Latin America News Dispatch

Chile Commemorates International Day Against Homophobia And Transphobia

Juan Pedro Catepillan Tecay — Thu, 17 May 2012 12:00:34 +0000

SANTIAGO, CHILE — Thousands of attendees enlivened the twelfth consecutive celebration of “Diverse Chile: Cultural Demonstration for Diversity and Against Discrimination” in Santiago’s Plaza de Armas on Saturday, May 12. Organized by the Chilean rights organization MOVILH (Movement for Homosexual Integration and Liberation), the event set the stage for International Day Against Homophobia and Transphobia, which is observed across the world on May 17.

This year’s “Diverse Chile” event was celebrated in the context of Chile’s recently-approved Anti-Discrimination Law, which Chile’s Congress passed in a 25-3 vote last Wednesday after nearly a decade of debate. “Diverse Chile” also coincided with Chile’s new 2012 Census, the first to gather data on same-sex households in Chile.

Participants in “Diverse Chile” paid homage to the memory Daniel Zamudio, the young gay man who died in March of a brutal beating said to be motivated by his sexual orientation. Public outcry over Zamudio’s death pushed Chilean lawmakers to speed the passage of the Anti-Discrimination Law, which some Chileans refer to as the “Zamudio Law” in his honor. Iván Zamudio, Daniel’s father, thanked supporters in the Plaza de Armas and received a standing ovation as he addressed the crowd from the podium.

Various organizations presented their proposals and demands onstage, including an effort to collect signatures to remove transexuality as a pathological disease and another initiative that would legalize abortion in Chile under special circumstances. Both demands remain controversial, though neighboring Argentina’s senate voted last week to allow transgender citizens to change their gender identity without bureaucratic obstacles. Currently, abortion is illegal in Chile without exception.

“We are here to celebrate the new Anti-Discrimination Law and the groundbreaking 2012 Census, which surveys same-sex households,” said Rolando Jiménez, President of MOVILH. “Chile is changing, Chile is no longer the same and now we’re fighting for complete social and legal equality.”

Kidnapped Honduran Radio Journalist Found Murdered

Staff — Thu, 17 May 2012 11:00:34 +0000

Top Story – Honduran police have arrested a suspect in the murder of kidnapped RHN radio journalist Alfredo Villatoro, whose body was discovered in Tegucigalpa late Tuesday. Villatoro, a prominent Honduran journalist and news director for RHN, was kidnapped early Wednesday on his way to work. His family and colleagues urged Villatoro’s kidnappers to release him unharmed, but he was found shot in the head nearly a week after his disappearance, wearing a police uniform, not the clothing he had on when he was last seen alive. Honduran President Porfirio Lobo went on national television to announce that the government would offer $3 million lempiras, or US $154,000, for information about the murder, but a Security Ministry spokesman declined to give details about the suspect currently in custody. Villatoro was reportedly close to the Honduran president, but the exact motive for his murder remains unclear. Villatoro’s kidnapping occurred only days after another journalist’s body was discovered in Honduras.

Headlines from the Western Hemisphere

North America

Banners hanging in northern Mexico attributed to the Zetas drug cartel say the gang was not involved in the murder of 49 people whose mutilated bodies were left on a highway in Nuevo Leon.
Alabama legislators passed a revised version of the state’s controversial immigration bill on Wednesday.
Mexican soldiers have detained two Mexican generals suspected of ties to drug trafficking rings.
A 200 year-old shipwreck was discovered in the Gulf of Mexico, according to a press release from NOAA.

Caribbean

The U.S. Treasury Department has tightened restrictions on non-Cuban American travel to Cuba for educational purposes, making it more difficult for U.S. tourists to visit the island.
Puerto Rico’s first astronaut, Joseph Acaba, joined a Russian crew on a trip to the International Space Station after blasting off from Kazakhstan.
Investors from the Clinton Global Initiative are looking to build a new soccer stadium they plan to call the Phoenix Stadium in Haiti’s impoverished Cité Soleil.

Central America

Guatemalan President Otto Pérez Molina said that the country’s homicide rate for the first four months of 2012 dropped 18 percent from the same period last year, but other statistics seem to refute his claim.
Women in the municipality of San Julián, El Salvador, have begun a food sovereignty program to help make their communities self-sustaining in the event of drought or floods.
The children of a Nicaraguan immigrant woman living in the U.S. have sued a California funeral home for mixing up their mother’s body with that of another person and burying her in Califonia, rather than Nicaragua, against her wishes.

