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Dictatorship

Fujimori Is Dead, Fujimorismo Is Not

October 4, 2024 Clau O'Brien Moscoso, Black Agenda Report. , , , ,
Former dictator and genocidaire Alberto Fujimori died on September 11, nine months after Peru’s Supreme Court illegally reinstated his pardon for crimes against humanity. His daughter and three-time presidential election loser, Keiko Fujimori, announced his death on the X platform a day after rumors started swirling. Sadly, Fujimori died peacefully in his home surrounded by family despite being responsible for massacres, torture, forced sterilizations, crimes against humanity, economic shock therapy and the selling off of the country to US economic and military interests. The families of his victims received neither reparations nor a formal apology.

How Safe Is Nicaragua? A Comparative Reflection

July 9, 2024 James Phillips, Orinoco Tribune. , , , , , , , , ,
Nicaraguan children march before a baseball tournament in Matagalpa. Having a government that promotes communitarian trust and supports meeting the needs of everyone seems to be a crucial factor in whether people feel “safe.” On the night before I was married in 1985, during the wedding rehearsal dinner, my “best man,” Gary MacEoin, knew that my wife and I were heading to Nicaragua a week later, where the country was in the middle of the Contra War. My wife’s parents were concerned for our safety. Gary proposed a toast, “To the second safest city in the hemisphere…Managua!”

Delay Tactics On First Day Of Genocide Trial In Guatemala

March 27, 2024 Network in Solidarity with the People of Guatemala, Popular Resistance. , , , ,
Guatemala City, Guatemala - On March 25, 2024, the first hearing of the Oral and Public Debate was held against former General Benedicto Lucas García, for the crimes of genocide, sexual violence and crimes against humanity, committed during the dictatorship of his brother Romeo Lucas García (1978-1982). Ancestral Indigenous Authorities of the Ixil people of Nebaj and Chajul, representatives of the National Platform of Victims, CONAVIGUA, along with members of other religious, social and human rights organizations, were present to support the plaintiffs, the Association for Justice and Reconciliation, and their legal team.

Puebla Group Demands Formal Apology From The US For Chile Coup

September 12, 2023 Saheli Chowdhury, Orinoco Tribune. , , , , , , ,
The Puebla Group has demanded that the United States present a formal apology for its role in the 1973 coup d’état against President Salvador Allende of Chile as part of the commemoration events for 50 years since one of the bloodiest coups in the world. On Sunday, September 10, the Puebla Group and the Latin American Council for Justice and Democracy (CLAJUD) released a joint declaration highlighting that “it is essential to recognize the responsibility of foreign actors in the events that led to the coup” that overthrew the elected government of Salvador Allende on September 11, 1973, and ushered in the 17-year dictatorship of General Augusto Pinochet, who led the coup.

Breaking Bread With Authoritarians

June 27, 2023 Patrick Lawrence, Consortium News. , , ,
“For the first time in recent history, the White House is hosting a state dinner that’s entirely plant-based: no meat, no dairy and no eggs,” the reliably supercilious NPR reported as it curtain-raised the Biden White House’s state dinner for Narendra Modi last Thursday. The Indian prime minister, our corporate-sponsored national radio broadcaster explained, is a strict vegetarian. The headline on this shattering piece of reportage was, “For Modi’s state dinner, the White House is elevating the mushroom.” This is big, to state the obvious. “While there are no specifically Indian dishes on the menu, many Indian spices and flavors are incorporated into the courses,” NPR’s Deepa Shivaram wasted our time informing us.

Justice For Forced Sterilization Cases During Fujimori Dictatorship

May 31, 2023 Clau O'Brien Moscoso, Black Agenda Report. , , ,
After almost six months of a coup regime that has murdered over 80 people during continuous protests against the illegal ouster of President Pedro Castillo, survivors of another case of human rights abuses may finally be seeing justice. On May 19th, former dictator Alberto Fujimori was summoned virtually from Penal de Barbadillo (where Pedro Castillo is also imprisoned on preventative detention) by the Chilean Supreme Court for the cases of forced sterilization during his regime in the 1990s. Between 1996 and 2000, approximately 270,000 women and 22,000 men were forcibly sterilized under the dictatorship’s “family planning” measures, all from poor rural indigenous areas.

President Dissolves Congress In Ecuador Good, In Peru Bad

May 29, 2023 Yves Engler. , , , ,
Last week right-wing Ecuadorian president Guillermo Lasso dissolved the national assembly. In stark contrast to their response to a similar move by the leftist president of Peru five months ago, Ottawa effectively supported the measure. As he was on the cusp of being impeached over corruption allegations Lasso dissolved the national assembly. He called on military leaders to endorse his initiative, sent police to take over Congress and cut internet connections to the legislature. The constitutional provision Lasso cited to dissolve the national assembly has never been employed before and it allows the president to rule by decree for six months (though elections need to be held within three months).

Ecuador’s President Dissolves National Assembly Triggering Early Elections

May 25, 2023 Teri Mattson, WtF is Going on in Latin America and the Caribbean. , , ,
Ecuador's President Guillermo Lasso dissolved the National Assembly by decree on May 17 bringing forward legislative and presidential elections and heading off an attempt by opposition politicians to impeach him. Opposition politicians wanted to impeach Lasso over accusations he disregarded warnings of embezzlement related to a contract at state-owned oil transportation company Flopec, charges the president denies. A majority of lawmakers had backed a resolution accusing Lasso of allowing the corrupt contract to continue after taking office in 2021, although a congressional oversight committee, which heard testimony from opposition lawmakers, officials, and Lasso's lawyer, said in its report it did not recommend impeachment.

