International
Millions of Venezuelans abroad will not be able to vote for government obstacles
Venezuela currently has a population of approximately 29.4 million people, of which 21.4 million can theoretically vote in the presidential elections on July 28, both inside and outside the country.
However, due to the various requirements imposed by the Government for electoral registration abroad, only 69,211 Venezuelans abroad are authorized to pay – less than in the previous Venezuelan elections, which were 110,000 -, which represents a small fraction of the approximately eight million Venezuelans who, according to UN data, have emigrated, a figure that the Executive of Nicolás Maduro reduces to two million.
And even if there were no obstacles, not all Venezuelans who are abroad could vote because a large part of them are minors and others, fundamentally those who emigrated many years ago, lack interest in these elections.
Of the eight million Venezuelans who live outside their country, about five million are of legal age and should be able to vote in the elections, but only 69,000 are authorized to do so, explains Estefanía Parra Anselmi, international coordinator of Voluntad Popular and member of the command that groups the opponents who reside in Spain, to EFE.
About three million Venezuelans currently live in Colombia, making it the country that has welcomed the most citizens of that nationality.
This population arrived looking for better horizons due to the political, social and economic crisis in Venezuela.
According to the Interagency Coordination Platform for Refugees and Migrants from Venezuela of the International Organization for Migration (IOM), there are 2.9 million Venezuelan refugees and migrants in Colombia, which places this country as the regional epicenter of the Venezuelan exodus.
A good part of this population expects that the elections of July 28 will generate a change in their country, although many will not be able to vote due to difficulties in registering and the high cost of obtaining documents such as the valid passport, which allows you to vote abroad.
Spain is the European country that welcomes the most Venezuelan migrants, including many opposition leaders who left Venezuela in recent years.
Among them are Dinorah Figuera, Antonio Ledezma, Diego Arria and Leopoldo López, who are part of the Spanish campaign command of María Corina Machado.
These opponents have worked in favor of the candidacy of Edmundo González Urrutia and hope to defeat Maduro at the polls.
However, they fear that Maduro will not accept the results or manipulate them, since they consider his regime as one that resorts to cheating and fraud.
Therefore, they have asked European governments to take measures to prevent fraud.
Parliamentarians from European and Latin American countries will travel to Venezuela to be present in the presidential elections, and the opposition abroad has called for several demonstrations in support of their candidate.
Venezuelans in Brazil will face difficulties voting, since they could only register at the Embassy in Brasilia and the Consulate General of São Paulo, the only places where they will be able to vote on July 28.
Of the seven consulates that Venezuela had in Brazil, five were closed between 2019 and 2022 during the Government of Jair Bolsonaro, and did not reopen after the normalization of relations.
About 125,000 Venezuelans covered by Operation Reception live in Brazil, and it is estimated that in the last six years another 400,000 have entered, although many have continued to other countries. There are no clear figures on how many Venezuelans remain in Brazil in a position to vote.
About 1.5 million Venezuelans live in Peru, of which about 900,000 are of voting age.
Despite this, according to figures from the National Electoral Council (CNE) only 589 are authorized to vote.
Most have not been able to register due to the obstacles imposed by the authorities, which require permanent residence, a valid passport and identity card.
On July 28, the Venezuelan Consulate in Buenos Aires will open its doors to vote on a day that will include a migrant fair and the reception of Argentine leaders who collaborated in the search for freedom in Venezuela.
Elisa Trotta, a human rights activist, explains that the accompaniment seeks to support Venezuelan voters in Argentina.
In Argentina, 2,638 Venezuelans will vote, a small figure compared to the nearly 250,000 Venezuelan residents in the country.
Trotta affirms that this vote has a special symbolism and that the authorized will do so to express their desire for political change.
In Italy it is difficult to establish the number of resident Venezuelans because the majority have dual nationality.
According to the Venezuelan Embassy in Italy, there are 13,548 Venezuelans in the country, but the figures of the opposition command of María Corina Machado estimate between 300,000 and 350,000 Italian-Venezuelans.
