Remittances to Mexico Keep Dropping

Remittances sent to Mexico dropped for the fourth month in row according to new data revealed by that country’s central bank. 

The Banco de México revealed yesterday that money transfers into Mexico totaled almost $1.78 billion in October, which was a decrease of 7.1% in comparison to the same month in 2011.  $19.04 billion in remittances were sent between January 2012 and last October and this represents a 0.9% decline compared to the first ten months of 2011. 

The new figures also revealed that the average amount of money sent per remittance in October 2012 ($299.78) is 5.8% less than in October 2011.

The decline in remittances can best be explained the old adage “when the U.S. sneezes, Mexico catches a cold”:

Daily Headlines: December 5, 2012

* Brazil: At least sixty-one police officers were arrested in Rio de Janeiro state and accused of taking bribes from drug traffickers in exchange for turning a blind eye to illicit activity.

* Latin America: Venezuela and Haiti are tied as the most corrupt countries in Latin America and the Caribbean according to an analysis by Transparency International.

* Argentina: Attorneys for Spanish oil firm Repsol filed a lawsuit in a U.S. federal court against Chevron regarding that company’s dealings with Argentina's YPF.

* Guatemala: A lawyer for software company founder John McAfee said that his client will seek political asylum in Guatemala despite being wanted on murder charges in the U.S.

Video Source – YouTube via user tvbrasil

Online Sources- CNN, Reuters, Transparency International, Sydney Morning Herald

Report: Major Abuses Committed at Guatemala Hospital

The International Day of Persons with Disabilities was observance this past Monday with this year’s theme calling for the “removal of barriers to create an inclusive and accessible society for all.”  Sadly many barriers continue to exist against the disabled around the world such as the recent allegations of abuse in Guatemala.

An investigation by the Human Rights Office of the Archbishop of Guatemala and Disability Rights International (DRI) concluded that abuse was rampant against patients at the Federico Mora psychiatric hospital.  The joint study claimed that approximately 300 children were kept in isolation cells, and that hospital staff and convicts of a nearby prison often abused patients. 

The report also noted that patients lack proper treatment and die from curable illnesses. As a result, there is a high risk of HIV infection and this is made worse since the hospital allegedly lacks the resources to treat those exposed to the virus.

“We found a climate of terror. Even authorities at the hospital are afraid of their own staff.  Authorities told us they cannot remove known abusers because they fear they will be killed or threatened by gang members due to the links between staff and the Mara Salvatrucha (street gang),” observed DRI attorney Sofía Galván via a statement on the organization’s website.

Ecuador: Police Free Presidential Password Infiltrator

Police in Ecuador freed a blogger who was able to infiltrate into “secure data” belonging to President Rafael Correa.

“I’m free.  Many thanks to everyone,” Paul Moreno mentioned via his Twitter account on Monday after he was released from approximately three days of police custody.  He subsequently tweeted a photo of him accompanied by his parents outside of the jail where he was held.

Moreno “did not commit any 'hacking' activity or intrusion into global information” of the DatoSeguro national dignity database said a statement from Ecuador’s Public Information Registry.

The forty-two-year-old professor gained access to Correa’s personal information by creating a fake account under the president’s name in the DatoSeguro database.  He reportedly used online searches in order to obtain two key pieces of information: Correa’s date of birth and a national identification number.  Moreno got passed the third safeguard, a set of two numbers from an identity card, in order to read Correa’s private data such as bank account numbers and criminal infractions.

According to Wired.com’s Gadget Lab blog, Delgado posted on his website screenshots from the DatoSeguro site proving his claims and wrote how shockingly easy it was to gain access to Correa’s confidential information:

Daily Headlines: December 4, 2012 (Updated)

* Honduras: At least 149 people were murdered by Honduras’ National Police over the past 23 months according to a report presented yesterday.

Update: Police spokesman Héctor Iván Mejía criticized the report as inaccurately "generalizing" the police as "criminals".  But in his remarks to the website of Honduran daily La Tribuna, Mejía did not touch on the data presented in the report blaming the police for 149 murders in nearly two years.   

