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<div class="header reader-header reader-show-element"> <font
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href="https://thegrayzone.com/2019/11/11/bolivia-coup-fascist-foreign-support-fernando-camacho/">https://thegrayzone.com/2019/11/11/bolivia-coup-fascist-foreign-support-fernando-camacho/</a></font>
<h1 class="reader-title">Bolivia coup led by Christian fascist
paramilitary leader and multi-millionaire – with foreign
support</h1>
November 11, 2019</div>
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<h3><b>Bolivian coup leader Luis Fernando Camacho is a
far-right multi-millionaire who arose from fascist
movements in the Santa Cruz region, where the US has
encouraged separatism. He has courted support from
Colombia, Brazil, and the Venezuela coup regime.</b></h3>
<h3><b>By Max Blumenthal and Ben Norton</b></h3>
<p><span>When Luis Fernando Camacho stormed into Bolivia’s
abandoned presidential palace in the hours after
President Evo Morales’s sudden November 10
resignation, he revealed to the world a side of the
country that stood at stark odds with the
plurinational spirit its deposed socialist and
Indigenous leader had put forward. </span></p>
<p><span>With a Bible in one hand and a national flag in
the other, Camacho bowed his head in prayer above the
presidential seal, fulfilling his vow to purge his
country’s Native heritage from government and “return
God to the burned palace.” </span></p>
<p><span>“Pachamama will never return to the palace,” he
said, referring to the Andean Mother Earth spirit.
“Bolivia belongs to Christ.”</span></p>
<p><span>Bolivia’s extreme right-wing opposition had
overthrown leftist President Evo Morales that day,
following demands by the country’s military leadership
that he step down. </span></p>
<p>Virtually unknown outside his country, where he had
never won a democratic election, Camacho stepped into
the void. <span>He is a rich and powerful
multi-millionaire named in the Panama Papers, and an
ultra-conservative Christian fundamentalist groomed by
a fascist paramilitary notorious for its racist
violence, with a base in Bolivia’s wealthy separatist
region of Santa Cruz. </span></p>
<p><span>Camacho also hails from a family of corporate
elites who have long profited from Bolivia’s plentiful
natural gas reserves. And his family lost part of its
wealth when Morales nationalized the nation’s
resources, in order to fund his vast social programs —
which <a
href="http://cepr.net/press-center/press-releases/new-report-reviews-changes-in-bolivia-s-economy-under-evo-morales-s-presidency">cut
poverty</a> by 42 percent and extreme poverty by 60
percent.<br>
</span></p>
<p>In the lead-up to the coup, Camacho met with leaders
from right-wing governments in the region to discuss
their plans to destabilize Morales. Two months before
the putsch, <span>he <a
href="http://web.archive.org/web/20191111213940/https:/twitter.com/LuisFerCamachoV/status/1166319600394539008">tweeted</a>
gratitude: “Thank you Colombia! Thank you Venezuela!”
he exclaimed, tipping his hat to <a
href="https://thegrayzone.com/2019/01/29/the-making-of-juan-guaido-how-the-us-regime-change-laboratory-created-venezuelas-coup-leader/">Juan
Guaido’s coup operation</a>. He also recognized the
far-right government of Jair Bolsonaro, declaring,
“Thank you Brazil!”</span></p>
<p>Camacho had spent years leading an overtly fascist
separatist organization. The Grayzone edited the
following clips from a promotional historical
documentary that the group posted on its own <a
href="https://www.facebook.com/unionjuvenilsczOficial/">social
media accounts</a>:</p>
<blockquote data-conversation="none">
<p dir="ltr" lang="en">The rich oligarch leader of
Bolivia’s right-wing coup, Luis Fernando Camacho, was
the leader of an explicitly fascist paramilitary
group.</p>
<p>Here are some clips from a promotional historical
documentary it published:<a
href="https://t.co/gFMyfjsi2p">https://t.co/gFMyfjsi2p</a>
<a href="https://t.co/XXNQfhD7ii">pic.twitter.com/XXNQfhD7ii</a></p>
<p>— The Grayzone (@GrayzoneProject) <a
href="https://twitter.com/GrayzoneProject/status/1194133424975613952?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">November
12, 2019</a></p>
</blockquote>
<p><span>While Camacho and his far-right forces served as
the muscle behind the coup, their political allies
waited to reap the benefits. </span></p>
<p><span>The presidential candidate Bolivia’s opposition
had fielded in the October election, Carlos Mesa, is a
“pro-business” privatizer with extensive ties to
Washington. US government cables published by
WikiLeaks reveal that he regularly corresponded with
American officials in their efforts to destabilize
Morales. </span></p>
<p><span>Mesa is currently listed as an expert at a
DC-based think tank funded by the US government’s
soft-power arm <a
