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President-elect Pedro Pablo Kuczynski could come under early pressure to undertake some sweeping reforms at Petroperú after yet another serious oil spill in the Amazon forced the resignation of Germán Velásquez, the president of the state oil company. The energy and mines minister, Rosa María Ortíz, accused Petroperú of committing a “serious offence” for pumping crude through the Norperuano pipeline in the northernmost Amazon region of Loreto despite operations being suspended on 16 February by the regulating body Osinergmin after two spills at the start of the year.

The Norperuano pipeline, in operation since 1977, transports extracted oil 854km to the port terminal of Bayóvar in the northern Pacific region of Piura. But recurrent spills have been attributed to poor maintenance and negligence: there have been as many as 23 leaks since 2011. But it was two major spills in the space of a few weeks in January and February this year, with 3,500 barrels of crude flowing into the Amazon riverine system contaminating drinking water and damaging the local ecosystem, which led to Osinergmin suspending the operations of the pipeline which had been transporting around 5,500 barrels of oil per day.

The third rupture of the year was the most controversial because the suspension was still in place. Petroperú initially released a statement denying that the company was pumping oil at all before later claiming that it had actually carried out a test three days beforehand to check if maintenance work on two leaks had been successful. The spill totalled 600 barrels of crude in the district of Barranca in the Loreto province of Datem del Marañón.

With the truth out, Velásquez promptly resigned, although the company swiftly released figures as evidence that, serious oil spills aside, his tenure had been a success. Under Velásquez Petroperú went from making a loss of NS$280m (US$85m) in 2014 to a profit of NS$503m in 2015 and NS$340m in the first five months of 2016.

Ortíz insisted that the resignation of Velásquez would not stop investigations taking place or administrative sanctions being imposed on the officials responsible for the unauthorised pumping. “This is a very serious failing by the company,” she said. The environment minister, Manuel Pulgar-Vidal, said his ministry had denounced Petroperú before the attorney general’s office to demand a criminal investigation. The environmental assessment and control body (Oefa) has already slapped Petroperú with a fine of more than NS$11.5m (US$3.5m) for the oil spill and its systematic non-compliance of environmental obligations.

The government appointed an economist, Carlos Linares, as the new president of Petroperú and a lawyer, Gina Vegas, as president of the board of directors after Velásquez resigned from both posts. They were both promoted from senior positions in the company. Their challenge will be to undertake some major maintenance improvements on the Norperuano pipeline.

MEXICO | Economy proves Trump-proof for now. On 26 April, the White House issued a statement saying that US President Donald Trump has agreed not to “terminate” the North American Free Trade Agreement (Nafta) for the time being but instead work with the governments from the other Nafta members, Mexico and Canada, to update and renegotiate the terms of agreement. The announcement is major boon for the Mexican economy.

Ever since Trump threatened to take the US out of Nafta if no new terms of trade more favourable for the US could be agreed, Mexico has insisted that the abandoning of Nafta would be detrimental for the economies of both Mexico and the US. Trump’s decision to back down from this option and to focus instead on trying to establish new trade terms that are beneficial for all Nafta parties, should ease some of the uncertainty regarding Nafta’s future and the shape that Mexico’s economic relations with the US will take. These uncertainties had produced a so-called ‘Trump effect’ which caused analysts to dampen their economic forecasts for Mexico amid fears that the economic relationship between the two countries would be severely affected by Trump’s protectionist economic policy stances. This led to the Mexican peso losing 15% of its value against the US dollar since Trump’s election last year as well as the cancellation of planned investment projects in Mexico by US firms. However, as Trump’s presidency approaches its 100-day milestone, Mexico’s economy has performed better than expected, with preliminary official figures suggesting solid GDP growth in the first quarter of the year (of around 2.5%) and the peso steadily recovering. Other economic indicators also show positive signs with the unemployment rate in March down to nine-year low of 3.2%.

Meanwhile, Mexico’s automobile manufacturing sector is also having its strongest year since 2011, with car production reaching a record high figure of 943,704 light vehicles produced in the first quarter. This despite Trump’s threat to adopt policies to protect US automobile manufacturing, which as yet have failed to materialise.

Unfulfilled threats are becoming something of a theme of the Trump administration so far, demonstrated by the latest decision not to unilaterally abandon the Nafta agreement and instead concentrate on striking a deal that is beneficial to all its members. This too appears to be the case for the much reviled ‘border wall’ that Trump has promised to build along the US-Mexico border and vowed to make Mexico pay for. After failing to come up with a convincing way in which to force Mexico to pay for the wall, Trump has decided to remove his request for funding for the wall in this year’s US budget after this was rejected by a cross-party group of US legislators. But while Mexico may hope that the realities of government continue to constraint Trump, this may not always be enough to prevent his administration from pursuing economic policies that could be detrimental to Mexico. Indeed, the decision not to abandon Nafta and to renegotiate its terms in good faith does not mean that the Nafta renegotiations will produce a favourable deal for Mexico.

In addition, the decision by Trump to present a tax reform proposal that calls for a reduction of the US business tax from 35% to 15% and the adoption of a “territorial tax system to level the playing field for American companies” could prove to be harmful for Mexico. The aim of Trump’s proposal clearly is to attract more investment by business in the US, potentially at the expense of investments in Mexico.

MEXICO | Boosting ties with Poland. Poland’s President Andrzej Duda concluded a three-day official state visit to Mexico on 25 April. The landmark visit of a Polish head of state to Latin America follows Mexico’s new strategy of expanding economic opportunities outside of North America, following the election of US President Donald Trump and the impending renegotiations of the terms of the North American Free Trade Agreement (Nafta). After meeting with President Enrique Peña Nieto, the Mexican and Polish governments signed several bilateral trade and investment agreements designed to boost “strategic relations” between the two countries. Duda pointed out that Poland sees Mexico as one of the top five markets outside of Europe to invest in, while bilateral trade between the two countries has increased ten-fold since 2004, from US$109m to US$1.04bn in 2016.

• WTO sides with Mexico in tuna dispute

On 25 April, the World Trade Organization (WTO) ruled in favour of Mexico in its long-running dispute with the US over bilateral tuna trade. The dispute dates back to 2008 and involves US tuna tins labelling regulations, which Mexico argued discriminated against Mexican fished tuna considered by the US authorities not to be ‘dolphin safe’. The WTO has given Mexico permission to impose up to US$163.23m in annual trade sanctions against the US. Mexico’s economy ministry has said that it will seek to impose trade sanctions immediately, with high-fructose corn syrup imports from the US previously identified as a likely target. Mexico has long complained that the US has been dumping corn syrup into its market, affecting Mexican producers.

President Nicolás Maduro shows no sign of compromise as ‘zero hour’ approaches – the 30 July election for a national constituent assembly – which the Venezuelan opposition fears will allow Maduro to consolidate a military dictatorship in the country. Even as the international community ratchets up the pressure, the Caracas government has doubled down and notably, there is no sign of the military breaking with Maduro. Close observers of Venezuela including the Bogotá-based International Crisis Group are warning of “a grave danger of violence on a scale so far unseen”, advising external players that “inaction is no longer an option”. A negotiating structure of some sort simply must be found, it urges.

On 20 July, the Venezuelan opposition claimed an 85% adherence rate to a nationwide civic strike in protest at the Maduro government. It was difficult to know the veracity of the opposition’s claims, but certainly the streets of Caracas and other main cities across the country appeared empty in TV images relayed by local and international media.

Despite the ‘New Year’s Day’ feel, the day was anything but quiet, with the most reported arrests in a single day since April, amid continuing clashes between protestors and the Venezuelan security forces. According to Alfredo Romero, director of the Venezuelan Penal Forum (Foro Penal), an NGO that provides free legal counsel to detainees and monitors the country’s prison system, there were 367 detentions, led by the restive Western border state of Zulia, where 140 were arrested, with high numbers also in states of Carabobo (66), Nueva Esparta (43) and Aragua (24). There were also two to three deaths reported, taking the total official death toll since these anti-government protests broke out to 97/98 (with an unofficial death toll of about 115, as reported by opposition media).

The Foro Penal says that 4,072 civilians have been arrested since 1 April. Of these, 1,007 remain in detention. A further 479 have been presented before military tribunals, with 307 sentenced to prison by these military courts. The NGO considers another 444 detainees to be political prisoners. The Maduro government denies that there are any political prisoners at all in Venezuela (it admits only to ‘imprisoned politicians’), and it has also defended the use of military tribunals to try civilians, on the grounds that protestors have attacked and assaulted military officers. In most cases, these alleged assaults were against the Bolivarian National Guard (GNB), the country’s military police, which has taken the front line against the anti-government protests since April.

The same day as the national civic strike, a senior Venezuelan diplomat, Isaias Medina, a minister counsellor at the UN for legal and environmental affairs, publically broke with the Maduro government over the systematic repression of protestors.

Medina, a lawyer and environmentalist, published a video on YouTube in which he criticised the “unlimited repression and persecution” of young protestors, in particular students, and said he could no longer remain silent against the “incoherent chaos” of a government that was repressing the people it was meant to defend. Pointing out that Venezuela was a party to the Statute of Rome (which established the International Court of Justice at The Hague), he noted that the Statute defines very clearly crimes against humanity and persecution [state aggression], and said that “this has been happening for an extended period in Venezuela”. “It is time for change. People are demanding change. We have a serious humanitarian problem, there is no food”, he stated. In a subsequent interview with the Associated Press (AP), he said Venezuela was “a failed state”. He accused Maduro of “dictatorship” and of “crimes against humanity” and called on him to resign. Rejecting those comments outright, Rafael Ramírez, Venezuelan’s permanent representative to the UN, said Medina had acted “dishonestly” and had been relieved of his post.

