Violence and warfare in Colombia are often blamed on the drug trade, but their roots run much deeper and go back well over five decades.

The militarization of Washington’s Latin America policy is being led by the drug war, training programs, arms transfers, and a wide array of “military-to-military contact” efforts.

The militarization of Latin America, which begins at the U.S.-Mexico border, is undermining recent trends toward greater democratization and respect for human rights while doing little to stanch the flow of drugs into the United States.

The UN estimates that Africa will need $3 billion just for basic treatment and prevention programs, yet the U.S. and other Western countries donated only $300 million in assistance in 2000.

U.S. officials have sought to relax restrictions on intelligence sharing with Andean governments at a time when these provisions need to be strengthened.

On May 1, 2001, President Bush reiterated his campaign pledge to deploy a multitiered ballistic missile defense system as soon as possible.

After years of negotiations, stalling tactics, and domestic political debate, the U.S. Congress is considering ratification of bilateral trade agreements (BTAs) with the Socialist Republic of Vietnam and the Lao People’s Democratic Republic (Lao PDR or Laos) this summer.

The G8/G7, a self-constituted forum of the major free-market democracies, has situated itself at the center of global governance.

The Bush administration’s Andean Regional Initiative (ARI)—largely an expansion of U.S. support for Plan Colombia—passed the House of Representatives in late July, largely intact.

Over the past 30 years, study after study by academics, development practitioners, and international agencies has demonstrated the seemingly self-evident fact that women are equal to men, and sometimes surpass men, in contributing to social and economic development.

Poverty, social disruption and destruction stemming from these wars, and the proliferation of small arms and light weapons are major factors in expanding the use of child soldiers.

The explosion of U.S. military interest and funding for Plan Colombia, occurring in the wake of the U.S. withdrawal from military bases in Panama in December 1999, has given rise to a proliferation of new U.S. bases and military access agreements in the region.

The devastating terrorist attack that struck the U.S. on September 11, 2001, shattered New York’s massive World Trade Center, a piece of the Pentagon, thousands of innocent lives, and the illusion that sophisticated technology and powerful weapons could keep America safe.