The alliance of Venezuela and Cuba took a major leap with the signing of 14 economic accords by Hugo Chávez and Raúl Castro on Oct. 15. The pacts include massive energy and communications projects between the two countries.
In a buoyant display of the countries’ close relations, Venezuela’s president arrived in the Cuban city of Santa Clara to
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As noted in the press, Chávez proposed a “confederation” of the two countries.
The 14 pacts join 19 existing ones, signed since 2001, when both countries embarked on a strategy of “economic integration,” through the “Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas,” ALBA in Spanish.
ALBA is the revolutionary governments’ antidote to ALCA, Spanish acronym for the FTAA, Free Trade Agreement of the Americas. Bolivia and Nicaragua are also members of ALBA.
The FTAA, a sweeping scheme pushed by the U.S. government to open up Latin America to unfettered U.S. investment and goods, has failed to win approval by a number of Latin American governments. Growing awareness by the people of Latin America of the disastrous consequences of neo-liberal policies such as NAFTA in Mexico has made it harder for the United States to force such pacts through.
In response the U.S. government has turned to the tactic of individual or regional “free-trade” pacts with certain countries closer to its orbit, such as Colombia, El Salvador, Honduras, and Costa Rica. After intense pressure and a media scare campaign, Costa Ricans narrowly approved the Central America Free Trade Agreement.
In a frank admission of the U.S. government’s concern over losing ground in Latin America, Nicholas Burns, undersecretary of state, told the press on Oct. 22, that Congress’s failure to ratify a U.S. trade agreement with Colombia “will embolden someone like Hugo Chávez to think that he can make hay out of that crisis, and it will be a crisis if the free trade agreement does not pass.”
The Venezuela-Cuba alliance and Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas offers trade and investment on equal terms.
More importantly, the ALBA members’ outlook is based on solidarity with the millions of poor and super-exploited masses, and the use of each country’s resources for real development.
The Havana-Caracas agreements signed on Oct. 15 are a further step in that direction.
The new agreements entail major energy and communications development that will certainly help loosen the vestiges of under-development that continue to debilitate Latin America and the Caribbean.
In the southeastern Cuban city of Cienfuegos, Chávez and Raúl Castro broke ground for a massive petrochemical complex and shipping terminal that will refine petroleum and convert liquefied gas to natural gas. The plant was built by the Soviet Union but has been closed for years.
Cuba’s telecommunications has long been in need of improvements. Now, through a credit arrangement with China, Cuba and Venezuela will form a joint venture to build an underwater fiber-optics cable to the island.
In his speech at Havana’s Convention Center on Oct. 15, Chávez said, “This project, which costs 70 million dollars, will break the communications blockade that they have on Cuba and ours as well. … It is a silent blockade, a terrible dependence. It is an underwater fiber-optic line of [930 miles], connected the national networks of both countries, with the possibility of expanding it towards third countries in the Caribbean.”
It will also greatly improve Cuba’s access to internet.
This month a neo-liberal agreement was narrowly adopted in Costa Rica by the voting population, after intense TV campaigning and apocalyptic threats by President Oscar Arias.
Venezuela and Cuba have played a major role in galvanizing opposition to the FTAA and other “free-trade” agreements in Latin America.
Nonetheless, Venezuela’s and Cuba’s alliance is attracting other countries whose leaders have been elected by a new mood demanding real social and economic improvements in the people’s lives.
This has the U.S. imperialists extremely worried and they are sparing no effort to fund counter-revolutionary elements, to employ terrorist attacks, and to beat a steady drumbeat of aggressive threats.
