Venezuela: Going Rogue

VENEZUELA

Going Rogue

Iranian oil tankers recently docked in Venezuela in defiance of American sanctions on both countries to prevent the transfer of fuel.

The situation is ironic, say analysts. Venezuela has the world’s largest oil reserves, but mismanagement of the economy has resulted in fuel shortages that have compelled the Latin American nation to reach out to Iran for help.

American leaders said they were monitoring the situation closely, but Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro didn’t appear to care that he was ratcheting up tensions.

“Two revolutionary peoples who will never kneel down before North American imperialism,” Maduro said in televised state address covered by the BBC. “Venezuela and Iran both want peace. We have the right to trade freely.”

The semi-official Iranian news agency Tasnim wrote that the shipments were a “smack in the face for the administration of Donald Trump,” reported Israel Hayom.

One might argue that Maduro is foolish to risk a confrontation with the US. But he and his people are desperate. Spiraling inflation, food shortages and an exodus of Venezuelans to neighboring countries have spurred street protests and police crackdowns for years.

Now, amid a worldwide pandemic, the country’s beleaguered healthcare system won’t be able to prevent a catastrophe as the coronavirus spreads, said Human Rights Watch.

Maduro is also fighting for his political survival, Agence France-Presse explained. Recently, his attorney general asked the Venezuelan Supreme Court to declare opposition leader Juan Guaido’s party a “terrorist organization” after a failed sea invasion by mercenaries, including two retired American soldiers.

The US and around 50 other countries recognize Guaido as the country’s interim president, citing Venezuelan laws that call into question whether Maduro truly won a 2018 election. In addition to Iran, China and Russia support Maduro.

The Iranians might be seeking revenge for the humiliating death of Qassem Soleimani, the Iranian military commander killed in a US drone strike in Iraq early this year, wrote Foreign Policy. If the US wants to undermine Iranian influence on its neighbors, Iran can do the same to American influence in its backyard, the theory goes.

Such moves might put pressure on the US to take rash action that might play into the hands of critics of America or compel the White House to consider détente as a more useful reaction, Business Insider added.

The old grudges are returning the situation back to normal. But it’s a new normal.

Brasil: Not Adding Up

BRAZIL

Not Adding Up

Brazil’s government stopped publishing data on total coronavirus deaths and infections over the weekend, a move criticized for obscuring the true death toll of the disease in South America’s largest nation, the Associated Press reported.

The move comes after months of criticism from scientists and health experts, who say that Brazil’s statistics were already skewed and make it impossible to know the true impact of the virus on the country.

The nation of 210 million had more than 670,000 cases and 35,930 deaths as of Sunday, according to Johns Hopkins University.

On Friday, Brazil’s federal health ministry took down the website that showed daily, weekly and monthly figures on infections and deaths in Brazilian states.

The site returned Saturday but only showed the numbers for the previous 24 hours – while removing the total numbers of infections for states and the nation.

President Jair Bolsonaro said the numbers are “not representative” of Brazil’s situation.

A council of state health secretaries condemned the move and said they will fight the changes by Bolsonaro’s administration, which has tried to stop attempts to impose lockdowns and social distancing rules.

D

Suriname: Come Together

SURINAME

Come Together

Four Surinamese parties formed an alliance over the weekend in an attempt to oust President Desi Bouterse following elections last week, the Associated Press reported.

Preliminary results show that the opposition United Reform Party (VHP) won 20 seats in the 51-member parliament, while Bouterse’s National Democratic Party won 16.

The new coalition would hold 33 seats, only requiring one more to reach the two-thirds majority needed to elect a new president.

Bouterse has rejected the results and asked for a recount, the AP reported separately. He currently faces criminal convictions at home and in the Netherlands, and could lose his immunity against prosecution if he leaves office.

The Independent Electoral Bureau said Sunday it has counted more than 99 percent of the votes from the May 25 election. It is expected to publish the results later this week.

Brasil: When News Becomes A Weapon

BRAZIL

When News Becomes a Weapon

Brazilian federal police raided the homes and offices of allies of right-wing President Jair Bolsonaro Wednesday, part of an investigation into a network that allegedly carried out fake news attacks against the Supreme Court, Reuters reported.

The operation was executed in six cities and primarily focused on social media posts that allegedly spread defamatory claims about the chief justices.

The targets of the raid included a congressman, Douglas Garcia, a Bolsonaro supporter, who called the raid a left-wing assault, according to the Guardian.