Andes

The Colombian government has offered an award of $500 million pesos (US $279,500) for information about the bomb assassination attempt that killed two people in Bogotá on Tuesday.
Venezuelan Foreign Minister Nicolas Maduro has stepped in to handle Venezuela’s affairs while President Hugo Chávez receives cancer treatments in Cuba, generating speculation that Maduro will be chosen as Chávez’s successor in the event Chávez can’t run for president.
The Pakitzapango hydroelectric dam project in Peru, currently stalled in Peruvian Congress, is expected to flood the Ene river valley, displacing the Ashaninka indigenous people.
The Ecuadoran government has requested that the U.S. return over 3,000 Ecuadorian archaeological artifacts that were in storage at the National Museum of the American Indian in Washington, D.C.

Southern Cone

Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff is under pressure from international environmental groups, business leaders and the country’s agricultural sector as she decides whether or not to veto revisions to the Brazilian Forest Code that would diminish environmental protections for the Amazon rainforest.
Sergio Schoklender, a former official for Argentina’s Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo, was charged with embezzling more than $156m from the venerable human rights group. He allegedly used the money to buy property, planes and a Ferrari.
After over a year of protests for educational reform in Chile, Chileans still pay more out of pocket for higher education than most other countries including the U.S., according to the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).

Image: clasesdeperiodismo @ Flickr.

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Brazil’s Truth Commission Set To Begin Its Work

Mari Hayman — Wed, 16 May 2012 12:00:28 +0000

Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff will preside over an official ceremony Wednesday to launch Brazil’s Truth Commission. The seven-member commission will convene for two years to investigate human rights abuses committed in Brazil between 1946-1988, focusing on the country’s 1964-1985 military dictatorship.

Rousseff, who endured torture as a political prisoner during the dictatorship, has made it clear that she intends to present the Truth Commission as a multi-partisan effort with broad support in Congress and across social sectors. The commission was created after the Inter-American Court of Human Rights charged Brazil will the task of clarifying the fates of the disappeared in a 2010 case brought by family members of the disappeared. In November, Brazil’s Congress passed a law that authorized the creation of the commission.

Former Brazilian presidents Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, Fernando Henrique Cardoso, Fernando Collor and José Sarney will be present alongside Rousseff on Wednesday for the ceremony in Brasilia.

While the formation of the Truth Commission has been applauded by the UN, OAS and human rights organizations around the world, conservative members of the Brazilian military have resisted the creation of any investigative body designed to examine Brazil’s period of state terrorism, alleging that the findings will encourage a climate of “revenge”.

Rio de Janeiro’s Navy Club said it would form its own “shadow commission” to counter the findings that emerge from the Truth Commission. “Of course there were terrible things that happened in this period but there were victims on both sides and they only want to tell one side of the story,” said Navy Club chairman and retired Vice Admiral Ricardo Antonio da Veiga Cabral.

However, the Truth Commission’s findings will not result in prosecutions, due to a 1979 amnesty law passed while the country was still under military rule and upheld by Brazil’s Supreme Court. The law remains an obstacle to prosecutions for human rights violations committed during Brazil’s dictatorship.

Families and survivors’ groups have expressed frustration that the commission cannot prosecute. “With the resources and powers given to the commission, I doubt very much they will be able to come up with anything groundbreaking,” said the president of the group Tortura Nunca Mais (Torture Never Again), Victoria Grabois.

But the Truth Commission will have the power to subpoena government employees and members of the military for testimony. Among the responsibilities of the commission is the task of investigating the disappearances of a at least 150 people opposed to the military regime who were never seen again. At least 400 Brazilians were killed or disappeared during the dictatorship, and thousands more were tortured.

Image: Fora do Eixo @ Flickr.

