SPEECH OF AMBASSADOR JORGE VALERO
AT THE PERMANENT COUNCIL OF THE OAS
Foreign Aggression against Venezuela’s Democracy
Washington D.C., March 31st, 2004

 

The Government led by Hugo Chávez Frias has decided to lodge a complaint before the Organization of American States (OAS) for situations that infringe the sovereignty of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela.

Fundamental principles enshrined in the OAS Charter regarding national sovereignty, independence and non interference in internal affairs are today as relevant as ever, if not more so.  Noble indeed is the provision stated in Article 3 that proclaims that: 

“Every State has the right to choose, without external interference, its political, economic, and social system and to organize itself in the way best suited to it, and has the duty to abstain from intervening in the affairs of another State. Subject to the foregoing, the American States shall cooperate fully among themselves, independently of the nature of their political, economic, and social systems.”

Article 19 of this same Charter also solemnly proclaims that:

“No State or group of States has the right to intervene, directly or indirectly, for any reason whatever, in the internal or external affairs of any other State. The foregoing principle prohibits not only armed force but also any other form of interference or attempted threat against the personality of the State or against its political, economic, and cultural elements.”

The Government of President Hugo Chávez Frias has always acted with absolute respect for these principles.  And it demands the same behavior from all the Member Countries of this Organization.

The Bolivarian Government hereby formally and responsibly lodges before this forum the complaint that the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) has been used – and continues to be used – by the Government of the United States to give support to the antidemocratic activities of opposition groups in Venezuela; that these actions are systematically dedicated to promoting a climate of political instability, seek a breakdown of the country’s democratic institutions, and are directed towards the achievement of an ultimate goal: the overthrow of the Constitutional President of Venezuela, Hugo Chávez Frias.

Latin America is experiencing a new historical cycle.  The neo-liberal policies applied in the region have failed, and have generated high levels of poverty, hunger and misery throughout the continent.  A model based on egotism and irrationality has collapsed.  We are now confronted with the fact that our societies require deep changes that cannot be delayed.

The Venezuelan government is moving ahead with a National Project based on the dreams and aspirations of all social sectors willing to participate in the construction of a just and egalitarian society.  Its efforts to promote and defend the demands of the groups that constitute the majority of the social universe derive from this commitment.

The Bolivarian revolution is peaceful and democratic, but it faces the irrational opposition of minority sectors that, in alliance with international interests, fear the loss of their immoral privileges.  Clinging to a predominance held since Colonial times, they have reacted with hatred and retaliation.

Venezuela is a pluralist country. Our Supreme Constitutional Law guarantees respect for all dissidence.  Every Venezuelan, whatever his political, religious or cultural beliefs may be, has the right to express his points of view.  The Government of President Chávez has always shown respect for the opposition.  It has guaranteed the full exercise of all constitutional rights.  Dissent and protest are welcomed, and can be fully exercised without limitations, as long as they are expressed within the boundaries of applicable law.

Venezuela requires a democratic, civilized opposition that is responsive to the social plight in which we are submerged.  Unfortunately, the opposition has been influenced by anti-democratic groups.  For this reason it attempted to overthrow the Government on April 11^th and 12^th of 2002, and later embarked on an oil industry sabotage that cost the nation more than 10 billion dollars in losses.

Several groups combined to carry out the Coup d’Etat: the business elite associated in Fedecamaras, a business association; parties both old and new, all associated with the ancient regime; and the larger mass media outlets.  Their aim was the restoration of long standing privileges.  And the coup became possible because these groups had the support of important elements within the United States; particularly, they had the backing of certain individuals in the State Department and the National Endowment for Democracy (NED).

The coup insurgents rose in arms against Venezuela’s legal order. They expressed violent opposition to legislative reforms designed to recover the dignity of all the Venezuelan people, and especially of the poor and those who have always been excluded from society.

The political class and the business elite that carried out the coup were planning to sell the national petroleum industry to the multinationals at rock bottom prices.  President Hugo Chávez, making use of his constitutional powers, prevented this outrageous plan from taking place.  It was no accident that the withdrawal of Venezuela from OPEC was one of the first announcements made by the coup leaders.

