Venezuela: Opposition Legislator Machado Arrives in Caracas

A Venezuelan opposition activist arrived in Caracas today amidst weeks of unrest and days after she was stripped of her legislative status.

“I have landed in my country.  Emotional for the care and confidence from the citizens who are an honor to represent in the National Assembly,” María Corina Machado mentioned via her Twitter account this afternoon.  

Later she urged her followers including those who greeted her upon her arrival to Caracas to meet her at the Brion Plaza where she would “bring support from the democrats across the continent.”

The forty-six-year-old flew in from Lima, Peru following several days of travel abroad where she did not cease from her harsh criticism of the Venezuelan government.

“This government is weaker than ever… The violence only helps the government and it’s the fault of (Venezuelan president Nicolás) Maduro, not the (opposition) protests,” said Machado in an interview published yesterday. 

“Maduro has crossed a red line,” she added.

The most controversial part of her foreign trip occurred last Friday when she was invited by Panama’s delegation to the Organization of American States (OAS) to speak at a meeting focusing on the chaos in Venezuela.  OAS representatives made the event that would normally be open to the press and accessed online into a closed session following a 22-11 vote. Some of the countries that voted for a closed session like Nicaragua and Bolivia are staunch allies of the Maduro regime while others like Brazil decried that her presence change the “objective” of the meeting “into a circus for an outside audience.”

Her participation at the meeting led the head of the National Assembly, Diosdado Cabello, on Monday to declare that Machado was stripped of her parliamentary immunity.  He also warned that she could be prosecuted for “inciting violence” relating to the past six weeks of turmoil that have claimed the lives of at least thirty-one people.

Panama’s representative to the OAS criticized the actions against Machado as “proof of arbitrary decisions” carried out by Cabello on behalf of the Maduro regime.  (Venezuela broke off diplomatic relations with Panama earlier this month after the Central American country’s president called for dialogue through the OAS.)

Daily Headlines: March 26, 2014

* Mexico: The chief executive and major stakeholder of Mexican oilfield services firm Oceanografia was placed under house arrest over his suspected role in the reported defrauding of about $400 million from Citigroup.

* Panama: What connection does Panama’s independence over a century ago have to do with the Russian invasion and apparent annexation of the Crimea region?

* Cuba: The CARICOM bloc of Caribbean nations once again called for an end to the U.S. trade embargo on Cuba. 

* Brazil: Brazil’s lower house of Congress approved a major Internet bill that did not include provisions on net neutrality or that would’ve permitted online data to be locally collected.

Video Source – YouTube user IBTimes UK

Online Sources- GlobalPost; Fox News Latino; USA TODAY; Reuters

Daily Headlines: March 25, 2014

* U.S.: Chilean Pablo Larraín will make his Hollywood debut by directing an upcoming Scarface remake where the protagonist is a Mexican immigrant who tries to make a name for himself in Los Angeles.

* Brazil: A new poll found that most Brazilians are skeptical of this summer's World Cup while the mayor of Porto Alegre admitted that his city may have to withdraw from hosting matches of the premier soccer tournament.

* El Salvador: El Salvador’s top electoral court dismissed appeals by the country’s opposition party of electoral fraud and confirmed Salvador Sanchez as president-elect by a razor-thin 0.22%.

* Haiti: Sandra Honore, the U.N.’s main representative in Haiti, said that the country “still has the highest number of cholera cases in the world” even though she admitted “progress is being made” to combat the epidemic.

Video Source – YouTube user George Lewis (Trailer to the 1983 version of Scarface, which starred Al Pacino as a Cuban-born drug capo in 1980s Miami).
 
Online Sources- The A.V. Club; The Guardian; Prensa Latina; BBC News; ABC News

Bolivian President Renews Push for Coastline

Bolivian President Evo Morales yesterday urged the international community to support his landlocked country’s push for a coastline that it lost to Chile 135 years ago.

