Latin America

Faecal bacteria are contaminating water in wells and sinkholes in Mexico’s Yucatan state, which are a vital source of drinking water, according to a report by Greenpeace, a global environmental organisation.

The report, published on Tuesday, said nearby pig farms and municipal wastewater were likely sources of the pollution in the southeastern coastal state.

“A range of chemical and microbiological indicators reveal a complex mosaic of severe, localised organic pollution,” it said.

Greenpeace called for an immediate moratorium on new industrial livestock operations and farm expansions in the peninsular state, which was once home to the ancient Maya civilisation.

With no above-ground rivers, groundwater is the Yucatan’s only freshwater source, and the area’s porous limestone bedrock lets pollutants quickly seep into the aquifer.

Laboratory results

The global environmental watchdog group commissioned an independent laboratory to test water at 17 sites near the state capital, Merida, in August.

The sites included household and farm wells, community water points and cenotes, the natural sinkholes that dot the Yucatan Peninsula, which is one of Mexico’s most popular tourist destinations.

According to the report, every sample showed some degree of contamination likely linked to faecal waste, and several sites appeared heavily polluted. Total coliform bacteria reached the test’s upper limit in 16 of 17 samples, and faecal coliforms did so in 13.

However, the tests cannot show whether the waste came from people or animals, and leaking septic tanks and municipal sewage may also contribute to contamination.

Greenpeace said, however, that separate testing using Pig2Bac, a pig-specific DNA marker method, detected pig faecal matter in samples analysed at laboratories at Johns Hopkins University in the US and Mexico’s National Autonomous University (UNAM).

Greenpeace said the results raise “critical accountability questions” about nearby pig farms.

Maya communities joined Greenpeace in demanding action from environmental authorities over the contamination.

Industrial pig farms

A UN report published in July found that there are more than 500 industrial pig farms across Yucatan state with more than 50,000 animals, many located near the lands and territories of Indigenous Peoples.

Marcos Orellana, a former UN special rapporteur who authored the report, said waste and chemicals from industrial farms “find their way very quickly” into the water communities use for bathing, cooking and drinking. He said most farms lack required permits and that regional government initiatives “remain insufficient”.

“The contamination of the waters that have sustained Mayan culture for millennia is predominantly coming from the industrial operations of the growth of animals,” Orellana said.

But Antonio Zumarraga, vice president of the Yucatan Citizen Scientific Water Observatory, defended the local pork industry, saying the sector has invested in water treatment and supports conservation programmes. He blamed local authorities for their inaction.

“It’s an issue that, as long as it doesn’t carry political weight for the government, they won’t do anything about it,” Zumarraga said.

The Yucatan state government was not available for comment, while Mexico’s national water commission, CONAGUA, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Merida’s Association of Pig Farmers also did not respond to a Reuters request for comment.

The top 1 percent in Peru captured 42 percent of all new wealth generated between 2019 and 2025, an analysis by the nonprofit group Oxfam has found.

The report, released on Tuesday, highlights growing inequality in the South American country and raises questions about how the government is addressing deepening social divisions.

“Economic inequality in Peru has remained stubbornly high for decades. And when people feel that the same people always win, that nothing changes and nothing can change, inequality starts to look less like an injustice and more like the natural order of things,” said Alejandra Alayza, the executive director of Oxfam in Peru.

“That is a dangerous kind of fatalism, and we must tear it down.”

The nonprofit told Al Jazeera in an email that the 42 percent figure represents an increase from the 2000 to 2019 period, when the top 1 percent captured about 39 percent of all new wealth.

Just 1.4 percent of new wealth from 2019 to 2025 went to the poorest 50 percent of the country’s population, according to the group.

Experts warn the trend bodes poorly for public faith in government and democratic institutions.

Oxfam worked with the Institute for Peruvian Studies, a think tank in Lima, to publish a report this month on Peruvians’ perceptions of inequality in their country.

The groups found that 84 percent of Peruvians believed their country is governed by powerful interests that shape politics to their benefit. More than 75 percent also said that wealthy corporations and individuals avoid paying their fair share of taxes.

The survey also suggested that public opinion was in favour of action to address the issue.

About 70 percent of respondents said they want the government to do more to reduce inequality, which a majority felt had limited access to services such as healthcare, employment, education and justice.

“The undeniable scale of public support for action to reduce inequality leaves no room for complacency,” Alayza said.

“Inequality is not a force of nature; it is made by political choices. And different choices can build a different Peru.”

Political instability

Peru’s rising inequality has been accompanied by a period of political turmoil, particularly in the presidential palace.

A stream of probes, scandals and impeachments has led to Peru being governed by nine presidents in the last 10 years.

The latest, right-wing President Keiko Fujimori, was sworn into office in July after a narrow race that saw voting delays and heated recriminations among the leading candidates.

Experts believe powerful interests have found opportunity amid the political tumult.

“It’s sort of a paradox. How can you have such a rotation among elites but still have a relatively narrow political-criminal-business elite that holds a lot of power? I think both things are true in Peru,” Will Freeman, a fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, a US-based think tank, told Al Jazeera.

Part of the political upheaval has come from clashes between the presidency and Peru’s powerful Congress, which has the power to impeach executive leaders on the basis of “moral incapacity”, an ambiguous term.

The repeated leadership shakeups have weakened Peru’s democracy, according to analysts.

In December 2022, for instance, then-President Pedro Castillo announced that he would illegally dissolve Congress in response to repeated attempts to impeach him.

His subsequent removal and arrest prompted widespread protests. The government of Castillo’s successor, Dina Boluarte, implemented a months-long crackdown on the demonstrations that rights groups say included widespread abuses for which there has been little accountability.

In the years since, the Peruvian government has also taken steps to weaken judicial oversight and hollow out anticorruption watchdogs.

The nonprofit Freedom House, which measures political freedom in countries around the world, ranked Peru as “free” in 2022. But its ranking dropped the following year to “partly free”, in light of the deadly clashes between security forces and protesters.

In its 2026 report, Freedom House maintained that Peru was only “partly free”, citing in part the denial of full political rights to certain groups, including Indigenous peoples.

“High-profile corruption scandals have eroded public trust in government, and the weakening of judicial independence has impacted the country’s governing bodies,” the nonprofit said.

Powerful interests, both licit and illicit, have taken advantage of those changes.

“The groups themselves are unstable and fluid,” said Freeman. “And yet, I think Peruvians are right to conclude that, generally, they are wielding outsized influence in defence of their own commercial interests or political power rather [than] in service of some kind of general welfare.”

Cuba is once again in the United States’s crosshairs. Washington’s operation in Venezuela at the start of the year is largely seen to have paved the way for a similar undertaking on the Caribbean island. Recent media reports have revealed US military activity nearby while US officials have repeatedly said they want “Cuba to be free”.

