Partners In Crime
Why Lawlessness Works For Chávez and PutinBy Robert R. Amsterdam
Thursday, January 22, 2009; A17The administrations of Hugo Chávez in Venezuela and Vladimir Putin in Russia are enjoying a robust, burgeoning friendship. Though they are separated by 6,000 miles, the two leaders' bond is sealed not only by their similar tastes for repressive authoritarianism, oil expropriations and large arms deals but also by parallel trends of increasing violence and murder on the streets of their cities.
The most high-profile political murder since the 2006 slaying of Anna Politkovskaya took place in Russia on Monday, when 34-year-old human rights lawyer Stanislav Markelov was shot, point-blank, in the head. The student journalist accompanying him was also killed. Three days earlier, radio journalist Orel Zambrano was assassinated in Venezuela, the second journalist killed there in as many weeks. Human rights groups have denounced the murders, but few seem to see that the conditions leading to violent crime in Russia and Venezuela are no accident.
Putin and Chávez preside over a pervasive sense of violence and insecurity in their capitals, which has resulted in parallel, politically motivated attacks against the opposition. In Russia, this trend has been illustrated by the shooting of Politkovskaya and, more recently, the near-fatal beating of journalist Mikhail Beketov, among many others. Last month alone in Venezuela, there were 510 violent deaths, leading Foreign Policy magazine to deem Caracas the "murder capital of the world."
In Putin's Russia, attacks by self-described nationalists against foreigners have gained international media attention -- helped in part by a video of a gruesome beheading that has been spread on the Internet. In Venezuela, three leaders of opposition student unions have been killed in street attacks, including University of Zulia organizer Julio Soto, who was shot 20 times in Maracaibo in October. Both countries have experienced rising public demonstrations of discontent during the economic crisis, and the rallies have been met with heavy-handed repression by police.
Since Putin and Chávez are said to rule with "iron fists," a menacing question arises: Why have they been unable to stem the tide of crime in their streets? Is it a reflection of incompetence, or is there some tacit benefit to keeping a society imprisoned under a cloak of severe insecurity and moral panic?
Some answers became clear to me during a recent visit before a congress of student leaders in Caracas. These impressive young men and women, who cooperate across the political spectrum, take on enormous risks in assuming political consciousness. In Bolivarian Venezuela, political discrimination has been institutionalized by the pervasive use of blacklists, and those who oppose Chávismo accept a future of divisiveness and lost opportunities.
This political landscape is eerily similar to what has happened in Russia under Putin; the citizenry experiences the same helplessness and fear in the face of a leviathan cloaked in the misappropriated vocabulary of democracy.
The similarities are striking: Whether its banner is "21st Century Socialism" or "Sovereign Democracy," neither administration is comfortable discussing the considerable fortunes that have been amassed by government officials or the impunity of the corrupt. Both in Putin's Russia and in Chávez's Venezuela, the state has become the principal instrument used by predatory business groups, which employ the authority of the courts, regulatory agencies and police to seize assets, influence deals and enrich themselves at the people's expense. This relationship is particularly noxious because it is grounded in the insecurity of the populace.
While the relationship between Russia and Venezuela is outwardly manifested by military showmanship, it is actually an alliance of entrepreneurial convenience meant for a small group of beneficiaries. For the heads of state-owned businesses, for example, things are flourishing. A plethora of military hardware sales agreements have been signed, while Russian national energy firms enjoy multiple exploration licenses in Venezuela's Orinoco Belt that most multinational companies would be denied on principle.
In both countries, key members of the opposition are barred from participating in the regime's continuous political campaign. The fight to suppress real opposition is waged through constitutional amendments that create an appearance of competent rule but actually are designed to exclude opposition. What is not accomplished by faux legalism is carried out through government-backed neighborhood militias or extreme nationalist youth groups.
In my discussions with the Venezuelan student leaders, I was struck by deep parallels with the conditions faced by Russian civil society leaders, such as Oleg Kozlovsky, whose courage has never faltered in the face of attacks, arrests, threats and harassment from official and unofficial sources. It occurred to me that the monstrous violence on the streets of Caracas and Moscow is perhaps useful to both regimes -- and that in their incompetence at delivering public security, they have found a convenience that contributes to their grip on power.
The first step toward improving this situation is to drop the pretense that these two governments have constructed a vertical structure of power and recognize that they have institutionalized a horizontal structure of incompetence -- one characterized by violence, insecurity and impunity. It's time we summoned the political will to hold such world leaders accountable for the rights of their own people by all means available, regardless of how much oil they export.
Robert R. Amsterdam is an international lawyer who represents political prisoners in several countries, including Eligio Cedeño in Venezuela and Mikhail Khodorkovsky in Russia. He blogs at www.robertamsterdam.com.
Dear Robert Amsterdam
Chavez is a funny kind of "authoritarian"
Venezuela's Newspapers, Radio, TV, are all dominated by those opposed to him, his party and his policies. Some of whom participated in the attempted coup of April 2002.
People freely criticise him and demonstrate in Churches, universities, work places, streets and malls against him and his policies.
He holds regular local, regional and national elections all supervised by international observers - all judged by them to be free and fair. He immediately accepts the will of the majority - even when it is only 51.1% in the previous referendum that opposed his reform agenda. He immediately accepted the loss of Caracas District in the last State/Regional elections.
Please report the facts - not the propaganda that proceeds from Washington.
Many thanks, Luke.
I write the facts, and suggest you review the use of the blacklists, maintaining of political prisoners, and the stacking of the courts in Venezuela. Also all these votes you talk about occur every six months or so, invariably about Chavez's unending attempt to cling to power and further consolidate state power.