The NGO Amnesty International (AI), which has documented the Venezuelan protests since April, has also suggested that Maduro could be accused of crimes against humanity. Ignacio Jovtis, an Argentine human rights investigator sent to Venezuela on behalf of the NGO, told the Spanish daily El País on 20 July that AI had observed a State policy of systematic violent repression against dissidents, along with government rhetoric inciting violence. It also considers civilians put before military justice to be the victims of arbitrary detention under international law. These findings, he suggested, could legally be considered evidence of crimes against humanity by the Venezuelan State.

In his latest (third) report on Venezuela, the secretary general of the Organization of American States (OAS), Luis Almagro, also said that the repression of protests was “not a series of random or isolated incidents of violence. Under the direction of President Maduro, the cabinet and top military commanders, the regime has developed and implemented systematic practices of repression through the criminalisation of opposition and civil society voices, arbitrary detention, the military prosecution of civilians, and the excessive use of force against peaceful protests…The regime has created a “new normal” where systematic institutional violence of the state is used in a dirty war against the people,” Almagro alleges.

A group of 100 Chilean and Colombian deputies in mid-July denounced Maduro before the ICJ for crimes against humanity, based on reports compiled by the UN, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, local and international NGOs and official Venezuelan reports from the attorney general’s office led by the now-dissident Luisa Ortega Díaz. Asked as to whether this type of case might proceed, Jovtis said that the complaint might be accepted should legal evidence mount against the Maduro government, but he suggested that third countries, first and foremost, would need to act (i.e. lodge a formal case with the ICJ). As things stand, this appears unlikely.

Nonetheless, with a string of current and former Venezuelan government officials (including serving ministers) also under sanction by US authorities for alleged crimes including drug trafficking, money laundering, illicit association and criminal conspiracy, there is little doubt that the ‘exit costs’ for the Maduro administration are very high. Latest threats by US President Donald Trump indicated that they were about to get higher again, with the State Department all but confirming that further sanctions were being readied, most likely against Venezuela’s defence minister and military chief, General Vladimir Padrino López, and Diosdado Cabello, number two in the ruling Partido Unido Socialista de Venezuela (PSUV). State Department sources were also hinting that latest measures are being coordinated with the support of third countries, including in Europe and Latin America, in order to give them added weight (and to prevent Maduro from taking political advantage of unilateral US action). US media sources suggested that these new sanctions could be announced before the 30 July constituent assembly process.

Yet as conflict resolution specialists point out, reducing the exit costs for the Maduro administration (and those closely associated with it) may be critical to a negotiated solution to the Venezuelan crisis. Agreeing legal arrangements, whether in the form of political exile and asylum, or a domestic transitional justice process, tend to be uppermost in this. While likely unpalatable to some in the Venezuelan opposition, these discussions may be inevitable. The UK’s Financial Times (FT), which caused a stir in Latin America in late July with a suggestion that Presidents Juan Manuel Santos of Colombia and Raúl Castro of Cuba were laying the groundwork for a negotiated solution (a claim immediately denied in forthright manner by the Colombian foreign minister), likewise observed that “the point of departure for all negotiated transitions – be that in Northern Ireland, South Africa or Colombia – is ‘talks about talks: establishing the where, who, and what of transition negotiations”.

The pressure on Maduro to compromise remains intense. Following a turnout of almost 7.3m for its informal national plebiscite on 16 July, and an apparently-successful civic strike four days later, the opposition had called another mass demonstration for Saturday 22 July as part of its ‘Zero Hour’ strategy – a final push against the government ahead of the 30 July D-day. Henrique Capriles Radonski called on Maduro to cancel the constituent assembly, as “the least costly” option. “It’s the easiest option. Do they think this situation is sustainable? Do they think they can impose themselves upon millions of Venezuelans? The answer is obvious: no,” he tweeted on 20 July.

The Mexican foreign ministry on 20 July also formally called for the suspension of the constituent assembly as a way to “open the door to a negotiation towards a democratic solution”, adding its voice to the 10 countries and two international organisations pressuring Maduro to back down from the divisive process. These include the US, Canada, Germany, Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Costa Rica, Panama, Peru and Spain, along with the European Union and the Southern Common Market (Mercosur), the Brazil- and Argentina-led regional trade bloc from which Venezuela has already been suspended.

The Vatican has yet to issue a similar call, but a direct plea by Pope Francis to Maduro to suspend the constituent assembly would be a markedly strong statement.

The position of Cuba

Citing sources close to the Santos government, the FT on 16 July had suggested that Colombia’s Juan Manuel Santos and Cuba’s Raúl Castro were in talks as part of a fresh regional diplomatic effort, backed by Argentina and Mexico, to resolve the Venezuelan crisis. Santos, reportedly, had agreed to lead this effort because of his unique position as someone with deep knowledge of Maduro and Venezuela, and a good working relationship both with the Castro government (which sponsored the recent peace process with the Farc) and also the White House. The FT speculated that Cuba might once again play host to transition negotiations, noting that “Maduro and his retinue might feel comfortable in Havana”. Colombia’s foreign minister, María Angela Holguin, quickly quashed the FT story, saying it categorically was not true. After his Havana trip however, Santos tweeted that “the whole world” wanted Maduro to suspend the constituent assembly process, a tweet that seemed to provoke particular fury in Caracas.

Cuba has long been a staunch defender of the Caracas government. The Venezuelan opposition claims that Cuba continues to closely advise (if not direct) the Maduro government. Yet Castro also has motive to see a resolution to the Venezuelan crisis. Not only is Castro under renewed pressure from the US Trump administration, but the Cuban economy is also feeling a very heavy toll from the Venezuelan crisis.

In late July, the former economy minister, José Luis Rodríguez, acknowledged as much on the pro-government website CubaDebate, noting that earnings from professional service exports (mostly medical services) – Cuba’s main source of foreign exchange revenues – were projected to fall again this year, after an almost 12% drop in 2016. According to Rodríguez, professional service exports generated about US$11.5bn in annual earnings, on average, between 2011 and 2015, but these fell by 11.8% in 2016. Rodríguez estimated a further fall of 8.5% this year, due to a drop in earnings not only from Venezuela, but also from Brazil. On top of the reduced Venezuelan oil shipments to the country, this amounts to a double whammy for the Cuban economy at a critical time, ahead of its own political transition of sorts in 2018, when Castro has pledged to step down and hand over the reins to the next generation of the ruling Communist Party.

HONDURAS | Exports up. Total exports in 2017 were worth US$4.56bn, a 17.4% year-on-year increase, the Honduran central bank (BCH) reported on 5 March. According to the BCH report, agro-industrial goods accounted for 57.9% of total exports, with coffee, palm oil, and prawns being the main export items. Meanwhile total imports were worth US$9.68bn, an 8.7% year-on-year increase, resulting in an overall trade deficit of US$5.12bn, up from the US$5.02bn deficit recorded in 2016.

On the same day that the BCH released its report, the country’s coffee institute (Ihcafe) revealed that the value of Honduran coffee exports from October 2017 to February 2018 reached US$446.5m, a 1% decrease from the US$450.5m reached in the same period a year earlier. The total export volume in 2017-2018, measured in 46kg sacks, rose 17% to 3.61m sacks, as compared with 3.09m sacks in the comparable period of 2016-2017. The average price per 46kg sack is currently US$123.67, which represents a 15% fall on the average price of US$145.80 per sack recorded in the 2016-2017 period.

Germany was the largest recipient of Honduran coffee exports, importing 30.38% of total exports. The next largest importers were Belgium (with 23.64% of the total) and the US (12.33%). These three countries combined accounted for 65% of the total exports.

VENEZUELA | New electricity minister appointed. President Nicolás Maduro has appointed Freddy Brito Maestre, an electrical engineer, as electricity minister and president of Venezuela’s state energy company (Corpoelec). Brito takes over from Igor Gavidia, who had only been appointed two months earlier following a series of severe power cuts affecting at least 11 of the country’s 23 states. Maduro offered no explanation for the decision to replace Gavidia. Brito faces the challenge of continued electricity shortages, and protests against them, as well as overseeing energy rationing. Brito was made science and technology minister on 1 April, a post now filled by Gabriel Servilia Jiménez Ramírez.

Faced with an upsurge in violence in the south-western department of Cauca, Colombia’s President Iván Duque has responded with a combination of force, sending in an additional 2,500 troops, and social programmes, announcing some US$400m in spending. The measures may be insufficient to pacify the beleaguered region. Meanwhile, the defence minister has been compelled to resign in the wake of revelations of army involvement in civilian deaths.

Cauca has all the ingredients for trouble. According to the United Nations (UN), the Pacific coast department is the poorest in Colombia with 62% of the population, which includes many indigenous communities, living under the poverty line. The presence of state institutions is limited. There have been decades of conflict over land ownership. The department has a long history of drug cultivation, illegal mining, and guerrilla activity. Many community leaders have been killed. A peace accord might have been signed by the leadership of the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (Farc) in 2016, but in Cauca many Farc dissidents have continued fighting. The Ejército Nacional de Liberación (ELN) guerrillas are also active, as well as drug trafficking organisations.

