Forecasters with the U.S. National Hurricane Center say Tropical Storm Fred, the sixth storm of the hurricane season, has formed in the Caribbean Sea and is expected to move near the Dominican Republic and Haiti Wednesday, bringing heavy rain and the possibility of flooding and mudslides.In its latest report, the hurricane center said the storm was positioned about 190 kilometers east-southeast of Santo Domingo in the Dominican Republic and moving west-northwest toward the island nation at about 26 km/ph.  Its maximum sustained winds were about 65 km/ph.Tropical storm warnings have been posted for the Dominican Republic and parts of Haiti. The storm is expected to bring five to 10 centimeters of rain, with as much as 15 cms in isolated areas. The rain is likely to cause flooding in some areas and mudslides are possible.On its current track, the hurricane center says the storm could threaten the Turks and Caicos Islands and the southeastern Bahamas by Thursday and move north of the northern coast of central Cuba Friday.Forecasters say some weakening is likely Wednesday as the storm moves over the island of Hispaniola – where the Dominican Republic and Haiti are located. They say some restrengthening should occur after the system moves away from the island, but it may be slow to regain intensity. The hurricane center says, as usual, there is significant uncertainty on the storm’s intensity two to three days from now. 
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President Jair Bolsonaro suffered a major defeat in Congress when Brazilian lawmakers did not adopt his proposal to require printed receipts from some electronic ballot boxes.  Bolsonaro has insisted printed receipts are needed to avoid fraud, without providing any evidence that Brazil’s electronic voting system is prone to cheating. His allies needed 308 votes to pass the proposed constitutional change, but got only 229 Tuesday night.  The opposition, however, also fell short of its goal of rebuffing the president with an overwhelming majority but got only 218 votes. Earlier in the day, dozens of military vehicles and hundreds of soldiers paraded past the presidential palace as Bolsonaro looked on, then continued past the congressional building and Defense Ministry. The military vehicles left the city at night. Brazilian Navy tanks pass next flags with the image of Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro at the Esplanade of Ministries after a military parade in Brasilia, Brazil, Aug. 10, 2021.The navy issued a statement saying the convoy had been planned long before the congressional vote. But it was announced only on Monday and critics said it looked like an attempt to intimidate opponents of a president who has often praised the country’s past military dictatorship. Military parades in the capital are usually limited to independence day events. Tuesday’s procession was described as a ceremonial invitation for Bolsonaro to attend annual navy exercises that are held in a town outside the capital. Critics contend Bolsonaro is trying to sow doubt among his passionate supporters about the 2022 election results, setting the stage for potential conflicts similar to those spawned by then U.S. President Donald Trump’s allegations of fraud in the United States. Bolsonaro has repeatedly insulted Luis Roberto Barroso, a Supreme Court justice who is president of Brazil’s electoral court, accusing him of working to benefit former leftist President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who has been leading in the polls for next year’s election. The measure voted on Tuesday was a watered-down version of an initial proposal to adopt printouts at all of the nation’s voting ballot boxes. That measure was rejected last week by a congressional committee. Electoral authorities and even many of Bolsonaro’s political allies opposed the proposal, saying it would attack a nonexistent problem and could create opportunities for vote buying. Cláudio Couto, a political scientist at the Getulio Vargas Foundation, said Tuesday’s rejection marked the biggest legislative defeat for Bolsonaro. “The administration is getting more frail in every aspect. It suffers in polls, it is investigated in the Senate inquiry on the COVID-19 pandemic, and the chances that Bolsonaro is not reelected are getting bigger,” Couto said. “By insisting in today’s proposal to solve a problem that does not exist, Bolsonaro has made this defeat to be important.” The call for a vote appeared to be a bid by lower house Speaker Arthur Lira, a Bolsonaro ally, to settle the dispute for good and ease tensions. On Monday, Lira called the military exercise taking place the same day as the vote a “tragic coincidence.” “We hope that this subject is finally ended in the lower house,” Lira said after the vote. Juan Gonzalez, the U.S. National Security Council’s senior director for the Western Hemisphere, told reporters Monday that Biden administration officials were “very candid” speaking last week with Bolsonaro about elections, particularly in light of parallels with what has happened in the U.S. 
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Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says the 11 year prison sentence handed down by a Chinese court to businessman Michael Spavor is “absolutely unacceptable and unjust.” A court in the northeastern city of Dandong convicted Spavor Wednesday on a charge of espionage. The verdict came nearly six months after Spavor’s one-day, closed-door trial that even Canadian diplomats were prevented from attending.   In his written statement, Trudeau condemned the “lack of transparency in the legal process, and a trial that did not satisfy even the minimum standards required by international law.” A statement on the court’s website said Spavor will be deported as part of his sentence, but did not say when that would happen. Spavor was arrested in December 2018, just days after Canadian authorities arrested Meng Wanzhou, the chief financial officer of China’s Huawei Technologies, in Vancouver, British Columbia, on a U.S. warrant.   The arrest of Spavor and another Canadian, former diplomat Michael Kovrig, that same month triggered accusations from Ottawa that the two men were arrested in retaliation for Meng’s arrest.  Spavor’s verdict comes a day after a Chinese court upheld a death sentence for another Canadian, Robert Lloyd Schellenberg, who was convicted in 2018 for trafficking methamphetamine. Schellenberg was arrested in 2014 and initially sentenced to 15 years in prison, but his sentence was changed during a one-day retrial in 2019, shortly after Meng’s arrest.   Meng remains under house arrest in Vancouver as she fights the extradition warrant from the U.S. As chief financial officer of Huawei — one of the world’s largest manufacturers of smartphones — Meng is accused of lying to U.S. officials about Huawei’s business in Iran, which is under U.S. sanctions.    The U.S. has also warned other countries against using Huawei-built products, suspecting the Chinese government of installing spyware in them.      Some information for this report came from the Associated Press, Reuters and AFP.  
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A Chinese court on Tuesday rejected an appeal by a Canadian whose sentence in a drug case was increased to death while Beijing was trying to pressure Canada to release a detained executive of tech giant Huawei. Robert Schellenberg was sentenced to prison in November 2018 after being convicted of drug smuggling. He was abruptly resentenced to death in January 2019 following the arrest of the chief financial officer of Huawei Technologies in Vancouver. Meng Wanzhou was detained on U.S. charges related to possible dealings with Iran. The Higher People’s Court of Liaoning Province rejected Schellenberg’s appeal and said court procedures were legal and the sentence appropriate. It sent the case to the Chinese supreme court for review, as is required by law before any death sentences can be carried out. The Chinese government also arrested a former Canadian diplomat, Michael Kovrig, and a Canadian entrepreneur, Michael Spavor, on unspecified spying charges in an apparent attempt to pressure Ottawa to release Meng. Two other Canadians, Fan Wei and Xu Weihong, also were sentenced to death on drug charges in 2019 as relations between Beijing and Ottawa deteriorated. The United States wants the Huawei executive, Meng, who is also the daughter of the company’s founder, extradited to face charges she lied to banks in Hong Kong in connection with dealings with Iran that might violate trade sanctions. A Canadian judge is to hear final arguments over whether Meng should be extradited. China also has reduced imports from Canada. 
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Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador and U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris spoke on Monday about migration, the battle against COVID-19, and the need to strengthen Central American economies, the White House said in a statement. In a brief statement on Twitter, Lopez Obrador said the conversation had been good and that he would provide more details Tuesday.Volvimos a conversar con Kamala Harris, vicepresidenta de Estados Unidos. En buenos términos, tratamos el asunto migratorio, la completa apertura de la frontera norte para reactivar nuestras economías y continuar con la mutua cooperación para enfrentar la pandemia de #COVID19. pic.twitter.com/7XeNVyJGRW— Andrés Manuel (@lopezobrador_) August 9, 2021The White House said the two leaders discussed ongoing bilateral cooperation to address “irregular migration” to the shared U.S.-Mexican border and agreed to focus on bolstering Central American economies through investment in agriculture and climate resilience. Harris updated Lopez Obrador on U.S. efforts, including the July 29 release of the U.S. strategy for addressing the root causes of migration in Central America. The U.S. vice president also told Lopez Obrador that Washington was committed to sending additional doses of COVID-19 vaccines to Mexico, on top of the 4 million doses already delivered, the White House said. Speaking before the call, a senior U.S. official said the vaccines could come from multiple manufacturers, including Moderna and AstraZeneca. Earlier, Lopez Obrador said he and Harris would discuss reopening the U.S.-Mexico border, immigration and vaccines against COVID-19, new cases of which have jumped in Mexico. Speaking at a regular morning news conference, the Mexican president said vaccinations along Mexico’s border with the United States had led to fewer hospitalizations and deaths in the face of rising infections on both sides. “This is what I’m going to suggest today, that we can demonstrate that we’re not putting the population at risk,” Lopez Obrador said in the northern city of Ciudad Juarez, across the border from El Paso, Texas. The United States has sent a few million vaccine doses to Mexico and would be sharing more with it than with any other country, reflecting the importance it attached to the bilateral relationship, the U.S. official said. The countries’ 2,000-mile (3,200-km) border has been closed to nonessential travel since early in the pandemic last year.  
