English Edition Nº 33

Pg. 7 | Culture Venezuela is hosting this year’s World Body Art Conference, an unusual and spectacular gathering of artists using corporal expression to impact humanity

FRIDAY  October 15th, 2010  No. 33  Bs. 1  Caracas

Pg. 8 | Opinion

Paul Craig Roberts analyzes how the Western world is losing what’s left of its morality

ENGLISH EDITION The artillery of ideas

Nationalizations advance agricultural development

Currency Revolution

A new currency, the SUCRE, is making waves in South America and enabling nations to decrease dependence on the US dollar for regional transactions. The SUCRE was launched last year by member nations of the Bolivarian Alliance of the Americas (ALBA) and permits direct commercial transactions between the central banks of participating countries.

This week, Bolivian and Venezuelan companies used the SUCRE to exchange food products. “It’s liberating”, declared the Presidents of both nations.

Recent nationalizations of several private companies charged with speculation and bad practices are enhancing Venezuela’s development Last week’s nationalization of Venezuela’s Monsanto, Agroilseña, a Spanish-Venezuelan company, is already improving the business of farmers and agricultural producers by substantially lowering costs of fertilizers and seed products. The company was caught illegally hiking prices well above 60% of market rates. Other expropriations announced this week in the oil and petrochemicals industry will also enable more affordable costs for small businesses and producers.

Economy

Cars, not bombs

A joint venture between Iran and Venezuela, Venirauto, is creating the nation’s first automobile industry.

Social Justice

Cuba and Venezuela advance in social reforms

In comparison to more developed nations, Cuba & Venezuela are leading the race to achieve the Millennium Development Goals.

Economy

Housing solutions

The Venezuelan government is providing housing to hundreds displaced by heavy rains last month.

President Chavez in Russia this Week

Venezuelan model promoting biodiversity will be presented in Japan

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he balance between human beings and nature is the model that the Bolivarian government will present at the Biodiversity Summit to be held from October 19-29 in Nagoya, Japan.

Leading up to the summit, a forum was held at Venezuela’s Pedro Gual Institute of Higher Diplomatic Studies in order to discuss the model in the country, debate various perspectives on biodiversity and highlight the achievements made in Venezuela on these issues.

Jesus Manzanilla, Director Gen-

eral of Biodiversity at the Ministry for the Environment, stressed that the Venezuelan delegation to attend the summit in Nagoya will present the National Conservation Strategy for Biological Diversity, which was developed with the participation of communities within the country.

“The strategy promotes the relationship between humans and nature as a development model based on ecological, cultural, social, and political sustainability”, he revealed.

Manzanilla added that Ven-

ezuela will defend the right of all people to have access to biodiversity and its resources.

Venezuela also will participate in the upcoming Green Festival in the United States from October 23-24. Claudia Salerno, Special Presidential Envoy for Climate Change from Venezuela, will speak at the progressive event, presenting her country’s position for the upcoming climate summit in Cancun as part of a panel discussion on “The Coalition Between Governments of the Global South and Environmentalists”.

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enezuelan President Hugo Chavez is on an official visit to Russia this week, meeting with his colleagues, Russian President Dimitri Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, to further solidify agreements and cooperation between both nations.

During the visit to Moscow, Presidents Chavez and Medvedev signed the statutes creating a new Binational Russian-Venezuelan Bank. The financial venture will enable the consolidation of economic relations between the two countries in diverse areas, such as transportation, energy, science, technology and education.

Prime Minister Putin visited Venezuela last April and signed thirty-one cooperation agreements with the Venezuelan government in what was considered a significant expansion in relations. Accords included a venture between Venezuela’s state-owned PDV-Marina de Venezuela and Russia’s Sovcomplot to establish a strategic association for the construction of oil tankers to guarantee an autonomous maritime transportation system for oil and gas.

President Chavez’s visit to Russia this week also led to an agreement for university-level exchange programs, which will strengthen educational and cultural ties between the two diverse nations.

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IMPACT

The artillery of ideas

Nationalized companies reduce prices, increase production Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez announced the nationalization of two additional companies deemed strategic to the country’s economy last Sunday during his weekly television program, Alo Presidente, broadcasting from the state of Aragua

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he company Venoco, a producer of lubricants and other petro-derived commodities, and the mixed Venezuelan-US-Italian company Fertinitro, a producer of agricultural fertilizers, will now be owned and operated by the Venezuelan state.

The nationalizations came in the wake of the expropriation last week of the transnational agrobusiness, Agroisleña, and the nationalization of the British Vestey Group’s properties in Venezuela.

Chavez has referred to this latest wave of nationalizations as the recovery of “propiedad patria” or homeland property.

“We’ve been working on this for a while in order to construct a sovereign country”, the Venezuelan head of state said on Sunday.

“Now you’re going to see how we’re going to begin to lower the cost of these products and liberate the workers”.

