ARGENTINA: NATO & more – 25th Apr 2024

¡Buenos días from Greenway Parks! This is the Rorshok Argentina Update from the 25th of April twenty twenty-four. A quick summary of what's going down in Argentina.

Let’s start off this week with some news about international relations. On Thursday, the 18th of April, Argentina formally applied to become a NATO ally. Luis Petri, the defense minister, presented authorities with a letter of intent stating Argentina wished to become a global partner. The only Latin American country to achieve this status was Colombia in twenty eighteen.

Even though Argentina has been a non-NATO ally since nineteen ninety-eight, the request shows a significant shift in foreign policy compared to past governments. The country’s leadership seeks to establish closer ties to the United States in order to attract investments that could revert Argentina’s dire economic situation.

The strategy seems to be working since the US recently announced it was giving Argentina $40 million dollars to invest in defense modernization. The security assistance comes from a program called Foreign Military Financing, which gives grants to select countries deemed as allies. That said, the grant will barely help to pay for the twenty-four F16 fighter jets the country bought from Denmark recently, which cost around 300 million dollars.

Next, one of the highest-impact news pieces of the week was the massive protest in defense of public universities on Tuesday, the 23rd.

There are seventy-three public universities in Argentina, and its students, staff, and faculty gathered in cities across the country to protest the current government’s funding measures. The institutions’ budget has been frozen since early twenty twenty-four because the government did not approve a new one. This meant that they maintained the same one from twenty twenty-three, despite yearly inflation running at 288 percent.

The issue came into focus after news broke out that Buenos Aires’ National University or UBA, had suspended several classes because they could not afford their hefty electricity bills. Later, on Monday, the 22nd, the UBA’s dean mentioned that the university only had two or three months of funding left.

Another measure that ruffled many feathers was the Argentine Upper Chamber’s decision to approve a raise in the senators’ salaries. Senators passed the raise via a legislative resolution on Thursday, the 11th, and it established that the minimum monthly wage would jump from $1.7 million pesos (around 1,800 dollars) to $4.1 million pesos (about 5,000 dollars).

The resolution was heavily criticized, and even President Javier Milei spoke against it. He wrote on Twitter that “This is the way the caste moves.” He also mentioned that the only senators who had voted against it were from his party, Liberty Advances or La Libertad Avanza or LLA. But Senators from the conservative PRO party also voted against the raise.

However, one of the project’s co-signers was Bruno Olivera, a senator belonging to the LLA.

On Friday, the 19th, the 124th Assembly of the Argentine Episcopalian Conference shared a statement where they raised concerns about some of the government’s policies.

Catholic bishops from all across the country signed the document. In it, they expressed concerns over “senior citizens having to choose between eating or buying their medicine.” and “soup kitchens being forced to shut down”. It also called the current drug trafficking issue in the city of Rosario, in the Santa Fe province, a “pandemic”.Violence related to drug trafficking in the Argentine city has grown significantly, and, since one of the new government’s aims is to ensure law and order with a tough hand, gangs are ramping up retaliations.

On the same day, President Javier Milei attended a forum at the Llao Llao hotel, in Bariloche, in the southern part of Argentina, where he met with some of the country’s most important business people. Milei gave an hour-long speech where he highlighted the government’s goal of returning the 15% of Argentina’s GDP that the state took in taxes to the private sector to stimulate productive investment.

The Head of State also responded to detractors from his own political group, after members of his own party criticized the government capping the rise in private health prices for going against their free-market stance. Milei called them “idiots” and said they had to adapt to “the real world”. He also set his sights on twenty twenty-five as the year when the true, radical transformation he espoused would come into effect.

Let’s go back to foreign policy for a second. On Wednesday, the 24th, Argentina requested Interpol assistance in arresting Ahmad Vahidi, Iran’s Interior Minister. The charge is in connection to the nineteen ninety-four bombing of the AMIA Jewish community center, which left eighty-five people dead and 300 injured.

Since Vahidi is currently visiting Pakistan and Sri Lanka, the Argentine Foreign Ministry Office also contacted representatives of those two countries and called for his arrest. Interpol’s Central Bureau issued a Red Notice, and its Buenos Aires office has also sent an arrest request to Pakistan with the possibility of extradition to Argentina.

In other news, as if Argentina’s economic woes weren’t already plenty, there is also the matter of the oil and gas company YPF and the ongoing legal issues surrounding its twenty twelve expropriation from Spanish multinational Repsol. Argentina owes the US-based financial firm Burford Capital $16.1 billion dollars after losing a lawsuit over the country’s takeover of YPF.

Now, the firm is asking that the 51% of YPF’s shares the State owns be given to them. If the judge were to grant Burford’s request, it could become a real headache for the country. The government would need the approval of two-thirds of Congress to relinquish the shares, and if they did not get it, Argentina could be held in contempt of court.

The current liberal government has not changed the legal strategy for now, even though the re-privatization of YPF was included in Milei’s “omnibus bill” —a package of reform bills he presented in early twenty twenty-four. It remains to be seen how they will handle the issue.

Although inflation finally seems to be slowing down, consumption has fallen an average of 10% in the first trimester. The fall has affected a wide array of sectors, with sales of clothing, cars, appliances, and even construction materials dropping drastically.

Experts warn that even though inflation is slowing down, the recession will not get better unless people’s salaries recover their acquisitive power.

Things are not looking too bright for Argentina’s cultural scene either. On Monday, the 22nd, the country’s National Cinema and Audiovisual Arts Institute (or INCAA) announced that it was closing down some areas “indefinitely” in order to modify the institute’s organizational structure. Its employees were put on leave as well.

Some movie theaters, like the historic Gaumont cinema, will also be shut down. However, any showings related to the Buenos Aires International Film Festival (or BAFICI) would go ahead as planned.

Despite the grim outlook, there is a silver lining for Argentina’s cultural scene. The Buenos Aires Book Fair, one of the country’s most important literary events, opened on Thursday, the 25th.

Even though the Culture Secretariat declined to buy a booth, citing budget concerns, there will still be some government presence at the fair, In fact, the president himself will be attending the Book Fair to present his latest book, Capitalism, Socialism, and the Neoclassic Trap, on Sunday, the 12th of May.

And that’s it for this week! Thanks for joining us!

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¡Nos vemos la próxima semana!