Fire in a sugar mill in Argentina leaves at least 11 dead

A massive fire in sugar mill in northwest Argentina has resulted in 11 reported deaths and at least 15 injured.

The fire began yesterday at around 4:00 p.m. in the La Esperanza sugar mill in a small town of the same name in the northwestern Argentine province of Jujuy.

A team of eight firefighters and an air tanker succeeded in putting out the flames within hours - but not before an explosion in the alcohol tanks at the site.

The flames, some over 30 feet in height, engulfed the area near the main access gates - just feet away from a residential street.

Neighborhood residents, as well as the 200 workers at the mill, were promptly evacuated. Victims were taken to two hospitals in neighboring San Pedro.

Time bomb

Governor Gerardo Morales, who declared two days of mourning in the province, has so far admitted to only five fatalities. But Enrique Wandschneider, chief counsel for the La Esperanza Mill Workers' Union (SOEAILE), released a figure of 11 deaths as of today.

SOEAILE had denounced numerous safety flaws at the La Esperanza mill since its re-opening in July. "How many times did we say it?" union leader Sergio Juárez lamented. "This was a time bomb."

Founded in 1883, the mill produced 65,000 tons of sugar at its height in 2015 before the right-wing Mauricio Macri administration slashed federal subsidies - forcing its eventual closure and later privatization.

A nationwide economic crisis led to the closure last year of the San Isidro sugar mill, founded in 1760 and the nation's oldest. The "Macrisis," as it's known in Argentina, led to Macri's defeat in elections on October 27.

At: https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&tab=wT&sl=auto&tl=en&u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.pagina12.com.ar%2F232131-ya-son-once-los-muertos-en-el-incendio-del-ingenio-la-espera

The La Esperanza sugar mill fire yesterday claimed at least 11 lives, and has jeopardized the roughly 200 jobs at the facility.

The union representing workers at the mill (SOEAILE) had denounced numerous safety flaws since its re-opening in July.

'Fleeing' tycoon is arrested at sea over journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia's murder

A business tycoon with ties to two Maltese cabinet members was arrested yesterday after armed forces intercepted and boarded his yacht in connection with the murder of the investigative journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia.

Prime Minister Joseph Muscat announced that Yorgen Fenech, 37, one of Malta’s most prominent businessmen, was a “person of interest” in the investigation into the car bombing in October 2017 that killed Caruana Galizia, an anti-corruption crusader.

Fenech was arrested shortly after his yacht, Gio, had left the Portomaso marina, five miles north of Valletta, the capital. It was understood to be heading for Italy.

Muscat is facing calls to resign because of Fenech’s ties to two of his cabinet members.

At: https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/daphne-caruana-galizia-fleeing-tycoon-is-arrested-at-sea-over-journalists-murder-dfjkbp9mr

Maltese businessman Yorgen Fenech, a person of interest in the 2017 car-comb murder of muck-raking journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia, and his yacht.

He was caught in the yacht trying to flee to Italy, where he presumably owns property.

Alberto Fernandez vows to send bill legalizing abortion to Argentine Congress

Argentine President-elect Alberto Fernández announced Sunday he will send a proposal to legalize abortion to Congress ‘as soon as possible’ once he takes office on December 10.

“We should respect the woman who feels she has the right to make decisions, like abortion, about her own body - as much as we do the woman who feels God doesn’t permit her to have an abortion,” Fernández said in an interview with the progressive Buenos Aires daily Página/12.

“I would like the debate to be not one between progressives and conservatives: It’s a problem of public health that we should resolve.”

A public health problem

Argentina's restrictive abortion laws date from 1921 - and its statutory exceptions for rape or to save the mother's life are often flouted by conservative judges and even doctors.

But despite the legal hurdles, over 300,000 abortions are performed annually - up to 50,000 of which result in dangerous complications, and, in 2017, in 30 deaths.

Bills legalizing abortion have been debated in Argentina's Congress eight times since 1983 - most recently last year, when a bill legalizing abortion on demand up to the 14th week was passed by the Lower House on June 14; but was defeated in the Senate on August 8, by 38 votes to 31.

