Agence France-Presse,
Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez announced Monday his country's decision to pull out of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, accusing them of exploiting small countries.
“I want to formalize the exit (of Venezuela) from the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and all that. We don't need a representative there any more,” he said in broadcast on VTV state television.
The OPEC nation's leader branded the organizations “tools of US imperialism” to exploit the less powerful.
Chavez, a leftist firebrand who has made a habit of demonizing the US administration, was given sweeping powers in February to govern by decree for 18 months.
“We are going to withdraw … and let them pay back what they took from us,” he said, claiming that the organizations were “in crisis”.
“I read in the press somewhere that the IMF does not have enough money to meet its payroll,” he explained.
“We are going to withdraw before they go and rob us,” he added, issuing an order for his Finance Minister Rodrigo Cabezas to begin proceedings to withdraw Venezuela from the organizations.
The IMF recently reviewed a campaign launched last September to increase the stature and voting rights of emerging-market and poor countries.
The United States has accused Chavez of being a destabilizing force in Latin America. US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Wednesday that he was wrecking his country “economically and politically”.
Chavez also warned that if the Organization of American States (OAS), a Washington-based pan-American organization, condemns Caracas over a complaint by journalists at RCTV, Venezuela would withdraw from it as well.
The Inter-American Human Rights Commission (CIDH) has sent to the Inter-American Court in San Jose, Costa Rica, a complaint by Radio Caracas Television's (RCTV) journalists who were beaten by pro-government activists on April 11, 2002.
Chavez complained that the CIDH was arguing that Caracas had violated freedom of speech.
“Let me make this official,” Chavez said. “If they convict us in the OAS or any of its bodies, Venezuela is pulling out, because it would make no sense to be there. Why?”
Three weeks after his December re-election, the leftist leader announced he would not renew RCTV's license, which ends May 27, thus taking off the air the only private channel available nationally.
Chavez has drawn condemnation from media rights groups and protests at home for his decision to close the popular channel which he accuses of backing a 2002 coup against him.
He has never forgiven RCTV for running cartoons and modeling shows during the brief coup that kept him out of power for 47 hours in April 2002.
The private broadcaster and the state-owned Venezolana de Television (VTV) are the only channels whose signals cover the entire South American country
