 Welcome to what the F is going on in Latin America and the Caribbean, a popular resistance broadcast of hot news out of the region. In partnership with Code Pink, Common Frontiers, Council on Hemispheric Affairs, Friends of Latin America, Inter-religious Task Force on Central America, Massachusetts Peace Action, and Task Force on the Americas, we broadcast Thursdays at 4.30 p.m. Pacific, 7.30 p.m. Eastern right here on YouTube Live, including channels for the ConvoCouch, Popular Resistance, and Code Pink. Post-broadcast recordings can be found at Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Telegram, redindymedia.com, and now under podcast at popularresistance.org. Today, we're also happy to announce the Black Alliance for Peace, Haiti America's team has joined our program as a broadcast partner. Today's episode, Lawfare, The Case of Argentina and Peru. Joining me today is my friend and co-host, Raul Berbano. Raul Berbano is the program director for Common Frontiers based in Toronto. Common Frontiers is a WTF broadcast partner, and I think some of you probably know that Raul and I have done a lot of solidarity work together in Venezuela, Colombia, and Honduras. So a real honor to have you with us, Raul. Thank you, Teri. It's a pleasure. And I should share with the audience that this episode is Raul's idea. So the bulk of the work went to him, finding the guests and getting everything organized. So a big thank you to you, Raul, for this really timely episode. Our guests today are Anibal Ibarra and Daniela Ortiz. Anibal is the former mayor of Buenos Aires and federal prosecutor. Anibal is currently a criminal defense lawyer and member of the Broad Front political party. Daniela Ortiz is a Peruvian artist and anti-racist militant who lives in Urubamba, Peru. She was part of the campaign against immigrant detention centers in Catalonia from 2009 until 2012. The Espacio del Immigrante in Barcelona from 2012 until 2016. During the pandemic, she was part of the Red de Cuidados Antiracistas in Barcelona and was founder of the Madresistas Colectiva against judicialization of motherhood and childhood of migrant families and the removal of casualties. She is now part of the Frente de Lucha Materna in Peru where she currently lives and she is joining us live from Peru. So I want to... So hello, Daniela. Hi, Teri. Hi, Raul. Thanks a lot. So I'm ready to have you with us. I want to share with the audience that we're going to focus on two countries in this episode. We're going to first start with Argentina. And Raul had us set up a fabulous conversation on Tuesday with Anibal Ibarra, which we pre-recorded. And we're going to start with about 13 minutes of a 30-minute conversation. In this 13 minutes, we're going to share with you. Anibal gives a really good context of what lawfare is and how it is being used across the Americas to push back against these emergence of center-left, radical-left governments that have been elected into office, principally since about, I don't know, October of 2020 through Bolivia, this or Brazil, excuse me, starting in Bolivia and ending with Brazil this fall. And then he will... And then he gives us a really good, concise description of what has happened to Vice President Christina Kirchner in Argentina. This was last week. And then we'll follow with Daniela as to what has unfolded in Peru since December 7th. Again, last week as well. I think what everyone will find is that this 13-minute piece with Anibal Ibarra from Buenos Aires is a really good, kind of a good setup leading to a really in-depth conversation of what's happening in Peru. And again, I'm really thankful to you, Raul, for providing two on-the-ground people, one in Argentina and one in Peru. And Daniel, thank you for joining us live tonight. So, okay, folks, let me make sure I do the screen share properly. And make sure you click it with sound. It says... It'll give you an option that you have to do videos with sound. Yes. Okay, here we go. Thank you very much, Terry. It's a pleasure to be on the show and to have another great conversation. Lawfare, as you mentioned, is a key component taking place across Latin America. And I thought, for our discussion with Anibal, maybe Anibal, you can kind of start from the beginning, kind of give us some basic access to lawfare in this particular case, because it's very complicated. There are a lot of names and details. And obviously, the judgment that just came out against Christina is the sum of a long process of judicial criminalization, as I like to call it. So maybe if you could walk us through some details, how it's worked, and I guess what is the impacts. Well, first of all, thank you for your kind invitation. And I think it's very important for us to reflect on what's happening in Argentina. Why? Because this is not something that is only happening in Argentina. This is happening across the region. And when I say this, I speak specifically about the political persecution through the judicial branch, lawfare, to be accurate. This has happened several times. And this is part of the tools that power has to overcome opponents in an attempt to destroy a political group. And the power uses several tools for that. And one of them is lawfare. And in Brazil, this became very clear. On one hand, a soft coup took place with the removal of Dilma Rousseff from power. It was used against Lugo in Paraguay as well. And the other tool that they use is what they use later on. When Lula said, I want to be a candidate for the presidency, several judges and prosecutors that linked to politicians tried to prosecute Lula. And in fact, they sent him to prison. And he was prevented from becoming president again. So we see these two tools, the soft coup and political persecution through the judiciary. So it's not that you have a president or a governor