http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-15799705
Brazil’s new president Dilema Rousseff has founded a Truth Commission to investigate human rights abuses in the country especially from their dirty war, during which she was even tortured. She also has approved a law of access to public information which will allow previously secretive documents to be released for public viewing. However, an amnesty law is still in place so no prosecutions will be able to come from the investigations.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/22/calle-13-unicef-human-trafficking_n_1108205.html
In looking for a news article this week I stumbled upon this interesting one corresponding to media and the fight for human rights. It turns out that MTV Latin America, specifically the Reggatone group Calle 13, and UNICEF are teaming up to bring awareness to the issue of human trafficking in the region. This is an incredible publicity move for Human Rights seeing as Calle 13 is so popular. It will be very interesting to see what comes out of this campaign.
Activists lodge complaint against Felipe Calderon at International Criminal Court over offensive against drug cartels.
In this article, Rafael Romo discusses the number of women who were unwillingly and unknowingly sterilized during Alberto Fujimori’s presidency in the nineties. The special prosecutor investigation the issue, Victor Cubas, estimates that there are thousands of undocumented cases of forced sterilization, and at least 2000 documented cases. These investigations were opened first in the years following Fujimori’s term, but were shelved in 2009 by Alan Garcia’s government. It wasn’t until Ollanta Humala was elected in July that the investigations were ordered to be opened up once again. Under Fujimori, doctors, gynaecologists and nurses had a quota to fill, consisting of sterilizing three women a month. Marino Costa Bauer, the Peruvian health minister between 1996 and 1998 insists that although the campaign was ‘perhaps’ poorly executed, the sterilizations were all voluntary, citing many signed documents as proof. However, a woman says that she and her husband were forced to sign such a document, indicated that even if there was signed consent, it was not voluntary. Costa Bauer also denies that this campaign targeted poor, indigenous women in isolated communities, although human rights groups have insisted that this is the demographic that seems to be mostly effected.
The above article is simply about how Columbia is trying to bolster trade with England and show itself as an economic power in Latin America. What’s really interesting about it is that England has said that they will sign a Human Rights agreement with Columbia as part of starting to trade with them. It was pointed out in another article on the topic that England has put Human Rights at the forefront of it’s international policy (so it says), but Columbia is accused of some of the worst Human Rights abuses especially against trade unionists. It will be very interesting to see what the Human Rights agreement actually says when it is signed by the two countries as trading partners. It is one thing to have a bilateral trade agreement but it is very interesting to see a bilateral Human Rights agreement as well.
“A new report says Mexico fails to limit security forces’ torture, disappearances, and extrajudicial killings in the drug war. But Calderon’s response ‘skirts the issue,’ says blogger Patrick Corcoran.”
This website promotes the use of Tactical Media in Human Rights Movements. There are plenty of interesting blogs about the use of media in Latin America and around the world.
Also an interesting post about the relationship between the media and Human Rights: http://www.newtactics.org/en/blog/new-tactics/engaging-media-human-rights
We need to be interested in “engaging” the media not just as another constituency with some influence, but because it is one of the ESSENTIAL levers of power. The media is integral to civil society. The media — and this may be a worldwide phenomenon — bolsters or undermines progress. It makes or breaks regimes. It fosters, or undoes, a culture of respect for human rights.
“On Tuesday, the UN General Assembly again voted overwhelming to condemn the U.S. embargo of Cuba. This was the 20th consecutive vote against the U.S. embargo. The final result was 186-2 in favor of the resolution. Like last year, only Israel and the United States voted against the measure while the island nations Palau, Micronesia, and the Marshall Islands abstained.”
Since the end of the Cold War, the US has justified the continuation of the embargo as a form of encouraging more respect for human rights in Cuba (according to Ronald D. Godard, U.S. Senior Area Adviser for Western Hemisphere Affairs). Ironically, however, the embargo actually violates some basic human rights itself. Moreover, human rights have never been a major consideration in the formation and continuation of the embargo. It is only recently, that human rights have become such a popularly debated topic, that they have become a factor in the embargo.
