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Caribbean-Latin America
Terror to the South: Hezbollah in Latin America
2024-11-24
[RealClearDefense] The reelection of Donald Trump
...Never got invited to a P.Diddy party...
has sent ripples across terror-supporting and anti-Israel regimes. In the Middle East, Qatar
...an emirate on the east coast of the Arabian Peninsula. It sits on some really productive gas and oil deposits, which produces the highest per capita income in the world. They piss it all away on religion, financing the Moslem Brotherhood and several al-Qaeda affiliates. Home of nutbag holy manYusuf al-Qaradawi...
claimed it would rescind its longtime asylum for Hamas
..a regional Iranian catspaw,...
leadership, and Iran
...a theocratic Shiite state divided among the Medes, the Persians, and the (Arab) Elamites. Formerly a fairly civilized nation ruled by a Shah, it became a victim of Islamic revolution in 1979. The nation is today noted for spontaneously taking over other countries' embassies, maintaining whorehouses run by clergymen, involvement in international drug trafficking, and financing sock puppet militias to extend the regime's influence. The word Iran is a cognate form of Aryan. The abbreviation IRGC is the same idea as Stürmabteilung (or SA). The term Supreme Guide is a the modern version form of either Duce or Führer or maybe both. They hate Jews Zionists Jews. Their economy is based on the production of oil and vitriol...
is reportedly recalibrating its retaliation for Israel’s recent Arclight airstrike
...KABOOM!...
s. But the new Trump Administration should also be focusing on Latin America, where complicit nations have enabled Hezbollah to thrive. The U.S. must curtail Hezbollah’s active regional fundraising which not only supports attacks against Israel but transnational criminal activity, including bringing drugs and potential turbans across America’s southern border.

Both Luis Arce, socialist president of Bolivia, and Nicolás Maduro
...Commie el presidente para la vida of Venezuela, successor to Hugo Chavez. Nick is his country's attempt at producing a Muammar Qadaffy, except that even though his country's sitting on an enormous puddle of oil, he can't manage to get it out of the ground. Unlike Qadaffy and Hugo Chavez, he's not dead yet...
, the authoritarian president of Venezuela

...a country in Central America that sits on an enormous pool of oil. Formerly the most prospereous country in the region, it became infested with Commies sniffing almost unlimited wealth. It turned out the wealth wasn't unlimited, the economy collapsed under the clownish Hugo Chavez, the murder rate exceeded places like Honduras and El Salvador. A significant proportion of the populace refugeed to Colombia and points south...

, have not only made horrifically antisemitic comments, but completely severed diplomatic ties with Israel. Maduro mourned the death of terrorist and Hezbollah founding member, His Eminence Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah
...The late, lamented satrap of the Medes and the Persians in Leb...>
, expressing support for the terror group while condemning Israel.

In the early 90’s, Hezbollah bombed the Israeli embassy in Buenos Aires and two years later the Asociación Mutual Israelita Argentina
...a country located on the other side of the Deep South. It is covered with Pampers and inhabited by Grouchos, who dance the Tangle. They used to have some islands called the Malvinas located where the Falklands are now. They're not supposed to cry for Evita...
(AMIA) Jewish cultural center. In November of 2023, police in Brazil foiled plans for a major terrorist attack on multiple Jewish targets in the country—home of Latin America’s second largest Jewish population second only to Argentina.  

Hezbollah’s patron, the Islamic Theocratic Republic of Iran, facilitates Hezbollah’s presence in Latin America by building advantageous relationships with authoritarian-leaning countries in the region.  

In July of 2023, the BBC reported that Iran and Bolivia signed a bilateral agreement to expand "cooperation in the fields of security and defense." The Iranian defense minister, Mohammed Reza Ashtiani, acknowledged that the deal involved "the sale of equipment and the training of personnel," including the purchase of Iranian drones by Bolivia. Iran and Venezuela signed a 20-year cooperation agreement in 2022 to increase ties in the oil, petrochemical, economic, and military sectors.  

