Monday 27 July 2009
27th July, another Bolivian anniversary
This is a country very keen on its anniversaries and its history, a country with a big chip on its shoulders keen to emphasise national unity and create the semblance of a nation state. This, even though the state does not get to all those corners of the country where there is no health care, no education, no police presence, no justice…
So, anniversaries cover every single important event in Bolivia and in Latin America’s history. It was from current Bolivia after all, that the Latin American liberation from Spain was instigated exactly 200 years ago. There are, however, less memorable anniversaries; Bolivian defeats in the Pacific War, the Chaco War…just some of the many Bolivian defeats at war with her neighbours.
This time the anniversary is mine. I arrived here exactly on 27th May 2008 and I am now only weeks away from leaving (if they let me out of the country but that’s another story). In the interim, political events have been exhilarating (some) and depressing (others). These are some of them.
I arrived in the middle of a political campaign like I have never experienced before. Having taunted the president for endless months accusing him of being a ‘dictator’ scared to put his position under the scrutiny of the electorate, the opposition won the right to expel Evo Morales through a recall referendum – the first such event in Bolivian political history – to be held on 10th August.
I have never seen a more ruthless, unpleasant, vile campaign. One accepts that lies and politics are one and only thing. But in Bolivia, I heard open calls to the military to overthrow the president on live radio and TV, accusations of fraud before, during and after the referendum, in the most biased media campaign I have ever witnessed. It was a truly bizarre experience.
The result in favour of the president (with a 67 % support nationwide, even greater than expected) was followed by a mature call for dialogue with the opposition prefects. Not a chance. Those who before the election took the mantle of guardians of democracy, instigated from the regions a violent uprising led by violent thugs – racists and not a few neo-fascists paid by the opposition and the infamous civic committees in Santa Cruz – designed to destabilise the government, force a military intervention and provoke a few deaths that could serve as the basis to overthrow the same government that two thirds of the electorate had just legitimised with its support. The provocation went as far as to lead to the massacre of peasants in the northern department of Pando in the middle of September.
Fortunately for Bolivia, the events of 2003, when a previous president had to leave the country, did not repeat themselves. Instead, the government chopped off the head of the snake, so to speak, when the US ambassador was expelled from Bolivia, leaving the opposition prefects without a political rudder. Very soon things got back to a tense normality. Along with the ambassador, the DEA and USAID were also soon expelled from the country. The US response was swift and petty, suspending Bolivia’s special trade agreement ATPDA, something that new president Obama has only confirmed. Oh well, no surprises there in spite of some initial high hopes that Obama’s presidency symbolised a new beginning for US-Latin American relations.
For me, the second ‘historic’ moment took place on 21st October in the presidential square, Plaza Murillo. As the country has become accustomed to expect, there was a blocking of the law needed to call a referendum that would put to the Bolivian people the constitution drafted by 255 men and women elected for the purpose in 2006 (after many, some would say illegal changes made on it by Congress and a group of negotiators that included the opposition prefects in October 2008).
I have never seen a demonstration like this. Some estimate that as many as 100,000 people from all over the country marched on to La Paz to demand from congress their right to vote. They came, led by their own president, and they stayed for 30 hours outside congress, chanting, dancing, and listening to speeches. Every now and then the president himself, surrounded by the leaders of the social movements, had to make an appeal for calm, especially at 6 am when a group of miners, dynamite in hand were ready to storm congress. At last there was a law and it would be January 25th 2009 when Bolivia approved the new constitution that many hope will be the basis for refounding the state. We will know how when, after new elections in December, the new plurinational assembly – this is the new name for congress – begins to work.
The shine was rubbed off this process of change when days after the new constitution was approved, the head of the ‘nationalised’ oil and gas company was arrested after being involved in the worst corruption scandal of this administration. That the head of YPFB was someone with the total confidence of the president didn’t help. Oops, the MAS appeared to be not quite as virtuous as we thought.
At last (and at least), after such high level social and political confrontation, you could think that it was time for the country to pacify itself. Not a chance, I’m afraid. Only a couple of months later, antiterrorist police arrested two members of a terrorist cell (three others died in the shooting that ensued during the arrest) in Santa Cruz, just meters away from where I had been staying a couple of weeks earlier. There is more than enough evidence to link them to opposition leaders and businessmen from the Santa Cruz region. It seems that the same forces at work behind the recent Hondurean coup will not give up. Will they ever?
This month we have just celebrated the bicentennial of Bolivia’s role in the war of liberation from Spain. Celebrations are over and now begins the race towards the December elections that will continue the process of change that was set in motion with the victory of MAS in December 2005. It is difficult to know what might happen. All we can guarantee is that this will be another hot pre election period full of surprises.
Thursday 23 July 2009
Why the crisis in Honduras is so important for Bolivia
Sorry to go on about Honduras when this is a blog about Bolivia. I can't help to think, however, that what happens in Honduras is of enormous importance to Latin America generally, the standing of the US in the region, and to Bolivia in particular.
Let's start with the latest on the crisis. The negotiation table that Washington set up between the 'two contending parties', as Hillary Clinton referred to the coup instigators and the democratically elected president of the country, has failed. It has failed because the de facto president Micheletti has refused to attend the last two negotiation meetings chaired by Oscar Arias in Costa Rica. This has prompted Manuel Zelaya to declare his intentions to return to his country where he risks being detained and imprisoned. Or worse where his presence might lead to a civil insurrection with the possibility of violence and, dare I say it, civil war.
Meanwhile, a troubling 'legitimation' of the coup took place when a delegation of the golpistas visited Manuel Uribe in Colombia who showed signs of 'understanding' for the coup. This, by the way, a Colombian president who is seeking to change the constitution in order to get a third term. Wasn't Zelaya's attempt to hold a non-binding referendum on the possibility of having a second term the explanation given for the coup? Some people just have no sense of irony.
So why is this coup and its possible success a problem for Latin America and the US? Firstly, because it is happening with the tacit support of the US. Obama has called it illegal but Clinton seems to legitimise the coup when she refers to it as an internal political dispute. Sorry Hillary but it isn't. This is a very dangerous precedent in a region with long and bloody wars fuelled by US involvement.
The US is playing very dangerously with the great hopes of a new beginning in US-Latin American relations Obama created a few months ago in Trinidad and Tobago. All Latin American countries know that this coup would be over if the US withheld support for the military in Honduras. Not acting decisively on it is tantamount to supporting it. Except that Washington acted decisively to remove Miguel Insulza, head of the Organisation of American States, from the scene, installing instead Oscar Arias, a much safer pair of hands for those who want the coup to succeed.
Secondly, because progressive Latin American governments confronting extremist right oppositions like the Bolivian one, know that a coup victory in Honduras would set a very dangerous precedent in the region. Opposition leaders in Bolivia like the prefect of Santa Cruz have already declared themselves in support of the coup. This is interesting given that his usual accusation to this government is that there is no democracy in Bolivia. What is worrying is that a victory for the military and the coup in Honduras could make more, no less, possible, the replication of other similar attempts in Bolivia. We know that entrepreneurs and landowners from Santa Cruz recruited and paid the foreign mercenaries arrested in Santa Cruz arrested last March. Could Micheletti's victory in Honduras lead to more such attempts over here? The next few months leading to the presidential elections of December could be last opportunity for those who desperately want to reverse the process of change in Bolivia.
Let's start with the latest on the crisis. The negotiation table that Washington set up between the 'two contending parties', as Hillary Clinton referred to the coup instigators and the democratically elected president of the country, has failed. It has failed because the de facto president Micheletti has refused to attend the last two negotiation meetings chaired by Oscar Arias in Costa Rica. This has prompted Manuel Zelaya to declare his intentions to return to his country where he risks being detained and imprisoned. Or worse where his presence might lead to a civil insurrection with the possibility of violence and, dare I say it, civil war.
Meanwhile, a troubling 'legitimation' of the coup took place when a delegation of the golpistas visited Manuel Uribe in Colombia who showed signs of 'understanding' for the coup. This, by the way, a Colombian president who is seeking to change the constitution in order to get a third term. Wasn't Zelaya's attempt to hold a non-binding referendum on the possibility of having a second term the explanation given for the coup? Some people just have no sense of irony.
So why is this coup and its possible success a problem for Latin America and the US? Firstly, because it is happening with the tacit support of the US. Obama has called it illegal but Clinton seems to legitimise the coup when she refers to it as an internal political dispute. Sorry Hillary but it isn't. This is a very dangerous precedent in a region with long and bloody wars fuelled by US involvement.
The US is playing very dangerously with the great hopes of a new beginning in US-Latin American relations Obama created a few months ago in Trinidad and Tobago. All Latin American countries know that this coup would be over if the US withheld support for the military in Honduras. Not acting decisively on it is tantamount to supporting it. Except that Washington acted decisively to remove Miguel Insulza, head of the Organisation of American States, from the scene, installing instead Oscar Arias, a much safer pair of hands for those who want the coup to succeed.
Secondly, because progressive Latin American governments confronting extremist right oppositions like the Bolivian one, know that a coup victory in Honduras would set a very dangerous precedent in the region. Opposition leaders in Bolivia like the prefect of Santa Cruz have already declared themselves in support of the coup. This is interesting given that his usual accusation to this government is that there is no democracy in Bolivia. What is worrying is that a victory for the military and the coup in Honduras could make more, no less, possible, the replication of other similar attempts in Bolivia. We know that entrepreneurs and landowners from Santa Cruz recruited and paid the foreign mercenaries arrested in Santa Cruz arrested last March. Could Micheletti's victory in Honduras lead to more such attempts over here? The next few months leading to the presidential elections of December could be last opportunity for those who desperately want to reverse the process of change in Bolivia.
Friday 17 July 2009
200 years of Bolivian independence
As the previous post mentioned, yesterday marked the 200th anniversary of the start of the rebellion in 1809 that would result in the independence of Bolivia 16 years later. The celebrations in La Paz were memorable but I thought that these pictures from the BBC do much more justice to them than any I could have taken so...enjoy.
The link is the following:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8155083.stm
Thursday 16 July 2009
Presidents of Venezuela, Ecuador and Paraguay visit La Paz
July 16 is the day when, 200 years ago, La Paz joined the cry for freedom from Spain, giving way to a revolutionary wave that led to the independence of all of the current South American countries. Today, that day is remembered in La Paz, with the presence of Hugo Chavez, Rafael Correa and Paraguay’s president Lugo.
In the Villarroel square of La Paz, they are currently remembering Pedro Murillo, the independence leader who pronounced the words that have become so famous this year: “I will die but nobody will be able to put out the torch of freedom that we set alight today”. And so it was.
But 200 years later there is still a long way to go for those aspirations to become a reality. The signs of change are in the air with a new wave of democratic and progressive governments in power and united among themselves that have realigned the power relations with the US. The extent to which they are undertaking revolutionary changes as they claim is less clear. The mass of impoverished populations are still with them. Let’s hope that these governments can deliver more social justice before patience runs out.
Monday 13 July 2009
Ex ministro de dictadura boliviana conoció sentencia condenatoria
PRENSA LATINA
PL Agencia Informativa Latinoamericana S.A.
o o o o
La Paz, 13 jul (PL) La justicia boliviana presentó hoy al ex ministro de Interior Luis Arce Gómez (1980-1981) la condena a 30 años de prisión sin derecho a indulto, por delitos de lesa humanidad vinculados a la dictadura.
Arce Gómez, ex funcionario del gobierno de facto de Luis García Meza, arribó a la nación andina el pasado jueves deportado de Estados Unidos para cumplir la pena, impuesta aquí en ausencia en 1993.
El ex coronel del ejército, también conocido como rey de la cocaína, pasó los últimos 18 años en una cárcel norteamericana por tráfico de drogas.
En Bolivia fue procesado en rebeldía y por eso ahora hacemos pública la sentencia condenatoria, dijo el juez de ejecución penal José Ayaviri, quien leyó el dictamen.
Tras la llegada al país, Arce Gómez fue recluido en una cárcel de máxima seguridad, el mismo penal en el que cumple su condena García Meza, responsable de las jornadas sangrientas del golpe de Estado del 17 de julio de 1980.
Como ministro de Interior organizó y comandó grupos paramilitares que asesinaron a líderes opositores. Fue sentenciado por el asesinato de 11 de ellos entre 1980 y 1981.
En una abierta muestra de chantaje, así calificada por el vocero gubernamental Iván Canelas, el reo pidió a través de su abogado una reducción de la sentencia a cambio de revelar dónde están los restos del líder del Partido Socialista Marcelo Quiroga Santa Cruz y otros desaparecidos.
"Ese pedido nos confirma una vez más que Arce Gómez conoce dónde fue conducido el cuerpo de Quiroga Santa Cruz luego de su asesinato", recalcó Canelas.
Indicó que por moral, debería, sin chantaje alguno, decir dónde están los restos del dirigente socialista y los de otros líderes como Carlos Flores y Gualberto Vega, desaparecidos en la década de 1980.
Tuesday 7 July 2009
Obama pide regreso a Honduras de Zelaya. Contradicciones entre golpistas ante probable "amnistía" de la Corte
Kaos en la red:
http://www.kaosenlared.net/noticia/obama-pide-regreso-honduras-zelaya-contradicciones-entre-golpistas-ant
Hillary Clinton informó que Óscar Arias mediará en las negociaciones entre el gobierno constitucional y el golpista. Contradicciones entre Congreso y Corte Suprema de facto ante una "amnistía".
La esperada repuesta de los EEUU a los hechos acontecidos el pasado domingo, cuando el Ejército hondureño asesinó a al menos dos personas e impidió el retorno de Zelaya al país centroamericano, se ha mantenido en la misma línea que en los días pasados.
Desde Rusia, el presidente estadounidense, Barack Obama, declaró que “Estados Unidos apoya el retorno del democráticamente elegido presidente de Honduras, aunque se él se ha opuesto con fuerza a políticas estadounidenses”.
Sin embargo, tal y como señalaba TeleSUR, Obama se ha limitado a reconocer a la administración de Micheletti como un gobierno de facto, evitando en todo momento el referirse a lo sucedido como un golpe de estado. Asimismo, además de no haber retirado a su embajador en Honduras –como sí han hecho la mayoría de países americanos y de la Unión Europea- tampoco ha anulado la ayuda que envía a Honduras, la cual, sin embargo, sí ha sido momentáneamente congelada.