This article, by Joseph Nevins, discusses the issue of the children of illegal immigrants left behind in the US when their parents are exported. Apparently, “the federal government deported more than 46,000 mothers and fathers of U.S. citizen children in the first six months of 2011″. A majority of these parents are Mexicans, and leave more that 5100 children in the foster care system. According to law, however, the state must consider what is in the best interest of a child, something that is often forgotten when it comes to illegal immigrants who have a child born in the US. In fact, “the U.S. Supreme Court has upheld ‘the right to live together as a family,’ calling it in 1977 an ‘enduring American tradition,’ while noting that the right to raise one’s child has been deemed a basic civil right, one ‘far more precious than property rights’”. Essentially, the US government is ignoring both federal and international law when they deport thousands of illegal immigrants. The children seem to be unconsidered in this equation, leaving many without parents or even homes.
BBC NEWS
Venezuelan opposition politician Leopoldo Lopez has launched his campaign to challenge President Hugo Chavez in elections next year.
It comes a week after the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACHR) ordered Venezuela to allow him to run.
Addressing thousands of supporters in the capital Caracas, Mr Lopez urged President Chavez to accept the ruling.
Mr Lopez had been banned from public office because of corruption allegations.
President Chavez has criticised the IACHR ruling, and Venezuelan election officials say they will wait for a judgement from the supreme court on whether he should be allowed to stand.
Afraid?
At the rally in Caracas, Mr Lopez accused Mr Chavez of “hiding behind” public institutions.
“Is it true what they are saying all over Venezuela, that you are afraid of me?” he asked.
He said his main priorities would be to tackle violent crime and reduce unemployment.
Mr Lopez, 40, is one of several contenders for a primary election in February, when Venezuela’s main opposition alliance will choose a unity candidate to challenge President Chavez on 7 October 2012.
A former mayor of the Chacao district of Caracas, he was banned from public office in 2004 by the comptroller-general’s office over two separate allegations of financial wrongdoing.
He has denied the allegations, and has never been convicted in court.
Challenge
Whoever wins the opposition nomination faces a tough challenge to defeat President Chavez, who has governed Venezuela since 1999, winning repeated election victories.
The left-wing leader has said he is determined to win another term in office, despite having surgery for cancer in June.
He says he is now recovering his health after four courses of chemotherapy.
But secrecy about the exact nature and extent of his cancer has fuelled continuing speculation about whether he will be well enough to campaign.
Parliamentary elections last year showed Venezuelan voters evenly divided between support for Mr Chavez’s socialists and the opposition.
Among the other candidates seeking the opposition nomination in February’s primary are state governors Henrique Capriles Radonski and Pablo Perez.
BBC NEWS
Government supporters in Cuba have prevented the “Ladies in White” dissident group from holding a protest march in the capital, Havana.
Shouting insults and slogans, a crowd of hundreds massed outside the home of the group’s leader, Laura Pollan.
The dissidents had been planning to march to church on the Day of Our Lady of Mercy – patron saint of prisoners.
Government security agents looked on but did not intervene as the two groups argued. There was no violence.
Waving Cuban flags, the pro-government demonstrators shouted “Worms!” and “Get out!” at the 35 dissident women inside Laura Pollan’s House.
They also set up a sound system that blared out the Cuban national anthem.
Spontaneous?
Cuba’s small dissident movement often faces harassment from groups of government supporters.
The communist authorities say such demonstrations are spontaneous reactions by ordinary Cubans, but the opposition say they are orchestrated by the government.
The Ladies in White group is made up of wives and daughters of dissidents who were jailed in a 2003 crackdown on opposition activists.
The prisoners have all been released over the past year under a deal brokered by the Roman Catholic Church, and some have gone into exile in Spain.
But the Ladies in White have continued to campaign for the release of around 50 other prisoners convicted of violent crimes such as hijacking which they say are political.
The Catholic Church says the authorities have stepped up a campaign of low-level harassment of dissidents in recent months.
The Cuban government generally refer to dissidents as mercenaries paid by the US to destabilise the communist system.
BBC NEWS
Bolivian Defence Minister Cecilia Chacon has resigned in protest at the government’s decision to deploy police to break up an anti-road march.
