The Devil's Excrement

—Flying in PDVSA jet to Villavicencio to wait for the realese of the hostages zero $

—Spending a night in Villavicencio to await the release $100

—Getting a receipt from the FARC so you can prove you have protection: Priceless!!!

(taken from today’s El Nacional, note it says annual fee, next payment in 2006)

Petkoff in today’s Tal Cual Editorial used a very similar play on words that I did two nights ago in trying to show how Chavez (Chacumbele) is either trying to play innocent or does it in bad faith in his silly defense of teh FARC and why it should be recognized as a belligerent force:

The Great Farc(e) by Teodoro Petkoff in Tal Cual

What we could call the “Chacumbele Doctrine” about the Colombian conflict is either innocent or it is ignorant or it is bad faith or it is the three things at once.

The crux of the thesis of the Great Strategists is that if you recognize the FARC as a “belligerent force, they would immediately enter the Geneva Protocol (a convention that establishes certain rules in war to “humanize” them) and they could not use kidnapping (Chacumbele dixit). Just BS. The serene little angels from the FARC do not need to be protected by the Geneva Protocol to stop kidnapping civilians.

They know what they are doing. They know perfectly well that the kidnapping of innocent civilians, divorced from the armed fight, is a monstrous practice, abominable, that denies in itself any noble purpose that could motivate those that take up arms with a political purpose and that denies the rules of war.

They kidnap with a full conscience that they are doing it because this is a financing mechanism and not because the known the “rules of war” that came out of the Geneva Convention. Our Clausewitz is wrong when he points out that the kidnappings (which he claims to reject) are part of a policy, different from that of the common criminal, because these are political kidnappings, not to kill them or torture the but for humanitarian exchanges (Chacumbele redixit). For God’s sake, how can he lie like that! Not long ago the FARC assassinated 11 members of Parliament they had in their hands.

 But the main thing is that 99% of those kidnapped by the FARC are non-political citizens, kidnapped to demand (and obtain) a monetary ransom. Bt even if the few political kidnappings had been taken to advance a humanitarian exchange, it is not possible to justify it. The jailed guerrilla members are uniformed combatants captured in combat. The ladies recently freed are civilians removed from the conflict.

To use them as an object of exchange does nothing but accentuate the monstrosity of the FARC’s procedure. The fight that claims to be revolutionary is in the end, a fight for the soul of the collective. Even with weapons in the hands, a revolutionary organization needs to again supporters not lose them. The means that it uses cannot deny the ends that it claims to pursue. To use monstrous procedures, such as kidnapping and drug trafficking, without mentioning the massacres of peasants, alienate sympathies. It is no coincidence that all of Colombia, from the rich to the poor, rejects the FARC, as demonstrated by numerous polls. Since the FARC devoted themselves to drug trafficking and kidnappings they lost all respectability and all credibility.

If kidnapping takes part of the outlaw panoply it is because it happens to be a fully conscious decision f its bosses and it is stupid to think that the Geneva Protocol would stop them from continuing with it. To stop the kidnappings the only thing the FARC needs, is to recuperate its political meaning. If they did it a small path could be opened towards peace in Colombia.

By now, it would seem as President Hugo Chavez, acting irresponsibly and in absurd fashion is simply trying to pick a fight with Colombia. After suggesting that the FARC should be taken off the terrorist list and refusing to recognize that he is  involving himself in matters which are sovereign to a nation, Chavez accused the Colombian Government of plotting with the US against him. Using claims that those that love in Venezuela are quite used to, Chavez said he had videos and tapes of meetings between the US and Colombia where such plotting took place. Of course, this non-existent “proof” is never seen much like the weapons of those that attempted so many times to kill him using bazookas that seemed to repeat and high power rifles that look oxidized.

But Chavez has to vent his frustration with his failure as President of Venezuela. Not only has he failed in making life better for the people of this country, bu he has failed to convince the people to follow his lead into XXIst. Century Socialism or to be their President indefinitely. Thus. instead of worrying about solving the problems that he has failed to solve for the last ten years, he has spent the month and a half since his loss in the referendum traveling and trying to sove Colombia’s problems as if they were his while treating the terrorist group FARC as buddies and making them out to be the good guys.

Thus, the man who can not make peace with his own people now claims Colombia does not want peace and discusses the FARC on equal footing with Colombia’s politicians and legal military forces, forgetting the horror and the terror with which the FARC have treated the innocent citizens of that country.

