Venezuela’s currency, the bolivar, is worth almost nothing these days. That’s forced the country’s citizens to figure out new ways to put food on their tables. Adriana Nunez Rabascall reports this story narrated by Cristina Smit.
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After 3½ years of living inside a Missouri church to avoid deportation, Honduran immigrant Alex Garcia finally stepped outside Wednesday, following a promise from President Joe Biden’s administration to let him be.Garcia, a married father of five, was slated for removal from the U.S. in 2017, the first year of President Donald Trump’s administration. Days before he would have been deported, Christ Church United Church of Christ in the St. Louis suburb of Maplewood offered sanctuary.Sara John of the St. Louis Inter-Faith Committee on Latin America said Garcia’s decision to leave the church came after Immigration and Customs Enforcement declared that he was no longer a deportation priority, and that the agency would not pursue his detention or removal.Garcia, in a statement, said he was separated from living with his family for 1,252 days. A crowd of about 100 people cheered as he and his family left the church Wednesday.”We are not done yet,” Garcia said. “There is still so much work that has to be done and I look forward to being able to join you all out there in the community and continue to fight for my permanent protection.”In his first weeks as president, Biden has signed several executive orders on immigration issues that undo his predecessor’s policies, though several Republican members of Congress are pushing legal challenges.Myrna Orozco, organizing coordinator at Church World Service, said 33 immigrants remain inside churches across the U.S., a number that should continue to drop.”We expect it to change in the next couple of weeks as we get more clarity from ICE or [immigrants] get a decision on their cases,” Orozco said.Others emergeOthers who have emerged from sanctuary since Biden took office include Jose Chicas, a 55-year-old El Salvador native, who left a church-owned house in Durham, North Carolina, on January 22. Saheeda Nadeem, 65, of Pakistan, left a Kalamazoo, Michigan, church this month. Edith Espinal, a native of Mexico, left an Ohio church after more than three years.In Maplewood, Pastor Becky Turner said Garcia has become a valued part of the church family.”The hearts of all of us at Christ Church are overflowing today,” Turner said. “God has answered our prayers for Alex Garcia to live freely, without the threat of being separated from his family.”Garcia’s exit came just two days after U.S. Representative Cori Bush, a St. Louis Democrat, announced she was sponsoring a private bill seeking permanent residency for Garcia. Bush said Wednesday that she would still push the bill forward.”ICE has promised not to deport Alex, and we will stop at nothing to ensure that they keep their promise,” Bush said in a statement.Garcia fled extreme poverty and violence in Honduras, his advocates have said. After entering the U.S. in 2004, he hopped a train that he thought was headed for Houston, but instead ended up in Poplar Bluff, Missouri, a town of about 17,000 residents in the southeastern corner of the state.He landed a job and met his wife, Carly, a U.S. citizen, and for more than a decade they lived quietly with their blended family.In 2015, Garcia accompanied his sister to an immigration office for a check-in in Kansas City, Missouri, where officials realized Garcia was in the country illegally. He received two one-year reprieves during Barack Obama’s administration. 
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A federal judge late Tuesday indefinitely banned President Joe Biden’s administration from enforcing a 100-day moratorium on most deportations.  U.S. District Judge Drew Tipton issued a preliminary injunction sought by Texas, which argued the moratorium violated federal law and risked imposing additional costs on the state.Biden proposed the 100-day pause on deportations during his campaign as part of a larger review of immigration enforcement and an attempt to reverse the priorities of former President Donald Trump. Biden has proposed a sweeping immigration bill that would allow the legalization of an estimated 11 million people living in the U.S. illegally. He also has instituted other guidelines on whom immigration and border agents should target for enforcement.  Tipton, a Trump appointee, initially ruled on January 26 the moratorium violated federal law on administrative procedure and the U.S. failed to show why a deportation pause was justified. A temporary restraining order issued by the judge was set to expire Tuesday.  Tipton’s ruling did not require deportations to resume at their previous pace. Even without a moratorium, immigration agencies have wide latitude in enforcing removals and processing cases.  But in the days that followed his ruling, authorities deported 15 people to Jamaica and hundreds of others to Central America. The Biden administration also has continued expelling immigrants under a separate process begun by Trump officials, who invoked public-health law due to the coronavirus pandemic.  The legal fight over the deportation ban is an early sign of Republican opposition to Biden’s immigration priorities, just as Democrats and pro-immigrant legal groups fought Trump’s proposals. Almost four years before Tipton’s order, Trump signed a ban on travel from seven countries with predominantly Muslim populations that caused chaos at airports. Legal groups successfully sued to stop implementation of the ban.It was not immediately clear if the Biden administration will appeal Tipton’s latest ruling. The Justice Department did not seek a stay of Tipton’s earlier temporary restraining order. 
