Chavez only recognizes the Gaddafi government; accuses US of inciting civil war
Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez said he will only recognize a Libyan government led by his friend and ally Muammar Gaddafi and accused the United States of inciting the country's civil war.
Chávez accused Western powers of riding roughshod over international laws by supporting the rebels in their revolt against Gaddafi.
“This is kicking, spitting ... on the most basic elements of international law,” he said. “Where are the international rights? This is like the caveman era.”
Venezuela's leader spoke after rebels overran Gaddafi's compound in Tripoli in what appeared to be the end of his 42-year rule.
“We only recognize one government, the one led by Muammar Gaddafi,” Chávez said to applause as he presided over a cabinet meeting broadcast live on state TV.
During six months of civil war more than 30 countries, including the United States and major European Union countries, have moved to recognize the rebel National Transitional Council as the governing authority in Libya.
The 57-year-old former soldier one again accused Western powers of fuelling the conflict to steal Libya's oil.
“They arranged this war,” Chávez said, referring to the United States. “They provided the arms, the mercenaries. They better not attempt to apply the Libyan formula to Venezuela or we'll have to show them our power.”
Both Chávez and Gaddafi are military men who cast themselves as anti-imperialist revolutionaries and forged a friendship during half a dozen encounters in the past decade. They have enjoyed a long-standing alliance based on left-wing economic ideas, antagonistic relations with the United States, and their countries' membership in OPEC.
Some media reports have suggested Gaddafi, whose whereabouts remain unknown, could seek asylum in Venezuela but Chávez made no reference to that.
Meantime the Libyan Embassy in Buenos Aires announced it recognizes the National Transitional Council as the legitimate authority of Libya, the head of press of the Embassy reported.
Spokeswoman Norma Nur added that the embassy has moved away the green flag of the state founded by the leader Muammar Gaddafi in 1969 and changed it for the green, black and red flag of the monarchy previous to Gaddafi’s administration that identifies the rebels.
However in Brazil the pro-Gaddafi Libyan ambassador Salem al-Zubaidi said he would remain in his post.
“The Brazilian authorities still consider me the ambassador,” al-Zubaidi said. However, his claim is being challenged by part of the Libyan community in Brazil's capital Brasilia, where the Libyan embassy recently witnessed clashes between local Libyans of the pro- and anti-Gaddafi camps.
On Friday, supporters of the anti-Gaddafi rebels tried to replace the embassy's Libyan flag with the rebel flag, but were stopped by the ambassador's son and the embassy guards.
Three days later, another group of people entered the embassy, saying they would not leave until Muammar Gaddafi stepped down.
“Communication with Libya is very difficult. We have to wait three or four days to get clear information,” al-Zubaidi said.
After Libya's rebels took control of most of the Libyan capital Tripoli Monday, Gaddafi's 41-year rule seems to be over. However, his whereabouts remain unknown.
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Is that what a flea normally says to an elephant?
Heads up Hugo - nobody cares.
Does he think the world will stop turning if he refuses to acknowledge the TNC?
Who will he recognise after a free and fair vote which will come to Libya at some point in the future?
Who can take the torch ??? Anyone could do things better than this stupid monkey.....he has leaded one of the richest Latam countries to a one of the poorest one, even they are living over a lake of oil....and of course he has been disjoining the Latam countries more that joining them with his inconvenient intromissions into their internal affaires.....Hope he will be underground soon...Thanks to the cancer ....
You demonize Chavez while the banksters (legal mobsters) of the world are raping country after country (Greece, Ireland, Portugal, iTaly...) of their sovereign wealth. Chavez is an irritation to the oligarchs. He pokes them in their butts and ridicules them. They hate him for that, yet they thoroughly deserve it.
I have had a falling out with Chavez (just as I have had a major falling out with Obama, the biggest terrorist in the world now), but I appreciate that he (Chavez) was there for a while. Hopefully someone with integrity will step into his shoes.
Chavez can, for the moment, maintain his 'dream world' with his armed forces and his Cuban palace guard.
As long as these remain loyal, Chavez is Gaddafi's 'best bet'.
Mugabe is 'worth a punt' but he is very old, and the African Union is fickle and 'accidents happen' there.
Ahmedinejad and Kim are also fair 'outside bets'.
We understand that Ahmedinejad offered, through the Iranian London Embassy, refugee status in Iran for all the London rioters.
It would please me immensely if all 'my' dissidents would so aggregate . . . all in the same place, all at the same time . . . . . . ;-)
[does this mean they may go the same way ] lol.
who threatend to send his navy to destroy the royal navy,
or was that another pipe dream lol.
He's the icon for the anti-system, no matter if his system fails (and it DOES), but alone the fact it has kept up for such long is a very humble satisfaction for some, but to say this is an example for non-oil countries? No way... We also have to consider he is swimming in one of the biggest oil reserves in the world. His country is practically undestroyable from an economic point of view, no matter which economic atrocity he might have launched. Considering that oil reserves, you must really admit that he has failed after more than 10 years. Venezuela is not really better than it was back then, and if you compare VEN with its respective oil peers like Emirates, Quatar... oh man, did he fail.
you put this argument so well.
Congrats.
Chavez is also happy to fly out to Cuba for treatment for cancer. Do ordinary venezuelans get the same opportunities? Some socialist leader.
Shame on those who support such a hypocrite, and that includes you Think!
Marxism never died because it never existed in the first place and anyone who claims to be a Marxist is a liar. Ultimately the majority of us are self-interested individuals!
Cant we copyright think think ??
thinking abt it .
In 1953, UK and USA overthrew the democratically elected government of Mohammad Mosaddegh of Iran. The coup was orchestrated by the intelligence apparatus of both countries after Mohammad Mosaddegh nationalized the oil industry that was controlled by foreign interests. They set up Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi (“King Shah” of Iran) as a puppet authoritarian ruler who relied heavily on American support.
In 1961, in the Congo, the CIA in collaboration with Belgium plotted the overthrow and subsequent murder of Patrice Lumumba—the country’s first post colonial prime minister—and installed Joseph Mobutu who served USA for more than three decades until his own demise at the hands of US President Clinton and CIA backed proxies, Rwanda and Uganda. The war caused the death of six million Congolese.
In 1966, Ghanaian independence leader Dr Kwame Nkrumah was deposed by the CIA using ambitious enemies from within Ghana while Dr Kwame Nkrumah was abroad in China on a peace mission attempting to mediate the Vietnam conflict.
Another gross example of American meddling in the affairs of others was the September 11, 1973 ousting and assassination of the legitimate, elected government of President Salvador Allende of Chile. The coup d’état was organized by the Richard Nixon administration and Chilean military, ushering in the brutal dictator General Augusto Pinochet. These are only three examples out of many that can be named as examples of America’s pursuit of wicked foreign policy objectives.
-Nalliah Thayabharan
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