Wednesday, 15 May 2013

A response to Chavista sympathizers in Norway

Oslo's Freedom Forum took place 14 May. Venezuelan opposition politician Borges was one of the invited guests. A group of "Latin American researchers" wrote a letter in Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten criticizing the "biased position" of the forum. Those researchers were particularly disturbed by the presence of people opposing the Cuban and Venezuelan governments, people like Borges, whom they accuse of being just "a coup monger" and by what they considered an over-representation of people from "the right".

Fortunately, soon after that a group of international activists responded. You can see the letter here (in Norwegian). You can get a rough machine translation here. Among the signatories depending the OFF's position you find people like Chen Guancheng, Garry Kasparov and quite some others. The letter shows how such accusations as stated against Borges are typically used against other people fighting for human rights (among them San Suu Kyui). I just regret the letter didn't go deep into the 2002 events, but then I can refer you to my comment (in English) there or to literature about the 2002 coup.


2 comments:

  1. A good book on Chavez appeared recently in Norway: "Diktator I Forkledning" by Kristian Tonning Riise. I am proud of having collaborated on the research for this book,as the author says: "grundig research og gode diskusjoner underveis".

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thanks for telling us that, Gustavo. And thanks for contributing.

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