 Today is July 9th. We give the people what they want. Coming to you from people's dispatch, we have Prashant and Zoe and from Globetrotter. Two days after the assassination in cold blood of the president of Haiti, rumours swirling out of Port-au-Prince. Who did it? Gunmen, perhaps Colombian mercenaries, that's on the table. Some people with US passports, that's on the table. People speaking Spanish, well, they were Colombian. People speaking English, well, they might have been Haitians from the United States. Rumours here, there everywhere. Government in crisis, paralysis in Haiti right now. One rumour being a drug dealer extradited by Moises to Miami by the Drug Enforcement Agency of the United States might have engineered the hit on the man who had him extradited. Lots of rumours, speculation, hard to know what's happening. It is an outrage. However much a head of state is disliked, head of government is disliked. It's an outrage to have somebody killed like this in cold blood. Killed in cold blood, pictures of the dead body of the president of Haiti spreading around social media. Zoe, what's the latest from Haiti? Yeah, well, as you mentioned, Vijay, this is, you know, truly has shocked, I think, the world and especially Haiti, a country that was already in such deep political, social and institutional crisis. And this is obviously only going to make that worse. And, you know, the latest updates are, you know, yesterday, the director of the National Police of Haiti, Leon Charles, gave a press conference. And he basically gave the latest updates about who they've been able to identify who participated, you know, as hit men in this crime. And essentially it's 28 people, according to the director of police, 26 of whom would be Colombian, and two, it seems that are Haitian American. You know, the Minister of Defense from Colombia, Diego Molano, has already made a statement and said that the Colombian government will cooperate with all of the Interpol investigations. They've already been contacted because these are former members of the Colombian Army. So this, I mean, this moment is really bringing together, it's kind of just this like convergence point of all of the unrest that we've been seeing across the region, across Latin America and the Caribbean. You know, we have Colombia serving as kind of this place of exporting paramilitary violence of mercenaries, of, you know, participating in this horrific act. But at the same time, you know, understanding the context in Haiti in which this, you know, assassination and political murder took place is also very important. And, you know, Moise was at this point quite isolated in the political scene in Haiti. You know, as we've been covering extensively people's dispatch since February, he essentially is a de facto president. He overstayed his constitutional term as of January 2020. There was no legislature functioning in the country of Haiti, no elected officials. So Haiti, I mean, has been in this crisis, there have been massive waves of protests, you know, in February, we saw huge protests, people on the streets opposing not only Moise overstaying his term, but also opposing him calling for a constitutional referendum, which was set to take place on June 28th, but was postponed, opposing also the elections that are scheduled for September, which now will also include, well, now we don't really know what's going to happen where we're set to include presidential legislative elections. The opposition, you know, had come up with a proposal, a transition out of this institutional crisis. And I think, you know, right now the real question is what's going to happen next because already Haiti was in a crisis already there was, you know, erosion of the institutions already, you know, the international community was concerned about what was happening in Haiti, which of course means preparing to, you know, have troops on the ground. I mean, Haiti has been occupied militarily by UN forces since the early 2000s in different UN missions, minou stah, minou juice. These missions, you know, had officially ended, I think, one year back when a juice technically left. And the response to this political assassination, which, you know, Haitian movements movements across Latin America have rightly, you know, warned and cautioned about has been, you know, calling for some sort of, as Washington Post said, muscular response. And as we know, a muscular response to crisis in Haiti is not good news for Haitians and it's not good news for the region. And the Organization of American States has also made some vague illusions, you know, what kind of response there could be. But really, right now, with, you know, movements in Latin American movements in Haiti are saying no to any foreign intervention. Yes, to Haitian democracy, yes, to Haitian sovereignty. And of course, the assassination of a president is a violation of the country's sovereignty, which had already been ceded and worn away. So, I mean, really, we need to keep our eyes on this situation every day. It's developing, you know, today, I'm sure we'll have new updates. But it's surely a tragic situation and we will have to see what unfolds. You see, these rumors, many of them will not be untangled. That's the problem, because as you mentioned, there is a political crisis in Haiti. Two different politicians claiming the mantle of the state paralysis at the political level is going to, I think, have a direct impact on paralysis at the investigative level. It should be said that since there