International
Khan candidates outnumber rivals: Pakistan election recount
In a surprise twist, independent candidates backed by jailed former Prime Minister Imran Khan are leading the vote count in Pakistan’s general election.
With more than half of the results counted, those backed by Khan’s Party Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) have secured 54 of the 136 seats announced so far. This result has surprised, since Khan was excluded from the electoral contest and his party had to compete without his official symbols and identity.
Although no political force has a clear majority, the PTI has gained an early lead, defying pre-election expectations.
International
Trump appoints Stallone, Voight, and Gibson as special ambassadors to Hollywood
U.S. President-elect Donald Trump announced on Thursday the appointment of actors Sylvester Stallone (‘Rocky’) and Jon Voight (‘Midnight Cowboy’), as well as actor and director Mel Gibson (‘Braveheart’) as special ambassadors to the “very problematic” Hollywood.
“They will help me as special envoys to make Hollywood, which has lost many overseas businesses in the last four years, COME BACK BIGGER, BETTER, AND STRONGER THAN EVER,” he posted on his social media platform, Truth Social.
The Republican lamented all the “problems” he claims Hollywood faces and created this role with the aim of improving the situation from a business perspective.
“These three talented men will be my eyes and ears. I will do whatever they suggest,” he said.
Stallone had previously described Trump as the second George Washington, the first U.S. president (1789–1797) and one of the nation’s founding fathers, during a dinner after his victory in the November presidential elections, where he served as the master of ceremonies.
Meanwhile, Gibson attacked Trump’s rival, Vice President Kamala Harris, accusing her of having “the IQ of a fence.”
The Republican leader will be sworn in as president on January 20 on the steps of the U.S. Capitol, succeeding Democrat Joe Biden.
International
Latin American and Caribbean diplomats voice concern over U.S. mass deportation plan
Diplomatic chiefs from ten Latin American and Caribbean countries expressed their “serious concern” over the announcement of a mass deportation of migrants, a measure they consider incompatible with human rights, according to a joint statement released this Friday.
The statement, which does not attribute the measure to any specific country, refers to the announcement made by U.S. President-elect Donald Trump, who has promised to carry out the largest foreign deportation operation in the history of the nation once he takes office next Monday. “The announcements of mass deportations are a serious cause for concern, especially due to their incompatibility with the fundamental principles of human rights and their failure to effectively address the structural causes of migration,” the statement said, released by Mexico’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs (SRE).
The signing countries—Brazil, Belize, Colombia, Cuba, El Salvador, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Mexico, and Venezuela (almost all migrant-sending nations)—also committed to “defend the human rights of all migrants.”
This includes “rejecting the criminalization of migrants at all stages of the migration cycle” and “protecting them as a priority from transnational organized crime that profits from migration,” the document adds.
International
Noboa once again entrusts the Vice President of Ecuador to the vice president he appointed by decree
The President of Ecuador, Daniel Noboa, returned this Thursday to delegate – for the second time – the Presidency to the Secretary of Public Administration and Cabinet of the Presidency Cynthia Gellibert, whom he himself appointed by decree vice president in charge, in the face of the open confrontation he maintains with the vice president, Verónica Abad.
As he did last week, Noboa again issued a decree in which he announces that he is absent from the Presidency from Thursday to Sunday, to make an electoral campaign in search of his re-election in the elections of February 9, and during that period of time it will be Gellibert who will be in charge of the head of the State.
This action of the president of Ecuador is a matter of evaluation by the ordinary and constitutional justice at the request of the vice president, Verónica Abad, who claims to assume the presidential functions during the full period of the electoral campaign, in which according to the Constitution the head of state must ask for leave for being a candidate for re-election.
In his decree, Noboa argues that, although the Constitution determines that the Vice Presidency must assume the head of State in the event of the absence of the president, this “is not limited to the elected vice-president, but to the person who to date is exercising the functions of the Vice Presidency.”
Before appointing Gellibert as vice president in charge by decree, Noboa sent Abad to the Ecuadorian Embassy in Turkey, after a judge annulled the five-month suspension that the same Government had imposed on him. Until now, the vice president remains in Ecuador to claim to be the one who temporarily assumes the Presidency.
The new period of Gellibert with presidential powers began at 18:00 local time (23:00 GMT) this Thursday and is scheduled to end at 22:00 (03:00 GMT) next Sunday, time at which the debate between presidential candidates is expected to end where Noboa is summoned to participate.
After the debate, Noboa plans to travel to Washington to attend Donald Trump’s presidential inauguration, according to the Ecuadorian Presidency.
After the first assignment of the Presidency to Gellibert, Abad denounced a “coup d’état” and urged the Organization of American States (OAS) to apply the Democratic Charter, considering that the constitutional order had been broken because it had not received the presidential powers, as contemplated in the Ecuadorian Constitution.
