----- Original Message ----- From: Walter Lippmann <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: Change Links <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; IRL32-ACTION list <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; CubaNews <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Sunday, October 29, 2000 10:32 PM Subject: [CubaNews] Fidel in Venezuela - Four Articles October 28, 2000 Cuba's Castro Exhorts Venezuela Farmers to Revolution By REUTERS Filed at 4:16 p.m. ET BARINAS, Venezuela (Reuters) - Cuban leader Fidel Castro exhorted Venezuelan peasants on Saturday to take an active role in the ``revolution'' being led by his fellow leftist radical, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez. On the third day of a five-day state visit to the South American oil exporting country, during which he hopes to sign a deal for cheap oil, Castro visited the Chavez family home in the southwestern state of Barinas. Sporting his trademark khaki battle fatigues and cap, Castro accompanied Chavez, who wore a camouflaged paratrooper outfit, invoking farming communities to organize themselves and depend less on the hugely popular failed coup leader. ``Chavez can't be mayor of the whole of Venezuela,'' he told a street meeting in Sabaneta. ``You don't know the infinite number of things that the Bolivarian revolution has to do, because it has to do in a few years what was overlooked for more than 50 years,'' he said, referring to the revolutionary movement backed by Chavez, named after Venezuela's 19th century independence hero Simon Bolivar. The two leftist Latin American radicals professed their profound admiration for each other's version of the ''revolution'', denouncing the U.S. embargo of the Communist island and calling for a new Latin American power block. They are planning to sign an oil deal on Monday which allows energy-starved Cuba to finance a quarter of its $1 billion annual oil import bill with soft Venezuelan government loans. They will also sign a wide-ranging economic cooperation agreement to bring Cuban expertise in medicine and agriculture to the South American country. ``We are diagnosing, locating and detailing the areas where the integral agreement to be signed on Monday will be concentrated, and one of those areas is support for the agricultural sector,'' Chavez told reporters at the Barinas airstrip in his home state, where his father is governor. Amid heavy security, Castro was greeted by a small group of government-sanctioned flag-wavers who also chanted support for the Marxist leader. ``Fidel, friend, Barinas is with you,'' they said. OPPOSITION PROTEST Opposition politicians protested against Castro's visit, and boycotted a speech he gave to Congress on Friday night because of what they call a lack of democracy and human rights violations on the Communist island. Following a visit to Chavez's birthplace, the two leaders were due to travel north to the western city of Barquisimeto for a Cuba-Venezuela baseball match on Saturday night. Chavez professes a close friendship for Castro, who gave him a hero's welcome in Cuba after the failed 1992 coup, for which Chavez served two years in jail. Castro told Venezuela's Congress on Friday that Chavez was the only man who could reverse the social injustices in the South American nation of 24 million, by increasing funding for education and health care. Diplomatic analysts expect the visit to bolster Castro's international standing and aid Chavez's apparent ambition to become a spokesman for Latin America. But they warned that Venezuela risks alienating the United States, its largest oil market, by defying the U.S. trade embargo of Cuba. Under the terms of the proposed oil deal, Venezuela will supply around 100,000 barrels a day directly to Cuba, circumventing the third parties which now route the oil to the island. The sales, currently worth $1 billion annually, will receive up to 25-percent financing from the Venezuelan state and can be repaid in kind with goods or services such as health care and education. After 20 months in office, Chavez remains overwhelmingly popular. But Castro's visit has split Venezuelan public opinion, with opposition-controlled media and some politicians condemning what they say is a lack of democracy and civil rights in Cuba. October 29, 2000 Chavez Pitches Balls To Castro By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Filed at 2:51 p.m. ET BARQUISIMETO, Venezuela (AP) -- In a diamond showdown between heads of state, the veteran from Havana worked a walk off the kid from Venezuela. Cuban leader Fidel Castro, in sneakers, a blue batting helmet and his usual military fatigues, took time off from a national tour that included the signing of a big oil-export contract to step in at bat against his host, President Hugo Chavez. Chavez started at first base and went 0-for-3 as Cuba scored a 17-6 exhibition victory over