Bolivia's Morales seeks new election but army calls on him to resign

Yahoo – AFP, Francisco JARA, Raul BURGOA and Francisco JARA, 10 November 2019

Bolivian President Evo Morales, seen here at a news conference
November 10, 2019, calls new elections

President Evo Morales called new elections Sunday but the commander of the armed forces asked him to resign "for the good of our Bolivia" after an OAS audit found serious irregularities in elections last month that gave the leftist leader a fourth term.

Morales, Bolivia's first president of indigenous descent, promised new elections under the direction of a revamped Supreme Electoral Tribunal in a televised address but did not say whether he would run again.

With no sign of violent protests abating, the commander-in-chief of the armed forces, Williams Kaliman, told reporters he was asking Morales "to resign his presidential mandate to allow for pacification and the maintaining of stability, for the good of our Bolivia."

Kaliman said the armed forces had ordered "military operations in the air and on land to neutralize armed groups that are acting outside the law" by attacking opposition demonstrators.

The commander of the police, General Vladimir Yuri Calderon, also called on Morales to step down.

There were signs of disarray among Morales supporters, with the head of the lower house of parliament and the ministers of mines and of hydrocarbons announcing their resignations.

Two of those resigning cited risks to their families after mobs attacked their respective houses in the city of Potosi.

The opposition runner-up in Bolivia's recent polls, Carlos 

Mesa, has called for President Evo Morales to resign

Protests have flared across Bolivia since Morales was declared the winner of the October 20 election, beating his nearest rival, centrist Carlos Mesa, by just enough to avoid a second round.

An audit of the election by the Organization of American States, however, found "irregularities that range from serious to indicative," in virtually every area reviewed -- in the technology used, the chain of custody of ballots, the integrity of the count, and statistical projections.

"This leads the technical auditing team to question the integrity of the election results," the report on their preliminary findings said.

OAS Secretary General Luis Almagro said the results giving the leftist leader a fourth term in office "must be annulled and the electoral process must begin again."

Calls for resignation

Opposition leaders were not appeased, however.

Mesa said Morales should resign "if he has a speck of patriotism left."

The leader of a protest movement, Luis Fernando Camacho, said Morales "has fractured the constitutional order and must resign."

In Washington, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo urged the OAS to send a full mission to Bolivia to ensure free and fair new elections.

"In order to restore credibility to the electoral process, all government officials and officials of any political organizations implicated in the flawed October 20 elections should step aside from the electoral process," Pompeo added.

Police officers march with protesters against Bolivian President 

Evo Morales in Santa Cruz, Bolivia, on November 9, 2019

The October 20 results showed Morales, in office since 2006, defeating Mesa by slightly over 10 points, just enough to ensure an outright first-round victory.

It is possible that Morales came in first place in the first round but "statistically improbable" that he obtained the 10 percent margin of victory needed to avoid a second round, the OAS report said.

It said "the manipulations of the informatic system are of such magnitude that they should be thoroughly investigated by the Bolivian state to get to the bottom of them and determine responsibilities in this serious case."

Police rebellion

The dramatic turnabout came two days after police in three cities joined anti-government protests and a day after the opposition rejected Morales' appeal for urgent, open-ended dialogue.

Three people have died and more than 350 were injured in three weeks of often violent protests calling for new elections and Morales' resignation.

On Sunday, three people were injured, one with a gunshot wound, after a bus carrying miners to La Paz to join opposition protesters outside the presidential palace came under attack.

On Saturday, demonstrators overran two state-run media outlets and forced them off the air, while some police stopped guarding the square where Morales' presidential palace is located.

Profile of Evo Morales, who called Sunday for 

new elections after violent protests and claims 

of electoral fraud in the first-round presidential 

vote, which he claimed to have won

In announcing the new elections, Morales said, "I want to lower the tension. Everyone has an obligation to bring peace to Bolivia."

Morales said that in the new elections "the Bolivian people will be able to democratically elect new authorities, incorporating new political actors."

That begged the question whether Morales would stand again for re-election, a source of controversy because Bolivia's constitution, which he promulgated himself a decade ago, limits presidents to two terms.

Morales said Bolivia's bicameral legislature, which his party controls, would meet in the coming hours for the parties to work out procedures for changing out the electoral tribunal.

At the Vatican, Pope Francis on Sunday exhorted Bolivians to await the full results of the OAS audit with "peace and serenity."

