Democracy in Latin America

Campus Report ^ | September 30, 2008 | Irene Warren

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Democracy in Latin America

by: Irene Warren, September 30, 2008

Frantically and with great urgency, the Human Rights Foundation in New York drafted a letter beckoning the Inter American Democratic Charter and Secretary-General Jose Miguel Insulza, with the Organization of American States (OAS), to honor the agreement to protect Latin American citizens from militant extremists. In addition, the organization invited Insulza to join its new program called The Inter-American Democratic Charter, as a way to bring global attention to his efforts in improving human rights in the Americas.

Several regional experts took part in an event at the American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research recently to discuss the region’s future challenge in establishing democratic institutions within its region, as Roger F. Noriega, a visiting fellow at AEI, explained.

“Despite the signing of the Inter-American Democratic Charter nearly seven years ago, you have repeatedly failed in your responsibility to activate its democratic clause,” the president of the foundation stated in a handwritten letter that he had addressed to Insulza, August 20, 2008. “As a result, the human rights situation in Latin America has fallen into a perilous state unlike any since military dictatorships ruled the continent in the 1980s.”

Further, Thor Halvorssen, the leader of the foundation, noted that “since the inception of the OAS, tens of thousands of people have been persecuted, detained, tortured and killed because of their political beliefs in the Americas.” Thus, “their pain and suffering finally led to the design of a mechanism to both prevent the systematic violation of human rights in the Americas and clearly denounce the violators.” However, Halvorssen warns Insulza, “with your constant unwillingness to implement the democratic clause, individuals throughout the continent are suffering terrible violations of their human rights.”....