MEXICO CITY (AP) – Central America is experiencing a wave of unrest that is remarkable even for a region whose history is steeped in turmoil. The most recent example is political upheaval in Guatemala as the country heads into a runoff presidential election in August.
A look at several events affecting Central American countries:
Guatemala
Costa Rica and the US government have agreed to open possible legal pathways to the United States for some of the Nicaraguan and Venezuelan migrants among the 240,000 asylum seekers already waiting for asylum in the Central American country.
Despite a campaign of deterrence by the US government, migrants are heading to its southern border in increasing numbers ahead of the end of pandemic-era asylum restrictions and proposed new restrictions on people seeking asylum
Costa Rica’s president is pledging to put more police on the streets and wants legal changes to deal with a record number of homicides that have rocked daily life in a country long known for peaceful stability.
Guatemala is closed the most complicated presidential elections in the country’s recent history. The first round of the June election ended with a surprise twist when a little-known progressive candidate Bernat Arevalo of the Moviment de les les partys was advanced as a favorite.
Now heading to a runoff in the August election with conservative candidate and top vote-getter Sandra Torres, Arévalo has managed to survive so far. judicial attacks and the attempts of the Guatemalan political establishment to discredit his party. comes later other movements by the country’s government to manage the election, including banning several candidates before the first round of voting.
Although it is not entirely unprecedented in a well-known country high levels of corruptionUS officials say the latest escalation is a threat to the country’s democracy.
El Salvador
El Salvador has been radically transformed in recent years with the entry of millennial populist president Nayib Bukele. A year ago, Bukele entered into an all-out war with the gangs Barri 18 and Mara Salvatruchas, or MS-13. He suspended constitutional rights and threw 1 in 100 people in the country into prisons that have fueled allegations of massive human rights violations.
The sharp drop in violence that followed Bukele’s actions, combined with an elaborate propaganda machine, has ignited a pro-Bukele populist fervor across the region, with other governments trying to emulate the leader pushing Bitcoin.
At the same time, Bukele has announced that he will run for re-election in February next year even though the constitution forbids it. He has also made moves that observers warn are gradually dismantling the nation’s democracy.
Nicaragua
President Daniel Ortega is in plenary repression against dissent. For years, regional watchdogs and the US government raised the alarm that democracy was eroding under the leader of the Sandinista National Liberation Front. This came to a head in 2018, when Ortega’s government launched a violent crackdown you protest.
More recently, Ortega forced hundreds of opposition figures into exile, undressing them of their citizenship, seizing their properties and declaring them “traitors to the motherland”. Nicaragua has expelled aid groups such as the Red Cross and a years-long crackdown on the Catholic Church has forced the Vatican close its embassy. The tightening of the suffocation in the country has caused many Nicaraguans to do so run away their country and seek asylum in neighboring Costa Rica or the United States.
Honduras
President Xiomara Castro took office last year as a first female president of Honduras, winning in a message of fight against corruption, inequality and poverty. Wife of former president Manuel Zelaya, who was ousted in a military coup, won a landslide victory.
But his popularity has waned, as many of his promises of change have not been fulfilled. At the same time, the government has tried imitate the repression of neighboring El Salvador on the gangs, answering fiercely aa horrible massacre in a women’s prison in June.
Costa Rica
Once known as the land of “pure life” and soft politics compared to the surrounding region, Costa Rica has seen increasing bloodshed that threatens to tarnish the country’s reputation as a safe haven. Homicides they shot up as the nation has become a base for drug traffickers. President Rodrigo Chávez, who took office last year, does he promised more police on the street and tougher laws to take on the rise in crime.
At the same time, a migratory flight from Nicaragua has overwhelms the country, which is known as one of the world’s great refuges for people fleeing persecution. The government has done since then squeeze their asylum laws.
panama
Panama heads to presidential elections in May, with simmering frustration in the face of economic problems, corruption and insecurity that act as a possible harbinger of change. Any changes could have global significance due to Panama’s status as a financial center.
The nation has also become the epicenter of a constant migratory flow through the dangerous jungles of the Darien Gap that runs along the border between Colombia and Panama.
Belize
Belize is often seen as a place of relative calm in a region where it is not. A former British colony called British Honduras, Belize’s system of government still is well tied in the country But prime minister Johnny Briceño he has tried to distance his nation from the monarchy. The nation is also one of the few in America which maintains formal ties with Taiwan amid a broad effort by China to withdraw support from the island nation by funneling money to Central America.
