Ortega starts fifth mandate (Jan. 11, 2022)

Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega was sworn into office for his fourth consecutive term yesterday, and the second with his wife, Rosario Murillo at his side as vice president, consolidating the country's autocratic governance after a sham election last year. (Reuters)

Ortega promised to return the country to its pre-April, 2018 "economic growth," a pointed reference to the start of widespread anti-government protests that started then and were brutally repressed by his regime. Murillo also referenced the protest movement, which she called a "terrible episode" promoted by "retrogrades." The government maintains more than 160 political prisoners, reports Confidencial.

Ortega's reelection in November was widely condemned as fraudulent,Ortega imprisoned the majority of potential opposition candidates throughout 2021. Dozens remain locked up in deplorable conditions, lacking medical attention, reports El País. Women detainees have been particularly singled out for abuse, say relatives.

Many countries shunned the inauguration ceremony yesterday, though Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, Cuban President Miguel Diaz Canel and Honduran Juan Orlando Hernández participated, and China, Russia and Iran sent representatives. 

The United States and the European Union imposed sanctions on Nicaraguan officials, including the defense minister, yesterday, part of a strategy aimed at increasing pressure on Ortega's government. The UK and Canada said they might follow suit.

But "the real effect of the series of sanctions and condemnations is unclear," notes El Faro. And with the most well-known opposition figures jailed or in exile, Nicaraguan opposition groups are trying out different tactics. A group of Nicaraguans in exile, made up of less prominent opposition figures, believe the solution is to build a “collective leadership” that they call the National Transition Council with the goal of overthrowing the dictatorship and establishing a new government. They convened a Congress on Jan. 9 and elected seven members.

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Report links Henry to Moïse assassination suspect

New evidence links Haitian Prime Minister Ariel Henry to a prime suspect in the July assassination of President Jovenel Moïse, reports the New York Times. The report adds to previous allegations linking Henry to Joseph Felix Badio, a former justice ministry official wanted by the Haitian authorities on suspicion of organizing the attack that killed Moïse.

The New York Times also interviewed Rodolphe Jaar, a Haitian businessman and former drug trafficker detained last week after six months on the run. (See yesterday's briefs.) Jaar admitted to helping finance and plan the plot but claimed that he thought the goal of the plot had been to depose, not kill, the president.

Henry’s term ends on February 7, though without a clear path forward, it’s possible that Henry will attempt to hold on to power for months, according to the Latin America Risk Report. "Haiti is likely to hold elections this year, though these elections are going to be flawed and polarizing."

This week the Haiti Unity Summit will meet at the Southern University Law Center, with the goal of reaching a consensus agreement on how to form a government of transition and set the stage for a pathway to free and fair elections -- it is the best bet for a Haitian-led political transition, argues Russel Honoré in a Miami Herald opinion piece.

News Briefs

Migration

• The U.S. Coast Guard pulled 176 Haitians from an overloaded, unseaworthy wooden sailing vessel as it approached the Florida Keys, yesterday. U.S. interdictions of Haitian migrants at sea have increased sharply this year, reports the Associated Press.
  
  
• The U.S. Biden administration's former special envoy to Haiti, Daniel Foote, said the ongoing U.S. deportation policy could further destabilize the already fragile country. (The Hill)
  
  
• Would-be Guatemalan migrants face skyrocketing prices for human smugglers, in part due to the pandemic and shifting migratory controls, reports Al Jazeera. This has "made an already lucrative human smuggling industry even more so for criminal enterprises, while migrants suffer the brunt of the consequences."

Venezuela

• As Venezuela enters another year in a deep political and humanitarian crisis, WOLA's Geoff Ramsey sketches out the best-case, worst-case, and status quo outcomes for 2022. Without mobilization by Venezuelan protagonists, and significant reforms and concessions from the de facto Maduro government, the status quo is essentially guaranteed, he writes. "In each case, however, it is clear that decisions made in Washington over the next twelve months will impact likely outcomes. While the U.S. cannot unilaterally resolve Venezuela’s crisis, it is an essential actor in the multilateral search for a solution." (Venezuelan Politics and Human Rights)
  
  
• The best-case scenario Ramsey outlines requires an end to U.S. policy inertia: "A road map pairing sanctions relief with democratic reforms is carefully coordinated with Venezuelan and international allies, while the White House takes care not to impose its own agenda on a Venezuelan-led process ... Maduro and key members of his coalition perceive a clear benefit to participating in negotiations focused on overdue and fair elections." (Venezuelan Politics and Human Rights)

Regional Relations

• Honduran president-elect Xiomara Castro's first trip abroad will likely be to Mexico, according to a LIBRE ally, and she will seek to emulate Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador's cooperation with the U.S., despite maintaining a leftist stance. (Aristegui Noticias)

Honduras

• Castro will assume office on January 27 with an unprecedented rights agenda strongly shaped by women’s activism and other social movements, writes Suyapa Portillo Villeda in Nacla. In her campaign and platform, Castro embraced gender rights and sought to address femicides and structural violence against women and LGBTI communities—issues ignored in previous campaigns.
  
  
• Pablo Isabel Hernández, a local leader of Honduras’ Indigenous Lenca group was shot to death Sunday, near the town of San Marcos de Caiquín. Hernández served as director of a radio station known as “Radio Tenan, the Indigenous Voice of the Lencas.” He was also active in Indigenous education and environmental projects, reports the Associated Press.
  
  
• Thalía Rodríguez, a prominent transgender activist in Honduras was killed yesterday. She was shot in the head outside her home in Tegucigalpa, the 400th trans person to be reported killed in Honduras since 2009. (Los Angeles Blade)
  

Regional

• Latin America’s transition away from oil and gas is well underway, with green energy investments bearing fruit in countries including Colombia, Uruguay, Argentina and Brazil, energy analyst Luisa Palacios told the AQ Podcast.
  

