By Patrick Vanderpool
Impunity Watch Reporter, South America

People Protest Treatment of Mapuche Prisoners (Photo courtesy of Freedom to all mapuche political prisoners)

 SANTIAGO, Chile – Chilean President Sebastián Piñera recently called for an end to an ongoing hunger strike by indigenous Mapuche inmates.  The Mapuche political prisoners are protesting a Pinochet-era anti-terror law that was used to convict them.

The Mapuche people have clashed with the Chilean government and farmers for years over ancestral lands in the southern part of the country.  Read more...

By R. Renee Yaworsky
Impunity Watch Reporter, South America

Hunger striker Franklin Brito. (Photo courtesy of El Universal)

CARACAS, Venezuela—A man who had been protesting President Chavez has died of a hunger strike.  His supporters accuse Chavez of human rights abuses and call the death state-sponsored murder.

Franklin Brito, who was 49 and a father of four, died of a heart attack Monday in a military hospital.  He had been there since last December when authorizes took him away from a protest.  When he died, he weighed 77 pounds.  Read more...

By Patrick Vanderpool
Impunity Watch Reporter, South America

Leader of Indigenous Tribe Voices Displeasure During Meeting of Commission of Human Rights of the Federal Senate in Brasilia (Photo Courtesy of The Washington Post)

 BRASILIA, Brazil – Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva recently signed a contract allowing the construction of a controversial dam to begin.  The Belo Monte mega dam, as it is being called, is set to be built on the Amazonian Xingu River.  President Lula championed the dam under the guise that it will be a victory for Brazil’s energy sector and the Brazilian government claims that the project will create 20,000 jobs.  Critics contend that, in all likelihood, the dam will devastate the area and cause the demise of the local government and indigenous peoples.  Read more...

By R. Renee Yaworsky
Impunity Watch Reporter, South America

The teen hit lists were posted on Facebook. Photo courtesy of Time.

PUERTO ASIS, Colombia—A small Colombian town has been gripped by panic after three teens who were named on online hit lists were murdered.  Many local families have reacted by moving out of the area or sending their children away to safety.

Three hit lists, containing 90 names, were posted on the social networking website Facebook.  Those named were youths, threatened with death if they did not leave the town Puerto Asis.  According to a local official, some of the names on the lists were nicknames only known and used within the youths’ group of friends.  Read more...

By Patrick Vanderpool
Impunity Watch Reporter, South America 

Venezuelan Man who was Stabbed in the Eye During a Violent Outbreak (Photo Courtesy of www.sulekha.com)

 CARACAS, Venezuela – What has been viewed as an ongoing joke has officially become a grave reality.  It is almost unfathomable to think about, but there are places on earth more dangerous than an active war zone.  While the world is focused on the US war in Iraq because of the never-ending news cycles recounting the number of fatalities in any given given day, little attention is paid to a country that experiences even greater violence, Venezuela.  Read more...

By R. Renee Yaworsky
Impunity Watch Reporter, South America

CARACAS, Venezuela—Two officers were shot and killed on a Venezuelan military base after a soldier opened fire with an assault rifle.  Six other soldiers were injured in the following shootout .

The gunfire erupted early Saturday on the Fort Tiuna military base, located in the capital city of Caracas.  The base is the largest in the country and houses the headquarters of the Defense Ministry.  The gunman fled from the base after firing a Russian AK-103 assault rifle.  Read more...

By Ricardo Zamora
Impunity Watch Reporter, South America

MEXICO CITY, Mexico – Mexico’s Supreme Court upheld a law granting same-sex couples in Mexico City the right to adopt children earlier this week. The decision comes a week after the Court upheld the constitutionality of same-sex marriage, and after Argentina legalized gay marriage and adoption in July.

Juliana Cano Nieto, researcher in the LGBT rights program at Human Rights Watch, said that “the Supreme Court’s ruling confirms that the state cannot withhold any legal rights on the grounds of a person’s sexual orientation and gender identity.” This decision will “have resonance for courts throughout the continent for protecting the basic human rights of LGBT people,” she added.  Read more...

By Patrick Vanderpool
Impunity Watch Reporter, South America

RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil – Brazilian comedians are prohibited from publicly making fun of candidates ahead of the upcoming presidential election.  The law, which could last until the runoff election at the end of October, has been dubbed the “anti-joke law.”  Specifically, the law forbids television and radio programs from “using trickery, montages or other features of audio or video in any way to degrade or ridicule a candidate, party or coalition.”

Brazilian internet services are not licensed by the government and therefore the ban does not cover internet material, but the material could still be judged by the Brazilian courts.  Read more...

By R. Renee Yaworsky
Impunity Watch Reporter, South America

The site of the car bomb that damaged 30 buildings. (Photo courtesy of the Guardian.)

BOGOTA, Colombia—At least 13 people were injured when a car bomb was detonated near a popular radio station in north Bogota.  The blast is thought to have been the work of left-wing FARC rebels.

The bomb, which exploded early Thursday, damaged an entire block, including the studio of Caracol Radio.  The car bomb had been placed in the country’s financial center, just five blocks from the capital city’s stock exchange and near the American Embassy.  Read more...

By Patrick Vanderpool
Impunity Watch Reporter, South America

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez and Colombian President Alvaro Uribe (Photo courtesy of casamerica.es)

BOGOTA, Colombia – Alvaro Uribe, Colombia’s outgoing President, has filed a complaint in the International Criminal Court against Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez.  Jaime Granados, Uribe’s attorney, has also filed a lawsuit against the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela at the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights.

According to a statement made by Granados, both the complaint and the lawsuit stem from human rights abuses by Chavez personally and by Venezuela as a state.  The alleged human rights violations at issue focus on the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Columbia (FARC) and the National Liberation Army (ELN) being present within Venezuela’s borders.  Read more...