Category Archives: Americas

Mexico City police teargas teachers’ protest 10 days before World Cup

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Teachers associated with CNTE union were marching toward Zócalo for salary raises and reversal of pension laws

Riot police fired teargas at teachers who were marching toward Mexico City’s historic Zócalo plaza, just days before the square is expected to host the 2026 World Cup “Fan Fest”. The incident is the second time police have clashed with teachers in the past week, and more conflict is likely as Mexico City prepares to hold the opening game of the Fifa World Cup on 11 June.

“This event will have to be suspended,” Filiberto Frausto, a union leader, told AFP, which witnessed police firing teargas on 1 June. “A cause like ours should be far above – it’s far more important than a little bit of distraction and fun.”

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Trump admirer’s surprise first-round win is a blow to Colombia’s traditional conservatives

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Success of far-right presidential candidate, Abelardo de la Espriella, suggests some voters are ‘fed up with politics’

The far-right lawyer Abelardo de la Espriella and the leftwing senator Iván Cepeda have just under three weeks to compete for the roughly 3.6m votes that did not go to either of them in the first round of Colombia’s presidential election.

That is no insignificant number, given that De la Espriella’s lead over Cepeda amounted to little more than 670,000 votes – 43.7% to 40.9%.

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Colombia’s far-right presidential candidate Espriella wins first round of vote ahead of runoff

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Lawyer and Trump admirer has risen rapidly in the polls and will face Iván Cepeda in election runoff in three weeks

The far-right lawyer Abelardo de la Espriella won the first round of Colombia’s presidential election on Sunday and will face senator Iván Cepeda, the candidate backed by leftwing president Gustavo Petro, in the runoff.

With 100% of ballots counted, the outsider and Donald Trump admirer Espriella secured 43.7% of the vote – just over 10.3m votes – compared with 40.9% (about 9.6m votes) for Cepeda, a philosopher and human rights activist who has served as a senator since 2014.

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Colombia goes to polls in election pitting outgoing leader’s ally against pro-Trump candidates

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Ballots are being cast in the first round of the South American nation’s presidential elections

Colombians are casting ballots in the first round of the South American nation’s presidential election, choosing between candidates with radically diverging visions for the future of peace in a country haunted by decades of armed conflict.

The vote on Sunday, seen as a referendum on outgoing President Gustavo Petro’s policies, comes 10 years after Colombia signed a historic peace pact with guerrillas of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Farc).

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Colombia prepares to go to polls in election shadowed by resurgence of political violence

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Sunday’s presidential vote is contest between left and right – and between contradictory proposals for dealing with the decades-long armed conflict

Mateo Pérez Rueda was one internship away from completing a degree in political science. The 24-year-old also worked as a bicycle delivery rider and sold fruit salads and juice to finance his passion: the Colombian independent digital magazine El Confidente.

On 4 May he travelled to Briceño, in the western province of Antioquia, to report on the long-running conflict between the army, paramilitaries and dissidents of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Farc).

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Alarm at Mexico bill allowing elections to be annulled for ‘foreign interference’

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Opposition says constitutional amendment would give bill ruling party carte blanche to overturn will of voters

Amid fierce criticism from opposition groups, Mexico’s senate has passed ‌a constitutional amendment to include “foreign interference” as grounds to annul election results in the country.

The bill, which was presented by the country’s president, Claudia Sheinbaum, defines foreign interference as “illicit financing, propaganda, the systematic ⁠dissemination of misinformation, digital manipulation, and ⁠the intervention of foreign governments ⁠or agencies”.

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Lula says Brazil will not be treated like ‘tinpot country’ after US designates gangs as terrorists

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Marco Rubio made announcement after meeting president’s far-right challenger Flávio Bolsonaro

Brazil will not be treated as a “tinpot country,” the country’s president, Luiz Inácio da Silva, said on Friday after the United States designated Brazil’s two largest criminal gangs, the First Capital Command (PCC) and the Red Command, as foreign terrorist organisations.

The announcement, made by Marco Rubio, the secretary of state, on Thursday, is being widely seen in Brazil as a setback for Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, the president who had strongly opposed the designation – and a boost for Lula’s main challenger in October’s presidential election, the far-right senator Flávio Bolsonaro.

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Anger at decision not to prosecute Canadian suicide kit supplier in UK

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Kenneth Law pleaded guilty in Canada to sending products internationally, knowing they would probably be used to end lives

Bereaved families whose loved ones were the victims of an online supplier of suicide kits say they feel insulted by a decision not to prosecute him in the UK.

Kenneth Law pleaded guilty in a court in Ontario, Canada, to 14 charges of aiding suicide and sending products internationally in the knowledge that they were likely to be used to end lives. He is due to be sentenced at a later date.

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Guatemala requests US military cooperation against drug trafficking

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Central American country says its president spoke with Pete Hegseth to confirm terms of cooperation

Guatemala has requested US military cooperation spanning access to equipment, training and experts to assist Guatemalan operations against drug trafficking, the country’s president, Bernardo Arévalo, said on Thursday.

The joint plans stopped short of US military operations on Guatemalan soil and fall within existing bilateral agreements, the government noted.

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Clashes between armed groups in Colombia kill at least 52

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Rival groups are vying for territorial control of strategic cocaine production and trafficking region

At least 52 guerrilla fighters have been killed in clashes between two rival armed groups vying for territorial control of a strategic cocaine production and trafficking region in south-east Colombia, a faction of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Farc) involved in the fighting has said.

