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Brazil’s Senate Cuts the Workweek to 40 Hours in a Pre-Runoff Win for Lula: October 15, 2026

BRASÍLIA — Brazil’s Senate approved a constitutional amendment cutting the standard workweek from 44 hours to 40 and guaranteeing two days off without cutting pay, a major labour win for President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva less than two weeks before the Oct. 25 runoff, BBC News and DW reported.

Senators passed the measure 75–1 after the Chamber of Deputies backed it in May. The government says more than 30 million workers could benefit; one survey found nearly 70% of Brazilians support ending the six-day “6×1” schedule. Lula is expected to sign it next week.

Rival Flávio Bolsonaro, who leads Lula after the first round 47% to 45.2%, reversed his opposition and voted yes, saying most workers want the change — a shift Lula called “electoral opportunism.” BBC News said it is the biggest workers’-rights overhaul since Brazil’s 1988 return to democracy.

“It means more time to live, rest, be with family,” Lula wrote on social media. Businesses warn of higher costs, and freelancers and delivery workers in the informal economy remain largely outside the reform, DW noted.

Sources: BBC News, DW

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World Brief, Evening: October 14, 2026

Elon Musk said Starshield speed limits on Ukraine’s drones are a U.S. government call; Mauritius extended its riot curfew for two more nights; and Tropical Storm Trudy is still aimed at becoming a major hurricane off southwestern Mexico. Ten stories as of Wednesday evening, October 14.

1. Kyiv / Ukraine, London / United Kingdom, and SpaceX. Elon Musk said Wednesday that any speed or usage limits on Starshield — SpaceX’s military-grade sister to Starlink — are set by the U.S. military and ultimately the president, after Ukraine said overnight caps at 160 km/h (100 mph) knocked drone and interceptor missions offline without warning, BBC News reported. Former defence minister Mykhailo Fedorov said connectivity up to that speed was being restored and asked Musk to remove the Starshield limit entirely; Musk replied that Starlink itself is limited to civilian or defensive use. In London, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy got a Downing Street hug from Prime Minister Andy Burnham, who accelerated Lightweight Multirole Missile deliveries and told him Britain is “behind you.” Asked by Piers Morgan if he felt betrayed by Washington’s Russian diesel deal, Zelenskyy said “really yes,” but that it was “a little bit more complicated” than emotion alone. The White House has not commented on the Starshield limits.

2. Port Louis and island-wide / Mauritius. After the Indian Ocean island’s worst riots in decades — sparked by water shortages, living costs and a police shooting of a woman — the Cabinet on Wednesday extended overnight curfews for Wednesday and Thursday nights (8:30 p.m. to 5:00 a.m.) across about a third of the country, AFP and local outlets reported. Police put total arrests since the unrest began at 94, including 16 minors, with seven officers wounded; schools and nurseries were suspended Thursday and Friday. Prime Minister Navin Ramgoolam had already imposed a first curfew Tuesday, warning of “anti-patriotic” acts, BBC News reported. The officer who shot the woman has been arrested.

3. Nairobi / Kenya. Kenya confirmed a second Ebola case — a 39-year-old close relative of the first victim — who was already in quarantine when he fell ill Tuesday, the health ministry said, per BBC News. Officials said both cases are linked, with “no evidence of spread in the wider community,” and that Kenya remains open with no travel restrictions. The first patient, a 40-year-old businessman who died October 5 after traveling from DR Congo through Uganda undetected, had 128 contacts; 113 had been found by Wednesday, most quarantined. The Bundibugyo strain driving Congo’s outbreak has no approved vaccine; Congo has recorded more than 4,000 Ebola deaths this year.

4. Tirana / Albania. On a second day of student-led unrest, protesters set part of the education ministry alight and attacked the prime minister’s office and the finance and interior ministries, BBC News reported. Riot police used tear gas and water cannons; sixteen people were arrested over Tuesday’s violence. Students began outside the education ministry demanding better university conditions and jobs; the protests feed into the broader “Flamingo Revolution” calling for Prime Minister Edi Rama to resign amid corruption anger, including over a luxury tourism project linked to Jared Kushner. Opposition leader Sali Berisha praised the students; ministers condemned arson as endangering lives.

5. South of Acapulco and west of Baja / Mexico. Tropical Storm Trudy strengthened to 65 mph (100 km/h) by 3:00 p.m. CST Wednesday about 345 miles south of Acapulco, and the National Hurricane Center still forecasts a major hurricane by Friday with a possible approach to southwestern Mexico on Saturday; watches are likely tonight or Thursday. Farther northwest, Hurricane Simon weakened further to about 75 mph southwest of Baja California Sur, NHC aircraft data showed. Outer bands could bring 2–4 inches of rain (locally 6) from Guerrero to Jalisco this weekend, with life-threatening surf and rip currents.

6. Bogotá and nationwide / Colombia. Thousands marched in Bogotá and other cities Wednesday against right-wing President Abelardo de la Espriella’s austerity push and security policies, in the opposition’s first major street action since he took office in August, Al Jazeera reported. Former President Gustavo Petro joined the capital rally; unions, Indigenous groups and students objected to budget cuts and restored ties with Israel, including a new Colombian embassy in Jerusalem opened the same day. De la Espriella issued expanded police powers ahead of the marches and said protest is fine but “violence, vandalism and blockades” will not be tolerated; reporters described Wednesday’s actions as largely peaceful.

7. Brasília / Brazil. A Quaest poll for Brazil’s October 25 presidential runoff put senator Flávio Bolsonaro at 46% to President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s 44% — a two-point edge inside the poll’s ±2-point margin, so a technical tie — Reuters reported. Quaest surveyed 2,154 people aged 16 and up from October 10–13. The reading lands amid a bitter campaign that has already seen Lula’s party accuse Meta of tilting the field toward the Bolsonaro camp.

8. East Sea of Korea / North Korea. North Korean state media said the Missile Administration test-fired two types of submarine-launched strategic cruise missiles in the East Sea on October 14, overseen by senior officials including Kim Jong Sik and Missile Administration chief Jang Chang Ha, AP and Yonhap reported, citing KCNA. Pyongyang said the exercise checked underwater combat readiness and showed the “reliability” of its deterrents, and claimed no adverse impact on neighbors. The report did not say whether the launch platform was a submarine or an underwater test stand.

