AFP (with additional material by Reuters). 8 January 2002. Press highly critical of Venezuela's Chavez after move to sway daily; US concerned by attempts to intimidate Venezuelan opposition, press.
CARACAS -- Venezuelan media declared a "state of alert" Tuesday, citing interference with press freedom by President Hugo Chavez, a day after a group of his supporters surrounded a newspaper office for four hours. Venezuela's Press Association issued the alert after some 200 Chavez sympathizers launched an aggressive protest late Monday outside the headquarters of the El Nacional daily, a vocal critic of Chavez's regime. The protest outside the newspaper's headquarters by demonstrators claiming it was telling lies "is without precedent in Venezuela's democratic era," said Press Association vice president Andres de Armas. The media group said it would denounce the protest, which police eventually broke up with the use of tear gas, to the Organization of American States, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, and international media. Press editorials and headlines Tuesday described the demonstration as "fascist," saying it pushed Chavez's Venezuela closer to a break with democracy. In a scathing editorial entitled ``Dictator Without a Mask,'' the daily El Nacional blamed Chavez for a noisy demonstration staged on Monday night outside its Caracas offices by about 100 followers of the president yelling chants and banging pots. El Nacional said Chavez was employing the same strong-arm tactics of "political blackmail ... corruption and open use of violence" that he had criticized in previous governments. "What a poor and tragic destiny awaits us if we don't stop this apprentice dictator in time," the newspaper said. El Nacional editorial coordinator Sergio Dahbar described Monday's protest as a "well thought out plan to scare off the media." "We have to realize this, understand the plan," said Dahbar. "We have to be alert and on guard." And general secretary of media workers union SNTP Gregorio Salazar said that signs from government leaders clearly showed democracy was under threat. "Signs from government leaders ... lead us to think that the regime will definitively cross that line if it is not controlled by the institutions," Salazar told AFP. On Tuesday, Venezuela's National College of Journalists lambasted the government's behavior in a statement, saying: "This type of attitude has only been displayed by Nazi regimes, fascists and dictatorships where fundamentalist groups have tried to silence the informative task of the media." Government officials hotly reject these charges, arguing there is more press freedom now than under previous governments and that no journalists or political opponents have been jailed for their activities during Chavez' three-year rule. Meanwhile [and ominously], the United States [who admits to censoring war coverage in the US] expressed concern Tuesday over attempts by supporters of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez to intimidate the country's opposition and independent press. "We're concerned about the attempts by Chavez supporters to intimidate both opposition politicians and the press," State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said. Boucher said Washington recognized the legality of demonstrations in democratic countries but said the United States was nevertheless "concerned about the events of last (Monday) night." In a show of support for the free press, the US ambassador to Venezuela, Donna Hrinak, was to visit the El Nacional offices on Tuesday, Boucher said. Cilia Flores, a close Chavez ally and leader of the MVR parliamentary group, denied the president was responsible for the protest. She described the demonstrators as "some ladies who went with their pots and pans to protest against false, manipulated information published by the newspaper." . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Barry Stoller http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ProletarianNews
