 Give the people what they want. Give the people what they want. Give the people what they want. Your weekly movement news roundup. Yovit, give the people what they want. Brought to you every week from People's Dispatch. That's Prashant and Zoe both looking very happy to be here. I'm Vijay from Globetrotter. Reasonably happy to be with you. It's the 6th of January, an epochal day in the United States where once there was an attempt to sort of bizarre insurrection, let's say. This is the 109th show of Give the People What They Want. Really happy to be with you to bring you from the front lines news happening around the world. Just want to indicate that on the 1st of January, just five days ago, Luiz Ignacio Lula de Silva was inaugurated as the president of Brazil. There was a big hoopla in Brasilia, the capital of Brazil, the landless workers movement unfurled a giant flag of Brazil in an attempt to reclaim the symbols of Brazil from the right wing, the yellow color on the flag to be reclaimed, the flag to be reclaimed and so on. Meanwhile, Mr. Bolsonaro, making a very poor sartorial choice was roaming around the streets of suburban Miami in shorts. Not a good look I must say for a world leader on the day in which he was supposed to hand over the sash to his successor. Instead, his sash was handed to Mr. Lula by a person who collects garbage. Well, interesting. What's the garbage that Brazil has just gotten rid of? An interesting question. Let's leave that to our listeners. Meanwhile, not far from Brazil in Colombia, a very confusing scene of events. Zoe, peace, no peace. What's going on in Colombia in these recent weeks? Well, on December 31st, Gustavo Petro recently sworn in president from August, one of his main campaign promises has been total peace. And so on December 31st, he very audaciously posted on Twitter and other social media platforms that had achieved a bilateral ceasefire with major armed groups in the country. These include Farc dissident groups and paramilitary groups, but also he included the National Liberation Army. And the National Liberation Army has been engaged in a peace process with the Colombian government over the past several years. Of course, during the four years of the Iván Duque government, this was completely suspended. But the process did begin before Duque and it was retaken by Petro. The first moves that he did when he was sworn into office was to revoke, for example, the Interpol order on the ILN peace delegation and was to resume all of the activities in order for this peace process to begin. They had their first round of peace talks just over a month ago in Caracas and they will have the second round in Mexico. And amongst the things they've been discussing are it's very vast about the participation of society in these peace talks, about the transformations that they want to achieve with these, of course, ceasefire is always on the table because that, of course, is the objective of peace negotiations for people to abandon their weapons if they're an insurgent group to reincorporate into society. But this is part of a peace talk. This is something that gets discussed at the table. And so what happened is that on December 31, Gustavo Petro said that they had achieved a bilateral ceasefire with this group and very quickly the ILN actually clarified and said, this has never been discussed. We do not have a ceasefire. And this has created a lot of discord within society because of course, of course, after six decades of armed conflict, the Colombian people want peace. There was a very positive response to this announcement by Gustavo Petro. But on the other hand, you don't actually achieve such gains after only one round of talks. And it is, you know, according to everything that's been said and according to what the government delegation has said in this first round of talks, they did not discuss a permanent bilateral ceasefire. And he announced it would be a six month bilateral ceasefire. The ILN had declared a unilateral ceasefire, as they often do, for the period of the end of the year holidays, for Christmas, for New Year's. And so it's created quite a situation. And they've said that this will be the first point on the agenda. One of the many things that will be discussed in Mexico at the next round of the peace talks, but that this has not been achieved. And so it's, again, it's created a very difficult situation, pressure on all sides, pressure on Gustavo Petro for having made this announcement, pressure on the ILN for essentially not accepting a bilateral ceasefire that they did not negotiate with. But I think it also calls into question to remember really actually how peace talks happen, the longevity of this process. If we look at the parallel process in the country with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Columbia, in order for them to get a lasting bilateral ceasefire, this took about three and a half years, very many rounds of discussions, concessions on both sides. So I think while there is this momentum behind the total peace in Columbia, we have to remember that is a process. It takes time. Peace is not a question of one day. And especially for this group, the ILN, it has much to do with what happens in these negotiations, what's being brought to the tail by the government and what transformations the government promises to bring. So that's the news from Columbia. Well, not far from Columbia. In fact, bordering Columbia is, of course, Venezuela. President