Chávez and Venezuelan economy

Chavez: Troops to escort oil takeovers – Yahoo! News

President Hugo Chavez said Thursday that soldiers will accompany government officials when they take over oil projects in the Orinoco River basin next month.

Chavez has decreed that Petroleos de Venezuela SA, or PDVSA, will take a minimum 60 percent stake in four heavy-oil projects in the Orinoco River region and invited the six private companies operating there to stay on as minority partners.

«On May 1 we are going to take control of the oil fields,» Chavez said. «I’m sure no transnational company is going to draw a shotgun, but we will go with the armed forces and the people.»

The projects — run by BP PLC, Exxon Mobil Corp., Chevron Corp., ConocoPhillips, France’s Total SA and Norway’s Statoil ASA — upgrade heavy, tar-like crude into more marketable oils and are considered Venezuela’s most promising. As older fields elsewhere go into decline, development of the Orinoco is seen as key to Venezuela’s future production.

Isn’t it wonderful??? He invited, how sweet, how understanding of the situation…





PoliBlog ™: A Rough Draft of my Thoughts writes about this:

In all seriousness, while I do not think that Chávez is as pernicious as some do (I see a lot of what he does as far more bluster than reality), I can’t help but think that he is going to, in the end, damage Venezuela’s economy just as he has severely damaged its democracy.

Well, if he has «severely damaged its democracy» then he is really pernicious…

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Chávez ha decretado que petróleos de Venezuela tomará un mínimo del 60% del total de varios proyectos muy importantes que se desarrollan en la región del el río Orinoco e invitó a las seis compañías privadas que operan en él; a que permanezcan allí como; socios menores.; Anunció que van a invadirlas el día 1 de mayo y que para prevenir cualquier enfrentamiento, «iremos con las fuerzas armadas y el pueblo«.

Poliblog comenta que no tiene una idea tan mala de Chávez, pero que no puede dejar de pensar que va a dañar la economía de Venezuela tanto como ha dañado la democracia.

Como digo arriba el hecho de que haya dañado la democracia de forma grave, a mí me es suficiente para considerarle alguien pernicioso.

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But we continue: from NoisyRoom.net » Blog Archive » Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez Calls Reconciliation With the U.S. ‘Impossible’

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, threatening to cut off oil shipments to the U.S. if its government supports any efforts to oust him, said that reconciliation with Washington was impossible.

Chavez said a thirst for oil motivated both the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq and a failed 2002 coup against him. The outspoken leader has often accused the U.S. of being behind the coup, and Washington has repeatedly denied the allegation.

“There is no possibility of understanding for our revolution with the government of the United States, with U.S. imperialism,” Chavez said during a news conference to mark the fifth anniversary of his return to power two days after the coup.

Yes, yes. Hugo, we know that you only care for love, and that US hates Venezuela: that is why trade balance between the two states is favorable to … Venezuela.



But the cenit of Hugo’s malevolence comes when he says:

Chavez also said that the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks were “a gift for (President) Bush” because they enabled him to wage war.

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Para continuar haciendo amigos, Hugo Chávez ha amenazado a EEUU con no mandar más petróleo si el gobierno apoya cualquier movimiento para echarle y añadió que la reconciliación es imposible con el «imperialismo americano«.

Pero el colmo ha sido cuando ha dicho que los atentados del 11 de septiembre fueron un «regalo para Bush» porque le permitieron iniciar una guerra.

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From EldiarioExterior.com

Ex vicepresidente sandinista pide un socialismo tolerante y no tan radical como el de Venezuela El modelo socialista ´´debería medirse por su institucionalidad democrática y su tolerancia´´ para alejarse del ´´viejo modelo autoritario´´, opinó el ex vicepresidente sandinista Sergio Ramírez, en una entrevista en la cual criticó al actual gobierno de Daniel Ortega en Nicaragua.

