*** ¿El próximo ataque perverso
a la Revolución Bolivariana?
En Honor al 4 de Febrero de 1992.
Por: Franz J. T. Lee.
***
THE NEXT VICIOUS ATTACK ON THE BOLIVARIAN REVOLUTION?
By
Franz J. T.Lee.
***
REGISTRO DE CÍRCULOS BOLIVARIANOS INTERNACIONALES.
***
Venezuelans march in many thousands to support reformist President Chavez
Frias.
*** Venezuelan opposition radicals seek US-backing for Chavez Frias overthrow.
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http://www.aporrea.org/dameverbo.php?docid=13677
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Vicepresidente
Rangel coincide con EE.UU. en que la oposición no tiene líderes
Por: Venpres
Publicado el Jueves, 05/02/04 12:52pm |
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http://www.aporrea.org/dameverbo.php?docid=13680
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The Bush administration is deliberately concealing from the American people the number and condition of US military personnel who have been wounded in Iraq. The efforts by those few politicians and media figures who have pursued the issue make this clear.
Estimates on the number of US soldiers, sailors and Marines medically evacuated from Iraq by the end of 2003 because of battlefield wounds, illness or other reasons range from 11,000 to 22,000, a staggering figure by any standard. Thousands of these young men and women have been physically or psychologically damaged for life, in turn affecting the lives of tens of thousands of family members and others. And the war in Iraq is less than one year old.
A recent piece by Daniel Zwerdling on National Public Radio (January 7) highlighted some of the difficulties in establishing the truth about US casualties. Zwerdling began by noting that few Americans seemed aware of the large number of US wounded in Iraq. He questioned a few dozen people on the street about the total number of American soldiers who had died in Iraq, and most answered more or less correctly. However, when the NPR correspondent asked about the number of US military personnel who have had to be evacuated with wounds, no one was close to the actual figure. The answers ranged from a few hundred to a thousand.
Zwerdling set about finding the actual number by contacting the appropriate government and military offices. A spokesman for Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld told him to call US Central Command in Tampa, Florida. A spokesman there informed him that only Rumsfeld’s office had such information. A spokesman for the Army provided with him the number of its personnel wounded seriously enough to be evacuated out of Iraq by the end of 2003—8,848—but he had no figures on Marines, Navy Seals or other forces. The United States Medical Command told Zwerdling they were still searching for the numbers.
Zwerdling contacted Sen. Chuck Hagel (Republican-Nebraska), a Vietnam veteran and former deputy administrator of the Veterans Administration. Hagel explained that he had been trying to obtain certain information from Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld, including the “total number of American battlefield casualties in Afghanistan and Iraq. What is the official Pentagon definition of wounded in action? What is the procedure for releasing this information in a timely way to the public and the criteria for awarding a Purple Heart [awarded to those wounded in combat or posthumously to the next of kin of those killed or those who die of wounds received in action]?”
The Nebraska senator also wanted an updated tally on the number of US military personnel who had received Purple Hearts and the dates they were awarded. Six weeks later, Hagel received the provocative reply: the Department of Defense did not have the requested information.
The information on the number of Purple Hearts awarded is significant because it speaks to the total number of battlefield casualties.
In December, Mississippi Democratic congressman Gene Taylor raised the possibility that the Pentagon was deliberately undercounting combat casualties when he brought to light the case of five members of the Mississippi National Guard who were wounded in a booby-trap bomb explosion, but whose injuries were listed as “noncombat” by the military. The truth emerged only because Taylor happened to speak to the most seriously injured of the five at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington. Taylor indicated that he would send a memo to the other members of Congress “and ask if anyone has had a similar incident.”
Other commentators have noted the discrepancy between the number of wounded in combat listed by the military and the large number of service personnel medically evacuated from Iraq, an action, one would imagine, that the military does not encourage or take lightly. In passing, for example, an article in the November 5 European edition of Stars and Stripes noted that the Landstuhl military hospital in Germany had “treated more than 7,000 injured and ill servicemembers from Iraq.” At that time, the military had recorded some 2,000 combat casualties.
The Landstuhl facility, located near the huge Ramstein US airbase, reported January 23 that the total of US medical evacuations from Iraq to Germany by the end of 2003 was 9,433. The number of hostile and “non-hostile” wounded by that point listed by the Army was approximately 2,750.
Julian Borger in the Guardian last August noted the odd imbalance between combat and “non-combat” deaths and injuries. He cited the comments of Lieut. Col. Allen DeLane, in charge of airlifting the wounded into Andrews air force base near Washington, who had already seen thousands of wounded flown in and who told National Public Radio, according to Bolger, “90 percent of injuries were directly war-related.”
As casualties mounted last summer, US military officials did their best to suppress any discussion of the wounded total in particular. Only on July 10, almost four months after the launch of the invasion, CNN reported that for “the first time since the start of the war in Iraq, Pentagon officials have released the number of US troops wounded from the beginning of the war through Wednesday [July 9].”
In keeping the number of wounded from the public, the military high command was aided by the American media. Editor & Publisher Online observed in July that while deaths in combat were being reported, the many non-combat deaths were virtually ignored and the numbers of wounded, in and out of battle, were being under-reported. Questioned by E & P Online, Philip Bennett, Washington Post assistant managing editor of the foreign desk, acknowledged blandly that “There could be some inattention to [the number of injured troops].”
The sharp increase in the number of US wounded in the autumn—the official number of combat wounded alone averaged nearly 100 a week between mid-September and mid-November (lunaville.org)—made the reluctance of the military to provide figures increasingly problematic. Even the servile US media was beginning to request figures. Still the Pentagon officialdom put up as much resistance as it could.
In September 2003, the Post itself noted, “Although Central Command keeps a running total of the wounded, it releases the number only when asked—making the combat injuries of US troops in Iraq one of the untold stories in the war.”
Sen. Bob Graham of Florida, one-time candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination and ranking Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, declared around the same time that he wanted to know how many US soldiers had been wounded in Iraq, but had been unable to find out because the administration would not release the information.
An article in the October 13 New Republic by Lawrence F. Kaplan noted: “Pentagon officials have rebuked public affairs officers who release casualty figures, and, until recently, US Central Command did not regularly publicize the injured total either.” Ten days later, however, E & P Online commented, “Current injury statistics were easily obtained...through US Central Command and the Pentagon, so getting the numbers is no longer a problem.”
In that same New Republic piece, Kaplan discussed the state of many injured soldiers at Walter Reed Army Medical Center. He pointed out that modern medical technique meant that a far higher percentage of wounded soldiers now survived who would have died in previous wars. The use of Kevlar body armor had also reduced deaths. The result, however, was that many of the wounded were left with debilitating injuries, particularly amputated limbs. Because of the higher survival rate, information about the seriously wounded is essential to any accurate picture of the Iraq war.
Kaplan wrote: “The near-invisibility of the wounded has several sources. The media has always treated combat deaths as the most reliable measure of battlefield progress, while for its part the administration has been reluctant to divulge the full number of wounded.”
