[Onthebarricades] Anti-neoliberal protests in Latin America, Apr-Aug 2008

[Andy]

ON THE BARRICADES:  Global Resistance Roundup, April-August 2008
https://lists.resist.ca/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/onthebarricades
http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/globalresistance/



*  MEXICO:  Protests head off oil privatisation

*  CHILE:  Protests over neoliberal education "reform" continue - lecturers 
strike, students clash with police, hundreds arrested

*  BRAZIL:  Via Campesina lead wave of protests over food crisis, land; 
target multinationals, mines

*  BOLIVIA:  Protests against US asylum for rights violator target US 
embassy

*  BOLIVIA:  "Where Rioting is a Way of Life"

*  CHILE:  Mine shut after "violent" workers' protests

*  CHILE:  Argentine consulate occupied in protest for services

*  OAXACA:  Protests target local government

*  HONDURAS:  Protests over visit by US official

*  MEXICO:  Protest against Canadian mine

*  GUATEMALA:  Protests over cost of living

*  EL SALVADOR:  Bus price rise leads to social unrest

*  NICARAGUA:  Banning of left party, neoliberal policies lead to protests

*  ARGENTINA:  Pension cuts spark unrest in Cordoba

*  PARAGUAY:  Landless protesters occupy hacienda


http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/mexico/20080415-1007-mexico-energy-left.html

Mexico protests snag government's oil reform plans

By Catherine Bremer
REUTERS
10:07 a.m. April 15, 2008
MEXICO CITY - Mexican leftists have stormed Congress and taken to the 
streets in a campaign that could force President Felipe Calderón to dilute 
his plans to allow foreign companies a bigger role in the oil industry.
Calderón had hoped to rush through a law this month to boost private 
investment in the oil sector to help Mexico seek new crude reserves in the 
deep waters of the Gulf of Mexico.
He has the backing of some opposition members in the divided Congress but a 
backlash of left-wing protests has now delayed a vote until after this 
month.
Even Calderón's conservative National Action Party, or PAN, admits the bill, 
which makes it easier for state oil firm Pemex to ally with private firms in 
the search for oil, will not be voted on before Congress breaks for the 
summer April 30.
Leftist lawmakers from the Party of the Democratic Revolution, or PRD, have 
seized the podiums of both houses of Congress and are even sleeping there to 
prevent a quick debate and vote on the bill.
"It's clear we'll now have a summer of this," said analyst Dan Lund, head of 
research firm MUND Americas.
Tens of thousands of protesters gathered in the capital's main square at the 
weekend in a demonstration against what they see as the "creeping 
privatization" of the oil sector.
"Even the elite is divided, not just ordinary people. The administration 
will basically not get its proposal," said Lund, predicting Congress will 
pass a more watered-down version of the bill later this year.
The energy proposal is Calderón's most ambitious reform attempt since taking 
office in 2006 but he is taking a big risk by tampering with the cherished 
state-controlled oil industry, nationalized in 1938 when foreign firms were 
thrown out.
CAN'T KILL THE BILL
Mexico is the world's No. 5 oil producer and a top U.S. supplier but Pemex 
says that without foreign partners it cannot reach new reserves fast enough 
to shore up falling output.
Calderón needs the backing of the centrist Institutional Revolutionary 
Party, or PRI, to get the 50 percent majority to pass the bill.
PRI leaders say they broadly back plans to give Pemex more autonomy and let 
it sweeten oil field service contracts with bonus fees.
But analysts say some in the party are wary of being seen to support changes 
to oil laws so close to mid-term congressional elections in 2009, and the 
left-wing protests might lure some centrists to the "No" camp.
"The PAN's main challenge is defectors from the PRI," said Francisco 
Gonzalez, a Latin American studies professor at Johns Hopkins University.
"The left will not be able to derail it, but the public relations dimension 
is important," he said.
The leftist PRD has been weakened by ideological divisions between moderates 
and radicals, yet a large group of its lawmakers managed to seize the 
podiums in the Senate and lower house Chamber of Deputies last week to 
protest the energy reform plan.
PRD deputies dressed in oil worker suits covered the lower house podium with 
a banner reading "Closed" and began a round-the-clock vigil, snoozing on 
benches, playing chess and bedding down for the night in sleeping bags.
The government proposals omit risk-sharing contracts that Pemex had wanted, 
yet opponents say its "incentive contracts" amount to the same thing and 
breach a ban in the constitution on private firms drilling for Mexican oil.
"Anyone from a great law expert to a D-grade student would say this is a 
flagrant violation of the Constitution," an unshaven Sen. Ricardo Monreal 
said at the Senate sit-in.
Calderón's party and centrists held a short session at another hall in the 
Senate Tuesday to sidestep the protests.
Leftist leader Andres Manuel López Obrador, who riled Calderón with months 
of street protests in 2006 after claiming his presidential election defeat 
was rigged, has drummed up big crowds to street rallies in recent days.
The government might be helped by a rift in the PRD as moderate and militant 
camps bicker over an unresolved March 16 party leadership vote.
"The internal struggle for control of the PRD and the failure of its 
election to redistribute power between moderates and radicals weakens the 
party's position," said Enrique Bravo at political risk consultancy Eurasia 
Group.
(Additional reporting by Michael O'Boyle; Editing by Kieran Murray)

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=ROS20080523&articleId=9057

Mexico: Oil privatisation halted due to mass protests
by John Ross
Global Research, May 23, 2008
"The Adelitas have arrived/To defend our oil/Whoever wants to give it to the 
foreigners/ Will get the shit kicked out of him!" yodelled the brigades of 
women pouring onto the esplanade of the Mexican senate. The demonstration 
was to protest a petroleum privatisation measure President Felipe Calderon 
insists is not a petroleum privatisation measure - and which he sent onto 
the Senate for fast-track ratification at the tag end of the session this 
April.

Inside the small, ornate Senate, leftist legislators aligned in the Broad 
Progressive Front (FAP), some dressed in white oil workers' overalls and 
hard hats, were camped out under pup tents arranged around the podium for 
the eighth straight night. They paralysed legislative activities and 
demanded an ample national debate on Calderon's plans to open up the 
nationalised petroleum corporation PEMEX to transnational investment.

Sneak privatisation

The hullabaloo, which has been brewing for months, exploded when rumours 
circulated that Calderon's right-wing PAN party and allies in the 
once-ruling (71 years) PRI had cooked up a secret vote approving the 
privatisation measure.

Such covert manoeuvring is called an "albazo" or "madruguete' - a pre-dawn 
ruse to approve legislation in the dark when there is significant 
opposition, often behind locked doors and military and police barricades. 
Seizing the podiums in both houses of congress and the timely arrival of the 
Adelitas prevented a madruguete and derailed plans to fast-track the 
privatisation.

Under Calderon's "energy reform" package, building and operating refineries 
and pipelines will be opened up to the private sector - 37 out of PEMEX's 41 
divisions would be subject to partial privatisation.

In an analysis anti-privatisers label "catastrophic", which Calderon sent on 
to congress to back up his initiative, the president pinned salvation of 
PEMEX on deep water drilling in the Gulf of Mexico that would necessitate 
the "association" of private capital.

Mexico's petroleum industry was expropriated from an array of oil companies 
known collectively as the "Seven Sisters" in March 1938 by then-president 
Lazaro Cardenas - an act that remains a paragon of revolutionary nationalism 
throughout Latin America.

But down the decades, PEMEX has subcontracted out important parts of its 
structure to transnational drillers and service corporations like 
Halliburton, now its number one subcontractor, that suck billions of dollars 
in profits from Mexican oil each year.

The appearance of the Adelitas and their male counterparts ("Los Adelitos") 
is the latest gamble by the left populist leader Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador 
(AMLO) to monkey wrench the government's plans to return PEMEX to the 
contemporary version of the Seven Sisters.

Organised by neighbourhoods and by workplaces, the Adelita brigades are the 
lineal descendants of the groups of AMLO supporters who came together after 
the stolen 2006 election in a seven-week sit-in that shut down the capital's 
main thoroughfares. At last count, there were 41 registered brigades - 28 
Adelitas and 13 Adelitos, about 50,000 citizens in all.

Operating in shifts, 13,000 "brigadistas" have been encamped off and on for 
a week in front of the Senate and the Chamber of Deputies.

