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Development: On 17 March, César San Martí­n, president of the Peruvian supreme court confirmed that two warrants had been issued by the executive to indict imprisoned former president Alberto Fujimori (1990-2000) on several new counts.

Significance: According Alberto's daughter and current presidential candidate, Keiko Fujimori, this development proved that there was no alliance between Garcí­a's Partido Aprista Peruano and her party, Fuerza 2011.   Keiko had previously said that any decision on her father's early release - mooted by Garcí­a - “would have to be a judicial decision". But new charges and a possible extension of his sentence was probably not what she had in mind.  

Key points:

Under the terms of Peru's 1937 extradition treaty with Chile, any further charges brought against an individual extradited from Chile, as Alberto Fujimori was, must be approved by Rosa Marí­a Maggi, a Chilean supreme court judge. The crimes to be investigated in Chile are embezzlement, crimes against the state, and fraud. The former president is currently serving a 25 year sentence on one count of human rights abuses, relating to extrajudicial killings, and three of corruption.
 
The warrants, instigated by the supreme court back in January and signed by Alan Garcí­a soon after, were published by the Chilean supreme court on Wednesday (16 March). With just over three weeks to go till the general election, the timing of this could hamper Keiko Fujimori's presidential hopes: she is currently polling second place with 18-19%.

On 3 March President Garcí­a had floated the idea of Fujimori's early release on humanitarian grounds, saying that he felt the Peruvian public should decide. If Chile agrees that Alberto has a case to answer on these new changes it could put a spanner in the works for any future president planning on procuring an early release in exchange for political support from Keiko's 'Fujimorista' congressional faction.

Development: On 6 May a majority of Ecuadoreans either voted against, voted blank or spoilt their ballot papers in the government's 10-point constitutional reform referendum, according to partial results from the official Consejo Nacional Electoral (CNE).

Significance: The result, which is still not final as less than 40% of the votes have been counted, means that President Rafael Correa can no longer rely on elections and referendums to defeat his opponents. Formally, a narrow majority of voters (excluding blanks and spoilt votes) approved the proposed reforms but by a much smaller margin than the government expected. Correa's opponents clearly hope that this setback will tempt him to govern in a more authoritarian way.

Key points:

The election looks clean because the official CNE results published so far contradict an exit poll from the government's favourite pollster, Santiago Pérez, which claimed that the government's “Yes" campaign had won 60:40. The final result is likely to be much closer: although the CNE figures show the government winning on all 10 questions, its victory is hollow because at 4.40am local time today (10.40am BST), if blanks and spoilt ballots are taken into account, a clear majority had not voted “Yes".

The government was clearly defeated in several provinces on all 10 questions (notably the opposition heartland of Napo which is one of the few provinces where all the results are in). Even in Pichincha, which surrounds Quito, where less than 30% of the votes have been counted, the government is losing on Question Four, which would give it the authority to appoint (or sack) all judges for the next 18 months. The government is also losing on Question Seven which asked voters to approve the banning of commercial gambling.

The government initially hailed its victory, following the exit poll, but as the full story unfolded yesterday (8 May), its reaction became more aggressive. Leading government figures said that they expected the opposition in congress, where Correa's majority is flimsy, to try to boycott congress. The government warned that if the opposition followed this strategy, it would use its powers to expel opposition members from congress.Â

Correa's opponents claim that the result of the wide ranging referendum will give the government huge, unquestioned powers to reform the judicial system and curb criticism in the media. The complicated 10-question consultation covered issues ranging from judicial reform to the definition of what constitutes an economic crime and whether bull-fighting and commercial gambling should be banned.

Pointer: It is easy to argue that Correa and the government are the consultation's losers. However, the winners are harder to find. Although the mayor of Guayaquil, Jaime Nebot, the standard bearer for the traditional opposition, claimed that his city rejected five of the government's proposals, at the provincial level, according to the CNE's still partial count, Guayas voted in favour of the government. If this proves to be the case, Nebot's threat to Correa's power will remain muted. A bigger winner from the consultation appears to be former president Lucio Gutiérrez (2003-2005), whom Correa defeated in the last (2009) presidential election. The provinces which supported Gutiérrez then, voted against Correa in yesterday's referendum.

AsiaInt Political and Strategic Review, April 2005

Click here for full text:
http://www.asiaint.com/arl/arl5849.asp - 1,114 words

One of China's key strategic priorities over the last 15 years, since the US demonstrated the breadth of its military capabilities on the battlefields of Iraq for the first time, has been to modernise its armed forces to close the gap with the world's most advanced military. Its ability to do so has been constrained by several factors, not least ongoing reforms which have prioritized market-driven, consumer-led economic growth and tighter constraints on public spending. But the most obvious constraint has been a lack of access to advanced military technology_

COLOMBIA:Bush visit 

CHILE: Apec fiasco

DOMINICAN REPUBLIC: Zoellick recommends dropping DR from Cafta

ELECTIONS: Bush wins New Mexico

IMMIGRATION: Surge in immigration

IMMIGRATION: Mexico gets a deal

COLOMBIA
US President George W Bush stopped off in Cartagena on 22 November for a meeting with his Colombian counterpart, Alvaro Uribe. Bush was on his way back from the two-day Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (Apec) summit in Santiago where he caused a stir after hauling his security guard out of a melee with Chilean security officers, who blocked the agent from accompanying Bush to the closing dinner of the Apec forum. Bush's visit to Colombia was purely symbolic. He stayed for just four hours during which time he repeated that the US would maintain its support for Uribe's democratic security policy during Bush's second term in the White House. 'My nation will continue to help Colombia prevail in this vital struggle,' Bush told a news conference. He also said that he would back Uribe's crackdown on terrorism and the illegal drugs industry even after Plan Colombia expires at the end of 2005. 'Next year I will ask our Congress to renew its support so that this courageous nation can win its war against narcoterrorists,' Bush said, before praising the progress Uribe had made since coming to power in August 2002. Bush also took home the extradition order for Gilberto Rodrí­guez Orejuela and his brother Miguel Rodrí­guez Orejuela, the former leaders of the Cali Cartel. 

