Thursday 11 September
2008, San José, Costa Rica
BOLIVIA:
U.S. Ambassador Expelled
for Allegedly Supporting
Violent Opposition
By Franz Chávez
LA PAZ (IPS) -
Bolivian President Evo
Morales has declared
U.S. Ambassador to La
Paz Philip Goldberg
"persona non grata",
after accusing him of
aiding and abetting
pro-autonomy opposition
groups that are blocking
highways and occupying
government buildings,
reducing the supply of
natural gas to Brazil.
"I am not afraid of
anyone, not even the
empire (the United
States)," Morales said
Wednesday afternoon at
the presidential palace
when he instructed
Foreign Minister David
Choquehuanca to inform
the U.S. ambassador in
writing that he was no
longer welcome in the
country.
"It is unprecedented for
a head of state to
announce a declaration
of "persona non grata,"
although this must be
looked at within the
context of the
deteriorated diplomatic
relations," former
Foreign Minister Armando
Loaiza told IPS.
Over the past year, the
leftwing Morales
administration has
accused the U.S. embassy
in Bolivia of offering
its backing to
departmental
(provincial) governments
in Santa Cruz, Beni,
Pando, Tarija and
Chuquisaca in their
crusade for radical
autonomy.
Loaiza said that
Washington may retaliate
by expelling the
Bolivian ambassador,
Gustavo Guzmán,
precipitating a crisis
in the already difficult
relations between the
two countries.
Washington has been
critical of Bolivia's
foreign policy alignment
with Cuba and Venezuela,
and its recent overtures
to Iran, as well as the
longstanding issue of
coca leaf cultivation
for traditional and
medicinal uses.
The decision to expel
Goldberg came after
major confrontations,
such as the Bolivian
Foreign Ministry's
report that the U.S.
ambassador had held a
private meeting on Aug.
25 with the rightwing
governor of Santa Cruz,
President Morales' main
political opponent.
The following day,
Ambassador Goldberg was
summoned to the Foreign
Ministry and asked for
an explanation. Minister
Choquehuanca also asked
Goldberg to be cautious
in his contacts with
opposition governors.
Goldberg later paid a
courtesy visit to the
opposition governor of
Chuquisaca, Savina
Cuellar, on Sept. 4,
further fuelling the
government's annoyance.
"We do not want
separatist or divisive
people, who want Bolivia
to break apart. We do
not want people who are
conspiring against
democracy," said
President Morales, while
in the eastern and
southern departments,
respectively, of Santa
Cruz and Tarija, acts of
violence by radical
rightwing youth groups
continued, encouraged by
pro-business Civic
Committees and
opposition governors.
Senator Félix Rojas of
the governing Movement
Towards Socialism (MAS)
said President Morales'
action was based on the
Bolivian constitution,
which proclaims the
principle of
self-determination.
Goldberg, who presented
his credentials in La
Paz on Oct. 13, 2006,
has an interesting
diplomatic record. He
was head of mission
(2004-2006) in Kosovo,
formerly a province of
Serbia until its local
government, supported by
the ethnic Albanian
majority of the
population, declared
independence in February
2008.
The government argues
that he may have had
contact with Bolivian
separatist movements in
the natural gas-rich
"eastern crescent" of
the country, which are
encouraged and backed by
conservative groups.
According to opposition
lawmaker Fernando
Messmer of the rightwing
Social and Democratic
Power (Podemos) party,
the government's
attitude is "radical and
reckless."
An immediate effect on
trade with the United
States is that it will
be hard to negotiate a
new enlargement of a
trade agreement that
would allow market
access for exports of
250 million dollars a
year of manufactured
goods, said congressman
Michiaki Nagatani of the
rightwing Revolutionary
Nationalist Movement.
"The government should
think twice" before
taking such measures,
Nagatani said.
The move by President
Morales came the day
after severe incidents
of social unrest were
provoked by Civic
Committees in the city
of Santa Cruz. Several
public buildings were
occupied and looted, and
executives working for
the state oil company
YPFB confirmed that an
explosion had occurred
at a pipeline that
transports natural gas
to Brazil.
At 5:00 a.m. (09:00 GMT)
on Wednesday the
pipeline was sabotaged
at kilometre 51, between
the gas fields of San
Alberto and San Antonio,
in the southern province
of Tarija, an area
containing two-thirds of
Bolivia's gas wealth.
Santos Ramírez, the head
of YPFB, announced that
the explosion caused
losses of 100 million
dollars, and reduced the
26 million cubic metres
a day of gas that
Bolivia exports to
Brazil, its main market,
by three million cubic
metres.
Ramírez said putting out
the fire in the gas
pipeline and repairing
it would take about 20
days.
In the city of Tarija,
the capital of the
department of the same
name, pro-autonomy
activists attempted to
occupy a large market
belonging to small
farmers in the region
who provide food for the
city's 180,000 people.
Inocencio Almanza, the
head of the Association
of Town Councils in
Cercado, a town in
Tarija, told IPS that
groups of radical
rightwing students, with
the support of Governor
Mario Cossio, attacked
the food market where
some 5,000 farmers sell
their produce.
Over the course of the
day, small farmers
supporting the
government resisted the
violent attacks of these
groups, and the police
were only able to make
the two sides disperse
by using tear gas.
In the town of
Villamontes, also in
Tarija, rightwing
protesters beat and
disarmed army troops,
and went on to take over
the gas field of Vuelta
Grande and the gas
processing plant there.
The president’s chief of
staff, Juan Ramón
Quintana, reiterated his
statement that a
civilian coup by
opposition governors is
in progress.
He accused Civic
Committees and the five
opposition governors of
blocking roads and
ordering the takeover of
gas fields. The
authorities have ordered
reinforcements for the
troops guarding YPFB
installations and those
of private oil companies
operating in the
country.
In the city of Santa
Cruz, members of the
rightwing Santa Cruz
Youth Union (UCJ)
continued to occupy
public offices for the
second consecutive day,
and at nightfall they
took control of the bus
and rail terminals,
overwhelming the police
on guard who fled before
the demonstrators’
violent onslaught.
Several times on
Wednesday, the violent
youth groups swarmed a
low-income market called
Barrio Lindo, where
indigenous people from
the western Bolivian
regions of La Paz, Oruro
and Potosí sell clothes
and food |
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