Argentina uses yuan for the first time to settle part of its IMF debt

The lack of dollars in its central bank’s international reserves forced the government of Argentina to make an unprecedented decision this Friday:

For the first time, it met a payment obligation with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in Chinese yuan worth the equivalent of one billion US dollars - with a further $1.7 billion paid in Special Drawing Rights (SDR), the IMF’s currency.

This is the first time that President Alberto Fernández's administration resorts to freely available yuan from the currency swap with China to pay the international organization.

This money was intended to finance imports from the Asian country - but officials had already anticipated that it could be put to other uses.

Argentina's trade deficit with China reached a record $9.5 billion last year, as the South American country's economy continued to recover from a "Macrisis" inherited from Fernández's right-wing predecessor, Mauricio Macri (2015-19) - as well as a short but deep recession amid Covid lockdowns in 2020.

The "Argenchinese" swap, first signed in 2014 after Argentina was locked out of credit markets by vulture fund lawsuits, was since expanded - under both left- and right-wing administrations - to 130 billion yuan ($18.8 billion).

At: https://english.elpais.com/economy-and-business/2023-07-01/argentina-uses-yuan-for-the-first-time-to-settle-part-of-its-imf-debt.html

Argentine Economy Minister Sergio Massa shares his country's football jersey with a Chinese State Grid official during a visit to Shanghai in May.

Argentina's severe hard currency shortage - compounded by a 100-year drought - has forced the country to rely on its growing Chinese yuan swap portfolio to finance both Chinese imports and its $190 billion foreign public debt - which doubled under the Trump-backed Mauricio Macri administration (2015-19) but has since stabilized.

First solar-powered soy oil plant in the Americas opens in Argentina

The first “green” soybean oil production plant in the Americas, 100% powered with solar energy and without waste or the use of chemical solvents, was inaugurated in the town of San Andrés de Giles, northwest of Buenos Aires, on Thursday.

The 16,000 ft² plant, powered by 412 photovoltaic panels, was developed not by one of Argentina's large agro-industrial conglomerates (most of them owned by U.S., European, or Chinese interests) - but by Rumará, a locally-owned and women-owned medium firm.

“It is the first industrial plant in America that will produce soybean oil from renewable energy,” Industry Secretary José Ignacio de Mendiguren, 72, exulted. “It's a project led by women, which adds value, industrializes rural areas and boosts the countryside, and transforms a product of 500 dollars a ton into one of 1,600 dollars a ton.”

Financed by the Argentine Development Bank (BICE) and the CreAr subsidized business credit program, the plant has a milling capacity of 250 tons of soybeans daily - equivalent to 95,000 tons a year.

Currently, the firm works with 22,000 owned and leased acres of prime Pampas land, has 40 employees and sells mainly to the domestic market. The new plant, however, will allow them to begin exporting.

Green soybean oil, which was registered under the Oil Green brand, is the first to be produced based on renewable and clean energy. In addition, production does not generate waste and no solvents are used in the preparation of the product.

Argentina is the world's fourth-largest soy oil producer, and the top exporter - earning $7 billion for the hard currency-strapped country last year alone (nearly 8% of goods exports).

At: https://euro.eseuro.com/trends/557309.html

Argentine Economy Minister Sergio Massa (center-left, with blue tie) and Industry Secretary José Ignacio de Mendiguren (center-right, with green tie) headline the opening of the first first “green” soybean oil plant Argentina - and in the Americas - on Thursday.

Massa described the plant, developed by one of the few women-owned agroindustrial firms in the country, as “what Argentines can do if we align the work of the State with the will, the desire for investment, the capacity, the talent, the creativity of the private sector - and above all the entrepreneurial vocation of Argentines.”

Massa, 51, is running for president on the ruling, center-left Union for the Homeland ticket - whose chances have been throttled by 114% inflation and a record drought that has tightened hard-currency access in severely-indebted nation of 46 million.

