Chile on the Cusp of Becoming “Developed”

In the eyes of the global community, Chile may be on the cusp of entering the so-called “developed world,” becoming the first Latin American country to shed its “developing world” status. The Washington Post’s Juan Forero has a report this morning, noting that the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, a “club of rich nations that includes the United States, Japan and several European countries,” formally invited Chile to join the group this week. The last such transition for any country occurred over one decade ago, when South Korea and Ireland made the jump. According to the director of poverty reduction and economic management at the World Bank, Marcelo Giugale, Chile’s “well on its way to becoming a developed country, and it's not just because we see numbers that look very promising. I think there are more profound transformations happening in Chilean society that point to a very promising developed country very soon.” Not only has the country experienced fast economic growth, the Post notes, but poverty has been reduced to a regional low of 14% (down from 45%) since the end of the Pinochet dictatorship. Andres Oppenheimer also writes on the matter this morning, adding that extreme poverty sits at just 3% in Chile today. The columnist argues that the “national consensus to support stability” which emerged after Pinochet is a major factor in explaining Chilean success over the last two decades.

While many of the privatizations that the dictator implemented remain in place, Forero adds that significant social programs have been added over the last 20 years as well. “Chile has accelerated spending on education and day care. Forty percent of youths now go on to universities or other institutions beyond high school, authorities say, and 70 percent of those are the first in their families to do so.” Chile also created a rainy day fund with the profits retained from soaring copper prices in the 1990s, allowing the country to implement a major stimulus program when the financial crisis spread this year. Analysts now say Chile's economy will contract this year but will grow 4.5 percent in 2010.

That said, problems remain. Manuel Riesco, an economist with the Center for National Studies of Alternative Development, a left-leaning think tank in Chile, says the economic liberalization benefited big companies and foreign firms which have allowed for historical inequities to persist. And many in the Chilean middle class feel the Chilean miracle has passed them by, citing increases in drug trafficking and other social problems among the worries they have about the future.

In other news,

Honduras Round-Up

From Honduras, a quick round-up. The de facto government of Roberto Micheletti announced Tuesday night that it will be asking Congress to pull Honduras out of ALBA. I’m somewhat surprised this is the first time Micheletti has made the call but analysts are interpreting the move as one last effort by Micheletti to separate his country from the left-leaning governments of the region before handing power to Pepe Lobo in late January. For his part, Pepe Lobo said Wednesday that he hopes Micheletti will “reflect” more on the possibility of resigning before January 27 so as to secure the support of the international community for his new government.

On human rights abuses, the Guardian’s Rory Carroll writes that abductions and murders continue, despite the Nov. 29 election of Lobo. Carroll notes the murder of gay activist and anti-coup leader, Walter Trochoz, reported yesterday, as well as the murder of 16-year-old Catherine Nicolle Rodriguez, who was shot this week by two men on a motorcycle while she traveled in her mother’s car. Coincidentally or not, Rodriguez is the daughter of Carol Cabrera, a TV presenter and outspoken supporter of the de facto government. (There are contradicting reports about whether or not Cabrera was in the car at the time, but Micheletti used the killing to denounce what he called the “sicarios of the Resistencia”). “We are very concerned that the recent election in Honduras appears to have done nothing to protect political activists,” says Jasmine Huggins, Latin America policy officer for the UK advocacy group Christian Aid.

And on the still disputed Nov. 29 elections themselves, AFP reports that Costa Rican President Oscar Arias made yet another call on the international community to recognize the election’s results. Arias also insisted that Micheletti step down, something the coup regime leader unequivocally rejected earlier this week. The Council on Hemispheric Affairs in Washington, meanwhile, has a new report detailing all the questions that still remain about the actual results of the Nov. 29 vote, including a still unclear vision of actual voter turnout. COHA writes:

“The lack of impartial international observers, the undeniable human rights abuses that took place during the campaigning period and election, as well as the TSE’s apparent fabrication of high voter turnout figures for strategic political purposes, all evidence that the Honduran elections were something significantly less than free, fair, or transparent.”

Colombia

Three Colombia-related pieces to highlight this morning. Reuters reports this morning that the country’s two largest guerrilla groups, the ELN and the FARC, may soon join forces against the Colombian state “after years of being pushed onto the defensive by the U.S.-backed security policies of President Alvaro Uribe.” In a surprise statement yesterday, leaders from the two groups threatened to unite with “force and belligerence” in their fight against the conservative government of Mr. Uribe. Some analysts say the unification may end up being solely symbolic, however. “Their command and control capabilities have been seriously damaged and even if they were to join forces, they could not mount a threat to the security advances that Uribe has made,” argues Mauricio Romero, an analyst at the Bogota’s Javeriana University.

In Foreign Policy, Adam Isacson writes about “Integrated Action” programs in Colombia, most ambitiously launched in the La Macarena region south of the country’s capital, Bogota. Isacson writes: “Integrated Action scored some important initial successes. By mid-2008, the Army had quickly cleared guerrillas from most town centers. A massive eradication campaign sharply reduced the zone's coca crop. The region's small town centers saw quick-impact projects such as road-building, school repairs, and military ‘health brigades.’” But, he goes on, in 2009, the “counteroffensive in the zone's rural areas has made road travel unadvisable, leaving the relatively secure towns as islands in a sea of guerrilla influence. Ambushes, bombings, land-mine deaths, and forced recruitment (especially of minors) have increased.” And Colombia’s civilian government has yet to show up, as promised they would.

And in Time, news about a new report from a commission set up by the Ecuadorian government to investigate the 2007 cross-border attack on FARC guerrillas. The magazine writes that the findings indicate some of the government’s top officials had ties with the FARC rebels killed in a Colombian strike nearly two years ago. The independent commission’s coordinator, Francisco Huerta, said the report raises worries that Ecuador is “becoming a narco-democracy.”

Fujimori Trial in Peru

At WOLA, a new report from Jo-Marie Burt on the ongoing judicial appeal of former president Alberto Fujimori, found guilty of human rights crimes in April and sentenced to a maximum 25 years in prison. Burt writes: “To date, the trial of Alberto Fujimori has been an exemplary process. The international community should remain vigilant to ensure that it concludes in the same manner.” A final decision on the Fujimori’s appeal is expected by the end of the year, although the judges have until mid-January to issue their ruling. For more on the trial, see Burt’s International Journal of Transnational Justice article “Guilty as Charged.”

UN Critical of Chavez’s Moves Against Independent Judiciary

Three independent United Nations human rights experts have called for the immediate and unconditional release of a Venezuelan judge arrested after she ordered the release of a prisoner held for almost three years without trial. Judge María Lourdes Afiuni was arrested by intelligence police officers this week after ordering the conditional release pending trial of Eligio Cedeño, whose detention was declared arbitrary in September by the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention, citing violations of the right to fair trial. In their public statement, the UN officials said:

“We are particularly troubled about allegations that President Hugo Chávez attacked both Mr. Cedeño and Judge Afiuni, calling them ‘bandidos’ [bandits] and accusing Judge Afiuni of corruption.”

Drug War in Mexico

Finally this morning, news in the Wall Street Journal about the killing of one of Mexico’s most notorious drug barons. According to the Mexican government, navy sailors carried out an operation to kill Arturo Beltrán Leyva in the city of Cuernavaca on Wednesday. And the LA Times reports on an astoundingly bloody week in Tijuana where more than 45 individuals have been killed since Saturday, signaling the end of a nearly yearlong truce between rival crime bosses in the city.