All from US missionary group freed in Haiti, police say
Source: Associated Press
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) — The remaining members of a missionary group who were kidnapped two months ago have been freed, Haiti police and the group said Thursday.
The spokesman for Haiti’s National Police, Gary Desrosiers, confirmed to The Associated Press that the remaining hostages had been released, but did not immediately provide additional details.
“We glorify God for answered prayer — the remaining 12 hostages are FREE!” Christian Aid Ministries said in a statement. “Join us in praising God that all 17 of our loved ones are now safe.”
The Ohio group said it hopes to provide more information later.
To many Bajans (inhabitants of Barbados), the move to republicanism represents an important attempt by the state to, in the words of youth activist and founder of the Barbados Muslim Association, Firhaana Bulbania, cast off “the mental chains that continue to persist in our mindsets.”
…In 1979, the Bajan government published the report of the Cox Constitution Review Commission that concluded that a constitutional monarchy remained the preferred form of government.
Subsequent governments examined the possibility of republicanism in 2008 and 2015. Yet nothing came of these studies. It was the global reckoning with institutional racism from the summer of 2020 that inspired this constitutional shift.
TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras (AP) — The prospects of Honduras President-elect Xiomara Castro governing with the support of a solid congressional majority took a hit Friday when the selection of leaders for newly-elected lawmakers devolved into shouting and shoving among her own allies.
Castro’s Liberty and Refoundation Party —known as Libre— won 50 seats in the 128-seat Congress in November elections. That’s not enough for a simple majority, but with the support of allies, Castro’s alliance would control the body.
However, that was cast into doubt Friday when 20 lawmakers from her party chose to elect some of their own as leaders, breaking Castro’s agreement to make a congressman from Vice President Salvador Nasralla’s Honduras Salvation Party the Congress’ president.
MEXICO CITY (Courthouse News) — The busy diners at the Churubusco market may not know it, but the same vegetable oil used to fry their lunch could soon power the bus that gets them to work in the near future.
This market located in the historic neighborhood of Coyoacán is one of several in Mexico City that sell their used cooking oil to a plant that processes it into an additive for biodiesel. The final product is being used in two of the capital’s sundry public transportation networks.
Designed by researchers at Mexico’s National Polytechnic Institute (IPN), the compact plant occupies a 1,400-square-foot corner of a large bus garage at the city’s sprawling wholesale foods market known as the Central de Abasto (Ceda).
Here the oil used to fry classic Mexican snack foods called antojitos or garnachas — such delectable and greasy fare as flautas, gorditas and quesadillas (yes, they deep fry them down here) — is put to use rather than wasted.
It is processed into an organic additive that is mixed at a 20/80 ratio with petroleum-based diesel, which is being used to move buses over the circuitous routes of the city’s Metrobus and Public Transport Network (RTP) systems.
TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras (AP) — Police arrested former Honduras President Juan Orlando Hernández at his home Tuesday, a step toward fulfilling a request by the United States government for his extradition on drug trafficking and weapons charges.
The arrest came shortly after a Honduran judge signed an arrest order and less than three weeks after Hernández left office. It follows years of allegations by U.S. prosecutors of the Honduran leader’s alleged links to drug traffickers.
Hernández exited his home flanked by police, shackled at the wrists and ankles, and wearing a bulletproof jacket. He got into a police vehicle and was driven away. A police helicopter that had been waiting nearby took flight, but appeared to just be escorting the caravan.
The Supreme Court of Justice had designated a judge Tuesday morning to handle the case and hours later the judge signed the order for Hernández’s arrest, said court spokesman Melvin Duarte. The security ministry, which had Hernández’s home surrounded since Monday evening, moved quickly to arrest him.
Honduran Security Minister Ramón Sabillón, who was fired by Hernández as head of the National Police in 2014, said Tuesday that Hernández had conspired “with cartels to traffic (drugs) and corrupt many public institutions, which led to social deterioration and undermined the application of justice in Honduras.”
