MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Chile downplays US pressure in UN voting

Chile is downplaying threats made by the United States Department of State aimed at squashing Chile's support for Venezuela's bid for a seat on the United Nations Security Council.

Government spokesman Ricardo Lagos Weber said this week that Chile would not be pressured by the U.S., but will instead seek regional consensus on the issue before deciding how to vote.

The U.S. government is supporting Guatemala as the next Latin American representative on the U.N. Security Council.

"These are distinct issues that have nothing to do with each other," said Lagos Weber.

"I do not see how a country could be penalized for exercising its international rights".

According to a story that was published may 28 in Santiago's daily La Tercera, U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Robert Zoellick told Chile's Foreign Minister Alejandro Foxely that Chilean support for Venezuela as a member of the U.N. Security Council in October's elections would "decisively damage" bilateral Chile/US relations.

The report went on to quote Zoellick as saying that, in the event that Chile did support Venezuela, it would lose its status as a "major non-NATO ally of the U.S." and would suffer economic penalties in the form of reduced commercial exchange between Chile and the U.S.

Foxely said Monday that Chile would consult with the Group of Latin American and Caribbean States (GRUPAC) to arrive at a consensus as to which way the region would vote.

"We are in a phase of consultations in which we are going to evaluate and take into consideration the opinions of friendly countries and then, later, we will make a decision," he said.

In the 2003 build up to the invasion of Iraq, Chile cast a deciding vote against the U.S.-U.K. led resolution to overthrow Saddam Hussein without any noticeable effect on bilateral relations with the U.S. By Nathan Gill The Santiago Times - News about Chile