that is acting against the politician. No, it's the so-called justice. It's the prosecutors, the judges that should process criminals. But what they do instead and the true corrupt officials are the ones representing that judiciary that are tearing out lawfare. And also the large media outlets. It's a confluence as a tool for disputing power. That's the context I want to give as an introduction. So this has taken place in Brazil, as I said before. And when that situation was left behind, now Lula is president again. And in Argentina with the government of Macri, these people started to, with this trend of political persecution through the judiciary. And they started doing this with the help of some judges and some prosecutors and with political power behind and with the large media outlets backing this persecution. So they don't depict this as a persecution. They start to speak about judicial investigation of corruption. And we as a country have committed internationally to act against corruption. And we need to let the justice act. That's the discourse they're using and that is reproduced by the large media outlets. Instead what we have is a political decision behind of persecuting the opponents, the other political sector and chasing their leaders, send them to prison. That's what they want, discredit them. And the media outlets start to speak about corruption and then you have judges and prosecutors to apply justice according to what they say. This is the scenario. This is the context that we need to pay attention to when you analyze in Argentina and across the region conviction or persecution through cases that mentioned the word corruption. Why? Because in some cases you may find corruption facts but in other cases such as the case of Cristina Fernandez what you have is a strategy of persecution. It's such a systematic strategy that the officials from the government that were part of a so-called judicial table and they used to see to analyze the case of Cristina and other leaders from the opposition and they had a sort of tie with the judges to continue this persecution, this processing to take her to court, to arrest officials. So you would say well but judges are independent. Well they should be independent. Now when you start digging facts you start to see judges that at meetings with the former president without knowing about those meetings you start to wonder they're not so independent. So it's not that they go for a specific case to the presidential palace. They went to the presidential palace to see former president 10 to 15 times. They used to play tennis and paddle. So this perverse bond, this immoral bond between the judges that were deciding on Cristina's case and former president I want to use it as an example of what corruption is like in our country or in a part of our judiciary and specifically judges that decide federal cases against government officials. This is the context in which this persecution against Cristina Fernandez took place and Cristina Fernandez was targeted with several denounces. She was processed, she was investigated in the same day, she was investigated in eight different cases by the same judge. Her house was raided. The houses that she owns in the south of the country they digged in part of her houses because there were rumors that she had money hidden. So they carried out the systematic persecution and now what we see is what this concrete case is. This is the context. So we cannot analyze a trial against Cristina Fernandez who was twice president in an isolated manner as if it was a regular case and I'm going to start mentioning the following. This was a political case, a political case, political ruling and a political conviction. It was not a judicial case or a judicial process or a judicial conviction, not at all. So regardless of our discussions about juridical arguments, this is not what is relevant when it comes to a political decision. Some days before the conviction was revealed a journalist asked me, Ibarra, you were a member of the judiciary. You held the position of federal prosecutor and you were the major of a city. You have the two perspectives, the political and the judicial perspective. What do you think? Is she going to be convicted? And I said this and I had mentioned this same thing I'm going to mention about Milagros Alas, another leader that was politically persecuted and I repeated the same argument. And my judicial side told me it was impossible that she would be convicted because there were no legal grounds and we are going to speak about this in a second. But my political side was suggesting me when there is a political decision the judicial grounds are not relevant. It's not relevant if there is evidence or proof what the decision of power is that's what's going to have an influence and effectively that was what happened and she was convicted. So what was being discussed in this case the prosecutors said and I'm going to summarize there was a group of criminals associating with a criminal intent to enrich themselves and okay what happened? Well what did they do? So they said they favor public works in Santa Cruz Santa Cruz is a southern province in Argentina where former president Kirchner was born. And so how did the Cristina favor those public works? Well they carried out projects through a friend but where there are tender beats? Yes there were tender beats but they were directed I'm summarizing what they said no as arguments what happened? Who was in charge of those tender beats? Cristina no any national official was in charge of that? No that was in the hands of the province of Santa Cruz a directorate from the province of Santa Cruz well the prosecutors were saying look all the public works are approved by the parliament senators and deputies in the law of budget well but the