Four Bolivian regions declare autonomy from government

[bemildred]

Source: CNN

Tensions were rising in Bolivia on Saturday as members of the country's four highest natural gas-producing regions declared autonomy from the central government.

Thousands waved the Santa Cruz region's green-and-white flags in the streets as council members of the Santa Cruz, Tarija, Beni and Pando districts made the public announcement.

The officials displayed a green-bound document containing a set of statutes paving the way to a permanent separation from the Bolivian government.

Council representatives vowed to legitimize the so-called autonomy statutes through a referendum that would legally separate the natural-gas rich districts from President Evo Morales' government.

Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/americas/12/15/bolivia.unrest/index.html?imw=Y&iref=mpstoryemail

---

I don't know that I've ever heard of a place "declaring autonomy" before.

[bemildred]

1. Autonomy effort grows in Bolivia provinces

(12-16) 04:00 PST Santa Cruz, Bolivia -- Antigovernment demonstrators gathered in this city and three other provincial capitals Saturday as four of Bolivia's wealthiest provinces celebrated efforts to seek greater autonomy from the central government, even as President Evo Morales said he would mobilize the armed forces to prevent any secession plans.

The protests began in Santa Cruz, Bolivia's most prosperous city, in a festive spirit, as demonstrators waved green-and-white flags inscribed with the words, "Now We Are Autonomous."

Although the president had sent hundreds of soldiers to Santa Cruz and other capitals as fear of violence grew, there were no signs of a major armed presence on the streets Saturday afternoon. The only violence reported was an explosion on the fifth floor of the Palace of Justice in Santa Cruz; no one was hurt.

Supporters of Morales, meanwhile, gathered in the capital, La Paz, to celebrate a new Constitution aimed at strengthening the rights of indigenous groups.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2007/12/16/MNJFTVFF4.DTL&type=politics

[boricua79]

2. this is illegal, and not popular

I hope Bolivia's army removes these putschists quickly.

[shenmue]

3. War around the corner?

:scared:

[EFerrari]

4. It's a white separatist movement:

"Evo is putting us on the road to chaos with ideas that discriminate against people who are not indigenous," Branko Marinkovic, president of the Pro-Santa Cruz Committee, said in an interview. "No one wants to invest or create jobs in this environment."

Yeah right, Mr. Pro-Santa Cruz. Too late, the inditos are already walking on your sidewalk.

[HereSince1628]

6. the reference to investing sounds distinctly corpo-capitalist

It may be that it's a nonindigenous white people's movement, but talk about investing rings at another harmonic.

[EFerrari]

7. As in Venezuela, the monied are not happy with the direction

the government is going in. It must be hard to claim your country is going to hell AND to court investors at the same time.

[Judi Lynn]

11. The U.S. had everything to do with the suffering of indigenous people during the coup and regime

of Hugo Banzer in the 1970's:

Bolivia

Hugo Banzer was the leader of a repressive regime in Bolivia in the 1970s. The U.S. had been disturbed when a previous leader nationalized the tin mines and distributed land to Indian peasants. Later that action to benefit the poor was reversed.

Banzer, who was trained at the U.S.-operated School of the Americas in Panama and later at Fort Hood, Texas, came back from exile frequently to confer with U.S. Air Force Major Robert Lundin. In 1971 he staged a successful coup with the help of the U.S. Air Force radio system. In the first years of his dictatorship he received twice as military assistance from the U.S. as in the previous dozen years together.

A few years later the Catholic Church denounced an army massacre of striking tin workers in 1975, Banzer, assisted by information provided by the CIA, was able to target and locate leftist priests and nuns. His anti-clergy strategy, known as the Banzer Plan, was adopted by nine other Latin American dictatorships in 1977. (2) He has been accused of being responsible for 400 deaths during his tenure. (1)
(snip/)

http://www.countercurrents.org/lucas240407.htm

This look indicates there was an effort to bring in white racists during that same time to occupy the land the U.S. supported dictator grabbed after throwing out, and persecuting the indigenous citizens:

