|
LATEST NEWS OF AUGUST 2010 |
|
former advisor to dictator hugo chavez
reports venezuelan arms shipment TO the
farc
MIAMI,
FLORIDA-- Former
Rear Admiral Carlos Molina Tamayo,
who used to be a National Security
Adviser to dictator Hugo Chávez's
administration, witnessed some of the
first attempts of the Venezuelan
government to illegally supply weapons
to members of the Revolutionary Armed
Forces of Colombia (FARC), according to
an interview published on Monday by the
international press. Molina, in exile in
Europe after taking part in the failed
coup d'état in 2002, said that retired
Navy Captain Ramón Rodríguez Chacín, an
aide of President Chávez, asked him to
hand over rifles to the guerrilla rebels
when Molina Tamayo was in charge of the
Armed Forces arsenal, Efe reported.
In a August
2003 article, Molina Tamayo stated that
the Bolivarian Circles are identical to
the Cuban Committees for the Defense of
the Revolution (CDR), noting that the
Circles' main job is "to keep all
National Guard personnel and all
organizations under control by means of
espionage and extortion" (El Diario de
Hoy 20 Aug. 2003). Moreover, Tamayo
claimed that the Circles are "shock
troops that are also used to wreak
terror" as members have reportedly
attacked journalists and store owners
(ibid.). Recent reports about the
Bolivarian Circles continue to
demonstrate conflicting viewpoints about
the nature of these groups; proponents
have noted that the Circles are civilian
organizations whose "basic goal is to
foster and encourage culture, equality,
and social justice" (Notimex 28 July
2003), while critics contend that the
Bolivarian Circles are a cover for
paramilitary activities and that they
are linked to Colombian subversive
groups.
El Universal of Caracas stated in April 2003 that a
secret Colombian security forces report
contained information about a joint
Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Fuerzas
Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia,
FARC) and Bolivarian Liberation Forces (Fuerzas
Bolivarianos de Liberacion, FBL)
training centre in Zulia state that had
been instructing "commanders" of
Bolivarian Circles on techniques used to
organize covert urban operations.
Reportedly, these commanders develop
into members of the FBL and the
Bolivarian Liberation Army (Ejercito
Bolivariano de Liberacion, EBL) whose
numbers are estimated to be around 200
and who have apparently been involved in
confrontations with the Colombian United
Self-Defence groups. In a 10 August 2003
interview with former Venezuelan
Infantry Lieutenant Moises Roberto Boyer
Riobueno, El Espectador reported that
the Bolivarian Circles serve as a "front
for Colombian subversive groups." |
|
iran state media call french first lady
"A prostitute"
TEHRAN,
IRAN--Iranian
state media called France's first lady,
Carla Bruni-Sarkozy, a "prostitute"
on Monday in an unusual attack on
the wife of a world leader that shows
deep anger over her support for an
Iranian woman who faced death by stoning
on an adultery conviction. The wife of
French President Nicolas Sarkozy has
condemned the stoning sentence against
Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani, which Iran
temporarily suspended but did not throw
out after an international outcry.
Ashtiani, a
43-year-old mother of two, could still
face execution by stoning or hanging
after a final review of her case, her
lawyer, Javid Houtan Kian, told The
Associated Press Monday. The Kayhan
newspaper, whose editor is a
representative of Supreme Leader
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, described
Bruni-Sarkozy as a "prostitute" on
Saturday in an article headlined "French
prostitutes enter the human rights
uproar." That appeared to be a reference
to rumors of infidelity in her marriage
that Bruni-Sarkozy dismissed in April as
"insignificant." The rumors have since
died down.
The French president's office declined Monday to comment on the
remarks in Iranian media. The media
attack was in response to an open letter
Bruni-Sarkozy wrote to Ashtiani that was
printed in several French news outlets
last week. "How to remain silent after
learning of the sentence against you?"
Bruni-Sarkozy wrote, adding that the
stoning would "deeply wound all women,
all children, all those who have
feelings of humanity." "Deep within your
jail cell, know that my husband will
plead your cause tirelessly and that
France will not abandon you," she wrote.
Ashtiani was convicted in May 2006 of
having an "illicit relationship" with
two men after the murder of her husband
and was sentenced to 99 lashes. Later
that year, she was convicted of adultery
and sentenced to be stoned, even though
she retracted a confession she claims
was made under duress. |
|
HITMEN KILL MEXICAN MAYOR IN DRUG WAR
STATE
MONTERREY, MEXICO--
Suspected drug hitmen killed the mayor
of a small town in northern Mexico
on Sunday in a region where two car
bombs exploded last week and the bodies
of 72 murdered migrant workers were
found. Mayor Marco Antonio Leal was shot
dead by gunmen in SUVs as he drove
through his rural municipality of
Hidalgo near the Gulf of Mexico in
Tamaulipas state, the local attorney
general's office said. Leal's 4-year-old
daughter was slightly wounded in the
attack, a spokesman said.
It was not
immediately clear why Leal, a member of
the opposition Institutional
Revolutionary Party, or PRI, was
targeted. But Tamaulipas has become one
of Mexico's bloodiest flashpoints since
the start of the year as rival hitmen
from the Gulf cartel and its former
armed wing, the Zetas, fight over
smuggling routes into the United States.
Leal spent Sunday morning in a meeting
with other Tamaulipas PRI mayors and the
governor-elect, also a member of the
PRI, which has long been dominant in the
state. Gunmen threw grenades at the town
hall earlier this year and Hidalgo's
former mayor, also from the PRI,
narrowly survived an assassination
attempt this month.
President Felipe Calderon, a conservative from the ruling
National Action Party, or PAN, condemned
the attack and vowed to continue his
fight against drug gangs. "This cowardly
crime and the reprehensible violent
events recently in the region strengthen
our commitment to continue fighting the
criminal groups that seek to terrify
families (in Tamaulipas)," Calderon said
in a statement. Drug gangs killed a
mayor from Calderon's party near the
wealthy industrial city of Monterrey in
neighboring Nuevo Leon state this month,
as attacks on public officials grow. In
a sign of escalating drug war violence,
two car bombs exploded in Tamaulipas'
state capital, Ciudad Victoria, on
Friday, three days after marines found
the bodies of 72 migrants gunned down at
a ranch in the state. Calderon has
blamed the surge in violence in
Tamaulipas on the split between the Gulf
and Zetas gang but has vowed to crush
the cartels. More than 28,000 people
have died in drug violence since
Calderon launched his war on drugs in
late 2006, prompting fears that
bloodshed could undermine tourism and
investment as Mexico slowly recovers
from its worst recession since 1932. |
|
VENEZUELAN WOMEN PROTEST AGAINST
UNCHECKED VIOLENCE
CARACAS,
VENEZUELA-- Opponents
of dictator Hugo Chavez
marched through Caracas on Saturday to
protest rampant violence that claims
thousands of lives each year in
Venezuela and has been worsening in the
past decade. Protesters beat on drums
and held signs with images of skulls and
crossbones and slogans such as "Enough"
and "No more deaths." Nurse Gladys
Perez said she is flabbergasted by the
steady stream of people with gunshot
wounds who are brought to the emergency
room at the hospital where she works.
"We've had up to 60 wounded people in a
weekend," said Perez, 55, adding that in
her three decades as a nurse she has
never seen so much bloodshed. "There's
an undeclared war here. I don't know
what to call it," she said.
Venezuela has
one of Latin America's highest murder
rates. The government has not released
complete annual statistics recently, but
last year authorities said there were
more than 12,000 homicides nationwide in
the first 11 months of 2009. The
Venezuelan Violence Observatory, an
organization dedicated to crime
research, has estimated more than 16,000
homicides last year in the country of 28
million people - up from less than 6,000
in 1999 when Chavez took office. Those
figures would give Venezuela a homicide
rate of 56 per 100,000 people in 2009 -
far higher than the 14 per 100,000 rate
last year in Mexico, which is beset by
rising drug violence. But it's lower
than the rate in El Salvador, which is
home to ruthless street gangs and
recorded 71 homicides per 100,000 people
in 2009.
A government study obtained by local media suggests the
violence could be even worse. The survey
was based on more than 16,000 interviews
last year and estimated more than 21,000
homicides in the previous 12 months, as
well as more than 26,000 kidnappings.
National Statistics Institute president
Elias Eljuri confirmed that the agency
was involved in the survey. But he said
the results described in the document
were preliminary and it was being
analyzed by other agencies. "It is not a
definitive document," Eljuri told The
Associated Press. In any case, the
bullet-ridden bodies of victims fill the
morgue in Caracas on weekends, and the
vast majority of murder cases go
unsolved. Many at Saturday's protest
said Chavez has failed to take
significant action on crime in his more
than 11 years in office. |
|
10 VENEZUELAN SOLDIERS KILLED IN
SUSPICIOUS HELICOPTER CRASH
CARACAS,
VENEZUELA--National
Guard General Luis Motta said in
a telephone interview on VTV state
television that the accident occurred
when the National Guard helicopter 'was
undertaking a search for a gang of drug
traffickers' in Apure state, the
military chief said. After leaving a
military patrol on the ground 'in a
sector between Buena Vista and
Carabobo,' the helicopter 'had this
terrible accident as it was taking off,'
Motta said.
The helicopter that
went down was a Russian-made MI-17
covering the Buena Vista route along the
Meta River to the town of Cararabo in
Apure state, the local press said this
Saturday. Motta said that the 'boys died
doing their duty, their patriotic duty,'
and offered condolences to the families
of the victims in the name of the armed
forces, of the country's dictator Hugo
Chavez, and the Venezuelan defense
minister, Gen. Carlos Mata. The
cause of the accident, which occurred in
the state of Apure, near the border with
Colombia, was still unknown.
Officials were investigating why the
Russian-made Mi-17 helicopter crashed
"within a few minutes" after taking off
on Friday, Chavez said in a televised
speech, reading off the names of the
victims.
The crash took place in western Apure State near the
Colombian border on Friday as three
officers along with seven soldiers were
taking off on a counter-narcotics
mission. Venezuela is a major route for
Colombian cocaine headed to Europe and
the United States. Much of its
1,375-mile (2,200-km) border with
Colombia is rugged terrain where leftist
guerrillas, drug traffickers and
paramilitary fighters are active. This
week Venezuelan authorities found 4 tons
of cocaine on a farm, the government's
largest haul in recent years. A few days
earlier, Colombian authorities captured
Walid Makled, a Venezuelan wanted in his
home country and the United States on
charges of major drug trafficking.
|
|
INSULZA HIGHLIGHTS DICTATOR CHAVEZ'S
CALL TO THE FARC TO END CONFLICT IN
COLOMBIA
BOGOTA, COLOMBIA--Secretary
General of the Organization of American
States (OAS) José Miguel Insulza
highlighted Venezuelan President Hugo
Chávez's move to suggest Colombian
guerrilla groups to abandon armed
struggle and begin a peace process.
"What President
Chávez has done recently, -a formal
request to the FARC to lay down their
weapons- is very important," Insulza
told Colombian newspaper El Tiempo, as
reported by DPA.
Insulza, who on August 25 ended a two-day
visit to Bogotá, said that Colombia
needs a peace process to put an end to
nearly five decades of internal armed
conflict. Further, Insulza said
that the proposal made by the rebel FARC
to the presidents of the Union of South
American Nations (Unasur) in order to
voice their stance regarding a peace
process in Colombia is unlikely to
succeed. |
|
CUBAN DISSIDENT ARIEL SIGLER AMAYA
LEAVES JACKSON HOSPITAL
MIAMI,
FLORIDA--The
muscles in the stranger's shoulders
merge with the ones in his neck,
and his chest swells through a plain
white T-shirt. His eyes are bright,
energetic. He looks like a human
fighting machine, a man who once was a
heavyweight national boxing champion in
Cuba. The man, Ariel Sigler Amaya, in
the hospital bed has deep inkwells for
eye sockets, like someone who hasn't
seen the sun for years. His sallow skin
stretches tight over the bones in his
face like a fist through a plastic bag.
It's impossible to reconcile that these
two images -- the vibrant boxer and the
frail, newly released political prisoner
-- are the same man. ``He was a tronco,
a tree trunk of a man,'' a new friend
and Cuban-American blogger, Valentin
Prieto, says later.
Cuba trained
Sigler to fight. He learned discipline,
endurance and how to take a punch. But
Sigler also learned to think for
himself, and that's when the trouble
began. Sigler, 46, used those lessons to
become one of Cuba's most strident
dissidents, a decision that earned him a
20-year sentence in the spring of 2003,
when more than 75 journalists were
jailed in a mass roundup. Thanks to
intervention from the Catholic Church,
Sigler was among the 50 or so dissidents
Cuba agreed to release. He arrived in
Miami on a humanitarian visa July 28,
the only one of released prisoners
allowed to enter the United States so
far. The others have been exiled to
Spain. Physically, the man who entered
prison is not the one who came out. He
rolled off the plane in a wheelchair as
a paraplegic, his body withered from
seven years of malnutrition in Cuba's
gulag.
On the
morning of March 18, 2003, to witness
the secret inauguration of a private
library, a collection of contraband such
as the United Nations' Universal
Declaration of Human Rights and the
complete works of Cuban patriot Jose
Martí. Police arrested Sigler that day.
He waited 39 days in jail before he was
arraigned, tried and convicted of
treason -- all in the same day. His
first cell, where he spent a year and a
half, was a seven-by-five-foot cage with
a hole in the concrete floor for a
toilet. On June 12, the Catholic
Church performed one. Sigler was one of
about 50 political prisoners Cuba agreed
to free. That same day, he was taken by
ambulance to his mother's house, where
the international press was waiting.
The media was not there a month later,
he said, when he and his wife were
beaten outside the government office
where they had gone to pick up their
visas. The memory still makes his face
flush like the 210-pound boxer who burns
behind his eyes. |
|
US EMBASSY staff told to send children
out of monterrey
MONTERREY,
MEXICO--The
U.S. government told staff at its
consulate in Monterrey to send
their children out of the northern
Mexican city where drug violence has
been escalating, the consulate said on
Friday. Cancun5Star.comThe decision
follows an apparent kidnap attempt
outside an elite private school attended
by children of U.S. consulate staff,
amid rising drug violence in Mexico's
business capital that has surged since
the start of this year.
"U.S. government
personnel from the consulate general are
not permitted to keep their minor
dependents in Monterrey," a U.S. Embassy
spokeswoman said in Mexico City. "As of
September 10, no minor dependents, no
children of U.S. government employees
will be permitted in Monterrey," she
added. Suspected drug hitmen attacked a
group of security guards working for
Latin America's top beverage maker,
Femsa, outside the American School in
Monterrey on August 20, in what the
consulate said was "an attempted
kidnapping targeting the relatives of a
local business executive." Two of the
bodyguards were killed and their bodies
returned to the company's offices,
police said.
Monterrey, once considered one of Latin America's safest
cities and a top regional business
center, has seen a dramatic spike in
violence since the start of this year,
when a split between two local drug
cartels turned to all-out war. The
powerful Gulf cartel and its former
allies, the Zetas, are fighting over
smuggling routes into the United States
across northeastern Mexico, sucking
Monterrey into the conflict, with more
than 450 drug killings this year. |
|
OVER 800,000 YOUNGSTERS HAVE LEFT
VENEZUELA IN 10 YEARS
CARACAS, VENEZUELA--In
one decade only, more than 800,000
Venezuelans, mostly young people,
have left the country going in quest of
new projects of living, shooed by
insecurity, violence, unemployment, low
wages and lack of opportunities.
The news was given by
Iván de la Vega, a professor with Simón
Bolívar University who has conducted
several studies about brain-drain.
"Violence and lack of opportunities
corner Venezuelan youngsters," the
scholar said in a session called
"Solutions for people who organize
citizens for unity." Venezuela used to
be an immigration country. However, such
a situation changed in the nineties and
worsened after the events of 2002-2003,
De la Vega said.
"At this time, the horizon is dire. We have not only
brain-drain and flight of selected human
resources (…) but also the probes
conducted by us show that 72 percent of
students cherish the idea of leaving the
country," De la Vega lamented.
Presently, there are 260,000 Venezuelan
residents in the United States; 30,000
in Canada; 10,000 in Australia and
approximately 200,000 in Europe. The
last number is underestimated, as many
children of European immigrants have
dual citizenship. |
|
FORMER DICTATOR FIDEL CASTRO SAYS
THAT COLOMBIA "HAS BECOME A US MILITARY
BASE"
HAVANA,
CUBA--
Colombia "has become a US military
base," former Cuban DICTATOR Fidel
Castro said and lambasted the
presence of US military bases in the
region, according to statements released
on Friday by Cuban official press.
"There are no
military bases in Venezuela. Colombia
has become (a military) base. They (the
US) have a military base in Honduras.
They do not have any in Costa Rica, but
they do have 40 military vessels, an
aircraft carrier and a helicopters'
carrier which are 'nobly' helping in the
fight against drugs. It is totally
cynical," Castro said, as quoted by Efe.
Castro made these statements during a meeting with the
Lithuanian-born writer Daniel Estulin,
author of a best-seller called "The True
Story of the Bildeberg Group." The issue
of the US military bases in the region
was one of the topics addressed in the
talks between Castro and Estulin. The
Cuban leader considers that "there is a
war" against Hugo Chávez because
Venezuela is one of the few Latin
American countries without Washington's
military presence. |
|
FORMER US PRESIDENT JIMMY CARTER WINS
RELEASE OF AMERICAN HELD IN NORTH KOREA
ATLANTA,
GEORGIA--Former
U.S. President Jimmy Carter
headed home from North Korea today after
securing a pardon for an American
teacher jailed there since January.
Carter and Aijalon Gomes boarded a plane
at Pyongyang's airport and are expected
to arrive in Boston this afternoon, the
Carter Center said in a statement. The
ex-president landed in North Korea on
Wednesday on a private mission to
negotiate Gomes' release. The
31-year-old English teacher was
sentenced to eight years' hard labor in
April and fined more than $600,000 after
he was accused of illegally crossing the
border from China and committing a
"hostile act.
North Korean
news agency KCNA reported that the
dictatorship decided to free Gomes after
Carter "made an apology" to No. 2
official Kim Yong Nam and promised that
such a case "will never happen again."
The regime-run propaganda outfit boasted
that the dictatorship's decision to "set
free the illegal entrant is a
manifestation of [North Korea's]
humanitarianism and peace-loving
policy." Although Gomes was said to have
attempted suicide in July -- due, KCNA
claimed, to his "strong guilty
conscience" -- the prisoner looked
surprisingly healthy, if a little gaunt,
and in good spirits in video footage
taken as he boarded Carter's plane.
In Washington, officials welcomed news of the teacher's
release and praised the ex-president for
embarking on the mercy mission. "[We]
are relieved that he will soon be safely
reunited with his family," State
Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said.