The Coup d’Etat was brought about by resistance to democratic change.  The Venezuelan people reacted against the coup leaders and joined the constitutionalist and democratic Armed Forces in an effort that reinstated President Chávez to his legitimate post.  Venezuelans took to the streets by the millions, and through peaceful means were able to rescue democracy during its hour of peril.

The Coup had external support.  Had it not been so, the coup leaders would not have embarked on their adventure.  On Friday, April 12^th, 2002, officials of the Department of State and of the Permanent Mission of the United States to the OAS carried out an intense lobby within this organization and with the diplomatic corps of Latin American and Caribbean countries posted in Washington, in an attempt to justify the Venezuelan Coup d’Etat.  Many of those present here today are witnesses to what I say.  Meanwhile, in Caracas, the Ambassador of the United States, Charles Shapiro, was paying a “courtesy visit” to the dictator Pedro Carmona Estanga.

That same day, in a letter that is now in our possession, Phillip Chicola, acting for the State Department, made the following suggestions to Pedro Carmona Estanga:

 

·        That the “transition presently taking place in Venezuela, which it understands and with which it sympathizes, should preserve constitutional forms;”

·        That “the resignation of President Chávez should be approved by the National Assembly;”

·        That “elections should be convened within a reasonable period, with assurances that OAS Observers would be welcome to monitor these elections;”

·        That they “wish(ed) to receive a copy of the resignation signed by President Chávez;”

·        And that “the present Permanent Representative to the OAS should be replaced as soon as possible.”

These suggestions were accepted by Carmona, as can be seen in the letter he sent to the Secretary General of the OAS, Cesar Gaviria, on April 13^th, 2002.

Simultaneously, on that day of April 12^th, Phillip Reeker, in an Official Communiqué released by the Department of State, accused President Chávez of being responsible for his own overthrow.  He said that “Chávez resigned the presidency. Before resigning, he dismissed the Vice President and the Cabinet. A transition civilian government has promised early elections…  this situation will be resolved peacefully and democratically by the Venezuelan people in accord with the principles of the Inter-American Democratic Charter.”

Our Government has photographs, recordings and abundant evidence that prove the involvement of United States Government officials in the planning and the execution of the Coup d’Etat.

It has evidence that United States military helicopters landed in Maiquetia Airport during the coup; that US warships illegally penetrated Venezuelan waters in the Caribbean, infringing on our sovereignty; that United States military personnel met with Venezuelan military officers involved in the coup, both before and during the coup.

On April 12^th, 2002, a United States airplane was in Orchila, the Venezuelan island to which President Chávez had been taken when he was kidnapped by the coup leaders.  This airplane made a hurried take-off when its crewmembers realized aware that patrol frigates of the Venezuelan Navy were on their way to that location.

Secretary of State Colin Powell, during a hearing on March 3^rd, 2004 before the Commerce and State Subcommittee of the Appropriations Committee of the House of Representatives, recognized that the State Department had made a mistake.  He said, and I quote: “a Communiqué of the State Department was issued that could have been handled better, that did not reflect our position, and we corrected that in less than 24 hours.”  End of quote. However, by then the people were already restoring President Chávez to his post in the presidency.

A New York Times editorial published on March 9^th states the following “The Bush Administration has so openly allied itself with the anti-Chávez camp that it would be hard for it to play a mediating role [in Venezuela].”

After the Coup d’Etat failed, the anti-democratic sectors of the opposition – backed by the Department of State and the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) – designed a new plan to remove the President, to be carried out in two phases.  They would now attempt the electoral route:

 

·        During a first phase, they made efforts to achieve an “early calling of elections,” even though they knew this violated the Constitution.  They also failed in this attempt.

·        Now they are trying to force the calling of a presidential recall referendum, violating the requirements established in Article 72 of the Constitution.

The National Endowment for Democracy (NED) was created in November, 1983, through Public Law Nº 98-164 of the United States Congress, for the purpose of “promoting democracy in the world.”  The law establishes that its programs shall be financed by the United States Congress.

