Geography Archives: Venezuela

The United Nations conference to address climate change in Copenhagen over the last week has illustrated several crucial features of contemporary politics, as Obama completes a year in power, the NATO plots a military surge into the war spanning from Palestine to Afghanistan, and an economic recovery staggers along. Three Features of Political Climate First, […]

The nature of the current wars in the wider western Asian area reveals a disturbing trend: next to sources of conflict between states there are an increasing number of conflicts within them.  In Yemen, the civil war has had a ripple effect throughout the Persian Gulf region provoking the military intervention of Saudi Arabia and […]

  15th International Conference of the United Nations on Climate Change, Kingdom of Denmark, Wednesday, 16 December 2009 Mr. President, ladies and gentlemen, Excellencies, friends, I promise that I will not talk more than most have spoken this afternoon.  Allow me an initial comment which I would have liked to make as part of the […]

The historical geography of capitalist development is at a key inflexion point in which the geographical configurations of power are rapidly shifting at the very moment when the temporal dynamic is facing very serious constraints.  Three-percent compound annual growth (generally considered the minimum satisfactory growth rate for a healthy capitalist economy) is becoming less and […]

“Sanctions alone cannot eradicate apartheid; that task is ultimately left to the people of South Africa themselves.  But economic pressure and political isolation of the South African government can hasten the day when justice and freedom reign in that troubled land.” — Richard L. Trumka, June 23, 1987 “We call on other workers and unions […]

Fifteen years ago to this day, on December 14, 1994 we met at the Main Hall of the University of Havana. The previous night I had waited for you at the steps of the plane that brought you to Cuba.

  Human societies have created the bases of our survival, sustenance and advancement through the use of our natural resources in production with rudimentary tools and rising levels of science and technology.  Yet in no time in history has environmental destruction been systematically brought about in most parts of the world. The people of the […]

Jesse Freeston, Producer, The Real News Network: The Honduran elections of Sunday, November 29 were unique in that they were less about who was going to win than they were about how many people were going to vote.  Both major presidential candidates were supporters of the June 28 coup that ousted President Manuel Zelaya and […]

  General elections were held in Bolivia on Sunday, December 6, 2009.  A few weeks before these elections I had the opportunity to discuss the contours of Evo Morales’ first term in office with the Bolivian Ambassador to Canada, Edgar Tórrez Mosqueira.  The following interview provides a backdrop to the elections that were held yesterday, […]

Over the last decade an epoch-making political change has taken place in the Western Hemisphere: Latin America, a region that was once considered the United States’ “back yard,” is now more independent of Washington than Europe is. But while Latin America has changed, U.S. foreign policy has not — even now, with the election of […]

Torrential rain didn’t keep voters away from the polls on Sunday, November 29th when José “Pepe” Mujica was elected president with 52% of the vote.  The 74-year-old Agricultural Minister spent 14 years in jail for his participation in the Tupamaro guerilla movement and has pledged to continue the policies of his predecessor, current left-leaning president […]

November 29th Dear President Obama, Today is a blurry day for those of us with eyes on Central America, mister president.  It’s blurry because we’ve watched herman@s suffering day and night over the last four months in that small country in the waist of America, Honduras, and now, after all the blood and toil, you […]

November 29, 2009 The true divides in Latin America — between justice and injustice, democracy and dictatorship, human rights and corporate rights, people’s power and imperial domination — have never been more visible than today.  People’s movements throughout the region to revolutionize corrupt, unequal systems that have isolated and excluded the vast majority in Latin […]

The United States, in its struggle against the Revolution, had in the Venezuelan government its best ally: the choice specimen Mr. Romulo Betancourt Bello. We did not know it then. He had been elected President on December 7, 1958; he had not taken office yet when the Cuban Revolution triumphed on January 1st, 1959. Weeks later I had the privilege of being invited by the provisional government of Wolfgang Larrazabal to visit Bolivar’s homeland, which had been so supportive of Cuba.

  Addressing delegates at the International Encounter of Left Parties held in Caracas, November 19-21, Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez stated: “the time has come for us to convoke the Fifth International.”  Face with the capitalist crisis and the threat of war that is putting at risk the future of humanity, “the people are clamoring for” […]

  Lula from Brazil and Ahmadinejad from Iran.  What is this — the new axis of evil?  No — Luladinejad is a new axis of business. In the latest round of the increasingly warm embrace between Latin America and the Middle East, Lula and Ahmadinejad, meeting in Brazil, signed agreements on energy, trade and agricultural […]

International Republican Institute and National Democratic Institute Plan to Observe Elections Controlled by Honduran Military and Police Cf. Eva Golinger, “The Role of the International Republican Institute (IRI) in the Honduran Coup” (Postcards from the Revolution , 6 July 2009) Washington, D.C. – The National Democratic Institute (NDI) and the International Republican Institute (IRI), organizations […]

  One side is the barely veiled alliance between Washington and Micheletti.  The other side consists of the Constitutional Zelaya Government, the National Front against the Coup d’Etat and the principal former presidential candidate linked to the latter who has decided to boycott the November 29 elections.  The candidate had formally taken his final position […]

The End of Poverty? is a kind of bookend to Capitalism: A Love Story: if Michael Moore’s movie examines how private enterprise operates at home, writer/director Philippe Diaz ‘s documentary explores what happens when that economic system is exported to the Third World.  As scathing exposes of exploitation these nonfiction films share much — ironic […]

Juan Cole’s very positive report card for President Barack Obama’s foreign policy is a bit shocking, given his knowledge and frequent enlightening comments.  (“Obama’s Foreign Policy Report Card,” Salon, October 27, 2009.1)  “[Obama] receives his lowest grade for his failure to force America’s chattering classes to take notice,” Cole judges — policy issues resolve into […]