As many states move toward reopening after a horrific April that saw nearly 60,000 deaths because of the coronavirus, a new report offers a stark warning: A group of experts has concluded the pandemic could last as long as two years, until 60% to 70% of the population is immune.
Meanwhile, President Donald Trump is scheduled to leave the White House on Friday for the first time in a month to travel to Camp David, one day after the expiration of federal social distancing guidelines.
Our live blog is being updated throughout the day. Refresh for the latest news, and get updates in your inbox with The Daily Briefing.
Here are the most important developments Friday on the coronavirus pandemic.Scroll down for the latest updates.
Dr. Deborah Birx, coordinator of the White House coronavirus task force, suggested social distancing could continue in some form through the summer as the White House quietly allowed official guidelines to expire. Meanwhile, a new report warns the pandemic could last up to two years, until the world hits the threshold for herd immunity.
Trump said Thursday he’s seen evidence suggesting the new virus originated in a Chinese virology lab. The president didn’t provide the evidence, but his top national intelligence official said the virus was not man-made or genetically modified, as scientists have concluded. The intelligence community “will continue to rigorously examine” the virus’ origin, the national intelligence director’s office said.
Some positive news today: If you’re a fan of “Parks and Recreation,” then you must catch the show’s quarantine special. It’ll make you laugh, cry and sing for Lil Sebastian.
Most EU laws will continue to be in force – including the free movement of people – until the end of December, by which time the UK aims to have reached a permanent free trade agreement with the EU.
Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn urged the country not to “turn inwards” and instead “build a truly internationalist, diverse and outward-looking Britain”.
The Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “We must be united in a common vision for our country, however great our differences on achieving it – a common hope for what we want to happen, and what we want to do in the years to come.”
And Brexit Party leader Nigel Farage said: “At last the day comes when we break free. A massive victory for the people against the establishment.”
Brexit was originally scheduled for 29 March last year but was repeatedly delayed when MPs rejected a previous withdrawal agreement reached by the EU and former Prime Minister Theresa May.
Mr Johnson was able to get his own deal through Parliament after winning December’s general election with a House of Commons majority of 80, on a pledge to “get Brexit done”.
This brought to an end more than three years of political wrangling, following the referendum of 2016, in which 52% of voters backed leaving the EU.
Image copyright Reuters
Image caption
Brexit Party MEPs left the European Parliament led by a bagpiper
The prime minister will hold a cabinet meeting in Sunderland – the city that was the first to back Brexit when results were announced after the 2016 referendum – on Friday morning.
Mr Johnson, who led the 2016 campaign to get the UK out of the EU, will attempt to strike an optimistic, non-triumphalist note in his message, stressing the need to bring all sides together.
“The most important thing to say tonight is that this is not an end but a beginning,” he will say.
“This is the moment when the dawn breaks and the curtain goes up on a new act. It is a moment of real national renewal and change.”
Image copyright Getty Images
Image caption
Tourists pose for pictures with Manneken Pis statue in Brussels
In his message, filmed in Downing Street, Mr Johnson will also say: “This is the dawn of a new era in which we no longer accept that your life chances – your family’s life chances – should depend on which part of the country you grow up in.
“This is the moment when we begin to unite and level up.”
Brexit Party MEPs, including Ann Widdecombe, left the European Parliament in Brussels led by a bagpiper.
Supporters of the EU are expected to take part in a procession through Whitehall at 15:00 GMT to “bid a fond farewell” to the union.
Later, Brexiteers will gather in Parliament Square for a celebration, and a clock counting down to the moment the UK leaves the EU will be projected on to Downing Street.
Buildings along Whitehall will be lit up and Union flags will be flown from all the poles in Parliament Square.
A new commemorative 50p coin will also come into circulation to mark the UK’s withdrawal.
However, Big Ben will not chime at 23:00 GMT due to ongoing renovation works – despite a fundraising effort led by Conservative MP Mark Francois.
