INTERVIEW - Venezuela's "sweetheart" champions Chavez By Andrew Cawthorne CARACAS (Reuters)

When President Hugo Chavez's government held a ceremony in parliament's hallowed Salon Eliptico room to chastise foreign meddling in Venezuela, the keynote speaker was a petite and passionate American named Eva Golinger.

"The Salon Eliptico is reserved for the most important and prestigious events, and only two people from the U.S. have ever spoken there. One is me and the other is John F. Kennedy," the writer and lawyer recalled of the event in November last year.

Dubbed "La Novia de Venezuela" (Venezuela's Sweetheart) by Chavez, Golinger is one of the most vocal foreign champions of his socialism, writing prolifically to try to counter what she sees as a U.S.-led global campaign to portray him as a tyrant.

"Chavez has been demonized and there has not been enough on the other side to combat that," she told Reuters.

Such unflinching support has put Golinger at the forefront of Venezuela's ideological battle. The mere mention of her name raises hackles and prompts disgust in opposition circles, whose members like to mock the American lilt in her Spanish accent.

Golinger admits she was nervous speaking live on TV in front of Chavez in the room honoring Venezuela's independence and where former U.S. president Kennedy spoke in 1961.

But she shows no timidity in her daily work promoting the policies of a man who has become one of the world's most recognizable and controversial heads of state.

"This is not a horrible place led by some brutal dictator," Golinger said in an interview. "Chavez has recovered Venezuelan identity and made people proud to be Venezuelan ... there is nothing covered (by foreign media) in terms of social gains."

Chavez, who takes a hard line with opposition leaders, prompted an outcry last month when he secured special decree powers from the outgoing parliament after elections gave the opposition a stronger hand in the assembly.

The socialist president, who has led Venezuela on an increasingly radical path, regularly rails against the United States for being aggressive and imperialistic.

With dual nationality due to roots in Venezuela on her mother's side, Golinger, 38, who is a specialist in international human rights and immigration law, first left her New York home to visit the South American nation in 1993.

Living and visiting Venezuelan on and off since then, her political engagement crystallized with the brief 2002 coup against Chavez that Golinger sought to expose as CIA-backed.

Now she edits the international edition of the pro-government Correo del Orinoco newspaper and has met Chavez "more times than I can count," making her something of a confidante for El Comandante.
She accompanied him on a recent trip to political allies including Iran, Syria, Libya and Belarus.

'MAJOR TRANSFORMATION'

Her most recent paper, "Setting the record straight on Venezuela," cites poverty reduction, Chavez's three presidential election wins, media criticism and grass-roots activism as evidence Venezuela is no dictatorship.
Critics have forgotten, she argued, what she called the economic chaos and repressive political atmosphere in the country, including the suspensions of constitutional rights, before Chavez won the 1998 presidential election.

"If you don't put it into context of before and after, then no one understands ... the major transformation," she said.

Though critics accuse her of being blindly partisan, Golinger has some criticism of the government too.
"Of course everything is not perfect," she said, acknowledging Chavez needed to combat "a horrific culture of corruption" and ensure he was not surrounded by "yes men."

"He is intimidating. Some people give it to him straight, others don't," she said.

The president's popular touch faded somewhat in 2006 and 2007, Golinger said, when information on assassination threats forced him to stop plunging into crowds so regularly.

But his recent personal handling of the response to floods that have left more than 130,000 people homeless showed Chavez is rectifying that despite security risks, she said.

"With the rains, he's been out there again ... He is a very sincere, humane person. His heart aches."
Despite September's parliamentary election that disappointed the government -- opposition parties took slightly more votes, though the socialists still won more seats in the National Assembly -- Golinger predicted Chavez would win the 2012 presidential election comfortably.

"2012 is still safe because the opposition does not have a nationally popular candidate and Chavez still has over 50 percent popularity," she said, adding that new house-building and other projects like more trains would swell his support.

Golinger scoffed at claims that Chavez represses freedom of expression, pointing to the plethora of mockery and criticism of the government in media and on the street.

"Freedom of expression here is excessive," she said, arguing that an aggressively pro-opposition TV station like Globovision would not be allowed in many other countries.

(Editing by Daniel Wallis and David Storey)

An Interview With Eva Golinger/Chavez's Venezuela By MIKE WHITNEY

Eva Golinger

Eva Golinger is a Venezuelan-American attorney from New York living in Caracas, Venezuela since 2005 and author of “The Chávez Code: Cracking US Intervention in Venezuela” (2006 Olive Branch Press), “Bush vs. Chávez: Washington’s War on Venezuela” (2007, Monthly Review Press), “The Empire’s Web: Encyclopedia of Interventionism and Subversion”, “La Mirada del Imperio sobre el 4F: Los Documentos Desclasificados de Washington sobre la rebelión militar del 4 de febrero de 1992” and "La Agresión Permanente: USAID, NED y CIA".

Mike Whitney: The US media is very critical of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez. He's frequently denounced as "anti-American", a "leftist strongman", and a dictator. Can you briefly summarize some of the positive social, economic and judicial changes for which Chavez is mainly responsible?

Eva Golinger: The first and foremost important achievement during the Chávez administration is the 1999 Constitution, which, although not written nor decreed by Chávez himself, was created through his vision of change for Venezuela. The 1999 Constitution was, in fact, drafted - written - by the people of Venezuela in one of the most participatory examples of nation building, and then was ratified through popular national referendum by 75 per cent of Venezuelans. The 1999 Constitution is one of the most advanced in the world in the area of human rights. It guarantees the rights to housing, education, healthcare, food, indigenous lands, languages, women's rights, worker's rights, living wages and a whole host of other rights that few other countries recognize on a national level.

My favorite right in the Venezuelan Constitution is the right to a dignified life. That pretty much sums up all the others. Laws to implement these rights began to surface in 2001, with land reform, oil industry redistribution, tax laws and the creation of more than a dozen social programs - called missions - dedicated to addressing the basic needs of Venezuela's poor majority. In 2003, the first missions were directed at education and healthcare. Within two years, illiteracy was eradicated in the country and Venezuela was certified by UNESCO as a nation free of illiteracy. This was done with the help of a successful Cuban literacy program called "Yo si puedo" (Yes I can). Further educational missions were created to provide free universal education from primary to doctoral levels throughout the country. Today, Venezuela's population is much more educated than before, and adults who previously had no high school education now are encouraged to not only go through a secondary school program, but also university and graduate school.

The healthcare program, called "Barrio Adentro", has not only provided preventive healthcare to all Venezuelans - many who never had access to a doctor before - but also has guaranteed universal, free access to medical attention at the most advanced levels. MRIs, heart surgery, lab work, cancer treatments, are all provided free of cost to anyone (including foreigners) in need. Some of the most modern clinics, diagnostic treatment centers and hospitals have been built in the past five years under this program, placing Venezuela at the forefront of medical technology.

Other programs providing subsidized food and consumer products (Mercal, Pdval), job training (Mission Vuelvan Caras), subsidies to poor, single mothers (Madres del Barrio), attention to indigents and drug addicts (Mission Negra Hipolita) have reduced extreme poverty by 50 per cent and raised Venezuelans standard of living and quality of life. While nothing is perfect, these changes are extraordinary and have transformed Venezuela into a nation far different from what it looked like 10 years ago. In fact, the most important achievement that Hugo Chávez himself is directly responsible for is the level of participation in the political process. Today, millions of Venezuelans previously invisible and excluded are visible and included. Those who were always marginalized and ignored in Venezuela by prior governments today have a voice, are seen and heard, and are actively participating in the building of a new economic, political and social model in their country.

