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What is very odd about this Embassy announcement is that the withdrawal of Humala's visa occurred MORE THAN A YEAR AGO. This seems to me like bald-faced interference in Peru's election--both to try to discredit the leftist candidate, AND to prevent his attendance at important policy meetings, as well as to cast a cloud over him as a president who might have trouble with foreign relations/foreign trade because the Bush junta won't let him travel freely.
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One of the snipped parts reveals that "Antauro has surrendered to the authorities and he is jailed now." It does not say whether or not he was tried, how he pleaded, whether or not the trial was a fair one, and what his sentence is--nor what he is in jail FOR. And the Bushites banned his BROTHER, Ollanta Humala, the leading candidate in Peru's presidential campaign, because of something someone SAID--mere hearsay. The Embassy failed to inform Humala that the junta had rescinded his visa, and he won't likely get a new one from the Bushites, whose top man on South America is John "death squad" Negroponte.
The article goes on to say, "Humala who claims his U.S. visa was good for 10 years, hoped to travel to the United States to hold meetings with officials of the Organization of American States, the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, among other financial organizations. // He said that if elected, he will keep good ties with the United States as long as 'its interests don't collide with our interests,' such as national rights over biodiversity, the penalty-free sowing of coca, and a trade treaty under other terms, unlike the U.S.-Peru Free Trade Agreement, which he criticizes." Humala was on his way to visit the new Bolivian President Evo Morales when he made these remarks.
I think it's likely that Ollanta convinced his brother to surrender. It appears to me that the South American left, in so far as it has been involved in armed resistance, has made a collective decision to abandon that self-defeating path, has understood that the vast majority of South Americans support leftist policy, and, with the hard civic work done on TRANSPARENT elections--by local groups, the OAS, EU election monitoring groups and the Carter Center--over the last decade, it is now possible for real representatives of the people to be elected, and for good government to be possible. These are countries where the U.S. has perpetrated death squads, assassinations of leftist leaders, the murderous U.S. "war on drugs," grand theft by the rich, and domination by U.S./global corporate predators. Tens of thousands of people have been tortured, slaughtered and 'disappeared.' Millions have been impoverished. Every progressive/leftist movement has been smashed, in the past. Armed resistance is certainly understandable in these dreadfully oppressive conditions. Hugo Chavez flirted with it as well. And it's interesting that, while Chavez was in jail for his part in an attempted coup--back before transparent elections and the new Venezuela constitution--that was when his great popularity began. He became a great hero for trying to topple a very oppressive government--but decided upon the peaceful route of electoral politics.
I think what we are seeing, in both Ollanta Humala and Huge Chavez, is essentially peaceful men, who grew up in times of desperate oppression. Both did well in the military in their youths (a more democratic force in Latin America than any of us realize--lots of poor people in uniform, given an opportunity for leadership). They saw dreadful injustice. They were tempted to solve it through military means. And both have undergone a great turnaround in their lives and philosophies.
The Bush junta--talk about "calling the kettle black"--is now trying to destroy the achievement of democracy in South America, in their typical "swiftboating" way (Karl Rove having poisoned the entire government), by calling these new popular leaders "authoritarian," etc.--when that is exactly what they are NOT. They are people who COULD HAVE taken the "authoritarian" path and DIDN'T. They should be applauded! They should be praised! These new developments in South America are WONDERFUL! Peace through voting. Change through voting. Let the people decide! Eh, Bush?
I'm sure that Rice, Negroponte, et al, have plans to re-introduce violent repression. They like seeing nuns raped and killed by US-trained death squads, and leftist bishops (i.e., advocates of the poor) slain on their altars, and people like the new socialist president of Chile, Michele Batchelet, tortured and her family members killed. That's what Bushites DO.
I don't think they will succeed, though. The people of Latin America have outfoxed them--through civic organization and clean elections, supported by the vast majority. This revolution is well-grounded, very widespread, and unstoppable. The Bushites can only do "damage control," at this point--like their nasty little denial of a visa to Ollanta Humala, and announcement of it a year later, in the middle of Peru's presidential election.
It will probably get him more votes.
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"The time of the people has come." --Evo Morales
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