March 31, 2009

SECRETARY OF DEFENSE ROBERT GATES SAYS US CAN DO NOTHING ABOUT NORTH KOREA MISSILE

    WASHINGTON, D.C.-- The U.S. can do nothing about North Korea's plans to launch a rocket even though it's a step toward developing an intercontinental ballistic missile that could carry a nuclear warhead, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said. North Korea says it plans to launch a communications satellite into orbit between this coming Saturday and April 8 as part of its space program. The U.S. and other nations believe that the launch is actually a test of the North's technology for a long-range missile and therefore a violation of a 2006 U.N. Security Council resolution prohibiting ballistic activity by the Asian country.

    "I don't know anyone at a senior level in the American government who does not believe this technology is intended as a mask for the development of an intercontinental ballistic missile," Gates said in an interview broadcast on "Fox News Sunday."  Asked if North Korea was capable of placing a nuclear warhead atop a missile, Gates said: "I think that we believe that that's their long-term intent. I personally would be skeptical that they have the ability right now to do that."

    Gates said the U.S. has no plans to try to shoot down the North Korean missile but might consider trying if an "aberrant missile" were headed to Hawaii "or something like that." He said he didn't believe a missile from the North could reach the West Coast of the U.S. or Alaska. Earlier this month, the top U.S. commander in the Pacific, Adm. Timothy Keating, told the Senate that the U.S. has the capability of shooting down any missile from North Korea and would be "prepared to respond" in the event of a missile launch.

U.S. DEPLOYS MISSILE DESTROYERS TO NORTH KOREA
   
     WASHINGTON, D.C.--  The U.S. deployed two missile-interceptor ships from South Korea on Monday, days ahead of a North Korean rocket launch seen by many as a test of its longest-range missile. The two U.S. destroyers were on a mission believed to monitor the North's rocket launch. The ships are equipped with Aegis radar, a system that enables the vessels to locate, track and shoot down missiles. U.S. military spokesman Kim Yong-kyu said the ships would depart from the South Korean port of Busan, but declined to give details. South Korea also plans to dispatch an Aegis-equipped destroyer off the east coast to monitor the launch.

    In addition to the long-range rocket, North Korea is preparing to launch a short- or medium-range missile, a Japanese newspaper reported Sunday. The Sankei newspaper, citing several unnamed Japanese government sources, said the North is preparing to test-launch another missile from Wonsan, about 155 miles south of Musudan-ni. It said U.S., South Korean and Japanese intelligence analyses said the missile could be short or medium range.

    The report said the North may conduct another missile test if the U.N. Security Council approves sanctions against it or if it cannot wrest concessions from the United States. Japan's Defense Ministry declined to comment on the Sankei report. South Korea's Defense Ministry and National Intelligence Service — its main spy agency — said they couldn't immediately confirm the report. President Lee Myung-bak said South Korea opposes any military response to North Korea's planned launch of a rocket, while Washington's defense chief said the U.S. won't try to shoot it down. The remarks by Lee and U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates appear to reflect concerns that any tough reaction could send tensions spiking out of control at a time when the communist regime is warning that even U.N. sanctions would prompt it to quit nuclear disarmament talks.

MEXICAN PRESIDENT FELIPE CALDERON RULES OUT JOINT RAIDS WITH US

March 30, 2009

VICE PRESIDENT JOSEPH BIDEN KILLS RAUL CASTRO'S HOPE OF LIFTING CUBAN EMBARGO

    VIÑA DEL MAR, CHILE--In his first official visit to Latin America, U.S. Vice President JoSEPH Biden said Saturday the White House wants the region to play a more active role in organizations such as the World Bank and International Monetary Fund and ruled out lifting the embargo on Cuba. Biden spoke in Chile at the Summit of Progressive Leaders, a meeting of like-minded center-left politicians from the Americas and Europe.  In a news conference, he was asked if the Obama administration would back Latin American countries in a push for greater power within the world's multilateral institutions; if it would support reform of the U.N. charter; and if it would lift the decades-old Cuban embargo.

     ''Yes, yes and no,'' Biden responded. He acknowledged that the global economic crisis presented ''an opportunity to recalibrate the world economic agenda'' and that ''emerging countries should have a bigger say as we deal with that,'' saying that included reform of the World Bank and IMF. Latin American countries have long complained that they are under-represented at the world's major political and economic bodies.

     On Cuba, Biden said there was ``a need for a transition in our policy, but we all share one thing in common: We think the Cuban people should determine their own fate and that they should be able to live in freedom and with some prospect of economic prosperity.'' Biden's first official trip to Latin America has been watched closely for clues on how the White House will handle its relationship with Latin America, which was often strained during the Bush years. In an op-ed piece published in 11 Latin America newspapers on the eve of the summit, Biden proclaimed ``a new day for partnership in the Americas.'' Common concerns were aired at Saturday's summit in this Chilean coastal resort. Biden met seven leaders, including the presidents of Argentina, Cristina Fernández and Brazil, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.

UNITED NATIONS TO ASSESS HUGO CHAVEZ'S HUMAN RIGHTS RECORD
   
     NEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK--IN 2011, HUGO CHAVEZ GOVERNMENT  will be assessed by the United Nations Human Rights Council. The UN body will review the moves Chavez has undertaken to the constitutional rights of the Venezuelan citizens.  The information was provided by Ombudswoman Gabriela Ramírez, who said that in 2011, if Chavez is still in power, will undergo the Universal Periodic Review to assess his human rights record.

     "Argentina, Ecuador and Guatemala have already submitted their report. El Salvador, Nicaragua and Bolivia will submit their reports next year and Venezuela will follow suit in 2011. During the review, representatives of the UN members can question the Venezuelan government's delegates on the status of the fundamental rights and then make recommendations to improve what has to be improved," Ramírez said in a telephone conversation from Geneva, Switzerland, where she attended the 20th meeting of the International Co-Ordinating Committee of National Human Rights Institutions (ICC) and a workshop on the Periodical Review.

    Ramírez showed confidence that the Council will recognize Venezuela's progress in education, health and food thanks to the results of the social programs (missions) launched by the government in the last few years. She conceded, however, that there will surely be controversy with regard to freedom of expression, association and other political and civil rights.

PARAGUAYAN PRESIDENT FERNANDO LUGO ADVOCATES HUGO CHAVEZ'S ENTRY INTO MERCOSUR

March 29, 2009

AFGHAN PRESIDENT HAMID KARZAI PRAISES PRESIDENT OBAMA'S NEW STRATEGY FOR HIS COUNTRY

    KABUL, AFGHAMOSTAM--Afghan President Hamid Karzai on Saturday praised U.S. President Barack Obama's new plan for the war in Afghanistan. President Hamid Karzai says Obama's plan has Afghanistan's full support. "He has our full support," Karzai told a news conference. "This was better than what we expected." Obama unveiled the plan Friday which called for more troops, new legislation, improved troop training and added civilian expertise in the war in Afghanistan.

      Obama said the plan would address what he called an "international security challenge of the highest order." Obama said the "situation is increasingly perilous" in the region in and around Afghanistan, where the United States has been fighting al Qaeda and the Taliban for more than seven and a half years after it was attacked in New York and at the Pentagon. The President said he is sending another 4,000 troops to Afghanistan along with hundreds of civilian specialists, such as agricultural specialists, educators and engineers.

      The troops -- which are in addition to the 17,000 the president announced earlier would be sent to Afghanistan -- will be charged with training and building the Afghan Army and police force. In Pakistan Saturday President Asif Ali Zardari also welcomed Obama's plan to pump economic aid into Pakistan. Speaking to parliament on Saturday, Zardari hailed Obama's proposal for legislation authorizing $1.5 billion in direct support to the Pakistani people every year over the next five years. It is part of Obama's strategy unveiled Friday to fight al Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan and neighboring Pakistan. Obama said such resources will help Pakistan "build schools, roads, and hospitals, and strengthen Pakistan's democracy."

DOMINICAN REPUBLIC PRESIDENT LEONEL FERNANDEZ EXCLUDED FROM VICE-PRESIDENT JOSEPH BIDEN'S MEETING IN CHILE
   
     SANTO DOMINGO, DOMINICAN REPUBLIC--Dominican REPUBLIC newspapers are abuzz today over an alleged dis-invitation for Dominican President Leonel Fernández to attend VP Joseph Biden’s meeting with Central American presidents in Costa Rica this weekend. According to various news reports quoting Dominican and Costa Rican diplomats by name, it seems Costa Rican president Oscar Arias invited Fernández to the meeting since his country is a member of the Central American Integration System and a signor of the CAFTA-DR free trade pact.

     Costa Rican ambassador to Santo Domingo Marta Núñez Madriz says they had to renege, because if you take a good look at that map, Dominican Republic just isn’t in Central America. “When president Arias said he would invite president Fernández, he was told the meetings were by region, because they are going to tackle specific problems in those countries,” Núñez told El Nacional newspaper. “We were informed that the American vice president will hold regional meetings and we were included in the Caribbean nations,” Dominican foreign minister Carlos Morales Troncoso told the paper. “…They said on a later trip through the Caribbean, he will do the same with the leaders of the region.’’   

    But Dominican Today news outlet has its own theory. “Although the diplomats didn’t mention it and no one during the preparations for the meeting with Biden made reference to it, Fernandez’s recent visit to Cuba, where for more than two hours met with ex dictador Fidel Castro, who also wrote two extensive articles praising the Dominican chief executive, could have been one of the reason to snub Dominican Republic,” the web site story says. “Fernandez's strong ties with Hugo Chávez has also been mentioned as a sour point in the relations between Washington and Santo Domingo.”

ECUADOR PRESIDENT RAFAEL CORREA THREATENS TO WITHDRAW HIS COUNTRY FROM THE ANDEAN BLOC

March 28, 2009

us vice president joseph biden arrives in chile for summit

    SANTIAGO DE CHILE, CHILE--VICE PRESIDENT JOSEPH BIDEN flew to Chile early Friday and went to the resort city of Vina del Mar, where the Progressive Governance Summit will take place on Saturday. Biden's three-day visit will include bilateral talks with Chilean President Michelle Bachelet and other visiting leaders. he leaders attending the Progressive Governance Conference in the seaside resort city of Vina del Mar are Presidents Michelle Bachelet of Chile, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva of Brazil, Christina Fernandez de Kirchner of Argentina and Tabare Vasquez of Uruguay as well as Prime Ministers Gordon Brown of Britain, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero of Spain and Jens Stoltenberg of Norway.

     The conference is billed as "a vital opportunity for the center left's leading international figures to put forward a future vision for progressive politics, as an era defined by the neoliberal faith in laissez faire irrefutably comes to an end." Bachelet, Brown, Lula da Silva and Stoltenberg will address the gathering Friday night to speak about charting a progressive path in response to the global economic crisis. n Saturday, Biden and the seven heads of state will explore the financial crisis and environmental issues in a round table discussion, the Mercopress news agency reported.

     After the conference, Biden will travel to Costa Rica for meetings with President Oscar Arias and other Central American leaders. He is scheduled to return to Washington on Monday. resident Bill Clinton started the conference in 1999. This year's gathering was organized by the Policy Network, an international think tank based in London, and the Chilean Instituto Igualdad.  Separate from the conference, Clinton will meet Friday afternoon with Peruvian President Alan Garcia in Lima to sign an agreement between Peru's Health Ministry and the William J. Clinton Foundation, which is working on HIV/AIDS, climate change and other matters, the Andina news agency reported.

JAPAN ISSUES ORDER TO DESTROY NORTH KOREA ROCKET 
   
     TOKYO, JAPAN--Japan's defense minister ordered the military to prepare to shoot down any debris that could fall on Japanese territory if a North Korean rocket launch fails, mobilizing interceptor missiles and sending two warships to the Sea of Japan. North Korea has said it will launch a communications satellite April 4-8, and has warned that fragments from the launch could fall into waters off Akita and Iwate prefectures (states) in northern Japan. In response, Defense Minister Yasukazu Hamada told reporters he ordered the deployment of land-to-air and sea-to-air missile interceptors to the area at risk.

     "We issued a destruction order," Hamada told reporters at parliament. "We will make sure to eliminate anything that may cause us any damage." North Korea has mounted a rocket on a launch pad on its northeast coast, American intelligence officials say, putting Pyongyang well on track for a launch the U.S. and South Korea warned Thursday would be a major provocation with serious consequences. Pyongyang says the rocket will carry a satellite, but regional powers suspect the North will use the launch to test the delivery technology for a long-range missile capable of striking Alaska. They have said the launch — banned by the U.N. Security Council in 2006 — would trigger sanctions.

