CARACAS (Reuters) – Venezuelan security forces and demonstrators faced off in streets blocked by burning barricades in several provincial cities on Thursday as protests escalated against President Nicolas Maduro’s socialist government. At least five people have died since the unrest turned violent last week, with scores of injuries and arrests. The demonstrators, mostly students, blame the government for violent crime, high inflation, product shortages and alleged repression of opponents. They want Maduro to resign. In middle-class areas of Caracas overnight, security forces fired teargas and bullets, chasing youths who threw Molotov cocktails and blocked streets with burning trash. It was one of the worst bouts of violence the capital has seen in nearly three weeks of unrest across Venezuela, and trouble also flared in other urban centers. Many Caracas residents banged pots at windows in a traditional form of protest, and knots of demonstrators were out again early on […]