www.vheadline.com Posted: Thursday, February 27, 2003 By: Julian Coningham

Date: Thu, 27 Feb 2003 22:33:14 +0000 From: Julian Coningham coninghams@hotmail.com To: Editor@VHeadline.com Subject: "placing" bombs in foreign embassies

Dear Editor: The idea that Mr, Chavez and/or his followers are "placing" bombs in foreign embassies does not make sense at all. If Mr. Castro, for example, is an ally of Mr. Chavez, etc., how come the Cuban Embassy was threatened with a bomb?

Brazil's too (Lula is a friend of Chavez). Also, when the Algerians decided to help the Venezuelan government re-start the oil industry (strike), the embassy was bombed.

In short, if we are to believe certain propaganda, Mr. Chavez & Co "bomb" their friends. CRAP.

We know that the opposition tried to enter by force into the Cuban embassy. Needless to say that they did not care that it was contrary to international law.

It is not in the interest of Venezuela's government to destabilize their government bombing foreign embassies. Consequently, since they are not so stupid, they would not place bombs to "blame the opposition."

The time has come to recognize that the opposition has a problem with criminals and terrorists (outlaws).

When a little innocent girl is injured, it is time to speak out against these criminal acts.

Finally, one thing is legitimate democratic opposition and another terrorism, etc.

regards Julian Coningham coninghams@hotmail.com

www.dailytimes.com.pk

Speaking at an informal summit of the Organisation of Islamic Conference (OIC) at Kuala Lumpur, the Malaysian prime minister, Mahathir Mohamed, said that the summit should consider using an oil embargo “to deter the United States from attacking Iraq”. Further elaborating the theme, he said that an oil embargo by the Islamic oil-producing nations could be resorted to “with regard to both the Palestine and Iraq”. But he was also careful to note that an embargo could prove to be a double-edged weapon, hurting the third world states more than the targeted United States. He clarified that the OIC had agreed “to think about the idea”. In the meanwhile, he recommended that the Islamic world should make common cause with the European states who were opposed to the war on Iraq. Mr Mahathir Mohamed must be thinking of a very sophisticated strategy of oil embargo that would neatly target only the United States and those siding with it and exclude those on the side of the Muslim world and its sympathisers. But even as far as the United States is concerned, it is likely to be affected by the embargo only partially. To be exact, only to the tune of 18 percent as that is the share of the Gulf in the American imports of oil. Today, the South Atlantic region supplies between 45 and 48 percent of oil imported by it. Combined with imports from Canada, the North Sea, South America (Venezuela and Mexico), Western East Africa (Nigeria, Equatorial Guinea, Angola and the Congo) the total non-Gulf oil represents 81 percent of the oil imported by the United States. During the Gulf War (1990-91) 27 percent of American oil had come from the Gulf. That could be one reason why the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) pledged never to use the oil weapon again and has not proposed an oil embargo in response to the continuing Israeli acts of wanton cruelty in Palestine. Only Iran has been calling for one and it even cut its production in April last year for a month to demonstrate its willingness to use the “oil weapon”. But if the OIC states decide to use the weapon now they will have to take a close look at what happened when it was used by them in 1973. Though ostensibly provoked by the Ramadan war, the embargo was not only against America but also against the entire industrially advanced world using cheap OPEC oil to keep their economies going. The price of crude oil climbed immediately from 2.5 dollars per barrel to 10 dollars and then went up to 40 dollars in the spot market. If the purpose at that time was to deprive the United States of oil, the strategy failed because the oil got to it nonetheless through third party importers. It benefited the American and Western manufacturers of high-technology goods and weapons as prices of such items were hitched up. However, Iran was able to afford the new prices of such imported commodities because income from oil rose considerably, and some observers think that Iran in fact was encouraged by some Western advisers to resort to the embargo to acquire enough income to be able to buy American arms. The Arab oil producers also saw their coffers fill up but most of the new “petrodollars” found their way into banks in the West to slake the region’s thirst for weapons and luxuries. As Mr Mahathir Mohamed said, the crunch came on the poor third world countries which could neither afford the 40 dollar per barrel oil nor buy the Western capital goods at the new inflated prices. Pakistan was one of the countries that went belly-up: it had to massively devalue its currency, causing the industrial sector to collapse and borrowers to default on loans. As oil prices went up in 1974, alternative sources to oil became economically viable. The West, armed with nuclear technology, converted to nuclear power and opened up the heretofore uneconomical offshore wells in the North Sea. In 1980, OPEC collapsed under the burden of its own embargo when the prices collapsed below 10 dollars per barrel and there was a glut in the market created by buyers building up huge reserves. What happened to the “petrodollars” is another sad story. Enriched with oil money, Iraq fell upon an Islamic revolutionary Iran and spent billions of dollars borrowed from the similarly enriched Gulf states to prosecute a war that is believed to have cost over 160 billion dollars. Embargo-enriched Iran suffered a fall in oil production that it still has not regained and is today dogged by economic problems incidental to non-oil producing third world states. After the 1991 Gulf war, the oil producers now being asked to go for another embargo were further impoverished and their leader Saudi Arabia was forced to borrow billions of dollars to meet its budget deficits. In 1973, the Islamic states had 70 percent of the world oil market; today they have 40 percent of it, and that 40 percent mostly includes states that don’t support attack on Iraq. An oil embargo will not work but a cutback in oil production will definitely jolt the world market. The crunch will also come on the “potential” oil producers in the Islamic world now struggling to bring themselves on line on the Caspian littoral. Foreign capital and technology will converge again on these Central Asian and Caucasian republics and effectively wean them away from any collective OIC decision to resort to a new oil embargo. Therefore our advice to Mr Mahatir is: Let’s not think of such ideas. *