Former GOP congressman shames colleagues for taking credit for funding they opposed

After President Joe Biden's $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill was signed into law in 2021, the White House says it has distributed around of $42 billion across America to expand internet access to rural and isolated communities and fund roads and bridges, public transit, water infrastructure, power grids, and airports.

One of the Republicans who voted in favor of the bill was former Illinois Rep. Adam Kinzinger, who took to Twitter and called out his former colleagues.

Kinzinger quote-tweeted a post from Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) that celebrated her state's receiving of funds for its transit system, accusing her of hypocrisy.

"I can't say how upsetting it is: I voted for this money and took a lot of heat from GOP. Mace didn't but is happy to pretend she did once the heat is off," he tweeted.

Republicans who voted in favor of the bill at the time were attacked by members of their own party. As Newsweek points out, Georgia GOP Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene even called them "traitors."

At: https://www.alternet.org/former-gop-congressman-shames-colleagues/

Former Illinois Congressman Adam Kinzinger: Keeping them honest (or at least, trying to)

Argentina's political coalitions define tickets for this year's elections

With just hours until the deadline for registering candidates for this year's federal elections in Argentina, the country's leading coalitions have announced their respective tickets for first-round elections scheduled for August 13th.

Economy Minister Sergio Massa, 51, will run for president as the sole candidate for the ruling, center-left Peronist coalition - recently rebranded as Unión por la Patria ('Unity for the Homeland').

An 11th-hour agreement resulted in two other major Peronist candidates - left-wing Interior Minister Eduardo de Pedro, 46, and centrist Ambassador to Brazil Daniel Scioli, 66 - bowing out in favor of Massa, who now faces only token primary opposition from left-wing activist Juan Grabois, 40.

The pragmatic Massa, widely credited with averting a collapse since taking office last July, has struggled with inflation reaching 114% - partly the product of a severe debt and currency crisis inherited from right-wing President Mauricio Macri in 2019.

Outgoing President Alberto Fernández's Cabinet Chief, Agustín Rossi, 63, will be Massa’s running mate. Facing 20% approval, Fernández, 64, has opted out running for re-election.

Vice President Cristina Kirchner, 70 - the most popular figure among Peronist voters, but who's currently appealing a conviction for public works bid-rigging during her 2007-15 presidency - is likewise not running.

Divided opposition?

The main opposition, the right-wing 'Together for Change' (JxC) coalition, on the other hand remains divided between five tickets - with most JxC votes likely to be divided between a moderate wing led by Buenos Aires Mayor Horacio Rodríguez Larreta, 57, and Macri's hard-line former Security Minister Patricia Bullrich, 67.

In an apparent bid to counter Bullrich's appeal among hard-right voters, Larreta tapped Jujuy Province Governor Gerardo Morales, 63, as his running mate.

Morales reaped controversy this week for his crackdown of protests that erupted after he fast-tracked a provincial constitutional overhaul that restricted rights to protest and strike and stripped indigenous peoples of land rights.

Neo-fascist wild card

The two major coalitions are getting stiff competition this year from neo-fascist "libertarian" candidate Javier Milei, 52.

Running with far-right Congresswoman Victoria Villaruel, 48, a vocal apologist of the country's fascist last dictatorship, Milei has vowed to "dynamite" the Central Bank and other government institutions, dollarize the economy (despite a near-total lack of dollars to compensate the nearly 30 trillion pesos in deposits and circulation), and deregulate everything from the economy to organ transplants and adoptions.

Milei and Villaruel have slammed the country's progressive abortion, women's, disabled, and LGBT rights - a position shared with many in the more mainstream JxC coalition.

Indeed, polls show that Milei's Libertad Avanza ('Forward Liberty') ticket might peel enough support from JxC to hand Massa a victory in the second round on October 22nd. Their appeal outside Buenos Aires, however, is limited.

