CAFTA Influences Costa Rican Election
Costa Rican electoral officials began a recount on Tuesday to determine the winner of a presidential race in which the two candidates were separated by a mere .3 percent with most of the polling places […]
Year: 2006
“Killer Coke’s” New Competition in Colombia
Look out Coke, Pepsi and Seagram’s. Indigenous campesinos from Western Colombia have a new market for their coca crops: soft drinks. Nasa Indians approached officials in Bogota to license their new cola, named Coca Sek, […]
Is Chavez a Dictator?
Hugo Chavez and Fidel Castro have often met as the leaders of their countries, and they have clearly developed a warm personal friendship as well. The Bush administration, Fox News, and the Venezuelan opposition try to use this as "proof" that Chavez is taking orders from Castro, that Chavez intends to turn Venezuela into a "communist dictatorship," with capitalism severely curtailed, and freedom of speech limited.
Nature Conservation or Territorial Control and Profits?
San Juan residents
"But the greatest doubt – considering that over half of all Garifuna communities are located in protected areas or their respective buffer zones – is if the dedication to environmental protection work really exists or if it can be reduced to a formula for territorial control, so that later the protected areas can be raffled off among the same old sorcerers as always." (The Fraternal Black Order of Honduras)
Another Way Called Venezuela
I thought that I would die without living and knowing a revolution. I came late to the Cuban Revolution, since I was born a few years after it. I witnessed the ephemeral triumph and then the drowning in blood and fire, by the government of Ronald Reagan and his "contras," of the Sandinista Revolution. I had wanted, like John Reed, to be in the middle of the explosion of the great revolutions.
Progressive Bishop Leads Church in Guatemala
The Guatemalan Episcopal Conference elected Bishop Alvaro Ramazzini, a defender of popular causes, as its new president on Friday. Ramazzini has been bishop of San Marcos, in western Guatemala for 17 years where he has […]
Plans to Build Amazon Pipeline
South American leaders announced last week plans to build a massive natural gas pipeline through the Amazon rain forest. Environmentalists say it could damage part of the Amazon by polluting waterways, destroying trees and creating […]
Defender of Brazil’s Indigenous Gets Fired
Sydney Possuelo, a Brazilian explorer who made a career out of finding and protecting indigenous tribes, was fired for criticizing government officials. Possuelo compared his boss to the "ranchers, land-grabbers, miners, and loggers" who have […]
The World Social Forum and the Street in Caracas, Venezuela
Apartment in El 23
Caracas, Venezuela is a city made up of skyscrapers, colonial architecture and, wherever possible, the do-it-yourself tile and cement houses of poor neighborhoods, known as barrios. Though the local mainstream media ignored the coming of the 2006 World Social Forum, Caracans themselves found out quickly as they watched a parade of activists from across the globe pour into their city waving banners, setting up tents and discussing the state of the world on park benches and hotel lobbies.
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Bush Using Implementation of CAFTA Agreement to Expand Corporate Rights in Central America
What does tightening intellectual property laws have to do with "free" trade? That’s the question many people in Central American and the Dominican Republic are asking as the United States Trade Representative continues to insist on dramatic changes to constitutional laws in the six countries involved in the US-Central America-Dominican Republic Free Trade Agreement (otherwise known as CAFTA).