US Undermines Latin American Integration

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http://watchingamerica.com/News/234092/us-undermines-latin-american-integration/Argenpress, Argentina

The U.S. insists on a difficult relationship with Latin America by dismissing its people’s right to self-determination and to its political, economic and social sovereignty.

US Undermines Latin American Integration
By Carlos Angulo Rivas
Translated By Olivia Szymanski
28 February 2014
Edited by Gillian Palmer

The U.S. government’s belligerent provocation is growing. Recent events in Venezuela constitute an insolent and unacceptable interference from Barack Obama’s government. And that’s not counting the previous defeats in the 15 years of the Bolivarian revolution, the last two presidential elections, the re-election of Hugo Chavez, the constitutional ratification of Nicolas Maduro, and the elections for governorships and municipalities conducted last December, which demonstrate the clear strengthening of the Bolivarian bloc.

These results were confirmed and guaranteed by the most prestigious international observation missions, which the majority support for a government that emerged from a participatory democracy made precisely clear when barely two and half months ago, it took an almost 12 percent lead in the adverse circumstances of economic war and sabotage of production and public services. The victory of the Bolivarians, despite this awful, destructive policy, was indeed a true plebiscite, just as the MUD (Mesa de la Unidad Democrática) [party] and lawbreakers, namely Henrique Capriles and Leopoldo Lopez, demanded.

The stakes for a widening democracy in the social, economic and political order channeled by the Bolivarian revolution do not interest Washington, nor do the Latin American oligarchies. Hence, in all instances, the lost referendums are now about undermining the internal and external order in order to stop and destroy a process that no longer belongs only to Venezuela, but to the entire continent, dissolutely called the "backyard" of the United States. The fascist agitation, the leading model for overthrowing legitimate governments that are disagreeable toward the White House, will continue as a new destabilizing policy (slow blows); let us not forget that Venezuela is a rich country that has one of the largest oil reserves in the world and, since the beginning of the Bolivarian revolution established on nationalism and sovereignty, has earned the hostility of the corrupt dominant sectors in Latin America and of U.S. imperialism.

In the external order, apart from the ill-tempered attacks from the monopolized press against the Venezuelan government since April 2011, with the creation of the Pacific Alliance, attempts to halt the advance of social, economic, political and cultural integration of Latin America have not stopped. Following the unsuccessful U.S. hegemony proposed by George W. Bush in the FTAA [Free Trade Area of the Americas], the new geopolitical schema changed and has been established by autonomous bodies such as ECLAC, UNASUR, Mercosur, ALBA and PetroCaribe.* By itself, Latin American unity has been shaped through the awakening of public awareness, known as the Pacific Alliance — a last ditch effort that the right-wing presidents of the continent are submitting to their imperial plans in order to bring back the Washington Consensus. It is no coincidence that in less than three years, the Pacific Alliance has had eight presidential summits for its members: Chile, Colombia, Mexico, and Peru; and in addition, that these four governments are the main leaders of the all-encompassing privatization and the absolute liberalization of the market, globalization and neoliberalism. And to top that off, three of them are of the most closely linked to corruption, violence and drug trafficking.