President Franco claims Venezuela regime supports terrorist group in Paraguay

Paraguayan president Federico Franco accused the Venezuelan regime of Hugo Chavez of ‘direct and malicious’ involvement in his country’s affairs in support of a ‘terrorist and criminal’ gang, the Popular Army of Paraguay, EPP, which has committed kidnappings, assaults and killings.

Franco made the statements during an interview with journalist Patricia Janiot from CNN in Spanish. He added that he has documents and other evidence to support his accusation of Venezuela interference in support of EPP.

According to the Paraguayan president the Chavez regime organized and developed training programs for members of EPP that have been involved in kidnapping for ransom, killings of police forces, assaults, arson and other criminal actions in Paraguay.

Franco said that some EPP terrorist group members were invited to Venezuela with scholarships for alleged agriculture training programs but once there “were not precisely involved in learning to till the land but rather in the use of weapons and guerrilla tactics”.

“We have evidence and documents to support what I am saying now” added Franco.

Asked what his administration was doing to confront the EPP, Franco said that it is based on two stages: immediate action and the long term.

“The first is to establish industries and agricultural activities to the north of the country with an effective participation of the State, the other, long term to combat the subversives”.

The interview took place at the Time-Warner studios in New York.

President Franco also had a brief encounter with British PM David Cameron in the UN grounds out of the two leaders’ agenda.

The Paraguayan president also met with Bill Clinton at the Clinton Global Initiative foundation Monday night.

Message to Mercosur: “Paraguay will never accept intervention by foreign powers in its internal affairs”

On what he described as the “first and last time” he will address the United Nations General Assembly, the President of Paraguay, Federico Franco, affirmed that his country will not abide by any infringement on its sovereignty.

 President Franco addressing the UN assembly recalled the holocaust of the Triple Alliance.

“Here, before humanity's highest assembly, I expressly declare that Paraguay will never accept intervention by foreign powers in its internal affairs,” President Franco told the 67th Assembly’s General Debate, at UN Headquarters in New York.

“We will continue building upon our democracy according to the will of the Paraguayan people, sovereignty exercised through our freely elected institutions,” he added.

In June, the landlocked South American country experienced a political crisis, with President Franco predecessor – Fernando Lugo – removed from office through an impeachment process instigated by the country’s National Congress.

Then serving as Vice President, Mr. Franco assumed the office of President. “Since then, in accordance with the oath of office, I govern Paraguay peacefully and democratically, fully respecting public liberties,” he noted.

The events led to a fact-finding mission led by the Organization of American States (OAS), as well as an extraordinary meeting of the Heads of State of the Union of South American Nations (UNASUR).

Subsequently, UNASUR, as well as MERCOSUR, adopted sanctions against Paraguay “without allowing it to exercise its right to defend itself, as clearly expressed in the international agreements that are invoked for the application of sanctions,” President Franco said.

“In violation of international treaties, these countries have attempted to become the custodians of Paraguayan democracy, putting aside the principle of non-intervention consecrated in our United Nations Charter,” he said. “But”, he underlined, “they will not defeat us”.

Throughout its history, he continued, Paraguay has suffered repeatedly as a result of “arrogant intervention” in its internal affairs.

“The holocaust known as the War of the Triple Alliance (1865/1870), resulting from an unjustifiable coalition (Brazil, Argentina and Uruguay) that decimated Paraguay's population and destroyed its economy has still not faded from the memory of my people,” he said, adding that every right enshrined in human rights agreements signed in the UN and OAS frameworks has been respected.

“In the short time of my government, our detractors have not been able to point out a single violation of the agreements we have mentioned,” he added.

Leadership is based on respect for International law. “Only this way can we have a common position to reform the Security Council, a long standing wish of this universal organization that hosts us”.

“Paraguay calls to prop and continue building the beautiful international utopia of a planetary organization ruled by the strong and the weak, by the large and the small, by the poor and the rich, all equal in this magna world assembly. Therefore Paraguay believes it is necessary to insist that the reform process must necessarily include the gradual elimination to the right of veto”.

In opposition to this utopia, the Brazilian president Dilma Rousseff at the opening of the General Assembly argued the need for the incorporation to the UN Security Council of more countries with the right to veto.

Other topics mentioned in President Franco’s speech included sustainable development, UN reform, transnational crime human rights, gender issues and UN peacekeeping, with the latter being an area in which Paraguay has contributed its troops.

Paraguayan senators challenge Chavez version of attempted bribes to favour Venezuela

An international controversy has surfaced between President Hugo Chavez and Paraguayan senators as to who really tried to bribe whom regarding failed attempts to have Venezuela incorporated to Mercosur.