9. Canberra / Australia. Australia’s unemployment rate held at 4.7% in September — still the highest post-COVID seasonally adjusted reading — after August was revised up from 4.6%, ABC News reported. Employment fell by an estimated 39,300 and unemployment rose by 8,900; the participation rate slipped to 66.8%. The September-quarter average jobless rate of 4.63% sits above the Reserve Bank’s December-quarter forecast of 4.5%.

10. Istanbul / Turkey. Torrential rain shut down large parts of Istanbul with flash flooding described as the city’s heaviest rainfall since 1985, Al Jazeera reported; video showed streets underwater and a woman pulled from floodwaters in the Esenyurt district. Transport and daily life were heavily disrupted as the storm moved across the megacity.

Coming Up

Confirmed dates on The Watch and beyond: October 15, G20 finance ministers in Bangkok as the IMF and World Bank Annual Meetings continue through October 18. October 15–16, the European Council in Brussels. October 19, Alberta’s referendum on whether to move toward a binding independence vote. Pope Leo XIV’s audiences remain cancelled through October 20 while he recovers at Gemelli. NHC: Trudy is forecast as a major hurricane by Friday with a possible southwestern Mexico approach Saturday.

Sources: BBC News; AP; Reuters; Al Jazeera; ABC News; U.S. National Hurricane Center; KCNA via AP/Yonhap; AFP reports on Mauritius cabinet measures.

World Brief: October 14, 2026

Russia threw 39 ballistic missiles at Ukraine’s grid the same night SpaceX quietly throttled Kyiv’s Starlink; a Houthi missile tore the top off an Aramco tower in Dhahran; and Pope Leo XIV is up and walking a day after cancer surgery. Ten stories as of Wednesday morning, October 14.

1. Kyiv, Kharkiv and Lutsk / Ukraine, plus London and Balakovo, Russia. Russia fired 39 ballistic missiles and more than 120 attack drones at energy and critical infrastructure in Kyiv, the Kyiv region and Kharkiv overnight, Volodymyr Zelenskyy said, leaving at least 600,000 people without power and damaging 26 power-system sites and four oil and gas facilities, all despite President Trump’s claim of an “energy ceasefire.” Three people were killed in Kyiv, and later on Wednesday a Russian drone strike on a warehouse in Lutsk killed at least six, BBC News reported. The same night, SpaceX put a 160 km/h (100 mph) speed limit on Starlink terminals in motion without telling Kyiv, presidential adviser Serhiy Beskrestnov said, disrupting a number of drone missions; he said it “cannot be a coincidence.” SpaceX hasn’t commented, and the 7th Rapid Reaction Corps had to cancel some sorties, DW reported. Zelenskyy meets Prime Minister Andy Burnham at Downing Street on Wednesday; Burnham says he wants to “repair bridges” between Ukraine and the U.S. and promises Kyiv won’t leave “empty-handed,” per BBC News. Going the other way, Ukrainian drones hit Sberbank’s data centre in Balakovo on the Volga, Russia’s biggest, which the bank says kept running normally, Reuters reported.

2. Dhahran, Riyadh and Sanaa / Saudi Arabia and Yemen. A Houthi missile hit an administrative building at Aramco’s headquarters complex in Dhahran overnight after the Saudi-led coalition struck the Yemen Petroleum Company’s al-Sabaha depot near Sanaa, BBC News reported. The energy ministry called it a “limited fire,” but sources told Reuters a ballistic missile caused extensive damage and a blaze between the sixth and 10th floors; “top three floors have gone,” one employee told AFP. Debris from intercepted cruise missiles injured two women, a man and a child in Riyadh. Houthi spokesman Yahya Sarea said attacks on Saudi airports and oil sites “will continue in the coming days,” and on Wednesday the coalition said it shot down another ballistic missile aimed at Riyadh, Al Jazeera reported. The IMF’s Kristalina Georgieva warned of “potentially negative spillovers for everybody, everywhere.”

3. Rome / Vatican City and Italy. Pope Leo XIV, 71, has started walking and is back on a normal diet a day after surgery at Gemelli Hospital that removed the lower lobe of his right lung, and his recovery is “progressing as expected,” his doctors said; blood tests and an X-ray on Wednesday showed his recovery “proceeding normally,” BBC News reported. The tissue was confirmed as lung adenocarcinoma, and he’s expected to stay in hospital about a week. The open question is his early-November trip to South America, including Peru, his home for more than 20 years, which may now be in doubt given the risks of flying soon after lung surgery, BBC News said.

4. Bunia and eastern Congo / Democratic Republic of the Congo. Congo’s Ebola outbreak has passed 9,000 confirmed cases, with the Health Ministry reporting 9,066 cases and 4,381 deaths across seven provinces, AP reported. It’s the country’s worst outbreak on record, caused by the Bundibugyo strain, for which there’s no approved vaccine or treatment; the WHO says a vaccine trial is due to start in Congo this month, per Africanews/AFP. Armed groups and community distrust keep complicating the response.

5. Dublin / Republic of Ireland. More than 300,000 public-sector workers, including nurses, doctors, teachers and civil servants, walked out Wednesday in a 24-hour strike over pay, with schools expected to close and hospital appointments cancelled, BBC News reported. Expenditure minister Jack Chambers called it “deeply disappointing.” Unions say the government never set up formal talks, and another strike is planned for October 21.

6. New Delhi / India. A Delhi magistrate sent Cockroach Janta Party leaders Saurav Das and Ashutosh Ranka to five days in judicial custody after they climbed a locked gate into Jantar Mantar, the protest site police just removed from the city’s authorised list, BBC News reported. They deny trespass and the other charges. Opposition leader Rahul Gandhi called the arrests “an act of cowardice,” and founder Abhijeet Dipke dared Prime Minister Narendra Modi to “declare the Emergency officially.” The Gen Z-led movement wants Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar out over alleged voter-roll irregularities, which the commission denies.

7. Brasília / Brazil. With the October 25 runoff between President Lula and Flávio Bolsonaro closing in, Meta has told Brazil’s electoral court it did not tilt Facebook or Instagram toward Bolsonaro, after Lula’s campaign accused it of throttling his posts, AFP reported. The court had given Meta 48 hours to explain, profile by profile. Meta conceded a global glitch that froze Instagram view counts and a wrongful suspension of the campaign’s ad account in September, but called the interference charge false, O Globo reported.

