U.S. Petroleum reserve use not expected - Venezuelan Strike Day 18

WASHINGTON -- The Bush administration sought to counter industry rumors Wednesday that it might release oil from the government's emergency reserve to make up for lost Venezuelan imports.

"Currently lending or exchanging oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve is not an active consideration," the Energy Department said in a statement.

But the statement did not categorically rule out using the reserve in the future and said the department "continues to monitor the situation in Venezuela and its possible impact on U.S. markets."

White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said the emergency oil stockpile is designed to be used for a severe disruption and so far that has not occurred. "Obviously, we're going to continue to monitor the situation very closely," he said. "But at this time we do not think the release is necessary."

Venezuela's oil exports have all but stopped because of a 17-day-old general strike against the regime of President Hugo Chavez. The country's oil output, which had been nearly 3 million barrels a day, has dropped to 400,000 barrels.

The world's fifth-largest oil producer, Venezuela is a major source of oil for the United States, accounting for about 14 percent of U.S. oil imports.

Crude oil and products futures rallied Wednesday as concerns that an attack on Iraq is becoming more likely converged with the continued paralysis of Venezuela's oil industry.

Futures for light, sweet January crude, which expire today, rose 34 cents to $30.44 a barrel at the New York Mercantile Exchange. The January gasoline futures contract surged 2.15 cents to 87.54 cents a gallon and the January heating oil futures contract jumped 1.58 cents to 85.53 cents a gallon.

Natural gas for January delivery rose 4.3 cents to $5.278 per thousand cubic feet.

On London's International Petroleum Exchange, February Brent futures rallied 57 cents to $28.49 a barrel.

Venezuela government plan to import oil products raises doubts [Full Text] AMSTERDAM, Netherlands - Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez's plan to import gasoline and other refined products to offset a shortage as a nationwide strike enters its third week has many flaws and simply won't work, industry observers and analysts said Monday. The financial and logistical risks of importing refined product in a country almost entirely equipped for exports while ports and shipping crews are almost all on strike are just too high, they say.

"I can't think of a single shipping company in the world that is prepared to take care of a tanker and have it unloaded in a port that is declared unsafe," said Jose Toro Hardy, a former director at state-owned oil monopoly Petroleos de Venezuela SA and now a private oil consultant. Currently, only one small refinery is producing, but running at a meager rate of 80,000 barrels a day. Venezuela needs around 400,000 barrels a day to satisfy its domestic needs.

The overwhelming majority of workers at ports in Venezuela have joined the strike, making any export shipments or unloading procedures a risky operation. Only a few ports are equipped to unload tankers for domestic supply. "But the overall system is set up for exporting and not importing," says William Edwards, president of the Texas-based Edwards Energy Consultants. Shipping agencies will also have difficulties securing credit and have their shipments insured for a Venezuelan destination, analysts say.

Sourcing products for import is yet another question, Edwards said. "It is possible that the country can get some products out of its Caribbean outlets," he said. And any imports will be very limited, he added: "I think only 10 percent of its daily domestic needs, really insignificant." Venezuela's oil production has thinned to a trickle against just under 3 million barrels a day before the strike began Dec. 2. Analysts don't view Chavez's threats to bring foreign crews and use the military - which lacks the required technical skills - to restart domestic oil operations as very realistic, either, given the sheer magnitude of the task. The vast majority of PdVSA's 40,000 workers are on strike, as are oil workers in associated or supporting sectors crucial to Venezuela's oil industry as a whole. The stakes for the government are high as sustained gasoline shortages could trigger riots. Toro Hardy estimated that Caracas still has gasoline supply for four to five days. [End]

October 29, 2002 - Chavez Blocking Vote on His Rule***"What is of more national importance than asking Venezuelans about what is happening in the country?" railed opposition lawmaker Leopoldo Puchi. "These are just excuses, legal traps, obstacles to a democratic way out by a government intent on provoking confrontation and violence." Petitioners argue Chavez is resisting the same tool he used to push through a new constitution in 1999 - paving the way for elections that stacked congress and state governments with his allies. In 2000, Chavez convoked a referendum to oust the opposition-aligned leadership of the Venezuelan Workers Confederation. Labor leaders condemned the vote, but resigned out of embarrassment when they lost.

