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The State Department’s annual report on other countries’ counter-drug efforts, with some information about U.S. aid. 2020 International Narcotics Control Strategy Report (Washington: Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs, March 2, 2020) <PDF from https://www.state.gov/2020-international-narcotics-control-strategy-report/>.
Intricately detailed tables of the status of aid to Central America between 2013 and 2018, from a GAO performance audit. U.S. Assistance to Central America: Status of Funding (Washington: U.S. Government Accountability Office, March 4, 2020) <PDF at https://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-20-163R>.
Two GAO reports about the Homeland Security Department’s processing—and cruel separating—of apprehended migrant families. Southwest Border: Actions Needed to Address Fragmentation in DHS’s Processes for Apprehended Family Members (Washington: U.S. Government Accountability Office, March 18, 2020) <PDF at https://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-20-274>. Southwest Border: Actions Needed to Improve DHS Processing of Families and Coordination between DHS and HHS (Washington: U.S. Government Accountability Office, March 18, 2020) <PDF at https://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-20-245>.
I got a kick out of recording this one with John Otis, from his home outside Bogotá. Since 1997, John has been reporting from Colombia, covering the Andes, for many news outlets. You may recognize his voice as National Public Radio’s correspondent in the Andes, or seen his many recent bylines in the Wall Street Journal. He is also the author of a highly recommended book about aspects of the conflict, Law of the Jungle (2010).
Here, John talks about some of the many changes he has seen in both Colombia and Venezuela during his tenure. The conversation also covers Colombia’s peace process, the difficulty of explaining the country’s complexity, and some places and people who’ve left very strong impressions over the years.
Alejandro Prieto photo at National Geographic. Caption: “Aerial view of wall construction at Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument in November, 2019, from the Mexican side of the border. The Department of Homeland Security has waived dozens of laws to allow this wall to be built, including the Endangered Species Act.”
Según una fuente que militó en dicha guerrilla, el acercamiento entre Galán y Uribe se dio gracias al padre Francisco De Roux, hoy presidente de la Comisión de la Verdad, quien, a su vez, contactó a la esposa del expresidente Álvaro Uribe
La decisión del Eln obedece, en gran parte, a un silencioso trabajo, según pudo confirmar EL TIEMPO con fuentes de entero crédito, de miembros de la comunidad internacional y de la Iglesia Católica
This is the story of “Memo Fantasma” or “Will the Ghost,” who started life in the Medellín Cartel, funded the bloody rise of the paramilitary army, and today lives the high life in Madrid. He has helped move hundreds of tons of cocaine, yet has no arrest warrants and nobody is looking for him
Caught in the middle of the war are former FARC combatants and social leaders. Since the signing of the peace accord, over 191 disarmed FARC and 323 social leaders have been assassinated nationwide
The Colombian criminal group Los Rastrojos is fighting a two-front war: against ELN guerrillas looking to usurp the group’s highly profitable operations along the border with Venezuela, and against Venezuelan security forces that have been targeting them
La extorsión impuesta por las pandillas también ha sido modificada por la crisis del coronavirus. En zonas concretas, dicen, han perdonado el cobro criminal a algunos vendedores informales. El otras zonas, simplemente no han podido recogerlo debido a la presencia masiva de fuerzas del Estado
Miles de personas siguieron las indicaciones que el presidente Bukele había dado y se movilizaron hacia oficinas estatales para preguntar por un subsidio de $300 destinado a las familias afectadas económicamente por el COVID-19. Así, las aglomerarciones rompieron la cuarentena
Honduras’s healthcare system has reached the edge of collapse in recent years after chronic underfunding from the government and a series of corruption scandals that have drained what little public funds do exist
La información disponible permite presumir la tortura y la desaparición forzada contra un número indeterminado de migrantes, a manos de la Guardia Nacional
Luego de difundirse un video en el que aparece el Presidente Andrés Manuel López Obrador saludando a la madre de Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, dirigentes del PAN y PRI reprobaron el encuentro y exigieron al mandatario dar una explicación
With the world focused on coronavirus, the federal government paves way for 175 miles of new walls along U.S.-Mexico border, through prime wildlife corridors
The intensification of construction during the pandemic is raising fears among residents of Ajo, Ariz., and other nearby border communities that the growing influx of workers increases their risk of exposure