8. Acapulco and Cabo Corrientes / Mexico. Tropical Storm Trudy, about 375 miles south of Acapulco with 60 mph winds, is expected to become a hurricane tonight and a major hurricane by Friday, and it could approach southwestern Mexico on Saturday, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said. Watches will likely be needed later today or tonight. Hurricane Simon has weakened to 90 mph while drifting about 165 miles west-southwest of Cabo Corrientes, and Mexico dropped its hurricane watch for Las Islas Marías, per the NHC.

9. Kalimantan, Sumatra and Singapore / Indonesia and Southeast Asia. Indonesia is fighting its worst wildfire season in a decade, and the haze has turned the air over Kalimantan and Sumatra amber, hidden Singapore’s skyline and closed some schools in Malaysia, BBC News reported. Monitor Nusantara Atlas counts more than a million hotspots and 900,000 hectares burned, with an unusually strong El Niño making it worse. President Prabowo Subianto calls slash-and-burn clearing “ecological terrorism,” and authorities have suspended 26 companies’ licences.

10. Cairns / Australia. The Australian Defence Force has confirmed a hidden video recording device was found Sunday in a cabin aboard the navy ship HMAS Leeuwin in Cairns, Queensland, BBC News reported. Senator Jacqui Lambie told parliament that personnel told her concealed cameras had been found in female sailors’ showers and that footage may have been uploaded online. Defence wouldn’t say where the device was, but it said the ship stayed alongside for the investigation, which went to military police.

Coming Up

Confirmed dates on The Watch: October 15, G20 finance ministers in Bangkok, as the IMF and World Bank Annual Meetings run through October 18. October 15–16, the European Council in Brussels. October 19, Alberta’s referendum on whether to move toward a binding independence vote.

Sources: BBC News; DW; Reuters; Al Jazeera; AP; Africanews/AFP; AFP; O Globo; U.S. National Hurricane Center; Volodymyr Zelenskyy on X.

Colombia Opens an Embassy in Jerusalem and Restores Its Free-Trade Deal With Israel: October 14, 2026

JERUSALEM — Colombia opened its embassy in Jerusalem on Wednesday, becoming the 10th country to do so, as new President Abelardo de la Espriella reversed his predecessor’s break with Israel and restored a free-trade agreement, Reuters reported via Al-Monitor and The Jerusalem Post.

Colombian Foreign Minister Omar Bula Escobar cut a ribbon beside Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar. “Today, we are taking a concrete step towards restoring diplomatic relations between our countries, relations that should never have been broken,” Escobar said. Saar called the move recognition that Jerusalem is Israel’s capital and “a historical truth.”

Most countries keep embassies to Israel in Tel Aviv. Israel regards Jerusalem as its capital; Palestinians seek East Jerusalem as the capital of a future state. Former Colombian President Gustavo Petro broke relations in May 2024 over Israel’s Gaza campaign, closed the Tel Aviv embassy and recalled Colombia’s ambassador — a step Israel called antisemitic. De la Espriella, a right-winger who took office in August, reinstated the free-trade pact on Tuesday, Al-Monitor (Reuters) reported.

Countries that have moved embassies to Jerusalem since the United States did so in 2018 include Guatemala, Honduras, Paraguay and Somaliland, Israel’s Foreign Ministry noted. Saar and Escobar were also due to hold bilateral talks Wednesday.

Sources: Al-Monitor (Reuters), The Jerusalem Post

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World Brief, Evening: October 13, 2026

Pope Leo XIV left the operating room with a lung-cancer diagnosis; Houthi fire reached an Aramco building in Dhahran after the Saudis hit a fuel depot in Sanaa; and Kyiv says it again got no allied warning before a ballistic missile slammed into the capital. Ten stories as of Tuesday evening, October 13.

1. Rome / Vatican City and Italy. Pope Leo XIV, 71, has been diagnosed with lung adenocarcinoma after a successful 90-minute operation at Rome’s Gemelli hospital that removed the whole lower lobe of his right lung, the Vatican said in a medical bulletin, BBC News reported. “The operation was successful and there were no complications,” the Holy See said; he awoke normally and returned to his room after a brief observation. Doctors first spotted the nodule in routine checks; Leo himself told the Angelus crowd on Sunday it was “contained” and found “at a very early stage.” He is expected to stay in hospital about a week, with audiences cancelled through October 20, and further tests are checking whether the cancer has spread, a Vatican source told AFP, per DW.

2. Riyadh, Dhahran and Sanaa / Saudi Arabia and Yemen. After the Saudi-led coalition struck the Yemen Petroleum Company’s al-Sabaha fuel facility near Houthi-held Sanaa on Tuesday, the Houthis answered with missiles and drones aimed at the kingdom; the coalition said it intercepted projectiles over Riyadh and other cities including Dammam, BBC News reported. Saudi Energy Ministry said an Aramco administration building in Dhahran took a hit that sparked a “limited fire,” with no casualties; a company source told Reuters a ballistic missile struck upper floors. Civil defence said debris from two intercepted missiles in Riyadh injured four people — two women, a man and a child — and damaged 15 homes, DW reported. The Saudi cabinet, chaired by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, said the Iran-backed Houthis would “bear the consequences” of recent deadly airport strikes that killed 14 over the weekend.

3. Kyiv / Ukraine, and London / United Kingdom. A Russian ballistic missile hit Kyiv’s CHPP-4 power plant Tuesday evening with “once again, no early warning from our partners,” President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said, adding a residential building was damaged and rescuers were fighting a fire; France 24, citing Reuters, put the toll at at least two dead and about 20 wounded. Zelenskyy later told Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney it was the second time this week Ukraine got no ballistic warning. On Wednesday he meets Prime Minister Andy Burnham at Downing Street, where the UK will accelerate delivery of Lightweight Multirole Missiles — more than 5,000 already committed, worth £1.6bn over four years — and push further Russia sanctions, including a maritime-services ban on Russian LNG that Chancellor John Healey is pressing at the IMF meetings, BBC News reported. Burnham: “We are with you for as long as it takes.”

4. Hamburg / Germany. Four years after the Baltic Sea blasts that wrecked three of the four Nord Stream pipelines, Ukrainian national Serhii K goes on trial Wednesday in Hamburg as the first suspect in the case, BBC News reported. German prosecutors say he plotted with other Ukrainian military personnel to cut Russia’s gas revenue and allege the saboteurs acted “by order of Ukrainian state agencies”; he denies the charges, as does a second suspect fighting extradition from Croatia. Investigators focused on divers who rented the yacht Andromeda in Rostock, where traces of subsea explosives were later found. Zelenskyy has long said Ukraine had “nothing to do” with the attacks. The trial is delicate for Berlin, one of Kyiv’s closest European backers.

