Category: US Regime Change

  • “Take your money with you,” said Colombia’s President Gustavo Petro, when told about Trump’s plans to cut aid to Latin America, “it’s poison.”

    USAID (US Agency for International Development) spends around $2 billion annually in Latin America, which is only 5% of its global budget. The temporarily closed-down agency’s future looks bleak, while reactions to its money being cut have been wide-ranging. Only a few were as strong as Petro’s and many condemned the move. For example, WOLA (the Washington Office on Latin America), a leading “liberal” think tank which routinely runs cover for Washington’s regime-change efforts, called it Trump’s “America Last” policy.

    The post The Demise Of USAID: Few Regrets In Latin America appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.

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  • Among the flurry of executive orders issued by President Donald Trump in the first days of his administration, perhaps the most consequential to date is one titled, “reevaluating and realigning US foreign aid.”

    Under this order, a 90-day pause was instantly enforced on all US foreign development assistance across the globe – excepting, of course, the largest recipients of US aid in Israel and Egypt. For now, the order forbids the disbursement of federal funding for any “non-governmental organizations, international organizations, and contractors” charged with delivering US “aid” programs overseas.

    The post Did Trump Executive Order Just Cripple US Regime Change Network? appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.

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  • The self-appointed transitional government in Syria is undertaking sweeping internal reforms, including privatizing state-run enterprises and laying off a third of the public sector, as authorities say they are shifting to “a competitive free-market economy.”

    In an interview with Reuters, ex-officials of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) who are serving as cabinet ministers for transitional President Ahmad al-Sharaa – former ISIS and Al-Qaeda commander Abu Mohammad al-Julani – say they have a “wide scope” of plans to shrink the state, including removing thousands of “ghost employees.”

    The post Syria’s De Facto Authorities Execute ‘Sweeping’ Neoliberal Reforms appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.

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  • The New York Times, the so-called US “newspaper of record,” carried an opinion piece by one of its columnists promoting “military intervention” to promote “democracy” by overturning the democratically elected government of Venezuela.

    The central tenet of the NYT piece is that the moral basis for deposing the current president is clear because it claims that he stole the election, terrorizes his opponents, and brutalizes his people with no sign of letting up, much less letting go. Every other option for political change, it contends, has been attempted. Not only that, but Venezuela maintains friendly relations with “our enemies” such as China, Russia, and Iran.

    The post US Media Promotes Military Intervention In Venezuela appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.

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  • Ten days before Donald Trump will be inaugurated in Washington DC on January 20, there will be another inauguration in Caracas. Two contenders claim they will receive the Venezuelan presidential sash.

    Nicolás Maduro’s claim to the presidency is backed by the finding of the Venezuelan electoral authority (CNE) that he won 51.95% of the vote in the July 28th contest. This was subsequently confirmed by their supreme court (TSJ), after a thorough examination of the voting records.

    Edmundo González Urrutia’s claim is based on informally collected voting tallies from 70 to 80% of the precincts showing that he won anywhere from 55 to 75% of the total vote (depending on the source). In contrast, the official CNE electoral authority found he lost with 43.18% of the vote.

    The post Will The US Military Intervene In Venezuelan Inauguration To Force Regime Change? appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.

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  • The corporate media in the United States is waging a misinformation campaign as part of the hybrid warfare being used to try to subjugate Ethiopia. Ajamu Baraka of the Black Alliance for Peace states there “is a coordinated effort to criminalize and delegitimize the Ethiopian state in order to cripple or balkanize it, maybe even to provide the political will for a direct military intervention.” For 27 years, the United States-backed Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) ruled Ethiopia until it was overthrown by a popular movement in 2018. Ethiopians then elected their Prime Minister, Abiy Ahmed, who refuses to bend to pressure from the US. To clarify what is happening in Ethiopia and the fight to protect its people’s right to self-determination, Clearing the FOG speaks with Deacon Yoseph Tafari, the chairman of the Ethiopian American Civic Council.

    The post US Sends A Clear Message To African Nations As It Turns Its Back On Ethiopia appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.

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  • Managua, Nicaragua – US President Joe Biden hectored Nicaragua about their November 7 elections accusing them of “a pantomime election that was neither free nor fair, and most certainly not democratic.” Three days earlier, the US lavished a $650mil arms deal on Saudi Arabia, a monarchy where they don’t even pretend to have elections for higher office. Clearly more than democracy is at issue with the US offensive against Nicaragua.

