Category Archives: Americas

Canada: 14 arrested at indigenous anti-pipeline protest camp as tensions rise

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Indigenous groups are fighting construction of liquified natural gas pipeline which would cross through First Nations territory

Canadian police have arrested 14 demonstrators at an indigenous protest camp in northern British Columbia, amid growing tensions over a proposed pipeline running through First Nations territory.

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police, Canada’s national police force, said 14 people had been arrested late on Monday as officers enforced a court order to remove barriers built along a logging road.

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Canada: indigenous anti-pipeline protesters call police presence ‘act of war’

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Police officers deployed near checkpoint where protesters have gathered to block the construction of a natural gas pipeline

Indigenous protesters in Canada have called a growing police presence near their makeshift checkpoint “an act of war”, as tensions mount over a stalled pipeline project in northern British Columbia.

In defiance of a court order, dozens of protesters have gathered on a logging road nearly 700km (430 miles) north-west of Vancouver, to block the construction of a natural gas pipeline.

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‘Sonic attack’ on US embassy in Havana could have been crickets, say scientists

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Noise which saw diplomats complaining of headaches and nausea could be song of Indies short-tailed cricket

The US embassy in Havana more than halved its staff in 2017 when diplomats complained of headaches, nausea and other ailments after hearing penetrating noises in their homes and nearby hotels.

The mysterious wave of illness fuelled speculation that the staff had been targeted by an acoustic weapon. It was an explanation that appeared to gain weight when an audio recording of a persistent, high-pitched drone made by US personnel in Cuba was released to the Associated Press.

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Venezuela crisis takes deadly toll on buckling health system

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With hospitals lacking even soap, a ‘perfect storm’ of poor hygiene, malnourished patients and shortage of drugs has left families grieving and experts fearing a total collapse

In the dusty squatter settlement where she spent her short life, Victoria Martínez is remembered as a vivacious, dance-loving child who showered “buenos días” on all those she met.

Related: The fallen metropolis: the collapse of Caracas, the jewel of Latin America

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‘The US can’t dump people in Mexico’: Trump asylum policy in doubt

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Head of immigration authority says Mexico has ‘asked for answers’ on ‘catch and return’ – but shutdown isn’t helping

When she announced last month that tens of thousands of asylum seekers would be returned to Mexico while their cases are considered, the homeland security secretary, Kirstjen Nielsen, described the move as a “historic” overhaul of US immigration policy.

But more than two weeks later, the new strategy has yet to begin and it remains unclear how the plan would work – or even if Mexico is willing to enforce it.

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Mexican president Amlo reveals $23,000 in savings – and no credit card

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  • Leftwing president cut his own pay to $65,000 a year
  • Amlo to sell presidential plane and travel in Volkswagen Jetta

Despite spending his adult life in a political system where public service is seen as a route to self-enrichment, Mexico’s president Andrés Manuel López Obrador has revealed that he has a little less than $23,00 in savings.

Related: 'It's a comfy plane': Mexico's Amlo seeks buyer for presidential jet

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El Chapo v El Vicentillo: son of cartel’s co-founder testifies against drug lord

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Vicente Zambada Niebla, son of the Joaquín Guzmán’s longtime partner, had been groomed to take over Mexico’s Sinaloa cartel

One of the greatest betrayals in mafia history emerged into open court this week at the New York trial of Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, as the former heir-apparent to Guzmán’s Sinaloa federation turned against his own boss, the cartel – and apparently even his own father.

Related: Behind the El Chapo trial: what's been left unsaid in a New York courtroom

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Rio governor confirms plans for shoot-to-kill policing policy

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Brazilian activists and experts expressed outrage after Wilson Witzel said security forces were authorized to use lethal force

Human rights activists and public security experts have expressed outrage after the newly elected governor of Rio de Janeiro state confirmed plans to implement shoot-to-kill policing tactics in the crime-ridden region.

Related: Jair Bolsonaro launches assault on Amazon rainforest protections

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‘It’s like 1984’: Venezuela targets human rights defenders

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Amid Venezuela’s collapse, Nicolás Maduro has locked up those accused of criticizing his regime – often without due process

Geraldine Chacón, a 24-year-old lawyer from Caracas, went four months without seeing the sun while a prisoner in the Helicoide, the feared hillside prison complex administered by Venezuela’s secret police, where she was denied access to sunlight, water and food.