Bolsonaro’s son Carlos Bolsonaro also criticized the raid as part of an “unconstitutional, political and ideological” investigation. Last month, police identified Carlos Bolsonaro as one of the key members of the “criminal fake news racket” engaged in threatening and defaming Brazilian authorities.

Supporters of Bolsonaro have expressed frustration at the court for limiting the powers of the president. They have been demonstrating in front of the court on weekends demanding its closure.

Opposition politicians, meanwhile, have praised the raids and have accused Bolsonaro of building “a fake news network that operates from within the presidential palace and the offices of congressional allies.”

Nazi Germany's Last Jet Fighter - Argentina 1950

A Military Dictatorship May Be Coming In Brasil

BRAZIL

Who’s in Charge?

Brazil has been facing three threats recently: a public health emergency due to the coronavirus, a political crisis stemming from alleged corruption in the rightwing, populist administration of President Jair Bolsonaro, and an economic meltdown.

Any of these three could threaten the stability of a nation. Now add in growing calls to oust the president and counter calls for a military takeover and you have a situation careening out of control, analysts say.

“The scenario has given Brazil’s generals an opening to insert themselves back into the front lines of politics, a role they last played during the country’s 21-year military dictatorship, which ended in 1985,” the New York Times wrote.

How did Brazil arrive at this moment – again?

Let’s start with the president’s handling of the pandemic, which has turned coronavirus-denial into an artform: Bolsonaro has resisted lockdowns and mocked those who fear it. As a result, Brazil might now have more coronavirus cases than the US, according to a study cited in the Week. It has less capacity to handle the sick, however.

And as the pandemic has raged, the Brazilian president and his family have become mired in a web of scandals and investigations.

Recently, the country’s Supreme Court blocked Bolsonaro from appointing a family friend as head of the federal police after the resignation of Justice Minister Sergio Moro, who publicly said that Bolsonaro had pressured him to choose a police official in Rio de Janeiro. Moro claimed that Bolsonaro wanted a Rio chief who would give the president information on the investigations into his two sons, Reuters explained.

Moro said Bolsonaro sent him a text message that read, “You have 27 superintendencies (of the federal police). I just want one, the one in Rio de Janeiro,” the Associated Press reported.

A video has surfaced to back up the charges against Bolsonaro, Al Jazeera reported.

Bolsonaro denied the accusations. But the Supreme Court has sanctioned a probe into the matter.

Meanwhile, Moro, the former lead judge of the Petrobras “Car Wash” investigations that ultimately led to the arrest of ex-president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and, arguably, the election of Bolsonaro, is one of the most popular figures in Brazil, wrote Forbes.

“President Bolsonaro’s signature issue was the Car Wash and cleaning house. Sergio Moro is the living embodiment of that cause,” Kevin Ivers, vice president for Latin America at DCI Group in Washington, D.C., told Forbes. “This is a profound and potentially fatal blow for Bolsonaro’s presidency.”

Investigators have also identified Bolsonaro’s son, Carlos, as running a criminal fake news racket that defamed the president’s enemies, wrote the Guardian. As the Intercept described in fascinating detail, another of the president’s son, Flavio Bolsonaro, a senator and former local lawmaker in Rio, has close ties to assassins for hire and was involved in corruption schemes involving phantom employees in local government.

Bolsonaro likely faces impeachment. Two of the five presidents elected since Brazil’s military junta ended in 1985 have been removed from office – most recently in 2016 – so there is ample precedent. Bolsonaro also has plenty of enemies among the Brazilian establishment. He yearns to be a strongman, opined Venezuelan political commentator Francisco Toro and Latin American analyst James Bosworth in the Washington Post, but he hasn’t built the coalition that a strongman needs to succeed.

“To undermine a country’s institutions and take greater individual control, you need to chip away at democratic rules over time,” they wrote. “It takes more than fire-breathing rhetoric to do that, it takes political skills, alliance-building chops and a bit of luck, too. To Brazil’s great fortune, Bolsonaro seems to have run out of all three.”

Meanwhile, the value of the Brazilian currency, the real, is plunging. The economy is on track to shrink 4 percent, and is on the verge of collapse. Food shortages loom.

As chaos engulfs Bolsonaro’s presidency – and ordinary Brazilians’ lives – speculation is rife that his vice president, retired Gen. Hamilton Mourao, is preparing to take over. Mourão at times has appeared to enjoy the pandemonium, the New York Times wrote.

“Everything is under control,” he said. “We just don’t know whose.”

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