Belafonte led a delegation of Americans including actor Danny Glover, Princeton University scholar Cornel West and farmworker advocate Dolores Huerta that met the Venezuelan president for more than six hours late Saturday and attended his television and radio broadcast yesterday.

Belafonte and Chavez embraced at the end of the show as Belafonte's song Matilda blared over the speakers.

"No matter what the greatest tyrant in the world, the greatest terrorist in the world, George W. Bush says, we're here to tell you: Not hundreds, not thousands, but millions of the American people . . . support your revolution," Belafonte told Chavez during the broadcast.

"We respect you, admire you, and we are expressing our full solidarity with the Venezuelan people and your revolution," he added.

The 78-year-old Belafonte, famous for his calypso-inspired music, including the Day-O song, was a close collaborator of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and is now a UNICEF goodwill ambassador.

He also has been outspoken in criticising the United States embargo of communist Cuba.

Attending the live Hello President programme under a canopy at a farming cooperative southwest of Caracas, Belafonte said he had come to learn about Chavez's "Bolivarian Revolution," which includes a wide range of social programmes for the poor and is named after South American independence hero Simon Bolivar.

He accused American news media of falsely painting Chavez as a "dictator," when in fact, he said, there was democracy and citizens were "optimistic about their future."

The Americans toured a prison, spoke with people in the street and heard praise, as well as criticism, Belafonte said. To be able to criticize, he said, "is the greatest truth of a democracy."

Huerta, a pioneer of the United Farm Workers labour union, called the visit a "very deep experience."

Belafonte suggested setting up a youth exchange for Venezuelans and Americans to learn from each other.

He finished by shouting in Spanish: "Viva la revolucion!" (AP)