Argentinas

July 26 (UPI) — Brazil’s foreign ministry has summoned Argentina’s ambassador after inflammatory remarks delivered by Argentinian President Javier Milei about Brazilian counterpart Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva over the weekend.

Argentinian diplomat Julio Bitelli must go to Brasilia on Sunday or early Monday to meet with Brazilian leaders in wake of Milei’s harsh attacks on Lula during the national convention of Brazil’s Liberal Party, or PL, in São Paulo on Saturday, diplomatic sources told the O Globo newspaper.

Milei used his speech to denounce what he called the “tragedy of socialism” in Latin America, singling out the Lula and Minister Alexandre de Moraes of the Supreme Federal Court for intense criticism while praising PL presidential candidate Flavio Bolsonaro.

The Argentine leader hailed Bolsonaro as the only candidate who can stop Lula, saying that “there is no one else capable of stopping Lula” and his effect on the country or confronting criminal and drug trafficking organizations.

“Do not allow your future to be stolen. We are counting on you, Flavio, to stop this socialist garbage,” said Milei.

The Argentinian leader also slammed de Moraes for prohibiting him from visiting former president Jair Bolsonaro in a Brasilia prison where the ex-president is serving a 27-year prison sentence for leading a 2022 coup attempt against Lula.

“I was not allowed to visit my unjustly imprisoned friend,” said Milei, a declared ally of the Bolsonaro family.

Flavio Bolsonaro, son of the imprisoned former president, launched his formal bid challenging Lula at the PL convention, declaring, “This the beginning of the toughest battles of our life. A fight between good and evil.”

Reactions to Milei’s attacks reverberated throughout Brazil in Sunday.

Workers’ Party president Edinho Silva said the Argentine leader had crossed a line with the attacks.

“No public authority in Brazil is above criticism, as long as it is made in the appropriate manner and at the right time,” he said in a social media post. “However, it is unacceptable for a foreign head of state to come to our country and address its constitutional powers in disrespectful terms.”

It is no surprise that the current president of Argentina “behaves in this way,” he added. “After all, there are not a few recent situations in which he has shown himself not up to the office he holds.”

Brazilian Supreme Court President Luiz Edson Fachin, meanwhile, similarly pushed back, reaffirming the autonomy of the country’s judiciary.

So as Argentina prepares to face Spain in the World Cup final why is the team so white in comparison to its South American neighbours? Al Jazeera’s Rahul Pathak explains.

July 18 (UPI) — Brazil’s top court on Saturday denied a request from former President Jair Bolsonaro to be visited by Argentinian President Javier Milei while under house arrest.

The attempted visit by Milei, a political ally of the far-right Bolsonaro, was part of a campaign to drum up political support for the son of the former president, who is running against leftist President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.

Bolsonaro is serving a 27-year sentence for a coup attempt but has been in his home in Brasilia since March due to his health condition.

He was already barred from participating in national politics as part of his sentence.

But Bolsonaro was placed under further restrictions on Friday for breaching conditions of his house arrest, after he wrote a political letter supporting his son’s candidature for president.

The son, right-wing state Sen. Flavio Bolsonaro, then showed the endorsement letter during a live stream on social media.

Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes barred Bolsonaro from receiving any visits of a “political-electoral” nature until after Brazil’s general elections in October.

Bolsonaro’s defense lawyers argued in court he was unaware that his son would divulge his writing on social media, though the former president titled the text “letter to the Brazilian people.”

“The letter — written and personally signed by Jair Messias Bolsonaro — was addressed ‘to the Brazilian people,’ demonstrating that it was not of a private nature but rather intended for political and electoral purposes, with dissemination to the general public, using Flavio Nantes Bolsonaro as an intermediary, or in his own words, as his ‘spokesperson,'” Moraes wrote in his decision, G1 reported.

“The text of the ‘Letter to the Brazilian People,’ therefore, clearly shows that Jair Messias Bolsonaro intended to communicate with his political supporters through his son’s social media accounts,” the justice added.

Bolsonaro is now barred from receiving visits for 30 days, except by his medical and legal teams.

He is also not allowed to be visited by his son for 90 days.

