U.S. Summit gatekeeping offends region (May 12, 2022)

Some countries in the region that condemn nondemocratic regimes in Nicaragua, Venezuela and Cuba still feel the Summit of the Americas invite-list kerfuffle is "yet another reminder of what they see as U.S. hubris when it comes to the hemisphere," reports the Washington Post. (See yesterday's post.)

Cuba, particularly, is a flashpoint for governments nettled by U.S. gatekeeping: "CARICOM countries take the view that the Summit of the Americas is not a United States summit, which it isn’t. It is a summit of all the countries of the Americas, of which the United States is only one," Ambassador Ronald Sanders of Antigua and Barbuda told the Washington Post. “Does hosting the summit give you the right to decide who should or should not be representing countries of the Americas? ... Many have come to the conclusion that ... everybody should be there. That must include Cuba.”

Honduran President Xiomara Castro joined the growing chorus of voices demanding broader inclusion. "If all the nations are not present, it is not the Summit of the Americas," she said. (Telesur)

"But what feels to many like Latin American solidarity, or a golden opportunity to stick it in Uncle Sam’s eye, also tells a less flattering story about the region’s current political reality—namely, a wavering commitment to democracy," writes Brian Winter in Americas Quarterly. 

Beyond the invite list, many fear the agenda will be thin, reports Politico, with few concrete plans to improve the region’s economy and trade links, while dealing more with U.S. concerns about migration. "Among Latin America hands, there’s a sense that Biden just doesn’t prioritize the region, home to some of the United States’ biggest trading partners, including Mexico."

News Briefs

Haiti

• Haitian gang members raped women and girls and burned people alive during turf wars over the past coupe of weeks near Port-au-Prince, the Haitian National Human Rights Defense Network said in a report detailing the bloody conflict between the rival Chen Mechan and 400 Mawozo gangs. The battles left 148 people dead, some of whom were hacked to death with machetes or died when their homes were set on fire. (Reuters)
  

Venezuela

• Venezuelan oil production is set to get a boost from record inflows of Iranian crude, which is mixed with local production, a lifeline for the Maduro government, reports Bloomberg.
  
  
• Some Venezuelan public companies will offer a small portion of their shares on the local stock market, as a way of boosting resources and maintaining operations, President Nicolás Maduro announced yesterday. (Reuters)

Regional

• The brazen killing of Paraguayan prosecutor Marcelo Pecci on a Colombian beach has shocked people in both countries. The assassination of a key South American partner of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration appeared to underscore the dangers of investigating drug trafficking in Latin America, reports the Washington Post. (See yesterday's briefs.)
  
  
• Brazil’s consumer prices in April rose 12.13 percent over the same period a year ago, the highest inflation rate the country has faced since 2003. Headline inflation also topped forecasts in Peru, Colombia and Chile, reports Bloomberg.

Brazil

• Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro has spearheaded land-titling distribution, particularly in the country's agricultural south, in an effort to shore up rural voter support, reports Bloomberg. In Bolsonaro’s first three years in office, more deeds were distributed than in 13 years of Workers' Party governments.
  
  
• The Nobel prize-winning author Mario Vargas Llosa has declared a preference for Bolsonaro over  Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva as Brazil prepares to head to the polls later this year, reports the Guardian.
  

Costa Rica

• Costa Rican President Rodrigo Chaves took office on Sunday. The former minister and World Bank economist launched his mandate with a series of decrees that all addressed economic issues including the cost of energy, the cost of food, the cost of medicine, the composition of the country’s tax basket, and aiding agricultural supply chains. -- Latin America Risk Report

Peru

• Peruvian President Pedro Castillo signed a 45-day extension to the state of emergency order that has been in place in five provinces of La Libertad Department, the country's illegal coal mining heartland, after regional leaders requested help to stop a wave of gang violence, reports InSight Crime.

El Salvador

• Credit agencies are increasingly concerned that El Salvador could default, though President Nayib Bukele said there was "zero risk." Bukele announced that his government had bought 500 bitcoins, its largest purchase of the cryptocurrency to date, as the cryptocurrency value has plummeted more than 50% from its all-time highs. (El País)

Mexico

• Thousands of women in Mexico took to the streets on Sunday, Mothers' Day, to demand government action in response to their relatives' disappearances. Relatives of Mexico’s disappeared march every year, but this year, they were joined by a caravan of Central American mothers searching for loved ones who went missing while on their journey to the United States, reports Al Jazeera. 
  
