Al Jazeera has obtained exclusive footage of a Colombian contract killer detailing an alleged $25m plot to kill Hugo Chavez, the Venezuelan president.
He says the money was offered by Manuel Rosales, one of Chavez’s main political rivals, during a secret meeting in 1999
A Colombian paramilitary group took up the offer, according to the hitman.
Chavez has long said there is a plot by Colombia to kill him, and the relation between the two countries is tense.
Al Jazeera’s Gabriel Elizondo reports.
Chavez said he hopes the United States and Venezuela can work better together when his ideological foe, U.S. President George W. Bush, leaves the White House next year, but he said McCain seemed “warlike.”
“Sometimes one says, ‘worse than Bush is impossible,’ but we don’t know,” Chavez told foreign correspondents. “McCain also seems to be a man of war.”
Chavez — who has called Bush “the devil,” “a donkey” and ‘Mr Danger” — accuses the United States of having imperial designs in Latin America and says the White House has plotted his overthrow.
McCain calls Chavez a dictator who wants to emulate retired Cuban leader Fidel Castro.
Although Venezuela remains a key supplier of oil to the United States, relations have steadily deteriorated since Bush took office in 2001.
Chavez is an outspoken critic of the U.S. wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and has accused Washington of stirring unrest in Tibet to destabilize China.
He said on Tuesday that he had better communication with the administration of former U.S. President Bill Clinton.
“Independently of who wins the elections, we are hopeful and it is within our plans to enter an era of better relations with the U.S. government,” he said. “At the least one would hope for the level of relations we had with ex-President Clinton.”
He did not mention Democratic hopefuls Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton. Both are cautious about Chavez, although Obama has said he could meet him.
Chavez, who holds office until 2013, aims to unite Latin America through socialism and promotes trade plans opposed to U.S. dominance in the region.
//reuters//
Colombia’s Cornered President
By FORREST HYLTON
Sadly, the operation on March 1 in which the Colombian Armed Forces shot and killed Luis Edgar Devia Silva, a.k.a. “Raúl Reyes,” spokesman for the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), along with sixteen other guerrillas in a camp across the Putumayo River in Ecuador, was yet another case of the oft-mentioned “death foretold” that characterizes the country’s seemingly endless civil war.
Eerily, in a March 1 column, one of Colombia’s most prescient political analysts, Alfredo Molano, predicted that a giant storm cloud was about to sweep across some portion of Colombia’s borderlands. Molano described how President Álvaro Uribe had brought the war with the FARC to the Darien Gap joining Panama, the Catatumbo region of Northern Santander shared with Venezuela, and the frontiers of Pasto and Putumayo bordering Ecuador. In Molano’s view, the fact that Uribe had been politically cornered at home and abroad made a widening war across national borders all but inevitable. As Justin Podur noted, domestic and foreign pressure for a negotiated peace-that is, a political solution to the armed conflict-has led to an escalation of the war by the stronger, more violent party, along Israeli lines.
Since the end of 2006, Uribe has been beset by the parapolítica scandal, in which some 77 political figures, including 14 congresspersons, nearly all of them staunch allies of the president, are under investigation for ties to rightwing paramilitaries. The scandal reveals how the president and the Casa de Nariño (presidential palace) in Bogotá are tied to the country’s regions, where power and authority are delegated, hence most directly exercised. Indeed, most of the para-politicos investigated are local office holders-governors, mayors, legislators, etc. The bedrock of the paramilitary-politico alliance was sealed in 2001 with the “Pacto de Ralito” in Córdoba province. The pact led to the first and second election of Uribe with solid-indeed fervent-paramilitary support in congress and the regional state bureaucracies.
Parapolítica and the President
Politicians under investigation include Uribe’s closest political ally and second cousin, Senator Mario Uribe, who fell under suspicion after former paramilitary chieftain Salvatore Mancuso testified to meetings he had with the president’s cousin to map electoral strategy in Antioquia and Córdoba provinces. As Molano notes, what everyone knows and has long talked about in those 
provinces-relations between the Uribe family, land deals and landholding, rightwing politics, and paramilitarism-is but a step away from becoming a matter of public record. As early as 1987 and as recently as 2002, distinguished investigative journalists began looking into (and in some cases uncovering) these connections. Uribe has publicly lashed out at journalists digging into his past, forcing some to flee the country amid ensuing death threats. Now, it would seem, legal issues, and not merely personal honor, are at stake.