New York City – It’s dubbed “Little Argentina”, but lifelong resident Christian Gimenez says much has changed in the neighbourhood he grew up in.

Once an epicentre of the Argentinian diaspora that settled in New York City, most relocating during the so-called “dirty war” of the 1970s, only a handful of Argentinian restaurants and bakeries remain as a foothold of what once was in the Elmhurst, Queens neighbourhood.

But when the FIFA World Cup comes around, the block swells with revellers, clad in white and sky blue. With Argentina heading to the final against Spain on Sunday in East Rutherford, New Jersey, just a few kilometres (miles) away, everything on the block – from the asphalt, to the benches, to the store fronts, and even the fire plugs – bears the iconic colours.

As a child, “everywhere you would go, it was Argentinian,” Gimenez, who owns Rio de la Plata Bakery and is among those who spearheaded the decorations, told Al Jazeera. “So what I do is try to keep it alive.”

To be sure, the 40-year-old is clear that the commitment to Argentina’s national team goes far beyond the monthlong tournament. The World Cup may come only once every four years, but the vaunting mural of Lionel Messi and Diego Maradona on the side of his bakery is a mainstay.

To many, it is a reminder of the generational significance of the country’s football tradition, one that has for decades been a glue for Argentinians in New York City, even as the community has dispersed.

Seventy-four-year-old Beatriz Jaime recounted watching Argentina’s 1978 routing of the Netherlands in a broadcast at Madison Square Garden, and returning to the neighbourhood soon after to find it “loaded with people” celebrating into the night.

“The thing is that the roots are here, and they’re in Argentina,” said Jaime, who grew up in Queens but now lives on Long Island.

“You never forget that. I get goosebumps.”

For Henry Pachaco, 45, who is also from Queens, fandom is a family affair. He stood clad in the national team jersey, his mother wearing a blue shirt with a single phrase, “Hand of God”, a reference to the infamous hand-ball goal scored by Maradona in the 1986 quarterfinal match against England.

Pachaco called the block “the centre” for Argentinian fans in the city, offering a stadium atmosphere on game day – complete with a closed street, music, an outdoor television, and street food – without the price tag.

For Argentina to be in the final, for Messi to possibly be playing in his last national team match, and for all of it to be happening on New York’s doorstep, he said, represents a convergence of worlds.

“It’s like bringing Argentina to New York … wherever you go, anywhere in the world, when Argentinians get together. That that same passion is equal, no matter what.

“You’re always gonna be accepted here and have the best time of your life,” he said.

Gimenez echoed the sentiment, while addressing several racist incidents from Argentinian fans that have tarnished La Albiceleste’s run in this World Cup and the last. He said that was not representative of the fan base.

“Whatever your race or whatever your ethnic background is, we don’t look into that,” he said.

“If you’re supporting us, we love you. Straight up, just like that.”

A new fandom grows in Brooklyn

It is a message that is likely to be well received a borough away, in the Kensington neighbourhood of Brooklyn, home to an rapid-growing Bangladeshi community that has earned the area the title “Little Bangladesh”.

NYC data shows the diaspora population has tripled in the last two decades, one of the fastest-growing groups in an ever-changing city. Last year, the community elected the first-ever Bangladeshi American to the NYC Council.

Shafiqul Alam, 66, who has lived in the neighbourhood for 36 years, said the area has transformed, bringing with it a passionate new base of support for Argentina’s national team.

On match days, large-screen televisions have been set up in pedestrian squares in the neighbourhood. If the weather turns, he said, it is not uncommon for people to crowd inside his shop to watch on his own television.

“Bangladeshi people love Argentina,” he said, “and Argentina loves Bangladesh.”

Many factors have coalesced to fuel support for Argentina within South Asia, and particularly Bangladesh, notably a newfound access to televisions in the 1980s, which aligned with the Maradona-led national team’s 1986 defeat of England.

The match held potent political significance for countries still grappling with the legacy of British colonialism. But for many younger fans, support comes down to one man: Messi.

“Knowing this could be Messi’s last match, everyone will want to watch,” said Sajid Bhuyan, 31, a resident of the neighbourhood.

He had trouble imagining that any less than 90 percent of the local Bangladeshi community in Kensington backed Argentina.