In the space of seven days President Duque visited Cauca twice. The first visit on 30 October was to Santander de Quilichao. Duque was reacting to an attack, attributed to Farc dissidents, in which five indigenous leaders were killed, including members of the Guardia Indígena, a community organisation which has been targeted before but not by any of the other armed organisations active in the area.

Duque responded by announcing the deployment of an additional 2,500 troops, taking the total to 10,500. The extra forces, he said, would have three objectives: helping control the territory, disrupting drug-trafficking routes, and dismantling illegal organisations.

A week later, after further attacks which pushed the death toll up to 13, Duque was back again, this time in Popayán, the departmental capital, for another in-situ security council meeting. On this occasion, Duque announced nearly US$400m in social programmes, with subsidies for poor families, road construction, support for small-scale employment, and improvements in health, education, and nutrition.

The combination of a security clampdown and increased social spending might in other circumstances be considered potentially positive. But many community and human rights activists think it is insufficient to counter Cauca’s deeply embedded patterns of violence. Indigenous communities have little trust in either the army or the government, particularly as many of the promised measures in the peace agreement, including recognition of land rights, have not been implemented in the department.

Colombia’s main indigenous grouping, the Organización Nacional Indígena de Colombia (Onic) says the Cauca communities are facing a campaign of genocide. It has demanded that the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) send a mission to investigate. Onic has also urged its members to support students and workers in anti-government protests called for 21 November.

Botero forced to resign

Defence Minister Guillermo Botero resigned on 6 November, a day after the start of a senate vote of censure on his role in alleged human rights violations by the army in both Cauca and the contiguous department of Caquetá. Senator Roy Barreras, of the centrist opposition Partido de la U (PU), had claimed that under Botero the army is once again using ‘false positives’ – killing innocent civilians who are then passed off as guerrillas or criminals in order to improve the published ‘kill rates’.

• False positives

Prosecutors are currently investigating roughly 5,000 ‘false positives’ in Colombia said to have been committed by 1,500 officers and soldiers between 1988 and 2014.

Flower Jair Trompeta, a young man allegedly killed in a clash between Farc dissidents and an army unit in Cauca on 28 October, was, according to Barreras, a false positive: not a Farc dissident but an environmental and human rights activist who had suffered extrajudicial execution at the hands of the army. Most critically, the senator also claimed that an army bombing raid in Caquetá last August killed 14 civilians including seven children, and that the incident was falsely presented by the army as a clash with Farc dissidents.

Botero denied this, arguing that the raid was legal and conducted within the framework of international humanitarian law. He admitted that children had died but blamed the guerrillas for having under-age recruits in their camps. In his resignation letter Botero made no mention of the bombing raid (now, according to new information collected by a prosecutor, said to have led to the deaths of eight children) but insisted that “Colombia’s enemy is drug trafficking”. General Luis Fernando Navarro, the current commander of the armed forces, has been appointed as the new defence minister.

The supreme court (STF) has convicted the masterminds behind the high-profile assassination in 2018 of Rio de Janeiro councillor Marielle Franco (2017-2018) and her driver Anderson Gomes. Former lawmakers João Francisco ‘Chiquinho’ Brazão and Domingos Brazão, along with their accomplices, were each sentenced to over 76 years in prison for planning the murder of their political opponent. The case highlights the intersection of organised crime and corruption, and the convictions have been hailed as a landmark victory against impunity. This verdict provides a sense of closure to a case that has become an international symbol of the struggles faced by social activists in Brazil, which ranks among the deadliest countries for human rights defenders.

Nearly eight years after Franco’s death in March 2018, the trial of the masterminds behind her assassination concluded on 25 February, with a panel of four STF justices ruling against the Brazão brothers and their accomplices –former chief of the Rio civil police, Rivaldo Barbosa; Ronald Paulo de Alves, a former military police officer, and Robson Calixto Fonseca, a former aide who worked for Domingos Brazão. Chiquinho had served as a Rio city councillor (2005-2019) and later as a deputy in the federal congress (2019-2025), and his brother had served as a Rio state deputy (1999-2015) before sitting on the council of Rio’s state audit tribunal (TCE-RJ).

It was during Chiquinho Brazão’s time on the Rio city council that Franco and her left-wing party, Partido Socialismo e Liberdade (PSOL), emerged as an obstacle to the Brazão family’s interests in local real estate dealings in parts of Rio believed to be controlled by criminal gangs known as ‘milícias’. Franco built her local political reputation on being a vocal campaigner and human rights defender who stood up for Rio’s marginalised communities especially those living in the city’s favelas, who are often extorted by the milícia gangs that allegedly have ties to corrupt police officers and politicians. 

The trial of the Brazão brothers and their associates was also closely watched by human rights groups. On 24 February international NGO Amnesty International released a statement saying that justice for Franco was “long overdue” and describing the trial as a “historic opportunity to break the cycle of impunity that has characterised the state’s response to the killings of human rights defenders for decades”, as well as expressing regret over the fact that it has taken eight years for this trial to take place, which highlights how “the Brazilian justice system fails to provide swift, effective, and respectful responses”. Amnesty International also cited figures from another NGO, Global Witness, highlighting that 342 land and environmental defenders were killed in Brazil between 2012-2021, which is the highest tally in the world for this period.

A similar statement released on 23 February by human rights experts at the United Nations (UN) framed the trial not only as the “final chapter in the fight for justice for Franco and Gomes, but also an important milestone in addressing structural impunity for racism, intersectional discrimination and violence against human rights defenders, women, people of African descent and LGBTIQ+ persons in Brazil.” The statement went on to highlight Franco’s legacy as an activist who spoke out against systemic racism, structural discrimination, and police brutality. The Brazilian STF justices who ruled against the defendants on 25 February also framed Franco’s assassination as an act of violence to silence a black woman who grew up in a favela and devoted her career to standing up for favela residents.

Prison sentences

The main plotters of the assassination, Chiquinho and Domingos Brazão, were each handed prison sentences of 76 years and three months. Rivaldo Barbosa, who obstructed the initial police investigations into the killing, was sentenced to 18 years in prison. The other two accomplices, Ronald Paulo de Alves and Robson Calixto Fonseca, were sentenced to 56 years and nine years respectively.

Marzo traerá consigo muchos (y económicamente serios) problemas. Esto es lo que predijeron los comentaristas locales en Argentina, luego de los anuncios hechos por el gobierno en noviembre relacionados con la remoción de los subsidios, que tendría un amplio impacto en la capacidad de compra de los consumidores. La administración de la Presidenta Cristina Fernández está enfrentando miríadas de otros problemas, incluyendo los cuestionamientos planteados acerca de (la falta de) las imposiciones de controles de mantenimiento por parte del gobierno en las redes ferroviarias manejadas por empresas privadas, como resultado de la tercer mayor tragedia ferroviaria ocurrida la semana pasada; las supuestas prácticas corruptas del Vicepresidente Amado Boudou [IL-12-08]; el fracaso del gobierno en alcanzar un acuerdo salarial, por primera vez desde el 2003, con los sindicatos de maestros; y la escasez de combustibles, particularmente diesel, que han disparado el rumor de que, era posible que en los primeros días de marzo, Fernández podría anunciar la re-nacionalización de Repsol-YPF.

Por primera vez en más de dos años, Fernández parece estar reaccionando ante los acontecimientos en vez de fijar por sí misma la agenda política, lo que un (pequeño) grupo de personas trató (sin éxito) de convertir en un cacerolazo, convocando a través de Twitter. Sin embargo, como las secuelas del trágico choque ferroviario del 22 de febrero que provocó la muerte de 51 personas e hirió a más de 700 otras continúan, las demostraciones públicas contra el manejo de la administración de las concesiones de las redes ferroviarias podrían materializarse en el (no muy distante) futuro. Los medios locales han puesto especial énfasis sobre varios informes oficiales presentados por la comisión nacional de regulación del transporte (CNRT) al secretario de transporte, Juan Pablo Schiavi en el 2010 y el 2011.

Uno de los últimos, con la fecha de 21 de marzo del 2011, expresa que la Línea Sarmiento, operada por Trenes de Buenos Aires (TBA), está en un estado deplorable, con “deficiencias estructurales [que] continúan incrementando el considerable déficit de mantenimiento, generando un deterioro de los componentes y la superestructura del ferrocarril”. Debido a las  “irreversiblemente estropeadas” vías, la CNRT pidió a la secretaría de transporte que diseñe un plan a través del cual los trenes reduzcan su velocidad; el informe también afirma que “puede observarse un pronunciado déficit de mantenimiento, con preocupantes fallas desde el punto de vista de la seguridad, debido a su gravedad y recurrencia”. El gobierno alega que no se hizo de la vista gorda ante esto y que, de hecho, la empresa TBA fue multada más de 40 veces en años recientes –en el 2008, los trenes de TBA sufrieron 23 descarrilamientos y en el 2009, 39.

Schiavi empeoró más las cosas cuando en la primera declaración después del choque él pareció culpar a los pasajeros por la magnitued de la tragedia “Existe una cultura muy argentina de pasarse a los vagones del frente del tren, para así ubicarse más cerca de la salida [...] que convirtió un accidente en una tragedia”, dijo durante una ‘conferencia de prensa’ en la cual no se permitió que los medios hicieran preguntas. Desde entonces la etiqueta “queremos preguntar” se ha usado con más frecuencia en Twitter por miembros de la prensa argentina que afirman que, a diferencia de cualquier otro país de la región, ellos son invitados a las conferencias de prensa como una audiencia y no para plantear preguntas.