Whitney: On Monday, President Chavez threw a Venezuelan judge in jail on charges of abuse of power for freeing a high-profile banker. Do you think he overstepped his authority as executive or violated the principle of separation of powers? What does this say about Chavez's resolve to fight corruption?

Eva Golinger: President Chávez did not put anyone in jail. Venezuela has an Attorney General and an independent branch of government in charge of public prosecutions. Chávez did publicly accuse the judge of corruption and violating the law because that judge overstepped her authority by releasing an individual charged with corruption and other criminal acts from detention, despite the fact that a previous court had not granted conditional freedom or bail to the suspect. And, the judge released the suspect in a very irregular way, without the presence of the prosecutor, and through a back door. The suspect then fled the country.

This is part of Venezuela's fight against corruption. Unfortunately - as in a lot of countries - corruption is deeply rooted in the culture. The struggle to eradicate corruption is probably the most difficult of all and will probably not be achieved until new generations have grown up with different values and education. In the meantime, the Chávez administration is trying hard to ensure that corrupt public officials pay the consequences. That judge, for example, engaged in an act of corruption and abuse of authority by illegally releasing a suspect and therefore was charged by the Public Prosecutor's office and will be tried. It has nothing to do with what Chávez said or didn't say, it has to do with enforcing the law.

Whitney: Why is the United States building military bases in Colombia? Do they pose a threat to Chavez or the Bolivarian Revolution?

Eva Golinger: On October 30, the US formally entered into an agreement with the Colombian government to allow US access to seven military bases in Colombia and unlimited use of Colombian territory for military operations. The agreement itself is purported to be directed at counter-narcotics operations and counter-terrorism. But a US Air Force document released earlier this year discussing the need for a stronger US military presence in Colombia revealed the true intentions behind the military agreement. The document stated that the US military presence was necessary to combat the "constant threat from anti-US governments in the region". Clearly, that is a reference to Venezuela, and probably Bolivia, maybe Ecuador. It's no secret that Washington considers the Venezuelan government anti-US, though it's not true. Venezuela is anti-imperialist, but not anti-US. The US Air Force document also stated that the Colombian bases would be used to engage in "full spectrum military operations" throughout South America, and even talked about surveillance, intelligence and reconnaissance missions, and improving the capacity of US forces to execute "expeditionary warfare" in Latin America.

Clearly, this is a threat to the peoples of Latin America and particularly those nations targeted, such as Venezuela. Most people in the US don't know about this military agreement, but it they did, they should question why their government, led by Nobel Peace Prize winner Barack Obama, is preparing for war in South America. And, in the midst of an economic crisis with millions of people in the US losing jobs and homes, why are millions of dollars being spent on military bases in Colombia? The US Congress already approved $46 million for one of the bases in Colombia. And surely more funds will be supplied in the future.

Whitney: What is ALBA? Is it a viable alternative to the "free trade" blocs promoted by the US?

Eva Golinger: The Bolivarian Alliance of the Americas - Trade Agreement for the People, is a regional agreement created five years ago between Venezuela and Cuba, and now has 9 members: Bolivia, Cuba, Ecuador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Venezuela, Antigua and Barbuda, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, and Dominica. ALBA is a trade agreement based on integration, cooperation and solidarity, contrary to US trade agreements which are based on competition and exploitation. It promotes a way of trading between nations that assures mutual benefits. For example, Venezuela sells oil to Cuba and Cuba pays with services - doctors, educators and technological experts that help to improve Venezuela's industries. Venezuela sells oil to Nicaragua and Nicaragua pays with food products, agricultural technology and aide to build Venezuela's own agricultural industry, which long ago was abandoned by prior governments only interested in the rich oil industry. ALBA seeks to not just provide economic benefits to its member nations, but also social and cultural advances. The idea is to find ways to help members develop and progress in all aspects of society. ALBA recently created a new currency, the SUCRE, which will be used as a form of exchange between member nations, eliminating the US dollar as the standard for trade.

Whitney: Are US NGOs and intelligence agents still trying to foment political instability in Venezuela or have those operations ceased since the failed coup?

Eva Golinger: In fact, the funding of political groups in Venezuela, and others throughout Latin America that promote US agenda, has increased since the April 2002 coup against President Chávez. Through two principal Department of State agencies, USAID and the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), the US government has channeled more than $50 million to opposition groups in Venezuela since 2002. The USAID/NED budget to fund groups in Venezuela in 2010 is nearly $15 million, doubled from last year's $7 million. This is a state policy of Washington, which the Obama Administration plans to amp up. They call it "democracy promotion", but it's really democracy subversion and destabilization. Funding political groups favorable to Empire, equipping them with resources, strategizing to help formulate political platforms and campaigns - all geared towards regime change - is a new form of invasion, a silent invasion. Through USAID and NED, and their "partner NGOs" and contractors, such as Freedom House, International Republican Institute, National Democratic Institute, Pan-American Development Foundation and Development Alternatives, Inc., hundreds of political groups, parties and programs are presently being funded in Venezuela to promote regime change against the Chávez government. US taxpayer dollars are being squandered on these efforts to overthrow a democratically elected government that simply isn't convenient for Washington. Remember, Venezuela has 24 per cent of world oil reserves. That's a lot!

Whitney: How hard has Venezuela been hit by the economic crisis? Do the people understand Wall Street's role in the meltdown?

Eva Golinger: Actually, the Chávez government has taken important steps to shelter Venezuela from the financial crisis. People here in Venezuela absolutely understand Wall Street's role in the crisis and know that the US capitalist-consumerist system is principally responsible for causing the financial crisis, but also the climate crisis that the world is facing. The Venezuelan government took preventive steps against the financial crisis, such as withdrawing Venezuela's reserves from US banks two years ago, creating cushion funds to ensure social programs would not be cut and diversifying Venezuela's oil clientele so as not to be dependent solely on US clients. Recently, several banks have been nationalized by the Venezuelan government and others have been liquidated. But this was more due to the mismanagement and internal corruption within those banks. The Venezuelan government reacted quickly to take over the banks and guarantee customers' savings would not be lost. In fact, it's the first time in Venezuela's history that no customers have lost any of their money during a bank liquidation or takeover. This is part of the Chávez Administration's policy of prioritizing social needs over economic gain.

Whitney: Here's an excerpt from a special weekend report by Bloomberg News: "Americans have grown gloomier about both the economy and the nation’s direction over the past three months even as the U.S. shows signs of moving from recession to recovery. Almost half the people now feel less financially secure than when President Barack Obama took office in January... Fewer than 1 in 3 Americans think the economy will improve in the next six months... Only 32 per cent of poll respondents believe the country is headed in the right direction, down from 40 percent who said so in September." The frustration and disillusionment with the US political/economic system has never been greater in my lifetime. Do you think people in the United States are ready for their own Bolivarian Revolution and steps towards a more progressive, socialistic model of government?

Eva Golinger: The rise of Barack Obama neutralized a growing sentiment for profound change inside the US. Hopefully, the slowdown in US activism will only be temporary. South of the border, there is tremendous change taking place. New social, political and economic models are being built by popular grassroots movements in Venezuela, Bolivia and other Latin American nations that seek economic and social justice. I believe strongly that models in process, like the Bolivarian Revolution, provide inspiration and hope to those in the US and around the world that alternatives to US capitalism do exist and can be successful.

The US has a rich history of revolution. There are many groups inside the US dedicated to building a better, more humanist system. Unity and a collective vision are essential aspects of building a strong movement capable of moving forward. Every nation has its moment in history. This is the time of Latin America. But there is great hope that the people of the US will soon unite with their brothers and sisters south of the border to bring down Empire and help build a true world community based on social and economic justice for all.

