Nicolás Maduro’s United Socialist Party has reportedly won Venezuela’s legislative election held Dec. 6. With the win, Maduro retains control of the country’s national assembly and solidifies his grip on power.

Maduro’s Big Win

According to the country’s electoral authority, Maduro’s party alliance received almost 68 percent of the vote. The opposition — which partially ran campaigns despite its leader Juan Guaidó’s call for a boycott — received a meager 18 percent of the vote.

Maduro was confident of victory. After casting his vote on Sunday he declared that a new era was beginning in Venezuela as part of “a truly democratic process to rebuild our beloved fatherland.”

Around 14,000 candidates from more than a hundred parties competed for the 227 seats in the National Assembly, though the voter turnout was just 31 percent. The new legislators will be sworn into office Jan. 5.

Opposition Leader Guaidó: ‘the Election is a Fraud’

A large part of the opposition parties had called for a boycott of the elections — above all the National Assembly validated acting-president Juan Guaidó. They stated that  the minimum conditions for democratic elections were not in place.

“The election is a fraud of the dictatorship led by Nicolás Maduro and will only exacerbate the crisis in the country,” wrote the Foreign Minister of Guaidó’s acting-government Julio Borges in an open letter to the international community on election day.

“What Venezuela needs are free presidential and parliamentary elections.”

Maduro Tightens His Grip on Power

With the victory, Maduro and his United Socialist Party of Venezuela (Partido Socialista Unido de Venezuela or PSUV) now control all of the country’s political institutions. The result is a significant setback for the opposition in Venezuela. It previously had a majority in the National Assembly and organized the resistance against Maduro’s increasingly authoritarian socialist government.

In 2019, the National Assembly appointed its chairman Guaidó as acting president, recognized by more than 50 countries, including the EU and the US. However, he never succeeded in asserting himself against Maduro. The authoritarian ruling head of state is supported in the power struggle by the nation’s powerful military. The United Nations accuses the security forces of serious human rights violations, but sanctions by the US have not succeeded in lessening the power of Maduro or his loyalist troops. An attempt in May by a mercenary force to bring about an armed overthrow of the Maduro government also failed. 

Moreover, while Guaidó had initially managed to unite the opposition behind him, the rifts between moderate government opponents and hardliners came to light again with continued failure.

The opposition is now back to square one. With his boycott, Guaidó loses not only his seat in parliament but also his position as chairman of the National Assembly and thus the legitimation for his claim as acting president.

Venezuela Approaches Full Collapse

Meanwhile, the once-wealthy country is steering deeper and deeper into an economic and humanitarian crisis. Once comparatively prosperous — and still oil-rich — Venezuela has been in a deep crisis for years. Corruption, nepotism, and a strict US embargo against Maduro have caused the economy to collapse.

The country faces the world’s highest inflation rate, and the national currency is hardly worth the paper it’s printed on. Power outages occur regularly, and there is a lack of food, fuel, and life-saving medicine.

Five million Venezuelans have left their country in recent years because of poverty, hardship, and political persecution. With the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic, the situation has worsened again significantly.

Many Venezuelans have given up and trust neither the opposition nor the government. Instead they are more concerned with their daily survival. This helps explain the low turnout in Sunday’s election. According to surveys, hardly anyone wants to take part in the upcoming opposition referendum either.

Despite this low turnout, President Maduro is now more firmly in the saddle than ever and the country faces even more uncertainty and instability in years to come.

L'articolo Maduro Wins Venezuela Election proviene da InsideOver.

Brazil held municipal elections on Sunday, Nov. 15, with a runoff round set to take place Nov. 29. The votes are a helpful way to assess the relative strength of Brazil’s right-wing populist President Jair Bolsonaro, who rode to victory on a surge of push-back against Brazil’s left in 2018.

Four Bolsonaro-backed candidates in the cities of Sao Paulo, Manaus, Recife and Belo Horizonte lost their races, leading Tom Phillips of the Guardian to characterize the results as a “setback” for the firebrand leader. In total the elections saw 5,500 mayors and 57,000 city councilors elected to power.

Despite the President’s son Carlos Bolsonaro winning re-election to city hall in Rio de Janeiro, the overall effect of this election is a resurgence of Brazil’s left-wing parties and a drift from Bolsonaro.

But naysayers should be careful about writing off Bolsonaro just yet, and the upcoming 2022 presidential election is still well within his grasp.

Bolsonaro’s Background

Brazil’s national populist leader — who holds the rank of Captain in the Brazilian Army — has been under sustained attack by mainstream media in the country before and after his 2018 election to lead the 209.5 million-population South American nation. Bolsonaro was almost stabbed to death in the summer of 2018 while running for office during a campaign stop in Juiz de Fora by a mentally ill, left-wing fanatic associated with Brazil’s Partido Socialismo e Liberdade (Socialism and Liberty Party, PSOL).

Bolsonaro lost around half of the blood in his body but survived, going on to win the presidency. He was boosted in part by feelings of solidarity from his sharing of his daily recovery process with voters.

Like US President Donald Trump, Bolsonaro successfully engaged in a process of disintermediation, cutting out the middle man and the polite language of political discourse and communication, instead talking directly in whatever way he wanted through social media and in person. He shouted, swore and said whatever he felt like, ranting against Brazil’s ascendant left, and millions of Brazilians rose up and joined him.

While maintaining a friendly relationship with Trump and attempting to shore up Brazil’s economy from the effects of a coronavirus lockdown, Bolsonaro has been repeatedly smeared in the media and had his outlandish comments on race, homosexuality, crime and his support for extrajudicial killings of communist militants blared across the front page in frantic condemnation. He expressed a desire to punch a reporter for O Globo newspaper in the face this August and recently complained about the cowering attitude of the country in the face of the coronavirus, which Bolsonaro has previously survived.

