Carter Proposes Plan to Solve Impasse in Venezuela

www.nytimes.com By GINGER THOMPSON

CARACAS, Venezuela, Jan. 21 — Former President Jimmy Carter dived into this country's tumultuous political crisis this week and offered two proposals today for ending seven weeks of bitter stalemate between President Hugo Chavez and a broad coalition of opponents that has left the country's economy in shambles and its people poised for violence.

In one proposal, Mr. Carter urged the government and its opponents to support a constitutional amendment that would cut the president's term from six years to four. Under such an amendment, President Chavez' term would end this year and new elections could be held soon afterward.

As an alternative to that plan, Mr. Carter suggested that the conflicting parties agree to hold a recall referendum in August that would allow the people to vote on whether President Chavez should remain in office.

"Our feeling is that both sides now want to reach an agreement to end the impasse that is destroying the economy of this country and the social order," Mr. Carter said during a press conference this morning. "I don't think anyone imagined that the strike would last 50 days. And no one wants to see it last for 70 days or 100 days.

"In my opinion," he added, referring to President Chavez and government opponents, "the proposals we have put forward encompass the basic demands of both sides."

Mr. Carter's proposals were drafted after four hours of private meetings with President Chavez on Monday, and numerous hours of meetings with important business people, union officials and political parties who lead the opposition movement against the government. The proposals are aimed at ending a national strike that has shut down most major businesses and crippled the state-owned oil industry. Oil is the lifeblood of the nation's economy, and Venezuela supplies some 14 percent of the oil that the United States imports.

An umbrella opposition group, called the Democratic Coordinator, has upheld the strike for nearly two months in an effort to force President Chavez from power. However, while Venezuela loses more than $50 million a day in oil sales, a determined President Chavez has defied the political pressure against him.

The former lieutenant colonel has kept the economy crawling. In response to the strike, President Chavez has announced the firings of more than 1,000 striking oil workers and begun sporadic imports of food and gasoline to ease critical shortages. Last week, he began seizing warehouses of soft drinks and bottled water that have been closed during the strike.

Mr. Carter said he was confident that his proposals would be well received by the opposition. And he added that there was a "positive reaction," from President Chavez. But he acknowledged that President Chavez also expressed reservations about agreeing to shortening his presidency and to rehiring oil workers who had gone out on strike.

Some 30,000 oil workers reportedly have joined the strike.

Mr. Carter said he urged President Chavez not to fire oil workers who joined the strike because of their political convictions. But he said President Chavez had told him that some workers had been accused of sabotaging refineries and tankers.

"That is a criminal act," Mr. Carter said. "But the decision about the punishment of those people would be made by the court, not the executive and based on evidence."

He added, "I hope there is going to be some backing down on both sides, which is always a crucial element in every dispute in which I have ever been involved."

Mr. Carter said the strike showed that both President Chavez, elected four years ago by an unprecedented majority of voters, and the opposition, whose demonstrations against the government draw hundreds of thousands of people, had seriously underestimated one another. Mr. Carter said, viewed the opposition as "a flash in the pan." And he said the opposition misjudged President Chavez political fortitude.

"I think now they both see the strength of the other side," Mr. Carter said, "and now is the time for them to accommodate those strengths."

President Carter said he presented a written version of the proposal to President Chavez this morning. The proposals were also presented today at negotiations between the government and opposition leaders that are being overseen by OAS Secretary General Cesar Gaviria.

Mr. Carter said the proposals would also be presented Friday in Washington at a meeting of the so-called "Group of Friends." The six-nation group — composed of the United States, Mexico, Brazil, Chile, Spain, and Portugal — is scheduled to discuss strategies for pressing both President Chavez and government opponents toward a peaceful settlement.

He flatly rejected President Chavez' recent calls to add more countries to the group, including Cuba, China, and Russia.

"This group will not be changed," Mr. Cater said. He said later, "Although President Chavez has made proposal for other countries to be members, in my opinion they will no longer be considered. The group is fixed."