the home team. Afterward, the 46-year-old left-hander insisted on pitching to the 74-year-old Castro, a pretty good pitcher himself in his day. Castro took a couple of practice swings with an aluminum bat, then stood in as Chavez's first pitch bounced near the plate. Ball one. Castro swung and missed Chavez's second toss, then tried to bunt. Soon he faced a full count. Chavez stared down his opponent before unleashing his final pitch: dead center, called strike three by the umpire. Not for Castro. Declaring the pitch a ball, he walked, bat in hand, to first base. Nobody argued. ``Hugo is a good pitcher, but today wasn't his day,'' Castro joked. ``He couldn't do it against an old man who's almost twice his age.'' The game began more than an hour behind schedule and ended at 12:30 a.m., capping an arduous day that included a tour by Castro and Chavez of the western states of Barinas, Portugesa and Lara. Mindful of their rushed itinerary, Chavez had interrupted Castro Saturday as the Cuban president grilled farmers about their work in the southwestern rural town of Guanare. ``Mr. President,'' Chavez broke in. ``Sit down, because you have to play tonight.'' Venezuela's state television channel billed the game as ``The Rematch'' -- a reference to Cuba's 5-4 win in an exhibition game last year in Havana. In that encounter, Castro slowly substituted Cuba's Pan American Games baseball champions in the place of old-timers. On Saturday night, Chavez exchanged his own red beret and combat fatigues for a pinstriped Venezuelan uniform before jogging to first base. As baton-twirling cheerleaders and a band strode through the outfield, Castro wished his opponents well. ``I would like it if you won,'' he diplomatically told the stadium crowd October 29, 2000 Castro Appears On Radio Talk Show By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Filed at 1:45 p.m. ET VALENCIA, Venezuela (AP) -- Fidel Castro appeared on President Hugo Chavez's radio talk show Sunday, praising Chavez's efforts to change Venezuelan society and joining his host in a sing-along to a popular ballad. Decidedly off-key, the two leaders sang the chorus of ``Venezuela'' at the end of a four-hour program that was at turns jocular and studious, mournful and combative. It was a demonstrative show of the close friendship between the 74-year-old Cuban president and the 46-year-old Chavez. ``I have confidence in you,'' Castro told Chavez. ``At this moment, in this country, you have no substitute.'' Castro has been on a visit to Venezuela since Friday. He and Chavez were to sign an oil assistance pact Monday before he returns home. ``Hello President,'' Chavez's weekly call-in show, became ``Hello Presidents'' Sunday in a studio broadcast to Cuba and Venezuela from a place dear to both leaders: the Carabobo Battlefield where South American liberator Simon Bolivar defeated the Spanish colonial army in 1821. Fielding calls from Cuba and Venezuela, the two leaders denounced the Spanish colonialism of the past and a present-day economic colonialism they attribute to a ``unipolar'' economic order dominated by the United States. They demanded that Latin Americans work together to confront that order. ``The only way we can fight neoliberalism ... is to unite,'' declared the garrulous Chavez, who dominated much of the show. As an army paratrooper, Chavez led a failed 1992 coup here and was imprisoned for two years. Elected president in 1998, he has deepened ties with Cuba and overhauled political institutions in this oil-rich but poverty-stricken nation of 24 million people. His leftist coalition eliminated the old Congress and Supreme Court and dealt heavy blows to the two traditional political parties that ruled Venezuela for 40 years. Castro repeatedly has suggested during his five-day visit that his days as a Marxist revolutionary may be coming to an end, and he has all but anointed the leftist Chavez as a successor to lead a ``social revolution'' in Latin America. ``Cuba's history is Venezuela's history,'' Castro said of Cuba's fight for independence from Spain, and its struggle against the U.S. economic embargo. Chavez, in turn, compared his ``Bolivarian revolution'' to Castro's own 1959 revolution. Chavez fielded a plea for help from a Venezuelan caller who said he couldn't pay for his mother-in-law's medical bills because she didn't have social security. Worker complaints that Venezuela's government owes them billions of dollars in pensions constitute one of Chavez's biggest challenges. Chavez denounced corruption in past governments for a debt to workers he said surpasses Venezuela's $21 billion foreign debt. ``They robbed (the workers),'' he said, insisting his government would honor that debt. ``This is the first government with ethics.'' Chavez and Castro joked about Cuba's 17-6 trouncing of Venezuela in a friendly baseball game Saturday. They also engaged in a studious discussion of