WNU #1250: US Grants UN Immunity in Haiti Cholera Suit

Issue #1250, January 11, 2015

1. Haiti: US Grants UN Immunity in Cholera Suit
2. Peru: Fujimori Sentenced for Tabloid Bribery
3. Mexico: Protests Follow Peña to Washington
4. Latin America: Why Did Monsanto Profits Dip?
5. Links to alternative sources on: Latin America, Ecuador, Venezuela, Honduras, Guatemala, Mexico, Cuba, Haiti, Puerto Rico, US/immigration

ISSN#: 1084 922X. Weekly News Update on the Americas covers news from Latin America and the Caribbean, compiled and written from a progressive perspective. It has been published weekly by the Nicaragua Solidarity Network of Greater New York since 1990. It is archived at http://weeklynewsupdate.blogspot.com. For a subscription, write to weeklynewsupdate@gmail.com. Follow us on Twitter at http://twitter.com/WeeklyNewsUpdat.

Note: The Update is ceasing publication on Feb. 15. In each of the remaining issues we will try to include some updated information on stories we covered in the past.

*1. Haiti: US Grants UN Immunity in Cholera Suit
On Jan. 9 a federal district judge in New York, J. Paul Oetken, dismissed a lawsuit seeking compensation from the United Nations (UN) for a cholera epidemic introduced into Haiti in October 2010 by infected soldiers from the United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH) [see Update #1238]. “The UN is immune from suit unless it expressly waives its immunity,” Judge Oetken wrote in his decision, which was based on the 1946 Convention on the Privileges and Immunities of the UN and a US appeals court ruling in a 2010 sexual discrimination case. Lawyers from the Boston-based Institute for Justice and Democracy in Haiti (IJDH), representing thousands of Haitian cholera victims, said they would appeal the decision, which came three days before the fifth anniversary of an earthquake that devastated much of southern Haiti.

The suit, Delama Georges, et al, v. United Nations, et al, was filed in October 2013. The plaintiffs’ attorneys argued that the UN was not entitled to immunity under the 1946 convention because the world organization failed to meet its obligation under the convention to establish a settlement process for the victims. A number of legal experts agreed with the plaintiffs’ position, filing three amicus curiae briefs with the court and arguing in support of the plaintiffs at a hearing in October 2014. The UN has never admitted its responsibility for the cholera outbreak and didn’t respond to the suit; the US government argued on the UN’s behalf. According to Haitian rights lawyer Mario Joseph, the president of the Bureau of International Lawyers (BAI), Oetken’s ruling “implies that there is nowhere in the world [the victims] can turn to seek justice. That is irreconcilable with their human rights and basic notions of justice.” (IJDH press release 1/9/15; Reuters 1/10/15)

At least 8,774 Haitians had died of the cholera epidemic by Jan. 8, according to the DC-based Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR). Some 14,000 or more were sickened by the disease in 2014, and 243 died that year. The amount of money required for a program for the eradication of cholera in Haiti is estimated to be $2.2 billion; the amount pledged so far is $50 million. (Haiti: Relief and Reconstruction Watch, CEPR, 1/8/15)

Arnel (or Anel) Alexis Joseph, the controversial president of the Superior Council of the Judicial Branch (CSPJ), offered his resignation on Jan. 7, as was recommended on Dec. 9 by an 11-member “consultative commission” that President Michel Martelly set up to resolve a political impasse; terms are set to expire for one-third of Haiti’s senators on Jan. 12, leaving the Senate without a quorum and possibly creating a constitutional crisis [see Update #1246]. Other people that the commission asked to resign, including former prime minister Laurent Lamothe and the members of the Provisional Electoral Council (CEP), had already complied. The Senate called for Joseph’s resignation back in 2012 on the grounds that he was past the maximum legal age for the post. (AlterPresse (Haiti) 1/7/15)

*2. Peru: Fujimori Sentenced for Tabloid Bribery
After a trial lasting more than a year, on Jan. 8 a Peruvian court sentenced former president Alberto Fujimori (1990-2000) to eight years in prison for embezzlement. The court found that between 1998 and 2000 Fujimori diverted some $43 million from the military to the National Intelligence Service (SIN) in order to pay tabloid dailies to follow the government’s editorial line. The colorful tabloids--known in Peru as “diarios chicha” after a popular musical style—supported Fujimori’s campaign for reelection in 2000 by characterizing his opponents as communists, homosexuals and spies; some of the papers were actually created by Fujimori’s government for the purpose. The former president claimed in court on Dec. 29 that he didn’t know about the diversion of the money. In addition to the prison sentence, Fujimori lost his right to hold public office for three years and was ordered to pay a fine of 3 million soles (about US$1 million). (RRP (Peru) 1/8/15; El País (Madrid) 1/8/15 from correspondent)

This was the fifth conviction for Fujimori since 2007. On Dec. 11, 2007, he was found guilty of ordering an illegal search of the home of the wife of his former adviser Vladimiro Montesinos to seize compromising video tapes. On Apr. 7, 2009, a court sentenced him to 25 years in prison for two massacres of unarmed civilians carried out by the Colina Group, a death squad organized by military intelligence and allegedly reporting to the president: the November 1991 killing of 15 people at a family barbecue in the Barrios Altos neighborhood of Lima, and the July 1992 abduction and murder of nine university students and a professor from the Enrique Guzmán y Valle (La Cantuta) university; the group also kidnapped journalist Gustavo Gorriti and business owner Samuel Dyer in 1992 [see Update #1019]. Also in 2009, Fujimori was sentenced to seven years and six months for appropriating $15 million from the treasury for Montesinos; in a separate case, he was sentenced to six years for spying on phone calls, payoffs to the media and the buying of Congress members.

Although elected as a populist in 1990, Fujimori quickly imposed a harsh neoliberal program known as “Fujishock.” In 1992 he seized dictatorial powers with a “self-coup,” claiming this would clear the way for combating two leftist rebel movements. He fled the country in 2000 when his government’s massive corruption came to light, and sought asylum in Japan. In 2005 he went to Chile as part of a plan to return to Peru, but Chilean authorities imprisoned him and turned him over to the Peruvian government in 2007. The maximum sentence in Peru is 25 years, so the five sentences will run concurrently. Fujimori will theoretically be released in 2032, at the age of 94. (La República (Peru) 1/8/15; El País 1/8/15)

In other news, judicial authorities announced on Dec. 30 that Attorney General Carlos Ramos Heredia had been suspended from his post for six months to “safeguard the optimal development of the investigations” into charges that he impeded inquiries concerning alleged corruption in the central western department of Ancash. Officials there took $113 million in public funds between 2008 and 2011, according to Mesías Guevara, the president of the parliamentary commission investigating the allegations. Ramos Heredia told RPP radio that he would respect the suspension but wouldn’t resign. (Yahoo News 12/30/14 from AP)

*3. Mexico: Protests Follow Peña to Washington
Facing serious political and economic problems at home, on Jan. 6 Mexican president Enrique Peña Nieto made his first official visit to Washington, DC, since taking office in December 2012. A private meeting at the White House with US president Barack Obama lasted longer than was scheduled, and the two presidents didn’t take questions when they spoke with the press afterwards. The US has been following the “tragic events” involving seven deaths and the abduction of 43 students the night of Sept. 26-27 in the southwestern Mexican state of Guerrero [see Update #1246], Obama told reporters, and the US would continue to aid in investigations and in the fight against drug cartels. Obama also praised Mexico’s efforts to keep Central American migrants from reaching the US border, especially during the child migrant “crisis” in the summer of 2014 [see Update #1237]. Peña Nieto promised that Mexico would help the US and Cuba normalize relations. (La Jornada (Mexico) 1/7/15)

In addition to facing massive protests against the Mexican political system since the Guerrero abductions, Peña Nieto’s government is having to deal with a drop in oil prices that has led to downward pressure on the peso. Now at $39.70 a barrel, the price of Mexico’s export oil plummeted by 61.23% from June 20, 2014 to Jan. 9 of this year, while the peso fell by 12.3%, ending up at 14.5 to the US dollar. (El Financiero (Mexico) 1/12/15)

As the two presidents were speaking, about 100 protesters, mostly Mexicans and Mexican Americans, rallied outside the White House. The protesters charged that the US government is supporting corruption and violence in Mexico through its Mérida Initiative, a program often referred to as “Plan Mexico,” in which the US funds anti-narcotics campaigns by Mexican security forces, themselves often linked to the cartels [see Update #952]. Among the participants in the rally was Nansi Cisneros, whose brother was kidnapped by men in police uniforms in the western state of Jalisco; a US citizen living in Los Angeles, Cisneros had written about her brother’s case on the Huffington Post news site.

