Guatemala
In his first act as Guatemalan president, Bernardo Arévalo visited the site outside the Attorney General’s Office where Indigenous protesters kept vigil for more than three months, in defense of his electoral victory. He applauded the protesters for defending the country’s democracy, reports the Associated Press.
El Faro reports on the details of the final efforts by Guatemala’s outgoing Congress to thwartArévalo’s ultimately successful swearing in on Sunday. “Secret conspiratory meetings were held, elected deputies broke down doors, chains were used to partially block access to the congressional floor!” (See yesterday’s post.)
But, in “a new plot twist of the political tragicomedy,” the ruling Semilla Party, which had until Sunday been declared null, “showed its negotiating muscle in finding the votes in the sudden fissures of the traditional parties … to secure the presidency of Congress for a one-year term.” The surprise success could give Arévalo breathing room for his legislative agenda, reports El Faro. (See yesterday’s post.)
The “tumultuous start” to Arévalo’s term on Sunday “signals the challenges ahead for his ambitious anti-corruption agenda through a year likely to be just as turbulent as the last,” argues Claudia Méndez Arriaza in Americas Quarterly. “Arévalo’s ability to effect structural change will hinge on three key fronts: reforms of the government contracting system at the heart of a slew of corruption scandals; the recovery of the Attorney General’s Office; and nominations to the high courts.”
Haiti
As ransom kidnappings continue to see an alarming spike in Haiti, “abductions have become increasingly more sophisticated as victims are held for longer and subjected to abuse,” reports the Miami Herald.
On the anniversary of the 2010 earthquake that destroyed large swathes of Haiti, Le National’s editorial said the disaster “could have been a salutary shock. It wasn't. Our illness is perhaps too chronic for a natural disaster to change our ways of seeing and understanding our relationships with others, our relationships with our land.” (via Haiti Weekly)
Mexico
“Mexico’s increasingly diverse and horizontally integrated criminal landscape could enter a period of violent upheaval in the wake of political shifts following federal elections set for June 2024,” reports InSight Crime.
Regional
Ecuador’s militarised crackdown could set a new precedent for a region where security concerns seem to increasingly overshadow commitments to democratic principles, I argue in the Guardian. Past ineffectiveness won’t dim the central allure of militarized security policies in a region where failures in public security have pushed the conversation towards brutal realism. The regional debate is whether the “Bukele method” works or not, rather than its dependence on arbitrary detention and torture.
“Given the role that demand for cocaine in the West plays in financing the criminal networks driving the violence, both the U.S. and Europe owe Ecuador support in its current fight against the gangs. At the same time, discussion about demand reduction as well as shifting the incentives so cartels cannot profit as much from drug-trafficking is necessary,” writes James Bosworth in World Politics Review.
“Colombian authorities are struggling to disrupt extortion schemes run by imprisoned Venezuelan gang members, mounting a series of recent arrests but failing to prevent those incarcerated from continuing their criminal activities,” reports InSight Crime.
Ecuador
Ecuador's security crisis “is creating difficulties for Venezuelans living in the country, both in terms of violence and insecurity and in terms of scapegoating xenophobia,” explains Jordi Amaral in the Americas Migration Brief.
Migration
An MPI report explores “compassion fatigue” and public support for Venezuelan migration in Colombia, as well as for Syrians in Turkey and Ukrainians in Europe. (via Americas Migration Brief)
Brazil
“Neighborhoods in Brazil's Rio de Janeiro state remained flooded Monday more than a day after torrential rains that killed at least 12 people,” reports the Associated Press.
A public works program is a pillar of Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s “plans to kick-start Latin America’s largest economy and drag it out of a prolonged period of mediocrity,” according to the Financial Times.
Cuba
Cuba’s government announced new austerity measures that include a gas price hike of 528 percent, cuts on ration card food subsidies, and increases in the prices of transportation, electricity and cooking gas. “The measures will be paired with further restrictions on small and medium private businesses, in the latest signal the government is resisting calls to open up the economy significantly,” reports the Miami Herald.
Hundreds of Cuban health workers have moved to Italy to fill a drastic shortage of doctors across Calabria, reports the Guardian.
Argentina
An Argentine judge dismissed allegations of an international terrorist plot that the government claimed to have foiled earlier this month. (See Jan. 4’s post.) Página 12 reports that the supposed plan, which allegedly involved three foreign nationals awaiting a package from Yemen in a Buenos Aires hotel, actually centered around a Lebanese citizen who sought to move to Argentina to teach ping-pong classes.
Colombia
Colombia’s newest national park, Parque Nacional Natural Serranía de Manacacías, came to fruition thanks to “a rare and fortuitous alignment of science, philanthropy and a new carbon tax,” reports the New York Times. In a decade-long process, “a whole community had to be persuaded that it was worthwhile.”