Media captionUrsula von der Leyen: “It’s a very emotional day”
In Brussels, the UK flag will be removed from the EU institutions, with one Union flag expected to be consigned to a museum.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen paid tribute to UK citizens who had “contributed to the European Union and made it stronger”.
“It is the story of old friends and new beginnings now,” she said. “Therefore it is an emotional day, but I’m looking forward to the next stage.”
Upcoming negotiations would be “fair” but each side would fight for its interests, she added.
Irish Deputy Prime Minister Simon Coveney told Sky News he thought the EU and UK would struggle to reach a trade deal during the 11-month transition period, as there was “too much to agree”.
Media captionConfused by Brexit jargon? Reality Check unpacks the basics.
In Scotland, which voted to stay in the EU in the 2016 referendum, candlelit vigils are planned.
And in a speech in Edinburgh later, First Minister Nicola Sturgeon is expected to say Scotland has been “taken out of the European Union against the wishes of the overwhelming majority” of its people.
She will argue that Scotland has “the prospect of a brighter, better future as an equal, independent European nation”.
For Labour, Mr Corbyn, who is due to stand down as party leader in April, said the UK was “at a crossroads”.
“We can build a truly internationalist, diverse and outward-looking Britain,” he added. “Or we can turn inwards, and trade our principles, rights and standards to secure hastily arranged, one-sided, race-to-the-bottom trade deals with Donald Trump and others.”
Mr Corbyn promised Labour would “hold the government to account every step of the way”.
Liberal Democrat acting leader Sir Ed Davey vowed his pro-EU party would “never stop fighting” to have the “closest possible relationship” with Europe.
He said it would be on a “damage-limitation exercise to stop a hard Brexit hurting British people”.
Cabinet minister Michael Gove told BBC Breakfast he was “relieved” and “delighted” that Brexit was “at last coming to pass”.
The Secret Service detained a man outside the White House on Friday afternoon after he apparently attempted to light himself on fire.
A Secret Service spokeswoman confirmed the man had tried to set his jacket on fire, and the D.C. Fire Department responded to administer first aid. No information about the man’s condition or reason for setting himself on fire was immediately available.
The identity of the man was not released. It appears only one person was involved in the incident.
Authorities removed reporters, who were gathered on the driveway, from the area following the incident. Most were guided back into the West Wing.
White House reporters were just sternly ordered away from Pennsylvania Ave. fence, including out of TV tents
There’s a major incident response here now. Talk is someone set themselves on fire, but I did not see it pic.twitter.com/YOdMAeZ6ei
Authorities lifted the lockdown on the White House late Friday afternoon. The Associated Press reported President Trump was at the White House at the time.
It is unclear if the man will be arrested or face charges. He is being described by multiple media outlets as a likely protester.
The Secret Service said they are still investigating.
White House scene just before Secret Service forced reporters indoors
Smuggling gangs in Mexico are reportedly using power tools to cut large holes in walls at the southern US-Mexico border, according to a new report from The Washington Post.
The steel-and-concrete portions of the walls, which President Donald Trump has touted as the solution to the flow of undocumented immigrants coming across the US-Mexico border, can be sawed apart with at least one commercially available cordless tool that retails for less than $100, according to the Post, which cites US border officials with knowledge of the damage.
In addition to cutting through the walls, officials told the Post that smugglers have also repeatedly scaled and climbed over the walls with makeshift ladders, particularly in areas near San Diego.
The report comes as the first and most detailed description of such breaches and says that the lack of government reporting means it is unclear how many times they have occurred. US Customs and Border Protection reportedly declined to provide further information about the number of wall breaches to the Post and had not yet fulfilled a Freedom of Information Act request seeking such data at the time of the report.
One factor of deterrent is electronic sensors that are yet to be added but could sense where and when the wall was damaged, triggering repairs. However, one former border chief said smugglers would likely eventually find a way around those as well.
