Category Archives: Americas

Canadian police accuse Indian diplomats of ‘criminal’ activities including homicides

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Accusations made hours after both countries expel senior diplomats in escalating row over killing of Sikh activist

Canadian police accused Indian diplomats and consular staff of “clandestine” and “criminal” activities in the country on Monday night, hours after senior diplomats were expelled from both countries in an escalating geopolitical row.

Speaking to reporters at a hastily organised press conference, the head of the Royal Canadian Mounted police (RCMP) said the force had evidence of “agents” acting on behalf of the Indian government engaging in extortion, intimidation, coercion and harassment.

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Woman pleads guilty over attempt to smuggle turtles by kayak into Canada

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Wan Yee Ng was arrested in June with a bag of 29 turtles as she prepared to paddle across Lake Wallace, affidavit says

A woman who wanted to smuggle turtles across a lake and into Canada by hiding the creatures using socks in a duffle bag has pleaded guilty to a smuggling charge.

Wan Yee Ng was arrested in June in Vermont as she was about to enter an inflatable kayak with the bag of 29 eastern box turtles and paddle across Lake Wallace to the border with Canada, according to an affidavit filed in federal court.

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Alleged Pinochet agent turned Bondi nanny Adriana Rivas launches last-ditch appeal to block extradition to Chile

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Rivas, who is accused by Chile of being a torturer and kidnapper, launches challenge in the federal court

A former Bondi nanny and cleaner accused by Chile of being a torturer and kidnapper for Pinochet’s military dictatorship in the 1970s has launched a last-ditch legal appeal to avoid extradition.

Adriana Rivas, 70, has been in prison in Australia since 2019, when she was arrested on an extradition request from Chile – seeking her for trial on seven counts of aggravated kidnapping relating to the disappearance, and presumed murder, of seven members of Chile’s communist party who disappeared in 1976.

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BHP to face 620,000 claimants in Mariana dam collapse trial in London

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Claimants seeking damages from Anglo-Australian mining company over 2015 environmental disaster in Brazil

The mother of a seven-year-old boy who was torn from the arms of his grandmother and drowned in one of Brazil’s worst environmental disasters is among more than 620,000 claimants who will have their case heard this month in the largest group claim in English legal history.

Gelvana Aparecida Rodrigues da Silva, 37, lost her son Thiago on 5 November 2015 when the Fundão dam, near Mariana in eastern Brazil, collapsed, releasing about 50m cubic metres of toxic waste.

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‘Vengeful’ Trump withheld disaster aid and will do so again, ex-officials warn

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Former administration officials say Trump deliberately denied funds to states he deemed politically hostile

Donald Trump deliberately withheld disaster aid to states he deemed politically hostile to him as US president and will do so again unimpeded if he returns to the White House, several former Trump administration officials have warned.

As Hurricane Helene and then Hurricane Milton have ravaged much of the south-eastern US in the past two weeks, Trump has sought to pin blame upon Joe Biden’s administration for a ponderous response to the disasters, even suggesting that this was deliberate due to the number of Republican voters affected by the storms.

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Venezuela has cancelled passports of dozens of activists and journalists

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Rights group in Caracas says at least 40 people affected, as Maduro government continues clampdown on opposition

The Venezuelan government has cancelled the passports of dozens of journalists and activists since President Nicolás Maduro claimed a re-election victory, part of what rights groups said is an intensifying campaign of repression against the authoritarian president’s opponents, the Financial Times has reported.

At least 40 people, mostly journalists and human rights activists, have had their passports annulled without explanation, the newspaper reported on Saturday, citing Caracas-based rights group Laboratorio de Paz.

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Haitian gangs recruiting starving children to fight security forces, rights group finds

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Hundreds of poor and desperate children targeted in anticipation of long and bloody battle, says Human Rights Watch

Haitian armed gangs are recruiting starving children to swell their ranks ahead of an anticipated long and bloody battle with international security forces, a report from Human Rights Watch (HRW) has found.

