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15th March, 2010
US heavy metal group Metallica has planned extensive security measures for its concert Friday at a Caracas baseball stadium after rioting fans sparked chaos and violence in Bogota. But organizers are heeding to lessons learned during Wednesday’s riots, and have called on a large contingent of police officers, civil protection officers, firefighters and private security agents to ensure an orderly concert in Caracas.
The 50,000-strong expected crowd will also have to go through metal detectors before they can enter Rinconada stadium.
Hundreds of angry fans who could not get tickets to the Bogota concert tried to storm the venue on Wednesday at Simon Bolivar park to catch a glimpse of the Californian metal legends’ first concert inColombia in 11 years. Police on horseback fought back and eventually dispersed the crowd.
Some 170 people were arrested for rioting, vandalism and destruction of property, although they were released on Thursday for lack of evidence, Bogota Metropolitan Police said. Three officers were also injured.
Police are investigating a group of fans on online social networking website Facebook that urged fans to cause disruption if they could not get tickets for the concert attended by 35,000 people.
It was not the first incident of the band’s Latin American tour. In January in Santiago, a riot broke out during the concert, forcing police to use water cannons and arrest 120 people. Friday’s performance will also be the first visit in 11 years to Venezuela by James Hetfield (vocals and guitar), Kirk Hammett (guitar), Lars Ulrich (drums) and Robert Trujillo (bass). The four California veterans are noisier and darker than ever, doing what they know best—with thrashing guitars and howling vocals at a heart-stopping pace—after releasing their first studio album in five years in September 2008.
It is the last leg of a Latin American tour that took the group to Colombia, Panama, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Mexico, Brazil, Peru, Chile and Argentina. On Saturday,Metallica performs in San Juan, Puerto Rico.
The group then pursues its “Death Magnetic” tour in Europe, performing in Norway, Latvia, Lithuania, Russia, Northern Ireland, Hungary, Croatia, Portugal, France,Spain, Poland, Switzerland, the Czech Republic, Bulgaria, Greece and Romania. It will also make stops in Israel and Turkey.
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