Cuando fue hallado el cuerpo de la 51^ra víctima a bordo del cuarto vagón, 60 horas después de la tragedia, la ministra de seguridad, Nilda Garré también pareció culpar a la víctima en un comunicado oficial que señalaba que estaba viajando en un área “prohibida para el público”. La familia de Lucas Menghini Rey, la 51^ra víctima quien se ha convertido en el rostro de la tragedia, respondió al gobierno con palabras fuertes en una carta abierta, “a la sociedad argentina”. “Debido a su magnitud, nosotros consideramos el hecho un desastre previsible y no un accidente, considerando que el último término es elegido para eludir responsabilidad”, expresó su padre, Paolo Menghini. María Luján Rey, su madre, dijo que era su deber “expresar mi más enérgico repudio al comunicado emitido por el ministerio de seguridad, encabezado por la Dra. Nilda Garré, que insinúo la posibilidad de que Lucas era responsable por lo sucedido.”

• Controversial requerimiento judicial

Un día después del choque ferroviario, Schiavi y el ministro de planeamiento, Julio de Vido, anunciaron que el gobierno se presentaría para asumir el estatus de demandante en el proceso judicial relacionado con el choque. La movida tiene sentido desde las perspectivas, política y de relaciones públicas, aunque su legalidad es altamente cuestionable. Al asumir el estatus de demandante, el gobierno se alinea con las víctimas mientras intenta poner cierta  distancia entre su problemáticamente cercana relación  con el Grupo Cirigliano, dueño de TBA. Sin embargo, esto podría resultar ser un tiro por la culata, ya que los medios de la oposición han desempolvado grabaciones de octubre y noviembre pasados en las cuales Fernández aparece con los dueños del grupo y los elogia por su inversión y mejoramiento de las líneas de trenes bajo su cuidado. (Cintas similares también han reaparecido en relación a la inversión de Repsol-YPF, la cual cual el gobierno elogió hace seis meses y ahora dice que es carente.)

     El Estado también era técnicamente responsable por asegurar de que TBA cumpla con las normas de seguridad y operación. Por lo tanto, si se prueba que el accidente es el resultado de un error mecánico, el Estado debería ser un acusado, no un demandante. El juez Claudio Bonadío tendrá la última palabra, pero el rumor en Buenos Aires es que rechazará el pedido del gobierno. De hecho, el juez también se pronunció en contra de otro pedido hecho por la propia Fernández durante un discurso público–la presidenta no habló ni apareció en público por cinco días después de la tragedia, pero cuando lo hizo, pidió a la justicia que complete todos los estudios forenses dentro de 15 días. El juez Bonadío replicó inmediatamente que los estudios forenses podrían o no podrían estar completados dentro del periodo estipulado.

     Después de declarar que el gobierno no rescindiría el contrato de TBA a menos que la compañía sea hallada culpable por las cortes, Fernández decidió asumir la administración de TBA esta semana y designar un supervisor hasta que concluyan los estudios forenses. Si el gobierno fuese a rescindir el contrato, y las cortes no hallan suficiente evidencia de que el choque fue el resultado de negligencia, el Estado tendría que pagar una multimillonaria cuenta en dólares por ruptura de contrato.

• Macri se desprende del Metro

Después de que la ministra Garré anunció que  desde el 1 de marzo la policía federal (PFA) ya no patrullara el metro de la ciudad de Buenos Aires, el alcalde local, Mauricio Macri, dijo que, por lo tanto, su administración ya no asumiría el manejo del metro. Al hacer el anuncio, Macri trató claramente de vincular su decisión con la tragedia ferroviaria: “Yo sentí que nosotros, los argentinos, nos debemos a nosotros mismos una reflexión [...] desafortunadamente, el metro no puede escapar a la realidad [...] Nosotros no podemos asumir la responsabilidad de los 10 años sin inversión [...] Yo no mentiré ni me convertiré en un cómplice en poner en riesgo a los usuarios por la carencia de seguridad y de inversión, [por estas razones] hemos decidido ceder nuestro control,” dijo.

POLITICS | Capriles challenges election result before supreme court. On 2 May Venezuela’s opposition Mesa de la Unidad Democrática (MUD) filed an appeal before the supreme court against the 14 April presidential election. Gerardo Fernández, a lawyer for the MUD, said the 180-page appeal was against the entire electoral process and sought to annul the elections and request a new ballot. He said the appeal includes complaints relating to incidents prior to the election. The defeated opposition presidential candidate, Henrique Capriles Radonski, claims there were thousands of irregularities on the day, including the names of 200,000 dead people on the electoral register. "This is not over. No one here can get tired or throw in the towel", Capriles stated at a later press conference, before he was interrupted by a government ‘cadena,’ an obligatory State broadcast that all local channels are obliged to show live. President Nicolás Maduro yesterday accused Capriles of trying to create “civil war” in Venezuela.

NICARAGUA | Comenzará la construcción del retrasado proyecto Tumarín. Roberto Abreu, el gerente general de Centrales Hidroeléctricas de Nicaragua (CHN), una subsidiaria de la compañía de electricidad estatal de Brasil, Eletrobrás, y la compañía privada brasileña Queiroz Galvão, anunciaron el 13 de julio que la construcción del más grande proyecto hidroeléctrico de Nicaragua, Tumarín, comenzaría en octubre, una vez que haya terminado la estación de las lluvias. De acuerdo con el vocero oficial del gobierno, el19digital, la represa de US$1,1mm, que será construida en la región Autónoma del Atlántico Sur (RAAS) se espera que tendrá una capacidad eventual de 253MW.

     Las obras en la planta, que tomarán cuatro años construir, ha estado retrasada por dos años. De acuerdo con el19digital, entre las varias fuentes de financiación, Eletrobrás y Queiroz Galvão desembolsarán el 47% del costo de la planta, el Banco Nacional de Desarrollo  Económico y Social (BNDES) de Brasil proveerá un préstamo de US$342m, mientras que el Banco Centroamericano de Integración Económica (BCIE) proveerá un préstamo de US$252m.

     La construcción de la planta está en línea con el declarado objetivo del Presidente Daniel Ortega de reducir la dependencia de las importaciones de petróleo a favor de los recursos renovables. El 19digital citó al ministro de energía, Emilio Rapaccioli como diciendo que la energía renovable se espera que alcance el 50% - 53% de la matriz energética del país para fin de año, subiendo de 40,5% en el 2012. El gobierno apunta a elevar esto a 90% para el 2026.

President Evo Morales might well trumpet two recent deals ahead of his re-election bid this October: one with the mining cooperatives, cooperativistas, following recent deadly clashes over a proposed mining bill [WR-14-14]; and another with the main umbrella union, Central Obrera Boliviana (COB), over minimum wage increases. These have both provided sources of unrest for his Movimiento al Socialismo (MAS) government in recent years. However, while Morales remains clear favourite ahead of the vote, an unprecedented strike called by lesser ranking members of the military (FFAA), is proving an unexpected concern for his government.

On 21 April the MAS government and COB agreed a 10% general salary increase and 20% increase to the national minimum wage, bringing the latter to B$1,400 (US$203) a month up from B$1,200 (US$174) in 2013. While the government had initially offered increases of 7% and 10%, the final deal was much more in line with the 12% and 20% demanded by the COB which now seems to have abandoned its traditional fantastical call for a new monthly minimum wage of B$8,300 (US$1,199), based on its estimates of the cost of a basic basket of goods.

Flanked by his economy and labour ministers, Luis Arce and Daniel Santalla respectively, President Morales highlighted that the national minimum salary had increased by 173% since 2005, the year before he took office. He was also quick to note that the increase was significantly more than the 6.48% inflation rate registered in 2013 (up from 4.5% in 2012).

Morales said the salary increase was in line with his government’s efforts to redistribute wealth – given that growth reached 6.4% in 2013 on the latest (January 2014) report by the Economic Commission for Latin America & the Caribbean (Eclac). The 2013 figure is the third highest in the region after Paraguay (13.0%) and Panama (7.5%). The same report projects 5.5% growth for Bolivia in 2014, second only to Panama (7.0%). Meanwhile, on 20 April, Bolivia’s central bank announced that international reserves reached US$14.4bn to 31 December 2013, up US$503m on 2012.

As was the case with Morales’ November 2013 decree establishing a second annual pay bonus whenever real annual GDP growth exceeds 4.5% [WR-13-48], private sector lobbies like the Confederación de Empresarios Privados de Bolivia (CEPB) were quick to slam the latest salary increase as electorally motivated. They complained that the private sector had been excluded from the talks.

These claims were not altogether unjustified given that Morales himself has admitted that the COB remains important to his bid for re-election. At the end of last month, he told reporters that COB would add an additional 10% to his vote; even without the COB’s support he hopes to exceed the 64% with which he won re-election in 2009.

While the COB has been a traditional MAS ally, its differences with the government became pronounced during Morales’ second term (which began in 2010) over issues like the government’s failed attempt to scrap state fuel subsidies in December 2010 (the gasolinazo) and minimum salary increases. This disaffection culminated in the COB’s January 2013 launch of a new party, Partido de los Trabajadores (PT). While the November 2013 decree appeared to have its desired aim of getting the COB back on side - the very next day, Trujillo announced the PT’s dissolution - the union has been clear that this support is not unconditional (see sidebar).

