The White House announced on Tuesday that Donald Trump will not travel to South America this week as planned.

Trump had been due to attend the Summit of the Americas in Lima and travel to Bogotá, Colombia, as well. Vice-President Mike Pence will make the trip in his stead. It would been Trump’s first visit to Latin America as president. A statement issued by the White House press secretary, Sarah Sanders, said: “At the president’s request, the Vice-President will travel in his stead. The president will remain in the United States to oversee the American response to Syria and to monitor developments around the world.”

On Monday, Trump said a decision about a US response to a chemical weapons attack in Syria was imminent. Speaking to reporters at the White House, he said: “We’re making decisions as to what we do with respect to the horrible attack that was made near Damascus. And it will be met. And it will be met forcefully. When I will not say because I don’t like talking about timing.” In April 2017, the US launched 59 Tomahawk cruise missiles into Syria in response to a chemical weapons attack by the Assad regime. Trump made the decision while entertaining Chinese President Xi Jinping at his private club in Florida.(theguardian)…[+]

Yulia Skripal, the daughter of the former Russian spy Sergei Skripal, has been discharged from hospital, doctors have said. Just over a month after she and her father were found collapsed on a park bench in Salisbury, Wiltshire, after being poisoned with a nerve agent, medics confirmed she had left Salisbury district hospital.

Skripal, 33, flew to the UK on 3 March, the day before she and her father are believed to have been poisoned with the nerve agent novichok. She released a statement on Friday saying her strength was “growing daily”. Sergei Skripal, 66, is also making good progress and doctors hope he will be able to leave hospital “in due course”.

Speaking outside the hospital on Tuesday, its medical director, Christine Blanshard, said: “We have now discharged Yulia from Salisbury district hospital. Yulia has asked for privacy from the media and I want to reiterate her request. “I also want to take this opportunity to wish Yulia well. This is not the end of her treatment but marks a significant milestone. “Her father has also made good progress. On Friday I announced he was no longer in a critical condition. Although he is recovering more slowly than Yulia, we hope that he too will be able to leave hospital in due course.”

Blanshard gave further insight into how the nerve agent attacked the two patients and the treatment they received. “In the four weeks since the incident in the city centre, both have received round-the-clock care from our clinicians, who have been able to draw on advice and support from world-leading experts in the field,” she said.(theguardian)…[+]

Hungary’s prime minister, Viktor Orbán, has pledged to push through a controversial package of bills targeting civil society, described by his government as the “Stop Soros” package. Orbán said his Fidesz party’s landslide victory in Sunday’s parliamentary elections had given the government perhaps the strongest mandate in modern Hungarian history.

“The reason we submitted this package before the elections is in order to allow the Hungarian voters to cast their vote knowing our intention on this. This has happened and we believe we are mandated by this election to pass this law.” Among other things, the proposed laws will require NGOs that work on migration-related issues to seek registration from the interior ministry. They could be rejected on a national security basis after vetting by security agencies. Any foreign funding for migration-related activities will be subjected to a 25% tax.(theguardian)…[+]

Brazil’s former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has handed himself in to police after spending two nights at the metalworkers’ union headquarters in São Paulo in defiance of an arrest warrant. “I’m going to prove my innocence,” Lula told a large crowd of adoring supporters on Saturday at the building where he began his political career. “Do what you want, the powerful can kill one, two or 100 roses. But they’ll never manage to stop the arrival of spring.”

Afterwards, he was carried on the shoulders of supporters shouting “Free Lula!” before being flown to the southern city of Curitiba where he will begin serving a 12-year sentence for corruption. Military police in Curitiba later dispersed Lula supporters with rubber bullets and teargas when he arrived at a police station in the city.

Although the 72-year-old will appeal against the conviction and is unlikely to serve the whole sentence, his imprisonment has for now ended his hopes of regaining the presidency in October’s elections. A final decision on his eligibility will be made by the electoral court. Thousands of supporters, many from unions and leftwing social movements, had for two days formed a human shield around the union building in the São Bernardo do Campo district of the city to prevent Lula from handing himself in.

“He managed to transform the moment of his imprisonment into a demonstration of his political force and popular support, not humiliation,” said Maurício Santoro, a political scientist and professor of international relations at Rio de Janeiro’s State University.(theguardian)…[+]

Canada has been plunged into “shock and mourning” after 15 people died and more than a dozen were injured in a “nightmare” collision between a bus carrying a junior hockey team and a semi-trailer. The royal Canadian mounted police said 29 people, including the driver, were on the Humboldt Broncos team bus when the crash occurred late on Friday afternoon on a rural highway some 200km north-east of Saskatoon in the province of Saskatchewan. The team had been heading to a Saskatchewan junior hockey league playoff game against the Nipawin Hawks, officials said.The crash has shocked hockey-crazed Canada, where sports teams often travel hours in gruelling winter conditions. Within hours of the launch of a fundraising campaign to help those affected by the crash, it had raised more than C$2.4m, far exceeding its initial target of C$10,000.(theguardian)…[+]

India’s railway ministry said a “ghastly” accident had narrowly been avoided after 22 passenger carriages carrying about 1,000 people became detached from a train engine and sped backwards for miles before being stopped. The runaway carriages rolled for seven miles in the north-eastern state of Odisha before being brought to a shuddering halt by rocks placed on the tracks by railway staff. A spokesman for the railway ministry’s eastern division said on Sunday that none of about 1,000 passengers had been injured in the incident on Saturday night.

