World News

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) — Residents of the Cite Soleil neighborhood in Haiti’s capital protested Tuesday, demanding government protection after gang violence forced hundreds of people to flee their homes over the weekend.

Roselaine Jean-Pierre, 67, was among two dozen people who gathered at an intersection in Cite Soleil holding tree branches and demanding that police intervene in the area, even as gunshots were ringing nearby.

“I did not do anything to deserve this,” said Jean-Pierre, who fled her home on Sunday, and is now sleeping in the streets of the capital, Port-au-Prince.

Some of the protesters said they saw people getting killed over the weekend in Cite Soleil, where burned cars and dead cows could also be observed. Haitian authorities have not released any information on casualties.

“I know of seven people that have been killed and also people that have been shot,” said Michel-Ange Toussaint, who had returned briefly to her home in Cite Soleil to gather some clothes.

She said the attacks on civilians began Sunday around 6 p.m., prompting many people to flee the area in search of safety. “It is our good feet that saved us,” Toussaint said.

Gangs have overtaken Port-au-Prince since the assassination of President Jovenal Moïse in July 2021 at his home. Police say they control about 70% of the capital — down from 90% — and have expanded their activities — including looting, kidnapping, sexual assaults and rape — into the countryside. Haiti has not had a president since the assassination.

In a statement released Monday, the humanitarian group Doctors Without Borders announced the evacuation of its hospital in Cite Soleil following the intense clashes Sunday.

The Centre Hospitalier de Fontaine, another hospital that operates in Cite Soleil, said on Tuesday that it had also suspended operations due to the outbreak of violence that began Sunday, and had to evacuate all of its hospitalized patients, including 11 newborns.

In April, the first foreign troops linked to a U.N. force arrived in Haiti to help quell ongoing violence.

The U.N. Security Council in late September approved a plan to authorize a 5,550-member force, which has not fully arrived in the island nation. An unknown number of troops from Chad have so far been deployed.

A report published earlier this year by the International Organization for Migration found that gang violence has displaced more than 1.4 million people in Haiti, with approximately 200,000 of them now living in crowded and underfunded sites in the nation’s capital.

___

Follow AP’s coverage of Latin America and the Caribbean at https://apnews.com/hub/latin-america

source

SAO PAULO (AP) — Brazil said Tuesday that the European Union has moved to block its animal product exports from September, just days after a mega deal between the South American trade bloc Mercosur and the EU on a trans-Atlantic market estimated at $22 trillion went into effect, at least provisionally.

The deal, which is now before the European Court of Justice, has faced opposition from European farmers and environmental groups worried about unfair competition, threats to their livelihoods, price pressures and environmental standards.

A statement from Brazil’s agriculture ministry said Europe’s decision was received “with surprise,” adding that the South American country’s government will try to reverse it. Brazilian media said the EU claimed it had not received proof that animal products from Brazil and other countries were free of antimicrobial substances used to stimulate animal growth.

Brazil’s head of mission at the EU will meet the bloc’s authorities on animal products on Wednesday “to seek explanations about the decision,” the ministry said.

According to the Brazilian government’s association for animal products, EU countries were the third biggest destination for Brazil’s beef in 2025, after the United States and China.

The EU-Mercosur free trade agreement came into force on May 1. It was signed Jan. 17 at a meeting of the South American group, which includes Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay, and Uruguay.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen’s has provisionally enacted the deal, effectively sidestepping the EU Parliament where the agreement is now being challenged by EU lawmakers at the bloc’s judiciary. The agreement will be halted if the European body rules against it.

___

Follow AP’s Latin America coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/latin-america

source

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (AP) — Tens of thousands of Argentines flooded the streets of major cities nationwide on Tuesday to protest funding cuts by libertarian President Javier Milei to the public university system that represents a near-universal point of pride in this crisis-prone country.

Vast crowds in downtown Buenos Aires marched toward the government headquarters to denounce budget shortfalls eroding the financial foundation of the country’s higher education. Argentina’s public university system, a cornerstone of its well-educated workforce cherished by its large middle class, has been tuition-free since 1949 and produced five Nobel Prize laureates.

Congress passed a law last year to fund universities’ operational costs and raise teacher salaries in line with high inflation. But the government has not implemented it as it challenges the legislation in court.

