Michele Bertelli

Ecuador sees min­ing as a ‘cru­cial dri­ver’ of the econ­o­my, pro­vid­ing jobs and in­comes, but lo­cals dis­agree.

Res­i­dents are tak­ing pre­cau­tions to avoid clash­es with the grow­ing gang pres­ence in Ecuador amid a state of emer­gency.

Noboa, heir to a ba­nana in­dus­try for­tune, faces ris­ing crime with lit­tle po­lit­i­cal back­ing and an ab­bre­vi­at­ed term.

Sev­en sus­pects in the as­sas­si­na­tion of pres­i­den­tial can­di­date Fer­nan­do Villav­i­cen­cio have died in prison this month.

Left-lean­ing can­di­date Luisa González and cen­trist Daniel Noboa face off ahead of the Oc­to­ber 15 run-off elec­tion.

Ital­ian mil­i­tary has locked down a nine-storey squat, where 18 peo­ple share one toi­let, af­ter res­i­dents test­ed pos­i­tive.

Some re­stric­tions, on tim­ber com­pa­nies and book­shops, have been lift­ed, but oth­ers re­main shut­tered.

Italy shut ports as a ‘safe­ty’ mea­sure but peo­ple flee­ing war and per­se­cu­tion con­tin­ue to ar­rive, up­set­ting some lo­cals.

A new de­cree aims to help stem coro­n­avirus in­fec­tion af­ter the death toll jumped by al­most 800 in one day.

Hos­pi­talised coro­n­avirus pa­tients can­not see their fam­i­lies and, as fu­ner­als are banned, fi­nal good­byes must wait.