[If participatory democracy is to offer an alternative it must rise to the direst of challenges. In Venezuela, where the 1999 Bolivarian Constitution explicitly aims to create a "democratic, participatory and self-reliant" society, yet over 100,000 people were killed in a decade, this challenge is insecurity.]
Battling Murder in Venezuela's Participatory Republic
May 28th 2009, by George Gabriel - OpenDemocracy.net
Increasingly, the Left's response to representative institutional frameworks - "participatory democracy" - demands a further empowerment of the people, the antidote to an at times suffocating conglomeration of modern elites. This suffocation gave birth to the Venezuelan Caracazo in 1989, where in response to popular protest against the imposition of neo-liberal reforms the security forces massacred Caracas slum dwellers in their homes. If participatory democracy is to offer an alternative it must rise to the direst of challenges. In Venezuela, where the 1999 Bolivarian Constitution explicitly aims to create a "democratic, participatory and self-reliant" society, yet over 100,000 people were killed in a decade, this challenge is insecurity.
Professor Ross Hastings of Ottawa University identifies three determinants of a person's engagement in criminal activity: personal disposition, personal situation, and lack of fear of the justice system. In Venezuela, with poverty halved since 2003, the stand out cause of homicides must be considered the impunity with which they are carried out. Barely 3% of murders result in a sentence. Yonny Campos, Commissioner of the Caracas-wide Metropolitan Police explains, "they commit homicides, 2,3,15,20, and no one denounces them, no one chases them, no one takes action."
(click here to view entire article)
Showing posts with label Armed Forces. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Armed Forces. Show all posts
Tuesday, 2 June 2009
Tuesday, 19 May 2009
Separating Fact from Fiction: An Analysis of Venezuela’s Military Power
[Exercises like those carried out with the Russian navy in November 2008 are good for morale, and also helps mold the Venezuelan military into an authentic regional power, though certainly not a hemispheric security threat, given its still very limited capacity to project its force.]
Separating Fact from Fiction: An Analysis of Venezuela’s Military Power
May 13th 2009, by Alex Sánchez - COHA
Following the recently concluded Summit of the Americas held April 17-19, in Trinidad and Tobago, President Barack Obama claimed that the U.S. defense budget was 600 times greater than that of Venezuela. While it is true that, in conventional warfare, a Venezuelan victory over this country is totally beyond any credulity, the question remains regarding how much relative military strength does Venezuela actually project. Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez is widely acknowledged as having carried out an aggressive policy of military acquisitions in recent years, which has had far-reaching implications particularly through purchasing Russian military equipment. In effect, this arms program made Chávez appear on Washington’s SOUTHCOM security radar screen as well as those of neighboring South American nations, especially Colombia.
Military Overseas’ Providers in the Chávez Era
A key facet of the Russian-Venezuelan military partnership has been Chávez’s continued interest in purchasing state-of-the-art Russian weaponry. This process, which can be traced back to 2006, at the same time marked the beginning of Moscow’s active return to the western hemisphere, as its influence in the region continually has spread through various precise spheres (military cooperation, commerce, trade and cultural relations). Meanwhile, Venezuela significantly has linked itself to Moscow and made Russia its most important military arms-provider in the region. This inevitably has fomented a comparison of the Caracas-Moscow relationship with the Havana-Soviet relationship dating back to the origins of the Cold War, even if such a comparison is not entirely warranted.
(click here to view entire article)
Separating Fact from Fiction: An Analysis of Venezuela’s Military Power
May 13th 2009, by Alex Sánchez - COHA
Following the recently concluded Summit of the Americas held April 17-19, in Trinidad and Tobago, President Barack Obama claimed that the U.S. defense budget was 600 times greater than that of Venezuela. While it is true that, in conventional warfare, a Venezuelan victory over this country is totally beyond any credulity, the question remains regarding how much relative military strength does Venezuela actually project. Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez is widely acknowledged as having carried out an aggressive policy of military acquisitions in recent years, which has had far-reaching implications particularly through purchasing Russian military equipment. In effect, this arms program made Chávez appear on Washington’s SOUTHCOM security radar screen as well as those of neighboring South American nations, especially Colombia.
Military Overseas’ Providers in the Chávez Era
A key facet of the Russian-Venezuelan military partnership has been Chávez’s continued interest in purchasing state-of-the-art Russian weaponry. This process, which can be traced back to 2006, at the same time marked the beginning of Moscow’s active return to the western hemisphere, as its influence in the region continually has spread through various precise spheres (military cooperation, commerce, trade and cultural relations). Meanwhile, Venezuela significantly has linked itself to Moscow and made Russia its most important military arms-provider in the region. This inevitably has fomented a comparison of the Caracas-Moscow relationship with the Havana-Soviet relationship dating back to the origins of the Cold War, even if such a comparison is not entirely warranted.
(click here to view entire article)
Friday, 17 April 2009
Human Rights and Police Reform in Venezuela: A Venezuelan Perspective
[Seeking an experienced, nuanced, and Venezuelan perspective on human rights and insecurity in Venezuela, Venezuelanalysis.com spoke with the Venezuelan human rights organization Red de Apoyo por la Justicia y la Paz (Support Network for Peace and Justice).]
Human Rights and Police Reform in Venezuela: A Venezuelan Perspective
April 3rd 2009, by Pablo Fernández Blanco, Maryluz Guillén, and James Suggett – Venezuelanalysis.com
Recent reports by Human Rights Watch and the U.S. State Department have put the issue of human rights in Venezuela under much international scrutiny. Seeking an experienced, nuanced, and Venezuelan perspective, Venezuelanalysis.com spoke with the Venezuelan human rights organization Red de Apoyo por la Justicia y la Paz (Support Network for Peace and Justice). The Red de Apoyo was founded in 1985 to denounce abuses of power by the police and military and to support its victims. Since then, the non-governmental organization has expanded to include work on a variety of economic, social, cultural, and civil rights. General Coordinator Pablo Fernández Blanco and Coordinator Maryluz Guillén speak about the ways in which the Chávez government has progressed, the areas where there is still much work to be done, the government's attitude toward human rights activists, the situation before Chávez was elected, and the potential impact on human rights of the February 15th referendum, in which voters approved an amendment to abolish term limits on elected offices.
(click here to view interview)
Human Rights and Police Reform in Venezuela: A Venezuelan Perspective
April 3rd 2009, by Pablo Fernández Blanco, Maryluz Guillén, and James Suggett – Venezuelanalysis.com
Recent reports by Human Rights Watch and the U.S. State Department have put the issue of human rights in Venezuela under much international scrutiny. Seeking an experienced, nuanced, and Venezuelan perspective, Venezuelanalysis.com spoke with the Venezuelan human rights organization Red de Apoyo por la Justicia y la Paz (Support Network for Peace and Justice). The Red de Apoyo was founded in 1985 to denounce abuses of power by the police and military and to support its victims. Since then, the non-governmental organization has expanded to include work on a variety of economic, social, cultural, and civil rights. General Coordinator Pablo Fernández Blanco and Coordinator Maryluz Guillén speak about the ways in which the Chávez government has progressed, the areas where there is still much work to be done, the government's attitude toward human rights activists, the situation before Chávez was elected, and the potential impact on human rights of the February 15th referendum, in which voters approved an amendment to abolish term limits on elected offices.
(click here to view interview)
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