deputies were not aware of what they were voting for look the deputies were there and voted and no one exercised any pressure for them to vote and these projects were approved normally so I guess then you should convict the deputies that voted to approve those public works no they said no no no the prosecutor said no and what about the ministers and the chief of staff? No Cristina and some specific officials and then you say well these public works were not executed? Yes they were executed some other public works were stopped by Macri and where these projects were executed was an overpriced on these public works so there was no way I mean as a lawyer I was analyzing and I was saying okay there was no way to convict her because all the works were lovefully approved by the congress and what does Cristina have to do with that so there were no irregularities but in the case there were irregularities she didn't have anything to do she was away from this decision but however they convicted her why because it doesn't matter the legal grounds in these cases in these political cases he lost the connection for a second okay it is the political will of persecuting her and to convict her and this is what they did and that is why I say this was a political ruling not a judicial ruling and in this context we need to analyze this with this okay folks so that was 13 minutes of a legal of a legal treatise on what has happened in Argentina with Vice President Cristina Kerschner and I'm happy to share the entire recording with those of you who want in fact I'll paste the link to it in our in our YouTube program description so you can see the whole thing it's very very in depth but I think that was the principle 13 minutes is to give all of you you know some idea of how lawfare political judicial legislative coups are being used to remove people from office particularly those of center left and revolutionary left government so that was last week in Argentina and now joining us live from Peru is Daniela Ortiz to talk about another situation of of lawfare that happened in Peru within one day of of Argentina so welcome Daniela really thrilled to have you here with us live from from Peru and you know what before we start talking about Peru I really do have to give a shout out to our translator for Annabel Ibarra Carmela Velasquez who was joining us on Tuesday from Argentina as well to provide Spanish to English translation so so just a special thank you to him for that okay Daniela thank you so much I'm really honored to have you with us and again I have to big shout out to Raul for putting this episode together where's the best place for us to start Daniela maybe with with what happened last week in Congress in Peru or do we should we go back a little farther than that yes it's been a difficult presidency for Castillo from the start exactly this is the like an outcome of what has been happening in more than a year now since Castillo was elected that there was a position from the right wing from the elite from the media to do not accept that he was elected actually it's interesting to see in the context of Peru that when Castillo was elected a whole process of denouncing citizens that were part of the votations tables that were processed by huge law firms from Lima that they actually all go together to start saying that Castillo won because there was a general fraud that was committed by the citizens that were in the in the votations so and the the the mechanism was to initiate legal process against those citizens like a loafer in a citizen sense so it's really important to also understand and it's interesting to see in the case of Peru that loafer is not only applied to the political figure that they want to persecute but in this case was to citizens at the beginning but also to the family and to everybody who was around him no so that was a first response from the elite the first response from Fujimori's party a first response from from the right wing but then since he started to be in government there were three attempts of impeachment this was the third one many cases of open it of supposed corruption and as I mentioned not only to him also to his wife to his daughter who was detained actually for almost a month with this type of weird accusations really similar to the ones that we're seeing in Argentina and actually here we can see another similarity no the daughter of Cristina was also legally persecuted accused of corruption no and how they try to impose pressure over political figures using their families no and and then a whole process of avoiding the government to be able to go to make their regular life as a president for example Castillo is forced any president in Peru because precisely we have a parliament that have created laws in order to control the president he was obliged to ask the parliament for permission for example for traveling to Colombia when Petro was elected for the initial ceremony of his government I did and they didn't give him the permission no so many trips that Castillo was supposed to do in order to carry out regular protocol activities of a president were not allowed and what to say about all the laws that come came from the executive power and from the presidency that were not accepted by the parliament so he could not even accomplish those things he promised during the campaign so also that was against him but what he decided was what other presidents have decided before to dissolve the the parliament because they were having this obstructionist attitude towards the presidency and for example Martin Viscara who was also president a few years ago here in Peru took the same decision but in the case of Martin Viscara he was not accused of making a coup like how Castillo is being accused and he was not accused of being a dictator of how like how