Headline

Mexico Election Heats Up As Two Women Vie For Presidency

Published

1 year ago

March 1, 2024

Campaigning officially began Friday for elections likely to produce Mexico’s first woman president – a watershed for a nation with a long tradition of macho culture.

Opposition candidate, Xochitl Galvez, launched her campaign after the stroke of midnight in one of Mexico’s most dangerous states, seeking to tap into voter concerns about the country’s rampant violence.

Public opinion polls suggest that she faces a tough battle against ruling party candidate, Claudia Sheinbaum, a former Mexico City mayor and close ally of outgoing President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, known by his initials AMLO.

With three months to go before the June 2 vote, Sheinbaum, a 61-year-old scientist by training, enjoys a significant lead with 63 per cent support, according to an average of polls compiled by the Oraculus research firm.

Galvez, also 61, has 31 per cent support, while Jorge Alvarez, 38, of the Citizens’ Movement party is a distant third with just five per cent, polls show.

At stake is the future of Latin America’s second-largest economy, a country of 126 million people that is a key trading partner of the United States and a major tourist destination, but which faces huge challenges from illegal migration and drug-related violence.

Galvez, an outspoken businesswoman with Indigenous roots, sought to put the focus on the country’s insecurity with a night-time rally in the city of Fresnillo in the violence-wracked central state of Zacatecas.

She led a candle-lit march through the streets before sharing the stage with a relative of one of Mexico’s more than 100,000 missing persons, holding a minute’s silence for victims of violence.

“Here in Fresnillo, as in all of Mexico, people are afraid,” Galvez said, hitting out at Lopez Obrador’s “hugs not bullets” strategy to tackle violent crime at its roots by combating poverty and inequality, rather than using military force.

“Hugs for criminals are over,” she said.

“To have a Mexico without fear, we’re going to restrain the most violent and aggressive criminal organizations in our country,” she added.

It was the first of several planned stops in cities considered by their residents to be among the most unsafe in Mexico, to highlight what Galvez says is the government’s failure to tackle spiraling violence.

Nearly 450,000 people have been murdered across Mexico since 2006 when then-president Felipe Calderon launched a controversial anti-drug military campaign, according to official figures.

‘Formidable party machinery’
Sheinbaum is a staunch supporter and confidant of Lopez Obrador, a leftwing populist who enjoys an approval rating of nearly 70 per cent according to Oraculus, but who is required by the constitution to leave office after one term.

The granddaughter of Bulgarian and Lithuanian Jewish migrants, Sheinbaum has vowed to continue Lopez Obrador’s policy agenda.

“Sheinbaum is in a very strong position, with a significant lead in the polls over Galvez,” analyst Michael Shifter of the Inter-American Dialogue think tank in Washington told AFP.

“Although nothing is impossible in politics, with just over three months to go before the election, it is highly unlikely that Galvez will be able to gain enough ground to make it a competitive race. AMLO is too popular, and the government and party machinery is too formidable,” he added.

Sheinbaum is due to address supporters on Friday afternoon in Mexico City’s main square, the heart of the city she governed from 2018 until last year when she stepped down to run for president.

On the eve of her campaign launch, Sheinbaum said that her opponents were “looking for a way to rise in the polls, but there is no way they can do it because we represent the future, and they represent the past.”

Galvez represents an opposition coalition made up of the Institutional Revolutionary Party – which ruled the country for more than 70 years until 2000 – the conservative National Action Party and the leftist Party of the Democratic Revolution.

But her background sets her apart from the traditional conservative opposition – she wears Indigenous clothing, uses colloquial language peppered with swear words and is known for travelling around Mexico City by bicycle.

AFP

Headline

Russia Hits Ukraine With 85 Drones, One Missile

Published

9 hours ago

August 16, 2025

Editor

Russia launched 85 attack drones and a ballistic missile at Ukraine overnight, Kyiv said Saturday, hours after Russian leader Vladimir Putin and US President Donald Trump held their Alaska talks.

The highly anticipated meeting in the remote US state ended with no breakthrough in halting Russia’s more than three-year-long Ukraine invasion.

Ukraine’s air force said Moscow had “attacked with an Iskander-M ballistic missile and 85 Shahed-type” drones, while also attacking “frontline areas” in four regions.

In its daily report, the air force said the attacks took place “on the night of August 16” and started in the evening of August 15 — when Putin and Trump held their negotiations.

Kyiv said its air defences shot down 61 of the drones.

The Trump-Putin summit ended with no ceasefire announcement, despite the West pressing the Kremlin for months to commit to a halt in fighting.

Ukraine’s leader, Volodymyr Zelensky, has not yet publicly reacted to the talks.

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, launched by Putin in February 2022, has killed thousands.

AFP

Headline

Trump, Putin Make No Breakthrough On Ukraine Deal, End Summit

Published

9 hours ago

August 16, 2025

Editor

Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin made no breakthrough on Ukraine at their high-stakes summit on Friday, pointing to areas of agreement and rekindling a friendship but offering no news on a ceasefire.

