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U.S. giving Latin war foes cold shoulder *** There is a fierce fight within the Bush administration over how the United States should deal with neighboring countries that opposed the U.S. war on Iraq. And the hard-liners are winning. Judging from interviews with senior U.S. officials in recent days, the Bush administration's level of annoyance is escalating with countries such as Mexico and Chile, which have refused to support U.S.-backed resolutions at the U.N. Security Council, or Canada, Argentina and Brazil, which have opposed the war with various degrees of intensity.

At first, the official U.S. line -- both publicly and privately -- was that there would be no retaliation against countries that did not support the war. Washington would not give leaders of these countries the cold shoulder, nor suddenly find previously undetected bugs in their countries' fruit exports, officials said. But now that the war is in full swing -- and Mexico is scheduled to take over the chairmanship of the U.N. Security Council on Tuesday -- the hard-liners within the Bush administration are taking their gloves off. Countries that support Bush will be rewarded, and those that don't will get the cold treatment, the hawks say.***

Venezuelan Shooting Suspects Cleared AP [Full Text] CARACAS, Venezuela - A court tossed out homicide charges Tuesday against four suspects in shootings that killed 19 people and helped trigger a short-lived coup against President Hugo Chavez last year. Dozens of Chavez supporters celebrated the ruling with fireworks outside the courthouse in the central city of Maracay, 40 miles from Caracas, the state-run Venezolana de Television channel reported. The suspects, all Chavez supporters, were released. They had pleaded innocent to the charges.

Gunfire broke out April 11, 2002, when a massive opposition march clashed with a pro-government rally in downtown Caracas. The shootings spurred a bloodless military coup that briefly ousted the leftist Chavez. Loyalists in the military returned Chavez to power two days after the uprising.

Venezuela remains divided over Chavez's continued rule since the mid-April rebellion. Government opponents accuse the former paratrooper of riding roughshod over democratic institutions and dragging this South American nation of 24 million into chaos with ill-defined economic policies. Chavez claims Venezuela's opposition, including leading labor and business groups, are leading an "economic coup" with the intention of overthrowing his revolutionary government. The judges on Tuesday did uphold lesser charges - of improper firearm use and public intimidation - against the four. But defense attorney Amado Molina said they were granted conditional freedom. [End]