Countries

Debates on impunity for people convicted of heinous crimes against humanity are acquiring a new urgency in Chile, where the Senate has approved a measure which would allow convicted prisoners over the age of 70 to serve their sentences under house arrest, or have them suspended. Trials and judgements reached in Germany and Holland may provide relevant parallels.

Indigenous activist Haizel explains to LAB contributor Isàlia McIntyre how strengthening Maya identity supports resistance to megaprojects harming communities across the Yucután.

Venezuelan poets in exile tell Piotr Kozak about their experiences of leaving their home country, their conflicted feelings towards it, and the promise and sadness of their lives abroad.

The US attack on Venezuela has halted vital oil shipments to Cuba as a tightening US embargo is strangling the island's economy. Lack of fuel is collapsing the energy grid, halting all but essential transport and threatens to destroy the vital tourism industry. Cubans are resilient, but can they survive this crisis?

COP30 in Belém raised hopes that the Amazon would finally move to the centre of global climate action. While governments agreed to expand adaptation finance and launch new forest-protection initiatives, binding commitments on deforestation, fossil fuels and Indigenous land rights remained absent. As Brazil hosted the climate summit in the heart of the rainforest, the gap between diplomatic ambition and enforceable protection became stark.

In an impassioned article, LAB author Marcos Colón denounces the double-standards afflicting the mainstream press in Brazil, prompt to condemn those who defend the Amazon, its rivers and people as radicals and vandals, while they hail the confidence, predictability and business-friendly character of projects to dredge rivers and construct massive ports for exporting soya.

Global social movements rallied in Cartagena, Colombia, on 23-24 February, ahead of the second International Conference on Agrarian Reform and Rural Development, ICARRD+20

Brazil's National Museum of Indigenous Peoples is struggling. Its funding has been cut to below 2015 levels; it is dependent on FUNAI; and institutional wrangling has left it unable to fulfill its mission. The crumbling museum building is closed to the public and important exhibits are left in limbo. Who will come to its rescue?

As an offshore oil prospecting ship arrives in Montevideo, Mike Gatehouse interviewed Vito Mata who has been closely involved in campaigns of protest that aim to halt seismic exploration and subsequent drilling and production. Uruguay’s ocean, fisheries and coastal communities are under threat.

Omar García Harfuch has won unprecedented popularity, bordering on adulation, for his apparent success in tackling organized crime and the drug cartels, especially in Sinaloa. Thwarted (by gender quota) in his run for mayor of Mexico City, he remains the most visible figure in the government after Claudia Sheinbaum, and could well run for president in 2030.