International roundup

By Agencies
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In a bid to stoke nationalism and justify his policies, Mexico’s president has increasingly taken to calling his opponents “traitors” and accused them of working for the foreign governments.

Analysts say President Andrés Manuel López Obrador is starting to sound more like right-wing Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, calling anyone who opposes him a foreign agent.

The issue came to a head last week when President Andrés Manuel López Obrador tried to side-step court challenges to one of his pet projects by declaring a tourist train line “an issue of national security,” without explaining why a tourism project warranted that status.

On Tuesday, the president said it was a case of foreign intervention by environmentalists paid by the U.S. government, a heady accusation in a country that has been invaded several times.

“Pseudo environmentalists come from Mexico City and other parts of the country, financed by the government of the United States, and they file these injunctions against us. It is an issue of national security for many reasons, because a foreign government is interfering,” said López Obrador.”

Activist Pepe Urbina filed one of the court challenges that stalled the Maya Train project, which is cutting a swath through the jungle on Mexico’s Caribbean coast. 

The project threatens extensive sinkhole caverns where some of the oldest human remains in North America have been discovered.

“They are slandering us, by claiming we work for the U.S. government,” said Urbina, who makes his living as a professional diver and denies receiving U.S. money. 

“It is absurd.”

The 950-mile (1,500- kilometer) Maya Train line is planned to run in a rough loop around the Yucatan peninsula, connecting beach resorts and archaeological sites. López Obrador has exempted it from environmental impact statements, but a judge disagreed and froze work on a 36-mile (60 kilometer) stretch of train line between Cancun and Tulum.

Antonella Vazquez, a lawyer who took on the appeals on a volunteer basis, also denied getting any U.S. government funding.

“It’s shameful that they attack us, just to justify a national security designation that doesn’t apply to a tourist train,” said Vazquez, who noted the judge in the case refused Monday to lift the work stoppage, even though the government has started to ignore it.

Vazquez says “I have received messages (on social media) that I am corrupt, or that someone is financing me or that I don’t love my country. No! We aren’t doing anything other than asking that the law be respected. ”

Over the weekend, López Obrador used similar language to attack anyone — environmentalists or businessmen — who opposes his plan to give dirty, fuel-oil and coal government power plants preference in electricity purchases, over private gas-fired, wind and solar plants.

López Obrador’s actions on electrical power led the U.S. and Canadian governments to file complaint against Mexico under the U.S.-Mexico Canada free trade pact, which forbids discriminating against foreign companies.

PARAGUAY

A former president of Paraguay who has been investigated for his alleged participation in money laundering operations was included on Friday on a U.S. corruption list.

The Department of State announced the designation of former President Horacio Manuel Cartes “for his involvement in significant corruption”.

Cartes served as president of Paraguay between August 2013 and August 2018. He owns a conglomerate of some 25 companies, including media and tobacco companies, and a supermarket chain. 

The former president has been investigated about alleged irregularities in his multimillion-dollar assets and for his alleged links with the leader of a money laundering network.

The former president “obstructed a major international investigation into transnational crime in order to protect himself and his criminal associate from potential prosecution and political damage,” Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a statement.

He added that his actions “undermined the stability of Paraguay’s democratic institutions” and enabled the involvement of Cartes with “foreign terrorist organizations” and other U.S.-designated entities. 

The statement did not provide details on the investigations or alleged involvement in terrorist activities.

The businessman, who is currently seeking to be the new president of his conservative political party Partido Colorado, said the allegations are unfounded.

“I deny and reject the content of the allegations,” Cartes said on Twitter. 

He added that the is “committed to offering all the support and primary-source information that the authorities need to clarify” anything.

The internal election for the new president of the official Partido Colorado is scheduled for December. Cartes is competing with the current president of Paraguay, Mario Abdo Benítez, to be the next president of this political party.

In addition to the former president, his adult children Juan Pablo Cartes Montaña, Sofía Cartes Montaña and María Sol Cartes Montaña were included on the corruption list.

In a news conference at the U.S. Embassy in Asunción on Friday morning, Ambassador Marc Ostfield said more such designations are likely.

The ambassador declined to provide any details of ongoing investigations into the former president.

GUATEMALA

Guatemalan President Alejandro Giammattei visited Ukraine this week and expressed his solidarity with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

Giammattei met with Zelenskyy in the capital, Kyiv, becoming the first Latin American president to make the trip.

Many Latin American leaders have avoided taking a stance on the Russian invasion of Ukraine. That reflects in some cases decades-old ties to Russia and in others a wariness of U.S. foreign policy goals.

“We stand in solidarity with the Ukrainian people, who have resisted with courage. As long as human lives are lost, we cannot silence our voices,” Giammattei said at a joint news conference.”

“Let it be clear that since the beginning of this conflict, Guatemala has raised its voice We will always be consistent with our words. Guatemala does not and will not remain silent,” he said.

