Above photo: Orange County Register.
How can you speak of press freedom when your governments murder journalists?
The ninth Summit of the America’s opened in Los Angeles on Monday, June 6. This is the second time that the summit has been hosted in the United States. The Biden administration chose to exclude the elected governments of Cuba, Nicaragua and Venezuela, inviting members of the US-backed far right ‘opposition’ instead. That decision caused the presidents of other American countries to boycott the summit, notably Mexico, Bolivia, Honduras and Guatemala.
In protest, social movements from the United States and Latin America organized a counter summit, The People’s Summit, which begins on June 8. Journalists involved in the People’s Summit disrupted Biden’s sham Summit, confronting US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and the head of the US-controlled Organization of American States, Luis Amalgro.
One journalist confronted Amalgro over the OAS’ backing of a violent right-wing coup in Bolivia in 2019 that prevented the democratically-elected Evo Morales from taking his seat as president. Coup supporters massacred dozen of people, including journalist Sebastien Moro.
Abby Martin of The Empire Files confronted Sec. Blinken over the United States selling weapons to Saudi Arabia and the state of Israel, two countries that are responsible for the murders of journalists Jamal Khashoggi, a Saudi Arabian who worked for The Washington Post, and recently Shireen Abu Akleh, a US citizen who worked for Al Jazeera.
And Eugene Puryear, host of Break Through News, also confronted Sec. Blinken over the exclusion of the governments of Cuba, Nicaragua and Venezuela while including illegitimate leaders such as Dr. Ariel Henry of Haiti, who is governing without a Constitutional mandate and who has been involved in multiple crimes, including the murder of the past president Jovenel Moise.
You can follow The People’s Summit at Break Through News.