17-08-00 President Hugo Chavez concluded a foreign tour that solidified his position as a force within the OPEC cartel - and angered Washington with his defiant visit to Iraq's Saddam Hussein. Chavez gave a memorable performance on the world stage, taking a spin through Baghdad with a car driven by Saddam and giving Libya's Moammar Ghadafi a bear hug. He irked the United States by becoming the first world leader to call on Saddam since the 1991 Gulf War.
But the ultimate consequences of his tour remain uncertain. It's doubtful the trip will set off a stream of heads of state to Saddam's doors. It's also unclear whether Chavez will achieve a goal more dear to him: cementing unity within the fractious 11 OPEC members.
Once in Iraq, Chavez further rebuffed the United States by calling for an end to UN sanctions against Saddam's country. "It turns out that Iraq is not hell and Saddam is not the devil. I call on the UN to lift sanctions against Iraq because I was there. In Baghdad there were children whowere dying and they couldn't get medicine because of the sanctions," Chavez said.
Chavez added that he didn't know he would be the first head of state to visit Saddam since the Gulf War. "I didn't know the trip would be so controversial. Many said the trip to Iraq was due to an aversion to the United States but I don't have an aversion to anyone," he said.

For Chavez, increasing Venezuela's international profile was a satisfying enough coup. "There is a recuperation of Venezuela's leadership in OPEC," Foreign Minister Jose Vicente Rangel told. "The trip opened up space for Venezuela in international affairs." Rangel said Chavez established himself as a peacemaker within OPEC -- a goal more important, he said, than persuading the group's members to adopt Venezuela's vision of fair oil prices and adequate production volume.
Rangel played down the friction that emerged between the United States and Venezuela over Chavez's visit to Iraq, saying the dispute was a normal bump in otherwise smooth relations between two allies.
But for some Venezuelans, seeing their leader in a car with Saddam was an embarrassment. Jeopardising relations with the United States, the critics say, is a high price to pay for promoting OPEC unity. "I am angry that the president of Venezuela hangs out with the greatest tyrants in the world," said Venezuelan oil expert Jose Luis Cordeiro. "Venezuela's interest is in its relations with its (oil) consumers, who are the United States, Europe and Japan." Chavez says strengthening OPEC as a global force is in Venezuela's economic interests. The president sought to persuade fellow OPEC heads of state to stand up to US-led pressure to lower prices, which are hovering at 10-year highs of nearly $ 30 a barrel. A crash in the price of oil would be "a death sentence" for countries like Venezuela, Chavez said during his trip.
The jury is still out on whether Venezuela has sufficient weight within the cartel to persuade its members to comply with their production quotas or to adoptChavez's band mechanism designed to keep prices within in a set range. Chavez's pleas had little impact on oil prices, an indication that traders and analysts are sceptical about the Venezuelan leader's influence on OPEC decisions.

Chavez hailed the trip as a triumph, pointing out that he persuaded the leaders of Iran, Indonesia, Nigeria, Algeria and Prince Abdullah of Saudi Arabia to travel to Caracas for a September heads of State OPEC summit - only the second of its kind in the cartel's 41-year history. He also claimed to have rallied support for the price band mechanism.
Chavez's goal of ending Iraq's isolation may be elusive, although Indonesia said it agreed with Chavez's calls for an end to UN sanctions on Iraq. "Chavez likes to see himself as a leader in the global scene but I'm not sure other countries see him that way. There's still strong advocacy for isolating Iraq," said Michael Shifter, a Latin America analyst with Washington-based Inter-American Dialogue.
The opening of a new Congress overshadowed the controversial trip. Although jaws dropped around the world at the sight of the South American leader dining with Saddam, the trip was no shock to Venezuelans, long accustomed to their leader's irreverent ways.
And opposition politicians stayed out of the controversy -- too timid to personally attack the freshly re-elected popular president, who entered Venezuela's national scene eight years ago. "The opposition doesn't want to take on Chavez personally right now. It would be political suicide," said local pollster Luis Vicente Leon.