Pulque, once the most consumed alcoholic drink in Mexico, is fighting to regain broad appeal following decades of being out-marketed by the European beer industry. But the current struggle goes much further than the drink. It is also an attempt to preserve an indigenous tradition that dates back thousands of years.
I began writing a eulogy for Berta Isabel Cáceres Flores years ago, though she died only last week. Berta was assassinated by Honduran government-backed death squads on March 3. Like many who knew and worked with her, I was aware that this fighter for indigenous peoples’ power; for control over their own territories; for women’s and LGBTQ rights; for authentic democracy; for the well-being of Pachamama; for an end to tyranny by transnational capital; and for an end to US empire was not destined to die of old age. She spoke too much truth to too much power. […]
Yesterday the world woke to the terrible news that Berta Cáceres, world-renowned Honduran indigenous activist and mother of four, was murdered in her home in La Esperanza, Intibuca, Honduras. It was a shock to many who knew and worked with her. Cáceres was a founder of the Civic Council of Grassroots and Indigenous Organizations of Honduras (COPINH), a powerful coalition active in various struggles around Honduras. The violence and impunity against indigenous activists like Cáceres cannot be fully understood outside of the context of the 2009 military coup, which paved the way for multinational interests and free market policies to be implemented at any cost in Honduras.
In recent years, the popular tourist attraction of Semuc Champey in the Guatemalan department of Alta Verapaz has become a point of social conflict for the indigenous Q’eqchi’ Mayan communities surrounding the site. On February 8, tensions erupted and led to the occupation of the municipality building of Lanquín by over 200 members of the communities near the tourist attraction. Community members demanded the recuperation of the site. Since that day, residents have maintained management of the park. As the indigenous-led recuperation of this park continues, the conflict has shed light on a longstanding dilemma in Guatemala around indigenous communities’ access to sacred sites. […]
In a country where political crises are ignored by the government until they fade into oblivion, the families of the missing students of Ayotzinapa have kept their search alive for seventeen months.
Bolivian President Evo Morales lost the referendum last Sunday that could have given him the ability to run for re-election in 2019. The margin was small, but the implications are huge: Bolivia’s longest standing and most popular president finally has an end date for his time in power, on January 22, 2020. The Bolivian left and its vibrant social and indigenous movements were always bigger than Morales, and Sunday’s referendum results underline this.
Bolivians head to the polls today in a referendum to decide whether or not President Evo Morales can run for a fourth term. In October of 2014 Morales was elected to his third term, and the constitutional amendment up for a vote today would allow him, if re-elected, to remain in office until 2025. Here is a collection of photos from the Yes campaign, in support of the amendment to allow Morales to run again, and the No campaign, against the constitutional change.
In 2013, Francisco Javier Cisneros Torres was forcibly taken from his home in Tala, Jalisco. Since then, his sister Nansi Cisneros of Los Angeles, California, has built new initiatives to bring together other families who are also searching for loved ones. For her, this is an important step to building cross-border momentum to demand an end to human rights abuses in Mexico.
Farmers and residents in the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, Oaxaca have repeatedly stated that the construction of electricity-generating wind parks is focused more on profits, greenwashing and generating cheap electricity for the US, rather than serving their own communities or Mexico’s energy needs.
The election results in Venezuela and Argentina, the Brazilian crisis, and the erosion of the “citizens’ revolution” in Ecuador are part of a change in political climate that puts the transformative processes underway on the defensive.
Copyright 2003-2018 Upside Down World