The Guardian: Operation Condor: the cold war conspiracy that terrorised South America

 It has taken decades to fully expose this system, which enabled governments to send death squads on to each other’s territory to kidnap, murder and torture enemies – real or suspected – among their emigrant and exile communities. Condor effectively integrated and expanded the state terror unleashed across South America during the cold war, after successive rightwing military coups, often encouraged by the US, erased democracy across the continent. Condor was the most complex and sophisticated element of a broad phenomenon in which tens of thousands of people across South America were murdered or disappeared by military governments in the 1970s and 80s. [...]

Although Condor operatives hunted down targets in all member states, their work focused on Argentina in particular, which was a refuge for exiles escaping military dictatorships across the continent before it, too, fell under military control. Condor squads dispatched to Argentina from Uruguay and Chile used a series of makeshift jails and torture centres provided by their hosts. The first was the abandoned car repair garage, Automotores Orletti, where Anatole Larrabeiti was held and his mother Victoria was last seen alive. Larrabeiti still recalls seeing a jar of glittering metal in the garage, in which victims’ wedding rings were kept. [...]

The new information about the rigged cryptography machines follows the revelations, from a declassified document handed to Argentina by the US last year, that West German, British and French intelligence services even explored the possibility of copying at least part of the Condor method in Europe. A heavily redacted CIA cable from September 1977 is headed: “Visit of representatives of West German, French and British intelligence services to Argentina to discuss methods for establishment of an anti-subversive organization similar to Condor”. The visit coincided with cross-frontier terror campaigns by Germany’s Baader-Meinhof gang, Italy’s Red Brigades and the Irish Republican Army. According to the cable, the visitors explained that “the terrorist/subversive threat had reached such dangerous levels in Europe that they believed it best if they pooled their intelligence resources in a cooperative organization such as Condor”.

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The Guardian: Uruguay court orders government to sell Nazi bronze eagle from battleship

A court in Uruguay has ordered the country’s government to sell a huge Nazi bronze eagle that was recovered off the South American country’s coast in 2006.

The eagle with a swastika under its talons was part of the stern of the German battleship Admiral Graf Spee that sank off Uruguay’s coast at the outset of the second world war. The divisive symbol has been kept hidden inside a sealed crate in a Uruguayan navy warehouse for more than a decade.

The court ruled on Friday that it must be sold within 90 days and the proceeds must be split equally among the investors who organized the effort to recover the eagle from the bottom of the River Plate.[...]

Germany then said it was the rightful owner of the eagle and the vessel and opposed its sale, while Jewish groups asked that the swastika under the eagle’s talons be covered with a cloth. Finally, the eagle was stored in the navy warehouse in a sealed wooden crate.

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Jacobin Magazine: Latin America’s Re-Militarization

Law No. 13.491, passed by the Brazilian Congress in October 2017, gives military courts jurisdiction over their personnel accused of human rights violations. Prior to the law’s approval, the Ministry of Defense publicly made the case that allowing civilian courts to handle such cases would hinder policing operations. Michel Temer’s administration increasingly used the armed forces for domestic policing duties, whether in rural areas against land rights activists or in the favelas and peripheries of major cities.

Brazil’s 2008 “pacification” policy led to the deployment of military personnel to the favelas of Rio de Janeiro, and the militarization of policing intensified in the run-up to the 2014 World Cup and 2016 Olympic games. According to Human Rights Watch, thousands of civilians are killed by the military and police each year. The new Ministry for Public Security, created in February, is led by an army general, and in May the Brazilian military was deployed in response to the nationwide truckers’ strike that blockaded highways. This was the first time the military had been used in this way since the end of the military dictatorship in 1985.[...]

Brazil is not alone in militarizing its justice system. Military courts are increasingly asserting jurisdiction throughout Latin America. In June 2015, Colombia passed a bill similar to the one adopted in Brazil, shifting jurisdiction for most crimes committed by members of the military to the military courts. The Constitutional Court struck down the first two iterations of the bill, but the government was determined to make the change and crafted a slightly narrower law that has since taken effect. Since 2005, Venezuela has been using military courts extensively to prosecute civilians involved in protests against the government. In Chile, cases of human rights violations committed by the military are still tried in military courts. [....]