    At issue is what Biden described as “the arbitrary imprisonment of nearly 40 opposition figures since May, including seven potential presidential candidates.” An objective investigation reveals: (1) the motivation for the arrests had nothing to do with the election and (2) the effects of the arrests had no impact on the election.

    The post Nicaragua Has A Public Relations Problem appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.

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  • Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, and his Russian counterpart and key ally, Vladimir Putin, have come in for much criticism from the Western media since coverage of the crisis began, with both leaders being accused of ‘orchestrating’ the current situation, allegedly in a bid to destabilise the EU, and also as a retaliatory measure taken by Minsk in response to EU sanctions imposed as a result of it successfully repelling a Western-backed colour revolution launched against it last August following the re-election of Lukashenko – again, the warmongers who actually created the refugee crisis in the first place via their colour revolutions and ‘humanitarian’ interventions, have come in for virtually little to no criticism from the Western MSM amidst the coverage of the current crisis, their ire seemingly reserved for Lukashenko and Putin instead.

    The post Regime Change In Belarus – Following The Same Script Used In Syria appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.

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  • On Monday, September 13, solidarity activists protested outside the US Congress against the RENACER Act, which stands for the Orwellian title, “Reinforcing Nicaragua’s Adherence to Conditions for Electoral Reform.” The bill is part of the United States’ effort to undermine the presidential election in Nicaragua this November to prevent President Ortega from being re-elected.

    The RENACER Act would place more unilateral coercive economic measures (aka Sanctions) on Nicaragua, facilitate greater coordination of the US’ economic war on Nicaragua with Canada and the European Union, create stricter oversight of financial institutions doing business with Nicaragua and impose greater Visa restrictions.

    The post Stop US-Directed Regime Change In Nicaragua; Stop The RENACER Act appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.

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  • There are high hopes surrounding the upcoming round of negotiations between the Venezuelan government and the extreme right-wing of the opposition. The sides are set to meet on September 3 in Mexico after having signed a memorandum of understanding in August.

    That document established a 7-point agenda with a broad scope that encompasses elections, political rights and the economy, among others. It calls for lifting the sanctions and ending violent coup attempts. These talks have the potential to end years of political and economic instability caused in large part by U.S. intervention.

    Despite the intense pressure imposed by the Trump administration, the Maduro government enters the talks in its strongest position in years. The governing PSUV party swept legislative elections in 2020.

    The post Venezuela Dialogue Offers Way Out Of Crisis appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.

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  • Chevy Chase, MD – You have likely not heard of them, but Creative Associates International (CAI) is one of the largest and most powerful non-governmental organizations operating anywhere in the world. A pillar of soft U.S. power, the group has been an architect in privatizing the Iraqi education system, designed messenger apps meant to overthrow the government of Cuba, served as a front group for the infamous Blackwater mercenary force (now rebranded as Academi), and liaised with Contra death squads in Nicaragua. As such, it has functioned as “both as an instrument of foreign policy and as a manifestation of a broader imperial project,” in the words of Professor Kenneth Saltman of the University of Illinois, Chicago.

    The post Creative Associates International: It’s Not Exactly The CIA, But Close Enough appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.

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  • We have had a good many people to write us and ask us what in the world is going on in Nicaragua as they read all the international reporting. This is our attempt at trying to put the recent arrests in a way that people living in the United States might better understand.  We are finding that if we do comparisons, that other people can maybe get a feeling of what this little nation that we love so much is doing.

    First let us explain some before we get to the comparisons between Nicaragua and the U.S.

    USAID and other U.S. government entities have sent astronomical sums of money to NGOs in Nicaragua, a poor country of only 6.5 million people. A comparison of the wealth of the two countries makes the figures even more outrageous. Nicaragua’s GDP is around $12 billion, while the GDP of the US is around $21 trillion—that makes the U.S. economy more than 1,750 times larger than Nicaragua’s. We multiplied the figures of money sent to Nicaragua by 1,750 to show what an equivalent sum would mean in the U.S. in the comparisons below.

    The post What If It Happened Like This In The US? appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.

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  • Since the Sandinistas won the 2006 election their anti-poverty policies have had enormous success.

