The News Roundup is a regular feature of the blog where we select news articles from various sources around the web, with the goal of providing an overview of the weekly conversation about the countries where MCC works in the region. Quotes in italics are drawn directly from sources and do not necessarily reflect the position of MCC
Mexico is massacring its citizens and nobody seems to have noticed
The press originally reported a “clash between teachers and police” in the town of Nochixtlán in the southern state of Oaxaca. The authorities claimed their agents were unarmed and the protesters had fired on them first. The new U.S. Ambassador to Mexico, Roberta Jacobson, was carefully neutral in her first public evaluation of the incident, stating simply that she “lamented the loss of human lives.” But during the ensuing days the awful truth has trickled out. Thanks to the reports of journalists on the scene, the Mexican government has been forced to accept that the police were in fact heavily armed. And the evidence now points to the commission of a brutal massacre by federal forces against peaceful protesters. These forces are under the command of Mexico´s President Enrique Peña Nieto and receive significant funding from the United States government under the Merida Initiative.
Surviving Death: Police and Military Torture of Women in Mexico
An unprecedented Amnesty International investigation of 100 women arrested in Mexico reveals that they are routinely sexually abused by the security forces who want to secure confessions and boost figures in an attempt to show that they are tackling rampant organized crime. All of the 100 women held in federal prisons who reported torture or other ill-treatment to Amnesty International said they had experienced some form of sexual harassment or psychological abuse during their arrest and interrogation by municipal, state or federal police officers or members of the Army and Navy. Seventy-two said they were sexually abused during their arrest or in the hours that followed. Thirty-three reported being raped. Sixty-six of the women said they had reported the abuse to a judge or other authorities but investigations were opened in only 22 cases. Amnesty International is not aware of any criminal charges arising from these investigations.
Honduras Police Reform Commission Finds More Crimes
The Guardian reported this month that the Honduran military has also been implicated in death squad activity. First Sergeant Rodrigo Cruz told the publication that he had seen murdered environmental activist Berta Cáceres’ name on a hit list circulated to US-trained special forces units of the Honduran military. Central American security forces have been accused of a long list of human rights abuses, stretching back to Cold War conflicts in the subregion and beyond. The failure of justice systems to hold anyone accountable for those crimes is part of the reason modern Central American soldiers and police enjoy such a high degree of impunity. An apparent lack of judicial action in the Landaverde and González murders is an indication that the impunity will continue despite the police reform in Honduras.
Nicaragua suppresses opposition to ensure one-party election, critics say
A Nicaraguan government crackdown on free speech, opposition parties and foreign diplomats has been condemned as an attack on civil liberties to bolster one-party rule. With less than five months to go until the country holds a general election, former Sandinista guerrilla leader Daniel Ortega looks almost certain to win a third presidential term unimpeded after the latest assault on opposition leaders. The supreme court last week ousted Eduardo Montealegre as leader of the main opposition party, the Independent Liberation party (PLI), in a move widely criticized as politically driven ad criticized by international observers and the Catholic church. A statement signed by the Bishops of the Episcopal Conference said that “any attempt to create conditions for the implementation of a single-party regime in which ideological diversity and political parties disappeared is harmful to the country”.
Murder and malady: El Salvador’s sugarcane workers
They’re investigating an epidemic that has failed to catch the eye of the mass media, something insidious that has killed an estimated 20,000 people in 10 years across Central America and accounts for more deaths in El Salvador and Nicaragua than Aids, leukemia and diabetes combined. It’s something called “Mesoamerican Nephropathy”, also known as CKDu, a chronic form of kidney disease whose cause the medical community is still trying to determine. Entire family surnames are disappearing – mostly those of poor labourers working in the sugarcane fields, where we are now headed.
The Secrets in Guatemala’s Bones
On June 7, a judge ruled that eight of Guatemala’s top former military leaders will stand trial for massacres, torture and disappearances they ordered or helped orchestrate at a military base in the city of Cobán between 1981 and 1987. (Prosecutors also hope to bring charges against other military officials in the case, including a sitting congressman and eight fugitives, some of whom may be in the United States.) Unlike most war trials in Guatemala, the accused are not foot soldiers but high-ranking officials — more than have ever been prosecuted at one time. “There has never been anything like this in Guatemala,” says Jo-Marie Burt, professor of political science at George Mason University and a transitional-justice expert. The bulk of the evidence comes from exhumations Peccerelli and his group, the Guatemalan Forensic Anthropology Foundation, known as F.A.F.G., undertook at the former military base, where they uncovered 84 graves and 565 bodies.
Congress faults Obama for not being tough with UN over Haiti’s cholera crisis
A bipartisan group of 158 members of Congress has accused the Obama administration of a failure of leadership over the cholera scandal in Haiti in which at least 30,000 people have died as a result of an epidemic caused by the United Nations for which the world body refuses to accept responsibility. A joint letter highly critical of US policy – and devastatingly critical of the UN – has been sent to the US secretary of state, John Kerry, signed by 12 Republican and 146 Democratic members of Congress. Led by John Conyers, a Democratic congressman from Michigan, and Mia Love, a Republican congresswoman from Utah, the letter’s signatories include many of the most senior voices on foreign affairs on Capitol Hill. The missive takes the Obama administration to task for failing to admonish the UN for its refusal to accept responsibility for the cholera outbreak.
Q&A: Colombia Cease-Fire Accord Marks Historic Turn
The agreements signed yesterday suggest that there is no turning back. Santos put the full weight of his office behind yesterday’s event, as did FARC leader Londono, better known as Timochenko. There has never been such a serious and persistent effort to find a peaceful resolution to Colombia’s conflict. But … we are not quite there yet. A few dozen items are still outstanding from previous deals on rural agrarian development, political participation, illicit crops and drug trafficking, victims and transitional justice. There are still discussions needed on how they will be implemented and the mechanisms for resolving conflicts that may come up. In addition, the commission analyzing gender effects of the agreements still needs to complete its review of the documents, and an initiative to bring an ethnic delegation to the peace table has yet to be completed. This visit will be important because the agreements will have a direct impact on indigenous and Afro-Colombian communities and could potentially fan new conflicts if these issues aren’t raised before the final signatures.
Bolivia leader Morales wants to ditch Gregorian calendar
Bolivian President Evo Morales has proposed that the Andean country switch back from the Gregorian calendar to the calendar previously used by its indigenous people. During celebrations for the Aymara New Year, Mr Morales said that he found the Gregorian calendar “untidy”. He suggested that Bolivia “reclaim its ancestral calendar as part of the rebuilding of our identity”. Mr Morales is from the Aymara indigenous group. It is not the first time the Bolivian government has suggested changes to the way time is measured. Two years ago, the clock on the facade of the Congress in La Paz was reversed so that its hands turned left and the numbers were inverted to go from one to 12 anti-clockwise.