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    Trump says drug cartels operating in the Caribbean are ‘unlawful combatants’

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    Donald Trump has said that drug cartels operating in the Caribbean are “unlawful combatants” and says the United States is now in a “non-international armed conflict”, according to a White House memo obtained by the Associated Press on Thursday.A US official familiar with the matter who was not authorized to comment publicly told the AP that Congress was notified about the designation by Pentagon officials on Wednesday.The story was first reported by the New York Times.It comes after the US military conducted strikes on three boats in the Caribbean Sea last month that killed 17 people and triggered widespread international outrage, especially in Central and South America.The administration is required by law to report to Congress the US government’s use of armed forces. The Times reports that the administration’s memo cites that statute and also repeats its past justifications that the strikes were conducted in self-defense and accusing the boats of containing members of a Venezuelan drug gang. But the memo also reportedly goes further and frames the US military’s attacks on the boats to be part of a sustained conflict.The memo also reportedly states that Trump has deemed cartels engaged in smuggling drugs as “non-state armed groups” whose actions “constitute an armed attack against the United States”.The Trump administration has been increasing its military presence in the Caribbean in recent months, deploying a number of ships and military personnel to Puerto Rico. It has justified the military action as a necessary escalation to stem the flow of drugs into the US. But some lawmakers as well as human rights groups have questioned the legality of the attacks.The notice to Congress is an aggressive escalation in the US government’s attempts to stop the flow of narcotics. The US government’s drug war in recent years has increasingly focused on political targets, and this latest escalation may be seen as an attempt by the administration to further place pressure on the Venezuelan government.Earlier this year, the Trump administration determined several criminal groups to be “terrorist” organizations. The designation by the administration included a number of Mexican cartels, the MS-13 gang, the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua and the Venezuelan so-called Cartel de los Soles.For years, the US government has accused the Venezuelan government of Nicolás Maduro of being involved in drug trafficking. The Trump administration earlier this year accused Maduro of directing the activities of Tren de Aragua, and used it as a justification to expel hundreds of immigrants to a notorious Salvadorian prison under the Alien Enemies Act.Intelligence assessments have determined there is little proof of Maduro’s links to Tren de Aragua.Maduro and members of his cabinet and military also stand accused by the US of running the Cartel de los Soles and seeking to traffic cocaine to the US. The infrastructure of the cartel has been disputed, with drug trafficking analysts and experts saying that the Cartel de los Soles is a loose network of lower-ranking military officials without a strict hierarchical structure.Earlier this year, the US government raised its bounty for Maduro to $50m. There is an active indictment in a Manhattan federal court related to the Cartel de los Soles case. A co-defendant and former top Venezuelan military intelligence chief pleaded guilty earlier this year to narco-terrorism crimes.The three vessels that were targeted by the US in recent weeks were traversing through the Caribbean. Trump administration officials, without proof, have said the vessels were carrying members of Tren de Aragua with drugs destined for the US.The administration has been adamant in escalating its fight against fentanyl trafficking into the US. However, fentanyl typically arrives across the southern US border from Mexico. More

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      As US warships prowl the Caribbean, our region must hold fast against Trump’s gaslighting