Gustavo Petro of Columbia has opened up a kind of process with the Venezuelan government which had been blocked for many years. In fact, they exchanged high-level officials in conversation, dialogue has started, and so on. Mr. Gustavo Petro has decided to talk directly to the government of Nicolas Maduro in Venezuela. Now that's a pretty big move because Columbia had been part of group Lima or the Lima Group, which had been set up under the ages of the Canadians, actually, to overthrow or conduct regime change or isolate the government in Venezuela. An interesting development from Mr. Petro's government since Columbia had been a major player in this overthrow of the government of Nicolas Maduro offensive. Well, interesting development took place in the White House's press briefing room. And I watched this with some amusement. Sean Tandon, a good reporter from Ajans Frans Press, asked Ned Price a pretty simple question. Now, what was the question? Well, in context for that question, we need to just return to a few weeks before this. The Venezuelan opposition had decided to basically stop the facade of having Juan Graboy, who for one year in 2019-2020 was the president of the National Assembly elected in 2015. It's important to say for one year because that's an annual rotating position, which means that by 2021, he didn't actually have a constitutional mandate to even be the president of the National Assembly, let alone the fact that in December 2020, there were new elections for a National Assembly and a new National Assembly had taken its seats in the next to Plaza Bolivar in Caracas. That means the 2015 National Assembly, where Juan Graboy had been president for one year, had been lost its mandate. Its mandate ended and new National Assembly was seated and there was a new president of the National Assembly. Who could stake a claim to be president of the country in the case of a constitutional challenge and so on? But it was not to be Juan Graboy. Guaido, sorry, Juan Guaido. Mr. Guaido, for instance, was now finally told to be, oh, you are no longer the interim president of the interim government of Venezuela. So Mr. Guaido finally was informed by the opposition, not by anybody else, not by Washington, but by the opposition. No longer the interim president. Okay, the Sayonara Mr. Guaido, that's one issue as context. Secondly, on the first day of January of this year, Nicolas Maduro gave an interview to Ignacio Ramonet, the very legendary journalist from Spain, in which he told Mr. Ramonet that, look, I'm open to talking to Mr. Ba... I'm open to a conversation with the United States at the highest level. That was an important phrase at the highest level. He's willing to even speak to Joe Biden. Now, why that's important is just earlier in the year twice. In fact, very high officials, senior officials of the United States government had come to Caracas to meet with the government of Nicolas Maduro to discuss the question of oil and oil development and to discuss the release of U.S. nationals who are in Venezuela in prison. So they were already talking to Mr. Maduro's government. Here comes Sean Tandon of Aijan Sports Press, asks Ned Price, the spokesperson of Mr. Biden. Hey, Mr. Price, which government do you recognize in Venezuela? Ned Price answered that, well, we recognize the 2015 National Assembly. That's an interesting answer because the 2015 National Assembly hasn't actually sat for seven years. So the United States government recognizes a defunct legislative body that had been there in Venezuela whose major party, the MUD, boycotted the elections in 2020, refused to participate, and yet the U.S. government has given it legitimacy. It was an interesting exchange between Ned Price and Sean Tandon. I'm going to keep following this story because I think there's an element of absurdity here when the Venezuelan opposition itself had said that Juan Guaido is no longer the president of the United States. Recognizing that and now has turned back to saying, well, we recognize a defunct body which hasn't actually sat for seven years. Interesting development. We'll be looking at that. Now, crossing the Atlantic Ocean back to Sudan, a beat of people's dispatch, which is always very much in our minds, a situation in Darfur. Prashant, what is going on in that great country of Sudan? Right. Of course, we've talked about Sudan quite a lot in recent times in a different context. We'll be having a story on Darfur from power coming up shortly. But Darfur is one of those issues which did gain a lot of international attention at various points of time over the past many years. There was a lot of outrage and deep grief over the humanitarian crisis. Now, not so much in the news, but the fact remains that the impacts of what happens in a place like Darfur where millions were displaced, tens of thousands were killed, does not really end in a year or two or just because it disappears from the headlines. So what we have right now is something that's very closely connected to what's been happening otherwise in Sudan as well. But towards the end of December, there was a recent round of violence against internally displaced people. Now, the irony here is very hard to miss because we're talking about people who were already displaced or suffered one round of displacement because of this kind of violence. And once again, faced another round of violence. I think about 21 people were killed and again, I'd say 16,000 people have been displaced