This explains, at least in part, Uribe’s confrontations with the Supreme Court, whose authority he has repeatedly attempted to undermine in order to obtain “political” status for paramilitary commanders looking to whitewash their criminal pasts. As Senator Gustavo Petro highlighted in 2005 during debates about the “Justice and Peace” law regulating paramilitary demobilization, there is reason to believe that Uribe aims to protect family members from future prosecution with its passage. During the parliamentary debates about parapolítica in March 2007, Petro named Antioquia under governor Uribe (1995-97) as the birthplace of modern-day paramilitarism. Any investigation of its roots would need to begin there.
Claudia López, co-author of the most comprehensive scholarly study of paramilitary penetration of local and regional politics in Colombia between 2002 and 2006, recently remarked on the extent to which, especially compared to the Caribbean coast, parapolítica investigations have stalled in Uribe’s native Antioquia. This is to be expected, as there is undoubtedly much to hide: Under Uribe’s watch, paramilitary activity-along with murders and disappearances of thousands of suspected guerrillas-skyrocketed to record levels through close coordination with the military and provincial government officials.
Though Uribe has made numerous tours of Europe and the U.S. in order to sell peace with the paramilitaries and war with the FARC, the parapolítica scandal has become his Achilles heel. A number of leading Democrats and not a few Republican congresspersons are wary of a trade agreement with Colombia, given human rights conditions and lingering doubts about the president’s ties to paramilitaries. In May 2007, Rep. Nancy Pelosi, leader of the House Foreign Relations Committee, reprimanded Uribe and sent him home empty-handed when he tried to sidestep the issues in Washington. Because of ties to organized labor, Hillary Clinton has kept her distance from him in this electoral season, while Al Gore refused to attend an event in Miami last year that Uribe was scheduled to attend. (Unsurprisingly, Bill Clinton has been less circumspect, hob-knobbing with Uribe at an event called “Colombia is Passion” in New York City in May.)
A bilateral “free trade” agreement with the U.S. has been one of Uribe’s chief goals since coming to power in 2002, but it appears increasingly remote. European countries, meanwhile, are reluctant to contribute funds for war with the FARC or peace with paramilitaries, and their meager offers of development aid are of little import to him.
Chávez, Reyes, and the Hostages
Uribe has also been increasingly cornered by the foreign policy of Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez. In what constitutes the major achievement by a Latin American statesperson in recent memory, after months of negotiations (sanctioned by President Uribe), in January and February of this year Chávez convinced the FARC to turn over six hostages to his government-all of them former politicians who, upon release, began agitating for the release of the rest of the prisoners, particularly Ingrid Betancourt, a center-left politician with dual French-Colombian citizenship.
Betancourt’s family, together with human rights organizations and NGOs, have mounted a relatively successful campaign of public awareness and political pressure in France: President Sarkozy’s government has reiterated its commitment to free Betancourt, acknowledging the positive role Chávez and the Venezuelan government have played thus far. For Uribe, such meddling strengthens FARC diplomacy in Europe, which is why he wanted Reyes dead. In Uribe’s eyes, Reyes and the FARC paved the way for Betancourt’s family and European NGO’s to damage his image and undermine his policy of war as peace. In 2001, as part of the FARC’s “peace process” with former president Andrés Pastrana, Reyes toured Europe and deepened existing ties to European governments and NGOs. As recently declassified documents obtained by the non-governmental National Security Archive demonstrate, in 1998 Reyes established contact with a U.S. diplomatic mission in Costa Rica led by Philip T. Chicola, then director of the State Department’s Office of Andean Affairs. For all intents and purposes, Reyes was the FARC’s ambassador.
For Uribe, then, Reyes was a rival, a competitor, and according to the mafia rules that govern politics in Colombia, such people must die. There were scores to be settled: it was Reyes and the FARC who, in the mid-1990s, convinced allies in European government and society that Uribe’s security policies in Antioquia were unacceptable in terms of human rights and international law. And it was Reyes and his pals (no women were invited) who charmed European politicians and solidarity groups in Europe in 2001. This set the stage for Uribe’s damaged credibility in Europe after 2002. Since then, Reyes has presented his organization’s position before the European Parliament: prisoner exchanges that lead to a negotiated peace settlement. There is strong support for such a policy in official European circles.