Zelaya se reunió con Clintón
A las 5:30 de la mañana hora local llegó a Washington el presidente constitucional de Honduras, Manuel Zelaya, proveniente de Managua, invitado por la secretaria de Estado de EE.UU., Hillary Clinton, para realizar un encuentro bilateral.
Tras el encuentro, Clinton anunció que tanto Zelaya como Micheletti, con quien se comunicó telefónicamente, aceptaron la propuesta estadounidense de elegir al presidente de Costa Rica, Óscar Arias, para mediar en las negociaciones que se realizarán entre el gobierno constitucional y el golpista. “Esperamos que mediante este mecanismo de diálogo supervisado por el presidente Árias (...) pueda haber una resolución pacifica del orden constitucional de Honduras”, agregó la representante estadounidense.
Al preguntársele a Clinton si ese regreso al orden constitucional de Honduras, implica el retorno del presidente Zelaya dijo: “Ahora que tenemos un proceso de mediación que podría comenzar pronto, no quiero prejuzgar lo que las partes van a acordar”.
Paralelamente, una delegación del gobierno de facto conformada por diputados y empresarios que apoyan el golpe, también presente en Washington, no será recibida ni por la OEA ni por el gobierno estadounidense.
La intención era la de asesinar a Zelaya
Según declaraciones hechas por Manuel Zelaya ayer lunes, el propio general Romeo Vásquez, implicado en el golpe, le confesó que lo planeado para el anterior domingo 28 de junio, cuando Zelaya fue sacado por la fuerza de su casa y conducido hasta Costa Rica, era asesinarle. Algo que no sucedió ya que el Vázquez decidió en el último momento cambiar los planes. Zelaya señaló que la responsable de ordenar su muerte fue una “élite muy voraz, con mucho control en el Congreso Nacional”, la misma que “maneja política y económica el país y se opone a cualquier cambio que afecte sus intereses”.
Asimismo, hoy martes se supo que la Policía Internacional (Interpol) rechazó la solicitud de detención cursada por el gobierno de Micheletti, argumentando que "los delitos de 'abuso de autoridad, usurpación de funciones, ofensas contra el Gobierno y traición' que se imputan al presidente Zelaya son de carácter político y no presentan ningún elemento de derecho común", lo cual atenta contra el artículo 3 de la organización, según el cual queda “rigurosamente prohibida a la organización toda actividad o intervención en cuestiones o asuntos de carácter político, militar, religioso o racial”. (Con informaciones de TeleSUR)
Justicia de facto hondureña dice tener una opción para regreso de Zelaya
TeleSUR. El presidente de la Corte Suprema hondureña, anunció este martes, a pocos minutos de iniciarse la reunión del presidente Manuel Zelaya, derrocado por fuerzas militares, con la Secretaria de Estado Hillary Clinton, que si el Congreso le concede una amnistía puede volver al país.
"Una posibilidad (de salir de la crisis) podría ser una amnistía política tanto para don José Manuel Zelaya Rosales como para otros actores involucrados", declaró el presidente de la Corte Suprema de Honduras, Jorge Alberto Rivera, al matutino salvadoreño El Diario de Hoy.
"A través de esa amnistía, nuestras resoluciones dejarían de aplicarse en lo que corresponde a lo político, porque en lo que corresponde a delitos de índole general o comunes cometidos por algún funcionario, no entran en una amnistía política", explicó.
La fiscalía hondureña acusó de manera ilegal al presidente hondureño, Manuel Zelaya, de 18 delitos, entre ellos, el de traición a la patria, luego de que este fuese secuestrado y obligado a abandonar el país por fuerzas militares golpistas el 28 de junio.
El presidente de la Corte Suprema, Rivera, indicó que las autoridades de facto de Honduras le encomendaron la tarea de negociar una salida a la crisis porque la Corte Suprema "es el único órgano del Estado que está reconocido por la Organización de Estados Americanos OEA", que suspendió a Honduras tras el derrocamiento de Zelaya.
Rivera encabeza una comisión del gobierno de facto de Roberto Micheletti presente en Washington para negociar con la OEA una "salida dialogada". Sin embargo, de manera oficial se ha conocido que la comitiva no será recibida ni por el Sistema Interamericano, ni por el gobierno estadounidense, tras desconocer su autoridad.
Medios Golpistas evidencian la confusión y desacuerdos internos entre las autoridades de facto: “Congreso no ha evaluado amnistiar a Zelaya”
Kaos América Latina. Agencias internacionales y algunos medios hondureños dieron a conocer hace minutos, las declaraciones del vicepresidente del Legislativo, Ramón Velásquez Nassar, quien manifestó que “el Congreso hondureño no ha considerado por ahora la posibilidad de amnistiar al depuesto presidente Manuel Zelaya”.
“Aquí en el Congreso no se ha iniciado una discusión sobre ese tema. Es más, no sabemos ni cuáles son las intenciones de decirlo, si es por una posición internacional”, afirmó el diputado de la Democracia Cristiana (DC).
Con estas declaraciones, Velázquez Nassarsale al paso de lo manifestado por elpresidente de la Corte, Jorge Alberto Rivera, que anunció hace unas horas la posibilidad de que el Congreso otorgue una amnistía, lo cual implicaría el retiro de los cargos políticos que pesan sobre Zelaya, entre ellos el de traición a la patria.
El diputado dijo que la salida de Zelaya del poder “es una cosa juzgada, una página dada vuelta y la frase repetida es ‘aquí nadie se rinde’”.
Zelaya: Mediación de Arias no es una negociación es ''la planificación de la salida de los golpistas''
TeleSUR. El presidente legítimo de Honduras, Manuel Zelaya, aseguró este martes desde Washington que el acuerdo alcanzado con la canciller estadounidense, Hillary Clinton y con el presidente de Costa Rica, Oscar Arias, no es una negociación, sino una "plataforma para la salida de las autoridades de facto y retorno del gobierno legítimo".
Durante una rueda prensa el presidente indicó que: "No estamos haciendo una negociación hay cosas que no son negociables (...) Mal haría su servidor de ir a negociar lo que a mi no me compete, no voy a traicionar mis principios".
Asimismo, agregó que la aceptación por parte de su gobierno de la interlocución del presidente de Costa Rica, Oscar Arias, es una decisión que goza de su respaldo y es aceptada por Estados Unidos y por las autoridades de facto hondureñas.
Zelaya afirmó que "el pueblo hondureño ha comparado lo que es un presidente demócrata y lo que es un régimen represivo, que está allanando viviendas y ha violentado todo el sistema de soberanía popular que es un atentado contra la constitucionalidad".
El mandatario dijo que la pazen Honduraspasa por el restablecimiento del gobierno legítimo, "los presidentes no somos jueces representamos al Estado y al pueblo".
Agregó que su postura no significa dejar solo al pueblo en su reclamo, sino más bien representa la búsqueda de una salida a la situación creada por los poderes públicos que el pasado domingo 28 de junio losecuestraron, sacaron por la fuerza de Honduras y lo obligaron a viajar a Costa Rica.
Se dirigió además a su pueblo, al que le dijo: "tienen que mantenerse en la lucha paraque pueda ser respeta su opinión, siempre luchando es que hemos alcanzado nuestros derechos civiles", dijo y refirió que la lucha por los procesos de participación en Honduras no "será fácil".
Más temprano, la canciller estadounidense Hillary Clinton anunció, luego de reunirse con Zelaya, que éste había aceptado la mediación de Arias para retomar el hilo constitucional.
Mencionó que se acordó habilitar un "mecanismo de diálogo entre las partes" discordantes de Honduras, que tenga como mediador a Árias.
En rueda de prensa desde el Departamento de Estado en Washington, la funcionaria explicó que la propuesta fue aceptada por el propio Zelaya y también por el presidente de facto hondureño, Roberto Micheletti, con quien se comunicaron por teléfono.
Destituido embajador de Honduras en EE.UU.
En otra parte de su encuentro con la prensa, Manuel Zelaya informó que destituyó al embajador de Honduras en Estados Unidos , Roberto Flores Bermúdez, por haberse plegado al golpe de Estado que lo derrocó hace casi dos semanas.
El embajadorserá sustituido por Enrique Reina y mientras se agilizan los procesos de aceptación porparte del gobierno estadounidense, la embajada quedará a cargo de Rodolfo Pastor.
"El embajador está siendo sustituido porque se plegó a un golpe de Estado que atropella los derechos de la sociedad", afirmó Zelaya.
Además, el Jefe de Estadocentroamericano informó que viajará esta noche a Costa Ricapara iniciar las conversaciones que le permitan retomar el hilo constitucional en la nación donde fue legítimamente electo.
Por su lado, el presidente costarricense, Oscar Arias, confirmó este martes que Zelaya y el gobernante de facto Roberto Micheletti llegarán a Costa Rica para iniciar el jueves en su casa un diálogo para restituir el orden constitucional.
Tuesday 30 June 2009
The military are at it again in Honduras: Who is supporting them?
It is pretty depressing to see that a number of soldiers would have decided to arrest the elect president of Honduras Manuel Zelaya in the middle of the night and to expel him to Costa Rica. All this, it was said, in order to defend the constitution. It is a strange way to ‘defend’ the constitution by breaking it.
The military are clearly working against history by pretending a political return when nobody will recognise their illegal government. Their time in the 1960s, 70s and 80s is over and the return to democratic rule all over Latin America irreversible. Unless, that is, we let them return by giving the slightest bit of legitimacy to their actions.
This is exactly what seems to be happening from a number of sources. The first was Hilary Clinton, the US secretary of state, who ‘condemned’ the coup but pledged the US would not break diplomatic relations with the new government, thus giving a kind of green light to other such attempts throughout the continent.
We have to remember that the excuses used by the military in Honduras are very similar indeed to those used to justify the Venezuelan coup a few years ago and those used by the leaders of the ‘golpe civico prefectural’ here in Bolivia last September. Is there a link between them? Perhaps.
We have to hope that these declarations by the US secretary of state were a mistake provoked by the uncertainty of the first few hours after the coup. President Obama has condemned the new regime and will not recognise it so we would hope this is the last we hear from the US in tacit support of the coup.
Other sources of support are less surprising. The union of so called democratic organisations of America (UnoAmerica), a right wing network of organisations, formally recognised the new government referring to the coup as ‘a legitimate succession of power provoked by the president’s attempt to break the constitution and follow Venezuela’s path’.
What is more worrying is the position that seems to have been taken by CNN that has repeatedly referred to the coup as a ‘forced succession of power’. In what must be one of the worst blunders of all times on live TV, the news anchor joked about the deposed president’s pyjamas during an interview with the president of the Organisation of American States (OAS), Mr Insulza.
Neither the OAS, the Rio Group, nor ALBA have recognised the new dictatorship. They have all retired their ambassadors from the country. It is only to be expected that the European Union will make a clear and formal statement denouncing the return to one of the darkest moments of Latin America’s history.
Wednesday 17 June 2009
Peru and Bolivian relations deteriorate
Both are Andean countries with large indigenous populations. Both are supposed to be part of the Andean community of nations. Unfortunately, that is where similarities end.
Peru and Bolivia have never seen eye to eye since the arrival to power of the first indigenous leader in the history of Bolivia. However, that relationship of brother nations has taken a turn for the worse since the violence that erupted in Peru last week that has left unconfirmed numbers of dead among policemen and indigenous protesters.
The Peruvian government has rejected Bolivian recriminations for the indiscriminate use of force and description of the killing of indigenous people as genocide. In addition, Peru has blamed the hand of 'foreign interests' in the protests that led to this bloody end, clearly pointing the finger at Bolivia and citing an 'ideological contagion' between the vibrant indigenous movement in Bolivia, and the increasing organisational strength of its own indigenous movements that object to the opening of vast tract of their land to the oil industry.
The differences are clearly great. The strength of the indigenous social movements in Bolivia is precisely a measure of the extent to which the country has moved on from the imported political models that have failed it in such a calamitous way since the arrival of democracy in 1982. Along with this system went the neoliberal economic logic that gave away the country's natural resources to the detriment of its people, making a poor country even poorer.
In Peru, by contrast, the neoliberal economic paradigm continues to be dominant in political circles even though a nascent indigenous movement opposes it from the bottom-up. It is a symptom of this grass-roots level opposition's relative weakness that the state can resort to repressive tactics while blaming the victims through a cynical media campaign that criminalises any form of peaceful protest.
We have seen all this before in Bolivia itself. During the 1990s, the coca growers of the Chapare region were criminalised for defending their way of life but would eventually lead a coalition of social movements that went on to become the current government. Their leader was called Evo Morales. Are we seeing in Peru the beginnings of a similar process?
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Sunday 14 June 2009
'We are fighting for our lives and our dignity'
Across the globe, as mining and oil firms race for dwindling resources, indigenous peoples are battling to defend their lands – often paying the ultimate price
o John Vidal
o The Guardian, Saturday 13 June 2009
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/jun/13/forests-environment-oil-companies
It has been called the world's second "oil war", but the only similarity between Iraq and events in the jungles of northern Peru over the last few weeks has been the mismatch of force. On one side have been the police armed with automatic weapons, teargas, helicopter gunships and armoured cars. On the other are several thousand Awajun and Wambis Indians, many of them in war paint and armed with bows and arrows and spears.
In some of the worst violence seen in Peru in 20 years, the Indians this week warned Latin America what could happen if companies are given free access to the Amazonian forests to exploit an estimated 6bn barrels of oil and take as much timber they like. After months of peaceful protests, the police were ordered to use force to remove a road bock near Bagua Grande.
In the fights that followed, at least 50 Indians and nine police officers were killed, with hundreds more wounded or arrested. The indigenous rights group Survival International described it as "Peru's Tiananmen Square".
"For thousands of years, we've run the Amazon forests," said Servando Puerta, one of the protest leaders. "This is genocide. They're killing us for defending our lives, our sovereignty, human dignity."
Yesterday, as riot police broke up more demonstrations in Lima and a curfew was imposed on many Peruvian Amazonian towns, President Garcia backed down in the face of condemnation of the massacre. He suspended – but only for three months – the laws that would allow the forest to be exploited. No one doubts the clashes will continue.