The number of “combat injuries,” however, is far from the whole story. That leaves out the thousands who have become physically or mentally ill in Iraq. As noted above, estimates of the real number of US servicemen and women evacuated from Iraq by the end of 2003 vary widely.
The British Observer newspaper asserted September 14 that the “true scale of American casualties in Iraq is revealed today by new figures...which show that more than 6,000 American servicemen have been evacuated for medical reasons since the beginning of the war, including more than 1,500 American soldiers who have been wounded, many seriously. The figures will shock many Americans, who believe that casualties in the war in Iraq have been relatively light.”
By the end of November, Roger Roy in the Orlando Sentinel could place the number of those “killed, wounded, injured or...ill enough to require evacuation from Iraq” at approximately 10,000. Roy noted that such figures were hard to track, “leading critics to accuse the military of underreporting casualty numbers.”
Mark Benjamin of United Press International (UPI) has been one of the more assiduous in pursuing an accurate total of the number medically evacuated from Iraq. On December 19, Benjamin reported that in response to a request from UPI the Pentagon had provided a figure of nearly 11,000 US wounded and medical evacuations—2,273 wounded and 8,581 medical evacuations.
Benjamin cited the comments of Aseneth Blackwell, former president of the Gold Star Wives of America, a support group for people who lose a spouse in war, who said the country had not seen such a total since Vietnam. “It is staggering,” she added.
Benjamin pointed out that the Pentagon’s official casualty update as of December 17 reported only 364 soldiers as “non-hostile wounded.”
The largest estimate of the number of medical evacuations from Iraq is to be found in a December 30 article by retired US Army Col. David Hackworth, “Saddam’s in the slammer, so why are we on orange?”
Hackworth writes, “Even I...was staggered when a Pentagon source gave me a copy of a Nov. 30 dispatch showing that since George W. Bush unleashed the dogs of war, our armed forces have taken 14,000 casualties in Iraq—about the number of warriors in a line tank division.” The former colonel adds that the figure “means we’ve lost the equivalent of a fighting division since March. At least 10 percent of the total number” of available personnel—135,000—“has been evacuated back to the USA!”
Lt. Col. Scott D. Ross of the US military’s Transportation Command told Hackworth that as of Christmas his “outfit had evacuated 3,255 battle-injured casualties and 18,717 non-battle injuries,” a total 21,972 servicemen and women. Ross, however, cautioned that his figure might include some of the same service members counted more than once.
The major categories of “non-battle” evacuations included orthopedic surgery, 3,907; general surgery, 1,995; internal medicine, 1,291; psychiatric, 1,167; neurology, 1,002; gynecological (mostly pregnancy-related), 491.
Hackworth concludes that “it’s safe to say that, so far, somewhere between 14,000 and 22,000 soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines have been medically evacuated” from the war zone in Iraq.
Once back in the US, the injured are stored in dozens of military medical facilities around the country, their existence virtually ignored by the administration, their plight largely unreported by the media.
Until a public outcry improved matters, many wounded veterans, UPI reported in October, had to wait “weeks and months for proper medical help” at military facilities such as Fort Stewart in Georgia and were “being treated like dogs,” according to one officer. The indifference of Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld to the fate of US servicemen and women is a part of their general contempt for the broad layers of the working population, Iraqi and American.
The deliberate obscuring of the human toll of the war and occupation in Iraq is an indication of considerable nervousness within the Bush administration. Despite the official claims of overwhelming popular support, the political and media establishment knows full well that opposition to this war is growing, and that an accurate picture of the war’s devastating consequences would further turn the tide of public opinion.
See Also:
New
signs of discontent in the military: “Stop-loss” orders prevent soldiers
from leaving US Army
[20 January 2004]
More
questions on the deaths and illnesses of American soldiers
[10 October 2003]
Thousands
of US troops evacuated from Iraq for unexplained medical reasons
[9 September 2003]
America’s
maimed come home from Iraq
[30 July 2003]
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2004/feb2004/woun-f04.shtml
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The announcement by the Bush administration that it plans a budget deficit of $521 billion for the 2004 fiscal year—a record in dollar terms—is certain to bring further warnings of the dangers to the world financial system posed by the escalating US debt.
Last month the International Monetary Fund published a report stating that there were “significant risks” for the American economy and the rest of the world from growing US budget deficits. Significantly its warnings were echoed in a paper co-authored by former US Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin which was presented to a meeting of the American Economic Association in early January.
The paper, written by Rubin and well-known economists Peter Orszag of the Brookings Institute and Allan Sinai of Decision Economics, warned that the US federal budget was on “an unsustainable path” and that in the absence of significant policy changes deficits would total around $5 trillion over the next decade.
“The scale of the nation’s projected budgetary imbalances is now so large that the risk of severe adverse consequences must be taken very seriously, although it is impossible to predict when such consequences may occur.”
The Bush administration has sought to quell such concerns by offering assurances that it will halve the deficit by 2009. But these assurances do not cut much ice given that the administration only two years ago projected a deficit of just $14 billion for the fiscal year 2004.
One of the main arguments of the Rubin-Orszag-Sinai paper is the “conventional view” that the costs of budget deficits tend to build up gradually over time rather than occurring suddenly may not be correct.
“Substantial deficits projected far into the future,” they write, “can cause a fundamental shift in market expectations and a related loss of confidence both at home and abroad. The unfavourable dynamic effects that could ensue are largely if not entirely excluded from the conventional analysis of budget deficits. This omission is understandable and appropriate in the context of deficits that are small and temporary; it is increasingly untenable, however, in an environment with deficits that are large and permanent. Substantial ongoing deficits may severely and adversely affect expectations and confidence, which in turn can generate a self-reinforcing negative cycle among the underlying fiscal deficit, financial markets, and the real economy.”
The negative cycle could involve loss of investor confidence and a decision by international investors to shift out of dollar-based assets. That would spark a fall in the dollar and a rise in interest rates, leading to a decline in stock prices and reductions in household wealth. The result would be in a further loss of confidence.
They warned that failing to act sooner rather than later only made the problem more difficult to resolve and “raises the probability of fiscal and financial disarray at some point in the future.”
Other analysis of fiscal projections shows that the problem is bigger than has so far been officially acknowledged.
On January 6, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) issued new projections showing that the cumulative deficit between 2004 and 2013 would reach $2.3 trillion. But this is generally acknowledged to be an understatement.
A study by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities issued on February 1 noted that if likely or virtually certain costs, left out of the CBO projection, were added back in then the deficit projection for the next 10 years rose to $5.2 trillion.
The Center’s analysis made it clear that the budget blowout is not due to increases in domestic spending but is the result of the Bush tax cuts—aimed primarily at the wealthy—and increased spending on the military and “homeland security.” As a result of the tax cuts, revenues in 2004 will total only 15.8 percent of GDP—the lowest level since 1950—and will only average 17.1 percent of GDP over the coming decade, lower than average levels for every decade in the second half of the twentieth century.
