Posted on 06/05/2005 9:56:07 PM PDT by CHARLITE
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (Reuters) - The United States called on Sunday for new ways to support "fragile" democracies in the Western Hemisphere but was immediately accused by Venezuela of seeking to impose a "global dictatorship."
The United States hopes to use a three-day meeting of the 34-member Organization of American States that began on Sunday to advance its idea of allowing private groups to help monitor and promote democracy by raising their concerns with the OAS.
"When you look at some of the fragile democracies that there are, it's very clear that the institution needs to be better capable of dealing with them," Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told reporters as she flew to Florida.
U.S. officials have talked of allowing ordinary citizens, rights groups and other nongovernmental organizations to bring their concerns directly to the OAS and of empowering ad hoc groups and elder statesmen to step in during crises.
"Together we must insist that leaders who are elected democratically have a responsibility to govern democratically," Rice said at the gathering's opening session.
She did not directly mention Venezuela but Washington and other critics of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez say that although twice elected, the Venezuelan president is showing authoritarian tendencies in office.
Speaking before the conference began, Chavez accused the United States of trying to impose a "global dictatorship" and said that it, not Venezuela, should face OAS scrutiny.
"So, they're going to try to monitor the Venezuelan government through the OAS, they must be joking!" Chavez said, speaking on his weekly "Hello President" TV and radio show.
'GLOBAL DICTATORSHIP'
"If there is any government that should be monitored by the OAS, then it should be the U.S. government, a government which backs terrorists, invades nations, tramples over its own people, seeks to install a global dictatorship," he said.
His latest anti-U.S. outburst reflected the tense state of relations between Venezuela, the world's No. 5 oil exporter, and the United States, its biggest oil client.
Rice sought to play down expectations the OAS meeting would result in agreement on any mechanisms to protect democracies and said as its host, she wanted to listen to others. She also expressed hope a free and democratic Cuba would soon rejoin the OAS. Cuba was suspended from the body two years after President Fidel Castro's 1959 revolution took the island down a communist path.
Ministers at the meeting did not hear much from protesters who were kept about 100 yards from the convention center in the seaside resort of Fort Lauderdale, which was encircled by hundreds of police and sealed off by roadblocks.
The OAS historically has been hamstrung by its tradition of operating by consensus, which gives any country an effective veto over collective action in a region where Washington's motives are suspect because of its history of interference.
It has failed to calm the political instability in Bolivia, Ecuador and Haiti -- three countries where Rice said "the institutions of democracy have perhaps brittle roots."
Bolivian President Carlos Mesa is facing crippling protests by indigenous groups, Ecuador's former President Lucio Gutierrez was fired by Congress in April amid protests, and in Haiti, former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide was forced into exile last year by an armed revolt and U.S. and French pressure.
Despite the fierce rhetoric from Chavez, a U.S. official said Rice greeted Venezuelan Foreign Minister Ali Rodriguez and thanked him for his comments at a private meeting of OAS ministers on Sunday afternoon.
But in a gesture sure to anger Chavez, Rice plans to meet Maria Corina Machado, a prominent opponent of the Venezuelan president, on Monday, six days after President Bush welcomed her to the White House. (Additional reporting by Pascal Fletcher in Caracas)
Chaves just keeps getting loonier and loonier. Bet it is getting close to the beginning of the end for him.
What is it with this pi$$-pot countries? Global dictatorship???
What does the USA want with third-world countries? Oil??? Hell, it's cheaper to just buy it than it is to fight over it.
We have enough of our own problems here without "taking over" underdeveloped cesspools.
Your comment inspires me to reflect that Hugo Chavez and Howard Dean would make such a lovely couple. Doncha think?
........also apologies for my typo in the title; I typed an "e" where there should have been an "a" in Chavez. So sorry, folks!
Char :)
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