Venoco, a company that worked as a contractor for the state oil company PDVSA, is one of Venezuela’s largest producers of motor oil and brake fluids as well as a manufacturer of household detergents derived from petro-chemicals.

REDUCING COSTS The Venezuelan President accused the company of speculation and price inflation.

According to Chavez, stateowned PDVSA produces the base for lubricants but “later the private business comes along and buys the raw materials. They have plants, money, and workers who, in the majority of cases, are exploited. They produce the lubricants and sell them for four

or five times more than they are really worth”.

Telesur reports that Venoco’s management had also been cited by the Venezuelan government for labor and environmental violations since 2008.

Vice Minister for Petro-Chemicals, Asdrubal Chavez, after meeting on Sunday with the Executive Board of the company and members of the labor union that represents a majority of Venoco workers, confirmed that the employees have expressed their support for the government takeover.

“We’ve received total support to go ahead with this action. The workers are very grateful for this decision… to expropriate this company and they are offering

all of their support and efforts to continue producing and to even increase production”, stated Vice Minister Asdrubal Chavez during an interview with Radio Nacional de Venezuela.

Jose Marinez, Secretary General of the union which represents 415 of the 700 Venoco workers, said during a demonstration held at the company on Sunday night that he’s expecting the working conditions to improve as a result of the government’s intervention.

“There were a lot of irregularities here, among which was the existence of many sub-contracted colleagues. There were people that had been working up to 40 years in Venoco and didn’t receive any kind of benefits, vacations, or social secu-

rity. We’re sure that with socialism, this is going to end”, he affirmed.

Saul Ortega, National Assembly Representative from the state of Carabobo, was present during the meeting with management and expressed his assurance that the nationalization process will be smooth.

According to Ortega, the conversations held with the company’s executive board were “cordial” and the transition of the company from the private to the public sector will occur “without trauma”.

The second company nationalized on Sunday, Fertinitro, is also a manufacturer of petrochemicals.

Jointly owned by the Venezuelan state entity Pequiven, the US firm Koch, and a subsidiary of the Italian oil company Eni, Fertinitro is one of the largest producers of nitrogen-based agricultural fertilizers in the world.

President Chavez said the plant would be put to use in the implementation of the government’s agricultural production and food sovereignty plans.

AGROPATRIA Following up on the expropriation of the transnational agricultural supply corporation Agroisleña, Chavez announced

on Sunday that the company will be renamed Agropatria and the supply products once offered to farmers at elevated prices will now be available at considerably reduced costs.

Seeds, fertilizers, and agrochemicals will all see an average reduction in price of 49.3% thanks to the state takeover of the company, the Venezuelan president explained.

By way of example, Chavez highlighted the price of rice seeds, which will now be available to producers for 1.9 bolivars per kilo, whereas before they were sold at 4.1 bolivars.

Similarly, a 50-kilo bag of urea used for fertilizer will see a reduction in price from 46 to 18.9 bolivars.

Land and Agriculture Minister informed that the price reductions are intended to make supply products more accessible for small producers and increase the agricultural potential of the country.

Agroisleña, one of the largest agricultural supply companies operating in Venezuela was expropriated on October 5th for speculative business practices and the promotion of toxic agricultural methods.

The takeover of the Spanish company marks renewed efforts on the part of the Chavez government to consolidate its agricultural reforms and lessen the South American nation’s dependence on food imports.

On Sunday, the Venezuelan head of state approved the disbursement of 565 million bolivars in credits to be granted to the farmers dependent on Agroisleña for agricultural supply loans.

Chavez guaranteed that the new company, Agropatria, “is going to continue, legally and without exploiting anyone, to attend to the farmers that need credit at an interest rate of 8%, as is stated by law and not double that rate, which was what Agroisleña was doing”.

The new funding will come from Venezuela’s Agricultural Bank, the Socialist Agrarian Development Fund (Fondas), and the nation’s Bicentennial Fund.

T/ Edward Ellis P/ Presidential Press

INTERNATIONAL

The artillery of ideas

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Argentina protests Britain’s war games in Malvinas Islands

his week, Argentina presented before the United Nations a copy of the formal protest Buenos Aires conveyed to the British government over London’s plans to hold military exercises in the disputed Malvinas (Falklands) Islands, Ambassador Jorge Argüello said Monday.

“We will ask UN secretary-general (Ban Ki-moon) to distribute among the members of the organization a copy of the protest to put on record this new violation of United Nations resolutions”, Argentina’s envoy to the world body told state news agency Telam.

“And we will insist on the task with which the UN General Assembly has already charged him (Ban Ki-moon), which is to carry forward this action of good faith aimed at the opening of bilateral negotiations about sovereignty”, Argüello said.

The UN Special Committee on Decolonization issued a resolution in 1965 urging London and Buenos Aires to negotiate the future of the Islands, but Britain refuses to discuss the question of sovereignty over the South Atlantic archipelago that Latin Americans call the Malvinas.

