CNN
 — 

A floating village now lies stranded on a lakebed in Brazil’s Amazon as severe drought leaves communities struggling to access food, fresh water and fuel.

Dramatically receding water levels in Lake Puraquequara, east of Manaus, the capital of the state of Amazonas, have left boats and floating buildings marooned in the mud.

It is the latest example of the devastating impacts of heat and drought on this part of Brazil – earlier this month more than a hundred river dolphins washed ashore dead as water temperatures soared – and authorities say the situation is set to get worse.

Lake Puraquequara is part of the Rio Negro river system, which has been near record-low since the end of September, according to the state’s civil defense authority. “Declining water levels are having a profound impact,” a spokesperson for the authority told CNN.

Some residents have resorted to digging wells in the cracked lakebed in an attempt to reach water.

“Our shops have no customers. We are isolated, boats cannot enter or leave the lake,” local resident Isaac Rodrigues told Reuters. “We’re going to be here until God sends us water.”

The severe drought extends across the state. Forty-two municipalities of the 62 in the state were in an emergency situation with more than 300,000 people affected, the civil defense authority told CNN Monday.

And the situation is expected to get worse. Around 500,000 people and 50 municipalities are likely to be affected over the next several weeks, “since we are still predicting a few months with reduced rain levels,” the spokesperson for the state authority said.

In late September, Amazonas Gov. Wilson Lima declared a state of emergency and announced a package of assistance measures, including providing food to those most affected by the drought.

“There are many people already having difficulty accessing food, food security, drinking water and other important inputs,” he said in a statement at the time.

The drought is also devastating wildlife in the state’s rivers.

Scientists believe the unusual deaths of more than 100 dolphins in Lake Tefé, west of Manaus, at the beginning of October may be linked to the searingly high water temperatures.

“It’s still early to determine the cause of this extreme event but according to our experts, it is certainly connected to the drought period and high temperatures in Lake Tefé, in which some points are exceeding 39 degrees Celsius (102 degrees Fahrenheit),” the institute said in comments carried by CNN affiliate CNN Brasil.

It is currently the dry season in the Amazon, but the drought has been exacerbated by El Niño, a natural climate pattern that originates in the tropical Pacific Ocean and affects weather around the world.

Underlying El Niño is the long-term trend of global warming that is leading to more frequent and more severe extreme weather events, like drought and heat.

Swaths of South America, including Brazil, have been gripped by severe and deadly heat as the region moves from winter into spring.

This heat in August and September – during which Brazil experienced temperatures above 40 degrees Celsius (104 Fahrenheit) – was made at least 100 times more likely by the human-caused climate crisis, according to a study published Tuesday by the World Weather Attribution initiative.

CNN
 — 

A bus crash in the Mexican state of Oaxaca killed 16 people on Friday, according to local authorities, who say most of the passengers were migrants.

Three children and two women are among the victims, all of whom are from Venezuela and Haiti, the Oaxaca state attorney general said. At least 27 people were injured and transported to nearby hospitals.

Pictures posted by authorities on Facebook show the large bus flipped over and heavily damaged on a curve of the mountainous Oaxaca-Cuacnopalan highway.

Authorities are investigating the cause of the accident, which took place at 5 a.m. local time (7 a.m. ET). The Oaxaca state attorney general’s office had first said 18 people died in the crash, then revised its count late on Friday evening.

The tragedy follows the deaths of at least 10 Cuban migrants, including a child, on Sunday, when the truck they were traveling in also overturned in southern Mexico, according to local authorities.

Venezuela and Haiti are sources of large numbers of migrants traveling northward, fleeing insecurity and economic crisis at home.

US and Mexican officials have struggled to respond to the arrivals, with Washington putting increasing pressure on Mexico City to shoulder more responsibility for people crossing its territory.

Food shortages and limited access to health care have driven more than 7.7 million people from Venezuela alone – a scale of displacement that outpaces Ukraine, where there’s an active war.

On Thursday, senior officials in the Biden administration said the US would restart deporting Venezuelans directly to Venezuela in an attempt to curb the record influx, marking a major shift in policy.

Haiti meanwhile is waiting for a new multinational mission to help bring order to the country, currently roiled by unchecked gang violence, kidnappings and food insecurity.

Bogota
CNN
 — 

Venezuelan authorities on Thursday issued an arrest warrant for opposition leader and former interim president Juan Guaido, who dismissed the move as politically motivated.

During a press conference in the capital Caracas, Attorney General Tarek William Saab alleged that Guaido had used the state-owned oil company PDVSA’s resources to finance himself and pay his legal expenses.

“Juan Guaido used PDVSA resources to finance himself, pay his legal expenses, and forced PDVSA to accept his financing terms. These decisions caused losses to the nation of $19 billion, resulting in the almost definitive loss of Citgo,” Saab said, adding that Venezuela will request a red notice from Interpol.

“For this reason, we have opened a new investigation against former deputy Juan Guaido, and we have requested an arrest warrant against him,” he said.

Guaido served as the interim president of Venezuela’s transitional government from 2019 until late 2022 – when he was ousted from his leadership role after struggling to make significant gains against the authoritarian regime of Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro.

This spring, Guaido traveled to Miami, where he has remained. Speaking to CNN on Friday, he said, “Of course, I want to be back in Venezuela, but at least here I am alive and free, which is not the same for many Venezuelans who are behind bars or have been murdered by the dictatorship.”

Saab said the arrest warrant against Guaido will be for the alleged crimes of treason; usurpation of functions; profit or extraction of money, securities and public goods; money laundering; and association.

He also said that least 28 investigations are ongoing in the country against Guaido for a raft of alleged crimes including usurpation of functions, money laundering, terrorism, arms trafficking, and treason.

“Those who at some point believed in this guy and went out to march; they see that they found it to be a vulgar criminal of the worst caliber, robbing and kidnapping,” Saab said.

Guaido’s spokesperson declined to comment on the allegations, but during a live transmission on his Instagram account, Guaido described them as “false” and challenged President Maduro to submit to justice himself.