CounterPunch 17-12-09

Mike Whitney lives in Washington state. He can be reached at fergiewhitney@msn.com.

"How Does One Build Socialism Here?" Postcard from Venezuela By SAUL LANDAU

“The construction of socialism in Venezuela is ratified, and now we will take charge of deepening it.”
-President Hugo Chavez, after learning the results of the November 23 elections.
Hugo Chavez’s PSUV (United Socialist Party of Venezuela) won 17 of 23 governorships, approximately 60-40%. But his party lost in states with large populations and much oil as well in the mayor’s race for the crowded capital of Caracas.

Consumer-dominated societies fill spiritual voids with loud sounds and pictures: “BUY BUY BUY!”

Consumerism doesn’t seem compatible with historical awareness. Young Venezuelans I met seem oblivious to their recent history. Indeed, the majority of them were barely conscious or not yet born when successive gangs of kleptocrats – calling themselves political party leaders -- stole the nation’s oil revenue. In 1989, under the second round of super thief President Carlos Andres Perez (a supposed socialist), repressive forces killed as many as 2,000 demonstrators on the streets of Caracas during an uprising (the “Caracazo”) in response to Andres Perez’s decision that poor Caraqueños, not his wealthy amigos, should shoulder the burden of the IMF’s austerity plan for Venezuela.

Rich Venezuelans and US officials shook their heads in sympathy. Poor Carlos Andres had to take desperate measures to maintain necessary order! It was unthinkable to place the burden of doing with less on those who had most.

From the early 1960s through the mid 1990s, corruption and looting characterized both Christian and Social Democratic governments. Voters, disgusted with the larcenous behavior of one regime, would elect a successive group of politicians to steal the oil wealth.

In 1998, Chavez won the presidency. He swore to end “elite” rule and redirect the country’s oil wealth to education health and welfare – to the poor.

In ten years, hundreds of thousands have received medical care, some education and primary forms of welfare. He and his allies continue to win seats in free elections, and Chavez has announced he will hold a referendum in February to ask the people to allow him to hold presidential power until 2021.

Anti-Chavez sentiment, which inspired a failed military coup in 2002, has grown smarter. Newly elected opposition governor Capriles Radonsky participated in that coup, but now he has pledged to work with Chavez’s government to confront national problems. Didn’t McCain say that to Obama?

The good opposition cop finds its antithesis on the radio. On 747 AM, the talk show host sounds like a Spanish-speaking Rush Limbaugh. “I hate Chavez,” he screamed on December 1. Sound effects followed: gun shots reverberated as if to enhance the drama of his soliloquy on the evils of Chavismo, including 30 thousand Cuban doctors who offer primary care to Venezuela’s poor.
A taxi driver in Margarita, a forty minute flight from Caracas, also despised Chavez. Assuming I was a US tourist, and thus logically against Chavez, he sneered at “Senor Presidente.”
“Imagine, he angered the mighty United States and invited the Soviet Union or whatever they call themselves these days to bring in their warplanes and ships.” Another cab driver worried about crime and expressed cynicism about the possibility Chavez could realize his socialist goals.
“Corruption in this country,” said another cabbie from Margarita, “goes deep. The cop in the street to cabinet Ministers to the President’s family (referring to rumors of close Chavez relatives getting business favors in the state of Barinas).”

I look out the window at Margarita, a tropical island, once a perfect picture postcard, with brooding mountains, flapping palm trees, warm ocean water and tropical birds. Then came the developers who must have hired an evil teenager with acne of the soul to design the architecture. The rows of high-rise condo blocks should make Frank Lloyd Wright turn in his grave. Billboards carry gaudy ads for Digitel. Posters of busty young women in skimpy bras and dental floss bottoms urge: “buy.” Those who “need” a second or third home – including foreigners – purchase condos.

“How does one go about building socialism here?” I ask my friend who lives in Caracas.
We see the obstacles dramatically on the downtown streets of Venezuela’s teeming capital (4-5 million estimated), with wall-to-wall traffic twelve hours a day, spewing pollution and noise. For $2, a Venezuelan can fill his gas tank. How does one ban cars and shopping in downtown Caracas and expect to get reelected?

From a jammed McDonald’s in Chacaito we see masses of humanity, resembling Asian cities, pushing and shoving en route to shopping. Behind downtown, situated in a long valley, lie the barrios, etched into the surrounding hills. In these slums live Venezuela’s poor majority, Chavez supporters. They received little from the oil-rich governments of the past. Chavez has put back some of the wealth in the form of medical, educational and basic welfare programs. Cuban doctors have built modular clinics and members of literacy brigades have offered basic education in the poorest areas – free of charge. In addition, the Chavez government has offered healthy meals to the most down-trodden.

Unlike his mentor in the socialist island to the north, Chavez won power through the ballot box, not guerrilla war. Fidel Castro exported his enemies, with, ironically, US cooperation. Why not? In 1960, the powerful in Washington and the wealthy exiles biding their time in Miami, believed they could dispatch Castro and the revolution without even sending in US troops. In April 1961, the new President, John F. Kennedy, discovered their mistake when the CIA’s exile force fell to Cuba’s fledgling army at the Bay of Pigs.

As W prepares his exit, Castro remains vital in his new career as a writer (La Paz en Colombia, published in November). However, Chavez cannot export his enemies. Venezuela’s elite and the US government learned that lesson after 50 frustrating years of trying to overthrow the Cuban revolution from Miami.

An organized opposition makes political noise especially through elections – charges and counter charges, TV, radio and billboard ads. Imagine if Cuba’s revolutionaries would have had to transform the island’s economic and social structure with the presence of one million vocal opponents! Fidel had to deal with an angry Washington, but not with the daily stings and bites of his own wealthy classes who would pay for newspaper, TV and radio assaults and mount an international gossip network to demonize him.

Hugo Chavez’s socialist vision has emerged amidst a collapsing environment and world economy, in a country whose outward culture reeks of the worst of consumerism: maddening sounds of car horns, traffic jams, playing to the pounding of reggaetón reverberating over car and public speakers. Caracas reeks with dangerous anarchy – vast areas of poverty amidst the unshared wealth of a small minority. Consumption has become the spiritual value of capitalism: obsession with the superficial (Venezuela supposedly leads the world in number of boob jobs per capita).
Venezuela is still very much capitalist, not socialist. Chavez has learned in 10 years as President that change does not come easily through legislatures and courts when wealthy opposition politicians also use the media to help provide a formidable obstacle course to a just distribution of wealth.

Chavez lacks a large disciplined cadre to carry out his policies, a seasoned political party of people dedicated to doing nothing in life but work to change the course of their nation’s history.
“Oil in the hands of corrupt governments has corrupted this place,” says Jesus Marrero, who in 1973 underwent brutal torture supervised by Commissar Basilio. “He was obviously a big shot in Venezuelan intelligence circles (DISIP).” Marrero belonged to the Insurrectional Revolutionary Movement (MIR). “This man [Basilio] radiating cold cynicism” supervised sessions for months in which his men applied electric shocks to Marrero’s ears, testicles and penis.

“I escaped from prison in 1975,” he said, “and rejoined my comrades in the mountains. In October 1976, we saw the newspaper report on the bombing of a Cuban airliner in mid air killing everyone on board. The newspaper photo was none other than Basilio, identified as Luis Posada Carriles.”

Marrero wants to testify against Posada “as soon as Obama realizes this man is a real terrorist, unlike the Cuban Five (referring to five Cuban intelligence agents who provided material to the FBI on Cuban exile terrorism in Miami and got arrested and sentenced to long prison terms in federal penitentiaries).”