* Cuba: The U.S. State Department urged Cuban officials to release ill, imprisoned contractor Alan Gross and “return him to his family where he belongs.”

* Mexico: Doctors in Mexico confirmed that retired Colombian soccer goalkeeper Miguel Calero is brain dead and on life support machines.

Update: Miguel Calero was declared clinically dead by doctors overseeing him according to a statement from Mexican soccer club Pachuca.  The forty-one-year-old Calero appeared in fifty games for the Colombian national team, and won three CONCACAF Champions Cup and a Copa Sudamericana in his eleven years as Pachuca goalkeeper. 

* U.S.: Two suspected Mexican drug smugglers were accused of killing a U.S. Coast Guard officer on California's seas.

Video Source – YouTube via user Vox Populi (Honduran police officers were accused of abuse while trying to break up a teachers’ occupation of a Tegucigalpa school in 2010).

Online Sources including Updates - CNN, The Huffington Post, ESPN Soccernet, Fox News Latino, LaTribuna.hn, RCN Radio

Today's Video: Shattering Taboos on AIDS

In the upcoming days several of our posts will focus on HIV/AIDS throughout the Americas in commemoration of World AIDS Day that was observed last Saturday.

Guillermo Chacón, President of the Latino Commission on AIDS, mentioned recently to The Huffington Post that stigmas on HIV/AIDS are one of the main factors that "disproportionately impact" the Latino populace.

"Talking about HIV and safe sex is still very difficult, and we need to promote more education around both of these subjects so that people are aware of how HIV is transmitted and what they can do to have safer sex," said Chacón.  He also observed that "homophobia and transphobia are also major obstacles to address HIV/AIDS" and, thus, he recommends that "we also advocate for LGBT rights and acceptance in all of our families".

One of the efforts aimed at removing the unfortunate stigma on HIV/AIDS among Latinos comes via new webseries that commenced last week.  Sin Vergüenza (translated as Shameless), according to the description provided with the initial episode, aims to "encourages people to get tested as a routine part of their medical care and to seek HIV medical care should they test positive".

The first chapter of this dramatic, telenovela-like webseries can be viewed below:

Daily Headlines: December 3, 2012

* Peru: A ten-year ban on the import, production and use of genetically modified foods went into effect in Peru last week.

* Colombia: At least twenty guerillas were killed in a military raid reported as the “biggest military operation against FARC since peace talks began in October”.

* Argentina: Former navy captain Alfredo Astiz, known as the "Blonde Angel of Death," is among the sixty-eight defendants involved in the biggest “Dirty War”-related trial in Argentine history.

* U.S.: A recently released report found that domestic workers in the U.S., most of whom are undocumented immigrants, suffer from all forms of abuse at the hands of their employers. 

Video Source – YouTube via user FirstscienceTV

Online Sources- current.com, France24, BBC News, LAHT

Today's Video: Psychopath

Over the past few days we've focused on several instances of abuse against women in Latin America in commemoration of the recent International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women.  On Monday we will discuss several news stories from the Americas focusing on HIV/AIDS in observance of World AIDS Day this past Saturday.  The following story from Colombia is a tragic confluence of these two subjects.

Police in Bogotá this weekend arrested a 57-year-old truck driver accused of infecting approximately fifty of women with HIV.  According to the EFE news agency police believe that José Libardo Rojas "seduced" dozens of women in five states even though he knew he was infected with HIV.

Rojas, who had an arrest warrant issued against him for alleged child abuse, was detained in very ill health and subsequently sent to a hospital while under police custody.

Over 7000 new cases of AIDS have been reported in Colombia in 2011 based on government data released on World AIDS Day.

Video Source - YouTube via user InfoColombia

Online Sources - Univision.com, Vivelo Hoy

Weekend Headlines: December 1-2, 2012

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* Mexico: Police clashed with protesters opposed to Enrique Peña Nieto while he was being inaugurated on Saturday as president of Mexico.

