CARACAS (Reuters) – Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez flew back to Cuba on Saturday to begin radiation treatment for cancer, but said he was in good shape and would be back home in several days.

The socialist leader’s latest trip to Havana will heighten anxiety among supporters worried about his health, fan rumors of a power struggle among his top aides, and leave Chavez absent just as his election rival is stepping up a campaign tour.

CARACAS (Reuters) – Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez will fly back to Cuba to begin radiation treatment for cancer on Sunday, but said he was in good shape and would be back home in several days.

Since making a triumphant return to Caracas from Havana a week ago after a third operation in less than a year to remove a malignant tumor from his pelvis, the 57-year-old socialist leader had been saying he would start radiation therapy soon.

CARACAS (Reuters) – Under pressure after a string of attacks on diplomats, Venezuela charged four people on Saturday, including a former police officer, with kidnapping the Mexican ambassador and his wife in the capital earlier this year.

Carlos Pujalte and his wife were grabbed by gunmen as they left a reception in a wealthy Caracas neighbourhood at around midnight on January 29. They were held captive for several hours before being freed in a slum on the other side of the city.

CARACAS (Reuters) – Venezuela’s opposition candidate Henrique Capriles will continue a nationwide “house by house” campaign tour despite a warning by President Hugo Chavez that there was a plot to kill him, a top aide said on Wednesday.

Capriles, seeking to unseat Chavez in an October 7 election, has embarked on a three-month tour that is largely targeting pro-government districts to try to win over disenchanted supporters of the socialist leader.

CARACAS (Reuters) – Venezuela’s opposition leader Henrique Capriles dismissed as irresponsible on Tuesday a government warning of an assassination plot against him that further stirred up an already volatile election campaign.

President Hugo Chavez made the surprise announcement on Monday evening, implying that elements within the opposition were behind a plan to kill Capriles, the 39-year-old Miranda state governor who is challenging him in an October 7 election.

CARACAS (Reuters) – Venezuelan authorities said on Saturday that 11 members of an investigative police unit were suspected in the fatal late-night shooting of a Chilean diplomat’s teenage daughter while she was riding in a car with her brother.

Karen Berendique, the 19-year-old daughter of Chilean consul Fernando Berendique, was killed late on Friday when the officers apparently opened fire on the vehicle being driven by her brother in Venezuela’s western city of Maracaibo, officials said. She was hit three times.

CARACAS (Reuters) – Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez sang, danced with his daughter and vowed on Saturday to win a presidential election this year, a day after returning from what he said was a successful operation to remove a second tumor.

“The beating we’re going to give the Venezuelan right will be memorable … not just in the history of Venezuela but in almost all the world,” he told thousands of red-clad, ecstatic supporters gathered outside the presidential palace.

CARACAS (Reuters) – Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez sang, danced with his daughter and vowed on Saturday to win a presidential election this year, a day after returning from what he said was a successful operation to remove a second tumour.

“The beating we’re going to give the Venezuelan right will be memorable … not just in the history of Venezuela but in almost all the world,” he told thousands of red-clad, ecstatic supporters gathered outside the presidential palace.

CARACAS (Reuters) – Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez flew home on Friday after cancer surgery in Cuba, vowing to conquer the illness and win an October presidential election despite the need for radiation treatment.

“Who said the path was going to be easy?” said Chavez, 57, in an emotional speech to the nation on the runway. “I have promised I will live, and to this end I will give my all!”

CARACAS (Reuters) – Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez flew home on Friday after cancer surgery in Cuba that will require him to have radiation therapy ahead of October’s re-election bid.

Chavez’s presence on Venezuelan soil after an absence of more than three weeks in Havana should reassert his leadership, calm anxiety among supporters and quell whispers of a brewing succession struggle behind the scenes.