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A federal judge has ordered the wife of Mexican drug kingpin Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman to remain temporarily jailed after she was arrested and accused of helping her husband run his multibillion-dollar cartel and plotting his audacious escape from a Mexican prison in 2015. Emma Coronel Aispuro, 31, appeared by video conference for an initial court appearance before a federal magistrate judge in Washington, D.C. The judge’s order came after Coronel’s attorney, Jeffrey Lichtman, said he would consent to her temporary detention after her arrest at Dulles International Airport in Virginia. U.S. Magistrate Judge Robin Meriweather explained the charges to Coronel, who spoke to the judge through a Spanish interpreter. She said prosecutors had provided sufficient reason to keep Coronel behind bars for now and noted that her attorney had consented to the temporary detention. Prosecutor Anthony Nardozzi said the U.S. government believed that Coronel should remain jailed, arguing that she “worked closely with the command-and-control structure” of the Sinaloa cartel, particularly with her husband. Nardozzi said she conspired to distribute large quantities of drugs, knowing that they would be illegally smuggled into the U.S.  Nardozzi said Coronel had access to criminal associates, including other members of the cartel, and “financial means to generate a serious risk of flight.” If convicted, she could face more than 10 years in prison. Her arrest was the latest twist in the bloody, multinational saga involving Guzman, the longtime head of the Sinaloa drug cartel. Guzman, whose two dramatic prison escapes in Mexico fed into a legend that he and his family were all but untouchable, was extradited to the United States in 2017 and is serving life in prison.This photo shows the shower area where authorities claim drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman slipped into a tunnel to escape from his prison cell at the Altiplano maximum security prison, in Almoloya, west of Mexico City, July 15, 2015.And now his wife, with whom he has two young daughters, has been charged with helping him run his criminal empire. In a single-count criminal complaint, Coronel was charged with conspiracy to distribute cocaine, methamphetamine, heroin and marijuana in the U.S. The Justice Department also accused her of helping her husband escape from a Mexican prison in 2015 and participating in the planning of a second prison escape before Guzman was extradited to the U.S.  As Mexico’s most powerful drug lord, Guzman ran a cartel responsible for smuggling mountains of cocaine and other drugs into the United States during his 25-year reign, prosecutors said in recent court papers. They also said his “army of sicarios,” or “hit men,” was under orders to kidnap, torture and kill anyone who got in his way. His prison breaks became the stuff of legend and raised serious questions about whether Mexico’s justice system was capable of holding him accountable. In one case, he escaped through an entry under the shower in his cell to a milelong (1.6-kilometer-long) lighted tunnel with a motorcycle on rails. The planning for the escape was extensive, prosecutors say, with his wife playing a key role.  Court papers charge that Coronel worked with Guzman’s sons and a witness, who is now cooperating with the U.S. government, to organize the construction of the underground tunnel that Guzman used to escape from the Altiplano prison to prevent his extradition to the U.S. The plot included purchasing a piece of land near the prison, firearms and an armored truck and smuggling him a GPS watch so they could “pinpoint his exact whereabouts so as to construct the tunnel with an entry point accessible to him,” the court papers say. Guzman was sentenced to life behind bars in 2019.  Coronel, who was a beauty queen in her teens, regularly attended Guzman’s trial, even when testimony implicated her in his prison breaks. The two, separated in age by more than 30 years, have been together since at least 2007, and their twin daughters were born in 2011.  Her father, Ines Coronel Barreras, was arrested in 2013 with one of his sons and several other men in a warehouse with hundreds of pounds of marijuana across the border from Douglas, Arizona. Months earlier, the U.S. Treasury had announced financial sanctions against her father for his alleged drug trafficking.  After Guzman was rearrested following his escape, Coronel lobbied the Mexican government to improve her husband’s prison conditions. And after he was convicted in 2019, she moved to launch a clothing line in his name. Mike Vigil, the Drug Enforcement Administration’s former chief of international operations, said Coronel “has been involved in the drug trade since she was a little girl. She knows the inner workings of the Sinaloa cartel.” He said she could be willing to cooperate. “She has a huge motivation, and that is her twins,” Vigil said. 
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Officials in Ecuador say order has been restored at prisons in three cities, where authorities said at least 75 inmates died in riots between rival gangs. President Lenín Moreno declared the national prison system in a state of emergency and ordered stepped-up security measures.    Officials say authorities, with the assistance of an additional 800 police officers, gained control of the fighting within the detention centers at Guayaquil, Cuenca and Latacunga. The president also ordered the Ministry of Defense to exercise strict gun, ammunition and explosives control in the surrounding areas of correctional facilities..  Edmundo Moncayo, the General Director of the National Service of Attention to People Deprived of Liberty (SNAI), said the inmate fights were set off when police carried out a search for weapons. Moncayo said some prison staff were injured in the riots but none died.   Moncayo also said the vast majority of the country’s prison population lives in the centers where the violence occurred. Among Ecuador’s roughly 38,000 inmates, confrontations among criminal groups often resulted in riots. In December, riots at several facilities left 11 people dead. 
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The number of people going hungry in El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua has nearly quadrupled in the last two years, the United Nations said on Tuesday, as Central America has been battered by an economic crisis. New data released by the U.N.’s World Food Program showed nearly 8 million people across the four countries are experiencing hunger this year, up from 2.2 million in 2018. “The COVID-19-induced economic crisis had already put food on the market shelves out of reach for the most vulnerable people when the twin hurricanes Eta and Iota battered them further,” Miguel Barreto, WFP Regional Director for Latin America and the Caribbean, said in a statement.   He was referring to two hurricanes that hit Central America in November. “We’re eating the little food that people give to us,” said Marina Rosado, 70, who along with her son and grandchildren live along a boulevard in the Honduran city of Lima that was inundated by flooding last year. The storms that destroyed their home were the latest blow pushing the family further into hunger, Rosado said, after pandemic-related restrictions limited their ability to collect bottles and cans in the streets to sell to recycling companies.   The WFP also noted that 15% of those surveyed by the organization in January 2021 said that they were making concrete plans to migrate — nearly double the percentage in 2018. 
