Overlooking Mexico´s Copper Canyon Photo: Anna Vogt
New Report Questions Effectiveness of U.S. Aid to Central America
Despite more than $1.2 billion in U.S. assistance since 2008, perceptions of citizen security in Central America have continued to decline and rates of violent crime have continued to rise, contributing to large numbers of children and families fleeing for the United States in recent years. In light of the worsening situation in Central America, a new report from the Wilson Center calls into question the implementation and effectiveness of U.S. assistance programs in the region, particularly the Central American Regional Security Initiative, known as CARSI.
Similar uncertainty over land ownership has played out across Haiti as the country attempts to attract foreign investment in tourism, mining, manufacturing, and agriculture—often without clear knowledge of who, precisely, owns what. The country’s present difficulties with land ownership are a function not only of its twentieth-century dictators but of Haiti’s history as a former slave colony.
Goodbye to the jungle: Young people abandon Bolivia’s “Gateway to the Amazon”
But Carlos is part of a generation that doesn’t want to stay on the edge of the jungle forever. New technology is opening up horizons. The cybercafes back in town are packed with teenagers on Facebook and Twitter. Many, like Carlos, think about leaving to somewhere better connected. La Paz lies 20 hours away, along gravel tracks and mountain roads, often impassable due to flooding and snow. Rurrenabaque itself was evacuated after several people died in huge floods last February.
Trying to end gang bloodshed in El Salvador
The $2 billion Safe El Salvador plan promises parks, sports facilities, education and training programs for the country’s 50 most violent municipalities, as well as improvements to the worst prisons where the country’s biggest gangs — Mara Salvatrucha 13 (MS13) and Calle 18 — have proliferated over the past decade. How the 124-point action plan presented by the Council on Citizen Security will be funded is unclear. But, the prevention-focused proposal appears to be the most comprehensive yet to reduce violence since the 1992 peace accords, which ended the bloody 12-year civil war.
Ottawa must take action on Mexico’s growing human rights crisis
The only way for Mexico to move away from its dark present is for authorities to put in place structural changes which bring human rights to the centre of the political agenda. Mexican authorities have the power to make these changes but they need the political will to do so. Pressure from influential partners can help create that will.
Bodies at the border: ‘Many Mexicans have no option. This flow will not cease’
Immigration reform is expected to convulse Washington in 2015, with a Republican-controlled Congress vowing to challenge Barack Obama’s alleged softness on undocumented people and border control. In fact, in the past six years the number of border agents has doubled to 23,000 and swaths of desert have become militarised. That and a sluggish US economy have curbed the influx.
Colombia’s Coca Farmers Face Uncertain Future As FARC Negotiates Peace
One supporter, economist and coca expert Felipe Tascon, says the plan can work as long as the government does its homework and invests its cash wisely. The ambitious goal means there’s much to be done, he says — addressing the local agricultural considerations, for starters, but also improving the roads and infrastructure surrounding the farmland. But what if the attempt to strangle the drug supply backfires? A Colombia without the FARC controlling coca could turn even more criminal. As long as global demand continues, experts say, drug traffickers will fill the vacuum left by the insurgents.
Colombia: The ELN’s Long and Slow March to Peace
Opening talks with the ELN remains essential if Colombia is to seize its unprecedented opportunity to end the Western Hemisphere’s longest-running conflict. But this window will not stay open indefinitely. Despite the shortcomings, the results of the Fifth Congress should revitalise the exploratory talks. This would be crucial. As talks with FARC continue to make strides toward a final deal, neither the ELN nor the government can afford to lose much more time.
Prosecuting Guatemala’s Dirty War: Rigoberta Menchú Hails Embassy Fire Verdict, Dictator’s Trial
In a major victory for human rights activists, a Guatemalan court has returned a guilty verdict in the Spanish Embassy massacre of 1980. On Monday, the court found former police chief Pedro García Arredondo responsible for ordering an attack on 37 peasant activists and student organizers who were occupying the Spanish Embassy in Guatemala City to protest government repression.
Genocide charges, mistrials and one filmmaker’s fight for justice in Guatemala
“The story of what really happened in the early 1980s in Guatemala, the role of the state and security forces, is now on the record, the historical narrative has changed, and the construction of the genocide case on the part of the prosecution and the survivors (querellantes adhesivos) will be read, studied, emulated and discussed for years to come.”
Land of opportunity – and fear – along route of Nicaragua’s giant new canal
In an era of breathtaking, earth-changing engineering projects, this has been billed as the biggest of them all. Three times as long and almost twice as deep as its rival in Panama, Nicaragua’s channel will require the removal of more than 4.5bn cubic metres of earth – enough to bury the entire island of Manhattan up to the 21st floor of the Empire State Building. It will also swamp the economy, society and environment of one of Latin America’s poorest and most sparsely populated countries. Senior officials compare the scale of change to that brought by the arrival of the first colonisers.