The United States Southern Command’s New Strategy in Latin America

Por

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14 August, 2018

The United States Southern Command has launched its new 2017-2027 THEATER STRATEGY. “This plan is our model to defend the access routes from the south of the American continent to its interior and promote regional security through the degradation of threats by transregional and transnational illicit networks (T3Ns), immediate response to any type of crisis (natural or human disaster) and forming relations to confront global challenges”, outlines the strategy document presented by Kurt Walter Tidd, current Commander of the United States Southern Command.

The United States Southern Command (USSOUTHCOM) is one of nine military commands belonging to the United States. It encompasses the area relative to the south of the American continent, Central America, and the Caribbean. It is headquartered in Miami, Florida.

In this strategy, the Sothern Command resizes its presence in Latin America considering that transregional and transnational illicit networks extend beyond transnational criminal organizations and gangs to violent extremist organizations ideologically motivated such as the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), and Lebanon’s Hezbollah. It also considers among its threats the presence of China, Russia, and Iran in that region.

According to the documents of this new strategy, “the Violent Extremist Organizations focus on spreading their influence and form a network of supporters and radicalized followers—including foreign terrorist fighters—especially in vulnerable populations in the Caribbean and parts of South and Central America”.

Mexican Anthropologist Gilberto López y Rivas points out to Avispa Midia that what the United States government is doing with its rhetoric of defending democracy and humanitarian aid is “a form of Global State Terrorism and, in the countries the United States considers its allies, a State Local Terrorism is replicated, as in the case of Colombia and Mexico”.

The strategy document is clear in assuming that it wants to strengthen relations in the region. “Naturally, these strategic challenges also present opportunities to promote security and regional stability. During the last five decades, SOUTHCOM worked diligently to obtain—and maintain—the region’s trust. Now we propose to develop this trust to deepen the bilateral cooperation and broaden the cooperation to trilateral, multilateral or transregional dimensions. For example, we are encouraging Pacific countries such as Chile, Colombia, and Peru to improve the integration and exportation of the best security practices to Asian and Pacific partners”, the document states.

The strategy confirms that there already exists an established network in Latin America and the Southern Command which aims to “cultivate a network of allies and partners and undertake our activities as part of a thorough effort through this integrated network comprised of: The Joint Force, intergovernmental agencies, multinational agencies and non-governmental organizations”, according to the 2017-2027 THEATER STRATEGY document.

Civil Society

At the same time, the strategy ranks its operations from civil society, academia, and the social and military organizations. “SOUTHCOM will partner with civil society, the academic sector, the private sector and the populations that extend the governance, improve the community’s resilience, broaden the social and economic opportunities and help the vulnerable populations resist the corrupt influence from the existing threats and illicit networks, and from wicked or perverse external actors”, asserts the new strategy.

“In each of our countries, the agencies are embedding themselves in the police and military structures that provide them intelligence to carry out their actions. I have already pointed to the type of relationship that all the military forces have with what they call the host nations. These host nations are in charge of carrying out their war or internal counterinsurgency”, says anthropologist López.

The Mexican researcher adds that drug traffickers function “like a paramilitary force or at the service of the armed security forces. In the case of Mexico, they are the other side of the clandestine Armed Forces, which are used to criminalize [movements that resist government policies]. The mining companies call this Conflict Engineering, which is how mining corporations impose their presence in a region by using criminals who are protected by security corporations.”

The main military influence areas for the Southern Command are the Task Forces located in each of the countries of Central and South America. Implementation of the new strategy links “Components, Joint Task Forces, and Security Cooperation Organizations (SCO)”.

SOUTHCOM exercises, the document says, “its legal authority as a Combatant Command to fulfill missions through its components of each service, Joint Task Force and other organizations which regularly carry out exercises, operations, and exchanges of experts from different fields. The Armed Forces (Army, Navy, and Air Force) provide SOUTHCOM with command components that carry out the specific objectives of the mission and the security cooperation activities”.

The strategy emphasizes one of its main areas of influence in Central America, the Joint Task Force-Bravo, which operates in the Honduran military facilities in Soto Cano Air Base, located in Comayagua Valley, Honduras. Its staff is composed of more than 500 United States military men and 500 American and Honduran civilians. In also considers the Guantanamo Bay Joint Task Force, located in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba; the Joint Interagency Task Force South (JIATF-South), located in Cayo Hueso, Florida.

These United States military areas coordinate their actions with interagency units located within the teams of each country of the United States Embassy. “Working with interagency partners such as the Department of State (DOS), the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), the Department of Homeland Security, the Department of Treasury, the Department of Justice, and the collaboration with the ONGs and intergovernmental, business, and academic organizations allows us to move towards national objectives that would be impossible to achieve solely with military power”, the 2017-2027 THEATER STRATEGY document points out.

Read also ⇒ The US Southern Commands Silent Occupation of the Amazon

“Trump is trying to recover the ground lost during the last decade by the progressive governments and wants to take a strong stance due to the presence of China and Russia. China is being a reflected as a model of development for the countries of the region. This is where the United States sees a problem in the region. Unlike the United States, China is making its presence economically and not militarily”, said researcher Wolf Grabendorff, from the Andean University Simon Bolivar of Ecuador in a correspondence with Avipa Midia.

In Grabendorff’s opinion, in a scenario in which the United States is losing economic presence, “what remains as a last resort a military presence”.

United States & NATO Military Bases in Latin American & the Caribbean

The objective of the military base is ‘to protect the interests of North American companies” in the Neuquén zone.

Oil, A Strategic Motive

The Southern Command had previously launched a strategy for the 2008-2018 decade, which is now coming to an end, entitled United States Southern Command Strategy 2018 Partnership for the Americas. Among the economic title, they looked to secure the supply of oil and natural gas. According to the United States Department of Energy, in 2008, three of the four main energy suppliers for this country were located in the western hemisphere (Canada, Mexico and Venezuela). Likewise, the Coalition for Affordable and Reliable Energy projected that the United States would need 31% more oil and 62% more natural gas in the following two decades, 2008-2028.

“As the United States continues needing more oil and gas, Latin America become a global leader in energy with its enormous oil reservations and production and supply of gas and oil. We must work together to guarantee that these energy resources and the infrastructure that supports them allow for regional prosperity”, the official 2008-2018 strategy document argued.

The Argentine province, Neuquén, took a geopolitical turn. In 2011, one of the most important deposits of gas and unconventional oil in this country, Vaca Muerta, was discovered. This deposit is located in Neuquén Basin. It has a surface of 30 thousand km². According to the Argentine company Yacimientos Petrolíferos Fiscales (YPF)—Fiscal Oilfields—in Vaca Muerta there are 117 trillion cubic feet of shale gas and 40 billion barrels of unconventional oil which is already extracted using the hydraulic fracturing method (fracking).