When and how the US may strike is still unclear. But indications are that the Cuban Revolution may be nearing its end. That is reason enough to pause and reflect on the outsized role this nation of 10 million has played on the world stage.

When thinking of the Cuban presence on the global geopolitical scene, the figure of Eshu, the most powerful spirit in Cuban Santeria comes to mind. Derived from the beliefs of the Yoruba people, Eshu is a divine messenger, the guardian of the crossroads and mediator between the past and the future.

In stories, Eshu is often portrayed as a mischievous elder, one whose antics are used to teach humility and morality. As a character, Eshu is a classic trickster, an archetype commonplace to many traditions that functions to challenge established norms, subvert power structures and reveal hidden truths.

It’s hard to imagine a more apt analogy for Cuba than Eshu, the trickster, foil to US hegemony. At its best, trickster Cuba forced an open debate on what kind of world we might aspire to and held the empire to account, at times even pushing the US towards its better angels, however begrudgingly. At its worst, it held up an uncomfortable mirror to US power.

It is a potent formula, one struck upon from the very earliest days of the revolution. In September 1960, just a year after taking Havana, Cuban leader Fidel Castro found himself visiting New York to address the United Nations General Assembly. Wary of his anti-imperialist rhetoric, a Cold War-obsessed US government put pressure on several prominent hotels to refuse service to Castro and his entourage. But the Cubans were not to be deterred. Instead, they went uptown to Harlem and found a place at the Hotel Theresa.

Photographers and TV camera people flocked there. A media sensation ensued. And Castro used the opportunity to draw comparisons between the plight of the Cuban delegation and that of Black Americans being refused service in the segregated South.

This landed like a bomb in the middle of the burgeoning civil rights movement. It was an awkward contrast, not just because of the optics but because of the location, not in the heart of Jim Crow, but in a liberal northern city, New York, the cradle of American civilisation. This was the first, but not the last time that Cuba, the trickster, would strike.

In the following years, the revolutionary government developed its programme of Cuban Internationalism, which inevitably stood as a counter to US soft power efforts in the developing world through organisations like the Peace Corps and USAID.

Cuba would send as many as  400,000 doctors, not to mention engineers, agricultural technicians and other professionals, to 164 countries across the world. This material solidarity garnered great affection for Cuba among many countries in the Global South, countries as disparate as Venezuela, South Africa and Vietnam, where characters like Castro and Che Guevara are as recognisable as national heroes like Simon Bolivar, Nelson Mandela and Ho Chi Minh. In these same countries, American leaders are remembered too, often in far less flattering terms.

Other examples of Cuba’s trickster antics abound. Perhaps most notable is the Cuban armed forces’ sound military defeat of the Bay of Pigs invasion, which, while carried out by Cuban exiles, was supported and funded directly by the CIA.

There is also the revolution’s support for the Palestinian liberation movement and the antiapartheid struggle even as the US provided diplomatic cover and military aid to Israel and the apartheid regime in South Africa.

From 1975 to 1991, more than 300,000 Cuban soldiers fought alongside forces in Angola, eventually emerging victorious in a proxy conflict with the US. Operation Carlota, as it was called, would not only liberate Angola and neighbouring Namibia, but it would precipitate the downfall of South African apartheid as well. According to former South African President Nelson Mandela, Cuba’s intervention in Angola “destroyed the myth of the invincibility of the white oppressor”.

Castro himself has carried the spirit of Eshu. The Cuban leader reportedly survived more than 600 assassination attempts and died of natural causes at the age of 90.

And there are the many ways that Cuba has defied the “third world” label so often foisted upon it by beating the US in literacy rates, infant mortality and life expectancy at various points in its revolutionary history.

But beyond all of this, there is the sheer fact of the revolution’s survival. For more than 60 years, the US has imposed a severe economic embargo against the island. The embargo – the world’s longest – has been intensified at various points, specifically after the fall of the Soviet Union as Cuba reeled from a profound economic crisis.

Despite this regime of maximum pressure from the world’s largest superpower, the revolution nevertheless persevered through the crisis of the 1990s by diversifying  and liberalising the economy and by drawing upon its well-established programme of internationalism in the Global South. Not only that, but it managed a nationwide sustainable agricultural revolution in the process, a feat for any nation, but perhaps unsurprising for Cuba, given its trickster nature.

But tricksters also work in unexpected, even contradictory ways. Despite these accomplishments, the denial of political rights and the repression of the freedoms of expression and assembly have been the Cuban Revolution’s greatest failings.

Speech is not free in Cuba. Access to information and the internet is heavily restricted, and recent popular protests have been violently extinguished.

Such dynamics have long been pointed to by detractors as evidence of Cuba’s inherent authoritarian nature. But in this regard, Cuba is not the US’s opposite, but rather its peer.

The US in 2026 is a country facing its own rash of unfreedoms: comical levels of corruption; the erosion of democratic institutions; the embrace of AI and the panopticon surveillance it enables; continual attacks on free speech, voting rights and the media; extrajudicial killings of US citizens by masked agents of the state; and an increasingly monarchical presidency. All of which is to say nothing about the spectre of the infamous detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, still home to 15 detainees from the “global war on terror”, raised once more in relation to President Donald Trump’s brutal immigration crackdown.

One cannot help but be struck by the ways that the Trump administration appears to emulate countries like Cuba or Russia or Iran that it rhetorically maligns.

But in this way, Cuba carries on in its role as the foil to American power. In its repression, it reflects the creeping authoritarian inclinations that characterise the Trump administration. Tricksters, after all, are themselves morally ambiguous. And if the greatest flaw of the US has always been that it fails consistently to live up to its most laudable ideals, then in this sense, it is no different to Cuba and its revolution.

With the US poised and ready and with the conditions in Cuba deteriorating rapidly, we may be witnessing the final days of the revolution. That begs the question: When the day comes that Eshu no longer guards the crossroads, what then? What becomes of the world when there is nothing but unquestioned empires and techno-feudal overlords? Without tricksters to confound their power, will we revert to the revanchist past or tumble into some kind of dystopian future?

If and when the revolution finally falls, there will no doubt be cheering on the streets of Miami. But there will be tears elsewhere – tears not just for the revolution, but for the alternative that it represented, however flawed. Perhaps if the US had listened more or differently, they would have heard the lesson that Eshu was trying to teach.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial stance.

Brazil’s President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and right-wing Senator Flavio Bolsonaro fired off a barrage of personal attacks during their first debate a week before a tight presidential run-off.

In a chaotic exchange on Sunday, the two men called each other “liar” multiple times, accused each other of corruption, dragged up various scandals, and clashed on issues from public security to healthcare.

