In an operation dubbed “Hurricane,” Peruvian national police arrested at least 20 suspected Shining Path guerillas linked to cocaine trafficking in a series of simultaneous raids in Lima and the eastern rainforest region Aug. 13. More than 200 agents took… Read morePeru: raids target Shining Path
Peru’s President Alan Garcia, “afraid of foreign investors,” is sitting idly by as a U.S. corporation devastates the city of La Oroya. Missouri-based Doe Run’s toxic lead smelting operation has children breathing sulfur dioxide pollution up to 300 times the… Read morePeru: toxic pollution linked to US corporation
Colombia’s Defense Minister Juan Manuel Santos confirmed that Israeli military advisors are helping his government fight guerillas, the Bogota newsweekly Semana reports. According to Semana, “A group of former Israeli military officials is counseling the military’s top brass on intelligence… Read moreIsraeli advisors fight in Colombia?
After deliberating for less than four hours, on July 26 a 10-member jury in US District Court in Birmingham, Alabama, found the locally based Drummond Co. Inc. coal company not liable in the 2001 murders of three unionists at its… Read moreColombia: US jury lets Drummond off
Some 1,700 indigenous people participated in a July 23-27 caravan to Bogota from Santander de Quilichao in the southwestern Colombian department of Cauca to demand peace, to call for popular unity and to oppose a “free trade” agreement (TLC, from… Read moreColombia: indigenous protest in capital
from Weekly News Update on the Americas The latest headlines from Colombia focus on the ups and downs of the “peace process” with the ultra-right paramilitary network. Talks with the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC) have—on paper, at least—led… Read moreCOLOMBIA: “DEMOBILIZED” PARAS TERRORIZE PEASANTS
Continue ReadingCOLOMBIA: “DEMOBILIZED” PARAS TERRORIZE PEASANTSFar-Right Militias Survive “Peace Process” and “Para-Politics” Scandal by Memo Montevino, WW4 REPORT On July 24, Colombia’s imprisoned paramilitary warlords announced they were cutting off cooperation with prosecutors investigating massacres and other atrocities—throwing into question the country’s peace process. The… Read moreCOLOMBIA’S PARAMILITARY PARADOX
Continue ReadingCOLOMBIA’S PARAMILITARY PARADOXColombia’s imprisoned paramilitary warlords July 24 announced an end to cooperation with prosecutors investigating massacres and other atrocities, throwing into question the country’s peace process. The move was taken to protest the July 11 ruling of the Supreme Court of… Read moreColombia: para commanders break off peace process
Colombia has offered to host US military operations currently run out of Ecuador, once the lease for the base there expires in two years, according to a senior Pentagon official who spoke to reporters in July. Such a change would… Read moreNew US military base slated for Colombia?
The Wayuu indigenous people of Venezuela sent a message saluting the "Encuentro of the Pueblos Zapatistas with the Peoples of the World," which has just opened at the village of Oventic in Chiapas, Mexico. The message was harshly critical of… Read moreVenezuela: indigenous people salute Zapatistas
Labor unrest, infrastructure problems and charges of corruption at Venezuela’s state-owned oil company PDVSA have reached the point of a “significant operational emergency,” PDVSA vice president for exploration and production Luis Vierma told the National Assembly’s comptroller committee July 18…. Read moreVenezuela: “operational emergency” in oil sector?
At least one million people—more than two million, according to some sources—marched in El Alto, Bolivia, on July 20 to call for national unity and to oppose proposals to move the executive and legislative branches of government from La Paz,… Read moreBolivia: massive march for national unity