Bombing In Bogotá Kills Two, Injures Dozens More

Staff — Wed, 16 May 2012 11:00:55 +0000

Top Story – A driver and a police bodyguard for former Colombian Interior Minister Fernando Londoño were killed after a bomb went off in Bogotá on Tuesday, injuring dozens of other people. Lodoño was traveling through a commercial district when an assailant allegedly threw a bomb at his car, according to security camera footage mentioned by Bogotá Mayor Gustavo Petro. Colombian authorities had discovered another bomb earlier Tuesday, hidden in a car allegedly destined for police headquarters in Bogotá, but they managed to defuse it. It is not clear if the two bombing incidents were related. While Londoño is in the hospital in stable condition, his driver and police bodyguard were killed, and the police reported that a third, unidentified person was killed as well. Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos condemned the bombing, which police blamed on the FARC, and cancelled a scheduled trip to Cartagena to attend a ceremony marking the beginning of a new U.S.-Colombia free trade agreement.

Headlines from the Western Hemisphere

North America

Latin American literary great Carlos Fuentes died in Mexico City on Tuesday at age 83.
Rev. Alejandro Solalinde, a priest who runs the “Hermanos en el Camino” shelter for migrants in southern Mexico, has temporarily left his post due to death threats.
Four demonstrators in Chicago were arrested Tuesday during a protest against immigration policy and economic injustice in anticipation of the NATO summit to be held in Chicago this weekend.
A plumber digging a swimming pool in Florida discovered pottery shards and two skulls dating from between 1200 and 1400 that are said to have originated in Peru.

Caribbean

Laurent Lamothe was voted in by Haitian Parliament as Haiti’s new Prime Minister on Monday.
Cuba’s National Statistics Office reported Monday that university admissions in Cuba dropped 26 percent in the 2011-2012 academic year.
A bank robber featured on “America’s Most Wanted” was detained by authorities in Puerto Rico after arriving at the airport from Venezuela.

Central America

Honduran police and U.S. DEA agents in a helicopter killed two men and two pregnant women in a boat on the Patuca River on Friday in what authorities say was a botched attempt to kill drug traffickers.
Six Guatemalan taxi drivers were killed in six days as violence and extortion targeting transit workers is on the rise.
Guatemala extradited a man to face charges in California for kidnapping, raping and robbing his ex-wife in 2002.

Andes

The Ecuadoran government said that a crashed Mexican plane that contained two dead men and three dogs also contained $1.3 million in cash and is thought to be linked to a drug traffickers.
Unlicensed mining in Peru, Bolivia and Colombia is having devastating effects on the Amazon rainforest as the price of gold continues to climb.

Southern Cone

Spanish oil and gas company Repsol sued Argentina on Tuesday for seizing control of Repsol’s majority stake in state energy company YPF.
The Brazilian Sports Minister denied rumors that construction on a World Cup stadium in Salvador, Bahia won’t be ready for next year’s Confederations Cup.
Much of Paraguay’s national soccer squad will be sidelined due to injury in Paraguay’s World Cup qualifier against Bolivia.

Image: Knight Foundation @ Flickr.

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Judge Rejects Declassification Of CIA Volume On Bay of Pigs

Staff — Tue, 15 May 2012 11:00:04 +0000

Top Story – A U.S. federal judge rejected an effort by the National Security Archive to declassify the CIA’s fifth and final volume on the history of the U.S. Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba. The volume, the last in the CIA’s Official History of the Bay of Pigs, was written over three decades ago and details the CIA’s internal investigation of the failed Bay of Pigs operation in April 1961, in which the U.S. unsuccessfully attempted to overthrow Fidel Castro’s government in Cuba. Judge Gladys Kessler ruled that the volume was exempt from the Freedom of Information Act under “deliberative process privilege”. According to the CIA, the volume is a draft that was rejected by the CIA’s chief historian for inaccuracies, and could have a “chilling effect” on current CIA historians. The National Security Archive, an independent organization that seeks to declassify government documents, said that the CIA had already declassified the previous volumes on the Bay of Pigs.

Headlines from the Western Hemisphere

North America

René Orta Salgado, a Mexican journalist reported missing by his family on Saturday, was found dead in the trunk of a car in the state of Morelos.
Mexican presidential candidate Josefina Vazquez Mota on Sunday blamed the rising violence in Mexico on the policies of the governing PRI party.

Caribbean

The U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear an appeal by Puerto Rico to have a voting representative in Congress.
An eight year-old boy died when heavy rains washed him down a river in the Dominican Republic.

Central America

The 18 year-old Panamanian hotel worker whose two friends died at sea while he survived a 28-day ordeal will sue Princess Cruise Line for failing to assist him and his friends while they were adrift.
Guatemalan officials said the U.S. government is refusing to return a girl who was stolen at age two and given up for U.S. adoption because the two countries had not signed the Hague Abduction Convention when the abduction occurred.
Mexican authorities seized 136 tons of chemicals used for synthetic drugs in the port city of Lazaro Cardenas that was bound for Honduras.

