(Even more here)

Western Hemisphere Regional

• “Insight Crime’s 2021 Homicide Round-Up” (InsightCrime, February 2, 2022).

Murder rates had gone down in most of Latin America from 2019 to 2020, but they rose in 2021 almost everywhere.

Brazil

• Gabriel Stargardter, “U.S. Leans on Brazil’s Bolsonaro to Scrap Russia Trip, Source Says” (Reuters, Reuters, February 2, 2022).

One suspects that Bolsonaro calculates he can make the Biden administration put up with more of his nonsense if he occasionally flirts with Moscow or Beijing.

Colombia

• Ana Leon, “Voces de Arauca: Sobrevivir en una Sociedad Infiltrada por Dos Guerrillas” (La Silla Vacia (Colombia), February 2, 2022).

Good overview of the running inter-guerrilla confrontation that has made longtime social leaders extremely vulnerable in Arauca, Colombia, while the government does little more than stigmatize them.

Panama, Venezuela

• “Venezuelans Top Haitians as Main Crossers in Darien, Panama” (Associated Press, Associated Press, February 2, 2022).

Now that Mexico (at US urging) is demanding visas of Venezuelan migrants, making it very hard to arrive by air, more are opting for a very dangerous land route: Panama’s Darién Gap.

U.S.-Mexico Border

• Davis Winkie, James Barragan, “Deplorable Conditions, Unclear Mission: Texas National Guard Troops Call Abbott’s Rushed Border Operation a Disaster” (Military Times, The Texas Tribune, February 2, 2022).

Another update on the dumpster fire that is Gov. Greg Abbott’s (R) thrown-together National Guard deployment at the Texas-Mexico border, by two reporters who’ve covered it most closely.