Her resignation came amid growing public anger at the police action which saw some 500 officers fire tear gas and round up indigenous demonstrators.
The protesters had been marching since mid-August against plans to build a road through a rainforest reserve.
President Evo Morales says the road is essential for Bolivia’s development. However, on Sunday he offered to put the issue to a regional referendum.
Protest leaders said dozens of people had been put on buses and driven away. Local police chief Oscar Munoz said they were being taken back to their hometowns.
The Bolivian ombudsman, Rolando Villena, criticised what he said was excessive use of force by the police.
“Injured children, disappeared mothers who didn’t want to separate from their children – this does not talk well about our democracy. This is not democracy,” he said.
And on Monday, trade unions, indigenous associations and opposition parties all condemned the police action.
In a letter to President Morales, Ms Chacon gave notice of her “irrevocable” resignation.
“I do not agree with the decision to intervene in the march and I cannot defend or justify the measure when other alternatives existed,” her letter said.
Also on Monday, people seized the landing strip in the Amazon town of Rurrenabaque to prevent police from flying detained protesters out of the area.
Hundreds of people set off last month from Trinidad to walk 500km (310 miles) to Bolivia’s main city, La Paz, but were stopped at Yucomo, with about half the journey covered.
On Saturday, they briefly detained the foreign minister, David Choquehuanca, forcing him to walk with them.
Mr Choquehuanca, who had come to negotiate with the protesters, said the fact that he was freed showed “they want to resolve matters through dialogue”.
Indigenous people who live in the reserve say the highway would encourage illegal settlement and deforestation in their ancestral Amazon homeland.
But others, including Mr Morales, say the road would help bring basic services to isolated communities, and also boost the local economy by giving farmers better access to markets.
The road, which would link the highland city of Cochabamba with San Ignacio de Moxos in the Amazon lowlands, is being funded by Brazil and built by a Brazilian company.
The march is the latest in a series of challenges Mr Morales is facing from the indigenous groups and social movements that helped make him Bolivia’s first indigenous president.
A special report published by the Committee to Protect Journalists in 2010 on the effect that drug trafficking has had on freedom of the press in Mexico.
“Violence against the press has swept the nation and destroyed Mexicans’ right to freedom of expression. This national crisis demands a full-scale federal response.”
It delves into the popular saying “plomo o planta” - take our money or die. A saying that has become a powerful silencing/censoring mechanism in the country.
It outlines the situation in Mexico, offers a few case studies and concludes with a call to the Federal Government and recommendations for further action.
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5gk3Lm0YuSp9w4bS_yBJYEPSAkPMg?docId=CNG.de5fa5e5f0b9012b76c51bb65cb042d6.4f1
This article is very interesting because it combines indigenous and environmental rights. Additionally, I find it to be a little unexpected in coming from Bolivia, where Morales is the first indigenous president of the country.
Particularly in media coverage, attention is only given to the most spectacular cases. Even though there are cases in which that spectacularity seems unethical, there are dramas that remain unnoticed, because they are simply not as dramatic, or perhaps because within the contest for attention, there are only so many bad news that can be attended. I have chosen this week’s article http://colombiajournal.org/colombia3.htm because it portrays how during the high of internal displacement, most of the media attention was given to the State sponsored violence in Kosovo and East Timor, whereas the almost 1.7 million displaced people that have left the ongoing conflict remained aloof from media coverage.
According to the article “The number of Colombians displaced by the war between the Colombian army and leftist guerrillas far exceeds the number of refugees in East Timor. It even exceeds the number of Kosovar Albanians forced to flee Serb repression. And yet, in spite of the fact that Colombian refugees currently constitute the third largest displaced population in the world, behind only the Sudanese and Angolans, their plight receives little attention from the mainstream media.“
The issue is not so much a contest of attention. The issue is more why some conflicts are seen with different eyes. Is it because the geo-political reality in which the conflicts occur? Is it because there are first, second and third types of human rights? Or is it because prior and above human rights, there are economic interests which take precedence over humanitarian concerns and only where there are economic profits to be gained can the flag of human rights be properly advanced?