“Today, in our America, different winds are blowing. Today, we are a continent of peace. We seek to find peaceful solutions to historical injustices without wars nor confrontations,” said Morales at a public speech to commemorate the local Day of the Sea holiday. 

The remarks by Morales occurred at an event in a La Paz plaza named after Eduardo Abaroa, a Bolivian national hero who lost his life in the War of the Pacific in 1879.  It was during this brutal conflict where Chile annexed tens of thousand of square miles of Bolivian and Peruvian land including some 260 miles of Bolivian coastline.

“Bolivia wants access to the sea before all of the area’s natural resources are exhausted and exploited by the international companies,” he added in apparent reference to billions of dollars Chile earns yearly by exports from copper, silver and minerals extracted from land formerly controlled by Bolivia.

“If a dictator like (former Chilean strongman Augusto) Pinochet proposed access to the ocean for bolivar in the 1970s, then the current socialist and democratic government can make this a reality in the 21st century,” Morales mentioned in a message to recently inaugurated Chilean President Michelle Bachelet.

Since Bachelet retook the presidency on nearly two weeks ago, she has indicated that it will differ from that of her conservative predecessor, Sebastián Piñera, on issues like the treatment of the indigenous Mapuche and the planned HidroAysen hydropower complex.  Moreover, both Bachelet and Morales held bilateral negotiations during her first term in the presidency yet it appears like Bachelet in her second period in office would not sway from Piñera’s stance against the need to redraw boundaries.

Daily Headlines: March 24, 2014

* El Salvador: Will Salvadoran Archbishop Oscar Romero, who was murdered while celebrating Mass on this day 34 years ago, be granted sainthood by the Vatican within the next three years?

* Spain: Argentine soccer superstar Lionel Messi’s hat trick helped push Barcelona to a 4-3 victory against their traditional Spanish rivals Real Madrid.

* Brazil: Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff has reportedly come under fire over alleged irregularities in the costly purchase of a California oil refinery by Petrobras in 2006.

* Uruguay: President Jose Mujica of Uruguay said that his country would take in several Guantanamo Bay detainees in exchange for the U.S. freeing three Cubans convicted of spying in 2001.
 
Video Source – YouTube user interestmedia

Online Sources- The Pilot; SI.com; Forbes.com; Xinhua

The Weekender – Water

“The Weekender” is our new feature where every weekend we hope to highlight a short film, movie or documentary pertaining to Latin American and the Caribbean.  
 
March 22nd is the U.N.-sponsored World Water Day, which helps to examine the importance of water in our daily lives and the challenges communities face globally in order to gain access to such a vital substance.  This year’s theme focuses on the “closely linked an interdependent” relation between water and energy including how they affect economic development and wealth worldwide.

The 2009 documentary Water Which Makes Us Alive looks at how residents of the Peruvian community of Andamarca manage the limited supplies of water that are in their area.  Their system of self-regulation aims to ensure that they can all have a fair access to water for all and helps in the survival of the Andamarca area. 

According to a synopsis of the documentary from Culture Unplugged Studios, “This spiritual, social and political system of water management is an example for managing water resources for irrigation in a participatory, democratic way that respects the ecosystem…Without the sense of unity that underlies this collective management, the inhabitants would break their roots and the community would be transformed into a dead place.

Unfortunately Water Which Makes Us Alive cannot be embedded though we have included a link to the very insightful and interesting film.  This link is available under the page break as well as a short embedded video on an innovative billboard in Peru that converts air into potable water. 

Daily Headlines: March 21, 2014

* Uruguay: President Jose Mujica said that Uruguay would be willing to take in five detainees of the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba though no definitive agreement has been reached.

* Dominican Republic: Dominican officials are reportedly working “urgently” on a nationalization bill that could help some of the thousands of residents of Haitian background whose citizenship was stripped in a controversial high court ruling.
 