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A justice official told The Associated Press on Monday that he has selected a judge to oversee the case of the slaying of President Jovenel Moïse amid concerns over death threats and demands for additional security. Mathieu Chanlatte will be in charge of proceedings involving the July 7 attack at Moïse’s private home, said Magistrate Bernard Saint-Vil, who is dean of the Court of First Instance in Port-au-Prince. “The judge is very competent,” Saint-Vil said. Chanlatte could not be immediately reached for comment. The choice was praised by some people, including Haitian attorney Steevens Rosemond, who is not involved in the case. “I ask that the Haitian state guarantee the safety of this magistrate so that he can do his work in accordance with the standards,” Rosemond said. Last week, Saint-Vil said he had requested extra security measures as he prepared to select a judge to oversee the case. Death threats are especially common in high-profile slayings in Haiti, and several court clerks probing Moïse’s death have already gone into hiding after being ordered to change some names and statements in their reports. Haitians reacted swiftly to the news on social media, with some saying they hope justice will be served. “You have a great responsibility for the history of this country,” one man tweeted. “You have the responsibility to make justice triumph.” More than 40 people have been detained in the case; among them are 18 former Colombian soldiers and 20 Haitian police officers. Authorities are still looking for several suspects including an ex-senator, a judicial official and a Haitian Supreme Court judge. Human rights activists, defense attorneys and Colombia’s government have said they are worried about those detained, given that they were recently transferred to an overcrowded prison whose conditions have been compared to torture. Haiti has long been criticized for lengthy pre-trial detentions, with thousands of inmates languishing in prison for years before they even get a court hearing, let alone a trial. In Colombia on Monday, more than 20 relatives of the ex-soldiers arrested in Haiti organized a protest to demand due process and attorneys for them. Julián Andrés Gómez, brother of the captured ex-military officer John Jairo Ramírez Gómez, said they need “strong evidence” to know if the Colombians are alive and out of danger. A request that Haiti’s government made to the United Nations for a special inquiry into the assassination is still pending. “We’re taking a look at the letter, and that letter will be answered,” U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric said Monday. He noted the U.N. could help in the investigation through its existing mandate in Haiti, which includes four police investigative advisers. He said that an international inquiry would have to go through the U.N.’s legislative bodies. 
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Canada Monday reopened its land border with the United States to vaccinated citizens for non-essential travel, the first time U.S. citizens could do so since March of 2020.Under the plan, along with filling out an application, visitors must provide proof of full vaccination with a Canada health department-approved vaccine and a negative COVID-19 test taken within the previous 72 hours. The application is available via a downloadable smartphone app.The Associated Press reports while the Canada Border Services Agency won’t say how many people it’s expecting, a U.S. company that offers same-day COVID-19 testing says it has seen the number of procedures it performs more than triple in recent weeks.Video from various border crossings in New York and Washington states showed cars lining up to cross into Canada Monday. Businesses on both sides of the border believe increased traffic will boost commerce.The move follows Canada’s decision last month to drop a two-week quarantine requirement for its citizens when they return home from the U.S.
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Zuleydis Elledias has gotten up each morning for the past two months hoping for a phone call, a message — any news on the fate of her husband and nephew, who disappeared at sea after the boat they were in capsized as they tried to reach Florida. Another half dozen families in the small town of Orlando Nodarse, 35 miles (55 kilometers) west of Havana and near the port of Mariel, are living with the same uncertainty. “Due to the pandemic my husband lost his job. Many places closed and he had been home for more than a year. Every time he went to his workplace, they told him to wait. And that made him desperate because we have a 2-year-old son,” Elledias, a 38-year-old homemaker, told The Associated Press through tears. Cuba is seeing a surge in unauthorized migration to the United States, fueled by an economic crisis exacerbated by the pandemic, increased U.S. sanctions and cutbacks in aid from its also-crisis-wracked Venezuelan ally. That has led to shortages in many goods and a series of protests that shook the island on July 11. FILE – Cubans are seen outside Havana’s Capitol during a demonstration against the government of Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel in Havana, July 11, 2021.And legal ways to leave have been strained by the Trump administration’s near-closure of the U.S. Consulate in 2017 following a series of mysterious illnesses among diplomatic personnel that some claimed could result from an attack — allegations Cuba bitterly denies. Most Cubans who want to try for a U.S. visa now have to go to embassies in other countries — and getting there is almost impossible due to sharp cuts in air traffic during the pandemic. Most can’t afford tickets anyway unless relatives abroad can front them the money. That has pushed many Cubans to launch themselves into the sea on small boats or rafts to attempt the dangerous crossing of the Florida Straits to the United States. The U.S. Coast Guard said recently it has intercepted 595 Cubans at sea since the current fiscal year started on Oct. 1. That’s larger than any any full fiscal year since 2017 — during which the U.S. announced that even Cubans reaching U.S. shores were likely to be expelled, ending a longstanding policy of granting asylum to those who reached dry land. FILE – Cuban deportees wait to be quarantined at a COVID control center, after disembarking from Coast Guard cutter Charles Sexton to be handed over to the Cuban authorities at Orozco Bay in Artemisa, Cuba, June 29, 2021.It’s still small in comparison with the nearly 5,400 halted at sea in 2016 or the dramatic crises of 1994-1995 and 1980, when Cuba’s government temporarily stopped trying to block departures and tens of thousands set out en masse. Thousands died in the ocean. It’s also still far smaller than the current flow of those who have somehow made their way to the continent and worked their way north. The U.S. Border Patrol had recorded 26,196 Cubans trying to enter the U.S. without documents between Oct. 1 and June 30, most by land. As well as her husband — 45-year-old driver Fernando Quiñones — Elledias is also awaiting word on her nephew, Ismel Reyes, 22, who worked on a farm. They were among a group of 18 men and two women who left Cuba for Florida on May 25. The boat sank the following night and survivors were rescued by the U.S. Coast Guard about 18 miles (29 kilometers) southwest of Key West. The search by sea, land and air lasted for days. “Something happened, I don’t know, the currents, the boat flipped. The United States Coast Guard rescued eight people alive, found two bodies and there are 10 people missing,” Elledias said. Among the survivors were four cousins of Elledias, some of whom have already been repatriated to Cuba. Elledias, her sister Sudenis — Reyes’ mother — and other Orlando Nodarse residents who spoke with the AP all agreed that the risky decision to head for the United States was triggered by the economic crisis and the difficulties in obtaining a visa. Cuban historian Alina Bárbara López noted that two earlier mass exoduses by sea were spawned by crises and Cuban authorities opened the borders as a kind of release valve in the face of social pressure. In 1980, with unhappy Cubans pouring into foreign embassy compounds seeking visas, Fidel Castro opened the port at Mariel for people who wanted to leave and 125,000 Cubans rushed north, setting off a political crisis for the government of U.S. President Jimmy Carter. The dire economic tailspin of the early 1990s following the collapse of Cuba’s aid from the Soviet Union led tens of thousands to put to sea in innertubes, makeshift rafts and highjacked boats. Then too, many died. But now Havana is “trapped” because it cannot open its borders due to migration agreements signed with the Washington in that wake of that crisis, she said. Meanwhile, Cuba’s economic reforms have only been superficial, López said. The economy remains stagnant. “All this makes the underlying political foundation of this crisis much stronger than in the previous” crises, she said. Cuban authorities acknowledge there are “symptoms” of a possible migratory crisis but say it could be deactivated if President Joe Biden fulfills a campaign promise to jettison Trump’s tighter sanctions, which were aimed at trying to drive the Communist Party from power, and resumes the dialogue launched by former U.S. President Barack Obama. “The situation we have now is the result of a number of negative factors,” said Jesús Perz Calderón of the United States department at Cuba’s Foreign Ministry. “In the first place, the deterioration of the economy as a result of COVID-19 … but at the same time the resurgence of an economic war of blockade against Cuba by the United States.” José Ramón Cabañas, a former Cuban ambassador to the U.S. and current director of the Center for International Policy Research, said both nations have instruments in place to prevent an exodus to Florida, “There are agreements in force but they are not being fully applied,” Cabañas said. The United States had been providing 22,000 visas a year to Cuba for two decades until 2017, when Trump froze relations. The consulate shutdown made applying for a visa almost moot for most Cubans. FILE – Cubans drive past the U.S. Embassy during a rally calling for the end of the U.S. blockade against Cuba, in Havana, March 28, 2021In addition, at the beginning of 2017, Obama eliminated the policy known as “wet foot-dry foot” that let Cubans who reached U.S. shores remain, usually as refugees, while those caught at sea were sent back. Back in Orlando Nodarse, Elledias hopes a miracle will bring home her loved ones. “I would tell people who are thinking about this option [of crossing the Florida Straits] not to do it, that it is not a safe route. There is no money in the world that can pay for this suffering we are going through,” she said. 