Cuba called on the international community to condemn the protests against its close ally Morales as an attempted coup by "imperialism and the oligarchy."

Related Article:

Bolivia President Evo Morales announces resignation - New

G7 pledges millions to help fight Amazon fires

Yahoo – AFP, 26 August 2019

Nearly 80,000 forest fires have been detected in Brazil since the beginning
of the year, a little over half in the Amazon region

The G7 has agreed to spend $20 million (18 million euros) on the Amazon, mainly to send fire-fighting aircraft to tackle huge blazes engulfing parts of the world's biggest rainforest, the presidents of France and Chile said Monday.

The G7 club -- comprising Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the United States -- also agreed to support a medium-term reforestation plan which will be unveiled at the UN in September, France's Emmanuel Macron and Chile's Sebastian Pinera said at a summit in southwest France.

Brazil would have to agree to any reforestation plan, as would indigenous communities living in the Amazon.

The initiative was announced after G7 leaders meeting in the resort of Biarritz held talks on the environment, focusing on the record number of fires destroying chunks of the Amazon.

Macron had declared the situation in the Amazon region an "international crisis" and made it one of the summit's priorities.

He has threatened to block a huge new trade deal between the EU and Latin America unless Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, a climate change sceptic, takes serious steps to protect the forest from logging and mining.

"We must respond to the call of the forest which is burning today in the Amazon," Macron said Monday.

Nearly 80,000 forest fires have been detected in Brazil since the beginning of the year, a little over half in the massive Amazon basin.

Bolsonaro has lashed out at Macron over his criticism and suggested that NGOs could be setting the fires to embarrass him -- without giving any evidence to back the claim.

But at the weekend he finally caved in to international pressure to save a region crucial for maintaining a stable global climate, deploying two aircraft to douse fires and authorising the army to help tackle the blazes.

Speaking in Biarritz, UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said new planting was needed "to preserve this universal heritage, which is absolutely essential for the well-being of the world's population."

He said the issue would be discussed during the UN General Assembly in New York in September.

GRAPHIC: Amazon fires still active pic.twitter.com/qFDteP09Vs

— AFP news agency (@AFP) 26 augustus 2019

World court sinks Bolivia bid for sea access

Yahoo – AFP, Jan HENNOP and Danny KEMP, 1 October 2018

Bolivia -- South America's poorest country -- became landlocked after losing a
four-year war against Chile at the end of the 19th century, forfeiting territory and
 its access to the Pacific coast

The International Court of Justice on Monday ruled against landlocked Bolivia in a row with Chile over access to the Pacific Ocean that dates back to the 19th century.

Bolivia lost its prized route to the sea in a 1879-1883 war with Chile, and Santiago has rejected every attempt since then by its smaller and poorer neighbour to win back its coastline.

La Paz took Santiago to the top UN court in The Hague in 2013 to try to force it to the negotiating table over the maritime spat, a long-running strain on relations between the two South American countries.

"The court by 12 votes to three finds that the Republic of Chile did not undertake a legal obligation to negotiate a sovereign access for the... state of Bolivia," judge Abdulqawi Ahmed Yusuf said at the end of a judgement that took an hour and 20 minutes to read out.

The judge said, however, he hoped that "with willingness on the part of both parties meaningful negotiations can be undertaken".

Bolivia's leftist President Evo Morales -- who has used the issue to boost support at home as he seeks a fourth term in office -- attended the court in person for the verdict.

"Bolivia will never give up" its claim, Morales told reporters afterwards. "The people of the world know that Bolivia had an invasion and we had our sovereign access to the Pacific Ocean taken away from us."

Bolivia says regaining its territory which comprises of several hundred kilometres

of coastline along the northern tip of Chile will stimulate growth and development

'False expectations'

The ICJ was set up after World War II to rule in disputes between UN member states. The court's findings are binding and cannot be appealed, although it has no real power to enforce them.

Chile and Bolivia have had no diplomatic relations since 1978 when Bolivia's last major attempt to negotiate a passage to the Pacific broke down in acrimony.

The War of the Pacific pitted Bolivia and Peru on one side against Chile on the other, and saw battles fought in the Pacific Ocean, the Andes mountains and even in the Atacama Desert, the driest desert in the world.

