Daily Headlines: January 18, 2011

* U.S.: The family of a Mexican boy killed by a U.S. Border Patrol agent last June has filed a multimillion-dollar wrongful death lawsuit against the U.S. government.

* Peru: An executive order issued by President Alan Garcia bans all smoking in public buildings and the workplace.

* Latin America: Execs at CONCACAF, the ruling soccer body for North America, Central America, and the Caribbean, will advocate that the region receive another automatic berth for the 2014 World Cup.

* Guatemala: According to a 2008 diplomat cable released by Wikileaks, Guatemalan President Alvaro Colom was highly critical against Nobel Peace Prize laureate Rigoberta Menchu.

Image – AP via MSNBC (“Friends and relatives of Sergio Adrian Hernandez Guereca, 15, carry his coffin before his burial in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, on June 10, 2010.”)
Online Sources- AP, Reuters, LAHT, Houston Chronicle

Guatemala: Ex-dictator won’t be extradited

A Guatemalan constitutional court refused a Spanish judge’s request to extradite a former dictator and seven others.

Efrain Rios Montt was accused of “crimes against humanity” during his 1982-1983 regime by a Spanish magistrate in June 2006. Yet the Guatemalan court decided that Spain did not have the jurisdiction to try Montt and his cohorts.

1992 Nobel Prize winner Rigoberta Menchu- who filed charges against Montt in 1999- blasted the court’s decision:

"This only confirms the reason why I did not trust the Guatemalan justice system and filed the complaint in Spain in 1999," Menchu said of the ruling, which was handed down last week but not announced until Monday.

Benito Morales, Menchu's lawyer, said he would ask the court to reconsider the ruling.

Menchu said the former officials "can no longer leave the country because international arrest warrants are still active elsewhere."

Despite being accused of some of Guatemala’s worst atrocities, Rios Montt ran unsuccessfully for president in 2003.

Sources- Voice of America, Reuters, Associated Press, Wikipedia, BBC News

Image- BBC News

Daily Headlines: August 17, 2007

* Follow-up: Remember the “incident” we mentioned in Daily Headlines on Wednesday regarding Rigoberta Menchu being ejected from a Cancun hotel? Turns out it never really happened. (Hat tip: Guanabee).

* Researchers concluded that the infamously dirty air above Mexico City causes more health damage to children than tobacco smoke.

* This is a peace process? – Colombia’s government found that new criminal gangs were forming in areas that had been controlled by paramilitary groups.

* Caribbean countries are bracing themselves for the season’s first hurricane.

Sources- The Latin Americanist, Latina.com, Guanabee, Reuters, International Herald Tribune, BBC News

Image- UCLA

Daily Headlines: August 15, 2007

* Was 1992 Nobel Peace Prize recipient Rigoberta Menchu discriminated against by Cancun hotel personnel?

* Yale University promised to give back artifacts from Peru’s Machu Picchu that were taken by U.S. explorer Hiram Bingham nearly a century ago.

* Amazon rainforest deforestation has gone down by 25% according to figures from the Brazilian government.

* Colombian ambassador to the U.S. Carolina Barco claimed that the U.S. will cut aid to the Andean country by about 10%.

* The Cuban-born daughter of “Che” Guevara became a nationalized Argentine citizen over the weekend.

* Follow-up: Actor Mel Gibson dined with Guatemalan president Oscar Berger approximately one month after meeting with Costa Rica’s head of state.

Sources- Monsters & Critics, Newsday, ABC Online, People’s Daily Online, Melbourne Herald Sun, TIME, The Latin Americanist

Image- Cambio Sonora

Daily Headlines: August 10, 2007

* More heavy snow is expected in areas of Chile after the capital, Santiago, received its first snowfall in eight years on Wednesday (image).

* A team of Mexican teens upset the U.S. and Canada by winning the National Geographic World Championship.

* Political violence in Guatemala nearly ended the lives of the daughters of 1992 Nobel Peace Prize winner Rigoberta Menchu.

* Cuba’s government rejected accusations that they impede the U.S. from distributing visas to Cubans.

* Follow-up: The lawyer for recently arrested Colombian drug trafficker Juan Carlos Ramirez Abadia wants his client to be extradited to the U.S.

Sources- Bloomberg, The Latin Americanist, CNN, Voice of America, International Herald Tribune

Image- La Nacion

Guatemala: Menchu far behind in presidential polls

Nobel Prize winner and Guatemalan presidential candidate Rigoberta Menchu (image) has some serious catching up to do if she wants to win her country’s elections. According to one of the latest polls, she sits in a distant third place, whereas in another survey se lies in fifth with a mere 1.5% in her favor.

Despite having widespread name recognition, it seems that Menchu is being hampered by Guatemalans who view rampant crime as the country’s main problem and thus support the main right-wing candidate. At the same time, she is hurt by the leading leftist candidate who is championing social causes. Hence, Menchu is stuck behind the proverbial rock and a hard place.

Sources- Angus Reid Consultants, Guardian UK, Reuters AlertNet

Image- Prensa Libre

Daily headlines: March 27, 2007

* Telesur = Latin American version of Al Jazeera? Oh really?

* Mexican stocks took a bit of a tumble during trading on Monday due to worry over slumping home sales in the U.S.

* China and Venezuela signed off on several agreements including constructing refineries in China to handle increased shipments of Venezuelan oil.

* Polls taken earlier this month show that Rigoberta Menchu is last amongst the four main candidates for Guatemala’s presidency; the leader is the 2003 presidential runner-up who’s running with a former Texas surgeon.

Links- Forbes, China Daily, Angus Reid Global Consultants, Houston Chronicle, MarketWatch

Image- Narco News

Bolivia’s Morales supports Rigoberta Menchu’s bid for prez

Politicians linked to Bolivian president Evo Morales expressed his support for Nobel Prize laureate Rigoberta Menchu (image) in her bid for Guatemala’s presidency. A key senator to Morales’ Movement Towards Socialism party said that they would send an advisory group to “accompany and support comrade Menchu.”

Morales was elected as Bolivia’s first indigenous president and indigenous leader Menchu certainly hopes to emulate in his footsteps and be elected to the presidency.

Links- Javno, Washington Post

Image- BBC News