Nothing But Politics

[Amaunet]

CT, does Jimmy Carter work alone?

Two pertinent texts regarding the Southern Hemisphere.

Jimmy Carter, the recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize for 2002, is being called a Communist by Republicans who in their recent backing of Khodorkovsky, the former head of the Moscow Komsomol communist youth league, who recently bought the political support of two right-wing parties together with some sections of the leadership of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation (CPRF), the heir of the old revisionist CPSU, have proven that the Republicans are not beyond backing Communism.
http://www.londoncommunists.org/28907/60026.html

At the very least I show Russia with influence in Cuba, Venezuela, Bolivia, Brazil and French Guyana. Given this, one would have to wonder if Bush’s recent wooing of Mexican illegal aliens is solely for reelection purposes or if there is a more recondite meaning behind his maneuver? Bush is losing it badly; there is a massive unification against us. All this must, of course, be kept from the American voter.
http://www.investorshub.com/boards/read_msg.asp?message_id=2039287



Washington still plays Cold War games in Latin America
01/06/2004 10:30
The US State Department issued a statement in which it accuses Cuba and Venezuela of being a potential danger to democracy in the region. The message comes only one week before a hemispheric meeting in Mexico.

Washington issued a kind of warning to Cuba and Venezuela on Monday, as accused both Governments of being a potential danger to democracy in Latin America. "Venezuela's neighbors are bothered by close ties between the Venezuelan and Cuban governments and their potential dangers to democracy", said US State Department spokesman Adam Ereli, who also said Cuba remains an antidemocratic force in the region.

Ereli criticized any action that "might impede free and fair democratic processes" in the hemisphere and said Cuba has a long history of attempting to undermine elected governments in the region. "For that reason the close ties between the government of Venezuela and the government of Cuba raise concerns among Venezuela's democratic neighbors," Ereli said.

Ereli"s words are quite interesting as said Cuba "has a long history of attempting to undermine elected governments in the region". According to unclassified US State Department documents, Washington plotted the coup that toppled the democratic, constitutional and legal government of Salvador Allende in Chile in 1973, and fueled Argentine military to oust the legally elected administration of Maria Estela Martinez de Peron in Argentina, less than three years later. Mr. Ereli should also look into those files.

Moreover, as early as in 1954, Washington sponsored a military coup in Guatemala. One year later supported the military after overthrowing Peron"s ruling in Argentina. All along the eighties supported all sort of bloody dictatorships in Central America, as invaded Panama in 1989. The death toll of the US intervention in Latin America should be in the region of 500.000 casualties, taking into account thousands of deaths in Argentina, Paraguay, Chile, Uruguay and Bolivia in the seventies and Central America in the eighties.

However, lack of memory makes US hawks to say Cuba and Venezuela are working together to oppose pro-American, democratic governments in the region with money, political indoctrination and training. PRAVDA.Ru correspondent in Buenos Aires is in position to confirm that neither Venezuela nor Cuba are financing such activities neither in Argentina nor in Uruguay, as doubts something similar may happen in other South American nations.

In Caracas on Monday, Tarek William Saab, head of Venezuela's congressional foreign relations commission and a supporter of President Hugo Chavez, assailed an Associated Press story that recounted U.S. worries about Chavez's activities. Saab accused the U.S. government of "using slander and defamation to weaken a constitutional government like ours." "It's false and irresponsible and cowardly," Saab said.

Aside from his ties to Cuba, Chavez's US officials have increasingly questioned democratic spirit of Chavez, as his political foes are trying to depose him through a recall election. Both President Bush and Chavez are expected at a hemispheric summit meeting Jan. 12-13 in Mexico.

However, as principal US administration goal for the hemisphere is to conclude a free trade agreement to extend from Alaska to Argentina by early 2005, it makes sense that Washington insists in its attacks to Venezuela and Cuba. As for the Caribbean Island, it has been already excluded from the negotiations. Unfortunately for Washington they cannot do the same with Venezuela as Chavez administration is absolutely legal and constitutional. Aside from the political considerations, Venezuela is a key nation for the Agreement, as it is hemisphere"s largest -by far- oil exporter. Cuba, in turn, is as big for the Caribbean market, as Brazil is for South America.