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Haiti’s justice system is still struggling to find a judge willing to investigate the assassination of President Jovenel Moise, a full month after he died.”It is a sensitive, political dossier. Before agreeing to investigate it, a judge thinks about his own safety and that of his family,” one judge told AFP.”For this reason, investigating magistrates are not too enthusiastic about accepting it,” this judge told AFP, speaking on condition of anonymity out of safety concerns.Several magistrates have told the dean of the Court of First Instance in Port-au-Prince that they are not interested in working on the shocking July 7 assassination of Moise at the presidential residence by a commando team, this judge said. Moise’s wife, Martine, was wounded but survived.Senior Magistrate Bernard Saint-Vil has sought to reassure these judges, telling them he has asked the government to guarantee their safety and has requested bodyguards.Saint-Vil said early this week that he would announce on Thursday the name of the investigating magistrate chosen to take on the case, but in the end he could not because no judge wanted the job.Police say they have arrested 44 people in connection with the killing, including 12 Haitian police officers, 18 Colombians who were allegedly part of the commando team and two Americans of Haitian descent.The head of Moise’s security detail is among those detained in connection with the plot allegedly organized by a group of Haitians with foreign ties.Moise, an unpopular leader, had been ruling the impoverished and disaster-plagued nation by decree, as gang violence spiked and COVID-19 spread.Police have issued wanted-persons notices for several other people, including a judge from Haiti’s highest court, a former senator and a businessman.Prosecutors have also issued summons for an opposition party leader, the head of Moise’s own party, and two Haitian preachers who had spoken out publicly against the late president.
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The Mexican government sued U.S. gun manufacturers and distributors Wednesday in U.S. federal court, arguing that their negligent and illegal commercial practices have unleashed tremendous bloodshed in Mexico.The unusual lawsuit was filed in Boston. Among those being sued are some of the biggest names in guns, including Smith & Wesson Brands, Inc.; Barrett Firearms Manufacturing Inc.; Beretta U.S.A. Corp.; Colt’s Manufacturing Company LLC, and Glock Inc. Another defendant is Interstate Arms, a Boston-area wholesaler that sells guns from all but one of the named manufacturers to dealers around the U.S.The manufacturers did not immediately respond to requests for comment.The Mexican government argues that the companies know that their practices contribute to the trafficking of guns to Mexico and facilitate it. Mexico wants compensation for the havoc the guns have wrought in its country.The Mexican government “brings this action to put an end to the massive damage that the defendants cause by actively facilitating the unlawful trafficking of their guns to drug cartels and other criminals in Mexico,” the lawsuit said.Mexico’s figuresThe government estimates that 70% of the weapons trafficked to Mexico come from the U.S., according to the Foreign Affairs Ministry, and that in 2019 alone, at least 17,000 homicides were linked to trafficked weapons.The National Shooting Sports Foundation, the U.S. firearm industry’s trade association, said in a statement it rejected Mexico’s allegations of negligence.”These allegations are baseless. The Mexican government is responsible for the rampant crime and corruption within their own borders,” said Lawrence G. Keane, the group’s senior vice president and general counsel. The Mexican government is responsible for enforcing its laws, he said.FILE – A security guard stands outside the Glock Inc. headquarters in Smyrna, Ga., Oct. 8, 2014. Glock is one of the gunmakers Mexico sued on Aug. 4, 2021, in U.S. federal court.The group also took issue with Mexico’s figures for the number of guns recovered at crime scenes and traced back to the U.S. It said traces were attempted on only a small fraction of the recovered guns and only on the ones carrying a serial number, making them more likely to have originated in the U.S.Alejandro Celorio, legal adviser for the ministry, told reporters Wednesday that the damage caused by the trafficked guns would be equal to 1.7% to 2% of Mexico’s gross domestic product. The government will seek at least $10 billion in compensation, he said. Mexico’s GDP last year was more than $1.2 trillion.”We don’t do it to pressure the United States,” Celorio said. “We do it so there aren’t deaths in Mexico.”Goal: Reduce homicidesForeign Affairs Secretary Marcelo Ebrard said the lawsuit was another piece of the government’s efforts against guns. “The priority is that we reduce homicides,” he said. “We aren’t looking to change American laws.”Mexico did not seek the advice of the U.S. government on the matter but advised the U.S. Embassy before filing the lawsuit.Steve Shadowen, the lead attorney representing Mexico, said that in the early 2000s, about 30 U.S. cities brought similar litigation against gun manufacturers, arguing that they should be responsible for increased police, hospitalization and other costs associated with gun violence.As some cities started winning, gun manufacturers went to Congress and got an immunity statute for the manufacturers. Shadowen said he believes that immunity doesn’t apply when the injury occurs outside the United States.”The merits of the case are strongly in our favor, and then we have to get around this immunity statute, which we think we’re going to win,” he said. “That statute just simply doesn’t apply. It only applies when you’re in the United States.”He said he believes it is the first time a foreign government has sued the gun manufacturers.Adam Winkler, a law professor at the University of California-Los Angeles and an expert on gun policy, called Mexico’s effort a “long shot.””It is a bold and innovative lawsuit,” he said. “We haven’t seen anything like this before. The gun manufacturers have enjoyed broad immunity from lawsuits for now two decades.”FILE – The Beretta U.S.A. facility is shown in Accokeek, Md., Aug. 4, 2014. Beretta is one of the U.S. gunmakers sued by Mexico on Aug. 4, 2021.He said he had not seen arguments that the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act applies only to damages in the United States.The sale of firearms is severely restricted in Mexico and controlled by the Defense Department. But thousands of guns are smuggled into Mexico by the country’s powerful drug cartels.There were more than 36,000 murders in Mexico last year, and the toll has remained stubbornly high, despite President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s pledge to pacify the country. Mexico’s nationwide murder rate in 2020 remained unchanged at 29 per 100,000 inhabitants. By comparison, the U.S. homicide rate in 2019 was 5.8 per 100,000.El Paso shootingIn August 2019, a gunman killed 23 people in an El Paso Walmart, including some Mexican citizens. At that time, Ebrard said the government would explore its legal options. The government said Wednesday that recent rulings in U.S. courts contributed to its decision to file the lawsuit.It cited a decision in California allowing a lawsuit against Smith & Wesson to move forward, a lawsuit filed last week against Century Arms related to a 2019 shooting in Gilroy, California, and the $33 million settlement reached by Remington with some of the families whose children were killed in the Newtown, Connecticut, Sandy Hook Elementary School mass shooting in 2012.Winkler of UCLA mentioned the Sandy Hook lawsuit as one that initially few people thought would go anywhere.”The plaintiffs in that case made an innovative and bold argument, too,” he said. “They argued that the immunity statute does not prevent these gunmakers from being held liable where they act negligently.””Over the past year or so, we’ve seen some cracks in the immunity armor provided by federal law,” Winkler said. “Even if this lawsuit moves forward, it will be extremely difficult for Mexico to win because it will be hard to show that this distribution process or their distribution practices are a manifestation of negligence on the part of the gunmakers.”