And it is as if Chavez not only wanted to pick a fight with Colombia, with one affront after the other and truly medling in that country’s affairs. Chavez is provoking Colombia and it seems as if he is using this as a distraction, but at the same time he wants to escalate the distraction into an irreversible conflict with that country.

Tonight the Colombian Government forcibly asked Chavez to show more respect for it and to stop meddling, as he is confusing cooperation with meddling. Unfortunately Chavez is unlikely to stay quiet and understand that he has violated the boundaries of what is proper. This is likely to lead to a break in diplomatic relations, which are already quite strained and who knows into what adventure the thoughtless autocrat wants to take the Venezuelan people, thinking that it will make us forget or ignore the problems that he ahs failed to solve in the last nine years, despite the biggest windfall in the country’s history

And just so there is no mistake as to who the FARC exactly are and the horror they subject their captives to, here is a Reuters article from today on the letters the hostages still in captivity sent their relatives with the two women that were freed:

Colombian hostages sad, ill, letters show

Chained, often weak from disease and wracked with despair, Colombian hostages in jungle camps cling to hope a deal with their Marxist rebel captors will free them, letters from the captives released on Tuesday show.

The notes and pictures from guerrilla hostages were brought by former congresswoman Consuelo Gonzalez who was freed last week after nearly six years in rebel captivity in a deal brokered by Venezuela’s left-wing President Hugo Chavez.

The release of Gonzalez and fellow captive, Clara Rojas, has raised hopes for an accord to free other hostages held by Latin America’s oldest insurgency, including French-Colombian politician Ingrid Betancourt and three Americans.

But letters from those left behind such as Police Col. Luis Mendieta, captured nearly a decade ago, show the toll on their physical and mental health after bouts of illness, long jungle marches, and frustration after years in insect-infested camps.

“It is not the physical pain that wounds us, nor the chains on our necks that torment us or the constant sickness … it’s the mental agony of the irrationality of all this,” says one letter signed by Mendieta and others read on local radio.

“It seems that we are worthless, that we do not exist.”

Details of suffering from recent hostage letters have shocked Colombians even as violence from their four-decade conflict eases under President Alvaro Uribe, a Washington ally who has led a campaign to drive the rebels into the jungles.

The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, known as the FARC, still holds several hundred hostages for ransom or political leverage. Authorities said the rebels kidnapped six Colombian tourists on Sunday from a remote Pacific beach.

Mendieta wrote that he has been chained to a pole and spends days trying to pass time playing cards and learning English and Russian in informal classes from another hostage.

Sickness has forced him to be carried several times in a hammock. Injections have eased ailments in his legs and feet, but at times he cannot walk.

“I had to drag myself to the bathroom for my necessities through the mud with just the strength of my arms because I could not get up,” he wrote in a letter read by his daughter.

Blurry photos show Mendieta with former local governor Alan Jara and ex-congressman Luis Eduardo Gechem and other police hostages who have been held for more than five years.

In one letter read by Gechem’s wife he appealed for help from Cuba, which has been host to attempts to broker a peace deal with the ELN, Colombia’s second-largest rebel group.

Gechem, who suffers from a bleeding ulcer and a heart ailment, writes he is even willing to be jailed in Cuba while he recovers his health, his wife said.

“President Fidel Castro, I ask you, beg you to make an additional gesture for humanity,” Gechem wrote. “Comandante Castro, please save this life.”

After a failed attempt at the end of the year, Chavez last week helped negotiate the release of Rojas and Gonzalez, who were held for nearly six years by the FARC, which Washington brands a drug-trafficking terrorist group.

Rojas gave birth to a child in captivity who was taken from her months after he was born. They were reunited on Sunday.

Chavez, a foe of Washington, has stirred tensions with Colombia by demanding Uribe recognize the FARC’s political status and has urged foreign governments to take the group off their lists of terrorist organizations.

Uribe’s government says that could only happen when the FARC commits to a peace process.

“This shows the horror and infamy to which the FARC submits those held in its power. For us it is clear the need for an immediate way out of this,” Peace Commissioner Luis Carlos Restrepo told reporters on a visit to Costa Rica.

The rebels, who began as a peasant army fighting for socialism in the 1960s, are insisting Uribe pull troops from an big area of southwest Colombia to facilitate any hostage deal.