Many politicians have run on platforms promising to be “tough on crime” and have deployed the military to conduct domestic policing operations, as in Brazil, Ecuador, Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras. Elected leaders, seeking to deliver results for their voters in fighting drug trafficking and gang violence, are turning to their militaries and equipping them with increased legal powers.

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IFLScience: Canada Votes To Legalize Cannabis For Recreational Use

The new bill, known as The Cannabis Act, controls and regulates how the drug is grown, distributed and sold. It means that Canadians can now legally grow up to four plants in their own household, and carry up to 30 grams of dried cannabis for personal use. Anyone found to be carrying more than this amount, or providing it to minors – anyone under the age of 18 or 19 depending on the province – will be breaking the law. [...]

It means that Canada now joins Uruguay as the only two countries in the world where recreational cannabis is now legal, as technically it is still illegal in the Netherlands although the law is not actually upheld. In Portugal, which famously relaxed its drug laws, the possession and use of the drug is decriminalized, but not legal.

The move by Canada is likely to cause a headache south of the border, and twist an already strained relationship with the current US government. Currently, 29 states have legalized medical marijuana, with nine of those going the whole way and opening it up to personal use. But there have been previous suggestions that the White House may try and stem the recreational use by enforcing federal laws to override individual states.

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CityLab: This Circular Bridge Actually Has a Point

A new bridge spanning (or circumnavigating) Laguna Garzón, a coastal lagoon in southeastern Uruguay, poses just that question. It’s a circular bridge, or rather two joined semicircular bridges, that crosses the lagoon, which runs along the border of the states of Maldonado and Rocha. At a glance, it’s the sort of ridiculousness that you might expect of a bridge in London.  [...]

Uruguay’s bridge also smacks of iconic-architecture-posing-as-infrastructure. The circular bridge only cost $11 million, and Constantini, the Argentinian developer, picked up about $10 million of that price. That’s the point, according to the Architect’s Newspaper: Constantini owns property in Rocha, where development has been considerably slower than in Maldonado.  

Viñoly’s bridge ought to do the trick. But to his credit, the excesses of this pretty bridge serve a larger aim. Just like a roundabout, it will slow down drivers heading over the environmentally sensitive lagoon, while providing new pavilions and views for pedestrians and adding to the simple beauty of the land.

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The Economist: Uruguayan pharmacies will start selling cannabis

That will be the last and most important stage of a long process. In 2013 the senate voted to legalise marijuana and regulate its production and sale, making Uruguay the first country to do so. (Canada proposed a bill to legalise cannabis for recreational use on April 13th.) Uruguay’s goal is to stamp out the black market, controlled mainly by Paraguayan smugglers, without encouraging more consumption. Registered Uruguayans (but not visitors) will be able to get the drug in one of three ways. They can grow up to six plants at home; join a club, where 45 members can cultivate as many as 99 plants; or buy it in pharmacies. All consumers are restricted to 40g (1.4 ounces) a month, enough to roll a joint or two a day. About 10% of adults smoke at least once a year.

More than 6,600 people have already registered to grow cannabis at home; 51 clubs have opened. But Uruguayan officials expect pharmacies to be the biggest retailers, and are counting on them to drive illegal dealers out of business. They will start out selling weed in 5g packets, with the concentration of THC, the active ingredient, capped at 15%. With a price of $1.30 a gram, store-bought marijuana will be cheaper than what is available on the street. The quality will be better, says Milton Romani, who oversaw the law’s implementation until last July. Street cannabis can contain 52 toxins; pharmacies will sell purer weed. The government sought advice on potency from regular smokers. “They are the ones who know about this stuff,” laughs Mr Romani. [...]

Even then, clubs and home growers will cater to a niche market. The pharmacies’ business will build slowly. The 30 outlets that have signed up cover much of the country. But their corporate suppliers are allowed to grow just four tonnes a year. That is 15% of what Uruguayans smoke. If the country is to drive pushers off the streets, pharmacies will have to sell a lot more weed alongside the dental floss.

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