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      For decades, the Caribbean has been caught in the slipstream of other people’s wars – from cold war proxy battles to Washington’s “war on drugs” and “war on terror”. Our islands have too often been turned into the frontlines for policies scripted elsewhere but fought in our waters, our communities, and on the backs of our most vulnerable.The recent US naval strikes against alleged “drug boats” leaving Venezuela, and the decision of Trinidad and Tobago’s prime minister, Kamla Persad-Bissessar, to grant access to territorial waters without first consulting the Caribbean collective of developing countries, Caricom, risk dragging our islands into yet another manufactured storm.As US warships fire missiles at vessels they claim carry “narco-terrorists”, the Caribbean faces the prospect of being sacrificed in someone else’s theatre of war. The consequences could be catastrophic for livelihoods and fragile regional stability. Unless diplomacy and regional solidarity prevail, we could be destabilised in ways we are ill-equipped to endure.The US narrative rests on a familiar trope: that the Caribbean is nothing more than a trans-shipment hub for narcotics flowing north. Geography makes the accusation plausible. For decades, cocaine from Colombia has moved through Venezuela, Guyana, Suriname and across the archipelago to Miami, New York, Madrid and London.But the narrative is dishonest. The true driver is demand. The US insatiable appetite for cocaine and opiates created the billion-dollar trade routes that snake through Trinidad, Jamaica, the Bahamas and Guyana. Rather than own its addiction, the US projects blame outward, painting the Caribbean as “narco-territory” while denying the role of its own citizens as consumers, financiers, and enablers.View image in fullscreenFishing communities have long paid the highest price. In Trinidad and Tobago, countless fishers have been harassed, detained or shot at by Venezuelan coastguards. Some have been killed. These people, eking out a precarious living in overfished waters, now fear being mistaken for traffickers by US drones and warships.When the US broadcasts videos of small boats exploding into fireballs, they endanger every fisher who dares cast a net in the Gulf of Paria, between Trinidad and Venezuela.Washington’s sudden military zeal is telling. After decades of indifference to Caribbean pleas for fair trade, reparations and climate justice, we are asked to believe US destroyers lurk offshore to protect us. But the reality is this is about squeezing the Venezuelan president, Nicolás Maduro, destabilising the country and preparing the ground for regime change.It would be naive to ignore the oil factor. Between Trinidad’s long-established energy base, Venezuela’s colossal reserves and Guyana’s massive discoveries, the southern Caribbean has become one of the most coveted hydrocarbon regions anywhere.Donald Trump’s fixation on “narco boats” cannot be separated from the desire to influence who controls this wealth. From Iraq to Libya, Washington has repeatedly intervened in oil states, toppling governments and installing pliable leaders. The Caribbean must recognise the danger of being drafted into the next act of this playbook.History shows the consequences; Grenada in 1983, Panama in 1989, Haiti through multiple interventions. Each was justified as defending democracy; each left behind wreckage. To believe these new strikes are purely about drugs is to ignore the US’s long habit of cloaking imperial ambition in moral language.In a statement, Persad-Bissessar endorsed US naval forces’ presence as a necessary step to tackle organised crime.View image in fullscreen“For two decades, our country has been overwhelmed by bloodshed and rising violence,” she said. Acknowledging remarks by the US vice-president, JD Vance, she added: “He was right to point to our alarming crime and murder rates. My government will not be deterred by partisan outbursts or anti-American rhetoric when it comes to accepting help in confronting the terrorist drug cartels.”In one stroke, she undermined the regional solidarity that has been the Caribbean’s only shield in international politics. Caricom exists precisely so that no island has to face down a superpower alone. Persad-Bissessar has inadvertently conceded a harsher truth: that her administration, like those before it, is clueless in curbing the crime and corruption that continues to bleed the nation.Her unilateral approval of US access was dangerous statecraft. It weakens our collective negotiating hand and leaves Trinidad exposed as the naive accomplice of a superpower with a history of gaslighting its allies. The US knows it can pick off states one by one, securing “basing rights” or “access agreements” without facing a unified Caricom.Venezuela’s response has been furious. Maduro branded the US strikes “extravagant, unjustifiable, immoral and absolutely criminal” and warned of “the biggest threat our continent has seen in 100 years”.His vice-president, Delcy Rodríguez, told Trinidad and Guyana: “Don’t dare, don’t even think about it. You are lending yourselves to the perverse plans of aggression against the Venezuelan people.” She ridiculed US