Senate Oviedo Matto claims it was Chavez brother who was offering money to vote in favour of Venezuela’s inclusion in Mercosur.

Venezuela first applied for Mercosur full membership in 2006, but only managed it this week after in special circumstances and with a process that international law experts describe as “highly questionable” when not null and void

On Friday a Paraguayan Senator quoted by the Spanish press said that the brother of President Chavez offered money to at least one lawmaker so that his country’s congress would vote the incorporation of Venezuela to Mercosur.

“The President of the Paraguayan congress Jorge Ovideo Matto claims that there were repeated offerings of money from emissaries responding to President Chavez brother begging for the approval of Venezuela’s inclusion in Mercosur”, according to Madrid’s conservative daily ABC.

“With me he (Chavez) never spoke, but yes he did send emissaries through a brother of his, I believe he has more than one brother, offering money. It was him (Chavez) that was offering money and was trying that way to change the vote of members from Congress” said Senator Ovideo Matto.

“The only thing I’m sure of is that Chavez sent money through members of Congress; that is a categorical fact, and not only to try and bribe lawmakers”, underlined the president of the Paraguayan Senate.

Venezuelan president Chavez earlier in the week revealed that “last year” he met with Senator Lino Oviedo (without specifying which of the two with the same last name) in Brazil where money was asked to accept the inclusion of Venezuela to the regional trade block, since only the Paraguayan Senate was pending approval for the incorporation.

Senator Oviedo Matto said the news is nothing new since the money offers by Chavez brother were made public by Senator Zulma Gomez before the Paraguayan Senate in October 2011. The lawmaker admitted having been approached by an emissary who was promising 100.000 dollars for those who voted for Venezuela.

Chavez talked about the issue on his return to Caracas from Brasilia where the three presidents of Mercosur; Cristina Fernandez, Argentina, Jose Mujica, Uruguay and Dilma Rousseff, Brazil, since Paraguay was suspended, formalized the inclusion of Venezuela as full member of Mercosur.

He said that on the suggestion from Brazil’s Lula da Silva, ‘some time ago’ he flew to Sao Paulo where he met with Senator Oviedo to talk about the issue. The talks included phone calls with President Fernando Lugo and former president Nicanor Duarte.

“Nothing was achieved since a bunch of extreme right Paraguayan Senators, instruments of the US empire, wanted millions of dollars for their vote, but I couldn’t permit extortion of Venezuela to prosper, and did not yield”, according to Chavez.

He added he told the Senators that “the time will come and the time came for the decent inclusion of Venezuela to Mercosur by the front door with no tricks”.

Paraguay was suspended from Mercosur following the removal from the presidential office of Fernando Lugo, following a summary impeachment described by the three full member presidents, as “a rupture of democratic institutions”.

Not without controversy Venezuela becomes Mercosur fifth full member

Following a full day of deliberations in Brasilia between Foreign Affairs ministers, the presidents from Brazil, Argentina and Uruguay, on Tuesday will formally receive Venezuela as the new full member of Mercosur, as was agreed at the regular mid year summit in Mendoza.

 The incorporation procedure has Uruguay’s Mujica and Astori in opposite positions

The historic event, as it is described by Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez, nevertheless has been plagued with controversy since the incorporation was decided on the absence of the fourth original Mercosur full member, Paraguay, suspended from the group until April next year, and contrary to basic consensus rules.

In Brazil the procedure used to implement the incorporation decision has been consistently criticized by opposition leaders, lawmakers and law professors. Likewise in Uruguay where even Vice-president Danilo Astori has openly clashed with President Jose Mujica saying the procedure is illegal and could represent the “kiss of death” for the Mercosur group which took off in 1991 in Paraguay.

Mujica has argued that sometimes the political must prevail over the juridical, and “this was one case”, adding that Venezuela as an energy powerhouse would further strengthen the group, balance inside forces and open other opportunities to expand in the region..

But Mujica will be focusing on other issues in Brasilia: the River Plate canal dredging differences with Argentina for which he is hoping on a bilateral meeting with Cristina Fernandez (despite her refusal to address foreign ministry affairs) and which has exposed a serious confrontation between the neighbouring countries.

The Uruguayan president will also hold talks with the host President Dilma Rousseff hopefully to sign several bilateral agreements referred to infrastructure, energy, ship yards, science and technology, plus attracting investments in new alternative energies such as wind.

The Brazilian Foreign ministry said in a release that with the incorporation of Venezuela, (the main oil producer of South America with 2.3million bpd) Mercosur will represent 83% of South America’s GDP.

