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Pregnant teen receives ultrasound on stage at Mexico anti-abortion rally

AFP

A pregnant 15-year-old girl underwent an ultrasound on stage during an anti-abortion rights protest in Mexico City Sunday, where some 10,000 demonstrators prayed and shouted slogans amid the spectacle.

The March for Women and Life, which wound from the Paseo de la Reforma to a rally in front of the city’s iconic Angel of Independence monument, was made up mainly of Catholic groups pushing back after last month’s Supreme Court ruling that would decriminalize abortion in Mexico. 

“The government … is elevating the right to abortion as a right to kill,” 56-year-old protester Alma Bello told AFP. “It worries us a lot, because it is not the feeling of a majority of Mexicans.”

A stretcher was rolled out onto the rally stage for gynecologist Fernando Urquiza to perform an ultrasound on 15-year-old Ana, who is 38 weeks pregnant. 

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Images of the inside of the teenager’s uterus were broadcast on huge screens on either side of the stage, accompanied by cheers and applause from the crowd. 

“All good to go, ready to be born,” pronounced the doctor, who said he was “very excited” to be part of the display. 

When asked how she was feeling during the exam, Ana replied only that she was “fine.”

Meanwhile, a rally announcer told Ana the event was “the biggest baby shower I have ever seen.”

Alison Gonzalez, a Catholic activist and head of Steps for Life, the group that organized the march, said the gathering was not meant as a response to any particular event — such as the Supreme Court ruling — but rather as a show of “national support for women.”

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“We need policies that reconcile the professional with the maternal, that make sure we can return home safely, that help us move forward in the face of an unwanted pregnancy,” 26-year-old Gonzalez told AFP. 

“Legal or illegal, abortion must be out of the question, because women deserve so much more,” she said.

In a highly orchestrated move, groups arrived in buses from far-flung cities such as Morelos in central Mexico and Jalisco in the west — attendees all carrying hundreds of banners, scarves and signs in the signature light blue color of the international “pro-life” movement. 

Some factions prayed Hail Marys together, while others shouted chants such as “Legal or illegal, abortion still kills!”

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International

Trump urges Putin to reach peace deal

On Monday, U.S. President Donald Trump reiterated his desire for Russian President Vladimir Putin to “reach a deal” to end the war in Ukraine, while also reaffirming his willingness to impose sanctions on Russia.

“I want to see him reach an agreement to prevent Russian, Ukrainian, and other people from dying,” Trump stated during a press conference in the Oval Office at the White House.

“I think he will. I don’t want to have to impose secondary tariffs on Russian oil,” the Republican leader added, recalling that he had already taken similar measures against Venezuela by sanctioning buyers of the South American country’s crude oil.

Trump also reiterated his frustration over Ukraine’s resistance to an agreement that would allow the United States to exploit natural resources in the country—a condition he set in negotiations to end the war.

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International

Deportation flight lands in Venezuela; government denies criminal gang links

A flight carrying 175 Venezuelan migrants deported from the United States arrived in Caracas on Sunday. This marks the third group to return since repatriation flights resumed a week ago, and among them is an alleged member of a criminal organization, according to Venezuelan authorities.

Unlike previous flights operated by the Venezuelan state airline Conviasa, this time, an aircraft from the U.S. airline Eastern landed at Maiquetía Airport, on the outskirts of Caracas, shortly after 2:00 p.m. with the deportees.

Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello, who welcomed the returnees at the airport, stated that the 175 repatriated individuals were coming back “after being subjected, like all Venezuelans, to persecution” and dismissed claims that they belonged to the criminal organization El Tren de Aragua.

However, Cabello confirmed that “for the first time in these flights we have been carrying out, someone of significance wanted by Venezuelan justice has arrived, and he is not from El Tren de Aragua.” Instead, he belongs to a gang operating in the state of Trujillo. The minister did not disclose the individual’s identity or provide details on where he would be taken.

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International

Son of journalist José Rubén Zamora condemns father’s return to prison as “illegal”

Guatemalan court decides Wednesday whether to convict journalist José Rubén Zamora

The son of renowned journalist José Rubén Zamora Marroquín, José Carlos Zamora, has denounced as “illegal” the court order that sent his father back to a Guatemalan prison on March 3, after already spending 819 days behind barsover a highly irregular money laundering case.

“My father’s return to prison was based on an arbitrary and illegal ruling. It is also alarming that the judge who had granted him house arrest received threats,” José Carlos Zamora told EFE in an interview on Saturday.

The 67-year-old journalist was sent back to prison inside the Mariscal Zavala military barracks on March 3, when Judge Erick García upheld a Court of Appeals ruling that overturned the house arrest granted to him in October. Zamora had already spent 819 days in prison over an alleged money laundering case.

His son condemned the situation as “unacceptable”, stating that the judge handling the case “cannot do his job in accordance with the law due to threats against his life.”

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