Diplomatic Stalemate: Chavez, Clinton Discussed Ambassador Flap

“Wise people correct their mistakes,” Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez told U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton when the two chatted briefly last weekend in Brazil about Caracas’ rejection of Washington’s proposed ambassador to Venezuela, according to an unnamed Venezuelan official.

Government daily Correo del Orinoco identified the source only as a Venezuelan official who heard the informal chat between Chavez and Clinton last Saturday after the inauguration of Dilma Rousseff as president of Brazil. The leftist president also told Clinton, according to the same official, that he has no plans to break off relations with the United States. “It was a pleasant, unforeseen encounter,” the official said. The Venezuelan government rejected the appointment of Larry Palmer as Washington’s ambassador to Caracas after the diplomat told the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee that the morale of the Venezuelan military was low and called for a probe into the alleged presence of Colombian rebels in Venezuela. An additional episode in the diplomatic crisis took place soon after the meeting between Clinton and Chavez in Brasilia, when it was announced that the visa of the Venezuelan ambassador to the United States, Bernardo Alvarez, had been annulled. After the brief exchange of words in the Brazilian capital, Washington left open the possibility that it would name a substitute for Palmer. Palmer’s nomination became null and void upon the close of the 111th Congress at the end of 2010, State Department spokesman Philip Crowley said Monday. President Barack Obama’s administration “will evaluate” whether to propose a new nominee, Crowley said. “Chavez is convinced that what Clinton did is a good sign,” the government official told Correo del Orinoco, adding that “everyone thought they were going to expel Bernardo Alvarez, but they simply withdrew his visa.”

“They sent a signal that isn’t bad,” he said. The same official said that Chavez thinks that those interested in a break between Venezuela and the United States are Obama’s Republican opponents. “There is a Republican plan to break off relations, but that is not our plan. We must always put our national interests first,” the unidentified Venezuelan official said.