www.vheadline.com Posted: Monday, January 27, 2003 - 1:58:37 PM By: Patrick J. O'Donoghue

Isla de Margarita Coordinadora Democratica (CD) supporters put on a show for 26 rebel merchant navy officers, who traveled to Venezuela's paradise island allegedly to take part in a prayer vigil. Dismissed "Pilin Leon" tanker Captain Daniel Alfaro was present at a floral offering at the shrine of Our Lady of the Valley (Virgin del Valle) in Garcia municipality.

The spic 'n span rebel officers were treated as heroes, signing autographs on paper, T-shirts and flags outside the shrine, while a church ceremony was in progress.

Most of the officers are said to be natives of Isla de Margarita … on Wednesday,  there will be an opposition march in Porlamar to drum up up support for opposition mayors on the island who are opposed to the pro-government Nuevo Esparta State Governor.

www.morningstar.ca 27 Jan 03(1:17 PM) |  E-mail Article to a Friend By Patrick Markey

CARACAS, Venezuela (Reuters) - Venezuela's opposition on Monday debated scaling back its strike against leftist President Hugo Chavez to ease the burden on a struggling private sector now also threatened by government currency curbs and price controls.

But two months into the grueling stoppage, there was no sign that rebel oil workers -- the backbone of the strike protest -- would end their disruption to crude oil production and shipments from the world's fifth largest petroleum exporter.

Some opposition leaders, who began the strike on Dec. 2 to force Chavez to call elections, said they may allow some shopping centers and food franchises to reopen as the long-running protest squeezes private businesses.

"People have held on for more than 50 days and made a great sacrifice," opposition leader Julio Borges told reporters. "Some people plan to reopen some commerce, industry and work activity. We must respect that as the strike is voluntary."

But there were clear divisions within the opposition ranks over strategy. Carlos Fernandez, a strike leader, said the protest would continue and played down comments by colleagues that it could be eased in some sectors.

"The only thing I can say is that the protest continues," Fernandez said.

The debate underscored the opposition's struggle to maintain momentum for their strike and left a question mark over the fate of thousands of striking workers at the state oil firm PDVSA, who may be left more isolated in their fight to oust the populist Chavez.

The shutdown has driven Venezuela's economy deeper into recession by choking off its lifeblood oil exports that account for half of government revenues. Severe gasoline shortages coupled with disruptions in food supplies have also fueled tensions in the oil-rich South American country.

Faced with the possibility of bankruptcy, many private businesses, restaurants and stores have already broken the strike and opened their doors. Commerce has been bustling in the center and west of Caracas for weeks although private banks are still only open for limited hours.

Chavez, who has fought back by firing 3,000 state oil workers and sending troops to oil installations, said on Sunday he would introduce price controls and foreign exchange restrictions to counter the strike's economic impact.

The president, who was elected in 1998 and survived a coup in April, has vowed he will defeat the shutdown he portrays as an attempt by "terrorists" to topple his self-styled revolutionary government. He dismisses opposition calls for early elections.

Speaking in Porto Alegre, Brazil, Chavez said on Sunday his government was studying putting a levy on speculative financial market transactions. The government last week suspended foreign exchange trading to shore up the battered bolivar currency and preserve its international reserves from capital flight.

The bolivar, which has tumbled more than 28 percent against the U.S. dollar since the start of the strike, lost 46 percent of its value last year as it was buffeted by investor jitters.

Opposition leaders say that Chavez is responsible for the sharp downturn in the nation's economy. Rather than helping the poor, they say, his corrupt and dictatorial rule has driven Venezuela into economic and political chaos.

Chavez's foes said the government's new control measures would only worsen the financial crisis and could be used to punish striking businesses by limiting their access to U.S. currency. "All these actions are going to bring severe consequences," Rafael Alfonzo, an opposition business leader told El Universal newspaper in an interview.

