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
Continue reading...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
Continue reading...More than 10,000 artists, craftspeople and revellers take part in the carnival, a fusion of different cultural celebrations. It takes place every year from 2 to 7 January in the city of Pasto and is on Unesco’s intangible heritage list
Continue reading...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.”
Continue reading...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.
Continue reading...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.
Continue reading...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.
Continue reading...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.
Continue reading...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
Continue reading...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
Continue reading...The inauguration of the Brazilian president took place in Brasilia
Continue reading...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?
Continue reading...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.
Continue reading...Brazil’s new president will feel emboldened to roll back rainforest protections and legitimise police’s use of deadly force
It was a softball question at a campaign trail press conference: what would Jair Bolsonaro do on his first day as president?
Brazil’s preeminent provocateur wrestled it straight into a Trumpian whirlpool of bluster and barminess.
Continue reading...Without urgent action against environmental degradation, the forest ravines covering 20% of the city could be reduced to sterile valleys within decades
It can be difficult to keep up with Lawrence Warriner while walking; running, it’s next to impossible. Many of the trails that weave through the ravines near his house in Toronto are well groomed, but for Warriner – a decorated trail runner and coach – the more exciting ones are off the beaten path, tracks only faintly visible to the eye.
He has come to these forests, which rise along the sides of the river valleys that snake through the city, ever since he was a child. He has discovered a secret communal stone grill next to a sandy beach, hidden by trees; he has watched awestruck as a dozen white-tail deer crossed a bridge. He has also seen things he can’t explain, such as a parade of men, women and children, clad in period clothing, walking the woods at dusk with antique rifles slung over their shoulders.
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