In January 2001 estimates from the CBO showed surpluses for the 10-year period to 2011 totalling $5 trillion. Now it is estimated that there will be a deficit over the same period of $4.3 trillion. According to the Center’s report, approximately 35 percent of this $9.3 trillion turnaround is due to the tax cuts made by the Bush administration. Another 28 percent is due to increased spending, more than two thirds of which arises from increased costs for the military, homeland security and the “war on terrorism”. Only one-twenty-fifth of the new spending represented the increased costs of domestic programs outside of homeland security. The remainder of the turnaround was accounted for by over-optimistic estimates by the CBO in 2001.
Besides the financial dangers there are also concerns that the growing budget and balance of payments deficits may have adverse implications for the conduct of US foreign policy. An article by Sherle R. Schwenninger, entitled “America’s ‘Suez Moment’”, published in the latest issue of the Atlantic Monthly points out that while its military might is unchallenged, the US economy is dependent on the inflow of foreign capital with China and Japan holding so much US debt that they could “exert enormous leverage on American foreign policy.” If China were to disagree with a particular policy initiative, such as a decision to invade North Korea, it could move to dump US Treasury bills and other dollar-denominated assets, causing the value of the dollar to plunge and leading to a “major crisis” for the US economy.
“China and Japan,” the article pointed out, “wouldn’t have to be consciously hostile to wreak havoc; they could create a currency crisis by accident, through either bad policy decisions or instability in their own economies. Both countries have weak banking systems that are burdened by bad loans that will never be repaid. Economists have long warned that the collapse of Japan’s banking system could devastate the United States. A Chinese banking crisis could cause equally severe problems.”
Schwenninger recalled that at the height of its imperial domination, in contrast to the present position of the US, Britain was a net exporter of capital. However the empire declined and in 1956 its demise from great-power status was made clear in the clash with the US over Suez. “US policymakers should take note: Britain was brought to its knees not by a military defeat but by an economic one—specifically, America’s refusal to support the British pound, which created a monetary crisis for the British government, forcing it to call off its ill-advised campaign with France and Israel to recapture the Suez Canal after nationalisation by Egypt. As international debt grows, the United States becomes ever more vulnerable to its own Suez moment.”
Schwenninger, who wants a return to a more multilateral approach to foreign policy, clearly hopes that the growing economic difficulties will force a change from the bellicose agenda of the Bush administration. Such hopes are misplaced. Rather than resulting in a less aggressive foreign policy, the economic difficulties of the US will see ever more strenuous attempts to counter its economic decline with the use of military force, whatever administration rules in Washington. This dialectic was pointed out by Leon Trotsky more that 70 years ago as he analysed the rise of American imperialism in the 1920s.
Any belief that economic problems would restrict American imperialism, he wrote, could only result in the grossest errors. “In the period of crisis the hegemony of the United States will operate more completely, more openly, and more ruthlessly than in the period of boom.” The US would seek to extricate itself from its difficulties at the expense of its rivals “whether this takes place peacefully or through war.”
See Also:
Whither
the US dollar?
[25 November 2003]
UN
agency warns of “anxious time” for world economy
[13 October 2003]
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2004/feb2004/defi-f04.shtml
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Venezuelans march in many thousands to support reformist President Chavez
Frias
Thousands of Venezuelans have marched through Caracas in support of reformist President Hugo Chavez Frias and to mark the 12th anniversary of the 1992 attempted coup d'etat that brought the Army Lieutenant to the political stage. As commander of a paratrooper regiment Chavez Frias had led a revolt against corruption-besotted Accion Democratica (AD) President Carlos Andres Perez (CAP) who was impeached and imprisoned on multi-$ million corruption charges just 15 months as Venezuelans began to reach to decades of political and economic looting that left more than 80% of the population in abject poverty.
Even anti-Chavez international observers have had to admit that he had sown the seeds of a popular democratic revolution against a CAP's "false democracy, marked by corruption and resentment among Venezuela's impoverished majority."
Government supporters turned Caracas streets into "rivers of red berets" (a symbol of Chavez' peaceful revolution) as they marched to the La Rinconada horse racing track to hear the President speak.
Chavez' opponents, faced with a dismal failure of their contentious efforts to raise enough signatures to call for a revocatory referendum against his corruption-persecuting rule, hung black flags from the windows of their luxury mansions and apartments before setting off for a candlelight vigil against Venezuela's new-found democracy which establishes equal rights for all citizens. Supporters say Chavez has given Venezuela's poor greater access to health care and education and a voice they never had before in Venezuelan politics.
Chavez had declared February 4 to be "a day of national jubilee," while opposition leaders made great show of mourning those who were killed during the foiled coup and another in November the same year ... his critics accuse him of accumulating power and running roughshod over democratic institutions by insisting they should pay income and other taxes after decades of tax evasion and impunity from criminal charges afforded to those who could bribe court officials and judges.
http://www.vheadline.com/readnews.asp?id=14801
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Venezuelan opposition radicals seek US-backing for Chavez Frias overthrow
Voice of America (VOA), the US government propaganda broadcaster, is reporting from Washington that Venezuela's opposition is seeking US observers to preempt sovereign Venezuelan decisions in a petition to call for a revocatory referendum against President Hugo Chavez Frias.
VOA reporter Michael Bowman reports from Washington that the (opposition) leaders are appealing to the United States to send an observer mission to Caracas to monitor developments.
Obviously feeling the heat from home as the National Elections Council (CNE) gets closer to a public announcement of their failure to achieve the number of signatures required under the terms of the 1999 Constitution, the "leaders" are said to be expressing deep concerns about the fate of "more than three million signatures collected last year in support of a referendum." Although Venezuela's National Elections Council (CNE) has dutifully followed electoral regulations to the letter, opposition elements appear determined not to recognize the constitutional authority despite supportive endorsements by the Organization of American States (OAS) and former US President Jimmy Carter's Carter Center, each with their own observer teams.
Nevertheless, Beltway observers see the move as the latest ploy by the Bush administration to give excuse for a military intervention to secure Venezuelan's oil supplies to North America, neglecting to understand that it was the Venezuelan opposition that organized and followed-through on a crippling labor stoppage a year ago that saw critical oil supplies to the United States strangled by US-backed saboteurs causing nearly $8 billion in revenue losses.
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Negating the fact that it is already a constitutional requirement, VOA reports that Venezuelan Confederation of Trade Unions (CTV) boss Manuel Cova insists that the CNE must operate with complete openness and transparency in judging the validity of the referendum petition drive. VOA's Michael Bowman incorrectly describes opposition deputy Timoteo Zambrano as a "Venezuelan Senator" -- the Senate has been defunct for the last four years -- and quotes him as saying that "the only way to assure transparency is through the presence of international observers."
Teams of OAS and Carter Center observers are already in Caracas...
But, unabashed, Zambrano insists "we are asking representatives of the US Congress about the possibility of sending a legislative delegation to Venezuela to observe all sectors of society as the process [of checking signatures] goes forward!"
