BOLIVIA: Evo Changing Tune About GMOs, Price Controls And Export Limits.

AP

Last year, Bolivia had to import food. Normally, it is self sufficient...and even exports food stuffs.

La Nina's freakish weather was one reason. But farmers also blame President Evo Morales' policies...price controls and export limits...instead of a free market setting prices and demand.

Now, Evo is starting to listen to the farmers...even cultivating their council.
"Advise me, help me. Let's work together to guarantee food production," he said last month."If we've had ...ideological differences, that's in the past. Now the situation is different."

BOLIVIA/ ARGENTINA : Evo Apologizes For Controversial Iran Minister's Visit.

TELEGRAPH

     Since 2007, Argentina has wanted Iran's Defense Minister Ahmad Vahidi (above) for allegedly planning a 1994 Jewish center bombing in Buenos Aires that killed 85 people.
    Gen.Vahidi just attended a military ceremony in Santa Cruz with President Evo Morales.
    Now Bolivia has formally apologized for letting Vahidi visit Bolivia and Santa Cruz...and has sent him home.

BOLIVIA / CHILE: Oppenheimer: Evo Picking Fight With Pinera To Improve Popularity.

M.HERALD/ OPINION: Andres Oppenheimer

    "Leftist populist President Evo Morales — until recently one of Latin America’s most popular presidents — is playing a dangerous card to improve his falling support at home: reviving a 132-year-old territorial conflict with neighboring Chile.
    What’s going on?, I asked several Bolivian politicians and journalists. Virtually all responded that Morales, who won a second term in 2009 with a massive 64 percent of the vote, has been in a political free fall since December, and is propping up the fight with Chile for domestic political reasons.
   Morales’ popularity has fallen to 32 percent in most polls, his lowest number since he took office five years ago."
   “The government is rapidly losing popular support, and this fight with Chile is a consequence of that,” says Samuel Doria Medina, a business tycoon and opposition leader who is currently facing several government suits for alleged economic crimes. “Morales is trying to divert public attention from our economic problems.”

BOLIVIA : Evo Claims New Total Nat Gas Find Adds 30% To Reserves.

BLOOMBERG/

   Last year, some geologists slashed Bolivia's estimated nat gas reserves.
   Today, France's Total claims it has found new nat gas deposits in the Aquio field that boost Bolivia's reserves by 30%...some 6.5 million cubic meters a day... when it begins operating in 2015 possibly reaching 18 million cubic meters by 2020.
   It's Bolivia's biggest discovery biggest since Morales became president in 2006.
   Bolivia's total gas reserves could now equal some 13 trillion cubic meters.
   Nat gas is Bolivia's top export responsible for $1.7 billion in income in 2010.

BOLIVIA / USA : Evo Backtracks; Now Takes $250k For Anti-drug Satellite Monitoring.

GUARDIAN/

    President Evo Morales says he will not let US agents return...but will accept a mere $250,000 from the USA...for satellite monitoring to combat growing drug trafficking problems.
    In 2008, former coca grower Morales expelled around 30 DEA agents.
    In February, 3 senior Bolivian police officers and the former head of counter-narcotics, were arrested for smuggling cocaine to the USA.
    Another 40 officials and agents are facing drug trafficking charges.
    Brasil is also concerned that massive amounts of cocaine from Peru and Bolivia are crossing the border and bringing increasing violence and corruption with it.

BOLIVIA: 19 April UPDATE: After 11 Days, Wage Protests End...With 11% Increase.

NTDTV/ 2:02 video with :30 advert of El Alto clash/ Original Link/

    After 11 days of clashes over wages throughout Bolivia, trade unions agreed to end their general strike.
   They will accept the government's slightly improved offer of an 11%  pay increase for 2011.
     Stone-throwing protesters  had blocked La Paz's main streets for days in clashes with police lobbing tear-gas.
    Teachers and health workers had demanded a 15% pay increase to keep up with food inflation.
     Protests and blockades were also reported in Cochabamba, Santa Cruz and Tarija.
    In El Alto, 5,000 teachers clashed for 5 hours with 700 police. Four protestors were injured.
   19 APRIL UPDATE:
http://www.hrreporter.com/ArticleView.aspx?l=1&articleid=10026

BOLIVIA: After Violent La Paz Protest, Unions Call For Indefinite Strike Over Wage Increases.

REUTERS/

    A day after violent protests with police in La Paz, trade unionists still reject the government's 10% wage hike offer and call for an indefinite strike.
    They want 20% pay increases to offset rising consumer prices.
   We're calling an indefinite strike starting today," said labor leader Pedro Montes.
    "The strike will go on until the government agrees to a salary increase of more than 10 percent ... from now on we demand to speak to the president directly."
    President Evo Morales himself once led such mass protests against the government but a proposed fuel hike last year enraged his indigena base and sparked nationwide protests.
    His approval has plummeted recently to about 32%.