Another deal

On the same day that Morales announced the wage increase, Interior Minister Carlos Romero unveiled a deal between the government and cooperativistas, grouped under the Federación de Cooperativas Mineras (Fencomin) in relation to the new mining bill. This followed a stand-off after the plurinational legislature’s lower chamber, on 29 March, approved changes to the mining bill, drafted to replace the 1997 mining code approved under the administration led by Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada (1993-1997; 2002-2003), which had triggered protests by Fencomin.

The cooperativistas had specifically objected to an amendment to article 151 of the proposed bill which had authorised cooperatives to sign mining contracts with private companies. The amendment struck this out on the grounds that it was unconstitutional, stipulating that only the Bolivian State was in fact authorised to sign contracts with private investors to exploit natural resources. This prompted protests from the cooperativistas which turned deadly [WR-14-14].

Under the deal reached on 21 April with cooperativistas (who number between 80,000 and 120,000 according to 2012 estimates), cooperatives can form mixed companies with the state mining company, Corporación Minera de Bolivia (Comibol), but not with either foreign or local private companies. While the government has yet to clarify whether it will make good its proposal to redraw the mining bill (itself three years in the pipeline), the agreement is a welcome solution to the dispute for the government, particularly given threats by Fencomin’s leader Alejandro Santos, that “just as we brought Evo to power, so can we remove him”.

Another cloud

While both deals will be crucial in terms of ensuring support from the MAS’s traditional support base ahead of October elections, the threat of unrest from the military could provide a further test for Morales. The “indefinite strike” was announced on 21 April by the president of Bolivia’s national association of non-commissioned officers and sergeants of the armed forces (ASCINALSS), NCO Johnny Gil Leniz. It was triggered by the decision announced the previous day by Defence Minister Rubén Saavedra to fire four NCOs who had been calling for internal reform of the armed forces (FFAA) – the first such demands to take place under Morales.

The sacked officials (two air force officials, one army official and a naval officer), had presented a proposal on 3 April citing the need to address “discrimination within the FFAA”. Among other things, the proposal calls for NCOs to be allowed the same educational opportunities as their seniors and for the ranks of NCO and sergeant to be replaced with the position of “technical officer”. As well as the four sacked officials, more than 50 students from the military engineering school and the technical aviation school were expelled for attending a meeting about the initiative.

While Saavedra is downplaying the threat of unrest, highlighting that just 500 of the 10,000 NCOs took part in the protests on 22 April, the government has said that it is open to negotiation. At the time of writing, however, this had yet to produce any concrete result.

Morales is also clearly not taking any chances that the unrest could spread to the police, which in 2012 staged revolts to demand better wages and conditions [WR-12-25]. On 22 April the government announced a deal with the national police association (ANSSCLAPOL) to increase daily food expenses for police officers to B$7 (US$1), up from B$4.50 (US$0.65).

• Profits

Bolivia’s deputy minister for the budget and fiscal accountability, Jaime Durán Chuquimia, recently told reporters that profits from state companies reached B$6.62bn (US$959m) in 2013, up from US$6.4bn (US$932m) in 2012 and B$69m (US$9.9m) in 2005. He said that there were now 23 state companies up from six public companies in 2005. He said that the state-oil company, Yacimientos Petrolíferos Fiscales Bolivianos (YPFB) accounted for an overwhelming 96.7% of the earnings, contributing B$6.4bn in profits. This was followed by the state mining company, Corporación Minera de Bolivia (Comibol), B$297m; the national electricity company Empresa Nacional de Electricidad (Ende), B$187m; and the mining company, Metalúrgica Vinto, B$34m.

• COB’s demands

In an interview with national daily, La Razón on 16 February, COB Secretary General Helmo Pérez said that the salary increase was one of four demands the COB had ahead of the election. Others include political participation (the COB is demanding unionist candidates be included on the MAS’s slate); commitments vis-à-vis the productive sphere (the COB is calling for the re-activation of stalled mining projects as well as industrialisation plans in certain areas); and that the government address a shortage of housing for COB workers.

Jorge Roig, presidente de la principal cámara empresarial de Venezuela, Fedecámaras, ha pedido al gobierno liderado por el Presidente Nicolás Maduro que se siente con el sector privado y “tome decisiones” de cara a la “muy grave crisis” en el país. Fedecámaras sugiere que la economía podría contraerse un 4% - 5% este año.

Roig se quejó de que el gobierno no se ha reunido con el sector privado en más de dos meses –a pesar de que Fedecámaras aceptó una invitación oficial para sentarse con la administración “en el interés nacional” en enero. “Le pedimos al gobierno que reanude estas mesas de trabajo”, Roig declaró, señalando que el gobierno debe al sector privado US$9,0mm en moneda extranjera. Roig fuertemente rechazó el uso escáners de huellas dactilares que prontamente serán instalados en los supermercados venezolanos como parte de los esfuerzos para impedir el acaparamiento y el contrabando de alimentos y otros bienes de consumo. “En nombre de todo el sector empresarial y todos los minoristas en el país, por favor acepten nuestras disculpas por forzarles a ustedes al humillante proceso de marcar sus huellas digitales para comprar sus alimentos”, Roig dijo dirigiéndose al público en general.

Sin embargo, el Presidente Maduro, permaneció desafiante en un feroz discurso el fin de semana, negando la responsabilidad del gobierno por la crisis, y culpando de todo a la guerra económica que está siendo desarrollada contra el país desde adentro y desde afuera. Comparó a Venezuela con el Chile bajo Allende, Yugoslavia bajo Tito, y Cuba bajo los Castro, diciendo que Venezuela estaba siendo sujeta a una vasta conspiración de extremistas de Derecha para destruir la Revolución Bolivariana. Expresamente negando que habría alguna liberación de precios o de los controles de divisas, Maduro pareció directamente contradecir a su propio zar económico, Rafael Ramírez, lo que plantea la cuestión de si el todopoderoso Ramírez, también presidente de la empresa petrolera estatal Pdvsa y ministro del petróleo & minería, permanecerá en su puesto en la inminente reorganización del gabinete.

¿Venezuela importará petróleo crudo?

Pdvsa está considerando importar crudo liviano argelino a fin de estimular las ventas de su propio crudo pesado, principalmente a China, pero también teniendo en mente a otros clientes asiáticos como India, informó la agencia de noticias Reuters.

Venezuela, de hecho, ha estado importando –a alto costo– crecientes volúmenes de productos refinados desde alrededor del 2010, principalmente nafta pesada de EU, para mezclar con su crudo pesado. Reuters señaló que esta mezcla de crudo y nafta, conocida como petróleo crudo diluido (DCO siglas en inglés), “carece de compradores y es enviado principalmente a su unidad Citgo en EU” (la cual según informes, está en venta). El problema radica en el hecho de que la largamente planeada actualización para ampliar la capacidad de refinación interna aún debe materializarse. La muy cacareada refinería Abreu e Lima en el norte de Brasil –originalmente una joint venture entre Pdvsa y su contraparte brasilera, Petrobrás– supuestamente iba a procesar crudo pesado, pero después de que el acuerdo fracasara, Petrobrás ahora está construyendo una refinería de petróleo liviano para procesar su propio petróleo crudo ‘dulce’. Mientras tanto, la mayor refinería de Venezuela, Amuay, aún no está operando en plena capacidad dos años después de un gran incendio.

El informe de Reuters (basado en documentos internos de Pdvsa), sugiere que ahora la estrategia es usar los nuevos supertanqueros de la firma para recortar costos de fletes y expandir las ventas trayendo el petróleo de Argelia y luego reembarcar la mezcla más liviana a Asia, donde la demanda es alta y los precios mejores. Las ventas de Venezuela a su principal cliente, EU, han estado cayendo a medida que estas son desviadas a China; y la demanda de EU por petróleo importado en todo caso está cayendo debido al boom de su petróleo de esquisto propio. Pdvsa, según informes, le dijo a sus socios locales que estaba en conversaciones con la estatal Sonatrach de Argelia acerca de un contrato de compra de crudo ‘dulce’ liviano. Transportar crudo de Argelia –que tiene un inventario abundante– a Venezuela tomaría unos 20 días y Pdvsa podría ahorrar alrededor de US$3m por embarque usando su propia flota, de acuerdo con los citados documentos internos. Desde ese punto de vista, la estrategia de Pdvsa no parece ilógica. Reuters señala que Pemex, de México, también analiza importar petróleo, de nuevo principalmente crudos condensados y livianos.

• Importar petróleo

Cualquiera sean los ahorros en los costos, la noción de que el país con las mayores reservas de crudo del planeta ya no tiene autosuficiencia petrolera, caerá bien a algunos críticos de la Revolución Bolivariana, quienes dicen que ha conducido hasta al suelo a Pdvsa en el curso de los últimos 14 años. Venezuela exportó 2,43m de barriles de petróleo y derivados por día el año pasado según cifras de Pdvsa, cayendo un 11% año en año, y el nivel más bajo desde el 2007. Y mientras que la producción se estanca, el barril de petróleo venezolano ha promediado US$96,4/barril (/b) hasta la fecha este año, cayendo de US$99,5/b en el 2013 y aproximadamente US$102/b en el 2011/2012.