The requirements imposed by the consulates have made it difficult for many to vote.
María Claudia López, president of the Italian-Venezuelan association and the opposition campaign, denounces that the consulates have asked for requirements that are impossible to meet, preventing many from voting.
International
At least ten dead in Iran in a bus accident in the west of the country
At least ten people lost their lives this Saturday when a passenger bus fell down a ravine on a highway in the province of Lorestan, in western Iran.
“The bus that left Andimeshk (Juzestan province) to Poldokhtar (Lorestan), went off the road and fell into a ravine so unfortunately at least 10 people have died,” announced the executive director of the Red Crescent of the province of Lorestan, Mohammad Ghadami, reported the Tasnim agency.
The official did not give details about the number of injured in the accident and their state of health.
Ghadami said that four rescue teams were sent to the scene of the incident immediately after it was reported at 12:39 local time (9:10 GMT) this Saturday.
Mortality on roads, one of the highest in the world
Traffic accidents are very common in Iran, where the road mortality rate is one of the highest in the world, with an average of 20,000 deaths per year.
Many of the accidents are due to the poor condition of the vehicles and the poor compliance with traffic rules by drivers.
Last August, at least 28 Pakistani pilgrims died when the bus in which they were traveling overturned in central Iran, in an accident that occurred due to a brake failure.
International
Helene, the violent hurricane that destroyed the southeastern United States
Hurricane Helene is one of the extreme climatic events that have starred this 2024 after leaving more than 150 direct deaths and billions of dollars in losses in six states of the southeastern United States, according to preliminary figures.
The deadly Helene, which in the continental United States has only been surpassed by Katrina (2005), ended with more than 150 deaths, at least a hundred in North Carolina, in addition to leaving a path of destruction that reached the mountainous area of that state with special virulence.
After impacting Central America and the Yucatan Peninsula, Helene made landfall on September 26 with winds of 225 kilometers per hour in the Big Bend region of Florida, in the northwest of that state, as the most powerful cyclone in that region since records have been available.
From Florida, where it arrived as a major hurricane, and while it weakened progressively to become a tropical depression, Helene continued on land through Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Tennessee and Virginia.
North Carolina was the one that took the worst part, not only for the number of deaths but for the economic losses, which amount to more than 59.6 billion dollars, according to an update from the state government released this month.
The historic rainfall of up to 76 centimeters caused floods and landslides in this state, which caused serious damage, and long-term, both in homes and in public infrastructure and the agricultural industry.
Million-dollar economic losses
Quantifying at this time the economic losses in all the states impacted by Helene, which generated strong winds and tornadoes, is difficult because there are discrepancies in the damage assessment since it produced “a large-scale disaster,” as Mónica Escaleras, professor of the Department of Economics at Florida Atlantic University (FAU), told EFE.
“The widespread nature of the damage, the diversity of affected sectors and ongoing recovery efforts” are factors that prevent an accurate estimate at present, he added.
Escaleras believes, however, that Helene is a reflection of how in recent years “extreme weather events have become increasingly frequent and intense, altering infrastructure and supply chains.”
A preliminary report from the Institute of Agricultural and Food Sciences of the University of Florida (UF/IFAS) estimates that agricultural losses in this southern state due to Helene can range between 40.3 and 162.2 million dollars, after destroying 6.1 million acres (2.4 million hectares) of arable land.
More hurricanes like Helene in the future
A key factor in Helene’s intensity were the high temperatures in the waters of the Gulf of Mexico, whose surfaces were at about 29.4 degrees Celsius when the system began to form.
A preliminary study by the World Weather Attribution network of scientists reflected that this temperature is the result of climate change, which made Helene’s effects worse, responsible for example for 10% more rain.
“It is expected that the growing occurrence of these events will generate higher insurance premiums and may lead to the withdrawal of coverage in high-risk areas, which will affect both the real estate and business sectors,” Escaleras said.
