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BUENOS AIRES — Bolivia´s exiled former president Evo Morales on Sunday defended a call he made for the formation of armed groups, a recording of which was leaked on public radio.

Speaking exclusively to Reuters on Sunday night in Argentina where he is in exile, the defiant former president confirmed his was the voice in a recording played on Bolivian radio calling for creation of armed militas “as in Venezuela.”

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He said people have a right to defend themselves if the new government was attacking them. He said he had not meant armed with guns and was referring to citizen defense groups that had always loosely existed.

“In Bolivia, if the armed forces are shooting the people, killing the people, the people have the right to organize their security,” he said in the interview with Reuters.

“We´re not talking arms, more like slingshots,” he said.

“In some times (these groups) were called militias, in other times they were called union security or union police and in some places it is called communal guard. It is not new.”