Daily Headlines: September 15, 2016

* Latin America: Former Guantanamo detainee Abu Wa'el Dhiab woke up from a coma following the effects of a hunger strike, while Cuban dissident Guillermo Fariñas said he was duped by a fake website into halting his fast.

* Mexico: Extradition hearings against imprisoned drug capo Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman are expected to start on September 26th though the process could take years to carry out.

* Venezuela: The Vatican confirmed its mediation in the tense and deep political division in Venezuela between the government and the opposition.

* Brazil: Ex-president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva claimed he was a “victim of extremely serious illegalities” after prosecutors charged him with corruption as part of the “Lava Jato” probe.

YouTube Source – Marti Noticias (Guillermo Fariñas halted his latest hunger strike, the twenty-fifth such protest by the Cuban dissident, on Monday after more than two months).

Online Sources – ABC News, Fox News Latino, El Pais, BBC News, CNN

Daily Headlines: November 5, 2013

* Argentina: The government declassified hundreds of previously secret files including transcripts of all the meetings held by the “Dirty War” military junta and the names of blacklisted artists.
 
* Puerto Rico: A new survey reveled that about one in three Puerto Ricans are seriously considering leaving the island due to the commonwealth’s financial troubles.

* Guatemala: Guatemala withdrew from the Petrocaribe oil alliance due to the inability to reach “favorable rates for purchases and financing.”

* Cuba: Dissident Guillermo Fariñas claimed that he was attacked by a “government-organized mob” on Sunday when he attempted to file a complaint against the detention of several members of the Ladies in White protest group.

Video Source – YouTube via user TV Pública – Argentina
 
Online Sources- BBC News; LAHT; Reuters; Miami Herald

Daily Headlines: May 14, 2013

* Venezuela: President Nicolás Maduro launched the “Safe Homeland” program where over 3000 soldiers will be deployed in major cities in order to combat rampant street crime.

* Guatemala: One of the judges who convicted ex-dictator Efrain Rios Montt in a historic genocide trial ordered the Guatemalan government to publicly apologize for human rights abuses committed under his rule.

* Cuba: Guillermo Fariñas, a frequent Cuban hunger striker and dissident, travelled to Miami as part of a tour of the U.S. and Europe.

* Mexico: Authorities raised the alert level for the Popocatepetl volcano as residents in nearby towns might soon have to evacuate.

Video Source – YouTube via Al Jazeera English

Online Sources- Businessweek; Miami Herald; NBC News; BBC News; The Latin Americanist

Weekend Headlines: November 10-11, 2012

* Cuba: Blogger Yoani Sánchez and ex-hunger striker Guillermo Fariñas were among the approximately twenty dissidents briefly detained after protesting in Havana.

* Guatemala: A family of ten were among the over fifty fatalities caused by Wednesday's 7.4-magnitude earthquake that was the most powerful to hit the nation since 1976.

* Mexico: U.S. and Mexican officials are reportedly close to signing a pact regarding water use in the border region.

* Argentina: The Argentine government may be forced by a U.S. court to pay billions of dollars in defaulted debt to private creditors.

Daily Headlines: August 27, 2012

* Central America: A tsunami alert affecting Mexico and several Central American countries was lifted hours after a 7.3-magnnitude earthquake shook off the coast of El Salvador.

* Ecuador: Could Latin American support behind Ecuador’s approval of asylum for Julian Assange help push for the start of negotiations between the South American country and Britain?

* Cuba: Prominent dissident Guillermo Fariñas was released from police custody over the weekend after having been detained for approximately forty hours.

* Nicaragua: Police last week confiscated over $7 million from eighteen people who were arrested and posing as false journalists.

Video Source – YouTube via CNN Chile (Thus far there have been no reports of serious damage or injuries after the tremor occurred in the overnight hours into Monday).

Online Sources- Herald Sun, The Latin Americanist, Reuters, AFP, GlobalPost

Daily Headlines: November 3, 2011

* Colombia: Ex-Soviet military officer Viktor Bout faces life in prison after being convicted in a U.S. court for attempting to smuggle weapons to Colombia’s FARC guerillas.

* Cuba: Authorities detained dissident Guillermo Farinas on Wednesday while he was trying to visit a hospitalized political activist.

* Mexico: Is there really a “dispute” among members of the Anonymous hackers group over possibly revealing personal information of alleged Zetas drug gang collaborators?

* South America: The planned merger between Chilean airline LAN with Brazil’s TAM will supposedly be completed early next year.

Video Source – YouTube via Associated Press

Online Sources - MercoPress, The Telegraph, Fox News Latino, Huffington Post

Weekend Headlines: June 4-5, 2011

* Cuba: Political activist Guillermo Farinas announced yesterday that he would go on another hunger strike to protest the death of fellow dissident Juan Soto.