After an abrupt ending to three hours of talks with aides, Trump and Putin offered warm words but took no questions from reporters, highly unusual for the media-savvy US president.

“We’re not there yet, but we’ve made progress. There’s no deal until there’s a deal,” Trump said.

He called the meeting “extremely productive” with “many points” agreed, although he did not offer specifics.

“There are just a very few that are left; some are not that significant, one is probably the most significant,” Trump said without elaborating.

Putin also spoke in general terms of cooperation in a joint press appearance that lasted just 12 minutes.

“We hope that the understanding we have reached will… pave the way for peace in Ukraine,” Putin said.

As Trump mused about a second meeting, Putin smiled and said in English: “Next time in Moscow.”

The former KGB agent quickly tried to flatter Trump, who has voiced admiration for the Russian leader in the past.

Putin told Trump he agreed with him that the Ukraine war, which Putin ordered, would not have happened if Trump were president instead of Joe Biden.

Trump, for his part, again complained of a “hoax” that Russia intervened to help him in the 2016 election, a finding backed by US intelligence.

Before the summit, Trump had warned of “severe consequences” if Russia did not accept a ceasefire.

But when asked about those consequences during a Fox News interview with Sean Hannity after the talks, Trump said that “because of what happened today, I think I don’t have to think about that now.”

The friendly reception contrasted with Trump’s berating of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky when he met him at the White House in February.

Trump earlier said he sought a three-way meeting with Zelensky but did not announce one at the summit.

Trump said he would now consult Zelensky as well as NATO leaders, who have voiced unease about the US leader’s outreach to Putin.

“Now it’s really up to President Zelensky to get it done,” Trump said in the Fox News interview after the summit.

Putin warned Ukraine and European countries to “not create any obstacles” and not “make attempts to disrupt this emerging progress through provocation or behind-the-scenes intrigues.”

Trump invited Putin just a week ago and ensured there was some carefully choreographed drama for their first in-person meeting since 2019.

The two leaders arrived in their respective presidential jets and descended on the tarmac of an air base, with Trump clapping as Putin appeared.

US military might was on display with a B-2 stealth bomber flying overhead, as a reporter shouted audibly to Putin, “Will you stop killing civilians?”

Putin, undaunted, grinned widely as Trump took the unusual step of escorting him into “The Beast,” the secure US presidential limousine, before a meeting in a room before a screen that said, in English only, “Pursuing Peace.”

Putin smiled and joked with Russian reporters on the visit, a landmark for a leader who is facing an arrest warrant by the International Criminal Court related to the Ukraine war, which has killed tens of thousands of people.

Russia, in recent days, has made battlefield gains that could strengthen Putin’s hand in any ceasefire negotiations, although Ukraine announced, as Putin was flying in, that it had retaken several villages.

Trump had insisted he would be firm with Putin, after coming under heated criticism for appearing cowed during a 2018 summit in Helsinki.

While he was travelling to Alaska, the White House announced that Trump had scrapped a plan to see Putin alone, and he instead held the talks alongside Secretary of State Marco Rubio and his roving envoy Steve Witkoff.

Zelensky was not included and has refused pressure from Trump to surrender territory seized by Russia.

“It is time to end the war, and the necessary steps must be taken by Russia. We are counting on America,” Zelensky said in a social media post.

Headline

Russia, Ukraine War: Trump Rules Out Immediate Ceasefire, Pushes For Peace Deal

Published

9 hours ago

August 16, 2025

Editor

US President Donald Trump early Saturday ruled out an immediate ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine after his inconclusive summit with Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin, saying a direct peace agreement would end the war.

The White House and Kremlin leaders pointed to areas of agreement during their three hours of talks in Alaska, but offered no breakthrough on a ceasefire in the conflict that has left tens of thousands dead and caused widespread destruction in Ukraine.

“A great and very successful day in Alaska!” Trump proclaimed on his Truth Social platform hours after touching down in Washington.

“The meeting with President Vladimir Putin of Russia went very well, as did a late-night phone call with President Zelenskyy of Ukraine, and various European Leaders, including the highly respected Secretary General of NATO.”

He said it was determined by all that the best way to end the “horrific war… is to go directly to a Peace Agreement, which would end the war, and not a mere Ceasefire Agreement, which often do not hold up.”

Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky said earlier he will go to Washington for a meeting with the US leader on Monday, which Trump confirmed would be held in the Oval Office.

“If all works out, we will then schedule a meeting with President Putin,” Trump added, without specifying whether it would be a three-way meet.

“Potentially, millions of people’s lives will be saved.”

The war went on meanwhile with Ukraine announcing that Russia had launched 85 attack drones and a ballistic missile during the night. Russia said it had taken two more villages in Ukraine.

Zelensky voiced support for Trump’s proposals in an earlier social media post.

“We support President Trump’s proposal for a trilateral meeting between Ukraine, the USA, and Russia. Ukraine emphasises that key issues can be discussed at the level of leaders, and a trilateral format is suitable for this,” he wrote.