President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) has opened yet another battlefront in Mexico’s belligerent political context. In violation of the constitution, the national education law, and the most basic sense of decency and morality, but with the usual levels of opacity and cynicism, AMLO’s government has drafted and published new textbooks for public schools nationwide through the Ministry of Education. The textbooks are fraught with manifold math, science, and history errors and reveal a total disregard for knowledge and education.

Rightly so, there has been a strong reaction and outrage by opposition parties, civil society, and parents for this assault against public education. Several local governments have refused to distribute the textbooks and have filed lawsuits before the Supreme Court. Some federal judges have already issued precautionary measures against their distribution, given the violations in the legally required drafting process, which was conducted opaquely and without the necessary consultations with the various actors within the education system. Regardless of the legal effects of these cases, the episode is a clear representation of the government’s nature and political intentions. If some doubts remained about AMLO’s political and ideological goals, the textbooks now expose it in black and white.

One of AMLO’s first actions as president was to eliminate the National Institute for the Evaluation of Education (INEE), an autonomous government agency in charge of evaluating the development and shortcomings of education nationwide. It made sense. If education is no longer a priority, why bother to measure it? Likewise, only a few months after the inauguration of his presidency, he capsized the educational reform made by the previous administration, yielding enormous influence to radical teachers’ unions in exchange for their political backing. The textbooks are just another stride in a hurried race to place public education in a place from where it will be hard to rebuild.

Mexico’s public education was already in crisis. Public schools have long lacked proper equipment and infrastructure, paired with the fact that results of the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA test have repetitively shown lower scores than the average of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) member countries. To make matters worse, during the pandemic, the Ministry of Education was negligent enough to allow 1.4 million children to abandon school. But the current blatant destruction of anything resembling an education system is a new phenomenon; this is a political provocation to lower the standard below anything imagined in the past, an attempt to create apathy, cynicism, and a political climate in which barely anything astonishes anymore. It is a cruel plan to use children for a petty political project and perpetuate dogmatism into the future.

According to one of Mexico’s most renowned education experts, Gilberto Guevara, the textbooks are filled with “dogmas, fanatism, and are a pedagogic absurdity.” They destroy the national education policy to satisfy the interests of a single political movement, abandoning logical thinking and erasing the line between scientific and non-scientific knowledge. This should come as no surprise. The textbooks are a representation of the movement’s three basic hallmarks.

Firstly, the ideological nature. The textbooks are a reliable exemplification of an antiscientific government and its determination to politicize public life. Flooded with historical errors and vulgar manipulations of information, the textbooks disseminate a cognitive relativism in which any form of knowledge is equally valid and displaces the student’s individuality with “collective values.” The manipulations of history include, among many others, AMLO’s lie about the 2006 electoral fraud against him, a bigoted narrative for which no evidence has ever been presented. Based on the rancid ideology known as ‘epistemologies of the South,’ which attempts to repudiate Western values and to surpass “the rotten roots of neoliberalism,” math and sciences are portrayed as part of an oppressive model that corruptly promotes individualism and meritocracy.

Secondly, the textbooks are representative of the regime’s opacity. The government has reserved the information about the elaboration processes for five years, a clumsy admission of guilt. The Marxist firebrand and fanatic in charge of the textbooks, Marx Arriaga, with the help of a former public official of the Maduro regime and a small cohort of people with no expertise in education or pedagogy, were responsible for the elaboration process. Given their backgrounds, it is no surprise that they hid how they worked together.

Finally, the textbooks signal the government’s distinctive incompetence. In this case, ill intentions go in tandem with ineptitude. Some mistakes are also the result of carelessness, even for their propagandistic enterprise, i.e., errors in pictures of the solar system and the birthdates of former presidents.  

Sadly, even critics of this assault have fallen into a trap. By asking for the mistakes to be corrected, they overlook that AMLO’s party is a movement that nurtures itself through provocation and disruption and where conflict is inherent in every action. Correcting the mistakes is not a solution because it misses the purpose of the original intent: the textbooks are no longer tools to educate but to indoctrinate. In propaganda leaflets, mistakes become requirements. AMLO and his political movement are conscious that any personal achievement, aspiration, and personal development are kryptonite for a project that feeds itself from resentment and prides itself on anti-intellectualism.

Public education should be the guidepost of long-term policies that transcend government idiosyncrasies. The Mexican constitution forbids the ideology of incumbent governments to be translated into public education; the third article mandates that: “the criteria that will guide education will be based on scientific progress, the fight against ignorance […] fanaticisms and prejudices”. Not surprisingly, some of Mexico’s most brilliant and renowned intellectuals were appointed as ministers of Education and responsible for the drafting of public textbooks during the 20^th century. Yet, it would be naive to think that all previous governments have continually placed public education on an apolitical and unreachable shelf. In 1939, the opposition party, PAN, with the help of the catholic church, emerged with freedom of education as a political banner, given the inclusion of socialist ideas in the constitution during the 1930s. Spawning a political tug-of-war for the ideological content of education. But the flagrant destruction of any basic moral or pedagogical standard is new. The current petty debate in Mexico around how much communism in the textbooks is too much is irrelevant to the millions of children who will not care about the label we use for books that will harm their future.

AMLO’s books do not contain mistakes because he is not trying to educate.  This is another step in a broader scheme to propagate lies in the prevailing ambush to eliminate research centers, public universities, and scholarships. For a self-declared antiscientific government and a president who repetitively prides himself in having “other facts”, belittling science and knowledge is no mistake—it is the natural outcome of the disdain.

There is an old and common trap used by radicals against moderates and common sense: to avoid being called a bigot, one must always be willing and capable of finding the golden nuggets in the dirt. However, this is a set-up and a fallacy nonetheless. We mustn’t fall into the ploy of finding merits when something sprouts from a rotten core. If a whole model is corrupted and, more importantly, devised to corrupt, it must be rejected and condemned, regardless of the glitter to conceal it. Propaganda disguised as education is propaganda, not education with mistakes. Yes, Mexico’s education system was already in a ruinous situation, but the recent events are not the aggravation of an existing crisis but rather the upholding and propagation of disaster as a political aim. Destroying public education is not a mistake for someone who sustains his power in lies and political instability. The textbooks are a faithful projection of the political project.

Those who claim that AMLO should “fix” the mistake of not teaching children math, for example, are missing the point. They are scrutinizing a fantasy and a projection of what they would like to be analyzing. The existence of mistakes presupposes a basic concern for facts and the truth. Well-intentioned liberal critics have created their own veil, through which it is extremely difficult to comprehend a level of ignorance and irresponsibility that throws the public education of millions of children under the bus without any shame. But such is the case. AMLO has fooled his critics once again by making them believe and reiterate that his “textbooks have mistakes,” ignoring the most important fact: the books are made for his purposes, not theirs.

Emiliano Polo is a graduate student of global affairs at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy. His research focuses on applied history and Latin American politics. He currently works in the Americas Program at the Center for Strategic & International Studies.

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On October 29, 2023, Colombians will go to the polls. Seats for 32 governors, 418 state representatives, 1102 mayors, and more than 12,000 city council members are up for election. With so much at stake and amid a growing dissatisfied and skeptical electorate concerned about the country’s future, the elections will become an unofficial referendum on President Gustavo Petro’s first year in office. Indeed, President Petro is keenly aware that the electoral results will not only impact his political standing but also set the course of Colombia’s political trajectory during the rest of his term as well as a bellwether for the outcome of the 2026 presidential election.

The elections will take place in a context of increasing political violence, lack of information due to poor polling and media coverage in rural areas, and growing political disarray over Colombia’s fragmented party system. Indeed, most Colombians are becoming increasingly pessimistic about the general direction of the country. According to a poll conducted by Invamer in August, 69 percent of Colombians believe the nation is heading in the wrong direction. The same poll revealed that, a large majority of Colombians are concerned about the country’s deteriorating security, the rising cost of living, the escalation of corruption, and the government’s failure to address poverty.

One of the main issues facing President Petro is that he set such huge expectations for his administration during the campaign that now he is grappling with the challenge of meeting those ambitious and difficult-to-attain goals. As he enters his second year, his government’s achievements are largely symbolic, lacking any substantial legislative successes (beyond the 2022 Tax Reform or the approval of his National Development Plan) or tangible enhancements to the lives of Colombians. As a result, his approval ratings have dropped from 64 percent at the outset to 31 percent by August. The unfulfilled campaign promises, ongoing scandals, and a fragile Pacto Histórico have left the administration wrestling with a range of pressing issues, making these elections even more crucial.