Read also ⇒ Fracking Expands in Latin America, Threatening to Contaminate World ’’s Third-Largest Aquifer

Argentina went on to lead, after China, the list of nations with most “technically recoverable” reserves of shale. But it also reconfigured its geopolitical position. During 2017, Tom Cooney, who was then North American interim ambassador, had visited the Neuquén province and ratified the intention to reactivate a military base construction for humanitarian aid. At the same time, he highlighted the investments made by Chevron and Exxon Mobil in Vaca Muerta.

The objective of the military base is to “protect the interests of North American companies” in the Neuquén zone, according to Mariano Mansilla, an Argentinian deputy.

However, the General Secretary of the Provincial Government of Neuquén, Leonel Dacharry, holds that “this is not about a military base, but about the Humanitarian Assistance Program that will resume the work that was suspended in 2012 and which consists of a deposit and an office building for the coordination of the Civil Defense and other agencies in case of an emergency”.

In addition, Albert Kraaimoore, interim minister advisor of the United States, who led one of the last American delegations that visited the Neuquén province on March 22 and 23 of 2018 said, “we are visiting many provinces but, especially, it is very important for us to get to know Neuquén better, because there are a lot of interests in what is happening in this very young province and because of the growth of the oil industry. I think we have something to share with you. There are many American companies that have seen a great change here in Argentina. There are many who are coming to make their investments, especially in Neuquén, big companies like Chevron and Exxon”.

The former U.S. ambassador to Argentina, Tom Cooney, emphasized that the tours in these provinces have been taking place since 2009 and that “the donation for humanitarian assistance further increases the capacity of the province to respond and prepare for natural disasters”. Mr. Cooney was a Foreign Policy Advisor for the U.S. Department of State. During his time in Washington, Minister Cooney worked closely on topics related to the fight against terrorism in Latin America.

In February of this year, 2018, in the framework of the official visit to the United States, the Minister of Security of Argentina, Patricia Bullrich, along with the Secretary of Interior Security Gerardo Milman, were welcomed in Florida by Admiral Kurt Walter Tidd, current head of the Southern Command. Among other points, they addressed the upcoming thirteenth G20 meeting that will be held for the first time in the Southern Cone on November 30^th and December 1^st of this 2018 in Buenos Aires, Argentina. In these meetings, dialogues with the FBI and the DEA were drawn. The Minister returned to her country with the commitment to create a Task Force against international crime and drug trafficking for the northeast region of Argentina, with the support of intelligence analysts from the DEA.

“This compromise includes more analysts that will help us analyze where the drugs are coming from”, said Bullrich.

“Hezbollah is a concern to the United States in this region because “it came up in every meeting we had.” - Patricia Bullrich, Minister of Security of Argentina

According to the official, “official U.S. reports identifying several potential terrorists in the Triple Frontier between Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay” were presented in the meetings.

“Hezbollah is a concern to the United States in this region”, says Bullrich, because “it came up in every meeting we had”. In the same way, Gerardo Milman also added that, “it is very important for our government to be able to collaborate with them [the United States] and vice versa. We have offered them a joint task in the Triple Frontier due to terrorism issues, and we believe we may also work with other agencies, in addition to the DEA, that will allow us to have a deeper look into what is happening there”.

Researcher Grabendorff contradicts this vision. “I don’t find it adequate for people to label any sort of activity as terrorism where there is only a Molotov. Terrorism is something else”, points out the German political scientist Grabendorff to Avispa Midia.

“The word terrorism is a very important word for the relationship of the United States with other countries. This is the case of Argentina with Mauricio Macri, the current president of this country”, says Grabendorff.

It seems that the presence of the Southern Command goes beyond terrorism, drug trafficking and oil. The Triple Frontier constitutes the geographical point where the borders of Argentina, Paraguay and Brazil converge, coinciding with the Iguazú River mouth in the Paraná River. The Guarani Aquifer System is located in this area, which is one of the main reservoirs of underground fresh water in the world. Based on a study conducted by the Military Center for Argentine Democracy, the Guarani Aquifer would have a capacity of approximately 50,000 km³, with an annual recharge of 160 Km³to 250 Km³, such that exploiting some 40 Km³ annually could provide 360 million people with about 300 liters of water daily per inhabitant.

Friendly Relations

The humanitarian aid in the face of natural disasters, the response against illicit organized crime networks, and terrorism have been the lines by which the “United States Southern Command Strategy 2018 Partnership for the Americas” has been implemented from 2008 to 2018. That strategy sought to strengthen ties with its international partners to support “security and stability” of the region. During this period, many diverse military operations have been carried out to promote the security cooperation and reach the strategic objectives of the United States.

“The Southern Command’s present strategy is to create closer relationships with the nation-states, with the police and military units, mainly due to the presence of China and Russia in the region. Under progressive governments it was not that easy to trace those relationships, and today, they return in the form of humanitarian aid, training, and the politics against drug trafficking and terrorism”, adds the German political scientist Wolf Grabendorff, an international consultant on issues of international relations and security in Latin America.

For Grabendorff, there are several processes of reorganization of the United States in the Southern Cone. For example, he warned that “after the United States military bases closed in Ecuador they moved to Peru and Colombia, we must pay attention there”.

According to the United States Embassy in Peru, “in total, since 2007, the United States government is providing more than $44 million to Peru in 277 projects, through its Humanitarian Assistance Program (HAP), to help Peru improve its capacity to respond to disasters.” Among other projects is the new Regional Emergency Operations Center of Huánuco financed by the Southern Command that will be used to “improve the response capacity to natural disasters. The investment in this center goes above $1.5 million”, said Jorge Chávez Cresta, a Southern Command representative.

In addition, in August 2017, the head of the Southern Command, Kurt Walter Tidd, in the framework of the South American Defense Conference-2017 (SOUTHDEC 17), held in Lima, Peru, said that “this meeting demonstrates our interest in strengthening relations with the countries of this region, to join as partners and true friends who welcome all ideas and perspectives.

The South American Defense Conference is one of three regional security conferences that the United States Southern Command carries out to “exchange experiences among defense and security authorities of the region”, including on the issue of “climate change”.

A month prior to this meeting, the Southern Command had carried out a military exercise by sea, air and land called Multinational Exercise UNITAS—2017. More than 4,200 sailors from 19 countries, and approximately 60 naval, terrestrial and aerial units, participated in the “Mar de Grau” off the northern coast of Peru, in its fifty-eighth edition of these exercises. The United States, Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Colombia, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Guatemala, Honduras, Indonesia, Italy, Mexico, Panama, Paraguay, Spain and the United Kingdom, as well as the Peruvian Armed and Air Force, participated in this international exercise.

“Colombia is the United States’ most important ally in the region. Colombia could be the Trojan horse in an eventual military intervention against Venezuela or against any country in the region, according to their interests”, points out Gilberto López y Rivas, who is an author of “Estudiando la Contrainsurgencia de Estados Unidos” (Analyzing the United States’ Counterinsurgency), among other books.

In addition to these military exercises, others were carried out in the Triple Frontier shared by Brazil, Colombia and Peru, with the multinational military exercise titled AmazonLog2017, organized by the Brazilian Armed Forces with support from the Southern Command. At least 2,000 Brazilian military men participated, as well as men from the invited countries, with high-caliber weapons and ammunition, ships, planes and helicopters, information technologies, nautical equipment, smart energy, radars and sensors.

