International
Petro opens an unexpected debate in Colombia with his proposal for a constituent assembly
An unexpected debate on the Constitution opened in Colombia with the proposal of President Gustavo Petro to convene a national constituent assembly in the face of the difficulty of getting Congress to approve its reforms.
This was recognized this Saturday by the president himself on the social network X where he referred to the proposal he presented on Friday in Cali (southwest), which has been criticized by politicians of all currents, including some who supported him in the presidential elections of 2022.
“The proposal of the Constituent Assembly will unleash a national debate. It’s good that it is so,” said the president when sharing the speech in which he made the controversial announcement, described as a “globe” of distraction by various sectors because Petro’s legislative and popular support is diminishing.
According to former left-wing senator Jorge Robledo, Petro’s idea of a constituent only seeks to distract “because he does not have enough votes to approve it in Congress or to approve it among the citizens.”
“That he mentions it, rather than proving his political strength in Colombia, what he demonstrates is his weakness,” Robledo said in X, and assured that Petro’s maneuver is a sign of “despair.”
On Friday, at an event in Puerto Resistencia, a sector of Cali that was the epicenter of the 2021 social protests, Petro argued that the constituent national assembly is necessary if the institutions that the country has “are not able to live up to the reforms” proposed by his Government and that are bogged down in Congress.
The protests were the starting point of the nonconformity that led Petro to win the 2022 elections and in them, the protesters, mostly young people, demanded profound social changes in the country, a flag that the current president took.
Petro’s statement has not been received by politicians, who consider it impertinent to change a Constitution that was promulgated in 1991 and in the drafting of which the demobilized of the M-19 guerrillas, of which the current president was a part, participated, among others.
Senator Humberto de la Calle, a member of the Esperanza Center Coalition and who was the only representative of the Executive in the National Constituent Assembly of 1991, described the president’s argument as “weak.”
“The cause that the president alleges to convene a constituent is the impossibility of complying with the Constitution, according to his own saying (…) If it were true, it is not the Constitution that must be changed but the way of governing,” the congressman added in a statement.
De la Calle recalled that to approve a constituent, a bill is required, which must go through a Congress in which Petro no longer has majorities, and “two calls to the people,” first to say if he wants a constitutional reform and, if so, to approve any changes.
The president was reminded on social networks of a campaign promise he made in 2018 when he allied himself with a faction of the Green Alliance party – led by the former mayors of Bogotá Antanas Mockus and Claudia López – not to convene a constituent.
In the photo, today’s president appears carrying a marble plaque in which he signed a decalogue of commitments in case he wins the elections, which he ended up losing with the Uribe Iván Duque.
The second point said: “I will not convene a constituent assembly.”
Claudia López, who was mayor of Bogotá between 2020 and 2023, said in X: “Gustavo Petro deceived Colombia, ended his incapable government, and decided to devote himself to chaos, the distribution of subsidies and polarization. Serenity and firmness Colombia. In democracy we will protect the Constitution of ’91, which was the result of a national and citizen agreement.”
“It does not have a majorities even to approve an ordinary Law, much less to convene a Constituent Assembly. He knows it, but he says it to sow chaos, division and polarization that are the tools with which he will maneuver the remaining period. Gustavo Petro doesn’t care about change, the people, the economy, security, or the country. The only thing that matters to him is to feed his vain megalomania,” he added.
Analyst León Valencia, director of the Peace & Reconciliation Foundation (Pares), assured that he understands “Petro’s frustration” because “social reforms, as necessary as they are urgent, do not advance” and “the resistance of the traditional elites is enormous.”
However, he considered that “perhaps the environment is not there to embark on a constituent process.”
“The best thing is to go to the presidential faculties to make the possible changes through decrees and directives and concentrate efforts on executing the approved development plan and advancing peace with the ELN (National Liberation Army),” Valencia added.
International
Indigenous candidate Leonidas Iza predicts a new social explosion if there is no change in Ecuador
The presidential candidate of Ecuador for the indigenous movement, Leonidas Iza, who was part of the wave of protests of 2019 and who led that of 2022, reveals himself as an “anti-system” politician in the face of “a corrupt system” that he intends to reformulate to relieve the impoverished, because he predicts a new social explosion if there is no change in the Government to meet popular demands.
Iza, 42, is the candidate of Pachakutik, the political arm of the Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of Ecuador (Conaie) that he himself presides over, and with which he was at the forefront of the 2022 wave of protests against the government of conservative President Guillermo Lasso, where he was arrested and even labeled a “terrorist.”
“I am one of those who has never lost the ability to be outraged when governments have had policies against their own citizens,” Iza, a native of the Andean province of Cotopaxi, said in an interview with EFE.
“I am not against the private sector, I am against those who do not pay taxes and those who come to the Government only to defend their companies,” said the candidate in reference to the last two presidents (Lasso and Daniel Noboa).
“We fight for social justice, not to be violent. It is a reaction to the injustice to which we have been subjected,” he said.
For Iza, who represents the anti-extractivist left of Ecuador, the country has “a corrupt system, a health system that does not work, a deficient and unfair economic system, and public services that are not helping citizens.”
“And that’s what we want to change. We won’t be able to do it overnight, but the State can give relief to the people,” the candidate said.
To do this, it proposes to fight against tax evasion, which amounts to about 7.5 billion dollars a year, and also against corruption, which is estimated at about 3 billion dollars per year, to balance public accounts without having to follow the current credit program with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) that asks to cut public spending and raise taxes.
He also aimed to increase agricultural productivity, as well as boost tourism to go from 1 to 3 million visitors a year, and anticipated that he will regulate small and artisanal mining to avoid illegal mining but will not allow large-scale mining because it considers that it can contaminate the country’s large river basins.