href="https://thegrayzone.com/tag/usaid/">USAID</a>,
various oil giants, and a host of multi-national
corporations active in Latin America.</span></p>
<p><span>Evo Morales, a former farmer who rose to
prominence in social movements before becoming the
leader of the powerful grassroots political party
Movement Toward Socialism (MAS), was Bolivia’s first
Indigenous leader. Wildly popular in the country’s
substantial Native and peasant communities, he won
numerous elections and democratic referenda over a
13-year period, often in landslides.<br>
</span></p>
<p><span>On October 20, Morales won re-election by more
than 600,000 votes, giving him just above the 10
percent margin needed to defeat opposition
presidential candidate Mesa in the first round. </span></p>
<p><span>Experts who did a statistical analysis of
Bolivia’s publicly available voting data found <a
href="http://cepr.net/press-center/press-releases/no-evidence-that-bolivian-election-results-were-affected-by-irregularities-or-fraud-statistical-analysis-shows">no
evidence of irregularities or fraud</a>. But the
opposition claimed otherwise, and took to the streets
in weeks of protests and riots.<br>
</span></p>
<p><span>The events that precipitated the resignation of
Morales were indisputably violent. Right-wing
opposition gangs attacked numerous elected politicians
from the ruling leftist MAS party. They then ransacked
the home of President Morales, while burning down the
houses of several other top officials. The family
members of some politicians were kidnapped and held
hostage until they resigned. A female socialist mayor
was <a
href="https://twitter.com/MaxBlumenthal/status/1192616479784607744">publicly
tortured</a> by a mob.<br>
</span></p>
<blockquote data-width="550" data-dnt="true">
<p dir="ltr" lang="en">The squalid US-backed fanatics of
the Bolivian right ransack the house of the country’s
elected president, Evo Morales. And the havoc is just
beginning. Let no one call them “pro-democracy.” <a
href="https://t.co/rwwvOSAEaA">pic.twitter.com/rwwvOSAEaA</a></p>
<p>— Max Blumenthal (@MaxBlumenthal) <a
href="https://twitter.com/MaxBlumenthal/status/1193696946961211393?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">November
11, 2019</a></p>
</blockquote>
<p><span>Following the forced departure of Morales, coup
leaders arrested the president and vice president of
the government’s electoral body, and forced the
organization’s other officials to resign. Camacho’s
followers proceeded to <a
href="https://twitter.com/MaxBlumenthal/status/1193699485358145536">burn
Wiphala flags</a> that symbolized the country’s
Indigenous population and the plurinational vision of
Morales.</span></p>
<p><span>The Organization of American States, a pro-US
organization <a
href="https://thegrayzone.com/2018/06/01/oas-anti-venezuela-pro-us-bias-right-wing-hypocrisy/">founded
by Washington during the Cold War</a> as an alliance
of right-wing anti-communist countries in Latin
America, helped rubber stamp the Bolivian coup. It
called for new elections, claiming there were numerous
irregularities in the October 20 vote, without citing
any evidence. Then the OAS remained silent as Morales
was overthrown by his military and his party’s
officials were attacked and violently forced to
resign.</span></p>
<p>The day after, the Donald Trump <a
href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/statement-president-donald-j-trump-regarding-resignation-bolivian-president-evo-morales/">White
House</a> enthusiastically praised the coup,
trumpeting it as a “significant moment for democracy,”
and a “strong signal to the illegitimate regimes in
Venezuela and Nicaragua.”</p>
<h3>Emerging from the shadows to lead a violent far-right
putsch</h3>
<p><span>While Carlos Mesa timidly condemned the
opposition’s violence, Camacho egged it on, ignoring
calls for an international audit of the election and
emphasizing his maximalist demand to purge all
supporters of Morales from government. He was the true
face of the opposition, concealed for months behind
the moderate figure of Mesa.</span></p>
<p><span>A 40-year-old multi-millionaire businessman from
the separatist stronghold of Santa Cruz, Camacho has
never run for office. Like Venezuelan coup leader Juan
Guaidó, whom more than 80 percent of Venezuelans had
never heard of until the US government anointed him as
supposed “president,” Camacho was an obscure figure
until the coup attempt in Bolivia hit its stride.</span></p>
<p><span>He first created his Twitter account on </span><a
href="https://twitter.com/LuisFerCamachoV/status/1133036951039352832"><span>May
27</span></a><span>, 2019. For months, his </span><a
href="https://twitter.com/LuisFerCamachoV/status/1176974932225470465"><span>tweets</span></a><span>
went ignored, generating no more than three or four
retweets and likes. </span><span>Before the election,