So far 5.8 million Brazilians have contracted the coronavirus and 165,658 have died of COVID-19-related illness, according to the World Health Organization.

Brazil is Divided

Brazil is certainly divided between those who tend to be more pro-Lula (former left-wing President Luiz Lula da Silva) and those who favor Bolsonaro, but the country is also losing a lot of middle ground to center parties and a mixture of other candidates. Despite losing almost half of its prefectures, Brazil’s Marxist Partido dos Trabalhadores (Workers’ Party, PT) and similar left-wing parties still have considerable. Brazil’s 14 percent unemployment and high national debt coupled with hard choices ahead about deep cuts in spending that could be necessary may be keeping Bolsonaro up at night, however at the end of the day he is still in a very strong position.

The runoff round on Nov. 29 will provide a better snapshot, but at this time it’s clear that Bolsonaro can’t “coast.” Nonetheless, he’s still got millions of very energized citizens in his base and is likely to keep showing up for him. Even if Bolsonaro keeps losing power in urban areas, smaller cities and the countryside will – by and large – rally to his side for God and country when push comes to shove and those numbers are sure to add up. After all, as Bolsonaro has exclaimed: “God is Brazilian!”

Support for Bolsonaro Remains High

Although Brazil’s left would like to argue that Bolsonaro is a lame duck slated for the back pond come 2022, the truth is that support for him remains high. His 2018 campaign slogan: Brasil acima de tudo, Deus acima de todos (“Brazil above everything, God above everyone”) still has power to rally many Brazilians to the voting booth. The idea that Bolsonaro’s authoritarian statements and tendencies have alienated voters is far from certain and many still remember the corruption of Lula and past leftist politicians with bitter specificity.

Brazil’s PT party went too far for many citizens under Lula and his successor and former Marxist guerrilla fighter Dilma Rousseff who was impeached in 2016. The PT was seen by many center and right-leaning Brazilians to be too close to instituting a dictatorship and as a deeply corrupt money-laundering apparatus leeching off the nation.

Bolsonaro, despite scandals which have arisen with his sons and certain dealings in government, was widely regarded as a fresh start and a push back against the dominant left of Brazil which is often hard-line and informed by militant Marxist ideology, including parties who are friendly to terrorist organizations such as Colombia’s narco-terrorist Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (FARC) group.

Although the state elections won’t have much direct effect on federal proceedings, Bolsonaro will be facing more headaches as his state governments continue to erode to the left and center. In addition, Trump’s apparent loss in the United States, the results of which Bolsonaro questions, puts him in a weaker position. Indeed, Joe Biden has directly threatened to punish Brazil’s government over problems in the Amazon. But to assume these local election results mean Bolsonaro is done in 2022 is far from a sure bet.

L'articolo What do Brazil’s Local Election Results Mean for Bolsonaro Going Forward? proviene da InsideOver.

The criminal world has gone digital. Crime syndicates are sinking their dirty teeth into cybercrime and today it is the fastest growing criminal activity on earth.

Trillions of Dollars are at Stake

Accenture, considered one of the world’s top companies, numbers digital and technology consulting in its stable of services. The firm predicts businesses will lose US$5.2 trillion to cybercrime globally over the next five years.

Cue the mafia and other nefarious organizations. Cyberattacks cost businesses from large to small on average $200,000 annually, according to Hiscock, a commercial liability insurance company. And the little guy is the easiest target.

Most Businesses Woefully Unprepared for Cyberattacks

Small businesses account for almost half of online attacks – 43 percent – but they are woefully unprepared to stave off breaches because only 14 percent have the technology shield to counter the assaults.

“Modern IT infrastructures are more complex and sophisticated than ever and the amount of virtual ground that we’ve got to safeguard has also grown exponentially,” said Jesse Rothstein of security provider ExtraHop. “…(C)yber criminals can launch thousands of digital attacks designed to compromise our operations at every turn, only one of which ever needs to connect to cause serious disruptions.”

But while large companies are the prime organized crime targets, individuals do not escape notice and while the coronavirus pandemic is a plague to most, to syndicates like the mafia it is a blessing, presenting an opportunity to defraud. From March to May in Canada this year, organized crime swindled individuals out of CAN$1.9 million.

The most common method of bilking people is through email or text messages where the recipient clicks on a link to collect the $2,000 a month the federal government offers to those who have lost jobs to the pandemic. The link takes individuals to a phony website asking for financial information, or it could allow the intrusion of malware that can steal, encrypt, delete or hijack data, leading to financial theft.

Cosa Nostra Goes Online

Italy has had its share of cybercrime courtesy of the world’s most infamous crime syndicate.

In May of this year, 91 suspected mobsters were collared by police probing money-laundering and extortion. Authorities were attempting to stop Sicily’s Cosa Nostra from bilking people who were suffering financially due to the coronavirus.

In one conversation recorded by police, a man said “look, we pay cash” for businesses hard hit by the pandemic. The mob was trying to buy legitimate businesses at bargain basement prices so as to illegally launder dirty money gleaned from extortion and drug trafficking.

Gangs also hold businesses for ransom – hence the name ransomware, a malicious software that infects a computer and restricts access until money is paid to unlock it.

In Israel, the chip wear maker Tower – the computer chip used for processors, memory and other information functions – came under ransomware attack and had to shut down some production systems and its IT systems were damaged, the Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported in August. A publicly-traded company with second-quarter earnings of US$310 million, one day of lost work would cost the company an estimated $3.4 million.

Hackers demanded money and Tower’s insurance company said pay up.

Insurance Company Advises Firm To Pay Ransom

“Its insurance company encouraged paying the ransom, which is estimated at several million dollars,” Einat Meyron, who advises companies on cybersecurity and is well acquainted with this attack, as reported by Haaretz. “It definitely wasn’t $250,000, as has been reported in several places.”