"We appreciate former President Carter's
humanitarian effort and welcome North
Korea's decision to grant Mr. Gomes
special amnesty and allow him to return
to the United States." It is still
unclear why Gomes -- who traveled to
South Korea to teach English in his
early 20s -- decided to cross the
border. It's thought that he may have
been inspired by Robert Park, a fellow
evangelical Christian who walked into
North Korea on Christmas Day singing
hymns and clutching a letter calling on
Chairman Kim Jong-Il to resign. Park was
immediately arrested and released in
February after making a forced
confession. |
|
GOVERNOR BILL RICHARDSON SEEKS RELEASE
OF AMERICAN HELD IN CUBA
HAVANA, CUBA--GOVERNOR
Richardson, who has a history of
diplomatic trouble-shooting, said his
talks with officials including Cuban
Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez had
given the Cuban government "a better
understanding of the personal side of
Alan Gross," but he appeared to extract
no promises on Gross' release. "I
believe I've made some inroads in the
case. However, I was informed by the
Cuban government that the Alan Gross
case is at a very sensitive
investigatory and legal process at this
moment," said Richardson, who spoke to
reporters at the end of what he said was
a trade mission on peddling New Mexican
food products to Cuba.
The Hispanic
Democrat said he did not come as an
emissary for U.S. President Barack
Obama, but had been asked by the
administration to raise the issue of
Gross' release. He gave few details on
his talks nor did he say if he would
return for more discussions on Gross.
Richardson was United Nations ambassador
and energy secretary under President
Bill Clinton and served as a special
envoy on diplomatic missions to
countries including North Korea, Myanmar
and Cuba. In 1996, he met with then
Cuban leader Fidel Castro and secured
the release of three political
prisoners. The arrest of Gross in
December had soured and slowed apparent
rapprochement moves by Obama toward
Castro's government, seeking to defuse a
half century of hostility. Gross, who
was in Havana on an assignment
contracted by the U.S. Agency for
International Development, has not been
formally charged but Cuban officials
said he was suspected of spying and
subversion. They said he had been
illegally distributing satellite
communications equipment.
The Obama administration said he was not spying but was
trying to help the Cuban Jewish
community hook up to the Internet. Cuba
has long accused the United States,
which maintains a 48-year-old trade
embargo against the Caribbean island, of
actively backing internal dissidents and
Cuban exiles in efforts to undermine and
destabilize its socialist system. "I
believe Alan Gross is a good man who may
have made some mistakes. I think he is
innocent," Richardson said. He said he
hoped the case would be resolved soon,
but added, "I don't want to get into
what soon is." Despite the Gross case,
Richardson said the atmosphere between
the United States and Cuba was "the best
I've seen in years" and that both
governments deserved credit for taking
positive steps. He cited Cuba's recent
decision to release 52 of its estimated
150 political prisoners and Obama's
expansion of travel opportunities for
U.S. citizens. |
|
venezuelan dictator hugo chavez spends 5
hours with fidel castro
HAVANA,
CUBA--
Venezuelan DICTATOR Hugo Chavez met for
five hours with Fidel Castro
behind closed doors Wednesday, and state
television said they discussed the
former Cuban dictator's warnings about
impending nuclear war.
Castro has been using
his written opinion columns to warn for
months that the U.S. and Israel will
launch a nuclear attack on Iran and that
Washington could also target North Korea
- predicting Armageddon-like devastation
and fighting. The state TV broadcast
Wednesday night also said Chavez
expressed satisfaction at Castro's
"magnificent" health.
Venezuela's socialist leader later met with President Raul
Castro before leaving Cuba. Chavez is a
close ally of Fidel Castro and visited
him frequently during the four years he
disappeared from public view following
emergency intestinal surgery in July
2006. Wednesday was the first time,
however, that Chavez had visited since
Castro began making a string of public
appearances in recent weeks. |
|
iran proposes to produce nuclear fuel
with russia
TEHRAN,
IRAN--Iran
has submitted a proposal to Russia
to jointly produce nuclear fuel for
Iran's Bushehr nuclear power plant and
any future facilities built in the
country, state media reported Thursday.
Iran's state-run, English-language Press
TV quoted the head of Iran's atomic
energy agency, Ali Akbar Salehi, as
saying "we have made a proposal to
Russia to create a consortium under
Russian license to do part of the work
in Russia and part in Iran." Salehi, who
is also Iran's vice president, said
Moscow is "studying the proposal." An
official at the Russian nuclear agency
said the two countries have discussed
the possibility of creating a facility
to assemble the fuel rods for Bushehr.
The facility would operate under Russian
license on Iranian territory.
But the
official said the uranium enrichment
would be performed on Russian soil.
Speaking on condition of anonymity
because of the sensitivity of the issue,
the official added that first Russia
will focus on commissioning Iran's
Russian-built nuclear plant at Bushehr,
and then turn its attention to Iran's
new proposal. With Russian help, Iran
began loading uranium fuel on Saturday
into the Bushehr facility. The
1,000-megawatt plant - Iran's first -
will pump electricity to the country's
cities. Iran plans to build more such
plants across the country. The uranium
fuel Russia has supplied for Bushehr is
well below the more than 90 percent
enrichment needed for a nuclear warhead.
Iran is already producing its own
uranium enriched to the Bushehr level -
about 3.5 percent.
It also has started a pilot program of enriching uranium to
20 percent, which officials say is
needed for a medical research reactor.
Salehi said Thursday that Iran has
produced some 25 kilograms of uranium
enriched to 20 percent so far. The
United States and other nations have
tried to persuade Iran to stop enriching
uranium over concerns that Tehran is
seeking a pathway to produce nuclear
weapons under the cover of its civil
nuclear power program. Iran denies the
charge, and says its program is
peaceful. The U.N. Security Council
imposed a fourth round of sanctions on
Iran in June over Tehran's refusal to
stop enriching uranium, a process that
can be used to produce fuel for power
plants or, enriched to around 90
percent, for weapons-grade material for
atomic weapons. |
|
CUBAN CATHOLIC CHURCH HELPS SON OF LATE
REBEL COMMANDER JUAN ALMEDIA LEAVE FOR
US
HAVANA, CUBA--The
Roman Catholic Church said
Wednesday it has intervened again on
behalf of a political dissident, this
time helping the ailing son of one of
Cuba's top revolutionary heroes go to
the United States for medical treatment.
Juan Almeida Garcia is the son of Juan
Almeida Bosque, who fought alongside
Fidel Castro in the guerrilla uprising
that brought down dictator Fulgencio
Batista in 1959. The father was among
Cuba's ruling elite, sitting on the
Communist Party's Politburo and serving
as a vice president on the Council of
State, the island's supreme governing
body. When he died last September, at
82, he was given honors befitting his
title as a "commander of the
revolution." But it has been a
different story for the younger Almeida,
a dissident who frequently criticizes
the Castro government. In November he
was detained by state security agents
for three days after protesting not
being allowed to leave the island for
treatment. He was earlier arrested for
attempting to leave Cuba illegally.
Almeida, who worked
for state security within the Interior
Ministry in the 1990s, suffers from
ankylosing spondylitis, a painful,
progressive form of spinal arthritis. He
has received treatment in Belgium in the
past after receiving permission to leave
Cuba. But authorities did not look as
kindly on his efforts to travel to Los
Angeles to see a doctor at Cedars-Sinai
Medical Center. His family contacted
Cardinal Jaime Ortega who "got involved
in the matter" and personally informed
Almeida earlier this week that Cuba's
government had agreed to let him go to
the U.S., church official Orlando
Marquez said in a phone interview.
Almeida had already obtained U.S.
permission, but when he would leave for
the United States was not immediately
clear, Marquez said.
Cubans wishing to leave the island must first obtain
permission from the country they are
visiting, then an exit visa. Doctors,
scientists and other key personnel, as
well as the relatives of leaders in
sensitive military or political
positions, are often denied permission
for fear they will not return. Ortega's
efforts in the case were the latest
example of the Catholic Church stepping
in on behalf of Cuban dissidents. Last
week, church officials successfully
spoke to the government about calling
off pro-government mobs that had broken
up a weekly Sunday march by Reina Luisa
Tamayo, mother of a political prisoner
who died in February after a lengthy
hunger strike. |
|
JOSE MANUEL INSULZA TERMINATES OAS WORK
IN COLOMBIA-VENEZUELA CRISIS
WASHINGTON,
D.C.--Organization
of American States (OAS)
Secretary-General José Manuel Insulza
terminated on Wednesday his role as
mediator in a diplomatic impasse between
Colombia and Venezuela near to be
overcome.
"As the
Secretary-General of the OAS, or any
other international organization
requested to take part in a bilateral
affair, all I can do is making the
request to the other party," Insulza
said after a meeting with Colombian
President Juan Manuel Santos in Bogotá,
Efe quoted. "Therefore, there is no
further steps to be taken," the former
Chilean Minister of Foreign Affairs
added. In this regard, he pointed out
that the OAS may not retake the case
that confronted the two countries,
"unless the Venezuelan government gives
some reply in the upcoming days."
Reference was made to a petition made by the outgoing
government of ex Colombian President
Álvaro Uribe last July 22 in a session
of the OAS Permanent Council. The
session was called at the request of
Colombia to produce evidence of the
alleged deployment of Colombian
guerrillas in Venezuela. "We are
very encouraged by reinforced relations
between Ecuador and Colombia and between
Colombia and Venezuela," Insulza said. |
|
72 FOUND DEAD IN MEXICO MAY BE MIGRANTS
MEXICO
CITY, MEXICO--A
survivor has told police that 72 people
found dead at a ranch near the Mexican
border with Texas were migrants
kidnapped by an armed group, a
federal official said Wednesday. The
bodies of 58 men and 14 women were
discovered Tuesday when Marines manning
a checkpoint on a highway in the
northern state of Tamaulipas were
approached by a wounded man who said he
had been attacked by gang gunmen at a
nearby ranch.
A federal official
said that man had identified himself an
illegal migrant. The man said he and
other migrants had been kidnapped by an
armed group and taken to the ranch in
San Fernando, a town about 100 miles
(160 kilometers) south of Brownsville,
Texas, according to the federal
official, who had access to the
investigation. He spoke on condition of
anonymity because the was not authorized
to speak publicly about the case.
The official said police believe the
migrants were mostly from Central
America - a population that has been
increasingly targeted by drug gangs who
demand money from U.S.-bound foreigners
or who kidnap them to claim ransoms from
relatives in the United States or their
home countries. The bodies were taken a
a morgue in San Fernando, where
officials were taking fingerprints.
Investigators have not determined who was behind the
massacre, but the federal official noted
that the area is controlled by the Zetas
drug cartel, which has diversified into
kidnapping migrants. The scale of the
massacre of migrants appeared to be
unprecedented even by the gruesome
standards of Mexican drug cartels. It
was unclear if all 72 were killed at the
same time - or why. The Navy said it
dispatched aircraft to check out the
man's report and when the gunmen saw the
marines, they opened fire and tried to
flee in a convoy of vehicles. One marine
and three of the suspects were killed in
the shootout. Navy personnel seized 21
assault rifles, shotguns and rifles, and
detained a minor. |
|
IRAN SAYS IT SUCCESSFULLY TEST-FIRES NEW
GENERATION OF THE SHORT-RANGE FATEH-110
TEHRAN, IRAN--Iran
said Wednesday that it has
successfully test-fired an upgraded
version of a short-range
surface-to-surface missile. Defense
Minister Gen. Ahmad Vahidi said the
third generation of the Fateh-110, which
means "conqueror" in Farsi and Arabic,
is equipped with a high accuracy
guidance control system. He said the
solid-fuel missile was developed
domestically by Iran's Aerospace
Industries Organization and tested
Wednesday.
The new version of
the missile increases the weapon's range
from earlier generations, Vahidi said
without providing any further details.
Earlier versions of the Fateh-110, which
Iran has had for several years, could
strike targets up to 120 miles (193
kilometers) away. "Employing a highly
accurate guidance and control system has
enabled the missile to hit its targets
with great precision," Vahidi was quoted
by state TV as saying Wednesday. Tehran
frequently makes announcements about new
advances in military technology that
cannot be independently verified.
State TV broadcast footage of the missile being fired and
then hitting a target on the ground.
Iran's English-language Press TV said
the missile is 30-feet (9-meters) long
and weighs 7,700 pounds (3,500
kilograms). The upgraded version of
Fateh-110 will be handed over to Iran's
armed forces late September, Vahidi
said. |
|
CUBA TO FREE 6 MORE POLITICAL PRISONERS
INTO EXILE
HAVANA,
CUBA--Cuba's
Roman Catholic Church on Tuesday
revealed the names of six more political
prisoners to be released into exile in
Spain under an agreement with President
Raul Castro's government. The men are
among 75 dissidents who were arrested in
a March 2003 crackdown on organized
political opposition and sentenced to
lengthy prison terms on charges that
included treason. In a landmark deal,
Cuba agreed on July 7 to release the
remaining 52 prisoners still jailed from
the crackdown.
The new releases
would bring to 32 the number freed under
the agreement so far - and all have left
Cuba for Spain, with one then settling
in Chile. Church official Orlando
Marquez said in a statement that the
next six slated for release are Victor
Arroyo Carmona, Alexis Rodriguez
Fernandez, Leonel Grave de Peralta
Almenares, Alfredo Dominguez Batista,
Prospero Gainza Aguero and Claro Sanchez
Altarriba. Both the Cuban government and
the church say releasing all 52 will
take months - but Tuesday's announcement
means that after barely six weeks, just
20 are still left behind bars. Some
political prisoners in Cuba have been
offered freedom but have declined to
leave their homeland. It is not clear if
those released subsequently will be
exiled or if some will be allowed to
stay in the country.
On Monday, U.S. State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley told
reporters in Washington that some of the
Cubans released to Spain "have inquired
about coming to the United States and we
will evaluate those cases on a case by
case basis." He said U.S. officials are
working "to find the most expeditious
manner to handle any requests that these
individuals might make and details are
still being worked out." Crowley said
that coming to the U.S. through a third
country is a more complicated process
than arriving directly from Cuba, "but
it doesn't by itself rule out anyone
coming to the United States." |
|
DIAZ-BALARTS AND ROS-LEHTINEN DEMAND
IMMEDIATE RELEASE OF DISSIDENTS ARRESTED
AT UNIVERSITY OF HAVANA
MIAMI,
FLORIDA--Congressmen
Lincoln Diaz-Balart, Ileana
Ros-Lehtinen, and Mario Diaz-Balart
today publicly demanded the
immediate release of Sara Marta Fonseca
Quevedo, Luis Enrique Labrador Diaz,
Eduardo Perez Flores, and the other
young Cuban pro-democracy leaders
brutally arrested Monday August 16, 2010
by the Cuban dictatorship after
peacefully staging a pro-democracy
protest on the main steps of the
University of Havana. Sara Marta
Fonseca, of the Rosa Parks Feminist
Movement, read a statement on behalf of
all the young Cuban pro-democracy
leaders, members of various
organizations which are grouped together
in the Orlando Zapata Tamayo Nacional
Civic Resistance and Civil Disobedience
Front.
According to news
reports, the dictator Fidel Castro has
decided to condemn the five youths to
long sentences in the tyranny’s gulags.
Once again, the Diaz-Balarts and
Ros-Lehtinen today asked the
International community to raise its
voice on behalf of the five young
pro-democracy activists and they issued
the following statement:
“Mr. Moratinos and Mr. Ortega Alamino are constantly chanting
praise and worship of the Castro
brothers and seeking monetary rewards
for the Castros’ criminal acts. The
Obama Administration is also on the
verge of announcing another unilateral
weakening of US sanctions on the Cuban
dictatorship in order to reward the
Castros’ actions. Where is their
outrage?” asked the three
Congressmembers today. “Where is their
outrage over the brutal arrests of the
young Cuban activists at the University
of Havana on August 16th? It is time for
Moratinos, Ortega, President Obama, and
the entire international community, to
demand the immediate release of the
Cuban pro-democracy leaders arrested on
August 16, 2010, and to demand the
immediate release of all Cuban political
prisoners,”, said the three
Congressmembers. |
|
SOMALI MILITANTS STORM HOTEL, 31 DEAD
INCLUDES HIGH GOVERNMENT OFFICIALS
MOGADISHU, SOMALIA--Eight
Somali parliamentarians and at least
another 26 people have been
killed in an attack in the capital,
Mogadishu, by members of the extremist
Al-Shabaab insurgent group, who attacked
the Muna Hotel August 24 disguised as
security personnel. The
hardline al Shabaab Islamists who have
been fighting for three years to oust
the fragile Western-backed "transitional
government," and control most of the
city, claimed the attack.
Al Jazeera reports
the attack follows Shabaab’s declaration
of a “massive, all out war” yesterday.
Somalia’s Information Minister
Abdirahman Yariisow accused Al Shabaab
of not even respecting Islam’s holy
month of Ramadan. Mohamud Huusein,
a civil servant who lived in the hotel,
told Reuters the gunmen had pretended to
be government soldiers and approached
the hotel's entrance, bragging of having
beaten some rebel militiamen. "The
security guards moved forward smiling,
and eager to hear more stories but they
were floored with fire and the gunmen
entered the hotel and fired into every
room and hall," he said.
On Tuesday, al Shabaab spokesman Sheikh Ali Mohamud Rage told
reporters in Mogadishu that its fighters
had "carried out an operation at Hotel
Muna" and succeeded in killing
government and intelligence officials,
MPs and civil servants. The Information
Ministry said the 31 dead included six
legislators and five government security
personnel. "The blood of the dead is
leaking out of the hotel," Information
Minister Abdirahman Osman said. In a
testament to the violence, the head of
one of the gunmen was still outside the
two-storey hotel late in the afternoon
and the body of another, missing one
hand and riddled with bullets, lay
nearby, a Reuters witness said. Workers
cleaned the hotel floor with brushes
stained red as they pushed bloody water
toward the building's entrance. |
|
IRANIAN PRESIDENT OFFERS FRIENDSHIP TO
THE US BUT ALSO TAUNTED WASHINGTON
TEHRAN,
IRAN--Iran's
president MAHMOUD AHMADINEJAD offered
friendship to the United States but also
taunted Washington by saying he
does not fear an attack by the U.S.
because it could not even defeat a small
army in Iraq, according to a television
interview with the leader aired Sunday.
President Barack
Obama has repeatedly offered to start a
dialogue with Iran, but his
administration says Iran chose
international isolation instead. The two
countries are at odds over Iran's
nuclear program, which the U.S. fears is
aimed at producing weapons though Tehran
denies it. U.S. military chief Adm. Mike
Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of
Staff, said earlier this month that the
U.S. military has a plan to attack Iran,
although he thinks a military strike is
probably a bad idea. Still, he said the
risk of Iran developing a nuclear weapon
is unacceptable and he reiterated that
"the military option" remains on the
table.
"There are no logical reasons for the United States to carry
out such an act," Ahmadinejad told the
Arabic satellite television channel Al
Jazeera, according to an Arabic
translation of the interview in Farsi.