La difusión de una conversación grabada entre un traficante de droga condenado y tres funcionarios del gobierno han reavivado las preocupaciones en torno al hecho de que grupos de narcotraficantes locales han logrado infiltrarse en el sistema político interno. Con el Presidente Horacio Cartes fuera del país en un viaje oficial en Europa (ver más abajo), ha sido el Vicepresidente Juan Afara quien ha tenido que tratar con la emergente crisis. Afara ha mantenido reuniones con algunos de los funcionarios del gobierno implicados en el incidente para tratar de llegar al fondo de la cuestión. Pero tal parece que la renovada atención sobre la ‘narcopolítica’ ahora podría comenzar a reclamar las cabezas de algunos funcionarios.

La grabación comenzó a circular en medios paraguayos el 5 de junio. Se dice que es una conversación que dos senadores (Arnaldo Giuzzio, del opositor Partido Democrático Progresista [PDP], y Arnoldo Wiens de la gobernante Asociación Nacional Republicana-Partido Colorado [ANR-PC]) y el titular de la Secretaría Nacional Antidrogas (Senad), Luis Rojas, mantuvieron con un prisionero traficante de drogas brasilero, Ezequiel de Souza, en noviembre del 2014. En la grabación (de la cual solamente se ha hecho pública una parte) De Souza le cuenta a los tres hombres acerca de los vínculos que su organización y otras organizaciones de tráfico de drogas  (OTD) habían logrado forjar con autoridades locales.

De Souza le dice a sus interlocutores que las OTDs han permeado todos los niveles del gobierno desde el nivel municipal hasta el nacional; desde los responsables de aplicar la ley y el poder judicial, hasta el poder legislativo e incluso el ejecutivo. Él proveyó nombres de decenas de fiscales, políticos y jueces (incluyendo muchos de los nombres que ya habina sido implicados en la ‘narcopolítica’ después del asesinato del periodista Pablo Medina [IL-15-05]), acusando a todos ellos de formar parte de una extensa red de corrupción. Pero la revelación más significativa hecha por De Souza fue que él mismo había pagado entre US$30.000 y US$40.000 al mes a miembros de la Senad y del ministerio del interior, a cambio de información. De Souza mencionó al viceministro del interior, Javier Ibarra, un ex fiscal antidrogas, como su principal contacto (él sugirió que el ministro del interior también podría estar entre los que recibían parte del dinero, aunque no mencionó al Ministro Francisco de Vargas por su nombre).

Las revelaciones inmediatamente causaron furor. Rojas, quien en el pasado había advertido acerca de la propagación de la influencia de las OTDs entre los políticos locales y que en abril dijo que las investigaciones de su agencia sobre esto podrían proveer algunas “sorpresas”, admitió haber estado presente en la conversación con De Souza. Pero Rojas dijo que él no estaba consciente de que la misma se había grabado (el propio Giuzzio, un ex fiscal anticorrupción a quien se oye describiendo la circunstancias de la conversación en la grabación, ha admitido que fue él quien grabó la conversación); y que el material no debería haberse hecho público. Rojas explicó que la reunión tuvo lugar en su oficina, poco después del arresto de De Souza y a pedido de éste, diciendo que quería dar evidencia a dos legisladores “respetados”. Pero Rojas ha advertido que  no todo lo que dijo De Souza puede ser verdad, teniendo en cuenta que “en ese entonces De Souza temía ser trasladado [de una celda en la Senad] a [la cárcel de] Tacumbú”.

Pero los comentarios de Rojas sólo condujeron a más preguntas. ¿Por qué los alegatos se mantuvieron en secreto? ¿Fue esta información pasada al ministerio público? Y si fue así, ¿hubo una investigación? El 7 de junio, la oficina del fiscal general respondió algunas de las preguntas, lanzando una investigación formal sobre los alegatos. Y en una conferencia de prensa del 8 de junio, Giuzzio y Wiens dijeron que ellos habían enviado al ministerio público la grabación completa. Desde Europa, el Presidente Cartes ordenó a Rojas, Ibarra y todos los funcionarios implicados a que cooperen plenamente con la investigación. Afara convocó a Ibarra y Rojas a reuniones privadas para discutir la cuestión. Ibarra rechazó las acusaciones, negando conocer a De Souza, y se mantuvo firme en que él no renunciaría y que está dispuesto a enfrentar una investigación.

• Cartes viaja a Europa

En momentos en que emergía el escándalo de la grabación, el 5 de junio, el Presidente Cartes dejaba el país rumbo a Europa. Cartes tenía programado hacer una visita oficial de dos días a España el 8 y 9 de junio, antes de su participación en la cumbre de la Unión Europea-Comunidad de Estados Latinoamericanos y Caribeños (UE-Celac) que debía realizarse entre el 10 y 12 de junio en Bruselas, Bélgica. Sin embargo, Cartes dijo que él había decido viajar a Europa unos días antes para poder asistir al partido final de la Liga de Campeones, de la Union Of European Football Associations (Uefa) que enfrentaba a Juventus de Italia y el Barcelona de España en Berlín, Alemania, el 6 de junio.

At the end of November, Guatemala’s 158-member unicameral legislature passed the 2016 national budget of Q$70.79bn (US$9.31bn). While the approval of the budget is itself an achievement given that the process is a traditionally difficult one in Guatemala, the allocations to sectors such as health – which the human rights ombudsman recently declared to be facing unprecedented crisis – remain a major cause for concern. Days after the budget’s approval, a new report was released which shows that poverty in the country has gone up.

Approved literally minutes before the constitutionally established deadline of 30 November by 100 votes to eight, the 2016 budget was less than the proposed Q$72.4bn (US$9.4bn) put forward by the executive but up from the 2015 Q$70.6bn (US$9.2bn) budget. According to a congressional press release, education will receive Q$12.89bn (up from Q$12.29bn in 2015); health will receive Q$5.53bn (down from Q$5.64bn); and the interior ministry will receive Q$4.47bn (down from US$4.57bn). Meanwhile the judiciary will receive Q$1.19bn (up from Q$1.46bn in 2015) and the attorney general’s office, Q$1.99bn (up from Q$1.05bn).

Local think-tanks including Instituto Centroamericano de Estudios Fiscales (Icefi), as well as the United Nations Children’s Fund (Unicef), had already criticised the executive’s initial (higher) budget proposal for cutting back on crucial social spending. Prior to the budget’s approval, Health Minister Mariano Rayo warned that the Q$5.53bn proposed allocation for the sector (1.1% of GDP) was insufficient and would mean that the public health needs of 40% of the population would not be met. The Icefi also warned that unless the incoming conservative Frente de Convergencia Nacional (FCN) government led by Jimmy Morales (which takes office on 14 January) overhauls the tax authorities (SAT) -  the credibility of which has been left in tatters following the series of corruption scandals – which ultimately forced Otto Pérez Molina to resign as president in September last, tax take for 2016 will reach just 10.1% of GDP. Tax take for 2014 was just 10.8% of GDP - less than the 12% minimum target established in the 1996 peace accords that ended Guatemala’s 36-year civil war (1960-1996) and one of the lowest in Central America.

• Poverty

According to the Guatemalan national statistics institute (INE)’s national survey on living conditions (Encovi), released on 10 December, 59.3% of the population (total 16.7m) were living in poverty in 2014, up from 51.2% in 2006 while 23.4% were living in extreme poverty, up 8.1 percentage points from 2006. The Encovi survey also showed a discrepancy between indigenous and non-indigenous populations, indicating that 79.2% of the indigenous population is poor, compared with 46.6% of the non-indigenous population. According to the local press, the poverty and extreme poverty lines were set at Q$10,218 (US$1,334) and Q$5,750 (US$750) annually. The most impoverished regions were Alta Verapaz (where 83.1% of the population were living in general poverty), Sololá (80.9%) and Totonicapán (77.5%). Guatemala, Sacatepéquez and Escuintla departments registered the lowest rates of general poverty (33.3%; 41.1% and 52.9% respectively).

The announcement by Donald Trump that he intends to pull the US out of the Paris climate change agreement reached in December 2015 has been widely criticised by other signatories. Countries from Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) have been broadly supportive of the need for action to mitigate the effects of climate change. The US decision, and shifts in energy usage, may have far-reaching effects on the region.

Two interventions at a recent international symposium in London underline the climate change challenge facing the LAC countries. The inaugural Green Financial Summit (GFI), held on 31 May-1 June, was well-attended by Latin American delegates, particularly from Brazil and Argentina. It focused on the development and funding of renewable energy projects via mechanisms such as green bonds. One of the interventions came from Sir David King, formerly the UK government’s chief scientific advisor and special representative for climate change.

King’s analysis of the state of play on the Paris agreement (also known as the COP21 agreement) was stark. The core agreement, signed by 197 countries, was that signatories should take steps to limit global warming to no more than 2 degrees centigrade (and if possible to hit the lower target of 1.5 degrees) above pre-industrial revolution levels by 2100. This was to be achieved by voluntary government-by-government action plans, known as nationally determined contributions (NDCs). The COP21 also envisaged a review process in 2018-2020 that would allow adjustments to NDCs to further reduce carbon emissions to get back onto the 2-degree track. Legally, US withdrawal would not happen until 2019, however the Trump administration suggested that the US would no longer be taking the voluntary steps envisaged in the agreement. Led by California and New York, US states, cities and corporations have pledged to make take their own steps to comply with the Paris agreement, independently of US federal government policy decisions. Nonetheless, the White House move was seen as a very heavy blow, not least because it abrogates US leadership on climate change and sends a negative message to developing countries struggling to grow their economies sustainably.