Marrero says Venezuela faces an awesome challenge. But “Chavez has illuminated the healthy road and we must overcome the garbage that clutters our minds and on our streets and work for justice and equality in a green world.” I nod. He has maintained revolutionary zeal through decades of exile in Mexico.

In 1998, he returned to work toward the same vision that enticed him to become a revolutionary forty years earlier. He helps bring solar energy to remote rural areas, to use the sun’s heat to make potable water and other necessities. If Chavez wins the referendum to continue until 2021, thousands more could join Marrero in his attempt to bring clean energy to the needy.

Saul Landau received the Bernardo O’Higgins award from the Republic of Chile for his work on human rights. His latest book is A Bush and Botox World (AK/CounterPunch Press).

18 December 2008, CounterPunch-US Political Magazine edited by Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St.Clair, their website is offered at no charge to the general public. New articles are generally posted every weekday. A batch of several articles, including the Poet’s Basement, are usually posted in the Weekend Edition.

Venezuela: ExxonMobil’s attack defeated in London court, oil giant forced to pay legal fees by James Suggett

Indonesian protest against ExxonMobil's theft of Venezuelan assetts


British Judge Paul Walker declared in a London courtroom today that the freezing of US$12 billion in assets of the Venezuelan state oil company PDVSA shall be revoked.

The decision is a major defeat for the world’s largest oil company, ExxonMobil, which had won the temporary asset freeze on February 7th in a dispute with PDVSA over the nationalisation of Exxon’s stake in a Venezuelan Orinoco River Belt project, known as Cerro Negro.


“We can say that we have won another battle, another victory for our people, for our government, and the most important is that it is another victory for our country”, declared Venezuelan energy minister Rafael Ramirez regarding the decision. The Venezuelan ambassador in London, Samuel Moncada, called the decision “the beginning of the end of ExxonMobil’s harassment of Venezuela”.


Moncada also said his country is “pleased” that the British court “refused to be utilised as an instrument of Exxon to impose itself in the international scene against Venezuela”. “The important thing for our country is that the campaign, the assault of lies and chaos [with which] they tried to install anxiety in our country and they tried to say that our national industry was broken, this was all discounted, because it was all a lie … it was part of, once again, this manipulation that they have forged against our people”, Ramirez said in an interview with the Venezuelan government television station VTV.


ExxonMobil’s lawyer Catherine Otton-Goulder, declined to comment on the decision. Judge Walker, who postponed the decision twice since the week-long case began February 28, will give a full explanation of his decision in coming days. PDVSA had argued that the London court does not have legal jurisdiction over the assets of a nationally owned foreign company that does not operate in Britain.


ExxonMobil argued the contrary, and had already won a court order in New York freezing $315 million in PDVSA assets in February. As a result of the case, Exxon is required to pay for PDVSA’s legal fees, which it says amounted to about $766,000. Also, PDVSA will pursue compensation for other damages, such as the devaluation of its bonds, increases in borrowing costs, and its inability to invest in refineries during the freeze, according to PDVSA lawyer George Pollack.


Meanwhile, PDVSA will regain full control over its assets in Britain, but the asset freezes ExxonMobil obtained in the Dutch Antilles, Holland, and New York will remain for now. “I think all Venezuelans can feel proud”, proclaimed Ramirez, vowing that the government will continue defending the “principles and sovereignty” of the nation against foreign aggression. He also assured that PDVSA would do all it can to clean up the image of Venezuela in the wake of Exxon’s actions. Ramírez had called Exxon’s efforts “judicial terrorism” in February because they went outside of the arbitration underway in the International Center for the Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) and sought to damage PDVSA’s reputation and credibility even though Exxon was offered indemnity.


“We have defeated ExxonMobil”, Ramirez elatedly announced, adding that “the decision is 100% in favor of Venezuela, the allegations of Exxon were discounted”, but said he would wait until the judge fully explains his decision before making any further comments, according to ABN news reports. Now, ExxonMobil and PDVSA will return to the process of ICSID arbitration where they had left off, Ramirez explained. Following the nationalisation of the Orinoco River Belt oil reserves in May 2007, the Venezuelan government required that the state hold at least a 60% stake in oil projects. It nationalised the stakes of several companies, including the Italian ENI, with which it reached an agreement for $700 million in compensation last month. Exxon, however, rejected Venezuela’s compensation offer of $750 million for a 41.6% stake in the “Cerro Negro” project.


The offer was based on the value of ExxonMobil’s stake according to PDVSA records at the time of nationalisation, PDVSA claimed, but ExxonMobil sought projected profits from the project and demanded arbitration. The maximum indemnity Exxon had attempted to negotiate was $5 billion before pursuing the $12 billion asset freeze, according to an announcement by Ramirez to the Venezuelan National Assembly in February.


The disparity in compensation claims prompted accusations that ExxonMobil’s efforts were part of an “economic war” against Venezuela. Since the nationalisations, state participation in the Orinoco River Belt has increased from 39% to 78%, and Venezuela remains Latin America’s largest producer of crude, with nearly half of its oil exported to the United States.


There is no sign that Venezuela’s termination of its business relationship with ExxonMobil on February 12 will be reversed, although PDVSA will honour its contract with the Chalmette refinery it co-owns with ExxonMobil. PDVSA and Mobil became business partners in 1997, before Mobil was acquired by Exxon. During this time period of the 1990s, known as the “Petroleum Opening” era, the 1976 nationalisation of Venezuelan oil was gradually weakened and PDVSA was granted autonomy, converting the company into what Ramirez called a “Trojan Horse” for international capital.


In contrast, the administration of President Hugo Chavez has promoted what it calls “petroleum sovereignty”. In addition to nationalising foreign controlled oil production projects, this policy has included channeling over $30 billion of PDVSA’s oil profits into Venezuela’s National Development Fund (FONDEN) between 2004 and 2007. The funds were invested in infrastructure projects, expansion of the Barrio Adentro health care system, environmental cleanup, and education, among other programs.


[Reprinted from http://venezuelanalysis.com/.]

From: International News, Green Left Weekly issue #744 19 March 2008.

US plans to divide Latin America frustrated by Federico Fuentes, Caracas

Reeling from the blow that it received in the aftermath of the Colombian military’s illegal incursion on March 1 into Ecuador — which resulted in the brutal massacre of a number of civilians and members of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), including its chief negotiator Raul Reyes — US imperialism has once again raised the ante in its struggle to undermine the growing process of Latin American integration.

Venezuela’s Bolivarian revolution, led by President Hugo Chavez whose government is spearheading the push to unite Latin American nations to counter US domination, is being specifically targeted. “The region is facing an increasingly stark choice: to quietly accept the vision of the terrorists and the demagogues, or to actively support democratic leaders”, US President George Bush stated on March 12.

Bush said his government was studying whether or not Venezuela should be added to its list of countries that “sponsor terrorism”. In Washington’s Orwellian world view — where war is peace and elected leaders are dictators — his comments were aimed at Venezuela’s democratically-elected government that is offering its services to assist with a negotiated peaceful solution to Colombia’s more than four decade-long civil war. Venezuela’s representative in the Organization of American States (OAS), Jorge Valero, hit back that same day, calling the US government “the terrorist government par excellence”.

Valero argued it was “an absolutely stupid thing to say from the government of Mr Bush … that practices state terrorism, that has invaded Iraq and Afghanistan without respect for international law, that commits genocidal practices in various parts of the world, that has invaded Latin American and Caribbean countries …”

Having viewed Latin America as its own backyard for decades, Washington is becoming increasingly concerned about developments south of its border. Its biggest headache is Venezuela, whose government has been making important headway in bring together governments of Latin America, as well as undermining capitalism inside Venezuela.