However, even from its early beginnings, the NED began to veer from its intended purpose.  Due to the scandal that erupted in 1984 when it used funds to finance the electoral campaign of a candidate for the presidency of Panama, Nicolas Ardito Barletta, the U.S. Congress enacted an Amendment to this Law with the mandate that, and I quote, “No funds will be used, by the NED or any of its beneficiaries, to finance campaigns for candidates to elected posts of government.”

Venezuela also forbids any foreign financing for organizations that participate in the political debate.  In a November 21^st of 2000 ruling, the Constitutional Court of the Supreme Tribunal of Justice found that civil society or “those who represent them cannot be foreigners, nor can they be organizations directed, affiliated with, subsidized by, financed or maintained, either directly or indirectly, by foreign States or by movements or groups influenced by those States: or by transnational or worldwide associations, groups or movements that pursue political or economic ends for their own benefit.”  Consequently, the organizations of civil society that receive foreign money to carry out political activities in Venezuela are acting against the law.

It is noteworthy that the NED is giving its support only, and exclusively, to opposition political parties in Venezuela.  The list is as follows: Primero Justicia, Acción Democrática, COPEI, Movimiento al Socialismo (MAS) and Proyecto Venezuela.

It is noteworthy that the NED is giving its support only, and exclusively, to non governmental organizations (NGOs) that operate, in practice, as opposition political parties or as subsidiary bodies of those parties, and that some of them were openly involved with the Coup d”Etat.  The list is as follows:

Súmate, Confederación de Trabajadores de Venezuela (CTV), Asociación Civil Comprensión de Venezuela, Asociación Civil Consorcio Justicia, Asociación Civil Consorcio Justicia –Occidente, Fundación Momento de la Gente, Asociación Civil Asamblea de Educación, Acción Campesina, Instituto de Prensa y Sociedad (IPYS), Fundación Justicia para la Paz del Estado Monagas, Asociación Civil Justicia Alternativa, Acción para el Desarrollo, Asociación Civil Liderazgo y Visión, Centro al Servicio de la Acción Popular, Asociación Civil Nuevo Amanecer, Agrupación Pro Calidad de Vida, Sinergia, PRODEL-Venezuela.

It is noteworthy that the NED is giving its support only, and exclusively, to political programs in states led by opposition Governors. The list is as follows:

 

·        Miranda State, Governor Enrique Mendoza, main leader of the Opposition Coordinating Body.  He participated directly in the 2002 coup, and during those events he ordered the closing of the Government television channel, Venezolana de Televisión.

·        Carabobo State, Governor Henrique Salas Feo, of the Proyecto Venezuela party.

·        Zulia State, Governor Manuel Rosales, main leader of the opposition Coordinating Body in that State.  He signed the “decree” of the coup leaders, purporting to represent the State Governors.

·        Monagas State, Governor Guillermo Call, of the Acción Democrática party.  He supported the Coup d’Etat.

·        Anzoategui State, Governor David de Lima, of the Movimiento al Socialismo party.  He supported the Coup d’Etat.

The financing plan designed by the NED for the opposition groups in Venezuela in 2002 – the year during which the Coup d’Etat occurred – was called “Democratization of Semi-Authoritarian States.”  To this end, 2 million 103 thousand 200 dollars were channeled through the State Department’s U.S. Information Agency (USIA).

The NED has also received extraordinary resources from other agencies of the State Department to carry out operations in Venezuela.  The Office for Democracy, Human Rights and Labor (DRL) that operates under the jurisdiction of the Assistant Secretary for Global Affairs of the Department of State also allocated 1 million dollars for the expansion and consolidation of NED programs during the year of the coup.

The following year, in view of the coup’s failure, the DRL allocated 285 thousand dollars to the NED to promote the calling of “early elections” in Venezuela, in total disregard of the timetable established in the National Constitution.

During the year the Coup d’Etat occurred, the State Department’s United States Agency for International Development (USAID) also directed 2 million dollars to the support of Venezuelan leaders and institutions described as “moderate” but that, in practice, were opposed to President Hugo Chávez.

During the six months that preceded the Coup d’Etat, six other Bureaus of the State Department directly disbursed 695 thousand 300 dollars to finance conferences and seminars that were favorable to the opposition.