Like his powerful backer and ally U.S. President Donald Trump, Milei routinely attacks university campuses as bastions of “woke” indoctrination. He has slashed public education funding as part of his plan to take a chain saw to state funding in a sharp break from what he describes as decades of reckless spending that spawned corruption under his left-leaning predecessors.

Tuesday’s protest gathered people of all ages and political persuasions as Milei faces declining approval ratings over slumping economic activity, falling wages and climbing unemployment. A recent series of corruption scandals has also struck a nerve, with fallout particularly growing from an investigation into lavish spending by Milei’s close ally, Cabinet chief Manuel Adorni, that appears inconsistent with his modest public salary and declared assets.

“How much does Adorni cost us?” read one of several student protest signs alluding to the alleged misuse of public funds.

Milei’s undersecretary for university policies, Alejandro Álvarez, criticized Tuesday’s march as “completely political” and said the government had compensated universities for higher operating costs — marginal increases that unions have rejected as insufficient.

In seeking to annul the legislation, Milei’s administration argues that it fails to specify how the state will supply the mandatory funding increases in a time of harsh fiscal austerity. The case is expected to go to the Supreme Court. Student protesters on Tuesday called on the nation’s highest court to “listen to the outcry throughout the country’s public squares.”

Since Milei took power in late 2023, university professors’ paychecks have declined by roughly 33% after accounting for stubborn inflation, according to the main teachers’ federation.

The rector of the prestigious University of Buenos Aires, Ricardo Gelpi, said the steep losses in purchasing power has driven at least 580 research professors in the engineering and science departments to ditch the public system for private universities or other better-paying jobs.

“It’s very clear this government is determined to defund public education,” said Sol Muñíz, 24, a law student at the University of Buenos Aires at the march. “University is a source of pride for us. It is the best thing we have.”

___

Associated Press writer Isabel DeBre contributed to this report.

___

Follow AP’s Latin America coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/latin-america

source

TRIPOLI, May 12 (Reuters) – Authorities in eastern Libya say they have found and deported 120 migrants who were being held captive by people traffickers south of Benghazi, and have recovered the bodies of three other migrants from the Mediterranean shore.

A statement by the security directorate in the city of Ajdabiya said an Egyptian migrant who had escaped and was found lost and exhausted in the coastal town of Bishr had led security services to the locations where the other migrants were being held.

The Egyptian had been held with compatriots and migrants of other nationalities “inside a den used to torture migrants and blackmail their families”, according to the statement, which was released late on Monday.

Since the toppling of Muammar Gaddafi in a NATO-backed uprising in 2011, Libya has become a transit route for migrants fleeing conflict and poverty to Europe via dangerous routes across the desert and over the Mediterranean.

The oil-dependent Libyan economy is also a draw for impoverished migrants seeking work, but security throughout the sprawling country is poor, leaving migrants vulnerable to abuse.

The operation to free the captive migrants lasted almost a fortnight, the Ajdabiya security directorate said.

In captivity, they had been “forced to plead for help under whippings and beatings, while their suffering is documented in videos sent to their families to extort money from them,” it said.

The bodies of two Bangladeshi migrants and one Egyptian were found on the shore in Bishr, which is located about 122 kilometers (76 miles) west of Ajdabiya, the directorate added. A boat was also found on the shore.

The directorate posted pictures appearing to show migrants sitting on the floor after they had been recovered from traffickers, and other pictures of passports, boat engines, blue plastic water containers and wooden boats, some fully assembled and others still under construction.

It said a small boat plant was also seized and that arrest warrants had been issued for “fugitive” human traffickers.

The migrants had been deported, it said, without providing details.

(Reporting by Ahmed Elumami; Editing by Aidan Lewis)

source

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia (AP) — Malaysian authorities searched Tuesday for 14 missing Indonesians after a boat carrying over 30 people sank.

The maritime office in central Perak state said that 23 people were rescued Monday by a local fishing vessel after the boat capsized off the island of Pangkor in Perak, adding it was believed to be carrying “undocumented migrants.”

