Thursday, July 28, 2005

ABA observer sharply critical of judiciary in Sumate's case. The American Bar Association sent an observer to Caracas for the preelimianry hearing agaisnt the Suamte leaders. Alek has the complete excellent scoop on the report which is quite critical of the way the case is being handled. Some highlights: "In the opinion of this observer, both that law as applied in this case and the criminal proceedings to date fail to meet international standards." "First, as applied in a novel way in this case, the law is impermissibly vague." "Second, the ambiguities in the law should be resolved in a manner consistent with Venezuela’s international legal obligations." "Third, the case is brought before a Venezuelan judiciary that fails to meet international standards of judicial independence." "Fourth, certain aspects of the pretrial proceedings to date violate due process of law." Rule of Law: Gone too! 10:59:51 PM    comment []

Reply to Isaias by Teodoro Petkoff Yesterday I talked about the Editorial that threw the Attorney General/Prosecutor into a rage. Today Tal Cual Editor Petkoff, a former very good friend of  Prosecutor Isaias Rodriguez, gives him hell for his attitude. Well deserved. Will Isaias also investigate whether he can jail Teodoro? Reply to Isaias by Teodoro Petkoff Yesterday the poet Isaias had his fuses blown. He accused the Andean Commission of Jurists, the Center for Justice and International Law (Cejil) and 83 jurists from nine countries of “improper interference “ in Venezuelan matters, because they demanded respect for the constitutional rights of lawyer Carlos Ayala Corao, President, by the way, of the Andean Commission of Jurists, who has been charged by the Prosecutor’s Office. He announced the opening of an investigation of daily El Universal to find out if an editorial of that daily was a punishable offense and eventually take the appropriate measures in the case. He also accuses Tal Cual of being part of an international conspiracy, of “harassment” against him, promoted according to guidelines of the new manual for coups, elaborated by the CIA. Isaias, without any doubt, is delirious. First of all, it is surprising that the representative from a Government characterized by its intromissions, whose President frequently gives opinions about internal matters of other countries, without hiding its links with political sectors of those countries, would complain abut the “intromission by the alluded international organizations”. The world of today, Isaias, is like that. Countries are more interdependent than ever and no Government can believe it is sheltered from international scrutiny. If the prosecutor behaved correctly, nobody would demand anything. But the Prosecutor’s office, Isaías himself has said it, is a body which you can have little trust in and it forces jurists from the Continent to have a watchful eye given its actions. In second place, the announcement of the opening of an investigation against El Universal already shows that those who are concerned with the respect of the constitutional rights of Venezuelans on the part of the Government, are quite correct in being worried. Isaias attempts to place obstacles on the exercise of freedom of speech. He pretends to charge El Universal with nothing but “a crime of opinion”. Isaias has revealed to us his authentic vocation as a censor of the press. In the third place, the reference to Tal Cual is frankly incomprehensible. To occupy ourselves with the Prosecutor’s office we don’t need to consult any CIA manual, it is sufficient with the digital page of the Public Ministry (MP) where Isaias places his considerations about the organization he directs. It is the Prosecutor himself who has said that the MP is full of “family” groups, of groups of “friends”, of people permanently “on leave”, of “cattle rustlers”, of “despots” with those below them and “disrespectful” of those above them. First he spoke of “cliques that brake, delay, slow down, block” . Later he corrected himself and qualified them as “ship nuts*”, which are impossible to loosen up. The poet denounced that his underlings “lack the preparation and do not have the technical knowledge in order to make decisions”. How does he pretend when he says things as serious (and as true) of his civil servants, that people abroad should not be concerned about the administration of justice in our country? Isaias complains because El Universal spoke of “justice on its knees”, but if we rely only on what he says, it is truly not on its knees, but on the floor, like a rag. * In Spanish this implies you are so “screwed” into your position, nobody can remove you 8:34:00 PM    comment []

