The wonderful imaginary world of friends
www.vheadline.com Posted: Tuesday, March 11, 2003 By: Charles Hardy
VHeadline.com commentarist Charles Hardy writes: While returning recently from a trip to Mexico, I started to think about Mexico's role as one of the "friends" that is meeting this week in Brazil to discuss Venezuela's inner workings.
In 1968, there was a massacre of university students in Mexico City that was neatly covered up by the government because the Olympics were going to be held there. During his campaign, President Fox promised that his government would finally investigate the matter. In 2001, a year after his election, he reneged.
44 years have now passed since the massacre, and Mexico still hasn't been able to confront what happened.
While in a small town, I visited some women who are working in one of Mexico's maquiladoras ... they work from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. with no breaks and only half-an-hour for lunch ... they earn less than $40 a week. I've also been reading about women who are disappearing along the US-Mexico border, many who have been working in this type of factory.
My question: will Mexico advise Venezuela on human rights, labor rights and truth commissions?
I was also given a free newspaper on the airplane in which I read that the Spanish government had just closed a Basque newspaper, and that President Azner was walking hand in hand with the US toward a war in Iraq.
Will Spain give Venezuela advice on freedom of the press and reconciliation?
In the United States, the Supreme Court elected President Bush, while Al Gore had more votes from the people. The biggest problem centered on Florida where his own brother is Governor. Did Mr. Bush ever think of calling for new elections in Florida so as to clarify who really won in that state? Would the US have accepted help from some foreign governments to help solve the problem?
Will the United States recommend to Venezuela how it should conduct its elections?
Yesterday, I watched a Portuguese immigrant throw an empty beer bottle into an open field. I asked him if he would do the same in Portugal ... he just shrugged his shoulders. Many of his Venezuelan construction workers earn less than $150 a month ... he lives in a three-story house.
Will Portugal talk to Venezuela about the great contribution that foreigners are making to this country?
Chile tolerated the dictator Pinochet from 1973 to 1988 and then left him in charge of the military until 1998.
Will Chile try to give Venezuela some lessons on democracy?
With "friends" like these, who needs enemies?
And the last time I was in Rio de Janeiro, thugs tried to attack me two times. There were people sleeping on the streets at night and death squads were exterminating homeless children. The landless people of the Movimiento Sem Terra were struggling for a little bit of dignity and recognition of their rights to work and to live. Has the situation changed?
President Lula may be a nice person, but doesn't Brazil have sufficient problems of its own to confront?
If a group of "friends" would have come to my parents to tell them that they were going to help our family solve its internal difficulties, I know what their reaction would have been. My parents would have responded as most English-speaking people would: "They can go to hell before they are going to enter our house."
When they had calmed down, they would have said, "Why don't they take care of their own homes first?"
My parents were never involved in foreign diplomacy ... they were honest and forthright.
That probably would have disqualified them automatically in the world of international diplomacy, that wonderful imaginary world of "friends."
Charlie A native of Cheyenne, Wyoming (USA), VHeadline.com columnist Charles Hardy has many years experience as an international correspondent in Venezuela. You may email him at: hardyce2@yahoo.com