Camacho did not have a Wikipedia article, and there
were few media profiles on him in Spanish- or
English-language media.</span></p>
<p><span>Camacho issued a call for a strike on July 9,
posting </span><a
href="https://twitter.com/LuisFerCamachoV/status/1148235516204191744"><span>videos</span></a><span>
on Twitter that got just over </span><a
href="https://twitter.com/LuisFerCamachoV/status/1148235926159659011"><span>20
views</span></a><span>. The goal of the strike was
to try to force the resignation of Bolivian
government’s electoral organ the Supreme Electoral
Tribunal (TSE). In other words, Camacho was pressuring
the government’s electoral authorities to step down
more than three months before the presidential
election.</span></p>
<p><span>It was not until after the election that Camacho
was thrust into the limelight and transformed into a
celebrity by corporate media conglomerates like the
local right-wing network Unitel,</span> <a
href="https://twitter.com/LuisFerCamachoV/status/1187794744094744576"><span>Telemundo</span></a><span>,
and</span><a
href="https://twitter.com/CNNEE/status/1191911832698654720">
<span>CNN en Español.</span></a></p>
<p><span>All of a sudden, Camacho’s tweets calling for
Morales to resign were lighting up with</span> <a
href="https://twitter.com/LuisFerCamachoV/status/1190098835483353089"><span>thousands
of retweets</span></a><span>. The coup machinery had
been activated.</span></p>
<p><span>Mainstream outlets like the New York Times and
Reuters followed by anointing the unelected Camacho as
the “</span><a
href="https://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2019/11/04/world/americas/04reuters-bolivia-election-protests.html"><span>leader</span></a><span>”
of Bolivia’s opposition. But even as he lapped up
international attention, key portions of the far-right
activist’s background were omitted. </span></p>
<p><span>Left unmentioned were Camacho’s deep and
well-established connections to Christian extremist
paramilitaries notorious for racist violence and local
business cartels, as well as the right-wing
governments across the region. </span></p>
<p><span>It was in the fascist paramilitaries and
separatist atmosphere of Santa Cruz where Camacho’s
politics were formed, and where the ideological
contours of the coup had been defined. </span></p>
<h3><strong>Cadre of a Francoist-style fascist
paramilitary</strong></h3>
<p><span>Luis Fernando Camacho was groomed by the Unión
Juvenil Cruceñista, or Santa Cruz Youth Union (UJC), a
fascist paramilitary organization that has been linked
to assassination plots against Morales. The group is
notorious for assaulting leftists, Indigenous
peasants, and journalists, all while espousing a
deeply racist, homophobic ideology. </span></p>
<p><span>Since Morales entered office in 2006, the UJC has
campaigned to separate from a country its members
believed had been overtaken by a Satanic Indigenous
mass. </span></p>
<p><span>The UJC is the Bolivian equivalent of Spain’s
Falange, <a
href="https://moderaterebels.com/episode-10-show-notes-india-hindutva-shehla-rashid/">India’s
Hindu supremacist RSS</a>, and <a
href="https://thegrayzone.com/tag/azov-battalion/">Ukraine’s
neo-Nazi Azov battalion</a>. Its symbol is a green
cross that bears strong similarities to logos of
fascist movements across the West. </span></p>
<p><span>And its members are known to launch into <a
href="https://twitter.com/AndeanInfoNet/status/1189963356209328128">Nazi-style
sieg heil salutes</a>.</span></p>
<blockquote data-conversation="none">
<p dir="ltr" lang="en">Here is another video posted by
Bolivia’s fascist opposition Santa Cruz Youth Union.</p>
<p>Coup leader Luis Fernando Camacho <a
href="https://twitter.com/LuisFerCamachoV?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@LuisFerCamachoV</a>
previously helped lead this sieg-heiling group.</p>
<p>These are the people who overthrew elected President
Evo Morales. <a href="https://t.co/gFMyfjsi2p">https://t.co/gFMyfjsi2p</a>
<a href="https://t.co/GvvMfL21UZ">pic.twitter.com/GvvMfL21UZ</a></p>
<p>— The Grayzone (@GrayzoneProject) <a
href="https://twitter.com/GrayzoneProject/status/1194137427474038784?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">November
12, 2019</a></p>
</blockquote>
<p><span>Even the US embassy in Bolivia has </span><a
href="http://wl.1-s.es/cable/2008/03/08LAPAZ693.html"><span>described</span></a><span>
UJC members as “racist” and “militant,” noting that
they “have frequently attacked pro-MAS/government
people and installations.”</span></p>
<p><img data-attachment-id="16475"
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<p><span>After journalist Benjamin Dangl </span><a
href="http://upsidedownworld.org/archives/bolivia/the-dark-side-of-bolivias-half-moon/"><span>visited
with UJC members</span></a><span> in 2007, he
described them as the “brass knuckles” of the Santa
