Former Colombian President Iván Duque sees that there is “despair” and “insecurity” in his successor, Gustavo Petro, who accused him of being a “terrorist” for the “murder” of dozens of young people at the hands of the public forces during the 2021 protests.

In a message published on the social network X, Duque (2018-2022) made a parallel between his career and that of Petro. He asked “that the healthy democratic debate begin now” for the presidential elections of 2026.

“There is despair, insecurity, paranoia, schizophrenia evident in this behavior, which intensifies with the drunkenness of applause and the motivation to eclipse failures and scandals. No more threats or attacks. Let the tragedy end on August 7, 2026 (the day that Petro’s mandate culminates), but let the healthy democratic debate begin without stopping at more crazy things to attract attention,” Duque said.

The day before, President Petro called his predecessor a “terrorist” for the “murder” of young people during the social outcuse of 2021. According to social organizations, more than 80 people died violently, most of them from police abuses.

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“When 60 young people killed by the State die, burned, tortured, when thousands of young people were arrested, the question is then: who was the terrorist? Who should be described as a terrorist?” Petro asked in a government act in Cali, capital of the department of Valle del Cauca (southwest).

Petro added: “The president of the republic today has to say that the terrorist was not the popular youth, that the terrorist was the State of Colombia and particularly the Government of (…) Mr. Duque. The 60 killed in Cali by you were not terrorists, the terrorist was you.”

In that sense, Duque wondered, “Who is the terrorist?” He recalled that he has never been a member of “illegal or terrorist armed groups,” as if Petro did, who was a guerrilla of the 19 de Abril Movement (M-19).

“I have never made an apology for terrorism by flying flags of illegal armed groups,” added the former president, referring to the controversy that erose last month when Petro ordered the M-19 flag to be displayed in a public event in which he commemorated the murder 34 years ago of former guerrilla commander Carlos Pizarro.

Among other issues that Duque reminded Petro of, there are the “alliances with criminals in prisons to make the most of the election.” Or the call to young people to “express themselves with violence and vandalism with the promise of impunity if they are prosecuted.”

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“I have never exalted the seizure of the Palace of Justice (in 1985), the murder of José Raquel Mercado (union leader kidnapped and executed by the M-19), the Tacueyó Massacre (in the 1980s), nor hundreds of kidnappings calling them ‘revolutionary’ acts,” Duque added in reference to Petro’s attitudes.

Likewise, Duque said that he has not “promoted the paramilitary leaders to return to the country to avoid their punishments, revictimizing those who have caused them so much pain,” referring to what happened to the former commander of the United Self-Defense of Colombia (AUC) Salvatore Mancuso, appointed peace manager by the Government and who may be released in the coming days.

“I have not threatened journalists, businessmen, politicians, judges, guilds, industrialists, intellectuals for not thinking like me, much less disagreeing with me,” Duque concluded in his decalogue of response to Petro.

Former President Álvaro Uribe (2002-2010) accused the current president of Colombia, Gustavo Petro, of wanting to instigate “civil war” in the country and of constantly challenging the Constitution.

“The president instigates civil war. Let’s add so that that war does not divide the citizenry, so that it is the president’s against all of Colombia,” said Uribe, leader of the opposition party Centro Democrático, in a video published on his social networks.

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Uribe assured that “the president of the republic, instead of reorienting the young people of Cali, as part of the support he wants to give them, instigates them more to violence, applauds violent acts.”

“He repeats to them that my permanence in politics is attachment to power when he should give thanks that that permanence allowed him to base himself on anti-uribism for his election,” said Uribe, who ruled in the periods 2002-2006 and 2006-2010.

He also stated that Petro defies the Constitution as a step “in his purpose of unleashing a civil war between compatriots.”

“We work so that respect for the Constitution and respect for the ideas of fraternal economy one more to the citizenry (…) That it is against all of Colombia, that it does not divide the Colombians more,” he concluded.

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Fourteen people remain hospitalized due to the train crash of the San Martín line that occurred the day before in Buenos Aires, whose formations are being withdrawn after the expertise.

Of the 90 people evacuated from the seven cars of the passenger train, the mayor of Buenos Aires, Jorge Macri, said that 20 were yellow code and were discharged, and 30 are red code, of which 14 remain interned.

“We talk about misfortune with luck. There are no misfortunes with luck,” Macri told the media stationed at the scene of the accident, in the capital neighborhood of Palermo, regarding the fact that there were no fatalities.

“Obviously this could have been much more serious if there were passengers in the van; that helped,” but he highlighted the professionalism of the fire service and the Emergency Medical Care System that arrived after half an hour.

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The accident occurred this Friday at 10:31 (13:31 GMT), when a formation with passengers collided with a locomotive and an empty van and as a result of the impact 60 people were affected with injuries of different severity.

The incident occurred for causes that are still grounds for investigation, which is being processed in the national criminal and correctional court 11 by judge Julián Ercolini.

The formations affected by the collision are being removed this Saturday after the scientific police carried out the relevant judicial expertise.

The Secretary of Transport of Argentina, Franco Mogetta, said that “there are multiple hypotheses” about the causes of the accident and acknowledged that there were reports of “cable theft.”

The secretary of the train drivers’ union La Fraternidad, Omar Maturano, had declared that “work has been working for approximately ten days without a signal, due to the degradation that exists today on the railroad and the lack of security because the signaling cables are stolen,” and that the route of the trains is made by means of papers or flags.

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The armed gangs of Haiti call for a series of demonstrations in repudiation upon the arrival, scheduled for May 26, of the multinational force to restore security in the nation and which will lead Kenya.

The demonstrations are organized by the armed coalition “Vivre Ensemble” (Living Together), led by the powerful Haitian ex-police officer Jimmy Cherisier, alias “Barbecue”.

Carrefour, south of Port-au-Prince, is practically paralyzed this Saturday, just like yesterday, since the armed structures that control the area require the population to prepare to go out to the street to demonstrate against the arrival of police forces.

To attract large crowds, bandits force thousands of people to take to the streets under threat of beating, killed or expelled if they refuse, as happened on Friday in Fontamara, in the south of the capital; in Bel-air, in the heart of the capital, and in Canaan, at the northern entrance of Port-au-au-Prince, where thousands of citizens demonstrated.

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In the massive demonstrations, heavily armed men with sa balacers shouted slogans hostile to the international community and the multinational assistance force to the Haitian Police, approved last October by the Security Council of the United Nations (UN).

Information circulating on social networks suggests that gang leaders are putting pressure on their members to prevent them from fleeing inland in the face of the arrival of international force.

Meanwhile, the armed gangs gain new territories and on Friday night they took the police station of the town of Gressier, at the southern entrance of the capital, which until then was not under the control of the gangs.

A resurgence of kidnappings in the metropolitan area of Port-au-Prince has also been reported these days, at the same time that there is a timid resumption of school activities in the capital.

For several days, U.S. military aircraft have been coming and going through the runway of Port-au-au-Prince’s Toussaint Louverture airport, as part of the preparations for the initial deployment of the multinational force.

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More than a hundred U.S. military flights are expected in the coming days, according to the local press.

Haiti is experiencing a crisis in all orders, aggravated by the terror imposed by the armed gangs, a situation that led to the resignation of the Prime Minister, Ariel Henry, and gave way to the installation in April of the Transitional Presidential Council, which must pave the way for the holding of elections to choose a new president no later than February 7, 2026.

This country, the poorest in America, held presidential elections for the last time in 2016, when Jovenel Moise won, killed on July 7, 2021 by an armed group in his private residence in Port-au-Prince.

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