Decades of post-independence border tensions in South America were finally ignited by a dispute over Bolivian attempts to tax a Chilean company mining saltpetre, a mineral used in fertilizer that was at the time replacing the traditional use of guano, the excrement of seabirds and bats.

Chilean President Sebastian Pinera lashed out at his Bolivian counterpart as he hailed the ICJ's decision.

"President Evo Morales of Bolivia has created false expectations in his own people, and has created great frustration in his own people," he said in a statement.

"We have lost five valuable years of the healthy and necessary relationship that Chile needs with all neighbouring countries, including Bolivia."

Based in The Hague, the International Court of Justice was set up in 1945

to rule on border and territorial disputes between nations

'The struggle continues!'

Morales has weaponised the dispute to boost his popularity at home where the importance of the issue is underscored by the fact that Bolivia still has a navy despite lack of access to the sea.

A small crowd of Bolivian protesters waved flags, played pan pipes and banged drums outside the Peace Palace for the verdict, shouting "The struggle continues!"

"Of course we are sad about the decision. We’re a small country, but we’re not Switzerland or Luxembourg. We need access to export and import our goods,” said Gabriella Telleria, 50, one of the protesters.

“We asked for justice and we didn’t get it,” she told AFP.

Bolivia says regaining the 400 kilometres (260 miles) of coastline along the northern tip of Chile that it lost in the war would stimulate growth and development in South America's poorest country.

Bolivian activists said the loss of the Chuquicamata mine, the world's largest open-pit copper mine which is situated in the disputed area, has also badly hit the country's indigenous peoples.

For its part, Santiago says the border is based on a 1904 peace treaty signed with Bolivia in the wake of the War of the Pacific and therefore must be respected.

Meanwhile, Chile has opened its own case against Bolivia over the Silala waterway, which flows into the Atacama desert and which La Paz has threatened to divert.

#UPDATE The International Court of Justice rejects a bid by Bolivia to force Chile to the negotiating table for access to the Pacific Ocean in a row dating back to the 19th century https://t.co/5TjZh9MFhB pic.twitter.com/i1BiinaE3s

— AFP news agency (@AFP) October 1, 2018

Development threatens Latin America's great Pantanal wetlands

France24 –AFP, 17 March 2018

A Yacare Caiman, in the Pantanal wetlands of Mato Grosso state, Brazil (CÁCERES
(BRAZIL) (AFP)

You can only just hear the murmur of running water through Plinia Rodrigues' vegetable garden, but that tiny stream has a huge job: keeping alive Latin America's mammoth wetlands, known as the Pantanal.

Rodrigues, 63, shows off the thick stands of palms and other native plants crowding around the fish-filled, crystalline water. The garden in the tiny community of Piraputanga in the far west of Brazil, near the border of Bolivia, looks like a little slice of paradise.

It's also important, one of a myriad of similar streams rising from the lush landscape to feed the mighty Paraguay river, which in turn underpins the Pantanal.

But with industrialized agriculture encroaching deeper and deeper into former wilderness, that fragile water network nestled between Brazil, Paraguay and Bolivia is now under serious threat, experts say.

The problem is that even if the Pantanal itself is protected -- and Brazil's Congress is currently considering additional measures -- destruction of the sources upstream would be just as bad.

Rodrigues, who raises chickens, makes cheese and grows vegetables, says the undergrowth flourishing along her stream shows its good health. The plants help keep the banks in place, shielding the water and the life in it.

"We don't touch the river banks, so they're full of trees. We want to preserve what we have," she said, adding that she has only told a handful of other people about the hard-to-access spot where the stream is born.

But she's aware of the growing threat from deforestation, pesticides and industrial-scale planting of monocrops like soya.

Once, big fish swam here but they vanished when a nearby hydroelectric station blocked their path, she says.

"Everyone around here works with soya. Since that started, our trees haven't produced such good fruit," she said. "We grew papaya for the market but not any longer and the oranges have turned ugly."

Natural treasure trove

Covering 65,600 square miles (170,500 square kilometers), the Pantanal contains some 4,000 species of flora and fauna. But even though the Pantanal is Brazil's best preserved biosphere, that doesn't mean it isn't under pressure.

The Pantanal itself enjoys many legal protections and some 82 percent is untouched, the World Wildlife Fund says, but in the area where water rises, 55 percent of the territory has suffered deforestation.