The quarrel dates from 1833, when Britain occupied the islands, and sparked a brief but bloody war in 1982.

Britain “cannot refuse to negotiate sovereignty”, the Argen-

fledged fighting in the islands officially began on May 1, 1982, with the arrival of a British task force, and ended 45 days later with the surrender of the Argentines. The conflict claimed nearly 1,000 lives – some 700 Argentines and 255 British soldiers and sailors.

tine diplomat said. “Moreover, it cannot unilaterally grant fishing permits in conflict waters, cannot explore or exploit minerals and petroleum on disputed territory, or conduct missile exercises”.

The Argentine navy was notified by Britain about the planned missile tests in the Islands, Argentina’s deputy foreign minister said Saturday.

“Argentina expresses its most energetic protest and demands of the British government that it refrain from carrying out those military exercises”, Alberto D’Alotto said.

Hours later, Argentine President Cristina Fernandez said on her Twitter account (@CFKArgentina) that she ordered the Foreign Ministry to summon British Ambassador Shan Morgan to receive a formal protest.

“Typical 19th-century colonialism. Anachronistic use of force, violating International Law. They don’t care. Clear example of double standards”, the Argentine leader tweeted of Britain’s stance.

“Synthesis. Pirates, forever?”

Fernandez wrote in a subsequent Twitter post.

Chinese to aid in gold and aluminium exploitation P

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resident of Venezuela, Hugo Chavez, informed this Sunday that a Chinese technical commission of diverse mining expertise is in Venezuela to provide technological support for the design of gold and aluminium projects.

“They are here to work with us, to cooperate in the technological design of projects to exploit, process and utilize aluminium and gold, and to enhance the Venezuelan iron and steel industry (Sidor)”, announced the head of

state during his weekly TV and radio show Alo Presidente.

The Commission visited the Sidor facilities on Monday and set up working groups with twentytwo representatives from diverse companies, who are all interested in developing several projects related to mining and technological production. Venezuela has about 30 billion in proven gold reserves, as well as large coltan mines and other minerals that are strategic for the development of the country. China is providing technolog-

ical support for the exploitation of these resources.

“Venezuela has become a great strategic ally of the People’s Republic of China”, underscored President Chavez. The two nations have dozens of cooperation agreements worth several billion dollars. Venezuela ships over 300,000 barrels of oil daily to China and plans to increase that amount to over one million barrels in the next few years.

T/ Venezuelan News Agency

Relations between Argentina and Britain have been tense since early this year due to oil exploration by British companies in the disputed islands.

Britain has rejected an offer

by US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to promote a dialogue between London and Buenos Aires on the islands.

The Islands may hold up to 60 billion barrels of crude oil, the British press reported.

Argentine troops invaded the Falklands on April 2, 1982, at the order of the military junta then in power in Buenos Aires. Full-

REGIONAL SOLIDARITY Venezuela, by means of a statement released on Sunday by the Foreign Ministry, expressed its solidarity with the Argentine people and their government in view of upcoming British military exercises on the Malvinas Islands.

The Venezuelan government “exhorted Latin American and Caribbean countries to react immediately in rejection to these actions” and suggested neighboring nations “not give any kind of logistical support to the ships and aircrafts taking part on these operations”.

Venezuela also demanded the UK “cease its unacceptable colonialist behavior, which places the continent’s security and peace at risk”.

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez also expressed his solidarity directly to Argentine President Cristina Fernandez via Twitter: “Cristina, all our Bolivarian solidarity for you and the beloved people of Argentina. Down with colonialism! The Malvinas are Argentina’s”.

T/ CO with reporting from EFE

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ECONOMY

Housing solutions a priority

The emergency law, which would require 110 votes to pass in the National Assembly, was sent earlier this week to the legislative body for debate.

The Chavez administration is finding long-term solutions to solve the nation’s housing problems. This week, announcements were made to immediately provide new homes for hundreds of families who lost everything in last month’s heavy rainstorms

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n a move designed to combat the current housing shortage facing the capital city Caracas, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez announced the construction of 50 thousand new homes to be built in the city’s expansive military complex, Fuerte Tiuna.

The declaration was made during a visit to a newly erected high school in the military sector located in southwestern district of Caracas. Chavez called for the underutilized military zone to be transformed into the “Great City Tiuna” where the poorest residents of the city currently living in precariously constructed shantytowns that line the hills of the capital will have the opportunity to live a better life.

“I’m beginning to see in reality what was before was a dream”, the Venezuelan head of state said to the students in the new school.

The artillery of ideas

“I dreamed that one day Fort Tiuna would be converted into a city with high schools, primary schools, and dignified housing for those most in need”.

According to the President, the current inequality in housing is the product of more than a century of economic injustice.

“The hills filled with shacks in Caracas are the result of 100 years of capitalism, where the rich live in chalets and the poorest over there, in shacks”, he remarked.

