How the Tonga volcano has been felt around the world – video

A large underwater volcano in Tonga has sent huge swells around the world affecting countries bordering the Pacific Ocean. The tsunami waves caused damage to boats as far away as New Zealand and large swells were seen in California and Japan but did not appear to cause any widespread damage. Two people have drowned off a beach in northern Peru, local authorities say, after unusually high waves were recorded in several coastal areas

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Could Chile show the United States how to rebuild its democracy? | Tony Karon

The US once helped destroy Chilean democracy. Now, a constitutional reform movement in Chile could teach the US how to fix its own

Chile always gave the lie to the cold war claim that the United States stood for democracy. When its voters in 1970 showed the temerity (“irresponsibility”, Henry Kissinger called it) to elect socialist Salvador Allende as president, Washington helped orchestrate the coup that toppled him, and backed the resulting dictatorship.

It seems those “irresponsible” Chilean voters are at it again – on Sunday, they elected leftist Gabriel Boric as president by a 12-point margin, on the back of a campaign for a new constitution. But if Chilean democracy seems on the road to recovery from its Washington-backed disfiguration, prospects for democracy in the United States look rather bleak.

Tony Karon is a South African-born journalist and former anti-apartheid activist. He is currently the Managing Editor of AJ+

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Chilean president-elect Gabriel Boric urges citizens to back constitution rewrite

Boric envisions a greener, fairer and more inclusive country, reflecting the generational shift underway in Chile

Chile’s future as a greener, fairer country, depends on the success of efforts to rewrite the country’s dictatorship-era constitution, president-elect Gabriel Boric said on Tuesday.

After a meeting with the delegates elected last year to rewrite the 1980 constitution which enshrined the ideological legacy of General Augusto Pinochet, Boric called for Chileans to unite behind the project.

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Gabriel Boric’s triumph puts wind in the sails of Latin America’s resurgent left

The decisive victory reflects Chileans’ revolt against a threadbare welfare system and a society systematically stacked in the favour of the rich

At the age of 14, Gabriel Boric – the great-grandson of a Croatian migrant and an avid reader of Marx and Hegel – formed a city-wide student union in the Chilean city of Punta Arenas.

At 21, and by then a law student, he led a campus sit-in for 44 days in Santiago, Chile’s capital, to oust a senior professor accused of plagiarism and corruption. Two years later, in 2011, he was elected figurehead of a massive student rebellion against profiteering private universities, and in 2013 became a congressman for his remote home region.

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Leftwing millennial to be Chile’s new president – video

Gabriel Boric, a leftwing former student leader, will become Chile’s youngest president after storming to a resounding victory in a run-off vote against his ultra-conservative far-right opponent, José Antonio Kast.

With nearly 97% of the vote counted, the 35-year-old claimed 55.8% to take a 12 percentage point lead over Kast, who quickly accepted his defeat and called Boric to congratulate him.

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Gabriel Boric vows to ‘fight privileges of the few’ as Chile’s premier

Leftist former student has vowed to unite country and tackle poverty and inequality

Gabriel Boric has vowed to unite Chile, fight “the privileges of the few” and tackle poverty and inequality after winning a decisive victory over his far-right opponent to become the South American country’s youngest premier.

The 35-year-old leftist former student leader won 56% of the vote in Sunday’s second-round presidential election, cruising past his ultra-conservative opponent, José Antonio Kast, who took 44.2%.

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Chilean election offers stark choice: a leftist or an admirer of Pinochet

The campaign has resurfaced deep divisions and revived bitter memories of the country’s recent past

Chilean voters headed to the polls on Sunday to chose between two presidential candidates offering starkly contrasting visions for the future, in the country’s most divisive elections since it returned to democracy in 1990.

Leftwing candidate Gabriel Boric, a tattooed former student protest leader, has pledged to empower women and Indigenous people and raise taxes and spending in order to create a fairer Chile.

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Widow of Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet dies age 99

For opponents of the dictatorship Lucía Hiriart was a reviled symbol of the violent authoritarian regime and its bitter legacy


Lucía Hiriart, the widow of the Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet, has died at her home at the age of 99.

Hiriart – an intensely divisive figure in Chile – had rarely been seen in public in recent years and her health has been kept a closely guarded secret.

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‘Very worrying’: is a far-right radical about to take over in Chile?

As election run-off looms, José Antonio Kast’s opponents sound the alarm

María Irene Campos was a woman on a mission.

“I want to send the message that Chile will never again be communist,” the 74-year-old retiree proclaimed as she hit the streets last Friday to catch a glimpse of the man she believes can save her South American homeland from such a fate.

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A Fight Against … review – Chilean playwright’s sparky sketches

Royal Court Theatre Upstairs, London
Pablo Manzi’s political scenes, which span several decades and are powerfully performed, could perhaps lead to a future epic

Thirty years ago, the Royal Court introduced a Chilean playwright, Ariel Dorfman, with Death and the Maiden, a much-revived, twistily structured thriller about South American human rights abuses.

While theatre can have a one-hit-and-run attitude to distant politics, the Court has commendably kept an eye on Santiago. Its international programme mentors new writers in an initiative spawning several Court stagings, including Guillermo Calderón’s B in 2017 and now, in sparky English by the same translator, William Gregory, Una Lucha Contra … by Pablo Manzi.