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The World Health Organization says more than 700 health care workers and patients were killed, more than 2,000 injured, and hundreds of health facilities destroyed in countries of conflict between 2018 and 2020.A three-year analysis was carried out in 17 conflict-ridden countries and territories, including Ethiopia, Yemen, Syria, Mozambique, the occupied Palestinian territories, and Myanmar.New data show that health care continues to be under attack. So far this year, the World Health Organization has recorded 588 incidents in 14 countries with emergencies, causing 114 deaths and 278 injuries of health care workers and patients.   The WHO’s director of health emergencies interventions, Altaf Musani, says the impact of those health care attacks goes well beyond claiming lives. He says the ramifications are significant and alarming, especially considering the ongoing COVID-19 response.   “Their impact reverberates on health care workers’ mental health and willingness to report to work, equally, on communities’ willingness to seek health care, and also drastically reduces resources for responding to a health crisis, amongst others,”  Musani said. Musani says the ripple effect of a single incident is huge and has a long-lasting impact on the system at large. When health facilities are destroyed, he says, they need to be rebuilt.    When health care workers are killed or wounded, he says a vital work force must be reinforced. Building back those vital systems, he says, requires years of costly investment, years in which people in need are underserved.“During the pandemic, more than ever, health care workers must be protected, must be respected,”  Musani said. “Hospitals and health care facilities, including the transportation of ambulances should not be used for military purposes. Essential conditions for the continued delivery of vital health care must be given the necessary space.”   Musani notes any reduction in capacity will interrupt services and deprive vulnerable communities of urgent care.   The WHO is calling on all parties in conflicts to ensure safe working spaces for the delivery of health care services. It says people caught in emergency situations must be able to safely access care, free from violence, threat, or fear.
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Haiti will hold elections this year despite setbacks, Provisional Electoral Council (KEP) President Guirlande Mesadieu told VOA Creole.  “We will hold elections. We will hold a referendum,” Mesadieu said. She admitted that the current September 26 date may have to be pushed back.  Despite some political groups’ attempts to pressure the KEP to put election plans on hold after President Jovenel Moise’s assassination in July, Mesadieu said the council is determined to respect the presidential decree, which called for a referendum and general elections this year.  FILE – A picture of the late Haitian President Jovenel Moise hangs on a wall before a news conference by interim Prime Minister Claude Joseph, in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, July 13, 2021.”We, as members of the electoral council, would be acting irresponsibly if we were to decide unilaterally to hold a referendum but not general elections, or general elections and not a referendum. So, everything in the (presidential) decree is what we are focused on,” she told VOA. The United States and the international community have repeatedly called on Haitian officials to hold general elections to restore crippled democratic institutions, such as the Parliament, and begin resolving major issues.In an interview Tuesday with VOA, Julie Chung, acting assistant secretary for the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs, reiterated that message.  “I think it’s a critical time for the people of Haiti to come together with consensus and to listen to the voices of all stakeholders to build that pathway to free and fair elections as soon as is technically feasible,” Chung told VOA.The assistant secretary said U.S. Special Envoy for Haiti Daniel Foote stayed in the country after attending Moise’s funeral to meet with Haitian officials and civil society representatives and “hear their voices.”   FILE – U.S. Special Envoy Daniel Foote meets with National Police Chief Leon Charles, U.S. Ambassador Michele Sison and a police official in Haiti over the weekend, in this image posted by the national police on Twitter on July 24, 2021.But Andre Michel, spokesperson for the Democratic and Popular Sector, said the opposition wants a dialogue to select a new transitional government and a new electoral council to organize the elections. “There must be an electoral council that is credible, an electoral council that is honest and is made up of representatives from all sectors of society,” Michel said during a press conference Tuesday.But Mesadieu told VOA the KEP will not stop working while it waits for such a dialogue.  “So, whatever people are discussing doesn’t really concern us, because we are not part of those discussions. What is clear is that if there is some sort of political accord that would allow more people to participate in the election, it will be a pleasure for us to accommodate that,” she said. “If you’re asking us to just sit idle and wait for a political accord, we’ll just keep working. If there is a political accord, it will happen while we are moving forward.”  Before Moise’s death on July 7, the opposition was unsuccessful in its attempts to agree on a consensus government and a path forward.  Mesadieu admits the KEP faces multiple obstacles as it works to organize elections.  “Of course it’s tough, because we are living in the country, and we have to deal with reality. Politics, security, the environment — all those things have repercussions on our work,” Mesadieu told VOA.It is unclear how far the September 26 election date would be pushed back, but Mesadieu said the KEP is committed to seeing its mission completed. Jacquelin Belizaire, Jorge Agobian and Renan Toussaint in Port-au-Prince contributed to this report.
 
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The number of children traveling alone who were picked up at the Mexican border by U.S. immigration authorities likely hit an all-time high in July, and the number of people who came in families likely reached the second-highest total on record, a U.S. official said Monday, citing preliminary government figures. The sharp increases from June were striking because crossings usually slow during stifling — and sometimes fatal — summer heat. U.S. authorities likely picked up more than 19,000 unaccompanied children in July, exceeding the previous high of 18,877 in March, according to David Shahoulian, assistant secretary for border and immigration policy at the Department of Homeland Security. The June total was 15,253. The number of people encountered in families during July is expected at about 80,000, Shahoulian said. That’s shy of the all-time high of 88,857 in May 2019 but up from 55,805 in June. Overall, U.S. authorities stopped migrants about 210,000 times at the border in July, up from 188,829 in June and the highest in more than 20 years. But the numbers aren’t directly comparable because many cross repeatedly under a pandemic-related ban that expels people from the country immediately without giving them a chance to seek asylum but carries no legal consequences. The activity was overwhelmingly concentrated in the Border Patrol’s Del Rio and Rio Grande Valley sectors in south Texas, accounting for more than 7 of 10 people who came in families.Lizeth Morales, of Honduras, hugs the daughter of a Honduran friend she met at a camp for migrant families as she waits to cross into the United States to begin the asylum process, July 5, 2021, in Tijuana, Mexico.In the Rio Grande Valley sector, the “epicenter of the current surge,” agents stopped migrants about 78,000 times in July, Shahoulian said, up from 59,380 in June and 51,149 in May. The government disclosures came in a court filing hours after immigrant advocacy groups resumed a legal battle to end the government’s authority to expel families at the border on grounds it prevents the spread of the coronavirus. On Monday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention renewed those emergency powers, known as Title 42 and named for a 1944 public health law. The Homeland Security Department said it would continue to enforce the ban on asylum for single adults and families despite growing pressure from pro-immigration groups that it isn’t justified on public health grounds. Unaccompanied children are exempt. “Title 42 is not an immigration authority, but a public health authority, and its continued use is dictated by CDC and governed by the CDC’s analysis of public health factors,” the department said in a statement. The final count for July border arrests isn’t expected for several days, but preliminary numbers are usually pretty close. Over the first 29 days of July, authorities encountered a daily average of 6,779 people, including 616 unaccompanied children and 2,583 who came in families, Shahoulian said. The number of people stopped in families is expected to hit an all-time high for the 2021 fiscal year that ends September 30, Shahoulian said, adding it will likely be higher if courts order that the pandemic-related powers be lifted. The rising numbers have strained holding facilities, Shahoulian said. The Border Patrol had 17,778 people in custody on Sunday, despite a “COVID-19 adjusted capacity” of 4,706. The Rio Grande Valley sector was holding 10,002 of them. The American Civil Liberties Union and other advocacy groups said Monday that they were ending settlement talks with the Biden administration over their demand to lift the pandemic-related ban on families seeking asylum. The impasse resumes a legal battle before U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan in Washington. “We are deeply disappointed that the Biden administration has abandoned its promise of fair and humane treatment for families seeking safety, leaving us no choice but to resume litigation,” said Neela Chakravartula, managing attorney for the Center for Gender & Refugee Studies. Since late March, the ACLU has been working with advocates to choose particularly vulnerable migrants stuck in Mexico for the U.S. government to allow in to seek asylum. ACLU attorney Lee Gelernt said the exemptions will continue for another week. “Seven months of waiting for the Biden administration to end Title 42 is more than enough,” Gelernt said. The breakdown reflects growing tensions between advocates and the administration over use of expulsions and the government’s decision last week to resume fast-track deportation flights for families to Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras.  Last week, the International Rescue Committee and HIAS also said they were ending efforts to help the administration choose asylum-seekers to exempt from the pandemic-related ban. The asylum advocacy groups had been working on a parallel track with the ACLU to identify particularly vulnerable migrants stuck in Mexico. The CDC said Monday that the ban would remain until its director “determines that the danger of further introduction of COVID-19 into the United States from covered noncitizens has ceased to be a serious danger to the public health.” 