Reyes was not a charismatic leader, nor is Manuel “Sureshot” Marulanda, who has led the FARC since it was founded in 1966. The FARC does not depend on charismatic individuals for its survival. More important than Reyes or Marulanda to FARC coffers was Tomás Medina Caracas, alias “Negro Acacio,” a former public school teacher who became the first FARC commander wanted for extradition to the U.S. after September 11, 2001, on charges of cocaine trafficking. At the time of Medina’s death in September 2007, much was made of the putative “blow” it represented to the FARC, as Medina was the group’s answer to Pablo Escobar, managing cocaine routes and protection rackets through Venezuela, Brazil, and the Guyanas. Since Medina’s death, no one has mentioned him again, and it would be surprising if his routes had been disrupted or destroyed without proper media fanfare. At the time of his death, seasoned commentators were quick to note that as a matter of policy, the FARC have at least three people ready to take the place of someone like Medina at a moment’s notice. As Fernando Cubides has argued, the FARC is an “armed bureaucracy.”
Thus there is no shortage of trained personnel to keep the war machine running, and it is unlikely that the killing of Raúl Reyes will make much of a dent in its functioning, except in terms of negotiating the release of the remaining hostages and laying the foundation for a negotiated peace; in terms of politics rather than total war. This explains the reaction of French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner, who said, “It is bad news that the man we were talking to, with whom we had contacts, has been killed. Do you see how ugly the world is?”
It may tempting to dismiss Kouchner’s question, but his point may be somewhat more subtle: namely, that Uribe killed Reyes in a deliberate effort to block the French government from negotiating the release of Ingrid Betancourt. Were Betancourt to be freed, Uribe would likely come under international pressure to grant the FARC political status as a pre-condition for a negotiated political settlement, and might have to contend with Betancourt’s efforts to build a broad anti-Uribe coalition at home and abroad.
It is doubtful that the United States was directly involved in killing Reyes, since Plan Colombia was specifically designed to give the Colombian government the hardware, surveillance, and training to carry out such missions on its own. The Bush administration, of course, has greeted the death of a top FARC “terrorist” with glee, legal niceties and political subtleties aside. Uribe does not appear to have asked permission to pursue Reyes into Ecuador, but in light of past episodes, he had little reason to fear a reprimand from Washington, and was likely emboldened by past precedent. Whether Washington gives the green light beforehand matters little, as long as Uribe’s moves are sanctioned ex post facto, as they were on March 4.
High Stakes in the Andes
Ecuadorian and Venezuelan government responses came quickly and unequivocally: within 48 hours, both broke off all diplomatic ties with Colombia and moved troops, tanks, and planes to their borders. Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa explained that in addition to the efforts of Sarkozy and Chávez, his government had been working on the liberation of 12 hostages-including Ingrid Betancourt and three U.S. mercenaries-at the time Reyes was assassinated. He added negotiations were at an “advanced” stage. Chávez jumped in and labeled Uribe a “criminal, mafioso, paramilitary” in charge of a “narco-government.” In one of his more restrained remarks, the Venezuelan president said, “It is very serious that a country arrogates to itself the right to bomb the territory of a neighbor and commit an incursion to take bodies, violating many international laws. Think of the consequences, not just for Colombia, but for your neighbors.”
Predictably, Uribe engaged in an almost surreal effort to re-create the atmosphere of the build-up to the U.S. occupation of Iraq. The smoking gun was Reyes’ laptop, reportedly recovered at the scene. Head of Colombia’s National Police, Gen. Oscar Naranjo alleged that the FARC had been plotting to get uranium for a dirty bomb: “When they mention negotiations for 50 kilos of uranium, this means that the FARC are taking big steps in the world of terrorism to become a global aggressor. We’re not talking of domestic guerrillas but transnational terrorism.” On March 4, the Colombian government announced that the FARC was building a dirty bomb. All of this would seem to be a transparent attempt to convince the U.S. government and the rest of the world that the incident-and the region-can be neatly slotted into the global “war on terror.”
Though allegations have cropped up repeatedly, as ideologically needed, since Chávez came to power in 1998, no one has ever documented illicit ties between Chávez and the FARC; the Uribe government is apparently now free to invent them. Another item recovered from Reyes’ hard drive purportedly demonstrates that the FARC received $300 million in payments from Chávez as recently as February. To Gen. Naranjo, this suggested clear proof of “an armed alliance between the FARC and the Venezuelan government.” A third item allegedly contains a thank-you note from Chávez during his stint in prison after his failed coup attempt in 1992. Given the advanced division of labor within the FARC, it would be odd indeed if its ambassador kept such delicate-and, in the case of the “prison letter” from Chávez, dated-information so readily accessible. For good measure, the Colombian government also alleged that recovered documents linked the Ecuadorian government to the FARC.
The Venezuelan government was not fazed. Vice president Ramón Carrizales said, “We are accustomed to the lies of the Colombian government. Whatever they say has no importance. They can invent anything now to try to get out of that violation of Ecuadorian territory that they committed.” President Correa met with his cabinet to inform them of his government’s position: “They said we had a pact with terrorists, and that is completely false. We are dealing with an extremely cynical government.”