This possible future scenario can, on the other hand, affect unprotected communities more, such as the Hispanic one in the United States. The Climate Power organization revealed last week a report that shows that Latino communities have been the great victims of the extreme weather events that occurred in 2024.
The report in question found that many Latino families in western North Carolina live in trailers flooded or destroyed by the storm, and that not mastering English they had obstacles when it came to receiving information about recovery tasks.
Antonieta Cádiz, executive director of the Climate Power In Action campaign, reminded EFE of the case of the workers of a plastics factory in Erwin (Tennessee) who died after a negligence in their evacuation, which was not carried out due to the imminent effects of Helene, employees who were mostly Hispanic.
The above, he said, is a sample of the disproportionate and “deep inequalities” that affect the Hispanic community when it comes to extreme weather events.
International
The piangua, the mangrove mollusk that empowers women in the Colombian Pacific
When the low tide in the Colombian Pacific, a group of women put on rubber boots, take a raft and enter a mangrove forest to collect the piangua, a mollusk that, in addition to providing food to their families, empowers them and gives them a voice in their territory.
They are in the community of La Plata, in the heart of the Uramba-Bahía Málaga National Natural Park, and they have just six hours to work before the sea rises again. Stuck in the mud they sing to liven up their days and regardless of the sun or rain they fill their containers with this mollusk similar to the mussel with which they prepare delicious recipes.
“It is a very important ancestral activity because it allows us to have economic sustainability as women, to be a symbol of resistance to cultural traditions and to take care of our gastronomic traditions,” Matilde Mosquera Murillo, legal representative of the Raíces Piangüeras Association.
Mosquera, 27 years old and a sociologist by profession, took on the challenge of leading that organization created in 2019 and has managed to bring together more than 70 women who are dedicated to this profession in the Community Council of La Plata-Bahía Málaga, where they play a fundamental role in conservation.
“We monitor mangroves, because we know the importance they have in the ecosystem, they are the cradle of thousands of species. We also make every process sustainable so that all the initiatives we lead allow us to take care of nature,” Mosquera insists.
International recognition
Their work already has international recognition and since 2023 they have held the ‘Meeting of Women of the Colombian Pacific’. In the first edition they asked the National Government to advocate before UNESCO to declare the piangüeo as Intangible Heritage of Humanity.
“We believe in the need for a political strengthening of women, that our voice is heard and that we are part of the decisions that are made in the country so that we have votes in public policies and that they recognize our ancestral work in the world,” she adds.
The environmental richness of the La Plata archipelago is enormous and its 32 islands and islets are the habitat of 1,396 species of birds, reptiles, mammals and felines, as well as 60 classes of frogs, 25 of lizards and 52 of snakes.
There are also eight species of sharks, 22 rays and 348 of fish that have six types of mangroves as their home: red mangrove, born mangrove, ped mangrove, button or button mangrove, bobo mangle and feeder mangle.
Unity and awareness
According to Santiago Valencia, leader of the Community Council of La Plata-Bahía Málaga, women use a ‘piangüímetro’, a tool that works as a rule that allows them to measure the mollusk when it has already passed its reproductive stage.
“Their organization is as strong as the roots of the mangrove and they even come together to reforest when they see it necessary. This unity has made them look for other alternatives because they see that everything is possible and today they see themselves as what they are: powerful women, businesswomen and nature lovers,” says Valencia.
Currently, women piangüeras work in the search for resources that allow them to access studies to improve and strengthen their processes.
Some of them have already created other ventures for the manufacture of ointments based on medicinal plants from the jungle, ancestral drinks and even think about packing the piangua in a vacuum to export it to other countries.
“When we go to the mangrove we sing as a symbol of power, to express our feelings, it also serves to harmonize our activity and understand that we are important; we will leave this inheritance to our children and it will continue for generations,” concludes Mosquera.
At least ten dead in Iran in a bus accident in the west of the country
Helene, the violent hurricane that destroyed the southeastern United States
The piangua, the mangrove mollusk that empowers women in the Colombian Pacific
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