UNITED
NATIONS, March
13 – After a
more than two
hour memorial
for Hugo
Chavez in the
UN General
Assembly on
Wednesday,
Inner City
Press
asked
Venezuela's
foreign
minister Elias
Jaua about his
country's
position on
Syria.
Jaua
said Venezuela
opposes any
foreign
intervention,
“direct or
indirect.” He
said the
solution
should come
from the
Syrian people
(“pueblo”),
with
international
help, but
peacefully. He
did not
explain more.
Video
here.
Asked
about
elections and
an
investigation
mentioned by
Nicolas
Maduro,
Jaua cited
Jimmy Carter
as validating
previous
Venezuelan
elections,
and findings
that Chavez'
cancer was
“strange.”
The
United States,
when there was
silence in the
Security
Council, sent
a
person
multiply
described as a
lower level
diplomat.
Wednesday as
the
longer General
Assembly
memorial
began, China's
Li Baodong and
Russia's
Vitaly Churkin
went into the
GA.
Later,
much later,
Inner City
Press
witnessed a
legal adviser
from the US
Mission going
in, near the
end of the
memorial.
In
the speeches,
there were
more literary
references
than is usual
for
the UN. The
Permanent
Representative
of Uruguay
cited Bertolt
Brecht.
(Afterward, in
front of the
GA, he told
Inner City
Press he
was quoting
MERCOSUR.)
The
Permanent
Representative
of Argentina
quoted Jose
Marti about
“rivers of
bones,”
leading to the
wonder
if there can
be poetry in
consultations
of the
Security
Council,
reform of
which Chavez
called for in
2006, and on
which
Argentina now
serves for two
years.
Bolivia's
Permanent
Representative
offered
“revolutionary
greetings” to
Jaua, and said
Chavez stood
up to the IMF.
While Chile
was speaking,
Inner City
Press mused on
Twitter that
it was Michele
Bachelet
should
should have
spoken for the
UN. A helpful
reply came in,
linking to
Bachelet
calling Chavez
“un gran
amigo.”
When
UN Secretary
General Ban
Ki-moon spoke,
he cited
Chavez' work
in
Haiti. It was
hard not to
think: the UN
brought
cholera, then
found
the legal
claims “not
receivable.”
Jamaica's
former prime
minister P J
Patterson has
called the
UN's rule
“disgusting.”
What would
Chavez
have said?
Footnote:
in
the entrance
of the GA is a
photo exhibit
of the victims
in
Halabja. One
floor down in
the basement,
it is now said
that the
Security
Council will
move out on
March 28.
Watch this
site.
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