Perhaps the most hopeful development to arise out of the whole morass is the new multilateralism in South America: the regional powers, Chile and Brazil, demanded an official apology from Colombia to Ecuador, and were followed by Argentina, Bolivia, and Peru; all countries were eager to find a peaceful solution through the Organization of American States (OAS).
There is even more diplomatic unity against Uribe than there was when he supported the U.S.-preferred candidate for Secretary General of the OAS in 2005. That was the first time since the organization was founded in Bogotá in 1948 under the watchful eye of Secretary of State George Marshall that the U.S. candidate did not win. In dealing with Uribe’s incursion, South American countries may well make another end run around the U.S. and Colombia through the OAS, and at the very least, foreign ministers have agreed to conduct an investigation. Chávez has proposed to revive the Contadora group of countries whose governments helped broker peace agreements in Central America in the 1990s in spite of U.S. government obstructionism. The latest violation of Ecuadorian sovereignty could convince other South American countries of the need for such a group.
Poster for victims’ march: “Memory and Dignity for the Displaced, the Murdered, the Disappeared, the Victims.”
The protest march called for tomorrow, March 6, in Colombia and the world to commemorate the victims of paramilitary and state violence will be a test of the political temperature. A range of sectors have promised to participate: trade unions, human rights groups, families of the kidnapped and disappeared, women’s and neighborhood organizations, peasant, Afro-Colombian, indigenous, and student groups. If this push for truth, justice, and a negotiated peace finds an echo in multilateral diplomatic initiatives, Uribe could find himself cornered yet again; a frightening prospect, unless progressive forces in the hemisphere prove strong enough to contain him and his northern patrón.
Forrest Hylton is the author of Evil Hour in Colombia (Verso, 2006), and with Sinclair Thomson, of Revolutionary Horizons: Past and Present in Bolivian Politics (Verso, 2007). He is a frequent contributor to NACLA, where this essay originally appeared.
By Helen Murphy and Matthew Walter
March 3 (Bloomberg) — Colombia’s police chief alleged Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez helped fund Latin America’s biggest guerrilla group and has ties to the rebels going back more than 15 years.
Documents on a computer belonging to the second in command of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia show Venezuela provided the guerrillas with at least $300 million, police Chief Oscar Naranjo said. Venezuelan Vice President Ramon Carrizalez denied the allegations.
“These documents not only imply a closeness, but an armed alliance between the FARC and the government of Venezuela,” Naranjo said in a televised press briefing in Bogota.
Colombia’s Security Council found documents on three laptops belonging to Raul Reyes, who was killed by Colombian forces in an attack inside Ecuador this weekend. The air strike prompted Chavez and Ecuador’s President Rafael Correa to order troops to their respective borders with Colombia.
An expanded military presence along the Colombia-Venezuela border — a cauldron of paramilitary, drug trafficking and guerrilla activity where Colombian troops operate regularly — raises tensions between the countries to a level that a miscalculation could trigger a military clash. Both countries also recalled their ambassadors from Bogota.
`Degeneration’
Chavez, who yesterday went beyond his previous rhetoric to order 10 armored battalions to the border, said Colombia’s air strike on a rebel camp in Ecuadorean territory risks a regional war.
“This is an alarming degeneration in the region and has ominous overtones that could lead to provocative developments,” said Larry Birns, director of the Council on Hemispheric Affairs, a Washington-based research group. “This is a situation that’s unraveling and both sides need to stand back or it could degenerate into confrontation.”
Among Latin American countries that called for explanation from Colombia on the cross-border raid were Brazil, Chile, Nicaragua, Argentina and Peru.
“We want to help both countries find a solution for this crisis,” Brazil’s Foreign Affairs Minister Celso Amorim said in Brasilia.
Computer Files
Naranjo said the computer files, which will be subjected to outside analysis, also provided details on the drug-funded group’s plans to obtain 50 kilograms of uranium to make bombs as part of a bid to branch into international terrorism. He didn’t provide details about the alleged plot.
The documents also allegedly show the FARC, as the group is known, had ties to Chavez going back as far as 1992 when he was jailed for spearheading a failed coup as an army lieutenant colonel.
Colombia also accused Correa of ties to the guerrilla group. The files indicated Ecuadorean Security Minister Gustavo Larrea had been in contact with Reyes on Correa’s behalf. They talked about getting Correa involved in the release of hostages to boost his political standing, Naranjo said.
Ecuador today broke diplomatic ties with Colombia.