are Colombians involved, it should be said that since the administration of Colombian President Ivan Duque has not denied the presence of Colombians. People should be aware that it's likely that the United States government is not going to want to advance an investigation if it uncovers anything that's uncomfortable. Certainly, as I said, it could be a political motive, it could be revenge from a drug dealer, could be all kinds of things. Haiti had become one of the main transshipment points for cocaine into the United States. Important issues here, Colombia, Haiti, Miami, cocaine, assassination, keywords of the present. Meanwhile, in India, keywords of the present, illegal detention, political prisoners, committees are very upset by what is called the custodial death or institutional murder of Father Stan Swami. Father Stan Swami, a great voice in the wilderness of India. Prashant, who is Stan Swami and how did he die? Right, Vijay. Father Stan Swami, a Jesuit priest and also a very ardent and tireless advocate for the rights of India's tribal communities. Tribal communities which have actually not received any of the benefits of what the middle class maybe have received in India or the elite have received, whose land is often attacked for resources, whose areas have been militarized, often they have been detained in various circumstances. They accused of links with Maoist guerrillas. Father Stan Swami was somebody who fought for their rights, who advocated for justice for them, worked very deeply with them. He was not somebody who landed once in a while or anything, he lived with them, he worked with them. But just a few months ago, in October, he was arrested with accusations of being involved in what is called the Bhima Koregao case. By the way, he was 84 years old when he was arrested. Now, as a reporter, the Bhima Koregao case is one of probably the most confusing things to report out of India because it has to do with violence in the beginning of 2018. And at that point, all reports pointed to the fact that right-wing groups, internationalist groups were involved in this violence. However, the inquiry within a few months completely turned around. And then the government's case was that this was actually a left-wing conspiracy and blamed in this for a lot of prominent activists, lawyers, scholars, many of whom were not even there at that point of time. So this has been a case which has really puzzled reporters and journalists across India. And unfortunately, the law used to arrest people in this case has been one of the most draconian laws available, which is called the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act. And Stanswamy was also arrested under this law, although he had nothing to do with that event or anything of that sort. So Stanswamy is arrested in October, 84 years old. He's suffering from Parkinson's disease. He does not even have access to his zipper and straw in jail because he can't hold the glass properly or eat food properly. And for that, he had to approach the court. So that was the extent of how the judicial and prison system in India functions. An 84-year-old man with Parkinson's had to approach the court to even get a straw and a zipper. And he applied for bail. At that point, the National Investigation Agency, which is the apex body investigating this, said that he was trying to use the pandemic as a pretext. His bail was denied. Over time, his health deteriorated very rapidly. And all this happened, there were reports of all this. This was nothing hidden or obscured. So at the end of May, he told the court how his bodily functions, his physical capacities, is visibly deteriorated. And he had asked for medical bail. And the court said, you can go to a hospital. And Stanswamy said, I fear I'm going to die. So I would rather just be released on bail and go back to my friends in Jharkhand where I can go. So he was hospitalized for nearly a month. He got COVID-19. And as his bail was due to be heard on Monday, while the judges took up the matter, the hospital's director said that he had died. And a horrible, horrible tragedy here because we have an activist who spent decades working for the poor. An activist whose deterioration in health was very, very visible. He's not the only one in the case in such a situation, the very famous poet, Varavar Rao, a few months ago. Also, his health deteriorating so badly that his family said that he's almost delirious. His brain functions have declined. He was granted bail because his lawyers said that he is about to die. And that is sort of a six-month period. So a lot of people in this case are senior citizens about the age of 60. Many of them have health problems. Many of them have spent their lifetimes writing about working for the welfare of the underprivileged in India. And one of the most ironic and horrible things maybe about the case itself is that while Stanswamy was arrested in October, he was never after his arrest questioned for even a day. So he was under judicial custody. He was arrested presumably for the investigation, but he was never interrogated after his arrest for even a day. So from October to July he was in jail. There was no investigation. And while his bail plea was being heard, around that time exactly he died. So very difficult times for activists in India. A lot of newspapers, activists have pointed out how these laws are being used in very problematic ways against him. So the Bhima Koregao case itself, I believe, even authorities have raised concerns regarding