Bishop Rolando Alvarez refused to leave Nicaragua last week along with 222 other political prisoners. Since then, the regime has sentenced him to 26 years and four months in prison, and stripped him of his Nicaraguan nationality. The Pope, notes La Prensa“ spoke out this Sunday in his favor “, asking the leaders of the country that they ” open their hearts to truth and justice “. Conviction of the sentence also, underlines the newspaper, “ by the Latin American Episcopal Council and the Episcopal Conferences of Spain, Chile, Argentina and Costa Rica “.
While in the United States, tells Confidential, during a ” mass full of emotion celebrated Saturday in Maryland, priests exiled by the regime of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo asked to continue to pray for the bishop and Nicaragua. La Prensa interviewed José Antonio Canales, bishop in Honduras, who was, the newspaper specifies, a lawyer before becoming a priest. He claims that Monsignor Rolando Alvarez had already received other offers from the authorities to leave the country, all of which he had refused. He speaks of a crime factory put in place by the government to explain the prison sentence.
This sentence of 26 years and four months does not, according to Confidentialthat reflect ” impotence by President Ortega. In an editorial, the newspaper states that ” the day they imprisoned Monsignor Rolando Alvarez, they brought an additional stone to the construction of a new icon of the fight against the dictatorship, contrary to the pusillanimous attitude of the episcopal conference from Nicaragua. In fact, says the columnist, ” nothing that President Ortega was looking for in exiling the prisoners happened » : “if he wanted to get rid of international pressure, today it is multiplied by 222; if he wanted to make them stateless, the decision of the Spanish government gives them a new refuge; if he wanted to give an image of power in front of his people, he stays with that of a family business that only improvises “.
► To read also: Nicaragua: Bishop Rolando Alvarez sentenced to 26 years in prison for refusing forced exile
Four objects shot down in nine days
In the United States, we never stop shooting down objects in the sky: four in nine days, recalls the washington post – the first was the Chinese ball. On Friday a new object was spotted and shot down over Alaska, same thing on Saturday over the Yukon in Canada, finally on Sunday a last object was spotted over Lake Huron still in Canada: “ American and Canadian fighter planes were sent to the scene, and the object was shot down by an American plane, in American territory in Montana, says the Globe and MayI, A ” deed “unequivocally supported“ by Canada, wrote on Twitter its Minister of Defense “. According to the Americans, the object obviously fell in Canadian waters, it is now a question of recovering it to study it.
Why were these objects shot down much faster than the Chinese balloon? The last ball, explains the New York Times, only flew at 20,000 feet, and presented a potential hazard to civil aviation. And while there was a possibility that the debris from the Chinese balloon hit people on the ground, the other objects were shot over water or very sparsely populated areas. Another question: why suddenly so many objects in the sky? For ten days, explains USA Today, the military recalibrated their radars to take into account smaller objects. And then write it down New York Timesif the Americans detect more incursions, it is because from the Chinese balloon, they are looking for them.
► To read also: United States: the “spy” balloon would come from a Chinese company close to the army
In Haiti, gang atrocities in the Brooklyn neighborhood
The UN investigated gang atrocities in the Brooklyn area, Cité Soleil neighborhood of Port-au-Prince, Haiti. Informations ” that send shivers down your spine “, writing Le Nouvelliste : “ between July 8 and December 31, 2022, in this neighborhood alone which was particularly targeted, at least 552 people were killed, injured or disappeared “, can we read in this report. : ” To this is in addition to the gang rapes of dozens of women and young girls, and the displacement of several hundred people, some of whom have seen their homes destroyed or looted. “.
The report speaks of the use of snipers », the movement of inhabitants voluntarily restricted, access to essential goods blocked, all of which favors the spread of infectious diseases. The UN notes that the Haitian National Police intervened only in a limited way, and that there is ” need to immediately strengthen the capacities of the PNH with coordinated international support “.
► To listen also: Journal of Haiti and the Americas