“There’s no question of the enormous political tension now and any miscue could set off a conflict,” said Michael Shifter, a vice president of the Inter-American Dialogue in Washington. “It’s impossible to rule it out.”
Colombia said it would not reinforce its troops along either border.
Chest Thumping
The Colombian air strike on the camp of Colombia’s biggest rebel group took place 1.8 kilometers (1.1 miles) inside Ecuador and killed at least 12 other fighters, the government said.
Chavez, who has a history of verbally attacking the U.S. and its allies, may be seeking to stir up nationalist sentiment at a time when he’s faltering politically, said Myles Frechette, U.S. Ambassador to Colombia from 1994 to 1997.
Voters in December rejected Chavez’s plan to solidify his power by overhauling the constitution, his first electoral defeat. Since then, crime and food shortages have cut further into his popularity. Venezuela’s dependence on Colombia for food imports and the Colombian military’s superior training make a wide-scale war unlikely, said Liliana Fasciani, a legal philosophy professor at the Andres Bello Catholic University in Caracas.
“This is largely posturing and beating his chest,” Frechette said in a telephone interview. “The economic situation in Venezuela isn’t good.”
RIYADH (Reuters) – Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez told an OPEC summit on Saturday crude oil prices could double to $200 if the United States attacked his ally Iran.
“If the United States is crazy enough to attack Iran or commit aggression against Venezuela … oil would not be $100 but $200,” Chavez told the summit in the Saudi capital.
Chavez addressed a hall containing Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, a comrade-in-arms against Western influence.
Fears the United States or its ally Israel could attack Iran over its nuclear energy programme — which Washington says is a cover for developing atomic weapons — have helped drive world oil prices to record levels. Tehran denies the charge.
Oil has lapped against the $100-mark this month, prompting consumer nations to call on the exporter group to provide the market with more crude.
OPEC oil ministers said earlier this week in Riyadh that the summit, which ends on Sunday, will leave any decision on whether to raise OPEC output to a meeting in Abu Dhabi on December 5.
A draft final communique says only that OPEC seeks “stability of global energy markets” and oil ministers including Saudi Arabia’s say factors beyond their control limit OPEC’s powers.
That cleared the way for OPEC ministers to try to steer the summit towards relatively uncontroversial environmental issues.
The group “shares the international community’s concern that climate change is a long-term challenge”, the draft says.
OPEC Secretary-General Abdullah al-Badri said this week OPEC would be willing to play its part in developing carbon capture and storage technology to help reduce emissions in the air.
Though the draft makes no mention of an environmental fund with consumer countries to which OPEC would contribute — an idea floated in forums this week — King Abdullah told the opening session Saudi Arabia would give $300 million towards environmental research.
On Friday, Saudi Arabia steered the group towards rebuffing an attempt by Iran and Venezuela to highlight concern over dollar weakness in the summit communique.
The drop in the value of the dollar against other major currencies helped fuel oil’s rally to a record $98.62 last week. Yet it has also reduced the purchasing power of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries.
ANTI-U.S. PLATFORM
Chavez’s address on Saturday set the stage for a summit that could see more anti-U.S. rhetoric emanate from the capital of one of its closest allies.
“OPEC must stand up and act as a vanguard against poverty in the world,” self-styled socialist revolutionary Chavez said.
“OPEC should be a more active geopolitical agent and demand more respect for our countries … and ask powerful nations to stop threatening OPEC.”
Saudi Arabia’s octogenarian leader, who sat stony-faced throughout the 25-minute speech, was heard joking to Chavez afterwards: “You went on a bit!” Ahmadinejad told reporters he would make his views felt on Sunday.
Saudi Arabia this month proposed setting-up a consortium to provide Iran with enriched uranium for peaceful purposes in an effort to defuse the tension between Washington and Tehran. Iran said it would not halt its own enrichment programme.
Worried by a resurgent Iran with potential nuclear capability, Gulf Arab countries, including OPEC producers Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, have said they will start a nuclear energy programme of their own.
Source: Reuters
September 20, 2006
By HUGO CHAVEZ
Representatives of the governments of the world, good morning to all of you. First of all, I would like to invite you, very respectfully, to those who have not read this book, to read it.
Noam Chomsky, one of the most prestigious American and world intellectuals, Noam Chomsky, and this is one of his most recent books, ‘Hegemony or Survival: The Imperialist Strategy of the United States.‘” [Holds up book, waves it in front of General Assembly.] “It’s an excellent book to help us understand what has been happening in the world throughout the 20th century, and what’s happening now, and the greatest threat looming over our planet.