There were similar protests that day in at least nine other US cities, including Dallas, Houston, Los Angeles, Minneapolis, San Francisco and Seattle, organized by the USTired2 network [see Update #1245] and other groups to echo the demonstrations in Mexico. One of the protesters in Seattle was José Luis Avila, the husband of Nestora Salgado García, an imprisoned community police leader in Olinalá, Guerrero [see Update #1237]. (LJ 1/7/15)

On Jan. 8 the Guerrero government announced that it was dropping charges against Salgado “as a demonstration that this citizens’ government has been consistent in the search for peace and the harmonious development of Guerrero in all its aspects.” (LJ 1/8/15) As of Jan. 11 there had been no reports of her release.

In other news, the celebrated Mexican editor and investigative reporter Julio Scherer died on Jan. 7 at the age of 88. Scherer edited the influential daily El Excélsior from 1968 to 1976, when government pressure finally succeeded in getting the paper to remove him. He then founded the weekly Proceso, whose investigative reports have plagued Mexican politicians ever since--most recently in articles on alleged federal involvement in the abduction of the 43 students in Guerrero and on possible judicial favoritism for the brother of former president Carlos Salinas de Gortari [see Updates #1246, 1248]. People that Scherer interviewed or attempted to interview ranged from Chilean dictator Gen. Augusto Pinochet to Sinaloa cartel leader Ismael (“El Mayo”) Zambada García. The journalist claimed that he’d go to hell if the devil offered him an interview. (LJ 1/8/15)

*4. Latin America: Why Did Monsanto Profits Dip?
The Missouri-based biotech giant Monsanto Company announced on Jan. 7 that its revenues for September through November 2014, the first quarter of the company’s current fiscal year, fell to $2.87 billion from $3.14 billion for the same period the year before. The decline was less than analysts had expected. According to Bloomberg News, this was because the losses, including a 12% drop in corn seed sales, were partly offset by sales of Monsanto’s new Intacta soybeans, which the company says are genetically modified to withstand pests in South America. But the losses themselves were “in part, due to the reduction in sowing areas in South America,” the Spanish agricultural news site agroinformación.com reported. Agroinformación.com also cited resistance to the construction of a seed processing plant in Malvinas Argentinas in Argentina’s central Córdoba province [see Update #1204]. (Bloomberg 1/7/15; agroinformación.com 1/8/15)

In December residents of Malvinas Argentinas--a small working-class town near the provincial capital, also named Córdoba—celebrated their success so far in stopping Monsanto’s factory, which was to be the company’s largest South American seed processing plant. Since September 2013 residents have been blocking construction crews’ access to the site. Construction has in fact been suspended since January 2014, when an appeals court ordered the company to produce a new environmental impact study. Although the provincial government initially promoted the construction, in February the province’s Environmental Secretariat rejected the company’ new study. Monsanto is now reportedly looking at other sites.

Despite activists’ apparent success in Malvinas Argentinas—and a growing Latin American movement against Monsanto and other producers of genetically modified (GM) seeds [see Update #1232]—Argentina’s major farmers still rely heavily on the products. The country’s huge soybean crop is 100% transgenic, as are 92% of the cotton crop and 84% of the corn crop. The 23.9 million hectares of GM crop in the country represent the world’s third largest surface sowed with transgenic seed, after the US with 69.5 million hectares and Brazil with 36.6 million hectares. (BBC Mundo 12/14/14)

*5. Links to alternative sources on: Latin America, Ecuador, Venezuela, Honduras, Guatemala, Mexico, Cuba, Haiti, Puerto Rico, US/immigration

The Agents of Unregulated Globalization vs. the Agents of the Fight against Climate Change (Latin America)
http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs/the-americas-blog/the-agents-of-unregulated-globalization-vs-the-agents-of-the-fight-against-climate-change

Open Letter to Rafael Correa: Stop the Eviction of CONAIE (Ecuador)
https://intercontinentalcry.org/open-letter-rafael-correa-stop-eviction-conaie/

China Commits $20 Billion to Venezuela at First Latin America-China Forum in Beijing
http://venezuelanalysis.com/news/11143

Territories Free of Mining on the Rise in Honduras
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/honduras-archives-46/5170-territories-free-of-mining-on-the-rise-in-honduras-

Genocide Trial against Guatemalan Dictator Suspended Once Again
http://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/Genocide-Trial-against-Guatemalan-Dictator-Suspended-Once-Again-20150105-0020.html

The Federal Police Not Only Knew, They Were There (Audio) (Mexico)
https://nacla.org/news/2015/01/08/federal-police-not-only-knew-they-were-there-audio

‘Nothing Was an Accident That Night’: Mexican Federal Police Implicated in the Disappearance of the 43
http://www.thenation.com/blog/194073/nothing-was-accident-night-mexican-federal-police-implicated-disappearance-43

Popular Political Trial in Iguala (Mexico)
http://www.cipamericas.org/archives/14375

Led by Latinos, US Cities Organize to End Plan Mexico and Support Ayotzinapa
http://www.cipamericas.org/archives/14231

The Organizers Who Never Gave Up on the Cuban Five
https://nacla.org/news/2015/01/12/organizers-who-never-gave-cuban-five

Haiti 5 Years After Devastating Earthquake
http://therealnews.com/t2/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=74&jumival=12984

Haiti by the Numbers, Five Years Later
http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs/relief-and-reconstruction-watch/haiti-by-the-numbers-five-years-later

Haiti Cholera Suit Struck Down
http://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/Haiti-Cholera-Suit-Struck-Down-20150110-0005.html

Monsanto Hires Marketing Firm to Poll Citizens on GMOs (Puerto Rico)
http://alainet.org/active/79925

Deportations to Dangerous Zones (US/immigration)
http://fnsnews.nmsu.edu/deportations-to-dangerous-zones/

No Alternative: Ankle Monitors Expand the Reach of Immigration Detention (US/immigration)
https://nacla.org/news/2015/01/06/no-alternative-ankle-monitors-expand-reach-immigration-detention

For more Latin America news stories from mainstream and alternative sources:
http://www.cipamericas.org/
http://org.salsalabs.com/o/967/blastContent.jsp
http://fnsnews.nmsu.edu/
http://intercontinentalcry.org/
http://www.ueinternational.org/MLNA/index.php
http://nacla.org/
http://www.telesurtv.net/english/index.html
http://upsidedownworld.org/
http://venezuelanalysis.com/
http://wagingnonviolence.org/
http://ww4report.com/

For immigration updates and events:
http://thepoliticsofimmigration.blogspot.com/

END

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Order The Politics of Immigration: Questions & Answers, from Monthly Review Press, by Update editors Jane Guskin and David Wilson:
http://thepoliticsofimmigration.org/

WNU #1247: Panamanians Remember US Invasion

Issue #1247, December 21, 2014

1. Panama: Victims Remember US Invasion
2. Cuba: US Agrees to Normalize Relations
3. Cuba: Leftists, US Firms Praise New Policy
4. Cuba: USAID Head Quits After Latest Scandal
5. Venezuela: US Imposes Sanctions on Officials
6. Links to alternative sources on: Latin America, Argentina, Brazil, Peru, Ecuador, Colombia, Venezuela, Panama, Honduras, Guatemala, Mexico, Cuba, US/immigration

ISSN#: 1084 922X. Weekly News Update on the Americas covers news from Latin America and the Caribbean, compiled and written from a progressive perspective. It has been published weekly by the Nicaragua Solidarity Network of Greater New York since 1990. It is archived at http://weeklynewsupdate.blogspot.com. For a subscription, write to weeklynewsupdate@gmail.com. Follow us on Twitter at http://twitter.com/WeeklyNewsUpdat.