“Under military dictatorship in Brazil, these joint exercises with the United States never took place. This is the first time, since they were aided in World War II, in which the Brazilian government helps this North American country carry out these exercises. This is a very significant historical geopolitical change”, said Grabendorff.

In Honduras, a hydroelectric project for autonomy

Por

Renata Bessi

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24 July, 2018

Translated by: Sam Warren

The half-truths created by the green economy marketplace are many. In various parts of Latin America there are mining projects stamped with the label “green,” hydroelectric dams that fall within the Clean Development Mechanism and at the same time destroy forests, water and the social fabric of indigenous and rural communities. But Avispa Midia found, in a corner of Honduras, one small community on the Caribbean, known as Plan Grande, where there truly is green energy production—or rather “community energy,” as the town’s residents call it.

Six kilometers (4.8 miles) from Plan Grande lies the community of Betulia. The two communities have shared in the diverse attempts undertaken to produce their own energy within their territory. At first the two communities attempted it by using a small diesel-powered turbine. A second effort saw the installation of a commercial hydroelectric plant in Betulia, though not in Plan Grande. Although the people of Betulia rejected this project, it was implemented anyways, causing social and environmental damage as a result of a dam that, even so, was recognized internationally as a Gold Standard Premium Quality sustainable project. In this report, divided in four chapters, we share the experience of the two projects.

Community-Based Energy

Yadira Santos lightly bends her knees, as if she were climbing a staircase, amidst the turmoil of the Caribbean waters of Honduras, on a beach by the town known as Rio Coco. She looks for the reporter and says excitedly, "Come on!" A storm was coming and this was the only way to arrive at the final destination--by boat. Yadira insists: "Come on, if we wait more than five minutes the storm will hit us full on and we won't get to the town today." There was no other option. The reporter, assures her team, placed one of her feet on Yadira's knee as Yadira tried to lend some stability to the boat; then she pushed herself off and threw herself inside. Half an hour later, everyone disembarked safe and sound in Plan Grande.

Plan Grande is not, geographically, an island. It is a small town that lies on the same Caribbean coast of Honduras. But even though it is on the American continent, visitors must arrive either by boat or an hours-long hike along paths through dense forest. It is connected neither by highways nor wires. That is to say, the community is not connected to the national electrical system, which relies heavily on contributions from large public and private dams; they produce 32.8% of the country's electricity, according to government figures from 2017.

The town isn't connected and doesn't need to be. It has its own hydroelectric plant, a small power station that generates its own energy communally. The turbine is small, with only 18 kilowatts of power, but it is enough to supply 120 houses in the town, around 500 people. The dam itself is just over six meters (about 20 ft) wide and the waterfall goes no higher than three meters (about 10 ft)

Comparison

While the Plan Grande plant has 18 kilowatts of power, the Agua Zarca hydroelectric project, on the Gualcarque River in the Lenca village of Río Blanco where the indigenous activist Berta Cáceres was murdered as a result of protest against the project--has 21.3 megawatts of power and is commercially considered a small hydroelectric plant. This status was conferred by its funders, the FMO (Financierings Maatschappij voor Ontwikkelingslanden), of the Netherlands. By way of example, the Itaipú hydroelectric plant, Brazil's largest and the second largest in the world, has an installed capacity of 14,000 megawatts.

"We work with the flow of water that comes from the mountain, and it's not large. Our logic as a community is not of limitless consumption, it is not the logic of commercializing energy, it is the logic of meeting our most basic needs. Thus we adapt our consumption to what nature offers us," said Oscar Padilla, of the community council. "What we propose is not to stop using technology that has been created, but to use it responsibly and with respect for our rivers and forests. Because, yes, nature does have limits."

How electricity arrived

Those who arrive for the first time and are not from the community would say, at first, that it is impossible to carry turbines, generators, poles, cables, and cement to the village's beach on a small boat. But this is not the greatest problem. There are no wide roads where the river is, but only small paths; there would be no way to transport all the equipment necessary to the winding road upriver, where the powerhouse and the dam wall were built.

"Well, that's how we did it. And not only the men, us women too. The men go lobster-fishing a large part of the year. The ones who are captains go for the whole season, 8 months, it starts in June and they stay until March. The ones who are sailors go for three. Almost all the youth go. So we had to work just as hard," said Bernarda Baños, 63 years old.

This wasn't a one-time effort. They had to carry the turbines and generators to the town in small boats twice.

Until 2006 the people of Plan Grande used gas lamps. "And when we didn't have money to buy gas, we made coconut oil lamps. All this beach you see, along the entire shore there were coconut trees and that's where we got the oil from," recalls Baños.

In 2006, a diesel generator plant arrived in the neighboring town of Betulia, donated by the Spanish Cooperation Agency for International Development (or AECID, for Agencia Española de Cooperación Internacional para el Desarrollo). "We knew that one of their representatives was going to be in Betulia. That day it rained a lot and we couldn't go by sea, so we walked for hours to get there. So we talked with him and he told us that if we got a hold of a helicopter to carry the equipment to Plan Grande, then they'd give us a plant too," remembers Dilsia Reyes, from the organized women's group of the community and president of the community council.

See what the community representatives' response was to the AECID member:

Without helicopters and "on our own backs," as Reyes put it, the community maneuvered the plant upriver and managed it for four years, until 2010. "We had three hours of energy per day, from 6 pm to 9 pm. At 9 pm we all went looking for a lamp because the plant turned off," said Reyes. To generate three hours per day of energy the plant consumed three gallons of diesel and as time went on the community could no longer sustain it.

The town's second project hit the mark. After abandoning the diesel plant, the community presented their need to an international organization and was awarded financing to install a small hydroelectric plant.

"The whole town joined together to build the project and figure out its organization and administration. It's been three years now that we've had truly clean energy for the 120 homes in the community," said Edgardo Padilla, of the Electricity Committee, the administrative committee for Plan Grande's energy project.

Edgardo calculates that it's possible to acquire all the apparatuses for energy generation by spending around $10,000 USD and assures that the project's maintenance is more reasonable. "Before we were spending at least 1000 lempiras ($42.50 USD) per month to maintain the system; now we spend no more than 100 lempiras ($4.25 USD)," states Edgardo.

Plan Grande's turbine is propelled by gravity-driven water from the San Matías River, which forms part of the Lis Lis River Basin, in the Matías Microbasin and El Gringo Gorge Forest Protection Area. Part of the water from the Matías River is diverted from its course by a PVC pipe that connects with the dam wall, passes through the powerhouse and returns to the normal course of the river some meters below. "Studies were done to determine how much could be diverted from the river without causing harm," explains Edgardo.

"At first we didn't know about turbines, we had technical assistance to manage them and also for the installation of the pipes, the dam wall, the electric system, the cables, the poles. Now we train each other. Installing the transformers, for example, is now a responsibility of the townspeople. That is, the problems aren't so complex; we already resolved them. The idea is to work so that we have full autonomy," Edgardo added.