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The wife of Haiti’s assassinated president, seriously wounded in the attack that killed her husband, listened in terror as the gunmen ransacked their home, she said in her first interview since that night.The killers eventually found what they were looking for in President Jovenel Moise’s residence and made cursory efforts on their way out to see if first lady Martine Moise was still alive.”When they left, they thought I was dead,” she told The New York Times in an interview published Friday, weeks after the July 7 assassination that heaped a fresh crisis on the fragile Caribbean nation.She survived and was rushed for emergency treatment to the United States, where she spoke to the newspaper while flanked by security guards, diplomats and family.Moise is left wondering what happened to the 30 to 50 men usually posted to guard her husband at the house. None of those guards were killed, or even wounded.”Only the oligarchs and the system could kill him,” she said.Haitian police have arrested the head of Jovenel Moise’s security, as well as about 20 Colombian mercenaries, over the plot they say was organized by a group of Haitians with foreign ties.Jovenel Moise had been ruling the impoverished and disaster-plagued nation by decree, as gang violence spiked and COVID-19 spread.His widow told the Times that the couple had been asleep when the sound of gunfire woke them.He called his security team for help, but soon the killers were shooting in the bedroom. She was struck in the hand and elbow.As she lay bleeding, her husband dead or dying in the same room, she felt like she was suffocating because her mouth was so full of blood.The killers spoke only Spanish — Haiti’s languages are Creole and French — and were communicating by phone with someone while they carried out the attack.She said she doesn’t know what the assassins took, but that it came from a shelf where her husband kept his files.Martine Moise wants the killers to know she is not afraid and is seriously considering a run for the presidency once she is healthy.”I would like people who did this to be caught, otherwise they will kill every single president who takes power,” she said. “They did it once. They will do it again.”
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Greenland’s ice sheet has experienced a “massive melting event” during a heat wave that has seen temperatures more than 10 degrees above seasonal norms, according to Danish researchers.Since Wednesday, the ice sheet covering the vast Arctic territory has melted by about 8 billion tons a day, twice its normal average rate during summer, reported the Polar Portal website, which is run by Danish researchers.The Danish Meteorological Institute reported temperatures of more than 20 degrees Celsius (68 Fahrenheit), more than twice the normal average summer temperature, in northern Greenland.And Nerlerit Inaat airport in the northeast of the territory recorded 23.4 degrees C (74.1 F) on Thursday — the highest recorded there since records began.With the heat wave affecting most of Greenland that day, the Polar Portal website reported a “massive melting event” involving enough water “to cover Florida with two inches of water” (five centimeters).The largest melt of the Greenland ice sheet still dates to the summer of 2019.The area where the melting took place this time, though, is larger than two years ago, the website added.The Greenland ice sheet is the second-largest mass of freshwater ice on the planet with nearly 1.8 million square kilometers (695,000 square miles), second only to Antarctica.The melting of the ice sheets started in 1990 and has accelerated since 2000. The mass loss in recent years is approximately four times greater than it was before 2000, according to the researchers at Polar Portal.One European study published in January said ocean levels would rise between 10 and 18 centimeters by 2100 — or 60 percent faster than previously estimated — at the rate at which the Greenland ice sheet was now melting.The Greenland ice sheet, if completely melted, would raise the ocean levels by six to seven meters.But with a relatively cool start to the Greenland summer, with snowfalls and rains, the retreat of the ice sheet so far for 2021 remains within the historical norm, according to Polar Portal. The melting period extends from June to early September.
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Two lakes in a far-flung coastal region of Patagonia, in Argentina, have turned fluorescent pink, an as-of-yet unexplained phenomena that local environmentalists fear could be harmful and caused by industrial contamination.The lakes, located near an industrial park on the outskirts of the Argentine city of Trelew, sprawl across a dusty, desertlike plain and are largely undeveloped. Officials with the municipality of Trelew recently discovered a truck dumping waste in the watershed, according to posts made by the city on social media.Authorities gave conflicting views to local media, however, on whether the sudden change in color of the lakes was harmful. Environmentalists were more concerned.Local activist Pablo Lada, a member of Argentina’s National Ecological Network (RENACE), told Reuters in an interview that the pink color could potentially be the result of a dye typically used to give prawns raised nearby their typically rose-colored hue.”I think that the pink lagoon uncovered a … lack of treatment of this waste that has become a big problem,” Lada said.Local and regional environmental officials are investigating the cause and potential damage to the lakes but have yet to arrive at any conclusions. 
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The Biden administration has imposed sanctions on Cuba’s police force and two of its leaders following recent protests on the island against the communist government.U.S. President Joe Biden said Friday before meeting with Cuban American leaders at the White House that more sanctions were coming “unless there is some drastic change in Cuba, which I don’t anticipate.”Biden also said he had directed the Treasury and State departments to report to him within a month on how to allow Americans to send remittance payments to Cubans.U.S. officials said the administration was working to find ways to permit remittances that would not benefit the Cuban government.Earlier Friday, the U.S. Treasury Department announced the latest sanctions on Cuba, saying they were a reaction to “actions to suppress peaceful, pro-democratic protests in Cuba that began on July 11.”Large demonstrationsThousands of Cubans took to the streets on that Sunday in the largest demonstrations against the Cuban government in decades. The demonstrators were protesting shortages of basic goods, power outages, restrictions on civil liberties and the government’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic.“The Treasury Department will continue to designate and call out by name those who facilitate the Cuban regime’s involvement in serious human rights abuse,” Andrea Gacki, director of the Office of Foreign Assets Control, said in a statement. “Today’s action serves to further hold accountable those responsible for suppressing the Cuban people’s calls for freedom and respect for human rights.”U.S. President Joe Biden meets with Cuban American leaders in the State Dining Room at the White House in Washington, July 30, 2021.The sanctions target the Cuban interior ministry’s national police force as well as the force’s director, Oscar Callejas Valcarce, and deputy director, Eddy Sierra Arias.Cuban American leaders have been urging the Biden administration to do more to support to the Cuban protesters.Among those who were at the meeting Friday with Biden were Yotuel Romero, one of the authors of “Patria y Vida,” a song that has become the anthem for the protesters. Also present were L. Felice Gorordo, the CEO of eMerge Americas; Ana Sofia Pelaez, the founder of the Miami Freedom Project; and former Miami Mayor Manny Diaz.Internet accessU.S. officials say the Biden administration is also looking into ways to provide internet access to the Cuban people. Internet service was cut off at one point during the July 11 protest.Last week, the Treasury Department announced sanctions on Cuba’s defense minister, Álvaro López Miera, and an interior ministry special forces unit.In addition to the sanctions imposed Friday, the Office of Foreign Assets Control continues to enforce the Cuba sanctions program, which is the most comprehensive sanctions program administered by the office, the office’s statement said.Some information for this report came from Reuters and The Associated Press.
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The Association of Journalists of El Salvador is warning about increased assaults on the press. For VOA, Claudia Zaldaña reports from San Salvador. 