EMERGENCY SOLUTIONS In a further attempt to resolve the housing issue, Chavez proposed during his weekly television program on Sunday, Alo Presidente, an emergency law to assist in the recovery of abandoned and underutilized urban lands for home construction.

The law would also facilitate government intervention in sham building projects carried out by private contractors as well as put an end to the usurious business practices of

some real estate companies.

According to the Venezuelan head of state, some 167 thousand families have made complaints about illegal business practices in the housing sector ranging from false constructions to 300% increases in monthly rents.

“It’s theft”, Chavez declared of the dubious real estate practices that have affected both the lower and middle classes. “Now there is a government here that is going to protect everyone”, he affirmed.

HOMES FOR DISPLACED On Monday, President Chavez also announced via his Twitter account (@chavezcandanga) that over 1,000 homes will be obtained for the families left homeless by recent flooding in the capital city.

“The displaced families are my priority”, the message read. “I’ve approved 258 million bolivars [US$60 million] to acquire 1,138 homes for these compatriots. Socialism is Solidarity!” he wrote.

Over the past two weeks, the issue of housing has become a priority of the Chavez administration after heavy rains in the capital region exposed the severity of the problem. According to the mayor of Caracas, Jorge Rodriguez, more than 21 homes collapsed due to landslides, close to 1,000 residents have been left homeless, and 8 people have been killed.

Chavez has since elevated the issue of adequate housing to the state level, considering it a personal responsibility to resolve.

“The government that I manage will not rest until there is justice in Venezuela for everyone”, he exclaimed last Friday in reference to housing.

T/ Edward Ellis P/ Agencies

Cuba-Venezuela undersea fiber-optic cable operational in 2011 A

n undersea fiber-optic cable between Cuba and Venezuela will be operational in July 2011, the Cuban Vice Minister of Informatics and Communications, Alberto Rodriguez, said last Friday.

Rodriguez added that the cable will contribute to the promotion of cooperation ties between Cuba and Venezuela and it will also strengthen national sovereignty and security.

“It will enable greater quality in info-communication services and create more favorable conditions for confronting future developments”, he added.

The main cable will link the northern Venezuelan city of La Guaira with eastern Santiago de Cuba and it has a 640-gigabyte-

per-second capacity. Waldo Roboredo, Vice President of Telecomunicaciones Gran Caribe S.A., the Cuban-Venezuelan joint venture that will operate the undersea cable, said the island will multiply its current data, image and voice transmission speeds by 3,000 and it will reduce operational costs by 25 percent and could be extended in the future to Haiti, the Dominican Republic and the Dutch territories of Aruba, Curaçao and Bonaire.

According to the expert, the cable covers a distance of 5,340 kilometers and its cost is $70 million USD, with a lifespan of 25 years.

Roboredo noted that these technological advances would not imply an end to Cuba’s current

satellite-based Internet service, which is all Havana is allowed due to United States unilateral restrictions against the island.

Washington prevents Cuba from accessing the Internet via undersea cables, one of which connects Cancun, Mexico and Miami and passes just 32 kilometers (20 miles) northwest of Havana.

Cuba has had a satellite-based Internet link since 1996 that offers a 65-megabyte-per-second upload bandwidth and a 124 Mb/s download bandwidth, but any modification of the channel must be licensed by the US Treasury Department.

T/ Cuban News Agency (ACN)

ECONOMY

The artillery of ideas

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Sucre: regional currency advances integration and independence

enezuela and Bolivia took further steps in the strengthening of regional economic integration and the creation of a financial system independent of the United States when the two South American nations successfully completed a commercial transaction using a new virtual currency.

The transaction took place on Friday when the Venezuelan state-owned company Aceite Diana imported 5,000 metric tons of crude soy oil from the Bolivian company Gravetal for the price of 4.24 million Sucres.

“Today we’re making the first business deal between a Venezuelan and Bolivian firm without the necessity of using the dollar.

This is a sign that we are becoming free”, said Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez.

The Sucre, or Unique System of Regional Compensation, is a new regional currency named after South American field marshal and independence hero, Jose Antonio Sucre.

It was first devised in 2008 to operate as a payment system for commercial activity between member states of the Bolivarian Alliance of the Americas (ALBA), a regional group created in 2004 to promote integration and cooperation between Latin American nations outside the purview of the United States.

ALBA members currently include Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador, Cuba, Nicaragua and the Caribbean countries of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Dominica, and Antigua and Barbuda.

sents a new way of doing business in Latin America.

“It’s a new industrial architecture that challenges the concept of transnational commerce which contaminates, exploits workers, excludes people and carries the wealth to other countries”.

The first transaction with the Sucre took place between Venezuela and Cuba last February.

In July, Venezuela used the currency to import over 5,000 tons of rice from Ecuador for 1.9 million Sucres.

One Sucre is currently equivalent to US$1.25.

The transactions are carried out electronically between the Central Banks of participating countries and are made effective in local currencies, eliminating the need for the dollar.

