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<h1 class="title">Obama Could Face Another Disastrous Summit Due to
Sanctions Against Venezuela</h1>
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<p class="byline"> By <span class="author">Mark Weisbrot - Center
for Economic Policy Research</span>, <span class="date">April
10th 2015</span> </p>
</div>
<p>The last (2012) Summit of the Americas, in Cartagena, Colombia,
was a disaster for President Obama. There were scandals involving
Secret Service agents and sex workers, an increasing rebellion
from the South against the failed U.S. “War on Drugs,” and—most of
all—unanimous opposition to the U.S. embargo on Cuba.</p>
<p>The most decisive evidence that this was not just the usual
suspects stirring up trouble was the warning from President Manuel
Santos of Colombia—one of Washington’s few “friendlies” in the
region —that there would not be another Summit without Cuba.</p>
<p>So President Obama offered up a surprise Christmas present to its
Southern neighbors last year: after more than a half-century of
aggression against Cuba, he would finally begin to normalize
relations. Welcome to the 21<sup>st</sup> century, finally!
Although Republican jihadis and neocons would inevitably delay the
process in Congress, the White House publicly expressed hope that
there would at least be embassies open in the two countries before
the Summit on April 10.</p>
<p>But the Lord giveth, and the Lord taketh away. On March 9 the
White House declared a “national emergency” due to the
“extraordinary threat to the national security” posed by
Venezuela. The Obama administration tried to dismiss the language
as a mere formality, but the world knows that such threatening
language and accompanying sanctions can be quite hazardous to the
designated country’s health – in the past they have sometimes even
been followed by military action.</p>
<p>Most ominously in the present, at a U.S. Senate <a
href="http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs/the-americas-blog/live-blog-senate-foreign-relations-hearing-on-venezuela">hearing</a> on
March 17, the State Department’s Alex Lee declared that the
current sanctions were just the “first salvo” against Venezuela.
Of course, the world outside of Washington knows that the
sanctions have nothing to do with any alleged human rights
violations in Venezuela. From 2000 to 2010, the Colombian military
assassinated more than 5700 innocent civilians; the U.S.
government continued to provide literally billions of dollars of
military and police aid. In Honduras, the Obama administration
took numerous steps to help ensure that the 2009 military coup
against the democratically elected government of Mel Zelaya would
succeed. And in Mexico, 43 students were disappeared six months
ago with complicity of local authorities and police, and possibly
federal police and government as well. But the U.S. government
does not appear to be concerned, and will not even consider
reducing its military aid to Mexico.</p>
<p>What the sanctions also made clear, for those who didn’t already
know, is that President Obama’s opening to Cuba represented
exactly zero change in Washington’s overall strategy toward the
region: The intention of expanding commercial and diplomatic
relations with Cuba was mainly to pursue a more effective strategy
of undermining the Cuban government--and all of the left
governments in the region. This includes Brazil, where the U.S.
State Department funded efforts to <a class="blank"
href="http://www1.folha.uol.com.br/fsp/brasil/fc2207200823.htm"
target="_blank">weaken the Workers’ Party (PT) government</a> in
2005, according to U.S. government documents.</p>
<p>Representatives of Brazil, Mexico, Colombia, Argentina and nearly
every country in the Americas spoke out against the sanctions at
the Organization of American States (OAS) last Thursday in
Washington. The Union of South American Nations <a class="blank"
href="http://www.unasursg.org/node/169" target="_blank">demanded</a> their
repeal. So did the Community of Latin American and Caribbean
States, which includes all countries in the hemisphere except the
U.S. and Canada. And on March 26 the opposition governor of the
state of Lara sent a <a class="blank"
href="http://www.panorama.com.ve/politicayeconomia/Gobernador-Henri-Falcon-envio-una-carta-al-presidente-Obama-20150326-0070.html"
target="_blank">letter</a> to President Obama, asking him to
“take a moment of your time to listen to the voice of the people
of Venezuela and the rest of Latin America that have spoken out in
favor of the rescinding of this executive order that you signed.”</p>
<p> “If there is a country that is a threat in the Americas,” <a
class="blank"
href="http://www.democracynow.org/2015/3/20/ecuadorean_foreign_minister_the_united_states"
target="_blank">said Ecuadorean Foreign Minister Ricardo Patiño</a>,
“it’s the United States, because it has permanently invaded
countries,” “created coups d’état” and “promoted dictatorships.”
The Cuban government also responded forcefully, dashing Obama’s
hopes of any deal before the Summit. Negotiations in Havana that
were expected to last until mid-week <a class="blank"
href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/18/world/americas/us-cuba-talks-on-restoring-diplomatic-ties-end-abruptly.html?_r=0"
target="_blank">ended abruptly</a> on Monday, March 16. So Obama
will go to the Summit empty-handed and with some egg on his face
because of this ill-considered move.</p>
<p>These sanctions against Venezuela violate the charter of the
Organization of American States, including Article 20, and Article
19, which states:</p>
<p>No State or group of States has the right to intervene, directly
or indirectly, for any reason whatever, in the internal or
external affairs of any other State. The foregoing principle
prohibits not only armed force but also any other form of
interference or attempted threat against the personality of the
State or against its political, economic, and cultural elements.</p>
<p>Let’s hope that all of the governments represented at the Summit
hammer it home that this kind of “rogue state” behavior will not
be tolerated.</p>
<p><em><a href="http://www.cepr.net/index.php/">Mark Weisbrot</a> is
co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, in
Washington, D.C. and president of <a class="blank"
href="http://www.justforeignpolicy.org/" target="_blank">Just
Foreign Policy</a>. He is also the author of the forthcoming
book </em><span>Failed: What the "Experts" Got Wrong About the
Global Economy</span><em>(Oxford University Press, 2015).</em></p>
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