Colombia's ex-president, Álvaro Uribe, sentenced to 12 years of house arrest
The former president was convicted of two charges on Monday in a witness-tampering case that has run for around 13 years.Two jailed ex-paramilitaries gave evidence saying Uribe's former lawyer Diego Cadena had offered them money to testify in Uribe's favour.Cadena, who is also facing charges, has denied the accusations and testified, along with several other ex-paramilitaries, on Uribe's behalf.Earlier this week, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio condemned Uribe's conviction, accusing Colombia's judiciary of being weaponised.The former president's "only crime has been to tirelessly fight and defend his homeland," Rubio wrote on the social media site, X.Paramilitary groups emerged in Colombia in the 1980s with the stated goal of taking on poverty and marginalisation. They fought the Marxist-inspired guerrilla groups that had themselves battled the state two decades prior.Many of the armed groups which developed in the standoff made an income from the cocaine trade. Deadly fighting between them and with the state has produced lasting rivalries for trafficking routes and resources.Uribe was praised by Washington for his hard-line approach to left-wing Farc rebels – but was a divisive politician, who critics say did little to tackle the inequality and poverty in the country.Farc signed a peace deal with Uribe's successor in 2016, though violence from disarmed groups persists in Colombia.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Daily Mail
25 minutes ago
- Daily Mail
CNN expert praises president Trump's use of tariffs
CNN's data expert Harry Enten called Donald Trump the most influential president of the 21st century. Enten - who often breaks down polling issues for the left-leaning network - said that Trump is 'remaking' America in a way George W. Bush, Barack Obama and Joe Biden didn't. He credits that to Trump's hardline policy to fix the southern border and even his controversial tariff policies. 'I can't think of a more influential president during this century, and it starts here with tariffs,' Enten said. 'He said he was going to raise tariffs, and despite the claims otherwise, he is in fact doing that.' He noted that tariffs are now 'nine times as high as it was last year. The highest since the 90s.' Enten then pivoted to how Trump has influenced America via his immigration policies. 'The other big thing that Trump ran on was immigration. How about net migration in the United States? Get this, it's down. It's going to be down at least 60%. We may be dealing with, get this, negative net migration to the United States in 2025,' he said. He added that this would be the first time America had negative net migration in a half a century. 'So Donald Trump has always run on tariffs, and he's running a hawkish line on immigration,' he said. 'And on both of those issues we are seeing record high tariff rates for this century going all the way back, well back into the early part of the 20th century. And when it comes to immigration, net migration We are seeing record low levels way down from where we were during the Biden administration.' Trump's influence and popularity lines up with a recent exclusive Daily Mail/J.L. Partners poll, even as they give him failing grades for his handling of the Jeffrey Epstein files. Forty-nine percent of voters now approve of Trump's job performance as president, up one point from the tracking survey conducted earlier in July. But he remains underwater as 51 percent disapprove of Trump's job performance, down one point from earlier in the month. The margin of error in the survey of 1,007 registered voters is 3.1 percent. The poll numbers suggest Trump is surviving politically during a punishing news cycle consumed by the Epstein files and his administration's failure to disclose them as he promised during his presidential campaign. The president's job approval is up one percentage point from June and remains his highest rating since May. 'The news saga might have seemed terrible for Trump in the last few days, but it isn't having an impact on his approval rating,' James Johnson, JL Partners co-founder told the Daily Mail. 'In fact, we think it's going up, from 48 percent to 49 percent, making this his best approval rating since May. His ratings with the base is holding up too, unchanged on 91 percent with Republicans,' Johnson continued. But Trump's strong job approval ratings does not carry over to his handling of the Epstein files. Forty-two percent of voters disapprove of his handling of the issue while just 27 percent approve. A significant number of voters, 20 percent, did not appear to care about the case as they neither approved nor disapproved Trump's handling of the issue. In the Oval Office on Wednesday, Trump referred to the ongoing saga as a 'witch hunt' indicating he was tired of answering questions from the media about it. Despite the president's best efforts to put the issue behind him, few voters believe in the administration's assessment of the case. Only fifteen percent in the poll said they believed the Justice Department's memo released by Attorney General Pam Bondi concluding that Epstein committed [self-murder] in prison and that the infamous man did not have a 'client list' they could release. Forty-seven percent said they did not believe the administration's account of the Epstein case, and that they believed there was more secrets to uncover. Twenty-three percent said they believed the Trump administration memo, but that there was more to uncover in the case. Ninety percent of the Republican voter base continue to grant the president solid approval ratings, despite their misgivings about the Epstein files. The poll was conducted as Trump furiously contested a Wall Street Journal report that he had signed a letter to Epstein for his 50th birthday which concluded: 'Happy Birthday - and may every day be another wonderful secret,' and featured a hand-drawn image of a unclothed woman as well as his signature. Trump decried the news article as 'fake' and filed a $10 billion lawsuit against the company. 'They are judging Trump on other issues - such as the economy, the southern border, and how he is actually running the country. Their grumbles on the Epstein handling are not enough for them to turn on their man,' Johnson said.