Castillo is being accused nowadays and after that that's he made this declaration to dissolve the congress which is actually a request from the from people not only now in the protest that the main request is to close the congress but before also there was a big amount of people in the streets actively asking Castillo to close the congress which actually in the polls had only 11 percent of approval it's an absolutely hated congress in the context of Peru no but with a lot of power because they have been building the legal frames in order to have the power they have nowadays no so just after that Castillo was detained he's been accused of rebellion which is a really a nonsense legal frame for this because rebellion means that you need to be using arms guns and it was not the case in fact Castillo was almost alone when he did this and and the situation now is that we have this imposed government by Dina lead by Dina Boluarte no that after the protest that came out because of the detention of Castillo asking for the congress to be shut down asking asking for Castillo to be liberated asking also for a opening a constituent process that after I can talk deeply about that but what they have decided was first there was a lot of police repression and since yesterday we are under an state of emergency and the army are in the streets and it's not we're not talking of a few soldiers in the streets we are talking about tanks and we're talking about I just was seeing videos of Ayacucho where the military are just running and shooting after people with not a rubber balls or anything like that they are shooting real a real munition no so the situation is really complicated wow so this this 30 this is went yesterday Wednesday it was the new president or the intro I don't even know what the coup president is that maybe declared a 30 day state of emergency and this is nationwide exactly it was for a few provinces and now it's nationwide exactly no and a the level of violence like we have been through like really complex moments here in the few in the last years we had like for example another parliamentarian a coup led by Manuel Merino after two days of protest and after the police killed two young protesters in Tizotelo and Brian Pintado they finally stepped down and then elections were called we had like an inter in a government no but the level of radical violence and the strength of the situation that we are seeing now not only by the government by this coup government by lead by Dina Boruarte and by the congress but also by the media that I have never we have seen violence here in like verbal violence in the media but for example the early day in the biggest radio of the country they were making an interview to a left wing congresswoman and she refused to repeat that Castillo made a coup and she was trying to explain her perspective in regard to what happened and they two told her we are not going to accept anyone in our radio to deny that there was a coup led by Castillo and they shoot down the interview with this parliamentarian so the level also of control in regard to the media that we are having and that's why I'm really thankful for this space because the level of control that there is being in regard to what is being said and understood how many times the word Pedro Castillo is a follow it by saying that he is a dictator like what type of dictator like for three hours what was what type of dictator makes a coup without military force and what we are seeing now is a real coup because not only they have a like a managed to get in power using a loafer process but also they have the military on the back like we are seeing the military on the streets and it's a military coup in that sense also no because many times we think that loafer is a soft way of imposing power but what we're seeing in Peru is that loafer was the path but what followed after was the legality in order to use the military and to have it in the streets no that makes total sense Danila and I think that's a really important component that the media is a key component of this it's sort of one of the pillars of soft coup of lawfare and in the case of Peru specifically I mean I read a report just recently from the Latin American strategic center for geopolitics they published a report called Pedro Castillo in the media and you know over the last year in 2022 you know out of all the reports that they analyzed in el comercio en la república 80% of them pretty much 80% of them were negative so that has probably had a huge impact I know it's had a huge impact in the in at least in North America where in Canada where I'm at where you know people are kind of confused as to you know did Pedro Castillo do something bad? Is he guilty? How do Peruvians or do Peruvians is it a divided country or are people confused as well? Is it the same as it is for us in the north? Can you talk a little bit about how the impact because it did seem like you said he made an announcement completely alone didn't have the support of his own party the media the military nobody and it just seemed kind of an odd action to do totally alone. Yeah well the situation with the media has been really complex not only in the level of aggression of portraying everything in a negative sense even with lies and manipulation of information but with a level of racism that has been amazing I mean like how because Castillo comes from a humble background from the countryside he's a rural teacher he's a union leader you know and at the same time he represents the majority of this country you know not as we have seen in the last 200 years of a colonial of a colonial republica where we have seen a white high-class presidents that we did not represent the the people of Peru you know and and but there is a complex thing also in regard to the portrayal of Castillo