International
The clock scandal leaves the exit door of Boluarte open
A new political crisis is experiencing Peru, after the raid on the home of President Dina Boluarte and the Government Palace by a police and prosecutor’s team looking for the luxury watches not declared by the president.
The image of this team breaking the lock marked the day in which the president said she was the victim of an arbitrary and abusive procedure. These are the keys:
Boluarte was summoned by the Public Prosecutor’s Office on Tuesday and Wednesday of last week to show the famous watches and testify, respectively, but the president did not attend any of these calls.
Local media reported that the Boluarte defense had asked to reschedule the appointments because of the president’s busy agenda.
Even so, the interim Attorney General, Juan Carlos Villena, affirmed that the president was acting in absentia and Supreme Prosecutor Hernán Mendoza said in the Congressional Oversight Commission that he was thwarting the investigation.
On March 18, the Public Ministry opened a preliminary procedure against Boluarte for the alleged commission of the crime of illicit enrichment by not having declared luxury watches before the National Election Jury (JNE).
Shortly before midnight on Friday, a team of about 20 prosecutors and as many police officers arrived at the house in Boluarte, in the Lima district of Surquillo, where, when they did not receive a response when they knocked on the door, they broke the lock and entered the house.
Five hours later they left with briefcases to their next destination, the Government Palace, where they were for several hours raiding the office and the residential area of the complex.
The court order signed by Supreme Judge Juan Carlos Checkley authorized the raid, with unveiling if necessary, of the residence of Boluarte, “who is attributed to be the alleged perpetrator of the crimes of illicit enrichment and failure to record statements in documents.”
Shortly after the registration at the Government Palace was concluded, the Prime Minister, Gustavo Adrianzén, went out together with several members of the cabinet and the president’s lawyer to describe this measure as disproportionate, illegal and unconstitutional.
“What they are doing is politicizing and evidencing that justice has been politicized in an unprecedented event that is attacking the democratic institutionality and the Presidency and, above all, evidencing the crocking of the democratic system and constitutionality,” said the Minister of Justice and Human Rights, Eduardo Arana.
Lawyer Mateo Castañeda said that the raid was unnecessary and unjustified, that it is not proportionate to the purpose of this diligence and “that so many fiscal and police personnel cannot be mobilized to search for watches.”
During the day, the official accounts on social network X of several ministries such as the Interior or Agrarian Development, as well as all the ministers, supported Boluarte and rejected the fiscal and police intervention.
While the country waited for Boluarte’s words, the raid divided the Peruvian political parties between those who saw an opportunity to resurrect a new election and criticize the president, and those who criticized the raid and defended it.
Among the first was the Marxist party to which the president herself belonged, Perú Libre, who presented to Congress a motion of vacancy (destitution) against her that so far has the signature of 26 parliamentarians of the 130 that make up the chamber.
But most conservative political formations such as Fuerza Popular, Renovación Popular or Somos Perú, who defined the raid as “mere spectacle” or “abuse of power,” showed their support for Boluarte.
With great expectation, the president made a statement with her entire cabinet in which she defined what happened at her home and Government Palace as “arbitrary, abusive and disproportionate and affirmed that there has never been either refusal or rebellion on her part in the face of the tax investigation.
He did not refer to what the citizenry expected: the origin of the clocks. According to he said, his lawyer has recommended that he only deal with this issue in public at the Prosecutor’s Office, where he will clarify the facts “as soon as possible.”
In addition, he blamed the media for organizing a campaign of harassment against him and spreading false and biased news against him for months and reiterated that he will leave the Government in 2026 with clean hands.
During the day it was made public that the Judiciary admitted to processing a habeas corpus presented by the president’s defense so that the procedure of raiding her home is declared null and void.
According to his lawyer, Boluarte will testify in the Public Ministry on Friday, April 5, and in the meantime journalistic programs have announced that they will reveal details of what the prosecutor’s team found at home and that Peruvians want to know.
International
The AP agency sues the Trump Government after being banned for writing Gulf of Mexico
The American press agency Associated Press (AP) announced this Friday that it has sued three members of the Donald Trump Administration after being banned from the Oval Office and the presidential plane Air Force One for not complying with the directive of calling the Gulf of Mexico the Gulf of America.
“The press and all people in the United States have the right to choose their own words and not to be retaliated for it by the Government. The Constitution does not allow the Government to control freedom of expression,” the media maintains.
In its style guide, AP decided to continue calling the Gulf of Mexico “by its original name”, still mentioning the new name chosen by Trump, since it is a body of water that shares a border with Mexico and Cuba.
The White House formally blocked AP’s access to the Oval Office and Air Force One on February 14. “We are very proud of this country and we want it to be the Gulf of America,” Trump said on Tuesday.
The agency’s lawsuit, of 18 pages and filed before a federal court in Washington DC, alleges that they have decided to take this step to claim their right to editorial independence and prevent the Executive from coercing journalists to use only a language approved by it.
Trump signed the executive order to change the name to Gulf of America on January 20, the first day of his return to power. He later named February 9 as ‘ Gulf of America Day’.
The AP complaint is specifically directed against the president’s chief of staff, Susie Wiles, his number two, Taylor Budowich, and the White House spokeswoman, Karoline Leavitt.
This Thursday, more than thirty US media asked the Government to restore AP’s participation in presidential events and not to take into account “the editorial point of view” when limiting access to the White House.
Among the signatories are the television networks Fox News and Newsmax, with a conservative tinge, in addition to other large newspapers such as The New York Times, The Washington Post, CNN, The Wall Street Journal or The Atlantic.
AP highlighted when reporting on his complaint that this Friday Trump referred to that agency as “radical left-wing lunatics”: It is “a third-rate company with a first name,” he said about it, the main one in the country and founded in 1846.
