Category Archives: Americas

St Vincent and the Grenadines court upholds laws criminalizing gay sex

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Activists decry ruling by top court as ‘a travesty of justice’ after two men sought to strike down colonial-era laws

A top court in St Vincent and the Grenadines has upheld laws that criminalize gay sex, in a blow to activists who have long decried the violence the LGBTQ+ community has faced on the conservative Caribbean archipelago.

The ruling on Friday by St Vincent’s high court stems from a 2019 case filed by two gay men from St Vincent who live in the UK and US. They sought to strike down colonial-era laws that call for 10 years in prison for anal intercourse and five years for “gross indecency” with another person of the same sex.

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Air Canada ordered to pay customer who was misled by airline’s chatbot

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Company claimed its chatbot ‘was responsible for its own actions’ when giving wrong information about bereavement fare

Canada’s largest airline has been ordered to pay compensation after its chatbot gave a customer inaccurate information, misleading him into buying a full-price ticket.

Air Canada came under further criticism for later attempting to distance itself from the error by claiming that the bot was “responsible for its own actions”.

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Venezuela closes UN human rights office citing ‘colonialist attitude’

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Foreign minister claims local office of UN high commissioner for human rights supported impunity for coup plotters

Venezuela’s government has ordered the local UN office on human rights to suspend operations, giving its staff 72 hours to leave, after accusing the office of promoting opposition to the South American country.

The foreign affairs minister, Yván Gil, announced the decision at a news conference in Caracas on Thursday. Gil’s announcement came on the heels of the detention of the human rights attorney Rocío San Miguel, which set off a wave of criticism inside and outside Venezuela.

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Heavy metals and E coli: raw sewage at US-Mexico border a ‘public health crisis’

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The Tijuana River flows through Mexico and empties off California, carrying pathogens and chemicals and threatening public health

Raw sewage and runoff in the Tijuana River is exposing communities at the US-Mexico border to an unusual and noxious brew of pathogens and toxic chemicals, according to a report released this week.

Billions of gallons of sewage flow through the river, which winds north from Mexico through California and empties into the Pacific Ocean, containing a mix of carcinogenic chemicals including arsenic, as well as viruses, bacteria and parasites, according to public health researchers at San Diego State University, who published the report.

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Tobago oil spill spreads to Grenada waters and could affect Venezuela

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Fuel continues to leak from overturned and abandoned barge as stain spreads into the Caribbean Sea

An oil spill that has stained Tobago’s coastline in the Caribbean is entering Grenada’s waters and could affect neighboring Venezuela, authorities have warned.

Eight days after Trinidad and Tobago’s coastguard first spotted the oil from an overturned and abandoned barge, the vessel continues to leak fuel, and portions of the stain have moved about 144km (89 miles) into the Caribbean Sea at a rate of 14km/h.

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‘Very afraid’: Colombian human rights lawyer loses security after winning prize

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Adil Meléndez Márquez received call from bodyguards 20 minutes after Sir Henry Brooke award from Alliance for Lawyers at Risk

“I’m very afraid,” says Colombian lawyer Adil Meléndez Márquez, the day after being presented with an award in London honouring human rights defenders.

Meléndez is no stranger to death threats, because of his work on cases related to Colombia’s decades-long civil war, environmental justice and corruption, but things have just got a lot scarier. With bitter irony, 20 minutes after receiving the Sir Henry Brooke award from the Alliance for Lawyers at Risk, his bodyguards called him to say that they had been stood down from, leaving him without protection.

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Paraguay senate expels one of few opposition members, sparking protests

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Kattya González, who had called out corruption and the country’s fall to organized crime, was dismissed from her post on Wednesday

Paraguay’s senate has expelled one of the few opposition voices in national politics, sparking protests in the capital Asunción and prompting concerns over the fragile state of the country’s democracy.

Senator Kattya González from the center-left National Meeting Party was dismissed from her position during an extraordinary session on Wednesday for the “misuse of influence” while in office.

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British Columbia bids to stop spread of fatal ‘zombie deer disease’

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Chronic wasting disease, which affects deer and other cervids, confirmed in Canada but experts divided over risk to humans

The Canadian province of British Columbia has released a strategy to combat the spread of chronic wasting disease (CWD) as the virus continues to move across North America.

Officials in the westernmost province this week ordered the testing of any road-killed deer, moose, elk and caribou after two cases were confirmed at the end of January. Both cases – in a mule deer and a white-tailed deer – were found in the Kootenay district. The province also placed restrictions on the movement and disposal of deer in the area.

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Amazon rainforest could reach ‘tipping point’ by 2050, scientists warn

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‘We need to respond now,’ says author of study that says crucial forest has already passed safe boundary and needs restoration

Up to half of the Amazon rainforest could hit a tipping point by 2050 as a result of water stress, land clearance and climate disruption, a study has shown.

The paper, which is the most comprehensive to date in its analysis of the compounding impacts of local human activity and the global climate crisis, warned that the forest had already passed a safe boundary and urged remedial action to restore degraded areas and improve the resilience of the ecosystem.

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Canadian federal police officer charged with passing information to a ‘foreign entity’

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Eli Ndatuje of Royal Canadian Mounted Police was charged with accessing police records and passing information to the Rwandan government

A member of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) has been arrested and charged with accessing police records and passing information to the Rwandan government.

