news.ft.com By Andy Webb-Vidal in Caracas Published: February 24 2003 19:57 | Last Updated: February 24 2003 19:57

A pact condemning political violence, signed last week by the government of Venezuela's President Hugo Chávez and opposition leaders, appeared to be breaking down on Monday as opponents threatened to withdraw from the accord.

Opponents of Mr Chávez, grouped in the "Democratic Co-ordinator", warned they could rescind their side of the agreement unless the international community pressed the government into upholding the accord.

The warning follows the house arrest of Carlos Fernández, head of the Fedecamaras business federation, who was captured by armed security police in a heavy-handed midnight raid last week.

Mr Fernández is facing charges of "criminal instigation" and "civil rebellion" for his role in co-leading a two-month strike in December and January aimed, unsuccessfully, at pressing for early elections and forcing Mr Chávez's resignation.

"If the international community does absolutely nothing and the government does not uphold its side of the agreement we will withdraw," said Timoteo Zambrano, an opposition negotiator in talks facilitated by the Organisation of American States (OAS). No outside sanctions were agreed as part of the accord, but opponents of Mr Chávez had hoped members of a six-nation "Group of Friends" would be able to lend diplomatic weight to reinforce the OAS-sponsored agreement.

The group - consisting of Brazil, Mexico, Chile, Portugal, Spain and the US - was formed in January to give fresh impetus to a four-month-old but virtually fruitless effort by the OAS to broker an electoral solution to the country's political deadlock, which has on several occasions spilled over into violence.

However, in a sign that Mr Chávez is willing to put already cool diplomatic relations on the line to deflect outside pressure, he has bluntly warned both the OAS and the "Group of Friends" not to interfere in domestic affairs.

Speaking on his weekly Alo, Presidente television show on Sunday, Mr Chávez accused both the US and Spain of taking sides with his opponents, who charge that the populist president and former paratrooper is governing like a dictator.

Government spokesmen from the US and Spain, and César Gaviria, secretary-general of the OAS, have expressed concern at the handling of Mr Fernández's case. However, the Fedecamaras chief has said he was treated with due respect by the authorities.

Mr Chávez warned Mr Gaviria, a former president of Colombia, "not to step out of line" and to "respect Venezuelan sovereignty".

The opposition warning also comes after a shoot-out in Caracas at the weekend in which one police officer was shot dead, allegedly by government supporters.

www.alertnet.org NEWSDESK   24 Feb 2003 19:09

By David Ljunggren

OTTAWA, Feb 24 (Reuters) - Canada wants the Organization of American States to hold an extraordinary summit this year to discuss the growing chaos in South America but Brazil is effectively blocking the idea, officials said on Monday.

The 34-nation OAS is due to hold its next Summit of the Americas in Argentina in early 2005, but the officials said Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien felt the grouping needed to take stock of increasing disarray in some member states.

"In the last 18 months, close to two years, there have been all kinds of difficult times in the hemisphere," a senior Canadian official told reporters, saying Chretien wanted to look at "the convulsions" that have rocked the OAS recently.

"It (the proposed summit) would partly be an occasion to reassure ourselves, to examine our main objectives and to reaffirm hemispheric cooperation," he said.

The leaders of the OAS held their last summit in Quebec City in April 2001 and since then several South American nations have experienced severe problems.

Argentina suffered an economic meltdown that spilled over into Uruguay. Venezuela is in the grip of an increasingly violent standoff between friends and foes of President Hugo Chavez, 32 people died last week in riots in Bolivia, while Colombia is still in the grip of a decades-long civil war.

Mexican President Vicente Fox is volunteering to host the proposed OAS summit if all member states agree on the need to meet but Brazil has said more than once that it needs more time to study the idea, the official said.

Diplomats said Brazil -- already locked in a protracted dispute with Ottawa over subsidies to aircraft manufacturers -- was reluctant to let Canada take the lead on problems mainly affecting South America.

Canadian Foreign Minister Bill Graham raised the idea of the summit during an official visit to Brazil last month but did not get any firm commitment.

In Brasilia, no one was immediately available for comment at the foreign ministry.

The Quebec City summit focused on the need to strengthen democratic institutions in the OAS and the official said Chretien did not doubt that the organization was heading in the right direction.