Argentina

• Argentina's insistence on its deficit spending plan is putting it on a fresh collision course with the International Monetary Fund, reports Reuters, though analysts still believe the country will reach a deal.
  
  
• Sixteen U.S. Democratic lawmakers are urging U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen to back a review aimed at ending the International Monetary Fund's policy of charging countries significant surcharges on larger loans that are not repaid quickly, reports Reuters. Argentina, which is expected to spend some $3.3 billion on surcharges from 2018 to 2023, has repeatedly asked for temporary relief from the surcharges given the COVID crisis.
  

Mexico

• Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador tested positive for Covid-19 -- his second bout. He announced the test results yesterday afternoon, after appearing visibly ill at a Monday morning news conference, and without a mask as he spoke to reporters. “Don’t do an AMLO and self isolate if you have flu-like symptoms,” read a headline in the El Financiero newspaper. (Washington Post)

Did I miss something, get something wrong, or do you have a different take? Let me know ... 

Latin America Daily Briefing

Venezuelan opposition wins Barinas (Jan. 10, 2022)

 A Venezuelan opposition candidate won a special gubernatorial election in Barinas state yesterday -- a significant blow against Nicolás Maduro's government. Garrido obtained 55.36 percent of the vote, according to the National Electoral Council (CNE), while his opponent, former foreign minister Jorge Arreaza, obtained 41.26. (Efecto Cocuyo)

The special election was organized after an opposition contender in November’s regional elections was retroactively disqualified as he was ahead in the vote count. The move added to questions about the fairness of Venezuela’s electoral process after the first vote in years in which most major political parties participated. (See post for last Nov. 22, and Dec. 10's briefs.)

Though international observers regarded the November 21 elections as the most free and inclusive process the country has seen in years, the elections occurred in a fundamentally uneven playing field, according to the preliminary reports of the European Union and Carter Center. "Nowhere was this more apparent than in the case of Barinas," writes Kristen Martinez-Gugerli in WOLA's Venezuela Update.

Garrido's defeat of Arreaza is particularly symbolic in Barinas, late President Hugo Chavez's home state and longtime government stronghold, notes the Associated Press. Arreaza conceded defeat on social media even before officials released the results. It was the first time in more than two decades, no member of Chávez’s family was on the ballot in the northwestern state. 

Following the determination of a special election for the state's governor, the Maduro government deployed significant resources -- high level officials campaigned and handouts were marshaled for the population -- aimed at maintaining control in Barinas, making the loss even more significant, notes Efecto Cocuyo.

Opposition leader Juan Guaidó, welcomed the result in Barinas yesterday: “Beautiful Barinas, where it started, ends,” he tweeted, referring to the cradle of Chavismo. 

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Haitian journalists killed

Two Haitian journalists were killed by gang members while reporting in a conflictive area south of Port-au-Prince, last Thursday. A third journalist who was part of the group survived. (See Friday's briefs.) One of the journalist’s employers and some media reports said the men had been shot then burned alive, reports the Associated Press. Later reports indicate the victims were not burned.

Local media reported that the three journalists were crossing a canal separating one gang territory from another when a group of armed individuals opened fire on them from a vehicle, on Thursday. Members of Haiti's National Police did not go to the scene of the crime that day due to security concerns. Without enough resources, the police were concerned they could face severe danger from gangs operating in the area, reports CNN. The bodies were finally recovered Friday afternoon by police accompanied by a justice of the peace.

Laboule 12, where the journalists were killed, has for months been the site of violent gang clashes and is the only way by road to reach the southern region of the country, which has been cut off since June by gang violence at the southern entrance of Port-au-Prince, reports the Miami Herald.

The Committee to Protect Journalists condemned the killings and called on Haitian authorities to conduct “a swift and thorough” investigation.

More Haiti

• Convicted drug trafficker and former DEA informant Rodolphe Jaar, who had been in hiding since Haitian President Jovenel Moïse was assassinated last July, has been apprehended in the Dominican Republic, reports the Miami Herald. Jaar, also known as “Dodof,” was arrested Friday in Santo Domingo by Dominican authorities after crossing from Haiti. He was detained at the request of U.S. authorities based on statements provided by Mario Antonio Palacios Palacios, a retired Colombian sergeant charged by U.S. authorities in the assassination. (See last Thursday's briefs.)
  
  
• Underpinning much of Haiti's troubles is environmental injustice and food insecurity, with 4.4 million people (of a population of nearly 11 million) at risk of hunger, reports the Guardian. Haiti's grassroots Papaye Peasant Movement (MPP) works to tackle deforestation and the climate crisis in Haiti’s poorest regions by working with subsistence farmers.
  

News Briefs

Brazil

• Ten people were killed by a giant rock slab that fell off a cliff in a popular tourist spot in Minas Gerais, in Brazil. Onlookers filmed the rock slide onto tourist boats in Lake Furnas, and the videos went viral in Brazil, where intense rain and flooding in recent weeks have left at least 20 other people dead and damaged thousands of homes. (New York Times, Associated Press, Washington Post)
  
  
• Brazilian health regulator Anvisa's head asked vaccine-skeptic President Jair Bolsonaro to retract statements he made criticizing the agency for authorizing the vaccination of children against Covid-19, reports Reuters. A few weeks ago, Bolsonaro asked for the names of health officials who approved Covid vaccines for children, saying he planned to make their identities public despite previous death threats.
  