Ex-vicepresident from the Sandinista Government -Nicaragua- has asked for a tolerant socialism and not so radical as Venezuelan one. The socialist model should be measured «by its democratic institutionality and its tolerance» to abandon the «old authoritarian model«, said the ex-vicepresident Sergio Ramírez, in an interview in which he critisized the actual government of Daniel Ortega in Nicaragua.

«For me, the revolution is a buried project in history, in the past. The revolution was made for some ideals which did not survive. The Sandinista Front is a party that uses the traditional political mechanisms of Hispanic America to obtain power and not respect the institutions«.

«In Nicaragua the Constitution is being reformed for Daniel Ortega could be re-elected, the same that it’s happenning in Bolivia and tht certainly conveys intolerance for critics and independent opinion. We are not viewing a model of neosocialism but in front of an old neo-authoritarian model which has been so damaging for Hispanic America«.





And now Chávez confronts Chilean President Bachelet from Noticias24 :: Actualidad » Dura crítica del diario ‘El Mercurio’

“La concentración de poderes de Chávez no tiene parangón en ningún país del sistema interamericano que pretenda mantener la condición democrática”. Así cuestion hoy el diario chileno “El Mercurio”, en su editorial, el carácter democrático del Gobierno de Hugo Chávez.

A 48 horas de la visita de Michelle Bachelet a Venezuela, el Presidente Chávez se permitió atacar públicamente al Senado de Chile, a raíz de haber éste acordado solicitar a aquélla que presente ante la OEA, en nombre de nuestro país, una protesta por el arbitrario término de la concesión a la estación independiente Radio Caracas TV. La mayoría del Senado -por 18 votos UDI, RN, PPD y DC (incluido el del ex Presidente Frei, actual presidente de la Cámara Alta), contra seis votos PS y PPD- estimó que eso atenta contra la libertad de pensamiento y de expresión, y no puede ser aceptado por estados democráticos.

Continúa haciendo amigos, vamos…



«Chávez’s concentration of power has no equal in any other country of the interamerican system that pretends to maintain its democratic condition«.that is the editorial of the Chilean newspaper EL Mercurio, about the «democratic» condition of Hugo Chávez Government.

48 hours before the visit of Michelle Bachelet (Chilean PM) to Venezuela, President Chávez attacked publicly the Chilean Senate, because of the protest it made about the arbitrary ending of Independiente Radio Caracas Station TV concession.

The majority of the Senate -18 votes (including the ex-president Frei) against 6- esteemed that Chavez´Government attitude and procedure is an attack against the freedom of thought and expression, and cannot be accepted by any democratic Government.



As you know, Chávez has Bolívar as a hero. There is a very good article about his figure at EldiarioExterior.com

Bolívar tenía un concepto muy extraño de democracia. Él creía que los pueblos sudamericanos no podían practicar virtudes democráticas como los europeos9. Cuando en Bolivia se le presentó la oportunidad de escribir una constitución, Bolívar la aprovechó para escribir una a su medida: presidencia vitalicia (él), senadores hereditarios, diputados elegidos por el pueblo y «Censores» con el deber de «proteger la moral, las ciencias, las artes, la instrucción y la imprenta» (10).

«Si esto no es legítimo es al menos popular y, por lo mismo, propio de una república eminentemente democrática», le dijo Bolívar a Francisco de Paula Santander cuando éste se opuso a que la constitución «democrática» de Bolivia fuese aplicada a la Gran Colombia (11). ¿Cómo se puede creer que alguien que asumió poderes dictatoriales en Caracas en 1813, en Angostura en 1817, en Lima en 1824 y luego en Bogotá en 1828 era un demócrata? (12).

Álvaro Vargas Llosa dice que Bolívar encarnó el «pecado original» de las repúblicas latinoamericanas: «el elitismo, el totalitarismo, y una pasión desmesurada por lo que nosotros conocemos como la construcción social» (13).

Bolívar had a very strange concept of democracy. He believed that the South-American people could not practice the same democratic virtues European had. When opportunity came to write a constitution for Bolivia, Bolívar wrote it to his own benefit: life presidency for him, inherited seats at Senate, MPs elected by the people and censors with the duty of protecting the moral, the sciences, the arts and the instruction and printing».

