Tag: Latin America

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Terrorism

Geopolitical Considerations of the NATO-Colombia Cooperation Agreement

Colombian Navy
Photo: Cristianmed230/Wikimedia Commons.

In June 2013, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and Colombia signed a security cooperation agreement aimed at exchanging intelligence information in order to improve the capabilities on both sides of the Atlantic to face common threats, particularly transnational crime.  This accord was sent to the Colombian Congress in September and, at the time of writing, is still awaiting ratification. It should be noted that this accord has weathered criticism, in particular from several Latin American leaders who regard it as a potential NATO “beachhead” into Latin America. The objective of this article is to place this agreement into the proper context of Latin American geopolitical and geosecurity affairs.

The Agreement

The Security of Information Agreement between Colombia and NATO was signed on June 25, 2013 between NATO Deputy Secretary General Ambassador Alexander Vershbow and Colombia’s Defense Minister Juan Carlos Pinzón Bueno. The goal is to strengthen security relations between the Alliance and the South American nation.

According to media reports, Bogotá will provide the Alliance with its experience in combating drug trafficking and international terrorism, while “Colombia will allegedly receive intelligence information from NATO, as well as gain access to best practices in relation to transparency, humanitarian operations, and strengthening the army.” In September 2013, the Colombian Ministries of Defense and Foreign Affairs sent a bill to the Colombian congress to ratify the Bogotá-NATO accord. The document highlights how “an objective of Colombia is to strengthen cooperation with multilateral organizations and nations […] to guide the future vision of the Colombian armed forces.” Hence, closer relations with NATO are strongly encouraged.

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Latin America’s Wired Activists Take on Crime

2011 Peace march in Mexico City. Image: Wikipedia.

Buenos Aires, 5 November 2013 (IRIN) – In Latin America, where violent crime rates are six times higher than in any other region and where most residents have reported distrust in the state’s ability to fight crime, a number of communities have taken to social media to boost security, say analysts.

“Violent crime in Latin America undermines the social fabric of communities [and poses] a major human security threat to populations who live in slum areas,” said Vanda Felbab-Brown, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, a US-based non-profit security policy group.

Violent crime has soared in the past decade with murder rates for Latin and Central America four times the global average in 2011, at 29 per 100,000 people, according to a 2013 UN Development Programme (UNDP) report.

In parallel, internet access in Latin America has multiplied thirteenfold in the past decade, providing communities with an alternative way to report crimes in near anonymity, share information on violence hotspots, mobilize community policing and organize protests calling for greater security.

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Categories
Regional Stability

Disgruntled Democracies

Yo Soy 132, courtesy of Micheal Fleshman /flickr

MEXICO CITY – In 2011 and 2012, tens of thousands of students demonstrated in Santiago, Chile, demanding greater access to higher education. Earlier this year, hundreds of thousands of Brazilians marched in São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, and Belo Horizonte, calling for improved public-health services, better schools, and cheaper, more efficient public transport. And Colombians and Peruvians from all walks of life (especially peasants, farm owners, and mineworkers), as well as Mexican school teachers, now occupy the centers of Bogotá, Lima, and Mexico City, disrupting inhabitants’ daily lives and creating serious problems for the authorities.

These countries, once models of economic hope and democratic promise in Latin America, have become examples of democracies without legitimacy or credibility. Although they have made significant social progress in recent years, they have become centers of popular unrest. And their presidents, despite their undeniable competence, are watching their approval ratings plummet.

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Four Marijuana Moments

Nogales CBP officers seize shipment of marijuana.

Latin America and the United States have experienced what one could call a series of “marijuana moments” over the past few weeks. Given growing support for ending the senseless and bloody decades-long “war on drugs,” these signs of progress toward decriminalization and legalization should not pass unremarked.

The first moment took place during the Organization of American States’ annual General Assembly, held this year in Antigua, Guatemala, at the beginning of June. The OAS Secretary General, José Miguel Insulza, presented a report entitled “The Drug Problem in the Americas,” which had been requested by the region’s heads of state when they met at last year’s Summit of the Americas in Cartagena, Colombia.

The report was drawn up by experts from almost all OAS member states, and was divided into two parts: an excellent analytical section, and a brief and somewhat exasperating chapter devoted to future scenarios. The document itself represents a watershed, because it provides the data needed for a scientific and empirical discussion of an issue that is too often debated in ideological terms.

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Autumn of the Patriarchs

Hugo Chávez
Hugo Chávez. Photo: Valter Campanato/ABr/Wikimedia Commons.

MADRID – “How difficult it is to die!” Francisco Franco is reputed to have exclaimed on his deathbed. Death, it seems, is always particularly difficult for autocrats to manage, even when they succeed in dying of natural causes.

A dictator’s death throes are always a form of theater, featuring ecstatic masses, would-be successors fighting for political survival, and, behind the scenes, the dictator’s coterie locked in efforts to extend the life of their patriarch until they can secure their privileges. Franco’s son-in-law, who was also the family doctor, kept the dying despot on life-support machines for more than a month.

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