by Emily Chow
on October 19, 2011
On Monday, October 17th, Chairman of the House Foreign Relations Committee, Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, sent a letter to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, expressing grave concerns over the U.S. performances by the National Cuban Youth Theater, “La Colmenita.” In her letter, she questions the decision of the State Department to issue visas to the children’s group and demands an explanation for granting the visas, in addition to a “detailed accounting of all funding for educational programs with Cuba.” Her reasoning? To ensure that the State Department is not misusing taxpayer funds to promote exchange with Cuba. Rep. Ros-Lehtinen also claims that the group, which is comprised of 5-16 year olds, poses a national security threat, as one of the plays they perform is inspired by the story of the Cuban Five, un-registered agents of the Cuban government who were convicted of conspiracy to commit espionage and are currently serving long sentences in U.S. prisons. The Economist, a United Kingdom-based newspaper (with offices in the Americas, Europe, Africa and the Middle East, and Asia), conducted an interesting poll last week about the fairness of the trial (which was held in Miami) of the Cuban Five; see the results here.
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by Lisa Haugaard
on September 26, 2011
The State Department on September 15, 2011, certified that Colombia had met the human rights conditions attached to U.S. assistance. No surprise there—the State Department always certifies Colombia meets the conditions, no matter what is happening on the ground. To be fair, this time, with the year-old Santos Administration, there’s somewhat more reason to certify than during countless rounds of certification during the Uribe Administration. The certification document cites the Santos Administration's successful passage of a victims' reparations and land restitution bill; a “disarming of words” initiative in which it abandoned the inflammatory anti-NGO language used by Uribe and his top officials, which had endangered human rights defenders and journalists; progress on some historic human rights cases; and a variety of directives and policy initiatives, at least on paper, to support human rights and labor rights.
But the 118- page document contains a wealth of information that shows why we should still be deeply concerned.
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by Geoff Thale, Director of Programs, WOLA
on October 14, 2011
The Latin America Working Group is pleased to re-post this piece on U.S.-Cuba policy from our colleague at the Washington Office on Latin America, Geoff Thale. At LAWG, we are trying to maximize the opening recently made available by President Obama for increased travel to Cuba -- people-to-people travel, educational travel, religious travel, cultural travel. We are encouraging and educating the public on "how-to" travel to Cuba. See our on-line brochure, "How-to Travel to Cuba" here . We are very aware of how tenuous this small opening is, and how far it is from "Travel for All" with no restrictions. And we are aware that with just a stroke of the pen from a new President, these advances could be erased. We ask for your help in preventing that roll-back. Sign up for our Cuba policy updates and action alerts here. And "like" our "End the Travel Ban on Cuba" Facebook page here.
The 2012 presidential race is effectively underway, and the two leading candidates have both recently made statements about Cuba. While they may differ in emphasis, Barack Obama and Mitt Romney clearly share one thing: they are both out of touch when it comes to Cuba and what U.S. policy should be towards the island.
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by Ben Leiter
on September 20, 2011
Inés and Valentina have waited long enough. It’s time for justice to be served.
Nine long years after being raped and tortured by soldiers in the Mexican military, Inés Fernández and Valentina Rosendo—two Me’phaa indigenous women from Guerrero, Mexico—have yet to see justice done. They’re tired of excuses and sick of delays, so they’re launching a campaign that calls on President Calderón to stand up against human rights abuses by the military and hold soldiers accountable for their crimes.
But Inés and Valentina can’t do this alone. They need your help.
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by Lisa Haugaard and Vanessa Kritzer
on October 12, 2011
The U.S.-Colombia trade agreement was held up for an unprecedented five years over human rights and labor rights concerns. It was passed today, October 12th, but over strong and passionate opposition from many members of Congress, and from a broad range of civil society organizations in the United States and Colombia, including labor unions, human rights groups, faith-based organizations, environmental groups, and Afro-Colombian, indigenous and small-scale farmer associations.
"Why do we care so much about this?" said Lisa Haugaard, Executive Director of the Latin America Working Group (LAWG). "Because we believe that passage of this agreement will make it harder to encourage the Colombian government to protect its trade unionists, who are still murdered with impunity today—23 so far this year. Because we believe the flood of agricultural imports from the United States will undermine Colombia’s small-scale farmers, including Afro-Colombians and indigenous people, who have suffered so much in Colombia’s civil war. And because it will boost the kinds of large-scale investment, such as mining and biofuel, that has helped to fuel the violence in a conflict that still grinds brutally on."
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by Max Schoening and Sibylla Brodzinsky, Voice of Witness
on September 13, 2011
“And the worst of all is when the things happen to you and you can’t do anything,” said María, a displaced woman in Colombia who has endured abuses by guerrillas, paramilitaries and the army. “And you have to just watch and simply be silent. If you say something, it will happen all the same. That’s when I saw that the only real right we have as people is to be silent. Maybe that’s the real right I’ve exercised here, in Colombia. It’s watch and be silent, if you want to survive.”
LAWGEF is pleased to publish this selection from a book coming out in 2012 from McSweeney’s Voice of Witness, by editors Max Schoening and Sibylla Brodzinsky. This will be a powerful collection of oral histories, compiling the life stories of a selection of Colombia’s over 5 million internally displaced people. In their own words, narrators recount their lives before displacement, the reasons for their flight, their personal tragedies and struggles to rebuild their lives. By amplifying these unheard voices through the intimacy of first person narrative, this Voice of Witness book aims to increase awareness of Colombia’s human rights catastrophe and illuminate the human impact of the country’s ongoing war.
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