claims of narco-trafficking: “How can there be a drug cartel if there’s no drugs here?”View image in fullscreenDiosdado Cabello, Venezuela’s interior minister, flatly rejected US allegations, saying: “They openly confessed to killing 11 people … none were drug traffickers.”Caracas has since mobilised its navy and air force, raising the risk of accidental clashes at sea. With Trinidad tethered to Washington, the danger of being pulled into the line of fire is very real.All of this plays out against the backdrop of our demographic reality: with more than 22,000 Venezuelan refugees officially registered in Trinidad, and estimates suggesting the true figure may be 45,000 — the country hosts the highest per capita population of Venezuelan migrants anywhere in the Caribbean. The human consequences of any escalation will therefore be borne not only at sea but also within our own communities.At the UN general assembly last week, regional leaders voiced their unease. Barbados’s Mia Mottley warned that militarisation of the Caribbean “could occasion an accident that put the southern Caribbean at disproportionate risk” and insisted that “full respect for the territorial integrity of each, and every state in the Caribbean must be respected.”St Vincent and the Grenadines’ prime minister, Ralph Gonsalves, described US-Venezuela tensions as “most unhelpful”, reminding the world that the Caribbean had long declared itself to be a “zone of peace”.Their interventions reflected a deep regional anxiety about becoming collateral damage in a quarrel between larger powers. Yet in sharp contrast, Persad-Bissessar used her own UN platform to defend her embrace of Washington’s presence, dismissing the “zone of peace” as an “elusive promise”, while justifying security cooperation with the US as necessary to combat crime.The most chilling element of Washington’s narrative is the absence of any proof, though 11 people were killed in the first strike and three in the second. More, allegedly, were killed in subsequent strikes. Yet not a shred of credible evidence has been produced to show that these individuals were traffickers, much less members of the gang Tren de Aragua, as was claimed. Venezuelan officials insist their investigations found no gang affiliations.Are Caribbean citizens simply expected to accept Washington’s word? After Iraq’s phantom weapons of mass destruction and after decades of interventions elsewhere justified by doctored intelligence, we know better. If these were truly narco-traffickers’ boats, why were suspects not detained and questioned? Why was the norm of investigation abandoned in favour of summary execution at sea?The answer lies not in law but in politics. Trump thrives on chaos. His strategy is division, gaslighting and distraction. These strikes play directly to his Maga base – fiery video clips of boats blowing up, paraded as proof of “decisive action”. It is spectacle, not strategy.To believe these operations are genuine counternarcotics measures rather than campaign optics is to ignore everything Trump has shown us about his politics of manipulation. And it is the Caribbean that risks paying the price for his theatre.View image in fullscreenIf this trajectory continues, the consequences will be dire. Fishers may abandon their livelihoods if they fear being mistaken for traffickers, collapsing entire coastal communities. Tourism will falter in a militarised Caribbean where warships and drones haunt the waters. Trade through the Gulf of Paria and regional ports could be disrupted, raising costs for fragile economies already strained by debt and inflation. Diplomacy will fracture as Caricom’s delicate balance with Washington and Caracas collapses, leaving small states exposed.What is needed now is not more posturing but restraint. Talks between Trinidad and Tobago, Venezuela, Caricom, and Colombia – the historic source of the cocaine pipeline – are essential. The international community must demand transparency and de-escalation. Small island states cannot afford to become battlegrounds.The Caribbean must also insist on restoring international norms: detain suspects, investigate, prosecute. To kill without evidence and bomb small vessels without warning or due process is a descent into lawlessness that endangers every fisher, trader and innocent seafarer.Trinidad and Tobago, and the wider Caribbean, cannot be reduced to staging grounds for US electioneering or Venezuelan brinkmanship. Without restraint – from Caricom, the UN and sober voices in the hemisphere – the region risks being dragged into a conflict that is not of its making.Our fishing industry, our tourism, our fragile economies all stand to suffer. And beyond this lies sovereignty over our most valuable assets: oil and gas. The southern Caribbean is a resource frontier of immense global importance. History shows that US interventions in oil-rich states rarely end in stability or prosperity for the people who live there.Caribbean leaders must rediscover the discipline of solidarity, the wisdom of diplomacy, and the courage to say no to superpowers who mistake small states for pawns.The price for silence will not be paid in Washington or Caracas, but in the lives, economies and futures of Caribbean people. More

