Caracas - A threat by Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez to stop oil exports to the United States has raised the stakes over a Sunday referendum he has called in a bid to expand his powers.
Chavez told tens of thousands of supporters late Friday he was putting Venezuela's oil field and refineries under military "protection" and would halt the exports "if this (referendum) is used as a pretext to start violence in Venezuela".
He accused the US Central Intelligence Agency of preparing to spread unrest during the plebiscite in an effort to topple him, and said if its operation was activated "there won't be a drop of oil from Venezuela to the United States".
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The menace was an escalation of anti-US rhetoric Chavez has long employed, and highlighted both Venezuela's pivotal role as South America's biggest oil producer, and the parlous relations between Washington and Caracas.
Venezuela, an Opec member, currently exports around 60 percent of the two million barrels of oil it produces per day to the United States, which relies on them for 11 percent of its oil needs.
Chavez faces a real risk of losing Sunday's referendum - an unprecedented situation for the president, who has always triumphed in elections by comfortable margins during his eight-year rule.
The latest polls show a dead-heat in voter intentions, with many Chavez loyalists in Venezuela slums balking at his proposals.
The referendum calls for a scrapping of term limits for the president, opening the way for Chavez to stay on past 2013, when he is due to step down.
The 53-year-old president said Friday he wanted to reign "until 2050", if the people backed him.
Changes to allow the government to take over the central bank and expropriate private property in the name of "economic socialism", and gag the media in times of emergency are also being proposed.
Opponents, whose number has swelled in past weeks with the defection of some Chavez allies, say the reforms would amount to making Venezuela a Cuba-like communist state, with an elected "dictator".
Chavez, who reveres Cuba's Fidel Castro, dismisses those ranked against him as "traitors" acting to further US "imperialism".
"A vote 'yes' is a vote for Chavez - a vote 'no' is a vote for (US President) George W Bush," he said.
The United States is not the only target of Chavez's verbal broadsides. Recently, the Venezuelan president has accumulated international disputes.
Last month, Spain's King Juan Carlos told him to "shut up" at a summit. Stung by the opposition's adoption of the phrase in its campaign against the referendum, Chavez has demanded an apology - failing which he said he might nationalise Spanish banks in Venezuela.
He also fell out spectacularly with his Colombian counterpart, Alvaro Uribe, after the latter dropped him as a mediator in negotiations to release hostages held by leftist FARC guerrillas.
Chavez said he would have nothing to do with Colombia's government as long as Uribe remained in power - another potentially costly decision, given that Colombia supplies much of Venezuela's basic food supplies, including eggs, milk and chicken.
The foreign media were not spared either.
He accused CNN of inciting his assassination by putting the caption "Who killed him?" under his picture this week. He dismissed the network's explanation that it was an on-air mix-up with another news item.
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