    U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton warned such a "provocative act" could jeopardize the stalled talks on supplying North Korea with aid and other concessions in exchange for dismantling its nuclear program. Japan has reacted the most strongly because the satellite will fly over its airspace and because North Korea has designated a zone near Japan's coast where debris is likely to fall. North Korea has warned it will retaliate against any country attempting to intercept the satellite. Under Friday's order, the Japanese military is allowed to shoot down any missile fragments and debris heading toward Japanese territory. The military will also move some PAC-3 land-to-air missiles, currently deployed around Tokyo, to Japan's northern coast, and deploy a pair of destroyers carrying SM-3 sea-to-air missiles in nearby waters, the Defense Ministry said in a statement.

LATE FARC LEADER MANUEL MARULANDA HONORED IN CARACAS 

March 27, 2009

NORTH KOREA POSITIONS ROCKET FOR APRIL LIFTOFF 

    SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA--The U.S. and South Korea warned of serious consequences Thursday if North Korea forges ahead and fires a rocket that American officials say is now positioned on a launchpad in the northeast for fueling. Pyongyang says the rocket will carry a satellite, but regional powers suspect the North will use the launch to test the delivery technology for a long-range missile capable of striking Alaska. They have said the launch — banned by the U.N. Security Council in 2006 — would trigger sanctions.

    Analysts say that after positioning the rocket, scientists need a number of days to conduct tests and to fuel the projectile, keeping Pyongyang on track for liftoff during the announced April 4-8 launch dates. U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton warned such a "provocative act" could jeopardize the stalled talks on supplying North Korea with aid and other concessions in exchange for dismantling its nuclear program. "We intend to raise this violation of the Security Council resolution, if it goes forward, in the U.N.," Clinton said Wednesday in Mexico City. "This provocative action in violation of the U.N. mandate will not go unnoticed, and there will be consequences."

    North Korea responded Thursday by threatening "strong steps" if the Security Council criticizes the launch, and suggested it would reverse nuclear disablement carried out so far. Any challenge to its bid to send the satellite into space would mean an immediate end to nuclear disarmament talks, the Foreign Ministry said in a statement carried by the state-run Korean Central News Agency. U.S. spy satellites spotted the rocket two days ago, South Korean reports said — the first indication that the countdown toward a launch has begun. Counterterrorism and intelligence officials in Washington confirmed that a rocket was in position. North Korea is now "technically" capable of launching it in three to four days, South Korea's Chosun Ilbo newspaper said, citing an unnamed diplomatic official.

US WARNS NORTH KOREA ON APRIL ROCKET
   
     SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA --The White House is warning North Korea that a suspected rocket launch set for next month would be a "provocative act" in violation of U.N. Security Council mandates. Officials in Pyongyang said the rocket is designed to carry its Kwangmyongsong-2 satellite into orbit, an accomplishment timed for the eve of the inaugural session of North Korea's new parliament and for late founder Kim Il Sung's April 15 birthday.

   But regional powers suspect North Korea will use the launch to test the delivery technology for a long-range missile. White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said Thursday that any rocket launch would be "provocative" and violate Security Council resolutions. The U.N. Security Council banned North Korea from any ballistic activity in 2006.

    Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton made similar comments Wednesday. "We intend to raise this violation of the Security Council resolution, if it goes forward, in the U.N.," Clinton said Wednesday in Mexico City. "This provocative action in violation of the U.N. mandate will not go unnoticed, and there will be consequences."

OPPOSITION GOVERNORS AND MAYORS DECLARE EMERGENCY FOR ATTEMPTS AT CENTRALIZATION

March 26, 2009

HUGO CHAVEZ CHANGED IN HIS FAVOR THE RESULTS OF THE CRITICAL 2004 ELECTION

    WASHINGTON, D.C.--The CIA, which has been monitoring foreign countries' use of electronic voting systems, has reported apparent vote-rigging schemes in Venezuela, Macedonia and Ukraine and a raft of concerns about the machines' vulnerability to tampering. Appearing last month before a U.S. Election Assistance Commission field hearing in Orlando, a CIA cybersecurity expert suggested that Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez and his allies fixed a 2004 election recount, an assertion that could further roil U.S. relations with the Latin leader.

    Stigall, who has studied electronic systems in about three dozen countries, said most countries' machines produced paper receipts that voters then dropped into boxes. However, even that doesn't prevent corruption, he said.Turning to Venezuela, he said that Chávez controlled all of the country's voting equipment before he won a 2004 nationwide recall vote that had threatened to end his rule. When Chávez won, Venezuelan mathematicians challenged results that showed him to be consistently strong in parts of the country where he had weak support. The mathematicians found ''a very subtle algorithm'' that appeared to adjust the vote in Chávez's favor, Stigall said. Calls for a recount left Chávez facing a dilemma, because the voting machines produced paper ballots, Stigall said.

     ''How do you defeat the paper ballots the machines spit out?'' Stigall asked. ``Those numbers must agree, must they not, with the electronic voting-machine count? . . . In this case, he simply took a gamble.''   Stigall said Chávez agreed to allow 100 of 19,000 voting machines to be audited. ''It is my understanding that the computer software program that generated the random number list of voting machines that were being randomly audited, that program was provided by Chávez,'' Stigall said. “That's my understanding. It generated a list of computers that could be audited, and they audited those computers.  ‘You know. No pattern of fraud there.''

HUGO CHAVEZ CRITICIZES INTER-AMERICAN COMMISSION OF HUMAN RIGHTS
   
     CARACAS, VENEZUELA --HUGO CHAVEZ harshly criticized on Tuesday the Inter-American Commission of Human Rights (IACHR), claiming that ever since the failed coup d’état to overthrow him on April 2002 the body has been "biased."

     The Venezuelan delegate to the IACHR, Germán Saltrón, blasted Santiago Cantón, the executive secretary of the commission.  The accusations were made in a hearing requested by Venezuela in the 134th session of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, EFE reported.

     Saltrón, a Venezuelan foreign ministry official who deals with international human-rights organizations, highlighted the appointment of Venezuelan Luz Patricia Mejía, as the new interim Chair of the Inter-American Commission. According to Saltrón, Mejía "will help end the biased and selective attitude of the Commission since 2002."

EX-SPANISH PREMIER AZNAR SAID COLOMBIAN'S NEIGHBORS (VENEZUELA-ECUADOR) HARBOR TERRORIST ORGANIZATIONS

March 25, 2009

CZECH GOVERNMENT LOSES NO-CONFIDENCE VOTE

    PRAGUE, CZECH REPUBLIC--The Czech Republic's three-party coalition government must step down after losing a parliamentary no-confidence vote Tuesday over its handling of the economic crisis. It was a huge embarrassment for Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek because it comes just days before President Barack Obama visits Prague next week for talks with Czech and European officials. The Czech Republic is also in the middle of its turn in the EU's rotating presidency.

    The motion passed 101-96 in the 200-seat lower house. Three of the lawmakers were absent. It was the first time a government was ousted since the country came to existence after the split of the former Czechoslovakia in 1993. The result means the Cabinet has to resign. It was not immediately clear who will be picked by President Vaclav Klaus to form a new government. If three attempts to form a government fail, early elections must be called.

    "I take the vote into account and will act according to the Constitution," Topolanek briefly said after the vote. His government took charge in January 2007 after months of difficult political negotiations following the 2006 general elections split the lower house down the middle. "The government got what it deserved," said former Prime Minister Jiri Paroubek, who is now chairman of the Social Democrats.

MEXICO OFFERS $2 MILLION FOR TOP DRUG LORDS
   
     MEXICO CITY, MEXICO --Mexico's government on Monday offered $2 million each for information leading to the arrest of 24 top drug lords in a public challenge to the cartels' violent grip on the country.

    The list indicated that drug gangs have splintered into six main cartels under pressure from the U.S. and Mexican governments. The two most powerful gangs — the Pacific and Gulf cartels — each suffered fractures that have given rise to new cartels, according to the list published by the Attorney General's Office. The list offers 30 million pesos ($2 million) in rewards for 24 top members of the cartels and 15 million pesos ($1 million) for 13 of their lieutenants.

    Mexico's drug violence has killed more than 9,000 people since President Felipe Calderon took office in December 2006 as gangs battle each other for territory and fight off a government crackdown. Some of that violence is spilling over into the United States, especially the Southwest, where kidnaps and killings are on the rise. The rewards are the largest Mexico has ever offered for top drug lords, said Ricardo Najera, a spokesman for the Attorney General's office. Some of the men, such as suspected Pacific cartel leaders Joaquin Guzman and Ismael Zambada, are targeted by separate $5 million reward offers from the U.S. government.

HUGO CHAVEZ ORDERED TO MOVE TRIAL OF MANUEL ROSALES FROM HIS HOME CITY TO CARACAS

March 24, 2009

hugo chavez ASSAILS president obama again, calls him "A POOR Ignorant"

    CARACAS, VENEZUELA --Hugo Chavez on Sunday called President Barack Obama "a poor ignorant," saying he has a lot to learn about Latin America. The socialist leader said he had been ready to name a new ambassador in Washington when Obama took office, but put that on hold after the new U.S. president accused him of "exporting terrorism" and being an obstacle to progress in the region.

     "At least one could say, 'poor ignorant person,'" Chavez said on his weekly television and radio program, adding that Obama "should read a little bit so that he learns about ... the reality of Latin America." Chavez's relations with Washington grew increasingly strained under former President George W. Bush. The Venezuelan president expelled the U.S. ambassador and withdrew his envoy from Washington in September. Top diplomats have yet to be restored at either embassy. Chavez and Obama plan to attend a summit of leaders from across the Americas next month in Trinidad and Tobago. There, Chavez said he will make a case for Cuba to be included in regional talks, saying "we can no longer continue to accept the impositions of the U.S. empire."

    "We ask only for respect for Venezuela, nothing else," Chavez said. Chavez said he showed some of the U.S. administration's critical remarks about him to U.S. Rep. William Delahunt when the Massachusetts Democrat visited Caracas last week. "They keep pointing to me as the bad boy, as the one who attacks," Chavez said. "Who started the attack first? Obama." Chavez recalled that shortly before Obama took office, the new president had accused Chavez of acting as a "destructive force" in the region. "Obama said Chavez has been an obstacle to Latin America's development. What ignorance," Chavez said. "The real obstacle to the development of Latin America, Mr. Obama, has been the empire you now preside over."

PRESIDENT OBAMA WANTS AFGHANISTAN EXIT STRATEGY
   
     WASHINGTON, D.C. --THE United States met NATO allies on Monday to outline its policy review for Afghanistan after President Barack Obama said it would contain an exit strategy and greater emphasis on economic development. With violence rising ahead of elections in August, Obama has already committed an extra 17,000 troops to Afghanistan, but on Sunday he said military force alone would not end the war. "What we can't do is think that just a military approach in Afghanistan is going to be able to solve our problems," he said in an interview with CBS TV's "60 minutes." "So what we're looking for is a comprehensive strategy. And there's got to be an exit strategy ... There's got to be a sense that this is not perpetual drift."

    The interview gave a taste of what to expect in the results of a comprehensive policy review on Afghanistan and Pakistan expected soon. Officials have already said the review would include more coordination with other stakeholders than practiced by the Bush administration. In Brussels, U.S. Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan Richard Holbrooke met NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer on Monday before briefing the 26 alliance ambassadors. "It is to give the broad lines of the U.S. strategy review as it now stands," NATO spokesman James Appathurai said.

    "I don't know that they've arrived at any final conclusions on which President Obama has signed off on, but their thinking is now very close to the conclusion of the process." Appathurai said he was not aware of a plan, reported in Britain's Guardian newspaper, for Washington and its allies to create an Afghan chief executive or prime minister to bypass President Hamid Karzai, widely seen as ineffective by the West.  In Kabul, Karzai spokesman Humayun Hamidzadeh said: "I would characterize this as nonsense ... Introducing a prime minister in a country in which there is a constitution which says there is a presidential system is simply impossible." Some analysts say Washington is going to have to engage in dialogue with Taliban elements, a point Obama and Vice President Joe Biden have conceded recently.

ACTING LIKE A VULGAR DICTATOR, HUGO CHAVEZ SEIZES PORTS IN VENEZUELA AND THREATENS TO SINK SHIPS

March 23, 2009

president obama welcomes france back to nato command after 43-year hiatus

    WASHINGTON, D.C. --President Barack Obama welcomed France back to NATO’s military command after a 43-year absence, saying full participation by the European nation will lead to a “stronger alliance and a stronger Europe.”  “I enthusiastically welcome the decision made by French President Nicolas Sarkozy to fully reintegrate France into the NATO Alliance,” Obama said in a statement e-mailed today to reporters.

    The president, scheduled to attend his first North Atlantic Treaty Organization summit next month, said the alliance has been the “cornerstone of trans-Atlantic security for the past 60 years.”  “France is a founding member of NATO and has been a strong contributor to NATO missions throughout the alliance’s history,” he said. “The United States is committed to its success, and knows that it is through close cooperation with allies and partners that we can overcome our most difficult challenges.”

    Sarkozy’s government won a confidence vote March 17 on the decision to return to the military command, four decades after Charles de Gaulle removed French officers and obliged NATO to move its headquarters to Brussels from Paris. The National Assembly in Paris voted 329-238.