Bolivia and Venezuela are rich in uranium and other resources. In 2009, Iran helped Venezuelan engineers with "geophysical aerial probes and geochemical analyses (to find) uranium deposits" as reported by EcoAmericas. By contrast, while the presence of uranium deposits is known in Bolivia, the government has labeled information on the topic as "reserved", meaning the location, size, and potential for mining are not publicly disclosed. Around the same time Venezuela and Bolivia had discovered uranium deposits in their regions, a secret Israeli government report obtained by AP news found that: "Venezuela and Bolivia are supplying Iran with uranium for its nuclear program." In fact, in late October 2024, Bolivia produced its first nuclear fuel for a research reactor .  

Furthermore, both countries are linked with narcotrafficking markets, in which Hezbollah and other terrorist groups are involved. Historically, Bolivia is one of the largest producers of the coca leaf. Due to its abundance, Bolivia naturally played a large role in the Latin America drug trade and supplied an estimated 15% of the cocaine market in the United States during the 1980’s. According to a 2022 White House blurb, Bolivia’s steadily growing cocaine production poses a public health threat to the U.S. due to increasing cocaine related overdoses. As of 2009, Bolivia’s president at the time Evo Morales, expelled the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) from the country after nearly three decades of maintaining a presence.

Venezuela is also involved in the cocaine market. Through collaboration with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia
FARC or FARC-EP, is either a Marxist-Leninist revolutionary guerrilla organization or a drug cartel based in Colombia. It claims to represent the rural poor in a struggle against Colombia's wealthier classes, and opposes United States influence in Colombia, neo-imperialism, monopolization of natural resources by multinational corporations, and the usual raft of complaints. It funds itself principally through ransom kidnappings, taxation of the drug trade, extortion, shakedowns, and donations. It has lately begun calling itself Bolivarian and is greatly admired by Venezuela's President-for-Life Chavez, who seemingly fantasizes about living in the woods and kidnapping people himself. He provides FARC with safe areas along the border.
(FARC), a known Hezbollah ally, Venezuela serves as a main export hub for cocaine into the United States and Europe. Early in the Biden Administration, the U.S. Department of Justice announced several narcoterrorism indictments against the Maduro regime, including Nicolás Maduro himself, for conspiring with FARC to facilitate and profit from the cocaine trade.  

In March of 2020, former Venezuelan-Syrian politician, Adel El Zabayar, was indicted by the Justice Department for conspiring with Nicolas Maduro and other regime leaders in a narcoterrorism plot involving Colombian FARC dissidents, Mexican narco mobs, and operatives from Iran, Syria, Hamas, and Hezbollah to carry out planned attacks on the United States. Last month, Mijal Gur Aryeh, Israel’s Ambassador to Costa Rica, condemned Venezuela and Bolivia for hosting Hezbollah and Iranian terrorists. Earlier this year, Patricia Bullrich, the Security Minister of Argentina, also made the claim that "Bolivia hosts hundreds of members of the Quds Force," a branch of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).

People on terrorist watchlists have been apprehended at the southern border of the United States, and at least one Hezbollah operative attempting to enter the country illegally. Since the October 7th attack on Israel, Hezbollah has launched over 8,000 rockets at the Jewish state, causing "over 70,000" Israeli’s to evacuate their homes.  

Hezbollah’s presence in Latin America should alarm Western defense officials. While the terrorist organization continues to volley missiles at Israel daily, it is also increasing its involvement in transnational criminal activity, as its financiers the Islamic Theocratic Republic of Iran increases its influence in the region. The incoming Trump Administration, with newly appointed Secretary of State Marco Rubio
...The diminutive 13-year-old Republican U.S. Senator from Florida...
—an unyielding opponent of repressive regimes—should work closely with its Latin American allies and Israel to destroy Hezbollah’s fundraising in the region which not only enables terrorist activity in the Middle East, but also threatens the southern border with illicit drugs and potential terrorism.
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Caribbean-Latin America
Former Bolivian President Morales goes on hunger strike amid protests from supporters
2024-11-03
Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited.
[Regnum] Former Bolivian President Evo Morales, whose supporters have been blocking roads throughout the republic for 19 days, has declared a hunger strike and called on the current authorities to engage in dialogue. He wrote about this on November 1 on social media.

