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Chavez accuses CIA of backing plot to kill him
(Agencies)
Updated: 2009-06-03 10:57

CARACAS, Venezuela – President Hugo Chavez on Tuesday alleged that US intelligence agencies were behind a purported assassination plot that prevented him from visiting El Salvador.

Chavez accuses CIA of backing plot to kill him
Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez speaks into a radio during his weekly 'Alo Presidente' broadcast in the western state of Zulia May 28, 2009. [Agencies] 

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Chavez had planned to attend the inauguration of leftist President Mauricio Funes in the Central American nation on Monday, but canceled his trip due to the alleged plot.

"I don't doubt that the intelligence organizations of the United States are behind this," Chavez said, accusing them of plotting with Cuban militant Luis Posada Carriles to murder him.

He said Venezuelan intelligence services have "very precise information" that they were planning to launch rockets at the Cubana de Aviacion plane he was going to travel in.

Venezuela has asked the US to extradite Posada, an opponent of former Cuban president Fidel Castro and a former CIA operative accused of plotting the 1976 bombing of a Cuban plane in Venezuela that killed 73 people on board. The 81-year-old Posada denies involvement in the bombing.

Chavez has repeatedly accused the US of plotting to overthrow him or to invade Venezuela, without offering proof. The US State Department has denied such accusations in the past.

Nobody at the US Embassy in Caracas was immediately available to comment Tuesday.