"This region is at risk and if nothing is done to change this, we'll start seeing the collapse of the Pantanal during the coming years," said Julio Cesar Sampaio, WWF's coordinator for the Cerrado-Pantanal.

On the Pantanal, life is governed by the coming and going of the dry and rainy seasons. Between October and May, rain-swelled rivers spill and gradually flood 80 percent of the whole area, leaving only rich green islands.

At peak flooding, the Pantanal is a spectacular place for fishing and adventurous tourists. Birds, alligators, jaguars, monkeys and the mammoth green anaconda snake call this magical place home.

The Pantanal also plays an important role in controlling the climate, says Sergio Freitas, who studies the region at the University of Brasilia.

"The surface functions as a big mirror made of water, reflecting part of the heat back and making the climate more agreeable," he said.

It's not that humans can't coexist with the natural treasure house. Local cowboys, called "pantaneiros," move their herds in rhythm with the movement of the floods.

Freitas said ranchers have had a presence for more than 200 years without causing undue impact. The problem was the arrival in recent decades of intensive agriculture, reducing the topsoil and muddying the streams.

A better balance could still be achieved if the government applies incentives for producers to diversify and to steer away from current unsustainable practices, he said.

Development threatens Latin America's great Pantanal wetlands https://t.co/LgCKvqlVZq pic.twitter.com/kzGw4rKWbD

— AFP news agency (@AFP) March 18, 2018

Amazon's indigenous people 'never so threatened': pope

Yahoo – AFP, January 19, 2018

Pope Francis shakes hands with an indigenous woman during a meeting with
 Amazon basin community members from Peru, Brazil and Bolivia, in the Peruvian
city of Puerto Maldonado (AFP Photo/Vincenzo PINTO)

Puerto Maldonado (Peru) (AFP) - Pope Francis sounded a stark warning about the future of the Amazon and its peoples during a visit to the region on Friday, saying they had "never been so threatened."

In a speech to thousands of tribe members on the edge of the rainforest in Peru, he said the Amazon and its peoples bore "deep wounds."

Francis lamented "the pressure being exerted by great business interests that want to lay hands on its petroleum, gas, lumber, gold and forms of agro-industrial monocultivation."

Bare-chested tribesmen, their bodies painted and their heads crowned with colourful feathers, danced and sung for the pope when he arrived in the Peruvian city of Puerto Maldonado.

Thousands of indigenous people had traveled to meet the pontiff from throughout the Amazon basin region of Peru, Brazil and Bolivia.

Members of one of the tribes presented the pope with a bow and arrow in a symbolic gesture aimed at urging him to defend land rights they say they have been stripped of.

"The native Amazonian peoples have probably never been so threatened on their own lands as they are at present," said the pope, who appeared visibly moved by the reception.

"Amazonia is being disputed on various fronts," he said.

"The problems strangle her peoples and provoke the migration of the young due to the lack of local alternatives.

"We have to break with the historical paradigm that views Amazonia as an inexhaustible source of supplies for other countries without concern for its inhabitants."

Bolivia ruling party defies referendum, backs Morales for 4th term

Yahoo – AFP, December 17, 2016

Bolivia's President Evo Morales, seen in November 2016, has the backing
 of his ruling party to run for a fourth term in 2019, despite the results of a
February referendum (AFP Photo/Aizar Raldes)

La Paz (AFP) - Bolivia's ruling socialist party on Saturday defied the results of a February referendum and backed President Evo Morales for a fourth term in 2019.

The Movement for Socialism (MAS) party, holding a congress in the eastern city of Montero, approved the candidacy of Morales -- Bolivia's first president with an indigenous background -- in a unanimous vote.

Morales welcomed the party's decision, saying, "If the people decide it, Evo will continue."

He added: "So many times we have defeated the right."

Morales was first elected president in 2005, and re-elected in 2009 and 2014.

But he narrowly lost the referendum in February on the question of whether the constitution should be revised to permit him to run again in 2019. His current term expires on January 22, 2020.

The party congress Saturday recommended "four legal alternatives" to allow his candidacy within the constitutional framework, according to a union leader who read the conclusions.

The first was a partial constitutional reform through an initiative requiring the signatures of some 20 percent of the electorate. Another also involves a constitutional reform to allow an extended presidential mandate.

The third recommends that the president renounce his office before the 2019 elections, so that he would not have served three full terms, while the fourth involves a reinterpretation of the constitution.

