International rebuke on Saturday swelled over what observers say are efforts to use a politicized justice system to keep Guatemalan president-elect Bernardo Arevalo out of office.
A prosecutor at Guatemala’s attorney general’s office on Thursday moved to strip Arevalo of his immunity from prosecution, accusing him and his running mate of complicity in the takeover of a university in the capital last year.
Arevalo, an anti-graft candidate elected in a landslide in August, called the prosecutor’s move “absolutely illegal.”
Photo: Reuters
In a statement on Saturday, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights and its Office of the Special Rapporteur for Freedom of Expression condemned the attorney general’s office’s “incessant improper actions and interference.”
“These threaten the democratic order, the ongoing presidential transition process and the individual and collective exercise of civil and political liberties in the country,” the statement said.
Earlier on Saturday, US Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs Brian Nichols condemned the attorney general’s office’s “malign request” to strip Arevalo and Guatemalan vice president-elect Karin Herrera of immunity in a post on social media.
Also on Saturday, the Democratic Initiative of Spain and the Americas published a letter signed by 29 former heads of state from Latin America and Spain denouncing the “persecution” of Arevalo and Herrera, which has the “repeated and clear purpose of obstructing the sovereign will of Guatemalans, already expressed through free elections.”
Guatemalan Attorney General Consuela Porras, accused by the US government of corruption, has pursued a criminal investigation against Arevalo as well as his center-left Seed Movement party since before his election.
The Philippine Department of Justice yesterday labeled Vice President Sara Duterte the “mastermind” of a plot to assassinate the nation’s president, giving her five days to respond to a subpoena. Duterte is being asked to explain herself in the wake of a blistering weekend press conference where she said she had instructed that Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr be killed should an alleged plot to kill her succeed. “The government is taking action to protect our duly elected president,” Philippine Undersecretary of Justice Jesse Andres said at yesterday’s press briefing. “The premeditated plot to assassinate the president as declared by the self-confessed mastermind
Texas’ education board on Friday voted to allow Bible-infused teachings in elementary schools, joining other Republican-led US states that pushed this year to give religion a larger presence in public classrooms. The curriculum adopted by the Texas State Board of Education, which is controlled by elected Republicans, is optional for schools to adopt, but they would receive additional funding if they do so. The materials could appear in classrooms as early as next school year. Republican Texas Governor Greg Abbott has voiced support for the lesson plans, which were provided by the state’s education agency that oversees the more than
Ireland, the UK and France faced travel chaos on Saturday and one person died as a winter storm battered northwest Europe with strong winds, heavy rain, snow and ice. Hampshire Police in southern England said a man died after a tree fell onto a car on a major road near Winchester early in the day. Police in West Yorkshire said they were probing whether a second death from a traffic incident was linked to the storm. It is understood the road was not icy at the time of the incident. Storm Bert left at least 60,000 properties in Ireland without power, and closed
CONSPIRACIES: Kano suspended polio immunization in 2003 and 2004 following claims that polio vaccine was laced with substances that could render girls infertile Zuwaira Muhammad sat beside her emaciated 10-month-old twins on a clinic bed in northern Nigeria, caring for them as they battled malnutrition and malaria. She would have her babies vaccinated if they regain their strength, but for many in Kano — a hotbed of anti-vaccine sentiment — the choice is not an obvious one. The infants have been admitted to the 75-bed clinic in the Unguwa Uku neighbourhood, one of only two in the city of 4.5 million run by French aid agency Doctors Without Borders (MSF). Kano has the highest malaria burden in Nigeria, but the city has long
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