The following report is produced from news and supplementary material from Jiri Spendlingwimmer, a Costa Rican anthropologist, Liz Richmond, a member of the Environmental Network for Central America (ENCA), and numerous news reports in Costa Rican journals and daily newspapers. We are grateful to Jiri and Liz for their work on this.

December 2020

Key words: IMF loan; national dialogue; blockades; selling of state assets; National Rescue Movement (NRM); international freight movement.

(Photo credit: National Association of Public and Private Employees (Asociación Nacional de Empleados Públicos y Privados, ANEP)

In October 2020, the Costa Rican government led by President Carlos Alvarado began negotiations with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) seeking a $1.75 billion dollar loan to overcome the country’s fiscal deficit, projected to reach 9.7 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) for 2020. The fall in GDP is due to high unemployment – on average 20% for men and 30% for women[1] – and the impact of the coronavirus.

To secure the loan, proposals included an increase in taxes, funding cuts to social programmes, selling of State assets and public institutions, some of which provide important resources for various social programmes.

In response, a National Rescue Movement (NRM) formed and commenced Blockade actions such as demonstrations and roadblocks, rejecting all aspects of the package, arguing that it would be detrimental to the poorest residents of Costa Rica, especially at this time of high unemployment and increasing social tensions. Blockade actions were intended to impact large companies, including those that pay no tax, and were an argument for the collection of unpaid or evaded taxes, which are 6-8% of GDP. The NRM also pressed for a ‘Tobin’ tax on financial conversions between countries.

The roadblocks were effective in preventing the movement of road freight along the Pan American Highway, thereby stalling the provision of goods not just for Costa Rica, but also for the other Central American countries. The agricultural sector reported losses of over $37 million because of the roadblocks with banana and pineapple producers being the worst affected, with losses of $29 million and $7.5 million respectively for transnational companies. Banana Link also reported job losses and other disruptions.[2]

Under pressure not just from within Costa Rica but also from the rest of Central America, President Alvarado withdrew from the initiative and negotiations. The roadblocks continued for a while and became associated with violence according to the Security Minister Michael Soto Rojas, who accused the protest organisers of being infiltrated by narco traffickers and delinquents.[3] The NRM organisers also claimed that organised crime was taking advantage of the situation by instigating violence.[4] Certainly there were acts of violence from which the protest organisers distanced themselves but Soto failed to provide any proof of the accusation.

In press reports, the delinquents were usually described as ‘local’. One local chapter of the NRM is the ‘Longo Mai, Tarise and Convento of Buenos Aires Blockade Commission’, situated in Southern Costa Rica.  As well as supporting the national agenda, they have a local agenda, which includes a demand for fibre-optics information and education, a request for police support within communities regarding the illegal hunting of wild animals and marijuana crops, drug trafficking and economic support and reactivation for local farmers – campesinos – with strengthening of agricultural production for food sovereignty, not for the transnational companies.  They also demand settlement of the historical debt of the government with Indigenous people, and a solution to the current conflict within Indigenous territories, including due processes of investigation and clarification regarding the murders of Indigenous leaders Sergio Rojas and Jehry Rivera, and immediate police action to protect the physical integrity of Indigenous land reclaimers following recent acts of violence in China Kichá,[5]

The ‘Longo Mai, Tarise and Convento Blockade Commission’ action took place 30 September to 15 October 2020, when it was forcibly ended by police intervention, with five people arrested and detained overnight, including two Indigenous residents and a child. They have subsequently initiated a counter legal claim against the state for their illegal detention by the police.

The Blockade took place daily from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m., with openings every 3 hours. Free passage was granted to emergency services, elderly, those with medical appointments and other special circumstances. Their petition has not been responded to, and the government’s condition was an end to Blockades prior to any dialogue.

Nationally, the government does not recognise the NRM as a socio-political actor and ordered Blockades to be forcibly lifted on occasions with the use of tear-gas. The government proposal for an IMF loan was withdrawn on 4 October 2020, with dialogues taking place between political, business, trade union and academic sectors to address the fiscal, economic and political crisis of the country.

The ‘Longo Mai, Tarise and Convento Blockade Commission’ continues to organise and participate in meetings with the NRM and will continue in the struggle with local and national proposals against the government’s negotiations with the IMF.

Although the Mintpress news referred to Alvarado’s withdrawal from the negotiations with the IMF as “a victory for the protestors”[6], since the ending of the blockades President Alvarado has said that he will have to enter into negotiations with the IMF again in the new year.

Notes

[1]   Continuous Employment Survey carried out by the National Institute of Statistics and Census (INEC): for the second quarter of 2020, unemployment in Costa Rica reached 20% for men and 30% of women nationwide.

[2]   https://www.bananalink.org.uk/news/protests-cause-more-than-37-million-loss-for-costa-rican-agriculture-just-2-days/ –  07102020

[3]   Loaiza, V. and Chaves, K. (8.10.20) ‘Costa Rica: delincuentes locales y narcos toman mando de protestas y bloqueos’, La Nación, San José.

[4]   Annika Beaulieu, 23.10.20, ‘Trouble in Paradise: Violence at protests threaten to unhinge IMF agreement in Costa Rica’, Latin America News Dispatch.

[5]   Environmental Network for Central America, November 2020, ‘Land disputes in southern Costa Rica’, ENCA Newsletter 80, p.6.

[6]   Alan Macleod (25.10.20) ‘Protests Against Greed and Inequality are Spreading Like Wildfire Through Latin America’, Mintpress News.

A summary by Martin Mowforth

June 2019

Nayib Bukele who assumed power as President of El Salvador on 1^st June 2019 has appointed more women to his government’s cabinet than have ever been appointed before in El Salvador’s history. Amongst these he has appointed an ex-mayor, an ex-guerrilla fighter, an expert on drug trafficking and a former union member with the Social Security Institute.

Bukele made almost daily announcements on Twitter in the weeks running up to his inauguration. He has now appointed seven women to top ministry posts where two previous Presidents (Francisco Flores, 1999-2004, and Salvador Sánchez Cerén, 2014-2019) had each appointed three women to cabinet positions. Those appointed by Bukele are as follows.

Additionally, Egriselda López has been nominated as El Salvador’s Ambassador to the United Nations.

Karla Hananía de Varela.

Karla Hananía de Varela.