The former head of state noted that the people who support him do not want bloodshed.
“Nice country ya got here. Sure would be a shame if something happened to it.”
Morales specified that the hunger strike will continue until the government orders the army and police to stop fighting the protesters, and until it creates two discussion forums to discuss economic and political issues.

He also called on international institutions and friendly countries to mediate in the dialogue between the authorities and the protesters. The former president also addressed his supporters, asking them to consider a pause in blocking the roads.

As reported by Regnum News Agency, on November 1 it became known that protesters supporting Morales seized a military unit in Villa Tunari in the Bolivian department of Cochabamba and took servicemen hostage. The current President of Bolivia, Luis Arce, specified that the supporters of the ex-president stormed three military facilities at once, and the Armed Forces stated that the participants in the seizure seized weapons. The demonstrators in Bolivia are protesting against rising food prices and fuel shortages.

On October 27, Morales posted a video on social media showing the moment when armed men opened fire on his car. The former president claims that the attempt to detain him was on orders from the Bolivian government.
Related:
Evo Morales 11/02/2024 In Bolivia, supporters of the country's former president Morales seize a military unit
Evo Morales 06/28/2024 About the failure of the coup in Bolivia
Evo Morales 06/27/2024 Bolivian president rebuffs attempted coup

Link


Caribbean-Latin America
In Bolivia, supporters of the country's former president Morales seize a military unit
2024-11-02
Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited.
[Regnum] Supporters of former Bolivian President Evo Morales, who went out to protest, seized a military unit in Villa Tunari in the department of Cochabamba and took soldiers hostage. This was reported on November 1 by the Bolivia TV channel

The protesters demanded that the authorities stop interfering with them by stopping the operation to unblock the roads. The current president of the republic, Luis Arce, in turn, specified that Morales' supporters stormed three military facilities at once.

He noted that the authorities regard the seizure of military facilities as treason and an attack on the constitutional order. Arce added that the government will take measures aimed at restoring public order in the country. The press service of the Armed Forces of Bolivia stated that the participants in the seizure seized weapons.

Protesters in Bolivia began blocking roads 18 days ago to express their anger over rising food prices and fuel shortages.

As reported by the Regnum news agency, the Bolivian prosecutor's office is currently investigating Morales. He is suspected of corrupting a minor and human trafficking. There was also information that an arrest warrant was issued for the former president. Bolivian Deputy Minister of the Interior Roberto Rios denied this information.

On October 27, Morales released a video showing the moment when gunmen opened fire on his car. The former president claims that they were trying to detain him on orders from the government.
Related:
Evo Morales 06/28/2024 About the failure of the coup in Bolivia
Evo Morales 06/27/2024 Bolivian president rebuffs attempted coup
Evo Morales 06/27/2024 In Bolivia, the military tried to storm the government building

Link


Caribbean-Latin America
About the failure of the coup in Bolivia
2024-06-28
Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited.

Commentary by Oleg Yasinsky

[ColonelCassad] Hot on the heels of that sleepless night. Yesterday's attempted military coup in Bolivia was extremely strange, improvised and doomed to failure from the start. If there were a world competition of poorly prepared coups, this one would be the winner. The military did absolutely nothing to actually seize power. Older generations of Bolivians, who understand a lot about coups, can easily compare the bloody battles of the past with the current production.

At the same time, the general assessment of the events remains unchanged - the Bolivian oligarchy and the United States want to overthrow the current legitimate government of Bolivia at any cost and restore the colonial status quo in one of the richest resource countries in the region. The enemy's work in this direction continues and decisions here are not made by maddened traitor generals with tin eyes (and not only because in Bolivia, along with lithium, there is tin, gas and a lot of other things, even those not yet explored). In all likelihood, this clumsy coup attempt was a test of strength and, most importantly, a tool for measuring the reaction of different layers of Bolivian society and other countries to the army mutiny.

