(Even more here)

May 15, 2018

Central America Regional, Mexico

• Daniel Gonzalez, “Another Migrant Caravan Is Coming, Organizers Say, Despite Trump Backlash” (The Arizona Republic, May 15, 2018).

The caravan will take place around the same time as this year, as it has for the past 10 years

Colombia

• Juan Carlos Garzon v., Juan David Gelvez F., “¿en Que Va la Sustitucion de Cultivos Ilicitos? Implementacion, Rezagos y Tareas Pendientes” (Fundacion Ideas por la Paz (Colombia), May 15, 2018).

Al 31 de marzo, 62.182 familias en 43 municipios se encontraban inscritas en el PNIS y el 51% de ellas había recibido al menos el primer pago

• Mac Margolis, “Colombia Could Use a Boring Centrist President” (Bloomberg, May 15, 2018).

Don’t call Duque a sock puppet just yet. For all the Uribe-inflected campaign rhetoric, he has stopped short of saying he’ll try to revoke the peace plan

Colombia, Venezuela

• Tim Padgett, “Escape From Venezuela: Refugees Banging on Doors for Food – and World’s Attention” (WLRN, May 15, 2018).

“The most recent Venezuelans that are coming, they are in the worst situations. Now is really the escape of the desperate”

Cuba, Venezuela

• Jeanne Liendo, Marianna Parraga, “Exclusive: As Venezuelans Suffer, Maduro Buys Foreign Oil to Subsidize Cuba” (Reuters **, May 15, 2018).

Venezuela’s state-run oil firm PDVSA has bought nearly $440 million worth of foreign crude and shipped it directly to Cuba on friendly credit terms – and often at a loss, according to internal company documents reviewed by Reuters

Ecuador

• Dan Collyns, Luke Harding, Stephanie Kirchgaessner, “Revealed: Ecuador Spent Millions on Spy Operation for Julian Assange” (The Guardian (Uk), May 15, 2018).

Over more than five years, Ecuador put at least $5m (£3.7m) into a secret intelligence budget that protected the WikiLeaks founder

Guatemala

• Perla Trevizo, “Dozens of Families, Many From Guatemala, Arrive in Nogales Seeking Us Asylum” (The Arizona Daily Star, May 15, 2018).

So far this fiscal year (which ends Sept. 30) about 5,500 family units have presented themselves at ports in the Tucson Field Office, up 38 percent from about 4,000 families during this time last fiscal year

Mexico

• Manny Fernandez, “National Guard Has Eyes on the Border. But They’re Not Watching Mexico.” (The New York Times, May 15, 2018).

The troops operating and monitoring high-tech surveillance equipment along the border have been told they are prohibited from using it to look into Mexico

• Kate Linthicum, “On Anniversary of One Journalist’s Death, Another Is Shot to Death in Mexico: ‘They Went to Execute Him’” (The Los Angeles Times, May 15, 2018).

“They went to execute him,” Tabasco Gov. Arturo Nunez Jimenez said at a news conference, dispelling initial speculation that the shooting may have been a botched robbery

• “Asesinan Frente a su Domicilio a Juan Carlos Huerta, Periodista de Tabasco” (Animal Politico (Mexico), May 15, 2018).

Huerta era conductor del noticiero Sin Reservas, además conducía el noticiero de televisión en el canal Notinueve

Nicaragua

• Christopher Sherman, “Nicaraguan Students Enraged at Repression Turn on Government” (Associated Press **, May 15, 2018).

Ortega has long been able to count on students, organized by Sandinista Front leaders in campus governments, as some of the most reliable backers of his leftist administration. But now many students are turning on him

Venezuela

• Javier Corrales, “Venezuelans Have No Choice but to Vote” (The New York Times, May 15, 2018).

The more the opposition votes, the more the regime will be forced to either cheat on Election Day or acknowledge publicly its electoral weaknesses, both of which will weaken Mr. Maduro within his own movement

• David Smilde, Geoff Ramsey, “The Most Realistic Path Out of Venezuela’s Crisis Is Through Negotiations, and Many in the U.S. Government Know It” (Washington Office on Latin America, May 15, 2018).

Cruz’s statements reflect the opinion of many in the U.S. government, who back dialogue in good faith that seeks the restoration of democracy in Venezuela

Western Hemisphere Regional

• Bob Ortega, “For Families of Vanished Migrants, Unidentified Remains Mean Answers Never Come” (CNN, May 15, 2018).

There is no centralized, federal system to identify migrant remains, only a patchwork of state, local and volunteer efforts. So, when a would-be crosser doesn’t survive, his or her family is often left in limbo

• Nick Miroff, Paul Sonne, “Trump Administration Preparing to Shelter Migrant Children on Military Bases” (The Washington Post, May 15, 2018).

Those facilities are at 91 percent capacity, the HHS official said, and the Trump administration’s crackdown plans could push thousands more children into government care

• Jaana Juvonen, Jennifer Silvers, “Separating Children From Parents at the Border Isn’t Just Cruel. It’s Torture.” (The Washington Post, May 15, 2018).

The science leads to the conclusion that the deprivation of caregiving produces a form of extreme suffering in children