The brigades are named after significant political events - "18th of March", 
marking the day Cardenas expropriated the oil - or to honor social activists 
such as Jesus Piedra, the long-disappeared son of left senator Rosario 
Ibarra. Women warriors like Leona Vicaria and Benita Galeana are similarly 
remembered.

Citizens' army

The creation of so large a citizens' army pledged to carry out civil 
disobedience to prevent the passage of legislation it thinks detrimental to 
the republic is unprecedented in Mexico's political history.

Similar brigades, led by women, have invaded local congresses outside of 
Mexico City and one band of activists closed Acapulco's busy airport last 
week. Shutting down Mexico City's Benito Juarez International Airport is the 
Adelitas' ultimate threat.

The Adelitas, like most of the weapons in AMLO's arsenal, are drawn from 
Mexico's revolutionary history. Las Adelitas were "soldaderas", or women 
soldiers who fought shoulder to shoulder with the men in Pancho Villa's 
"Northern Division" during the 1910-1919 revolution.

With their long skirts, broad sombreros, bandoleers strung across their 
chests, and toting .22 carbines, the Adelitas were emblematic of the many 
courageous women who participated in that epic struggle.

AMLO's crusade has not been confined to one house of congress. On April 8, 
when Calderon sprung his initiative on the legislature, FAP members stormed 
the tribune in the Chamber of Deputies while lawmakers were preparing to 
grant Calderon permission to travel to New Orleans for the April 21-22 
summit of the North American Security and Prosperity Agreement. Mexican 
presidents must solicit congress for permission to travel.

Calderon was eager to attend the summit with the re-privatisation of Mexican 
oil in hand.

Suddenly, the FAPos unfurled a 60-foot banner that announced Congress had 
been closed and cast it over the entire presidium - trapping president Ruth 
Zavaleta in its folds. The ensuing chaos prevented her from calling for a 
vote on the President's travel arrangements.

Eight days later, the tribune was still draped in the banner and FAP 
deputies had chained shut the doors of the chamber and moved the desks of 
the PAN legislators to the podium to barricade themselves from attempts to 
take it back.

Zavaleta, a member of AMLO's Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD) but 
not friendly to him, has called for the use of "public force" to remove the 
rebel lawmakers.

AMLO is the target of extravagant vitriol delivered by the media, 
reminiscent of the public lynching he was subjected to during the tumultuous 
2006 presidential campaign. TV tyrant Televisa's coverage of the takeover of 
congress was so venomous that thousands of Adelitas, wearing bandaleros and 
wielding facsimile .22s, descended on the conglomerate's Mexico City 
headquarters, provoking one prominent PAN politico to label them 
"paramilitaries".

In violation of constitutional amendments banning "black" political hit 
pieces, a PAN front group "Better Society, Better Government", is running 
primetime Televisa spots comparing AMLO to Hitler, Mussolini, and Pinochet. 
The Empresorial Coordinating Council, the nation's elite business 
federation, takes out full-page ads blasting AMLO for staging a coup d'etat.

PRD divisions

Despite the anti-AMLO media blitz, or perhaps because of it, Lopez Obrador 
remains the only figure on the Mexican political stage who is able to 
convoke tens of thousands of supporters, often with virtually no notice.

Three times since March 18, when he kicked off this crusade, AMLO has filled 
the great Zocalo plaza, the heart of Mexico's body politic. What makes the 
turnouts even more impressive is the fact that AMLO has built this massive 
movement while the PRD has been reducing itself to rubble.

In-fighting since a corrupted March 16 party presidential election has 
divided the PRD down the middle. The party is roughly split between an 
activist wing headed by Lopez Obrador and party bureaucrats who see the PRD 
as an instrument for political and personal advancement. The latter seek to 
demobilize the Adelitas.

The "Chuchus" (many of their leaders are named Jesus) eschew AMLO's rallies 
and sit-ins and instead conduct their own private hunger strikes to protest 
privatisation. The Chuchus portray themselves as the "reasonable" left and 
are only too willing to "dialogue" with Calderon - a president Lopez Obrador 
resolutely refuses to recognise, due to the fraudulent nature of his 
"victory" in 2006.

Whoever wins, the tussle over the bones of the PRD may be a moot one - after 
two years of grassroots campaigning, ALMO's base has grown wider than the 
PRD's.

Although Calderon's scam to fast track privatisation through congress was 
blunted by the Adelitas and the FAPs, the PAN and the PRI still have plenty 
of room in which to connive. Now the PRI, seconded by Calderon's right-wing 
minions, proposes an uninterrupted 50 day "national" debate to be restricted 
to the two houses of congress with a congressional vote by mid-summer.

Calderon's initiative can only pass if at least half of the PRI's 120-vote 
delegation goes along with the game. Even if the privatisation measure 
eventually passes, the legislation is bound to wind up in the Mexican 
Supreme Court the moment it clears congress.

Meanwhile, AMLO's people are clamouring for a very different kind of debate, 
one that would unfold over the next four months and be conducted inside and 
outside congress in every state and municipality with the prospect of a 
national referendum to decide the issue - one poll has 62% opposed to the 
privatisation.

Such grassroots decision-making would be a revolutionary step in the land of 
the albazo and the madruguete.

Out on the esplanade of the Senate, the Adelitas were shaking their bodies 
to "La Cumbia del Petrolio". "Are you tired, companeras?" the companera with 
the bullhorn asked and brigadista Berta Robledo, a nurse about to retire 
from the National Pediatric Hospital, came to her feet with a loud "No!"

"Sure the sun is hot but so what?", she responded to a gringo reporter's 
stupid question, "the sun can't stop us, the rain can't stop us, the cold 
can't stop us and you know why? Because we are right! We are fighting for 
our oil and for our country. This is the resistance. We don't get tired."

[Abridged from http://counterpunch.org, April 28.]

http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2008-07-08-Chile-protests_N.htm?csp=34

New clashes rage between police and protesters in Chile
Posted 7/8/2008 2:00 PM
By Roberto Candia, AP

A masked demonstrator runs from a water cannon during a similar protest in 
Santiago on June 25, 2008.
SANTIAGO, Chile (AP) - Chilean police are using tear gas and water cannon to 
scatter hundreds of school teachers and students protesting a 
government-sponsored education bill.
The clashes Tuesday began when protesters tried to march along the main 
avenue of Santiago toward the government palace. Some protesters were 
detained and two reportedly suffered minor injuries.
The protesters complain the education reforms don't give the center 
government enough control over education.
The bill was approved by the lower house of Congress last month and now 
waits for Senate approval.

http://rss.xinhuanet.com/newsc/english/2008-06/19/content_8398880.htm

Chilean police detain 180 protesters
    SANTIAGO, June 18 (Xinhua) -- At least 180 Chilean high school and 
college students were detained in Santiago Wednesday during a large-scale 
protest against a proposed new education law.
    Over 5,000 students took to the streets in the capital at a time when 
Chilean law makers were discussing the education bill, which had drawn 
strong criticism from students and professors.
    They argued the bill inherits the existing education law established 
during the military dictatorship and fails to address inequality and 
profit-focused practices within the Chilean education system.
    The bill was expected to be passed in Chilean parliament earlier in the 
day, but it now faces an uncertain destiny as many legislators from the 
ruling coalition boycotted the bill, saying the government has made too many 
concessions to the opposition.
    Professors and students threatened their demonstration will continue if 
the authorities make no efforts to amend the bill and provide quality 
education to all citizens.

http://rss.xinhuanet.com/newsc/english/2008-04/25/content_8046490.htm

260 arrested during student protests in Chile
    SANTIAGO, April 24 (Xinhua) -- Some 260 people were arrested Thursday 
during protests in Chile convoked by a student organization, police said.
    The Association of High School Students is boycotting the Organic 
Education Law (LGE), which will replace the one inherited from the country's 
military regime, and urged the government to increase the educational 
budget.
    The protests were especially large in the Chilean capital Santiago and 
the southern city of Valdivia.
    Some 2,000 people participated in the protest in Santiago. The 
protestors, aged between 14 and 17, received official authorization to march 
to the Bellas Artes Museum and through the Parque Forestal in the downtown 
area.
    However, police intervened to stop the manifestation and arrested some 
50 people as the students tried to surpass the authorized limits.
    Meanwhile, thousands of students clashed with police and about 210 
people were arrested in Valdivia, 840 km south of Santiago, and Concepcion, 
another city in the south of this South American nation.
    "The police repression surpassed all the limits since it was a peaceful 
manifestation that only demanded the compliance of the government's 
commitment not to commercialize education," said Ursula Shuller, vice 
president of Chile's Federation of University Students.
    In 2006, students staged protests against the LGE, which they said would 
change the country's public state education system.
    Nicolas Pineda, a spokesman of the Manuel de Salas School in Santiago, 
said the LGE "does not represent all students and it does not solve any of 
the demands we made in 2006."