  
• Evangelical Andre Mendonça’s appointment to the Supreme Court marks the beginning of a new era of increased evangelical influence in Brazil, argues Raphael Tsavkko Garcia in Al Jazeera. "Throughout Bolsonaro’s presidency the Supreme Court served as the final, and sometimes only, line of resistance against deeply conservative, and at times discriminatory and dangerous, policies supported by evangelicals on issues like minority rights, abortion access and drugs regulation. Mendonça’s arrival to the bench will likely inhibit the court’s ability to resist such policies and allow evangelicals to increase their influence over Brazilian politics further."

Colombia

• Leftist Colombian presidential candidate Gustavo Petro has lost his claim to represent socially progressive voters, in a bid to expand his 2018 voter base by building alliances with more traditional politicians, argues Mariana Palau in Americas Quarterly. Petro's new allies have alienated those who were once faithful to him, most notably feminists, many of whom have become some of his fiercest critics.
  
  
• Victor Escobar became the first person Colombia with a non-terminal illness to die by legally regulated euthanasia late on Friday, reports Reuters.
  
  
• Martha Sepúlveda, a 51-year-old Colombian woman died by euthanasia on Saturday after a historic legal battle to exercise the right without a terminal prognosis, reports the Washington Post. Her plan to terminate her life was postponed for months, after a medical committee said she did not meet the legal requirements.

Chile

• Chile's "new left" has brought hope, but president-elect Gabriel Boric faces significant challenges, including the national version of the regional phenomenon of the "new right": radicals "who mobilize moral discourse, evangelical churches and Catholic hard-liners, and xenophobic agitation against migrants and fear of feminist gains and the LGBTQ movement," writes Franck Gaudichaud in The Nation.

Ecuador

• The tallest mountain in the Galápagos islands, Wolf Volcano, has erupted, spewing lava down its flanks and clouds of ash over the Pacific Ocean. There was no immediate danger to populated areas. (Associated Press)
  

Arts

• The Tate Britain’s show “Life Between Islands: Caribbean-British Art, 1950s — Now” charts 70 years of Caribbean-British art through the works of over 40 artists with either Caribbean heritage or other connections to those islands. It tackles the themes of identity and family, colonialism and racism, and celebrates the richness of Caribbean culture, reports the New York Times.
  

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Latin America Daily Briefing

CJNG violence in Mexico (Jan. 7, 2022)

 News Briefs

Mexico

• An SUV filled with 10 bodies was left outside the office of Mexico's Zacatacas state governor. Authorities said the bodies had apparent signs of beating and bruising. Zacatecas has become one of the most violent regions of the country due to turf wars among rival gangs, reports the Guardian.
  
  
• Murders have spiked in Mexico's northern state of Sonora, thanks to the volatile mix of a veteran drug trafficker's alleged return, internal disputes within the Sinaloa Cartel, and an offensive by the powerful Jalisco Cartel New Generation, reports InSight Crime.
  
  
• The Jalisco Cartel New Generation (CJNG), led by Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes, is at the center of national and international security policies due to the extreme violence which has accompanied its expansion in Mexico, where violence has been intricately linked to the groups rapid territorial spread, reports InSight Crime.
  
  
• Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s plans to rollback his predecessor's energy reforms are a grave threat, not only to the economy but also to the rule of law, according to the Economist.
  
  
• Indigenous communities in Oaxaca, Mexico, are replacing corn crops with cannabis in anticipation of marijuana being legalized in the country, reports Axios.
  

Regional Relations

• Mexico’s government has invited Chilean president-elect Gabriel Boric to visit the country, with lithium mining likely to feature on the bilateral agenda going forward, Mexican Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard said yesterday after a visit with Boric. (Reuters)
  
  
• The Mexican government requested a dispute resolution panel under the U.S.-Mexico-Canada free trade agreement because it claims the United States is improperly interpreting stricter regional content rules under the pact, reports the Associated Press.
  

Migration

• Mexico formally announced new visa requirements for visitors from Venezuela, as part of efforts to curb a sharp increase in undocumented immigration at the U.S.-Mexico border, reports Reuters.
  

Haiti

• Two journalists in Haiti were killed yesterday by a gang operating on the outskirts of the capital Port-au-Prince, according to the radio station that employed one of the victims. A third journalist, who was with them at the time, escaped, reports AFP.
  

Brazil

• Brazil will stop monitoring deforestation in the Cerrado, the world's most species-rich savanna, a government researcher has said, citing a lack of funds, days after data showed destruction hitting a 6-year high in 2021, reports Reuters. (See Tuesday's briefs.)
  
  
• Former Brazilian judge Sergio Moro's supporters hope he can present a viable challenge to President Jair Bolsonaro's reelection, and to former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva's own comeback bid, though polls put the onetime anti-corruption crusader at a distant third. Corruption is Moro's signature issue, but his actual track record is checkered, writes Mac Margolis in a Washington Post opinion.
  
  
• Brazilian businesswoman Luiza Trajano made waves with a company policy limiting her Magazine Luiza executive training program to Black applicants -- an effort to combat the country's structural racism, reports the New York Times. Trajano has made waves far beyond corporate spheres by speaking bluntly about issues like race, inequality, domestic violence and the failings of the political system.
  
  
• Video games involving politicians have gone viral in Brazil, reports the Economist, a reflection of polarized politics, but also politics but also the history of video games in the country where Indie games have long been popular, reports the Economist.
  
  
• Private covid tests in Brazil show the coronavirus omicron variant is taking off, even if official data is failing to reflect the toll of the new wave, reports Bloomberg. A series of cyberattacks on Brazilian government websites in December compromised the Ministry of Health's DataSUS platform, which gathers information on COVID-19 cases and deaths.
  
  The platform remains down. (See yesterday's briefs.)

Regional

• Long lines and crowding have overwhelmed Covid-19 testing centers in Mexico, Argentina, Bolivia, and Peru in recent days. These obstacles mean infections are likely even more underreported than usual, and could have a political knock-on effect, reports the Latin America Brief.
  
