[R-G] South American leaders back Morales

[Anthony Fenton]

http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2008/09/200891632256800782.html

South American leaders back Morales
The South American leaders announce
their 'firm support' for Morales [AFP]

South American leaders at a crisis summit in Chile have issued a  
statement strongly supporting Evo Morales, the Bolivian president, and  
rejecting any break-up of Bolivian territory.

The meeting, where the statement was released late on Monday, was  
convened as an attempt to resolve the political turmoil in Bolivia  
that has left at least 18 people dead.

In the statement the presidents of nine South American countries  
expressed "their full and firm support for the constitutional  
government of President Evo Morales, whose mandate was ratified by a  
big majority".

The statement was agreed by Morales and the presidents of Argentina,  
Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Paraguay, Uruguay and Venezuela.

Cristina Kirchner, the president of Argentina, said after the six  
hours of talks that "the agreement was unanimous".

Rebellious governors

The leaders also said they were looking at creating a committee to  
attend talks between Morales's government and rebel governors in  
Bolivia's east who oppose his rule and are seeking autonomy for their  
states.

They encouraged both sides to negotiate an end to Bolivia's political  
crisis, which has disrupted natural gas supplies to Argentina and  
Brazil.

At least 18 people died and 100 were wounded in Bolivia's northern  
state of Pando last week after clashes broke out between government  
supporters and opponents.

The South American leaders condemned the deaths in Pando and called  
for a commission to investigate allegations many of the victims were  
pro-Morales peasants shot dead in an ambush.

Morales' government has said it will charge the rebellious eastern  
governor with genocide for allegedly ordering the machine-gunning of  
peasants, a part of Bolivian society that strongly supports him.

Coup claim

On arrival in Santiago, Chile's capital, Morales accused his enemies  
at home of mounting a "civic coup d'etat".

The summit statement said the presidents "warn that our respective  
government energetically reject and will not recognise any situation  
that attempts a civil coup and the rupture of institutional order and  
which could compromise the territorial integrity of the Republic of  
Bolivia".

"We hope opposition groups can understand this statement as being from  
all of South America, not just its presidents," Morales said after the  
summit.

The violence in Bolivia has also sparked a diplomatic standoff between  
Bolivia and Venezuela on the one side, and the US on the other, with  
Morales and Hugo Chavez, the Venezuelan president, expelling  
Washington's ambassadors to their countries, accusing them of backing  
the opposition.

Washington responded by ordering the Bolivian and Venezuelan envoys to  
the US to leave.