The wall has been a costly and politically tense issue between lawmakers and Trump, after the president previously enacted what became the longest shutdown in government history when he did not relent in debates with lawmakers through December 2018 on his request for $5 billion to be allocated for the wall.
Despite the president’s repeated pushes for the wall, environmental and immigration experts have expressed doubts about its possible effects on nearby areas and its overall efficacy. CBP officials were vocal during Trump’s weighing of different designs that a solid concrete wall wouldn’t be beneficial to agents who ideally would be able to see through to the other side.
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According to the Post’s report, smugglers are exploiting the “bollard” style design that the administration eventually settled on, which has been described as part of a “border wall system” as agents insisted a wall alone couldn’t safeguard the border.
NBC News reported in January 2019 that a test of a steel bollard wall in Trump’s chosen design by the Department of Homeland Security showed the wall could be sawed through.
Photos of the breaches were not included in a redacted version of an internal February 2018 US Customs and Border Protection report that mentioned the faults, NBC reported, and Trump denied the validity of the photos, saying it was “a wall designed by previous administrations,” though the one in question was made under his administration.
Detail of a scarf print from the Beyond Buckskin Boutique. Photo courtesy of shop.beyondbuckskin.com. Download Full Image
Morris said by spearheading innovative partnerships and leveraging resources from ASU, tribes and community organizations, she hopes that Inno-NATIONS will create a “collision community,” causing a ripple effect of economic change in tribal communities.
Both events are free and take place at The Department in downtown Phoenix.
Inno-NATIONS will also launch a three-day pilot cohort with approximately 20 Native American businesses starting in June.
“Beyond Buckskin” features Jessica Metcalfe, a Turtle Mountain Chippewa, Dartmouth graduate and entrepreneur, who grew a small online store into a successful boutique on the Turtle Mountain Indian Reservation in North Dakota.
The store promotes and sells Native American-made couture, streetwear, jewelry, and accessories from more than 40 Native American and First Nations artist, employing tribe members from the Turtle Mountain community.
ASU Now spoke to Metcalfe to discuss her work.
Jessica Metcalfe
Question: We’ve seen Native American fashion emerge and evolve. How did you get into the business?
Answer: I was writing my master’s thesis in 2005 and my advisor at the time had told me about some research she had done, which looked at Native American fashion in the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s. She had wondered if I was interested in picking up where her research left off. I looked into it and found that there were these breadcrumbs, little bits here in there, that something had been going on in the past 60-70 years, but hadn’t been looked at as a collective movement.
Through my doctoral dissertation, what I discovered was that Native American fashion has gone through waves of acknowledgements by the broader public, but what we’re experiencing now is perhaps the biggest wave yet.
You have designers like Patricia Michaels out at New York’s Style Fashion Week and the Native Fashion Now traveling exhibit touring the country, so there’s really a lot of exciting things happening lately. It’s coming from a collective movement. Designers basically grouping together to share costs but also to put together more events to cause a bigger ruckus.
Q: How did you build your online store into a brick-and-mortar business?
A: I first launched a blog in 2009 as an outlet for my dissertation research, and wanted to share it with more people and to also get more stories and experiences. My readers kept asking where could they see and buy these clothes? At that time, there wasn’t an easy way to access functions like a Native American Pow Wow or market in order to do that.
I had established a rapport with designers through my research and writing. They saw what I was doing through the blog and then a question popped into my head. “How would you feel about creating a business together?” There were 11 initial designers who said they needed the space, and I worked with them to sell their goods online. We just now opened our design lab on the Turtle Mountain Indian Reservation. We are creating a system where we can meet demand and maximize a need in Indian Country.
We employ Native Americans from ages 15 to 22. There aren’t a whole lot of opportunities for people that age on the reservation. They either work at the grocery store or the gas station. One of them is interested in film and photography and so they run our photo shoots. Another person is interested in business entrepreneurship, and they get to see how an idea goes from concept to execution.