A Fight Against … (Una Lucha Contra … ) is at the Royal Court theatre, London, until 22 January

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Chile: candidates battle for moderate votes as presidential race nears end

Far-right José Antonio Kast and left-wing Gabriel Boric in tight race amid divided political landscape

Chile’s presidential race is hurtling towards its conclusion with the two remaining candidates battling to secure moderate votes in a deeply divided political landscape.

Far-right candidate José Antonio Kast secured a two-point victory in November’s first round, but polls show that Gabriel Boric – the leftwing former student leader he will face in the 19 December runoff – now holds a narrow lead.

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Chilean presidential candidate’s father was member of Nazi party

Revelations appear at odds with José Antonio Kast’s own statements about his father’s military service

The German-born father of Chilean presidential candidate José Antonio Kast was a member of the Nazi party, according to a recently unearthed document – revelations that appear at odds with the far-right candidate’s own statements about his father’s military service during the second world war.

German officials have confirmed that an ID card in the country’s federal archive shows that an 18-year-old named Michael Kast joined the National Socialist German Workers’ party, or NSDAP, in September 1942, at the height of Hitler’s war on the Soviet Union.

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‘A bit of hope’: Chile legalizes same-sex marriage

Vote seen as a blow to conservative presidential candidate José Antonio Kast, who won majority of votes in November’s first round

A historic vote granting equal marriage rights to same-sex couples in Chile has been heralded by activists as a triumph and a blow to the conservative agenda of presidential candidate José Antonio Kast.

Kast won the majority of votes in November’s first-round vote, instilling a wave of fear among the country’s LGBTQ+ community. A tight runoff between Kast and his progressive opponent, former student protest leader Gabriel Boric, is scheduled on 19 December.

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Chilean environmental activist who opposed dam projects found dead

Javiera Rojas remembered as ‘an emblematic activist who was dedicated to the process of resistance’

Environmental activists in Chile have called for justice after a 42-year-old land defender was found dead with her hands and feet bound.

The body of Javiera Rojas was found buried under a pile of clothes in an abandoned house on Sunday in Calama in the northern region of Antofagasta.

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Chile’s right rejoices after pro-Pinochet candidate wins presidential first round

José Antonio Kast will face progressive former student leader Gabriel Boric in runoff election next month

Chile’s right wing have claimed a jubilant victory after José Antonio Kast, a former congressman with a history of defending the Pinochet dictatorship, secured a surprise win in the first round of the country’s presidential election.

Kast, who campaigned on a platform of public order, migration controls and conservative social values, confounded expectations to take 28% of the vote and beat the progressive former student leader Gabriel Boric by two percentage points.

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Far-right populist, ex-protest leader set for runoff vote in Chile’s presidential election

Republican party’s José Antonio Kast set to win first round with 28% of the vote

The far-right populist José Antonio Kast is on course for a convincing victory over former protest leader Gabriel Boric in the first round of Chile’s presidential election.

With more than 90% of the votes counted, Kast led Boric by 28% to 25.6%. The two will meet in a runoff next month. Chileans also voted for a new congress in the general election.

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‘I will never get my eyes back’: the Chilean woman blinded by police who is running for senate

Fabiola Campillai was shot in the face by a teargas canister as she walked to work in 2019 amid nationwide protests against social inequality. Now she is running for office as an independent

On a November evening two years ago, Fabiola Campillai stepped out into the fading sunshine to head for her night shift at a food processing plant.

For weeks, Chile had been racked by a wave of mass protests against social inequality, but there were few signs of demonstrators in Cinco Pinos, the quiet neighbourhood on the outskirts of Santiago where Campillai lives.

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Rightwing Chilean newspaper accused of ‘apology for Nazism’ over Göring article

Germany embassy condemns El Mercurio for Sunday piece and says ‘no room to justify or minimise his horrific role’

Chile’s main conservative daily newspaper has been accused of publishing “an apology for Nazism” after running an illustrated article commemorating the life of the German war criminal Hermann Göring.

After El Mercurio published the article on Sunday, the German embassy in Santiago expressed its concern, highlighting Göring’s many crimes.

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Chile president Piñera faces impeachment after Pandora papers leak

Opposition politicians launch proceedings against Sebastián Piñera over possible irregularities in mining company sale

Opposition politicians have launched impeachment proceedings against Chile’s president, Sebastián Piñera, over possible irregularities in the sale of a mining company, after new details about the deal were revealed in the Pandora papers.

Lawmakers cited an “ethical duty” to hold the president accountable for the alleged irregularities in his involvement in the controversial Dominga project.

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Chile protest leader reveals he lied about having cancer

Efforts to rewrite constitution rocked after key figure Rodrigo Rojas Vade says on Instagram that he does not have leukaemia

Chile’s efforts to rewrite its Pinochet-era constitution have been rocked by the revelation that one of its most prominent members has been lying about his very public battle with cancer.

Rodrigo Rojas Vade, 37, admitted that he does not in fact have leukaemia – a major factor in his rise to prominence and eventual political career – after an investigation by La Tercera newspaper revealed inconsistencies in his story.

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