How can the outside world hold a guy like Vladimir Putin accountable? Sadly, as far as I can see (admittedly a true novice in this area) the means do not seem to exist.
As widespread as human rights values are, they have not spread so far as to allow for all nations to judge a leader according to the same, or even similar, basic criteria.
Putin is very popular in Russia, as everyone knows. How to hold him accountable with that kind of democratic support - not to mention the economic and political clout he has?
It is very easy to make them accountable. Go after their money. Putin is a figurehead only, backed by a cabal of state officials, many of them in the MVD (Ministry of Interior), which had made themselves multi-millionaires during these past two administrations.
Take international legal actions to freeze their money, and strip Putin of his visa to travel to Europe. The second the Russian government is humiliated to the point that they can't even fly to Paris, you would see major changes overnight.
Dear Robert Amsterdam, being a criminal defence/ fraud lawyer I sympathise with your struggle to expose those who are not fit to be called state leaders of their county. I wish you luck in your forthcoming Khodorkovsky trial which I'm sure will reignite maximum political schockwaves through the already battered system.
Off the Record:- I would be delighted to offer my services to your efforts in any way possible.
Regards
Chris
But Stephen, we all know that the West relies on Russia for gas and oil. To anatagonise Russia to that extent would surely be detrimental?
The only path that seems open, to my mind, is to educate the Russia people. Make them realise that Putin & Cronies are reviving Russia's status in the world at the expense of basic human values.
However, this will be tough because, in my opinion, the Russian people seem groggy under the influence of their recent material gain. They do not seem to care so much about the trampling of human rights - rather, they revel in the prospect of Putin giving the opulent, snobbish West a bloody-nose at every opportunity.
Dear Robert Amsterdam,
We all know that there are problems in Venezuela but your article is completely over the top. First of all define whtat "a political prisoner" is? I imagine that you know that it is a person jailed for his political beliefs. There are NO cases of this in Venezuela. Give us the names instead of writing in generalities.
Stacking the Supreme Court. I suggest that you expolain to your readers how supreme court judges are appointed in Venezuela. It's not like in the US where the President names the judges. Chavez had nothing to do with this process, so how could he stack the court?
Blacklists? I assume you mean the famed Tascon list? This list was used so as to prevent opposition from obtaining posts in government institutions and industries, such as the oil industry. Why? Since the 220-2003 oil sabotage the government cannot afford to employ potential saboteurs. And before you talk about discriminstion of human rights, tell us how many communist synmpathizers are employed at NASA or in the Pentagon? It's the same as the US so this means that both countries are practising discrimination or human rights violations according to your standpoint.
Since 1998 there have been 14 elections or referendae in Venezuela. Chavez lost the reform vote in December 2007 and acepted the defeat two hours later.
Let's face it - Venezuela has the world record for elections and universal suffrage. All voting has been declared clean and fair by the Carter Center, EU, OAS etc. as well as indpendent observers.
I find it incredible that you do not mention these FACTS so as not to bias your article too much. The article you write about Venezuela is hardly "fair and balanced" to say the least and if you believe what you have written, then you are at least badly informed, or at worst spreading mendacious propaganda.
Mr. Rosales,
Perhaps we need to debate why Venezuela has so many "elections." They are in a permanent campaign dictated by Chavez, always concerning measures to extend his personal power. This has absolutely nothing to do with ideology, social programs, or even the pretense of the government agenda - it is about one man's power ... if it weren't, why wouldn't somebody else from the party take over?
Furthermore, you fail to identify one erroneous fact in the article. It is true that there were 510 murders in Caracas in December alone, and that crime and public security is completely out of control. Today the Inter-American Commission of Human Rights has just condemned the murder of the journalist mentioned in the article, while the front page of the newspapers carried yet another story of a poor young man gunned down for no reason.
Second, you are probably aware that it is a violation of the Venezuelan constitution to reintroduce bills, referendums, or enmiendas a second time after they have been defeated. This is blatantly what Chavez is doing right now.
Lastly, here are a list of some, but certainly not all political prisoners, who have suffered undeniable violations of their constitutional right to due process.
Nixon Moreno
Felipe Rodríguez
Humbert Quintero Aguilar Henry Vivas Hernández
Lázaro Forero López
Otoniel Guevara Pérez
José Sánchez
Iván Simonovis Aranguren
Rolando Guevara Pérez
Otto Guebauer Morales
Marcos Hurtado
Héctor Rovaín
Juan Guevara Rodríguez
Eligio Cedeño
Silvio Mérida
Raúl Díaz Peña
Julio Rodríguez
Farael Neazoa
Arube Pérez
Ramón Zapata
Luis Molina
Erasmo Bolívar
Luis Rodríguez Villamizar
Diana Mora
Delfín Gómez Parra
Gustavo Arriaz
Unsurprisingly, I disagree with the gist of the article. But there's just one point I'd raise (Venezuela's homicide rates), because that's the article's "pivot".
I looked up Venezuela’s historical homicide rates (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_homicide_rate), / 100,000.
1986 - 8, 1990 - 14; 1995 - 23; 1999 (Chavez comes to power) - 28; 2003 (homicide peak, attempted coup/PDVSA strike) - 59; 2007 - 48.
So it seems that a) the homicide rate there was on an upward trend, for whatever reason, since well before Chavez came to power and b) the peak was reached while he was still relatively weak and around the time of the political disturbances and PDVSA strike of 2002/3.
The period after that, when the Bolivarian rhetoric heated up and Chavez became one of Washington's bogeymen, has seen a stagnation or small improvement.
Just to give another perspective...