Lula said Bolsonaro was “a habitual liar” and a “thug”, and physically distanced himself on stage from the candidate he called a “militiaman”, alluding to his alleged ties to Rio de Janeiro’s paramilitary groups.

Bolsonaro, who led the first-round election with 47 percent to Lula’s 45 percent, said it was better to keep Lula at a distance “because my wallet could be stolen”.

Throughout the debate, Bolsonaro, 45, the son of former President Jair Bolsonaro, paced behind Lula, shaking his head, smirking and scoffing as his adversary spoke.

The 80-year-old Lula, who is seeking a fourth term, demanded an explanation regarding a corruption investigation involving the older Bolsonaro, a question his opponent dodged.

The younger Bolsonaro responded by calling Lula a “clown”, and then parried by bringing up a potential corruption case involving one of the president’s sons.

Jair Bolsonaro has been under house arrest while serving a 27-year sentence connected to efforts to overturn the 2022 election, which he lost to Lula.

Cost of living, public spending in focus

Flavio Bolsonaro hammered away at the top concerns of Brazilians, such as the cost of living and crime, and accused Lula of “reckless spending” to get re-elected, referring to various social measures the president has announced during the campaign.

Lula countered by asking Bolsonaro about his plans to emulate the drastic public spending cuts implemented by Argentina’s right-wing president, Javier Milei.

Bolsonaro dodged the question throughout the debate and pivoted to different topics.

When his father’s handling of the COVID-19 pandemic came up, Bolsonaro admitted that this “wasn’t an area where we saw the best results during Bolsonaro’s presidency. I’ll offer a mea culpa here.”

Lula also sought to portray his opponent as out of touch with poor Brazilians, saying Bolsonaro had never used the country’s public healthcare system or taken a bus.

“My opponent only knows about buses from books. He has never even stepped foot on one. He has no idea what the world of work is like,” Lula said.

Voters show their colours

Ahead of Sunday’s debate, supporters of each candidate gathered en masse in public to show their allegiance.

Pro-Bolsonaro crowds wearing Brazil’s national colours of yellow, green and blue packed Paulista Avenue in Sao Paulo’s financial centre, where the candidate addressed the crowd.

Lula supporters wearing red, symbolic of his Workers’ Party, filled Brasilia’s plaza of government buildings, while students backing the president protested against Bolsonaro in Rio de Janeiro.

“We need the current government to remain in power. If another government comes in, we’re, excuse my language, screwed,” said Lula supporter Sonia Maria at the Brasilia rally.

“I don’t like bandits. Out with Lula!” said Bolsonaro backer Vera de Sousa in Sao Paulo.

Also on Sunday, Brazil’s federal police asked the country’s Supreme Court to open an investigation into Bolsonaro over a money laundering accusation involving a lawyer close to him.

The presidential candidate is already under investigation for his links to Daniel Vorcaro, a disgraced former banker who financed a movie about Jair Bolsonaro’s life.

Lula spent 580 days in prison in ⁠2018 and 2019 on a corruption conviction that was later annulled over flaws in the investigation and legal proceedings.

Polls suggest a close race for the October 25 run-off, with Flavio Bolsonaro holding a slight advantage after finishing nearly 2 percentage points ahead of Lula in the first round on October 4.

Both candidates hope to engage the 33 million voters who stayed home in the first ⁠round, equal to about one in five eligible voters.

Sunday’s debate was the first between Lula and Bolsonaro after the candidates both ⁠declined previous opportunities. A second debate is scheduled for October 23, just ahead of the runoff.

An alliance of Venezuelan opposition parties has reaffirmed its commitment to exiled Nobel Peace Prize laureate Maria Corina Machado as its leader.

On Sunday, members of the opposition’s Unitary Democratic Platform (PUD) agreed in a meeting in Caracas to “recognise and support the leadership of Maria Corina Machado”.

The coalition also renewed its demand for free elections in Venezuela, following a series of contested presidential votes in 2024 and 2018.

Sunday’s statement included 14 proposals for a democratic transition, including freedom for political parties, the release of all political prisoners and the safe return of those who went into exile.

The announcement also increases pressure on authorities to allow Machado’s return. She has been living in exile since leaving Venezuela last December to receive her Nobel Prize.

“The will of the Venezuelans must once again govern the destiny of our nation,” the opposition’s former presidential candidate Edmundo Gonzalez wrote on social media supporting the proposals.

“We will not accept political prisoners, persecution or a governing power that disregards the mandate of its citizens. Living in freedom and under a genuine constitutional order is a legitimate demand of our society.”

No election set

Venezuela has yet to declare a date for a new presidential vote. Since January 3, the country has been led by interim President Delcy Rodriguez of the long-governing United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV).

PSUV leaders have been accused of carrying out human rights abuses against political dissidents, including arbitrary arrest, imprisonment and torture.

Still, after the United States launched a military operation to abduct and jail former President Nicolas Maduro, the PSUV has remained in power with the support of the White House.

US President Donald Trump has backed Rodriguez’s leadership, despite her having been Maduro’s vice president.

His administration has maintained an active role in Venezuela, exerting control over its oil resources and pressuring the Rodriguez government for reforms.

But critics point out that Trump has been reluctant to push Rodriguez for new elections, opting instead for a three-phase plan that focuses first on stabilising the country and economic recovery before pursuing a political transition.

Machado, meanwhile, has told The Financial Times she would like to see Venezuela hold elections by July next year.

“The US government and the Venezuelan people all agree ⁠⁠that the only way to make ⁠⁠this sustainable and ⁠⁠a real victory is to turn Venezuela into a stable democracy,” she told the newspaper earlier this month.

A thwarted return

Venezuelan authorities blocked Machado’s repeated attempts to return to the country, according to her party, Vente Venezuela.

Machado has also reportedly attempted to petition the Trump administration for help re-entering Venezuela.

Separately, she gifted Trump her Nobel Peace Prize in January, during a visit to Washington, DC. Media reports, however, have suggested friction between the Trump administration and Machado.

In interviews with Reuters and Axios, US administration officials have anonymously expressed frustration with the opposition leader’s repeated efforts to return home, particularly after a pair of deadly earthquakes in Venezuela last July.

Axios quoted one official as calling Machado’s push “political opportunism”.

Machado, however, remains one of the most popular figures in Venezuela’s opposition.

In October 2023, Machado won the opposition coalition’s presidential primary, but in January 2024, Venezuela’s courts blocked her from running in the upcoming race.

The courts upheld a 15-year ban on her holding public office, reportedly due to her support of US sanctions against the Maduro government.

