22/04/2026

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Amnesty report warns of new world order

Gunman kills tourist at Mexico pyramid MEXICO CITY: A gunman killed a Canadian tourist and wounded six other people on Monday at Mexico’s famed Teotihuacan archaeological site, authorities said. The gunman killed himself after opening fire at the heavily visited destination in central Mexico, home to pre-Aztecan pyramids, according to a security official. The shooting occurred on the Pyramid of the Moon, a 45m high monument visitors are allowed to climb using steep steps carved of volcanic rock. Six people were wounded by gunfire and taken to local hospitals, including a Canadian woman, a Colombian woman and child, a Brazilian and two Americans. Seven other people were injured in the scramble for safety and were treated at the scene after the gunman, identified as Julio Cesar Jasso Ramirez of Mexico, opened fire. The midday shooting stunned tourists at one of Mexico’s most visited pre-Hispanic sites, less than two months before the 2026 World Cup kicks off with games in Mexico, the United States and Canada. AFPTV footage showed a body wrapped in a white sheet being walked down the steps of the pyramid. State authorities at the scene seized a firearm, a knife and unused ammunition and evacuated tourists from the premises. More than 2,000 years old, the pyramid city near Mexico City attracted over 1.8 million visitors last year, tourism officials said. Canadian Foreign Minister Anita Anand in a post on X called the attack “a horrific act of gun violence”. Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum called for a thorough investigation and said she sent personnel to the site to provide assistance. “What happened today in Teotihuacan deeply pains us,” Sheinbaum posted on X. Located about 50km from the capital Mexico City, Teotihuacan draws domestic and foreign tourists to see its pyramids and its Avenue of the Dead. – AFP Check military spending: UN chief NEW YORK: UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Monday called on governments to stop the madness of unchecked military spending. Guterres made the appeal at the opening of the UN Economic and Social Council’s Forum on Financing for Development Follow-Up. “I also call on all governments to reverse the upward spiral of unchecked military spending. It’s time to stop this madness. It is time to come together to end the wars that are pushing development out of reach,” said Guterres. The UN chief also said borrowing must work for, not against, developing countries, stressing that when channelled toward investment, debt is an important ally of development. Guterres also called for the reform of the international financial architecture. He said: “The world has changed dramatically since these institutions were created. Developing countries account for an ever-larger share of global output and trade. But institutions and financing arrangements still largely reflect the economic and power structures of the past. “As a matter of justice and common sense, we must ensure developing countries have the strongest possible participation across global financial institutions corresponding to the realities of today’s global economy. “Global economic governance must become more inclusive, representative, equitable and effective. “Financing for development is about more than economic progress. It is about human progress and about restoring trust in multilateralism.” – Bernama

o Secretary-general blasts US, Israel and Russia

report said: “The world’s most powerful governments failed to take meaningful action to stop the genocide or to bring an end to Israel’s unlawful occupation and apartheid.” When it comes to facing up to these “bullies and looters”, almost every world leader “has demonstrated cowardice”, Callamard said, calling this the “era of the coward”. “Most of the world, sadly, has to be defined as a coward,” she said. “I will tell you that almost the entire European Union is concerned”, she said, with the exception being Spain and Slovenia. Slovenia is one of the few EU countries to describe Israel’s war in Gaza as “genocide”, along with Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez. Governments around the world must hold Israel to account, including through economic means, the Amnesty chief said. She urged the EU to ditch a “shameful” association agreement with Israel and impose other measures such as sanctions. The report also criticised the United Kingdom for proscribing the Palestine Action group and arresting thousands of peaceful protesters against the ban. “Governments should stop cracking down on and criminalising dissent, including peaceful acts of civil disobedience.” – AFP

