The Latin American Report # 249

Union leader murdered in Norte de Santander, Colombia

Trade unionist Harry Vargas became the 63rd social activist to be murdered in Colombia this year, after being shot by hitmen in the town of Tibú. We talked about the latter here last year, characterized by a serious erosion of institutionality due to violence. Its mayor “governed” from the capital of Norte de Santander. The murder of Vargas, a contractor for the Colombian state-owned oil company, occurred outside a gymnasium. When we share these events, there is always the unpleasantness of not having elements to understand why he was killed. Was he a good trade unionist? Or was he immersed in something bad? The only truth we have is that whatever the problem was, it was solved with bullets. In 2023, 181 social leaders were murdered.

_{Attack in Catatumbo, Norte de Santander (reference image, source).}

Cuban president seeks refuge in Russia

Miguel Díaz-Canel returned from Russia yesterday, Friday, where he held talks with his peer Vladimir Putin. The Cuban head of state showed a strategic and understandable adherence to the Russian area of influence in international geopolitics. However, he has been criticized by some actors who want the island to explode. Díaz-Canel participated in the Victory Day parade in Moscow, and went so far as to wish Russia success in the so-called “special military operation”, the euphemism with which the Kremlin refers to the war against Ukraine. For the first time there was a replica in Havana of the Russian celebration.

The sirens that indicate—symbolically speaking—that the country is in an economic emergency don't stop sounding in 24-hour mode. The value of the Cuban peso has been staging a chaotic fall, without finding a bottom. This is pulverizing the purchasing power of the meager salaries and pensions a good part of the population receives. Only those privileged who receive income in a kind of digital dollar—introduced three years ago by the Government—or remittances manage to keep up with inflation, but always based on an accumulated distortion that hits even most of them.

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In this context, without credit, without dollars, with tourism in crisis, without oil, choked and hanged by U.S. sanctions, with a decrepit network of thermoelectric plants, in a hurry to deliver a subsidized basic food basket that Cubans received every month, with its blunders in terms of economic policy, Cuba is looking for who can pull it out of the quagmire. The head of the palace designed by Консонстанти́н Андре́евич Тон is its strongest bet in this sense, but except for the punctual use of the defibrillator to extend the life of Cuban socialism—in the form of irregular oil shipments—, still the Caribbean intention and the Russian promise are not reflected in deeds. Yet bilateral commerce nominally grew nine times between 2022 and last year.

On the plane back to Havana, the Cuban president explained that there are “more than six projects” in execution with the Eurasian giant, four that will be activated very soon, and five in the process of approval. All related to the most urgent needs of the Antillean economy, focused on the energy and food sectors. But it is not a matter of promises but of facts. Russia has its own wars, military and economic as well, both derived from the conflict with Ukraine. Thus, the Island's possibilities lie in its capacity to clean up its internal economic structure to make it more resilient. This implies reaching a consensus with the once undesired—but today increasingly necessary—internal private sector.

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Corn chicharrita cuts production estimates by millions of tons in Argentina

The Rosario Stock Exchange said yesterday, Friday, that the chicharrita pest, an insect that transmits the spiroplasma disease, will cause a reduction set at more than 11 tons in the second harvest of the 2023-2024 campaign. Thus, the oilseed production for the referred cycle is 47.5 tons. Corn chicharrita affects the grain filling in the plant, and its impact is irreversible. Two-thirds of Argentina's corn production is exported, but with the estimated cutback, the value of this activity would fall by more than 1.6 billion dollars. In the domestic market, losses would amount to US$ 2 billion. Source for the photos below.

And this is all for our report today. I have referenced the sources dynamically in the text, and remember you can learn how and where to follow the LATAM trail news by reading my work here. Have a nice day.

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