For instance, Petro’s government leading “Total Peace” policy exhibits mixed results, advancing talks with the ELN guerrilla group while persistent violence from Clan del Golfo and FARC’s dissidents fuels insecurity concerns. The increase in political violence obeys both the struggle for territorial control between armed groups, and groups currently in negotiations looking to establish a better negotiating position with the government during the peace talks. Despite progress, complexities in the simultaneous engagement of all armed factions and hurdles in implementing the 2016 Peace Accord with FARC dissidents persist.

President Petro’s relationship with traditional political parties (Partido Liberal, Partido Conservador and, Partido de la U)  has reached a critical juncture as he has effectively dissolved the political coalition that held on to majorities in Congress. An unwillingness from both the government and traditional political parties to make significant concessions on key reforms such as healthcare, pensions, and labor reforms has led to a stalemate in Congress awaiting the results of the local elections in October to determine if the government or traditional parties will have more advantage as the political balance shifts. This situation has been made more complicated considering that Colombia’s political landscape is experiencing a notable transformation with the proliferation of over 35 political parties, many of which are relatively new entities. Around 20 of these parties, active in the current electoral competition, have been established in recent years.

These factors have strained the government’s ability to deliver on its promises and maintain widespread support among the population. Consequently, the regional elections will serve as a litmus test of public approval for President Petro’s policies and leadership, and the outcome will significantly shape the political landscape moving forward. These elections will hurt the government as they are most likely to favor candidates not aligned with Petro. While the local elections will not predict the outcome of the 2026 presidential elections, and it remains premature to say whether President Petro will become a lame duck after losing the elections, should his party lose the elections, there is a high likelihood of growing tensions between the president and local administrations affecting the government’s ability to deliver.

In sum:

1. The 2023 local elections will become a referendum on President Gustavo Petro. Voters will likely use this unique opportunity to react to the government’s handling of the country. If the elections were today, Petro and his coalition parties would stand to lose key cities, such as Bogotá, Medellín, Cali, Barranquilla, and Cartagena.
2. Lack of voter intention polls will likely affect voter preferences. The scarcity of accurate and comprehensive polling data and media coverage, particularly in rural areas, is likely to lead to a skewed understanding of voting preferences and the electorate’s priorities, creating a vacuum that is likely to be used by malicious actors to mislead and misinform the public. It will also allow candidates to label legitimate polls as “fake,” further misleading the public.
3. The erosion of the political party system will likely continue. Political fragmentation may occur after the election as more political parties sprout. The growing number of political parties has made it harder to conduct a clear and concise analysis of the election and its implications. In addition, political fragmentation and first-past-the-poll voting structures make it challenging for any candidate to secure a clear majority, potentially resulting in a less representative government.
4. Political Violence is likely to increase as Colombia gets closer to election day. The increase in violence will affect democracy as it hampers candidates’ freedom to campaign and voter turnout, compromising local mayors in some regions. The relationships between candidates and armed groups will taint the legitimacy of some local leaders or constrain their actions.

A potential electoral defeat of the Petro administration will likely lead to an escalation in disputes between the executive and local governments over the next three years. The national government will probably resort to a strategic maneuver of halting, delaying, or conditioning project financing to gain leverage with local governance. This tactic could exert control and minimize the potential fallout from elections that are unlikely to favor them. Such a move will likely cast a cloud of uncertainty over the economy, potentially hampering economic growth and deterring investor confidence. Additionally, introducing such delays will likely erode the nation’s reputation as a reliable investment destination.

In this intricate tapestry of challenges and uncertainties, the outcome of the Colombian regional elections remains a crucial turning point for and the entire nation. Safeguarding the integrity of the democratic process and ensuring fair representation will be imperative to navigate these complex dynamics and sustain the foundation of a strong and vibrant democracy.

Sergio Guzmán is the Director of Colombia Risk Analysis, a political risk consulting firm based in Bogotá. Follow him on X, previously known as Twitter @SergioGuzmanE and @ColombiaRisk.

Enrique Reyes Dominguez is a MA Student at the School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University. He was a summer intern at Colombia Risk Analysis. Follow him on X, previously known as Twitter @Enrique_ReDo21.

This piece was adapted from Colombia Risk Analysis’ most recent “Special Report on the Local Elections“

All opinions and content are solely the opinions of the authors and do not represent the viewpoints of Global Americans.

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I knew Fernando Villavicencio Valencia, a crusader against corruption and candidate in Ecuador’s August 20 presidential elections, who was assassinated on August 9 as he was leaving a political rally in the auditorium of a high school in the northern suburbs of Quito. Although for some the magnitude and complexity of Villavicencio’s accusations could strain credibility, for me, he was a good man, driven by a passion to call out endemic high-level corruption in Ecuador, no matter who he offended or how many enemies he made in the process.

I first met him in Washington, D.C. in July 2013, where he was promoting his new book Ecuador: Made in China. Fernando’s book provided detailed data on how elites tied to the populist anti-U.S. regime of Rafael Correa in Ecuador had made millions of dollars in bribes and illicit earnings from shady deals with Chinese companies in the country’s petroleum and energy sectors. My interactions with him in the years that followed, and his later work on China-linked corruption in Ecuador, The Petroleum Holiday, profoundly shaped my thinking about the tragic results when well-resourced PRC-based companies, open to conferring “personalistic benefits,” engage in non-transparent business with corrupt politicized governments whose policies have eliminated more attractive options. 

The Correa regime persecuted Fernando for what he exposed. In 2014, an Ecuadoran court sentenced him to 18 months in jail for insulting the president, forcing him into hiding in the Ecuadoran Amazon. In 2016, another incarceration order for publicly revealing Correa emails he had secretly obtained obliged him to flee to Peru until Correa departed from the presidency in 2017. Once Correa was out of office, evidence vindicating Fernando’s crusade poured forth for years. In 2020, Correa was sentenced to eight years in prison for corruption in a wide-ranging case involving his Vice President Jorge Glas and 19 of the former president’s other government and business associates.

With respect to public works projects, the Sinohydro-built Coca Coda Dam arguably came to stand as a pharaonic monument to shady deals that Fernando had decried, benefitting Correa and his cronies but a disastrous waste of money for the nation. China’s Coca Coda Sinclair, which ultimately led to the prosecution of Correa’s then Vice President and later successor Lenin Moreno for bribery, was so poorly designed and built that it was diagnosed by an independent audit with thousands of structural cracks, preventing it from generating at full capacity. Meanwhile, the hydrological pressures from the water the dam retained caused massive erosion leading the Coca River to reroute itself. They led to the rupture of the country’s main oil export pipeline, which traversed the affected area.

For me, following his persecution by Correa, it was fitting that Villavicencio was elected to the National Assembly in May 2021 following Correa’s departure and came to serve as the head of its anti-corruption commission. Ironically, the enemies that Fernando made in his anti-corruption crusade make it difficult to establish who killed him.

Villavicencio pushed “rooting out the mafias” that had come to dominate the Ecuadoran political system and economy at the center of his presidential campaign. In the immediate aftermath of his murder, six Colombians and a Venezuelan were arrested for suspected involvement, suggesting a link to the Colombia-based narco-groups who, in conjunction with the Mexican Sinaloa and Jalisco Nueva Generacion (CJNG) cartels, had exported their cocaine through Ecuador’s Pacific ports. In the days prior to his murder, Fernando had received death threats from the Choneros, one of the local gangs working with Colombian and Mexican narcos which have terrorized Ecuador. Individuals supposedly representing the Chonero’s rival, the Lobos, also claimed responsibility for Villavicencio’s deaths—although others, also claiming to represent the Lobos, denied the claim.

Fernando’s anti-corruption crusade had led him to accuse 21 candidates in Ecuador’s February 2023 local elections of ties to narco-trafficking. Just days before his assassination, Villavicencio made public photos associating Raisa Vulgarin, legislative candidate for Rafael Correa’s Revolution Ciudadano party, with Nicolas Petro, the son of Colombia’s president, who is cooperating with Colombian authorities after being caught taking money from narco-traffickers. Fernando had also denounced the alleged involvement of radical leftist Colombian Senator Piedad Cordoba and criminally convicted Venezuelan Chavista Tarek William Saab in money laundering involving narco-trafficking groups in Ecuador.

