ICC urged to probe Morales:
The chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court said that Bolivia has asked her to investigate whether former president Evo Morales and his supporters committed crimes against humanity by setting up roadblocks aimed at preventing people in one of Latin America’s poorest nations from accessing vital health care during the coronavirus pandemic.
In a written referral to the court filed last Friday, Bolivia argues that Morales and his top supporters incited blockades in August that had “the direct consequence of causing the death of several people and anxiety in the rest of the population” about not being able to access health care and medical oxygen, the court said in a statement.
The request by Bolivia comes amid unrest that erupted after Bolivia’s Supreme Electoral Tribunal postponed elections from Sept. 6 to Oct. 18 following warnings from medical experts that it would be unsafe to hold the election while the pandemic wasn’t yet under control. It was the third time the vote has been delayed, angering protesters who accuse the government of interim President Jeanine Áñez of simply trying to cling to power.
After 14 years in power, Morales resigned under pressure from the military and police on Nov. 10 amid widespread protests and disturbances alleging he was attempting to fraudulently claim reelection. He went into exile, first in Mexico and later in Argentina.
Morales was the country’s first Indigenous president and remains a powerful influence in the country. His party, the Movement Toward Socialism, controls the congress. (AP)
Mexican reporter slain:
A newspaper reporter in Mexico’s Gulf coast state of Veracruz was murdered and decapitated, his paper reported Wednesday.
The newspaper El Mundo in the city of Cordoba said the body of reporter Julio Valdivia was found near his motorcycle on railroad tracks in the town of Motzorongo.
Valdivia, who covered a rural zone near the border with Oaxaca state that has long been plagued by gang violence, was at least the sixth journalist to be killed in Mexico this year.
The Committee to Protect Journalists condemned the “terrible events” and issued an “urgent call” for authorities to identify those responsible.
In August, an independent journalist died in police custody in a Mexican border city. Juan Nelcio Espinoza had been arrested while covering a confrontation in the city of Piedras Negras, across from Eagle Pass, Texas. (AP)