Q: The subtext is that this isn’t just about fashion but, history, representation and cultural appropriation?
A: Our clothing is just more than just objects. It’s about how the material was gathered, what the colors represent, what stories are being told and how does that tie into our value system. One of the things I often discuss is the Native American headdress. Our leaders wear them as a symbol of their leadership and the dedication to their communities. These stories are a way to share our culture with non-Natives and protect our legacy for future generations.
Q: Why is it important for Native American businesses to branch out into other cultures?
A: Native American people desperately need to diversify their economic opportunities on and off the reservations. Up until recently, people haven’t thought of fashion or art as a viable career path.
A recent study conducted by First Peoples Fund that found a third of all Native American people are practicing or are potential artists. That is a huge resource we already have in Indian Country and we need to tap it and develop it, and push for Natives in various fields to look at themselves as entrepreneurs and launching businesses.
Now, Native American people have an opportunity to make a positive impact in their local communities by reaching people through their art and sharing our culture with the rest of the world.
A man suspected of involvement in a mysterious dissident groups February raid on North Koreas Embassy in Madrid was arrested in Los Angeles by U.S. authorities.
Christopher Ahn, a former U.S. Marine, was arrested and charged Friday, according to a person familiar with the matter. The specific charges against Ahn were not immediately clear.
The person could not discuss the matter publicly and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.
Separately, on Thursday, federal agents raided the apartment of Adrian Hong, a leader of the Free Joseon group, the person said. Hong was not arrested.
Free Joseon, also known as the Cheollima Civil Defense group, styles itself as a government-in-exile dedicated to toppling the ruling Kim family dynasty in North Korea.
The group said it consists of North Korean defectors living in countries around the world, but that it has not worked with or contacted defectors living under tight security in South Korea.
Lee Wolosky, a lawyer for the group, said in a statement that he was dismayed that the U.S. Department of Justice has decided to execute warrants against U.S. persons that derive from criminal complaints filed by the North Korean regime.
The last U.S. citizen who fell into the custody of the Kim regime returned home maimed from torture and did not survive, Wolosky said, referring to college student Otto Warmbiers 2017 death.
We have received no assurances from the U.S. government about the safety and security of the U.S. nationals it is now targeting, he added.
A Spanish police investigator in the case told The Associated Press in Madrid on Saturday that Ahn was identified by the Spanish police at a later stage of its investigation into the Feb. 22 raid and that an international arrest warrant was also issued against him.
Thats in addition to warrants issued for the other suspects named last month in Spanish court documents.
The investigator, who spoke under condition of anonymity given the sensitivities of the case, said that because of judicial secrecy, he couldnt confirm how many arrest warrants had been issued by Spanish authorities beyond the two initially confirmed.
A Spanish judge said an investigation uncovered evidence that a criminal organization shackled and gagged embassy staff before escaping with computers, hard drives and documents.
Cheollima said on its website that it was responding to an urgent situation at the embassy and was invited onto the property, and that no one was gagged or beaten.
The group said there were no other governments involved with or aware of our activity until after the event.
The Spanish court report said the intruders urged North Koreas only accredited diplomat in Spain, So Yun Sok, to defect.
In March 2017, the group said it had arranged the escape of Kim Han Sol, the son of Kim Jong Nam, the half-brother of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, who was assassinated at a Malaysian airport earlier that year.
The Cheollima website said the group shared certain information of enormous potential value from the raid with the FBI, under mutually agreed terms of confidentiality.
According to the Spanish court report, Hong flew to the United States on Feb. 23, got in touch with the FBI and offered to share material and videos. The report didnt say what type of information the items contained or whether the FBI accepted the offer.
The FBI said its standard practice is to neither confirm nor deny the existence of investigations.
Jared Kushner spoke about Russian election interference during the TIME 100 Summit 2019 in New York City.
