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MACHAKOS, Kenya — With dismay, Martha Waema and her husband surveyed their farm that was submerged by weeks of relentless rainfall across Kenya. Water levels would rise to shoulder height after only a night of heavy downpour. The couple had expected a return of $1,500 from their three acres after investing $613 in corn, peas, cabbages, tomatoes and kale. But their hopes have been uprooted and destroyed. "I have been farming for 38 years, but I have never encountered losses of this magnitude," said the 62-year-old mother of 10. Their financial security and optimism have been shaken by what Kenya's government has called "a clear manifestation of the erratic weather patterns caused by climate change." The rains that started in mid-March have posed immediate dangers and left others to come. They have killed nearly 300 people, left dams at historically high levels and led the government to order residents to evacuate flood-prone areas — and bulldoze the homes of those who don't. Now a food security crisis lies ahead, along with even higher prices in a country whose president had sought to make agriculture an even greater engine of the economy. Kenya's government says the flooding has destroyed crops on more than 67,987 hectares of land, or less than 1% of Kenya's agricultural land. As farmers count their losses — a total yet unknown — the deluge has exposed what opposition politicians call Kenya's ill preparedness for climate change and related disasters and the need for sustainable land management and better weather forecasting. Waema now digs trenches in an effort to protect what's left of the farm on a plain in the farthest outskirts of the capital, Nairobi, in Machakos County. Not everyone is grieving, including farmers who prepared for climate shocks. About 200 kilometers west of Waema's farm, 65-year-old farmer James Tobiko Tipis and his 6½-hectare farm have escaped the flooding in Olokirikirai. He said he had been proactive in the area that's prone to landslides by terracing crops. "We used to lose topsoil and whatever we were planting," he said. Experts said more Kenyan farmers must protect their farms against soil erosion that likely will be worsened by further climate shocks. Jane Kirui, an agricultural officer in Narok County, emphasized the importance of terracing and other measures such as cover crops that will allow water to be absorbed. In Kenya's rural areas, experts say efforts to conserve water resources remain inadequate despite the current plentiful rainfall. At Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology, professor John Gathenya recommended practices such as diversifying crops and emphasizing the soil's natural water retention capacity. "The soil remains the biggest reservoir for water," he said, asserting that using it wisely requires much less of an investment than large infrastructure projects such as dams. But soil needs to be protected with practices that include limiting the deforestation that has exposed parts of Kenyan land to severe runoff. "We are opening land in new fragile environments where we need to be even more careful the way we farm," Gathenya said. "In our pursuit for more and more food, we are pressing into the more fragile areas but not with the same intensity of soil conservation that we had 50 years back."

NICE, France — At just 28 years old, Jordan Bardella has helped make the far-right National Rally the strongest political force in France. And now he could become the country's youngest prime minister. After voters propelled Marine Le Pen's National Rally to a strong lead in the first round of snap legislative elections on June 30, Bardella turned to rallying supporters to hand their party an absolute majority in the decisive round on Sunday. That would allow the anti-immigration, nationalist party to run the government, with Bardella at the helm. Who is the National Rally president? When Bardella replaced his mentor, Marine Le Pen, in 2022 at the helm of France's leading far-right party, he became the first person without the Le Pen name to lead it since its founding a half-century ago. His selection marked a symbolic changing of the guard. It was part of Le Pen's decadelong effort to rebrand her party, with its history of racism, and remove the stigma of antisemitism that clung to it in order to broaden its base. She has notably distanced herself from her now-ostracized father, Jean-Marie Le Pen, who co-founded the party, then called the National Front, and who has been repeatedly convicted of hate speech. Bardella is part of a generation of young people who joined the party under Marine Le Pen in the 2010s but likely wouldn't have done so under her father. Since joining at age 17, he has risen quickly through the ranks, serving as party spokesperson and president of its youth wing, before being appointed vice president and becoming the second-youngest member of the European Parliament in history, in 2019. "Jordan Bardella is the creation of Marine Le Pen," said Cécile Alduy, a Stanford University professor of French politics and literature, and an expert on the far right. "He has been made by her and is extremely loyal." On the campaign trail, Le Pen and Bardella have presented themselves as American-style running mates, with Le Pen vying for the presidency while pushing him to be prime minister, Alduy said. "They are completely in line politically." How did he become the movement's poster child? It wasn't only having a different last name that made Bardella an attractive prospect for a party seeking to widen its appeal beyond its traditionally older, rural voter base. Bardella was born in the north Parisian suburb of Seine-Saint-Denis in 1995 to parents of Italian origin, with Algerian roots on his father's side — and far from seeking to deny these roots, he has used them to soften the tone (if not the content) of his party's anti-immigration stance and its hostility to France's Muslim community. Although Bardella attended a semi-private Catholic school and his father was fairly well-off, party-sanctioned accounts have stressed his upbringing in a rundown housing project beset by poverty and drugs. Never having finished university, Bardella's relatively modest background set him apart from the establishment. What's more, he could tell people directly — and crucially young voters — about it. With over 1.7 million followers on TikTok and 750,000 on Instagram, Bardella has found an audience for his slick social media content, which ranges from more traditional campaign material to videos mocking Macron and seemingly candid glimpses into the life of the National Rally's would-be prime minister. With a neat, clean-shaven look and social media savvy, he has posed for selfies with screaming fans. While his rhetoric is strong on hot-button issues like immigration — "France is disappearing" is his tagline — he has been relatively blurry on specifics. What is he proposing for France? It was Bardella who in a post on X called on Macron to dissolve the parliament and call early elections after the president's centrist group suffered a crushing defeat by the National Rally at European elections in June. When Macron did just that, Bardella, often wearing a suit and tie, hit the campaign trail, toning down his popstar image to seem more statesman-like despite his lack of experience in government. In recent months, the National Rally has softened some of its most controversial positions, including pedaling back some of its proposals for more public spending and protectionist economic policies, and taking France out of NATO's strategic military command. Laying out the party's new program, Bardella said that as prime minister he would promote law and order, tighter regulation of migration and restricting certain social benefits, such as housing, to French citizens only. He said that dual citizens would be barred from some specific key jobs, such as state employees in the defense and security field. He promised to cut taxes on fuel, gas and electricity, and pledged a rollback of Macron's pension changes. His law-and-order minded government would also extend to the nation's public schools, extending the ban on cellphones to high schools. Rivals say his policies could do lasting damage to the French economy and violate human rights. On the international front, Bardella has aimed to counter allegations that Le Pen's party has long been friendly toward Russia and President Vladimir Putin. He said he regards Russia as "a multidimensional threat both for France and Europe," and said he would be "extremely vigilant" of any Russian attempts to interfere with French interests. Although he supports continued deliveries of French weaponry to Ukraine, he would not send French troops to help the country defend itself. He would also not allow sending long-rage missiles capable of striking targets within Russia. For voters with low incomes or who feel left out of economic successes in Paris or the globalized economy, Bardella offers an appealing choice, Alduy said. "The feeling of vulnerability people have to factors that are beyond their control, calls for a radical change in the minds of many voters," she said. "He has a clean slate and comes with no baggage of the past."