International
Buenos Aires advances legislative elections to May 18 and suspends the primaries
The Legislature of the city of Buenos Aires approved this Friday the suspension of the open, simultaneous and mandatory primary elections (PASO), a measure that, according to the deputy head of government, Clara Muzzio, “allows to save 20 billion pesos (about 18,894 million dollars)”, and advanced the legislative elections for May 18.
“The City Legislature suspended the PASO, a measure that saves $20 billion for neighbors,” Muzzio announced on Friday.
For his part, the mayor of the City, Jorge Macri, maintained that the PASO “were an expensive mechanism that only solved the problems of politicians, not of the people.”
The May 18 elections, which were originally scheduled for July, will be held through the Single Electronic Ballot system.
In that instance, the inhabitants of the city of Buenos Aires will elect their local legislators and, in October, they will have to return to the polls to define, together with the rest of the country, the composition of the chambers of Deputies and Senators.
“The fact that the elections are in May allows each Buenos Aires to decide on their own city, without being tied to national discussions,” said the mayor.
The project was approved in the Buenos Aires legislature with 55 votes in favor, 3 against and one abstention, after an agreement between the main political forces.
The suspension of the primaries in the City of Buenos Aires occurs one day after the Argentine Parliament approved the same measure at the national level.
The original project sent by the national government sought the elimination of the primary system but finally, given the lack of support for that objective, the government chose to promote an initiative that suspends them for this year.
The primary election system was first implemented in Argentina to define the candidates for the 2011 general elections, based on a political reform approved by Parliament at the end of 2009, with the aim of democratizing political representation, transparency and electoral equity.
According to the PASO system, to be qualified to compete in the general elections, candidates or lists of candidates must achieve at least 1.5% of the total votes in the primaries.
All parties are obliged to participate in the primaries, although they do not necessarily have to present more than one list of candidates to decide which one will lead to the general elections, an option for which the majority of the forces have opted in the last elections.
That is one of the reasons why the system has been questioned, among which are also its costs and the cumbersomeness of the organization.
International
Trump threatens to impose tariffs on governments that apply digital fees to US companies
The President of the United States, Donald Trump, signed an executive order on Friday that threatens to impose tariffs on foreign governments that apply digital fees to US companies, including Spain, the United Kingdom and France.
The order states that “foreign governments have exercised a growing extraterritorial authority over US companies, particularly in the technology sector,” and directly cites the taxes on digital services that “several business partners” apply since 2019.
According to the text, the Trump Administration will impose tariffs on those governments that use taxes or regulations that are “discriminatory, disproportionate or designed to transfer significant funds or intellectual property from US companies to that government or its chosen domestic entities.”
Trump delegates to the US Trade Representative the possibility of “renewing investigations” on the so-called technology fees of Spain, the United Kingdom, France, Italy, Austria and Turkey, imposed in the first term of the Republican, and if so, “take all appropriate actions”, which would include the imposition of tariffs.
“US companies will no longer sustain failed foreign economies through fines and extortionational taxes,” says the White House document, which provides for a “process” for them to “report” these “disproportionate” measures to the Commercial Representative.
He also instructs him to investigate together with the Secretaries of the Treasury and Commerce whether in the European Union or the United Kingdom the use of products or services of US companies is “required or encouraged” to “undermine freedom of expression”, political activity or, “otherwise, moderate content”.
It also suggests to the Representative, among other things, to hold “a panel” with its partners of the T-MEC (Canada and Mexico) on the tax on digital services in Canada, and identify ways to achieve a “permanent moratorium on customs duties on electronic transmissions”.
The order does not mention any specific company, but mainly affects large technology companies such as Apple, Google (subsidiary of Alphabet), Meta and Amazon, which have precisely starred in a resounded approach to President Trump since he won the elections in November.
In his first term (2017-2021), Trump ordered to investigate the digital fees to his companies abroad and threatened to apply tariffs to the six countries indicated today; taxes were imposed in the government of his successor, the Democrat Joe Biden, and subsequently suspended.
Trump signed another executive order aimed at restricting access to US technology, especially in the field of artificial intelligence, what he calls “foreign adversaries”, including Cuba, Venezuela, Iran, Russia and China.
The executive order does not specify in detail what measures will be taken to restrict the access of these “foreign adversaries” to US technology.
Under the label of “foreign adversaries”, the order identifies China, Hong Kong, Macau, Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Russia and the “regime of Venezuelan politician Nicolás Maduro”, according to the text.
Trump justifies his decision with the argument that “economic security is national security” and maintains that the country must protect its sensitive infrastructures and technologies, from artificial intelligence to semiconductors and advances in biotechnology.
The executive order focuses especially on China, pointing out that companies linked to Beijing have used investments in the US to access key technologies and that the Chinese government is taking advantage of US technology to modernize its military apparatus.
Since his return to the White House on January 20, Trump has announced several restrictions on trade with the aim of balancing the trade balance and pressuring countries such as Mexico and Canada to make concessions on immigration and efforts against drug trafficking.
It has imposed a 10% tariff on China, which is in addition to the rates already applied during its first term (2017-2021).
Trump’s new restrictions come after his predecessor, Joe Biden, took steps to limit exports of semiconductors and artificial intelligence technology to China, which led Beijing to respond with export controls on graphite, a key material for electric vehicle batteries.
The AP agency sues the Trump Government after being banned for writing Gulf of Mexico
Buenos Aires advances legislative elections to May 18 and suspends the primaries
Trump threatens to impose tariffs on governments that apply digital fees to US companies
Tec de Monterrey honors one of its students for his contribution to nanotechnology in medicine
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