CHILE
The president of Chile, Ricardo Lagos, cancelled a state ceremony for his US counterpart George W Bush and some 200 Chilean dignitaries on 21 November after the US president's insisted that the guests go through a metal detector. It was a shambolic end to Bush's visit to Chile, where he was attending the Apec summit. Chilean diplomatic sources revealed that Lagos cancelled the state ceremony because he deemed it an insult that top Chilean officials should have to be subjected to a rigorous security check. Instead, he called an impromptu 'working dinner', which was attended by Bush, Lagos and ten others in the presidential palace, La Moneda.

DOMINICAN REPUBLIC
Robert Zoellick, the US trade representative, has asked his staff members to forward to Central American governments a text of the free trade agreement (Cafta) that excludes the Dominican Republic. Zoellick sent a letter to the Senate Finance Committee chairman, Charles Grassley, explaining that the decision by the Dominican Republic to impose a 25% tax on beverages containing high fructose corn syrup was incompatible with its commitments under Cafta. The Dominican Republic was appended to Cafta in August. Zoellick also asked the US International Trade Commission to assess the likely impact of Cafta on the US economy.

ELECTIONS
The final result of the presidential election on 2 November was declared on 23 November. President George W. Bush won the state of New Mexico by 376,930 to 370,942. This was a change from 2000, when the Democratic Party's candidate, Al Gore, won New Mexico by 366 votes. The result is a blow for the ambitious Hispanic governor of New Mexico, Bill Richardson, who had led John Kerry's campaign for the Hispanic vote. 

IMMIGRATION
The Center for Immigration Studies, a US NGO, reported that immigrant numbers in the US hit 34m in March this year. This was 4m up on the figure for March 2000. The range of immigrants' nationalities is narrowing: in 1980, 16% of immigrants came from Mexico. By March 2004, 31% did. Between 2000 and 2004, the gross inflow of immigrants was 6.1m but the net inflow came down to 4.3m thanks to people returning home or dying. The Center reckons that there at 10m illegal immigrants in the US. The US Census Bureau reckons that there are 9m. The Center for Immigration Studies is in favour of fewer immigrants but providing them with more of a welcome in the US. 

IMMIGRATION
Mexico's foreign minister, Luis Ernesto Derbez, seized on statements from President George W Bush at the Apec summit in Santiago on 20 and 21 November to assert that Mexico would have a deal to improve the rights of illegal immigrants in US within a year. The US deal on offer seems to be the three year renewable work visas, offered by President Bush earlier this year. The Mexicans recognise that there may be problems getting any deal on rights for undocumented migrants through the US congress. President Bush is next due to meet President Vicente Fox in Washington in February 2005.

Haiti: On 19 April Army Lt. Gen. Ken Keen, the former top American commander in Haiti, said that the US military role in Haiti which followed the devastating 12 January earthquake, would further decrease by 1 June. Keen said that the military drawdown, which will see the 2,200-strong US force on the ground cut to about 500, was prompted by the expanding role of civilian agencies. He was clear however that some US assistance would continue beyond 1 June, with 500 US reserve forces moving in to conduct more normal types of military exchanges with Haiti, including training for medical personnel, building schools and clinics, and helping Haiti establish an emergency operations centre. Keen said that the current security situation in Port-Au-Prince “remains calm" and that while there have “been isolated incidents of violence, if you will, it has not been to the degree that it has impacted at all on our ability to provide humanitarian assistance". At the height of the US military effort, some 22,000 forces were located in or around Haiti, including 7,000 land-based troops, with the remainder operating aboard 58 aircraft and 15 nearby vessels.

Mexico: On 20 April the US ambassador to Mexico, Carlos Pascual, admitted that some US companies were considering pulling out of Mexico because of the violence. He argued that it was still profitable to invest in Monterrey, though he admitted that costs of doing business in Mexico are rising because of the violence. He also announced that the US was ready to extend its training programmes, which the US already provided for 5,500 federal policemen, elite army and marine units, to include state and municipal police forces in Mexico, and, once Mexico has a single national police force, for those officers as well. Pascual also said that the US had provided training for judges and prosecutors in eight Mexican states where legislation allowed for such training. The point of this training was to ensure that gang members did not escape prosecution. Across Mexico, comparatively few of the people arrested on serious charges are actually prosecuted and convicted.

Mexico:  On 15 April, Mexico's army and navy commanders attended the first ever summit of the high commands of Mexico, the US and Colombia to discuss anti-drugs policies. Mexico's defence minister is a serving general, Guillermo Galván, and its navy minister is a full admiral, Mariano Francisco Saynez Mendoza. The host for the meeting was the chairman of the US joint chiefs, Admiral Mike Mullen. The Colombians fielded General Freddy Padilla de León.  The US also fielded Dan Restrepo, the director for the Western Hemisphere at the National Security Council. This meeting came a day after the US announced that it had suspended aid to the Colombian intelligence service, the DAS.Mullen, in a statement, said that each of the attendees had to learn from the others' experiences.

Region: On 19 April the Arizona senate approved a draft law that will, effectively, allow state police officers to arrest illegal migrants. The bill, which now awaits the signature of the state governor, Jan Brewer, a Republican, before becoming law, was heavily criticised by the Cardinal Archbishop of Los Angeles, Roger Mahony, who likened it to “German Nazi and Russian communist techniques." The LA archdiocese is almost 70% Latino. The Arizona law will be by far the toughest measure taken by any US state to curb illegal immigration. Around 18% of Arizona's registered voters are Latinos.  The bill allows police officers to stop people and demand evidence that they are legal migrants. If those stopped cannot produce the evidence, they can be arrested. Previously, the police could only ask people about their immigration status after an offence had been committed. The draft law, however, could have been even tougher: an earlier version had a provision that would have mandated all state agencies to report suspected illegal migrants to federal agencies. Crucially, however, the new bill makes it an offence for an employer to hire day-labourers without checking their immigrations status. It is also a criminal offence to transport an illegal migrant.  Separately but also on 19 April, Arizona's two sitting senators, McCain and John Kyl, called on the state government to send 3,000 National Guardsmen to the border immediately and deploy an extra 3,000 Border Patrol agents on the Arizona-Mexico border by 2015.