International attempts to broker an end to the stalemate have so far failed. Negotiations chaired by the Organization of American States are stalled over the timing of possible elections. Representatives from six nations, led by the United States and Brazil, will arrive Thursday in Caracas to lend weight to the OAS talks.

Both sides are studying proposals by former U.S. President and Nobel Peace Prize winner Jimmy Carter for either a constitutional reform that will shorten the president's term or a binding referendum on his rule in August -- halfway though Chavez's current term.

www.forbes.com Reuters, 01.27.03, 1:50 PM ET

In our LONDON story "Oil falls as U.N. calls for more time in Iraq" para 14 should read ...President George W. Bush's State of the Union address on Tuesday, starting at 2100 EST (0200 GMT Wednesday)... instead of ...starting at 2100 GMT (1600 local)... (correcting time) A corrected version follows

(adds Venezuela para 2, 19-21) By Richard Mably

LONDON, Jan 27 (Reuters) - Oil prices fell on Monday as United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan called for more time for weapons inspectors to search Iraq before the United States makes a final decision on going to war.

Signs that the Venezuelan government of President Hugo Chavez is wearing down an eight-week old nationwide strike that has slashed oil exports also helped undermine prices.

U.S. light crude by 1815 GMT was off 83 cents at $32.46 a barrel and London Brent 54 cents lower at $29.95 a barrel.

Chief U.N. weapons inspector Hans Blix delivered his first full report to the U.N. Security Council on Iraq's cooperation with arms inspectors.

He said: "Iraq appears not to have come to genuine acceptance, not even today, of the disarmament that was demanded of it."

Annan said arms experts should be given a "reasonable amount of time."

"If they need time, they should be given the time to do their work," he told reporters at U.N. headquarters in New York.

European and Middle Eastern allies are pushing the United States to allow the inspectors more time, possibly until March 1, officials and former policy makers told Reuters at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.

"What's driving the timetable for war is not diplomacy but military readiness," said Roger Diwan of consultancy PFC Energy in Washington.

"If the U.S. needs more time to get the military in place it will use that time to seek diplomatic backing but, whether it gets that or not, we still expect war to start some time between the middle of February and early March."

Blix said that documents Iraq submitted in a 12,000-page declaration had not answered questions on the whereabouts of the deadly VX nerve gas, two tons of nutrients or growth media for biological agents, such as anthrax, and 550 artillery shells filled with mustard gas and 6,500 chemical bombs.

And despite assurances from Iraq that it would encourage its scientists to submit to private interviews, he said no such talks have taken place and Baghdad had blocked the use of U-2 surveillance flights over all parts of Iraq.

At the same time the inspectors had not found evidence of banned activity or production facilities at any of the sites investigated that the United States says exist.

STATE OF THE UNION Attention now will turn to U.S. President George W. Bush's State of the Union address on Tuesday, starting at 2100 EST (0200 GMT Wednesday). Bush is due to meet key ally Britain's Prime Minister Tony Blair on Friday. Britain has sent thousands of troops to join a U.S. military build-up in the Gulf.

The world's biggest oil exporter Saudi Arabia said at the weekend that it and fellow OPEC members were pumping sufficient volumes to prevent shortages.

"There is no shortage in the market and there should be no reason for prices where they are today," Saudi Oil Minister Ali al-Naimi told a panel at Davos at the weekend.

"We checked. We called. I checked with individual customers, refineries and others. I ask them one question: Do you feel you need more oil? And the answer is no," he said.

OPEC agreed two weeks ago to raise output by 1.5 million barrels per day to counter some of the shortfall caused by the Venezuela strike.

The Venezuelan opposition on Monday debated scaling back action to ease the burden on a struggling private sector now also threatened by government currency curbs and price controls.

Two months into the grueling stoppage, there was no sign that rebel oil workers -- the backbone of the strike protest -- would end their disruption to crude oil production and shipments from the world's fifth largest petroleum exporter.

But the debate underscored the opposition's struggle to maintain momentum for their strike and left a question mark over the fate of thousands of striking workers at the state oil firm PDVSA, who may be left more isolated in their fight to oust the populist Chavez.

