bonjour

en reponse a vos questions


http://www.globalvoicesonline.org/2008/03/05/colombia-the-unsettling-conflict-with-ecuador-and-venezuela/ march 11 08


http://www.columbusworldaffairs.org/resources_archive0708.php
About 100 people filled every seat to listen to Hellinger’s lecture. After his speech, one of the event organizers inquired about political connections between Iran, Venezuela and China. The speaker explained that as Iran and Venezuela are both are oil-rich members of OPEC (Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries) they have very similar economies. He described a recent partnership in which Venezuela has been importing tractors from Iran and in turn Venezuela is providing new technology to Iran in the oil fields. Furthermore, he noted the relationship between China and Venezuela is a good one, but it could one day pose a threat to the U.S., because of market competition for petroleum. China is already beginning to invest in oil refineries in Venezuela.

And then, http://www.stwr.net/content/view/864/36/

President George W. Bush, already weakened at home by the soaring cost of oil, is finding that it's also eroding his ability to achieve his foreign-policy goals. "It's a geopolitical nightmare,'' says William Cohen, a former Republican senator from Maine and defense secretary under President Bill Clinton who is now chairman of the Cohen Group, a Washington-based consulting firm. Such nations as Iran, Russia and China ``don't see us as the colossus that can cause them any harm, either by our economy or by our prestige." Record-high energy prices are weakening Bush's prospects of assembling an international coalition to counter Iran's nuclear ambitions. They are diminishing his chances of influencing energy-rich nations such as Russia and isolating troublesome ones including Venezuela and Sudan. And they are straining U.S. economic and diplomatic ties with China, whose oil needs are skyrocketing. Prices show no signs of abating in the last two-and-a-half years of Bush's presidency, with oil futures hovering near $72 a barrel through the November 2008 presidential election. That's creating a windfall for oil-producing nations that may thwart Bush's goal of promoting democracy and free markets from Asia to the Middle East and halting the spread of nuclear arms. Bush acknowledged last week that high oil prices have decreased the U.S.'s power to sway events. "Some of the nations we rely on for oil have unstable governments or agendas that are hostile to the United States,'' he ....