by El Reportero’s news services
Alberto Fujimori
With this conclusion, Alberto Fujimori, the President of Peru from 1991 to 2000 was sentenced to 25 years in prison by Judge César San Martín.
“It is reasonable to infer that such a vast criminal plan, and the institutional compromise that it signified, could only have taken place with the direct participation of the incumbent head of state,” said the former president.
The ruling is unprecedented in Latin America. Fujimori is the first former, elected head of state in the region to be brought to trial and convicted in his own country for serious human rights violations. The conviction was a triumph for the Peruvian judicial system. It could have regional repercussions as a deterrent to authoritarian rule. It is not over yet, however – Fujimori is appealing.
A big year
This year, 2009, is one of those in which Latin America has masses of elections and other votes. Already (this report went to press in early April) Venezuelans and El Salvadoreans have gone to the polls in national elections: Venezuela backed President Hugo Chávez in his request that he (and other executive officials) could be re-elected indefinitely.
El Salvador held municipal and congressional elections in January followed by presidential elections on March15. Before the year is out, Chile, Honduras, Panama and Uruguay will have elected new presidents and Bolivia and Ecuador (almost certainly) re-elected their incumbents. Mexico will have elected a completely new lower house of congress, while Argentina will have voted for a fresh half of the chamber of deputies and replaced (or reaffi rmed) one third of the senate.
Obama extends hands to Chavez, Ortega at summit
PORT-OF-SPAIN, Trinidad – President Barack Obama offered a spirit of cooperation to America’s hemispheric neighbors at a summit Saturday, listening to complaints about past U.S. meddling and even reaching out to Venezuela’s leftist leader.
While he worked to ease friction between the U.S. and their countries, Obama cautioned leaders at the Summit of the Americas to resist a temptation to blame all their problems on their behemoth neighbor to the north.
“I have a lot to learn and I very much look forward to listening and figuring out how we can work together more effectively,” Obama said.
Obama said he was ready to accept Cuban President Raul Castro’s proposal of talks on issues once off-limits for Cuba, including political prisoners held by the communist government.
While praising America’s initial effort to thaw relations with Havana, the leaders pushed the U.S. to go further and lift the 47-year-old U.S. trade embargo against Cuba.
As the first full day of meetings began on the two-island nation of Trinidad and Tobago Saturday, Obama exchanged handshakes and pats on the back with Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez, who once likened Obama’s predecessor, President George W. Bush, to the devil.
In front of photographers, Chavez gave Obama a copy of The Open Veins of Latin America: Five Centuries of the Pillage of a Continent, a book by Eduardo Galeano that chronicles U.S. and European economic and political interference in the region.