Morales, who has cultivated an "everyman" image, has been highly popular throughout most of his presidency.

He won his first election with 54 percent of the vote, his second with 64 percent and his third with 61 percent.

Morales has generally benefited from a fragmented opposition.

At the time of the February referendum, his popularity had been damaged by allegations that he had fathered a child with a young woman, Gabriela Zapata, and done favors for the Chinese company employing her.

He admitted the two had had a son, who died in infancy, but emphatically denied the other allegations.

Still, he lost the referendum by a narrow margin, 51 percent to 49 percent, and vowed to continue pressing the leftist platform that underlies his popularity.

As president, he has worked to redistribute the nation's natural gas wealth and provide a more inclusive environment for the indigenous majority.

To burnish his common-man credentials, Morales has often traveled on foot or stopped to play soccer with locals.

But some Bolivians said they felt he had amassed too much power in his years in power, and that the onetime outsider had himself joined the elite establishment.

In a survey early this month, the Ipsos polling firm found Morales's popularity had slipped a bit but was still relatively solid, at 49 percent.

Football mourns as plane crash kills Brazilian players

Yahoo – AFP, Rodrigo Almonacid, November 29, 2016

Rescuers and aviation authorities said the survivors of the LAMIA plane crash were
three players, two crew members and a journalist (AFP Photo/Raul ARBOLEDA)

La Unión (Colombia) (AFP) - The football world was plunged into mourning Tuesday after a plane carrying a Brazilian team crashed in the mountains in Colombia, killing 75 people with six survivors, officials said.

Football legends Pele and Maradona as well as current superstar Lionel Messi led tributes to the players of Chapecoense Real.

Having risen only recently from obscurity, the team was on its way to play in the finals of the Copa Sudamericana, South America's second-biggest club tournament when the accident took place.

"The pain is terrible. Just as we had made it, I will not say to the top, but to have national prominence, a tragedy like this happens," club vice-president Ivan Tozzo told Globo SportTV.

"It is very difficult, a very great tragedy."

Colombia's civil aviation authority said in a statement that 75 people were killed in the crash and six survivors were being treated in hospital.

'Electrical failures'

The charter plane of Bolivian company LAMIA, which left from the Bolivian city of Santa Cruz, declared an emergency at around 10:00 pm Monday (0300 GMT Tuesday).

It reported "electrical failures" and crashed a short time later near the city of Medellin, its destination, officials said.

The British Aerospace 146 airliner was first sold as new in 1999 and was used by two other airlines before being eventually acquired by LAMIA, a spokesman for the manufacturer told AFP.

Aircraft tracking website Planespotters said it was sold to LAMIA in 2013.

Specialist sites revealed that the same plane was used two weeks ago to fly the Argentine national team with Messi on board to San Juan, Argentina for a World Cup qualifying match.

Britain's Air Accidents Investigation Branch said it was sending investigators along with representatives of the plane's manufacturer BAE Systems to Colombia to help with investigations.

Map showing the flightpath of the LAMIA airlines plane that crashed late Monday 

with 81 people on board. (AFP Photo/Vincent LEFAI, Jean Michel CORNU)

'Disastrous scene'

Scores of rescuers picked through the wreckage of the white fuselage which was plastered over a remote hillside in northwestern Colombia.

The plane went down about 50 kilometers (30 miles) from Medellin, the country's second largest city, in an area called Cerro Gordo.

Elkin Ospina, the mayor of the town of La Ceja near the crash site, said the mountainous terrain was some 3,300 meters (10,800 feet) above sea level and very difficult to access.

"We found ourselves faced with a disastrous scene. The plane was completely destroyed," fire service captain Elkin Gonzalez told AFP.

In all, there were 72 passengers and nine crew on board, including the team and numerous journalists going to cover the game.

Rescuers and aviation authorities said the survivors were three players, two crew members and a journalist.

"I have just seen the plane and given the state it is in, it is a miracle that six people survived," said the governor of the surrounding Antioquia region, Luis Perez.

The survivors included three players: defenders Helio Neto and Alan Ruschel and another goalkeeper, Jakson Follmann.

The other known survivors were two crew members and a journalist.

The team's goalkeeper Marcos Danilo Padilha, 31, died on the way to hospital, the civil aviation authority said.

