Caracas

Dubbing their planned offensive "Operation Venezuela," ex-army sergeant Eddier Rodríguez said there were around 150 men ready to take part with his group.

Over 1,400 defectors and their families are holed up in hotels in Cúcuta, Colombia, where they are registered as asylum-seekers, according to Colombia's migration authority. But funding has run out.

Two Venezuelan lawmakers sought refuge at foreign embassies in Caracas on Thursday, as the government of President Nicolás Maduro cracked down on allies of opposition leader Juan Guaidó who supported his attempted uprising last week.

Venezuelan opposition politician Leopoldo Lopez, evading arrest in a Spanish diplomatic residence, on Thursday disclosed he met with senior military officials before a failed uprising against President Nicolás Maduro this week.

Venezuelans heeded opposition leader Juan Guaidó's call to take to the streets on Wednesday in a bid to force President Nicolás Maduro from power, but there was little concrete sign of change in a crisis that increasingly looks like a political stalemate.

Reuters witnesses said several dozen mostly young armed men in military uniform accompanying Guaidó exchanged gunfire with soldiers acting in support of Maduro outside the La Carlota air base but the opposition did not appear to be about to take power by force.      

Armed civilians loyal to embattled President Nicolás Maduro are more trusted than the military to restore order and quell dissent in Venezuela.

The rise of black comedy to explain Venezuela's chaos recalls an old saying in the crisis-stricken South American country: 'Laugh so you don't cry.'

For the past month, unprecedented nationwide blackouts in Venezuela have paralyzed the country's industrial sector. The number of companies based in Venezuela has fallen to a tenth of the 5,000 there were two decades ago. The blackouts have only made it worse.

Angry Venezuelans set up burning barricades near the presidential palace in Caracas and in other parts of the country on Sunday in protests over constant power outages and shortages of drinking water in the wake of two major blackouts this month.