In the tightly packed Matamoros camp, social distancing is impossible, and high-level health care is inaccessible. The Trump administration’s Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP) require asylum-seekers to remain in Mexico while their claims are processed
The pandemic has allowed the U.S. Border Patrol to implement the kind of rapid-fire deportation system President Trump has long extolled as his preferred approach to immigration enforcement
On Sunday, just four unaccompanied minors were referred to ORR shelters. DHS averaged 14 referrals a day over the past week, a drop of 78% from the previous month
Los civiles dependen de militares para abastecerse de combustible. Productores agrícolas denuncian que están «en manos» del Comando Estratégico Operacional
Los funcionarios rechazaron las acciones registradas el pasado fin de semana, además de este mismo lunes, por parte de cuerpos de seguridad contra diputados e integrantes de sus equipos de trabajo
The proposal, to be released on Tuesday in Washington, offers to ease American sanctions intended to pressure President Nicolás Maduro and his loyalists over the past year. But it also demands that Mr. Maduro relinquish power
This morning I’m talking to a researcher and then recording a podcast. I should be at my desk writing about Colombia and doing research on the border all afternoon.
Here’s a conversation we recorded late Friday over a beer.
After nearly 30 years of movement away from military rule and toward civilian democracy, Latin America’s armed forces are again playing larger, more political roles. The COVID-19 pandemic is exacerbating the trend, with the danger that having soldiers on the streets may again become “normalized” throughout the region.
Joining me to talk about this is Gregory Weeks, Associate Dean for Academic Affairs in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. Weeks doesn’t see a return to 1970s-style military regimes anytime soon—but he is not optimistic about civil-military relations in the region.
A political scientist, Weeks is the author of two volumes that appear very often in university Latin American studies curricula: Understanding Latin American Politics (available as a free PDF and for sale) and U.S. and Latin American Relations. He is one of the first Latin America bloggers, posting to Two Weeks Notice almost daily since 2006. And his Understanding Latin American Politics podcast is one of few other Latin America podcasts in English.
Imported by the wealthy, the virus is now reaching into impoverished communities, at times through domestic employment, infecting people with fewer resources to combat the disease
To reduce crime, it is critical to boost local government’s resources in high-risk crime areas. Crime in these countries is very context-specific and requires nuanced and flexible policies
El Ejército de Liberación Nacional (ELN) decidió declarar un cese unilateral activo al fuego durante un mes, a partir del 1 hasta el 30 de abril, a causa de la emergencia que vive el país por el el nuevo coronavirus
Desde el 5 de marzo pasado, cuando el país estaba alerta por la llegada del nuevo coronavirus, hasta la fecha, cuatro de los exguerrilleros que firmaron el Acuerdo de Paz murieron en confusos hechos en Bogotá, Caquetá y Meta
El Espectador reconstruyó buena parte de lo ocurrido el pasado 21 de marzo en el penal. Una noche que inició con un “cacerolazo”, exigiendo medidas para enfrentar el COVID-19, y terminó con 23 internos muertos
Denuncian amenazas por parte del Ejército Nacional de abrir fuego contra quienes se encontraran en asentamientos campesinos, oponiéndose a la erradicación manual forzada
En Cauca hubo seis hostigamientos, en Chocó y Nariño hay cerca de 800 familias confinadas y en el Valle del Cauca siguen asesinando a comuneros indígenas
Just over a week ago, with assurances from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security that health protocols had been established, Guatemalan authorities allowed flights to resume
Indigenous groups across South America are blockading their villages and retreating into their traditional forest and mountain homes in a bid to escape the potentially cataclysmic threat of coronavirus
Militares consultados no creen que, por ahora, Maduro cambie su anillo de seguridad. Aunque no pueden predecir el comportamiento castrense, vislumbran más acciones de inteligencia a lo interno
Guaidó, who is recognized as Venezuela’s lawful leader by the U.S. and almost other 60 countries, said opponents of Maduro need to be “realistic” and be prepared to share power
Podrían cohesionar el entorno de Nicolás Maduro e impedir una salida pacífica a la crisis política del país, en momentos donde se vive una situación delicada por la propagación de la covid-19
Other than a long morning staff meeting and check-ins with colleagues at WOLA, I should be reachable today. Other than some brief writing about Colombia, my main goal is to make big progress on a project, involving creation of a web resource, that will focus and strengthen my work on the border.
