President Hugo Chavez Warns of US Plan to Divide Venezuela

President Hugo Chavez warned Friday of a separatist plan orchestrated by the United States to take control of natural and other economic resources in several states in the west of Venezuela. “To be united is our best emblem. We must be alert to the attempts made by counterrevolutionary forces to promote division in this country,” pointed out Chavez at a political rally with Socialist Party members in the state of Zulia. “We are in Maracaibo, land of liberators and natural resources, but this is also the epicenter of a separatist plan orchestrated by Washington,” the president said. “Now,” pointed out Chavez, “the oligarchy and the counter-revolutionaries want to extend those manoeuvres to other departments, such as Merida, Apure and Falcon, in order to create a so-called divisionist chain.”