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      Travelling to Trump’s US is a low-level trauma – here’s what Africans can do about it

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      Hello and welcome to The Long Wave. This week, I reflect on the increasing difficulty of travel and immigration for many from the African continent, and how one country is plotting a smoother path.Parallel experiences of travelView image in fullscreenI have just come back from holiday, and I’m still not used to how different travel is when not using an African passport. My British citizenship, which I acquired about five years ago, has transformed not only my ability to travel at short notice but it has eliminated overnight the intense stress and bureaucratic hurdles involved in applying for visas on my Sudanese passport.It is difficult to explain just how different the lives of those with “powerful” passports are to those without. It is an entirely parallel existence. Gaining permission to travel to many destinations is often a lengthy, expensive and sickeningly uncertain process. A tourist visa to the UK can cost up to £1,000, in addition to the fee for private processing centres that handle much of Europe’s visa applications abroad. And then there is the paperwork: bank statements, employment letters, academic records, certified proof of ownership of assets, and birth and marriage certificates if one is travelling to visit family. This is a non-exhaustive list. For a recent visa application for a family member, I submitted 32 documents.It may sound dramatic but such processes instil a sort of low-level trauma, after submitting to the violation of what feels like a bureaucratic cavity search. And all fees, whatever the decision, are non-refundable. Processing times are in the hands of the visa gods – it once took more than six months for me to receive a US visa. By the time it arrived, the meeting I needed to attend for work had passed by a comically long time.Separation and severed relationshipsView image in fullscreenIt’s not only travel for work or holiday that is hindered by such high barriers to entry. Relationships suffer. It is simply a feature of the world now that many families in the Black diaspora sprawl across continents. Last month Trump restricted entry to the US to nationals from 20 countries, half of which are in Africa. The decision is even crueler when you consider that it applies to countries such as Sudan, whose civil war has prompted many to seek refuge with family abroad.That is not just a political act of limiting immigration, it is a deeply personal one that severs connections between families, friends and partners. Family members of refugees from those countries have also been banned, so they can’t visit relatives who have already managed to emigrate. The International Rescue Committee warned the decision could have “far-reaching impacts on the lives of many American families, including refugees, asylees and green card holders, seeking to be reunified with their loved ones”.A global raising of barriersView image in fullscreenThe fallout of this Trump order is colossal. There are students who are unable to graduate. Spouses unable to join their partners. Children separated from their parents. It’s a severe policy, but shades of it exist elsewhere by other means. The UK recently terminated the rights of foreign care workers and most international students to bring their children and partners to the country. And even for those who simply want to have their family visit them, access is closed to all except those who can clear the high financial hurdles and meet the significant burdens of proof to show that either they can afford to maintain their visitors or that they will return to their home countries.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionIt was 10 years before I – someone with fairly stable employment and a higher-education qualification – satisfied the Home Office’s requirements and could finally invite my mother to visit. I broke down when I saw her face at arrivals, realising how hard it had been for both of us; the fact that she had not seen the life I had built as an adult. Compare this draconian measure to some countries in the Gulf, such as Saudi Arabia, that have an actual visa category, low-cost and swiftly processed, for parental visits and residency.A new African modelView image in fullscreenBut as some countries shut down, others are opening up. This month, Kenya removed visa requirements for almost all African citizens wanting to visit. Here, finally, there is the sort of regional solidarity that mirrors that of the EU and other western countries.Since it boosts African tourism and makes Kenya an inviting destination for people to gather at short notice for professional or festive reasons, it’s a smart move. But it also sends an important signal to a continent embattled by visa restrictions and divided across borders set by colonial rule.We are not just liabilities, people to be judged on how many resources they might take from a country once allowed in. We are also tourists, friends, relatives, entrepreneurs and, above all, Africans who have the right to meet and mingle without the terror, and yes, contempt, of a suspicious visa process. If the African diaspora is being separated abroad, there is at least now a path to the option that some of us may reunite at home.

