Chavez and allies take swipe at US
(Reuters)
19 December 2007
MONTEVIDEO - Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez and two Latin American allies accused the United States on Tuesday of conspiring to undermine the region’s leftist governments.
The charge followed a diplomatic firestorm set off by claims from a US prosecutor that Venezuela attempted to smuggle $800,000 in a suitcase to the election campaign of Argentina’s President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner.
Chavez, Fernandez and Bolivian President Evo Morales rebuked the United States in separate public comments at a meeting of the South American trade bloc Mercosur in Uruguay’s capital Montevideo.
Chavez accused Washington of meddling in Bolivian politics and seeking to destabilize the Morales’ leftist government, which faces calls for autonomy by several opposition-controlled provinces amid a dispute over constitutional reforms.
“I have to blame the empire. They are trying to sabotage a legitimate democratic process,” Chavez said, referring to the United States. “We have to warn the empire that if they try to topple that legitimate government ... it will cause an earthquake that will shake the Americas.”
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On Tuesday, Morales reiterated accusations that the US ambassador in La Paz was involved in a conspiracy to damage his government. “It would be good if the United States would advise its ambassador to practice diplomacy, not politics,” he said.
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‘Dirty operations’
Argentina’s Fernandez, who took office on Dec. 10, did not name the United States directly but suggested it was looking to influence the region through “dirty operations and dirty politics.”
“Let’s not be naive ... there are going to be many more ’interferences’ like those we’re experiencing now,” she said.
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Former President Kirchner said in a fiery speech earlier on Tuesday: “The US ambassador said relations with Argentina are good. But what they’re doing in Miami is shameful ... so relations are not good. Argentina isn’t a colony and you must respect us and the Argentine courts.”
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