Washington has waged a constant public campaign (similar to its campaign against Iraq before the invasion) attempting to link Venezuela with narcotrafficking, terrorism, promoting an arms race, money laundering and threats to regional security. US-Venezuelan lawyer Eva Golinger argued on the Venezuelan TV show La Hojilla that this campaign is aimed at containing Chavez’s influence and undermining Latin American integration — a process aided by the election of a number of governments that, to varying degrees, have proven willing to exercise independence from Washington and pursue closer regional collaboration.

For Dario Azzellini, author of several books about US military intervention into the region, Colombia’s illegal cross-border attack (publicly supported by the US government, which funds and arms the Colombian military) was the first step in carrying out more serious military infractions across its border in order to provoke a response from Venezuela and lay the blame for the subsequent conflict at their feet.

“Their aim is to create massive destabilisation in a region where Colombia would play a similar role to that of Israel in the Middle East”, Azzellini told Green Left Weekly. “The Colombian government said that they had the coordinates of Reyes whereabouts for month, during which we can suppose that he moved between Colombian, Venezuelan and Ecuadorian territory as part of the current negotiations by the FARC in releasing prisoners.

So the question is why did they choose to carry it out in Ecuador? “It was a test, they wanted to do it in Ecuadorian territory and not in Venezuela to see what the international reaction would be.” Luis Bilbao, director of Latin American magazine America XXI, told GLW US imperialism had two aims in mind with Colombia’s attack (which was clearly coordinated with the US) — put a halt to the hopes for humanitarian accord with the FARC, who only days before had released four prisoners unilaterally, and sabotage the growing South American convergence.

Finding a political solution to Colombia’s current conflict is a danger to Washington, which has used it as justification to build up their military presence in Colombia. This is why the issue of peace in Colombia is so closely intertwined with the process of Latin American integration. Colombia's attack came just days before global protests in favour of a peaceful solution to Colombia's civil war and against state and paramilitary violence, which targets political activists, with more trade unionists killed in Colombia every year than any other country.

On March 6, hundreds of thousands marched across Colombia, defying threats of reprisals from paramilitaries. Associated Press reported on March 14 that six organisers of the march had been murdered, and two dozen more received death threats from the Black Eagles death squad. Moreover, Bilbao pointed out that in the immediate aftermath of this event, it seemed unthinkable that the meeting of the South American Community of Nations (Unasur, formed in April 2002 with the aim of creating a European Union-style body across South America) that had been scheduled to take place in Colombia at the end of the month could have gone ahead.

Such a turn of events would suit Washington, as the development of Unasur threatens the ability of the US to exert its control over the region on behalf of US corporate interests. Bilbao argued that the action was nonetheless a big mistake on the part of Colombia. Bilbao argued that “they didn’t attack Venezuela”, as Venezuelan foreign minister Nicolas Maduro had stated Venezuela expected, “because of the firm stance that Venezuela has taken and instead attacked Ecuador expecting a timid response … setting a precedent for further repeat actions in Ecuador and to extend this to Venezuela”.

However the firm stance by both Ecuador and Venezuela — both of whose governments broke diplomatic ties and moved troops to their Colombian borders — put Colombia on the back foot. In fact, rather than reverse the trend towards integration, the response to Colombia’s attack could mark an important regional realignment — assisting the process of regional integration. The most significant event was the summit of the Group of Rio held on March 6 and 7.

Televised live across the whole continent, representatives of all Latin American governments debated the issue without the presence of the US government. After a fiery debate, the meeting came to a unanimous decision to reject the actions of the Colombian government and any further violation of the sovereignty of another country. Crucially, the vote was a rejection of the doctrine of “preventive war” that the US has pushed since the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.

Ecuador and Colombia are pushing for the March 17 meeting of the OAS (of which the US is a member) to ratify the Group of Rio’s motion. Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa has stated bluntly that if the OAS meeting did not condemn the aggression, that it should be thrown “in the dustbin of history”. Arguing that it would be “difficult for the US government to oppose such a resolution”, Valero asserted that “I don’t believe the United States has sufficient strength to crush the will of the Rio Group countries”.

From: International News, Green Left Weekly issue #744 19 March 2008.

A Response to the Muder of Raúl Reyes in Ecuador, Uribe's Colombia is Destabilizing a New Latin America By JAMES J. BRITTAIN and R. JAMES SACOUMAN

Bush & Uribe

A few weeks after the Ecuadorian and Venezuelan state called on the Colombian government to respect the need for peace and negotiation with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia-People's Army (FARC-EP), the administration of Álvaro Uribe Vélez (2002-2010) supported an extensive armed air and land assault against the insurgency movement--not within Colombia's borders but rather on the sovereign territory of Ecuadorian soil.

On 1 March, 2008 the Colombian state, under the leadership of Uribe and Vice-President Francisco Santos Calderón (and his cousin Defence Minister Juan Manuel Santos), illegally deployed a military campaign within Ecuador, which resulted in the deaths of Raúl Reyes, Julian Conrado, and fifteen other combatants associated with the FARC-EP. Such actions are a clear display of the (US-backed) Colombian state's open negation of international codes of conduct, law, and social justice.

The actions of Saturday 1 March took place days before a major international demonstration scheduled for 6 March, 2008. Promoted by The National Movement of Victims of State-Sponsored Crimes (MOVICE), the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC), and countless social justice-based organizations, March 6th has been set as an international day of protest against those tortured, murdered, and disappeared by the Colombian state, their allies within the paramilitary United Self-Defence Forces of Colombia (AUC) and the newly reformed Black Eagles.

Recently, President Uribe's top political adviser, José Obdulio Gaviria, proclaimed that the protest and protesters should be criminalized. In addition, paramilitaries in the southwestern department of Nariño (not far from where the illegal incursions were carried out in Ecuador), have threatened to attack any organization or person associated with the activities scheduled for Thursday.

It is believed that the Uribe and Santos administration is utilizing the slaughter of Comandante Raúl Reyes and others as a method to deter activists and socially conscious peoples within and outside Colombia from participating in the March 6th events. Numerous state-controlled or connected media outlets, such as El Tiempo (which has long-standing ties to the Santos family), have been parading photographs of the bullet ridden and mutilated corpse of Raúl Reyes throughout the country's communications mediums. Such propaganda is clearly a tool to psychologically intimidate those preparing to demonstrate against the atrocities perpetrated by the state over the past seven years.

Over the past two months, numerous researchers, scholars, and lawyers have supported the call to declare the FARC-EP a legitimate force fighting against the corrupt Colombian state. In January 2008, Ecuador's Foreign Minister Maria Isabel Salvador argued that the FARC-EP should no longer be depicted as a terrorist organization. Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez too announced that the FARC-EP are far from a terrorist force but are rather a real army, which occupies Colombian territory and shares in a Bolivarian vision for a new Latin America.

Mexican deputy Ricardo Cantu Garza also has promoted the recognition of the FARC-EP as a belligerent force legitimately fighting against a corrupt and unequal sociopolitical system. As prominent US attorney Paul Wolf argued, the FARC-EP are a belligerent army of national liberation, as evidenced by their sustained military campaign and sovereignty over a large part of Colombian territory, and their conduct of hostilities by organized troops kept under military discipline and complying with the laws and customs of war, at least to the same extent as other parties to the conflict. Members of the FARC-EP are therefore entitled to the rights of belligerents under international law there is no rule of international law prohibiting revolution, and, if a revolution succeeds, there is nothing in international law prohibiting the acceptance of the outcome, even though it was achieved by force.

