Around Latin America

-Many are aware that Colombia has been in a civil war for 40+ years, but the ongoing process of electoral processes sometimes obscures just how violent Colombia still is. In the last 8 years (2002-2010), 20,915 people in Colombia have died as a direct result of its ongoing war. Stop and think about that: 20,915 people. That's nearly 18,000 more than those the Pinochet regime killed in 17 years; that's 10,000 more than the number of people killed in Brazil's favelas in twelve years. That's a depressing but important reminder that the war in Colombia is ongoing, it is real, and is still extremely violent.
-In Uruguay, former foreign minister Juan Carlos Blanco (who served during Uruguay's dictatorship in the 1970s and 1980s) was sentenced to twenty years in prison for his role in the disappearance of a Venezuelan teacher in 1976, marking yet another victory against dictatorship-era officials in Uruguay.

-In neighboring Paraguay, the government has imposed a 30-day state of emergency to combat an armed leftist group operating out of the country's north. The group, Ejército del Pueblo Paraguayo, has launched attacks on government buildings and police stations, and a recent attack left four people dead. Among other things, the 30-day state of emergency will allow the Paraguayan government todetain suspects and ban public meetings in the five provinces affected.

-Paraguay is not alone in facing a governmental crisis. In Nicaragua, a showdown between the judiciary and Daniel Ortega is intensifying, after two judges refused to resign in the face of Daniel Ortega's questionable use of an allegedly-expired law, leading to an increasingly uncertain situation in Nicaragua. As Greg points out, it's not a question of leftism; many view Ortega's move as an increasing tendency towards dictatorship, with one critic going so far as to declare that Nicaragua had gone "From Somocismo without Somoza to Somocismo with Ortega."

-Honduras has established a truth commission to look into the coup of last June. However, the commission is already off to a rocky start, with criticisms coming from all sides (including the suggestion of an "alternative truth commission" from non-pro-government individuals). Among the more problematic aspects of the commission: a leading member of the commission's formation declared the report would be archived for 10 years upon completion, meaning nobody would see the commission's findings for ten years. As the good folks over at Honduras Culture and Politics put it, this is effectively an effort to "hide the truth for ten years."

-Evo Morales has offended Brazilian farmers after the Bolivian president declared that eating chicken reduced masculinity and could lead to homosexuality. The claims are silly but fairly unimportant in terms of evaluating Morales's political agenda (though it does say something about societal views of homosexuality and homophobia in Bolivia). Still, given how much agriculture Brazil produces and supplies to the rest of Latin America, including Bolivia, I wouldn't really want to actively alienate any major food producer in Brazil.

-Finally, in doubly-depressing daily news out of Brazil: a 24-year-old housewife was lynched in Rio de Janeiro state yesterday after she ran over a pregnant woman while driving drunk. While the pregnant woman survived, the baby was lost, and in anger, a crowd gathered and shot the housewife. Certainly, drunk driving is not acceptable, but the crowd's response is far more unacceptable.

Around Latin America

-First, the earthquake in Haiti is an absolutely devastating tragedy, and the news will only get worse as estimates become available. And it hasn't just hit Haitians. There are reports that the U.N. headquarters there has collapsed. This will affect numerous countries, especially Brazil, which has been the head of and formed the majority of the peacekeeping missions there since the early 2000s. Brazil is already reporting the confirmed deaths of "at least" 11 Brazilian soldiers, with reports on peacekeeping troops still unavailable. Randy points us to places to donate aid

Mercy Corps
Doctors Without Borders
Oxfam
Charity Navigator (interactive map for charities in Haiti).

Haiti is one of the poorest countries in the world, so even a tiny donation in U.S. dollars could go a long way. I strenuously urge anybody and everybody who can to contribute to help Haitians.



-In other news, Chile last week opened up its Museum of Memory, which deals with the horrors of the Pinochet Regime. Lillie has been following this for quite awhile, and offers a good summary of the pros and cons of the museum.

-Chile was also able to repatriate the remains of five indigenous people who had been taken to Europe a century ago to be displayed as "curiosities." The issue of repatriation of indigenous people's remains and indigenous artifacts in Latin America is a heated issue, of course.

-I had commented before on the Brazilian military's opposition to the formation of a Truth Commission in Brazil. Sectors of the Catholic Church are now joining in on that opposition out of fear that the broader human rights plan that includes the Commission may also pave the way to gay marriage and legalized abortion.

-Honduras's military is expected to appear before the Supreme Court tomorrow (English summarization here) to determine whether the court will drop charges or not against the military for illegally removing Manuel Zelaya from Honduras last June. Meanwhile, in disgusting news,Honduras' National Association of Industrialists named Robert Micheletti the "Hero of the 21st Century." There has been strong evidence for awhile that the coup was done at least in part to protect the interests of a tiny minority of wealthy elites, but this definitely adds to that argument.

-Finally, because it's already been far from a cheerful beginning to the year, Erwin links us to this powerful video compiling human rights abuses from the victims' perspectives. It's only 60 seconds, but it's a powerful and important reminder of how far the human rights struggle has to go, and how it affects its victims directly.

The Brazilian Military's Opposition to a Truth Commission

A couple of months ago, I commented on Brazil finally launching a truth commission into the use of torture (thousands of victims) and disappearances (several hundred) during its twenty-one year military dictatorship. A couple of weeks ago, Lula sent a bill to Congress creating the "committee". I don't have much to add in terms of my own opinions expressed in the link above.