FOUR POLICE OFFICERS GUNNED DOWN BY A PAROLEE IN OAKLAND
   
     OAKLAND, CALIFORNIA--An Oakland police officer shot during a traffic stop died Sunday, bringing to four the number of officers killed on the deadliest day in the department's history, police said. Officer John Hege, 41, died at Highland Hospital after being gravely wounded in the first of two shootings on Saturday, Oakland police spokesman Jeff Thomason said. A 26-year-old parolee wanted on a parole violation opened fire on Hege and 40-year-old Sgt. Mark Dunakin after they pulled him over Saturday afternoon, police said. Dunakin died that day. Hege was hospitalized with a major brain injury and survived through the night, his family said.

    Suspect Lovelle Mixon was slain later Saturday afternoon in a gunfight with police that left two more officers dead. Thomason identified those officers as Sgt. Ervin Romans, 43, and Sgt. Daniel Sakai, 35. Oakland police said never in the department's history had so many officers been killed in the line of duty in a single day. The violence began when Hege and Dunakin, both on motorcycles, stopped a 1995 Buick sedan in east Oakland just after 1 p.m., Thomason said. The driver opened fire, killing Dunakin and gravely wounding Hege.

     The gunman then fled on foot, police said, leading to an intense manhunt by dozens of Oakland police, California Highway Patrol officers and Alameda County sheriff deputies. Streets were roped off and an entire area of east Oakland was closed to traffic. Around 3:30 p.m., officers got an anonymous tip that the gunman was inside a nearby apartment building. A SWAT team entered the building and the gunman opened fire, police said. Romans and Sakai were killed and a third officer was grazed by a bullet, police said. Officers returned fire, killing Mixon, Acting Oakland police Chief Howard Jordan said. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger ordered flags at the state capitol flown at half-staff Sunday in honor of the slain officers.  "All four officers dedicated their lives to public safety and selflessly worked to protect the people of Oakland," he said in a statement. "Our thoughts and prayers are with the families of those lost, the Oakland Police Department and law enforcement officers throughout California during this

THE ANTIQUE CHEVY PICKUP THAT SAILED ACROSS THE ATLANTIC FROM CUBA IS ON DISPLAY IN CALLE 8, MIAMI

March 22, 2009

IRAN'S SUPREME LEADER AYATOLLAH ALI KHAMENEI SAID HE SEES NO CHANGE IN U.S. POLICY TOWARD IRAN

     TEHRAN, IRAN -- Ayatollah Khamenei said Iran would change its policy when the U.S. did so as well. Khamenei said a change in rhetoric is not enough, and Washington must practice what it preaches, according to the English-language Press TV channel in Iran. He also promised that Iran will change its policy if the United States does so as well, Press TV reported. Khamenei's comments, which he made in a televised address to mark the start of the Iranian New Year on Friday, come a day after U.S. President Barack Obama reached out to Iran in a videotaped message.

    A spokesman for Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad condemned U.S. foreign policy Friday in response to the video. Obama's message spoke of "new beginnings" with the promise of a new year. "My administration is now committed to diplomacy that addresses the full range of issues before us, and to pursuing constructive ties among the United States, Iran and the international community," the president said in his message Friday. Obama said the United States seeks engagement with Iran that is "honest and grounded in mutual respect."

    Khamenei also said world powers have come to realize they are not able to block Iran's nuclear progress. He looked back on the February 25 testing of Iran's first nuclear power plant, at Bushehr, as one of the "joyful developments" of the past year. Last month, the Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security released a report saying that Iran has reached "nuclear weapons breakout capability" -- it has enough uranium to make a nuclear bomb.

JURY CLEARS PUERTO RICO EX-GOVERNOR IN CORRUPTION TRIAL 
   
     SAN JUAN, PUERTO RICO--A jury found Puerto Rico's former governor not guilty Friday on all nine counts including conspiracy, money laundering and lying to the FBI, concluding his monthlong corruption trial. Anibal Acevedo Vila, who could have faced 20 years in prison if convicted, was the first governor to be charged with a crime since the island became a semiautonomous U.S. commonwealth in 1952. Acevedo made the sign of the cross as he heard the verdict and began to cry, as did former adviser Luisa Inclan, who was also cleared of similar charges.

     Judge Paul Barbadoro faced both defendants after the verdict. "This case has ended. You are free to go," he said. The acquittal is a major blow to the U.S. Attorney's office, which prosecuted the governor in an election year - likely contributing to his defeat in one of the most lopsided elections in Puerto Rican history. U.S. Attorney Rosa Emilia Rodriguez said Friday that she respects but disagrees with the verdict. She also denied that evidence was weak.

    "The circumstantial evidence allowed for inferences to be made that the jury did not understand as such, but we accept that," she said. Jurors were not available Friday evening to explain how they reached their verdict. Hundreds of Acevedo's supporters celebrated outside the courthouse, waving flags, singing, blowing whistles and chanting "Innocent!" Squeezing his way through the crowd, the ex-governor clutched a large Puerto Rican flag and jumped atop an SUV. "I hope Puerto Rico learns from this lesson," said Acevedo, who also professed to having learned from his own mistakes. "You defend the truth no matter what."

CUBANS SENTENCED TO 3 YEARS FOR SELLING SATELLITE-TV GEAR

March 21, 2009

members of the ladies in white DENOUNCED HARASSMENT

     HAVANA, CUBA -- Members of the Ladies in White, a group comprising relatives of the 75 peaceful dissidents jailed in Cuba's "Black Spring" of 2003, were heckled Thursday by some 40 government supporters while protesting outside the Supreme Court to demand the release of all political prisoners. More than 30 Ladies assembled at the entrance to the building and made their demands heard before being insulted minutes later by dozens of people, among them plain-clothes police.

     After leaving the area, the dissidents were followed by a group of men and women who called them
"sellouts" and "worms" while singing the Cuban national anthem and shouting slogans hailing Fidel and Raul Castro. No physical altercation took place and the dissidents eventually boarded a public bus that took them back to their homes. Laura Pollan, a founder of the Ladies in White, told Efe that the group's intention was "to demand the prisoners' freedom" at the Supreme Court because "that's the (body) that judges and can get together and determine whether or not to free them."

    The group noted in a letter to President Raul Castro and older brother Fidel that 54 of the "Group of 75" remained behind bars six years after they were sentenced in summary trials. "They have served over three times more than you did when you were imprisoned for attacking the Moncada Barracks, where blood was spilled on both sides and you were granted amnesty," the missive said, a reference to the Castro brothers' failed 1953 assault on a military installation.

IS SPY VLADIMIR PUTIN REALLY IN PHOTO WITH RONALD REAGAN?
   
     WASHINGTON, D.C.--Was Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin captured posing as a tourist, while serving as a KGB spy, in a photograph with former President Ronald Reagan? The photo in question, taken years ago by the official chief White House photographer for Reagan, is causing an international stir -- all the more so because the photographer himself says it's Putin in the picture.

     In the picture, President Ronald Reagan greets a Russian boy while in Red Square with Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev (far right) in Moscow in 1988. Pete Souza, the current chief White House photographer, took the photo when he held the same position under Reagan. Souza said the man with the camera is Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin posing as a tourist during his days as a Soviet spy.

     In a January interview with National Public Radio (NPR), Souza said he was struck at how the tourists in the photograph were asking questions of Reagan on serious subjects like human rights. "And I remember saying to the Secret Service agent, 'I can't believe these tourists in the Soviet Union are asking these pointed questions,'" Souza told NPR. "And the Secret Service agent said to me, 'Oh these are all KGB families.'"  "It's been pointed out to me and verified that that was Putin," Souza said.

PRESIDENT OBAMA SAYS U.S. WANTS TO BEGIN A "NEW DAY" IN ITS RELATIONS WITH IRAN
   
     WASHINGTON, D.C.--President Barack Obama told Iran's people and leaders that the United States wants to engage with their country and end decades of strained relationship, but not unless their officials stop making threats. Obama on Friday released a video message with Farsi subtitles that urged the two countries to resolve their long-standing differences. His video was timed to the festival of Nowruz, which means "new day." It marks the arrival of spring and is a major holiday in Iran.

    "So in this season of new beginnings I would like to speak clearly to Iran's leaders," Obama said in the video. "We have serious differences that have grown over time. My administration is now committed to diplomacy that addresses the full range of issues before us, and to pursuing constructive ties among the United States, Iran and the international community."

   Obama has signaled a willingness to speak directly with Iran about its nuclear program and hostility toward Israel, a key U.S. ally. At his inauguration last month, the president said his administration would reach out to rival states, declaring "we will extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist." Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has criticized Obama as merely a continuation of President George W. Bush's policies toward Tehran's enemy, Israel. Khamenei has called Israel a "cancerous tumor" that is on the verge of collapse and has called for its destruction. In his message Friday, Obama had a warning for Tehran: "This process will not be advanced by threats. We seek instead engagement that is honest and grounded in mutual respect."

HUGO CHAVEZ MEETS WITH U.S. CONGRESSMAN WILLIAM DELAHUNT

March 20, 2009

JAPAN HUMILIATES CUBA AND ELIMINATES FIDEL CASTRO'S TEAM OF THE WBC

     SAN DIEGO, CALIFORNIA -- For the second time, the Japanese have knocked the once-irrepressible Cubans out of the World Baseball Classic, this time with a 5-0 victory on Wednesday night at PETCO Park behind the combined five-hit pitching of starter Hisashi Iwakuma and reliever Toshiya Sugiuchi. Iwakuma and Sugiuchi combined on a five-hit shutout, and defending champion Japan advanced to the semifinals of the World Baseball Classic with a 5-0 triumph over Cuba at Petco Park. The loss eliminates Cuba, ending an incredible run for the country in international play. In the last 50 events, Cuba won 42 times and finished second on eight other occasions. It marked the second time in second-round play Japan blanked Cuba, scoring a 6-0 win on Sunday.

    "For Team Japan, it was a very special game," Japanese manager Tatsunori Hara said afterward. "The reason for that is we had to win. That was the main purpose for us. All the team members, we were aware of this. As the manager, I was all tensed up. The players all felt great pressure. However, they all played a very good game."  Much like the Yankees missing the playoffs this past season for the first time in 13 years, the Cuban defeat was historic on many different levels.  It broke a streak of 40 consecutive trips to the finals in those four events.

    In addition, this is the worst finish for the Cubans, who heretofore had never finished below third place in any of those four tournaments. And that had previously happened only three times, the last in the '51 World Cup. This year, the best they could finish with a 4-2 record would be in a tie for fifth with Puerto Rico. Asked about the historic value of stopping the Cubans, whose last tournament victory of any consequence was defeating Australia for the 2004 Olympic gold medal, Hara said: "On behalf of Team Japan, that means a lot. It was a big deal for us and it will be left to history. I have a great respect for the Cuban team and we were able to beat them. For Team Japan and the baseball world of Japan, it meant a great deal." 

FREED CUBAN DISSIDENT, ENRIQUE MAYO, ARRIVES IN MIAMI
   
     MIAMI, FLORIDA--Attorney and journalist Mario Enrique Mayo, imprisoned in 2003 by the Cuban government, arrived Wednesday in Miami on a commercial flight from Mexico. Mayo was freed in December 2005 after two suicide attempts, several hunger strikes and other acts of protest at the Kilo 7 prison of Camagüey, Cuba, where he was confined with the other activists. Mayo had been sentenced to a 20-year prison term on charges of having undermined the principles of the Cuban revolution and for acts of civil disobedience.

    While in prison, Mayo tried twice to hang himself with a nylon rope. He also lacerated his face with the initials ''L,'' for liberty, and ''I,'' for innocence, and demanded his unconditional release. He suffered from hypertension and other health problems, including mental issues. The 2003 roundup resulted in prison sentences of up to 28 years for some of the dissidents. Some 54 remain jailed, including 28 journalists. Nine of the journalists have been released on parole due to illnesses, and four have opted for exile.

    According to the Cuban Commission for Human Rights and National Reconciliation, led by opposition leader Elizardo Sanchez, Cuban authorities are holding 205 political prisoners, 29 fewer than last year. In February 2008, journalists Jose Gabriel Ramon Castillo and Alejandro Gonzalez Raga, sentenced to 20 and 14 years respectively, were freed after the Spanish government worked for their release.

VENEZUELA'S ENERGY MINISTER: OPEC NEEDS A USD 70 OIL PRICE TO SUSTAIN

March 19, 2009

HUGO CHAVEZ plotTED to overthrow raul castro

     NEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK -- Jorge G. Castaneda, who served as Mexico's foreign minister from 2000 - 2003, wrote in the March 23 issue of Newsweek, which became public Saturday, that Deputy Prime Minister Carlos Lage Davila and Foreign Minister Felipe Perez Roque were concerned that Raul Castro would make concessions that would betray the 50-year-old Cuban Revolution. "For at least a month or so, Lage, Perez Roque and others were apparently involved in a conspiracy, betrayal, coup or whatever term one prefers, to overthrow or displace Raul from his position," Castaneda wrote.

