AFP is reporting: “Ex-Morales’ officials take refuge in Mexico embassy in Bolivia.”
Time Magazine reported recently: “8 Killed, Dozens Injured as Bolivian Police Open Fire on Evo Morales Supporters.” “A tearful woman put her hand on a wooden casket surrounded by flowers and asked: ‘Is this what you call democracy? Killing us like nothing?’ Another woman cried and prayed in Quechua over the coffin of Omar Calle, which was draped both in the Bolivian national flag and the multicolor ‘Wiphala’ flag that represents indigenous peoples.”
See recent piece in The Guardian: “What the coup against Evo Morales means to indigenous people like me” and “Is Bolivia turning into a rightwing military dictatorship?” by Nick Estes. Also see “Bolivia’s Anti-Indigenous Backlash Is Growing” by Jacquelyn Kovarik in The Nation reporting from Bolivia who warned earlier this month: “The ouster of President Evo Morales has reignited the country’s long-standing racism against its indigenous peoples.”
See Twitter list on Bolivia for latest.
KATHRYN LEDEBUR, kath.ledebur at gmail.com
Ledebur is director of the Andean Information Network in Cochabamba and researcher, activist, and analyst with over two decades of experience in Bolivia. See the group’s Twitter feed — @AndeanInfoNet — which has recently highlighted the coup government preventing human rights groups from doing their work and a recent statement from the Center for Justice & Accountability: “International Human Rights and Humanitarian Law Experts Urge the Bolivian Government and Armed Forces to Abide by Their International Law Obligations,” which rebuffs the coup government attempting to immunize government officials from criminal repression of protesters: “Under international law, domestic measures that attempt to create such impunity for gross human rights violations, including extrajudicial killings, are invalid.”
ANDRÉS ARAUZ, [in Mexico City] andres.arauz at comunidad.unam.mx
Also via Dan Beeton, beeton@cepr.net, @Dan_Beeton
Arauz is a former Ecuadorian central bank official and a PhD candidate at the National Autonomous University of Mexico. As a senior research fellow with the Center for Economic and Policy Research, he has closely tracked the recent Bolivian election and violence since. See the group’s recent work on Bolivia, including piece at Dow Jones’ MarketWatch: “The OAS lied to the public about the Bolivian election and coup.”