Andes

The Colombian army reported that 7 FARC guerrillas surrendered on the Colombia-Ecuador border with 1.25 tons of explosives and other material.
Venezuela demanded that the U.S. extradite former Venezuelan judge Eladio Aponte, who may be helping the U.S. build a drug case against the Venezuelan government.
The U.S. Supreme Court rejected appeals that silver coins awarded to the Spanish government and discovered in a sunken Spanish galleon could be claimed by Peru, where the ore reportedly originated.
Two men and a dog were found dead in an airplane filled with cash that crashed in Ecuador.

Southern Cone

Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff announced that she will expand her predecessor Lula da Silva’s cash transfer program, Bolsa Familia, by extending additional benefits to poor families with children six and under.
An Argentine prosecutor said that Argentine Vice President Amadou Bodou should be investigated for illegal enrichment in addition to other corruption allegations.
Chilean police arrested a woman who allegedly stole a baby from a Santiago hospital on Mother’s Day.

Image: Adam Jones, Ph.D. @ Flickr.

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Colombia: FARC Plans To Release French Journalist

Staff — Mon, 14 May 2012 11:00:45 +0000

Top Story — Red Cross officials said Sunday that the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) guerrillas have agreed to release French journalist Romeo Langlois, who was captured by the rebels while he was embedded with Colombian troops on April 28. The soldiers were in the process of destroying cocaine laboratories in southern Colombia when they were confronted by the rebels, who reportedly killed four members of the Colombian security forces. The head of the ICRC in Colombia said the Red Cross had received a message directly from the FARC saying the group was willing to let Langlois go and requested the involvement of mediator Piedad Córdoba to receive Langlois. The rebels have said that Langlois is a “prisoner of war” because he was captured wearing a flak jacket and helmet as he accompanied the Colombian soldiers.

Headlines from the Western Hemisphere

North America

Mexican authorities found 49 headless bodies dumped on a highway near the desert town of San Juan in northern Mexico. Graffiti saying “100% Zeta” was found nearby.
Employees of El Mañana newspaper in Nuevo Laredo returned to work Saturday after their building was hit with gunfire and a grenade. No injuries were reported.
Some of Alabama’s farmers are planting less due to a shortage of immigrant workers who have left due to the state’s strict immigration law.

Caribbean

Mariela Castro, daughter of Cuban President Raúl Castro, led a gay rights parade in Havana and said that she hoped gay marriage would be legalized in Cuba.
Haitian President Michel Martelly marked his first year in office after being sworn in on May 14, 2011.
A U.S. court ruled that Jehovah’s Witnesses must be permitted to enter gated communities in Puerto Rico, where at least 587 communities have barred them from proselytizing.

Central America

El Salvador’s three main parties are preparing for the 2014 presidential elections, as the ruling FMLN looks to defend itself against ARENA’s strong position following the March municipal elections.
The founder of anti-whaling organization Sea Shepherd Conservation Society will be extradited to Costa Rica to face attempted murder charges for a 2002 encounter with an illegal shark finning operation.

Andes

Venezuelan intelligence agents questioned the author of a crossword puzzle after a TV host pointed out that a puzzle he’d created spelled out the words “asesinen” (“kill”) and “Adan”, the name of President Hugo Chávez’s older brother.
U.S. citizen Jacob Ostreicher, jailed in Bolivia for 11 months without formal charges, has completed his first month of a hunger strike.
A bus plunged in a ravine on Thursday night in Peru, killing 19 people and injuring seven.

Southern Cone

Uruguayan authorities have two months to decide whether to put six Uruguayan marines on trial after a 19 year-old Haitian man accused them of sexually assaulting him when they served as UN peacekeepers.
Chile’s Supreme Court on Friday halted construction on a hydroelectric dam project to be built in Patagonia.
U.S. FBI agents have been training police in Brazil to respond to terrorist attacks in preparation for the 2014 World Cup.
Seven people are missing after a Paraguayan tugboat collided with an Argentine ship on the Paraná River.

Image: Agencia Prensa Rural @ Flickr.