Zelenskyy thanked Giammattei for his support for sanctions on Russia and Guatemala’s support for an international tribunal on crimes committed during the war.

Ukraine’s president noted that Latin America, like many other parts of the world, has suffered from higher prices due to the fighting in Ukriane, which is a big producer of agricultural and other commodities.

“Only together can we protect our world,” Zelenskyy said.

Critics of Giammattei’s government said the president has more pressing issues he should be dealing with at home, including corruption and human rights.

“The entire world knows the way in which President Alejandro Giammattei has been eroding democracy and promoting impunity in his country. One trip to Ukraine is not going to change that reality,” said Carolina Jiménez, president of the Washington Office on Latin America.

BAHAMAS

Authorities in the Bahamas combed shorelines and open waters on Monday in hopes of finding more survivors after a boat carrying up to an estimated 60 Haitian migrants apparently capsized.

Divers have found the bodies of 15 women, one man and a toddler, while another 20 men and five women have been rescued since Sunday, according to Bahamian officials.

The U.S. government is helping with the ongoing search as local authorities deploy drones, planes and submersibles, said Capt. Shonedel Pinder, deputy commander of the Bahamas Defense Force.

“It’s a combined effort using all available resources…to see if there are any potential survivors…as well as to recover any remains,” he told reporters.

Two Bahamian men are in custody, although it wasn’t immediately clear if they have been charged as officials launch a criminal investigation into a suspected human smuggling operation.

The twin-engine speed boat named “Bare Ambition” apparently capsized about seven miles from New Providence after leaving the Bahamas around 1 a.m. on Sunday, likely bound for Miami. 

It became the latest deadly voyage for Haitian migrants as they flee a deepening economic crisis and a spike in gang-related violence in their country, which is struggling to recover from the assassination last year of President Jovenel Moïse.

In May, at least 11 people died and 38 others were saved near Puerto Rico, while another boat carrying 40 migrants went down near Florida, with only one man rescued and another found dead.

MEXICO

Gunmen shot to death five men and one woman at a privately-run drug rehabilitation center in wester Mexico, authorities said Monday.

The prosecutors’ office in the western state of Jalisco said the attack occurred around midnight in Tlaquepaque, a suburb of the state capital, Guadalajara. 

Jalisco is home to the drug cartel of the same name, and has been plagued for years by violence between rival factions of the cartel in Guadalajara.

The office said that several people were involved in the attack, but did not offer information on a motive.

Drug gangs in Mexico have attacked rehab centers in the past, usually to kill drug users or dealers allied with rival gangs. In 2020, in the neighboring state of Guanajuato, gunmen killed 27 people at a rehab center.

Mexico has long had problems with rehab centers because most are privately run, underfunded and often commit abuses against recovering addicts.

The government spends relatively little money on rehabilitation, often making the unregistered centers the only option available for poor families.

In addition, addicts and dealers who face attacks from rivals on the streets sometimes take refuge at the rehab clinics, making the clinics themselves targets for attack.

PUERTO RICO

Norma Quiñones spent four years without running water after Hurricane Maria destroyed the well that she and dozens of neighbors depend on in their community deep in the mountains of western Puerto Rico.

Last Christmas, crews installed a new well, but the water is not treated, so Quiñones is forced to drive 45 minutes into town to buy nearly 100 bottles of water every week for her family.

“It’s been years of suffering,” she said.

A school nurse, the mother of two hopes their situation and others like it across the U.S. territory will change with the official visit this week of Michael Regan, administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

He is expected to tour several poor communities on the island as part of a U.S. initiative dubbed “Journey to Justice” to learn how pollution has affected them.

“It’s really important for me that we’re on the ground and we’re seeing these injustices up close,” Regan told The Associated Press in an interview Monday. “These are the same communities that are on the front line, facing the impact of climate change.”

Regan’s first stop will be Tuesday at the Cano Martín Peña, considered one of Puerto Rico’s most polluted waterways.

It is part of the San Juan Bay Estuary and is home to more than 25,000 people descended from impoverished migrants who arrived in the mid-1900s from the island’s rural areas.

Community leader Lucy Cruz told AP that while federal and local officials have made funds available to clean the waterway and reduce flooding, problems include the lack of a sewage system.

“This would not only be a change for the Cano Martín Peña community, but for all of Puerto Rico,” she said.

On Wednesday, Regan is expected to visit at least two community drinking water systems in the northern city of Caguas and talk with residents about the challenges they face.

He also is scheduled to stop at a facility in southern Puerto Rico that burns coal to produce energy and has long been the source of complaints and health concerns for those living nearby.

“I’m headed to Puerto Rico not only to spotlight these injustices, but to listen and learn from the community so we can develop solutions together,” he said.

The visit comes as Puerto Rico is slated to receive $78 million in EPA funds for water infrastructure projects. 

The local government will decide how the funds will be allocated, although Regan already has sent a letter that outlines the criteria for those resources and the agency’s expectations.