In the days before his assassination, a poll put Fernando number two in the race with 13 percent of the vote, behind Luisa Gonzalez with 27 percent. He thus had a significant chance to make it to the second round, where Villavicencio’s focus on Correa administration corruption and Gonzalez’s ties to the former president would likely have given Villavicencio a real chance of winning, rallying Ecuadorans fed up with the scourge of narco money and narco violence in their country, similar to what has occurred in Guatemala with previously unknown anti-corruption candidate Bernardo Arevalo, now leading in the polls there.

Fernando thus had a plausible path to the Ecuadoran presidency, creating a risk of him working from a position of authority to dismantle webs of corruption involving not only Rafael Correa, his cronies, and the Chinese companies he built his presidential administration around but also the broader penetration of the Ecuadoran economy and political system by international criminal organizations.

Fernando Villavicencio’s murder will likely significantly impact the outcome of Ecuador’s election in a country already traumatized by an explosion of violence as local gangs, backed by foreign narco-trafficking organizations, have gone to war against each other and launched a campaign of terror against the Ecuadoran state. President Lasso’s declaration of a 60-day state of emergency, and the suspension by many of the presidential contenders of their campaigns just 11 days before the election, has already affected its dynamics. 

Ecuadoran Senator Luisa Gonzalez, closely tied to Rafael Correa, stands to benefit from Fernando’s “absence” and his drumbeat of declarations of the corruption and malfeasance of the exiled populist Godfather, who he called “the fugitive” for his flight to Belgium to avoid incarceration in Ecuador, and whose legacy Gonzalez wishes to continue. Law and order candidate Jan Topic, who has built his campaign around social media calls for a heavy-handed approach to gangs, similar to that adopted by immensely popular El Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele, also stands to benefit from Ecuadoran outrage over Fernando’s assassination and the focus it puts on violence in the country. Yet the implications of a victory by Topic are also troubling. The Topic family businesses Telconet and Netlife are tied to documented bribes paid by the Brazilian construction firm Odebrecht through Chinese banks, possibly also linking Topic financially to Correa’s Vice President George Glas.

The outcome of Ecuador’s presidential election will be strategically significant for the region. The country is one of only three remaining in South America with center-right governments disposed to collaborate with the United States on major strategic issues. The return to power of Correa’s “Citizen Revolution” movement, or candidates financially or ideologically tied to him, would complement the consolidation of power by anti-U.S. authoritarian regimes in Venezuela, Nicaragua, Bolivia, and Cuba. It would also turn to more radical, China-friendly policies by regimes in Brazil, Honduras, El Salvador, and others to profoundly erode U.S. influence in the region to which we are intimately connected by bonds of geography, commerce, and family.

As I have watched the unfolding tragedy of Latin America these past years, the bad news has seldom been so personal as Fernando’s assassination. He was a colleague who profoundly shaped my thinking on the corruption and disastrous results when populist regimes such as Rafael Correa embrace business with China in non-transparent, politicized deals which are “win-win” only for the populist elites who sign the deals and their Chinese counterparts. For me, that tragedy would turn to farce if Fernando’s murder paved the way for the return to influence of the very malevolent figures he spent his career and repeatedly risked his liberty and life seeking to expose.

Evan Ellis is Latin Research Professor at the U.S. Army War College. The views expressed by the author are his own and do not necessarily represent his institution or the U.S. government. The author would like to thank Santiago Najera, among others, for their input to this work.

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After the Cold War, Cuba and China developed a strong and comprehensive alliance. Today, their collaboration is two-fold. Firstly, the economically-dependent Cuba helps China advance its myriad of interests in Latin America and the Caribbean. Secondly, the alliance meets China’s strategic needs in two broad areas: military-intelligence and biotechnology/neurosciences.

Cuba is a poor investment and trade partner, has failed to repay China billions of dollars in loans, and requires major support and humanitarian aid. However, the country has enabled China’s enormously successful economic, political, and geostrategic offensive into the region.

China has become South America’s first trading partner and the region’s second-largest after the United States. With trade growing from USD 12 billion in 2000 to USD 445 billion in 2021, China has secured new markets and privileged access to raw materials. The roughly USD 150 billion in loans from China have given it control over critical infrastructure projects, including 56 ports and telecommunications in 29 countries. Military personnel from the region now receive training on cybersecurity and military doctrine in China. This has all accelerated risks for malign commercial activities, political and economic coercion, and asymmetric attacks on infrastructure. Furthermore, it has boosted China’s civilian-military fusion strategy, which seeks to make its military the most advanced in the world and able to defeat the U.S.

Last June, the Wall Street Journal reported that Cuba and China were jointly operating four electronic eavesdropping facilities in Cuba and negotiating to establish a military training facility there. Since the 1990s, China has reportedly sold military equipment and provided training to Cuba while jointly engaging in military and intelligence projects. The Chinese presence in Signals Intelligence (SIGINT) stations in Cuba goes back to the 1990s—one defector reports it as far back as the 1980s. The terms of China’s involvement are unclear but it has been reported that China provides Cuba with equipment, supplies, and technical training in exchange for a presence on the island and the sharing of collected intelligence. The radioelectronic activities have been camouflaged in Radio China transmissions from Cuba and by China’s building of Cuba’s telecommunications infrastructure.

Numerous defectors have long reported that Cuba’s Communist regime has always collected extensive intelligence on the U.S. and other countries, which it shares with allies for profit and to strengthen relations. According to a Cuban regime official interviewed confidentially, the country’s Radio-Electronic Brigade, a Division of the Military Intelligence (DIM), currently runs its SIGINT operations from an underground facility south of Havana. The brigade’s longstanding priority has been to intercept all U.S. military communications within reach into the mainland, Central America, the Caribbean, and northern South America. It has also systematically monitored the Cuban population and foreign targets in Cuba, and has used encrypted communications with its embassies, intelligence centers, and vast network of spies around the world.

With China’s help, Cuba has also used information technology to monitor Venezuela strategically and spread digital authoritarianism regionally. In particular, Cuba’s armies of trolls have helped to advance its interests in the cyber space. Its information warfare has even confused air traffic controllers in New York and jammed pro-democracy broadcasts to Iran. According to the U.S. government, China’s electronic espionage from Cuba was enhanced in 2019. Coincidentally, in the midst of an economic crisis, Cuba continued to order Chinese broadcasting equipment at remarkably high volumes. Between 2016 and 2021, this figure increased considerably to USD 276.6 million, surpassing food and medical imports from China as overall imports declined.

Another fundamental pillar of the Cuba-China relationship is the strategic alliance in biotechnology, in line with a Chinese government mandate for China’s biotech sector to expand and surpass that of the U.S. and the West. It has relied on Cuba’s know-how and technology transfers in at least 30 collaborative biotech projects. This is concerning because Cuba has had biowarfare capabilities since the 1980s. Into the early 2000s, several defectors also reported on a suspected biowarfare program.

Cuba and China also conduct joint research in neurotechnology and bioengineering and are developing five neuro-technological products. Cuba’s mind-control and neuroscience programs stem from the 1960s and have been used to torture political opponents and U.S. prisoners of war in Vietnam. Since the 1980s, it has developed novel neurological drugs and treatments by way of experimental practices of questionable safety, marred in ethical deficits and claims of atrocities.

Meanwhile, the U.S. government has been warning that China seeks to acquire technology to take over the biotechnology and neurosciences sectors. In December 2021, the U.S. imposed a ban on exports and transfers to China’s Academy of Military Medical Sciences, along with eleven entities believed to be involved in creating brain-control weaponry to dominate Chinese citizens and repress minorities. Several reports by the People’s Liberation Army have detailed the brain warfare research underway in mind control technologies meant to subdue the enemy, as well as “neuro-defense” equipment and brain-implanted microchips meant to fend off similar attacks.

It is difficult to acquire evidence proving these illicit activities. Secrecy is intrinsic to military and intelligence operations, and biotech and neuroscience institutions are tightly guarded operations within the two authoritarian states of China and Cuba. Thus, a comprehensive examination of all potential threats is in order. The international community should demand expert inspection of Cuba’s biotechnology facilities, including their activities and exports, to verify compliance with the Biological Weapons Convention, as well as an independent review of neuroscience collaborations with dual-use capabilities.