PARIS — Voting has begun in mainland France on Sunday in pivotal runoff elections that could hand a historic victory to Marine Le Pen's far-right National Rally and its inward-looking, anti-immigrant vision — or produce a hung parliament and years of political deadlock. French President Emmanuel Macron took a huge gamble in dissolving parliament and calling for the elections after his centrists were trounced in European elections on June 9. The snap elections in this nuclear-armed nation will influence the war in Ukraine, global diplomacy and Europe's economic stability, and they're almost certain to undercut President Emmanuel Macron for the remaining three years of his presidency. The first round on June 30 saw the largest gains ever for the anti-immigration, nationalist National Rally, led by Marine Le Pen. A bit over 49 million people are registered to vote in the elections, which will determine which party controls the National Assembly, France's influential lower house of parliament, and who will be prime minister. If support is further eroded for Macron's weak centrist majority, he will be forced to share power with parties opposed to most of his pro-business, pro-European Union policies. Racism and antisemitism have marred the electoral campaign, along with Russian cybercampaigns, and more than 50 candidates reported being physically attacked — highly unusual for France. The government is deploying 30,000 police on voting day. The heightened tensions come while France is celebrating a very special summer: Paris is about to host exceptionally ambitious Olympic Games, the national soccer team reached the semifinal of the Euro 2024 championship, and the Tour de France is racing around the country alongside the Olympic torch. The elections wrap up Sunday at 8 p.m. (1800 GMT) in mainland France and on the island of Corsica. Initial polling projections are expected Sunday night, with early official results expected late Sunday and early Monday. Voters residing in the Americas and in France's overseas territories of Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon, Saint-Barthélemy, Saint-Martin, Guadeloupe, Martinique, Guyana and French Polynesia voted on Saturday.    The elections could leave France with its first far-right government since the Nazi occupation in World War II if the National Rally wins an absolute majority and its 28-year-old leader Jordan Bardella becomes prime minister. The party came out on top in the previous week's first-round voting, followed by a coalition of center-left, hard-left and Green parties, and Macron's centrist alliance. But the outcome remains highly uncertain. Polls between the two rounds suggest that the National Rally may win the most seats in the 577-seat National Assembly but fall short of the 289 seats needed for a majority. That would still make history, if a party with historic links to xenophobia and downplaying the Holocaust, and long seen as a pariah, becomes France's biggest political force. If it wins the majority, Macron would be forced to share power in an awkward arrangement known in France as "cohabitation." Another possibility is that no party has a majority, resulting in a hung parliament. That could prompt Macron to pursue coalition negotiations with the center-left or name a technocratic government with no political affiliations. Both would be unprecedented for modern France, and make it more difficult for the European Union's No. 2 economy to make bold decisions on arming Ukraine, reforming labor laws or reducing its huge deficit. Financial markets have been jittery since Macron surprised even his closest allies in June by announcing snap elections after the National Rally won the most seats for France in European Parliament elections. Regardless of what happens, Macron said he won't step down and will stay president until his term ends in 2027. Many French voters, especially in small towns and rural areas, are frustrated with low incomes and a Paris political leadership seen as elitist and unconcerned with workers' day-to-day struggles. National Rally has connected with those voters, often by blaming immigration for France's problems, and has built up broad and deep support over the past decade. Le Pen has softened many of the party's positions — she no longer calls for quitting NATO and the EU — to make it more electable. But the party's core far-right values remain. It wants a referendum on whether being born in France is enough to merit citizenship, to curb rights of dual citizens, and give police more freedom to use weapons.

Washington — The NATO summit scheduled for this week will include a discussion among the allies about strengthening security ties with South Korea and Japan against deepening military cooperation between Russia and North Korea, experts said. The leaders of 32 NATO members will convene in Washington July 9 to 11 to discuss ways to provide continued military support to Ukraine to help it defend itself against Russia, which invaded more than two years ago. Australia, Japan, New Zealand and South Korea — sometimes referred to as the Indo-Pacific 4 or IP4 — are invited to the NATO summit. The United States, Japan and South Korea plan to meet on the sidelines of the summit. Among the items that analysts expect NATO to discuss with Japan and South Korea is the growing military cooperation between Russia and North Korea. "The Russian-North Korean agreement is a problem for both NATO countries and for the countries in the Northeast Asia," said Bruce Bennett, a senior defense analyst at the RAND Corporation. "I expect that it will be discussed at this meeting. It may become a critical aspect of the meeting, if, by that time, intelligence is saying that North Korea is sending many military personnel to support Russia in Ukraine," Bennett said. After Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un signed a mutual defense pact in Pyongyang last month, some speculated that North Korea could dispatch army engineers to Russian-occupied Donetsk to rebuild the war-torn region. Pentagon press secretary Major General Patrick Ryder said at a press conference on June 25 that the U.S. is keeping an eye on a possible dispatch of troops but warned North Korea about sending military forces, saying they would be "cannon fodder in an illegal war against Ukraine." North Korea on June 27 renewed its support for Russia's war against Ukraine, saying, "We will always be on the side of the Russian army" in "the war of justice." Both Washington and Seoul have estimated that Pyongyang sent about 10,000 containers of munitions to Russia. Moscow and Pyongyang denied arms exchanges between the two. But in the defense pact that Putin and Kim signed last month, they agreed to set up ways to bolster their defense capabilities and openly announced possible military and technical cooperation. "NATO members will discuss the implications of closer Russia-North Korea relations and how best to respond, including in terms of risks and opportunities," said Matthew Brummer, a professor at the National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies in Tokyo. "Risks primarily include material outcomes, such as how North Korea involvement will come to bear on warfighting in Ukraine. But there are also opportunities to be exploited, including how to use increased North Korea involvement to drive a wedge between China and Russia," he said. "The reemerging axis between China, Russia and North Korea has most certainly precipitated the security link between Europe and Asia. As a result, I expect increased NATO involvement in East Asia, especially with Japan, which is the world's greatest latent military power," Brummer said. Beijing said that it is keeping "a close eye" on the NATO summit and that it hopes the summit does not "target any third party." Liu Pengyu, a spokesperson for the Chinese Embassy in Washington, told VOA on Tuesday that "the Asia-Pacific lies beyond the geographical scope of the North Atlantic" and that "NATO's attempt to make eastward inroads into the Asia-Pacific will inevitably undermine regional peace and stability.” "The countries and people in this region are on high alert against this and firmly oppose any words or actions designed to bring military blocs into this region and stoke division and confrontation," he said. The U.S. State Department did not respond to an inquiry by VOA's Korean Service seeking a response to Beijing's comments. Luis Simon, director of the Elcano Royal Institute in Brussels, Belgium, said he would not rule out NATO countries conducting joint military exercises with its East Asian partners "in the Korean Peninsula context rather than in a China context" because it offers "diplomatically an easier entry point." At the same time, he said, "It will be more with NATO allies rather than the NATO as a whole because NATO as a whole is very clear about being laser focused" on defending Ukraine. The Japan Air Self-Defense Force announced on June 25 that it will hold a series of joint drills in July with Germany, Spain and France — all NATO members. David Maxwell, vice president of the Center for Asia Pacific Strategy, also said that bilateral arrangements between South Korea and individual NATO countries could be possible as "a number of NATO countries are member states of the United Nations Command." The U.N. Command is a multinational military body created during the Korean War of 1950-53 to defend against North Korean aggression. Some analysts said there are limits to NATO's involvement in the Indo-Pacific. "Most of the countries in NATO are focused on the Atlantic area, and those who have projection capabilities" that can go beyond that "have rather small ones," said Barry Posen, Ford international professor of political science at MIT. William Ruger, a nonresident senior fellow at Defense Priorities, said U.S. "capabilities, material and policy bandwidth" are not sufficient to deal with the security of both Europe and Asia.

