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BBC News
2 hours ago
- BBC News
Colombia's ex-president, Álvaro Uribe, sentenced to 12 years of house arrest
Colombian former President Álvaro Uribe has been sentenced to 12 years of house arrest for witness tampering and a fraud 73-year-old is the first former president in the country's history to be convicted of a crime. He has also been barred from public office and fined $578,000 (£435,000).Uribe, who maintains his innocence, told a judge in Bogotá he would appeal against his conviction. He said the case was meant to "destroy a voice for the democratic opposition".He was president from 2002-2010 and remains popular in Colombia, despite being accused of working with right-wing paramilitaries to destroy leftist rebel groups. A claim he denies. The former president was convicted of two charges on Monday in a witness-tampering case that has run for around 13 jailed ex-paramilitaries gave evidence saying Uribe's former lawyer Diego Cadena had offered them money to testify in Uribe's who is also facing charges, has denied the accusations and testified, along with several other ex-paramilitaries, on Uribe's this week, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio condemned Uribe's conviction, accusing Colombia's judiciary of being former president's "only crime has been to tirelessly fight and defend his homeland," Rubio wrote on the social media site, groups emerged in Colombia in the 1980s with the stated goal of taking on poverty and marginalisation. They fought the Marxist-inspired guerrilla groups that had themselves battled the state two decades of the armed groups which developed in the standoff made an income from the cocaine trade. Deadly fighting between them and with the state has produced lasting rivalries for trafficking routes and was praised by Washington for his hard-line approach to left-wing Farc rebels – but was a divisive politician, who critics say did little to tackle the inequality and poverty in the signed a peace deal with Uribe's successor in 2016, though violence from disarmed groups persists in Colombia.
The Independent
8 hours ago
- The Independent
Donald Trump's latest Liberation Day means another dark day for America
Precisely what poor, benighted Syria and prosperous, neutral Switzerland have done to deserve US tariffs of 41 per cent and 39 per cent respectively is hard to discern. Neither is the kind of industrial superpower that represents a threat to America's economic hegemony, and both would, in their different ways, prefer to stay on reasonably good terms with the Trump White House. It is, sadly, easier to see why Canada got whacked with a 35 per cent levy on some of its exports – and Donald Trump's tariff tactics do have a hint of the mob about them. Mr Trump suggested that Canada's decision to recognise the state of Palestine as a sovereign nation would make it harder to achieve a trade deal, and he also mentioned the scourge of fentanyl. But then again, Mexico, which has also recognised Palestine and is by far the more important source of the drug, has been granted a 90-day tariff reprieve. Ever since the opening salvo in the Trump tariff war on 2 April – so-called Liberation Day – the shifting schedules and random pauses have lacked both rhyme and reason. Even at the time, their supposed 'reciprocity' was ridiculed. They have generated huge uncertainty, and, for a time, did so much damage to the dollar and US Treasuries on the capital markets that even Mr Trump had to make a tactical retreat. In fact, the US president's observed tendency to cave in whenever a trading 'partner' showed any sign of resistance led to the unwelcome 'Taco' sobriquet – 'Trump Always Chickens Out'. Some countries, such as the UK, Japan and the EU member states, have breathed a sigh of relief that they have escaped the worst, while others – often impoverished ones with no diplomatic leverage, such as Bangladesh and Lesotho – will find it difficult to cope with tariffs that are now considered moderate, but would have seemed shocking even a few years ago. Yet the game, even now, is not over. China – the second-largest economy in the world, and America's most formidable rival – has been left out of this supposedly final list of tariff increases. The trade talks between the two economic giants in Stockholm are dragging on, the prohibitive mutual tariffs having been abandoned, and they may well be extended past the next deadline of 12 August. President Trump met his match in Xi Jinping, and will not be imposing any further punitive trade sanctions on China for fear of another tit-for-tat escalation. Thus far, the markets have received the latest news of tariffs with some equanimity, but a collapse in trade between the world's two greatest economies would generate the kind of turmoil Mr Trump doesn't need right now. Even assuming that the eventual trade truce with China avoids disaster, these US tariffs are, in broad terms, the highest since 1934 and the era of the notorious Smoot-Hawley Act, which helped to strangle world trade and exacerbated the Great Depression. The Trump tariffs are no less damaging to world trade, and thus to economic growth, including that of the United States. But these restrictions on trade are what Mr Trump's Maga 'base' voted for, the folk memory of the previous disastrous experiment with tariffs having faded. The president's winning slogan was 'America First', epitomising a zero-sum, nationalistic view of the world, and unfortunately, he has proved as good as his word on inauguration day: 'Instead of taxing our citizens to enrich other countries, we will tariff and tax foreign countries to enrich our citizens.' Words that were both misguided and economically illiterate, naturally – but a promise kept. Many of the worst fears of America's friends and allies are coming true in these early months of Mr Trump's second term. With far more preparation than took place prior to his first term (which followed an election that, reputedly, he never expected to win), the US president has pressed on with his protectionist, isolationist, natalist agenda with speed and determination, surrounded by mostly underqualified, grotesquely sycophantic cronies. The judiciary is increasingly cowed, and Congress is listless in defending the constitution. The tendency to Caesarism is apparent in everything from the theatrical executive orders to the grandiose golden remodelling of the White House, and the contempt for the chair of the US Federal Reserve, Jerome Powell – a 'moron', apparently. Mr Trump thinks he can, with a stroke of a Sharpie, abolish the birthright to citizenship enshrined in the 14th amendment, passed in 1868. His conception of 'America First' is more America Alone, yet everything he does weakens American power and prosperity. It is an inward-looking, selfish, exclusionary approach. Undoubtedly it enjoys a political constituency, but ultimately it will prove self-defeating.