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The United States and Canada have agreed to “double down” on efforts “to achieve net zero emissions by 2050,” President Joe Biden announced on Tuesday, following his first bilateral meeting with a foreign leader since taking office last month.Due to coronavirus pandemic precautions, his discussion with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was virtual — with Biden in the White House in Washington, D.C., and the Canadian leader in Ottawa. Usually, Canada is a quick first stop abroad for any newly elected U.S. president, but COVID-19 turned the bilateral meeting into one with considerable social distancing.A screen shows US President Joe Biden and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau (virtual) speak to the media after holding a virtual bilateral meeting in the East Room of the White House on Feb. 23, 2021.The two leaders, however, appeared mostly in sync even if they were 700 kilometers apart.Trudeau, whose image and voice were piped into the Oval Office, said that “U.S. leadership has been sorely missed over the past years,” specifically on addressing climate change — a criticism of former President Donald Trump’s four years in power when the United States pursued an “America First” agenda, neglecting alliances and multilateral relationships.“As we’re preparing the joint rollout and communique from this one, it’s nice when the Americans aren’t pulling out all references to climate change and, instead, adding them in,” Trudeau said.Biden told the Canadian leader during their virtual meeting that “the United States has no closer friend than Canada. That’s why you were my first call as president, my first bilateral meeting. … We’re all best served when the United States and Canada work together and lead together in close coordination on a whole range of issues.”Trump and Trudeau had a contentious relationship. When the prime minister complained to the president about tariffs slapped on Canadian steel and aluminum, ostensibly on grounds of U.S. national security, Trump called Trudeau “very dishonest and weak.” Trump even raised the War of 1812, asking Trudeau: “Didn’t you guys burn down the White House?” (They didn’t; Canada was still a British colony in 1814 when troops that had come from across the Atlantic burned it.)Despite the vastly improved relationship for the North American neighbors, there are unresolved disagreements.FILE – A depot used to store pipes for Transcanada Corp’s planned Keystone XL oil pipeline is seen in Gascoyne, North Dakota, Jan. 25, 2017.In a move that “disappointed” Trudeau, Biden recently blocked the $8 billion Keystone XL pipeline project to pump oil from Canada to the United States. He also signed a “Buy American” executive order that hurt Canada by redirecting more government purchasing to domestic manufacturers.White House spokesperson Jen Psaki said earlier Tuesday that no changes were anticipated in Biden’s position on the Keystone issue during the meeting.Neither leader made direct reference to the controversial pipeline during their public remarks on Tuesday.“Canadian energy workers power homes on both sides of the border,” said Trudeau after Biden delivered remarks. “It goes to show that we’re all better off for this partnership.”Trudeau also wants Canada to be allowed to buy COVID-19 vaccines for its struggling vaccination program from a Pfizer manufacturing facility in the U.S. state of Michigan.Trudeau first raised the issue during a phone conversation last month, Biden’s first with a foreign leader as president.Psaki on Tuesday called any such permission premature as “our focus right now is getting shots in arms at home.”Trudeau said he and Biden, in Tuesday’s discussions, had “discussed collaboration to beat COVID-19 — from keeping key supplies moving and supporting science and research to joint efforts through international institutions.”Trudeau also thanked Biden for his support to apply pressure on Beijing for the release of two Canadians — former diplomat Michael Kovrig and businessman Michael Spavor.FILE – Huawei Technologies Chief Financial Officer Meng Wanzhou leaves her home to appear for a hearing in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, Sept. 30, 2019.The two men have been in detention in China since 2018 after Canada arrested on fraud charges Meng Wanzhou, a Chinese executive with Huawei Technologies. Meng is also the daughter of the telecommunications company’s founder.Washington has pursued Meng’s extradition and the case remains pending in Canadian courts.“Human beings are not bartering chips,” Biden declared. “You know, we’re going to work together until we get their safe return.”
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Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador called on the United Nations on Tuesday to guarantee equitable access to coronavirus vaccines.  Speaking at a news conference alongside Argentine President Alberto Fernández, Lopez Obrador called the current state of vaccine distribution “totally unfair.” “The U.N. has to intervene because it’s … an ornament,” he said. “Where is the universal fraternity?” Mexico’s President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador and Argentina’s President Alberto Fernandez attend a news conference at the National Palace, in Mexico City, Mexico, Feb. 23, 2021.Fernández, who is on a three-day state visit to Mexico, is hoping to develop a hemispheric strategy with Lopez Obrador to address the issue. “It is fundamental that there is transparency and solidarity in the vaccine rollout,” said Fernandez, who had previously discussed the topic with French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel. “I agree with what (López Obrador) did at the U.N. — we have to look for a way to have quick access to the doses and that doesn’t leave the poorest countries behind.” On February 15, Lopez Obrador urged the U.N. to call an “urgent meeting” to address vaccine hoarding by the countries responsible for vaccine production. He also pushed for the implementation of mechanisms to guarantee equitable access to vaccines and medications during the pandemic such as COVAX, a vaccine-sharing program co-led by the World Health Organization. A few days later, Mexican Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard asked the U.N. Security Council to “avoid hoarding vaccines and accelerate the first stages of COVAX deliveries, to give priority to countries with fewer resources.”  A health care worker administers a dose of the Oxford-AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccine, marketed by the Serum Institute of India (SII) as COVISHIELD, to a woman at a vaccination center in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Feb. 22, 2021.”It is urgent to act, to reverse the injustice that is being committed, because the security of all humanity depends on it,” Ebrard told the council. As of last week, three-quarters of the world’s first doses had been administered in only 10 countries. Those countries, however, account for 60% of global GDP, Ebrard added. Mexico has administered at least 1.7 million vaccine doses, inoculating around 0.7% of its population, according to the Reuters COVID-19 Tracker. The country currently ranks third in the world in coronavirus deaths, with at least 180,000 Mexicans having died of COVID-19 since the beginning of the pandemic. 
 
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The United Nations Security Council has expressed serious concern about Haiti’s worsening political instability and called for elections to be held this year.
Security Council members met by videoconference Monday to discuss a Demonstrators take part in a protest against Haiti’s President Jovenel Moise, in Port-au-Prince, Haiti on Feb. 14, 2021.Helen La Lime, Special Representative of the U.N. Secretary-General in Haiti and head of BINUH, painted a mostly bleak picture while briefing members.
“As the country prepares to enter a tense pre-electoral period, the polarization that has defined most of President [Jovenel] Moïse’s term in office has become even more acute, as signs of a shrinking civic space abound and an already alarming humanitarian situation continues to deteriorate,” La Lime said.
Describing the human rights situation as “dire,” La Lime cited Moise’s November 26 decree on public security as particularly problematic for civil liberties.
“The overly broad definition of terrorism articulated in a 26 November decree on public security — to include lesser offenses such as vandalism and obstructing roads, along with an increase in both the threats directed at, and attacks on journalists, lawyers, judges and human rights defenders — all risk chilling the public debate and curtailing such inalienable rights as those of freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and peaceful assembly,” La Lime said.
The BINUH chief also criticized Moise’s decree sidelining three Supreme Court justices after announcing an alleged coup attempt — a move that unified the previously divided opposition groups and angered Haiti’s allies in the international community.Haitian Président Jovenel Moïse speaks to VOA Creole about his decision to retire three Supreme Court Justices, Feb. 9, 2021.Haiti’s response
In an unusual move, President Moise personally addressed the Security Council to defend his policies. It is normally the Foreign Minister who speaks at such meetings.