*1. Panama: Victims Remember US Invasion
Victims and survivors of the 1989 invasion of Panama by the US held a public ceremony on Dec. 20 to mark the 25th anniversary of the start of the military action. As they have for 25 years, the ceremony’s participants called for the US government to acknowledge the damage from the invasion, indemnify the victims and their survivors, and reveal the location of mass graves where some of the dead were buried. “There were bodies that were thrown in the sea, and there are bodies scattered in different places, so we can never finally offer them a tribute,” Trinidad Ayola, whose husband died defending an airport, told the AFP wire service. “Without justice there can’t be peace or reconciliation, and we can’t turn the page.” President Juan Carlos Varela attended the ceremony, announcing that the government would form a commission to consider the families’ demands, including the declaration of Dec. 20 as a national day of mourning. He is the first Panamanian president to attend the annual commemoration.

Codenamed “Operation Just Cause,” the invasion was ordered by then-president George H.W. Bush (1989-1993) and overseen by armed forces head Gen. Colin Powell. The stated goal was to capture Panamanian military leader Manuel Antonio Noriega, a longtime asset of the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), in order to restore democracy and end cocaine trafficking through Panama. Others have suggested that Bush invaded because Noriega refused to help the US attack the government of Nicaragua, then headed by the leftist Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN), and because he wouldn’t renegotiate the Torrijos-Carter treaty, in which the US agreed to return control of the Panama Canal to Panama in 1999. After serving out a prison sentence in the US, Noriega was extradited to Panama in 2011 and remains in prison there.

According to official sources, 314 Panamanian soldiers and 23 US soldiers died in the invasion. The Panamanian government says some 200 civilians were killed, but Panamanian human rights organizations estimate that more than a thousand died. US bombing caused widespread damage in the country, setting off fires in Panama City’s impoverished El Chorrillo neighborhood that destroyed some 4,000 homes.

Panamanians may not have been the only victims of the invasion. Writing in TomDispatch on Dec. 21, New York University history professor Greg Grandin concluded that the success of “Just Cause”--both in achieving its military goals and in influencing US public opinion--encouraged US leaders to larger and even bloodier military interventions. “[T]he invasion of Panama was the forgotten warm-up for the first Gulf War, which took place a little over a year later,” according to Grandin. “The road to Baghdad, in other words, ran through Panama City. It was George H.W. Bush’s invasion of that small, poor country 25 years ago that inaugurated the age of preemptive unilateralism, using ‘democracy’ and ‘freedom’ as both justifications for war and a branding opportunity.” (El Siglo (Panama) 12/18/14 from AFP; Fox News Latino 12/21/14; TomDispatch 12/21/14)

*2. Cuba: US Agrees to Normalize Relations
In a surprise move, Cuban president Raúl Castro and US president Barack Obama announced in separate television appearances on Dec. 17 that their two countries were now working to renew diplomatic relations, which the US broke off nearly 54 years earlier, in January 1961, under former president Dwight Eisenhower (1953-1961). The two countries were releasing a total of 58 prisoners in the agreement, officials said, and the US will loosen some restrictions on contacts with Cuba by US residents; however, the US government’s 52-year-old embargo against trade with Cuba will remain in effect.

The accord was worked out in 18 months of secret discussions and meetings, apparently with some mediation from Argentine-born Catholic pope Francis (Jorge Mario Bergoglio). President Castro said the agreement “in no way means that the heart of the matter has been resolved,” but he added that “the progress made in our exchanges proves that it is possible to find solutions to many problems.” President Obama described the previous US policy towards Cuba as “an outdated approach that for decades has failed to advance our interests” and said the accord will “begin a new chapter among the nations of the Americas.”

As part of the agreement Cuba released US citizen Alan Gross, who had been serving a 15-year prison sentence in Cuba since 2011 for his work there as a contractor for the US Agency for International Development (USAID) [see Update #1241]. At the same time the US released Antonio Guerrero, Gerardo Hernández and Ramón Labañino, three of the “Cuban Five,” a group of Cuban agents that US courts convicted in 2001 of espionage-related activities; the other two agents, René González and Fernando González, were released earlier after serving their sentences [see Update #1211]. Cuban officials said Gross, who was unwell, was freed for humanitarian reasons. Apparently the three Cubans were not exchanged for Gross but for a US spy who had been imprisoned in Cuba for nearly 20 years. The Cuban government also agreed to release 53 Cubans that the US had described as “political prisoners.” (New York Times 12/18/14)

Cuban and US officials refused to name the US spy who was released, but unidentified former US intelligence agents told the media they were certain the spy was Rolando Sarraff Trujillo, a Cuban cryptologist who was arrested in 1995 and was serving a 25-year sentence for revealing Cuban secret codes to the US. Reportedly his actions helped lead US intelligence to the exposure of a number of important Cuban agents in the US: the Cuban Five, Ana Belén Montes [see Update #664], Walter Kendall Myers and Gwendolyn Myers. Although officials said the spy was freed and sent to the US as part of the deal, as of Dec. 19 Sarraff Trujillo’s relatives said they hadn’t heard from him and were concerned for his safety. (Los Angeles Times 12/18/14; NYT 12/19/14 from AP)

The US government is to ease restrictions on different categories of travel to Cuba by US residents--for family visits, official visits, and journalistic, professional, educational and religious activities, and public performance--and travelers will also be able to bring back $400 worth of goods, including up to $100 in tobacco and alcohol products. However, private tourism will still be forbidden. Banking connections will be increased, and US residents will be able to send family members in Cuba $2,000 every three months, up from $500 at present. The US State Department has been instructed to “re-evaluate” its 22-year-old listing of Cuba as a “state sponsor of terrorism,” a designation which has been questioned even by establishment groups like the Council on Foreign Relations think tank. The US president lacks the authority to end the trade embargo, which Congress has mandated through various laws, but on Dec. 17 Obama asked for an “honest and serious debate about lifting” it. (Boston Globe 12/17/14; NYT 12/18/14; US Today 12/19/14)

*3. Cuba: Leftists, US Firms Praise New Policy
US president Barack Obama’s Dec. 17 announcement that the US would restore diplomatic relations with Cuba was “an historic triumph for the society and the government of the island,” the left-leaning Mexican daily La Jornada asserted in an editorial the next day. “[T]he hostility converted into Washington’s government policy has arrived at its end—although the repeal of the blockade laws is still pending—and this occurred without Havana’s having made any concession in its political and economic model.” The paper added that the policy change demonstrated “the correctness of the position of the Latin American governments, which advocated for decades for an end to the official US hostility to Cuba.” (LJ 12/18/14)

The change won praise from Latin American leaders on both the left and the right. “For us, social fighters, today is an historic day,” center-left Brazilian president Dilma Rousseff said at conference of South American countries in Argentina. “We imagined we would never see this moment.” Venezuela’s leftist president Nicolás Maduro, attending the same conference, called the move an “historic victory for the Cuban people…. [W]e have to recognize the gesture from President Barack Obama, a courageous and necessary gesture.” Center-right Colombian president Juan Manuel Santos expressed his hope that the new policy would lead to attaining “the dream of having a continent where there is total peace.” (Washington Post 12/18/14 from correspondents)

The response in the US was generally favorable, despite heavy media coverage of opponents of the policy change like Cuban-American senators Marco Rubio (R-FL) and Robert Menendez (D-NJ). A poll by Zogby Analytics found 56% of US voters in favor of the new policy and only 27% opposed. Among Latino voters, 70% supported the policy and 21% opposed it.