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      Michelle Obama 2.0 – the reinvention of the former first lady

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      Hello and welcome to The Long Wave. This week, I review Michelle Obama’s new podcast, IMO, which is surprising in the ways it breaks with the Michelle of the past.I came to sneer – and stayed to cheerView image in fullscreenFirst, a disclaimer: I had never fully bought into the Michelle Obama hype. I felt her now legendary line “When they go low, we go high” encapsulated a troubling and complacent form of respectability politics, in which Black people have to maintain coolness and grace under fire to be taken seriously. As the first lady, Michelle often seemed like a sanitising presence, wheeled out so that her national treasure status could serve as a smokescreen to obscure more honest and damning assessments of Barack Obama’s political record.Also, I am not a huge fan of the celebrity podcast genre, which is a vehicle for high-profile figures to chat to their friends in return for huge pay packets. So I was sceptical when Michelle’s podcast was launched in March. Yet when I listened to it, I was immediately charmed and hooked. In truth, I came to sneer and stayed to cheer. She is honest, reflective and vulnerable in ways that are profoundly resonant of a universal Black female experience, something that her icon status had rarely spoken to previously. The irony is that just as Michelle is finding her voice, her popularity appears to be falling – the podcast received poor ratings on launch, though it’s arguably the best thing she’s ever done.A great orator has the conversation of her lifeView image in fullscreenThe most arresting thing about IMO, despite the genuinely interesting high-profile Black guests such as Keke Palmer and the Wayans brothers, is Obama herself. She has always been one of the great orators in US politics – one of the superpowers that made her and Barack, another impressive public speaker, such a compelling couple on the world stage. In her podcast, Michelle uses this talent to reflect on her life and the challenges of ageing, losing her parents and the constant demands placed upon her.The fact that she co-hosts the show with her brother, Craig Robinson – a genial and down-to-earth foil for her confessions – gives the podcast such an intimate air that you feel like you’re in the presence of everyday people, not celebrities. I found myself listening not to hear any snippets of political gossip or insight into the Obamas’ lifestyle, but to receive some exceptionally articulated wisdom from an older Black woman who has seen a lot and gone through milestones we will all experience.She is also funny. Her account of how differently men and women socialise is familiar and hilarious. Michelle describes catching up with her female friends as a “multiday event”, something that leaves Barack perplexed as to why it takes two days for a basic meetup.There is pathos and uncertainty, too. In a recent episode, Michelle talks about the death of her mother, who lived in the White House during the Obamas’ tenure. Michelle says that, at 61, only now does she feel that she has finally become an adult, having had to reckon with her own mortality after the loss of her parents. The former first lady has revealed that she is in therapy, and that she is still trying to navigate this phase of her life.And, in a striking segment, she speaks with barely restrained annoyance about her reasons for not attending Trump’s inauguration, an absence that triggered divorce rumours that have been swirling for months. She says “it took everything in [her] power” to choose what was right for her in that moment. Yet that decision was met with “ridicule” because people couldn’t believe she was saying no to the inauguration for any other reason than she just did not want to be there – they had to “assume my marriage was falling apart”. Oof. It caught my breath.Beyond Black Girl Magicskip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionView image in fullscreenThis Michelle is worlds away from the Michelle of the 2010s. The publishing juggernaut and icon of Black social mobility, who rose to first lady from a bungalow in the south side of Chicago, was the product of a particular moment in feminist and racial discourse.The start of that decade brought the rise of Black Girl Magic, a cultural movement that focused on the exceptional achievements and power of Black women. It intersected with Black Joy, which moved away from defining the Black experience primarily through racism and struggle. Both unfolded against the backdrop of “lean in” feminism, which glorified hard graft, corporate success and having it all. The result was the marketing of women such as Michelle to promote popular narratives of inspiration and empowerment.That energy has since dissipated, losing steam culturally and overtaken by more urgent battles. The gains of the Black Lives Matter movement triggered a rightwing backlash against diversity and inclusion that is spearheaded by Trump. Now the Obamas seem like relics of a naively optimistic and complacent time.‘We got out of the White House alive – but what happened to me?’View image in fullscreenBut all that change and disappointment seems to have freed Michelle from the expectation that she should project graceful power and guru-like wisdom at all times. The podcast may not be the runaway hit it might have been 10 years ago, but that speaks to its authenticity and refreshing lack of a cynical big marketing campaign. Michelle is not trying to catch a moment – she even looks different. Gone is the silk-pressed hair, the minimalist jewellery and the pencil dresses. She now embraces boho braids, long colourful nails and bold gold jewellery. In an episode of IMO, she asks herself: “What happened that eight years that we were in the White House? We got out alive; I hope we made the country proud. But what happened to me?” There is so much urgency in her voice. And though her high-octane political experience may not be relatable to the average person, that question is one that I and many women of a certain age are asking as we emerge, blinking into the light, from the tunnel of navigating racism, establishing careers against the odds and having families. What happened to me?To receive the complete version of The Long Wave in your inbox every Wednesday, please subscribe here. More

