Ex-President Jimmy Carter urges Venezuelans to trust the National Electoral Council's tallying of petition signatures in a drive to recall President Hugo Chávez.

  BY PHIL GUNSON
  Special to The Herald

  CARACAS - Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter said Monday that despite opposition complaints, he is ''satisfied'' with the National Electoral Council's
  tallying of signatures demanding a recall referendum on Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez.

  Carter's three-day visit, which began Sunday, coincides with growing opposition concern over delays and alleged irregularities in the council's counting of
  the 3.4 million signatures that Chávez's foes claim to have collected last month.

  After meeting with council officials and later with Chávez, Carter urged Venezuelans to trust the process and said he believed the electoral panel is
  handling the controversial referendum process in ``complete compliance with the laws and constitution.''

  ''The political future of Venezuela rests on their shoulders, and we are very gratified and satisfied with the performance of the CNE,'' Carter said, using the
  council's Spanish acronym.

  Carter, who has long been trying to mediate a negotiated end to the political crisis racking Venezuela as opponents try to oust the leftist populist
  president, was scheduled to hold a news conference before returning to the United States.

  The Organization of American States, which also has an observer mission in the country, meanwhile is insisting that it should be allowed to put some of its
  own monitors at critical points of the CNE signature-verification process.

  On Friday, the OAS mission requested access to two stages of the complex, seven-stage verification procedure that it considers ''critical.'' These are the
  ''quality-control'' stage and the deliberations of a technical committee that will determine whether any of those signatures considered dubious are to be
  rejected outright.

  These elements, the OAS said in a statement Sunday, ''will be vital in the final decision'' by the electoral authority as to whether enough signatures were
  gathered.

  Two members of the CNE's five-person board of directors considered close to the government have said that such access would violate Venezuelan
  sovereignty, but the council has yet to make a decision.