COLONEL HUGO BANZER
President of Bolivia

In 1970, in Bolivia, when then-President Juan Jose Torres nationalized Gulf Oil properties and tin mines owned by US interests, and tried to establish friendly relations with Cuba and the Soviet Union, he was playing with fire. The coup to overthrow Torres, led by US-trained officer and Gulf Oil beneficiary Hugo Banzer, had direct support from Washington. When Banzer's forces had a breakdown in radio communications, US Air Force radio was placed at their disposal. Once in power, Banzer began a reign of terror. Schools were shut down as hotbeds of political subversive activity. Within two years, 2,000 people were arrested and tortured without trial. As in Paraguay, Argentina and Brazil, the native Indians were ordered off their land and deprived of tribal identity. Tens-of-thousands of white South Africans were enticed to immigrate with promises of the land stolen from the Indians, with a goal of creating a white Bolivia. When Catholic clergy tried to aid the Indians, the regime, with CIA help, launched terrorist attacks against them, and this "Banzer Plan" became a model for similar anti-Catholic actions throughout Latin America.
(snip/...)

http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/US_ThirdWorld/dictators.html

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Banzer came from this same area, originally, where the trouble is, currently.

He was re-elected (not by the majority of impoverished poor, of course) in 1997, and ruled over Bolivia until 2001, when he resigned due to cancer, and later died. In his last couple of years he actually attempted to overcome the filthy things he did to Bolivia when the U.S. installed him to wreack havoc upon the poor, and he actually begged the world to forgive him. Asshole!

Little know fact in the U.S.: In Bolivia, indigenous people could not walk on the sidewalk until 1952!

http://www.inthesetimes.com/article/3136/gone_but_not_forgotten/

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~snip~
In many cases, land ownership in Bolivia is unclear. Often, if not in most cases, large landowners simply confiscated land in times past and arbitrarily included it in their latifundios -- large landed estates -- and today consider it their property, whether it is used or not.

The Morales government insists that such land belongs to the state. Under his presidency, for the first time, the state is redistributing land to the peasants.

Along with nationalization of the energy sector and a new constitution, the land question is a priority in Morales’ government program. Redistribution of land is in fact the heart of the government’s policies for social justice. He considers the agrarian reform begun in 1953 that was limited chiefly to Andes western highlands far from sufficient. A former farmers union president points out that in eastern Bolivia big landowners possess five hectares of land “for each cow.” While in the western part of the country a family of five persons must live from half a hectare of land, a little more than an acre.

It is the old story of Latin America. Of the world. Few people possess nearly everything. Yet this is the key question in much of Latin America. I have quoted elsewhere the French sociologist and close observer of Latin America, Alain Touraine, who wrote that “the key to the political life of the continent and its capacity to invent a political-social model capable of working in an exceptionally difficult situation is without doubt in Bolivia.”

Land distribution in Latin America’s poorest country is very unfair. The unfair distribution of land has led time and time again to social tensions. According to estimates of even the Catholic Church, a few families claim more than 90 percent of Bolivia’s farmable land and pastures, while 3 million small Indian farmers have to get by with the rest.
(snip)

The elite class of European background -- about 15 percent of a country with a predominantly indigenous population -- and the dominant class via which the USA has historically controlled Latin America, is just as determined as is Morales. This minority class is ready to defend old privileges by any means, as it always has. And it depends on Washington’s economic and moral support. Here then, again, is a classic case of Washington and its local vassals vs. any sign of genuine progress in the Americas.

More:
http://onlinejournal.com/artman/publish/article_2307.shtml

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~snip~
Bolivia’s white and near-white minority have been content to lord it over the Aymara and Quechua majority for nearly five centuries and see no reason to change.
(snip)

If the poor benighted cholos and collas – the Bolivian equivalents to words like 'niggers' and 'coons' - learn to read what will they not demand, say the Cruzeños and their allies?

More:
http://www.newstatesman.com/200712130067



The kind of "President" the U.S. right-wing loves to see in Bolivia, and a photo of his handiwork.

[EFerrari]

12. Thanks, Judi Lynn. I'd forgotten about the recruitment of S. Africans

to create a whiter population. These idiots never learn, do they?

[Judi Lynn]

15. Isn't that nasty? They live on land stolen from the indigenous people.

This is material our own corporate media have thoughtfully not bothered to write in current event articles for the American public, not wanting us to bother our "beautiful minds."

Sounds as if there's a very LARGE, grotesque, bloody story behind this material, doesn't it? It really needs to be told. The reason it hasn't been told so far is because all the damage and suffering has been born by the people the European descendants call "cholos" and "collas."

[Judi Lynn]

13. Interesting pictures of Branko Marinkovic, the president of the Pro-Santa Cruz Committee:

A few weeks ago he threatened to go on a hunger strike. Apparently he hasn't wasted away! What's next: holding his racist's breath?


Noah Friedman-Rudovsky for The New York Times

A demonstrator in Santa Cruz, Bolivia, waved a flag at a rally on Saturday in support of a move toward provincial self-rule.