Perak maritime chief Capt. Mohamad Shukri Khotob said the fishing vessel called for help after finding the people floating at sea before dawn. The search and rescue operation, which began Monday, would continue until all missing individuals were located, the statement said. A total of 37 people were believed to be on board, he said.

Mohamad Shukri said the victims were believed to have departed from Kisaran, Indonesia, on May 9 and were headed to multiple territories in Malaysia, including Penang, Selangor, and Kuala Lumpur.

The 23 survivors were handed over to marine authorities for questioning.

Malaysia has long been a destination for Indonesian workers seeking better job opportunities. Many attempt to enter the country illegally via sea routes, often in overcrowded and unsafe vessels, risking accidents and loss of life. Indonesians make up the large bulk of foreign labor in Malaysia, predominantly in plantations and construction.

source

By Francois Murphy

VIENNA, May 12 (Reuters) – The Eurovision Song Contest gets off to a tense start in Vienna on Tuesday with a protest due to be held hours before the first semi-final featuring Israel, whose attendance prompted five countries to boycott over the Gaza war.

The contest, traditionally a good-natured celebration of pop music and high camp now in its 70th year, has become mired in crisis over Israel’s military offensive in Gaza in response to the Hamas-led attack of October 7, 2023.

The public broadcasters of five countries – Spain, the Netherlands, Ireland, Iceland and Slovenia – are boycotting this year’s event, making it the smallest since 2003 with 35 entries. That will also most likely reduce viewership from last year’s estimated 166 million, more than the Super Bowl’s 128 million.

‘WE WILL NOT BE TERRORISED’

A first protest, expected to draw an estimated 500 people, was planned for Tuesday afternoon and the tension in the city was palpable ahead of the semi-final scheduled for 9 p.m. (1900 GMT).

“We won’t let ourselves be terrorised into silence,” Vienna Mayor Michael Ludwig of the Social Democrats said on Friday in an angry response to a small group of pro-Palestinian protesters who blew whistles at a concert he was speaking at.

“Unfortunately we will need large security measures because of people like you, for example. That will incur great expense, but we will nevertheless hold a festival of togetherness, I can promise you that,” he said.

The joint head of Amnesty International Austria, Shoura Hashemi, said on X Ludwig should apologise for his “unbearable, false, divisive” remarks aimed at peaceful protesters.

Austrian officialdom is strongly supportive of Israel, and pro-Palestinian protests are small. A handful of protests are planned this week, with attendance estimated at up to 3,000.

IRELAND SAID ATTENDANCE WOULD BE ‘UNCONSCIONABLE’

Police also say there could be spontaneous protests, particularly on Saturday, the day of the final. A cold snap, with rain and temperatures not due to exceed 18 degrees Celsius (64 degrees Fahrenheit) all week, could help keep numbers down.

Irish broadcaster RTE referred back to its statement in December that it would be “unconscionable” to take part.

Israel often alleges a global smear campaign against it.

At least 1,200 people were killed in the October 7 attack, most of them civilians. Israel responded by launching an assault on the enclave that killed more than 72,000 Palestinians, mostly civilians, and left much of Gaza in ruins.

Israel’s contestant last year was Yuval Raphael, a survivor of the attack, who came second thanks to a massive public vote.

Its contestant this year, Noam Bettam, has no obvious political connotation but did receive a formal warning on Saturday for posting videos instructing the public to vote for him 10 times, the maximum allowed.

Contest Director Martin Green told Reuters he hoped those boycotting would return.

“They are members of our family, right? We miss them,” he said, adding: “We remain in dialogue to see if we can find pathways for them back.”

(Editing by Alexandra Hudson)

source

By Jasper Ward

May 12 (Reuters) – Bahamians headed to the polls on Tuesday to decide whether to grant Prime Minister Philip Davis and his ruling Progressive Liberal Party (PLP) a second consecutive term, a feat no leader has accomplished in nearly 30 years.

The vote pits the incumbent PLP against its primary rival, the Free National Movement (FNM), led by Michael Pintard. Polls open across the archipelago as voters weigh concerns about affordability and housing against the government’s record.

The election, which was not due until October, was called early by Davis. An official in his office stated the decision was made to hold the vote to get ahead of the upcoming Atlantic hurricane season. The previous election in September 2021, which brought Davis to power, was also a snap election. 