Earlier in the day the foreign ministers addressed legal and practical trade issues so that Venezuela adapts to Mercosur nomenclature and the common external tariff plus the list of exceptions (safeguards) she’s entitled to. It was agreed Venezuela would have until 2016 to get all these issues straightened out.

Although the formal presidential summit of incorporation for Venezuela takes place on Tuesday with the attendance of Argentina’s Cristina Fernandez, Uruguay’s Jose Mujica, Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez and the host Dilma Rousseff, the full annexation will effectively occur on August 12.

On that day a month will have passed since Venezuela deposited its ratification of the Mercosur protocol, as demanded by the group’s rules.

Israel says Mercosur should be “much concerned” with the inclusion of Venezuela

Israeli ambassador in Uruguay Dori Goren said that the incorporation of Venezuela of Mercosur should “concern” the countries of the regional block given what he described as “Venezuelan support to Iranian agents that establish terror webs in the region”.

Ambassador Dori Goren claims Iranian agents are establishing terror nets in the region with the coverage of Venezuela.

“The incorporation of the government of President Hugo Chavez to Mercosur should be of significant concern for member countries” because in the continent “there are a lot of Iranian agents which operate establishing terror webs under the cover of Venezuela” said ambassador Goren in a Sunday interview with Montevideo’s leading newspaper.

Presidents from Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay, Cristina Fernandez, Dilma Rousseff and Jose Mujica are meeting on Tuesday July 31 in Brasilia to ratify the incorporation of Venezuela to the regional block which was approved at the Mendoza Mercosur summit of last 29 June.

President Hugo Chavez has promised to attend Brasilia for what he described as a historic event.

The Venezuelan request to belong to Mercosur dates back to 2006 and after Argentina, Uruguay and Brazil approved it, only Paraguay was pending because the Senate rejected the move arguing the ‘non democratic practices’ of President Hugo Chavez.

Chavez and Israel have had rough relations: the Israeli ambassador Shlomo Cohen was expulsed from Caracas on January 2009 following the Israeli army offensive against Palestinian territory in Gaza.

Chavez also has close relations with those countries aligned against the US beginning with Iran. He has visited Teheran and the Iranian president has been to Venezuela on more than one occasion and has also visited Chavez allies in Bolivia and Nicaragua.

Venezuela and Iran have signed a raft of agreements from trade and investment to defence and development of arms, and the relation is described as “strategic”.

Mercosur on the other hand has a free trade agreement with Israel and according to Ambassador Goren he was informed at the Uruguayan Foreign ministry that “the treaty will not be affected by the inclusion of Venezuela”.

“Venezuela will have to accept the agreements already signed among which obviously the free trade agreement with Israel”, Uruguayan diplomacy informed the Israel ambassador.

Nevertheless “we are waiting to see how things evolve and to what extent the inclusion of Venezuela in Mercosur can affect the trade relation with Israel, bilaterally with each country member and above all with the whole block”.

Ambassador Goren believes that for the moment, Venezuela’s incorporation will not affect diplomatic relations of his country with members of the block.

“Relations with Mercosur block members are very good, but the inclusion of Venezuela implies a very strong political and economic signal”, he emphasized.

Goren added that Israel’s relation with Venezuela “is very bad because it is one of the countries in the world which most supports Iran and particularly Teheran’s nuclear program”.

Iran “can still survive” all international actions because of the “economic support” from Venezuela and the aid it provides Teheran to deviate all economic actions through Venezuelan banks” said Ambassador Goren who underlined “this must be of much concern to Mercosur countries”.

The Mercosur Farce

Brazil discusses with Chavez arrangements for Venezuela’s Mercosur incorporation

Venezuelan President met on Wednesday with a committee from the Brazilian government to discuss mechanisms to speed the full integration of the country to the regional block. Brazil currently holds the Mercosur rotating chair.

“We addressed two main areas, one relative to the whole process of incorporation to Mercosur, inclusion mechanisms which we want to speed to recover lost time”, said Chavez following a meeting in the president Palace of Miraflores with a delegation headed by Alessandro Texeira, Development, Industry and Foreign Trade minister.

Chavez added that the first meetings both in Brazil and Montevideo have been agreed “so that we can continue working in the first issues such as nomenclature, tariffs and Mercosur norms”.

“We are ready to begin the process as soon as the full incorporation of Venezuela is officially confirmed 31 July in Brasilia”.

Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay with the absence of suspended Paraguay, decided at the end of June during a Mercosur summit the full integration of Venezuela, which was pending since 2006 because of the Paraguayan Senate to support the request. It was precisely the absence of suspended Paraguay which opened the way for the controversial and much questioned incorporation.

Chavez said the second issue addressed was referred “to the area of structural development, structural projects for the agro-industrial development and the production of food” and other areas.

