International

Brazil’s Bolsonaro gets in spat with heckler

AFP

Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro got into an altercation Thursday with a social media personality who questioned and insulted him, grabbing the man by the shirt and arm after he called the leader a “bum.”

Video of the incident outside the presidential residence shows Bolsonaro clutching the heckler in an apparent attempt to grab his cell phone as the man filmed himself criticizing the far-right leader.

News site G1, which published the video, identified the man as Wilker Leao, a self-described lawyer, army corporal, politics junkie and military enthusiast with 127,000 followers on TikTok.

The incident happened outside the Alvorada Palace in Brasilia as a grinning Bolsonaro, looking casual in an untucked, short-sleeve blue shirt, greeted supporters who crowded around his waiting motorcade to take pictures with him.

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Filming with his phone, Leao approached the president and asked why he had entered an alliance with a corruption-stained group of parties known as the “Centrao” and signed legislation restricting plea bargains, often used in anti-graft investigations.

An unidentified person pulled Leao away and threw him to the ground. Undeterred, Leao approached again, calling the president — who had gotten in his car — a “coward,” “bum” and “the Centrao’s sweetheart.”

Bolsonaro then exited the car and appeared to make a grab at Leao’s phone.

“Come here, I want to talk to you,” the president said, first grabbing Leao by the front of his football jersey, then clutching his left arm with both hands.

The president’s security detail then intervened and escorted Leao away.

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Several minutes later, Bolsonaro allowed Leao to approach again — a line of bodyguards between them — and spoke briefly with him.

“I have to get things passed in Congress, right?” the president said, before returning to his car and leaving.

Neither Leao nor the president’s office immediately responded to requests for comment.

Bolsonaro, a 67-year-old ex-army captain, is running for reelection in October against leftist former president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva (2003-2010).

Leao, who regularly posts videos of himself asking hostile questions of both left- and right-wing supporters, said he was no fan of Lula’s Workers’ Party (PT), either, calling them “bums” too.

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International

One Dead, Three Injured in Shooting at Cree Nation in Saskatchewan

One person was killed and three others were injured in a shooting reported early Tuesday in the Big Island Lake Cree Nation, in the Canadian province of Saskatchewan, according to local media.

Police said they were alerted to the incident in a remote area located approximately 392 kilometers northwest of the city of Saskatoon. Authorities issued a dangerous persons alert for two suspects, who were described as armed.

Saskatchewan police urged residents to seek shelter immediately, lock their doors, and avoid the area while the situation remains under investigation. Officers are working to determine whether the shooting was a targeted attack or a random act of violence.

As a precautionary measure, seven health-care facilities in the surrounding area were placed under lockdown, Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe said in a post on X.

International

Mexico’s President Visits Victims After Train Derailment Kills 13 in Oaxaca

Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum visited on Monday the victims injured in a train accident that left 13 people dead in the southern state of Oaxaca and announced financial assistance for those affected by the derailment of the Interoceanic Train, which was inaugurated in 2023.

The train, carrying 241 passengers and nine crew members, derailed on Sunday while traveling along the Interoceanic Corridor, a major infrastructure project that connects the Pacific coast with the Gulf of Mexico across the Isthmus of Tehuantepec. The corridor was one of the flagship initiatives of former President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s administration (2018–2024).

Sheinbaum visited three hospitals in the neighboring towns of Tehuantepec and Salina Cruz, where around 20 injured passengers remain hospitalized. She also went to a funeral home to accompany the families of those who lost their lives in the accident.

According to Mexico’s Navy Secretary, Raymundo Morales, the accident occurred when one of the locomotives derailed, causing all four railcars to leave the tracks.

International

Six killed, including baby, in armed attack near tourist beach in Ecuador

Six people, including a baby girl about two years old, were killed on Sunday in an armed attack near a tourist beach in southwestern Ecuador, police said. The shooting, carried out with rifles, also left three people wounded.

The incident took place in the coastal town of Puerto López, in the province of Manabí, a popular tourist destination known for whale watching. The attack occurred amid a surge of violence over the weekend that left at least nine people dead nationwide, according to local media reports.

“There are six fatalities and three injured,” Colonel William Acurio, the local police commander, told reporters on Sunday. He confirmed that one of the victims was a baby “approximately two years old.”

Authorities have not released further details about the motive behind the attack or whether arrests have been made.