Government Seeks Overbroad Emergency Powers for President

Amendments proposed to Venezuela's constitution increasing presidential emergency powers would jeopardize the protection of fundamental rights at times when they are most needed, Human Rights Watch said today.
The proposed changes would eliminate the constitutional prohibition on suspending due process guarantees during states of emergency. They would also eliminate specific time limits on states of emergency, giving the president de facto power to suspend due process and other basic rights indefinitely.

Human Rights Watch is particularly concerned that these provisions could lead to suspension of fundamental rights in violation of international law, as the proposed amendments would also eliminate the requirement that such restrictions meet the requirements, principles, and guarantees established in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the American Convention on Human Rights.

These amendments would enable President Chávez to suspend basic rights indefinitely by maintaining a perpetual state of emergency, said José Miguel Vivanco, Americas director at Human Rights Watch.

Suspension of Due Process Guarantees
President Hugo Chávez's supporters in the National Assembly originally proposed completely eliminating the constitutional prohibition on suspending due process rights during states of emergency.

This proposal would allow the president to suspend other fundamental due process guarantees, including the presumption of innocence, the right to be tried by an independent and impartial tribunal, the right against self-incrimination, the right not to be convicted for a non-existent crime, and the right against double jeopardy. In addition, the proposal appears to allow for the suspension of the rights of a defendant to know the charges and have access to the evidence against him.

Other Fundamental Rights at Risk
Under the proposed amendment, the constitution would explicitly protect a number of rights from suspension during states of emergency. These include the right to life, the right to personal integrity, the right not to be sentenced to prison terms exceeding 30 years, and the prohibitions against torture, incommunicado detention and enforced disappearance.

The proposed emergency powers would also allow the president to suspend indefinitely the right of citizens to information, a right that is integral to the protection of human rights and accountability.

Expansion of the President's Emergency Decree Power
The proposed changes would greatly enhance the president's power to impose and maintain the states of emergency in which these basic rights could be suspended.

It would broaden the circumstances in which the president could impose states of emergency, to include not only catastrophes, calamities and other similar situations, but also cases where a certain and imminent possibility exists for the occurrence of situations capable of originating catastrophes, public calamities and other similar situations. This is of concern, because, as the UN Human Rights Committee has made clear, not every disturbance or catastrophe qualifies as a public emergency which threatens the life of the nation and would justify restrictions or suspension of protected rights.

The proposal would eliminate the existing time limits on states of emergency, leaving it entirely to the discretion of the president to determine when an emergency has ended. Under the proposed amendments, the president would still be required to seek congressional approval for an emergency decree (within an eight-day period), but would not need authorization to extend it. The proposal would also eliminate the power of the National Assembly to revoke the state of emergency.

The reform would also eliminate the requirement that the Supreme Court review the constitutionality of the decree regulating the suspension of rights during times of emergency. Although the proposed amendment indicates that rights should only be suspended temporarily, it provides no mechanism for ending the suspension so long as the state of emergency remains in place.

Source: HRW.ORG

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Around a hundred people turned up at the Spanish embassy in Caracas today with banners criticising Spanish authorities and presented a document supporting Batasuna and expressing solidarity "with the towns that fight". The demonstrators lauched firecrackers and burnt two dolls with the efigie of the King of Spain and the ex-president of the Government Jose Maria Aznar, leaving behind graffiti supporting ETA.

Since 1968 to date ETA has killed 821 people and committed dozens of kidnappings. ETA is proscribed as a terrorist organisation by both the Spanish and French authorities as well as the European Union as a whole, the United States, and the United Nations. More than 500 members of the organisation are incarcerated in prisons in Spain, France and other countries.

ETA is a terrorist group just like FARC and ELN in Colombia.

Photos Gallery: Chavistas Support ETA.

After Chavez's defeat at the polls in December, which saw his wide-sweeping socialist reforms struck down by Venezuelans, it was only to be expected that Chavez would lay the blame for many of Venezuela's problems on the United States (even though, ironically, US oil money contributes to a vast percentage of the Venezuelan economy, without which Chavez's socialist ideals would be entirely unsupportable). However, even die-hard chavistas must be shocked by the latest, and most ludicrous, claims in a long line of bizarre accusations- a Venezuelan scientist working in the University of Zulia has expressed her belief that American "biological warfare" is to blame for outbreaks of Dengue fever in Venezuela. Her argument seems to negate the fact that Dengue fever is spread naturally by mosquitos, and appears to be, frankly, a poor attempt to shift the blame for increasingly prevalent weaknesses in Chavez's flagship state healthcare system.

Whilst government attempts to openly manipulate public knowledge are not uncommon, attempting to inspire panic amongst Venezuelans is most certainly a step beyond the standard crimes attributed to "El Imperio" by Chavez- perhaps he now feels it is necessary to control through fear- the start of a downward spiral?

U.S. drug czar points finger at Chavez.U.S.

In unusually harsh criticism of the Venezuelan president, John P. Walters blames lack of enforcement for an increase in drug shipments.

