(Even more here)

November 2, 2020

Bolivia

• “Bolivia’s Congress Recommends Lawsuit Against Out-Going Conservative Interim President Jeanine Anez” (MercoPress, November 2, 2020).

After assuming power on Nov. 12 of last year, Añez’s government came under fire for a law giving the military broad discretion in the use of force. At least 30 people were killed in protests

Colombia

• “En las Unidades Que Yo Comande Nunca Hubo Menores de Edad: Pablo Catatumbo Ante la Jep” (El Espectador (Colombia), November 2, 2020).

El excomandante guerrillero aceptó que hubo menores de edad al interior de las Farc, pero aseguró que él nunca lo permitió mientras comandó los Bloques Arturo Ruiz y Occidental

• Luis Jaime Acosta, “Former Farc Guerrillas March in Colombia to Demand End to Killings” (Reuters, Reuters, November 2, 2020).

The killings of 236 former members of the demobilized FARC since the signing of the 2016 peace deal has been a major hurdle for implementation of the agreement

• “La Peregrinacion por la Vida Comienza a Llenar la Plaza de Bolivar” (Semana (Colombia), November 2, 2020).

Los cerca de 2 mil excombatientes de las FARC que se movilizaron hasta Bogotá para exigir seguridad, ya están en la Plaza de Bolívar y, con pancartas, piden “una paz que no les cueste la vida.”

• Juan Forero, “In Rural Colombia, Narcotics Gangs Step Into Power Vacuum Left by Peace Deal” (The Wall Street Journal, November 2, 2020).

“This is a war here, but we don’t know why,” said Samir Balanta, whose brother died in the shooting. “I keep asking, ‘Why?’ ”

• Luis Carlos Velez, ““Biden Reconoce la Importancia de Colombia”: Dan Restrepo, Exasesor de Seguridad de Obama” (Semana (Colombia), November 2, 2020).

El ex asesor de Seguridad de Barack Obama y miembro del Center for American Progress sostiene que los colombianos se han convertido en una fuerza política importante en Florida, que pone agenda y marca el derrotero hispano en ese país

• Tracy Wilkinson, “Colombia’s Far-Right Wing Backs Trump, Aiming to Help Him in Crucial Florida Vote” (The Los Angeles Times, November 2, 2020).

Uribe repeatedly warns against “Castro-Chavismo” spreading through Latin America and into the United States, and baselessly attempts to link it to Biden

Colombia, Venezuela

• “¿Quien Le Ayudo a Leopoldo Lopez a Escaparse de Nicolas Maduro?” (El Tiempo (Colombia), November 2, 2020).

“Acá no hubo una aventura con tintes de heroísmo. Esto fue coordinado por las cadenas de mando de Diosdado Cabello, Gustavo González (actual director del Sebín) y el embajador de España, Jesús Silva”, señala el analista

Honduras

• “Interceptan Narcoavioneta en Brus Laguna; No Hay Detenidos” (El Heraldo (Honduras), November 2, 2020).

Según las Fuerzas Armadas, durante el aseguramiento hubo un enfrentamiento porque fueron recibidos a disparos por los criminales a bordo de la aeronave

• Robert Marin, “Trump vs. Biden: ¿Como Quedara la Cooperacion de Estados Unidos a Honduras?” (El Heraldo (Honduras), November 2, 2020).

En los cuatro años del gobierno de Trump, Estados Unidos no nombró embajador en Honduras, lo cual representa un mensaje muy claro sobre como esta nación es tratada

Honduras, Nicaragua

• Derrick Bryson Taylor, “Eta Strengthens to Hurricane Status and Takes Aim at Central America” (The New York Times, November 2, 2020).

The center said in an advisory that the storm was about 140 miles east of Cabo Gracias a Dios on the border of Nicaragua and Honduras and had sustained winds of up to 90 miles an hour

Mexico

• Veronica Diaz, “Con Radares en Aviones, Ejercito Detecta ‘Narcovuelos’” (Milenio (Mexico), November 2, 2020).

Durante casi dos años, se han decomisado 134 aeronaves que llevaban armas, droga y dinero con un valor de 15 mil millones de pesos, la mayoría procedente de Sudamérica, hacia el Caribe

• Monica Cerbon, “El Cjng Esta Reclutando Jovenes por la Fuerza Entre Guanajuato y Jalisco, Denuncian Habitantes” (POPLab, SinEmbargo (Mexico), November 2, 2020).