The legal wrangling over a petition is confounding efforts by the secretary general of the Organization of American States, Cesar Gaviria, to broker peace talks this week. Gaviria said "significant efforts" were made to establish negotiations between the leftist Chavez and domestic opponents but details need to be ironed out before talks could formally start. He is trying to persuade the two sides to discuss other issues, such as reforming the country's electoral system. He has argued that neither Chavez opponents or supporters will accept a vote organized by the current electoral council, which is seen as corrupt and untrustworthy.***

November 28, 2002 - Venezuela Election Body Agrees to Chavez Referendum***CARACAS, Venezuela (Reuters) - Venezuela's election authorities agreed early on Thursday to hold a nonbinding referendum in February demanded by the opposition on whether President Hugo Chavez should resign, an option dismissed by the populist leader who refuses to step down. The consultative vote, scheduled for Feb. 2, would not legally force Chavez from office. But his foes believe a decisive rejection would deliver a political defeat that could press the president into resigning and trigger elections in the world's fifth-largest oil exporter.

Alfredo Avella, president of the National Electoral Council, said the institution that oversees elections and polls agreed to stage the popular referendum on the question of whether Chavez should resign immediately from office. The proposed referendum will likely become caught up in fierce legal wrangling in the Supreme Court and the National Assembly as the government contests its validity. Opposition leaders earlier this month handed in more than 2 million signatures demanding the immediate vote on Chavez's rule. They have threatened to stage a general strike on Monday if the government does not accept the referendum and a broader electoral accord during peace talks brokered by the Organization of American States.

Chavez, a former paratrooper who was elected in 1998, is locked in a bitter struggle with political enemies who blame his left-wing reforms for destroying the nation's economy and who accuse him of dictatorial rule. Chavez said on Sunday he would not resign even if 90 percent of the electorate voted against him in a consultative poll. The president insists the constitution only allows for a revocatory or binding referendum on his mandate in August 2003 -- halfway through his current term.***

November 29, 2002 - Venezuela Court Halts Vote on Chavez ***CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) - Venezuela's Supreme Court put the brakes on opposition efforts to force a non-binding referendum on President Hugo Chavez's presidency, quashing a decision hours earlier by the electoral council to conduct the vote. The back-to-back decisions on Thursday threw Venezuela into political turmoil. Foes and supporters of Chavez held rival demonstrations, with police keeping them apart. Opposition leaders threatened a general strike on Monday to press for the non-binding vote on whether the president should resign.

The opposition began its push for a referendum on Nov. 4, delivering a petition with 2 million signatures to the electoral council demanding the plebiscite. Electoral officials have said they verified about 1.2 million signatures - the number needed to schedule the vote. The council early Thursday approved holding a Feb. 2 referendum in a 3-1 vote with one member absent, citing a new law allowing approval by a simple majority. But the high court said the council is still bound by an old electoral law requiring approval by four council members. "The referendum still hasn't been called," said electoral council member Romulo Lares, who abstained. "That decision is null according to the Supreme Court's ruling." Dissenting council member Romulo Rangel also said a more thorough check of the signatures on the petition referendum is needed.

Council members who backed the referendum stood by their action. "The decision is transparent and in keeping with the law," electoral council vice president Jose Manuel Zerpa said.***

December 12, 2002 - Opposing views on crisis stalling negotiation talks*** CARACAS, Venezuela -- Wildly divergent views of the impact of a general strike that has crippled Venezuela's oil industry and economy have frustrated a negotiated solution, a senior diplomat said Wednesday. Cesar Gaviria -- the secretary-general of the Organization of American States who is brokering talks here between Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez and his opponents -- said the worsening crisis caused by the strike makes reaching an agreement within a few days imperative.

The talks have made little headway so far. While the opposition has demanded general elections by next March, government officials have agreed only to a binding referendum on Chavez's rule next August, as allowed by the Constitution. Moving up an election would require a vote by the 165-seat National Assembly, where Chavez's supporters hold a seven-seat majority. Lawmakers from both sides said it may be possible within a few days to pass such an amendment.***

President Hugo Chavez waves during a meeting with supporters at a stadium in Caracas, Wednesday, Dec. 18, 2002. Chavez branded as traitors striking workers who have crippled the nation's vital oil economy and asked his supporters to be ready to fight for his government. (AP Photo/Esteban Felix)

The woman with the blonde spike hair-do near Chavez looks like "Comandante" Lina Ron. Here's more about Ron:

Chavistas: Venezuelan street toughs: Helping "revolution" or crushing dissent? April 5, 2002 | By FABIOLA SANCHEZ, AP -[Full Text] CARACAS, Venezuela - From her bed in a Caracas military hospital, the wiry, chain-smoking prisoner vowed to continue a hunger strike and risk becoming the first death in Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez's "revolution." "Comandante" Lina Ron, who considers herself a modern version of "Tania," a woman who fought alongside Cuban revolutionary Ernesto Che Guevara, says she is a willing martyr for Chavez's cause. She was arrested after leading a violent pro-Chavez counter-protest against demonstrating university students.

Thousands follow her lead in Venezuela and they have increasingly quashed dissent, breaking up anti-government protests, intimidating journalists and alarming the president's critics. Chavez has angered Washington by expressing his admiration for Cuban President Fidel Castro and adopting policies seen as anti-business. Venezuela is a key oil supplier to the United States.

"If I fail or die, the spirit of the revolution dies," Ron said. "But I'm not going to fail. I'd rather lose my life than my principles." Just what those principles are have sparked debate across the nation. Ron began her hunger strike after being arrested for leading a violent confrontation Feb. 26 at the Central University of Venezuela against students defending the university's autonomy against encroachments by Chavez's government. In recent months, the 42-year-old Ron has organized and led street marches - called "countermarches" here - to stop or intimidate demonstrations by civilians and a disorganized opposition to Chavez.

Two December marches to Miraflores, the presidential palace, were stopped by Ron's "countermarches." A February march to the National Assembly to commemorate Venezuelan democracy was similarly met - and diverted - by a countermarch. Ron and her followers burned a U.S. flag in Caracas' central Plaza Bolivar just after the September terrorist attacks in the United States. The anti-Washington demonstration appalled many Venezuelans. More recently, Ron's followers threatened journalists at El Nacional newspaper in Caracas.

Chavez has called Ron a political prisoner. "We salute Lina Ron, a female soldier who deserves the respect of all Venezuelans," he said recently. Ron's activism was inspired by her father, Manuel, a former director of the Social Christian Party in the western state of Anzoategui, according to her sister Lisette. The fourth of seven children born in Cantaura, a poor town just east of Caracas, Ron cut short studies in medicine at the Central University of Venezuela after becoming pregnant. She spent 10 years working with Caracas' homeless before joining Chavez's Bolivarian movement, named after native independence hero Simon Bolivar.

Ron is "very violent because of the 40 years of oppression, of injustice, of impunity" of administrations that ruled Venezuela since its last dictatorship was toppled in 1958, said her attorney, Oswaldo Cancino. Now Ron has become a focal point for debate about Chavez's "Bolivarian Circles," which the government calls self-help neighborhood groups. Chavez opponents call them a violent threat to democracy styled after Cuba's Revolutionary Block Committees. Created after Castro urged Venezuelans to "organize" to defend Chavez's revolution, the committees are forming street tribunals to demand Ron's release - and to symbolically prosecute government opponents as "traitors."

Greater Caracas Mayor Aldredo Pena accuses the government of secretly arming hundreds of Bolivarian Circles across the country - a charge the government denies. Yet circle members have clashed with students in Caracas and labor union activists in Barquisimeto. They've warned newspaper vendors in Ciudad Bolivar that they will torch kiosks unless they stop selling a newspaper, Correo del Caroni, that is critical of the government. After her arrest, Ron was hospitalized, forced to eat, and resumed her hunger strike, then went on a spartan diet. She is denied bail pending an April 12 court hearing on formal charges of inciting violence.

Ron suggested that violence is needed to quash mounting opposition to Chavez - whose combative rhetoric has contributed to a precipitous decline in popularity polls. It's needed, she said, to allow Venezuela's majority poor a stake in the country's governance for the first time in history. Ron attributes her growing flock of supporters to a "gift that God gave me" so that "the people follow me and believe in me. ... We're ready for the Fatherland to call us." Ron recently was transferred to a prison cell operated by Venezuela's secret police, known as DISIP. She said it doesn't bother her that the opposition to Chavez calls her "vulgar" and "violent." "I am the ugly part of the process - the part that is unpleasant, that is angry," she declared after the El Nacional protest, one dispersed by police using tear gas and water cannons.***

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.