in the media because one of the big factors why Castillo has so much support is because people feel identified with him not only in in an identity sense in the sense I can also come from this background I if I see his parents I feel I'm similar to him but also in the way Castillo is being treated by the elite that elite has been treated in this way in this way for 200 years since we have had an supposed independence all the people in in the country you know so there is a huge in identification and that's why also people are now in the streets because they have seen all this time the big media that I mean like really in Peru there are non non non right wing media available in the in like me I mean in the big channels and all this not even that I cannot name you a left wing journalist in any big media not even one you know but what happens with this that's only consumed in Lima and in the big cities mainly in Arequipa and Trujillo and mainly in the capitals because also this media is most of them they are white white mestizo high class and they are also hyper racist in their way of approaching every time they talk about the provinces every time they were talking about Castillo for example they have compared him to animals so many times even progressive me a journalists and people that look alike they were different they were using all the time this like violent racist approach to him no but yeah like cholo no they don't mention that anymore because that's not political correct anymore but they were creating know this for example saying that he's not capable that he's just not capable we can question him but I guess somebody that arrives to a presidency has a capacity because I have friends that have gone to the Sorbonne university and they cannot even win elections in the university but Castillo won elections in the country so and he was also a big leader of the he was the leader of the biggest teachers strike in the history of Peru so he must have some capacities no but he was always portrayed like this but there is something really important in regard to is for example the area where I live in Urbamba and in Cusco in many of the rural areas of Peru there are local radios there are community and radios so people here that have been supporting Castillo strongly since the beginning actually Castillo was a surprise for the elite when he appeared in the second round CNN the American channel didn't even have his image his photo when when they saw that he was for the the second round in the elections no but that has given some type of freedom of thought in the context in the rural context and mainly in the south of the country that we have these communitarian radios that people listen to the to that not from now not because of the elections only but from before because of the level of racism in the big media no you know this the role of the media came up at one point when Robo and I were talking with Anivali Bada on Tuesday as well and how it's owned by you know a certain segment of capitalist elitists it's all works you know hand in glove they're tools of one another and and that's seen throughout the what do you say the oligarchy the capitalist the global capitalist it's all we see it playing out in the United States as well and not just in traditional media but social particularly social media I would argue you mentioned a few minutes ago there's tanks in the street that this congressional action against Castillo was really about getting a militarized you know with what's now basically it seems to be a military coup the day before was it Tuesday or was it yesterday it was Tuesday correct but the U.S. embassies the U.S. ambassador to Peru met with the minister of defense is that correct yeah actually now we see this unfolding yeah just a few minutes ago before we started the program Castillo has a published well his twitter account has published another one of his letters he has been writing down letters from prisons that are being published in his twitter account which I recommend following and in the letter he talks about this visit of the American ambassador who is a Lisa Kenna who is actually somebody not any type of ambassador is somebody that before coming to Peru was really involved in in Ukraine and and then before she was in Iraq and she has been and this is not paranoia or things that we are inventing no it's the reality it's a reality and the CIA has a website they have a budget and they have an agenda and she had a meeting with the ministry of defense of Castillo that was a new minister something that is really important to understand that in this process of pressure that was done by the parliament to Castillo because the parliament has so much legal process power and it has much more power than the executive and and the presidency and something that happened with Castillo and it has happened before with other presidents is that they start changing ministers in order to avoid having an impeachment and to have a parliament that likes you know so he has a for example the first a group of ministers was amazing no and we were all like really glad maybe we could question some of them but it was really interesting the first time we had Quechua speakers in the in the ministers first time we had a be like a majority of racialized people in the minister even though it's a 90 percent racialized people country you know but the situation is that this defense minister entered at the end and he had a meeting just three days before Castillo dissolved the the congress but something important is that she has been having meetings also with the nation's persecutor who is the one that is accusing Castillo not only of rebellion but also of the other cases of supposed corruption and actually this persecutor has been like really questionable because she has taken out of