Venezuelan crude output has recovered from the lows of December and strikers said on Monday production was about 966,000 bpd, 29 percent of pre-strike levels. Chavez claims production has reached 1.32 million bpd.

www.granma.cu Havana. January 27,  2003 BY ORLANDO ORAMAS LEON —Granma daily special correspondent—

PORTO ALEGRE.- A new era in Latin America and the world is about to start, affirmed Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez, who received numerous demonstrations of support from the authorities, participants at the 3rd World Social Forum (WSF), and the Brazilian people in Porto Alegre.

Chávez met with the president of Río Grande de Sul’s legislative assembly along with the WSF organizers, gave a press conference, and then, from a balcony, addressed a huge crowd of people who had been waiting since early morning.

Venezuela’s head of state explained that the WSF had become the most important political event of the yea, "because the hope of humanity is condensed here and we are building an alternative to the savage neoliberal model that is leading us to suicide."

He called the international economic order, one of the expressions of Third World debt, dreadfully unjust. As an example he cited that his government has paid $20 billion USD towards its debt; nevertheless the total amount it owes to international organizations remains at $26 billion USD.

Venezuela has been placed in the role of precursor of changes occurring in Latin America, he pointed out, commenting that it is the oligarchic groups and their instruments — the television channels and newspapers —opposed to those changes, who are waging a media war.

Responding to a question from Granma he affirmed that he hoped what has been happening in Venezuela does not occur in other countries. "We are making a peaceful revolution, which is also to the benefit of groups with economic power because they need it too. There are 224 million poor people in Latin America, and of those 90 million are destitute and cannot sit back and wait for a solution."

He explained some of the measures adopted by his government to confront the pro-coup mob and protect the population from its actions. In the years of the Bolivarian process land has been given to campesinos, educational resources have been increased to 7% of the GDP, the infant mortality and malnutrition rates gave gone down, as well as the indicator for low weight in minors. Entry to all educational levels has grown and popular participative forums have been established through the National Planning Councils.

Chávez qualified those trying to defeat the legitimate Venezuelan government as fascists applying the same tactics as those used in Chile nearly 30 years ago. "However, they made a mistake this time, because the people are in the streets and the armed forces are with the Bolivarian process," he observed.

Later, in the Porto Alegre legislature, the Venezuelan leader attended an event organized by the Brazilian Committee of Solidarity with Venezuela, where he introduced Cuban Foreign Minister Felipe Pérez Roque, whose presence was applauded.

"New processes will appear in Latin America and throughout the world, some of those will be surprise ones, for which reason we need strong social movements to combat neoliberalism," he affirmed.

Outside, hundreds of people carrying flags from various countries and organizations gave him a their welcome to the 3rd World Social Forum. Chávez assured them that Venezuela would resist the fascist mob.

blogs.salon.com VOA News 27 Jan 2003, 16:15 UTC

Venezuela's opposition strike enters its ninth week as President Hugo Chavez announces plans to impose currency and price controls to stabilize the country's economy.

The Associated Press reports hundreds of thousands of protesters in the capital, Caracas, have allowed traffic to flow again, after Mr. Chavez called for indefinite currency controls expected to begin Wednesday.

In a speech Sunday at the World Social Forum in Porto Alegre, Brazil, Mr. Chavez said that the government must control the value of the Brazilian bolivar. He also said the government will implement price controls to protect the poor from inflation for necessities such as food and medicines.

The opposition strike, which began December 2, has crippled the country's oil industry, caused a shortage in goods and sent the value of the bolivar down 30 percent.

The opposition says government policies are ruining the Venezuelan economy, and are demanding Mr. Chavez either resign or call for early elections. The president has so far refused to step down.

Mr. Chavez and strike leaders have given a positive response to a plan by former U.S. President Jimmy Carter to end Venezuela's political crisis. The Carter plan would amend the Venezuelan constitution and shorten the president's term in office, leading to early elections.