     "In this endeavor, they recruited -- or were recruited by -- Venezuela's Hugo Chavez, who in turn tried to enlist the support of other Latin American leaders, starting with Leonel Fernandez of the Dominican Republic, who refused to get involved." Castaneda points to an "enigmatic" comment former leader Fidel Castro made in a column after the two men were removed. "He resorted to a baseball metaphor on the occasion of the World Baseball Classic to praise Dominicans for not participating (the team's plans had been unclear) and to claim that Chavez's baseball players, 'as good and young' as they might be, were no match for 'Cuba's seasoned all-stars,' " Castaneda wrote in the Newsweek article.

     "Their reasons for wishing to unseat Raul were mainly turf and power," Castaneda wrote, "but they also feared that the leader was beginning to feel threatened by the reaction of the Cuban people to excessive economic and social deprivation, and after his brother's demise would be unable to control the flow of events. According to Castaneda, Raul Castro detected the plot and went to his brother and gave him an ultimatum: support him or the plotters. Fidel Castro agreed to back his brother, Castaneda wrote. The Castro brothers then called in Chavez and gave him a "devil's alternative: back off, while maintaining economic support for the island, or lose his Cuban security detail and intelligence apparatus, exposing himself to coups and assassination attempts from eventual Venezuelan replacements. He chose to stick with the Castros."

U.S. SENATORS BLAST TREASURY OVER CUBA TRADE LIMITS
   
     WASHINGTON, D.C.--A group of U.S. senators has complained that the Treasury Department is not easing trade with Cuba as called for under new legislation, according to a letter released on Tuesday. President Barack Obama last week signed into law a spending measure that included provisions that ease a strict embargo on Cuba, focusing on allowing more travel and making it easier to sell agriculture goods to the communist-run island nation. However, 15 Republican and Democratic senators accused the Treasury of failing to implement the changes by continuing to uphold payment restrictions introduced in 2005 by the Bush administration.

    "The intent of those provisions was to facilitate already legal agricultural trade with Cuba," the group said in the March 16 letter. Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus said that there was an opportunity for the United States to make Cuba a bigger trading partner and that he would press the Treasury to resolve the matter. Many lawmakers have pressed for a review of U.S. policy toward Cuba after Fidel Castro, who seized power in a 1959 revolution, retired last year. President Barack Obama has favored relaxing some limits on the trade embargo.

    The lawmakers had hoped the new law approved last week would remove this hurdle which slowed food sales to Cuba. However, that was thwarted by Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner who made it clear that the law would remain the same when he sent a letter to two Democratic senators unhappy about easing restrictions on Cuba. "This is contrary to the intention of the provisions included in the omnibus legislation to halt this use" of the regulations, the senators said. The letter was signed by Baucus and Senators Jeff Bingaman, Tom Harkin, Blanche Lincoln, Jon Tester, Patty Murray, Mary Landrieu, Tim Johnson, Richard Lugar, Mike Enzi, Pat Roberts, Mike Crapo, Kit Bond, Mark Pryor and Maria Cantwell.

OPEC IS HAPPY WITH OIL PRICES AT USD 60 IN 2009  

March 18, 2009

FORMER COLOMBIAN PRESIDENT ANDRES PASTRANA SAID THAT US GAVE COLOMBIA INFORMATION ABOUT FARC LEADERS

     BOGOTA, COLOMBIA -- Former Colombian President Andrés Pastrana said on Tuesday that the United States gave Defense Minister Juan Manuel Santos information related to the location of the leaders of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) in Ecuador and Venezuela.

    "Some sources have said that the US gave Minister Santos the coordinates of FARC leaders in Venezuela and Ecuador (...) The United States said ‘we are not going to meddle but it is important that you have the coordinates of the guerrilla leaders on the border with Colombia,’" Pastrana said in an interview with Caracol Radio.

    Pastrana said that after having such information, Minister Santos requested President Álvaro Uribe to convene a High Council of Security and Defense two weeks ago. The Colombian president rejected the proposal, DPA reported.

NORTH KOREA FULLY REOPENS BORDER CROSSING WITH THE SOUTH
   
     SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA--North Korea fully reopened its border Tuesday to South Koreans commuting to jobs at factories in a northern economic zone after four days of restrictions, South Korean officials said. The crossing was closed twice in a week, stranding hundreds of South Koreans who work in Kaesong and keeping new deliveries of raw materials from factories in the industrial complex for days. After partially opening the border Monday, the North Korean military relayed a letter Tuesday saying it would fully reopen the crossing to Kaesong workers, Unification Ministry spokeswoman Lee Jong-joo said in Seoul. About 280 South Koreans crossed into Kaesong while 200 others returned home, and some 100 others chose to spend the night in the enclave, the ministry said.

    North Korea has provided no explanation for the closures, which have unnerved business owners who rely on South Korean managers and raw materials for factories that employ some 38,000 North Korean workers just across the border. But Pyongyang has been critical of Seoul's decision to hold 12 days of joint military exercises with the U.S. at a time of heightened tension on the peninsula. As the drills got underway last Monday, the North's military severed the only communications hot line between the Koreas and banned traffic across the border.

    Relations between the two Koreas have steadily deteriorated since President Lee Myung-bak took office a year ago with a new, tough policy on Pyongyang. One by one, joint projects developed during the previous era of warming ties have been suspended. The Kaesong complex — the most prominent of the landmark inter-Korean projects and a lucrative source of hard currency for the impoverished North — has been allowed to operate with a skeleton South Korean staff. But the closures forced at least 10 companies halted operations, and many more warned they would be forced to close within days if the border restrictions were not eased, a Kaesong business association, the Corporate Council for the Gaesong Industrial Complex, said Monday.

VENEZUELAN BUSINESSMAN IN HUGO CHAVEZ'S SUITCASE SCANDAL SENTENCED TO FOUR YEARS

March 17, 2009

HUGO CHAVEZ THREATENS TO ARREST DISSENTING GOVERNORS

     CARACAS, VENEZUELA -- Hugo Chávez threatened to arrest any opposition governors who resist the implementation of the recently amended Organic Law on Decentralization, which allows the Executive branch of government to take up the power granted to the regions. Chávez, who was in Puerto Sucre, Cumaná (east Venezuela), where he aired the 327th edition of his weekly program "Aló Presidente" (Hello, President), ordered the Navy and the Army to take over the key seaports of Puerto Cabello, Porlamar and Maracaibo. Noting that Henrique Salas Feo, the governor of Carabobo state (central Venezuela), said that he would reject this measure, Chávez said: "You would better have an army, buddy, because the Navy will go there. I do not know what you are going to do; you will go to jail, then. No authority here -a mayor, governor, or whatever- may oppose the Constitution and the Venezuelan law, otherwise he will be arrested."

    He delivered the same warning to the governors of Zulia and Nueva Esparta states, Pablo Pérez and Morel Rodríguez, respectively. "We will recover ports and airports throughout Venezuela. No matter who opposes these measures, this is the Venezuelan law," Chávez said. At the same time, he ordered the commander of the Navy, Zahím Alí Quintana Castro, to seize this week the ports of Puerto Cabello, Porlamar and Maracaibo. Also, he told Quintana Castro that if the governor of Carabobo Salas Feo, or the governors Pérez or Rodríguez "try something funny," he must arrest them "red handed."

    "These are strategic facilities and belong to all the Venezuelan people, not to a regional warlord or to the mafias," Chávez said. The Venezuelan leader accused Luis Felipe Acosta Carlez, the former governor of Carabobo and a member of the pro-government United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV), of giving the administration of the port of Puerto Cabello to drug traffickers. "This was one of my first divergences with him (Acosta Carlez). He was surrounded by drug traffickers," he admitted. "What is up with these governors? Please, opposition sirs, behave yourselves," he urged, while he joked about the name he would put to a military operation to arrest Governor Salas Feo (nicknamed Chicken): "Maybe "Chicken’s Operation, bring me a jailed chicken." Finally, Chávez sent this message: "We will have a fight to death with oligarchy. There is no agreement possible."

ZULIA STATE GOVERNOR, PABLO PEREZ, SAID HE IS NOT AFRAID OF HUGO CHAVEZ'S THREATS
   
     CARACAS, VENEZUELA--Pablo Pérez, the governor of western Zulia state, said on Monday that he is not afraid of the government attempts at putting him behind bars and added that his government actions and management are in accordance with the Constitution. "If they intend to imprison me for defending Zulia, they may come for me, because I will stand up for Zulia," he said.

    The Zulia state governor highlighted that the state "exclusive" powers are set forth in the Constitution and that the amendment to a law "cannot prevail over the Constitution." "I am fabricating nothing; I am asking for compliance with the national Constitution, which states that administration is the states exclusive competence," added Pérez.  The governor said that they would stage a protest against centralism. "We will not allow for it."

     He noted that decentralization was an accomplishment of local governments, when they managed to remove "anachronistic, ineffective, awkward centralism, which had state governors and city council members as employees of the Executive Office, and followed the orders sent from Miraflores presidential palace regardless of the reality in the province."

U.S.. FIGHTER JETS SHOT DOWN IRANIAN DRONE OVER IRAQ

March 16, 2009

BRAZILIAN PRESIDENT LULA DA sILvA SAID PRESIDENT OBAMA'S ELECTION OFFERS A "HISTORIC OPPORTUNITY"  

     WASHINGTON, D.C. -- President Barack Obama said on Saturday that his country has a lot to learn from Brazil in the field of renewable energy and said he plans to use ties with that country to strengthen relations with Latin America. In a statement at the Oval Office together with his Brazilian counterpart Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, the U.S. president promised to redouble his country’s efforts to use clean energy. Lula, for his part, offered Obama a drive in one of the Brazilian “flex-fuel” vehicles that run on ethanol and gasoline when he visits Brazil, which the U.S. leader said would take place “soon."

     Lula also said that Obama’s election offers a “historic opportunity” for the United States to improve its relations with Latin America, which his colleague said he wanted to strengthen. Besides energy, the main topic of the meeting was the economic crisis. In that regard, Obama said that there is no conflict between the United States and Europe about the agenda for the G-20 presidential summit scheduled for April 2 in London.

     Obama said the United States will place financial reform front and center of its priorities, and that the $787 billion stimulus package approved last month is only a first step. The local press has reported in recent days that the Washington government would be more interested in new budgetary stimulus measures abroad than in undertaking a reform of the international financial structure, something that Obama denied Saturday. Lula, for his part, warned of the repercussions of credit reductions at an international level and the exit of money from emerging markets. “If we do not make credit supply flow again, then, yes, the crisis could deepen in our country,” Lula warned.

EVO MORALES SAID HE IS INVESTIGATING CONTACTS BETWEEN ARMY, POLICE WITH CIA
   
     LA PAZ, BOLIVIA--Bolivian President Evo Morales is once again accusing the CIA of meddling in internal affairs.

    This time, Morales says a midlevel military official and Bolivian police officers are in contact with the U.S. spy agency. Morales made the allegations on Saturday, but offered no details or proof. He said he is personally investigating the matter because "selling information to foreign agents is treason."

    Morales spoke just days after ordering a U.S. diplomat to leave Bolivia. He accused the diplomat of conspiring with the opposition and "coordinating contacts" with a former police captain accused of infiltrating the state energy company on behalf of the CIA. The U.S. has called the allegation about CIA infiltration baseless.

HUGO CHAVEZ TAKES OVER OPPOSITION-RUN PORTS OF CARABOBO, ZULIA AND NUEVA ESPARTA 

March 15, 2009

PRESIDENT OBAMA MET WITH BRAZILIAN PRESIDENT LULA DA SILVA

     WASHINGTON, D.C. -

PRESIDENT OBAMA WILL MEET with Brazil’s Lula

      President Obama met with Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva to discuss bilateral and regional relations, financial assistance and development to help with economic and social problems across the region, a senior U.S. diplomat says. “This from our point of view was a great opportunity for the United States to build on an important relationship that we have with Brazil, a country which we have an important bilateral relationship with, an important regional relationship with, and an important global relationship,” Assistant Secretary of State Thomas Shannon said.

     Lula traveled to Washington for a White House meeting with Obama on March 14. While they have held telephone conversations, it was the first face-to-face meeting for the two world leaders. Lula is the third head of state invited to the White House since Obama took office. The meeting was especially important for Obama, who is preparing for his first meeting with the G20 advanced and largest developing economies that are meeting April 2 in London, and also the fifth Summit of the Americas April 17-19 in Port-of-Spain, the capital city of Trinidad and Tobago. Brazil’s Lula will attend both meetings, and Obama has said he was eager for consultations with Lula.