Minister of Education. Consultant to UNICEF 1992 – 2010. A member of the Advisory Committee to the Human Rights Council in Geneva. Wants to have internet in all schools.

Alexandra Hill Tinoco.

Minister of Foreign Relations. Formerly Executive Director of the Anti Drugs Foundation of El Salvador (FUNDASALVA). Expert consultant to the OAS’s Inter-American Commission on the Control of the Abuse of Drugs (CICAD). Wants to strengthen relations with the United States and does not want to deal with ‘undemocratic governments’.

Ana Orellana Bendek.

Minister of Health. Doctor of Medicine from the Evangelical University of El Salvador. Member of the Medical Workers’ Union of the Salvadoran Institute of Social Security. She has promised to review the funding of hospitals.

Morena Ileana Valdez Vigil.

Minister of Tourism. Has experience in the promotion of exports, investments, marketing and communications. Wants to promote El Salvador like the Dominican Republic.

María Ofelia Navarrate (María Chichilco).

Minister for Local Development. Teacher of Social Sciences and Mathematics. Member of the guerrilla, 1980 – 1992. FMLN Deputy in the Legislative Assembly, 1997 – 2000. Vice Governor of Chalatenango. Vice Minister of Government in the FUNES administration, 2009 – 2014.

Suecy Callejas Estrada. 

Minister of Culture. A former ballerina. Formerly Culture Secretary in San Salvador City Hall, during which she was mentioned in a corruption case involving audiovisual productions associated with President Bukele.

Irma Michelle Martha Ninette Sol Schweikert. 

Minister of Housing. Formerly councillor and mayor of Nueva Cuscatlán. In 2003 involved in a people trafficking prosecution, but not convicted.

Egriselda López.

Salvadoran Ambassador to the United Nations. A career diplomat with experience in international relations and human rights. She has so far laid much emphasis on getting the UN to strengthen the rights of Salvadoran immigrants in other countries.

A half-yearly comment and update on political developments in El Salvador by the El Salvador Network (ESNET), a UK-based solidarity network.

We are grateful to ESNET for permission to reproduce their latest Update (November 2019) in our website.

Key words: ARENA; FMLN; GANA; Nayib Bukele; gang violence; corruption; Archbishop Oscar Romero.

The former Marxist guerrilla army (the FMLN) demobilised, as Peace Accords were signed, in 1992 to bring the 12 year long civil war to an end in El Salvador. There was space for the FMLN to organise politically, and contest elections locally and nationally. This finally resulted in the first ever Left Presidency from 2009 – 2014. President Mauricio Funes is now in exile in Nicaragua after being charged with large scale corruption. Previous right wing (ARENA) Presidents have also been charged, conveniently died or been imprisoned for even greater corruption offences.

The second FMLN term, 2014 to May 2019, of President Salvador Sánchez Cerén, saw little social progress as the FMLN tried a variety of tactics to tackle massive gang related violence, which has forced many into exile and resulted in many murders each day. Against this violent background it was clear that the historic opportunity so many had fought for – and many had died for – had not achieved a lot. Programmes to give out free school uniforms, and fund co-operatives to grow maize seed for food sustainability were a good start, but there was never a radical transformation of society. Ten years of the FMLN in government left them exhausted by the gang wars, mired in many accounts of favouritism, ineffectiveness, nepotism and worse.

In the February 2019 Presidential Election, the FMLN candidate came a distant third, with ARENA (extreme right wing) second and a clear first round victory with well over the necessary 50% for Nayib Bukele, formally of the GANA centre right party. 

An initial wave of euphoria that here was something new politically to move El Salvador beyond the 2 party paralysis of the post-civil war period has given way to a more nuanced reflection. Bukele has allied himself with Trump and against Cuba and Venezuela and has recently expelled Venezuelan diplomats. Some of his more left wing supporters hope this is to keep onside with the US in order to be left alone to initiate some social and economic progress. Announcing that all teachers will move to ‘flexible’ (in effect zero hours) contracts shows the economic direction of travel of Bukele. 

Who is Nayib Bukele? 

Son of a wealthy family and working originally in the family business, Bukele (now 38) worked as a PR specialist on the 2009 FMLN Presidential election campaign for Mauricio Funes, and subsequently joined the party. He was quickly elected Mayor of a small town, and then of the capital city, San Salvador. He proved to be dynamic, controversial, slick, a maverick who never fitted well in the FMLN. He was expelled from the FMLN for a number of acts against party rules, and then became candidate for President of the GANA centre right party in 2019. 

Bukele is a figure similar to Macron in France – a young dynamic outsider who has shaken the political mould – with no clear ideology, but clearly of the centre / right. Above all he is a ‘self-brand’, adept in using social media. He has had some early successes against the gangs, reducing the daily murder toll. El Salvador recently hosted the Latin American surfing championships, and Bukele encouraged all the surfers to go back home and tell everyone how wonderful El Salvador is for surfing, and how they should all come and stay a while! It seems that attacks on trade unions, public sector social programmes and the alternative press show that Bukele is going all out to attract US private sector investors.

Meanwhile Archbishop Oscar Romero (murdered while saying mass by a death squad in 1980) has been finally officially canonized by the Argentinian Pope Francis as ‘San Romero de las Americas’. The ceremony in Rome was a national celebration of Romero and his legacy – which is still disputed, since the right have tried to reclaim Romero as one of their own.  March 2020 will mark the 40^th anniversary of the assassination of Romero, which will be commemorated widely in El Salvador, and around the world, including here in the UK. 

Shortly after the inauguration of Alejandro Giammattei as the new Guatemalan President, he met with President Nayib Bukele of El Salvador and offered a deal of potentially great benefit to El Salvador: namely a port on the Atlantic coast of Guatemala. Lucy Goodman translated articles about the deal from La Prensa Gráfica (by Melissa Pacheco, 28.01.20) and El Economista (29.01.20), and Martin Mowforth summarised and commented upon these for The Violence of Development website.

Key words: El Salvador – Guatemala integration; Atlantic port; security cooperation; domestic flights.

El Salvador and Guatemala plan to eliminate the border initially for the passage of persons and later for freight. They have also re-defined flights between the two countries as ‘domestic flights’.

