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Javier E

Tabaré Vázquez Reclaims Presidency in Uruguay Election - NYTimes.com - 0 views

  • Uruguayan voters elected Tabaré Vázquez as president on Sunday in a show of support for the leftist coalition that has governed the country over the last decade, presiding over robust economic growth and a pioneering set of socially liberal laws, including a state-controlled marijuana market.
  • The election came after a stretch in which Uruguay’s president, José Mujica, 79, a former guerrilla, raised the country’s profile with legislation that legalized abortion and same-sex marriage and created the marijuana market. He is set to leave office with high approval ratings.
  • Dr. Vázquez is more moderate than Mr. Mujica, having vetoed an abortion law during his first term as president. He has also expressed opposition to parts of the marijuana law, a position shared by many Uruguayans as broad skepticism persists over the project. Still, he has said that he would enforce the law.
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  • A more important issue for many Uruguayans involved the handling of economic policy by the Broad Front, a coalition of left-wing parties, with Uruguay registering average growth of nearly 6 percent a year during the last nine years. Even as growth slowed this year, cautious economic policies were seen as shielding the country from external shocks.
  • “Practically 70 percent of Uruguayans hold a positive or very positive view of the economic situation in the country,”
  • during his first term, Dr. Vázquez also governed with his own style, reserving one morning each week to continue practicing medicine.
  • An increase in violent crime also weighed on voters, and Mr. Lacalle Pou, the conservative challenger and son of a former president, ran on a platform seeking to crack down on crime, reduce inflation and improve Uruguay’s schools.
Javier E

A 'Brave' Move by Obama Removes a Wedge in Relations With Latin America - NYTimes.com - 0 views

  • After years of watching his influence in Latin America slip away, Mr. Obama suddenly turned the tables this week by declaring a sweeping détente with Cuba, opening the way for a major repositioning of the United States in the region.
  • Washington’s isolation of Cuba has long been a defining fixture of Latin American politics, something that has united governments across the region, regardless of their ideologies. Even some of Washington’s close allies in the Americas have rallied to Cuba’s side.
  • “Our previous Cuba policy was clearly an irritant and a drag on our policy in the region,”
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  • “We have to recognize the gesture of President Barack Obama, a brave gesture and historically necessary, perhaps the most important step of his presidency,” Mr. Maduro said.
  • Daniel Ortega, the Nicaraguan president and former Sandinista rebel, was chastising Mr. Obama just days ago, saying the United States deserved the top spot in a new list of state sponsors of terrorism. Then, on Wednesday, he saluted the “brave decisions” of the American president.
  • “We never thought we would see this moment,” said Brazil’s president, Dilma Rousseff, a former Marxist guerrilla who chided the Obama administration last year over the National Security Agency’s surveillance of her and her top aides. She called the deal with Cuba “a moment which marks a change in civilization.”
  • “It removes an excuse for blaming the United States for things,”
  • “In the last Summit of the Americas, instead of talking about things we wanted to focus on — exports, counternarcotics — we spent a lot of time talking about U.S.-Cuba policy,” said the official, who was not authorized to speak publicly. “A key factor with any bilateral meeting is, ‘When are you going to change your Cuba policy?’
  • But while sharp differences persist on many issues, other major Washington policy shifts have recently been applauded in the region, including Mr. Obama’s immigration plan and the resettlement in Uruguay of six detainees from Guantánamo Bay.
  • “There will be radical and fundamental change,” said Andrés Pastrana, a former president of Colombia. “I think that to a large extent the anti-imperialist discourse that we have had in the region has ended. The Cold War is over.”
mikecoons

New Study Ranks Democracy in Latin America | Americas Quarterly - 0 views

  • Only two countries in Latin America—Costa Rica and Uruguay—can be considered “full democracies,”
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    This article is about the poor ranking that democracy received in Latin America, where only two countries are listed as "full democracies". This relates to my article because they both are related to democracy.
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