MEXICO: “LATINOS IN THE UNITED STATES FEEL DISAPPOINTED” The rise of the Latino vote that brought Barack Obama to the presidency may come to an end in the legislative elections in November. After the failure of the immigration reform, “it is very possible that many latinos will not vote because their enthusiasm of two years ago has been converted into disappointment, commented, Maria Blanco (Mexico City), executive director of the Earl Warren Institute of the University of California, Berkeley, in an interview with El País newspaper from Spain this Tuesday, Oct. 5. Blanco informed the paper that “there has always been a marginalization of immigrants, because of the language barrier, by the economic sector in which they work. What is new is that the legal system has segregated this group and have denied them their basic rights which are enjoyed by the rest of the population.” She added that “under Obama’s administration, deportations have risen 50 percent. The undocumented are very fearful…. In California, in 2008, the Latino vote, traditionally low, rose to 30 percent. Today it is very probable that they will not vote. And not only in the presidential elections but in the legislative elections of November. I do not think that they will support at any moment a Republican candidate, which would be worse in relation to the immigration issue, but it is unlikely that they are motivated to vote for the Democrats. They feel disappointed by the turn of events of national politics”. (www.elpais.com)
SAN JUAN, PUERTO RICO: MACRO-OPERATION IN PUERTO RICO AGAINST DRUG AND ARMS TRAFFICKING A total of 133 police officers and civil servants were arrested this Wednesday, Oct. 6, in Puerto Rico in the biggest operation against police corruption related to drug trafficking that has taken place in the history of the Office of Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI). The chief of the FBI in Puerto Rico, Luis Fraticeeli, said in a press conference that 89 police officers and 44 civil servants were arrested for the distribution of drugs and narcotics, criminal offenses that brought about an operation that is considered the most important against police corruption and drug trafficking in the history of the FBI, as well as, the largest, due to the number of agents that participated in the operation. Those arrested include the officers of the Police Force of Puerto Rico, city police, agents from the Department of Prisons, members of the National Guard and ex-officers of law and order, among others. The activities of the accused consisted in providing protection with firearms to the narcotics traffickers and in exchange were paid between $500 and $4,500 for each operation. Fraticelli has pointed out that the operation took place after a long investigation by the FBI from July of 2008 to September of 2010. (www.elpais.com)
LIMA, PERU: “IT IS A GREAT DAY FOR PERU” The awarding of the Nobel Prize in Literature to Mario Vargas Llosa this Oct. 7, caught the writer’s country, Peru, where the news has generated enormous joy, by surprise. It was surprising for the country that was accustomed to writing news headlines related to the Nobel Prize in the negative: “The Swiss academy continues to ignore Vargas Llosa…”. Not even Vargas Llosa considered himself among those nominated. According to a local radio station, he was told of his award a mere 14 minutes before the official announcement. An avalanche of greetings and congratulations did not take long to emerge, and one of the first to congratulate him was the Peruvian President Alan Garcia, who for a number of years had been his political adversary. “It is a great day for Peru,” commented the President and he then added that the prize was “an act of great justice, that in truth, we have waited for since our youth.” Vargas Llosa – writer, journalist and Peruvian literary critic – is considered one of the most important contemporary writers and essayists of the Spanish language. (www.elpais.com)
COLOMBIA: THE FARC REFUSE TO PUT DOWN THEIR ARMS The principal Colombian guerrilla organization declined an offer by the Juan Manuel Santos administration to disband, after receiving hard blows in the last months. “No, thank you”: This was FARC’s answer to the offer presented by President Santos’ administration to put down their arms and disband. In the communique broadcast Oct. 10, the Secretariat of the Central High Command of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia has insured that, after more than four decades of struggle, they are not going to disband nor accept “a false peace.” The Administration of President Juan Manuel Santos has indicated that it will no longer dialogue with the FARC if it does not put down its arms and cease its actions. The FARC acknowledges that Colombia needs to initiate a process of reconciliation and peace agreements, but “it will not take place with a false peace where a minority of oligarchy continues monopolizing all of the riches, at the same time that the large national majorities can not do anything because of their impoverishment, the military terrorists, the misery and the moral degradation of a ruling class corrupt through and through. We have failed to sit and seriously communicate through a civilized exchange of opinions for the purpose of resolving our differences, in order to bring about a definitive solution to our political, economic and social differences, the originators of this internal conflict, and to bring about the welfare of future generations of compatriots,” he concluded. (www.elpais.com)