Brian Ach/Getty Images for TIME
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Brian Ach/Getty Images for TIME
Jared Kushner spoke about Russian election interference during the TIME 100 Summit 2019 in New York City.
Brian Ach/Getty Images for TIME
In a rare public appearance on Tuesday, Jared Kushner, President Trump’s son-in-law and one of his closest advisers, said that the multiple investigations into Russian election interference have been more harmful to American democracy than the original interference itself.
“The whole thing is just a big distraction for the country,” Kushner said at a Time Magazine event in New York City. “You look at what Russia did — buying some Facebook ads to try and sow dissent. And it’s a terrible thing, but I think the investigation and all the speculation that’s happened over the past two years has had a much harsher impact on our democracy.”
In describing Russia’s efforts leading up to the 2016 election, Kushner emphasized what he called the relatively small amount of money Russian agents spent advertising on social media.
“They said they spent $160,000. I spent $160,000 on Facebook in three hours during the campaign,” Kushner said. “If you look at the magnitude of what they did and what they accomplished, I think the ensuing investigations have been way more harmful to our country.”
Fact check: Were Facebook ads the extent of Russian election interference?
The short answer: No.
The long answer: The redacted version of Justice Department special counsel Robert Mueller’s report revealed a years-long plot by the Russian government to interfere in the U.S. that investigators called “sweeping and systemic.”
As to the amount of money expended on Facebook ads, the company said Russian operatives did spend less than $200,000 on advertising on the platform — but that doesn’t account for the organic content the operatives created and shared.
Not only were influence specialists within Russia’s “Internet Research Agency” purchasing normal advertisements, they were authoring their own posts, memes and other content as they posed as American users.
They also reached out to real politically active Americans, posing as like-minded supporters, and helped organize rallies and other events in the real world.
Facebook says the IRA may have reached as many as 126 million people. Separately, Twitter announced that about 1.4 million people may have been in contact with IRA-controlled accounts.
The social media aspect of the interference was just one dimension. Cyber-attackers also went after political victims in the United States — whose emails and other data were released publicly to embarrass them — and state elections officials and other targets. And there may have been other avenues of interference as well.
The origins of the scheme
Russian operatives lied to get into the U.S. as early as 2014 on “intelligence-gathering missions.” They traveled across the country to get the lay of the land before ramping up efforts to try to interfere with American politics.
By September 2016, two months before the U.S. presidential election, the IRA was working with an overall monthly budget that reached over $1.25 million. It employed hundreds of employees, a graphics department, a data analysis department, a search-engine optimization department, an IT department and a finance department, according to an indictment filed last year by Mueller’s team.
And it hasn’t stopped.
The U.S. military reportedly blocked the Internet access of the IRA during last year’s midterm elections to keep it from interfering with the midterm election. U.S. Cyber Command also targeted Russian cyber operatives, according to a report by The New York Times, with direct messages letting them know that American intelligence was tracking them.
And in October, a Russian woman was accused, according to a criminal complaint filed in federal court, with conspiring to sow discord and division in the U.S political system.
That conspiracy, the complaint said, “continues to this day.”
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Take, for instance, the 1974 investigation of President Richard Nixon, when the House gave the president the opportunity to refute the charges against him either personally or through counsel and with additional fact witnesses. (Nixon chose to appear only through his attorney, James St. Clair.) After its impeachment proceedings, the House Judiciary Committee drafted particularized findings less in the nature of accusations to be assessed by the Senate – which of course never weighed in, given Nixon’s resignation – than in the nature of determinations of fact and law and verdicts of guilt to be delivered by the House itself, expressly stating that the president was indeed guilty as charged.
Anyone confused about the demented psychology of liberals who believe American taxpayers should support all of Central America’s poor can gain instant clarity by reading one of Justice Sonia Sotomayor’s dissents this week.