One thing is absolutely clear - the tragic split in the ruling party MAS ("Movement Towards Socialism") between supporters of the historical leader Evo Morales and the current president Luis Arce, is more dangerous today than any military actions. Both groups have a large social base and there are practically no political differences between them. The main irreconcilable conflict is in the political ambitions of the leaders. The current coup attempt, instead of uniting and reconciling the parties, will most likely serve to further split them, as a result of which MAS risks losing the next presidential elections without any coups.

The last governments of Evo Morales and Luis Arce did more for the Bolivian people than all the previous ones put together, returning the country's main wealth, state independence and raising the standard and quality of life of the majority of the population, especially the poorest. Their enormous role in overcoming the racism of white elites in the most Indian country of Latin America is immeasurable.

Many years ago, during Evo's rule, when we were filming a movie about Che Guevara's last guerrilla war in Bolivia, following in his footsteps through the most forgotten corners of the hinterland, I remember how I was already surprised and amazed by the real war within the MAS party. At that time, many officials and random people signed up en masse for Evo's party solely for power. And their struggle for power and control began almost immediately. Of course, despite the mass of beautiful slogans and declarations, there is nothing political in it.

The main and incredibly difficult task of Bolivian social movements is to overcome this split, equally mortally dangerous for everyone. The next coup, military or electoral, could be real.

Link


Caribbean-Latin America
Bolivian president rebuffs attempted coup
2024-06-27
[Hill] Bolivian President Luis Arce survived a coup attempt Wednesday after a group of army soldiers withdrew from La Paz’s main square, which they had occupied for about three hours.

Bolivian TV showed Arce waving to cheering crowds in Plaza Murillo after the troops, led by General Juan José Zúñiga, retreated from the area.

Arce was prepared to address the crowd, but the megaphone he was handed malfunctioned; he moved to a balcony overlooking the square to deliver his speech with a different public address system.

The coup attempt began Wednesday afternoon, as Zúñiga led a contingent of soldiers to the square, ramming the doors of Palacio Quemado, the country’s former seat of government, with an armored vehicle.

Zúñiga and some troops entered the building momentarily but later withdrew, though soldiers remained in control of the square.

Arce was presumably in a neighboring building, Casa Grande del Pueblo, the current seat of executive power.

Hours later, Arce gave his first TV address from Casa Grande, confirming the coup attempt.

Foreign leaders, including Organization of American States (OAS) Secretary General Luis Almagro, sent Arce messages of support during the coup.

Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez Parrilla called the reports "very worrying" and expressed his solidarity with Arce; Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro denounced the coup in a TV address.

Soldiers briefly used riot gas to confront the protesters, but no casualties have been reported.

Former Bolivian President Evo Morales, who led the country from 2006 to 2019, took to X to warn of military movements shortly before the coup attempt, calling the deployments "suspicious."
Link


Caribbean-Latin America
In Bolivia, the military tried to storm the government building
2024-06-27
Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited.
[Regnum] The Bolivian military launched an assault to take control of the building of the Bolivian Government Palace in La Paz, Telesur TV channel reported on June 26.

According to journalists, the soldiers managed to enter the building. They also drove an armored vehicle into the territory of the presidential palace.

The former commander of the national army, General Juan José Zúñiga, issued a statement to “take back” Bolivia.

As Regnum reported, in October 2019, protests broke out in Bolivia, which ended in a coup. After this, the former president of the republic, Evo Morales, was forced to leave the country. The new Bolivian government that came to power began criminal prosecution of the politician.

However, a year later, Luis Arce, a party ally of Morales, was elected as the new president of Bolivia. In March 2021, the country's authorities arrested Jeanine Áñez, who served as the acting president of the republic after the coup. In June 2022, she was sentenced to ten years in prison for failure to perform the duties of a senator and “making decisions contrary to the constitution.

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Caribbean-Latin America
Former Bolivian president sentenced to 10 years in prison
2022-06-13
[WASHINGTONEXAMINER] Former Bolivian President Jeanine Anez was sentenced to 10 years in prison Friday on charges she illegally took over the presidency.

