March 14, 2025
Milei’s storm troopers attack pensioners
We, the social organizations of the Alba-Movimientos., strongly condemn the brutal repression unleashed by the government of Javier Milei and his Minister of Security, Patricia Bullrich against pensioners, football fans and social organizations that mobilized peacefully to reject the neoliberal austerity to which the government of La Libertad Avanza is subjecting the Argentine people. The excessive use of force, with tear gas, rubber bullets and water cannon, resulted in 114 people being illegally detained — including children — 20 people being injured and the photographer Pablo Grillo being seriously injured after being hit in the head by a tear gas canister. This systematic violence not only violates basic human rights, but also demonstrates a repressive and authoritarian method that puts democracy and the sovereignty of the Argentine people at risk. The basis of this struggle has been sparked by people whose social security is under attack making them poorer than they already were.
photo: EFE
Milei’s government is not an isolated case in the region. His repressive actions and neoliberal agenda are similar to those of figures such as Dina Boluarte in Peru, Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil, Nayib Bukele in El Salvador and José Raúl Mulino in Panama, who have promoted policies of hunger, dispossession and repression against their people, to give just a few examples. These right-wing governments, allied with local oligarchies and transnational capital, have deepened inequality in Latin America and the Caribbean, one of the most unequal regions in the world. Milei, like them, attacks the most vulnerable: pensioners, workers, journalists and social movements, while prioritizing the interests of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the economic elites. Unfortunately, this is yet another example of a familiar story in other Latin American countries where the repressive forces of the State have been deployed against their people with brutality, illegal detentions and a systematic pattern of violence that seeks to impose a profoundly neoliberal economic model at the expense of popular dignity.
Out with Milei
We denounce that this government, far from being something new, represents the deepening of a neocolonial project that seeks to plunder natural resources and subject the people to policies of austerity and social insecurity. The repression of March 12 is nothing more than the expression of the desperation of a regime that, faced with its lack of legitimacy, resorts to violence to impose its agenda. This repressive method only confirms that Milei’s project is doomed to failure, as it is based on fear and oppression, not on the will of the people. The intention to shoot to kill, justified by the ideas and political orientations of those demonstrating, marks a pattern that is anything but casual; there is no way to apply a neoliberal model without repressing and indoctrinating a people who are fighting for their dignity.
We urgently call for international solidarity to defend Argentina, which historically has been a beacon of struggle for human rights, memory, truth and justice. The Argentina that won pioneering laws such as equal marriage and the Gender Identity Law, and that in 2005, together with Commander Hugo Chávez and the heads of state of the Patria Grande, defeated the FTAA and halted the advance of imperialism. Today, more than ever, we need to unite to resist this authoritarian and neoliberal government that is trying to destroy the people’s achievements.
Enough repression! Enough austerity! For the defense of democracy and the rights of the people, today and always, the struggle continues!
Taken from Alba-Movimientos, Source: Cuba en Resumen