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Colombia authorizes extradition of former senator to US
Colombian President Alvaro Uribe authorized the extradition of former Senator Samuel Lopesierra to the United States, the president's office said Tuesday.
Samuel Lopesierra, a former senator of the northern state of LaGuajira, will face drug trafficking charges in the United States.
Lopesierra was captured in October and indicted in Washington. He was accused of sending cocaine to the United States and having ties with illegal paramilitary groups.
The US and Colombian authorities had seized more than 25 tons of cocaine from the drug smuggling group, allegedly headed by
Lopesierra.
Lopesierra will be sent to the United States within a week.
Venezuelan president agrees on possibility of referendum
Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez said Tuesday it was possible to hold a referendum on his tenure as demanded by the opposition, and called it a right granted by the Venezuelan Constitution.
But, he said, it must be a process which has a continuity.
He stressed that the 3.2 million signatures, demanding a referendum to oust him, collected in February by the opposition were not valid.
He urged his opponents to collect signatures again and present them before the National Electoral Council, and let the top electoral authority check them and make a decision on the matter.
He was satisfied with the resumption of rule and peace in the country, which favored the development of the nation, and described it as the first step toward an agreement signed between the his government and the opposition.
He expressed thanks to a six-nation "Friends Group", comprising Brazil, the United States, Chile, Mexico, Spain and Portugal, for its intervention in the signing of the accord to end the political conflict ravaging the country.
He said the opposition attempted to take power by force, first through a coup, then assassination, later by pressing the president to resign, and finally by resorting to a referendum after a two-months general strike.
The referendum was the third attempt by Chavez's opponents to oust him after a failed coup in 2002 and a general strike earlier this year, which crippled the oil industry of the world's fifth oil exporter.
Under the Venezuelan Constitution, the signatures of at least 20 percent of registered voters, about 2.4 million, are required to initiate a referendum on a president's rule. And the vote can be held halfway through a president's six-year term, after Aug. 19,2003, in Chavez's case.
Venezuela has suffered almost two years of violent political turmoil. Its economy has been gripped by recession with an unemployment rate of 20 percent, government figures showed.
Report warns of increased poverty in Venezuela
Venezuelan people will suffer from deteriorating poverty in 2003, according to a report by the EU Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean
(CEPAL).
The report, quoted Tuesday by the local daily El Nacional, blamed the worsening poverty on a fall in Venezuela's local production this year.
The CEPAL predicted in a report earlier this month that Venezuela's gross domestic product (GDP) would contract by 13 percent this year, the worst in Latin America.
The new CEPAL report showed that in 2002, poverty affected 48 percent of Venezuelans, with 20 percent of the population living in a "state of misery."
In 2002, 21 percent of Venezuelan people said they could not meet their basic needs for food, while in the 1990s, only 11 percent of people were in this condition, the report said.
As for other Latin American countries, the CEPAL report said that in 2002, 11 percent of Peruvians could not meet their basic needs for food.The same index for Chile stood at 4 percent.
Chile Lower House approves FTA with South Korea
The Chilean Lower House approved on Tuesday the Chile-South Korea free trade agreement (FTA), which provides for tariff reductions in trade between the two countries.
The FTA, signed on Feb. 15, is expected to be ratified by the Chilean Senate before the year ends.
According to Chile's Foreign Minister Soledad Alvear, the agreement "opens new opportunities for Chile, and in this sense, we thank the Lower House for its clear support."
He also said it is impossible for South Korea to apply restrictions on Chilean agricultural products once the agreement comes into effect.
However, South Korea expressed its concerns about the possible negative consequences produced by the FTA. On July 12, it announced an amendment to be presented before its national assembly, in an effort to protect its agriculture by applying special tariffs.
South Korea is Chile's ninth most important trading partner. In2002. Chile's exports to East Asia amounted to 715.4 million US dollars and they mainly included copper, cellulose, iron, wood and zinc.
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