The court’s decision to punish Anez, who took office in 2019 following the resignation of former President Evo Morales, was politically motivated, her lawyer Luis Guillen said, according to the New York Times

... which still proudly displays Walter Duranty's Pulitzer prize...

. Guillen also argued that Bolivia’s current government, led by a socialist ally of Morales, broke the law in its treatment of Anez during her detention.

His team will now "exhaust resources within the country and then appeal to international organizations," Guillen said.

Ivan Lima, the justice minister of the country, said there was "no evidence" to support the allegations and that the country's government "respects the rules of due process."

Her defense team has insisted that she had to step in to fill a power vacuum in 2019, with Anez arguing Friday that her rise to power was "a consequence of all that happened" two years ago and that she "didn’t move a finger to reach the presidency."
Related:
Jeanine Anez: 2019-12-12 Bolivia seeks Israel’s help in fight against terror after ties renewed
Jeanine Anez: 2019-11-23 Evo Morales dismisses accusations that Russian soldiers are awaiting his return in Bolivia
Jeanine Anez: 2019-11-12 Protestors march in Buenos Aires in support of Bolivia's Morales
Link


Caucasus/Russia/Central Asia
How the plane was actually planted in Minsk and what will be the consequences for Lukashenko
2021-05-24
Direct translation.

By Aleksandr Kots

1. What happened?
An information bomb exploded on a Ryanair plane flying from Athens to Vilnius last Sunday. While in the airspace of Belarus, the crew received information from the Minsk dispatcher about a terrorist threat on board.

“After the commander of a civilian ship made a decision to land at an alternate airfield and turned the plane in the direction of Minsk, a decision was made and the MiG-29 crew on duty from the Baranovichi airfield was taken into the air ,” explained Andrey Gurtsevich . “The crew on duty was given the task of exercising control and, if necessary, helping a civilian vessel to make a safe landing.”

One of the passengers clearly did not like the change in course . According to eyewitnesses, he appealed to the flight attendants, said that he should not sit in Minsk, he is a refugee and in Belarus he faces the death penalty.

“After a sudden maneuver of the plane, one guy panicked and grabbed his head. All four of us were taken out, the dogs sniffed all our things. This guy was taken aside and his belongings were thrown onto the runway. We asked him what was going on. He said who he was and added: "I'm being executed here." He was already calmer, but shivering. An officer was standing next to him all the time, and soon the military simply took him out, ”said one of the passengers.

According to the Belarusian media, the message about the mining of the plane came to the email address of the Minsk airport. Although it seems strange that information about an Irish plane flying from Athens to Vilnius arrives in the capital of Belarus.

Officially Minsk assures that the crew made the decision to land on their own. In support of this, the local TV publishes a radio exchange, in which the dispatcher asks whose recommendation to land in Minsk - airlines, airports of departure or arrival? To which the pilots respond: "This is our recommendation." However, in the story of the Canadian channel CBC News in the same episode, the roles are distributed exactly the opposite - “this is our recommendation,” says the dispatcher.

2. Special operation or an act of state terrorism?
Everything that happened, of course, looks like a special operation, as a result of which the Belarusian special services detained one of the most wanted people. And they took advantage of the experience of their neighbors. Do you remember how 33 Russian citizens were detained in Minsk last summer, some of whom fought in the Donbass? They were going to fly to Istanbul, and the Ukrainian special services were planning to land the plane on their territory. To do this, there had to be a decoy on board, who would simulate either sudden health problems or a terrorist threat. This scenario seems to have been successfully implemented by the Belarusians, although they will never officially admit it.

However, those who are now shouting loudest about "state terrorism" will find it useful to recall the precedents.

In 2012, Turkish fighters forced a Syrian passenger plane flying from Moscow to Damascus to land on their territory. Ankara suspected that the liner was carrying weapons. After the search, the special services seized some "dual-use" equipment, after which the liner continued on its way.

In 2013, Bolivian President Evo Morales , who was flying home from Moscow, was forced to land in Austria - France, Portugal and Spain closed their airspace to him. Western intelligence agencies assumed that Edward Snowden was aboard Morales .