    The country is 90% self-sufficient in food. 99% of the population have electricity in their homes that is now generated with 70+% green energy; International financial Institutions including the World Bank, the International Development Bank and The Central American Bank for Economic Integration praise Nicaragua for its excellent, efficient project execution. it has one of the best health systems in Latin America praised by the International Monetary Fund, with 20 new state of the art hospitals since 2007 achieving one of the lowest Covid mortality rates in the world. Poverty, extreme poverty, maternal, child and infant mortality have all been cut at least in half. Nicaragua is number one in the world in both women in politics and women in ministerial positions and it is fifth in gender equity behind the Nordic nations.

    The post Nicaragua: CIA Attempting A Coup Through US Agencies And Foundations appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.

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  • Yesterday the foreign minister of Belarus, Vladimir Makei, expressed alarm over recent statements by NATO’s Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg about his nation, ones that were openly hostile and implicitly threatening. He’s quoted by the Belarusian Telegraph Agency voicing these concerns:

    “We are absolutely concerned over these recent statements by NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg. Just a few days ago, he expressed concern over deeper ties between Minsk and Moscow, saying that they see it as a threat to the alliance’s eastern flank. They are also concerned about closer cooperation between Moscow and Beijing. They also see it as a threat.”Yesterday the foreign minister of Belarus, Vladimir Makei, expressed alarm over recent statements by NATO’s Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg about his nation, ones that were openly hostile and implicitly threatening. He’s quoted by the Belarusian Telegraph Agency voicing these concerns:

    The post Belarus Concerned Over NATO’s Threatening Statements appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.

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  • Peru’s National Elections Court (Jurado Nacional de Elecciones, JNE) has extended the deadline for presenting motions to nullify votes. The move will benefit far-right candidate Keiko Fujimori who is presenting a flurry of spurious claims of she says constitutes ‘electoral fraud’. 

    The deadline for presenting complaints was 8pm, Wednesday, June 9th. The new deadline is now Friday, June 11th at 8pm. Of the 771 motions to annul presented so far, 741 are from Keiko Fujimori’s Fuerza Popular party and 30 are from Pedro Castillo’s Peru Libre party. 

    Pedro Castillo has rejected the move stating, “If it is true that the JNE intends to extend the deadline to present motions to nullify vote, it would be violating electoral norms.

    The post Peru Electoral Authorities Extend Deadline For Fujimori Fraud Claims appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.

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  • The first and most important element of context is that Nicaragua is a country under attack. Since the 2018 coup attempt, documents have come to light indicating that the leaders of the violence were receiving tens of millions of dollars from such CIA front groups as USAID and the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) through programs to “promote democracy” and “facilitate transition”—code words for regime change. Additionally, as revealed in August 2020, there is an ongoing USAID coup plot called Responsive Assistance in Nicaragua (RAIN) which seeks to ensure that this year’s election results in a government to the liking of the U.S. The document even admits that the FSLN is likely to win in a fair election, in which case a “sudden, unanticipated transition” may be necessary.

    The post US Cries Foul Because Nicaragua Stops It From Buying This Year’s Elections appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.

    This post was originally published on PopularResistance.Org.

  • Imagine what would happen if the US media discovered that a candidate in the mid-term elections was under investigation by the FBI for receiving money from a foreign government. Then, suppose it was one that’s hostile to the US, perhaps Syria or Iran, and that the same government was also covertly funding election coverage in, say, Fox News. How would the rest of the media respond? By claiming that the candidate’s democratic rights were under threat from the FBI? Or by expressing shock and horror at foreign interference in US elections and urging the FBI to arrest the culprits?

    The answer is obvious, but why aren’t the shock and horror also evident when US media identify foreign meddling in an election somewhere else?

    The post NPR Should Ask Where Nicaraguan Non-Profits’ Money Comes From appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.

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  • Red Lines host Anya Parampil explores a new report issued by USAID’s Office of the Inspector General which admits the agency’s policy on Venezuela was driven by the State Department and National Security Council’s push for regime change. The report specifically investigated USAID’s attempt to use the US military to force aid through Venezuela’s border with Colombia on February 23, 2019. Anya highlights the most interesting findings in the audit, including that USAID failed to put proper fraud controls in place in order to appease US officials seeking to overthrow Venezuela’s elected government.

    The post USAID Admits To Venezuela Regime Change Fraud appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.

