Guatemala City Centre. Anna Vogt
The forcibly displaced are part of a global trend — by the summer of 2015, more than 60 million people had been forced from their homes as a result of persecution, conflict, violence, or human rights violations, according to the UN refugee agency. More than 700,000 of the displaced were in the Americas. The plight of Central Americans is particularly dire. Although no official figures exist, it is thought that at least 70,000 migrants and refugees have gone missing in Mexico since 2006. And yet, it is a cumbersome task assessing exactly how many have perished, because no one is counting, or identifying the dead, according to Rubén Figueroa of Movimiento Migrante Mesaomericano, the organization behind the mothers’ caravan.
Detainees in ICE raids speak out as lawyers scramble to stop deportations
“I don’t understand why they want to deport me, if I complied with all the requirements. We had our life here. My children were doing well in school. my child was getting the help he needed. I was going to be treated for my condition. Both of my parents and some of my siblings reside in the United States.” Her story echoes another statement seen by the Guardian, in which a different woman detained in Atlanta argued that her efforts to remain in the country have been hampered by ineffective counsel and a lack of explanations and translations of legal proceedings; that she was misled by officials during the raids and was told that she no longer had a right to an attorney.
Organized Crime in the Americas: What to Expect in 2016
We often use the year past as a guide. In 2015, corruption and crime at the highest levels have led to unprecedented judicial action in various countries. But the underworld remains adept at undermining prosecutors. What’s more, the end of old conflicts — as well as the unraveling of a truce — will open new possibilities for transnational organized crime (TOC). (See 2015 Game Changers below) For 2016, we have listed seven nations where we expect changes to the criminal status quo, or where organized crime is likely to make gains.
How can Latin America meet the demands of an aspirational new generation?
Unemployment in Latin America and the Caribbean increased in 2015 for the first time in five years, from 6.2% to 6.7%, a figure that could rise further over the coming year. It suggests a bleaker outlook for young people; a lack of opportunities that is engulfed in the region’s issues concerning violence and the war on drugs. How can this vicious cycle of insecurity be broken? The assertive Rebeca Grynspan, secretary general of the Ibero-American General Secretariat (SEGIB), says succinctly: “Employment is the problem, and education is the answer. But we need quality education, and at the moment we don’t have that.”
Mexican marijuana farmers see profits tumble as U.S. loosens laws
The loosening of marijuana laws across much of the United States has increased competition from growers north of the border, apparently enough to drive down prices paid to Mexican farmers. Small-scale growers here in the state of Sinaloa, one of the country’s biggest production areas, said that over the last four years the amount they receive per kilogram has fallen from $100 to $30. The price decline appears to have led to reduced marijuana production in Mexico and a drop in trafficking to the U.S., according to officials on both sides of the border and available data.
Guatemala Arrests Former Military Officers in Connection With Massacres
The Guatemalan authorities on Wednesday arrested 18 former military officers on charges related to massacres and disappearances during the 1980s, the bloodiest period of the country’s 36-year civil war. The arrests pose a direct challenge to the president-elect, Jimmy Morales, a political neophyte who ran as the candidate of a party dominated by former officers. Among the men who were arrested was retired Gen. Manuel Benedicto Lucas García, 83, who was the army chief of staff during the dictatorship of his brother, Gen. Romeo Lucas García. A former military intelligence chief, Manuel Antonio Callejas y Callejas, was also detained, as was one of the generals who ousted General Lucas García in a 1982 coup.
Guatemala: Appeal court rules against ‘ecocide’ palm oil plantation
Accused of ‘ecocide’ by local communities and environmentalists, Empresa Reforestada de Palma de Petén (REPSA), a Spanish-owned African palm oil company with extensive plantations in the Petén region of Guatemala, has failed to overturn a court-ordered suspension of works. In September 2015, Judge Karla Hernández of the Petén Environmental Crimes Court demanded the company to cease operations pending an investigation into alleged criminal negligence that has resulted in catastrophic fish die-off in the La Pasión River.Last week, a small group of residents sympathetic to REPSA appealed the decision and lost, marking an important victory for local campaigners and international organizations seeking wider recognition of ‘ecocide’ as an international crime against peace.
Living Within the Boundaries of El Salvador’s Gang ‘War’
It’s not that the Monteblanco MS13 behave uniquely. Such are the border rules of this war. It doesn’t matter of someone is a gang member or not. If you live on one side of a border, that’s your side, whether you’ve chosen it or not. For most of these people, such as our youngster, the gang demarcation is more important than the official demarcation: one can forget their voting district and the consequences will not be anywhere near as severe as if they forget the colony their walking through belongs to an opposing gang. Governments come and go, but gangs have been present for the past two decades.
“The Struggle for Land Justice Knows No Borders”: Corporate Pillaging in Haiti
When corporations arrive in countries like Haiti – where extreme poverty is so prevalent – they cast a spell on the people by promising a brighter future. When people don’t know what the consequences may be, they tend to welcome any proposal for potential progress. However, once the development projects begin, the promises start to break. That’s when people begin to resist. They protest, they try to bring the companies to court, and they go on the radio to denounce what’s going on. That’s what is happening right now in Haiti. We’re working on alternatives and we are leading a concentrated resistance movement against this model of development.
1,500 Colombia civilians face charges over war-related crimes
Colombia’s prosecution seeks to charge some 1,500 civilians with conflict-related crimes allegedly committed by guerrilla groups like the FARC, which is currently negotiating peace with the government. The civilians are all suspected of having either ordered or taken part in crimes like homicide, kidnapping, extortion and forced displacement carried out by a row of leftist guerrilla groups during Colombia’s more than 50-year-long armed conflict. Vice-Prosecutor General Jorge Fernando Perdomo said the civilians were incriminated by demobilized guerrillas of the FARC, ELN, EPL, ERG and ERP.
How can people with the world’s worst internet set up a technological network independent of external corporate or governmental control? Bolivia, with the world’s slowest internet, is working towards full technological sovereignty. This means creating an internet by Bolivians, for Bolivians. They also have hopes of training up generations of programmers and hackers who will turn the Latin American country into a technological producer instead of a consumer…They want to train up generations of Bolivians who can write code and develop software. They are trying to establish a “sovereign cloud”, independent of international corporate and governmental control, that will protect the country’s data and speed up access and connectivity. Although they both use and support mobile internet platforms, they know that erecting more masts won’t solve the basic problem of structural integrity. They want full technological sovereignty and we are catching them as they build the architecture from the bottom up.