if I'm not mistaken. And once again, the role of what is called the rapid support forces is very notorious militia in Sudan, headed by the number two in the Sudanese army, this general called Mohammed Abdad Dagalo, who's also known as Hemathee. The role of this force is once again come under scrutiny. Now, it should be remembered that this force, the RSF was actually formed out of various elements which were involved in the genocide in Darfur in the early part of the century. Under the reign of Omar al-Bashir, this force sort of gained a particular amount of, gained legitimacy as an official wing of an arm of the state and this continues to today. And this RSF is of course perpetrated violence not only in Darfur, but also against the protesters who are fighting for democracy in Sudan itself, the infamous massacre of Khartoum in 2019. So what has happened here is once again clash between two groups which is often talked about as a tribal conflict, but is actually more defined by whether the participants are either farmers or you know, a tribal, you know, nomads, et cetera. And basically this clash escalated and then the RSF reportedly came in engaged in violence with the aid of all the aspects of the state including surveillance, et cetera, et cetera and led to what has been happening. Now, many of the people who suffered were people who were once in internal displaced camps then had come back to their old locations, their old homes because the fact that aid had stopped there was barely any way to meet livelihoods or any way to deal with hunger and malnutrition and lack of water so many of them came back to their old homes tried to sort of eke out a living and once again this violence has again forced them out again very difficult situation right now. The important thing of course to remember is that two things to remember is that of course one is the fact that a lot of this is connected to what has been described by many analysts as the attempt of the Sudanese regime so to speak to depopulate the region so that its mineral resources can be tapped its mineral resources can be exported at the international market and so for that it is essential to remove the people who live there and this has been the violence that has continued for many years and equally importantly is the fact that while people do talk about Darfur sometimes still sometimes comes up in conversation the fact the role of the RSF, the role of the current regime in say it's often described as largely tribal violence which is often how we sort of insulate a conflict make it seem like it's about these primordial passions so to speak which is just people in some part of the world fighting out because they're unsophisticated or whatever but actually what is happening is that this is part of a very clear campaign by sections of the Sudanese regime with the full support of the topmost leadership and also these same sections are backed by the international community so to speak which wants to resolve a conflict in any way possible and their method of resolution is basically by getting the military to work together so it is more or less confirmed that this general Hematy who is in charge of the RSF will play an important role in surrounding the future as well and I think it's an important question to keep asking that while his foot soldiers are on the ground perpetrating this kind of violence against those who have already suffered so much how do you sort of consider him as a credible partner in any kind of reconciliation process in Sudan? It's a very important point and when we get to Bolivia in a second the question of reconciliation and so on is really on the top of the table you're listening to give the people what they want coming to you from People's Dispatch that's peoplesdispatch.org and Globe Trotter happy to be with you every week this is a 109th show I want to say that we started on December 19, 2020 that was our first show a long time ago and I forgot to mention at the top of the hour that of course this is our first show from 2023 Happy New Year and that means that we've entered the third calendar year of our existence that's pretty incredible well one of the principal stories we've covered since December 18, 2020 has been the situation in Bolivia because after all our show started within a year of that coup occurring and that coup regime was still in power at that time Zoe, lot of problems in Bolivia in terms of reconciliation and so on the right wing on the charge tell us what's going on it is an extremely worrying situation as we've reported there's been a very concerted effort since democracy was covered and recovered in Bolivia which is refers to the defeating the coup regime at the polls and also demanding that elections take place this is when the movement towards socialism won the elections with Luis Arce as president and since then since they took office one of the key focuses of the government has really been to carry forward this process of justice against those who planned the coup who instigated the coup and then who really enacted violence against the population after this coup took place and people were protesting and so these past two weeks there's been a lot of developments with regards to this press of justice and with the right wing really being angered with what's happening and so one is that on December 28 Luis Fernando Camacho who's kind of this the classic far-right leader from Santa Cruz he's the governor he was elected governor