Bolivian president, Evo Morales referred to the transaction that took place on Friday as historic and hailed the initiative as an important step away from the international financial institutions that have historically dominated Latin American economies.

“It’s a way to free ourselves from the International Monetary Fund, from the dollar”, Morales said. “The Sucre will the base for ALBA countries, and hopefully all of South America, to have a single currency”.

Amenothep Zambrano, Executive Secretary of ALBA, also praised the initiative for the break that it represents with the region’s dependency on international finance capital.

“Regional finance banks always gave us political conditionalities and led to the centralization and concentration of capital in a few hands. Alternatives like the Sucre and the Bank of ALBA are promoting a new type of economy”, Zambrano affirmed.

The Executive Secretary explained that the measure repre-

PRIVATE TRANSACTIONS INCLUDED Although the Sucre was originally designed to facilitate the commercial transactions of state owned firms, the Venezuelan government announced last week that it would now be open to private businesses as well.

The utilization of the Sucre offers particular advantages for businesses in Venezuela, a country that has enacted strict foreign exchange regulations to protect its economy from capital flight and currency speculation.

Now, instead of having to request dollars through the state’s foreign exchange provider, Cadivi, private business can simply make purchases by depositing the local currency, the bolivar, in an account that is transferred to the Venezuelan Central Bank.

Those purchases are in turn transferred, electronically, in the form of Sucres to the central bank of the vendor nation, allowing the producer to withdraw the payment in the local currency.

According to economist Ramon Jose Paris, the use of the Sucre will be an incentive for business, as it will represent lower costs compared to the dollar.

“If the mechanism is efficient, Venezuelan producers and importers are going to be motivat-

ed to use [the Sucre] because in financial terms, it’s going to be cheaper”, he said.

In Bolivia, the transaction that took place on Friday was met warmly by members of the business community.

The General Manager of the National Chamber of Bolivian Exporters, Jose Rivero, applauded the measure as a new opportunity for vendors to access the Venezuelan market.

“We’re grateful for the initiative which has gone very well.

The system is now up and running and businesses are going to use the Sucre to commercialize their products in Venezuela”.

President of the Micro and Small Business Confederation in Bolivia, Marco Gonzalez, explained that the Sucre marks an important advance in efficiency that will help small producers and exporters.

“The transaction is immediate.

For that reason we don’t have to wait for payment. [The Sucre] allows us to carry out transactions and sales much quicker so we can continue to produce and export”, he stated. President Morales mentioned on Friday that Bolivia is hoping to utilize the Sucre for the future sale of rice, books, and textiles to Venezuela.

According to the Bolivian head of state, the benefits the Sucre will bring to Bolivians and Venezuelans are the product of the “important bilateral meetings that have been carried out to strengthen our economic relations”.

T/ Edward Ellis

No, they’re not making bombs, they’re making cars!

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ran Khodro, the country’s largest automaker, aims to quadruple to 60,000 the number of cars it assembles each year in a venture with the Venezuelan government.

Venirauto Industrias CA is a joint venture owned by Venezuela, Iran Khodro and Iran’s second-biggest carmaker, the Saipa Group, Iran Khodro’s export deputy, Yaser Seifvand, said in an interview yesterday at his company’s headquarters outside Teh-

ran. The South American plant’s current annual output is 16,000 vehicles, Seifvand said.

“We are still at the initial stage and need to reach our full potential at this site” in Venezuela, said Abdolazim Sadian, Iran Khodro’s deputy chief executive officer responsible for exports, speaking in the same interview. “We have suggested a plan and are waiting for feedback from the other party”.

Sadian declined to quantify the amount of investment needed for Venirauto to boost production, saying that the joint venture’s owners were in talks about this.

Sadian and Seifvand did not specify the respective shareholdings in the car-assembly project, which the two countries set up in 2006.

Venirauto assembles Iran Khodro’s Samand LX passenger car, a five-speed, manual-transmission model that sells in Ven-

ezuela as the Centauro. The plant also makes a Saipa car with a 1.3liter engine that it markets locally as the Turpial.

Venirauto’s planned expansion would enable it to assemble additional Iran Khodro models, Seifvand said. Iran Khodro, founded in 1962, produced about 680,000 vehicles in the last Iranian calendar year that ended on March 20.

T/ Ladane Nasseri

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SOCIAL JUSTICE

The artillery of ideas

Cuba and Venezuela advance with social planning

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ore than 130 countries of the United Nations met from September 20-22 to review progress toward the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). In 2000, the UN established eight modest MDGs with measurable targets to be achieved by 2015, including: eradicating extreme poverty and hunger; achieving universal primary education; promoting gender equality; reducing child mortality; improving maternal health; combating HIV/ AIDS, malaria and other diseases; ensuring environmental sustainability; and developing a global partnership for development.

In the United States, the richest country in the world, workingclass living standards are dramatically decreasing. If global statistics show any improvement, it would likely be due to advances in China, the world’s most populous country, which still retains strong elements of socialist planning.