Cruz separatist movement. </span><span>“The </span><span>Unión
Juvenil</span><span> has been known to beat and whip </span><span>campesinos</span><span>
marching for gas nationalization, throw rocks at
students organizing against autonomy, toss molotov
cocktails at the state television station, and
brutally assault members of the landless movement
struggling against land monopolies,” Dangl wrote.</span></p>
<p><span>“When we have to defend our culture by force, we
will,” a UJC leader told Dangl. “The defense of
liberty is more important than life.”</span></p>
<p><span>Camacho was elected as vice president of the UJC
in 2002, when he was just 23 years old. He left the
organization two years later to build his family’s
business empire and rise through the ranks of the </span><span>Pro-Santa
Cruz Committee. It was in that organization that he
was taken under the wing of one of the separatist
movement’s most powerful figures, a Bolivian-Croatian
oligarch named Branko Marinkovic.</span></p>
<p><span>In August, Camacho tweeted a photo with his
“great friend,” Marinkovic. This friendship was
crucial to establishing the rightist activist’s
credentials and forging the basis of the coup that
would take form three months later.</span></p>
<blockquote data-width="550" data-dnt="true">
<p dir="ltr" lang="es">Hoy cumple años un gran líder
cruceño y expresidente del Comité pro Santa Cruz pero
todo un gran amigo, Branko Marinkovic, quien entregó
todo, su libertad y su vida, por su pueblo. <a
href="https://t.co/uVzNrgH2pI">pic.twitter.com/uVzNrgH2pI</a></p>
<p>— Luis Fernando Camacho (@LuisFerCamachoV) <a
href="https://twitter.com/LuisFerCamachoV/status/1164253866470383616?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">August
21, 2019</a></p>
</blockquote>
<h3><strong>Camacho’s Croatian godfather and separatist
powerbroker</strong></h3>
<p><span>Branko Marinkovic is a major landowner who ramped
up his support for the right-wing opposition after
some of his land was nationalized by the Evo Morales
government. As chairman of the Pro-Santa Cruz
Committee, he oversaw the operations of the main
engine of separatism in Bolivia. </span></p>
<p><span>In a 2008 letter to Marinkovic, the International
Federation for Human Rights </span><a
href="https://www.fidh.org/es/region/americas/bolivia/El-Comite-Civico-pro-Santa-Cruz"><span>denounced</span></a><span>
the committee as an “actor and promoter of racism and
violence in Bolivia.” </span></p>
<p><span>The human rights group added that it “condemn[ed]
the attitude and secessionist, unionist and racist
discourses as well as the calls for military
disobedience of which the Pro-Santa Cruz Civic
Committee for is one of the main promoters.” </span></p>
<p><span>In 2013, journalist Matt Kennard </span><a
href="https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/bolivian-democracy-vs-united-states/"><span>reported</span></a><span>
that the US government was working closely with the
Pro-Santa Cruz Committee to encourage the
balkanization of Bolivia and to undermine Morales.
“What they [the US] put across was how they could
strengthen channels of communication,” the vice
president of the committee told Kennard. “The embassy
said that they would help us in our communication work
and they have a series of publications where they were
putting forward their ideas.”</span></p>
<p><span>In a 2008 profile on Marinkovic, the </span><a
href="https://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/27/world/americas/27bolivia.html"><span>New
York Times</span></a><span> acknowledged the
extremist undercurrents of the Santa Cruz separatist
movement the oligarch presided over. It described the
area as “a bastion of openly xenophobic groups like
the Bolivian Socialist Falange, whose hand-in-air
salute draws inspiration from the fascist Falange of
the former Spanish dictator Franco.”</span></p>
<p><span>The Bolivian Socialist Falange was a fascist
group that provided safe haven to Nazi war criminal
Klaus Barbie during the Cold War. A former Gestapo
torture expert, Barbie was repurposed by the CIA
through its Operation Condor program to help
exterminate communism across the continent. (Despite
its antiquated name, like the German National
Socialists, this far-right extremist group was
violently anti-leftist, committed to killing
socialists.)<br>
</span></p>
<p><span>The Bolivian Falange came into power in 1971 when
its leader, Gen. Hugo Banzer Suarez, </span><a
href="https://www.nytimes.com/1971/08/23/archives/rebels-in-bolivia-crush-resistance-and-install-chief-colonel.html"><span>ousted</span></a><span>
the leftist government of Gen. Juan Jose Torres
Gonzales. The government of Gonzales had infuriated
business leaders by nationalizing industries and
antagonized Washington by ousting the Peace Corps,
which it viewed as an instrument of CIA penetration.
