Human Rights

Andrés Manuel López Obrador was inaugurated Saturday, in a ceremony unlike any other seen in Mexico. What’s next for the new president?

The victory of the extreme right candidate, Jair Bolsonaro, in Brazil’s presidential elections and the fall of the Workers Party are having a profound impact on the rest of the countries of Latin America. These dramatic events require close analysis on the left– to learn from what happened and avoid being shut out as an option for change, and to prevent further victories of the ultra-right.

This year the Caravan of Central American Mothers arrived in Mexico City to participate in the first World Summit of Mothers of the Disappeared with mothers, other relatives of the missing and allies from Mexico, Algeria, Tunisia, Senegal, Morocco, Mauritania, Spain, Italy and the United States to compare notes and gain a deeper understanding of the problem, across borders.

After a major defeat in the first round, the Brazilian Workers’ Party and progressives are pinning their waning hopes on a second-round miracle for candidate Fernando Haddad.

Fifty years since the attack that marked contemporary Mexican history, the demands of 1968 are still valid and the Mexican State has not yet clarified what happened this day.

Laura Carlsen talks to Jesus Vargas, a leader of the student movement who was at the demonstration when the army attacked on Oct. 2. Jesus recounts the terror of that day, how the movement regrouped and his work for social justice.

“As long as one single neighbor is still displaced from their home, the crisis that started with the earthquake continues,” says Gabriel Macías of the Tlalpan United group of neighbors whose apartment complex collapsed in the Sept. 19 quake. Around him crowd dozens of journalists, neighbors and members of the “Topos”, the moles, Mexico City’s volunteer rescue crews.