Hugo Chavez Has Shut Down Broadcast News Media Companies - 30 of Them
Monday, September 7, 2009, 10:59 AM - South America
Hugo Chavez is the president of Venezuela and he was originally elected to that position and then re-elected several times. Unfortunately, he is acting a lot less like a president and more like a dictator each and every year. He has worked to change their constitution allowing for no term limits, thus giving him almost the status of a king.
Only Pro-Chavez Media or State Run Media
Hugo Chavez has been using regulations on the media and using a licensing program to shut them down. Of course, he only shuts down the media that reports things that might be offensive to his political domination. Therefore, most of the private media has been shut down except for those that are pro-Hugo Chavez.
The Winds of War
The president/dictator of Venezuela is now telling his troops to be prepared for war because the US - See Political, International And Religious Issues for the full article.
add comment Regional Leaders Gather to Discuss Bolivian Crisis
Monday, September 15, 2008, 07:09 PM - South America
Bolivian President Evo Morales and a group of South American leaders have begun an emergency summit in an effort to resolve a political crisis in his country.
Mr. Morales and the other heads of state started their meeting Monday in Santiago, Chile. After arriving in Chile, Mr. Morales said he was looking for support from his South American counterparts. He also accused opposition Bolivian governors of mounting a coup against him.
South American leaders scheduled the talks to discuss the conflict that killed at least 28 people last week.
Government and opposition supporters clashed last week over Mr. Morales' plans to rewrite the constitution and redistribute land and natural gas revenues to the poor. The conflict pits the rich against the poor, many of whom are indigenous people like the president himself.
The governor of the oil-rich Tarija province, Mario Cossio, told reporters he and Mr. Morales will meet when Mr. Morales returns from Chile. - See Regional Leaders Gather to Discuss Bolivian Crisis for the full report.
U.S. Calls Venezuelan Officials Rebel Supporters
Friday, September 12, 2008, 01:36 PM - South America
The United States stepped up the diplomatic skirmish with its left-wing adversaries in Latin America on Friday, saying it would expel the Venezuelan ambassador and declaring that Venezuela’s top two intelligence officials had supported the “narco-terrorist activities” of rebels in the region.
The moves heightened the political tensions that have been building between the United States, Venezuela and Bolivia in recent days. On Wednesday, Bolivia’s embattled president, Evo Morales, expelled the American ambassador there, Philip S. Goldberg, accusing him of supporting rebellious groups in eastern Bolivia.
Then on Thursday, President Hugo Chávez of Venezuela said he was expelling the American ambassador to his country, Patrick Duddy, contending that an American-supported coup plot had been discovered.
The State Department responded by declaring Bolivia’s ambassador to Washington persona non grata. Then on Friday morning, it said it would expel Venezuela’s ambassador, while the Treasury Department accused the Venezuelan intelligence officials of aiding Colombia’s largest rebel group, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, “even as it terrorized and kidnapped innocents.”
The department said that the head of Venezuela’s military intelligence agency, Hugo Carvajal Barrios, protected drug shipments from seizure by Venezuelan anti-drug authorities and helped provide weapons to the FARC, which the United States considers a terrorist organization. The department also said that Henry Rangel Silva, the director of the DISIP intelligence agency, “materially assisted” the FARC’s drug trafficking activities and pushed for greater cooperation between the Venezuelan government and the rebels. - See U.S. Calls Venezuelan Officials Rebel Supporters for the full report.
One-eyed female rebel leader surrenders in Colombia
Monday, May 19, 2008, 08:03 PM - South America
Exhausted, ill and cut off from her troops, a one-eyed female guerrilla commander surrendered to Colombian authorities in what they described Monday as a major blow to the rebels.
Nelly Avila, the highest ranking female rebel, told a news conference that she had lost hope and decided to cut a deal.
On Sunday, the 45-year-old woman widely known by her nom de guerre "Karina" became the latest in a series of rebel commanders to fall prey to President Alvaro Uribe's carrot-and-stick counterinsurgency strategy.
"She was known for her cruelty and daring, and for the massacres and beatings she ordered over 20 years with the guerrillas," Defense Minister Juan Santos said. "So she was a very important military target."