Gonzalez ultimately replaced Machado as the opposition candidate in the 2024 race. Maduro claimed victory for a third term as Venezuela’s president in that election cycle, despite widespread criticism that the vote did not meet democratic standards.

The opposition released vote tallies that appeared to show Gonzalez had won the race.

The US had recognised Gonzalez as the country’s rightful president-elect and denied the legitimacy of Maduro’s election claims.

Machado was previously removed from the National Assembly in 2014, due to her activism against the Venezuelan government.

A third round of talks between the Rodriguez government and the opposition began in Venezuela this month.

But instead of including Machado, the negotiations have involved members of the 2015 National Assembly, which was led by the opposition and dissolved under Maduro.

Still, in a statement this month, the US State Department praised the talks as aiding the Venezuelan government’s reform.

“Political reconciliation talks between the interim Venezuelan government and 2015 National Assembly representatives are producing tangible reforms in civil liberties and political rights, laying the groundwork for credible elections and a democratic transition,” the State Department said.

Guatemalan police say they arrested two men in connection with the killing of Juan Francisco Solorzano Foppa.

Lawyer Juan Francisco Solorzano Foppa, known for his high-profile cases against powerful businessmen in Guatemala, has died after being shot by two men during a visit to a sports centre.

The attack on Saturday at the Campo Marte sports complex in Guatemala City resulted in the deaths of Foppa and another man, Gustavo Adolfo Aguilar Gamarro, according to the Public Prosecutor’s Office.

Shortly after, the Guatemalan police said they arrested two men and seized a carbine-style firearm and a motorcycle in connection with the case.

Foppa was a 43-year-old former prosecutor and anticorruption lawyer who denounced wrongdoing by some of Guatemala’s most powerful politicians, business leaders and companies, and in 2023 briefly joined the defence team of a prominent journalist.

President Bernardo Arevalo condemned the attack. “I strongly condemn the cowardly murder of former prosecutor Juan Francisco Solorzano Foppa,” he wrote on his official X account. “Both the direct perpetrators and those who ordered the crime must face the full weight of the law.”

Arevalo said he has instructed his government to coordinate with the relevant authorities to solve the crime.

“Those who believe that terror can intimidate the people of Guatemala and the government I lead are mistaken. In honour of Foppa, in honour of our homeland, in honour of justice.”

Foppa headed the Criminal Investigations Directorate within the Public Prosecutor’s Office before he took charge of Guatemala’s tax authority (SAT) from 2016 to 2018, when he helped prosecute dozens of powerful Guatemalan business figures and recover unpaid taxes.

In 2025, Foppa alleged a connection between the Barrio 18 gang and the National Unity of Hope party, as well as links between criminal gangs and the judicial system. In 2023, he briefly joined the defence team of Guatemalan journalist Jose Ruben Zamora, who has become an international symbol of resistance to the criminalisation of journalism and the erosion of judicial independence in Central America.

Foppa had to leave the Zamora case after being accused by the Public Prosecutor’s Office of obstructing the proceedings and destroying or concealing information, a charge he denied but ultimately accepted as part of a plea agreement, saying he did not believe he would receive a fair trial.

Some of 16 survivors treated for suspected shark bites, US coastguard says.

The search continues for 11 people still missing after a boat capsized off Mexico’s Baja California coast on Friday, as multiple survivors have been treated for suspected shark bites, according to the US coastguard.

“Several of the individuals rescued were suffering from severe injuries consistent with shark bites, and the Coast Guard provided life-saving first aid while en route [to] San Diego,” the coastguard said in a statement on Saturday.

Sixteen Mexican nationals were rescued on Friday. Survivors told officials there were 27 people on board.

The coastguard and US Navy used multiple aircraft and boats, along with assistance from the Mexican Navy, to search the area for the remaining passengers. An additional helicopter will be deployed later on Saturday, according to the coastguard.

A Mayday call was transmitted from someone on the boat at about 1am on Friday, coastguard Lieutenant Santiago Tamburini said on the day.

A rescue helicopter reached the site about two hours later. It took about 90 minutes for the crew, which included a rescue swimmer, to pull the 16 people from the water, he added.

The boat went down about 225km (140 miles) west of Ensenada, Mexico, an area popular with fishing and leisure boats, but that is also frequented by smugglers.

Although the incident did not happen in US waters, coastguard official Charlie Valor said on Saturday they “were able to help, and that’s why we launched our assets”.

Fatal attempts to transport refugees and migrants from Mexico to the US have occurred in the past.

In May 2025, at least three people died when a boat flipped off the coast about 56km (35 miles) north of the US-Mexico border.

In 2023, eight people were killed in one of the deadliest maritime smuggling accidents off the US coast, when two boats approached a San Diego beach in heavy fog, and one capsized in the surf.

Follow updates, including toss and team news, from our live text commentary stream of the series decider.

Data show a 42 percent drop in forest clearance from a year earlier, giving Lula a boost before the election run-off.

Deforestation in Brazil’s Amazon rainforest has fallen to its lowest level since records began in 1988, according to official figures that give a boost to President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva days before a presidential run-off.

Brazil’s space research agency, Inpe, said on Friday that 3,335 square kilometres (1,288 square miles) of forest were cleared in the 12 months through July, about 42 percent less than the year before.

The previous record low was 4,571 sq km (1,765 sq miles) in 2011-12, while annual losses peaked at nearly 30,000 sq km (nearly 11,600 sq miles) in the mid-1990s, according to Inpe’s Prodes satellite programme, which measures from August to July because cloud cover is lower in mid-year.

“It’s an absolutely stratospheric drop…it’s like a dream,” Environment Minister Joao Paulo Capobianco said at a news conference in Brasilia.

Marcio Astrini of the climate advocacy group Observatorio do Clima called the figures “a historic achievement” and said they show that “with political will, it is possible to curb deforestation and greenhouse gas emissions”.

President Lula wrote on X: “Our goal is to achieve zero illegal deforestation by 2030.”

Lula took office in 2023 pledging to end illegal deforestation by 2030, after clearing soared to a 15-year high under his far-right predecessor, Jair Bolsonaro. The Amazon lost about 11,600 sq km (about 4,480 sq miles) a year on average during Bolsonaro’s 2019-2022 term, almost 60 percent more than in the previous four years.

Deforestation has fallen every year since 2022 and is down 71.2 percent over four years. The AFP news agency attributes the drop to greater monitoring and stiffer penalties for illegal logging.

Lula faces Bolsonaro’s eldest son, Senator Flavio Bolsonaro, in the election run-off on October 25, with polls showing them neck and neck.

Flavio pledged in his manifesto to strengthen environmental oversight in the Amazon, focus enforcement on organised crime rather than extractive workers and small farmers, and end “illegal deforestation” by 2029.

