Venezuela's Military Police Take on Crime Wave

CARACAS, Venezuela - The government will deploy 1,300 military police officers in and around the capital to help police battle rising crime, President Hugo Chavez said Wednesday.

The announcement comes less than a month after Chavez restored control of the capital's police department to the mayor of Caracas, one of his opponents.

"Faced with the problem of crime and public insecurity, the federal government cannot cross its arms," the president said in a speech at Venezuela's Military Academy in Caracas.

Chavez did not say when the military police would be deployed in the capital and its suburbs, beefing up the 9,000-member city force.

Metropolitan Police Chief Lazaro Forero has said violent crime has increased because his officers are often outgunned by criminals. There have been about 1,800 murders in Caracas so far this year, compared to 1,435 homicides in 2002, he said.

In November 2002, the army took control of all police stations in Caracas and confiscated the department's automatic weapons and shotguns, leaving officers to patrol with revolvers.

On Oct. 10, the federal government relinquished control of the stations and dispatched national guardsmen to patrol the capital, but did not return the weapons. Chavez ordered the takeover after accusing the Metropolitan Police force of aiding a botched 2002 coup.

Chavez is dispersing his military in advance of the presidential recall petition dive later this month. He's already told the people of Venezuela names will be taken and remembered forever, now he is sending out his troops to intimidate them further.

Venezuela's Gathering Marxist Storm - Who Is Protecting Hugo Chavez? Washington insiders say part of the reason the White House has not taken a strong position in dealing with Chavez is that the Marxist leader has several very effective advocates. First and foremost is U.S. Ambassador to the OAS Maisto. The inside account goes that Maisto was diverted from retirement, first to take the Western Hemisphere post on the National Security Council (NSC) and now the OAS post because Vice President Dick Cheney valued his expertise in the region and also because he wanted to thank Maisto for sorting out a difficult legal problem in Venezuela for Halliburton when Cheney was the company's chief executive officer and Maisto was serving under Clinton during his tenure as ambassador.

Maisto served as U.S. ambassador to Venezuela and to Nicaragua and as special assistant to President Bush and senior director for Western Hemisphere affairs at the NSC. Several Latin specialists in Washington say Maisto has been among the chief proponents of ignoring the deteriorating situation in Venezuela, arguing that Chavez's bark is worse than his bite. With an inside track to Cheney because of his former tenure in Venezuela and his work on "Plan Colombia" when he was assigned to Southern Command in Miami, Maisto reportedly has been one of Chavez's most effective protectors. Gonzalo Gallegos, public-affairs adviser at the State Department, refused to comment about Maisto's views on Chavez, but confirmed that U.S. officials recently have had discussions with the Chavez government "at the highest levels" about the need to be vigilant against terrorism.

Maisto is described as a pragmatist within the Bush inner circle, but there also are prominent Republicans reportedly working for Chavez behind the scenes, among them former New York congressman and GOP vice-presidential nominee Jack Kemp. The Wall Street Journal reported in June that Kemp developed a friendship with the Venezuelan ambassador in Washington, former oil executive Bernardo Alvarez, and accompanied him on public-relations missions, including an editorial-board meeting at the Journal. Kemp's office at Empower America did not return repeated calls by Insight seeking to ask if the former congressman has been acting as an unregistered agent of Venezuela.

Kemp reportedly is trying to sell crude oil to the U.S. Strategic Reserve on behalf of a company formed by the Venezuelan government to sell royalty oil. The newsletter Petroleum World reports that the company, Free Market Petroleum LLC, has links to international fugitive Marc Rich, who received a last-minute pardon from outgoing president Bill Clinton. According to Petroleum World: "Jack Kemp ... is using his unquestionable influence in the U.S. political scene to try to swing a deal of over $1.2 billion in Venezuelan oil, serving on the side as a public-relations adviser to Bernardo Alvarez and the Chavez government. The 'normal' commissions on such a deal would be of the order of $50 million. Not bad."

Neither Kemp nor his firm are registered with the U.S. Justice Department as foreign agents for Venezuela.

Also helping to keep Chavez in power has been the attention of Sen. Christopher Dodd (D-Conn.), at the time of the brief coup the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations subcommittee on Western Hemisphere Affairs, and his chief foreign-policy aide, Janice O'Connell. Columnist Robert Novak wrote in April that Dodd and particularly O'Connell hold a grudge against Assistant Secretary of State Otto Reich, a conservative and anticommunist. This antagonism to Reich in particular, and conservatives generally, fuels Dodd's aggressive stance on U.S. policy in Latin America.

Novak reported and Insight sources confirm that, with the Democrats in control of the Senate, O'Connell made it clear to career officials in the State Department that it was she who was calling the shots on U.S. policy in Latin America. As a result, career State Department officials were unwilling to take risks by supporting the democratic opposition in Venezuela for fear of retribution by O'Connell. Foreign policy insiders say that during the 48-hour period when Chavez was removed from the presidency, Dodd's office was very active - and successful - at guaranteeing that Washington did nothing to assure Chavez's permanent ouster. "Dodd clearly called the shots on Latin America policy," said one State Department official. "There is no conservative counterbalance to Janice O'Connell in the Senate now that Jesse Helms is gone." O'Connell did not return telephone calls seeking comment for this article. ***

Chavez Alerts Venezuela Army for Coups, Vote Fraud***"I call on the Armed Forces. ... We must be alert 24 hours a day," he said in a speech to military police in Caracas. He did not offer evidence to back his warning, nor identify the "small groups with their international allies" he said were behind the subversion threat.

Chavez also warned soldiers to watch out for attempted electoral fraud by the opposition, who must collect 2.4 million signatures between Nov. 28 and Dec. 1 to trigger a referendum in March or April next year.

The government's rival signature drive for a referendum against opposition deputies will take place Nov. 21-24.

Chavez's opponents, who accuse him of ruling like a dictator, say his government is fabricating plots to frighten voters away from supporting the referendum against the president.

They point to the beefing up of security and the creation of brigades of pro-Chavez army reservists as a sign he is bolstering his military power to confront the referendum challenge. ***

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After the first recall petition: ………Vanessa Roca, a 31-year-old secretary from the eastern state of Monagas, says she lost her job at a state-owned transport company after signing a petition calling for a recall referendum to remove Chavez from office. She traveled seven hours by bus to ask officials at the National Electoral Commission (CNE) to remove her name from the petition.

"A friend who had the same thing happen to him told me this might help me get my job back," she said. "I understand it happened to a lot of us."

As the Chavez government tries to remain in office, state employees and students who signed the petition, or who are suspected of sympathizing with the political opposition, are being purged from jobs, internships and grants, according to dozens of interviews with trade unionists, students, state workers, lawyers and human rights activists.

And in an effort to discredit the recall movement, state workers whose names appear on the petition are being encouraged by the government to sign legal complaints alleging that their signatures were forged.

Former President Carlos Andres Perez predicts Chavez "will not have a peaceful exit" and will be forced out of office if he refuses to accept the recall vote. "Violence is bad, and we don't promote it," he recently told Colombia's daily newspaper, El Tiempo, "but no other option is possible." *** Source

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