Category Archives: Americas

Colombia’s president and ELN guerrillas agree six-month ceasefire

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Talks in Cuba between Gustavo Petro and rebel leader Antonio García aimed at ending decades of conflict and follows Farc deal

Colombia’s government and its largest remaining guerrilla group have agreed to a six-month ceasefire at talks in Cuba, in the latest attempt to resolve a conflict dating back to the 1960s.

The government and the National Liberation Army, or ELN, announced the accord at a ceremony in Havana on Friday attended by Colombia’s president, Gustavo Petro, top guerrilla commander Antonio García and Cuban officials. The ceasefire takes effect in phases, goes fully into effect in August and then lasts for six months.

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China reportedly reaches secret deal with Cuba to host spy base on island

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Facility would allow Beijing to gather electronic communications from US but Cuba dismisses report as ‘unfounded’

China has reached a secret deal with Cuba to establish an electronic eavesdropping facility on the island roughly 100 miles (160km) from Florida, the Wall Street Journal has reported, but the US and Cuban governments cast strong doubt on the report.

Such a spy installation would allow Beijing to gather electronic communications from the south-eastern United States, which houses many US military bases, as well as to monitor ship traffic, the newspaper reported.

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Canada battles hundreds of wildfires as smoke still chokes major cities

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Quebec minister described ‘unprecedented’ situation amid warnings that country must be prepared in future

• Wildfires latest news – live

Wildfire crews in Canada continue to battle hundreds of blazes across the country as air quality in major cities remains poor and other regions brace for intense heat. And as the country burns, experts warn Canada needs to do a better job of readying its communities in areas increasingly prone to destructive blazes.

More than half of the 414 fires across the country are out of control, said the emergency preparedness minister, Bill Blair – with the hottest and driest months still to come.

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Peru extradites Dutch murderer to US over Natalee Holloway disappearance

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Joran van der Sloot, already serving 28-year sentence, faces fraud and extortion charges linked to Alabama teen missing since 2005

Peruvian police have handed over a convicted Dutch murderer to US FBI agents for transfer to the United States, where he faces extortion and fraud charges related to the killing of the Alabama teenager Natalee Holloway two decades ago.

Joran van der Sloot, a Dutch national from the Caribbean island of Aruba, is set to face charges in the United States related to the mysterious disappearance and presumed murder of Holloway, an 18-year-old from a suburb of Birmingham, Alabama, who vanished during a high school graduation trip to Aruba in 2005.

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Activists take Canada’s environment minister to court in fight to save northern spotted owl

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Advocacy group says continued destruction of critical habitat leaves it no choice but to take legal action against Steven Guilbeault

Environmental groups in Canada are taking legal action against the country’s environment minister, arguing his delay in protecting old growth forest is harming the critically endangered northern spotted owl.

In February, Steven Guilbeault said he would recommend an emergency order after determining the species was facing “imminent threats” to its survival.

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Canada’s wildfires are part of our new climate reality, experts and officials say

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Canada is on track to experience its most severe wildfire season on record, and it’s part of a trend experts say will intensify

Canada’s ongoing wildfire season is a harbinger of our climate future, experts and officials say.

The fires are a “really clear sign of climate change”, said Mohammadreza Alizadeh, a researcher at McGill University in Montreal, who is also a postdoctoral associate at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

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‘Out of control’ fires burn across Canada as poor air quality expected to persist

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Hundreds of wildfires burn in country, with 238 ‘out of control’ as of Tuesday afternoon, blanketing cities in smoke

Hundreds of wildfires are burning across Canada, many of them out of control, have blanketed cities in a thick haze of smoke, amid warnings from experts the situation will continue to worsen.

Toronto has long been known as “the Big Smoke” for its history of heavy industry, but the nickname took on a different meaning on Wednesday when residents donned masks outside, following alerts from officials that the city’s air quality would continue to deteriorate. Outdoor school events were delayed and city officials warned vulnerable groups to remain inside when possible. In the nation’s capital of Ottawa, Environment Canada said the air quality was “very high risk”, alongside the nearby cities of Kingston, Cornwall and Belleville. In much of southern Ontario, the poor air quality is expected to persist into the weekend.

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Tens of millions under air quality alerts in US as Canada fire smoke drifts south

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Eastern US states including New York, Massachusetts and Connecticut issue alerts as hundreds of wildfires burn in Canada

Tens of millions of people in the US were under air quality alerts on Wednesday, as smoke from Canadian wildfires drifted south, turning the sky in some of the country’s biggest cities a murky brown and saturating the air with harmful pollution.

States across the east, including New York, Massachusetts and Connecticut, issued air quality alerts, with officials recommending that people limit outdoor activity.

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At a glance: what you need to know about Canada wildfires and smoky US skies

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Hazy skies hung over north-eastern US a day after the midwest received a similar alert from the Environmental Protection Agency

Canada is dealing with a series of intense wildfires that have spread from the western provinces to Quebec, with hundreds of forest fires burning. Wind has carried smoke from the fires southward, triggering air-quality alerts throughout the United States.

The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on Tuesday issued a poor air-quality alert for New England, a day after parts of Illinois, Wisconsin and Minnesota received a similar advisory. Last week, US officials as far south as Maryland, Virginia and Pennsylvania reported being affected by the wildfires.

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What’s the Caribbean without its beaches? But the people are losing access to them

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Barring public access to beaches and other sites is not a model for development. Transparency and engagement are needed

Walk along a Caribbean beach, which may stretch for miles, and your stroll is guaranteed to be cut short by an angry hotel security guard. In recent years, the Caribbean has seen a worrying trend of governments readily selling off assets to foreign corporations and political financiers.