5. Peshawar and Bara / Pakistan. Pakistan has put Khyber Pakhtunkhwa — the stronghold of imprisoned former Prime Minister Imran Khan’s PTI party — under emergency rule and suspended the provincial government, citing a terror threat, BBC News reported. Schools closed and internet service was partly cut, then largely restored by Tuesday; PTI leaders have gone into hiding, and supporters clashed with police in Bara, Khyber district, with tear gas reported. Information Minister Attah Tarrar claimed the PTI provincial government was “hand in glove with the terrorists” without producing evidence on the day. Opponents say the crackdown risks more instability ahead of any path back for Khan.

6. Kingston / Jamaica. Jamaica took its first flight of third-country deportees from the United States on Tuesday: 22 people landed at Norman Manley International Airport in Kingston and were bused to an undisclosed location, Al Jazeera reported, citing the AP. Jamaica signed a June memorandum to receive such transfers — part of a Trump administration network that advocacy group Third Country Deportation Watch puts at about 35 countries — and says it will not take deportees with criminal records, moving people on to their home countries with International Organization for Migration support. Opposition figures have asked why the deal was not made public; the National Security and Foreign Affairs ministries called it a “transit arrangement.”

7. Bogotá / Colombia. Colombia’s Special Jurisdiction for Peace charged 10 former FARC members on Tuesday with war crimes and crimes against humanity against five Indigenous groups in the southeast between 1996 and 2016, including torture, murder and forced displacement, Al Jazeera reported. Magistrate Catalina Diaz said FARC commanders ordered landmines on Indigenous land and wrecked ecosystems the communities needed to survive: “Today we are delivering justice to the most forgotten peoples of a segregated Colombia.” The Truth Commission previously counted 450,664 conflict deaths from 1985 to 2018.

8. Cabo Corrientes, Ensenada and Acapulco / Mexico. Hurricane Simon re-strengthened Tuesday evening to about 110 mph — nearly a major hurricane again — roughly 120 miles west of Cabo Corrientes and drifting west at 2 mph, the National Hurricane Center said at 6:50 p.m. MST. Farther south, newborn Tropical Storm Trudy was at 40 mph about 490 miles south-southeast of Acapulco and forecast to become a major hurricane by Friday, the NHC said. The death toll from Simon and the remnants of Tropical Storm Rachel rose to six, the AP reported: one in Guerrero from Simon, and five in Ensenada, Baja California, from Rachel’s floods — among them a 13-year-old girl, two women, a 4-year-old boy and an unidentified person — with five still missing and a helicopter rescue of 32 people, including 13 minors, from an orphan camp near Ensenada.

9. San Francisco / United States. Federal prosecutors charged OpenAI engineer Abdulrahman Alfozan, a Saudi national, with planting a covert recording device in an executive conference room at the company’s San Francisco offices, BBC News reported. The encrypted gadget was found wrapped in toilet paper in a TV USB port; OpenAI said it used its own AI models to identify the employee, who has been fired, and that it has no indication source code, model weights or customer data were taken. FBI Director Kash Patel said the alleged aim was to capture information about the company’s AI products. Alfozan had worked at OpenAI since July 2025; the device was discovered September 30, two days after prosecutors say it was installed.

10. Port Moresby / Papua New Guinea. Papua New Guinea police seized a cache of high-powered semi-automatic rifles, parts, magazines and 3D-printing gear at a Gerehu residence after intelligence from international partners, Commissioner David Manning said, RNZ reported. An adult male remains in custody pending charges; Manning called him a key coordinator who hid dismantled parts in ostensibly legitimate imports moved by courier. “These guns fuel violence, undermine community safety, and pose a grave national security risk,” he said.

Coming Up

Confirmed dates on The Watch and beyond: Through October 18, the IMF and World Bank Annual Meetings in Bangkok, with G20 finance ministers there October 15. October 15–16, the European Council in Brussels. October 17, the earliest King Khalid International Airport in Riyadh is expected to reopen. October 19, Alberta’s referendum on whether to move toward a binding independence vote. Pope Leo’s audiences remain cancelled through October 20 while he recovers at Gemelli.

Sources: BBC News; Vatican / DW; Al Jazeera; AP; Reuters (via DW/France 24); U.S. National Hurricane Center; RNZ; DOJ/FBI statements via BBC.

World Brief: October 13, 2026

Russia left Ukraine’s power plants alone overnight for the first time since President Trump’s “energy ceasefire,” but hit its cities anyway; the Houthis told civilians to clear out of Saudi oil sites; and a second ship in a week went down off Bulgaria’s coast. Ten stories as of Tuesday morning, October 13.

1. Kyiv, Kharkiv and Warsaw / Ukraine and Russia. Russia hit no Ukrainian energy targets overnight into Tuesday, the first time that has happened since Trump announced his “energy ceasefire” at the weekend, while it hammered transport and logistics sites with ballistic missiles and drones, France 24 reported, citing Reuters. Four people were killed in a residential building in Kharkiv, and one missile came down just over a kilometre from a plant that heats much of Lviv. The Kremlin would only say that “contacts” were ongoing. Ukraine’s air force said it had no advance surveillance warning before Russia fired six ballistic missiles at Kyiv late Monday. Volodymyr Zelenskyy called that strike “particularly vile” and said partners gave no early warning, The Guardian reported: “This is precisely what helps prevent people from being killed – when there is an early warning about ballistic missiles.” That comes after U.S. officials threatened over the weekend to halt intelligence sharing, though Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said cooperation continues. Zelenskyy said Ukraine hasn’t hit a Russian refinery in two days. In Moscow, Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak said Russia could supply 3.5 million tonnes of diesel a month to world markets by year’s end, Al Jazeera reported.