The United States has laws and mandates in place that would, if fully enforced, better contain Cuba, hinder resources for the dictatorship, and aid the Cuban people in attaining their freedom. A thorough review should be undertaken to assure their full enforcement, starting with the State Sponsor of Terrorism designation, the Cuban Liberty and Democratic Solidarity Act, and the Trafficking in Persons Victims Act. If the Cuban economy and the regime’s hold on power continue to weaken, China would have to reevaluate its investments in the Caribbean Island. The region would then greatly benefit from a free and democratic Cuba.

Maria C. Werlau is co-founder and Director of the Free Society Project/Cuba Archive, a non-profit think tank defending human rights through information. She holds a Bachelor’s degree in Foreign Service from Georgetown University, and a Master’s degree in International Studies from Universidad de Chile. This article is based on a scholarly paper that will be published in an academic journal by year-end 2023.

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Leaders of the world’s democracies, convening a few months ago in South Korea, pitched the tagline “Democracy Delivers…opportunities, digital freedom, prosperity, free elections.” etc.  However well-intentioned, the messaging missed the mark. By touting the benefits of democracy, the leaders directed their message to those in failing democracies, not to lose hope and fall for the siren song of rising populist autocrats. In doing so, these democratic leaders fundamentally failed to understand the modern autocrat’s appeal. This failure continues to result in the autocrats winning at the ballot box. In 2022 Freedom House found that autocracy is making gains against democracy and encouraging emergent leaders to abandon the democratic path. Countries that suffered democratic declines in 2022 outnumbered those that improved by two to one.

Nowhere is this more apparent than in our own Western Hemisphere. In 2000, thirty-four of thirty-five countries in our Hemisphere were nominal electoral democracies.  Since then, these democratic governments have simply not delivered for their people.  As a region, Latin America has the greatest income inequality in the world.  Access to education, health, and social services remains at some of the lowest levels in the world. Official corruption in too many of these countries is endemic. Covid put all of this in stark relief as unemployment (30% in some countries) eviscerated the then-growing middle class. It is no surprise that political instability has risen dramatically.  Even the now-faded promise of Free Trade Agreements between the U.S. and a dozen or so countries in the region has failed to provide enough opportunities for burgeoning young Latin populations, as reflected in migrant caravans headed for the U.S. Southern Border.

Democracy summiteers have correctly cited the foregoing as threats to democracy. However, where they have been tone-deaf is on the one issue that is having the most profound effect on instability, out-migration, and the embrace of populist autocrats in the region…the withering of state-provided public, or citizen, security. Democratic governments and leaders have failed to recognize that the provision of public security is THE primordial responsibility of government and that all too many governments in failing democracies have not delivered this essential condition. 

Latin America, in the absence of armed conflict, has the highest rates of crime and violence in the world. The region has ten times more homicides than Europe. In poll after poll, increasing numbers of Latin Americans are citing the degradation of public security as their biggest concern. A recent poll in Ecuador cited a whopping 85% of the respondents claiming that spiking violence is their chief concern. In Ecuador, and neighboring Andean states, drug cartels, organized crime groups, vigilantes, and gangs have taken over the traditional role of the state in providing security. These Transnational Criminal Organizations (TCOs) have evolved into criminal corporations, moving well beyond their “traditional” pursuits of extortion and drug trafficking into human smuggling (Mexican cartels earned an estimated $7 billion last year by moving people across our border). The Department of Homeland Security estimated that TCO “enterprises” reached over $100 billion in gross profits in 2022. In addition to people and drug smuggling, TCO growth businesses now include government procurement, all manner of services, pirating of intellectual property, real estate, and commercial supply chains.    

Salvadorans confronting decades of burgeoning homicides, violence, and general lawlessness elected a two-time mayor in 2019.  Enter Nayib Bukele, 41 years old, the brash President of El Salvador. – the self-described “coolest dictator in the world.”  He pledged to end the country’s endemic gang-induced violence. El Salvador had the ignominious moniker of the world’s “Homicide Capital.” In February 2020 Bukele sent the Army into the country’s unicameral Assembly to “encourage” the passage of a bill that provided critical U.S. government funds for the police and army. Surrounded by soldiers and sitting in the President of the Assembly’s chair, he announced, “It’s clear who is in control of the situation, and we’re going to put the decision in the hands of God. He also describes himself as “God’s Emissary”.  

Since 78 people were killed in a single weekend in March of 2022, he has imprisoned over 68,000 Salvadorans for suspected “gang affiliations”, suspended civil liberties under a rolling state of emergency, bypassed legislators, and packed the courts.  Bukele has gotten results. Homicides are down by over 52%. His approval ratings are north of 80% and his power grab, consolidating powers from the legislative, judicial, and electoral branches, is the envy of Latin American politicians running for elected office in crime-ridden countries in the region. His mastery of social media, combined with his “rule by spectacle” has made him the darling of those in the region seeking to escape from fear stalking their own neighborhoods.

Last month he announced his intention to seek another term, even though the constitution clearly does not permit successive terms and all his predecessors have honored the one-term rule. Notwithstanding, his hand-picked electoral council ruled that he can run. As a result of his popularity, an extraordinarily successful crackdown on gangs, and because of his control of all government institutions, Bukele is a hero to many in the Hemisphere’s political class. There is little doubt that he will win a second term. In Ecuador and Guatemala, both countries conducting general elections soon, several candidates have invoked the Bukele name as the gold standard for elected leadership and effective public security policies.

 Bukele’s success has come at great cost to essential democratic norms and standards. He removed the attorney general and replaced Supreme Court justices with loyalists. His state of emergency (extended 11 times) has enabled him to virtually eliminate due process. Tens of thousands are held incommunicado without charges. Family members are left with only vague assumptions of what may have happened to their loved ones. There is no legal due process in today’s El Salvador, where Bukele brooks no criticism nor dissent. To his critics he says, either embrace what I am doing or hand the country over to the gangs. Several noted journalists have departed the country, citing harassment from the government. Worse, Bukele has never talked about when and if he would ever return basic civil liberties.

While Bukele’s stock rises throughout the Hemisphere, the next country to succumb to “Bukelismo” and join the ranks of the autocrats may well be Ecuador, already on the endangered list as a U.S. ally in the region. Ecuador is one of the few countries in the Global South that has stood with the U.S. and other allies in imposing sanctions against Russia, but it has come at a great cost. Ecuador lost over $1.5 billion in exports that would have been sold to Russia in 2022.

Followers of Ecuador’s strongman, ex-President Rafael Correa, succeeded in assembling enough votes to impeach the sitting President. Before they could vote, President and staunch U.S. ally Guillermo Lasso moved to dissolve the Assembly. Under the constitution, the president must also resign. With surging crime and his popularity at a low ebb, Lasso decided not to run in the August elections. Long an island of tranquility in a tough neighborhood, sandwiched between Colombia and Peru, Ecuador has descended into rampant criminality at the hands of TCOs.

Ecuador recorded 4,539 murders in 2022, the highest murder rate in its history. Ecuador is now ranked 93^rd out of 140 countries in terms of the rule of law. It is listed at 105 out of 180 counties in the 2021 Corruption Index. The spark seemed to have come from prison massacres, over 600 prisoners have been killed inside prison walls since 2019. Prisons have become operating bases for the drug trade. Last year 210 tons of drugs were seized by the authorities. Reminiscent of the TCO violence in Mexico, children as young as 13 are recruited by the gangs, and grisly beheadings and bodies hanging from bridges are all too common along the country’s coastline.

How did Ecuador get there? While weak institutions and lax policy are the root causes. The demobilization of the Colombian guerrillas operating out of northern Ecuador set off a free-for-all to control the movement of drugs in that area, an uptick in European demand for cocaine and loose visa requirements allowed members of TCOs, including the Albanian Mafia, to enter the country unimpeded, making common cause with local gangs. The country’s ports have become lucrative transshipment points for drugs bound for Europe. In the port cities of Guayaquil and Esmeraldas, where violence is most intense, massacres, targeted assassinations of police and public officials, and car bombs have become weekly occurrences.

