www.miami.com Posted on Mon, Feb. 17, 2003

Jose Valdivia and Miguel Zaldivar are traveling south of the border. The two Miami lawyers have picked up a piece of legal work for Hogan & Hartson worth more than $1 million. Hogan & Hartson won over four other law firms to serve as counsel to Pemex in its construction of a petrochemical complex in Mexico. The site hasn't yet been selected. Pemex is the Mexican state-owned oil company. The lawyers will work with Mexican counsel Haynes & Boone and with consultants Charles River Associates from Houston.

''We had all the right people,'' Zaldivar said. ``Also key is we had the ability to do the documents in Spanish and English.''

The right people included Flavio Principe, former general counsel of Venezuela's state-owned oil company, now in Hogan's Miami office, and Tovan McDaniel from Hogan's Washington office. Hogan also has Berlin, London and Paris offices, crucial for tapping overseas investors.

Hogan gets paid a flat fee, at least for phase one, through the end of February. Seven lawyers in the Miami office are working on the matter. The initial phase calls for drawing up bid documents for the selection of investors. The firm will analyze Pemex's potential role in the project. If the law firm continues as counsel during the next phase, its Miami office could become home for road shows and data analyses for Latin American investors. Miguel Espino, a Pemex attorney, is working from Hogan's Miami office.

A number of international companies are reported to be interested in participating with Pemex in the project. The initial investment is anticipated to be in the range of $1 billion to $2 billion.

In another coup for Hogan & Hartson, Paul F. Hancock, former Florida deputy attorney general in charge of South Florida offices, has joined the firm's Miami office as of counsel practicing in its litigation group.

www.vheadline.com Posted: Monday, February 17, 2003 By: Robert Rudnicki

President Hugo Chavez Frias has announced that the government is considering setting commercial banks' lending rates following the introduction of price and foreign exchange trading controls.

If the measure is taken, it would be the first time in around ten years that the Venezuelan government had felt such a necessity. 

According to the President, commercial bank lending rates should not be higher than 30%, hinting that the Central Bank of Venezuela (BCV) may cut rates to help poorer Venezuelans who currently cannot afford to borrow. 

"I would fix lending rates at a maximum of 30% ... I want rates to be fixed, I want rates to be cut and I want the BCV to fix the rates."

However, despite the President's comments, the BCV will have to take the final decision on whether or not to move ahead with these kinds of measures.

www.thisisleicestershire.co.uk 11:00 - 17 February 2003

Al Qaida terrorists have a "substantial presence" in the UK, and the risk of attacks remains "high", according to the most senior police officer in England and Wales.

Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir John Stevens dismissed suggestions that a hoax was to blame for the terror alert which has seen tanks at Heathrow and heightened security at other airports around the country over the past week.

The Government's emergency planning committee, codenamed Cobra, was meeting daily to assess the level of threat and did not believe the danger of terror attacks was over, said Sir John.

He confirmed there were concerns at the highest levels that ground-to-air missile-launchers had been smuggled into the UK and could be used in attempts to shoot down aeroplanes taking off or landing at British airports.

And he said there was a "generalised threat" that people operating within London would use whatever means they could find to bring mayhem to the capital.

While most security work to thwart the terrorists had to go on in secrecy, Sir John said some successes had been achieved, with a total of 72 arrests over several months for terrorist offences.

Asked how many al Qaida cells were operating in the UK, he told BBC1's Breakfast with Frost: "It is very difficult to know, but we do know that there is a substantial presence and we are taking action in relation to those.

"The threat is still high and we have still got an operation at Heathrow. What we do every day is analyse the threat and meet that threat with whatever resources necessary."

Sir John was speaking as it was reported that a man arrested at Gatwick airport on Thursday with a live grenade in his baggage was known to authorities in his native Venezuela and had visited "sensitive countries" within the past few months.

Venezuelan authorities named the man, being questioned at the high-security Paddington Green police station in west London, as Rahaman Alan Hazil Mohammad, who has Venezuelan citizenship, said the BBC. Scotland Yard refused to confirm the suspect's name, but said anti-terrorist officers were liaising with their counterparts in South America and would fly out if necessary.

www.democratandchronicle.com By Dolores Orman Democrat and Chronicle

Victoria Heredia of Pittsford, a native of Venezuela, is pressing for new elections there. [Day in Photos] (February 17, 2003) — PITTSFORD — A Pittsford woman is among Venezuelans locally and throughout the world involved in efforts to oust that country’s president, Hugo Chavez. Victoria Heredia collected signatures locally as part of a “Great Sign-Up” effort on Feb. 2 that was sponsored by Chavez opposition leaders in Venezuela. A Pittsford resident for th e past 21/2 years, Heredia, 37, said she also hopes to help organize a local support group of Venezuelans. “I feel very attached emotionally to my country,” she said. “All my family and my husband’s family live there.” Chavez’s opponents are pushing for a free election to allow Venezuelans to decide if they want him to stay in office. “We want Venezuelans to vote and decide what we want to do with our country before a civil war starts,” said Heredia. About two weeks before the petition-gathering, she decided she wanted to participate. She joined one of the major anti-Chavez Venezuelan organizations in the United States so she could collect signatures. She got 11 and forwarded them to a collection point in Miami. “I feel I have helped the situation,” Heredia said. “I wish I were there to help more. Being outside, we can still do many things for our country.” She already has an idea. “We may start to create in Rochester (an organization) as a way of helping over there,” said Heredia, a former adjunct professor of management information systems at the Rochester Institute of Technology and the mother of triplets. Liliana Carrano of Penfield and her husband were among those who signed Heredia’s petition. “We hope that it does help to go to (an) election,” said Carrano, 37. “That is our weapon and our signature -- that we do have.” Centers for the petition effort were in such major cities as Madrid, Amsterdam and Toronto. Maria Martinez-Campos, 34, and her husband traveled to Toronto to sign up. The Hilton couple arrived at 11:45 a.m. at a Venezuelan restaurant where signing was to begin at noon. “We were the first ones (to sign up),” Martinez-Campos said. “It was wonderful. You feel that you are doing something for your country.” She said she later learned that more than 300 people had signed the petition at the restaurant. E-mail address: dorman@DemocratandChronicle.com

www.vheadline.com Posted: Monday, February 17, 2003 By: Robert Rudnicki

The Venezuelan economy is reported to have shrunk by 8.9% over 2002, with the key driver for the contraction being a opposition-led work stoppage which commenced on December 2 and closed down the vital petroleum industry as well as many other sectors of the economy.

During the fourth quarter of 2002 the economy contracted by a whopping 16.7% following a 26% fall in the oil sector as thousands of Petroleos de Venezuela (PDVSA) workers walked out on their jobs to support the Coordinadora Democratica political action.

• Since the work stoppage came to an end on February 4, oil production has slowly but surely shown signs of recovery, with estimates now at between 1.4 million and 1.9 million barrels per day.

This recovery in production is likely to soften the blow of the strike on this quarter's figures, however the contraction is still expected to be high, with a possible recovery only likely during the second quarter.