Chavez health blamed for summit cancellation

CARACAS — Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez's health problems prompted the suspension Wednesday of a new regional summit a day after a video showed him with Cuban icon Fidel Castro in an effort to dispel rumors about Chavez's condition.The cancellation of the inaugural July 5-6 summit for the CELAC bloc also cast doubt on Chavez's return for celebrations in Venezuela July 5 marking its bicentennial of independence from Spain.The video footage, where Chavez seemed to have lost weight but was acting his usual animated self, was the first to surface since the 56-year-old firebrand leader was rushed into emergency surgery in Cuba on June 10.Since the surgery, said to have been prompted by a sharp pain diagnosed as a pelvic abscess, top government officials have insisted he was "recovering well," but the unusual silence and prolonged absence from political life in Venezuela has prompted rumors about his condition.However after the video was aired -- showing Chavez and Castro, 86, speaking in a garden, and seated in a room -- his health emerged as the cause for the cancellation of the meeting of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC, its Spanish-language acronym)."It was a medical recommendation," Brazilian Foreign Minister Antonio Patriota confirmed to reporters at a meeting of the trade body Mercosur in Paraguay after being informed of the suspension by his Venezuelan counterpart Nicolas Maduro.Earlier, sources close to the new CELAC regional body said only that it had been suspended "for now and will be held at another date."Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos, who has built a close relationship with Chavez in contrast to the high tensions between the neighboring South American nations in recent years, lamented summit's postponement on Wednesday."I deeply regret the summit was canceled due to the health of President Chavez," he said in Bogota as he welcomed Peru's president-elect Ollanta Humala, but adding it was better to say "postponement" than "cancellation" of the meeting. The two

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