Dispatches and Features

Despite US Import Ban, Sugar Cane Cutters Still Face Abuse in Dominican Republic

Fields of sugar cane are spread as far as the eye can see across Central Romana Corp.’s plantation. As the largest sugar producer and exporter, and the largest private landowner and employer in the Dominican Republic, the company has built an empire that covers most of the eastern part of the country.

Fire in Paradise: Fighting Wildfires in Puerto Rico - Latino Rebels

The mountain was on fire. The ground shook. “The Utuado volcano woke up,” people were saying. They had never seen a fire like it there before.

Environmental Activists in Puerto Rico Face Severe Repression

Amid sweltering heat, five burly men ripped a cement walkway up from the muddy ground, revealing dead mangrove roots sticking up like grave markers. Activists around them continued tearing down other parts of the path that led into one of more than a hundred wooden cabins built right on the beach, only occasionally stopping to check the progress of the men hacking away at the slab.

Venezuelan Becomes ‘Mother of Movement’ to ‘Stop Cop City’

A short woman with flowers in her raven hair, Belkis Terán touched a small dot of herbal oil to the base of activists’ and journalists’ necks before the march through Gresham Park began on Wednesday, June 29, on the outskirts of East Atlanta. Terán’s small ceremony, with its strange sense of calm, washed away the tension and excitement that moved through the crowd, some thinking that being so close to the forest would provoke a mountain of police repression. She would repeat it multiple times throughout the sixth week of action organized by the groups Defend the Atlanta Forest and Stop Cop City.

Recent Threats of School Shooting in Puerto Rico Part of Worrying Trend in Latin America

Puerto Rico has inherited a lot of cultural artifacts from the United States as its colony, such as fast food, car-centric city design, and Santa Claus. But the latest import is far darker than the others: the threat of school shootings.

Widespread Panic as Anti-Haitian Decree Goes into Effect in Dominican Republic (VIDEO)

Videos have flooded out of the Dominican Republic in recent days showing security forces corralling Black people outside their homes and loading them into cages on migrant control trucks to be carted off and, presumably, placed in detention centers or deported.

Reforesting Mangrove Trees Could Prove Key to Storm Defense in Puerto Rico

The sun shone brightly on a recent Saturday morning in Puerto Rico as a group of three dozen people grabbed mangrove roots from a bucket provided by organizers. Some of the planters were clad in waders while others wore flip-flops and board shorts, but all came to the beach town of Isabela for the same purpose: to restore the mangrove forests to their former glory in hopes of preventing the beach from moving inland.

How The Police in Puerto Rico Privatize Public Property

For years, the Puerto Rico Police Department (PRPD) has guarded public property that has been illegally privatized by the state and private businesses. But no public space remains more emblematic of the police barricade that guards the so-called New World than its oldest executive mansion, La Fortaleza.

An activist wears a “No Cop City” t-shirt at a “Slow Roll for Tort” event in Atlanta, Georgia. “Slow Roll for Tort” events have become a weekly event for cyclists attempting to keep alive the memory of slain activist Manuel “Tortuguita” Esteban Paez

For Latino Activists, ‘Cop City’ a New Phase of US Imperialism - Latino Rebels

Priscilla Grim lay comfortably in her hammock reading and enjoying the thick foliage of the South River Forest as music blared a few dozen yards away. Once the sun had set, she began making her way over to the South River Music Festival. But as she walked through the forest, police came at her quickly and without identifying themselves.