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      in US Politics

      Emboldened by Trump, the ‘liberal’ UK is giving free rein to its colonial impulses | Kenneth Mohammed

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      As Donald Trump rains chaos down upon the US – dismantling the rule of law trading in rage-fuelled nationalism and bullying the rest of the world – his ideology is now being eagerly imitated not just by the expected rogues of global politics, but by supposed bastions of democracy.These democracies now wear only a mask of civility over that old colonial impulses: control, divide, exploit.Most disturbing is the UK’s quiet complicity, sneaking its own brand of institutional cruelty. Like seasoned illusionists, they use chaos abroad to obscure injustice at home, to legitimise morally indefensible immigration policies.It is as though the UK and the US exchanged a sly nod across the Atlantic, and said: “Let’s see just how far we can go.”The US is now overseeing the deportation of thousands. Not illegal migrants. Legal. Some have lived in the country for decades, built families, contributed to society, paid taxes. As detention centre doors slams, dreams are extinguished in real time.Caribbean nation’s citizenship-by-investment (CBI) programmes, including Antigua & Barbuda, Dominica, Saint Kitts & Nevis, and Saint Lucia, are now under investigation by the US due to perceived security concerns, potentially facing travel restrictions. So, too, Africans are facing bans and visa cancellations.Not to be outdone, the UK has begun tightening visa restrictions on African and Caribbean nations under the thinnest of pretexts. To us, the message is clear: if you are the wrong colour and hail from a former colony, you’re not welcome. Of course, you’re more than welcome if you are Ukrainian or bringing money or minerals.View image in fullscreenA report on the roots of the Windrush scandal posted on the UK government’s website summarises, “major immigration legislation in 1962, 1968 and 1971 was designed to reduce the proportion of people living in the United Kingdom who did not have white skin.” Sixty years later, the UK still engages this socio-political ideology.Take the absurd treatment of Trinidad and Tobago. British authorities last month slapped exorbitant visa fees on Trinidadians, similar to Jamaica and Dominica. The justification? A spike in asylum claims – from an average of 49 a year between 2015 and 2019 to 439 in 2023.In the year ending June 2024, the UK’s net immigration was 728,000, a 20% decrease from 2023’s peak of 906,000. Yet 439 Trinidadians cause a “crisis”? This is political theatre staged for a frothing few with empire nostalgia and immigrant paranoia.But the Trinbagonian government cannot be let off the hook. For over a decade, gang violence triggered by smuggled guns from the US, the drug trade from South America and the influx of gang members from Venezuela has worsened under an impuissant minister of security and a government in paralysis.This new UK immigration policy for Trinidad and Tobago isn’t policy, its punishment. It’s the empire rearing its head again – this time in the guise of “immigration control”. If the UK was truly concerned, it could have picked up the phone and spoken to the high commissioner to the UK or even the Prime Minister to find a proportionate solution – as fellow Commonwealth members. But what does the Commonwealth mean any more? A glorified nostalgia club presided over by a monarch few in the Caribbean have ever seen.The Commonwealth is a relic. An expensive, hollow monument to a colonial past Britain refuses to apologise for and the Caribbean refuses to walk away from. Common means subservience, and wealth flows only one way. For example, the judicial committee of the privy council remains the highest court for many Caribbean nations – a colonial backdoor that ensures British influence remains after the union jack has been lowered.View image in fullscreenWhy does the Caribbean still genuflect before a throne that sees it as a holiday destination at best and an aid burden at worst? Why do African nations tolerate the condescension of aid when their stolen minerals fuel the west’s riches? As Bob Marley demanded, we must “emancipate ourselves from mental slavery”?The truth is: the west cannot function without us. It feeds off our resources, our oil and minerals, our intellect. Yet it treats us like pests at the door: unworthy of entry, let alone equality.Why are we still playing this rigged game? Why are we still begging for visas, pleading for asylum, when our presence build these nations in the first place?It’s time we stopped asking for permission, withdrew our labour, our brilliance, ourselves – and left them to stew in their nostalgia, mistaking walls for strength and xenophobia for sovereignty. We’ll build something better.Trump’s sledgehammer approach to diplomacy has torched relationships with Canada, Panama, Greenland, South Africa and the broader African continent. The Caribbean is not spared, least of all that US favourite: Cuba.This time, he unleashed his bulldog secretary of state, Marco Rubio,on Cuba’s quiet but powerful diplomatic engine: its doctors. For decades, Cuban medical professionals have travelled the world, from rural outposts in Africa to hurricane-ravaged villages in Haiti, treating the sick and delivering babies, with the soft diplomacy the US abandoned around the time it thought regime change was a sustainable foreign policy model.Cuban doctors have long symbolised international solidarity, emerging from a nation routinely vilified – because nothing terrifies Washington more than socialism in brown skin. But rather than acknowledge this medical diplomacy for what it is – a humanitarian gift – Rubio has instead accused Caribbean nations of exploiting these doctors, underpaying them and “trafficking” them. The audacity is breathtaking.Rubio threatened to revoke US visas from government officials and their immediate family members in any Caribbean country that accepts Cuban medical workers. Because America now exports moral lectures it no longer even pretends to live by.But this time, the Caribbean didn’t flinch. Leaders across the region responded with collective eye-rolling and a resounding: “Come take your visa.”These are independent nations, not subsidiaries of the US. Caribbean leaders made it clear: Cuban doctors are paid on a par with local medical professionals, they are not coerced, and are free to leave at any time. They are crucial to the region’s healthcare systems.Rubio’s daring to speak on behalf of doctors who have done more good across the global south than the aid-slashing US state department has in decades, is an insult not just to the Caribbean but to common sense.What we are witnessing here is a petulance from a fading empire that has replaced its moral compass with paranoia, and outsourced its diplomacy to the whisperings of an erratic billionaire, delusional oligarchs and baby-faced thinktanks addicted to colonial cosplayAmerica’s diplomacy had died, been cremated and scattered over Mar-a-Lago.So while Washington plays imperial hardball with nations trying to provide healthcare to their citizens, the rest of us are left wondering, again, why we allow ourselves to be bullied by a country that cannot keep its own citizens out of medical bankruptcy.At some point, the Caribbean – and the wider global south – must draw a red line. Not just rhetorically, but structurally. We need new alliances, new trading currencies, new friends, new models of cooperation rooted not in colonial debt but mutual respect.Because it is increasingly clear that the US is not interested in partnerships – it wants puppets. Preferably black or brown-skinned, desperate and pliable. More