Support seemed to be especially strong among US business groups hoping to take advantage of the new relationship. “We deeply believe that an open dialogue and commercial exchange between the US and Cuban private sectors will bring shared benefits, and the steps announced today will go a long way in allowing opportunities for free enterprise to flourish,” US Chamber of Commerce president Thomas Donahue said on Dec. 17. Some US corporations did more than just support the move. Heavy equipment manufacturer Caterpillar Inc., personal care product maker Colgate-Palmolive Company and the Chubb Group of Insurance Companies have each spent tens of thousands of dollars lobbying for an end to the embargo. The liquor company Bacardi Limited and the Swedish-owned General Cigar Company have also been lobbying, while Carnival Cruise Lines, Marriott Hotels & Resorts, the Coca Cola Company and heavy equipment manufacturer John Deere have all expressed interest in doing business in Cuba. (The Hill 12/17/14; Fortune 12/18/14; LJ 12/20/14 from correspondent)

*4. Cuba: USAID Head Quits After Latest Scandal
On Dec. 17, less than a week after the Associated Press (AP) wire service reported on a failed effort by the US Agency for International Development (USAID) to co-opt Cuban hip-hop artists, agency administrator Rajiv Shah announced that he was leaving his post in February. Shah’s announcement came the same day as news that the US was moving towards normalizing relations with Cuba and that the Cuban government had released imprisoned USAID contractor Alan Gross. Shah didn’t give a reason for his resignation but said he had “mixed emotions.” In a statement released that day US president Barack Obama said Shah, who has headed the USAID since December 2009, “has been at the center of my administration’s efforts to advance our global development agenda.” (Bellingham (WA) Herald 12/17/14 from AP)

According to a Dec. 11 AP article, documents obtained by the wire service show that from 2009 to 2011 USAID “secretly infiltrated Cuba's underground hip-hop movement, recruiting unwitting rappers to spark a youth movement against the government.” The program, which the AP describes as “amateurish and profoundly unsuccessful,” was run through Washington, DC-based private contractor Creative Associates International and employed the services of Serbian rock promoter Rajko Bozic, who claims to have been part of the Serbian student movement that helped remove Slobodan Milosevic from power in 2000. The project’s contractors ended up “putting themselves and their targets at risk” and “compromising Cuba's vibrant hip-hop culture,” AP investigative reporters concluded. (AP 12/11/14)

AP reported earlier this year on two other failed USAID “democracy promotion” projects, also contracted through Creative Associates: the ZunZuneo “Cuban Twitter” program and an effort to build an anti-government youth movement. All three projects were carried out during Shah’s tenure as USAID administrator, although they appear to have started before he took over [see Updates #1215, 1230].

Shah, a former executive with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, preceded his resignation with a visit to Haiti over the weekend of Dec. 19. There he signed a partnership agreement with the healthcare nonprofit Partners in Health’s Haitian branch, Zanmi Lasante; he reportedly also met with Partners in Health co-founder Paul Farmer, who was the Obama’s administration’s first choice to head USAID. (Devex 12/17/14) Like the Cuban programs, USAID projects for Haiti have experienced a number of failures under Shah. The “New Settlement Program,” for example, was supposed to build 4,000 houses by 2012 to replace homes lost in the earthquake that struck southern Haiti in January 2010; the cost was to be about $53 million. Only about 816 houses had been built when USAID’s inspector general issued a report in April 2014, but the program’s cost had soared to $90 million. According to a Nov. 20 news item by the DC-based nonprofit Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR), 750 of the houses are so badly constructed that they will need millions of dollars of repairs. (CEPR 11/20/14; Fiscal Times 12/9/14)

*5. Venezuela: US Imposes Sanctions on Officials
On Dec. 18 US president Barack Obama signed a bill into law that will impose sanctions on those Venezuela officials that the US government decides were involved in repressing demonstrators during rightwing protests last spring. The measure, which Congress passed the week before, would deny visas to the officials and freeze any assets they may hold in the US. Diplomats in Venezuela said dozens of officials could be affected, although the US is not expected to publish their names. A total of 43 people were reportedly killed in the three months of demonstrations, including government supporters, government opponents and security agents.

Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro noted that Obama signed the bill just one day after announcing plans to normalize relations with Cuba following a half-century of sanctions. “These are the contradictions of an empire that seeks to impose its domination by whatever means, underestimating the power and conscience of our fatherland,” Maduro wrote in his Twitter account on Dec. 18. In a New York Times op-ed National Assembly president Diosdado Cabello Rondón noted the “unfortunate coincidence” that Congress passed the sanctions bill “just as scores of people demonstrating against police brutality were being arrested on the streets of New York and other cities” and “a Senate report revealed the extent of torture by the Central Intelligence Agency” [see Update #1246]. (NYT 12/19/14; Reuters 12/19/14)

*6. Links to alternative sources on: Latin America, Argentina, Brazil, Peru, Ecuador, Colombia, Venezuela, Panama, Honduras, Guatemala, Mexico, Cuba, US/immigration

Climate Justice: Uniting Struggles Across Latin America
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/international-archives-60/5156-climate-justice-uniting-struggles-across-latin-america

The Torture Consensus in U.S. Democracy (Latin America)
https://nacla.org/news/2014/12/19/torture-consensus-us-democracy

Argentina: Dock Workers End Strike at Major Grain Port
http://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/Argentina-Dock-Workers-End-Strike-at-Major-Grain-Port------------20141219-0037.html

Argentina: Mining Corporations vs. Democracy
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/argentina-archives-32/5155-argentina-mining-corporations-vs-democracy

PEC 215: No Vote by Special Commission of Brazilian House
https://intercontinentalcry.org/pec-215-no-vote-by-special-commission-of-brazilian-house-26664/

Gratitude for the Defense of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples in Brazil
https://intercontinentalcry.org/gratitude-defense-rights-indigenous-peoples-brazil/

Denunciation of the Suppression of Rights and Attempts to End the Indigenous Peoples of Brazil
https://intercontinentalcry.org/denunciation-suppression-rights-attempts-end-indigenous-peoples-brazil/

Peru: campesino family scores win against mine
http://ww4report.com/node/13834

An Open Letter from Boaventura de Sousa Santos to Ecuadorian President Correa on Kicking the CONAIE Indigenous Movement Out of its Headquarters
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/ecuador-archives-49/5150-an-open-letter-from-boaventura-de-sousa-santos-to-ecuadorian-president-correa-on-kicking-the-conaie-indigenous-movement-out-of-its-headquarters

CONAIE Indigenous Organization Evicted from Headquarters by Ecuadorian Government
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/ecuador-archives-49/5152-conaie-indigenous-organization-evicted-from-headquarters-by-ecuadorian-government

Ecuador: Correa acts against CONAIE
http://ww4report.com/node/13833

Colombia: FARC declare ceasefire —amid fighting
http://ww4report.com/node/13831

Colombia: corrupt cops caught in crackdown
http://ww4report.com/node/13830

Beyond Ayotzinapa: How U.S. Intervention in Colombia Paved the Way for Mexico’s Human Rights Crisis
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/mexico-archives-79/5153-beyond-ayotzinapa-how-us-intervention-in-colombia-paved-the-way-for-mexicos-human-rights-crisis

Venezuela sanctions highlight US hypocrisy on human rights
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/news-briefs-archives-68/5157-venezuela-sanctions-highlight-us-hypocrisy-on-human-rights

Tomgram: Greg Grandin, How the Iraq War Began in Panama
http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/175937/tomgram%3A_greg_grandin%2C_how_the_iraq_war_began_in_panama

The Struggle for Indigenous Land and Autonomy in Honduras
https://intercontinentalcry.org/the-struggle-for-indigenous-land-and-autonomy-in-honduras-26652/

Mining interests in Guatemala challenged by indigenous direct democracy
http://wagingnonviolence.org/feature/mining-interests-guatemala-challenged-indigenous-direct-democracy/

Unearthing the Truth: Mexican State Violence Beyond Ayotzinapa
https://nacla.org/news/2014/12/22/unearthing-truth-mexican-state-violence-beyond-ayotzinapa

The Revolution of Lupe Reyes (Mexico)
http://fnsnews.nmsu.edu/the-revolution-of-lupe-reyes/

Collapse of Oil Prices, Fall in Peso Exacerbate Mexican Crisis
http://www.ueinternational.org/MLNA/mlna_articles.php?id=231#1780

Mining Water in Sonora: Grupo México’s “Irregular” Water Permits in the Sonora, Yaqui, and San Pedro River Basins (Mexico)
http://www.cipamericas.org/archives/13998

Making Mining Dreams Come True in Mexico
http://www.cipamericas.org/archives/14055

Mining, Megaprojects, and Metrosexuals in Sonora (Mexico)
http://www.cipamericas.org/archives/14062

Atento Workers Seeking Democratic Union Lose Election Re-run (Mexico)
http://www.ueinternational.org/MLNA/mlna_articles.php?id=231#1781

