Venezuelan police yesterday arrested the head of Globovision, a TV network critical of leftist President Hugo Chavez, on charges that he was trying to flee the country to avoid criminal charges.

Attorney General Luisa Ortega said that she issued a warrant for the arrest of Guillermo Zuloaga, who "was about to leave the country trying to get himself out of a criminal case."

Mr Zuloaga confirmed by telephone to his network that police detained him at the airport in the northeastern city of Punto Fijo, where he said he was planning to travel to the Netherlands Antilles in the Caribbean with his family on vacation. He said that he had not been informed of any arrest warrant against him.

"This is another abuse," Mr Zuloaga told Globovision. "I have no intention of leaving Venezuela now nor any time soon."

Earlier in the week Venezuela's National Assembly asked Ortega to investigate recent Zuloaga statements at an Inter American Press Association meeting in Aruba (Netherlands Antilles) to consider legal action.

According to the assembly, which is dominated by pro-Chavez legislators, Mr Zuloaga lied about the Venezuelan government activities, and was attempting to portray President Chavez as a criminal to tarnish his reputation.

Mr Chavez has accused Globovision of "media terrorism."

The network in 2009 was forced to pay a 4.1 million dollar fine for failing to acknowledge having aired ads in favor of an opposition strike in 2002.

The network claims that government action against it are politically motivated. Mr Zuloaga's arrest comes on the same day as the publication of a damning report by The Inter American Commission on Human Rights, denouncing Venezuela's persecution of political opponents, and accusing it of using the power of the state to attack its political enemies.

Public debate in Venezuela "is being increasingly reduced through the use of instruments such as the criminal justice system to silence critical or dissident expressions," said the commission, an independent rights body of the Organisation of American States, located in Washington.

"It is extremely troubling that those who make allegations or state opinions about the situation in the country are charged with such offenses as the instigation to commit a crime."