office to many people for example that were investigating cases of corruption and cases that has to do with with drug cartels and things like that there are linked to the Fujimori people because they also that's a big part of their power has to do with the cocaine the cocaine production and exportation no so as in many other countries we know and in many other situations that the embassy and in Peru we know that the american embassy has a lot of power also the ambassador from all the european union when there were already five people murdered by this government of Dina Voluarty they came to uh salute and to approve Dina Voluarty no when the the same people then they talk about Venezuela and Cuba and they are talking about human rights violations but with this they were okay with a government that in the first two days have killed already five people that were protesting in the streets so what we what we what I think and it's really scary to think that is that because the imperialist power has lost power in the region because we now do have a biggest amount that most of the countries have left-wing governments that they are going more radical with that situation of getting into power again no and Peru also besides having had a big idealist ideologization process in the cities that are really people are really neoliberal in the way they think no we also have like really strong anti-terrorist laws and they are starting to use those laws against the people that are protesting in the streets no so I do think that there is a situation that is not only the right wing the Fujimori people but I we are almost sure that the American embassy is having a big role in this in this situation no how do you think um this is going to play out of somebody was asking me the other day in a the meeting I was in um I've just gotten back from Columbia actually and said well you know a lot of a lot of the bad stuff we're seeing erupt in the past week across Latin America is in response as you just said Daniela so all the good things that have happened since October 2020 with all these elections and these center right to revolution center left to revolutionary left governments how do you think enroll this is a great place for you to jump into with your thoughts you have the U.S. embassies role really over now in Peru and also you have Mexico Colombia Argentina Bolivia and I think now Honduras who uh have not recognized this regime change in Peru um I think President Petro in Colombia overtly called it a coup regime and I and Xiomara Castro as well I believe so you've got these nations who are center left not radical left who are still allied pretty closely with the United States saying they don't recognize this this new regime in Peru how do you how do the two of you see that I mean that's like the first time really I think for me in my lifetime a block of nations who are allied with the United States are not recognizing what's happening I was going to play out as I was saying I do think there is a like a dispute in the region and this has to do with that no it it was really it was really great to see this but also we confront that situation in which because of the level of aggressive historical aggressiveness against the left wing here in Peru and mostly after the armed conflict in the 80s and 90s that we have had all these anti-terrorist laws that have been applied to anybody that was just left wing having a Marx book was enough to be processed you know what happens also many times is that is that many times we are detached from the other left wings in the region we are not uh into there are certain political groups that have relationships with the region but uh unfortunately it's not something that is being let's say it doesn't have such a big reverberation inside no for example from Evo Morales it does have more but because of an identity relationship from the south of Peru with Bolivia no and that there is a recognition over there but what I have seen and that's a positive thing in regard to this position which is amazing and it's amazing how come Chile took the opposite decision and today Borics government decided to support Dina Voluarte you know that I don't understand why they have taken this decision you know and and also we can see that it's a great strategy to come to do not recognize this government and they can also do it because they have the power to do it I imagine if Lula would be already empowered no from the first of January we're going to have him no maybe she would not even be able to be in government after having all that pressure from from the region but also we saw that the exterior minister from Peru answered it really quickly saying that they were interfering in national things etc so that's something that is shaking making shake the government and that's really important if it continues no and you can see it that on the other hand you had the american ambassador at the european union ambassadors recognizing the government also really fast because as I say it's something that is bigger than the situation in Peru yeah it's a regional situation yeah absolutely situation actually yeah as I mean as Daniela I mean I'll just add a few things that you know there are obviously regional power play going on here where the US you know I don't I don't know the details specifically around Peru so it's great that Daniela kind of like gave a little bit more information on that but we know that they're always there you know these decisions aren't taken alone right so you know the congress I'm sure in consultation with the US and their international partners made that decision when it was necessary I do think there is like a you know there is you know the United States that would add the you know Eastern the Europe and Canada of course I was at Canada in that mix where there