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US Senators Criticize Robertson Call to Assassinate Chavez •
Robertson Is Pilloried for Assassination Call •
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Venezuela Slams Robertson over Remarks
The Associated Press
Tuesday 23 August 2005
Caraca, Venezuela - Pat Robertson's call for American agents to assassinate President Hugo Chavez is a "terrorist" statement that needs to be investigated by U.S. authorities, Venezuela said Tuesday. The Bush administration quickly distanced itself from the religious broadcaster.
Robertson's suggestion Monday that the United States "take out" Chavez to stop Venezuela from becoming a "launching pad for communist influence and Muslim extremism" appeared likely to aggravate tensions between the United States and the world's fifth-largest oil exporting country.
Chavez, who was democratically elected, has emerged as one of the most outspoken critics of President Bush, accusing the United States of conspiring to topple his government and possibly backing plots to assassinate him. The United States is the top buyer of Venezuelan oil, but Chavez has made it clear he wants to decrease the country's dependence on the U.S. market by finding other buyers.
Winding up a visit to Cuba, Chavez said in response to questions from reporters about Roberston's remarks that such comments did not matter to him and that he would prefer to "talk about life."
"I don't even know who that person is," said Chavez, standing next to Cuban leader Fidel Castro at Havana's airport.
In Venezuela, however, Vice President Jose Vicente Rangel said the U.S. response to Robertson would be a test of its anti-terrorist policy and that Venezuela was studying its legal options.
"It's a huge hypocrisy to maintain this discourse against terrorism and at the same time, in the heart of that country, there are entirely terrorist statements like those," Rangel said.
Asked about his vice president's statementS, Chavez said, "we haven't heard anything." Castro, referring to Robertson's words, said "only God can punish crimes of such magnitude."
Rangel called Robertson "a man who seems to have quite a bit of influence in that country," adding that the comments "reveal that religious fundamentalism is one of the great problems facing humanity in these times."
At the Pentagon, Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld said when asked about Robertson's comments: "Our department doesn't do that kind of thing. It's against the law. He's a private citizen. Private citizens say all kinds of things all the time."
State Department spokesman Sean McCormack called Robertson's remarks "inappropriate."
"This is not the policy of the United States government. We do not share his views," McCormack said.
The United States was believed in the past to have been involved in the 1963 assassination of South Vietnam President Ngo Dinh Diem and attempts to assassinate Castro.
Political assassination was put off-limits by former President Gerald R. Ford in an executive order in the mid-1970s.
Rumsfeld said he knew of no consideration ever being given to assassinating Chavez.
Robertson is a founder of the Christian Coalition of America and a supporter of Bush, who was elected twice with the solid backing of Christian conservatives.
The 75-year-old religious broadcaster has made controversial statements in the past. In October 2003, he suggested that the State Department be blown up with a nuclear device. He has also said that feminism encourages women to "kill their children, practice witchcraft, destroy capitalism and become lesbians."
On Monday, Robertson said on the Christian Broadcast Network's "The 700 Club": "We have the ability to take him (Chavez) out, and I think the time has come that we exercise that ability."
"We don't need another $200 billion war to get rid of one, you know, strong-arm dictator," he continued. "It's a whole lot easier to have some of the covert operatives do the job and then get it over with."
A spokeswoman for Robertson, Angell Watts, declined to elaborate on his statements Tuesday and said Robertson would not be available to comment.
Chavez has irritated U.S. officials with his fiery rhetoric against American "imperialism" and his increasingly close ties to U.S. enemies such as Cuba and Iran. He says he is leading Venezuela toward socialism and, in a visit to Cuba this week, praised Castro's system as a "revolutionary democracy."
Chavez left Cuba Tuesday afternoon for Jamaica to discuss Petrocaribe, a Venezuela initiative to supply petroleum to Caribbean countries under favorable terms.
The Venezuelan president for the first time offered to help impoverished U.S. communities with their fuel needs as well, complaining that middle men have taken advantage of the American poor by pushing up the prices of gasoline and diesel unnecessarily high.
"We could also help some poor communities in the United States, directly selling them gasoline," Chavez said. He did not explain how the direct sales would work.
Although he is disliked in Washington, Venezuelans overwhelmingly supported Chavez in a failed recall effort by the opposition.
Venezuela has demanded in the past that the United States crack down on Cuban and Venezuelan "terrorists" in Florida who they say are plotting against Chavez with conspirators in Venezuela.
Chavez, a former army paratrooper, also has accused Washington of backing a short-lived coup against him in 2002, a charge U.S. officials have denied. Chavez is up for re-election next year, and polls suggest he is the favorite.
Bernardo Alverez, the Venezuelan ambassador to Washington, said Tuesday that "it is essential that the U.S. government guarantee his safety when he visits this country in the future. ... We are concerned about the safety of our president."
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US Senators Criticize Robertson Call to Assassinate Chavez
Bloomberg
Tuesday 23 August 2005
U.S. Senators Norm Coleman, Republican of Minnesota and Mel Martinez, Republican of Florida, said a call by U.S. televangelist Pat Robertson for the U.S. government to assassinate Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez was "irresponsible" and "incredibly stupid."
The senators, visiting Brazil to meet with government and business leaders, spoke with reporters today in Rio de Janeiro.
"It was an incredibly stupid statement and has no reflection on reality," said Coleman, the chairman of the Senate's Foreign Relations subcommittee on the western hemisphere. "I met with President Chavez on my last visit a couple of months ago and he related that concern to me, about how the U.S. was out to assassinate him. I told him not to lose any sleep about it."
