Caracas

Visibly overcome with emotion, four former Colombian legislators — Gloria Polanco, Luis Eladio Perez, Orlando Beltran and Jorge Eduardo Gechem — held prisoner by the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) for years, were reunited with their families in the Simon Bolivar International airport near Caracas on February 27 after a successful Venezuelan-led humanitarian mission.

In recent weeks, external and internal pressure against Venezuela’s Bolivarian revolution, as the process of change led by socialist President Hugo Chavez is known, has intensified dramatically.

“This is pure judicial terrorism”, Venezuelan energy minister Rafael Ramirez told reporters in Caracas on February 8, in response to court injunctions obtained by US-based ExxonMobil Corp. — the world’s largest oil corporation — in January.

Since January 12, more than 1600 delegates to the founding congress of the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV) — along with thousands of local socialist battalions (branches — have been discussing the new party’s program, principles and statutes, and in large part the future of the Bolivarian revolution.

Venezuela’s Energy Minister, Rafael Ramirez, characterised a series of court orders obtained by Exxon Mobil Corp. in Britain, the Netherlands, and the Dutch Antilles, freezing up to US$12 billion in assets of Venezuelan state oil firm PDVSA, as "judicial terrorism" in a statement today.

On February 4, a series of massive ostensibly “non-political” “peace” demonstrations against the left-wing guerrilla group the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) took place in Colombia. Hundreds of thousands took part under the banner of “No more FARC, No more kidnappings”. Protests also took place around the world.

On January 12, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez opened the founding congress of the provisionally-named United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV). Chavez argued it was necessary to go on the offensive with the PSUV “as the spearhead and vanguard” of the revolution his government is leading. “We have arrived here to make a real revolution or die trying.”

During the final week of campaigning around Venezuela’s December 2 constitutional reform referendum, which was narrowly defeated, solidarity activists from Australia and Canada had an opportunity to witness first hand the Bolivarian revolution being led by socialist President Hugo Chavez.

A collective discussion is occurring throughout the revolutionary movement led by President Hugo Chavez following the defeat of the proposed constitutional reform proposals — that were intended to deepen the revolution to help open the way towards socialism — in the December 2 referendum.

John Riddell and Suzanne Weiss traveled to Venezuela at the end of November, as participants in a tour organized by the Australia-Venezuela Solidarity Network (<http://www.venezuelasolidarity.org>. The authors are members of the editorial team of Canadian publication Socialist Voice (http://www.socialistvoice.ca).

Heightened political tensions between Colombia and Venezuela over Colombian President Alvaro Uribe’s decision on November 21 to cancel the mediating role of his Venezuelan counterpart, President Hugo Chavez, in negotiations for the release of 45 high-profile hostages held by the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), signifies more than just a war of words between two presidents, but a clash between the Latin American left and the right-wing aligned with US imperialism.

Following the massive student protests in support of the constitutional reforms and the revolutionary process on November 21, Venezuela’s workers’ movement met the next day, with around 1500 representatives from workplaces gathering at the Teatro Teresa Carreno to plan the campaign to ensure a “Yes” vote in the referendum on constitutional reforms on December 2.