"There is an increasing evidence that the Government has been unable to contain dissent through dialogue and resorted to the police and repression to do so." The somewhat heated words of the former guerrilla leader of the Venezuelan Revolution Party (PRV), Douglas Bravo, came minutes after troops of the Aragua police and the Military Intelligence Directorate (DIM), detained him yesterday, without specifying any reason. "Four of us were traveling to Falcón, where a forum was being held. When we were near Cagua, the state police stopped us and surrounded us," said Bravo, who has as of late gone public with criticisms and disagreements with the Chávez government. Without any court order, Bravo, who also represents the Humanist People's Front, explained that he had to wait for two hours until the DIM appeared and told them it was simply "routine". "This is a violation of human rights and democratic freedoms. There is a persecution of dissidents. Anyone who has a critical view is immediately harassed," he said.
Reporters Without Borders expressed concern at the imminent closure of the open signal broadcast of the television channel Globovision, and, through a public statement, said the closure of media would be a "whim" of President Chávez. "President Chávez recently announced that Globovisión would leave the airwaves for not changing its editorial line, adding pressure to the administration and to justice. In the respect that this is a 'health problem', as he has previously done, the President has chosen a remedy worse than the disease. The suspension of its terrestrial frequency would be the culmination of a genuine harassment, legally questionable, against the channel for its content," said the journalists' organization. Reporters Without Borders recalled that on June 16 Conatel opened a fourth administrative proceeding against Globovisión, noting that the first three might, among other things, lead to a suspension of the signal by 72 hours.
The Mayor of Caracas, Antonio Ledezma, asked the Organization of American States to declare the President Chávez a mockery of democratic rule. During his meeting with OAS Secretary General Jose Miguel Insulza, Mayor Ledezma said that dialogue is the solution to the governance crisis facing the country. "I told the secretary general that there are neo-dictatorial governments when the Legislature and the Judiciary are not autonomous, which is currently happening in Venezuela and because of that I asked them to go to Venezuela to confirm this unfortunate situation," said Ledezma. "The OAS cannot be indifferent, cannot remain silent when in a country that is part of that organization is violating the constitution daily. We are able to show how items articles of the Constitution are ignored or violated when the president agrees, for example, to attack decentralization, attack free speech or ignore property rights," said Ledezma.
Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and Venezuela's Vice President and Minister of Defense, Ramón Carrizalez, presided yesterday over the signing of an agreement to establish a Russian-Venezuelan bank. Signing the agreement were the Russian Deputy Minister of Finance, Dmitri Pankin, Venezuela's vice-minister of Finance and Economic Affairs, Gustavo Hernández, according to Russian agencies. The ceremony took place in Novo-Ogariovo, rural residence of Russian head of state, on the outskirts of Moscow. The government assumes that Russia will have a 51 percent stake, said Deputy Minister Pankin, and PDVSA and Venezuela's National Treasury will be the other shareholders.
Eleven countries are represented in the Bolivarian Alternative for Latin America (ALBA) summit, held today in Venezuela to welcome Ecuador and two island nations of the Caribbean, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, and Antigua and Barbuda. Up to now, the presidents of Bolivia, Evo Morales, of Ecuador, Rafael Correa, and Nicaragua, Daniel Ortega, have so far confirmed their participation but it is unknown whether Cuban president Raúl Castro will be present, according to President Chávez. Also attending, according official Venezuelan state media, the prime ministers of Dominica, Roosevelt Skerrit, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Ralph Gonsalves, and Antigua and Barbuda, Baldwin Spencer and the Foreign Ministers of Grenada, Peter David, Honduras, Patria Rosas, and Paraguay, Héctor Lacognata. ALBA, now composed of Bolivia, Cuba, Dominica, Honduras, Nicaragua and Venezuela, will expand on Wednesday with the accession of three new countries, while Paraguay and Granada will continue as observer nations. "ALBA continues to grow, we are already nine nations that make up this space of where a new project is being constructed, a radical space we could say, though not the only one, but the core is stronger, more dynamic," President Chávez stressed on Sunday.
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