FATF mission may find Paraguay corruption worsening

Significance The controversial decision coincided with the start of a major international evaluation of Paraguay’s compliance with international guidelines on combatting illicit financial flows. SEPRELAD head Carlos Arregui has admitted that it is by no means certain that Paraguay will pass the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) exam. Impacts Failure to pass would mean a negative ‘country image’, involving a higher risk premium on government foreign borrowing costs. A negative result would lead to reduced foreign investment inflows, something that the private sector is keen to avoid. The Biden administration will step up pressure for greater Paraguayan vigour in combatting corruption.

Intellectuals and commitment to global anti-fascism: The Second Spanish Republic according to Aníbal Ponce and Carlo Rosselli, 1935-1937

Aníbal Ponce, the highest figure of Argentine Marxism in the 1930s, was in Paris participating in the Antifascist Intellectuals Vigilance Committee, and was sent to Spain as a member of an international evaluation commission of the repressive events in the Asturias Insurrection. When he returns to Argentina after presenting a report and making an initiatory visit to Moscow, he speaks on the Spanish situation, on the political limits of the Second Republic and on the recent triumph of the Popular Front and its challenges. There he posits the idea of the events in Asturias as victorious defeat, as a prelude to the coming revolution. Since his Parisian exile, Carlo Rosselli, the leader of the Italian anti-fascist movement Giustizia e Libertà, reflected critically on the Spanish experience, eventually leading an Italian legion on the Aragon war front. Ideologically closer to the anarchists than to the communists, Rosselli warns of the limits of revolutionary action in Spain, but anticipates a similar opinion to Ponce on the momentary defeat of the working class. In both cases, the Spanish experience leads them to consider the transition from speculation to action as the greatest possible destination for the intellectual class.

Calliandra houstoniana var. calothyrsus (calliandra).

C. houstoniana var. calothyrsus is a nitrogen-fixing tree legume which has recently become popular for use in small-scale tropical agroforestry due largely to its provision of fuelwood and animal fodder, and its tolerance of acidic soils. Genetic variation within the species has been the subject of widespread international evaluation and has revealed variation in productivity amongst provenances. A problem with poor seed production has been reported in a number of countries where C. houstoniana var. calothyrsus is planted.