His last-minute save in the semi-final had ensured the team made it through to the Copa Sudamericana final.

Brazil's Chapecoense Real players were on the plane and were to have played in

 the Copa Sudamericana finals on Wednesday against Atletico Nacional de Colombia 

(AFP Photo/Nelson Almeida)

Game suspended

The cup final first-leg had been scheduled for Wednesday against Atletico Nacional of Colombia.

In an emotional gesture, Nacional called in a statement for the title to be handed to its Brazilian opponents in tribute.

It asked of CONMEBOL "that the Copa Sudamericana title be handed to Chapecoense Football Association as an honorary trophy for its great loss, and as a posthumous homage to the victims of the fatal accident that has put our sport in mourning."

Regional football confederation CONMEBOL suspended the game. It had yet to announce how the title would be settled.

A source close to CONMEBOL told AFP it was "very unlikely" that the final would ever be played.

Brazil's President Michel Temer declared three days of mourning for the victims.

Dashed dreams

Chapecoense is seen as one of the minnows of Brazilian club football.

It was founded in 1973 in the city of Chapeco in southern Santa Catarina state.

After decades in the lower divisions, Chapecoense returned to Brazil's top flight Serie A in 2014 for the first time since 1979.

The mayor of Chapeco, Luciano Buligon, described the city's despair, in tearful comments to TV Globo.

"We have moved from a dream to a true nightmare," he said.

Related Article:

Bolivia shuts down Colombia crash airline

Castro's Cuba, beacon in Latin America's leftist tide

Yahoo – AFP, Alexandre Grosbois, November 27, 2016

A billboard depicting Cuban revolutionary leader Fidel Castro and reading "The
 Revolution Will Go On," is seen in Havana, on November 27, 2016 two days after
his death (AFP Photo/Yamil Lage)

Havana (AFP) - Beyond his native Caribbean island, Fidel Castro's revolutionary fire set alight much of Latin America, helping drive numerous leftist allies to power in a tide that is now turning.

"Cuba was a model, a beacon for the left in Latin America," said Gaspard Estrada, head of the Latin America Observatory at the Sciences Po politics institute in Paris.

Over the decades, Cuba became a mecca for Latin American leftist dissidents. Thousands of men trained at the Punta Cero military camp near Havana and took up arms against the US-backed right-wing regimes that prevailed in the region.

Here are some of Castro's most prominent friends and admirers across the continent over the years.

Venezuela's late socialist leader Hugo Chavez (L) possibly shared the most 

similarities with Fidel Castro's revolutionary fervor (AFP Photo/Pablo Porciuncula)

Chavez

Venezuela's late socialist leader Hugo Chavez possibly came closest to matching Castro's revolutionary fervor and charisma in recent times.

Castro had backed guerrillas in Venezuela in the early 1960s, as in various other countries.

But it was not until 1998 that Chavez was elected, ushering in what he called "21st-century socialism" strongly influenced by the Cuban revolution.

Often appearing in public with his friend Fidel, Chavez became the Latin American left's provocateur-in-chief with respect to the United States.

Chavez died in 2014 and his protege Nicolas Maduro was elected to replace him. Maduro is now facing pressure to quit over a grave economic crisis.

Brazil's former president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva (L) became Cuba's second

most prominent ally after Chavez (AFP Photo/Roberto Stuckert Filho)

Lula

Brazil's former president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva became Cuba's second most prominent ally after Chavez.

A working class union leader, Lula came to power in 2003 and presided over a boom in Latin America's biggest country, winning international plaudits.

But Brazil plunged into recession in 2015 under Lula's successor Dilma Rousseff. She was impeached this year, when conservatives came to power.

Kirchner

Castro allies dominated politics in Argentina from 2003 under Nestor Kirchner and his wife Cristina, who succeeded him in 2007.

Reacting after Castro's death, Cristina Kirchner called her friend Castro and Cuba "an example of dignity and sovereignty."

She became one of the most outspoken anti-US figures in the so-called "pink tide" of leftist governments that swept Latin America from the late 1990s.

She left office a year ago, replaced by conservative Mauricio Macri in another shift to the right.

Bolivia's president Evo Morales (L) hailed Fidel Castro as "the master of

revolutionaries" after his death (AFP Photo/Adalberto Roque)

Morales

Bolivia's president Evo Morales is a confessed admirer of Castro, whom he has called "wise grandfather."