of Santa Cruz he was formerly the president of a fascist organization in Santa Cruz the Santa Cruz Civic Committee there's several organizations in Santa Cruz including that committee which organized a lot of the process at the time of the election saying that fraud had been committed carrying out extreme violence even before the coup happened against members of the movement towards the Socialist Party attacking for example the headquarters of the supreme electoral tribunal and so a lot of those people who have been implicated in that violence have actually been as I said brought to justice Luis Fernando Camacho arrested on the 28th as part of the coup of thought one case he's accused of terrorism and other things he had been summoned by the court four times to give testimony and he refused and he said I refuse to turn myself in to those masistas and the capital in La Paz and I will resist from here and essentially he's been for the past couple of months as this investigation has been underway knowing that he was going to be arrested knowing that he was clearly implicated in all of the charges that they have pressed against him organizing and mobilizing his base and finally when he's arrested on the 28th he's brought to La Paz he's sentenced he's given sorry pre-trial detention on December 30th his base is ready already on the 28th they engage in violent protests violent riots in Santa Cruz since then it really hasn't stopped they've been burning all kind of public property state institutions whether it be the prosecutor's office the national energy headquarters anything that has to do with the government they've been attacking they've been committing arson attacks attacking the houses of government officials that live in Santa Cruz it's really a state of complete violence there a lot of people demanding that there's a return to normalcy that people are able to go to work but essentially they're trying to make a situation of chaos and instability to make sure that Luis Fernando Camacho gets released it's very unlikely he would be released after over two years of investigation there's extremely clear evidence implicating him in all of the charges that he's tried with of course the process of justice will continue I think we can only look at the the conviction of Janine Agnes to kind of get a sense of what could lay ahead for him but also this week Arturo Murillo who was another key player in this coup he was the government minister of engineering Agnes's government he's the hard head behind a lot of the repression that took place and he was even involved in a huge bribery scandal where he received large payments so that the government would pay an extremely inflated price for weapons to use against the population so it's such a and he was even tried and convicted in a US court he's also being pressed he also faces charges in Bolivia so the hope is that he will be extradited once he serves his sentence in the United States but it's a real uphill battle for the Bolivian government trying to get justice fighting against these right wing forces that are determined to not pay for their crimes Well as we see the situation in Bolivia unfold a new government in Israel the government of Benjamin Netanyahu the ongoing government that that country has ever seen and that's saying a lot well for the Palestinians there's been a process long process of discrimination loss of land settler colonial experience and so on there's one particular area at the bottom of the west bank Masafari Yatta a great name by the way the translation of which is traveling to nothing with the settlement of Masafari Yatta Masafari Yatta of course been in the news before also especially last year but also many many years because it's a location which the Palestinians have been fighting to save their homes for many years right now now the story behind it of course is all too familiar in the occupied territories one day randomly Israel decides to declare Masafari Yatta in which people have lived for decades and there are records of that Israel decides to term it what is called the firing range since it's a firing range it automatically means that of course Palestinians cannot live there and then it that begins this process I believe the decision takes place in the late 90s and from then on the Palestinians wage a very determined legal battle trying to sort of somehow stop this that ends last year when the Israeli court of justice decides in favor of the Israeli government Masafari Yatta is located in area C of the occupied West Bank which means Israelis have much greater control over there but even in this interim period where there were before the verdict the Palestinian residents living there had to face a great amount of hardship checkpoints, restrictions evictions taking place is by the fact that the case was in court after that what has happened is that there have been evictions again and now the latest news was just a few days ago there were again reports of the possibility of close to a thousand people being evicted you know of hundreds of over children now there have been notices issued structures turned down in fact not only was structures turned down but structures that were built in their place as some kind of temporary placeholder structures for schools I believe but also turned down now this is the shifting of people the shifting of people in the area under occupation classically definition of what is a war crime and again also the classic