“This message goes to you, Maduro, tomorrow let’s meet at any prosecutor’s office in the US or, if you prefer, another jurisdiction, The Hague. We can then go directly to the jurisdiction that also points (to) you directly,” Guaido said.

In June, the International Criminal Court ruled that prosecutors should resume investigating alleged crimes against humanity in Venezuela by security forces under President Maduro.

“The question is, why now? Why did the dictatorship not do it before?” he said of the arrest warrant. “So no, Maduro, I did not allow you to kidnap me, I will not allow you to take away my voice, and I will continue to denounce you in all places where possible, as a criminal.”

Venezuela is due to hold a presidential vote in 2024, though critics have cast doubt on whether elections can be free and fair in the country’s repressive political climate.

Guaido called on his followers to vote in the upcoming opposition primary election on October 22, saying, “today the vote is kidnapped in Venezuela, but we have an opportunity to mobilize again to confront Nicolas Maduro.”

The US, which had long been a supporter of Guaido, has somewhat softened its stance toward Caracas as the region struggles with rising energy costs and hundreds of thousands of Venezuelan migrants.

On Thursday, senior officials in the Biden administration said the US will restart deporting Venezuelans directly to Venezuela in an attempt to curb the record influx of crossings at the US-Mexico border, marking a major shift in policy.

Venezuelans who cross the US-Mexico border unlawfully and lack a legal basis to remain in the US will be eligible for removal, the senior administration officials said, adding that Venezuela had agreed to accept back its nationals.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken called the new policy “a key piece” of the administration’s approach to migration. Advocacy groups however have slammed the shift as dangerous for deportees; the policy will “likely lead to unsafe returns,” Refugees International warned in a statement.

In his interview with CNN on Friday, Guaido said he didn’t believe that the deportation deal was connected to his arrest. However, he did say that it underlined Maduro’s interest in gaining international recognition as Venezuela’s head of state.

“They are not going to stop the migration situation just by stopping migration or connect flights. We need to put a stop to the regime and recover rights in Venezuela,” Guaidó said.

“The only thing Maduro is looking for is recognition, and even with these deportation flights, he’s going to spin them as de facto recognition for his regime. That’s what he gets from this,” he continued.

“We never expected that Venezuelan migrants would reach the US directly, on foot, from Venezuela. Those are thousands of miles of desperation through the jungle. But we need to change the situation in Venezuela, bringing the country back to democracy, if we want to solve the migration crisis.”

Tijuana, Mexico
CNN
 — 

Estefanía Rebellón knows the trauma that stems from being forced to flee your home for safety. She understands the fear and uncertainty felt by the more than 70 million migrant and forcibly displaced children around the world.

She was a migrant child, too.

“My family’s case is the case of many refugees and migrants at the border. It was never a choice for our family to leave our home. We were forced out of it,” Rebellón, 32, said.

She was 10 when her family fled Cali, Colombia, because of death threats to her father, who had been forced into hiding. They settled in Miami, and with the support of teachers at school, Rebellón thrived. Now, through her nonprofit, Yes We Can World Foundation, she provides education for children living in limbo in shelters at the US-Mexico border.

Rebellón moved from Miami to Los Angeles when she was 21 to pursue an acting career. In 2018, she was so moved after volunteering in migrant camps in Tijuana that she put her career on hold.

“There were no schools set up to help these kids. They were walking around the camps barefoot,” she said. “I couldn’t forget about what I had just seen. And I was like, ‘I literally have to go back.’”

Rebellón and her partner, Kyle Schmidt, used about $1,000 of their savings to buy tents and supplies and set up a makeshift school at the border. They enlisted volunteer teachers to provide learning opportunities in the camps.

“We set up a school overnight and … told just a couple of kids,” Rebellón said. “It spread throughout the camp, and we had like over 50 kids surrounding us.”

In the months that followed, when those families living in the camps were moved to shelters, Rebellón and Schmidt wanted to continue offering educational services.

“I thought, “Why don’t we turn a bus into a mobile classroom, and we could take it to all the different shelters?” Rebellón said. “We literally just Googled and YouTubed how to convert a bus into a mobile classroom.”

Over the next year, Rebellón and Schmidt bought and gutted a bus, partnered with shelters, and drove the transformed bus over the border. Their goal: to provide bilingual educational programs to keep children in school.

“All the families that we work with and all the children that we work with on a daily basis are legally seeking asylum,” Rebellón said. “They’re going through all the processes that are being required of them.”

Rebellón’s organization hires professional teachers and tailors their curriculum to the specific needs of each student. The program has been accredited by the education secretary in Mexico and serves children ages 3 to 15 – a crucial period for education, Rebellón says.

Despite the challenges she faced as a migrant child, she says she was lucky to have teachers who advocated for her and guided her along the way.

Many migrant children do not have this support and often fall through the cracks and miss valuable school time. Many have been on the road for months, if not years, and have difficulty attending school because they are often in transit, without a permanent home. Safety, economic instability, poverty, lack of transportation, and perceived legal status are also factors.

“People don’t realize that this is such a long process for families,” Rebellón said. “It’s not just like you arrive at the border, you seek asylum, and your life is all rainbows. It takes decades and a lot of work and a lot of pain.”

Rebellón’s family navigated a decades-long legal process to obtain political asylum and later US citizenship. Her parents, both lawyers by trade, were forced to abandon their careers in Colombia and take on new jobs in the US to support their family of five. Her mother worked multiple jobs as a caregiver and her father worked nights at Walmart. He has worked there full time for nearly 20 years.

“Any time I get a chance, I share my immigration story with (the kids),” Rebellón said. “I always want the kids that come through our programs to realize that being a migrant is not something they need to be ashamed of.”

Today, Yes We Can Foundation educates 250-300 kids a day through its four school locations along the border and three mobile school buses. Since 2019, Rebellón says the group has served more than 3,100 migrant children from 10 countries.

