On July 5, the US-based Venezuela Solidarity Network launched a campaign against the Mercenaries 2: World in Flames video game, which simulates an invasion of Venezuela to regain control of Venezuela’s oil supply from a “power hungry tyrant”. The game was created by Pandemic, a subcontractor for the US Army, and funded by Elevation Partners, an investment firm of U2’s Bono. Bono has not responded to the VSN’s queries about his funding of the project, which the group slams as anti-Venezuelan propaganda. In a letter to Bono, Chuck Kaufman from the Alliance for Global Justice wrote that “the game is designed to demean the Venezuelan people, to undermine the democratically elected government of Venezuela, and to strike fear in the hearts of ordinary Venezuelan citizens who, through this game, can witness their very neighbourhoods, villages, and capital being blown up and their virtual selves being massacred by a band of marauding mercenaries, who are clearly working for foreign interests who want to take control of the country’s oil industry.” Send protest letters to Bono c/o Principle Management, 250 West 57th Street, New York 10019.

From Green Left Weekly, July 19, 2006.
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