this. There's a widespread demand that all of the activists arrested in this case be released immediately because many of them have spent over two years in prison right now. And of course the case is nowhere close to getting over. So that is the situation with Stanswamy. They were called the Bhima Koregao 16, now they become the Bhima Koregao 15. Many of them in bad health have been a lot of excellent reporting on how the kind of situations they're facing. So that's where we are now. Full disclosure Prashant, several of the 15 that remain in jail are personal friends. People like Anand Taltunde, Gautam Navlakha, Sudha Bharadwaj. Personal friends were reporting about people we know. It's always an awkward moment for journalists to report about people they know. I knew Stanswamy, a very fine man, did not deserve to die at the age of 84 in a prison like this. It was a very, very disturbing situation. No evidence. In fact, the Washington Post reports that evidence was planted most likely in their computers. Very disturbing report in the Washington Post. We need answers to questions. I think reporters need to be asking these for the period ahead. This is a show filled with a lot of stories and we come together every week, with the people what they want, Prashant, Zoe and I. We come from People's Dispatch from Globetrotter. We look forward to your comments. We want you to tell people about our show. It's a half hour journey around world affairs. You can't do a show without talking about Afghanistan today. US troops going to pull out of Afghanistan. There's a story at People's Dispatch on that, Biden's comments. There's also a story at People's Dispatch on the July 9th letter, or July 6th letter published by Elizabeth Warren and Ro Khanna, both lawmakers in the United States about underreporting of civilian casualties. Take a look at those stories, but much more than that. The United States is withdrawing from Afghanistan. Well, most of the troops will withdraw, sure. Regional partners around Afghanistan are very concerned. News breaking now from Kalainaw in the northwest of Afghanistan, that the Taliban making significant progress in the provinces. Taliban controlling the entire border region that comes towards China, including border regions with the northern part of Afghanistan to Central Asia. We'll come back to that in a minute. The gains by the Taliban have raised eyebrows by the neighbors. Therefore, many of the neighbors, Iran, Pakistan, India, not directly a neighbor, but India, Russia. Again, not directly a neighbor, but because of Russian influence in Central Asia, Russia. Qatar, where I visited the Taliban's foreign office some years ago. The Taliban had a post office in Qatar. Many of the peace negotiations took place through Doha. Qatar, Iran, Pakistan, India, Russia. All of them very concerned, holding talks both with the Taliban and with members of the Afghan political establishment in Kabul. Mr. Saniq Zai of Abbas Saniq Zai of the Taliban meeting in Iran with Eunice Kanuni, a member of parliament of Afghanistan. They're meeting in Iran because the Iranians trying to broker some sort of modus vivendi between the Afghan government and the Taliban. Very, very difficult situation. They're not able to communicate directly. India and Russia coming into this, India's Jay Shankar has made public statements saying that India is going to take a direct involvement in the discussions between the Taliban and the government in Kabul. Russia, Sergey Lavrov will be with Jay Shankar later the year. They've been talking about the importance of a Russia-India summit. So there's an Iran summit already held. Qatar involved in that. Now there's a Russia-India summit. We saw Suhail Shaheen of the Taliban make a comment that the Taliban is not going to allow the East Turkmenistan group to do terrorist activities in China. Even if the Taliban come back to power, Mr. Shaheen made a public comment saying that the Taliban would welcome Chinese investments inside Afghanistan. Very interesting development, friends. I don't have the ability to tie everything up together. The reason is the story is ongoing, disturbing developments, but also something positive. Here's the positive takeaway from this. The regional partners seem mature and quite deliberate in their attempt to bring peace to Afghanistan. Biden in his press conference washed his hands on Afghanistan, saying there may be a civil war, we hope not. Kalis attitude, 20 years after an occupation, extraordinarily Kalis press conference. But Iran, Pakistan, India, Russia, China seized of the necessity of bringing peace to Afghanistan. We'll be keeping an eye on this. People's dispatch globetrotter. We'll be running a story in the next few weeks. Fascinating things. Don't consider the United States as the only power in the world. Regionalism has a role and they're going to show it. Well, regionalism has a role. It's sometimes ugly. News reports coming out that the former president of Argentina, Mauricio Macri had delivered riot equipment to the coup government in Bolivia. That's a kind of regionalism, not good regionalism perhaps, but that's a kind of regionalism. Another form of regionalism, the coup government in Honduras under pressure now, the organization of American states, even they with their limited political capacity to stand by their own charter, even they have to accept the coup government in Honduras in trouble. Something has happened in the case of Bertha Krakeras. Zoe, what's the latest update? People's dispatch