commander
A comprehensive article, by Annie Bird, about the intersection between “development” projects funded by the World Bank, and repression carried out by U.S.-supported regimes - and directly by U.S. military involvement - in Guatemala and Honduras.
- Associated Press: “ GUATEMALA WAR TRIAL PUTS PAST CLOSER TO PRESIDENT”
- Reuters: “WITNESS AT EX-DICTATOR'S TRIAL LINKS GUATEMALAN PRESIDENT TO WAR CRIMES”
A delegation of academics, human rights and labor activists, visited the community of Ahuás in the Department of Gracias a Dios in a region known as La Moskitia. On May 11, 2012 four helicopters conducted an apparent drug interdiction near the town of Ahuas. At least one of the helicopters opened fire on a passenger boat killing two pregnant women, a 14-year-old boy and a 21-year-old man, while seriously injuring at least four more. The purpose of the visit was to inquire into this tragedy.
The Summits of the Americas began in 1994 as forums to promote free trade. In 2009 the Summit's focus shifted to demands for the inclusion of Cuba in regional political bodies and the end of the U.S. economic embargo, a debate which continued in this month's Sixth Summit in Cartagena.
"The world's deadliest prison fire in a century"
"Most inmates at charred Honduras prison had not been charged"
The basic facts are brutal: Over 350 inmates were burned to death on Tuesday night/ Wednesday morning, February 14-15, in a huge fire at the Comayagua prison, located north of Tegucigalpa, about 15 minutes from the United States “Palmerola” military base. More are receiving medical treatment for burns and smoke inhalation.
On January 5, 2012, just days before the January 14 inauguration of former general Otto Perez Molina as President of Guatemala, a Guatemalan court in a highly irregular procedure dismissed charges against Perez Molina for the 1992 forced disappearance, illegal detention, prolonged torture and presumed extrajudicial execution of Efrain Bamaca.
In Guatemala, former military officers and their supporters have filed legal charges against human rights activists, journalists, and surviving victims of State repression, even as a former general, Otto Perez Molina - himself implicated in Guatemala's genocide -
The US is advancing a regional security strategy which apparently is oriented toward the militarization of Central America and the participation of private security contractors in policing, a strategy also being promoted for Central America by the IDB (Inter American Development Bank) and former Colombian president Alvaro Uribe.
Otto Perez Molina, a former general who was in charge of the Nebaj, Quiche military base during Guatemala's genocide from mid-1982 to mid-1983, has won the presidency.