He has also praised his father, who is serving a 27-year sentence under house arrest for coup plotting, for opposing what he calls a “radical environmental agenda”.

Deforestation in the Cerrado savanna, south of the Amazon, also fell by about 24 percent, to 5,517 sq km (2,130 sq miles), the lowest since records began in 2001.

The messages, reported by a Brazilian daily, say the platform recommended Bolsonaro’s profile and his WhatsApp channel.

Employees at Meta have acknowledged in internal communications that the Instagram accounts of Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva were negatively affected by restrictions during the country’s election, media reports say.

The messages, reported on Friday by Brazilian daily Folha de S Paulo, also acknowledged the platform recommended the profile of Lula challenger Senator Flavio Bolsonaro, as well as his WhatsApp channel. Folha, the Sao Paulo-based paper, cited messages it had reviewed.

Meta told the Reuters news agency that the technical issues cited in the report were already public and the conversations it referenced related solely to the severity of the issues, not political interference.

“Any suggestion that Meta favors one side is false,” it added in a statement.

Lula, the left-wing incumbent, will face right-wing challenger Bolsonaro in a presidential runoff on October 25, following a stronger-than-expected performance by the senator in the first-round vote earlier this month.

Friday’s report came on the heels of a Brazilian court ruling on Thursday that ordered Meta to immediately adopt measures to provide equal treatment of the two candidates ahead of the runoff.

The ruling by a judge in Brazil’s top electoral court was made shortly after Lula filed a complaint that accused the tech giant – which owns Instagram, Facebook and WhatsApp – of using biased algorithms and AI restrictions to favour opposition candidate Bolsonaro ahead of the election.

Justice Marco Aurelio Bellizze ruled that Meta cannot reduce the distribution of political content, restrict searches or remove posts in a way that creates an imbalance between Lula and Bolsonaro. His ruling also orders the company to ensure its artificial intelligence tool applies identical criteria to both candidacies.

Bellizze said in his ruling that Meta must pay a fine of 500,000 reais ($98,700) per day if it fails to comply.

According to Lula’s party, some of his posts appeared without a share button and had reduced reach. Options for reactions, sharing, audio or accelerated speed were also missing.

India host West Indies in the final match of the tour on Saturday with an all-time classic T20 series level at 2-2.

Who: India vs West Indies
What: Twenty20 International cricket series
Where: M Chinnaswamy Stadium, Bengaluru, India
When: Saturday, October 17, at 7pm (13:30 GMT)
How to follow: Al Jazeera Sport will have all the build-up from 11:30 GMT before our live text commentary stream

India host West Indies in the decisive T20 International series finale on Saturday after one of the most compelling white-ball tours in recent memory.

The five-game series is level at 2-2 before the match in Bengaluru after record-breaking feats by the tourists that have pushed the T20 World Cup holders to the limit.

Al Jazeera Sport takes a look at what has become a must-not-miss showdown.

How did West Indies tour of India begin?

The teams played a three-match One-Day International to begin the white-ball tour, which saw India take an unassailable lead after opening eight-wicket wins in Thiruvananthapuram and Guwahati.

After posting a mammoth 351-7 off their 50 overs – thanks largely to KL Rahul’s 129 off 87 balls – in New Chandigarh, India would have felt they had enough on the board to claim the third match, too.

Enter West Indies captain Shai Hope. The opener hit 162 off 143 balls in an unbeaten knock that led his side to a five-wicket win.

It was the West Indies highest ODI run chase.

How did the India-West Indies T20 series begin?

India put the disappointment of the closing defeat in the ODI series behind them by claiming an eight-win win, with 5.2 overs to spare, in the first T20 of the series.

Despite fifties from Hope and Sherfane Rutherford, West Indies were bowled out for 171, with Naman Dhir taking three wickets for the hosts.

Hope then hit an unbeaten 102 off only 45 balls in the second match to lead West Indies to their highest successful Twenty20 run chase.

Hope hit nine sixes and six boundaries as the West Indies finished with 252-4 in reply to India’s 249-5.

India restored their series lead in the third match, but only via a narrow 14-run victory.

After being bowled out off the last ball of their innings, India posted 223 – led by Abhishek Sharma’s 69 off 30 balls.

Arshdeep Singh claimed three wickets as West Indies were restricted to 209-7.

What happened in the last India-West Indies T20?

It was time for the Hope show again in the fourth game of the T20 tour, as the wicketkeeper-batter hit his second century of the series.

The tourists struck 247-3, having been put in, with Hope hitting an unbeaten 102.

His nine sixes and four fours were a record tally for a West Indies batter in a T20 International.

The total was the second-highest first innings score in T20s against India, trailing England’s 257-3 in Southampton this year.

Opener Sanju Samson’s 56 off 23 balls set India off to a good start, but Keemo Paul’s five-wicket haul led West Indies to a 24-run series levelling win.

What did Shai Hope joke about his Player of the Match awards?

Hope joked after the fourth T20 that he was worried he may ⁠have to fork ⁠out excess baggage fees after picking up his third Player of the Match award on their tour of India.

“To be honest, they are a bit heavy, and we have got to look at the luggage weight,” he quipped after the win.

“I think we are going to have some problems going back home.”

Predicted India team lineup

Abhishek Sharma, Sanju Samson (w), Ishan Kishan, Shreyas Iyer (c), Tilak Varma, Naman Dhir, Nitish Kumar Reddy, Axar Patel, Prince Yadav, Mayank Yadav, Arshdeep Singh

Predicted West Indies team lineup

Shai Hope (c and w), Jewel Andrew, Shimron Hetmyer, Rovman Powell, Sherfane Rutherford, Romario Shepherd, Roston Chase, Shamar Springer, Keemo Paul, Shamar Joseph, Gudakesh Motie

For every five plates of food served around the world, roughly one ends up in the bin. That adds up to more than a billion tonnes of food a year.

Meanwhile, 645 million people, about one in 13 of the world’s population, went hungry in 2025, according to the UN.

That gap is the focus of World Food Day on October 16, the annual UN observance marking the founding of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) in 1945. This year’s theme, “Innovate today, nourish tomorrow”, calls for food systems that feed more people and waste less.

In this visual explainer, Al Jazeera looks at global hunger, which countries waste the most food and simple ways to waste less at home.

Hunger is falling, slowly

Global hunger has fallen for a third year in a row, but it remains above levels seen before the COVID-19 pandemic.

According to the UN’s annual State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World report, an estimated 645 million people, or 7.8 percent of the world’s population, faced hunger in 2025. That is down from 8.1 percent in 2024 and a peak of 8.6 percent in 2022, but still about 61 million more people than in 2019.

Where are people the most hungry?

Africa has more hungry people than any other region.