Their program runs Monday through Friday from 9:00 am to 3:00 pm. School runs for the entire year, with no summer breaks. They also provide free uniforms, backpacks, and school supplies. Lessons focus on common core instruction in the subjects of language arts, math, and science as well as addressing practical and immediate needs like how to translate basic information including phone numbers and addresses.

“I want our efforts to be something permanent,” Rebellón said. “And that when it’s all said and done, we will be proud to look back and say that we were there when people needed us the most.”

Want to get involved? Check out the Yes We Can World Foundation website and see how to help.

To donate to Yes We Can World Foundation via GoFundMe, click here

Mexico City
CNN
 — 

Last month, as the Biden administration scrambled to manage the latest wave of migrants overwhelming the US southern border, top US immigration authorities crossed into Mexico for an emergency meeting.

Seated around a Ciudad Juárez conference room, the officials and their Mexican counterparts drafted a 15-point plan to help defuse the flashpoint – most of it a checklist of actions for the Mexican government. Notably, according to a readout from Mexico’s federal immigration agency, Mexico agreed to carry out more costly deportations of the migrants gathering on their side of the border – a move that some believed would dissuade disorderly crossings.

The measures, which also specified Mexican efforts to clamp down on the crush of migrants riding north on railcars, are the latest in a series of policy shifts in Mexico that have alleviated, if slightly, the massive political headache in Washington caused perennially by migration. Analysts in both countries see a pragmatic bargain: as Mexico increasingly carries the weight of US immigration strategy, the Biden administration has granted rare leeway to the country’s divisive but popular leader.

“Mexico has real leverage in the relationship with the US. And right now that leverage is around migration,” said Andrew Selee, the president of the nonpartisan Migration Policy Institute.

Sharing nearly 2,000 miles of land border and a history of important economic exchange, Mexico and the US have long held intertwined immigration policies that adapted as international migration patterns shifted. When George W. Bush made his first trip out of the US as president in 2001, it was to the ranch of Vicente Fox, the Mexican leader, to discuss a new era of cooperation on border issues, like trade, drugs, and the northward flow of Mexicans, who at that time comprised the bulk of undocumented border-crossers.

But as spiraling violence and desperate economic conditions fueled years of mass migration out of Central America and the Caribbean to the US, overpowering the country’s legal intake system, the stretch of Mexican territory in between became a critical “buffer state,” said Maureen Meyer of the Washington Office on Latin America.

“The Mexico southern border pretty much was the US southern border,” Meyer said.

Under pressure from several US administrations, Mexico has repeatedly sent resources to its border with Guatemala over the past 10 years to formalize migration routes and detained record numbers of migrants at newly installed checkpoints as they made their way north.

At the helm of Mexico’s latest immigration coordination with the US has been President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, a leftist leader who in 2018 campaigned on resistance to doing the US’s “dirty work” on migration. His political calculus has changed swiftly since then.

Under the threat of crippling tariffs from then-President Donald Trump, López Obrador agreed in 2019 to allow asylum applicants to wait out their claims inside Mexico under the “Remain in Mexico” policy, roiling activists who said it forced migrants into dangerous living conditions.

During the pandemic, when the US employed a public health measure known as Title 42 to turn around many asylum seekers at the border, López Obrador agreed to receive many of the migrants, reversing a long-standing position in the country and straining the resources of Mexico’s own border cities. In May, as the US ended the use of Title 42, López Obrador continued to allow the returns on “humanitarian grounds.”

“I think these more recent steps really do cross another line because it is not just stopping people from coming to the United States, which has been the more enforcer role,” Meyer said.

“It is actually allowing people deported from the United States to either stay in Mexico, or in this case now, actually maybe actively returning them back to their home countries for the United States,” she said.

Details on the deportation plan announced last month have been limited. In a news conference from Washington on Friday, Mexican Foreign Secretary Alicia Bárcena said that Mexican authorities were carrying out six flights each week to return migrants to Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador. Bárcena added that officials were “exploring” the possibility of expanding the returns to Ecuador, Venezuela, and Colombia.

It was unclear where the deportation flights were taking place and when they had begun. It also couldn’t be learned if the migrants being returned had already been deported from the US or if they had pending asylum claims. Stakeholders in Mexico told CNN last week that there had not appeared to be any significant change in the pace of repatriation flights in the country’s north.

A spokeswoman for Mexico’s federal immigration agency declined to provide more details on the deportations.

But the announcement may already have had the effect of discouraging migrants from crossing to the US without the appointment required to seek an asylum claim. In the weekend that followed the meeting, the number of migrants encountered by border authorities entering the US near El Paso, Texas, fell by about 30%, CNN has reported.

Last Wednesday, López Obrador also announced that he was planning a summit with officials from several Latin American and Caribbean countries “whose populations are migrating” to be held in the coming days. Mexico also last month agreed to urge countries like Venezuela, Nicaragua, and Cuba — which have limited diplomatic relations with the US — to take back their citizens deported at the border.

“What we are looking for is to reach an agreement to confront the migration phenomenon by addressing the causes,” López Obrador said at a news conference. “We have to align ourselves.”

The recent cooperation between the two countries has come with a busy schedule of shuttle diplomacy. Last week, Bárcena held meetings in Washington with Senate leaders and Elizabeth Sherwood-Randall, Biden’s homeland security advisor. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken is expected to travel to Mexico this week along with other cabinet secretaries and meet with López Obrador.

For Mexican negotiators, the country’s increased responsibilities have often been conditioned on a US commitment to grow the ways that migrants can enter the country legally, like through temporary work visas and a recently expanded humanitarian parole program that the Biden administration says has allowed tens of thousands of Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans, and Venezuelans who meet certain conditions, including a local sponsor in the US, to fly into the country and secure work authorization.

Last month, ahead of the announcement around Mexican deportations, Mexico’s foreign minister told Bloomberg in an interview that the US and Mexico were nearing an agreement with the United Nations to pre-screen tens of thousands of migrants in Mexico for entry into the US under the parole programs. The US has opened similar processing centers in Colombia, Costa Rica, and Guatemala.

