Category Archives: Americas

‘Pray for us’: Bahamas residents tell of terror as Hurricane Dorian hit

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Bahamians say storm has left devastation, with buildings destroyed and bodies floating

• Hurricane Dorian hits Bahamas – live updates

Residents of the Abaco Islands and Grand Bahama have described “nightmarish” scenes as the full force of Hurricane Dorian struck the northernmost part of the Bahamas.

As the first person to have died in the storm was reported to be seven-year-old Lachino Mcintosh, who drowned after his family tried to move from their home, witnesses described large-scale flooding and damage as 185mph (300km/h) winds ripped roofs from buildings.

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Hurricane Dorian: as many as 13,000 houses severely damaged or destroyed in Bahamas – live updates

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Reports an eight-year-old boy has been killed after Dorian made landfall at Great Abaco Island on Sunday

Despite its downgrade, Dorian is still a powerful hurricane and will remain so in the coming days. There’s not much difference between an intense category 4 and a low-end category 5.

Friendly reminder: There is little difference in impact between a #hurricane at the top end of Cat 4 and "low end" of Cat 5. Grand Bahama Island would certainly vouch for that right now. #Dorian pic.twitter.com/g93aDrp02T

Disastrous flooding from the Bahamas - lady who posted this video said: “#HurricaneDorian this was taken in a home by the canal my aunty live by the canal yall I scared” pic.twitter.com/EEZHE3GeCx

Queens Cove Grand Bahamas #Dorian pic.twitter.com/yDhBwoiy3k

NEW: The Hurricane Warning along the east coast of Florida has been extended northward to the Flagler/Volusia County Line. The Hurricane Watch has been extended northward to Altamaha Sound, Georgia. Full advisory on #Dorian is at: https://t.co/tW4KeFW0gB pic.twitter.com/at3bCDs6OQ

The National Hurricane Center expects the hurricane to gradually weaken and has reclassified from a category 5 to a category 4. Maximum winds are at 155 miles per hour, with higher gusts.

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Hurricane Dorian lashes Bahamas with ferocious winds and flash flooding – video

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Winds of more than 220mph (355km/h) have struck the northern Bahamas in the biggest storm to hit the Caribbean island chain in modern times. The ‘catastrophic’ category 5 hurricane forced the US states of Georgia and South Carolina to issue evacuation orders for their coastal communities on Sunday night as the National Hurricane Center warned of storm surges of 18-23ft (5.5-7 metres) above normal levels.

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Sewage, Zika virus – and the team in Brazil mapping disease hotspots | Dom Phillips

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Volunteers in Salvador’s favelas are collecting data on deadly infections and inequality to help campaign for better sanitation

Wearing crisp, white T-shirts and carrying tablets, the students fan out through Marechal Rondon – a bustling favela spread over hillsides and a valley in Brazil’s north-eastern city of Salvador. As they walk, they map blocked drains and piles of rubbish on their tablets. These are the “infection points” that attract the rats and mosquitoes which, in turn, spread diseases like leptospirosis and the Zika virus, both prevalent here.

Student Alexandre Santos, 20, stops before a weigh-high tangle of wild plants overlooking a housing block. “We look at sewers, rubble, garbage. Now there is high vegetation,” Santos says, tapping in the data. “It goes straight into the data bank.”

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Hurricane Dorian pounds northern Bahamas with ‘catastrophic’ winds

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Hurricane Dorian grew into a “catastrophic” category 5 storm on Sunday as winds of more than 180mph pounded the northernmost islands of the Bahamas, the biggest storm to hit the island chain in modern times.

Related: Floridians not fazed as Hurricane Dorian’s path keeps state guessing

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Hurricane Dorian: where will the storm hit and what damage will it bring?

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Dorian is one of the six strongest hurricanes recorded in the Atlantic, but meteorologists are finding its path difficult to predict

Hurricane Dorian is proving a slippery customer. Not only is it one of the six strongest hurricanes recorded in the Atlantic in the past 70 years, but meteorologists are finding its path very difficult to predict because of its wide “cone of uncertainty”. It is impossible to say just where the storm will hit – and with how much deadly force.

Within that fuzzy picture, Dorian has the potential to affect millions in the Caribbean and along the US coast. So what is the current thinking about its path?

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Revolutionary poster designs from cold-war Cuba – in pictures

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An upcoming exhibition at London’s House of Illustration collects 185 posters and magazines from Cuba’s golden age of design, from the 1960s to the early 90s.

“The posters tell us that Cuba sees supporting the struggles of liberation movements internationally as an integral part of its own revolution,” says curator Olivia Ahmad.

Designed in Cuba: Cold War Graphics is at House of Illustration, London N1 from 27 Sept to 19 Jan

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Hurricane Dorian: Trump flies to golf club as likelihood of direct hit recedes

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  • National Hurricane Center warns of winds and storm surge
  • Bahamas set to be hit Sunday, US east coast remains on alert

Millions along the US east coast from Florida to North Carolina remained under threat of a deadly strike from Hurricane Dorian on Saturday, even as official predictions for the path of the 150mph monster storm pulled back from from a direct hit on land.

Related: The historic hurricanes that made landfall on Florida’s east coast

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Mexico uncovers 3,000 secret graves hiding bodies of drug war victims

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  • New data reveals nearly 5,000 bodies found across the country
  • Disappearances common amid extreme drug-related violence

More than 3,000 secret graves containing victims of Mexico’s raging drug wars have been found across the country, according to the first ever official tally of the phenomenon.

