Going Local: Venezuela’s Leader Targets Towns to Survive Dissent, Sanctions
NEED TO KNOW
Going Local: Venezuela’s Leader Targets Towns to Survive Dissent, Sanctions
VENEZUELA
Over the past six months, President Nicolás Maduro has been removing mayors in the northwestern state of Zulia.
The first to be arrested was Maracaibo Mayor Rafael Ramírez Colina in October. Six more followed soon after. The most recent was Indira Fernández, mayor of Guajira, who was detained by intelligence officials in early April.
All-in-all, more than a third of the 21 mayors in the state – of all political stripes – have been removed and detained since the fall, ostensibly because of their links to a drug-trafficking network allegedly plotting with opposition leader María Corina Machado to topple the president, Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello said in early April.
“This entire operation is being directed by (former Colombian Presidents) Álvaro Uribe and Iván Duque, who want to use our territory to attack Venezuela,” he said, according to the Orinoco Tribune, which is close to the government. “They use that money to conspire, and promote terrorism and drug trafficking.”
He explained that there is a “conspiracy and corruption scheme” that was detected last year after an investigation was launched into the Maracaibo mayor’s office.
Analysts say it’s a ruse to take total control of the country’s most populous state, and crack down on the opposition ahead of May 25 parliamentary and regional elections – and also prevent Zulia’s top official, Manuel Rosales, from being reelected governor.
“The arrests of … mayors in Venezuela show how President Nicolás Maduro’s government has weaponized the supposed fight against organized crime to achieve its political ends,” wrote Insight Crime. “There is little chance that those arrested will be able to campaign for reelection.”
Since his inauguration in January for a third term, Maduro has been moving fast to counter the opposition as well as new sanctions by the United States.
As a result, the government wants total control over Zulia state, one of four led by an opposition governor, and one that borders the trafficking hub, Catatumbo, in Colombia. That makes it key to Venezuelan cocaine trafficking operations, which the government wants to control because of its revenue generation that allows Maduro to keep the security services, powerbrokers, and criminal gangs happy, who, in turn, keep Maduro in power.
The regime has long been positioning itself as the “gatekeepers” of the cocaine trade.
For example, Cabello, who was appointed “supreme chief” of Zulia recently, has been accused of being a key player – along with military and other officials – in Venezuelan drug-trafficking operations. He has been sanctioned by the United States and other countries.
Colombian guerrilla group, the National Liberation Army (ELN), an ally of the Maduro administration, is also involved, and has a strong presence in Zulia.
The trafficking corridor via Zulia is controlled by the Cartel of the Suns (Venezuela), the Sinaloa Cartel (Mexico), and the Gulf Clan (Colombia), operating through various municipalities in Zulia, according to the report Drug Trafficking in Venezuela 2024: A Business that Enriches Power and Expands, by Transparency International’s Venezuela chapter.
However, Venezuela’s Cartel of the Suns is less a cartel and more a “fluid and loose-knit network of trafficking cells embedded within the Venezuelan security forces, facilitated, protected, and sometimes directed by political actors,” Insight Crime added.
“All this structure is well known to municipal, regional, and national authorities,” a security official told independent outlet, the Caracas Chronicles. “That’s why Minister Cabello’s actions are less about solving the problem and more about signaling a shift in who wields power in Zulia.”
Also, Maduro needs more control over the trafficking routes because the US sanctions on the country are biting. Maduro recently declared “an economy emergency,” which allows him to enact emergency measures to “defend the national economy,” including suspending tax collections and establishing “mechanisms” for the mandatory purchasing of national production facilities to promote import substitution.
“The country’s economy is unraveling yet again as key oil revenue dries up due to renewed economic sanctions punishing Maduro for electoral fraud, and as his government finds itself with little wiggle room to respond despite some post-pandemic stability,” the Associated Press wrote.
One contributing factor is the US’s revoking of a permit by energy giant Chevron and other multinationals to pump and export Venezuelan oil after July’s election, which was widely viewed as fraudulent after the opposition produced proof that its candidate won the most votes.
As a result, Venezuelan oil tankers this month began returning home, with their cargo still on board. The US has also threatened to sanction countries that purchase Venezuelan crude, including allies like Spain, Agence France-Presse wrote.
That is putting Maduro in a difficult situation, analysts say, especially as its allies, Russia, China, and Iran, are supporting the country far less than a decade ago, World Politics Review noted.
The protégé of former socialist strongman Hugo Chávez, who died in 2013, Maduro has long cracked down on opposition figures, dissidents, and journalists, increasing repression when the economy was struggling. The economy shrank about 80 percent between 2014 and 2020. Recovering slightly after the pandemic, in the period when he promised to work with the opposition, it’s headed downward again.
Now he’s pushing harder. Along with the crackdown on Zulia, he’s planning to reform the country’s constitution to tighten control over the country, MercoPress reported.
Maduro plans to add a new level of government he called “communal” in addition to federal, state, and municipal governments that exist today, which he says he also wants to “transform.”
