VENEZUELA THREATENS TO WITHDRAW FROM COMMUNITY OF ANDEAN NATIONS.
In retaliation for Colombia's and Peru's decision to sign a free-trade agreement (FTA) with the US (see NotiSur, 2006-01-13 and 2006-03-10), Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has announced that he will pull out of the Comunidad Andina de Naciones (CAN), a regional trade bloc that also includes Ecuador and Bolivia. Chavez's decision increased tensions between his government and those of Colombia and Peru, while Chavez ally Bolivian President Evo Morales initially called on him not to pull out of the bloc.
Response to approval of free trade agreements
Chavez said that the decision to pull out of the CAN was a response to the acquiescence of Presidents Alejandro Toledo of Peru and Alvaro Uribe of Colombia to US trade deals. Chavez also announced a set of protectionist measures to insulate his country from an "invasion" of US products through neighboring countries. Venezuela has been attempting to rebuild its suffering agricultural sector, which has declined since oil became the country's primary economic driver (see NotiSur, 2005-03-18).
Venezuela cannot compete against "subsidized products" from the US, said Chavez, who accused Colombia and Peru of killing the CAN by signing free-trade pacts with Washington. "It is a strategic decision to safeguard the national interests," Chavez said April 23 on his weekly radio and TV program. Chavez says FTAs with the US benefit big international companies at the expense of the region's poor.
Chavez announced the withdrawal from CAN the week before, calling it a "fatally wounded" group after Colombia and Peru finalized the trade pacts with the US. "We will have to take a series of measures to protect us from the invasion of products from the US through Colombia and other countries like Peru that have signed the free-trade agreements," he said. "The decision is irrevocable," Chavez said, adding that the US government "intends to impose an international dictatorship."
Venezuela notified the CAN on April 22 of its decision, but the pullout will be "a long process" of about five years, said Maria Cristina Iglesias, the government's minister of commerce and light industry.
Still, Chavez said Venezuela could ask for "an acceleration of the process of disconnecting from the agreements." Iglesias said that the government would study each area of exchange with the bloc and that the country "would fulfill all its obligations."
Foreign Minister Ali Rodriguez said in a letter to the CAN that the US trade deals with Colombia and Peru go against the "original...
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