La Ruana, Mexico
Vigilantes march: Hundreds of armed vigilantes paraded through La Ruana this week to celebrate the one-year anniversary of the militia movement that ended a drug cartel’s reign of terror in Michoacán state. Local ranchers and businessmen pitched in to buy weapons for the militia groups so they could battle Knights Templar gang members who had been extorting protection money. “People are happy; there is work,” said Javier Cortés, a local priest. But now some former Knights have been allowed to join the militias, raising fears that the vigilantes could be undermined. “I am worried about letting the lookouts in because what they do is report to the Knights Templar what is going on,” farmer Raúl Jiménez told The New York Times.
Caracas, Venezuela
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Masses in the streets: Unrest spread across Venezuela this week as anti-government protesters heaped furniture and trash to barricade major thoroughfares. Opposition leader Henrique Capriles urged demonstrators to stay in the streets, calling President Nicolás Maduro “an error in the history of the country” and rejecting Maduro’s invitation to a peace conference of government and opposition figures. “This is a dying government,” Capriles said. “I’m not going to be like the orchestra on the Titanic.” Since the protests began two weeks ago, at least a dozen people have been killed in clashes with police, including a beauty queen who was shot in the head.
The crisis began in San Cristóbal, where students protesting a crime wave on campus were beaten and tear-gassed by police. More student demonstrations followed, along with more police brutality. That brought ordinary people into the streets along with the students, and now the protests encompass anger at rising crime, food shortages, and blackouts as well as government repression. Maduro said the protests were the work of a foreign plot. “It’s a campaign to justify an intervention in the domestic affairs of Venezuela,” he said. Many Venezuelans, particularly the rural poor, still do support the government. But the more Maduro equates protest with treason, the more people pour into the streets to assert their right to demonstrate. It is “a nationwide paroxysm of anger that puts the government’s stability in question,” said journalist Francisco Toro.
Fortaleza, Brazil
Bypassing the U.S.: Brazil is going to build a new undersea communications cable to Europe that will be impervious to U.S. spying. President Dilma Rousseff struck a deal with European leaders to build the cable from Fortaleza, Brazil, to Lisbon, Portugal, at a cost of about $185 million. “We have to respect privacy, human rights, and the sovereignty of nations,” Rousseff said. “We don’t want businesses to be spied upon.” Right now, Brazilian Internet traffic to Europe is routed through American undersea cables. Last fall, Rousseff canceled a trip to Washington after leaks by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden revealed that her cellphone and email had been tapped.
