South America Archive

In this week’s Trend Lines podcast, WPR’s editor-in-chief, Judah Grunstein, and associate editor, Robbie Corey-Boulet, discuss the implications for Africa and elsewhere of the Trump administration’s emphasis on security ties over development aid. For the Report, Laurence Blair talks with Peter Dörrie about the politics of inequality at the heart of Paraguay’s recently averted presidential term limit crisis. If you’d like to sign up for the beta version of WPR’s Africa-only subscription, you can do so here. It’s free for the first two months. And if you like what you hear on Trend Lines, as well as what you’ve seen […]

Tensions rose exponentially in Venezuela on Tuesday evening, when a police helicopter took to the skies of Caracas in an operation aimed at bringing an end to the rule of President Nicolas Maduro. It is not clear if the attackers’ intention was to directly overthrow the government or to send a message to the president and the public that it’s time for Maduro to step—or be pushed—aside. What is clear is that the most likely scenarios for Venezuela’s future are increasingly becoming a coup or a civil war. It’s remarkable that the chopper, apparently commandeered by rogue members of the […]

ASUNCION, Paraguay—The dramatic events that took place on the evening of March 31 grabbed an unusual amount of international media attention for Paraguay. After months of behind-the-scenes preparations, the governing right-wing Partido Colorado (PC), the left-wing Frente Guasu coalition (FG) and a dissident faction of the Authentic Radical Liberal Party (PLRA) made a bid to change the constitution to allow for presidential re-election, which is prohibited by Paraguay’s post-dictatorship 1992 constitution. Allies of President Horacio Cartes—one of the country’s richest businessmen, and a political newcomer prior to his election at the head of the PC in 2013—had been working for […]

On Saturday, June 17, the upscale Centro Andino shopping center in the Colombian capital, Bogota, was teeming with families, mostly women and children shopping the day before Father’s Day. At about 4 p.m., a powerful bomb went off in the women’s bathroom. The explosion killed three people, including a French woman, and injured 11 others. It also laid bare the obstacles along Colombia’s path to a sustainable peace. The immediate question, and one that authorities have not been able to answer, is who built and planted the bomb. But as investigators run down the clues and explore various theories, the […]

German Chancellor Angela Merkel visited Argentina and Mexico earlier this month in advance of the G-20 summit meeting scheduled to take place in Hamburg in July. While discussing trade and investment between Latin America and Europe, she also offered a subtle rebuke of U.S. President Donald Trump, extolling the virtues of the Paris climate agreement and cooperation in an “interconnected world.” In an email interview, Dr. Claudia Zilla, head of research for the Americas at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs in Berlin, discusses Germany’s current engagement with Latin America and the areas in which it could deepen. […]

In addressing the root causes of migration, building allies, developing markets and advancing U.S. interests, the Inter-American Foundation provides the best dollar-for-dollar return on U.S. investment in Latin America. Yet the Trump administration wants to end it. An independent agency of the U.S. government, the IAF has funded local development projects throughout Latin America and the Caribbean since its creation in 1969. The Trump administration’s budget proposes shutting it down to save a mere $22.5 million in appropriations this year. The administration’s budget would cut funding to the IAF to just $4.6 million in the 2018 fiscal year, with nothing […]

Colombia right now is closer than it has ever been to solving its illicit drug problem. This may be a surprising contention, since the country just measured record-breaking cultivation of coca, the plant used to make cocaine. Yet the landmark peace deal between the Colombian government and the country’s principal guerrilla group, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, has eliminated the most prominent obstacle to consolidate democratic governance over the vast rural areas where coca is cultivated. Or, at least it has eliminated the handiest excuse for longstanding inaction. Passed in November, the peace accord, along with President […]