~snip~
Most frightening so far seems to be the Santa Cruz-based far right. Rumors abound of Colombian mercenaries training on big Bolivian ranches. And several Cruzano political figures, like Ruben Costas, prefect of Santa Cruz province, have intimated that they will "resist domination" from the central government. Branko Marinkovic is one of the Cruzano heavies. He is president of the Federation of Private Industries in Santa Cruz, a big rancher and like many elites in Bolivia's east a descendant of Croatian immigrants. He tells me he's made his peace with the gas nationalization, but he sounds ominous, if conflicted, on other issues. "Land reform could lead to civil war," says Marinkovic in Texan-flavored English, the product of six years studying at the University of Texas, Houston. When I ask if he is building a private militia, as is rumored, he is dismissive. "That's BS. Just BS. I am running a huge business here. I am not involved in anything like that." What else could he say?

More:http://www.boliviasolidarity.org/briefing/parenti

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Sounds as if the _Bush administration is certainly watching, expecting hell to break loose, having issued a travelers' warning:

US Embassy Issues Travel Warning

The U.S. Embassy in La Paz took the unusual step Wednesday of issuing a warning against travel to Bolivia: "The Department recommends that U.S. citizens defer non-essential travel to Bolivia at this time. U.S. Embassy La Paz is restricting the official travel of U.S. Government employees to Bolivia during this period. Since protests and demonstrations can break out with little or no notice, U.S. citizens in Bolivia should monitor local media sources for the latest developments. U.S. citizens should avoid demonstrations at all times and exercise caution."

More:
http://www.democracyctr.org/blog/

[stimbox]

25. He's a Croat. Nazi collaborators...

Wonder if his ancestors were Nazi supporters who fled Yugoslavia after WWII?

[Judi Lynn]

26. Once you start researching, you see so MANY Nazi's embedded themselves in South America,

all OVER the place. Seems a natural place for their collaborators to turn up, too!

Apparently the Bolivian government thinks his family has done something wrong, all right:

.... the Confederation of Bolivian Indigenous Peoples have recently demanded the president of Pro Santa Cruz Civic Committee, Branko Marinkovic, return 27,000 hectares of lands belonging to the Guarayo, which were illegally appropriated through the use of false documents.

Branko insists the lands were obtained legally—however “Vice Minister of Land Alejandro Almaraz on Thursday cited “abundant evidence” that Marinkovic amassed his family’s empire at the expense of Santa Cruz’s Guarayo Indians.” (2). The attorney General intends to sue “Marinkovic for ideological falseness and use of false documents."
(snip)

http://intercontinentalcry.org/land-recovery-in-bolivia/

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Marinkovic seems to think he can rally a violent enough resistance to the growing Latin American transformation:

Branko Marinkovic, president of the Santa Cruz Civic Committee, said the new charter would be "stained with blood" and pledged that opposition-led regions would not obey it.
(snip)

http://www.wtopnews.com/?nid=389&sid=1300488

[KaptBunnyPants]

33. Look a little closer, and you see quite a few of them embedded here as well.

Just think about it, in 30 more years we can officially call it the century of Fascism. Who could argue that it is not the dominant political theory of today, and likely for the rest of a soul crushing eternity?

[donsu]

5. you know the neo cons are paying for this - gas = neo cons

nt

[HereSince1628]

8. I don't know that my tax dollars are not paying for this

The CIA has a budget that's secret, and led by Dick Cheney, the NeoCon in Chief, the CIA could easily be spending money on this.

[donsu]

14. true

nt

[EFerrari]

10. We're probably paying for this. The Cons are just the party planners.

I hope no one gets hurt. :(

[McCamy Taylor]

27. NeoCons. Liberating nationalized petrochemicals from brown people since 1973.

[bemildred]

9. Political tensions rise in Bolivia

Political divisions appear to have deepened in Bolivia after four provinces controlled by the opposition put forward plans for greater autonomy from the central government.

The move comes as large rallies were held in the country both in support and opposition of Evo Morales, the president.

Thousands of Morales supporters marched through the city of La Paz to celebrate the unveiling of a new constitution that has divided public opinion in the country.

"This is a historic day ... the people will never again be marginalised," Morales told crowds outside the presidential palace after the president of the constitutional assembly submitted a copy of the new charter.

