Rescue comes after a boat believed to be used for human smuggling capsized with only one of 40 passengers surviving
Ten Cuban migrants in a sinking vessel were rescued off the Florida coast, according to the US Coast Guard.
A Coast Guard boat spotted the vessel on Thursday about 40 miles (about 64km) off Key Largo, the Coast Guard said in a tweet.
Continue reading...About half the country’s population is yet to receive a single dose of vaccine, despite availability
In a vaccination centre in El Alto, Bolivia, the staff bagged up in protective gear far outnumbered the few people sitting in plastic chairs waiting for their injection. A young doctor reeled off a list of all the vaccines available: Sinopharm, Sputnik, Pfizer, Moderna. What’s lacking is demand. They see 100 people on a good day.
South America, once the region most afflicted by the pandemic, is now the most vaccinated in the world. But this turnaround doesn’t extend to Bolivia, where roughly half the population is yet to receive a single dose – even though the state has had all the vaccines it needs since October.
Continue reading...Héctor Valer confirms resignation just four days after being named for the post
The Peruvian prime minister Héctor Valer confirmed on Saturday that he will step down just four days after being named for the post, after allegations that he beat his daughter and late wife.
On Friday, President Pedro Castillo said he would reshuffle the cabinet again, after just three days, amid widespread condemnation of his appointment of Valer as prime minister.
Continue reading...President Gabriel Boric has brought renowned named climate scientist Maisa Rojas into government to help ensure a greener future
Hidden behind the Andes in a quiet corner of South America, a formidable generation of former student leaders are putting together one of the world’s most exciting progressive movements.
On 11 March, Gabriel Boric, 35, a tattooed leftist with a steely resolve to reform Chile from the bottom up, will become the country’s youngest ever president – and his green agenda is echoing across the world as time ticks away on an impending climate catastrophe.
Continue reading...Ottawa police announce 150 more officers will be deployed as 400 more trucks and 2,000 protesters expected to arrive
Police in Canada have promised tougher action against the “unlawful and unacceptably dangerous” protests paralyzing the nation’s capital, but admitted the situation was increasingly out of their control.
With 400 more trucks and 2,000 protesters expected to arrive in the city this weekend, Ottawa police on Friday announced that 150 additional officers will be deployed and concrete barricades set up to prevent more vehicles from reaching the city’s downtown core. Illegally parked vehicles will be towed and highways and bridges could be closed.
Continue reading...Former boxer Agustín Álvarez jailed for piloting a sub carrying 3,000kg of cocaine across the Atlantic
Twenty-eight months after it began in a clandestine shipyard deep in the Brazilian Amazon, one of the more unlikely criminal voyages of all time came to an end on Tuesday with the seven sentences handed down by a court in north-west Spain.
Agustín Álvarez, a 31-year-old former Spanish amateur boxing champion, was jailed for 11 years for piloting a semi-submersible “narco-submarine” carrying 3,068kg of cocaine worth an estimated €123m (£104m) across the Atlantic. His two crewmates, Ecuadorian cousins Luis Tomás Benítez Manzaba and Pedro Roberto Delgado Manzaba, received the same sentence, while four Spaniards who conspired with Álvarez to help guide the sub ashore were jailed for between seven and nine years.
Continue reading...Does movement against vaccine mandates herald Canada’s tea party moment?
For nearly a week, Paul Aubue has lived and slept in the cab of his truck, parked in downtown Ottawa.
The 64-year-old grandfather travelled from New Brunswick to join hundreds of others as they descended on the Canadian capital. Aubue, the owner of a trucking company, said he’d been driven to protest by a recent requirement that truckers crossing from the US into Canada be vaccinated against Covid.
Continue reading...Officials fear death toll from adulterated cocaine could increase, with 84 people currently in intensive care
Authorities in Argentina are advising drug consumers to throw away any cocaine they may have purchased in the last two days after at least 23 people died after ingesting adulterated cocaine in the Greater Buenos Aires area.
Eighty-four others are are currently under intensive care, of which 20 have been intubated, but authorities fear the death toll could increase as further victims are found to have died alone at home.
Continue reading...In El Carmen de Bolívar, LGBTQ+ people want the history of their brutal persecution by police and paramilitaries to be told, but the sense of safety is fragile and many still face prejudice
In a mountain town near the north coast of Colombia, three drag queens strike poses in the blazing sun. Wearing extravagant Caribbean carnival costumes, they place each high heeled step carefully to avoid puddles. Neighbours come out to take photos and cheer.
This impromptu show has unique significance in the streets of El Carmen de Bolívar, representing the remarkable resurgence of a community once brutally victimised by homophobic armed groups.