The Week Ahead

FRIDAY

Bolivia: President Evo Morales will continue talks with the country's nine prefects over a solution to the current political crisis.

SATURDAY

Ecuador: Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa will lead a rally in Guayaquil city to celebrate one year in government.

Peru: Peruvian President Alan Garcí­a will begin a three day official visit to Spain to meet King Juan Carlos I and Prime Minister Rodrí­guez Zapatero.

SUNDAY

Cuba: Legislative "elections" will take place.

MONDAY

Paraguay: The Colorado Party will announce the results of its primary.

THURSDAY

Colombia: US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will visit the city of Medellí­n.

Spillover from the Colombian conflict into Ecuador is becoming increasingly manifest. The Ecuadorean military, spurred into heightened surveillance activity by the recent discovery of Farc guerrilla camps inside Ecuador, have discovered in Sucumbí­os, in late July, four more suspect encampments and engaged an unidentified armed group in a brief gunbattle. Elsewhere in the provinces bordering on Colombia they have discovered and destroyed several coca plantations.

In early July army patrols combing the north-western border province of Esmeraldas as part of the border protection plan came upon a field planted with 3,000 coca bushes close to the border and several dispersed coca plantations covering 4 hectares in the Pampa de Oro sector. They also seized 40 kilos of cocaine in the La Tolita sector.

On 21 July the military launched a sweep codenamed Limpieza II ('Cleanup II'), deploying 1,200 soldiers in the sectors of Sofí­a and Santa Rosa de los Cofanes, in the northern border province of Sucumbí­os.

While nothing was found in the Sofí­a sector, in that of Santa Rosa de los Cofanes the army found four camps described as possible bases of illegal Colombian armed groups. In one of them the soldiers seized grenades and drums of chemicals used in the processing of coca base.

On 27 July an army patrol came under fire, in the Ají­ river sector, from what the defence ministry described as a 'subversive group'. In the subsequent exchange of gunfire one of the attackers was killed. He was found to be wearing civilian clothes, and carried no identity documents.

In an unrelated army operation in the eastern province of Pastaza, the army seized 55 kilos of plastic explosive — apparently originating in the stocks of an oil company — in the provincial capital, Puyo. In connection with this five members of the autonomous Kichwa community of Sarayacu were arrested. This community has a long history of conflict with the oil companies operating in the province.

The imprisoned leader of the left-wing guerrilla group Sendero Luminoso, Abimael Guzmán, faces a retrial on 5 November. The trial comes twelve years after he was convicted of orchestrating a systematic rebellion to undermine the state and overthrow the government. Guzmán was convicted in 1992 by a hooded military tribunal. Nobody seriously expects a different verdict.

The retrial of Guzmán has been on the cards since January 2003 when the constitutional court ruled that sentences for terrorism offences handed down by military courts during the term of now-fugitive former president Alberto Fujimori were unconstitutional. The government of President Alejandro Toledo was left with little option: it could scarcely be seen to be challenging the Inter-American Court of Human Rights after having returned Peru to its jurisdiction.

In addition to Guzmán, 17 other top leaders of Sendero Luminoso will face retrial, including Guzmán's lover, Elena Iparraguirre, and Oscar Ramí­rez. It is worth underlining that there is no great sympathy in Peru for the plight of the imprisoned members of Sendero Luminoso and the Movimiento Revolucionario Tupac Amaru, however questionable the manner in which they were tried and convicted. The retrials are expected to last some six months.

PEOPLE PROFILE is published every Tuesday and describes the professional background of key people emerging in the political and economic scenario.

Who Is Luis D'Elí­a? He is Argentina's main piquetero leader. The piqueteros are unemployed people who in 1996 began a form of protest known as "piquetes", which consisted of blocking streets in protest at a lack of employment opportunities, low salaries, and a lack of assistance for the unemployed. The piqueteros have also called on the government to stop criminalising their movement and to cut the nation's links to the IMF. D'Elí­a is head of the organisation Federación Tierra y Vivienda (FTV).

Why watch him? He is a moderate leader, who enjoys considerable support from the piqueteros. Now, thanks to a deal struck with President Néstor Kirchner when he came to power, the FTV is trying to create unemployment cooperatives so that piqueteros can receive thousands of pesos in subsidies that the government hands out each month in exchange for carrying out community work. D'Elí­a is opposed to two other piquetero organisations, led by trotskyite firebrands. The Piquetero movement has planned a mass protest for 20 December.

Born: 21 January 1957  
Place of birth: Buenos Aires, Argentina  
Education: He is a primary school teacher  
Public life: He became known in early 2000 when he led thousands of unemployed people to block major transport arteries in Buenos Aires to protest against poverty and marginalisation. He was a councillor of the party FREPASO, that formed the alliance that brought former President Fernando de La Rúa to power. He is responsible for the Asociación Civil Fuerza de los Trabajadores por la Tierra. He is married to Alicia Sánchez and his five children.

Timeline:  
1980-1995: Trade union activist in the Sindicato Unificado de los Trabajadores de la Educación de la Provincia de Buenos Aires.  
1983-1990: He was an active member of the Democracia Cristiana party.  
1990: Joins the Partido Justicialista, (currently in power under Néstor Kirchner) as a regional coordinator in Gran Buenos Aires.  
1999: Joins the list of councillors for La Matanza.  
2000: Heads the first piquetero movements in Buenos Aires and, following the example set by protesting oil workers in the provinces of Neuquén and Salta, starts to erect roadblocks.  
2001: Active participant in the piquetes and marches that lead to the ouster of President De La Rúa on 20 December.  
2002: Gains notoriety for leading hundreds of piquetes in the streets of Buenos Aires.  
2003: Courted by President Néstor Kirchner as a moderate leader, in the complex map of piquetero groups and subgroups, some of them extremely radical and unwilling to negotiate with the government.

