Colombians head to the polls on 29 May for the first round of a presidential contest that will starkly pose left against right. In this Q&A, Crisis Group expert Elizabeth Dickinson lays out the stakes for the country’s future stability.
As protests in Colombia are met with deadly violence, Declassified reveals the UK’s National Crime Agency trained the Colombian police in a multimillion-pound five-year programme that is shrouded in secrecy.
May 16, 2021 Share
An increasing public debt and high fiscal deficit led to Colombia’s President Ivan Duque to announce an increase in taxes in what was seen as austerity measures for the struggling economy. But widespread violent protests condemning the move for over a week, led to withdrawal of the proposed bill by the government. The proposal was withdrawn within a week of its announcement and led to the resignation of the Finance Minister on May 3, weakening the Duque government.
A weakened Duque administration will be unable to take the strong fiscal measures required to avert the financial crisis faced by the Columbian economy. Rating agencies have underlined the need to generate more taxes without which the Columbian sovereign bonds will be downgraded to the level of junk rating. This will imply significant borrowing costs in the long run and a drought of finance in the short run. The situation can also get complicated from the increase in the interest rates of t
Twitter and Facebook clamp down on social media accounts of armed, Colombian FARC rebels with $10million US bounty for drug trafficking, for inciting violence against country s president
Twitter suspended accounts linked to Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, for allegedly inciting violence against the country s president in a new video
Facebook said it also removed content from the armed, Colombian rebel group FARC from its platform
FARC president Iván Márquez, 65, appeared in Jan 13 video with machine guns calling for Colombian president Iván Duque Márquez, 44, to be overthrown
Crack down from tech giants happens a week on from US Capitol riot