When we talk about community projects, we mean that which is community-developed and community-sustained, Padilla made clear. "We know of other communities that received donations of turbines and generators, but they didn't succeed in maintaining the project. So we worked hard to create a way of organizing ourselves, in such a way that the whole community has the responsibility for the energy we generate," he explained.

The community council was responsible for the project construction and the entire community participated in the process. After it was ready, an Electrification Committee was created, which administers, maintains and supervises the project. "We have an executive committee with seven members, a coordinator, the treasurer, president, secretary, members. Also, we have operators, who operate the system. When big problems arise we hire technicians from outside the community. And we rotate these responsibilities throughout the community, so we have to prepare other people to exercise these functions."

The decisions are made in a community assembly. "We periodically convene the assembly for the economic report of revenues and expenses, very detailed reports. In the assembly the people have the opportunity to ask questions and propose ideas, improvements. We, as directors, analyze them and follow up. There are no restrictions in the assembly," he explained.

The committee generated rules for energy consumption. "We thought of norms of use that would allow for the division of energy among the people in the most egalitarian form. With respect for the capacity of the river, we created some restrictions. For example, we don't allow the use of air conditioners. We don't allow one person to have too many electrical appliances because it restricts the consumption of another person, it takes away their right, so we have consumption maximally calibrated."

Four rates were created, of 250 lempiras ($10.60 USD), 200 lempiras ($8.50 USD), 130 lempiras ($5.50 USD) or 100 lempiras ($4.40 USD) monthly, depending on consumption and home appliances. "There are fines if people don't respect the rules. They were all decided on in assembly. People educate themselves because they know how much it costs all of us to produce energy," sustained Edgardo.

Profits for the community

Before, there was nothing cold in Plan Grande, remembers Reyes. When the sailors came with their products, we had to give them away because there wasn't any way to conserve them. "Now they bring their products, their lobsters, they give to everyone in the community who needs it and the rest they store for their own consumption or for sale. So nothing goes to waste. It's all consumed."

Now they can maintain computers. "We created a basic center in the community so that children could learn to use computers," says Padilla. The women's group in the community was also able to realize their bakery project. "We can plan our production with greater certainty," said Nolbia Cortez, who forms part of the women's group.

In addition to the possibilities for work and learning generated by the use of power, the production of energy itself generates profits for the community due to the fees paid for use. That is, a part of the resources is used to maintain the system, and the rest goes to a communal fund for the town's use.

"We have made a petty cash fund so that people in the community, in moments of need or emergency, can go to the treasury and obtain an allowance to take a sick person to the hospital, for example. We have also created a fund for loans, small credits. If I have a need, whether it is urgent or not, there is a fund where I can apply for a loan. We have as collateral the use of energy; if we don't pay the loan, our service is cut," explains Edgardo.

With the fund, children studying at the community school have been given scholarships. "The assembly decided on the parameters for the scholarship. One is for high academic achievement. The other is for the degree of the child's need," said Edgardo. Further support goes to the school administration.

If a private hydroelectric project had been built in Plan Grande, it would have damaged the forested, mountainous area above the town, comments Padilla. "It would have taken away a good part of the forest for the construction of a dam and it would have used the entire flow of water. The truth is that they already came to propose the purchase of our project. But our logic is different, it's to utilize the minimum flow of water necessary and adapt our consumption to it. We work with the aim of protecting our forest above, our source of water. We know that if there's no forest, there's no water," said Padilla.

6 km (3.7 miles) from Plan Grande, in the town of Betulia--the same one that initially had a small diesel plant--there is now a commercial hydroelectric plant. "The river of Betulia is destroyed. Before it was fertile, people went to catch shrimp in the river. Now the river is muddy, and it floods. The fishing grounds that used to exist no longer do."

The report:

The cases of Río Blanco, Guadalupe (Betulia), and the El Tumbador estate form part of a general context of the despoiling of the commonly held properties of indigenous, black and poor rural peoples, with the purpose of ceding these properties to third parties, alien to the community, so that they may be exploited.

The State has been the judge and the judged: it allies itself with the interests of the investors, it constitutes itself as their first business partner. Far from protecting the indigenous and poor rural communities, it favors their despoilment. This is shown in the murder of Berta Cáceres, as it was the same State that persecuted Berta Cáceres and refused to hear her denunciations that now has exclusive control over the investigation and the search for "justice," as was documented by the International Expert Assessor Group (GAIPE, for Grupo Asesor Internacional de Personas Expertas).

The project on the Betulia River bears the Gold Standard Premium Quality certificate, which confers sustainable project status

The Gold Standard Foundation is a nonprofit organization based in Switzerland which provides premium carbon credit certification. That is, the certificate attests that the project promotes reduction of polluting gas emissions and has the right to carbon credits that can be sold to countries which have to meet reduction goals.

The government of Honduras has oriented its actions in the development, enlargement, modernization and optimization of electrical services around the generation of what it considers to be clean energy. In official reports, the Honduran government boasts that 61% of the national electrical grid is powered by clean energy.

"We have taken our experience to other areas. We've talked. We had an event in San Pedro Sula, where there were multimillion-dollar hydroelectric projects, and we shared the example of Plan Grande with them. And do you think they paid attention? No, they didn't care. But oh well, in Plan Grande we're fighting to do something healthy for the community and the environment."

Legal basis for despoilment

Beginning in 2010, according to the report Human Rights Violations in Extractivist Projects in Honduras, from the Honduran Center for the Promotion of Community Development (CEHPRODEC, for Centro Hondureño de Promoción para el Desarrollo Comunitario), 40 contracts with private businesses were approved for the generation of hydroelectric energy. 21 of these projects were within the territory of the Lenca, Pech, Tawahka, Misquito, Tolupan and Garifuna indigenous groups.

The government that followed the 2009 coup saw the approval of Decree 233-2010, repealing the ministerial decrees 001-96 and 158-2009, which prohibited hydroelectric projects in protected areas. This in turn made possible the approval of laws favoring the concession of rivers, the construction of dams, mineral exploitation, hydrocarbon exploration and the approval of the Special Regimens of Development (RED, for Regimenes Especiales de Desarrollo) or "Model Cities" in the following government (2010-2013) presided over by Porfirio Lobo Sosa.

The General Law on Water, also reformed in 2009, promotes the concession of bodies of water to third parties and based on this legal framework 40 contracts were conceded to private businesses the following year, without any previous consultation of indigenous communities.

The processes of the concession and despoilment of these communities' natural resources, sustains the report, are complemented by repressive policies based on the militarization of public spaces. Some examples include the Anti-Terrorism Act, the NGO Control Act, the Illicit Association Act, and the creation of military police and elite police forces.