#Fergazinapa: Liberating Our Outrage, Remapping Our Action (Mexico/US)
https://nacla.org/news/2014/12/16/fergazinapa-liberating-our-outrage-remapping-our-action

Report on "Solidarity from the Ground Up: an Organizers' Tri-national Exchange" (Mexico/US/Canada)
http://www.ueinternational.org/MLNA/mlna_articles.php?id=231#1785

Do Cubans Really Want U.S.-Style Internet Freedom?
https://nacla.org/news/2014/12/20/do-cubans-really-want-us-style-internet-freedom

Raúl Castro: The New Opening With the USA (Cuba)
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/news-briefs-archives-68/5158-raul-castro-the-new-opening-with-the-usa

The Fight against Migrant Family Detention Continues (US/immigration)
http://www.cipamericas.org/archives/14131

Migrant Deaths and Displacement Soar in 2014(US/immigration)
http://fnsnews.nmsu.edu/migrant-deaths-and-displacement-soar-in-2014/

For more Latin America news stories from mainstream and alternative sources:
http://alainet.org/index.phtml.en
http://www.cipamericas.org/
http://org.salsalabs.com/o/967/blastContent.jsp
http://fnsnews.nmsu.edu/
http://intercontinentalcry.org/
http://www.ueinternational.org/MLNA/index.php
http://nacla.org/
http://www.telesurtv.net/english/index.html
http://upsidedownworld.org/
http://venezuelanalysis.com/
http://wagingnonviolence.org/
http://ww4report.com/node/

For immigration updates and events:
http://thepoliticsofimmigration.blogspot.com/

END

Your support is appreciated. Back issues and source materials are available on request. Feel free to reproduce these updates, or reprint or re-post any information from them, but please credit us as “Weekly News Update on the Americas” and include a link.

Order The Politics of Immigration: Questions & Answers, from Monthly Review Press, by Update editors Jane Guskin and David Wilson:
http://thepoliticsofimmigration.org/

WNU #1246: UN “Peacekeepers” Fire on Haitian Protesters

Issue #1246, December 14, 2014

1. Haiti: UN “Peacekeepers” Fire on Protesters
2. Mexico: Official Ayotzinapa Story Questioned
3. Latin America: OAS Group Calls for CIA Torture Probe
4. Links to alternative sources on: Latin America, Uruguay, Brazil, Bolivia, Peru, Colombia, Venezuela, Honduras, Guatemala, Mexico, Cuba, Haiti, US/immigration, US/policy

ISSN#: 1084 922X. Weekly News Update on the Americas covers news from Latin America and the Caribbean, compiled and written from a progressive perspective. It has been published weekly by the Nicaragua Solidarity Network of Greater New York since 1990. It is archived at http://weeklynewsupdate.blogspot.com. For a subscription, write to weeklynewsupdate@gmail.com. Follow us on Twitter at http://twitter.com/WeeklyNewsUpdat.

*1. Haiti: UN “Peacekeepers” Fire on Protesters
At least two Haitian protesters were wounded by gunfire and another was apparently shot dead during two days of opposition demonstrations in Port-au-Prince on Dec. 12 and 13; there were also protests in the northern cities of Cap-Haïtien and Gonaïves. The demonstrations, which drew thousands of participants, came as the government of President Michel Martelly (“Sweet Micky”) was taking steps aimed at defusing a political crisis that has been building for several months [see Update #1244].

The Dec. 12 demonstration started with a gathering at the ruins of the Saint-Jean Bosco Catholic church; protesters then marched through a number of working-class neighborhoods and approached the site of the National Palace, which was destroyed by a January 2010 earthquake, in the central Champ de Mars park. At this point security forces, including at least one contingent from the United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH), dispersed the marchers with tear gas grenades and gunfire. Spokespeople for the international group said its members only used tear gas and fired in the air, but a video seems to show at least two men from MINUSTAH taking aim and shooting at eye level; one wears a blue cap and fires a pistol, while the other wears a blue helmet and fires a rifle.

It is unclear from the video whether the men were using live ammunition. Two people were reportedly wounded by gunfire and taken to the hospital during the Dec. 12 march, but who shot them wasn’t reported. This was said to be the first time in several months that MINUSTAH, a joint police-military operation led by Brazilian officers, intervened in an anti-government demonstration. (AlterPresse (Haiti) 12/13/14, 12/15/14; VICE 12/13/14)

Protesters accused Haitian police of shooting a man dead the next day at the Dec. 13 protest; the victim “had a visible bullet wound in his chest,” according to the Miami Herald. “[N]o one died in today’s protests,” police spokesperson Gary Desrosiers claimed. He suggested that somebody “put the body there.” (MH 12/14/14 from correspondent)

The protests followed several days in which President Martelly made apparent concessions to government critics. On Dec. 9 an 11-member “consultative commission” that Martelly named on Nov. 28 presented its recommendations for a sweeping series of resignations, which the commission called “patriotic sacrifices.” The officials asked to resign included Prime Minister Laurent Lamothe; Arnel Alexis Joseph, the controversial president of the Superior Council of the Judicial Branch (CSPJ); and the entire Provisional Electoral Council (CEP), which has failed to organize legislative elections scheduled for 2011. The commission’s report also called for the immediate release of “a number of people” who have been arbitrarily detained and “classed as ‘political prisoners.’” The report laid out a timetable for reforms and agreements intended to clear the way for elections next year and head off a constitutional crisis likely to occur when the terms of one-third of the country’s senators expire on Jan. 12.

Martelly announced his acceptance of the report in a radio address the evening of Dec. 12, and Prime Minister Lamothe taped a resignation speech the evening of Dec. 13, although it wasn’t broadcast until early the next morning. The government also seemed to be moving on at least some of the cases of arbitrary detention. Rony Timothée amd Byron Odigé, two opposition leaders in prison since Oct. 26 [see Update #1243], were released on Dec. 11, in time to participate in the Dec. 12 protest. Police agent Jean Matulnès Lamy, who had been imprisoned since Feb. 21, was freed on Dec. 12; he was arrested after leading other local residents in protests against a tourism project on Ile-à-Vache, a small island southeast of Les Cayes in South department [see Update #1211].

It was far from certain that these moves would satisfy the protesters who have been demanding Martelly’s resignation. At the Dec. 12 demonstration human rights attorney André Michel said democratic forces needed to continue to push for the liberation of more prisoners, including Louima Louis Juste, Jean-Robert Vincent and the brothers Enold and Josué Florestal [see Update #1232]. (AlterPresse 12/12/14, 12/12/14; MH 12/14/14 from correspondent)

*2. Mexico: Official Ayotzinapa Story Questioned
On Dec. 13 the left-leaning Mexican news magazine Proceso published an investigative report challenging the government’s account of the abduction of 43 students and the killing of three students and three bystanders the night of Sept. 26-27 in Iguala de la Independencia in the southwestern state of Guerrero [see Update #1245]. Based on cell phone videos, interviews, testimony by witnesses and leaked official documents, the report’s authors, Anabel Hernández and Steve Fisher, claim that agents of the Federal Police (PF) were involved in the attack on the students, that the Mexican army was at least complicit, and that the administration of President Enrique Peña Nieto has been covering up the role of federal forces.

The official version is that responsibility for violence against the students, who attended the traditionally leftist Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Teachers’ College in the Guerrero town of Ayotzinapa, lies entirely with Iguala mayor José Luis Abarca Velázquez, municipal police in the Iguala area and a local drug gang. But a leaked document shows that federal and state police were regularly informed on the students’ movements from the time they left Ayotzinapa for Iguala the evening of Sept. 26 through the time of the attack, according to the Proceso report. Federal forces could have intervened to stop the violence; instead, they may have participated in it. Some of the students reported seeing federal agents during the attack; other students said the police assaulting them had equipment, including a machine gun, not issued to municipal police departments in Mexico.

Guerrero state prosecutors clearly suspected federal involvement. On Sept. 28 they ordered the PF to provide records on the activities of federal agents in the area for the Sept. 24-28 period; the PF didn’t comply. Under political pressure, the state government dropped out of the case on Oct. 4, leaving the investigation entirely in the control of the federal government.