But Uribe, a hardliner whose father was killed in a botched FARC kidnapping more than 20 years ago, has refused, saying creating such a safe haven would let the guerrillas regroup.

I meant to translate this Editorial in El Nacional, but had no time, but now BBC Monitor published it and you can read it too (link later):

Bolivarian friends? Plain bandits Editorial in El Nacional

The international news agencies had a feast yesterday with President [Hugo] Chavez’ request for the democratic countries of the world to erase the crimes and terrorist actions perpetrated throughout the past 20 years by the Colombian FARC [Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia] and the ELN [Army of National Liberation] and declare them
“insurgent forces.” In other words, he has asked them to give the two groups their own political status of a movement of national liberation, status they had back in the 1960s and 1970s. However, our president has forgotten that he is shamefully raising some up in arms groups that today have industrialized kidnapping, extortion, and the protection of drug trafficking networks, thus betraying the ethical principles of a revolutionary.

Did Ho Chi Minh, the brave old man who defeated the US forces in Vietnam, ever become involved in the illegal drug trade to finance his struggle? He never did, and he never lowered himself by practicing the extortion tactics practiced in Colombia with kidnapping and with the demanding of protection money. Furthermore, that old, calm, and wise, old Vietnamese man, never recruited children to be killed on the battle fields as the FARC does.

Did Nelson Mandela during his struggle for South Africa’s freedom ever become the guardian of the drug traffickers in that vast African zone? How many extortions did Mandela practice and how many kidnap victims did he negotiate for cash and political support, as we saw in Venezuela? Did this wise former South African president ever cover up the dirty businesses of the guerrilla groups that disguised as revolutionaries to operate in Africa and export diamonds and gold to Europe? No honest revolutionary supports a guerrilla machinery whose operation depends on illegal, cruel, and criminal tactics. All we have to do is listen to the statements made by one of the two hostages released by the FARC, Consuelo Gonzalez who said that there are “people’s jails” in the Colombian jungles, jails where [Manuel] Marulanda’s people are holding dozens of hostages in miserable and infrahuman conditions.

But what is most horrifying is what Gonzalez also said, that “the prisoners who are soldiers or policemen have chains around their necks,” like the chains that the captains of slave boats during the days of the colony made the slaves wear. One of the things Gonzalez said, which she said was very painful, was “seeing the men in chains who were forced to carry those chains in a haversack on their shoulders, wherever they went.” She added that Colombia “is the only place in the world where this is happening.” For her, the way these prisoners behaved was amazing: “One would look at them and wonder: how can these people who were kidnapped nine or 10 years ago keep on going, people who have been in chains for more than a year?” She also said that all the hostages have very serious health problems.

This Dantesque picture shows the true nature of President Chavez’ guerilla friends [amiguitos guerrilleros], those he wants to turn into “insurgent rebels”.

Originally published by El Nacional website, Caracas, in Spanish 12
Jan 08.

(Weil: And I propose to the world…specially the people of Transylvania that we stop qualifying  Count Dracula as a vampire)

The whole issue of the FARC is so absurd that I meant to stay away from it, but by now it reveals so much about the true state of mind of Hugo Chavez that I can’t help but comment on the whole FARC(e) he has staged over the last few days after he left his mouth opened for so long that the truth came out and he has spent his time trying to make himself the big humanitarian that he ain’t.

For years, everyone has suspected Hugo Chavez’ admiration for the FARC, which are apparently not too reciprocal, given the way the FARC left Hugo Chavez repeatedly standing at the rescue attempt altar over the last three months. But Hugo and the FARC have a sordid history of close calls and cover ups since Chavez became President that all the last few days prove is the FARC(e) Hugo has staged over the years to protect his international image that he now tries to hide under the transparent cover of his fake humanism and care for others.

In the early Chavez days, General Gonzalez Gonzalez brought to Chavez’ attention the number of FARC camps within Venezuela’s borders which were not being eliminated by the country’s armed forces. Under Chavez’ orders, Gonzalez Gonzalez was told not to do anything, which created a deep chasm between the General and the autocrat which led to Gonzalez Gonzalez not only splitting from the Government, but from Chavez going after him. He remains at large at this time.