About 30 percent of the the fighters of the FARC — the Spanish acronym of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia — are thought to be women. But Avila was the first to command a "front," the rebel equivalent of a small battalion of about 400 fighters.
After decades of eluding the authorities, five top rebels have been captured or killed by Colombia's U.S.-backed army in the past year alone. The casualties included two members of the rebels' ruling secretariat.
"This will be another blow to the FARC's morale," said Bogota political analyst Ariel Avila, who is not related to the guerrilla leader.
An additional 1,100 guerrillas, mostly foot soldiers, have simply surrendered in the past year and joined a government-sponsored program that provides housing, job training and other benefits for former fighters.
Now, Avila will join the program, although it wasn't immediately clear whether she would also face criminal charges.
"What Karina has done is the path that all FARC members must take," the army's commander, Gen. Mario Montoya, said in a message aimed at the rebels. "Because if you don't, sooner or later you will be neutralized."
"We don't want you dead. We want you alive."
In some ways, Avila's surrender was a personal victory for Uribe. Avila, who commanded the FARC's 47th Front, was based in Antioquia when Uribe was governor of the mountainous state in northwestern Colombia in the mid-1990s.
She carried out a rash of attacks and kidnappings and was one of the few rebel leaders to defeat right-wing paramilitary units, which often worked in tandem with the army.
On Monday, the Bogota newspaper El Tiempo described her as "a sort of Rambo." She was even rumored to have taken part in the murder of Uribe's father, a wealthy rancher who was killed in 1983, a role she staunchly denied at a news conference in the state's capital city, Medellin, on Monday.
"She had become a legend, with the guts to carry out any action," Santos said. "Such people rise up rapidly through guerrilla ranks, and she had reached one of the most important posts of any woman in the organization." - See One-eyed female rebel leader surrenders in Colombia for the full report.
Bush Sends Colombia Free-Trade Bill to Congress
Monday, April 7, 2008, 02:32 PM - South America
President Bush says he is sending the Colombia free-trade agreement to Congress because it is time to level the playing field for American workers and safeguard U.S. security interests in the hemisphere.
"This agreement will advance America's national security interests in a critical region," President Bush said. "It will strengthen a courageous ally in our hemisphere. It will help America's economy and America's workers at a vital time. It deserves bipartisan support from the United States Congress."
Mr. Bush says the need is too urgent and the stakes to national security too high to allow the year to end without a vote on the deal. The president's action forces a vote on the free-trade agreement within 90 legislative days.
Most Colombian exports already enter the United States duty free. The deal makes permanent Colombia's preferential access to the U.S. market, while eliminating tariffs on 80 percent of American exports to Colombia; including aircraft and auto parts, beef, cotton, wheat, soybeans, and fruit.
President Bush says approving the deal is the best way the United States can demonstrate its support for Colombia at a time when Bogota is standing against the anti-American rhetoric of Venezuela's Hugo Chavez. - See Bush Sends Colombia Free-Trade Bill to Congress for the full report.
Bush blasts Chavez's actions on rebels
Wednesday, March 12, 2008, 03:17 PM - South America
President Bush today struck out against Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez for his recent behavior towards Colombia, calling him a "demagogue" and saying that his "agenda amounts to little more than empty promises and a thirst for power."
Mr. Bush, speaking to U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, criticized Mr. Chavez for the second time in the last week over his response to a cross-border raid by Colombian troops into Ecuador earlier this month, which killed a senior Colombian terrorist with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC).
Mr. Bush said that Mr. Chavez's ordering of Venezuelan troops to their border with Colombia was "the latest step in a disturbing pattern of provocative behavior by the regime in Caracas."
"It has also called for FARC terrorists to be recognized as a legitimate army, and senior regime officials have met with FARC leaders in Venezuela," Mr. Bush said.
In fact, U.S. government officials are currently in Colombia examining a laptop recovered by Colombian forces in the raid, which the Colombians say proves that Mr. Chavez had agreed to provide millions of dollars in funding to FARC.
Mr. Bush and Mr. Chavez have sparred before, but Mr. Bush today went farther than he has before, though he still avoided mentioning Mr. Chavez by name. - See Bush blasts Chavez's actions on rebels for the full report.
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