In 2025, an estimated 309 million people in Africa were undernourished. That is one in five people on the continent and almost half of the world’s hungry people.

By comparison, 292 million people in Asia (6 percent of the population) and 32 million in Latin America and the Caribbean (4.8 percent) were undernourished.

The 2026 Global Hunger Index shows a similar pattern at the country level. The index scores countries out of 100, combining undernourishment with child stunting, child wasting and child mortality. Scores of 35 or more are considered “alarming”.

Hunger is classed as alarming in eight countries, seven of them in Africa. Somalia has the worst score of the 122 countries ranked, followed by the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Chad and Madagascar.

Sudan, South Sudan, Burundi and Yemen were also classed as alarming, but conflict and data gaps meant the index could not calculate their scores.

At the same time, a large share of the food the world grows never reaches a plate.

How much food is wasted every year?

Food is lost and wasted at every stage of its journey from farm to table.

According to the FAO, about 13 percent of the food produced globally is lost after harvest and before it reaches shops, spoiling in storage, during transport or in processing. Fruits and vegetables suffer the highest losses.

Food lost before it reaches shops is worth more than $400bn a year, according to the FAO.

Shops, restaurants and households then throw away almost a fifth of the food available to consumers, about 1.05 billion tonnes in 2022, according to the UN Environment Programme (UNEP). That is equivalent to 52.5 million trucks, each carrying 20 tonnes.

Households account for the most, 60 percent, followed by restaurants and other food services at 28 percent and shops at 12 percent.

How to reduce food waste at home

Most food waste happens at home, which means households can make a real difference. Here are some simple steps recommended by food waste campaigners and UN agencies:

1. Plan before you shop: Check what you already have, plan meals for the week and shop with a list to avoid buying more than you need.
2. Understand date labels: “Use by” dates are about safety, but “best before” dates are about quality. Food is often still safe to eat after its “best before” date.
3. Store food properly: Keep your fridge at 5C (41F) or below, and store fruit and vegetables where they last longest. Bananas, for example, speed up the ripening of other fruit nearby.
4. Use the freezer: Bread, cooked meals, meat and many fruits and vegetables can be frozen before they go off.
5. Cook the right amount: Measuring portions, especially for rice and pasta, cuts down on leftovers that get thrown away.
6. Eat the oldest food first: Move older items to the front of the fridge and cupboard so they get used before newer ones.
7. Use leftovers and scraps: Turn leftovers into new meals, and use vegetable peels and stalks in soups and stocks.
8. Compost what you can’t eat: Composting inedible parts such as peels and eggshells keeps them out of landfills, where rotting food releases methane.

Which country wastes the most?

On average, every person in the world wastes about 132kg (291 pounds) of food a year, roughly the weight of two adults. Of that, 79kg (174 pounds) was thrown away at home.

But the amount varies widely. Hotter countries tend to waste more at home, UNEP says, possibly because of more fresh produce and less refrigeration.

The Maldives wastes the most food, with each person throwing away about 260kg (573 pounds) a year, about twice the global average. Syria, the Dominican Republic, Seychelles, Mexico and Tunisia follow, each wasting more than 210kg (463 pounds) per person, according to UN estimates.

Spain recorded some of the lowest levels, at around 39kg (86 pounds) or less per person.

What does food waste cost?

Food loss and waste costs the global economy more than $1 trillion a year, according to the UN.

To put that in perspective, what else could $1 trillion buy?

Use the + buttons to add items to your cart and see how the money would be spent across 35 categories.

Throwing food away also wastes the money, land and energy used to produce it.

About 1.4 billion hectares (3.5 billion acres) of land, or 28 percent of the world’s agricultural land, is used to grow food that is never eaten. That is an area larger than Canada.

Food loss and waste also generate an estimated 8 to 10 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions, including methane released as food rots in landfills.

Judge fines government for failing to fund universities as protests over Milei’s cuts turn violent.

“This cannot go on!” students shout during an assembly in the middle of the central hall of the University of Buenos Aires Exact and Natural Sciences building.

It is part of Argentina’s prestigious public university system.

The faculty’s central hall is covered with dozens of banners protesting President Javier Milei’s spending cuts. Students have called an assembly to announce the occupation of the university, a traditional form of protest in Argentina meant to raise public awareness and pressure the government.

They say they will take over the building for a day. Many students and professors here are concerned about the impact of Milei’s austerity policies on public universities and say the future of free higher education is at risk.

“Our best professors are leaving en masse. With salaries that cannot cover their basic needs, they are leaving for private universities,” Emiliano Gato, a physics student who is part of the group, told Al Jazeera.

“I dream of doing research and teaching at the public University of Buenos Aires. It’s a prestigious school. But now, with this austerity plan, I don’t know what will happen.”

Public universities in Argentina have become a major battleground of Milei’s austerity plan. Students and professors are protesting the lack of funding and the erosion of salaries, which they say is a major threat to the country’s public education.

Milei is implementing one of the harshest austerity plans in Argentina’s history.

Since taking office in 2023, he has laid off thousands of state employees, shut down ministries, reduced subsidies and cut government-funded programmes. The measures were meant to fight high inflation, which was a major problem in Argentina. Almost three years later, inflation has fallen to around 2 percent a month. Milei says his plan is going well.

“Argentina is growing at a remarkable pace. We have now recorded 27 consecutive months of sustained growth, and today the country is expanding at four times its historical rate. This growth is being felt across almost every sector of the economy,” said Milei during a recent visit to Washington.

Ripple effects

But not everyone agrees. His plan is also having a profound impact on public education, welfare plans for people with disabilities, pensioners and others who depend on state support. The opposition has tried to block many of Milei’s reforms.

Last year, Congress overturned presidential vetoes and approved two laws, one increasing funding for public universities and another declaring a disability emergency. But Milei’s government has refused to implement them, arguing that Congress failed to identify how they would be financed.

A federal judge has now begun fining the government 100,000 pesos (around $70) a day for failing to implement parts of the financing law, which requires Milei’s government to restore university salaries and student scholarships lost to inflation, regularly update budgets and provide funding for research, hospitals and infrastructure.

And that’s why thousands of people took to the streets on Thursday to demand that the government implement it. All around Buenos Aires, long columns of people blocked the centre of the city as they called for a general strike. Although the protest was meant to be peaceful, it soon turned violent. Police fired tear gas and rubber bullets as protesters threw rocks.

The plaza in front of Congress resembled a battleground. At least 25 people were detained, and several others were injured, including members of the security forces.

Maria Teresa de Jesus is a professor in the University of Buenos Aires chemistry department. She says she makes around $700 a month and it has become difficult to make ends meet. “I have come to this protest as a last resort. I am professor. I love teaching, doing research. I shouldn’t be here,” she told Al Jazeera. “Public education is crucial in this country, to make education accessible to all. And the government is ignoring it.”