new york — TikTok and its bite-sized videos arrived in the United States as a global version of the Chinese app Douyin in 2018. Less than six years later, the social media platform is deeply woven into the fabric of American consumerism, having shortened the shelf life of trends and revamped how people engage with food and fashion.  The popularity of TikTok — coupled with its roots in Beijing — led the U.S. Congress — citing national security concerns, to pass a law that would ban the video-sharing app unless its Chinese parent company sells its stake. Both the company, ByteDance, and TikTok have sued on First Amendment grounds.  But while the platform faces uncertain times, its influence remains undisputed.  Interest in bright pink blush and brown lipstick soared last year, for example, after the cosmetics were featured in TikTok videos with looks labeled as "cold girl" and "latte" makeup. An abundance of clothing fads with quirky names, from "cottagecore" to "coastal grandma," similarly owe their pervasiveness to TikTok.    Plenty of TikTok-spawned crazes last only a week or two before losing steam. Yet even mini trends have challenged businesses to decipher which ones are worth stocking up for. A majority of the more than 170 million Americans who use TikTok belong to the under-30 age group coveted by retailers, according to the Pew Research Center. Whether fans of the platform or not, shoppers may have a #tiktokmademebuyit moment without knowing the origin story behind an eye-catching product.  Platform's algorithm is 'secret sauce' What made TikTok such a trendsetter compared to predecessor platforms? Researchers and marketing analysts have often described the platform's personalized recommendation algorithm as the "secret sauce" of TikTok's success. The company has disclosed little about the technology it employs to populate users' "For You" feeds.    Jake Bjorseth, founder of the advertising agency Trndsttrs, which specializes in Generation Z, thinks the app's use of an interest-based algorithm instead of personal contacts to connect like-minded people is what gave TikTok the edge.  TikTok also changed the standard for what was considered desirable in social media content. The beginner-friendly platform featured videos made without filters, lighting setups or production-level audio. TikTok creators could develop more intimate relationships with their followers because they appeared more authentic, Bjorseth said.  The platform has plenty of critics. Some experts argue that TikTok, like other social media sites, can be addictive and promote unnecessary spending. Others accuse TikTok of encouraging harmful behavior, like girls engaging in skin care rituals intended for older women.  Yet for all the detractors who won't mourn TikTok if it goes away, a vocal base of fans hopes it doesn't come to that.  Influencing fashion, accessories Casey Lewis, a trend analyst based in New York, said TikTok's clout in the fashion arena first became apparent to her when videos about Birkenstock's Boston clogs overtook her "For You" feed in 2022.    As the number of TikTok videos exploded, creators advised their followers where they could find the suddenly sold-out clogs. Lewis thought it was odd since her brother, whom she described as a "frat boy" and not a fashionista, wore the cork-soled comfort shoes in college.    "I'm not a psychologist, but I'm sure there's some psychology where your brain goes from thinking like, 'How weird? Is that fashion?' And then suddenly you're obsessed with it," she said.    The pace with which TikTok-shaped trends pop can be dizzying. In the last year, the hot pink ensembles of "Barbiecore" coexisted with the deliberately unsexy looks of "dadcore" — think chunky white sneakers, baggy jeans and polo shirts. The linen-draped "coastal grandma" aesthetic gave way to "eclectic grandpa."    While the rotating cast of "cores" may not drive their adherents to buy entire wardrobes, they're "influencing spending in small ways, and that adds up," Lewis said.    Influencers provide tips, tricks Daniella Lopez White, 21, a recent college graduate on a tight budget, said TikTok influencers provided tips on finding affordable clothes but also connected her to plus-size creators featuring fashions for larger-bodied women, which made her more confident.  "Those TikTok trends really helped me figure out what parts of my body I want to accentuate and feel cute in, and still incorporate my sense of style," she said.  A go-to spot With easy-to-follow cooking videos and clever hacks, TikTok became a go-to spot for home cooks during the COVID-19 pandemic. The platform made humble ingredients a star and earned endorsements from some of the stars of the food world.    "Every day, honestly, I am blown away by the creativity from the FoodTok community," restaurateur and chef Gordon Ramsay said in a TikTok video late last year.    Like the clothing styles of earlier eras, foods that had fallen out of fashion were resurrected via TikTok. U.S. sales of cottage cheese jumped 34% between April 2022 and April 2024 after videos promoting cottage cheese ice cream, cottage cheese toast and other recipes racked up millions of views.  Ben Sokolsky, the general manager of sales and marketing for Dallas-based dairy company Daisy Brand, said cottage cheese is seeing its highest sustained growth in nearly 50 years. The curdled milk product used to be a "secret sensation," but social media helped expose new customers to its benefits, Sokolsky said.  Topics that went viral on TikTok have even spawned analog equivalents. Last summer, TikToker Olivia Maher posted what she called her "girl dinner" of bread, cheese, pickles and grapes. It was a hit, with more than 1.6 million views. A handful of "girl dinner" cookbooks soon followed.    But the eagerness to try trendy foods had a downside. A 14-year-old in Massachusetts died after trying a challenge involving an extremely spicy tortilla chip that appeared on TikTok and other social media sites. An autopsy of the boy, who had a congenital heart defect, found that eating a large quantity of chile pepper extract caused his death. Paqui, the maker of the chip, pulled it off the market.  Upending cosmetic industry TikTok has upended the cosmetics industry by causing ingredients to get labeled as the next miracle cure or to be avoided and featuring videos of people gleefully applying or panning the contents of their latest shopping hauls.  Influencers on TikTok and elsewhere have made freckles an asset with clips showing how to add faux ones with eyebrow pencils or broccoli florets. The "clean girl" aesthetic, a renamed version of the no-makeup makeup look, prompted both luxury and drugstore brands to rush out their own versions of skin tints and lip oils.  Some veteran users of TikTok have noted the platform is almost too good in its role as both a tastemaker and a shopping search engine. A popular category of beauty videos shows influencers "decluttering" drawers filled with piles of barely used lipsticks, blushes and eyeshadow palettes.  Though the desire for clicks can encourage creators to follow the same hair and makeup trends, TikTok's defenders credit the platform with forcing brands to create products for a wider range of skin tones and hair types.  Tiffany Watson, who currently has more than 31,00 followers on TikTok and has done paid partnerships with brands like Colourpop Cosmetics, said the platform has promoted a more inclusive image of beauty compared to other sites.  "I see more diversity on TikTok because (with) every video you're swiping, you're seeing somebody new," she said. 

