US accuses Venezuela of secret election funding
Rory Carroll in Caracas
The Guardian, Thursday 13 December 2007
Article history
Prosecutors in the US have accused Venezuela of secretly funding the election campaign of Argentina's newly inaugurated president, Cristina Kirchner. The claim ignited a political row between the three countries.
The prosecutors told a Miami court on Wednesday that a suitcase filled with nearly $800,000 (£392,000) intercepted at Buenos Aires airport was a payment from the government of President Hugo Chávez. Venezuela and Argentina rejected the allegation as a politically motivated smear.
Kirchner, thrown on the defensive on her first week in the job, said it was an example of "garbage in international politics" and that the US wanted to "subordinate" other nations. "This president may be a woman but she's not going to allow herself to be pressured."
The row revives suspicions that Chávez has used Venezuela's oil revenues to sponsor allies to try to forge a Latin American front against the US, which he terms "the empire". If the charges stick they will taint Venezuela and erode the credibility of Argentina's first elected female head of state. Both governments said it was an attempt to drive a wedge between Chávez and the rest of the region.
Venezuela's foreign minister, Nicolás Maduro, said it was a fabricated scandal. "It is a desperate effort by the US government using the judicial branch for a political, psychological, media war against the progressive governments of the continent."
Three Venezuelans and a Uruguayan are charged with failing to register with the US as agents of a foreign power. All were arrested on Tuesday night.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2007/dec/14/argentina.usa?INTCMP=ILCNETTXT3487
Soon Kirchner's wife, the new President Kirchner, who isn't even a leftist, just a nationalist, will become Venezuelan installed puppet. If you don't know Argentina's recent politics, Her late husband defauted on Argentinas generation of debt to the IMF, and the IMF threw an endless amount of fits and threatened the worst apocalyptic hellscape futures. Instead, Argentina has already paid most of their foreign debt and the economy grew quite well, despite the oligarchy trying to depose him.
Argentina has also stood up for its territorial sovereignty while uk mineral exploration operations constantly happen in its territorial waters. David Cameron seems to have threatened a new falklands war, but without an aircraft carrier, has no actual capability to conduct a falklands style war without significant US assistance.
Say hello to the newest dictator of the newest socialist state that probably supports terrorism, who is simply a puppet of chavez.
How do you think it will unfold? Do you think that UK will fly some SAS into Ministro Pistranini International Airport and kill all the pilots they can find? Will the IMF tell everyone that their economy is on the brink of collapse and their political situation is very unstable? Will there be another coup? What kind of great rewards can Argentines hope for for their populist and shortsighted policies that lack sophistication and are mostly wishful thinking,
