BOLIVIA’S former president Evo Morales insisted that “the struggle does not end here” against the US-backed fascist coup that overthrew him earlier this month, shortly after his fourth election victory.

Speaking on Tuesday at a meeting with students of the National Autonomous University of Mexico alongside his former vice-president Alvaro Garcia Linera and health minister Gabriela Montano, Mr Morales struck a defiant tone.

“It hurts [to see] so many lost families and how they [the right] are destroying what we have built for the economic liberation,” he said.

The ousted leader explained that when he assumed the presidency in 2005, Bolivia had a high rate of extreme poverty and almost all basic services were privatised.

The country’s gross domestic product was just $9 billion when he came to power compared with $49bn today, when there is a more equitable distribution of wealth among Bolivians.

“In the 13 years of the government that we led, Bolivia was for six years the top country in the region for economic growth,” he said.

Mr Morales, Bolivia’s first indigenous leader, condemned attacks on supporters of his Movement Towards Socialism party, who have continued to protest against the right-wing coup regime led by self-declared interim President Jeanine Anez.

She was instantly recognised by Washington and yesterday appointed the first US ambassador in 11 years as she vowed to overturn many of her predecessor’s progressive policies.

Ms Anez has aligned herself with US regional policy, severing ties with Cuba and recognising Venzuelan usurper Juan Guaido as that country’s legitimate president.

But it is her views on Bolivia’s indigenous people that have caused most alarm. She has referred to them as to them “satanic” and declared that God is back in government, while her supporters have pulled down and burnt the indigenous population’s Wiphala flags across the country.

Her regime has tried to drown the protest movement in blood, with violent repression leaving scores of people dead.