The federal police force said on Tuesday that its integrated national security enforcement team (Inset) had arrested Constable Eli Ndatuje, who was stationed in Alberta.

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Polar bears risk starvation as they face longer ice-free periods in the Arctic

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Bears use ice to access food, but study of animals in Canada shows them struggling to adapt to more time on land amid climate crisis

Polar bears in Canada’s Hudson Bay risk starvation as the climate crisis lengthens periods without Arctic Sea ice, despite the creatures’ willingness to expand their diets.

Polar bears use the ice that stretches across the ocean surface in the Arctic during colder months to help them access their main source of prey – fatty ringed and bearded seals.

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Medellín authorities to meet embassies and dating apps after five foreigners die

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Cluster of cases in seven days follows spate of druggings and robberies of tourists, some of which have ended in death

Authorities in Medellín will meet representatives of embassies and popular dating apps this week after five foreigners were found dead in Colombia’s second city in the past seven days.

Police say none of the deaths were violent, though one of the cases appears to involve a man who was found dead in his hotel room hours after entering accompanied by two women.

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Samba school puts Rio’s long-silenced legacy of slavery at center of carnival

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In the 1800s, Luiz Gama defied fate to become Brazil’s first Black lawyer. Nearly a century and a half later, Portela’s parade puts his struggle center stage

Born in 1830 to a trafficked African woman who escaped enslavement and led uprisings, Luiz Gama defied fate and the Brazilian empire to become the country’s first Black lawyer and a leading abolitionist.

When he was 10 his father, a Portuguese nobleman, illegally sold him into slavery to pay off gambling debts. Gama regained his freedom as a young adult and having learnt to read, became a writer, intellectual and self-taught lawyer. He founded newspapers defending abolition and used the law to help free more than 500 enslaved people before Brazil finally abolished slavery in 1888, six years after he died.

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Canada: second Sikh activist’s house hit by gunfire this month

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Bullet hole found in Inderjit Singh Gosal’s house, reigniting fears of apparent campaign of violence targeting Sikh separatists

The house of a Sikh activist in Canada has been hit by gunfire, in the second such incident this month, reigniting fears of an apparent transnational campaign of violence and intimidation targeting Sikh separatists.

A construction crew found a bullet hole in a window of an unfinished house in the city of Brampton, Ontario, on Monday, according to the the US-based group Sikhs for Justice.

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Canadian teacher accused of selling students’ art on personal website

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Parents in disbelief after students at Montreal’s Westwood junior high found their art for purchase on mugs, phone cases and clothes

A Canadian teacher is under fire for allegedly using his personal website to sell nearly 100 pieces of art created by students, prompting disbelief and anger from parents.

Students at Montreal’s Westwood junior high school made the chance discovery last night after searching out their art teacher’s website. On it they found their own art, available for purchase on coffee mugs, mobile phone cases and clothing.

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Trinidad & Tobago says oil spill from mystery vessel is national emergency

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Upturned and largely submerged vessel of unknown origin is leaking hydrocarbon off south-west coast or Tobago

Trinidad and Tobago’s prime minister has said that a large oil spill near the twin-island nation has caused a “national emergency” and vowed that the government will spare no expense to help rehabilitate the island’s beaches.

Oil from the spill has coated numerous beaches on Tobago’s south-west coast, and the government has yet to identify the owner of the vessel that was found overturned off the coast last week.

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‘They’re treating us like thieves’: Rio de Janeiro traders rage as historic flea market shuts

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Feira de Acari is closed down by the mayor after claims that gangsters used it to sell stolen goods

Manoel Ribeiro has never known a world without Rio de Janeiro’s best-known flea market, the Feira de Acari.

The swarming suburban bazaar was founded outside his home in 1970, the year of his birth. It existed in 1993 when the market trader was shot nearby during an armed robbery and lost the use of his legs.

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Ex-DEA informant sentenced to life in prison for 2021 killing of Haiti president

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Haitian American Joseph Vincent, who admitted to helping plot assassination of Jovenel Moïse, is among 11 people accused

Joseph Vincent, a former informant for the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), was handed a life sentence by a US court on Friday for his role in the 2021 assassination of Haiti’s president.

A Haitian American national, Vincent admitted to helping plot to kill the Haitian president Jovenel Moïse in his home in Port-au-Prince, including advice about the political landscape and meetings with key community leaders.

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Venezuela building up troops on Guyana border, satellite images show

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Aerial evidence follows months of President Nicolás Maduro ramping up claim to Essequibo region

Venezuela is expanding military bases near its border with Guyana and deploying forces to the jungle frontier as President Nicolás Maduro ramps up his threats to annex the country’s oil-rich neighbour, satellite images have revealed.

Maduro pledged at mediation talks in December not to take military action against his neighbour but images shared by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in Washington today suggest a buildup of forces.

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Weather tracker: ‘Pineapple express’ atmospheric river deluges California

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Weather system brings heavy rainfall, strong winds and mudslides. Elsewhere, Nova Scotia declares state of emergency

During the first week of February two storms hit California in quick succession, both featuring intense precipitation thanks to the “pineapple express” atmospheric river.

Atmospheric rivers are long narrow channels of very moist air that flow through the atmosphere, transporting impressive amounts of water vapour that eventually fall as heavy rain or snow. The pineapple express is a famous recurring atmospheric river that forms near the Hawaiian Islands and flows northe-east to the Pacific coast of North America.

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