Voices of Latin America

Indigenous leader Auricélia Arapiun describes the occupation of the Cargill terminal, in Pará, which forced the government to concede after 33 days, repealing the controversial decree 12.600, which provided concessions to developers hoping to turn the Tapajós, Madeira and Tocantins tributaries of the Amazon into waterways for the export of soya and the other fruits of extraction.

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.

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.

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?

Marcos Colón reviews the Cannes and Golden Globe award-winning Brazilian film The Secret Agent, directed by Kleber Mendonça Filho, starring Wagner Moura. The film engages questions of state censorship, political repression, and surveillance not by following a reporter chasing a story, but, this time, by following a man hunted by a system terrified of memory.

Carlos Beas of UCIZONI on the impact of the Interoceanic Corridor and the future of Indigenous Rights in Mexico The headquarters of the Unión de...

The issue of enforced disappearances in Mexico has been represented in cinema, on stage, in music, in performance, and in literature. Through various means of artistic expression, a demand for truth and justice is made, inviting society to feel compassion and empathy. It is a call to give a face, a life story, to the numbers, to the digits of violence in Mexico. It is a call against revictimisation. 

This article is reproduced from OpenDemocracy.net under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International licence. You can read the original here. Extremist candidate José Antonio Kast...

Chile’s Mapuche people hoped for better things after the election of Gabriel Boric in 2021. The extension of the Estado de Excepción has signalled a return ‘to the old discourse of the internal enemy’.

Indigenous Mayor Dina Juc is a human rights defender, community organizer, nature rights advocate, and Maya woman of Q’eqchi’ and Poqomchi’ heritage raising her children in K’iche’ territory.