Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua – Latin America’s last remaining socialist countries – find themselves firmly in the rifle sights of Trump’s National Security Advisor John Bolton, who recently proclaimed that ‘The Monroe Doctrine is alive and well’. In view of increasingly bellicose – and at times erratic – U.S. foreign policy towards their southern neighbours, what lies in store for competing international interests in Latin America?

As the White House extends a cordial embrace to new populist leaders with authoritarian leanings, whilst tightening the screws on leftist autocrats, they jostle for position with competing Russian and Chinese influence in the region once known as ‘America’s backyard’.

Speakers

Jon Lee Anderson is a journalist and author who has covered numerous conflicts as staff writer for the New Yorker, including those in Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Iraq, Afghanistan, Angola, Somalia, Sudan, Mali, and Liberia. He has also reported frequently from Latin America and the Caribbean, most recently from Brazil on Bolsonaro’s ‘Southern Strategy’, and from Venezuela following Guaido’s international reception as interim President. He is the author of several books including The Lions Grave: Dispatches from Afghanistan, and Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life.

Andres Schipani is the Brazil correspondent for the Financial Times. Before moving to São Paulo, he was the newspaper’s Andes correspondent, covering Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, and Venezuela, as well as parts of the Caribbean. Before that, he worked in the FT’s New York bureau as a markets and emerging markets reporter. A native of Buenos Aires, he was educated in London, Oxford, and New York. He was also a fellow in business, economics, and financial journalism at Columbia University.

Arturo Wallace is a Nicaraguan journalist with more than 25 years of experience, currently working as a reporter for BBC Mundo, the BBC World Service’s Spanish-language portal. A former BBC correspondent in Colombia (2011 – 2015), he has also reported from Venezuela, Panama, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, USA, France and Greece for radio, TV and online. A co-founder and former director of the award-winning Nicaraguan free weekly La Brújula (now extinct), he has also been professor of journalism at the Central American University (UCA) and American University of Managua (UAM).

Photograph courtesy of Alejandro Cegarra, selected from his series, ‘State of Decay’. 

Author of the critically acclaimed El Narco, Ioan Grillo has covered Latin America since 2001 and has gained access to every level of the cartel chain of command in what he calls the ‘new battlefields of the Americas’. In his new book Gangster Warlords, he writes about a new kind of criminal kingpin that has arisen: part CEO, part terrorist, and part rock star.

Moving between militia-controlled ghettos and the halls of top policymakers, Grillo will be joining us, in conversation with journalist and media consultant Susana Seijas, to share what he has discovered – a disturbing new understanding of a war that has spiralled out of control and urgently needs to be confronted.

Ioan Grillo is a journalist and writer based in Mexico City. He has covered Latin America since 2001 for TIME magazine, CNN, Reuters, The Houston Chronicle, The Associated Press, GlobalPost, France 24, CBC, The Sunday Telegraph, Letras Libres and many others. His work has also appeared in The New York Times, the BBC and the Guardian. He is author of Gangster Warlords: Drug Dollars, Killing Fields and the New Politics of Latin America and El Narco: Inside Mexico’s Criminal Insurgency.

 
On Monday 30 March the Frontline Club hosted a screening of A Quiet Inquisition, followed by an insightful discussion with director Alessandra Zeka. Recently previewed at the London edition of the Human Rights Watch Film Festival, A Quiet Inquisition has been described by the Huffington Post as a film that “every human rights advocate should see.”

A Quiet Inquisition follows the daily life of OBGYN Doctor Carla Cerrato, as she works at a public hospital in Nicaragua and battles the restrictions of a new law which forbids the termination of any pregnancy, even when a woman’s life is at stake. As pregnant women and young girls turn to the hospital for help, Carla and her colleagues are torn between fears of prosecution and their moral duty as doctors to save lives. Illuminating the deadly implications of this law through human stories, the film reveals the reality of an absolute abortion ban against the backdrop of Nicaragua’s complex political, religious and historical identity.

The documentary was inspired by an article in the New York Times that examined the restrictions of El Salvador’s anti abortion laws. “We actually started the film in El Salvador, but when we arrived there people did not want to talk about the issue,” said Zeka.

Along with co-director Holen Sabrina Kahn, Zeka then turned to Nicaragua, where the change in law had just gone into effect and people were more willing to speak. It was there that they met A Quiet Inquisition’s main protagonist, Dr Carla Cerrato, and the story began to take hold.

“Over the period of time, Carla opened up a lot and it was like following the dots for us,” Zeta said.

Really eye opening night @frontlineclub watching The Quiet Inquisition http://t.co/jdix2KdmUZ watch if you can

— Gina (@CuriousGe) March 30, 2015

Zeka discussed her intent to show the “universe of the doctor,” placing the issue of anti-abortion laws in a broader political and socio-economic context. Poverty, lack of education, and teenage pregnancies are prevalent in Nicaragua, an environment that reinforces the struggles faced by Carla in her daily work.