The court on Wednesday offered temporary relief to the Trump administration by allowing it to go forward with a new rule that will allow immigration authorities to quickly deny asylum requests for Central Americans who didn’t first try to seek refuge in other countries they passed through while making their way to the United States.
Sotomayor’s dissent reads like the script from one of those starving children commercials: For just 10 cents a day, you can save a life. Joined by Justice Ruther Bader Ginsburg, Sotomayor wrote, “the stakes for asylum seekers could not be higher,” and that, “some of the most vulnerable people in the Western Hemisphere” will be affected without having given the American public “a chance to weigh in” on the rule change.
Setting aside the fact that this argument would abolish all executive rule-making if taken to its logical conclusion, it’s unclear why the public would need “a chance to weigh in” on a policy that doesn’t affect a single person in the country. The only way the rule might affect a person already here is if they were hoping some relative or friend would illegally cross the border and then claim asylum. Well, that’s the very problem the administration is trying to solve — hundreds of thousands of people with no meritorious asylum claim are simply hopping onto American soil and securing indefinite legal protection to remain in the country by exploiting the legal loophole that our asylum system has become.
Nobody is denying that the asylum seekers are “vulnerable.” They’re poor and often they’ve left their homes because their broken countries have been overrun by gang violence. But the asylum process wasn’t meant to function as a welfare net for the “vulnerable.” Asylum is for the persecuted. If a person feels persecuted in their own country, why would they need to travel 2,000-plus miles, passing through at least one other country, to get to the U.S. before finally claiming asylum?
They don’t need to. A story in the Washington Post on Saturday proved it, quoting several migrants who decided that because the administration has made it more difficult to get into the U.S., they would simply try elsewhere first (which is the whole point of the rule change). From the story:
Sotomayor can relax. The court’s decision is only effective while related legal questions sort themselves out in lower courts. It could very well be reversed. But at least her dissent offers a wide window into the twisted thought process of open-border advocates.
El uso de mentiras y calumnias no es nuevo. Es tan viejo como la humanidad. La información siempre ha sido fuente de poder. Su manipulación tienen muchos nombres: guerra sucia, noticias falsas (fake news) o trascendidos.
En la era de lo instantáneo, los chismes y las infamias se mezclan, selectivamente, con trozos de verdad para disponer, al fragor de las batallas políticas, de municiones y morteros para ganar la guerra en el despiadado juego de la política. Lo que es notable, en torno a un tema tan trillado, es que el papa Francisco, fiel a su estilo franco y directo, aborde sin ambages este fenómeno creciente: la difusión masiva de noticias falsas.
El pontífice apuntó: los medios que se centran en los escándalos y difunden información incorrecta para difamar, especialmente a los políticos, cometen “pecados”.
“Los medios de comunicación tienen sus propias tentaciones. Pueden ser tentados por la calumnia y ser usados, por tanto, para difamar a la gente y calumniarla, sobre todo, en el mundo de la política”, sentenció.
En declaraciones al semanario católico belga Tertio, el argentino dijo que expandir la desinformación es, probablemente, el mayor daño que pueden hacer los medios a la democracia.
Al utilizar las redes para este objetivo, todos nos transformamos, figurativamente, en presas cautivas de la coprofilia, patología que genera gusto y excitación por los excrementos. Nos transmutamos en coprófagos, encontrando un placer pervertido al comer heces.
Consciente de lo escatológico de su analogía, el Papa ofreció disculpas por recurrir a estos conceptos, al responder a un cuestionamiento sobre el uso adecuado de los medios en el debate político. “Creo que los medios deben ser muy claros, muy transparentes, y, sin intención de ofender, no caer en la enfermedad de la coprofilia, que es querer cubrir siempre escándalos y cosas desagradables, incluso aunque sean verdaderas”. El segmento anterior, que fue repartido a la fuente del Vaticano con una traducción italiana de la entrevista, realizada en español por el propio Papa, se da en el lenguaje más duro y frontal jamás usado por Francisco para referirse a los medios de comunicación. Lo descrito no debería extrañarnos ya que la noticia falsa de mayor impacto en las redes sociales este año giró en torno a su persona. La web WTOE 5 News publicó un artículo durante la campaña electoral en EU en el que señalaba que el Papa había respaldado a Trump en su camino a la presidencia.
