In an Oct. 8 speech reported by Brujula Digital, Bolivian President Rodrigo Paz Pereira justified his government’s alliance with the Trump administration’s Shield of the Americas, which he said was necessary to “save our country in collaboration with the international order.” Which International order is he talking about?

After a week in which U.S.-directed security forces arrested Attorney General Roger Mariaca on drug trafficking and money laundering charges and hauled him off to jail in record time, along with several other former prosecutors, Paz denied that his decision to ally with the Trump administration to combat “corruption” was an ideological or political decision. “This is a fight against “national and international crime, and that’s why [we need] the Shield of the Americas, to create alliances…. [I]t’s only mediocre people who think this is an ideological or political issue.” Apparently there are many more such “mediocre” people who are questioning Paz’s recent decisions. Instructive is the opinion piece by investigative reporter Gonzalo Colque who titled his column in Brujula Digital “Washington to Rodrigo Paz’s Rescue.”