* Latin America: The presidents of Colombia and Nicaragua agreed to use dialogue to resolve a territorial dispute while the Peruvian and Chilean presidents said that they would respect an upcoming international court ruling on maritime boundaries.

* Paraguay: At least 69 people have died this year in Paraguay as a result of the dengue fever that has also killed over 400 people throughout Latin America.

* Brazil: President Dilma Rousseff vetoed portions of a controversial bill that would redistribute oil royalties amongst Brazilian states.

Today's Video: A Sibling's Search for Justice

We'll be back over the weekend with more headlines from around the Americas including news on violence against women.

"Justice for My Sister" is a documentary released this year that focuses on Rebeca Eunice Pérez, an impoverished Guatemalan woman who sought retribution for her murdered sister, Adela Chacón Tax.  The film shows the many hardships faced by Pérez over three years including the trial against her Tax's ex-boyfriend who was accused of beating her to death.

"Breaking the silence helps other women do the same and this serves as a chain for healing," said the film's director, Kimberly Bautista, to the EFE news agency.

Creating the documentary took its toll on Bautista who was attacked by a group of robbers while filming in Guatemala.  Nevertheless she soldiered on and the documentary was completed and reportedly screened this week in Los Angeles.

 The following video is the trailer to "Justice for My Sister" that also notes how only 1% of the 580 femicide cases in Guatemala in 2007 were solved:

Online Sources - Official Website for "Justice for My Sister", Siglo21.com.gt

Video Source - Vimeo

Report: Fourteen Women Murdered per Day in Mexico

In a televised farewell speech broadcast this week, Mexican president Felipe Calderon expressed his satisfaction with the path his country took during his six years in the presidency.  Yet while he patted himself on the back for having “worked to leave a stronger country with a better justice system and a healthier and stronger economy,” there are numerous goals that went unfulfilled during the Calderon regime.  One of them is the plight of violence against women.

Fourteen Mexican women day each day as a result of violence according to a report published by the Fundación Origen women’s’ rights group.  Between November 2011 and 2012 the organization claimed that 4112 women were victims of femicides while nearly 4000 females “disappeared” during that period of time.

“One of the worst things is that most of them stayed quiet and only two of the femicides registered over the past year were denounced,” alleged Fundación Origen president Mariana Baños to Mexican daily Milenio.

A survey conducted by Mexico’s National Human Rights Commission (CNDH, in Spanish) found that 30% of women do not denounce violence against them since they believe that “if there is domestic violence it’s a family issue and nothing more.”  Yet the CNDH also concluded that problem with women speaking out against being the targets of violence also occurs due to a lack of help from the government.

“There are laws for the protection of female victims of violence in most of the 31 states and Mexico City but they are not respected,” claimed attorney José Luiz Zamora to Xinhua.  “There is also a lack of political will behind funding and creating the necessary mechanisms for these laws to be applied,” added Zamora.

Daily Headlines: November 30, 2012

* Panama: Only nine countries including Panama voted against a U.N. General Assembly proposal that granted nonmember observer status to Palestine.

* U.S.: A new report concluded that a sharp decrease in births among immigrant women led the U.S. birth rate to fall to its lowest level on record.

* Venezuela: Vice President Nicolas Maduro said that President Hugo Chavez is doing "very good" while seeking "hyperbaric oxygenation" therapy in Cuba.

* Brazil: Luis Felipe Scolari was rehired as the Brazilian men's soccer team coach ten years after he helped guide the squad to a World Cup title.

Online Sources: Huffington Post, NPR, Reuters, SI.com

Video Source: YouTube via euronews

Daily Headlines: November 29, 2012

* Colombia: A recent International Court of Justice on Colombian territory and public doubts over peace talks with the FARC have caused the approval rating of President Juan Manuel Santos to plummet by fifteen points in two months.

* Latin America: A U.N. report concluded that poverty levels in Latin America and the Caribbean decreased to its lowest levels in three decades due to an increase in wages and more jobs.