2. Riyadh, Dammam and Sanaa / Saudi Arabia and Yemen. The Saudi-led coalition told civilians to leave the Yemeni Oil Company’s al-Sabah central station in Houthi-held Sanaa ahead of a planned operation, and Al Jazeera’s team then heard explosions in the capital, Al Jazeera reported. Houthi spokesman Yahya Saree hit back with his own evacuation alert, calling Saudi oil facilities “a legitimate target.” He named Aramco’s headquarters in Dammam, Riyadh’s King Khalid International Airport and an Aramco refinery in Riyadh, and promised a “harsh and painful” response to any strikes on Sanaa. The coalition said it shot down three drones north of Riyadh on Tuesday. France’s embassy told its citizens to stay away from the airports in Riyadh, Jeddah and Dammam, France 24 reported. On the ground, Saudi-backed government forces say they’re pushing into Marib province, and in besieged Taiz a rights group counted five civilians killed and 17 wounded by Houthi shelling in 24 hours, Al Jazeera reported.

3. Strait of Hormuz / Iran, Oman and the United Arab Emirates. At least 12 tankers have been attacked in and around the Strait of Hormuz in the past week, going by the U.K. Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) warnings, The National reported. Delayed UKMTO reports cover six ships hit on Sunday alone: five tankers and a container ship, five in the strait and one hit by a drone near Oman’s Sohar anchorage. The U.S. Navy-led Joint Maritime Information Center rates the threat to shipping in the strait “severe” in its latest advisory, published by UKMTO, and says the attacks show Iran’s “intent to assert [its] presence along key transit lanes.” “The Strait of Hormuz is closed,” an adviser to the Revolutionary Guards’ commander, Mohammadreza Naqdi, was quoted as saying. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said last week it is open, with “almost as much oil flowing out now as there was before this conflict began.”

4. Krapets and Byala / Bulgaria. Prime Minister Rumen Radev summoned Russia’s ambassador after drones hit two merchant ships off Bulgaria’s Black Sea coast on Tuesday and one of them sank, BBC News reported. Six crew from the Guinea-Bissau-flagged HS Dignity were rescued and 10 are missing after it went down 17 nautical miles east of Krapets, the defence minister said. All 15 aboard the Ukrainian-owned Chelsea-3, hit off Byala, were rescued. There’s no conclusive evidence against “either side,” Radev said, but “the logic suggests that the outcome benefits the Russian Federation.” His defence minister was blunter: “We assume the drones are Russian.” The ambassador, Eleonora Mitrofanova, said she had no information from Russia’s defence ministry and suggested a third-party provocation. Both ships were just outside Bulgarian territorial waters. At least 45 merchant ships have been hit by drones in the Black Sea in the past year, DW reported.

5. Rome / Vatican City and Italy. Pope Leo XIV, 71, checked into Rome’s Gemelli hospital on Tuesday for an afternoon operation to remove a small nodule from his lung, The Guardian reported. The surgery is considered low risk and will show whether the growth is malignant. A thoracic team led by Prof. Stefano Margaritora is doing the operation, and the pope is expected to stay in hospital for about a week, Vatican News said. His audiences are cancelled through October 20, and Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle will lead Wednesday’s general audience. Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin said the news came “like a bolt out of the blue.” There was no word on how the surgery went as of this brief.

6. Budapest / Hungary. Hungary’s parliament voted on Tuesday to scrap the parts of Viktor Orbán’s 2021 child protection law that banned the “portrayal or promotion of homosexuality or transgenderism,” BBC News reported. Minutes later, the government said the EU had agreed to release €4.2bn in funds frozen in the final years of Orbán’s rule. Prime Minister Péter Magyar’s Tisza party, which ousted Orbán in April, now holds the same two-thirds majority Fidesz once had. Fidesz and the Christian Democrats voted no. “We’ve been fighting this so-called child protection law for five years,” said Tamás Dombos of the Háttér Society. Activists still want same-sex marriage and adoption rights.

7. Washington and Athens / United States and Greece. “We have asked Ambassador Guilfoyle to resign,” new White House press secretary Katie Zacharia said on Tuesday, adding “we wish her well,” Al Jazeera reported. Kimberly Guilfoyle, the U.S. ambassador to Greece, has faced weeks of misconduct reports. The Wall Street Journal reported she asked a Trump donor to cover a $100,000 credit card bill shortly before her confirmation hearing, promising access to administration officials. Her lawyers deny wrongdoing and say the money was owed for past speaking engagements. Trump said Monday, “We’re not happy.” Top House and Senate Democrats want investigations, DW reported.

8. Ceuta / Spain and Morocco. King Felipe VI and Queen Letizia began the first Spanish royal visit to Ceuta in nearly two decades on Tuesday, as the North African exclave still deals with July’s surge of about 70,000 people from Morocco, BBC News reported. Aid groups estimate at least 141 people died in the crossings. Ceuta’s president Juan Jesús Vivas puts the number still in the city at 15,000; Madrid says it has 7,400 shelter places. The royals will attend an interfaith ceremony at the cemetery where many of the dead are buried, then head to Melilla on Wednesday. Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez recently confirmed that Moroccan military vessels entered Spanish waters off Ceuta during the crossing but played it down. Spain votes on November 29.

9. New Delhi / India. Police detained Cockroach Janta Party leaders Ashutosh Ranka and Saurav Das early on Tuesday after they climbed barricades into Jantar Mantar, Delhi’s traditional protest site, and chanted for Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar to resign, BBC News reported. A day earlier the home ministry had said Jantar Mantar would no longer be a designated protest venue. “You cannot denotify the resistance,” founder Abhijeet Dipke wrote on X. The movement and opposition parties say a revision of voter rolls that removed tens of millions of names favors Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s party; the party and the Election Commission reject that. Congress has asked the Supreme Court to step in.

10. Puerto Iguazú / Argentina, and the Pacific. Argentina briefly shut tourist access to Iguazu Falls on Monday when the Iguazu River topped 12,000 cubic metres per second, more than six times its average flow, after heavy rain fuelled by a supersized El Niño, The Guardian reported. “It just keeps raining,” said park director José María Hervás. Officials planned to reopen on Tuesday as the flow eased. Out in the Pacific, Australia’s Bureau of Meteorology says weekly sea-surface temperatures in the central Pacific have hit their highest level on record, weeks before the event’s expected December peak, BBC Weather reported. “We are currently witnessing an El Niño event that is unprecedented in the historical record,” said Berkeley Earth’s Zeke Hausfather.

Coming Up

Confirmed dates on The Watch: Through October 18, the IMF and World Bank Annual Meetings in Bangkok, with G20 finance ministers there October 15. October 15–16, the European Council in Brussels, where von der Leyen says Ukraine’s funding will be “front and centre.” October 19, Alberta’s referendum on whether to move toward a binding independence vote.

