Russia, Venezuela kick off naval operations

CARACAS: Venezuelan and Russian military officials signed an agreement Sunday to launch joint naval operations this week on the United States’ doorstep, in the first such move since the end of the Cold War, official media said.

1,600 Russian forces and 700 Venezuelan forces will engage in these maneuvers, called “VenRus 2008” and set to take place December 1-3. Vice admiral Luis Morales Marquez, a Venezuelan operations commander, and Russian vice admiral Ivanovic Kolorof, commander of the Northern Fleet, signed the agreement aboard a Venezuelan ship anchored in the port of La Guaira, near Caracas.

“This exchange of experience will allow us to discover and develop naval maneuvers and use communication and arms systems,” Marquez was quoted as saying by official media.

“It will also allow us to know the new operational objectives of a highly experienced army like Russia’s,” he added.

On Thursday, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev visited four Russian warships, including the nuclear-powered cruiser Peter the Great, which arrived in Venezuela this week to carry out exercises in the Caribbean Sea close to US waters. Russian officials have repeatedly denied the exercises are aimed at “third countries,” and Venezuela’s president rejected talk of provocation on Monday, describing the exercises as an exchange between “free, sovereign countries.”

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice dismissed the impact of the arrival of the Russian ships.

“A few Russian ships is not going to change the balance of power,” she said.

Medvedev’s tour of left-leaning Latin American countries, which also included Peru, Brazil and Cuba, sought to restore Cold War-era ties and has been portrayed as a rebuke of US moves in formally Communist nations in Eastern Europe, including a controversial missile defense plan.

Medvedev said he wants to restore “privileged relations” with Latin American countries that had close ties to the Soviet Union in the Cold War, when fierce superpower rivalry played out in the region.

But some analysts have said that the economic crisis will likely hinder Russian plans to project its sphere of influence in Latin America.

Sunday, AFP