Venezuela's Chavez Is Losing Influence, Says U.S.
Venezuela's Chavez is losing influence, says U.S
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(Gold9472: Mainstream... what's that? Bending over and taking it up the...)
Wed Nov 15, 2006 2:27pm ET
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez is losing influence worldwide and his "rhetorical bombs" against President George W. Bush have back-fired, a senior U.S. official said on Wednesday.
Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns, currently the no. 2 official in the State Department, pointed to Venezuela's failure to win a seat on the U.N. Security Council as a sign of the firebrand Venezuelan leader's waning importance.
"People see him for what he is, he is somebody who divides, who throws little bombs -- rhetorical bombs into rooms -- and he seeks to tear people down," Burns told a security conference at the State Department.
Burns said the speech Chavez made at the U.N.'s General Assembly in September, in which he called Bush the devil, had cost his country an open U.N. Security Council seat that ultimately went to Panama.
"The speech he made that was so critical and so objectionable and critical of President Bush -- that backfired," Burns said. "I think Chavez is losing influence."
Burns predicted Chavez would lose influence, but several influential Latin American leaders have rallied around the Venezuelan leader in recent weeks.
This week President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, the leader of Brazil, Latin America's economic and diplomatic heavyweight, embraced and heaped praise on his fellow leftist during a visit to Venezuela, and predicted he would win reelection next month.
Most recent polls in Venezuela show Chavez easily winning the December 3 election with more than 50 percent of the vote.
Venezuela is a major oil supplier to the United States but has very strained ties with Washington, which Chavez says is his no. 1 enemy.
Chavez is a close ally of Bolivia's President Evo Morales but Burns said he hoped the Bolivian leader would change his allegiance to more moderate Latin American leaders.
"We would like to encourage President Morales to go with the mainstream (in Latin America)," Burns said.
