Chavez must Apologise for Insulting Cardinal

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has again escalated his criticism of Catholic Church leaders, referring to a cardinal from Honduras as an "imperialist clown." Chavez lashed out against Cardinal Oscar Andres Rodriguez Maradiaga of Tegucigapla, Honduras, after the cardinal, in an interview with a Venezuelan news agency, said that Chavez "seems to think that he is a god and can trample over others." Chavez responded by saying that the Honduran cardinal was a "parrot" serving the forces of imperialism which, he said, sought to undermine his regime.

The president of Honduras, Manuel Zelaya, the country’s parliament, business leaders, and human rights activists are defending Cardinal Oscar Andres Rodriguez Maradiaga from the insults by Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez. President Zelaya of Honduras told reporters, “As head of State I am going to call President Hugo Chavez on the phone to tell him about Oscar Andres Rodriguez, explain who he is and what he means to our country and our people,” he said.

The Honduran Congress approved a motion calling on Zelaya to use appropriate means to ask Chavez to retract his statements. The president of the Congress, Representative Roberto Micheletti Bain, called the cardinal a “symbol for all Hondurans, and we are not going to allow anyone from the left or the right to attack Cardinal Rodriguez.” “We Hondurans, who believe firmly in God, should take strong positions because our Christian sentiments oblige us to do so,” Bain added. Representative Juan Orlando Hernandez also criticised the statements of Chavez, calling them “an offence against the entire Catholic people and obviously against a symbolic figure for all Hondurans.”

The statement by Cardinal Rodriguez fell in line with the criticism of the Venezuelan president by his own country's hierarchy. The bishops of Venezuela have frequently provoked the wrath of Chavez by criticising his plans to consolidate power in his own authoritarian regime.
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