Meanwhile, following a visit to Venezuela last month, former US President Jimmy Carter had stated that he saw a Venezuelan people remain committed to democracy, and he believed the CNE would make the proper democratic decision on the referendum petition if 2.4 million verified signatures have indeed been collected to support the recall.
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The week before last a report appeared in the Miami Herald, which said that President Chavez was scheduled to visit this country on January 30-31, to discuss Venezuela's claim to Guyana's land. It cited as the source for this, Minister of Foreign Affairs Rudy Insanally; however, the Minister told this newspaper that although those dates had been mooted, they had not been confirmed. President Chavez did not come, of course, although since actual dates are under discussion perhaps it is not too unrealistic to suppose that he might still do so in the not-so-distant future. President Chavez, has been preoccupied with domestic matters ever since the failed coup in April 2002, and everything has appeared to have been relatively quiescent on our western frontier since that time - or at least, since the PdVSA strike which began at the end of that year. When boundary matters have obtruded into the political preoccupations of the neighbouring government, they have related to Colombia, rather than to Guyana. And there have been real tensions on the Colombian-Venezuelan frontier, sections of which are penetrated on a regular basis by Colombian left-wing guerillas, right-wing paramilitaries and criminal elements from both nations. The US has accused President Chavez of giving active assistance to the Colombian guerillas, although this has been strenuously denied by Miraflores. The least that can be said is that there are parts of Venezuela's border with her western neighbour where the writ of Caracas does not run. It has been announced in the Venezuelan press that President Chavez is to meet President Uribe of Colombia at the end of February to discuss their border problems, so perhaps the neighbouring head of state is in a frontier mode. Where this country is concerned, he may have various motives for being open to discussions now - presuming, of course, that he really does want to come here - given his active role in continental politics, and his stand-off with Washington. President Chavez, however, has a history with the border controversy which should not be ignored. In the first place, in his early days he showed a certain impatience with the multilateral process, being quoted just before he became President as saying that it might be necessary "to look for other mechanisms [to solve the border controversy]... especially negotiations on a government to government basis." Negotiations between the Colombians and Venezuelans are undertaken on a bilateral basis, but it would be sheer folly for Guyana to buckle to the neighbouring head of state's sense of urgency, and come out from under the shade of the multilateral umbrella. It should be remembered too, that prior to his preoccupation with domestic difficulties, he had maintained a consistently aggressive stance in relation to our frontier. Early on he had referred to Venezuela's need for "a terriotrial revindication of the wide section of Guyana," and one of his first forays into hemispheric summitry saw him engaged in public advocacy of Venezuela's meretricious claim to Essequibo. This was at the meeting of South American heads of government which had been called by President Cardoso in August 2000. It must be said that on that occasion we went prepared, and President Jagdeo held his own briefing outlining Guyana's case. During Mr Chavez' presidency there has been more than one incursion into Guyana's air-space by military aircraft, including an incident which occurred on December 24, 1999. Following the inevitable protest, the Venezuelan authorities disingenuously informed their Guyanese counterparts that it was just "the customary New Year salute to the garrisons posted at the frontiers of the Republic." In another case that same year, the explanation proferred was that the planes were engaged in anti-narcotics exercises. There were also territorial intrusions, as well as economic aggression, when three oil companies granted exploration licences off the Essequibo coast by Guyana, were pressured by Venezuela into relinquishing them. In the meantime, Venezuela has granted international oil companies licences for three blocks, and invited bids on two others, to explore for hydrocarbons in the Orino-co delta region. Fears have been expressed that one of those blocks - block 5 - might impinge on Guyana's maritime space. Whether this is so or not, has never been clarified by our Ministry of Foreign Affairs, although we did report that they were in discussions with Caracas about it. Finally, it must also not be forgotten that Venezuela's new constitution introduced under President Chavez incorporates the dubious Article 10, which by implication could repudiate the 1899 Award. While as far as the international domain is concerned, this article has no practical consequence, it is still not something about which Guyana should feel comfortable. Hopefully, we can presume that the Government of Guyana has not moved from the traditional position that the 1899 Award was a full, perfect and final settlement, and that in the case of Essequibo, joint development with Venezuela is a definite no-no. One hopes too, as said above, that the administration will not be tempted or harried into bilateral negotiations concerning this particular boundary. As President Chavez has demonstrated over his years in office, he is a man who likes to act quickly. If he does come here, therefore, he might not give State House much notice. Despite the fact that our government has domestic problems of its own at the moment, one can only wish that it ensures that adequate preparation is done in anticipation of his visit, so that our head of state is more than adequately briefed on what remains a complex matter. http://www.stabroeknews.com/index.pl/article_editorial?id=2972099 |
Cospomolitik y www.sendika.org Traducida para Rebelión por Marina Trillo
James Petras estuvo en Turquía del 7 al 17 de enero de 2004. Fue su primera visita a este país, cercano a sus orígenes familiares, y la visita fue una contribución muy valiosa para los activistas turcos y militantes de los movimientos sociales que, desde hace mucho tiempo conocen y siguen sus estudios, especialmente sobre imperialismo y movimientos sociales Iberoamericanos. Petras fue invitado a Turquía por las Casas del Pueblo (Halkevleri - una organización democrática vecinal de la clase obrera) y por Cosmopolitik una revista trimestral, que está publicando sus libros en turco. Dio dos conferencias en Estambul y Ankara bajo el título de "Imperialismo, Globalización y Resistencia". A continuación sigue la entrevista realizada a Petras, con fecha 16 enero 2003, por Çigdem Çidamlý y Hakan Tanittiran para Cospomolitik y www.sendika.org (una web obrera en turco).
-- Petras, hoy uno de los problemas históricos más importantes de Turquía ha llegado a un punto decisivo; el problema de Chipre. Salió elegido un gobierno liberal en la sección turca, en el norte de Chipre, que es apoyado también por el gobierno de AKP en Turquía y ambos dan apoyo al Plan de Annan. ¿Cuáles son sus comentarios sobre el asunto?
-- Creo que la cuestión de Chipre fue una tragedia doble. Primero el derrocamiento de Makarios y el ascenso de la facción de extrema derecha del nacionalismo griego, Grivas, Sampson, etc. Sampson era un psicópata. Creo que ésta fue la primera tragedia. La segunda tragedia fue la invasión y la ocupación de Chipre por el ejército turco, con el estímulo de Kissinger. Esto rebajó la posibilidad de un Chipre independiente, neutral, que pienso que era la idea de Makarios. El ala izquierda progresista de la sección griega era un Partido Comunista que tenía un programa muy moderado. Yo creo que hoy la idea de un Chipre unificado está en el orden del día con el surgimiento de una nueva generación en el norte, con el aumento de movimientos progresistas y con el relativo declive del Denktash y su política reaccionaria. Creo que el lado griego es más conciliatorio y no puede volver al pasado. Creo que lo que veremos es una especie de gobierno federal unitario en el que habrá autogobierno en el ámbito regional para ambas comunidades y en el ámbito nacional tendrá que haber cierta acomodación y reconocimiento del gobierno de ambas mayorías y respeto a los derechos de las minorías, garantizados por la Unión Europea. Bajo estas condiciones, tengo la esperanza de que las fuerzas progresistas, los sindicatos, las fuerzas de clase, puedan formar un movimiento sindical unido, un movimiento ecologista unido, etc. Para que se aclaren los asuntos de clases y se calmen las animosidades nacionales y étnicas. La apertura de movimiento entre las dos zonas fue un muy buen primer paso; las personas pueden empezar a conocerse entre sí etc. En ese sentido soy optimista. Por supuesto nunca se sabe lo que puede suceder en estas circunstancias, a mí me preocupa de modo especial el ala derecha del ejército en Turquía que apoyó totalmente al Denktash y puede vetar el arreglo final.-- ¿Cómo ve usted la posición de Turquía en general en la región Euro-Caucásica?
