Month: January 2015
Forced Disappearances Are Humanitarian Crisis in Mexico
(IPS) – The Mexican government will face close scrutiny from the United Nations Committee on Enforced Disappearances – a phenomenon that made international headlines after 43 students from a rural teachers college were killed in […]
The Cuban Opening and the Struggles for a New Social Order
Source: TeleSUR English Introduction When the Cuban revolutionaries took power on January 1, 1959, the political leaders of the United States were initially ambivalent towards the Castro leadership but after the leadership nationalized foreign capital […]
Mexico: Ayotzinapa, Emblem of the Twenty-First Century Social Order
Ayotzinapa is the end result of a bundle of interconnected events. These, with greater or lesser density and visibility, are part of the essence of Twenty-First Century capitalism, not limited to Mexico but spreading, whether surreptitiously or scandalously, throughout the whole world.
Prosecutor’s Death a Test for Argentine Democracy
The death of a special prosecutor investigating one of the biggest unresolved mysteries in the history of Argentina, the bombing of a Jewish community center over 20 years ago, has put to the test an immature democracy that is caught up in a web of conspiracy theories and promiscuity between the secret services and those in power. […]
Commodity boom extracting increasingly heavy toll on Amazon forests
Source: The Guardian Unlimited A commodity boom has helped pull millions out of poverty across South America over the past decade. It has also unleashed a new scramble for oil, minerals and cropland that is […]
Ecuador: The “Citizens’ Revolution” vs Social Movements
In this way, thousands of indigenous communities, and tens of thousands of civic organizations, are under the control of the State. The arrival of Rafael Correa’s government and his Alianza País was made possible thanks to the fight of the movements, who are now criminalized and under control … The new power devours those who made it possible.
Bolivian Socialist Funds Election Campaign by Selling Potatoes
An indigenous Bolivian politician will fund her campaign for governor by selling both normal potatoes and traditional freeze-dried potatoes. Source: teleSUR One candidate running for governor of the Bolivian department of La Paz will fund her campaign in an unusual […]
Brazil Truth Commission Details Extent of Rape During Military Dictatorship
Brazil’s National Truth Commission (Commissão Nacional da Verdade, CNV) presented its final report on the history of the human rights violations committed by the military dictatorship that ruled the country from 1964 to 1985. Through its working group “The Dictatorship and Gender,” the CNV took testimony and detailed the use of rape and sexual violence as a weapon against those the dictatorship considered to be political and social activists or otherwise subversive.