The president listed his achievements in the energy sector, infrastructure and modernizing Haiti’s police force. He cited progress toward reforming the constitution and organizing a referendum and general elections later this year. He also expressed his commitment to addressing gang violence, kidnappings, human rights abuses and press freedom. But at times, his claims were at odds with BINUH’s report.
“To reinforce the rule of law and consolidate the security agencies in the absence of a functioning parliament, I had to adopt certain decrees that were necessary to combat organized crime, rampant insecurity and kidnapping,“ Moise said in French, pushing back on criticism about ruling by decree.
“I am the fifth president since 1987 to use this tool to respond to the needs of the people. I will continue to do so in a limited fashion until a new parliament is elected and the 59th president of the Republic is sworn in on February 7, 2022,” Moise added.
In response to calls for more inclusivity and encouraging more women and youth to participate in the electoral process, Moise blamed the “radical opposition” and “corrupt oligarchs” for the current state of affairs.
“The fear of elections and the popular vote explains these coup d’etat attempts to install a transitional government bypassing the will of the people,” Moise said. “The results of the previous six elections organized by Haiti show that the majority of these political actors will never pass the 1% bar. The biggest challenge we have is how to build a democracy with actors who are incapable of constructing a coalition to become an alternative [choice]. I won these presidential elections as an opposition candidate who solicited the popular vote.”FILE – Jeffrey DeLaurentis, charge d’affaires to the U.S. Embassy in Havana, Cuba, speaks in Atlanta, Jan. 18, 2016.U.S. adopts tough stance
But Ambassador Jeffrey DeLaurentis, the Acting Alternate Representative for Special Political Affairs at the U.S. Mission to the United Nations, was unsympathetic.
“Let me begin with something we all know: legislative elections were due in Haiti in October 2019. Both before and after that date, members of this Council repeatedly called on Haiti’s political stakeholders to come together, to set aside their differences, and to find a way forward to address Haiti’s most pressing challenges,” DeLaurentis said. “They chose not to do so; however, ultimate responsibility for creating an atmosphere conducive to free and fair elections, and then conducting those elections, must rest on the government.”
The ambassador also repeated that ruling by decree must end.
“Let me conclude by reiterating the need to bring the current period of rule by decree to a swift conclusion. It is only through the presence of a stable, democratic, and fully representative government that issues such as violence, corruption, and civil and human rights abuses can be meaningfully addressed,” DeLaurentis said.
Moise told the council a constitutional referendum would be held in June — a departure from the April 25 date previously cited in the Provisional Electoral Council’s calendar. He added that legislative and presidential elections would follow in September.France slams Moise on Human Rights
Nathalie Broadhurst, France’s Deputy Permanent Representative to the United Nations, slammed Moise on human rights and lack of progress investigating gang violence.
“In the terms of security and respect for human rights, the authorities must do more,” she said. “I ask this question straightforwardly: how is it possible today that Jimmy Cherizier [notorious Haitian gang leader] is still walking free? Those responsible for the La Saline and Bel Air massacres must be brought to justice. I also note that the investigation into the assassination of Monferrier Dorval [constitutional law professor and head of the Port-au-Prince bar association] is not making progress. The fight against impunity must be the priority of the authorities.”China questions continuing U.N. assistance
Describing 2021 as a “watershed moment” for Haiti, China’s Ambassador Geng Shuang questioned if the United Nations should continue its work after investing more than $8 billion over the past 30 years.
“I would like to stress here again that there is no solution to the Haitian problem from the outside,” Shuang said. “We should learn the lessons, comprehensively assess the situation in light of what is happening, ponder seriously on the future presence of the U.N. in Haiti, and avoid endless and fruitless investment.”Margaret Besheer contributed to this report. 
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U.S. President Joe Biden meets virtually Tuesday with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, marking Biden’s first bilateral meeting with a foreign leader since taking office last month.The two leaders are set to discuss China, climate change and other issues, according to a Biden administration official who spoke to reporters anonymously, as they try to reset relations that soured during Donald Trump’s four years as U.S. president.The official told reporters that Biden is eager to discuss security threats presented by climate change, the coronavirus, as well as threats posed by China, Iran, North Korea and Russia.In a move that “disappointed” Trudeau, Biden recently blocked the $8 billion Keystone XL pipeline project to pump oil from Canada to the United States by signing a “Buy American” executive order aimed at spending more U.S. funding to bolster domestic manufacturers.White House spokesperson Jen Psaki said “no changes are anticipated” in Biden’s position on the pipeline issue during the meeting.Trudeau plans to show that Canada is realigned with the U.S. on COVID-19, foreign policy, climate change and other issues, according to a Canadian government source who also spoke anonymously before the meeting.It is unclear if Trudeau would again propose that Canada be allowed to buy COVID vaccines from a Pfizer manufacturing facility in the U.S. Midwestern state of Michigan for its struggling vaccination program.Trudeau first raised the issue during a phone conversation last month, Biden’s first with a foreign leader as president. A senior Biden administration official said, however, that Biden is focused on vaccinating people first in the U.S.Canada has frequently been the first stop abroad for a newly elected U.S. president, but COVID-19 has turned the bilateral meeting into a virtual affair.Officials said Biden and Trudeau will deliver remarks to the media before and after their meeting.The Biden administration also said a shared document summarizing collaborations between the two countries on a wide range of issues would likely be disclosed after the meeting. 
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The wife of Mexican drug kingpin Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman was arrested in the United States and accused of helping her husband run his multibillion-dollar cartel and plot his audacious escape from a Mexican prison in 2015.
Emma Coronel Aispuro, a 31-year-old former beauty queen, was arrested Monday at Dulles International Airport in Virginia and is expected to appear in federal court in Washington, by video, Tuesday afternoon. She is a dual citizen of the United States and Mexico.
Her arrest is the latest twist in the bloody, multinational saga involving Guzman, the longtime head of the Sinaloa drug cartel. Guzman, whose two dramatic prison escapes in Mexico fed into a legend that he and his family were all but untouchable, was extradited to the United States in 2017 and is serving life in prison.  