While the origin stories of their fandom may be different, Bhuyan felt the passion from Little Bangladesh to Little Argentina was the same.

He recounted a tournament that has repeatedly seen Argentina come back from the brink of defeat, most recently in a stunning turnaround in the semifinal against England.

“I almost died when Argentina scored the two goals in just minutes,” Bhuyan said. “I couldn’t breathe, I couldn’t talk, I had to take five or six minutes to calm down.

“So if it happens again,” he said, “we will enjoy!”

Argentina players held up a banner declaring ‘Las Malvinas son Argentinas’ after beating England to reach the World Cup final. The message refers to the disputed Falkland Islands, reviving the sovereignty dispute and raising questions over FIFA’s ban on political displays.

Jubilant fans leapt with joy in Buenos Aires after Argentina defeated England 2-1 in Wednesday’s World Cup semifinal match. The defending champions will take on Spain in Sunday’s final.

It seems a long time ago now, but go back to the day that Liverpool sealed the Premier League title under Arne Slot in 2025 and there is a lovely clip of Alexis Mac Allister.

As the final whistle goes and the players run on to the pitch to celebrate, Mac Allister sits alone on the bench and starts to cry.

That day, when the Argentina midfielder scored a goal the celebrations inside Anfield registered 1.74 on the Richter scale – just shy of the 2.0 needed for a minor earthquake.

Mac Allister was undeniably a force that season and integral to Liverpool‘s title-winning campaign.

But a year on, after a disappointing campaign that wasn’t helped by injury problems at the outset, Mac Allister would be the first to admit that the 2025-26 season fell below the standards he had set previously.

It was undoubtedly the poorest of his three campaigns since he arrived from Brighton for £35m in 2023.

Inevitably, there were question marks about his future going into the summer, but seeing him play a starring role for Argentina at the World Cup will please new Liverpool head coach Andoni Iraola – even if it means he will have to wait a little longer before meeting Mac Allister.

Bar Argentina’s last group-stage game – when qualification was already secured – the 27-year-old has played every minute for his country, including 120 minutes against both Cape Verde and Switzerland, which went to extra time. Only the keeper, Aston Villa‘s Emiliano Martinez, has played more minutes for Argentina.

Across those games, Mac Allister has played 539 minutes, won 31 duels, 10 tackles, made nine interceptions and applied high pressure 208 times – all numbers which put him high up in the rankings.

“I feel like maybe the number eight position, also double number six (double pivot), is my best position, but I can play anywhere,” Mac Allister told ESPN last month.

That versatility will be food for thought for Iraola – who is known to want his midfielders to be all action, given his high-press system and his desire for his teams to be direct.

Regardless of the result against England in Wednesday’s World Cup semi-final, Argentina will be in the United States until the weekend, when the third-place play-off and final take place.

According to Fifa regulations, players at the World Cup are entitled to at least three weeks off, so anyone who features this weekend will not return to their clubs until 10 August at the earliest, which is less than two weeks before the Premier League season begins.

So there is a strong chance that Mac Allister won’t be ready to start for the first few weeks of the season, but Iraola will know that when it comes to building his midfield, he already has a proven winner.

“It’s always about winning,” Mac Allister said on Saturday, after Argentina beat Switzerland in the quarter-final in a game in which he scored.

Mac Allister’s CV already contains a World Cup and a Copa America title, as well as a Premier League title. He is the only man to have 12 World Cup appearances to his name and have won all 12 of those games.

He is no stranger to big games now and perhaps Wednesday’s semi-final, when he will come up against England’s midfield, will give the clearest indication yet that he is still an asset on the biggest stage.

Was this the moment the footballing rivalry between the two sides really developed? Possibly. Probably.

The two teams met in the quarter-finals in a match Argentina, to this day, insist they were robbed in, claiming Geoff Hurst’s winning goal was offside.

That was just the tip of the iceberg when it came to controversy though, with Argentina captain Antonio Rattin sent off after just 33 minutes for two offences in the space of three minutes.

The first was for a trip on Bobby Charlton, the second was for continuing to argue with German referee Rudolf Kreitlein.

The match was delayed for almost eight minutes as Rattin refused to leave the pitch.