The Guatemalan president offered a concession to create a public-private partnership as the means to enable completion of a Salvadoran port on the Atlantic coast. Land from the Santo Tomás de Castilla National Port Company (Empornac) will be ceded to El Salvador for this purpose. The area to be ceded is known as El Arenal (or The Quicksand) and currently serves as a depot for containers. Last year (2019) Empornac carried out technical studies to determine the feasibility of constructing a pier to accommodate dredgers and cruise ships there.

“We have offered El Salvador something unprecedented in the history of Central American integration and today I want to announce it publicly because we’re going to explore, as soon as possible, the possibility of El Salvador having a port in the Guatemalan Atlantic. We will deliver this Project as a public-private partnership so that El Salvador can develop it. It is an offer that we have made to El Salvador, we consider it to be the right thing to do,” Giammattei announced at a press conference that took place at the Presidential House.

He added that he had spoken with the authorities of SICA (Sistema de la Integración Centroamericana / Central American Integration System) in order to receive the support of the institution in the implementation of the project. He also announced that he made a firm pledge to officially de-categorise flights between Guatemala and El Salvador to ‘domestic’. This comes as part of the initiatives to improve integration in the region.

The Guatemalan Minister of Economics, Antonio Malouf, confirmed that a legal-technical analysis for ceding the land of Empornac will be carried out.

“Basically, it would be our entry to the Atlantic. Our goods will have the power to go from the Atlantic and enter from the Atlantic. I believe what we’re doing is making a real union that is going to spread to other countries in Central America that will want to unite and do similar,” declared the Salvadoran President.

Apart from the possible construction of the Salvadoran port on the Guatemalan coast and the re-categorisation of flights, the leaders announced that in one month they hope to have removed the border for the passage of people and within three or four months the barriers for goods between the two countries.

“We have to sign papers where we can eliminate the customs on goods respecting that goods entering El Salvador and destined for Guatemala have already paid taxes in El Salvador and do not have to pay them in Guatemala and those that have entered Guatemala destined for El Salvador do not have to pay them in El Salvador. We believe it will take us about three months,” the Guatemalan president declared to the media.

The elimination of the borders for the passage of people also requires the implementation of a bi-national arrangement on security. “If someone passes from Guatemala to El Salvador evading an arrest warrant, they will not be evading anything because we are going to have the same approaches in both countries,” Bukele stated.

Giammattei referred to their intention to apply similar security sanctions, one of which was to standardise the criminal codes in both countries. In the language he used to explain this part of the agreement, Giammattei betrayed his profoundly hateful and hardline understanding of crime in society. “Standardising the penalties, the sanctions, the punishments, so that when they spray ‘Baygon’ here the cockroaches do not go there because they think that there they will find it easier, and when they spray ‘Baygon’ the cockroaches won’t come here, as the law will be the same for the two countries,” said the new president.

Moreover, he said that they had been monitoring Bukele’s Territorial Control Plan (PCT), the main commitment of the Salvadoran Government to improve security conditions, and he (Giammattei) did not rule out implementing some of the same sanctions in Guatemala.

Key words: Guatemala; non-governmental organisations (GOs); human rights defenders; social activists; Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR).

Early this month (February 2020) the Guatemalan Congress moved to limit the work of non-governmental organisations (NGOs). Human rights defenders and social activists criticised the Guatemalan Congress for passing a law that could be used by governments to arbitrarily control non-governmental organisations (NGOs).

The ‘Law of Non-Governmental Organisations for Development’ establishes that NGOs will not be able to use foreign donations or financing to carry out activities that “alter” public order.

“If an NGO uses foreign donations or financing to alter public order, it will be immediately cancelled … its executives will be charged under criminal and civil legislation,” the new law states.

The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) also expressed its reservations regarding what happened in Congress.

“The reform of the NGO law could affect the freedom of association, assembly, and expression, as well as democratic spaces for organised civil society,” the OHCHR said and added that “it is important to adopt laws and policies that guarantee spaces for democratic participation.”

In 2019, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet expressed concern about the NGO bill as it introduces controls that could be used to arbitrarily limit social organisations.

The NGO law is based on proposals that lawmakers of the previous legislature made to avoid the fight against corruption promoted by the International Commission Against Impunity in Guatemala.

With the new law, the government can “arbitrarily cancel uncomfortable organisations,” said Justice Now (JusticiaYa), an NGO which was born amidst the anti-corruption fight in 2015.​​​​​​​

The leftist party Winaq, whose most notable member is the 1992 Nobel Peace Prize winner Rigoberta Menchu, said the NGO law is “a blow to freedom of social organisation and harmful to the majority.”​​​​​​​

Sources:

• La Prensa Gráfica (El Salvador) 12 February 2020.
• Impunity Watch

El artículo siguiente es originario del blog Two Worlds por John Perry. Apareció originalmente en el Grayzone.com – thegrayzone.com . Estoy agradecido a John por su autorización para reproducir el artículo en este sitio web.

John Perry

Two Worlds blog:  (twoworlds.me)

18 de febrero 2020

Aquí hay un titular que no verás: Nicaragua está en paz. Tras el violento intento de derrocar al gobierno en 2018, que costó al menos 200 vidas, el país ha vuelto en gran medida a la tranquilidad que disfrutaba antes. Esta no es sólo la impresión que recibe cualquier visitante de Nicaragua, sino que está confirmada por las estadísticas: Insight Crime analizó los niveles de homicidio en toda América Latina en 2019 y demostró que sólo tres países eran más seguros que Nicaragua en todo el continente.

Además, tres de sus vecinos, el ‘triángulo del norte’ de Honduras, El Salvador y Guatemala, estaban entre los peores países. También tienen altos niveles de violencia mortal contra las mujeres. En los primeros 24 días de 2020, por ejemplo, 27 mujeres hondureñas sufrieron muertes violentas, mientras que el vecino Nicaragua sigue teniendo uno de los niveles más bajos de femicidio en América Latina.

Pero, espera. Un titular de enero denuncia la trágica epidemia de violencia en Nicaragua. Este mes la ONU censura al gobierno nicaragüense por permitir ataques repetidos contra los pueblos indígenas. Un ‘informe de situación’ de la ONU habla de un ambiente general de amenaza e inseguridad. A finales del año pasado se informó de la represión sistemática, selectiva y letal de los campesinos. ¿De dónde proceden estas acusaciones y qué significan?