Strong points: He is the only piquetero leader that has the support of Argentina's middle class. On the basis of this support and his negotiating skills, he oversees 50% of the subsidies that the government hands out to the piqueteros (under the official `heads of household' subsidy programme, the government hands out Arg$150 (about US$52) a month to each of 2m households. The funds are allocated by local piquetero bosses, who have each built up their own clientele).

Weak points: Although he has widespread support among piqueteros, he is in danger of getting too close to President Néstor Kirchner and suffering the inevitable repercussions. If the piquetero movement becomes more radical, D'Elí­a could be seen as a "traitor" within his own organisation.

Prospects: The Kirchner government has come under heavy pressure from the middle class to end the disruption caused by the piqueteros once and for all. D'Elí­a will play a central role in the resolution of the conflict between hardline and moderate piqueteros and the government.

People Profile: Laura Chinchilla Miranda, Costa Rica

Who is she? On 7 June Laura Chinchilla won the ruling Partido Liberación Nacional (PLN)'s primary election to become its candidate for the 2010 presidential election.

Why watch her? She is the first candidate from a major traditional party to run for the presidency in Costa Rica and is well positioned to win, potentially becoming the country's first female head of state.

Born: 28 March 1959, Costa Rica

Education:

1981: BA in Political Science, University of Costa Rica, San José.

1989: MA in Public Policy, Georgetown University, Washington DC, USA.

Public life: Chinchilla has built a career around her interest in judicial and public security reform. Since 1990 she has worked as an academic and a consultant specialising in judicial reform and public security reform (particularly police reform), for various international organisations in Latin America and Africa, including USAID, the UN Development Programme (UNDP) and the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB).

She is involved in several international and regional initiatives to promote judicial reform, reform in citizen security, policing and human rights, including programmes run by the Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA), the Arias Foundation for Peace and Human Progress and the Central American Foundation for Peace and Democracy (Funpadem).

Chinchilla first served as vice minister and later minister for public order in the period 1994-1998, under the administration of José Marí­a Figueres. In parliament her listed areas of interest are: judicial reform; public security (policing, drugs trafficking, organised crime); political and institutional reform (state reform and electoral reform); external trade; technology; and, children and youth.

Time Line:

1989-1990: Ministry of Planning and Political Economy (MIDEPLAN) - consultant and technician on state reform and structural adjustment programmes.

1994-1996: Vice minister for public security and governance, National Drugs Council (CONADRO), ruling council member, President of the National Council on Migration.

1996-1998: Minister for public security and governance, Centro de Inteligencia Conjunto Antidrogas (CICAD), president of the directors' council.

2002-2006: Congress member in the legislative assembly, President of the Special Commission on Drug Trafficking, Member of the Commission on Judicial Affairs, Member of the Commission on International Affairs.

2006-2008: First vice- president, Minister for Justice. In April 2008, Chinchilla also served as interim Security Minister after the previous minister, Fernando Berrocal, was dismissed following his controversial (and unsubstantiated) allegations that the opposition in Costa Rica had links with a Colombian guerrilla group, the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (Farc).

October 2008: Leaves the cabinet in order to run for the PLN nomination.

June 2009: Wins PLN nomination with 54% of the vote, against her nearest rival, Johnny Araya, the popular former mayor of San José, on 43%, with Fernando Berrocal, a former defence minister, on 3%.

Strengths: Chinchilla is an experienced administrator, her democratic credentials are impeccable and she is very popular, consistently rated among the top three favourite politicians in the country (along with Arias and Araya).

Her core competencies of judicial reform and public security should appeal to Costa Rican voters, who are increasingly concerned about rising levels of violent crime and insecurity in the country. As a female candidate, she will also play well with voters anxious for change.

Chinchilla has the full backing of President Arias, and his support should help secure her position as the leading candidate for 2010. On 15 April the local daily La República published a poll putting popular support for the Arias government at 53%, while Arias himself had an approval rating of 35%, the highest rating in 28 years for a president in the final year of his term.

The PLN's decision to hold open primaries was also an astute move. An estimated 500,000 turned out to vote (18.5% of the total national electorate of 2.7m), giving Chinchilla's victory added broad-based national strength. In contrast, her main opposition rival for 2010, Otton Solí­s, of the Partido Acción Nacional (PAN), had a much less convincing victory in a closed primary (open to registered party members only) with a poor turnout and a very high abstention rate (71%).

In policy terms, Chinchilla represents broad continuity with the orthodox centrist economic stance of the current government. In the current uncertain environment this should be an advantage. After posting several years of strong, export-led growth, the Costa Rican economy, which is heavily dependent on trade with the US, has tipped into recession, prompting renewed debate in some circles about its export-led development model. Yet despite tough times this year, the electorate broadly trusts the Arias government to steer the country through the economic downturn. In the April poll, 41% of respondents approved of its economic management, against 28% who disapproved.

Against this, Solí­s, on his third presidential bid, is a more divisive character - he led the bitterly polarising PAN campaign against Costa Rica's entry into the regional free-trade agreement with the US (Cafta-DR) and although he came a very close second to Arias in the 2006 presidential election, he may struggle to make the leap from opposition politician to potential future president. The PAN is relatively weak on the policy side, and the fact that it has not managed to inflict much damage at all on the Arias administration in the midst of a difficult economic downturn suggests that voters do not see Solis and the PAN as a credible alternative.

Weaknesses: Chinchilla's close links with the powerful Arias clan could be an electoral disadvantage and certainly Solis will use this against her, portraying her as part of the ruling elite. Polls indicate that crime and public insecurity is the one area where the Arias administration consistently falls down and as a previous justice minister this could be a weak point for Chinchilla's campaign. In the April poll, 30% of respondents expressed a lack of confidence in the police. The PAN will inevitably seek to make this an election issue moving into 2010.

Also, despite being minister of justice, Chinchilla has not spent a lot of time in the public eye and her policy stance on many key economic and external issues (like Cafta, relations with the US, Costa Rica's regional affairs etc) is not well known.