Many in Argentina continue to support Milei’s economic plan. They are hoping the government’s plan to exploit the country’s vast natural resources will pay off and translate into more jobs, higher wages and improved living standards.

But many others have stopped believing and are prepared to raise the stakes. They accuse Milei’s government of protecting the interests of a privileged few while asking the rest of the country to bear the cost of his economic plan.

Poll shows right-wing candidate with two percent advantage over Lula going into second round of voting on October 25.

A new poll has found that right-wing Senator Flavio Bolsonaro maintains a slight lead over President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva as the two candidates seek an edge ahead of Brazil’s tense October 25 run-off vote.

A Quaest poll released on Thursday found that Bolsonaro, son of former far-right President Jair Bolsonaro, would receive 46 percent of the vote compared to Lula’s 44 percent, a difference within the two-percent margin of error.

Bolsonaro outperformed expectations during the first round of voting on October 4, beating Lula by less than two points despite most polls suggesting that the leftist president was on track for a marginal first-round win. Neither candidate secured a majority that would have avoided a run-off.

The poll, the first released by Quaest since the initial round of voting, shows that Bolsonaro has held onto his lead and remains the favourite heading into the second round.

Lula has sought to rally his supporters after the October 4 loss, holding large rallies that have drawn millions of people onto the street.

While Bolsonaro has remained ahead in the polls, analysts have pointed out that he has not benefitted as much from the elimination of several conservative candidates, whose supporters would presumably prefer him to Lula, as might have been expected after the first round.

Bolsonaro has made progress securing endorsements from right and centre-right parties, however, seeking to consolidate support from conservatives and build a coalition friendly to business interests and a policy agenda sought by investors.

Brazil’s Senate approved a constitutional amendment on Wednesday reducing the country’s maximum workweek from 44 to 40 hours per week without a reduction in pay, delivering a key priority for Lula as the president presses his case to an electorate that is anxious about cost-of-living issues.

“Today is a day to celebrate a historic achievement for millions of workers,” Lula said in a statement. “This means having more time to live, rest, be with family, watch your children grow up, take care of yourself, and enjoy life. Those who work so hard to build Brazil also deserve to have time to live.”

The president also recently banned sports betting, which had caused an explosion of gambling addiction and contributed to surging household debt across the country.

The G20 finance ministers and central bank governors are gathering in Bangkok, Thailand, on Thursday amid an uncertain global outlook shaped by the US-Israel war on Iran.

The meetings are being held in conjunction with the annual meetings of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank, taking place in the Thai capital from October 12 to October 18.

Here are some of the key details about the meetings:

What are the G20, the IMF and the World Bank?

The G20 is an economic forum comprising 19 large economies, including the United States, China, the United Kingdom, Australia, Brazil, India, Japan, Indonesia and Saudi Arabia, as well as the European Union and the African Union.

The grouping has an annually rotating presidency, currently held by the US.

Together, the G20 countries account for about 85 percent of global gross domestic product (GDP) and three-quarters of global trade.

The G20 was established in 1999 as a forum for finance ministers and central bank governors to address shared economic concerns in the wake of the Asian Financial Crisis, before expanding into a broader forum for national leaders.

The IMF, based in Washington, DC, is an international financial institution that promotes international cooperation on monetary policy, trade and economic growth.

Its membership includes all but a handful of the world’s sovereign states, including North Korea, Cuba, the Vatican City and Monaco.

The World Bank, also based in Washington, DC, primarily serves as a provider of loans and grants to developing countries. It has 189 member countries.

The IMF and the World Bank were created at the 1944 Bretton Woods conference in the US, convened by the Allied Powers to establish the contours of the post-World War II international financial order.

Who will be attending the meetings?

Most finance ministers and central bank governors of the G20 will be in Bangkok, along with IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva and World Bank Group President Ajay Banga.

US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent will be a notable absence from the gatherings, as the top economic official of the world’s biggest economy and G20 chair.

US officials have cited “domestic engagements” for Bessent’s decision to skip the events, at which Washington will be represented by Deputy Secretary Francis Brooke and Undersecretary for International Affairs Erin Browne.

The G20 meeting, one of several gatherings of the group’s finance ministers each year, will help shape the agenda for the headline leaders’ summit in Miami, Florida, taking place on December 14-15.

What is on the agenda?

The economic fallout from the US-Israel war on Iran is expected to dominate discussions.

Attacks across the Middle East have upended economic activity across the region, while disruption to shipping in the Strait of Hormuz has driven a surge in energy prices worldwide.

Crude oil prices have exceeded $100 a barrel for much of the past eight months, placing a strain on government coffers and household budgets, particularly in the Gulf region and the rest of Asia.

In advance of the meeting, Australia’s Treasurer Jim Chalmers MP said he would use the discussions to call for an end to the conflicts in the Middle East and the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz “because that’s what the global economy desperately needs”.

“The war in the Middle East is having a devastating economic impact and is pushing up fuel prices, inflation and interest rates around the world,” Chalmers said in a statement.

Other issues likely to feature on the agenda include the ballooning debt levels of many countries, which exceed 100 percent of GDP in the US, Canada, Japan, Italy and France.

In a speech on Wednesday, Georgieva warned that mounting debt posed a threat to the global economy and that there was no “magic” formula that would allow governments to avoid tax hikes or spending cuts.

G20 members will also bring more specific individual concerns to the table based on their economic and geopolitical priorities.

The US, for example, has repeatedly expressed concern about “global imbalances”, a veiled reference to China’s state-driven industrial model that has allowed Chinese exporters to flood overseas markets with cheap goods.

US President Donald Trump has long claimed that China’s large trade surplus, which stood at a cumulative $938bn in September, proves that international trade is stacked against US manufacturers.

In a statement addressed to the IMF on Wednesday, Bessent called for action to address mismatched trade balances.

“This especially includes strengthening its analysis and engagement on the role non-market policies and practices and exchange rates play in driving external imbalances,” Bessent said.

“Policymakers around the world are having difficult discussions about how to sustain market-based systems amid distortionary policies from some economies that skew competition and hurt employment.”

Divisions and competing interests cloud the prospects for coordination, however.

At the last meeting of G20 finance ministers in Asheville, North Carolina, US, held on August 31 and September 1, member countries failed to issue a joint communique after China objected to language to do with trade.

The President’s ally says conservatives “cannot give an inch” in Latin America as he accepts an award in Washington.

Argentine President Javier Milei has urged his ally, US President Donald Trump, to come out of the United States midterm elections in a stronger position, calling the vote important for the West as a whole.

