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Colombian nun kidnapped in Mali returns home

AFP

A Colombian nun who was kidnapped and held by jihadists in Mali for more than four years returned to her home country on Tuesday.

“Welcome, welcome, our heart welcomes you,” sang a dozen nuns waiting for her at the airport in Bogota, while Sister Gloria Cecilia Narvaez hugged each one of them.

The 59-year-old nun was taken hostage on February 7, 2017 in southern Mali near the border with Burkina Faso, where she had been working as a missionary.

“The Lord gave me the joy of having brothers and sisters,” said the nun, who was freed on October 9.  “I thank you with all my heart.”  

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“Your strength amazes me,” said Colonel Gustavo Camargo, deputy director of the anti-kidnapping police who had gone to Mali to press for her release. 

Returning to her homeland, which was itself plagued by kidnappings in a conflict that lasted more than half a century, Narvaez spoke out for victims of abduction. 

“I was thinking of all the suffering that people go through when they are kidnapped right here in Colombia, in the whole world, there in Mali, how many people are left,” said the nun, whose mother died in September 2020 while awaiting the release of her daughter.

Kidnappings are common in Mali, mired in unrest of its own, and especially in the center of the country, a hotbed of jihadist violence. 

Since March 2012, several areas have been in the hands of groups linked to Al-Qaeda. 

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Before returning to Colombia, the nun visited Pope Francis at the Vatican.

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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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