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The protests that shook Cuba earlier this month started spontaneously and spread rapidly on social media, providing a clear demonstration of the challenges the new technologies pose to authoritarian governments.On July 11, that the midday calm was broken by the appearance of the first images showing hundreds of people demanding freedom, vaccines, medicines and food. In almost real time, they spread from profile to profile, on Facebook and Instagram.“There was a group of people, Cubans, gathered in a park in San Antonio de los Baños, everything was very confusing,” says Norges Rodríguez, co-founder of the YucaByte project, which works to promote the development of information-sharing technologies in Cuba.Rodríguez tells VOA that he quickly began to share the videos with his more than 15,000 followers.Within hours, journalists José Ignacio Martínez and Daniel González Oliva – collaborators in the creation of the Diario de Cuba digital portal – had sent VOA videos of some of the demonstrations, which had quickly spread to the streets of Havana.Sorry, but your browser cannot support embedded video of this type, you can
download this video to view it offline.Download File360p | 4 MB480p | 6 MB540p | 8 MB720p | 23 MB1080p | 36 MBOriginal | 63 MB Embed” />Copy Download AudioVideo of anti-government protestors in San Antonio de los Baños (José Ignacio Martínez / Daniel González Oliva “Diario de Cuba”) 
Videos began to emerge of other protests: one in Arroyo Naranjo, a municipality in the Southern part of Havana;Sorry, but your browser cannot support embedded video of this type, you can
download this video to view it offline.Download File360p | 2 MB480p | 2 MB540p | 3 MB720p | 9 MB1080p | 13 MBOriginal | 25 MB Embed” />Copy Download AudioProtestor on foot and on motor scooters protesting in Arroyo Naranja, a southern Municipality of Havana. (José Ignacio Martínez / Daniel González Oliva “Diario de Cuba”) 
and another from Central Havana.   Sorry, but your browser cannot support embedded video of this type, you can
download this video to view it offline.Download File360p | 4 MB480p | 5 MB540p | 8 MB720p | 22 MB720p | 34 MBOriginal | 33 MB Embed” />Copy Download AudioMasked demonstrators in Central Havana protesting poor economic conditions and the government’s slow response to the COVID Crisis. (José Ignacio Martínez / Daniel González Oliva “Diario de Cuba”)Those videos and others like them went viral, prompting the Cuban government to cut internet access a day after the protests began.The official version of events broadcast in Cuba showed the arrival of President Miguel Díaz-Canel to San Antonio de los Baños in Artemias province. The president called the protesters “confused,” blamed the worsening of the crisis on the U.S. government embargo, and said discordant voices had no place in the state media.Some of the online profiles of people who initially uploaded video from the protests have disappeared, says Rodríguez. The original video with the first Facebook Live from San Antonio is no longer on social media. He says he is unable to find some of the first videos that were published by Yoan de la Cruz and Samantha Regalado.Sources contacted by VOA report there is pressure from Cuban authorities to remove any mention of support for the protesters from social media platforms, and some pressure to persuade residents’ relatives abroad to do the same.”There was something contained in the Cubans after so many years of deprivation, of all kinds: economic and also freedom in general, and that day it exploded,” says Rodríguez. “It came at a time when the country has one of the most critical situations, probably in its most recent history.”A challenge and an alternativeSeven years after it was founded, the independent newspaper 14ymedio saw the opportunity to cover an unprecedented event in the history of Cuba – a massive protest that ran from one end of the island to the other.Yoani Sánchez, author of the Generación Y blog and today’s news director of 14ymedio, told VOA that the hashtag #11J popped up on Twitter and was “… a mixture of informative enthusiasm, adrenaline, but also with many difficulties and pressure.”As the Internet outages spread, the unauthorized journalists trying to report what they were seeing began turning to older technologies, by dictating over phone lines and transcribing what they were learning about protests, complaints and arrests.Sánchez says his reporters are feeling the heat from the Cuban government. Luz Escobar, one of his regular reporters, has been under police siege for two weeks, Sánchez told VOA. She says state security forces surround the vicinity of her home and do not allow her to go out.Right now, Sánchez says, “police operations continue, where, for example, taking a photo or a small video in the streets can get you a fine, an arrest and even a physical attack against our reporters.”Citizen reportersThe Cuban entrepreneur Saily González, or Saily de Amarillo as she is known to some, is the owner of the Amarillo B&B hostel in Santa Clara. Since the protests began, she has published daily videos on her social media discussing the Cuban situation and inviting her followers to debate.“Seeing that San Antonio de los Baños was on the street was one of the most exciting moments of my life,” recalls González. That Sunday, she exchanged messages with her employees and friends on WhatsApp and Telegram encouraging them to join the protests.She tells VOA that she has received numerous messages of support. In the week after the protests started, she gained more than 2,000 followers on her Instagram account, she said with some amazement.She does not trust the official media, controlled by the Communist Party of Cuba, and says many Cubans agree with her. “Cuba is not blind. We have access to all the true information,” she says, referring to independent Cuban news outlets, such as El Toque, 14yMedio and Periodismo de Barrio.For the work team at the independent publication El Toque, the days after #11J marked “a complicated moment in time.” The first week was spent “trying to make sense of it and understand the magnitude,” explains its director, José Jasan Nieves.One of his efforts was “to maintain the narrative of the importance, the scope, the legitimacy of these protests, countering a government narrative that wants to minimize them, label them as vandalism and downplay their importance and value,” he told VOA.Official reactionsBoth the official media and senior state officials, including the president, have described the protests as riots and many of the protesters as “confused revolutionaries.”But in an unusual move, the president did offer some self-criticism. For the first time, he acknowledged the shortcomings in the country, the neglect of vulnerable sectors and the lack of opportunities for young people.Driven by the speed with which news spreads on social media, the independent media, citizen journalists and Internet users created a unique moment on July 11.Journalist Boris González Arenas, a Havana resident and contributor to the Diario de Cuba portal, told VOA that this moment has allowed the independent press to be seen as “a magnificently organized phenomenon in Cuba” and one which “has had the ability to reflect what is happening, which is very big.”For Arenas, this opportunity showed that there is a population that has “accepted the challenge of making themselves visible by reflecting what was happening.” 
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Canada’s decision to reopen its borders to international visitors is encouraging tourism operators in tiny Prince Edward Island, who are hoping the Asian visitors who have become a mainstay of the province’s economy will soon be back.
Best known in Asia as the setting for the “Anne of Green Gables” novels, this province in Atlantic Canada has long been a magnet for visitors — especially from Japan and more recently China — who come to visit the house where the century-old children’s stories are set.A Charlottetown street is of interest to a couple looking at the crowded bar patios. (Jay Heisler/VOA)But travel restrictions imposed by the federal government last year in response to the coronavirus pandemic brought all of that screeching to a halt, reducing overall visits to the island by 70% compared with pre-pandemic levels, according to provincial officials.Prospects brightened this month when Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced that fully vaccinated Americans would be able to enter Canada for nonessential travel beginning on August 9, and that visitors from other countries would be admitted as of September 7.The downtown Charlottetown waterfront on a normal Sunday. (Jay Heisler/VOA)That is good news to George Campbell, who operates a museum in the real-life house where author L.M. Montgomery set the early 20th-century stories that have more recently been made into a movie and a Netflix series. Fans of “Green Gables” from China are an important part of his clientele.
“We are eager to have Chinese tourists visit our province and my museum,” Campbell told VOA ahead of a reporter’s visit to the white clapboard house with its iconic green gables. “It is wonderful that they will travel so far to come and visit.”An authentic Chinese hotpot at Noodle House in Charlottetown. (Jay Heisler/VOA)
While it was Green Gables that put Prince Edward Island on the map for many Asians, enterprising islanders have been quick to offer the visitors other ways to spend their money.
According to the federally funded Canadian Broadcasting Corp., bus tours have been established that cater to Chinese tourists, and golf courses have begun offering Motion Pay, a payment system favored by many Chinese.
Wang Shoutao, a spokesperson for the Chinese Embassy in Ottawa, told VOA that visitors from his country have been attracted to other parts of Canada as well.
“In recent years, tourism exchanges between China and Canada have been developing, and Canada has become a very important destination for Chinese tourists,” he said without addressing recent friction between the two countries over the detention of two Canadian citizens in China.Latin American soft drinks in a corner store that caters to migrant labor flown in to work the fields during the pandemic. (Jay Heisler/VOA)
A formal statement provided by Wang said, “Friendship between the peoples holds the key to sound state-to-state relations, and heart-to-heart communication contributes to deeper friendship.”
For Prince Edward Island, the personal connections forged by tourism have led to more permanent links. Until it was supplanted by India in 2017, China had been the largest source of new immigrants settling in the province for a decade.The National Post newspaper reports that 2,400 Chinese newcomers arrived in 2006-09, making a visible impact in a province of 160,000 people whose main industries are tourism, potato farming and fishing.
The province, located at the mouth of the St. Lawrence River, is also looking for new business opportunities with China, according to Peter McKenna, a professor at the University of Prince Edward Island (UPEI).
“I would say that the province is interested in examining possibilities and the potential for greater linkages with China,” McKenna told VOA. “One of those areas would be in the fishing or the seafood sector. I think there are opportunities there for companies in PEI and Atlantic Canada in general to develop a market in China.”Locals enjoy the view along the Charlottetown waterfront. (Jay Heisler/VOA)Jeffrey Collins, another UPEI professor who works on trade policy for the provincial government, agreed that trade with China is important to the island but said it is still far overshadowed by the exchange of goods and services with the United States.