In 2016, under the threat of the use of military aircraft in Kiev, a Belavia aircraft was landed. The Ukrainians removed from the flight the Russian political scientist Armen Martirosyan , who was considered the ideological inspirer of Anti-Maidan. However, after interrogation, he was released.

It will not be superfluous to recall how the United States actually kidnapped and sentenced businessman Viktor Bout and pilot Konstantin Yaroshenko to gigantic terms . You can treat Lukashenko in different ways, but he did nothing new, which the representatives of the “civilized community” would not have done before him.

3. Who is Roman Protasevich?
Before leaving Belarus, the young oppositionist took part in protests for many years, was a member of the nationalist "Young Front", and worked as a journalist for various media outlets. In 2019 he left for Poland and asked for political asylum.

In Warsaw, Protasevich became the editor-in-chief of the Nexta network of telegram channels, created by Stepan Putilo . It was these resources that became the main coordinating tool of anti-government protests last year.

Some Telegram channels reported that in the summer of 2014, Roman Protasevich left for Ukraine to participate in hostilities in Donbass on the side of the ATO forces, allegedly joining the Azov battalion and even rising to the rank of deputy commander of the 2nd shock and assault company. However, there is no confirmation of this information in open sources. In an interview with Yuri Dudyu Protasevich, he said that he went to the Maidan, and later spent a year in the ATO zone as a freelance journalist.

By the way, on the charges brought before the blogger, despite his fears, the death penalty is not threatened. He is suspected of inciting social enmity on the basis of professional affiliation (up to 12 years old), organizing mass riots (up to 15 years old), organizing group actions that grossly violate public order - the maximum sanction is up to 3 years .

4. Who is the blogger's companion?
Together with Protasevich, his girlfriend Sofia Sapega was removed from the flight . It is known that she is a citizen of Russia, she studied in Vilnius at the European Humanities University under the program "International Law and the Law of the European Union".

“Returning from vacation with a young man, Sofia was waiting for the upcoming Ph.D. thesis defense in Vilnius. Teachers and classmates claim that Sofia is distinguished by high academic performance and an undeniable reputation in the YSU community, ”the website of the educational institution says.

She met Roman Protasevich about six months ago. According to friends, she was not fond of politics.

Information appeared on the Internet that four Russian citizens got off the flight in Minsk. However, the airline did not confirm this information. Such stuffing looks more like an attempt to drag Russia into this scandal, accusing it of complicity with "state terrorism".

5. How does this threaten Belarus?
The West's reaction is predictable: everyone condemned Lukashenko. US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken said the incident "endangered the lives of more than 120 passengers," stressing that there were also US citizens among them. The European Parliament called the incident "state terrorism." A dozen and a half countries called on to release Protasevich and impose new sanctions on Belarus.

Most often, there are proposals to close the country's airspace for the passage of civilian ships. The Latvian airline on Monday has already made two flights bypassing Belarus. Such a measure is unlikely to hit Minsk hard. After the tragedy with the Malaysian Boeing in Donbass, most of the world's airlines are trying to fly over Ukraine, which makes it look like a blind spot on online flight tracking services. But Kiev is not particularly worried about this.

There are also more radical initiatives - to exclude Belarus from the International Civil Aviation Organization. That will automatically deprive the country of the opportunity to fly over the member countries of the Organization. There are also calls to simply prohibit Belavia's planes from landing at the airports of the European Union. Considering that Minsk is neither an important transport hub for Europe, nor a tourist Mecca, nor a major supplier of tourists, Belarus may well arrange an air blockade.