England held on, in an incredibly ill-tempered affair, with Three Lions boss Alf Ramsey describing the Argentine side as ‘animals’ and insisting that his players did not swap shirts.

England’s 1966 World Cup-winning defender George Cohen reflected on the match in the Guardian in 2009.

“Tackling is fine,” he said. “But it was some of the snidey things, the spitting and pulling the short hairs on your neck, pulling your ear. They were trying to intimidate us. The trouble was when they found out they weren’t going to get their way they fell into some of the worst excesses I’ve ever seen.

“I just consider it the greatest shame that they didn’t play the game they were capable of. We might even have got beaten but they just should have got on and shown what they could do.

“There was a lot of commotion in the tunnel after the game. Nobody was allowed out so we didn’t see it.”

The match is also believed to have led to the introduction of red and yellow cards, which were first used in the 1970 World Cup in Mexico. Previously, referees had to rely on verbal warnings.

Rattin, who represented Argentina from 1959 to 1969 and played at the 1962 and 1966 World Cups, died at the age of 89 on Saturday.

Marcelo Bielsa is widely revered as a pioneer of coaching, but his unconventional methods risk ruining Uruguay’s World Cup chances before the tournament has even begun, with rumours of dressing room unrest.

Nicknamed “El Loco”, which means madman, the 70-year-old’s bold, attacking approach has proved an inspiration to a younger generation of coaches, including Pep Guardiola and USA boss Mauricio Pochettino.

Yet, his famously demanding standards have often caused friction during a nomadic coaching career, and his stint in Uruguay has been no exception.

The Argentinian’s arrival initially generated huge excitement, which was fuelled by landmark victories over Brazil and Argentina in qualifying.

But they needed that flying start just to make it through after winning just three of their final 12 qualifiers.

The tipping point for many in the squad came at the Copa America in 2024.

Uruguay finished a creditable third, eliminating Brazil along the way, but Bielsa’s intensity during the monthlong tournament did not endear him to his players.

Luis Suarez hit out at Bielsa’s methods after retiring from international football months later, claiming he had reduced former Liverpool striker Darwin Nunez to tears at half-time of a 2-0 win over Argentina, such was the force of his criticism.

Bielsa accepted that after the former Barcelona striker’s backlash, his “authority was affected” with the rest of the dressing room.

Results have also regressed, with Bielsa stating he was “ashamed” by a 5-1 friendly defeat by the USA in November.

Now, as his third World Cup with a third different nation approaches, the question is whether Bielsa can win back the faith of his players for a country so used to punching above its weight on the world stage.

And there are doubts as to how his high-energy style will fare in the gruelling conditions of Miami and Guadalajara, where Uruguay will face Saudi Arabia, Cape Verde and Spain in Group F.

Pochettino hails Bielsa as a ‘genius’

Bielsa made his name winning three league titles in Argentina with Newell’s Old Boys, where the stadium now bears his name, and Velez Sarsfield.

“For me, he’s a person I will always admire,” said Pochettino, whom Bielsa recruited for Newell’s as a 13-year-old.

“He’s a genius. A person with charisma and a personality very different from us, normal coaches, and that’s what makes him special.”

Bielsa’s sides in Bilbao with Athletic Club, where he reached the Europa League and Copa del Rey finals in 2011-12, and Marseille, where he led Ligue 1 at the halfway stage in 2014-15, were also admired but ended up empty-handed as their energy ran out.

In Leeds, murals still bear Bielsa’s face, four years on from his departure, after he led a sleeping giant of English football back to the Premier League for the first time in 16 years in 2020.

His time there ended in familiar fashion with an exhausted squad that was relegated to the second tier the season after he departed.

Yet, the esteem with which he is held for his daring tactical approach endures.

“To be loved is this biggest title, bigger than the Champions League or Premier League or whatever,” said Guardiola, who went to visit Bielsa in Argentina before setting out as a coach at Barcelona.

“To be loved is the most important thing, and I think Marcelo has that more than any other manager in the world.”

Bielsa, who oversaw Argentina’s group-stage elimination in 2002 and Chile’s round-of-16 loss to hosts Brazil in 2014, has already hinted ‌that he may not remain as manager ⁠of Uruguay beyond ⁠July, saying his job with the team ends with the World Cup.

