President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela wants to bring his country's gold back home. Eleven billion dollars worth of Venezuelan gold (211 tonnes ) is currently deposited among a number of US and European banks, at least some of which will have difficulties meeting the call. Transporting the gold will be expensive and complicated - not because of the physical volume but because of its immense value. (via) [more inside]
posted by Joe in Australia on Aug 29, 2011 - 83 comments

A half-month hunger strike by Venezuelan students has ended. More than 150 students participated in the protests, some sewing their own mouths shut. [more inside]
posted by clarknova on Mar 25, 2011 - 18 comments

Just ahead of a re-election referendum in Venezuela (scheduled for February 15), The Chávez Administration at 10 Years: The Economy and Social Indicators [PDF][Via]
posted by Rykey on Feb 10, 2009 - 26 comments

A high ranking FARC leader, Paul Reyes, was killed during a Columbian raid into Ecuador. Hugo Chavez, the president of Venezuela, responded and ordered ten battalions to the Columbian border, threatening a key regional ally of the United States. Some think it is just more bluster by Chavez. Meanwhile Air Force 2 is in Aruba; which is just 18 miles off the coast. Also Exxon-Mobil was recently cut off from Venezuela's oil.
posted by humanfont on Mar 2, 2008 - 50 comments

Operation PLIERS. An internal CIA memorandum has been obtained by Venezuelan counterintelligence from the US Embassy in Caracas that reveals a plan to destabilize Venezuela during the upcoming constitutional referendum. The plan, titled "OPERATION PLIERS" was authored by CIA Officer Michael Middleton Steere and was addressed to CIA Director General Michael Hayden in Washington. The full text of the memo will be released soon for verification purposes. Many previously.
posted by scalefree on Nov 28, 2007 - 42 comments

Llaguno bridge is a documentary offering an alternative point of view on some of the violent events that took place in Venezuela during the coup d'etat attempt of 2002 [1]. Some local private television are accused of deliberatedly picking some facts in an attempt to support the ongoing coup ; different videos taken from different angles show how some people were wrongly accused of shooting at unarmed masses of demonstrators. Regardless of political preferences and actual events, it is an interesting documentary on how easily facts can be misrepresented.
posted by elpapacito on Apr 29, 2007 - 8 comments

Newsfilter: Chavez announces he may call a referendum asking voters to allow him to rule without further elections until 2031, well past the 2012 limit currently imposed by the Venezuelan constitution. Bluff? Naked power grab? Fatal mistake? Either way, watch what you say about it if you're in Caracas.
posted by loquax on May 8, 2006 - 248 comments

"You are a donkey, Mr Danger" Hugo Chavez woos Bush.
posted by ruelle on Apr 10, 2006 - 62 comments

Venezuela bans US Airlines. The Chavez government announced yesterday that as of March 1st, Continental and Delta will no longer be allowed to fly into Venezuela, and American's flights will be restricted significantly (allowing AA to continue their Miami to Caracas route, which is the same one that Aeropostal flies to the US). We've talked about Chavez in the blue before, and this may be simple political posturing in an effort to open more routes for Aeropostal and other Venezuelan airlines, but between this, and the recent comments by Rumsfeld, Condoleezza Rice and Porter Goss, are we looking at a new low in US/Venezuela relations?
posted by toxic on Feb 24, 2006 - 45 comments

Rumsfeld likens Chavez to Hitler - expels diplomat in tit for tat
meanwhile the American Family Association calls for a boycott of Venezuelan owned Citgo (obviously encouraging more support for gulf arab regimes). The Venezuelan grandmother I recently spent a Sunday with was very happy with Chavez - and proud of him despite his faults and corruption in the country. What's with Rummy and friends?
posted by specialk420 on Feb 3, 2006 - 123 comments

Pat Robertson calls for the assassination of Hugo Chavez. Robertson, founder of the Christian Coalition of America and a former presidential candidate, said on "The 700 Club" it was the United States' duty to stop Chavez from making Venezuela a "launching pad for communist infiltration and Muslim extremism."
posted by billysumday on Aug 22, 2005 - 300 comments

Dick Cheney, Hugo Chavez and Bill Clinton's Band by Greg Palast
posted by skallas on Aug 17, 2004 - 36 comments

USA intelligence agencies revealed Ok. But we get 5% of our oil from there. You decide.
posted by Postroad on Dec 17, 2002 - 23 comments

If at first you don't succeed... Venezuelan army officers tell the Christian Science Monitor they're planning another coup attempt. Other signs: Ten masked men criticized President Chavez on TV last week, protests are mounting and, oh, those 50 tanks you see over there? Don't be alarmed. They're just "rehearsing" for the July 5 Independence Day parade, which also happens to be the day Chavez may try to clean house during an annual round of military promotions. Ruh-roh. The good news: On June 10, workers at the country's largest newspaper released a statement denouncing last April's media manipulation by wealthy owners and promised to fight if it happened again. And everyone's favorite meddling Baptist has announced he's heading to the area. (More inside)
posted by mediareport on Jun 20, 2002 - 22 comments

Online journalism, Venezuela style: "Venezuela's Electronic News," an independent source of news and opinion since 1996, has lots of details about the amazing events of last week. And this online newspaper from the island of Trinidad/Tobago, only a few miles from the Venezuelan coast, helped spread initial reports that contradicted the standard line. Meanwhile, over at good ol' Narco News, journalist Al Giordano has posted a must-read analysis of the online "counter-coup" against the spin from mainstream news outlets. Were the Venezuelan TV stations that fanned the coup's flames simply "upset with Chavez...over having to pay taxes like any other business for the first time in their history," as Giordano claims? Was this really "online journalism's finest hour," driven by "a decentralized slingshot army - you know who you are - that now has the microphone and will never give it up to the commercially-driven usurpers of democracy again?"
posted by mediareport on Apr 16, 2002 - 1 comment

Was the Venezuela coup another Chile 1973? Two months ago, Narco News called attention to the striking similarities between the situation in Venezuela and CIA plots against leftist Chilean president Salvador Allende in the early 1970s. The CIA's own version of what happened in Chile discusses its "sustained propaganda efforts, including financial support for major news media, against Allende and other Marxists." Hmm. Chavez shut down five private TV stations after they repeatedly aired what he called misleading footage of the protest deaths last week, after months of relentless attacks against his government. Sure makes you wonder.

On another note, did eyewitness accounts widely disseminated over the Web help doom the White House spin that "government supporters, on orders from the Chavez government, fired on unarmed, peaceful protestors"? If the Web didn't exist, would the final word have come from articles like this now out-of-date, pro-business analysis in yesterday's Washington Post?
posted by mediareport on Apr 14, 2002 - 47 comments

Venezuela's Chavez deposed with the military claiming control for now. The end of a sometimes cringe-inducingly entertaining era. What next? Civilian constitutional rule restored by lunchtime, or not? Will the strike end, allowing oil exports to resume?
posted by dhartung on Apr 11, 2002 - 11 comments