Protests in Colombia derail an important tax reform
The unpopular bill was going to be Iván Duque’s legacy
SINCE APRIL 28TH protesters have defied an 8pm curfew, and the risk of catching covid-19, to take to the streets of Bogotá, Colombia’s capital. They have burned buses and police stations and looted banks and shops. Protesters also blocked all the main roads leading to Cali, the country’s third-largest city, for several days, resulting in empty shelves in grocery shops and a shortage of medicine in hospitals. At least 24 people died and more than 800 civilians and police officers have been injured. On May 1st Iván Duque, the president, sent in the army to quell the violence.
This article appeared in the The Americas section of the print edition under the headline “Taxing times”
More from The Americas
Canada, China, Mexico and the art of retaliation
The three victims of Donald Trump’s trade war use different playbooks
Armed groups are terrorising Colombia’s border with Venezuela
The government has declared a “state of internal commotion” in response to the worst humanitarian crisis in decades
Brazil’s ragged finances are holding back its green ambitions
The transformation of its largest private port has lessons for the country’s aspirations
Donald Trump turns an angry gaze south
Relations with Central America are likely to worsen
Can Brazil’s left survive without Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva?
Brazil’s current president, a titan of the Latin American left, has no apparent heirs
Donald Trump is targeting Mexico like no other country
The United States’ southern neighbour is bracing for a wave of deportees and trapped migrants