Latin American history and the struggles of Bolivar and Cuba's Jose Marti against the Spanish. Outside, at the sun-splashed battleground, more than 2,000 people lined up at a tent where government agencies offered help ranging from issuing identification cards to dispensing health information and legal advice. The scene is played out every Sunday in Caracas, the capital, while Chavez hosts his show. ``I feel closer to this president,'' said Merly Escobar, 21, who was looking for help for her sick mother. ``I have faith in him.'' October 28, 2000 Castro Visits Chavez's Hometown By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Filed at 6:19 p.m. ET SABANETA, Venezuela (AP) -- With a vast country to show off, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez could have taken Fidel Castro to the world's highest waterfall, impressive colonial forts or stunning coral reefs. Instead, Chavez took the Cuban leader Saturday to his hometown of Sabaneta in western Venezuela's cowboy country -- the ``llanos,'' or plains. ``And well he should,'' said Fernando la Riva, adjusting a felt cowboy hat at a culture festival in nearby Guanare. ``He needs to show Fidel some real Venezuelans.'' Elected in 1998, the leftist Chavez has deepened ties with Cuba, and his close friendship with Castro has made the United States uneasy. Surrounded by a crush of admirers, the two visited the tiny blue-and-white concrete home where Chavez was born, then walked to Sabaneta's plaza, where Castro was presented the keys to the city on a stand draped with a banner portraying Cuban revolutionary hero Ernesto ``Che'' Guevara. ``Just like people go to Caracas to visit the house of Bolivar, one day people will come to visit Sabaneta, where Chavez was born,'' Castro told about 3,000 cheering residents. Plainsmen were the backbone of the army of Simon Bolivar, who led the 19th-century battle for South American independence from Spain. Castro called the town ``the cradle of the Bolivarian revolution,'' a phrase Chavez has used for his radical changes for Venezuela's government. ``The social and economic revolution has just begun!'' proclaimed Chavez, vowing to address the needs of the poor in a town with a grain elevator and streets lined with feed and fertilizer stores. Chavez and Castro started the day in nearby Barinas visiting Chavez's father, a retired teacher who was elected governor of Barinas state in 1998. Later they flew to the northern city of Barquisimeto for a forum with students and a night baseball game between Cuba and Venezuela. Castro, on a five-day visit to sign a petroleum assistance pact with oil-producing Venezuela, praised Chavez Friday as a leader in the tradition of his own revolution and urged Venezuelans to protect him. ``There is no doubt that his enemies here and abroad will try to eliminate him,'' Castro said in a speech to Congress that was boycotted by lawmakers who oppose Chavez. Castro, 74, suggested that his own days as a revolutionary are coming to an end, but that the 46-year-old Chavez's are just beginning. ``I have realized a large part of my dreams'' since seizing power in 1959, Castro said. ``I am not like Chavez -- a young leader, full of life, who has ahead of him great work to accomplish. He must be careful.'' Born in Sabaneta, Chavez grew up poor, dreaming of pro baseball. After graduating from Venezuela's Military Academy in 1975, he spent years building an underground organization inside the army to oppose military corruption. As commander of an elite paratrooper unit, he staged a failed coup in 1992 and was imprisoned for two years. As president, he has overhauled political institutions in this nation of 24 million people. His leftist coalition eliminated the old Congress and Supreme Court and dealt heavy blows to the two traditional political parties that ruled Venezuela for 40 years. To the poor majority that provides much of his support, Chavez's fiery rhetoric promising an end to social injustice has been an antidote to despair. To his critics, Chavez's revolution has amounted to an assault on the democratic balance of power. In Sabaneta, a town of 40,000 about 270 miles southwest of Caracas, some people drive Chevy pickups, ride horses and wear finely woven white felt hats. Ranchers used to drive their cattle across the plains to market. Today, much of the land is planted with sugar cane and corn. But it still has a wild feel. Capybaras -- the world's largest rodent at 3 feet in length -- are not uncommon, nor are frontier traditions such as dances and ballads played on ``cuatro'' guitars and 36-string, hollow-based harps. ``We have a lot of culture to be proud of here,'' said Carlos Garcia Aguilar, 50, a former bank manager. ``And we have souls as big as the savannah.'' -------------------------- eGroups Sponsor -------------------------~-~> eLerts It's Easy. It's Fun. 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