http://tvnz.co.nz/view/page/536641/1857312

Protesters clash with Chile police
Jun 19, 2008 10:59 AM

Students and teachers clashed with police in Chile as they protested against 
an education bill they say doesn't go far enough to bring equal access to 
schooling for the poor even with a government flush with copper dollars.
About a thousand students marched shoulder to shoulder in the nation's 
capital, confronting police with tear gas and water canon in the upscale 
Providencia neighborhood.
In Valparaiso, the port town where the national Congress is debating the 
controversial legislation, 10,000 teachers marched in peaceful 
demonstrations.
"The quality of public education is very poor in this country, and does not 
stand a chance against the interests of the rich," said Jaime Gajardo, 
president of Chile's National College of Teachers.
Chile is the world's largest copper producer and revenues from the red metal 
have helped make the Chilean economy one of the region's healthiest.
Demonstrators want President Michelle Bachelet to withdraw an education bill 
from Congress that replaces a law in place since the end of Chile's 
1973-1990 dictatorship.
Students and teachers don't like the existing law either, but they say the 
new bill does not go far enough to meet their needs, and are demanding the 
government draw more on funds from coffers bursting with revenues from a 
four-year copper bonanza.
They also accuse the center-left government of allowing the wealthy right to 
control the debate over education funding.
"When you negotiate with the (political) right, the right wins," Gajardo 
said.
Public school students and teachers say privileged, private schools receive 
government funds that would be better served in improving the public school 
system.
Police said at least 270 students were arrested by late afternoon in 
Santiago, and at least seven more were arrested in Valparaiso.

http://www.mathaba.net/rss/?x=590094

260 arrested during student protests in Chile
Posted: 2008/04/25
From: Mathaba

Some 260 people were arrested Thursday during protests in Chile convoked by 
a student organization, police said.

SANTIAGO, April 24 (Xinhua) -- The Association of High School Students is 
boycotting the Organic Education Law (LGE), which will replace the one 
inherited from the country's military regime, and urged the government to 
increase the educational budget.

The protests were especially large in the Chilean capital Santiago and the 
southern city of Valdivia.

Some 2,000 people participated in the protest in Santiago. The protestors, 
aged between 14 and 17, received official authorization to march to the 
Bellas Artes Museum and through the Parque Forestal in the downtown area.

However, police intervened to stop the manifestation and arrested some 50 
people as the students tried to surpass the authorized limits.

Meanwhile, thousands of students clashed with police and about 210 people 
were arrested in Valdivia, 840 km south of Santiago, and Concepcion, another 
city in the south of this South American nation.

"The police repression surpassed all the limits since it was a peaceful 
manifestation that only demanded the compliance of the government's 
commitment not to commercialize education," said Ursula Shuller, vice 
president of Chile's Federation of University Students.

In 2006, students staged protests against the LGE, which they said would 
change the country's public state education system.

Nicolas Pineda, a spokesman of the Manuel de Salas School in Santiago, said 
the LGE "does not represent all students and it does not solve any of the 
demands we made in 2006."

http://www.santiagotimes.cl/santiagotimes/2008051513685/news/political-news/chile-students-protests.html

CHILE STUDENT PROTESTS CONTINUE UNABATED
Thursday, 15 May 2008


Santiago students also took part in transportation-related protests last 
month
Leigh Shadko, Santiago Times

Region V students on Wednesday continued to protest what they claim are 
unfair regulations regarding student bus fares, among other alleged 
problems. Meanwhile, the government proposed the formation of a dialog group 
to analyze the fare issue and called on the demonstrators to return to 
classes.
In February, the companies that provide public bus transportation in Region 
V announced they would raise student fares in order to compensate for 
financial difficulties partially caused by high oil prices.

Region V student leaders then called on the government to address the 
problem. Specifically, they demanded that authorities overturn a 
Transportation and Telecommunications Ministry decree that allows bus 
companies outside of Santiago to charge students up to 50 percent of the 
adult fare, a greater percentage than what bus companies in the capital can 
charge. The students also asked to be able to pay discounted fares year 
round, not just during the traditional school year months.

The students began demonstrating in April, claiming officials had not 
satisfactorily responsed to their petition. A Saturday protest convoked an 
estimated 2,500 students near Chile´s National Congress in Valparaíso. 
Police suppressed the demonstration after protestors set garbage bins on 
fire (ST, May 12).

Additionally, students at some Region V universities protested by taking 
over university buildings.

In response to a request by the Regional Government, the bus companies this 
week agreed to freeze student fares, which had been slated to increase on 
Thursday. The companies said student tariffs will not increase until 
Congress votes on a bill that would provide government subsidies to bus 
companies to keep fares down.

Education Minister Mónica Jiménez then called on students to end the 
protests, saying they had "no reason" to continue striking.

On Tuesday, education and transportation officials met with Region V student 
leaders and proposed creation of a dialogue group to examine and resolve the 
bus fare problem.

Some Region V student leaders called the proposal a step in the right 
direction. But Radical Party (PRSD) Senator Nelson Ávila, who represents 
Region V, said the proposal failed to directly address the bus fare 
regulations at the root of the students´ complaints.

The president of the Universidad de Playa Ancha Student Federation, 
Sebastián Delpiano, agreed. He told The Santiago Times that changing the 
controversial regulations is the only acceptable solution to the fare 
conflict. He said the fare-freezing agreement between the Regional 
Government and the bus companies leaves students dependent on a bill he 
doubts Congress will pass.

The vice president of the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Valparaíso 
(PUCV) Student Federation, David Mora, agreed that authorities must change 
the fare regulations. "There aren't first and second-class students, 
depending on which city they live in," he told The Santiago Times.

Delpiano said the government´s proposal will not necessarily put an end to 
the region´s student protests. Both he and Mora said Region V students are 
also protesting the proposed General Education Law (LGE), which some have 
charged does not combat inequality and profit-focused practices rooted in 
Chile's education system (ST, March 12).

Delpiano, who claimed that the public Universidad de Playa Ancha is in 
"financial crisis," said students will continue their occupation of 
university buildings until the LGE is removed from consideration in 
Congress. He said the students hope Chilean President Michelle Bachelet will 
address the issue in her annual May 21 speech to the nation.

Mora said PUCV students, who have also taken over university facilities, 
planned to hold a meeting on Wednesday night to determine a course of 
action.

The Region V protests are unfolding in the context of widespread 
demonstrations by Chilean university and high school students. Students 
demanding changes to bus fares, school hours and education finance have 
taken to the streets in Valparaíso, Santiago, Temuco, Concepción and 
Valdivia over the past few weeks. The demonstrations have resulted in 200 
arrests and scattered reports of property damage (ST, May 12, 2008).

Chilean student federations have called for a nationwide student strike for 
today, Thursday.