Chinchilla will also need to build bridges with her defeated rival, Araya, who desperately wanted the presidential nomination and for several months led the polls. Araya complained that strong government support for Chinchilla gave her an unfair advantage. Araya represents a competing section of the PLN: the urban working class and more conservative rural populations. Chinchilla, who appeals to the young, educated, professional urbanites (and women) will need to bring these sections onboard - it is unclear whether Araya would accept the number two slate.

Prospects: Chinchilla's status as a clean slate female presidential candidate (albeit not the first in Costa Rica's history), with the clear backing of the popular incumbent Oscar Arias, means that she has a very good shot at becoming the country's first woman leader in 2010.

The Organization of American States (OAS) decided not to adopt an ‘action plan' on public security proposed by El Salvador, but an assembly of donors gathered in Guatemala pledged more than US$1bn in new funding for the subregional security strategy devised by the Sistema de la Integración Centroamericana (Sica) — just as a new study raised questions about the funding the region has already received for this purpose.

As host of the 41st general assembly of the OAS, El Salvador's president Mauricio Funes had hoped to see his ‘action plan' on ‘citizen security' adopted by the regional organisation. That issue, after all, had been the main theme of the meeting, and one speaker after another had emphasised that the time had come for action, not more words. However, all that the assembly produced were more words, and El Salvador's plan was not even mentioned in the final declaration.

El Salvador had produced a terse, two-page document. It was reviewed by the OAS body named, in all seriousness, the Multidimensional Security Secretariat, which added another 15 pages of summarised reference to OAS resolutions and declarations that covered the same ground. As consolation prize, the OAS signed an agreement with El Salvador to provide technical support to ‘follow up the execution of [El Salvador's own] policy of public security and justice'. Canada offered to fund this.

Guatemala was more fortunate later in the month (22-23 June) when it hosted the Conferencia de Seguridad de Centroamérica, attended by all Central American leaders, plus presidents Felipe Calderón of Mexico, Juan Manuel Santos of Colombia, Leonel Fernández of the Dominican Republic, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, representatives of international financial institutions and delegations from 55 countries. The purpose of the meeting was to present Sica's Estrategia de Seguridad de Centroamérica (Central American Security Strategy) and secure funding pledges of at least US$900m.

The strategy has been summarised for public consumption as containing 14 priorities embodied in 22 regional projects, which cover a wide range of topics. The priorities are hard to discern in the wide-ranging 23-page document which, to put it mildly, is not a model of clarity (it can be found at www.sica.int/csc, from where one must navigate to Centro de Documentación).

The outcome exceeded expectations. The hosts announced that funding pledges of ‘up to US$2bn' had been received, of which 80% as soft loans and the remainder as grants and technical assistance, The actual amount, after discounting commitments made before the Guatemala meeting, was US$1.08bn, of which US$1bn from the World Bank [see the table below]. The higher, hyped-up total includes US$500m promised earlier by the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) and US$260m pledged earlier by the US.

Just before the Guatemala meeting, the Washington Office on Latin America (Wola, an NGO) and the IDB produced a survey of funding commitments for Central American security projects made from the beginning of 2009 to June 2011. The commitments totalled US$1.7bn, of which US$1.3bn was accounted for by projects being implemented [see table below].

Adriana Beltrán, Wola's senior associate for citizen security and co-coordinator of the new study: ‘For many years, Central American governments talked about the "iron fist" instead of seriously developing a comprehensive strategy to address the problems of crime and violence. Meanwhile donors have been developing a huge range of projects and committing major funding to those projects. This study suggests that it's time to do some thoughtful evaluation, coordination, and future-oriented planning in relation to the funds already committed before donors commit more funds.'

Funding for Central American Security Strategy
Conferencia de Seguridad de Centroamérica, Guatemala 22-23 June

Donors	US$m	Disbursement timeframe
Grants & technical assistance
US	401	Next 3 years
Australia	25	n.a.
Spain	112	Next 2 years
Canada	5	n.a.
Soft loans
World Bank	1,000	Next 3 years
Inter-American Development Bank	5003	Next 2 years
Total	1,0814

1Added to US$260m already pledged for 2008-11. 2Added to US$200m already pledged for 2008-14. 3Pledged before the Guatemala meeting. 4Pledged at the Guatemala meeting.

Sources: Official announcements.

What Central America had previously been offered
Grants & loans for citizen security in 2009-11*

Funds pledged by donors
Total	US$1.7bn
-Projects being implemented (423)	US$1.3bn
-Projects in design/approval stage (30)	US$375m
Purpose of funds (% of projects being implemented):
-Strengthening of institutions	46%
-Prevention	30%
-Action against organised crime	18%
-Rehabilitation programmes	5%

Source: Wola/IDB, Mapeo de las intervenciones de seguridad ciudadana en Centroamérica financiadas por la cooperación internacional.

Development: On 7 July the Comisión de Verdad y Reconciliación (truth and reconciliation committee, CVR) published its final report on the overthrow of President Manuel Zelaya on 28 June 2009.

Significance: The CVR's report is thorough and pulls very few punches. Crucially, it ruled that there was a coup d'état against Zelaya and that the interim government of Roberto Micheletti was unconstitutional; ‘Latin American Newsletters' made both points at the time. Sensibly, the CVR also calls for the creation of mechanisms in the constitution to allow for the impeachment of presidents: the current constitution provides no mechanism whereby a president who acts unconstitutionally can be replaced. This recommendation opens the way for President Porfirio Lobo to push on with his plans for constitutional reform, probably through referendum and a constituent assembly.

Key points:

• The CVR states that the Organization of American States (OAS), which commissioned the report, had not been helpful in the run-up to the coup by agreeing to support the referendum that Zelaya advocated, which could have changed the constitution to allow him to seek re-election. The CVR ruled that the threat of such an OAS-sanctioned change prompted the coup against Zelaya and undermined the confidence of key elements in Honduras (i.e., congress, the army and the judiciary) in the OAS.