there is a hegemonal struggle with you know the influence of China Russia another another sort of you know countries they're coming in and and it seems like the west has taken their eye off Latin America for the last little bit so we're now seeing a resurgence of you know progressivish type governments you know at all levels from you know from different countries and and it's great that these countries can kind of come together somewhat as a block but I mean there is confusion because we saw in Chile we'll I mean I saw Lula statement as well and it wasn't great in my opinion I thought it was kind of weak based on somebody who's suffered you know under lawfare and imprisonment so I do think that the challenge with lawfare and these soft coups is that it's easy to kind of overlook what's going on because there's a quasi legal component to it and and then it's very easy for the Canadian government the US government and sort of the west to say well you know we don't support coups but it's not you know it's a it's a quasi legal thing and it always brings me back I mean I always put this context with Manuel as a lion Honduras in 2009 and if we recall when this happened it was like everybody said this was a judicial issue you know people were trying to change the constitution and so then it confuses a lot of people and it confuses and what it does and I think for me the most concerning is that it breaks the link of solidarity international solidarity from people in the in the north with with these struggles because people are like well you know was he corrupt you know one of somebody asked me like well he had to have been found guilty of something right because there were so many charges against this deal so there is a confusion around that and I think that does create kind of a separation of solidarity so there is like why would someone want to support a person who's closed congress right so I think that's the big challenge and I think that we have to somehow overcome and through lawfare it really makes it very difficult in my opinion so I think that's a bit of a struggle even with progressive governments in the region Daniela do you want to comment on that or yeah actually that's something that happened I think it has to do with breaking the trust in between us that it's really strong like I mean it we have this call legal thing you know but also when we think about for example cancellation culture in the worst version of it you know we we know that it was needed to go out to denounce patriarchal violence but then the way it has been used is really complex you know and we can see that there is this constant thing of as soon as you have one small denounce it's enough to say okay there is something going on here or we are not going to believe this no and that also has to do with breaking as I say the trust within the left wing within the left wing organizations that as soon as you have and then this notion here was installed really strong in the media well it's really easy you just have to prove that you are not guilty yeah but a judicial process is not one month three days or something like that it takes a lot of resources a lot of time in order to win a process no and even if you have all the media against you and then what happens in many cases you win the process and then the media doesn't say anything about that and nobody talks about you in the in the sense that you have already won the process that's something that happened here for example with all the many of the people of the party that Castillo won with Perú Libre and mostly the leader of Perú Libre that is Vladimir Serrón he has for example 16 processes and other groups of left wing once he had like a denounce they were like oh now we have to see and wait what happens with this no because he already has a denounce and as we know it's really easy to denounce and then nobody's going to persecute the people that are unfairly using law and denouncing people to manipulate this no i i i don't know anybody that is now in jail because they have been using lawfare then you just go home and okay you were free and that's it you know so i think they have a also lawfare works you know in a really not only it doesn't only break your image with the media publicly with the people who voted for you but also breaks political organizations no we have seen it for example with Julian Assange like making this parallelism in regard to gender violence or gender like or abuse denounce it that one in certain moment that suddenly Julian Assange was denounced by that and everybody believed him because we are supposed to believe him no because we are against gender violence and abuse and all this but i think in this type of cases that is so clear that that person is living a political persecution we cannot believe any corruption or any type of of denounce just like that and it's really important also to remember that the Biden government one of the first things they did was to create and make a fund that is actually delivered through USA to context such as Peru for making anti-corruption and supporting anti-corruption policies no and we know that that has to that has to do with supporting organizations that are being part of reinforcing these these lawfare processes no and then also for me like in a as an artist i did a few years ago a video that is called the empire of the law because for me there is also a bigger question in regard to law no law has been historically the tool that power has used to inflict violence as is broadly said no like slavery was legal all the colonial system was legal no and law is if you see the colonial monuments that were being teared down in the recent protests in the states and in many other contexts you have always these colonizers many times are half a sore in a hand and then the law in the other