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  • The US government blames the crisis on the mismanagement and corruption of the Venezuelan government headed by Nicolás Maduro. The Venezuelan government faults the US and its allies for imposing sanctions, unilateral coercive measures illegal under international law.

    An official US Congressional Research Service report issued April 28, Venezuela: Background and US Relations, suggests the Venezuelan government has valid arguments that it is being strangulated by US sanctions. According to the report:

    It is difficult to attribute precisely the extent of Venezuela’s economic collapse that is due to US sanctions versus broad economic mismanagement.

    The post Government Report Documents US Responsibility For Venezuela’s Humanitarian Dilemma appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.

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  • Gioconda Belli, the Nicaraguan writer perhaps best known for her autobiography The Country Under My Skin, has been described as ‘an icon of Latin American feminist literature’. She spoke recently of the ‘extraordinary power’ of being a woman, and that despite this power ‘women have often been relegated to a second place, one where they are only seen from the role of reproduction, pleasure and service.’ Nevertheless, she added, ‘there have been enough ground-breaking women who have been and are still breaking into lots of situations where we couldn’t have been found before.’

    Extraordinary, then, that Belli has attacked Nicaragua’s National Assembly, because it is proposing to strengthen the laws requiring female representation in politics.

    The post Women’s Rights In Nicaragua Under Attack From An Unlikely Source appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.

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  • Nicaragua’s Sandinista Revolution is being targeted with a new sanctions bill as retaliation for triumphing over Washington’s domination attempts and as President Daniel Ortega is anticipated to win this year’s election.

    The Reinforcing Nicaragua’s Adherence to Conditions for Electoral Reform (RENACER) Act (full text of the bill here), introduced in March, would require the U.S. government to increase sanctions coordination with Canada and the European Union and proposes new immediate measures against the Nicaraguan government and officials ahead of Nicaragua’s November elections, all under the guise of promoting democratic elections.

    A House companion bill to the RENACER Act, with the same wording of the bill to be voted on in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, will be brought to the House Foreign Affairs Committee any day now—potentially speeding up the process. 

    The post RENACER Act: US Congress To Expand Nicaragua Sanctions appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.

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  • The US role in the defeat of leftist Andrés Arauz in Ecuador’s presidential contest on April 11 was not overt because it did not need to be, according to a high-ranking Latin American diplomat. We met with the diplomat and others on an official election observation delegation with CODEPINK. Names of some sources remain anonymous due to a hostile political environment towards progressives. 

    This setback for the Citizens Revolution movement, founded by Rafael Correa, will have profound implications for Ecuador and beyond, fortifying the US-allied reactionary bloc in Latin America. 

    Former President Correa left office with a 60% approval rating. He had been twice elected president on the first round; unprecedented for Ecuador, which had a turnover of seven presidents in the previous decade.

    The post US Role Behind The Defeat Of Ecuador’s Leftist Presidential Candidate appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.

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  • The second and final round of the presidential election took place in Ecuador on April 11. Clearing the FOG speaks with Leonardo Flores, the Latin American campaign coordinator for CODEPINK who served as an official election observer, about that election and the many ways the United States and the corporate media worked to prevent the election of the popular leftist candidate, Andres Arauz. The election of a banker, Guillermo Lasso, means the neoliberal assault on the people will continue. Flores speaks about the resistance in Ecuador and the general state of the Pink Tide in South America.

    The post How The United States Stole Democracy In Ecuador appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.

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  • A young left-wing economist, Andres Aruaz, is favourite to win Ecuador’s presidential election later this month, in what would be the latest victory for progressives in Latin America after elections in Mexico, Argentina and Bolivia in recent years. 

    But with a left victory likely, there are growing concerns that elites in Ecuador and abroad are conspiring to sabotage the electoral process. This has become an all too common response of the Latin American right-wing to progressive victories. 

    In Bolivia, when socialist Evo Morales was elected in 2019, a military coup ousted him after exploiting trumped-up charges of fraud that were later found to be wholly false. 

    The post Ecuador’s Socialists Set To Defeat Neo-liberalism appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.

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  • A friend of mine was found dead in his bed this past winter because he had no heating. Why? Because U.S. sanctions are hurting ordinary people rather than Bashar al-Assad’s government; there is only an hour or so of electricity per day.

