The Latin Americanist

Nuestro Cine: Wedding Bell Blues

2012-05-26T16:45:00.000-04:00

Indie filmmakers have increasingly sought the use of websites such as Kickstarter to help finance and support their plans. But might this also be a useful resource for up-and-coming Latino and Latin American auteurs? We will briefly look at one example today.

The following is the trailer to "After the Wedding," a drama/comedy film in the works that looks at traditional love in a modern age through the experiences of a newlywed couple:

"After the Wedding" is an appealing project with an interesting plot, a largely Latino cast and is also written, directed and produced by three Latina sisters. Yet for the movie to become a reality the film’s creators are seeking donations via Kickstarter and today is the deadline for funding.

As of the time of this post over sixty percent of the $75,000 goal has been pledged to fund "After the Wedding." Thus it remains to be seen if in the upcoming hours the project can reach its aim and the film can go into production this summer. The campaign for "After the Wedding" can already be viewed as a success, however, since it raised awareness of a proposal that would’ve been largely unknown had it not been for Kickstarter.

Video Source – Vimeo via After the Wedding

Online Sources – Kickstarter, Los Angeles Times

Weekend Headlines: May 26-27, 2012

2012-05-26T12:30:00.003-04:00

* Honduras: Several thousand people took to the streets around the country to call for justice in the murders of over twenty journalists in the past three years.

* Brazil: President Dilma Rousseff used her line-item veto powers to reject portions of a controversial forestry law.

* Panama: An organization representing most of the world’s ship owners urged the Panama Canal Authority to delay a proposed toll hike.

* Costa Rica: Anti-whaling activist Paul Watson could be extradited to Costa Rica on charges from a 2002 incident involving a Costa Rican fishing vessel.

* Cuba: A spokeswoman for the Ladies in White said that Cuban Catholic Church do not consider them as a “humanitarian group.”

* Ecuador: A group of Chevron shareholders urged the oil giant to settle its legal battle in an Ecuadorian environmental damages lawsuit.

Video Source – YouTube via The VJ Movement

Online Sources- BBC News, CBS News, Bloomberg, Los Angeles Times, Miami Herald, Wall Street Journal

Daily Headlines: May 25, 2012

2012-05-25T11:45:00.002-04:00

* Brazil: Defending champions Santos will face fellow Brazil club Corinthians in the semifinals of the Copa Libertadores while Universidad de Chile will try to upset six-time titleholders Boca Juniors of Argentina.

* Latin America: According to a new study alcohol consumption in Latin America is far lower than Europe and the U.S.

* Argentina: Researchers were able to identify the remains of a body found in a Uruguayan cemetery as those of an Argentine man who disappeared thirty-six years ago during the “Dirty War.”

* Ecuador: Foreign Minister Ricardo Patino said that Ecuador will buy $400 million of fuel from Iran.

Video Source – YouTube via paulkiske

Online Sources- SI.com, Bernama, CNN, Bloomberg

Daily Headlines: May 23, 2012

2012-05-23T08:15:00.003-04:00

* Colombia: Is there a link between the deactivated bomb in a Buenos Aires theater where ex-Colombian leader Alvaro Uribe was supposed to lecture and the failed assassination attempt last week against former interior minister Fernando Londoño?

* Honduras: A new national police chief was sworn in to replace Ricardo Ramirez del Cid who left the post amidst controversy over the murder of journalist Alfredo Villatoro.

* Peru: Fisheries Minister Gladys Triveno claimed that “natural causes,” not oil exploration, led to the deaths of hundreds of dolphins off the Peruvian coastline.

* Guatemala: A judge added a second genocide charge against former dictator Efrain Rios Montt due to his supposed role in 1982’s Dos Erres massacre.

Video Source – YouTube via TVPublicaArgentina

Online Sources- Los Angeles Times, BBC News, Fox News, Huffington Post, Deutsche Welle

Today’s Video: Red Card of God

2012-05-22T20:00:00.000-04:00

The ongoing diplomatic tug-of-war between Argentina and Britain over the Falklands/Malvinas recently spread into the world of sport. Several weeks ago the Argentine government aired an ad featuring hockey captain Fernando Zylberberg secretly training on the disputed islands.

