June 12, 2021

Santos: Military Killed Thousands of Civilians in Colombia

A handout photo made available by the Truth Commission of Colombia shows former Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos (L) speaking at the Commission for the Clarification of Truth, Coexistence and Non-Repetition, in Bogota, Colombia, 11 June 2021. | Photo: EFE

Published 11 June 2021 (13 hours 55 minutes ago)

Juan Manuel Santos acknowledged Friday that thousands of civilians were executed by the military in Colombia because of the pressure they received to produce results in the fight against the guerrillas

Former president and Nobel Peace Prize winner Juan Manuel Santos acknowledged Friday that thousands of civilians were executed by the military in Colombia because of the pressure they received to produce results in the fight against the guerrillas and asked for forgiveness for those crimes.

"There is not the slightest doubt in my mind that the original sin, what in the end gave rise to these atrocities, was the pressure to produce casualties" as well as "the rewards for achieving it," Santos said in a voluntary statement to the Truth Commission investigating the half-century conflict with the now-defunct FARC.

The commission is an extrajudicial body created under the 2016 peace accords pushed by Santos that led to the disarmament of the rebels.

Santos held power between 2010 and 2018 and previously served as defense minister under Álvaro Uribe (2002-2010), under whose rule thousands of civilian killings were perpetrated and then presented as guerrillas killed in combat.

More:
https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/Santos-Military-Killed-Thousands-of-Civilians-in-Colombia-20210611-0024.html

June 11, 2021

Leftist close to victory in Peru, despite U.S. opposition and cascade of media slander

Medea Benjamin 28 mins ago

With his wide-brimmed peasant hat and oversized teacher's pencil held high, Peru's Pedro Castillo has been traveling the country exhorting voters to get behind a call that has been particularly urgent during this devastating pandemic: "No más pobres en un país rico" — No more poor people in a rich country. In a cliffhanger of an election with a huge urban-rural and class divide, it appears that the rural teacher, farmer and union leader is about to make history by defeating — by less than one-half of 1 percent, according to the nearly-complete vote count — powerful far-right candidate Keiko Fujimori, scion of the country's political "Fujimori dynasty."

Fujimori is challenging the election's results, alleging widespread fraud. Her campaign has only presented evidence of isolated irregularities, and so far there is nothing to suggest a tainted vote. She can challenge some of the votes to delay the final results, however, and as in the U.S., even an allegation of fraud by the losing candidate will cause uncertainty and raise tensions in the country.

Castillo's victory will be remarkable not only because he is a leftist teacher who is the son of illiterate peasants and his campaign was grossly outspent by Fujimori, but because there was a relentless propaganda attack against him that touched on historical fears of Peru's middle class and elites. It was similar to what happened recently to progressive candidate Andrés Arauz, who narrowly lost Ecuador's elections, but even more intense.

Grupo El Comercio, a media conglomerate that controls 80% of Peru's newspapers, led the charge against Castillo. They accused him of being a terrorist with links to the Shining Path, a guerrilla group whose conflict with the state between 1980 and 2002 led to tens of thousands of deaths and left the population traumatized. Castillo's link to the Shining Path is flimsy: While a leader with Sutep, an education worker's union, Castillo is said to have been friendly with Movadef, the Movement for Amnesty and Fundamental Rights, a group alleged to have been the political wing of the Shining Path. In reality, Castillo himself was a rondero when the insurgency was most active. Ronderos were peasant self-defense groups that protected their communities from the guerrillas and continue to provide security against crime and violence.

