At least 17 dead in busy Venezuela club after TEAR GAS canister set off during fight

More than 500 revelers rushed for the door at the Los Cotorros club in the capital Caracas when the device was activated during a fight in the early hours of Saturday morning.

Partygoers fell down a flight of stairs on top of others in a stampede for the door, Venezuelan media reports.

Eleven of those who died suffocated when tear gas filled the club, Noris Villanueva, an autopsy assistant at the local Perez Carreno Hospital, said.

It is unclear how the other six died.

Eight of those who died were younger than 18, Venezuela’s interior minister Nestor Reverol said.

Speaking on state TV, he said: “The government of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, led by President Nicolas Maduro, deplores this unfortunate event. We send our condolences to the families.”

Relatives of those who were in the club have condemned the way the situation has been handled by authorities.

The father of one victim said he had received no information from police or doctors and that he had only learned his 19-year-old son had died because he saw his body in the morgue.

He said: “We haven’t received a response from anybody, neither from the police nor the doctors.”

Some local media reports put death toll as high as 22, though exactly how many people lost their lives in the chaos has yet to be confirmed.

A further five people were injured and are being treated by medics.

Seven people have been arrested and authorities are investigating.

The Los Cotorros club is in the middle-class neighbourhood of El Paraiso in the west of the city.

Murder rates in Venezuela have shot up as the country continues to descend into an economic crisis.

Many Caracas residents refuse to leave their homes at night because of security fears.