An AS/COA panel moved the Cuba-policy conversation beyond talk on the embargo, looking into the actual conditions and potential for reform inside different sectors. Read a summary.

With the recent death of a Cuban hunger striker and harassment of the Ladies in White dissident group in Havana, U.S. President Barack Obama criticized human rights conditions on the island. His March 24 statement came ahead of a large Miami-based rally supporting dissidents.

Las month Cuba detained a USAID contractor for passing out laptops. It's time for the United States to send over a whole lot more, writes AS/COA's Christopher Sabatini for Foreign Policy.

Before the United States agrees to lift more sanctions toward Cuba, Havana must allow for greater political and economic freedoms.

A policy update in the Fall 2009 issue of Americas Quarterly examines health care systems in Cuba, Chile, Colombia, and Costa Rica.

Leaders from the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of the Americas met October 16 and 17 in Cochabamba, where they charted a course for implementing a virtual currency that could replace the dollar in commercial transactions. ALBA also imposed a blockade on Honduras.

While some journalists reporting in Latin America face threats to personal security, others deal with official intimidation in what some warn could roll back hard-won press freedoms. But governments and journalists have also taken steps to ensure greater access to information.