Dateline Latin America: Teargas and Tango

Rats! From Hantavirus to Hondurasgate

There are two viruses threatening Latin America and beyond. The first is Hantavirus (Andean strain) which it's thought was picked up by European tourists who boarded a Dutch cruise ship in April in the far southern Argentinian city of Ushuaia. It is usually spread from rodent to human. The fear now is that humans are passing it to one another. The World Heath Organisation is dealing with it since, like the coronavirus, it is a potentially global issue. Only Argentina, which has experience and knows more about this particular strain than any other nation, has, like the US, ducked out of the WHO, wants nothing to do with it. The Argentine president, Javier Milei, is instead reportedly dabbling in Hondurasgate - a plot involving right-wing leaders from around the world to undermine the three major remaining progressive, democratically elected governments in Latin America - Mexico, Colombia and Brazil. It's on tape. The former president of Honduras, Juan Orlando Hernandez, talking about the involvement in this new plot of Trump and Milei, as well as - get this! - the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu. Don't forget that Trump released JOH, as he's known, from a 45-year prison sentence in the US which he was serving for drug-related issues. Why? Maybe Hondurasgate is payback? It wouldn't be the first time the US and its allies have meddled in Latin American affairs. There was Iran Contragate? The Bay of Pigs, countless US invasions of Haiti and US support of every military military dictator from Augusto Pinochet to Alfredo Stroessner? Joe and Daniel discuss to what extent these connections were rodent to human, human to rodent, rodent to rodent or human to human with the rats simply observing.

Insecure Presidential Security

The attack last week on Donald Trump was merely the latest in a series of assassination attempts against American presidents. Joe and Daniel have covered a fair few presidential events in their time - from Bush to Obama and Chavez to Castro - and been subject to the security measures that accompany them. They compare Trump's security with that on the events they've covered. And whether, as we mark World Press Freedom Day, security is used as an excuse to keep prying journalists at bay.

Exposed! The Emperors' New Clothes

The people of Hungary have had enough of the malicious, regressive, oppresive policies of their president of sixteen years, Viktor Orban. He was one of the first of the world's anti-women, anti-abortion, anti-migrant, anti-LGBTQ+, anti pretty much anything deemed to be progressive leaders of recent times. In his wake followed Donald Trump, Jair Bolsonaro, Javier Milei, Jose Antonio Kast and more - leaders who undermined their countries' electoral and judicial systems to remain in power and, through foul means and fair, ensure that they and their mates keep raking in the cash. Joe and Daniel discuss what implications the Orban defeat may have on like-minded leaders in Latin America and how and why these pelotudos keep getting away with it.

The Battle for Human Rights in Argentina: Truth, Justice and Memory

The military was in office in Argentina between 1976 and 1983, kidnapping, torturing and killing an estimated 30,000 of its own people. Thousands more fled into exile. Argentina is still a country coming to terms with this dark history: to find out what happened, who was responsible, where the bodies are buried. The survivors and the families of the victims want truth and justice. They also want to ensure that such horror is never again allowed to thrive - Nunca Mas! Never Again! It's a sentiment that rings even more strongly with a government in office that questions the extent of the horror and even tries to justify it. Joe and Daniel have, over the years, interviewed survivors, witnesses and torturers, visited the detention centres and attended the trials. They marched on 24 March - the day fifty years on from when the military took office and here discuss what that date means to them.

Latin America and the New World Order

The Monroe Doctrine implemented in 1823 by the then president of the United States, James Monroe, was designed to tell the European colonial powers to get out of their backyard. Make no mistake - Latin America was Uncle Sam's. Now dubbed the Donroe Doctrine after the current US president, their military operation in Venezuela in January was just the latest in a series of incursions in countries deemed to have strayed too far from US influence - Guatemala, Haiti, Chile, Grenada and Panama among them. Cuba next? Once the US has finished in Iran? Joe and Daniel discuss Washington's meddling in Latin America while the drones cause destruction on the other side of the world.