  
• An estimated 3 million peach trees across 6,000 hectares in Mexico's Zacatecas state have been abandoned by farmers fleeing cartel violence in the area, reports InSight Crime.
  

Regional Relations

• Argentine President Alberto Fernández said "protectionism" in some European sectors was the biggest challenge for a free trade agreement between the Mercosur bloc, and the European Union. (Reuters)
  
  
• The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration has stopped stationing a plane in Mexico for anti-narcotics operations for the first time in decades, after Mexican officials rescinded its parking spot, reports Reuters. It's the latest hit to joint cooperation against drug crime between the two countries.

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

Mexico threatens to skip Summit (May 11, 2022)

Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador said he would not attend next month’s Summit of the Americas in Los Angeles if the Biden administration excludes Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua. Mexico's leader said he wants all the countries in the region to be invited. It is unclear whether the US will invite Cuba, Nicaragua and Venezuela. (Reuters, see April 26's post)

He is the latest leader to voice concern over the invite list, after Caribbean Community (Caricom) leaders discussed a collective boycott of the summit if nations are excluded and criticized the U.S. plan to invite Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaidó. Today Bolivia's President Luis Arce joined AMLO's stance. Argentina, which currently holds the rotating presidency of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States, also issued an appeal this month to avoid excluding any governments. (Associated Press, Associated Press, and Friday's briefs)

Separately, Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro has told his aides he won't be going, but gave no reason why, reports Reuters.

Despite the voices of protest, most leaders who are invited will likely attend, predicts James Bosworth at the Latin America Risk Report. "The expected controversy is that there is a fight over who is invited, who is not invited and who may or may not attend. This happens at essentially every regional meeting."

More Summit

• Lack of excitement about the meeting in general is perhaps "testimony to a hemisphere exhausted by the pandemic, record migration, political polarization and the worsening effects of climate change," according to Americas Quarterly, which dedicated its latest issue to opportunities for cooperation that could bolster the meeting's agenda.
  
  
• A renewed commitment to democracy could also help stop the erosion of freedoms and institutions being seen in many countries, writes AS/COA’s Eric Farnsworth.
  
  
• John Otis writes about how some Honduran farmers are adapting to climate change instead of migrating. But funding is scarce for strategies that include crop rotation, diversification, and other adjustments.
  
  
• And in Haiti, the international community should reconfigure its approach to aid, and target micro-loans to small-scale farmers, argues Michèle Duvivier Pierre-Louis.
  
  
• The U.S. Biden administration is working on a proposal to bolster economies in Latin America and strengthen ties with the region ahead of the summit meeting, reports Bloomberg. The framework would seek to set a new course for economic integration with the region and create an environment of stability to help attract private investment in countries where a lack of development and opportunities have spurred outward migration.

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Bolsonaro's fight against the Brazil's electoral system

In their influential 2018 book “How Democracies Die” Levitsky and Ziblatt argued that rather than staging an open coup, modern leaders may subvert the democratic process by repeatedly undermining institutions. In the runup to the October election, President Jair Bolsonaro appears to be following their script closely, reports the Brazil Research Initiative.

Since 2018 Bolsonaro and his supporters have stoking baseless rumors about the integrity of the voting process, and particularly focused on sabotaging the reputation of Brazil’s well-regarded electronic voting system. The president alone is accused of making more than 5,000 false or distorted statements to date, including repeated attacks against the country's electoral court and the Supreme Court. (Foreign Policy)

Bolsonaro's questioning of Brazil's electronic voting system and clashes with the judiciary have cost him the votes of Brazilian moderates and stalled recent gains, according to a Genial/Quaest poll released today. In fact, Bolsonaro's persistent allegations against the country's long-established electronic voting system have not lessened voter faith in it: distrust of electronic voting machines among Brazilians has fallen, to 22% of the electorate from 27% in September. (Reuters)

Another Bolsonaro move that drove away moderate voters was granting a pardon to his ally Congressman Daniel Silveira hours after the Supreme Court sentenced him to jail for threats against the judiciary and Brazil's democratic system. The poll showed 45% of voters disagreed with the pardon while 30% approved of it. (Reuters)

More Brazil

• Brazilian presidential candidate Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva remains firmly in the lead for October's election, with 40.6 percent of voter intentions against 32 percent for Bolsonaro according to a new opinion poll by CNT/MDA released yesterday. But Bolsonaro gained ground in recent polls. (Reuters)

News Briefs

Regional Relations

• U.S. government officials in March asked Brazil's state-run oil company Petrobras whether it could increase crude output after Russia's invasion of Ukraine sent global prices soaring, but were told that output levels respond to business strategy rather than diplomacy, reports Reuters. Petrobras officials reportedly also said that a significant short-term production boost would not be logistically possible.
  
