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| Caribbean-Latin America |
| State sez Venezuela working to destabilize its neighbors |
| 2005-08-05 |
| The State Department says it has found ''mounting evidence'' that Venezuela is using its oil wealth to fund ''anti-democratic groups'' in Bolivia, Ecuador and elsewhere as part of a plan to destabilize the region. The allegation is contained in a July 27 letter from the department's top congressional affairs official, Matthew Reynolds, to Rep. Ileana Ros Lehtinen of Florida, a member of the House International Relations Committee. The letter was perhaps the clearest expression of administration concerns about the activities of Venezuela's leftist government in the Andean region. It said the State Department is troubled by the close relationship between the governments of Venezuela and Cuba. ''Cuba has a 46-year record of fostering instability and thwarting democracy at home and abroad,'' Reynolds said. He also noted that the administration is worried about Venezuela's program to purchase arms and military equipment, including 100,000 Kalashnikov rifles and military helicopters from Russia and maritime patrol aircraft and vessels from Spain. Asked about the letter by reporters at a briefing, State Department acting spokesman Tom Casey said he stands by the letter but he declined to cite evidence to back up the charges. ''I think if you look at the public actions Venezuela has taken, some of its efforts to use revenues that it's gotten through its oil industry to exercise influence or gain influence over some of its neighbors, you have at least some idea of some of the issues that have concerned us,'' Casey said. Venezuelan Ambassador Bernardo Alvarez rejected the State Department allegations against his government. ''There is no evidence whatsoever,'' he said. ''We have good relations with all of the countries of the region,'' he added, mentioning Colombia, Ecuador, Bolivia, Peru, Brazil and the Caribbean. ''We are using energy as way of promoting real integration of the continent,'' he said. He added that Venezuela is striving for a more balanced relationship between Latin America and the United States to replace the ''hegemonic'' concepts associated with the Monroe Doctrine of 1823. Casey said another source of U.S. concern about Venezuela is the ability of Colombia's largest leftist rebel group, the FARC, to operate on Venezuelan soil. He also complained about the ''lack of controls'' in the border area and called attention to the weapons that find their way ''through illicit means'' into ``the hands of Colombian terrorist groups.'' Reynolds sent the July letter to Ros-Lehtinen in response to a letter she wrote to his office that she said was prompted by expressions of concern by constituents about Venezuelan activities. |
| Posted by:Dan Darling |
| #4 Which explains why Bush is entertaining the President of Columbia in Crawford this month. |
| Posted by: john 2005-08-05 14:32 |
| #3 They can't. It's...broke. |
| Posted by: tu3031 2005-08-05 13:04 |
| #2 Biged, maybe Khartoum would lend him a helicopter.... |
| Posted by: GK 2005-08-05 12:20 |
| #1 I think "Hugo the Magnificent" should suffer an "unfortunate" accident... |
| Posted by: BigEd 2005-08-05 12:03 |