The mafia is becoming so pervasive in cyber crime that its involvement is now known as the “New Mafia.” The mafia has hired cybersmart engineers to hack and uncover where shipments of specific goods are being readied for shipment, then sends in drivers in their own trucks to haul the goods away.

The Internet is also used to help facilitate and plan various crime operations.

Brazilian Gangsters Running Drug Networks from Jail Cell Computers

In Brazil, the Primeiro Comando da Capital (PCC), Sao Paulo’s mafia corporation is using smart phones so members of its council can call the shots from their prison cells. Sao Paulo prosecutors seized two laptops of senior syndicate members and discovered Excel spreadsheets showing the entire cocaine distribution network for the metropolitan area.

Included was the identity of those marked for punishment – and sometimes death – due to embezzlement or not fulfilling their promised participation in crime.

An Expanding Crime Network

In 2018, 30,000 people were members of the PCC and new recruits were joining each day, reported Rolandburger.com, a respected American-based management consulting firm with 50 offices in 39 countries. The PCC is spreading to other South American countries.

Perhaps Malwarebytes, the ubiquitous anti-virus Internet security company, best sums up today’s evolving criminal use of the internet. “What was once the reserve of hobbyists and enterprising individuals has taken a more sinister turn as the world has become more interconnected.

“In the last decade, cybercrime has evolved from computer viruses that commandeered a select number of PCs to spectacular security breaches and cyberattacks that exceed the imagination. The Internet has allowed criminals to send tentacles out all over the world while sitting in comfort thousands of miles away. A new day has dawned for organized crime.

L'articolo The “New Mafia” Takes Crime Online proviene da InsideOver.

A recent report in Wall Street Journal notes that Venezuela is entering a post-oil era, and now produces only 10% of what it did two decades ago. From one of the original co-founders of OPEC to a sanctions-ravaged nation that’s also struggling with the coronavirus pandemic and endemic poverty.

The Current Situation

Over five million Venezuelans have found ways to leave the country in the past five years and the remaining population mostly lives below the poverty line. Gas shortages are common and many houses don’t have enough propane to cook food with their rudimentary propane tank stoves.

The biggest American company still operating in Venezuela is Chevron – which has been active in the country for almost a century – but the others took the exit door more than a decade ago when former leader Hugo Chávez amended their contracts to terms they did not agree with. Chevron will be closing up most of its in-country operations by December of this year due to increasing sanctions pressure which will also hit other key oil companies which have been helping Venezuela turn its crude oil into dollars.

Brief Historical Snapshot

In the 1970s, Venezuela had the highest GDP in South America, but still had festering poverty and income inequality between its booming upper class and everyone else. When military man and committed socialist Chávez took the helm in the late 1990s he distributed oil income to the people and subsidized the cost of gas to make it cost almost nothing.

Chávez also strengthened ties with Cuba and by 2006 he began using legislation and contract amendments that hiked royalties to make doing business in Venezuela unprofitable in order to force foreign oil firms to turn over their wells to the state oil behemoth Petróleos de Venezuela SA (PdVSA). Most did turn over control and summarily left the country.

Corruption by government insiders and a failure to really pay attention to the vast oil infrastructure under PdVSA control led to a revenue decline and after Chávez’s death in 2013, the global oil price drop in 2014 delivered the knockout punch to the Venezuelan economy.

Chávez’s successor Nicolás Maduro — facing ongoing US and Western efforts to install Juan Guaidó as president in his stead including by new US envoy to Venezuela and war criminal Elliott Abrams — has taken action to get around sanctions by selling to allies like Cuba and getting help from Iran, as well as cracking down strongly on domestic dissent. The Trump Administration put a $15 million bounty on Maduro several months ago.

As some turn against Maduro and blame him for the poverty and political repression in the country, others support his government more strongly and agree with him that Western imperialism is at the root of Venezuelans’ suffering.

Income Implosion

The Venezuelan government is now faced with taking in significantly less money than it has in the past, with their lack of input to OPEC quickly being made up by other members and rising US refinery production quickly offsetting any Venezuelan gap.

Cars, buses and trucks are seen much less on the roads now that gasoline is being sold at near market prices. Despite plans to fix the industry, so far it continues to suffer under sanctions and the Venezuelan economy is in ruins. Private industry was significantly weakened by government seizures and policies and

Has the Bolivarian Revolution Lost Popular Support?

Problems of getting enough food, electricity, running water, medicine, medical care and the loss of the good times under Chávez have certainly taken their toll, and the growth of opposition groups in the country can’t only be ascribed to foreign meddling, but also as a reaction to the dire situation in the country, rash of extrajudicial killings and a lack of coherence within the ruling United Socialist Party.

Many farmers aren’t even harvesting most of their fields, since there’s not enough gas to get it to market in the cities and many essential workers are also having trouble getting to work because of the cost of gas. Maduro is facing international isolation on an intense scale, and the US is still working hard to put Guaidó in charge via a “transitional government” structure that would sponsor transparent elections.

Chávez formed a strong base of support through an authoritarian military-led socialist government, but without the economic underpinnings to sustain support it’s fair to say that Venezuelans are far from united around the current government.

Status Quo and Collapse

If the status quo continues, full collapse is possible and more emigrants rushing to leave is a likely scenario. If allies can help get Venezuela’s government through this time and money from drugs and black market mines flows sufficiently along with a heavy hand by security forces that stay loyal then collapse could be averted. Still, if nothing is done it is fully possible Venezuela will become a power clash between many different groups and see increased intervention from Russia and Cuba.

Another option is for Maduro to use the US transition mechanism to bargain for time, talk more to the opposition and buy himself time. This could also be used by Washington as a way to slowly oust him from power and bring about regime change, although it could also lead to the current government digging in its heels even further or leading to a cobbled together government of Chávista (including anti-Maduro Chávistas such as Somos Venezuela “We are Venezuela” who have grown disillusioned with his government) and opposition elements trying to keep the country together as it continues to buckle under sky high inflation that neared 10 million percent by the end of last year.