These leaders are “destroying all that stands in the way of their domination and greed” and “assaulting the very foundations of universal human rights”, she said. “And rather than confront those predators, the majority of governments, most notably European governments, opted instead for appeasement.” The spiralling conflict in the Middle East is “just the latest example of this new predatory world order”, based on a vision of the world that is “dehumanised through racist ideology”, Callamard said. The Amnesty International chief accused Trump of “an unprecedented number of actions undermining the rule of law” and “arbitrary use of power”. Trump and Putin share a world view “that is highly racist, that is highly patriarchal”, Callamard told AFP in a separate interview. The US “has done everything it could to undermine years, decades of effort to enshrine women’s rights and to defend access to sexual and reproductive rights”, she said. China is not on the “predator” list because it has been “much more discreet”, she said, but the country nevertheless has “supported the military operations in Myanmar” and is “involved in supporting Russia”. Focusing on Israel’s actions in Gaza, the

LONDON: The leaders of the United States, Israel and Russia are seeking to impose a new “predatory” world order while most countries are too cowardly to stop them, rights group Amnesty International said. Launching the global group’s annual report in London, Secretary-General Agnes Callamard condemned US President Donald Trump, Russia’s Vladimir Putin and Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu as “predators”. Such leaders have rejected the multilateral system developed since World War II in favour of a “vision without moral compass”, where “war, not diplomacy, rules”, the report into global protection of human rights said. The report comes at a “challenging moment” that could “destroy all that was built up over the last 80 years”, she said. “Throughout 2025, Trump, Putin and Netanyahu, among others, pursued economic and political domination through international destruction, suppression and violence on a massive scale,” she said in her opening speech.

El Salvador holds mass trial SAN SALVADOR: Nearly 490 alleged members of the powerful Central American gang Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13), including several alleged leaders, went on trial collectively in El Salvador on Monday, accused of thousands of murders. El Salvador is conducting mass trials of thousands of suspected gang members, many of whom have spent years in prison without charge or visiting rights, as part of iron-fisted President Nayib Bukele’s anti-gang crackdown. The Attorney General’s Office said 486 suspected MS-13 members were on trial for 47,000 crimes committed between 2012 and 2022, including 29,000 homicides.

The country’s court system said the trial included “members of the national leadership, street-level leaders, programme coordinators from across the country, and founders of” MS 13. Salvadoran authorities accuse the group of a range of crimes, including the killing of 87 people in a single weekend in March 2022. In the wake of those killings, Bukele, a close ally of US President Donald Trump, declared a “war” on gangs, which he said controlled 80% of Salvadoran territory. MS-13 is charged with the crime of rebellion “because they sought to ... establish a parallel state,” the Attorney General’s Office said. “We are going to put them on trial, and we are going to settle a historic debt,” prosecutors said. Bukele in 2022 imposed a state of emergency, which has been used to arrest more than 91,000 suspected gang members, including thousands of people who were later declared innocent. The campaign, which made Bukele hugely popular, has resulted in a dramatic decrease in crime, turning El Salvador from one of Latin America’s most dangerous countries to one of its safest. Rights groups, however, have denounced gross human rights abuses, including a lack of due process for the detainees, reports of torture and more than 500 deaths in prison. The fates of the detainees are now being

Accused gang members on trial at the Terrorism Confinement Center in Tecoluca, El Salvador on Monday. – ATTORNEY GENERAL’S OFFICE OF EL SALVADOR HANDOUT/REUTERSPIC

Bukele has accused them of murdering 200,000 people over three decades, including about 80,000 who disappeared without trace. State prosecutors said they had “ample evidence to request the maximum sentences” against the defendants, without specifying whether that meant life imprisonment. At the opening of the trial, the judge stated that armed groups had disturbed “the peace of the Salvadoran population and the security of the state” for decades, and would be tried “with the full force of the law”. New York-based Human Rights Watch and regional NGO Cristosal have criticised the mass trials, warning of the risk of innocent people being made to pay for the crimes of the guilty. – AFP

decided in mass trials, with anonymous judges handing down one-size-fit-all punishments to large groups of defendants following the proceedings via video-link from prison. MS-13 and the rival Barrio 18 gang operate drug trafficking rings and extortion rackets across Central America. The Trump administration has declared the two groups, among others, as terrorist organisations, designations it has used in part to justify deadly military strikes on alleged drug-running boats. The two gangs were born among Salvadoran youth on the streets of Los Angeles and then spread back to El Salvador, where they terrorised the population for more than three decades.