"Do you believe an army that has been
defeated by a small army in Iraq can
enter into a war with a large and well
trained army like the Iranian army?" he
asked, referring to the insurgents in
Iraq. He said Washington lacks real
motives for attacking Iran and will not
benefit from hostility. "The friendship
of Iran is much better than its
hostility," he said. |
|
ARGENTINA'S GOVERNMENT ORDERS INTERNET
PROVIDER SHUT DOWN
BUENOS
AIRES, ARGENTINA--Argentina's
government ordered the closure
one of the nation's three leading
Internet providers, demanding that Grupo
Clarin immediately inform "each and
every one" of its more than 1 million
customers that they have 90 days to find
new ways of getting online. The order
says Grupo Clarin - which has grown
through mergers to become one of Latin
America's leading media companies -
illegally absorbed the Fibertel company
through its Cablevision subsidiary in
January 2009 because it failed to obtain
prior approval from the commerce
secretary. Cablevision denied that
Friday, citing a previous approval
obtained in 2003, and planned to appeal,
accusing the government of continuing a
campaign to stifle opposition
viewpoints.
President Cristina
Fernandez has made dismantling Grupo
Clarin a priority of her government. A
new law that has been challenged in
court would force the company to break
apart in a drive to dissolve media
monopolies. The immediate effect of
taking Fibertel offline may actually
reduce competition for high-speed
Internet access in Argentina, where
Cablevision competes with two major
multinational telephone companies -
Grupo Telecom and Telefonica SA.
Together the three have roughly equal
shares of an overall market that adds up
to more than 4.2 million Internet
connections.
While the government
says there are more than 200 providers
in Argentina, most have tiny market
shares. Removing Fibertel would enable
Telecom's Arnet and Telefonica's Speedy
to reach nearly 90 percent of
Argentina's Internet users between them,
and in many locations in the country,
customers would only have one of those
two companies to choose from.
Cablevision and Fibertel called the
order "illegal and arbitrary," and "one
more step in a brutal campaign of
persecution, attacks and hostility" that
will result in a telecom duopoly.
Cablevision's chief executive, Carlos
Moltini, said he's confident the courts
will overturn the "crazy" order in an
interview Friday with radio Mitre.
|
|
COLOMBIA GOVERNMENT SEEKS VENEZUELA
SUPPORT TO FIGHT AGAINST THE FARC
BOGOTA, COLOMBIA--Colombia
and Venezuela would work
together against the guerrilla group in
the military and police fronts.
Colombian Defense Minister Rodrigo
Rivera
said that Colombia hopes to work jointly
with Venezuela to fight the guerrilla
groups, according to an interview
published by the Colombian newspaper El
Tiempo. "The agenda will be an
understanding on all areas, including
the military and police fronts, against
all forms of crime," Efe reported.
On the alleged presence of members of the Revolutionary
Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) and of
the National Liberation Army (ELN) in
neighboring countries, Rivera believes
that the fight against them "is not a
responsibility of a State, but it
includes efforts from the entire world
community." |
|
IRANIAN PRESIDENT MAHMOUD AHMADINEJAD
UNVEILS NEW 'AMBASSADOR OF DEATH'
UNMANNED DRONE BOMBER
TEHRAN,
IRAN--Iranian
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on
Sunday inaugurated the country's first
domestically built unmanned bomber
aircraft, calling it an "ambassador of
death" to Iran's enemies. The
4-meter-long drone aircraft can carry up
to four cruise missiles and will have a
range of 620 miles (1,000 kilometers),
according to a state TV report — not far
enough to reach archenemy Israel. "The
jet, as well as being an ambassador of
death for the enemies of humanity, has a
main message of peace and friendship,"
said Ahmadinejad at the inauguration
ceremony, which fell on the country's
national day for its defense industries.
The goal of the aircraft, named Karrar
or striker, is to "keep the enemy
paralyzed in its bases," he said, adding
that the aircraft is for deterrence and
defensive purposes.
The president
championed the country's military
self-sufficiency program, and said it
will continue "until the enemies of
humanity lose hope of ever attacking the
Iranian nation." Iran frequently makes
announcements about new advances in
military technology that cannot be
independently verified. State TV later
showed video footage of the plane taking
off from a launching pad and reported
that the craft traveled at speeds of 560
miles per hour (900 kilometers) and
could alternatively be armed with two
250-pound bombs or a 450-pound guided
bomb. Iran has been producing its own
light, unmanned surveillance aircraft
since the late 1980s.
The ceremony came a day after Iran began to fuel its first
nuclear power reactor, with the help of
Russia, amid international concerns over
the possibility of a military dimension
to its nuclear program. Iran insists it
is only interested in generating
electricity. Referring to Israel's
occasional threats against Iran's
nuclear facilities, Ahmadinejad called
any attack unlikely, but he said if
Israel did, the reaction would be
overwhelming. "The scope of Iran's
reaction will include the entire the
earth," said Ahmadinejad. "We also tell
you — the West — that all options are on
the table." Ahmadinejad appeared to be
consciously echoing the terminology used
by the U.S. and Israel in their
statements not ruling out a military
option against Iran's nuclear
facilities. On Friday, Iran also
test-fired a new liquid fuel
surface-to-surface missile, the Qiam-1,
with advanced guidance systems. |
|
TWO ARMY OFFICERS SHOT DEAD AT CARACA'S
FORT TIUNA
CARACAS,
VENEZUELA--
A soldier shot and killed two officers
at a Venezuelan military base Saturday,
setting off a gunfight that wounded six
other soldiers, authorities said. The
alleged gunman fled Caracas' Fort Tiuna
in a car that was later found abandoned
in a slum, and troops and police were
searching for him.
The soldier opened
fire after arguing with a superior,
Capt. Miguel Angel Rosales, shooting the
33-year-old officer in the head with a
Russian-made AK-103 assault rifle,
according to the attorney general's
office. Minutes later the suspect,
identified as Jeffersson Jose Trujillo
Vasquez, fatally shot Lt. Alfredo Ruiz,
25, at an arms depot, the office said in
a statement that was carried by the
state-run Venezuelan News Agency. The
statement said an exchange of gunfire
followed in which six soldiers were
wounded - three women and three men
ranging in rank from sergeant to first
lieutenant. There was no immediate
public reaction by military officials,
and government officials could not be
reached for comment.
Fort Tiuna is Venezuela's largest military base and
also the headquarters of the Defense
Ministry. It is the same installation
where a Hong Kong athlete was wounded by
an apparent stray bullet Aug. 13 during
the women's baseball World Cup. The team
pulled out of the tournament afterward,
and organizers moved the remaining games
away from the base. It was unclear
whether the bullet was fired from inside
Fort Tiuna or elsewhere |
|
CHAIR OF THE VENEZUELAN PRESS BLOC:
GOVERNMENT WILL NOT FORCE US TO
SELF-CENSORSHIP
CARACAS, VENEZUELA--
David Natera, the chair of the
Venezuelan Press Bloc, said that
it is not the action taken by a judge,
“because here public powers are
subordinated to the Head of State.” In
his opinion, the action is due to
“another attack from Chávez’s regime”
"The Venezuelan
government is not to force us to
self-censorship," David Natera, the
chair of the Venezuelan Press Bloc,
said. The agency representatives called
members to an emergency meeting, where
they analyze the challenges posed on
newspapers by the measure imposed by the
Caracas Trial Mediation and
Substantiation Court for Protection of
Children and Adolescents. On the
intention of newspapers to abide by the
action, which prohibits the publication
of images of "violent, bloody, hideous
content, whether of accidents and crime
or not," Natera said that as long as
there are accidents and crime, readers
of newspapers will have somewhere to
learn about them. "They will not crush
our spirit. Articles 57 and 58 of the
Constitution ensure freedom of speech
and the people's right to receive
information."
Natera considered
that Venezuelans have accustomed to see
the high crime rates in the country, as
the numbers on murders "became a
routine." He said that the photo
published by daily newspaper El Nacional
had the "responsible intention to
attract the country's attention on the
high rates of murders resulting from
violence." David Natera, the chair of
the Venezuelan Press Bloc, said that it
was not the action taken by a judge,
"because here public powers are
subordinated to the Head of State." In
his opinion, the action is due to
"another attack from Chávez's regime." |
|
with russia's help, iran began fueling
its first nuclear power plant
TEHRAN,
IRAN--Iran
began fuelling its first nuclear power
plant yesterday, a potent symbol
of its growing regional sway and
rejection of international sanctions
designed to prevent it building a
nuclear bomb. Iranian television showed
live pictures of Iran's nuclear chief
Ali Akbar Salehi and his Russian
counterpart watching a fuel rod assembly
being prepared for insertion into the
reactor near the Gulf city of Bushehr.
"Despite all the pressures, sanctions
and hardships imposed by Western
nations, we are now witnessing the
start-up of the largest symbol of Iran's
peaceful nuclear activities," Salehi
told a news conference afterwards.
Iranian officials said it would take two
to three months before the plant starts
producing electricity and would generate
1,000 megawatts, a small proportion of
the nation's 41,000 megawatt electricity
demand recorded last month.
Russia designed,
built and will supply fuel for Bushehr,
taking back spent rods which could be
used to make weapons-grade plutonium in
order to ease nuclear proliferation
concerns. Saturday's ceremony comes
after decades of delays building the
plant, work on which was initially
started by German company Siemens in the
1970s, before Iran's Islamic Revolution.
The United States criticized Moscow
earlier this year for pushing ahead with
Bushehr given persistent Iranian
defiance over its nuclear program.
Moscow supported the latest U.N.
Security Council resolution in June
which imposed a fourth round of
sanctions and called for Iran to stop
uranium enrichment which, some countries
fear, could lead it to obtain nuclear
weapons.
"The construction of
the nuclear plant at Bushehr is a clear
example showing that any country, if it
abides by existing international
legislation and provides effective, open
interaction with the IAEA (International
Atomic Energy Agency), should have the
opportunity to access peaceful use of
the atom," Sergei Kiriyenko, head of
Russian state nuclear corporation
Rosatom, told the news conference. The
fuelling of Bushehr is a milestone in
Iran's path to harness technology which
it says will reduce consumption of its
abundant fossil fuels, allowing it to
export more oil and gas and to prepare
for the day when the minerals riches dry
up. Iran's neighbors, some of whom are
also seeking nuclear power, are wary of
Tehran's nuclear ambitions and its
growing influence in the region, notably
in Iraq where fellow Shi'ites now
dominate and Lebanon, where it is a
backer of Hezbollah. While most nuclear
analysts say Bushehr does not add to any
proliferation risk, many countries
remain deeply concerned about Iran's
uranium enrichment. It disclosed the
existence of a second enrichment plant
only last year and announced in February
it was enriching uranium to a level of
20 percent, from about 3.5 percent
previously, taking it closer to
weapons-grade levels and well above what
is needed to fuel a power plant. |
|
colombia captured a major venezuelan
cocaine trafficker
BOGOTA,
COLOMBIA--
a Venezuelan businessman
suspected of being part of a major drug
trafficking ring has been arrested by
Colombian authorities. Walid
Makled Garcia, 43, who is wanted by the
US on drug charges and Colombia and
Venezuela on murder charges, was caught
in the border city of Cucuta. He is
accused of trafficking 10 tons of
cocaine every month to the US and
Europe. Colombian police have hailed the
arrest as a significant success.
Colombian police
chief Gen Oscar Naranjo said that Mr
Makled is on a US extradition list as
"one of the world's most wanted drug
traffickers". Also known by his alias
"The Turk", Mr Makled is wanted by a New
York court for allegedly being part of a
group which regularly smuggles large
amounts of cocaine to the US and
European markets. At a news conference
in Bogota on Friday, Gen Naranjo said Mr
Makled was a "pseudo-businessman" who
used legitimate business as a front for
his illegal activities.
He was also said to have links with the Revolutionary
Armed Forces of Colombia (Farc) Marxist
rebel group, Gen Naranjo said. But a
handcuffed Mr Makled protested, saying:
"It's nothing, nothing, just lies,
lies... Do you really believe I am a
criminal? I'm a businessman." Colombiana
He accused Venezuela of planting the
drugs on him so they could seize his
companies. Venezuelan authorities say
they are also preparing an extradition
request for Mr Makled, who they believe
was responsible for two murders.
One of the victims, newspaper columnist
Orel Zambrano, was killed by two gunmen
on a motorcycle in January 2009 after
writing about drugs cases where the
Makled family had been implicated. In
2008, Venezuelan police arrested Mr
Makled's three brothers after finding
300kg of cocaine on a family ranch. |
|
PRESIDENT OBAMA BYPASSES SENATE TO PICK
ENVOY TO EL SALVADOR
WASHINGTON, D.C.-- President
Barack Obama appointed as
ambassador to El Salvador a lawyer whose
nomination to the post had been blocked
in the Senate because of questions about
her links to Cuban diplomats. Obama used
a congressional recess appointment,
which allows him to sidestep the Senate
confirmation process, to make Mari
Carmen Aponte ambassador to the Central
American nation.
Aponte was cleared by
the FBI after questions about her
contacts with Cuban diplomats in
Washington first became public in 1998,
when President Bill Clinton nominated
her as ambassador to the Dominican
Republic. She withdrew amid opposition
from Senate Republicans. Obama
nominated her to the El Salvador post
this year and the Senate Foreign
Relations committee approved her in
April. Sen. Jim DeMint, R-SC, later put
a hold on her nomination, to block a
full Senate vote, saying he wanted to
look at Aponte's FBI file.
The Puerto Rico-born Aponte, 63, has acknowledged that
she and a former boyfriend, Cuban-born
Roberto Tamayo, attended some events
with Cuban diplomats in the early 1990s
but said they were purely social
occasions. Florentino Aspillaga, a
Havana intelligence defector, alleged in
1993 that Cuba's intelligence services
were trying to use Tamayo to recruit
Aponte. FBI agents have publicly
confirmed Tamayo was passing them
information on his contacts with the
Cuban diplomats. |
|
IRAN'S DEFENSE MINISTER: THE COUNTRY
HAS TESTED A NEW SURFACE-TO-SURFACE
MISSILE
TEHRAN,
IRAN--Iran
tests new missile, official media says.
The words “Ya Mahdi” were written
on the side of the missile, referring to
Imam Mahdi, one of the 12 imams of
Shiite Islam, who disappeared as a boy
and whom the faithful believe will
return one day to bring redemption to
mankind. Mr Vahidi, who was speaking
during Friday prayers in Tehran, did not
say when the launch took place nor did
he disclose the precise range of the
missile. “The missile has new technical
aspects and has a unique tactical
capacity,” he said on state television,
adding that the device was of a “new
class.”
“Since the
surface-to-surface missile has no wings,
it has lot of tactical power, which also
reduces the chances of it being
intercepted,” he said. On Tuesday, Mr
Vahidi had said that Qiam was to be test
fired during the annual government week,
the period when Tehran touts its
achievements in various fields. This
year government week begins on Monday.
The third generation Fateh 110
(Conqueror) missile was also to be test
fired during this period. Iran has
previously paraded a version of Fateh
110 which has a travel range of 150 to
200 kilometres (90 to 125 miles). Also
during government week, the production
lines of two missile-carrying
speedboats, Seraj (Lamp) and Zolfaqar
(named after Shiite Imam Ali’s sword)
are due to be inaugurated, while a
long-range drone, Karar, is expected to
be unveiled.
The firing of Qiam comes days after a top commander from the
Revolutionary Guards said Iran will mass
produce replicas of the Bladerunner 51,
often described as the world’s fastest
boat, and equip them with weapons to be
deployed in the Gulf. On August 8, Iran
took delivery of four new
mini-submarines of the home-produced
Ghadir class. Weighing 120 tonnes, the
“stealth” submarines are aimed at
operations in shallow waters, notably in
the Gulf. Iranian officials regularly
boast about the Islamic republic’s
military capabilities and the latest
missile launch comes at a time when
local officials have been warning
against any attack on the Islamic
republic. |
|
IRAN TO FIRE UP ITS FIRST NUCLEAR POWER
PLANT
TEHRAN,
IRAN-Iran's
first nuclear power station will
be loaded with fuel on Saturday, a
showcase for Tehran's claim that its
atomic ambitions are purely peaceful.
After decades of delays, the event is a
milestone in Iran's path to harness
technology which it says will reduce
consumption of its abundant fossil
fuels, allowing it to export more oil
and gas and to prepare for the day when
the minerals riches dry up. "It is a big
day. Iran has been waiting for it for
years. Bushehr has seen the start up
postponed so many times that Iranians
will breath a sigh of relief," said Mark
Fitzpatrick of London's International
Institute for Strategic Studies.
Iran will claim
victory over the United States which has
tried to block a nuclear program it sees
as highly suspect. Western nations
question why Iran wants to enrich
uranium itself when, as Bushehr shows,
it does not need it for power stations.
Tehran's refusal to cease enrichment has
resulted in a raft of new United Nations
sanctions and tougher unilateral
measures by the United States, the
European Union and elsewhere. "The
inauguration of the plant will be a
thorn in the side of ill-wishers," said
Ali Akbar Salehi, the head of Iran's
Atomic Energy Organization.
Diplomats say the Bushehr plant, monitored by the
International Atomic Energy Agency, the
United Nations nuclear watchdog, poses
little proliferation risk and has no
link with Iran's secretive uranium
enrichment program, seen as the main "weaponization"
threat, at other installations. But that
has not prevented hawks in Washington
flagging Saturday, when Russian and
Iranian specialists begin loading fuel
rods into the reactor, as a threshold.
"If Israel's going to do anything
against Bushehr it has to move in the
next eight days. If they don't, then as
I say something Saddam Hussein wanted
but couldn't get, a functioning nuclear
reactor ... the Iranians, sworn enemies
of Israel, will have," the former U.S.
ambassador to the United Nations, John
Bolton, told Fox News television last
week. Israel bombed a site where the
then Iraqi leader was building a nuclear
reactor in 1981 and has not ruled out
taking similar pre-emptive military
action against Iran which it believes
could try to annihilate the Jewish
state. |
|
FORMER CUBAN DICTATOR FIDEL CASTRO
CALLED "DISTORTED" AND "PROSTITUTED" THE
EDUCATION IN THE USA
HAVANA, CUBA--Former
Cuban dictator Fidel Castro
refers to the information contained in a
study published by the University of
Beloit with regard to some facts never
seen before in the history of the United
States and the world. In his latest
article Fidel said to be stunned to
realize to what extent education could
be distorted and prostituted in US. “To
think that there are still people in
their right mind capable of believing
that my warnings are exaggerated!”, he
added.
After referring on
August 17 and 18 to the book written by
Daniel Estulin, which narrates, through
undeniable facts, the horrible way in
which the minds of American youth and
children are distorted by the
consumption of drugs and the influence
of the media, in connivance with
American and British intelligence
agencies, in the final part of my last
Reflection I expressed the following:
“It is terrible to think that the
intelligence and the feelings of
children and youth in the United States
could be mutilated in such a way.”
Yesterday, several news agencies were
reporting the information contained in a
study published by the University of
Beloit with regard to some facts never
seen before in the history of the United
States and the world, associated to the
knowledge and habits of American
university students who will graduate in
2014.