The reporters also questioned the official claim that the Guerreros Unidos (“United Warriors”) gang was involved, since the only evidence for this seems to come from confessions by gang members who had evidently been tortured by the authorities. The government asserts that the abducted students were transferred to members of the gang at a specific Iguala police station. According to the Proceso report, the activity would have been visible to anyone in the area, but neighbors said they saw and heard nothing unusual that night.

Hernández and Fisher charge that the motive for the attack was political: “The attack on and disappearance of the students was directed specifically at the ideological structure and administration of the college.” They note that the students were all members of the college’s Student Struggle Committee and 10 were “political activists in training” with the Political and Ideological Orientation Committee (COPI).

Hernández is an award-winning Mexican journalist and the author of a bestselling book on official corruption and the drug trade; the book was published in English as Narcoland: The Mexican Drug Lords and Their Godfathers. Fisher is a US reporter and filmmaker. The research was supported by the Investigative Reporting Program at the University of Berkeley, California. (El Diario de Coahuila 12/14/14 from Proceso; Fusion 12/14/14)

Just as the new issue of Proceso was hitting the newsstands in the early morning of Dec. 14, a confrontation between federal police agents and students and their supporters left 22 people injured in Chilpancingo, the Guerrero state capital. According to a local human rights attorney, Vidulfo Rosales Sierra, some 15 to 20 Ayotzinapa students were setting up for a rock concert they were to hold that morning in the north of the city as part of activities protesting the Sept. 26-27 attacks. At around 5 am a group of federal agents, apparently drunk or on drugs, arrived and attacked the students with fists and rocks, Rosales Sierra said.

Parents, teachers and students from the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) also became involved in the confrontation, and later some 250 members of the militant State Organizing Committee of Education Workers in Guerrero (CETEG) joined in; they have been holding a sit-in at Chilpancingo’s main plaza since Oct. 8. The CETEG members reportedly set three police vans on fire, along with four other vehicles, and detained three federal agents, taking them to Ayotzinapa in nearby Tixtla municipality and then transferring them to the municipal prison. The injured included eight federal agents and two reporters; the rest were students, teachers and parents. (La Jornada (Mexico) 12/15/14)

*3. Latin America: OAS Group Calls for CIA Torture Probe
The human rights agency of the Organization of American States (OAS) has joined other international rights groups in calling for the US government to act on a report that the US Senate Intelligence Committee released on Dec. 9 about the use of torture by the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). According to its Dec. 12 press release, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR, or CIDH in Spanish) called for the US “carry out a full investigation in order to clarify the facts, and prosecute and punish all persons within its jurisdiction responsible for acts of torture or other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment; and to provide integral reparations to the victims, including restitution, compensation, rehabilitation, satisfaction and measures of non-repetition, pursuant to international standards.” The commission added that “the lack of punishment encourages practices that erode respect for integrity and human dignity.”

Critics of the IACHR have questioned the group’s ability or willingness to enforce its call. During his weekly radio show on Dec. 13, center-left Ecuadorian president Rafael Correa dismissed the IACHR statement as a “fake.” “You’ll see that absolutely nothing will happen,” he said, attributing his doubts to the fact that the US finances the Washington, DC-based commission and many of its members “come and go to and from gringo foundations.” The IACHR’s own press release noted that since early in 2002 the commission has repeatedly “called for the reports of torture and other cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment of detainees at the [US-operated] Guantánamo detention facility to be investigated, and for the facility to be closed.” These calls seem to have had no effect on the US government. (IACHR press release 12/12/14; El Tiempo (Ecuador) 12/13/14 from EFE)

Some US commentators have emphasized that there is nothing new for Latin Americans in the evidence that US agencies employ torture: the region has had decades of experience with torture advocated by US agents.

In 1988 a Honduran Army officer told the New York Times’ James LeMoyne about his training by the CIA and the US Army: “They taught us psychological methods--to study the fears and weaknesses of a prisoner. Make him stand up, don't let him sleep, keep him naked and [in] isolation, put rats and cockroaches in his cell, give him bad food, serve him dead animals, throw cold water on him, change the temperature.” In September 1996 the US Defense Department released documents showing that from 1982 to 1991 the US Army School of the Americas (SOA, now known as the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation, WHINSEC) trained Latin American military officers with US Army intelligence manuals advocating the blackmail, torture and murder of insurgents [see Update #347]. Four months later, in January 1997, the Baltimore Sun reported that CIA manuals on the use of torture and other forms of coercion were employed in training Latin American military personnel in the 1980s [see Update #369]. The DC-based National Security Archive provides links to these CIA training manuals at http://www2.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB122/index.htm.

“[A] direct line runs between what happened in Central America [in the 1980s] and US torture methods during the George W. Bush administration,” according to Bloomberg News’ James Gibney, who points to an unnamed CIA officer mentioned in the Intelligence Committee report. In Central America this officer provided training and “conducted interrogations” for an unidentified group, which according to Newsweek “was almost certainly the Nicaraguan contras,” a rightwing rebel group fighting the leftist Nicaraguan government of the 1980s. “The CIA inspector general later recommended that [the officer] be orally admonished for inappropriate use of interrogation techniques,” the Senate report says. In the fall of 2002, this same officer “became the CIA’s chief of interrogations in the CIA’s Renditions Group, the officer in charge of CIA interrogations.” (Newsweek 12/10/14; Bloomberg News 12/12/14)

*4. Links to alternative sources on: Latin America, Uruguay, Brazil, Bolivia, Peru, Colombia, Venezuela, Honduras, Guatemala, Mexico, Cuba, Haiti, US/immigration, US/policy

The Torture Report: Latin America’s Lessons for the United States
https://nacla.org/news/2014/12/10/torture-report-latin-america%E2%80%99s-lessons-united-states

UNESCO Preserves Uruguay Prison Diary
http://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/UNESCO-Preserves-Uruguay-Prison-Diary-20141214-0007.html

The Police and the Massacre of Afro-Brazilian Youth
http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs/the-americas-blog/the-police-and-the-massacre-of-afro-brazilian-youth

Brazil: truth commission report on military rule
http://ww4report.com/node/13809

Peru-Brazil Indigenous People Pledge to Fight Amazon Oil Exploration
https://intercontinentalcry.org/its-war-peru-brazil-indigenous-people-pledge-to-fight-amazon-oil-exploration-26487/

Developmentalism and Social Movements in Bolivia
http://www.cipamericas.org/archives/13900

Without Respect for Indigenous Rights, There Will be No Solution to Climate Change Report from Lima (Peru)
http://www.cipamericas.org/archives/13981

People's Summit in Lima Envisions Bottom-Up Movement for Global Climate Justice (Peru)
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/news-briefs-archives-68/5148-peoples-summit-in-lima-envisions-bottom-up-movement-for-global-climate-justice

Lima climate summit in shadow of state terror
http://ww4report.com/node/13818

Kicked Out By Coal (Colombia)
https://intercontinentalcry.org/kicked-coal/

U.S. Congress Passes Venezuela Sanctions, Obama Expected to Sign
http://venezuelanalysis.com/news/11065

The Situation of Human Rights and Democracy in Honduras Since the Elections of November 2013
http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs/the-americas-blog/the-situation-of-human-rights-and-democracy-in-honduras-since-the-elections-of-november-2013

Indigenous Guatemalans Create Political Platform for 2015 Elections
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/guatemala-archives-33/5149-indigenous-guatemalans-create-political-platform-in-2015

Ayotzinapa, emblem of the Twenty-First Century social order (Mexico)
http://alainet.org/active/79434

Protests Erupt Linking Police Impunity in Ferguson to Ayotzinapa (Mexico)
https://nacla.org/news/2014/12/09/ayotzinapa-ferguson-and-eric-garner

Mexico’s Epidemic of Violence Against Women
http://www.cipamericas.org/archives/13916

Why USAID Could Never Spark a Hip Hop Revolution in Cuba
https://nacla.org/news/2014/12/15/why-usaid-could-never-spark-hip-hop-revolution-cuba

Presidential Commission Recommends Removing Prime Minister as Pressure Mounts to Resolve Electoral Crisis (Haiti)
http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs/relief-and-reconstruction-watch/presidential-commission-recommends-removing-prime-minister-as-pressure-mounts-to-resolve-electoral-crisis