(Janata Weekly) Women, particularly those in the Third World, often find themselves with limited ability to participate in community organizations and political life because of the bondage poverty and their traditional sex role imposes on them. On them falls sole responsibility to care for their children and other family members, especially when sick; they maintain the home, cook the meals, wash the dishes, the clothes, bathe the children, clean the house, mend the clothes. This labor becomes unending manual labor when households have no electricity (consequently, no lights, no refrigerator, no labor-saving electrical devices), and no running water. The burden of this work impedes the social participation, self-expectations, and education of the female population.
Women in the Third World (and increasingly in the imperial First World) face problems of violence at home and in public, problems of food and water for the family, of proper shelter, and lack of health care for the family, and their own lack of access to education and thus work opportunities.
In Nicaragua, before the 1979 Sandinista revolution, men typically fulfilled few obligations for their children; men often abandoned the family, leaving the care to women. It was not uncommon to hear the abuse that men inflicted on women, to see women running to a neighbor for refuge. It was not uncommon to encounter orphaned children whose mothers died in childbirth, since maternal mortality was high. Common illnesses were aggravated because there were few hospitals and if there were, cash payment was demanded.
After the 1979 Sandinista victory, living conditions for women drastically improved, achievements the period of neoliberal rule (1990-2006) did not completely overturn. Throughout the second Sandinista period (2007- today), the material and social position of women again made giant steps forward.
The greatest advance has been made by poor women in the rural areas and barrios, historically without safety, electricity, water and sanitation services, health care, or paved roads. The liberation women have attained during the Sandinista era cannot be measured only by what we apply in North America: equal pay for equal work, the right to abortion, the right to affordable childcare, freedom from sexual discrimination.
Last edited by caltrek on Wed Apr 06, 2022 11:58 am, edited 1 time in total.
MEXICO CITY (Courthouse News) — Mexico’s federal Chamber of Deputies passed a bill Thursday that would allow politicians to express political opinions despite a ban on such speech during electoral campaigns.
The vote to pass the bill represented the stark polarization of Mexican politics, with 267 votes in favor from President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s Morena party, along with deputies from the Labor and Ecological Green Parties.
Voting in opposition were 210 deputies from the National Action Party (PAN), Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), Citizens’ Movement and Party of the Democratic Revolution.
Despite the straight party-line vote, Morena Deputy Juan Ramiro Robledo Ruiz, head of the Constitutional Affairs Committee, called the issue one of “legal constitutional character, of course political, but not partisan.”
The objective of the bill, according to Morena Deputy Sergio Carlos Gutiérrez Luna, President of the Chamber of Deputies, is “to interpret the reach of government propaganda, … the principle of impartiality … and the application of sanctions” in federal election laws.
(Courthouse News) — Honduras’ Supreme Court ruled Wednesday evening to extradite former President Juan Orlando Hernández to the United States on drug charges less than two months after he left office.
Hernández was arrested on Feb. 15 after the United States requested his extradition on drug trafficking and weapons charges.
He is accused of having aided in the smuggling of over 500 tons of cocaine to the United States during his two terms as president.
Hernández’s arrest and extradition came after years of allegations that he had received payments for providing protection to drug runners in Honduras. Reuters reported in May 2021 that U.S. prosecutors called Honduras a “narco-state” during a trial of drug trafficker Geovanny Fuentes Ramírez.
Ramírez, a Honduran national, was sentenced to life in prison and ordered to forfeit over $151 million on drug and weapons charges in February.
SAN SALVADOR, El Salvador (AP via Latino Rebels) — El Salvador’s congress granted President Nayib Bukele’s request to declare a state of emergency early Sunday amid a wave of gang-related killings over the weekend.
Fourteen people were killed Friday and 62 people died Saturday, a scale of violence that has not been seen for years. By comparison, there were 79 homicides in the entire month of February.
Bukele announced the request Saturday on his social media accounts, and congress approved it early Sunday. The decree would suspend constitutional guarantees of freedom of assembly and loosen arrest rules for as much as 30 days, but could be extended.
The homicides appeared linked to the country’s street gangs, who effectively control many neighborhoods in the capital. The National Police reported they have captured five leaders of the Mara Salvatrucha or MS-13, who they claimed ordered the weekend killings.
Bukele wrote in his social media accounts that he was ordering the head of the country’s prisons to carry out an immediate 24/7 lockdown of gang inmates in their cells.
