A Venezuelan policeman arrested in 2024 on "treason" charges was reported to have died in jail on 10 January, state prosecutors and local rights groups stated. Stated prosecutors declared that Edison Torres Fernández, a 52-year-old officer convicted of "treason against the fatherland," died from a brain stroke followed by a heart attack in spite of "timely" medical attention, Univisión and the Agence France-Presse reported on 13 January. Rights groups and families of detainees observed in previous days that the interim government was being painfully slow in implementing its pledge to release jailed opponents, further fueling suspicions it was fiddling the numbers on how many it had released. One activist separately told CNN on 10 January that those released were in any case only conditionally free and had yet to recover full civil rights.
Tuesday, 13 January 2026
Murders said to have dropped by a third in Mexico's Tijuana
Authorities in the district of Tijuana in northern Mexico said criminal killings (homicidios dolosos) dropped 32% in 2025 compared to 2024, with better policing and coordination between local and state authorities. "Preliminary figures" given by the state prosecution service of the state of Baja California showed there were just over 1,200 criminal killings in 2025 in Tijuana, a district of around two million residents, compared to just over 1,800 in 2024, the newspaper Excelsior reported on 13 January. It observed that tighter coordination between the various levels of government - local, state and national - was a crucial part of the security strategy of the government of President Gloria Sheinbaum Pardo. A chart showed April to have been the deadliest month in Tijuana in 2024, with 173 reported killings that fell to 102 for the same month in 2025.
Honduran army says stands by election results
The head of the Honduran armed forces confirmed on 12 January that the army had already recognized the results of presidential elections on 30 November and would help assure a transfer of presidential powers this month, regardless of any bid for another recount of votes. The ruling party of President Xiomara Castro whose candidate was roundly defeated, earlier appeared to have engineered a recount. But the head of the armed forces joint chiefs of staff, Héctor Valerio, said the army obeyed the constitution and "we are still backing" the electoral authority's December verdict, which declared the conservative Nasry Asfura president-elect, Spain's EFE news agency reported. The president, he stated, had "at no time given me instructions" to hand over ballots for a recount, referring to the army's role in guarding the premises of the electoral authoritiy. Asfura is to begin a four-year term on 27 January, and travelled to the United States on 13 January to meet with U.S. officials, EFE reported.