Venezuelan, Brazilian Presidents Sign Joint Declaration

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The President of Venezuela, Hugo Chavez, and his Brazilian counterpart, Luis Inacio Lula da Silva, on Tuesday signed a far-reaching joint declaration and other agreements, aimed at fostering closer trade, commercial, energy, and cultural relations between their countries.

The Brazilian leader arrived here late Monday night on an official one-day visit for talks with Chavez.

Both presidents were keynote speakers at the closing ceremony of a meeting of businessmen from both countries.

They signed a memorandum of understanding between the state-run Economic and Social Development Bank of Venezuela (Bandes), and the Economic and Social Development National Bank of Brazil (BNDES), designed to promote the development of production and exports between the two countries, through technical and training assistance of human resources.

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this is good and I only base this on my impression that the South and Central American countries do not join together enough. It seems that financially - each are independently at the mercy of the IMF and World Bank. They should grow strong and independent together. The U.S., U.K., Australia, and Canada do not have to own the world. They need to make decisions for the people and avoid the crimes of their predecessors. Let these two leaders not go down in crime, scandal, bank failures, or in airplane accidents. The poor of those countries need a chance to thrive honestly.

will give them combined strength to fight off the IMF but at the same time they must foster growth within their national economies so that the have something to fight with!