Outgoing President Mauricio Macri, whom Fernández defeated amid the worst economic crisis in two decades, has long opposed abortion rights.

Macri's right-wing ‘Let's Change’ caucus in Congress mostly voted against the 2018 bill.

“Since 1983 I've been pointing out that punishing a woman for an abortion is barbarous,” Fernández said in a May interview when he began his presidential campaign.

“This is a serious public health problem - not a criminal matter.”

At: https://www.batimes.com.ar/news/argentina/law-to-decriminalise-abortion-will-go-to-congress-as-soon-as-possible-fernandez-says.phtml

Argentine President-elect Alberto Fernández appears with abortion rights activists at Thursday's presentation of Soy Belén (I am Belén) - a documentary about a young woman in the country's conservative northwest who spent nearly 3 years in prison for a miscarriage.

Abortion rights have sparked heated debate in this largely Catholic nation of 45 million. But to Fernández, a law professor, it should be a public health issue.

“To all those who object to abortion rights, my advice is simple: don't have one.”

Bolivia's self-proclaimed president, Jeanine Anez, tied to cocaine trafficking

Self-proclaimed President of Bolivia Jeanine Áñez, who took office two days after a violent coup forced President Evo Morales to resign, has been reported to have close family ties with at least one major drug trafficker.

Áñez's nephew, Carlos Andrés Añez, was arrested on October 16, 2017, with Calí Cartel associate Fabio Andrade Lima Lobo in the neighboring Brazilian state of Mato Grosso.

According to the police report they were in possession of no less than 480 kilos (1,058 lbs.) of pure cocaine - its street value estimated at over $60 million.

"The subject who has been apprehended infraganti with 480 kilos of drugs in Brazil is Mr. Carlos Andrés Añez Dorado, who is the nephew of Jeanine Añez Chávez, senator for the Democratic Unity party," Bolivian Interior Minister Carlos Romero confirmed at that time.

"So, in this case, we are talking about a family bond with a person in politics.”

Romero, like many Morales officials and lawmakers from Morales' left-wing MAS, was forced to seek refuge, and has been in the Argentine Embassy since the coup last Sunday.

Argentine President-elect Alberto Fernández, who helped negotiate President Morales' exit from Bolivia to Mexico on November 12, has called on outgoing President Mauricio Macri to extend political asylum to Romero or any other officials or lawmakers currently under threat.

At least 21 Bolivians have been killed since the coup amid massive demonstrations.

At: https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&tab=wT&sl=auto&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fkontrainfo.com%2Flos-vinculos-con-el-narcotrafico-de-la-autoproclamada-presidenta-de-bolivia-jeanine-anez%2F

Bolivia's self-proclaimed president, Jeanine Áñez, new nephew, Carlos Áñez, and the latter's partner, Calí Cartel associate Fabio Andrade, with part of the 480 kg of pure cocaine seized by Brazilian authorities in 2017.

Áñez - who became Bolivia's president over at least two others in the order of succession and without senate quorum - has been compared to the U.S. installation of Guillermo Endara as President of Panama in 1989.

Endara had served as director of a bank targeted by the FBI and DEA as a major laundering front for the Calí and Medellín cartels.

Like Áñez, Endara's partner had been arrested (in Georgia) for attempting to traffic half a ton of pure cocaine.

Following violent coup, right-wing Senator Jeanine Anez proclaims herself president of Bolivia

Two days after a violent coup against Bolivian President Evo Morales, Senator Jeanine Áñez proclaimed herself president of the crisis-wracked South American nation.

Áñez, 52, the third-ranking member of the Bolivian Senate, took office amid an irregular meeting of the upper house - which lacked the quorum necessary to call a session.

Senators belonging to Morales' Movement To Socialism (MAS), which until the coup held 25 of the 36 seats, did not attend - both to deny a quorum as well as out of fear for their safety.

Tanks have plied the streets of La Paz and other cities, homes of Morales officials have burned, and hundreds have been injured - including numerous disappearances and reports of torture - since Sunday's coup.

