Photo: Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez, Bolivian President Evo Morales, and Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa chat while Colombian President Álvaro Uribe Vélez wrings his hands.
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By Martin Arostegui
http://www.wvwnews.net/story.php?id=3519’s second in command, Raul Reyes.
South America was on the brink of war yesterday as Venezuela and Ecuador amassed troops on the Colombian border in response to the killing of a Marxist rebel leader.
Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez threatened to join the rebels in a war to overthrow hard-line Colombian President Alvaro Uribe, a key ally of the United States, deploying tanks, fighter jets and thousands of troops along the Colombian border.Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa also ordered troops to the border, expelled Colombia’s ambassador and recalled its ambassador to Bogota, but left its embassy open. Venezuela closed its embassy in Colombia and ordered all diplomats home.
A weekend battle sparked the mobilization, in which Colombian forces killed a top leader of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), in a camp in Ecuador.
“The obsessive conduct of those who prize the military option sharpens the armed conflict with grave possible consequences” read a statement from Venezuela’s Foreign Ministry after the weekend killing of FARC’s second in command, Raul Reyes.
On his weekly Sunday talk show “Hello President,” Mr. Chavez accused Colombia of “invading” Ecuador, and compared the action to Israeli attacks against Palestinians.
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From a Western Voices correspondent: Calling the FARC “Marxist” is simplistic. The FARC is a modern expression of the political unrest that has plagued what is now Latin America since long before the Spaniards came: downtrodden campesinos rising up against a tiny ruling elite. This populism has taken both leftist (Castro) and far right (Peron) forms. Lately, as globalism has further immiserated the poor people of Latin America, a populist/nationalist wave has taken hold, led by Chavez and his allies like Bolivian President Evo Morales and Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa. Colombia’s Uribe, using US “Plan Columbia” aid supposedly earmarked for drug interdiction, is seen as a cat’s paw of US policy, which has failed to unseat Chavez. Uribe is widely denounced as a neocon comprador. For whites in the US, governments in Latin America that work to raise the living standards of their poorest help to slow illegal immigration from these places. As it is, http://www.wvwnews.net/story.php?id=3467 their restless underclass.