[Conspiracy!] Venezuela

[Grojlach]

In my never-ending quest to broach subjects that don't have "Iraq", "religion" or "mp3" written all over it, how about a nice conspiracy theory on good old Venezuela?


Videotapes show secret CIA & Venezuelan terrorists conspiring another coup d'etat

Video-taped images filmed by Venezuelan intelligence agents are to be screened in Los Angeles (Calif., USA) later this month under the title: "Agenda Oculta" (Hidden Agenda) showing one of the most recent hidden conspiracy meetings between the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and Venezuelan opposition terrorists in the act of planning another bloody coup d'etat against the democratically-elected government of Venezuela.

The Spanish-language presentation will be at the Echo Park Film Center at 1200 North Alvarado Echo Park, Los Angeles at 7:00 p.m. and 9:00 p.m. Thursday, February, 26, with English subtitles.

One of the most astonishing moments in the video is when someone says "we cannot walk around telling everyone we're with the CIA...” The video maps a series of references made to the US Embassy in Caracas and US Ambassador to Venezuela Charles S. Shapiro. It verified the attendance of a US Embassy staffer and a former US Army Colonel (identified only as a Col. Corry) speaking of operative modes, discretion, etc.

The video was sent to the US Congress by the Venezuelan National Assembly (AN) deputies Nicolas Maduro and Juan Barreto to prove what they alleged to be "a flagrant interference by the CIA in the Venezuelan domestic affairs," as well as to demand that "the most outrageous and vicious activities against Venezuelan sovereignty should immediately cease."

* The video will be re-screened in Los Angeles in March as part of a series of recent videos from Venezuela ... that venue and others will be announced shortly.

Source: [url=http://www.vheadline.com/readnews.asp?id=14825.VHeadline[/url]

And, in other Venezuela-related news:


By TRACEY EATON / The Dallas Morning News

HAVANA – Leaders of Cuba and Venezuela say they have
joinedforces in a strategic alliance aimed at helping
the poor and fending off U.S. influence in the region.

And it's not just talk. Cuba has sent 12,000 doctors,
teachers and others to work in every corner of
Venezuela, from the violent, impoverished slums in
Caracas to remote jungle villages, officials say.
Venezuela is selling Cuba 53,000 barrels of oil a day
at bargain rates, helping to keep the cash-strapped
island's economy afloat. (strapped because of
US-imposed embargoes, NOT because of Fidel- Vanessa)

U.S. officials have stepped up criticism of both
countries in recent days, accusing them of working to
destabilize pro-American democratic governments
elsewhere in Latin America. One U.S. lawmaker called
the Cuba-Venezuela partnership a new "axis of evil."

Roger Noriega, U.S. assistant secretary of state for
Western Hemisphere affairs, on Tuesday accused Cuban
President Fidel Castro of "actions to destabilize
democratically elected governments" and said
Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez makes his neighbors
"very nervous when it comes to defending their
institutional democracies."

Secretary of State Colin Powell also expressed
concern.

"I've been in senior national security positions on
and off over the last 17 years. And through that whole
period of time, Cuba has been trying to do everything
it could to destabilize parts of the region," he said
Thursday.

Venezuela and Cuba rejected the charges. And even one
of Mr. Castro's toughest critics said the accusations
were part of a campaign to spread disinformation about
Cuba and Venezuela.

"The Bush administration has taken a step back. It's
giving Latin America more rhetoric, but not more
attention or resources," said Joe García, director of
the Cuban American National Foundation, traditionally
South Florida's most powerful anti-Castro
organization. He said the idea that the Cuba-Venezuela
partnership threatens U.S. interests is
"ridiculous."

The debate is likely to be the stuff of cocktail-hour
gossip – or maybe more – at the upcoming Summit of the
Americas, which will bring the leaders of 34 nations
together Monday and Tuesday in Monterrey, Mexico.

At the summit, U.S. officials hope to wrap up a free
trade agreement that would stretch from Alaska to the
tip of South America by early 2005.

Mr. Castro isn't invited but has regularly lashed out
at the trade plan, saying it would allow powerful
nations to exploit weaker ones. He and Mr. Chávez have
said that rather than create a lot of wealth and hope
it will trickle down, they want to help the poor and
give Latin American nations true independence.

"Should we allow the rich of the world to turn us into
beggars?" Mr. Chávez asked during a visit to Havana.
"We have dignity. The fact that we're poor doesn't
mean that we're prostitutes."

Serious claims about his government persist, however.

U.S. News & World Report said Oct. 6 that terrorist
training camps were "operating in Venezuela with the
full knowledge and support of the Hugo Chávez
government."