The government libel Granma reported the news using an
eloquent language:
1º “They do not wear watches to
check the time; instead they use their
cell phones;”
2º “They believe Beethoven is a dog
they saw in a film;”
3º “They think Michael Angelo is a
computer virus.”
4º “They believe e-mail is ‘too
slow’, used as they are to texting
through sophisticated mobile phones.”
I was stunned to realize to what extent
education could be distorted and
prostituted in a country with more than
8 000 nuclear weapons and the most
powerful means of war in the whole
world. To think that there are
still people in their right mind capable
of believing that my warnings are
exaggerated! |
|
un and oas reject court ruling censoring
all venezuelan newspapers
WASHINGTON,
D.C.-The
UN and OAS Rapporteurs on Freedom of
Expression, Frank La Rue and Catalina
Botero, respectively, questioned
the decision issued by the Caracas 12th
Judge on the Protection of Children and
Adolescents
The UN and OAS
Special Rapporteurs on Freedom of
Expression, Frank La Rue and Catalina
Botero, respectively, described as a
decision that "seriously compromises"
free dissemination of information, ideas
and opinions the ruling issued by
William Páez, the Caracas 12th Judge on
the Protection of Children and
Adolescents, who banned all Venezuelan
newspapers from disseminating pictures
of homicides, traffic accidents and
other violent and bloody events for a
month. In a joint statement, La Rue
and Botero recalled that international
treaties such as the American Convention
on Human Rights prohibit prior
censorship. They also warned that the
Inter-American Court on Human Rights, in
various rulings, has established that
restrictions on freedom of expression
must be clearly defined.
La Rue and Botero
supported the authorities' intention to
protect children and adolescents.
However, they rejected the fact that
such purpose is used as an excuse to
"impose prior censorship." On Tuesday,
Judge Páez upheld a complaint filed by
the Ombudsman's Office against El
Nacional newspaper for the publication
of a photo of the interior of the
Caracas morgue. The judge ordered the
newspaper to refrain from publishing any
violent or bloody images or contents
indefinitely. Further, Tal Cual
newspaper, which also released the
controversial image some days later, was
ordered not to publish photographs of
violent crimes. This ban applies to all
the newspapers in Venezuela, but only
for a period of 30 days. |
|
INTERNATIONAL PRESS FORCES DICTATOR
CHAVEZ’S CAPITULATION:
JUDGE CANCELS RULING THAT CENSORED
VENEZUELAN NEWSPAPERS
CARACAS, VENEZUELA--William
Páez, the 12th Trial Judge for
Protection of Children and Adolescents
in Caracas, changed his mind and
repealed a ruling banning all Venezuelan
daily and weekly newspapers, as well as
magazines, from posting images of
violent events over the next 30 days.
The Legal Adviser of
the Ombudsman Office, Larry Davoe,
released the information in an interview
with state-run television station
Venezolana de Television (VTV).
Earlier, Páez had
advised daily newspaper El Nacional that
he had revoked a decision banning the
newspaper from disseminating information
and ads related to violent events. |
|
IRAN CONDEMNS POSSIBLE US MILITARY
ACTION
UNITED
NATIONS, NEW YORK--UNITED
NATIONS Iran took its case against the
United States to the United Nations on
Wednesday and strongly condemned the top
U.S. military chief for saying military
action remains a possibility if the
country develops nuclear weapons. Iran's
acting U.N. ambassador Eshagh Alehabib
claimed in letters circulated to the
secretary-general and presidents of the
Security Council and General Assembly
that Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the
U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, and other
U.S. officials and lawmakers
"threatened" to use military action
under the "totally false" pretense that
Iran is developing nuclear weapons.
Mullen said earlier
this month that the U.S. military has a
plan to attack Iran, although he thinks
a military strike is probably a bad
idea. Still, he said the risk of Iran
developing a nuclear weapon is
unacceptable and he reiterated that "the
military option" remains on the table.
Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali
Khamenei warned Wednesday that Iran's
response to an attack would not be
limited to the region, suggesting Iran
would target U.S. interests beyond the
Persian Gulf. "It's unlikely that they
(U.S.) will make such a stupidity (to
attack Iran) but all must know that if
this threat is carried out, the field of
the Iranian nation's confrontation will
not be only our region," Khamenei told
state TV. "The area of confrontation
will be much wider." He also said there
will be no talks with the U.S. under the
shadow of threats.
Khamenei, who has the final say on all state matters in Iran,
apparently was referring to recent calls
by the U.S. and other key powers for
Iran to resume talks on its nuclear
program following the U.N. Security
Council's recent vote imposing a fourth
set of sanctions against the country for
refusing to halt uranium enrichment. The
U.S. and some of its allies accuse Iran
of using its civilian nuclear program as
a cover to build nuclear weapons. Iran
has denied the allegations, saying its
nuclear program is geared merely toward
generating electricity, not bombs.
Alehabib said the United States was
using threatening language that violates
international law and the U.N. Charter
and goes against "global efforts to
strengthen regional and international
peace and security." He reiterated that
Iran "would not hesitate to act in
self-defense to respond to any attack."
Khamenei said negotiations would be
possible if the U.S. stops making
threats against Iran, and he set
conditions for it. "If the U.S. puts
aside threats, sanctions and its
superpower display and refuses to set
goals for the talks, then there will be
a possibility of talks. But under the
present conditions and given the threats
and pressures, no talks with be held at
all," Khamenei was quoted as saying. |
|
LAST U.S. COMBAT CONVOY Has left iraq
mosul, iraq--The
last U.S. brigade combat team in Iraq
has left the country, a move that
helps U.S. President Barack Obama reach
his goal of 50,000 troops in the country
by September 1. Their departure leaves
about 56,000 U.S. troops in the country,
according to the U.S. military. Capt.
Christopher Ophardt, spokesman for the
4th Stryker Brigade, 2nd Infantry
Division, said the last of the 4,000
members of the unit crossed the border
into Kuwait early Thursday. A few
hundred members stayed behind to finish
administrative and logistical duties but
will fly out of Baghdad later Thursday,
Ophardt said. Much of the brigade
departed more than a day ago, but the
announcement was delayed for security
reasons.
Their departure comes
more than seven years after U.S. combat
forces entered, though their departure
does not signify the end of all U.S.
combat forces in the country. Another
6,000 U.S. troops must leave Iraq to
meet Obama's deadline for the end of
U.S. combat operations in the country
and the beginning of Operation New Dawn,
in which the remaining U.S. forces are
expected to switch to an
advise-and-assist role. A public
information officer at Joint Base Lewis-McChord,
Washington, said it will take a few
weeks for all of the 4-2's members to
return home. "It is one flight at a
time," she said. "We are expecting most
of them to be home by mid-September."
As they prepared to depart, some soldiers laughed and some
expressed relief at having survived
multiple deployments. A few reminisced
about having endured firefights and
helping carry the bodies of buddies off
the field of battle. Many said they
would never forget the war. "The first
time you get shot at, it's just, I mean,
it wakes you up," said Sgt. Terry
Wetzel, the company's senior sniper.
"You think, before you come here, that
you're an adult, that you're a grown
man. But this place will change you."
Wetzel said he was ready to go home. "I
feel like we have done as much as we can
do here now. It's pretty much up to the
Iraqi army and Iraqi police and their
government," he said. "We have helped
them out as much as we can." "We put our
blood, sweat and tears since we've been
here for 12 months and we know we did
our job and we know it's not going to be
in vain, but there's a lot of excitement
right now," said Spc. Don Lanpher as he
prepared to depart. |
|
five cuban dissidents remain in prison
after demonstration at the university of
havana
HAVANA,
CUBA--Five
young Cuban dissidents remained
in custody 36 hours after a rare protest
at the University of Havana, an iconic
spot for airing grievances before the
Castro revolution, activists said
Tuesday.
"We are
peaceful youths and defenders of human
rights, demanding freedom and democracy
for our country,'' Sara Martha Fonseca
Quevedo is heard saying in a recording
of the protest Monday morning before the
group broke into chants of ``Down with
the Castros'' and ``Freedom.'' The
anti-Castro protest on the broad stone
steps that lead up to the university
campus were the first he could remember
since the early 1960s, said human-rights
activist Elizardo Sanchez Santacruz.
Before 1959, many anti-government protesters --
including Fidel Castro, then a law
student -- gathered on the steps because
police were legally barred from the
campus. Castro ended the university's
autonomy after he seized power.
Dissident Jorge Luis García Pérez ``Antúnez''
identified those arrested as Fonseca,
Luis Enrique Labrador, Eduardo Pérez
Flores, Yordanis Martinez Carvajal, and
Michel Rodríguez Luis. |
|
COLOMBIA'S CONSTITUTIONAL COURT DECLARES
US-COLOMBIA PACT 'UNCONSTITUTIONAL'
BOGOTA,
COLOMBIA--Colombia's
constitutional court has declared
a US-Colombian accord that gave the US
military access to at least seven
Colombian bases to be unconstitutional.
The court ordered the government on
Tuesday to submit the agreement to the
Colombian congress, arguing that it
should be executed in the form of an
international treaty that would be
subject to congressional approval in
order to comply with constitutional
norms.
The agreement "is an
arrangement which requires the State to
take on new obligations as well as an
extension of previous ones and as such
should be handled as an international
treaty, that is, subject to
congressional approval," said the
court's chief justice Mauricio Gonzalez.
The court decided in March to review the
agreement after a group of lawyers filed
a complaint arguing it was
unconstitutional. The lawsuit claimed
the October 2009 military accord was
invalid because it was signed by the
government of President Alvaro Uribe
without prior discussion in Congress, as
mandated by the constitution.
The military pact, part of a joint effort to counter
drug trafficking and insurgencies, has
been denounced by neighbouring Venezuela
as US interference in the region,
raising tensions between Bogota and
Caracas. Opponents also accuse Uribe of
ignoring the advice of the State Council
- the highest court on administrative
matters - which also urged that the
congress take up the agreement before it
was signed. The Uribe administration
deemed the State Council's opinion
non-binding, and said the accord was not
new but merely an extension of a 1974
military pact with the United States,
and as such required no legislative
oversight, government officials said. |
|
VENEZUELAN COURT PROHIBITS DISSEMINATION
OF "BLOODY" PHOTOS
CARACAS, VENEZUELA--Venezuelan
newspapers were banned from
publishing information, images and ads
showing bloody situations, weapons and
physical attacks or conveying warlike
messages and encouraging crime that may
hit the psychological wellbeing of
children and adolescents.
The decision was made
by the Twelfth Trial Court on Children
and Adolescents Protection, following
the publication of pictures of the
Caracas morgue by daily newspapers El
Nacional and Tal Cual in recent days.
The threefold decision was issued by
Judge William Páez.
El Nacional was banned from publishing any pictures or
content with the above features, and Tal
Cual was banned from publishing images
as described above. This prohibition on
both newspapers will be in force until
the relevant court rules on the case.
The court banned the remaining
Venezuelan newspapers from publishing
images that may be deemed harmful for
children and teenagers. Unlike the
actions against El Nacional and Tal Cual,
this prohibition will be in force only
for a month. |
|
DIAZ-BALART AND ROS-LETHINEN DEMAND
IMMEDIATE RELEASE OF CUBAN PRO-DEMOCRACY
LEADERS ARRESTED
MIAMI,
FLORIDA--Congressmen
Lincoln Diaz-Balart, Ileana
Ros-Lehtinen, and Mario Diaz-Balart
today publicly demanded the immediate
release of Sara Marta Fonseca Quevedo,
Luis Enrique Labrador Diaz, Eduardo
Perez Flores, and the other young Cuban
pro-democracy leaders brutally arrested
Monday August 16, 2010 by the Cuban
dictatorship after peacefully staging a
pro-democracy protest on the main steps
of the University of Havana. Sara Marta
Fonseca, of the Rosa Parks Feminist
Movement, read a statement on behalf of
all the young Cuban pro-democracy
leaders, members of various
organizations which are grouped together
in the Orlando Zapata Tamayo Nacional
Civic Resistance and Civil Disobedience
Front. It is unknown where Sara Marta
Fonseca, Eduardo Perez Flores, and Luis
Enrique Labrador are being held by the
regime. The names of the other
pro-democracy advocates are unknown, as
are their places of incarceration.
“Mr. Moratinos and
Mr. Ortega Alamino are constantly
chanting praise and worship of the
Castro brothers and seeking monetary
rewards for the Castros’ criminal acts.
The Obama Administration is also on the
verge of announcing another unilateral
weakening of US sanctions on the Cuban
dictatorship in order to reward the
Castros’ actions. Where is their
outrage?” asked the three
Congressmembers today.
“Where is their
outrage over the brutal arrests of the
young Cuban activists at the University
of Havana on August 16th? Where is their
outrage over the dictatorship's brutal
treatment of Orlando Zapata Tamayo's
mother, Reina Tamayo, who in addition to
being prevented from even visiting her
son’s grave, has received grave threats
from the regime. It is time for
Moratinos, Ortega, President Obama, and
the entire world, to demand the
immediate release of the Cuban
pro-democracy leaders arrested Monday,
to demand the immediate release of all
Cuban political prisoners, and an
immediate cessation to the
dictatorship’s brutality toward Reina
Tamayo and all Cubans”, said the three
Congressmembers. |
|
us congressman eliot engel lambasts
VENEZUELAN dictator chavez
administration
WASHINGTON,
D.C.--
"Every step (Venezuelan dictator Hugo)
Chávez takes is to remove freedom
and democracy." This is the opinion of
Democratic Congressman Eliot Engel,
Chairman of the Subcommittee on the
Western Hemisphere, US House of
Representatives.
During an interview
released by the Voice of America, the
Congressman said last week that the
Venezuelan president "seems to govern
more and more as a dictatorship."
"Venezuela has the highest violence
rates in Latin America, the highest
inflation rate, the worst poverty,
largest unemployment in Latin America.
That is a country with large oil
reserves; it should be the richest in
the area. Hugo Chávez has torn the
economy to pieces," he added.
In addition, Engel questioned the commercial flights between
Iran and Venezuela. "For me, the flights
coming to Caracas from Iran represent a
big problem. I think that Iran is the
country which most fosters terrorism in
the world," he said. |
|
dictator chavez advises the uniteD
STATES to FIND A REPLACEMENT FOR
AMBASSADOR LARRY PALMER
CARACAS, VENEZUELA--Venezuela's
dictator Hugo Chávez thinks it is
impossible for his government to accept
Larry Palmer as the new US ambassador.
"The healthiest way would be for them to
look for anyone else."
"We do not want to
discuss this subject anymore; we gave an
opinion already. It is impossible to
accept him (Larry Palmer)," President
Hugo Chávez told state-run TV channel
Venezolana de Televisión during a
telephone conversation, DPA quoted.
Chávez made the comment with regard to Washington
insistence on keeping Palmer as the
potential US Ambassador to Caracas, even
after the president expressed his desire
to veto the appointment due to the
diplomat's controversial remarks. Palmer
said in a hearing at the US Congress
that the morale of the Venezuelan army
was low and voiced concern about the
Cuban influence. The Venezuelan
government harshly replied to Palmer's
opinion and labeled it as meddling. |
|
us REITERATES THAT LARRY PALMER IS THE
AMBASSADOR-DESIGNATE TO VENEZUELA
WASHINGTON,
D.C.--Larry
Palmer is still the
ambassador-designate to Venezuela, said
on Tuesday a State Department spokesman,
Mark Toner, after President Hugo Chávez
reiterated that his government would not
accept the US diplomat. "He is still
our nominee," Toner said in a press
conference, as quoted by AFP.
Chávez
insisted on Monday that "no decent
government could possibly welcome Mr.
Palmer." The US Senate -currently in
recess until mid-September- has yet to
vote on Palmer's nomination. The
diplomat told the Senate that Colombian
guerrillas are deployed in Venezuela. He
pointed to "low morale" in the
Venezuelan military and to Cuban
influence in the Venezuelan Armed
Forces.
Washington has said it shares Palmer's
"concerns" and that it has not received
any formal notification from Venezuela
against the ambassador-designate. The
head of the US diplomacy in Latin
America, Arturo Valenzuela, advocated
the nomination of Palmer when he met
with Venezuelan Ambassador to US
Bernardo Álvarez in Washington last
Wednesday, said a US State Department
spokesman. |
|
|
|
secretary of defense robert gates wants
to retire in 2011
WASHINGTON,
D.C.--SECRETARY
OF Defense Robert Gates is
expected to leave his post in the spring
of 2011, a senior administration source
told CNN on Monday. A Pentagon spokesman
confirmed that Gates wants to retire
some time next year. Gates was quoted in
an article in the magazine Foreign
Policy published Monday saying he wanted
to step down before the end of 2011.
Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman said
references in the article to Gates'
desire to retire next year "accurately
reflect the secretary's thoughts." "He's
not about to walk out the door," Whitman
said. "He hopes to leave in 2011."
According to the
senior administration official, Gates
privately promised President Barack
Obama he would not leave the Cabinet in
2010 in order to maintain stability at
the Pentagon while more U.S. forces are
heading to Afghanistan. In addition, the
senior official said, Gates does not
want a potentially difficult
confirmation battle for his successor to
take place in the presidential election
year of 2012. Gates, who became defense
secretary in 2006 under former President
George W. Bush, stayed in the post when
Obama took office in 2009.
White House spokesman Bill Burton praised Gates for his
service, telling reporters Monday that
the defense secretary has stayed on the
job longer than originally planned. "He
did the president and the nation a great
favor by agreeing to stay on longer than
he had originally intended, when the
president started his administration,"
Burton said. "The president is greatly
thankful for that service." Burton made
clear that Gates would decide when to
formally announce his plans. "It's not a
surprise to see him discussing his plans
to move on," Burton said. Gates
previously spent almost 27 years in the
Central Intelligence Agency, including
posts at the White House serving four
presidents. Gates also was president of
Texas A&M University prior to becoming
defense secretary. |
|
BARCLAYS BANK FINED FOR HANDLING COVERT
FINANCIAL TRANSITIONS INVOLVING CUBA,
IRAN AND LYBIA
WASHINGTON,
D.C.--Law
enforcement authorities in the US
are set to levy a $298m (£190m) penalty
on Barclays for breaking international
sanctions by handling covert financial
transactions involving banks in Cuba,
Iran, Libya, Sudan and Burma. Criminal
charges filed in a federal court in
Washington accused Barclays of stripping
off identifying information from certain
money transfer payments between 1995 and
2006 to disguise the fact that they
involved institutions in countries
barred from doing business with the US.
A deal to settle the case was due to be
brought before a judge, Royce Lamberth,
in the District of Columbia today. A law
enforcement source said Barclays would
pay $149m to the US government and a
further $149m in a "deferred prosecution
agreement" with New York's district
attorney.
The arrangement would
be in line with a provision disclosed in
Barclays' half-year financial results
earlier this month which said the bank
was setting aside £194m "in relation to
the possible resolution of Barclays'
compliance with US economic sanctions".