Seven railway employees who were reported not to have followed proper procedures were suspended and an investigation was opened into how the carriages became separated during the journey from the western state of Gujarat to Odisha, said JP Mishra, a spokesman. Authorities believe that brakes normally applied when carriages are detached or attached to an engine were either incorrectly used or overlooked altogether. “Something ghastly could have happened and it was averted by alert staff. Safety cannot be compromised,” Mishra told AFP. He said more heads were likely to roll, adding: “Everybody in the railways [ministry] is aghast and shocked.”(theguardian)…[+]

Former president Jacob Zuma has appeared in court in South Africa to face corruption charges relating to a multibillion-dollar arms deal that took place 20 years ago. Zuma, who was ousted as head of state in February, attended a brief preliminary hearing at the high court in Durban, a city on the south-east coast. Referred to as Accused Number One, the 75-year-old did not speak, but told cheering supporters outside court: “The truth will come out. What have I done? I am innocent until proven guilty.”

Hundreds of supporters, many dressed in the green and gold of the ruling African National Congress (ANC) party, had gathered to chant and sing slogans, and a large police presence had been deployed to prevent clashes. Some carried placards saying “hands off Zuma” and performed the high-stepping toyi-toyi protest dance made popular in South Africa’s decades-long struggle against apartheid. The case was adjourned until June. The hearing is likely to be the first of many as the former president fights a possible jail sentence.(theguardian)…[+]

Sergei Skripal is “responding well to treatment, improving rapidly and is no longer in a critical condition”, doctors at Salisbury district hospital have said. Dr Christine Blanshard, medical director at the hospital, said: “Following intense media coverage yesterday, I would like to take the opportunity to update you on the condition of the two remaining patients being treated at Salisbury district hospital.

“Last Thursday, I informed you that Yulia Skripal’s condition had improved to stable. As Yulia herself says, her strength is growing daily and she can look forward to the day when she is well enough to leave the hospital.” She added: “I also want to update you on the condition of her father, Sergei Skripal. He is responding well to treatment, improving rapidly and is no longer in a critical condition.” The news comes a day after Yulia Skripal, who was poisoned along with her former spy father in a nerve agent attack that has caused international tensions after the UK said that it held the Russian government was responsible, released a statement through the Metropolitan police in which she said she was getting stronger by the day. After the news of Mr Skripal’s improved condition was reported on Twitter, the Russian Embassy to the UK tweeted: “Good news!”(theguardian)…[+]

Washington — On the eve of World Health Day, the Director of the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO), Carissa F. Etienne, and former president of Chile Michelle Bachelet today called for collective actions to ensure that all people, everywhere have access to the health services they need. In the Americas region, one third of the population faces obstacles to accessing health. “Health is a right, and as such we must overcome barriers to have access to care,” said Etienne, noting that out-of-pocket payments that many people must make to obtain health services “constitutes the main barrier and pushes families towards poverty.”

Other barriers are geographic or institutional in nature, including stigma and discrimination in health services. “It is not enough to have hospitals and health centers, these institutions must have the right combination of human resources, infrastructure and equipment, medicines and other health technologies, to avoid long waiting times and offer quality care,” Etienne said. Universal health, the theme of World Health Day 2018, implies that all people and communities have access, without discrimination, to quality health services without having to expose themselves to financial difficulties. Under the slogan “Universal Health: Everyone, Everywhere,” the campaign calls on representatives of governments, academia and civil society to stimulate dialogue on policies that can help achieve health for all by 2030.

“We need a massive regional movement and listen to all voices” to move towards universal health, Etienne said. Last year, PAHO created the High Level Commission on “Universal Health in the 21st Century: 40 Years of Alma-Ata,” led by Michelle Bachelet. To achieve universal health, “we have to build national consensus, because the challenges are of such magnitude that they require the commitment and effort of all,” said Bachelet. Forty years after the Declaration of Alma-Ata—which promoted the values of the right to health, equity and solidarity—the region of the Americas continues to be one of the most inequitable in the world. Bachelet noted that there have been important advances since Alma-Ata, but that there are still major gaps between and within the countries. “At the same time that we see health centers with quality we could not have imagined in the past, there are still women and children who continue to die from totally avoidable causes,” she said, adding that “inequality is the great enemy in Latin America and the Caribbean.”

Bachelet said that PAHO’s regional strategy for universal health along with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) and the sustainable health agenda for the Americas infuse new life into the path toward “health for all” outlined at Alma-Ata. She urged greater emphasis on health promotion and disease prevention, reducing segmentation and fragmentation in health services, safeguarding the working conditions of health personnel, including new technologies and innovation, and for building health financing systems that promote solidarity. “In this matter there are neither miracles nor shortcuts, what there is a long road of collective work that leads to more justice for all,” said Bachelet…[+]

The Bollywood superstar Salman Khan has been sentenced to five years in jail for poaching a protected species of Indian antelope, in the latest twist to an off-screen life almost as dramatic as the epics he has starred in.

A court in Rajasthan state on Thursday found Khan, one of the world’s best-paid actors, guilty of illegally hunting the two blackbucks from his car window while filming in Jodhpur in 1998. Public prosecutors alleged that Khan, 52, and four other actors in the car with him fled the scene when they were spotted, leaving the animals’ carcasses behind. The other actors, among them Saif Ali Khan and Sonali Bendre, were acquitted by the court in Jodhpur for lack of evidence.

India’s wildlife protection act bans the hunting of all but a few species of wild animals without a special permit. As well as the five-year sentence the court also fined Khan 10,000 rupees (£109). His lawyers said they would appeal against the decision. and an urgent bail hearing had been scheduled for 10.30am on Friday. Khan was taken to Jodhpur central jail after visiting a local hospital for a medical examination.

Hundreds of police had surrounded the courtroom in Jodhpur to keep back fans of the actor, known for his bad-boy image and macho film roles. Khan has long maintained that he was framed by forest officials “for publicity” and that the blackbucks could have died from natural causes such as overeating.(theguardian)…[+]