Untold Stories

Paraguay: Priest in Wolf’s Clothes

Fernando Lugo was tense during our first formal interview.  I didn’t see this, but my photographer did. 

My first impression of the priest-turned-presidential candidate was that he was a politician through and through.  No different from the pols I meet in the States—slippery with a glass smile and an eye on the time.  His responses were short and calculated and he resisted all my efforts to bridge the reporter/source gap.

Click here to continue reading "Priest in Wolf's Clothes" and more from Charles Lane

Paraguay: The Brazilians

I asked Lena Rigley, the wife of a Brazilian soy grower, to read from the police report filed shortly after their soy plantation was invaded in 2001:

Approximately 50 people who call themselves peasants without land who live by the road came to the property violently with firearms. A group went directly to where the machinery is kept and another group went to kick-in the house door. One of the invaders screamed if they don’t come out they will kill them. They couldn’t see their faces because it was dark. The other group immediately set fire to the farm machinery and also burned the storage area.

Continue reading "The Brazilians" and more from Charles Lane in Paraguay.

Paraguay: "The Chemicals"

Here is a list of the chemicals used in soy production in Paraguay:

The main one being Glyphosate (Roundup Ready)
Pyrethrin
Triazole
Strobilurinas

The last three chemicals are relatively benign. Strobilurnias for instance is a fungicide used on food products and golf courses. The US Environmental Protection Agency issues only moderate risks to aquatic animals when it’s filtered through certain soils and says these three fall below their level of concern.

However, use of Glyphosate is more complicated and raises ample concern.

Click here to continue reading "The Chemicals" and more from Charles Lane in Paraguay.

Paraguay: "The Squatters"

Driving along highway 6 in Paraguay’s eastern Altro Parana department we encountered a community of landless squatters about 40 kilometers south of Santa Rita. There were 180 mostly women and children living in 57 shacks not 10 feet from the road. The nicer dwellings had floors raised off the dirt, rough sawn planks for walls, and a corrugated tin roof. The more modest ones were sticks tarped in black plastic.

Click here to continue reading "The Squatters" and more from Charles Lane in Paraguay.

Driving along highway 6 in Paraguay’s eastern Altro Parana department we encountered a community of landless squatters about 40 kilometers south of Santa Rita. There were 180 mostly women and children living in 57 shacks not 10 feet from the road. The nicer dwellings had floors raised off the dirt, rough sawn planks for walls, and a corrugated tin roof. The more modest ones were sticks tarped in black plastic.

Click here to continue reading "The Squatters" and more from Charles Lane in Paraguay.

Iraq: "Everyone should read this"

This is a remarkably frank assessment of the war, written by soldiers who are there. All of the Iraqis I have showed it to agree.

Click here to read more from David Enders and Richard Rowley in Iraq

This is a remarkably frank assessment of the war, written by soldiers who are there. All of the Iraqis I have showed it to agree.

Click here to read more from David Enders and Richard Rowley in Iraq

Paraguay: "Lugo’s Road to Hoqueta"

Today the road to Horqueta was clogged with flatbeds driving supporters to see Fernando Lugo speak. An announcement went out on the radio that the former Bishop turned presidential candidate would be speaking in the town square. More than 600 people came from as far as 50 miles away. They dressed in wool hats and scarves and parkas because it was cold and undoubtedly colder in the back of a flatbed traveling 40 mph.

Click here to read more from Charles Lane in Paraguay

Today the road to Horqueta was clogged with flatbeds driving supporters to see Fernando Lugo speak. An announcement went out on the radio that the former Bishop turned presidential candidate would be speaking in the town square. More than 600 people came from as far as 50 miles away. They dressed in wool hats and scarves and parkas because it was cold and undoubtedly colder in the back of a flatbed traveling 40 mph.

Click here to read more from Charles Lane in Paraguay

Iraq: "Why don't you ask him?"

Before leaving the Middle East, there was one last thing I had to do. F., an Iraqi friend and colleague who I worked with in Baghdad and was now living in Damascus needed to get to Jordan. He had been promised a job there. The only problem is that, despite extremely rare exceptions, Jordan has closed its borders to Iraqis.

Iraqis refer to it as “rent-a-whitey.” In Baghdad, I used to do it for people when they had to deal with the American military. It was no secret that the US military would take an Iraqi accompanied by an American much more seriously than an Iraqi alone. (This included, at one point, walking toward a snipers’ nest with my passport raised above my head, shouting, “I’m an American journalist.”)

Click here to read more from David Enders in Iraq

Before leaving the Middle East, there was one last thing I had to do. F., an Iraqi friend and colleague who I worked with in Baghdad and was now living in Damascus needed to get to Jordan. He had been promised a job there. The only problem is that, despite extremely rare exceptions, Jordan has closed its borders to Iraqis.

Iraqis refer to it as “rent-a-whitey.” In Baghdad, I used to do it for people when they had to deal with the American military. It was no secret that the US military would take an Iraqi accompanied by an American much more seriously than an Iraqi alone. (This included, at one point, walking toward a snipers’ nest with my passport raised above my head, shouting, “I’m an American journalist.”)

Click here to read more from David Enders in Iraq

News Points: "Occupation Boosterism"

The New York Times op ed "A War We Might Just Win" (July 30, 2007) by Brookings Institution scholars Kenneth Pollack and Michael O'Hanlon has occasioned much comment, most of it sparked by the chutzpah of two noted champions of the war describing themselves as "two analysts who have harshly criticized the Bush administration’s miserable handling of Iraq."

But Pollack and O'Hanlon's article was just as striking for how much they presumed to conclude, as to the status of U.S. military operations in Iraq, on the basis of a two-week visit in which every night was spent in Baghdad.

Click here to read more from News Points and Jon Sawyer

Paraguay: “I was born Colorado, and I will die Colorado”

Last night I attended my first political rally put on by the Colorado party, the party that has ruled Paraguay since 1947 making it the oldest government in the world. Never before have I seen such blatant puppeteering.

Close to 1000 people squeezed into the tiny courtyard headquarters of the Colorado Sectional in Itapua’s Cornell Bogado...

Click here to read more from Charles Lane in Paraguay

Last night I attended my first political rally put on by the Colorado party, the party that has ruled Paraguay since 1947 making it the oldest government in the world. Never before have I seen such blatant puppeteering.

Close to 1000 people squeezed into the tiny courtyard headquarters of the Colorado Sectional in Itapua’s Cornell Bogado...

Click here to read more from Charles Lane in Paraguay

A durable solution

Resettlement has been described by UN officials as the only “durable” solution for the Iraqi refugee problem.

Since Syria is one place that foreign journalists can work and interact with Iraqis, the problem has received coverage. Nonetheless, the humanitarian crisis continues to worsen. 

Click here to read more from David Enders in Iraq

Resettlement has been described by UN officials as the only “durable” solution for the Iraqi refugee problem.

Since Syria is one place that foreign journalists can work and interact with Iraqis, the problem has received coverage. Nonetheless, the humanitarian crisis continues to worsen.