Sanctions are overseen by the US
treasury's office of foreign assets
control, which enforces economic
embargoes on certain foreign regimes "to
accomplish foreign policy and national
security goals". Barclays' New York
office falls under US jurisdiction and
the bank is by no means the first
overseas institution to fall foul of
sanctions rules. Lloyds TSB agreed to
pay $350m in January 2009 to settle
charges that it helped American
customers get round rules preventing
doing business with Libya, Sudan and
Iran. And in December, the Swiss banking
group Credit Suisse struck a deal paying
a $536m penalty for violating sanctions
against Iran.
The Washington Post said charges against the bank comprised
one count described as "trading with the
enemy" and a second of violating the US
international emergency economic powers
act. The US treasury has taken an
aggressive approach in recent years to
enforcing economic sanctions. Banks are
accused of deliberately flouting the
rules by masking transactions by using
complicated routing mechanisms to blur
the origin of clients' money and by
omitting details from wire transfers. At
the time of the department for justice's
prosecution of Lloyds TSB, the then
acting assistant attorney general,
Matthew Friedrich, said: "The department
will continue to use criminal
enforcement measures against the knowing
and intentional evasion of US sanctions
laws, particularly where such conduct
has the potential to finance terrorist
activities." Three of the countries with
which Barclays is accused of doing
business – Cuba, Iran and Sudan – are
still on the US department of state's
designated list of state sponsors of
terrorism. |
|
VENEZUELAN CONGRESS CHAIR WELCOMES HER
COLOMBIAN COUNTERPART
CARACAS, VENEZUELA--Deputy
Cilia Flores, the president of the
Venezuelan National Assembly
planned to hold a meeting with her
Colombian colleague Armando Benedetti,
on visit to Caracas to back
reestablishment of bilateral diplomatic
and trade relations.
Venezuelan dictator
Hugo Chávez was expected to meet with
Benedetti on Monday afternoon at the
Miraflores Presidential Palace. The
Senator for ruling Partido Social de
Unidad Nacional, also known as the U
Party, organized around former President
Álvaro Uribe, arrived on Friday in
Caracas in order to talk with Venezuelan
authorities about the organization of
five bilateral committees. The teams
will be responsible for restoring
political and economic ties between the
two countries
"I came (to Caracas) to discuss how these committees are to
be implemented; (to tell) that the
(Colombian) peace process should be
managed by (Colombian President Juan
Manuel) Santos; that the two countries
should fight against terrorism," the
congressman said on Sunday night in an
interview with multi-state TV network
Telesur. |
|
|
|
VENEZUELAN GOVERNMENT PROBES OPPOSITION
PAPER "EL NACIONAL" OVER MORGUE PHOTO
CARACAS,
VENEZUELA--Venezuelan
prosecutors are investigating
opposition newspaper El Nacional after
it published a front-page photograph of
corpses piled up at a morgue in the
capital Caracas, the government said on
Saturday. the color photograph under a
Friday headline about deteriorating
security in the South American oil
producing country.
Two prosecutors
have been appointed to coordinate the
investigation and determine whether the
publication of the photograph violated
provisions of the Law on the Protection
of Children and Adolescents, the
authorities said in a statement. Violent
crime is a sensitive subject in the
country in the run-up to September 26
legislative elections that could test
support for President Hugo Chavez's
socialist policies ahead of a
presidential poll in 2012.
Official statistics are hard to come by, but nongovernmental
organizations say Venezuela has one of
the highest crime rates in the
continent. Chavez says violent crime is
decreasing, and that fears are being
whipped up by his political rivals for
propaganda. The director of El Nacional,
Miguel Henrique Otero, said his
newspaper had been right to publish the
"strong" photo. On Saturday, the paper
carried a headline saying homicides had
increased by 134 percent in Venezuela
over the last 10 years. |
|
U.S. MISSILE STRIKE KILLS 12 TERRORIST
IN PAKISTAN
MIRANSHAH,
PAKISTAN--A
pilotless U.S. drone aircraft fired
missiles into Pakistan's North
Waziristan, an al Qaeda and
Taliban sanctuary on the Afghan border,
killing at least 12 militants on
Saturday, intelligence officials
said.GlobalVolunteerNetwork.org/AsiaThe
United States has intensified missile
strikes by drone aircraft in Pakistan's
lawless Pashtun tribal lands in an
effort to curb violence in Afghanistan,
much of which U.S. officials say comes
from militant sanctuaries on the
Pakistani side.
Most of the missile
attacks this year were carried out on
militant targets in North Waziristan
region. In the latest strike, the
missiles hit a house used by militants
as a hideout near Mir Ali, the second
major town of the region. "We have
reports that 12 militants were killed in
the attack. The death toll could be
more," an intelligence official in the
region told Reuters. He said Amir Moawia,
an important Pakistani Taliban
commander, was among the dead. Another
intelligence official said there were
five foreigners among the slain
militants but their nationalities could
not be immediately confirmed. A large
number of militants linked to al Qaeda
and Taliban, including Arabs, Uzbeks,
Chechens and Chinese fled to Pakistani
border regions and took refuge with
their Pakistani allies after the U.S.
invasion of Afghanistan following the al
Qaeda attacks on the United States in
2001.
Pakistan is a key U.S. ally in its efforts to stabilize
Afghanistan but it officially objects to
U.S. missile strikes and says they
infringe on its sovereignty though
analysts believe that the strikes are
carried out with the tacit approval of
Pakistan. Pakistani forces are
themselves fighting homegrown militants
and have killed hundreds of militants
and destroyed many bases over the past
year in their strongholds in the
northwest. The militants have unleashed
a campaign of reprisal bomb and suicide
attacks across the country, killing
hundreds of people in recent months. |
|
U.S.-SOUTH KOREA DRILLS ANGER NORTH
AGAIN, WORRY CHINA
SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA--The
U.S. and South Korean militaries will
stage their second joint exercise in
less than a month from Monday,
fuelling tensions with the prickly North
and angering regional power China. A
crew member of South Korean navy's
14,000 ton-class large-deck landing ship
Dokdo signals to a UH-60 helicopter
during a military drill in the Yellow
Sea of South Korea August 5, 2010. The
annual exercise comes a week after Seoul
completed its own drills near a disputed
maritime border off the west coast that
prompted the North to retaliate by
firing a barrage of artillery shells in
the same area. Responding with the same
rhetoric as it has in the past, the
reclusive North said the latest exercise
was a "dangerous act to light the fuse
of a new war."
Pyongyang has often
turned to saber-rattling to make a point
but analysts say it is unlikely to risk
a full-blown war which would pit it
against the combined might of the U.S.
and South Korean militaries. But U.S.
officials have said further provocations
by the North are possible in coming
months, especially as Pyongyang tries to
build political momentum for the
succession to leader Kim Jong-il,
expected to hand power to his youngest
son. Unlike the show-of-force drills in
July which involved a U.S. aircraft
carrier, this month's exercises are
lower key. Washington and South Korea
say the exercises are defensive and
designed to send a message to Pyongyang
that its behavior is aggressive and must
stop. Last week's tit-for-tat military
actions occurred near the Northern Limit
Line, the site of several deadly clashes
since the 1950-53 Korean war, and the
location of the torpedoing of a South
Korean warship earlier this year.
Seoul blames the sinking of the Cheonan corvette, which cost
46 lives, on Pyongyang. The North denies
responsibility. "Taking into
consideration the exceptionally tense
security situation following the Cheonan
attack, the (latest) drills this year
will be conducted throughout the whole
country so that it is as similar as
possible to actual battle," the South's
defense ministry said. The exercises
have also sparked regional tensions,
with the North's only major ally China
calling the U.S.-led drills a threat to
both its security and regional
stability. Following last month's
U.S.-South Korea joint naval drill in
the Sea of Japan off the Korean
peninsula, China conducted its own
heavily publicized military exercises. |
|
FORMER CUBAN DICTATOR FIDEL CASTRO MEETS
WITH COLOMBIAN SENATOR PIEDAD CORDOBA
HAVANA,
CUBA--Former
Cuban DICTATOR Fidel Castro met
here Thursday with visiting Colombian
Senator Piedad Cordoba and her assistant
Danilo Rueda, according to the official
website Cubadebate. During the meeting,
Castro and his guests exchanged points
of view on the peace process in
Colombia, the situation in Latin America
and around the world.
Castro and
Cordoba expressed optimism about the
prospects for peace and building a new
world, according to Cubadebate. The
Colombian senator congratulated Castro
on his birthday Friday and presented him
with several books on the history and
current situation of Colombia, while
Castro gave his Colombian visitors
autographed copies of his book
"Strategic Victory."
Senator Cordoba also asked Castro to meet with a group of key
leaders who strive for peace in Colombia
on Sunday, and Castro agreed. Cordoba
has been mediating the release of
hostages held by the Colombian
guerrillas. She is a member of the
Colombian Movement for Peace, which
promotes a humanitarian agreement to end
the inner conflict in that South
American nation. The Colombian
senator congratulated Fidel on his
birthday and gave him a number of books
on the history and current realities of
her country. Fidel gave the senator and
her aide, Danilo Rueda, signed copies of
his book La victoria estratégica. |
|
SIX MORE CUBAN DISSIDENTS TO BE FREED,
LEAVE FOR SPAIN
HAVANA,
CUBA--The
Catholic Archdiocese of Havana
announced Friday that six more political
prisoners will be released soon and
leave Cuba for what they hope will be
temporary exile in Spain, following in
the path of 20 other dissidents freed
last month. The prisoners to be freed
are Marcelo Manuel Cano, Regis Iglesias,
Juan Carlos Herrera, Efren Fernandez,
Fabio Prieto and Juan Adolfo Fernandez,
a communique from the archbishop’s
office said in a communique.
The statement did not
specify the exact date when the
dissidents will be released, news of
which coincided with the 84th birthday
of former Cuban dictator Fidel Castro.
These six prisoners are also members of
the “Group of 75,” as members of the
opposition are called who were jailed in
the crackdown of March 2003. This
Friday’s announcement renews the process
of freeing political prisoners that
Cuba’s current dictator, Gen. Raul
Castro, promised on July 7, when he
agreed to free over a period of four
months the 52 still behind bars of the
original Group of 75 prisoners.
That commitment was
achieved within the process of dialogue
opened by the communist government with
the Catholic Church in May and which was
supported by Spain. In the first phase
of releasing jailed dissidents, 20 were
freed and were immediately taken to
Spain with their families. The
announcement of the six new releases, as
occurred with the others, comes after
the opposition members agreed to go to
Spain after being consulted on the
matter by Cardinal Jaime Ortega, Cuba’s
Catholic primate. |
|
colombian foreign minister says no
verification of guerrillas' presence in
venezuela
bogota, colombia--Colombian
Minister of Foreign Affairs María Ángela
Holguín said on Wednesday that
neither countries nor international
organizations are to check the presumed
deployment of members of the Colombian
Revolutionary Armed Forces (FARC) and
the National Liberation Army (ELN) in
Venezuela, for considering that they are
"looking ahead."
"No. Not
verification. We are looking ahead of
us. We will see in security which
schemes we can implement. The idea is
that the security committee will define
the best methods," Holguín said in an
interview posted on the website of
Bogotá's daily newspaper El Tiempo.
During the interview, she highlighted the key role of
the Union of South American Nations (Unasur)
to restore Colombia-Venezuela political
and trade relations, as agreed last
Tuesday in Santa Marta by Presidents
Juan Manuel Santos and Hugo Chávez.
"Unasur was very positive because
Venezuela took the matter there.
Further, President Néstor Kirchner is
very close to President Chávez, and he
had a very good relationship with
President Santos. This instilled
confidence on both sides." |
|
the washington post: ambassador larry
palmer tells the truth about venezuelaN
DICTATOR HUGO CHAVEZ
WASHINGTON,
D.C.--Larry
Palmer, nominated as the new US
Ambassador to Venezuela, told the truth
when reporting on close ties between the
government of Venezuelan President Hugo
Chávez and the Colombian Revolutionary
Armed Forces (FARC), as well as Cuba's
meddling in the Venezuelan army, The
Washington Post said.
According to an
editorial published on Friday of the
influential US daily newspaper, "to his
credit (…), Mr. Palmer answered
truthfully" when, queried by the Senate
Committee on External Relations, talked
about Chávez-FARC ties, the links
between government officials and drug
traffic and the close cooperation
between Venezuela and Cuba in the
military field. Chávez's threat to
refuse Palmer as ambassador is because
the Venezuelan president "has dedicated
himself to bullying and intimidating
those who dare to speak publicly about
what everyone in the Western Hemisphere
knows to be true."
The Washington Post added that there is evidence
"beyond any reasonable doubt that Mr.
Chávez's regime has provided haven and
material support to the FARC movement in
neighboring Colombia," AP quoted. The
daily also deplored that the US
government and other members of the UN
Security Council "have shown little
interest in recognizing what, in terms
of state sponsorship of terrorism,
amounts to a smoking gun." |
|
RUSSIAN NUCLEAR AGENCY CONFIRMS IT WILL
START UP IRANIAN REACTOR NEXT WEEK
MOSCOW,
RUSSIA--
Russia said on Friday it will
begin loading nuclear fuel into the
reactor of Iran's first atomic power
station in about one week, an
irreversible step marking the start-up
of the Bushehr plant after nearly 40
years of delays. Russian and Iranian
specialists are to begin loading
uranium-packed fuel rods into the
reactor on August 21, a process that
will take about 2-3 weeks. "This will be
an irreversible step," Sergei Novikov, a
spokesman for Russia's state nuclear
corporation, Rosatom, said by telephone.
"At that moment, the
Bushehr nuclear power plant will be
certified as a nuclear energy
installation," he said. "That means the
period of testing is over and that the
period of the physical start-up has
begun, but this period takes about two
and a half months," he said, adding that
the first fissile reaction would take
place in early October. Novikov said
that Rosatom chief Sergei Kiriyenko will
travel to Bushehr in southern Iran for
the Aug. 21 ceremony, which will also be
attended by the Iranian Vice President
Ali Akbar Salehi, who also heads the
Atomic Energy Organization of Iran.
Russia agreed in 1995 to build the Bushehr plant on the
site of a project begun in the 1970s by
German firm Siemens. Prime Minister
Vladimir Putin said in March that the
Bushehr plant would begin operating this
summer, but delays have long haunted the
$1 billion project and diplomats say
Moscow has used it as a lever in
relations with Tehran. The United States
has criticized Russia for pushing ahead
with the Bushehr project at a time when
major powers including Russia are
pressing Tehran to allay fears that its
nuclear energy program might be aimed to
develop weapons. |
|
RUSSIA DEPLOYS AIR DEFENSE MISSILES IN
ABKHAZIA
MOSCOW, RUSSIA--Russia
announced it had deployed a
missile battery in Georgia's pro-Moscow
rebel region of Abkhazia, infuriating
its arch foes in Tbilisi some two years
after they fought a brief war. "We have
deployed the S-300 system on the
territory of Abkhazia," air force
commander-in-chief General Alexander
Zelin said in a statement. "Its role
will be anti-aircraft defence of the
territory of Abkhazia and South Ossetia,
in cooperation with the air defence
systems of the army."
Georgia insists that Abkhazia and South
Ossetia are an integral part of its
territory but Russia in 2008 recognised
the two regions as independent after its
war with Tbilisi. "The task of these air
defence systems is not only to cover the
territory of Abkhazia and South Ossetia
but to avert violations of state borders
in the air," Zelin said in a statement
carried by Russian news agencies. They
were also aimed at the "destruction of
any flying object penetrating into the
covered territories, whatever aim they
were flying with," he added.
In Tbilisi, Georgian Deputy Prime Minister and Reintegration
Minister Temur Yakobashvili said that
Russia's deployment "should be of
concern not only for Georgia but also
for other regional actors, including
NATO." Georgia's ambition to join NATO
has long flustered Russia. He said the
move by Moscow could be linked to its
anger over US plans to install missile
defence facilities in former Communist
bloc East European countries which have
become members of NATO. "This is
changing the balance of power in the
region," he said. "It is also a kind of
asymmetric answer to the American
missile defence deployment in Eastern
Europe.... The Russian government is
saying 'if you can do it, we can do
it'." |
|
SIX PEOPLE INJURED IN EXPLOSION NEAR
COLOMBIA RADIO STATION
CARACAS,
VENEZUELA--A
car bomb exploded outside a major radio
station shook Colombia's capital on
Thursday, injuring at least six
people, police said. No deaths were
reported. The blast occurred at 5:30
a.m. (1030 GMT) outside the building of
Caracol Radio in northern Bogota. The
national police operations director,
Gen. Orlando Paez, said the car was
packed with at least 110 pounds (50
kilograms) of explosives.
Gen. Cesar Pinzon,
the city's police chief, cast blame on
leftist rebels, but said authorities
were not sure if the bomb was aimed at
the station or at several nearby bank
headquarters. President Juan Manuel
Santos hurried to the scene and branded
the explosion "a terrorist act," saying
it was meant to sow fear and create
skepticism about the government. "We are
going to continue fighting terrorism
with everything we have," said Santos,
who took office on Saturday. He replaces
Alvaro Uribe, whose tough tactics
sharply weakened the leftist guerrilla
groups that have fought the government
for decades. Santos toured the blast
site surrounded by a cloud of security
agents and urged Colombians to go on
with normal activities. The blast
shattered windows and left scraps of a
destroyed car scattered in the street.
Pinzon said six people had suffered minor injuries, mostly cut
faces and arms. He said most had been on
a bus that was passing by as the bomb
exploded. Caracol Radio continued
broadcasting from its 12-story building
despite the blast. A car bomb that
exploded in March in the Pacific coast
city of Buenaventura killed at least
nine people and injured about 50. Bogota
had not suffered a car bombing since
January 2009, when a blast at an
automatic teller machine killed two
people. |
|
FOR COLOMBIA, DEBT TAKES PRECEDENCE OVER
TRADE RELATIONS
BOGOTA,
COLOMBIA--Hugo
Chávez and Juan Manuel Santos inked
peace. Disagreements were left behind.
After the meeting in Santa Marta,
Colombia, the Heads of State are certain
about the appropriateness of "renewing
bilateral relations." However, getting
bilateral trade back to normal will not
be easy. The decision of Venezuela's
President to "freeze" relations between
Caracas and Bogotá in 2009 curbed
transactions and instilled distrust in
Colombian businessmen.
"In all
honesty, for us, payment of the debt is
more important than reestablishment of
trade, because there are many
distrustful businessmen concerned about
exporting to Venezuela, as the payment
scheme is unclear," Colombian Minister
of Foreign Affairs María Angela Holguín
told Caracol Radio. Venezuelan
businessmen owe Colombian exporters an
accrued debt of USD 800 million, due to
the late allocation of foreign currency
by the Foreign Exchange Administration
Board (Cadivi). But distrust is not the
only stumbling block. Due to the
restrictions imposed by the Venezuelan
government to the entry of Colombian
goods, Colombian businessmen opted for
other markets elsewhere. Precisely, the
Colombia's National Businessmen's
Association (Andi) submitted on
Wednesday a report noting growth in the
manufacturing sector by 4.8 percent and
5.7 percent in sales during the first
half of 2010.