Robertson, a television evangelist, said yesterday on a broadcast of his "700 Club" program that Chavez is a "dangerous enemy." He said killing Chavez would be cheaper than going to war to remove him.
"We have the ability to take him out, and I think the time has come to exercise that ability," Robertson said.
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Robertson Is Pilloried for Assassination Call
By Laurie Goodstein
The New York Times
Tuesday 23 August 2005
Pat Robertson, the conservative Christian broadcaster, has attracted attention over the years for lambasting everything from feminists and "activist" judges to the United Nations and Disney World.
Now Mr. Robertson has set off an international firestorm with his comments on his television broadcast that the United States should kill Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez, a leftist who sits atop the largest oil reserves outside the Middle East.
"If he thinks we're trying to assassinate him, I think that we really ought to go ahead and do it Mr. Robertson said on his program, "The 700 Club" on Monday. "It's a whole lot cheaper than starting a war. And I don't think any oil shipments will stop."
Today, Mr. Robertson's statements were denounced by both the State Department and Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld. In Caracas, Mr. Robertson was criticized by the vice president of Venezuela, and in Cuba, by President Fidel Castro.
Vice President José Vicente Rangel of Venezuela said: "This is a huge hypocrisy to maintain an antiterrorist line and at the same time have such terrorist statements as these made by Christian preacher Pat Robertson coming from the same country." He told reporters, "The ball is in the U.S. court now."
Mr. Rumsfeld dismissed Mr. Robertson's call for Mr. Chávez's assassination, saying to reporters: "Certainly it's against the law. Our department doesn't do that type of thing." He added, "Private citizens say all kinds of things all the time."
Sean McCormack, a State Department spokesman called Mr. Robertson's comments "inappropriate." Mr. Robertson unsuccessfully sought the Republican presidential nomination in 1988. He has often used his television program and the political advocacy group he founded, the Christian Coalition, to drum up support for Mr. Bush.
"Mr. Robertson has been one of the president's staunchest allies," said Bernardo álvarez, the Venezuelan ambassador to the United States. "His statement demands the strongest condemnation by the White House."
Some of Mr. Robertson's conservative Christian allies distanced themselves from his comments. Rev. Rob Schenck, president of the National Clergy Council in Washington, released a statement calling on Mr. Robertson to "immediately apologize, retract his statement and clarify what the Bible and Christianity teaches about the permissibility of taking human life outside of law."
The Rev. Richard Cizik of the National Association of Evangelicals said in an interview that he and "most evangelical leaders" would disassociate themselves from such "unfortunate and particularly irresponsible" comments.
"It complicates circumstances for foreign missionaries and Christian aid workers overseas who are already perceived, wrongly, especially by leftists and other leaders, as collaborators with U.S. intelligence agencies," he added.
But other conservative Christian organizations remained silent, with leaders at the Traditional Values Coalition, the Family Research Council and the Christian Coalition saying through spokesmen that they were too busy to comment.
A spokeswoman for Pat Robertson said today that he is not giving interviews and had no further comment.
Liberals, however, were not silent. The Rev. Jesse Jackson called for an investigation by the Federal Communications Commission, just as it did when Janet Jackson's breast was exposed during a Superbowl broadcast. "This is even more threatening to hemispheric stability than the flash of a breast on television during a ball game," he said.
One liberal watchdog group, Media Matters for America, sent a letter urging the ABC Family network to stop carrying Mr. Robertson's program. Another group, Americans United for Separation of Church and State, asked President Bush to repudiate Mr. Roberson personally.
The program is broadcast by ABC Family, which agreed to carry it as part of the deal ABC made in 2001 to buy Fox Family Worldwide, which previously aired it.
In a statement today, ABC Family said the network was "contractually obligated to air 'The 700 Club' and has no editorial control over views expressed by the hosts or guests."
It added, "ABC Family strongly rejects the views expressed by Pat Robertson in the Aug. 22 telecast of the program."
Mr. Chávez, who won office in 1998, has become the Bush administration's most vocal antagonist in Latin America, accusing President Bush of terrorism for the war in Iraq and of trying to impoverish developing countries by pushing market reforms for their economies.
Mr. Chávez has often accused the United States of trying to assassinate him. The White House quickly welcomed a coup against Mr. Chávez in April 2002, but the Venezuelan president was returned to power two days later.
Today, Mr. Chávez was visiting Mr. Castro in Havana, where he shrugged off Mr. Robertson's assassination call. But Mr. Castro, standing beside the Venezuelan president, said of Mr. Robertson's remarks, "I think only God can punish crimes of such magnitude."
Mr. Robertson made his comments on his program immediately followed a segment about Venezuela. Speaking live in the studio, Mr. Robertson asserted that Mr. Chávez had "destroyed the Venezuelan economy" and was turning Venezuela into "a launching pad for communist infiltration and Muslim extremism."
"Without question this is a dangerous enemy to our south, controlling a huge pool of oil that could hurt us very badly," Mr. Robertson said. "We have the ability to take him out and I think the time has come that we exercise that ability. We don't need another $200 billion war to get rid of one, you know, strong-arm dictator."
"The 700 Club" has an audience of about one million people, according to Mr. Robertson's Web site.
Mr. Robertson has a history of getting attention for inflammatory remarks. In May, he argued that the threat to the United States from activist judges was "probably more serious than a few bearded terrorists who fly into buildings." In 2003, Mr. Robertson said "maybe we need a very small nuke thrown" at State Department headquarters "to shake things up."
In 1998, he warned that hurricanes and other natural disasters would sweep down on Orlando, Fla., because homosexuals were flocking to Disney World there on special "gay days." And he has often denounced the United Nations as a first step toward a dangerous "one world government."
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