Subject: Brazil - Lula to Aid Venezuela
From: [email-masked]
To: [email-masked]
Date: Sun, 5 Jan 2003 18:40:21 EST

Brazil's new President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva to aid Venezuelan oil 
industry

http://www.vheadline.com/readnews.asp?id=648

Brazil's new president has agreed with Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez 
Frias to send experienced Brazilian oil executives to break the back of a 
month-long opposition impasse which has disrupted production and supply at 
the State-owned oil corporation, Petroleos de Venezuela (PDVSA).

Chavez Frias had yesterday (Wednesday) attended Lula da Silva's inauguration 
in what has been described as the first peaceful transition of power in the 
last forty years in Venezuela's southern neighbor. Top-level discussions have 
been taking place with executives at Brazil's Petrobras today to decide on 
logistics in a unique technical aid package.

In Caracas, the Chavez Frias government has already begun remedial action to 
separate a number of employees from positions where they have sabotaged PDVSA 
operations since December 2, 2002, in an increasingly futile attempt to 
dislodge the democratically-elected Head of State.  Chavez Frias told 
reporters "we are going to begin conversations between Petrobras and PDVSA to 
see how this technical cooperation can be formed."
Chavez Frias had joined the leaders of 120 countries for Lula da Silva's 
inauguration but he answered repeated questions about Venezuela saying that 
"the striking oil workers have stabbed the heart of Venezuela ... they are 
traitors of the homeland."

Venezuela's opposition-led saboteurs insist that national oil production has 
been culled to just 190,000 barrels from a full capacity of 3 million barrels 
a day, but Chavez Frias says pre-December levels will be reached again in 45 
days.  Nevertheless, the crisis has contributed by no small means to a spike 
in world oil prices, to now in excess of $30 a barrel.

A Brazilian oil tanker arrived in Venezuela last Saturday with 525,000 
barrels of gasoline to stave off the effects of the opposition's 
self-inflicted shortages of fuel with long lines at gas stations throughout 
the country that are still open.
Chavez Frias said today that he has asked Lula da Silva to send more 
Brazilian gasoline to Venezuela, and that Brazilian tankers could carry 
Venezuelan oil to refineries in the Virgin Islands to ensure supplies to 
North America.

Back home in Venezuela, Federation of Chambers of Commerce & Industry 
president Carlos Fernandez (who replaced Dictator-for-a-Day Pedro Carmona 
Estanga after the latter pulled off the April 11 coup d'etat and attempted to 
close down the Venezuelan Congress and the Judiciary), is still demanding 
that Chavez Frias should call a consultative referendum on February 2 or 
resign.
But his support is dwindling as trade union mafia boss, Carlos Ortega refuses 
to answer challenges on his own dubious "election" to the Confederation of 
Trade Unions (CTV) leadership and is said to be preparing for a quick exit 
from Venezuela to an undisclosed location in Europe as his chips go down this 
coming weekend and as supermarket chains and big businesses prepare to go 
back to work on Monday.

In what is seen as sheer desperation, the opposition is claiming again that 
Chavez Frias is trying to impose heavy-handed rule similar to that of Cuba's 
Fidel Castro, but they are unable to explain how such widespread liberties 
are tolerated under the supposedly totalitarian Chavez Frias rule they 
despise.
Meanwhile the Internet is abuzz this Thursday evening with emails calling for 
Venezuelans resident in North America to congregate at CITGO service stations 
on Saturday (December 4) to demonstrate against the democratically-elected 
Chavez Frias government and its wish to impose law & order ... and democratic 
rule. 

The email agitators say that they want volunteers to picket CITGO gas 
stations in a pots & pans protest but warn that participants should treat the 
"gringos" with respect and explain why they don't want them to buy gas.

Brazilian President Lula da Silva says "the great priority of foreign policy 
during my government will be the construction of a politically stable South 
America that is prosperous and united ... for that, it is essential to take 
action to revitalize Mercosur, which is weak for the crises of each one of 
its members."