In addition, he filed a protection action with which he seeks that the Justice annul the decrees in which Noboa appointed Gellibert as vice president in charge and delegated the Presidency to him. A court admitted the appeal on Friday, but did not accept some precautionary measures that Abad also asked for to suspend those effects immediately.
Controversies like this will be part of the analysis and evaluation of the electoral observation mission (EOM) of the European Union (EU) for the Ecuadorian elections, as anticipated on Wednesday by its leader, Spanish MEP Gabriel Mato.
The confrontation between Noboa and Abad began in the electoral campaign for the second round of elections for the extraordinary elections of 2023, and was reflected when he assumed the charges, when in one of his first decisions, the president sent the vice president to Israel as ambassador, with the mission of seeking peace between Israelis and Palestinians.
Abad has denounced Noboa for alleged political gender violence and has accused her of leading a harassment against her to force her to resign and thus avoid having to delegate the Presidency to her during the electoral campaign period, which runs from January 5 to February 6.
The titular vice president has also accused the Government of being behind the corruption investigation in the offices of the Vice Presidency that involves her son in a case where the Prosecutor’s Office also sought to indict Abad, but the National Assembly (Parliament) voted mostly against lifting the jurisdiction, although the ruling party voted in favor.
The general elections in Ecuador are called for Sunday, February 9 and, according to the polls published so far, Noboa and the candidate of the correismo Luisa González appear as prominent favorites to move on to the second round.
-
Central America4 days ago
President Arévalo highlights anti-corruption and drug trafficking efforts in first year report
-
Central America3 days ago
Venezuelan opposition leader to meet Costa Rican president Rodrigo Chaves on thursday
-
International2 days ago
The Government of Israel accuses Hamas of wanting to modify the truce agreement and postpones its vote
-
International4 days ago
ACLU prepares for “worst-case scenario” on immigration under incoming Trump administration
-
International2 days ago
An Australian influencer is accused of poisoning her baby to earn money
-
International2 days ago
Russia attacks Kiev in the middle of British Prime Minister Starmer’s visit
-
International4 days ago
HMPV infection rate declining in Northern China, health official reports
-
International4 days ago
Trump announces creation of external revenue service to collect foreign tariffs
-
International2 days ago
Far-right Israeli minister will leave the Netanyahu government if his country does not resume the war after the truce
-
International21 hours ago
Mark Carney announces his candidacy to replace Trudeau as Prime Minister of Canada
-
International22 hours ago
HRW assures that Sheinbaum “inherited a crisis” from López Obrador due to “extreme violence” in Mexico
-
International21 hours ago
Musk’s Starship was lost after a smooth takeoff
-
International4 days ago
Elon Musk sends Cybertrucks with Starlink and supplies to assist Los Angeles wildfire victims
-
International21 hours ago
Noboa once again entrusts the Vice President of Ecuador to the vice president he appointed by decree
-
International21 hours ago
The Prosecutor’s Office asks Boluarte to hand over the documents that justify the surgery he kept hidden
-
International2 days ago
Pope Francis suffers a fall without fractures and his arm is immobilized as a precaution
-
International3 days ago
Canadian business leaders meet with president Sheinbaum to boost investments in Mexico
-
International3 days ago
Biden warns “Soul of America” still at stake ahead of farewell address
-
International2 days ago
Emotional support dogs help firefighters fighting fires in California
-
International22 hours ago
Antony Blinken assures that the Panamanian sovereignty of the Panama Canal “will not change”
-
International2 days ago
Indigenous peoples of Mexico help migrants stranded in the south far from the border
-
International22 hours ago
China, Israel and Burma, the countries in the world with the most journalists imprisoned in 2024
-
International3 days ago
Marco Rubio warns of China’s threat and criticizes Venezuela and Cuba in Senate hearing
-
International2 days ago
Russia and Iran will sign a strategic agreement three days before Trump’s inauguration
-
International22 hours ago
Edmundo González Urrutia’s team says that the anti-chavista will attend Trump’s investiture
-
International22 hours ago
At least five peace signatories and social leaders are killed in fighting in Colombia
-
International2 days ago
The ‘Supersopa’, created during the great crisis of 2002, returns to the canteens of Argentina
-
International2 days ago
French justice saves a domesticated boar threatened with euthanasia by the authorities
-
International2 days ago
Carlos Correa, director of the Venezuelan NGO Espacio Público, has been released from prison
-
International2 days ago
Separate negotiators and last-minute details, this is how the ceasefire in Gaza was negotiated
-
International22 hours ago
Foreign Affairs confirms the kidnapping of a Spaniard in North Africa by a jihadist group
-
International4 hours ago
Latin American and Caribbean diplomats voice concern over U.S. mass deportation plan
-
International4 hours ago
Trump appoints Stallone, Voight, and Gibson as special ambassadors to Hollywood