  
• Former U.S. Secretary of Defense Mark Esper said he prevented “dangerous things” from happening during the time President Donald Trump was in office, including military intervention in Venezuela and a blockade of Cuba. “At various times, certainly during the last year of the administration, folks in the White House were proposing to take military action against Venezuela," Esper said in an interview on CBS’ 60 Minutes. At some point, he said, “somebody proposed we blockade Cuba.” (Miami Herald)

Honduras

• Former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández pleaded not guilty to drug charges in a U.S. federal court yesterday. Prosecutors allege he was part of an international trafficking network that moved 500 tons of cocaine over two decades. (InSight Crime, see yesterday's briefs)
  
  
• Also yesterday, former Honduras National Police Chief Juan Carlos Bonilla Valladares, better known as “El Tigre,” was extradited to the U.S. to face drug charges in the same New York court. The two cases "offer a stark display of how drug money infiltrated the highest rungs of government and law enforcement in Honduras," according to InSight Crime. (See yesterday's briefs.)
  

Haiti

• U.S. authorities charged a leader of a violent Haitian gang with conspiracy to commit hostage-taking for his alleged role in the brazen kidnapping of 16 American missionaries with an Ohio-based charity in the Haitian capital last year. (Washington Post)
  

Mexico

• Eleven journalists have been killed in Mexico so far this year, a significant increase in violence even in a country that has long been one of the most dangerous in the world for media workers. There is no single cause, reports the Washington Post. "Instead, the deaths point to the wide range of threats that journalists here face daily — and the impunity that allows their killers to act without fear of consequence."

Ecuador

• Imprisonment is nearly “a death sentence” in Ecuador, warned Amnesty International yesterday, after 44 prison inmates were killed in a jail massacre on Monday. (Al Jazeera, see yesterday's post.)
  

El Salvador

• A woman in El Salvador has been sentenced to 30 years in prison for the death of her unborn child following an obstetric emergency. El Salvador is known for its draconian prohibitions against abortion, which have resulted in decades-long sentences for women who suffered obstetric complications, but this case is the first of its kind in the past seven years in the country, reports Al Jazeera.

Colombia

• Colombia's highest court legalized abortion in February, the latest in a regional string of reproductive rights victories. But the court's narrow 5-4 decision legalizing abortion has also provoked backlash, illustrating some of the green wave's challenges, reports NPR.

Argentina

• Argentine President Alberto Fernández responded to criticisms from Vice President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, who said last week that the government has "disappointed" its voters. Her view is partial and doesn't take into account pandemic difficulties, Fernández told El País in an interview, in which he welcomed debate but demanded mutual respect.
  
  
• A group of Argentine ruling party lawmakers presented a bill to create a "universal basic salary," which would apply for unemployed people and low-income workers. The proposal has the backing of the social development ministry, but not the economic ministry, highlighting the government's internal rifts, reports Bae Negocios.
  
  
• Fernández said yesterday that he will seek reelection during the 2023 presidential elections. (Reuters)
  
  
• Fernández and the first lady, Fabiola Yánez, offered to pay three million pesos in damages for a birthday party held in the official residence while Argentina was in strict Covid-19 lockdown in 2020. (La Nación)

Paraguay

• Paraguay’s prosecutor of organized crime and drug trafficking cases was slain Tuesday by gunmen on a Colombian beach. (Associated Press)
  

Peru

• Peru will increase public spending in mining regions in a bid to de-escalate social conflicts that have impacted mining output, announced the country's finance minister yesterday. (Reuters)

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

Latin America Daily Briefing

44 killed in Ecuador prison riot (May 10, 2022)

At least 44 inmates were killed in Ecuador's latest prison riot, yesterday. The uprising started in the morning and ended in the afternoon when more than 200 police commandos retook control of the maximum-security wing of the Santo Domingo de los Tsáchilas prison. Gruesome pictures on social media showed mutilated bodies strewn in a courtyard in the jail, images that have become almost commonplace in Ecuador. It was the country's sixth prison massacre since the beginning of 2021, with a collective death toll of nearly 400 inmates. The most recent prison uprising was last month, in which 20 inmates were killed. (Guardian, Associated Press)