And now his wife, with whom he has two young daughters, has been charged with helping him run his criminal empire. In a single-count criminal complaint, Coronel was charged with conspiracy to distribute cocaine, methamphetamine, heroin and marijuana in the U.S. The Justice Department also accused her of helping her husband escape from a Mexican prison in 2015 and participating in the planning of a second prison escape before Guzman was extradited to the U.S.
 
Coronel was moved to the Alexandria Detention Center in Virginia late Monday night and is expected to appear by video conference for her initial court appearance on Tuesday. Her attorney Jeffrey Lichtman declined to comment Monday night.
As Mexico’s most powerful drug lord, Guzman ran a cartel responsible for smuggling mountains of cocaine and other drugs into the United States during his 25-year reign, prosecutors said in recent court papers. They also said his “army of sicarios,” or “hit men,” was under orders to kidnap, torture and kill anyone who got in his way.
His prison breaks became the stuff of legend and raised serious questions about whether Mexico’s justice system was capable of holding him accountable. In one case, he escaped through an entry under the shower in his cell to a milelong (1.6-kilometer-long) lighted tunnel with a motorcycle on rails. The planning for the escape was extensive, prosecutors say, with his wife playing a key role.
 
Court papers charge that Coronel worked with Guzman’s sons and a witness, who is now
cooperating with the U.S. government, to organize the construction of the underground tunnel that Guzman used to escape from the Altiplano prison to prevent his extradition to the U.S. The plot included purchasing a piece of land near the prison, firearms and an armored truck and smuggling him a GPS watch so they could “pinpoint his exact whereabouts so as to construct the tunnel with an entry point accessible to him,” the court papers say.
Guzman was sentenced to life behind bars in 2019.  
Coronel, who was a beauty queen in her teens, regularly attended Guzman’s trial, even when testimony implicated her in his prison breaks. The two, separated in age by more than 30 years, have been together since at least 2007, and their twin daughters were born in 2011.  
Her father, Ines Coronel Barreras, was arrested in 2013 with one of his sons and several other men in a warehouse with hundreds of pounds of marijuana across the border from Douglas, Arizona. Months earlier, the U.S. Treasury had announced financial sanctions against her father for his alleged drug trafficking.  
After Guzman was rearrested following his escape, Coronel lobbied the Mexican government to improve her husband’s prison conditions. And after he was convicted in 2019, she moved to launch a clothing line in his name.
Mike Vigil, the Drug Enforcement Administration’s former chief of international operations, said Coronel “has been involved in the drug trade since she was a little girl. She knows the inner workings of the Sinaloa cartel.”
He said she could be willing to cooperate.
“She has a huge motivation, and that is her twins,” Vigil said.
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Mexico received its first batch of Russia’s COVID-19 Sputnik V vaccine, with 200 thousand doses arriving late Monday night.  Mexican Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard Casaubón expressed gratitude to Russian President Vladimir Putin after accepting the shipment at Mexico International Airport, alongside the Russian ambassador to Mexico, Viktor Koronelli, who praised the partnership between the two countries.Arrival of the first batch of Russia’s Sputnik V coronavirus disease (COVID-19) vaccine, in Mexico City, Feb. 23, 2021.Mexico President Andrés Manuel López Obrador struck a deal with the Russian leader a few weeks ago to purchase 24 million doses of the Sputnik vaccine to immunize 12 million people.  Mexico joins other Latin American countries, including Argentina, Bolivia and Venezuela, in approving the use of the Russian vaccine. Mexico is also expecting deliveries of vaccines from Pfizer-BioNTech and AstraZeneca. Authorities are hoping the vaccine can help slow the spread of COVID-19, which has tallied more than 2,043,000 infections and 180,536 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University Covid Resource Center. 
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Brazil’s northwestern state of Acre is under a state of emergency after flooding caused by heavy rains prompted mass evacuations, impacting more than 120,000 people.   The Acre River in the state capital, Rio Branco, has been well above flood stage in recent days, with many streets underwater.  Brazil President Jair Bolsonaro visited the region Sunday and is expected to survey the capital of Acre on Wednesday, where thousands of residents were forced to leave their homes because of the flooding. Governor Gladson Cameli said the flooding in Acre is among the latest crisis facing the the impoverished state bordering Peru, where mostly Haitian migrants are being denied entry into the country from Peru because of COVID-19 restrictions.  Brazil has the highest COVID-19 tally in Latin America, with more than 1,168,000 infections and  246,504 deaths.  The flooding may also worsen the surge in dengue cases in the country.  
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The wife of Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, the imprisoned former leader of Mexico’s Sinaloa drug cartel, was arrested Monday over her alleged involvement in international drug trafficking, the U.S. Department of Justice said. Emma Coronel Aispuro, 31, a regular attendee at her husband’s trial two years ago, was arrested at Dulles International Airport in Northern Virginia and is expected to appear in a federal court in Washington on Tuesday. A lawyer for Coronel could not immediately be identified. It was unclear why Coronel, a dual U.S.-Mexico citizen, was in the Washington area. Her arrest came two years after a celebrated trial in Brooklyn, New York, where Guzman, now 63, was convicted of trafficking tons of drugs into the United States as Sinaloa’s leader, where prosecutors said he amassed power through killings and wars with rival cartels. FILE – In this photo provided U.S. law enforcement, authorities escort Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, center, from a plane to a waiting caravan of SUVs at Long Island MacArthur Airport, in Ronkonkoma, N.Y., Jan. 19, 2017.He was sentenced in July 2019 to life in prison plus 30 years, which the sentencing judge said reflected his “overwhelmingly evil” actions. He was sent to ADX Florence in Colorado, the nation’s most secure “Supermax” prison. Coronel was charged in a one-count complaint with conspiring to distribute heroin, cocaine, marijuana and methamphetamines for unlawful importation into the United States. Prosecutors said Coronel also conspired to aid her husband in his July 2015 escape from the Altiplano prison in Mexico when he dug a mile-long tunnel from his cell and began plotting a second escape following his capture by Mexican authorities in January 2016. FILE – This photo shows the shower area where authorities claim drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman slipped into a tunnel to escape from his prison cell at the Altiplano maximum security prison, in Almoloya, west of Mexico City, July 15, 2015.U.S. and Mexican efforts to fight drug trafficking had become strained when the Justice Department brought drug charges in October against former Mexican Defense Minister Salvador Cienfuegos. The Justice Department unexpectedly dropped that case the following month and let Cienfuegos return to Mexico, in a bid to restore trust in the countries’ security ties. Cienfuegos was exonerated two months later when Mexico dropped its own case. Tomas Guevara, an investigator in security issues at the Autonomous University of Sinaloa, said Coronel’s arrest might be part of a “pressure strategy” to prompt cooperation from Guzman. A Mexican official familiar with Coronel’s case who asked not to be identified said her arrest appeared to be solely a U.S. initiative and that Coronel was not wanted in Mexico. 