By that time FARC friendly Rodriguez Chacin had become Minister of the Interior, raising all sorts of tales about his relationship with the guerrilla group that were never clarified. Chavez got rid of Rodriguez Chacin, rumored to be Chavez’ Ambassador to the FARC, in one of his many Cabinet shake ups and the issued died down. Later, he was found to have two separate identities under very similar names and to have deposited a multimillion Bolivar or dollar amount under his “secondary” identity at a local institution.

But in a country where opposition figures are prosecuted and persecuted for shifting funds from one line item to the other and prohibited from holding public office for years, no Prosecutor ever charged Rodriguez Chacin. But it did not seem to happen as the former Minister had simply disappeared from the face of the Earth with some even claiming he had died in one of his “secret” missions for Chavez and others claiming he had simply moved to his newly acquired cattle farm in Barinas state near the border with Colombia.

But it seemed irrelevant at the time as Rodriguez Chacin could (would?) never come back to an important position, so what was the point? Let sleeping or war dogs lie, wherever they may be.

Later, one Foreign Minister of the FARC was found living in Venezuela illegally, or legally depending on your point of view, using an assumed named, moving about and living the life of the guerrilla rich and famous, and aided by, guess who, none other than Rodriguez Chacin when he was Minister.

But Venezuela’s ineffable Justice system was too busy to look into this, instead prosecuting Uson, Mendoza and the like for saying things, and everyone was happy as Rodriguez Chacin was nowhere to be found as Chavista hordes even made Granda out to be a hero in one of their marches.

And while Chavez denied and denies that there are FARC in Venezuela, Granda was very clear when he was “kidnapped” by Colombian authorities saying the FARC has people “everywhere”, and in fact he actively participated in a “Bolivarian” Congress in Venezuela, where Granda using his fake Venezuelan nationality and identity, the same one he used to vote in the referendum to recall Chavez, actually managed to propose a condemnation of Uribe, the US and the attacks on the FARC.

And then, after some silence on the issue, Chavez saw his chance to prop up his much damaged reputation in teh world, when he discovered the interest of the French and the new French President on the Ingrid Betancourt issue. And even as his buddies in the FARC did not deliver, making him look bad, he kept the attack on Colombian President Uribe, making him look as the bad guy, as if the FARC did not hold thousands of hostages in its hands and forgetting the thousands of deaths and injured in their record.

The FARC the forced us to watch Director Stone and first gentleman Kirchner waste their time in the heat of Villavicencio, as the FARC accused Uribe of military operations barring the return of the captives. Chavez defended the FARC and accused Uribe, so did the dumb Director and only Kirchner showed that he at least has some political sixth sense as he tried to leave the Colombian town before the whole thing collapsed. Then Uribe explained how the “humanitarian” FARC turned over Enmanuel with a broken arm, malaria and parasites to a caretaker, who realized the severity of the child’s health, turning him into Colombian social authorities, a true act of humanity which almsot cost him his life.

While Uribe gave this explanation in a very calm fashion, Chavez and his Foreign Minister stridently questioned it and suggested this was another step to “boycott” and “dynamite” Chavez’ operation to get the attention of the Norwegian Nobel Institute. And as Enmanuel’s mother and friend were finally released, a revived Rodriguez Chacin was put in charge of the operation and everyone heard him tell the guerrillas releasing the hostages to “hang in there” and ” we will support you”. Remarkable words for a man no longer a civilian but now in charge of the Ministry of the Interior and Justice of Venezuela, despite his outlaw background.

But as Chavez’ hopes were dashed and he spoke freely and reportedly under sedation or the effects of coca leaves Chavez went over board, calling for the world to remove the FARC from its terrorist lists. But it was a matter of the tongue being faster than the brain or simply the output to be under no control from the brain. And as friendly and unfriendly Governments called Chavez’ bluff, the autocrat tried to make it look better than it was, failing miserably,

Failing, because even if the FARC began as an organized Army with a political goal, its use of kidnapping and drug trafficking has washed away this long gone idealism which turned the organization into a mercantile operation and a FARC(e).

Even worse, Chavez failed, like Brazilian President Lula, to ask the FARC for anything. He could ave asked for teh 3,000 hostages to be released as a gesture of good will. Or more simply, he could have asked them to stop kidnapping and killing, but just yesterday the great “humanitarian” organization known as the FARC kidnapped six tourists, one Norwegian, to add to their stock of human captives.

