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| Bolivian Legislator Defends Military Deals with Venezuela |
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The president of the Bolivian legislature's defense committee, Javier Zabaleta, dismissed on Tuesday press reports that Bolivia and Venezuela planned to attack neighboring states. Bolivia and Venezuela signed a military cooperation pact on May 26, under which Venezuela agreed to set up 20 military bases on Bolivia's borders with Peru, Brazil, Paraguay, Argentina and Chile. Since the weekend, press reports in Chile, Peru and Paraguay have said that these nations are worried by the military buildup on their borders. Recent construction "does not mean that Bolivia is building up its capacity for war, as people are wrongly seeking to show," Zabaleta said. Under the accord, the two nations plan to set up a port terminal in Puerto Quijarro, a base for the Engineers Regiment in Ixiamas, and a military fort in Riberalta. All of these were mainly intended to help the fight against drug trafficking, he said, adding that Venezuela's help was mainly academic and technological. Walker San Miguel, Bolivia's defense minister, has told the media that the measures were only intended to build trust and were an extension of an existing 1998 pact and therefore, they are little different from similar agreements between Bolivia and Argentina and Peru. The defense minister emphasized that the basic agreement between Bolivia and Venezuela was first signed in 1973. (Xinhua News Agency October 11, 2006)
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