“The guards told me I was a political prisoner, and for that I don’t get anything,” said Chacón, speaking by phone from Caracas, where she is on conditional release. “Without seeing the sun, you lose a sense of time, you don’t know if it’s day or night – it’s horrible.”

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Canada says 13 citizens detained in China since Huawei CFO’s arrest

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Diplomatic tensions between the two countries have escalated since Meng Wanzhou’s arrest on 1 December

Canada has said 13 of its citizens have been detained in China since the Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou was arrested in December in Vancouver at the request of the US.

“At least” eight of those 13 have since been released, a Canadian government statement said, without disclosing what charges if any had been laid.

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China thinks it can arbitrarily detain anyone. It is time for change | Michael Caster

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The lack of global outcry over the detention of two Canadians virtually guarantees the next such case

Canada’s foreign minister, Chrystia Freeland, has called China’s detention of Canadian citizens Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor a “worrying precedent” but for many China watchers it is all too familiar.

It reminds us of the detentions of other foreign citizens, such as Canadian Kevin Garratt, Briton Peter Humphrey, Sweden’s Gui Minhai, or Taiwanese Lee Ming-che, and that over the years China has institutionalised arbitrary and secret detention affecting innumerable Chinese citizens, and with little international consequence.

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Google shifted $23bn to tax haven Bermuda in 2017, filing shows

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Firm used Dutch shell company in move known as ‘double Irish, Dutch sandwich’ that cuts its foreign tax bill

Google moved €19.9bn ($22.7bn) through a Dutch shell company to Bermuda in 2017, as part of an arrangement that allows it to reduce its foreign tax bill, according to documents filed at the Dutch chamber of commerce.

The amount channelled through Google Netherlands Holdings BV was about €4bn more than in 2016, the documents, filed on 21 December, showed.

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Mother of student held over Ortega protest in global plea for help

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Family of activist Amaya Eva Coppens, 24, appeal for help to ‘stop the repression’ of Nicaraguan government

The mother of a medical student facing more than 20 years in prison for protesting against the Nicaraguan government is appealing to the international community to put pressure on president Daniel Ortega’s regime.

Amaya Eva Coppens, a Belgian-Nicaraguan dual national, is due to stand trial in the capital Managua after being “abducted” in a raid by more than 30 riot police and paramilitaries on 10 September.

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Mexican experts discover first temple of god depicted as skinned human corpse

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Two skull-like stone carvings and a stone trunk depicting the Flayed Lord were found during excavation in Puebla state

Mexican experts say they have found the first temple of the Flayed Lord, a pre-Hispanic fertility god depicted as a skinned human corpse.

Related: Conquistadors sacrificed and eaten by Aztec-era people, archaeologists say

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Jair Bolsonaro launches assault on Amazon rainforest protections

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Executive order transfers regulation and creation of indigenous reserves to agriculture ministry controlled by agribusiness lobby

Hours after taking office, Brazil’s new president, Jair Bolsonaro, has launched an assault on environmental and Amazon protections with an executive order transferring the regulation and creation of new indigenous reserves to the agriculture ministry – which is controlled by the powerful agribusiness lobby.

Related: Jair Bolsonaro's inauguration: the day progressive Brazil has dreaded

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US authorities fire tear gas across border to repel Central Americans

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Women, children and members of the press were affected by gas as authorities said it was aimed at rock throwers on Mexican side

US authorities fired tear gas into Mexico during the first hours of the new year to repel about 150 Central Americans who they claimed were trying to breach the border fence in Tijuana.

Related: 'I don't want to go back': what's next for the Central American migrant caravan?

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Bolsonaro sworn in as Brazil’s president on wave of conservative enthusiasm

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Far-right populist invited lawmakers to help country free itself from ‘ideological submission’ in speech

Jair Bolsonaro has been sworn in as the 42nd president of Brazil, to the delight of passionate supporters, many of whom had travelled to its modernist capital for the event, convinced the far-right populist can rescue their troubled country from virulent corruption, rising violent crime and economic doldrums.

The former army captain waved from an open-topped Rolls Royce as he was driven to a ceremony at the city’s futuristic, Oscar Niemeyer-designed cathedral before he and his vice-president, retired army general Hamilton Mourão, were sworn in at Congress.

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