"We're getting there. But at the same time there are convulsions in the hemisphere which deserve attention," he said, adding that the proposed summit would discuss "questions of governance, the big principles of democracy and where the hemisphere is going in this regard".

Another reason to hold an interim summit was the fact that since Quebec City, around a dozen OAS members had elected new leaders, he said.

www.vheadline.com Posted: Monday, February 24, 2003 By: Patrick J. O'Donoghue

Print & broadcast media have criticized children’s rights specialists meeting in Caracas to draw up a declaration outlining children’s rights situation in Latin America.  According to reporters, when delegates were asked to provide details and concrete analysis of supposed children’s rights violations in Venezuela during the national stoppage, they were only able to supply regional statistics.

The event was organized by the Education, Culture & Sports (MECD) Ministry, International Defense of Children (IDC), UNICEF, Inter American Institute of the Child (IAIC) and the Central American Parliament. IDC president Jorge Vila says 3 million children in Latin America are outside the school system.

Delegates have called on national institutions to place children first and undertake actions to protest children’s right to education, health, physical and psychological integrity.

Venezuelan children rights groups and UNICEF-Venezuela have failed to reply to reporters' jibes that alleged HR abuses against the right of education during the stoppage were bogus.

www.vheadline.com Posted: Monday, February 24, 2003 By: Patrick J. O'Donoghue

Opposition Coordinadora Democratica (CD) politician Jesus Torrealba says the CD will ask the National Assembly (AN) to open an investigation into the dismantling of Petroleos de Venezuela (PDVSA) and will hire undisclosed international energy agencies “to study the direct relationship between the political interests of some Arab administrations linked to international terrorism and the process of corporative genocide that (President) Chavez Frias is promoting against the Venezuelan oil company.”

Torrealba claims that Chavez Frias is hell bent on ruining national interest and wants to place in the hands of his terrorist allies greater control of the oil market to use as a political tool against the West.”

Torrealba recalls the links of friendships between Chavez Frias and terrorist governments, such as those of Saddam Hussein and Ghaddafi.

www.forbes.com Reuters, 02.24.03, 10:57 AM ET Latin America     By Marc Frank HAVANA, Feb 24 (Reuters) - Communist Cuba's foreign trade declined by more than $900 million in 2002, as a foreign exchange crisis forced Havana to slash imports by $677 million, the official daily Granma said on Monday. "Trade was $5.574 billion ... a 13.9 percent decline compared with 2001," Granma said, reporting on a Foreign Trade Ministry meeting over the weekend. Cuba reported 2001 trade was $6.5 billion, of which $4.838 billion was imports and $1.662 billion exports. Granma said imports declined 14 percent last year and exports 13.6 percent, or by $266 million. The trade deficit was $2.725 billion, a 14.2 percent decline from $3.176 billion in 2001. The trade decline was the first reported by Cuba since 1994, when it began recovering from an economic crisis caused by the demise of former benefactor the Soviet Union. The recovery has slowed since 2000, with the government reporting the gross domestic product up 1.1 percent last year, compared with 3 percent in 2001 and more than 6 percent in 2000. A 5 percent decline in tourism, low sugar prices, hurricanes, shrinking foreign investment and credit and the U.S. trade embargo left the country short of cash to import oil and other products in 2002, Economy Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez recently said. EUROPE AND THE AMERICAS DOMINATE TRADE Western diplomats reported exports of machinery and nonessential items such as cars and computers declined significantly, as did supplies for the sugar industry in the wake of Havana's 2002 decision to close half the country's mills. Europe accounted for 41 percent of Cuba's 2002 trade, the Americas 39 percent and Asia 18 percent, Granma reported. Havana's top trading partners were Venezuela, Spain, China, Canada and Russia in that order, unchanged from 2001. Granma said oil and its derivatives accounted for 21 percent of Cuba's imports last year, and food 20 percent of imports. Developing food trade with the United States was a special focus of the weekend meeting, Granma said. In 2000, the U.S. Congress loosened the trade embargo against Cuba to allow for the sale of agricultural products for cash. Cuba began purchasing U.S. food in December 2001, with 2002 representing the first full year of trade since the United States slapped sanctions on the Caribbean island in the early 1960s. The United States recently reported 2002 agricultural sales to Cuba were around $140 million.