Category Archives: Americas

Ana Ofelia Murguía, Mexican actor and voice of Disney’s Coco, dies aged 90

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Murguía, who voiced titular character in Oscar-winning animated Pixar film, appeared in more than 100 roles spanning cinema, stage and television

Ana Ofelia Murguía, the Mexican actor who voiced the titular character of Disney and Pixar film Coco, has died aged 90.

Her death was announced “with deep sadness” on social media by Mexico’s National Institute of Fine Arts and Literature, which said Murguía’s “artistic career was vital for the performing arts of Mexico”. Her cause of death was not given.

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Plane detained in France sheds light on Nicaragua’s role in US migrant crisis

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Flight contained 303 Indians en route to Central American country whose light visa requirements have attracted US-bound travelers

The detention in France of a charter plane bound for Nicaragua has renewed attention on the Central American nation’s role as a springboard for migrants from across the world seeking to make their way to the United States.

The flight, which left the United Arab Emirates on 21 December with 303 passengers of Indian nationality, was grounded during a refueling stop after an anonymous tip-off alleging human trafficking.

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‘El Jefe’: is Karina Milei the power behind Argentina’s presidential throne?

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Javier Milei swept aside an anti-nepotism law to appoint his sister to a high-ranking position – but who is she?

When Javier Milei first walked into Argentina’s presidential palace earlier this month, the radical libertarian leader was not accompanied by his vice-president, Victoria Villarruel, nor his partner, the actor Fátima Flórez.

Milei’s escort at this key political moment was a woman who many analysts describe as the true power behind his throne: his sister, Karina.

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California dazzled by ‘extremely rare’ killer whale sightings off southern coast

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A group of 10 orcas has been seen leaping into the air to catch prey, delighting watchers and experts for the past two weeks

Experts and whale watchers have been dazzled by a series of orca sightings off the southern California coast that are being described as “extremely rare”.

A group of 10 whales – including a calf just a few months old – has been spotted for the past two weeks off the coast of southern California, between Oxnard and San Diego. Images from social media show the giant creatures leaping into the air to catch dolphins and coming within feet of boats full of eager viewers.

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Milei says Argentina will not be joining Brics bloc in policy reversal

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Far-right president says not ‘opportune’ for Argentina – which had been set to become a member on 1 January – to be part of alliance

Argentina has formally announced that it will not join the Brics bloc of developing economies, the latest in a dramatic shift in foreign and economic policy by Argentina’s new far-right populist president, Javier Milei.

In a letter addressed to the leaders of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa – all members of the alliance – Milei said the moment was not “opportune” for Argentina to join as a full member. The letter was dated a week ago, 22 December, but released by the Argentinian government on Friday, the last working day of 2023.

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Weather tracker: rain batters Argentina and DRC as fog shrouds India and Pakistan

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Turkey also affected by fog, with 10 killed and 57 injured in serious road crash involving three buses

During the Christmas period, parts of South America experienced intense showers and thunderstorms, resulting in substantial rainfall in various regions. On Monday, more than 100mm of rain fell in the Catamarca province in Argentina, which led to flash floods. A sudden surge in river water levels then caused the collapse of a pedestrian bridge, which was the only link between the towns of Rincón and Pomán. While many other roads in the region were damaged and houses were flooded, no casualties were reported.

The unique topography of Catamarca aided the formation of a near-stationary convective shower over Pomán, unleashing several hours of torrential rain and causing catastrophic flooding.

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Controversial Brazil law curbing Indigenous rights comes into force

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‘Time marker’ legislation means Indigenous peoples can only lay claim to lands they occupied in 1988, invalidating scores of claims

A controversial law curtailing Indigenous rights in Brazil has come into force, marking a victory for the powerful agribusiness caucus in congress.

The new legislation upholds the so-called “time marker” theory (marco temporal), which establishes that Indigenous peoples can only lay claim to land they physically occupied as of October 1988, when the current constitution was promulgated.

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Venezuela mounts military exercises as UK sends warship to support Guyana

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Nicolás Maduro orders ‘defensive’ manoeuvres as British Navy deploys vessel in territorial dispute

Venezuela’s president Nicolás Maduro has ordered more than 5,600 military personnel to participate in “defensive” exercises, after the UK deployed a warship to waters off the coast of Guyana in a show of support for the former British colony.

Maduro said he was launching an action “of a defensive nature in response to the provocation and threat of the UK against peace and the sovereignty of our country”.

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US-Mexico border talks yield ‘important agreements’ on rail and bridge crossings

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Two countries agree to enhance efforts to tackle human smuggling, poverty and violence and promote legal ‘pathways’

US and Mexican officials have hailed the success of talks held on Wednesday aimed at curbing historically high unauthorized immigration across their shared, 2,000-mile border that risks becoming a humanitarian disaster and an election year political crisis for Joe Biden.

After the closed-door meeting between the US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, and the Mexican foreign minister, Alicia Bárcena, the Mexican president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, hailed what he described as “important agreements”.

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Mexico: 14 kidnapped from village that rose up and killed cartel members

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Farmers in Texcaltitlán in central Mexico, tired of being extorted, chased down gang members and killed 10 earlier this month

A drug cartel in central Mexico has kidnapped 14 local residents, including four children, in apparent retaliation for an uprising by angry farmers earlier this month that killed 10 cartel gunmen, officials said.

