THE former presidential candidate Pat Robertson, a founder of the Christian Coalition, was taken to task last night by the Bush Administration for urging the assassination of Hugo Chávez, the Venezuelan leader.

The right-wing religious broadcaster had said that President Chávez was a “terrific danger” to the US because he wanted to use his oil-rich country as “a launching pad for communist infiltration and Muslim extremism”.

“We have the ability to take him out and I think the time has come that we exercise that ability,” Mr Robertson, 75, told the Christian Broadcast Network’s 700 Club.

“We don’t need another $200 billion war to get rid of one dictator. It’s a whole lot easier to have some of the covert operatives do the job and then get it over with.” Señor Chávez faces elections next year after surviving a coup attempt in 2002, but has infuriated the US by accusing it of plotting to overthrow his left-wing government and kill him. But Donald Rumsfeld, the US Defence Secretary, said: “Our department doesn’t do that kind of thing. It’s against the law. He’s a private citizen — private citizens say all kinds of things all the time.”

Sean McCormack, the State Department spokesman, emphasised that, for all its differences with Señor Chávez, assassinating him was “not the policy of the US Government”.

But Mr Robertson said: “If he thinks we’re trying to assassinate him, I think that we really ought to go ahead and do it. It’s a whole lot cheaper than starting a war, and I don’t think any oil shipments will stop.”

The US, which wants to reduce its reliance on Middle Eastern oil supplies, buys about 10 per cent of its oil from Venezuela. Señor Chávez, in Cuba yesterday visiting Fidel Castro, a close ally, has said that he would cut off such shipments if there is American aggression against his government.

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