Venezuela recalled its ambassador to protest Peru’s decision to grant political asylum to a prominent opponent of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, calling it a mockery of international law and escalating a diplomatic dispute.
Peru announced early on Monday that it was giving Manuel Rosales, a former presidential candidate who ran against Chavez in 2006 and now claims he is being persecuted by Venezuela’s socialist president, political asylum for humanitarian reasons.
Peruvian Foreign Minister Jose Antonio Garcia Belaunde said he believed the decision shouldn’t strain relations with Venezuela.
Rosales’s lawyer, Javier Valle-Riestra, said the Venezuelan opposition leader was “very happy” after receiving word of Peru’s decision.
But late on Monday, Venezuela’s foreign ministry issued an angry statement saying Peru’s decision “constitutes a mockery of international law, a tough blow to the fight against corruption and an insult to the people of Venezuela.”
The statement said Peru should have arrested and extradited Rosales, and announced that Venezuela was recalling its ambassador to Lima.
Venezuelan prosecutors accuse Rosales of illegal enrichment while he was governor of western Zulia state, saying he failed to show a legal source of about US$68,000 in income between 2000 and 2004.
Rosales said he reported the disputed income in his tax returns. He calls the accusation a “political lynching” ordered by Chavez and says a fair trial is impossible.
He stepped down as mayor of Maracaibo, Venezuela’s second-largest city, three weeks ago and went into hiding. His party said he was being harassed and feared for his safety, and he entered Peru as a tourist on April 4 and requested political asylum last week.
Peru has granted asylum to two other Chavez opponents: former Yaracuy state governor Eduardo Lapi and prominent labor union leader Carlos Ortega. Both men escaped from prison and fled the country.
SEEKING CHANGE: A hospital worker said she did not vote in previous elections, but ‘now I can see that maybe my vote can change the system and the country’ Voting closed yesterday across the Solomon Islands in the south Pacific nation’s first general election since the government switched diplomatic allegiance from Taiwan to Beijing and struck a secret security pact that has raised fears of the Chinese navy gaining a foothold in the region. The Solomon Islands’ closer relationship with China and a troubled domestic economy weighed on voters’ minds as they cast their ballots. As many as 420,000 registered voters had their say across 50 national seats. For the first time, the national vote also coincided with elections for eight of the 10 local governments. Esther Maeluma cast her vote in the
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
HYPOCRISY? The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday asked whether Biden was talking about China or the US when he used the word ‘xenophobic’ US President Joe Biden on Wednesday called for a hike in steel tariffs on China, accusing Beijing of cheating as he spoke at a campaign event in Pennsylvania. Biden accused China of xenophobia, too, in a speech to union members in Pittsburgh. “They’re not competing, they’re cheating. They’re cheating and we’ve seen the damage here in America,” Biden said. Chinese steel companies “don’t need to worry about making a profit because the Chinese government is subsidizing them so heavily,” he said. Biden said he had called for the US Trade Representative to triple the tariff rates for Chinese steel and aluminum if Beijing was