CARACAS, Venezuela (AP):
VENEZUELAN PRESIDENT Hugo Chavez was marking his seventh year in power yesterday with a show of military and political force - a parade of troops and then a visit to Cuba, where Fidel Castro's government said 200,000 people would gather to see him receive a United Nations prize.
PREDICTS A WIN
Looking ahead to the presidential elections he predicts to win with an overwhelming majority, the former army paratroop commander appeared before several thousand supporters in Caracas, waving to the crowd and swaying to Venezuelan folk music under a banner reading "7 Years .. for now."
Chavez will receive the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) 2005 International Jose Marti Prize today in Havana, where the Communist Party daily Granma said the government plans a massive gathering of more than 200,000 people in Revolution Plaza in his honour.
CONTRIBUTION TO UNITY
Chavez's close alliance with Castro has become a defining issue of his presidency, while relations have been increasingly tense with the U.S. government. Chavez says Venezuela needs new recruits and a larger reserve to face any possible U.S. attack - an idea U.S. officials dismiss as ridiculous.
UNESCO, meanwhile, is honouring Chavez in the name of Marti, the Cuban independence hero held dear by Castro and his opponents alike.
UNESCO says the Marti Prize, first proposed by Cuba, was created by the agency in 1999 to honour a person who has "contributed to the unity and integration of the countries of Latin American and the Caribbean and to the preservation of their identities, cultural traditions and historical values."