“We have detected at least 230 products that can be exported from Venezuela to Brazil and other countries from the block in the near future”.

Nevertheless the Brazilian delegate Minister Texeira said Venezuelan has ahead important considerations such “as adapting to the new economic rules, foreign trade rules, but we have a full year for all the basics to be in place so that Venezuela can join the block and the Venezuelan people can harvest benefits for the economy”.

“For us the incorporation of Venezuela is strategic to strengthen the block and consolidate Latinamerican integration”, added the Brazilian minister who travelled to Caracas with a delegation of experts and the president advisor on foreign affairs, Marco Aurelio Garcia.

Chavez is scheduled to fly next week to Brasilia to attend the meeting in which Venezuela will officially become a full member of Mercosur. Previous to the ceremony he is scheduled to have a private meeting with President Dilma Rousseff and former head of state Lula da Silva.

Among the issues to be addressed according to Brazilian sources are Mercosur “foreign relations” situation. Mercosur has trade agreements with countries such as Israel and Palestine, but Caracas has no formal relations with Israel following the Gaza attacks. Argentine president Cristina Fernandez is a strong lobbyist for Jewish communities in Latin America and ally of Israel.

Similarly with Uruguay which is one of the first countries to vote for the foundation of the state of Israel in 1948.

Furthermore Teheran is a close political and military ally of President Chavez and some members of the Iranian cabinet have pending arrest orders from Argentine Justice for their alleged masterminding of an attack on a Jewish institution back in 1994 which killed dozens and left hundreds injured.

However it is also a fact that even when China is Mercosur member-countries main trade associate, Paraguay does not have diplomatic relations with Beijing and actually recognizes the ‘rebel’ regime of Taiwan.

Brazilian influential newspaper blasts “Dilma’s anti-diplomacy”

Brazil’s influential newspaper O Estado de Sao Paulo blasted Brazilian foreign policy and its handling of the Paraguayan political crisis. In an opinion column under the heading “Dilma’s anti-diplomacy” the newspaper argues that the current administration is politicizing foreign policy, the same way that her predecessor, Lula da Silva.

The conservative newspaper claims that since the Workers Party reached office, the eight years of former president Lula da Silva were rich in transforming Brazilian diplomacy into an “ideological exercise”. It mentions the case in 2006 when Bolivia troops took over Petrobras refineries (and Brazilian assets), and Lula da Silva called it an “act of sovereignty” and that Bolivia needed to be treated with “love”.

However with the arrival of Dilma Rousseff there were hopes of a change, particularly since the president committed her administration to the defence of human rights, including in Iran, whose president denies the Holocaust and heads a regime that beats and jails opponents and Lula da Silva referred to him as “compañero”.

It seemed that Dilma was prepared to abandon Lula’s childish Anti-Americanism and join sides with the civilized world in condemning Teheran. But the Brazilian president who likes to be called “the manager” is more intent in imprinting her own seal to foreign policy, says O Estado de Sao Paulo.

For example, when Dilma had the chance to show her statesmanship at the RIo+20 conference last June, she left aside the professional diplomats and preferred a watered down document with no decisive weight that seemed to please or be accepted by everybody, believing it was a diplomatic success.

Later when the opportunity to put out the fire caused by the removal of Paraguayan president Fernando Lugo, also last June, she ended adding fuel to the situation by accepting the thesis of a ‘coup’ and therefore Paraguay had to be sanctioned.

O Estado de Sao Paulo adds that later Dilma personally patronized the regrettable operation to include Venezuela in Mercosur, taking advantage of the suspension of Paraguay, which resisted all along the incorporation of President Hugo Chavez’ country to an already discredited South American block.

Basically Dilma’s excessive personalism in foreign policy does not differ from the political-ideological contamination of the eight years Lula da Silva was president. In both cases foreign policy decisions are adopted not according to national interests as mandates the Constitution, “but in line with those projects to affirm and retain power”. Under Lula da Silva the imprudent policy of siding with autocrats imperilled the independence of Brazil in the definition of its foreign interests and in the search of a “community of Latinamerican nations” the former president put the country “at the service of the delirious Bolivarian project”.

With Dilma the “Lulopetista” (blend of Lula da Silva and Workers Party) ideology persists in Brazil’s foreign relations, but with an added probably more explosive ingredient: her idiosyncrasies. The President does not get along with her Foreign Affairs minister Antonio Patriota, the “manager” insists in a diplomacy of results and is contrary to making concessions and to the flatteries which are part of the essence of diplomacy.

Finally the newspaper cautions that with two and a half years ahead Dilma, has ample chance to further imprint her personal views, further compromising the influence of Brazil in international affairs.