Caracas, Venezuela ? Military leaders asked President Hugo Chavez to resign and call elections, after a day of violence Thursday in which National Guard troops and pro-Chavez gunmen clashed with 150,000 opposition protesters.

At least 12 people were killed and as many as 110 wounded, officials said.

“We are waiting for the president to make that decision,” said Armed Forces Chief of Staff Bernabe Carrero Cubero.

Retired Gen. Guaicaipuro Lameda said Chavez was at the presidential palace with loyalist troops in talks with rebel officers. Chavez’s defense minister, Jose Vicente Rangel, resigned, and rebel troops seized the government television station.

Carrero Cubero said Chavez had asked him to negotiate with rebellious officers “to avoid a bloodbath. If the National Guard, the army and the marines go at it in the streets, that’s what we’re going to have.”

The head of the state security police ordered his forces to remain in their barracks. A spokesman for Oil Minister Alvaro Silva said all ministers had been meeting with Chavez at the palace.

Chavez’s family flew from a Caracas military base to the western city of Barquisimeto earlier in the day, said Air Force Col. Marcos Salas.

The violence erupted in the South American country of 24 million on the third day of a general strike called to support oil executives who want Chavez to fire new management at the state oil monopoly Petroleos de Venezuela, or PDVSA. The executives are conducting a work slowdown that has seriously cut production and exports in Venezuela, the No. 3 oil supplier to the United States and the No. 4 oil exporter in the world.

In Washington, the White House had no immediate comment, spokesman Taylor Gross said.