Venezuela announced Thursday the purchase of three Chinese military radar systems under President Hugo Chavez' military modernization plans, which have prompted US criticism.
Venezuela purchased the three-dimensional, long-range JYL-1 radar systems for command of military air operations from China's state-owned Electronics Import and Export Corporation, Venezuela's state news agency ABN said.
The deal was signed by Venezuelan Defense Minister Orlando Maniglia and Qu Huimin, the vice president of the Chinese company, who said that in 18 months new purchases may be made.
The deal includes spare parts, technical and operational training.
Chavez has purchased 15 helicopters and 100,000 Kalashnikov rifles from Russia, four ships and 10 transport planes from Spain, among other items.
Washington has said that Chavez' rearming threatens Latin American democracies, especially neighboring Colombia, if the weapons wind up in the hands of rebels, paramilitary death squads and drug dealers fighting there.
Meanwhile, Chavez strongly denied US charges that he is supporting Colombian rebels or trying to destabilize other South American countries, accusing the US of spreading lies and of being a "terrorist state."
Chavez lashed out at what he calls the "US empire" Thursday night as he responded to statements by State Department officials who accused Venezuela of backing Colombian guerrillas with weapons and funding "anti-democratic groups" in Bolivia, Ecuador and elsewhere.
"They accuse us of buying arms to give them to the guerrillas -- no, they're for our troops," Chavez said. "They are a terrorist state, but they accuse us of being terrorists."
Venezuela has signed a deal to buy 100,000 Kalashnikov rifles from Russia, and Chavez said the guns are due to arrive soon.
High-ranking US officials also have expressed alarm about Chavez's plans to buy military helicopters from Russia, his virtual domination of Venezuela's political system and his increasingly close ties to Cuban leader Fidel Castro.
In some of his sharpest comments in months, Chavez accused Washington of stepping up a campaign of lies to try to isolate his government.
Chavez, a former army officer elected in 1998 on pledges of leading a "peaceful revolution" for the poor, often accuses the US government of plotting against him to try to take control of the country's vast oil reserves.
ANGER: A video shared online showed residents in a neighborhood confronting the national security minister, attempting to drag her toward floodwaters Argentina’s port city of Bahia Blanca has been “destroyed” after being pummeled by a year’s worth of rain in a matter of hours, killing 13 and driving hundreds from their homes, authorities said on Saturday. Two young girls — reportedly aged four and one — were missing after possibly being swept away by floodwaters in the wake of Friday’s storm. The deluge left hospital rooms underwater, turned neighborhoods into islands and cut electricity to swaths of the city. Argentine Minister of National Security Patricia Bullrich said Bahia Blanca was “destroyed.” The death toll rose to 13 on Saturday, up from 10 on Friday, authorities
Local officials from Russia’s ruling party have caused controversy by presenting mothers of soldiers killed in Ukraine with gifts of meat grinders, an appliance widely used to describe Russia’s brutal tactics on the front line. The United Russia party in the northern Murmansk region posted photographs on social media showing officials smiling as they visited bereaved mothers with gifts of flowers and boxed meat grinders for International Women’s Day on Saturday, which is widely celebrated in Russia. The post included a message thanking the “dear moms” for their “strength of spirit and the love you put into bringing up your sons.” It
In front of a secluded temple in southwestern China, Duan Ruru skillfully executes a series of chops and strikes, practicing kung fu techniques she has spent a decade mastering. Chinese martial arts have long been considered a male-dominated sphere, but a cohort of Generation Z women like Duan is challenging that assumption and generating publicity for their particular school of kung fu. “Since I was little, I’ve had a love for martial arts... I thought that girls learning martial arts was super swaggy,” Duan, 23, said. The ancient Emei school where she trains in the mountains of China’s Sichuan Province
DISASTROUS VISIT: The talks in Saudi Arabia come after an altercation at the White House that led to the Ukrainian president leaving without signing a minerals deal Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy was due to arrive in Saudi Arabia yesterday, a day ahead of crucial talks between Ukrainian and US officials on ending the war with Russia. Highly anticipated negotiations today on resolving the three-year conflict would see US and Ukrainian officials meet for the first time since Zelenskiy’s disastrous White House visit last month. Zelenskiy yesterday said that he would meet Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the nation’s de facto leader, after which his team “will stay for a meeting on Tuesday with the American team.” At the talks in the Red Sea port city of Jeddah, US
RSS