Las últimas provienen de un incidente a finales de enero. Los campesinos sin tierra atacaron una comunidad en el gran bosque de Bosawás. Según la agencia Reuters, seis muertos, diez secuestrados y casas destruidas. The Guardian, el New York Times y el Washington Post repitieron la historia. El periódico local de derecha La Prensa citó a la ONG Fundación del Río, que lo calificó de ‘masacre’; la Alianza Cívica de la oposición nicaragüense se sumó a esta calificando el ataque de ‘etnocidio’. Amnistía Internacional condenó ‘la indiferencia del Estado’ ante el sufrimiento de los pueblos indígenas. La Comisión Interamericana de Derechos Humanos dijo que el gobierno no estaba cumpliendo con sus obligaciones internacionales.

Bosawás es la mayor superficie de selva tropical al norte del Amazonas. Tiene pocas carreteras y principalmente comunidades pequeñas, muchas de las cuales dependen de los ríos para su transporte. Muchos habitantes locales pertenecen a grupos indígenas a los que el gobierno ha concedido títulos de propiedad de la tierra. Otros son los llamados ‘colonos’, familias campesinas de las cuales algunos han comprado sus tierras pero también hay otras que las ocupan ilegalmente. Las disputas entre los agricultores establecidos y los campesinos sin tierra son comunes, y durante muchos años han dado lugar, a veces, a la violencia. Los problemas de la vigilancia de esos lugares, con su historia de conflictos y corrupción, no se limitan a su lejanía.

Lo que realmente ocurrió en el caso reciente sólo quedó claro después de que la policía llegó en horas avanzadas de la tarde del 29 de enero para investigar, tras haber sido llamada al lugar por motivo de un reporte de dos personas muertas, no de seis como se reportó en los medios. En el lugar donde se produjo el atentado, la comunidad de Alal, la policía encontró 12 casas quemadas y dos personas heridas. Nadie había desaparecido. Para el 31 de enero habían revisado otras tres comunidades cercanas y no encontraron pruebas de asesinato o secuestro. Los líderes de la comunidad local condenaron las noticias falsas.

Luego, en un lugar completamente distinto, a 12 km al este de Alal, a lo largo del río Kahaska Kukun, cerca de la comunidad de Wakuruskasna, la policía encontró e identificó cuatro cadáveres, dos en una parte del río y dos en otra parte, aparentemente muertos por heridas de bala. La población local dijo que no conocía a nadie que hubiera desaparecido o estuviera desaparecido. Las investigaciones continuaron y dos días después altos funcionarios de la policía y del gobierno se reunieron con la comunidad en la escuela local para explicar las investigaciones y la labor de aplicación de la ley que estaban realizando, así como la ayuda que recibirían las personas para reconstruir sus casas destruidas. Posteriormente, el 5 de febrero, los familiares de las víctimas se reunieron con la Procuradora de los Derechos Humanos de Nicaragua, Darling Ríos, para denunciar los crímenes cometidos. La policía cree haber identificado a la banda criminal involucrada y continúa la búsqueda de los mismos.

Los antecedentes de esta historia son importantes y son ignorados por los medios de comunicación internacionales y los organismos de derechos humanos. Una parte importante del territorio nicaragüense está legalmente en manos de grupos indígenas y ha sido debidamente titulado por el Gobierno de Nicaragua como tierras comunales de cada comunidad. Las autoridades que las administran son designadas por las propias comunidades. En el territorio indígena de Mayangna Sauni As, formado por 75 comunidades, existe una disputa interna por el control de estas tierras comunales. De tal manera que algunos de los líderes han vendido tierras a grupos de colonos externos, lo que podría ser la raíz del conflicto del mes pasado.

Lamentablemente, a pesar del proceso masivo y continuo de reforma agraria en Nicaragua, sigue habiendo casos de campesinos desplazados que no pueden comprar tierras caras en zonas pobladas y tratan de comprarlas en otro lugar a bajo precio, y tal vez ilegalmente, o simplemente las toman. Las zonas poco pobladas como Bosawás son especialmente vulnerables. Las organizaciones internacionales describen los conflictos resultantes como luchas entre pueblos indígenas conscientes del medio ambiente y forasteros destructivos, instigados por el gobierno. La realidad es que los pobres compiten por la tierra, a veces de forma violenta. Y la violencia es espasmódica: en los dos últimos años se han registrado pocas muertes en conflictos por la tierra, aunque hubo varias en 2015 y 2016, que afectaron principalmente a una comunidad indígena diferente, los miskitu.

No es de extrañar que los medios de comunicación se pongan del lado de los grupos indígenas y que los colonos rara vez tengan voz. Inevitablemente, como en el caso de Alal, quien pueda sacar una historia a través de una llamada telefónica recibirá atención, e incluso una agencia como Reuters parece ser dispuesta a basar sus reportajes en ese tipo de información antes de que los hechos puedan ser comprobados. Para quienes no están familiarizados con Nicaragua, cualquier noticia sobre grupos indígenas conjura imágenes de los tribus aislado de la Amazonia, lo cual está lejos de la situación real. Los medios de comunicación establecen la escena con imágenes románticas de las selvas tropicales. Sólo en raras ocasiones envían a sus reporteros para investigar a fondo los acontecimientos sobre que están reportando.

Si esto es lo que se espera de los medios de comunicación de hoy, no debería ser el caso de las ONG de derechos humanos. Sin embargo, los organismos de ‘derechos humanos’ con sede en Nicaragua son notoriamente sesgados políticamente, y desde hace mucho tiempo ya pasaron el punto en que se pueden considerar ser objetivos. Sus recientes denuncias de una campaña gubernamental de asesinatos en zonas rurales, por ejemplo, se han demostrado ser completamente falsas. Todas las ONG locales compiten por las donaciones de gobiernos extranjeros, y (como uno admitió) exageran sus cuentas de muertes para conseguirlo.

Lamentablemente, las ONG internacionales no son mucho mejor. Los reportajes de Amnesty International sobre Nicaragua se han demostrado estar llenos de errores y tergiversaciones. Anteriormente, varios individuos y organismos habían solicitado a la ONG Global Witness corregir la información sesgada en sus informes sobre de las disputas de tierras en el área de Bosawás, que caracterizaron a Nicaragua como el “país más peligroso del mundo” para ser un defensor del medio ambiente. A pesar de los muchos esfuerzos que hizo para asegurar que Global Witness escuchara las complejidades de la historia real, ese ONG se negó a retirar sus acusaciones, incluso cuando se descubrió que algunas eran completamente falsas.