hand no because it was something historical it is something historically used in in order to impose violence the thing is that as as left wing we have said okay we're going to use your rules we're going to accept your democratic system we're going to accept your laws and we're going to play within that no but but then we see what is the outcome also because we're we're working inside the year system in this sense no inside the year legal system no maybe one last question from my end Terry if that's okay sure go ahead and i think it's just kind of important juxtapose you know i guess the question for me is so you know Petro Castillo he closed down congress right he tried to absolve it without any real power he kind of lost touch with his base it seems like his party his own party didn't support him he you know he started bringing into congress as you mentioned a lot of sort of neoliberal you know members you know he wasn't able to do much you know a Dina Dina is a part of his party she's you know she's progressive supposedly she's a woman why you know do are Peruvians not happy with the change like how how much because i'm just i get a lot of people in the north they confuse about this is this not a good thing like this is not a coup from the mill not not there's no good thing but like this is not you know it wasn't a military coup it was a congress it was you know women now and from from his party is there anything good that can come from this or how do you see you know what's going on around that specifically and maybe it's kind of an odd question sir i apologize no i don't know totally no obviously there is i mean like this right wing or right center people from from lima or from arekip or Trujillo from the cities is the government they wanted no uh also mainly because one of the biggest attacks against Castillo was that only because he's a rural man you know a racialized male have more uh uh are are being are accused uh to be uh more macho than white male and it's just belief because they are racialized no there is a racist also a parameter in regard to understand how patriarchal is a male no and but for example in the government of Castillo something that has never happened in the country we had two ministers of the women ministry that were feminist militants we had never had feminist militants in the government for example no but what was more important for this center or right wing pointing out no but how many women are in the in the ministers if it's not 50-50 then is a it's not a parietarian process then he's a macho and all these stuff no so that's something they they have tried to use i think they try to use it in bolivia also no something that was used broadly against evo was that he was male and that he didn't but then at the end we have an anti-patriarchal minister in in the context of bolivia no but then they had Janine Añez there was a female figure no that was strategically used for that and i think in the case of Dina Boloarte they are pushing to create that narrative and the same to create the narrative that they have 50 percent of women in the different uh ministers but as i say that's something that is only working in the context of lima because also here uh we are seeing uh it's it's common the discussion to see that the ministers are all the time all white no and that's something that we can see again in the ministers of uh of Dina Boloarte so Castillo also had a lot of support because many for example Guido Bellido who was uh uh from the first group of ministers uh it was the first time i listened and speech in Quechua that was not only saying hi and by in a symbolic symbolic way it was speaking politically in Quechua and that is the aspiration of the white politicians in the parliament to have an authority speaking in in Quechua was speaking giving a whole speech giving making political reflections about that no because indigenous people were never allowed to occupy that space so here and mostly in the south of the country you can see that the main uh worried about uh the government is to feel represented in that context no wow this is so much to unpack in a role you really brought that to the forefront so what else i'm Daniela you've been speaking with us for almost an hour i'm so i'm so thankful for your time tonight is there anything else we have not touched upon that our audience should should hear should know about anything you Daniela would like to bring up or rubble yeah well from here is that it's really important uh to try to find information that is not from the main media because what is happening is terrible and what we're seeing is that it's going to get harder no and that's also a like i think it is really important and that the persecution is not only to the president many of his ministers are already processed the main the one that started being his justice minister and that has been with him all the time is already underground like he had to we don't know where he is because of all the situation of persecution and that is going to come also to the to the militancy and to people that are just like union leaders people who are part of feminist groups and everything no we are sure it seems that it's going to come to that level no wow almost a cleansing for lack of a i mean it's not just a it's not just a persecution of the president and his cabinet it's a persecution or everybody that of people who voted for him and continued to support him yeah it's scary so we um we're gonna have to do a follow-up and follow you Daniela because this is really i mean every day it's getting more and more intense and more and more dangerous for people like you and uh so we should uh we should plan on talking with you again Raul absolutely for sure sir so let me just remind the audience that you've been watching what the f is going on in