Among the reasons, the study stressed that the outcome
arises from increasing orientation
towards "third-party markets." In this
regard, the report underscored that in
the first half of this current year, 30
percent of businessmen claimed to "have
succeeded in entering new markets."
Sales to such new destinations account
for 6 percent of their total exports.
Mexico, Peru, Brazil, Chile, Panama and
Costa Rica are some of the nations which
replaced the Venezuelan market. |
|
MOSCOW CELEBRATES COLOMBIA-VENEZUELA
DIPLOMATIC TIES
MOSCOW, RUSSIA--The
Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs
praised on Thursday amended diplomatic
relations between Venezuela and
Colombia.
"Russia has received
with satisfaction the news about
reestablishment of diplomatic relations
between the Bolivarian Republic of
Venezuela and the Republic of Colombia,"
stated a press release from the Russian
Foreign Ministry. The text noted that
"political willingness of the
governments of both countries has made
reestablishment of dialogue possible,"
Efe quoted.
"We are convinced that this will help build relations between
Caracas and Bogotá in the spirit of good
neighborhood and taking into account
mutual concerns, as well as reinforcing
peace and stability in Latin America,
with which Russia actively increases its
engagement," the notice added. |
|
|
|
AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTION FALLS 7.5% IN
CUBA
HAVANA,
CUBA--Agricultural
production in Cuba fell 7.5 percent in
the first half of this year compared
with the same period in 2009,
according to a report released on the
Web site of the National Statistics
Office, or ONE. Farming output –
excluding sugar, which is treated as a
separate industry – fell by 9.7 percent
on the communist-ruled island, while
livestock production was down 4.8
percent, ONE said. The harvests of
tubers, roots, vegetables, beans, rice
and citrus declined, and bananas were
the only product experiencing a notable
increase of 48 percent.
The fall in the
broader agricultural sector so far this
year comes along with a bad situation in
the sugar industry, where the 2009-2010
harvest was called by government-run
media the poorest since 1905 although
the precise figures have not been made
public. In an Aug. 1 speech to the
national legislature, President Raul
Castro referred to the “failure” of the
sugar sector and other agricultural
areas “due to errors of leadership and
also ... the effects of the drought.”
During the first half of this year, the
Cuban government put more than 1 million
hectares (2.5 million acres) of idle
lands into the hands of new producers to
work as part of its policy to spur food
production and reduce imports.
The law for
distributing land in this way was
approved in 2008, after the announcement
that half of Cuba’s arable land was
idle. Raul Castro, who succeeded ailing
older brother Fidel in January 2008, has
insisted on several occasions that food
production is a matter of “national
security” and has reiterated his
determination to boost the island’s
agricultural production. Cuba has been
importing more than 80 percent of the
food its 11.2 million citizens consume,
and in April it emerged that the country
spends more than $1.5 billion each year
on food purchases from abroad. |
|
VENEZUELA CHARGES GENERAL ANTONIO RIVERo
WHO DENOUNCED "CUBANIZATION" OF ARMY
CARACAS,
VENEZUELA--Venezuelan
military prosecutors charged a
retired general who had become an
opponent of the government of President
Hugo Chavez with the crimes of
“insulting” the armed forces and
“revealing private or secret
information” about the armed forces, the
media said Tuesday. Gen. Antonio
Rivero was ordered to appear in court
Wednesday, defense attorney Guillermo
Heredia told the press.
The crimes of
“insulting” the armed forces and
“revealing private or secret
information” carry with them respective
prison terms of 3-8 years and 4-10
years, the lawyer said. Rivero was the
head of the national civil defense corps
for several years and won praise for his
work in that post from both supporters
and critics of the leftist Chavez
government. The general resigned last
March after complaining that Cuban
military personnel were performing
“planning ... tasks of the military
organization ...and training” in the
Venezuelan armed forces.
Rivero told Globovision television on Monday that he had
information that he could be charged by
military prosecutors, but he downplayed
those rumors arguing that he had
presented his complaints about the
alleged Cuban interference in the armed
forces to the Venezuelan Attorney
General’s Office and congress. “I spoke
in the name of the armed forces, and in
another order I presented at the proper
and appropriate moment the
(corresponding) complaints,” Rivero told
the network. In March, Chavez downplayed
Rivero’s complaints about the
“Cubanization” of the military and said
that the behavior of the retired general
was “sad.” “What Cubanization?” the
president asked. “The Cubans are helping
us here!” There are some 60,000 Cuban
personnel in Venezuela, including both
teachers and medical workers, according
to official figures. |
|
WORLD BANK: VENEZUELA HAS BEEN MOST
STRICKEN BY THE GLOBAL FINANCIAL CRISIS
WASHINGTON, D.C.--Chile
was the Andean country with the best
reaction to the global economic crisis
and Venezuela was the most stricken,
Felipe Jaramillo, Director of the World
Bank (WB) for Andean Countries, said.
"It (Venezuela) is
the only country with heavy shrinking in
its economy last week and has not get
over it. And this year, it is, I think,
the only country in all Latin America
which will have again economic
shrinking; they are facing serious
troubles," Jaramillo added. The CEO also
said that "it is very difficult" to give
an opinion and analyze the situation of
poverty and the Venezuelan economy, Efe
quoted.
"It is a country which three or four years ago
resolved, even though it continues being
a member of the WB, not to request
financial services or technical
assistance, and we barely receive
numbers from Venezuela," the senior
official added. |
|
SECRETARY OF DEFENSE ROBERT GATES WOULD
CUT THOUSANDS OF DEFENSE JOBS
WASHINGTON.
D.C.--In
an effort to deter potential budget cuts
by Congress and streamline a burgeoning
Defense Department, Secretary of
Defense Robert Gates Monday proposed to
cut spending on contracting, to close a
command stationed in Norfolk, Va., and
to reduce the number of flag officers
and civilian leaders. The proposed
changes would lead to the elimination of
thousands of jobs. However, whether the
changes - which add up to small fraction
of the defense department's $535 billion
annual budget - will be enough to pacify
Congress remains unclear. With war
funding, the defense budget has doubled
since 2001. "We must be mindful of the
difficult economic and fiscal situation
facing our nation," Gates said in
briefing reporters at the Pentagon
Monday. "We cannot expect Congress to
approve budget increases each year."
Gates called the
changes an effort to eliminate waste and
duplication. "I am determined to change
the way this department has done
business for a long time," Gates said.
Gates called for the closure of the
Joint Forces Command in Norfolk, Va.,
one of the military's 10 commands. It
employs 2,800 Defense Department
employees and another 3,000 contractors,
and has a $704 million operating budget.
With the elimination of JFCOM, other
command posts will have to write new
doctrine, monitor U.S. coordination
efforts with NATO allies in Afghanistan
and oversee how the services are
readying their forces, all tasks that
now fall under JFCOM. Many of those
tasks will fall under the Joint Staff at
the Pentagon, he said.
Former Iraq commander Gen. Raymond T. Odierno, who leaves
Iraq later this month for JFCOM, will
now be tasked with shutting down the
command, much as he was charged in Iraq
with winding down the U.S. mission
there. Gates also proposed cutting the
budget for contractors who support the
Defense Department by 30 percent over
three years; freezing the number of
employees in his offices, defense
agencies and combatant commands; and
eliminating 50 generals and admirals and
150 top civilian posts over two years.
He also called for cuts in intelligence
contractors. The secretary made the
announcement while Congress is in
recess, but regardless, his proposal
spurred immediate protests from Virginia
Republican officials. |
|
IRAN DIGGING GRAVES FOR US TROOPS IF
THEY ATTACK
TEHRAN,
IRAN--Iran
has dug mass graves in which to bury
U.S. troops in case of any American
attack on the country, a former
commander of the elite Revolutionary
Guard said. The digging of the graves
appears to be a show of bravado after
the chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of
Staff, Adm. Mike Mullen, said last week
that the U.S. military has a contingency
plan to attack Iran, although he thinks
a military strike is probably a bad
idea. The U.S. and some of its allies
accuse Iran of using its civilian
nuclear program as a cover to build
nuclear weapons. Iran has denied the
charges, saying its nuclear program is
geared merely toward generating
electricity, not bomb.
Gen. Hossein Kan'ani
Moghadam, who was the Guard's deputy
commander during the 1980s, said graves
have been dug in Iran's southwestern
Khuzestan province, where Iran buried
Iraqi soldiers killed during the ruinous
1980-88 war between the Islamic republic
and Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein's
regime. "The mass graves that used to be
for burying Saddam's soldiers have now
been prepared again for U.S. soldiers,
and this is the reason for digging this
big number of graves," Moghadam told The
Associated Press Television News late
Monday. He did not say how many were
prepared. Footage obtained by APTN
showed a large number of empty, freshly
dug graves in a desert region of
Khuzestan. The digging of the graves was
first reported earlier this week by
Iran's semiofficial news agency Fars.
Moghadam repeated warnings that Iran will retaliate
against U.S. bases in the Gulf if there
is an attack on Iran. The U.S. Navy's
5th Fleet headquarters is based just
across the Gulf from Iran in Bahrain. If
U.S. forces attack, "Iran will have no
choice but to strike the American bases
in the region," he said. "The heavy
costs of such a war will not be just on
the Islamic Republic of Iran. America
and other countries should accept that
this would be the start of an extensive
war in the region." The war of
words has intensified between Iran and
the United States after the U.N.
Security Council imposed a fourth round
of tougher sanctions in June in response
to Iran's refusal to halt uranium
enrichment, a technology that can be
used to produce nuclear fuel or material
for an atomic bomb. The U.S. and Israel
have said military force could be used
if diplomacy fails to stop what they
suspect is an Iranian nuclear weapons
program. |
|
"NOTHING OR NOBODY CAN REVERSE ALVARO
URIBE'S COMPLAINT" AGAINST DICTATOR
CHAVEZ
CARACAS, VENEZUELA--A
complaint brought against Venezuela's
President Hugo Chávez at the
International Criminal Court and
another complaint against the Bolivarian
Republic of Venezuela at the
Inter-American Commission on Human
Rights has legal effects, as opposed to
what some experts purport. This is what
Asdrúbal Aguiar, former judge at the
Inter-American Court of Human Rights,
thinks. Everything depends on the
contents of the materials submitted to
the Commission and the Court. "I reckon
that when outgoing Colombia's President
Álvaro Uribe lodged that complaint, he
had some objective, verifiable facts."
Are the Criminal
Court and the Inter-American Commission
international political bodies? No,
they are not political bodies, such as
the Organization of American States
(OAS) Permanent Council, where they try
to take a different way according to the
likings of the majorities or minorities.
These are two autonomous, independent
organizations which act based on
certain, verifiable facts. As for the
Inter-American Commission, it should
also have significance and importance.
What are the legal consequences of these actions at the
Criminal Court and the Inter-American
Commission? It could be twofold. In the
case of the Inter-American Commission on
Human Rights, it could turn out to be a
declaration of the international
accountability of the Venezuelan State
for internationally unlawful facts. As
for the International Criminal Court, it
could turn out to be individual
accountability in the person of Hugo
Chávez. These are slow, protracted and
effective processes; therefore, anybody
thinking that the complaint will have no
legal effects is wrong. Could the
complaint at the International Criminal
Court result in prison for President
Chávez? The legal effect of individual
criminal accountability is imprisonment,
even life imprisonment, for the
president. |
|
US INSISTS ON HAVING LARRY PALMER AS THE
AMBASSADOR TO VENEZUELA
WASHINGTON.
D.C.--The
US State Department insisted on
Monday both on Larry Palmer's assets to
face the "challenge" of the US Embassy
in Venezuela and the significance of
diplomacy and communication to
compromise and settle bilateral
differences.
The US
government replied in this way to the
remarks made last Sunday by Venezuelan
dictator Hugo Chávez, who said
that he would not accept Palmer as the
new US Ambassador to Caracas for having
told the US Senate that the morale of
the Venezuelan army was low. The
State Department added that the
Venezuelan government needed to
investigate the alleged deployment of
the Revolutionary Armed Forces of
Colombia (FARC) and the National
Liberation Army (ELN) in Venezuelan
territory.
The State Department does think that Palmer is the most
appropriate person to be the US chief of
mission in Caracas and regretted that he
had been "disabled" because of his
comments, as Chávez said in his Sunday
TV and radio show "Aló, Presidente"
(Hello, President!). "President
(Barack) Obama has elected Larry Palmer
for this challenge precisely for his
superb qualifications and outstanding
professionalism," Charles Luoma-Overstreet,
Press Advisor and Spokesperson, Western
Hemisphere Affairs at the US Department
of State, told the press. |
|
VENEZUELAN DICTATOR HUGO CHAVEZ AGREES
TO MEET WITH HIS COLOMBIAN COUNTERPART
CARACAS,
VENEZUELA--"We
are at a new time, seeking peace" in
Colombia, Venezuelan dictator Hugo
Chávez said at the beginning of
his TV and radio Sunday show "Aló,
Presidente" (Hello, President!) and
right afterwards he urged the Colombian
guerrillas to "provide certain evidence"
of their willingness to join the peace
process. "Guerrillas should take a
stance for peace, but with certain
evidence; for instance, shall they
release all the hostages. Why the
guerrillas are to hold people hostages?"
President Chávez wondered.
"As we recommend the
Colombian government taking the way for
peace, this also applies to the
guerrillas. The Colombian guerrillas
have no future on the way of arms and
have become an excuse for the (US)
empire to meddle in Colombia and
threaten Venezuela from there," a Head
of State flanked by most of his
ministers added. Chávez started his
presentation around midday because, he
disclosed, he had been in touch with his
Foreign Minister Nicolás Maduro, who was
in Bogotá finishing up the details of a
meeting with brand-new Colombian
President Juan Manuel Santos.
At 2:50 p.m., Chávez held a telephone conversation with
Minister Maduro and Néstor Kichner, the
Secretary-Genral of the Union of South
American Nations (Unasur). Both of them
were getting ready to meet with
Colombian Minister of Foreign Affairs
María Ángela Holguín. "I am happy. Who
does want a war with Colombia?"
President Chávez wondered. "We are sure
that President Santos and his government
will ensure security, which is one of
the most sensitive topics, taking into
account the extent of the strained
situation reached with the previous
administration," he added. |
|
the international criminal court to
assess former colombian president alvaro
uribe's complaint against dictator
chavez
BUENOS AIRES, ARGENTINA--The
International Criminal Court (ICC)
is to study a complaint lodged by
ex Colombian President Álvaro Uribe
against Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chávez,
before commencing any investigation,
according to its statutes.
The Court has
not acknowledged yet the receipt of
Uribe's complaint or provided any
further information by arguing that it
is confidential, Court sources said. As
stated on the ICC website, the Court may
receive two kinds of complaints:
"remissions" of questions or application
for a decision sent by States or the
United Nations Security Council, or
"communications," presented by
individuals.
Neither several ICC sources that were queried specified
whether the complaint filed by Uribe was
a remission or a communication.
Few hours before leaving the Colombian
government, Uribe reported last Friday
that he had filed a complaint against
Chávez at the ICC and another against
the Venezuelan State at the
Inter-American Commission on Human
Rights (IACHR). |
|
JUAN MANUEL SANTOS ASSUMES COLOMBIA'S
PRESIDENCY
BOGOTA,
COLOMBIA--Juan
Manuel Santos, sworn in Saturday
as Colombia's 59th president, vowed to
cement security gains but declared
himself open to dialogue with rebels in
hopes of ending the Western Hemisphere's
only armed conflict. He also got to work
immediately mending frayed relations
with neighboring Venezuela and Ecuador.
Although he was invited, Venezuelan
President Hugo Chavez was not among the
14 Latin American and Caribbean leaders,
including Felipe Calderon of Mexico and
Inacio Lula da Silva of Brazil,
attending Saturday's ceremony on the
carpeted cobblestones of Bogota's
central plaza. Also absent was Chavez's
close ally President Evo Morales of
Bolivia.
Chavez broke
diplomatic ties with Colombia two weeks
ago after outgoing hard-line President
Alvaro Uribe's government presented the
Organization of American States with
video of alleged Colombian rebel camps
in Venezuela. Chavez did, however, send
his foreign minister. President Rafael
Correa of Ecuador did attend the
inauguration, though he severed ties
with Uribe's government in 2008 after
the Colombian military raided a
guerrilla camp a mile inside his
country, killing a rebel chief and 25
others. Those ties have been on the
mend, however, and one of the first
things Santos did as president was hand
over to Correa the hard disks from the
computers of rebel chief Raul Reyes that
the Colombians seized in the raid.
Santos, a 58-year-old economist, set a new, less
confrontational tone. He is a scion of
one of Colombia's leading political
families. Uribe is a rancher's son from
Medellin, the country's second city. And
the mood was certainly more relaxed than
Uribe's 2002 inauguration, when homemade
mortars lobbed at the presidential
palace by leftist rebels killed 19
people, most of them indigents who were
blocks away. Santos indicated his
presidency would take a broader approach
to ending Colombia's nearly half-century
conflict — focusing for one on attacking
the nation's deep-seated inequalities at
their roots through social programs and
job creation. He signaled an
unwillingness to talk peace with the
Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia,
or FARC, until it frees its hostages,
halts "terrorist acts" and stops
recruiting child soldiers and planting
land mines. "But at the same time I want
to reiterate: The door to dialogue is
not locked," Santos said. "It is
possible to have a Colombia at peace, a
Colombia without guerrillas, and we're
going to prove it! By reason or by
force!" |
|
NORTH KOREA SEIZES SOUTH KOREAN FISHING
BOAT IN WATERS OFF THE PENINSULA'S EAST
COAST
SEOUL,
SOUTH KOREA--North
Korean authorities seized a South Korean
fishing boat and its crew Sunday
in waters off the divided peninsula's
eastern coast, the South's coast guard
said amid heightened tensions over the
sinking of a southern navy ship. Four
South Korean and three Chinese fishermen
were questioned for an alleged violation
of the North's exclusive economic zone,
South Korea's coast guard said in a
statement. It said the fishing boat was
being taken toward the North Korea's
eastern port of Songjin.
A South Korean
fisherman told South Korea via a
satellite phone that his boat was being
towed by a North Korean patrol,
according to the coast guard. The coast
guard said it was not clear where
exactly the 41-ton fishing boat was
operating when it was seized. The boat
departed South Korea's southeastern port
of Pohang on Aug. 1 and was scheduled to
return home on September 10. South Korea
called on the North to quickly return
the fishing boat and its crew. However,
the prospect of their quick return is
being complicated because of tension
over the March sinking of a South Korean
warship off the western coast blamed on
North Korea.