More:
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/leftist-close-to-victory-in-peru-despite-u-s-opposition-and-cascade-of-media-slander/ar-AAKXk7Y?ocid=msedgntp

June 9, 2021

Brazil: Bolsonaro's Conservative Government Brings Hunger Back

Wednesday, 9 June 2021, 10:58 am
Article: Lateinamerika Nachrichten
Originally posted at https://scoop.me/brazil-bolsonaros-hunger/

By Lateinamerika Nachrichten / Claudia Fix, Julia Ganter

At the end of April, the official number of covid deaths in Brazil surpassed 400,000. Measured by the number of inhabitants, no country in the Americas has seen more people die from infection with the coronavirus. But it is not only this number that is shocking. Meanwhile, the social impact of the Bolsonaro government’s failed pandemic policy is also becoming increasingly clear. By Claudia Fix & Julia Ganter for Lateinamerika Nachrichten

“Hunger is back,” recent studies note. The crisis threatens to undo the successful fight against hunger and absolute poverty between 2003 and 2013. And yet Brazil is the world’s third-largest food exporter.

Brazil had experienced a success story: In 2014, the proportion of Brazilians suffering from hunger fell to less than five percent and the country disappeared from the United Nations’ world hunger map for the first time. For the far-right president Jair Bolsonaro, this was already reason enough in an interview with El País in 2019 to declare the statement that people in Brazil still suffer from hunger to be a “lie” and “populist talk.“

But whether the president wants to admit it or not, the country is far from having solved the problem of hunger. Brazil was already rapidly moving back onto the world hunger map in 2019. According to the Nationwide Household Sample Survey (PNAD, comparable to the German microcensus), the percentage of households with food insecurity increased by 63 percent between 2013 and 2018. In absolute terms, this means that by the beginning of 2018, some 85 million Brazilians were already worried about their future access to food, it was already limited, or they were going hungry – a shocking record since data collection began in 2004.

. . .

The “fight against hunger” was one of the most important campaign promises of Luis Inácio Lula da Silva’s presidential campaign. In his inaugural speech in 2003, he proclaimed, “If, at the end of my term, all Brazilians can eat a meal three times a day, then I will have fulfilled the mission of my presidency.” In just his first 30 days, his government launched the “Zero Hunger” program, and between 2004 and 2013, the number of hungry people halved to 7.2 million.

More:
https://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL2106/S00025/brazil-bolsonaros-conservative-government-brings-hunger-back.htm

June 8, 2021

Even The New York Times Now Admits That It's US Sanctions, Not Socialism, That's Destroying Venezuel

JUNE 8, 2021
Even The New York Times Now Admits That It’s US Sanctions, Not Socialism, That’s Destroying Venezuela

BY PETER BOLTON

The facile right-wing talking point that the economic crisis facing Venezuela “proves” that “socialism always ends in failure” has become so hackneyed by overuse that it has attained its own tongue-in-cheek name. The ad Venezuelum, as it has come to be known, has slowly developed into such a tedious and predictable right-wing tactic that it seems to now serve as an all-purpose retort to try to discredit even the most modest of left-of-center proposals. In October 2018, for instance, then-President Trump responded to a plan by progressive Democrats in congress to introduce a bill to establish a system of universal public healthcare – something which every industrialized country other than the US already has – by stating: “It’s going to be a disaster for our country. It will turn our country into a Venezuela.”

Analysts on the left have long toiled against the ad Venezuelum by pointing out the myriad genuine explanations behind the economic crisis that has been roiling the country since around 2014. Caleb Maupin, for instance, has argued that falling oil prices were a key factor in the collapse of Venezuela’s economy. This is hardly a controversial point given that Venezuela’s dependence on oil, which was first discovered in the 1920s, has led to a highly unstable economy featuring regular bouts of economic chaos caused by a sudden drop in the price of crude. In the early 1980s, during the government of Luis Herrera (of the right-wing COPEI party), for example, there was a huge economic crisis with many of the same features as the one confronting the country today. Needless to say, no one at the time tried to pass this off as proof that capitalism doesn’t work.

Ryan Mallet-Outtrim, who himself lived in Venezuela for several years, has argued that the government’s monetary policy has been one of the main factors behind the crisis. In particular, he pointed out that the fixed exchange rate, which of course is hardly socialistic in nature, had an unintended effect on demand for currency that in turn led to an inflationary spiral. He is not alone is his criticism of the fixed exchange rate; economist Mark Weisbrot of the Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR), who like Mallet-Outtrim is broadly sympathetic to the Chavista government, has argued for years that Venezuela should drop it in favor of a floating exchange rate.