A United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees spokesperson told CNN that the organization is “regularly in contact with US and Mexican authorities including on how we can provide support to possible future initiatives.”

“Politically for the Mexican government, they can’t do enhanced enforcement without showing that they are also fighting for the well-being of migrants and for legal opportunities, because it is a country with a history of migration to the United States,” Selee said.

A free hand for Lopez Obrador?

Still, some analysts see a more cynical incentive behind the cooperation, arguing that the Biden administration has largely turned a blind eye to elements of López Obrador’s agenda that would have typically drawn rebuke.

“López Obrador very quickly understood that if he gave into Biden’s request for support he would have significant political capital to ensure that US pressure on a number of either bilateral issues or domestic Mexican policy issues would be constrained,” said Arturo Sarukhán, a former Mexican ambassador to Washington who has been a critic of the current administration.

Detractors point to democratic backsliding in a number of López Obrador’s positions: an attempted reform of the country’s independent election authority, frequent criticism of the judiciary and the press, and the capitulation of state powers on policing and transportation to the military.

The election reform, which was passed earlier this year but later blocked by the Mexican Supreme Court, diminished the country’s independent election authority, cutting its workforce across the country and limiting its autonomy ahead of a presidential vote next year.

Tens of thousands of Mexicans marched on the capital against the policy in the largest opposition protest of López Obrador’s presidency. Critics decried it as a dangerous erosion of democratic institutions.

But in Washington, the Biden administration was unusually muted. In a statement following the February protests, Ned Price, a senior adviser to Blinken, described “a great debate on electoral reforms on the independence of electoral and judicial institutions that illustrates Mexico’s vibrant democracy.”

“We respect Mexico’s sovereignty. We believe that a well-resourced, independent electoral system and respect for judicial independence support healthy democracy,” Price said.

If Mexico had less leverage in its relationship with the US, “I think that you’d see greater public pressure from the State Department, from the White House, on the slippery slope of democratic erosion that we’re seeing in Mexico,” Sarukhán said.

“I think the United States should be invested in Mexico’s democratic strength because if not, what you’ll have in Washington sooner or later is someone asking the question, ‘Who lost Mexico and why?’” he added.

CNN
 — 

The governing party called it a ceremonial passing of the baton. But the opposition lambasted it as a “passing of the scepter.”

Constitutionally barred from running for reelection, Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador sought to show last month, in a very public way, that presidential candidate Claudia Sheinbaum has his blessing. So he handed his hoped-for successor an actual baton, in a ceremony outside a Mexico City restaurant not far from the National Palace – the seat of the country’s executive power.

Sheinbaum, a 61-year-old former Mexico City mayor and longtime political ally of Lopez Obrador, hit all the right notes in thanking him. Accepting the baton along with the leftist Morena party’s presidential nomination, Sheinbaum said she would assume “the full responsibility of continuing the course marked by our people, that of the transformation initiated by President Andrés Manuel López Obrador.”

When Mexicans go to the polls next June, they will choose between two women for president – a first in the country’s history. Only four days before Morena nominated Sheinbaum, Mexico’s opposition coalition Broad Front chose another formidable female candidate, former senator Xochitl Gálvez from the conservative PAN party.

It’s not the first time Mexico sees women running for the presidency; before Sheinbaum and Gálvez, were six other female presidential candidates. But with the two major political sides nominating women, this is the first time that it’s practically a given that starting in December 2024, Mexico, a country previously known for machismo, will be run by a woman.

Still, some critics say the outgoing Lopez Obrador’s shadow looms over the contest.

Meet the candidates: Sheinbaum and Galvez

Gálvez’s rise in Mexican politics has been meteoric; this spring, she said she wasn’t even the favorite of the PRI, PAN and PRD, the parties that now form the Broad Front coalition. It was a public spat with Lopez Obrador himself – who regularly attacked her as a “wimp,” “puppet,” and “employee of the oligarchy” in news conferences – that ultimately rocketed her into the spotlight.

In June, Gálvez went viral when she attempted to enter the National Palace with a judicial order that granted her the right to reply to the president, after successfully suing López Obrador. “This is not a show,” she told reporters at the doors of the National Palace. “The law is the law, period.”

The daughter of an indigenous father and a mixed-race mother, Gálvez served as the top official for indigenous affairs under former President Vicente Fox before becoming a senator. Unfiltered and irreverent, she described herself in an interview with CNN en Español as “an all-terrain, 4-by-4, kind of woman.”

In some respects, she appears progressive. Gálvez has advocated in the Mexican Congress for the rights and welfare of indigenous groups and Afro-Mexicans, and in a regional forum earlier this year in Monterrey, said that oil-rich Mexico should shift to renewable energy. “We haven’t done it because we are dumbasses,” Gálvez unapologetically said.

She has also said leftist Lopez Obrador’s pension for all senior citizens should continue, and proposes what she calls a “universal social protection system” of welfare programs for a large portion of the middle and lower classes.

But when it comes to security and the fight against organized crime, Gálvez’s three-pronged plan is muscular, based on what she describes as “intelligence, heart and a firm-hand”: strengthening local and state police and giving them access to intelligence, advocating for and protecting victims, and respecting the rule of law.

Macario Schettino, a political analyst and Social Science professor at ITESM, a renowned Mexican university, describes Gálvez’s political momentum as impressive, considering that only a few months ago, she wasn’t even considered a candidate with a national profile. “She barely begun to register in political terms, and she’s already had great growth. Many people in Mexico still don’t know her. She is going to grow [..] in popularity,” Schettino said, “While Claudia Sheinbaum can no longer move from where she is because she is already known by most Mexicans.”

Sheinbaum, a physicist with a doctorate in environmental engineering, would also be the first president with Jewish heritage if she wins, although she rarely speaks publicly about her personal background and has governed as a secular leftist.