North Korea — which has denied involvement in the
sinking — warned last week it would
"counter the reckless naval firing
projected by the group of traitors with
strong physical retaliation" and advised
civilian ships to stay away from the
maritime border. Maritime incidents
involving fishing boats and other
commercial vessels occur from time to
time between the two Koreas. While most
are resolved amicably, the rival navies
engaged in three deadly skirmishes near
their disputed western sea border in
1999, 2002 and November last year. Last
August, North Korea freed four South
Korean fishermen after detaining them
for a month for illegally entering North
Korean waters. |
|
COLOMBIAN PRESIDENT ALVARO URIBE FILES A
COMPLAINT AGAINST VENEZUELAN DICTATOR
HUGO CHAVEZ AT THE INTERNATIONAL
CRIMINAL COURT
BOGOTA, COLOMBIA--Jaime
Granados, the lawyer of Colombian
outgoing president Álvaro Uribe,
on August 6 filed a complaint against
Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez at the
International Criminal Court (ICC) and a
lawsuit against the Bolivarian Republic
of Venezuela at the Inter-American
Commission on Human Rights (IACHR).
Speaking to radio station RCN, Granados,
who acts as the legal representative of
Uribe, said the complaint and the
lawsuit before the two international
bodies came in response to human rights
violations by Chávez, as an individual,
and Venezuela, as a State'
"Indeed, today
(August 6) I forwarded to the
headquarters of the International
Criminal Court in The Hague, to the
office of Luis Moreno Ocampo, the
court's prosecutor, the relevant
complaint, and we expect he to take
action," said Granados. He added
that he also sent "to Washington, to the
Inter-American Commission on Human
Rights (IACHR), a lawsuit for purposes
of achieving remedy in connection with
serious human rights situations "
involving Venezuela. This is a
"complaint against the Head of State,
Hugo Chávez, as a natural person, at the
ICC, based on the Treaty of Rome, and
the other one is a lawsuit filed with
the Inter-American Commission on Human
Rights against the Bolivarian Republic
of Venezuela," Granados explained.
Granados said that
such human rights violations also have
to do with the alleged presence of
guerrillas of the Revolutionary Armed
Forces of Colombia (FARC) and the
National Liberation Army (ELN) in
Venezuelan territory. Both the
lawsuit and the complaint are reportedly
related to the fact that guerrillas are
preparing terrorist acts while on
Venezuelan soil for implementation in
Colombia against people.
Uribe's move came only hours before
handing over power to president-elect
Juan Manuel Santos. The decision
threatens to stir further tensions with
Chávez's government, which broke
diplomatic ties on 22 July after
Colombia reported at the Organization of
American States (OAS) the presence of
guerrillas in Venezuela. |
|
FORMER CUBAN DICTATOR FIDEL CASTRO MAKES
1ST OFFICIAL GOVERNMENT APPEARANCE
HAVANA,
CUBA--former
cuban dictator Fidel Castro appealed to
President Barack Obama to prevent
a global nuclear war in an emphatic
speech Saturday that marked his first
official government appearance since
emergency surgery four years ago.
Castro's speech before the Cuban
parliament, along with other numerous
recent public appearances, raised
questions about how much he will resume
a leadership role. Dressed in
olive-green fatigues without military
insignias, he immediately took the
podium and delivered a fiery 12-minute
speech on his fears of an impending
global nuclear war. He implored Obama
and other wealthy nations to make sure
such an event never happens.
Castro then took a
seat next to Parliament leader Ricardo
Alarcon - instead of sitting in the
chair that parliament members leave
empty in his honor during his absence.
Current dictator Raul Castro sat
on the other side of the stage, where he
listened intensely and took notes as his
older brother spoke. Lawmakers followed
the speech with enthusiastic remarks to
Fidel Castro about how fully recovered
and healthy he appeared. They also
commented on the topic at hand. Asked by
one parliamentarian if Obama would be
capable of starting a nuclear war,
Castro replied, "No, not if we persuade
him not to." He patted his hand on the
desk for emphasis, then fell silent,
seemingly surprising a crowd long
accustomed to the hourslong speeches for
which he was famous during his 49 years
in power.
Castro's
participation in Saturday's legislative
session marks the bearded
revolutionary's first official
government act - and his first joint
appearance with Raul - since his
emergency intestinal surgery in 2006. It
was bound to raise questions about his
future role in the government. Even
before he confirmed his attendance at
this weekend's gathering, top leaders
and state media had begun calling him
"commander in chief," a title he had
largely shunned since relinquishing
power. Castro, who has written on
the topic of nuclear war for months,
maintains that the United States and
Israel will attack Iran and that
Washington could also target North
Korea. He has suggested the conflict
could have Armageddon-like consequences
for the whole world, even predicting in
several opinion columns that fighting
was to already have begun by now. |
|
PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA COULD EASE
RESTRICTIONS ON VISITS TO CUBA
WASHINGTON,
D.C.--PRESIDENT
BARACK OBAMA
will soon ease some restrictions on U.S.
travel to Cuba and other sanctions
following Havana's promise to free
political prisoners, according to people
close to the administration. Two sources
close to the administration say
the decision has been made and will be
announced in the next two weeks. Another
said he has heard the reports but
cautioned they could be ``trial
balloons.'' The key change will be an
expansion of educational and cultural
travel, which accounted for about 2,000
visits in 2009, said two of the sources.
Many academics have urged President
Barack Obama to expand those visits,
drastically trimmed by the George W.
Bush administration. One of them
added that Obama also will restore the
broader “people-to-people'' category of
travel, which allows “purposeful''
visits to increase contacts between U.S.
and Cuban citizens.
Though that category
requires prior U.S. licenses for the
trips, it is fuzzy enough to allow for
much expanded travel to Cuba, the source
added. All asked for anonymity because
they did not want to be seen as
preempting a White House announcement.
The people-to-people category was
established by the Clinton
administration but was closed in 2003 by
Bush, both because of his more
aggressive policies toward Cuba and
complaints that too many people were
abusing it for tourist trips. An
estimated 150,000-200,000 U.S. travelers
visited the island in 2001. The figure
dropped to 120,000 during Bush's last
year in office, but rebounded to 200,000
in 2009 after Obama lifted nearly all
restrictions on Cuban-Americans' travel
to the island. Another change will be
permission for U.S.-Cuba flights from
all of the approximately 35 U.S.
airports that have top-level security
arrangements, according to two of the
sources. Cuba flights are now approved
only for Miami, Los Angeles and John F.
Kennedy airport in New York.
Obama also will make it easier to pay in the United States
for telephone and other services
rendered in Cuba, the sources added, in
hopes of increasing communications
between the island and Cuban exiles.
Francisco “Pepe'' Hernandez, president
of the Cuban-American National
Foundation, said he could not
confirm the reports but noted that CANF
opposes U.S. tourism in Cuba but favors
easing the travel restrictions. “For a
long time we have been making an effort
with the [Obama] administration to
extend the licenses and spectrum of
people-to-people travel because we
believe this is a proactive measure that
is going to help to provide people in
Cuba with the support they need,'' he
said. |
|
COLOMBIAN GENERAL FREDDY PADILLA: "A WAR
WITH VENEZUELA IS UNTHINKABLE"
BOGOTA, COLOMBIA--Honestly
and outspokenly, General Freddy Padilla
de León, the outgoing commander
in chief of the Colombian military
forces, ruled out any possibility of an
armed conflict between Caracas and
Bogotá, as forecasted and warned quite a
few times by Venezuelan dictator
Hugo Chávez. "Colombians and their
militaries are just looking for
cooperation of all countries and of
Venezuelan brothers for us to finish off
narco-terrorism which has damaged so
much our homeland," Padilla de León said
in an interview with daily newspaper El
Universal.
"A conflict between
the militaries of Venezuela and Colombia
is absolutely unthinkable. I think that
in the face of strong historical, trade
and fraternal relations, the idea of a
war has never crossed my mind." And he
clarified, "as Colombia's military
forces, we deeply respect our brothers,
the Venezuelan people, their armed
forces and their government."
Padilla de León, the commander in chief
since 2009 and next to step down,
expects that "the final defeat of such
narco-terrorist structures of the FARC
and ELN will come in the next four
years. We were conclusive."
Queried about the whereabouts of FARC
leaders, particularly Alfonso Cano,
Padilla answered: "we do know where they
are, not general locations, but ongoing
operations envisage a good forecast."
General Padilla takes a prudent stance on the
Colombia-Venezuela standoff, but he
recalled that border cooperation with
the Venezuelan government is missing
since 2002. "What is happening nowadays
is a matter between the Ministry of
Foreign Affairs and the Presidency… but
we urge all the people who belong to
those armed organizations, wherever they
are, to join the demobilization program
that has enabled more than 52,000 people
to return to their homes and thus
rectify their way." The general
does not mind that the Constitutional
Court started to analyze a military pact
between Colombia and the United States,
whereby US troops may use Colombian
military bases. "It is a normal issue in
a democratic country." However, he
noted: "Colombia needs international
cooperation to keep on fighting
terrorism… we need the support of
Venezuela and its armed forces in global
efforts against drug trafficking."
|
|
FORMER CUBAN DICTATOR FIDEL CASTRO TO
ADDRESS THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY TODAY
DURING SPECIAL SESSION
HAVANA,
CUBA--In
case anyone questioned the permanence of
Fidel Castro's recent return to the
national stage, this should answer
doubts: The former Cuban leader
has called the National Assembly into
special session today. For four years,
Castro kept out of sight as he
recuperated from a life-threatening
intestinal illness that required
multiple surgeries. He temporarily ceded
power to younger brother Raul in July
2006 and resigned as president in
February 2008. He wrote a column called
"Reflections" while recuperating and
sometimes would be seen in photos when a
foreign dignitary like Venezuelan
President Hugo Chavez would visit. But
that was all. He was mostly out of
sight, if not forgotten.
That reclusive lifestyle ended in
mid-July, when photographs of Castro
visiting the National Center of
Scientific Investigations surfaced on a
pro-government blog. A few days later,
Castro appeared on a Cuban TV show
called "Roundtable." Since then, he has
made several public appearances,
including at an unveiling ceremony for
his latest book, "The Strategic
Victory." Now Castro, who turns 84 on
August 13, has called the National
Assembly into special session. The
assembly will discuss world affairs, in
particular what Castro views as an
imminent nuclear war involving the
United States, Iran and North Korea.
Castro has dwelt on that topic since
resurfacing last month.
Castro's apparent
recovery has surprised many in Cuba, and
fuelled speculation that he may once
again be exerting a strong influence on
government policy. Supporters of
reform fear he may be blocking reforms
aimed at reviving the communist island's
struggling economy. But he has not
so far appeared alongside his brother,
Raul, and has not yet commented on
domestic affairs. For his part,
Raul Castro, 79, has dismissed any
suggestion that there is a divide in the
communist party leadership over the
direction of policy.
Whether the return of an elderly
revolutionary from his sickbed will make
any difference remains to be seen. |
|
us says venezuela fails to cooperate
with counter-terrorism efforts
WASHINGTON,
D.C.--Venezuela
is still not a reliable partner for the
United States in counterterrorism
efforts, an area in which Caracas
reduced its cooperation with Washington
to an "absolute minimum" during the last
year, said the US State Department in
its new "Country Report on Terrorism,"
released on Thursday. "Venezuela's
cooperation with the United States on
terrorism has been reduced to an
absolute minimum," stressed the annual
report. The document noted that
Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez
"persisted in his public criticism" of
US counterterrorism efforts, and
"continued to strengthen" relations with
countries listed by Washington as
sponsors of terrorism, specifically with
Iran, DPA reported.
The report -released
just months after the US State
Department ranked Venezuela as "not
cooperating fully" in anti-terror
efforts- clarified that it remains
unclear "how much" help Chávez's
government is providing to Colombian
rebel groups such as the FARC or the ELN.
In this sense, the document mirrored
Colombia's repeated "complaints" that
Chávez's government is "harboring and
helping senior leaders of the FARC in
Venezuelan territory." The latest such
complaints was aired a few weeks ago and
resulted in a new severance of
diplomatic relations between both South
American countries.
Among others, the
report noted that last December 4 Chávez
promoted to high military ranks two men
identified as drug dealers by the US
Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC).
They are Hugo Carvajal Barrios and Henry
de Jesús Rangel Silva, whom the
Venezuelan president promoted to
high-ranking generals even though in
2008 they were accused by the OFAC of
supporting drug traffic activities of
the FARC leaders in the territory of
Venezuela. In addition, the report
claimed that, beyond the issue of the
Colombian guerrillas, Venezuela served
as a "safe haven" for suspected member
of Basque armed separatist organization
ETA Ignacio Echeverría Landazábal. |
|
RECENTLY FREED CUBAN DISSIDENT
CRITICIZES DICTATORS RAUL CASTRO AND
HUGO CHAVEZ
SANTIAGO DE CHILE, CHILE--Cuban
disSIDENT José Ubaldo Izquierdo
Hernández lambasted the dictators
of Cuba Raúl Castro, and Venezuela, Hugo
Chávez, in arriving in Chile, the first
Latin American country which receives
one of the former political prisoners
who traveled in July to Spain.
In a press conference
held at the international airport of the
Chilean capital city, Izquierdo railed
on a "Stalinist dictatorship" in Cuba,
which, in his view, "survives thanks to
Chávez oxygenation," The ex
political prisoner who spent seven years
behind bars claimed to feel "a weird
mixture of happiness and sorrow."
Together with six of his family members,
he arrived in Chile, where he was
welcome by Foreign Minister Alfredo
Moreno and Senator Patricio Walker.
Izquierdo, a 44-year-old, free-lance journalist, related the
ordeal undergone for more than seven
years in prison in his country. He was
captured on March 19, 2003 for
supporting the Varela Project in demand
of more liberties in the Caribbean
island. "There were about 2,700
days living, first, for more than one
year in totally blocked off cells, where
rats, cockroaches, bedbugs and
mosquitoes were my companions." |
|
FORMER CUBAN DICTATOR FIDEL CASTRO ASKS
PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA TO PREVENT WAR
HAVANA,
CUBA--FORMER
Cuban DICTATOR Fidel Castro asked
US President Barack Obama this Tuesday
to prevent the imminent war in the
Middle East, a fact which, he stated,
every citizen in your country, even your
worst left wing or right wing
adversaries, will most certainly
appreciate it. In his regular
newspaper column Fidel remembered that
“the Iranians have declared that they
would shoot one hundred missiles against
each of the US and Israel ships that
blockade Iran as soon as they start
inspecting an Iranian merchant ship”.
This was,
affirmed Fidel in his reflection
entitled A Challenge to the US
President, “by the time Obama gives the
order to comply with the Security
Council Resolution, he would also be
ordering the sinking of all US warships
in that area”. In what he calls the
first time he addresses Barack Obama,
Fidel said: “You should know that it is
in your power to offer humankind the
only real possibility of peace.
Only once will you be able to make use
of your prerogatives to give the order
to open fire”.
“I understand that a quick response is not to be expected;
nor will you ever give one. Think
it over -wrote Fidel- and consult your
specialists, ask your most powerful
international allies and adversaries for
their opinion about the subject”. The
Cuban leader, who has turned himself
into a passionate and experienced
analyst of the issue, has repeatedly
warned during the last months about the
danger posted by such outbreak of war
which, “is already virtually
inevitable”. |
|
SOUTH KOREA LAUNCHES NAVAL DRILLS
DESPITE NORTH KOREAN THREATS
SEOUL,
SOUTH KOREA--South
Korean troops fired artillery and
dropped sonar buoys into the Yellow Sea
as naval drills kicked off Thursday near
the spot where a warship sank four
months ago. Some 4,500 South Korean
troops aboard more than 20 ships and
submarines as well as about 50 aircraft
were mobilized to take part in the five
days of naval exercises off the west
coast, including spots near the two
Koreas' maritime border, the Joint
Chiefs of Staff said. North Korea called
the drills a military provocation that
threatened to re-ignite war on the
Korean peninsula.
"If the puppet
warmongers dare ignite a war, (North
Korea) will mercilessly destroy the
provokers and their stronghold by
mobilizing most powerful war tactics and
offensive means beyond imagination," the
ruling Committee for the Peaceful
Reunification of the Fatherland said in
a statement carried by North Korea's
official Korean Central News Agency.
KCNA reiterated the committee's message in a separate
report later Thursday, warning North
Korea will retaliate at "even the
slightest sign of attack." Soldiers
aboard the 14,000-ton ROK Dokdo, an
amphibious landing ship, patrolled the
deck as Lynx helicopters dropped sonar
devices into the sea in search of enemy
submarines. A 1,200-ton frigate remained
on standby, ready to bomb the target.
The fleet dispatched for the exercises
also include three 1,800-ton submarines,
a 4,500-ton destroyer, and some 50
fighter jets, Cmdr. Won Hyung-sik of the
Joint Chiefs of Staff said in Seoul. The
drills come just weeks after South
Korea's joint military exercises with
the U.S. off the east coast - maneuvers
held in response to the deadly March
sinking of the Cheonan warship, which
killed 46 South Korean sailors. |
|
COLOMBIAN GOVERNMENT CLAIMS TO HAVE MORE
EVIDENCE OF FARC PRESENCE IN VENEZUELA
BOGOTA,
COLOMBIA--Colombian
Minister of Foreign Affairs Jaime
Bermúdez disclosed that his
government has further evidence of
members of the Colombian Revolutionary
Armed Forces (FARC) present in Venezuela
and urged the Venezuelan government
again to help fight the guerrillas.
"That evidence is for
the State and the Government to decide
and where to submit it," Bermúdez told
Bogotá's radio RCN, two days before the
inauguration of incoming Colombian
President Juan Manuel Santos, AFP
quoted. "One also defines the
conduct and the appropriateness of
certain evidence and the sensitiveness
of all that material (…) an effective
cooperation from Venezuela would be most
important in this discussion," he added.
The
administration of President Álvaro Uribe,
who is to hand over the office to Juan
Manuel Santos next Saturday, denounced
last July 22 at the Organization of
American States (OAS) the deployment in
Venezuela of about 1,500 members of the
FARC and of the National Liberation
Front (ELN). |
|
INCOMING US AMBASSADOR TO VENEZUELA,
LARRY PALMER, REPORTS ON LOW MORALE
AMONG VENEZUELAN ARMED FORCES
WASHINGTON,
D.C.--Incoming
US Ambassador to Venezuela Larry Palmer
reported the US Senate on
presumed low morale in the Venezuelan
armed forces and Cuba's meddling,
according to a questionnaire released on
Wednesday.
The questions, as
reported by Efe news agency, were
forwarded by Republic Senator Richar
Lugar, as part of an assessment made by
the US Congress to confirm or not
Palmer's nomination to the US Embassy in
Caracas.
Based on the report, morale in Venezuelan armed forces "is
considerably low, particularly due to
politically-oriented appointments,"
Palmer said when answering to a query
into the alleged division of Venezuelan
armed forces. The questionnaire was
disclosed to several media outlets
during a session held at the US Senate
Committee on Foreign Relations, where
they approved about thirty ambassadors
to Latin America, Asia and Africa, but
Palmer was not listed. |
|
IRAN'S AHMADINEJAD UNHURT AFTER
ASSASSINATION ATTEMPT
TEHRAN,
IRAN--
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad
was unharmed when a homemade explosive
went off near his motorcade during a
visit to the western city of Hamadan on
Wednesday, a source in his office said.