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — Majorie Edoi sells food from a stand in Haiti's capital Port-au-Prince -- or she used to, until a conflict with armed gangs cut off the city from suppliers, paralyzed trade routes and pushed the Caribbean country to its highest levels of hunger on record. The 30-year-old mother of three now sells food out of one of the many makeshift camps for displaced people set up across the city's schools. But with goods harder to come by, opportunities to provide for her young children are shrinking fast. "We can't buy anything. We can't eat. We can't drink," she said. "I'd like there to be a legitimate government to establish security so we can move around and sell goods, so the children can go to school." Some 5 million people in Haiti, nearly half its population, are struggling to feed themselves due to the conflict, according to the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC), an international benchmark used to assess hunger. Since the 2021 assassination of Haiti's last president, armed gangs have expanded their power and influence, taking over most of the capital and expanding to nearby farmlands. Their land grabs have brought lootings, arson, mass rapes and indiscriminate killings. In June, the first contingent of a long-delayed U.N.-backed force of mostly African troops arrived in Haiti to bolster its under-resourced security services, and Kenyan police began patrolling the capital. Residents have responded with cautious optimism, though it remains unclear when the majority of the force will arrive. For mothers like Edoi and Mirriam Auge, 45, change cannot come fast enough. "We can't do anything -- there's no money, no trade," said Auge, who was forced out of her home three months ago. Since then, she has been sharing a chair to sleep on with her two daughters and five others in a makeshift school-shelter crammed with tents. "We lost everything in our homes," she said. "I cried while everyone was sleeping." Unable to work, the families depend on food rations and hygiene kits brought in by non-governmental organizations, whose delivery drivers brave stray bullets along Port-au-Prince's ever-changing battle lines. The United Nations World Food Program (WFP) is a major supplier of these meals. Working with farms and kitchens staffed largely by women, it helps deliver food from four central kitchens to the camps. "It's tricky," said WFP Haiti director Jean-Martin Bauer. "There might be a shooting near one of the locations we distribute through, so you might have to cancel and leave people without a meal that day. These are the calls we need to make." WFP has looked to shorten its supply chains, sourcing food such as sorghum grains and callaloo - a leafy green popular in the Caribbean -- from nearby farms rather than risking longer transport by boat or truck via gang-controlled roads and shuttered ports. Nonetheless, Bauer said, the WFP did not have enough food in stock to meet its distribution plan. He pointed to a 2024 U.N.-wide humanitarian fund for Haiti that is over $500 million below target. Rice import In a community action center where WFP meals are prepared, workers dish out rice and vegetables into rows of polystyrene containers that will later be distributed to a school camp. The food crisis has been a long time coming to Haiti's 11 million people. In the 1980s, policies under a U.S. export program followed by trade liberalization encouraged by multilateral lenders saw import tariffs slashed and U.S. rice flood the market, while local producers of the country's staple were pushed out of their jobs. Once a self-sufficient rice producer, the Western Hemisphere's poorest country now imports some 80% of its rice from the richest. Today, farmers in the Artibonite, Haiti's breadbasket, must contend with shootings, theft, racketeering and extortion by armed gangs, U.N. agencies say. They have also reported that Madan Sara, the tradeswomen who traditionally bring fruit and vegetables from farms to markets across the country, are often kidnapped and raped. Soaring costs Rita Losandieu, 53, looks after her two granddaughters, ages 4 and 6, in a small, bare-brick house built on a dusty slope. Her daughter works in the neighboring Dominican Republic -- which built a wall to thwart migration and last year deported over 200,000 Haitians. "To buy something to eat, you need a lot of money. It's very difficult," she said. Her two sons work odd jobs to help make ends meet. For many children in Haiti, there are few options to obtain food. Desperation leads many to join gangs, while girls end up trapped in prostitution. "If you are displaced or your family doesn't have a place to sleep, you may need to join armed groups just to cover your needs," said Save the Children Haiti food adviser Jules Roberto. Soaring food prices have also fueled the crisis. Fresh fish on the island nation sold for 60% more in March than a year ago, according to Haiti's IHSI statistics agency, while cooking oil and rice both soared 50%. "We need to have a security response force but also a robust humanitarian response," Bauer said. "Haiti will never be at peace as long as half its citizens are starving."