What Does the Future Hold for Venezuela?

Another option US analysts consider possible is for a temporary government to be set up that would hold fair elections where Maduro, Guaidó and others could run for office in return for lifting sanctions and helping out financially with the country. Armed colectivos enforcing government dogma must also be disarmed in order to prevent chaos breaking out.

The truth is that cynicism against US involvement in Latin America and world affairs has become so high – for partly valid reasons – that bad actors around the world are able to exploit fear of change or transition to cling to power. In order to truly believe in a free or fair scenario, the current government and array of opposition groups would have to trust in a range of conditions including justice and an independent judiciary that will be there for the victims of the current government and inclusion of as many different voices as possible who will agree to non-violent and non-corrupt involvement.

For such trust to happen, however, the regime would have to see more of an upside to relinquishing a grip on power than to holding on, which is quite unlikely at this point.

The current disintegration of Venezuela’s oil economy is part of a broader portrait of a country in collapse.

L'articolo Venezuela’s Oil Sector Grinds to a Halt proviene da InsideOver.

Drug wars in Mexico are as conventional as sombreros and Burritos. For decades, cartels have been fighting for territory and power – while the government has acted as an inept bystander. The current president López Obrador has pledged a paradigm shift in the cartel wars. In lieu of fighting them, he is conducting an appeasement policy – with fatal consequences even beyond Mexico’s borders.

The Cartels Aren’t Interested in Compromise

It is a one-sided peace mission President Andrés Manuel López Obrador is undertaking. His credo, “abrazos, no balazos”, meaning hugs not bullets, could be mistaken for a comedy show script. It sounds simply too naïve to be official policy. Nevertheless, it is the reality in Mexico these days, a country that never managed to get the cartel wars under control nor the violence that makes Mexico one of the most dangerous places in the world.

Unsurprisingly, the first 19 months of Obrador’s presidency have been a fiasco, a farce. Example? The government recently released the son of drug kingpin “El Chapo”. Not due to lack of evidence but due to the Sinaloa Cartel. Once the arrest occurred, the cartel appeared in armoured vehicles in the city, committed arson and engaged in shootings with the authorities. Not unusual for Mexico: it was the authorities who had to retreat.

The message was sent: release Guzman’s son or all hell will break loose. The government succumbed to the cartel’s demands, and Ovidio Guzman walked out of jail the very same day. The government’s excuse? Guzman’s release was made to avoid an escalation of violence in order to protect the population. Translation: The Mexican government does not have the power, nor the reputation for applying any form of pressure onto the cartels. The executive branch is a government branch in name only.

Appeasement Doesn’t Work

It fits in with the president’s appeasement approach, which he has been pursuing with regard to the cartels since taking office: leave the cartels alone to end the violence, carte blanche in the middle of a war. The issue with the “abrazos, no balazos” approach is that the violence has not decreased but exacerbated. Homicides have not disappeared but are at a record high.

In the period from January to April, it was, according to official information, a record 11,535, after 11,266 in the same period last year. For López Obrador, who had sharply criticized his predecessor for the high number of murders during the election campaign, his first year in office was the bloodiest in recent Mexican history: in 2019, a total of 34,582 people died a violent death. The majority of these murders are related to drug crime in the country. An end does not seem to be near. Since the extradition of El Chapo into the US, the resulting power vacuum has been attempted to be filled by several cartels and gangs.

However, the violence of the cartels also affects many people outside the crime syndicates. These included assassinations of police chiefs, murders of a federal judge and his wife or the massacre in a rehab clinic in which 24 people were murdered only recently.

Obrador’s Popularity is Still High in Mexico

Obrador’s popularity remains high despite his apparent incompetence. His approval ratings are usually between 50 and 68.4 per cent, primarily as his government has invested heavily in the reduction of poverty and simplified access to loans for agriculture. With the fight against economic inequality, the president seeks to remove the breeding ground for organized crime, but he seems to ignore that the cartels are long-established criminal enterprises, financially bigger than Walmart. Shortage of new prodigies due to slightly more pesos in one’s pocket hence seems inconceivable.

Instead, he continues to endanger the country with his appeasement policy as the long-term effects are highly likely an overwhelming increase in crime of all kinds and security organs that are unable to curb the violence of the cartels as these are currently able to operate at will.

Obrador’s policies also ignore the fact that the Mexican drug trade is a global problem. As a producer and middleman, the country supplies the majority of the heroin and cocaine consumed in the United States, of up to 90 per cent. Moreover, the ongoing drug war is forcing hundreds of thousands of Mexicans to migrate to the United States – with dramatic political and humanitarian consequences.

L'articolo Mexico’s Appeasement Policies Against the Cartels proviene da InsideOver.

Reportage / Society 06.07.2020

Ecuador: the Great Game

Writing about South America has often meant recounting the movements of the world with the almost certainty that every contraction, however slight and local, is actually the symptom of humanity’s cosmic malaise. If the South American continent is the face…

Giuseppe De Lauri

Margherita Teodori

Among them, President Lenin Moreno’s Decree 883, which put an end to ten years of state subsidies on fuel. This package followed the austerity requests of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) as a condition for repaying the loan of $4.2 billion, contracted by Moreno in 2018. Why is an oil-rich country forced to apply for a loan?

While international media praised the indigenous revolt as a class movement against the government of vested interests, there are those who tell a different story. According to some journalists, such as Álvaro Vargas Llosa, columnist for the Washington Post, the natives have been used. Under suspicion is Conaie, the largest association representing the indigenous people of Ecuador. It was the powerful Conaie that summoned the natives to Quito en masse. The increase in the price of fuel is said to be only a pretext to demonstrate against Moreno’s neoliberal turnaround and to ask for more rights. It is interesting at this point to report the Human Rights Watch data on personal freedom and rights in Ecuador, which indicates Moreno’s presidency as the turning point towards a freer and more independent society and press.

