The surname of Bolivia’s president, Rodrigo Paz, translates as “peace”, as does the name of Bolivia’s capital city, La Paz. But there is nothing peaceful about Bolivia right now.
Elected in October on a platform of alleviating Bolivia’s worst economic crisis in decades, Rodrigo Paz is already in serious trouble. After weeks of unrest, his fledgling government faces a general strike, nationwide road blockades and violent street clashes that have brought the country’s already struggling economy to a standstill.
At the root of the protests is the so-called “Marinkovic Law”, or Law 1720, which seeks to transform land rights in Bolivia by facilitating the conversion of small properties into medium-sized properties. This opens the way for large landowners to take over campesinos’ small holdings which, perhaps unsurprisingly, has found little favour among rural communities.
In recent days, demonstrators, led by mining unions, neighbourhood councils and indigenous organisations, have clashed with law enforcement as tensions boil over. As Jacobin reports, the protesters have converged on the capital from far and wide, many on foot, through gruelling conditions — all with one main goal: to demand Paz’s resignation:
Marching for over twenty days from the tropics into freezing high-altitude terrain, many wearing nothing more substantial on their feet than plastic sandals, land workers and indigenous representatives arrived in the capital of La Paz this week to defend their territories…
The marchers are from northern Amazonian territories of Beni and Pando and are protesting the new Law 1720, which will transform land rights in Bolivia and could herald the end of the plurinational model of land distribution that safeguards indigenous and peasant land holdings.
The march has been grueling. Many marchers suffered from dehydration and exhaustion; at least fifty indigenous marchers from the delegation of the Central of Ethnic Mojeño Peoples of Beni (CPMB) required medical treatment last week…
Law 1720 is the latest in a long-standing tendency in Bolivia toward the intensification of land inequalities with a view to benefiting large-scale agribusiness. Law 1720 supposedly benefits small-scale farmers by enabling them to convert their smallholdings into “medium-size” businesses and therefore to obtain mortgages. But in reality, Law 1720 sets a precedent for the encroachment on territories and communities by corporate interests.
Some images from La Paz over the last couple of days, including this great photo…
Footage of rural teachers marching through La Paz…
Ominously, the US and Israel have issued eerily similar statements denouncing the protests. This should not surprise our regular readers. Eight governments in Latin America, all members of Trump’s Shield of the Americas initiative and closely aligned with Israel — Argentina, Chile, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Guatemala, Panama, Paraguay, and Peru — have all issued a joint statement on Friday expressing “concern” over the humanitarian situation.
As we reported in our January 20 post, The Attempted Israelisation of Latin America, it is not just Washington that is seeking to significantly expand its dominance over Latin America through its alliance with far-right governments in the region; so, too, is Israel’s Netanyahu regime.
Notably, one of Rodrigo Paz’s first acts in government was to remove Bolivia from the Hague Group — an international bloc of Global South nations established in early 2025 to coordinate legal and diplomatic measures against Israel. Bolivia was a founding member.
A few days after that post, Middle East Eye similarly reported that “US interventions [in Latin America], including extensive lobbying by US politicians, threats against regional leaders and the recent seizure of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, are geared towards tilting the region towards much closer alignment with Israel.”
The recent Hondurasgate scandal exposed by Spanish news outlet Canal Red Latinoamerica revealed the extent to which Washington and Tel Aviv are willing to go to cement their dominance of the region — and the critical resources it holds. From The Canary:
At the centre of the story are the war-criminal US regime of Donald Trump, convicted drug trafficker and far-right ex-president of Honduras Juan Orlando Hernández, Argentina’s far-right president Javier Milei, and the genocidal government of Israel.
Key facts include that:
- Ahead of the 2025 election in Honduras, in which the US regime was clearly meddling, Trump pardoned Hernández (the “kingpin” who was in a US jail serving a 45-year sentence). Israel had paid for his release, and Trump apparently wanted him to regain power in Honduras. Hernández ally Nasry Asfura — the “façade” — won the election.