Haiti Rape Accountability and Prevention Project, 16 Days of Activism
http://www.cipamericas.org/archives/13928

Border Farmworkers Still Lack Health Care (US/immigration)
http://fnsnews.nmsu.edu/border-farmworkers-still-lack-health-care/

Immigration Enforcement: Anti-Labor Tool (US/immigration)
http://ww4report.com/node/13810

Latin America: NYPD chief wants to teach the world’s police (US/policy)
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/news-briefs-archives-68/5146-latin-america-nypd-chief-wants-to-teach-the-worlds-police

For more Latin America news stories from mainstream and alternative sources:
http://alainet.org/index.phtml.en
http://www.cipamericas.org/
http://org.salsalabs.com/o/967/blastContent.jsp
http://fnsnews.nmsu.edu/
http://intercontinentalcry.org/
http://www.ueinternational.org/MLNA/index.php
http://nacla.org/
http://www.telesurtv.net/english/index.html
http://upsidedownworld.org/
http://venezuelanalysis.com/
http://wagingnonviolence.org/
http://ww4report.com/node/

For immigration updates and events:
http://thepoliticsofimmigration.blogspot.com/

END

Your support is appreciated. Back issues and source materials are available on request. Feel free to reproduce these updates, or reprint or re-post any information from them, but please credit us as “Weekly News Update on the Americas” and include a link.

Order The Politics of Immigration: Questions & Answers, from Monthly Review Press, by Update editors Jane Guskin and David Wilson:
http://thepoliticsofimmigration.org/

WNU #1229: 3 More Nations Recall Israel Envoys

Issue #1229, August 3, 2014

1. Latin America: 3 More Nations Recall Israel Envoys
2. Argentina: US Hedge Funds Force Bond Default
3. Mexico: Maya Campesinos Beat Monsanto in Court
4. Links to alternative sources on: Latin America, Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Venezuela, Guatemala, Mexico, Haiti, US/policy, US/immigration

ISSN#: 1084 922X. Weekly News Update on the Americas covers news from Latin America and the Caribbean, compiled and written from a progressive perspective. It has been published weekly by the Nicaragua Solidarity Network of Greater New York since 1990. It is archived at http://weeklynewsupdate.blogspot.com. For a subscription, write to weeklynewsupdate@gmail.com. Follow us on Twitter at http://twitter.com/WeeklyNewsUpdat.

*1. Latin America: 3 More Nations Recall Israel Envoys
A total of five Latin American governments had recalled their ambassadors to Israel as of July 29 in an escalation of diplomatic protests against an operation the Israeli military had been carrying out in the Palestinian territory of Gaza since July 8 [see Update #1228]. With the Palestinian death toll passing 1,500—including more than 300 children--centrist and even rightwing Latin American governments started joining left and center-left government in distancing themselves from the main US ally in the Middle East.

Chile, El Salvador and Peru called their ambassadors home for consultations on July 29; Ecuador had already recalled its ambassador on July 17, followed by Brazil on July 24. While it condemned the firing of rockets into Israel by the Gaza-based Hamas organization, the center-left government of Chilean president Michelle Bachelet denounced Israeli attacks on the Palestinians as “collective punishment,” saying they “violate the principle of proportionality in the use of force, an indispensable requirement for the justification of legitimate defense.” El Salvador’s center-left government said it was responding to “the serious escalation in violence and the realization of indiscriminate bombing from Israel into the Gaza Strip,” while the centrist Peruvian government charged that Israel’s actions “constitute a new and reiterated violation of the basic norms of international humanitarian law.”

Also on July 29, four of the five members of the Southern Common Market (Mercosur)--Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and Venezuela—issued a joint statement during a summit held in Caracas saying they “energetically condemn the disproportionate use of force by the Israeli army in the Gaza Strip, which in the majority affects civilians, including children and women.” Argentina and Uruguay didn’t recall their ambassadors, but the left-leaning government of Argentine president Cristina Fernández de Kirchner issued a statement expressing concern over the safety of an Argentine priest working in Gaza and that of 30 disabled children, nine elderly people and six nuns in his care. Venezuela broke off relations with Israel over a similar Israeli operation in Gaza in 2009; it is planning to send humanitarian aid to the Palestinian territory now.

On July 30 the rightwing government of Paraguay, the one Mercosur member that didn’t join in the statement, called for “an immediate end to aggression and hostilities” in the Gaza Strip. The center-right government of Colombian president Juan Manuel Santos also seemed to be moving away from support of Israel. In a July 10 press release Colombia had condemned “acts of violence and terrorism against Israel,” without mentioning Israeli operations, but a July 22 statement from the Foreign Ministry said Colombia “rejects the military offensive by Israeli forces in the Gaza Strip” and expresses condolences for “victims of Israel’s retaliatory actions.”

The harshest condemnation of Israel’s actions came from center-left Bolivian president Evo Morales, who on July 30 described Israel as a “terrorist state.” He announced that his government was cancelling an agreement that had been in effect since 1972 allowing Israelis to visit without a visa requirement. Bolivia has had limited diplomatic ties with Israel since 2009, when Morales’ government restricted relations to protest the Gaza operation then.

With the strong statements from its governments, Latin America “has set itself apart from other regional blocs,” according to Michael Shifter, the president of the centrist Washington, DC-based think tank Inter-American Dialogue. The “emerging consensus condemning Israel for its military actions in Gaza is not surprising,” he said, given that 11 Latin American governments had recognized Palestine as a state by 2011 [see Update #1153]. Farid Kahhat, a political scientist and Middle East expert with the Catholic University of Peru, noted that now “[i]t isn’t only the nations with left-leaning governments that have recalled their ambassadors… This transcends ideologies.”

The Israeli government continued to react angrily to the protests from Latin America. “Israel expresses its deep disappointment with the hasty decision of the governments of El Salvador, Peru and Chile to recall their ambassadors for consultations,” Foreign Ministry spokesperson Yigal Palmor said on July 30. “This step constitutes encouragement for Hamas, a group recognized as a terror organization by many countries around the world.” The statement was more moderate than Palmor’s dismissal of Brazil a week earlier as a “diplomatic dwarf,” a remark that led the Brazilian Jewish Confederation (CONIB), an umbrella body of Brazilian Jewish groups, to apologize to the government of Brazilian president Dilma Rousseff on July 24. CONIB itself had charged that Rousseff’s administration had “a one-sided attitude to the conflict in Gaza in which the Brazilian Ministry of Foreign Affairs criticizes Israel and ignores the actions of the terrorist group Hamas,” but CONIB president Claudio Lottenberg called Palmor’s comments, which included a sneer at the Brazilian soccer team, “very unfortunate.” “Brazil has the right to express its point of view,” Lottenberg said. (Haaretz (Israel) 7/24/14 from Jewish Telegraphic Agency, 7/30/14 from staff; Wall Street Journal 7/30/14; Latin American Herald Tribune 7/30/14 from EFE; The Americas Blog 7/31/14)

*2. Argentina: US Hedge Funds Force Bond Default
The US financial services company Standard & Poor’s Ratings (S&P) declared Argentina in default the afternoon of July 30 after last-minute negotiations failed to produce an agreement between the country and a group of creditors who insisted that they be paid in full for the $1.5 billion in Argentine bonds they own. This was Argentina’s second default since an economic collapse in December 2001 brought on by a decade of extreme neoliberal austerity and privatization measures [see Update #621]. Opinions were divided on how the new default would affect the country, which was already entering a recession. “The ordinary Argentine citizen will be the real and ultimate victim,” Daniel Pollack, the mediator appointed by a US federal court in New York, said in a statement. But Argentine Economy Minister Axel Kicillof was defiant. “We aren't going to sign any agreement that would jeopardize the future of Argentines,” he said at a news conference after the negotiations ended on July 30.

