Bush to push compassion in Guatemala

Guatemala City: Frame-by-frame, the images of US President George W. Bush in Guatemala will depict sharp contrasts.

The leader of the richest nation reaching out to the impoverished. A smiling vegetable farmer benefiting from a free trade deal that Bush had trouble selling to Congress.

Bush touring Mayan ruins and speaking out against social injustice suffered by Guatemala's indigenous citizens of Mayan ancestry, who have protested against his visit.

Undeterred by demonstrations dogging Bush at every stop on his five-nation Latin American trip, Bush will work to convince Guatemalans that the United States is a compassionate nation. It's the same message he delivered earlier at stops in Brazil, Uruguay and Colombia.

"It's very important for the people of South America and Central America to know that the United States cares deeply about the human condition, and that much of our aid is aimed at helping people realise their God-given potential," Bush said on Sunday in Bogota, Colombia.

Goodwill tour

His goodwill tour also serves as a counterweight to Venezuela's Hugo Chavez, who has been doing his own tour of Latin America. On Sunday in Bolivia, Chavez called for a socialist counter-attack against the American "empire." Chavez has been pumping his nation's oil profits into social programmes across the region to further the leftward political shift he's leading in the United States' backyard.

Using his own Marine One helicopter, Bush will fly around this mountainous Central American country, for a series of events meant to show that strong democratic reforms can improve the lives of Guatemalans.

He will visit with US military medical team that offers basic health care - everything from giving vaccinations to helping build new health centres. He'll tour Labradores Mayas, a thriving vegetable packing station in Chirijuyu that has received $350,000 (Dh1.28 million) in US assistance since 2003 and is taking advantage of eased trade restrictions under the US-Central America Free Trade Agreement.

Week-long message

Congress narrowly passed the trade pact last year and Bush wants lawmakers to approve of three similar ones with Colombia, Panama and Peru. He acknowledges that these are "tough votes," but failing to get congressional approval would blunt Bush's week-long message that free trade and democratic reforms can help lift Latin Americans from poverty.

The vegetable packing station he'll visit was started in the 1990s by an indigenous farmer named Mariano Canu. The association of 66 small farming families produces 95,000 heads of lettuce a week that are sold in Guatemala, Costa Rica, El Salvador and Honduras.

Laura chases the moon with children

While Presidents George W. Bush and Alvaro Uribe talked about trade and the war on drugs, US First Lady Laura Bush chased the moon with Kitten and a group of underprivileged Colombian children.

Escorted by Colombian First Lady Lina Moreno, Bush - a former librarian and teacher - visited a children's library in Bogota's old town where she read, in English, a personal favourite: Kitten's First Full Moon, by Kevin Henkes, about a hungry cat who confuses the full moon with a bowl of milk.

"I love to read, do you like to read?" said Laura Bush, before being drowned out by a unison shout in agreement by the children gathered at the Rafael Pombo foundation, a reading centre named for 19th century author on whose moral fables generations of Colombians have been raised.

The children looked on in minor disbelief when, in response to a child's question, the First Lady said she really was the wife of President Bush.