Weekly Report - 25 January 2024 (WR-24-03)

Venezuela’s President Nicolás Maduro is cracking down on opposition to his government ahead of elections that are scheduled to be held this year but which still have no date.... Read More

Ecuador’s hurtling plunge into narco-violence has intensified discussion among the country’s neighbours over how they can work together to confront transnational drug trafficking.... Read More

The government summarily dismissed the commander of the national police force (PNP), General Jorge Angulo, on 22 January for “very serious negligence”.... Read More

Supporters of former president Evo Morales (2006-2019) began blocking key highways around Bolivia on 22 January as they intensified their demands for overdue judicial elections to be convened immediately.... Read More

Colombia’s foreign minister, Álvaro Leyva, was handed a three-month suspension on 24 January by the inspector general’s office, which is responsible for overseeing the conduct of public officials.... Read More

Neither the Argentine government nor the opposition delivered any knockout blows during a 12-hour general strike held on 24 January.... Read More

Before taking office in January last year, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva promised on the campaign trail to support Brazil’s declining industrial sector.... Read More

The federal ministry of indigenous peoples announced on 19 January that the national guard (‘Força Nacional’) would be deployed to Paraná state, in the south of Brazil, to provide security for the Avá Guaraní indigenous community.... Read More

The government’s efforts to hold the US arms industry legally responsible for gun violence in Mexico scored a victory on 22 January.... Read More

The investigation into the 2014 disappearance of 43 trainee teachers from Ayotzinapa, Guerrero state, has become the latest battleground for President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s offensive against the judiciary.... Read More

Guatemala’s President Bernardo Arévalo has named constitutional lawyer Santiago Palomo Vila to head up a new anti-corruption commission.... Read More

“Changing one injustice for another equally serious.” This was the response by exiled opposition figure Miguel Mora to the recent release of Bishops Rolando Álvarez and Isidoro Mora, and 17 other clerics, jailed by the authoritarian government led by President Daniel Ortega, who were promptly exiled to Rome, bar one who is in Venezuela.... Read More

Chile’s lower chamber of congress has approved President Gabriel Boric’s flagship pension reform proposal.... Read More

“I can hear the roar of a people prepared to defend the country with their own lives if necessary, wherever necessary”.... Read More