"To me to be training in any other province or to do it over the islands is the same," said Zylberberg in response to the commercial though his views were not shared by the British government or the International Olympic Committee.

A lighter, more humorous ad in the U.K. in order to promote ITV's coverage of June's Euro 2012 soccer tournament. The clip pokes fun at England's failures on the pitch and wonders what would've happened if the infamous "Hand of God" goal in the 1986 World Cup by Diego Maradona had been disallowed:

Defending Euro champions Spain are the odds-on favorites to win the tournament while one betting firm placed England's odds at 11 to 1.

Meanwhile, Lio Messi, Sergio Aguero and Gonzalo Higuain were among those named to the Argentina squad that will play Ecuador in a June 2nd World Cup qualifier.

Video Sources - YouTube via pupianews, ITV

Online Sources - CNN, Fox Sports, The Independent

Daily Headlines: May 22, 2012

2012-05-22T08:15:00.002-04:00

* Honduras: Residents of the Miskito Coast have called on U.S. drug agents to leave the area after four people were killed earlier this month in a counternarcotics raid.

* Haiti: Two U.S. citizens were arrested after allegedly taking part in protests by Haitian former soldiers seeking the return of the country's disbanded army.

* Chile: Several hundred anti-government demonstrators took to the streets of Valparaiso during President Sebastian Piñera’s state of the union address.

* Guatemala: Officials are on high alert due to increased activity from the Volcan de Fuego in central Guatemala.

Video Source – YouTube via Democracy Now (A recent segment on Democracy Now took a critical look at the “war on drugs” including this month’s deadly DEA raid in Honduras).

Online Sources- Fox News Latino, Huffington Post, LAHT, IOL News

Daily Headlines: May 21, 2012

2012-05-21T08:00:00.002-04:00

* Cuba: In a possible setback for future oil exploration off the Cuban coast Spanish firm Repsol claimed that the first well they drilled in Cuban waters came up dry.

* Brazil: President Dilma Rousseff will receive compensation for the human rights abuses she suffered during Brazil's 1964-1985 military dictatorship, while she formally inaugurated a “truth commission” to investigate violations committed during that era.

* Mexico: Police arrested a suspected member of the Zetas drug gang accused of being behind the recent massacre of forty-one people.

* Peru: Did the military secretly execute over a dozen rebels in 1997 during a raid to rescue hostages in the Japanese ambassador's residence?

Video Source – YouTube via Associated Press (From January 2012 – “An oil rig is ready to begin drilling off Cuba's coast. The area is believed to have billions of barrels of oil under the sea floor, and Cuba is hoping that oil will provide an economic boost.”)

Online Sources- BusinessWeek, GlobalPost, Bloomberg, Huffington Post, Time

Taking a Break

2012-05-16T10:30:00.002-04:00

We are going on a brief hiatus for a few days and hopefully we will return to publish a few posts over the weekend.

In the meantime we'll leave you with a video that we've previously highlighted - the Mystery Science Theater 3000 poking fun at a short film on Venezuela:

Enjoy!

Video Source - YouTube via Ekit357

Mexican Author Carlos Fuentes Died

2012-05-16T09:00:00.000-04:00

Carlos Fuentes, one of Latin America’s leading authors and intellectuals, died on Tuesday at the age of 83.

Born in Panama, Fuentes was a prolific writer whose works included "The Death of Artemio Cruz" and "Destiny and Desire." For his writing he won numerous awards including Spain’s coveted Cervantes Prize for literature in 1987.

His bestseller "The Old Gringo" was turned into a Hollywood film in 1989 that starred Gregory Peck.

Fuentes was not afraid to express his political views on topics affecting the Americas. In his novel “The Crystal Frontier,” Fuentes blasted U.S. immigration policy, while more recently he criticized Mexican presidential frontrunner Enrique Perez Nieto and called for drug legalization.

