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CARACAS -- President Hugo Chavez's socialist government is creating peasant-based militias throughout Venezuela's rural, agricultural-rich regions, raising fears of confrontation among the country's cattle ranchers and landholders. The armed groups, organized by Venezuela's military, will be responsible for protecting poor farmers from vigilante groups allegedly organized and financed by cattlemen and wealthy landowners, Chavez wrote in a newspaper column Sunday... The government claims that more than 300 peasants have been killed - purportedly by mercenaries for wealthy landholders - since authorities launched a sweeping land reform initiative in 2001. Landowners and cattle ranchers dispute those claims, saying Chavez's administration is...

Unknown assailants early Jan. 19 threw five tear gas canisters at the headquarters of the Apostolic Nunciature in north Caracas, the Vatican’s embassy in Venezuela, El Universal reported. The canisters exploded inside the building. Assailants also lobbed tear gas canisters at the house of an anti-government media mogul and torched a student leader’s car, Reuters reported. Pro-government group La Piedrita allegedly was behind the attacks.

LIMA, Peru (AP) — Hugo Chavez has been accused of using Venezuela's oil riches to meddle in Colombia, Argentina, Bolivia and Nicaragua. Now, Peru's president says the Venezuelan leader may be doing it here by funding militants and anti-poverty centers that preach populist revolution. In recent weeks, Peruvian police have arrested nine people the government alleges are militants bankrolled by Venezuela. And the head of a Congressional investigatory committee accused Venezuela of supplying funds to outreach centers he says agitate against the government. President Alan Garcia supports the ongoing investigation into the centers. Venezuela and allies Bolivia and Ecuador "want...

Some ten Mexican citizens may be among the dead from the Colombian military attack carried out last Saturday against a FARC camp in Ecuador, confirmed today the Coordinating Minister of Internal Security, Gustavo Larrea. Larrea said to news reporters that there could be "more than ten, a numerous group" of the at least 24 people who died in Operation Fenix, in which died the number two of the rebel Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), "Raul Reyes". The minister said that they were a group of professors and students from the Autonomous National University of Mexico (Unam) who had "come...

Chavez supporters await call to arms By Jeremy McDermott, in Caracas Last Updated: 1:52am GMT 29/11/2006 Thousands of armed Venezuelans are preparing to ensure that President Hugo Chavez is re-elected on Sunday and will "shed their blood" for the cause if necessary. President Hugo Chavez watches a parade in Caracas Paranoid about the prospect of a coup or losing the presidential election fair and square, the firebrand leader of anti-American sentiment in Latin America has spent his eight years in office filling government jobs with acting and retired army officers. With Mr Chavez hoping to win another six years in...

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) – President Hugo Chavez constantly warns Venezuelans a U.S. invasion is imminent. Now he’s begun training a civilian militia as well as the Venezuelan army to resist in the only way possible against a much better–equipped force: by taking to the hills and fighting a guerrilla war. Supporters of the president, a former paratroop commander, are increasingly taking up his call. Chavez wants 1 million armed men and women in the army reserve, and 150,000 have already joined, surpassing the regular military’s force of 100,000. Now Venezuelans are also organizing neighborhood–based militia units for Chavez’s Territorial Guard....

Nearly 15 years after the collapse of the USSR, America could encounter what would have been unthinkable during the Cold War - a hostile, communist nation on our southern border. If the plans of the Marxist president of Venezuela, Hugo Chavez, are successful, America's neighbor to the south will become a virtual enemy camp. For the past five years, Chavez has sent money and agents to Mexico to finance and infiltrate local political groups on the left, according to a Mexican news daily The goal is ideological -- pro-Chavez operatives want to dominate the increasingly powerful left wing in Mexico....

Dictators and strongmen enjoy basking in their own glory. Spain's Generalisimo Francisco Franco waved from balconies to arranged crowds. North Korea's Kim Jong-il once preferred to be called "Dear Leader." Uganda's Idi Amin loved to show off in race cars. Cuba's Fidel Castro turned olive-green fatigues and seven-hour speeches into trademarks. None managed to extend their charisma much beyond their borders. But Venezuela's authoritarian President Hugo Chavez seems to be making waves -- not only in South America, but also in the United States, throwing money around from his country's oil industry, which he controls. Here, his government reportedly pays...

Chavez prepares his people's army to confront US By Sophie Arie in Caracas (Filed: 04/03/2006) Venezuela begins training a vast army of civilian reserves today to fight off the attack its Left-wing president, Hugo Chavez, says the United States is plotting against it. The oil-rich state aims to teach up to two million volunteers, from the unemployed to office workers, shop assistants and housewives, basic military skills such as marching in step or shooting to kill.Hugo Chavez warned Venezuelans to expect an attack from the US If it reaches that size, the force will be the largest civilian reserve army...

SAN JUAN, PUERTO RICO (USA) - Venezuelan exile groups in this U.S. territory accuse Hugo Chavez of interfering with the internal affairs of the United States by expanding his "Bolivarian Circles" to U.S. shores. At the popular local talk show "En La Mirilla" (In The Cross Hairs), Venezuelan exile leaders exposed the attempts of the Chavez "Bolivarian Revolution" to stir revolt in this U.S. Commonwealth. The accusations coincide with the visit of Venezuelan Minister Luis Tascón to the island. Tascón, infamous for publishing lists of opposition members in Venezuela by using electoral lists, is in Puerto Rico to meet with...