Por eso los titulares como ‘Una trágica epidemia de violencia’ no deben tomarse al pie de la letra. Incluso la BBC (seis indígenas muertos en un ataque) se equivocó. El sesgo mediático contra el gobierno sandinista de Nicaragua es incesante, y las ONG internacionales lo están alimentando (al igual que el gobierno de EE.UU., por supuesto). Mientras tanto, detrás de los titulares, el pueblo nicaragüense está recuperando con éxito la preciosa paz y seguridad de la que disfrutaba antes de los violentos acontecimientos de 2018. La mayoría se siente aliviada de que la verdadera ‘epidemia de violencia’ haya terminado unos meses después de haber comenzado para dejar a Nicaragua el país más seguro de la región.

By John Perry

Two Worlds blog: (twoworlds.me)

February 19, 2020

The following article by John Perry comes from his Two Worlds blog. It originally appeared in The Grayzone, an independent news website dedicated to original investigative journalism and analysis on politics and empire – thegrayzone.com. I am grateful to John for permission to reproduce his article in this website.

Here’s a headline you won’t see: Nicaragua is at peace. After the violent attempt to overthrow the government in 2018, which cost at least 200 lives, the country has largely returned to the tranquillity it enjoyed before. This is not only the impression that any visitor to Nicaragua will receive, it is confirmed by statistics: Insight Crime analysed homicide levels across Latin America in 2019 and showed that only three countries were safer than Nicaragua in the whole continent. What’s more, three of its neighbours, the ‘northern triangle’ of Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala, were all among the worst countries. They also have high levels of fatal violence against women. In the first 24 days of 2020, for example, 27 Honduran women met violent deaths, while next-door Nicaragua continues to have one of the lowest levels of femicide in Latin America.

But wait. A headline in January denounces the Tragic Epidemic of Violence in Nicaragua. This month the UN slates the Nicaraguan government for allowing repeated attacks against indigenous peoples. A UN ‘situation report’ talks about a general environment of threat and insecurity. Towards the end of last year the systematic, selective and lethal repression of peasant farmers was reported. Where do these allegations come from and what do they mean?

The latest ones come from an incident at the end of January. Criminals attacked a small community in the large forest reserve of Bosawás. It was reported by Reuters to have led to six deaths, ten people being kidnapped and houses being destroyed. The Guardian, New York Times and Washington Post all repeated the story. Local right-wing newspaper La Prensa quoted the NGO Fundación del Rio who called it a ‘massacre’. Nicaragua’s opposition Civic Alliance joined in by calling it ‘ethnocide’. For the opposition news channel Patriotic Communications it was a ‘war’ against indigenous people in which ‘the Ortega government is silent’ about the crimes committed. Amnesty International condemned ‘the state’s indifference’ to the sufferings of indigenous people. The Interamerican Commission for Human Rights said the government was failing its international obligations.

Bosawás is the largest area of tropical rainforest north of the Amazon. It has few roads and mainly tiny communities, many relying on rivers for transport. Many local people belong to indigenous groups which have been granted land titles by the government and this land cannot be sold, only leased. Others are settlers (called ‘colonos’) some of whom have leased land but others who occupy it illegally. Disputes between established farmers and landless peasants are common, and for many years have sometimes resulted in violence. The problems of policing such places, with their history of conflict and corruption, are not confined to their remoteness.

What really happened in the recent case only became clear after the police arrived to investigate, having been called to the scene of two reported deaths, not six, late on the afternoon of 29 January. In the place where the attack occurred, the community of Alal, the police found 12 houses had been burned down and two people had been injured. No one had disappeared. By 31 January they had checked three more nearby communities and found no evidence of murder or kidnapping. Local community leaders condemned the false news reports.

Then, at a completely differently place 12km east of Alal, along the River Kahaska Kukun near the community of Wakuruskasna, police found and identified four bodies, two in one part of the river and two in another part, apparently dead from gunshot wounds. Local people said they knew of no one who had disappeared or was missing. Investigations continued and two days later senior police and government officials met with the community in the local school to explain the investigations and the enforcement work they were doing, as well as the help that people would get to rebuild their destroyed houses. Then, on February 5, the families of the victims met with Nicaragua’s Procurator of Human Rights, Darling Ríos, to denounce the crimes committed. The police are pursuing the criminal gang involved and so far (February 12) have captured one culprit who was carrying a sub-machine gun.

The background to this story is important and is ignored by the international media and human rights bodies. A significant proportion of Nicaraguan territory is legally held by indigenous groups and has been duly titled by the Nicaraguan Government in each community’s ownership. The authorities that administer them are designated by the communities themselves. In the indigenous territory of Mayangna Sauni As, made up of 75 communities, there is an internal dispute over control of these communal lands. Some of the leaders have sold land to groups of outside settlers, which is possibly at the root of last month’s conflict.

Sadly, despite a massive and ongoing process of land reform in Nicaragua, there are still cases of displaced peasant farmers who can’t buy expensive land in populated areas and seek to buy it cheaply, and perhaps illegally, elsewhere, or simply to occupy it. Sparsely populated areas like Bosawás are especially vulnerable. The ensuing conflicts are portrayed by international organisations as struggles between environmentally conscious indigenous people and destructive outsiders, abetted by the government. The reality is that poor people are in competition for land, sometimes violently. And the violence is spasmodic: there were few reported deaths in land disputes for the last two years, although there were several in 2015 and 2016, mainly affecting a different indigenous community, the Miskitu.

It is hardly surprising that news media side with indigenous groups and that the settlers rarely get a voice. Inevitably, as in the Alal case, whoever can get a story out via a phone call will receive attention, and even an agency like Reuters will (it seems) accept such a report before the facts can be checked. To those unfamiliar with Nicaragua, any news item about indigenous groups conjures images of uncontacted tribes in the Amazon, which is far from the real situation. News media set the scene with romantic images of rainforests. Only rarely do they send reporters to investigate in depth.