• Zelaya, who refused to give evidence to the CVR, had dismissed the committee's authority before it published its report. Once the report was out, he called for the current government to rescind all the decisions made by the illegal Micheletti government.

• The five person CVR was chaired by Eduardo Stein, a former vice-president of Guatemala. The CVR also ruled that the alleged resignation letter from Zelaya was a fake. The CVR ruled that under the constitution there was no way that a president could be replaced or nominate a replacement, so Micheletti's claim that his assumption of power was "constitutional" was also false.
 
• The coup against Zelaya was not bloodless: 20 people were killed, the CVR states - 12 of them by security forces. On 6 July a report from the Comisionado Nacional de los Derechos Humanos (CNDH) reported that between 2000 and 2010, 39,343 people had been murdered. In 2010 there were 6,239 murders, of which 83% were with firearms.

Development: On 3 May Peru's politicians and commentariat hailed the agreement on the maritime border with Ecuador.

Significance: It is notable, however, that Ollanta Humala, the left-wing nationalist and strongly anti-Chilean candidate for the presidency, refused to comment directly on the agreement. He said that he wanted to discuss the agreement with the foreign minister before stating his views. Peru's line is that the agreement with Ecuador reinforces Peru's case in its maritime border dispute with Chile, which is currently before the International Court of Justice (ICJ) at The Hague. Peru argues that the agreement upholds its contention that the 1952 and 1954 maritime agreements with both Chile and Ecuador did not define the maritime border but only pertained to fishing rights. Peru claims that it has now negotiated a fresh agreement, admittedly based on the 1952 and 1954 fishing accords, but the new one has the force of a treaty and thus overrides those of the 1950s.

Key points:

• Chile dismisses Peru's argument. Hernán Larraín, a prominent senator from the Unión Demócrata Independiente (UDI) - part of the ruling alliance - said that Peru's agreement with Ecuador was a "huge own goal". There are several arguments for this view. The first is that Peru did not negotiate with Ecuador: Peru simply accepted Ecuador's own map of the maritime border. Peru implies that it had been working behind the scenes with Ecuador on the map but Ecuador denies this. If this is so, Peru is effectively accepting that the 1952 and 1954 agreements define the maritime border, which is Chile's contention.

• The second argument against Peru's case is that the maritime border with Ecuador runs along a line of latitude (at a right angle to the coast). This is Chile's view of the angle of its maritime border with Peru. Peru, on the other hand, argues that the maritime border with Chile should continue into the sea at the angle at which the land border between the two countries reaches the coast. As the angle is at about 35 minutes past (on a clock face), Peru would gain a lot more sea than if the border were to run at a right angle (or 45 minutes past).

• The fascinating question is the timing of Peru's announcement of the agreement with Ecuador. The Peruvian government's line is that the agreement means that Ecuador won't be drawn into supporting Chile (its traditional ally) against Peru at the ICJ. Ecuador agrees with this point, but also implies that Peru was misguided in taking its border dispute with Chile to the ICJ.

• The timing is particularly interesting because the second round of Peru's polarising presidential election will take place on 5 June. The second round pitches Humala against Keiko Fujimori, the daughter of the now jailed former president Alberto Fujimori (1990-2000), who went to war with Ecuador in 1995 over a highlands border dispute.  

• Humala, who has toned down his anti-Chilean rhetoric from the levels it reached in his first run at the presidency in 2006, could be tempted into saying something rash, which could cost him the election. Humala is narrowly, but clearly, ahead in the opinion polls. Before the election campaign started, President Alan García made it clear that he did not want to be succeeded by Humala. The Peruvian establishment is alarmed at Humala's left-wing populism, even though Humala says that his political model, now, is former president Lula da Silva of Brazil (2002-2010) and not Hugo Chávez of Venezuela.

Pointer: The next move in the long-running process at the ICJ will be Chile's rebuttal of Peru's response to Chile's initial argument. This is due on 11 July. Then, the ICJ may move to hearing oral arguments. Peru's foreign minister, José Antonio García Belaúnde, does not expect a decision from the ICJ until 2012 or 2013.

The political parties have reacted adversely to the new Zapatista strategy, warning of the threat to the rule of law. One man disagrees: Chiapas governor Pablo Salazar. 

The coordinators of the senate blocs of all three leading political parties - PAN, PRI and PRD - have issued a warning that the new strategy announced by the Zapatista leader, 'Subcomandante Marcos' (WR-03-29), could lead to armed conflict. Only the PRD's Jesús Ortega qualified this by noting that the events in Chiapas were 'an attention call' to congress for dragging its feet on reforming the indigenous rights legislation. 

In the lower chamber, congressmen called for the revival of the legislature's peace commission, Cocopa - while admitting that it did not make much sense when a new congress will be installed within a month. 

Meanwhile, Marcos added to the list of things the Zapatistas intended to do. Apart from their traditional Internet presence, they will launch shortwave broadcasts through their own station, Radio Insurgente (on 5.8 megahertz; if there is government jamming, 'move your dial as you would your hips in a cumbia, and find us'). Worth noting: while the Internet is a 'cool' medium for the affluent, radio is a hot medium that directly addresses the population at large. 

Dissident governor 

The Zapatistas will also set up five juntas de buen gobierno to coordinate the 30 'autonomous' Zapatista municipalities in Chiapas and act as their official links with the outside world. It was this last initiative which allowed Chiapas governor Pablo Salazar to break ranks with the politicians who were ringing alarm bells. He said, 'No community that seeks ways to improve their lives is breaking the law.' This was in flat contradiction with the attitude of the Chiapas bar association, which had said the state and federal authorities should deal with Marcos's announcements as an ultimatum, 'intransigent, inopportune and very hostile [and aimed at] breaking the rule of law.' 

Even the bishop of San Cristóbal de las Casas, Felipe Arizmendi, had bowed to the mood of the political milieu, noting that while the changes announced by the Zapatistas were 'licit', they should be carried out 'within the framework of legality'. 

