Thursday 25 September
2008, San José, Costa
Rica
BOLIVIA:
Morales Cites "Evidence"
of U.S. Meddling
By Haider Rizvi
UNITED NATIONS (IPS)
- Bolivian President Evo
Morales reiterated the
charge Tuesday that the
U.S. government was
plotting to overthrow
his government and that
Washington had a hand in
the recent episodes of
violence in which a
number of his supporters
were killed and wounded
by opposition gangs.
"We have the evidence,"
Morales told a news
conference on the
sidelines of the United
Nations General Assembly
in New York Tuesday,
regarding U.S.
involvement with the
groups and individuals
in certain provinces who
are refusing to
recognise the authority
of the federal
government in La Paz and
are trying to assert
their economic and
political dominance over
indigenous populations
by violent means.
The Bolivian president
charged that the George
W. Bush administration
has not only given away
a "tremendous amount of
money" to the opposition
groups through the U.S.
Agency for International
Development (USAID), but
also provided them with
ammunition to carry out
acts of sabotage and
killings of unarmed
indigenous people.
Despite its formal
denial of these charges,
the U.S. government has
not issued any statement
condemning the killings,
looting and acts of
sabotage that have cost
millions of dollars in
losses.
"They are setting fire
to gas pipelines, and
the U.S. government does
not condemn that?" asked
Morales. "Of course,
they know they [the
opposition groups] are
their allies. So why
then they would denounce
them?"
Last week, Bolivia's
right-wing vigilantes
launched several attacks
on indigenous
communities that support
the government. They
killed about 20 Morales
supporters, most of whom
were poor farmers.
Soon after the attacks,
Morales declared the
U.S. ambassador Philip
Goldberg "persona non
grata" and asked him to
leave the country within
three days. He was
accused of aiding the
Bolivian opposition
groups, a charge the
U.S. State Department
denied.
Explaining the decision
to cut diplomatic ties
with Washington, the
Bolivian president said
that the U.S. ambassador
was deeply involved in
activities aimed at
strengthening the
opposition and weakening
the government.
"[President] Bush sent
me a message [saying] if
I am not friend, I am an
enemy," said Morales,
who added, "I'm a friend
of the people of the
United States. I am in
touch with many groups
who believe in social
justice."
Addressing the morning
session of the General
Assembly debate, Bush --
who used the terms
"terror" and "terrorism"
some 30 times in his
15-minute speech -- did
not mention Latin
America, where many
countries are
increasingly challenging
Washington's influence
in the region.
Venezuela also expelled
its U.S. envoy earlier
this month, claiming
that the U.S. was
attempting to depose
President Hugo Chavez,
leading many critics of
the Bush administration
to question the
direction of U.S. policy
in Latin America.
They specifically called
for Bush to clarify U.S.
activities and funding
in Bolivia.
On Sep. 19, 90 leading
academics and foreign
policy experts signed an
open letter expressing
their "deep concern"
over the opposition-led
violence in Bolivia.
The U.S. government
needs to "turn a new
page" in its relations
with Latin America, they
said in the letter
addressed to U.S.
Secretary of State
Condoleezza Rice,
presidential hopefuls
Barack Obama and John
McCain, as well as other
top U.S. officials.
The letter's signers,
who represent dozens of
leading U.S. academic
institutions --
including New York
University, the
University of Maryland,
and Johns Hopkins
University -- as well as
think tanks, said they
were "especially
concerned" about the
U.S. backing for groups
in Bolivia who are using
violent means to oppose
the popularly elected
government.
Morales, the first-ever
indigenous president of
Bolivia, wants to
implement an agenda on
economic and social
development, which many
believe would help
improve the lives of
indigenous people, who
make up the country's
majority yet have
suffered from extreme
poverty for a long time.
During his General
Assembly speech, Morales
said his people's
struggle for "equality
and social justice" is
meant to retain their
dignity. "It's a fight
between capitalism and
socialism. Capitalism is
the worst enemy of
humanity," he said.
The letter cites
numerous incidents of
violence over the past
several months organised
by the opposition in
five of the country's
departments (provinces)
run by non-native
governors who are
fiercely opposed to
Morales's plan to
introduce reforms.
In one incident in May,
according to published
reports, opposition
extremists in Sucre
forcibly paraded
indigenous mayors and
town councillors,
partially stripped
naked, in front of
crowds in the centre of
the town.
"They stripped them of
clothing, and forced
them to chant
anti-Morales slogans
while berating them with
racist taunts," the
letter said about the
incident, which was
strongly condemned by
the Inter-American
Commission on Human
Rights.
The opposition-led areas
hold a disproportionate
share of Bolivia's
natural gas resources.
Morales's government
argues that it has the
right to share the
profits of those
resources among the
country's various
regions and ethnic
groups, while local
officials would like to
maintain financial
control.
The opposition stopped
its attacks on farmers
after receiving a strong
snub from South American
leaders who met in Chile
last week to discuss the
Bolivian situation. In a
statement, they deplored
the opposition's
behaviour and urged
talks between the two
sides.
Talks began on Sep. 18,
but reports from the
region suggest the
situation remains tense
in the
opposition-dominated
areas.
Since Morales's election
in December 2005,
Washington has sent
millions of dollars in
aid to departmental and
municipal governments in
Bolivia, but some
agencies have failed to
disclose who they
provided money to, and
for what purposes. USAID
opened an "Office of
Transition Initiatives"
(OTI) in Bolivia in
2004, which provided
some 11 million dollars
in funds to "build on
its activities designed
to enhance the capacity
of departmental
governments," the letter
said.
In its 2006 report, the
OTI said it sought to
"[build] the capacity of
prefect-led departmental
governments to help them
better respond to the
constituencies they
govern," and even
brought departmental
prefects to the United
States to meet with
state governors.
Signers claim that some
of the same provincial
governments later
launched organised
campaigns to push for
"autonomy" and to oppose
through violent and
undemocratic means the
Morales government and
its political platform.
According to OTI, it
ceased its operations in
Bolivia about a year
ago. However, some of
its activities were then
taken up by USAID, which
refuses to disclose some
of the recipients and
programmes that
benefited from the 89
million dollars the
agency spent in Bolivia
last year. This is a
significant amount
relative to the size of
Bolivia's economy, say
the Latin America
experts, noting that in
the U.S. economy it
would be equivalent to
about 100 billion
dollars.
"U.S. taxpayers, as well
as the Bolivian
government and people,
have a right to know
what U.S. funds are
supporting in Bolivia,"
they said in the letter.
Morales won renewed
nationwide support
earlier this year
through an Aug. 10
referendum where more
than 67 percent of the
nation's people
supported the
continuation of his term
in office.
At the news conference,
Morales thanked the
regional alliance of
South American countries
UNASUR for exerting
pressure on extremist
groups in Bolivia to
stop the killings and
violence. "It shows that
in Latin America, the
U.S. policy has been
defeated," he said.
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