From Copenhagen to Caracas, numerous state officials have denounced the description of the FARC-EP as a terrorist organization. Progressive officials and administrations in Mexico, Ecuador, and Venezuela have rather opted for the status of belligerent or irregular forces to more accurately depict the FARC-EP domestic and geo-political stance. Disturbingly, in the face of this evidence and the FARC-EP's consistent promotion for a humanitarian prisoner exchange and peace negotiations with the state in a demilitarized zone in southwestern Colombia, the Uribe and Santos administration has moved ever farther away from supporting an end to the civil war within Colombia by opting for systemic violence.

Over the past several years, different aspects of the FARC-EP's real social, political, and cultural activities for progressive social change have been censored or marginalized by the private press or governments in support of the Colombian state. Nevertheless, after researching the FARC-EP and the country of Colombia for years, Garry Leech argued that "while there is little doubt regarding the global reach of terrorist organizations such as al-Qaeda, there is no evidence that the FARC is anything but one of the armed actors in Colombia's long and tragic domestic conflict".

In actuality, the FARC-EP are actors within the strategic confines of Colombian society that aim their directives at domestic social change. In light of such realities, how can this insurgency be a terrorist threat to external nation-states? Coletta A. Youngers responds to this question by describing how the U.S. government now views the Latin American region almost exclusively through the counterterrorist lens, though the region poses no serious national security threat to the United States little evidence has been put forward to substantiate such claims, and whatever activity is taking place there appears to be minimal.

While Youngers does not trivialize its revolutionary tactics, she clearly argues that the FARC-EP cannot be correctly framed within the concept and rhetoric of global terrorism. Youngers argues that the insurgency is not a direct political threat to administrations within the United States, Canada, the European Union and any other foreign nation-state in the fact that the FARC-EP activities "are targeted inward, not outward," hence, "applying the terrorism concept to these groups negates their political projects".

Characterizing the FARC-EP as a foreign terrorist organization dramatically alters the dynamics of the peace process in favour of a killer state. Stipulating that the FARC-EP is terrorist results in the inability for legal peace negotiations to take place between the FARC-EP and any government that subscribes to the categorization. Promoting the FARC-EP (and their supporters) as terrorists "puts them on the list of targets to be assaulted by the US military machine" and "thus subject to total war," according to James Petras and Henry Veltmeyer. The terminology of terrorism is perfect for imperialist ideology and expansionism. It is a very open-ended reference that "allows maximum intervention in all regions against any opposition" and "that any group engaged in opposing militarism, imperialism (so-called "globalization") or local authoritarian regimes could be labelled "terrorist" and targeted", thus legitimizing external invasion or attack.

Internal and external condemnation of the Colombian state has fallen upon the deaf ears of the Uribe and Santos administration. After years of increased violations of civilian human rights, the ongoing suppression of trade-unionism, assassinations of left-of-centre activists and politicians, and a political reality that has witnessed 75 governors, mayors, and Congressional politicians alleged or found guilty of having direct links to the paramilitary--including Vice-President Francisco Santos Calderón and his cousin Defense Minister Juan Manuel Santos and President Uribe's brother Santiago and their cousin Senator Mario Uribe--now the Colombian state has deemed it necessary to illegally encroach upon those nations that deviate from their ideological model of political and economic centralization. Not only has the Uribe administration criticized their neighbours but after the actions realized on 1 March, 2008 it is clear that the Colombian state, with the full backing of the United States, will impose its own ideological goals and values, through force, regardless of the democratic rights and privileges of conventional electoral law and procedure.

While the neighbouring states of Ecuador and Venezuela struggle for peace and try to assist the people of Colombia in the quest for an end to the civil war, the Uribe and Santos administration has bypassed judicial realities and governance to impose its own objectives. Careful analysts of the Colombian situation continue to debate whether the Colombian state is pre-fascist or actually fascist. It is certainly neither humane nor actually democratic. The current Colombian state must be transformed, sooner rather than later. Those fighting for peace must condemn the action of this regime. In solidarity, we must protest the policies of the Colombian state and raise our voices in support for a New Colombia which stands for Peace with Social Justice.

James J. Brittain (Assistant Professor) and Jim Sacouman (Professor) are Canadian sociologists at Acadia University in Nova Scotia who have been researching the Colombian civil war and political economy over the past decade. They can be reached at: james.brittain@acadiau.ca

from http://www.counterpunch.org/

Exporting Health Care, Oil and Health in Venezuela By PATRICK IRELAN

Simon Romero of the New York Times never fails to report the slightest flutter of bad news from Venezuela. On February 9 of this year, under the headline "In Venezuela, Faith in Chávez Starts to Wane" he tells us that--despite the blessings of large oil reserves--food shortages and "outbreaks of dengue fever" have the populace in a foul mood.

I previously dealt with the problem of food shortages on February 13 and again on February 21 at this site, but I wrote nothing about dengue or its deadly variation known as dengue hemorrhagic fever (DHF).

Perhaps Romero was in a hurry, but if he had checked a story released by the Bolivarian News Agency (ABN) on February 8, the day before his own story appeared in the Times, he might have seen this headline: "Venezuela is First Country to Show Progress in the Fight against Dengue."

Under this headline, Romero and the entire staff of the NYT could have read the article's opening sentence: "Members of the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO), who are visiting Venezuela, said that Venezuela is the first nation of the region to make great progress in the fight against dengue." The PAHO is the regional office of the World Health Organization (WHO).

Maybe Romero and the Times assumed that President Chávez made up this story and ordered the ABN to foist it on an unsuspecting continent. But it seems to me that Mr. Chávez might be too busy dealing with FARC rebels and the Colombian invasion of Ecuador to fiddle around in a newsroom in Caracas, and nobody at the World Health Organization has denied the truth of the ABN story anyway.

Incidentally, as of the 12th of February, 118 cases of dengue had been reported in Puerto Rico, where one has to assume that faith in George W. Bush is starting to wane.

Dengue and DHF exist throughout South America, Central America, Mexico, and the Caribbean. Some countries do a better job than others of fighting these diseases. Why has Venezuela been so successful? One could ask the same question about health care in general in Venezuela, a country where every success excites the hatred of the American Empire.

The explanation for this pathological hatred may lie in the fact that, given the socialist leanings of its current government, Venezuela dares to use its resources to provide health care at no charge to all its citizens who need it, especially the poor. Previous Venezuelan governments have promised free health care in the past, but they never had enough clinics and sympathetic doctors to turn the promise into reality. The Chávez government has both doctors and clinics.

By contrast, the rulers of the American Empire tell us that we cannot afford to provide free health care for our people. We're obligated instead to spend trillions of dollars to create and detonate weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and Afghanistan. It's for their own good, of course. We're trying to bomb them into free and democratic societies.

But how unusual this Chávez fellow is. He has no interest in WMD. He says that Venezuela will soon become an "a superpower in food production." Instead of continued reliance on the United States, Venezuela now manufactures its own tractors. If you want to improve public health, it seems, you must first prevent malnutrition and starvation.

For the best health care possible, you also need doctors, clinics, and all the benefits of medical science. In Venezuela, the most representative expression of the Bolivarian Revolution's attitude toward health care has been the growth of the Misión Barrio Adentro (Inside the Neighborhood) movement. "It entailed placing doctors in urban shantytowns and rural villages where few Venezuelan doctors would dare to tread. To many poor Venezuelans, that was a revolution in itself." (Bart Jones, ¡Hugo!, 2007, p. 288)

Where did Venezuela find these doctors? What country could produce doctors filled with revolutionary ardor, doctors who would gladly go where the poor people lived?

In October of 1999, Fidel Castro traveled to Venezuela for a fraternal reunion. He and Chávez visited the tomb of Simón Bolívar. They traveled to Sabaneta, Chávez's boyhood village, where he and his grandmother had lived in a hut made of mud and straw. Chávez and Castro played baseball. Actually, Fidel, at age 75, only managed his team, although he did pinch hit in the last inning. He was called out on strikes, but disputed the call.