-- Bien con los grandes cambios, creo que es una gran oportunidad para la izquierda; la estrategia estadounidense para esta región ha cambiado. Antes Turquía era un cliente estratégico muy importante para EEUU, a causa de la Unión Soviética, a causa del ala nacionalista de izquierdas, a causa del aislamiento de Israel. Así que los EEUU pusieron mucho énfasis en el Mediterráneo Oriental y en Turquía. Ahora con la desintegración de la URSS, con EEUU estableciendo clientes nuevos en Georgia, Uzbekistán, Turquestán etc., tienen otros puntos operativos, no se sienten amenazados por Rusia, así que ahora se están expandiendo. Están más interesados en la expansión que en la contención. En el Oriente Medio, están creando clientes nuevos con los Kurdos en Irak Septentrional. Están buscando algún tipo de liberalización en la India y por supuesto hay algunos vínculos entre la Unión Europea e Irán. Esto significa que Turquía ya no es tan vital dentro de la estrategia imperialista. Esto es muy positivo porque debilita la posición del ejército. En el pasado decían, "somos los socios más importantes de los Estados Unidos"; ahora la cuestión se dirige más al desarrollo interno que a la dependencia exterior. Si ahora la izquierda destaca que Turquía puede jugar un papel independiente, jugará un papel independiente, y su punto inicial fue la negativa a enviar a tropas a Irak. Creo que esto apunta hacia estas posibilidades. Hay mucha más capacidad interna, para definir una política exterior alternativa, una política exterior democrática, con autodeterminación, con solidaridad internacional con la gente oprimida, no al nivel estatal sino al nivel popular.--¿Quiénes
pueden ser los socios de la izquierda turca en la región?
-- Creo que en un ámbito
significa que la izquierda puede empezar a desarrollar lazos más
fuertes con la resurgencia del nacionalismo en Irak, la izquierda que
está débil en Irán y con parte de los movimientos
pan árabes que están resurgiendo de nuevo. En el ámbito
estatal quiere decir que se dispone de un proyecto para diversificar las
relaciones comerciales de Turquía de estrictamente la UE y EEUU,
hacia relaciones más amplias con los países del Oriente Medio
especialmente Irán. Es difícil de ver ahora, porque estamos
en un período muy fluido. La oposición al imperialismo estadounidense
está dominada en un grado considerable por la derecha Islámica:
antiimperialismo de derechas y antiimperialismo de izquierdas. Así
que para la izquierda secular y democrática hay limitadas oportunidades
para desarrollar relaciones sólidas. Quizás algunas coincidencias
prácticas sobre cuestiones anticoloniales. En lo que respecta a
la solidaridad internacional ideológicamente compatible, piense a
menor escala.
-- En Turquía
hay ahora una facción integracionista (en pro de la Unión
Europea) de las clases gobernantes incluido el gobierno neoliberal de
AKP, los grandes jefes etc. y algunas secciones de la clase gobernante
y del ejército están produciendo reacciones más nacionalistas
contra esta integración neoliberal y esta división está
influyendo sumamente a la izquierda en general. ¿Cree usted que es
posible que la izquierda apoye a una de estas facciones o establezca alianzas
con la llamada ala nacionalista del ejército como en el caso de Chávez?
-- Creo que hay ahora una importante
doble tentación para la izquierda. Una es apoyar de modo crítico
al gobierno de Erdogan, porque proporciona más espacio para la
política a costa del liberalismo económico: Un pacto con
el diablo. La otra sección de la izquierda dice, "Vale, debemos
apoyar tácticamente al estado, el estado es el ejército
contra el liberalismo aunque sepamos que son autoritarios y represivos.
Las dos tentaciones del diablo. Creo que es un error para la izquierda
formar cualquier tipo de alianza, corta o larga, con cualquier grupo. Si
hay un golpe militar contra Erdogan todos protestaremos contra este gobierno
militar, pero eso no significa que uno deba dar apoyo político al
gobierno. El problema entonces es definir una nueva clase de socialización,
que no sea ni estatalista ni mercado. Para proporcionar una comprensión
clara de que cuando nosotros hablamos acerca del socialismo no estamos
hablando acerca de un estado administrado burocráticamente. Debemos
hablar sobre fábricas controladas por los obreros; debemos hablar
sobre las organizaciones administrativas que son responsables ante los consumidores
y los receptores de los programas públicos. Eso significa representantes
en vivienda, representantes elegidos en programas médicos y en educación,
padres y otros. Debemos hablar claramente acerca de qué es realmente
socialismo. Autogobierno por los productores, no burocracia estatal sobre
las personas. Si surge allí, como en Venezuela, un antiguo oficial
militar, democráticamente elegido, en clara oposición al imperialismo
y que abra el espacio político, que permita a la izquierda promover
las organizaciones populares, entonces yo creo que sería una cuestión
para abrir debate sobre cómo participar críticamente en ese
proceso. Pero es un error pensar en un Chávez en el contexto del
ejército turco. Chávez ha ganado seis elecciones libres, congresal,
constitucional y dos elecciones presidenciales. Son más que las elecciones
de cualquier político burgués. Así que pienso que
no debemos hacer analogías entre situaciones que son diferentes.
Es un error decir, "Vale, hay nacionalistas, apoyemos el golpe"... En el
golpe el ejército siempre determina lo que habrán de hacer
los que los apoyan. Este es uno de los graves riesgos, tomar atajos al poder.
Es una tentación cuando queda mucho camino por delante.
-- Volvamos
a Ibero América, el continente de movimientos sociales más
prometedores contra el neoliberalismo. "Revolución de amplitud continental",
¿qué se puede decir acerca de las posibilidades y esfuerzos
sobre este ideal de movimientos revolucionarios en la actual izquierda y
movimientos sociales Iberoamericanos?
-- Hay muchas tentativas desde
direcciones diferentes para crear un movimiento e ideología unitarios.