If this is to be expected of today’s media, it shouldn’t be the case with human rights NGOs. Yet Nicaraguan-based ‘human rights’ bodies are notoriously biased politically, and have long passed the point where they can be considered objective. Their recent allegations of a government campaign of rural assassinations, for example, were shown to be completely false. All the local NGOs compete for donations from foreign governments, and (as one admitted) exaggerate their death counts in order to get it.

Regrettably, the international NGOs are little better. Amnesty International’s reporting on Nicaragua has been shown as full of errors and misrepresentations. Global Witness was earlier called out for biased reporting of the land disputes in the Bosawás area, in which it called Nicaragua the world’s ‘most dangerous country’ to be an environmental defender. Despite many efforts to get it to listen to the complexities of the real story, it refused to withdraw its allegations even when some were found to be completely untrue.

This is why headlines like ‘A Tragic Epidemic of Violence’ should not be taken at face value. Even the BBC (Six indigenous people reportedly killed in attack) was wrong. Media bias against Nicaragua’s Sandinista government is unremitting, and international NGOs are feeding it (as, of course, is the US government). Meanwhile, behind the headlines, Nicaraguan people are successfully recovering the precious peace and safety they enjoyed before the violent events of 2018. Most are relieved that the real ‘epidemic of violence’ ended a few months after it began.

A version of this article appears in: The Grayzone and also in Tortilla con Sal and here in Spanish (en Español).

By Martin Mowforth, March 2021

Guatemala gained its independence from Spain in 1821 and claims that it inherited Spain’s original claim to a large part of what is now Belizean territory – see map. Belize gained its independence from the UK in 1981 and argues that the borders were defined by an 1859 boundary convention between the UK and Guatemala.

In April 2018, over 95% of Guatemalan voters (with a low turnout of only 25%) voted in favour of referring the decision about the border dispute to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) based in The Hague, although the two countries had already, in 2008, agreed to allow the ICJ to resolve the dispute. In April 2019, Belizeans also approved the reference of the dispute to the ICJ by a 55% to 45% majority.

Relations between the two current governments are cordial and on 8^th March this year (2021) the Latin America News Dispatch reported that officials from the two governments  met at the disputed border between the two countries on 4^th March, the first time that such a meeting has taken place. In the meeting, which took place at an Organisation of American States (OAS) office, Belize Foreign Minister Eamon Courtenay and his Guatemalan counterpart Pedro Brolo Villa expressed a shared desire to improve relations between the two countries, which have deteriorated because of the border dispute. Since independence, Guatemala has claimed all or part of the territory of Belize.

Despite the cordial governmental relations, the last two decades have witnessed various illegal incursions and resource thefts by Guatemalans in the disputed territory and numerous killings of Guatemalan squatters by Belizean civilians and soldiers. At times even air travel between the two countries has been affected.

The ICJ is currently analyzing briefs submitted by each country.

(Have we seen this somewhere before?)

By Martin Mowforth for The Violence of Development website – with thanks to the Committee in Solidarity with the People of El Salvador (CISPES – www.cispes.org) and their newsletters. May 2021

Key words: El Salvador; President Bukele; New Ideas party; democracy; separation of powers; dictatorship; public approval.

If anyone had any doubts about President Bukele’s intentions to tear down any government institutions that could oppose him, he made them abundantly clear on Saturday, 1^st May. On the first day of El Salvador’s new legislative term, Bukele’s New Ideas party, which now has an overwhelming majority, moved quickly to illegally sack all the members of the Supreme Court’s Constitutional Chamber and the Attorney General, who were quickly replaced in a midnight session.

The decision to remove and replace the five magistrates failed to comply with the constitutionally-established justifications for doing so, and the magistrates were not granted a hearing and defence, as is their right under law.

It is clear that the basis of the decision was to eliminate any institutional opposition and to convert all of the branches of government into instruments of the president. This explains why the same legislators also removed the Attorney General, Raúl Melara and next may remove the Human Rights Ombudsman, José Apolonio Tobar Serrano, who, during the pandemic, denounced widespread violations of human rights and corruption among many members of the Bukele administration.

US Vice President Kamala Harris rejected the actions of El Salvador’s President for dismissing his country’s Attorney General and Supreme Court judges. “Washington is concerned about El Salvador’s democracy. An independent judiciary is vital to a healthy democracy and a strong economy,” Harris tweeted.[i]

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken also reacted to Bukele’s decision to remove Salvadoran Attorney General Raúl Melara.”We urge President Bukele not to interrupt El Salvador’s democratic path, respect the separation of powers, defend the press, and support the private sector,” he said.

The Committee in Solidarity with the People of El Salvador (CISPES) remarked that: “Condescending lectures from the Biden administration will not impede [these] assaults on democracy; President Bukele and his party are very clear on the type of dictatorship they wish to establish in El Salvador. If the United States government does not immediately act to restrict police, military, and other funds that strengthen the regime, there is no doubt that the United States, too, will be responsible for what follows.”[ii]

Meanwhile, as the following table shows, the President’s approval rating has remained high since he became president. In all the surveys conducted since taking office, Bukele has received a rating or score of over 75 percent. The table below shows just those polls conducted so far in 2021.[iii]

[i]  Telesur (3 May 2021) ‘Kamala Harris Rejects Actions of the President of El Salvador’.

[ii]  https://www.cispes.org/article/cispes-condemns-technical-coup-detat-el-salvador

[iii]  https://elsalvadorinfo.net/nayib-bukele-approval-rate/

Since El Salvador adopted the US Dollar as the country’s main currency, both sides of the political spectrum have questioned the lack of economic autonomy that comes with being tied to the US Federal Reserve. Now as President Bukele pushes for the formal adoption of bitcoin as legal tender, Doug Specht writes on the political, economic, and environmental implications of such a move. This article has previously appeared in Geographical Magazine and the newsletter of the Environmental Network for Central America, and is reproduced here with kind permission of the author.

On 9th June 2021, El Salvador’s congress approved President Nayib Bukele’s proposal for Bitcoin, one of the world’s largest cryptocurrencies, to become legal tender within the nation. This will move the currency from a form of payment that businesses can choose to accept (Bitcoin is already legal in El Salvador, as it is in most countries) to one that they have to accept. Celebrating his win, Bukele quickly changed his profile picture on Twitter to one in which lasers are shining from his eyes, a move that did not go unnoticed by other crypto enthusiasts such as Elon Musk. To these enthusiasts, the act is seen as paving the way for Bitcoin to become more mainstream and accessible. Others, though, question why any government would wish to link themselves to a currency that sees wild volatility—in the week following the Salvadoran Congress’ approval, Bitcoin’s value fluctuated between US$38,200 and US$31,428, having previously hit more than US$58,000 through May.