At: https://buenosairesherald.com/politics/elections/union-por-la-patria-announces-massa-and-rossi-as-only-presidential-ticket

Leading Argentine presidential candidates Sergio Massa (center-left, representing the governing coalition), Patricia Bullrich (hard-right), Javier Milei (far-right), and Horacio Rodríguez Larreta (center-right).

Polling shows an advantage for Rodríguez Larreta - but with no clear majority for any candidate or coalition. Some 25% of voters, in turn, may vote blank - the highest such figure, if reached, since the country's 2001 crisis.

While job creation remains strong, inflation has reached 114% in the severely-indebted country.

For second year running, Buenos Aires chosen as the best city to live in Latin America

Buenos Aires, Argentina, was distinguished by the English magazine The Economist as the city with best quality of life of Latin America, according to the 2023 edition of The Global Liveability Index ranking - which is taken every year.

Buenos Aires, with 3 million people in the city proper and another 12 million in 30 suburban counties, ranked very close to prestigious global cities such as New York, Rome, and Edinburgh - surpassing Abu Dhabi and Shanghai. Vienna once again topped the list.

The Global Liveability Index measures and evaluates the quality of life in cities through different categories.

While the city ranked 70th out of 173 cities surveyed, its average score of 82.4 was well above the Latin American average of 68.2. Buenos Aires got 100 points in education (the highest possible score), 85.9 in culture and environment, 85.7 in infrastructure, 83.3 in health, and 70 in stability.

The stability score was weighed down primarily by the country's 5 year-long foreign debt and currency crisis, which has resulted in 114% annual inflation as of May.

The nation's economy - and particularly Buenos Aires' - remains strong however: over last year, GDP was up 1.3% despite a severe drought; real supermarket sales are up 3.4%; auto sales, 11.8%; and real shopping center sales, 15.4%.

“Once again Buenos Aires has consolidated as one excellent city to live, visit, study and work,” the city's Foreign Affairs Secretary, Fernando Straface, noted.

“Today’s quality of life is a key factor in the competition to attract visitors and talent to cities. Along these lines, this ranking confirms why it is one of the most chosen metropolises by digital nomads in the world - and one of the best for international students in Latin America.”

At: https://euro.eseuro.com/local/513746.html

Not the Onion: RFK Jr. says Russia 'acting in good faith' in Ukraine invasion

Democratic presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. suggested Wednesday that Russia has been “acting in good faith” in various efforts to end the war in Ukraine and placed blame on the U.S. for the 16-monthlong conflict.

Kennedy said in an interview on SiriusXM’s The Briefing with Steve Scully that Russian President Vladimir Putin has “repeatedly said yes” to negotiations.

“In fact, he negotiated, two times he agreed to agreements,” Kennedy said. “He agreed to the Minsk Accord, and then he agreed in 2022 to an agreement that would’ve left Ukraine completely intact.”

The Minsk agreements were two separate international agreements in 2014 and 2015 that sought to end fighting in the Donbas region of Ukraine. Fighting never ended entirely, and Putin claimed that the agreements did “not exist” shortly before launching his full-scale invasion of Ukraine last February.

It’s not immediately clear what 2022 agreement Kennedy is referring to. However, the long-shot Democratic candidate accused the U.S. of tanking the negotiations in Wednesday’s interview.

At: https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/4063124-rfj-jr-says-russia-acting-in-good-faith-in-ukraine-invasion-us-in-part-to-blame-for-war/

Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. and his invisible string.

Jujuy Province, in NW Argentina, rises up against repression and regressive reforms

In Jujuy Province, in NW Argentina, communities and organizations have been mobilizing on the streets and highways to reject the constitutional reform that was pushed through by conservative Governor Gerardo Morales in the early morning of Friday June 16.

The massive protests in cities and towns across the province - which have seen participation from Indigenous communities, trade unions, and social movements - have been met with heavy repression from state forces.

The incidents, which appear to have calmed by Wednesday, resulted in at least 68 arrests and 170 wounded - including a journalist and one protester, 17-year-old Mijael Lamas, who lost an eye from a rubber bullet.