Zeka spoke of how she wanted to underline these issues from the beginning of the film, particularly by focusing on Dr. Cerato’s work with young girls.

“It was pretty disturbing for me,” she said. “That was one of the hardest things for me to deal with whilst making this film: 12-, 13-year-old girls walking out the hospital with 25 year old men. We met 45 year old guys with 13 year old girls.”

Asked by an audience member if she thinks Carla will get in trouble with the authorities for being so frank in her criticism of the new law and her willingness to break it, Zeka said: ‘We’re hoping and praying that she wont… I spent a lot of time with her and sometimes she’s very excited and gung ho about it and sometimes she’s a little bit afraid.”

The film has so far received an overwhelmingly positive response, and the hope is that Dr. Cerato’s story will continue to have a wider impact.

“We would like things to be different, we would like people to have a conversation about it,” said Zeka.

“We will also show the film to medical students, as there are many who don’t know how to make procedures for medical abortions. Even if we can achieve that, to have more students in Nicaragua to be trained for these cases, we have already achieved something.”

Click here to find out more information about A Quiet Inquisition and upcoming screenings.

At a public hospital in Nicaragua, OBGYN Dr Carla Cerrato must choose between following a law that bans all abortions and endangers her patients or taking a risk and providing the care that she knows can save a woman’s life. In 2007, Dr. Cerrato’s daily routine took a detour.

The newly elected government of Daniel Ortega, a former Marxist revolutionary who converted to Catholicism to win votes, overturned a 130-year-old law protecting therapeutic abortion. The new law entirely prohibits abortion, even in cases of rape, incest, or when a woman’s life is at stake.

As Dr Cerrato and her colleagues navigate this dangerous dilemma, the impact of the law reveals the tangible reality of prohibition against the backdrop of a political, religious, and historically complex national identity. In A Quiet Inquisition, the emotional core of the story – the experiences of the young women and girls who are seeking care — illustrates the ethical implications of one doctor’s response.

Directed by Alessandra Zeka and Holen Sabrina Kahn
Duration: 65′
Year: 2015
For enquiries info@ journeyman.tv

Burden of Peace tells the impressive story of Claudia Paz Y Paz, the first woman to lead the Public Prosecutor’s Office of Guatemala. Ravaged for years by a devastating civil war, in which nearly 200,000 Mayan Indians were systematically massacred, the country today is one of the most crime-ridden in the world. Paz Y Paz starts a frontal attack against corruption, drug gangs and impunity and does what everyone had hitherto held to be impossible: she arrests former dictator Efraín Rios Montt on charges of genocide against the Mayan Indians.

Each year, nearly 6,000 people are murdered in Guatemala, and the individuals responsible almost always avoid prosecution. When Claudia Paz Y Paz took office in 2010, senior political officials openly criticised her soft spoken demeanour and questioned her ability to combat issues of crime and corruption, claiming that the position of Attorney General is not suited to a human rights lawyer.

Directed by Joey Boink
Producer: Framewerk
Duration: 76′
Year: 2015
For any enquiries contact info@framewerk.nl

“The Journey towards you Lord, is life. To set off is to die a little.” (The Migrants’ Prayer)

On Monday 7 July 2014, the Frontline Club screened Who is Dayani Cristal? The film follows actor Gael García Bernal as he retraced the footsteps of a Honduran man found dead in the Arizonan desert – one of the thousands of lives snuffed out by the lure of the American Dream.

Director and cinematographer Marc Silver joined us for the Q&A.

Director Marc Silver

Silver began with how he discovered the story:

“We actually launched a website here, about five or six years ago, asking people to send in stories of resistance against walls and barriers, and just general economic division. And one of the stories that came in was this story of skulls, in the desert.”

Gael García Bernal was on board from the outset.

“He literally sat here and launched that website,” said Silver. “So he was on board before we knew what the film was, and we were just mulling over the subject of resistance. During that research period . . . we did four short films for Amnesty, called The Invisibles, which was just set in the Mexico part of the journey. Through that we were able to recce the river crossing, the trains, the shelter system and it started to inform Gael as to what kind of journey he would go on. Even though it’s a story about one person he takes on this everyman, following in the footsteps of a loose interpretation of the migrants’ journey.”

An audience member asked how the film was made.

“Basically, it sounds crazy,” explained Silver, “but we would just rock up at each of the locations, from Guatemala through Mexico to the border and literally just try to introduce what we were trying to do. I think we created this very reciprocal relationship with the people that we were filming. . . . As you said these voices are never ever heard – and I think there was some sense of empowerment that they were able to literally teach us, or guide us through that journey.

“I didn’t just feel that because of who we met and how those conversations went down on the road,” continued Silver, “but having spent time, for example, in that village in Honduras. No one talked about these issues at home. And I was really puzzled why. Literally every teenage boy has been to America already. And they get deported and they make their journey all over again. They literally said they just don’t want their mums to know how dangerous their journey is. Because they would fear that their mums wouldn’t let them go again.”

