Red Pepper's Venezuela Blog

The Venezuelan Arms Build Up: Fact or Fiction?

[For Victor Figueroa-Clark, facts show the total falsity of the allegations that Chavez is engaging Venezuela in an arms build up that threatens regional peace and stability; and they also help to disclose the worrying level of anti-Chavez propaganda that is finding its way into the mainstream media. For a Spanish version of this article click here.]

New recruits for the reserves report to duty from the Caracas barrio 23 de enero. Credit: Alexander Holland/Venezuelanalysis.com

New Study Says Venezuelan Economy to Continue to Boom

[A new paper from the Center for Economic and Policy Research looks at the Venezuelan economy during the last eight years and finds that it does not fit the mold of an "oil boom headed for a bust," as is commonly believed. For a Spanish version of the CEPR paper click here.]

BBC Distorts Venezuela News

[For Calvin Tucker, co-editor of www.21stcenturysocialism.com, the BBC’s Caracas correspondent, James Ingham, has been at it again. 'It' being the use of clever journalistic tricks that leave the reader with the impression that the Venezuelan president, Hugo Chavez, is a dictator-in-waiting. For a Spanish version of the article click here. --Ed]

Bank of the South: Toward Financial Autonomy

[For Raúl Zibechi, a member of the Editorial Council of the weekly Brecha in Montevideo, the launch of the Bank of the South is an ambitious and strategic gambit in regional integration, one that could result in a truly regional development bank. To read the original Spanish version of this article click here. --Ed] 

Reporters Without Borders and Venezuela’s RCTV

[Salim Lamrani argues that the refusal to renew the 20-year-old concession license of the private Venezuelan television channel RCTV set off extraordinary media hysteria worldwide. Reporters Without Borders (RSF), naturally, participated in the international disinformation campaign, publishing an extremely biased report about RCTV on June 5, 2007. For a Spanish version of this article click here. --Ed]

Venezuela: Blows and Counterblows

[Marta Harnecker, author of Rebuilding the Left, argues that once again, an attack by the opposition has resulted in a very positive event for the Bolivarian process: a new social actor, full of force, of ideals, has entered into the political sphere. To read the original Spanish version of the article click here. --Ed] 

RCTV and Freedom of Speech in Venezuela

[Venezuelanalysis.com editor Gregory Wilpert provides a detailed examination of the arguments used to criticise the Chavez government's decision not to renew RCTV's broadcast license. Do any of these arguments have merit? A few might, but the bottom line is that they end up defending the privileges of the country's elite. For a Spanish version of this article click here.] 

Venezuelan Civil Society Groups Accuse U.S. of Fomenting Destabilization

[Venezuelanalysis.com's Chris Carlson reports on how organisations, journalists, students, activists and intellectuals in Venezuela have accused the national and international media of waging a campaign against Venezuela and of supporting destabilisation plans that have been carried out in the country in the past few days. For an account of this news in Spanish click here.  --Ed]

Venezuela's Chávez Announces World Bank Debt Has Been Paid Off

[Telesur report on Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez's announcement last Friday that Venezuela had paid off the debt it owed to the World Bank. Chavez's announcement was made during a ceremony that was held around the Presidential Palace of Miraflores, to commemorate the 13th of April of 2002, the day when a civic-military rebellion restored the constitutional order in Venezuela. For a Spanish version of this article click here. --Ed]

Documentary: The Revolution Will Not Be Televised

[Five years ago this week, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez was temporarily ousted in a  coup backed by the U.S. government. Mass protests across the country by his supporters along with the actions of loyalist factions within the Venezuelan army resulted in Chavez's return to power less than 48 hours later. These extraordinary events are documented in the film The Revolution Will Not Be Televised which you can see below. --Ed]