The below video comes from an interview via the AARP. In it, Fuentes describes how loneliness can become an impetus for writing and explains the advantages to being an artist:

Video Source – YouTube via AARP

Online Sources – Reuters, New York Times

Daily Headlines: May 16, 2012

2012-05-16T07:30:00.002-04:00

* Colombia: President Juan Manuel Santos said that officials do not know who was responsible for a deadly bombing in Bogota that allegedly targeted a former minister.

* Puerto Rico: The U.S. Supreme Court rejected hearing a case challenging Puerto Rican voting restrictions.

* Brazil: A spokesman for the Brazilian Foreign Ministry warned that the biggest challenge for next month’s Rio+20 environmental summit is to reach consensus and "to conciliate multiple interests."

* Panama: The only survivor of a Panamanian fishing boat that was lost for twenty-eight days is suing a cruise company whose ship allegedly ignored his calls for rescue.

Video Source – YouTube via TVPublicaArgentina

Online Sources- CNN, UPI, CBC News, Xinhua

Dangerous Liaisons in Peru

2012-05-15T16:45:00.000-04:00

The U.S. Secret Service scandal involving agents soliciting sex workers in Colombia has garnered plenty of headlines. Yet another incident in Peru has served as an example of a women being taken advantage of by a politically connected individual.

Congressman Walter Acha has come under intense scrutiny after being accused of raping his former press advisor, Idelia Calderón. She alleged that her ex-boss doped her and then sexually abused her during a working trip in February. Calderón then claimed that she impregnated him and he attempted to pay for her to abort the fetus. (She would eventually miscarry the child).

Acha initially denied the accusation but he was forced to quickly change his tune after Calderón secretly videotaped a conversation with him. In the video, which she gave to a Peruvian TV network, Acha admitted that he “touched” the lawyer and subsequently claimed that he and Calderón were “lovers”:

Acha, who is married, was expelled from the political party he was allied to and prosecutors this week opened an investigation against him.

Video Source – YouTube via Univision Noticias

Online Sources – ABC News, Peru21, Andina

Dominican Presidency Up for Grabs Says Polls

2012-05-15T15:15:00.000-04:00

Recent polls have indicated that with less than a week to go in the election for president of the Dominican Republic the race is up for grabs between official party candidate Danilo Medina and ex-president Hipólito Mejía.

According to the results of two recently released polls Medina would be the victor in this Sunday’s elections though by differing margins. One poll conducted in late April of over 1500 eligible voters by Spanish firm Sigma Dos Group found that Medina would win by 7.1%. The results, which were released today, concluded that Medina would win since the survey’s margin of error was only 2.5%.

Meanwhile, another poll by Greenberg Quinlan Rosner and published in Diario Libre gave Medina a slim 51-46 advantage over Mejía though they also found that as much as ten percent of the electorate could change their vote. Hence, this survey indicated that both candidates would have to faceoff in a head-to-head second round.

Despite those results a third poll conducted by The Campol Group gave Mejía the edge by a five-point margin (50-45) ahead of Medina.

With such a high uncertainty over who would win and the possibility of election heading to a runoff, the race for the presidency could be decided by the estimated 5.0% of the electorate residing in the U.S. Hence, both Medina and Mejía have traveled abroad to attract voters though the latter’s visit to New York was marred when he said that U.S. President Barack Obama “came from Africa.”

Furthermore, other factors that could push Dominican expat voters to the polls is that they don’t have to travel to Santo Domingo to vote and they will also be choosing legislators for the Dominican Congress.

As blogger James Bosworth recently observed, Dominican voters abroad this Sunday could have an impact on upcoming elections in countries like Mexico and Venezuela:

A number of Latin American countries have created absentee voting systems to allow their expat communities to vote in national elections. Up through now, it has never been the decisive factor in an election.  

If May's Dominican election or any other future election is decided by voters abroad, or even if it's close enough to make it a question, what happens next in the region? Could any country backtrack on the voting abroad rules they have created? Is it actually fair for a portion of the population who live outside the country to overturn what would otherwise be the majority result by the domestic population? Those are all fun questions to consider as the DR race comes down to the wire.

Video Source – YouTube via VideosJCE (2011 PSA by the Dominican Republic’s electoral commission urging expats to register to vote).

