Calls for accountability for police repression in Arg
March 19, 2025
Argentine lawmakers are discussing an executive order pre-approving a deal with the IMF, the details of which have not been announced. Outside Congress, protesters are bracing for confrontation with security forces, after the brutal repression of a protest last Wednesday. Pensioners have been protesting outside of Congress every Wednesday for months. (Ámbito, Página 12, see last Thursday’s post.)
The Committee to Protect Journalists called on Argentine authorities to hold to account police officers who injured independent photographer Pablo Grillo, who was struck in the head by a tear gas cartridge last Wednesday’s protest and remains in critical state.
An independent investigation by Mapa de la Policia — supported by CELS, Revista Crisis and the Asociación de Reporteros Gráficos de la República Argentina — has identified the gendarmerie official who threw the tear gas canister. The investigation shows that canisters were thrown horizontally, rather than at a 45 degree angle as required, and also identifies the chain of political responsibility, which ultimately reaches Security Minister Patricia Bullrich. (El Destape)
Mexico
Masked and heavily armed men have circulated a video threatening people searching for missing relatives at the site of what authorities said was a cartel training camp in the western Mexican state of Jalisco. Self-identified as members of Cartel Jalisco Nueva Generación, the men in the video questioned the motivations of the searchers who last week had found hundreds of articles of clothing and charred bones at a ranch outside Guadalajara, where an “extermination camp” had been operated by a criminal group. (Associated Press)
Mexican authorities arrested and handed over the U.S. of one of the FBI’s “Ten Most Wanted” suspects, Francisco Javier Román Bardales, an alleged senior leader of the Mara Salvatrucha or MS-13 gang from El Salvador. Mexico’s security chief Omar García Harfuch applauded the arrest Monday, which his agency said was the result of international cooperation. The agency referred to his handover as a deportation to the United States, reports the Associated Press.
Chinese authorities are delaying approval for carmaker BYD to build a plant in Mexico amid concerns that the smart car technology developed by the country’s biggest electric-vehicle maker could leak across the border to the U.S., reports the Financial Times.
Regional Relations
Officials in Beijing and Hong Kong spoke out yesterday against a proposal to sell ports in the Panama Canal to a consortium led by BlackRock. The statements sent shares in the Hong Kong-based conglomerate, CK Hutchinson, that owns the ports plummeting. But it unclear how regulators could interfere with the plan, which was announced earlier this month, reports CNN.
The case “highlights how escalating tensions between Beijing and Washington can leave the Chinese financial center’s business leaders trapped in the middle,” reports the Associated Press.
Brazil
Brazilian lawmaker Eduardo Bolsonaro, one of former president Jair Bolsonaro’s sons, said that he would seek political asylum in the United States, claiming he is the target of persecution for defending the right-wing movement embodied by his father, reports the New York Times.
The move comes comes after a ruling Workers’ Party lawmaker asked the Supreme Court seize Eduardo Bolsonaro’s passport, alleging that he has sought to negotiate with U.S. lawmakers a bill to “attack and intimidate” Brazil’s Supreme Court since Trump’s inauguration. (Associated Press)
More Regional Relations
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio threatened to impose additional sanctions on Venezuela if the country doesn't accept its citizens who are repatriated from the United States, reports Reuters. "Unless the Maduro regime accepts a consistent flow of deportation flights, without further excuses or delays, the U.S. will impose new, severe, and escalating sanctions," Rubio said in a post on X.
The threat raised immediate questions because Richard Grenell, a Trump special envoy tasked with securing the release of U.S. citizens imprisoned in Venezuela, announced Friday on X that the Maduro government had agreed to accept repatriation flights, reports Politico.
Trump’s foreign policy is chaotic, at least partly, by design, writes James Bosworth in World Politics Review. “To implement this chaotic strategy, Trump has assembled his own “Team of Rivals” … If the chaotic scenario is likely, then leaders outside the U.S. must prepare for it. They cannot just plan for facing Trump’s worst possible policies. Rather they must be ready for policies that never stop changing and even reversing.”
Migration
U.S. deportation flights this weekend have set off a frantic international search among terrified families after hundreds of immigrants vanished from ICE’s online locator, reports the Associated Press. Some turned up in the maximum security prison in El Salvador, but many families have no idea where to find their loved ones. El Salvador has no online database to look up inmates, and families there often struggle to get information.
Regional
The leaders of several Caribbean governments being targeted under a proposed U.S. travel ban — including Haiti, Dominica, Antigua and Barbuda, St. Kitts and Nevis and St. Lucia — say they have received no formal notifications from the Trump administration, reports the Miami Herald.
Haiti
The intense violence by the powerful Viv Ansanm gang coalition has forced nearly 60,000 people to flee their homes in just one month, the United Nations International Organization for Migration yesterday. The relentless attacks in Port-au-Prince have eroded the last few gang-free areas in the capital, reports the Miami Herald.
Colombia
Colombian President Gustavo Petro urged supporters to “rebel” against centrist and right-wing politicians who have blocked efforts to reform the country’s health system and labor laws, reports the Associated Press.
Ecuador
Ecuador's President Daniel Noboa has told the BBC he wants US, European and Brazilian armies to join his "war" against criminal gangs.
Ecuador's state-owned oil company declared an emergency over a damaged pipeline and cut crude exports yesterday, following a spill that polluted several rivers, leaving hundreds of thousands of people without drinking water, reports AFP.
Bolivia
James Bosworth analyzes plans by Bolivia’s MAS opposition to united behind a single presidential candidate, to be chosen by poll later this year — Latin America Risk Report.
Critter Corner
Mexico City lawmakers overwhelmingly voted to ban traditional bullfighting, a move supported by President Claudia Sheinbaum. The legislation prohibits the injuring or killing of bulls for sport but allows for what proponents call “bullfighting without violence,” in which rules determine how long a bull can be in the ring and limit bullfighters to using only capes, reports the New York Times. The move triggered outrage from aficionados and celebration from animal rights advocates, reports the Associated Press.