news

Video news from Paraguay: fumigations, land struggle and the agro-export model.

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Eviction San Marco, 28-10-08With the start of the new soy season, tension and conflicts are increasing in Paraguay. In the new political context, social movements are increasing pressure for what they have been fighting for, especially land reform and food sovereignty. Changes are visible, such as the change in the direction of the national land reform institute, INDERT. Nevertheless repression of the campesino movement continues, as recent events like the violent evictions of land occupations and the assassination of campesino leader Bienvenido Melgarejo on October 4th prove.

An international team of LaSojaMata is currently filming and documenting various events, reflecting this new political conjuncture and the seize of conflicts in Paraguay. A series of video reports is being produced, which are listed below and are added continuously with new testimonies on fumigations .

Paraguayan's Health Minister commits herself to act against the poisoning of campesinos.

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written by Jorge Zarate - December 11th 2008

“To take up this problem is an ethical compromise”, said Paraguayans health minister, Esperanza Martínez, announcing that a special Commission of which the Health Ministry and other state institutions forms part of, will control the impacts of fumigations with agrochemicals on the more than 2.6 million hectares that are being sown in the country. The minister said that it is necessary to have norms to regulate this issue. “At first it can be a decree that later sanctions a law; we have to take this up and stop worrying”, she explained.

Paraguay: Soy producers protest while indigenous died poisoned.

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por Radio Mundo Real y IPS and SomosParaguay.

Paradox has become a symbol of our time. There are plenty of examples in Latin America. In Paraguay, for instance, while the rural landowners start a day of protests to ask the government for “security and work”, it became public that four indigenous children were poisoned with agrotoxics, and that the youngest died due to lack of health care.

Lack of resources. That was the answer given by the health authorities involved to the Paraguayan health attorney who is investigating the case. The local papers report that the indigenous affected live in Canindeyu department. They were poisoned with agrotoxics used by the Brazilian soy producers and their long tour around the different health care centers began last Wednesday.

Conflict on deforestation along Route 86, in the province of Salta

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Below a translation of three newspaper articles on the deforestation that affects indigenous Wichí communities that live along route 86, in the North of Argentina. Source: Nuevo Diario de Salta

Police Repression and Presidential Promises: The Fight for Social Justice in Paraguay

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by Lorena Rodriguez
written for Upside Down World
represión 05/11/2008 en Asunción
Despite brutal police violence, last week campesinos celebrated the victorious ending of a three day long mass mobilization. Some five thousands campesinos from all over Paraguay gathered in the capital city of Asunción to celebrate what constitutes a first victory for the campesino and landless movement in Paraguay.

campesino herido durante movilizacion

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Paraguayan social movements are mobilising against the corrupt judicial system and for an integral land reform.

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Mobilisation of FSP in Caaguazu, 10-08Thousands of campesinos will mobilise all over Paraguay demanding the destitution of the Judicial Power which represses and criminalises them.
Social sectors demand a stop to the detentions of mobilised campesinos and a concrete answer to the severe situation in the countryside through the means of an agrarian emergency plan. There will be mobilisations and road blocks on the national highways on more than 10 core points around the country.

videoreport on the mobilisations

(Spanish)Results and victories of the mobilisation
(Spanish)Wednesday 5- Repression against campesinos en Asunción (with photo report)
(Spanish)Mobilisations in Ciudad del Este (with photo report)
(Spanish)Comunicado de la CONAMURI, en relación a los hechos sucedidos hoy frente a la Fiscalía general del Estado
(Spanish)Diez verdades en contra de la impunidad en el campo y un llamado a la paz
(Spanish)News of the mobilisations of march 4

SOLIDARITY ACTION TO STOP VIOLENCE AGAINST PEASANT COMMUNITIES IN PARAGUAY

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online email form
Peasant organisations are resisting against the beginning of the GM soya season all over the country of Paraguay. They demand access to land, land reform and the stop of the pesticide spraying which impacts on their communities. Despite the new government, many camps have been evicted and violence has taken place: 2 leaders have been murdered and hundreds of peasants have been arrested. Please sign the letter below to put pressure on the government and put a stop to violence!