definition of ethnic cleansing but these aspects do not seem to somehow stop Israel when it comes to its actions so in Masafari Yatta once again the struggle definitely continuing we need to wait and watch and see what happens in the coming days as well there has been of course widespread condemnation from international bodies etc in fact last year I believe that the last last week I believe that the UN General Assembly resolution asking the international court of justice to provide a legal opinion on Israel's occupation on the nature of its settlements etc of course Israel you know blatantly denying that the ICJ had any jurisdiction over it but this is part of the pattern that we have been talking about for a long time and like you said with Netanyahu's government it's probably going to get worse we didn't see that Itmar Ben-Gui the person who talked about multiple times probably invaded Al-Aqsa very early this year his first election as a minister with full security cover etc etc and clearly making a point that whatever you know Netanyahu wanted to say about his government not being very different Ben-Gui and his allies who are going to drive the agenda so we also need to see the eviction orders at Masafari Yatta in that context so very important couple of days and weeks ahead for the people in the region whether they'll be able to stick on to the land in which they've been able to do for generations really a big question at this point it's a very serious question question of land up in the Arctic Circle which is only about 6% of the Earth's land you know it's not an enormous part of the land it's about 21 million square kilometers a lot of the Arctic Circle is made up of water and increasingly so as the ice melts up there in the Arctic Circle for the first time NATO the North Atlantic Treaty organization has created a military headquarters up inside the Arctic Circle it's the first time actually we're seeing the militarization of the Arctic at this level led by Norway NATO has produced this office in collaboration with Sweden they've been holding something called Cold Response which is a military exercise since about 2016 it's an annual military exercise with 15 or 16 mostly European countries up there conducting their exercises now there's a lot of discussion about why this is going on one of them is that there's an awful lot of oil and natural gas up in the Arctic Circle most of that is up in Canada where the Canadians have begun to drill very close to the Arctic and perhaps very soon inside the Arctic this is of great concern to people worried about the environment also oil and natural gas in the Russian areas in the Arctic Circle so that's one secondly it is becoming clearer and clearer that the Arctic is not just about oil and natural gas but it's about rare earth minerals neodym, prasodium terbium I'm not saying these properly because these are far too difficult for an amateur chemist or a person who is a geologist to pronounce but apparently these are key rare earth minerals found up in the Arctic Circle it is said that there are trillions of US dollars worth of wealth up in the Arctic much of it in what is claimed by Russia in other words it is in fact legally part of Russia because the way the UN convention the laws of the sea operates it has a standard which is that where your territorial limit ends there's about a 12 kilometer or so shelf where you are able to exercise your right and then there's about a 200 kilometer reach where you can exercise mineral rights the UN convention on the laws of the sea is very straight forwardly in the Arctic what is NATO doing up there in fact this is an interesting issue why are they militarizing the Arctic Circle the question has been raised because the United States has been conducting freedom of navigation exercises not only in the South China Sea but also in the Arctic Circle now that's interesting freedom of navigation exercises are conducted based on which the United States has not ratified so it's using a convention which it has not ratified to essentially quite aggressively move against Russia and China both of whom have vessels that go through that region so this is something that we need to pay attention to because it's an underreported story recently in Iceland there was an interesting exchange between the Chinese ambassador to Iceland and the Norwegian general who's in charge of the Arctic Circle arena and so on actually he's an admiral they had an interesting testy exchange around the question of sovereignty and so on I'm going to be following up and writing about this story for Globetrotter in the weeks to come it's a very interesting story highly underreported people are not paying attention to the flashpoints in the Arctic that could really lead to a significant clash between countries that register based on the UN convention on the laws of the sea that they have the right to do certain things other countries that are trying to prevent them particularly organized around NATO and then the question who owns those resources or whether indeed those resources should be mined at a time when the climate catastrophe is a worry for everybody around the planet well that's a good way to end I suppose this episode of give the people what they want brought to you by People's Dispatch that's Prashant and Zoe People's Dispatch.org best place to get your movement driven coverage I'm Vijay from Globetrotter 109th episode we'll be back with you next week with 110 see you then