Sources: France 24; Reuters; The Guardian; Al Jazeera; The National; UKMTO; BBC News; DW; Vatican News; BBC Weather.

Argentina Asks the U.N. Law of the Sea Tribunal to Halt Falklands Oil Drilling as Britain Urges Interpol to Reject Milei’s Arrest Requests: October 13, 2026

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina — Argentina said Tuesday it has asked the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea for provisional measures to stop British-authorized oil activity off the Falkland Islands, escalating a dispute that The Guardian reported has pushed tensions over the islands to levels not seen since the 1982 war, according to Reuters and the Argentine broadcaster TN.

The request aims to prevent the United Kingdom from exploiting hydrocarbons on the continental shelf of the North Falklands Basin, where the Sea Lion project is being developed, and “seeks to preserve Argentina’s sovereign rights over its continental shelf and prevent activities authorized unilaterally and illegally by the United Kingdom,” the government said, Reuters reported. TN said the filing to the Hamburg-based tribunal came the day after a two-week deadline President Javier Milei gave Britain on Sept. 28 expired, and forms part of an arbitration case Argentina opened under Annex VII of the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea.

Britain, meanwhile, has written to Interpol urging it to treat Argentine “red notice” requests for the arrest of people involved in Sea Lion, including British nationals, as politically motivated, The Guardian reported. Interpol is understood to have replied that it would respect Article 3 of its constitution, which bars interventions of a political character, the paper said. “One would hope that Interpol wouldn’t necessarily take action,” said Andrea Clausen, chief executive of the Falkland Islands government.

Milei has opened criminal proceedings against Israeli company Navitas Petroleum and its British partner Rockhopper Exploration, the core companies in Sea Lion, and a bill before Argentina’s Congress would toughen penalties on companies and individuals working on Falklands resources without Argentine authorization. The companies have said they do not expect Argentina’s actions to derail the project, which The Guardian said could triple the islands’ GDP.

British Prime Minister Andy Burnham told Parliament on Monday that he had raised “the clear and declared will of the islanders to remain British” with President Donald Trump, according to The Guardian. Argentina claims sovereignty over the islands, which it calls Las Malvinas, and dismisses a 2013 referendum in which 99.8% of voters chose to remain a British territory.

Sources: Reuters (via Devdiscourse), The Guardian, TN

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World Brief, Evening: October 12, 2026

Riyadh took Houthi fire for a third straight night while Saudi officials try to work out how the missiles got through; Kyiv says Moscow has answered President Trump’s “energy ceasefire” with more strikes; and Britain pinned last month’s RAF Fairford scare on Iran’s Revolutionary Guards. Ten stories as of Monday evening, October 12.

1. Riyadh / Saudi Arabia. Explosions shook the Saudi capital again Monday night, and the Saudi-led coalition said it intercepted a ballistic missile fired at Riyadh and two more aimed at Khamis Mushait in the southwest; the Houthis said their target was King Khalid International Airport, Al Jazeera reported. The airport, closed since Saturday’s strike that killed 13, is expected to stay shut until this Saturday. Saudi authorities have opened an investigation into why the kingdom’s air defences failed; an initial inquiry found the Houthis sent drones first to clear a path for a mix of cruise and ballistic missiles that flew more than 1,000 km, two regional officials told the AP. Energy Minister Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman told an energy congress in Riyadh, “Our response must be equally serious,” and Qatar Airways suspended flights to Riyadh and Dammam, BBC News reported. Asked what he’d do, President Trump said, “The Houthis are misbehaving very badly. No good,” without signalling U.S. action; a Houthi official warned of a “swift and painful response” against U.S. interests if Washington joins in.

2. Kyiv / Ukraine and Russia. Volodymyr Zelenskyy says Russia has hit six Ukrainian energy facilities since Trump announced the energy truce Sunday, injuring 33 people, and calls it proof Moscow is “unwilling to accept an energy ceasefire,” BBC News reported. Ukrenergo reported new power cuts in Kharkiv, Donetsk and Zaporizhzhia, and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Ukraine doesn’t deserve the “respite” a ceasefire would bring. The Kremlin’s only official word was Dmitry Peskov’s “Contacts are continuing,” while pro-Kremlin media called the truce “a one-way deal that benefits us,” BBC News reported. Trump said both sides agreed “because I said you agree.” Monday evening a Shahed drone hit a high-rise in Kyiv; Zelenskyy said two people were killed and nine hurt, after Mayor Vitali Klitschko had first reported one dead and 11 injured.

3. London / United Kingdom and Iran. Prime Minister Andy Burnham told MPs the suspected plot at RAF Fairford, the U.S.-used base in Gloucestershire, was “almost certainly directed by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard,” and Britain sanctioned two Iranians: Ruhollah Bazghandi, head of IRGC counterespionage, and Shahram Ali Reza Tamarzadeh Jakki, described as a facilitator for the Zindashti criminal network, Al Jazeera reported. Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband summoned Iran’s ambassador, who said Tehran wasn’t involved and would cooperate. Seven men have been arrested and bailed over the September 27 incident and none has been charged; the UK and 28 other countries, including the U.S., issued a joint statement condemning Iranian “lethal plotting, arson, sabotage,” BBC News reported.

4. Warsaw / Poland and Germany. Two Turkish citizens have been detained in Germany over a fire last month at a Starlink station in Poland’s Masovia region, and Warsaw says they’ll face sabotage charges for acting on the orders of a foreign intelligence service, Al Jazeera reported. “We have no doubt that Russian services are behind this act of sabotage,” said Special Services Minister Tomasz Siemoniak; Poland pays for Ukraine’s Starlink service. At the Warsaw Security Forum the same day, NATO’s top commander, U.S. Gen. Alexus Grynkewich, said any attack on an ally would prove “utterly futile” and NATO would hit “anything and everything” that supports an attacking force, per Al Jazeera.

5. Bangkok / Thailand, and Australia. The IMF’s World Economic Outlook, released at the Bangkok annual meetings, warns the global economy “could soon test the limits of resilience” as emergency oil stocks run low and budgets stretch thin, The Guardian reported. It nudged 2026 global growth up to 3.1% from 3.0%, left 2027 at 3.4%, and sees global inflation at 4.7% this year and 4.1% next. A downside scenario, with the war dragging through June 2027 and Hormuz and Bab el-Mandeb largely shut, has oil at $130 a barrel; economists told Guardian Australia that could add about 30 cents a litre to Australian petrol.