Authorities said 220 prisoners escaped during yesterday's violence, of which 112 had been recaptured. Most of those killed were stabbed to death, according to Patricio Carrillo, Ecuador’s interior minister, who noted that the riot was caused by a conflict between criminal gangs. (New York Times) On April 30, Ecuador's President Guillermo Lasso declared a state of emergency in three coastal provinces: Esmeraldas, Guayas and Manabí. Throughout 2021 and this year, violence between drug gangs in these areas has soared, reports InSight Crime.

The violence has spiked to unprecedented levels fuelled by rivalry between international drug trafficking gangs vying for control of lucrative cocaine trade routes. The evolution of Ecuador's violent clashes between criminal groups follows the evolution of rivalries at the heart of Colombia's and Mexico's drug wars have evolved over the years, according to InSight Crime, with a repeating pattern of splintering groups, changing leaders and evolving trafficking routes.

But massive overpopulation in penitentiaries contributes to violence, reported InSight Crime last year. The country's prisons house 35,000 people and are overcrowded at about 15% beyond maximum capacity. A government committee created last year to study conditions in the country's prisons found that despicable conditions had turned prisons into "human warehouses and centers of torture." 

The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights has said the system is blighted by state abandonment and the absence of a comprehensive policy, as well as poor conditions for inmates. (Reuters) At least 316 people died while incarcerated in Ecuador in 2021, according to a report in March released by the commission. The majority of those killed were young and accused of minor crimes, and some were waiting to be released, the report found. (Washington Post)

Some advocates also say government apathy towards inmates is behind the violent scenes. Even in instances when intelligence networks or family members have warned of imminent bloodshed, authorities have been slow to take action, Vianca Gavilanes, a lawyer for the inmates' rights NGO Dignity Foundation, told AFP last month.

At the time of yesterday's riot, the Santo Domingo de las Tsáchilas prison housed more than 1,600 detainees, nearly double its original capacity of 905, according to official records. Only 25 officers were on duty for the entire prison

In February, President Guillermo Lasso began a new policy aimed at increasing access to food, health care and work, among other things, for prisoners. To help reduce overcrowding, he also ordered the release of about 5,000 prisoners, including those who had committed minor crimes and had served more than half their sentence. (New York Times)

News Briefs

Regional

• The potential overturning of Roe v Wade in the U.S. has put a spotlight on Latin American feminist movements. In Argentina the legalization of abortion in 2020 builds on a long history of activism, and massive mobilizations that included demands for reproductive rights along with broader protests against multiple forms of gender violence, writes Verónica Gago, a Ni Una Menos leader, in the Guardian.

Mexico

• Two more Mexican media workers, Yesenia Mollinedo Falconi and Sheila Johana García Olivera, were assassinated yesterday – taking the 2022 death toll to 11, in what has long been one of the most dangerous countries in the world for reporters. Advocates accuse President Andrés Manuel López Obrador of failing to respond to the ongoing media security crisis, while critics say his public attacks on journalists have fueled the violence. (Guardian)
  

Regional Relations

• Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador said the country would hire over 500 Cuban doctors to help make up for a shortage of medical professionals, and that it will purchase COVID-19 vaccines from Cuba. Cuba and Mexico signed an agreement to expand cooperation in public health, this weekend, when AMLO visited the island. (Reuters)
  

Honduras

• Former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández is due to appear in U.S. federal court for the first time today for his arraignment, where he is expected to plead not guilty to three counts of drug trafficking and illegal use of weapons. His defense team plans to call high-profile witnesses -- including Joe Biden, Barack Obama and Donald Trump -- to prove he was an ally in the war on drugs, reports Univisión.
  
  
• Former Honduran police chief Juan Carlos Bonilla is scheduled to be deported to the U.S. today, where he faces drug trafficking and weapons charges. Better known as "El Tigre," he faced allegations of human rights abuses during his time in command. (EFE)

Brazil

• Social media mobs, with the blessings of Brazil’s “cabinet of hate,” are trolling the Amazon rainforest, write Robert Muggah and Mac Margolis in the Washington Post. "Throw in Brazil’s penchant for culture wars and caustic polarization, along with one of the planet’s worst environmental crises, and you have the makings of a climate misinformation catastrophe."
  
