<a href=www.vheadline.com>Venezuela's Electronic News Posted: Thursday, May 08, 2003 By: Patrick J. O'Donoghue

Miranda State Governor, Enrique Mendoza and former Presidential Secretariat Minister (under President Rafael Caldera), Asdrubal Aguiar have paid a visit to the Brazilian Embassy to hand a letter to that country's Foreign Minister as member of the six-nation Group of Friends, insisting on the need to seek an electoral solution to the Venezuelan crisis. 

Speaking on behalf of Coordinadora Democratica (CD), Mendoza says the recall referendum is the solution and the CD wants the group to ensure that nothing is altered. "We insist that the date, laws and other legal instruments be respected ... the Group must monitor that nothing changes." 

Aguiar insists that the government-opposition negotiation process must continue and that transfering the forum to the National Assembly won't work ... "there are no conditions in Venezuela of institutional normality, political normality or social normality." 

A lawyer, Aguiar highlights current criminal violence, which he says shows severe explosive conditions in society, owing to the absence of mediating institutions ... "it's a picture that the international community cannot ignore."

08 May 2003 By Tomas Sarmiento, Environmental News network-Reuters

ON THE ORINOCO RIVER, Venezuela — It may be South America's largest fresh water turtle, but when the green-lacquered amphibian is young, it fits in the palm of a hand and looks like the ideal aquarium pet.

The Arrau turtle is threatened with extinction, so every year conservationists in Venezuela collect thousands of the hatchlings, raise them in captivity, and then release them into the wild to try to guarantee the survival of the species.

Hunted for their meat and eggs by native Indians and other residents living along the banks of Venezuela's mighty Orinoco River, the population numbers of the species known in Latin as Podocnemis expansa have been decimated over the last century.

"The problem is basically human. Residents of the region have a strong tradition of eating the eggs, eating the newborns and the adult turtles," said Omar Hernandez, coordinator of the government-funded program to save the turtles.

Although the species has been legally protected since the 1960s, turtles are sold at local markets for nearly $100 each. The region's poor inhabitants, mostly farmers, simply go to the river and catch them to enrich their meager diet.

For the last 11 years, Venezuela's Scientific Development Foundation FUDECI has spearheaded the project to raise and release young Arrau turtles into the Orinoco River. The release point is a sun-baked, sandy islet in southwest Venezuela, where the Orinoco flows between the isolated and jungle-covered states of Apure and Bolivar.

During the 19th century, German naturalist and explorer Alexander von Humboldt estimated there were at least 300,000 adult female turtles, Hernandez said. Today, despite the prohibition on hunting, only about 1,000 female adults lay their eggs on the jungle islands and beaches of the Orinoco, one of the world's largest rivers.

A small team of biologists, ecologists, and government officials annually takes thousands of recently born turtles from the river to a nearby breeding center to protect them for a year and strengthen their chances of survival in the wild.

INTO THE WATER

When they are born, Arrau turtles are the size of a coin and easy to catch. Avid predators include not just local fishers but also a long list of wild creatures such as the catfish, the heron, and the black-and-white "cari-cari" hawks that swoop over the banks of the river.

When freed, the young turtles measure a more robust five inches in diameter and are safe from most of their natural enemies. "We can avoid the high mortality rate, and the animals are much more likely to escape," Hernandez said.

The Arrau turtles that inhabit the basin of the Orinoco and Amazon rivers are also found in Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Guyana, and Peru. When fully grown, they can reach about one yard in length.

The FUDECI project financed by the government has released about 120,000 Arrau turtles into the wild since it began, including 16,000 freed during the latest operation in April. Next year, Venezuela expects to release about 50,000 turtles into the Orinoco River, one of the key spawning areas for the turtles, Environment Minister Ana Elisa Osorio said.

The government hopes the project will help take the Arrau off the endangered list. The turtles reach sexual maturity around age 15, so in the next three years, some of the turtles raised briefly in captivity should start to breed.

COLOMBIAN BROTHERS

Venezuela is studying joint conservation projects with Colombia since the turtles often swim across the border between the two Andean neighbors, said Colombian Environment Minister Cecilia Rodriguez, who attended April's turtle release.

"This is a species of habitual migrants. Without a doubt these turtles released here will pass through the River Meta and say hello to their Colombian brothers," the minister said.

The proximity of the border with war-torn Colombia is evident. Journalists, officials, and project members who witnessed April's release operation reached the islet on National Guard patrol boats bristling with weapons.