She is currently ahead in most polls, and will be a formidable opponent to beat. Not only does Sheinbaum have the full support of the governing party, she has also long enjoyed the spotlight as mayor of Mexico’s most important city for the last five years until her resignation in June to run for the presidency.

On policy, Sheinbaum has vowed to continue many of Lopez Obrador’s policies and programs, including a pension for all senior citizens, scholarships for more than 12 million students and free fertilizers for small farm owners. But the high-profile ex-mayor rejects criticism of her close political alignment with the president. “Of course we’re not a copy (of the president),” she said in July.

Still, she does not shy away from touting the principles they share: “For everybody’s good, let’s put the poor first. There cannot be a rich government if the people are poor. Power is only a virtue when it’s used to serve the people,” Sheinbaum said, repeating the same campaign slogans Lopez Obrador has used for years.

Schettino believes the immensely popularly Lopez Obrador views Sheinbaum as his extension in power. He points to their party Morena’s roots in the authoritarian Institutional Revolutionary Party that governed Mexico for more than seven decades until 2000, which came to be known as “The Dinosaur,” and the Party of Democratic Revolution that branched off from it.

In 2012, Lopez Obrador created Morena as a political party. Schettino describes the party today as a “tyrannosaurus” under Lopez Obrador’s influence – representing what he says is the current leader’s desire for a successor to hew closely to his own agenda. “President López Obrador, a dinosaur who not only is a dinosaur, but also has the vocation of a tyrant. He doesn’t want to go. He wants to stay in power,” Schettino said.

“I believe that he built Claudia’s candidacy,” Schettino said.

López Obrador however has repeatedly dismissed accusations of authoritarian leanings or that he favors a candidate he will be able to control. Earlier this year, Lopez Obrador denied he had any favorites among his party’s hopefuls or that he was pushing for one candidate or another behind the scenes.

He has also said that he is going “retire completely” after his six-year term in office comes to an end. “I am retiring, I will not participate in any public event again, of course. I am not going to accept any position, I do not want to be anyone’s advisor, much less am I going to act as a chief. I am not going to have relations with politicians. I am not going to talk about politics,” the president told press in February.

CNN
 — 

The United Nations Security Council has greenlit the deployment of an armed multinational force to Haiti, as the Caribbean nation wrestles with rampant gang violence and political paralysis.

The decision follows repeated calls for military assistance by Haitian Prime Minister Ariel Henry. United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres and the United States have also strongly urged the international community to back such a mission.

Thirteen members of the council voted in favor of the resolution, with Russia and China abstaining.

Though approved by the powerful UN Security Council, the force would not formally be under UN control. It is expected to be led by Kenya, which has pledged 1000 police to spearhead the mission. Several of Haiti’s Caribbean neighbors – Antigua and Barbuda, the Bahamas, and Jamaica – have also offered support to the mission.

The “multinational security support” force will have a 12-month mandate in Haiti. The timing of its arrival is not set yet and more countries have been invited to participate. The resolution also calls for a global stop to arms sales to Haiti, except for approved security purposes.

An adviser to Haitian Prime Minister Henry, Jean-Junior Joseph, told CNN that the government welcomed the vote, adding, “We await with impatience the mission to combat general insecurity.”

Warring gangs control much of Port-au-Prince – Haiti’s capital city and main port – choking off vital supply lines to the rest of the country. Gang members have also terrorized the metropolitan population, forcing some 200,000 people to flee their homes amid waves of indiscriminate killing, kidnapping, arson and rape.

The mission is expected to strengthen local security and to reinforce the Haitian National Police in its pursuit of the gangs. Haiti’s security forces already receive some international support but remain understaffed and outgunned.

Addressing the United Nations General Assembly in New York on Sept. 22, Prime Minister Henry told fellow nations that it was “urgent” that the Security Council approve a military mission to reestablish order. Violence has exacerbated broader instability across the country, Henry said, noting that inflation has soared past 50%, leaving 4.9 million Haitians struggling to eat – a dismal new record for the country.

In a statement the same day, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken urged the international community to support the plan and to provide assistance, including personnel, and said Washington was ready to provide “robust” financial and logistical assistance.

The Security Council has found itself in repeated deadlock in recent years amid deepening geopolitical rivalries. A statement by the US ambassador to the UN, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, described Monday’s decision on Haiti as “historic” and said the mission “speaks to the UN’s ability to galvanize collective action.”

Speaking in the Security Council after the vote, China’s UN ambassador Zhang Jun said his country had “a cautious and responsible approach” toward authorizing the use of force – but that in the case of Haiti, China’s abstention represented a “constructive position” toward the resolution.

Russia’s UN envoy Vassily Nebenzia criticized the move in remarks to the council, saying “that sending the armed forces of another state to any country even upon its request is an extreme measure that must be thoroughly thought through,” but noted “some positive elements” to the approved resolution.

Both Russia and China expressed approval of the resolution’s arms embargo.

Critics of the mission have previously pointed to scandals associated with UN peacekeeping missions in Haiti, including allegations of sexual abuse and the introduction of a deadly cholera epidemic, which killed nearly 10,000 people. Some Haitians also question the mandate of Prime Minister Henry, who took leadership of the country after President Jovenel Moise was assassinated in 2021.

Henry has said that Haiti’s long-overdue elections cannot be held until the country reaches a basic level of security.

The United Nations’ special representative in Haiti, Maria Isabel Salvador, said her office would support the mission “within the limits of its mandate,” while emphasizing that “unlike recent international missions deployed in Haiti, the MSS mission is not a UN mission.”

CNN
 — 

At least 11 people were killed and two people seriously injured on Sunday after the roof of a church in northern Mexico collapsed, officials said.

Preliminary reports indicate that about 100 people were inside the building in Ciudad Madero at the time of the incident, according to a statement from security services in the state of Tamaulipas. Thirty people were believed to be buried in the rubble, Reuters reported.

At least 60 people were injured, with two people sustaining serious injuries, Tamaulipas security spokesperson said.