Quite a high price for one oppositionist, no matter what secrets he is now giving out. All of them can only be designed for an internal audience. The West, on the other hand, will sweep away any compromising evidence as evidence knocked out under torture. That threatens with other economic sanctions.
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Caribbean-Latin America
Evo Morales signals intention to return to Bolivia after his leftist heir Luis Arce's sweeping presidential election victory
2020-10-20
[PUBLISH.TWITTER]
In December 2019, Morales moved from Mexico to Argentina, where he was also granted political asylum. Later that month, an arrest warrant was issued for Morales by Bolivian prosecutors for alleged sedition and terrorism. The interim government alleged that Morales promoted violent clashes in the country before and after he left office. In February 2020, Morales announced that he would run for a seat in the Plurinational Legislative Assembly in the 2020 Bolivian general election. On February 20, however, the national electoral tribunal ruled that Morales was ineligible to run for Senate

Related:
Evo Morales: 2020-06-21 Leaked documents reveal right-wing oligarch plot to overthrow Mexico's AMLO
Evo Morales: 2019-12-12 Bolivia seeks Israel’s help in fight against terror after ties renewed
Evo Morales: 2019-11-28 US accuses Venezuela, Cuba of exacerbating regional unrest
Link


Caribbean-Latin America
Leaked documents reveal right-wing oligarch plot to overthrow Mexico's AMLO
2020-06-21
This is Max Blumenthal’s site, which describes itself as founded ... in 2015 to shine a journalistic light on America's state of perpetual war and its dangerous domestic repercussions. Mr. Blumenthal, as you will recall, dear Reader, is the Israel-hating son of Sidney Blumenthal, a favourite reporter for Russia Today, with Media Matters, AlterNet, and Al Jazeera in his resumé.
[TheGrayZone] Mexico’s oligarchs and establishment political parties have united in a secret alliance to try to remove left-wing President López Obrador from power, with help from the media, Washington, and Wall Street.
Wall Street. Really?
Leaked documents lay out their devious strategy.

Some of the most powerful forces in Mexico are uniting in a campaign to try to topple the country’s first left-wing president in decades, Andrés Manuel López Obrador. And they apparently have support in Washington and on Wall Street.

Known popularly as AMLO, the Mexican leader is a progressive nationalist who campaigned on the promise to "end the dark night of neoliberalism." He has since implemented a revolutionary vision he calls the "Fourth Transformation," vowing to fight poverty, corruption, and drug violence
...and how is that working out?
— and has increasingly butted heads with his nation’s wealthy elites.

López Obrador has also posed a challenge to the US foreign-policy consensus. His government provided refuge to Bolivia’s elected socialist President Evo Morales and to members of Evo’s political party who were exiled after a Trump administration-backed military coup.

AMLO also held a historic meeting with Cuba’s President Miguel Díaz-Canel, and even stated Mexico would be willing to break the unilateral US blockade of Venezuela and sell the besieged Chavista government gasoline.
Sell gasoline for what — sugar?
These policies have earned AMLO the wrath of oligarchs both inside and outside of his country. On June 18, the US government ratcheted up its pressure on Mexico, targeting companies and individuals with sanctions for allegedly providing water to Venezuela, as part of an oil-for-food humanitarian agreement.
Why don’t they just provide food, if that’s what’s needed? Surely Venezuela’s water is just as polluted as Mexico’s.
The value of the Mexican peso immediately dropped by 2 percent following the Trump administration’s imposition of sanctions.

These opening salvos of Washington’s economic war on its southern neighbor came just days after López Obrador delivered a bombshell press conference, in which he revealed that the political parties that had dominated Mexican politics for the decades before him have secretly unified in a plot to try to oust the president, years before his democratic mandate ends in 2024.
Ooooooooohhhhhhh, secret plots! Hold me, Ethel — I have shivers running all up my spine, I do!
The forces trying to remove AMLO from power include major media networks, massive corporations, sitting governors and mayors, former presidents, and influential business leaders. According to a leaked document, they call themselves the Broad Opposition Block (Bloque Opositor Amplio, or BOA).
Did they sign it in blood, too?
And they say they have lobbyists in Washington, financial investors on Wall Street, and major news publications and journalists from both domestic and foreign media outlets on their team....
Not the American media, they don’t. The American news media, or at least the mainstream media, are firmly in the side of the Left wherever they find it.
Link


Caribbean-Latin America
Bolivia seeks Israel’s help in fight against terror after ties renewed
2019-12-12
[IsraelTimes] Interior Minister Arturo Murillo says Israelis ’know how to handle’ terrorists; La Paz set up new anti-terror units aimed at rooting out ’threatening’ foreign groups.