6. Adwa / Ethiopia. Ethiopian federal troops and an allied militia entered the Tigray town of Adwa, about 40 km from the Eritrean border, on Sunday without a fight after TPLF fighters pulled out, residents said, Al Jazeera reported. It follows the capture of Adigrat and last week’s fall of Mekelle, where Ethiopian Airlines flights resumed Sunday for the first time since September 23. One resident told AFP government offices and Adwa Hospital were looted overnight. Eritrea, accused by Addis Ababa of backing the rebels, cut diplomatic ties last week.

7. Goma / DR Congo. Former President Joseph Kabila will lead a new political-military movement with the Rwanda-backed M23, which has held Goma since January 2025, the two sides announced at a joint news conference at his Goma residence, France 24 reported, citing AFP. Kabila, who ruled from 2001 to 2019, was sentenced to death in absentia a year ago for “complicity” with M23. The move lands as President Félix Tshisekedi’s camp floats constitutional changes ahead of the end of his final term in 2028.

8. Washington / United States. Homeland Security Investigations agents searched Rep. Ilhan Omar’s home in the Washington area under a court-approved warrant as part of “an ongoing federal criminal investigation,” the Justice Department said, BBC News reported. Omar called it political intimidation: “I will not be silenced.” Trump said he had “nothing to do” with it and called her “a terrible person.” Fox News reported the probe involves immigration paperwork her late father filed when she was a child. House Democratic leaders called the raid “deeply disturbing,” coming less than 30 days before the midterms, The Guardian reported.

9. Jalisco, Guerrero and Baja California / Mexico. Simon is down to 100 mph, a Category 2, about 80 miles west of Cabo Corrientes and 205 miles south of Mazatlán at 5 p.m. MST, creeping west-northwest at 3 mph and expected to turn northwest tonight, with flooding rains still hitting the coast, the National Hurricane Center said. At least two people are dead: a 71-year-old man killed by a collapsing wall near Chilpancingo, Guerrero, during Simon, and a young girl in Baja California from what was Hurricane Rachel, with 10 missing there, Al Jazeera reported. Forecasters say Simon could make landfall Thursday or Friday.

10. La Paz and Santa Cruz / Bolivia. Bolivia’s acting attorney general, José Armando Urioste, opened a preliminary investigation into former President Evo Morales and his vice president Álvaro García Linera over a 2009 police raid on a Santa Cruz hotel that killed three Europeans and left two others reporting torture, The Guardian reported. The alleged crimes include murder, torture and unlawful detention. Morales, who called the men “mercenaries” at the time, is already in hiding from two arrest warrants; neither he nor García Linera has commented.

Coming Up

Confirmed dates on The Watch and beyond: October 13, Pope Leo XIV checks into Rome’s Gemelli hospital for lung-nodule surgery, with audiences cancelled until October 20, Al Jazeera reported. Through October 18, the IMF and World Bank Annual Meetings in Bangkok, with G20 finance ministers there October 15. October 15–16, the European Council in Brussels. October 17, the earliest Riyadh’s King Khalid airport is expected to reopen. October 19, Alberta’s referendum on whether to move toward a binding independence vote.

Sources: Al Jazeera; BBC News; AP; The Guardian; Guardian Australia; France 24; U.S. National Hurricane Center.

World Brief: October 12, 2026

Zelenskyy says it’s “increasingly clear” Moscow wants no part of Trump’s “energy ceasefire,” Riyadh’s main airport stays shut while the war on the ground in Yemen grinds on, and Iran says the oil shuttle out of Hormuz is now a target. Ten stories as of Monday morning, October 12.

1. Warsaw, Kyiv and Kharkiv / Ukraine and Russia. Speaking to the Warsaw Security Forum on Monday, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Russia had bombed six energy facilities that day, injuring 33 people, and that “it is becoming increasingly clear that Russia does not want to agree to the energy ceasefire proposed by the US,” The Guardian reported. “If Russia does not agree to an energy ceasefire this winter, we will respond,” he said, adding of Trump’s announcement: “It’s clear that Putin does not read Truth Social.” Europe lined up behind Kyiv. “I have not noted, over the last 48 hours, any energy ceasefire coming from the Russian side,” France’s Emmanuel Macron said, per Al Jazeera, and the EU’s Kaja Kallas said the bloc welcomes the truce “when it holds.” In Ottawa, Prime Minister Mark Carney’s office said Trump’s Russian diesel deal “will provide additional revenue for Russia and help finance its illegal, unjustifiable war,” The Globe and Mail reported, even as Carney thanked Trump for pushing the ceasefire.

2. Riyadh and Taiz / Saudi Arabia and Yemen. Saudi Arabia extended the suspension of all flights at King Khalid International Airport on Monday while it verifies the airport’s safety, and its military said more missile and drone threats had been detected, The Guardian reported. Saturday’s toll is now 13 dead. Inside Yemen, Saudi jets carried out eight strikes around Taiz, the country’s third city, where as many as 60 fighters from both sides died on Sunday; the governor warned a medicine shortage means Taiz will soon run out of emergency surgical and intensive care. The UN Security Council is expected on Tuesday to debate a resolution calling the Houthis a terrorist organisation. Delta, meanwhile, pushed its new Atlanta–Riyadh nonstop back to March 2027, CNBC reported.

3. Strait of Hormuz / Iran and United Arab Emirates. Iran’s security chief Mohsen Rezaei said Sunday night that the U.S.-assisted shuttle moving Gulf crude past Iran’s grip on Hormuz is now an explicit target, Al Jazeera reported. He claimed U.S. Central Command and the UAE military are using smaller vessels to carry oil out to bigger tankers, and that Iran has been hitting five or six of those vessels nightly for weeks. “You are smuggling, but the strait is under Iran’s control, and we manage it,” he said. Rezaei also threatened U.S.-linked cables, data centers and AI facilities in the UAE, and accused Saudi Arabia of helping move the oil, though he stopped short of threatening Riyadh directly.

4. Peshawar / Pakistan. A day after President Asif Ali Zardari imposed emergency rule in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, the government confirmed that suspended Chief Minister Sohail Afridi and some of his cabinet were taken into “preventive custody” at his house in Peshawar, minister Talal Chaudhry told Reuters, via The Guardian. Police told Dawn the assembly speaker was among eight Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf leaders held, and hundreds of party politicians have been detained. Imran Khan’s party calls it a coup and says the emergency is meant to stop his supporters marching on Islamabad to demand his release. The government says the province failed to tackle Islamist militancy.

