International

Internally displaced by gang violence in Haiti has increased by 60% since March

The number of internally displaced persons in Haiti, a country that is going through a serious crisis due to the violence of armed gangs, has increased by 60% since March to reach 580,000 people, the United Nations International Organization for Migration (IOM) said on Tuesday.

“These figures are a direct consequence of years of increasing violence, which reached new record levels in February, and its catastrophic impact on humanitarian matters,” the head of the IOM office in Haiti, Philippe Branchat, said in a statement.

“The endless crisis forces more and more people to leave their homes and leave behind everything they have,” added the local leader, who stressed that many of them is not the first time they have to change homes fleeing violence.

The displacements occur not only in the capital, Port-au-Prince, the main area of activity of the armed gangs that according to some reports control 80% of their territory, but also in neighboring southern provinces, where the number of people who have fled has increased from 116,000 to 270,000 in the last three months.

Many of them are welcomed in communities that previously had problems with access to basic services and with poor infrastructure, which increases the fear of new tensions that will degenerate into greater violence, IOM said.

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According to the UN immigration agency, this risk exists to a greater extent in areas of the south not yet recovered from the earthquake that devastated the region in 2010, one of the worst that has occurred on the planet so far this century, with about 160,000 deaths according to different estimates.

IOM also warned of the obstacles in the distribution of medicines, fuel and other basic goods between the capital and other provinces that the country has been suffering since the end of February.

International

Chile declares state of catastrophe as wildfires rage in Ñuble and Biobío

Wildland firefighting crews are battling 19 forest fires across the country, 12 of them concentrated in the Ñuble and Biobío regions, located about 500 kilometers south of Santiago.

“In light of the severe fires currently underway, I have decided to declare a state of catastrophe in the regions of Ñuble and Biobío. All resources are now available,” the president announced in a post on X.

Authorities have not yet released an official report on possible casualties or damage to homes.

According to images broadcast by local television, the fires have reached populated areas, particularly in the municipalities of Penco and Lirquén, in the Biobío region, which together are home to nearly 60,000 people. Burned vehicles were also reported on several streets.

“The Penco area and the entire Lirquén sector are the most critical zones and where the largest number of evacuations have taken place. We estimate that around 20,000 people have been evacuated,” said Alicia Cebrián, director of the National Disaster Prevention and Response Service (Senapred), in an interview with Mega TV.

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In recent years, forest fires have had a severe impact on the country, especially in the central-southern regions.

On February 2, 2024, multiple wildfires broke out simultaneously around the city of Viña del Mar, located 110 kilometers northwest of Santiago. Those fires resulted in 138 deaths, according to updated figures from the public prosecutor’s office, and left approximately 16,000 people affected, based on official data.

International

Former South Korean President Yoon sentenced to five years in prison

Former South Korean president Yoon Suk-yeol was sentenced on Friday to five years in prison for obstruction of justice and other charges, concluding the first in a series of trials stemming from his failed attempt to impose martial law in December 2024.

The sentence is shorter than the 10-year prison term sought by prosecutors against the 65-year-old conservative former leader, whose move against Parliament triggered a major political crisis that ultimately led to his removal from office.

Yoon, a former prosecutor, is still facing seven additional trials. One of them, on charges of insurrection, could potentially result in the death penalty.

On Friday, the Seoul Central District Court ruled on one of the multiple secondary cases linked to the affair, which plunged the country into months of mass protests and political instability.

International

U.S. deportation flight returns venezuelans to Caracas after Maduro’s ouster

A new flight carrying 231 Venezuelans deported from the United States arrived on Friday at the airport serving Caracas, marking the first such arrival since the military operation that ousted and captured President Nicolás Maduro.

On January 3, U.S. forces bombed the Venezuelan capital during an incursion in which Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, were captured. Both are now facing narcotrafficking charges in New York.

This was the first U.S.-flagged aircraft transporting migrants to land in Venezuela since the military action ordered by President Donald Trump, who has stated that he is now in charge of the country.

The aircraft departed from Phoenix, Arizona, and landed at Maiquetía International Airport, which serves the Venezuelan capital, at around 10:30 a.m. local time (14:30 GMT), according to AFP reporters on the ground.

The deportees arrived in Venezuela under a repatriation program that remained in place even during the height of the crisis between the two countries, when Maduro was still in power. U.S. planes carrying undocumented Venezuelan migrants continued to arrive throughout last year, despite the military deployment ordered by Trump.