[R-G] Morales Cites "Evidence" of U.S. Meddling

[Anthony Fenton]

BOLIVIA:  Morales Cites "Evidence" of U.S. Meddling
By Haider Rizvi

http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=43985

UNITED NATIONS, Sep 24 (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.

(END/2008)