LIMA - Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez extolled socialism on Saturday while visiting the flood-ravaged lowlands of Bolivia, the second stop on his counter-Bush tour in Latin America, news reaching here said.

Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez and Bolivia's President Evo Morales hold stuffed squirrels during their visit to Trinidad, Bolivia, Saturday, March 10, 2007. President Chavez's counter-Bush tour reached flood-ravaged Bolivia on Saturday, following up on millions of dollars in aid the leftist leader has pledged to cope with months of flooding in its eastern lowlands. [AP]

"Those who want to go directly to hell, they can follow capitalism, and those of us who want to build heaven here on Earth, we will follow socialism," Chavez told a crowd of some 2,000 Bolivian flood victims, and Venezuelan and Cuban aid workers.

Chavez, the primary South American tormentor of the United States, appears intent on spoiling the show of U.S. President George W. Bush's parallel trip, saying at every turn that Venezuela is doing more to help the region.

Venezuela's pledge of 15 million U.S. dollars in flood aid is 10 times the 1.5 million promised by the United States.

Chavez started his counter-Bush tour in Argentina, where he called Bush a "political cadaver" and blasted U.S. policies as "imperialist." He said the U.S. president's tour is an attempt to divide Latin America.

In Bolivia, Chavez mentioned a rally against Bush he led on Friday in Buenos Aires, saying it was to protest "the presence in these South American lands of the head of the empire."

Meanwhile, Bush is seeking to shore up relations and highlight U.S. aid to Latin America with his longest-ever tour to the region. He visited Brazil, Uruguay and will go to Colombia, Guatemala and Mexico.

Chavez plans to visit Haiti and is expected to offer aid to the impoverished nation.

Faced with Chavez's provocations, Bush refrained from mentioning the Venezuelan leader when asked after meeting with Uruguayan President Tabare Vazquez whether Chavez should be considered a threat.

"I've come to South America and Central America to advance a positive, constructive diplomacy that is being conducted by my government on behalf of the American people," Bush said.

"I would call our diplomacy quiet and effective," he said.