MILEI ALL OVER THE PLACE
More extended accounts of President Javier Milei’s busy week abroad can be found in the rest of this newspaper so a breathless summary now follows. Preceded by a weekend meeting with International Monetary Fund Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva, Milei attended United States President Donald Trump’s inauguration on Monday as well as the accompanying gala events, also picking up two prizes – “Titan of Economic Reform” and “Champion of Economic Freedom.” Milei’s next stop was Switzerland for the World Economic Forum in Davos, where he arrived on Wednesday, but not before tweeting a defence of tycoon (and brand-new Trump sidekick) Elon Musk’s controversial neo-Nazi salute. His Thursday morning address to the Davos Forum centred on two main themes – firstly, “the world embraces Argentina, which has become a global example of fiscal responsibility,” also describing the formation of an international alliance of “all the nations who embrace the ideas of liberty” and naming five of those nations including the United States now under Trump, and secondly, “the virus of woke ideology must be eliminated,” also accusing at least some of his audience of complicity.
EXPORT DUTIES TRIMMED
After repeated pressure from farming lobbies, Economy Minister Luis Caputo announced late Thursday a temporary reduction of grain export duties, along with the elimination of export duties for regional economies, attributing the decision to the prospects of drought and lower global commodity prices. The reductions (from 33 to 26 percent for soy and from 12 to 9.5 percent for wheat, barley, sorghum and maize among other cuts, which still await confirmation of the exact details) will only run until midyear. Caputo assured that the fiscal surplus would not be jeopardised.
THREE IN EVERY FIVE
No less than 61 percent of Argentines or 29 million people were living in poverty in the first half of last year, as measured by income or deficient healthcare, housing or education, a Human Capital Ministry report released last Thursday quantified. This percentage outstrips the official figure of INDEC national statistics bureau, which was 52.9 percent for the first half of 2024. The study further highlights that among those aged under 17, multidimensional poverty leaps to 72.2 percent.
MIXED HEALTH MESSAGES
A week in which the Milei administration was mooting an exit from the World Health Organisation (WHO) in emulation of the newly inaugurated Trump, followed by placing the Laura Bonaparte mental hospital under state trusteeship in midweek, began with the Health Ministry assuring on Monday that “the National Vaccination Calendar is guaranteed “ as against “malicious rumours” to the contrary from health officials of the previous government. The Bonaparte Hospital trusteeship was preceded by the dismissal of 200 employees the previous week, according to hospital staff, with the government charging overmanning, claiming that the hospital had only 55 beds with 19 occupied while 326 people had been hired during the 2019-2023 Frente de Todos government under Alberto Fernández.
NISMAN REMEMBERED
The AMIA Jewish community centre last Monday headed a tribute to special AMIA prosecutor Alberto Nisman on the first weekday after the 10th anniversary of his mysterious death from a bullet through the head (January 18, 2015), deploring the persistence of “impunity,” a sentiment echoed by all speakers. The government was represented by Cabinet Chief Guillermo Francos and Health Minister Mario Lugones with President Milei attending Trump’s inauguration in Washington that day, while City Hall was represented by mayoral spokesperson Laura Alonso with Coalición Cívica founder Elisa Carrió also present. The speeches included harsh criticisms of Kirchnerism and any theory of suicide (“It was not suicide, it was magnicide,” read a banner in the crowd). Nisman’s widow, San Isidro federal judge Sandra Arroyo Salgado, threw her support behind Milei’s international policies, saying: “Today Argentina is on the right side of the world and not signing pacts with terrorists” in a reference to the Cristina Fernández de Kirchner administration’s 2013 Memorandum of Understanding with Iran.
139TH GRANDCHILD FOUND
After not identifying any victims of baby-snatching during the 1976-1983 military dictatorship in 2024 until the tail-end of the year (the 138th), it took the Grandmothers of Plaza de Mayo only three weeks of this new year to recover the identity of the first in 2025 (and 139th overall), “the daughter of Noemí Beatriz Macedo and Daniel Alfredo Inama, both militants of the Partido Comunista Marxista Leninista,” according to Grandmothers president Estela Barnes de Carlotto. The baby’s parents were abducted on November 2, 1977, she added, and remain missing until this day. Inama’s mother never stopped looking for them and her grandchild until she died in 2013.
PATAGONIAN FIRES ARSON
Chubut Governor Ignacio Torres last Tuesday confirmed that the fires affecting the Epuyén zone were intentional, pointing out that glass and other combustible items had been found. His own theory is that the arson was the work of “criminals” posing as Mapuche militants rather than genuine representatives of the Mapuche and Tehuelche communities, also describing the problem as inherited from the previous Kirchnerite governments at both national and provincial level. Torres did not directly name the notorious Mapuche militant leader Facundo Jones Huala (who was arrested last weekend in the Río Negro town of El Bolsón trying to open car doors with the apparent intention of stealing them but was soon released while the case remains open) as being responsible for the arson but Security Minister Patricia Bullrich did. Electricity has now been recovered in 98 percent of Epuyén after power cuts following the forest fires which devastated almost 4,000 hectares.
PAEDOPHILES FACE TRIAL
The case against the brothers Germán and Sebastián Kiczka (the former a provincial deputy until expelled from the Misiones legislature last September) for the distribution of material recording the sexual abuse of children was sent to trial last Tuesday. The brothers have been jailed since last August after several days on the run in Misiones and Corrientes. Sebastián Kiczka faces the more serious charges of having actually abused children while his brother’s computer contained as many as 1,500 files of a sexual nature.
LOCAL WRITER WINS PRIZE ABROAD
Argentine writer Guillermo Saccomanno, 76, last Thursday won Spain’s Premio Alfaguara prize in Madrid for his novel Arderá el viento (“Windburn”) with Colombian writer Juan Gabriel Vásquez, the chairman of the jury, paying tribute to his “rare intensity.” The prize consists of US$175,000 and a sculpture by Spanish artist Martín Chirino.
DIED ALONE
The decomposing body of a pensioner was found by her nephew in a Mar del Plata house last Wednesday over four months after what was believed to be a natural death. The nephew explained the delay by saying that since he did not live in Mar del Plata, he did not visit his aunt María Cristina Marsili, 76, with any regularity and only travelled to the Atlantic resort when she repeatedly failed to communicate. An autopsy is awaited for final conclusions as to the cause of her death.