Padilla speaks to the communities harassed by hydroelectric megaprojects:

If you have a river, don't sell it. The communities need to be ready for when the multimillion-dollar hydroelectric projects arrive. These projects are a disaster for the communities. We have the example of Betulia nearby. Business people arrive and in many cases the community isn't ready, they don't have enough information and they say yes to the projects. They draw you a beautiful picture of the generation of clean energy but when the time comes, things are very different.

I invite the communities to look favorably on the work we have done in Plan Grande. Take note, we are ready to give any information they might need. Our people can even lend technical assistance and can go to other communities, share the experience. The Committee also has its doors open to explain everything, how we manage the project in the community, the technical and administrative parts as well as the organizational parts.

Social Conflict in Nicaragua: More than 108 dead

Por

Renata Bessi

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13 June, 2018

Traslate: Laura Krasovitzky

On Thursday, May 31, student and social movements, farmers and civil society organizations in Nicaragua that are part of the Civic Alliance for Justice and Democracy called for greater resistance against the repression carried out by President Daniel Ortega’s administration. “We are calling for an intensification of different forms of peaceful protest: intensify the struggle for university autonomy, strengthen and reorganize barricades, reinforce supply centers and strengthen expressions of solidarity and support", expressed the Alliance in a statement. The Nicaraguan Centre for Human Rights (CENIDH) has confirmed that as of the evening of May 31, the death toll has risen to 108 after 43 days of government repression against protestors.

The Alliance’s call took place a day after an attack on a giant demonstration on Mother's’ Day in Nicaragua on May 30, led by mothers of the victims of the wave of repression in April ("Mothers of April“ movement) in the country. The attack left 88 injured and at least 16 dead in different cities around the country, according to the most updated count on May 31 by the CENIDH.

"The simulation carried out by the government of President Daniel Ortega has reached inconceivable levels of perversion. While in the morning his government signed an agreement with the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights to create an Interdisciplinary Group of Independent Experts, which would investigate grave human rights violations committed so far, later in the day, the government violently attacked a mass march convened by mothers of youth executed within the context of the protests,"
SAID ERIKA GUEVARA ROSAS, DIRECTOR FOR THE AMERICAS AT AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL.

The protests, led mostly by students, began on April 18 in response to government reforms that increased workers’ and employers’ contributions to social security, while cutting benefits.

Within the first five days of protests alone, the Nicaraguan Red Cross provided treatment to more than 400 wounded, 235 of whom had to be transferred to health units, according to Amnesty International’s (AI) report Shoot to kill: Nicaragua's strategy to repress protest, presented on May 29. Moreover, 311 of all cases regarding medical attention took place in Managua, primarily at the Polytechnic University of Nicaragua (UPOLI), making it one of the areas with the highest number of registered attacks against protesters across the country.

Audiovisual materials presented by AI confirmed the use of firearms by police during the first days of the protest in the areas surrounding the UPOLI. The images show a law enforcement group (riot police and National Police) with shotguns and two firearms. The police fired lethal ammunition at least once, despite a lack of perceivable threats against them. This event would have happened at night.

Understanding the context

Nicaragua's political context shies away from traditional left-wing and right-wing politics. For a sector of what is considered to be the institutionalized political left of Latin America, the protests in Nicaragua appear to follow the script of the United States-led coup against Ortega, who currently leads the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN), heir to the Sandinista movement that overthrew the Somoza dynasty in Nicaragua in 1979.

In an interview for TeleSur, for example, international analysts like Sandino Asturias, Adolfo Pastrán and ErnestoWong pointed out that the protests are part of a new interventionist plan put together by the United States, as a reissue of the right-wing script that has been used in Venezuela to trigger a change in government.

However, reality is much more complex. Avispa Midia interviewed Rigo del Calvario López, who was part of the Sandinista guerrilla in the 1970s. Talking about Sandinismo in the times of President Daniel Ortega is a matter of nostalgia and anger for this old ex-guerrilla.

"To be a Sandinista meant learning from the principles of General Augusto César Sandino, who led the resistance against the United States armed occupation in Nicaragua between 1926 and 1933. He did not seek to be a landowner or president. Those of us in the original block of the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) affirmed that we did not want to be entrepreneurs or millionaires and much less presidents. However, the opposite happened. They became landowners, presidents, businessmen and millionaires. They only use the red and black flag to shelter themselves and that's not being a Sandinista", shares Calvario.

Learn more ⇒ Avanza el neoliberalismo en Nicaragua: del rojinegro de la revolución al fiusha de las modas

Taking all of the above into account, the wave of violence on behalf of the State is unjustifiable and indefensible. Nicaragua has been governed for three consecutive terms since 2007 by President Daniel Ortega. His wife, Rosario Murillo, has been vice-president since January 2017. According to AI’s report, in recent years, the signs of human rights deterioration have been increasingly visible. On the eve of the 2016 presidential elections, Amnesty International expressed concern that Nicaragua was "very quickly and dangerously slipping back into some of the darkest times the country has seen in decades", the document stated.

An Avispa Midia team tried to enter Nicaragua on the eve of the elections, but was denied entry by immigration authorities after realizing it was a team of international journalists.

Rights violations regarding freedom of expression and peaceful protests have been repeatedly carried out by President Daniel Ortega’s government, This has been documented by various national and international human rights organizations. The violent crackdown on protests and harassment experienced by representatives and rural community leaders is also due to their resistance to the Interoceanic Grand Canal mega-project, which has also been repeatedly condemned by Nicaraguan organizations and Amnesty International.

AI made a recount of the events in its report. On April 16, 2018, the Board of Directors of the Nicaraguan Social Security Institute (INSS) approved a reform regarding the social security system, which was ratified the following day by President Daniel Ortega through the 2018 Presidential Decree, published in La Gaceta Official on April 18, 2018.

The reform entailed an increase in social security contributions for employers and workers and an additional contribution of 5% for pensioners, among other changes. The affected sectors of the population took these measures as an attack on their rights. The lack of consultation and transparency during negotiations further fueled discontent. As a result, thousands of people protested in Managua and other cities in the country such as Bluefields, León, Estelí, Ciudad Sandino and Masaya.

Acts of repression and violence against protesters, most of whom were students, by state security forces and government related groups or paramilitaries were denounced through social media networks and by human rights organizations as soon as the protests began. On the first day, a parapolice group attacked students at the Central American University (UCA).

On April 19, 2018, students from various universities joined the protests. The day ended with at least three people killed, including a student and a police officer, and dozens of people injured. The protests spread to other departments across Nicaragua, while the government blocked the transmission of at least four media outlets, as was later reported.

Universities like the Polytechnic University of Nicaragua (UPOLI), the National University of Engineering (UNI) and the Agrarian University (UNA) became shields for hundreds of young people to protect themselves from the violence carried out by public security forces and parapolice groups. On April 21, 2018, reporter Ángel Gahona was murdered in Bluefields and nine other journalists were injured.

The following day, additional attacks were reported and attributed to the National Police, which went after students sheltered in the UPOLI. Six people were injured, as a result, and one person died. That same day, President Daniel Ortega announced he would revoke the reforms to the social security system, but made no mention of the deaths of protesters. The repression has been increasing ever since.