 
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Canada’s parliament passed a nonbinding motion on Monday saying China’s treatment of the Uighur Muslim minority in the Xinjiang region constitutes genocide, putting pressure on Liberal Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government to follow suit. Canada’s House of Commons voted 266-0 for the motion brought by the opposition Conservative Party. Trudeau and his Cabinet abstained from the vote, although Liberal backbenchers widely backed it. The motion was also amended just before the vote to call on the International Olympic Committee to move the 2022 Winter Olympics from Beijing if the treatment continues. FILE – Huawei Technologies Chief Financial Officer Meng Wanzhou exits the court registry following the bail hearing at British Columbia Superior Courts in Vancouver, British Columbia, Dec. 11, 2018.Trudeau’s Conservative rivals have been pressuring him to get tougher on China. After Canada arrested Huawei Chief Financial Officer Meng Wanzhou in 2018 on a U.S. warrant, China detained two Canadians on spying charges, igniting lingering diplomatic tensions between the two countries. China has been widely condemned for setting up complexes in Xinjiang that it describes as “vocational training centers” to stamp out extremism and give people new skills, and which others have called concentration camps. Beijing denies accusations of abuses in Xinjiang. Citing testimony, documents and media reports of human rights abuses against Uighurs, Conservative lawmaker Michael Chong said: “We can no longer ignore this. We must call it for what it is — a genocide.” Trudeau has been reluctant to use the word genocide, suggesting that seeking broad consensus among Western allies on Chinese human rights issues would be the best approach. FILE – Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau attends a news conference at Rideau Cottage, in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, Jan. 22, 2021.”Moving forward multilaterally will be the best way to demonstrate the solidarity of Western democracies … that are extremely concerned and dismayed by reports of what’s going on in Xinjiang,” Trudeau said on Friday after speaking to fellow G-7 leaders. Trudeau and U.S. President Joe Biden will hold a virtual bilateral meeting on Tuesday afternoon, and relations with China are likely to be discussed, a government source said. Former U.S. President Donald Trump, on his last full day in office last month, said China had committed “genocide and crimes against humanity” by repressing Uighur Muslims. The Biden administration is trying to ensure that the genocide declaration is upheld, according to his choice to be ambassador to the United Nations, Linda Thomas-Greenfield. Cong Peiwu, the Chinese ambassador to Ottawa, denied accusations of genocide. “Western countries are in no position to say what the human rights situation in China looks like,” Cong said in an interview before the vote. “There is no so-called genocide in Xinjiang at all.”  
 
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Among those seeing an opportunity for change in Venezuela under the new U.S. administration is Leopoldo López, one of the leaders of the Venezuelan opposition who fled the country in 2020. López now lives in Madrid and sat down for an interview with VOA. Alfonso Beato has more on his interview, in this report narrated by Roderick James. 
Camera: Alfonso Beato, Miguel Angel Trejo
 
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Brazil has one of the highest homicide rates in the world and tens of thousands of people are listed as missing – many of them at the hands of drug traffickers and other armed groups.  Families say they often get little help from police, and many are turning to the Internet and social media apps to find their loved ones. For VOA, Edgar Maciel reports from Sao Paulo.Camera: Edgar Maciel
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Two South African medics are swapping their medical gear for oars as they train for a risky 4,000-kilometer (2,500-mile) journey by rowboat through the Arctic Northwest Passage.  If the 14-member team finishes the trip, across the north of Canada to Alaska, they will make history as all attempts to row the icy waters have failed. Franco Puglisi reports from Johannesburg. Camera: Franco Puglisi 
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Leftist economist Andres Arauz will face conservative Guillermo Lasso in the upcoming second round of Ecuador’s presidential election, officials said Sunday, in a vote marred by fraud allegations and taking place amid a worsening economic crisis.Thirty-six-year-old Arauz won the first round with 32.72 percent of the vote — not enough to win outright.His opponent in the second round will be ex-banker Lasso, who took 19.74 percent to beat left-wing indigenous leader Yaku Perez’ 19.39 percent, according to the final results of the February 7 poll.The runoff will take place on April 11, after the first round results were approved by four out of the five members of the National Electoral Council (CNE) at a meeting that lasted into the early hours of Sunday morning.Perez, a 51-year-old environmental lawyer, had formally submitted a request for a recount in 17 of the country’s 24 provinces, which was suspended on Wednesday.He has alleged there was fraud to keep him out of the run-off after he was narrowly displaced by Lasso from second to third place in the middle of the count.Perez could still mount a legal challenge against the official results.”Today democracy has triumphed, we are going with courage and optimism to this second round,” Lasso said in a statement following the announcement.Incumbent President Lenin Moreno, whose term in office ends on May 24, did not seek reelection.Ideological battleArauz is the protégé of Rafael Correa, a leftist two-time former president currently living in Belgium to evade a conviction for corruption and who remains an influential force in the country.Esteban Nichols, a political scientist at Quito’s Simon Bolivar Andean University, told AFP that Arauz had retained his mentor’s electoral base.”He himself is not the one generating the votes,” he said. “People voted for Correa.”The first round result, he added, sets the scene not just for a battle between left and right, but for a “fight between Correism and anti-Correism.”To win, Lasso will have to “seek alliances with antagonists” — such as supporters of Perez.Running in his third presidential race, free market advocate Lasso has promised to create a million jobs in a year.He would likely stick to the austerity policies adopted by Moreno, who had to rein in spending in exchange for International Monetary Fund loans to bolster the oil-producing country’s faltering dollar-based economy.Ecuador has been mired in debt since the profits of an oil boom during Correa’s presidency dried up under Moreno as the global price of crude crashed.National debt rose from 26 percent of GDP to 44 percent during Moreno’s term.The coronavirus pandemic has increased the pressure on the economy, with some $6.4 billion in losses attributed directly to the health crisis, according to government data. 