  
• A second term for Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro would be even more disastrous than the first has been, argues Oliver Stuenkel in Americas Quarterly. "He would likely use a second term to intensify his most aggressive postures, following the example of Hungary’s Viktor Orbán and Russia’s Vladimir Putin, leaders for whom Bolsonaro has expressed support."

Costa Rica

• Costa Rican President Rodrigo Chaves Robles started his term by declaring a national emergency this weekend — a belated response to a ransomware attack by the Russia-based Conti gang that has disrupted government agencies for more than a month, reports the Washington Post.
  

Bolivia

• The trial against Bolivia's former interim president Jeanine Añez was suspended last week in response to an unconstitutionality appeal submitted by the defense, and no date to resume the trial has been announced. The problematic trial lays bare the country’s political polarization and lack of due process, write James Bosworth and Lucy Hale in the Latin America Risk Report.
  

Language

• Inclusive language is increasingly becoming a hot-button issue in the so-called culture wars raging throughout much of Latin America, write Ezequiel González Camaño and Rich Brown in Americas Quarterly.
  

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Latin America Daily Briefing

Gulf Clan carried out 4 day paro armado (May 9, 2022)

Colombia's feared Gulf Clan cartel shut down cities, towns and villages across the country's north for four days, starting last Thursday, in retaliation for the extradition to the United States of its former leader, Dairo Antonio Úsuga, better known as Otoniel. At least six people were killed and 180 vehicles attacked as part of the move, reports Infobae. The armed group imposed strict curfews on communities, burning vehicles and blocking off highways. Militiamen blocked main roads and forbidden everyone to venture out, even to buy food, reports the Guardian. The group, which calls itself the Autodefensas Gaitanistas, lifted the measure today.

It is not the first time the Urabeños, as the Gulf Clan is also known, have mounted such nationwide demonstrations of force, reports InSight Crime. Indeed, "the paro armado has been a common way for Colombian armed actors to show their power when their leaders are killed or arrested, when they face military operations or ahead of national elections."

But previous shutdowns haven't reached the same levels of violence and simultaneity in multiple regions as this one. Analysts say the Gulf Clan's move evinces the failure of President Iván Duque's security strategy, reports France 24.

Otoniel’s capture was hailed by U.S. and Colombian authorities as a major blow against drug traffickers, but police say that two of his lieutenants, known as Gonzalito and Chiquito Malo, have taken command of the militia, which is believed to have as many as 2,000 fighters, and in addition to drug trafficking is also involved in people trafficking, extortion, kidnapping for ransom, and forced recruitment of children. (See Friday's briefs.)

News Briefs

Brazil

• Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva formally launched his much anticipated presidential bid for Brazil's October elections, this weekend. The former leader is challenging incumbent President Jair Bolsonaro, and posited Brazilians' choice as one between democracy or authoritarianism; truth or lies; tolerance or obscurantism; education or automatic rifles; environmental preservation or depredation. "Never was it easier to choose – and never was it so important to make the right choice," he said. (Guardian)
  
  
• Deforestation in Brazil’s Amazon surged to record levels for the month of April, to 1,012.5 square km.Preliminary data for last month shows that nearly double the area of forest was removed as in the same month last year, which was already a record, reports Reuters.
  
  
• Brazilian buyers have managed to continue purchasing Russian fertilizer, a crucial commodity for the country's food production, despite dire predictions that Russia's invasion of Ukraine and ensuing sanctions would lead to agricultural shortages, reports the New York Times.

Cuba

• At least 31 people were killed and a further 54 injured in a powerful explosion that destroyed parts of a luxury hotel in central Havana on Friday morning. Speaking at the scene soon afterwards, the Cuban president, Miguel Díaz-Canel, ruled out a bomb, and said the Hotel Saratoga blast was likely caused by a gas leak. The hotel was under renovation and not open to guests at the time. (Guardian, Associated Press, New York Times)
  
  
• The explosion comes as Cuba struggles to relaunch its economically crucial tourist industry after Covid-19, reports the Guardian.

Regional Relations

• Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador carried a five-day, migration-themed tour of four Central American countries and Cuba, reports AFP. In Havana yesterday he called for an end to US sanctions against Cuba.
  
  
• AMLO met with El Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele, on Friday. Comments on their meeting focused on concerns about immigration and the Mexican president's desire for development aid so that people in Central America won't feel forced to emigrate, reports the Associated Press. Concerns about rights violations in El Salvador in relation to Bukele's massive crackdown on street gangs did not come up publicly.
  