* Colombia: A U.S. judge decided to go ahead with a class action suit by victims of Colombia’s armed conflict against the Chiquita Brands food company.

* Ecuador: Chevron may not have to pay billions of dollars in restitution in an Ecuadorian environmental damages case after a Quito court dismissed criminal charges in the lawsuit.

* Caribbean: Over 2000 Haitians who left for the neighboring Dominican Republic have reportedly returned voluntarily to their homeland as part of a new immigration program.

Image – EFE
Online Sources- AFP, The Latin Americanist, New York Times, MSNBC

Cuba: Dissidents caught in crackdown

The Cuban government allegedly agreed to free eight additional political prisoners aside from a group of 52 who have slowly been released since last year. Dissidents on the island, however, have accused authorities of targeting them as part of a crackdown.

Roughly 100 dissidents were either arrested or put under house arrest in the same week that activists commemorated the one-year anniversary of the death of political prisoner Orlando Zapata. The most notable of these detentions was the brief arrest of former hunger striker Guillermo Farinas who “shouted anti-government slogans” from the rooftop of his house. “I believe that the best tribute we can give to Zapata was for the government to be forced to mobilize its repressors,” Farinas said to the press after his 27-hour arrest.

The tense atmosphere continued over the weekend when state television showed a documentary critical of the Ladies in White dissident group. The film accused them of receiving funds from the U.S. government to fund their activities. Hence, it should come as no surprise that pro-government demonstrators confronted the Ladies in White as they marched through Havana yesterday.

U.S. President Barack Obama said last week that the February 2010 death of Zapata after a lengthy hunger strike brought attention to "the ongoing mistreatment of those unjustly held by Cuban authorities". Cuban state newspaper Granma would subsequently bash Obama by claiming he was being manipulated by Cuban-American exile organizations.

Human rights groups tried to bring additional attention to the crackdown on the Cuban opposition. Amnesty International denounced the harassment of Zapata’s relatives including “preventing his family from properly celebrating his life.” According to Human Rights Watch:

"A year after Zapata's tragic death, this latest wave of arrests shows the Cuban government continues to deny its citizens the basic freedoms of assembly and speech," said José Miguel Vivanco, Americas director at Human Rights Watch…

"Through arbitrary detentions, physical abuse, and threats, the Cuban government has once again shown its willingness to repress its citizens who participate in the most basic civic activities," Vivanco said.

Image- AP via BBC News (“Pro- and anti-government protesters clashed in Havana on the anniversary of Mr. Zapata's death.”)
Online Sources- BBC News, ABC News, LAHT, AFP, Gulf Times, CBS News, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch

Daily Headlines: October 22, 2010

* Cuba: Dissident Guillermo Farinas won the Sakharov human rights prize by the European Parliament, while the archbishop of Havana said that the government would release five more political prisoners.

* Bolivia: A deal was signed this week that would grant landlocked Bolivia access to the sea via a Peruvian port.

* Argentina: One of the country's main unions called a general strike in order to protest the recent death of an activist.

* Latin America: Haiti's Palace of Sans Souci and the pre-Columbian Guatemalan city of Mirador are among 200 international cultural sites that could soon disappear according to a Global Heritage Fund report.

Image: Canada.com (Journalist Guillermo Farinas had gone on a four month hunger strike this year as a way of protesting Cuban human rights violations).
Online Sources: BBC News, The Guardian, LAHT, Reuters

Daily Headlines: July 30, 2010

* Latin America: According to German researchers marsupials such as kangaroos and koalas may have descended from a “common ancestor” in the Americas.

* Cuba: Roughly three weeks after ending his four-month hunger strike Cuban authorities allowed dissident Guillermo Farinas to leave hospital and return home.

* Costa Rica: President Laura Chinchilla State Department vowed not to reverse a decree allowing an open-pit gold mine to operate near the border with Nicaragua.

* Mexico: U.S. authorities indefinitely closed the consulate in Ciudad Juarez in order to conduct a “security review.”

Image – The Telegraph
Online Sources- BBC News, The Latin Americanist, MSNBC, BusinessWeek

Cuba: Guillermo Farinas postpones hunger strike (Updated)

Earlier today Cuba’s best-known dissident reportedly put a halt to a hunger strike that left him at the brink of death.

A spokeswoman for Guillermo Farinas said that he ended his five-month-long fast on Thursday by drinking a glass of water. She added that his health is “grave”; thus supporting recent remarks made by Farinas who said that he was “conscious of my nearing death.”

The 48-year-old psychiatrist’s actions came after the Cuban government announced that it would free 52 political prisoners and allow them to leave the country. The release appeared to have resulted from close dialogue in recent weeks between President Raul Castro and leading members of the Cuban Catholic Church. According to Church officials five prisoners will be freed in the upcoming days after having spent at least seven years in jail.