The Nixon administration immediately welcomed Banzer
with open arms and </span><span>courted him</span><span>
as a key bulwark against the spread of socialism in
the region. (An especially ironic <a
href="https://wikileaks.org/plusd/cables/1973STATE220267_b.html">1973
dispatch</a> appears on Wikileaks showing Secretary
of State Henry Kissinger thanking Banzer for
congratulating him on his Nobel Peace Prize).</span></p>
<p><span>The movement’s putschist legacy persevered during
the Morales era through organizations like the UJC and
figures such as Marinkovic and Camacho. </span></p>
<p><span>The Times noted that Marinkovic also supported
the activities of the UJC, describing the fascist
group as “a quasi-independent arm of the committee led
by Mr. Marinkovic.” A member of the UJC board told the
US newspaper of record in an interview, “We will
protect Branko with our own lives.”</span></p>
<p><span>Marinkovic has espoused the kind of Christian
nationalist rhetoric familiar to the far-right
organizations of Santa Cruz, calling, for instance,
for a “</span><a href="http://archive.ph/ZCfDo"><span>crusade
for the truth</span></a><span>” and insisting that </span><a
href="http://archive.ph/8ggNi"><span>God is on his
side</span></a><span>.</span></p>
<p><span>The oligarch’s family hails from Croatia, where
he has dual citizenship. Marinkovic has long been
dogged by rumors that his family members were involved
in the country’s powerful fascist Ustashe movement. </span></p>
<p><span>The Ustashe collaborated openly with Nazi German
occupiers during World War Two. Their successors
returned to power after Croatia declared independence
from the former Yugoslavia – a former socialist
country that was intentionally <a
href="https://monthlyreview.org/2007/10/01/the-dismantling-of-yugoslavia/">balkanized
in a NATO war</a>, much in the same way that
Marinkovic hoped Bolivia would be.</span></p>
<p>Marinkovic denies that his family was part of the
Ustashe. He claimed in an interview with the New York
Times that his father fought against the Nazis.</p>
<p>But even some of his sympathizers are skeptical. <span>A
Balkan analyst from the private intelligence firm
Stratfor, which works closely with the US government
and is popularly known as the “<a
href="https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2013/12/15/stratfor-canadian-government_n_4449505.html">shadow
CIA</a>,” produced a rough <a
href="https://wikileaks.org/gifiles/docs/17/1791843_on-branko-marinkovic-.html">background
profile</a> on</span> <span>Marinkovic</span><span>,
speculating, “Still don’t know his full story, but I
would bet a lot of $$$ that this dude’s parents are
1st gen (his name is too Slavic) and that they were
Ustashe (read: Nazi) sympathizers fleeing Tito’s
Communists after WWI.”</span></p>
<p><span>The Stratfor analyst excerpted a <a
href="https://www.thenation.com/article/letter-bolivia-morales-moves/">2006
article</a> by journalist Christian Parenti, who had
visited Marinkovic at his ranch in Santa Cruz. Evo
Morales’ “land reform could lead to civil war,”
Marinkovic warned Parenti in the Texas-accented
English he picked up while studying at the University
of Texas, Houston. </span></p>
<p><span>Today, Marinkovic is an ardent supporter of
Brazil’s far-right leader </span><a
href="https://correodelsur.com/politica/20190107_branko-arremete-contra-evo-y-mira-bien-a-bolsonaro.html"><span>Jair
Bolsonaro</span></a><span>, whose only complaint
about Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet was that he “</span><a
href="https://www.brasilwire.com/chilean-fury-as-bolsonaro-praises-murder-of-michelle-bachelets-father/"><span>didn’t
kill enough</span></a><span>.”</span></p>
<p><span>Marinkovic is also a public admirer of
Venezuela’s far-right opposition. “</span><a
href="http://archive.ph/nsY5I"><span>Todos somos
Leopoldo</span></a><span>” — “we are all Leopoldo,”
he tweeted in support of Leopoldo López, who has been
involved in numerous coup attempts against Venezuela’s
elected leftist government.</span></p>
<p><span>While Marinkovic denied any role in armed
militant activity in his interview with Parenti, he
was accused in 2008 of playing a central role in an
attempt to assassinate Morales and his Movement Toward
Socialism party allies. </span></p>
<p><span>He told the New York Times less than two years
before the plot developed, “If there is no legitimate
international mediation in our crisis, there is going
to be confrontation. And unfortunately, it is going to
be bloody and painful for all Bolivians.” </span></p>
<h3><strong>An assassination plot links Bolivia’s right to
international fascists</strong></h3>
<p><span>In April 2009, a special unit of the Bolivian
security services barged into a luxury hotel room and
cut down three men who were said to be involved in a
plot to kill Evo Morales. Two others remained on the
loose. Four of the alleged conspirators had Hungarian
or Croatian roots and ties to rightist politics in
eastern Europe, while another was a right-wing
Irishman, <a
href="http://www.indymedia.ie/article/92865">Michael
Dwyer</a>, who had only arrived in Santa Cruz six
months before. </span></p>
<p><span>The ringleader of the group was said to be a
former leftist journalist named Eduardo Rosza-Flores
who had turned to fascism and belonged to Opus Dei,
the traditionalist Catholic cult that emerged under
the dictatorship of Spain’s Francisco Franco. In fact,
the <a
href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/southamerica/bolivia/5185198/My-meeting-with-the-man-accused-of-plotting-the-assassination-of-Evo-Morales.html">codename</a>
Rosza-Flores assumed in the assassination plot was
“Franco,” after the late Generalissimo. </span></p>
<p><span>During the 1990s, Rosza fought on behalf of the
Croatian First International Platoon, or the PIV, in
the war to separate from Yugoslavia. A Croatian
journalist </span><span>told</span><span> Time that
the “PIV was a notorious group: 95% of them had
criminal histories, many were part of <a
href="http://content.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1892945,00.html">Nazi
and fascist groups</a>, from Germany to Ireland.” </span></p>
<p><span>By 2009, Rosza returned home to Bolivia to
crusade on behalf of another separatist movement in
Santa Cruz. And it was there that he was killed in a
luxury hotel with no apparent source of income and a
massive stockpile of guns. </span></p>
<p><span>The government later released photos of Rosza and
a co-conspirator posing with their weapons.