The UN funding plan for achieving the MDGs is based on the unrealized — and unlikely, especially in the case of the US — projection that industrialized countries will contribute 0.7 percent of their gross domestic product to achieving these goals. During the conference last month at the UN, Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez pointed out, “Those same countries are also mostly responsible for a worldwide military spending that amounts to $1.4 trillion USD, equivalent to 2.4 percent of the world’s GDP”.

On the other hand, Cuba has shown the Millennium Development Goals are achievable when the capitalist drive to maximize profits is eliminated. An article in the Cuban newspaper Juventud Rebelde, titled “Millennium goals only attainable with new economic order”, reported, “Rodriguez said that Cuba has achieved many of the MDGs, while reaffirming the country’s commitment to support third world nations in moving forward to eradicate extreme poverty and hunger”.

“He said the nation’s progress towards reaching the millennium goals has been possible thanks to a

socialist revolution that prioritizes the well-being of citizens, in a climate of equity, social justice and solidarity. `Cuba has made great achievements, despite the halfcentury US-imposed blockade’”.

At the UN MDGs summit, Venezuela’s Vice-Minister of Foreign Affairs for North America, Jorge Valero — who also serves as Venezuela’s ambassador to the UN — highlighted the social achievements of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela. A press statement from the Venezuelan Mission to the UN stated, “From 1999 to 2009, 60 percent of all public revenues in Venezuela have gone towards in-

vestment in social programs”.

According to VenGlobal News, Valero affirmed, “Our levels of poverty exceeded 49 percent in 1998 and dropped to 24.2 percent in 2009.

And our levels of extreme poverty decreased dramatically from 29.8 percent in 2003 to 7.2 percent in 2009.

The UN Economic Commission on Latin America and the Caribbean has recognized that Venezuela is the country that has most diminished inequality in our region”.

Valero also informed that unemployment in Venezuela fell more than 50 percent from 1998 to December 2009, when it reached 6.6 percent.

During the conference, the Venezuelan ambassador explained that Venezuela has advanced in the promotion of gender equality and the rights of women. “Four of the five branches of government in Venezuela are run by women”, he affirmed.

“Venezuela succeeded in eradicating illiteracy in 2005, an achievement recognized by UNESCO. Venezuela will reach universal primary education, a significant reduction in the maternal mortality rate and a decrease in the spread of HIV/ AIDS, amongst other objectives yet to be achieved, prior to 2015”, announced Valero.

The Venezuelan representative also highlighted the support Venezuela has given other countries in the region so that they can reach their objectives under the MDGs, through initiatives like the Bolivarian Alliance of the People of Our Americas — People’s Trade Agreement (ALBA-TCP), Petrocaribe and the Bank of the South”.

These initiatives are all cooperative economic tools for exchanging skills and human and natural resources based on the ability and need of each country. Both Cuba and Venezuela provided assistance to Haiti before and since the devastating January earthquake and are now funding a literacy program for Haiti’s 49% illiterate population.

T/ Cheryl LaBash

You won’t forget Venezuela

Strangely beautiful and beautifully strange

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lose your eyes. Don’t peek.

Are you ready for a surprise?

The Republica Bolivariana de Venezuela, wrapped in petrol-politics and socialist agendas has a far less notorious side. Beyond the hyperbole is one of South America’s most diverse and postcard-perfect lands, where turquoise seas rub against the continent’s longest stretch of Caribbean coastline to the north and flat-topped mountains hide towering waterfalls and otherworldly landscapes in the south. In between, Venezuela is both an unparalleled adventure sports kingdom and a naturalist’s paradise, boasting exotic wildlife, river deltas and more ways to get your blood pumping than a pacemaker. We’re pulling back Venezuela’s veil.

DESTINATION VENEZUELA Venezuela is an intriguing beast indeed, depending on whom you ask - a menage a trois of viewpoints that might be a brash, woefully troubled petrostate run by a leftist bully to a Chacao intellectual; to an oil baron, an exotic Andean-Caribbean playground for the wealthy and privileged, with crystalline coastline and mountainous majesty rivalling all of its neighboring nations; or a socialist wonderland of the future to a supporter of President Hugo Chavez.

What makes Venezuela a good time is that it’s in some respects all three: a tsunami of discord and bounty of splendor that battle it out in a living, breathing, sensationalizing war of contradiction.

While other South American

countries are romanticized for the tango, Machu Picchu or Carnaval, Venezuela’s international reputation swirls around oil, the aggressive political style of Chavez and the next international beauty pageant winner. But through the rhetorical looking glass lies a little-known secret: Venezuela can be shockingly gorgeous and, though criminally undervisited, offers more to travellers than even the most intrepid explorers are aware. Yes, La Tierra de Gracia (Land of Grace), as Christopher Columbus put it in 1498, is nothing if not strangely beautiful and beautifully strange.

