Venezuela freezes relations with Colombia

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has frozen diplomatic and trade relations with Colombia in a spat over Colombian allegations that Swedish anti-tank weapons sold to Venezuela turned up in the hands of leftist guerrillas.

Citing Bogota's irresponsible accusations, Chavez recalled the ambassador to Colombia, Gustavo Marquez, and froze bilateral "diplomatic and trade relations".

The leftist head of state said during a televised Cabinet meeting that any further aggression against Venezuela by Colombian President Alvaro Uribe would lead to a definitive severing of bilateral ties.

"We would simply sever relations with the Colombian government, so let's prepare for that ... that's enough (in the way of) irresponsible (accusations) against our country," Chavez said.

Chavez said a complete rupture would involve expropriating Colombian businesses operating in Venezuela, a threat he had made in the spring of 2008 when - amid an earlier diplomatic crisis sparked by a Colombian airstrike on a clandestine rebel camp in Ecuador, Venezuela's close ally - he ordered the closure of Venezuela's 2,219-km (1,380-mile) border with Colombia.

"We would expropriate the Colombian companies here ... it might be a good idea to (take over) the (Colombian) food-distribution companies," Chavez said.

The Colombian government did not respond immediately to Chavez's announcements.

Chavez announced the moves in response to Colombian claims that several anti-tank rocket launchers produced in Sweden and sold to Venezuela in the 1980s were recently found at a camp of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) guerrilla group, which has fought a decades-old insurgency in Colombia and has been designated as a terrorist organisation by Bogota, the US and the European Union.

Sweden, meanwhile, has confirmed the decades-old arms sales to Venezuela and asked the Chavez government to explain how the weapons ended up in the possession of the FARC.