Miguel Ángel is an activist of Otavalos descent who took part in the October protests. “While the police officers were outside the government headquarters, less than two blocks away people were shopping in the mall, drinking coffee and smoking their pipes as if nothing was happening. That’s when we realised our problems did not interest our country.” There is a strong sense of frustration among the indigenous protesters, mainly due to the realisation that, suddenly, a game of Risk is being played over their heads. “Both presidents (Correa and Moreno) sold the country to foreigners. Our green gold was corn and now we find ourselves saddled with PetrolChina, which is exploiting our oil fields.”

From Coca you enter what is now Yasuní Park. Here tourism is gold, like oil. Via Auca runs perpendicularly through the jungle, like a scar in the green rainforest. The road is dotted with churches and small built-up areas where the oilfield workers live, almost all of the Shuar ethnic group. Tankers drive through continuously, creating a small passing economy. Tiny supermarkets selling Coca-Cola and other products imported from the United States have sprung up along the roadsides.

L'articolo Ecuador: the Great Game proviene da InsideOver.

South America has seen a sharp rise in the number of new COVID-19 cases for the past few weeks, even while countries in Europe and Asia have begun to relax their lockdown measures.

On Sunday June 28, Latin America and the Caribbean recorded 2,432,245 infections (1,319,274 of which are in Brazil) with 110,6821 deaths and 1,373,504 cases in recovery.

The surge in the COVID-19 figures is due to the loose lockdown, non-synchronized responses from governments and worsened by massive economic inequality.

Brazil Has the Second-Highest Number of COVID-19 Cases in the World

Brazil — the largest country in the region — has recorded the world’s second-highest numbers of COVID-19 infections behind the U.S. As of Monday, June 29, Brazil had 1,345,254 cases, with 733,848 cases in recovery and 57,658 deaths.

The alarming amount of COVID-19 cases in the country are at least partly due to the mishandling by President Jair Bolsonaro, who underestimated the virus from the beginning, claiming it was a “little flu”. COVID-19 has symptoms similar to common flu such as cough and sore throat but is potentially much more serious.

The former army captain also ignored health protocols by not wearing a face mask and shunning physical distancing while attending a mass rally. He opposes lockdown measures for the sake of sustaining economic activity. Bolsonaro’s responses to the pandemic led to the resignation of the country’s health minister, Nelson Teich, who served for just one month.

‘We’re Fighting Against the Coronavirus and Against the Bolsonaro Virus’

Teich replaced Luiz Henrique Mandetta, who was fired by the president after calling on all citizens to stay at home to prevent the further spread of the virus. Bolsonaro’s handling of the pandemic also triggered a stand-off with Brazil’s state governors, with one of them calling the president’s approach the “Bolsonaro virus”.

“We’re fighting against the coronavirus and against the Bolsonaro virus,” said Joao Doria, governor of Brazil’s densely-populated state Sao Paolo, adding that Bolsonaro’s has taken “incorrect, irresponsible positions,” in dealing with the pandemic.

Brazil’s states and cities have adopted their quarantine measures, different from the president’s policy. Also, there is a rising concern over the spread of the virus in slum areas, indigenous communities, and areas with a lack of testing capacity.

Research from The University of Washington’s Institute of Health Metrics and Evaluation estimated the death toll over COVID-19 in Brazil could exceed 125,000 in August.

Chile’s Health Minister Resigned Over COVID-19 Data Discrepancy

On Sunday, June 28, Chile’s total COVID-19 cases reached 271,982, with 232,210 cases in recovery and 5,509 deaths, according to official data.

Chile is one of the countries in the region that took early anticipatory measures to slow down the outbreak, such as the closure of borders and extensive testings. However, the quarantine policy did not help to control the number of new cases as the numbers of confirmed COVID-19 cases surged in May.

In the middle of June, Chile’s then-health minister Jaime Manalich resigned amid the controversy over the numbers of COVID-19-related deaths.

Previously, Chile’s Sebastian Pinera government informed the public that the COVID-19 had taken over 3,000 lives since the first case emerged for the first time on March 3.

However, a report from an investigative journalism organization (CIPER) exposed that the government informed the World Health Organization (WHO) that the COVID-19-related death toll had exceeded 5,000. The organization got a copy of the country’s health ministry document handed over to the United Nations (U.N) health body, CNA reported.

Chileans took to the streets demanding food aid during the lockdown measures, which led to chaos. President Pinera promised to deliver support to the most vulnerable groups of people.

Peru Scrapped Lockdown Despite Rising Infection Numbers

As of Monday, June 29, Peru has 279,419 COVID-19 cases, with 9,317 deaths and 167,998 cases in recovery.

“Although the number of cases in the country is still high, there has been a decrease in infections in recent weeks,” the country’s health minister Victor Zamora said, cited in Menafn.

After imposing social restrictions for about three months, Peru decided to end the policy on June 30 despite the rising numbers of new COVID-19 cases. The Andean nation has gradually reopened its economy. The pandemic has worsened the economy as at the end of this year, Peru is estimated to lose 4.2 million of jobs.

Other Countries in South America are Performing Relatively Well

Uruguay, the tiny nation in the region, has successfully dealt with the pandemic as the country had only 847 COVID-19 cases, with 23 deaths as of June 14.

The country’s president Luis Alberto Lacalle Pou, never issued a lockdown measure, but Uruguay quickly imposed a social distancing policy and conducted a massive testing program, as BBC reported. Uruguay’s long history of less income inequality and trust in political institutions has been one of the most important keys to its successful tackling of the pandemic.

Uruguay’s larger neighbor Argentina slapped a quarantine on March 20, and citizens complied with the social restrictions. The Alberto Fernandez government provided financial aid to low-wage workers to help them survive the crisis, as Reuters reported. Even though the policy could trigger inflation and will increase the government’s debt, at least Argentina prioritizes its people during the health crisis.

