May 2009 Archives

From the great Bloggings by Boz:

When Human Rights Watch released its report "A Decade Under Chavez," which criticized Chavez's efforts to repress criticism and opposition of his government, Chavez had the HRW personnel detained and deported from the country.

Yesterday, after HRW criticized the Venezuelan government's harassment and intimidation of media, particularly Globovision, the government raided property belonging to the network owner.

I'm convinced the Venezuelan government is actively trying to increase the credibility of Human Rights Watch by following up all of HRW statements with government actions that immediately prove them correct.

Caracas Chronicles is definitely one of my most favorite blogs, which I read religiously.  Today they have a posting of some excellent legal commentary from an anonymous expert.  It's a very valuable contribution to help understand how the government of Hugo Chavez has taken over the judiciary, allowing for the corruption and persecution of political prisoners such as the case against Eligio Cedeño.

To continue our commemoration of the event that made our justice Simply Red and our democracy Simply Dead, I've asked a Venezuelan legal scholar - who comments here as Capablanca - to contribute his thoughts on the state of Venezuela's legal system.
Capablanca says: On January 26, 2006, in the opening act of the Judicial Branch's activities for that year, Venezuelan Chief Justice Omar Mora Diaz, speaking in front of Chávez and other prominent political figures, proudly stated that the Venezuelan judiciary was, at last, free from external political interference. The AD & COPEI era of judicial submissiveness was gone, and a new time of true judicial power had arrived. Shortly afterwards, several judges started spontaneously singing "Uh, ah! Chávez no se va!" showing everybody what judicial independence meant in Chavista jargon.

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez's international popularity has long depended upon two things:  the belief that he acts in the interests of the poor and the workers (an assumption that we disagree with), and second, the enormous amounts of oil cash he can dispense like Santa Claus, dropping tractors into Honduras, employing a large percentage of the nation of Cuba, or even making this relatively small country the world's largest purchaser of Russian arms.  However, with the crunch of the economic crisis, the Chavista piggy bank to purchase loyalty and support abroad is running dry, leaving him with a lot less influence.

So reports Simon Romero of the New York Times:

In recent years, Mr. Chávez has used his nation's oil wealth to drive his socialist-inspired agenda at home and draw other countries in the region into his sphere of influence, helping to consolidate a leftward political shift in parts of Latin America.

Surely most readers have come across the crass new name for Hugo Chavez's $15 cell phone, but this blog post at ARS Tecnica does the best job getting to the bottom of it (and arranged for the best graphic arts!):

"Verga" is a Venezuelan slang term for "penis." The fact is glossed over in some Spanish newspaper accounts, which say that the phone's name only signifies "excellence." But, as The Guardian points out, the root word retains prominence. And Chavez can't keep himself from chuckling when he says it.

As other Spanish-language sources have noted, the phone is already known as the "penis cellphone" in the US, and Chavez isn't above making jokes about the name. "Whoever doesn't have a Vergatario is nothing," he said.

That's all odd enough, but the phone's launch was then timed to coincide with... Mother's Day, and Chavez made a big show of calling his mother on one of the devices during a TV appearance.

Suddenly and without explanation, Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has canceled his trip to Latin America this week, where he was expected to visit Brazil, Ecuador, and Venezuela.  The announcement comes amid domestic political struggles for Ahmadinejad as well as a speech by Sec. of State Hillary Clinton warning on Iran's presence in Latin America.

A poll conducted in Peru has found that a majority of citizens support the government's decision to grant an asylum request to the Venezuelan politician Manuel Rosales, whom Caracas is pursuing on charges of corruption - which lawyers describe as politically motivated.  Although the Peruvian government has claimed that the asylum would not affect their relations with Venezuela, Hugo Chavez ordered the withdrawal of their ambassador in protest.

At 4:40AM today, a substantial earthquake was felt in the central region of the country, measuring 5.4 degrees on the Richter scale - though there were no reports of injuries or deaths.  "Fortunately, we have not yet received any reports of material or structural damage," Interior Minister Tareck El Aissami said on state television. "Residents who are in the street should return to their homes."  According to Francisco Garcés, president of FUNVISIS, the first quake lasted 15 seconds, with a 4.0 aftershock being felt 13 kilometers to the southeast of Los Teques.

Over the weekend a Venezuelan military helicopter crashed in the state of Táchira, killing 17 high ranking military officers and prompting an investigation by the CICPC into the cause of the accident.  One of the fatalities included General Domingo Faneite, who commanded a significant theatre of operations near the Columbian border.  Meanwhile President Hugo Chávez had a busy weekend, denouncing a U.S. report on terrorism, threatening to crack down on caudillos within his own party, and brushing off requests from the Colombian president to arrest FARC members seeking refuge in Venezuelan territory.