The sixth largest country in South America boasts Andean peaks; the longest stretch of Caribbean coastline to be found in

any single nation; tranquil offshore islands set amid turquoise seas; wetlands teeming with caimans, capybaras, piranhas and anacondas; the steamy Amazon; and rolling savanna punctuated by flat-topped mountains called tepuis. The world’s highest waterfall, Salto Angel, plummets 979 metres from the top of a tepui in

Parque Nacional Canaima. Those seeking adventure will find hiking, snorkeling, scuba diving, kitesurfing, windsurfing, paragliding and more. Even better, Venezuela is relatively compact; no thrill is discouragingly too far from the next.

T/ Kevin Raub, Lonely Planet

The artillery of ideas

CULTURE

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Venezuela hosts Fifth World Body Art Conference Amazing, unusual and strangely beautiful body art fills the streets of Venezuela nationwide this week

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rtists from the Americas, Europe, Africa and Asia are gathering in Venezuela from October 14 - 17 to participate in the Fifth World Conference of Body Art. The event is organized by the Institute of Images, Arts and Space, the National Experimental University of the Arts (UNEARTE), the Science Museum and the Museum of Fine Arts (MBA), all part of Venezuela’s Ministry of Culture.

The opening gala, which displayed the human body as a fantastic canvas for multiple expressions, was held on Friday at the country’s largest and most prestigious theatrical space, the Rios Reyna Sala in the Teatro Teresa Carreño (TTC).

Artists from Germany, Argentina, Bulgaria, Cuba, China, USA, France, Italy, The Netherlands, United Kingdom, Senegal and Venezuela were invited to this most unusual event marked by non-traditional artistic expressions, such as body painting, corporal modifications, tattoos, body ornaments, expressive clothing, rituals and performances.

Some participating artists in this year’s event have incorporated volume environments and installations together with the human body, to combine several aspects of corporal expression. The conference also included training workshops for participating artists and guests aiming to strengthen the concept of body art as a tool for expression of different areas of art.

International artists attending this year’s conference included, Nazareno Tubaro (Argentina), Filippo Ioco (Italy), Liu Bolin (China), Terry Smith (England); Verena Stenka

& Andrea Pagne - Vest & Page (Italy and Germany); Marianela Orozco (Cuba); Bella Volen and Guido Verhoef (Bulgaria and The Netherlands), Lucy and Bart (Netherlands), Craig Tracy (USA); Angele Diabang Brener (Senegal), Lukas Zpira and Satomi (France) Flesh & Blood (USA), and the show Taboo from National Geographic.

Venezuela was represented by national artists and artistic groups: Teresa Davila, Gabriela Acuña, Ana Emilia Lyon, Luis Salazar, Maruma Rodriguez and Juan Carlos Vivas, Natalia Molina, Veronica Ramirez and Maria Jesus Garcia Emerita Mendible, Caroline Petit, Luz Urdaneta, Efren Rojas, Rene Guerra and Ana Chin Loy. All of Venezuela had the opportunity to participate and bear witness to this important artistic event as part of the Ministry of Culture’s efforts to bring the international artists and presentations to different regions and cities nationwide.

During the conference, a selection of Venezuelan artists from different cities were also invited to the capital, Caracas, to participate in the body art workshops and activities, in order to later multiply the knowledge gained in their respective regions.

Regional artists have formerly received training in this unique artistic expression during prior editions of the World Body Art Conference.

Throughout the duration of this year’s event, tattoo art received special attention and participants from the Venezuelan states of Anzoategui, Aragua, Carabobo, Miranda, Vargas, Apure, Barinas, Cojedes, Guarico, Portuguesa, Lara, Merida, Tachira, Zulia had the opportunity to display their body art at the World Tattoo Expo in Caracas.

T/ CO

FRIDAY  October 15th, 2010  No. 33 Bs. 1  Caracas

ENGLISH EDITION The artillery of ideas

A publication of the Fundacion Correo del Orinoco Editor-in-Chief | Eva Golinger • Graphic Design | Arturo Cazal, Pablo Valduciel L., Alexander Uzcátegui, Jameson Jiménez • Press | Fundación Imprenta de la Cultura

Opinion

Y

The collapse of western morality

es, I know, as many readers will be quick to inform me, the West never had any morality. Nevertheless things have gotten worse.

In hopes that I will be permitted to make a point, permit me to acknowledge that the US dropped nuclear bombs on two Japanese cities; fire-bombed Tokyo; Great Britain and the US fire-bombed Dresden and a number of other German cities, expending more destructive force, according to some historians, against the civilian German population than against the German armies; President Grant and his Civil War war criminals, Generals Sherman and Sheridan, committed genocide against the Plains Indians; the US today enables Israel’s genocidal policies against the Palestinians, policies that one Israeli official has compared to 19th century US genocidal policies against the American Indians; the US in the new 21st century invaded Iraq and Afghanistan on contrived pretenses, murdering countless numbers of civilians; and British prime minister Tony Blair lent the British army to his American masters, as did other NATO countries, all of whom find themselves committing war crimes under the Nuremberg standard in lands in which they have no national interests, but for which they receive an American pay check.