Maduro also wants to provide constitutional cover for harsher penalties against individuals who he says threaten the government’s authority.
“Venezuela will not tolerate in any way any fascist threat,” Maduro said, adding that traitors should be punished “in a more draconian” manner.
The draft of a new charter is slated to be completed this spring, and then will be put to a referendum.
Venezuelan political scientist, Walter Molina, who is based in Argentina, says the reform is Maduro reacting to the July elections, and worrying about upcoming ones: “In order to try to maintain power by force and terror, they need to establish a new system that they will call ‘communal,’ but which, at its core, will seek to be what they have always wanted to achieve: totalitarianism,” he wrote on X.
“They are despised by almost all of society and are left with only bullets and a tiny elite made up of generals who have made Venezuela their personal estate and have become collaborators of barbarism who … crawl for crumbs.”
THE WORLD, BRIEFLY
Stood Up: High-Level Ukraine Peace Talks Halted After US Withdrawal
UKRAINE
High-level Ukraine peace talks scheduled to take place in London on Wednesday were postponed when European diplomats canceled following a withdrawal by top US officials from the meeting, the Washington Post reported.
The cancelation of the high-level talks – lower-level meetings continued – follows US anger in Washington over Ukraine’s refusal to accept proposals to cede territory to Russia and its preference to discuss a complete ceasefire first, the newspaper added.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy firmly rejected a proposal from the US suggesting that the US might officially recognize Russia’s annexation of Crimea in return for a Russian halt to the fighting. Another possible concession US negotiators presented to Ukraine was for it to make a firm renunciation of Ukraine’s desire to join NATO.
Zelenskyy emphasized that Ukraine will not recognize Crimea as a Russian territory – it would violate the country’s constitution. However, the US proposal only referred to US recognition of Crimea. In this scenario, US sanctions on Russia would also be lifted.
US President Donald Trump, who clashed with Zelenskiy in an Oval Office meeting in March, called this an inflammatory statement that made peace harder to achieve, adding in a social media post that Crimea was lost years ago “and is not even a point of discussion.”
White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt told reporters Trump is “frustrated” with the pace of talks and that Zelenskiy “seems to be moving in the wrong direction,” according to Reuters.
Europeans, meanwhile, saw the cancellation by US representatives, including US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, as a sign that the US is looking to extricate itself from involvement in the war, downgrading the meeting, and undermining ongoing peace efforts, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) reported.
“It’s the US one step further toward checking out,” one European diplomat told RFE/RL. A US State Department spokeswoman, however, said Rubio’s decision was logistical and should not be interpreted as a position on the negotiations.
Separately, US Vice President JD Vance told reporters that the US had proposed a deal to Russia and Ukraine: “It’s time for them to either say yes or for the United States to walk away from this process.”
Meanwhile, Steve Witkoff, a US special envoy involved in the peace negotiations, will fly to Moscow this week, according to Russian sources.
Rubio, who canceled his London travel plans at the last minute, said on X that the special envoy to Ukraine and Europe, retired Lt. Gen. Keith Kellogg, will represent the US, and hopes another high-level meeting could take place “in the coming months.”
The Ukrainian delegation arrived in London, ready to work for peace – “despite everything.”
Russian President Vladimir Putin, meanwhile, said this week he was open to talks with his Ukrainian counterpart, according to the BBC.
Killing of Tourists Rocks India’s Restive Kashmir Region
KASHMIR
Indian security forces launched a sweeping manhunt across Kashmir on Wednesday, the day after gunmen killed at least 26 people in one of the deadliest attacks in the region since New Delhi revoked the northern region’s limited autonomy in 2019, the Guardian reported.
On Tuesday, four gunmen reportedly opened fire near the resort town of Pahalgam, killing 24 Indian nationals, one Nepalese tourist, and a local guide. At least 17 others were wounded.
A previously unknown group called Kashmir Resistance claimed responsibility for the attack, citing opposition to the settlement of more than 85,000 “outsiders” in the region, which it characterized as a “demographic change.”
The group said the victims were not actual tourists but “linked to and affiliated with Indian security agencies.”
Indian authorities described the incident as a “terror attack,” but did not confirm the identities of the attackers or address the claim.
Defense Minister Rajnath Singh and Home Minister Amit Shah both vowed a strong response, with Singh declaring that “those behind such an act will very soon hear our response.”
Tens of thousands of troops were deployed in the aftermath, with roadblocks and checkpoints set up and helicopters dispatched to comb forested areas, the Associated Press added.
Tuesday’s attack marked a serious escalation in the decades-long conflict, where militants have mainly targeted security forces.
It triggered a rapid exodus of tourists from Kashmir, with airlines adding flights from the region’s summer capital of Srinagar. Kashmir’s top elected official, Omar Abdullah, called the attack “heartbreaking” and said authorities were helping tourists evacuate.
World leaders condemned the assault, including US Vice President JD Vance, who was on a four-day visit to India when the attack occurred.
