It has been a tumultuous few days in Honduras. Since voting in elections on Nov. 30, former president Juan Orlando Hernández—convicted in the US last year of drug trafficking and bribery—was pardoned by President Donald Trump and subsequently released. The country has remained on tenterhooks as the results of the presidential election have still not yet been finalized, and Trump has threatened reprisals if his favored candidate fails to win. Adding to the unease is the country's deeply flawed vote-transmission system, which has crashed twice.

President Donald Trump's new National Security Strategy, unveiled Dec. 4, puts the Western Hemisphere at the center of US foreign policy and revives the Monroe Doctrine of 1823, appending it with a "Trump Corollary." The document presents the Americas as the main line of defense for the US homeland and links that doctrine directly to ongoing military operations against suspected drug traffickers in Caribbean and Pacific waters.

Trump's perverse ambition to win the Nobel Peace Prize was given a boost by his "winning" of the first "FIFA Peace Prize"—just as he is carrying out illegal deadly air-strikes in the Caribbean, and threatening Venezuela with war. "Secretary of War" Pete Hegseth is denying claims that he gave orders to "kill them all" in the strikes, but Congress is preparing an investigation. Regardless of whether this order was given, the strikes are clearly illegal under the international laws of war. Nonetheless, the Pentagon has opened an investigation into Sen. Mark Kelly for his video calling for troops to refuse illegal orders. Trump—who pardoned soldiers convicted of war crimes in his first term—has called for Kelly to be hanged for sedition. In Episode 307 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg continues to be flabbergasted by the Orwellian war-is-peace propaganda.

The United Nations on Dec.1 urged all countries to respect international norms safeguarding civil aviation, following US President Donald Trump's announcement of his intention to "completely shut down" Venezuelan airspace.

UN Secretary-General António Guterres condemned the military coup in Guinea-Bissau that took place just days after national elections, saying that it gravely violates constitutional order and democratic principles. The African Union Commission similarly condemned the coup, while the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) suspended Guinea-Bissau from the organization's decision-making bodies until there is a full restoration of constitutional order.

In a decisive referendum held on Nov. 16, Ecuadoran citizens overwhelmingly rejected a constitutional amendment that would have allowed foreign military bases on the country's soil. Early counts show nearly two-thirds of ballots cast opposed the measure. President Daniel Noboa introduced the referendum, arguing that foreign cooperation, such as hosting bases for allied nations, was essential to combat the ongoing surge in violence related to drug-trafficking.

Venezuelan nationals deported to El Salvador by the US government earlier this year were tortured and ill-treated, advocacy groups reported Nov. 12.

According to an 81-page report jointly released by Human Rights Watch (HRW) and Cristosal, a Salvadoran advocacy organization, members of a group of 252 Venezuelan deportees sent to El Salvador’s notorious Center for Terrorism Confinement (CECOT) were subjected to torture, arbitrary detention, and in some instances sexual abuse, while held incommunicado in inhumane conditions. The organizations found a pattern of coordinated abuse rather than isolated incidents. One former detainee told the investigators: "I'm on alert all the time because every time I heard the sound of keys and handcuffs, it meant they were coming to beat us."

A comprehensive global report on "uncontacted" indigenous peoples, published Oct. 27 by UK-based Survival International estimates that the world still holds at least 196 uncontacted or isolated peoples living in 10 countries in South America, Southeast Asia and the Pacific region. Nine out of 10 of these groups face the threat of unwanted contact by extractive industries, including logging, mining, and oil and gas drilling. It's estimated that a quarter are threatened by agribusiness, with a third terrorized by criminal gangs. Intrusions by missionaries are a problem for one in six groups. After contact, indigenous groups are often decimated by illnesses, mainly influenza, for which they have little immunity. Survival International found that unless governments and private companies act to protect them, half of these groups could be wiped out within 10 years.