     Brazil is the world’s fifth most populous nation and has the world’s ninth largest economy. This meeting is “recognition of Brazil’s ascendancy in the world,” Shannon said. “What I want is for the United States to look at Latin America and South America with a friendly eye,” Lula said in a recent press conference, according to press reports. Issues expected to be discussed include the meltdown of the global economy, regional security issues, emerging U.S. policy toward Cuba, trade issues, biofuels and alternative energy sources, climate change, environmental protection, and health care concerns, Shannon said at a State Department briefing March 13 in Washington.

CUBA, VENEZUELA OFFERED THEIR AIR  FORCE BASES FOR STRATEGIC RUSSIAN BOMBERS 
   
     MOSCOW, RUSSIA--A Russian Air Force chief said Saturday that Hugo Chavez has offered an island as a temporary base for strategic Russian bombers, the Interfax news agency reported. The chief of staff of Russia's long range aviation, Maj. Gen. Anatoly Zhikharev, also said Cuba could be used to base the aircraft, Interfax reported. The Kremlin, however, said the situation was hypothetical. "The military is speaking about technical possibilities, that's all," Alexei Pavlov, a Kremlin official, told The Associated Press. "If there will be a development of the situation, then we can comment," he said.

    Zhikharev said Chavez had offered "a whole island with an airdrome, which we can use as a temporary base for strategic bombers," the agency reported. "If there is a corresponding political decision, then the use of the island ... by the Russian Air Force is possible." Interfax reported he said earlier that Cuba has air bases with four or five runways long enough for the huge bombers and could be used to host the long-range planes. Two Russian bombers landed in Venezuela last year in what experts said was the first Western Hemisphere touchdown of Russian military craft since the end of the Cold War.

   Cuba has never permanently hosted Russian or Soviet strategic aircraft. But Soviet short-range bombers often made stopovers there during the Cold War. Russia resumed long-range bomber patrols in 2007 after a 15-year hiatus. Independent military analyst Alexander Golts said from a strategic point of view there was nothing for Russia to gain from basing long-range craft within relatively short range of U.S. shores. "It has no military sense. The bombers don't need any base. This is just a retaliatory gesture," Golts said, saying Russia wanted to hit back after U.S. ships patrolled Black Sea waters.

TOP FARC SUSPECT REPORTEDLY CAPTURED IN ECUADOR

March 14, 2009

U.S. HONORS THREE COURAGEOUS CONTRACTORS HELD HOSTAGE BY COLOMBIAN GUERRILAS

     MIAMI, FLORIDA--Three U.S. citizens rescued from jungle captivity by Colombian rebels last summer were honored Thursday morning at U.S. Southern Command headquarters in Miami. Adm. James Stavridis, commander of U.S. Southern Command, presented Keith Stansell, Thomas Howes and Marc Gonsalves with Defense of Freedom Medals.

     The three men were captured in February 2003 while working as contractors for Northrop Grumman, a California company that had a Pentagon contract to survey the jungles of southeastern Colombia. They were among more than 600 hostages held by Colombia's leftist rebels, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia.

      They were rescued last July in a high-stakes Colombian operation that also liberated former presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt. The Defense of Freedom medal was created following the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, to honor defense department and defense contractor employees injured or killed while supporting department activities. It is the civil service equivalent of the military's Purple Heart medal given to soldiers. To date, the defense department has awarded the medal to 37 individuals in honor of their personal sacrifice, according to military officials.

JAPAN THREATENS TO SHOOT DOWN NORTH KOREAN SATELLITE 
   
     TOKYO, JAPAN--Japan said Friday that it could shoot down the satellite that North Korean officials said they plan to launch. Japan's Chief Cabinet Secretary Takeo Kawamura says it has the right to shoot down the satellite. "Japan is legally able to shoot down the object to secure safety if it looks like it will fall on to Japan," Chief Cabinet Secretary Takeo Kawamura said during a news conference.

    North Korea had informed an international organization that it plans to launch a satellite. Yonhap, South Korea's state-sponsored news agency, said the launch was slated for April 4 to 8.  The announcement has triggered international consternation. U.S. and South Korean officials have long said the North is actually preparing to test-fire a long-range missile under the guise of a satellite launch. The missile, Taepodong-2, is thought to have an intended range of about 4,200 miles (6,700 kilometers), which -- if true -- could give it the capability of striking Alaska or Hawaii. A U.N. Security Council resolution in 2006 banned North Korea from conducting ballistic missile testing. Japanese officials said they could shoot down the object whether it is a missile or a satellite.

     "As the U.N. resolutions prohibit (North Korea) from engaging in ballistic missile activities, we still consider it to be a violation of a technical aspect, even if (the North) claims it is a satellite. We will discuss the matter with related countries based on this view," said Japanese Foreign Minister Hirofumi Nakasone. Japan's Prime Minister Taro Aso added: "No matter what they call it, a satellite or anything, it will violate U.N. Security Council Resolution. We must lodge a stern protest through the U.N. and strongly demand it be called off."

HUGO CHAVEZ CRITICISM OF UNIONS BREAKS WORKERS' UNITY

March 13, 2009

SECURITY COUNCIL ACCUSES IRAN OF VIOLATING UNITED NATIONS SANCTIONS

     UNITED NATIONS, NEW YORK--A key Security Council committee reported Tuesday that Iran violated U.N. sanctions by trying to send weapons-related material to Syria on a cargo ship now docked in Cyprus. Japan's U.N. Ambassador Yukio Takasu, chairman of the committee monitoring sanctions against Iran, provided few details, but his report marked the first official confirmation that the Cypriot-flagged M/V Monchegorsk was trying to circumvent the U.N. arms embargo on Iran. The ship docked on Jan. 29 and is still there, diplomats said.

    France's U.N. Ambassador Jean-Maurice Ripert described its shipment as "explosives and ... arms." Takasu said a U.N. member state — identified by the United States, Britain and France as Cyprus — sent a letter to the committee in early February "seeking guidance with respect to its inspections of cargo on a vessel carrying its flag that was found to be carrying arms-related material." The committee responded with a letter saying the transfer of the material was a violation of a 2007  Security Council resolution that prohibits Iran from transferring any arms or related material and requires all countries to prohibit the procurement of such items from Iran, Takasu said.

    Britain's U.N. Ambassador John Sawers praised "the vigilance and cooperation" of Cyprus and said his country "looks forward to the committee receiving explanations from Iran and Syria as to why the shipment was permitted by Iran as the reported state of origin, and as to the involvement of Syria as the reported state of destination." Council diplomats say the ultimate destination of the weapons-related material remains unknown — possibly Hamas fighters in Gaza, Hezbollah militants in Lebanon, or Iraqis with close ties to Syria. There has been no decision on what to do with the cargo, though Britain has signaled that it is ready to help Cyprus dispose of it.

IRAQI WHO THREW SHOES AT FORMER PRESIDENT BUSH JAILED FOR 3 YEARS
   
     BAGHDAD, IRAQ--Muntadhar al-Zeidi, 30, defiantly shouted, "Long Live Iraq!" when the sentence was imposed, according to defense lawyers. Some of his relatives collapsed and had to be helped out of the courthouse. Others were forcibly removed by guards after shouting "Down with Bush!" "This judiciary is unjust," al-Zeidi's brother, Dargham, said tearfully. Other family members shouted insults against Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, who like al-Zeidi is a Shiite.

    Although al-Zeidi received the minimum sentence — it could have been 15 years behind bars — his lawyers denounced the verdict and said they would appeal, possibly hoping a public outcry would aid their cause. Al-Zeidi's brazen act during a Dec. 14 press conference by Bush and al-Maliki in Baghdad's Green Zone turned the young reporter into a folk hero across the Arab world, where the former U.S. president is reviled for invading Iraq in 2003 and for other policies.

    It appeared unlikely, therefore, that al-Maliki would recommend a presidential pardon for the journalist, at least anytime soon. Al-Maliki was deeply embarrassed by the assault against an American president who had stood by him when some Arab leaders were quietly urging the U.S. to oust him. His aides had said the prime minister was personally offended by such an insult to a foreign guest.  The speed of the trial — two relatively brief hearings — is likely to feed widespread suspicion among Iraqis that al-Maliki's government orchestrated the process, although defense lawyers said they had no evidence of interference.

HUGO CHAVEZ MOVES ON CREATION OF COMMUNES

March 12, 2009

U.S.-CUBA POLICY CHANGES STUCKED INTO THE GIANT 2009 SPENDING BILL

     WASHINGTON, D.C.--The 2009m spending bill to be signed by President Obama creates a general travel license for Americans who want to travel to Cuba to cut agricultural and medical sales deals with the communist government. It also lets Cuba pay for goods on arrival -- instead of before the products leave U.S. ports -- and removes funding for enforcement of family travel restrictions enacted by former President George W. Bush.Geithner wrote that the agricultural travel license would be limited to ''only a narrow class of businesses,'' which would have to report back on their trips.

     By law, he said, Cuba would still have to pay up front. Left intact in the bill, which expires in October, is a measure that suspends enforcement of rules that say Cuban Americans can only visit immediate relatives once every three years. Travel to the island would still be illegal, but the department wouldn't be allowed to spend money trying to catch anyone doing it.

''The assurances I have received from Secretary Geithner allayed my most significant concerns,'' said Menendez, who voted in favor of the bill. In letters to Menendez and Nelson, Geithner sought to distance the administration from the changes and assure them that few of the provisions will actually change U.S.-Cuba policy.

NORTH KOREA ACCUSES THE UNITED STATES OF PLOTTING ATTACK
   
     SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA-- North Korea's Foreign Ministry on Wednesday accused the United States of preparing for a war against the communist state in Pyongyang's first verbal criticism of the Obama Administration. A ministry spokesman said military drills taking place between U.S. and South Korean forces were "nuclear war exercises designed to mount a preemptive attack on the DPRK." The DPRK is the North's official name, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.

    The comments came as Russia and China -- two of the North's few remaining allies -- said that they were also concerned about rising tensions on the Korean peninsula. "The new administration of the U.S. is now working hard to infringe upon the sovereignty of the DPRK by force of arms in collusion with the South Korean puppet bellicose forces," said a Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman, in comments carried by the North's official KCNA news agency.

     "The DPRK, exposed to the potential threat of the U.S. and its allied forces, will take every necessary measure to protect its sovereignty," the unnamed spokesman added. Since the inauguration of the South's conservative President Lee Myung-bak, the North has all but severed relations with its wealthy neighbor, and in recent weeks increasingly stepped up rhetoric against the United States. The North Korean official said that inter-Korean relations had reached their worst phase and the situation had grown so tense that "a war may break out any moment due to the reckless policy of confrontation" pursued by South Korea.

WASHINGTON SAID CHAVEZ CONTINUES TO SUPPORT THE REBEL FARC

March 11, 2009

FIDEL CASTRO:  A FAIR AND CONSTRUCTIVE CRITICISM

     HAVANA, CUBA--Former Cuba dicator Fidel Castro wrote he is trying to follow the details about the Baseball Classic through our national television. In an article posted in the Cuban press under the title "A Fair and Constructive Criticism, Fidel Castro said "the Japanese players are excellent; I would like our victory in the baseball Classic to be achieved while confronting that team of great technical expertise."

    "And that won’t happen if we act carelessly as I saw we did yesterday, Sunday 8 in the afternoon, during the game between Cuba and South Africa," he warned. Prensa Latina is posting below the full text of Fidel Castro´s article. Olivera and Paret let themselves be caught by surprise on first base, and Michel Enríquez brought about an ‘out’ with that irrational advance towards second base after connecting a hit, as a result of being pushed perhaps too much by the team leadership to run for a base.

    As we all could see, that game could have been won by a knock-out in the seventh inning, with 6 home-runs, two of them by Cepeda, a record in the Classics. That would have enhanced the well-deserved prestige of Cuban sport. I allow myself to make this criticism because those are three extraordinary athletes, with great dignity and self-confidence. They know they represent a wholesome sport in that world tournament. I should express this with honesty and admiration.

PENTAGON: CHINESE VESSELS HARASSED U.S. NAVY SHIP
   
     WASHINGTON, D.C. --The Defense Department charged Monday that five Chinese ships shadowed and maneuvered dangerously close to a U.S. Navy vessel in an apparent attempt to harass the American crew. Defense officials in the Obama administration said the incident Sunday followed several days of "increasingly aggressive" acts by Chinese ships in the region. The incident took place in international waters in the South China Sea, about 75 miles south of Hainan Island.

    U.S. officials said a protest was lodged with the Chinese government over the weekend and it was to be repeated to a Beijing military attache at a Pentagon meeting Monday. U.S. officials said a protest was to be delivered to Beijing's military attache at a Pentagon meeting Monday. The USNS Impeccable sprayed one ship with water from fire hoses to force it away. Despite the force of the water, Chinese crewmembers stripped to their underwear and continued closing within 25 feet, the Defense Department said.