Publication of emails between the ringleader and </span><a
href="https://www.csmonitor.com/1998/0311/031198.intl.intl.1.html"><span>Istvan
Belovai</span></a><span>, a former Hungarian
military intelligence officer who served as a double
agent for the CIA, cemented the perception that
Washington had a hand in the operation.</span></p>
<p><span>Marinkovic was subsequently </span><a
href="https://www.irishtimes.com/news/opposition-linked-to-alleged-morales-death-plot-1.759504"><span>charged</span></a><span>
with providing $200,000 to the plotters. The
Bolivian-Croatian oligarch initially fled to the
United States, where he was given asylum, then
relocated to </span><a href="http://archive.ph/1gmMN"><span>Brazil</span></a><span>,
where he lives today. He denied any involvement in the
plan to kill Morales.</span></p>
<p><span>As journalist Matt Kennard reported, there was
another thread that tied the plot to the US: the
alleged participation of an NGO leader named Hugo Achá
Melgar.</span></p>
<p><span>“Rozsa didn’t come here by himself, they brought
him,” the Bolivian government’s lead investigator told
Kennard. “Hugo Achá Melgar brought him.”</span></p>
<h3><strong>The Human Rights Foundation destabilizes
Bolivia</strong></h3>
<p><span>Achá was not just the head of any run-of-the-mill
NGO. He had founded the Bolivian subsidiary of the
Human Rights Foundation (HRF), an international
right-wing outfit that is known for hosting a “school
for revolution” for activists seeking regime change in
states targeted by the US government. </span></p>
<p><span>HRF is run by <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/content/oslo-freedom-forum-founders-ties-islamophobes-who-inspired-mass-killer-anders-breivik/12451">Thor
Halvorssen Jr.</a>, the son of the late Venezuelan
oligarch and CIA asset Thor Halvorssen Hellum. The
first cousin of the veteran Venezuelan coup plotter
Leopoldo Lopez, Halvorssen was a former college
Republican activist who crusaded against political
correctness and other familiar right-wing hobgoblins.<br>
</span></p>
<p>After a brief career as a firebrand right-wing film
producer, in which he oversaw a scandalous <a
href="https://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/19/movies/19stra.html">“anti-environmentalist”
documentary</a> financed by a mining corporation, <span>Halvorssen
rebranded as a promoter of liberalism and the enemy of
global authoritarianism. He launched the HRF with <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/content/oslo-freedom-forum-founders-ties-islamophobes-who-inspired-mass-killer-anders-breivik/12451">grants</a>
from right-wing billionaires like Peter Thiel,
conservative foundations, and NGOs including Amnesty
International. The group has since been at the
forefront of training activists for insurrectionary
activity from Hong Kong to the Middle East to Latin
America.</span></p>
<p><span>Though Achá was granted asylum in the US, the HRF
has continued pushing regime change in Bolivia. As
Wyatt Reed </span><a
href="https://thegrayzone.com/2019/08/29/western-regime-change-operatives-launch-campaign-to-blame-bolivias-evo-morales-for-the-amazon-fires/"><span>reported
for The Grayzone</span></a><span>, HRF “freedom
fellow” Jhanisse Vaca Daza helped trigger the initial
stage of the coup by blaming Morales for the Amazon
fires that consumed parts of Bolivia in August,
mobilizing international protests against him. </span></p>
<p><span>At the time, Daza posed as an “environmental
activist” and student of non-violence who articulated
her concerns in moderate-seeming calls for more
international aid to Bolivia. Through her NGO, Rios de
Pie, she helped launch the #SOSBolivia hashtag, which
signaled the imminent foreign-backed regime-change
operation. </span></p>
<h3><span><strong>Courting the regional right, prepping
the coup</strong> </span></h3>
<p><span>While HRF’s Daza rallied protests outside
Bolivian embassies in Europe and the US, Fernando
Camacho remained behind the scenes, lobbying
right-wing governments in the region to bless the
coming coup.</span></p>
<p><span>In May, <a
href="http://www.la-razon.com/nacional/civico-duque-corteIDH-repostulacion-bolivia-evo-morales_0_3152084817.html">Camacho
met with Colombia’s far-right President Ivan Duque</a>.