Prime real estate, protected land and valuable resources are being relinquished without consideration for long-term consequences. It raises questions about whether remnants of the colonial mindset still prevail in political ideologies and decision-making.

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Election of Delfina Gómez as governor of Mexico state signals decline of PRI

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The PRI – once the overwhelmingly dominant party of Mexico in the 20th century – is now a weak and also-ran political force

Mexico’s oldest party has lost control of the country’s most populous and influential state, in an election result that could signal the end of a powerful network that has dominated politics in the region for almost a century.

Alejandra del Moral Vela – the candidate for the incumbent Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) which has governed the state of Mexico (Edomex) uninterrupted since 1929 – was beaten by eight points on Sunday, despite claiming victory during the vote count.

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Weather tracker: Finland experiences coldest June on record

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Despite 24-hour sun, Lapland dips to -7.7C. Elsewhere, the Atlantic hurricane season begins

Thursday 1 June saw potentially the lowest June temperature on record in Finland. A weather station in Lapland, Enontekiö Kilpisjärvi Saana, reached -7.7C. This may not seem that cold for northern Finland, where winter temperatures reach as low as -51.5C, but the last time Lapland saw a minimum temperature of -7C in June was on 3 June 1962.

In addition, at this time of year Lapland experiences midnight sun where it is constantly light and the sun does not set. This unseasonal cold was possible in the first month of summer due to a large area of high pressure to the west of Finland, blocking the usual westerly/south-westerly flow of weather systems across the Atlantic and North Sea.

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‘Journalism mustn’t be silenced’: colleagues to complete slain reporter’s book

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How to Save the Amazon will be published so Dom Phillips’ work telling the stories of rainforest defenders does not die with him

One year after Dom Phillips was killed in the Brazilian Amazon, friends and colleagues have come together in a show of journalistic solidarity to keep his legacy alive and finish the book the British journalist was working on at the time of his death.

Phillips and his Brazilian companion, the Indigenous expert Bruno Pereira, were killed while returning from the remote Javari valley in the western Amazon last June. Three men have been charged with murder and are being held in high-security prisons while awaiting a decision on whether they will face trial.

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Colombian president’s allies resign amid illegal wiretapping scandal

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Inquiry reveals phone calls of Gustavo Petro’s aide’s nanny were intercepted in ‘grotesque’ abuse of power

Two of Gustavo Petro’s closest political allies have resigned as the Colombian president’s office was embroiled in a bizarre scandal involving a nanny, illegal wiretaps and a missing briefcase full of cash.

Petro’s closest adviser, Laura Sarabia, and his key political power broker, Armando Benedetti, stepped down on Friday after an investigation by the general attorney into allegations made by Marelbys Meza, the nanny to Sarabia’s son.

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Events in Brazil and UK to celebrate lives of Dom Phillips and Bruno Pereira

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British journalist and Brazilian Indigenous expert were killed a year ago on Monday in remote Amazon region they tried to defend

Friends and admirers of Dom Phillips and Bruno Pereira are preparing to gather in towns and cities across Brazil as well as London to remember the men and the causes they cherished.

The British journalist and the Brazilian Indigenous expert were shot dead during a reporting trip in the Amazon’s remote Javari valley region one year ago, on 5 June 2022.

If you want to help finish Dom Phillips’s book on the Amazon you can contribute here.

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Lone renter in ‘David and Goliath’ row with Montreal developers

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Carla White’s battle has shone a light on city’s lack of affordable new housing for those on low incomes

A single tenant in a Montreal apartment block has halted a multimillion-dollar development project in a standoff that has focused fresh attention on the lack of affordable housing in major Canadian cities.

Property developer Mondev has been trying for years to persuade Carla White to move from her small C$400-a-month (£238) apartment so it can demolish a row of mostly abandoned buildings and build 176 luxury apartments.

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Montreal: holdout tenant halts developer’s push to force her out

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Focus over affordable housing as Carla White says she will not leave unless Mondev provides similar apartment with cheap rent

A single holdout tenant in a Montreal apartment block has halted a multimillion-dollar development project, in a standoff which has focused fresh attention on the lack of affordable housing in major Canadian cities.

Real estate developer Mondev has been trying for years to persuade Carla White to move from her small, C$400-a-month apartment so it can demolish a row of mostly abandoned buildings and build 176 condominium units.

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US air quality as far south as Virginia affected by Nova Scotia wildfires

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National Weather Service issues air quality alert for Richmond while Maryland, Pennsylvania and other states affected

The historically intense wildfires that battered the Nova Scotia province on the eastern coast of Canada have had a severe effect on air quality as far south as Virginia and Maryland, the US National Weather Service alerted.

Four wildfires have destroyed hundreds of buildings and homes and displaced tens of thousands of people, hitting the Halifax municipality hardest. But the blazes have also sent smoke billowing over New York City, and have prompted officials from New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland and Virginia to report negative effects on their air quality.

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Texas woman dies of infection linked to cosmetic surgery in Mexico

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Family says Lauren Brooke Robinson, who reportedly contracted fungal meningitis, began to feel ill months after February surgery

A Texas woman has died after contracting fungal meningitis in an outbreak that has been linked to a cosmetic procedure performed in Mexico.

Lauren Brooke Robinson, 29, died on Wednesday from a fungal meningitis infection after receiving cosmetic surgery in Mexico, the local TV news station KBMT reported.

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Snow fly in US and Canada can detach its legs to survive, research shows

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Flies chilled to sub-zero temperatures amputate one or more of their six limbs to protect their internal organs

Flightless snow flies in the US and Canada can amputate their legs to survive as they begin to freeze, researchers have discovered.

Lab experiments in which the flies were chilled gradually to sub-zero temperatures revealed they can detach one or more of their six legs, an apparent “last-ditch tactic” to protect their internal organs from the advancing cold.

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