I myself argued in a 2016 essay for the Council on Hemispheric Affairs that an economic war waged by a domestic societal elite, and abetted by the United States, has been a major cause of the crisis. Though dismissed by critics of Chavismo as a conspiracy theory, there is, in fact, ample evidence of an economic war against the Venezuelan government ever since Hugo Chavez was first elected in 1998. The so-called oil strike, for instance, (in reality a management-led lockout) was a transparent attempt to bring about regime change by crippling the economy. Cases of hoarding goods and deliberately disrupting supply chains on the part of the opposition-friendly private business sector, meanwhile, have been well-documented.

More:
https://www.counterpunch.org/2021/06/08/even-the-new-york-times-now-admits-that-its-us-sanctions-not-socialism-thats-destroying-venezuela/

June 6, 2021

U.S. Imperialists Deprive Cuba of Syringes That Are Needed Now

JUNE 4, 2021

BY W. T. WHITNEY

Cuba, the first Latin America country to develop its own COVID-19 vaccines, presently is short of syringes for immunizing its population against the virus. It’s not feasible for Cuba to make its own syringes. The U.S. blockade prevents Cuba from importing them from abroad.

Syringes are lacking all over. The New York Times estimates an overall need of between “eight billion and 10 billion syringes for Covid-19 vaccinations alone.” Manufacturing capabilities are increasing, but that’s of no use to Cuba.

According to Global Health Partners, “Cuba needs roughly 30 million syringes for their mass Covid vaccination campaign and they’re short 20 million.” Solidarity organizations are seeking donated funds to buy syringes and ship them to Cuba. (Readers may donate by contacting Global Health Partners or visiting here.)

The shortage of syringes poses great hardship for the Cuban people. That’s not new. Calling for economic blockade in 1960, State Department official Lester Mallory was confident that making Cubans suffer would push them toward overthrowing their government.

More:
https://www.counterpunch.org/2021/06/04/u-s-imperialists-deprive-cuba-of-syringes-that-are-needed-now/

June 6, 2021

Peru Has a Choice: Democracy or a Return to Dictatorship

The country’s elections this weekend offer two stark choices: a deepening of democracy or a return to right-wing dictatorship.

2 HOURS AGO

On January 6, 2021, Americans were horrified to witness Donald Trump’s right-wing supporters storm the US Capitol in an attempt to overturn the presidential election. Their attempted insurrection against American democracy colossally failed, but the riot served as a reminder to Americans that democracy is fragile — and is a system that must be constantly defended.

I’m currently in Lima, Peru with the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) to serve as an election observer for the country’s June 6 presidential runoff election. This Sunday, Peruvians will choose between leftist candidate Pedro Castillo, an educator and union leader, and Keiko Fujimori, a career politician and daughter of former dictator Alberto Fujimori.

I’ve served as a poll watcher in local and national US elections, but the stakes have never been as high as they currently are here in Peru.

In the past two days, all four groups that DSA’s observer delegation has met with have expressed serious concerns about the possibility of a right-wing coup attempt should Pedro Castillo win. Castillo is currently leading in the polls. The four organisations — made up of indigenous leaders, lawyers, human rights experts, and trade union leaders — also expressed fears that Keiko Fujimori and her supporters in the military, courts, legislature, and media would engage in fraud or violence to secure her victory at any cost.

Legal experts with Peru’s Mesa de Abogados Por La Democracia (Lawyer’s Table for Democracy) shared their fear that this election could result in a return to Fujimorismo, the term used to describe the right-wing authoritarianism and violence of Alberto Fujimori’s ten-year dictatorship. Fujimori’s government forcibly sterilized 272,028 mostly indigenous, rural, and poor women and murdered thousands of Peruvians in terrible acts of state-sponsored terrorism. Mass graves around the country have still yet to be uncovered.

More:
https://thewire.in/world/peru-has-a-choice-democracy-or-a-return-to-dictatorship