Barack Obama's visit to Argentina on Dirty War anniversary brings out 'some dark sides'
Source: Associated Press
Barack Obama's visit to Argentina on Dirty War anniversary brings out 'some dark sides'
March 23 2016 - 11:23AM
Peter Prengaman
Buenos Aires: When President Barack Obama's state visit to Buenos Aires was announced early this year, Argentina's new president Mauricio Macri cast it as a sign that the South American nation was on a US-backed path to investment and modernisation that would help it conquer its economic problems.
But in the weeks leading up to Mr Obama's arrival on Wednesday, the country's attention hasn't been on the future, but rather on painful chapters in Argentina's past – and unanswered questions about the United States' relationship with one of the most repressive military dictatorships in Latin American history.
The catalyst has largely been the timing: Thursday marks the 40th anniversary of the military coup.
"The dictatorship is still very much on the table" in Argentine society, said Roberto Bacman, director of the Centre for Public Opinion Studies, a South American research firm. "This visit is going to bring out some dark sides of the past."
Read more: http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/world/barack-obamas-visit-to-argentina-on-dirty-war-anniversary-brings-out-some-dark-sides-20160322-gnp3wn.html
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It's hard for Obama - or any U.S. president - to make a visit to state visit to such a head of state look good, least of all when that man's policies have caused the sharpest recession in Argentina since the cataclysmic 2001 collapse.
107,000 jobs lost in just two months since Macri enacted austerity recipes from his IMF-issued cookbook. That's equivalent to over 800,000 jobs lost in the U.S. - and that hasn't happened since the dying days of the Bush regime.
That said, I hope President Obama and his family enjoy Buenos Aires and Bariloche. Two great spots, each in their own very different way.
Buenos Aires (President Obama's state dinner will be in the dome on the ornate building at left):
Bariloche (and yes, there will be a round of golf):
