FACTBOX: Friction between neighbors Venezuela, Colombia

(Reuters) - Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez on Monday taunted Colombian President Alvaro Uribe as a "traitor" to Latin America over his plan to allow U.S. troops access to seven bases in Colombia for counter-narcotics operations.

Arriving in Quito for a South American summit, Chavez defied Uribe to show up and face off with the gathered leaders.

While insults, threats and diplomatic protests are common between the leftist Chavez and the conservative Uribe, they usually make up quickly.

Following are some facts about the two countries and their relationship:

* Venezuela and Colombia share a 1,375-mile (2,200-km) border and hundreds of years of volatile history. After both were liberated from the Spanish by Venezuelan freedom fighter Simon Bolivar in the 19th century, the two countries were at the center of a short-lived nation known as Gran Colombia that also included Ecuador and Panama.

* Colombia's four-decade internal conflict has for years spilled over into Venezuela but the ideological closeness of Chavez and the FARC Marxist rebels has increasingly led Uribe's government to accuse the Venezuelan leader of supporting the guerrillas.

* Chavez often responds to such accusations not only with diplomatic reprisals but torrents of abuse against Uribe, who he has called a "mafioso" linked to right-wing paramilitary fighters. Last week, he accused Uribe of "spitting lies" about him. Uribe's government has threatened to take Chavez to international court, charging he supported genocide by leftist Colombian rebels.

* Chavez's recall of his diplomats from Colombia in July was the third such move since 2005, when tensions rose over the arrest in Caracas of a FARC leader in a Colombian-led police operation.

* The two countries raised the specter of war last year after a Colombian bombing raid on a guerrilla camp in Ecuador sparked troop movements from Quito and Caracas. Chavez cut diplomatic relations with Bogota and threatened to stop cross-border trade.

* Despite the friction, trade between Venezuela and Colombia has blossomed in recent years to $7 billion in 2008. Flush with cash from a boom in its principal export, oil, Venezuela has bought Colombian farm produce and cars, in exchange for fuel and chemicals.

* In calmer times, Chavez and Uribe have displayed a rapport, exchanging hugs and jokes and striking a cross-border natural gas pipeline deal.

(Reporting by Frank Jack Daniel; Editing by John O'Callaghan)