Iza anticipated that he will not pay the external debt as long as there are “guaguas (children, in Kichwa) who have no education and are dying of hunger, and colleagues who are dying for lack of health.”
“We will tell the IMF and the other multilaterals that we are going to pay, but first we are going to solve the structural problem we have at the moment: education, health and minimum conditions for security,” he warned.
In that sense, Iza pointed out that “the strength of a popular reaction in the streets is accumulating” that must be resolved by whoever is elected. “Knowing my country, which has been on the streets all its life, there will be a popular reaction if (the discomfort) is not resolved in the following months,” he reiterated.
“The option that understands the people is us, and not the sectors that have always been in the Government,” said Iza, who avoided pointing out whether that reaction will reach the dimensions of the strong protests of 2019 and 2022, both led by the indigenous movement.
In this electoral campaign, Iza has left his distinctive Andean red poncho to put on the bulletproof vest in the face of the persistent wave of violence of organized crime that the country is experiencing, because he warned that the “war” that Noboa declared to the criminal gangs has not worked because its leaders are still free.
Faced with this, he promised “a hard hand for all” and recalled that “state institutions must suffocate everyone (criminals)”.
The candidate also advocated deepening international cooperation: “there must be a responsibility of all countries (producers, consumers and drug transit), especially in the region (of Latin America)”.
Asked if Ecuadorian society is ready to have an indigenous president of rural origin, Iza sees himself with popular support to face “the most reactionary sectors that have support in racism and stigmatization.”
International
Deaths in a hotel fire in a ski resort in Turkey rise to 69
The fire that occurred this morning in a 12-story hotel in a ski resort in northwestern Turkey claimed at least 69 deaths, in addition to causing fifty injuries, according to the latest assessment of the country’s authorities.
The fire originated around 3.30 a.m. local time (0.30 GMT) in a hotel, built entirely of wood, in the Kartalkaya ski center, halfway between Istanbul and Ankara, with almost full occupancy.
The flames were extinguished after about ten hours of firefighters’ work and the authorities found the death of 66 people, in addition to rescuing 51 injured, compared to the 10 dead and 32 injured initially estimated.
The hotel, with 161 rooms, had an occupancy close to 90%, because these days are the winter school holidays in Turkey, says the Turkish newspaper Hürriyet.
The wooden construction and the location of the hotel at the foot of a ski slope, which only allows vehicle access from the front facade, made the intervention of firefighters difficult, the Turkish newspaper explained.
According to the television network NTV, about 300 people, including employees, were in the hotel at the time of the fire, the causes of which are still unknown.
International
Hamas calls for counterattack on Israeli soldiers during their incursion in the West Bank
The Islamist organization Hamas urged the Palestinians on Tuesday to intensify and support their militiamen in the clashes against the Israeli Army during the military incursion that began today in Yenin, in the north of the occupied West Bank.
“We call on the masses of our people in the West Bank and their revolutionary youth to mobilize and intensify the clashes against the (Israeli) occupation army at all points, and to work to thwart the extensive Zionist aggression against the city of Yenin.”
“This military operation launched by the occupation in Yenin will fail, as did all its previous military operations against our brave people and their tenacious resistance,” the Palestinian group said.
Since the beginning of the operation, nicknamed by the Army “Iron Wall”, at least seven Palestinians have died in Yenin and another 35 have been injured, according to data from the Palestinian Ministry of Health.
Hamas accused the forces of the Palestinian National Authority (ANP), President Mahmoud Abbas’ ruling party in the West Bank, of having left Yenin to allow the operation of Israeli troops, instead of defending the Palestinians.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu defended on Tuesday that the last assault launched by his forces against Yenin, in the north of the occupied West Bank, seeks to “eradicate terrorism.”
“This is another step towards the objective we have set ourselves: to strengthen security in Judea and Samaria (West Bank),” according to a statement released by its Office.
“We are acting systematically and decisively against the Iranian axis wherever it sends its weapons: in Gaza, Lebanon, Syria, Yemen, Judea and Samaria (West Bank),” concludes the Israeli president’s note.
The rail comes shortly after the start of the ceasefire in Gaza, which includes a weekly exchange of hostages in the Strip for Palestinian prisoners in Israeli prisons.
Following the release of the prisoners, the Army increased its presence in this occupied territory with seven companies, claiming to strengthen its “anti-terrorist efforts.”
The images recorded in Yenin show dozens of Army vehicles accessing the local refugee camp, which has also been bombed by Israeli aviation.
The incursions and attacks of Israeli forces in Yenin, considered a bastion of Islamist-like militias, were already constant but they worsened after the Hamas attacks of October 7, 2023.
However, since mid-December it has been the security forces of the Palestinian National Authority (ANP), which governs small parts of the West Bank, that have led an offensive in this population, which until last Friday triggered armed fighting against the militiamen.
This exchange of fire has caused at least 15 people dead on both sides, including two minors.
The occupied West Bank is experiencing its greatest spiral of violence since the Second Intifada (2000-05), and in 2024 at least 491 Palestinians have died in the territory by Israeli fire, most of them militiamen from refugee camps, but also civilians, including at least 75 minors, according to EFE’s count.
So far this year, at least 24 Palestinians have already died in Israeli attacks, five of them minors.
Indigenous candidate Leonidas Iza predicts a new social explosion if there is no change in Ecuador
Deaths in a hotel fire in a ski resort in Turkey rise to 69
Hamas calls for counterattack on Israeli soldiers during their incursion in the West Bank
Tec de Monterrey honors one of its students for his contribution to nanotechnology in medicine
Defense Minister commends salvadoran soldier for Central American Cross Country victory
Ecuador prison riot leaves at least 43 dead
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