- Hernández sought to use public money to spread propaganda (in collaboration with the Trump regime) and destabilise left-wing governments across Latin America. In one audio, he advocated the use of violence, saying “if you want to keep people controlled, you need to oppress them“.
- The target would be “the cancer of the left” in Honduras and throughout Latin America. Mexico and Colombia, currently under left-leaning governments, would be key targets.
- The money for destabilisation efforts would come from Honduran public coffers, from Javier Milei’s network, and from Israel. Reactionary International describes the strategy as “the systematic conversion of Latin American states into dependencies of a US-Israeli axis, using money, media, military infrastructure, religion, and organised crime”.
- The reaction to the leaks was tens of thousands of cyberattack attempts in just one day, mainly seeming to originate from the US and Israel.
Rumours of Live Ammunition
US-supported crackdowns of indigenous resistance movements in Latin America have a tendency of ending in mass bloodshed. The most recent case was the Dina Boluarte government’s suppression of protests in Peru in 2022, which left 65 dead.
According to some unconfirmed reports, the Bolivian police have already received orders to use live ammunition against protesters.
Late afternoon Monday, Bolivia’s Government Palace was still surrounded by police and military forces. The barricades to block Bolivia’s highways — and by extension paralyse the country’s economy — are, if anything, growing as unions in the two most economically important regions (Santa Cruz and Potosí) just joined the general strike, now on day eight.
Meanwhile, prominent far-right influencers in Latin America, such as the Argentine Agustín, Antonetti are calling for foreign intervention, presumably from the US. Rolando Pacheco, a Bolivian deputy, of the Popular Alliance, has alleged that Argentina’s Milei government sent two plane loads of tear gas and other crowd control tools, just as the Mauricio Macri government illegally furnished Jeanine Áñez’s coup forces with weapons in 2019.
Blackwater founder and long-time Trump ally, Eric Prince, has also called for the US to intervene in what he describes as “a violent takeover of the government of Bolivia by an international cartel of narco communist terrorists”. From his Twitter account:
Heads up all those who respect rule of law!
Act immediately to prevent the violent takeover of the Government of Bolivia by an international cartel of narco communist terrorists financed and directed by the leader of coca growers in Bolivia, Evo Morales.
Morales stole hundreds of millions of dollars while he was President of Bolivia. He is a cocaine trafficker currently on trial for sexual assault of a minor.
Armed narcotics gangs and terrorists from Colombia, Chile, Cuba, and other countries have entered Bolivia, joining Morales’ own Bolivian militia of terrorists, and are taking over government buildings and even an airfield built by the US Drug Enforcement Administration, Morales’ nemesis.
They are attempting to surround and take the Presidential Palace in the capital city of La Paz, where the constitutional President and his Cabinet are working to protect the country. The objective of these terrorists is to overthrow the democratically-elected government of President Rodrigo Paz.
Paz has been in office mere months and is trying to clean his country of organized crime gangs, many responding to Morales, that have caused harm, violence, and economic hardship in Bolivia.
Please United States to take (sic) the lead in repelling the international criminal invasion of Bolivia and to restore order and constitutional rule. Bolivia had a real election. Rodrigo Paz won, don’t let the narcos overthrow him.
Prince has taken a growing interest in Latin America’s trouble spots since Trump’s re-election. The world’s most notorious military contractor has already been invited to help out, in an advisory role, in both Haiti and Ecuador, two of Latin America’s most violent countries. He also organised a crowdfunding campaign “Ya Casi Venezuela” (“Almost There Venezuela”) to raise funds to oust the Maduro regime. Where those funds ended up is anyone’s guess.
Economic Grievances
Besides Law 1720, the Bolivian protesters have other grievances. They include fuel shortages, the government’s removal of fuel subsidies, the controversial sale of “junk gasoline” (gasolina basura), which severely harms engine components in cars and motorcycles, an acute dollar shortage, the rising cost of living, aggravated by the progressive fall in exports of natural gas, historically the country’s main source of income, and a new US-led war on drugs.