The strategies of repression

Some of the elements AI mentioned as part of this strategy of repression are: an official discourse of denial and covering up of existing repression and its consequences, as well as having the highest levels of government stigmatize people protesting publicly; the use of parapolice groups to carry out attacks, amplify their repressive strength, and operate outside the law more easily; the excessive use of force by the National Police and its riot police unit; possible extrajudicial executions by both the National Police and parapolice groups; possible acts of concealment and obstruction in investigations due to a lack of basic and crucial initial steps to make them successful; the denial of medical care in public hospitals; as well as attempts to control the press in order to conceal reality and limit freedom of expression.

Details for some of these elements according to AI’s report can be explored below.

Denial of State repression

After reports of the first three people killed by state forces surfaced on April 19, 2018, Vice President Rosario Murillo told reporters that the groups of people protesting were "tiny" groups that were "against peace and development, led by interests and a political agenda, selfish, toxic, (and) full of hate, [...] "and had made up the deaths reported that day as an anti-government strategy. She also expressed that these sick hearts, full of hatred, and perverts cannot plant chaos and strip all Nicaraguan families of the tranquility that God has given us".

She also accused the media of being manipulative and "promoters of violence that cowardly and premeditatively hide from the cameras they themselves carry", and warned that the government would not allow any provocations.

On April 21, President Ortega made a public statement regarding the protests for the first time, emphasizing that the protesters were "murderers, who walk with weapons of war and when they fall in combat because of the army or the police, then it’s poor them and one has to go to Human Rights on their behalf. "He also stated that protests were being manipulated by political factions that take advantage of any excuse to take political advantage".

Despite the fact that the number of people murdered within the context of police repression increased every day, neither President Ortega nor Vice President Murillo lamented the deaths of protesters. It was not until April 30, 2018, when the Head of State expressed his solidarity with people who lost a loved one in acts of violence and called for "a minute of silence, remembering the deceased, [ ...] but above all, committing ourselves to prevent violence from returning to our homeland".

Without proof of evidence

Safeguarding and preserving the crime scene correctly is one of the most important aspects to ensure an impartial and effective investigation. International standards indicate that essential steps must be taken to process all evidence that may contribute to the success of the investigation in these types of cases.

However, Amnesty International stated that in most of the documented cases, the crime scene was not preserved (when it was in fact possible) and the evidence was not recollected promptly and exhaustively and lacked a guarantee for the chain of custody.

In at least two cases, families told Amnesty International that the evidence at the scene of the crime had been removed. According to videos analyzed by the organization, the morning after the murders of Orlando Pérez and Franco Valdivia, several people cleaned traces of blood and other evidence with a hose and buckets of water.

In the case of Cristhiam Cadenas, whose body was found inside a burnt building in the city of León, the police did not preserve the evidence (his clothes) and did not guarantee the chain of custody. At the time of the interview with Amnesty International, his brother Alexander Sarria Cadenas explained that the police showed him his brother's pants half burnt on one side and a burnt body that was unidentifiable. Although Alexander Sarria identified the clothes, he was not completely sure if it was his brother since he did not have a DNA test to verify his identity. Moreover, Alexander mentioned the body’s legs, arms and teeth were missing.

Nonetheless, the forensic pathologist told him he had died from smoke inhalation without offering any further explanation.

Censorship

Censorship, attacks and threats to media and journalists by riot police and parapolice groups were repeatedly reported during protests. On April 19, 2018, the Nicaraguan Institute for Telecommunications and Mail (Telecor) issued an order to take Channel 100% Noticias, Channel 12, Channel 23 and Channel 51 off the air. Additionally, the Radio Darío radio station in León was set on fire on April 20.

Nicaragua Dialogue

Conversations currently held between movements and organizations and the Ortega government were suspended by the Catholic Church, which has been acting as a mediator and witness in the process after the massacre on Mother's Day. "At the time, we agreed to a National Dialogue despite the lack of conditions and political will by the government. This time has been wasted in sterile discussions that do not touch upon the pillars of the dialogue: Justice and Democratization", the Alliance declared in its statement.

"We continue to believe that the Nicaragua Dialogue is still a way to find a peaceful solution to the crisis. However, following the most recent events, it will only be possible to proceed with this dialogue if the conditions set forth by the Episcopal Conference of Nicaragua are fulfilled and if we have international independent guarantees present".

Guatemala: Military men trained by the U.S. go to prison as a result of abducting a minor and raping his sister during the Civil War

Por

Santiago Navarro F

-

6 June, 2018

Translated by Carlos Magin and Alessandro Morosin

After a lengthy process of more than 13 hours that began on Tuesday, May 22 and ended early morning on the following day, the Mayor Riesgo C. court, directed by Guatemalan Judge Pablo Xitumul, convicted 86-year-old retired general Benedicto Lucas Garcia to 35-58 years in prison, as well as four other Guatemalan senior military commanders who participated in counterinsurgency during the civil war of the 1980s until 1996. This war left 200,000 casualties and 50,000 disappeared, out of which 5,000 were minors.

The court’s ruling, presented at 4:30 AM on Wednesday, May 23 (8:30 GMT local time) read as follows: “The military men directly participated in designing the counterinsurgency plan, and ordered the men executing the plan to capture and torture Emma Molina Theissen, who was beaten and raped by soldiers in a torture-like manner for nine days. After she escaped, they illegally preceded to capture and disappear her brother, Marco Antonio”.

Enma Theissen waited 37 years for justice to be served after the disappearance of her 14 year-old-son in 1981, Marco Antonio Molina Theissen, and for the kidnap, torture, and rape of his sister, Emma Guadalupe Molina Theissen.

According to the records, it was September 27, 1981, when Emma Guadalupe Molina Theissen was detained in a checkpoint conducted by the Army on the road toward the Guatemalan highland. Within her belongings, the military men found propaganda from the Patriotic Labor Youth (Juventud Patriótica del Trabajo) movement, a Marxist-inspired group. For Enma, what happened next was completely different. The military men, dressed as civilians, interrupted the residence located in the Florida colony, zone 19, where her family lived. “Inside our home they pushed the 14-year-old minor and they arrested him. They did not do anything to anybody else in the house. Only him. They took me room by room, they were trying to find weapons, or who knows what they were searching for. When I was able go out to the streets, they were taking him,” said Enma.

That was the last time she saw Marco Antonio. Exactly one day after one of her three daughters, Emma Guadalupe, escaped after being kidnapped for nine days, in which she was tortured and raped repeatedly by several Guatemalan military members.

Counterinsurgency & the United States

Benedicto Lucas Garcia, former Chief of Staff of the Guatemalan Army and brother of former Guatemalan president Romero Lucas Garcia, best known as the “criminal of war” by human rights organizations, was trained by the United States in the torture school known as the School of the Americas (SOA).