Ex-President Correa’s hands-off approach to narco-trafficking during his 10 years in office enabled the drug trade to flourish. His view was that drug trafficking was the exclusive responsibility of the governments of drug-consuming nations. As a result, the country’s navy and army have been compromised by organized crime at the highest levels. The US Ambassador recently referred to “Narco-Generals” in the security services.  The Ambassador also raised the threat level for intending American tourists, urging increased caution due to civil unrest, crime, and kidnapping. Several cities along the coast were deemed no travel zones. Ecuador is on a slippery slope. The next level of advisory will urge Americans not to travel to the country.

Sentenced to eight years for corruption, Correa has been living in Belgium. He is seeking to return to the country, and if a surrogate wins in August, he will receive a pardon. Whether in the presidential palace or simply pulling the strings from behind, the return of Correa would be disastrous for the country, portending a further descent into Venezuelan-style chaos, lawlessness, and autocracy. 

Turning this around will not be easy or quick. It is not simply a matter of sacking a few bad apples in the military and police. Any effective national campaign should begin with a well-articulated crime-fighting strategy, with the recognition that adjustments will continuously be made over time. Security force leadership in the coastal hotspots would need to be completely replaced. Intelligence and counterintelligence fusion centers to collect all-source information on bad actors would need to be created. A heavily vetted strike force should be stood up to act on fusion center intelligence and a robust corps of inspectors given the responsibility of continuously rooting out compromised officers.

Beyond these measures, the key to success will be community buy-in. This trust will only be achieved through sustained government actions to protect those in the affected communities. Only then will the government begin to turn the tide against the gangs. While vital to any success, there should be a recognition that trust will only be earned over time by deed, steady community policing, not just empty pledges of community support. Finally, the next President of Ecuador will have to maintain a laser focus on security. For him/her it must trump all other pressing priorities.

This can be done. Ecuador’s neighbor to the north eviscerated armed and criminal groups and eventually brought many of those to peace negotiations. Criticisms of Colombian President Alvaro Uribe aside, his “Democratic Security” plan did more than efforts by any president before or after him to bring peace to the country.  Only when the uncontrolled excesses of Uribe’s police and military went unchecked, did he suffer a loss of credibility and an immovable constitutional barrier in his attempt to stay in power. 

Uribe’s success was a direct result of hundreds of visits with the locals of villages and towns in the most violent areas of the country. Uribe would target those rural towns that had been plagued by insurgent, paramilitary, drug cartel, and gang violence for decades. After the town and its environs had been secured by the security forces, his initial meetings would begin by apologizing on behalf of his and previous Colombian governments to the assembled for not fulfilling the primordial obligation of the state…that is the provision of public security. This is as opposed to excoriating them for cooperating with bad actors. He vowed never to abandon the town again. Uribe would then conduct a town meeting to discuss public works that would be generated by the community itself. Project agendas were then drawn up, and subsequent visits by Uribe would review progress. The local police were instructed to hand out cell phones to those that would anonymously report the activities and movements of bad actors. With the continued protection of the security forces, local self-rule re-established, jobs created through public works, and ubiquitous cell phone reports, the bad actors had no place to hide.

He achieved all this, while at the same time, remaining within the constitutional parameters of due process and accountability. While the circumstances of Colombia and Ecuador’s criminal instability are not identical, much can be learned from Uribe’s phenomenally successful strategy and tactics to win hearts and minds and restore trust in the government.

Salvadoran President Bukele spares no effort to taunt the U.S., saying that our brand of democracy promotion is outmoded and sclerotic. He cites our plague of mass shootings as yet another reason why we are failing our own citizens. He repeatedly questions the U.S. standing to promote democracy or public security best practices. He is winning adherents in the region. But we can prove him wrong when effective measures to combat organized crime can be brought about under a democratic framework. Indeed, experience shows that when communities feel safe from criminal retribution, democracy can flourish, starting at the grassroots.

There is a strong consensus in the Senate for U.S. support to end the bloodletting in Ecuador. The Senate U.S.-Ecuador Partnership Act of 2022, passed out of committee unanimously, seeks to strengthen ties between our two countries. It directs the Department of State to develop and implement strategies to increase the capacity of Ecuador’s beleaguered justice system and law enforcement agencies in an effort to combat crime, corruption, and “the harmful influence of malign foreign and domestic actors”.

For the U.S. and the other global democracies there must be a long-overdue recognition that, while citizens in failing states may abstractly value democracy, rampant criminality has set their houses on fire. And in the midst of the inferno, they will elect leaders who will put the fire out. The U.S. and other like-minded democracies have an obligation to assist Ecuador in combatting criminality while preserving essential civil liberties. Enduring democratic leadership in Ecuador and the world will have to bring both effective law enforcement and civil liberties to douse the fire. If in August Ecuador elects such a responsible and committed leader, one that can work with the U.S. and our democratic allies, we should respond with substantial security assistance, to include equipment and training. This is not just Ecuador’s fight. Democracy is at stake. 

Ambassador (Retired) John Feeley is the Executive Director of the Center for Media Integrity of the Americas. He is a former career U.S. diplomat who served as Ambassador to Panama, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary in the Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs, Charge d’Affaires and Deputy Chief of Mission in Mexico, in addition to other postings in Latin America and the Caribbean. He is a former Marine Corps Officer.

Ambassador (Retired) Peter F. Romero is currently the Producer and Co-host of the very popular podcast American Diplomat. He has been a consultant and advisor to several governments and private entities on community-based security strategies. As a career Foreign Service Officer, he was the Assistant Secretary of State, who initiated the successful Plan Colombia, US Ambassador to Ecuador, as well as several other assignments in Latin America over a career that spanned 25 years.  

The post Ecuador: The Next Domino to Fall to Autocracy? appeared first on Global Americans.

It seems like cyber-attacks occur every single day. On May 24th, Microsoft announced that a Chinese state-sponsored hacking group called “Volt Typhoon” has compromised critical U.S. cyber infrastructure across numerous industries. Russian hackers recently attacked Europe’s air traffic agency, the latest in a stream of seemingly daily assaults on countries’ critical infrastructure. In 2023, cybercrimes are expected to drain USD $8 trillion from the U.S. economy. In response, the White House recently released its National Cybersecurity Strategy to address these threats. Within its five-pillar strategy, the United States advocates for working with allies and partners around the world, recognizing the increasingly interconnected and digital landscape where cyber criminals and state actors such as China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea target vulnerable countries and populations to achieve political and economic goals. The fifth pillar, aptly titled “forging international partnerships to pursue shared goals,” is arguably as important as the other four combined.

In recent months, Latin American and Caribbean countries grappled with unprecedented cyber threats from state and non-state actors. Costa Rica’s Revenue Service suffered a ransomware attack in May 2022, forcing citizens to pay taxes by hand. In October 2022, a group called Guacamaya hacked Mexico’s Defense Ministry and six terabytes of data and four million emails exposed the ministry’s problematic surveillance tactics. In December 2022, cyberattacks hobbled Barbados’ Queen Elizabeth Hospital, such that residents could not receive certain medical procedures and services for months. Similarly, Ukraine has withstood repeated cyberattacks from Russia, and Taiwan is strengthening its cyber capabilities against China, but Latin American and Caribbean countries are also looking to fortify cyberspace.

Some Latin American and Caribbean countries have proactively strengthened international partnerships to boost their cybersecurity capabilities. In 2022, the Dominican Republic and the European Union launched the LAC4 cybersecurity training center and trained 60 Dominican students at the Salesiano Technical Institute (ITESA). For years Brazil has had cyber dialogues with the EU and signed a memorandum of understanding with the UK on cyber cooperation. Jamaica is a leader on cybersecurity issues in the Caribbean. The country established a National Cybersecurity Authority this year, has an extensive National Cyber Security Strategy, and received $2 million from the U.S. to create a Cyber Center of Excellence.

However, the region still faces very real cyber vulnerabilities. At a recent regional conference hosted by Florida International University, cyber experts Boris Saavedra of the Perry Center and Louise Marie Hurel of the Royal United Services Institute noted that the region still needs a legal framework for cybersecurity, the political will to make cybersecurity a major priority, and the financial resources to train a local cyber workforce and update outdated digital infrastructure that is vulnerable to ransomware attacks and espionage.