Daily Mail
26 minutes ago
- Daily Mail
Tommy Robinson is released on bail after being arrested over St Pancras 'assault' at Luton Airport when he arrived back in the UK
Tommy Robinson has today been released on bail by police. The 42-year-old was filmed being arrested on the Tarmac at Luton Airport on suspicion of grievous bodily harm last night. Police had been searching for him in connection with an incident at St Pancras Station last week where a man was allegedly assaulted and filmed unconscious of the floor. Robinson, whose real name is is Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, was taken into custody by officers after a plane he boarded in Faro, Portugal, landed in Britain on Monday. He is believed to have flown out to Tenerife hours after the alleged attack. British Transport Police has said he has been released on police bail until September 8 as they continue to investigate what happened. Shortly after walking free, this morning Robinson tweeted the Metropolitan Police demanding they release CCTV of the incident. A video emerged last week of Robinson walking away from the scene of an alleged attack at the railway station. Paramedics rushed to the scene at around 8.40pm on Monday, July 28, and the alleged victim was taken to a major trauma centre with 'serious injuries'. The 64-year-old victim - whose head appeared to be covered in the video - was taken to a major trauma centre with 'serious injuries' after the ordeal. He was discharged from hospital last Wednesday, British Transport Police confirmed.
The Independent
an hour ago
- The Independent
Trump swears he's hearing ‘great reviews' after White House Rose Garden leveled
President Donald Trump has insisted he is hearing 'great reviews' for his makeover of the White House Rose Garden, which has seen its famous manicured lawn paved over to make way for a stone patio. 'We're getting great reviews of the Rose Garden, and we had to do it,' the president told reporters on Sunday as he returned to Washington, D.C. 'When we had a press conference, you'd sink into the mud. It was grass and it was very wet, always wet and damp and wet and if it rained it would take three, four, five days to dry out and we couldn't use it really for the intended purpose. 'It's a beautiful white stone and it's a stone that's the same color as the White House itself. And because it's very white, it's going to reflect the heat and it's not going to be very hot. Yeah, we've got great reviews of the Rose Garden.' The president's assessment does not match that of social media users, who complained over the weekend that he had turned a cherished piece of American history into a 'parking lot' and a 'concrete jungle' that looks 'devoid of life.' The garden was first opened in 1913, was planted up with roses by then-first lady Jackie Kennedy in the early 1960s and has hosted receptions for visiting dignitaries for decades, also serving as a venue for annual ceremonies like the Thanksgiving turkey pardon and occasional policy announcements, most recently Trump's swiftly-reversed 'Liberation Day' tariff unveiling in April. The redesign leaves its signature rose bushes pushed to the periphery to accommodate a design much closer to the president's Mar-a-Lago home in Palm Beach, Florida. The cost of the 'upgrade' has not been released although it is known that the work was paid for by the Trust for the National Mall, a nonpartisan nonprofit that has raised $75m in private funding for D.C. restoration projects since 2007. The president has enjoyed imposing his idiosyncratic taste on 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue since returning to office and last week announced the construction of a new $200m ballroom. He has already had the Oval Office redecorated, wasting no time in switching the pictures, busts and ornaments around and introducing as much gold as possible. As CNN noted earlier this year: 'There is gold everywhere: new gold vermeil figurines on the mantle and medallions on the fireplace, gold eagles on the side tables, gilded Rococo mirrors on the doors, and, nestled in the pediments above the doorways, diminutive gold cherubs shipped in from Mar-a-Lago.' Trump also tripled the number of pictures of his predecessors on the walls, adding portraits of George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Franklin D Roosevelt, Thomas Jefferson and Ronald Reagan, amongst others. He further reinstated his signature Diet Coke button on the Resolute Desk and a bust of Sir Winston Churchill last seen during his first term.
