Venezuela oil firm to probe Argentina suitcase cash

CARACAS, Aug 11 (Reuters) Venezuelan state oil company PDVSA is investigating how a suitcase with nearly 800,000 dollars in undeclared cash ended up on a plane carrying company officials to Argentina to work on bilateral cooperation deals.

The incident prompted the resignation of an official in Argentine President Nestor Kirchner's government and has embarrassed Venezuela's Hugo Chavez, who traveled earlier this week to Buenos Aires to discuss energy accords with his leftist counterpart.

Argentine Customs officials found the cash in the suitcase of Venezuelan businessman Guido Antonini, who arrived at Buenos Aires' Jorge Newberry airport on a flight chartered by Argentine state energy company Enarsa. Antonini was traveling with three PDVSA employees.

''PDVSA has opened an investigation to determine the circumstances of those employees, together with other Venezuelans, including the citizen Antonini, on that plane,'' the company said in a news release.

Chavez, who made a two-day trip to Argentina to announce a 400 million dollars energy investment, denied Antonini was part of his entourage and said talk of that was part of a conspiracy by the United States.

Kirchner and Chavez were both elected on vows to crack down on rampant corruption, which was particularly prevalent during Venezuela's 1970s oil boom and thrived during Argentina's free-market reforms of the 1990s.

REUTERS RSA RAI2132