As the United States seeks to counter cyberattacks on its own critical infrastructure, the fifth pillar of the National Cybersecurity Strategy suggests that the U.S. will also invest more in international capacity building with partners and allies. The problem, however, lies in determining who should coordinate and monitor ongoing training activities. The Defense Department, the State Department, and the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), among others, are all carrying out international cyber training programs. However, there is little indication of who is the primary coordinating body preventing redundancies in communication and training. Even within the same institution, communication seems to be the primary hindrance to increased efficiency and collaboration.

Cyber policymakers in the United States can take several steps to improve international cyber training coordination. The White House Office of the National Cyber Director (ONCD) has been tasked with coordinating this interagency effort. However, the ONCD must expedite the hiring process of its staff and nominate a new National Cyber Director following Chris Inglis’ retirement. Members of Congress from across the political spectrum recently criticized the administration for taking over two months to identify a replacement for such a crucial position.

In the State Department, Nathaniel Fick’s confirmation and swearing-in as the inaugural Ambassador at Large for Cyberspace and Digital Policy suggests that the U.S. now has a primary point of contact for partner nations. The State Department’s Bureau of International Cyberspace Security Policy Unit, in particular, will be crucial in ensuring that agencies jointly develop and implement cyber training curricula. For instance, USAID can provide country assessments and digital development training, while the Department of Homeland Security’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency’s (CISA) international engagement team supports emergency communications and industrial control systems training.

The Department of Defense can also better coordinate the entities providing cyber training and assessments. For example, U.S. Cyber Command, U.S. Southern Command and its Component Commands, and various National Guard units all offer some form of cyber training to Latin American and Caribbean partners, but they should coordinate through U.S. embassies and the countries’ ministries in charge of cyber to ensure such training is additive and not redundant.

Beyond the U.S. government, the Organization of American States (OAS), through its Inter-American Committee against Terrorism (CICTE), serve as a coordinating body for training activities across the Americas. Similar multilateral organizations perform this function in other regions of the world. The Global Forum on Cyber Expertise (GFCE)—a multi-stakeholder community of over 180 members—supports coordination through regional working groups, involving both governmental and non-governmental entities, and conducts capacity-building efforts. Private sector entities like Microsoft, through its Digital Diplomacy team and initiatives such as the Cybersecurity Tech Accord, contribute to shared best practices in capacity building. Finally, academic institutions can serve as neutral conveners for partner nations hesitant to work directly with U.S. government partners.

As the U.S. aims to expand cybersecurity partnerships with Latin American and Caribbean countries, as well as with other global allies, it is imperative that interagency cooperation focuses on capacity-building efforts. In an era marked by the heightened visibility of cyber-attacks and widespread tech proliferation across the region, many governments are pleading for assistance from Washington. Yet, they are often met with inconsistent communication from a multitude of U.S. government entities. Consequently, countries are growing impatient with unfulfilled U.S. promises of support. Instead, they are turning to predatory states such as China for cyber training, safe city surveillance systems, and digital infrastructure investments. The U.S. must work as an equal with our Latin American and Caribbean partners, integrating current interagency and international efforts to boost cybersecurity training and policy. This approach will likely determine whether our allies and partners are adequately prepared to defend against cybersecurity threats or whether training becomes redundant and disjointed across the globe.

Randy Pestana serves as Associate Director for Cybersecurity Policy at the Jack D. Gordon Institute for Public Policy and the Director of Education and Training at Cybersecurity at Florida International University. In these roles, he is responsible for managing the institutes cyber-related partnerships to include U.S. Departments of Commerce, Defense, Homeland Security, Labor, State, and Veterans Affairs, the Organization of American States (OAS), and numerous industry partners across the cybersecurity community.

Leland Lazarus is Associate Director for National Security at Florida International University’s Jack Gordon Institute of Public Policy and a nonresident fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Global China Hub. He formerly served as special assistant and speechwriter to the commander of U.S. Southern Command and as a U.S. State Department foreign service officer in China and the Caribbean.

The post <strong>International Cybersecurity Cooperation Looks Great on Paper, but Needs Work on Implementation</strong> appeared first on Global Americans.

Originally published in Spanish in Diario Libre.

For almost thirty years, the international community has been involved in Haiti, albeit the results have been far from satisfactory. This began in October 1994, when a military intervention led by the United States, with a mandate from the UN Security Council, restored President Jean-Bertrand Aristide to power. Aristide had been overthrown by a military coup on September 30, 1991, just seven months after entering office as the first democratically elected president in Haitian political history. The coup itself occurred just four months after the Organization of American States (OAS) adopted Resolution 1080, which established the basis for the collective defense of democracy when there was an abrupt interruption in the democratic process of any country in the region.

Against this backdrop, Haitian political life experienced a precarious normalization with the election of René Préval the following year and the peaceful transfer of power on February 7, 1996. At the end of Préval’s term, Aristide was reelected and returned to power in February 2001, although the opposition parties boycotted the election. This time his presidency lasted three years instead of four, as political and military forces overthrew him again on February 29, 2004.

On April 30, 2004, the UN Security Council adopted Resolution 1542 (2004), which established the United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH, by its French acronym), replacing the Multinational Interim Force (MIF) authorized by the Security Council immediately after Aristide’s overthrow. MINUSTAH, initially created for a period of nine months, had both a civilian and military component. This reflected the UN’s intention to assist the Haitian government in the normalization of government institutions and the consolidation of a police force to increase order and security. The Armed Forces had been dismantled following Aristide’s return to power in 1994, creating significant security problems that persist to this day.

MINUSTAH’s mandate was renewed several times and the mission remained in Haiti until October 17, 2017. It was then replaced by the United Nations Mission for Justice Support in Haiti (MINUJUSTH, by its French acronym), created by the Security Council through Resolution 2350 (2017) on April 13, 2017. This mission’s general mandate was to support the Haitian government in developing the rule of law in the country by supporting the National Police, the judiciary, prisons, and the protection of human rights.

During this time, Haiti was struck by a devastating earthquake in January 2010 as well as other natural disasters, further deteriorating the precarious living conditions of the Haitian people. These events shifted international aid toward humanitarian assistance rather than addressing the long-standing structural problems affecting the nation.

MINUJUSTH concluded its operations on October 15, 2019, and was replaced the following day by the United Nations Integrated Office in Haiti (BINUH, by its French acronym), created by the UN Security Council through Resolution 2476 (2019) on June 25, 2019. BINUH’s mandate focuses on promoting political stability, good governance, preserving and fostering a peaceful and stable environment, promoting human rights, and supporting national dialogue among different sectors of Haitian society. This mission, originally conceived to last twelve months, has been successively extended until July 15, 2023, through Resolution 2645 (2022) on July 15, 2022.

Despite the United Nations’ successive missions in Haiti, the Haitian crisis deepens. The country’s political system has become disoriented and more unstable, and the conflict has become practically unmanageable. On July 7, 2021, President Jovenel Moïse was assassinated, further exacerbating the political and institutional crisis in the country. This also led to the proliferation of criminal gangs that are gaining increasingly broad control of the territory and making further weakening the state.

It would be presumptuous to give advice on what to do in a crisis of this magnitude after so many failed attempts to resolve it. However, it seems evident that these UN missions and other initiatives to support Haiti have lacked a vision of state-building as a basic premise to articulate society, the economic system, and the governmental structure. In his report to French President Jacques Chirac in 2004, Regis Debray pointed out that Haiti was the country with the most NGOs per square kilometer in the world. This indicates that a tremendous amount of international aid resources has been diluted in projects contributing little or nothing to the (re)construction of state institutions in key areas such as security, fiscal and customs administration, economic planning, environmental management, public works, education, public health, and the justice system. In other words, what Haiti needs is more state, not less.

Thinking afresh about these issues could be useful in the difficult task of assisting the Haitian people in their search for order, stability, and governance. This was the objective expressed in the resolution that created BINUH. Promoting dialogue among all social sectors can be very promising if carried out with a strategic, incremental, and sustained vision over time, particularly with the support of national or international actors who have the capacity to convene. This dialogue could be the starting point for gradually piecing together the Haitian state and its system of government. Of course, the ultimate responsibility for the country’s destiny lies with the Haitian people themselves. Without an active and conscious commitment from Haiti’s political, business, ecclesiastical, and social leaders, there will be no possibility of steering Haiti toward stability, governance, and development, regardless of international support.