At stake are 41 seats in the Bahamian House of Assembly. This represents an increase of two seats from the last election, following recommendations from the independent constituencies commission to add two new seats. The PLP, which held a strong majority with 32 of the 39 seats heading into Tuesday’s vote, is campaigning to build on its mandate, while the FNM seeks to return to power after its 2021 defeat.

Key issues dominating the campaign have been the rising cost of living, stagnant wages, and a persistent housing shortage. The International Monetary Fund noted these challenges in a 2025 report, acknowledging government efforts on housing while suggesting more public spending could be necessary.

Months ahead of the election, Davis took steps to remove value-added tax from food sold in grocery stores – a move that the opposition said would have little impact on Bahamians. 

Several high-profile races are expected to draw significant attention. In the Garden Hills constituency, incumbent Mario Bowleg faces a challenge from three-time NBA champion Rick Fox, who is running as a candidate for the FNM.

Former Prime Minister Dr. Hubert Minnis, who Davis defeated in 2021, is running as an independent candidate for a seat he has held for nearly two decades. His independent bid comes after the FNM, the party he once led, refused to ratify him as its candidate.

(Reporting by Jasper Ward; Editing by Brendan O’Boyle and Stephen Coates)

source

GENEVA, May 12 (Reuters) – Antigua and Barbuda has nominated Ecuador’s Maria Fernanda Espinosa as candidate to be the next United Nations Secretary-General, a U.N. official told Reuters on Tuesday.

Espinosa, a former foreign affairs minister and defence minister in Ecuador, headed the U.N. General Assembly in New York from 2018-2019.

Five candidates are now competing to take over from outgoing U.N. chief Antonio Guterres, including three women seeking to become the first female head.

Elections are due later this year and the new Secretary-General’s five-year term will begin on January 1, 2027.

(Reporting by Emma Farge, editing by Kirsti Knolle)

source

U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer is fighting for his political survival after a disastrous set of results in local elections for his Labour Party last week.

Dozens of Labour lawmakers are calling on Starmer to resign, though several ministers publicly spoke of their support for Starmer as they left a Cabinet meeting on Tuesday.

The prime minister has insisted he has no intention of resigning. Starmer could be forced out if one-fifth of sitting Labour lawmakers, or at least 80 or them, agree to back a lawmaker to challenge him. So far, no formal leadership challenge has been triggered.

In a blow to Starmer, a junior minister became the first member of his government to quit on Tuesday.

Here’s the latest:

At least 80 out of Labour’s 403 lawmakers have now demanded the prime minister stand down, or at least set out a timetable for his departure, after Labour suffered heavy losses in local elections last week.

However, so far no Labour lawmaker has announced they will challenge Starmer for the leadership.

While there is no clear frontrunner to replace Starmer, here are some of the leading contenders for the top job:

1. Wes Streeting – The health secretary is widely regarded as one of the government’s best communicators and has led on one of its key pledges, improving the creaky National Health Service.

2. Angela Rayner – the formerdeputy prime minister has long set herself apart as a different kind of politician with a compelling personal story. She was brought up in social housing and left school at 16 as a teen mother.

3. Andy Burnham – The former cabinet minister has long been seen as a potential rival for Starmer. But his leadership prospects were dented after Labour blocked him from standing as the party’s candidate for Parliament.

4. Ed Miliband – The energy secretaryis a former Labour leader, but his five years at the top of the party ended in the party’s 2015 election defeat.

5. Shabana Mahmood – The home secretary has become a favorite of many on the right of the Labour Party with her moves to tighten border controls and crack down on immigration.

A cabinet member in Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s government said there was no direct challenge to his leadership at Tuesday’s meeting.

Jenny Chapman, minister of international development, said she did not think Starmer’s authority had been destroyed by dozens of Labour Party members calling for him to step down.

“That’s not what I have just seen around the Cabinet table,” she told reporters outside 10 Downing St. “I saw a Cabinet united and focused on dealing with the issues that are confronting the British people.”

U.K. Health Secretary Wes Streeting, long believed to be preparing for a leadership challenge against U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer, didn’t comment as he left the Cabinet meeting at Downing Street.

“Wes Streeting, do you want the job, or not?” one person yelled from across the street. “Are you measuring the curtains?”