Farmers in the village of Texcaltitlán and a neighboring hamlet had apparently grown tired of cartel extortions. Armed only with sickles and hunting rifles, they chased down suspected gang members amid bursts of automatic gunfire on 8 December, hacking, shooting and burning them. Four villagers also died in the clash.

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Taylor Swift fan died of heat exhaustion at Rio concert, forensics report finds

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Ana Clara Benevides, 23, died hours after the singer’s 17 November show – a day when temperatures hit 40C

Heat exhaustion caused the death of a Brazilian fan who attended a Taylor Swift concert in November, according to a forensics report obtained by the Associated Press on Wednesday.

Ana Clara Benevides, 23, passed out during Swift’s second song at the show in Rio de Janeiro on 17 November and died hours later at a local hospital. Temperatures in the city that day were at about 40C (105F).

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Nearly 21ft bronze statue of Shakira unveiled in her home town in Colombia

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In social media posts, the singer thanked the sculptor Yino Márquez and his students for their ‘enormous artistic talent’

Shakira has been transformed into a 21.3ft (6.5 meters) bronze statue in her home town of Barranquilla, Colombia, where according to legend she began her trademark hip-shaking dance moves on the table in a Lebanese restaurant at the age of four.

The Hips Don’t Lie singer shared photos and video of the statue, which captures her making her trademark hip swivel, on her Instagram account. She captioned one post: “Estoy muy emocionada por este homenaje a la mujer Colombiana y a las Barranquilleras dentro y fuera de mi tierra!” (I am very excited for this tribute to the Colombian woman and the Barranquilleras inside and outside my land!)

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Illegal mining on rise again in Amazon, says Yanomami leader

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Activist Davi Kopenawa says miners are returning after eviction operations were scaled back, and others never left

Thousands of illegal miners are resisting government attempts to evict them from Brazil’s largest Indigenous territory, the renowned activist and shaman Davi Kopenawa has said, nearly a year after operations to displace them began.

President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva made expelling an estimated 20,000 illegal gold and tin ore miners from the Yanomami Indigenous territory one of his top tasks after taking power last January.

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Britain to send patrol ship to Guyana amid Venezuela border dispute

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HMS Trent will take part in exercises with Guyana as tensions over mineral-rich Essequibo region raise anxieties

A Royal Navy patrol ship will be sent to Guyana in a show of British support for the Commonwealth country.

The South American country is in a dispute with Venezuela over a mineral-rich border region.

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Mixed-race people become Brazil’s biggest population group

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Grouping that includes descendants of Indigenous Brazilians as well as of Africans now outnumbers white population

Mixed-race Brazilians are now the largest population group in the South American country, the latest census has revealed, as the number of people identifying as African-descended in Brazil continues to grow.

New data from the 2022 census released on Friday shows that 92.1 million Brazilians identify as mixed-race, equivalent to 45.3% of the population. This is up from 43.1% in 2010, when the last census was carried out.

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Colombia looks to recover billions in treasure from ‘holy grail of shipwrecks’

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But critics say the raising of the San José, sunk in battle with British ships in 1708, might damage the country’s cultural heritage

The Colombian government has announced that it will attempt to raise objects from the 1708 shipwreck of the galleon San José, which is believed to contain a cargo worth billions of dollars.

The 300-year-old wreck, often called the “holy grail of shipwrecks”, has been controversial, because it is both an archaeological and economic treasure.

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Canada intelligence operation put diplomats in legal ‘grey zone’ – report

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Program – under scrutiny after imprisonment of Canadians in China – said to lack safeguards to protect officers overseas

A controversial intelligence-gathering program run by Canada’s foreign affairs ministry operates in a “distinctly grey zone”, puts its officers at risk and breaches global diplomatic conventions, says a damning watchdog report.

Canada’s global security reporting program (GSRP), a critical part of the foreign ministry’s security and intelligence footprint overseas, places officers in countries with “poor human rights records” including Ethiopia, India, Egypt, Turkey, Israel and China.

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Two Guinean children abandoned in Bogotá airport as migrant routes shift

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Migration through the treacherous Darién gap is slowing as less restrictive air routes open up between South and Central America

Two children from the west African country of Guinea who were abandoned in Bogotá’s airport have been taken into government custody after spending several days on their own in the international departures terminal.

Colombia’s national immigration department said the children, aged 10 and 13, had been travelling with separate groups and were left in the airport by their relatives earlier this month for reasons that have not been clarified.

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Javier Milei’s radical economic policies for Argentina met with protests

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New libertarian president accused of drawing up a ‘battle plan against working people’

Thousands of protesters have poured on to the streets of Buenos Aires after Argentina’s new president announced a far-reaching emergency decree containing dozens of controversial economic measures – a move one prominent critic compared to the actions of an absolute monarchy.

Javier Milei, a radical libertarian economist who was inaugurated less than a fortnight ago, won power promising a dramatic shake-up of Argentina’s moribund economy amid rampant inflation and widespread poverty. On Wednesday night Milei appeared on television, flanked by 12 stony-faced ministers and top officials, to unveil a decree he claimed would haul the South American country out of “the economic hell we are now living through”.

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‘Disappearing the disappeared’: outcry after Mexico reduces number of missing

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Activists say the review of 113,000 missing people in Mexico is a ploy to reduce the number ahead of the presidential election

When the Mexican government announced it would review the official register of “disappeared” people, it was presented as an effort to eliminate false entries. But with little transparency over how it was being done, activists suspected a ploy to reduce the number ahead of the 2024 election.

The government has now announced it was able to confirm just 12,377 of the more than 113,000 cases of disappeared people.

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