Units from the National Guard, State Guard, Civil Protection and the Red Cross were assisting in the rescue operation.

Bishop Jose Armando Alvarez, from the diocese of Tampico, said the roof of the church collapsed while worshipers were taking communion, Reuters reported. He urged other members of the community to pray for survivors.

“In this moment the necessary work is being carried out to pull out the people who are still under the rubble,” Bishop Armando said in a recorded message shared on social media, according to Reuters.

CNN
 — 

Two people are dead after a suspected grizzly bear attack in Canada’s Banff National Park, officials said.

Rescuers were first alerted to the incident around 8 p.m. Friday after receiving “an alert from an inReach/GPS device indicating a bear attack,” the national park said in a statement.

The alert said the incident happened in the Red Deer River Valley area of the park, which is in the Canadian Rocky Mountains.

“Parks Canada immediately mobilized a Wildlife Human Attack Response Team whose members are specially trained in responding to wildlife attacks,” Banff National Park said in the statement. “Weather conditions at the time did not allow for helicopter use, and the response team travelled through the night to the location by ground.”

The response team arrived at the site around 1 a.m. Saturday and found two people dead and a grizzly bear displaying aggressive behavior, the statement said.

Parks Canada staff euthanized the bear “to ensure public safety,” and Royal Canadian Mounted Police officers arrived at the scene to assist in transporting the victims to Sundre, Alberta, about 75 miles northwest of Calgary, officials said.

“This is a tragic incident, and Parks Canada wishes to express its sincere condolences to the families and friends of the victims,” the statement said.

The deadly suspected grizzly attack in Canada happened just weeks a grizzly bear linked to the death of a woman in July near West Yellowstone was euthanized in Montana after breaking into a home through a window with a cub and taking a container of dog food.

In 2020, the same bear was also involved in an encounter that injured a person near Henrys Lake State Park in Idaho, Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks said in a news release.

The male cub who was near the adult grizzly was captured and was being held in Helena at the agency’s wildlife rehabilitation center before it was set to be transferred to a zoo, officials said.

And last month, portions of Custer Gallatin National Forest near Big Sky, Montana, were closed after a person was attacked by a grizzly bear while hunting, officials said.

Banff National Park, Canada’s first national park, is a popular attraction for tourists, known for its picturesque turquoise waters. Parks Canada notes the park is “home to hundreds of species, including grizzly bears, wolves, elk and more.”

Mexico City
CNN
 — 

At least 10 Cuban migrants died and 17 others were injured when the truck they were traveling in overturned in southern Mexico on Sunday, Mexican authorities say.

The truck was “irregularly” transporting 27 Cuban nationals on the Pijijiapan-Tonalá highway in the southern state of Chiapas when the accident occurred, Mexico’s National Migration Institute (INM) said in a statement.

Officials said initial reports suggested the driver had been speeding and lost control of the unit, fleeing the scene after it overturned.

The 10 victims were female and included a minor, authorities said. All the injured are being treated in hospital.

“The INM will establish communication with the consular authorities to initiate the administrative process for the repatriation of the bodies to their country of origin and is aware of the evolution of the health status of those seriously injured,” the statement said.

Migrants from Central America and the Caribbean sometimes travel through Mexico in trucks and trailers in the hope of reaching the United States.

In 2021, 55 people were killed and more than 100 injured when a truck also believed to be carrying migrants overturned in Chiapas state, which borders Guatemala.

CNN
 — 

Center-right candidate Daniel Noboa, the 35-year-old son of a banana tycoon, will become Ecuador’s next president, following an election driven by concerns over rising violence and a worsening security situation in the Latin American nation.

More than 10 million people have voted in the presidential election, and data from the National Electoral Council of Ecuador (CNE) shows Noboa obtained 52.3% of the votes (4,829,130).

His main political rival, leftist candidate and first round front-runner Luisa González, obtained 47.7% of votes (4,404,014), the CNE said.

Noboa was a lawmaker before outgoing President Guillermo Lasso dissolved the legislature and called for early elections.

The Acción Democrática Nacional party’s candidate, he has pledged to create more work opportunities for the young, bring in more foreign investment, using technology to fight crime, and has suggested several anti-corruption measures including sentences for tax evasion.

Speaking to reporters after the result, Noboa thanked his wife, parents, and God for allowing him to serve his country.

“I also thank all those people who have been part of a new, young, improbable political project, a political project whose purpose was to give back a smile to the country,” he said.

“Starting tomorrow, Daniel Noboa, your president of the republic, starts working.”

His rival, González of the Movimiento Revolución Ciudadana party, a protégé of former leftist President Rafael Correa, ran on a promise to enhance public spending and social programs and wants to address the security crisis by fixing the root causes of violence, such as poverty and inequality.

González was the frontrunner in the first round of voting.

She conceded to Noboa after the result was announced, saying she would congratulate him on his victory.

“To the candidate now president-elect, we offer deep congratulations because it’s a democracy; we have never called for a city to be set on fire, we have never come out to shout fraud,” she said.

Security was tight throughout Sunday’s vote with tens of thousands of police officers and army personnel stationed at polling stations across the country.

Crime remained at the forefront of Ecuador’s run-off vote, months after the high-profile assassination of another presidential candidate, Fernando Villavicencio, who was slain days before the August 20 first-round poll.

The killing became a tragic symbol of the country’s worsening security situation, where rival criminal organizations have been meting out brutal and often public shows of violence in the country’s streets and prisons in their battle to control drug trafficking routes.

Voter turnout was “historic” at 82.33% despite initial security concerns, CNE president Diana Atamaint said after polls closed Sunday.

“The transmission of the results has been fluid and constant; the Ecuadorians have permanently followed the votes obtained by each of the candidates, which are the result of the popular will expressed at the polls,” she Atamaint after the results came out.

“We have complied with a historic electoral process. The country gave us this mission, and today, we say to Ecuador and the entire world, ‘task accomplished;’ today democracy won, today Ecuador won.”