* U.S.: The National Hispanic University, which is the only Latino-oriented four year college in the U.S., will be shutdown next year due to “significant ongoing regulatory and financial challenges.”

* Mexico: Hipolito Mora, the leader of one of the “self-defense” vigilante groups in Michoacán, will face trial over his suspected involvement in the murders of two men.

Video Source – NTN24 via YouTube

Online Sources- Fox News Latino; Dominican Today; The Latin Americanist; GlobalPost; LAHT

Daily Headlines: March 20, 2014

* U.S.: Officials in Texas found 109 migrants mostly from Central America and Mexico crammed into a dilapidated house and who may have been victims of a human smuggling operation.

* South America: Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos gave final approval to the dismissal of Bogotá mayor Gustavo Petro while Venezuelan authorities arrested San Cristobal Mayor Daniel Ceballos and charged him with inciting “civil rebellion.”

* Argentina: Argentine President Cristina Fernandez blasted last week’s referendum in Crimea as “worthless” and compared it to a March 2013 vote where most residents of the disputed Falklands Islands opted to remain under British rule.

* Brazil: Lawmakers dropped a controversial provision from a major Internet bill that would’ve permitted online data to be locally collected in order to bypass U.S. intelligence surveillance.

Video Source – Associated Press via YouTube

Online Sources- The Guardian; Reuters; ZDNet; Bloomberg

”Extreme Emergency” in Drought-Hit Haitian Region

When referring to the affects of weather on Haiti one probably thinks of hurricanes and other tropical storms ravaging the Caribbean nation.  Yet northeastern Haiti has been hit by a doughty so severe that one government official called the situation an “extreme emergency.”

According to Pierre Gary Mathieu, representative of Haiti’s National Coordination of Food Security (CNSA), the drought has lasted eight months and has led to the loss of two harvest seasons. As a result, farmers have been forced to travel farther in order to obtain water while some schools where meals are provided to impoverished students do not have water or food.

“People need jobs immediately but they also need food,” Mathieu said to the Associated Press (AP) in an article published on Wednesday.

Even though some rain has fallen recently in the affected area, Mathieu believes that it will take at least six months for a recovery to occur.  Nevertheless, government officials are expected to meet tomorrow with international aid workers in order to plan out a proper response to the drought affected area.  (A World Food Program spokesman told the AP that the organization would send food kits containing rice, beans and cooking oil to some 120,000 people in northwestern Haiti).

The latest CNSA outlook for the first six months of this year concluded that the drought may not affect national food production and availability yet could cause a “deterioration” in food security in dry areas.  For example, Haiti has imported thousands of tons of rice from Vietnam to satisfy local demand yet rice farmers in areas like Maribaroux and Fort Liberté have experienced difficulties due to “the lack of water in irrigation systems.”

Daily Headlines: March 19, 2014

* Venezuela: Federal legislators called for an investigation against opposition congresswoman Maria Corina Machado while anti-government demonstrators rallied on the one-month anniversary of the arrest of protest leader Leopoldo Lopez.

* Central America: A new study concluded that state recognition of indigenous land rights could serve as a vital deterrent for drug trafficking in Central America. 

* Mexico: Jorge Arvizu, the veteran Mexican voice actor who was the Spanish-speaking world’s Mel Blanc, died yesterday at the age of 81.

* Colombia: President Juan Manuel Santos will likely finalize the dismissal and fifteen-year suspension of Bogotá mayor Gustavo Petro sometime this week.

Video Source – AFP via YouTube

Online Sources- The Guardian; Tico Times; LAHT; Al Jazeera English

Daily Headlines: March 18, 2014

Note: Before getting to today’s headlines, we would like to wholeheartedly apologize for publishing this post so late in the day.  This delay is inexcusable and a major error that we hope not to commit again.

* Brazil: U.S. Treasury Secretary Jack Lew, who is undergoing his first Latin American trip since taking office over a year ago, traveled to Brazil where he’s hoping to repair weak relations resulting from denunciations made by intelligence whistleblower Edward Snowden.

