Chavez-Bush rivalry threatens to overshadow Americas summit

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11.04.2005, 01:32 AM

MAR DEL PLATA, Argentina (AFX) - US-Venezuelan tensions and protests against US President George Bush Friday threaten to overshadow trade and anti-poverty agendas at a summit of hemispheric leaders in this Argentine resort.

Some 8,000 security forces were deployed to Mar del Plata for the Summit of the Americas, as several thousand people were expected to march Friday in an anti-Bush rally led by Argentine football legend Diego Maradona.

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, a frequent critic of US policies, is expected to speak at a counter-summit, called the People's Summit, organized by the protestors.

The leftist Chavez and Bush are not expected to hold one-on-one talks at the fourth Summit of the Americas, but their rivalry risks stealing the spotlight from the its agenda.

Nelson Cunningham, who was former president Bill Clinton Latin America adviser, said he feared the summit would be limited to 'a confrontation between president Bush and president Chavez, which is likely to dominate the headlines, with the US having far fewer allies in that confrontation that we should.'

While Bush's national security adviser, Stephen Hadley, insisted that the summit was 'not about Hugo Chavez,' other US officials have underscored the two nations' differences.

'Our respective governments have very different visions for the hemisphere,' said Tom Shannon, the chief US diplomat for the Western Hemisphere.

'It's thus hard to imagine a productive dialogue when the Venezuelan government has repeatedly made clear its negative intentions with respect to the summit and its personal animosity toward the president,' he said.

Shannon said Bush would work at the summit on a 'positive agenda' to create jobs and 'help the poor and traditionally marginalized group fully join the economic life of their countries.'

Argentine officials want leaders Friday and Saturday to concentrate on ways of eradicating poverty and creating jobs, but free trade will also figure prominently in the meetings.

The United States hopes to revive the stalled Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) talks, which it proposed at the first summit in 1994.

But Latin American countries are divided over the FTAA.

'Every country or group of countries is standing by their positions and no one is ready to budge,' said a source close to Argentine negotiators.

A US-led group that includes Canada, Mexico, Chile, Colombia and Caribbean nations wants the summit's final declaration to schedule a new round of FTAA negotiations in 2006.

But the Mercosur trade bloc, which includes regional powerhouse Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay, refuses to set a date and instead proposes general wording on economic integration.

Setting a date 'is more rhetoric than concrete, because no one expects that a paragraph can relaunch negotiations,' said a Brazilian negotiator.

For his part, Chavez, a close ally of Cuban leader Fidel Castro, has vowed to 'bury' the FTAA. Castro will not attend the summit.

The summit participants will announce Saturday a series of commitments to combat poverty and unemployment in the Americas.

The vast Western Hemisphere is a tale of two regions, with Canada and the United States living in prosperity while their southern neighbors struggle to lift their citizens out of poverty.

Last year, Latin America reported record growth of around 5.5 pct, but poverty affects some 220 million of the region's 512 million residents.

Worse, some 96 million people in the region survive on less than one dollar per day, according to the United Nations.