Online Sources – lainformacion.com, Dominican Today, Observatorio Politico Dominicano, Fox News Latino, Christian Science Monitor

Arizona's Classroom Battleground

2012-05-15T11:00:00.002-04:00

Arizona has become a key state in the often-acrimonious discussion over illegal immigration, particularly with respect to the controversial S.B. 1070 immigration law. The U.S. Supreme Court is expected to render a verdict next month on the legality of the statute though that decision might do little to change other debates in Arizona related to race and ethnicity.

“Precious Knowledge” is a documentary that focuses on the contentious fight over Mexican American studies programs in Arizona public schools. Last January, for example, Tuscon education officials dropped Mexican-American Studies courses due to supposed promotion of ethnic resentment. As noted in this article from Fox News Latino, however, such actions have allegedly created “a web of censorship and confusion (that) has entangled the city’s public schools”.

The following trailer for “Precious Knowledge” includes portions of interviews with teachers, parents and lawmakers who are for and against the ethnic studies ban:

The film by Tuscon-based filmmakers Ari Luis Palos and Eren Isabel McGinnis premieres on Thursday May 17 as part of PBS’ “Indepenedent Lens” series. (Check your local lisitings for airings in your area).

Video Source – Vimeo via Dos Vatos

Online Sources – Reuters, Fox News Latino

Daily Headlines: May 15, 2012

2012-05-15T08:00:00.002-04:00

* Latin America: Members of the UNASUR bloc vowed to “share information on their military spending” but will it be enough to stem the growing arms trade throughout Latin America?

* U.S.: Despite objections from immigrant rights groups and Latino rights activists the federal government continues to implement the “Secure Communities” program across the country.

* Mexico: The recent discovery of forty-nine headless bodies in northern Mexico has brought additional scrutiny on President Felipe Calderon’s offensive against on drug gangs.

* Ecuador: A U.S. judge dismissed some of the claims made by attorneys for Chevron against Ecuadorian plaintiffs in an environmental damages lawsuit.

Video Source – YouTube via Al Jazeera English (From April 2009 – “Latin America's largest defense trade show in the Brazilian city of Rio de Janeiro has attracted governments from all over the region.”)

Online Sources- UPI, MSNBC, Fox News Latino, BusinessWeek

Colombia: Prosecutors Crackdown on “Para-Politics” Figures

2012-05-14T15:45:00.000-04:00

The FARC’s deadly ambush on a police post and the kidnapping of French journalist Romeo Langlois have served as the latest examples of the barbarism committed by Latin America’s oldest-existing guerillas. But Colombia’s long-running civil conflict runs far deeper than military actions against the state and has embedded itself in the world of Colombian politics.

Case in point is the recent actions related to the “para-politics” scandal where local and federal legislators have been accused of collaborating with illegal paramilitary groups. Since Sunday the Prosecutor General's office have arrested at least a dozen politicians from the Magdalena valley over their alleged ties to paramilitaries.

Investigators have yet to reveal exact names but it’s believed that the accused are part of a list of sixty wanted officials including former and current mayors, governors and legislators.

According to Colombia Reports, the supposedly corrupt politicos made devilish deals in order to receive electoral support:

In the Chivolo Pact, which was signed by more than 400 leaders in the village of La Estrella on September 28, 2000, local leaders aligned with extradited paramilitary leader Rodrigo Tovar Pupo, alias "Jorge 40" in order to receive his electoral "blessing."

In the Pivijay Pact, another group of politicians joined forces with Jorge 40 in order to receive support and votes for the 2002 congressional campaigns of Jose Gamarra, Dieb Maloof, Jorge Castro and Gustavo Orozco. The pact was signed in the municipality of Pivijay, Magdalena department on November 22, 2001.

Over the past few years the “para-politics” scandal has implicated hundreds of politicians including the cousin of then-President Alvaro Uribe and the brother of former Foreign Minister Maria Consuelo Araujo.

Video Source – YouTube via valleduparnoticias7 (Rodrigo Tovar Pupo, alias "Jorge 40", was extradited to the U.S. and sentenced to twenty-six years in prison).