    "On March 8, 2009, five Chinese vessels shadowed and aggressively maneuvered in dangerously close proximity to USNS Impeccable, in an apparent coordinated effort to harass the U.S. ocean surveillance ship while it was conducting routine operations in international waters," the Pentagon statement said. The Chinese ships included a Chinese Navy intelligence collection ship, a Bureau of Maritime Fisheries Patrol Vessel, a State Oceanographic Administration patrol vessel, and two small Chinese-flagged trawlers, officials said. "The Chinese vessels surrounded USNS Impeccable, two of them closing to within 50 feet, waving Chinese flags and telling Impeccable to leave the area," officials said in the statement. China views almost the entirety of the South China Sea as its territory. China's claims to small islets in the region have put it at odds with five governments — the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan.

ECUADOR PRESIDENT RAFAEL CORREA REVEALED THAT FIDEL CASTRO SUFFERED RELAPSE IN JANUARY

March 10, 2009

ISRAEL WARNS: IRAN HAS CROSSED "NUCLEAR THRESHOLD"

     JERUSALEM, ISRAEL--Iran is now capable of producing atomic weapons, Israel's top military intelligence officer said Sunday, sounding the highest-level warning that Israel's arch-enemy has achieved independent nuclear capability. At a Cabinet meeting, the chief of military intelligence, Maj. Gen. Amos Yadlin, did not say Iran already has an atomic bomb, participants said. However, he said, Iran has "crossed the threshold" and has the expertise and materials needed for one.

    The participants spoke on condition of anonymity because the Cabinet meeting was closed. They said Yadlin told them that Iran continues to accumulate uranium for enrichment and hopes to exploit the Obama administration's intention to open a dialogue as a cover for developing nuclear weapons. Yadlin's comments follow a similar assessment by the U.S. military chief, Adm. Mike Mullen. He said a week ago that Iran has enough fissile material to build a bomb now.

    Israeli officials have long identified a nuclear Iran as the most serious threat to the Jewish state. Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has repeatedly called for destruction of Israel, and Iran has tested long-range missiles that could strike Israel. Israel's long-held policy is that the world must cooperate to defuse the Iranian nuclear threat. While not directly threatening to take out Iran's nuclear facilities, Israel has avoided taking the military option off the table. Prime Minister-designate Benjamin Netanyahu, who is putting together the next Israeli government, for years has said that Iran represents an existential threat to the Jewish state. He is seen as more likely than other Israeli leaders to order an attack.

IRAN TEST FIRES NEW LONG-RANGE MISSILE
   
     TEHRAN, IRAN--Iran has launched a new long-range missile, Reuters reported Sunday, days after the Islamic Republic's military chief warned Israel that Tehran's missiles are within range of its nuclear facilities. "Iran test fires new long range missile," Press TV, Iran's English-language television station, said in a scrolling headline, Reuters reported.

     The report comes days after Iran's military chief warned Israel that its nuclear facilities are within the range of Iranian missiles. The warning from Revolutionary Guards commander Gen. Mohammad Ali Jafari is the latest message from Tehran that it will strike back if attacked.

    Israel and the United States suspect Iran's nuclear program is a cover for weapons production and say they would not accept a nuclear-armed Iran. Tehran denies the accusation and says its nuclear activity is for generating power. Iran's Shahab-3 missiles have a range of up to 1,250 miles, putting Israel within striking distance.

NORTH KOREA THREATENS WAR IF SATELLITE SHOT DOWN

     SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA-- North Korea put its armed forces on standby Monday and threatened "a war" if anyone tries to shoot down what regional powers suspect is an imminent test-firing of a long-range missile. Pyongyang also cut off a military hot line with the South, causing a complete shutdown of their border and stranding hundreds of South Koreans working in an industrial zone in the North Korean border city of Kaesong.

     The North also indicated it was pushing ahead with plans to send a communications satellite into space, a provocative launch neighboring governments believe could be a cover for a long-range missile capable of reaching Alaska. U.S. and Japanese officials have suggested they could shoot down a North Korean missile if necessary, further incensing Pyongyang."Shooting our satellite for peaceful purposes will precisely mean a war," the general staff of the North's military said in a statement carried Monday by the official Korean Central News Agency. Any interception will draw "a just retaliatory strike operation not only against all the interceptor means involved but against the strongholds" of the U.S., Japan and South Korea, it said.

March 09, 2009

COLLECTIVE OWNERSHIP IS THE GOAL OF SOCIALISM 

     CARACAS, VENEZUELA--Ideologically, Hugo Chávez is against making room for the private sector to grow and get stronger. On the contrary, he cries that the collective nature of ownership is the core of the production policy, no matter the constitutional provisions on use and enjoyment of private property and the State's duty to foster and promote both private property and investment.

    In advancing the revolution following the victory of the Yes vote for an amendment to the Constitution allowing for endless reelection of elected officials, President Chávez has threatened to seize rice processing plants -property of Polar, Iancarina and Cargill, among others- and "turn them into social property, should they clown around. Socialism, socialism!" The endeavor to reduce private space is neither a sudden President's whim nor a current situation. The State planning points to that reduction under the First National Socialist Plan for 2007-2013, and the proposed constitutional reform, that was denied in 2007.

     In this way, the Bolivarian government guidelines aim at "breaking with the bourgeois capitalist model (...) dismantling the superstructure that sustains the capitalist reproduction in the constitutional and legal fields (…) laying the foundations for a new production model based on new relations of production, new kinds of ownership."  The issue of ownership has been always included in President Chávez's speeches. During his TV and radio show "Aló, Presidente" last Sunday March 1st, the head of state said, "A fundamental component for socialism is social ownership of the means of production. What are the means of production? The land, which is not private but social property."

HUGO CHAVEZ SAID THAT HE WILL NOT HESITATE TO SEIZE "EMPRESA POLAR" 
   
     CARACAS, VENEZUELA--Should the food holding Empresas Polar fail to abide by the Constitution and laws, "rest assured, it will be expropriated and my hand will not shake to stand up in the people's interest," said President Hugo Chávez during a ceremony to start up the building of a new iron and steel industry in southern Bolívar state.

     He added that seizures will not stop "until attaining food sovereignty." "I already signed the expropriation of a set of rice processing plants, particularly, a plant unwilling to follow the national regulations."  "We will work and talk, but first, you should acknowledge that here there are laws, a head of state, authorities and people," he admonished.

    A rice processing plant, property of Polar, located in western Guárico state, was intervened this week. According to government authorities, it was not meeting the production quota of white rice, the price of which is regulated.

EMPRESAS POLAR SEEKS PROTECTION AGAINST HUGO CHAVEZ'S INTERVENTION

     CARACAS, VENEZUELA--Empresas Polar, the largest food industry in Venezuela, stated on Thursday through a press release that it has "always complied with laws," a day after President Hugo Chávez threatened to expropriate it for alleged failure to comply with the regulations in force.

    "We have worked for Venezuela, continuously invested in the country and created wellbeing and progress for all Venezuelans," said the text. The head of state ordered on Wednesday the expropriation of the local facilities of US Cargill, as well as a court investigation into the firm. Earlier, last weekend, Chávez ordered the intervention into all rice processing plants, including that of Polar, as a result of shortage of the regulated good.

    "Since then, we have fully met the quotas set in all our facilities," added the communiqué. "We, at Alimentos Polar, have always abided by law and will continue doing it," said the firm in reply to Chávez's threats, who maintained, "If the Polar company is not taken in hand, Mr. (Lorenzo) Mendoza, we will expropriate you, I warn you," Chávez told the corporate CEO.

March 08, 2009

HUGO CHAVEZ URGES PRESIDENT OBAMA TO TURN TO SOCIALISM

     CARACAS, VENEZUELA--"I recommend to Obama -- they're criticizing him because they say he's moving towards socialism -- come Obama, ally with us on the path to socialism, it's the only road," he said on Venezuelan state television, according to a Bloomberg report. "Imagine a socialist revolution in the U.S. Nothing is impossible," he added.

     Obama's $787 billion stimulus package and his talk of addressing income inequalities through government policies have drawn accusations that he favors a wealth redistribution plan that would replace the free markets with socialism.

      But Obama has said he has no intention of eliminating capitalism; he is simply trying to fix the economic crisis with a long-term view by reforming education, energy and health care. As for Chavez, he gleefully declared in his speech Friday that capitalism in America has failed

VENEZUELA CONDEMNS COLOMBIAN DEFENSE MINISTER'S STATEMENTS
   
  CARACAS, VENEZUELA --The Venezuelan government condemned on Tuesday Colombian Defense Minister Juan Manuel Santos' statements, and branded the official as a "threat to the stability and the sovereignty of Latin American countries."

    In a press release, the Venezuelan Foreign Ministry described as "reprehensible the arrogant attitude" of Santos, who last Sunday advocated as "legitimate right to self-defense" the attack on "terrorists who are systematically assaulting the population of a country, even though they are not within its territory."

     Santos was referring to Colombia's military operation in Ecuador, a year ago, when the Colombian armed forces attacked a camp of the rebel Colombian Revolutionary Armed Forces (FARC) and killed the FARC's second in command. Venezuela claimed that Santos' remarks show his "coarse ignorance of the unanimous consensus" reached the regional summit held in Santo Domingo in March 2008.

COLOMBIAN SENATOR PIEDAD CORDOBA IS AT ODDS WITH HUGO CHAVEZ'S REELECTION

     BOGOTA, COLOMBIA--Colombian Senator Piedad Córdoba, whose international image is linked to the pacification of her country, said on Thursday that she does not agree with the aspirations of President Hugo Chávez to be reelected, in spite of the fact that the Venezuelan leader considers the liberal legislator as one of his closest friends.

    "I have formed a deep friendship with President Chávez; I have much respect for him; I love him a lot. We remain friends; I admire the whole process of the Bolivarian revolution," Córdoba said, referring to Chávez. "But if you ask me to make a choice, I would rather reelect the project."

     Córdoba talked with a group of reporters at the Club Nacional de la Prensa (National Press Club), where she spoke about her own presidential aspirations as a result of a poll published on Thursday, and her opposition to the intentions of Colombian President Alvaro Uribe to be reelected if a constitutional reform is passed, AP reported.

March 07, 2009

ANOTHER LEADING CUBAN OFFICIAL, FERNANDO REMIREZ DE ESTENOZ, OUSTED

     HAVANA, CUBA--The purge of Cuba's elite ranks has claimed yet another victim amid a strong hint that Fidel Castro is healthy enough to have returned home from the hospital where he had convalesced at least part of the time since emergency surgery in 2006. The latest known victim of the purge announced Monday was Fernando Remírez de Estenoz, former chief of the island's diplomatic mission in Washington and most recently head of the Cuban Communist Party's Foreign Relations Department.

    Remírez de Estenoz, 57, was considered part of the group of top Cuban officials who were just one generation behind the island's current rulers, mostly men in their late 70s, like President Raúl Castro and Vice President José Ramón Machado Ventura. His ouster has not been noted in the official media, although one Foreign Ministry official told El Nuevo Herald that the news is circulating in Cuba. On Wednesday, the state-run National Information Agency issued a report on the meeting between Castro and Honduran President José Manuel Zelaya that mentioned Jorge Martí Martínez as the head of Communist Party's Foreign Relations Department.

     Martí served as Cuba's ambassador to Russia 2003-2008. In July, he was appointed head of the Cuban Institute of Friendship with the People, which promotes solidarity with Cuba overseas. The removal of Remírez de Estenoz appears linked to the massive government restructuring and political purge announced Monday that replaced 12 senior officials, including Foreign Minister Felipe Pérez Roque and Carlos Lage, vice president of the ruling Council of State. Fidel Castro wrote in a column Tuesday that Lage and Pérez Roque had succumbed to the undignified ``honey of power.'' Both resigned from all their other government and party jobs in letters made public Thursday, acknowledging having made ''mistakes'' but not detailing them. 

SOUTH KOREA AIRLINES STEER CLEAR OF NORTH KOREAN AIRSPACE AFTER NORTH THREATENS PLANES

     SEOUL SOUTH KOREA--South Korean airlines are rerouting their flights away from North Korean airspace, hours after the North threatened Seoul's passenger planes amid heightened tensions on the divided peninsula. The move _ which will cost carriers thousands of dollars on each flight _ comes after Pyongyang warned in state-run media that it cannot guarantee security for South Korean civil airplanes flying near its airspace and accused the U.S. and South Korea of attempting to provoke a nuclear war with the upcoming joint military drills.

    It did not say what kind of danger South Korean planes would face or whether the threat meant the North would shoot down planes. South Korea has urged the North to immediately retract the threat. "The military threat against civil airplanes' normal flights is a violation of international norms and an inhumane act that cannot be justified under any circumstances," Unification Ministry spokesman Kim Ho-nyeon told reporters. He indicated it may be notice to clear the airspace before a possible missile launch but declined to elaborate.