Camacho was helping to spearhead regional efforts at
undermining the legitimacy of Evo Morales’ presidency
at the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, seeking
to block his candidacy in the October election.<br>
</span></p>
<p><span>That same month, the rightist Bolivian agitator
also </span><a
href="https://revistaforum.com.br/global/golpista-boliviano-que-se-reuniu-com-ernesto-araujo-manda-prender-evo-morales/"><span>met
with </span><span>Ernesto Araújo</span></a><span>,
the chancellor of Jair Bolsonaro’s ultra-conservative
administration in Brazil. Through the meeting, Camacho
successfully secured Bolsonaro’s backing for regime
change in Bolivia. </span></p>
<p><span>This November 10, <a
href="https://twitter.com/ernestofaraujo/status/1193683822312902661">Araújo</a>
enthusiastically endorsed the ouster of Morales,
declaring that “Brazil will support the democratic and
constitutional transition” in the country.</span></p>
<p><span>Then in August, two months before Bolivia’s
presidential election, Camacho held court with
officials from Venezuela’s US-appointed coup regime.
These included <a
href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yYy-lBV4cxI">Gustavo
Tarre</a>, Guaido’s faux Venezuelan OAS ambassador,
who formerly worked at the right-wing <a
href="https://thegrayzone.com/tag/csis/">Center for
Strategic and International Studies (CSIS)</a> think
tank in Washington.</span></p>
<p><span>After the meeting, Camacho </span><span>tweeted</span><span>
gratitude to the Venezuelan coup-mongers, as well as
to <a
href="http://web.archive.org/web/20191111213940/https:/twitter.com/LuisFerCamachoV/status/1166319600394539008">Colombia
and Brazil</a>.</span></p>
<blockquote data-width="550" data-dnt="true">
<p dir="ltr" lang="es">No vamos a parar hasta tener una
democracia real! Seguimos avanzando! </p>
<p>Vamos sumando apoyo… ahora lo hace Venezuela…Gracias
a Dios.. hay esperanza! </p>
<p>Gracias Colombia!<br>
Gracias Venezuela!<br>
Gracias Brasil! <a href="https://t.co/v9TQ2Fi2Sa">pic.twitter.com/v9TQ2Fi2Sa</a></p>
<p>— Luis Fernando Camacho (@LuisFerCamachoV) <a
href="https://twitter.com/LuisFerCamachoV/status/1166319600394539008?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">August
27, 2019</a></p>
</blockquote>
<h3><strong>Mesa and Camacho: a marriage of capitalist
convenience</strong></h3>
<p><span>Back in Bolivia, Carlos Mesa occupied the
spotlight as the opposition’s presidential candidate. </span></p>
<p><span>His erudite image and centrist policy proposals
put him in a seemingly alternate political universe
from fire-breathing rightists like Camacho and
Marinkovic. For them, he was a convenient front man
and acceptable candidate who promised to defend their
economic interests.</span></p>
<p><span>“It might be that he is not my favorite, but I’m
going to vote for him, because I don’t want Evo,”
Marinkovic told a right-wing </span><a
href="https://www.clarin.com/mundo/evo-morales-dice-oposicion-prepara-golpe-gana-elecciones-bolivia_0_yfrF0R2o.html"><span>Argentine
newspaper</span></a><span> five days before the
election.</span></p>
<p><span>Indeed, it was Camacho’s practical financial
interests that appeared to have necessitated his
support for Mesa. </span></p>
<p><span>The Camacho family has formed a natural gas
cartel in Santa Cruz. As the Bolivian outlet </span><a
href="https://www.primeralinea.info/camacho-promueve-el-paro-para-volver-a-aduenarse-del-negocio-del-gas-en-santa-cruz/"><span>Primera
Linea reported</span></a><span>, Luis Fernando
Camacho’s father, Jose Luis, was the owner of a
company called Sergas that distributed gas in the
city; his uncle, Enrique, controlled Socre, the
company that ran the local gas production facilities;
and his cousin, Cristian, controls another local gas
distributor called Controgas. </span></p>
<p><span>According to Primera Linea, the Camacho family
was using the Pro-Santa Cruz Committee as a political
weapon to install Carlos Mesa into power and ensure
the restoration of their business empire. </span></p>
<p><span>Mesa has a well-documented history of advancing
the goals of transnational companies at the expense of
his own country’s population. The neoliberal
politician and media personality served as vice
president when the US-backed President Gonzalo “Goni”
Sanchez de Lozada <a
href="https://corpwatch.org/article/bolivian-president-falls-over-gas-sale-california">provoked
mass protests</a> with his 2003 plan to allow a
consortium of multinational corporations to export the
country’s natural gas to the US through a Chilean
port. </span></p>
<p><span>Bolivia’s US-trained security forces met the
ferocious protests with <a