SOURCE: EL MERCURIO DE VALPARAÍSO
By Leigh Shadko ( editor at santiagotimes.clThis e-mail address is being 
protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it )
Last Updated ( Thursday, 15 May 2008 )

http://rss.xinhuanet.com/newsc/english/2008-06/05/content_8315434.htm

50 detained in Chile in protests against proposed education law

Students participate in a protest against an education law under review in 
the parliament in Santiago, capital of Chile, June 4, 2008. (Xinhua Photo)

    SANTIAGO, June 4 (Xinhua) -- At least 50 people were detained here 
Wednesday as a protest launched by students and teachers against an 
education law under review in parliament turned violent.
    The protest was organized to support a Wednesday strike by the country's 
largest teachers' union, the College of Professors, demanding the rejection 
to the proposed law.
    The demonstration in downtown Santiago led to clashes between protesters 
and riot police.
    Meanwhile, hundreds of students were detained in continued protests 
throughout the country against the education law, which they said did not 
bring substantial reform to the education system inherited from the 
country's military regime.
    The protesters seized a dozen schools and at least four universities, 
urging an immediate rejection to the education bill, which is a result of a 
consensus between the rightist opposition and the ruling leftists.
    The government is abusing the education system to profit from the 
misallocation of educational resources, the protesters said.

http://rss.xinhuanet.com/newsc/english/2008-06/12/content_8353831.htm

Chilean professors to launch strike to protest new education law

    SANTIAGO, June 11 (Xinhua) -- The Professors' College of Chile decided 
on Wednesday to call a nationwide strike for next Monday to protest the 
controversial General Law of Education (LGE).
    Jaime Gajardo, head of the school teaching, said the professors were 
calling the strike seeking to revoke the LGE and create a new project.
    The professors also agreed to launch a series of activities, including 
delivering letters to the authorities of each region, province and 
municipality.
    The LGE is an education reform package designed to replace the existing 
Organic Constitutional Education Law. Opponents argue that the reform fails 
to properly address inequality and profit-focused practices within the 
Chilean educational system.
    Also on Wednesday, groups of young people gathered at the seat of the 
National Coordinator of Popular Students in protest at the LGE. They were 
stopped by police while trying to march through Alameda avenue.
    Meanwhile, the Coordinator Assembly of High school and Collage Students 
also planned to launch a strike to press their demand for a repeal of the 
LGE.

http://www.santiagotimes.cl/santiagotimes/news/education/nationwide-teachers-strike-keeps-chile-students-protesting.html

NATIONWIDE TEACHERS STRIKE KEEPS CHILE STUDENTS PROTESTING
Thursday, 05 June 2008
Marchers Say Education Officials Are Changing LGE "Behind Teachers and 
Students' Backs"
A sea of umbrellas flooded Santiago's central Plaza de Armas around midday 
on Wednesday as teachers, high schoolers, university students, and parents 
took over the rainy Santiago streets in a national protests called by the 
Teacher's Association. The protest was against the General Education Law 
(LGE), an education reform package being put forward to replace the existing 
Organic Constitutional Education Law (LOCE).
Students and teachers alike participated in nationwide protests against the 
proposed education reform act
Christian Peña, Santiago Times.
"More than 90 percent of teachers in the country did not hold classes today 
to support this national movement," said Jaime Gajardo, the president of the 
Teacher's Association.  "With all the obstacles people faced today, 
including the rain, transportation, and police interference, I would say 
that more than 5,000 people arrived, making this strike an astounding 
accomplishment."
In the Plaza de Armas, Gajardo, along with other influential leaders of the 
education reform movement, spoke to a crowd of enthusiastic supporters. 
"From Arica in the north to the Straight of Magellan in the south, teachers 
are on strike," Gajardo said.

Commenting on the objective of Wednesday's gathering, Gajardo said, "The 
LGE reform does not represent what the majority of the country wants and we 
need to stop it from passing through Congress now."

As leaders spoke, protestors continued to file into the Plaza de Armas, some 
with picket signs and others with puppets of penguins (representing high 
school students for their black and white uniforms).  A group of students 
from Vaparaíso, Chile´s largest port city in Region V, created a huge puppet 
of President Bachelet, dressed in the typical suite she uses for the state 
of the union address.  Bachelet just recently gave her State of the Nation 
speech on May 21 and made little mention of the student demands.

Wednesday's  march to the Plaza de Armas marked the third week of organized 
protest against the LGE.  After two previous protests, more than 30 
Metropolitan Region high schools have either ceased classes or have been 
taken over by students, while their university counterparts have also taken 
over faculties in various universities, including the emblematic Universidad 
de Chile, Universidad Tecnológica Metropolitana (UTEM), and the Universidad 
de Santiago.

On Tuesday, Education Minister Mónica Jiménez announced she would like to 
make some changes to the LGE.  Most important, said Jiménez, is the need to 
cut the deadline for education facility administrators to declare themselves 
non-profit from four years to one.  She also expressed a desire to not rush 
the LGE through Congress.

"I am glad she has made the decision she has, so we can have more time for 
discussion," said Gajardo. Still he remained unconvinced that she really 
sides with the teachers and students. "She has been trying to make 
modifications behind the backs of teachers and students," alleged Gajardo.

Along with the Teacher's Association, other related groups involved in the 
education reform movement - including the Student Federation of the 
Universidad de Chile (FECH) and the Metropolitan Association of Parents and 
Guardians (AMPA) - made a significant impact with their presence on 
Wednesday.

 "We cannot continue to accept small advances on this law," said FECH 
president Jaime Zamorano. "Rather, there needs to be a structural reform in 
Chile's education system."  As a solution, Zamorano presented the idea of 
creating a project where all social actors participate.  "There has been 
talk of a Popular Law, or a Participative Law, but still nothing concrete," 
Zamorano said.

Zamorano also defended the student educational movement, insisting it is not 
anarquistic. "Those of us fighting for education reform do not want to 
alienate the government, rather, we want to work together," said Zamorano. 
"There are people from the right that we cannot dismiss because they vote in 
parliament, too."

The march to the Plaza de Armas was authorized by the Metropolitan Regional 
authorities.  But at the end of the Teacher's Association's act in the 
plaza, protestors decided to march towards the Education Ministry, an exit 
plan that had not been accepted by regional authorities.

As a result, conflicts erupted. High school students who managed to reach 
the Alameda began blocking traffic and were later dispersed by police armed 
with water canons and tear gas.

Student spokespeople said their protest was growing and predicted  this year's 
movement will be as large and possibly larger than the massive student 
protests of 2006.

By Thomás Rothe ( editor at santiagotimes.clThis e-mail address is being 
protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it )

http://www.organicconsumers.org/articles/article_12834.cfm

The Food & Farming Crisis: Wave of Grassroots Protests Across Brazil
· Activists launch wave of protests against giant agribusiness across Brazil
Protestors blame big multinationals for food price hikes
By Michael Astor
The Associated Press, via MSNBC, June 10, 2008
Straight to the Source
Thousands of landless rural workers invaded dams, railways, plantations and 
corporate headquarters in a wave of protests across eight Brazilian states 
on Tuesday.
Rogerio Homm, a coordinator with the Via Campesina activist group, said the 
protests are aimed at large corporations that benefit from Brazilian 
policies favoring agribusiness over small farmers.
"This is a big demonstration on a national level against big multinationals, 
which are to blame for high food prices," Homm said. "There are only a few 
companies that control the production of seeds and fertilizers."
Homm said the protests are also aimed at electric companies the group 
accuses of causing environmental problems and displacing people with the 
huge reservoirs created by hydroelectric dams.
Protesters invaded a soy-crushing plant belonging the multinational 
agribusiness giant Bunge Ltd. in Southern Rio Grande do Sul state and the 
company said it shut down operations to avoid security problems.
The Agencia Estado news service said police fired rubber bullets at the 
protesters, injuring five, as they entered the Bunge plant.
The group said about 600 rural workers briefly occupied the headquarters of 
Votorantim, an industrial conglomerate in Sao Paulo..

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N11363933.htm

Brazil peasant protests target multinational firms
11 Jun 2008 19:25:04 GMT
Source: Reuters
RIO DE JANEIRO (Reuters) - Hundreds of landless peasants occupied properties 
of industrial conglomerate Votorantim and a supermarket belonging to the 
Wal-Mart group Wednesday in a second day of protests in Brazil against 
multinational firms.
The Via Campesina movement said about 500 protesters occupied two sites 
belonging to Votorantim, one of them a farm in Rio Grande do Sul state to 
demonstrate against the advance of monoculture crops that were harming the 
environment and small farmers.
It said its members had also occupied a Nacional supermarket, part of the 
Wal-Mart group, in the Rio Grande do Sul city of Porto Alegre to protest 
against what it called the control of agriculture by multinational 
companies.
At least 10 protesters were wounded when they clashed with police during a 
march by more than 1,000 people to protest against the state government, Via 
Campesina said in a statement.
Several thousand peasants of Via Campesina, which includes the Landless 
Workers Movement (MST), invaded properties across Brazil Tuesday, protesting 
against foreign corporate influence, the country's fast-growing biofuels 
industry and rising food prices.
The actions in 13 states Tuesday targeted mining giant Vale , Brazil 
construction and petrochemical group Odebrecht, U.S. fertilizer and oilseed 
processor Bunge Ltd>, and French power firm Suez.
The MST and similar groups frequently occupy farms, block highways, torch 
crops and stage rallies to pressure the government to give more land to the 
poor. Landowners often hire armed guards and hit squads to repel invasions.
Landless militants have blocked a railroad operated by Vale several times in 
recent months and interrupted the flow of iron ore to foreign markets. 
Industry and farm lobbies have urged the government to get tougher on the 
landless movements, saying they undermine investment conditions in Brazil.
(Reporting by Stuart Grudgings; Editing by Cynthia Osterman)