Peru is just one of many countries now in open conflict with its indigenous people over natural resources. Barely reported in the international press, there have been major protests around mines, oil, logging and mineral exploitation in Africa, Latin America, Asia and North America. Hydro electric dams, biofuel plantations as well as coal, copper, gold and bauxite mines are all at the centre of major land rights disputes.
A massive military force continued this week to raid communities opposed to oil companies' presence on the Niger delta. The delta, which provides 90% of Nigeria's foreign earnings, has always been volatile, but guns have flooded in and security has deteriorated. In the last month a military taskforce has been sent in and helicopter gunships have shelled villages suspected of harbouring militia. Thousands of people have fled. Activists from the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta have responded by killing 12 soldiers and this week set fire to a Chevron oil facility. Yesterday seven more civilians were shot by the military.
The escalation of violence came in the week that Shell agreed to pay £9.7m to ethnic Ogoni families – whose homeland is in the delta – who had led a peaceful uprising against it and other oil companies in the 1990s, and who had taken the company to court in New York accusing it of complicity in writer Ken Saro-Wiwa's execution in 1995.
Meanwhile in West Papua, Indonesian forces protecting some of the world's largest mines have been accused of human rights violations. Hundreds of tribesmen have been killed in the last few years in clashes between the army and people with bows and arrows.
"An aggressive drive is taking place to extract the last remaining resources from indigenous territories," says Victoria Tauli-Corpus, an indigenous Filipino and chair of the UN permanent forum on indigenous issues. "There is a crisis of human rights. There are more and more arrests, killings and abuses.
"This is happening in Russia, Canada, the Philippines, Cambodia, Mongolia, Nigeria, the Amazon, all over Latin America, Papua New Guinea and Africa. It is global. We are seeing a human rights emergency. A battle is taking place for natural resources everywhere. Much of the world's natural capital – oil, gas, timber, minerals – lies on or beneath lands occupied by indigenous people," says Tauli-Corpus.
What until quite recently were isolated incidents of indigenous peoples in conflict with states and corporations are now becoming common as government-backed companies move deeper on to lands long ignored as unproductive or wild. As countries and the World Bank increase spending on major infrastructural projects to counter the economic crisis, the conflicts are expected to grow.
Indigenous groups say that large-scale mining is the most damaging. When new laws opened the Philippines up to international mining 10 years ago, companies flooded in and wreaked havoc in indigenous communities, says MP Clare Short, former UK international development secretary and now chair of the UK-based Working Group on Mining in the Philippines.
Short visited people affected by mining there in 2007: "I have never seen anything so systematically destructive. The environmental effects are catastrophic as are the effects on people's livelihoods. They take the tops off mountains, which are holy, they destroy the water sources and make it impossible to farm," she said.
In a report published earlier this year, the group said: "Mining generates or exacerbates corruption, fuels armed conflicts, increases militarisation and human rights abuses, including extrajudicial killings."
The arrival of dams, mining or oil spells cultural death for communities. The Dongria Kondh in Orissa, eastern India, are certain that their way of life will be destroyed when British FTSE 100 company Vedanta shortly starts to legally exploit their sacred Nyamgiri mountain for bauxite, the raw material for aluminium. The huge open cast mine will destroy a vast swath of untouched forest, and will reduce the mountain to an industrial wasteland. More than 60 villages will be affected.
"If Vedanta mines our mountain, the water will dry up. In the forest there are tigers, bears, monkeys. Where will they go? We have been living here for generations. Why should we leave?" asks Kumbradi, a tribesman. "We live here for Nyamgiri, for its trees and leaves and all that is here."
Davi Yanomami, a shaman of the Yanomami, one of the largest but most isolated Brazilian indigenous groups, came to London this week to warn MPs that the Amazonian forests were being destroyed, and to appeal for help to prevent his tribe being wiped out.
"History is repeating itself", he told the MPs. "Twenty years ago many thousand gold miners flooded into Yanomami land and one in five of us died from the diseases and violence they brought. We were in danger of being exterminated then, but people in Europe persuaded the Brazilian government to act and they were removed.
"But now 3,000 more miners and ranchers have come back. More are coming. They are bringing in guns, rafts, machines, and destroying and polluting rivers. People are being killed. They are opening up and expanding old airstrips. They are flooding into Yanomami land. We need your help.
"Governments must treat us with respect. This creates great suffering. We kill nothing, we live on the land, we never rob nature. Yet governments always want more. We are warning the world that our people will die."
According to Victor Menotti, director of the California-based International Forum on Globalisation, "This is a paradigm war taking place from the arctic to tropical forests. Wherever you find indigenous peoples you will find resource conflicts. It is a battle between the industrial and indigenous world views."
There is some hope, says Tauli-Corpus. "Indigenous peoples are now much more aware of their rights. They are challenging the companies and governments at every point."
In Ecuador, Chevron may be fined billions of dollars in the next few months if an epic court case goes against them. The company is accused of dumping, in the 1970s and 1980s, more than 19bn gallons of toxic waste and millions of gallons of crude oil into waste pits in the forests, leading to more than 1,400 cancer deaths and devastation of indigenous communities. The pits are said to be still there, mixing chemicals with groundwater and killing fish and wildlife.
The Ecuadorian courts have set damages at $27bn (£16.5bn). Chevron, which inherited the case when it bought Texaco, does not deny the original spills, but says the damage was cleaned up.
Back in the Niger delta, Shell was ordered to pay $1.5bn to the Ijaw people in 2006 – though the company has so far escaped paying the fines. After settling with Ogoni families in New York this week, it now faces a second class action suit in New York over alleged human rights abuses, and a further case in Holland brought by Niger Delta villagers working with Dutch groups.
Meanwhile, Exxon Mobil is being sued by Indonesian indigenous villagers who claim their guards committed human rights violations, and there are dozens of outstanding cases against other companies operating in the Niger Delta.
"Indigenous groups are using the courts more but there is still collusion at the highest levels in court systems to ignore land rights when they conflict with economic opportunities," says Larry Birns, director of the Council on Hemispheric Affairs in Washington. "Everything is for sale, including the Indians' rights. Governments often do not recognise land titles of Indians and the big landowners just take the land."
Indigenous leaders want an immediate cessation to mining on their lands. Last month, a conference on mining and indigenous peoples in Manila called on governments to appoint an ombudsman or an international court system to handle indigenous peoples' complaints.
"Most indigenous peoples barely have resources to ensure their basic survival, much less to bring their cases to court. Members of the judiciary in many countries are bribed by corporations and are threatened or killed if they rule in favour of indigenous peoples.
"States have an obligation to provide them with better access to justice and maintain an independent judiciary," said the declaration.
But as the complaints grow, so does the chance that peaceful protests will grow into intractable conflicts as they have in Nigeria, West Papua and now Peru. "There is a massive resistance movement growing," says Clare Short. "But the danger is that as it grows, so does the violence."
Tuesday 9 June 2009
Genocide once more
The news is sadly familiar. Indigenous people from the amazonian areas of Peru who objected to president Alan Garcia's nine decrees since April, essentially giving their lands to oil transnationals, were massacred over the course of the weekend. In all, more than twenty were killed, bringing back the spectre of genocide to this part of the world.
What is more depressing is the official reaction of Peru, headed by an inflamatory speech by the president himself. Apologies? There were none. Regrets? They were sadly missing. Instead, Alan Garcia launched on a diatribe against 'the forces of anti-development' - presumably those who are unimpressed by his macroeconomic policies - and against 'foreign intervention', a thinly veiled attempt to blame Bolivia for the massacre.
Not only is his position disgraceful and his accusations untrue. Alan Garcia has a knack for reminding Bolivians of the worst racist excesses in living memory that took place last September in Pando. And unfortunately he defends those excesses by condescendingly referring to Peru's 'natives' - a term that denotes not only contempt for indigenous peoples, but that denies them of all citizenship rights. Sounds familiar? The viscerous Bolivian extreme right speaks in exactly the same way and has shown to be prepared to act accordingly too.
Let's be clear. In wanting to make Peru's natural resources available to capital at any price, Alan Garcia, a populist demagogue, has shown to be prepared to criminalise any peaceful and democratic form of protest from civil society and, if necessary, to resort to murder, blaming Bolivia along the way.
But, being the leader of a country that has recently condemned former president Fujimori to 25 years imprisonment, Alan Garcia should be careful. And, Peru being situated next to a country that shows the world the example of a healthy political change with powerful social movements of which the indigenous movement is the spinal column, there is more than enough reasons to be concerned about the contagion effect of progressive politics.
javascript:void(0)
Alan Garcia, you should be worried.
What is more depressing is the official reaction of Peru, headed by an inflamatory speech by the president himself. Apologies? There were none. Regrets? They were sadly missing. Instead, Alan Garcia launched on a diatribe against 'the forces of anti-development' - presumably those who are unimpressed by his macroeconomic policies - and against 'foreign intervention', a thinly veiled attempt to blame Bolivia for the massacre.
Not only is his position disgraceful and his accusations untrue. Alan Garcia has a knack for reminding Bolivians of the worst racist excesses in living memory that took place last September in Pando. And unfortunately he defends those excesses by condescendingly referring to Peru's 'natives' - a term that denotes not only contempt for indigenous peoples, but that denies them of all citizenship rights. Sounds familiar? The viscerous Bolivian extreme right speaks in exactly the same way and has shown to be prepared to act accordingly too.
Let's be clear. In wanting to make Peru's natural resources available to capital at any price, Alan Garcia, a populist demagogue, has shown to be prepared to criminalise any peaceful and democratic form of protest from civil society and, if necessary, to resort to murder, blaming Bolivia along the way.
But, being the leader of a country that has recently condemned former president Fujimori to 25 years imprisonment, Alan Garcia should be careful. And, Peru being situated next to a country that shows the world the example of a healthy political change with powerful social movements of which the indigenous movement is the spinal column, there is more than enough reasons to be concerned about the contagion effect of progressive politics.
javascript:void(0)
Alan Garcia, you should be worried.
Tuesday 26 May 2009
200 years on, a new revolution still needs to take place
25th May was the date when the call to revolution and independence from Spain was made in Sucre, unravelling a wave of independentist fervour throughout Latin America. In spite of starting it all, Bolivia would be the last country in South America to gain independence many years later.
To add insult to injury, the indigenous majority only managed to swap one set of masters, the Spanish crown, for another in the form of criollos, or Bolivians of Spanish descent, who now took their place at the top of the highly stratified society to continue to perpetuate racist practices that survive to this day, as the shameful events of 24th May last year in Sucre demonstrate.
In the meantime, two Bolivias and two speeds of development have imposed themselves in the country. One is modern and city-based, looking to join a single, globalised world. The other is indigenous, poor, and largely rural.
The 1952 revolution attempted to bring together these two worlds by denying the existence of the indigenous reality of Bolivia while perpetuating the discrimination against the majority of the population and maintaining the highest levels of inequality and discrimination in Latin America.
With the arrival to power of the first indigenous president in the history of the country in 2005, a new revolutionary period began. Through democratic means, Bolivia aims to reconcile these two worlds, uniting them in their difference. For this reason, the much-maligned new Bolivian constitution recognises for the first time the existence of 36 nations inside the country, with their cultures, languages and customs. In addition, it recognises different economic systems and forms of property – private, state, and collective property forms favoured by Andean communities. The new constitution also recognises different legal systems, including the also much maligned traditional forms.
At the heart of current divisions in the country lies precisely the unwillingness of the modern world to recognise equality in difference. Bolivia is, for the first time, bringing to the fore the worldviews of its traditional societies. It is telling the world, for example, that an alternative model of development based on a symbiotic relationship with ‘mother earth’ is possible and desirable; that the Andean concept of suma qamaña (literally ‘living well’) can help us achieve the wellbeing that a model based on conspicuous consumption and the accumulation of wealth is not giving us; and that participative forms of democratic practice can also improve our body politic.
Will the modern world listen? The new revolution that needs to take place will do so when dissonant voices at the margins of the world are finally listened to.
To add insult to injury, the indigenous majority only managed to swap one set of masters, the Spanish crown, for another in the form of criollos, or Bolivians of Spanish descent, who now took their place at the top of the highly stratified society to continue to perpetuate racist practices that survive to this day, as the shameful events of 24th May last year in Sucre demonstrate.
In the meantime, two Bolivias and two speeds of development have imposed themselves in the country. One is modern and city-based, looking to join a single, globalised world. The other is indigenous, poor, and largely rural.
The 1952 revolution attempted to bring together these two worlds by denying the existence of the indigenous reality of Bolivia while perpetuating the discrimination against the majority of the population and maintaining the highest levels of inequality and discrimination in Latin America.
With the arrival to power of the first indigenous president in the history of the country in 2005, a new revolutionary period began. Through democratic means, Bolivia aims to reconcile these two worlds, uniting them in their difference. For this reason, the much-maligned new Bolivian constitution recognises for the first time the existence of 36 nations inside the country, with their cultures, languages and customs. In addition, it recognises different economic systems and forms of property – private, state, and collective property forms favoured by Andean communities. The new constitution also recognises different legal systems, including the also much maligned traditional forms.
At the heart of current divisions in the country lies precisely the unwillingness of the modern world to recognise equality in difference. Bolivia is, for the first time, bringing to the fore the worldviews of its traditional societies. It is telling the world, for example, that an alternative model of development based on a symbiotic relationship with ‘mother earth’ is possible and desirable; that the Andean concept of suma qamaña (literally ‘living well’) can help us achieve the wellbeing that a model based on conspicuous consumption and the accumulation of wealth is not giving us; and that participative forms of democratic practice can also improve our body politic.
Will the modern world listen? The new revolution that needs to take place will do so when dissonant voices at the margins of the world are finally listened to.
Saturday 23 May 2009
Climate Change: Save the Planet from Capitalism
Dear all,
This is a translated version of the speech made by Evo Morales to the UN last November. It is ´old´ but I thought it would be interesting for some of you and, in ny case, it will inform the official position taken by this country to the climate change conference in Copenhagen next December. Please send your comments to me.
Regards,
Boliviandiaries
Sisters and brothers:
Today, our Mother Earth is ill. From the beginning of the 21st century we have lived the hottest years of the last thousand years. Global warming is generating abrupt changes in the weather: the retreat of glaciers and the decrease of the polar ice caps; the increase of the sea level and the flooding of coastal areas, where approximately 60% of the world population live; the increase in the processes of desertification and the decrease of fresh water sources; a higher frequency in natural disasters that the communities of the earth suffer[1]; the extinction of animal and vegetal species; and the spread of diseases in areas that before were free from those diseases.