href="https://ccrjustice.org/home/press-center/press-releases/new-allegations-government-planning-2003-bolivian-massacre">brutal
repression</a>. After </span><a
href="https://www.baltimoresun.com/news/bs-xpm-2003-11-23-0311230173-story.html"><span>presiding
over</span></a><span> the killing of 70 unarmed
protesters, Sanchez de Lozada fled to Miami and was
succeeded by Mesa. </span></p>
<p><span>By 2005, Mesa was also <a
href="http://www.coha.org/the-imf-and-the-washington-consensus-a-misunderstood-and-poorly-implemented-development-strategy/">ousted
by huge demonstrations</a> spurred by his protection
of privatized natural gas companies. With his demise,
the election of Morales and the rise of the socialist
and rural Indigenous movements behind him were just
beyond the horizon.</span></p>
<p>US government cables released by WikiLeaks show that,
after his ouster, Mesa continued regular correspondence
with American officials. A <a
href="https://wikileaks.org/plusd/cables/08LAPAZ2311_a.html">2008
memo</a> from the US embassy in Bolivia revealed that
Washington was conspiring with opposition politicians in
the lead-up to the 2009 presidential election, hoping to
undermine and ultimately unseat Morales.</p>
<p>The memo noted that Mesa had met with the chargé
d’affaires of the US embassy, and had privately told
them he planned to run for president. The cable
recalled: “Mesa told us his party will be ideologically
similar to a social democratic party and that he hoped
to strengthen ties with the Democratic party. ‘We have
nothing against the Republican party, and have in fact
gotten support from IRI (International Republican
Institute) in the past, but we think we share more
ideology with the Democrats,’ he added.”</p>
<p><img data-attachment-id="16517"
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<p><span>Today, Mesa serves as an </span><a
href="https://www.thedialogue.org/experts/carlos-mesa/"><span>in-house
“expert”</span></a><span> at the Inter-American
Dialogue, a neoliberal Washington-based think tank
focused on Latin America. One of the Dialogue’s top
donors is the US Agency for International Development
(USAID), the State Department subsidiary that was
exposed in classified diplomatic cables published on
Wikileaks for strategically directing </span><a
href="https://www.mintpressnews.com/wikileaks-us-government-plotted-to-kill-bolivian-president-evo-morales/210255/"><span>millions
of dollars</span></a><span> to opposition groups
including those “opposed to Evo Morales’ vision for
indigenous communities.” </span></p>
<p><span>Other top <a
href="https://www.thedialogue.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/IAD_BiennialReport_WEB.pdf">funders
of the Dialogue</a> include oil titans like Chevron
and ExxonMobil; Bechtel, which inspired the initial
protests against the administration in which Mesa
served; the Inter-American Development Bank, which has
forcefully opposed Morales’ socialist-oriented
policies; and the Organization of American States
(OAS), which helped delegitimize the Morales’s
re-election victory with dubious claims of irregular
vote counts.</span></p>
<h3><strong>Finishing the job</strong></h3>
<p><span>When Carlos Mesa touched off nationwide protests
in October by accusing the Evo Morales government of
committing electoral fraud, the right-wing firebrand
hailed by his followers as “Macho Camacho” emerged
from the shadows. Behind him was the hardcore
separatist shock force that he led in Santa Cruz. </span></p>
<p><span>Mesa faded into the distance as Camacho emerged
as the authentic face of the coup, rallying his forces
with the uncompromising rhetoric and fascist symbology
that defined the Unión Juvenil Cruceñista
paramilitary. </span></p>
<p><span>As he declared victory over Morales, Camacho
exhorted his followers to</span> <span>“finish the
job, let’s get the elections going, let’s start
judging the government criminals, let’s put them in
jail.”</span></p>
<p>Back in Washington, meanwhile, the Trump administration
released an <a
href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/statement-president-donald-j-trump-regarding-resignation-bolivian-president-evo-morales/">official
statement</a> celebrating Bolivia’s coup, declaring
that “Morales’s departure preserves democracy.”</p>
<hr>
<p><em><a
href="https://thegrayzone.com/author/max-blumenthal/"><strong>Max
Blumenthal</strong></a> is an award-winning
journalist and author, and the founder and editor of
The Grayzone.</em></p>
<p><em><strong><a
href="https://thegrayzone.com/author/ben-norton/">Ben
Norton</a></strong> is a journalist, writer, and
filmmaker, and the assistant editor of The Grayzone.</em></p>
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