Since 1947, Kashmir has been the center of a territorial dispute between India and Pakistan, with both nations claiming full control of the region – but administering separate parts.
In 1989, an armed insurgency in Indian-controlled Kashmir began with the aim of shaking off Indian control. Tens of thousands have been killed since then.
India has long accused Pakistan of backing militant groups operating in the region – an allegation Islamabad has consistently denied.
In the wake of Tuesday’s attack, Indian media and commentators quickly blamed Pakistan, despite official condolences issued by Pakistani authorities. The government, meanwhile, moved to close the main border crossing linking the two countries, suspended a landmark water-sharing treaty, expelled Pakistani diplomats and ordered some Pakistani nationals in India to leave the country within 48 hours, the BBC reported.
Observers described the massacre as a blow to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, whose Hindu nationalist government has touted the 2019 revocation of Kashmir’s semi-autonomous status as a turning point for peace and development in the Muslim-majority region.
The government has tried to entice non-Kashmiris to buy land and obtain employment in the territory, as well as enabled local authorities to issue domicile certificates to outsiders. The Himalayan area, long revered for its lush beauty, has also seen an increase in tourists since 2019, with a record 23 million visitors in 2024.
But despite the government’s claims of “normalcy,” Kashmir has witnessed a sharp rise in targeted killings of Hindus and migrant workers. The status revocation also saw civil liberties curtailed, restrictions on media freedom, and the mass detention of activists and politicians in the region.
Ghana Chief Justice Suspended in ‘Judicial Coup’
GHANA
President John Mahama suspended Supreme Court Justice Gertrude Torkornoo on Wednesday and opened an investigation into the judge in an unprecedented move that critics called an assault on judicial independence, Reuters reported.
The move followed petitions calling for her permanent removal based on undisclosed allegations.
The petitions, which will be reviewed by a committee, have not been released to the public, and Torkornoo has not commented so far on the suspension. Copies of the petition were also not provided to Torkornoo, which some lawyers argued was a violation of her right to a fair hearing.
Chief justices in Ghana, who serve life terms, can only be removed on very narrow grounds, including incompetence and misbehavior, according to the BBC.
Ghana’s former attorney general, Godfred Yeboah Dame, said the suspension was an excuse to attack the judiciary.
“It’s the biggest assault on the (judiciary) in the nation’s history, the greatest assault on the independence of the judiciary under the constitutional dispensation of this country,” Dame told the BBC.
This is not the first time Torkornoo has faced calls for her removal. She survived a removal request earlier this year after the then-President Akufo-Addo rejected a dismissal petition, citing “several deficiencies.” She was appointed chief justice by Akufo-Addo in 2023.
Meanwhile, opposition lawmakers fiercely condemned the suspension of the country’s chief justice, accusing Mahama – elected in January – of trying to “pack the courts” with justices who are sympathetic to the governing party.
“(It is) nothing short of a brazen judicial coup, a reckless abuse of executive power, and a direct assault on the independence of Ghana’s judiciary,” the lawmakers said in a statement.
Ghana was once an island of stability in Africa, and was held up as a model for the continent. But in more recent years, it has faced economic uncertainty and threats from militants in neighboring Burkina Faso.
DISCOVERIES
Ancient Home Chefs
Home chefs often use a pestle and mortar and a cutting board to prepare meals. So, too, did ancient cooks.
“People have lived here for time immemorial and have been processing native plants on ground stone tools for a long time, too,” said archeobotanist Stefania Wilks, author of a new study on Native Americans’ cooking habits, referring to the western United States.
The researchers identified manos and metates as the ancient equivalents of today’s common kitchen tools and explained how they were used.
A metate is a large, flat stone or a rocky indentation, while a mano is a handheld stone tool used to crush plant and animal matter against the metate, explained Cosmos Magazine.
Open-air metates carved into bedrock are relatively easy to spot at archeological sites and can be more than 15,000 years old. Metates tend to be found in groups or in rows.
To understand the use of these tools by Native Americans, archeologists used new microscopic techniques and focused on bedrock metates in Warner Valley, Oregon.
Researchers had believed bedrock metates might still contain an untapped source of starch granules from when ancient populations refined plant matter, as the small crevices in the stone likely shielded the granules from degrading.
They used water and an electric toothbrush to scrub the metate and then added a deflocculant, which acts like laundry detergent, to break up clumped particles and free them from the stone’s crevices. They did the same on nearby rocks not used as metates to serve as the control group.
“It increased our confidence that what we were seeing was direct evidence that different plant species with starchy organs were processed on the metate,” said Wilks.
The team then analyzed the samples under the microscope and confirmed that the matter retrieved from the crevices of the metates consisted of starch granules.
They then compared the shape and features of the starch granules in the sample with those of plants in the area and found that among the plants processed on the metates were biscuit root, part of the carrot family, wild grasses, likely wild rye, and plants from the lily family – still important food sources for local Indigenous people today.