<a href=www.vheadline.com>Venezuela's Electronic News Posted: Thursday, May 22, 2003 By: Patrick J. O'Donoghue

A Venezuelan citizen is in a state of comma in Cancun, Mexico after several phials of heroin she had swallowed burst inside her stomach. Miriam Gonzalez de Gonzalez (39) is said to have been carrying 44 phials totaling a little more than half a kilo. The local police did not say how Gonzalez de Gonzalez reached Mexico and circumstances relating to her capture.

Aragua 5th Control Court Judge Zomalia Gutierrez has ordered the preventive arrest of Venezuelan lawyer, Felix Acuna for alleged complicity in drug-trafficking activities and obtaining illegal benefits at the cost of public administration.

The same judge has already ordered the arrest of Maracay Police Detective Branch (CICPC) Anti-Drugs Division chief, Alexander Herrera and agent, Francis Medina for their alleged role in exchanging 4.5 kilos of cocaine seized in a raid for maize bread powder.

The State Prosecutor had requested the arrests of Maracay CICPC laboratory chief, Roger Vidal Rios and agents: Valmore Andrade and Julio Ortega but the judge did not find enough evidence to warrant the arrest. Lawyer Felix Acuna had to be interned in a clinic after suffering a heart attack.

The National Guard (GN) Anti-Drugs Command says it has uncovered an ecstasy cartel operating in Venezuela. GN General Jose Antonio Paez Cabrera says the investigation started on May 16 when agents stationed at Caracas (Simon Bolivar) international airport at Maiquetia seized 593 tablets sent to the States via Venezuela's postal service (Ipostel).

"We didn't catch anyone and have mounted an operation ... last week the same person sent another packet containing the tablets to Michigan."

The US Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) has joined the search for the narco-trafficking gang.

<a href=www.vheadline.com>Venezuela's Electronic News Posted: Thursday, May 22, 2003 By: Patrick J. O'Donoghue

In the latest revelations surrounding the case of the Spanish and Colombian embassy explosions, opposition April 11 (2002) coup financial backer Isaac Perez Recao and an Italian car battery businessman ... referred to as Gianni ... allegedly financed terrorist acts against Spanish and Colombian diplomatic buildings and the Teleport Center where government-opposition negotiations had been taking place.  

According to the police, Perez Recao was contacted abroad and paid part of 500 million bolivares towards a destabilization bombing campaign that allegedly had been hatched at a Los Ruices apartment where rebel Generals, Enrique Medina Gomez, Felipe Rodriguez and Nestor Gonzalez and Colonel Yucepe Piglieri met several times.  

The money was spent on buying C4 explosive and hiring people to place the bombs ... among whom were 2 persons in charge of Plaza Altamira security, currently under arrest for their alleged part in the murders of three rebel privates and a young lady. 

Reports allege that State Political & Security (DISIP) Police and CICPC investigations point to former DISIP agent Julio Galati, National Guard (GN) Lieutenant Antonio Colina, Navy Corporal Pedro Sifontes, Luis Chacin Sanguines, alias “Armadillo” and the Italian businessman's bodyguard Ernesto Lovera. 

Sifontes is said to have told Judge Deyanira Nieves that Lovera handed "Armadillo" C4 explosive and the latter monitored the placing out of the explosives from a motorbike.

<a href=www.vheadline.com>Venezuela's Electronic News Posted: Thursday, May 22, 2003 By: Roy S. Carson

Having used the plight of beautiful Miss Venezuela 2003, Mariangel Ruiz to create worldwide headlines, shadowy billionaire Gustavo Cisneros has stepped in to save the maiden in distress by paying for the trip out of petty cash.

Cisneros had played the political violin strings with precision as he launched his media network into overdrive, with Miss Venezuela as the centerpiece, attacking the Venezuelan government saying that Mariangel could not attend the June 3 Miss Universe pageant in Panama because she (personally?) could not get the necessary greenbacks to pay for her participation.

The international PR coup had all the hallmarks of Cisneros' own shadowy participation in the April 11, 2002 coup d'etat against democratically-elected Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez Frias but low-keyed the reality that Cisneros' television syndicate is literally rolling in US revenues from Spanish-language TV stations across America as well as his key participation in Time/AOL, Coca Cola etc.  There was effectively "no way, Jose" that Cisneros was NOT going to have Miss Venezuela turn up for the event, considering the multi$ million revenues the Misses always make for the mogul.