SUMATE is a political and electoral instrument of the NED in Venezuela.  María Corina Machado, its Vice-president, was among those who signed the Decree of Pedro Carmona Estanga’s de facto government by which all of the country’s democratic institutions were declared to be dissolved.  Súmate was also one of the most important participants in the sabotage of the Venezuelan petroleum industry.

Súmate received 53,400 dollars from the NED to be used from September 2003 to September 2004 for the implementation of a project allegedly directed towards “Electoral Education.”  However, its true purpose has been to finance a media campaign promoting a recall referendum against President Hugo Chávez.

The NED has also been giving resources to the Center for Justice and International Law (CEJIL) so it may support the filing of accusations in the Inter-American system against the Venezuelan Government for alleged violations of human rights.  83,000 dollars were allocated for the 2003-2004 period.

With money from the NED, CEJIL urges the sidestepping of Venezuela’s democratic institutions and its judicial authorities, advising Venezuelan NGOs to recur directly to supra-national judicial bodies, without first presenting their cases to the appropriate legal bodies at the national level, as is required by the Inter-American Convention of Human Rights.

Through the Center for International Private Enterprise (CIPE), the NED has also given resources to the Venezuelan Center for the Promotion of Economic Knowledge (CEDICE), in the amount of 462 thousand 686 dollars from 1999 to 2003.  To justify this allocation, the NED has falsely alleged that the Government of Hugo Chávez “has shown militaristic and Marxist tendencies,” that Venezuela’s economic laws “prevent social and financial development,” and that “achieving a consensus among civil society groups in order to contribute to the building of an alternative vision for Venezuela is imperative.”  In other words, a “consensus” is sought among opposition groups so that they may confront the Government.

In the “Examination of Agrarian Reform” program through which the NED finances the Accion Campesina (or “Farmers Action”) organization, President Chávez is subjected to accusations that have no basis in the facts.  And when the goals of this organization – as declared in NED documents – are examined, it can be easily determined that its true purpose is to fight the Lands and Agricultural Development Law and sabotage agrarian reform.  Acción Campesina maintains an alliance with Venezuelan owners of large tracts of land (“latifundistas”) who during recent months have instructed vigilantes at their service to assassinate 72 peasant leaders and agricultural workers that were struggling to secure their right to land ownership.  From 2002 to 2004 the NED gave this organization 93 thousand dollars.

From 2001 to 2004 the NED gave 167 thousand dollars to the Asamblea de Educación (or “Education Assembly”) Civil Association, for the purpose of carrying out an “Educational Reform” program.  This group was instructed to promote “alliances among groups of civil society, teachers’ unions and parents of students all over the country,” and to oppose “the government’s educational reform package.”

The NED alleges that Chávez’ Government must be confronted because “it is using education as an indoctrination tool in order to extend his personal, political and ideological project.”  This organization is led by Leonardo Carvajal, a prominent leader of the Opposition Coordinating Body, who was designated by the dictator Pedro Carmona Estanga to become his Minister of Education.

From 2000 to 2004, 229 thousand 74 dollars were given to the Momento de la Gente (or “People’s Moment”) Foundation.  The task of this group is to give “Legislative Assistance” to the opposition parties, to lobby the National Assembly in order to block laws proposed by the parliamentary group that supports the government, and to foster the introduction of bills drafted by the opposition.

The International Republican Institute (IRI) is the main conduit for the financing of opposition parties in Venezuela.  From 1999 to date, the NED and the State Department have given 1 million 408 thousand 818 dollars to the IRI to train and advise opposition leaders and to support parties that oppose the Government.

One of the programs financed by the IRI from 2003 to 2004 is called “Strengthening of Political Parties.”  To justify granting this money, the NED paints a dark and misleading picture of Venezuela, and says it believes “the international community should call for a peaceful solution of the crisis through early elections.”  In other words, it has allocated resources for an unconstitutional political plan, since Venezuela’s Constitution contemplates electoral timetables and procedures that are very well established and defined.

