Blog, Latin America: Week in Review
Guatemala’s Perez Molina wants to Discuss Drug Decriminalization
January 19, 2012 By Staff
Today in Latin America
Top Story — Newly inaugurated Guatemalan President Pérez Molina called for a discussion of regional drug decriminalization during an appearance on Mexico’s Televisa network Wednesday, saying the strategy should be analyzed as soon as possible. “I believe that the decriminalization of drugs would have to be a strategy in which the whole region is in agreement,” Pérez Molina said in the interview. Pérez Molina also praised Mexican President Felipe Calderón’s efforts to combat drug trafficking in the region, alluding that the U.S. was not doing its share to fight drugs and reduce domestic consumption. During his presidential campaign, Pérez Molina advocated a hard-line stance toward drug trafficking.
Read more from Fox News Latino and El Nuevo Herald.
Headlines from the Western Hemisphere
North America
- Eleven Irish couples in Mexico are being questioned for their role in a child-trafficking ring in which at least 4 of 10 children rescued showed signs of sexual abuse.
- False rumors that Tarahumara Indians were committing suicide rather than allowing their families to die of starvation have drawn attention to the widespread malnutrition affecting the Tarahumara after a record drought.
- The New York Times took a look inside the seized homes of Mexican drug dealers on Wednesday.
Caribbean
- Environmental activists in Puerto Rico are rallying against a $50 million waste gassification plant designed to turn landfill waste into energy.
- Guards at Guantánamo prison reportedly found an English-language copy of Al-Qaeda’s “Inspire” magazine in the prison, in the midst of a debate about detainees’ rights to private legal mail.
- A Puerto Rican police officer was killed by a gunman while attempting to thwart a robbery at a gas station.
Central America
- A report by Mexico’s Civic Council on Public Security and Criminal Justice said that the Honduran city of San Pedro Sula has surpassed that of Ciudad Juarez as most violent city in the Americas.
- A mass grave discovered in Honduras over the weekend has prompted authorities to suspect that there are at least three more.
- The Costa Rican government blocked a subsidiary of Canadian mining company B2Gold from resuming work in the country after a 2007 mine collapse.
Andes
- Colombian land reform under the “Victims’ Law” went into effect this month with the goal of returning 3.5 million hectares of land to 4 million Colombians displaced by the country’s internal conflict.
- U.S. Ambassador to Peru Rose M. Likins delivered $2 million in equipment and training to Peru to support its security forces.
- Bolivia’s Social Defense Deputy Minister Felipe Caceres said there are no Bolivian drug cartels and blamed trafficking on Brazilian and Colombian “emissaries” to Bolivia.
Southern Cone
- British Prime Minister David Cameron’s attempt to characterize Argentina’s sovereignty claim to the disputed Falkland Islands as “colonialism” backfired.
- British Foreign Secretary William Hague’s visit to Brazil on Wednesday was marked with tension over Brazil’s support of Argentina’s claim to the Falkland Islands.
- The Chilean Court of Appeals asked Interior Minister Rodrigo Hinzpeter to clarify his statement that members of a Mapuche activist group are responsible for forest fires in the south of Chile.
- A drought affecting Paraguay since November has forced Paraguayan President Fernando Lugo to declare a national food emergency for 90 days.
- FIFA’s general secretary told Brazil that it must serve beer at its twelve World Cup venues, despite a ban on alcohol in the country’s stadiums, calling the issue “something we won’t negotiate”.
Image: Surizar @ Flickr.
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