Flavio Darío Espinal is a former Ambassador of the Dominican Republic to the United States of America and the Organization of American States (OAS), in which he also held the positions of Chair of the Permanent Council, Chair of the Committee on Legal and Political Issues, and Chair of the Committee on Hemispherical Security. He is also currently serving on Global Americans’ International advisory council, works as a managing partner of FDE Legal, and writes a regular column in Diario Libre.

The post The United Nations and Haiti appeared first on Global Americans.

Haiti is headed toward a catastrophic humanitarian and political crash. With an estimated 90 percent of the Port-au-Prince region under the chaotic control of gangs, kidnappings remain a lucrative trade (389 recorded incidents in the 1^st quarter of 2023). Societal life—including the operation of schools—is essentially shut down. Haiti is halfway off the cliff. This is not a sudden development but the result of a dramatic deterioration of Haitian political governance since President Jovenel Moïse’s assassination in July 2021. Yet the international community’s response has been strikingly messy. U.S. policy, historically the determining factor, appears at this stage to be boxed in by two factors. First, its continuing support of Haiti’s interim PM, Ariel Henry, anchored to the delusion that he could survive the deepening chaos. Second, the U.S.’s reluctance to help break the political stalemate in Haiti necessary for a coherent international response. In fact, the outcome of this policy paralysis is likely the kind of full-scale security intervention that the Biden administration wants to avoid.

This policy hesitancy may be shaped in part by the U.S. domestic political repercussions of the Afghan withdrawal. While the U.S. ability to shape events in Afghanistan was sharply reduced by the summer of 2021, the circumstances on the ground—let alone the geopolitical context—are different in the Haitian case. Yet, the void of substantive U.S. diplomacy toward Haiti over several years implies that partial remedies are unlikely to secure constructive outcomes.

This includes three components whose overall flaw is that each is dependent on the successful outcome of the other. First, strengthening the PNH (Haitian National Police), the most widely held component of U.S. and multinational responses so far, and now the most misaligned element with reality in the streets of Haiti. Second, energizing the Haut Conseil de Transition (HCT–High Transition Council), the operational heart of the December 21, 2022 political consensus cobbled together with encouragement from particularly the UN and nominally providing Henry with a transition gameplan. Third, encouraging some form of political harmony between enough elements of the December 21 agreement and its primary alternative anchored by the Montana Accord political and civil society constituency. This is not an easy task considering that both have suffered internal divisions, let alone defections over time.  

As a practical matter, the PNH is not only understaffed but weakened by street-level corruption, penetrated by gang elements, and tied to a regime lacking credibility in the eyes of too many Haitians. It is, by implication, faced with an operational security environment where it is unlikely to succeed. As for the HCT—a core element of the December 21 agreement architecture—it is not only not operational but undermined by a nearly fatal conceptual contradiction. A transition mission that implies that sooner or later, Henry fades from a leadership position when in practice, the interim Prime Minister has demonstrated little interest in doing so. Hence, the longer this impasse continues, the less likely the HCT can succeed in its mission. Overall, without strategic engagement from the international community, there is little incentive among key Haitian actors to work toward a political consensus. But without the latter, Washington and other key actors remain reticent to act. 

Critically, this might offer limited openings to alternative options. There are still behind-the-scenes Haiti-related discussions at the Organization of American States (OAS). However, it is unclear how it can achieve a consensus on thorny issues such as addressing Haiti’s security challenges. Also, one can conceive of a response built around a “coalition of the willing,” but without more engagement from the U.S. and Canada, how other hemispheric actors like Chile, Brazil, and Colombia could sustain such an option is not apparent. Finally, The Caribbean Community (CARICOM) remains an interested party in the above scenarios. However, since its Bahamas summit in February, it has backtracked somewhat from direct engagement to address Haiti’s violence. Nonetheless, a high-level delegation CARICOM to Haiti in late February led by the Jamaican Prime Minister and a follow-up session in Jamaica to gather Haiti’s political and civil society leaders in the near future retains some potential.

Despite repeated calls for action from the UN Secretary-General and the arrival of a new head of the United Nations Integrated Office in Haiti (BINUH), the big power dynamics of the Security Council don’t hold much promise. These uncertainties provide an opening for a third wheel of international diplomacy. In this case, a of British diplomat Jonathan Powell’s negotiating mission after a roughly two-month hiatus. It remains unclear how stalemated political dynamics in Haiti (whose ambassador in Washington was just recalled on corruption charges  ) can support this form of semi-private diplomacy without clearer signals from Washington and other key capitals. 

In the near-term, several potential scenarios should make policymakers pause. The most worrisome may be the collapse of the Henry regime, either violently or through internal political divisions. This is enhanced by the fact that there is little left of functioning state institutions. Secondly, the increasingly vocal frustrations of Dominican leaders demanding international action regarding their chaotic neighbor is an understandable policy posture but runs the danger of transitioning to potentially inflammatory rhetoric and mistakes as the country enters a presidential election cycle. A third catastrophic scenario has already emerged, in effect mayhem in the streets of Port-au-Prince, with gangs fighting among themselves and local communities taking matters into their hands against both the gangs and the government’s impotence. In effect, Haiti’s spiral toward a humanitarian and political crash is underway.

Georges A. Fauriol is a Fellow with Global Americans; he is also a co-chair of the Caribbean Policy Consortium (CPC), as well as a Think Tank Haiti (TTH) Steering Group member, a partnership of Université Quisqueya (Haiti) and the Inter-American Dialogue, and a Senior Associate at the Center for Strategic & International Studies (CSIS).

The post Haiti’s Humanitarian and Political Crash appeared first on Global Americans.

Active Non-Alignment is the term some analysts and academics have begun to attach to an aspirational policy that would promisingly guide the nations of the Global South between the Scylla and Charybdis of Great Power competition in the 21st century. In truth, it is more likely to cause a shipwreck or at least a few rudderless ships of state.

The active non-alignment argument goes something like this. Latin America and the Caribbean are currently irrelevant on the world stage. Summitry between the European Union and the region is on life support and the Group of Latin American and Caribbean States (GRULAC) is lost in the halls of the UN, absent from the major debates. To remediate this identity crisis, the Non-Aligned camp argues that the best course of action is to rigorously abstain from choosing sides between China and the United States—as well as between Russia and Ukraine. As evidence of “relevance,” but a refusal to align, proponents point to Lula’s recent offer to broker Russia-Ukraine talks.

While Active Non-Alignment may be an accurate portrayal of some countries’ foreign policies, it would be disastrous as a regional strategy for two fundamental reasons. 

• Active Non-Alignment is anachronistic. Half a century ago, this approach relegated Latin America to “hermit kingdom” status, under development, and strategic irrelevance—and would do so again. 
• Pandemics, migrants, and climate change are agnostic about a nation or region’s alliances or non-alignment. Instead, these challenges compel neighbors to act in a geographically aligned manner.

The original Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) of the Cold War—which still exists, but is truly irrelevant these days—was born in a very different era, one marked by European decolonization and newly emerging, independent states. As a convenient way to avoid becoming pawns in a nuclear NATO-Warsaw Pact confrontation, the NAM nominally served as a fig leaf. However, most of its discourse was decidedly anti-American, especially among Latin American adherents. For instance, Fidel Castro—who overtly aligned his country with the Soviet Union—chest thumped in the 1979 Havana Declaration that the purpose of the NAM was to ensure “the national independence, sovereignty, territorial integrity and security of non-aligned countries” in their “struggle against imperialism, colonialism, neo-colonialism, racism, and all forms of foreign aggression, occupation, domination, interference or hegemony as well as against great power and bloc politics.” 

Today, suggesting that not taking a stand on the Russian-Ukraine conflict is principled or supports sovereignty rings hollow. Talk to the Ukrainians about sovereignty when the Russian shelling stops. History is a harsh judge. Silence in the face of Russian expansionism and its state policy of war crimes and barbaric human rights violations, will only hurt Latin America’s voluntary benchwarmers. No one is asking for arms or money, but a symbolic UN vote for territorial sovereignty in a sovereignty obsessed region? This should not be a stretch. The Hemispheric South’s current reticence to criticize or castigate Russia’s unprovoked violation of Ukraine’s territorial sovereignty makes abstaining Latin governments look weak and unprincipled. Far more admirable—and memorable—will be the principled voice of Chile’s President Boric regarding Russia’s aggression. 