Shining Star: Cuba

Cuba has been the leading example of how a country should deal with the pandemic. The communist state is widely known for its excellent healthcare and qualified medical workers, who have done extensive work to visit residents and interview them to discover and document new COVID-19 cases.

The country even sent its doctors to some of the hardest-hit nations around the world, such as Italy. Cuba guarantees that every citizen has access to healthcare. Despite people in the country making a monthly wage of around only $20 USD, the government works to ensure their wellbeing. 

The ratio is one doctor for ever 150 Cubans, which is an outstanding figure compared to other developed nations. The United States, for example, with its private healthcare system has only 0.4 doctors per 150 people. Therefore, Cuba’s success story during this pandemic — while richer nations are still struggling deeply — should come as no surprise.

L'articolo Latin America Sees Alarming Rise in COVID-19 Cases proviene da InsideOver.

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has few allies in the international community, and fewer still who can economically assist his starving nation. When Iran came to his aid by sending oil tankers loaded with gasoline, for a brief moment there was a glimmer of hope for Caracas. Now it is clear how the Trump administration is determined to stop the Venezuelan oil trade.

New US sanctions on shipping companies caused a wave of tankers, some of which were set to retrieve Venezuelan oil, to turn away from the state this week over fears of being blacklisted.

Blacklisting Works

The Trump administration has often used tariffs and sanctions as political tools to punish adversaries. Iran and Venezuela have both found themselves on the receiving end of them. In Venezuela’s case, Washington views Maduro’s presidency as illegitimate. In retaliation, the US has applied the same maximum pressure that it has successfully wielded against Iran to cripple its economy.

After five tankers ferrying gasoline from Iran successfully made port in Venezuela last week, the Trump administration initially took a reserved approach. The US has a contingent of vessels already off the coast of the state to interdict drug shipments, but the American ships were not ordered to stop the fuel shipments.

This week, the Trump administration threatened to blacklist dozens of tankers, as Reuters reported. The mere threat of blacklisting ships has already caused ripples in China, which is considering the possibility of denying to use any vessel that has made port in Venezuela over the past three years.

Washington is Not Backing Down

The threats from Washington also serve to stymie the small trickle of Venezuelan oil that is shipped to a few customers across the globe. The state-owned PDVSA refinery company saw exports fall to 452.000 barrels in May, the lowest point since 2003. Simply put, customers are afraid to accept shipments from Venezuela now over possible repercussions from Washington.

Tipco Asphalt, a Thai refinery company, is making plans to replace a vessel owned by Greek-based Thenamaris Ships Management. It was set to transport 1 million barrels of Venezuelan crude in Malaysia.

Some vessels were already blacklisted two weeks ago. The Seahero, owned by Thenamaris, and the Novo, owned by Dyncom Tankers Management Ltd, were on the receiving end of Trump’s maximum pressure campaign. Refineries often do not own their own fleets so they rent vessels, like the Seahero and Novo. When these become blacklisted, it’s not the refinery companies that are hurt the most, but the shipping companies.

“Anything on the potential sanctions list will just become toxic,” an oil company source told Reuters. “No one will touch it until it’s clear what the rules will be.”

No Trade Partners Left

The move will likely cut off the little help that Iran provided. Venezuela faces dual, competing problems. First, it has a severe gasoline shortage, which is where Tehran came in to help. There were some flaws with the strategy, notably that Maduro raided the state’s gold reserves to fund the shipment. Those wouldn’t last forever, experts warned, and therefore couldn’t be a long-term solution.

The second problem ties into the first; money isn’t coming in for the Venezuelan economy because the US has tightened its grip on exports. The states that did buy it, now will be unable to over threats of blacklisting vessels.

The powerful effect of blacklisting ships has even reached China, which is not a consumer of Venezuelan crude. Chinese oil companies will reportedly refuse to charter vessels that have been to Venezuela over the past year, according to a report from Al Jazeera.

US sanctions and the threat of retaliating against any vessel that sets sail for Venezuela will undoubtedly deter any future Iranian help in addition to suffocating the state’s main source of revenue. Going forward, Maduro’s economy will be entirely reliant on trade partners who are willing to risk breaking the rules and sacrificing ships to do so.

Tehran is not such a partner. Iran has been the closest resemblance of an ally that Venezuela had, but now it will be powerless to help. It would be foolish to risk losing a fleet of tankers to help a dictator barely clinging to power.

Maduro’s Days are Numbered

The move from Washington to completely eliminate trade with Venezuela leaves the question of how long can Maduro remain in power?

The state has gold reserves, but not all of it can be readily accessed. As it stands, Caracas is forced to beg the Bank of England to sell some of its reserves to buy food and humanitarian supplies, according to Al Jazeera. Whether the bank allows it remains to be seen. It could be on the receiving end of Trump sanctions if it is perceived as helping the Maduro regime.

Maduro’s hold on the Venezuelan presidency will last only as long as he is able to pay the military that defends his position. Once their paychecks stop, the military will have an incentive to install Juan Guaido, whom 50 states recognize as the rightful winner of the 2018 election.

That moment may come sooner now that the small flow of tankers will dry up completely. The nation already had a fuel shortage and incredibly low exports. International businesses including American and Russian oil companies pulled their operations from the state. At this point, there is very little left to lose, economically, for Maduro, who also has a US bounty on his head.

Maduro’s days are numbered. At some point his people and the military that keeps him in power will turn on him. That timeline seems to be moving up as the Trump administration continues to take aggressive action against the few trade partners Maduro has left.

L'articolo US Blacklists Vessels in Plan to Cut Off Venezuelan Oil Trade proviene da InsideOver.