The IMF is also back in town — not just figuratively but literally. An IMF mission is currently in La Paz hammering out the terms and conditions for a new loan, Bolivia’s first in five years. And Bolivia has had a complex relationship with the Fund.
As the Fund returns to Bolivia, so too, inevitably, will the privatisations of public services and national assets, including, of course, Bolivia’s vast trove strategic resources. Besides lithium and natural gas, Bolivia is an emerging frontier for critical minerals (primarily nickel and cobalt but also antimony, indium, and tungsten reserves). It is also a major producer of tin and silver, while also producing meaningful amounts of gold, zinc, lead, and copper.
In Paz’s defence, many of Bolivia’s economic problems long pre-dated his arrival, with the obvious exception, of course, of his government’s removal of fuel subsidies. Bolivia’s long-touted economic miracle turned sour a long-time ago, mainly because the key driver of that miracle — natural gas exports, principally to Brazil and Argentina — had begun to decline in price and volume.
However, since Paz took over the reins, Bolivia’s collapse has accelerated — the IMF forecasts a more than 3% drop in the country’s GDP this year. Workers’ already low salaries have depreciated sharply amid surging prices. The abrupt withdrawal of public subsidies has compounded the economic pain, fuelling increases of up to 160% in the price of diesel.
There are also fears that Paz’s government is planning to privatise Bolivia’s industries, including its natural gas and lithium mining sectors. Ominously, one of his first acts was to dissolve the Ministry of Environment and Water.
As one mining leader said, the protesters’ only demand is the president’s resignation:
The sole demand of the mobilised people is the removal of the president due to his inability to solve this country’s structural problems. He is leading us adrift, giving away our natural resources, mortgaging the country for our children and grandchildren.
There is another dimension to Bolivia’s nationwide protests, revolving around Washington’s alleged plans to capture former President Evo Morales (2006-19), who is on trial for allegedly fathering a child with a 15-year-old girl while in office.
Morales claims he is a victim of “lawfare” aimed at destroying him physically and morally. For her part, the alleged victim of the crime denies the charges and has requested that the case be dismissed, but the prosecution insists on proceeding.
After Morales refused to attend the hearings on the grounds that he would not receive a fair trial, the prosecution last week issued a warrant for his arrest. According to media speculation, Morales is hiding out in Cochabamba, where his most loyal supporters are protecting him against any risk of imprisonment or abduction by US-backed forces.
On Friday, Morales announced on Twitter:
“The U.S. ordered the government of Rodrigo Paz to execute a military operation, with the support of the DEA and the U.S. Southern Command, to detain or kill me.
According to Radio Kawsachun Coca, a leaked confidential document from the General Command of the Bolivian Police outlines a plan to capture the former president. The operation, dubbed “Operation Tambaqui Lightning,” would entail a massive deployment of forces in the Cochabamba region, jointly coordinated by the Government, the Armed Forces and the US DEA, which recently resumed operations in Bolivia following a 19-year absence.
For the moment there is no way of confirming the veracity of the alleged documents or Morales’ claims. That said, the US is developing a habit of abducting senior left-wing political figures in Latin America, starting with the January 3 “capture” of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife and serving senator, Cilia Flores.
In recent days, reports have emerged that the US plans to charge 94-year-old former Cuban leader Raúl Castro in connection with the deaths of four men aboard two Brothers to the Rescue planes shot down 30 years ago. On Sunday, Venezuela’s interim president Delcy Rodríguez turned former minister of industry and senior diplomat Alex Saab back over to the US in what is widely seen as definitive confirmation of her betrayal of the Chavista movement.
In other words, South American countries are on full alert for US military interventions in support of right-wing client governments in the region…
Nick Corbishley 