Having lived in Venezuela for the past two years, I can report that the majority of Venezuelan were extremely supportive of the candidacy of Barack Obama for the U.S. presidency, believing that his election would mean a great improvement over the Bush administration's efforts to depose President Chávez and his government from power, to demonize Chávez in the international press, and to use U.S. taxpayers money to fund the anti-democratic opposition movement here.
Much to the dismay of many Venezuelans, it appears that, as president, President Obama is maintaining the anti-Chavez rhetoric and policies of the Bush administration, accusing Chavez of exporting terrorism and being an obstacle to Latin American development.
But, when it comes to exporting trouble to other nations, it appears that the U.S. has that business under express contract. Eva Golinger, writing in Venezuelanalysis.com, explores one of the mechanisms that the U.S. has used to generate dissent against the Chavez government in Venezuela.
In "Conspiracy and Propaganda Centers: Illegal US Consulates in Venezuela", Ms. Golinger documents, with materials obtained through U.S.Freedom of Information Act requests, how the U.S. has created extra-legal propaganda centers in major cities in Venezuela.
Established without the permission of the host government in violation of international law, the U.S. has placed what it calls "American corners" in private law society offices and even that of an opposition mayor:
At the end of 2005, the Embassy of the United States in Venezuela, under the leadership of then Ambassador William Brownfield (present U.S. Ambassador in Colombia), inaugurated the first of what would become a total of four seats of "virtual consulates",known as American Corners" in Latin America. These are no typical diplomatic seats, given the fact that they do not have any authorization from the Foreign Ministry of the respective countries in which they are situated; neither do they offer services to the US citizens who reside in the country. Documents of the US State Department, recently declassified in the realm of my investigations, explicitly emphasize that the purpose of these "American Corners" is to facilitate an "unfiltered" dialog and relation between Embassy of the United States and the Venezuelan people. In a clear flagrancy [of their disregard] for international law and the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations in particular, Washington intends to ignore the authority of the Venezuelan government in order to manage establishing bilateral relations directly with sectors of the Venezuelan society.
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Since President Chávez and the Bolivarian Revolution came to power in 1998, Washington has intended to undermine the Venezuelan democracy through different acts of destabilization,including the coup d'état of April 2002, the economic sabotage and the sabotage of the petroleum industry of 2002-2003, Guarimbas1, electoral interventions, media warfare, and a constant flow of dollars into the pockets of the violent and anti-democratic groups of the opposition. Hence, when the Embassy of the United States seeks to establish an "unfiltered" relation with the Venezuelan people, it cannot be understood other than that they have the same intentions as always; their objective continues to be the overthrow of President Chávez and the destruction of the Bolivarian Revolution.
The U.S. State Department has signed contracts with each of their "corner" sites, expressly giving the U.S. the right to approve all aspects of the centers, including the nature of the books, documents, cds, speakers, and the like used by the centers.
As Golinger notes:
They serve as spaces for Washington to continue promoting their destabilization agenda in Venezuela behind the back of the Venezuelan government. If Venezuela would establish similar diplomatic seats in the United States without the authorization of that government, they would be closed down immediately and their US employees would be jailed for being "non-authorized agents of a foreign government"
Indeed, in November 2008, the U.S. did shut down an office of the Venezuelan consulate in Texas for just moving to a new office site that had not previously been approved:
The U.S. State Department has revoked the visas and diplomatic privileges of a dozen Venezuelan consular officials after a two-month dispute over the Venezuelan government's plans to relocate its Houston office.
Employees with the consulate general in Houston were given until Sunday to leave the country, or they will become illegal immigrants, a State Department official confirmed Friday. The consular office on Fountain View Drive was locked on Friday, with a notice taped in the window saying it will remain closed until further notice for reasons "beyond our control."
The expulsion stemmed from the Venezuelan Consulate's decision to move its Houston office to another location less than five miles away — apparently without getting permission from the State Department.
Equally recently, a Venezuelan citizens was convicted and sentenced to four years in jail in a Federal District Court in Florida for having come to Florida to talk with a Venezuelan-America citizen, having been charged as an unregistered agent of Venezuela, a foreign government.
The hypocrisy with which the U.S., which has fomented illegal coups, murders and kidnapping throughout Latin America, as well as conducting illegal invasions of foreign countries, dares to attack President Chávez for "exporting terrorism" is appalling.
One hopes that President Obama will have access to more accurate information about who is exporting trouble and terrorism and which country is the presenting the biggest obstacle to the development of Latin America.