Online Sources – The Guardian, BBC News, Colombia Reports, Huffington Post, El Colombiano, El Espectador

Argentine Senators Back Breakthrough Gender Identity Law

2012-05-14T13:45:00.000-04:00

In last Thursday’s “Daily Headlines” we mentioned that Argentina’s Senate easily approved a “dignified death” law. Yet this important proposal was overshadowed by another bill overwhelmingly backed during the same legislative session last week.

By a 55-0 vote the Senate passed a proposal that grants increased rights to transgender individuals. One of the items in the new Law of Gender Identity allows Argentina to become the world’s first country to allow people to change their legal gender without being obligated to first undergo judicial, psychiatric and medical procedures.

Justus Eisfeld, co-director of Global Action for Trans Equality in New York, told the AP that the new law “is a real game changer and completely unique in the world. It is light years ahead of the vast majority of countries, including the U.S., and significantly ahead of even the most advanced countries.”

Local human rights groups as well as the LGBT community celebrated the new law. As noted in Global Voices Online, however, the bishop of the Diocese of Jujuy was not pleased with the Senate’s actions. “Identity is given from the sex that we receive and from the identity that we take from our mother's womb,” said Daniel Fernández before the law was approved.

The following video is a public service announcement released earlier this year in favor of the gender rights law. Among those interviewed was transgender rights activist Claudia Pía Baudracco who died last March.

Argentina was the first nation in Latin America to pass a comprehensive marriage equality law in 2010.

Other countries in the region have made great strides to improve the rights for the LGBT community. Same-sex couples are “a constitutive form of family” according to part of a recent ruling made by Colombia’s Constitutional Court.

(Video hat tip: Blabbeando).

Video Source – YouTube via Blabbeando

Online Sources – The Latin Americanist, NPR, Fox News Latino, Blabbeando, BBC Mundo, Global Voices Online

Daily Headlines: May 14, 2012

2012-05-14T08:00:00.003-04:00

* Venezuela: Pastor Maldonado became the first Venezuelan driver to win a Formula 1 race after he triumphed in the Spanish Grand Prix yesterday.

* Mexico: Police discovered the mutilated bodies of forty-nine people along a highway near the northern city of Monterrey.

* Colombia: Former right-wing paramilitary commander Salvatore Mancuso alleged that the militias supported “in the communities and with money” the 2006 reelection campaign of then-President Alvaro Uribe.

* Peru: Interior Minister Daniel Lozada and Defense Minister Alberto Otarola resigned after facing heavy criticism over a “failed security operation” against Shining Path guerillas.

Video Source – YouTube via MotorsportLiveTV (“Pastor Maldonado expects there will be a "big party" in his native Venezuela after taking his maiden Formula 1 win at the Spanish Grand Prix.”)

Online Sources- ESPN, BBC News, Voice of America, Fox News Latino

Today’s Video: Seeking Justice on Mexico's Mothers Day

2012-05-11T19:45:00.001-04:00

Mother's love is peace. It need not be acquired, it need not be deserved.

---German psychologist and philosopher Erich Fromm

On May 10th, the date that is observed as Mother’s Day in Mexico, several thousand protesters from around the country gathered in Mexico City. As seen in the below video, participants in the “March for National Dignity” sought to call attention to victims of the country’s violence such as mothers whose children have “disappeared”:

Among the stories of personal anguish found in the march was that of twin sisters Mitzi and Nitza Alvarado according to Mexican daily Vanguardia.

“We where arriving at a family reunion…when the army got there and took away my uncle, mother-in-law and cousin,” said Mitzi. The twins, who were fourteen at the time of the incident in December 2009, claimed that their mother said, “I’ll be right back” before leaving with the group. That was the last time the teens ever saw their mom.

“They took my son away and they took my life away,” said “Delia”, one of the mothers who marched from the northern department of Torreon in order to take part in the rally in the Mexican capital on Thursday.

Despite her “living a nightmare and in darkness”, she told the press that because of her love as a mother she “will never stop being tired of waiting,” for the return of her missing son.

March organizers urged authorities to actively and fully investigate the whereabouts of their “disappeared” family members. Other demands made included suggesting the appointment of a special prosecutor to look into the cases of those who have gone missing as well as creating a national database of all suspected “disappearances”.