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Chilean Congress Approves “Zamudio Law” Against Discrimination

Staff — Fri, 11 May 2012 11:00:11 +0000

Top Story – Chile’s Congress passed a long-delayed anti-discrimination law on Wednesday night in a vote of 25-3, seven years after the law was initially introduced and more than two months after 24 year-old gay Chilean Daniel Zamudio was beaten in a violent attack from which he eventually died. Zamudio’s murder prompted thousands of Chileans, including Chilean President Sebastián Piñera, to call for expedited passage of the anti-discrimination law that had been languishing since it was approved by the Senate in November 2011. Chile’s House of Deputies approved the law last month. The law, referred to by many as the “Zamudio Law”, will enable Chileans to file anti-discrimination lawsuits and to add hate crime sentences for violent crimes.

Headlines from the Western Hemisphere

North America

The U.S. Justice Department filed a lawsuit against controversial sheriff Joe Arpaio of Maricopa County, Arizona, for discrimination and racial profiling.
About 300 Mexican women and their supporters participated in a march in Mexico City to draw attention to the plight of their disappeared children on Mothers’ Day.
The ACLU issued a letter of complaint to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, alleging abuse and mistreatment of people crossing the U.S.-Mexico border.

Caribbean

An offshore drilling expert said that the 50 year-old U.S. embargo of Cuba could complicate any emergency responses needed in the event of an oil leak when Repsol drills off the Cuban coast.
A U.S. attorney charged 6 people for importing cocaine into Puerto Rico, where they allegedly made $67 million in profit.

Central America

U.S. authorities arrested 28 people linked to a cocaine smuggling ring between Honduras and Virginia.
Archaeologists in Guatemala discovered a 9th-century dwelling adorned with paintings and the oldest Maya calendar discovered to date.
A group of U.S. Congressmen wrote to Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega, asking him to review the case of a U.S. Citizen and former Peace Corps volunteer jailed on drug charges.

Andes

Peruvian Defense Minister Luis Alberto Otarola and Interior Minister Daniel Lozada both resigned following indications that they would be censured for an anti-narcotics operation against Shining Path guerrillas that resulted in 10 soldier and police deaths.
Colombian authorities said Thursday that seven troops were killed in a FARC attack as they were carrying out an anti-narcotics operation in northeast Colombia.
A U.S. attorney wants convicted murderer Luis Guaman to be extradited to the U.S to face charges for killing a woman and her 2 year-old child in Massachusetts. Guaman has been sentenced to 25 years in prison in Ecuador.

Southern Cone

A 19 year-old Haitian appeared at a hearing in Uruguay to identify the former UN Peacekeepers who allegedly assaulted him in a sexual attack that was filmed on one of the peacekeeper’s cell phones.
The Argentine Senate unanimously passed a new gender identity law that would permit citizens to change their legal gender identity without having to undergo legal, medical, and psychiatric evaluations.
Brazilian police detained a California tourist who attempted to leave Rio de Janeiro without paying for his hotel stay and $3000 bar tab.

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Honduras: Second Journalist Kidnapped in One Week

Staff — Thu, 10 May 2012 11:00:28 +0000

Top Story — Honduran radio journalist Angel Alfredo Villatoro was kidnapped Wednesday just a few days after authorities discovered the body of another journalist, Erick Martínez, on the side of a road in eastern Honduras. Witnesses of the kidnapping reported that Villatoro was taken by “young gang members” at dawn on his way to work at HRN radio station in Tegucigalpa. The Honduran government and HRN colleagues have issued statements pleading that Villatoro’s captors release him unharmed. Meanwhile, little information has emerged about the killing of Martínez, a member of the Diversity Resistance Movement who worked for LGBT rights organization Asociación Kukulcan. Martínez went missing Saturday and his body was found on the side of a road on Monday, making him the nineteenth Honduran journalist to be murdered since the country’s 2009 coup. While Honduran police say that four of the murders are under investigation, no arrests have been made.

Headlines from the Western Hemisphere

North America

Mexican soldiers in Nuevo Leon detained 17 young suspects who allegedly belong to the Gulf drug cartel, along with a Cuban man said to be giving them special training to join the cartel.
The U.S. Border Patrol announced Tuesday that the organization will shift its focus to intelligence-gathering as rates of illegal immigration continue to drop.
Mexican authorities released a video reenactment of the murder of Canadian graduate student Ximena Osegueda and her Mexican boyfriend Alejandro Honoria, who disappeared last December. Police arrested five murder suspects on Monday.