One of the most tragic consequences of the climate change is that some nations and territories are the condemned to disappear by the increase of the sea level.
Everything began with the industrial revolution in 1750, which gave birth to the capitalist system. In two and a half centuries, the so called “developed” countries have consumed a large part of the fossil fuels created over five million centuries.
Competition and the thirst for profit without limits of the capitalist system are destroying the planet. Under Capitalism we are not human beings but consumers. Under Capitalism mother earth does not exist, instead there are raw materials. Capitalism is the source of the asymmetries and imbalances in the world. It generates luxury, ostentation and waste for a few, while millions in the world die from hunger in the world. In the hands of Capitalism everything becomes a commodity: the water, the soil, the human genome, the ancestral cultures, justice, ethics, death … and life itself. Everything, absolutely everything, can be bought and sold and under Capitalism. And even “climate change” itself has become a business.
“Climate change” has placed all humankind before great choice: to continue in the ways of capitalism and death, or to start down the path of harmony with nature and respect for life.
In the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, the developed countries and economies in transition committed to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions by at least 5% below the 1990 levels, through the implementation of different mechanisms among which market mechanisms predominate.
Until 2006, greenhouse effect gases, far from being reduced, have increased by 9.1% in relation to the 1990 levels, demonstrating also in this way the breach of commitments by the developed countries.
The market mechanisms applied in the developing countries[2] have not accomplished a significant reduction of greenhouse effect gas emissions.
Just as well as the market is incapable of regulating global financial and productive system, the market is unable to regulate greenhouse effect gas emissions and will only generate a big business for financial agents and major corporations.
The earth is much more important than stock exchanges of Wall Street and the world.
While the United States and the European Union allocate 4,100 billion dollars to save the bankers from a financial crisis that they themselves have caused, programs on climate change get 313 times less, that is to say, only 13 billion dollars.
The resources for climate change are unfairly distributed. More resources are directed to reduce emissions (mitigation) and less to reduce the effects of climate change that all the countries suffer (adaptation)[3]. The vast majority of resources flow to those countries that have contaminated the most, and not to the countries where we have preserved the environment most. Around 80% of the Clean Development Mechanism projects are concentrated in four emerging countries.
Capitalist logic promotes a paradox in which the sectors that have contributed the most to deterioration of the environment are those that benefit the most from climate change programs.
At the same time, technology transfer and the financing for clean and sustainable development of the countries of the South have remained just speeches.
The next summit on Climate Change in Copenhagen must allow us to make a leap forward if we want to save Mother Earth and humanity. For that purpose the following proposals for the process from Poznan to Copenhagen:
Attack the structural causes of climate change
1) Debate the structural causes of climate change. As long as we do not change the capitalist system for a system based in complementarity, solidarity and harmony between the people and nature, the measures that we adopt will be palliatives that will limited and precarious in character. For us, what has failed is the model of “living better”, of unlimited development, industrialisation without frontiers, of modernity that deprecates history, of increasing accumulation of goods at the expense of others and nature. For that reason we promote the idea of Living Well, in harmony with other human beings and with our Mother Earth.
2) Developed countries need to control their patterns of consumption - of luxury and waste - especially the excessive consumption of fossil fuels. Subsidies of fossil fuel, that reach 150-250 billions of dollars[4], must be progressively eliminated. It is fundamental to develop alternative forms of power, such as solar, geothermal, wind and hydroelectric both at small and medium scales.
3) Agrofuels are not an alternative, because they put the production of foodstuffs for transport before the production of food for human beings. Agrofuels expand the agricultural frontier destroying forests and biodiversity, generate monocropping, promote land concentration, deteriorate soils, exhaust water sources, contribute to rises in food prices and, in many cases, result in more consumption of more energy than is produced.
Substantial commitments to emissions reduction that are met
4) Strict fulfilment by 2012 of the commitments[5] of the developed countries to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by at least by 5% below the 1990 levels. It is unacceptable that the countries that polluted the planet throughout the course of history make statements about larger reductions in the future while not complying with their present commitments.
5) Establish new minimum commitments for the developed countries of greenhouse gas emission reduction of 40% by 2020 and 90% by for 2050, taking as a starting point 1990 emission levels. These minimum commitments must be met internally in developed countries and not through flexible market mechanisms that allow for the purchase of certified emissions reduction certificates to continue polluting in their own country. Likewise, monitoring mechanisms must be established for the measuring, reporting and verifying that are transparent and accessible to the public, to guarantee the compliance of commitments.
6) Developing countries not responsible for the historical pollution must preserve the necessary space to implement an alternative and sustainable form of development that does not repeat the mistakes of savage industrialisation that has brought us to the current situation. To ensure this process, developing countries need, as a prerequisite, finance and technology transfer.
An Integral Financial Mechanism to address ecological debt
7) Acknowledging the historical ecological debt that they owe to the planet, developed countries must create an Integral Financial Mechanism to support developing countries in: implementation of their plans and programmes for adaptation to and mitigation of climate change; the innovation, development and transfer of technology; in the preservation and improvement of the sinks and reservoirs; response actions to the serious natural disasters caused by climate change; and the carrying out of sustainable and eco-friendly development plans.
8) This Integral Financial Mechanism, in order to be effective, must count on a contribution of at least 1% of the GDP in developed countries[6] and other contributions from taxes on oil and gas, financial transactions, sea and air transport, and the profits of transnational companies.
9) Contributions from developed countries must be additional to Official Development Assistance (ODA), bilateral aid or aid channelled through organisms not part of the United Nations. Any finance outside the UNFCCC cannot be considered as the fulfilment of developed country’s commitments under the Convention.
10) Finance has to be directed to the plans or national programmes of the different States and not to projects that follow market logic.
11) Financing must not be concentrated just in some developed countries but has to give priority to the countries that have contributed less to greenhouse gas emissions, those that preserve nature and are suffering the impact of climate change.
12) The Integral Financial Mechanism must be under the coverage of the United Nations, not under the Global Environment Facility (GEF) and other intermediaries such as the World Bank and regional development banks; its management must be collective, transparent and non-bureaucratic. Its decisions must be made by all member countries, especially by developing countries, and not by the donors or bureaucratic administrators.
Technology Transfer to developing countries
13) Innovation and technology related to climate changes must be within the public domain, not under any private monopolistic patent regime that obstructs and makes technology transfer more expensive to developing countries.
14) Products that are the fruit of public financing for technology innovation and development of have to be placed within the public domain and not under a private regime of patents[7], so that they can be freely accessed by developing countries.
15) Encourage and improve the system of voluntary and compulsory licenses so that all countries can access products already patented quickly and free of cost. Developed countries cannot treat patents and intellectual property rights as something “sacred” that has to be preserved at any cost. The regime of flexibilities available for the intellectual property rights in the cases of serious problems for public health has to be adapted and substantially enlarged to heal Mother Earth.
16) Recover and promote indigenous peoples practices in harmony with nature which have proven to be sustainable through centuries.
Adaptation and mitigation with the participation of all the people
17) Promote mitigation actions, programs and plans with the participation of local communities and indigenous people in the framework of full respect for and implementation of the United Nations Declaration on Rights of Indigenous Peoples. The best mechanism to confront the challenge of climate change are not market mechanisms, but conscious, motivated, and well organized human beings endowed with an identity of their own.
18) The reduction of the emissions from deforestation and forest degradation must be based on a mechanism of direct compensation from developed to developing countries, through a sovereign implementation that ensures broad participation of local communities, and a mechanism for monitoring, reporting and verifying that is transparent and public.
A UN for the Environment and Climate Change
19) We need a World Environment and Climate Change Organization to which multilateral trade and financial organizations are subordinated, so as to promote a different model of development that environmentally friendly and resolves the profound problems of impoverishment. This organization must have effective follow-up, verification and sanctioning mechanisms to ensure that the present and future agreements are complied with.
20) It is fundamental to structurally transform the World Trade Organization, the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and the international economic system as a whole, in order to guarantee fair and complementary trade, as well as financing without conditions for sustainable development that avoids the waste of natural resources and fossil fuels in the production processes, trade and product transport.
In this negotiation process towards Copenhagen, it is fundamental to guarantee the participation of our people as active stakeholders at a national, regional and worldwide level, especially taking into account those sectors most affected, such as indigenous peoples who have always promoted the defense of Mother Earth.
Humankind is capable of saving the earth if we recover the principles of solidarity, complementarity, and harmony with nature in contraposition to the reign of competition, profits and rampant consumption of natural resources.
November 28, 2008
Evo Morales Ayma
1 Due to the “Niña” phenomenon, that becomes more frequent as a result of the climate change, Bolivia has lost 4% of its GDP in 2007.
2 Known as the Clean Development Mechanism
3 At the present there is only one Adaptation Fund with approximately 500 million dollars for more than 150 developing countries. According to the UNFCCC Secretary, 171 billion dollars are required for adaptation, and 380 billion dollars are required for mitigation.
4 Stern report
5 Kyoto Protocol, Art. 3.
6 The Stern Review has suggested one percent of global GDP, which represents less than 700 billion dollars per year.
7 According to UNCTAD (1998), Public financing in developing countries contributes with 40% of the resources for innovation and development of technology.
This is a translated version of the speech made by Evo Morales to the UN last November. It is ´old´ but I thought it would be interesting for some of you and, in ny case, it will inform the official position taken by this country to the climate change conference in Copenhagen next December. Please send your comments to me.
Regards,
Boliviandiaries
Sisters and brothers:
Today, our Mother Earth is ill. From the beginning of the 21st century we have lived the hottest years of the last thousand years. Global warming is generating abrupt changes in the weather: the retreat of glaciers and the decrease of the polar ice caps; the increase of the sea level and the flooding of coastal areas, where approximately 60% of the world population live; the increase in the processes of desertification and the decrease of fresh water sources; a higher frequency in natural disasters that the communities of the earth suffer[1]; the extinction of animal and vegetal species; and the spread of diseases in areas that before were free from those diseases.
One of the most tragic consequences of the climate change is that some nations and territories are the condemned to disappear by the increase of the sea level.
Everything began with the industrial revolution in 1750, which gave birth to the capitalist system. In two and a half centuries, the so called “developed” countries have consumed a large part of the fossil fuels created over five million centuries.
Competition and the thirst for profit without limits of the capitalist system are destroying the planet. Under Capitalism we are not human beings but consumers. Under Capitalism mother earth does not exist, instead there are raw materials. Capitalism is the source of the asymmetries and imbalances in the world. It generates luxury, ostentation and waste for a few, while millions in the world die from hunger in the world. In the hands of Capitalism everything becomes a commodity: the water, the soil, the human genome, the ancestral cultures, justice, ethics, death … and life itself. Everything, absolutely everything, can be bought and sold and under Capitalism. And even “climate change” itself has become a business.
“Climate change” has placed all humankind before great choice: to continue in the ways of capitalism and death, or to start down the path of harmony with nature and respect for life.
In the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, the developed countries and economies in transition committed to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions by at least 5% below the 1990 levels, through the implementation of different mechanisms among which market mechanisms predominate.
Until 2006, greenhouse effect gases, far from being reduced, have increased by 9.1% in relation to the 1990 levels, demonstrating also in this way the breach of commitments by the developed countries.
The market mechanisms applied in the developing countries[2] have not accomplished a significant reduction of greenhouse effect gas emissions.
Just as well as the market is incapable of regulating global financial and productive system, the market is unable to regulate greenhouse effect gas emissions and will only generate a big business for financial agents and major corporations.
The earth is much more important than stock exchanges of Wall Street and the world.
While the United States and the European Union allocate 4,100 billion dollars to save the bankers from a financial crisis that they themselves have caused, programs on climate change get 313 times less, that is to say, only 13 billion dollars.
The resources for climate change are unfairly distributed. More resources are directed to reduce emissions (mitigation) and less to reduce the effects of climate change that all the countries suffer (adaptation)[3]. The vast majority of resources flow to those countries that have contaminated the most, and not to the countries where we have preserved the environment most. Around 80% of the Clean Development Mechanism projects are concentrated in four emerging countries.
Capitalist logic promotes a paradox in which the sectors that have contributed the most to deterioration of the environment are those that benefit the most from climate change programs.
At the same time, technology transfer and the financing for clean and sustainable development of the countries of the South have remained just speeches.
The next summit on Climate Change in Copenhagen must allow us to make a leap forward if we want to save Mother Earth and humanity. For that purpose the following proposals for the process from Poznan to Copenhagen:
Attack the structural causes of climate change
1) Debate the structural causes of climate change. As long as we do not change the capitalist system for a system based in complementarity, solidarity and harmony between the people and nature, the measures that we adopt will be palliatives that will limited and precarious in character. For us, what has failed is the model of “living better”, of unlimited development, industrialisation without frontiers, of modernity that deprecates history, of increasing accumulation of goods at the expense of others and nature. For that reason we promote the idea of Living Well, in harmony with other human beings and with our Mother Earth.
2) Developed countries need to control their patterns of consumption - of luxury and waste - especially the excessive consumption of fossil fuels. Subsidies of fossil fuel, that reach 150-250 billions of dollars[4], must be progressively eliminated. It is fundamental to develop alternative forms of power, such as solar, geothermal, wind and hydroelectric both at small and medium scales.
3) Agrofuels are not an alternative, because they put the production of foodstuffs for transport before the production of food for human beings. Agrofuels expand the agricultural frontier destroying forests and biodiversity, generate monocropping, promote land concentration, deteriorate soils, exhaust water sources, contribute to rises in food prices and, in many cases, result in more consumption of more energy than is produced.
Substantial commitments to emissions reduction that are met
4) Strict fulfilment by 2012 of the commitments[5] of the developed countries to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by at least by 5% below the 1990 levels. It is unacceptable that the countries that polluted the planet throughout the course of history make statements about larger reductions in the future while not complying with their present commitments.
5) Establish new minimum commitments for the developed countries of greenhouse gas emission reduction of 40% by 2020 and 90% by for 2050, taking as a starting point 1990 emission levels. These minimum commitments must be met internally in developed countries and not through flexible market mechanisms that allow for the purchase of certified emissions reduction certificates to continue polluting in their own country. Likewise, monitoring mechanisms must be established for the measuring, reporting and verifying that are transparent and accessible to the public, to guarantee the compliance of commitments.