Events related to the march where also held in Central American countries such as El Salvador where local immigrants’ rights groups organized a small rally near the Mexican embassy in San Salvador.

Video Source – YouTube via Cadena3Noticias

Online Sources – El Siglo de Torreon, Quoteland, NSS Oaxaca, CNNMexico.com, Vanguardia

Daily Headlines: May 11, 2012

2012-05-11T12:00:00.003-04:00

* Haiti: A 19-year-old Haitian man testified at a closed-door judicial hearing against six former U.N. peacekeepers from Uruguay accused of sexually assaulting him last year.

* Chile: The Chilean legislature overwhelmingly backed an anti-discrimination law that had been stalled for years but was fast-tracked after the March murder of gay teen Daniel Zamudio.

* Mexico: An American Civil Liberties Union report urged U.S. authorities to investigate complaints of abuse by Border Patrol agents against migrants and Mexican residents.

* Puerto Rico: According to a poll published this week a slim majority of Puerto Ricans back the island’s current commonwealth status.

Video Source – YouTube via Al Jazeera English

Online Sources- News24, Huffington Post, The Latin Americanist, MSNBC, Fox News Latino

Today’s Video: Potty Mouth

2012-05-10T10:30:00.002-04:00

A politician from the Colombian department of Antioquia has come under fire over his use of offensive colloquialisms.

As mentioned in Colombia Reports, provincial legislator Rodrigo Mesa used silly language to describe his opposition to a program aiding the neighboring province of Choco. “The money you will invest in Choco is like adding perfume to a turd,” said the politico as seen in the following video:

“When you go to a party at someone's home, the first thing is to clean the house so when guests arrive they find an organized home. But if they find some shitty, dirty diapers everywhere they are going to criticize," added Mesa in reference to the country’s poorest department and whose residents are mostly people of African descent.

Mesa’s comments led to heavy criticism from numerous public figures such as an “embarrassed” Antioquia Governor Sergio Fajardo. The head of the Liberal Party, which Mesa belongs to, said that he might “open a disciplinary process” against the legislator.

The harshest reaction may have come from federal senator Carlos Alberto Baena who alleged that Mesa could be tried under anti-discrimination laws and might serve three years in prison if convicted.

Mesa was initially reluctant to apologize and even tried to defend his remarks by making the odd claim that his use of the Spanish word bollo was meant to describe a fight rather than a turd. (It should be noted that here is no such saying in the Spanish-speaking world alluding to “putting perfume on a turd”).

Ultimately, Mesa finally presented a partial apology in an interview with a local radio station.
“All that I meant to say was that Antioquia funds should stay in Antioquia and not be used elsewhere,” said Mesa who added that he only regretted his “use of words” but not the argument he made.

Video Source – YouTube via cablenoticiastv

Online Sources – Radio Santa Fe, Colombia Reports, El Espectador, Semana.com, El Tiempo

Daily Headlines: May 10, 2012

2012-05-10T08:30:00.004-04:00

* Argentina: The Senate overwhelmingly backed a "dignified death" law that has raised questions and concerns over issues of health and bioethics.

* Latin America: Honduran radio reporter Alfredo Villatoro was kidnapped after reportedly receiving numerous death threats, while the Colombian government rejected the FARC’s conditions for the possible release of French journalist Romeo Langlois.

* U.S.: Will President Barack Obama's endorsement of same-sex marriage have a major effect on Latino voters or will it get buried under other topics like immigration and the economy?

* Mexico: Authorities believe that the Zetas drug gang may have been behind the beheading deaths of fifteen people whose corpses were found in Guadalajara.

Video Source – YouTube via TVPublicaArgentina (Among those interviewed in this clip from Argentine TV is Selva Herbon, a vocal supporter of the "dignified death" law and mother of a three-year-old child in a vegetative state).

Online Sources- The Guardian, BBC News, Huffington Post, Fox News Latino, MSNBC

Today’s Video: In Limbo

2012-05-09T17:00:00.003-04:00

Last month we looked at a pair of Cuban actors who defected during a layover in Miami and after they starred in a film on immigrating to the U.S. In the latest case of life imitating art, a man has been stuck in a Venezuelan airport similar to the protagonist played by Tom Hanks in “The Terminal.”