* Brazil: According to new government data deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon has hit a record low yet the deforested area is still three times the size of Sao Paulo.

* Argentina: A U.S. appeals court froze a ruling made last week that would’ve obligated Argentina to pay about $1.3 billion in debt to foreign creditors.

Video Source – YouTube via teleSUR English (“The Minister of Foreign Relations of Colombia, Maria Angela Holguín, was summoned by the Senate of her country to explain the scope of the judgment of the International Court of The Hague that subtracts maritime possessions from this country in favor of Nicaragua”).

Online Sources- Bernama, Colombia Reports, CNN, Huffington Post

Remembering the Mirabal Sisters

The International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women was commemorated this past November 25th in order to raise awareness of the abuse faced by women worldwide.  Thus, Friday’s posts will examine several instances of aggression and exploitation against women in the Americas.  

The International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women was created via a resolution approved by the United Nations General Assembly in 1999.  The draft resolution for the date was introduced by the representative of the Dominican Republic, which was no coincidence since November 25th represents a dark day against women’s rights in that Caribbean country.

The Mirabal sisters (Patria, Dedé, Minerva and Maria Teresa) were four political dissidents opposed to the authoritarian rule of strongman Rafael Trujillo. They were known as Las Mariposas (The Butterfly Sisters), a nickname that came about due to their efforts for freedom and democracy in their country.  Despite dangers such as harassment from the police and the imprisonment of three of their husbands the sisters forged ahead and became symbols of the Dominican resistance movement.   

The Trujillo regime’s campaign to silence the Mirabal sisters came to a climax on November 25, 1960.  On their way home after visiting their incarcerated husbands, three of the sisters were intercepted by a group of soldiers. Patria, Minerva, Maria Teresa and their driver were choked and beaten to death.  The assassins brazenly tried to cover up the murder as an auto accident.

The plan to murder the Mirabal sisters backfired for the government and became a rallying cry against the Trujillo dictatorship.  Support for Trujillo decreased as more people defied the repression and spoke out in opposition to his rule.   Approximately six months after the Mirabal sisters were murdered Trujillo was ambushed and killed.

The spirit of the Mirabal sisters has lived on in popular culture through novels such as In the Time of the Butterflies by Julia Álvarez and films like 2010’s Trópico de Sangre.  The surviving Mirabal sister, Dedé, helped create a museum in memory of her slain sisters and has campaigned for the rights of Dominican women.  This week, for instance, Dedé and Álvarez lent their names to a petition criticizing a proposed Penal Code reform that will allegedly infringe the rights of women and children.

The video after the page break examines the legacy of the Mirabal Sisters and includes comments from Dedé on her courageous siblings:

Daily Headlines: November 28, 2012

* Mexico: A report from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development concluded that Mexico’s economy growth is expected to diminish by 0.5% to 3.3% next year but will then rebound in 2014.

* Venezuela: President Hugo Chavez, who has been largely out of the public spotlight since winning reelection nearly two months ago, traveled to Cuba to seek medical treatment related to his cancer.

* U.S.: A new study found that Latinos lag behind other racial groups in the use of technology such as the Internet and cell phones.

* Cuba: Cuban government officials claimed that imprisoned U.S. contactor Alan Gross does not have a cancerous tumor and that his “general health condition…is normal.”

Video Source – YouTube via Al Jazeera English (Video uploaded in February 2012).
 
Online Sources- Reuters, The Guardian, Huffington Post, Fox News Latino, ABC News

Daily Headlines: November 27, 2012

* Panama: At least five people are dead and parts of Panama are under a state of emergency as a result of damage from torrential rainfall.

* Puerto Rico: The murder of former champion boxer Hector “Macho” Camacho has shined a light on the rampant violence in Puerto Rico that includes at least 858 homicides this year.

* U.S.: Could “undocumented immigrants” be named as Time magazine’s Person of the Year for 2012?

* Colombia: One of the FARC negotiators involved in peace talks between the guerillas and the Colombian government claimed that both sides are “on the same wavelength.”