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      ‘There was no place for me in American society’: an ex-Black Panther cub speaks out

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      Hello and welcome to The Long Wave. This week, Guardian Documentaries has released a short film about the life and legacy of the Black Panthers with a focus on the group’s children. It was released alongside a Long Read by Ed Pilkington in the US on the wider group. I spoke to one of those cubs in the film, Ericka Abram, about her childhood within the activist community in the 1970s, and how her life was shaped by the experience. But first, the weekly roundup.‘I lived in a protected Panther bubble’View image in fullscreenThe first thing I notice about Ericka is that she is deliberate in her articulation and her responses are meticulously considered. She is also warm and quick-witted, with a flair for a killer line. She will not argue with people online about Donald Trump, she says, because it’s a waste of time to engage with a “bot, a baby or a bigot”.Ericka is the daughter of Elaine Brown, a former chair of the Black Panther party, and Raymond Hewitt, one of its leaders. She spent her early years in Oakland, California, and the Black Panther party she grew up in was not only a political organisation, but also a social one. The cubs lived in dormitories and had their own school. At weekends, they could return to a home where adult members of the party lived together and played an equal role in their care – “comrade moms” is how she describes the women she lived with.Ericka had no idea her childhood was anything out of the ordinary. Even though reporters showed up at their schools, and she had seen her mother and Huey Newton, the co-founder of the Black Panthers, on television, she did not have a sense of how outsiders perceived the party. I ask her if she was aware of the risks involved for her family and the wider network. “It just felt like family,” she says. Despite this, she shares a chilling story about her mother’s bodyguard stopping a seven-year-old Ericka from opening the door of their house and rebuking her, because he was the first person who should walk out, in case someone shoots.The full picture did not start to become clear until she was in high school, years after her mother left the party and took Ericka with her. She recalls someone once telling her: “Your mother is the only woman in US history to lead a paramilitary organisation.” Ericka says it was “strange” to hear her mum being described like that.She recalls a community that was deeply activist but also, perhaps counterintuitively, apolitical. Ericka tells me it often shocks people that she not only had no insights on the internal politics of the Black Panthers, but she had almost no idea what the party actually was. “The Black Panther party and the reasons it existed were unknown to me. [This is] because I wasn’t suffering racism or sexism; I lived in a protected Panther bubble.” The group participated in boycotts with farmworkers, who successfully secured better working conditions and union rights, and Ericka “hated” that party members couldn’t eat grapes and things she thought were delicious. But the boycotts were explained to her in such a way that she grasped that there were overlords who needed to be forced to play fair. She says from an early age she understood capitalism as synonymous with greed.View image in fullscreenLeaving that bubble was a sharp adjustment. When Ericka was eight her mother left the party and moved to Los Angeles, and the experience of attending a non-Black Panther school for the first time was full of conflict. “I had fights frequently – arguments with my teachers – most of it was about injustice. One teacher put me out of class because I said Australia was founded by prisoners and bigots or something like that. I was in seventh grade.” Another time she was ejected from class for sitting quietly during the pledge of allegiance. “I might not have understood the values that were raising me, but as soon as I was removed from them I needed them most,” she says.I ask how she adjusted to living in the mainstream. Her answer is unequivocal: “There was no place for me in American society.” That might have led to her finding refuge in drugs, says Ericka, who started using cocaine when she was 15. “I was trying to medicate a pain I didn’t understand. And living a life I hadn’t any intention of living.” As a child, she had assumed she would one day become a Black Panther. When that life did not come to pass, a profound sense of effacement took hold. “I developed this idea that unless I die for the people, my life was worthless,” she says. Growing up in an organisation with such a clear purpose raised the hurdle so high that one may as well not try to scale it. That’s what comes “from being raised by people who knew what they were willing to die for”, she says.I suggest that she is describing a sort of nihilism and erasure. Well, yes, is her answer. Ericka has always believed that individuals do not matter. “We were raised to believe we were precious – but we were precious for a purpose. I went to school with a kid called Bullet. I mean, there’s no pressure there.” Ericka says at times she felt she did not live up to expectations. As a teenager “I felt I had failed my mother,” she admits casually. I stop her. Why? “Because when we left [the Black Panther party] there was nothing to protect us from America. I thought I could protect her but I didn’t understand what that meant.”skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionWith such a legacy, I wonder if she harbours any resentment towards her mother, or indeed that generation of Black Panther parents, for not preparing their children for life outside the party? “No,” she says, before I finish the question. “I didn’t feel resentment. But I remember I was about to start my sophomore year when Huey Newton was killed. I felt so alone. And I realised that I wasn’t mourning his death but that, even at the age of 19, some part of me thought that as long as he was alive, someone would still come and tell me what to do.” As she holds back tears, there is such plaintiveness and loss in her voice. For a moment, she is again that 19-year-old faced with figuring life out on her own.And it feels as if she has. Ericka’s sense of failure has been replaced by an understanding that what the Black Panthers signed up to was something exceptional. She refuses to call herself a cub, because a cub grows up to be a Panther. And she is not that. “They really did promise their lives to an ideal,” she says.The values she grew up with are serving her well during a tumultuous time in US political history. “I know that I see the world in a unique way,” Ericka says when I ask how the Black Panthers shaped her life. She understands now that the difference between “activists and revolutionaries is what you are willing to risk” – and that without solidarity, nothing can be achieved. The Black Panthers were not just seeking racial equality but interconnection between all who are suffering the depredations of state and capital. There is in Ericka a clear understanding that what it takes to stabilise politics in a country roiled by a second Trump administration is a combination of empathy but also resolve – action guided by love.The Black Panther Cubs: When the Revolution Doesn’t Come is out now. For more on this story read Ed Pilkington’s in-depth essay, here. And for an exclusive behind-the-scenes look at the Guardian’s latest films as they release, sign up here to the Guardian Documentaries newsletter.To receive the complete version of The Long Wave in your inbox every Wednesday, please subscribe here. More

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      The Long Wave: Why Trump’s USAid freeze endangers millions

