Venezuela bars foreign NGO funding

CARACAS, Venezuela -- A congress dominated by President Hugo Chavez's allies has passed a law that bars foreign funding for nongovernment organizations and political parties, adding to a series of measures that government opponents say are aimed at cracking down on dissent.

The law approved by the National Assembly late Tuesday puts in jeopardy human rights groups and other organizations that receive foreign funding. Organizations that receive money from abroad may be fined up to double the amount of funding received.

It is one of many controversial measures Chavez's government is pushing through in the final weeks of an outgoing congress that had only a token opposition.

A new legislature with a much larger bloc of opposition deputies takes office on Jan. 5.

Opposition lawmaker Juan Jose Molina said on Twitter that the law "criminalizes and persecutes the democratic opposition" and harms the work of nongovernmental groups that serve a vital function in Venezuelan society.

It also penalizes organizations or political parties that invite foreigners to the country who publicly give "opinions that offend institutions of the state, its high officials" or that are contrary to Venezuela's sovereignty. Groups can be fined for such statements, and political parties can be barred from elections for five to eight years.

Venezuelan human rights groups have said the law will put some organizations at risk of disappearing by making them fully dependent on limited domestic donations.

Chavez has said the measures are needed to prevent foreign intervention in Venezuela, particularly by the U.S. government and U.S.-based organizations.

"How are we going to permit political parties, NGOs ... to continue to be financed with millions and millions of dollars from the Yankee empire?" Chavez said last month.

The U.S. Agency for International Development has provided millions of dollars to Venezuelan organizations for programs that it says aims to promote democracy. Other organizations that have funded programs in Venezuela include the National Endowment for Democracy, the International Republican Institute and the National Democratic Institute.

The National Assembly on Tuesday night also passed a law that would allow for the suspension of any lawmakers who defect from a party during their term. That aims to counter defections in the current legislature, where about a dozen lawmakers have broken with Chavez.

"They're putting a straitjacket on the parliamentarians who are to come," said opposition lawmaker Ismael Garcia, who was among those who broke with Chavez.

Other laws approved in the dying days of the congressional session impose regulations on the Internet, bar some kinds of online messages, make it easier for authorities to revoke the licenses of TV or radio stations and give the president powers to enact laws by decree for 18 months.

A new banking law passed on Friday says banks will be considered to be of "public utility," increasing the powers of Chavez's government to intervene in the sector.

The National Assembly is also discussing a measure to centralize government control over the country's autonomous universities. Students have held protests to denounce the measures, which they say are aimed at taking over universities that have been a bastion of opposition to Chavez.

Chavez has enjoyed near total control of the National Assembly since the opposition boycotted 2005 elections.

That is set to change when the new congress takes office, with 67 of the 165 seats controlled by the opposition -- enough to prevent Chavez from having the two-thirds majority needed to approve some types of major legislation and to confirm Supreme Court justices.

Anticipating that shift, pro-Chavez lawmakers earlier this month appointed nine new Supreme Court justices, reinforcing the dominance of judges widely seen as friendly to his government.