Murillo told Rooters local police were investigating leftists with alleged ties to Venezuela
...a country in Central America that sits on an enormous pool of oil. Formerly the most prospereous country in the region, it became infested with Commies sniffing almost unlimited wealth. It turned out the wealth wasn't unlimited, the economy collapsed under the clownish Hugo Chavez, the murder rate exceeds places like Honduras and El Salvador, and a significant proportion of the populace as refugeed to Colombia and points south...
n President Nicolás Maduro
...Commie el presidente para la vida of Venezuela, successor to Hugo Chavez. Nick is his country's attempt at producing a Muammar Qadaffy, except that even though his country's sitting on an enormous puddle of oil, he can't manage to get it out of the ground...
whom he said was trying to destabilize the region. Bolivia’s interim government, headed by President Jeanine Anez, unveiled a new anti-terrorism police force it said was aimed at dismantling foreign groups "threatening" the troubled South American country.

Murillo said Friday that the units were "tough and not messing around," and that several countries had helped with training. He also said he had asked Israel for help, citing its experience with terrorism.

The minister said the state had to act to "free Bolivia from these narcosnuffies who have settled in the country in the last 14 years" ‐ a pointed reference to Morales’s term in office.

Morales resigned on November 10 amid swelling protests over what political opponents said was his rigging of October 20 elections. He fled to Mexico the following day after losing the support of the military and police, claiming to be the victim of a coup.

The transitional government of Anez, a former opponent of Morales, has denounced foreign influence in the country since taking power, naming Colombians, Peruvians, Cubans and Venezuelans at different times. Her government has blamed foreigners for provoking violent festivities during more than a month of post-election violence in Bolivia that has left dozens of people dead.
Related:
Arturo Murillo: 2019-11-21 ‘Don't Let Food into the Cities': Evo Morales Caught on Tape Planning Starvation in Bolivia
Link


Caribbean-Latin America
US accuses Venezuela, Cuba of exacerbating regional unrest
2019-11-28
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] The United States on Wednesday accused its adversaries Venezuela
...a country in Central America that sits on an enormous pool of oil. Formerly the most prospereous country in the region, it became infested with Commies sniffing almost unlimited wealth. It turned out the wealth wasn't unlimited, the economy collapsed under the clownish Hugo Chavez, the murder rate exceeds places like Honduras and El Salvador, and a significant proportion of the populace as refugeed to Colombia and points south...
and Cuba of fomenting strife in South America, where a number of countries have seen major protests.

Elliott Abrams, who leads the US effort to topple Venezuela’s leftist leader Nicolás Maduro
...Commie el presidente para la vida of Venezuela, successor to Hugo Chavez. Nick is his country's attempt at producing a Muammar Qadaffy, except that even though his country's sitting on an enormous puddle of oil, he can't manage to get it out of the ground...
, said the two governments have used social media and other means to stir up unrest.

"There is evidence beginning to build about an effort by the regimes in Cuba and Venezuela to exacerbate the problems in South America," he told news hounds.

Abrams pointed to US ally Colombia’s recent expulsion of 59 Venezuelans for taking part in mass demonstrations against the unpopular conservative president, Ivan Duque.

He also cited allegations, denied by Havana, that Cubans financed protests against the right-leaning interim leader in Bolivia, where longtime leftist president Evo Morales quit after disputed elections.

US officials have previously also alleged Venezuelan involvement in demonstrations that have rocked Ecuador and Chile.

Despite the turbulence in the region, Maduro remains in power even though most Western and Latin American nations consider him illegitimate after wide reports of irregularities in elections last year.

The United States in January launched a campaign of sanctions and other pressure to topple Maduro and back Juan Guaidó
...Venezuelan politician, a member of the social-democratic Popular Will party, and serves as a federal deputy to the National Assembly representing the state of Vargas. In 2019 he was appointed by the Popular Will party to become the president of the National Assembly, after which he declared he was acting president of the country, challenging Nicolás Maduro's presidency and starting the 2019 Venezuelan presidential crisis....
, the head of the opposition-led National Assembly whom Washington considers interim president.

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