Great documentary and Q&A tonight @frontlineclub #WhoisDayaniCristal is beautifully made and really worth a watch #migration

— Flora Carmichael (@FloraCarmichael) July 7, 2014

On my way home from #WhoisDayaniCristal screening @frontlineclub. Once again, #GaelGarciaBernal shines a light on a secret american shame.

— Jonathan Campbell (@SoundbiteCultur) July 7, 2014

Another audience member said he was struck by compassion and anger of the [North] Americans. He asked how representative they were. Silver replied:

“We made a decision from the beginning that we only wanted people in the film who had physically been in touch with that body; which allowed us not to give voice to the other side of the debate. That was like a nice creative device. But partly also it was politically, I can’t see the point of giving voice to that other side, because it exists out there. And if people are interested they can just get on google. I think the humanisation of the subject of migration you can’t really get on google to find out. So that was a political decision on our part.”

“It depends when you ask me,” responded Silver to a question on the social impact films can make.

“Sometimes I think it’s really depressing and it doesn’t. And sometimes I think it’s really inspiring and I can see that it does. . . . This sounds really sick, but people have come up to me after US screenings and said, ‘Oh I might talk to my gardener a bit differently,’ which, isn’t as big a change as I was hoping for, but is actually really significant.

“Joking aside there are around 12 million undocumented people in the US, and if you can slightly change their perspective, and make them realise their story didn’t just begin on the other side of that wall; and actually there’s a massive trajectory that’s not so different to your own trajectory – of universal feelings of, ‘I need to support my family,’ or whatever the reason is that you’re leaving home – if you can shift perception and education then maybe you can shift politics.”

Silver concluded with the universal message of the film:

“It’s not just a Mexico–US issue. The story resonates with deaths in the Mediterranean and deaths in seas off north Australia, to build a bigger conceptual coalition around militarised borders; and the story of one skull in the desert leads to this bigger conceptual understanding.”

For upcoming screenings – and to take action – see the official website and social media:
whoisdayanicristal.com
Twitter: @DayaniCrystal
Facebook: facebook.com/whoisdayanicristal

“He’s this wonderful presence [in person],” remarked Rory Carroll, who spent from 2006 t0 2012 in Caracas as The Guardian‘s chief correspondent for South America, and whose latest book Commandante profiles Chavez in depth.

Western media, Carroll said, often offered a “polarised simplistic version, like Chavez is the demon, he’s blood thirsty, some kind of semi-Stalinist character, which was ridiculous, or he’s this messianic character who is delivering the poor from hell and he’s building a shining city on a hill, which was equally as ridiculous.”

“He is amiable,” The New Yorker‘s Jon Lee Anderson agreed, “and quite a fun interlocutor.”

But Anderson and Carroll, along with Diego Moya-Ocampos, a political analyst who used to practice law in Venezuela and event host Richard Lapper, the Financial Times‘ Latin America editor from 1998 to 2008, were dismayed by the promises Chavez made to fix Venezuela.

After 14 years, inequality has reached a gothic degree in today’s Venezuela, noted Anderson; hospitals are Dickensian, Carroll said – “people are selling bandages, sheets . . . there’s no bulbs . . . you’re crunching over broken glass, there’s malandros [thugs] in the corridors, maybe with guns”; the prisons are awash with automatic weapons, and have largely been overtaken by their prisoners.

Anderson commented: “The revolution made common cause with a kind of thug culture, that I don’t know how they’re going to undo at this point . . . violence is off the charts.”

Chavez championed the masses, but Moya-Ocampos saw democracy in tatters:

“[Chavez] has systematically undermined democratic institutions. . . . What we have in the end is just one institution in place: the armed forces – the only institution in Venezuela with the capacity . . . to obtain certain outcomes. . . .

Everyone wants to believe: ‘Chavez! It’s a revolution going on in Venezuela! . . . We’re really tackling inequalities, we’re really beating poverty issues!’ . . . No. It’s not true.”

Carroll agreed: “He was an extraordinary illusionist.”

“Is the Revolution one of Chavez’s illusions?” Lapper asked.

For the most part it was, the panel seemed to agree.

Carroll and Anderson still found value in Chavez’s defiance, however – be it to America’s domination of global decisions, or to haughtiness and racism suffered by Venezuela’s lower classes.

Anderson reflected: “There’s no doubt that, whatever else you say, . . . Chavez has had an extraordinary presence on the regional stage, and that he will have meant something.”

Carroll added:

“To some extent, [the revolution] is real. . . . A lot of ordinary Venezuelans feel there’s been a revolution, feel empowered by this government, and therefore in that sense, it’s real. Because for them, it’s written on their hearts, and that has value. I could [give] lots of anecdotes about people who just feel that now they finally have dignity, and the issue of poverty is [finally] center-stage, and that they don’t need to feel apologetic for being quite dark, or not speaking great Spanish. . . . In the longterm effect, how can you quantify that? No idea. But that certainly has value.”

Watch the discussion here: