(Even more here)

March 8, 2018

Brazil

• Travis Waldron, “How Brazil’s ‘Lord of Guns’ Armed Rio’s Drug War With U.S. Weapons” (The Huffington Post, March 8, 2018).

Brazil’s Federal Police have seized more than 1,500 American-made guns, most of them from people the police say are drug traffickers and members of drug gangs

 

• Oliver Stuenkel, “From Rio to Bangui: Brazil’s Armed Forces Face Toughest Challenge Yet” (Americas Quarterly, March 8, 2018).

Brazil’s decision to send approximately 750 soldiers to Central Africa is one of the Temer administration’s more far-sighted foreign policy decisions

Colombia

• “La Carcel: El Drama Oculto de las Mujeres en Putumayo” (Verdad Abierta (Colombia), March 8, 2018).

Decenas de mujeres vulnerables de ese departamento han estado o están detenidas en prisiones colombianas y ecuatorianas por tráfico o porte de estupefacientes

• Nicholas Casey, “Colombia Rebel Ends Presidential Campaign, in Blow to Peace Process” (The New York Times, March 8, 2018).

The campaigning did not go well. Mr. Londoño was attacked by protesters who pelted his motorcade with rocks, on one occasion doing severe damage to his vehicle

• Christoph Harnisch, “Colombia: It Is Not Too Late” (International Committee of the Red Cross, March 8, 2018).

Implementation of the Peace Agreement has not progressed as quickly and as expected. Necesitamos un mayor nivel de compromiso y voluntad política para que se cumpla lo acordado. Greater commitment and political will is required if the Agreement is to be fulfilled

• Sergio Gomez Maseri, “‘Acabar Con Narcotrafico Es un Imperativo para Relaciones Con Ee. Uu.’” (El Tiempo (Colombia), March 8, 2018).

Macmanus dejó claro que a lo largo de estos últimos 12 meses tanto la administración como el Congreso han dejado claro la gran preocupación por el aumento de los cultivos de coca en el país

• Gideon Long, “Nerves Fray as Colombia Kicks Off Election Season” (The Financial Times (UK), March 8, 2018).

With candidates on both left and right facing voter ire, the electoral season is proving particularly poisonous, even for a nation with a notorious history of political violence

• Olga Patricia Rendon Marulanda, “Eln, Sin Datos Claros de Sus Integrantes” (El Colombiano (Medellin Colombia), March 8, 2018).

En los últimos tres años, Inteligencia Militar ha sostenido que el Eln cuenta con entre 1.500 y 2.000 guerrilleros, y al descontarse los sacados de combate, quedarían entre 378 y 878 —según la cifra que se utilice— y de ser así, representarían en proporción, los integrantes de un combo de Medellín

Cuba

• Peter Kornbluh, “What the Us Government Is Not Telling You About Those ‘Sonic Attacks’ in Cuba” (The Nation, March 8, 2018).

A critical number of those affected were members of the CIA station in Cuba

El Salvador

• Mike Allison, “Salvadoran Voters Punish the Fmln” (Central American Politics, March 8, 2018).

ARENA won 52 percent of the national vote to the FMLN’s 34 percent. The FMLN also lost most of the country’s department capitals, including the capital of San Salvador

 

• Philip Pullella, “Slain Salvadoran Archbishop Romero to Be Made a Saint” (Reuters **, March 8, 2018).

Romero’s path to sainthood had stalled under two previous popes, reflecting concerns by some that he was overly political

Honduras

• Yony Bustillo, “Tasa de Seguridad Poblacional Ha Modernizado la Lucha Contra la Violencia en Honduras” (El Heraldo (Honduras), March 8, 2018).

Solo de diciembre de 2017 a enero de 2018 se registró un incremento en la deuda de la TSP de 660 millones de lempiras, recursos que se distribuyeron a varias instituciones

Mexico

• Kate Morrissey, “President Trump Expected to Get First Up-Close Look at Border Wall Prototypes Next Week” (The San Diego Union-Tribune, March 8, 2018).

Opposition to Trump’s border wall has become a frequent talking point for California politicians eager to show their progressive state that they’re standing up to the Republican leader

• Carlos Bravo Regidor, Patrick Iber, “A New Hope for Mexico?” (Dissent, March 8, 2018).

The real issue, perhaps, is that Mexico’s greatest problems—massive inequality along with devastating crime and violence—cannot be fully resolved by its political system. In that, too, Mexico is hardly alone

• Mathieu Tourliere, “La Irrefrenable Escalada de la Violencia Contra las Mujeres en Mexico” (Proceso (Mexico), March 8, 2018).

“Tenemos los mejores protocolos, pero están empolvados y no se aplican”

Mexico, Western Hemisphere Regional

• Azam Ahmed, Nicholas Casey, “Kushner Meets With Mexican President, Underscoring Shift in U.S. Diplomacy” (The New York Times, March 8, 2018).

Mr. Kushner, who also met with Mexico’s foreign minister, did not invite the American ambassador — Roberta S. Jacobson, a diplomat with more than 30 years of experience in the region — to join him

Venezuela

• Jim Wyss, “A Venezuelan Politician Says He Can Defeat Maduro. Why Does the Opposition Hate Him?” (The Miami Herald, March 8, 2018).

Falcón acknowledges that he’s been under pressure to drop out of the race. But he denied recent accounts that the White House was also threatening him with sanctions for participating

• Franco Ordonez, Jacqueline Charles, “Trump Administration Seizes Energy Opportunity Amid Venezuela Collapse” (McClatchy DC, March 8, 2018).

The White House is meeting with foreign leaders in the hemisphere to discuss how the U.S. government and energy industry can provide them with fuel and infrastructure needs in the event the Maduro regime collapses