«If this is not legitimate, it is popular at least and, because of that, it is a consequence of being eminently democratic«, he told Francisco de Paula Santander when the latter opposed the application of the Bolivian «democratic» Constitution to the «Great Colombia». How on earth can anyone believe that someone who was given dictatorial powers in Caracas in 1813, in Angostura in 1817, in Lima in 1824 and afterwards in Bogotá in 1928, was a democrat?

Alvaro Vargas Llogas considers that Bolivar incarnated the «original sin» of all the Latin-American republics: «elitism, totalitarism and giantic passion for what we know as the social construction«.

From Fausta’s Blog:

Speaking of Chavez, Miguel has a post on fudged statistics on highway deaths, and one on CANTV and Electricidad de Caracas and the end of an era. Investor’s Business Daily explains how Chavez Blows Venezuela’s Fortune

Venezuela’s state oil company is a mess. Revenue in 2006 came to $101 billion, down 26% from the year before, and profit was only $4.8 billion. The poor results were due in part to the $13 billion of investment money that Chavez diverted to handouts for the poor. It is estimated that the company needs to be spending at least $3 billion a year on infrastructural maintenance and capital improvements.



Chavez is also giving away at least 100,000 barrels a day to Cuba, something the ruling Castro brothers sell on the open market at their own profit, draining Venezuela’s finances further.



The biggest reason for the decline in exports is falling production, the inevitable result of a long string of broken contracts and private-property expropriations. The investment that’s been chased out is not being replaced, not even by other state oil companies that Chavez claims to favor. Investment from U.S. companies has fallen more than 90%.

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La compañía de petróleos de Venezuela ha disminuido su total de ventas un 26% y su beneficio ha caído hasta 4,8 millones de dólares. Los pobres resultados se deben a que Chávez desvió dinero de inversiones para darlo a los pobres. La sociedad precisa al menos 3 billones al año en mantenimiento de infraestructura y mejoras.

Además Chávez está dando 100.000 barriles por día a Cuba, dejando a los hermanos Castro que lo vendan en el mercado para su propio beneficio.

A todo ello se une que se ha disminuido drásticamente las inversiones tanto del país como extranjeras (las de USA cayeron un 90%).

Y para terminar resulta que:



Venezuela is also giving money to Bolivia and the Evo Morales’ tour: EldiarioExterior.com

Acusan a Evo Morales de repartir el dinero de Venezuela

El presidente de Bolivia, Evo Morales, continuó la gira en su país en la que reparte a alcaldes dinero de la cooperación venezolana, según fuentes oficiales, lo que ha hecho que la oposición lo acuse de hacer campaña para su reelección en el 2008. ´´A título de qué el gobierno venezolano estaría poniendo plata a esta gira en un país que es soberano´´, dijo la jefa de los diputados de Podemos, Lourdes Millares, y comentó que «es peligroso que un país dé plata con tanta facilidad´´.

El prefecto (gobernador electo) de La Paz, José Luis Paredes, de Podemos, insistió en que los viajes de Morales por las regiones no son más que la organización de una «campaña para la reelección presidencial«.

Morales is making a tour throughout his country and is giving away money [1,7$ million] to the majors, money which comes from the «Venezuelan cooperation«. Bolivian opposition is not very happy with it asking «why the Venezuelan Government is giving lots of money to this tour in a country that is sovereign. Giving away money so easy is dangerous«, said the chief of the MPs from the Party Podemos.

Another MP Mr. Murillo, from , added that the President «has issued a supreme regulation which lets the Majors spend more money with no permission, something which is going to raise corruption«.

The elected Governor of La Paz, José Luis Paredes, from Podemos, insisted that «the trips of Morales by the regions are no more than a campaign for presidential reelection«.

Some months ago the Venezuelan blogosphere was already angered by Chávez’s expenses (read my post here). We have also to consider the important expenditure in weapons he had made and which had not finished.

