SOUTH AMERICA:Peru's earthquake relief effort was shaken by a political row yesterday over food aid with labels bearing an image of Venezuela's president, Hugo Chavez, and criticism of Peru's government.
The cans of tuna, with labels lauding Mr Chavez and condemning Peruvian authorities as "slow, inefficient and heartless", were distributed to survivors of a quake which destroyed several towns and killed more than 500 people last week.
President Alan Garcia expressed dismay. "One has to ask who is behind this. This is not the moment to take advantage of the circumstances to make electoral propaganda." Mr Garcia, who has been under fire for delays in getting food, blankets and other aid to stricken areas, has a tetchy relationship with the Venezuelan leader.
But Venezuela issued a forceful denial of any links to the polemical aid and said it might be an attempt to smear Mr Chavez as a cynical opportunist. "This is a damaging manipulation, a vile manipulation because Venezuela has brought humanitarian aid, not party politics," the country's ambassador, José Armando Laguna, told CPN Radio in Lima.
"If they want, they can go and open all the bags that [ Venezuela] brought and verify there is no political propaganda," he added.
Venezuela has sent two military aircraft with 25 tonnes of food over the Andes to Peru. Venezuela's information minister, William Lara, said "hidden" forces were trying to make it appear that Mr Chavez was manipulating the tragedy.
The cans were distributed in Chincha, the province south of Lima which bore the brunt of the 8.0 magnitude quake, but it has not been established by whom. The story broke in the Lima daily Expresso, a newspaper hostile to Mr Chavez.
The label on the cans reads: "In the face of the natural disaster . . . the Peruvian Nationalist party, along with our sister Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, its leader Hugo Chavez and our leader Ollanta Humala, makes itself present because the Peruvian government acts in a slow, inefficient and heartless manner, not caring about the pain of the victims and leaving them suffering from hunger, thirst and theft."
Mr Humala is a left-wing opposition leader who was backed by Mr Chavez in last year's presidential election but lost to Mr Garcia.
He has been attempting to mount a new challenge on the back of the president's sliding approval ratings. A spokesman for Mr Humala's party denied any links to the controversial aid.
The row threatened to undermine a fragile reconciliation between the two presidents.
After trading harsh insults last year, Mr Chavez, an outspoken leftist who assails the United States, made up with Mr Garcia, a conservative who seeks good relations with Washington.