CAPE TOWN, South Africa — Scientists in South Africa have been stunned to discover that termite mounds that are still inhabited in an arid region of the country are more than 30,000 years old, meaning they are the oldest known active termite hills. Some of the mounds near the Buffels River in Namaqualand were estimated by radiocarbon dating to be 34,000 years old, according to the researchers from Stellenbosch University. "We knew they were old, but not that old," said Michele Francis, senior lecturer in the university's department of soil science who led the study. Her paper was published in May. Francis said the mounds existed while saber-toothed cats and woolly mammoths roamed other parts of the Earth and large swathes of Europe and Asia were covered in ice. They predate some of the earliest cave paintings in Europe. Some fossilized termite mounds have been discovered dating back millions of years. The oldest inhabited mounds before this study were found in Brazil and are around 4,000 years old. They are visible from space. Francis said the Namaqualand mounds are a termite version of an "apartment complex" and the evidence shows they have been consistently inhabited by termite colonies. Termite mounds are a famous feature of the Namaqualand landscape, but no one suspected their age until samples of them were taken to experts in Hungary for radiocarbon dating. "People don't know that these are special, ancient landscapes that are preserved there," Francis said. Some of the biggest mounds — known locally as "heuweltjies," which means little hills in the Afrikaans language — measure around 30 meters across. The termite nests are as deep as 3 meters underground. Researchers needed to carefully excavate parts of the mounds to take samples, and the termites went into "emergency mode" and started filling in the holes, Francis said. The team fully reconstructed the mounds to keep the termites safe from predators like aardvarks. Francis said the project was more than just a fascinating look at ancient structures. It also offered a peek into a prehistoric climate that showed Namaqualand was a much wetter place when the mounds were formed. The southern harvester termites are experts at capturing and storing carbon by collecting twigs and other dead wood and putting it back deep into the soil. That has benefits in offsetting climate change by reducing the amount of carbon emitted into the atmosphere. It's also good for the soil. Masses of wildflowers bloom on top of the termite mounds in a region that receives little rain. Francis called for more research on termite mounds given the lessons they offer on climate change, sustaining ecosystems and maybe even for improving agricultural practices. "We will do well to study what the termites have done in the mounds. They were thought to be very boring," she said.

Trollstigen, Norway — Far from her home in the tourist hotspot of Tenerife, Canary Islands, Cati Padilla is one of the growing number of travelers escaping heatwaves for cooler holidays in Nordic countries. Countries like Norway and Sweden in northern Europe are now promoting "coolcations" to attract visitors to their temperate climates. Why leave the Canaries in summer? "To escape the heat," said Padilla while on holiday with her friends. "Norway attracted our attention a long time ago because of the green landscape, the mountains and the ice," added the civil servant in her fifties on the so-called "troll path," a serpentine mountain route towards the fjords. In 2023, foreign overnight stays rose by 22% in Norway and 11% in Sweden according to official statistics, mainly driven by the end of COVIS-related restrictions in 2022 and a slump in Scandinavian currencies. But a survey in Germany for tourist organization Visit Sweden also found that two out of five people plan to change their travel habits due to the southern European heat, opting for different seasons or cooler destinations. "Coolcation is not just about the weather," said Susanne Andersson, head of Visit Sweden. "It's about traveling to places where it's a little bit cooler both in the weather but also cooler in the sense of not that many people." For some people, gone are the overcrowded Mediterranean beaches and heatwaves causing forest fires and the partial closure of the Acropolis in the Greek capital in June. Nowadays, many prefer to take a dip in a lake or a fjord, or fill their lungs with fresh air on a mountain hike in relative isolation. Killer summer When British tourist Pam disembarked from a cruise ship on the majestic Geiranger Fjord, a UNESCO World Heritage site, she expected to find cool weather. But she found herself in sandals and a T-shirt, rather than the raincoat and woollen clothes she packed. "It's been wonderful," said the resident of Lichfield city in west-central England. "It's still not that hot that you can't walk." "It just does not interest me now to sit on a sunbed, read a book, get up, go and have something to eat and come back to the sunbed. I'd rather visit places, find the history and just look at beautiful places." The frequency and intensity of extreme heat events and the duration of heatwaves have almost certainly increased since 1950 and will continue to do so with global warming, according to UN climate experts. By 2050, half of Europe’s population could face high or very high risk heat stress in summer, with heat-related deaths potentially doubling or tripling with temperature rises of between 1.5 degrees Celsius (34.7 degrees Fahrenheit) to 3C. "Spain is a no. Greece is a no," said 74-year-old French pensioner Gerard Grollier, as he disembarked from a coach in Geiranger village in western Norway. Why Norway? "The climate is much more pleasant," explained his daughter, Virginie, a financial adviser. "We have not protected our planet, and now that is impacting tourism." Submerged villages The capital of Lapland in northern Finland, Rovaniemi, recorded a 29% jump in overnight stays last year. "You can feel the 'coolcation' here, the trend started years ago but it has increased with the hot summers in southern and central Europe," said Sanna Karkkainen, who promotes tourism in Rovaniemi. The coolcation influx has its issues, including a surge in Airbnb properties and unruly tourists. "Our main concern is to have too many people at the same time," emphasised Jan Ove Tryggestad, former mayor of a Norwegian village where a cruise ship carrying 6,000 passengers and 2,000 crew members had just docked. "It's a small village here. In Hellesylt, there are between 280 to 300 winter inhabitants. Obviously it's a bit of a culture shock when suddenly a small town, by European standards, turns up," he added. "But we adapt."

