This week the Inter-American Commission—a keystone in the inter-American system of human rights—warned that it will have to curtail activities and staff due to a budget shortfall. Will member states step up in time to save it?
Global Americans/LatinAmericaGoesGlobal.org is 1 year old! To celebrate this admittedly minor milestone, the editors picked over our contributions from the past 12 months and chose our favorites.
Chile and Uruguay seem to be on a path to a bilateral free trade deal. With the former in the Pacific Alliance and the latter in the customs union Mercosur, are the two blocs converging, or is Mercosur fracturing?
Recientemente tuvimos la oportunidad de entrevistar a Guillermo Lasso Mendoza, uno de los candidatos para las próximas elecciones Ecuatorianas de 2017. El candidato Lasso lidera el Movimiento Político Creando Oportunidades (CREO). Fue candidato a la Presidencia del Ecuador por CREO en las elecciones de 2013 en las que se convirtió en la segunda fuerza política del país.
A group of more than 20 leading scholars, convened by Global Americans, has outlined a series of nonpartisan proposals for the next administration to strengthen and leverage the U.S.’s relations with Latin America and the Caribbean.
Colombia’s remaining guerrilla group, the ELN, is finally coming to the negotiating table. But the government is in a very different negotiating position with the ELN than with FARC, a point reflected in the vague, poorly worded negotiation agreement announced March 30th.
Latin American and Caribbean states have been astoundingly cheap in supporting the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. In 2013, Chile only contributed $80,000, and the same year Brazil and Venezuela gave nothing to the Commission.
A recent Spanish report by DeJusticia details the modern challenges of the inter-American system of human rights: political consensus; countries refusing to pay their obligations; and countries cutting their contributions when they receive decisions they don’t like.
The net effect of these new bodies has been to create parallel forums more favorable to the interests of autocrats. That may be OK for Venezuela and others, but why are Brazil and other countries going along? And where are the media?
Human rights concerns in the Syria conflict? Not according to some Latin American governments.
