The Holocaust denier, the radical socialist, and their axis of unity

[zgrams at zgrams.zundelsite.org]

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http://www.guardian.co.uk/iran/story/0,,2134049,00.html?gusrc=rss&feed=12


The Holocaust denier, the radical socialist, and their axis of unity

Chávez's economic alliance with Iran is part of his wider policy of 
snubbing the US

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The Guardian / July 25, 2007

A billboard of Hugo Chávez and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad looms over a 
motorway in Venezuela, marking the entrance to a factory designed to 
produce three things: tractors, influence and angst.

The tractors, lined up in shiny red phalanxes on the grounds of 
Veniran, a joint venture between Venezuela and Iran, are for peasants 
and socialist cooperatives across Latin America.

The influence, less visible but real enough, is for Mr Chávez and Mr 
Ahmadinejad, two presidents who hope this and other ventures will 
project their prestige and power.

The angst, if all goes to plan, is for Washington. Veniran might be 
tucked away in the backwater provincial capital of Ciudad Bolívar but 
it is part of a wider attempt by Mr Chávez to forge a common front 
against the United States.

The socialist radical is using Venezuela's vast oil wealth to strike 
commercial and political deals with countries that challenge the US 
such as Iran, Belarus, Russia and China, as well as much of Latin 
America and the Caribbean, to rebuff what he refers to as the 
"empire".

"Chávez is a global player because right now he has a lot of money 
that he is prepared to spend to advance his huge ambitions," said 
Michael Shifter, an analyst with the Inter-American Dialogue 
thinktank. "He has worked tirelessly to upset US priorities in Latin 
America."

Cocaine

Supporters say he has worked tirelessly to support the poor and 
marginalised, for example through a $250,000 (£121,000) loan to help 
farmers in Bolivia's lowlands build a coca industrialization plant, 
part of an effort to turn the leaf into cakes, biscuits and other 
legal products instead of cocaine.

"For years we have wanted to do this but no one would support us," 
said Leonardo Choque, leader of the Chimoré federation of coca 
growers. "Then the Venezuelans come and offer us a loan with very low 
interest rates. And no conditions." Venezuela is also funding a new 
university nearby.

In contrast the US is accused of bullying Andean nations into 
destroying coca crops without promoting equally lucrative alternative 
livelihoods - a big stick and a small carrot.

Of all Mr Chávez's alliances the one with Iran is the most striking. 
Some of the estimated 180 economic and political accords signed with 
the mullahs over recent years are now bearing fruit - and prompting 
some disquiet among the small Jewish community.

The first "anti-imperialist cars" from a joint venture reached 
Venezuela's roads this month, with the first batch earmarked for army 
officers.

There is now a weekly flight between Caracas and Tehran, with a 
stopover in Damascus, operated by the Venezuelan state-controlled 
airline Conviasa and Iran's national carrier, Iran Air. New mosques 
are popping up across Venezuela and universities are teaching Farsi.

Iran is to help build platforms in a $4bn development of Orinoco 
delta oil deposits in exchange for reciprocal Venezuelan investments.

The 4,000 tractors produced annually in Ciudad Bolívar are small beer 
in comparison but they have a symbolic value as agents of 
revolutionary change. Most are given or leased at discount in 
Venezuela to socialist cooperatives that have seized land, with 
government blessing, from big ranches and sugar plantations.

Dozens have also been sent to Bolivia to support President Evo 
Morales, a leftwing radical and close Chávez ally, and last week 
dozens more began to be shipped north to Nicaragua, whose president, 
Daniel Ortega, is another Chávez ally and longtime bugbear for 
Washington. The first batch was timed to coincide with the 28th 
anniversary of the Sandinista revolution.

"The idea is to help our brothers develop the land," said Reza 
Mahboubi, an Iranian manager at the plant. The technology was 
Iranian, as were the supervisors, but most of the 130 staff were 
Venezuelan. Asked if the objective was also to stick a finger in 
George Bush's eye, Mr Mahboubi merely smiled.

Sun and salsa

A colleague who asked not to be named said the Iranians had been 
warmly welcomed. "I love it here. It's hot and sunny and they eat 
rice, just like back home. Except here I go out salsa dancing."

Mr Chávez inaugurated the factory in 2005 with the then Iranian 
president, Mohammad Khatami. He has struck up a friendship with his 
successor, Mr Ahmadinejad, and hailed their "axis of unity". "The 
relationship is fundamentally geopolitical rather than economic," 
said Mr Shifter. "It tells the world that Iran, an international 
pariah, is welcome in Latin America, which is traditionally regarded 
as the strategic preserve or 'back yard' of the United States."

The alliance has cost Mr Chávez some support. Europe would be 
friendlier were it not for his embrace of a Holocaust-denying 
Islamist, said the Council on Hemispheric Affairs thinktank. That may 
also partly explain his low popularity rating in a recent survey of 
global attitudes by the Pew Foundation.

However the Venezuelan leader has calculated there is more to gain 
than lose. "When I come to Iran, Washington gets upset," he said on a 
visit earlier this month, his sixth. He has likened Iran's Islamic 
revolution to his own secular revolution, a mix of socialism and 
ideas drawn from Simón Bolívar, South America's 19th century 
liberator.

Backstory

They make for an odd couple. Hugo Chávez, big and bear-like, is a 
radical socialist who quotes Marx, leads a largely Catholic country 
and has a habit of breaking into song. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, bird-like 
in comparison, is a radical Islamist who quotes the prophet Muhammad 
and is not readily associated with fun or secularism. Yet the two 
presidents have forged a personal and strategic relationship, and 
hold hands while touring joint ventures. They are linked by oil - 
Venezuela and Iran are big producers - and aversion to the US, which 
both regard as a hostile, predatory empire. Building economic and 
political ties, they calculate, will buttress Caracas and Tehran 
against Washington, the Great Satan.

Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007