Caracas, Venezuela ? The Mormon Church, citing difficulties with the government of President Hugo Chavez in renewing visas or obtaining new ones, said Wednesday it is pulling its foreign missionaries out of Venezuela and reassigning them to other countries.

The decision comes nearly two months after the government said it was temporarily suspending the granting of visas for foreign missionaries and two weeks after Chavez said he was booting U.S.-based New Tribes Mission from the country, accusing it of links to the CIA.

The U.S. Embassy said 219 American Mormon missionaries left the country over the weekend. Spaniards and Colombians where also among those who left, said Vivian Angulo, a church spokeswoman in Caracas. She said there were few foreign missionaries, if any, left in Venezuela.

“The visa situation is one reason they are leaving,” Angulo said. “It’s also due to the rotation of foreign missionaries who have finished their work here and will be replaced by Venezuelans.”

But U.S. Ambassador William Brownfield told local Union Radio on Tuesday that the security factors also contributed to the church’s decision.

However, the Utah-based Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints did not cite security among its reasons for leaving.