Stuart Munckton
Venezuela hosted an energy summit with officials from 16 Caribbean countries on June 29 that furthered President Hugo Chavez's plan to create an alternative trading bloc known as the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas (ALBA).
ALBA seeks to integrate the economies of Latin America in order to provide a challenge to US economic and political hegemony over the continent. The summit, held in Puerto La Cruz, agreed to form an energy alliance known as Petrocaribe, that will provide Caribbean countries with guaranteed supplies of petroleum at discounted prices and begin to introduce a fundamental principle of ALBA — economic cooperation over competition.
Venezuela promotes ALBA as a counter-proposal to the US-pushed Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA), which aims to open Latin American economies up to even greater exploitation by US corporations.
Speaking at a ceremony commemorating the anniversary of Venezuela's 1811 declaration of independence, Chavez insisted that the US-pushed FTAA was dead and "should be buried", according to a July 5 Reuters report.
In an article posted on the ZNet website on July 4, Toni Solo explained that the Petrocaribe initiative, "carefully developed by consensus over the last two years, offers a stable framework for the participating Caribbean countries to confront the developing energy crisis on a basis of cooperation and solidarity".
Solo explained that the agreement would "establish a social and economic fund to finance new infrastructure, assist with transport costs, and offer long term finance facilities at low interest rates. Under the agreement countries will be able to pay for petroleum products with goods and services, allowing them to save precious foreign currency."
Petrocaribe's executive secretariat will be based in Venezuela, which is committed to putting up US$50 million towards starting costs.
Venezuela's government-owned oil company PDVSA will establish a subsidiary, PDV-Caribe, to oversee Venezuela's operations under the agreement.
A June 30 Granma International article explained that a key part of the plan is for PDV-Caribe to cut out profiteering intermediaries by organising oil transportation at cost to keep down prices. PDV-Caribe would also "organise direct supply, storage and refining where possible; it would prioritize the neediest, and would adopt plans for training human capital, mass vaccinations and investments in public health."
The Cuban Prensa Latina news agency reported on July 2 that Dominican Republic President Leonel Fernandez called the agreement "an act of extreme [Venezuelan] generosity". Grenadian Prime Minister Dr Keith Mitchell said that the agreement would ensure that small nations in the region have access to much-needed petroleum.
All up, 13 Caribbean countries signed the agreement. Trinidad and Tobago and Barbados declined to sign, saying that it would contradict other agreements they are already party to.
Petrocaribe also aims to provide funding for alternative energy sources and promote more efficient energy use. Cuban President Fidel Castro, who described the energy summit as "a historic meeting", warned that wasteful consumption in developed countries is "causing a humanitarian crisis for survival" and specifically pointed to consumption of the US, which consumes 25% the world's oil, as unsustainable.
"Castro's visit to Venezuela came as a surprise because only two days before the summit began [Venezuelan] information and communication minister Andres Izarra had announced that Castro would not attend", Venezuela Analysis correspondent Sarah Wagner reported on June 29. "Later, after Castro's arrival, the ministry issued an explanation and an apology, saying that for security reasons Castro's visit had to be unannounced."
Castro has been a repeated target for assassination by US-organised, right-wing Cuban emigre terrorists.
The US government sought to use the summit to further its propaganda campaign against Chavez's revolutionary government, accusing it of attempting to use Venezuela's oil wealth to "destabilise" the region.
At the summit, Chavez denounced a letter that the US State Department had sent to many of the participating countries urging their governments to reject Venezuela's proposals. The letter claimed that there are "increasing proofs that Venezuela is actively using its oil wealth to destabilize its democratic neighbors in the Americas, by means of the financing of extremist and anti-democratic groups in Bolivia, Ecuador, and other places..." The letter failed, however, to provide any evidence to back up its claims.
Calling the letter "a lack of respect to our people and to our government", Chavez angrily declared: "If anyone has interfered and trampled on liberty and democracy in this continent, it is the US government. Who supported Pinochet and the most savage dictatorships that have filled these lands with blood? The US government."
Chavez said that the letter was part of a campaign by the US to prepare "another aggression, another attempt of the savage US imperialism that has filled America with blood".
From 91×ÔÅÄÂÛ̳ Weekly, July 13, 2005.
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