Hay muchas semillas plantadas. Por ejemplo está la Confederación
de Organizaciones Campesinas Latinoamericanas, CLOC, y esta es una reunión
periódica de las organizaciones de campesinos y granjeros que
tratan de planificar un calendario de actividades conjuntas: fechas diferentes,
manifestaciones diferentes etc. El segundo es los Movimientos de Solidaridad
Bolivarianos que proceden de Venezuela y en menor grado de Colombia. Están
estableciendo sus redes para propagar la idea de un nacional populismo
Bolivariano. Hay otras organizaciones internacionales de indios y mujeres,
que se celebran reuniones. Está el Foro Social de Porto Alegre y
está el foro más antiguo de Sâo Paulo, que reúnen
a todos los viejos social demócratas, social liberales, marxistas,
etc. Todos ellos abarcan corrientes diferentes e intercambian ideas e incluyen
a líderes muy conocidos. Intercambian ideas, expresan solidaridad
cuando hay represión, celebran las victorias comunes, pero no es
un movimiento centralizado. Cada movimiento mantiene su autonomía,
lo cual tiene su lado positivo: ningún país ni grupo dictan
su programa de actividades. Por otra parte no tiene suficiente cohesión
y dirección. Por eso cuando algunos movimientos o partidos se vuelven
más conservadores, todavía permanecen en la asociación.
Por ejemplo el llamado Partido de los Trabajadores, de Brasil, es ahora
un partido neoliberal, pero aún se considera un promotor líder
del Foro Social. Pienso puede ser un paso delante en el sentido de alguna
coordinación, pero no en clarificación ideológica: es
el pluralismo y la unidad el coste de la claridad ideológica y política.
-- ¿Cree Usted que dentro de los movimientos anti ALCA Iberoamericanos se puede dar un paso revolucionario hacia adelante?
-- Sí creo que el movimiento anti ALCA es muy importante. Es la constatación de que estamos en transición del neoliberalismo al colonialismo. Y esto ha despertado a una mayoría de personas a oponerse de modo activo al ALCA. De nuevo hay insuficiente cohesión y movilización respecto al asunto del ALCA sobre una base de amplitud continental. Hay grandes manifestaciones contra el ALCA que tienen lugar en momentos distintos con líderes diferentes. Sus muchas corrientes no están todavía unidas en un río.-- El desplome
de la Unión Soviética, este fenómeno se convirtió
en un punto decisivo en las discusiones internas de la izquierda turca
a principios de los años 1990. ¿Cuáles son sus comentarios
acerca de tal desarrollo para las otras partes de la izquierda internacional?
-- La Unión Soviética
no fue referencia para el modelo revolucionario de Iberoamérica.
El principal ejemplo de revolución victoriosa fue Cuba, al igual
que en Asia lo fue durante mucho tiempo China. Así que cuando la Unión
Soviética se desplomó, se convirtió en crisis primero
entre los Partidos Comunistas, que se fracturaron y muchos de ellos desaparecieron.
Y también para los intelectuales pequeño burgueses que creían
que la Unión Soviética les proporcionaba alguna base para
sus propias actividades políticas. Francamente, yo creo que el desplome
de la Unión Soviética sirvió de excusa a muchos intelectuales
para justificar su giro a la derecha. Creo que la tendencia, que empieza
en los años 1970 con las ONG y la absorción gradual en la
política democrática burguesa aceleró esta tendencia,
privilegiando a la democracia burguesa sobre la lucha para la transformación
social. Utilizaron el argumento de que la Unión Soviética
falló porque no era una democracia, en vez de ver las divisiones
de clases en la Unión Soviética como el hecho principal que
socavó al régimen. Así que las diferentes interpretaciones
acerca de lo que fue la contradicción principal de la Unión
Soviética permitieron que estos intelectuales continuaran su viaje.
Ahora ¿qué impacto
tuvo de hecho el final de la URSS? En Brasil los movimientos crecieron
a pesar de, o quizás a causa de, este desplome. Los cocaleros se
expandieron en Bolivia. En Argentina tuvimos la gran insurrección
de movimientos en 2001. En Colombia tuvimos un Partido Comunista y uno de
los grupos guerrilleros, el FARC, identificados hasta cierto punto con el
modelo soviético. Tuvieron debate interno, autocrítica y
después se reorientaron hacia lo que podemos denominar comunismo
nacional. No hubo una debilitación importante de la izquierda en
Colombia aunque estuviera de alguna manera influida por el Partido comunista
que estaba muy subordinado a la política soviética. En Venezuela
la izquierda se movió en alianza con Chávez y el nacionalismo,
y el PC ya se había reducido a un grupo pequeño después
de las divisiones de la guerrilla en los años 1960. Así que
en general podemos decir que la izquierda revolucionaria ha estado mas influida
por las condiciones en Iberoamérica que fomentaron la creación
de una ola revolucionaria nueva sin referencia a poderes exteriores. En muchos
aspectos este es un desarrollo muy positivo. Los movimientos se basan, no
en los conflictos entre estados, sinó en el desarrollo de conflictos
entre clases.
-- Estos nuevos
conflictos de clase, ¿qué tipo de oportunidades proporcionan
para la recreación de una alternativa revolucionaria nueva?
-- Seamos claros, la gran exclusión
de las masas de la producción, el desplazamiento de los obreros
de las fábricas, los cambios tecnológicos, la reorganización
del trabajo y la movilidad del capital han creado una reserva inmensa
de trabajo precario, de parados, que ha empezado un proceso autoorganización.
Y esta cara del capitalismo, esta dislocación ha llevado a formas
nuevas de organización fuera de las fábricas e industrias,
en los barrios y las calles. Y creo que esto necesita aún mayor
elaboración teórica. La segunda cosa es que, la ruptura
más decisiva dentro de la estructura social de los países
del Tercer Mundo está teniendo lugar en el sector agrícola
donde la agricultura todavía representa el 30% y más de
la población. Este fenómeno de ruptura de la estructura
agrícola ha llevado a enormes excedentes de mano de obra rural,
llamémosles trabajadores rurales sin tierra o campesinos empobrecidos,
quienes ya no ven las ciudades como un escape porque las ciudades en sí
mismas no ofrecen una solución en forma de empleo industrial. Así
que hay tres respuestas a eso: La tradicional de la migración a las
capitales de provincia, la segunda es la emigración al extranjero
y la tercera es quedarse y luchar. Esto significa que los movimientos agrícolas
a pesar de los desfavorables cambios demográficos han vuelto a la
vanguardia de las luchas de masas. En India, en Iberoamérica, y quizás
podamos ver otra vez su expresión en Turquía.
Así que debemos de tratar
de analizar los diferentes puntos, donde esta acumulación centrada
en el imperio está creando las relaciones más conflictivas.
Yo no creo que debamos hablar en términos de procesos de “acumulación
general”. Creo que tenemos que examinar estos procesos precisamente por
sus efectos específicos sobre sectores y clases diferentes de la
sociedad. Estudiar al nivel abstracto de “la lógica del capital”
puede ser verdad, pero no es muy relevante hasta que queramos vincularlo
a la teoría de la acción. Debemos ver donde suceden las rupturas
y la acción o donde pueden suceder potencialmente. Esto es porque
aquéllos de nosotros que estamos interesados en la acción política
no deseamos estudiar los procesos generales por sí mismos, sino
sólo cuando entran en el campo de la acción social - conflicto
de clases, luchas con el estado y eso me lleva al último punto.