Dicha invención fue compartida por miles de usuarios, no obstante de ser una mentira flagrante. Manipulaciones similares, involucrando al propio Trump y a su rival Clinton, se reprodujeron durante la contienda electoral, generándose una neblina de confusión sin precedente. Así, la veracidad de la información y la incapacidad de los ciudadanos para distinguir la verdad de la mentira, se ha transformado en un reto formidable para el periodismo en el siglo XXI.
BALANCE
Garantizar información fidedigna resulta cada vez más difícil ante los torrentes de datos que con velocidad incomparable fluyen en redes sociales, indómitas e ingobernables.
Inundados por reality shows, blogs, tuits, Facebook posts y snapchats, los consumidores de contenidos, vamos desarrollando un apetito insaciable por información vistosa, de dudosa reputación, con controles de veracidad lentos y defectuosos. Atender este fenómeno, sin vulnerar la libertad de expresión, es central para conservar la buena salud de la democracia en la era de lo instantáneo. Sin duda, un periodismo sin concesiones es la mejor medicina para tan escandalosa enfermedad.
*Secretario para el Fortalecimiento de la Democracia de la OEA. Los puntos de vista son a título personal. No representan la posición de la OEA.
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Ficha de María Teresa Osorio de Serna en la página web de la división internacional de la DEA.
Es prácticamente un fantasma. Casi nada se sabe de ella.
En su país natal, Colombia, no es requerida ni tiene asuntos pendientes con la justicia, pero tras la captura en México de Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, María Teresa Osorio es una de los dos únicas personas que hay en la lista internacional de buscados de la Admnistración para el Control de Drogas estadounidense (DEA, por sus siglas en inglés).
Ese organismo quiere apresarla por lavado de dinero y tráfico de cocaína.
Se sabe que Osorio de Serna estaba vinculada al extinto cartel de Medellín, pero no hay detalles acerca de cuál de sus capos era su jefe.
Se cree que lavó enormes cantidades de dinero.
La DEA dice que tiene cuatro alias: María Teresa Correa, María Teresa De Serna, Gloria Bedoya e Iris Conde.
Inconsistencias
Pero la misma agencia tiene información inconsistente acerca de la mujer.
La ficha sobre ella en la división internacional de la DEA dice que mide 1,52, pesa 61 kilos, que su cabello es negro, que nació en 1950 (no hay mes ni año) y que su último domicilio conocido es en algún lugar de Colombia.
Image copyright DEA
Image caption
La ficha de María Teresa Osorio de Serna en la división de Nueva Jersey de la DEA tiene datos que no coinciden con los que hay en la de la división internacional.
Sin embargo, la ficha de la oficina de Nueva Jersey del mismo organismo dice que mide 1,57, pesa 72 kilos, tiene cabello marrón, nació en 1945 o 1950 y su último domicilio conocido es en Hialeah, Miami, en EE.UU.
Más aún, la ficha de Nueva Jersey también da otros dos alias: Maria Teresa Serna-Osorio y Teyer Washington. Y dice que no se sabe si puede estar armada y ser peligrosa.
Eso es todo lo que se sabe, no hay más.
Image copyright AFP
Image caption
Tras la captura de Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, Osorio de Serna se convirtió en la persona más buscada por la DEA.
Una fuente que conoce profundamente el mundo judicial y criminal de Colombia le dijo a BBC Mundo que sorprende que en este país, donde los criminales se conocen todos con todos, nadie sepa quién es esta mujer.