Brazil is now second in the world for the number of coronavirus cases after the United States. The South American developing nation of over 209 million now has more than 25,700 recorded fatalities from the virus. Specifically, Brazil now has over 414,000 recorded cases of COVID-19 and some experts have projected this number is likely to be five times higher by August. According to a report cited by Reuters last month, Brazil likely has up to 12 times more coronavirus cases than the amount being officially recorded. So far testing has been minimal with only approximately 560,000 tests performed (less than .5% of the population), although the Brazilian government aims to test 46 million citizens (22 % of the population) by this December.

At this point Brazil is the epicenter of the coronavirus in Latin America and a surging global hot spot. US President Donald Trump recently blocked all Brazilians and foreigners currently in Brazil from entering the United States.

Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro has long been one of the biggest skeptics of COVID-19, dismissing it early in the pandemic as a “little flu” and stating that the crisis was being exploited by his enemies to remove him from power and intentionally crash Brazil’s economy. Conflicts between Bolsonaro and state governors who wanted stricter lockdowns such as the Governor of Goiás Ronaldo Caiado have caused division and political turmoil in the geographically massive Latin American nation.

Brazil’s Raging Political Firestorm

In the midst of the coronavirus crisis, Brazil has also been embroiled in an intense political showdown.

Bolsonaro fired the head of Brazil’s federal police last month and other key officials after learning they were investigating his son Flavio Bolsonaro and Carlos Bolsonaro for corruption and disinformation offences. A video showed Bolsonaro saying he would go up the government ranks as far as necessary to fire anyone who tried to “screw” with his family. The firing led Bolsonaro’s key partner and justice minister Sergio Moro to resign in protest at Bolsonaro’s executive intervention.

The situation has now escalated, with a series of “fake news” raids carried out May 27, including reportedly targeting Carlos Bolsonaro and what one Sao Paulo paper called his “fake news racket.” The 29 warrants seizing computers and information from Bolsonaro supporters and bloggers has outraged the President, and conservative Brazilian Congressman Douglas Garcia said the raids were nothing less than an attempt to “silence the voices of conservatives on social networks.”

Speaking on May 28, Bolsonaro angrily denounced the “absurd orders” of federal police acting on orders of Brazil’s Supreme Federal Court (STF), saying the situation is already “f***ing over” and bringing it back into the spotlight is an attempt to drag back up unfounded allegations and oust him from power. Bolsonaro said that the current fake news crisis is being staged to portray him as a “right-wing pseudo-dictator” and wrest power from him. Bolsonaro has previously expressed support for extrajudicial killings and torture, but indignantly referred to the necessity of upholding liberty and democracy in his May 28 remarks. The president ended his press conference when a journalist tried to ask him a question and walked away with his entourage to leave in a waiting vehicle. 

Bolsonaro Bucks the Trend

Bolsonaro has long claimed there is an agenda to steal his election win through the COVID-19 crisis by collapsing Brazil’s economy and fomenting political chaos. Despite early warning signs from other nations across the globe, Brazil responded relatively late by implementing quarantines and closing public facilities and restaurants. Bolsonaro attended rallies with anti-lockdown protesters, taking selfies with their phones and insisting that a lockdown would be far more harmful as a whole than letting the disease take its course.

Brazil’s former minister of health Nelson Teich quit after one month on the job in the middle of this month after falling out with Bolsonaro. Teich had taken over after Bolsonaro fired the previous Health Minister Luiz Henrique Mandetta for insisting that social distancing was necessary. The new Minister of Health is General Eduardo Pazuello, a military man without medical experience.

The coronavirus hit Brazil relatively late compared to other South American countries, with the first case recorded in Sao Paulo on Feb. 25, 2020 and the first death in Sao Paulo by March 17 from a 62-year-old man who had recently been to Italy. COVID-19 spread in Sao Paulo and other major regions and cities of Brazil but Bolsonaro was cautious about locking down, noting that “the economy has to function because we can’t have a wave of unemployment.”

As state governors exercised authority to lockdown they clashed with Bolsonaro who urged that “life must go on” and made it clear he was still going out shopping. He also promoted hydroxychloroquine as a cure for COVID-19 and said closing everything would be a surefire path to “breaking Brazil.” By May 16 Brazil’s coronavirus death toll was over 15,000 and is now surging, reaching 21,000 five days later. Cases are particularly prevalent in northern cities like Manaus and crowded, poor favelas in the south which are home to around 13 million densely-packed low-income citizens with minimal access to healthcare. Bolsonaro now says the fight against coronavirus is a “war” but remains disquieted by the prospect of extending the economic standstill.

Death Toll Doubling Every Five Days

The most alarming number so far out of Brazil is that the death toll is doubling every five days at the current time and Brazil has the highest transmission rate in the world. Here in Goiania near the capital the number of cases is still remarkably low with life mostly continuing as normal apart from hand sanitizer everywhere you turn, masked people on the streets and businesses locked down. Locals express frustration with the closure of businesses and question when things can return to normal, while others express fear of the tidal wave of infections in the country and have relatives who are being treated for COVID-19.

COVID-19 Isn’t Just Killing Brazil’s Elderly

As it tears through the favelas of Rio, Sao Paulo and in Brazil’s north, the coronavirus is not just killing Brazil’s elderly. One of the most shocking statistics of the pandemic in Brazil is that the mortality rate for COVID-19 in Brazilians under 35-years-old is 65% higher than in developed nations, as Globo reported. As in other nations, most of those dying from the disease are male but Brazil has more female victims than most other countries as well. While one reason for the higher amount of younger people dying from coronavirus in Brazil could be that comobordities in the elderly are distorting the data, a more worrying possibility is that many younger Brazilians live in close quarters, crowded neighborhoods and lower-income areas.

Brazil’s Class Divide and COVID-19

Brazil’s earliest cases of COVID-19 started among wealthier middle and upper class individuals who could afford to travel and imported it from abroad. Similar patterns occurred around Latin America. The disease has quickly spread in the favelas of Rio and Sao Paulo, with service industry workers often contracting the disease and elderly family members without good access to healthcare services dying. Of course, coronavirus does not look at your wallet before it kills you, but the class divide is certainly also being thrown into sharper contrast by the disease’s pattern of transmission and wider impact.

