El Universal reported that a decline in revenue from oil sales caused imports into Venezuela to drop by 49% during the first six months of 2009. Despite a recent increase the value of petroleum, Venezuela has experienced a sharp reduction in available funds since the price of a barrel of oil is just over $65, […]
Russian oil companies, including Gazprom and Lukoil, will pay $1 billion to Venezuela for the chance to develop oil reserves along the Orinoco. Even though Caracas and Moscow are allies, I still have doubts about the final payout for these businesses. In 2006 the Venezuelan government pushed out some foreign oil companies, and forced others […]
Gold plated AK-47s. Marble columned mansions with caged panthers in the foyer. Caches of jewel-encrusted gold crucifixes affixed to heavy chains. Lots of bling is how you live when “investing for retirement” refers to your grave setting. And so it has been in Mexico among the drug gangs, spawning a pop culture infused with reverence […]
Yesterday, President Hugo Chávez continued his travels overseas, spending the day in Russia. During his time there he announced that Venezuela will recognize Abkhazia and South Ossetia as independent states. A brief war with between Russia and Georgia in August 2008 led to the separation of these two regions. More information is available in today’s […]
When he first ran for office, Hugo Chávez declared that he wanted to reduce the size of government, and to make it more efficient. However, Venezuela’s National Institute of Statistics released figures showing that there are now 2,372,587 government workers, an increase of 70% during Chávez’s time in office. The percentage of all persons employed […]
President Hugo Chávez is on a weeklong trip overseas, to strengthen alliances in “the fight against imperialism”. His itinerary includes stops in Libya, Syria, Iran, Algeria, Belarus, and Russia. Freedom House, a US-based non-profit (and declaredly non-partisan) publishes “Freedom in the World, the annual survey of global political rights and civil liberties”. It ranked each […]
Conjecture is rife in the aftermath of Mexico’s decriminalization program. Much of it concerns the reaction of the drug cartels. Will they be undercut by legalization? Will they redouble efforts to expand drug use in Mexico? Will prices decrease? Will Mexico’s new focus on treatment, as opposed to punishment, work? Answers to some of these […]
Today and tomorrow (September 4 and 5) there will be a series of marches in Venezuela, Colombia and throughout the world based on the theme of “No More Chávez”. El Universal, one of the independent newspapers in the Venezuelan capital, has a short blurb here. Two weeks ago a march against the new education reform […]
The Venezuelan flag carries a rich historical tradition, and is based on versions used by rebels who fought for the country’s independence in the early 19th century. At the same time, like Venezuela as a whole, the flag has undergone changes in recent times. The flag has three horizontal colored stripes. The red is said […]
This past weekend President Chávez of Venezuela’s reiterated his commitment to maintaining “frozen relations” with the administration of Alvaro Uribe and Colombia. (You can read more at this link.) He stated that based on trade agreements with Brazil and Argentina, “we are not going to have problems with supplies”. This may be the plan, with […]
Today leaders met in Bariloche, Argentina, for a session of the Union of South American Nations (UNASUR). Atop the agenda was discussion of the military agreement between Colombia and the United States, signed to maintain efforts against drug-trafficking and terrorism in the region. See this BBC Mundo article for a preview of the meeting. As […]
The decriminalization of drug use in Mexico is bound to have unintended consequences. Beginning last Friday, possession of small amounts of drugs, including cocaine, heroine, LSD, marijuana and meth, is permitted. Such wholesale legalization is crude, but may prove beneficial to the Mexican economy. Having up to four joints on you (the legal limit is […]
President Alvaro Uribe recently moved one step closer to running for a third term in office. The Colombian Senate voted 56-2 last week to approve a plan for legal changes that would enable him to be reelected a second time. The process must now be approved by the House of Representatives and pass a nationwide […]
On August 24th HBO presented a new documentary titled “Which Way Home”. This film follows a number of children, as young as 9-years old, on their perilous journey from Central America into the United States. While seeking to enter the US illegally, they dream of building better lives. Venezuelan migrants do not live in the […]
On August 16th a staff person from the Colombian Consulate and between 20 and 30 Colombian migrants were detained by the police in Caracas. Despite diplomatic immunities, consular documents and a computer were also confiscated. The Consulate was carrying out a documentation exercise for residents of the barrio Catía. Although accused of not receiving authorization […]