5. Berlin / Germany. Bärbel Bas resigned on Monday as Germany’s labor minister and as co-leader of the Social Democrats, citing the death of her stepdaughter and “open attacks” on her from inside Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s coalition, DW reported. “I am currently unable to muster the strength to fully carry out my government and party duties,” she said. Alexander Schweitzer, the former SPD premier of Rhineland-Palatinate, takes over the labor ministry; a new party co-chair will be picked at a conference expected early next year. Merz’s conservatives had accused Bas of stalling pension and labor-law changes.

6. Aubagne and Paris / France. A 14-year-old pupil walked into Lakanal middle school in Aubagne, east of Marseille, with a shotgun in a guitar case on Monday morning and shot the head teacher and another teacher before a staff member restrained him, BBC News reported. Their injuries aren’t life-threatening, no children were hurt, and prosecutors opened an attempted-murder investigation. Separately, hackers took over refrigeration software at hundreds of Coopérative U and Intermarché supermarkets, heating some fridges and freezers to 50C overnight and spoiling food worth millions of euros; Paris prosecutors are investigating, BBC News reported. And a pre-dawn fire “totally destroyed” the Marché des Enfants Rouges, Paris’s oldest covered market, dating to 1615, The Guardian reported.

7. Washington, Brussels and Canberra / United States, European Union and Australia. Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin defended the plan to livestream the firing-squad execution of Fort Hood gunman Nidal Hasan: “I don’t see an elevated risk,” he said on Sunday, BBC News reported. Trump has signed off on the execution, but no final decision on the livestream has been made. The execution is scheduled for December 3. On Monday the European Commission warned platforms they must “enforce their own terms and conditions diligently” in Europe under the Digital Services Act, noting Meta bans livestreamed capital punishment, France 24 reported. In Australia, the Greens want eSafety Commissioner Julie Inman Grant to keep the video off Australian screens, The Guardian reported.

8. Jalisco and Islas Marías / Mexico. Hurricane Simon is crawling northwest just off Mexico’s Pacific coast. At 8 a.m. MST it had 110 mph winds and sat 55 miles west-southwest of Cabo Corrientes, moving at 3 mph, the National Hurricane Center said. Mexico downgraded the mainland hurricane warnings to a watch and a tropical storm warning, but forecasters expect Simon to turn northeast and approach west-central Mexico again on Wednesday into Thursday, possibly re-strengthening first. A hurricane warning is up for the Islas Marías and a watch runs from north of Cabo Corrientes to Bahía Tempehuaya. Isolated storm totals of 30 inches of rain are possible in Michoacán, Colima and Jalisco, with “life-threatening flooding and mudslides.”

9. Asunción and Belmopan / Paraguay and Belize. China sanctioned Paraguay’s communications minister, Gustavo Villate, and Belize’s foreign minister, Francis Fonseca, over their countries’ ties with Taiwan, freezing any assets in China, barring them from Hong Kong and Macau, and banning Chinese dealings with them, Al Jazeera and the AP reported. Beijing accused the pair of “egregious actions and statements” damaging its core interests. Villate had marked Taiwan’s National Day on social media, and Taiwan’s foreign minister visited Belize last month. Paraguay and Belize are two of the 12 countries that still formally recognize Taiwan.

10. South Africa. Lt Gen Shadrack Sibiya, South Africa’s deputy national police commissioner, resigned on Monday, three weeks after he was charged with sexual offences, BBC News reported. His lawyer handed in the letter at his disciplinary hearing, and police said his exit counts as a dishonourable discharge. The charges involve allegations that he groomed a 16-year-old girl and raped an 18-year-old woman, plus a trafficking charge; Sibiya denies them all and has been in custody since his bail was denied. The Madlanga Commission, probing police corruption, has also heard he was given 20 impalas by an alleged crime boss in exchange for a police contract.

Coming Up

Confirmed dates on The Watch and beyond: October 13, Pope Leo XIV goes into Rome’s Gemelli hospital for lung-nodule surgery, the Vatican says. Through October 18, the IMF and World Bank Annual Meetings in Bangkok, with G20 finance ministers there October 15. October 15–16, the European Council in Brussels. October 19, Alberta’s referendum on whether to move toward a binding independence vote.

Sources: The Guardian; Al Jazeera; BBC News; DW; The Globe and Mail; CNBC; Dawn; France 24; AP; Vatican News; U.S. National Hurricane Center.

Alvaro Pulido, Alex Saab’s Fugitive Partner in Venezuelan Bribery Schemes, Is Taken Into U.S. Custody After a $10 Million Manhunt: October 12, 2026

MIAMI — Alvaro Pulido, a Colombian businessman wanted for years in the United States on charges of laundering money from bribery schemes involving Venezuelan government officials, has been taken into U.S. custody, The Associated Press and the U.S. Justice Department reported.

Pulido was indicted in Miami federal court in 2019 and again in 2021 as part of an investigation into his longtime business partner, Alex Saab, a onetime ally of ousted Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, AP said. The Drug Enforcement Administration and the State Department had offered a reward of up to $10 million for information leading to his arrest. A Homeland Security Task Force spokesperson, Nicole Navas Oxman, said Sunday that the investigation was led by the DEA, FBI and Homeland Security Investigations. Details of where and how he was arrested were not released.

The 62-year-old, also known as German Enrique Rubio Salas, is due to make his initial appearance Tuesday afternoon in the Southern District of Florida, the Justice Department said. The 2021 indictment accuses him and four co-defendants of paying bribes to win about $1.6 billion in contracts to supply food and medicine through CLAP, a Venezuelan government program, inflating costs to fund the bribes, and moving about $180 million through or to the United States.

The 2019 case accuses Pulido and Saab of laundering about $350 million from a bribery scheme built around a contract to construct low-income housing, in which prosecutors say they exploited Venezuela’s government-controlled exchange rate with fraudulent import documents. He faces 13 money-laundering-related counts across the two cases, each carrying up to 20 years in prison. The department said he also had a 1997 drug-trafficking conviction in Italy under his alias.

“Those accused of exploiting the American financial system should understand that distance, borders, and time will not shield them from the reach of the American legal system,” the department said in its statement.

Sources: The Associated Press, U.S. Department of Justice

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