Milei made the appeal on Wednesday at a Hispanic Heritage gala in Washington, where a Hispanic association gave him an award, ahead of November’s vote.

Conservatives, he said, “cannot give an inch in our reconquest of the hemisphere”, according to Agence France-Presse (AFP).

Milei flew into the US capital on Wednesday for meetings with investors and the gala. He is due to address the US Chamber of Commerce on Thursday.

Milei’s lifeline

Trump firmly backed Milei a year ago, when his government also faced crucial legislative elections. He has called Milei his “favorite president”.

That backing, together with a currency swap agreement with the US Treasury, helped Milei to success in those polls, analysts have argued.

The centrepiece of the package, announced by Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, was a $20bn swap with Argentina’s central bank, in which the US exchanged dollars for pesos. The swap came shortly after Milei’s party lost a key provincial election.

Trump made clear at the time that the support hinged on a Milei victory. “I’m with this man because his philosophy is correct,” he said ahead of a White House lunch with the Argentine leader. “If he wins, we’re staying with him. And if he doesn’t win, we’re gone.”

Trump also warned that the US would not be “generous” if Milei lost. The remarks unsettled Argentine markets, with the main stock index giving up earlier gains and falling about 2 percent, The Associated Press reported.

The package drew criticism in the US. Democratic lawmakers accused Trump of prioritising a foreign bailout while the US government was shut down.

President Laura Fernandez says mega-prison is part of ‘tough-on-crime model’ embraced by her government.

Costa Rica has announced the opening of a new mega-prison amid near-record homicide levels and growing organised crime, as countries across the region embrace police crackdowns that have proven popular but often weaken key civil liberties.

President Laura Fernandez opened the High-Containment Centre Against Organised Crime, or CACCO, on Wednesday. The prison will have capacity for 5,100 people, equivalent to about 20 percent of the country’s current prison population.

“The CACCO will force criminals to face a new model – a tough-on-crime model. Costa Rica will become a global benchmark for prison security,” Fernandez said during an inauguration ceremony.

Candidates across Latin America have embraced mega-prisons, seeking to replicate the policies of Nayib Bukele, the president of El Salvador, who has won widespread popularity through a campaign of mass arrests and the suspension of basic rights in the name of combating crime.

Costa Rica, long spared from high levels of violent crime compared with its neighbours, saw a record-setting 905 homicides in 2023, followed by 876 in 2024 and 873 in 2025.

Analysts say that is partly due to increased fighting between criminal groups over lucrative drug routes.

The first transfers to Costa Rica’s new mega-prison will take place at the end of October, with Justice Minister Gabriel Aguilar saying the facility will help the government reassert control over the prison system and diminish infiltration by organised crime.

Right-wing leaders in other Latin American countries have also sought to replicate the mega-prison model.

Peruvian President Keiko Fujimori, inaugurated in July, has announced plans to tour El Salvador’s Terrorism Confinement Centre (CECOT), in anticipation of creating a similar facility in her country. CECOT can hold about 40,000 people.

In Colombia, meanwhile, newly elected leader Abelardo de la Espriella campaigned for the presidency, in part, on a pledge to build 10 mega-prisons. He took office in August.

Brazil, the largest country in Latin America, is currently in the midst of its own presidential election, and right-wing Senator Flavio Bolsonaro has advanced to the final round of the vote. His platform also includes building five mega-prisons, citing the Salvadoran model.

El Salvador first imposed a “state of exception” under Bukele in 2022, expanding police and military powers.

That emergency declaration has been credited with a sharp drop in that country’s homicides, but rights groups say it has led to severe rights abuses and has been weaponised against critics of the government.

The “state of exception” has also resulted in mass arrests and mass trials, with rulings delivered against hundreds of defendants at a time. Some defendants have been detained without charge.

While the Bukele administration frequently touts its success in dismantling the gangs, the government has continuously extended the state of exception since it was first imposed.

Critics have warned that conditions inside mega-prisons are often poor, with imprisoned people facing overcrowding, due process violations and alleged torture in facilities like CECOT.

Victims’ groups, however, have denounced the ruling as ‘selective’ justice that exonerates a former government head.

A Mexican judge has closed the case against Francisco Garduno, former head of the country’s immigration agency, for crimes related to the 2023 fire at a Ciudad Juarez detention centre that killed 40 migrants and injured 30 others.

The incident was the deadliest event ever to occur at a Mexican immigration centre, and critics said it exposed the shortcomings and irregularities in the country’s detention system.

Garduno faced trial for the crimes of abuse of public office and dereliction of duty after footage from the fire showed guards had failed to respond to cries for help.

On Tuesday, Judge Victor Manlio Hernandez Calderon ruled that Garduno had fulfilled the court-mandated measures required to address the damage. But victims rejected that decision and announced they would appeal.

“Yesterday, corruption and the impunity of politicians protected by power won again,” the Foundation for Justice, one of the NGOs representing some of the victims, wrote on social media on Wednesday.

The victims have also compared the judge’s decision to close the criminal case to a de facto exoneration for Garduno.

In their view, the ruling “confirms that justice in Mexico is selective” and denies the victims “full reparations” and concrete guarantees that such an event will not be repeated.

Miguel Zenteno, one of the foundation’s lawyers, noted that the ruling is not yet final because it will be appealed and because another injunction is pending against the court-mandated reparations, which critics say failed to meet the standards for serious events.

On March 27, 2023, some 70 men were crammed into a locked dormitory with no ventilation and barely any water at the Ciudad Juarez immigration detention centre, on the border with El Paso, Texas.

As night fell, a small group set fire to some mattresses in protest, and within seconds, smoke engulfed the entire area.

Security cameras recorded the guards leaving the area despite cries for help. They made no attempt to open the gates of the dormitory. Only the women, held in another cell, were released. Most of the victims were Central Americans and Venezuelans.

Garduno, a former prison guard and current official at the Ministry of Education, led the National Migration Institute (INM) starting in 2019 and continued in the role until 2025 despite the fire.

The judge had previously ordered Garduno to compensate the families, provide them with free specialised medical care, issue a public apology, provide human rights training to migration personnel and guarantee that the events would not be repeated.

Zenteno acknowledged that the measures were implemented only partially because Garduno did not pay the damages as stipulated by the legal process.

Instead, Zenteno pointed out that the funds came from the INM, and the payments did not fully compensate the families. Furthermore, he added, the victims were not even informed how to access free medical services, and the apology “was a mere formality, not substantive”.

In addition to Garduno, prosecutors accused another former director of the institute of the same crimes.

Six immigration agents – including a military officer and a private security guard – and the two migrants accused of starting the fire are charged with homicide and assault. Most of the officials remain free pending trial.