Caribbean

Jamaica’s interest payments on its debt were 10 percent of its gross domestic product, the highest of all countries in the world last year, according to the Center for Economic and Policy Research.
A Canadian man was sentenced to 10 years in prison for the beating death of a 19 year-old Canadian outside a nightclub in Punta Cana in the Dominican Republic last year.
Two Cuban-American senators and four House members wrote a letter to the head of Ikea North America demanding information about whether or not the company used Cuban dissidents to manufacture furniture and other goods in the 1980s.

Central America

The Salvadoran government said it would not extradite 13 former members of the military to Spain so that they could face charges for the 1989 murder of 6 Jesuit priests and a woman and her daughter in San Salvador. Five of the murdered priests were from Spain.
Former Panamanian dictator Manuel Noreiga was taken from prison to the hospital on Wednesday for treatment for a respiratory infection and a high fever.

Andes

Alleged FARC financial chief Wilson Tapiero was ordered detained indefinitely by an Ecuadoran judge after Tapiero was apprehended Monday just a few miles from the Ecuador-Colombia border.
Former Venezuelan Supreme Court justice Eladio Aponte has been meeting with officials from the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration after he claimed he could prove that Venezuelan officials had links to drug trafficking and crime.
The second day of a transport strike in La Paz, Bolivia has turned violent as police, strikers and residents alike are injured by flying rocks at makeshift barricades and roadblocks.
Convicted murderer Joran van der Sloot will challenge an extradition request by the U.S. to face charges in the disappearance of U.S. teenager Natalee Holloway in Aruba. He is serving a 28-year sentence in Peru for killing a different young woman, Stephany Flores.

Southern Cone

The Argentine Senate is debating a “dignifed death” law that would permit the terminally ill and those in a vegetative state to turn off life support without an order from a judge. The measure would not permit euthanasia, and is expected to pass.
Brazil has cancelled plans to build two new nuclear power stations as a result of the nuclear disaster in Fukushima, Japan after last year’s catastrophic earthquake and tsunami.
A group of German cult survivors are planning to sue Germany and Chile for failing to prevent decades of child abuse by sect members in Chile’s notorious “Colonia Dignidad” settlement.
The capsized Brazilian ship “Endless Sea” is leaking fuel off the coast of Antarctica, but the problem likely can’t be resolved until next October when the weather improves.

Image: clasesdeperiodismo @ Flickr.

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Puerto Rico Governor: Students Should Speak Fluent English by 2022

Staff — Wed, 09 May 2012 11:00:27 +0000

Top Story – Puerto Rican Governor Luis Fortuño has proposed an ambitious plan to make Puerto Ricans bilingual in English and Spanish by the year 2022, an effort that he hopes will pave the way for U.S. statehood. Fortuño wants public schools to teach all classes in English, with the exception of Spanish literature and grammar instruction. English is currently taught from kindergarten through high school, but Education Secretary Edwin Moreno said the government would begin to introduce a new bilingual curriculum at 31 schools starting in August, with the goal of making all public school students fluent in English within 10 years. Critics including the Puerto Rico Teachers Association have said the plan is too extreme and have expressed concern about a loss of the island’s identity while statehood remains a divisive political issue. According to the U.S. census, 96 percent of Puerto Ricans speak Spanish at home.

Headlines from the Western Hemisphere

North America

Nine bodies were found on Friday hanging from a highway overpass in Nuevo Laredo, Mexico, the same day that 14 heads were discovered in a cooler near Nuevo Laredo’s City Hall.
Mexican authorities said Monday that they had arrested suspected 26 year-old assassin Maria Jimenez, who allegedly carried out at least 20 murders for the Zetas drug cartel.
Authorities in Oaxaca have arrested five suspects in the slaying of a couple who went missing on December 13 and whose bodies were later discovered on December 27.
The U.S. federal government has begun to set up temporary shelters to house a rising number of unaccompanied children crossing the U.S.-Mexico border without documents.

Caribbean

Jamaica’s Labor Party and the People’s National Party are investigating claims that David Smith, now serving 30 years for wire fraud and money laundering, contributed large donations to both parties.
Haiti’s large delegation to the Caribbean Hotel & Resort Investment (CHRIS) Summit in Miami shows that the island is seeking to rebrand itself as a tourism destination.

