Maria Corina Machado targeted
Venezuelan opposition leader and former presidential candidate Maria Corina Machado reported being targeted earlier this morning. Her car was vandalized and the brake hose was cut as she campaigned in the city of Barquisimeto, in the northwestern state of Lara. (La Silla Vacía, AlbertoNews)
This follows the arrest of Machado’s security chief yesterday, as many warn of increasing repression in the lead up to the July 28th election between Edmundo González—selected as Machado’s replacement after she was deemed disqualified by the Maduro government—and president Nicolás Maduro. Machado’s security chief, Milciades Ávila, was arrested on “trumped up charges” following tensions and traded insults between Maduro supporters and the Machado campaign last weekend. “At least eight people connected to the opposition campaign have been detained in recent days in four states across the country, including the owner of a sound truck Machado and González hired during a recent rally in the central city of Valencia,” notes AP, while Reuters adds that “Foro Penal, a non-governmental organization, said on Monday that 102 people have been detained since the start of the election campaign on July 4.” (AP, Reuters, BBC, El País)
More Venezuela
If Maduro wins the election against González, “as many as one-third of Venezuelans would consider migrating,” reports The New York Times.
A Wilson Center report “offers recommendations for the United States and other democratic governments to pressure the Venezuelan regime to honor the results of the election, drawing on successful US responses to threats to elections and presidential transitions in Brazil and Guatemala in recent years.”
Dominican Republic
“Activists in the Dominican Republic protested on Wednesday against a bill for a new criminal code that would keep in place the country’s total abortion ban,” reports AP, noting, “The Dominican Republic is one of four Latin American nations that criminalizes abortion without exceptions,” and adding that “the new criminal code would also reduce penalties for sexual violence within marriage and exclude sexual orientation from the list of characteristics protected from discrimination, affecting the LGBTQ+ community.”
Brazil
“For the second year running, Brazil has recorded unprecedented levels of gender-based violence, according to new figures underlining just how unsafe the country is for its women and girls.” (The Guardian)
“Several tons of fish have died along one of the main rivers in Brazil’s Sao Paulo state after an alleged illegal dumping of industrial waste from a sugar and ethanol plant,” reports AP.
Illegal and environmentally unfriendly mercury use is rampant in illegal gold mining in the Brazilian Amazon, reports Mongabay.
Chile
16 homicides in 48 hours—half in the Santiago region—are creating a sense of crisis in Chile, notes El País.
Haiti
Haiti’s diaspora has a role to play in helping stabilize the country, explain Esnold Jure and Georges Fauriol at USIP, arguing that the diaspora can provide more than just remittances: “Through direct investment and by enabling greater capital flows into key economic sectors, the diaspora can play an active role in Haiti’s economic reconstruction while ensuring a more relevant participation in the country’s future.”
Mexico
President-elect Claudia Sheinbaum plans to continue AMLO’s tradition of “Mañanera” daily press briefings. (El País)
Financial Times highlights Mexican president Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s efforts to open and expand state-run businesses that compete with the private sector, reporting, “The push by López Obrador has turned some bureaucrats and soldiers into entrepreneurs and marketing executives. The results of some of the investments are modest so far.”
Americas Quarterly highlights a women-led reforestation project in the mangroves of Mexico’s Yucatán peninsula.
Argentina
Several legislators from Argentine president Javier Milei’s party met members of Argentina’s former military dictatorship that are in jail for murder, torture, kidnappings, and other gross human rights violations. (El País)
“Milei on Monday dissolved the espionage structure he inherited from Kirchnerism. He put an end to the Federal Intelligence Agency (AFI) by decree and replaced it with a structure of four offices that will answer directly to the president,” reports El País.
Regional Relations
“Paraguayan President Santiago Peña confirmed Wednesday in Buenos Aires that his country would be relocating its Embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.” (MercoPress)
Migration
Migration has fallen (for now) at the Darien Gap following the implementation of 3 miles of barbed wire fencing and new efforts to halt migration by the Mulino government inaugurated July 1st. (AP)
Football
The president of Colombia’s soccer federation and his son were “arrested and charged with three counts of battery on a specified official/employee” following the chaos at the Copa América final last Sunday. (Washington Post; see LADB 7/15/24)
In a pair of articles (1, 2), the Washington Post highlights the story of Sebastián Marset, “The cocaine kingpin who hid as a professional soccer player.”
Critter Corner
“Inside Ecuador’s Cuyabeno Wildlife Reserve, an Indigenous Cofán community has since the 1990s carried out an initiative that has contributed to an increase in the population of two river turtle species… The success of the program also means the Cofán have secured a sustainable source of turtle eggs and meat for consumption, an important part of Indigenous diets throughout the Amazon,” reports Mongabay.