(Janata Weekly) Women, particularly those in the Third World, often find themselves with limited ability to participate in community organizations and political life because of the bondage poverty and their traditional sex role imposes on them. On them falls sole responsibility to care for their children and other family members, especially when sick; they maintain the home, cook the meals, wash the dishes, the clothes, bathe the children, clean the house, mend the clothes. This labor becomes unending manual labor when households have no electricity (consequently, no lights, no refrigerator, no labor-saving electrical devices), and no running water. The burden of this work impedes the social participation, self-expectations, and education of the female population.
Women in the Third World (and increasingly in the imperial First World) face problems of violence at home and in public, problems of food and water for the family, of proper shelter, and lack of health care for the family, and their own lack of access to education and thus work opportunities.
In Nicaragua, before the 1979 Sandinista revolution, men typically fulfilled few obligations for their children; men often abandoned the family, leaving the care to women. It was not uncommon to hear the abuse that men inflicted on women, to see women running to a neighbor for refuge. It was not uncommon to encounter orphaned children whose mothers died in childbirth, since maternal mortality was high. Common illnesses were aggravated because there were few hospitals and if there were, cash payment was demanded.
After the 1979 Sandinista victory, living conditions for women drastically improved, achievements the period of neoliberal rule (1990-2006) did not completely overturn. Throughout the second Sandinista period (2007- today), the material and social position of women again made giant steps forward.
The greatest advance has been made by poor women in the rural areas and barrios, historically without safety, electricity, water and sanitation services, health care, or paved roads. The liberation women have attained during the Sandinista era cannot be measured only by what we apply in North America: equal pay for equal work, the right to abortion, the right to affordable childcare, freedom from sexual discrimination.
That place will always be in misery unless the people change. The only thing they had going correctly there was the removing of criminals with a quickness so I can vouch for the past articles about it saying it was one of the safest countries in Central America. I wonder how LATAM will fare in the future with all this tech and stuff.
MEXICO CITY (Courthouse News) — A case in Mexico’s Supreme Court concerning the president’s proposed electricity reform could have implications reaching much farther than the country’s energy sector: democracy at large.
While the case concerns President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s attempt to undo energy reforms from previous decades, the ruling could reveal how much influence Mexico’s executive branch now wields over the judiciary.
Initially proposed as two separate administrative regulatory policies in 2020 that the court deemed unconstitutional in February 2021, the reform is a combination of the two policies created by López Obrador, who said he did so without changing “even a comma” of the previous proposals.
Among other changes, the reform aims to give the country’s Federal Electricity Commission (CFE) first rights to all energy purchases, a move experts say will stifle competition and put billions of dollars of foreign investment at risk.
...
One of the issues up for debate was whether or not access to electricity is a human right that the state is obligated to provide. Six of the ministers said they did not agree that the issue is before the court and moved on to debate other aspects of the reform.
(Latino Rebels) COSTA RICA: Economist Rodrigo Chaves won Sunday’s presidential election ahead of ex-President José María Figueres (1994-1998). Chaves, from the Social Democratic Progress Party (PPSD), was projected to secure victory with about 52.9 percent of the vote according to the official preliminary partial tally of the run-off ballot.
The anti-establishment candidate and former World Bank official is popular among voters who reject traditional politics and grew concerned over the country’s national debt. Figueres’ National Liberation Party has dominated the country’s politics at the local and national levels over the past half-century.
Chaves promised to use referendums to bypass congress to bring change in Costa Rica. as a large number of voters grew discontent with the political establishment. The 60-year-old had already positioned himself as the favorite candidate coming in second in an initial vote on February 6.
During Chaves’ tenure at the World Bank, he was accused of sexual harassment; he denied the accusations
Cuba and US take tentative step with talks on migration
Source: AP
WASHINGTON (AP) — Cuba and the United States took a tentative step toward unthawing relations and resuming joint efforts to address irregular migration, a senior Cuban official said Friday following the highest-level talks between the two countries in four years.
There were no major breakthroughs, but the mere fact that the U.S. was holding substantive talks was a sign relations might be looking better under President Joe Biden after going into deep freeze under his predecessor, Deputy Foreign Minister Carlos Fernandez de Cossio said.
“They seem committed. They ratified that they are committed to the agreements in place," Fernandez de Cossio said. "So we have no reason to mistrust what they’re saying, but time will tell.”
