His Excellency President-for-Life, Caudillo of the Bolivarians Hugo Chavez's government should allow an international investigation into alleged human rights... which are not the same thing as individual rights, mind you...
abuses.
Foreign Minister Nicolas Maduro said the matter is a domestic affair and Washington has no business meddling.
Sounds like he's a little worried.
"We absolutely reject that the US get involved in this issue," he said. "Our country does not accept tutelage from anybody." Maduro was responding to a statement Thursday from the US State Department, which urged the South American nation to permit an investigation "as a means to promote dialogue and understanding." Diplomatic relations between Venezuela and the United States have been tense for years due to mutual antagonism, spurred by Chavez's frequent condemnations of US foreign policy in Latin America and Washington's accusations of deteriorating democracy in Venezuela.
The human rights probe is the key demand of a small but growing group of students conducting a hunger strike and sympathizers who want the chief of the Organization of American States to look into their allegations that the government improperly uses judges and prosecutors to attack Chavez's political adversaries.
Maduro said OAS Secretary-general Jose Miguel Insulza has not contacted Venezuela to make a formal request for a visit.
But Insulza said Friday that he has repeatedly asked for permission to travel to Venezuela.