6) Developing countries not responsible for the historical pollution must preserve the necessary space to implement an alternative and sustainable form of development that does not repeat the mistakes of savage industrialisation that has brought us to the current situation. To ensure this process, developing countries need, as a prerequisite, finance and technology transfer.
An Integral Financial Mechanism to address ecological debt
7) Acknowledging the historical ecological debt that they owe to the planet, developed countries must create an Integral Financial Mechanism to support developing countries in: implementation of their plans and programmes for adaptation to and mitigation of climate change; the innovation, development and transfer of technology; in the preservation and improvement of the sinks and reservoirs; response actions to the serious natural disasters caused by climate change; and the carrying out of sustainable and eco-friendly development plans.
8) This Integral Financial Mechanism, in order to be effective, must count on a contribution of at least 1% of the GDP in developed countries[6] and other contributions from taxes on oil and gas, financial transactions, sea and air transport, and the profits of transnational companies.
9) Contributions from developed countries must be additional to Official Development Assistance (ODA), bilateral aid or aid channelled through organisms not part of the United Nations. Any finance outside the UNFCCC cannot be considered as the fulfilment of developed country’s commitments under the Convention.
10) Finance has to be directed to the plans or national programmes of the different States and not to projects that follow market logic.
11) Financing must not be concentrated just in some developed countries but has to give priority to the countries that have contributed less to greenhouse gas emissions, those that preserve nature and are suffering the impact of climate change.
12) The Integral Financial Mechanism must be under the coverage of the United Nations, not under the Global Environment Facility (GEF) and other intermediaries such as the World Bank and regional development banks; its management must be collective, transparent and non-bureaucratic. Its decisions must be made by all member countries, especially by developing countries, and not by the donors or bureaucratic administrators.
Technology Transfer to developing countries
13) Innovation and technology related to climate changes must be within the public domain, not under any private monopolistic patent regime that obstructs and makes technology transfer more expensive to developing countries.
14) Products that are the fruit of public financing for technology innovation and development of have to be placed within the public domain and not under a private regime of patents[7], so that they can be freely accessed by developing countries.
15) Encourage and improve the system of voluntary and compulsory licenses so that all countries can access products already patented quickly and free of cost. Developed countries cannot treat patents and intellectual property rights as something “sacred” that has to be preserved at any cost. The regime of flexibilities available for the intellectual property rights in the cases of serious problems for public health has to be adapted and substantially enlarged to heal Mother Earth.
16) Recover and promote indigenous peoples practices in harmony with nature which have proven to be sustainable through centuries.
Adaptation and mitigation with the participation of all the people
17) Promote mitigation actions, programs and plans with the participation of local communities and indigenous people in the framework of full respect for and implementation of the United Nations Declaration on Rights of Indigenous Peoples. The best mechanism to confront the challenge of climate change are not market mechanisms, but conscious, motivated, and well organized human beings endowed with an identity of their own.
18) The reduction of the emissions from deforestation and forest degradation must be based on a mechanism of direct compensation from developed to developing countries, through a sovereign implementation that ensures broad participation of local communities, and a mechanism for monitoring, reporting and verifying that is transparent and public.
A UN for the Environment and Climate Change
19) We need a World Environment and Climate Change Organization to which multilateral trade and financial organizations are subordinated, so as to promote a different model of development that environmentally friendly and resolves the profound problems of impoverishment. This organization must have effective follow-up, verification and sanctioning mechanisms to ensure that the present and future agreements are complied with.
20) It is fundamental to structurally transform the World Trade Organization, the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and the international economic system as a whole, in order to guarantee fair and complementary trade, as well as financing without conditions for sustainable development that avoids the waste of natural resources and fossil fuels in the production processes, trade and product transport.
In this negotiation process towards Copenhagen, it is fundamental to guarantee the participation of our people as active stakeholders at a national, regional and worldwide level, especially taking into account those sectors most affected, such as indigenous peoples who have always promoted the defense of Mother Earth.
Humankind is capable of saving the earth if we recover the principles of solidarity, complementarity, and harmony with nature in contraposition to the reign of competition, profits and rampant consumption of natural resources.
November 28, 2008
Evo Morales Ayma
1 Due to the “Niña” phenomenon, that becomes more frequent as a result of the climate change, Bolivia has lost 4% of its GDP in 2007.
2 Known as the Clean Development Mechanism
3 At the present there is only one Adaptation Fund with approximately 500 million dollars for more than 150 developing countries. According to the UNFCCC Secretary, 171 billion dollars are required for adaptation, and 380 billion dollars are required for mitigation.
4 Stern report
5 Kyoto Protocol, Art. 3.
6 The Stern Review has suggested one percent of global GDP, which represents less than 700 billion dollars per year.
7 According to UNCTAD (1998), Public financing in developing countries contributes with 40% of the resources for innovation and development of technology.
Friday 8 May 2009
How to confront Bolivian bureaucracy and survive (Part III)
It has been a long time, hasn´t it? It was exactly seven weeks ago that I was told my having a work contract in order to apply for a 30 day visa was illegal even though, in order to apply for a 30 day visa I need a work contract.
What has happened since? Not a lot really. My lawyer says that the entire section dealing with foreign visas has been sacked and replaced in the migration service. This hasn´t helped because, aparently my case is ´so difficult´ that only the national director of foreign visas could make a decision about it (Are you kidding me?). Apparently not.
As you can imagine, it has taken this long to be told that no decision has yet been made but will be made next week. Which is why I was surprised to receive notification of a $150 fine for breaking the law. This makes as much sense as the above. If they have not yet pronounced themselves on the case, how can they fine me?
I now have 48 hrs to appeal this notification, except that the letter has taken three days (three days?)to reach me inside La Paz and by courier service (Can someone explain to me what the hell is going on?).
The plot thickens (more on this saga soon)
Thursday 7 May 2009
The Fun House Mirror: Distortions and Omissions in the News on Bolivia
Dan Beeton
http://boliviarising.blogspot.com/
In August, Bolivian president Evo Morales won a referendum on his term in office with 67% of the vote. The opposition, having failed to unseat Morales in the face of the largest electoral majority in Bolivian history, embarked on a campaign of violent destabilization that culminated in riots, economic sabotage, and the massacre of more than 20 indigenous Morales supporters in September. Just a day before the massacre, at the height of opposition violence, the Bolivian government expelled U.S. Ambassador Philip Goldberg, following revelations that the U.S. Embassy in La Paz had asked Peace Corps volunteers and a Fulbright scholar to spy inside Bolivia, together with growing evidence, amid official secrecy, of U.S. funding for violent opposition groups.1
It was in this context that in November Morales paid a visit to Washington, his first as Bolivian president. Following a busy itinerary, Morales spoke at the Organization of American States, addressed a large audience at American University, and held meetings with congressional members, among other engagements. Such visits by heads of state do not always draw much media attention. But considering that his visit came soon after a series of newsworthy political developments in Bolivia, as well as a breakdown in diplomatic relations with the United States, the scant coverage his visit received was still surprising.
Save for one Washington Post article, the Morales visit garnered no full-length reports in major U.S. papers, according to a Nexis survey.2 Furthermore, most editors apparently took no interest in one particularly notable meeting Morales held on Capitol Hill with Senator Richard Lugar (R-Ind.), the ranking minority member of the Foreign Relations Committee and the most influential Republican on international issues in Congress. After the meeting, Lugar issued a remarkable statement implicitly acknowledging that the United States had made a mistake in failing to condemn the September violence.
“The United States regrets any perception that it has been disrespectful, insensitive, or engaged in any improper activities that would disregard the legitimacy of the current Bolivian government or its sovereignty,” the statement read. “We hope to renew our relationship with Bolivia, and to develop a rapport grounded on respect and transparency.” Lugar’s overture represented the first olive branch to Bolivia from any U.S. government figure after the diplomatic breakdown, and it came, surprisingly, from a powerful Republican. The mention of transparency was also important, since the State Department has declined to disclose whom it is funding among Bolivia’s opposition, and for what purpose.
Yet the press largely ignored it. Only the Associated Press and The Washington Post even mentioned it, and the AP initially misrepresented the statement completely, reporting that Lugar had said “the United States rejects any suggestion that it did not respect Bolivia’s sovereignty or the legitimacy of its government.”3 (A correction was never issued. A subsequent AP article in December cited Lugar’s statement correctly and reported Morales’s encouraging response.)
Although Lugar’s statement was handed directly to the Post, neither the meeting with Lugar nor Lugar’s statement made it into the print edition of the paper’s article on Morales’s visit.4 This is a striking omission in a 700-word article, since it was arguably the most newsworthy event of the visit. A Web version of the article did mention the Lugar meeting, but only in the 13th paragraph.5
Following Bolivia’s approval of the new constitution in January, Lugar made a second statement on Bolivia, calling for respectful dialogue and a redeployment of ambassadors as steps toward building a “positive new stage in relations between the United States and Bolivia.” The statement received no notice from the U.S. press, save for one Bloomberg article.6
The nature of the opposition-led violence in September was also distorted or simply ignored in U.S. newspapers. During, and prior to, September’s violence, newswires including Agence France-Presse, Reuters, and Inter Press Service revealed the close ties between violent, racist youth groups and “respectable” opposition leaders like businessman Branko Marinkovic. Reuters, for example, in August reported that “although Marinkovic said he wanted to avoid violence, young people were seen coming in and out of his office building carrying batons and baseball bats.”7 Even more revealing was an Inter Press Service article, which reported that the campaign of violence carried out in September followed a plan coordinated by the opposition coalition, and that opposition legislators had been ejected from an early-September meeting after objecting to the violent methods under discussion.8
Yet major U.S. English-language media that covered the September events did not mention the planned nature of the violence, even after AFP noted that—in the midst of violent attacks, the ransacking of government offices, and the sabotage of a gas pipeline—“the conservative governors are . . . encouraging the protesters in their actions” and that “militants linked to the opposition group set up road blocks” to add pressure to the governors’ demands for more control over gas revenues.”9
Amateur video and images posted online easily demonstrate the violent and racist nature of many incidents and many groups and persons in the opposition. (One example, available at the time of this writing on Youtube.com, is a video of violent attacks in Santa Cruz titled “Autonomístas fanáticos y desesperados enlodan imágen de Santa Cruz.”) Even though videos and images are readily available on the Web, U.S. media reports, while sometimes noting racial overtones or racist incidents, have often failed to present details of the many attacks that have been carried out against indigenous Bolivians when they have occurred, or the common talk of assassinating Morales, Bolivia’s first indigenous president.
According to sources in Bolivia, a cell phone image depicting Morales being shot in the head was popular with some in the opposition, and in January a few wire services did report on an incident in which a Virginia-based Facebook user had posted a message encouraging others to contribute funds in order to hire a hit man to kill Morales.10 A particularly egregious example of racist violence occurred in May 2008, when opposition activists assaulted a group of indigenous Morales supporters in Sucre, stripping them and forcing them to publicly denounce Morales and the MAS government, while berating them with racist epithets.11 This incident was only reported by Inter Press Service and The Miami Herald at the time.12
The disturbing nature of Bolivia’s right-wing youth groups did not prevent the Los Angeles Times from publishing a 928-word profile of Edson Abad Ruiz, a young man killed in fighting with government supporters. Abad was a member of the Cruceño Youth Union (UJC), identified by the newspaper as a “group dedicated to defending this rebellious eastern region of Bolivia from its chief foe, the leftist administration of President Evo Morales.”13
As observers familiar with Bolivia’s conflicts know, the UJC is a far-right militant group that has attacked Morales supporters many times in recent years. While the Los Angeles Times should not be faulted for giving a human face to Bolivia’s violence, the context in which the article appeared made it perhaps an unusual choice. Racist groups, including the UJC, had massacred more than 20 indigenous Morales supporters in Porvenir, in the department of Pando, just nine days earlier. The Los Angeles Times has yet to run a human interest story on indigenous, or pro-government, victims of Bolivia’s recent violence.
The media’s attitude toward the violence in Bolivia—some of which was publicly supported by opposition leaders who had been in contact with the U.S. ambassador—seemed to mirror that of the U.S. government, which neglected to condemn the violence. In contrast, a commission to investigate the Porvenir massacre was quickly established by the Union of South American Nations (Unasur). The commission found that more than 20 people had been killed in a “massacre” and that the perpetrators had acted “in an organized fashion,” responding “to a chain of command” leading up to the Pando prefect, Leopoldo Fernández, who was also said to have provided funding.14 The Unasur report went generally unnoticed in U.S. news. Only the Associated Press, Reuters, Indian Country Today, and The New York Times (which noted it only in passing) even mentioned it.15
*
By any standard, Morales has a sizable political mandate. He not only triumphed in the August referendum on his presidency but gained 13 percentage points over his initial election in 2005. Yet much U.S. reporting has portrayed his electoral successes as an entrenchment of political polarization, especially between the pro-Morales western highlands and the opposition-dominated eastern lowlands. While there is some truth to this depiction, Bolivia’s geopolitical reality is more complex, as was apparent in the recall referendum’s results. Morales won six out of Bolivia’s nine departments, and of the three where majority No votes prevailed, only two had strong majorities against Morales—Beni (56.28%) and Santa Cruz (59.25%).
The third, Tarija, was split almost evenly down the middle, with a 50.17% No vote.16 Even outside the city of Santa Cruz, more voters supported Morales in the rest of the “opposition dominated” Santa Cruz department than voted against him, with a 53.1% Yes vote against 46.9% No.17 Yet many U.S. press reports presented the results as a deepening of divisions. “Bolivian Deadlock Remains as President, Foes Are Returned to Office” a Washington Post headline announced.18 The Miami Herald likewise ran an article titled “Voters Give Morales and Foes a Stalemate,” which stated: “Bolivian President Evo Morales survived an election test, but his foes gained as well, which means the stalemate between them will continue.”19
The reporting on the January 25 constitution vote, in which more than 61% of voters approved a new constitution long called for by indigenous groups and social movements, continued this pattern. Many articles summing up the results of the constitutional referendum emphasized that Bolivia remains “sharply divided,” claiming that the country “is split on ethnic and geographic lines.”20 While it is true that four departments in the eastern lowlands did have strong majorities against the new constitution, the media’s framing of the vote was similar to coverage of the August recall referendum, stressing opposition to Morales and his government, despite his unprecedented electoral popularity.