The IRI also gave its support to the Coup d’Etat in Venezuela.  A Press Communiqué released on April 12^th of 2002 by its President, George Folsom, states that the IRI acted as a “conduit” between the opposition political parties and civil society groups in order to achieve the overthrow of President Hugo Chávez.

The NED finance programs that we have mentioned here are only a representative sample.  There are many more.  The documents in which the aforementioned information is contained were declassified due to the Freedom of Information Act, and can be found at the following web site:  www.venezuelafoia.info.

Journalists, analysts and Members of the United States Congress have observed and pointed out the same concerns about the NED that are now being brought forth by the Venezuela State 

The agency says it “promotes political pluralism,” but lends its financing only and exclusively to political movements and leaders that maintain a position of confrontation with the Government, with no regard for the fact that they may be involved in anti-democratic activities.

We are accusing the NED of trying to impede democratic and progressive change in our country, with the complicity of unethical and unpatriotic Venezuelans, thirsty for American dollars, who, not coincidentally, are constantly asking for a foreign intervention in Venezuela.

If the NED is forbidden from financing campaigns of candidates for public office in other countries, how can it finance campaigns to revoke the mandates of leaders that have been democratically elected?  The NED has gone so far as to finance people who, at certain moments in time, were deemed to be potential presidential candidates in Venezuela, organizing workshops for the purpose of “cleaning up” and promoting their political image.

In recent days the opposition, in collaboration with the major media information outlets, has embarked on an intense campaign that seeks to distort the reality of the human rights situation in Venezuela.  They have the support of the Executive Secretary of the Inter American Commission of Human Rights, Santiago Canton, who is the same person that refused to order precautionary measures to protect President Hugo Chávez Frias when his life was in danger during his detention by the coup conspirators.  He is the one who addressed the illegal Government of Pedro Carmona Estanga by describing it as an “illustrious government.”  He is the one who asked the coup leaders to provide information on “Mister Hugo Chávez,” divesting him of his Presidential condition.

In Venezuela today the respect for Human Rights and fundamental liberties is strictly enforced.  Freedom of expression is being fully exercised.  We categorically deny that political prisoners or missing persons exist today in Venezuela, in contrast with previous administrations in which such situations were very frequent.

We denounce that a very well organized network is operating in Venezuela against the democratic Government of Hugo Chávez.  Each one of the organizations that receives financial support from abroad plays a specific role, seeking to harass the Government in many different ways and through various aspects of the country’s economic, political, educational, communicational, labor and legislative activities.

We accuse Christopher Sabatini, Director of the NED for Latin America and the Caribbean, of becoming a prominent political advisor for the opposition in Venezuela.  He is lending his support to a wide conspiratorial network in our country, and has close, permanent and complicit relationships with the main leaders of the opposition, including those that seek to carry out a new coup.

How would the Government of the United States react if a foreign government supplied money to political parties and non governmental organizations in order to help them obstruct its national or international policies, sabotage its nuclear industry, or encourage U.S. citizens to ignore or violently rebel against the country’s democratic institutions?

Venezuelans have every right to carry out and promote a sovereign and democratic national political project that draws its inspiration from the teachings of our Liberator Simon Bolivar.  Millions of people have embraced this project, particularly those who have historically been excluded from society.  It is an original, unprecedented and profoundly democratic and participatory undertaking.  No one has the right to prevent the hopes and dreams of our people from being realized.

Times of change have arrived and are being felt throughout the continent.  The neo-liberal model has collapsed in the region. According to data published by ECLAC, 64% of the population of Latin America and the Caribbean lives in poverty or extreme poverty.  Every year an additional six million human beings are thrown into this sordid circuit of poverty; in 2003 there were 227 million poor in our region.  Today we see the emergence of social and political currents, inspired in more exalted ethical principles, which challenge injustices and struggle for a new order based on justice and social inclusion.

We have come here today to formally declare that the Government of the United States – through the intervention of the Department of State and the National Endowment for Democracy – is interfering in the internal affairs of Venezuela, in violation of Articles 3 and 19 of the OAS Charter.  We demand that foreign intervention in Venezuela cease.  And we request that this complaint be placed on the permanent record of the Organization of American States.