And while Chavez continued to defend the FARC without calling for any concession on their part, he denies the FARC or ELN have any Venezuelans in their hands, outraging the relatives and making a true mockery of the whole process.

But as countries like Spain, that have seen the Basque separatist group ETA kill and maim in a scale that is almost miniscule compared to the barbaric and massive acts of the FARC, refuse and condemn Chavez request to remove the terrorist group form their black list, former Colombian President Gaviria says Chavez is violating the OAS charter with his request and the Presidents of Guatemala and Ecuador distance themselves form the autocrat.

But Chavez himself proved his sympathy for the rebel group, when he said the FARC were Bolivarian, a name he has reserved exclusively for his own movement over the years, But Bolivar would be ashamed of both. Chavez who ignores the people and concentrates in his own ambitious goals for power forever and the FARC, with their absolute disregard for the “people” they claim to love and represent.

In the end it is simply a FARC(e) as both Chavez and the guerrilla group simply aspire for power, without any clear plan as to what they would do with it once they have.

That is why Hugo is more interested in projecting himself internationally than dealing with the tough and daily problems of the Venezuelan citizens.

What a FARC(e)!

There is only one word for the signals and statements coming out of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez and his Government during the last few days: Clueless. After nine years in power, riding on his charisma and populism and the biggest oil windfall the country has ever enjoyed, Hugo Chavez and his collaborators continue to show how clueless they are as to how to run a country and seemed to have learned nothing during this time.

The first clueless statement this week was the brilliant statement by the new Vice President that the Government would set up a commission composed of some Ministers to study the country’s problems and how to solve them. Wow! They discovered the concept of Cabinet and it only took them nine years to do it. Brilliant! They can get together once a week and see what’s wrong with Venezuela and try to figure out how to solve it. Problem is, if it took them nine years to figure this one out, how long will it take them to make it work? No wonder Chavez wants his indefinite reelection, it will likely take infinite time at this learning pace to fix all the problems.

And just as we thought we had heard everything, the new prosecutor comes out and says that she will create a commission to fight corruption. Wait! Just a month ago, the Venezuelan National Assembly reappointed Clodosvaldo Russian as Comptroller, precisely the man who is supposed to fight corruption in a country where almost nobody has been prosecuted for corruption in the last nine years. Moreover Russian said upon the announcement that eh would come back to his position that eh was actual proud of the job he had done as corruption was down (??) and under control. This despite suitcases full of cash, a whole class of nouveau rich parading around the country and the world in fancy cars, yatchs and jet planes and dozens of examples of cases of graft with no investigation. Thus, if Clodosvaldo does not do his job, let’s create and alternative commission to see if they can do it. Clueless and priceless how the revolution can recognize how stupid, ineffective and clueless it is!

Then there is the new Minister of Finance, Rafael Isea, making the unnecessary and rather silly statement that he is sticking with the goal of 11% inflation and 6% growth for the year 2008 in Venezuela. Does this man even understand that to get to 11% inflation he needs twelve months of inflation below 0.9 % in a country where the rate has been above 3.3% the last two months? Or that if he wants to reduce inflation he has to cool down things so dramatically as to stump growth and that this is an either or question? Or maybe Mr. Isea, who was Vice-Minister of Finance for the last year, has not heard that interest rates have been driven up by the most recent decisions of the Ministry he now presides? Or has he heard what has been happening with prices ever since the so called Bolivar Fuerte came into effect twelve days ago? In fact, from the way things look I would not even dare suggest inflation will be below 11% for the first quarter of the year. In fact, it would take three months of 3.5% inflation for that, and we know that the last two came in at 4.5% and 3.3% respectively. Even Chavez recognized in his speech yesterday that his Government has “flunked” in controlling inflation. Of course, he blamed it on speculators, rather than on the economic policies of the Government he presides. Simply clueless.

And Chavez yesterday in his annual speech to the Nation asked: Why is crime still such a grave problem in the streets, towns and barrios? Well, given that in the last nine years he replaced all professional police administrators and replaced them with his military buddies and the fact that until last week Hugo Chavez never mentioned the crime problem in his thousands of hours of boring speeches. Is it any surprise that crime has ballooned? In fact, the homicide rate has tripled. It took more than 85,000 homicides in the last nine years before Chavez mentioned the problem. That is worse than Colombia’s “civil war” murder rate, but he seems to eb paying attention more to that problem rather than our own. Just think, if the average family has five members, there are five million families in Venezuela, which means one in fifty nine families has been touched by a homicide. But if you add parents and cousins, it quickly becomes one in ten in a country where extended families matter. And even worse, the distribution of murders is totally skewed towards the poor, precisely those that Chavez claims to care for and focus on. No wonder he is losing their support. Simply clueless.

