Freddy Guevara will never forget the 34 excruciating days he spent inside Venezuela’s most notorious political prison after being snatched by masked men from President Nicolás Maduro’s intelligence agency.
The black hood, the interrogations, the stress positions, the salsa music his captors blasted at him in an attempt to make him crack.
The US is in the process of seizing the Olina tanker in the Caribbean near Trinidad in the fifth such interdiction of ships in recent weeks as part of Washington’s efforts to control Venezuelan oil exports, two US officials said on Friday.
The Olina, according to public shipping database Equasis, was falsely flying the flag of the tiny south-east Asian nation of Timor Leste. The vessel had previously sailed from Venezuela and had returned to the region, said an industry source with direct knowledge of the matter.
Robot vacuums that can climb stairs and device for BlackBerry lovers also on display at annual Las Vegas tech show
This year will be filled with robots that can fold your laundry, pick up objects and climb stairs, fridges that you can command to open by voice, laptops with screens that can follow you around the room on motorised hinges and the reimagining of the BlackBerry phone.
Those are the predictions from the annual CES tech show in Las Vegas that took place this week. The sprawling event aims to showcase cutting-edge technology developed by startups and big brands.
As Americans worry about healthcare and affordability, the ‘no more wars’ president is helping oil companies instead
Immediately after Donald Trump ordered a military strike in Venezuela, many critics focused on how that attack violatedinternational law as well as the US War Powers Resolution. But there hasn’t been nearly enough focus on the domestic implications of Trump’s move.
Nearly 16,000 nurses to join union-led strike on Monday to demand large hospitals across NYC ‘put patients over profit’
Nearly 16,000 nurses in New York City are set to strike on Monday amid a battle over safe staffing, healthcare benefits, pay and workplace safety during contract negotiations.
The action, due to take place across five large hospitals, is being organized by the New York State Nurses Association (NYSNA), which is demanding the hospitals put patients over profit.
‘We have our own medics,’ bystanders were told after ICE agent fatally shot Renee Nicole Good in Minneapolis
Witnesses to an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent fatally shooting Renee Nicole Good in Minneapolis on Wednesday say federal officers impeded the response of emergency medical personnel to the scene, blocking the road with their vehicles.
Emily Heller, a witness who lives near the intersection of 34th Street and Portland Avenue, recorded the scene as it unfolded. She told NBC News that agents blocked people from approaching Good’s vehicle. Her video shows a man who identified himself as a physician asking to check for a pulse and being rebuffed.
US in process of taking fifth sanctioned tanker suspected of carrying oil to and from Venezuela, Reuters reports; Trump says he’s halting further attack after Caracas’ release of political prisoners
Pope Leo XIV has denounced how nations are using force to assert their dominion worldwide, saying they are “completely undermining” peace and the post-Second World War international legal order, AP reported.
In his most substantial critique of US, Russian and other military incursions in sovereign countries, Leo told ambassadors who represent their countries’ interests at the Holy See that “war is back in vogue and a zeal for war is spreading”.
Big names from Leonardo DiCaprio to Timothée Chalamet are aiming for a win at Hollywood’s most important Oscars precursor
Hollywood’s A-list will assemble this weekend for the 83rd Golden Globes ceremony, a night that will reveal where this year’s Oscars race is headed.
Stars including Leonardo DiCaprio, Timothée Chalamet, Jennifer Lawrence, Emma Stone, Michael B Jordan and Ariana Grande are among those nominated for film awards while small screen nominees include Helen Mirren, Jenna Ortega, Jude Law and Glen Powell.
Exclusive: SIK leader Jess Berthelsen rejects Trump claim that the US needs Greenland for ‘national security’
Greenland “will not be annexed”, the longtime leader of its largest labor union has declared, refuting Donald Trump’s claims that the Arctic territory’s current status poses a national security threat to the US.
In an interview with the Guardian, Jess Berthelsen, chair of SIK, Greenland’s national trade union confederation, said people in the territory do not recognize the US president’s allegations that Russian and Chinese ships are scattered throughout its waters. “We can’t see it, we can’t recognize it and we can’t understand it,” he said.
Barely a mile from Floyd’s murder, an officer killed Renee Nicole Good. We must peacefully say no to this violence
On 25 May 2020, America witnessed a stunning act of police brutality when a police officer in Minneapolis, Minnesota, murdered George Floyd. The killer, Derek Chauvin, apparently confident that he would be immune to accountability, did his deed in the open, with other officers standing by and in front of a crowd of onlookers.
Austin Sarat, William Nelson Cromwell professor of jurisprudence and political science at Amherst College, is the author or editor of more than 100 books, including Gruesome Spectacles: Botched Executions and America’s Death Penalty
Forecasts suggest that global heating could create a shortcut from Asia to North America, and new routes for trading, shipping – and attack
Another week, another freak weather phenomenon you’ve probably never heard of. If it’s not the “weather bomb” of extreme wind and snow that Britain is hunkering down for as I write, it’s reports in the Guardian of reindeer in the Arctic struggling with the opposite problem: unnaturally warm weather leading to more rain that freezes to create a type of snow that they can’t easily dig through with their hooves to reach food. In a habitat as harsh as the Arctic, where survival relies on fine adaptation, even small shifts in weather patterns have endlessly rippling consequences – and not just for reindeer.