My streak of sending out weekly e-mail newsletters now stands at 13. Here’s the latest one. I resolved at the new year to be more regular at these. So that means this horrible year is already 13 weeks old.
You can read it and subscribe there, or just subscribe at the bottom of this very page.
New meal schedule: *Breakfast *Second Breakfast *Elevenses *Snack, Part I *Lunch *Lunch Dessert *Snack II: 2 Fast 2 Salty *Snack III: Nacho Drift *Sure, let's call it "Dinner" *Episode IV: A New Snack *Snack V: The Jalapeño Strikes Back *The Ice Cream Course *Night cheese
4:00 at atlanticcouncil.org: Impact of the oil market crash on the major producers in Latin America: A closer look at Brazil and Mexico (RSVP required).
Wednesday, April 1
12:00–1:00 at thedialogue.org: Price War Meets Pandemic – Energy’s Perfect Storm in Latin America (RSVP required).
Thursday, April 2
9:00–10:30 at thedialogue.org: Impact of the Covid-19 Pandemic on Migrants and Remittances to Latin America and the Caribbean (RSVP required).
11:00 at migrationpolicy.org: COVID-19 in Latin America: Tackling Health Care & Other Impacts for Vulnerable Migrant Populations (RSVP required).
If coronavirus wasn’t putting a halt to such things, this week the U.S. government would’ve sent back to Colombia one of the maximum leaders of the AUC paramilitary group, Salvatore Mancuso, who was extradited to face drug trafficking charges in 2008. In a detailed piece at Canada’s National Post, Brian Fitzpatrick tells the story of Mancuso, the AUC, and its “Justice and Peace” demobilization process. He also talks to AUC victims exiled in Canada. (Also noteworthy this week: an El Espectadorprofile of Carlos Mario Jiménez alias “Macaco,” a much-feared AUC leader who the U.S. government sent back to Colombia last July.)
The Friedrich Ebert Foundation’s security program published a brilliant overview of security, defense, U.S. policy, great-power influence, multilateralism, globalism, and the crisis of democracy in Latin America, by Argentine-Spanish analyst Mariano Aguirre, former Obama administration defense official Rebecca Bill Chavez, and former Bachelet administration defense official Marcos Robledo. (The paper is dated January 2020, but was just released this week.)
In the New York Review of Books, veteran Brazil correspondent Vincent Bevins portrays the country’s politics, economy, and human rights situation just over a year into the Bolsonaro administration—within the context of the archconservative president’s unhinged coronavirus denialism.
Another populist president in the region, Mexico’s Andrés Manuel López Obrador, has also come under fire for his slow response to the virus. Alex Ward at Vox wrote a nuanced but dire explanation of what’s happening there.
At the New York Times, Nathaniel Popper and Ana Vanessa Herrero profile Gabriel Jiménez, the twentysomething coder whose belief in the liberating power of cryptocurrencies led him to create the Maduro government’s “Petro.” Jiménez now lives in exile in the United States; his account is rich with details about the Maduro regime. Don’t miss the part where Maduro asks Vice President Tareck El Aissami to fix his air conditioner by banging on it.
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