      by

      Hello and welcome to The Long Wave. I have been following Donald Trump’s suspension of the US Agency for International Development. USAid is the world’s single biggest aid donor, and the decision to halt its work has sent shockwaves around the world. This week, I trace the effects of its potential demise on the Black diaspora. But first, the weekly roundup.Weekly roundupView image in fullscreenFresh calls for DRC ceasefire | A summit of leaders from across Africa, including Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, has called for an immediate and unconditional ceasefire in DRC. The Rwanda-backed M23 rebel group has seized swathes of territory in eastern DRC, leaving thousands dead or displaced.Altadena seeks justice for LA fire victims | A memorial service at the First African Methodist Episcopal church in Pasadena, led by the Rev Al Sharpton, has highlighted the Eaton wildfire’s disproportionate impact on Altadena’s Black residents in a rally for justice and equality.Liverpool waterfront’s role in slavery | Canning Dock in Liverpool, England, where ships trafficking enslaved Africans to the Caribbean were fitted out and repaired, is opening to the public so lesser-told aspects of its history can be explored. This project, alongside other redevelopment programmes, aims to shed light on the waterfront’s role in the transatlantic slave trade.Overtourism fears for Bo-Kaap | Residents of the picturesque, candy-coloured Bo-Kaap district in Cape Town, South Africa, are grappling with the impacts of tourism. Many have expressed frustration about road traffic, crowds blocking streets for photos and rising gentrification.Black hair animation makes waves | Researchers at Yale University and the University of California, Santa Cruz, have developed algorithms to capture the true form of afro-textured hair in animation and computer graphics. The development marks a huge step for the portrayal of Black characters in animated films, cartoons and video games.In depth: What is USAid and why has it been suspended?View image in fullscreenThe significance and reach of USAid’s operations came very close to home when I realised that even in the war-stricken cities of my birthplace, Sudan, USAid was providing support to soup kitchens crucial to the survival of cut-off civilian populations. The freezing of USAid’s work has severely compromised these life-saving efforts, as well as that of US-funded facilities caring for malnourished babies. In the capital, Khartoum, two-thirds of Sudan’s soup kitchens closed in the first week after the aid suspension.On Donald Trump’s first day in office, he announced a 90-day pause in the organisation’s operations because they were part of a “foreign aid industry and bureaucracy … not aligned with American interests”. USAid was established by John F Kennedy in 1961 as an independent agency of the US government. It grew to have a large remit, providing everything from humanitarian assistance to disaster relief. But it also plays a role in education, promoting democratic participation and governance, and supporting the health ministries of the countries it operates in. The range of its programmes and the number of locations in which it is active is staggering.The USAid budget was more than $40bn in the 2023 fiscal year. The suspension, which looks like a permanent dismantling, is embroiled in legal disputes. A federal judge has blocked the decision to put thousands of USAid workers on administrative leave, on the grounds that the Trump administration does not have the authority to abolish an agency established by congressional legislation. As the process unfolds, the work of the agency has been halted overnight, with severe repercussions.Sub-Saharan AfricaView image in fullscreenCountries in sub-Saharan Africa account for more than a third of US foreign assistance spending. In addition to famine relief and medical and humanitarian support in conflict areas such as Sudan, USAid assists health ministries and, most urgently, a large sexual health and HIV prevention programme. Approximately 40,000 healthcare workers in Kenya partly financed by USAid are likely to lose their jobs. The impacts on treatment available to patients, pregnant women and disease treatment are almost too vast to estimate.What is unfolding in South Africa – where patients have showed up for treatment and medication to find that clinics were closed – offers a small insight into what could happen next to people at the sharpest end of medical emergencies. The country is in the grip of one of the world’s largest HIV/Aids epidemics, constituting a quarter of cases worldwide.Latin AmericaView image in fullscreenUSAid’s work focuses on the challenges most prominent in any given location. In Latin America, support for those displaced by guerrilla violence, integration of migrants and the prevention of sexual exploitation have relied heavily on US foreign assistance. Almost 8 million Venezuelans have left the country in the past decade, fleeing economic crises and settling in neighbouring countries. About 3 million of them are in Colombia, the largest recipient of US foreign aid in South America. Last year, USAid funded the feeding and nutrition of a large number of refugees in Colombia, partnering with the UN World Food Programme and extending almost $50m in relief. Abandoning such vulnerable populations not only deprives them of food, but leaves them prone to exploitation and abuse by the sort of criminal gangs that prey on the displaced and hungry.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionThe ramifications of the suspension extend to the preservation of precious and fragile ecosystems. In Brazil, USAid forged the Partnership for the Conservation of Amazon Biodiversity, an agreement that supports Indigenous people and rural communities, and in doing so protects the Amazon and helps combat the climate emergency. The loss of that support affects not just these communities and those employed by such foreign assistance programmes, but the environmental health of the planet.The CaribbeanView image in fullscreenIn the Caribbean, USAid projects are diverse and embedded in civil society, environmental protection and future proofing younger generations. In Jamaica, among the programmes that have halted is the Youth Empower Activity, which is targeted at the most at-risk people. It helps them access education, professional training and improve job prospects, with a view to increasing household income and promoting national development. Thousands of Jamaicans are enrolled in the scheme – but now a total of $54m of US funding is under threat in the country, according to government estimates.The suspension could also interrupt a USAid-funded, Caribbean-wide project to bolster food security by increasing fruit and vegetable farming, scholarships for degrees in agriculture and support for small farmers. The shutdown came days after the launch of a programme to reduce the risks to marine and coastal biodiversity – an attempt to ameliorate an environmental crisis affecting the region’s coral reefs and biodiversity. Beyond the impact on individuals, small business owners, and the environment, there is, as with all such stoppages, the loss of livelihoods of people employed by these schemes.Soft power lostView image in fullscreenDespite the large sums deployed, USAid, and US foreign assistance in general, is perceived to also benefit the United States. Although it cannot be quantified in exact numbers, supporters say such assistance contributes to the US’s soft power abroad. That soft power is twofold: the first is in a sort of preventive measure, whereby aid helps to stabilise poorer countries and pre-empt deepening crises that could compromise the US’s global security agenda. The second is that aid is seen as a bulwark to the influence of countries such as Russia and China, both of which are particularly active in Africa, for example. In maintaining a presence on the ground across the world, and strong alliances with governments and civil society organisations, the US promotes a foreign policy that aims to curtail the ability of its adversaries to create their own alliances and political footholds.Aid model under scrutinyView image in fullscreenThe speed of the suspension, and how it has plunged so many around the world into hunger and uncertainty, raises questions about the wisdom of depending so profoundly on a country that has proven to be so unreliable. Ken Opalo, a specialist in development and the author of An Africanist Perspective on Substack, wrote: “The cuts are a painful reminder that aid dependence isn’t a viable development strategy.” If the USAid suspension remains, that viable development strategy, or the stepping in of alternative funders, will not materialise overnight. In the meantime, millions of people wait to learn if their sudden change in circumstances will become permanent, subject to a huge constitutional battle thousands of miles away.

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