By the time Fidel left for home, he and Chávez had agreed about matters important to both countries. Venezuela would sell oil to Cuba at affordable prices. Cuba would pay for this oil in cash and medical assistance. Four hundred fifty Cuban doctors already in Venezuela would remain there and staff the new clinics Venezuela would build.

By 2004, the number of Cuban doctors in Venezuela had increased to 13,000. Cuba had also been training medical students from Venezuela. Today, ten years after Chávez was elected, Venezuela has a new generation of doctors who are eager to help the poor. Young ophthalmologists, for example, now work in free eye clinics throughout the country.

John Otis of the Houston Chronicle went to visit one of these new clinics, where he met 73-year-old Celestino Granados, one of 110 cataract victims from El Salvador. The nine doctors at the clinic removed the cataracts for all 110 at no charge. Venezuela even paid their air fare.

"I see perfectly," Granados told Otis a few days following his surgery. "I can even see the color of your eyes." Then he and the others flew back to El Salvador. Not one of those people could have afforded to pay for cataract surgery, which now costs about $1500 in traditional clinics in Latin America. (Houston Chronicle, June 18, 2007)

How does Venezuela pay for this health care? Most of the money comes from oil revenue. Some critics find this immoral. "They couldn't do those things without all that oil," they say.

That's right. They couldn't. But they do have the oil, and they spend it to help the poor. There used to be a great deal oil in Texas. But Texas never brought in hundreds of people to have their cataracts removed at no charge. In Houston, they sent people to the moon and built the Astrodome. If you had cataracts, would you like to visit an Astrodome you couldn't see, or would you prefer to regain your sight and look at the moon from your back yard?

Critics say the doctors and clinics in Venezuela are bad because their success promotes socialism. What should they promote? Faith healing?

Given all the publicity about eye clinics, the Times was sure to send Simon Romero back to Venezuela to report the latest news. In an article published on February 26, he recounted his visit to the Hospital Luis Ortega in the city of Porlamar, where Romero's news was as grim as always. "Paint peels from walls neglected for years." If this isn't bad enough, take note of the "unconscious patients." Their cots are "strewn near the reception desk."

The place sounds almost as bad as one of those American hospitals where doctors amputate the wrong limb. Or maybe they amputate the right limb, but from the wrong patient.

In spite of all the cots strewn in his path, Romero found his way to "a recovery room tucked away at the end of a dim corridor."

Regardless of the peeling paint and the dimness of the corridor, a team of ophthalmologists has successfully restored the sight of 96 men and women from Nicaragua. And, yes, they all got free airfare.

Just to keep his story fair and balanced, Romero hurried back to Caracas, where he spoke with Mirtha Noguera, president of the Venezuelan Ophthalmology Society. She thinks all this sight-restoration business is okay, but that it causes the health care system to neglect "other pressing health needs in Venezuela." This may or may not be a good point, but it probably doesn't matter anyway, because, as Ms. Noguera says, "Doctors are emigrating because they cannot earn decent salaries."

To be honest, I don't think the plight of underpaid doctors is really going to engage the sympathy of most newspaper readers here in the Middle West. We're more likely to empathize with Marden Espinoza, 69, a retired math teacher, one of the Nicaraguans who has by now returned home with his sight fully restored.

The sad fact for Ms. Noguera is that Venezuela is rapidly gaining a great many doctors who don't require millions of dollars before they'll help a retiree from a poor country regain his sight. I don't know what she plans to do after all the doctors in the Venezuelan Ophthalmology Society have emigrated because "they cannot earn decent salaries."

But here's my suggestion for Ms. Noguera's job search. At the inauguration of the new Dr. Osío de Cúa Hospital in Miranda, President Chávez pointed out that between 1997 and 2007, "[T]he number of primary health care clinics in Venezuela increased from 4804 to 11,373" (Kiraz Janicke, Venezuelanalysis.com, February 20, 2008)

Eventually, the paint in all those clinics will start to peel. Paint supplied at no charge, but bring your own brush.

Patrick Irelan is a retired high-school teacher. He is the author of A Firefly in the Night (Ice Cube Press) and Central Standard: A Time, a Place, a Family (University of Iowa Press). You can contact him at pwirelan43@yahoo.com.

from http://www.counterpunch.org/

SOME THINGS YOU SHOULD KNOW ABOUT EXXON MOBIL! DID YOU KNOW…

Exxon Mobil has broken the record for the biggest profit in US corporate history for 3 years in a row (2005, 2006, and 2007). In fact, as far back as May of 2003, after the invasion of Iraq forced gasoline prices sky high, Exxon broke the record for the biggest quarterly profit ever made by a US corporation.

Exxon Mobil’s annual revenue surpasses the gross domestic product of all but the 25 wealthiest nations.

Exxon Mobil is the world’s largest privately owned oil company.

IF EXXON MOBIL IS DOING SO WELL, WHY DID THEY GO TO COURT IN THREE DIFFERENT COUNTRIES (THE UNITED STATES, UNITED KINGDOM, AND THE NETHERLANDS) TO FREEZE ASSETS WORTH $12 BILLION BELONGING TO VENEZUELA’S STATE OIL COMPANY, PDVSA?
Before Venezuela’s Bolivarian Revolution, when a popular government was elected, Venezuelan oil was sold to the highest bidder, with benefits from oil production mainly going to foreign companies and a few wealthy Venezuelan business leaders. Despite its huge corporate wealth, Exxon and other oil companies paid Venezuela royalties amounting to a just 1 percent of the value of extracted oil.

Since the Bolivarian Revolution, the Venezuelan government has decided that the people should share in the benefits of oil development. Oil profits have helped fund many new social programs, such as food subsides for 40 percent of the people; an educational system that provides services to almost half the population; and a health care system that is reaching millions of poor people. In fact, since 2002, the poverty rate has fallen from 54 percent to 38 percent. With health care and food subsidies taken into account, the rate is well below 30 percent.

Venezuela now consults indigenous and rural communities affected by new oil development and it requires steps be taken to repair environmental damage resulting from oil exploration—something Big Oil never did. Minimizing environmental damage and including affected communities in development decisions are two more reasons Venezuela insists Big Oil honor its oil sovereignty.

EXXON MOBIL DOESN’T CARE ABOUT DEMOCRACY OR SOCIAL AND ENVIRONMENTAL BENEFITIS—IT WANTS ONE THING: OBSCENE AND UNJUST ACCESS TO OIL PROFITS!

Exxon Mobil is insisting that the Venezuelan government adhere to old agreements from past governments that ignored citizen needs in favor of Big Oil companies. Now that the people of Venezuela are demanding their fair share, Exxon Mobil is saying, “No—we want it all!”

Venezuela adopted a new Hydrocarbons Law in 2001, ratifying Venezuela’s sovereignty over its natural resources. In July of 2007, the Venezuelan government invited companies operating in the Orinoco Oil Belt to negotiate a smooth turnover of majority control to PDVSA. Chevron, BP, Total, ENI, Sinopec, and Statoil all cooperated with the handover, while Conoco Phillips and Exxon Mobil refused. Existing contracts provided for Exxon Mobil and Conoco Phillips to take the matter to international arbitration. While Conoco Phillips continues to participate in that process, Exxon Mobil has decided to pursue coercive and aggressive court actions, freezing PDVSA’s assets.