Before Ecuador, a nation of nearly 17 million, was transformed into one of the most dangerous countries in the region, it was known as a relatively peaceful place that was nestled between two of the world’s largest narcotics producers, Peru and Colombia.

Its deep ports, dollarized economy, and corruption have since made it a key transit point for drugs making its way to consumers in the US and Europe. The mounting violence, paired with a lack of economic prospects, have also compelled many Ecuadorians to leave the country.

“We are not sure [what] will put an end to this because we cannot live with that fear” of crime, small business owner César Ortiz told CNN en Español in Quito ahead of the poll.

Ortiz said he hopes the new president will focus not just on security but on the economy because “there are so many people who are unemployed, that is why crime [is] abound.”

Whoever wins on Sunday may gain a cursed chalice, say analysts covering the region. “Governing Ecuador right now is hell – this presidency is designed to eliminate you from political life,” Freeman said.

The new president will have relatively little time to work on a solution to the country’s woes. They will hold office only until 2025, which would have been the end of Lasso’s term – a short window for even the most seasoned politician to turn things around in the country.

How Afrobeats has become an unstoppable musical force

Afrobeats is a term often used to describe music coming out of West Africa. But in reality, music industry veterans and emerging stars say the sounds coming from the continent’s top artists shouldn’t be confined to one particular genre.

Editor’s Note: Know someone who inspires you? Click here to nominate them as a CNN Hero.

CNN
 — 

Growing up in poverty in rural Kenya, Nelly Cheboi watched her single mother, who had only completed fifth grade, work tirelessly so Cheboi and her three sisters could attend school.

From an early age, Cheboi realized that her family, along with others like hers in their village, was stuck in a cycle that left them little hope.

“She was working really hard, and I was still going to bed hungry. I was still sent home for tuition. I was still living in a house that was flooding,” said Cheboi, now 29. “Looking at the poverty in the household, looking at the community and suffering, it just became so clear that I needed to do something.”

Cheboi attended college on scholarship in the United States, worked odd jobs to support her family, and discovered her passion for computer science. She credits computer literacy for her ability to find job opportunities and make money doing what she loves. She knew she wanted to share it with her community back home.

Today, she’s giving 4,000 kids the chance for a brighter future through her nonprofit, TechLit Africa. The organization, whose name is short for Technologically Literate Africa, uses recycled computers to create technology labs in schools in rural Kenya.

“I know the pain of poverty, and that’s why I feel so passionate about it,” said Cheboi, a software engineer who splits her time between the US and Kenya. “I never forgot what it was like with my stomach churning because of hunger at night.”

In 2012, Cheboi received a full scholarship to Augustana College in Illinois and began her studies with almost no computer experience. She handwrote papers and struggled to transcribe them on a laptop. She said she never felt comfortable using a computer until her junior year when she took a Java course required for her mathematics major.

“When I discovered computer science, I just fell in love with it. I knew that this is something that I wanted to do as my career, and also bring it to my community,” she said.

Cheboi switched to a double major and earned a bachelor’s degree. Yet she says skills like touch-typing that came seamlessly to some were still a steep learning curve for her. At one point after college, she had to practice for six months before she could pass a coding interview. It’s a skill that is now a core part of the TechLit curriculum.

“I feel so accomplished seeing kids that are 7 years old touch-typing, knowing that I just learned how to touch-type less than five years ago,” she said.

Cheboi made inroads with businesses in her profession, and in 2018 she began accepting recycled computers from them. She started small, carrying the machines to Kenya in check-on bags and handling customs fees and taxes herself.

“At one point, I was bringing 44 computers, and I paid more for the luggage than I did for the air ticket,” she said.

TechLit Africa now works with freight and shipping companies to transport the donated computers so it’s more cost efficient. The donated hardware is wiped, refurbished and distributed to partner schools in rural Kenya, where students aged 4 to 12 receive daily classes and frequent opportunities to learn from professionals and gain skills that will help improve their education and prepare them for future jobs.

“We have people who own a specific skill coming in and are just inspiring the kids (with) music production, video production, coding, personal branding,” Cheboi said. “They can go from doing a remote class with NASA on education to music production with our artists.”

Cheboi’s organization maintains online and onsite ownership of the computers, providing tech support, software updates and troubleshooting. TechLit Africa installs new customer operating systems geared towards children, and schools are asked to pay a small fee for the services, which includes TechLit educators onsite from 8am-4pm.

The organization currently serves 10 schools, and by early next year, Cheboi hopes to be partnered with 100 more.

“My hope is that when the first TechLit kids graduate high school, they’re able to get a job online because they will know how to code, they will know how to do graphic design, they know how to do marketing,” Cheboi said. “The world is your oyster when you are educated. By bringing the resources, by bringing these skills, we are opening up the world to them.”

Want to get involved? Check out the TechLit Africa website and see how to help.

To donate to TechLit Africa via GoFundMe, click here

Abuja, Nigeria
CNN
 — 

Every morning at 7am Nigerian time, Pastor Jerry Eze can be seen on a YouTube livestream fervently praying over thousands of stacks of requests he has received from his followers around the world.

Flanked usually by his wife Eno, and an associate, Eze’s passionate prayers are delivered in an urgent staccato, as he prays for cures to ailments and challenges such as illnesses, court cases, and financial issues.

Eze touts miracle healings with the slogan ‘What God cannot do does not exist,’ and midway through the live broadcast, cuts to pre-recorded videos from his followers sharing testimonies they say are the results of his prayers.

They range from healings from terminal illnesses to conception after years of infertility.

Eze describes the testimonies as the “strange acts of God.”

“It’s way beyond science and technology,” he says.

CNN has not independently verified the content of the videos.

The broadcasts on the New Season Prophetic Prayers and Declarations channel (NSPPD) have propelled Eze to become one of the most watched preachers on YouTube.

With more than 90,000 peak concurrent viewers, Eze’s daily broadcasts rank among the most streamed globally on YouTube, according to the analytics website Playboard, which collates data for YouTube channels.