Continue reading...Few corals are safe from warming oceans, a new study warns, but studies are finding surprisingly hardy corals, natural sunscreens and how coral ‘IVF’ can regrow reefs
Wiarton citizens smelled a rat when Willie did not make an appearance at the virtual celebration last year
Every year in the Canadian town of Wiarton, devout followers of Wiarton Willie the albino groundhog learn from the rodent if the grip of winter is loosening.
The annual celebration is part of Groundhog Day, a North American tradition (and movie of the same name) which holds that if a groundhog sees its shadow after emerging from hibernation, six weeks more of winter weather are expected.
Continue reading...Outcry as club that is symbol of black resistance finds itself at the centre of politically charged squabble over Bolsonaro’s far-right government
The beer-soaked samba session was drawing to a close and, as usual, the crowd was preparing to vent its spleen.
As percussionists from one of Rio’s top samba groups hammered their tamborins and tantãs, revelers raised their glasses and let out loud, cathartic cheers demanding the removal of a president they despise. “Fora Bolsonaro!” jeered the sweat-drenched throng. “Bolsonaro out!”
Continue reading...Stores and vaccine clinics remain closed in Ottawa as protesters refuse to leave while federal Conservative leader faces criticism
Days of protests against pandemic policies and a deep rift within Canada’s conservative movement have highlighted the growing power of rightwing populist movements in the country.
On Tuesday, retail stores and vaccine clinics in Ottawa remained closed as protesters, who had travelled to the nation’s capital under the guise of protesting vaccine mandates for truckers, refused to leave.
Continue reading...Roberto Toledo was shot dead by three gunmen in a carpark in Zitácuaro, where he reported for a local news outlet
Journalists in Mexico have responded with fury and despair at the murder of a fourth reporter in the country this year, cementing its reputation as the world’s most murderous country for media workers.
Roberto Toledo was shot dead by three gunmen on Monday afternoon in a carpark in the city of Zitácuaro, where he reported for a local news outlet, Monitor Michoacán. Zitácuaro is best known for the nearby monarch butterfly reserves, but the region is rife with violence as drug cartels and criminal groups fight to control illegal logging.
Continue reading...Thousands gathered in Ottawa to protest against Covid mandates and some urinated on the National War Memorial
Justin Trudeau has said that Canadians were disgusted by the behaviour of anti-vaccine protesters, and said he would not be intimidated by those who hurled abuse.
The Canadian prime minister spoke as central Ottawa remained blockaded by dozens of trucks and other vehicles after thousands descended upon Parliament Hill on Saturday to protest against Covid-19 vaccine mandates.
Continue reading...A distressing neurological condition has afflicted dozens in New Brunswick – so why has the investigation slowed down?
For more than two years, dozens of people in the Canadian province of New Brunswick have suffered from a distressing array of neurological symptoms, prompting speculation that they had fallen victim to an unknown degenerative illness.
Provincial authorities are soon expected to release a report examining whether the cases are linked, or simply the result of misdiagnosis and clinical error. But as the public awaits the findings, those enduring the extreme symptoms say they’ve been left to suffer alone.
Continue reading...Incident is latest calamity as migrants from Dominican Republic and Haiti increasingly try to cross treacherous smuggling route
Federal authorities detained 17 Dominican migrants on Friday after their boat capsized near Puerto Rico’s north-west coast in the pre-dawn hours, with the US Coast Guard searching for an estimated 10 others still missing.
Jeffrey Quiñones, a Customs and Border Protection spokesman, told the Associated Press that those detained told officials that a total of 27 people were onboard the boat that struck a rock and turned over near Shacks Beach in Isabela.
Continue reading...Isolated Brazilian president accused of ‘utterly reckless’ plan to meet Vladimir Putin in Moscow
Jair Bolsonaro has sparked disbelief and outrage by insisting he will go ahead with a trip to meet Vladimir Putin in Russia despite the escalating military crisis along the Ukrainian border.
Foreign policy experts and rivals questioned the Brazilian presidents’s planned visit after he told supporters he would fly to Moscow in late February to improve trade ties.
Continue reading...Discovery brings total to five, but search for survivors will be suspended if new discoveries are not made, says US coast guard
The US coast guard said it would call off the search for survivors at sunset on Thursday if no new discoveries were made following a boat capsizing off the Florida coast at the weekend with 40 people on board.
Four more bodies had been discovered, bringing the total to five, Capt Jo-Ann Burdian, commander of the coast guard’s Miami sector, said in a press conference on Thursday.
Continue reading...A group of German, Austrian and Swiss immigrants has implanted an ideologically driven settlement in one of the country’s poorest regions
A 1,600-hectare (4,000-acre) gated community, dubbed El Paraíso Verde, or the Green Paradise, is being carved out of the fertile red earth of Caazapá, one of Paraguay’s poorest regions.
The community’s population – consisting mainly of German, Austrian and Swiss immigrants – will eventually swell from 150 to 3,000, according to the owners.
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