International
US special election seen as litmus test on abortion rights
AFP
A US special election Tuesday is being viewed as the last bellwether of the public mood on abortion ahead of November’s midterms, as Democrats seek to make reproductive rights a key issue in the campaign.
Voters in upstate New York are choosing a candidate to serve the final months of Democrat Antonio Delgado’s term in the House of Representatives, after he quit to become the Empire State’s lieutenant governor.
The battle for New York’s 19th Congressional — a swing district wedged between New York City and state capital Albany — comes two months after the Supreme Court sparked nationwide protests by ending the federally-guaranteed right to abortion.
Democrat Pat Ryan has sought to turn the vote — the last US special election before November — into a referendum on abortion access.
He has accused Republican Marc Molinaro and his party, who are against such access, of being “too extreme on women’s rights.”
“Choice is the ballot, but we won’t go back. Freedom is under attack, but it’s ours to defend. Our democracy is fragile, but we will fight for it,” Ryan said in a statement on the eve of the ballot.
Molinaro has also followed his party’s main political talking points, including on inflation, highlighting spiralling living costs in a campaign that has seen millions of dollars funneled on advertising.
“We can send a message that enough is enough, that we care deeply about one another, that we are willing to work hard to solve the problems that face us, and that together we can overcome anything,” he said in his own election eve message.
President Joe Biden carried the district by fewer than two points in 2020, after Donald Trump took it by about seven points in 2016. Barack Obama won there in 2012.
Both candidates will be back on the ballot in November, but in different districts newly drawn in the latest round of redistricting.
The somewhat anachronistic system means Ryan — who has yet to be nominated to fight for a seat in the midterms — is on the ballot Tuesday in two districts for two separate seats for two different congresses.
New York is also holding several nominating contests — known as primary elections — including a vote pitting Democratic committee chairs Jerry Nadler and Carolyn Maloney against one another.
In Florida, Democrats pick their candidate to challenge Governor Ron DeSantis in November.
US voters will decide control of Congress in the midterm elections, with all 435 House seats up for grabs, as well as 35 of the 100 Senate seats and the governor’s mansion in 36 out of 50 states.
International
Uribe requests freedom amid appeal of historic bribery conviction
Former Colombian President Álvaro Uribe on Monday requested that the Supreme Court restore his freedom while he appeals the historic 12-year house arrest sentence he received for bribery and procedural fraud.
Uribe, the most prominent figure of Colombia’s right wing, was convicted last week by a lower court for attempting to bribe paramilitary members into denying his ties to the violent anti-guerrilla squads.
Since Friday, the 73-year-old has been under house arrest at his residence in Rionegro, about 30 km from Medellín. The judge justified the measure by citing a risk of flight.
However, Uribe’s defense team rejected that argument and formally petitioned the court to immediately lift the detention order, claiming it lacks legal basis.
Uribe, a dominant force in Colombian politics for decades, is now the first former president in the country’s history to be convicted and placed under arrest, found guilty of witness tampering and obstruction of justice to prevent links to paramilitary groups.
He has repeatedly denounced the trial as politically motivated, blaming pressure from the leftist government currently in power.
His political party, Centro Democrático, has called for nationwide protests on August 7 in support of Uribe, who remains popular for his hardline stance against guerrilla groups.
Uribe has until August 13 to submit his written appeal. The case will then move to the Bogotá High Court, which has until October 16 to uphold, overturn, or dismiss the sentence. If the deadline passes without a decision, the case will be archived.
International
U.S. Embassy staff restricted as gunfire erupts near compound in Port-au-Prince
The poorest country in Latin America and the Caribbean is currently engulfed in a deep political crisis and a wave of violence driven by armed groups — a situation that an international security mission led by Kenya is attempting to stabilize.
Due to the worsening security conditions, the U.S. government has suspended all official movements of embassy personnel outside the compound in Port-au-Prince, the U.S. State Department announced Monday in a security alert posted on social media platform X.
“There are intense gunfights in the Tabarre neighborhood, near the U.S. Embassy,” the alert reads, urging the public to avoid the area.
Tabarre is a municipality located near Port-au-Prince International Airport, northeast of the Haitian capital.
According to a July report by the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, at least 3,141 people were killed in Haitibetween January 1 and June 30 of this year.
International
Israel says 136 food aid boxes airdropped into Gaza by six nations
The Israeli military announced on Sunday that 136 boxes of food aid were airdropped into Gaza by the United Arab Emirates, Jordan, Egypt, Germany, and Belgium.
“In recent hours, six countries conducted air drops of 136 aid packages containing food for residents in the southern and northern Gaza Strip,” read the statement, which added that the operation was coordinated by COGAT, the Israeli defense body overseeing civil affairs in the occupied Palestinian territories.
The Israeli military emphasized that they will “continue working to improve the humanitarian response alongside the international community” and reiterated their stance to “refute false allegations of deliberate famine in Gaza.”
The announcement comes as UN agencies warn Gaza faces an imminent risk of famine. More than one in three residents go days without eating, and other nutrition indicators have dropped to their worst levels since the conflict began.
The agencies also noted the difficulty of “collecting reliable data in current conditions, as Gaza’s health systems —already devastated by nearly three years of conflict— are collapsing.”
Meanwhile, Gaza’s Hamas-run Health Ministry reported on Sunday that hospitals in the enclave recorded six deaths from hunger and malnutrition on Saturday, all of them adults.
Uribe requests freedom amid appeal of historic bribery conviction
U.S. Embassy staff restricted as gunfire erupts near compound in Port-au-Prince
Israel says 136 food aid boxes airdropped into Gaza by six nations
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Uribe requests freedom amid appeal of historic bribery conviction