As shoppers in Venezuela look for basic essentials in supermarkets, lines swell stretching down roads and cutting corners. Some shoppers are showing up before dawn in search of products after a holiday slowdown in deliveries heightened the nation's shortages in basic products.

Consumers gathered, and National Guard troops kept the lines under control, Yahoo! Finance reports.

Still, swelling lines sparked action from a few protesters and caused scattered unrest in Venezuela, Reuters reports. Police arrested about 16 protesters over the weekend. About a dozen remained in jail Monday, and people with masks set a bus on fire. The government did not confirm how many protesters are still behind bars.

Venezuela continues to suffer from chronic shortages of products ranging from diapers to flour and other food products since the situation worsened after holiday deliveries.

President Nicolas Maduro said right-wing agitators and Venezuela's elite are trying to topple him via an "economic war."

"At the start of this year the parasitical oligarchy ambushed us but we and the people are responding," he said over the weekend from Saudi Arabia.

In the past week, Maduro and some of his ministers traveled to China, Russia and other oil-producing countries seeking financing and action on falling oil prices.

"This is an emergency, it's not the time for photos of Maduro doing tourism in China," Henrique Capriles, who lost a presidential election to Maduro in 2013, said. "I think it's time for our people to protest in the street."

Meanwhile, an explosive device was thrown into a building of a state phone company, burning eight vehicles on Saturday.

The economic turmoil in Venezuela sparked over three months of protests in the nation last year.

Now, National Assembly President Diosdado Cabello says current protests are a strategy from enemies of the revolution to cause unrest in the nation. He called on Venezuelans to resist "provocations."

State-run supermarkets have started to restrict access based on identity cards. Only people whose I.D. card numbers ended in the number one were allowed to shop on Monday.

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