A total of 4,874 bodies were found at 3,025 sites, and many of the victims have yet to be identified, said Karla Quintana, the head of the National Search Committee, which was set up last year to help desperate families find relatives who have gone missing.

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Corporations pile pressure on Brazil over Amazon fires

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Asset managers, pension funds and companies halt deals and stop buying bonds

Financial pressure is growing on Brazil over fires in the Amazon and the far-right president’s belligerent response to them.

Asset managers, pension funds and companies have issued warnings, halted deals and stopped purchases of government bonds.

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Salmon farming in the Beagle Channel enters troubled waters | Hannah Summers

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Victory for community concerned about the industry’s environmental costs strengthens calls for shakeup of rules along Chilean coast

A growing wave of resistance to the expansion of salmon farms along the Chilean coast has led to an important victory in the fight to protect a pristine fjord in southern Patagonia, home to indigenous groups and an array of stunning wildlife.

Dolphins, whales and colonies of penguins thrive in the 240km-long Beagle Channel, an area of outstanding natural beauty between Chile and Argentina which attracts tourists from all over the world.

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Brazil: fears for isolated Amazon tribes as fires erupt on protected reserves

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  • Fires broke out in 131 indigenous reserves from 15-20 August
  • Campaigners say indigenous territories easy targets for loggers

Fires have been reported in protected indigenous reserves of the Brazilian Amazon, raising fears that loggers and land grabbers have targeted these remote areas during the dramatic surge in blazes across the world’s biggest rainforest.

Blazes have been seen on the Araribóia indigenous reserve in Maranhão state – a heavily deforested reserve on the Amazon’s eastern fringes, which is home to about 80 people from an isolated group of Awá indigenous people, described by the NGO Survival International as the world’s most endangered tribe.

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Canada: workers race to free millions of salmon trapped after huge landslide

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  • Rockslide on banks of Fraser River created impassable barrier
  • Heavy machinery and helicopters used to help gather fish

Helicopters, heavy machinery and nearly 200 workers are frantically working to free millions of salmon trapped by a landslide in western Canada.

Government crews in the area have worked relentlessly along the banks of the Fraser River to clear debris after a rockslide, discovered in a late June, created an impassable 5m-high waterfall.

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Peru: skeletons of 227 victims unearthed at world’s largest child sacrifice site

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Experts believe the children were sacrificed by the Chimú culture to appease the El Niño phenomenon

Archaeologists excavating what is thought to be the world’s largest child sacrifice site have unearthed the skeletons of 227 young victims in the coastal desert of northern Peru.

Teams have been digging since last year at the sacrificial site in Huanchaco, a beachside tourist town close to Trujillo, Peru’s third largest city.

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Hurricane Dorian spares Puerto Rico and heads for eastern coast of Florida

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Power outages and flooding were reported in the Virgin Islands and the Puerto Rican islands, but no damages

Hurricane Dorian caused limited damage in the northern Caribbean as it left the region and gathered strength late Wednesday, setting its sights on the US mainland as it threatened to grow into a Category 3 storm.

Puerto Rico, which had braced for the worst, seemed to be spared any heavy wind and rain, a huge relief to many on an island where blue tarps still cover some 30,000 homes nearly two years after Hurricane Maria. The island’s 3.2 million inhabitants also depend on an unstable power grid that remains prone to outages since it was destroyed by Maria.

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Xikrin people fight back against Amazon land-grabbing

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Indigenous community under threat from fire, deforestation and Bolsonaro

Threatened by fire, deforestation and invasion, the Xikrin people of the northern Amazon are fighting back.

While the authorities stand idle and the Brazilian president, Jair Bolsonaro, tries to undermine their territorial rights, the indigenous community have taken matters into their own hands by expelling the loggers and ranchers who illegally occupied their land and set fire to the forest.

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‘Worst of wildfires still to come’ despite Brazil claiming crisis is under control

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Forestry expert warns annual burning season had yet to fully play out and calls for urgent steps to reduce potential damage

The fires raging in the Brazilian Amazon are likely to intensify over the coming weeks, a leading environmental expert has warned, despite government claims the situation had been controlled.

Related: Amazon fires: what is happening and is there anything we can do?

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Jair Bolsonaro demands Macron withdraw ‘insults’ over Amazon fires

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Brazilian and French presidents continue feud over G7 aid package for wildfires raging in Amazon rainforest

Brazil’s far-right president and his backers have escalated their row over the Amazon with Emmanuel Macron, attacking the French president’s “lamentable colonialist stance” as fires continued to rage in the world’s biggest rainforest.

As Brazil said it would reject a $20m (£16m) G7 contribution to fight the fires, Jair Bolsonaro spurned Macron’s criticism of his environmental record and flaunted Donald Trump’s support for his far-right administration.

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The IMF is hurting countries it claims to help | Mark Weisbrot

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The fund browbeats poor countries into accepting neoliberal measures that exacerbate inequality and economic distress

When people think of the damage that wealthy countries – typically led by the US and its allies – cause to people in the rest of the world, they probably think of warfare. Hundreds of thousands of Iraqis died from the 2003 invasion, and then many more as the region became inflamed.

Related: Brexit: EU ‘would block trade deal if Britain reneged on bill’

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