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Persecuted for more than a year, this electrician is just one of the Colombian government’s victims

[Translation of an article from Brasil de Fato of São Paulo, Brazil, for October 6. See original article here.]

by Patrícia Benvenuti

Thirty-seven-year-old Colombian electrician Carlos Alirio Peña García no longer feels safe at home, in the municipality of Barbacoas, in the department of Nariño, in the south of the country, where he lives with his wife and daughter. He is afraid that at any moment the police, who a year ago tried to make him pay for a crime he did not commit, will come back.

García’s case is just one example of the crimes the Colombian government perpetrates against the civilian population, who have to deal with the consequences of the alleged war against terrorism and narcotrafficking. (more…)

The structures had been abandoned for more than ten years

[Translation of an article from Brasil de Fato of São Paulo for October 5. See original article here.]

By Aline Scarso

Close to 3,000 people occupied four abandoned buildings in the center of São Paulo on the morning of Monday, September 4. The buildings are on São João, Prestes Maia, Ipiranga and Álvaro de Carvalho Avenues, at Nove de Julho Avenue. The Frente de Luta por Moradia (FLM – Front in the Struggle for Housing), which led the occupations, says the homeless people are from the eastern areas of the capital or had lived in slums and endangered areas in the center of the city. (more…)

[Translation of an article from El Mostrador of Santiago de Chile for October 9. See original article here and related article here.]

The last ten Mapuches who had been on hunger strike in the Angol prison decided last night to end their fast, the Secretary General of the Presidency, Cristián Larroulet, and representatives of the comuneros have announced.

The measure was taken after intense negotiations carried out in the past hours by representatives of the executive and of the strikers. (more…)

Rousseff changes her position on abortion, which costs her two points

[Translation of an article from La Jornada of Mexico City for October 7. See original article here.]

by Arturo Cano

Rio de Janeiro, October 6 – At the beginning of last year, Brazilian media gave prominence to a terrible story: a nine-year-old girl, raped by her stepfather and pregnant with twins, received an abortion in a public clinic in Pernambuco. The doctors had determined that in her case the two exceptional circumstances in Brazilian law were met: the life of the young mother was in danger and the pregnancy was the result of rape

The reaction of the Catholic Church, represented in this case by the archbishop of Recife and Olinda, José Cardoso, left no doubt about how far the Brazilian hierarchy would go in its “defense of life”: it excommunicated the doctors and the girl’s family members, except for the stepfather who had abused the child since she was six years old. “We consider it illicit to end one life to save another,” declared the Catholic hierarch in his final judgement on the episode.

When this case is taken into account, things did not go so badly for Dilma Rousseff, the Workers’ Party candidate, and Lula’s, for the Brazilian presidency. The war against her because of her support for decriminalizing abortion, on which she reversed herself in the campaign, cost her only two points in the first round of the election, according to some polls.

But although Rousseff would like to end this chapter, the more conservative sectors of the churches (the Catholic and the numerous evangelicals) are not going to let go of it from now until October 31, the date of the runoff election.

Besides, now they have an invaluable ally in José Serra, the Social Democrat Party candidate and Rousseff’s opponent. (more…)

Four articles

Recordings disclose police called for murder of president

[Translated from Diario Expreso of Guayaquil, Ecuador, for September 5. See original article here.]

A recording of the police radio includes voices of supposed officers calling for the killing of President Rafael Correa during a rebellion that left ten dead and 274 injured, according to audio distributed on Tuesday by the Andes public agency.

“Let them kill Correa so this can be over with, kill him and it will be done!” and “Kill him, kill the president!” are some of the comments heard on the half-hour recording of messages from the central radio facility released by Andes.

Last Thursday, protests against a law that eliminated bonuses for the police developed into a violent disturbance during which the president was detained for several hours in a hospital in Quito.

“Don’t let that son of a bitch [hijo de puta] go, make him sign (the police petitions) first, then he can leave; otherwise, that bastard [cabrón] doesn’t leave,” a voice demands. (more…)

Despite problems, community radio is struggling to break through the isolation imposed on the peasants.

[Translation of an article from Brasil de Fato of São Paulo, Brazil, for September 27. See original article here.]

by Thalles Gomes

It takes three hours of walking along a steep path to reach the community of Magò, a rural area in the minicipality of Pòdepè, in northeastern Haiti. It’s from there, on the top of the highest mountain in the region, with an infrastructure consisting of an antenna and a mud-walled house, that community Radio Zèbtènite carries on the struggle to break through the isolation of the Haitian peasants. (more…)

Three articles

Dilma makes amends with Catholics and evangelicals

[Translated from Hora do Povo of São Paulo for October 1. See original article here.]

The candidate of the Para o Brasil Seguir Mudando [So Brazil Will Continue Changing] coalition, Dilma Rousseff, held a meeting with representatives of catholics and evangelicals on Wednesday, September 29, in which she made a statement denying defamatory messages spread through the internet that accuse her of declaring that not even Jesus Christ could take this election away from her and that she would favor abortion and marriage between persons of the same sex.

“I reject totally statements that claim I used the name of Christ to say that not even he could defeat me in this election. It is slander, it is villany,” she said, emphasizing that these attacks represent a “defamatory campaign” against her candidacy. “These rumors come from the political underworld and are typical of the end of a campaign,” she declared. (more…)