Tenemos un fenómeno ahora
cuando las luchas se politizan inmediatamente desde que el capital, el
capital centrado en el imperio, entra en nuevas áreas de explotación,
a sectores agrícolas, en la reorganización de la industria
y las finanzas. El capital extranjero no tiene hegemonía dentro
de la sociedad: es claramente un fenómeno exterior, no como el
antiguo capital familiar nacional con sus relaciones y vínculos
paternalistas con los pobres, los campesinos, etc. El capital imperial
requiere intervención activa y directa del estado para regular
la industria y las finanzas, reorganizando el proceso del trabajo, facilitando
la compra de la tierra y el desplazamiento de los campesinos etc. Así
que todas las contradicciones, todos los conflictos de modo directo o indirecto
implican directamente al estado. Por ello esto es tanto una oportunidad
como un problema. Es una posibilidad que politice rápidamente los
movimientos y las luchas y un problema porque el estado es mucho más
fuerte que los capitalistas individuales y los terratenientes.
-- En sus conferencias
aquí en Turquía usted destacó que los movimientos
anti neoliberales de muchos países Iberoamericanos habían
llegado a las puertas del Palacio Presidencial, pero no entraron en él.
Estos son países, como usted sabe, que al menos durante 20 años
han estado sujetos a programas neoliberales, tienen enormes masas de obreros
empobrecidos pero no industrializados; en tales condiciones ¿cuales
pueden ser las piedras angulares de un programa popular y pre-socialista
en dichos países si llegara a suceder allí un verdadero cambio
revolucionario del poder?
-- Ante todo creo que la izquierda
debe volver a pensar cómo conceptualizamos el socialismo. Algunos
hablan del socialismo como una utopía, tienen un plan en el cielo
o en sus sueños, dicen que debemos volver a soñar en el socialismo
y las utopías. Esto es muy ajeno a mi manera de pensar. Pienso que
el socialismo crece a partir de las experiencias prácticas que la
gente tiene al trabajar, pensar y actuar colectivamente. Una de las maneras
principales de construir el socialismo es alentar la toma de decisiones colectiva,
en debate asambleario, en asambleas en las fábricas para discutir
los contratos sindicales, los problemas del centro de trabajo etc.; en el
sector agrícola, celebrar asambleas de ámbito regional o cooperativas
para el trabajo colectivo. Los partidos políticos tienen que rechazar
el culto a la personalidad y favorecer las asambleas activas que trabajen
sobre diferentes asuntos; esto se traduce incluso en cosas tan simples
como no sacar el retrato del líder en cada revista o publicación;
tener líderes rotativos, representantes diferentes que vayan a
reuniones internacionales para romper la idea de un movimiento organizado
alrededor de un líder. Ahora una vez establecido este principio
dentro de este armazón, se abre un área institucional para
discutir programas. Creo que no debemos formular programas de transición
y llevárselos a la gente. Creo que el programa de transición
debe ser resultado de la interacción entre propuestas, de debates
abiertos y de resolución. Ahora ¿qué tipos de resoluciones
podemos imaginar?
Lo mas importante dentro de
la lucha por el poder político para crear las bases para el socialismo
es capturar el superávit generado por la sociedad. Las sociedades
actuales, pobres, explotadas y dominadas generan cantidades inmensas de
superávit. Dicen que son países pobres; son países pobres
porque la riqueza que crean no se reinvierte. Así que debemos capturar
(lo evadido al) extranjero y los beneficios, para que puedan ser reinvertidos
en el país por el gobierno popular. Segundo, debemos repudiar por
completo la deuda externa; es una deuda ilegal, fue una deuda contraída
por la oligarquía, así que obliguémosle a ella a pagarla.
En tercer lugar, debemos bloquear por completo las salidas de capital.
Es un programa muy radical y por supuesto enajenará a las finanzas
internacionales, enajenará a los exportadores agrarios y también
enajenará a una gran sección de la burguesía local,
que gana localmente y manda sus ganancias al exterior. Este es el comienzo.
Estos cambios estructurales
van dirigidos a hacer reformas sociales exitosas. En otras palabras,
si se lleva a cabo una reforma agraria, la pregunta es ¿cómo
financiarla? Si se está pensando en nacionalizar algunas industrias
se deben modernizar las industrias. Se necesita inversión, tecnología,
aumentar la producción y también emplear a más trabajadores.
No se puede hacer esto si no se controlan las finanzas y el capital. Está
la cuestión de hasta donde llegar en la nacionalización
de la industria. Aparte de los sectores estratégicos: banca, comercio
exterior, principales telecomunicaciones e industria básica, el
ritmo depende de la capacidad del nuevo gobierno para explotar estas fábricas
a la capacidad normal. ¿Qué importa nacionalizarlas si luego
no se pueden hacer funcionar? Así que aquí hay un período
de control por parte de trabajadores bajo administración capitalista.
Puede ser muy inestable, y muchas veces los capitalistas se negarán
pero pienso que es posible negociar. El ritmo de transformación
social estará determinado por las capacidades crecientes de la
sociedad para sustituir al sector privado con la propiedad [social] y
la explotación eficaz. Dijimos que muchos capitalistas no querrían
cooperar. En tal caso tenemos que tomar una decisión política
para avanzar en el proceso social, aunque somos conscientes de que la
capacidad y el desempeño disminuirán. Finalmente en esta
dirección es un error nacionalizar las empresas de servicios pequeñas
y medianas en parte porque se echaría de modo innecesario a estos
sectores a manos de la burguesía y en segundo lugar porque el estado
no tiene capacidad para explotarlas. La intervención llevaría
al cierre, y esto es negativo para los trabajadores y los consumidores.
Así que la socialización de la sociedad no es algo que vaya
a suceder en una vida, puede que en 2-3 generaciones. La tendencia debería
ser la regulación de estos sectores para que no entren en el mercado
negro y no exploten a sus trabajadores. Significa introducir impuestos sobre
estas firmas privadas para que no aumenten las desigualdades, al objeto
de que el pequeño burgués rico no se convierta en un punto
de referencia para los trabajadores; para que la meta de los trabajadores
sea la de mejorar la vida y el trabajo en la fábrica en vez de la
apertura de un negocio privado. ¿Cómo gravar a muchas empresas
pequeñas? Pueden hacerse estimaciones de las ganancias que obtendrán
y gravarlas indirectamente porque no se puede contar solo con el impuesto
sobre las ventas.
Es un tema muy prolijo pero
con ordenadores, con programas muy sofisticados, se puede organizar una
economía planificada, lo cual anteriormente era mucho más
difícil. Se pueden hacer análisis de entradas y salidas
por sectores y al nivel de firmas y planificar fácilmente actividades
multisectorales y cambios. Así que las posibilidades técnicas
de planificación son hoy día más prometedoras y
con la asamblea de participación democrática se puede tener
un flujo mucho mayor de información de fuentes diferentes, trayendo
a trabajadores, consumidores y ecologistas a la toma de decisiones del
sistema de planificación. Podemos evitar la planificación
burocrática de la Unión Soviética.