The hegemonic pretensions of the American empire are placing at risk the very survival of the human species. We continue to warn you about this danger and we appeal to the people of the United States and the world to halt this threat, which is like a sword hanging over our heads. I had considered reading from this book, but, for the sake of time,” [flips through the pages, which are numerous] “I will just leave it as a recommendation.
It reads easily, it is a very good book, I’m sure Madame [President] you are familiar with it. It appears in English, in Russian, in Arabic, in German. I think that the first people who should read this book are our brothers and sisters in the United States, because their threat is right in their own house.
The devil is right at home. The devil, the devil himself, is right in the house.
“And the devil came here yesterday. Yesterday the devil came here. Right here.” [crosses himself] “And it smells of sulfur still today.
Yesterday, ladies and gentlemen, from this rostrum, the president of the United States, the gentleman to whom I refer as the devil, came here, talking as if he owned the world. Truly. As the owner of the world.
I think we could call a psychiatrist to analyze yesterday’s statement made by the president of the United States. As the spokesman of imperialism, he came to share his nostrums, to try to preserve the current pattern of domination, exploitation and pillage of the peoples of the world.
An Alfred Hitchcock movie could use it as a scenario. I would even propose a title: “The Devil’s Recipe.”
As Chomsky says here, clearly and in depth, the American empire is doing all it can to consolidate its system of domination. And we cannot allow them to do that. We cannot allow world dictatorship to be consolidated.
The world parent’s statement — cynical, hypocritical, full of this imperial hypocrisy from the need they have to control everything.
They say they want to impose a democratic model. But that’s their democratic model. It’s the false democracy of elites, and, I would say, a very original democracy that’s imposed by weapons and bombs and firing weapons.
What a strange democracy. Aristotle might not recognize it or others who are at the root of democracy.
What type of democracy do you impose with marines and bombs?
The president of the United States, yesterday, said to us, right here, in this room, and I’m quoting, “Anywhere you look, you hear extremists telling you can escape from poverty and recover your dignity through violence, terror and martyrdom.”
Wherever he looks, he sees extremists. And you, my brother — he looks at your color, and he says, oh, there’s an extremist. Evo Morales, the worthy president of Bolivia, looks like an extremist to him.
The imperialists see extremists everywhere. It’s not that we are extremists. It’s that the world is waking up. It’s waking up all over. And people are standing up.
I have the feeling, dear world dictator, that you are going to live the rest of your days as a nightmare because the rest of us are standing up, all those who are rising up against American imperialism, who are shouting for equality, for respect, for the sovereignty of nations.
Yes, you can call us extremists, but we are rising up against the empire, against the model of domination.
The president then — and this he said himself, he said: “I have come to speak directly to the populations in the Middle East, to tell them that my country wants peace.”
That’s true. If we walk in the streets of the Bronx, if we walk around New York, Washington, San Diego, in any city, San Antonio, San Francisco, and we ask individuals, the citizens of the United States, what does this country want? Does it want peace? They’ll say yes.
But the government doesn’t want peace. The government of the United States doesn’t want peace. It wants to exploit its system of exploitation, of pillage, of hegemony through war.
It wants peace. But what’s happening in Iraq? What happened in Lebanon? In Palestine? What’s happening? What’s happened over the last 100 years in Latin America and in the world? And now threatening Venezuela — new threats against Venezuela, against Iran?
He spoke to the people of Lebanon. Many of you, he said, have seen how your homes and communities were caught in the crossfire. How cynical can you get? What a capacity to lie shamefacedly. The bombs in Beirut with millimetric precision?
This is crossfire? He’s thinking of a western, when people would shoot from the hip and somebody would be caught in the crossfire.
This is imperialist, fascist, assassin, genocidal, the empire and Israel firing on the people of Palestine and Lebanon. That is what happened. And now we hear, “We’re suffering because we see homes destroyed.’
The president of the United States came to talk to the peoples — to the peoples of the world. He came to say — I brought some documents with me, because this morning I was reading some statements, and I see that he talked to the people of Afghanistan, the people of Lebanon, the people of Iran. And he addressed all these peoples directly.
And you can wonder, just as the president of the United States addresses those peoples of the world, what would those peoples of the world tell him if they were given the floor? What would they have to say?
And I think I have some inkling of what the peoples of the south, the oppressed people think. They would say, “Yankee imperialist, go home.” I think that is what those people would say if they were given the microphone and if they could speak with one voice to the American imperialists.
And that is why, Madam President, my colleagues, my friends, last year we came here to this same hall as we have been doing for the past eight years, and we said something that has now been confirmed — fully, fully confirmed.
