As Colombia approaches presidential elections next year, the US decision to decertify the country in the war on drugs plays into the hands of its allies on the political right, writes NICK MacWILLIAM

EARLY SIGNS of what the incoming Trump administration in the US has in store for Venezuela were revealed in mid-November with the approval by the House of Representatives of a new Bill tightening the existing blockade against Venezuela.
The Bill, which still requires Senate approval, is entitled Banning Operations and Leases with the Illegitimate Venezuelan Authoritarian Regime Act, known by its deliberately offensive acronym, the Bolivar Act.
The Bill was introduced by two representatives from Florida — Democrat Debbie Wasserman Schultz and Republican Mike Waltz, nominated as Trump’s national security adviser, who has said that the Bill “sends a powerful message to Maduro that there will be no appeasement.”

The US is desperate to stop Honduras’s process of social and democratic change, writes TIM YOUNG


