Conditions at Tijuana camp elicit warnings
Aid workers and humanitarian organizations expressed concerns Thursday about the unsanitary conditions at the sports complex in Tijuana, Mexico, where more than 6,000 Central American migrants are packed into a space adequate for half that many people and where lice infestations and respiratory infections are rampant.
As a chill rain fell, the dust that coated everyone and everything in the openair stadium turned to mud Thursday, making the already miserable conditions worse. On one side of the complex, a mud pit grew where people took outdoor showers next to a line of foulsmelling portable toilets.
The one large weddingstyle tent pitched in the middle of a sports field and several smaller ones with a capacity for just a few hundred people were far from adequate for the swelling number of migrants who keep arriving daily. The vast majority of the migrants were camped in makeshift enclosures made of lashed blankets and sheets of plastic or flimsy tents. Another 200 people slept on sidewalks because they couldn’t find space in the complex or decided it was more comfortable outside.
The United Nations children’s agency, UNICEF, said it was “deeply concerned” for the well-being of more than 1,000 migrant children waiting in Tijuana or still moving north through Mexico. According to local officials, of the more than 6,150 migrants at the shelter as of Wednesday, 1,068 were children.
Trade deal to be signed
The U.S., Canada and Mexico are set to sign their new trade deal Friday following a year of intense negotiations to revamp the continent’s free trade zone — and after President Donald Trump’s threats to kill it.
The countries are expected to ink the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement in Buenos Aires at the start of the Group of 20 summit, three officials familiar with the plans said, speaking on condition of anonymity. It’s unclear, though, if the heads of state will sign the document or cabinet-level officials, and Canadian officials said those arrangements are still being finalized.
Putting pen to paper would bring some certainty at a time of unease over global trade tensions, and be held up as an example of Trump-era deals as he prepares to meet China’s Xi Jinping at the G-20. The world’s two biggest economies are embroiled in an escalating trade war.
Iranian hackers charged
The federal charges against two Iranians for hacking into critical targets such as U.S. hospitals and cities are a step forward in the Justice Department’s prosecution of ransomware attacks. But the indictment unsealed Wednesday also highlights just how hard it is to hold cybercriminals accountable.
The Justice Department alleges the hackers wrote their own sophisticated ransomware, which encrypts data to lock victims out of their own computer files until they pay up, and used it on more than 200 victims, including major cities such as Atlanta and Newark, N.J. The department said Faramarz Shahi Savandi, 34, and Mohammad Mehdi Shah Mansouri, 27, collected over $6 million in ransom payments and caused over $30 million in losses to their victims.