  
• South America, one of the most unequal regions in the world, managed to become a Covid-19 vaccination leader, due to a combination of factors that include a culture of vaccination, tragic pandemic health tolls, and economic necessity, reports El País.
  
  
• The Wilson Center has a new study that examines the environmental impacts of soy and beef production in South America. Author André Vasconcelos argues that current efforts to address deforestation are focused largely on the Amazon region while ignoring other important, highly diverse biomes. He argues that shifting targets to combat deforestation to “specific production regions" offers a "strategic opportunity" for Chinese and European buyers to address the environmental impacts of large-scale beef and soy production.  
  
  
• Considered the world's sixth largest illicit economy, illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing accounts for around 20 percent of worldwide catch. In Latin America, that figure can be even higher, reaching nearly 50 percent in countries like Mexico, reports InSight Crime in a deep-dive on the spree of illicit fishing across the region in 2021, much of it driven by competition for diminishing catch.
  

Venezuela

• Venezuela's Guaidó government eliminated its Centro de Gobierno, an administrative unit run by Voluntad Popular party founder Leopoldo López. It is part of a series of reforms accorded by the 2015 National Assembly, which this week extended interim-president Juan Guaidó's mandate and its own term by another year, reports Efecto Cocuyo. (See Tuesday's post.)
  
  
• The changes are unlikely to have real budgetary or operative impact, reports Crónica Uno.

Argentina

• Nearly half the female prisoners in Argentina are serving time for drug possession. Photographer Magalí Druscovich portrays some in a Guardian photo essay. They form part of a regional pattern: aggressive drug policies are filling Latin America's prisons with women, many of whom are forced into the drug business because they have no other alternatives to support their families.
  

El Salvador

• El Faro reports that there are signs of schisms within El Salvador's Nuevas Ideas' legislative bloc. The ruling party hasn't lost any congressional votes as a result, but the growing internal dissatisfaction relates to budget, lack of press exposure, and fear of U.S. sanctions.

Guyana

• ExxonMobil said that it made two additional oil discoveries off the coast of Guyana, reports the Associated Press.
  

Cuba

• A garlic shortage, and rising prices, hint at larger problems in Cuba, reports the Economist.
  

Peru

• A newly erected statue of a grinning man with an enormous phallus has prompted delight and rage in an archeological hotspot in northern Peru. (Guardian)
  

Did I miss something, get something wrong, or do you have a different take? Let me know ... 

Latin America Daily Briefing

Brazil's election polarized (Jan. 6, 2022)

News Briefs

Brazil

• Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro and former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva have polarized this year's presidential race in Brazil, leaving little room for alternative candidates, reports Americas Quarterly in a "Meet the Candidates."
  
  
• "Bolsonaro’s years of misrule have left a yearning for stability" in Brazil. "Even conservative elites are adjusting to the idea of the Workers’ Party leader as president again," writes Vincent Bevins in the New York Review of Books. But it's not just popularity, he warns, "in weighing whether Lula might return to govern in 2022, it is crucial to understand how and why Brazil’s varied institutional forces—where power actually resides in moments of crisis—might be willing to let him."
  
  
• In the meantime, Brazilian generals have emerged as key power brokers, amid fears Bolsonaro may try to prevent a peaceful transition if he loses his reelection bid, writes Oliver Stuenkel in Americas Quarterly. The specifics of the electoral results will likely matter a lot: generals would likely stay out of a landslide Lula win, but coup-mongers could be emboldened if Lula's margin of victory is narrow.
  
  
• "The potential for political violence later in the year will be preceded by mass disinformation all year long," warns the Latin America Risk Report.
  
  
• Brazil's political polarization has spilled over into the pub and pizzeria scenes -- Guardian.
  
  
• Rio de Janeiro’s renowned Carnival parade will be held this year, but the city will cancel its street parties. Other major cities such as Olinda, São Luís and Florianópolis also canceled their Carnival events. (New York Times)
  

Haiti

• Mario Antonio Palacios Palacios, who is accused of participating in the July assassination of Haitian President Jovenel Moïse, sought to escape back to his native Colombia, where his lawyers said he planned to get in touch with the American Embassy to “bring clarity” to his role in the killing, reports the Miami Herald. Palacios was detained by U.S. authorities en route to Colombia, and accused of conspiracy to commit murder or kidnap outside the United States, and providing material support resulting in death. (See yesterday's briefs.)
  
  
• An unidentified person paid a ransom that freed three missionaries kidnapped by a gang in Haiti under an agreement that was supposed to have led to the release of all 15 remaining captives early in December, reports the Associated Press.
  

Regional

• A cyberattack that hit government websites in Brazil, including a Covid-19 health data platform, has stoked concerns about a surge in ransomware attacks on critical infrastructure in Latin American countries, reports InSight Crime.

Guatemala

• Guatemalan Indigenous authorities have become increasingly influential in the construction of broad-based political movements connecting Indigenous communities and campesino cooperatives with urban middle-class progressives, particularly given the country's fractured civil society, reports El Faro English.
  

Peru

• Peru's attorney general opened a preliminary investigation against President Pedro Castillo on Monday on allegations of collusion and influence peddling in cases related to government public works contracts, reports Reuters. Castillo said the allegations are politically motivated and untrue.
  

El Salvador

• El Salvador’s Supreme Court ordered the re-opening of an investigation into the 1989 massacre of six Jesuit priests. Attempts within El Salvador to investigate and prosecute the masterminds of the killings during the country’s civil war have been deflected by legal maneuvers for years, reports the Associated Press.
  

Guatemala

• The trial has begun in Guatemala of five former paramilitary soldiers accused of raping 36 indigenous Mayan women during the 1980s, reports the BBC.
  