www.dailytimes.com.pk

BEIJING: Cuban President Fidel Castro Thursday began his second day of meeting and greeting incoming and outgoing Chinese leaders, holding talks with Communist Party stalwart and parliamentary head Li Peng. Li at the Great Hall of the People greeted Castro only a week before Li’s parliament formally ushers in the nation’s next government to be headed by younger leaders promoted last November during a congress of the ruling party. “I’m very happy to have this opportunity to again meet with comrade Castro and our Cuban friends,” Li told the Cuban leader. “Your visit to China comes at a crucial time.” Li, who stepped down as party number two during the November party meeting, is expected to retire as head of the National People’s Congress during its annual session that begins next week. On Wednesday Castro met with outgoing President Jiang Zemin and was scheduled to meet Thursday with outgoing Premier Zhu Rongji and soon-to-be president Hu Jintao. During talks with Li, Castro praised the “great changes” China has undergone during its 20-year opening and reform drive. “I can’t really be sure just now what kind of China I am visiting, because the first time I visited your country appeared one way and now when I visit it appears another way,” he said. “You can say that every so often your country undergoes great changes.” The visit is Castro’s first to China since late 1995. As the last remaining leaders of the communist world, Castro has developed close personal ties with Jiang, who visited Cuba in November 1993 and April 2001. On Wednesday, the two leaders also signed an economic cooperation agreement. China is Cuba’s third most important trading partner after Venezuela, which provides the island with cheap oil, and Spain, which has hotel chains deeply invested in the tourism industry. China took over as Cuba’s main political and financial partner in the early 1990s after the fall of the Soviet Union. The trade balance, however, clearly favours China. According to official figures here, in 2001 Cuba exported 70 million dollars worth of goods to China, while it imported 547 million dollars’ worth. —AFP

news.pacificnews.org Commentary, Alicia Torres, Pacific News Service, Feb 27, 2003

Beyond gaining support from the military and portions of the underclass, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has channeled the historical, mythical, and to some, mystical figure of 19th century General Simon Bolivar. PNS contributor Alicia Torres examines a popular religion with indigenous roots to find one secret to Chavez's continuing rule.

As Venezuela's fate seems locked between President Hugo Chavez's militant, underclass supporters and the middle class, media and business communities arrayed against him, a third force lurks behind the scenes.

Pacing the labyrinth of Venezuela's popular imagination, the unnamed actor is the magical, long-dead General Simon Bolívar, the nation's founding father. The Bolivar myth, skillfully channeled by Chavez, is key to the former paratrooper's grip on power.

After leading a failed and bloody coup attempt in 1992, Chavez famously spent many months in jail and emerged from his "captivity" with a powerful rhetorical and symbolic ace card. Reaching into the confusing current of Venezuela's political history, he found one untainted image, a myth untouched by decades of rampant political corruption and squandering of the country's vast oil wealth, a messy recent history that started long before Chavez.

Hugo Chavez's deft ability to incorporate into his campaign persona the historical legacy of the brilliant general who liberated half of South America from the control of the 19th century Spanish empire helped propel Chavez to the Venezuelan presidency in 1998 with over 80 percent of the vote. Today, Chavez's cult of personality is centered on his image as Bolívar's heir, the modern-day liberator of Venezuela's poorest.