Members of the Argentine rock band Los Pericos found a Sri Lankan man who claimed to have been living in Maiquetia International Airport for the past four months. As seen in the following video via the YouTube page of Los Pericos, the man has been unable to return to his homeland due to Sri Lanka’s armed conflict and he has been unable to receive a visa from Venezuelan authorities:

The man alleged that he originally traveled to Mexico six months ago but was subsequently deported to Venezuela. He has reportedly received help from airline workers and from “ a human rights NGO” such as a bed for him to rest in.

“Someone made a mistake,” said an anonymous source at Maiquetia to the EFE news agency. The source also claimed “the man has been looked out for…by Venezuelan immigration officials.”

In 2008, Japanese traveler Hiroshi Nohara spent over one hundred days living in Mexico City’s Benito Juarez airport. Unlike the unnamed Sri Lankan man in Venezuela, however, Nohara did have a visa and he eventually used it to leave the airport.

Video Source – YouTube via pericoswebtv

Online Sources – The Latin Americanist, IMDb, Panorama, ABC Color

Daily Headlines: May 9, 2012

2012-05-09T11:00:00.002-04:00

* Venezuela: In the latest troubles to hit the Venezuela prison system, “heavy gunfire” was reported yesterday at a facility where inmates began rioting eleven days ago.

* Haiti: Will a push to “rebrand” Haiti as a major tourist destination fail or succeed?

* Peru: Scientists believe that a warming of coastal waters may have led to the recent deaths of over 4000 sea birds that have washed up on Peruvian beaches.

* Uruguay: According to the latest FIFA monthly rankings Uruguay continues as Latin America’s highest-ranked team and third in the world.

Video Source – YouTube via YoSoiTV (Amateur footage allegedly showing gunfire breaking out on Tuesday in the La Planta prison in Caracas)

Online Sources- TSN, Miami Herald, The Guardian, BBC News

Today’s Video: Going for Goal

2012-05-08T10:45:00.001-04:00

Women’s soccer may be viewed as secondary to their male counterparts throughout Latin America. Yet in recent years women have made great strides to become more involved in “the beautiful game.” Virginia Tovar of Mexico, for instance, enjoyed a thirteen-year career as a pro soccer referee despite the occasional insults from fans and players. The Brazilian women’s national team has emerged as one of the world’s top squads though sides from Argentina and Colombia have gradually gained regional prominence.

In a unique example of female inclusion in Latin American soccer, Nelfi Ibanez Guerra of Bolivia is using her experience and training in order to try to lead a Peruvian club into the Andean country’s first division:

The road for women in soccer has been bumpy; for example, the widely successful Santos women’s team of Brazil ceased operations months ago reportedly in order to pay for the salary of star male player Neymar. But that road continues without a dead end in sight for women who wish to participate in one of the world’s most popular sports.

Video Source – YouTube via AFP

Online Sources – ReVista: Harvard Review of Latin America, Mujer Futbol, Golcaracol.com, tribalfootball.com

Daily Headlines: May 8, 2012

2012-05-08T08:15:00.003-04:00

* Colombia: A statement from the FARC guerrillas demanded “a broad-ranging debate about freedom of information” as a possible condition for the release of kidnapped French journalist Romeo Langlois.

* Chile: President Sebastián Piñera’s approval ratings reached a new low of 26% according to survey results released yesterday.

* U.S.: Authorities have not named any suspects in the death of a Guatemalan-born stable worker who was killed at Churchill Downs on the same day that the Kentucky Derby was held.

* Venezuela: President Hugo Chavez broke his week-long silence and said that he was “fulfilling (his) duties as head of state” despite multiple trips to Cuba for medical treatment.

Video Source – YouTube via teleSUR (On Sunday a FARC commander claimed that the rebels detained French journalist Romeo Langlois as a “prisoner of war.”)

Online Sources- Reuters, The Latin Americanist, Santiago Times, CNN, MSNBC