http://rss.xinhuanet.com/newsc/english/2008-06/13/content_8360049.htm

Landless worker protestors block railway in Brazil

    RIO DE JANEIRO, June 12 (Xinhua) -- About 300 members of the so-called 
Via Campesina, a branch of the Landless Workers Movement (MST), blocked a 
railway line Thursday in Brazil, local media reports said.
    The railway, connecting Minas Gerais State to the ports of the coast of 
Espirito Santo, southeastern Brazil, is operated by mining giant Vale to 
transport ores produced by Vale and other companies.
    The protestors camped on the rails in the countryside of Governador 
Valadares, east of Minas Gerais. According to Vale, the protestors have 
prevented 30 trains from passing by.
    Via Campesina has been fighting for the re-nationalization of Vale and a 
share of local government's revenue from mining. Moreover, it has requested 
indemnities for the losses caused by the construction of hydroelectric power 
plants and floods caused by the dams that forced many families to flee.
    Via Campesina launched a series of protests in 13 Brazilian states 
Tuesday.
    Vale, the world's top iron-ore exporter, released a statement Thursday 
to criticize the protests, which it considered as harmful to the security of 
the communities and railway operations.

http://www.reuters.com/article/environmentNews/idUSN1248140120080612?feedType=RSS&feedName=environmentNews

Protesters end blockade of Brazil mining railroad
Thu Jun 12, 2008 7:14pm EDT

SAO PAULO (Reuters) - Hundreds of Brazilian protesters ended a blockade of a 
railway line that transports iron ore for mining company Vale, the company 
said late on Thursday.
It was the latest in a series of protests this week, some of them violent, 
by landless peasant groups targeting large companies and multinationals in 
Brazil.
Protesters left peacefully after the Minas Gerais state's justice department 
ordered them to leave the tracks earlier on Thursday or risk being removed 
by police or fined 30,000 reais ($18,000) for every day they remained, Vale 
said in a note.
"It started around 6 a.m. this morning," a Vale spokeswoman said, adding 
more than 30 trains were delayed in the 10 hours that protesters had stopped 
traffic on the railway.
Trains on the line each carry around 14,000 tonnes of ore from the company's 
network of mines in the state to ports but Vale could not immediately 
confirm how many were transporting the commodity. It said around 70 trains a 
day carry iron ore and other cargo down the line.
One passenger train was stopped by the protest as well as trains carrying 
goods for other firms, Vale said.
The Via Campesina peasant movement said about 1,500 people were occupying 
the railway to pressure Vale to negotiate with 500 families who will be 
dislodged by the construction of a hydro-electric dam in which the company 
is involved.
Protesters occupied properties of industrial conglomerate Votorantim and a 
supermarket belonging to the Wal-Mart group on Wednesday.
The peasant groups are demonstrating against the advance of one-crop farms 
they say harm the environment and small farmers. They are also protesting 
high food prices, the growing use of biofuels and the influence of 
multinational companies in Brazil.
Via Campesina said in a statement it was holding another protest in front of 
Goias state's electricity company over price increases.
(Reporting by Peter Murphy and Reese Ewing; Editing by Kieran Murray)

http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2008/06/12/business/LA-FIN-Brazil-Protests.php

Brazil activists block railway belonging to mining giant Vale
The Associated Press
Published: June 12, 2008

SAO PAULO, Brazil: About 300 protesters blocked a key iron ore-export 
railway belonging to mining giant Vale on Thursday in the third day of 
nationwide protests against multinational corporations.
Farm workers blocked the railway line - which carries 70 cargo trains and 
about 1,000 passengers daily - for about 10 hours before abandoning the 
site, Companhia Vale do Rio Doce SA said in a statement.
The demonstration halted the transport of about 463,000 U.S. tons (420,000 
metric tons) of iron ore and iron pellets, the company said.
Close to 1 million U.S. (metric) tons of iron ore and iron pellets are 
transported every day along the 560-mile (905-kilometer) line that links the 
company's mines in the southeastern state of Minas Gerais to the port of 
Tubarao on the Atlantic coast.
Demonstrators from the Via Campesina activist group and the Landless Rural 
Workers Movement are protesting government policies they say favor large 
corporations at the expense of small farmers.
About 700 activists also protested Thursday in front of a fertilizer plant 
owned by agribusiness company Bunge Ltd in the southern state of Parana, the 
government's Agencia Brasil news service reported, and about 1,000 
protesters blocked four highways in the states of Pernambuco and Goias. 
There were no reports of violence.
On Tuesday, thousands of rural workers organized by the two movements 
invaded dams, railways, plantations and corporate headquarters in 13 
Brazilian states.
The following day, police in the southern city of Porto Alegre fired rubber 
bullets and tear gas at about 500 protesters who tried to invade a 
supermarket to protest high food prices.
Police said five demonstrators and six officers were injured, none 
seriously. About a dozen protesters were arrested.

http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2008/06/10/america/LA-GEN-Brazil-Land-Protests.php

Activists launch protests against corporations in 8 Brazil states
The Associated Press
Published: June 10, 2008

SAO PAULO, Brazil: Thousands of landless rural workers invaded dams, 
railways, plantations and corporate headquarters in a wave of protests 
across eight Brazilian states on Tuesday.
Rogerio Homm, a coordinator with the Via Campesina activist group, said the 
protests are aimed at large corporations that benefit from Brazilian 
policies favoring agribusiness over small farmers.
"This is a big demonstration on a national level against big multinationals, 
which are to blame for high food prices," Homm said. "There are only a few 
companies that control the production of seeds and fertilizers."
Homm said the protests are also aimed at electric companies the group 
accuses of causing environmental problems and displacing people with the 
huge reservoirs created by hydroelectric dams.
Protesters invaded a soy-crushing plant belonging the multinational 
agribusiness giant Bunge Ltd. in Southern Rio Grande do Sul state and the 
company said it shut down operations to avoid security problems.
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The Agencia Estado news service said police fired rubber bullets at the 
protesters, injuring five, as they entered the Bunge plant.
The group said about 600 rural workers briefly occupied the headquarters of 
Votorantim, an industrial conglomerate in Sao Paulo. In Minas Gerais state, 
hundreds of workers blocked a railway owned by mining giant Companhia Vale 
do Rio Doce.
Police could not immediately confirm the invasions and calls to Votorantim 
and Vale were not immediately returned.
TV footage showed hundreds of farmworkers protesting at the Sobradinho 
hydroelectric dam in northeastern Bahia state.
Mozart Bandeira director of Chesf, the company that owns the dam, said about 
500 people were peacefully protesting in the dam's parking lot. "They are 
not interfering with operations and we are taking all measures possible to 
remove them," Bandeira said.
The vast majority of Brazil's food supply is produced by large corporations, 
but on Tuesday, the federal government announced a program to provide small 
farmers with low-interest loans of 100,000 Brazilian reals (US$61,000) or 
more to boost production on the country's roughly 1 million family farms.
According to the Agrarian Development Ministry, the program seeks to 
alleviate high prices caused by food shortages worldwide.

http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2008/05/14/business/LA-FIN-Brazil-Vale.php

Brazil protesters occupy, disable railway owned by mining giant Vale
The Associated Press
Published: May 14, 2008
SAO PAULO, Brazil: Some 400 demonstrators pushing for land reform blocked 
and disabled a key iron ore export railway in Brazil for several hours 
before moving out as police arrived on Wednesday.
The demonstrators occupied the railway late Tuesday and left peacefully the 
following day after federal police arrived, according to spokeswoman Cica 
Guedes of Companhia Vale do Rio Doce SA, which owns the line.
Guedes said the protest was organized by the Landless Workers Movement, 
which has spearheaded several other actions against Vale to pressure the 
government to speed up its land reform program.
Calls to the movement for comment went unanswered.
According to a statement issued by Vale, the protesters pulled out 1,200 
track clamps, slashed fiber optic communication cables and placed burning 
tires on the tracks, damaging more than 300 ties. Guedes said the railway 
was still inoperative.
The line typically carries some 275,000 U.S. tons (250,000 metric tons) of 
iron ore daily from Vale's Carajas complex to Atlantic ports.
Landless workers blocked the same railway for two days in November. In 
March, they invaded a Vale-owned pig iron plant in northeastern Brazil and 
damaged buildings and machinery at a charcoal ranch - leading to a court 
order banning the movement from using violence in protests against Vale.