And Chavez asked as if there was something sinister behind it: Why has milked disappeared from the shelves? Why is it so difficult for us to produce the goods we consume every day? Why do we consume so many products from other countries? This from the man that took over large farms that used to produce milk from their rightful owners, which forced others to simply sell their cattle before they suffered the same fate. Or that has kept prices controlled for five years, while authorizing billions of dollars of imports at the same exchange rate for the last three years, while inflation killed the ability to compete of local producers. The same man who suggested that small “conuco” the single family plot could produce more than industrialized farms, confiscating the latter and seeing production drop? To say nothing of the confrontational attitude with the private sector, which drove investment to a halt in the face of the absence of the rule of law. Simply clueless and he still does not seem to understand it.

And Chavez said in his speech yesterday that any transaction with the Government has become a nightmare, but all he has done in the last few years is nationalize companies which will soon adopt the attitude of Government workers that we have known for decades. Only yesterday there were lines two and three blocks long as the Government’s phone company billing system broke down. And it has been in the hands of the Government for less than seven months and the President asked that the company transfer all of ts 2008 profits to its coffers, insuring service will only get worse in the future. Absolutely clueless.

I could go on and on with all of the rhetorical questions Chavez asked yesterday about the failures of his Government that could be traced to his own cluelessness as to how to run the country. But it suffices to say that he provided little in terms of solutions or programs for 2008, other than the need to spend more money. Hugo Chavez only gave two concrete examples of what he wants for the future. One, he would “relaunch” his misiones, mostly abandoned and not as effective as he once thought. Two, he will try to sneak a “small” (and illegal) Constitutional reform question into a referendum to allow for his indefinite reelection. Which shows the scarcity of ideas other than his own personal and political ambitions.

Simply clueless…

As the New York Times had a long article on the details of the Maletagate case, the suitcase found with $800,000 in the hands of Venezuelan/US businessman Guido Antonini, it was clear that the case will not go away for either Venezuela or Argentina and that those involved in it are trying to pass the buck pointing fingers at each other, which is surely going to make a lot of people very nervous.

This week, the prosecutor in the case handed over videos and audios to the judge in Miami, while the Venezuelan defendants in the case declared themselves not guilty, but were denied bail by the judge. While the Venezuelan Government has tried to distance itself from the case, TV station Globovision revealed yesterday that the only person at large in the case, Antonio Jose Canchica Gomez, was not a member of the intelligence police DISIP as had been reported up to now, but was actually an active military officer in the Venezuelan Army, which will only make things more complicated for the Chavez administration and the other defendants. The other defendants are saying they have nothing to do with the Venezuelan Government,  as the US Government is charging them with being foreign agents in US soil, but were actually trying to help their friend Guido Antonini, who was actually taping them whenever they met. But Canchica being still in the military will make it harder for them to distance themselves from the Venezuelan Government after what they said on tape.

Meanwhile, the son of the PDVSA Vice President that was in the jet plane with Antonini, David Uzcategui, talked to an Argentinean newspaper and he clearly was trying to distance his father from the case and pass the buck to the Argentineans involved in it. Uzcategui said that he and Antonini were invited on the plane by Argentinean official Claudio Uberti, an adviser to that country’s Planing Ministry and the man in charge of toll roads in Argentina, who was forced to resign over the scandal. Uzcategui also said that the suitcase was not his. Thus, Uzcategui is trying to distance his father from the case, an unlikely story given his age, as he says Uberti and his secretary asked them as friends if they had anything to do that weekend and that his father did not like him flying in official airplanes.

But perhaps the most damming statement by Uzcategui, was that confirming the the testimony of Uberti’s secretary in Argentina that two days after Antonini was caught with the suitcase with the cash, he was at the Argentinean Presidential Palace, the Casa Rosada, invited by Argentinean officials to participate in a joint Venezuela-Argentina ceremony. Argentinean officials, including the current Chief of the Cabinet Alberto Fernandez, have denied that this was the case, but two witnesses have now said this was the case. Uzcategui also suggests he was not present only because he was late, but he fails to explain how he came to be invited that day. Argentinean authorities have requested that Interpol find Uzcategui to testify on the case and it is clear he wants to pass the buck to the Argentinean officials and distance his father from the case.