The talks did not focus on broader U.S.-Cuba relations but more narrowly on restoring adherence to previous agreements that were intended to curtail the often-dangerous irregular migration from the island to the United States.
MEXICO CITY (AP) — Mexico’s government on Thursday proposed a dramatic overhaul of the nation’s electoral system and the agency that oversees it—one of the country’s most trusted institutions. It would reduce the size of Congress and state legislatures while having the federal elections board chosen by voters, potentially adding a higher degree of politics to what has been an independent body.
The proposal also would reduce federal funding of political parties and spending on elections in general—a repeated target of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, who has often feuded with the National Electoral Institute.
The proposals presented by López Obrador and several members of his Cabinet would create a new federal elections authority to replace the institute, as well as eliminate similar state-level bodies.
“There is no intention of imposing a single party,” López Obrador said. “What we want is that there is a true democracy in the country and that electoral frauds end … to leave a true democratic state established.”
But the path for what will surely be a controversial reform package would be difficult. López Obrador’s party and its allies do not have the two-thirds majority in Congress required to make constitutional changes. The main opposition parties have already said they oppose such changes.
At least four dead as explosion rocks historic hotel in Havana
Source: Washington Post
An unexplained explosion at a historic hotel in Old Havana killed at least four people and destroyed much of the building on Friday morning, Cuban officials said.
Thirteen people were missing. Firefighters and a rescue team searched the rubble of the Hotel Saratoga, where people could still be trapped, according to a tweet from the official account of the Cuban presidency. The causes of the explosion were unclear, the tweet said, but preliminary investigation pointed to a gas leak.
Videos and images on social media showed smoke filling the air and crowds gathering in the street outside the hotel. A photo published by the news agency Reuters showed at least one body in the street outside the hotel covered with a sheet.
Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel and other officials were at the scene.
Mexico’s 100,000 ‘Disappeared’ A Tragedy, Says UN Rights Chief Bachelet
May 18, 2022
Introduction:
(UN News via Eurasia Review) The news that more than 100,000 people in Mexico are now officially registered as “disappeared” is a tragedy, UN rights chief Michelle Bachelet said on Tuesday, in a call for action to tackle the country’s longstanding problem.
A national database has listed all those who’ve been reported missing in the country since 1964, and the tally continues to climb, amid ongoing drug gang violence and a lack of effective investigations.
To date, only 35 of the disappearances recorded since then have led to the conviction of the perpetrators, a “staggering rate of impunity”, said the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights.
Justice for families
In a statement, the UN human rights chief urged the authorities to continue to implement reforms and ensure justice for the victims and their families.
“The crime of enforced disappearances is one of the worst things, for the families, precisely because they never get closure and rarely sadly are bodies found,” said UN rights office spokesperson Liz Throssell.
The cartels control a large part of Mexico and central America and has literally zero value on human rights. They will kill people as they see people as trash. It is a disease on humanity. 300,000 killed in the past 30 years. https://www.washingtonpost.com/es/post- ... parecidos/
Nicaraguan Bishop Fasts to Protest Police Harassment
May 20, 2022
Introduction:
MEXICO CITY (AP) — A Roman Catholic bishop in Nicaragua began an “indefinite fast” Friday inside a church to protest increasing harassment from national police, who he said followed him throughout the entire previous day.
Rolando Álvarez, the bishop of Matagalpa and a fierce critic of President Daniel Ortega’s government, said in a video published by his diocese that police had even breached his “circle of family privacy” while he visited a niece.
Ortega’s government arrested dozens of political opposition leaders, including most of the potential candidates, in the months before his reelection to a fourth consecutive term last year. His government has shut down dozens of nongovernmental organizations that he accuses of working on behalf of foreign interests to destabilize his government. Tens of thousands of Nicaraguans have been chased into exile.
The Catholic church remains influential but has not escaped Ortega’s wrath. He has accused its priests of being “terrorists and coup plotters” and blamed them for participating in his “failed overthrow.”
Álvarez was one of the bishops who supported demonstrators in massive street protests that broke out in April 2018 and became a call for Ortega to step down. Since then, Álvarez’s sermons often criticize the government and demand the release of political prisoners.