* U.S.: A group of twenty-four living and deceased U.S. Army veterans including several born in Puerto Rico and Mexico will receive the Medal of Honor.

* Venezuela: Flights to and from Venezuela with Air Canada were cancelled due to “ongoing civil unrest” jeopardizing the safety of the airline carrier's operation.

* Guatemala: Former Guatemalan resident Alfonso Portillo pled guilty in a U.S. federal court and admitted that he accepted $2.5 million in bribes in order to continue recognizing Taiwan diplomatically.

Video Source – euronews via YouTube

Online Sources- Bloomberg; The Latin Americanist; CBC News; ABC News

Daily Headlines: March 17, 2014

* Chile: More than 100,000 people were briefly evacuated from coastal areas in Chile after a 6.7-magnitude earthquake struck in the Pacific Ocean near the northern tip of the country yesterday.

* Venezuela: Tensions remain high between the Venezuelan government and opposition demonstrators after police fired tear gas at student protesters in Caracas.

* El Salvador: The Salvadoran Supreme Electoral Court tossed out a request to annul the March 8th presidential election and declared ruling party candidate Salvador Sanchez Ceren as the country’s president-elect.
  
* Peru: Former president Alberto Fujimori was discharged from hospital following a small stroke on Friday and returned to prison where he’s serving time on charges of human rights abuses and corruption.

Video Source – euronews via YouTube (No immediate reports of damages or injuries resulted from Sunday’s tremor off the Chilean coast that also led to a tsunami warning for several hours).

Online Sources- CNN; The Guardian; Voice of America; The Latin Americanist; Reuters

Follow-up: Top Venezuelan Diplomat Blasts “Murderer” Kerry

Yesterday we examined the Congressional testimony of U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry who urged the Venezuelan government to end their “terror campaign” against the population and warned that the White House was considering enacting sanctions. On Friday several Venezuelan officials pulled no punches in responding to Kerry’s statements.

“Mr. Kerry, we denounce to the whole world, you encourage the violence in Venezuela … We denounce you as a murderer of the Venezuelan people,” declared Foreign Minister Elias Jaua.

Jaua also alleged that every time Kerry makes a public declaration on Venezuela, violence flared up in the “main areas” of unrest in the South American country.

“You saw it on Wednesday (when) Kerry made comments and that evening there was an increase in the number of deaths including a captain of the National Guard,” said Jaua.

In addition, Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro claimed that the unrest over the past month that has officially left twenty-eight people dead “unclothed” the “real politics” of the U.S. State Department.

“It is more than evident today that the U.S. government is desperate for intervention (in Venezuela).  If they are successful and our regime were ousted, then Latin America will face its worst economic instability" in the region's history, Maduro said at a press conference this afternoon.

Aside from Kerry, Maduro blamed a “Miami lobby” of politicians for attempting to influence White House policy on Venezuela.  Similarly, Venezuela’s attorney general lashed out at the U.S. Senate for approving bipartisan resolutions condemning the Maduro regime and seeking $15 million in funds to “defend human rights in Venezuela (and) support democratic civil society organizations."

Kerry to Maduro: Halt “Terror Campaign” in Venezuela

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry had harsh words to say on Thursday against Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro as the death toll rose amidst weeks of unrest in the South American country.

"We are engaged now with trying to find a way to get the Maduro government to engage with their citizens, to treat them respectfully, to end this terror campaign against his own people and to begin to hopefully respect human rights and the appropriate way of treating his people," Kerry said during his testimony in front of the Foreign Affairs committee of the House of Representatives.

When asked by Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen as to what actions the U.S. is taking to respond to the turmoil in Venezuela, Kerry called on the Organization of American States (OAS) and Venezuela’s neighbors to “ensure accountability” of the Maduro regime.

“We are taking actions and not just making statements,” Kerry noted and he said that Vice President Joe Biden “talked with leaders of other countries” of the Americas during his visit to Chile this week.