http://www.channel4.com/news/articles/world/brazil+protesters+disable+railway/2197052?intcmp=rss_news_itnnews

Brazil protesters disable railway
Print this page
Last Modified: 15 May 2008
Source: PA News
Some 400 demonstrators pushing for land reform blocked and disabled a key 
iron ore export railway in Brazil for several hours before moving out as 
police arrived.
The demonstrators occupied the railway late on Tuesday and left peacefully 
on Wednesday after federal police arrived, according to spokeswoman Cica 
Guedes of Companhia Vale do Rio Doce SA, which owns the line.
Guedes said the protest was organised by the Landless Workers Movement, 
which has spearheaded several other actions against Vale to pressure the 
government to speed up its land reform program.

http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/world/archives/2008/06/11/2003414447

Bolivians march on US embassy in protest

AP, LA PAZ
Wednesday, Jun 11, 2008, Page 7

Indigenous Aymara farmers shout slogans outside the US embassy in La Paz on 
Monday during a protest against Washington's decision to give political 
asylum to former Bolivian defense minister Carlos Sanchez Berzain.

Thousands of people marched on the US embassy on Monday to demand that 
Washington extradite a former Bolivian defense minister who directed a 
military crackdown on riots that killed at least 60 people in 2003.
Former defense minister Carlos Sanchez Berzain, now a resident of Key 
Biscayne, Florida, told La Paz-based Radio Fides last week that the US had 
granted him political asylum more than a year ago.

The revelation sparked outrage in El Alto, a sprawling satellite city 
outside La Paz where dozens of anti-government rioters were gunned down by 
soldiers in 2003. On Monday, residents streamed down the hills into La Paz 
to demand justice for the killings.

Authorities did not release an estimate of the crowd's size, but reporters 
at the scene put the throng at 15,000 to 20,000.

"We've come to the doors of the embassy to say 'Enough with the impunity,'" 
said Edgar Patana, head of an El Alto labor union leading the protest. "The 
United States has to prove that they have the justice they're always showing 
off in their media and movies. Bolivia wants that justice."

Protesters shot fireworks at a US flag flying just beyond the compound's 
concrete wall, as helmeted Marines looked on from the embassy's roof. When 
crowds tried to push through a police line, officers cleared the street with 
tear gas.

Bolivia's government called the use of tear gas excessive.

"Security is one thing, repression is another," Government Minister Alfredo 
Rada told reporters.

La Paz state's police commander was fired on Monday night along with top 
policemen in Bolivia's eight other states. But government officials said the 
change had been planned since a new national police chief was named last 
month.

The 2003 "Black October" protests were initially sparked by a government 
plan to sell Bolivian natural gas to the US by building a pipeline through 
Chile. The idea angered El Alto's poor, who often struggle to obtain their 
own gas for cooking and heating.

The protests quickly snowballed as the city's largely Aymara Indian 
population vented centuries of anger over bitter poverty and political 
marginalization.

The uprising eventually drove then-president Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada from 
office, fortifying a growing indigenous political movement that brought 
Bolivian President Evo Morales to power two years later.

Sanchez Berzain's lawyer, Howard Gutman, declined on Monday to confirm 
whether his client has been granted political asylum. But he and other 
lawyers acknowledge and cite Sanchez Berzain's asylum status in a motion 
filed last month in a Miami federal court to dismiss a US civil case against 
him.

Plaintiffs, including families of the 2003 victims, accuse Berzain and 
Sanchez of authorizing the use of deadly force against protesters and say 
they are liable for the deaths.

The pair's lawyers say protesters instigated the violence and that their 
blockade of La Paz, which cut the capital off from food and fuel, justified 
a military response.

http://www.buzzle.com/articles/193669.html

Bolivia: Where Rioting is a Way of Life
A tropical morning sun beat down on the plaza and the crowd was impatient to 
become a mob. Some had sticks, others rocks. "To the school!" shouted 
someone, and a few young men started jogging down a muddy road.

The rest surged after them, about three hundred men, women and children. 
Some improvised weapons along the way, tree branches, bottles, car aerials, 
so by the time they reached Claudia Theveneth school, which on Sunday 
doubled up as a voting center, they were a ragged army.

This was Plan Tres Mil, a slum of mostly indigenous people in Santa Cruz, 
and their mission was to block a referendum on regional autonomy which 
threatened their champion, President Evo Morales.

The voting center guard bolted the metal blue gates just as the attackers 
arrived. The men smashed the gates with boulders, the women lobbed rocks 
over the walls and the children used catapults to ping stones.

In Bolivia rioting is not just a family affair, it's a way of life. South 
America's poorest and by some measures most volatile country has gone 
through 84 presidents and dictators in the past 182 years. In the past 
decade especially street protests have toppled presidents with alacrity.

The twist now is that Morales himself is a veteran protester and when 
threatened by the opposition his indigenous supporters take to the streets, 
blocking highways, burning tires or, in this case, storming a voting 
center.A pro-referendum man outside the center plucked a pistol from his 
grubby jeans and fired five wild shots at the mob. All missed.

The gates yielded and the crowd poured in as if it was the Bastille, 
shouting, cheering and breaking whatever seemed breakable. Under a hail of 
rocks and debris the center's officials fled through a back entrance while a 
handful of would-be voters cowered in voting booths.

A middle-aged woman hugged her weeping teenage daughter and denounced 
"drunken Indians". She picked up a ceramic pot and hurled it a man smashing 
a window. "No mama," wailed the girl.

By mid afternoon there was one reported death and 25 injuries, a mere blip 
compared to the huge disturbances which regularly shake El Alto, the 
indigenous stronghold beside the capital La Paz.

By the time police deployed tyres were burning and street hawkers were doing 
brisk trade with 20p plastic bottles of vinegar. The smoke would disperse 
the teargas and the vinegar, when dabbed on a cloth and inhaled, would dull 
the gas's sting.

"Here it's a bit like Braveheart," said Noe Osinaga, a young man selecting a 
rock. "Except we have vinegar."

By Guardian Unlimited © Copyright Guardian Newspapers 2008
Published: 5/5/2008

http://www.tradingmarkets.com/.site/news/Stock%20News/1457637/

DJ Chile Codelco Closes El Teniente Mine Amid Violent Protests
Tuesday, April 29, 2008; Posted: 08:43 AM
7 Stocks You Need To Know For Tomorrow -- Free Newsletter

SANTIAGO, Apr 29, 2008 (Dow Jones Commodities News via Comtex) -- -- Chilean 
state copper miner Corporacion Nacional del Cobre, or Codelco, again shut 
down its El Teniente division after a worker was hurt amid violent contract 
workers' protests, a company spokewoman said Tuesday.
The division, which includes the underground mine of the same name, was 
closed at the start of the night shift Monday night and remained closed for 
the morning shift Tuesday, she said.
The company will evaluate the situation this afternoon to decide if the 
mining compound resumes operations at the start of the afternoon shift, she 
added.
El Teniente accounts for about 25% of the company's annual output of around 
1.8 million metric tons of copper.
As the contract workers strike enters its 14th day, the smaller Andina and 
Salvador divisions are still closed. On Monday, Codelco said it was mulling 
reopening Andina sometime this week. These two divisions jointly account for 
about 18% of annual output.
Codelco's chief executive Jose Pablo Arellano is scheduled to release the 
company's first quarter earnings and production at a press conference later 
Tuesday. He'll also likely discuss the contract workers strike.
Several thousand contract workers, led by Cristian Cuevas of the 
Confederation of Copper Workers, went on strike April 16 to protest what 
they call Codelco's failure to meet the terms agreed upon after a month-long 
strike last year. Workers are now seeking improved benefits and production 
bonuses.
The state mining company maintains it has fulfilled its terms of the 
agreement and that it won't negotiate any new benefits with contract workers 
now.
Codelco employs about 14,000 direct workers and another 32,000 contract 
workers.
-By Carolina Pica, Dow Jones Newswires; 56-2-460-8544; 
carolina.pica at dowjones.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires


http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/209867,chilean-protestors-occupy-argentine-consulate-15-arrests.html

Chilean protestors occupy Argentine consulate, 15 arrests
Posted : Tue, 03 Jun 2008 17:57:01 GMT
Author : DPA
Category : World

Santiago - Chilean police arrested 15 people who on Tuesday peacefully 
occupied the Argentine consulate in Santiago, in an attempt to gain 
publicity for their demands for more access to education and housing. The 
protestors, members of Movement for Combat in the Santiago neighbourhood of 
Penalolen, were arrested by elite police forces as they left the diplomatic 
mission in central Santiago of their own accord. They had sought to meet 
with the consul.
There were no immediate reports of damage or injuries.

http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2008/06/2008619122747511453.html

Mexicans protest in Oaxaca
Oaxacan Governor Ulises Ruiz Ortiz is accused by the protesters of 
eliminating opponents [EPA]

Tens of thousands of protesters have converged on the southern city of 
Oaxaca in Mexico to protest against the regional government.

