The Failure of Washington's "Containment Policy" Toward Chavez

U.S. attempts to isolate Chavez in Latin America have been frustrated again. First, Hugo Chavez, Alvaro Uribe and Rafael Correa met last Friday to commemorate the opening of joint gas pipeline linking Venezuela, Colombia and Ecuador. Venezuelan energy and oil minister Rafael Ramirez said that Venezuela and Colombia are looking into an extension of the pipeline to Panama “and then to the rest of Central America.” According to Al-Jazeera, “Chavez said such an extension would make Central American countries less dependent on outside sources such as the United States and reduce pressure for free-market policies.”

Uribe, perceived by Washington as its most important military ally in the region, also announced at the ceremony that Colombia would be joining the Bank of the South, a Chavez-backed regional development bank. The Bank of the South is seen as an alternative to the World Bank and the Inter-American Development Bank.


Meanwhile, Agence-France Press reports that Chavez will be meeting with FARC rebels in Colombia to engage in peace negotiations, including a possible hostage exchange. Uribe administration officials had previously balked at Chavez’s proposals for talks with FARC; perhaps tighter trade ties with Venezuela have changed their minds.

None of this, of course, means that Uribe or his administration are "turning to the left." A new wave of protests against the Uribe government took place this week, as tens of thousands of protestors have taken to the streets. Some have blockaded the Pan-American highway. According to IPS News:

"The demonstrators protested the free trade agreement negotiated with the United States, the privatisation of water utilities and the health and education systems, the current labour legislation, and incentives offered to foreign companies and investors, which they described as "a disgraceful giveaway of national sovereignty." They also took aim at cuts in funding for health and education in rural areas, demanded the repeal of the government’s "national development plan", land laws and mining code, and called for the cancellation of concessions granted to foreign extractive companies since Uribe became president in 2002. In addition, the Democratic Coalition called the demobilisation of the ultra-rightwing paramilitary United Self-Defence Forces of Colombia (AUC) a "farce" and demanded respect for the collective land rights of black and indigenous communities. "

Regarding the latter point, the Colombian state has recieved $5 billion in U.S. military aid since 2000, during which time it has supported the most significant human rights abuses in Latin America. Polo Democratico Alternativo sums up the matter:

"[W]e are dealing with a large scale abuse of the power of the State, which has played a crucial role in the emergence and support of vigilante squads that have displaced nearly three million Colombians from their homes (865,000 between 2002-2005); murdered tens of thousands including three presidential candidates, eight members of Congress, hundreds of mayors, departmental assembly members, and municipal council members; forcefully grabbed between 2.6 and 6.8 million hectares of land from peasants and farmers; developed a gigantic narco-trafficking business and as a result produced enormous fortunes for death squad chieftains. In addition unionists have been systematically persecuted: 1,113 unionists have been murdered, 70 have disappeared and 896 forced into exile or displacement for a total (including other crimes) of 3,388 victims. These numbers reduced labor rights to meaningless words on paper as Colombia descended to become the world's most dangerous country for union activities."