The holdout creditors were led by US billionaire Paul Singer; two of his companies, Elliott Management and a subsidiary, NML Capital; and Aurelius Capital Management. NML and Aurelius are hedge funds of the type known as “vulture funds” for their practice of investing in weak debt that the debtors are likely to default on. These hedge funds bought up cheap Argentine bonds after the 2001 collapse. From 2005 to 2010 Argentina’s government negotiated settlements with the other bondholders, who agreed to accept exchange bonds at a 70% discount for the debt they were holding; this is a fairly standard arrangement for defaults by countries, like bankruptcy proceedings for a company or an individual. But Singer and his associates held out for full payment and took the case to a US federal court. In 2012 New York District judge Thomas Griesa ruled in Singer’s favor. He held that when Argentina paid the discounted exchange bonds, it also had to pay the holdouts in full. Argentina tried make a payment to the holders of the exchange bonds this June, placing $539 million in the Bank of New York Mellon, but the bank couldn’t pay out the money: Judge Griesa had ruled that any financial firm that distributed payments to the bondholders would be in contempt of court. Argentina turned to the US Supreme Court, but the justices rejected the appeal.

Estanislao Malic, an economist at the Scalabrini Ortiz Center for Economic and Social Studies in Buenos Aires, told the New York Times that the “default is not a drastic change.” “Argentina has been living in a default reality for over 10 years” since the earlier default, he explained. But there are implications for the global financial system, where exchange bonds have been a mechanism for resolving financial crises in the absence of any international bankruptcy procedures. “The danger here is all too easy to see,” British journalist Larry Elliott wrote on July 31. “The legacy of the financial crisis of 2007-08 is that many countries find themselves saddled with big budget deficits. In the event of another financial crisis, something that seems all too likely, there would be a wave of sovereign debt defaults.” The administration of US president Barack Obama appeared to agree on the seriousness of the threat: the US attorney general in New York, Preet Bharara, filed a brief in an appeals court in 2012 supporting Argentina against Judge Griesa.

Joseph Stiglitz, a former World Bank chief economist and now a Columbia University professor, called the US courts’ decisions in the case “America throwing a bomb into the global economic system.” “We don't know how big the explosion will be--and it’s not just about Argentina,” he said. (New York Times 7/30/14; McClatchy DC 7/31/14; BBC News 7/31/14; The Guardian (UK) 7/31/14)

*3. Mexico: Maya Campesinos Beat Monsanto in Court
A district court judge in the eastern Mexican state of Yucatán ruled in July against a license that the federal Agriculture Secretariat (Sagarpa) had granted the Missouri-based multinational Monsanto Company in 2012 for sowing 253,500 hectares with genetically modified (GM) soy in Yucatán and six other states. A group of campesinos from the Maya indigenous group filed a suit charging that the license endangered the traditional production of organic honey in a region including the Yucatán communities of Ticul, Santa Elena, Oxkutzcab, Tzucacab, Tekax, Peto and Tizimin. The judge’s ruling was “a great achievement because there is recognition of our legitimate right to make decisions about our territory and our livelihood,” Maya farmer Lorenzo Itzá Ek said. “[B]eekeeping is the main traditional economic activity we carry out, and we don’t want our honey contaminated with transgenics or with toxic products like agrochemicals that kill our bees.”

This was the third defeat for GM soy in eastern Mexico this year. In March and April a court in Campeche ruled in favor of two suits brought by Maya beekeepers from the Hopelchén and Pac-Chen communities in Campeche’s Cancabchen municipality. The decisions on GM soy follow a ruling in October 2013 by a federal judge that restrained Sagarpa and the Environment Secretariat (Semarnat) from granting further licenses for planting GM corn in Mexico [see Update #1195]. But Ximena Ramos, an adviser for the Litiga OLE legal assistance group, said the July ruling in Yucatán was especially important because the judge ordered a public consultation with the affected indigenous communities before any resolution could be made about the sowing of GM soy. This enforces “the multicultural principle in the Constitution, along with the human rights implied in the right to prior consultation with the Maya,” she said. (Terra Mexico 7/22/14; El Ciudadano (Chile) 7/30/14)

In related news, Brazilian farmers are calling on four multinational seed manufacturers to reimburse them for pesticide they used on GM corn they planted this year. According to Ricardo Tomczyk, president of the Aprosoja farm lobbying group in the southern state of Mato Grosso do Sul, the Spodoptera frugiperda (also known as the “corn leafworm” or “southern grassworm”) has developed a resistance to the poisonous protein in the type of GM corn known as “Bt corn.” The result is that farmers had to spend an average of 120 reais (about US$54) per hectare on pesticide to protect their crop, he said. The seed’s manufacturers are the US-based companies Monsanto, Dow Chemical Co and DuPont, and Syngenta AG, which is based in Switzerland. (Reuters 7/28/14)

*4. Links to alternative sources on: Latin America, Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Venezuela, Guatemala, Mexico, Haiti, US/policy, US/immigration

Update on Latin American Responses to Israel's Siege on Gaza
http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs/the-americas-blog/update-on-latin-american-responses-to-israels-siege-on-gaza

What the NML vs Argentina case means for the world
http://alainet.org/active/75763

The World Cup Has Come and Gone and Brazil Didn’t Crash and Burn
http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs/the-americas-blog/the-world-cup-has-come-and-gone-and-brazil-didnt-crash-and-burn

Gunmen threaten to assassinate Yanomami leader (Brazil)
http://ww4report.com/node/13417

Medellín kingpin busted in Spain (Colombia)
http://ww4report.com/node/13007#comment-452289

Obama Throws Another Bone to the Right on Venezuela
http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs/the-americas-blog/obama-throws-another-bone-to-the-right-on-venezuela

Inside Venezuela's "Proceso"
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/news-briefs-archives-68/4971-inside-venezuelas-qprocesoq

Venezuela to Send Aid to Gaza, Welcome Refugees, as Regional Leaders Condemn Assault
http://venezuelanalysis.com/news/10820

US Policies Exacerbate Migration Crisis in Guatemala
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/guatemala-archives-33/4962-us-policies-exacerbate-migration-crisis-in-guatemala

Guatemalan Court Rules in Favor of Indigenous People Over Goldcorp Mining in Sipacapa
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/guatemala-archives-33/4963-guatemalan-court-rules-in-favor-of-indigenous-people-over-goldcorp-mining-in-sipacapa

Laws That Kill Protesters in Mexico
http://truth-out.org/news/item/25339-laws-that-kill-protesters-in-mexico

Defending Communication Rights: “We will not remain silent” (Mexico)
http://www.cipamericas.org/archives/12696

Understanding and Countering Corruption and Migrant Abuse by Mexico’s National Migration Institute
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/news-briefs-archives-68/4964-understanding-and-countering-corruption-and-migrant-abuse-by-mexicos-national-migration-institute

Reconstruction or Haiti's Latest Disaster? Tourism Development on Île-à-Vache Island
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/beverly-bell/reconstruction-or-haitis_b_5606282.html

US Congress Passes Aid Accountability Legislation as Local Procurement Falls in Haiti
http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs/relief-and-reconstruction-watch/us-congress-passes-aid-accountability-legislation-as-local-procurement-falls-in-haiti

Police Should Not Be Managing the Drug Problem. Doctors Should Be. (US/policy)
http://nacla.org/news/2014/7/29/police-should-not-be-managing-drug-problem-doctors-should-be

We Reap What We Sow: The Link between Child Migrants and US Policy (US/immigration)
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/international-archives-60/4965-we-reap-what-we-sow-the-link-between-child-migrants-and-us-policy

The Central American Child Refugee Crisis: Made in U.S.A. (US/immigration)
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/news-briefs-archives-68/4966-the-central-american-child-refugee-crisis-made-in-usa

New Senate Bill Fails To Address Root Causes of Central American Migration (US/immigration)
therealnews.com/t2/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=74&jumival=12147

For more Latin America news stories from mainstream and alternative sources:
http://www.cipamericas.org/
http://org.salsalabs.com/o/967/blastContent.jsp
http://fnsnews.nmsu.edu/
http://intercontinentalcry.org/
http://www.ueinternational.org/MLNA/index.php
http://nacla.org/
http://upsidedownworld.org/
http://venezuelanalysis.com/
http://wagingnonviolence.org/
http://ww4report.com/node/

For immigration updates and events:
http://thepoliticsofimmigration.blogspot.com/

END

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Order The Politics of Immigration: Questions & Answers, from Monthly Review Press, by Update editors Jane Guskin and David Wilson:
http://thepoliticsofimmigration.org/