The article, citing unidentified senior U.S. military
and intelligence officials, said, "The oil-rich but
politically unstable nation of Venezuela is emerging
as a potential hub of terrorism in the Western
hemisphere, providing assistance to Islamic radicals
from the Middle East and other terrorists."

The magazine also alleged that "Cubans are working
inside Venezuela's paramilitary and intelligence
apparatus. Chávez is modeling his government on
Castro's Cuba."

Mr. Chavez described the story as "rubbish ... truly
disgusting. I challenge the editors of the U.S. News
... or those who are behind these claims ... to come
here and look for a single piece of evidence to prove
this pack of lies."

Castro supporters called it "yellow journalism ... yet
another example of media lies, media terrorism."

"Basically, you just keep hammering away at the same
lie, and this is what finally sticks," said Rogelio
Polanco, editor in chief of Cuba's state-run Juventud
Rebelde (Rebel Youth) newspaper.

The U.S. News reporter, Linda Robinson, defended her
work, telling a Colombian television journalist that
"information in this article is well-founded."

'Axis of evil'

In October, House International Relations Committee
Chairman Henry Hyde, R-Ill, wrote to President Bush,
warning that the Cuba-Venezuela alliance was part of
an emerging "axis of evil." Rather than look to Cuba
and Venezuela for inspiration, he and others say,
Latin American nations should endorse free trade and
open markets.

The trade pact that the Bush administration supports
is called the Free Trade Area of the Americas, or
FTAA, a $13 trillion market with nearly 800 million
people.

The initiative "has much to offer every country in the
hemisphere," Charles Shapiro, the U.S. ambassador to
Venezuela, said in September. "Trade liberalization is
not a policy that envisions the destruction of workers
or the working class. And it is not a policy that
plans to let multinational corporations control the
world."

The FTAA isn't a familiar term in the United States,
but in Cuba most everyone knows what it is, thanks to
the Cuban government's relentless propaganda campaign
against it.

ALCA, as the pact is known by its Spanish initials,
allows rich countries "to continue looting lesser
developed countries and make them poorer," said
Yanisleidys Gómez, 30, a Havana secretary. "It's like
a giant fighting a dwarf."

The FTAA will allow wealthy countries to deplete the
world's natural resources, Mr. Castro said in a Jan. 3
speech.

"The course of events must change or else our species
shall not survive," he said. "There is no other planet
we can move to. There is no atmosphere, no air, no
water on Mars."

Mr. Chávez proposes an alternative to ALCA. He calls
it ALBA, the Bolivarian Alternative of the Americas,
which envisions a Latin American trade bloc. It's
named in honor of Simón Bolívar, who led the fight for
South America's independence from Spain in the early
1800s and dreamed of uniting the continent, a goal
that Mr. Chávez has vowed to carry on.

"Either we unite for real or we sink together – for
real," he said.

As part of his country's alliance with Cuba, the
island nation has sent 10,169 doctors and dentists,
1,200 sports coaches, 70 literacy trainers, 25 sugar
industry experts and more than 500 other specialists
to Venezuela, said Julio Montes, Venezuela's
ambassador to Cuba.

To some, the effort kindles memories of Cuba's
attempts to export revolution in the 1970s. "But these
are not soldiers in olive green," Mr. Montes said.
"They're fighters in the social struggle."

Cubans work throughout Venezuela, venturing into some
of the most perilous, crime-ridden areas.

"People can't believe it when someone knocks on their
door and asks how their health is," Mr. Montes said.
"That's never happened in Venezuela."

The Cubans and their Venezuelan allies have also
taught 1 million Venezuelans to read and write, Mr.
Montes said. Cuba has donated thousands of books to
the country. And it has given free medical treatment
to 5,213 Venezuelans who have traveled to Cuba. Some
have had cornea, kidney and bone marrow transplants;
others have been treated for heart, lung, eye and
neurological problems.

Others interested

The initiative has drawn some interest from other
Latin American leaders.

Argentina's ambassador to Cuba, Raúl Taleb, said in
November that he would like to see other nations
follow the example of Cuba and Venezuela. With
Argentina and Brazil joining in, he said, the
countries could create a strong, stable alliance – a
"four-legged table," as he put it. And later, such
countries as Ecuador and Bolivia could get into the
act.

But not everyone likes the idea.

In Havana, some people resent that the Cuban
government is using valuable resources to support
Venezuela when there are so many needs at home. And in
Caracas, some worry about what they call the
"Cubanization" of their country.

Mr. Montes said the Venezuelan government is only
trying to help the poor. But there are no plans to
carry out a Cuban-style revolution, nationalizing
private enterprise, seizing land or taking over the
media, he said.

"What's going on in Venezuela isn't what happened in
Cuba in the 1960s," he said. "That's not going to
happen."

[ 02-11-2004, 04:18 AM: Message edited by: Grojlach ]