Chile

• Chilean Constitutional Convention delegates chose epidemiologist María Elisa Quinteros as the body's new head, after nine rounds of voting. (See yesterday's briefs.) She is an environmental epidemiologist, and was selected as part of the Asamblea Popular por la Dignidad y Movimientos Sociales Constituyentes. She will be seconded by rural medic and gay activist Gaspar Domínguez. (Al Jazeera, CNN, CNN)

• Historian Joshua Frens-String spoke to Jacobin on how the Chilean working-class dream of “wine and empanadas” became the basis for a political revolution, and how that dream can be revived amid a left-wing resurgence in the country today. His new book Hungry for Revolution: The Politics of Food and the Making of Modern Chile, shows that underlying the Allende government's drive for agrarian reform and consumer protections was a vision of working-class abundance  that had deep roots in Chile’s century-old socialist movement.
  

Correction: Yesterday I said that opposition parties did not participate in Venezuela's 2020 legislative elections. I should have said the country's principal opposition parties boycotted the process, which was marked by significant irregularities, including government intervention in the leadership of several main opposition parties. Maduro's allies won 91 percent of seats in that election, which was widely considered fraudulent.

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Latin America Daily Briefing

Guaidó's mandate extended (Jan. 5, 2022)

Venezuelan opposition parties extended the mandate of Juan Guaidó, the person they recognize as the nation’s legitimate leader, in a vote late Monday. But the opposition delegates curbed Guaidó's powers amid criticism of his management of overseas assets and his failure to make headway in his campaign to oust the government of Nicolás Maduro. (EFE)

The changes reflect increasing disagreement among opposition parties and a power struggle among them. (Cronica Uno) 

Guaidó now faces restrictions on the use of money from foreign assets and greatly reducing his diplomatic corps. Many figures in the opposition saw the moves as a sign of widening divisions in the opposition that will ultimately strengthen Maduro, reports the Wall Street Journal. 

Guaidó will still be able to appoint ambassadors to countries that recognize him, but they will have to be approved by a commission of lawmakers. The commission will name representatives to countries and multilateral organizations that do not recognize Guaidó, reports Efecto Cocuyo. The reform also eliminates the Centro de Gobierno coordinated by Leopoldo López.

Guaidó was declared interim-president by the opposition-dominated National Assembly in 2019, and received broad international recognition. But the opposition did not participate in highly questioned 2020 legislative elections, and the National Assembly sworn in a year ago is dominated by Maduro loyalists. A faction of opposition lawmakers declared a parallel assembly, which has now extended its own mandate for another year. (Efecto Cocuyo)

While Guaidó has lost much of his initial international recognition, the U.S. ratified it's support for his leadership and that of the opposition national assembly, yesterday. (State Department) The European Union stopped calling Guaidó “interim president,” last year, and now considers him “a privileged interlocutor” for negotiations regarding Venezuela.

"Guaidó’s claim is tenuous both legally and politically. He has never won a national election, his term as legislator expired more than a year ago, and his poll numbers are as low as Maduro’s," argues Francisco Rodríguez in a call for the U.S. to change its Venezuela policy. (Just Security)

The Biden policy towards Venezuela seems to be on auto-pilot, argues Geoff Ramsey in a Washington Post op-ed a few weeks ago. There are many questions over how the U.S.'s ongoing recognition of Guaidó will advance democracy in Venezuela—or how the White House plans on advancing a political solution, he argues.

"U.S. economic sanctions toward Venezuela – which, in contrast to those of other nations, block the country’s access to export and financial markets – have played a crucial role in limiting the country’s access to foreign exchange, contributing to a collapse of 72 percent in the country’s per capita income – the equivalent of four Great Depressions and the largest contraction ever documented in Latin America," according to Rodríguez.

More Venezuela

• In the midst of Venezuela's economic collapse, casinos—and the dollar—are king again, writes William Neuman in The Atlantic.

News Briefs

Regional

• Latin America is shifting leftwards, fueled by indignation over economic suffering, widening inequality, fervent anti-incumbent sentiment and mismanagement of Covid-19. Elections in Colombia and Brazil seem likely to confirm the trend -- if polls are correct, the left and center-left would be in power in the six largest economies in the region by the end of the year, reports the New York Times.
  
  
• The shift comes as the region has collectively lost faith in democracy, in part due to lasting inequalities, writes Asier Hernando Malax-Echevarría in El País. The shift towards greater state involvement faces structural challenges that will make progressive promises difficult to fulfill, he writes.
  
  
• The Latin America Risk Report argues that the shift is part of an ongoing anti-incumbency push, rather than an ideological swing leftwards. "The polling for upcoming elections and results from recent elections underscore that Latin American voters are voting against the status quo more so than for staunch leftism. Outsider candidates on the right have made significant strides too," writes James Bosworth.

Haiti

• The United States charged Mario Antonio Palacios, a retired Colombian commando, with taking part in the assassination of President Jovenel Moïse of Haiti. He is the first suspect to face U.S. prosecution in the crime, reports the New York Times. (See yesterday's briefs.)
  
  
• A criminal complaint filed in the Southern District of Florida in November and unsealed yesterday said that Palacios gave “voluntary statements” to U.S. law enforcement officials during an October interview in Jamaica, where he was detained after fleeing Haiti. The complaint alleges that Palacios was part of a group of some 20 Colombian ex-military personnel, several Haiti-based Haitian Americans and others who participated in the plot to kill Moïse, reports the Washington Post.
  
  
• Palacios has admitted in a media interview being in Moïse’s bedroom during the assault in which the president died, but has denied being involved in the killing, reports the Guardian.
  

Migration

• Legal  lawsuits and administrative complaints filed against the U.S. government by migrants who say their children were separated from them by the Trump administration are putting the Biden administration in a bind, reports the Washington Post.