But state media said only a firecracker
had been set off by an young man excited
to see the president and a police chief
called news of an attack a "big lie"
spread by foreign media. The source from
Ahmadinejad's office said the
president's convoy was targeted as he
was traveling from Hamadan airport to
give a speech in a sports arena.
The president was
unhurt but others were injured and one
person was arrested, he said. "There was
an attack this morning. Nothing happened
to the president's car," the
presidential office source told Reuters.
"Investigations continue ... to find out
who was behind it." Ahmadinejad,
who has cracked down on opposition since
a disputed June 2009 presidential
election, appeared on live Iranian
television at the sports stadium. He
looked unperturbed and made no mention
of any assault.
The populist, hardline
Ahmadinejad has accumulated enemies in
both conservative and reformist circles
in the Islamic Republic, as well as
abroad. But state news agency IRNA said
"an excited young man from Hamadan
exploded a firecracker in order to
express his happiness. It did not cause
any disturbance among the crowd which
was giving a warm welcome to the
president." "Some foreign media tried to
take advantage of this event, in line
with their goals," IRNA said without
elaborating. "Some domestic media called
this harmless firecracker a grenade
explosion and some called it a hand-made
grenade and this led to some ambiguity."
Iran's Deputy Police Chief Ahmadreza
Radan said foreign news media wanted to
exploit the situation by publishing
false news. |
|
REPUBLICAN SENATOR RICHARD LUGAR CLAIMS
THAT VENEZUELA IS HARBORING FARC LEADERS
WASHINGTON,
D.C.--US
Senator Richard Lugar said he is certain
that Venezuela is harboring the
Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC)
in its territory and praised the work of
outgoing Colombian President Álvaro
Uribe. "I think the case was
already made and that is precisely what
is happening, that Venezuela is
harboring FARC members who remain a
potential threat to the integrity of
Colombia,'' said the Republican leader
of the Senate Foreign Relations
Committee, AP reported. "I think the
government of President Uribe has tried
the FARC courageously and successfully,
and it is understandable that it is
concerned that a significant number of
guerrilla troops may be living across
the border in Venezuela safely and
openly," said the lawmaker.
Lugar made the
comments after a special session of the
Senate Foreign Relations Committee, in
which 14 of its 17 members agreed to
recommend to the plenary session of the
Senate to confirm 32 nominated
ambassadors, including US envoys to
Colombia, Peru, Chile and Panama. Larry
Palmer, the nominated ambassador to
Venezuela, was not included in the list.
Lugar told reporters he was not sure why Palmer was not
on the list. After listening to Palmer
during a hearing on Friday, Republican
Senator Robert Menéndez voiced doubts
about the ability of Palmer to act
strongly enough vis-à-vis the government
of Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez.
Last month, Colombia submitted videos
and photos to the OAS to report that
1,500 troops of the FARC have a camp in
Venezuelan territory, 23 kilometers off
the Venezuela-Colombia border. Caracas
rejected the allegations and for the
first time, broke diplomatic relations
with its neighbor. |
|
|
|
NORTH KOREA THREATENS "STRONG PHYSICAL
RETALIATION" AGAINST SOUTH KOREA OVER
PLANNED NAVAL DRILLS
SEOUL,
SOUTH KOREA--North
Korea's military threatened "strong
physical retaliation" against planned
South Korean naval drills near
their disputed sea border and warned
Tuesday that civilian ships should stay
away from the area. South Korea plans to
hold five-day naval drills in the Yellow
Sea, including exercises near the
border, beginning Thursday in response
to the deadly March sinking of a South
Korean warship blamed on North Korea.
Forty-six sailors were killed.
Pyongyang vehemently
denies downing the 1,200-ton Cheonan,
and has asked to send its own
investigators to examine the results of
the probe into the sinking. Seoul has
rejected the requests. North Korea will
"counter the reckless naval firing
projected by the group of traitors with
strong physical retaliation," the
military said in a statement carried by
Pyongyang's official Korean Central News
Agency. The military also warned
civilian ships to stay away from the
maritime border. North and South Korea
have fought three bloody skirmishes near
the maritime border in recent years,
most recently in November 2009. South
Korean defense officials said they had
no comment on North Korea's latest
threat.
North Korea routinely issues such threats, especially
when the South holds joint military
drills with the U.S., as they did last
month. Pyongyang sees the exercises as a
rehearsal for an invasion. The U.S. has
28,500 troops in South Korea to protect
the longtime ally. The North had
threatened to respond to those exercises
with "nuclear deterrence" but South
Korean military officials said there was
no sign of unusual North Korean military
activity. Washington and Seoul say their
exercises are purely defensive, but that
the recent naval drills off South
Korea's east coast were intended to warn
the North that further provocations will
not be tolerated. U.S. forces are not
taking part in the drills planned to
start Thursday. |
|
FOREIGN MINISTER NICOLAS MADURO ASKS
PARAGUAY TO OKAY VENEZUELA'S ADMISSION
TO MERCOSUR
SAN
JUAN, ARGENTINA--Venezuelan
Minister of Foreign Affairs Nicolás
Maduro encouraged Paraguayan
political and business sectors to
welcome a request made by Venezuela and
other South American countries and give
their blessing to Venezuela's admission
to the Common Market of the South (Mercosur).
During the 39th
Summit of Heads of State of the trade
bloc currently held in the city of San
Juan, northeast of Argentina, Maduro
made a "brotherly, candid" appeal to
Paraguay to "open its heart and
comprehension and look at the Venezuela
of today, the Bolivarian Venezuela,
which has risen from nothing, from being
a colony, and has started to tackle
major development issues and challenges
of modern time."
The minister said that since Venezuela joined Mercosur
as an associate member in December 2004
and later, in 2006, as a full member,
"the link is tighter and the relation is
deeper, not only a trade relation,
because Mercosur has gone as far as the
Andes and the Caribbean."
|
|
DICTATOR HUGO CHAVEZ FORCES VENEZUELAN
PEASANTS TO ESTABLISH SOCIALIST BRANCHES
CARACAS,
VENEZUELA--"The
land is for him, who works on it." Any
peasants willing to apply this principle
should get organized in socialist
companies, as set forth in the recent
reform of the Lands and Agrarian
Development Law.
The law
released last Thursday, July 29, in the
Official Gazette, Extraordinary Edition,
Number 5,991, states that outsourcing
and large estate are "mechanisms
contrary to the values and principles of
the national agrarian development."
Therefore, the National Lands Institute
(INTI) is to award deeds of stay to any
peasants who prove that they have worked
on the lands of individuals for more
than three years.
Note, however, that peasants should get organized in a
social property enterprise. In addition,
the reform sets a deadline of 180 days
from the date of entry into force of the
law so that peasants should attest to
the INTI that they occupy a land and are
working on it, no matter that it belongs
to a company or an individual. Such a
requirement should be met so that the
government agency takes the steps to
grant the deed of stay. |
former cuban dictator fidel castro
welcomes chinese foreign minister
HAVANA,
CUBA.--FORMER
CUBAN DICTATOr Fidel Castro met
on Sunday with Chinese Foreign Minister
Yang Jiechi, with whom he spoke about
topics of international interest and
bilateral relations between Cuba and
China.
Granma newspaper
reports that the visitor gave Fidel
greetings from the top leadership of his
country while the Commander in Chief
asked Jiechi to pass on greetings to
Chinese President Hu Jintao and to the
top Chinese leaders. Present in the
meeting were the Chinese ambassador to
Havana, Liu Yuqin, and the Director for
Latin America at the Chinese Foreign
Ministry. Cuba and China established
diplomatic relations on September 28,
1960, and after five decades both
governments agree on the excellent state
of these ties.
Cooperation between Cuba and China currently takes
place in sectors such as biotechnology,
health, informatics and communications,
development of renewable energy and
professional training. At the end of the
meeting, Fidel gave the Chinese diplomat
a copy ” with a personal dedication” of
the Chinese edition of the book “One
Hundred Hours with Fidel” and also a
copy of his own book “The Strategic
Victory”. The Chinese Foreign
Minister and his accompanying delegation
traveled to Costa Rica on Sunday.
|
|
VENEZUELA LIMITS TO UNASUR DISCUSSION OF
CRISIS WITH COLOMBIA
SAN
JUAN, ARGENTINA--Venezuela's
Minister of Foreign Affairs Nicolás
Maduro limited on Monday the
discussion of the diplomatic crisis
between his country and Colombia to the
field of the South American Union of
Nations (Unasur) when taking the floor
during the Mercosur summit currently
held in the Argentinean city of San
Juan.
"We think this matter
had been already addressed in Unasur,"
Maduro said at a meeting of the Common
Market Council, which gathers foreign
and economy ministers of the bloc Member
States. Colombia is not a party to
Mercosur. Maduro urged the 12 nations
which form part of the South American
bloc of Unasur to work on a peace plan
for Colombia.
"We have made a proposal at Unasur; we uphold it here: the
need for a peace plan for Colombia," he
told ministers. Mercosur is a trade bloc
composed of Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay
and Paraguay, in addition to Bolivia and
Chile as associated countries. Venezuela
is waiting for membership. In Maduro's
words, Unasur "took a positive step to
deal with this issue and so must be
acknowledged." He praised in this way
the progress made by a meeting of Unasur
foreign ministers held last week in
Quito. |
|
THE UNITED NATIONS DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM
DISCLOSES RISING URBAN POVERTY IN
VENEZUELA
CARACAS,
VENEZUELA--The
United Nations Development Program (UNDP)
noted in the Human Development Report
for Latin America and the Caribbean that
urban poverty in Venezuela stood at 19.8
percent in 2006, an increase over 7.1
percent in 1989.
The data, the latest
available information supplied by the
international organization, refers to
urban residents of Greater Caracas, at
least in the Venezuelan case. The
pointer, after years of fitful
variations, started to grow from 1998
and peaked 38.2 percent in 2004, to
decline afterwards. For the first time,
the UNPD released this report which
warns against continued inequality
levels in the Latin American region, the
highest in the world.
"It seems that to date, high inequality levels, except for
some variations, have been relatively
immune to the development strategies
applied in the region," the document
stated. The report tries to show
different thorny problems on the issue
of inequality in Latin America. While in
Central America, low-income people face
the worst living chances, there are some
other nations where the situation is
barely more favorable, such as Bolivia
and Brazil. |
|
ADMIRAL MIKE MULLEN SAYS U.S. HAS IRAN
ATTACK PLAN
WASHINGTON,
D.C.--The
United States military
has a plan to attack Iran in
order to prevent the country from
developing a nuclear weapon, the
chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
revealed Sunday. Adm. Mike Mullen, the
top-ranking U.S. military officer, said
a military strike would have severe
downsides -- but so would a
nuclear-armed Iran. He described the
challenge as a choice between two very
bad options.
"I am extremely
concerned about both of those outcomes,"
he said. But Mullen, speaking on NBC's
"Meet the Press," said the military
option is an important one. He said it's
a decision that's up to the president to
make. "The military options have been
on the table and remain on the table,"
he said. "It's one of the options that
the president has. ... I hope we don't
get to that, but it's an important
option and it's one that's well
understood."
Asked whether the U.S. military has an attack plan,
Mullen said: "We do." He did not
elaborate. Mullen, who addressed the
topic in the wake of new sanctions
against Iran being imposed by the United
States, European Union and United
Nations, said there is a narrow space
between those two options. He said that
space involves sanctions, diplomacy and
international pressure and that he
remains "hopeful" the combination will
yield positive results. "It's those
unintended consequences that are
difficult to predict in what is an
incredibly unstable part of the world,"
Mullen said. |
|
MEXICO, CHILE RECOGNIZE HONDURAN
GOVERNMENT
MEXICO
CITY, MEXICO--
Mexico and Chile
are formally recognizing the
government of Honduran President
Porfirio Lobo a year after his
predecessor was ousted by a
military-backed coup. Mexico's Foreign
Relations Department said Saturday in a
statement that it will send its
ambassador back to Honduras next week.
The department took into account a
recent report commissioned by the
Organization of American States that
found "significant advances on the part
of the government and other Honduran
actors to deal with the main problems
that came about after the coup,"
according to the statement.
Late Friday,
Chilean Foreign Minister Alfredo Moreno
said his nation is re-establishing
diplomatic relations with Honduras more
than a year after a coup sent the
Central American country into political
crisis, Chile's foreign ministry
announced Friday. In a declaration
posted on its website, the ministry said
it based its decision on a report
released by the Organization of American
States noting significant steps towards
normal democratic practices and the
defense of human rights in Honduras.
Foreign Minister Alfredo Moreno said in
a press conference that the Chilean
government recognizes Honduras President
Porfirio Lobo was elected in a free and
democratic process.
Lobo was elected president in November of last year
with 56 percent of the vote. His
election came months after the ouster of
former President Manuel Zelaya, who was
removed from office by the Honduran
National Congress after he tried to
change the country's constitution to
allow for his re-election. Chile and
many other nations broke off relations
with Honduras after the coup, and some
have refused to recognize Lobo's
election. Moreno said his country's
diplomatic presence in Honduras will
help strengthen the democratic process
in that country. |
|
VENEZUELAN DICTATOR HUGO CHAVEZ DEPLOYS
TROOPS TO COLOMBIA BORDER
CARACAS,
VENEZUELA--Venezuelan
dictator Hugo Chavez
has deployed troops to areas near
the Colombian border and says he is
reviewing plans for a potential war as
tension between the two nations rises.
"Three nights ago I told the
vice-president. It makes me sad, I
confess, that I'm reviewing war plans,"
he said during a phone interview on the
state-run VTV network. Special forces
are moving to 10 districts near the
Colombian border to be prepared in case
Colombian President Alvaro Uribe issues
an invasion order before he leaves
office August 7, Chavez said Friday.
Colombia and Venezuela are at odds over
accusations that leftist rebels have
found refuge in Venezuela.
Colombia says it has
photographic evidence of camps belonging
to the Revolutionary Armed Forces of
Colombia -- known by its Spanish
abbreviation, FARC -- in Venezuela.
Colombia made its case before the
Organization of American States earlier
this month and asked for international
observers to be allowed into Venezuela
to verify the presence of the guerrilla
group. Venezuela denied the accusations,
and in response broke off diplomatic
ties with Colombia.
On Friday, Chavez told VTV that the Colombian government's
accusations "have become a threat
against our sovereignty, [against] our
people and against the revolution."
Chavez said surveys by the Venezuelan
National Guard have proven that rebel
camps do not exist within the country's
borders. He accused Colombian officials
and right-wing paramilitary units of
plotting his assassination, while the
Colombian government has accused Chavez
of supporting the rebels Despite the
escalating tensions, the Venezuelan
leader on Friday also expressed hope of
restoring relations as soon as Colombian
president-elect Juan Manuel Santos takes
office. He told VTV that he hoped to
meet with Santos as soon as possible,
but stressed that in the meantime, "we
won't be sucked into a war that is not
ours." |
|
FORMER CUBAN DICTATOR FIDEL CASTRO
ACCUSES US OF TORTURING ONE OF HIS FIVE
CONVICTED SPIES
HAVANA,
CUBA--FORMER
CUBAN DICTATOR Fidel Castro
accused U.S. authorities of torturing a
convicted Cuban spy, telling a meeting
of communist youths that the agent had
been placed in solitary confinement in
California. Castro spoke about the case
of Gerardo Hernandez, who is serving a
double life sentence on counts of
conspiracy to murder four Miami-based
pilots who were slain by Cuban jets in
1996 when they were dispersing
pro-democracy pamphlets on the island.
Hernandez is one of
the so-called "Cuban Five" intelligence
agents that Cuba says it sent to the
U.S. to infiltrate anti-Castro groups
linked to 1990s hotel bombings and other
terrorists attacks on Cuban soil. The
five were convicted in the U.S. of
spying. Castro said Hernandez has been
placed in solitary confinement at a
prison in Victorville, California. "Did
he do anything? No, nothing," he said.
"Four FBI officials met to decide and
they decided. That's torture. There's
nothing else to call it, it's torture,
and its occurring in view of the whole
world."
Castro also said
Hernandez was in need of medical
treatment he was not receiving. A
spokeswoman for the U.S. Interests
Section in Havana - which Washington
maintains instead of an embassy -
referred questions about the case to the
Federal Bureau of Prisons, which said it
was up to authorities at the Victorville
facility to comment.
Complaints that Hernandez had been
placed in solitary confinement have been
made throughout the week by Ricardo
Alarcon, speaker of the Cuban
parliament, which convenes Sunday for
one of its two full sessions a year.
Castro repeated a warning of coming
nuclear war, which he has claimed for
weeks will pit the U.S. and Israel
against Iran, and be worsened by
tensions between North and South Korea.
"Why do our children and adolescents
have to die?" Castro asked. |
|
VENEZUELA, CUBA CONSOLIDATE COOPERATION
AGREEMENTS
HAVANA,
CUBA--Cuban
Vice President Ricardo Cabrisas and
Rafael Ramírez, the Venezuelan
Minister of Energy and Petroleum, opened
on Sunday a ministerial meeting to
strengthen economic, trade and financial
relations between the two countries.
The Cuban official
reported that the goal of the
Cuba-Venezuela summit was to advance
bilateral relations' planning. He also
recalled that the relations are based on
annual plans, state-run news agency AVN
reported.
Cabrisas said that the two countries selected only 140
out of the 360 new projects because they
are "the options more likely to be
implemented." For his part,
Minister Ramírez said that bilateral
relations have improved following better
coordination efforts between the
five-year plans in Cuba and the
three-year plans implemented in
Venezuela. |
|
VENEZUELAN OPPOSITION "VOLUNTAD POPULAR"
PARTY DEMANDS PRISON FOR PDVAL "BIG
FISH"
CARACAS,
VENEZUELA--In
a rally in front of the Attorney General
Office, a member of opposition
political Voluntad Popular party, vowed
not to rest until the individuals truly
liable for the case of spoiled food
report to the nation.
Prison for the "big
fish" of state-run food import and
distribution network Pdval was requested
on Wednesday by members of opposition
political Voluntad Popular (VP) party.
They staged a protest in front of the
Attorney General Office asking for an
answer to the questions related to the
scandal of rotten food found throughout
the country. Ismael León, a VP
militant, vowed not to rest until the
individuals truly accountable for the
case report to the nation.
He
specifically referred to A press release
quoted León as saying that the minister,
also the president of state-run oil
holding Petróleos de Venezuela (Pdvsa),
is the kingpin of "a Soprano-style mafia
embedded in Pdvsa high circles."
"How come that Pdval internal auditor
reported on a USD 10-billion profit for
the purchase of 130,000 tons of spoiled
food and 5,000 tons of beef? Grassroots
sectors ask for prison for the big
fish." |
|
|