The public criticism by Walters, who heads the Office of National Drug Control Policy, was unusually harsh for the Bush administration, which has tried to steer clear of provoking the fiery Venezuelan leader.

"Where are the big seizures, where are the big arrests of individuals who are at least logistical coordinators? When it's being launched from controlled airports and seaports, where are the arrests of corrupt officials? At some point here, this is tantamount to collusion," Walters said in an interview.

Complaints about Venezuelan counter-narcotics operations have risen since August 2005, when Chavez ordered a halt to all cooperation with the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration office in Caracas, the Venezuelan capital.

Then-U.S. Ambassador William Brownfield said in 2006 that the amount of drugs flowing through Venezuela had quintupled in five years.

"On the destination side of this flow, there has been action, but on the departure side of the flow, Chavez has not responded, not even in the minimal way," Walters said.

Source: Latimes.com

Complete Article: http://www.handsonvenezuela.org/articles/chavezisanarco/index.html

Colombia's foreign minister snapped back at Venezuela's Hugo Chavez, telling the neighboring president to cease interference in Colombia's affairs.

"Chavez doesn't waste a chance to mistreat Colombia and its government", Foreign Minister Fernando Araujo said today in a statement."The Colombian government asks President Chavez to cease his political aggressions".

Araujo's comments come after Chavez said today that Colombia doesn't want to reach a peace agreement in its decades-long conflict with rebels. Chavez, who brokered the release of two hostages held by the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia earlier this month, has repeatedly attacked Colombian President Alvaro Uribe for inciting conflict.

"The government that Colombia has today doesn't want peace", Chavez said during a visit to Managua, Nicaragua. "I'm convinced that this conflict doesn't have a military solution. We have to look for a political solution".

The FARC, as the Marxist group is known, holds about 750 hostages in jungle camps to extort money for its four-decade war against the government.

Chavez "fails to recognize the terrorist actions of the guerrillas, its participation in drug trafficking, and its crimes against children, women and the elderly", Araujo said.

Chavez said on Jan. 11 that the FARC weren't terrorists, comments that were condemned by countries including the U.S., Germany, the U.K. and France. The FARC was one of 22 organizations designated as terrorist on Nov. 1, 2001, by the State Department. The designation blocks the assets of organizations and individuals linked to terrorism.

Source: Blonberg.com

The victory of the Venezuelan opposition in the referendum pushed for by President Hugo Chavez to reform the Constitution and create a totalitarian Cuban-style "socialist" state was far more significant than the official margin of 50.7% to 49.3% could ever indicate. Andres Oppenheimer analysed the Venezuelan elections in "El Nuevo Herald", and here follows a translation of his article.

Chavez has certainly kept a firm grip on power and has assured his government is not under threat in the short-term. However, the opposition's triumph changed the country's political panorama overnight, and will make efforts by the leaders of Bolivia, Ecuador and Nicaragua- supported by Chavez- to change their own laws with the aim of enabling 'Presidency for life' significantly more difficult.

Amongst the evidence to support the claim that the opposition victory is far more significant than at first glance is: firstly, the opposition's victory could have been by a wider margin than the government claims. Whilst Venezuelan electoral authorities annouced defeat of the reform by a difference of 1.4% with 90% of the votes counted, Ojo Electoral ('Electoral Eye'), the independent body supervising the electoral process with the endorsement of the Venezuelan government, indicated that the opposition won by a margin of 3.8%.

Read complete article.
Gallery: Venezuelans said NO to the regime
Gallery: A hard hit for the Bolivarian Revolution.

In Venezuela, as well as human rights violations in prisons throughout the country, special attention must be paid to the cases of El Amparo and the so-called Caracazo which have been the motivation behind the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights' (CIDH) condemnation of the country. In their annual reports since the year 2000, numerous national and international organisations have reflected on Venezuela's breaches of human rights and their increasing occurence over the past few years.

Another interesting aspect to consider with regard to Human Rights violations is the treatment of soldiers, some of whom are victims of massively disproportionate punishments, which even include the use of "Punishment Cells"- a clear violation of fundamental human rights. Some have lost their lives during fires started in these cells and as this is written, it is still unclear who is responsible for these horrifying crimes.

Photos taken in Caracas on the last few days of December. With just hours left until the end of 2007, Venezuelan households were getting ready to bring in the New Year with their family and friends. There was, however, an exception- the people who find themselves relegated to a forgotten World; whether they be imprisoned, exiled or ill in hospital, we'd like to let them know they're in our thoughts.

Thousands more Venezuelans were in the streets- the forgotten ones (not just in the festive season, but all year) and those who lead empty lives without hope. Despite government forces working under the mission 'Negra Hipolita', which I don't wish to describe due to it's numerous shortcomings, the sad truth is that corruption feeds off the misery of those who are unhappy.

Gallery: 'Achievements' of the Revolution in 2007
Related Article: Weaknesses in Chavez's flagship state healthcare system.