    North Korea announced last week that it is preparing to send a communications satellite into space but regional powers suspect the claim is a cover for the launch of a long-range missile capable of reaching Alaska. The United Nations Command, the U.S.-led body overseeing the 1953 armistice that ended fighting in the three-year Korean War, called the North's threat to South Korean planes "entirely inappropriate." During a meeting Friday with North Korean generals, members of the command and said it should be retracted immediately, according to a statement issued after the meeting. It did not say how North Korean officers reacted to the appeal.

VENEZUELA AT THE BOTTOM OF INTERNATIONAL PROPERTY RIGHTS INDEX

     CARACAS, VENEZUELA--According to the 2009 International Property Rights Index (IPRI), Venezuela ranked 109th among 115 countries included in the survey.   The IPRI is an international comparative study that measures the significance of both physical and intellectual property rights and their protection for economic well-being. It is prepared by the Property Rights Alliance, a parent organization that has initiated a series of IPRI studies for the Hernando de Soto Fellowship Program.

    The survey takes into account several variables for 115 countries around the globe. It considers that a grade near 10 would be the best result, whereas a result near zero would be the worst. Finland tops the ranking, while Bangladesh ranks last. Venezuela has a weighted score of 3.2, and is one of the last countries in the list.

    Venezuela ranked 114th in the list together with Zimbabwe in the legal and political environment and ranked 109th in the weighted average, together with Chad.   According to the study, "Venezuela does not have an independent judiciary and there is no confidence in the Supreme Tribunal of Justice," Rafael Alfonzo said.  Alfonzo added that after examining the results of the report, one could say that "there is low political stability and that corruption has not been controlled. These facts, together with expropriations and nationalizations, show that there is little protection of these rights, he stressed.

March 06, 2009

CARLOS LAGE AND FELIPE PEREZ ROQUE RESIGNED ALL CUBAN COMMUNIST PARTY, GOVERNMENT POSTS

     HAVANA, CUBA--Two of Cuba's most prominent officials have resigned from all Communist Party and government posts after they were removed from the Cabinet and criticized by Fidel Castro, according to letters published Thursday in the state press. The letters from Vice President Carlos Lage and ousted Foreign Minister Felipe Perez Roque acknowledged they had committed errors - which were not specified - and promised to continue serving the country.

       The two were removed from the Cuba's Cabinet, the Council of Ministers, as part of a broad shakeup on Monday. A day later, former President Fidel Castro published a letter alleging they had been seduced by "the honey of power" and hinted they were demoted because their angling for leadership roles in a post-Castro Cuba had become unseemly.  The two brief letters reproduced in the party daily Granma used strikingly similar language. Both were addressed to President Raul Castro and pledged loyalty to both Castro brothers as well as to the Communist Party. "I recognize the errors committed and assume responsibility," Lage wrote.

     Both Lage and Perez Roque also have been close to the elder Castro. Lage, a former Communist Youth leader, oversaw the limited economic reforms of the 1990s that helped keep Cuba's economy from collapsing following the loss of aid from the Soviet Union. Both men were members of the elite Council of State as well as the Cabinet, and Lage was also a member of the party's ruling Political Bureau. Perez Roque was Fidel Castro's personal secretary before becoming foreign minister in 1999 and he reportedly kept in close touch with Fidel even after the leader stepped aside due to illness in mid-2006. Raul Castro formally assumed the presidency a year ago.

HUGO CHAVEZ APPOINTS NEW HEAD OF VENEZUELA ARMED FORCES COMMAND

     CARACAS, VENEZUELA--Hugo Chavez, in his role as Commander in Chief of the Bolivarian National Armed Force (FANB), has fired his existing commander of the Strategic Operational Command (CEO), Major General Jesus Gonzalez Gonzalez ,who had served in office since its inception in 2008, and appointed Major General Carlos Mata Figueroa in his place.

       Chavez made the announcement on the topical show Dando & Dando on state channel Venezolana de Television (VTV). He tried to downplay the change, emphasizing that these appointments are part of the restructuring process that takes place in the national government.

     Chávez argued that this appointment is a result of the changes being made in the armed forces in order to comply with the stipulations of the new Organic Law of the Bolivarian National Armed Forces. "These are some of the changes being done to implement the new law that states that the ministry should be a predominantly administrative body and everything is operational up to the CEO and will receive direct orders from the Commander in Chief," Chavez added.

HUGO CHAVEZ ORDERS NATIONALIZATION OF CARGILL

     CARACAS, VENEZUELA--Hugo Chavez said Wednesday he had ordered the nationalization of at least some of the operations of the U.S.-based food giant Cargill and threatened to do the same with the Caracas-based food maker Polar. Venezuela President Hugo Chavez accused Cargill of growing specialized rice to evade price controls.  "Begin the expropriation process with Cargill," he said in a nationally televised speech in which he accused the company of growing specialized forms of rice in an attempt to evade price controls. The leftist president called the company's practices "a flagrant violation of everything that we have been doing."

    Mark Klein, a spokesman for Cargill, said the Minneapolis, Minnesota-based company "is committed to the production of food in Venezuela that complies with all laws and regulations." He said a rice mill cited by Chavez "was designed exclusively to manufacture parboiled rice, which the company has done at this site for the last seven years and elsewhere in the country for 13 years." Klein added, "Cargill expects the opportunity to clarify the situation with the government and is respectful of the Venezuelan government decision."

    Cargill, which is privately owned, has been doing business since 1986 in Venezuela, where its operations include oilseed processing, grain and oilseeds trading, animal feed, salt, and financial and risk management. It has 2,000 employees in 22 locations in Venezuela, according to its Web site. About Polar, which is led by Lorenzo Mendoza, Chavez said, "We can expropriate all the plants of Polar. Mr. Mendoza, be alert. Because then you will go out and order your pricey lawyers and I don't know what to say that this is a violation of the constitution. Well, fine. If you want to fight with the government, brother, there you go. It's not with the government, it's with the law!"

March 05, 2009

INTERNATIONAL COURT ISSUES ARREST WARRANT FOR SUDANESE PRESIDENT OMAR HASSAN AL-BASHIR

     THE HAGUE, NETHERLANDS--The International Criminal Court at the Hague issued an arrest warrant Wednesday for Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir for a five-year campaign of violence in Darfur.  Al-Bashir is the first sitting head of state to be charged by the permanent war crimes court. Bashir is charged with seven counts of crimes against humanity and war crimes. The warrant does not mention genocide, but the court may issue an amended warrant to include that charge later, ICC spokeswoman Laurence Blairon said.

    Five counts are for crimes against humanity and include murder, extermination, forcible transfer, torture, and rape, Blairon said. The other two are for war crimes, for intentionally directing attacks against civilians and for pillaging. "Bashir's official capacity as head of state does not exclude criminal responsibility or get him immunity," Blairon said in announcing the warrant.  The ICC's chief prosecutor, Luis Moreno-Ocampo, filed genocide charges against al-Bashir in July last year, accusing him of masterminding attempts to wipe out African tribes in the war-torn region with a campaign of murder, rape and deportation. 

    The violence in Darfur erupted in 2003 after rebels began an uprising against the Sudanese government. To counter the rebels, Sudanese authorities armed and cooperated with Arab militias that went from village to village in Darfur, killing, torturing and raping residents there, according to the United Nations, Western governments and human rights organizations.  The militias targeted civilian members of tribes from which the rebels drew strength.  Al-Bashir bears responsibility for the crimes committed in Darfur, Moreno-Ocampo said last year, because he sat at the apex of the government.

HUGO CHAVEZ RESHUFFLES HIS CABINET

     CARACAS, VENEZUELA--Hugo Chávez announced in a press release a reshuffle of his cabinet, including changes in the names of ministries, transfers of functions and appointment of new ministers, said Minister of Information and Communication Jesse Chacón.

    According to Chacón, Eduardo Samán was appointed Minister of Trade; Jesús María Montilla was named Minister of Health and Social Protection. Diosdado Cabello will be the new Minister of Public Works and Housing, while Nuri Orejuela Guevara and Erika Farías were designated as Minister of Science, Technology and Intermediate Industry and Minister for Communes, respectively.

    Chávez appointed María Cristina Iglesias as Minister of Labor and Social Welfare. Additionally, Ramón Carrizales will keep his position as Executive Vice-President and he will be the acting Minister of Defense to replace General in Chief Gustavo Rangel Briceño. "The ministries that are not referred to in this communiqué will continue to operate under their present names, while their structure will be thoroughly reviewed to maximize efficiency. Further, their incumbent ministers are to remain in their positions," stated Chacón.

US GROUP CLAIMS HUGO CHAVEZ FOSTERED A CLIMATE FAVORING ATTACKS ON JEWS

     WASHINGTON, D.C.--Jewish-US representatives are concerned about anti-Semitism in Venezuela. The American Jewish Committee (AJC) accused Venezuela's Hugo Chávez of creating "a permissive environment" favoring attacks against the Jewish community in Venezuela.

    Dina Siegel-Vann, director of the Latin-American Institute, American Jewish Committee, said that "President Hugo Chávez's wording against the State of Israel resulted in a permissive environment favoring attacks against the Jewish community, with some people thinking that it is legitimate to attack our community and that there will be no consequences for such actions," quoted the website prensajudia.com.

     Siegel Vann completed a three day-visit to Caracas after the second attack against the Jewish community since the beginning of the Israeli military operation in Gaza Strip.

March 04, 2009

fidel castro: two ousted officials undone by 'honey power' 

     HAVANA, CUBA--former dictator Fidel Castro says he was consulted on the sweeping leadership changes by his brother Raúl's government and he says two of the ousted officials had been seduced by ``the honey of power.'' Castro's newly published article gives the first hint of why some of the officials were removed in the abrupt shakeup -- the largest in decades. The elder Castro wrote Tuesday that he had been consulted about the changes and said the two most mentioned had been seduced by ''the honey of power,'' though he did not name them.

    Although he will remain as vice president of the more important council of state, Lage was replaced as secretary of the council of ministers by a military general who last served as Castro's chief of staff at the defense ministry. A brigade general was also named minister of the Iron and Steel Industry.  Lage's departure from the council of ministers and the recent promotions of three others close to Raúl Castro leaves the Cabinet leadership in the hands of members of the armed forces and people in his closest confidence.

     Some Cuban exile leaders in Miami fear that the personnel moves announced on Cuban television's midday newscast after the sports and weather reports show Castro is closing ranks and consolidating power. Lage, 57, a physician, is known as an economic reformer credited with helping Cuba survive the collapse of the Soviet Union. e was once considered an heir apparent in Cuba, and his name was even mentioned as a possible successor for the presidency when Fidel Castro resigned last year. Also ''freed'' from his post at the council of ministers was longtime communist youth leader Otto Rivero Torres, who had been in charge of Fidel Castro's pet project, the ''Battle of Ideas'' campaign.

DEATH THREAT, BULLET MAILED TO FRENCH PRESIDENT NICOLAS SARKOZY 

     PARIS, FRANCE--French President Nicolas Sarkozy and two top government ministers have been sent anonymous death threats in letters stuffed with 9mm-caliber bullets, a judicial official said Tuesday. Counterterrorism agents are investigating the mailings to Sarkozy, Justice Minister Rachida Dati and Interior Minister Michele Alliot-Marie - the latest members of the ruling conservative party to be targeted by such a letter campaign, the officials said.

    The two-page, typed form letters feature disjointed messages addressed to "purveyors of freedom-killing and fascist laws," the judicial official said, on condition of anonymity because she was not authorized to speak publicly about the matter.  A total of 10 politicians were named in the letter - and six of them have already received one, the official said. Neither the author of the letter nor a possible motive is known, she said.

    The letter to Sarkozy's office was received Feb. 26, according to prosecutors. The presidential Elysee Palace had said earlier Tuesday that it had not received such a letter. Also Tuesday, Bordeaux City Hall said Mayor Alain Juppe - a former conservative prime minister - had also been mailed such a letter and bullet. Two senators from Sarkozy's party received similar threats last week. "I'm staying completely calm," Juppe told reporters in the southwestern French city. "It's the job of police services to analyze things, and take the proper measures. I have no intention of changing my agenda."

GUNMEN AMBUSH SRI LANKA'S CRICKET TEAM IN PAKISTAN, 7 KILLED

     LAHORE, PAKISTAN--At least a dozen men ambushed Sri Lanka's cricket team with rifles, grenades and rocket launchers Tuesday, converging on the squad's convoy as it drove through a traffic circle near an eastern Pakistani stadium. Seven players, an umpire and a coach were wounded, none with life-threatening injuries, but six policemen and a driver died. The attackers struck as a convoy carrying the squad and match officials reached a traffic circle 300 yards from the main sports stadium in the eastern city of Lahore, triggering a 15-minute gunbattle with police guarding the vehicles.