  
• Yesterday in Havana AMLO said he will emphasize to his U.S. counterpart Joe Biden that no country should be left out of the U.S.-hosted Summit of the Americas in Los Angeles in June, reports Reuters. (See Friday's briefs.)
  
  
• If the U.S. Supreme Court votes to overturn Roe v Wade, many U.S. residents in need of surgical abortion could be forced to travel across international borders, a return to practises of many decades ago. Options now would include the northern border to Canada and the southern one to Mexico, reports the Guardian. Mexican advocates are preparing for an increase U.S. residents visiting to access abortion services.

Guatemala

• A Guatemalan judge ruled Friday that nine former police and military officers will stand trial for a range of alleged crimes, including forced disappearances, torture and killings during the country’s civil war, reports the Associated Press.
  

Peru

• Peru's Congress rejected a bill presented by President Pedro Castillo to call a referendum to change the constitution, on Friday. The proposal, which fulfilled a Castillo campaign promise, called for a constitutional assembly to redraft Peru's Constitution of 1993. It was rejected by a congressional commission with 11 votes against and six votes in favor, reports Reuters.

Ecuador

• Ecuador’s Coca Codo Sinclair hydroelectric project has become a lightning rod for debate around China’s preferred form of international cooperation -- loans for large infrastructure projects. "Critics of Chinese global economic expansion have seized on Coca Codo Sinclair as a symbol of the danger of China’s influence in Latin America," writes Julie Radomski at the AULA blog. While "other observers argue that the project’s downsides are a result of national institutional failures, irrespective of the “Chineseness” of its finance, engineering, and construction."
  
  
• Belgium has refused to extradite Ecuador's former president Rafael Correa, after Brussels recently granted him asylum. Correa was sentenced in absentia to eight years in prison in Ecuador in relation to a corruption case, reports AFP.
  

Chile

• Chilean President Gabriel Boric's honeymoon ended abruptly after just a month in office -- three April surveys found that more people now disapprove of the leader than support him. The drop is partially related to voter discontent as the government ends pandemic-era financial aid, reports the Financial Times.

Argentina

• Argentine Vice President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner lambasted her own government’s management of the economy in a speech on Friday, fueling already high tensions with President Alberto Fernández, reports Bloomberg.

More Colombia

• Colombian vice presidential candidate Francia Márquez has cracked open a discussion about race and class in a manner rarely seen in the country's national politics, reports the New York Times.

Thank you to Jordi Amaral and Arianna Kohan for their expert work on the Briefing last week. Glad to be back!

Latin America Daily Briefing

Nicaragua to shut down a further 50 NGOs (May 6, 2022)

Nicaragua’s Ortega-allied parliament voted on Wednesday to shut down 50 non-profit organizations due to alleged non-compliance with established regulations, reports BBC. One pro-government lawmaker claimed, “many of these NGOs, which also operate as microfinance companies and have lucrative activities, can perfectly continue to operate under the regulation of the Ministry of Commerce,” reports Reuters. In reality, however, these NGOs mainly focus on human rights, education, and medical care, and have routinely and publicly criticized the Ortega government. Furthermore, BBC notes that “representatives of some of the NGOs closed down under previous decrees said that they had tried to hand in the required documents but that the relevant authorities had refused to receive them.” 144 total organizations have been banned so far this year, most of which have criticized the regime at some point or another. 

Last August, the Nicaraguan legislature had ordered the closure of 15 NGOs, resulting in a total of 45 NGOs closed down by the government canceling their permits for operation in the month of August 2021 alone (AP). 55 total NGOs had been shut down at the time, with the other 10 coming after the outbreak of protests in 2018. Ortega won a highly criticized 4th term last November in an election which was widely viewed as neither free nor fair, with many of his top opponents either jailed or forced into exile. 

More Nicaragua

• US sanctions on Russia and Venezuela have left Daniel Ortega and his inner circle without their usual sources for economic relief as they suffer under their own US-imposed sanctions. This has prompted Laureano Ortega, son of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo and expected eventual successor to the regime, to reach out to the US to resume diplomatic negotiations, reports the New York Times. 

News Briefs

Americas

• Catherine Osborn covers the green wave and abortion rights victories in Latin America in Foreign Policy’s Latin America Brief. 