Reality Check

The situation in Brazil is and should be cause for concern and there is no way to confidently state that the situation will decline in severity in the near future. Nonetheless, the skeptical analyst must take into account that Brazil may not actually be second in the world in COVID-19 cases. For one thing, the real numbers of China’s coronavirus cases and fatalities are clearly much higher than reported, and Iran likewise tapered off accurately reporting its case and death count. Turkmenistan, as another example, is forbidden from public statements on COVID-19 and doctors are not permitted to officially treat the disease. So when Turkmenistan reports “no cases” and Brazil reports hundreds of thousands we need to understand the exponential influence of political censorship on numerical transparency.

Still, Brazil and Bolsonaro are in for a tough fight.

The truth is that Bolsonaro is both the object of strong and targeted political opposition and has also contributed to a uniquely chaotic governance scenario that intensifies Brazil’s lack of readiness to effectively fight the virus. Although the actual benefits of full lockdown on transmission and fatality rates from the disease are fair to question there’s no doubt that Brazil’s approach so far has been far behind much of the world.

L'articolo Bolsonaro vs. COVID-19: What’s Really Going On in Brazil? proviene da InsideOver.

Iran and Venezuela have enough in common with US sanctions slapped on both of them that they have decided to form an oil partnership. Both states have remarkable similarities, each having their heavily dependent oil economies disrupted by the Trump administration. For Venezuela, however, the situation is far worse as President Nicolás Maduro has not only ostracized his nation from the US, but also from Russia.

Buying Time for Venezuela’s Economy

As Venezuelan society continues its slow-motion collapse, Iran has sent five oil tankers as part of a new business relationship. The first, the Fortune, arrived Monday and was hailed as a savior, as the New York Times reported.

“Thanks Iran,” Maduro tweeted on Sunday. He also said that “only the brotherhood of free peoples will save us.”

At first glance, it may seem odd that Caracas needs oil. After all, the state boasts the world’s largest supply of oil reserves. Unfortunately, severe mismanagement by the government and brutal US sanctions that deterred foreign investment have essentially caused all its refineries to shutter.

Venezuela direly needs refined oil, but Iran wins too with the deal by receiving gold. Money seldom flows into Tehran these days after Trump’s sanctions have pushed away most buyers of Iranian oil. The exchange of gold for oil benefits both ailing states.

US Reaction

Understandably, the US is displeased with the news that five tankers sailed around the globe from one sanctioned regime to another, raising questions of what, if anything, the Trump administration will do. America already has a contingent of Navy and Coast Guard vessels in the region that are operating a drug interdiction campaign. However, these ships were not ordered to engage the Iranian tankers.

The Trump administration is likely to let the transgression slide while pursuing the larger goal of unseating Maduro, which it has made little progress toward. In reality, Tehran’s shipment will not be enough to sustain Caracas longer than a month, and there aren’t enough gold reserves for Venezuela to continue the scheme for long. This month’s shipment likely cost $700 million according to Russ Dallen, partner at Caracas Capital Markets, a Florida-based monitoring agency.

If the shipment is a one-time affair, it would make sense for Washington to take care not to overreact. US President Donald Trump hasn’t faired well when he’s tried his hand at foreign policy. Since taking office, he’s managed to escalate tensions with nearly every other nation that he’s tried to secure a deal with — China, North Korea, Iran.

The US–Iran relationship in particular reached new lows this year after the assassination of Iranian Gen. Qasem Soleimani. With only months before the American election, it makes sense to keep the relationship as diplomatic as possible. Furthermore, Iran has made overtures to deescalate tensions since April in ways that would have been unimaginable in January.

Maduro Holds On

The larger issue for the Trump administration is Maduro’s continued hold on the Venezuelan government. In truth, Iran’s economic partnership will help sustain Maduro and is a cause for concern for Washington.

“The president has made clear the United States will not tolerate continued meddling by supporters of an illegitimate regime,” a senior US official said. Trump’s National Security Council also tweeted that the gasoline importation was done in “desperation.”

Washington, while it draws up plans for how to counter continued support of Maduro’s state, is playing the wait-and-see approach. If more tankers make a run for Caracas next month, then American intervention could be likely.

As for Maduro, Washington is burning up its options at a rapid pace. Now it’s left with only economic measures, but those have already been leveraged and by every account working. Trump also put a bounty on Maduro’s head, an incredibly rare move for the US government to do for a head-of-state. That in and of itself is a telling sign that the US really has few options for dealing with Maduro.

Venturing America’s Sphere of Influence

A new issue arises with Iran’s support of Venezuela that could force Washington into action: Tehran’s venture into the Western Hemisphere. For the most part, Iranian influence is limited to the Middle East and Africa. The late Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez did sign agreements with Tehran, but little came of them except some foreign investment.

During the recent depression, Iranian companies that did operate in Venezuela pulled out. The recent gasoline shipment marks the first sign of life in the partnership.

“It’s striking that the Iranians feel confident enough that the Trump administration is not going to get in their way and is willing to take this risk and come into what is traditionally thought of as the U.S. sphere of influence,” said Risa Grais-Targow, Venezuela analyst at the Eurasia Group.

Iran, therefore, is taking the largest risk. It has already been in the Trump administration’s sights since his first day in office and he seems to enjoy any excuse to hit Tehran with more sanctions. So far, the US has only condemned the transaction through the US State Department.

“Venezuelans need free and fair presidential elections leading to democracy and economic recovery, not Maduro’s expensive deals with another pariah state,” said spokeswoman Morgan Ortagus.

L'articolo Iran Supplies Venezuela with Crucial Gasoline Shipment proviene da InsideOver.