“Our job ends with the World Cup,” ⁠Bielsa said at an event organised by the Uruguayan Football Association last Friday.

Although he did not elaborate on his remarks, local media reported ⁠that the Argentinian will not continue once his current contract expires at the end of the June 11-July 19 tournament.

“It is a miracle in any ‌professional’s sporting career to take part in the World Cup,” he said. “I will be forever grateful to Uruguay for allowing me to enjoy a competition like the World Cup.”

On one of her previous visits to Los Angeles, Argentine filmmaker Lucrecia Martel found herself having a smoke on Hollywood Boulevard.

There, while she stepped over the famous concrete-embedded stars, an unhoused man struck up a conversation with her.

“He kept explaining to me that he was poorly dressed because he was currently living on the street after someone robbed him, but he had written a screenplay,” Martel, 59, recalls in Spanish over coffee on a morning in April at a West Hollywood hotel.

“He told me they had stolen a watch from him — not a Rolex but a known brand,” she continues. “The whole time he was trying to convince me he was a millionaire who just so happened to be on the street because of random circumstances.”

One of Latin America’s most indispensable storytellers, Martel is fascinated by how prevalent that dream still is in L.A. — that movies can change your life overnight.

“That particular fantasy is par for the course in this city,” she says, though she’s not above it. It’s the reason she’s back to promote her first documentary, “Our Land,” out Friday.

Unhurried when it comes to her output, Martel has only made four fiction features, among them 2001’s “La Cienaga” and 2008’s “The Headless Woman” (returning to theaters this month in a new 4K restoration). Her biting and formally audacious narratives examine class, politics and — a speciality — the interiority of women through enigmatic portraits of psychologically complex individuals.

“Our Land,” a piercing indictment of the enduring wounds of colonialism, chronicles the murder of Indigenous Argentine activist Javier Chocobar in 2009 and the prolonged trial of the perpetrators in 2018.

Chocobar was shot during a confrontation with armed men over land in the Tucumán province of Argentina where the Chuschagasta Indigenous community has lived for many generations. Martel explores the killing not as an isolated event in her country’s recent past but as part of a long history of dispossession.

“Racism is a foundational element,” she says of her homeland. “The only consistent thing in Argentina, from the country’s birth to the present day, is the rejection of Indigenous people.”

In Argentina, Martel explains, public education has indoctrinated the population into believing Indigenous people no longer exist. Yet many Argentines proudly claim a connection to the Europeans, Italians in particular, who arrived in the country in the late 1800s and early 1900s.

“When giving speeches, our presidents always say, ‘We are a country of immigrants,’ or ‘We came from the boats,’” says Martel. “They use metaphors like these because deep down Argentines feel much more indebted to European immigration than to our Indigenous population. But more than half of the people in Argentina have Indigenous ancestors.”

In 2020, Chocobar’s three convicted murderers appealed their guilty verdicts and were set free. “Our Land” premiered at the Venice Film Festival in September 2025, which brought renewed attention to the case. A month later, the sentence was upheld and two of the men returned to prison (one died in the interim).

Martel believes that outcome was a response to her film. “Communities wage the fight but cinema helps,” she says.

“I believe that we must use cinema for its enormous power to alter perception and not soothe the rich,” Martel says. “It’s not about delivering a message but rather about showing how an idea functions.”

(Jason Armond / Los Angeles Times)

For over 14 years, Martel worked on “Our Land” on and off. This time included periods when she focused on 2017’s “Zama,” her masterful period piece following a Spanish official in 18th century Argentina “who doesn’t want to be American,” she says, referring to the continent. In her mind, both “Zama” and “Our Land” come from the same impulse to dissect colonialism.

As part of her research process, Martel and her team created a detailed archive of documents related to the case that the Chuschagasta community now has at its disposal. Over the years, Delfín Cata, one of the Indigenous men present during the attack, would call Martel. He never asked about how her film was going, but the director sensed he was tacitly checking in on her progress, hoping that she was not losing faith.

“That was a confirmation that, beyond my own interest, there were people who needed this film,” she says. “I felt the immense satisfaction of knowing I was doing something that would be concretely useful.”