“PEI’s export growth to China, as impressive as it has been in recent years, is very much based on a handful of products, chiefly lobster,” he said. While that trade remains “robust despite larger geopolitical tensions,” he noted, “key limitations are in transportation access and need to develop deep business cultural ties with Chinese buyers/consumers.”
While the Asian influx has been a boost to the island’s economy, not everyone in the province’s tightly knit community has been happy to see the growing numbers of what are often described by longtime Atlantic Canadians as the “come-from-away.”“If anyone in PEI tells you that there is no racism, they’re lying or not aware of what’s going around,” said Satyajit Sen, a policy adviser at the Federation of Prince Edward Island Municipalities. “It exists and you can sense it, especially during the COVID times.”
 Popular PEI musical group Vishten plays with family as an afterparty to the Route 11 music festival in PEI, which has largely been spared by the pandemic. (Jay Heisler/VOA)Sen, who spoke to VOA in a Vietnamese-run coffee shop, said the island’s enviable standard of living, which he also enjoys, cuts both ways when it comes to the small-town mindset.
“It could be a sense of insularity, a sense of island-ness, which is largely a positive, but which can also be a negative if people come from away, which is not a good term to be honest with you.”Anxiety about outsiders has been heightened during the pandemic, which has infected relatively few people here. Sen said this has led to people vandalizing cars with license plates from outside Prince Edward Island.
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Alan Reyes Picado fled Nicaragua by bus in the middle of the night, haunted by memories of government officials harassing him, throwing him in jail and then leaving him half naked in a dumpster.After crossing the Mexican-U.S. border in February and being detained for two months, the 20-year-old immigrant lives in San Francisco and hopes to receive a work permit soon.”I lived in fear and decided to seek help in this country,” said Reyes Picado, who left his partner and an 8-month-old baby in his home country.Reyes Picado is one of the thousands of Nicaraguans the U.S. government has encountered at the border in recent months. Customs and Border Protection data shows a big jump in arrivals from the Central American country, which is the focus of international criticism over arbitrary arrests and the restriction of fundamental rights.U.S. authorities stopped Nicaraguans 7,425 times in June compared to 534 times in January. So far in the fiscal year that began Oct. 1, U.S. officials have stopped Nicaraguans more than 19,300 times at the southern border. That’s the highest number of encounters registered in recent years, surpassing record figures from fiscal year 2019, when authorities stopped Nicaraguans more than 13,000 times.At that moment, Nicaragua was immersed in a political crisis after the government announced a plan to cut social security benefits. Widespread protests caused the government to back down, but demonstrations grew into a movement demanding that President Daniel Ortega step down after more than a decade in power. At least 328 people died during repression of the demonstrations, said the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights.Now, Ortega is seeking a fourth consecutive term as president in elections in November and has been systematically clearing his path of potential challengers through arrests for alleged crimes against the state.According to the rights commission, more than 20 people have been detained, including presidential candidates Cristina Chamorro, Arturo Cruz, Félix Maradiaga, Juan Sebastián Chamorro, Miguel Mora, Medardo Mairena and Noel Vidaurre.Ortega’s government did not respond to requests for comment from The Associated Press.Hundreds of thousands of migrants from other countries have also arrived at the U.S. border this year, as the new administration of President Joe Biden has eased some restrictions on immigration imposed under former President Donald Trump.Other nationalities have also shown large increases, including Ecuadorians and Venezuelans. In June, more than one of four people stopped by CBP were from countries other than Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador.Nicaraguans have usually been a small number of the Central Americans trying to migrate to the U.S. However, Nicaragua’s government migration offices are now full of people trying to obtain passports, a scenario that also occurred during the 2018 crisis.Managua’s Roman Catholic Archdiocese has noticed the exodus.”It is with sadness that we see again the migration of Nicaraguans, mostly young people fleeing because of political persecution”, the Archdiocese said recently.Reyes Picado, the 20-year-old who recently fled Nicaragua, participated in the 2018 protests with his brother. Recently, he said in a telephone interview, local officials in Tipitapa, a city in western Nicaragua, would show up at the family’s truck depot asking to use the six trucks the family had. He said the government wanted the trucks to move its supporters around.Reyes Picado’s family said no to the request and that’s how their problems started, he said.”They would look for me at home; we couldn’t live in peace,” he said. “They would threaten us because we did not want to join them; they told us they would kill us, they would kidnap us.”White House officials did not respond to a request for comment by The Associated Press regarding the increase in arrivals of Nicaraguans. U.S. Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia, chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Western Hemisphere Subcommittee, told the AP that the arrests of political rivals in Nicaragua and violence against the opposition “must be stopped”.”These actions are destabilizing Nicaragua and forcing Nicaraguans who are fearful for their lives to flee their country,” he said.Anita Wells, an activist who helps fellow Nicaraguans on their way to the U.S. and recent arrivals, said she is “overwhelmed” with work.”We have tons of people, of young men, in detention centers. Some are hurt, some are former political prisoners, and still, some of them are not allowed in (the U.S.),” she said from her home in Virginia.Wells is one of the founders of Abuelas Unidas por Nicaragua (Grandmothers United for Nicaragua), a group that raises and sends money to Nicaraguans in need. She is also one of the founders of the Nicaraguan American Human Rights Alliance, which has increasing work because it assists with asylum applications and tries to avoid the expulsion of Nicaraguans at the border.Like Reyes Picado, José Olivera also fled Nicaragua, leaving behind a wife and two children.A sales executive in an appliances company based in the north of Nicaragua, Olivera took buses and walked towards the U.S. border in May after being fired for not accepting an ID card indicating support for the official political party, the Frente Sandinista.Government officials would knock on his door insisting he accept the card, and soon the threats started, he said.”I never accepted the offer of being one of their supporters,” said the 38-year-old from his small apartment in Miami. “Honestly I’m scared, they would have killed me.”He fled to Honduras and then Guatemala by bus. Afterwards he walked, following train tracks until blisters hurt his feet. In Mexico, he said he was kidnapped by drug traffickers. Relatives put together $6,500 and Olivera was released three days after, he said.He crossed the border in June and told Customs and Border Protection officials he wanted to ask for asylum. After being in a detention center for two days, he was released with an ankle bracelet.The number of Nicaraguans entering the U.S. legally also is increasing: It went from 3,692 in January to 7,375 in June, according to CBP data. Immigration attorneys and activists say that many of those Nicaraguans decide later whether to ask for asylum in the U.S. or return home before their visa expires.Nicaraguan asylum-seekers seem to fare well in U.S. immigration courts compared to people from neighboring countries. The grant rate for Nicaraguan asylum-seekers was 36% in the 12-month period that ended Sept. 30, compared to 26% for all nationalities, 17% for El Salvadorans, 13% for Guatemalans, 12% for Mexicans and 11% for Hondurans, according to Syracuse University’s Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse.Reyes Picado dreams of being among these lucky ones.His brother, who also participated in the student protests and was kidnapped by paramilitary groups in the 2018 upheaval, won asylum in the U.S.For Reyes Picado, life in Nicaragua meant moving in with his aunt to avoid putting his immediate family in danger.In December 2020, a paramilitary group, their faces covered in black ski masks, took Reyes Picado and handed him over to police. He was detained for three days, he said. He then was handcuffed, sprayed with gas in the eyes and left half naked in a dumpster in a rural area.”I feel better now because I know I can be safe,” he said. “I miss my family but I know they will be here with me one day.”