Very interesting the link of Devil’s Excrement mentioned by Fausta above:

Chavez woke up one day and decided to «nationalize» CANTV and Electricidad de Caracas, just because he felt like it. The Ministers scrambled and explained to him that Venezuela has lost all arbitration cases in international Courts, owns CITGO in the US and the Government could not «nationalize» anything without creating problems all over theplace. So, the Government negotiated a high price for Electricidad de Caracas and a cheap price for CANTV, the latter indicating Verizon wanted to get out of here as fast as possible. Funny thing was, the Government ended up paying less that Mexican Carlos Slim was willing to pay for CANTV, about 18% less. Who gets hurt? First, international investors who held the stock and will be paid less. More interesting, the second largest chunk of shares after the international investors is owned by the company’s workers. So, in this era of «shared-ownership», «coops», «Co-management» and the like, the revolution is buying back the workers shares at around $2 per ordinary share. Funny things is, the workers paid around US$ 4 for them in 1996 and some of them had to pay financing. You got to love the workers paradise of the XXIst. Century!

The Devil’s Excrement se refiere a la nacionalización de la empresa Electricidad de Caracas, nacionalización que se le metió en la cabeza a Chávez a pesar de que todos los ministros le dijeron que se lo pensara porque habían perdido todos los procesos de arbitraje. El gobierno, después de una negociación, en la que se acordó un precio muy pequeño para la empresa de telecomunicaciones CANTV, porque Verizon quería irse lo antes posible, terminó pagando menos de lo que el millonario mejicano Carlos Slim estaba decidido a pagar.

La nacionalización ha perjudiciado a los accionistas internacionales a los que se les pagará menos. Y a los trabajadores a los que se les habían vendido acciones en 1996 a 4$ la acción y ahora se les están comprando a 2$.

El gobierno bolivariano no les está tratando muy bien a los trabajadores que se diga…

Related posts:

1. Is Venezuela rationing food.
2. London is going to get foreign aid.
   
   

And they discover this now…

Well, this was one of things that has worried me more since the first time about Iran. And being the Middle East a very unstable part of the world -perhaps the most- this is more than worrying. If they have used chemical weapons in the past in the wars between them, why are they going to refrain from using nuclear power? Those countries are among the ones which respect less -in fact, which do not respect at all- Human Rights.



Eye on Iran, Rivals Pursuing Nuclear Power – New York Times

Turkey is preparing for its first atomic plant. And Egypt has announced plans to build one on its Mediterranean coast. In all, roughly a dozen states in the region have recently turned to the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna for help in starting their own nuclear programs. While interest in nuclear energy is rising globally, it is unusually strong in the Middle East.

“The rules have changed,” King Abdullah II of Jordan recently told the Israeli newspaper Haaretz. “Everybody’s going for nuclear programs.”

The Middle East states say they only want atomic power. Some probably do. But United States government and private analysts say they believe that the rush of activity is also intended to counter the threat of a nuclear Iran.

By nature, the underlying technologies of nuclear power can make electricity or, with more effort, warheads, as nations have demonstrated over the decades by turning ostensibly civilian programs into sources of bomb fuel. Iran’s uneasy neighbors, analysts say, may be positioning themselves to do the same.

“One danger of Iran going nuclear has always been that it might provoke others,” said Mark Fitzpatrick, a senior fellow at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, an arms analysis group in London. “So when you see the development of nuclear power elsewhere in the region, it’s a cause for some concern.”

Some analysts ask why Arab states in the Persian Gulf, which hold nearly half the world’s oil reserves, would want to shoulder the high costs and obligations of a temperamental form of energy. They reply that they must invest in the future, for the day when the flow of oil dries up.

But with Shiite Iran increasingly ascendant in the region, Sunni countries have alluded to other motives. Officials from 21 governments in and around the Middle East warned at a meeting of Arab leaders in March that Iran’s drive for atomic technology could result in the beginning of “a grave and destructive nuclear arms race in the region.”

Remember that Morocco has voiced its intention for going nuclear.



