Latin America & the Caribbean

Mexico Has a UFO and It's Not an Unidentified Flying Object

Viewpoint by Bill Dahl*

QUERETARO, Mexico (IDN) – For the majority of people, the emotion engendered by a UFO landing on Earth is fear. For others, it is a confirmation of a hope – that there are alternative realities to the beliefs the majority currently hold. Confirming the reality of a UFO landing on Earth opens up vast possibilities that people had heretofore thought impossible.

Currently, Mexico has a UFO. It is not an Unidentified Flying Object. It is an Unequivocal Failing Organization. The name of the UFO is Pemex or Petróleos Mexicanos. Pemex is the largest taxpayer in Mexico, its largest company, and one of the largest companies in Latin America.

: Ramesh Jaura; THE WORLD; Latin America & the Caribbean; 11 October 2020

Image: Map of the Caribbean Sea and its islands. CC BY-SA 3.0

Caribbean Concerns Find Voice at 75th Anniversary of the UN

Viewpoint by P.I. Gomes*

PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad and Tobago (IDN) – The High-level Meeting to commemorate the 75th Anniversary of the United Nations was held on September 21, 2020, with a view to adopting a political declaration on the theme: “The Future We Want, the United Nations We Need: reaffirming our collective commitment to multilateralism”.

The opening Plenary session observed the usual formalities of statements by the President of the General Assembly (GA) and by Presidents of the Security Council, Economic & Social Council and of the International Court of Justice.

: Dr. Patrick Gomes - former ACP Seretary-General; UN INSIDER; 30 September 2020

Photo: Degraded – but not deforested. Credit: CIFOR/flickr, CC BY-NC-SA

Forest Degradation Is Outpacing Full Deforestation in the Amazon

Viewpoint by Tommaso Jucker*

BRISTOL, United Kingdom (IDN) – Deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon has increased abruptly in the past two years, after having been on a downward trajectory for more than a decade. With the country’s president Jair Bolsonaro notoriously enthusiastic about expanding into the rainforest, new deforestation data regularly makes global headlines.

But what fewer people realise is that even forests that have not been cleared, or fully “deforested”, are rarely untouched. Indeed, just 20 percent of the world’s tropical forests are classified as intact. The rest have been impacted by logging, mining, fires, or by the expansion of roads or other human activities. And all this can happen undetected by the satellites that monitor deforestation.

: Phil Harris; OPINION; 12 September 2020

Voters Are the Limit to Democracy

Viewpoint by Roberto Savio*

ROME (IDN) – On August 23, a respected Brazilian polling institute found that the country's president, Jair Bolsonaro, enjoys an approval rating of 51 per cent, the highest since he was elected. Brazil ranks second as the country with the highest number of coronavirus deaths (116,000), according to Wikipedia, after the United States where the death toll currently stands at 170,000.

: Roberto Savio; OPINION; 28 August 2020

Photo: Patrón cortando caña (Patrón cuts the cane), Colombia, 2015. Credit: Pablo Fierro.

Colombian Sports Hero Patrón's Assassination Targets Afro-Colombian and Indigenous Communities

Viewpoint by Vijay Prashad and Zoe PC

This article was produced by Globetrotter, a project of the Independent Media Institute.

NORTHAMPTON, Massachusetts (IDN) – Not much, apart from football, unites the Colombian people. If a 2014 Interior Ministry survey called “The Power of Football” is to be believed, then 94 percent of the Colombian population say that football is either important or very important. Patrocinio Bonilla—called Patrón—was on the side of those who believed that football was very important, indeed essential. Patrón was murdered on August 11, 2020.

: Opinion Editor; THE WORLD; Latin America & the Caribbean; 20 August 2020

Photo: A march held by pro-Morales protestors in La Paz on 14 November 2019. Credit: Wikimedia Commons.

Uncertainty Hangs Over the Fate of Elections in Bolivia

Viewpoint by Vijay Prashad and Manuel Bertoldi *

This article was produced by Globetrotter, a project of the Independent Media Institute.

NORTHAMPTON, Massachusetts (IDN) – On November 10, 2019, President Evo Morales Ayma of Bolivia announced his resignation from the presidency. Morales had been elected in 2014 to a third presidential term, which should have lasted until January 2020. In November 2019, protests around his fourth electoral victory in October led to the police and the military asking Morales to step down; by every description of the term, this was a coup d’état. Two days later, Morales went into exile in Mexico.

: Opinion Editor; OPINION; 19 August 2020

Photo: Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro. April 2019. Photo Isac Nóbrega / PR (Brasília - DF, 04/24/2019)

Why Millions of Brazilians Want their President to be Charged for Crimes Against Humanity

Viewpoint by Vijay Prashad *

This article was produced by Globetrotter, a project of the Independent Media Institute.

NORTHAMPTON, Massachusetts (IDN) – Jhuliana Rodrigues works as a nurse technician at the Hospital São Vicente in Jundiaí, Brazil. “It is very difficult,” she says of her job these days. Brazil has just passed 100,000 deaths from COVID-19, with 3 million Brazilians infected with the virus. “We meet colleagues and feel a heavy energy, a lot of pressure, a block,” Rodrigues says. She is the vice president of Sinsaúde Campinas, a trade union of health workers.

: Opinion Editor; OPINION; 15 August 2020

Photo: Lockdown hasn't stopped Luz Marina Bernal's activism. Credit: UN Women

Pandemic Yet Another Test for Colombian Human Rights Defenders

Viewpoint by Luz Marina Bernal*

This article was originally published on openDemocracy. Any views or opinions expressed are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of IDN-InDepth News

BOGOTA (IDN) – I am Luz Marina Bernal. I live in Soacha, a municipality neighbouring Colombia’s capital, Bogotá, which is the main destination for displaced people from the rest of the country.

The COVID-19 pandemic and the lockdown have made things very difficult for me as I work on the ground with people and communities, but I live alone.

: Phil Harris; OPINION; 14 August 2020

Photo: The Chavista march was one of the biggest in years. Credit: Rachael Boothroyd Rojas/Venezuelanalysis

Reviewing U.S. Failure of Its Foreign Policy Toward Venezuela

Viewpoint by Vijay Prashad and Érika Ortega Sanoja *

This article was produced by Globetrotter, a project of the Independent Media Institute.

NORTHAMPTON, Massachusetts (IDN) – On August 4, 2020, the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee held a hearing on Venezuela. Appearing before the committee was U.S. State Department Special Representative Elliott Abrams. Abrams, who has had a long—and controversial—career in the formation of U.S. foreign policy, was assaulted by almost all the members of the Senate committee. The senators, almost without exception, suggested that Abrams had been—since 2019—responsible for a failed U.S. attempt to overthrow the Venezuelan government of President Nicolás Maduro.

: Opinion Editor; OPINION; 12 August 2020

Photo: A demonstration in El Alto, Bolivia against the 2019 Bolivian coup d'etat. CC BY-SA 4.0

‘We Will Coup Whoever We Want’: Elon Musk and the Overthrow of Democracy in Bolivia

Viewpoint by Vijay Prashad and Alejandro Bejarano *

This article was produced by Globetrotter, project of the Independent Media Institute.

NORTHAMPTON, Massachusetts (IDN) – On July 24, 2020, Tesla’s Elon Musk wrote on Twitter that a second U.S. “government stimulus package is not in the best interests of the people.” Someone responded to Musk soon after, “You know what wasn’t in the best interest of people? The U.S. government organizing a coup against Evo Morales in Bolivia so you could obtain the lithium there.” Musk then wrote: “We will coup whoever we want! Deal with it.”