following this very carefully. What's the latest update from Tegucigalpa? Well, Vijay, it's a really, I think it's good to have one piece of very positive news because it's been a very intense week, I think, across the world. But on Monday, there was a great victory in the case of Bertha Krakeras. The court in Tegucigalpa ruled that David Castillo, who's the former head of the DESA company, which is the company that was trying to build a dam on the Guacarque River, which Bertha and Copín were involved in opposing, they ruled that David Castillo is guilty as a co-collaborator in the assassination of Bertha. And this was after basically two months of trial, two months of very, very intense hearings where the legal team was presenting a lot of audios, transcripts, so overwhelming evidence pointing to his involvement in the campaign of intimidation, of harassment, of criminalization that Bertha suffered in the years leading up to her assassination. And so, you know, it's a victory in the sense that these people like David Castillo, who's important to mention, he was trained in West Point Military Academy in the United States. He was a military intelligence officer in the Honduran Army. He has very, very close links to both government officials, members of the Honduran Algarque, which the Atala Zabla family, who are also investors, of course, in the DESA company. And, you know, I think it was six weeks, six months after Bertha's assassination, he bought a $1.2 million house in Texas. So, you know, this is someone who's directly benefiting from not only an assassination of a leader, but also, you know, the coup in the country. He was one of, you know, one of the many military officers who was incorporated into the national economy. For example, he had shares in Honduras electricity company, and he was directly benefiting from the government's seating to foreign interests, you know, granting these concessions. He's also involved in a fraud case, which attempts to prove that him and 15 other public officials committed fraud when granting the concession for this project. And so, you know, this happens every day in Honduras. It continues to happen. People are continued to be assassinated. The government, you know, continues to prioritize foreign projects and capital over national sovereignty and the people's needs. But now the court has showed, and they kind of were forced to, because of all the overwhelming evidence that, you know, impunity is not eternal and that, you know, someday there will be justice and Copín has been fighting tirelessly for the past five and a half years to say, we know who's responsible for this murder and we will not let them walk free. And so finally the courts were able to ratify this cry and this call and, you know, convict him as guilty. You know, of course, this was celebrated by Copín. It was celebrated by many different Honduran movements, political parties and, of course, across the continent. And they've, I mean, they've said that this is a victory, that they, full justice means going after those who finance the operation and they, you know, they've showed through all of the evidence that they've collected who is behind this, who is David Castillo coordinate with. The evidence is there and they're demanding that the Honduran, you know, justice system go after them. So that's what's next. Justice for David, justice for Bertha on the other side. Hopefully maybe Prashant will see justice for Father Stan Swami. Meanwhile, at People's Dispatch, there was a statement Prashant about two reporters from New Frame picked up at East Swatini, a place that People's Dispatch has been covering the protests against the monarchy. Walk us through that Prashant, please. Right, Vijay. Last week we did talk about the situation in East Swatini in Swaziland, formerly known as Swaziland. A lot of people have not accepted the name change because it was arbitrary. But we've talked about how over the past few months there have been very intense protests against their king, the last absolute monarch in the African continent, how the status cracked down, how the state has repressed these protests, how the state has prevented people from even submitting petitions to their members of parliament. You know, they shut down the internet. So there's been a widespread campaign of resistance. And this is also extended to the press. And this was a very disturbing development that took place last Sunday to journalists from our friends at New Frame, Sevilleli and Magnificent, who were in East Swatini at that time when they were returning. They were, you know, they were detained. They were taken to a police station. They were attacked, beaten up, punched. Plastic bags were placed over their heads and they were taken to suffocate them. What is called is tubing. You know, it's been, it's been termed as a form of torture. And all this was done by the police. There is a podcast on New Frame where the journalists talk about their experiences. It's a very, it's something which is very disturbing to hear. But this actually indicates the extent of the repression which the government in East Swatini has been indulging in. Organizations, media organizations from around the world immediately took a stand, expressed solidarity with New Frame and the journalists who have done some really amazing work. The very next day after they returned, there was a story by them which actually very powerfully sets out what is the situation in the country right now. It is believed that almost over 50 people