 
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Feeling frustrated and stressed out? Brazilians now have a place to vent their anger and fury in the newly opened “Rage Room.”Inside a warehouse on the outskirts of Sao Paulo, people are able to swing giant hammers at old televisions, computers and printers, demolishing the machines and shattering the glass into tiny pieces.Vanderlei Rodrigues, 42, who opened the business a month ago in Cidade Tiradentes, said he had received a fair number of customers wanting to vent, especially during the pandemic.”I think it was the best moment to be able to set this up here in Cidade Tiradentes, related to everything that people are going through, a lot of anxiety, stress,” he said. The “Rage Room” experience costs $4.64.Wearing protective suits and helmets, participants write issues that bother them on the walls — “ex-girlfriends,” “ex-husbands,” “corruption” and “work.” These words become the targets of their anger.Alexandre de Carvalho, 40, who works in advertising and drives two hours back and forth to work, said with worries about health because of the pandemic, “it’s great to come here and release some adrenaline and pent-up feelings.”Luciana Holanda walks in front of the Rage Room, a place where people can vent their anger on everyday items, such as bottles, broken TV sets and other electronic devices, in Sao Paulo, Brazil, Feb. 19, 2021. Sign reads: “Come break everything.”Luciana Holanda, 35, an unemployed mother of two daughters, said that “with all this accumulated stress, being a mother, having children and not being able to work … it is very good to be able to release some stress and vent. “I am not going to vent my frustrations on my daughters or on anyone, so I really prefer to break things. I love it.”  
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Investigations are now under way into the Peruvian coronavirus vaccination scandal, in which hundreds of people, many well-connected, were given shots although they did not participate in trials for the Sinopharm vaccine to determine its efficacy.Heath Minister Oscar Ugarte said 3,200 vaccines were given, including 1,200 that went to the Chinese Embassy. He said of the other 2,000 doses, investigators are looking into where they are and who was vaccinated.The state-run Andina news agency reported Peru’s Congress also launched a committee to investigate the scandal, amid a public uproar over how privileged people were able to jump ahead of front-line health workers for vaccinations.Fernando Carbone, the head of the commission investigating those benefiting from the shots is guaranteeing impartiality in the probe, with a threat of sanctions against those involved.Carbone spoke publicly about not being compromised after the Peruvian Medical College called for him to step aside, citing his association with former Health Minister Pilar Mazetti, who was among those improperly receiving vaccinations.Peru’s foreign minister Elizabeth Astete resigned Sunday after revealing she had received the vaccine before health care personnel.The public anger over the scandal has been exacerbated by Peru having one of the highest coronavirus tallies in Latin America, with more than 1.2 million infections and more than 44,000 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center.
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Venezuela began its immunization program against the COVID-19 virus by vaccinating front-line health care personnel Thursday, less than a week after receiving the first batch of 100,000 doses of the Russian vaccine Sputnik V.”Fortunately, the strategic cooperation between Russia and Venezuela has allowed us to have access to one of the best vaccines in the world, with an efficacy of 91.6%,” Vice President Delcy Rodriguez said.Venezuela participated in trials of the Sputnik V vaccine trials before signing a purchase agreement with Russia in December.The Latin American country hopes to begin vaccinating the general public in April.Health Minister Carlos Alvarado said officials aim to vaccinate 70% of the population this year in order to achieve herd immunity.Venezuela has so far confirmed more than 134,000 COVID-19 cases and 1,297 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University Coronavirus Resource Center.
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Haiti has responded to a tweet by Julie Chung, the U.S. acting assistant secretary for the State Department’s Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs, expressing alarm at “authoritarian and undemocratic acts” by President Jovenel Moise.Chung’s tweet on Wednesday also said, “Respect for democratic norms is vital and non-negotiable.”The United States will not be silent when democratic institutions and civil society are attacked.We condemn all attempts to undermine democracy by violence, suppression of civic freedoms, or intimidation.2/3— Julie Chung (@WHAAsstSecty) February 17, 2021Haiti Ambassador to the United States Bocchit Edmond announced on Twitter early Thursday that he had a “constructive meeting” with Chung about the situation in the country.”We’re determined to create a better environment for free, fair & transparent elections under robust international observations,” Edmond tweeted.2/2) I also spoke with @WHAAsstSecty about the steps taken by the Electoral Council to prepare for the Constitutional referendum and the elections. We’re determined to create a better environment for free, fair & transparent elections under a robust international observations.— Bocchit Edmond (@BocchitEdmond) February 18, 2021Chung’s tweet also said, “The United States will not be silent when democratic institutions and civil society are attacked.” It also cited “unilateral removals and appointments of Supreme Court Justices” and attacks on the media.Addressing Chung’s concerns about attacks on the press, Edmond tweeted: “I reassured her that the Govt of Haiti has no intentions of targeting journalists.”1/2) I had a constructive meeting with @WHAAsstSecty Julie Chung about the current situation in Haiti. I reassured her that the Govt of Haiti has no intentions of targeting journalists. We are deeply devoted to respecting freedom of the Press & improve our ranking 83 on 189 PFGI.— Bocchit Edmond (@BocchitEdmond) February 18, 2021On the night of Feb. 12, President Moise tweeted that he had appointed three new Supreme Court Justices, to replace the justices he retired last week.J’ai nommé à la Cour de Cassation trois juges issus d’une liste préalablement soumise par le sénat de la République, conformément aux dispositions de l’art 175 de la Constitution.— Président Jovenel Moïse (@moisejovenel) February 13, 2021He also issued an “Arrete,” an official announcement, saying he had chosen a new secretary of state for communications, secretary of state for public security and a new delegate for the Artibonite Department.The announcements came hours after a statement by U.S. Ambassador to Haiti Michele Sison expressing concern about Moise’s unilateral moves.”What troubles us is governance by decree, governance by presidential decree that has been going on in Haiti for a period that is not normal and is ongoing,” Sison told VOA in an exclusive interview on Feb. 12.At least two journalists have died due to their interactions with law enforcement during protests so far this year. Others have been severely injured and hospitalized.Chung’s tweets about Haiti, which the U.S. Embassy in Haiti retweeted on its official Twitter account and translated into French and Creole, echo what Ambassador Sison told VOA.”Elections are essential to end the political paralysis that exists in Haiti since a long time. For more than a year,” Sison said. “Haitians should have their say, so they can realize their own vision for their country.”Laurent Weil, a country analyst for The Economist magazine’s Intelligence Unit who specializes in Latin America and the Caribbean, told VOA elections are central to an improvement in Haiti’s situation in 2021.”The best-case scenario is that you have an elected parliament. You have an elected president that takes office following this long and uncertain process,” Weil told VOA. “There is a generalized sentiment on the ground that things need to change.”