He was among senior ministers who dodged a barrage of shouted questions from a scrum of reporters gathered outside.

U.K. Business Secretary Peter Kyle has voiced support for embattled Prime Minister Keir Starmer.

Starmer is showing “really steadfast leadership,” Kyle told reporters as he left the Cabinet meeting.

Kyle says the meeting discussed the economy and issues facing society. He said that he was on his way to Brussels to deepen the U.K. relationship with the European Union — one of the goals Starmer announced Monday as he delivered a speech aimed at winning back support.

A U.K. official says that nobody had yet made a challenge to the leadership of U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer.

“The prime minister talked about the challenges we faced as a country, the crisis in the Middle East and the impact on the cost of living here,” Liz Kendall, the secretary of science, innovation and technology, told reporters as she left a Cabinet meeting.

“This government will do what we were elected to do, which is serve the British people. The prime minister has my full support in this,” Kendall said.

“There is a process to challenge the leader. Nobody has made that challenge,” she said.

U.K. Treasury chief Rachel Reeves won’t be taking part in a London risk summit that she was due to appear at after attending a Cabinet meeting.

Her place will be taken by Treasury minister Lucy Rigby.

U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s government is in turmoil as dozens of Labour Party lawmakers joined calls for him to quit, after poor local election results for the party last week.

Housing Secretary Steve Reed has urged Labour Party colleagues to support Prime Minister Keir Starmer as he faces calls to step down.

Reed posted a message on social media during a meeting of Starmer’s Cabinet.

“This is not a game,” Reed said on X. “This instability has consequences for people’s lives. The people who will be hurt most will be those that elected us less than two years ago. We must unite behind the Prime Minister.”

The Treasury confirmed that Rachel Reeves has pulled out of a London risk summit she was expected to take part in after attending a Cabinet meeting on Tuesday.

Her place will be taken by Treasury minister Lucy Rigby.

U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s government is in turmoil as dozens of his Labour Party lawmakers joined calls for him to quit Tuesday.

U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer doubled down Tuesday on his resolve to stay in office, despite calls to step down.

Starmer told Cabinet ministers that he took responsibility for devastating losses that his center-left Labour Party suffered in last week’s local elections across the U.K., but he would fight on.

Starmer said there’s a process to oust a leader and that hadn’t been triggered.

“The country expects us to get on with governing,” he said. ”That is what I am doing and what we must do.”

U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer lost the first member of his government Tuesday as he faced pressure to step down following losses in local elections.

Housing, communities and local government minister Miatta Fahnbulleh stepped down and urged Starmer “to do the right thing for the country” and set a timetable to step aside.

Fahnbulleh, a junior minister who is considered to be on the left of the party, said that she was proud of her service, but that the government hadn’t acted with the vision, pace and mandate for change it had been given by voters.

The next U.K. national election doesn’t have to be held until 2029, but British politics allows parties to change leader midterm without the need for a general election.

If it comes to it, the simplest option would be for U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer to announce his intention to resign, triggering an election for the Labour leadership. A resignation announcement could possibly come if members of his Cabinet tell Starmer in their regular meeting on Tuesday that he has lost too much support within the party.

If Starmer doesn’t resign, he could face a challenge from one or more Labour lawmakers.

source

NEW DELHI, May 12 (Reuters) – Dozens of members of the student wing of India’s opposition Congress party protested in New Delhi on Tuesday against the cancellation of a key undergraduate college entrance test after authorities discovered its questions had been leaked. 

Here are some details. 

• About 2.3 million students across India took the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) on May 3 for admission to undergraduate medical programmes.

• The federal National Testing Agency scrapped the test on Tuesday, saying the process could not be allowed to stand and a new date would be set.

• Visuals from news agency ANI showed dozens of protesters from the National Students’ Union of India (NSUI) chanting slogans, with some also trying to jump police barricades.

• NSUI President Vinod Jakhar demanded “strictest possible action” against those involved in leaking the questions, and the resignation of Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan, saying protesters had no faith in the government.

• NEET questions had been similarly leaked in some parts of India in 2024, but the test was not re-run.

(Reporting by Sakshi Dayal; Editing by YP Rajesh and Kevin Liffey)

source