Gaddafi is in dire need of help from his old comrade Hugo Chávez

Venezuelan president's proposal to mediate in the Libya crisis has met a frosty response – but could yield a diplomatic exit

• 
• • Ian Black, Middle East editor
  • guardian.co.uk, Thursday 3 March 2011 20.27 GMT
  • Article history

Hugo Chávez has said: 'What Simón Bolívar is to the Venezuelan people, Gaddafi is to the Libyan people. Photograph: EPA

Muammar Gaddafi and Hugo Chávez are old comrades in the struggle against imperialism and American hegemony. But the Libyan leader has probably never before been in such dire need of solidarity and help from his Venezuelan friend.

It is thousands of miles from Tripoli to Caracas, but the two have forged a relationship that includes revolutionary political views, a shared reputation for eccentricity, membership of the oil-producing cartel Opec, exchanges of extravagant gifts – and a near-unlimited capacity for generating controversy at home and abroad.
Though not even the wildest critic of Chávez would put him in the same category as Gaddafi, their enemies insist that both men are dictators. Chávez's proposal to mediate in the crisis rocking Gaddafi's Jamahiriyah (state of the masses) remains vague and has met a frosty response from the Libyan rebels. But it was the first sign of a diplomatic exit from the impasse.
The two men, pictured right, clearly admire each other hugely, with Chávez, 56, deferring to the 68-year-old Libyan. "What Simón Bolívar is to the Venezuelan people, Gaddafi is to the Libyan people," Chávez gushed after attending the 40th anniversary celebrations of the al-Fateh revolution in 2009.
The event was shunned by western leaders but alongside Chávez were Zimbabwe's Robert Mugabe and Omar al-Bashir of Sudan – wanted for war crimes in Darfur.
Shortly afterwards Gaddafi and Chávez met again at the South America-Africa (ASA) summit on the Venezuelan island of Margarita where they signed a document rejecting attempts to link terrorism to "the legitimate struggle of the people for liberty and self-determination". They also proposed the establishment of a South Atlantic treaty organization to rival US-dominated Nato.

Gaddafi praised Chávez for "having driven out the colonialists," just like he had driven out those in Libya. "We share the same destiny, the same battle in the same trench against a common enemy, and we will conquer," he said. The US embassy in Caracas, monitoring events closely, noted drily in a cable released later by WikiLeaks: "The meeting with Gaddafi ... provided the opportunity for rhetorical assaults on capitalism, colonialism, and imperialism." The relevant section of the confidential document was headlined, with heavy irony: "Gaddafi and Chávez – revolutionary brothers."

Gaddafi spent part of his first visit to South America shopping for digital cameras and jewellery and posing in photographs for bemused tourists. He also took home a replica of Simón Bolívar's sword, and a medal called Orden del Libertador, Venezuela's highest civilian decoration. He reciprocated by giving Chávez a set of handmade silver armour.
Another Libyan gift came in handy last year when Chávez moved out of his Miraflores palace into a Bedouin style tent given him by Gaddafi to make room for families made homeless by torrential rains.
Politics apart, the two men have a military background in common. Gaddafi was a colonel in 1969 when he and his fellow "free officers" seized power from the western-backed King Idris. Chávez, a former paratroop lieutenant colonel, staged a failed coup in 1992.
They first met in 1999, a year after Chávez was first elected president.
Five years later the Venezuelan received the Gaddafi International Human Rights Prize from prize-committee member Daniel Ortega, the ex-president of Nicaragua, and dedicated part of it to their common friend Yasser Arafat, the PLO leader, who had recently died. A citation praised Chávez's "brave heart, intelligent mind, eloquent oratory and firm hand."
In 2006, Libya named a new 11,000-seat soccer stadium after Chávez near Benghazi, curiously now the headquarters of the eastern rebels seeking to overthrow Gaddafi. The Libyan soccer federation said the Venezuelan was being honoured for his "brave humanitarian positions, especially in support of the people of Gaza in the recent Israeli aggression."Early on in the current crisis there was speculation that Gaddafi might go into exile in Venezuela. But he has laughed off the idea and insists he will die a martyr in his homeland rather than flee abroad.
It remains unclear whether the two will meet again when Libya hosts the third ASA summit, which had been scheduled for sometime in 2011. Indeed it seems unlikely the event will now take place in Libya at all.