In the United States, no figure commands the same kind of reverence as Bolívar does in Venezuela. The country's currency, plazas and universities carry his name. His maxims are taught in schools, broadcast on radio and emblazoned on government buildings. Bolívar is a liberator idealized in oral culture by small-town storytellers, and in the lyrics of traditional music such as contrapunto.

Chavistas, as the president's supporters are known, call the areas they control the "liberated zones of the Bolivarian Republic" and adorn offices and homes with giant portraits of Bolívar. Chavez trumpets Bolívar's dream of a politically unified South America, calls his political movement the Bolivarian Revolution and he has organized poor neighborhoods into political cells called Bolivarian Circles.

And, as Chavez well knows, besides the historical Bolivar there is a supernatural one, a figure of popular religious devotion who takes his place alongside other cult figures on home altars.

Alongside the Catholic religion, another spiritual tradition thrives in Venezuela, a popular religion with indigenous, African and Catholic roots called the religion of María Lionza. Based on the worship by Indians of a fertility goddess known as María Lionza, the syncretic faith predates any other touchstone of Venezuela's national identity. Many Venezuelans would not inhabit a home lacking an altar to the religion's principal divinities, each of which represents Venezuela's vibrant ethnic mixture of white, Indian, and black.

These religious altars usually feature a portrait of Simón Bolívar, and the religion's priests hold ceremonies in which the spirit of Bolívar is channeled through a medium who coughs when the general is present, since Bolívar had tuberculosis.

The official Bolívar celebrated in textbooks, statues and hymns still elicits the respect and devotion of Venezuelans, even if they inhabit luxury apartments. But in the figure of Chavez, some in Venezuela, including some of the nation's poorest, also see the spirit of Bolívar incarnate. The tradition of María Lionza has fed Chavez's grip on the country's imagination.

Chavez encourages this by echoing Bolívar's words and making his nationally televised speeches with a portrait of Bolívar placed next to his head. Venezuelans joke that Chavez always sets an extra place at his dinner table for Bolívar, and say that he parades the long hallways of his presidential mansion wearing the famed general's cape. Whether the stories are true or not, Chavez is definitely obsessed with Bolívar's legacy and exploits it to maintain power.

The president's posturing as a 21st century manifestation of Bolívar has helped radicalize the conflict in Venezuela. On one side, he is still revered by a significant part of the population as Venezuela's last hope -- a second liberator. The enraged opposition, on the other hand, thinks Chavez has betrayed Bolívar's legacy and 50 years of Venezuelan democracy with his authoritarian style and incendiary class rhetoric. It's one reason the new Bolivarian Revolution is in danger of ending in a civil war.

Torres has published several books of poetry in Venezuela and was a columnist for Caracas daily El Universal. She currently lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.

27 February 2003

State Department Official Reviews U.S. Priorities in the Americas (Curtis Struble says problems in region are not "intractable") (7560)

.........all times respecting the caps.

To the east, the situation in Venezuela continues to deteriorate, undermining Venezuela's democracy and economy while threatening regional economic and political stability. We must help Venezuela find a solution to the current impasse to avoid further harm. The only politically viable solution to the crisis in Venezuela is a peaceful, constitutional, democratic, and electoral solution agreed upon by both the government and the opposition. The dialogue led by the OAS Secretary General remains the best hope for Venezuelans to reach such a solution. The electoral proposals tabled January 21 by former President Carter - either a constitutional amendment to enable earlier elections or an August recall referendum, as provided for in Venezuela's Constitution - present viable options to break the impasse.

Four OAS member states (Brazil, Chile, Mexico, and the U.S.) and two leading OAS observer states (Portugal and Spain) have joined to address the current situation in Venezuela through the Friends of the OAS Secretary General's Mission for Venezuela. The Group of Friends plans to monitor and verify the implementation of any agreement brokered by the OAS. I was in Caracas four weeks ago with senior officials from the Group of Friends governments and had useful meetings with the government and the opposition.

President Chávez told us that the Carter proposals are constitutional and acknowledged that his government was obligated to provide funding and protection for constitutional elections and political activities. We are pleased that both sides to the dispute in Venezuela endorsed a non-violence pledge.

Still, President Chavez's incendiary rhetoric and the violence that has followed the signing of the pact, including the bombings outside the Spanish Embassy and Colombian Consulate in Caracas, cast doubt as to the government's commitment to honoring this pledge. It is imperative that this commitment, which is key to creating a climate conducive to dialogue, be respected. We hope to meet again soon with our partners in the Friends Group to discuss concrete initiatives to advance the dialogue.

In Bolivia, President Sanchez.............