NotiCen: Central American & Caribbean Affairs articles from June 2005

NotiCen: Central American & Caribbean Affairs archives from June 2005

GUATEMALA'S BORDER AND TERRITORIAL DISPUTE WITH BELIZE INTENSIFIES AS TRADE TALKS ADVANCE.
June 2, 2005... Guatemala's Foreign Minister Jorge Briz has said that Belize has assumed an "intransigent" posture in its effort to resolve a border dispute whose history reaches back beyond the birth of Belize as an independent country. Briz challenged the...

NICARAGUA'S PRESIDENT DECLARES STATE OF EMERGENCY, SUSPENDS CONSTITUTIONAL GUARANTEES.
June 2, 2005... Nicaraguan President Enrique Bolanos declared a State of Emergency on May 30, in an attempt to stave off a crisis caused by soaring energy prices. The decree was read over state radio. It suspends parts of the Constitution and imposes a hike...

STATES SHOW NEW INDEPENDENCE AT OAS GENERAL ASSEMBLY.
June 9, 2005... The 35th General Assembly of the Organization of American States (OAS) opened in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, June 5 with a diplomatic confrontation occasioned by a US proposal for a "pre-emptive democratic intervention" agenda for the hemispheric...

CHORTIS REJOIN BATTLE WITH HONDURAN GOVERNMENT TO RECOVER THEIR LANDS.
June 9, 2005... The Chorti indigenous group of western Honduras took over the Parque Arqueologico de Copan Ruinas in a new round of contention with the government that dates back, depending on length of historical view, to the conquest, or to the 1950s, or to...

ORGANIZATION OF AMERICAN STATES: SAVING NICARAGUA FROM ITSELF SINCE 1979.
June 16, 2005... Organization of American States (OAS) Secretary-General Jose Miguel Insulza visited Nicaragua June 16 to look into the institutional crisis that has plagued the presidency of Enrique Bolanos for much of his tenure. Bolanos said Insulza...

REGION'S MINISTERS MEET UNDER PLAN PUEBLA-PANAMA BANNER TO AVERT ENERGY CRISIS.
June 16, 2005... The region's energy ministers met this month in Guatemala to confront spiking energy prices. Electricity and fuel costs have come to be regarded as threats to the stability of regional governments as these costs are passed on to an...

DEBT RELIEF ANNOUNCED, BUT HONDURAS WILL KEEP ON PAYING.
June 23, 2005... The Honduran government has announced that the G8, the group of finance ministers of the eight industrialized nations, has approved more than US$3 billion in debt cancellation for the country, but those waiting to spend or receive money for...

GUATEMALAN INDIGENOUS PEDAL THEIR WAY TO MECHANIZATION.
June 23, 2005... With some help from afar, rural indigenous Guatemalans have discovered that the bicycle can get them from here to there in more ways than one. Bicitecnologia, as it is called in San Andres Iztapa, Chimaltenango, can pump their water, wash...

REGION EMBRACES ETHANOL; A CAFTA COMPLICATION.
June 30, 2005... In its desperate search for solutions to skyrocketing energy costs (see NotiCen, 2005-06-16), Central America may have stumbled upon an alternative that could end up costing even more. The production of ethanol, a plant-based combustible, can...

GUATEMALA DEPARTS FROM DRACONIAN REGIONAL POLICY ON GANGS.
June 30, 2005... Guatemala is taking a different tack from its neighbors in the regional effort to control gang violence. Guatemala has witnessed the result of the Super Mano Dura policy that has stuffed the prisons in El Salvador, and the anti-gang law in...