Samidoun: Free Alex Saab, political prisoner of capitalism and imperialism On January 30, over 30 organizations that make up the Movement of Solidarity with the Bolivarian Revolution in Madrid raised their voices to demand the release of Venezuelan diplomat Alex Saab and all the political prisoners of imperialism. Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network is a signatory of this statement.
February 16: National Lawyers Guild webinar on Alex Saab: Imprisonment, Sanctions and a Gag Order
Orinoco Tribune: Abducted Diplomat Alex Saab Sends Message Calling for Peace In his message, Alex Saab made several complaints about his current situation as “prisoner of an unconventional war that the United States has unilaterally declared on us, imposing criminal sanctions on us that have caused terrible harm to the people of Venezuela.” “The United States must return to the path of peace,” Saab added. “Venezuela is not its enemy. Political differences should not prevent us from maintaining diplomatic or economic relations between our nations.”
Latin America: Assange and CELAC Summit
Le Monde Diplomatique: Latin America rallies behind Julian Assange When WikiLeaks made its explosive revelations of classified documents in 2010, Fidel Castro said that Assange had ‘morally brought [the US] to its knees’. He wrote that Assange was ‘demonstrating that the most powerful empire in history can be defied. I must congratulate the people from WikiLeaks on their bravery and courage.’ Even today the majority of South American governments support Assange, who has been held in a high-security prison in London for nearly four years, awaiting a decision on his extradition to the US, where he could face a 175-year prison sentence.
Tortilla con Sal (Stephen Sefton): 7th CELAC Summit – between evasion and reality The main achievement of the seventh summit of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States in Argentina is to have been able to happen at all, thus keeping alive the vision of a Greater Nation for all the peoples of the region. Compared to the tremendous dynamism and forthrightness of CELAC’s founders, the summit’s Final Statement exhibits a bland, mediocre agenda of evasion and hollow aspirations. On a positive note, the Declaration confirms the commitment of the member States to integration, unity and political, economic, social and cultural diversity as a community of sovereign nations.
Nicaragua
Daniel Ortega: In a Brotherly People, Peru, they have sown terror and death there, simply because the People decided to elect a President of peasant origin, a teacher of peasant origin That’s just class hatred, they can’t bear to see a peasant, a worker, a humble teacher occupying the Presidency, for them that’s unacceptable and they started making war, war and more war against him, until they carried out a coup d’état, and President Pedro, yes, Pedro is his name, President Pedro Castillo, a teacher from the countryside, a rural teacher, you may have seen the photo of him, he’s a simple, humble person, they have him in jail, they have him imprisoned!
Lee Camp: We’re Trying To Crush The Happiest Country On Earth Lee Camp looks into the efforts by the US to undermine the leadership of one of the happiest countries on the planet: Nicaragua.
Popular Resistance: Nicaragua is run by women with a revolutionary feminism Nicaragua has made significant achievements in healthcare, education, housing, renewable energy and food sovereignty, to name a few. One achievement is the gain in equality for women. The Global Gender Gap Report for 2022 ranked Nicaragua 7th in the world for gender parity. The country is “run by women” who connect their feminism to the struggles against capitalism, colonialism and patriarchy. Clark-Gollub also dispels misinformation about Nicaragua being promoted in the US corporate media and explains how the US is working to undermine the gains of the Sandinistas through hybrid warfare.
Nica Notes (Brian Willson): Nicaragua’s flower is in full bloom despite vicious US efforts to destroy it Despite these features of Nicaragua’s progressive society, the US still considers Nicaragua, along with progressive Venezuela and Cuba, the troika of tyranny. This reveals the stupidity and ignorance of US policy makers. The blooming Nicaragua flower survived the world economic crisis in 2008, the US-orchestrated coup attempt in 2018, a global pandemic, two Category 4 hurricanes within two weeks of each other in November 2020, and severe US-imposed sanctions.
Cuba
World Politics Review (William LeoGrande): Cuba’s Deepening Economic Crisis Is Putting Diaz-Canel in a Bind The twin blows of U.S. sanctions and the COVID-19 pandemic have drastically reduced Cuba’s foreign exchange earnings, plunging the island into its worst economic crisis since the collapse of the Soviet Union. Foreign exchange receipts have dropped 45 percent, prompting a reduction in imports of 27 percent in 2020 and 40 percent in 2021. The result is pervasive shortages of all kinds of goods.
Venezuela
Orinoco Tribune: Venezuela Condemns Massacre of Palestinians The government of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela condemns the bloody operation perpetrated by the Israeli occupation forces in Palestinian territory since the early hours of yesterday in the West Bank, where at least nine Palestinian citizens lost their lives and a score of people were injured. These acts of violence are an example of the criminal network of the government of Benjamin Netanyahu against the Palestinian people, and of the flagrant violation of international law by the Israeli occupying power in the state of Palestine.
Venezuelanalysis: UN Human Rights Chief Calls for Suspension of Sanctions on Venezuela UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk called on member states to suspend measures such as sanctions that undermine human rights and aggravate the economic crisis in Venezuela. “It is clear that the sectorial sanctions imposed since August 2017 have exacerbated the economic crisis and hindered human rights,” Türk told reporters.
Mision Verdad: Pompeo’s Confessions About Trump’s Strategy Against Venezuela Pompeo gives his rationalizations for economically suffocating Venezuela and its entire population.
Events
Thursdays: WTF is Going on in Latin America & The Caribbean with Teri Mattson (or watch here or here)
February 4: Free Alex Saab Reportback
February 5: Nicaragua Webinar with Camilo Mejia “Journey of a Native Son”
February 16: National Lawyers Guild webinar on Alex Saab: Imprisonment, Sanctions and a Gag Order
February 19: Washington DC demonstration against the War Machine; David Swanson interview with the organizers
February 25-March 11: Revolutionary Figures art exhibit by Carlito Rovira
March 11-12: International US-Cuba Normalization Conference
Delegations/Tours
March 2-12: Venezuela, 10 years commemorating Chávez’s Legacy
March 3-13: Cuba Solidarity Tour – Culture, History, and Politics
March 11-19: Nicaragua Coffee and Cooperatives Brigade
March 10-20: Visit Cuba with The Center for Global Justice
April 4-13: Cuba Agroecology Tour
April 23 to May 7: NNOC-ICAP 2023 May Day Brigade Interest Form
April 25-May 7: Building Relations with Cuban Labor: Celebrating Labor and May Day in Cuba
April 27-May 6 Nicaragua delegation by Friends of the ATC
May 26- June 4: Lessons from Cuba: Exploring Art, Healthcare, Sustainability and Education
May 13-22 and June 19-26 delegations to Nicaragua
June 17-27 Nicaraguan Caribbean Coast Delegation with Friends of the ATC
If you have events to publicize or find helpful articles for readers on the ALBA countries, please send them to [email protected], or you can post them on Facebook here: Venezuela; Nicaragua; Bolivia; Latin America in general (here or here) Or send them to [email protected]
