New York – Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez said Saturday
that he would attempt to improve his relations with Washington,
which have been rocky in recent months.
“Sometimes I make mistakes, I tend to respond to any official
from the government of Mr. Bush who verbally attacks Venezuela,”
Chavez said during a speech at a Manhattan church, his last public
event in New York before heading to Cuba to meet with his close
ally Fidel Castro.
Chavez said the Rev. Jesse Jackson and U.S. Rep. Jose Serrano,
D-N.Y., who sat with him at the church, had advised him “not to be
provoked” by representatives of the U.S. government.
He acknowledged that he has occasionally “gone too far with
words” when responding to U.S. officials who criticize his
government, and he said his criticism of the Bush administration
has sometimes been misunderstood as attacks against the American
public.
“I love the people of the United States,” he said.
In reference to the U.S.-led war in Iraq, Chavez said it was
justifiable for people in an invaded country to defend themselves.
“The true war we ask for is the war against poverty and
misery,” he said to rousing applause.
Two days earlier, Chavez harshly criticized President Bush in
front of a United Nations summit for waging war in Iraq without
U.N. consent.
Chavez also criticized U.N. reforms Saturday, saying they would
permit powerful countries to invade developing ones whose leaders
are considered a threat.
In a speech earlier Saturday that was broadcast on state-run
television in Venezuela, Chavez said the document adopted at a U.N.
summit Friday was developed without consensus and was “invalid and
illegal.”
He singled out a section of the document creating a
Peacebuilding Commission that outlines a “responsibility to
protect.” He called it suspicious, saying “tomorrow or sometime
in the future, someone in Washington will say that the Venezuelan
people need to be protected from the tyrant Chavez, who is a
threat.”
Chavez, a self-declared revolutionary, has often clashed with
the U.S. government and has accused Washington of seeking to oust
him a claim U.S. officials have denied, though they have
expressed concern about Chavez’s ties with Castro and what
opponents call his authoritarian tendencies.
The disagreements between the two sides drew more attention last
month when religious broadcaster Pat Robertson suggested the United
States “take him out” because Chavez poses a danger to the
region. Chavez responded that Robertson clearly “expressed the
wish of the elite that govern the United States.” Robertson later
apologized, and the State Department said his remark had been
inappropriate.