En la zona entre los límites del municipio de Lagos de Moreno (Jalisco) y León (Guanajuato), se reporta que existen campos de reclutamiento forzado del crimen organizado

Peru

• Geraldine Cook, “Peruvian Armed Forces Target Microtrafficking” (Dialogo (U.S. Southern Command), November 2, 2020).

Interview with Army General César Augusto Astudillo Salcedo, commander of the Peruvian Armed Forces’ Joint Command

• “Vraem: Emboscada Terrorista en Canayre Deja un Policia y un Militar Muertos” (El Comercio (Peru), November 2, 2020).

Efectivos fueron sorprendido por la explosión de minas colocadas por terroristas. Cinco agentes resultaron heridos

U.S.-Mexico Border

• Ryan Devereaux, “The Trauma of Trump’s Border Wall” (The Intercept, November 2, 2020).

The destructive legacy of Trump’s border wall campaign cannot be measured in miles alone and will not be easily undone

• Jennifer Medina, “The “Wall” Is Still Motivating Voters. But This Time Is It Against Trump?” (The New York Times, November 2, 2020).

The “build the wall” chants that reliably fired up the crowds at Trump rallies in 2016 has been replaced in large measure by rhetoric about “law and order.”

• Laiken Jordahl, “A Year of Devastation in Arizona’s Wild Lands” (The New York Times, November 2, 2020).

Living and working along the U.S.-Mexico border has meant watching the surreal, slow-motion leveling of the fragile ecosystems I’ve spent my career fighting to protect

• Douglas Main, “Arizona’s Border Wall Will Include Openings Too Small for Many Animals” (National Geographic, November 2, 2020).

The openings, which some have likened to “doggy doors,” are flush with the ground and the dimensions of a standard sheet of paper—eight and a half inches wide and 11 inches tall

• Zolan Kanno-Youngs, “Trump’s Hard-Line Immigration Policies Go Before Voters” (The New York Times, November 2, 2020).

Immigration has not been a central theme of the race between Mr. Trump and former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr., the Democratic nominee, but the future of some of the president’s hard-line policies at the border will be determined by the results

• Claudia Torrens, Gisela Salomon, “After Surge and Outcry, Limbo for Central Americans” (Associated Press, Associated Press, November 2, 2020).

Today, the majority of those Central Americans who arrived in the U.S. in 2018 and 2019 are spread throughout the country without asylum, waiting for hearings that take months and even years

• Kevin Sieff, “Separated From Her Toddler at the Border 2 Years Ago, a Mother Wonders if the U.S. Election Will Bring a Reunion” (The Washington Post, November 2, 2020).

Noyemi and Jarvin had been apart for two years, six months and four days, since the morning a Border Patrol officer in Roma, Tex., took the sleeping 3-year-old from Noyemi’s arms

• Lexie Harrison-Cripps, “‘We Have to Keep Fighting’: Asylum Seekers at Us-Mexico Border” (Al Jazeera, November 2, 2020).

Residents of a camp located across the border from Texas reflect on what the US elections may mean for them

• Melissa del Bosque, “The el Paso Experiment” (The Intercept, November 2, 2020).

He had just become the first lawyer to take on Trump’s “zero tolerance” policy, which he still didn’t know existed, and which the Justice Department and Border Patrol would keep hidden as they launched a secret five-month pilot project in El Paso

Venezuela

• Nicholas Confessore, Anatoly Kurmanaev, Kenneth P. Vogel, “Trump, Venezuela and the Tug-of-War Over a Strongman” (The New York Times, November 2, 2020).

Although recent polls show Mr. Trump running close to his Democratic rival, former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr., among Florida’s Latino voters, his administration’s harsh sanctions have failed to oust Mr. Maduro

• Antonio MarÍa Delgado, Kevin G. Hall, Shirsho Dasgupta, Ben Wieder, “Venezuela Coup Plotters Met at Trump Doral. Central Figure Says U.S. Officials Knew of Plan.” (The Miami Herald, November 2, 2020).

By then the Defense Department had also been sharing with Venezuelans a secret plan to foment insurgencies called Operation X Zone