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/640BB35A-FED0-4A8F-9CDB-40CE00813131.htm

[struggle4progress]

29. Branko's been threatening violence for a while now

Bolivian States Protest Against Morales
November 28, 2007 - 8:51pm
... Branko Marinkovic, president of the Santa Cruz Civic Committee, said the new charter would be "stained with blood" and pledged that opposition-led regions would not obey it ... http://www.wtopnews.com/?nid=389&sid=1300488

Branko's also charged in a recent assault case:

... Como parte de esta ‘lluvia’ de amenazas, ayer el Gobierno presentó una querella en contra del presidente del Comité pro Santa Cruz, Branko Marinkovic, y los líderes de la Unión Juvenil Cruceñista (UJC), a quienes acusa de haber propiciado una golpiza al ex minero René Vargas (57) ...
http://www.eldeber.com.bo/2007/2007-12-14/vernotanacional.php?id=071214005243

ABI-B A1473 14:50:14 13-12-2007 1-P
ABI: PROCESS - MARINKOVIC
GOVERNMENT SUES AGAINST MARINKOVIC AND UNIONISTS THAT PUNCHED A FORMER MINER

Santa Cruz, Dec 13 (ABI).- Government bring a lawsuit before Republic’s General Prosecutor’s Office against Pro Santa Cruz’s Civic Committee, Branko Marinkovic, and representatives from the denominated group Santa Cruz’s Youth Union due the punch that they gave to a former miner of 57 years of age.

Vice Minister of Justice, Wilfredo Chávez, informed that the denunciations are based on the criminal acts, as well as the attempted murder and serious injuries that were committed against the integrity of René Vargas ...

http://abi.bo/index.php?i=noticias_texto&j=200712131254533x

[Judi Lynn]

30. I got the google translation of that passage you posted:

As part of this' rain 'threats, the government yesterday filed a lawsuit against the president of the Committee for St. Croix, Branko Marinkovic, and the leaders of the Santa Cruz Youth Union (UJC), whom they accused of having led to a beating Former miner Rene Vargas (57).
(snip)

http://www.eldeber.com.bo/2007/2007-12-14/vernotanacional.php%3Fid%3D071214005243&sa=X&oi=translate&resnum=1&ct=result&prev=/search%3Fq%3DEl%2BDeber%2B%252B%2BComo%2Bparte%2Bde%2Besta%2B%25E2%2580%2598lluvia%25E2%2580%2599%2Bde%2Bamenazas,%2Bayer%2Bel%2BGobierno%2Bpresent%25C3%25B3%2Buna%2Bquerella%2Ben%2Bcontra%2Bdel%2Bpresidente%2Bdel%2BComit%25C3%25A9%2Bpro%2BSanta%2BCruz,%2BBranko%2BMarinkovic,%2By%2Blos%2Bl%25C3%25ADderes%2Bde%2Bla%2BUni%25C3%25B3n%2BJuvenil%2BCruce%25C3%25B1ista%2B(UJC),%2Ba%2Bquienes%2Bacusa%2Bde%2Bhaber%2Bpropiciado%2Buna%2Bgolpiza%2Bal%2Bex%2Bminero%2BRen%25C3%25A9%2BVargas%2B%26hl%3Den%26rls%3DGGLD,GGLD:2004-37,GGLD:en">~~~~ link ~~~~

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
That takes a lot of class, doesn't it, this stupid Croat land baron, living on stolen land, hiring thugs to demolish an indigenous miner? Figures, for sure.

Thanks for the links. We really need all the information we can get, since our own corporate media can't be bothered writing about the plight of poor people at the hands of true, murderous assholes.

[Judi Lynn]

16. Bolivia: Political Racism In Question

Bolivia: Political Racism In Question

By Idón Moisés Chivi Vargas

02 September, 2007
Countercurrents.org


Bolivia is living through a time of political transition where the verbal masks used prolifically by the television, radio, and press to cover up reality and, as Galeano would say, lie in what they say and lie even more in what they don't say.

We live in a country where reality is one thing and what the media says is another, the media racism is a close relative of political racism, and it constructs a country where paradoxes have the perversity of showing us the world upside down.

In this context, born democrats are those with white skin; born dictators are the ones that have dark skin and that's why:

Democracy is when the political minority govern; dictatorship is how the social majority govern.

Democracy is the savage market where the only ones that are saved are those than can and those that have the ability to; dictatorship is the search of a society of equals.

Democracy is beating Indians, mestizos or progressive intellectuals with impunity; dictatorship is when the Indian, or the mestizo, or the progressive intellectual does not allow this to happen.

Democracy is the failure of deliberative mechanisms to find the solution to a historic crisis; dictatorship is the success of these mechanisms.

