In Colombia, Who Needs to Invent a False Victim, President Santos?
While Santos enjoys an official visit to the UK, his inflamatory remarks about a group of human rights lawyers who have worked for years to end impunity in Colombia, has left them fearing for their lives in Bogotá. What does this…
Gay Marriage Legalized in Argentina Despite Huge Opposition From Church
On Thursday the 15th of July, Argentina became the first country in Latin America to legalize gay marriage, granting to gay and lesbian couples the same legal rights and benefits that heterosexual couples have traditionally…
Making their Mark - the rise and rise of The Latino-Brits
First generation Latino-Brits are bubbling under the surface and seeping through into mainstream British cultural life.
Things That Matter to ...Aleida Guevara
Aleida Guevara was the first born of Ernesto “Che” Guevara’s seven children. The Argentine-born revolutionary fought in Cuba and the Congo before dying in Bolivia in 1967 at the age of 39. Aleida has grown up with an iconic…
Why we should save Pueblito Paisa
Maria Castro makes a case against the demolition of Seven Sister's indoor market, where Colombians who have fled displacement to build a livelihood, face displacement again.
The Change in the Latino Vote
Once thought of as natural Republicans, Barack Obama captured the hearts of Latinos in the last US election. But the words 'American Dream' are no longer enough, they want help to achieve it. In the run up to the 2012…
Things You Should Know About….Santería
Santeria is a belief system that travelled from West Africa to the Caribbean and is now practiced all over Latin America, the US and even Europa. Yet much fear, mystery and misunderstanding surrounds it. To explode some of the…
Favourite Quotes From our Favourite Latinos
We have dedicated this section to the fond memory of President Hugo Chávez being told, in mid-rant, 'why don't you just shut up?' by the King of Spain. Candela celebrates the gaff, the rant and the good 'ole…
The Iraq Inquiry Needs this Brazilian!
Few people know that José Bustani was one of the single biggest obstacles to Tony Blair and George Bush’s plans for regime change in Iraq. He had to be got rid of. For the first time the recent Brazilian Ambassador to Britain…
The Uribe Legacy: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
In his eight years as president Álvaro Uribe changed Colombia. But was it all for the best?
The President and the Miners
Chilean president enjoys his moment in the spotlight after rescuing ‘the 33’. But beneath the media coverage he is in danger of burying some more complex issues.
¿Viva la Revolución? What happened to Mexico’s Zapatista Movement...
“Excuse the inconvenience, but this is a revolution,” proclaimed Subcomandante Marcos on the 1st January 1994. But in 2010, is it just a mild inconvenience that the government and media readily ignore, or is the Zapatista…
Evo Morales, President of Bolivia
Ana Caistor-Arendar falls under the Aymaran charm of Bolivia’s first indigenous president.
Latin American Liberation Theologists
Liberation theology is a brand of Catholicism that prioritises the helping of the poor by actively seeking social change, and came to prominence in Latin America in the 1970s and 1980s. Many priests who took this position were…
Abimael Guzman
Yes Peru’s most notorious inmate! I hear he wants another ball and chain...
Bodyguard Grandmother
Human shield in Colombia at 65? A daughter leaves London to find her mother who has decided to be an ‘unarmed bodyguard’ in the Colombian jungle.
Los Niños Vascos and The English Lord
In 1937, as Bilbao was being bombarded, 4,000 Basque children arrived in Southamption, thanks to some extraordinary individuals who defied the British government's official policy of appeasement (which ultimately contributed…
Modern Spain: Stylizing the Stereotypes?
Spain is a country that attracts strong stereotypes. Images of wife-beating machos, blood thirsty sports and crazy drivers may have dissolved since the years of Franco isolation, but siestas, fiestas and Flamenco is still what…
Sarmiento: Argentine National Hero or Ideologue of White Settler Racism?
2011's Latin American bi-centenaries saw governments celebrating their national heroes again. In Argentina, a broader process of revising its recent 'Dirty War' history has made many eager to revisit their more…
Sarmiento: The Forging of a Racist Ideologue (part 2)
In this second part of our article on the Argentine national hero, we travel with Sarmiento to Africa where he took notes on how the French waged war on the natives to promote white immigration and settlement. The lessons he…
Mexican Milk
Indigenous culture is used to market the country at home and abroad, so why is it that only white faces appear on Mexican adverts?
Latinos in London Part 2-The Liberation of being Latin in London
Lazy, violent and corrupt?…it’s sometimes tiring countering the contantly reinforced stereotypes of Latin America in the British media, but if we don’t do it who will? In the second part of our Latin London identity series we…
And will God look favourably this time?
Having withstood years of international criticism, Chavez may need a bit of divine favour in his closest election battle yet.
Being Latin in London - Part 1
We all come with a different story. From the high life of Carlos Acosta and polo players who mingle with royals, to the invisible cleaner working double shifts in city offices so that she can put her children through school back…
Surrogate Latino #1 Ian Mursell – Founder of Mexicolore with Graciela Sanchez
LAYING DOWN THE LORE – For 30 years Ian Mursell, development education specialist and his wife Graciela Sánchez, a dancer with the world famous Ballet Folklórico de México, and have worked with 2,000 primary schools and a wealth…
Revolutionary People - A Brief History of Latin Americans in London
From Francisco de Miranda and the revolutionaries of the Wars of Independence to Ossie Ardiles and the new UK-Latin music pioneers of today, Latin Americans in London have always been trailblazers and visionaries. Forging new…
Would Oil be a Blessing or a Burden? The Cubans Sure as Hell Want to Find Out...
With speculation in the air and a Chinese drilling rig poised off its coast, Hugh O'Shaughnessy visits the island and talks to Ricardo Alarcón, president of the Cuban Parliament, about the country's hopes and fears.
Chavez' Victory - A Point Proven?
Hugh O'Shaughnnessy reports from Caracas on an amazingly good electoral process and how cold warriors in some of London´s progressive papers who have been dissing Chavez as a dictator are having to eat their words.
Favourite Quotes from our Favourite Latinos...
Sofia Vergara, Mitt Romney, Dilma Rouseff, Carlos Tevez and George Lopez among the gaffers this week.
Not So ‘Pura Vida’
Sun and sea yes, but sex tourism, in Costa Rica? Behind the image of the Caribbean’s cleanest and most civilised tourist hotspot, lies a murky world, fed by foreign sex tourists, of exploitation and poverty.
Argentina finds a New Kind of Meat to Export
They're on the television all the time, they're in the magazines, they're on the arms of footballers, politicians and businessmen in all the smart restaurants and nightspots of Buenos Aires.........they are the new…
Cheap Frills Better than No Frills for Argy women
In post-crisis Argentina, middle class women have been forced to lower their lingerie standards.
Sins of My Father: an interview with Juan Pablo Escobar
Despite countless books, documentaries and feature films about Latin America's most famous drugs lord, until now a word has never been publically uttered about Pablo Escobar by his family. Sixteen years after his death, now…