The media framing of Bolivia’s recent votes comes into sharp relief when we compare it with how the media framed the election of Barack Obama. Morales won his first election, in 2005, with slightly more than Obama’s near 53% of the popular vote in 2008 (53.7% voted for Morales, while Obama received 52.9% of the popular vote). Yet by comparison, coverage of Obama’s win has often been framed as not only an overwhelming rejection of George W. Bush policies but a moment of national reconciliation and unity. Obama’s inauguration, for example, inspired the New York Times editorial board to suggest that “this battered nation will be able to draw together and mend itself.” The accent on unity was so strong, as media critic Janine Jackson pointed out, that it led some in the media to declare a “post-racial” United States, in which the Obama victory would “absolve us of any need to talk about racism anymore.”21
Capturing 53% of the popular vote in a U.S. presidential election is not unusual, historically speaking—George H.W. Bush in 1988, Ronald Reagan in 1984, Richard Nixon in 1972, Lyndon Johnson in 1964, and Dwight Eisenhower in 1956, among others, all won with more than that percentage.22 But when Morales won with this percentage in 2005, it was unprecedented in Bolivia’s current period of democracy, going back to 1981 (to say nothing of his recall referendum victory by almost 70%).23 Yet the framing of Bolivia’s recent elections and referendums has tended to underplay this and stress divisions in the country, even though Morales is Bolivia’s most popular democratically elected president, measured in both votes and approval ratings.24
Of course, what made both the elections of Morales and Obama even more significant was that both came from a social group long excluded from higher office to be elected to the highest office. Here the contrast between the media’s framing is also striking: Whereas Obama’s win has often been framed as a historic maturation of the U.S. electorate, which is described as moving beyond prejudices and racism, Morales’s electoral successes have been framed to stress ongoing ethnic and racial divisions. This is all the more conspicuous in that indigenous people compose the majority of Bolivia’s population.
Bolivia’s history, both recent and distant, is, of course, unique, complex, and worthy of careful analysis. When it pays attention to Bolivian politics, however, the U.S. press sometimes offers coverage that treats the current government of Bolivia as a threat, and one that perhaps lacks appropriate popular support. One can only hope other U.S. media outlets will be more even-handed in their future treatment of Bolivia.
Dan Beeton is International Communications Coordinator at the Center for Economic and Policy Research (cepr.net). Research assistance: Jake Johnston.
Republished from NACLA
Notes
1. See Center for Economic and Policy Research, “U.S. Should Disclose Its Funding of Opposition Groups in Bolivia and Other Latin American Countries,” September 12, 2008, available at cepr.net.
2. The Hill publication Politico ran an article by Clint Rice, reporter for American University newspaper The Eagle. Opinion pieces by journalist Amy Goodman and CEPR co-director Mark Weisbrot also described Morales’s visit, but these were not news articles.
3. The Associated Press, “Bolivia’s Morales Seeks International Support,” November 20, 2008. The Hill publication Inside U.S. Trade did mention the statement, as did a McClatchy Tribune Information Services column by Weisbrot.
4. See Pamela Constable, “Bolivia’s Morales Diplomatic, Defiant in Visit to D.C.,” The Washington Post, November 20, 2008.
5. Constable, “Bolivian President Evo Morales Visits Washington, Talks of Fresh Start With U.S. Under Obama,” WashingtonPost.com, November 19, 2008.
6. Levin, Jonathan J. “Bolivia Seeks to Renew U.S. Ties, Choquehuanca Says (Update2),” Bloomberg, January 29, 2009. Bloomberg articles are not archived in Nexis.
7. Eduardo Garcia, “Foes of Morales Stage General Strike in Bolivia,” Reuters, August 19, 2008.
8. Franz Chávez, “Bolivia: Divisions Emerge in Opposition Strategy,” Inter Press Service, September 4, 2008.
9. Agence France-Presse, “Bolivia Orders US Ambassador Out, Warns of Civil War,” September 10, 2008.
10. Frank Bajak, “Facebook Nixes Group Seeking Morales ‘Liquidation,’ ” Associated Press, January 27, 2009.
11. Inter-American Commission on Human Rights Press Release, “IACHR Deplores Violence in Bolivia and Urges Punishment of Those Responsible,” no. 22/08 (May 29, 2008), available at cidh.org.
12. Jack Chang and Alex Ayala, “Two More Bolivian Provinces Weigh Autonomy,” The Miami Herald, May 30, 2008; Franz Chávez, “Bolivia: Armed Civilians Humiliate Local Indigenous Leaders,” Inter Press Service, May 27, 2008.
13. Los Angeles Times, “Young Bolivians Fuel Mob Violence in Civil Conflict,” September 20, 2008.
14. Mery Vaca, “UNASUR: ‘Hubo masacre en Bolivia,’” BBC Mundo, December 3, 2008.
15. Associated Press, “Bolivian Opposition Criticizes ‘Massacre’ Report,” December 5, 2008; Eduardo Garcia, “Bolivia Violence Was Massacre, Says Regional Report,” Reuters, December 3, 2009 (Reuters is not archived in Nexis); Rick Kearns, “Tensions Increase Between U.S. and Bolivian Governments,” Indian Country Today, December 26, 2008; Alexei Barrionuevo, “At Meeting in Brazil, Washington Is Scorned,” The New York Times, December 16, 2008.
16. See Corte Nacional Electoral, República de Bolivia, Referendum Revocatorio 2008 Resultados, available at www.cne.org.bo [1].
17. See results for the department of Santa Cruz in ibid.
18. Joshua Partlow, “Bolivian Deadlock Remains as President, Foes Are Returned to Office,” The Washington Post, August 11, 2008.
19. Tyler Bridges, “Voters Give Morales and Foes a Stalemate,” The Miami Herald, August 11, 2008.
20. Antonio Regalado, “Bolivians Projected to Approve New Constitution,” The Wall Street Journal, January 26, 2009. See also Associated Press, “Bolivian Constitution Vote Unlikely to Heal Divide,” January 23, 2009, and Chris Kraul, “In Bolivia, Vote Unlikely to Heal Divide,” Los Angeles Times, January 25, 2009.
21. Editorial, “President Obama,” The New York Times, January 20, 2009; Janine Jackson, “Let’s Talk About Race—Or Maybe Not,” Extra!, March 2009. Some conservative commentators, disputing the existence of a strong electoral mandate for Obama, tended to emphasize national disunity. See, for example, Robert D. Novak, “No Mandate for Obama and No Lopsided Congress,” syndicated column, November 6, 2008.
22. See uselectionatlas.org/results.
23. Richard Lapper and Hal Weitzman, “Morales Poised for Win in Bolivia,” Financial Times, December 19, 2005.
24. See, for example, Angus Reid Global Monitor, “President Morales Drops to 56% in Bolivia,” January 10, 2009, and “Bolivians Continue to Back Morales,” December 6, 2008.
Posted by Bolivia Rising on Wednesday, May 06, 2009 0 comments
Say NO to international fascist terrorism
http://boliviarising.blogspot.com/
In August, Bolivian president Evo Morales won a referendum on his term in office with 67% of the vote. The opposition, having failed to unseat Morales in the face of the largest electoral majority in Bolivian history, embarked on a campaign of violent destabilization that culminated in riots, economic sabotage, and the massacre of more than 20 indigenous Morales supporters in September. Just a day before the massacre, at the height of opposition violence, the Bolivian government expelled U.S. Ambassador Philip Goldberg, following revelations that the U.S. Embassy in La Paz had asked Peace Corps volunteers and a Fulbright scholar to spy inside Bolivia, together with growing evidence, amid official secrecy, of U.S. funding for violent opposition groups.1
It was in this context that in November Morales paid a visit to Washington, his first as Bolivian president. Following a busy itinerary, Morales spoke at the Organization of American States, addressed a large audience at American University, and held meetings with congressional members, among other engagements. Such visits by heads of state do not always draw much media attention. But considering that his visit came soon after a series of newsworthy political developments in Bolivia, as well as a breakdown in diplomatic relations with the United States, the scant coverage his visit received was still surprising.
Save for one Washington Post article, the Morales visit garnered no full-length reports in major U.S. papers, according to a Nexis survey.2 Furthermore, most editors apparently took no interest in one particularly notable meeting Morales held on Capitol Hill with Senator Richard Lugar (R-Ind.), the ranking minority member of the Foreign Relations Committee and the most influential Republican on international issues in Congress. After the meeting, Lugar issued a remarkable statement implicitly acknowledging that the United States had made a mistake in failing to condemn the September violence.
“The United States regrets any perception that it has been disrespectful, insensitive, or engaged in any improper activities that would disregard the legitimacy of the current Bolivian government or its sovereignty,” the statement read. “We hope to renew our relationship with Bolivia, and to develop a rapport grounded on respect and transparency.” Lugar’s overture represented the first olive branch to Bolivia from any U.S. government figure after the diplomatic breakdown, and it came, surprisingly, from a powerful Republican. The mention of transparency was also important, since the State Department has declined to disclose whom it is funding among Bolivia’s opposition, and for what purpose.
Yet the press largely ignored it. Only the Associated Press and The Washington Post even mentioned it, and the AP initially misrepresented the statement completely, reporting that Lugar had said “the United States rejects any suggestion that it did not respect Bolivia’s sovereignty or the legitimacy of its government.”3 (A correction was never issued. A subsequent AP article in December cited Lugar’s statement correctly and reported Morales’s encouraging response.)
Although Lugar’s statement was handed directly to the Post, neither the meeting with Lugar nor Lugar’s statement made it into the print edition of the paper’s article on Morales’s visit.4 This is a striking omission in a 700-word article, since it was arguably the most newsworthy event of the visit. A Web version of the article did mention the Lugar meeting, but only in the 13th paragraph.5
Following Bolivia’s approval of the new constitution in January, Lugar made a second statement on Bolivia, calling for respectful dialogue and a redeployment of ambassadors as steps toward building a “positive new stage in relations between the United States and Bolivia.” The statement received no notice from the U.S. press, save for one Bloomberg article.6
The nature of the opposition-led violence in September was also distorted or simply ignored in U.S. newspapers. During, and prior to, September’s violence, newswires including Agence France-Presse, Reuters, and Inter Press Service revealed the close ties between violent, racist youth groups and “respectable” opposition leaders like businessman Branko Marinkovic. Reuters, for example, in August reported that “although Marinkovic said he wanted to avoid violence, young people were seen coming in and out of his office building carrying batons and baseball bats.”7 Even more revealing was an Inter Press Service article, which reported that the campaign of violence carried out in September followed a plan coordinated by the opposition coalition, and that opposition legislators had been ejected from an early-September meeting after objecting to the violent methods under discussion.8
Yet major U.S. English-language media that covered the September events did not mention the planned nature of the violence, even after AFP noted that—in the midst of violent attacks, the ransacking of government offices, and the sabotage of a gas pipeline—“the conservative governors are . . . encouraging the protesters in their actions” and that “militants linked to the opposition group set up road blocks” to add pressure to the governors’ demands for more control over gas revenues.”9
Amateur video and images posted online easily demonstrate the violent and racist nature of many incidents and many groups and persons in the opposition. (One example, available at the time of this writing on Youtube.com, is a video of violent attacks in Santa Cruz titled “Autonomístas fanáticos y desesperados enlodan imágen de Santa Cruz.”) Even though videos and images are readily available on the Web, U.S. media reports, while sometimes noting racial overtones or racist incidents, have often failed to present details of the many attacks that have been carried out against indigenous Bolivians when they have occurred, or the common talk of assassinating Morales, Bolivia’s first indigenous president.
According to sources in Bolivia, a cell phone image depicting Morales being shot in the head was popular with some in the opposition, and in January a few wire services did report on an incident in which a Virginia-based Facebook user had posted a message encouraging others to contribute funds in order to hire a hit man to kill Morales.10 A particularly egregious example of racist violence occurred in May 2008, when opposition activists assaulted a group of indigenous Morales supporters in Sucre, stripping them and forcing them to publicly denounce Morales and the MAS government, while berating them with racist epithets.11 This incident was only reported by Inter Press Service and The Miami Herald at the time.12
The disturbing nature of Bolivia’s right-wing youth groups did not prevent the Los Angeles Times from publishing a 928-word profile of Edson Abad Ruiz, a young man killed in fighting with government supporters. Abad was a member of the Cruceño Youth Union (UJC), identified by the newspaper as a “group dedicated to defending this rebellious eastern region of Bolivia from its chief foe, the leftist administration of President Evo Morales.”13
As observers familiar with Bolivia’s conflicts know, the UJC is a far-right militant group that has attacked Morales supporters many times in recent years. While the Los Angeles Times should not be faulted for giving a human face to Bolivia’s violence, the context in which the article appeared made it perhaps an unusual choice. Racist groups, including the UJC, had massacred more than 20 indigenous Morales supporters in Porvenir, in the department of Pando, just nine days earlier. The Los Angeles Times has yet to run a human interest story on indigenous, or pro-government, victims of Bolivia’s recent violence.
The media’s attitude toward the violence in Bolivia—some of which was publicly supported by opposition leaders who had been in contact with the U.S. ambassador—seemed to mirror that of the U.S. government, which neglected to condemn the violence. In contrast, a commission to investigate the Porvenir massacre was quickly established by the Union of South American Nations (Unasur). The commission found that more than 20 people had been killed in a “massacre” and that the perpetrators had acted “in an organized fashion,” responding “to a chain of command” leading up to the Pando prefect, Leopoldo Fernández, who was also said to have provided funding.14 The Unasur report went generally unnoticed in U.S. news. Only the Associated Press, Reuters, Indian Country Today, and The New York Times (which noted it only in passing) even mentioned it.15
*
By any standard, Morales has a sizable political mandate. He not only triumphed in the August referendum on his presidency but gained 13 percentage points over his initial election in 2005. Yet much U.S. reporting has portrayed his electoral successes as an entrenchment of political polarization, especially between the pro-Morales western highlands and the opposition-dominated eastern lowlands. While there is some truth to this depiction, Bolivia’s geopolitical reality is more complex, as was apparent in the recall referendum’s results. Morales won six out of Bolivia’s nine departments, and of the three where majority No votes prevailed, only two had strong majorities against Morales—Beni (56.28%) and Santa Cruz (59.25%).
The third, Tarija, was split almost evenly down the middle, with a 50.17% No vote.16 Even outside the city of Santa Cruz, more voters supported Morales in the rest of the “opposition dominated” Santa Cruz department than voted against him, with a 53.1% Yes vote against 46.9% No.17 Yet many U.S. press reports presented the results as a deepening of divisions. “Bolivian Deadlock Remains as President, Foes Are Returned to Office” a Washington Post headline announced.18 The Miami Herald likewise ran an article titled “Voters Give Morales and Foes a Stalemate,” which stated: “Bolivian President Evo Morales survived an election test, but his foes gained as well, which means the stalemate between them will continue.”19
The reporting on the January 25 constitution vote, in which more than 61% of voters approved a new constitution long called for by indigenous groups and social movements, continued this pattern. Many articles summing up the results of the constitutional referendum emphasized that Bolivia remains “sharply divided,” claiming that the country “is split on ethnic and geographic lines.”20 While it is true that four departments in the eastern lowlands did have strong majorities against the new constitution, the media’s framing of the vote was similar to coverage of the August recall referendum, stressing opposition to Morales and his government, despite his unprecedented electoral popularity.
The media framing of Bolivia’s recent votes comes into sharp relief when we compare it with how the media framed the election of Barack Obama. Morales won his first election, in 2005, with slightly more than Obama’s near 53% of the popular vote in 2008 (53.7% voted for Morales, while Obama received 52.9% of the popular vote). Yet by comparison, coverage of Obama’s win has often been framed as not only an overwhelming rejection of George W. Bush policies but a moment of national reconciliation and unity. Obama’s inauguration, for example, inspired the New York Times editorial board to suggest that “this battered nation will be able to draw together and mend itself.” The accent on unity was so strong, as media critic Janine Jackson pointed out, that it led some in the media to declare a “post-racial” United States, in which the Obama victory would “absolve us of any need to talk about racism anymore.”21
Capturing 53% of the popular vote in a U.S. presidential election is not unusual, historically speaking—George H.W. Bush in 1988, Ronald Reagan in 1984, Richard Nixon in 1972, Lyndon Johnson in 1964, and Dwight Eisenhower in 1956, among others, all won with more than that percentage.22 But when Morales won with this percentage in 2005, it was unprecedented in Bolivia’s current period of democracy, going back to 1981 (to say nothing of his recall referendum victory by almost 70%).23 Yet the framing of Bolivia’s recent elections and referendums has tended to underplay this and stress divisions in the country, even though Morales is Bolivia’s most popular democratically elected president, measured in both votes and approval ratings.24
Of course, what made both the elections of Morales and Obama even more significant was that both came from a social group long excluded from higher office to be elected to the highest office. Here the contrast between the media’s framing is also striking: Whereas Obama’s win has often been framed as a historic maturation of the U.S. electorate, which is described as moving beyond prejudices and racism, Morales’s electoral successes have been framed to stress ongoing ethnic and racial divisions. This is all the more conspicuous in that indigenous people compose the majority of Bolivia’s population.
Bolivia’s history, both recent and distant, is, of course, unique, complex, and worthy of careful analysis. When it pays attention to Bolivian politics, however, the U.S. press sometimes offers coverage that treats the current government of Bolivia as a threat, and one that perhaps lacks appropriate popular support. One can only hope other U.S. media outlets will be more even-handed in their future treatment of Bolivia.
Dan Beeton is International Communications Coordinator at the Center for Economic and Policy Research (cepr.net). Research assistance: Jake Johnston.
Republished from NACLA
Notes
1. See Center for Economic and Policy Research, “U.S. Should Disclose Its Funding of Opposition Groups in Bolivia and Other Latin American Countries,” September 12, 2008, available at cepr.net.
2. The Hill publication Politico ran an article by Clint Rice, reporter for American University newspaper The Eagle. Opinion pieces by journalist Amy Goodman and CEPR co-director Mark Weisbrot also described Morales’s visit, but these were not news articles.
3. The Associated Press, “Bolivia’s Morales Seeks International Support,” November 20, 2008. The Hill publication Inside U.S. Trade did mention the statement, as did a McClatchy Tribune Information Services column by Weisbrot.
4. See Pamela Constable, “Bolivia’s Morales Diplomatic, Defiant in Visit to D.C.,” The Washington Post, November 20, 2008.
5. Constable, “Bolivian President Evo Morales Visits Washington, Talks of Fresh Start With U.S. Under Obama,” WashingtonPost.com, November 19, 2008.
6. Levin, Jonathan J. “Bolivia Seeks to Renew U.S. Ties, Choquehuanca Says (Update2),” Bloomberg, January 29, 2009. Bloomberg articles are not archived in Nexis.
7. Eduardo Garcia, “Foes of Morales Stage General Strike in Bolivia,” Reuters, August 19, 2008.
8. Franz Chávez, “Bolivia: Divisions Emerge in Opposition Strategy,” Inter Press Service, September 4, 2008.
9. Agence France-Presse, “Bolivia Orders US Ambassador Out, Warns of Civil War,” September 10, 2008.
10. Frank Bajak, “Facebook Nixes Group Seeking Morales ‘Liquidation,’ ” Associated Press, January 27, 2009.
11. Inter-American Commission on Human Rights Press Release, “IACHR Deplores Violence in Bolivia and Urges Punishment of Those Responsible,” no. 22/08 (May 29, 2008), available at cidh.org.
12. Jack Chang and Alex Ayala, “Two More Bolivian Provinces Weigh Autonomy,” The Miami Herald, May 30, 2008; Franz Chávez, “Bolivia: Armed Civilians Humiliate Local Indigenous Leaders,” Inter Press Service, May 27, 2008.
13. Los Angeles Times, “Young Bolivians Fuel Mob Violence in Civil Conflict,” September 20, 2008.
14. Mery Vaca, “UNASUR: ‘Hubo masacre en Bolivia,’” BBC Mundo, December 3, 2008.
15. Associated Press, “Bolivian Opposition Criticizes ‘Massacre’ Report,” December 5, 2008; Eduardo Garcia, “Bolivia Violence Was Massacre, Says Regional Report,” Reuters, December 3, 2009 (Reuters is not archived in Nexis); Rick Kearns, “Tensions Increase Between U.S. and Bolivian Governments,” Indian Country Today, December 26, 2008; Alexei Barrionuevo, “At Meeting in Brazil, Washington Is Scorned,” The New York Times, December 16, 2008.
16. See Corte Nacional Electoral, República de Bolivia, Referendum Revocatorio 2008 Resultados, available at www.cne.org.bo [1].
17. See results for the department of Santa Cruz in ibid.
18. Joshua Partlow, “Bolivian Deadlock Remains as President, Foes Are Returned to Office,” The Washington Post, August 11, 2008.
19. Tyler Bridges, “Voters Give Morales and Foes a Stalemate,” The Miami Herald, August 11, 2008.
20. Antonio Regalado, “Bolivians Projected to Approve New Constitution,” The Wall Street Journal, January 26, 2009. See also Associated Press, “Bolivian Constitution Vote Unlikely to Heal Divide,” January 23, 2009, and Chris Kraul, “In Bolivia, Vote Unlikely to Heal Divide,” Los Angeles Times, January 25, 2009.
21. Editorial, “President Obama,” The New York Times, January 20, 2009; Janine Jackson, “Let’s Talk About Race—Or Maybe Not,” Extra!, March 2009. Some conservative commentators, disputing the existence of a strong electoral mandate for Obama, tended to emphasize national disunity. See, for example, Robert D. Novak, “No Mandate for Obama and No Lopsided Congress,” syndicated column, November 6, 2008.
22. See uselectionatlas.org/results.
23. Richard Lapper and Hal Weitzman, “Morales Poised for Win in Bolivia,” Financial Times, December 19, 2005.
24. See, for example, Angus Reid Global Monitor, “President Morales Drops to 56% in Bolivia,” January 10, 2009, and “Bolivians Continue to Back Morales,” December 6, 2008.
Posted by Bolivia Rising on Wednesday, May 06, 2009 0 comments
Say NO to international fascist terrorism
Bolivian diaries is back!!
Dear all,
Apologies for not posting anything for the last two weeks. To all those millions of visitors to this blog, I want to let you know that after moving flats and being without internet access for a while, I am back online (ho Hoooooo). So keep an eye on more commentary on all things Bolivian.
Regards,
Boliviandiaries
Apologies for not posting anything for the last two weeks. To all those millions of visitors to this blog, I want to let you know that after moving flats and being without internet access for a while, I am back online (ho Hoooooo). So keep an eye on more commentary on all things Bolivian.
Regards,
Boliviandiaries
Thursday 16 April 2009
Police 'stop attempt on Morales'
BBC News
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8003117.stm
Bolivia's President Evo Morales says three foreigners have been killed after he ordered police to thwart a planned assassination attempt against him.
Security forces killed three alleged international mercenaries in the city of Santa Cruz, Mr Morales said.
He said intelligence reports had warned of a plot by a group comprising Irish, Hungarian and Bolivian attackers.
Arriving in Venezuela for a summit, Mr Morales said two people had been arrested over the alleged plot.
The three were killed in a half-hour shootout at the hotel in Santa Cruz, some 900km (620 miles) east of the capital La Paz, Mr Morales said.
Foreigners killed
"Yesterday, I gave instruction to the vice president to move to arrest these mercenaries and this morning I was informed of a half-hour shootout at a hotel in the city of Santa Cruz," said Mr Morales.
"Three foreigners are dead and two arrested."
He added that the alleged plot had been to kill him, the vice president and a cabinet minister.
Bolivian Police Chief Hugo Escobar said two Hungarians and one Bolivian were killed in the shoot-out.
Earlier reports suggested unknown assailants had attacked the home of the Roman Catholic Cardinal Julio Terrazas of Santa Cruz with dynamite.
Interior vice minister Marcos Farfan said Wednesday's blast, which caused structural damage but no injuries, a "terrorist" act.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8003117.stm
Bolivia's President Evo Morales says three foreigners have been killed after he ordered police to thwart a planned assassination attempt against him.
Security forces killed three alleged international mercenaries in the city of Santa Cruz, Mr Morales said.
He said intelligence reports had warned of a plot by a group comprising Irish, Hungarian and Bolivian attackers.
Arriving in Venezuela for a summit, Mr Morales said two people had been arrested over the alleged plot.
The three were killed in a half-hour shootout at the hotel in Santa Cruz, some 900km (620 miles) east of the capital La Paz, Mr Morales said.
Foreigners killed
"Yesterday, I gave instruction to the vice president to move to arrest these mercenaries and this morning I was informed of a half-hour shootout at a hotel in the city of Santa Cruz," said Mr Morales.
"Three foreigners are dead and two arrested."
He added that the alleged plot had been to kill him, the vice president and a cabinet minister.
Bolivian Police Chief Hugo Escobar said two Hungarians and one Bolivian were killed in the shoot-out.
Earlier reports suggested unknown assailants had attacked the home of the Roman Catholic Cardinal Julio Terrazas of Santa Cruz with dynamite.
Interior vice minister Marcos Farfan said Wednesday's blast, which caused structural damage but no injuries, a "terrorist" act.
Tuesday 14 April 2009
General elections will take place in December
Apologies for not having written for a little while; I have had too many distractions lately.
For those of you who haven’t been following Bolivian politics in the last couple of months, you might not know that the approval through referendum last January of a new Constitution established that general elections would take place on December 6. This would give the current president, if he wins, one final term in office instead of the two the new constitution establishes. The acceptance of only one term was one of the last minute compromises Evo Morales had to make back in October in order to unblock the opposition’s refusal to let the constitutional referendum take place.
Now we come to another attempt to paralyse congress. For any public consultation to take place, Congress (or the now renamed plurinational assembly) has to enact a law calling for such consultation. But, as has now become customary, the opposition have dug their heels and refused to support the law, reaching the point of walking out of congress last week. The reasons are many but the real intention has always been to make the country as ungovernable as possible preventing, if possible, the elections from taking place.
Two are the main reasons why the opposition wouldn’t approve the law calling for elections in December. The first is that the law would give the vote to the various millions of Bolivians living abroad, a process that would take place through the embassies. The accusation from the opposition is that, the embassies being the institutional representatives of the state, would not guarantee the lack of electoral fraud. What? What other institution can possibly administer the electoral process abroad? I’ve always gone to my embassy…In any case, support abroad is the only hope the opposition has of denting the government’s majority so why oppose it, I wonder. But that’s another matter.
The second reason is that according to them the electoral roll is inaccurate and therefore a tool that permits the government to commit fraud. It is interesting that fraud is an accusation one constantly hears from the opposition when every single legal popular consultation since the election of Evo Morales has had international observers and been declared clean and fair. This, by the way, is more than can be said for previous elections and for the illegal autonomic consultations that took place in a number of opposition departments last year where the president of the civic committee of Santa Cruz is well known for his remarks about how in Santa Cruz they didn’t need any foreigners telling them how to organise a referendum. Fraud? Most definitely.
Back to the electoral roll. It is obvious that there are mistakes in it like in all of them but an audit commissioned by the electoral court to the Organisation of American States last year determined that Bolivia’s roll is 97 % accurate and as such, the best in Latin America. Yet, the only possible way out of this crisis has been for the president, who had joined the social movements in a hunger strike demanding that congress gives the people of Bolivia the right to go to the polls, to divert funds earmarked for a presidential plane to the creation of a new biometric electoral roll for the 4.3 million Bolivians with the right to vote.
So why the opposition? The answer has to be the same as always. This country’s opposition is an obstacle to democratic practice, not a guarantor of it. The opposition belongs to a different political era where votes could be bought and public office was a way to self-enrichment. The opposition’s strategy is not to shape or contribute to the process of change in Bolivia, it is to make the country as ungovernable as possible by any means necessary, including the paralysis of congress and the provocation of civil unrest, while denouncing as loudly as possible to any international institution that will listen, that the country is descending into dictatorship.
No wonder new graffiti near the house says “the electoral census is clean, the right is not”.
Tuesday 7 April 2009
Breaking News: Fujimori is declared guilty
BBC Mundo
http://www.bbc.co.uk/mundo/america_latina/2009/04/090407_1530_fujimori_fallo_2.shtml
En un fallo histórico, un tribunal peruano declaró al ex presidente Alberto Fujimori culpable de los cargos que enfrentaba por violaciones de los derechos humanos.