Guatemala

• Twenty-five years after the end of Guatemala's thirty-six-year-long civil war, the lack of hope—resulting from an economic crisis and government inaction—is driving tens of thousands of people to migrate in search of opportunity, writes Jeff Abbott in the Progressive. 
  

Chile

• Chilean Constitutional Convention delegates failed to select new leaders in a marathon session yesterday, convention president Elisa Loncón said voting will resume today. Delegates carried out eight rounds of voting yesterday, but no candidate obtained the 78 votes required to replace Loncón who was elected last year for a six-month period. (EFE, see Monday's briefs.)

Colombia

• Five years after Colombia's peace accord with the FARC, the country is still struggling to resolve a displacement crisis that is only worsening, reports the Washington Post. Colombia has nearly 5 million internally displaced people, that includes at least 82,846 who were forcibly displaced between January and November 2021, a 169 percent increase from the previous year.

Cuba

• More than 90 percent of Cuba's population has been vaccinated with at least one dose of the country's nationally developed vaccines, while 83 percent have been fully inoculated, reports the Guardian. Of countries with populations of over a million, only the United Arab Emirates has a stronger vaccination record.
  

Brazil

• Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro has been discharged from hospital, two days after being admitted with an intestinal obstruction, his latest health complication from a 2018 stabbing, reports Reuters. (See yesterday's briefs.)
  
  
• São Paulo priest Júlio Lancellotti is an outspoken champion of homeless people – a cause that makes him unpopular with Brazil’s authorities, reports the Guardian.
  

Paraguay

• Environmentalists say construction of Paraguay's Bioceanic Corridor is a nightmare, that will accelerate destruction of the Chaco – the fastest-vanishing forest on Earth – and piling deadly pressure on its native inhabitants, including some who shun the outside world, reports the Guardian.

Argentina

• Argentina’s national intelligence agency presented a judicial accusation against former Buenos Aires province officials, accusing them of leading a secret scheme to "eliminate trade unions." The claim relates to a leaked video in which former labor minister, Marcelo Villegas, who served in Maria Eugenia Vidal's government, affirmed to businessmen: "If I could have a Gestapo, a shock force to finish off all the trade unions, I’d go ahead." (Buenos Aires Times)
  
  
• Argentine President Alberto Fernández has called on the judiciary to "investigate without delay" allegations of alleged espionage during the government of his predecessor Mauricio Macri. (Buenos Aires Times)
  
• Tensions within Argentina's ruling Frente de Todos coalition eased after last year's November's midterm elections, though it is unclear how ongoing government negotiations with the International Monetary Fund could affect the detente, writes Nick Burns in Americas Quarterly.
  
  
• Thousands of people protested yesterday along the beaches of Mar del Plata in Argentina to protest an oil exploration project off the Atlantic coast, reports AFP.
  

Did I miss something, get something wrong, or do you have a different take? Let me know ... 

Latin America Daily Briefing

Haitian PM dodged attack (Jan. 4, 2022)

Haitian Prime Minister Ariel Henry was forced to flee the northern city of Gonaïves, this weekend, after a shootout that left one person dead and two injured. Henry and other government officials were attending a New Year’s Day Mass to mark the country’s independence from France when the attack -- characterized as an assassination attempt by the prime minister's office -- occurred. 

Video footage broadcast on social media showed Henry and his entourage scrambling toward their vehicles as an armed group began shooting outside the city's cathedral, reports Reuters. Before the incident, a local gang boss had made threats against Henry in local media.

The shootout underscored the threat posed by violent gangs that control large swaths of the beleaguered Caribbean nation and that have been responsible for a surge in mass abductions for ransom, reports the Washington Post.

The incident is a fresh blow to Henry’s fragile interim regime, which is struggling with deepening poverty and  the surge in gang violence, reports the Associated Press.

More Haiti

• A suspected member of the group involved in the murder last year of Haiti’s president, Jovenel Moïse, has been detained while transiting through Panama after his deportation to his native Colombia by a Jamaican court. He is believed to have been put on a flight to the US, which, like Haiti, has issued an Interpol red notice requesting his arrest, reports Reuters.
  
  
• Though Mario Palacios Palacios is a key suspect in Moïse's assassination the fact that he has not been formally charged may have played a role in Jamaica’s failure to adhere to a request by Haitian authorities to extradite him to Port-au-Prince, reports the Miami Herald.
  
  
• The other 19 Colombian mercenaries detained in Haiti in relation to the assassination also remain in a legal limbo, in jail without access to lawyers, reports El País. Their families say the mercenaries have been tortured and coerced into confessing.

News Briefs

 

Regional

• Latin America's center right is in crisis, argues Open Society Foundations' Pedro Abramovay in an interview with Afonso Benites. "It is the center right that is running out of electoral space in Latin America. We have seen the emergence of a far right with such force that it’s shifting the debate, causing the left to rearrange itself." The issue is not one of increased polarization between the far right and far left, he argues, but rather a radicalization of the right. "The calculus of the center right has to be: is our commitment to democracy or to defeating the left?"

• "Political instability, violence and a lack of economic opportunities look likely to worsen during early 2022 and will provoke more displacement of people and migration, mainly northwards to the United States," reports InSight Crime, looking at specific dynamics of Haiti, the Northern Triangle and Venezuela. "The erosion of democracy and the continuing pandemic has also opened the door to criminal governance in many parts of the region."
  
  
• Criminal groups managed to thrive in the pandemic, and will adapt to the post-pandemic as well, notes James Bosworth at the Latin America Risk Report. "But it’s not the conditions of the pandemic that allow criminal groups to do well; it’s the lack of state capacity."