The protests on Saturday also mark the second anniversary of a violent 
crackdown on a teachers' protest, that left more than two dozens dead
The protesters allege the regional government is authoritarian and say that 
Ulises Ruiz Ortiz, the state governor, is guilty of oppressive rule.
Florentino Lopex Martinez, a protester, said: "This is a policy of 
oppression, the most fascist type of oppression in the whole of Oaxaca's 
history. The methods of repression have worsened considerably."

In 2006, protesting teachers had siezed the main plaza demanding better 
working conditions.

They complained that Ortiz was corrupt and came to office through a stolen 
election.

The protest developed into a broad demonstration against social and economic 
conditions in the poor Mexican state.

Violent crackdown

State and federal police violently cracked down on the protest leaving at 
least 27 people dead.

Witnesses claim gunmen supporting the governor fired into a crowd. There 
have been no convictions for the killings as yet.

His opponents say Ortiz uses violence to suppress his political opponents.

Amnesty International has said that his administration has been behind the 
murders of dozens of opposition members.

National and international human rights organisations say most of the 
violence now takes place in remote villages of Oaxaca.

Talking to Al Jazeera, Ortiz said: "There is no documentation to implicate 
any government official. Amnesty International's report is totally partial."

Ortiz's Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) has ruled Oaxaca for nearly 
80 consecutive years.

http://www.plenglish.com/article.asp?ID={82BA4C7C-441F-4FC4-A94D-FD6E885F18F5}&language=EN

CentAms to Protest Negroponte"s Visit
Tegucigalpa, June 3 (Prensa Latina) Hondurans plan to reject the announced 
Central American tour of US Deputy Secretary of State John D. Negroponte.
The protest, organized by the Civic Council of Popular, Indigenous 
Organizations, will be the first of several demonstrations to reject the US 
official"s arrival to the region.
In a communiqué, the group repudiates Negroponte"s presence and recalled his 
role in 1982-1986, when he served as US Ambassador and imposed the National 
Security Doctrine.
For its part, COMUN (the Comunicacion Comunitaria institution) recalled that 
this policy encouraged from Washington led to State terrorism and the 
emergence of the 316th Battalion, which tortured and killed hundreds of 
social fighters.
Other organizations joining the protest include Convergencia de Movimientos 
de los Pueblos de las Americas and the Committee of Families of Detained 
Disappeared, which announced a vigil tonight outside the US Embassy.
Axctions will continue tomorrow with a protest outside the Presidential 
House, where the US official and President Manuel Zelaya are scheduled to 
meet.
Negroponte will arrive in Honduras from Medellin, Colombia, where he is 
scheduled to attend the regular session of the General Assembly of OAS and 
share views with authorities and private sector representatives.
His Central American tour also includes El Salvador and Guatemala.

http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=43004

ENVIRONMENT: Mexicans Protest Canadian Mining Company
By Stephen Leahy*

The old city centre of Cerro de San Pedro.

Credit:Ángel Caído

TORONTO, Jun 28 (Tierramérica) - Residents and activists from the central 
Mexican state of San Luis Potosí travelled to Toronto to tell the 
shareholders of a Canadian mining company that their investments are at risk 
because the billion-dollar Cerro San Pedro gold and silver mine is illegal 
and environmentally unsafe.

The trip ended Jun. 17 with delegation member Armando Barreiro, a national 
lawmaker, being roughed up by Toronto police after he had made his 
presentation before the annual shareholders meeting of Metallica Resources 
Inc., owner of the open pit mine.

Barreiro, of the leftist Democratic Revolutionary Party (PRD), had stated 
that the Mexican Congress was about to pass a bill aimed at closing down the 
mining project and that a Mexican member of the board of Metallica Resources 
was under criminal investigation.

"This was an aggression and a lack of respect to someone who immediately 
identified himself as a representative of the Mexican people," Barreiro told 
Tierramérica. "This aggression is in deep contrast with the peaceful and 
respectful attitude with which we conducted ourselves."

The police also restrained and removed Juan Carlos Ruiz, a history professor 
at the Colegio de San Luis, who was part of the delegation organised by 
Frente Amplio Opositor, an anti-mining group.

"We want the Canadian people to be aware their investments have serious 
environmental and social damages in other countries," Ruiz had told 
Tierramérica earlier through a translator. "The mining is right next to 
monuments of national importance."

"A historic church has several large cracks because of the dynamite 
explosions from the pit," he said.

The village of Cerro San Pedro, some 400 kilometres north of Mexico City, is 
right in the middle of the 18-month-old San Xavier mining operation, a 
subsidiary of Metallica.

Some 150 people live in the 400-year-old village, and roughly 20,000 in the 
surrounding towns, in a region where mining for gold and silver has long 
been a fixture.

The local people are not opposed to underground or shaft mining, as has been 
done for hundreds of years. What they overwhelmingly oppose is a huge open 
pit mine with millions of tonnes of ore being treated in the open with large 
amounts of cyanide.

Of the 20,000 local people surveyed by the Frente Amplio Opositor in 2006, 
19,500 said "no" to the project, said Ruiz.

On its web site, the company displays another poll, conducted by Epiica and 
published in March 2007, in which 55 percent of those interviewed who said 
they knew about the project said they agreed with it, 31.3 percent said they 
disagreed, and 13.7 percent were undecided.

One of the biggest concerns is water. The region is semi-arid and water is 
in short supply, but a series of underground aquifers provide water for 
local residents and the state capital San Luis Potosí, a city of one million 
located less than 20 km from the mine site.

Not only does the mine require an estimated 32 million litres of water per 
day, there are serious concerns that the cyanide will contaminate the 
aquifers, says hydrologist Mario Martínez, resident of Cerro de San Pedro.

"There are cyanide heap leach pads (large pools) right on top of an 
aquifer," Martínez told Tierramérica through a translator.

Once the ore is removed from the Cerro de San Pedro pit, it is trucked two 
km to specially prepared outdoor pads, where a solution of water and cyanide 
is sprayed on the ore to dissolve the gold and silver out of the rock.

The water is treated to remove the precious metals and recover some of the 
cyanide. The "spent ore" is removed and piled into hills that Martínez says 
are already more than 20 metres high thanks to a daily deposit of 32,000 
tonnes.

"Sixteen tonnes of sodium cyanide are being used daily, and there is a great 
risk it could seep into the aquifer," he said.

The mining company assures that the cyanide is managed in a closed circuit 
and that the surface of the leaching pools are covered by special plastic 
membranes, injected with air and monitored by leak detectors.

The local residents also worry that the cyanide-saturated mountains of spent 
ore could pollute surface water after rains. Cyanide is very toxic to fish 
and other water species.

Not surprisingly, the mine has been the centre of controversy for many 
years. Ten court injunctions have been obtained to stop the project over the 
past six years, according to Ruiz. "Federal and state officials are not 
applying the law," he said.

Although a local court cancelled the mine's operating permits, the federal 
government re-authorised the project, observing several aspects of the 
environmental impact study.

Subsequent rulings were downplayed by federal officials, who argued that 
municipal agencies did not have the authority to approve or reject this type 
of project.