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Weeks after the discovery of more than 1,000 probable unmarked graves at now-closed schools for indigenous people, leaders of Canada’s First Nations are torn over whether to press for further forensic investigation and the repatriation of remains, or to let the sites be preserved undisturbed.Indigenous communities have had two months to absorb the shock since the discovery of what appear to be hundreds of unmarked student graves near the former Kamloops Indian Residential School was announced in May.   Scientists used ground penetrating radar to explore the site on the Tk’emlups te Secwépemc First Nation’s traditional territory in the western province of British Columbia, where the closed school building still sits. They found 200 anomalies that remain “targets of interest” and probable burials under a present day apple orchard. Using similar detection methods, hundreds of other probable unmarked graves of students have since been found on property of other closed residential schools across Canada, bringing the total to about 1,300.   Indigenous residential schools were paid by the Canadian government and run by various Christian churches starting in 1828. The last one closed in 1996. For most of their existence, Native children were taken by force from their families and placed into these institutions to be assimilated into Western culture. Reports abound that sexual, physical and verbal abuse were common.A suspected grave site cannot be confirmed until it is excavated, and some First Nation leaders are demanding a thorough investigation of the sites and an effort to repatriate the remains.FILE – Tk’emlups te Secwepemc Chief Rosanne Casimir speaks ahead of the release of findings on 215 unmarked graves discovered at Kamloops Indian Residential School in Kamloops, British Columbia, Canada, July 15, 2021.Tk’emlups te Secwépemc Chief Rosanne Casimir is calling the site in Kamloops a crime scene and says what happens next has to be done carefully and in consultation with the community and survivors.”We do know that our membership has been grappling with the information that has been shared. And we do know that every step that we do take moving forward, we’re going to be having the community consultation with our membership,” she said during a press conference in Kamloops. But many of the survivors, like Evelyn Camille, want the sites to be left undisturbed.”Yes, they may have to be some studies to be done,” she said at the same press conference. “What good are those studies going to do for us, for an individual, for me? It’s good to tell me that yes, they were murdered. Is that going to make me feel better? I don’t think so.  Those remains should be left undisturbed.”  FILE – Residential school survivor Evelyn Camille speaks at a presentation of the findings on 215 unmarked graves discovered at Kamloops Indian Residential School in Kamloops, British Columbia, Canada, July 15, 2021.Other Canadians are telling pollsters they are shocked by the revelations and want to see something done to acknowledge the mistreatment of indigenous children. A survey by Toronto-based Ipsos Public Affairs found that 77 percent of the public thinks there should be a national day of remembrance for the victims.”It’s about people who were truly victims, in this instance, and Canadians do have a lot of sympathy for what happened here,” Ipsos Public Affairs CEO Darrell Bricker told VOA. “They’re feeling badly about it, they want to see something done about it.”     The Kamloops Indian Residential School was one of the largest of the 139 that existed across Canada.It is expected that many more potential unmarked graves around other schools are yet to be discovered.  
 
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Haitians displaced by gang incursions into swaths of the capital now live on the sharpest edge of insecurity in the Caribbean country, which is reeling from the assassination of President Jovenel Moise earlier this month. Officials say thousands of people have lost their homes to encroachment by violent gangs into central and southern parts of the city, where urban sprawl envelops more than 2.5 million people.   “I’ve got no future in this country as a young man. I’m in an unstable situation, I can’t build a home, the situation is really critical,” said one youth, staying at a shelter in the Delmas 5 neighborhood of Port-au-Prince. Like others who spoke to Reuters at the center, which gives refuge to about 1,800 people, he declined to give his name for fear of reprisals from gangs. Gang violence in Haiti, the poorest nation in the Americas, increasingly marred Moise’s rule before he was shot dead in his official residence on July 7. The government says the attack was carried out by a group of largely Colombian mercenaries, though many questions about who was behind his killing remain. Ariel Henry was formally appointed as prime minister of Haiti last week, calling for unity, stability, and international support. But the gangs are powerful and security institutions are weak. Georges Michel, a Haitian historian, said the gangs can muster a firepower superior to official security forces and are highly mobile, used to deploying guerrillalike tactics to prey on the population and do battle with rival outfits.   “I hope that (the government) finds a way to destroy them because they create terror in all the neighborhood,” he said. Gangs have threatened to occupy the streets to protest the assassination of Moise. One of the most prominent bosses, Jimmy Cherizier, a former cop known as Barbecue, on Monday led hundreds of followers to a commemoration of the dead president.   “We never knew this situation before,” said another youth at the shelter. “This stems from the political crisis.” 
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Some Haitian officials are expressing doubt and criticism about U.S. Special Envoy Daniel Foote’s mission in Haiti after he had meetings over the weekend with National Police Chief Leon Charles and Senate President Joseph Lambert.  “(This is just) one more American official. But to do what?” Senator Patrice Dumont, one of 10 Haitian senators whose parliament terms have not expired, told VOA. “Haiti is an adult and should resolve its own problems.”  FILE – Haitian Senator Patrice Dumont gestures during an interview with Reuters in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, July 15, 2021.Asked by VOA if Haiti should accept American assistance in resolving its political crisis, Dumont responded, “Absolutely not.”  A State Department statement emailed to VOA said Foote will lead “U.S. diplomatic efforts and coordinate the effort of U.S. federal agencies in Haiti from Washington, advise the secretary and acting assistant secretary for the Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs, and coordinate closely with the National Security Council staff on the administration’s efforts to support the Haitian people and Haiti’s democratic institutions in the aftermath of the tragic assassination of (President) Jovenel Moise.”  On Saturday, the national police posted three photos on its official Twitter account showing Charles meeting with Foote, U.S. Ambassador Michele Sison and a police official.  The message did not provide any details about what was discussed during the meeting. It said only that it was in response to a request for assistance made by former Prime Minister Claude Joseph shortly after Moise’s assassination.? Suite à la demande de l’ex- Premier Ministre, Claude Joseph, peu après l’assassinat du Président Jovenel Moïse; pour qu’Haïti bénéficie du support des nations unies, l’ambassadeur Daniel FOOTE envoyé spécial pour Haïti, l’Ambassadeur des États-Unis, Michele J. SISON, (1/4) pic.twitter.com/uAlpoE9CWv— PNH (@pnh_officiel) July 24, 2021Lambert also posted on Twitter a photo of his meeting on Sunday with Foote and Sison.”I was invited by Ambassadors Sison and Foote. Our conversation was intense. Our exchanges took into consideration Haiti’s situation, which is currently at an impasse, as well as the urgent need to restore the country’s institutions,” Lambert tweeted.  J’ai été l’invité des ambassadeurs Sison et Foote. Notre conversation a été intense. Nos échanges ont considéré la situation d’Haïti qui est dans l’impasse et l’urgence des actions qui doivent être bonnes pour refaire les institutions de l’État. pic.twitter.com/A6ZvU8XUgn— Sénateur Joseph Lambert (@josephlambertHT) July 25, 2021Foote is a Foreign Service officer whose experience as a diplomat includes serving twice as the deputy chief of mission at the U.S. Embassy in Port-au-Prince. He also served as U.S. ambassador to Zambia during the Trump administration.  The envoy arrived in Haiti on Friday with a delegation of American officials named by President Joe Biden to represent the United States at the national funeral of Moise. The delegation was evacuated from Haiti after gunfire erupted and angry protesters approached a private compound serving as the site of the funeral.  Pastor Edouard Paultre, who heads the civil society organization National Council of Non-State Actors, said Foote should follow the will of the Haitian people.  “This is a period of extreme distress for our nation, as well as institutional bankruptcy. None of our institutions are able to function properly. It’s in this context that Daniel Foote is arriving in Haiti. But he is also arriving at a time when civil society is collaborating with other sectors of Haiti to search for a solution to the crisis,” Paultre told VOA. “I don’t know what he’s looking for, but he should not be making any unilateral decisions.”  The pastor said he thinks Foote should work with Haitians toward an “inter-Haitian” consensus.  Foote has not yet commented on his meetings with Haitian officials. But two U.S. representatives who traveled with him from Washington to Haiti for the funeral on Friday issued statements about their brief time in the country.  New York Democrat Gregory Meeks, chair of the House Foreign Relations Committee, said the U.S. wants to support the Haitian people as they work toward security and a stable government.  “Now is the time for the international community to listen to the voices of the Haitian people and stand shoulder to shoulder with them as they navigate these turbulent times, helping bring about a better future for all of Haiti,” Meeks said in a statement emailed to VOA.  U.S. Representative Jeff Fortenberry, a Nebraska Republican, posted a video message on Twitter that he had recorded on the tarmac at the Cap-Haitien airport. He expressed regret about having to leave so abruptly.  Today I traveled as a part of a Presidential Delegation to attend the funeral of Haitian President Moise. Unfortunately, after nearby gunshots, we had to quickly evacuate. Here’s a short video from #Haiti: pic.twitter.com/UD0X2PEhC4— Jeff Fortenberry (@JeffFortenberry) July 23, 2021″I regret that, because it’s a bit undignified, the way we had to leave,” Fortenberry said. “This is an important country, in proximity to America. It’s on our doorstep as we’ve tried to help significantly over the years, and we want to stand in solidarity with the Haitian people as they mourn and suffer.”  Fortenberry expressed hope that the tragedy of Moise’s assassination would lead to redevelopment and hope for Haiti’s people in the future.  Congressional correspondent Katherine Gypson contributed to this report.
 
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