Avance: TSJ aprobó solicitar a EE.UU extradición
de tenientes disidentes
Por: Venpres
Publicado el Martes, 03/02/04 01:55pm |
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Gobernador Martínez: absurdo que oposición
busque tutelaje en EE.UU.
Por: Venpres
Publicado el Martes, 03/02/04 01:41pm |
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Tuesday, Feb 03, 2004 | Print format | |
Send by email |
By: Martín Sánchez, co-editor Venezuelanalysis.com
Miami, Feb 3 (Venezuelanalysis.com).- According to Spanish news agency EFE, United States Immigration Authorities denied yesterday a petition to grant conditional freedom to two Venezuelan rebel military officers asking for political asylum in the U.S.
The rebels are accused of participating in the terrorist attacks against the diplomatic buildings of Colombia and Spain, in Caracas in February of 2003.
Last Friday, Leopoldo Ochoa, the lawyer of retired Venezuelan National Guard lieutenants José Antonio Colina and German Rodolfo Varela, asked U.S. Immigration authorities to release their clients from the Krome Penitentiary Center in south Florida State.
Colina and Varela belong to a group of military officials that rebelled against the Venezuelan government and held a protest camp in a Caracas Plaza. After investigations revealed their connection to the terrorist attacks, the officers eluded authorities and escaped to neighboring Colombia, from which they later traveled to Miami to ask for political asylum.
The rebels base their asylum request on suffering from “political persecution” in Venezuela. For months before being charged in connection with the attacks, the officers gave public anti-government speeches wearing their military uniforms, without being detained or harrased by the government.
The lawyer of the two terror suspects, told EFE that U.S. Immigration authorities saw "no humanitarian reason at this moment" to release their clients from the detention facility.
Yesterday, The Miami Hearld, which holds an editorial line opposed to Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, asked U.S. Immigration authorities that they hear the asylum cases and allow the officers to present their case. Even though Venezuela has no political prisoners and the death penalty is illegal, The Miami Herald said that the lives of these officers would be in danger if they return to Venezuela, since they could be executed.
The asylum seekers are expected to appear today before Immigration judge to present their formal request.
Last week, Venezuela ratified the Inter-American Convention Against Terrorism, which the U.S. has not ratified yet. Venezuela has also ratified several international treaties in recent months such as the International Convention for the Suppression of Terrorist Bombings, the Terrorist Financing Convention and the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the involvement of children in armed conflicts. These conventions demand that countries cooperate with one another to bring to justice those accused to committing or helping to commit terrorist acts.
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The following is a statement issued by Socialist Equality Party presidential candidate Bill Van Auken in response to President Bush’s announcement Monday that he will appoint an “independent bipartisan commission” to examine supposed US intelligence failures in relation to the US administration’s claims about Iraqi weapons of mass destruction.
The supposedly independent commission that Bush has proposed on “intelligence failures” related to Iraqi weapons of mass destruction is an insult to the intelligence of the American people.
After leading a $900 million, nine-month search by 1,400 weapons hunters, David Kay acknowledged last week that not a trace of such weapons had been found and that, in his estimation, no such weapons even existed in the run-up to the US invasion of Iraq.
In response, the Bush administration, with the complicity of leading Democrats, proposes to form a hand-picked panel to look into what is being variously described as “lapses” or “overestimations” by US intelligence agencies concerning the alleged Iraqi weapons.
By framing the issue in this way, the administration is dictating the conclusions of the commission before any investigation even begins. There is no reason to believe that the source of the false reports of Iraqi WMD was sloppy intelligence. Rather, the intelligence itself was crafted to fit the specifications of the White House.
This was not a matter of miscalculations or exaggerations by intelligence agents. The administration repeatedly claimed that it had irrefutable evidence that Iraq had several hundred tons of chemical and biological weapons and was on the verge of obtaining nuclear weapons. Top officials insisted that they even knew the precise whereabouts of these weapons. Now, with the first anniversary of the war approaching, they are forced to admit that not a single vial of such material is to be found in all of Iraq.
If no weapons were there, clearly there existed no verified evidence that they were there, something that United Nations inspectors attested to before the war began. The inescapable conclusion is that the government manufactured a pretext for dragging the American people into war. As a result, tens of thousands of Iraqis have been killed. At least 525 US soldiers have lost their lives and thousands more have been wounded.
This would be the starting point for any genuinely independent investigation. The questions before such a panel would include: Who was responsible for lying to the American people and to the world in order to carry out an illegal war? Whose interests—hidden behind the false claims about WMD—were served by this war? How was the administration allowed to get away with it?
The issue is not a failure of intelligence, but rather a colossal failure of American democracy implicating every section of the political establishment, including the media and the Democratic Party politicians.
The administration and its apologists now put forward the alibi that everyone was fooled by flawed intelligence into believing that the Iraqi weapons existed and posed a clear and present danger. Yet, millions in the US and tens of millions worldwide rejected the government’s lies and marched in the streets to say so.
The Socialist Equality Party refuted the government’s claims well before the war began. Our party explained that the motive for war was not Iraqi WMD, but a longstanding drive by the US corporate elite to lay claim to the world’s second-largest oil reserves and gain strategic advantage over potential rivals by placing US military forces in the center of the Middle East.
The proposed “independent” commission is designed to produce a whitewash. Bush will pick every one of its members from a stable of political hacks and former intelligence officials who can be trusted to deliver the desired conclusions. As insurance against the minimal danger that the commission might produce any findings critical of the administration, it will not deliver its conclusions until well after the November election.
The reality is that no genuinely independent commission could be formed based upon the personnel of the two major parties. Democrats and Republicans alike, none of them pass the smell test. Before Bush’s election, the Clinton administration utilized fraudulent intelligence about Iraqi WMD—and the demand that Baghdad prove a negative, that no such weapons existed—to justify a policy of bombing and starving Iraq into submission.
The Democrats in Congress and all of the party’s leading contenders for the presidential nomination are now going along with the fraud of a commission to investigate “intelligence failures”—and not a calculated conspiracy—because they are compromised and, like Bush, are in need of a whitewash.
A truly independent investigation into how the Bush administration dragged the American people into the war in Iraq will be possible only as the byproduct of a mass independent political movement of working people in opposition to the two parties of big business.
The Socialist Equality Party is participating in the 2004 elections in order to lay the political foundations for the emergence of such a movement. I and my running mate, Jim Lawrence, as well as other candidates of the SEP, will fight tirelessly to expose the hypocrisy and lies of the two establishment parties and the media in relation to the war in Iraq.
We will consistently raise the demands for the
immediate and unconditional withdrawal of all US military forces from
Iraq, and that those responsible for conspiring to launch a war of aggression—and,
as a result, for the immense suffering inflicted upon the Iraqi people
and rank-and-file US soldiers alike—be held accountable for war crimes.
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2004/feb2004/wmd-f03.shtml
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