Democracy is the infamous sell out of the nation to the transnationals; dictatorship is the recuperation of those resources for the nation.

Democracy is being an accomplice to the transnationals; dictatorship is to not be one.

Democracy is being an accomplice to the corrupt judges; dictatorship is justice for all.

Democracy is protecting the privileges of the powerful; dictatorship is not doing this.

Democracy is being the privileged owner of the state; dictatorship is when the state belongs to the entire nation

Democracy is telling lies; dictatorship is telling the truth

Democracy is the exacerbated racism of the white; dictatorship is the diversity of colours.

Democracy is the media justification of racial violence; dictatorship is preserving social peace.

This is because majestic democracy sustains itself on skin colour, on the most simple, and at the same time most grotesque and perverse, racism

More:
http://www.countercurrents.org/vargas020907.htm

[Peace Patriot]

42. And you know when Donald Rumsfeld calls something a "dictatorship," look out

--it's likely going to be hell for all the poor people in the region. See PNAC-part 2. They can't have Iran, so they've switched to...South America!

"The Smart Way to Beat Tyrants Like Chávez," by Donald Rumsfeld, 12/1/07
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/11/30/AR2007113001800.html

Discussion here:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=103x323889

I figured this would be Rumsfeld's "retirement" project. And he generalizes in this article, in a way that makes it clear he's not just after Venezuelan oil, he has a whole economic and military war laid out, to restore fascist rule and corporate profiteering in the Andes democracies in particular. His launching pad, Columbia--the most corrupt government on the continent, and a fascist dinosaur--now surrounded with leftist governments in Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador, Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Uruguay and Nicaragua. And it's interesting what's happening in Paraguay--which some IDed as the possible Bush Cartel launching pad. Paraguay (center/right government) has joined the Bank of the South, and has shown other signs of supporting South American SELF-DETERMINATION, possibly influenced by the great popularity of Fernando Lugo (the beloved "bishop of the poor"), who is running for president this year.

So, this thing is, Rumsfeld has one hell of a strategic problem. These governments are unifying against U.S. bullying, economic dominance and bloody plots--politically, AND--very important--practically, with regional development projects--oil/gas pipelines and other infrastructure, regional trade groups, regional finance, and, no doubt military and intelligence cooperation. They all also share the goal of social justice. It will have to be a bloody boot, indeed, that could subdue so many increasingly inter-cooperative countries and governments, and their millions and millions of supporters.

Not that Rumsfeld isn't capable of slaughtering a million people to get their oil. We know that he is. And we know he has multi-billions of dollars, stolen from the American people, stashed away for future global corporate predator projects. But my assessment of things is that, while Rumsfeld and cabal can certainly cause a lot of suffering and turmoil in South America, he and his global predator and local fascist allies will fail. And the reason is democracy.

[aquart]

17. That's because we call it "secession." Right before the civil war starts.

[killbotfactory]

18. It's their natural gas deposits, white conquistadors stole them fair and square

How dare those filthy mud people try and take a share of the profits.

[Judi Lynn]

19. Good information on the situation:Bolivia at a New Crossroads

Bolivia at a New Crossroads
Jeffery R. Webber

The following text is a postscript for the article Transition on Hold. It was written for the Dutch magazine Grenzeloos.

Postscript – December 11, 2007

Since this article was written (in early summer 2007) Bolivian politics has turned most decisively on the process of the Constituent Assembly (CA). Days before the scheduled completion of the CA in mid-August 2007 it was clear to everyone that it was going to be impossible to come up with a new constitution in time. Elite negotiations between MAS officials and the right-wing opposition groups and parties consequently took place and it was decided that the deadline for writing up the new constitution would be extended to December 14, 2007.

Knowing that they could not win by democratic means, however, the right-wing of the media luna departments – Pando, Beni, Santa Cruz, and Tarija (and increasingly the elite of the departments of Chuquisaca and Cochabamba as well) – invented a new reason for which the plenary sessions of the CA would have to be boycotted. The new rallying cry of the right was the necessity of transferring the status of capital city from La Paz to Sucre to overcome the supposed despotic centralism of the latter – today Sucre is the judicial capital of Bolivia, but the executive and legislative branches are in La Paz, making it the effective capital of the country. The private media, imperial forces acting primarily through the US embassy, financial and industrial domestic capitalists, large-landowners, and important sectors of the urban and rural middle classes began to rally around the demand for Sucre as the new capital of Bolivia.

