News stories by Humberto Márquez, page 3

VIENNA, Oct 01 (IPS) - Venezuela’s youth orchestras have gotten used to wild applause and standing ovations in Europe.

But this time the warm reception was not for the Simón Bolívar Symphony Orchestra, the most visible face of the National System of Youth and Children’s Orchestras of Venezuela (FESNOJIV), a network of youth and children’s orchestras that has put instruments and music scores in the hands of 400,000 children and young people.

SAN CRISTÓBAL, Venezuela, Sep 26 (IPS) - It's a straightforward calculation: a litre of gasoline costs 62 times more in Colombia than in Venezuela, a difference that fuels smuggling and crime along the border.

When 12 Colombian soldiers were killed by FARC insurgents a stone's throw away from the northern border with Venezuela, the consequences included military cooperation that reinforces the political, diplomatic and trade-related links that have developed over the past two years between Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos and Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez.

Latin America and the Caribbean have the potential to uncouple regional economic growth from fossil fuel consumption and develop a 'green economy' based on cleaner energy sources, while at the same time reducing social inequalities.

China may be the country that emits the most carbon dioxide (CO2), but oil-rich Venezuela and some of its Caribbean neighbours produce more of this greenhouse gas responsible for global warming on a per capita basis.

Venezuela and the United States claim they want to reduce their co-dependence on oil, as supplier and importer, respectively. But their mutually beneficial relationship continues with hardly a hiccup as the years go by, in spite of heated verbal confrontations.

Twenty years ago, a military rebellion led by Venezuelan president - then lieutenant-colonel - Hugo Chávez ushered in an enduring era of turmoil for the country's democracy, with abrupt changes in its institutions and a climate of political upheaval and social and economic instability.

A radical political group based in a working class neighbourhood of the Venezuelan capital has sparked a furore by publishing photographs of children from the community, with their faces partially hidden, brandishing AR-15 assault rifles.

Countries that have always depended on imported oil and gas, like Chile, Paraguay, Poland or Ukraine, and especially heavy consumers such as the United States and China, could become self-sufficient in natural gas in the near future and even start exporting it.

Thanks to soaring oil prices and new technology, oil producers in the hot sands of Arabia, the torrid Niger delta or the humid plains of the Orinoco are facing new competition from rivals in the frozen North.