King pointed out that the sum of the existing NDCs doesn’t limit global warming to 2 degrees centigrade by the end of this century, but points instead to a 3-4 degree increase in average temperatures. Given that the US is the world’s main polluter, the Trump administration’s decision to abandon the Paris commitments could make that gap wider.

Limiting the global temperature rise to no more than 2 degrees would require the world achieving a target of zero net greenhouse gas emissions by 2055. At the time of the agreement in 2015, actuarial studies indicated that on the current trajectory, by 2060 the world would already be exposed to sharply rising risks from extreme weather events and weather-related natural disasters. Melting ice caps may raise sea levels anywhere from six to 10 metres, increasing the possibility of what King described as “a potential disaster of extraordinary proportions”. Among the US cities most vulnerable to rising sea waters are New York, Boston, New Orleans and, somewhat ironically, Miami – which President Trump has his ‘second office’.

If temperatures rise by 1.5 degrees, the chances of this kind of epic disaster are believed “low”, but if temperatures rise by 2.0 degrees, the probability rises to 1%-5%, which King suggested was too high a risk. Above that, the probability becomes even higher. King’s core message was that the world needs to shift dramatically – and quickly – to the greater use of renewable energy. On a positive note, he believes that a whole range of commercially viable technologies to make that shift are now beginning to emerge.

Another speaker questioned the way in which the transition to renewables may actually happen. ‘Peak oil’ and other theories have traditionally held that global hydrocarbon reserves are becoming scarce, and that prices, although still volatile, are therefore inexorably moving up. For this school of thought, the commercial viability of renewable energy sources such as wind and solar power will be judged in a world where oil prices are set at US$100 a barrel or more. But Dieter Helm, Professor of Energy Policy at Oxford University, takes a contrary view. Speaking at the conference, he argued that the end-game for fossil fuels will play out against a background of relative hydrocarbons plenty, not of scarcity: and that the long-term trend will be for the oil price to fall further from its current level of around US$50 per barrel.

In fact, measured at present-day values, the long-term average oil price in the 100 years to 1970 was US$36 a barrel. Despite subsequent spikes caused by the Arab-Israeli war, the Iranian revolution, and the expansion of the Chinese economy, Helm expects that the trend going forward will be for prices to remain at below US$50. This will be a function of new discoveries, the shale oil and gas revolution, and technological change. Although renewable energy will therefore face stronger competition from hydrocarbons, he believes the renewable revolution will still advance, and that decarbonisation is inevitable. The digitalisation of production processes (the so-called Fourth Industrial Revolution), and revolutionary changes in transport (including autonomous vehicles) will pave the way to a more energy-efficient and zero net-emissions future, with electricity playing a key role. Electricity markets will be organised less on calculations of marginal costs and the operation of wholesale markets as they are now, and more on the sheer expansion of capacity.

The views of both King and Helm may or may not be correct, but taken together they sketch out a very different and striking international context for the LAC countries. One conclusion is that the region’s first moves to reduce its dependency on hydrocarbons will need to be deepened and accelerated. Targets for the renewables share of total electricity generation under COP21 have been set as follows – Argentina has pledged that 20% of its electricity output will come from renewables by 2025, Mexico has pledged a higher share of 35% by 2024, and Brazil has set a target of 86% by 2023 (the latter reflecting Brazil’s very large hydro resources). These targets almost certainly will need to be reviewed upwards.

Another conclusion is that global and LAC geopolitics are likely to shift. The shale revolution is making the US much less dependent on oil imports, and on it strategic relations with the Middle East. Traditional global oil exporters like Saudi Arabia, Russia and Venezuela could face long-term decline and sharpened economic challenges.

Those capable of best adapting to the electric and digital world (possibly the US and the European Union at a global level, and those LAC countries that are able to invest in broadband, education, and innovation) will do best in the regional context.

COLOMBIA | Growth picking up pace. The economy expanded by 2.2% in the first quarter of 2018 compared with the same period last year, the national statistics institute (Dane) reported this week. This compares favourably to 1.3% economic growth in the first quarter of 2017.

Nine of the 12 economic activities measured registered growth which was driven by financial and insurance services (6.1%), and the public administration and defence sector (5.95%). Wholesale and retail trade grew by 3.9% year-on-year. However, the president of the national business association (Andi), Bruce Mac Master, said it was concerning that the three sectors that should be leading the way all contracted: construction (-8,2 %), mining (-3,6 %), and manufacturing (-1,2 %). Agriculture, meanwhile, grew by just 1.6%. These are the sectors that generate most employment.

The finance minister, Mauricio Cárdenas, insisted that the result was “good” but would be “better in the next few quarters”, due in part to more oil investment and royalties, although political uncertainty due to the upcoming general elections could impact growth.

While Brazil is widely seen as a carnivorous society, one of the world’s largest producers and consumers of beef, a surprising new trend is beginning to make itself felt: the growth of vegetarianism.

Writing for website The Brazilian Report, journalist Ciara Long has pointed out that the number of vegetarians and vegans in Brazil is rising. According to a survey in April by polling company Ibope, 30m people, equivalent to 14% of the total population, now describe themselves as either vegetarian of vegan. Per capital meat consumption (whether of poultry, beef, pork, or mutton) appears to have reached something of a plateau. Indicative of growing interest in vegetarianism, a group of four schools in Bahia have committed to reducing meat, egg, and dairy intake by 25% each semester, aiming to get it down to zero in two years’ time.

The ministry of health has expressed interest in the project, called Escola Sustentável (Sustainable School), bearing in mind that over half the total population is now considered to be either obese or overweight. One-third of Brazilian children aged between five and nine years are said to be facing health risks as a result of their weight; research suggests an excessive meat intake may be just as likely to cause obesity as sugar. The vegetarian trend is likely to create significant business opportunities. According to one estimate, plant-based companies are growing by 40% every year. In big urban centres such as São Paulo there are now a range of vegetarian restaurants. Recife will hold its third week-long vegan food festival later this year. The fashion industry is also seeing strong growth in animal-free products ranging from foot wear to make-up.

Source: The Brazilian Report

While the coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic has forced people into their homes and ground many industries to a halt, it does not appear to have impacted the activity of those who drive deforestation in Brazil, as figures point to a 29.9% annual increase in Amazon forest loss for the month of March.

According to the real-time deforestation detection system (Deter) managed by the government’s Instituto Nacional de Pesquisas Espaciais (Inpe), 326.51 km² of Amazon forest were cleared in March this year, compared with 251.3 km² in March last year. In the first three months of 2020, the area of suspected deforestation increased by 51.45% on 2019 to 768.08 km², the highest figure in the last five years.

The anti-conservation discourse of President Jair Bolsonaro’s government coincided with a spike in man-made wildfires linked to deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon last year. There has been little indication that this will change during the rest of Bolsonaro’s administration [WR-20-06], while evidence points to the pandemic providing illegal loggers and land grabbers with an opportunity to increase their activity as already fragile environmental protection efforts are further weakened by measures to contain Covid-19.

Even before the Inpe’s data was reported on 10 April, NGOs, indigenous representatives, and human rights groups had been warning about the threat that Covid-19 represents for Brazil’s indigenous peoples and the land they protect. On 6 April, Amnesty International warned that indigenous peoples’ voluntary self-isolation efforts prevented them from patrolling their land and warding off illegal invaders, while the environmental authorities’ capacity is undermined by general lockdown measures.

Indigenous and Covid-19

On indigenous territories, increased deforestation suggests the illegal presence of non-indigenous people on protected land, exposing Brazil’s indigenous peoples to higher risks of contagion. On 9 April, a Yanomami teenage boy was reported to have died from Covid-19 in the northernmost state of Roraima. Although it is not known how he contracted the disease, he was known to have moved through an area where illegal gold miners were present. On 2 April, the government’s indigenous rights agency (Funai) received R$11m to support efforts to fight the coronavirus in Brazil’s indigenous communities, but on 14 April national daily O Estado de São Paulo revealed that none of those funds had been spent, prompting federal prosecutors to launch an investigation.

Deforestation in the Amazon biome decreased by 33.6% in the first half of 2023 compared with the same period in 2022, according to data from Brazil’s national space research institute (Inpe) released on 6 July. The figures were welcomed by President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s left-of-centre government as a victory for its environmental protection efforts. This progress, however, may be threatened by the government’s continued commitment to boost agriculture exports, which potentially undermines Lula’s green goals, given the huge amount of deforestation associated with the expansion of agribusiness activity.

Protecting sensitive biomes such as the Amazon was one of Lula’s key election pledges during the 2022 presidential race. Even before taking office in January, Lula attended the United Nations (UN) climate change conference (COP27) in November and declared his aim for “zero deforestation” in the Amazon rainforest by 2030. Lula’s green credentials are backed by his previous experience in office, as Brazil’s deforestation rate in the Amazon decreased by around 70% during his first two terms (2003-2011). The annual deforested area in the Amazon dropped from 21,600km² in 2002 down to 6,400km² by the time Lula left office in 2011. This is in stark contrast to the environmental record of Lula’s right-wing predecessor Jair Bolsonaro (2019-2023), as Inpe’s satellite monitoring systems detected a 73% rise in Amazon deforestation between 2019-2021.

Despite encouraging numbers in the Amazon, Inpe’s data showed worrying signs in other sensitive biomes, such as the Cerrado. The vast tropical woodland-savannahs of the Cerrado cover over a fifth of Brazil’s total land area and span 13 of the country’s 27 states, including Maranhão and Bahia in the Northeast, Mato Grosso and Goiás in the Centre-West, and Minas Gerais and São Paulo in the Southeast. Inpe noted a 21% year-on-year rise in Cerrado deforestation in the first half of 2023, with Bahia registering the highest yearly increase (28%), with 1,247km² of deforested land.

