International
In Bolivia, miners sacrifice llamas to appease ‘Lord of the Underworld’
AFP
In a dimly lit mine shaft in Bolivia, a man sharpens two knives next to a table laden with offerings: wine, beer and coca leaves. Waiting nearby are five white llamas.
The woolly animals’ blood and hearts are the preferred food of El Tio (The Uncle), a horned deity Bolivian miners believe offers them protection deep in the bowels of the Earth.
Statues of El Tio — “Lord of the Underworld” — abound in mines, surrounded by offerings of alcohol and coca leaf, a stimulant the miners chew to get through the long, dark hours underground.
El Tio resembles the Christian devil, sporting fangs, goat’s ears and, nearly always, a burning cigarette placed in his mouth by believers.
Once a year, miners from the Oruro region, on the high planes of western Bolivia, gather to offer sacrifices to appease El Tio.
He is, they say, a wrathful god.
“We bring the offerings… so that we can sleep well at night, to not have accidents” in the workplace, miner Miguel Valdez, 33, told AFP at one such sacrificial ceremony on Friday.
“If we don’t give him this offering, many things can happen.”
– Bloody offering –
The miners also believe El Tio controls the abundance of silver, tin and zinc they extract for a living.
Valdez and hundreds of his colleagues looked on as the llamas, blindfolded and their coats decorated with pink ribbons, were pushed into the mine on a trolley to be slaughtered.
To the tune of trumpets, drums and cymbals they danced, sipping from bottles of beer and occasionally splashing some on the ground for the “Earth Mother.”
Luciano Alejo, a yatiri, or Andean healer, wielded his knives as miners crouched at the ready with bowls to be filled with llama blood, which some then smeared on their faces.
The hearts — still beating — were cut out and placed in larger containers.
A chosen few in the crowd then brought the filled vessels to the lower levels of the mine, to place them before El Tio. With a burning cigarette dangling from his sinister grin, he was dressed in colorful woollen garments and miners’ boots.
After the animal sacrifice, the miners set fire to the other offerings they had gathered on large tables, then made a rapid exit as the shaft quickly filled with smoke.
The ritual is performed once a year, in February or March, on the eve of the street parade of the Oruro carnival. One of Bolivia’s biggest festivals, it is listed by UNESCO as an “intangible cultural heritage.”
The carnival resumed this year after being skipped in 2021 due to the coronavirus epidemic.
International
Colombian president Petro requests extradition of smuggling kingpin from Portugal
Colombian President Gustavo Petro formally requested Portugal on Friday to extradite Diego Marín, known as ‘Papa Smurf’ or ‘Pitufo’, who is considered Colombia’s biggest smuggling kingpin.
Marín was arrested last December in northern Portugal after fleeing from Spain.
“I hope Portugal extradites the largest smuggler in Colombia’s contemporary history. Large-scale smuggling is nothing more than money laundering for major drug traffickers,” Petro stated on his X account.
According to Petro, “Diego Marín deeply infiltrated government institutions to sustain his destruction of national industry and facilitate money laundering through smuggling.”
International
Cuban president Díaz-Canel condemns U.S. actions as a threat to global peace
Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel stated on Friday that the aggressive actions of the United States pose a threat to international peace and criticized its recent decisions to use the Guantánamo Naval Base (in eastern Cuba) to detain 30,000 undocumented migrants and to relist the island as a state sponsor of terrorism.
“We will not remain silent in the face of such infamy, nor will we lose hope in humanity’s progress,” said the Cuban leader during the closing session of the 6th International Conference for the Balance of the World, held in Havanaand dedicated to Cuba’s national hero, José Martí (1853-1895).
Díaz-Canel pointed out that “the dominant political forces embrace fascist ideologies that humanity has sought to eradicate since the last century. These trends are a product of capitalism.”
Two days ago, following U.S. President Donald Trump’s announcement that he would send 30,000 undocumented migrants to the Guantánamo base, Díaz-Canel condemned the decision as an “act of brutality” and emphasized that the military facility is “located on illegally occupied Cuban territory.”
International
Trump: “I won’t allow the stupidity of buying venezuelan oil again”
U.S. President Donald Trump declared on Friday that he would not allow the purchase of oil from Venezuela, as his predecessor Joe Biden did when he lifted a series of sanctions.
“Biden went and bought millions of barrels of oil. I’m not going to allow something that stupid to happen again,” Trump said in remarks to the media in the Oval Office.
The president was asked about the visit of his special envoy, Richard Grenell, to meet with Nicolás Maduro at the Miraflores Palace in Caracas on Friday.
“He (Grenell) is meeting with a lot of different people,” Trump responded.
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