So why would Bukele want to bring such a currency to the country? The reasons are complex and multifaceted. First, Bukele has earned a reputation of being technologically savvy and paints himself as much a social media star as a president. This, along with his promises to be radically different from the Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front (FMLN) and the Alianza Republicana Nacionalista (ARENA), political parties that have dominated Salvadoran politics since the end of the Salvadoran Civil War, helped him win over young voters in 2019, leading to his election. Bukele enjoys announcing his ideas and policies on Twitter. Unlike former US president Donald Trump, though, his content is clever and nuanced and often draws upon longstanding Internet jokes and memes. Although Bukele’s personal futurist ambitions are surely the catalyst for this move, it is El Salvador’s complex financial and political history that have paved the way for the adoption of Bitcoin.

In 2001, El Salvador moved away from its own currency—the colón, which was adopted in 1892—and made the US dollar its legal, and only, currency. Although places such as Ecuador undertook dollarization to stem runaway inflation, El Salvador’s move was less driven by a moment of economic crisis—though it did reduce interest rates in the short term. Instead, it was the consequences of living in the United States’ backyard that forced El Salvador’s hand. Political turmoil, the bloody civil war, and US foreign policy led to the emigration of many Salvadorans to the United States. This saw trade links and remittances grow as expats transferred dollars back to El Salvador. In 2016, these remittances accounted for 17 percent of El Salvador’s GDP, around US$4.6 billion. The US has also accounted for up to 60 percent of El Salvador’s export trade. These transactions were smoothed by dollarization, but as the colón stopped circulating, El Salvador’s central bank ceased to have any role in monetary policy, with this now resting in the US Federal Reserve’s hands. The long-term benefits to El Salvador have been questioned, and many have called for the end of the US dollar in El Salvador and for the country to regain control of its reserves.

Bukele has announced this regaining of control, as well as both the boosting of the economy and increased ease of transferring remittances as reasons for Bitcoin adoption. However, his assertion that the Salvadoran GDP will increase by 25 percent if 1 percent of Bitcoin is invested in the country has been widely questioned by economists, who note that his cited Bitcoin market cap of US$680 billion is unstable and that most bitcoin owners will not be looking to invest in El Salvador. Furthermore, given that El Salvador has one of the lowest rates of Internet connectivity in the Americas, it is hard to see how the wider population will be able to embrace Bitcoin for the collection of remittances or otherwise.

If the economic reasons for Bitcoin adoption are questionable, it might still be seen as a politically astute move. Talk of smoothing remittances will win over overseas voters. It will also be seen as a step towards further independence from the US, a policy that can win votes on both the political left and right. El Salvador might have been economically better off if it had adopted a cryptocurrency that was more stable, but these, being linked one to one to the US dollar, would have been much less of a political statement.

As a way to court voters, though, with perhaps little real economic gain, the adoption of Bitcoin might have some deeply significant and very real impacts on the lives of Salvadorans—unintended consequences of Bukele’s desire to appear ultra-modern. The digital mining of Bitcoin, like other crypto currencies, involves – in simple terms – using sophisticated and high-powered computers to solve extremely complex computational maths problems, the completion of which is rewarded with the production of a new bitcoin which can be store in a digital wallet, and then used for purchases and trading. This process is hugely power intensive, using dozens of terawatts of electricity per year—more than the whole of countries such as the Netherlands. And with a large amount of Bitcoin mining taking place where electricity is the cheapest, the environmental impact is huge.

China has the most Bitcoin mining facilities of any country by far, and although the country has been slowly moving toward renewable energy, about two-thirds of its electricity comes from coal. The Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance estimates a single transaction of Bitcoin has the same carbon footprint as 680,000 Visa transactions. Other currencies such as Ethereum have made promises of being more environmentally friendly, but with little oversight of the crypto-mining industry these promises are hard to measure.

With El Salvador being highly susceptible to climate change, pushing for the use of such an environmentally damaging currency seems short-sighted. The World Bank already predicts that weather-related events and other hazards caused by climate change mean El Salvador is incurring annual losses of around 2.5 percent GDP. Severe weather events driven by climate change have also led to a significant loss of life, habitats, and biodiversity in the last 30 years. Unregulated and unabated crypto mining will further drive climate change, making living in many parts of the world increasingly difficult, including Central America.

Bukele claims to be bringing El Salvador into the future with cryptocurrency. His choice of Bitcoin, though, rather than those that claim more environmental credentials or those that are securely connected to the US dollar, suggest that this is little more than a political gimmick—and one that could have serious environmental consequences that cannot be outweighed by any financial gains.

Nicaragua has begun the process of leaving the OAS which organisation Nicaragua accuses of undermining and subverting the process of democracy in that country and elsewhere. Certainly the OAS has been at the forefront of intense criticism of the Nicaraguan government to put it mildly. It would seem to be a significant step for any Latin American country to take, and so it is appropriate to at least record the event in this website under the heading ‘Selected political developments in Central America’. TeleSur published the letter sent by the Nicaraguan government to the OAS and we reproduce the letter here by way of outlining the reasoning behind the Nicaraguan government’s action. Clearly, the OAS would refute the claims made in the letter.

Published by TeleSur,19 November 2021

This Central American country resigned from being part of an organisation through which the United States tries to impose its hegemony and overwhelm the will of the peoples.