However, an interesting little knot has emerged in the process, as certain sectors of the military have already come out against the establishment such a committee, and the heads of the army, navy, and air force all tendered their resignations to Lula, who refused them. Still, he promised to "review" the bill again. This is, suffice to say, a step backwards, even if the bill proceeds. Scholars have done a good job of showing how, through much of the 1990s, military leaders were able to exert undue influence on presidents Collor, Itamar Franco, and Cardoso from behind the scenes, with the specter of possible military intervention always hovering over the leaders. While I haven't seen similar studies on Lula's administration, it's clear that much of the military's influence has remained in spite of Brazil re-writing its constitution in 1988 in an attempt to remove the military's constitution of 1967. If Lula buckles into this pressure, then there has been little change in this arena, and the military can still influence politicians in ways that should have disappeared with the dictatorship itself.

Beyond the obvious self-serving efforts of the military leaders on this (who I imagine may very well have entered the military and even began working their way up the chain of command during the dictatorship), there are a lot of reasons why their complaints that it will "tarnish" the military's reputation are bunk. Firstly, the fact that torture and disappearances happened is not only well-know, but very detailed and chronicled in the Nunca Mais project, an abbreviated version of which was published shortly after the end of the dictatorship, and is incredibly easy to find in Brazil (I actually have a copy sitting on my desk here next to me. The names of individual torturers are even pretty well-known, and the fact that such a commission may reveal more names doesn't tarnish the military's reputation; after all, we know what it did already. It simply tarnishes some of the individual torturers who may still be alive, and I'm sorry, but I just find little reason to sympathize with torturers. Additionally, this is as much about giving closure to the families of the hundreds of disappeared in Brazil. Their rights have been repeatedly violated over the years as this has remained unstudied and hidden away; it's time that the families, rather than the murderers, get some special treatment.

As the UPI article that Lillie links to points out, Lula may lose more face if he backtracks on the bill (which is now public) than the military would if he sticks with it. But this is about more than political face-saving. It's about justice and truth for thousands of Brazilians, and it's 25 years overdue.

Brazil to Establish a Truth Commission for Its Dictatorship Period (1964-1985)

Well, this is interesting news:

Twenty four years after the military left power in Brazil, the government is to create a Truth Commission to investigate crimes committed by the security forces between 1964 and 1985.

Brazil is the only country in Latin America which has not investigated deaths, disappearances and torture which took place during its dictatorship, or put alleged perpetrators on trial.

Anytime a Truth Commission is established, it's good news for multiple reasons: it forces governments and societies to recognize the horrible crimes some sectors have committed (and many more supported, tacitly or explicitly); it frequently allows closure for victims' families who still don't know the fate of their loved ones; and the sheer act of a truth commission hopefully deters such actions from future governments (though it's in no way guaranteed).

I'd like to say what all can emerge from this, but I really have no idea right now. It's not like the country, human rights organizers, or historians are going to be incredibly shocked by the techniques of torture and of murder by state agents - those accounts have been well-known and well-detailed both through non-state-sponsored commissions like the "Nunca Mais" ("Never Again") project, as well as testimonials of many others who were tortured. As for the disappearances and murders, it's true that sometimes details are missing, as in the case of the Araguaia guerrilla war in the early-1970s, when the military killed and buried dozens-to-hundreds of guerrillas challenging the dictatorship.

Additionally, I really do hope the military archives are opened up. The military's line that the archives were burnt and destroyed years ago and don't even exist rings hollow for a number of reasons. First, the military's stance on this has shifted throughout time; first, it said the archives didn't exist anymore, then that they never existed at all, then that they were did, but were closed, and then that they were destroyed. I suppose this is possible, but I find it unlikely. Additionally, I fail to see how some central components of the military security apparatus remain in archives like the Department of Public Order and Security (DOPS) archives in places like Rio and Sao Paulo, as well as the Division of Security and Information (DSI) archive at the National Archive, both of which I've had experience with. While the security apparati in Brazil were varying and multiple, they all ran through at least some branch of the military, so I fail to see how the DSI and DOPS collections could survive and make it into archives, yet the "military archives" have been destroyed. Plus, if my research experience showed anything in general terms, its that the "banality of evil" and the desire to document everything, no matter how incriminating, is a frequent feature (not a bug) of authoritarian regimes.

That said, I also suspect this can only illuminate so much. Even if the commission reveals the general whereabouts of the bodies of the victims of the Araguaian war, for example, it was in one of the most forbidding and rapidly shifting environmental areas in Brazil, and tracking down the bodies' remains could be difficult (though the fact that some remains have been found is somewhat encouraging).

I hate to end on a pessimistic note, so I'll make it the penultimate point. One of the people quoted in the article points out that state agents still actively practice torture in prisons and against the poor, and he's absolutely right. However, I don't have much hope that a Truth Commission into the dictatorship period in Brazil will lead to an end to current practices of torture. Torture and "alternate" rights for the poor and marginalized in Brazil have existed since slavery; the poor and the rich/darker and lighter have always had alternate sources of justice, prisons, etc. Torturing the poor and marginalized has been a part of the landscape of Brazilian "law" since the late-1800s, and I just don't see why a commission studying just 21 years would suddenly lead everybody to support an end to torture today. Again, it's not like the practice and methods of torture in the dictatorship are some secret - most people in Brazil (and those studying the dictatorship) are familiar with the "parrot's perch," the "dragon chair," and other torture mechanisms. If society has known about these for more than 30 years, I really don't see how a truth commission will suddenly lead to an "awakening." I hope I'm wrong, but I just don't see it.

That said, the fact that the government and state apparatuses themselves are finally forcing themselves to deal with this dark period in Brazil's history is nothing but good news. Again, scholars and others have known much of this for decades, but new details are always valuable to historians and human rights activists, and especially to the victims' families, and the fact that the government is finally willing to confront its past is an important step, even if it is symbolic. If nothing else, Brazil's governments and state owe this to the families who lost loved ones in their struggles against a repressive, authoritarian regime.