In Venezuela, publishing this report would be a crime carrying a 40-month prison sentence. Autocrats and Activists Warning! Do not discuss, debate, or distribute this report in the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela. This report contains statements critical of President Hugo Chávez, a criminal offense punishable by fine and imprisonment there. The Law on the Social Responsibility of Radio and Television went into effect in Venezuela in November 2004, followed by amendments to Venezuela’s Criminal Code that went into force in March 2005. These measures make it a criminal offense to insult or show disrespect for the president and other government...

WASHINGTON - Miami's Jesús Soto supports Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez's vision of ''participatory democracy.'' Valerie Pusch of Chicago backs Chávez because of his policies on behalf of the poor. And they say so loudly, as heads of their local Bolivarian Circles -- among the dozen or so U.S. copies of the groups Chávez has set up throughout his country to mobilize Venezuelans on behalf of his socialist ``revolution.'' Even as Chávez attacks President Bush as his sworn nemesis, his government is running a strong campaign to curry favor with U.S. citizens through leftist grass-roots groups, paid lobbyists and public relations...

An e-mail is bouncing around the Internet with photographs of alleged Bolivarian gunmen in an area of Caracas that appears to be 23 de Enero. Many appear to be teenagers, they are wearing Bolivarian t-shirts with Che Guevara's face super-imposed on Venezuela's national colors, and they are armed with Glock 9mm semi-automatic handguns. According to Pensamiento Militar Venezolano 2005, a strategic and tactical military defense document drafted under the direction of President Hugo Chávez, the core mission of these armed youths is to turn Caracas into a kill zone where escualidos will be hunted down systematically if the Chávez regime...

QUITO - An Ecuadorean military intelligence report alleges that leftists from Ecuador and seven other Latin American nations received guerrilla training in Venezuela this year from backers of President Hugo Chávez. The report does not link Chávez personally to the training in explosives, weapons and urban guerrilla tactics. But it notes that part of the training took place in two Caracas military bases, one used by the army reserves and another that houses the Defense Ministry. And in a concluding section, it says that backers of the Venezuelan president, ``with covert support from the government of Hugo Chávez . ....

ON SEPTEMBER 24 the International Atomic Energy Agency passed a resolution that, in part, called on Iran "to observe fully its commitments and to return to the negotiating process that has made good progress in the last two years." The resolution is just the latest chapter in the ongoing dispute over Iran's nuclear programs, but a look at the votes cast by the IAEA's members reveals a great deal about the international landscape: Of the IAEA's 35 board members, 22 voted in favor of the resolution, 12 abstained (including Russia, which is heavily invested in Iran's nuclear programs), and one...

London 06.09.05 | A church located southeast of Caracas in "Barrio El Winche" of Fila de Mariches and attended by the congregation of Laura Sisters and the Salesian Fathers has been invaded and taken over by supporters of Hugo Chavez, El Universal reports today. Members of Endogenous Battle Units (Unidades de Batalla Endógenas or UBE) -a Chavez invention to create a new democratic model of popular support- expressed that the action was taken in order to establish, in the church, a post of military security that shall be manned by Venezuela's National Guard.

Demagogues: Jesse Jackson was in top form, flying into Caracas to take a cheap shot at Pat Robertson and sing the praises of Hugo Chavez's Venezuela. But amid the huzzahs, something ugly was happening outside. Seems that Chavez was in top form, too, doing what dictators like his pal Fidel Castro do. Opposition leaders say that while Jackson was visiting over the weekend, Chavez's men sent mobs to ambush about 1,000 peaceful protesters with rocks, bottles and fireworks in downtown Caracas. Venezuelan media reported nine injured, two seriously. An eyewitness said those hit hardest, and often from behind, were vocal...

In Caracas, Venezuela Rafael Cabrices does not know whether the attack will come by sea, by land, or even from within Venezuela. But he is sure that US President George W Bush is plotting to oust leftist President Hugo Chavez - and Mr Cabrices is preparing his people to fight. "That crazy man wants the petroleum," Mr Cabrices, 60, says in his office decorated with posters of Che Guevara, Simon Bolivar and President Chavez. In the empty parking lot outside, civilian "corporals" bark commands at groups of adults and teenagers in white shirts and black caps and pants. They are...

In a recent speech to the Council of the Americas, Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice delivered an upbeat assessment concerning South America. She included the continent as part of the “larger tide of liberty” that was sweeping the globe, declaring the region “committed to democracy”. While the secretary’s optimistic tone is certainly pleasing to the ear, it fails to recognize the challenge posed by Venezuelan’s president, Hugo Chavez. An ally of both Fidel Castro and the government of Iran, Chavez has worked tirelessly to frustrate US efforts across the continent. His most recent provocation, among many others, was charging the...

The elimination of the Armed Forces committed to a democratic state is an essential condition to the development of the project headed by Hugo Chávez. The institution that swore loyalty to whom ever was elected by the people, as representative of the whole society (which includes everyone, whether they voted for him or not) does not work for this regime. The principle of alternating [in power] must be weakened so that, instead, the caudillo can install himself [in power] to the end of time. This is the reason the Armed Forces must be changed into an institution committed ideologically to...