As impressive as this array of alliances might seem on the surface, the vast majority of the Bolivian populace – the indigenous peasantry and working class – strongly denounced the issue of moving the capital as merely a purposeful distraction concocted by the right to steer discussion and contention away from substantive issues – agrarian reform, property rights, the future of the hydrocarbons and mining industries, indigenous territorial rights, etc. – and to provide a pretense for the right to undermine the CA as a whole once again through a boycott.

Violent clashes consequently ensued in the final week of August in Sucre and indigenous constituent deputies – mostly of the MAS – were attacked, threatened, and insulted with racist epithets by white-mestizo thugs – mostly private university students with the backing of bourgeois forces in the eastern lowlands. The CA was suspended due to lack of security in the city and elite negotiations between the sections of the far-right and the government continued.

More:
http://boliviarising.blogspot.com/

[L. Coyote]

20. Part of the NeoCon effort to "liberate" energy resources from state ownership??

WOW< does this ever stink of NeoCons and Big Oil.

[Festivito]

35. Troop movements in Paraguay and calls of US creating wars in SA.

We noticed the troop movements a few years ago. But, a lot of South America has realized or is realizing what our rogue CIA elements have done and are doing.

Might be interesting, or just become another scandal in our scandal fatigue.

[Judi Lynn]

21. An examination of how the major papers cover Latin America with their "Latino" journalists:

December 13, 2007...7:23 pm

~snip~
Without knowing about the details of the 500 years of oppression in Latin America, the reader can never understand that when opposition leaders in Venezuela call for democracy and justice it is a betrayal to both. It is a dual mantra repeated all over Latin America by the elites and represents increasing privatization, expansion of private property, and keeping the rest of the population in abject poverty. And, just like the days of the conquistadors, the only way the elite can obtain these things is through theft and murder.

What does this mean for peoples’ movements in Latin America?

For the first time, in both Venezuela and Bolivia, the people have elected leaders that not only look like them, but think like them. For the first time in 500 years the peoples of Venezuela and Bolivia are calling the shots. No wonder the Venezuelan and US media have engaged in the most debased propaganda to try to destroy Hugo Chavez of Black and Indian descent and Evo Morales, an Indian. No wonder they are caricatured in the press as various animals with emphasis on their fuller than European features. And no wonder their supporters are variously demonized as stupid, violent, guerrillas, and leeches upon society. Having tasted what it is like to run the ship, it is clear that the people are not going to let the Europeans take their sovereignty away from them again. The stakes are high, the stances are intractable, and the battle will be bloody.

And what does this mean for Latino journalists?

Chavez and Morales and their massive numbers of supporters pose the biggest threat to elite domination of Latin America in 500 years. “Bringing down” Chavez and Morales will be the most important assignment that many Latino journalists will have and their rewards are certain to be high. Enough said.

And solidarity activists supportive of peoples’ movements in Latin America?

Over the next several months, everyone involved in issues concerning the sovereignty of Venezuela and Bolivia will be playing tough. Those of us in solidarity with peoples’ movements in Latin America must play tough as well. While there are many fronts on which to do battle. I suggest we start with the Latino journalists who are doing the white man’s bidding.

http://hcvanalysis.wordpress.com/2007/12/13/venezuela-us-latino-journalists-doing-the-white-mans-bidding/

[annabanana]

22. Sounds to me like the international energy cartel is trying to

grab the Juicy Bits of Bolivia before the People can get their hands on it!

[Judi Lynn]

23. More information on the time the Bolivian government started bringing in white South Africans

and Rhodesians to take over the land where Native Bolivians were supposed to be living:

Penny Lernoux reports that 30,000 white Africans are being invited to settle in Eastern Bolivia in lands that had been earmarked for impoverished Indians, while “one-third of the Bolivian work force lives in exile because it lacks land and infrastructure-the very things the government is offering to white Africans.” Some 700,000 Bolivians have left the country because of poverty and repression, she estimates, most of them to Argentina where they work as plantation labor. But, as Dr. Strauss explained to a U.N. Commission, his government’s objective is to construct “a white Bolivia.” A South African delegation meanwhile reported in the Sunday Times of South Africa after a visit to Bolivia that white South Africans, with their “inbred intelligence” and “racial purity,” could easily take over the Bolivian economy, “run by a small minority of white immigrants from Europe who keep the Spaniards and local Indians well and truly in their place.”