I don’t think anybody in this room could defend the system. Let’s accept — let’s be honest. The U.N. system, born after the Second World War, collapsed. It’s worthless.
Oh, yes, it’s good to bring us together once a year, see each other, make statements and prepare all kinds of long documents, and listen to good speeches, like Abel’s yesterday, or President Mullah’s . Yes, it’s good for that.
And there are a lot of speeches, and we’ve heard lots from the president of Sri Lanka, for instance, and the president of Chile.
But we, the assembly, have been turned into a merely deliberative organ. We have no power, no power to make any impact on the terrible situation in the world. And that is why Venezuela once again proposes, here, today, 20 September, that we re-establish the United Nations.
Last year, Madam, we made four modest proposals that we felt to be crucially important. We have to assume the responsibility our heads of state, our ambassadors, our representatives, and we have to discuss it.
The first is expansion, and Mullah talked about this yesterday right here. The Security Council, both as it has permanent and non-permanent categories, (inaudible) developing countries and LDCs must be given access as new permanent members. That’s step one.
Second, effective methods to address and resolve world conflicts, transparent decisions.
Point three, the immediate suppression — and that is something everyone’s calling for — of the anti-democratic mechanism known as the veto, the veto on decisions of the Security Council.
Let me give you a recent example. The immoral veto of the United States allowed the Israelis, with impunity, to destroy Lebanon. Right in front of all of us as we stood there watching, a resolution in the council was prevented.
Fourthly, we have to strengthen, as we’ve always said, the role and the powers of the secretary general of the United Nations.
Yesterday, the secretary general practically gave us his speech of farewell. And he recognized that over the last 10 years, things have just gotten more complicated; hunger, poverty, violence, human rights violations have just worsened. That is the tremendous consequence of the collapse of the United Nations system and American hegemonistic pretensions.
Madam, Venezuela a few years ago decided to wage this battle within the United Nations by recognizing the United Nations, as members of it that we are, and lending it our voice, our thinking.
Our voice is an independent voice to represent the dignity and the search for peace and the reformulation of the international system; to denounce persecution and aggression of hegemonistic forces on the planet.
This is how Venezuela has presented itself. Bolivar’s home has sought a nonpermanent seat on the Security Council.
Let’s see. Well, there’s been an open attack by the U.S. government, an immoral attack, to try and prevent Venezuela from being freely elected to a post in the Security Council.
The imperium is afraid of truth, is afraid of independent voices. It calls us extremists, but they are the extremists.
And I would like to thank all the countries that have kindly announced their support for Venezuela, even though the ballot is a secret one and there’s no need to announce things.
But since the imperium has attacked, openly, they strengthened the convictions of many countries. And their support strengthens us.
Mercosur, as a bloc, has expressed its support, our brothers in Mercosur. Venezuela, with Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay, Uruguay, is a full member of Mercosur.
And many other Latin American countries, CARICOM, Bolivia have expressed their support for Venezuela. The Arab League, the full Arab League has voiced its support. And I am immensely grateful to the Arab world, to our Arab brothers, our Caribbean brothers, the African Union. Almost all of Africa has expressed its support for Venezuela and countries such as Russia or China and many others.
I thank you all warmly on behalf of Venezuela, on behalf of our people, and on behalf of the truth, because Venezuela, with a seat on the Security Council, will be expressing not only Venezuela’s thoughts, but it will also be the voice of all the peoples of the world, and we will defend dignity and truth.
Over and above all of this, Madam President, I think there are reasons to be optimistic. A poet would have said “helplessly optimistic,” because over and above the wars and the bombs and the aggressive and the preventive war and the destruction of entire peoples, one can see that a new era is dawning.
As Silvio Rodriguez says, the era is giving birth to a heart. There are alternative ways of thinking. There are young people who think differently. And this has already been seen within the space of a mere decade. It was shown that the end of history was a totally false assumption, and the same was shown about Pax Americana and the establishment of the capitalist neo-liberal world. It has been shown, this system, to generate mere poverty. Who believes in it now?
What we now have to do is define the future of the world. Dawn is breaking out all over. You can see it in Africa and Europe and Latin America and Oceanea. I want to emphasize that optimistic vision.
We have to strengthen ourselves, our will to do battle, our awareness. We have to build a new and better world.
Venezuela joins that struggle, and that’s why we are threatened. The U.S. has already planned, financed and set in motion a coup in Venezuela, and it continues to support coup attempts in Venezuela and elsewhere.
President Michelle Bachelet reminded us just a moment ago of the horrendous assassination of the former foreign minister, Orlando Letelier.