Brazil

• Deforestation last year rose to the highest level since 2015 in Brazil’s Cerrado savanna, a major carbon sink that helps to stave off climate change. Destruction of these trees, grasses and other plants in the Cerrado is a large source of Brazil’s greenhouse gas emissions, reports the Guardian.
  
  
• Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro was hospitalized yesterday with abdominal pain from an apparent intestinal obstruction, he announced on social media the surgery might be necessary. (Washington Post, New York Times, Associated Press)
  

Migration

• The number of people applying for refugee or asylum status in Mexico almost doubled between 2019 and 2021, reaching a historic high of over 130,000, likely related to the toughening of border enforcement and the slowdown in U.S. asylum processing, reports the Associated Press. Most applications came from Haitian and Honduran migrants, reports Reuters.
  
  
• Increasing difficulty in crossing the land border between Mexico and the U.S. has pushed more migrants to seek to cross by sea, reports El País.

Mexico

• A new wave of Covid-19 infections is spreading throughout Mexico, driven mainly by the large number of people in high-density tourist areas, reports El País.
  
  
• Mexico's government announced that the country’s central bank will issue its own digital currency by 2024. (Bitcoin.com)
  

Honduras

• Public sector teachers’ unions in Honduras are ready to have their members resume in-person classes this year if the government guarantees them certain conditions and the implementation of health measures to prevent Covid-19 infection, reports EFE.
  

Colombia

• Brigitte Baptiste has a high profile as a transgender Colombian woman and an ecologist – in a country where both are targeted, reports the Guardian. Baptiste is a believer in “green capitalism” – that the free market can promote sustainable development.
  

Chile

• Four beekeepers were detained after protesting in front of Chile's presidential palace in Santiago yesterday. The beekeepers set around 60 beehives, which contained an estimated 10,000 bees, on the avenue in front of the palace, demanding government help in the midst of a damaging, long-term drought that has hurt honey production. Seven police officers were stung during the demonstrations. (Reuters)
  

Critter Corner

• The tequila fish, declared extinct in the wild, has been reintroduced to its native Mexico after being bred in an aquarium at Chester zoo. The project has been cited as an International Union for Conservation of Nature case study for successful reintroductions, reports the Guardian.
  
  
• In Costa Rica, canopy bridges are used to help sloths, monkeys and other wildlife cross roads to combat collisions, dog attacks and electrocutions on power lines. The rope bridges are installed by the Sloth Conservation Foundation in areas where rainforest has been interrupted by human development on the country’s Caribbean coast. (Guardian)
  

Did I miss something, get something wrong, or do you have a different take? Let me know ... 

Latin America Daily Briefing

Boric is part of new leftist wave (Jan. 3, 2021)

Gabriel Boric's victory in Chile's presidential elections on Dec. 19 -- confirmed the country's leftward swing in the wake of massive social protests in 2019. The 35-year-old is the country's youngest president-elect. Boric gained prominence as a protest leader ten years ago, when student movements rallied to demand free public education, and is seen by many as the institutionalization of widespread generational anger at Chile's unequal social system. (New York Times)

Boric had campaigned on the promise of installing a "social welfare" state, increasing taxes and social spending in a country with one of the world's largest gaps between rich and poor. After proclaiming victory, Boric pledged to maintain an "orderly economy." (Reuters)

He will face high expectations and social movement pressure to deliver on his campaign promises, notes Nacla. Despite the president-elect's stirring rhetoric, his agenda won't be too revolutionary, according to the Economist. "The relationship between the presidency, the constitution-writers and legislators will determine how far the country lurches to the left."

Indeed, Boric's biggest immediate test will be his leadership in the midst of an ongoing constitutional rewrite that will be put to citizen referendum later this year. The 2019 protests decanted into a push to change the country's magna carta, drafted under the Pinochet dictatorship, which enshrined a market approach that made the country's a regional economic leader and created the social system demonstrators chafed against.

"In the presidential seat, Mr. Boric will have to walk the fine line of championing the new Constitution — which could inevitably circumscribe his own power — and not alienating that part of the electorate that doesn’t share the progressive values of the drafting committee members who themselves are still debating key provisions," writes Cristian Farias in a New York Times op-ed.

Boric forms part of a regional leftward shift. But while some analysts are again discussing the "pink tide," most agree that the current panorama is far more heterogenous than the leftist government's that characterized Latin America in the 2000's. "Latin America’s new crop of leftist leaders are, on average, less uniform and more measured," reports the Washington Post.  Notably, Boric represents a generational change in the region's left -- one characterized by concerns over minority rights, and the environment. "His more nuanced positions set him up to be Latin America’s first woke president, a leader built for an age of gender-neutral pronouns and Greta Thunberg," according to the Post.

U.S. President Joe Biden called Boric last week to congratulate him and the two leaders discussed their shared commitment to social justice, democracy, human rights and inclusive growth. Biden "applauded Chile’s free and fair elections as a powerful example to the region and the world," the White House said in a statement. (Reuters)

Chile's Constitutional Convention

• Chile's Constitutional Convention will select new leadership tomorrow, six months after starting the process of drafting a new magna carta. Five women are vying to replace Elisa Loncón, who currently presides over the CC, including Beatriz Sánchez of Boric's Frente Amplio.  (La Bot Constituyente, The Clinic)
  
  
• It's a critical election as the Convention heads into a crucial phase: commissions are concluding their proposals for new constitutional norms, which the convention plenary will begin to vote on in February, reports El País.
  
  
• Chile's approach to the environment is among the central issues the convention is analyzing -- with likely large impacts on the country's key mining industry, reports the New York Times. 
  
  
• A proposal to create autonomous regions within Chile, replacing the current unitarian system, has majority support within the relevant commission within the Convention, and will be voted on by the plenary, reports La Tercera.

