The Australia-Venezuela Solidarity Network would like to invite you to attend the relaunch of the Venezuela Solidarity Campaign in Sydney.

After the success of recent brigades of Australian solidarity activists and unionists to Venezuela and the 16th World Festival of Youth and Students in Caracas, and with the ongoing threat to Venezuela’s sovereignty posed by US-led threats and actions in the region, we believe it is time to found a new, loosely based solidarity network of all interested groups and individuals to share information, inspiration, and, where possible, co-ordinate activities in building international solidarity and support for Venezuela.

It is clear that the determination of the Venezuelan government led by President Hugo Chavez, endorsed repeatedly at the ballot box, to pursue an independent course dedicated to empowering the Venezuelan people, is perceived by powerful interests as a threat. Recent comments by leading US Republican and televangelist Pat Robertson calling for the US government to assassinate Chavez, and the failure of the US government to condemn the comments, are an indication of the importance of building a broad-based international solidarity movement of everyone who wants to defend the right of the Venezuelan people to democratically determine their own future.

The meeting to launch this network will be held on October 27, at the CFMEU office in Lidcombe (12 Railway St, near Lidcombe station), from 7pm. Stuart Munckton, Latin American correspondent for Green Left Weekly and recently returned from Venezuela; and a CFMEU delegate to the World Festival of Youth and Students, will give short presentations on their experiences, a charter of the groups aims will be proposed, and the working groups will be set up to begin charting possible future activites.

Sincerely,


Duroyan Fertl,
Australia-Venezuela Solidarity Network, Sydney
(M) 0403 919 377
02-9690 1977

[email protected]
www.venezuelasolidarity.org