For decades now, politicians have been warning of the coming climate wars – conflicts triggered by drought, flood, fire and storms forcing people on to the move, or pushing them into competition with neighbours for dwindling natural resources. For anyone who vaguely imagined this happening far from temperate Europe’s doorstep, in drought-stricken deserts or on Pacific islands sinking slowly into the sea, this week’s seemingly unhinged White House talk about taking ownership of Greenland is a blunt wake-up call. As Britain’s first sea lord, General Sir Gwyn Jenkins, has been telling anyone prepared to listen, the unfreezing of the north due to the climate crisis has triggered a ferocious contest in the defrosting Arctic for some time over resources, territory and strategically critical access to the Atlantic. To understand how that threatens northern Europe, look down at the top of a globe rather than at a map.
Donald Trump’s latest attack on climate action takes place amid rapidly rising temperatures, rising sea levels, still-rising greenhouse gas emissions, burgeoning costs from extreme weather and the imminent danger that the world will trigger “tipping points” in the climate system that will lead to catastrophic and irreversible changes.
The US president’s decision to withdraw from the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the world’s leading body of climate scientists, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, will not alter any of those scientific realities.
Trump sounds off on Venezuela’s future, Taiwan’s security and his aims for Greenland, days after operation to seize Nicolás Maduro
Just days after launching an unprecedented operation in Venezuela to seize its president and effectively take control of its oil industry, Donald Trump sat down with New York Times journalists for a wide-ranging interview that took in international law, Taiwan, Greenland and weight-loss drugs.
The president, riding high on the success of an operation that has upended the rules of global power, spoke candidly and casually about the new world order he appears eager to usher in; an order governed not by international norms or long-lasting alliances, but national strength and military power.
Mayor urges ICE to pause operations as representative says victims alive but extent of injuries unknown
US border patrol agents shot two people outside a hospital in Portland, Oregon, a day after an ICE officer shot and killed a woman in Minneapolis.
The Portland police bureau (PPB) said in a statement on Thursday afternoon that two people were in hospital after a shooting involving federal agents, adding that the conditions of those shot were not known.
Aria and Tia both south of Britain after US-UK seizure of Marinera, deemed to be part of Moscow’s ‘shadow fleet’
Two oil tankers under US sanctions are sailing east through the Channel towards Russia, prompting speculation over whether the US and UK would be willing to seize further vessels linked to Moscow.
The Aria and the Tia, which has changed its name and country of registration several times, were both travelling south of Britain a day after the Marinera oil tanker was captured in the Atlantic by the US with UK help.
Austin Peay State University will also pay theater and dance professor Darren Michael $500,000 in settlement
Austin Peay State University has reinstated a professor who was fired for his social media post after the killing of conservative activist Charlie Kirk. The Tennessee school is also paying the teacher $500,000 in the settlement.
Austin Peay spokesperson Brian Dunn said Darren Michael returned to his position as a tenured faculty member at the public university in Clarksville effective 30 December. A copy of the settlement agreement obtained through a public records request includes a $500,000 payment and reimbursement of counseling, as reported earlier this week by WKRN-TV.
Democrat Ro Khanna and Republican Thomas Massie seek to compel justice department to release full set of files
Two US House of Representatives members have asked a federal judge to appoint a special master to compel the justice department to release all files related to Jeffrey Epstein, the disgraced financier and convicted sex offender.
On Thursday, Democratic representative Ro Khanna of California and Republican representative Thomas Massie of Kentucky asked US district judge Paul Engelmayer to release the full Epstein files, as required by the Epstein Files Transparency Act.
GM says end of tax incentives and less stringent emissions regulations slowed consumer demand for EVs in 2025
General Motors said on Thursday it will record a one-time earnings hit of $7.1bn in its quarterly financial results, mostly due to its pullback from electric vehicles in light of shifting US policies.
The Detroit auto giant’s fourth-quarter results will be dented by $6bn in charges connected to reversals on EV investments, according to a securities filing. The remaining $1.1bn includes costs from the company’s restructuring of its China operations.
The vice-president went ballistic against the media and the left – a version of Trump with even more menace
It was James David Vance’s pitch to his boss: don’t forget me!
The vice-president was nowhere to be seen last weekend when US special forces swept into Venezuela and snatched its leader, Nicolás Maduro. Instead Marco Rubio, the secretary of state and a potential rival to Vance in the 2028 presidential election, grabbed all the Maga glory.
Kristi Noem, the homeland security secretary, has doubled down on her claim that the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent who shot and killed a 37-year-old woman in Minneapolis was acting in self-defense and responding to an “act of domestic terrorism”.
Noem also said that she was “not opposed” to sending additional federal agents to Minneapolis.
Disgraced former movie mogul would avoid a third trial in New York on charges that came to define the #MeToo era
Disgraced former movie mogul Harvey Weinstein is weighing a potential guilty plea to resolve an undecided third-degree rape charge and avoid a third trial in New York on charges that came to define the #MeToo era.
Weinstein, in a wheelchair and looking noticeably paler than he did when he was last in court in June, was brought to Judge Curtis Farber’s court on Thursday, seeking to have his latest sex crime conviction thrown out over claims of juror intimidation.
An almost admiring feeling pervaded the early coverage – and not just among right-leaning outlets
If you believe the early public opinion polls, Americans are uncertain about last weekend’s raid on Venezuela and the seizure of the country’s leader, Nicolás Maduro.
But many in the media seem to be trying to move that wavering needle to approval.
Margaret Sullivan is a Guardian US columnist writing on media, politics and culture
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