PAARL, South Africa — Freya, a 6-month-old lion cub rescued from the wildlife trade in Lebanon, poked a curious nose out of her transport crate and sniffed the air. Satisfied, she took her first cautious steps in her new forever home in a sanctuary in South Africa. Freya's relocation to the Drakenstein Lion Park is only a partial success story. She will never live as a lion should in the wild. She has been given lifetime sanctuary at Drakenstein, which has taken in other lions from zoos and circuses in France, Chile, Romania and elsewhere. Some have terrible backstories of abuse, noted on placards at the sanctuary: Ares was blind and neglected when he was rescued. Brutus had been beaten hard enough to break his jaw. But as Freya settles in at Drakenstein, animal welfare groups have again drawn attention to South Africa's contradictory position when it comes to the species that often symbolizes African wildlife. South Africa, with an admirable reputation for conservation and ethical sanctuaries like Drakenstein, also has a thriving captive lion business where the big cats are bred for petting and other encounters but also for killing in "canned hunting" experiences or for the lion bone trade. South Africa has special permission through the endangered plant and animal trade treaty CITES to export lion bones and skeletons, mostly to Southeast Asia to be used in traditional medicines. Canned hunting, where lions are chased down and shot in enclosures with no chance of a fair chase or escape, is also legal. Animal welfare groups have pushed for the business of breeding lions in captivity to end. The South African government announced recently it plans to close down the industry and it's expected to take two to three years if there are no legal challenges. It has been a stain on South Africa's conservation brand, said Audrey Delsink, the Africa wildlife director for Humane Society International, which was involved in Freya's relocation. She said it was important for people to realize that the cute cubs used for petting encounters at some South African parks — but not at Drakenstein — end up being big lions shipped off to be killed. "They've been pulled from their mothers, they've been hand-raised for you to take selfies with and enjoy them, and then eventually the same lions are going to be shot for trophies in a camp from which they cannot escape, and then end up as a bag of bones," Delsink said. There are more than 300 captive lion facilities in South Africa, with more than 7,000 lions. That is double the number of lions in the South African wild. Campaigners against the business say it should be made more clear to visitors that the vast majority of South Africa's lions live in cages in the world's largest captive lion industry. "We cannot pull the wool over tourists' eyes anymore," Delsink said. As for Freya, her rescuers hope that she will eventually bond and live in the same enclosure as young male cub Pi, who they believe is her brother and was brought from Lebanon in April. Pi was illegally trafficked and owned by a man who used him to promote his TikTok account, said Jason Mier, director of Animals Lebanon, which rescued Pi and Freya. Pi often had his mouth taped shut when used for videos or selfies and was locked in a small cage at night. He was kept as a status symbol for his owner "to be able to show off I'm powerful, I have money, look at me," Mier said. Freya and Pi are the latest of nearly two dozen big cats rescued from various situations by Animals Lebanon. Some have come to Drakenstein, which doesn't allow cub petting or any close encounters, but does welcome visitors to see the lions and learn about them. Freya and Pi wouldn't survive if released in the wild, so the sanctuary is the best option for them. Those involved in Pi's rescue said they remember watching the cub experience grass under his paws for the first time at Drakenstein, even if it was in the enclosure he and Freya will likely inhabit for the rest of their lives.

WASHINGTON — Scientists have revealed fossils of a giant salamanderlike beast with sharp fangs that ruled waters before the first dinosaurs arrived. The predator, which was larger than a person, likely used its wide, flat head and front teeth to suck in and chomp unsuspecting prey, researchers said. Its skull was about 60 centimeters (2 feet) long. "It's acting like an aggressive stapler," said Michael Coates, a biologist at the University of Chicago who was not involved with the work. Fossil remnants of four creatures collected about a decade ago were analyzed, including a partial skull and backbone. The findings on Gaiasia jennyae were published Wednesday in the journal Nature. The creature existed some 40 million years before dinosaurs evolved. Researchers have long examined such ancient predators to uncover the origins of tetrapods: four-legged animals that clambered onto land with fingers instead of fins and evolved to amphibians, birds and mammals including humans. Most early tetrapod fossils hail from hot, prehistoric coal swamps along the equator in what's now North America and Europe. But these latest remnants, dating back to about 280 million years ago, were found in modern-day Namibia, an area in Africa that was once encrusted with glaciers and ice. That means tetrapods may have thrived in colder climates earlier than scientists expected, prompting more questions about how and when they took over the Earth. "The early story of the first tetrapods is much more complex than we thought," said co-author Claudia Marsicano at the University of Buenos Aires, who was part of the research. The creature's name comes from the Gai-As rock formation in Namibia where the fossils were found and for the late paleontologist Jennifer Clack, who studied how tetrapods evolved.

PHOENIX, Arizona — Ron Falk lost his right leg, had extensive skin grafting on the left one and is still recovering a year after collapsing on the searing asphalt outside a Phoenix convenience store where he stopped for a cold soda during a heat wave. Now using a wheelchair, the 62-year-old lost his job and his home. He’s recovering at a medical respite center for patients with no other place to go; there he gets physical therapy and treatment for a bacterial infection in what remains of his right leg, which is too swollen to use the prosthesis he’d hoped would help him walk again. “If you don’t get somewhere to cool down, the heat will affect you,” said Falk, who lost consciousness due to heat stroke. “Then you won’t know what’s happening, like in my case.” Sizzling sidewalks and unshaded playgrounds pose risks for surface burns as air temperatures reach new summertime highs in Southwest U.S. cities such as Phoenix, which just recorded its hottest June on record. The average daytime high was 43 degrees Celsius (109.5 degrees Fahrenheit), without a single 24-hour high below 37.7 Celsius (100 Fahrenheit). Young children, older adults and homeless people are especially at risk for contact burns, which can occur in seconds when skin touches a surface of 82 C (180 F). Since the beginning of June, 50 people have been hospitalized with such burns, and four have died at Valleywise Health Medical Center in Phoenix, which operates the Southwest’s largest burn center, serving patients from six states, according to its director, Dr. Kevin Foster. About 80% were injured in metro Phoenix. Last year, the center admitted 136 patients for surface burns from June through August, up from 85 during the same period in 2022, Foster said. Fourteen died. One out of five were homeless. “Last year’s record heat wave brought an alarming number of patients with life-threatening burns,” Foster said of a 31-day period with temperatures at or above 43 C (110 F) during Phoenix’s hottest summer. In Las Vegas, which regularly sees summertime highs in the triple digits, 22 people were hospitalized in June alone at the University Medical Center’s Lions Burn Care Center, said spokesperson Scott Kerbs. That's nearly half as many as the 46 hospitalized during all three summer months last year. As in Phoenix, the desert sun punishes Las Vegas for hours every day, frying outdoor surfaces such as asphalt, concrete and metal doors on cars and playground equipment such as swings and monkey bars. Contact with pavement Surface burn victims often include children injured walking barefoot on concrete or touching hot surfaces, adults who collapsed on a sidewalk while intoxicated, and older people who fell on the pavement due to heat stroke or another medical emergency. Some don’t survive. Thermal injuries were among the main or contributing causes of last year’s 645 heat-related deaths in Maricopa