Tigerhawk looks on this subject. Also Right Truth, NoisyRoom.Net,Town Commons, and Clarity and Resolve.



And who is amid all the Muslim would-be nuclear countries?

More in IHT.

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La carrera de Irán hacia ser una potencia nuclear produce, a su vez, el deseo de los países de alrededor de seguile. Turquía o Marruecos así lo han hecho así como Arabia Saudí, en casi todos los casos ayudados o prometiendo la ayuda necesaria Rusia.

La decisión de producir energía nuclear ha sido cuestionada por analistas y diversos países que ven bastante extraño que las mayores productores de petróleo y gas precisen este tipo de energía.

El rey de Jordania, Abdullah II, reconoció a la revista israelí Haaretz que las cosas habían cambiado y que todos estaban buscando la energía nuclear.

Related news:

Editor’s Note – A Disarming Election: Iran and Syria lead the U.N. Disarmament Commission

On April 9, 2007 there was a United Nations believe-it-or-not moment extraordinaire. At the same time that Iran’s President Ahmadinejad declared his country was now capable of industrial-scale uranium enrichment, the U.N. reelected Iran as a vice chairman of the U.N. Disarmament Commission.



Yes Ripley, the very U.N. body charged with promoting nuclear nonproliferation installed in a senior position the state that the Security Council recently declared violated its nonproliferation resolutions.

Iran announces «industrial» nuclear fuel work – Yahoo! News

Iran announced on Monday it had begun industrial-scale nuclear fuel production in a fresh snub to the U.N. Security Council, which has imposed two rounds of sanctions on it for refusing to halt such work.

The announcement marks a shift from experimental atomic fuel work involving a few hundred centrifuges used for enriching uranium to a process that will involve thousands of machines. Western nations fear this will bring Tehran closer to what they say is its aim of building atomic bombs.

Iran, the world’s fourth largest oil exporter, insists it only wants the fuel for generating electricity so it can export more of its oil and gas.

Gateway Pundit and Sweetness and Light commented about this.

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En español: Florentino Portero: Irán, más cerca de la bomba.

Un Irán nuclear representa un grave problema que no siempre somos capaces de valorar. La violación del Tratado de No proliferación por Corea del Norte e Irán a un coste diplomático y económico asumible es la señal que algunos otros están esperando para dar el paso. El régimen de no proliferación funciona mediante un doble mecanismo de persuasión y disuasión. Si el segundo elemento falla todo se viene abajo. Los países vecinos de los nuevos socios del club nuclear se sentirán forzados ellos también a dar el paso, con el objetivo de establecer un principio de disuasión o, si se prefiere, para restablecer el equilibrio. Egipto, Turquía o Arabia Saudí no podrán quedarse de brazos cruzados. El actual rearme japonés y su renovada alianza militar con Estados Unidos no pueden entenderse sin tener en cuenta el programa nuclear y de misiles norcoreano. Si fracasamos en Irán y Corea del Norte el régimen general de no proliferación entrará en crisis, lo que nos abocará a un entorno donde un conflicto nuclear será más probable que en la actualidad. El trabajo de años tratando de hacer un mundo más seguro quedará convertido en papel.

Que un estado como Irán, que nos ha declarado su hostilidad por mucho que no queramos enterarnos, acceda a la bomba nuclear implica que debemos establecer nuevos mecanismos estratégicos: disuasión nuclear y escudos antimisiles. La disuasión tiene un valor limitado cuando la otra parte está dispuesta al martirio y ese puede, en un momento dado, ser el caso de Irán. Lo esencial, por lo tanto, es dotarse de un escudo antimisiles capaz de explosionar la cabeza nuclear enemiga cuando se encuentre en las capas superiores de la atmósfera. No hace falta decir que, aunque el problema se veía venir desde hace mucho tiempo, lo único que hemos hecho los europeos es criticar las iniciativas norteamericanas. De ahí que ahora volvamos, una vez más, a depender de sus capacidades militares y de su buena voluntad. Más carnaza para el resentimiento.