BOLIVIA: Evo Wants Obama Stripped Of Nobel Peace Prize For Libyan Airstrikes.

Zimbabwe GUARDIAN/

  President Evo Morales is suggesting that the Nobel Committee take back President Obama's 2009  Peace Prize after recent Libyan air strikes.
   Vladimir Zhirinovsky, leader of the Russia's Liberal Party, wrote that he will also ask the Nobel Committee to strip Obama of the Peace prize.
    "How can it be that a Nobel Peace Prize laureate leads a group of gangs to attack and invade? That is not part of a defense of human rights or (respect) for the self-determination of peoples," Morales asked the press.

BOLIVIA: 5 Mar. UPDATE: Evo Still Says "No" To U.S. Drug Agency.

LINK CHANGE/ AP/ More Details


 "Cocaine is resurgent in Bolivia," said professor Bruce Bagley. "Morales has a big problem on his hands."

  But President Evo Morales will not invite U.S. drug agents back to Bolivia despite recent failures and embarrassments in drug enforcement.

   Just last week, a DEA sting trapped Gen.Rene Sanabria, Morales' former chief of anti-drug police.
   Morales claims "interests of a geopolitical nature" were behind the Sanabria case. "They are using police to try to implicate the government," he said.

   In 2008, Morales expelled all of some 30 DEA 30 agents.

 

BOLIVIA: Thousands Protest Food Hikes.

AFP /

    Despite President Evo Morales' promise to begin to store some foods especially sugar, labor unions led  the second national protest in less than two months.
    Cochabamba's street were barricaded and thousands marched in La Paz, Santa Cruz, Oruro, Potosi and Sucre.
   Protesters want Morales to increase salaries and reverse rising food and service prices.

AFP :48 Video Of Protestors :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gH4b2UoqIoA

BOLIVIA: After Recent Riots, Evo May Stockpile Food.

BLOOMBERG/
S. Shahriari /

   Perhaps shaken from food riots that forced him to cancel a recent visit to the mining city of Oruro, President Evo Morales may tap the central bank's record $10 billion usd reserves to boost agricultural production and stockpile food.
   Consumer prices jumped by 1.76% in December from November, the biggest monthly rise since May 2008.
   “The Bolivian state for the first time will produce food in order to stock it,” said Finance Minister Luis Arce. “We are looking at a food crisis that is coming.”

BOLIVIA: Evo Flees Oruro After Protesters Boo Him And Blast Dynamite.

BBC//

    Are the populist tremors from Cairo now being felt in La Paz?
    President Evo Morales abruptly left the southern city of Oruro, returning to La Paz after protesters angered by rising prices booed him and set off dynamite.
    There were also protests in La Paz, Santa Cruz and Cochabamba over the rising food prices, especially a doubling of sugar costs and shortages.
 Apparently igniting dynamite is common in trade union protests,because explosive are available to miners, but injuries are rare.

BOLIVIA: Evo Backtracks On Fuel Hike After Massive Protests.

LATIMES / Chris Kraul /

   President  Evo Morales suddenly reversed a decision to cut gasoline and diesel subsidies that  had dramatically raised costs after the biggest protests since 2006 spread across his nation.
   Morales claimed cutting subsidies would save $380 million and end the sale of the low-cost subsidized fuels on black markets in Chile, Peru and Brazil.
   His decree raised the prices of gasoline and diesel to rise 73% and 83%.
  A 2003 protest after President Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada raised propane gas prices helped send Sanchez de Lozada from office and aided Evo Morales' 2005 election.
    Morales' approval ratings were already on the rocks. Polls show they plunged from 70% in January to 52% in November. His image especially suffered after a YOUTUBE video showed him kneeing an opponent in the groin during an October soccer match.

FOR REUTERS (ENGLISH) 1:09 VIDEO OF PROTESTS WITH :15 AD:
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KhBiecLRDLQ

BOLIVIA: 11 Dec. UPDATE: New Pension System Approved; Morales Lashes Out In Cancun, Warns of "Ecocide"; Will Get $2 Billion For Nat Gas; Japan To Develop Lithium, Lend Yen For Energy Plant.

BBC/
   While many developed countries are raising the retirement age, Bolivia has a new pension law lowering it from 65 to 58.
    It also nationalizes pension funds and extends the state pension to people working in the informal sector.
    Critics claim that Bolivia will be unable to fund the system in the  future. It privatized pension funds 13 years ago after a state-run system collapsed.