County, which encompasses Phoenix. One victim was an 82-year-old woman with dementia and heart disease admitted to a suburban Phoenix hospital after being found on the scorching pavement on an August day that hit 41.1 C (106 F). With a body temperature of 40.5 C (105 F), the woman was rushed to the hospital with second-degree burns on her back and right side, covering 8% of her body. She died three days later. Many surface burn patients also suffered potentially fatal heat stroke. Valleywise hospital’s emergency department recently adopted a new protocol for all heat stroke victims: submerging patients in a bag of slushy ice to quickly bring down body temperature. Recovery for those with skin burns was often lengthy, with patients undergoing multiple skin grafts and other surgeries, followed by months of recovery in skilled nursing or rehabilitation facilities. Bob Woolley, 71, suffered second- and third-degree burns to his hands, arms, leg and torso after he stumbled onto the broiling backyard rock garden at his Phoenix home while wearing only swim trunks and a tank top. “The ordeal was extremely painful; it was almost unbearable,” said Woolley, who was hospitalized at the Valleywise burn center for several months. He said he considers himself “95% recovered” after extensive skin grafts and physical therapy and has resumed some former activities such as swimming and motorcycle riding.   Children among the burned Some burn victims in Phoenix and Las Vegas were children. “In many cases, this involves toddlers walking or crawling onto hot surfaces,” Kerbs said of those hospitalized at the Las Vegas center. Foster said about 20% of the hospitalized and outpatient skin-burn victims seen at the Phoenix center are children. Small children aren’t fully aware of the harm a sizzling metal door handle or a scorching sidewalk can cause. “Because they’re playing, they don’t pay attention,” said urban climatologist Ariane Middel, an assistant professor at Arizona State University who directs the SHaDE Lab, a research team that studies the effects of urban heat. “They may not even notice that it’s hot.” In measuring surface temperatures of playground equipment, the team found that in 37.7-degree C (100 F) weather without shade, a slide can heat up to 71.1 C (160 F), but a covering can bring that down to 43.8 C (111 F). A rubber ground cover can hit as high as 86.6 C (188 F), a handrail can heat up to 48.8 C (120 F) and concrete can reach 55.5 C (132 F). Many metro Phoenix parks have covered picnic tables and plastic fabric stretched over play equipment, keeping metal or plastic surfaces up to 30 degrees Fahrenheit cooler. But plenty do not, Middel said. She said cooler wood chips are better underfoot than rubber mats, which were designed to protect kids from head injuries but soak up heat in the broiling sun. Like rubber, artificial turf gets hotter than asphalt. “We need to think about alternative surface types, because most surfaces we use for our infrastructure are heat sponges," Middel said. Pets in danger, too Hot concrete and asphalt also pose burn risks for pets. Veterinarians recommend dogs wear booties to protect their paws during outdoor walks in summer or keeping them on cooler grassy areas. Owners are also advised to make sure their pets drink plenty of water and don’t get overheated. Phoenix bans dogs from the city’s popular hiking trails on days the National Weather Service issues an excessive heat warning. Recovering at Phoenix's Circle the City, a respite care facility he was sent to after being released from Valleywise's burn unit, Falk said he never imagined the Phoenix heat could cause him to collapse on the broiling asphalt in his shorts and T-shirt. Because he wasn't carrying identification or a phone, no one knew where he was for months. He has a long road ahead but still hopes to regain part of his old life, working for a concessionaire for entertainment events. “I kind of went into a downward spiral,” Falk said. “I finally woke up and said, ’Hey, wait, I lost a leg.' But that doesn’t mean you’re useless.”

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paris — Photos of blood-red hands on a Holocaust memorial. Caskets at the Eiffel Tower. A fake French military recruitment drive calling for soldiers in Ukraine, and major French news sites improbably registered in an obscure Pacific territory, population 15,000. All are part of disinformation campaigns orchestrated out of Russia and targeting France, according to French officials and cybersecurity experts in Europe and the United States. France's legislative elections and the Paris Olympics sent them into overdrive. More than a dozen reports issued in the past year point to an intensifying effort from Russia to undermine France, particularly the upcoming Games, and President Emmanuel Macron, who is one of Ukraine's most vocal supporters in Europe. The Russian campaigns sowing anti-French disinformation began online in early summer 2023, but first became tangible in October, when more than 1,000 bots linked to Russia relayed photos of graffitied Stars of David in Paris and its suburbs. A French intelligence report said the Russian intelligence agency FSB ordered the tagging, as well as subsequent vandalism of a memorial to those who helped rescue Jews from the Holocaust. Photos from each event were amplified on social media by fake accounts linked to the Russian disinformation site RRN, according to cybersecurity experts. Russia denies any such campaigns. The French intelligence report says RRN is part of a larger operation orchestrated by Sergei Kiriyenko, a ranking Kremlin official. "You have to see this as an ecosystem," said a French military official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to reveal information about the Russian effort. "It's a hybrid strategy." The tags and the vandalism had no direct link to Russia's war in Ukraine, but they provoked a strong reaction from the French political class, with denunciations in the legislature and public debate. Antisemitic attacks are on the rise in France, and the war in Gaza has proven divisive. The Stars of David could be interpreted either as support for Israel or as opposition. The effect was to sow division and unease. French Jews in particular have found themselves unwittingly thrust into the political fray despite, at just 500,000 people, making up a small proportion of the French population. In March, just after Macron discussed the possibility of mobilizing the French military in Ukraine, a fake recruitment drive went up for the French army in Ukraine, spawning a series of posts in Russian- and French-language Telegram channels that got picked up in Russian and Belarusian media, according to a separate French government report seen by The Associated Press. On June 1, caskets appeared outside the Eiffel Tower, bearing the inscription "French soldiers in Ukraine." The larger disinformation efforts show little traction in France, but the Russian audience may have been the real target, officials said, by showing that Russia's war in Ukraine is, as Putin has said, really a war with the West. Among the broader goals, the French military official said, was a long-term and steady effort to sow social discord, erode faith in the media and democratic governments, undermine NATO, and sap Western support for Ukraine. Denigrating the Olympics, from which most Russian athletes are banned, is a bonus, according to French officials monitoring the increasingly strident posts warning of imminent unrest ahead of the Games. On June 9, the French far-right National Rally trounced Macron's party in elections for the European Parliament. The party has historically been close to Russia: One of its leading figures, Marine Le Pen, cultivated ties to Putin for many years and supported Russia's illegal annexation of Crimea from Ukraine in 2014. And its leading contender for prime minister, Jordan Bardella, has said he opposes sending long-range weapons to Kyiv. In more than 4,400 posts gathered since mid-November by antibot4navalny, a collective that analyzes Russian bot behavior, those targeting audiences in France and Germany predominated. The number of weekly posts ranged from 100 to 200 except for the week of May 5, when it dropped near zero, the data showed. That week, as it happens, was a holiday in Russia. Many of the posts redirect either to RRN or to sites that appear identical to major French media, but with the domain — and content — changed. At least two of the more recent mirrored sites are registered in Wallis and Futuna, a French Pacific territory 10 time zones from Paris. A click on the top of the fake page redirects back to the real news