WikiLeaks: Obama change on visa for kidnapper was an accident | McClatchy

WikiLeaks: Obama change on visa for kidnapper was an accident | McClatchy: "SANTIAGO, Chile — A Brazilian who helped kidnap the U.S. ambassador to his country in 1969 should never have received a tourist visa from the State Department last year, according to a U.S. State Department cable made public by WikiLeaks.

Officials realized what had happened after the U.S. consulate pasted the precious visa into former student radical Paulo de Tarso Venceslau's passport, but before it returned the passport to him. A top diplomat wrote to Washington asking whether it would be best to let him slide 'in light of the distance from the crime, the circumstances under which it took place, and our desire for a forward-looking relationship.'"



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While the initial visa acceptance may have been an error, the follow-up shows that diplomats wanted to take advantage of Obama's popularity after he won the Nobel Prize. Unfortunately, the effort to foment goodwill may have been for naught.

Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who leaves office this weekend, said this week he has been disappointed by how much Obama's policies in Latin America resemble those of earlier US presidents.

"Relations have changed little" between the U.S. and Latin America, Lula said this week. "The reality is they didn't change at all. That makes me sad."

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