Central America

Peasant groups and grassroots organizations in Guatemala are demanding the end to the state of siege declared by Guatemalan President Otto Pérez Molina in Huehuetenango after the murder of community leader Andres Francisco Miguel provoked a riot.
The body of Honduran journalist Erick Martínez was discovered in eastern Honduras on Monday. Martínez worked for an LGBT organization and had been missing since Saturday.
Three members of the Mara-18 gang in El Salvador have formed a rap group inside Quetzaltepeque prison in order to promote peace and prolong the truce between the Mara-18 and MS-13 gangs.

Andes

Colombian Defense Minister Juan Carlos Pinzón rejected demands by the FARC that the release of captured journalist Romeo Langlois be conditioned upon a discussion of the role of the press in covering Colombia’s armed conflict.
An Ecuadoran court gave Luis Guaman a 25-year sentence for murdering a woman and her two year-old son in Massachussetts in 2011.
More gunfire erupted at Venezuela’s La Planta prison on Tuesday as police fired teargas in an effort to put down a riot at the overcrowded facility.
Scientists in Peru say there is no conclusive evidence yet that links the massive die-offs of pelicans and dolphins along the Peruvian coast.

Southern Cone

Vandals torched a Volvo belonging to the rector of the University of Santiago in the school’s parking lot just after he walked into the building. The rector was one of only two in Chile who openly supported Chile’s student protests.
Argentina’s Olympic committee entered damage-control mode after an ad commissioned by the Argentine government and shot in the Falkland Islands caused an international outcry.
The Brazilian Senate’s Ethics Committee unanimously decided Tuesday to suspend Senator Demostenes Torres, who is suspected of involvement in a gambling racket.

Image: USFWS/Southeast @ Flickr.

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Colombia May Regulate Prostitution Following Scandal

Staff — Tue, 08 May 2012 11:00:21 +0000

Top Story – Colombian politicians have proposed a new bill that would regulate prostitution in Colombia, reacting to the scandal that erupted in Cartagena last month when members of the U.S. Secret Service reportedly hired prostitutes before the Summit of the Americas. Conservative Senator Armando Benedetti proposed the bill on Monday, noting that prostitution would remain legal in Colombia, but that the new law would “guarantee labor rights and public health”. It’s not clear whether the bill would pass, but Colombia’s Catholic church remains opposed to prostitution despite its legality. So far, at least eight Secret Service agents have lost their jobs as a result of the scandal.

Headlines from the Western Hemisphere

North America

The Association of Catholic Colleges and Universities is encouraging member schools to enroll and provide support for undocumented students despite pressure not to.
Mexican presidential frontrunner Enrique Peña Nieto was put on the defensive during a tough round of presidential debates on Sunday.
A former Mexican playmate became a trending topic on Twitter after she appeared in the Mexican presidential debates holding a box containing candidate names.

Caribbean

Haitian and UN authorities are cracking down on roving groups of armed former soldiers who want Haiti to reinstate its own military.
Cuban authorities say that the chances of train accidents involving automobiles and pedestrians is rising as the country upgrades its train system with faster trains.
Since 1993, Cuba has gradually been phasing out the use of sanitariums to house AIDS patients, but three remain.

Central America

Friends and family of slain U.S. engineer Ben Linder, killed by U.S.-backed contras in 1987, returned to Nicaragua to commemorate the 25th anniversary of his death.
Costa Rica’s Constitutional Court ruled that a transgendered inmate who dresses in women’s clothing should be allowed to continue doing so.

Andes

Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos reiterated demands that FARC rebels release French journalist and hostage Romeo Langlois.
Speaking on state television for the first time in a week, Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez said he would be returning from Cuba after another round of radiation on his cancerous tumor.
Colombian authorities said that alleged paramilitary Jose Antonio Calle, wanted for drug trafficking, was captured in Aruba and has been flown to the U.S. to face criminal charges.

Southern Cone

A survey in Brazil revealed that conflicts over land are on the rise since 2010, although the number of murdered activists decreased from 34 to 29 between 2010 and 2011.
Scientists have recorded major changes in the ecosystems along Chile’s coast following the 2010 earthquake and tsunami that killed more than 500 people.
Brazilian officials will meet at FIFA headquarters in Switzerland in an effort to demonstrate that preparations for the 2014 World Cup is on track.

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