The clashes, the most violent in recent months, took place in the jungles of the department of Guaviare, near the village of Barranco Colorado.

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Carney calls for new US-Canada partnership to ‘help make America great again’

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Canada prime minister urges greater economic cooperation between the two countries in speech delivered in New York

Canada’s prime minister, Mark Carney has called for a new relationship with the United States to “help make America great again”.

In a speech delivered in New York on Thursday, Carney said that there should be a “true partnership” that reimagines cooperation in specific sectors challenged by global competition.

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Argentina’s ‘European’ self-image under renewed scrutiny after racist incidents in Brazil

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Case involving seven-year-old boy is latest flashpoint in debate over race relations in Latin America

‘Argentina needs to end its fantasy of being a European country’: Lucrecia Martel on the story of a killing

A woman celebrating her 32nd birthday on a train journey in the Brazilian state of Minas Gerais was horrified when a fellow passenger alerted her that an unknown man had been secretly filming her seven-year-old son.

When confronted, the man – an Argentinian tourist – initially refused to show his phone. But after being pressed by other travellers, the man admitted he had sent the images to a WhatsApp contact.

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The race for oil: will Jamaica be the next country to drill and what does that mean for its green pledges?

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With early tests suggesting the presence of crude oil, the Caribbean island has begun to debate whether it could justify becoming a producer

Jamaica is closer than ever to drilling for oil. Tests on samples from the seabed off the Caribbean island’s south coast earlier this year identified hydrocarbons, which suggest the presence of crude oil below ground.

Jamaica imports all its fuel, which costs about $1.5-2bn (£1.1bn-1.5bn) annually, depending on global oil prices. It is a persistent drag on an economy that generated $4.3bn from tourism, its biggest earner, in 2024.

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Canada to order military plane fleet from Sweden in shift from US suppliers

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Mark Carney announces purchase of Saab’s GlobalEye early warning aircraft to patrol Arctic territory

Canada has announced plans to buy a fleet of early warning planes from Sweden’s Saab rather than a competing option from Boeing, as the country seeks to reduce reliance on US defense firms.

Mark Carney, the prime minister, said on Wednesday that Canada would opt for Saab’s GlobalEye, which is based on Bombardier’s Global 6500 jet. Boeing’s E-7 Wedgetail plane – which has suffered from delays and cost overruns – had also been in contention.

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Venezuela inmates occupy prison roof and set fire to mattresses to highlight alleged abuse

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Inmates at Barinas prison allege they were peacefully protesting when prison staff opened fire, leaving some wounded

Inmates at Venezuela’s western Barinas prison staged a protest on its roof on Sunday, piling flaming mattresses and calling for the removal of the facility’s director, whom they accused of overseeing guards as they shot unarmed prisoners.

“We want justice. They are shooting us, the guards and the wardens,” a prisoner said in a video shared by the Venezuelan Observatory of Prisons, a local NGO, on X, in which a man is seen with a bullet wound in his chest.

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‘Canada is handing people over to ICE’: refugees rejected at border face US detention

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As Canada tightens asylum rules, refugees reuniting with family say they were turned over to ICE and jailed for months after failed border claims

As each day in US detention passes, Markens Appolon can feel the life he had dreamed of slipping away.

The 25-year-old fled Haiti to escape the rampant gang violence that upended his university studies in economics, and planned to join family in Montreal.

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Rubio doubtful of diplomacy with Cuba as Trump renews threat of military action

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US secretary of state says president would like a negotiated agreement with Havana but likelihood ‘is not high’

The US president, Donald Trump, and the secretary of state, Marco Rubio, on Thursday again raised the spectre of military intervention in Cuba, a renewed threat that takes on greater weight a day after the administration announced criminal charges against Raúl Castro, the island’s former leader.

“Other presidents have looked at this for 50, 60 years, doing something,” Trump told reporters when asked about Cuba during an event in the Oval Office. “And it looks like I’ll be the one that does it. So I would be happy to do it.”

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Cubans outraged at US charges against Raúl Castro as fears of military strikes grow

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It’s a nerve-racking time for Havana neighbours of top Cuban officials as fears of US attack mount

A new question in being asked in Havana as people digest the news that the US has brought criminal charges against Cuba’s 94-year-old former president, Raúl Castro: who’s your neighbour?

If you happen to live near a senior figure in Cuba’s government or armed forces, others suck their teeth in an expression of concerned sympathy. For the first time, US military strikes on the island are being considered a serious possibility.

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Macron says France must address issue of reparations for its role in slave trade

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French president’s use of term comes as demand grows for formal discussion on addressing legacies of enslavement

Emmanuel Macron has said reparations for France’s role in hundreds of years of enslavement of African people is an issue that should be addressed, but he stopped short of making clear proposals.

“How to repair … is a question that must not be refused,” the French president said in a speech on the legacies of slavery at the Élysée Palace. “It’s also a question on which we must not make false promises.”

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‘It’s broken English’: MP’s attempt to speak Jamaican in parliament sparks language row

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Parliamentary rule that only English is allowed has reignited debate about language, legitimacy and postcolonial identity

When the Jamaican MP Nekeisha Burchell stood up to give her maiden speech, she was keenly aware of how much her country’s parliament mirrored the Westminster version thousands of miles away in London.

As in the UK, the session on 12 May had started with the arrival of the ceremonial mace – a 1.7-metre ornamented silver staff representing the British monarch’s authority over parliament – which now rested on a table between the government and the opposition. Despite the heat outside, debate was presided over by the speaker dressed in a ceremonial robe.

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