Armed groups – which control most of Haiti – are enticing hundreds, if not thousands, of impoverished children to take up arms with offers of food and shelter, the rights groups said.

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El Salvador faces scrutiny for ‘political’ trial of five environmental activists

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UN and legal experts have condemned prosecution of anti-mining campaigners over alleged civil war-era killing

Five environmental activists who helped secure a historic mining ban in El Salvador are facing life imprisonment for an alleged civil war-era crime, in a case that has been condemned by UN and legal experts as baseless and politically motivated.

The trial against Miguel Ángel Gámez, Alejandro Laínez García, Pedro Antonio Rivas Laínez, Antonio Pacheco and Saúl Agustín Rivas Ortega, who were arrested in January 2023 for the alleged killing of an army informant in 1989, opened on Tuesday in Sensuntepeque, in the department of Cabañas in northern El Salvador.

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Brazil lifts ban on X after Elon Musk complies with court demands

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Social platform was blocked after tech billionaire failed to name local representatives and pay fines

Brazilians are set to regain access to X after a supreme court judge lifted a ban introduced nearly six weeks ago as a result of Elon Musk’s failure to comply with the South American country’s laws.

X was blocked in Brazil, where it had more than 22 million users, at the end of August in what was the culmination of a months-long arm wrestle between the network’s billionaire owner and the Brazilian supreme court.

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Anger and disgust in Mexico over beheading of newly sworn-in city mayor

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Country’s new president to set out public security plans after murder of Alejandro Arcos Catalán in Chilpancingo

Mexico’s new government has been shaken by the murder of a city mayor who was attacked and beheaded days after taking office.

Alejandro Arcos Catalán was sworn in as the mayor of Chilpancingo, the capital of the southern state of Guerrero, on 30 September, a day before Mexico’s first female president, Claudia Sheinbaum, took power herself.

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Floridians warned ‘you are going to die’ if they don’t evacuate as Milton nears

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Thousands of evacuees clog highways as storm projected to hit Tampa Bay on Wednesday restrengthens to category 5

Florida’s western coast was making emergency preparations on Tuesday for the impact of Hurricane Milton, with thousands of evacuees clogging highways, contending with fuel shortages, and the mayor of Tampa warning residents bluntly “you are going to die” if they stayed behind.

The US National Hurricane Center (NHC) said Milton would retain major hurricane status and “expand in size” as it approached Florida after passing the Mexican city of Mérida before swerving north towards the US.

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UK ‘resolutely committed’ to its overseas territories, says foreign minister

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Stephen Doughty’s remarks come as Argentina vows to gain ‘full sovereignty’ of Falkland Islands

The UK is “resolutely committed” to all of its overseas territories, the responsible foreign minister said, after Argentina vowed to gain “full sovereignty” of the Falkland Islands.

Stephen Doughty said on Saturday that the sovereignty of the territories is “not up for negotiation”.

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Canada’s carbon tax is popular, innovative and helps save the planet – but now it faces the axe

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As prime minister Justin Trudeau trails in polls, opposition seek to persuade voters environmental policy is a burden

Mass hunger and malnutrition. A looming nuclear winter. An existential threat to the Canadian way of life. For months, the country’s Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre has issued dire and increasingly apocalyptic warnings about the future. The culprit? A federal carbon levy meant to curb greenhouse gas emissions.

In the House of Commons this month, the Tory leader said there was only one way to avoid the devastating crisis: embattled prime minister Justin Trudeau must “call a ‘carbon tax’ election”.

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US supreme court will rule on $10bn suit Mexico filed against US gun makers

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Mexico argues negligence from makers such as Colt and Glock has led to gun trafficking to drug cartels and criminals

The US supreme court said on Friday it will decide whether to block a $10bn lawsuit Mexico filed against US gun manufacturers and distributors that argues that their negligent and illegal commercial practices have unleashed bloodshed in the country.