Dr. Strauss explained how the South African settlers will be absorbed in this “promised land” after the government developes the infrastructure in areas where they are to be settled, some of which are now occupied by Bolivian Indians. To pursue the question further, Lewis, following Strauss’s suggestion, talked to the director of the Summer Institute of Linguistics (SIL), “the largest group of North American evangelical missionaries working in Bolivia,” a group regarded by every Bolivian he met “as the base for operations of the CIA in Bolivia; possibly in South America itself.” The SIL is perhaps the richest and most powerful of the “North American religious bodies devoted to the spiritual advancement of South America,” Lewis notes, and is supported by the government under the Ministry of Culture and Education. One of its main activities is Bible translation-with a few modifications for local consumption as when the phrase “Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers” becomes “Obey your legal superiors, because God has given them command.”

Lewis then discusses some of the past history of spiritual advancement, for example, the description of a German anthropologist of how missionaries allowed Indians “to die in cold blood, after establishing contact with them,” by holding back medicine, with the following argument: “In any case they won’t allow themselves to be converted. If I baptize them just before they die, they’ll go straight to heaven.”
(snip)

The North American missionaries, he continues, “have become-often officially-the servants of military right-wing dictatorships as that of Bolivia,” which is not above sending in planes or tanks to kill those who show “too spirited a resistance to its authority,” but which generally is more “like a digesting crocodile” in a state of “watchful inactivity.” The Roman Catholic Church, after centuries of complicity in torture and oppression is now attempting to defend the native population, as we describe further below.


More, starting on page #121
"The Washington Connection and Third World Fascism"
The political economy of human right By Noam Chomsky, Edward S. Herman:

http://books.google.com/books?id=lWjLdLahLToC&pg=PA121&lpg=PA121&dq=%22white+bolivia%22&source=web&ots=_PnQ5QnFpb&sig=kHVpPzVJ803XLthVq3d-0LJ8QD8#PPA121,M1

On edit:
You may well want to look through this book. It can be grabbed online from Amazon, used, starting REALLY low!

[Judi Lynn]

24. A useful bit of information from the page immediately preceding the quoted paragraphs

I posted, from the same book:

The text of the Observer article, by Norman Lewis, explains how “the Indians of Bolivia, already exploited by a military dictatorship, willl have to take up more of the white man’s burden if South African and Rhodesians accept an invitation to colonise the country” as Western civilization is driven from some of its historic conquests. Dr. Guido Strauss, Bolivian Under Secretary for Immigration, announced a plan to settle 150,000 whites from the racist regimes of Africa “financed by a 150-million-dollar credit to Bolivia offered by the Federal German Republic,” appropriately enough. He also alleged that “Britain, the U.S., and France between them were ready to put up 2,000 million dollars to indemnify white Rhodesians, ‘who would be unable to resist the process of Africanisation’.”

Looks like there's far more to this than we would have ever learned had not some people taken the time to at least write it down, for chrissakes, well after it happened.

[Judi Lynn]

28. Autonomy calls divide Bolivia's rich and poor

16/12 13:12 CET Autonomy calls divide Bolivia's rich and poor



Thousands of Bolivians have taken to the streets in competing rallies for, and against, their President, thus exposing the deep divisions threatening Latin America's poorest country.

In Santa Cruz, the thought of regional autonomy is exciting the crowds. The eastern province, and three others, hold Bolivia's huge gas fields. Their political leaders want more control over this natural wealth.

But Santa Cruz governor Rueben Costas insisted autonomy didn't mean breaking up the country, and he warned the army to keep away. Similar demonstrations took place in the other gas-rich provinces, Tarija and the Amazon regions of Beni and Pando.

The four make up the eastern half of Bolivia. Their huge gas reserves make them much more affluent than the western highlands, home to the capital La Paz.

More:
http://www.euronews.net/index.php?page=info&article=459751&lng=1

[burrowowl]

31. K&R!

Good info in this thread and the U$ of A Corporatists are hard at work@

[KaptBunnyPants]

32. I wondered what the CIA was up to now.

[Judi Lynn]

34. A little bit of rain for their parade! "Petrobras to invest up to $1 bln in Bolivia"

Petrobras to invest up to $1 bln in Bolivia
Mon Dec 17, 2007 3:30pm EST

By Helen Popper

LA PAZ, Dec 17 (Reuters) - Brazil's state energy firm Petrobras (PETR4.SA: Quote, Profile, Research) (PBR.N: Quote, Profile, Research) announced plans on Monday to invest up to $1 billion in Bolivia to increase natural gas production and look for new reserves of the fuel.

The plan marks a turning point in strained relations between the leftist government of Bolivian President Evo Morales and Petrobras, which criticized Morales' energy nationalization last year and froze planned investments.

