News in English

28.10.2003 Mexico's tragedy unfolded on the night of October 2, 1968, when a student demonstration ended in a storm of bullets in La Plaza de las Tres Culturas at Tlatelolco, Mexico City. The extent of the violence stunned the country. Although months of nationwide student strikes that preceded October 2nd had prompted an increasingly repressive response from the Díaz Ordaz regime, no one was prepared for the bloodbath that Tlatelolco became.

24.10.2003 It has been exactly twenty years since the U.S. forces invaded Grenada, ending that Caribbean island nation's four-year socialist experiment. An island nation no bigger than Martha's Vineyard, with a population that could barely fill the Rose Bowl, was defeated with relatively few American casualties. President Ronald Reagan's decision to occupy the country and replace the government with one more to his liking proved to be quite popular in the United States, with polls indicating that 63% of the public supported the invasion.

22.10.2003 Of the nearly 500 million inhabitants of Latin America and the Caribbean, 220 million live in poverty and of those 95 million live in extreme poverty or indigence, according to figures from the Economic Commission on Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC). Those most likely to experience poverty are indigenous groups, women and children.

21.10.2003 A class-action lawsuit against oil giant ChevronTexaco opened today in a small, cinderblock courthouse in a frontier oil town in the Ecuadorian rainforest, charging the company with despoiling the environment with millions of gallons of spilled crude oil during the 1970s and '80s.

21.10.2003 Results of a new survey by the Udall Center for Studies in Public Policy suggest that for U.S.-Mexico border activist groups to be more effective in improving environmental, health, and economic conditions they need to build long-lasting alliances fostered by personal contact between them. The conclusion is based on a review of cross-border work since the early 1990s.

18.10.2003 In the light of recent developments in the Human Rights crisis in which the country is immersed, Amnesty International reiterates its urgent call to the authorities and to all sectors of Bolivian society to prevent an increase in the escalation of violence and further bloodshed.

17.10.2003 International human rights advocate Bianca Jagger arrived in Ecuador to begin a historic tour of the Amazon jungle only two weeks before the start of a landmark trial in Lago Agrio where rainforest peoples are seeking to force ChevronTexaco to clean up the environmental contamination left behind from Texaco’s drilling operations.

16.10.2003 With names like the "Heavy Hand Plan" in El Salvador, "Clean Sweep" in Guatemala and "Operation Freedom" in Honduras, officials of Central American countries are taking steps to combat the gangs known as "maras" that have flourished in the region.

14.10.2003 Gunmen have killed two witnesses who gave testimonies about Brazil's death squads to UN special rapporteur, Asma Jahangir, visiting to investigate gross rights violations and allegations of police collusion. In a shocking demonstration of their apparent impunity, reminiscent of the worst days of 'disappearances', torture and arbitrary executions in Central and South America, the death squads have shamed a nation struggling to improve its human rights record.

13.10.2003 A special dinner to "celebrate and promote the work of Casa Alianza" was held this evening at the historic House of Lords on the banks of London's river Thames. Hosted by Lord Daniel Brennan, QC (Queen's Counsel), many Lords and Ladies, Members of the British Parliament, the European Parliament, the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and select supporters of Casa Alianza UK came to learn about the work of the agency which serves more than 9,000 homeless children and youth in Mexico and Central America every year.