Morales denounced Áñez as "a pro-coup right-wing senator who calls herself president of the senate and then interim president of Bolivia without a legislative quorum, surrounded by a group of accomplices and coddled by the armed forces and the police that repress the people."

Morales, 60, who sought to transform Bolivia since 2006 as its first indigenous president, landed in Mexico this afternoon pledging to keep up his political fight after resigning in the wake of mass protests over the disputed October 20 election.

He called recent events in his country of 11 million as "the most artful and disastrous coup in history."

At: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/11/jeanine-anez-declares-bolivia-interim-president-191112233635201.html



Jeanine Áñez, right-wing senator self-proclaimed as Bolivia's president two days after a violent coup against President Evo Morales left the country without a head of state.

The new regime's true strongman, however, is said to be Luis "Macho" Camacho - the son of a natural gas baron with links to the country's violent white supremacist movement.

Camacho met with Ivanka Trump during her visit to neighboring Argentina in September.

Legendary journalist Bill Moyers says he fears for the nation for the first time in his life

Veteran journalist Bill Moyers said Sunday that for the first time “in my long life” — including the Depression and World War II — he fears for the nation’s survival.

A “society, a democracy, can die of too many lies — and we’re getting close to that terminal moment unless we reverse the obsession with lies that are being fed around the country,” Moyers told Brian Stelter on CNN.

Hope rests in citizens paying careful attention to the televised impeachment hearings beginning this week on Wednesday and Friday in the House, noted Moyers, 85, who served for two years as President Lyndon Johnson’s press secretary.

He has urged PBS to rebroadcast the hearings during prime time so that they more easily be seen by working people.

“Do facts matter anymore?” Moyers asked, referring to the impeachment investigation. “I think they do. I think they mattered in the Watergate hearings, in the Clinton hearings, and I think they’ll matter this time, too.”

At: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/bill-moyers-impeachment-cnn-survival_n_5dc8cd83e4b02bf579426375

Trump applauds; Ocasio-Cortez, Omar, and Sanders condemn coup in Bolivia

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Monday became the second U.S. lawmaker to condemn the resignation of Bolivia's socialist President Evo Morales as a "coup."

Morales was forced to resign Sunday under threat from the nation's military, police, and violent right-wing protestors.

The resignation followed Morales' announcement that he would hold new elections after the U.S.-dominated Organization of American States (OAS) questioned his October 20 victory.

Ocasio-Cortez, a freshman Democrat from New York, tweeted in both Spanish and English Monday afternoon: "What's happening right now in Bolivia isn't democracy, it's a coup."

Her comment echoed those of Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.):

"There's a word for the President of a country being pushed out by the military: It’s called a coup."

"We must unequivocally oppose political violence in Bolivia. Bolivians deserve free and fair elections."

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) also took to Twitter to express his concern "about what appears to be a coup in Bolivia."

"The U.S. must call for an end to violence and support Bolivia’s democratic institutions," Sanders added.

Just Foreign Policy responded by thanking Sanders, Ocasio-Cortez, and Omar "for standing up for Bolivian democracy."

President Donald Trump on Monday called Morales' resignation "a significant moment for democracy in the Western Hemisphere."

"Morales' departure preserves democracy and paves the way for the Bolivian people to have their voices heard."

Tanks have been seen in the streets of La Paz (Bolivia's capital), homes of Morales officials have burned, and hundreds have been injured - including numerous disappearances and reports of torture - since yesterday's coup.

Coup leader Luis "Macho" Camacho, 40 - a religious fundamentalist and the scion of a local natural gas baron - reportedly met with Ivanka Trump during her September 5 visit to neighboring Jujuy, Argentina.

At: https://www.commondreams.org/news/2019/11/11/ocasio-cortez-joins-chorus-critics-condemning-coup-bolivia-forced-out-socialist

Bolivian coup leader Luis "Macho" Camacho adresses the nation following his takeover yesterday of the presidential palace.