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Popular cruises up Canada’s scenic Pacific coast to Alaska have become the latest victim of the coronavirus pandemic, creating a new source of friction between Canada and the United States.Canada’s Transport Ministry announced last week it was extending a prohibition of passenger cruise vessels carrying more than 100 people visiting its ports through the end of February 2022, effectively canceling the 2021 Alaska cruise season and cutting off an important source of revenue to the northernmost U.S. state.The reaction from Alaska was swift and predictable. In a terse statement, the state’s two U.S. senators and sole member of the House of Representatives charged that the decision was made arbitrarily with no consultation or advance notice. The statement also said it was made with no consideration for Alaska or its economy.The cruises, which weave through a network of coastal islands amid glaciers, fjords and towering pristine forests, are highly popular. According to the Alaska Travel Industry Association, the cruises accounted for 1,331,600 or 60% of all visitors to the state in 2019.Cruise ships near downtown Juneau, Alaska, in May 2019, in this view from from Mount Juneau.Last year, the state had projected a further 5% increase in cruise passengers before all sailings were canceled. Alaska tourism has been further set back by a closing of land borders between Canada and the United States.Sarah Leonard, CEO of the Alaska Travel Industry Association, told VOA she was not surprised to see the ban on the cruises extended but had not expected it to last for so long.She called for U.S. government assistance to heavily impacted businesses and workers and suggested a temporary waiver to the Passenger Vessel Services Act that will allow cruise ships to sail from American ports, like Seattle, directly to Alaska without stopping at Canadian ports.The act, established in 1886, prohibits cruise ships from sailing directly between American ports. This means Alaska-bound cruise ships must embark from Canada or stop at a Canadian port like Vancouver.“We’ve long advocated since the beginning of the pandemic for a potential temporary waiver of that federal legislation, which would again potentially allow large ship cruise passengers or large ship cruise operations to travel to Alaska,” Leonard said.One of the major stops for the cruise ships is the small town of Skagway, Alaska, with a population of 1,000 people. Located within the so-called Inside Passage on the Alaska panhandle, it often sees upwards of 20,000 cruise visitors a day during the travel season.According to the Alaska Visitor Volume Report, more than 1 million cruise passengers visited Skagway during the summer of 2019.Skagway Mayor Andrew Cremata says cruise passengers normally account for 95% of the local economy, representing some $160 million in revenue for local businesses. He says writing a strongly worded letter to the Canadian government is not going to help Skagway.“There’s nobody living here in Skagway that isn’t feeling the effects in some way,” said Cremata, who, besides being mayor, works as a part-time tour guide during the cruise season.“I mean, there are people, you know — my wife has a full-time job still and I have a lot of work, I’m able to get online — but we were definitely impacted,” he told VOA. “Some people, if they made their primary income from tourism, you know, they’re devastated.”Like Leonard, Cremata would like to see more federal stimulus money from the U.S. government and a waiver to the Passenger Vessel Services Act.It is not only Alaska that will feel the loss of the passenger cruises. The Canadian city of Vancouver is the main starting point for most ships heading to ports of call in Alaska, with nearby Seattle providing competition.According to the Port of Vancouver, 2019 was a record-breaking year with more than 288 cruise ship visits — a 22% increase from the previous year. The season for Alaska-bound cruise ships usually runs from the beginning of April to the end of October.FILE – In this July 28, 2014, file photo, a cruise ship passenger takes photos of Alaska’s Inside Passage. The Canadian government has extended a ban on cruise ships through February 2022.Walt Judas, CEO of the Tourism Industry Association of British Columbia, worries that any temporary waiver to the Passenger Vessel Services Act might become permanent, meaning potential disaster for tourism in Canada’s westernmost province.“Once you set a precedent like that, even if only on a temporary basis, who’s to stop a lobby from making that permanent? And so that would be a big concern, if you start to sail from, say, Alaska to Seattle, and vice versa, and you cut out the Canadian ports,” said Judas. “Now, you’ve lost a huge amount of business for the visitor economy. And for the economy in general. We’re talking more than $2 billion [Canadian] in economic impact.”Like many in the tourism industry, the length of the closure took Judas by surprise.He is still hoping, with enough pressure on the Canadian government and positive developments in the fight against the coronavirus pandemic, that the decision might be reversed in time to salvage some part of this year’s cruise season.“We hope that we can see some progress in the months ahead and try to work with government on the criteria by which we could see a partial cruise season before the end of the year,” he said.Tourism Vancouver, the city’s convention and visitors bureau, estimates each ship’s visit brings upwards of $2.2 million in immediate spin-off benefits, including stays in local Vancouver hotels. Many visitors continue on to visit other areas in the region.To make matters worse, the Vancouver convention and conference business has virtually disappeared, furthering the economic impact of the pandemic on the local tourism industry. 
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