The National Secretary of Human Rights, Horacio Pietragalla, traveled to the province on Sunday to verify the situation on the ground and has called on the governor to sit down and dialogue with protesters, and insisted he abandon his “capricious” position.

The fast-track approval of Morales' reform takes place in the midst of a context of great social unrest in Jujuy, with teachers already on week two of a strike.

The mountainous province of 800,000, one of Argentina's poorest, is governed by the historically centrist - but currently right-wing - Radical Civic Union (UCR) party.

President Alberto Fernández noted that the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, the United Nations Human Rights Regional Office (OHCHR), Amnesty International, and Human Rights Watch "have pronounced themselves clearly and forcefully calling immediately for the cessation of state violence and to guarantee the validity of human rights in the province of Jujuy."

The president instructed the Justice Ministry to analyze and suspend any articles that violate the Argentine Constitution.

At: https://peoplesdispatch.org/2023/06/19/jujuy-rises-up-against-repression-and-regressive-reforms/

The Sad Candidacy of Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.

Were it not for his illustrious name, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. would be just another crackpot in the growing list of bottom-feeding right-wing fringe politicians seeking high office.

But the Robert F. Kennedy brand is political gold.

RFK Jr. is now polling in the double digits against Biden. The latest CNN poll, taken less than three weeks ago, has him at 20%.

My bigger worry is that all the attention coming his way may convince RFK Jr. to launch a third-party candidacy that could hurt Biden in the general election.

Make no mistake: Junior has nothing whatever to do with his father — who stood up for economic and social justice (and for whom I worked in the late 1960s).

The younger RFK can best be described as a right-wing nut case:

He plans to travel to the Mexican border this week to "try to formulate policies that will seal the border permanently."

He wants the federal government to consider the war in Ukraine from the perspective of Russians.

He blames the rise of mass shootings in America on pharmaceutical drugs.

Robert Reich to Robert Kennedy, jr.: I knew Bobby Kennedy - and you're no Bobby Kennedy.

Lionel Messi to sign with Inter Miami

Messi’s future is decided: the Argentine legend will sign with Inter Miami.

The football superstar announced his decision in an interview with sports media MundoDeportivo and Sport on Wednesday at 4 p.m. Argentine time.

“I’ve taken the decision that I’m going to Miami,” Messi told his interviewers. “It’s not a 100% done deal. I’m missing a few things, but we’ve decided to continue that path.”

The former Paris Saint-Germain player will discard a lucrative contract in Saudi Arabia and become the latest addition to the US Major League Soccer as a free agent, according to the BBC.

If the agreement goes through, the 35-year-old captain of the Argentine squad will play outside of Europe for the first time ever since he entered the Barça football school at the age of 13 to later become the team’s top scorer with 672 goals.

At: https://buenosairesherald.com/sports/lionel-messi-to-sign-with-inter-miami-media-report

Legendary Argentine football forward Lionel Messi celebrates his country's World Cup win in Qatar last December.

Messi reportedly turned down a half billion-dollar offer from Saudi Arabia’s Al-Hilal, and instead opted to sign with Inter Miami - co-owned by England’s former captain David Beckham.

Astrud Gilberto, 'The Girl from Ipanema' singer, dies at 83

The singer behind one of the most recorded songs in history has died.

With her breathy vocals, Astrud Gilberto helped make the breezy and sensual "The Girl From Ipanema" into a global sensation. Her death on Monday night was confirmed by her son, bassist Marcelo Gilberto. She was 83.

The story of exactly who asked Gilberto to perform the song's breakthrough English-language version has many variations. But according to the woman herself, it was her husband — the bossa nova icon João Gilberto — who suggested it in 1963, at a recording session in New York with jazz great Stan Getz for an album called Getz/Gilberto.

At: https://www.npr.org/2023/06/06/1180416189/astrud-gilberto-the-girl-from-ipanema-singer-dies-at-83

Astrud Gilberto, 1940-2023: So Nice