The U.S. and crisis in Bolivia

Miguel and Blog From Bolivia note that the National Electoral Court (CNE) has not authorized any of the previously announced referenda, but that Santa Cruz is ignoring that fact and wants to push ahead with an autonomy vote. If it goes forward, it will almost guarantee violence.

I found it interesting that the EU very clearly said it would respect the CNE’s decision, and not recognize an illegal vote. The U.S. government, however, has said nothing (or at least I cannot find anything). When we think of the negative image of the U.S. in Latin America, this is a good example. The EU takes an unambiguous stand about a critical issue and the U.S. remains mum.

While searching, I ran across an interview Evo Morales just did with Al Jazeera. Here is his take:

You recently said that the United States government was pushing to try to turn Bolivia into a kind of Kosovo. What proof do you have of that?

First the American congressmen that visited me recently asked me to support that division of Kosovo. It's impossible that we can support the division of a country. Secondly, the conspiracy against my government is headed by the US ambassador.

USAID, with funds that come American tax payers, who think they are helping the Bolivian people, is using the money in a dirty campaign against my government and especially against me. They meet with NGOs and other groups here, always with the intention of conspiring. They offer them money on condition that they take part in the campaign against Evo Morales.

The mayor of a city, who recently visited me, told me he was offered money by the USAID agency to run as an opposition congressman. They even offered to pay for his campaign.

And the mayor told me that the people who work for the US agency go from house to house telling people that if they get rid of Evo Morales, they will have more money. If we wanted to document this we could. We are going to present the documents to prove this to the US Congress.