have been killed according to opposition sources by the end of towards the end of June. And some of these shootings extremely random in a sense that police officers arriving, shooting people out of the blue. Many people in hospitals very badly injured. These journalists took the effort to, you know, go to these hospitals, go to a funeral, talk to the people. The story is full of such horrifying accounts of what has been happening. And it's important to note these events because the response of countries in the region, the response of regional forums has been extremely weak. There has been no strong, you know, statements or actions against the country's government and the King Maswati III who and the repression continues. On the other hand, working class movements, people, you know, organizations across the world, the left, they have been mobilizing. There was a mobilization in South Africa in solidarity with them. And I think that what this shows is the extent of brutality because the about I believe 60% of the population is under the poverty line, unemployment is at 40%. On the other hand, the royal family, the king and his relatives, they have accumulated a huge amount of wealth. And this is mostly people just asking for their rights, for basic representation, for the demand that, you know, the prime minister be elected and not appointed by the king. And just the right to give petitions to the MPs, which is what was officially stopped, saying that, you know, you could submit your petitions online, but then the internet was blocked. So these journalists in New Frame are friends doing some extraordinary work in chronicling, not just the last few weeks, but even before what has been happening. And I think, like we said, last week's very important, very essential to keep tracking these events in Swaziland for both the development for the people as well as for the freedom of the press. Started at Haiti, came to Iswatini. In between, we've been to Honduras. We've been everywhere, to Afghanistan, to the region of Central Asia. The last few minutes, I wanted to just point to people's attention to a story Jose Carlos and I published through Globetrotter. It's available at the People's Dispatch site. It's an interesting story, friends. It's about 21st century democratic electoral politics because here was Peru had a second round election on the 6th of June. Pedro Castillo, let's be frank, won by a hair breadth. I mean, it's not a mandate. It's a tight electorate, but he won the election. Nobody denied that Pedro Castillo seemed to prevail, margin of error, et cetera, et cetera. He was going to win regardless. That was the 6th of June. Today, just so that I'm not inaccurate, let me check. Oh yes, it's the 9th of July. It's one month in three days since that election. Between the 2nd of June and the 24th of June, 17 phone calls were made from a high security prison by a former intelligence chief in Peru, intelligence chief of Mr. Fujimori, who you might remember conducted an auto golpe, a self coup in 1992. Mr. Alberto Fujimori now in prison himself. His intelligence chief sitting in prison, not far from the leader of Sandero Luminoso, Gonzalo or Mr. Abial Guzman, also in that prison cell in Lima. Mr. Montesinos, Vladimir Montesinos, made 17 phone calls to an associate military fellow called Pedro Rejas. Now, interesting, what did he tell Rejas? He told him, go out there. There's a lawyer called Guillermo. We need to bribe people who are jurors in the electoral panel. We need to raise the money from these capitalists. We need Keiko Fujimori, the daughter of his previous employer. Her husband is a US national. They met at Columbia University. Tell him as a US national to walk into the US embassy to present the evidence of fraud by Pedro Castillo. Get the CIA involved, get the US government involved. This is the kind of thing that happens in the world today. This is how elections take place. I mean, I'm afraid the story that Jose Carlos and I did, it's about Peru, yes. But I'd like you to go to the People's Dispatch website, read the story, not just to read about what's happening in Peru, but to read about the nature of democracy these days. How cavalier Vladimir Montesinos. This is the second scandal that he's been involved in of this kind. Previously, there were videos of him bribing TV channel executives, a channel one, two, three, five and nine in Peru, bribing them not to give airtime to the opposition, the opposition against Alberto Fujimori. Now he is, and those are called Vlad videos. Now in these Vlad audios, he is telling Reha's go out there and help the daughter of Alberto Fujimori, Keiko Fujimori, win the election. Incredible, incredible story. Please go take a look at it again. It's not just a story about Peru, friends. It's a story about elections these days. Vladimir Montesinos, former intelligence chief in Peru, also his fingers knee deep in CIA money, had been a contractor for the CIA. You've been listening to give the people what they want coming to you every week, every week from People's Dispatch, from Globetrotter. There is no other show available on the interwebs that gives you a close account of world news from the standpoint of movements, from the standpoint of the UN Charter. There is no other show like this. Tell your friends about the show. Let us know what you think about it. We're keen to hear from you. You give us the oxygen to come back to you Friday after Friday after Friday. On behalf of Prashant Zoe, myself, thanks a lot and see you next week.