Salazar, a former PRI senator who served on Cocopa, broke with his party to run for the governorship in 2000 as the candidate of a broad civic front. In his campaign he promised to review state legislation passed by his predecessor, Roberto Albores Guillén, with the purpose of neutralising the San Andrés agreements - the selfsame ones the Zapatistas now intend to implement in their 'autonomous' municipalities.

Electoral authority asserts its independence from domestic and external pressures.

The newly installed national electoral council, CNE, has announced that sometime this week it will rule on the validity of the signatures collected by the opposition to endorse their call for a mandate-revocation referendum. This is not as simple a proposition as it might seem, as there are at least two big issues at stake: whether the signatures collected before the mid-term threshold for a referendum are valid, and whether each and every signature is genuine. As things stand, it seems likely that the CNE will only be able, now, to rule on the first.

If it rules them invalidly collected, the opposition will have to go back out on the streets to collect them all over again. Several legal experts have noted that the law says nothing about when signatures should be collected, just that the right number should be submitted. However, there have been claims that the endorsements submitted had been padded with signatures collected last year for a different purpose: a `consultative' referendum on whether President Hugo Chávez should remain in office. If proven, these could be thrown out.

If the CNE accepts the signatures, it will have to begin the laborious task of verification - mindful of the fact that judicial and police investigations have already been launched into allegations that signatures had been forged, and that databases of opposition-linked banks had been `dumped' into the mass of signatures. On 4 September the CNE showed that it was not going to be pushed around: when a prosecutor turned up with vans to cart away the signatures for verification, he was refused access and told that any verification would have to be conducted without removing anything from CNE premises. The following day, chastened investigators turned up to do their work.

Pressure from two sides
The CNE was left in no doubt that it will be under pressure all the way. President Chávez , into one of his bluster phases, warned that if the CNE granted validity to the signatures collected by the opposition he would appeal to the electoral panel of the supreme court and, if necessary, to the court's constitutional panel. While it is the government's right to do this, Chávez made it sound menacing.

The CNE also received an uninvited visitor: US ambassador Charles Shapiro, ostensibly on a `courtesy call' during which he offered `technical assistance.' As with the police and state prosecutors, he was given short shrift by the electoral authority. CNE president Francisco Carrasquero told the press that he had `expressly' told Shapiro that the council would not accept any `interference'. `It was a clear warning,' said Carrasquero, `that this body is independent and that it will defend the country's sovereignty.'

What the latest polls say
	Datanálisis	Mercanálisis*
Stance	%	%
Anti-Chávez	42.2	53
Neutral	34.7	24
Pro-Chávez	22.6	23
Voting intentions
Oust Chávez	68.6	62
Keep Chávez	31.4	26
*Caracas only.

Outspoken ambassador Adolfo Aguilar Zí­nser of `backyard' notoriety [WR-03-45] did, after all, get his marching orders. Perhaps intending some sort of face-saving exercise, foreign minister Luis Ernesto Derbez announced that Aguilar would cease to be Mexico's ambassador to the UN on 1 January. 

President Vicente Fox provided the official motive: he, and Mexico, had been `offended' by the reference to the country as the `backyard' of the US — deliberately misconstruing Aguilar's words and thus avoiding a more damaging cause for offence: the ambassador's claim that Mexico would continue to be considered the US backyard as long as its stance continued to be submissive.

The ambassador took Fox to task publicly for this. In an open letter in which he announced his immediate resignation, Aguilar said, `You are wrong, Vicente. Your statements are unfair. I am a patriot and it is not I who has offended the Mexicans. It is not I who sees and treats Mexico as a backyard [...] While I was Mexico's representative on the Security Council, it was not anyone's backyard.'

Both opposition parties, the Partido de la Revolución Democrática (PRD) and the Partido Revolucionario Institucional (PRI) have publicly criticised the foreign minister for removing Aguilar from his post. Prominent members of both parties had initially expressed indignation at Aguilar's remarks on the strength of the same misinterpretation adopted by Fox.

GROWTH OUTLOOK I | Farming & mining looking better. The IGAE index, which usually foreshadows GDP calculations and serves as an indicator of short-term trends, shows a 3.9% year-on-year increase in December. This time round, the national statistical institute had already come out with early figures for last-quarter and full-year growth (2% and 1.3%, respectively).

In December the sector showing the highest y-o-y growth was agriculture (8.6%), not habitually a star performer in Mexico. The services expanded by 4.2% and industry by 2.4% overall ( with mining up 4.8%, construction 3.7% and manufacturing only 2.4% — while electricity, gas & water was actually down 2.4%). The good result in farming reflected increased sowings for the spring-summer cycle.

GROWTH OUTLOOK II | Fox & Ceesp issue rival appraisals. President Vicente Fox last week surprised many by saying that the economic growth rate was slowly `approaching 7%' — the rate he had promised during his electoral campaign. This is the way he worked it out: `Economic growth is improving, not as much as we'd like, but roughly as follows: 2002, 1% growth; 2003, 2% growth; 2004, we're reaching 3% growth. So there we go, approaching 7%, little by little.' He also underlined that only a little more than a million Mexicans are unemployed (according to the official methodology), as against 41.5m who are employed.

Ceesp, the think-tank of the umbrella employers' association, produced a tighter review of growth so far under Fox: 2001, -0.3%; 2002, 0.9%; 2003, 1.3%. It also noted, `While it is true that GDP grew faster in the last two years, per-capita GDP, considered one of the main indicators of wealth, showed no improvement.' In real terms, Ceesp reports, per-capita GDP last year was US$1,431, slightly lower than the US$1,436 recorded in 2002.

Right up to two days before the election, President Hipólito Mejí­a seemed on the brink of interfering with the results, threatening to put the electoral authority in charge of all media reporting of the event, so as to prevent the propagation of `false information'. The true situation, he insisted, was that he had moved ahead of his rival Leonel Fernández. Come the day, he did not even wait for the official count before conceding that he had been roundly defeated.