I don’t mean these few examples to be exhaustive. I know the list goes on and on. Still, despite the long list of horrors, moral degradation is reaching new lows. The US now routinely tortures prisoners, despite its strict illegality under US and international law, and a recent poll shows that the percentage of Americans who approve of torture is rising. Indeed, it is quite high, though still just below a majority.

And we have what appears to be a new thrill: American soldiers using the cover of war to murder civilians.

Recently American troops were arrested for murdering Afghan civilians for fun and collecting trophies such as fingers and skulls.

This revelation came on the heels of Pfc. Bradley Manning’s alleged leak of a US Army video of US soldiers in helicopters and their controllers thousands of miles away having fun with joy sticks murdering members of the press and Afghan civilians. Manning is cursed with a moral conscience that has been discarded by his government and his military, and Manning has been arrested for obeying the law and reporting a war crime to the American people.

Congressman Mike Rogers, a Republican from Michigan, who is on the House Subcommittee on Terrorism, has called for Manning’s execution. According to Rogers, it is an act of treason to report an American war crime.

In other words, to obey the law constitutes “treason to America”.

Rogers said that US wars are being undermined by “a culture of disclosure” and this “serious and growing problem” could only be stopped by the execution of Manning.

The US government, a font of imperial hubris, does not believe that any act it commits, no matter how vile, can possibly be a war crime. One million dead Iraqis, a ruined country, and four million displaced Iraqis are all justified, because the “threatened” US superpower had to protect itself from nonexistent weapons of mass destruction that the US knew for a fact were not in Iraq.

When other countries attempt to enforce the international laws the US established in order to exe-

cute Germans defeated in World War II, the US government goes to work and blocks the attempt.

A year ago, the Spanish Senate, obeying its US master, limited Spain’s laws of universal jurisdiction in order to sink a legitimate war crimes case brought against George W. Bush, Barack Obama, Tony Blair and Gordon Brown.

The West includes Israel, and there the horror stories are 60 years long. Moreover, if you mention any of them you are declared to be an anti-semite. I only mention them in order to prove that I am not anti-American, antiBritish, and anti-NATO, but am simply against war crimes.

As one Israeli official said, “we are only doing to the Palestinians what the Americans did to the American Indians”.

Alas, the collapse of morality is too widespread. Some sports teams now have a win-at-allcost attitude that involves plans to injure the star players of the opposing teams. Just look at Formula One racing where 200 mph speeds are routine.

Prior to 1988, 22 years ago, track deaths were due to driver error, car failure, and poorly designed tracks compromised with safety hazards. World Champion Jackie Stewart did much to improve the safety of tracks, both for drivers and spectators. But in 1988 everything changed. Top driver Ayrton Senna nudged another top driver Alain Prost toward a pit wall at 190 mph. According to AutoWeek, nothing like this had been seen before. “Officials did not punish Senna’s move that day in Portugal, and so a significant shift in racing began”. What the great racing driver Stirling Moss called “dirty driving” became the norm.

Nigel Roebuck in AutoWeek reports that in 1996, World Champion Damon Hill said that Senna’s win-at-all-cost tactic “was responsible for fundamental change in the ethics of the sport”. Drivers began using “terrorist tactics on the track”.

When asked about the ethics of modern Formula One racing, US World Champion Phil Hill said: “Doing that sort of stuff in my day was just unthinkable. For one thing, we believed certain tactics were unacceptable”.

In today’s Western moral climate, driving another talented driver into the wall at 200 mph is just part of winning. Michael Schumacher, born in January 1969, is a seven times World Champion, an unequaled record. On August 1 at the Hungarian Grand Prix, AutoWeek reported that Schumacher tried to drive his former Ferrari teammate, Rubens Barrichello, into the wall at 200 mph speeds.

Confronted with his attempted act of murder, Schumacher said: “This is Formula One. Everyone knows I don’t give presents”.

Neither does the US government, nor state and local governments, nor the UK government, nor the EU. The deformation of the police, which many Americans, in their untutored existence as naive believers in “law and order”, still think are “on their side”, has taken on new dimensions with the police militarized to fight “terrorists” and “domestic extremists”.

Anyone who googles videos of US police gratuitous brutality will call up tens of thousands of examples, and this is after laws that make filming police brutality a felony. A year or two ago such a search would call up hundreds of thousands of videos.

In one of the most recent of the numerous daily acts of gratuitous police abuse of citizens, an 84year-old man had his neck broken because he objected to a nighttime towing of his car. The goon cop body-slammed the 84-year old and broke his neck. The Orlando, Florida, police department says that the old man was a “threat” to the well-armed much younger police goon, because the old man clenched his fist.

Paul Craig Roberts