At the Jose Marti International Airport, leader of the Shepherds for Peace Movement Lucious Walker said the embargo imposed by Washington on Havana was immoral and illegal.

Walker arrived in Havana accompanied by 120 members of the caravan, coming from the United States, Denmark, Germany, Great Britain, Netherlands, Canada and Mexico, who are part of the project that rejects the anti-Cuban embargo.

The caravan members visited 127 US cities and three in Canada, where they collected 126 tons of humanitarian assistance for Cuba, without the approval of the US Treasury Department. The cargo is to arrive in Cuba within the coming days and is made by 12 buses, medicine, medical equipment, computers, bicycles, school and office supplies, auto parts and books.

Officials of the US Treasury Department notified the volunteers that when returning to the United States they could be fined with up to 65,000 dollars for violating the embargo laws.

This caravan, organized by the Shepherds for Peace Movement, began in 1992. Since then, the caravan has transported some 2,350 tons of humanitarian relief to the Caribbean country, despite the attempts of the US authorities to confiscate the cargo and vehicles and prevent their movement by force and threats of judicial sanctions.
 

Ancom summit to open in Ecuador
Leaders of the Andean Community (Ancom) countries will open a five-day summit Tuesday in Quito, capital of Ecuador, to discuss the future negotiations on an association agreement with the European Union (EU).

Ancom Secretary General Allan Wagner told the press Saturday that at the summit, the leaders of the bloc members -- Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and Venezuela -- will approve the process of the negotiations with the EU.

The negotiations between Ancom and the EU will start in the second half of the year, Wagner said after arriving in Quito on Friday.

He noted the association agreement with the EU will be based on three pillars: political dialogue, cooperation and free trade.

During the meeting, a political declaration will be issued to mark the creation of a regional peace zone, organizers said.

"The leaders have plans to lay a foundation for a common security policy and an Andean peace zone," Wagner said.

The peace zone would bring cooperative security in this region, and reduce arms expenditure, which could be saved for social programs, he said.

Wagner said the summit aims at expediting the Ancom trade integration into the international community.

Old problems that have hampered regional development, like poverty, political instability, heavy foreign debts, corruption, terrorism and drug trafficking, will also be discussed at the meeting.

After the meeting, Peru will take over the one-year Andean presidency from Ecuador.
 

Art sales thrive in turbulent Venezuela
The economy here shrank sharply for two years, the country's president keeps Venezuelans in a state of constant agitation, and businesses struggle to remain open.

But at the sleek new Ascaso Art Gallery, with its four spacious floors, hundreds of art buyers sipped wine and nibbled on hors d'oeuvres as they studied the works of such famed Venezuelan artists as Alirio Palacios and Carmelo Nino.

And they did more than just look during a recent art show. They bought, even though some of the sculptures and paintings sold for tens of thousands of dollars -- high prices in an economically unstable country whose president is facing a recall referendum in August that augurs more economic turmoil.

"When you have money, buying art is like putting money in the bank," said Vicente Espino, a retired textile factory owner, moments after studying the richly textured paintings of peppers and fruits by Jose Antonio Davila. "Venezuela is a country of miracles, and one is its artists. There's not just one, but many, many good ones."

Juan Korody, 26, a lawyer, added as he eyed a $20,000 engraving by Palacios: "A lot of people do not buy because they like art. They buy because it's a good investment."

Caracas has been long admired across Latin America for its rich museum collections and trendsetting artists. Art stores thrive in Caracas' malls and affluent districts.

Art festivals attract hordes of buyers. Large, museum like galleries are popping up, like a vast gallery under construction here by Alejandro Freites, Venezuela's best-known art dealer, to house the works of some of the country's marquee names.

Artists like Palacios, 65, who creates elaborate, 8-foot-high engravings of horses and paints with natural pigments made from plants that grow on his hacienda. He says he is busier than ever.

Turning to look over at a large, colorful depiction of a horse, propped against a table in his studio, Palacios said: "This work may cost $20,000, but they will buy it. They may buy it with bolivars, but they'll buy it."

Wearing a paint-spattered smock and sipping a strong Venezuelan coffee, Palacios explained that art sales are as brisk as he could recall. "It really has been extraordinary."

The trend has come even as President Hugo Chavez, a firebrand populist, embarked on a political revolution aimed at purging the elites from government and remaking Venezuelan society.

The art world has not been spared the country's political and social convulsions. Chavez's cultural revolution refocused the cultural emphasis from fine arts toward crafts, leading to an artistic upheaval that cost museum directors their jobs and prompted prominent artists to square off into opposing camps, some supportive of the country's determined opposition, others siding with the president's left-wing government.

Following a failed strike aimed at uprooting him from power, Chavez last year slashed the value of the bolivar to close a growing fiscal deficit and put in place strict exchange controls to stop capital flight.

Coupled with high inflation and a budding market in black market dollars, the new economic realities have prompted those with cash to purchase everything from luxury cars to apartments to high-priced art to protect their money from devaluation.

"The best investment in the world is art," said Martha Baluzzo, an economist and art dealer at the Ascaso gallery. "It may take longer than other things to sell, maybe five years," she said, "but you take this painting, which cost $20,000, and it could sell for $60,000."