Then, having garnered the worldwide negative publicity he so expertly craved against the Chavez Frias regime, Cisneros played his Howard Hughes' role to a T and called Panamanian organizers Tuesday to tell that Miss Venezuela will indeed be participating in the annual Miss Universe pageant ... he staged to rescue the "damsel in distress" in a supreme show to upstage the Venezuelan government, battling on a home front to contain the economic damage caused by the USA-backed coup d'etat last year and continued rebellion by corrupt elites.

Cisneros' VeneVision TV channel had claimed last week that foreign exchange controls imposed by President Hugo Chavez Frias had prevented it from obtaining $80,000 to send Miss Ruiz (23) to the pageant ... Miss Venezuela president Osmel Sousa had said his organization had the funds in the local bolivares but couldn't exchange them for dollars.

But the Cisneros organization ploy to discredit the government was neatly holed when Edgar Hernandez, the president of CADIVI (the government agency in charge of authorizing dollar sales) said the Miss Venezuela organization hadn't even bothered to apply for dollars ... but that he would consider granting a fast-track currency conversion if officially asked.

Venevision TV executives have remained resolutely mum following Hernandez' explanation and had persisted in their original claim that Venezuela's economic woes threatened Miss Ruiz' candidacy.  Cisneros claims Chavez' government is cracking down on his personal freedoms while Chavez Frias says there is conclusive evidence to show that Cisneros had been involved in destabilization efforts against his reform government.

<a href=www.vheadline.com>venezuela's Electronic News Posted: Thursday, May 22, 2003 By: Patrick J. O'Donoghue

Washington based Human Rights Watch (HRW) says Venezuela's newly approved media content law hinders minimum rights to freedom of expression... 

Concluding a three-day visit to Venezuela, HRW general secretary, Jose Miguel Vivancos points out that the media guarantee democracy, whereas in his view Venezuela's media content law promotes a climate of self-censure. 

The right to truthful and objective information, Vivancos proclaims,  does not exist in international law. 

"We know it exists in the Venezuelan 1999 Constitution, which attempts to gather the principles of international law, but objective information is built on a partial, limited and generic base that the media provides ... people can form an opinion in the measure that alternative sources exist ... people have the right to choose as regards information ... it doesn't take place in Cuba where there is no option."

• Vivancos accepts that the fact that media involvement is the best proof of full exercise of freedom of expression in Venezuela.

"That's democracy ... if the situation changes, we will be forced to highlight it ... freedom of expression is under serious threat in Venezuela because of a legal process against four TV channels, which hangs on a decision from Infrastructure Minister Diosdado Cabello and, of course, government legislation currently under debate in the National Assembly."

<a href=www.vheadline.com>venezuela's Electronic News Posted: Thursday, May 22, 2003 By: Patrick J. O'Donoghue

The government exchange rate administering body (Cadivi) says it has authorized 658 applications for $ 2.8 million dollars to Venezuelan students overseas. 

Among the universities that have filled in all the requirements to authorize dollars for their students abroad are: Universidad de Carabobo (36), Fondo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnologia (43), Universidad de los Andes (170), Universidad Central de Venezuela (93), Universidad Simon Bolivar (29), Universidad Nacional Experimental Politecnica (17), Universidad Centro Occidental Lisandro Alvarado (185) and Universidad del Zulia (85). 

Universities and research institutions must send all the details to the University Sector Planning Office (OPSU), which in turn checks the information before passing it on to Cadivi. 

Universities that have not sent in applications to OPSU are: Yaracuy, Romulo Gallegos, Francisco de Miranda y Tachira technical universities, Universidad de Oriente (UDO), Universidad Pedagogica Experimental Libertador and the Gran Mariscal de Ayacucho Foundation. 

• Applications from the Guayana, Maritima del Caribe y Los Llanos Ezequiel Zamora experimental universities are currently under review. 

Cadivi has called on universities and educational centers that have students studying abroad to speed up the red tape to alleviate the delicate situation Venezuelan students are confronting abroad as regards university enrollment, social security and residence fees.