The U.S. government as well as the Spanish Foreign Minister who was visiting Havana has welcomed the planned release of the Cuban prisoners. The president of the Cuban American National Foundation told the Christian Science Monitor that the actions represent “a very positive signal” from the Castro regime. Some analysts are skeptical, however:

"It's a good thing, but we've seen this before," said Daniel Wilkinson, deputy director at Human Rights Watch, citing the hundreds of prisoner releases that followed a papal visit to the island nation in 1998. "Despite these new developments, the law which allows for arbitrary arrests remains the same."

Farinas began his 130-day hunger strike in February shortly after jailed activist Orlando Zapata Tamayo died while fasting.

Update: In remarks to CNN en Espanol, Farinas said that he will postpone his hunger strike until November and warned that he would restart it if the Castro regime does not carry out the freeing of the 52 political prisoners. Meanwhile, Spanish Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos said that his country would accept the freed prisoners from Cuba.

Image- France24 (“Cuban opposition activist Guillermo Farinas (R) stands up helped by doctor Ismel Iglesias at his home in Santa Clara, Cuba, in March 2010. Farinas ended Thursday his 135-day hunger strike after the communist government announced it would free 52 political prisoners, an opposition leader told AFP.”)
Online Sources- BBC news, Reuters, AFP, Christian Science Monitor, CNN, Al Jazeera English, AP

Castro callously criticizes Cuban dissidents

In a speech yesterday Cuban president Raul Castro blasted dissidents on the island. "We will never give in to blackmail,” said Castro against political protestors he claimed where being manipulated by foreign countries. Castro also blamed the U.S. and Europe of "hypocritically holding up the flag of human rights" and declared that the Cuban human rights situation has slowly improved.

Castro’s comments echo those made last month by parliament speaker Ricardo Alarcon who said that a foreign-led “media campaign” was being run against the Castro regime.

The Cuban government has faced increased international pressure over a series of actions regarding political prisoners. Orlando Zapata Tamayo died in late February after going on hunger strike while the Ladies in White have accused authorities of heavy-handedness in breaking up a recent march. Dissident journalist Guillermo Fariñas has been in frail health while enduring his own hunger strike. Castro alluded to his condition in Sunday’s discourse:

"Everything possible is being done to save his life, but if he does not change his self-destructive attitude, he will be responsible, together with his backers, for the outcome we don't want," Castro said in a speech to a Union of Communist Youth convention.

"More than a half century of permanent combat has taught our people that vacillation is synonymous with defeat," he said.

Despite the Castro regime’s repression and staunch coercion against just about any opposition, the government denied that there are any political prisoners on the island.

Image- Guardian UK (Guillermo Fariñas has been on a hunger strike for over a month and has refused to leave Cuba in order to seek treatment).
Online Sources- CNN, MSNBC, LAHT, ABC News, The Latin Americanist, Washington Post, Reuters, BBC News

Mourning Cuban dissidents on hunger strike

Several Cuban dissidents vowed to continue with their hunger strikes in solidarity with a recently deceased comrade.

Orlando Zapata Tamayo died in late February after undergoing his own hunger strike against the Cuban government. The death of Zapata- who had been jailed since 2003 “on charges including disrespecting authority”- caused strong condemnation of the Castro regime from the Spanish and U.S. governments.

In response to his death, four more imprisoned dissidents as well as non-jailed activist Guillermo Fariñas started their own hunger strikes. Fariñas’ health has worsened sharply since his actions began nearly three weeks ago and he has reportedly lost 28 pounds. Nevertheless he recently told Mexico’s Milenio that he would continue his protest for the release of 26 infirm political prisoners “until the very end.”

Tamayo’s death and Fariñas’ hunger strike are likely to put a serious crimp in U.S.-Cuba relations that had been slowly improving. The Cuban government’s reaction to Fariñas’ debilitating state will surely worsen matters:

The Cuban government is willing to let Guillermo Farinas, a dissident who has been on hunger strike for two weeks, die, the official newspaper Granma suggests.

In an article published Monday, Granma said forced tube feeding would be "unethical" and the government cannot give in to "blackmail," The Miami Herald reported…

"There are bio-ethical principles that require a physician to respect a person's decision to start a hunger strike," Granma said. "Therefore, there's no way he can be forced to take food, as U.S. authorities do regularly at the prisons and torture centers in Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib and Bagram."

Image- USA TODAY (“Physician Ismely Iglesias checks Cuban dissident Guillermo Farinas' blood pressure last week. Farinas has since been taken to the hospital by relatives.”)
Online Sources- Washington Post, BBC News, AFP, Milenio, Reuters, UPI