    Last month, my phone rang. A relative in Damascus asked me to help a young Syrian child, Mohammed Daafis. Two-year-old Mohammed’s family uses a Primus kerosene stove, a Victorian-era product, for cooking. There is no boiler for running hot water in the shower. Electricity rationing in Syria has reached its highest levels due to the government’s inability to secure the fuel needed to generate electricity as a result of international sanctions.

    Like any child of his age, Mohammed was playing with his siblings—in a 300-square-foot dark house.

    The post US Sanctions Are Killing Innocent Syrians appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.

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  • Argentina has withdrawn from the Lima Group of countries established in 2017 to push for regime change in Venezuela.

    Buenos Aires withdrew symbolically on March 24 — the Day of Remembrance for Truth and Justice, which commemorates victims of Argentina’s “dirty war” on the anniversary of the 1976 coup d’etat.

    It condemned the group’s support for sanctions on Venezuela in the midst of a global pandemic and its treatment of the self-proclaimed Juan Guaido administration, a US-backed body with no territory, as Venezuela’s representative within it.

    The post Argentina Withdraws From Lima Group appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.

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  • Damascus, Syria – This March marks the 10-year anniversary of the Arab Spring and the protests that rocked Syria, which were a starting point for the ongoing civil war. That conflict has led to over half a million deaths and nearly 13 million people displaced, according to some estimates.

    Now, after 10 years of attempts to topple the government of President Bashar al-Assad, it appears that many in the U.S. government and media are quietly conceding defeat.

    “We tell Syria’s human stories so that the ‘victors’ don’t write its history,” ran the headline of a CNN article marking the anniversary.

    The post After Ten Years Of Civil War In Syria, US (Quietly) Declares Defeat appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.

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  • Ecuador’s third-place presidential candidate, Yaku Pérez Guartambel, has called for direct military intervention in his country’s political system, requesting a purge of electoral authorities and a nullification of the results of the February 7 election that he lost.

    Pérez has also demanded that Ecuador’s corrupt and undemocratic Lenín Moreno government immediately issue a legal judgment against the socialist-oriented candidate Andrés Arauz, who won the first round of the presidential election in a landslide, in an effort to disqualify him based on a debunked conspiracy alleging he received money from Colombian socialist guerrillas in the ELN.

    The Grayzone has documented how the Pachakutik party of Pérez has received support from the US government, and how the candidate has misleadingly portrayed himself as a progressive environmentalist while pushing for right-wing policies and US-backed coups targeting democratically elected left-wing governments across Latin America.

    The post Ecuador’s Pseudo-Left Candidate Yaku Pérez Echoes Call For Military Takeover appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.

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  • The day begins the night before. The cadre of hope dodge sleep and the police. Under the cover of night and the ancestors, they spray-paint the walls of Port-au-Prince to encourage communities to unite and rise up: “Aba enperyalis, Aba Jovenel!” (Down with imperialism! Down with Jovenel.) “PHTK, Bann volè.” (The PHTK – Haitian Bald Headed Party – is a bunch of thieves.) “Kote kòb PetroCaribe?” (Where is the PetroCaribe money?)

    The young writers of the People, Poetry, Revolution collective go deeper, emblazoning the walls of alleyways and main boulevards with short poems. “Powèt, ekri chante k ap ede nou rete debou sou miray lavi sa k ap disparèt.” (Poets, write songs, which help us to stay standing up, on this wall of life which is disappearing.)

    The post A Day In The Life Of Fighting Dictatorship And Neocolonialism appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.

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  • On Friday, March 12, 2021, the Committee on Foreign Affairs will host a hearing on policy recommendations for the Biden Administration regarding the constitutional crisis in Haiti. This crisis, exacerbated by Jovenel Moise’s refusal to step down from power after his presidential mandate ended, is threatening to submerge Haiti into yet another dictatorship. Inspired by Haitian activists on the ground and online, Woy Magazine has put together a comprehensive guide to help Haitian-Americans call their Congressional Representatives and demand that President Joe Biden to respect the clear limits set in place by the Haitian constitution and cease all support for the Moise regime. 

    Calling your Congressional representative can be daunting, but as a constituent it is your right to have your voice heard regarding the pressing issues you care about — Haiti, certainly included. 

    The post Tell Congress To Support Pro-Democracy Movement In Haiti appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.

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