PARADOX: Venezuela accused by the United States when it is the United States which protects criminals like Luis Posada Carriles

Caracas Daily Journal (Jeremy Morgan): Foreign Minister Nicolas Maduro accused United States Secretary of State John Negroponte of plotting to create divisions between "brother peoples such as the Venezuelans and the Colombians." The minister was reported by news agencies as having said at the meeting in Medellín, Colombia, that Negroponte didn't have "a curriculum but a criminal record because he's responsible for the disappearances, tortures and deaths in Central America and various parts of the world."

Negroponte was the representative of the United States and the foreign service of that country had been besmirched by having Negroponte as its representative, Maduro was reported to have added.

The United States was behind "intrigues" and the "decent people" of Colombia must know it, Maduro continued. He claimed that a "political operation and a show" was being mounted about files said to have been found in a computer allegedly belonging to Raúl Reyes - the deputy commander of the Revolutionary Forces of Colombia (FARC) who was killed on March 1. The aim of all this, Maduro claimed, was to "accuse factors outside Colombia" of being "guardians of the FARC" and behind it was the Bush Administration and Negroponte. It was a paradox, he added, that Venezuela was accused by the United States when it was that country which protected criminals.

Maduro cited the example of Luis Posada Carriles, who's long been held responsible for planting a bomb on a Cuban airliner that blew up in mid-air in 1976, killing all 73 people on board. Posada Carriles, who is said to be a Venezuelan citizen of Cuban origin, escaped from a Venezuelan jail years ago but turned up in Miami earlier this decade. Efforts to have him extradited to Venezuela came to naught amid allegations he'd been on the payroll at the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).

While this remains a matter of argument, the fact that Posada Carriles has not been returned is seen in Caracas as a sign of two-tongued talk by the United States as it repeatedly urges the need to battle terrorism around the world.