Meanwhile in Miami, the accused are now using different lawyers and strategies. All of the accused in custody have to be in jail until the trial begins and may get up to 10 years in prison for their role in the scandal. Thus, while declaring themselves not guilty, this may be just an opening position to negotiate leniency in exchange for more details about their role in the case and their huge fortunes, which is surely making a lot of people nervous in Venezuela. Meanwhile, the man with the suitcase, Guido Antonini, has not been charged with anything as he cooperates fully with the US authorities.

 The case is certainly not going away for a long time.

Chavez now wants to have countries in Europe and the Americas to remove the FARC and the ELN from their terrorist lists. At the same time, Chavez did not and has not called for an immediate release of all of the hostages of the FARC as a goodwill gesture and has never asked or negotiated for the release or help in the release of Venezuelans who are in the hands of the FARC.

Is there something wrong with this “humanitarian” picture?

But let’s see what released hostage Clara Rojas had to say today about her captivity and treatment. Recall she was the press secretary of the candidate for Vice President of Colombia, so she can truly say her political career was aborted, if not destroyed by this “humanitarian” group which Chavez wants to have recognized as a political force in Colombia. Said Rojas:

The former hostage said that to make the desist from the idae of escaping the guerrilas would show them animals in the camps that were in the jungle.

“They would scare us with tarantulas and snakes and would tells us stories of people that had been lost in the jungle, she said.

Rojas indicated that their attempt to esacpe was not the only one and that many hostages of the FARC also tried to escape.

After being recaptured, the guerrilla would punish their hostages with chains. They would put chains on us, first for fifteen days and later only at night, she pointed out. “

How nice and human, no? Maybe they should be in the tortures lists also.

What a bunch of BS from Hugo Chavez the cynic.

It was a somewhat paradoxical end to the hostage handover by the FARC. Paradoxical, because it was extremely emotional, while at times it seemed totally devoid of any feelings, as the two freed hostages met with the Red Cross helicopters and found themselves free after six years in the hands of the Colombian guerrilla group. There was as much emotion in the farewell to their captors as in the hugs to their relatives, most of whom displayed the joy and tears of a moment they thought at times would never come.

Thus, after much fanfare in the earlier operations, the first named operation “Transparency” aimed at liberating former Colombian Presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt in November and later operation “Enmanuel” in December, a more quiet unnamed operation gave freedom to Clara Rojas and Consuelo Gonzalez, who will try to return to their lives after a six year gap, in which one gave birth in captivity, the other one lost a husband and both missed many family milestones and moments.

Burned twice by his FARC buddies, President Chavez wisely decided not to mobilize himself to the border ,even as news of the hostage exchange reached Caracas, deciding instead to wait for them in Caracas, which at times appeared somewhat unfair to the two women, welcomed with military honors in a city that must not mean much to them, even if their closest relatives were here.

It was a victory at last for Chavez, but mitigated by the earlier failures by the FARC to deliver any hostages, the absence of Enmanuel in the operation, as well as the fact that the delays showed the world the true inhumanity of the FARC, who up to the last minute played once again with the emotions and humanity of the hostages, their families, and the trust Chavez had placed in them as the Venezuelan President had tried to put them in a good light in front of the world.

It was indeed a happy ending, until you realize that there are still between 700 and 3,000 more hostages in the jungles of Colombia, perversely kept in captivity by the FARC, without sometimes even asking for ransom or ever revealing whether they are alive or dead, even as some hostages have been held in captivity for over seven years. In fact, the FARC handed over to the Venezuelan Minister of the Interior proof of life for another eight hostages, only revealed for the simple fact that that the two hostages released today were being held in captivity with them.

Which only shows the cruelty of the guerrilla group, willing to play with the lives of thousands of Colombians, the hostages are after all the lucky ones since they are alive and not dead like thousands murdered by the FARC, who only released a token group and retained for their own purposes Mrs. Betancourt.

So, it was a day of paradox, a sad joy at seeing the two freed hostages, while realizing the meanness and inhumanity that political differences can lead to in a purportedly rational world.