For Martel, the question of whether she was the right person to make this film (one she got in Venice) seems unfair. “It’s wrong to prevent a human being from speaking about their own history because they are not a woman, because they are not Black, or because they are not Indigenous,” she says. “It’s better to make mistakes trying to understand something than not to try at all. The chances of making a mistake are enormous in a film, no matter how good your intentions are.”

A key piece of evidence in the Chocobar case, prominent in the film, is a video that one of the attackers filmed, presumably expecting the Indigenous community to react violently, to justify firing his gun at them. The Chuschagasta men that faced them weren’t armed. As used by their aggressors, the camera functioned as a weapon.

Hollywood feels incompatible with Martel’s sophisticated, confrontational movies rooted in her country’s troubles. By Martel’s own admission, it doesn’t feel like a fit for her.

“I would have to force myself to create something outside my own country, outside my own language,” she says. “And that doesn’t really appeal to me.”

Still, Marvel Studios famously asked to meet with her when seeking a director for 2021’s “Black Widow.” Martel says she was among many directors they contacted, but she was curious to take the meeting even if she knew nothing would come of it.

“They wanted to do it over Zoom and I happened to be here in Los Angeles,” she remembers. “I told them I could come in, because I wanted to see what the whole process was like.”

Martel describes the month she spent in L.A. — an eye injury prevented her from flying home sooner — as a “lot of fun in the end,” even if no blockbuster emerged from it. More recently, another Hollywood offer did tempt her, but she ultimately passed.

“It was a good book suggested to me by an actress of undoubted talent,” Martel shares, careful to avoid names. “I considered it, but you very quickly have to picture yourself spending three years or at least a year and a half living in the United States making a movie. I have a thousand things in Argentina to worry about.”

Still, Hollywood, and its significance to moviemaking, has a singular, unnerving allure on her. Two of Martel’s favorite movies set in L.A. are David Lynch’s nightmarish “Mulholland Drive” and Robert Aldrich’s psychodrama “What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?”

“There is something ruthless and utterly devoid of sanity at the heart of this film industry, and I’ve never felt that darkness as clear as in ‘Mulholland Drive,’” she says. “How can an industry that handles so many millions [of dollars] and such impeccably dressed famous people be so full of lunatics? That film captures that perfectly.”

And occasionally, she thinks, a big production breaks the mold, such as Todd Phillips’ “Joker,” which won the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival in 2019 when Martel served as jury president — a controversial choice.

“It certainly had an impact on me,” says Martel. “I didn’t vote for it, though. I had another favorite, a Chinese film that stood no chance of winning.”

Phillips, she thinks, created a premonition for what was to come. “For me, the real killer clowns are Trump, Milei or Orbán,” Martel says, referring to polarizing leaders. “They expose themselves to ridicule and spout all sorts of nonsense. Those are clowns. And I think that movie captured that.”

Not one to mince words, Martel elaborates on the relation of Joaquin Phoenix’s social outcast turned supervillain and President Trump.

“The origin of the Joker is social resentment,” she says. “Trump holds no resentment toward society because the system gave him everything. But he has exploited the people who do harbor resentment. That is where you see the kind of clown he is, one who knows how to use people.”

Artificial intelligence, far-right ideologies, voracious capitalism — all of it makes Martel alarmed, seeing it as pushing us collectively to the brink of collapse. But there is hope, she thinks.

“What we have invented is very dangerous but we can dismantle it,” she says. “That is the only thing I’m betting on, that, at some point, a consensus will emerge and we’ll go, ‘Let’s not do this.’”

“I believe that we must use cinema for its enormous power to alter perception and not soothe the rich,” she says. “It’s not about delivering a message but rather about showing how an idea functions.”

She points to one of her subjects in “Our Land,” an Indigenous man who told her he loves the 1959 Charlton Heston epic “Ben-Hur,” a passion she does not share but understands.

“That’s a blow for all of us who make auteur cinema,” Martel says with a laugh. “That feeling that ‘Ben-Hur’ evoked gave him the strength to continue fighting for his community’s territory.”

The night before our interview, Martel rode around L.A. on a scooter holding onto a friend. These days she uses a cane to help her with mobility. “The city has great light,” she says, still open to being surprised by it.