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Ecuador military calls Indigenous protests ‘grave threat’ to democracy

AFP

The head of Ecuador’s armed forces on Tuesday denounced as a “grave threat” to democracy the wave of Indigenous-led fuel price protests that have triggered regional states of emergency and a curfew in the capital Quito.

On the ninth day of protests that have seen roads barricaded countrywide, cost the economy tens of millions of dollars and left dozens injured, Defense Minister Luis Lara warned that the armed forces “will not allow attempts to break the constitutional order or any action against democracy and the laws of the republic.”

“Ecuador’s democracy faces a grave threat from the concerted actions of agitated people who are preventing the free movement of the majority of Ecuadorans,” charged Lara, flanked by the heads of the army, navy and air force.

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President Guillermo Lasso on Monday extended a state of emergency to cover six of the country’s 24 provinces as he sought to curtail the demonstrations.

The powerful Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of Ecuador (Conaie) — credited with helping topple three presidents between 1997 and 2005 — called the countrywide protests as Ecuadorans increasingly struggle to make ends meet.

Indigenous people comprise more than a million of Ecuador’s 17.7 million inhabitants, and their movement has since been joined by students, workers and others feeling the economic pinch.

Police said Monday 63 armed forces personnel have been wounded in clashes and 21 others briefly held hostage since the protests began, while human rights observers reported 79 arrests and 55 civilians wounded.

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US lawmakers threaten reprisals to the ICC if it issues orders against Israel

The president of the US House of Representatives, Mike Johnson, has described as “shameful” and “illegal” the arrest warrants of Israeli officials that are allegedly prepared by the International Criminal Court (ICC) and several Republican Party legislators work in retaliation by the legislative way against the court.

That international court, based in The Hague (Netherlands), has been investigating since 2014 the allegations of war crimes committed by Israel’s military forces and Palestinian militias and could issue arrest warrants against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other senior officials for his role in the death of civilians in the Hamas offensive in Gaza.

Johnson, in a press release, advocated that the Government of President Joe Biden oppose those orders, which he considers “shameful” and “illegal,” and that he “use all available instruments to prevent such an abomination.”

The Louisiana legislator maintained that if the U.S. Government does not oppose the alleged arrest warrants, “the ICC could create and assume unprecedented powers to issue arrest warrants against U.S. political, diplomatic and military leaders.”

The chairman of the Committee of the Lower House for Foreign Affairs, Republican Michael McCaul, assured Axios that they are working on a bill to sanction ICC officials investigating the United States and its allies in this international court that pursues serious violations of international humanitarian law.

White House spokeswoman Karine Jean-Pierre said on Monday that Biden’s government does not support the ICC investigation and does not believe that that court has jurisdiction in this situation.

The ICC, founded in 2002 under the Rome Statute, has more than 123 members and in 2000 the Government of then Democratic President Bill Clinton signed the statute, but did not submit the pact to Senate ratification.

In 2002, the Government of Republican President George W. Bush withdrew the signature and indicated that he would not proceed with the ratification of the Rome Statute.

Representative Brad Sherman, a California Democrat, was quoted by the Axios platform saying that “the United States should consider whether we continue as signatories” of the Rome Statute.

“We have to think about discussing with some of the countries that have ratified (the Statute) and see if they want to support that organization,” he added.

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International

New York Police surround the protest of the Columbia University campus

The New York Police deployed a large number of agents on Tuesday night around Columbia University, the epicenter of the protests against the Israeli war in Gaza.

This deployment occurs after the educational authorities claimed that they were “exploring options” after the students occupied one of the buildings of that teaching center last midnight.

According to local media, many of the students who were camped in the West Lawn area to protest Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza spontaneously went to Hamilton Hall to occupy it.

The University had already limited access to the campus to the necessary staff and the students who live there today due to the seizure of the building, of great symbolism because it was also occupied in 1968 in protest against the Vietnam War.

In parallel to the deployment around the camp in Columbia, the Police also started on Tuesday night an eviction device with multiple arrests of students camped at the University of the City of New York (CUNY), which is public.

The president of the House of Representatives, Republican Michael Johnson, said on Tuesday at a press conference that, if the police are not able to suppress the violent protests at Columbia University, “we need the National Guard.”

Johnson, a Republican from Louisiana, said at a press conference that the protests in U.S. universities around the war in Gaza have taken an anti-Semitic face that includes the clamor for the destruction of the state of Israel.

The legislator said that if the president of Columbia University, Nemat Shafik, is not able to control the situation in that institution, “it is time for her to resign.”

“The first responsibility of the administration of a university property is the protection and safety of students,” he added. “If someone fails in that obligation, he has totally failed.”

“Columbia is out of control,” Johnson said. “That’s why we demand that the police come and take care of the matter. And if the police are not able (to control the situation) then we need the National Guard.”

Johnson’s proposal brings to mind the incident in May 1970 at Kent State University, Ohio, when soldiers of the National Guard of that state shot protesters protesting the war in Vietnam, killing four and injuring nine students.

The Columbia protests are in addition to those that hundreds of students in dozens of other universities in the United States have been holding for days because of the war in Gaza.

The demonstrations have in common the rejection of US policy towards Israel and the request that educational centers break relations with the Government and the Israeli private sector.

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Former President Alberto Fujimori, admitted to a hospital for probable tumor in the tongue

Former Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori, 85, was admitted to a clinic in Lima and will be operated on for a probable tumor at the base of the tongue, his daughter Keiko Fujimori reported on Monday.

The former president (1990-2000), who received a humanitarian pardon in 2017 and was released at the end of last year, has received cancer treatment for an injury to the oral area in the past and has had recurrent medical attention for the same reason.

Precisely, his medical record was the reason for former President Pedro Pablo Kuczynski to grant him the pardon before he served 25 years of sentence for crimes against humanity.

Last night, on behalf of his family, his daughter and former presidential candidate reported on his account on the social network X that his father was admitted to the Delgado Clinic in Lima to prepare him and perform a surgical intervention related to his tongue injury.

He added that the medical report literally specifies that Fujimori has “an Ambulatory Presumptive Diagnosis of malignant tumor at the base of the tongue with probable right cervical metastases.”

In this sense, the also leader of the Fuerza Popular party announced that they will carry out an examination under general anesthesia and biopsy in the operating room for their father.

“The objective of this intervention is to perform a biopsy that allows us to confirm the exact nature of that disease. The results of the biopsy will still take several days,” he said.

He stated that his father and his family trust that he will be able to “overcome and recover” and thanked the prayers of those who appreciate his father.

In recent weeks, the images shared on social networks show the former president walking through the streets of Lima with people in his care and receiving in a good mood the greetings of his supporters.

Likewise, Fujimori opened a YouTube channel where he reviews his management by the government and in the last of his deliveries, last Friday, he denied that he had transported drugs on the presidential plane, as it emerges from a judicial process that recently expelled his children, and asked his followers not to be “poononed” by his “enemies.”

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