The two countries signed a series of energy cooperation deals during a two-day visit by Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva that aimed to secure Brazil's supplies of natural gas and patch up ties with its poorer neighbor.
(snip)

"In the end, Evo Morales and Lula didn't fight like some people wanted us to fight. We didn't become adversaries ... we became comrades," Lula said.

More:
http://www.reuters.com/article/rbssEnergyNews/idUSN1741932120071217?pageNumber=1&virtualBrandChannel=0

[Judi Lynn]

36. What can this mean? South Korea's coming forward: S. Korea to Develop Copper Mine in Bolivia

12-18-2007 19:16

S. Korea to Develop Copper Mine in Bolivia

By Ryu Jin
Staff Reporter



South Korea and Bolivia have agreed to jointly develop a copper mine in the Latin American country, estimated to have at least 15 million tons of the natural resource, according to the government Tuesday.

Officials from the Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Energy said that the deal was made in talks between Vice Minister of Commerce, Industry and Energy Lee Jae-hoon and Bolivian Minister of Mining and Metals Luis Alberto Echazu in Seoul.

Located some 50 kilometers southwest of La Paz, the Corocoro mine would be developed jointly by the Korea Resources Corporation (KORES), South Korea’s state-run resources development firm, and its Bolivian counterpart COMIBOL.

``KORES and COMIBOL signed the contract, under which a local consortium will be set up early next year to form a joint development company,’’ a ministry spokesman said. ``We will also establish a refinery to process copper ore.’’

He added that the project would be a 50-50 joint venture with about $200 million worth of joint investment. South Korea would acquire all products from the mine, which could have up to 100 million tons of natural resources.

More:
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/biz/2007/12/123_15774.html

[Bandit]

37. Another Haiti in the making

The USA signed a mutual defense pact with these South American countries that are Democratic< (as in elected Representatives). This appears to be an overthrow of an officially elected (Democratic) government and a dollar to a doughnut the USA will not only not come to the aid of the official government but aid in it's overthrow..Just as we did to Haiti..

[Blue_Tires]

38. ttt

too late for me to rec, sadly

[donkeyotay]

39. Kick nt

[Judi Lynn]

40. Brazil to invest nearly $1bn in Bolivian energy sector

Brazil to invest nearly $1bn in Bolivian energy sector
Posted : Tue, 18 Dec 2007 12:08:01 GMT

La Paz, Dec 18 - Brazil will invest $1 billion to develop Bolivia's energy sector, Spanish agency, EFE reported.

A energy pact was inked Monday by Brazil's petroleum giant Petrobras and its fledgling Bolivian counterpart, YPFB, during the visit of Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.

Petrobras will invest between $750 million and $1 billion in the development of Bolivia's fossil fuel sector.

Petrobras chief executive officer, Sergio Gabrielli said after the signing ceremony that Bolivia will maintain natural-gas exports to Brazil at the current level of 30 million metric feet per day.
(snip)

Brazil, which has substantial oil reserves and some natural gas, depends heavily on gas from Bolivia to keep factories humming in Sao Paulo state, the industrial heartland of South America's biggest economy.

'When some wanted us to fight, we didn't transform ourselves into adversaries, much less into enemies. We became comrades,' Lula said.

More:
http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/160708.html

[Judi Lynn]

41. US editor learned Bush has been sending our tax dollars to the Bolivian seperatist governors, who

are attempting to leave Bolivia, remove all the wealth, so they won't have to share with the poor indigenous people they loathe. (It was against the law for the indigenous people to walk on the sidewalk before 1952. They had to keep it nice and clean for the European descended elite ruling class.)

Some of these white elitists are living on land given to them by the Bolivian government in the `1970's, which belonged to the Native Bolivians, who had been driven off the land by US-supported coup dicator, Hugo Banzer, who offered money to the white settlers in South Africa to move to Bolivia, in the interest of creating a "white Bolivia."

Here's what the US editor learned:

Dangl used the Freedom of Information Act to obtain declassified documents about U.S. involvement in Bolivia and concluded that the United States has spent $4.5 million since Morales was elected supporting the neoliberal governors, principally through the National Endowment for Democracy. (He noted that the NED was also involved in the 2002 coup against Hugo Chavez, the president of Venezuela.) "That stuff's going on all over the continent," he said.
(snip)

http://www.timesargus.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071216/NEWS02/712160401/1003/NEWS02

[fascisthunter]

43. The Greedy Just Can't Leave South America Alone

I hope someday it all comes and bites them all in the asses. They surely deserve it.