En Oriente Medio el efecto será mucho más directo, favoreciendo el intento de los ayatolás chiíes por hacerse con el liderazgo en el Islam y dando cobertura a sus actividades terroristas -Hizbolá, Hamás…- y desestabilizadoras -Líbano, Palestina, Irak…-

«The only thing Europeans have done is to critisize US. So now we are going to depend once more on their military capacity and their good will. More fuel for resentment». (Florentino Portero, Spanish analist for GEES). Ejem…



Similar idea in CUANAS.



But now looks like that several US Senators have met with Iranian UN ambassador because US Dems wanted to talk with Iran.



Winds of Change.NET: (Thirty) Two Short Articles About Iran

it’s difficult for me to sit down and accept the authoritay of someone who is a Senior Fellow at the Council of Foreign relations and author of ‘Hidden Iran: Paradox and Power in the Islamic Republic’ when he tells me that Iran is an unstoppable force in the Middle East and doesn’t deal with the reasons why Iran may either be a hollow power – or why it may be motivated to be aggressive within a specific window of time. If this is what the leading experts are doing – heaven help us all.

Bushehr power plant to be inaugurated in Nov 2007: Russia – Irna



At a Glance | Deutsche Welle |

Iran seeks bids for two nuclear reactors Iran says its launching tenders for the construction of two new nuclear power plants in the southern city of Bushehr, where Russia is currently helping to build a nuclear power reactor. The Iranian leadership has unveiled plans for a network of power plants with a capacity of 20,000 Megawatts by 2020.

Also Reuters.



More in MNM.

ExtremeCentre.org » L’Iran persiste et signe ..:

Tehran Times: “A Country That Has… Uranium Enrichment Is Only One Step Away from Producing Nuclear Weapons; This Step Is Not a Scientific or a Technical [One] – But a Matter of Political Decision”

O Insurgente » Blog Archive » Coisas peculiares e fascinantes da democracia persa

While Iran’s international opponents have been distracted by the row over the country’s nuclear programme and the British naval hostages, Teheran has taken the opportunity to tackle reformers targeted by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad since he came to power.

As part of a wider crackdown, Iran’s parliament has also passed laws enabling security organisations – including the Revolutionary Guard, which was responsible for kidnapping the 15 Britons – to detain suspects for months for the purposes of interrogation.

Technorati Tags: Iran, nuclear crisis, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Ahmadinejad,

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Radical & Jailed Cleric Cries About His Deportation From the UK

Gateway Pundit:

Abdullah El-Faisal, who called for the killing of Jews, Westerners, Hindus and the rest of the unbelievers, even with chemical weapons, now is demanding that he be allowed to stay in Great Britain when he is released from jail.

El-Faisal was the first Muslim cleric to be prosecuted in the British criminal courts over the contents of his radical preachings.

Now… Sugiero is reporting that this radical cleric who has called for exterminating Westerners is crying about his deportation when he is released from jail. He claims it is a human right’s violation!

Continue reading: it’s worth it.

Related posts: More hypocrites. «The common denominator shared by Abu Qatada, [2] currently under arrest in Britain, Osama Nasser, who was kidnapped in Rome, [3] and Omar Bakri, who fled from London, [4] is that all of them want to [live] in the West, rather than in their native Islamic countries«.

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Abdullah El-Faisal, defensor del asesinato de los Judíos, Occidentales e Hindús y todos los no creyentes en general, incluso con armas químicas, ahora pide que le dejen estar en Gran Bretaña cuando sea puesto en libertad.

El-Faisal fue el primer musulmán procesado en los tribunales penales británicos por el contenido de sus prédicas radicales.

Ahora … Sugiero informa de que «está gritando para no ser deportado cuando sea puesto en libertad, porque es una violación de los Derechos Humanos» -de esos, en los que él no cree-.

Ya hablamos de Osama Nasser, Abu Qutada u Omar Bakri. Todos ellos han dicho que prefieren vivir en Occidente que en sus países islámicos de origen.

Ahora falta que se dén cuenta todos por qué…

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