El Salvador

• El Salvador’s National Police announced yesterday on Twitter that they received a large quantity of arms and equipment from the country’s Ministry of Security. The weaponry delivery is ostensibly to help the police as they crack down on gang members in urban areas.

Brazil

• Bolsonaro continues to attack Brazil’s Supreme Court, write Jordi Amaral and James Bosworth at the Latin America Risk Report, diving into their growing feud. “All indications are that Bolsonaro will continue to ramp up his attacks on institutions over the coming months, doing his best to muddy the waters prior to the upcoming October elections.” 

• Bolsonaro announced yesterday that his party would hire a private company to run a private audit of the upcoming presidential elections, says Folha. This comes amid Bolsonaro’s misleading claims of the potential of election fraud and his attacks on the electoral court. 

• More than 2 million 16- to 18-year olds registered to vote between January and April of this year, reports Estadão. This is an increase in comparison to the same period prior to the previous two presidential elections in 2018 and 2014. Youth voters are more likely to support Lula than Bolsonaro. 

Mexico

• Luis Enrique Ramirez becomes the 9th journalist killed in Mexico this year, amidst rising press-related violence in the country, says Reuters. 34 journalists have been killed during the AMLO administration, and the violence shows no signs of stopping.

• Mexico has declined to publish a report by Norwegian firm DNV that analyzes the collapse of Line 12 of the Metro due to an alleged conflict of interest, according to local governor Claudia Sheinbaum. (Animal Politico)

Argentina

• Argentina’s central bank banned financial institutions from offering digital assets, forcing the two of the country’s largest banks to retract their recent statements about allowing clients to buy Bitcoin and other digital currencies. (Bloomberg)

• A new Amazon series follows the story of an undercover spy who may have inadvertently aided in the 1992 and 1994 terrorist attacks against Jewish communities in Buenos Aires.

• Climate change and urban development have caused capybaras (the world’s largest rodents) to take over private neighborhoods in Buenos Aires and elsewhere around the city, reports Time. 

Caribbean

• Caribbean Community (CARICOM) countries will not attend the upcoming Summit of the Americas, citing “disrespect [of] the Democratic Charter” by part of the US after not inviting Venezuela, Cuba, or Nicaragua to the meetings. (Ultimas Noticias)

• Following the arrest of British Virgin Islands’ Premier Andrew Fahie on drug charges, the UK, which already controls the islands’ defense and foreign policies, is considering taking over the country’s domestic policy and budgets as well, reports The Guardian.

• Global Americans has launched a research project to assess the political, economic, and social consequences of climate change in the Caribbean.

Colombia

• Only 40 families have governed Colombia in over 200 years of history, up until 2018, according to a report from left-wing senators. (BBC)

Migration

• Cuban and Nicaraguan migrants stopped at the border will be taken in by Mexico who will then carry out deportation flights, according to the Washington Post. As both countries struggle with the influx of migrants, thousands of Cubans and Nicaraguans are expected to be sent back to their home countries.

• Venezuelan migrants arriving in Peru find themselves unable to pay extremely high fines as they seek to regularize their residency and remain in the country legally, reports NTN24.

Paraguay 

• 600 days have passed since the Paraguayan People’s Army (EPP), a Marxist rebel group, have kidnapped former vice President Óscar Denis. (BBC)

Chile

• Chile’s Constitutional Convention voted on Wednesday to approve topics related to land restitution for indigenous tribes to be included in the new draft of the constitution, reports La Tercera. 

Venezuela

• Despite negotiations and increased diplomatic forays under the Biden administration, “there are no serious signs so far that the administration intends to ease these sanctions in the slightest,” according to Daniel Larison at Responsible Statecraft. He argues that “the United States remains wedded to a failed Trump-era policy towards Venezuela, but it is no closer to achieving its regime change goals today than when it started more than three years ago.” 

• Crónica Uno reports that members of the Civic Forum (Foro Cívico) met virtually yesterday with members of the Unitary Platform, highlighting the importance of dialogue and negotiation and inviting the Platform to build a social and rights agenda. 

Jordi Amaral is a freelance researcher and writer currently working as a Research Analyst at Hxagon and as an independent consultant with the Latin America and the Caribbean Initiative at the Migration Policy Institute. 

Arianna Kohan is a Research Analyst at Hxagon and a current M.A. student in International Relations at the Universidad Torcuato di Tella in Buenos Aires, Argentina. She previously worked as a Program Coordinator with the Americas Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS).