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Declaring candidacy for Security Council, Venezuela anticipates US opposition

Declaring candidacy for Security Council, Venezuela anticipates US opposition

Hugo Chávez Frías, President of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela
During an address to the United Nations General Assembly, President Hugo Chávez Frías of Venezuela announced his country’s bid for a non-permanent seat on the Security Council and predicted strong opposition from the United States.

Washington had launched an “immoral” attack to try and prevent Venezuela from being freely elected to the Security Council, President Chávez said. “It calls us extremists but they are extremists,” he said yesterday, adding that the “open attack” by the US had galvanized many other countries, both from Latin America and elsewhere, that were supporting Venezuela.

To those supporters, he said: “I thank you all warmly on behalf of Venezuela, on behalf of our people, and on behalf of the truth. Because Venezuela with a seat on the Security Council will be expressing not only Venezuela’s thoughts, but it will also be the voice of all the peoples of the world.”

President Chávez said that the US was doing all in its power to take over the world, but, if the world were to survive, it could not allow this “dictatorship” to succeed. The American president purported to promote democracy, but “what type of democracy do you impose with Marines and bombs?” President Chávez asked.

“The devil came here yesterday,” he said, referring to US President George W. Bush, who had said he had come to speak to the peoples of the world. “Yankee imperialist, go home. I think that’s what people would say if they were given the microphone,” the Venezuelan President said.

The US has already planned, financed and set in motion a coup in Venezuela and it continued to support coups in Venezuela and elsewhere, he said, recalling the murder of former Chilean Foreign Minister Orlando Letelier in Washington, DC, three decades ago. “Those who perpetrated this crime are free.”