The United States’ School of the Americas is a military institution created in Panama during mid-1949. At its inception, the school was named the United States’ Latin American Training Center. In 1997, the CIA’s instruction manuals, used in this school, were declassified. One was titled “Murder Studies”. This manual detailed how to assassinate someone through distinct effective and sharp elements: a fall to a flat surface from a height of 75 feet, weapons, explosives, planned car accidents, among others. In addition, there was another manual titled “KUBARCK, counterintelligence interrogation”, which used methods like torture, beatings and murder.

Lucas Garcia not only received training from this American institution, he also received training in the French Military Academy of Saint Cyr, in Brazil and Chile. Garcia utilized the doctrine of “scorched earth” (tierra arrazada) to defeat the Guatemalan guerrillas, and especially the Guerilla Army of the Poor.

In 2012, forensic anthropologists’ exhumations led to the discovery of at least 550 disappeared victims between 1981 and 1988. This case, and the case of the Theissen family, resulted in the arrest of eighteen former military officials on January 6, 2016 accused of genocide and crimes against humanity. Twelve of these individuals were trained at the School of the Americas.

The Accused

After the Theissen family’s 37-year effort to seek justice, the court sentenced Benedicto Lucas Garcia, Division General Manuel Antonio Callejas and Chief of Staff of the Guatemalan Army Hugo Ramiro Zaldaña, for crimes against duties to humanity (25 years), forced disappearance (25 years), and aggravated rape (8 years). In addition, the court sentenced General Manuel Lizandro Barillas, military zone commander, to 33 years of deprivation of liberty. Francisco Gordillo Martinez was also sentenced to 33 years of deprivation of liberty for crimes against duties to humanity and rape with aggravation of sentence, while Edilberto Letona Linares, the Army’s second in command, was acquitted of all charges based on the court’s conclusion that he had no responsibility in the crimes.

All of them were in prison since January 6, 2016, after they were detained as petitioned by the Human Rights Prosecutor’s Office, who requested 112 years in prison for three members of the military.

Mexico: An indigenous language and territory at risk of disappearing

Por

Santiago Navarro F

-

23 April, 2018

Photo: Santiago Navarro F

Translation: Laura Krasovitzky

In San Lorenzo Azqueltán, a municipality in Villa Guerrero to the north of the state of Jalisco, the indigenous peoples of the Wixarika-Tepehuana autonomous community are engaged in a struggle to reclaim 38 thousand hectares of land from the 94 thousand registered in the 1777 viceregal title, which recognizes them as the legal owners of their territory. These lands have been usurped by narco-ranchers and the region’s political class. On Thursday April 19, around 1 pm, unidentified and armed individuals kidnapped Catarino Aguilar Márquez, one of the community’s agrarian representatives, and Noé Aguilar Rojas, both members of the National Indigenous Congress (CNI) who have been involved in a continuous struggle for the defense and recognition of their territory.

The indigenous community of Azqueltán is made up of two peoples, the Wixarika and the Tepehuano, who share the same communal territory. "Recently, they have set up roadblocks at the entrance of the village as a response to safety concerns and death threats, which are directly attributed to the municipal government of Villa Guerrero Jalisco and to small landowners, of course, who have usurped indigenous lands", Cristian Chávez, member of the Coordination Commission of the Indigenous Governing Council (CIG) and accompanier of the indigenous community of Tepehuana, told Avispa Midia.

On April 23, 1777, the community of San Lorenzo Azqueltán received its Viceregal Title from the Spanish Crown and on December 15, 1954, the Agricultural Department of the Secretariat of Agrarian Reform verified the title’s authenticity. Nonetheless, the government never concluded the Confirmation and Titling of Communal Lands so the procedure is currently held up in the Unitary Agrarian Tribunal of the 16th District in Guadalajara, Jalisco.

Chávez states that Catarino Aguilar served as the community’s legal representative before the Agrarian Tribunal of the 16th District, which links his kidnapping to municipal authorities. "Catarino had already reported receiving direct threats from municipal authorities. A video even shows Ignacio Reyes Márquez, city councilman, admitting having hired paramilitary groups to attack the community", said the accompanier of the indigenous community of Tepehuana.

Community members of Azqueltán have spent months publicly denouncing the intensifying dynamics they are experiencing regarding their lands due to initiatives implemented by state and federal programs and municipal authorities, who have strengthened and supported settlers on indigenous territory by offering livestock assistance. "This has resulted in a range of attacks, including shootings against fellow community members", Chávez adds.

Enforced Disappearance

Municipal, state and federal authorities hold firsthand information on the current situation in the indigenous community of Azqueltán. "We have experienced complete neglect. Enforced disappearances are what is taking place because when the armed group took our comrades, information quickly appeared about 10 minutes later in social media networks, reporting that the group was heading towards San Martín de Bolaños. Despite the extent of military presence in the region, Jalisco’s special police unit Fuerza Única and municipal police forces, no one stopped the car. There is only one road with no detours so a disappearance like this one cannot be carried out without the complicity of the Mexican State. This is why we are saying it is an enforced disappearance", says Chávez.

María de Jesús Patricio (Marichuy,), spokeswoman for the CIG, reported at an event convened by the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN) called Conversatorio Miradas, escuchas, palabras: ¿prohibido pensar?, that the two indigenous men were taken by unidentified and armed individuals that were traveling in a double cabin gray Toyota Hilux. "Apparently, they were headed towards San Martín de Bolaños, Jalisco", the spokeswoman stated. Minutes later, social media networks flooded with demands for the return of both indigenous men alive.

"We demand the immediate return of our comrades with their lives intact and we hold the municipal government of Villa Guerrero and the Jalisco state government responsible for any attacks against them",
MARICHUY SHARED IN A STATEMENT READ ON BEHALF OF THE CNI.

A language that can disappear

Tepehuán is the name given to two indigenous languages in Mexico: northern Tepehuán and southern Tepehuán. It is a region known as the Great Nayar, which stretches across the southern part of the Sierra Madre Occidental in areas belonging to the states of Durango, Nayarit, Zacatecas and Jalisco.

The southern Tepehuán language has two dialectal variations: the o'dam or southeastern tepehuán and the audam or southwestern tepehuán. The southern tepehuana language is closely related to the language spoken by the tepehuanes up north (ódami) in southern Chihuahua, the Pimas of Sonora (oob no 'ok), the Pápagos (tohono o’odham) of Sonora and Arizona, as well as the Pimas (akimel o'odham) in Arizona, United States. These languages make up a linguistic subfamily called Tepimana and are part of the greater yuto-nahuas language family. Tepehuán means mountain people.

Return of the disappeared

Following an intense wave of pressure through media, social media networks and reports, Catarino Aguilar Márquez and Noé Aguilar Rojas, kidnapped and disappeared on April 19, were able to call from an unknown location on a public street where their abductors had left them beaten up.

"At 14:20 hours today (20), community authorities received a call from Catarino Aguilar, agrarian representative of San Lorenzo Azqueltán and member of the Indigenous Governing Council, reporting that they were well and in a un familiar place. There was no further communication until 15:50 hours when community commissions embarked on search missions, finding their comrades at 16:25 hours at a place known as the crossroads of Patahua in the municipality of Villa Guerrero, Jalisco", the CNI reported in a statement.