   MEANWHILE  at Cancun's climate summit, President Evo Morales demanded more action on the environment.
     "If we here throw the Kyoto Protocol into the garbage dump, we would be responsible for economy-cide, for ecocide -- indeed, for genocide -- as we would be harming humanity as a whole," he said to loud applause. Morales wants an agreement that protects native populations and gives climate assistance to poor countries at a level "equivalent to the budget that developed countries spend on defense, security and warfare."
FOR  NEW LINK DETAILS, SEE:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/dec/11/cancun-talks-evo-morales

 ALSO:  Repsol YFP and other energy companies will invest about $2 billion dollars in four Bolivian natural-gas fields over the next five years.
FOR DETAILS, SEE:
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-12-08/repsol-bg-group-others-to-invest-2-billion-in-bolivia-by-2015.html

FINALLY:  Japan will help develop Bolivia's large lithium reserves and in construction of a geothermal power plant in Potosi with a loan. The Laguna Colorada plant loan is Japan's first since it forgave Bolivia's foreign debt four years ago. "Japan is the only country to forgive (our debt) and then later begin to provide loans to Bolivia," Morales said.

DETAILS AT : http://latino.foxnews.com/latino/politics/2010/12/08/japan-cooperate-bolivian-lithium-resume-lending-la-paz/#ixzz17jsSOHMe

BOLIVIA: Morales Lectures U.S.: We Will Pick Our Own Friends Including Iran.

LINK CHANGE/ LATIMES/ MORE DETAILS/ 23 NOV/
       While hosting a conference, President Evo Morales lectured attending U.S.officials including Secretary of Defense Robert Gates for an hour.
   "Bolivia under my government will have an agreement, an alliance, to anyone in the world," Morales said. "Nobody will forbid us."
     Morales defended the spread of Iranian and Russian business in Latin America and told the U.S. not to complain.
      He also went on to list the history of attempted coups, alleged election- and vote-tampering, military meddling and alleged conspiracies involving the United States.

BOLIVIA: Will Go It Alone To Produce Lithium Battery.

BLOOMBERG/ By CARLOS VALDEZ /
      President Evo Morales admits that he has been unable to find a foreign partner to help manufacture lithium batteries. So, he says, Bolivia will do it itself, investing about $900 million and starting production in 2014.
    But so far, the nation has not even moved out of the pilot phase of lithium production.
     Bolivia holds the largest known reserves of lithium, the world's lightest metal used for batteries in cell phones, laptops and other electronics and autos.
     Morales' talks so far with Bollore of France, Sumitomo and Mitsubishi of Japan and LG of Korea as well as Iran have been fruitless.
   "They only want to invest to buy lithium carbonate," Morales reports, referring to the compound used in batteries. But "we need partners for the industrialization of lithium batteries in Bolivia."

BOLIVIA: 1ST UPDATE: Morales Signs Racism Law After Newspaper Protest; Sorta Apologizes For Poor Soccer Behavior.

NEW LINK/  REUTERS/ 08 Oct./
     President Evo Morales has signed a controversial anti-racism law.
     Many major newspapers protested yesterday. They said it threatens press freedom. They left their front pages blank except for the slogan: "There is no democracy without freedom of expression."
    The law gives the government the power to shut down media outlets found guilty of racism.
  President Morales contends it will help reverse centuries of discrimination against Bolivia's indigenous majority.
   As for his recent poor soccer behavior, kneeing an opponent in the groin, caught on video and seen by millions, Morales sort of apologized, calling it a "trap."
   "The player who kicked me started to insult me and offend me and I very much regret my reaction," Morales said. "I ask forgiveness to the sportsmen, to the players, to the player. But after kicking me, it was another insult, a reaction. "Again, I ask for forgiveness. Sport is integration, but later I realized it was a trap," Morales said.

   

BOLIVIA: Nasty Morales Deserves Red Card For Kneeing Opponent's Groin.

GUARDIAN/  YOU TUBE (ES) Video :50 /

   During a soccer match in La Paz's newly remodeled Zapata stadium, President Evo Morales' team Movimiento Al Socialismo played "Movement Without Fear team.

  During play, Daniel Gustavo Cartagena committed a hard foul against Morales kicking him in the shin.

  Morales (#10 in green) reacted by kneeing Cartagena hard--- in the testicles.

BOLIVIA: Morales Insists He Can Seek Another Term In 2014.

AP/      President Evo Morales claims Bolivia's new constitution lets him seek another five-year term in 2014. The opposition insists it rules out re-election.
      "The right tried to trick me but we didn't fall for that. Instead, we outfoxed them," Morales said. 'That is what they do not want to admit."
      Morales was first elected in 2005 and won re-election in December under the revamped constitution approved in January 2009. But the new law permits just one re-election, and rivals say that rules him out for 2014.
      The dispute is likely headed for court.

BOLIVIA: Evo Confiscates 115,000 Hectares For The Poor.

M.PRESS/     President Evo Morales kept his promise to redistribute allegedly fallow or ill-gotten land to the poor when he took over 115,000 hectares in the east.
   The seizure includes thousands of hectares from the ranch of opposition leader Osvaldo Monasterio and 4 other haciendas. Monasterio owns the Unitel television network and a bank. Last December he lost another 3,000 hectares and in June, some 13,100 hectares.