Whether in Venezuela, Iraq, or elsewhere, Exxon Mobil doesn’t want people’s needs or national sovereignty to get in the way of profits. For example, the US government is urging passage of an Iraqi Oil Law that would turn over 66 to 75 percent control of Iraqi oil fields to Exxon Mobil and the other biggest oil companies. Recent polls show that two thirds of all Iraqis oppose the oil law. In this regard, US government and Exxon policies are the same toward both countries--take what you can and don’t let anyone or anything—not even democracy—stand in the way!

THE BUSH ADMINISTRATION AND EXXON ARE PARTNERS IN WAR, THEFT, AND ATTACKS ON PEOPLE’S CHOICE:

The people of Venezuela and Iraq both want to have the ultimate say about oil development in their nations. The Bush Administration’s and the US government answer to Iraq have been to choose war and occupation over justice and the popular will. Their answer to Venezuela has been to try to isolate the country internationally, to illegally fund electoral campaigns there, and to fund coup attempts, like the failed coup against the Venezuelan government in April, 2002.

Exxon Mobil CEO, Rex Tillerson was a major donor to the Bush-Cheney campaigns and to candidates that support administration policies toward both Iraq and Venezuela.

By maneuvering to freeze PDVSA’s assets, Exxon Mobil is effectively joining in US government efforts to once more try and destabilize Venezuela’s elected government.

EXXON MOBIL’S AGGRESSIVE ACTS TO FREEZE PDVSA ASSETS IS ANOTHER EXAMPLE THAT THEY ARE WILLING TO DO ANYTHING TO MAKE A BUCK—EXCEPT HONOR THE RIGHTS AND THE WILL OF THE PEOPLE! NO WONDER VENEZUELA’S PRESIDENT HUGO CHAVEZ RECENTLY REMARKED:

“Never again will they rob us—the Exxon Mobil bandits. They are imperial, American bandits, white-collared thieves. They turn governments corrupt, they oust governments. They supported the invasion of Iraq.”

For more information: Australia Venezuela Solidarity Network
Read/download this useful information sheet.

Venezuela resists ExxonMobil’s blackmail by Kiraz Janicke, Caracas

“This is pure judicial terrorism”, Venezuelan energy minister Rafael Ramirez told reporters in Caracas on February 8, in response to court injunctions obtained by US-based ExxonMobil Corp. — the world’s largest oil corporation — in January.

The injunctions froze more than US$12 billion worth of assets of the Venezuelan state-owned oil company PDVSA in Britain, the Netherlands and the Dutch Antilles. ExxonMobil, parent company in Australia to Esso and Mobil, has also frozen $300 million of PDVSA funds held in a US bank account. “If they think that with this they will get us to backtrack on our nationalisation policies, well, gentleman from ExxonMobil, you are dead wrong again”, Ramirez declared.

As part of a drive to recover full sovereignty over its natural resources, the Venezuelan government of socialist President Hugo Chavez nationalised ExxonMobil’s 41.7% stake in the Cerro Negro project in the Orinoco oil belt in May last year with an offer for compensation. Other major oil companies including US-based Chevron Corp., France’s Total, Britain’s BP PLC, and Norway’s Statoil negotiated deals with Venezuela to remain on as minority partners in the Orinoco oil belt projects following the May 2007 nationalisations.

As well as ExxonMobil, US-based company ConocoPhilips also rejected the nationalisations, but has said it is seeking an “amicable resolution” with Venezuela. ExxonMobil, however, rejected an initial compensation offer from Venezuela and has demanded arbitration. Although the oil giant has not specified how much it wants in compensation, it said its investment in the project was valued at $750 million at the time the assets were taken over. The injunctions were solicited by ExxonMobil in anticipation of an arbitration ruling by the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes over a compensation claim.

The court cases are ongoing, and the next hearing in London is scheduled for February 22. The Venezuelan parliament has passed a motion declaring the injunctions illegitimate, claiming it violates Venezuelan sovereignty using the argument that only Venezuelan courts should decide on issues relating to Venezuelan resources. Ramirez accused the US company of using the legal case to destabilise Venezuela, by creating panic over its finances.

The country’s dollar-denominated bonds have experienced their sharpest drop in six months because of fears the government could face a protracted legal battle. PDVSA is a crucial source of funds for the Venezuelan government’s social programs that provide free education and health care to the poor. In 2006, the company spent $13.3 billion on such programs, up from $6.9 billion in 2005. Ramirez said Venezuela was “being attacked by a transnational corporation”, and insisted that Venezuela would not back down from its policy of full oil sovereignty. He declared that “we are going to beat them in this battle”. During his weekly television show, Alo Presidente, on February 11, Chavez argued that ExxonMobil’s actions were part of a US government-backed “economic war” against Venezuela. “They will never rob us again, those bandits of ExxonMobil”, Chavez said.

He described the corporation as “imperialist bandits, white collar criminals, corrupters of governments, over-throwers of governments, who supported the invasion and bombing of Iraq and continue supporting the genocide in Iraq”. Chavez threatened that unless the injunctions were dropped, Venezuela would cease selling oil to the US. Venezuela accounts for 12% of US crude oil supplies, according to US energy department figures from November. Chavez said: “If the economic war continues against Venezuela, the price of oil will reach $200 [per barrel]. Venezuela will take up the economic war and more than one country is inclined to join us.” Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega offered his support to Venezuela, claiming the moves were “a clear imperialist offensive against Venezuela”, and that Venezuela “can count on the unconditional solidarity and approval of the Nicaraguan people”.

On February 12, PDVSA issued a statement explaining that it was freezing all its business dealings with ExxonMobil in retaliation against the injunctions. The previous day, PDVSA instructed its traders to deposit oil receipts with the UBS bank in Switzerland in a move to protect its assets. The actions by ExxonMobil have been roundly rejected by the vast majority of Venezuelans, who rightly see this as an attack on their national sovereignty and right to control their own resources. Protests have been occurring all around the country, including by the oil workers at the nationalised Cerro Negro plant (now renamed Petromonagas).

On February 14, thousands of Venezuelans turned out in the rain at PDVSA headquarters in Caracas to reject Exxon’s imperialist aggression. Many people spoke of the need to mobilise against US aggression, to deepen the struggle for socialism, and to defend the democratically-elected Chavez government. Further demonstrations outside the US embassy have been called, and there are plans for massive mobilisations across Venezuela. Journalist Mari Pili Hernandez, who spoke at the February 14 demonstration, said the most significant thing was that for the first time in ExxonMobil’s history — since its origins as Rockerfeller-owned Standard Oil in the 19th Century — an entire country has stood up to the corporate giant.

There is a real sense of national pride in this defiance. There has also been a sense of anger among poorer sectors towards the reaction of the pro-capitalist opposition — based on the elite that governed Venezuela before Chavez came to power — who have largely sided with ExxonMobil in the dispute. The US-funded opposition have gloated over the freezing of PDVSA’s assets and blamed the government for its nationalisation policies — once again exposing them as lackeys of US imperialism, as well as revealing their hostility to policies that benefit the majority of Venezuelans. Luis Carvajal, a union leader at the Cerro Nero/Petromonagas plant said: “This transnational has exploited our wealth, our workers and violated our rights — all the workers in the Orinoco oil belt support the nationalisation.”

[Kiraz Janicke is a member of the Green Left Weekly Caracas bureau. This article is largely compiled from articles originally posted on Venezuelanalysis.com. The Australia-Venezuela Solidarity Network has produced an online sign-on statement in solidarity with Venezuela against ExxonMobil’s attacks, which calls for ExxonMobil to withdraw its legal actions.

The AVSN is also seeking to initiate an international day of protest against ExxonMobil and in defence of Venezuelan sovereignty for February 29. To sign the statement, and for details of protest actions, visit http://www.venezuelasolidarity.org/?q=node/2397.]

From: International News, Green Left Weekly issue #740 20 February 2008.