Sin embargo, ahora que las autoridades mexicanas volvieron a capturar a Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, esta mujer fantasma, María Teresa Osorio de Serna, es la prioridad número uno para los agentes antinarcóticos estadounidenses, junto a John Alexander Thomson, quien creen que puede ser de origen africano o caribeño y al que acusan de tráfico de heroína.
The U.K. may be forced to create a national unity government to end the impasse over Britain leaving the European Union, as Prime Minister Theresa May clings to the Brexit divorce agreement that Parliament has rejected three times, a senior Conservative suggested Saturday.
Former Education Secretary Nicky Morgan’s comments came a day after the House of Commons rebuffed the prime minister’s call for lawmakers to “put aside self and party,” sending her Brexit deal to its latest defeat. The rejection leaves the U.K. facing the stark prospect of a chaotic departure from the EU in just two weeks — unless squabbling politicians can put aside their differences and engineer a long delay in the process of leaving the bloc.
The British Parliament will vote Monday on a variety of Brexit alternatives in an attempt to find an idea that can command a majority. But May’s government is considering a fourth vote on her deal, bolstered by their success in narrowing her margin of defeat to 58 votes Friday from 230 votes in January.
“If the government refused and Theresa May felt she could not implement what Parliament had identified as a way of leaving the EU, then I think we would have to think very hard about whether a cross-party coalition … could do that in order to make sure that the U.K. does leave the EU in an orderly fashion,” Morgan told the BBC.
Britain has in the past had national unity governments in times of national crisis, such as World War II. But critics point out that such coalitions were forged when there was a single goal — such as defeating Nazi Germany. It is unclear now how Britain’s political parties would agree to cooperate on an issue like Brexit, which has split the country and its two major political parties, May’s ruling Conservatives and the opposition Labour Party.
As a result of Friday’s vote, the U.K. is now scheduled to leave the EU on April 12, regardless of whether the two sides have reached an agreement to cushion the impact. That has led to concerns about crippling tariffs, border gridlock and shortages of food and medicines.
EU officials have suggested, however, they may agree to a lengthy delay to Britain’s departure from the bloc if U.K. politicians agree on a plan.
The House of Commons on Wednesday began the process of debating alternatives to the prime minister’s deal but rejected all eight proposals they considered. Two ideas, a customs union with the EU and a second referendum on any deal, achieved significant support. Lawmakers are expected to hold a second round of votes Monday on Brexit proposals.
Hilary Benn, a Labour Party lawmaker who chairs Parliament’s Brexit committee, dismissed criticism that the parliamentary process was a failure because it didn’t deliver a majority in the first round of voting. Benn said he hopes the latest defeat for May’s deal will “concentrate minds” and help build a clear majority for one of the Brexit options.
“Since it took 2 3/4 years for the government to get what it had negotiated defeated three times, it’s a little bit harsh on Parliament, when it started the process last Wednesday, for not having immediately solved the problem in 24 hours,” Benn said. “So I think a little bit more time is a perfectly reasonable thing to provide as we try and find a way forward.”
While Benn and Morgan are pushing for compromise, others are demanding that the Conservative-led government not cave in.
Some hard-line Conservative Party lawmakers have written to May insisting that she not agree to a Brexit extension beyond May 22, which would force the U.K. to take part in the May 23-26 European Parliament elections, The Sun newspaper reported. The letter, signed by 170 members of the prime minister’s party, called on May to bring her deal back to Parliament for a fourth vote, with the threat of a general election if it is rejected again, the newspaper said.
Brandon Lewis, a Cabinet member and chairman of the Conservative Party, said he was aware of the letter, though he had not seen the final text or the signatures.
“We should be doing everything we can to leave the European Union in good order as quickly as we can, as we said in our manifesto and as we’ve said to Parliament,” Lewis said. “I think the deal is the right way to do that.”
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Follow AP’s full coverage of Brexit at: https://www.apnews.com/Brexit
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