Thousands of protesters gathered in Buenos Aires yesterday to reject gender violence and demand government action. Part of Argentina's Ni Una Menos movement against femicides, the demonstration was spurred by the killing of Úrsula Bahillo last week. The 18-year-old was stabbed to death by her police officer ex-boyfriend -- the attack occurred after she had made several reports to authorities about his ongoing harassment. (See last Wednesday's briefs.)
298 women were killed last year in Argentina, 54 had previously reported violence, 19 had court orders against their attackers, and 15 of the murderers were police officers, according to activists. So far this year, 49 women have been killed, and activists are frustrated by unrelenting violence despite the high-profile fight against femicides in recent years. (Infobae, CNN)
Inadequate response to women's reports of threats, as occurred in Úrsula's case, is the latest focal point of women's rights activists in Argentina, who say women often face further violence after reporting abuse to the police. There is also a focus on incidents of gender violence carried out by members of the security forces. Femicides by police officers are recurrent -- over the past decade there have been 48 women killed by members of the police force in Argentina, reports CELS. (Página 12, Infobae)
Nearly six years after the first Ni Una Menos march in Argentina, one of the movement's leaders, Mariana Carbajal, asks if the government cannot prevent femicides, or doesn't want to -- pointing to the faulty implementation of a 2006 comprehensive sex education law, an example of a long-term strategy for reducing gender violence. (Página 12)
An activist open letter demanded national and local governments make combating gender violence a priority, with particular focus on forcing the judicial sector to take women's reports of violence seriously. (Página 12) President Alberto Fernández met with Úrsula's parents before yesterday's protest, and promised to create a federal council to address femicides and extreme violence against women and LGBTQI. (Página 12)
News Briefs
Vaccines
- Mexico asked wealthier countries to stop hoarding coronavirus vaccines. Three-quarters of the first doses have been administered to citizens in only 10 countries that account for 60% of global gross domestic product (GDP), Mexican foreign minister Marcelo Ebrard said at the U.N. Security Council yesterday. He also noted that so far no vaccines have been distributed under the global Covax initiative. (Reuters)
- Countries participating in the Covax coronavirus vaccine distribution mechanism will soon receive confirmation of their first shipments but should expect them to be small due to limited global supplies, the director of the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) said yesterday. (Reuters)
- A coronavirus vaccine developed by Cuba is about to enter final testing stages, if it is successful the country could be on the path to mass inoculation and vaccine exports by the end of the year, reports the New York Times. The vaccine, dubbed Sovereign 2, could also become a tourist pull, as officials have said the island could offer vaccinations to all foreigners who travel there.
- Cuban scientists say the government will probably give away some doses to poor countries, in keeping with its longstanding practice of strengthening international relations by donating medicine and sending doctors to address public health crises abroad, reports the New York Times. (See yesterday's Just Caribbean Updates on vaccine solidarity in the Caribbean.)
- Brazilian researchers an experiment -- the first of its kind globally -- to vaccinate the entire adult population of Serrana, population 45,000, in São Paulo state in order to test whether inoculated people can still transmit Covid-19. They also hope to counter Brazil’s growing antivaccination movement and demonstrate the wider benefits of mass immunization, such as a quick economic recovery, reports the Wall Street Journal.
- Covid conspiracy theories -- like rumors that the vaccine turns recipients into animals, or that it includes a chip ‘to control the Indigenous people’ -- are hampering efforts to inoculate Brazil's Indigenous population, reports Al Jazeera.
- Police in Brazil are investigating allegations that healthcare workers are giving fake Covid-19 inoculations, amid reports of nurses injecting people with empty syringes, reports the Guardian.
- Peruvians are furious about "Vaccinegate" the revelation that former president Martín Vizcarra and 467 public officials secretly received coronavirus vaccine jabs in October. (Washington Post) The issue isn't that Vizcarra was vaccinated, notes the Latin America Risk Report, but that he lied.
Jamaica
- Jamaica's government is responsible for violating the rights of two gay people and the country’s homophobic laws should be repealed immediately, according to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. The report, which is from 2019 but could not be reported on before, sets a precedent for LGBT rights across the Caribbean, reports the Guardian. It is the commission’s first finding that laws that criminalize LGBT people violate international law.
Venezuela
- A woman accused by Colombian prosecutors of participating in a plot to overthrow Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro said Colombian authorities and Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaidó were part of the plan. Her claims raise new questions about the role of staunch U.S. ally Colombia in the so-called Operation Gideon, reports the Associated Press.
Migration
- A group of 350 migrants attempted to force their way into Peru from Brazil, but were largely deflected by Peruvian authorities. (EFE)
Regional
- Indigenous communities in some of the world’s most forested tropical countries have faced a wave of human rights abuses during the Covid-19 pandemic as governments prioritise extractive industries in economic recovery plans, according to a new report produced by the NGO, Yale Law School researchers and the School of Law at Middlesex University London.
Carnival
- Rio de Janeiro's Carnival celebrations are officially cancelled, but the parties have just gone underground, reports the Washington Post.
Did I miss something, get something wrong, or do you have a different take? Let me know ...
No comments:
Post a Comment