Probably posted before.
Our Gang in Venezuela?
by David Corn
http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20020805&c=1&s=corn(Cut)
Created by President Ronald Reagan and Congress in 1983, NED was designed to run a parallel foreign policy for the United States, backing and assisting entities that Washington might not be able to officially endorse--say, an opposition party challenging a government with which the United States maintained diplomatic relations. In a way, NED took public some of the covert political activity the CIA had previously mounted. The endowment--which devotes much of its budget to funding the foreign policy arms of the Democratic and Republican parties, the Chamber of Commerce and the AFL-CIO (its core grantees)--has been involved in both questionable and praiseworthy projects. It awarded a large grant to a student group linked to an outlawed extreme-right paramilitary outfit in France, helped finance the development of conservative parties in countries where democracy was doing just fine and played a heavy-handed role in Nicaragua's 1990 elections. In the late 1980s it aided the pro-democracy opposition in Chile and antiapartheid organizations in South Africa. But even if its programs have indeed enhanced democracy on occasion, NED overall has long been problematic, as it has handed taxpayer dollars to private groups (such as the two major parties) to finance their overseas initiatives and has conducted controversial programs that could be viewed abroad as actions of the US government. What might the reaction be here, if the British government funded an effort to improve the Democratic Party's get-out-the-vote operation in Florida?
Which brings us back to Venezuela--where the US Embassy was compelled after the coup to declare as a "myth" the notion that "the US government, through organizations such as the National Endowment for Democracy, financed coup efforts." For months before the coup, Americans--including US government officials and officials of NED and its core grantees--were in contact with Venezuelans and political parties that became involved or possibly involved with the coup. This has provided Latin Americans cause to wonder if the United States is continuing its tradition of underhandedly meddling in the affairs of its neighbors to the south. And these contacts have prompted some, though not much, official probing in Washington. The issue is not only whether the United States in advance OK'd this particular coup (of which there is little evidence) or tried to help it once it occurred (of which there is more evidence). But did discussions between Americans and Chavez foes--such as those involving NED--encourage or embolden the coup-makers and their supporters? Give them reason to believe the United States would not protest should they move against Chavez in an unconstitutional manner? Much of the two-day coup remains shrouded in confusion. (It came and went so quickly: Carmona fled office the day after he seized power, once several military units announced they opposed the military coup, whereupon Chavez was returned to his office.) But enough questions linger about US actions in Venezuela to warrant a good look.
Consider some NED activities there. When Consorcio Justicia began to assemble the pro-democracy conferences, it approached the two main opponents of Chavez--Carmona and his Fedecamaras, as well as the Confederation of Venezuelan Workers (CTV), the leading anti-Chavez labor union--according to documents obtained from NED under a Freedom of Information Act request. Christopher Sabatini, NED's senior program officer for Latin America, says, "The idea was that the conferences (which were to include Chavistas) would be able to define a consensus-based policy agenda" for the entire country. But certainly NED's core grantees were trying to beef up Venezuelan organizations challenging Chavez. The AFL-CIO, for example, was working (seemingly laudably) to bolster and democratize the CTV, which Chavez had been trying to intimidate and infiltrate. The International Republican Institute was training several parties that opposed Chavez. At one session, Mike Collins, a former GOP press secretary, taught party leaders how to mount photo-ops; at another he suggested to Caracas Mayor Alfredo Peña, a prominent Chavez foe, how he "could soften his aggressive image in order to appeal to a wider range of voters," according to an IRI report. (Human Rights Watch found that at least two members of the police force controlled by Peña--now Chavez's primary rival--fired weapons during the April 11 melee.) The question, then, is, since it was not explicit US policy to call for Chavez's ouster--though his departure from office was desired by the Bush Administration, which detested his oil sales to Cuba and close ties to Iraq, Iran and Libya--should US taxpayer dollars have gone to groups working to unseat Chavez, even through legitimate means?
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