A major cause of deforestation in the Cerrado has been the practice of slash-and-burn. Farmers have been known to use this method to clear land for their cattle or crops. Inpe detected 4,472 forest fires in the Cerrado in June, marking a 5.4% increase from a year earlier and the highest number of fires registered for the month of June since 2010. More than half of the Cerrado’s forest fires in June this year (2,447 fires) were detected in the agricultural powerhouse of Mato Grosso state.

President Lula announced a package of environmental protection measures on World Environment Day (5 June), including an expansion of some protected conservation areas in Amazonian states, as well as the revival of the ‘Bolsa Verde’ fund. This conditional cash transfer programme for rural populations in the Amazon, first launched during the presidency of Dilma Rousseff (2011-2016), aimed to alleviate poverty and reskill communities towards environmentally sustainable jobs and sectors. The following day Lula travelled to the municipality of Luís Eduardo Magalhães in Bahia to attend one of Brazil’s largest agribusiness fairs, the Bahia Farm Show. At the event, Lula urged agricultural producers to prioritise sustainability and warned that “anyone who wants to act like a criminal and go cutting down trees will have to suffer legal punishments”.

But Lula’s tone towards agribusiness groups at the Bahia Farm Show was not entirely confrontational. He also said that “Brazil needs agriculture and industry” and that the government must support agribusiness to “finance the machines, finance the harvest, to guarantee exports.” The president went on to promote his government’s agriculture funding programme, Plano Safra 2023/24, initially announced on 27 June, which will provide R$364.22bn (US$75.63bn) in loans and subsidies for agribusiness companies.

The governor of Bahia, Jerônimo Rodrigues, hosted President Lula again on 3 July in the municipality of Ilhéus to attend the launch event of the first section of the Oeste-Leste railway (Fiol). When completed, Fiol will connect the Ilhéus port to Caetité and then to Barreiras, both municipalities in Bahia state. The final stretch would connect Barreiras to Figueirópolis, a municipality in neighbouring Tocantins, another state in the Cerrado biome with an economy predominantly driven by agro-industry and which saw a 17% yearly rise in deforestation in the first half of 2023.

The Lula government has similarly backed the construction of the Ferrogrão railway, a stalled infrastructure project originally proposed during the Rousseff administration and then suspended by the supreme court (STF) in 2017. If completed, Ferrogrão would tear through 993km of Cerrado woodlands and Amazonian rainforest, allowing freight trains to deliver Mato Grosso’s agricultural products to Itaituba, a municipality in Pará state which sits on the Tapajós River, a major tributary of the Amazon River. The railway was blocked because it would have infringed upon protected conservation areas, such as the Jamanxim National Forest in Pará. Speaking on national radio Band News on 16 July, Lula’s agriculture minister Carlos Fávaro expressed optimism that congress could table the necessary legislation to reduce the size of the Jamanxim protected area standing in the way of Ferrogrão’s licence.

Environmental impasse over EU trade deal

President Lula attended a summit on 17-18 July between European and Latin American leaders, where he repeated his criticisms of the additional environmental protocols requested by the European Union (EU) to be added to the free trade deal between the EU and the Southern Common Market (Mercosur). Lula has made environmental protection and the ratification of the EU-Mercosur deal a priority for this government. But, at the summit, he continued to accuse the EU of using environmentalism as veil for protectionism – reportedly fearing competition from South American agribusiness which would enter the European market if the deal were to come into force.

Brazil’s hub for climate diplomacy  

Belém, the capital of the northern Amazonian state of Pará, will be the venue for two climate diplomacy events during President Lula’s current term – the leaders’ summit of the Amazon Cooperation Treaty Organisation (OTCA) on 8-9 August this year and the United Nations climate change conference (COP30) in November 2025. On 8 July Lula travelled to Colombia, another OTCA member state, to discuss preparations for the summit of Amazonian nations, where he boasted that COP30 would be an opportunity “for the world to see the real Amazonia”, setting up the OTCA summit between eight South American nations as a small-scale rehearsal for the world’s largest climate diplomacy forum.

Rise of ‘narco-deforestation’

The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) released the 2023 edition of its annual World Drug Report on 26 June, which included a special chapter on environmental crimes in the Amazon Basin. UNODC noted a phenomenon known as ‘narco-deforestation’, which has been on the rise in recent years.

Not only in Brazil but also in neighbouring Amazonian nations, such as Colombia, Peru and Bolivia, UNODC found growing evidence of drug-trafficking organisations (DTOs) reinvesting their proceeds from the drug trade into legal and illegal land acquisition and forest clearances for farming activities and other extractive industries. DTOs not only ‘tax’ the miners, cattle ranchers, poachers, or fishing groups under a type of protection racket, but also use small local businesses as front companies to launder money across the thin boundaries separating the formal and illicit economies in the Amazon regions.

The largest DTOs in Brazil, such as Comando Vermelho (CV) and Primeiro Comando da Capital (PCC), have long had business links with logging groups and have been known to smuggle drugs in the hulls of boats shipping timber abroad. Between 2017 and 2021 Brazilian federal police carried out 16 major seizures of cocaine concealed in timber shipments. DTOs also share logistics networks and transport infrastructure with illegal mining groups, who often operate their own aircraft and landing strips. The UNODC report estimated that 58% of the 2,986 private airstrips in the Brazilian Amazon were not registered on official records.

The areas near the borders between the Amazonian nations are often under-policed, allowing Brazilian, Colombian, and Peruvian DTOs to collaborate as well as compete over local extractive industries. But competition between rival groups, such as the PCC and CV, has often turned deadly. UNODC observed a correlation between the rates of deforestation and violent crime, as the criminal groups vying for control of trafficking routes as well as the extractive industries tied to ‘narco-deforestation’ have caused a rise in homicides in Brazil’s northern region, where the murder rate in 2019 was 260% higher compared to 1980.

As a third round of negotiations between the Venezuelan government and opposition began on 14 October, calls from the US for patience regarding the holding of elections met a mixed response. Following an explanation from US Secretary of State Marco Rubio that democratisation will be a slow but thorough process, one of the leading opposition figures in the national assembly, Henrique Capriles Radonski, said he believes President Delcy Rodríguez intends to remain in power until 2030, when elections are next due.

Speaking after a meeting in Washington on 8 October with the opposition’s chief negotiator, Dinorah Figuera, Rubio argued that there would be little point rushing into elections without first strengthening Venezuela’s institutions. Failure to do so, he suggested, would jeopardise the long-term health of a nascent democracy. He said that “a peaceful transition to a permanent and enduring democracy will require a lot of hard work, a little bit of patience, free and fair elections, but more than just free and fair elections, the institutions that don’t just sustain democracy, but sustain stability and progress and prosperity”.

This will be a theme of the current round of dialogue with the opposition, which Figuera has said will focus on “political and civil guarantees”. There is some cause for cautious optimism; the previous two rounds of talks have resulted in a notable, albeit incomplete, lifting of censorship, and have kickstarted a legislative process of reforming the supreme court, although this reform will be steered by the ruling Partido Socialista Unido de Venezuela (PSUV) whose interests have long been served by the justice system.

If the dialogue process is sustained in the medium-term, while being overseen closely by the US, then the possibility exists for a steady increase in the credibility of Venezuelan institutions. Thornier issues lie ahead though, particularly opposition demands for an overhaul of the security forces, which may encounter resistance.

Key parties within the opposition now seem to have come around to the idea of a wait before elections are held. Primero Justicia (PJ) said on 9 October that, while a vote should be held “as soon as possible”, this would be the “culmination” of a process that includes the “reconstruction of the country’s democratic institutions, including the armed forces and the justice system, through the rule of law, the independence of public powers, and institutional guarantees”. Another party, Voluntad Popular (VP), echoed Rubio’s argument, saying that “Venezuela does not need merely to hold elections: it needs to build a democratic republic that can sustain itself and respond to its people”.

There is a suspicion, however, voiced on 14 October by Capriles, that the government will try to drag out this process for as long as possible. Noting Rodríguez’s visit to Rome this week, where she addressed the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) and announced a goal of “zero hunger by 2030”, Capriles responded with the rhetorical question, “What does she have to do with 2030?”. He added that remaining in office four years from now is her “aspiration”, asserting that “those who are in power are looking for any way … to keep stringing this along”.

Certainly, Rodríguez shows no inclination to convene elections in the near future and 2030 would be a logical endpoint, allowing her to serve out the term secured by her predecessor, Nicolás Maduro (2013-2026), in the disputed 2024 election. The need to keep the Venezuelan government on board with its democratisation plan was likely a factor in the US decision on 14 October to lift sanctions on Rodríguez’s brother, national assembly president Jorge Rodríguez, who is the government’s chief negotiator in the opposition talks.

Economic plan

Venezuela’s deputy economy minister, Calixto Ortega, addressed the annual meeting of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) in Bangkok on 14 October and reportedly set out an economic plan revolving around oil and mining, which he said would finance a broader economic recovery. Ortega also argued against a formal dollarisation of Venezuela’s economy, arguing that the bolívar should instead be strengthened. He said that renegotiating the country’s huge debt pile is a priority and that the government would take the first steps on this “very soon”, but added that the process had been delayed by the June earthquakes.