    The assault, just ahead of a match, was one of the worst terrorist attacks on a sports team since Palestinian militants killed 11 Israeli athletes at the 1972 Munich Olympics. By attacking South Asia's most popular sport, the gunmen guaranteed themselves tremendous international attention while demonstrating Pakistan's struggle to provide its 170 million people with basic security as it battles a raging Islamist militancy. Pakistani Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani said the incident "has humiliated the country" and the head of the Interior Ministry, Rehman Malik, declared Pakistan was "in a state of war."

    Tuesday's attackers melted away into the city, and none was killed or captured, city police chief Haji Habibur Rehman said. The attackers abandoned machine guns, rocket-propelled grenades and plastic explosives, Punjab police chief Khwaja Khalid Farooq said. They carried backpacks stuffed with dried fruit, mineral water and walkie-talkies — provisions also abandoned at or near the scene, officials said. Authorities did not speculate on the identities of the attackers, but the chief suspects will be Islamist militants, some with links to Al Qaeda, who have staged high-profile attacks on civilian targets before. The bus driver, Mohammad Khalil, accelerated as bullets ripped into the vehicle and explosions rocked the air, steering the team to the safety of the stadium. The players — some of them wounded — ducked down and shouted "Go! Go!" as he drove through the ambush.

March 03, 2009

RAUL CASTRO REPLACES LAGE AND PEREZ ROQUE, BOTH LOYAL TO FIDEL CASTRO

     HAVANA, CUBA--CUBAN DICTATOR RAUL CASTRO  shook up Cuba's top leadership on Monday, replacing key figures tied to his brother Fidel Castro with others apparently closer to him. The abrupt shakeup came a year after Fidel Castro handed the presidency to his younger brother because of poor health. It was announced at the end of the midday news, after the weather and sports.

    Perhaps the most prominent of those ousted, Foreign Minister Felipe Perez Roque, was the youngest of Cuba's top leaders and had been widely mentioned as a possible future president. Perez Roque, 43, was replaced by his own deputy, Bruno Rodriguez. Vice President Carlos Lage, 57, apparently kept his job as vice president of the ruling Council of State, but was replaced as Cabinet Secretary by Gen. Jose Amado Ricardo Guerra, who had been a top official in the military that Raul Castro ran for decades.

    Lage was credited with helping save Cuba's economy by designing modest economic reforms after the Soviet Union collapsed. Perez Roque was once personal secretary to Fidel Castro and a former leader of the Communist Party youth organization. He had been foreign minister for almost a decade. Among the others ousted was Economy Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez, Finance Minister Georgina Barreiro Fajardo and Labor Minister Alfredo Morales Cartaya. Several ministries were combined in the shakeup. The communique said the decision matched President Raul Castro's desire for a "more compact" and efficient government.

SPANISH AUTHORITIES DISMANTLE DRUG NETWORK TRAFFICKING COCAINE FROM VENEZUELA

     MADRID, SPAIN--A drug gang dedicated to the trafficking of cocaine from Costa Rica and Venezuela was dismantled in the southern province of Almería by the Spanish Civil Guard in a police operation in which enforcement officials arrested eight suspected members of the network, EFE reported.

    The investigations began when the Spanish police detected the move to South America of a member of the group allegedly responsible for preparing the shipment of several mail packages where the cocaine was hidden, police sources said.

    The network planned two shipments from Venezuela and Costa Rica. Drug dealers declared that that they carried in the packages a small laptop computer and a glass figure. However, the packages contained two kilograms of high-purity cocaine hidden inside.   Most of the detainees, who are from Spain, are in custody while the police examines the drug seized, which could have led to the introduction into the illicit market of more than 60,000 doses.

COLOMBIAN RADIO STATION: NINE FARC COMMANDERS ARE RESIDING IN VENEZUELA

     BOGOTA, COLOMBIA--At least nine members of the High Command of the Colombian Revolutionary Armed Forces (FARC), the Colombian guerrilla movement, have taken shelter in Venezuela and two in Ecuador, said on Monday Bogotá-based radio station RCN.

    The Colombian radio said that the whereabouts in foreign countries of 11 insurgent leaders was established by "Colombian intelligence agencies."  The report came a week after Colombian President Álvaro Uribe said that several top commanders of the FARC and the National Liberation Army of Colombia (ELN) live abroad.   The rebel leaders "pose as intellectuals" in foreign countries, Uribe said. The Colombian ruler mentioned no names but challenged them to return to Colombia, EFE reported.

     According to RCN, the FARC leaders living in Venezuela are: Rodrigo Londoño (also known as "Timoleón Jiménez"), Luciano Marín ("Iván Márquez"), Emilio Cabrera Díaz ("Bertulio") and Marcelino Trujillo ("Martín Villa").  The other leaders who allegedly found refuge in Venezuela are: Orley Jurado Palomino ("Hermes Aguilera"), Abelardo Caicedo ("Solis Almeida"), Rodrigo Granda ("Ricardo"), Jesús Santrich and Luis Alberto Albán ("Marco León Calarcá").

March 02, 2009

ADM. MIKE MULLEN SAID HE BELIEVES IRAN HAS ENOUGH FISSILE MATERIAL TO BUILD A NUCLEAR BOMB

     WASHINGTON, D.C.--The head of US military Joint Chiefs of Staff Adm. Mike Mullen said that Tehran has enough fissile material to make a nuclear bomb. "We think they do, quite frankly," Mullen told CNN. "And Iran having a nuclear weapon, I've believed for a long time, is a very, very bad outcome for the region and for the world."   A report by the UN nuclear watchdog said last month that Tehran had made strides in its uranium enrichment work.

    According to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Tehran now has 1,010 kilograms of low-enriched uranium hexafluoride from its enrichment activities at a plant at Natanz. "(That) is sufficient for a nuclear weapons breakout capability," David Albright, president of the Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security and an expert on Iran's nuclear program, told Agence France-Presse (AFP). A breakout capability is when there is sufficient low-enriched uranium, which is used for nuclear fuel, to turn into highly-enriched uranium needed for nuclear weapons. The West fears that Iran is developing a nuclear bomb, but Tehran says its nuclear program aims at generating energy for a growing population.

     Mullen said he has not been given "any instructions one way or the other" on whether to continue working on an anti-ballistic missile shield that has been in development and was to be deployed in East Europe. "There are an awful lot of reviews that are ongoing under President Obama, and there's an awful lot on the -- on all of our plates. So that's a review that will, I think, take place. And over time, that's much more a policy area than it is mine, per se," he said. Mullen said that the U.S. is also watching North Korea closely, but no decisions have been made on whether to rrespond to their preparations for a test missile launch. "The president's made no decision. Secretary Gates and I have made no recommendations. But it's -- it's an area that we watch with great concern. And I would hope that North Korea would not be provocative," he said.

SECRETARY GATES DENIES IRAN WAS CLOSE TO PRODUCE A NUCLEAR BOMB

     WASHINGTON, D.C.-- The United States GOVERNMENT was quick Sunday, March 1, to deny statements by its top military officer that Iran was close to produce a nuclear bomb, saying diplomacy is still on the table to persuade Tehran to abandon its nuclear program.  "They're not close to a stockpile. They're not close to a weapon at this point," US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates said on NBC television's "Meet The Press". "And so, there is some time."

    Gates said the West still has enough time to try to persuade Tehran to abandon its nuclear program. "I think that there has been a continuing focus on how do you get the Iranians to walk away from a nuclear weapons program," he said. US President Barack Obama favors diplomatic engagement with Tehran to defuse the dispute over its nuclear intentions. Tensions between Washington and Tehran soared under the Bush administration, which never ruled out a military action against Iran over its nuclear program.

    Gates said the challenge now is how to strike a balance between sanctions to pressure Iran and incentives for engagement with the US and Europe. He said diplomacy carried a greater chance of success now that oil prices had dropped, enhancing the effect of economic sanctions on Iran -- which relies heavily on oil revenue. "Our chances of being successful, it seems to me, are a lot better at 35 dollars or 40 dollars" than 140 dollars a barrel, Gates said.

COLOMBIAN ARMY UNEARTHS FARC HIDE-OUTS IN CAVES

     BOGOTA, COLOMBIA--Colombian soldiers have unearthed guerrilla hide-outs in caves deep in the jungles where rebels evaded attacks, stashed landmines and stored medical supplies, authorities said on Saturday. Colombia's largest rebel group, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC by its Spanish initials, has been battered by President Alvaro Uribe's U.S.-backed offensive, which has driven guerrillas deep into jungles and mountains.

    The army said troops had been searching for the cave hide-outs for five years in their hunt for a top FARC commander, Jorge Briceno, better known as Mono Jojoy, one of the guerrilla group's leadership secretariat. "They used to feel safe ... now they are living in caves they use to hide away," said Defense Minister Juan Manuel Santos, showing a group of reporters the caves in La Macarena region in Meta province, to the southeast of Bogota. Troops were led to the caves after a tip-off from a FARC deserter. Reporters at the site were shown weapons, landmines, surgical equipment and explosives discovered in camps surrounding the caves.

     The FARC, labeled terrorists by the United States and Europe, once controlled swaths of Colombia as it what it says was a fight for a socialist state. Latin America's oldest rebel insurgency, the FARC has funded its war with drug trafficking, kidnapping and extortion. But violence and kidnappings have declined since Uribe sent troops out to retake the parts of the country. Fighting goes on in remote areas, especially around cocaine trafficking routes. The FARC lost three top commanders last year and has suffered a string of military setbacks.

March 01, 2009

A FIDEL CASTRO SIGHTING REPORTED NEAR THE ENTRANCE OF HEMINGWAY MARINA IN JAIMANITAS

     HAVANA, CUBA--Residents of western Havana City have said that they recently saw Fidel Castro walking near the entrance of Hemingway Marina in the coastal town of Jaimanitas.

    A fisherman said that he saw Castro "because in this country anyone can recognize Fidel, no matter how far away he is" strolling in a jogging suit, "the same one he wears in the photos and videos, with the three colors of the Cuban flag, and he was flanked by two persons who looked like doctors or something like that."

     A worker in the marina said that Castro "walked straight and with a firm step." The government-run media have not confirmed the walks, although Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez said that Castro wrote to him that "he went to a 'distant' place and looked at giant trees that he planted 40 years ago as barriers against hurricanes, when they were doing agricultural experiments."

HUGO CHAVEZ SAYS FIDEL DOING VERY, VERY GOOD AND WALKING THROUGH HAVANA CITY

     CARACAS, VENEZUELA--Hugo Chavez said Friday that 82-year-old Fidel Castro seemed in "very, very good" shape when they met in Cuba last week. Remarking on the former Cuban president's health for the first time since their latest meeting, Chavez said Castro was "much better than all the times I've visited him in the past three years, two and a half years." Castro has not been seen in public since mid-2006 when he underwent intestinal surgery and ceded power to his younger brother Raul.

     Venezuela's socialist leader said in a telephone call carried on state television early Friday that he met with the elder Castro twice, once for three hours on Feb. 20 and a day later for more than four hours. "Fidel is - well - very, very, very good. Very good," Chavez said. In a televised speech later Friday, Chavez said he had received four letters from Castro a day earlier. "Fidel surprised us all," Chavez said. "He went for a walk. Fidel went out and they saw him. ... Fidel walking through Havana, through the streets. A miracle. The people were crying.

     "Of course he planned it all so there wouldn't be any record of it or anything," Chavez added. "There's a photo of that "miracle" that I've seen, and in that sense I feel humbly privileged (he probably was shown a "miraculous" photo similar to the one inserted by CAMCOCUBA in this section)." It wasn't clear exactly when Castro took the walk. When they met, Chavez and Castro discussed subjects including the world financial crisis and the new government of President Barack Obama, the Venezuelan government said in a statement. There were no images released of the meetings with Castro, whom Chavez views as an exemplary "father" for leftists across Latin America.

RUSSIAN BOMBER NEARED CANADA BEFORE PRESIDENT OBAMA VISIT

     OTTAWA, CANADA-- Canadian fighters scrambled to intercept an approaching Russian bomber less than 24 hours before U.S. President Barack Obama's visit to Ottawa last week, Canadian Defense Minister Peter MacKay said on Friday. The Bear bomber did not enter Canada's Arctic airspace but the two Canadian F-18 fighters had to order the plane to turn back, MacKay told a news conference.

   Obama spent a few hours in the Canadian capital on February 19 on his first foreign trip since becoming president."I'm not going to stand here and accuse the Russians of having deliberately done this during the presidential visit but it was a strong coincidence, which we met with the presence, as we always do, of F-18 fighter planes ... and sent a strong signal that they should back off and stay out of our air space," MacKay said.

        He also said Russia had stepped up its bomber flights toward the Canadian Arctic in the last few years, reviving a practice that was common during the Cold War. MacKay did not say exactly when the incident occurred or how close the bomber came to Canadian airspace. "It's not a game. It's not a game at all. These aircraft approaching Canadian or U.S. airspace are viewed very seriously," he said. "We have asked on a number of occasions ... that we are given a heads up when this type of air traffic is to occur and to date we have not received that kind of notice."