Colombia

This is an - incomplete - list of groups in Latin America working on issues of conscientious objection and related areas.

We send you greetings on the International Day Against Violence Against Women.

We write in the name of two working groups of the War Resisters' International - the Women's Working Group and the newly-formed Colombia Working Group. As some of you know, War Resisters' International is an international anti-militarist network opposed to all war and committed to nonviolent action to remove the causes of war. WRI has affiliates in more than 30 countries, including in Colombia the Red Juvenil of Medellín.

On 25 November, the International Day Against Violence Against Women, la Ruta Pacífica de Mujeres and the National Movement of Women Against War are organising activities in Putumayo and elsewhere in Colombia, calling for a negotiated end to armed conflict, for demilitarisation and the respect of women's rights, and for alternatives to fumigation as a means to eradicate illegal crops.

Nos queremos independizar de toda forma de militarización y armamentismo.
20 de julio día por la independencia. Plaza de Bolívar: Hora 3:00 p.m.

Luis Gabriel Caldas
Vocero Continental
Red de Objeción

Luis Gabriel Caldas
Vocero Continental

Paraguay

enviado por Orly, desde el SERPAJ PY

9 de agosto del 2001

Después de siete años de vigencia de la Constitución Nacional todavía no se reglamenta la figura de la Objeción de Conciencia. Hubo dos intentos, uno en 1996 y otro en 1997, en ambas oportunidades el poder ejecutivo vetó las leyes sancionadas por el Congreso.

Brazil

Brazil is the fifth largest country in the world. Under the military government (1964-1985), Brazil also accumulated the largest foreign debt in the world—US $121 billion. A constitutional process began in 1986, culminating in a new Constitution in 1988. Fernando Collor de Mello was elected President in 1990, the first directly-elected president since 1960.

Brazilian women won the right to vote in 1932. Today, women represent 5 percent of the House of Deputies and .24 percent of the Senate.

Some 20 percent of Brazil's 35 million families are now headed by women. Most are poor and live with inadequate sanitation: over 90 percent of children under a year old in the Northeast live in homes with inadequate sewage systems.

Women in Brazil earn, on the average, 52 percent of what men do.

Brazil

Brazil is the fifth largest country in the world. Under the military government (1964-1985), Brazil also accumulated the largest foreign debt in the world--US $121 billion. A constitutional process began in 1986, culminating in a new Constitution in 1988. Fernando Collor de Mello was elected President in 1990, the first directly-elected president since 1960.

Economy: Gross National Product per capita is $2,540 (to compare, GNP per capita in the US is $20,910). High inflation, with almost half the population living below the poverty line.