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Hugo Chávez goes a-twittering

Online counter-terrorism initiative

Venezuelan prez Hugo Chávez has decided that the best way to counter online criticism of his regime is to create a Twitter account via which he can disseminate his socialist vision in bite-sized insights.

According to Bloomberg, Chávez has described net attacks on his leadership as "terrorism", and his counter-terrorism arsenal will shortly include the interwebs' banality ticker tape.

Diosdado Cabello, head of the country’s telecoms regulator, confirmed yesterday: “Comandante Chávez is going to open his Twitter account soon to wage the battle online. I’m sure he’ll break records for numbers of followers.”

Given Chávez's penchant for speaking on Venezuelan TV for hours at a stretch, the biggest challenge facing el presidente is how to restrict his musings to 140 characters or less.

Whether he's capable of keeping it short remains to be seen, although this will not in fact be the Venezuelan government's first foray into Twitter.

According to Spanish singer Alejandro Sanz, dark forces moved against his account after he criticised the Chávez regime. In 2007, the Venezuelan powers that be banned a Sanz show when the popular crooner said he didn't much like the cut of the president's jib.

He now claims he's been hacked by Chavistas who've posted "racist and faked" tweets in his name.

We assume the government's next move will be to ensure Chávez secures more than the 292,804 twitterers currently following Sanz, thereby fatally undermining the Latino warbler's social networking credibility. ®

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