And I would just add one thing: Those who perpetrated this crime are free. And that other event where an American citizen also died were American themselves. They were CIA killers, terrorists.
And we must recall in this room that in just a few days there will be another anniversary. Thirty years will have passed from this other horrendous terrorist attack on the Cuban plane, where 73 innocents died, a Cubana de Aviacion airliner.
And where is the biggest terrorist of this continent who took the responsibility for blowing up the plane? He spent a few years in jail in Venezuela. Thanks to CIA and then government officials, he was allowed to escape, and he lives here in this country, protected by the government.
And he was convicted. He has confessed to his crime. But the U.S. government has double standards. It protects terrorism when it wants to.
And this is to say that Venezuela is fully committed to combating terrorism and violence. And we are one of the people who are fighting for peace.
Luis Posada Carriles is the name of that terrorist who is protected here. And other tremendously corrupt people who escaped from Venezuela are also living here under protection: a group that bombed various embassies, that assassinated people during the coup. They kidnapped me and they were going to kill me, but I think God reached down and our people came out into the streets and the army was too, and so I’m here today.
But these people who led that coup are here today in this country protected by the American government. And I accuse the American government of protecting terrorists and of having a completely cynical discourse.
We mentioned Cuba. Yes, we were just there a few days ago. We just came from there happily.
And there you see another era born. The Summit of the 15, the Summit of the Nonaligned, adopted a historic resolution. This is the outcome document. Don’t worry, I’m not going to read it.
But you have a whole set of resolutions here that were adopted after open debate in a transparent matter — more than 50 heads of state. Havana was the capital of the south for a few weeks, and we have now launched, once again, the group of the nonaligned with new momentum.
And if there is anything I could ask all of you here, my companions, my brothers and sisters, it is to please lend your good will to lend momentum to the Nonaligned Movement for the birth of the new era, to prevent hegemony and prevent further advances of imperialism.
And as you know, Fidel Castro is the president of the nonaligned for the next three years, and we can trust him to lead the charge very efficiently.
Unfortunately they thought, “Oh, Fidel was going to die.” But they’re going to be disappointed because he didn’t. And he’s not only alive, he’s back in his green fatigues, and he’s now presiding the nonaligned.
So, my dear colleagues, Madam President, a new, strong movement has been born, a movement of the south. We are men and women of the south.
With this document, with these ideas, with these criticisms, I’m now closing my file. I’m taking the book with me. And, don’t forget, I’m recommending it very warmly and very humbly to all of you.
We want ideas to save our planet, to save the planet from the imperialist threat. And hopefully in this very century, in not too long a time, we will see this, we will see this new era, and for our children and our grandchildren a world of peace based on the fundamental principles of the United Nations, but a renewed United Nations.
And maybe we have to change location. Maybe we have to put the United Nations somewhere else; maybe a city of the south. We’ve proposed Venezuela.
You know that my personal doctor had to stay in the plane. The chief of security had to be left in a locked plane. Neither of these gentlemen was allowed to arrive and attend the U.N. meeting. This is another abuse and another abuse of power on the part of the Devil. It smells of sulfur here, but God is with us and I embrace you all.
May God bless us all. Good day to you.
Source: CounterPunch
http://www.counterpunch.com/chavez09202006.html
Hugo Chavez has been a harsh critic of Israel’s policies |
The President of Venezuela, Hugo Chavez, has said his country is likely to sever ties with Israel in protest at its military offensive in Lebanon. Mr Chavez said he had “no interest” in maintaining relations with Israel, whom he has accused of committing genocide.
Venezuela recalled its charge d’affaires to Israel last week, prompting Israel to withdraw its ambassador to Caracas on Monday.
Mr Chavez recently expressed his support for Israel’s arch-foe, Iran.
In a televised speech, Mr Chavez said he had “no interest in maintaining diplomatic relations, or offices, or businesses, or anything with a state like Israel”.
Mr Chavez rounded on Israel at the weekend, accusing the Jewish state of committing a “new Holocaust”.
“Israel has gone mad. It’s attacking, doing the same thing to the Palestinian and Lebanese people that they have criticised – and with reason – the Holocaust. But this is a new Holocaust.”
The Venezuelan president has also angered Israel by showing support for Iran, which backs Hezbollah and has said the answer to the crisis in Lebanon is the elimination of Israel.
During a visit to Tehran at the end of last month, Mr Chavez said Venezuela would “stand by Iran at any time and under any condition”.
Israel said it had withdrawn its ambassador to Venezuela “as an act of protest against the one-sided policy of the president of Venezuela and in light of his wild slurs against the State of Israel”.
Source: BBC News
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/5258722.stm