But the Frente Amplio Opositor maintains that, according to environmental 
law, the company cannot operate without municipal authorisation. "We want 
government officials to respect the rule of law. This mine should not be in 
operation," said Ruiz.

Metallica is a small gold and silver mining company, headquartered in 
Toronto. Involved in exploration in Chile and Alaska, Cerro San Pedro is its 
only mine in production.

A wholly-owned Mexican subsidiary, Minera San Xavier, operates the mine and 
Metallica projects that it will extract an estimated 1.5 million ounces of 
gold and 62.1 million ounces of silver over the next eight to 10 years.

Tierramérica contacted Metallica for an interview but received a negative 
response by email: "Today was an Annual General Meeting where we approved a 
merger with Peak Gold and New Gold. We are currently in a PR (public 
relations) blackout. Feel free to contact me after June 30," signed by 
Rhonda Bennetto, director of investor relations and corporate 
communications.

"Cyanide heap leach mines have a chequered environmental record around the 
world," says Payal Sampat of the U.S.-based environmental group Earthworks, 
which in 2004, in cooperation with Oxfam, launched the "No Dirty Gold" 
campaign in an effort to get the industry to improve its mining practices.

Thirty leading jewellery companies agreed to buy only gold from companies 
that follow the "golden rules" of responsible human rights and environmental 
standards.

The rules do not exclude heap leach operations, which comprise the majority 
of large gold mine operations. They do oppose locating such mines near 
fragile ecosystems and require that companies obtain informed consent of 
affected communities.

According to Barreiro, more than 200 legislative deputies and 57 senators in 
the Mexican Congress have signed a bill to close the Cerro de San Pedro mine 
and require Metallica to pay for environmental damages. The bill will be 
debated in the next session. In April, a similar bill did not win the 
necessary votes.

"The mine will be permanently closed this year," said Ruiz. "The investors 
should be aware of this."

(*Stephen Leahy is an IPS correspondent. Originally published by Latin 
American newspapers that are part of the Tierramérica network. Tierramérica 
is a specialised news service produced by IPS with the backing of the United 
Nations Development Programme, United Nations Environment Programme and the 
World Bank.)

(END/2008)

http://rss.xinhuanet.com/newsc/english/2008-06/27/content_8448655.htm

Thousands protest high living costs in Guatemala

    MEXICO CITY, June 26 (Xinhua) -- Thousands of Guatemalans protested 
Thursday in the capital and several major cities against food price hikes in 
their country, the local press reported.
    The protesters marched to 15 governmental buildings, urging the 
government to lower living costs.
    Miguel Angel Sandoval, leader of the protest in Guatemala City, said 
that they also called for the government to take measures that would benefit 
poor people, not only the big companies.
    More than 20,000 people participated in the demonstration, the first 
since Guatemalan President Alvaro Colom took office on Jan. 14.
    Guatemala has a population of 13.3 million, more than 70 percent of whom 
live in poverty.

http://luterano.blogspot.com/2008/06/cost-of-bus-trip-stirs-conflict.html

Friday, June 20, 2008
Cost of a bus trip stirs conflict
The bus operators of El Salvador are getting squeezed by high fuel prices. 
The law does not allow them to raise fares to cover those increased fuel 
costs. The government has dragged its feet on increasing the subsidy to 
drivers which allows them to cover their costs.

So bus operators on some routes have begun illegally charging more than the 
set fare. They are demanding as much as 35 cents on routes supposedly capped 
at 25 cents.

The Center for the Defense of the Consumer has denounced the illegal price 
increases and critiqued the government for not acting against the bus 
operators. It has proposed that bus operators who charge the increased fare 
should lose their concession to operate. The CDC calculates that fares of 35 
cents would consume as much as 8-18% of a family's budget if two members 
needed to ride buses to get to minimum wage jobs.

The rise in bus fares has led to protest. Young men in masks have been 
taking to the streets alongside the University of El Salvador and burning 
things. They torched two buses on one day and burned tires on other days. 
The images of the protests have echoes in the recent past. It was a little 
less than two years ago, when, in this same location, protests against 
rising bus fares turned violent and two policemen were killed. That event 
led to the passage of an aniti-terrorism law in El Salvador and attempts by 
ARENA to blame the violence on elements in the FMLN.
Photos from Ethan James.

http://globalvoicesonline.org/2008/07/08/nicaragua-protesters-pay-visit-to-former-president/

Nicaragua: Protesters Pay Visit to Former President
Tuesday, July 8th, 2008 @ 02:25 UTC
by Rodrigo Peñalba
The hunger strike by Dora Maria Tellez to stop the Supreme Electoral Court 
from banning the Sandinista Renovation Party for this year's municipal 
elections lasted 13 days. However, it did not stop the banning of the 
political party. Since then, there have been new protests and meetings to 
oppose the political and economical measures of the goverment.
Within this context, all sort of political movements have been caught up in 
the confusion. Liberal candidates march together with members of the former 
Sandinista Front Party, while the goverment works on a pact with the largest 
opposition party, the Constitutional Liberal Party.
Just this last Saturday, after a rally in central Managua, two groups formed 
to go "visit" political personalities. One group visited the Assembly's 
president Rene Nuñez, and the second group found former president Arnoldo 
Alemán dining at a local restaurant. Alemán had been convicted for 
corruption charges that took place during his presidency.
The group stood outside the restaurant singing and shouting against this 
tried and convictedpolitical figure. The funny side of this is that Alemán 
had been proven guilty of corruption, but has permission to visit anyone he 
wants inside Nicaragua.
Jorge Mejía Peralta [es] was present and documented the event on his blog 
[es]:
A few entered, and inside they starting shouting "Corrupt Alemán", which is 
not offensive because it has been demostrated that he is a thief. With a 
strong judicial sentence.
There were struggles and the bodyguards of the corrupt thief forced the 
protesters to leave the restaurant. Then later, for about an hour, the 
protestors used speakers, flags and signs that read "Beware, Corrupt Person 
Inside", and continued shouting at Alemán and his family.
More than 20 officers from the National Police, plus the bodyguards, guarded 
Alemán. When he planned to leave the restaurant the National Police, paid 
with our taxes, pushed and hit some of the protesters, even moving vehicles 
without any care, putting lives in danger.
(.)
Today, spokesman Leonel Teller said that a mob tried to kill Arnoldo Alemán 
and his family (with what? with the national flag?)
Another online Facebook group was created to support the hunger strike of 
Dora Maria Tellez, and is now working on a apolitical AntiPact independent 
movement. Recently The Miami Herald published a report on this group. The 
group has 1500 members as of now, even though not all of them attend the 
protests.

http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2008/07/30/america/LA-Argentina-Protests.php

More than 20 injured in Argentine protests
The Associated Press
Published: July 30, 2008

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina: More than 20 people have been injured in violent 
clashes between police and protesters in one of Argentina's largest 
provincial cities.
The protests are in response to a proposal by the governor of Cordoba 
province that would cut state pensions by 20 percent for those making more 
than 5,000 pesos (US$1,600) a month. The proposal is being debated in the 
provincial legislature.
Local television stations are showing chaotic scenes of protesters in the 
city of Cordoba throwing stones and tearing down small trees amid clouds of 
tear gas.
Television station Todo Noticias reported that 17 police and six protesters 
have been hurt so far in Wednesday's violence, though the provincial police 
would not confirm those reports.

http://edition.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/americas/08/14/paraguay.land.ap/index.html?eref=edition_americas

August 14, 2008 -- Updated 1712 GMT (0112 HKT)
ASUNCION, Paraguay (AP) -- A Paraguayan farmers group says landless 
protesters have invaded a northern hacienda, setting up tents and destroying 
crops to press their demands for terrain.
Members of Paraguay's Farmers Movement camp out near a private estate in 
Capiibary, Paraguay, in June.
Soy growers association president Claudia Ruser said Thursday that 150 
people have stormed a Brazilian farmer's land in San Pedro and wrecked some 
500 acres (200 hectares) of sunflower crops.
Landless groups also have invaded two other farms in Guayaibi and Kanindeyu.
The protests come on the eve of the inauguration of President-elect Fernando 
Lugo, who has promised to deliver land to poor Paraguayans nationwide.
Incoming Interior Minister Rafael Filizzola said the new government will ask 
the protesters to abandon their camps, but will send police to evict them if 
necessary.