The lawsuit, filed in Boston in August, names Smith & Wesson, Barrett Firearms, Beretta, Colt and Glock, as well as Boston-area wholesaler Interstate Arms.

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Argentina’s Javier Milei accused of plagiarising UN speech from West Wing

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Populist leader alleged to have ‘copied word for word’ a monologue by TV show’s fictional president Jed Bartlet

Argentina’s rightwing populist president, Javier Milei, has been accused of plagiarising a chunk of his recent speech to the United Nations general assembly from the political drama The West Wing.

“It seems like fiction, but it isn’t,” the left-leaning Buenos Aires newspaper Página 12 reported on Friday, claiming Milei had “copied, word for word, a monologue” by the television show’s fictional president, Josiah “Jed” Bartlet.

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Jamaica welcomes US move to clamp down on gun trafficking to Caribbean

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Horace Chang, deputy PM of country with highest homicide rate, praises US attorneys generals’ support for legislation

Jamaica’s deputy prime minister has welcomed a campaign by the New York attorney general, Letitia James, to push through new measures and legislation to tackle gun trafficking from the US to the Caribbean.

Horace Chang, who is also Jamaica’s minister of security, praised a coalition of 14 US attorneys general, led by James, that is backing the passing of the Caribbean Arms Trafficking Causes Harm Act. Introduced in both houses of the US Congress earlier this year, the act aims to help curb illicit arms trafficking from the United States to the Caribbean.

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Quebec separatist leader holds Trudeau to ransom: ‘We saw an opportunity’

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Yves-François Blanchet says Liberals must pass legislation or lose support of party propping up government

The leader of the Quebec independence party propping up the government of Justin Trudeau has insisted that the political lifeline depends on the quick passage of two pieces of legislation, and warned Canada’s embattled prime minister that he remains “very vulnerable”.

The Bloc Québécois leader, Yves-François Blanchet, told the Guardian the Liberals must act swiftly to enshrine protections for dairy farmers and boost payments to seniors to stave off a fatal vote of non-confidence. He warned that unless both pieces of legislation are passed into law by 29 October, his party would begin discussions with other parties to trigger a federal election.

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Christmas Caracas: early festivities are no joke as Maduro tightens grip

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Venezuela’s president attempts to move on from bitterly disputed election result by declaring Christmas in October

’Twas 85 nights before Christmas when the decorations went up – at least in Venezuela, where President Nicolás Maduro has decided festivities should start early in an apparent attempt to lift spirits and distract minds after the recent election scandal.

A month after Maduro announced that Christmas 2024 would begin in October, residents of Caracas left home on Tuesday to find the capital’s boulevards and plazas decked with LED light strings and sculptures declaring: “Feliz Navidad.”

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Gang violence leaves Haiti facing ‘worst hunger emergency in the western hemisphere’

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Half the country’s population now struggling to find food as lawlessness and inflation cause ‘full-blown crisis’, say aid agencies

Half of all Haitians are struggling every day to find food as rampant gang violence and lawlessness are causing “the worst hunger emergency in the western hemisphere”, a report has found.

The UN World Food Programme (WFP) and its partner organisations estimate that 5.4 million Haitians are now regularly finding it hard to get enough to eat, a record for the Caribbean nation and the largest proportion of acutely food insecure people anywhere in the world, WFP said. The figure suggests another 600,000 people have fallen into “crisis” level hunger since the previous peaks recorded earlier this year and in 2023.

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Justin Trudeau survives a second parliamentary confidence vote

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House of Commons defeats oppositional Conservative party’s bid to topple Canadian prime minister’s reign

Justin Trudeau, Canada’s prime minister, has survived a second parliamentary confidence motion in less than a week after opposition parties vowed to keep his minority Liberal government alive for now.

Legislators in the House of Commons voted 207-121 to defeat a bid by the official opposition Conservative party to topple Trudeau, who faces increasing voter fatigue after almost nine years in power.

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