A former farmer and unionist, Morales became the first indigenous person to become Bolivia's president in 2006.

He hailed Castro after his death as "the master of revolutionaries."

"He guided us to raise our voices against those who tried to impose policies of domination to rob us of our natural resources," Morales said in a speech.

Morales lost a referendum in February on whether he should be allowed to stand for a fourth term in office.

Ortega

Castro backed the 1979 Sandinista revolution in Nicaragua, a staunch ally of its guerrilla leader, Daniel Ortega.

Unlike some leaders in the "pink tide," Ortega is hanging on. He won re-election this month to a third consecutive term. His opponents say the poll was rigged.

Castro also helped the rebel groups that formed the Farabundo Marti front in nearby El Salvador in the 1980s. One of its former commanders, Salvador Sanchez Ceren, is currently president.

Castro "is mourned in Cuba, across Latin America and in other places because of what he symbolized for the independence of his country and national pride, as a fighter for self-determination," said Geoff Thale of the Office on Latin America, a Washington-based NGO.

Related Articles:

World reacts to death of Cuba's Fidel Castro

Kryon Q&A

QUESTION (2005): Dear Kryon: I read in a spiritual article that Fidel Castro's mission is to show how to do things without money, that this is the reason why he and the tropical revolution have been kept alive. Is that true? If not, then why didn’t Cuba change when Eastern Europe changed? Has Fidel Castro been working for the light or is he a part of the old energy?

Answer: This leader is of the old energy, but was needed for the time. The real reason was to bring the Soviet Union close to your shores in order to help with the year 2000 Armageddon scenario that didn’t happen. His earthly masters would have played a very important part in Cuba with the nuclear war you didn’t have.

That’s the whole reason, and now he exists as a relic of what didn’t happen. His society is poor, and the culture is not elevated or pleased with itself. This energy will change soon… sooner than you think. Then you will see a Cuba that has been “hiding” for a very long time, and also realize the unbalance and cultural richness that has been there all along.

"Recalibration of Knowledge" – Jan 14, 2012 (Kryon channelled by Lee Carroll) - (Subjects: Channelling, God-Creator, Benevolent Design, New Energy, Shift of Human Consciousness, (Old) Souls, Reincarnation, Gaia, Old Energies (Africa, Terrorists, Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Venezuela ... ), Weather, Rejuvenation, Akash, Nicolas Tesla / Einstein, Cold Fusion, Magnetics, Lemuria, Atomic Structure (Electrons, Particles, Polarity, Self Balancing, Magnetism), Entanglement, "Life is necessary for a Universe to exist and not the other way around", DNA, Humans (Baby getting ready, First Breath, Stem Cells, Embryonic Stem Cells, Rejuvenation), Global Unity, ... etc.) - (Text Version)

"... I want you to watch some countries. I don't have a clock [this statement is Kryon telling us that there is no time frame on his side of the veil, only potentials]. I'll just tell you, it's imminent [in Spirit's timing, this could mean as soon as a decade]. I want you to watch some countries carefully for changes. You're going to be seeing changes that are obvious, and some that are not obvious [covert or assumptive]. But the obvious ones you will see sooner than not - Cuba, Korea [North], Iran, of course, and Venezuela. I want you to watch what happens when they start to realize that they don't have any more allies on Earth! Even their brothers who used to support them in their hatred of some are saying, "Well, perhaps not anymore. It doesn't seem to be supporting us anymore." Watch the synchronicities that are occurring. The leaders who have either died or are going to in the next year or so will take with them the old ways. Watch what happens to those who take their place, and remember these meetings where I described these potentials to you.

The Old Energy is Alive, But Not Happy

I want to tell you something: Old energy dies kicking and screaming. Old energy does not surrender, ever. Old energy simply dies hard and slow. There will be hold-outs for a long time. There will be those who are convinced that the only way to get what they want is to create drama, war, and fear. They continue to want to spring up in places you felt were safe, and to pull you backwards with them. They hate the fact that the earth is going soft on them, and they continue to rattle their sabers, make threats, and make news doing it. They're not the majority, Human Being, but often they are the loudest. When you walk around in perfect health and you are feeling great except for your sore toe, what do you think about? Your SORE TOE! So then you watch your media talk about sore toes for endless hours, and you get depressed. I know you understand the metaphor. ..."