Briefly

BOLIVIA

Morales sets recall election

LA PAZ — President Evo Morales committed himself and Bolivia’s nine state governors yesterday to face recall votes on Aug. 10, gambling that citizens will endorse his populist reforms halfway through his five-year term.

Mr. Morales originally proposed the recall vote in December amid a fierce battle over his proposed draft constitution that would increase the political power of Bolivia’s poor indigenous majority.

Bolivia’s lower house of Congress approved it, but the idea went nowhere until last week, when it was suddenly revived by the opposition-controlled Senate.

Mr. Morales accepted his opponents’ challenge in a nationally televised address and signed the bill yesterday.

The referendum requires removal from office if the officials get more “no” votes than the votes they won when they were elected, and if the percentage of “no” votes is greater than the candidates’ winning percentage in 2005.

MEXICO

Thousands protest drug violence

CIUDAD JUAREZ — Thousands of white-clad people marched silently Sunday to protest a surge of drug-related violence in a Mexican city across from Texas where the No. 2 police officer was fatally shot.

The crowd of several thousand students, church leaders, businessmen and politicians walked for about four miles across Ciudad Juarez to a park near a border crossing, breaking the silence in a burst of speeches, dancing and singing.

More than 200 people have been killed so far this year in Ciudad Juarez. The city of 1.3 million across the border from El Paso, Texas, is home base for the powerful Juarez drug cartel.

The assassination of police director Juan Antonio Roman Garcia on Saturday came despite the deployment of more than 2,500 soldiers and federal police to the city and surrounding Chihuahua state in March.

VENEZUELA

Chavez likens Merkel, her party to Hitler

CARACAS — Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez lashed out at Germany’s chancellor, suggesting that her party shares the political ideals of Adolf Hitler.

Mr. Chavez criticized Chancellor Angela Merkel for belonging to the conservative Christian Democratic Union, calling the movement “the same right wing that supported Hitler and fascism.”

Mr. Chavez was on the verge of directing more insults, but suddenly stopped.

“Ms. Chancellor, you can go to…,” he said during his weekly television and radio program, before pausing. Then he added: “Because you are a lady, I won’t say any more.”

From wire dispatches and staff reports