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..."We need to see a point of view that comes from South America, not from Europe or the United States," said Aram Aharonian, director of Telesur, a network based in Venezuela that hopes to launch in May. "Why can't we have our own point of view?"
Both Telesur and TV Brasil, based here in the Brazilian capital, are government-funded projects. They are products of a philosophy that is spreading throughout South America, fueled by governments that seek more economic and cultural independence from Europe and the United States.
Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, who is helping guide the creation of Telesur, has long pressed for alternative sources of information that can compete with such networks as CNN and the BBC. In recent months, the project has received pledges of financial and technical support from Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay and other neighbors.
The leaders of those countries might not speak with the fiery flair of Chavez -- a populist politician who is Latin America's most vocal critic of the United States -- but each has indicated reluctance to surrender to the ebbs and flows of free market forces generated in wealthy, first-world countries.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A21849-2005Mar9.html