Central America Report - UK goes online!
This bi-annual magazine is put together by journalists and activists working for social and economic justice in Central America. It has close ties with UK-based Central America solidarity organisations, including the Nicaragua Solidarity Campaign, the Guatemala Solidarity Network and the El Salvador Network.
After many years in print, we're now online too. We hope this website will allow many more people to find out about, and get involved with, solidarity work in Central America and the UK.
Plaid Cymru Assembly Member backs Wales NSC campaign against abortion ban
Posted March 8th, 2008 by Megan RowlingAM backs women’s right to choose on international day
Plaid Cymru AM Leanne Wood has backed a campaign by Wales Nicaragua Solidarity Campaign ahead of International Women’s Day (Saturday 8 March 2008).
According to Human Rights Watch 80 women have died in Nicaragua because of the therapeutic abortion ban. Therapeutic abortion is defined as the termination of pregnancy before foetal viability in order to preserve maternal health. In September last year, the majority of deputies in the Nicaraguan National Assembly upheld a ban on therapeutic abortion, which came into force in October 2006.
EVENT - Fairtrade and community tourism: what difference do they make to the lives of Nicaraguan women?
Posted March 8th, 2008 by Megan RowlingCelebrate International Women’s Day
Fairtrade and community tourism: what difference do they make to the lives of Nicaraguan women?
Monday 10 March, 7.00 – 9.00pm Conway Hall, 25 Red Lion Square, London WC1 (underground Holborn), £4 /£2 concessions.
Free taster glass of fairtrade coffee liqueur.
Speakers: Marta Gonzalez, fair trade coffee producer, SOPPEXCCA (association of coffee cooperatives), Nicaragua
Felicity Butler, formerly employed by CECOCAFEN (umbrella organisation of coffee cooperatives, northern Nicaragua) on a community tourism programme
Film: Coffee – take it fairly: stories of Nicaraguan women fair trade coffee producers. 25 min Anita Sandhu & Nicaragua Solidarity Campaign, 2006
All welcome.
Further information: Nicaragua Solidarity Campaign, tel: 020 7272 9619 email:campaigns@nicaraguasc.org.uk
Nicaragua- A Nation's Right To Survive
Posted January 19th, 2008 by paddanielsIn 1979, the Sandinistas won a popular revolution in Nicaragua, putting an end to decades of the ... all corrupt US-backed Somoza dictatorship. They based their reformist ideology on that of the English Co-operative Movement, but was to prove too 'radical' for the Reagan administration. In this film, Pilger describes the achievements of the Sandinistas and their "threat of a good example".
International trade union conference in Guatemala late Jan.
Posted January 16th, 2008 by Megan RowlingAn opportunity to put the struggles of Guatemalan trade unionists in the spotlight? The text below is from a press release issued by the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC), which is organising an international conference on the role of trade union organisations in the fight against impunity in Guatemala City from Jan. 29-31.
Brussels, 14 January 2008 (ITUC OnLine): Alvaro Colom began his term of office as president of Guatemala on Monday 14 January. In a letter sent to the new president the same morning, the ITUC underlined the need for strong leadership if he is to win the fight for social inclusion and against corruption, narcotrafficking and discrimination.
Educating and Learning from Nueva Esperanza
Posted December 7th, 2007 by paddaniels
The following short films by Michael Boorer give a vivid flavour of what it's like to visit a growing community in rural El Salvador. Two-week rural study visits organized by the Nueva Esperanza Support Group to build links of solidarity with the community of Nueva Esperanza, Usulatan.
Educating Nueva Esperanza - this film tells of work of local educators in Nueva Esperanza and their ambitions for their community
Music for Hope - this film explains the project to ensure that music and culture thrive and how young people are taking to it
Central America: "Holidays in the Danger Zone"
Posted December 4th, 2007 by paddaniels
Ben Anderson did a couple of documentaries which looked at El Salvador, Panama, Nicaragua and Honduras in a series for BBC Four called Holidays in the Danger Zone: America Was Here. Here Anderson is interviewed about his experiences in Central America and South East Asia.
BBC Four: One of the interesting legacies of the American involvement in these countries is the deportees that you met.
How fair is Fairtrade?
Posted November 11th, 2007 by paddaniels
In August 2007, a group of women from Britain travelled to Nicaragua with NSC to meet coffee producers, with the aim of finding out how fair Fairtrade really is.
Study tour member Karen Lawson writes: ‘Our stay with Melba Estrada, who visited Bristol and London in 2006, brought home how tough life is for the producers. Melba, a widow with six children, keeps pigs and chickens, and grows vegetables, beans and coffee. It takes her just over half an hour to walk up the steep mountain to her plot of land. For the group, which travelled part way on horseback, the exhausting journey took over an hour. During harvest time, sacks of beans have to be carried back to the trails to be loaded onto the animals.
Photo Essay on Activism in Canada Against Mining in Guatemala
Posted June 17th, 2007 by paddaniels"During the months of April and May, 2007, Rights Action organized a series of events throughout Canada and the United States focusing on the negative effects of the mining industry in Central America. Community leaders from Honduras and Guatemala took center stage during these speaking tours across North America."
Guatemalan Constitutional Court Approves CICIG
Posted June 17th, 2007 by paddanielsOrganizaciones no gubernamentales de Estados Unidos, Europa y Canadá acogemos con esperanza la opinión consultiva favorable a la iniciativa para el establecimiento de la Comisión Internacional Contra la Impunidad en Guatemala (CICIG) pronunciado el día de ayer por la Corte de Constitucionalidad de Guatemala.
“La decisión de ayer abre una valiosa oportunidad para que el país, con el respaldo de la comunidad internacional, retome el camino hacia la democracia, la vigencia del Estado de Derecho, y la protección de los derechos humanos”, dijeron las organizaciones firmantes.