News Briefs

Regional

• Latin America, once a hot spot of Covid-19 deaths, now leads the U.S. and much of the world in vaccinations, though wide disparities remain between urban and rural regions, reports the Wall Street Journal. (AS/COA reviews how countries in the region performed on vaccinations in 2021.)
  
  
• Burgeoning "minilateralism" in Latin America may be foreshadowing the revival of large-scale regional cooperation in Latin America, according to Foreign Policy's Latin America Brief. "That could affect policies from migration policy to vaccine manufacturing."
  
  
• Education in Latin America was particularly affected by Covid-19, the region had the longest school closures, and pandemic shutdowns exacerbated socio-economic and gender gaps in access to education. "Preventing mass dropout will require both immediate action and a long-term strategy," writes Mercedes Mateo-Berganza, chief of the education division of the Inter-American Development Bank, in Americas Quarterly.

El Salvador

• Salvadoran authorities released three Salvadoran women who were sentenced to 30 years in prison under the nation’s strict anti-abortion laws after suffering obstetric emergencies, on Christmas Eve. President Nayib Bukele commuted the sentences of the women, who served between six to 13 years after miscarrying due to “health emergencies," say abortion activists. El Salvador has one of the region's harshest abortion bans. (AFP, Associated Press)
  
  
• A former senior Salvadoran anti-corruption prosecutor, Germán Arriaza, said his team compiled documentary and photographic evidence that President Nayib Bukele’s government struck a deal with the country's dominant street gangs in 2019 to reduce murder rates and help the ruling party win legislative elections. Arriaza said the government then shut down his unit's investigation, reports Reuters. Arriaza’s comments mark the first time a former Salvadoran official has publicly accused the Bukele government of making a deal with the gangs -- El Faro published investigations backing the accusations, and, in December, the U.S. Treasury Department also claimed the talks took place. (See post for Dec. 9, 2021)
  
  
• Some users of El Salvador's national "El Chivo" bitcoin wallet report missing funds -- an example of the system's vulnerability to piracy, according to economist Steve Hanke. (El Diario de Hoy)

Brazil

• At least 24 people have died and 50,000 have been left homeless by deadly floods in northeastern Brazil, last week. Local officials said they have never before seen flooding on this scale -- part of a pattern of weather extremes Bahia has faced in recent years, reports the New York Times. (See also Reuters.)
  
  
• President Jair Bolsonaro rejected an aid offer from Argentina, but was countered by Bahia's governor, who said local authorities would welcome help from any nation and that foreign countries should feel free to contact the state directly, reports AFP.
  
  
• Bolsonaro announced a $125.67 million relief credit line to help the northeastern region with the impacts of severe flooding, reports Reuters.
  
  
• Brazil's government is polling citizens on whether children should be vaccinated against Covid-19 -- and Bolsonaro's supporters have been highly engaged on messaging apps trying to pressure parents to swing the results against inoculation, reports the Associated Press.
  
  
• Former Brazilian judge Sergio Moro made his reputation as an anti-corruption crusader who put former President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva in jail. But subsequent revelations that his decisions were partial and politically motivated tarnished his reputation -- now he is struggling to present a third-way alternative in the presidential race led by Lula and Bolsonaro, reports The Intercept.
  
  
• Lula "is gearing up for an electrifying bid to reclaim power in next October’s presidential election," reports the Guardian. Simultaneously Lula will make a series of overseas trips that allies say are designed to repair Brazil's international reputation and denounce Bolsonaro’s threat to the country's democracy.
  
  
• Bolsonaro has been admitted to hospital with abdominal pain and is being examined to see if surgery is necessary, reports Reuters.

Colombia

• Key commitments of Colombia's peace deal with the FARC aimed at addressing the root causes of the country's decades-long conflict: poverty, brutal inequalities in the countryside and the absence of government services. But the agreement's promise remains unfulfilled, writes WOLA President Carolina Jiménez Sandoval in a New York Times op-ed. Whoever wins Colombia's presidential election in May will have to double down on rural investment and tackling violence against social leaders in order to defend the country's fragile peace, she argues.
  
  
• The group that attempted to bomb Colombian air force planes at the Cúcuta aiport on Dec. 14th, killing three people, were members of a criminal gang hired by the dissident elements of the FARC guerrilla group operating out of Venezuela, according to Colombian authorities. (Miami Herald)
  

Regional Relations

• China has opened an embassy in Nicaragua for the first time since 1990, less than a month after the central American country cut ties with Taiwan, reports the Guardian. Nicaraguan foreign minister, Denis Moncada, said there was an “ideological affinity” between the two countries and thanked China for donating 1m doses of the Sinopharm coronavirus vaccine.
  

Venezuela

• Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro said on Sunday he will soon visit Iran to finalize new agreements on cooperation between the two countries. Iran has become Venezuela's top ally in boosting oil output amid U.S. sanctions, reports Reuters.
  
  
• Venezuela almost doubled its oil production in 2021 over 2020's decades-low, reports Reuters, separately. The reversal began as state-run Petroleos de Venezuela won help from small drilling firms by rolling over old debts and later obtained steady supplies of a key diluent from Iran. 
  

Mexico

• Declining birthrates in Mexico last year defied experts' expectations that the pandemic would lead to an increase in unplanned pregnancies, and demonstrate that many women are determined to avoid pregnancy in current conditions, reports the Washington Post.
  
  
• Tourist demand for recreational drugs is a major reason Mexico’s Mayan Riviera is increasingly party to violence between rival criminal groups, reports the Washington Post.

Culture Corner

• Sharing soup joumou on 1 January represents what Haitians bring to the world – but remembering that inequality prevails is arguably more important, argues Haitian novelist Lyonel Trouillot in the Guardian.
  

Very Happy New Year to all!

Latin America Daily Briefing