Another threat to freedom of the press For the last three years, I have been translating the Editorials of Tal Cual by Teodoro Petkoff, which have been extremely critical of the Government. I have yet to hear a Government official complain about them. That is why it is truly remarkable to hear that the Government is opening a penal investigation against El Universal for the Editorial below. For the last two days the “Attorney General/Prosecutor” has been reacting viciously against the Editorial in El Universal which I translate below. This is simply another sign of the intolerance and fascist streak that runs through this Government. Freedom of the Fress? Give me a break! If the Attorney General could take pride in what he has done in the last few years, maybe he could have complained about being criticized harshly. But to suggest that the following Editorial subjects his Office to public “scorn” is simply to ratify what most Venezuelans both pro and against Chávez feel. There is no Justice and rule of law in Venezuela. There have been hundreds of deaths and injured in political marches that remain unexplained, there has been an increase in crime and police brutality that has no counterpart in the number of cases prosecuted or convicted, there have been over a thousand cases of “disappeared” people in rural states in the hands of the police (mostly "pueblo"), there have been daily deaths in the country’ jails and we have yet to hear about what is being done about any of it. Or what Mr. Rodriguez, responsible for Justice in Venezuela is doing about it. While corruption runs rampant in the Chavez administration, not one case of courruption has been prosecuted, while hundreds of members of the opposition including human rights activist of international stature are harassed and prosecuted regularly. Meanwhile, people Chavez has fired fo corruption, resurface in oether prominent Government positions like the former Head of Fogade. And we will not forget the “solved” cases, such as the death of his Prosecutor and close confidant Danilo Anderson, whose wealth, lifestyle and behavior have yet to be explained, after the Government rendered him the honors of a dead patriot and Mr. Rodríguez shed his crocodile tears for him after his assassination The Attorney General has made a mockery out of the rule of law and due process, choosing instead to support the Government of which he was the first Vice President, a fact that will not be forgotten by Venezuelans when the day of reckoning comes. And now he threatens one of the very rights he is supposed to defend, the right of free speech. Nobody will ever forget his partisan role on Chávez’ return on April 12th., arms up in the air in celebration as the corpses were still warm and  leaving the murders of innocents Venezuelans in the black hole of the impunity that permeates this administration. Mr. Isaias Rodriguez represents the fascism, cynism and intolerance of this Government. What he has done today is simply another attempt to muzzle free speech and silence one of the few voices for freedom left in Venezuela. If rather than threatening and accusing El Universal, Mr. Rodríguez investigated the cases presented every Sunday in that paper’s “Expediente” cases he would have made a positive contribution to the country. But he is not interested in that, he is among those that believe that the fake revolution is immortal and he wants to have a prominent role in it. We will never forget. Here is the translation of the meek editorial that has irked the Attorney General and has made him behave like the partisan and mediocre politician and human being he really is: Justice on its knees To subordinate justice to one ideological dimension, subtracting form it efficiency and autonomy, is to place the engine out of the rails, leaving the wagons defenseless and abandoned. That is why there has been an increasing lack of legitimacy on the part of the Public Ministry and the Courts The center of interest from the point of view of the news is crime, guerrillas, paramilitary groups and the lack of security in general. The center of interest may also be criminalility, but what should concentrate the greatest efforts of public administration is the penal process, when the index of convictions is very scant and impunity triumphs. In this context are the statements by the Executive Director of COFAVCIC, analizing the specific modus operandi, which reveals deviations and perversions in security forces and in the administration of justice itself. That is the gravity of the alarm, when you prove that all citizens in Venezuela are subject to a very high risk of abuse. As Cofavic has pointed out, the politization of the penal system and its inefficiency, besides the inexistence of a policy against crime, which is a set of actions focused on directing the prevention and reduction of criminality in a ratiuonal and scientific way, all end up in this increasing insecurity. As a consequence, penal justice has to be professional and has to be coordinated with prevention, investigation repression and the treatment at penitentiaries, because the relation between justice and society tends to destabilize the latter even more. From it, the feeling of insecurity in the face of Government statements and the manipulation of statistics. A large part of the directives and procedures for social control demand a profound revision and as the absolute priority is the rational combat of poverty, with the participation of social, economic and political sectors of the country. The fight against poverty is not the exclusive realm of anyone but of the Nation, understood as a productive and harmonic set. There has to be work closely done among specialists both national and foreign in maintaining the decentralization of police forces, improve the regional mechanisms for coordination and strengthen justice making it professional, autonomous sand objective. That is the highest aspiration of all the citizens. 1:19:18 AM    comment []