sites themselves to give the impression of authenticity. Other posts redirect to original sites controlled by the campaign itself, dubbed Doppelganger. The redirects shifted focus for the European elections and continued after Macron called the surprise legislative elections with just three weeks to spare. Three-quarters of posts from the week ahead of the June 30 first-round legislative vote that were directed toward a French audience focused on either criticizing Macron or boosting the National Rally, antibot4navalny found in data shared with The Associated Press. One post on a fake site purported to be from Le Point, a current affairs magazine, and the French news agency AFP, criticizing Macron. "Our leaders have no idea how ordinary French people live but are ready to destroy France in the name of aid for Ukraine," read the headline on June 25. Another site falsely claimed to be from Macron's party, offering to pay 100 euros for a vote for him — and linking back to the party's true website. And still another inadvertently left a generative artificial intelligence prompt calling for the rewrite of an article "taking a conservative stance against the liberal policies of the Macron administration," according to findings last week from Insikt Group, the threat research division of the cybersecurity consultancy Recorded Future. "They're scraping automatically, sending the text to the AI and asking the AI to introduce bias or slants into the article and rewrite it," said Clément Briens, an analyst for Recorded Future. Briens said metrics tools embedded within the site are likely intended to prove that the campaigns were money well-spent for "whoever is doing the payouts for these operations." The French government cybersecurity watchdog, Viginum, has published multiple reports since June 2023 singling out Russian efforts to sow divisions in France and elsewhere. That was around the time that pro-Kremlin Telegram feeds started promoting Olympics has Fallen — a full-length fake Netflix film featuring an AI-generated voice resembling Tom Cruise that criticized the International Olympic Committee, according to the Microsoft Threat Analysis Center. Microsoft said this campaign, which it dubbed Storm-1679, is fanning fears of violence at the Games and last fall disseminated digitally generated photos referring, among other things, to the attacks on Israeli athletes at the 1972 Olympics. The latest effort, which started just after the first round of the elections on June 30, merges fears of violence related to both the Olympics and the risk of protests after the decisive second round, antibot4navalny found. Viginum released a new report Tuesday detailing the risks ahead for the Games — not for violence but for disinformation. "Digital information manipulation campaigns have become a veritable instrument of destabilization of democracies," Viginum said. "This global event will give untold informational exposure to malevolent foreign actors." The word Russia appears nowhere. Baptiste Robert, a French cybersecurity expert who ran unsuccessfully as an unaffiliated centrist in the legislative elections, called on his government — and especially lawmakers — to prepare for the digital threats to come. "This is a global policy of Russia: They really want to push people into the extremes," he said before the first-round vote. "It's working perfectly right now."

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berlin — Turkish supporters making their way to the European Championship quarterfinal against the Netherlands made the same nationalistic hand gesture that got a Turkey player banned from the match. More did the gesture again in the stadium during Turkey's national anthem before Saturday's game. Berlin police said on X on that the gesture was "massively shown" by the fans on their way to the Olympiastadion and they had therefore stopped their march and asked them to stop making it. Fans were asked to make their own way as individuals to the game – as long as they had a ticket for it. "When a lot of people are doing this gesture, it becomes a political demonstration and a football march is not political demonstration," police spokesperson Valeska Jakubowski told The Associated Press. The fans were making a gesture that is used by Turkish nationalists and associated with the Turkish ultra-nationalist organization Ulku Ocaklari, which is more widely known as the Gray Wolves. Jakubowski acknowledged that showing the gesture is not banned in Germany. She said some arrests were made, "very few," but they were likely for other reasons. Turkey defender Merih Demiral was banned for two games by UEFA on Friday for making the gesture after scoring in Turkey's round-of-16 win over Austria in Leipzig on Tuesday, an incident that led to a diplomatic row between Turkey and Euro 2024 host nation Germany. The ban rules Demiral out of Saturday's quarterfinal, and the semifinal should Turkey progress. The Turkish Football Federation joined Turkish government officials in denouncing the suspension. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan changed plans to visit Azerbaijan to attend Saturday's match. He had defended Demiral, saying on Friday the defender merely expressed his "excitement" after scoring. Demiral and Turkish authorities have defended the sign as an expression of Turkish pride. Critics say it glorifies a right-wing group known for racism and violence against minorities. The Gray Wolves group was founded as the youth wing of Turkey's far-right Nationalist Movement Party, or MHP, which is currently in an alliance with Erdogan's ruling party, the Justice and Development Party. In the decades following its founding in the 1960s, the group was accused of involvement in politically motivated violence, mostly against leftist groups. German authorities believe the group has around 12,100 in the country. It is monitored by Germany's federal domestic agency. The group has been banned in France, while Austria has banned the use of the Gray Wolf salute. 

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SAN SALVADOR, El Salvador — Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele, famous for his heavy-handed crackdown on street gangs, threatened to use similar tactics against price gougers. Since 2022, Bukele has rounded up tens of thousands of suspected street gang members — often on little evidence — and filmed them being frog-marched in their underwear though vast new prisons. In a speech late Friday, he threatened to use the same tactics on wholesalers and distributors who he blamed for a recent steep rise in the prices for food items and other basic goods. "I am going to issue a call, like we did to the gangs at the start of 2019," Bukele said, referring to the year he was first elected. "We told them either stop killing people, or don't complain about what happens afterward." "Well, I'm going to issue a message to the importers, distributors and food wholesalers: stop abusing the people of El Salvador, or don't complain about what happens afterward." He said, "We are not playing around" and his threats were not a smokescreen. "I expect the prices to come down by tomorrow or there are going to be problems," he said. Recently reelected with 85% of the vote, Bukele controls Congress and has been granted special emergency powers to fight gangs for more than two years. While his emergency powers probably wouldn't allow Bukele to lock people up for charging too much, he claimed there was evidence that wholesalers or importers had allegedly engaged in tax evasion, bribery and contraband importation, criminal charges that could warrant jail time. The Salvadoran government has said inspectors have found some products had tripled in price, and while fines are a possibility, that probably isn't enough. The government has also announced plans to set up 20 sales points to distribute food "at fair prices." It's all very much in character for Bukele, who once described himself as the "world's coolest dictator." Bukele is also riding a wave of popularity for his frontal attack on powerful gangs that once basically ruled many neighborhoods, extorting protection money from businesses and residents. The crackdown has converted what was once the world's murder capital into one of Latin America's safest countries. The state of emergency originally declared in 2022 and still in effect has been used to round up 78,175 suspected gang members in sweeps that rights groups say are often arbitrary, based on a person's appearance or where they live. The government has had to release about 7,000 people because of a lack of evidence.

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