The 2010 World Cup will kick off in South Africa this June, but Maureen Msisi, of the Landless People’s Movement wants to know “who this development [is] really going to benefit? Not … the people that most need it,” she says. Activists across the Atlantic in Brazil are saying the same thing, throwing into question a development model that has accompanied massive international events such as the World Cup and the Olympics for nearly two decades.
Last week, family and friends of environmentalists killed in the town of San Isidro, Cabañas, gathered in solidarity with their fallen loved ones at a public ecumenical and artistic commemoration. Those gathered attributed the recent assassinations of three environmental activists to a generalized repression targeted at those opposed to the re-opening of the “El Dorado” gold mine by the Vancouver, BC-based Pacific Rim Mining Corporation. The company has denied any role in the murders. (Special feature: recent video of anti-mining activities below.)
Much of the coverage of Haiti you will see over the next days and weeks will inevitably edit out the struggle and history of Haiti. We will see photos and videos depicting the human suffering that has resulted, but we will not see the dignity that has fused together generations of Haitian freedom seekers, and inspired millions more beyond the bounds of that small island nation. Here’s what you can do to help relieve the suffering and continue the legacy of solidarity at the same time.
In the early morning hours of Wednesday January 6, the Garifuna community radio Faluma Bimetu (“Sweet Coconut”) based in Triunfo de la Cruz was burnt down by unknown armed individuals who proceeded to loot the station’s radio equipment. This is not the first time the radio has been attacked and its equipment stolen.
Thanks so much to everyone who contributed to the Upside Down World fund drive and to those who helped spread the word about it! We also appreciated the many words of encouragement accompanying the donations. […]
On January 3, 2010, Peru’s Supreme Court upheld Former Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori’s April 2007 conviction and 25-year sentence for aggravated homicide, aggravated kidnapping, severe injuries and forced disappearance of persons.
All items entering the Brazilian embassy undergo police inspection, although the final say as to what gets through and what does not is generally left up to a military colonel; the fact that the delivery process is filmed by unidentified policemen in ski masks meanwhile hints at the existence of video footage of the confiscation of ballpoint pens by the self-appointed protectors of the embassy. […]
Corruption in Honduras has taken root at every level of the state, which is helpless to combat it because of the lack of credibility of most of its institutions, the erosion of social capital and the public perception that the problem is here to stay. […]
The coordinator of the commission convened by the Peruvian government to clarify a June massacre of 33 indigenous protesters and police near the Amazonian town of Bagua refused to sign the final report, which he says is biased. […]
Twenty-some years later, the question remains the same: where are the disappeared? Based on a witness testimony, the Association of Family Members of the Detained-Disappeared of Guatemala (FAMDEGUA in Spanish), along with the Forensic Anthropology Foundation of Guatemala (FAFG in Spanish), began a process of exhumation in a possible clandestine mass grave on December 10, 2009.
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