US SUSPECTS THAT CHAVEZ INTENDS TO EXPORT HIS BOLIVARIAN PROJECT

Washington Believes That Venezuela Supports Rebel Groups In Bolivia, Ecuador
And Colombia

The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) of the United States scrutinizes
the Bolivarian intentions of the Venezuelan president, Hugo Chavez,
fearing that is proclamations for a Latin American Union transcend the
political level and are carried out through economic aid that can be
used by rebel, indigenous, and Creole movements of the region.

The firing, last January, of the Venezuela Foreign Ministry's director
of information and opinion, Miguel Quintero, seems related to these
suspicions, as well as the imprudent closeness of the official with
the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC).

The appearance made in the Caracas hall of the National Assembly
(Venezuelan Congress) by Olga Lucia Marin, daughter of the historic
leader of this guerrilla movement Manuel Marulanda Tirofijo
("Sureshot"), and of Hernan Martinez, also a member of the militia
that declares itself to be Bolivarian, caused a behind-the-scenes
collision within the breast of the government alliance.

The Speaker of the House, the official partisan William Lara,
according to sources within the Foreign Ministry, filed a complaint
with the president's office for not having been consulted over the
invitation to the two insurrectionists. Quintero was the person in
charge of receiving and hosting them.

Exhibiting truths, lies, angry sounds and probably with intentions to
dissuade such activity, a high US official recently declared that the
Bolivarian propaganda of the commander of the paratroopers - that on
February 4, 1992 rose up in arms against the government of Social
Democrat Carlos Andres Perez - is not only verbal.

"There are indications that the government of Chavez has supported
violent indigenous movements in Bolivia, and in the case of Ecuador,
military coup members," according to the Assistant Secretary of State
of Hemispheric Affairs, Peter Romero. He described the president
himself, and his foreign minister, Jose Vicente Rangel, named last
week as Defense Secretary, as "professional agitators."

The most concrete accusation was thrown by the daily Miami Herald: That
Venezuela had delivered more than $500,000 dollars to Colonel Lucio
Gutierrez, who headed indigenous demonstrations that in 2000 ended with the
fall of the government of Jamil Mahuad, accused of committing a serious
banking corruption. The slogan of Gutierrez was the same that Lieutenant
Colonel Hugo Chavez held nine years ago: the corruption and immorality of
the traditional political class. Gutierrez was imprisoned and released
months later. The North American newspaper said that the CIA has film and
photographs of Miguel Quintero with this ex-colonel and coup member.

Always citing information from espionage services - that conveniently
are not made public - the leak over graphic documentation
demonstrates, without a doubt, that Chavez and his revolution are in
the sights and priorities of the CIA.

Another of the charges made is that during the Ibero-American Summit
last year in Panama, the Bolivian president, the right-winger Hugo
Banzer, attacked his Venezuelan colleague for the supposed support
given to one of the messengers of the indigenous leader Felipe Quisque
Huanca, active leader of the coca growers against the President.

Sources consulted in Caracas recommended caution in believing the
North American imputations because, obviously, Chavez has never hidden
his dream of a united and Bolivarian Latin America. Something very
distinct would be to act logistically by using government funds.

"So far it's all conjecture, interpretations of meetings that in fact
never happened. There are no convincing proofs that Venezuela has
supported subversion," said diplomatic sources. The "respectful"
position that Caracas has toward the Colombian guerrilla, however, and
the statements made, have caused frequent disputes with Colombia,
whose government demands solidarity from its neighbor and a rotund
belligerence against the violence carried out by the FARC.

Journalist Gioconda Soto, of the daily El Nacional, sustains that in
the cited document of the CIA against the administration of Chavez,
the retired general Milton Abreu, who until recently was military
chief in the Venezuelan Embassy in Quito, Ecuador, had participated.
Abreu, with contacts between the old guard of the Military
Intelligence Directorship (DIM, in its Spanish acronym), was connected
to Peter Romero, while both were representatives of their nations in
that Andean country.

Romero was Washington's Ambassador to Ecuador from November 1993 to
July 1996, after having served in diplomatic posts in El Salvador.
Supposedly, the Venezuelan ex-chief accompanied Quintero during a
meeting with Gutierrez, and with the mayor of Quito, retired general
Paco Moncayo, who led the Condor War of 1995 against Peru, over an old
territorial dispute.

"In official circles there is concern," says Soto, "over the supposed
present-day mechanisms of collaboration between certain figures from
the old militarism (that which existed during the 40 years of the
two-party system in Venezuela) and the US intelligence agency."

Quintero was a type of "specialist" for the government who established
contects with opposition circles in Latin America, be they civil or
military, and who possibly had lost his convincingness that any
initiative of his had counted with the good will of Chavez and Rangel.
General Santiago Ramirez, another man who is close to the president,
replaced him.

Analyst Nelson Bocaranda adds that the fired foreign ministry official
spoke, in his Caracas office, with a messenger of Vladamiro
Montesinos, the de facto chief of the Peruvian spy agency until the
disgraceful fall of ex-president Alberto Fujimori. His telephone
contacts with Cuba were constant. "He played the role of the Creole
007 and he liked it. His first report was sent to the Venezuelan
Defense Secretary (then, General Eliecer Hurtado) who delivered it to
President Chavez. He was immediately, ipso facto, fired from his post."

The doubts reside in knowing whether he maneuvered with the consent of
his superiors, or effectively adventured alone in high-voltage affairs
that ended up creating a problem for his government.

An Old Suspect of the CIA

The inclusion of Hugo Chavez in the list of suspects by the US
intelligence services began in 1994, a short time after he was
released from jail where he served two years for the failed uprising
of 1992. One of his first moves was to travel to Havana, where he was
received, with honor, by Fidel Castro, in a moment when nobody
believed in his political future. The paratroop commander returned
from Cuba, once praised, and prepared a warm welcome for Fidel in
Caracas when he visited there.

Later, a Venezuelan opposition magazine, Zeta, accused Chavez of
having alerted the Cuban revolution, until 1998, about the rise of
petroleum prices. He advised them, according to this publication, to
buy all the petroleum that they could because then it was a little
more than seven dollars a barrel and it rose as high as $30. The
Venezuelan leader has demonstrated his willingness to help Cuba in its
chronic oil shortage. Previous trips by the Venezuelan leader to Iraq
and Libya, challenging the United States, were made not to coordinate
petroleum policies, but to accelerate the creation political following
that predictably would generate talk.