In response to Washington accusations, Venezuelan Vice President Jose Vicente Rangel said his government has never allowed Colombian rebels to use Venezuelan territory, as also rejected allegations by U.S. officials of Venezuelan support for backers of an uprising in Bolivia that deposed the country's pro-U.S. president, Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada, last October.

Hernan Etchaleco
Pravda.Ru
http://english.pravda.ru/world/20/91/368/11708_washington.html




Venezuela’s Chávez wants the spotlight in Mexico

Monday, January 5, 2004


By Barnard R. Thompson

A Special Summit of the Americas will be held in Monterrey, Mexico, on January 12 and 13, a prelude to the planned 2005 Fourth Summit of the Americas, in Argentina. During this particular event, officials have indicated that the focus will be on economic growth, social development and democratic governance in the Western Hemisphere.

George W. Bush will attend, and sidebar to the summit he is scheduled to meet with Mexican President Vicente Fox Quesada to further discuss immigration and binational security matters according to Fox’s office.

Altogether the Special Summit will assemble 34 heads of state from all of the perceivably democratic countries in the hemisphere — that more bluntly means Fidel Castro of Cuba is not invited. Still, it appears that Castro will be represented by a perchance and/or wannabe successor, Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez.

Chávez continues to be under heavy fire at home, where opponents are advancing the drive for his recall. On December 19 opposition leaders delivered recall petitions with 3.46 million signatures to Venezuela’s National Elections Council, a sizable number over the requisite 2.4 million signatures needed to initiate a referendum. However due to holiday vacations, the counting and verification of the signatures are to begin on January 5. Once the counts officially begin, the council will have 30 days to decide if a referendum on Chávez remaining in office will be held.

Supporters claim that Chávez has given the poor a voice in Venezuela, whereas his detractors charge him with ruining the economy and wanting to change Venezuela into a Cuban-style communist dictatorship — with the help of best buddy Fidel Castro.

Since even before the signature drive began Chávez has been crying foul. Using terms like “mega-fraud, gigantic fraud” and more colorful invectives, he charges that people signed petitions more than once and that unregistered voters were given fake identification cards so they too could sign. He also is accusing private business, entrepreneurs and some unionists of threatening to fire workers if they would not sign the petitions. And the ex-paratrooper is warning that discharged military officers, who participated in the failed 2002 coup, are again plotting against him.

Chávez says that he will fight recall virtually beyond extremes, plus he has vowed to verify each and every signature on the petitions. Part of this latter strategy, if needed, is undoubtedly to delay a possible referendum until after August — when the less than two-year date before the 2006 elections comes around. After that the president could be removed, but legally there could not be a presidential election and the vice president would takeover (while Chávez campaigns for 2006).

On December 22 Fidel Castro made a hurried trip to Venezuela for secretive talks with Chávez, supposedly on healthcare and education issues. Also in Venezuela for the meetings was Evo Morales, Bolivia’s outspoken anti-capitalist congressman who heads both the Movement Toward Socialism party and organized coca growers in his homeland. (Morales has also been meeting with Jimmy Carter, a common denominator joining Castro, Chávez and Morales.)

Soon after the meetings Chávez started to talk about forthcoming plans and “his” international agenda. In this regard, it should be noted that there is growing concern in Washington and certain other western capitals that Chávez and his coconspirators are up to no good.

Chávez says that he will visit a number of countries in 2004, starting with Mexico in order to attend the Special Summit of the Americas. In late December, on his weekly radio and TV “Aló Presidente” program, Chávez said that he plans to speak against the Free Trade Agreement of the Americas (FTAA) during the summit. Likening participation in a FTAA to “committing suicide,” Chávez expounded on his rhetorical argument that such an accord would further impoverish Latin Americans by subjecting them to unfair U.S.A. and Canadian competition. News reports say that Chávez, while in Mexico, will also call for governments to support a redistribution of wealth through a new hemispheric social contract.

Saying that the world cannot have a single pole, Chávez told Prensa Latina that he would travel to Russia this year. “The objective of the visit to Russia will be to raise the level of bilateral relations, that have already been moved forward with the visit of Russian foreign minister Igor Ivanov to Caracas, when several cooperative agreements and letters of intent were signed,” Chávez told the Cuban news agency. Chávez also talked about plans to visit France and several other European nations.

http://www.mexidata.info/id111.html