His YouTube platform also ranks second among gospel channels with the most live viewers worldwide – trailing behind Brazilian preacher Bruno Leonardo, Playboard’s data shows.

Eze also rakes in large amounts of donations from his broadcasts. He is one of YouTube’s top-earning preachers who are leveraging the platform’s Super Chat donations that help creators earn revenue.

YouTube’s Super Chat feature allows viewers to pin their comments on live streams for a fee that ranges from $1 to $500.

Eze’s YouTube channel receives one of the highest Super Chat donations in the world, according to Playboard.

Among his ardent fans is award-winning Nigerian singer D’banj who tells CNN joining Eze’s morning prayers has become a routine.

“Waking up every day to NSPPD … has become part of my daily routine. I hardly miss it. It’s part of my family’s morning devotion,” adds D’banj, whose real name is Oladapo Daniel Oyebanjo.

The singer says he has had his own share of miracles from prayers on the platform.

“I remember last year Pastor Jerry said we should write seven things we want to see happen, and we prayed and I believed. I checked the list the other day and … all seven have been answered.”

Nollywood actress Tonto Dikeh says she also connected with Eze’s ministry early last year. She’s now “addicted,” she tells CNN.

Eze, who turns 40 on Monday, has come a long way from the days he and his single-parent mother struggled to find food to eat.

“I came from a family where poor people will describe my family as poor,” he says. “There were days my mum and I had no food to eat, and my mum would hold my hand and pray and give thanks to God. My mum was a single parent and a petty trader who sold groundnuts in the market … There were days she’d come home crying having not made any sales, so unable to buy us what to eat.”

Born on August 22, 1982, in Bende Local Government Area of Abia state, Eze tells CNN his education was funded by a benevolent couple who had noticed his active engagement in a church in his early years.

“I was just doing things in church like sweeping, singing, and reading the Bible – doing what most of my mates did not want to do. I had just finished junior secondary school at the time before they took me in,” he says of the couple.

Eze excelled in his studies and obtained a degree in history and international relations from Abia State University. He also went on to complete a master’s in human resource management.

Before venturing into ministry, Eze previously worked with a local TV station before joining the World Bank project for HIV/AIDS and later worked as a communications specialist with the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA).

“I was very excited about the job (at the UNFPA), but my mum wasn’t. She said it wasn’t what God told her. According to her, God told her I was going to be a preacher,” says Eze.

“I never shared those aspirations (to be a preacher). I wasn’t even listening to her. She and I lived in poverty, so I always asked why God didn’t first help us out of poverty before asking me to quit a job that was giving us money to be a preacher. The money I was giving her was coming out of the job (with the UN), so it didn’t make sense.”

He eventually quit his job and entered full-time ministry but sadly his mother died of heart failure before he fulfilled her ambition for him, he says.

“It was when she died that the reality of my assignment began to dawn on me,” he adds.

Entering into full-time ministry has come with huge sacrifices and Eze says he spends long hours praying into the night to prepare.

“I don’t have friends, I don’t hang out, I don’t have spare time. I can’t tell what my hobbies are anymore because there’s no room for hobbies,” he says.

Eze has two children with his wife Eno, who is also a pastor. He said his marriage hasn’t been perfect due to the demands of ministry.

“It hasn’t been 100 percent, but because my wife and I do the same thing (ministry), we bond the same way. The things that matter to other people don’t matter in our family. Our conversations are about ministry and how next we’ll fulfill God’s will for our lives. If I had married the wrong woman, I’ll be boring the person.”

Eze may have become an internet phenomenon, but insists his fame is accidental.

He had started livestreaming hoping to inspire his congregation when the pandemic shut down all church services and attendance at his fledgling ministry, Streams of Joy International, dwindled.

“It wasn’t a goal to reach the world,” Eze says. “During the (peak of) Covid, there was a palpable fear everywhere and I noticed that a lot of my church people were very scared of coming around the church. So, every morning, my wife and I will come online, spreading encouragement to people,” he tells CNN.

“I just wanted to speak hope,” he adds.

Eze’s daily messages of encouragement later morphed into a daily online prayer network every weekday on YouTube and other video-sharing services.

The live streams proved a hit and now in its third year, Eze’s YouTube channel has 880,000 subscribers as of this publication, and his broadcasts have garnered more than 122 million views over a three-year period, according to figures from his channel.

Viewers from the UK and the US jointly make up 25% of his live streams on YouTube, with more than one million views from the UK and over 700,000 views from the US between July 20 and August 16, 2022, according to figures from the platform.

Nigeria has the highest with over two million viewers. His broadcasts are also viewed in other African nations and countries such as Italy, Germany, Canada, France, Spain, Ireland, and the Netherlands, the chart showed.

Digital analyst Edward Israel-Ayide tells CNN Eze’s success can be linked to the “recent boom in digital churches and online religious movements.”

Israel-Ayide says this is because of the fallout from Covid-19.

“With lockdown restrictions in place, the need for community and a sense of belonging drove Nigerians at home and abroad to seek digital platforms that could provide them with direction and hope,” he says. “Post-Covid, many people are still seeking purpose and direction due to the socioeconomic challenges brought on by Covid-19 and the ongoing global economic crisis. This is one of the main reasons why religious movements like Pastor Jerry Eze’s NSPPD thrive.”

While many people now know him because of his online platform, “that’s not where it began,” Eze says. “There was a physical church before the online one.”

Eze founded the Streams of Joy International church in the suburbs of Nigeria’s eastern city of Umuahia many years before he shot to prominence.

Eze is now based in the Nigerian capital Abuja and his church has expanded beyond Nigeria to include branches in the UK, US and Canada.

Attendance in his Abuja church has also risen. But it is with the online community he has gained the most traction, and it is here to stay.

“People all over the world are accustomed to waking up and finding Pastor Jerry online,” Eze says. “It’s like a virus that has come stay.”