Haiti: Political Parties Reject ‘National Consensus’

January 3, 2023 Orinoco Tribune. , , ,
On Thursday, December 29, several political parties of Haiti condemned de facto Prime Minister Ariel Henry’s “National Consensus” that unilaterally promotes constitutional reform and asks for “help from the international community” to combat insecurity in the country. According to the protesting parties, Henry has been trying to illegally remain in power since the assassination of the former president, Jovenel Moïse, in July 2021. The leader of the Movement for Political and Cultural Independence Party (MEKSEPA), Vilaire Cluny Duroseau, said that the Consensus is a “macabre” attempt of the Core Group to continue controlling Haiti by any means necessary. Duroseau, who was a candidate in the presidential elections of 2016, strongly condemned Henry’s request for foreign military intervention.

How ‘Fist Rice’ Became A Symbol Of Korean Democracy

November 15, 2022 Jia Jung, Select. , , ,
On a humid summer morning in the mountain-backed metropolis of Gwangju, a cluster of fifth graders shuffled into an auditorium at 5.18 Freedom Park. Here were the former barracks where the South Korean military dictator Chun Doo-hwan and his forces imprisoned, interrogated, tortured, and in some cases killed thousands of civilians in May of 1980. Today, Koreans refer to these events as “5.18,” marking the first day of the Gwangju Uprising, when city residents demanded democracy in the wake of Chun’s 1979 power grab after the assassination of Park Chung-hee, the previous dictator president. The Chun regime’s brutal response still reverberates in the lives of the city’s residents. As the young students took a breather from their field trip, a guide passed out jumbo rice balls called jumeokbap, or “fist rice.”

Filipinos In The US Protest Far-Right President Marcos At His UN-Debut

September 23, 2022 People's Dispatch. , ,
As Filipino government officials participate in events across New York City over the course of the UN General Assembly, US-based Filipino activists have been determined to raise awareness about dictatorship in the Philippines. Actions have been organized in New York City by organizations such as Anakbayan, the youth wing of larger US-based progressive Filipino organization Bayan, Kabataan Alliance Northeast, an alliance of Filipino youth and student organizations, and the International League of People’s Struggle (ILPS). On September 19, over 70 activists attended a protest and rally at the Dag Hammarskjöld Plaza at the UN Headquarters, as the United Nations Transforming Education Summit convened.

The Chris Hedges Report: Journalism And Argentina’s ‘Dirty War’

June 25, 2022 Chris Hedges, The Real News Network. , , ,
In the late 1970s and 1980s, Argentina’s civic-military dictatorship disappeared over 30,000 people, using death squads trained by the US as part of the now infamous Operation Condor. The victims were held in secret prisons, savagely tortured, and murdered. To this day, many families do not know the fate of their loved ones. In this episode of The Chris Hedges Report, former Buenos Aires Herald editor Robert Cox joins the show to recount his experiences reporting on the disappeared during Argentina’s “Dirty War.” Robert Cox is a British journalist who served as editor and publisher of the Buenos Aires Herald, an English-language daily newspaper in Argentina. Cox became famous for his criticism of the military dictatorship; he was also targeted by police forces and was detained and jailed, then released after a day.

Xiomara Castro Denounces Hijack Of Legislative Power

January 24, 2022 Telesur English. , , ,
The elected president of Honduras, Xiomara Castro (Libertad y Refundación, Libre), denounced this Sunday, outside the National Congress, that a dictatorship is trying to hijack the Legislative Branch in a bid not to respond to the popular mandate. Hundreds of people continue to mobilize in the vicinity of the Parliament in defense of democracy and respect for the popular vote. Addressing the crowds of her supporters, Castro recalled that the elections of November 2021 were to remove from power the dictatorship of the current president, Juan Orlando Hernandez, and banish its unlawful practices. She stressed that on November 28, the people cast their votes and that their will must be respected.

South Korean Dictator Dies, Western Media Resurrects A Myth

December 3, 2021 K. J. Noh, Popular Resistance. , , , ,
General Chun Doo Hwan was the corrupt military dictator that ruled Korea from 1979-1988, before handing off the presidency to his co-conspirator General Roh Tae Woo.  Chun took power in a coup in 1979, and during his presidency he perpetrated the largest massacre of Korean civilians since the Korean war. He died on November 23rd, in pampered, sybaritic luxury, impenitent and arrogant to the very last breath.   Many western media outlets have written censorious, chest-beating accounts of his despotic governance and the massacres he perpetrated (here, here, here, and here)-- something they rarely bothered to do when he was actively perpetrating them in broad daylight before their eyes.

Haiti: Black Despots And White Rulers

February 18, 2021 Jemima Pierre, Black Agenda Report. , , ,
The past week has seen growing protests  against the contested presidency of Haiti’s Jovenel Moïse. An unpopular figure who has ruled without a mandate, and, increasingly, by decree , Moïse refused  to relinquish power when his presidential term expired on February 7, 2021. While claiming that his term ends in February 2022, Moïse has lashed out against his political rivals, arresting  his critics, members of opposition political parties, and supreme court judges, all the while consolidating his draconian, some would say dictatorial, rule over Haiti. How Haiti arrived at this moment is predictable and unsurprising. Moïse’s election was marred by fraud , extremely low voter turnout, and protests challenging his candidacy.
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