Kerry’s comments came one day after he spoke to a separate House committee and threatened with imposing sanctions against Venezuela if efforts at mediation were to fail.

“We are prepared, if necessary, to invoke the Democratic Charter of the OAS and get involved in various ways, through sanctions or otherwise, but the economy there is already quite fragile,” Kerry mentioned.

Numerous legislators representing the Democratic and Republican parties have urged the White House to raise sanctions against the Maduro regime and ease immigration requirements for Venezuelan migrants.  On Thursday the Senate approved a resolution with bipartisan sponsorship that condemns the Venezuelan government and urges U.S. President Barack Obama to "impose targeted sanctions."

Report Investigates Election of Crooked Colombian Congressmen (Updated)

The recent legislative elections in Colombia were marked by high abstentions and a greater than expected number of blank votes.  Yet the most troublesome part of the election may have to do with the shady connections amongst some of the legislators.

According to the Fundación Paz y Reconciliación, at least 70 candidates that will join the next Colombian legislature have either direct or indirect links to criminal organizations.   As a result the NGO believes that roughly 35% of the next Congress to be sworn in on July 20th will have questionable ties to criminal groups, especially right-wing paramilitaries and neo-paramilitaries.

“The para-politics phenomena is still alive,” said León Valencia, the foundation’s president, in reference to the scandalous revelations first made in 2006 regarding politicians financed and supported by the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC) and their successors. 

“We engaged in a serous investigation from November until February of this year and we received plenty of evidence explaining how this phenomena was going to influence the election,” added Valencia.

President Juan Manuel Santos last month kicked out five senior military officers including the chief of the armed forces amidst major allegations of corruption and illegal wiretapping.  Yet Paz y Reconciliación claimed that 41 of the supposedly “dirty” candidates belonged to political parties allied to the government that retained a majority of the legislature.

For example, Senator Musa Besaile of the Partido de la U received the third-most votes nationwide even though demobilized AUC commanders claimed that he received campaign funds from them in 2006. Luis Eduardo Diaz Granados Torres of Cambio Radical won a seat in the Chamber of Representatives with help from the corrupt Char political clan in Atlántico state.

Other Congressional Santistas are family members of former politicians convicted in the para-politics scandal such as Andres Felipe Garcia Zucardi, son of a pair of ex-legislators that are currently in prison, and Sandra Villadiego whose husband is parapolítico Miguel Ángel Rangel.

The recently formed Centro Democratico may have captured twenty Senate spots and become the main opposition party but some of their legislators have shady connections according to Paz y Reconciliación.  Such is the case of Alfredo Ramos Maya who is the son of Luis Alfredo Ramos Botero, a former Antioquia governor currently jailed and under investigation for possible ties to the AUC.  Electoral officials may have barred Pedro Jesus Orjuela Gomez for running for mayor of Arauca due to his links to another governor accused of being helped by the AUC but that didn’t stop him from capturing a seat in the Chamber. 

Daily Headlines: March 13, 2014

* Venezuela: Three people were killed in Venezuela on Wednesday on the one month anniversary of clashes between opposition protesters and pro-government activists in Caracas.

* Mexico: Some areas of Mexico may be hit by drug-related violence but that hasn’t stopped international tourism in the country from increasing by 17.4% in January 2013.

* Haiti: A new class action lawsuit was filed in a U.S. federal court this week against the U.N. to hold the international body responsible for a cholera epidemic that killed thousands across the Americas.

* Chile: “Chile must value the diversity that characterizes Latin America and effectively tackle the challenges presented by our relations with neighbors,” declared new president Michelle Bachelet during her inauguration address on Tuesday.

Video Source – YouTube user ExcelsiorTV (“Venezuela marks one month of protests and the violence has apparently not ceased.  24 people have died.”)

Online Sources- Reuters; SBS; The Guardian; Xinhua