The Guardian
9 hours ago
- The Guardian
Dozens of countries scramble to cope with latest wave of Trump trade tariffs
Leaders of more than 60 countries have been plunged into a fresh race to secure trade deals with the US after Donald Trump unleashed global chaos with sweeping new tariff rates. Trump's latest blitz triggered a wave of market jitters and fears for jobs in some of the poorest countries, as tariff rates were signed off ranging from 50% to 10%. There was a minor reprieve that opened the door to further negotiations, after the White House said the updated tariffs would take effect on 7 August, not on Friday, the deadline previously set by Trump. The new rates, which Trump sees as benefiting US exporters, create uncertainty for dozens of countries, including longtime US allies. They have also raised fears of inflation in the US. Rates were set at 25% for India's US-bound exports, 20% for Taiwan and 30% for South Africa. Switzerland faces a rate of 39%. The deadline for a tariff deal with Mexico was extended by another 90 days. Stock markets fell on both sides of the Atlantic, after earlier falls in Asia, amid investors fears about the impact on the global economy. Europe's Stoxx 600 was down nearly 2% while the UK's FTSE 100 was down 0.8%. Wall Street opened lower, with the Dow Jones, S&P 500 and Nasdaq all down more than 1% by late morning in New York. The sell-off was exacerbated by weaker than expected jobs figures in the US. Switzerland and chip powerhouse Taiwan are scrambling to negotiate deals after being hit by rates of 39% – one of the highest in the world – and 20% respectively. Canada's prime minister, Mark Carney, said his government was 'disappointed' by Trump's decision to increase US tariffs on Canadian goods from 25% to 35% with immediate effect – on the grounds Canada had failed to crack down on fentanyl and to increase border security. South Africa's president, Cyril Ramaphosa, said he would use the week to 'negotiate as strongly and as hard as we can' to reduce a crippling 30% duty on goods. Some of the world's poorest and struggling countries were hit with punitive rates, including Syria, which faces a levy of 41%. Laos and Myanmar were hammered with rates of 40%; Libya, 30%; Iraq, 35% and Sri Lanka 20%. Would-be EU member states were blindsided by punitive rates: Moldova 25%, Serbia 35% and Bosnia and Herzogovina30%. There was some reprieve for Lesotho, a country that Trump described a state that 'nobody has ever heard of' when halting USAid. It was facing 50% tariffs, an existential threat to its textile industry but came out on Friday with a 15% rate. Lesotho's $2bn economy is heavily dependent on duty-free exports to the US. The tiny African country declared a national state of disaster after the 50% rate was declared. The Swiss franc touched its weakest in six weeks after being hit with one of the highest tariffs in the world, 39%, while the Canadian dollar was set for a seventh straight weekly loss. Karin Keller-Sutter, the Swiss president, who was celebrating the country's national day, said she had spoken to Trump on Thursday but that 'no agreement could be reached'. Pharma accounts for 50% of Swiss exports to the US, which may have been Trump's target. Kathleen Brooks, research director at XTB, said Switzerland got the rough end of Trump's trade war. 'The Swiss rate was a shock, and the Swiss government have said that they plan to keep negotiating with the US to secure a lower levy. Chocolatiers, watchmakers and pharma companies are all under threat,' she said. Conspicuous as the only two trading partners listed at a 10% rate were the UK, the first to get a deal with Trump, and the Falkland Islands. The EU's 15% tariff rate as a single all-inclusive rate was confirmed in the executive order. In a setback to the EU, cars were left out in the executive order. They are currently being taxed at 27.5%, with many EU car companies resuming deliveries to customers in the US after last Sunday's deal with Trump. The new specific rates will apply seven days after the date of the executive order, starting on 8 August. For goods already in transit or warehoused for consumption before 8 August, the previous tariff rate (10% + MFN rate) will apply until 5 October 2025. Pharmaceuticals were conspicuous by their absence, given the White House said it had agreed a 15% rate on Monday, hours after Trump sealed the deal with the EU at his Scottish golf course. Pharma chiefs, who have been in Trump's crosshairs for months, were warned to reduce their prices to US patients by the US president. If they refused to, the federal government would 'deploy every tool' in its arsenal to protect American families, the White House said. Brazil's tariff rate was set at 10%, but a previous order placed a 40% tariff on to punish the country for prosecuting its former president, Jair Bolsonaro. Cambodia appeared to be close to reaching a deal after it said it would drop all tariffs on imports from the US and order up to 20 Boeing 737s.