But Angel Brito, one of the turtle project pioneers, is less worried about border tensions than about preserving the planet for his children. "Our greatest hope is that our children and grandchildren can get to know this important species, the hope that we can save a species," Brito said as he watched the last few turtles paddle slowly into the swirling currents of the great river.

<a href=www.vheadline.com>venezuela's Electronic News Posted: Thursday, May 08, 2003 By: Patrick J. O'Donoghue

Movimiento Quinta Republica (MVR) leader and parliamentarian, Cilia Flores  has been doing a spot of PR work to match that of the opposition Coordinadora Democratica (CD) to convince visiting six-nation Group of Friends delegates that President Hugo Chavez Frias does not have to sign any negotiated agreement regarding the recall referendum. 

"The Group of Friends must understand that the figure of the recall referendum as stipulated in the Bolivarian Constitution is a conquest of the revolution ... it's all there and therefore the President is not obliged to sign anything." 

Following the party line, Ms. Flores, who heads the pro-government parliamentary group, calls on the opposition negotiating team to show "political openness ... the best way to showing plurality is to transfer the forum to the National Assembly." 

Flores has praised Organization of American States (OAS)  general secretary, Cesar Gaviria, the Carter Center and the UN for their role in helping things along and says that even though their work is done, they should continue as facilitators.

<a href=www.metroweekly.com> by Jonathan Padget Published on 05/08/2003

When Juan Carlos Rincones arrived in Washington from Venezuela in 1980 to start his freshman year at The George Washington University, dancing was the furthest thing from his mind.

He'd never set foot in a dance studio in his life, and he was certain he'd be in Washington only as long as it took to earn a degree in civil engineering. So how is it that Rincones has become a 23-year-Washingtonian, the past nine of which have been spent at the helm of one of the city's most esteemed modern dance troupes, Rincones & Company Dance Theater?

It all started with a flier for Joy of Motion Dance Center that Rincones picked up one day in the early '80s while walking in Dupont Circle, despondent over the choice of his first boyfriend, another Venezuelan student, to return home and get married.

"I felt completely abandoned," says Rincones, 40, who was also struggling to come to grips with his sexuality. "I was miserable, I was doing terribly in school, and I couldn't afford a shrink."

Sensing that a dance class just might be the kind of change of pace that would take his mind off his troubles, Rincones signed up for the next one scheduled -- a Friday night course in Afro-Jazz. "It was so therapeutic," he recalls, "because for that hour and a half that the class lasted, you couldn't think about anything else. I experienced such a rush from being able to be out of my turmoil. I got hooked."

Rincones started going to dance classes more often, and engineering classes less, until he eventually decided to focus exclusively on a career as a dancer-choreographer. With his vocational calling in perspective, Rincones also found himself better able to accept his sexuality, and he's built an eighteen-year relationship with noted interior designer Thomas Pheasant.

"Being gay is an undercurrent that's always there in my work," Rincones says. "Dance is, after all, an accumulation of your experiences in order to express something very personal about who you are."

Rincones & Company Dance Theater performs at the Kennedy Center Terrace Theater on Thursday, May 15, at 7:30 p.m. Tickets are $35. Call 202-467-4600. Visit www.rinconesdancetheater.org.

by: OilOnline Thursday, May 08, 2003

Petroleos de Venezuela S.A. (PDVSA) has resumed oil production and has demonstrated its capacity for recovery. Speaking at an event held in conjunction with this year’s Offshore Technology Conference (OTC) in Houston during the week of May 5, PDVSA president Ali Rodriquez Araque said that oil production has returned to its normal level of more than three million barrels per day. Furthermore, former director of Exploration and Production of PDVSA, Luis Vielma, said at a luncheon held May 7 at OTC , “Venezuelan well productivity is low, which will require more technology and investment in the years to come.”

This return to “business as usual” in the oil markets in Venezuela and the need for new technology and investment in the oil sector has set the stage for show organizers, International Exhibitions Inc. of Houston, Texas, and Grupo B.V. de Eventos, C.A. of Caracas, Venezuela, to reschedule its’ 15th Latin American Petroleum Show for June 15-17, 2004 at the Palacios de Eventos in Maracaibo, Venezuela. Shaun Wymes, president of International Exhibitions, said, “Venezuela is a leading oil-producing nation and its pre-eminence in the world oil market is renown. As a sign of our confidence in the strides PDVSA has made in the last few weeks, we are delighted to announce the details of the 2004 Latin American Petroleum Show. The 2004 venue will be a great opportunity for attendees and exhibitors alike to return to doing ‘business as usual’ in Venezuela.”