Latin Am’ migrants’ money exceeds aid

Remittances could reach $100bn in four years’ time
The amount of money sent home by Latin American migrant workers to their families has reached more than $62bn.

This figure now exceeds the combined total of all direct foreign investment and foreign aid to Latin America.

According to the Inter-American Investment Bank, the figure could reach $100bn in four years’ time.

The biggest share of money, $23bn, was sent back to Mexico, mostly from workers living in the United States remitting small sums each month.

Foreign remittances now rank along with oil and tourism as Mexico’s biggest foreign currency earner.

The Inter-American Development Bank, which supports the region with aid and other help, says the remittances will increase by about 15% a year during the next four years.

The bank describes the money as a very effective poverty reduction programme because it keeps between 8m and 10m families above the poverty line.

But it says it also means the economies of the region are not generating enough jobs to keep workers from leaving in the first place.

Another problem is that much of the money is sent back in small amounts and so it is difficult to track.

The average is between $100 and $150 a month.

That in turn makes it an unpredictable source of revenue for governments to tap into.

The bank says it wants people to get away from what it calls cash to cash flows and into account to account transfers but the bank says the recent crackdown on illegal immigrants by the US authorities could hinder efforts to get migrants to use banks.
By Duncan Kennedy

Ever the more reason why “Bush” Dances on Immigration Policies in this Country
Comment by Malvo.

Latin Am’ migrants’ money exceeds aid

Remittances could reach $100bn in four years’ time
The amount of money sent home by Latin American migrant workers to their families has reached more than $62bn.

This figure now exceeds the combined total of all direct foreign investment and foreign aid to Latin America.

According to the Inter-American Investment Bank, the figure could reach $100bn in four years’ time.

The biggest share of money, $23bn, was sent back to Mexico, mostly from workers living in the United States remitting small sums each month.

Foreign remittances now rank along with oil and tourism as Mexico’s biggest foreign currency earner.

The Inter-American Development Bank, which supports the region with aid and other help, says the remittances will increase by about 15% a year during the next four years.

The bank describes the money as a very effective poverty reduction programme because it keeps between 8m and 10m families above the poverty line.

But it says it also means the economies of the region are not generating enough jobs to keep workers from leaving in the first place.

Another problem is that much of the money is sent back in small amounts and so it is difficult to track.

The average is between $100 and $150 a month.

That in turn makes it an unpredictable source of revenue for governments to tap into.

The bank says it wants people to get away from what it calls cash to cash flows and into account to account transfers but the bank says the recent crackdown on illegal immigrants by the US authorities could hinder efforts to get migrants to use banks.
By Duncan Kennedy

Ever the more reason why “Bush” Dances on Immigration Policies in this Country
Comment by Malvo.

Castro’s ideals live on

HAVANA
By WILL WEISSERT,
Communist leaders called Tuesday for the revolutionary ideals of ailing leader Associated Press Writer Fidel Castro to live on as they marked the 50th anniversary of a failed attempt to assassinate dictator Fulgencio Batista.
“This revolution will continue for all time,” parliament speaker Ricardo Alarcon told hundreds of students and top government leaders, including acting president Raul Castro, who watched the event from a front row seat but did not address the crowd.

Alarcon praised the courage of Jose Antonio Echeverria, the University Student Federation president who was killed by police after the attack a half-century ago, and said that Cubans like him would ensure the socialist revolution would endure.

On Jan. 1, 1959 — barely 18 months after Echeverria’s failed assassination attempt at the presidential palace — Fidel Castro led an army of revolutionaries who toppled Batista’s government.

The 80-year-old Castro announced on July 31 he had undergone intestinal surgery and was temporarily ceding power to his brother Raul, the defense minister.

Raul Castro, 75, appeared less reserved than at many of his recent public events, smiling broadly and waving to the crowd before and after the hour-long event.

Staged outside the towering columns of the palace — since converted to the Museum of the Revolution — the celebration featured a skit where dancers slain during a mock struggle leaped to their feet anew and joined hands in a circle.

Echeverria was 19 on March 13, 1957, when he led a group of college students in the attack. A three-story, black-and-white photo of a beaming and pudgy Echeverria smiled down on those assembled.

The students seized the local Radio Reloj station and announced Batista’s death, unaware that he had survived. Echeverria was shot and killed by police minutes later.

Will communism thrive after Fidel Castro’s is gone ?
Comment by Malvo

Castro’s ideals live on

HAVANA
By WILL WEISSERT,
Communist leaders called Tuesday for the revolutionary ideals of ailing leader Associated Press Writer Fidel Castro to live on as they marked the 50th anniversary of a failed attempt to assassinate dictator Fulgencio Batista.
“This revolution will continue for all time,” parliament speaker Ricardo Alarcon told hundreds of students and top government leaders, including acting president Raul Castro, who watched the event from a front row seat but did not address the crowd.

Alarcon praised the courage of Jose Antonio Echeverria, the University Student Federation president who was killed by police after the attack a half-century ago, and said that Cubans like him would ensure the socialist revolution would endure.

On Jan. 1, 1959 — barely 18 months after Echeverria’s failed assassination attempt at the presidential palace — Fidel Castro led an army of revolutionaries who toppled Batista’s government.

The 80-year-old Castro announced on July 31 he had undergone intestinal surgery and was temporarily ceding power to his brother Raul, the defense minister.

Raul Castro, 75, appeared less reserved than at many of his recent public events, smiling broadly and waving to the crowd before and after the hour-long event.

Staged outside the towering columns of the palace — since converted to the Museum of the Revolution — the celebration featured a skit where dancers slain during a mock struggle leaped to their feet anew and joined hands in a circle.

Echeverria was 19 on March 13, 1957, when he led a group of college students in the attack. A three-story, black-and-white photo of a beaming and pudgy Echeverria smiled down on those assembled.

The students seized the local Radio Reloj station and announced Batista’s death, unaware that he had survived. Echeverria was shot and killed by police minutes later.

Will communism thrive after Fidel Castro’s is gone ?
Comment by Malvo

Attacks on Bush not personal

Hugo Chavez on left and Fidel Castro

Hugo Chavez has called President Bush a devil, a donkey and a drunkard. But on Wednesday the Venezuelan leader said his comments were “nothing personal.”

Chavez, who had stepped up his verbal assault during Bush’s Latin American tour this week, suggested that the two adversaries might eventually overcome their differences and even play a game of dominos or baseball together.

“One day, if maybe George Bush and I survive all of this, we will reach old age, and it would be good to play a game of dominos, street baseball,” Chavez said on his weekday radio program.

But he said his comments about the American leader were “nothing personal” and that his opposition to Bush was due to “deep ethical, political, historic and geopolitical” reasons.

Chavez has fiercely opposed U.S.-backed free trade policies and criticized the Bush administration’s handling of Iraq and other foreign policy decisions.

Chavez said Bush was part of a long line of elitist U.S. administrations that have become accustomed to abusing the rest of the world, acting unilaterally and violating human rights.

He also taunted the U.S. leader for skirting questions about Chavez during his Latin American tour in the past week, comparing him to a matador avoiding the bull with his cape.

“The president of the United States takes out his cape as always, Ole!, because he doesn’t want to respond” to pointed issues raised by the Venezuelan leader, Chavez said.

Bush on Wednesday completed a tour of Mexico, Brazil, Uruguay, Colombia and Guatemala.

Chavez went on something of a shadow tour of Bush’s trip over the same period, visiting several regional nations including Argentina, where he led thousands in an anti-bush rally.

Was Anti-bush comments a way for political gain and recoginition for Hugo Chavez ?
Comment by Malvo.