Amid the worst violence in the country since the 1980 Cocaine Coup, Bolivia remains without a formal head of state since President Evo Morales was ousted on Sunday as Camacho and right-wing senators jockey for power.

Camacho reportedly met with Ivanka Trump in neighboring Argentina during her September 5 visit.

Wild turkeys are terrorizing a town; MLB player calls on the New Jersey governor for help

Not even Todd Frazier and friends have been safe from the aggressive wild turkey population reportedly plaguing an adult community in New Jersey, according to the MLB all-star's tweets.

Residents of an Ocean County 55-and-up community are being attacked by the gaggle of up to 60 wild turkeys, according to reports this week.

Frazier, a Toms River, New Jersey, native, tweeted Sunday morning a photo of his black Jeep surrounded by birds, just a day after he tweeted complaining about all the recent fowl play in town.

"They are a big problem here," Frazier tweeted. "They have come close to harming my family and friends, ruined my cars, trashed my yard and much more..."

At: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/wild-turkeys-are-terrorizing-a-town-mlb-player-calls-on-the-new-jersey-governor-for-help/ar-BBWAIb7

Turkeys trash truck in Toms River, NJ.

While not the first time a New Jersey town has been afflicted by an overweight, aggressive turkey, residents are calling fowl.

Spain's Socialists win national election; right-wing Vox Party surges

Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez's Socialists won Spain's national election on Sunday but large gains by the upstart far-right Vox party appear certain to widen the political deadlock in the European Union's fifth-largest economy.

After a fourth national ballot in as many years and the second in less than seven months, the left-wing Socialists (PSOE) held on as the leading power in the national parliament.

With 99.9% of the votes counted, the Socialists captured 120 seats, down three seats from the last election in April and still far from the absolute majority of 176 needed to form a government alone.

The big political shift came as right-wing voters flocked to Vox. The far-right party led by Santiago Abascal, who speaks of "reconquering" Spain in terms that echo the medieval wars between Christian and Moorish forces, rocketed from 24 to 52 seats.

The conservative Popular Party rebounded from its previous debacle in the April vote to 88 seats from 66, a historic low. The far-left United We Can (Podemos), which had rejected an offer to help the Socialists form a left-wing government over the summer, lost some ground - from 42 to 35 seats.

Podemos leader Pablo Iglesias expressed more openness to reaching an agreement with the PSOE this time, stating that "if after the April elections a progressive coalition government was a historic opportunity, now it is a historical necessity."

Sunday's outcome means there will be no immediate end to the stalemate between forces on the right and the left in Spain, suggesting the country could go many more weeks or even months without a new government.

At: https://www.foxnews.com/world/spain-national-election-socialists-vox-party

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez celebrates Sunday's results, which keep his 17 month-old government in power - albeit with a slightly reduced margin.

But falling well short of the 176 seats for an absolute majority, his Socialist Party will need support from the left-wing Podemos as well as Basque parties to pass legislation.

Bolivian leader Evo Morales steps down

President Evo Morales, who came to power in Bolivia in 2006 as part of a leftist wave sweeping Latin America, resigned on Sunday after unrelenting protests by an infuriated population that accused him of undermining democracy by clinging to office.

Morales was once widely popular, and stayed in the presidency longer than any other current head of state in Latin America.

Morales, 60, was the first Indigenous president in a country that had been led by a tiny elite of European descent for centuries, and he shepherded Bolivia through an era of economic growth and shrinking inequality, winning support from Bolivians who saw him as their first true representative in the capital.

But his reluctance to give up power — first bending the country’s laws to stand for a fourth election, then insisting that he won despite widespread concerns about fraud — left him besieged by protests, abandoned by allies and unable to count on the police and the armed forces, which sided with the protesters and demanded he resign.

Carlos Mesa, the former president who came in second in the disputed election, has said that the country’s political parties should come together and organize a new vote.

At: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/10/world/americas/evo-morales-bolivia.html

Bolivian President Evo Morales (right) and Vice President Alvaro García Linera, both of whom resigned at 5:00 p.m. local time today.

Morales had conceded to calling new elections before today's military coup.