Ironically, this stance also casts the region as irrelevant among the very powers—the United States, the Western Europeans, NATO, and the UN Security Council—from whom the Active Non-Aligners seek relevance and respect. We all know the story of the kid who takes his ball and goes home so the game ends. This is the equivalent of a kid with no ball who just goes home. 

In the 21st century, the world does not care if you do not want to play—you have to or you do not eat. Lula’s instincts are right. Brazil should be a global player. However, as an unproven, extra-regional referee in a conflict steeped in centuries of mutual animosity, he is most unlikely to lead Russia-Ukraine negotiations. Despite this, Brazil could—and should—play an active allied role as a rotating member of the UN Security Council and keep pushing for a permanent seat. 

Compare the Ukraine situation to the challenge of climate change—where Lula’s leadership is desperately needed and most welcome. Here, Brazil has an undisputed and critical leadership role to play. To be successful it must align itself regionally with its neighbors and globally with Paris Accord signatories—including extra-regional partners. Fortunately, alignment with China, Russia, the EU, and the United States is quite possible on this issue. 

Similarly future pandemics compel aligned regional action. Ditto for migration. Frankly, were Lula to use his hard-won democratic credibility to broker negotiations between the Maduro regime and the opposition to hold free and fair elections in 2024, it would be a far more useful contribution to hemispheric stability. Colombia’s Gustavo Petro was first to accept this challenge, but appears to be making a bit of a mess of it. However, it would be exceptionally relevant for Brazil and the nations of Latin America—who have absorbed the 7 million desperate refugees who have fled chavismo’s impoverishing and corrupt reality—were Lula to broker some sort of deal to get Venezuela to hold internationally observed elections.

The new Non-Aligned advocates stress that Latin America does not want to have to choose between China and the United States. In fact, they already are threading that needle on trade relations. However, on fundamental issues of human rights and democracy, how Latin American and Caribbean nations choose their allies today will very much determine their fate and future prosperity. Pre-emptively choosing not to choose is a recipe for precisely the irrelevance they seek to avoid.

Amb. (Ret.) John Feeley is the Executive Director of the Center for Media Integrity of the Americas. He is a former career U.S. diplomat who served as Ambassador to Panama, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary in the Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs, Charge d’Affaires and Deputy Chief of Mission in Mexico, in addition to other postings in Latin America and the Caribbean. He is a former Marine Corps Officer.

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In December 2022, Peru’s president, Pedro Castillo, botched his attempt at orchestrating a self-coup, or autogolpe. His constitutional successor, Dina Boluarte, stated her intention to remain in power through 2026 (rather than resigning and holding new elections), prompting mass protests led by poorer, indigenous, working-class, and rural Peruvians. In response, the police and security sector used lethal force against unarmed protestors, killing almost 50 and injuring almost 1,000 people injured, echoing Peru’s civil conflict of the 1980s and 1990s. Castillo’s swift impeachment by Peru’s congress after his autogolpe attempt may seem like a win for democracy, since one institution (Peru’s legislature) corrected an anti-democratic overreach by another (the executive). However, the messy affair actually reveals the weak foundations of Peruvian democracy, a legacy of an autogolpe by President Alberto Fujimori three decades prior—which began an autocratic period characterized by political murders, human rights abuses of indigenous communities, purges of the judiciary, and rule by decree. Since the post-Fujimori Unity and National Reconciliation Government, none of the nine Peruvian presidents have successfully served out a full term without resigning, being impeached, or being prosecuted for corruption.

The festering political crisis in Peru, along with other such instances of mass mobilization and coups d’état, can be understood as an example of a political transition: a turbulent political process in which new actors and institutions play new and important political roles. These processes are enormously varied and can include the overthrow of a government, the signing of a peace deal, the decision to reform a constitution, and many others. Importantly, transitions represent a break with “politics as usual.” Because of this, they create a high degree of political uncertainty, opening the door for a range of outcomes, some of which might lead to further repression and violence. But they also contain the possibility of creating a more democratic and peaceful post-transition status quo. In cases of political transitions, the international community has an important role to play by offering technical assistance, supporting civil society actors, as well as acting as a broker between parties as they chart a path forward. Further, supporting pro-democracy actors and processes in countries undergoing political transitions is an important part of U.S. strategy, and it aligns with the Biden administration’s focus on democracy as a key foreign policy priority.

To support pro-democracy actors in fragile political environments undergoing a political transition, the U.S. government needs a tailored approach that is responsive to the range of potential outcomes.

• First, this approach should incorporate nontraditional actors who often possess political legitimacy at the local level. It is often these actors who have routinely been excluded from the political system and whose demands are what set in motion political transition processes in the first place. Marginalized groups, indigenous communities, traditional authorities, and even demobilized armed groups are some examples of actors whose participation is vital in ensuring a political transition yields a democratic outcome.
• Second, it should retain a focus on political party support. Parties are the engine of democracy. They perform critical roles in candidate selection, policy development, campaigning, and—once in power—the role of governing. In transitional processes, political parties are often weakly institutionalized, fragmented, and unable to perform these functions. Ensuring they are strong enough to do so is a key component of democratic development.
• Third, it must engage and support oversight and watchdog groups in civil society. These groups are central to generating local demand for better, more responsive governance, tracking the authorities’ promises or commitments during political transitions, and documenting human rights abuses. Because transitions are notoriously messy, watchdog groups provide a layer of political accountability. In cases where civilians are subject to human rights abuses, they can document such events, which can ensure that any perpetrators of human rights abuses face justice in the long run.

In the case of Peru, first and foremost, this approach implies a need to engage with some of the marginalized indigenous communities for whom ex-President Castillo was a symbol of their political hopes. It is important to make a good-faith attempt to engage with these communities who have historically been excluded from fully participating in Peruvian politics. When faced with protests after Castillo’s impeachment and removal, President Boluarte dismissed the protestors as terrorists, using language that the Inter-American Human Rights Commission described as creating an environment of “tolerance towards discrimination, stigmatization, and institutional violence.” However, the protests represent a politics of frustration with the longstanding political crises in the country. Instead of dismissiveness and discrimination, meaningful outreach and dialogue are required to develop a constructive and inclusive political settlement.

Second, it is critical to support political party strengthening. In Peru, parties have become vehicles for personalistic amateur politicians who have no need for a political party apparatus that might hold them accountable: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski, better known as PPK, formed the Peruanos Por el Kambio party (also known as PPK) for his 2016 election campaign. However, parties need support to develop real, programmatic, ideological identities to filter out potential candidates who have anti-democratic or corrupt tendencies and instead select leaders who have the capacity to govern effectively once in power. Strengthening political parties will also serve Peruvian citizens who frequently have to vote for unknown political amateurs without discernible political identities.

Third, it is vital to support civil society and human rights defenders in monitoring security force abuses against civilians, especially protestors and indigenous communities. Recent violence against unarmed civilian protestors is concerning and is part of a trend of increasing politicization of the security sector in the country in recent years. Supporting civil society actors to track, document, and publish examples of security force abuses that fail to comply with international human rights law as well as domestic Peruvian law may have the effect of discouraging heavy-handed tactics of repression by state security actors. Where the deterrent effect is insufficient, it may help create a framework to hold perpetrators of human rights abuses might be held accountable.

There is no bulletproof methodology for choosing the right course of action during a turbulent political transition process. But adopting a framework for how to approach that incorporates scenario planning for different potential outcomes is an important first step. This process can help networks of democratic activists—such as civil society organizations, human rights defenders, and political parties—to develop and take ownership of a collective strategy. Ultimately, this is what increases the likelihood that will be able to generate popular support in favor of pro-democratic transition outcomes, a key determinant of whether or not transitions conclude democratically. When people mobilize in favor of free and fair elections, civilian control of the military, as well as the inclusion of women, young people, and underrepresented minorities and against autocratic power grabs and erosions of democratic norms—transitions are more likely to yield a democratic boon. Failure to push back on anti-democratic currents—as Peruvians well know—can result in only a mirage of the short-term stability that citizens deserve.

Louis Metcalfe is a Conflict Prevention & Stabilization Specialist at the International Republican Institute (IRI). The views expressed in this piece are his own. 

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