On Friday, Nicaragua’s Foreign Affairs Minister Denis Moncada announced his country’s decision to leave the Organisation of American States (OAS). The following is the letter sent by the Nicaraguan government to the OAS Secretary Luis Almagro:

1. Taking into account the “Declaration of the National Assembly in the face of the repeated actions of interference of the Organisation of American States in the Internal Affairs of the State of Nicaragua”, No. 05-2021; the Declaration of the Caucus of Congressmen and Women before the Central American Parliament of the State of Nicaragua, both of 16th November, 2021; Agreement No. 126 of the Supreme Court of Justice, of 17th November, 2021; and the Agreement of Proclamation and Adhesion of the Supreme Electoral Council of November, 2021, urging the President of the Republic, in his capacity as Head of State and Head of Government, to Denounce the Charter of the Organisation of American States, in accordance to the mechanism stipulated in Art. 143, of said Instrument.
2. Likewise, in accordance with Article 129 of the Political Constitution of Nicaragua, which provides that the Legislative, Executive, Judicial and Electoral Powers are independent from each other and harmoniously coordinated, subordinated only to the supreme interests of the Nation and to what is established within the Constitution:
3. In my capacity as Minister of Foreign Affairs, as instructed by the Constitutional President of the Republic of Nicaragua, Commander Daniel Ortega Saavedra and in accordance with Article 67 of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, I am writing to officially notify you of our unwavering decision to denounce the Charter of the Organisation of American States (OAS), in accordance with Article 143, which initiates the Definitive Withdrawal and Resignation of Nicaragua from this Organisation.
4. Nicaragua promotes and defends respect for the principles that govern International Law; compliance with the Charter of the United Nations, its principles and purposes, aimed at respecting the sovereign equality among States, non­-interference in internal affairs, abstention from the use of force or the threat of use of force and the non-imposition of unilateral, illegal and coercive measures; principles that the OAS is obliged to comply with, but irresponsibly ignores, in violation of its own Charter.
5. The Organisation of American States has been designed as a diplomatic political forum, born under the influence of the United States, as an instrument of interference and intervention and its actions against Nicaragua have shown that this organisation, which operates permanently in Washington, has as its mission to facilitate the hegemony of the United States with its interventionism against the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean. Which is unacceptable for Nicaragua and which we reject and condemn.
6. Nicaragua has repeatedly expressed its condemnation and rejection of the interventionist actions of the OAS, defending its sovereignty, independence and self-determination and the Right of the Nicaraguan People to freely choose their Government and to define their sovereign policies, which is the exclusive responsibility of Nicaraguans, respecting their Internal legal system, Nicaraguan institutionality, and International Law.

7 . We do not view ourselves as a Colony of any Power, and we claim National Dignity and Decorum, in legitimate defense of our Independence, Sovereignty and Self-determination, in the face of aggressive actions, violations of the UN Charter and International Law by the Organisation of American States, the United States of North America and of other Colonialist and Neocolonialist Entities, which at this point in Life, believe that they have the power to subdue and humiliate our Worthy People and Government.

8. The Dignified People and Government of Nicaragua resign to be a part of this captive organisation in Washington, instrumentalized in favor of North American interests, becoming an architect of interference and disagreement, to the detriment of the Peoples of Latin America and the Caribbean.
9. This Note constitutes our unwavering manifesto and decision to Denounce the Charter of the Organisation of American States (OAS), so that its harmful international effects against Nicaragua may cease. Therefore, as Depositary, you must immediately communicate to the Member States, Nicaragua’s Irrevocable, Dignified and Patriotic decision of Denunciation and Resignation, in the face of interference and the unfriendly and aggressive actions of this Organisation, of subordinate Governments of the United States and of the Secretary General, against the Free and Sovereign Motherland of Sandino and Dario.
10. I subscribe, reaffirming that Nicaragua bases its Denunciation of the OAS Charter, its Resignation and Withdrawal from this Organisation, on Article 1 of our Political Constitution, which establishes that: “Independence, sovereignty and national self-determination are inalienable rights of the people and foundations of the Nicaraguan nation. Any foreign interference in the internal affairs of Nicaragua or any attempt to undermine those rights, threatens the life of the people.

It is the duty of all Nicaraguans to preserve and defend these rights.” Likewise, it is based on the above-mentioned, Sovereign Declaration of the National Assembly; on Agreement No. 126 of the Supreme Court of Justice; on the Agreement of Proclamation and Adhesion of the Supreme Electoral Council; on the Declaration of the Caucus of Congressmen and Women before the Central American Parliament, for the State of Nicaragua; and the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties.

As instructed by the President of the Republic Commander Daniel Ortega Saavedra, in defense of dignity.

Denis Ronaldo Moncada Colines

Minister of Foreign Affairs

Republic of Nicaragua

By Martin Mowforth

On 30 December 2021 Salvadoran president Nayib Bukele announced on Twitter that a new national stadium would be built in Antiguo Cuscatlán on land currently used by the Military School. He said the construction project would be with the direct collaboration of the president of China, Xi Jinping, although no mention was made of the costs involved.

Bukele indicated that the new stadium would have a seated capacity of 50,000 compared with the old Cuscatlán stadium’s capacity of 34,000. President Bukele did not mention anything about the costs of the stadium construction, but it is expected to amount to $500 million (USD).

The Salvadoran Ecological Unit (UNES), however, has expressed concerns about the project. Prime among these are:

• The production of a meaningful environmental impact assessment which would ensure that the project was not simply imposed on the people.
• The possible implications for water supply and the recharging of the water table – a covered stadium surrounded by a concrete car park will reduce retention and diminish groundwater supplies
• The micro-climatic changes of temperature brought about in this area as a result of the building.
• Possible drainage and flooding problems in the low-lying area of the affected zone.

Luis Gónzalez of UNES explained that this type of project has often given rise to environmental abuse in the areas affected by these ’developments’, at a time when the country has so many other problems that should be prioritised. But he said: “We have a State that is incapable of responding to these needs, but which instead approves laws that privatise the provision of water in El Salvador.”

Additionally the stadium will be built in a protected natural area, described as “the last important forest” of the metropolitan area of San Salvador. According to the Salvadoran media, Julio César Acosta, an expert in wildlife observation, says that the El Espino forest is characterized by a great diversity of flora and fauna, including over 150 species of birds, two of which are seriously threatened with extinction: the yellow-headed parrot and the white-fronted parrot.

Construction is scheduled to start during 2022, but that seems especially optimistic given that there has not yet been a feasibility study or environmental impact study.

Sources

Karla Ramírez, 30.12.21, ‘Anuncian la construcción de un nuevo estadio con donación de China en terreno de Escuela Militar’, La Prensa Gráfica.

 Verónica Martínez, 31.12.21, ‘Ambientalistas temen daño medioambiental por construcción de nuevo estadio de fútbol’, La Prensa Gráfica.

Rafal Zagrobelny, 15.01.22, ‘El Salvador: Construction of the national stadium will start soon?’ StadiumDB.com