Why can't Spain leave Hugo Chavez alone?

The Spanish courts, the prime minister -- even the king -- all seem out to get him. Can't they see that the Venezuelan president wants only to be best friends with the state that gave birth to his country? After all, Venezuela's ambassador to Spain recently swore "to cooperate at all times with the Spanish government."

Spain keeps harping on allegations that Venezuela is harboring ETA terrorists, charging that a senior Venezuelan government official is training them. The ETA is a Basque separatist group that has been fighting a Quixotic guerrilla campaign for decades, trying to win its own state in Spanish and French territory.

Earlier this month, two ETA fighters testifying in a Spanish court said they had received guerilla-warfare and weapons training at camps in Venezuela. Their trainer, they told the judge, was none other than Arturo Cubillas, the Venezuelan Agriculture Ministry's chief of security. Cubillas's wife is Chavez's chief of staff.

Spain's first accusations came in March, after Madrid learned that computer records Colombia seized from FARC, that state's own guerilla group, showed that ETA and FARC fighters were being trained together in Venezuela -- by Cubillas. The Spanish government considers the latest court testimony as strong corroboration. Officials are quite upset. After all, ETA has been responsible for more than 800 deaths over the years. So they are blaming Chavez.

He is offended and says he finds the whole idea that his government is training Basque terrorists "stupid" and "a farce." Why, he asked, does Spain believe "two bloodthirsty criminals" making "absurd" accusations.

What's more, how can anyone believe that Spanish judge? Venezuelan Foreign Minister Nicolas Maduro wagged his finger as he told reporters that the judge "had connections" with the political party of a former Spanish president who had expressed support for the coup attempt against Chavez in 2002.

Then the Venezuelan ambassador to Spain asserted that the ETA guerillas were tortured in jail, so "Venezuela has serious doubts as to whether these statements" were "totally voluntary." Unspoken in that accusation is Spain's obvious animus toward Venezuela. Why did the torturers choose to extract those particular "confessions"?

Spanish officials are not mollified. They simply don't believe Chavez. The government is demanding "concrete action" to find the training camp and shut it down. The courts issued an arrest warrant for Cubillas. Late last week, Spain's attorney general declared that his country "will not tolerate that terrorism has any kind of international support" and demanded Cubillas' extradition to Spain. The next day, Chavez refused.

The trouble is, Chavez already has an unfortunate history with Spain's leaders. In 2007, he was in the audience while Spain's prime minister was making a speech. Chavez offered some comments he thought pertinent. Nobody seemed to be paying attention, so he spoke up louder, whereupon Juan Carlos, the Spanish king, cried out: Why don't you just shut up! Across Spain and Latin America after that, T-shirts imprinted with the king's remark sold briskly, and millions of people downloaded recordings of Juan Carlos saying "Shut up!" as a cell-phone ring tone.

Visiting Spain last year, Chavez, trying to make up, told the king: You look like my good friend Fidel Castro! An official photo from that moment showed Chavez grinning while the king, standing beside him, held a pinched-lip expression that seemed to be saying: When will this end?

Now Chavez is standing fast, insisting, "we have no ETA here." Why would those European terrorists hide out in Venezuela, of all places? Well, the Spanish press gleefully pointed out that 21 years ago, Venezuela accepted 27 deported Spanish ETA guerillas. One of them was Cubillas.

But how could Chavez be expected to know that? A predecessor, President Carlos Andres Perez, made that agreement with Spain. And now, the Venezuelan press isn't choosing to write about this. (Freedom House's press-freedom index lists Venezuela as the only nation in the Western Hemisphere that does not have a free press.)

This argument has grown to be quite nasty. King Juan Carlos led a national-day parade in Madrid a few days ago, and the flags of Spain's eight former colonies were on prominent display -- all except for Venezuela's. Juan Carlos was reported to be angry. But in a statement, the Venezuelan embassy explained that the flag was "unavailable."

Now, after weeks of this, Chavez appears weary. The Spanish charges, he lamented, are "a broken record." All of it is nothing more than "part of the orchestra that plays against" his "Bolivarian revolution."

 

Available at Amazon.com:

The End of the Free Market: Who Wins the War Between States and Corporations?

Running Out of Water: The Looming Crisis and Solutions to Conserve Our Most Precious Resource

Bottled and Sold: The Story Behind Our Obsession with Bottled Water

Water: The Epic Struggle for Wealth, Power, and Civilization

The Great Gamble

At War with the Weather: Managing Large-Scale Risks in a New Era of Catastrophes

 

 

(C) 2010 Joel Brinkley