Fujimori estaba acusado de ser el autor intelectual de las matanzas de Barrios Altos, en 1991, y La Cantuta, en 1992, cometidas por un escuadrón del ejército conocido como el grupo Colina, y del secuestro de un empresario y un periodista.
El incidente de Barrios Altos dejó 15 muertos y el de la Universidad La Cantuta, diez.
Según los analistas, este fallo tiene repercusiones no sólo en Perú sino también más allá de sus fronteras, ya que se trata de la primera vez que un ex mandatario constitucional latinoamericano es juzgado por crímenes de lesa humanidad en su propio país.
Durante la lectura de la sentencia, los jueces de la sala penal especial de la Corte Suprema de Justicia dijeron que el fallo respondía a la "gravedad" de los hechos juzgados, los cuales se inscribían en un plan de desapariciones forzadas y asesinatos a cargo del Estado, las fuerzas armadas y el servicio de inteligencia.
Los magistrados también atribuyeron al gobierno de Fujimori el intento de ocultar los abusos cometidos durante su gestión, que "están probados más allá de toda duda razonable".
Participe: ¿qué opina del veredicto?
Rechazo
Fujimori, de 70 años, ha negado los cargos en su contra, y su defensa adelantó que apelaría una sentencia condenatoria.
Sus simpatizantes han acusado al tribunal que lo juzgaba de tener "motivaciones políticas".
Fujimori fue extraditado el 22 de septiembre de 2007 por las autoridades de Chile, país al que había llegado en noviembre de 2005 por su propia voluntad desde Japón.
El ex presidente renunció a su cargo en noviembre de 2000 desde Japón, la tierra de sus antepasados, y se refugió allí a raíz de un escándalo por la red de corrupción que había creado su asesor Vladimiro Montesinos, quien está en la cárcel.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/mundo/america_latina/2009/04/090407_1530_fujimori_fallo_2.shtml
En un fallo histórico, un tribunal peruano declaró al ex presidente Alberto Fujimori culpable de los cargos que enfrentaba por violaciones de los derechos humanos.
Fujimori estaba acusado de ser el autor intelectual de las matanzas de Barrios Altos, en 1991, y La Cantuta, en 1992, cometidas por un escuadrón del ejército conocido como el grupo Colina, y del secuestro de un empresario y un periodista.
El incidente de Barrios Altos dejó 15 muertos y el de la Universidad La Cantuta, diez.
Según los analistas, este fallo tiene repercusiones no sólo en Perú sino también más allá de sus fronteras, ya que se trata de la primera vez que un ex mandatario constitucional latinoamericano es juzgado por crímenes de lesa humanidad en su propio país.
Durante la lectura de la sentencia, los jueces de la sala penal especial de la Corte Suprema de Justicia dijeron que el fallo respondía a la "gravedad" de los hechos juzgados, los cuales se inscribían en un plan de desapariciones forzadas y asesinatos a cargo del Estado, las fuerzas armadas y el servicio de inteligencia.
Los magistrados también atribuyeron al gobierno de Fujimori el intento de ocultar los abusos cometidos durante su gestión, que "están probados más allá de toda duda razonable".
Participe: ¿qué opina del veredicto?
Rechazo
Fujimori, de 70 años, ha negado los cargos en su contra, y su defensa adelantó que apelaría una sentencia condenatoria.
Sus simpatizantes han acusado al tribunal que lo juzgaba de tener "motivaciones políticas".
Fujimori fue extraditado el 22 de septiembre de 2007 por las autoridades de Chile, país al que había llegado en noviembre de 2005 por su propia voluntad desde Japón.
El ex presidente renunció a su cargo en noviembre de 2000 desde Japón, la tierra de sus antepasados, y se refugió allí a raíz de un escándalo por la red de corrupción que había creado su asesor Vladimiro Montesinos, quien está en la cárcel.
Monday 6 April 2009
Morales about the IMF: “the wolf can not keep the flock”
April 3, 2009/ Ennaharonline / AFP
http://boliviarising.blogspot.com/2009/04/morales-about-imf-wolf-can-not-keep.html
The Bolivian President Evo Morales has denounced Friday the injection of more than 1,000 billion dollars through the IMF against the global crisis, saying that countries at the root of the crisis can not solve it, or his words, that “the wolf can not keep the flock.”
“It's like giving money to the wolves, or to entrust the care of the flock: the wolf is not going to keep the sheep, it will devour them,” Morales told the foreign press in La Paz, commenting on the decisions G20 in London to fight against the crisis.
“It is not possible that the countries of capitalism, which has caused the financial crisis, are now the same from where comes the solution,” said the Socialist leader, adding that few countries are at the origin of this financial crisis, but “180 must cope.”
Bolivia is experiencing the beginning of economic deceleration, and is 5% growth at best in 2009, against 6.5% in 2008.
“As long as we do not touch the structural points of capitalism, it will be difficult to resolve the financial crisis,” said Morales about the G20. “If we want to solve economic problems, we must first end the free market, then the speculative capitalism.”
Morales has challenged the role of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), accusing him of the award of credit conditions, as “the privatization of our natural resources, our basic services, to implement the business models that are part of the capitalist system.”
Posted by Bolivia Rising on Monday, April 06, 2009
http://boliviarising.blogspot.com/2009/04/morales-about-imf-wolf-can-not-keep.html
The Bolivian President Evo Morales has denounced Friday the injection of more than 1,000 billion dollars through the IMF against the global crisis, saying that countries at the root of the crisis can not solve it, or his words, that “the wolf can not keep the flock.”
“It's like giving money to the wolves, or to entrust the care of the flock: the wolf is not going to keep the sheep, it will devour them,” Morales told the foreign press in La Paz, commenting on the decisions G20 in London to fight against the crisis.
“It is not possible that the countries of capitalism, which has caused the financial crisis, are now the same from where comes the solution,” said the Socialist leader, adding that few countries are at the origin of this financial crisis, but “180 must cope.”
Bolivia is experiencing the beginning of economic deceleration, and is 5% growth at best in 2009, against 6.5% in 2008.
“As long as we do not touch the structural points of capitalism, it will be difficult to resolve the financial crisis,” said Morales about the G20. “If we want to solve economic problems, we must first end the free market, then the speculative capitalism.”
Morales has challenged the role of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), accusing him of the award of credit conditions, as “the privatization of our natural resources, our basic services, to implement the business models that are part of the capitalist system.”
Posted by Bolivia Rising on Monday, April 06, 2009
Tuesday 31 March 2009
How to confront Bolivian bureaucracy and survive (Part II)
What did I say about this process of getting a temporary visa being easy? (read previous post to know what I am talking about). Yesterday was interesting because after three long hours, I passed a medical test that included blood and urine tests, a chest X-ray, and someone who checked my blood pressure, measured me (with my shoes on) and weighted me (with all my clothes on). The results will be ready in two, three (nobody knows) weeks. I don’t know when but I expect to get that health certificate at some point.
What I never expected was the hitch that emerged today. After trying in vain to recover my passport yesterday, I went again to the migration office today to get my shining new month-long visa that allows me to go forward with the process of getting the next, year-long one. I was surprised to be told that there was a problem with my application. Apparently the problem is that, although in order to apply for this visa I needed to have a work contract, it is illegal to have a work contract without having the visa in the first place. Has anyone read Catch 22? Hmmm…quite.
After being reprimanded by the same guy who gave me the list of required documentation to apply for this visa (by God, how could I think I could have a work contract without this visa!!) I was told an ‘inspector’ will call in to ‘fine’ me and my company for this transgression.
So, can this ‘problem’ be solved with money? Yes it can. Of course I smell a rat, a corrupt one at that, but can do nothing about it until this ‘inspector’ calls because the fucker has my passport. And when he calls in, do I shut up and give him the money he asks for or do I shoot him? I feel like doing the latter but you will have to wait and see what happens on the next episode of this saga…coming to your computer screens veeeeery soon.
If anyone has any useful suggestions as to how to proceed, please write with comments….
Thursday 26 March 2009
How to confront Bolivian bureaucracy and survive (I hope)
Ok so I have been here since September so I was about to get into trouble with the law. Normally when one enters the country, it is possible to get up to 90 days stay without visa. Until this year, most foreigners who lived in the country could go to a border point every three months, leave and re-enter the country asking for another 90 days. A friend told me he knew of someone who had spent the last 16 years doing just that!!
So, I thought, I could do the same. Except that things have changed and you now get 90 days stay maximum each year. So I stayed for 90 days between September and the end of December, point at which Karen and I went to Chile for New Year. That was my quota of time for 2008. On my return in January, I asked for permission to remain in the country for another 90 days and these are coming to an end next week.
Ohhh noooo…..what am I going to do?? Student visa? No, since you have to apply for it back in the UK. Could I get a visa as my wife’s dependent? No, because she has a volunteer’s resident permit (don’t ask me why, it’s a long story) and as such, cannot, in theory, have dependents.
Should I simply stay on as an illegal? I am yet to find out what the penalty for this might be. I hope a fine and expulsion from the country but then I rather not find out even though this is a country with one third of its population living abroad and, in the case of those in Europe – typically in Spain – 80 per cent of Bolivians are there illegally. Would the authorities here show more understanding with me, another one “…of those fu%^&ing immigrants who come over here to steal our jobs, our women and to bring diseases?” (Sorry but I had to repeat language that a friend in Spain was telling me is becoming rather common to refer to migrants over there).
Best not to find out, I thought. I wouldn’t want to spend a day in San Pedro Prison even though it appears to be a rather popular tourist destination, subject of a book that has made it to a best sellers’ list among backpackers and where, it is said, one can find the cheapest drugs in the city. News of this has become a minor scandal in the country in the last two weeks. Still…best not to find out.
So, instead, I am about to confront the bureaucratic nightmare that seems to be part of getting temporary residency for one year. I am really lucky because as part of a little job I was asked to do for a local NGO, I was given what 70 per cent of Bolivians who work in the informal economy do not have: a contract. Even more than that. When it emerged that a consultancy contract was not enough to satisfy the bureaucratic needs of the process, my friend Cecilia the administrator of this NGO, issued me a common contract that includes a monthly salary, pension and health care contributions… the lot. Can anyone imagine this with Bolivians living in the UK? I don’t think so.
So it appears I now have the most important thing needed to justify a request for a 12 month temporary residency permit. Well, more or less. This new contract has to go to the ministry of employment where for US $ 50 someone will stamp it in two, three... (nobody knows) weeks. But I still need a zillion other documents and signatures to actually get the permit. Do you want to know the list?
OK, here is the process (It will help me write it down so that I know what I am doing). When you apply for temporary residency, you actually have to apply for two separate visas. The first is a 30 day visa “de objeto determinado”(for a given reason - what on earth does that mean?) In order to get this, you need:
• A photocopy of the passport with the entry stamp indicating you are still legally in the country plus the original passport
• The work contract
• A letter stamped by a notary requesting the above visa
• US $300
In my case, I still don’t have the ‘real’ contract but it seems that for US $ 300 you can save yourself the hassle, at least for this one. OK, so after queuing for a while, being told I didn’t have a formal letter (it wasn’t on my list! Honest!), and finally reaching the top of the queue, this man checks you have all the required documentation and then sends you to another window (window number 9), where you pay the money and buy an ‘official folder’ in which to include your documentation (including the passport) and an ‘official form’ in which you write your request for this visa (yet again). After this, you are sent to another window (window number 10) where another person inputs the information written in your ‘official form’ into a computer screen, takes your passport away and gives you a receipt to collect your 30 day visa three days later…this time, I am told, in window number 8.
Pheeewww! Ok, so that was easy. Now begins the difficult bit, getting a 12 month visa. For that, I need the following documentation:
• A memorial (this is some kind of more ‘grand’ letter signed by a notary) making a formal request for this visa
• My passport with the previous 30 day visa
• A photocopy of my passport
• A copy of my employment contract stamped by the ministry of employment plus a photocopy of my employer’s company register
OK, so far so good. But wait, wait, there is more. I also need:
A certificate from INTERPOL saying that I have no previous criminal record. For that, I need:
• My passport and photocopies of it (many, they don't specify how many)
• My legalised contract
• Two photos
• I have to fill in an 'official' form
• Pay US $ 5
• Undergo an interview where they ask me what the hell I want to do in Bolivia
• Give my fingerprints
And after doing that, I can go and collect my INTERPOL certificate one, two, three…(nobody knows) weeks later
Once I have that, I need another certificate of my criminal record, this time from the Bolivian police. For that I need:
• A letter from the notary requesting this certificate (sounds familiar?)
• My passport and more photocopies of it
• And, surprise surprise, a copy of the INTERPOL certificate
OK, so that doesn’t look so bad. But I also need from the police proof of address in Bolivia. But in order to get this, I have to take the following:
• A letter signed by the notary (this sounds familiar) asking the national director of the Bolivian police that I need this certificate
• A photocopy of my passport
• A photocopy of the last payment of property tax (from the flat owner)
• Photocopies of gas, water and electric bills in my house (the fact that they are all in the name of the owner because it is virtually impossible to change them is a problem we will have to sort out when we get there)
• Photocopies of the ID cards of two neighbours who act as witnesses and attest I live there
• A hand drawing of where the flat is located (What?? Are you kidding me??)
• A copy of the INTERPOL certificate that specifies my current address and my previous one
• A photocopy of the rental agreement
• A photocopy of the owner’s ID
OK, we are almost there. In the unlikely event that I can get all this stuff, I will have to wait for this certificate for two, three…(nobody knows) weeks. And once I get it, I will then be able to go for the last step in the whole saga and get the medical certificate in some hospital or other where I will need:
• An ‘official’ certificate form to fill in @ US $ 5
• US $ 20 for the medical exam that includes urine and blood test (including HIV- is this dodgy or what?), a dental examination, and a chest X ray.
Once all of this is done, I can go away and return two, three…(nobody knows) weeks later to collect my medical certificate.
At last! Now I only have to go back to migration with all of these certificates and pay US $ 150. And after that, they will keep my passport for two, three… (nobody knows) weeks after which I will have an ID card that gives me the right to stay in Bolivia for a whole year. I am wondering if the entire process can take place before I actually have to return to the UK in August. But then, nobody can say that I didn’t try which should be a pretty good argument if, after getting into this labyrinth, I cannot get out. Wish me luck.
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