"The kidnapping-enforced disappearance of our comrades is a crime that has been widely reported. We hold our governments responsible for being negligent to the desperate calls of our people, who ask: Immediately end the displacement of communal lands that ancestrally belong to our people according to the viceregal title of 1733; Stop the series of harassments, threats and attacks against our authorities who speak on behalf of all our people through assembly gatherings and not just one person; Investigate and condemn all direct threats and those carried out through social media networks that have targeted our authorities,"
READS THE OFFICIAL STATEMENT OF THE CNI INDIGENOUS COMMUNITIES.

Emma Goldman: Intersectional Before The Word Existed

Por

Avispa

-

18 April, 2018

By Matthew Gindin

The higher the mental development of a woman, the less possible it is for her to meet a congenial male who will see in her, not only sex, but also the human being, the friend, the comrade and strong individuality, who cannot and ought not lose a single trait of her character.

A party in New York, just before the turn of the century. A young Jewish woman from Russian Lithuania is there, a remarkable person who ran away from home at the age of 16 to escape a forced marriage and made her way to the US. There are many other young radicals and intellectuals present, including others who are, like her, anarchists. She is bespectacled and bohemian looking, with a strong, yet somewhat pixie-ish face and long curly hair held up in a bun. One might say she looked somewhat like a pirate. As the band kicks up a joyous dance number, she joins with abandon. Her happy dancing attracts the attention of a taciturn radical who tells her with a frown “that it did not behoove an agitator to dance. Certainly not with such reckless abandon, anyway”.

Goldman responded furiously: “If I can’t dance, then I don’t want to be part of your revolution”.

Well, or at least she said something like that. Later, in her 1931 autobiography, Living My Life, she said, “I told him to mind his own business, I was tired of having the Cause constantly thrown in my face. I did not believe that a Cause which stood for a beautiful ideal, for anarchism, for release and freedom from conventions and prejudice, should demand denial of life and joy. I insisted that our Cause could not expect me to behave as a nun and that the movement should not be turned into a cloister. If it meant that, I did not want it. I want freedom, the right to self-expression, everybody’s right to beautiful, radiant things”. This telling of the episode was later paraphrased by others in the pithy quote above.

Emma Goldman was born in 1869,in Kovno, Lithuania, then part of the Russian Empire. By that time radical political movements were well underway in Europe, which would soon go to war against the status quo throughout the West and then the East. The intellectuals of the day fiercely debated solutions to the brutal systemic injustices which plague the world, taking sides in a plethora of different ideologies of thought and action. The Jewish youth were impassioned by these ideas; Jewish participation in socialism and communism were so widespread that Jews and communism came to be united in the popular imagination for decades to come.

Goldman, born into a religious family, ran away when her father tried to force her into a marriage she didn’t want. She would literally never stop running from the chains people wanted to catch her in, though along the way she would dedicate her life principally, not to her own freedom, but the freedom of others. By the age of 21, she was a dedicated anarchist and a fiery speaker on a lecture tour, using powers of rhetoric which are still admired a century later.

The demand for equal rights in every vocation of life is just and fair; but, after all, the most vital right is the right to love and be loved.

In the US, Goldman fell in love with the Anarchist activist Alexander Berkman, who would soon be convicted of the attempted assassination of the industrialist Henry Clay Frick, in retaliation for the killing of nine striking steelworkers by Pinkerton detectives (a private security force allied to political and business powers). Goldman was never charged, but for the rest of her life she was harassed by police. Jailed many times, in 1893 she served a year for incitement to riot; she was jailed again in the aftermath of President McKinley’s assassination by an anarchist, imprisoned again for disseminating “obscene” birth control literature in 1916, then again in 1917 for organizing against forced military conscription.

Anarchism, then, really stands for the liberation of the human mind from the dominion of religion; the liberation of the human body from the dominion of property; liberation from the shackles and restraint of government. Anarchism stands for a social order based on the free grouping of individuals for the purpose of producing real social wealth; an order that will guarantee to every human being free access to the earth and full enjoyment of the necessities of life, according to individual desires, tastes, and inclinations.

For Goldman, anarchism was a protest against unjust hierarchy, oppression, state violence, prejudice, and irrational convention. Her commitment to a human dignity that pre-existed any state or any state-given rights could sometimes lead her into controversial statements, as in her famous quip, “Ask for work. If they don’t give you work, ask for bread. If they do not give you work or bread, then take bread”.

In 1919, Goldman was deported back to Russia, where she quickly spotted the totalitarian tendencies of the Bolsheviks and became an early critic. Her experiences in Russia led her to change her belief that the means might sometimes be justified by the ends, one of several changes in her always evolving thought. In the afterword to My Disillusionment in Russia, she wrote: “There is no greater fallacy than the belief that aims and purposes are one thing, while methods and tactics are another….” Goldman came to be wary of the use of political violence, although she continued to sympathize with the use of it by those oppressed by dominator hierarchies.

Goldman was an early, and fierce, feminist. In 1897, she wrote:

“I demand the independence of woman, her right to support herself; to live for herself; to love whomever she pleases, or as many as she pleases. I demand freedom for both sexes, freedom of action, freedom in love and freedom in motherhood”.

Goldman was also an outspoken critic of discrimination and hatred against homosexuals. Her belief that social and legal liberation should include gay men and lesbians was virtually unheard of at the time, even among anarchists. As German-Jewish sexologist Magnus Hirschfeld, who is often viewed as the father of LGBTQ rights, wrote, “she was the first and only woman, indeed the first and only American, to take up the defense of homosexual love before the general public”.

In numerous speeches and letters, she defended the rights of gay men and lesbians. “It is a tragedy, I feel, that people of a different sexual type are caught in a world which shows so little understanding for homosexuals and is so crassly indifferent to the various gradations and variations of gender and their great significance in life”, she wrote.

Goldman’s defense of the rights of women, workers, LGBTQ people, and the poor; her defense of free speech and free thought, and her opposition to capitalism, human rights abuses, and warfare make her a great prototype of the intersectional activist. Her life is also, however, a lesson about what are most likely inescapable limits to intersectionality; although Goldman spoke out against racism, she did not give it nearly as much attention as other issues, whether that reflects a feeling on her part that her opposition to racial hierarchies was implicit in everything she said (which I suspect) or arose from a lack of an acute personal attunement to the issue (which may also have been a factor). Although an intersectionality reflected in an equal commitment to all issues of justice remains a worthy ideal, it is unlikely one human being can perfectly attain it.

In her independence of thought, uncompromising honesty and bold, self-endangering action, Goldman has few peers in history. In 1936, after living in Germany, England, France and Canada Goldman went to Spain to enlist with the Loyalists against the Fascists. When Franco’s Fascists won, Goldman returned to Canada, from where she raised money for the victims of the war. She died in Toronto, Canada, on May 14, 1940.

I’d rather have roses on my table than diamonds on my neck

By Matthew Gindin, in thewisdomdaily