Exit polls rapidly showed Fernández ahead with 54.5% of the vote to Mejí­a's 30.5%. Mejí­a said his own data showed a 54:36 split. Early official results seemed to confirm the trend: Fernández was the clear victor in the first round, with no need for a runoff. This is very much what the polls had been predicting.

The elections went off largely without incident, save one regrettable episode in which three people were killed in Barahona, in the southwest of the country.

The new man
Fernández, 50, spent much of his childhood in the US, but completed his university studies, in law, at the Universidad Autónoma de Santo Domingo (UASD). He would later lecture there and at the Facultad Latinoamericana de Ciencias Sociales (Flacso) - an activity he shared with an early devotion to politics, having become a founding member of the Partido de la Liberación Dominicana (PLD) at the age of 20. (The PLD was created by the late former President Juan Bosch after leaving the now-ruling Partido Revolucionario Dominicano (PRD)).
The President-elect is well-known as an author. He wrote Los Estados Unidos en el Caribe: De la Guerra Frí­a al Plan Reagan (`The United States in the Caribbean: From the Cold War to the Reagan Plan') and Raí­ces de un Poder Usurpado (`Roots of an Usurped Power'). His doctoral thesis, El delito de opinión pública (`The Crime of Public Opinion'), is still a must for students of journalism.

Fernández was first elected President in 1996, thanks to the support given by the late former President Joaquí­n Balaguer, founder of the Partido Reformista Social Cristiano (PRSC). He presided over years of rapid economic growth, when the Dominican Republic was sporting the highest rates in Latin America. His administration, though, was bedevilled by charges of corruption - which his successor, Mejí­a, chose not to pursue.

This time round, Fernández was supported by a breakaway faction of the PRSC led by former Vice-President Jacinto Peynado, and by several small parties: Bloque Institucional Social Demócrata (BIS), Partido de los Trabajadores Dominicanos (PTD), Partido Liberal de la República Dominicana (PLRD), Fuerza Nacional Progresista (FNP), Unión Demócrata Cristiana (UDC) y Alianza por la Democracia (APD). The core PRSC, according to the exit polls, attracted 9% of the vote.

Needless to add, Fernández's main challenge will be pulling the economy out of the trough created by last year's financial crisis.

As Nicaragua destroyed a second batch of SAM-7 missiles the commander of its army, General Javier Carrión, suggested that these could be the last to be disposed of unless two conditions were met: that the US should compensate Nicaragua with military assistance of another kind, and that the rest of Central America should actually embark on the reductions of their defence establishments foreseen in their commitment to a 'reasonable balance of forces' on the isthmus.

The 'compensation' that General Javier Carrión is seeking this week in Washington is basically a US$80m package to acquire two or three interceptor aircraft, coastguard vessels and at least one radar. These, as explained by General César Delgadillo, deputy chief of the army's general staff, are needed to counter the growing presence of drug traffickers along Nicaragua's coast and in its airspace. Delgadillo says there are at least 25 clandestine flights a month, presumably carrying drugs, through Nicaraguan airspace, and at least three fast boats pass through Nicaraguan coastal waters every week.

Carrión has said that in any case Nicaragua wants to keep 'about 10%' of its anti-aircraft missiles. Military sources say that they want to hold on to their stock of IGLA (or SAM-16) missiles, an upgraded version of the SAM-7 which flies higher, farther and faster, homes in on image as well as heat, and has a useful life of up to 40 years if properly maintained. [Worth noting: defence minister José Adán Guerra announced last week that Nicaragua would continue to receive 'non-lethal techno-military assistance' from Russia, which includes help in maintaining the military equipment bought during the years of Sandinista rule.]

Carrión looks unlikely to get what he wants. On 2 August, the day after Carrión flew to Washington, the US ambassador to Nicaragua, Barbara Moore, stated publicly that the US does not have the budget to provide Nicaragua with the US$80m worth of 'antinarcotics' equipment.

Washington's main stated reason for demanding the destruction of the anti-aircraft missiles was that they could be stolen by terrorists. It has also been peddling the line that Central America does not really need conventional armies, and so has endorsed Nicaragua's initiative for a regionwide reduction of military capabilities with the aim of achieving a 'reasonable balance of forces'. This is meant to start happening in September, but there have been few indications that anyone is preparing to move in that direction. One US official ventured that giving Carrión his interceptors and coastguard vessels could easily be construed by his neighbours as creating a 'new imbalance' that would have to be taken into consideration.

Washington waiver
The one thing Nicaragua got from the US last week was a further one-year extension of the waiver that protects it from the legally mandated aid cutoff for countries where US nationals have pending ownership disputes. Washington acknowledged that this last year Nicaragua resolved more claims and paid out more compensation than in any of the seven preceding ones. The cases in question are Sandinista confiscations of property owned by Nicaraguans who obtained US citizenship.

Country	Source	July	August	September	Last 12m	Jan-Dec 2003
Argentina	Indec	0.50	0.3	0.59	6.42	3.70
Bolivia	INE	0.53	0.35	-0.03	4.27	3.94
Brazil	FGV	0.91	0.69	0.33	6.70	12.53
Chile	INE	0.20	0.4	0.1	1.50	1.10
Colombia	Dane	-0.03	0.03	0.3	6.49	6.49
Costa Rica	DGEC	1.30	0.97	0.78	13.78	9.87
Ecuador	Inec	-0.61	0.02	0.24	1.61	6.07
El Salvador	Min.Ec.	0.31	0.2	0.2	4.70	2.50
Guatemala	BCG	0.48	0.29	0.78	8.05	5.85
Honduras	BCH	0.60	0.3	0.1	8.40	8.10
Mexico	Bco.Mx.	0.26	0.62	0.83	5.06	3.98
Nicaragua		0.62	0.23	0.59	9.09	6.48
Paraguay	BCP	0.20	1.5	-1.03	6.70	9.30
Peru	INE	0.19	-0.01	0.02	4.03	2.48
Uruguay	DGEC	1.01	1.2	0.27	9.59	10.19
Venezuela	BCV	1.40	1.3	0.5	20.80	27.10
US	DOL	_	0.1	0.2	2.5	1.60
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