President Rafael Correa of Ecuador is leading a relentless campaign against free speech, harassing his critics, forcing independent broadcasters off the air and hijacking the nation’s courts in his bid to bankrupt the country’s largest newspaper. After Emilio Palacio, the editorial page editor of El Universo, wrote a column accusing Mr. Correa of ordering the army to open fire on a hospital during a police protest, Mr. Correa filed a criminal suit against the editor and three of...

Now that it is known that Iran is moving ever closer to obtaining a nuclear weapon, the United States is targeting sanctions against the Iranian Central Bank. Likewise, the European Union is moving in the direction of imposing an effective oil embargo on Iran. These sanctions are apparently having a more dire effect on Iran’s economy as evidenced by their threat to close the Straits of Hormuz. If anything the Iranian government’s animus towards the West and towards the U.S and...

Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos has tried to build better relations with his counterpart in Venezuela, Hugo Chávez, who once accused the Colombian president of trying to have him assassinated. But as Mr. Chávez enters election year with stepped up rhetoric aimed at Washington and the opposition at home, Mr. Santos may be caught in the crossfire. One of the primary sources of antagonism between the two nations was Chávez’s alleged links to the Revolutionary...

Iran is quietly seeking to expand its ties with Latin America in what U.S. officials and regional experts say is an effort to circumvent economic sanctions and gain access to much-needed markets and raw materials. The new diplomatic offensive, which comes amid rising tensions with Washington and European powers, includes a four-nation swing through South and Central America this month by . His government has vowed to increase its economic, political and military influence in the United...

Press stories, as well as a television documentary, over the past two months have detailed the growing cooperation between South American drug traffickers and Middle Eastern terrorists, proving that the United States continues to ignore the mounting terrorist threat in its own “backyard” of Latin America at its own peril. A greater portion of financing for Middle Eastern terrorist groups, including Hezbollah and Al Qaeda, is coming from Latin America, while they are also setting up...

Earlier this month the Latin American and Caribbean Community of States (CELAC) held its first summit in Caracas, Venezuela. CELAC, which was created in 2010 excluded both the United States and Canada. It was created with the purpose of deepening regional integration within the Americas in order to form a regional block. However, with the rise of the left in Latin America, extreme and moderate, there is an additional element in the creation of CELAC: the reduction of U.S influence in the...

By In the wake of the September 11 attacks, the possibility of al-Qaeda infiltrating Latin America became a priority for U.S. intelligence and law enforcement officials. However, the most publicized incidents of radical Islamist activity in Latin America have not been linked to al-Qaeda but instead to the Lebanese Shi’ite Hezbollah, which is ideologically and politically close to Iran. These include the March 1992 bombing of the Israeli Embassy in Buenos Aires, Argentina and the July...

The international medical team treating Venezuela ’s cancer-ridden leader Hugo Chávez believe that, absent a radical change in his condition, he is not likely to survive more than six months. According to sources that have provided me privileged information and documents from within the Venezuelan regime for many months, recent tests show that Chávez’s cancer is accelerating and his chances of surviving until the October 2012 presidential elections are worsening. This...

The Justice Department's recent announcement that an Iranian agent attempted to recruit a Mexican drug gang to assassinate the Saudi ambassador in the United States presents an opportunity for the Obama administration finally to draw the line on Iran's growing presence in the Western Hemisphere. As we establish in a paper we co-authored recently for the American Enterprise Institute, "The Mounting Hezbollah Threatin Latin America," over the past several years, Iran, with its...

Until Chavez assumed power Iran's presence in the Western Hemisphere was not as strong as it is today. Its proxy, Hezbollah, had presence and even committed a number of atrocities in Latin America such as the attacks on Israeli and Jewish targets in Buenos Aires. However, its presence increased manifold since Chavez and his Bolivarian revolution began to spread throughout the hemisphere. Not surprisingly the Iranians have tried to carry out another act of terrorism by attempting to...