North America

OTTAWA/TORONTO (Reuters) - Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau may be renowned internationally for his youthful persona and social media savvy, but even before the embarrassment of his recent blackface makeup scandal there were concerns about the support he needs from younger voters to win re-election.

MEXICO CITY, Oct 2 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Mexico’s lower house unanimously passed a Bill to make manufacturers put warning labels on junk food, defying industry pressure in a bid to protect consumers’ health in one of the world’s most obese countries.

The Bill, which requires food packages to carry labels on the front if the contents are high in sugar, sodium or saturated fat, passed the Chamber of Deputies with 445 votes in favor and three abstentions.

UNITED NATIONS, Oct 2 (NNN-Prensa Latina) — More than 40 countries condemned the United States blockade against Cuban and expressed their solidarity with the Caribbean island during the high-level segment of the United Nations General Assembly in New York.

According to the Cuban Mission to the UN, 43 States from different continents demanded the lifting of blockade, which Washington has imposed for nearly 60 years and which has caused damages of 922.63 billion dollars to the island during that period.

UNITED NATIONS, Oct. 1 (Xinhua) -- President of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) Tijjani Muhammad-Bande on Tuesday urged member states to strengthen women's political participation, as only eight percent of speakers on behalf of member states had been women at the just-concluded the General Debate of the UNGA.

It was "not a good figure, especially in relation to our commitment to gender equality," he told reporters, adding that he would keep urging member states to allow for the broadest participation and "unlock obstacles to the participation of women in politics."

LAS VEGAS (AP) — After back-to-back mass shootings in Ohio and Texas this summer, gun control burst back on the scene as a major political issue for Democrats. Now it risks taking a back seat as impeachment fever overtakes Washington.

Gun control advocates are determined to prevent that from happening.

NEW YORK (AP) — Erin Brockovich, who has some experience in revealing disturbing secrets, knows what she would say to the government whistleblower at the heart of allegations that President Donald Trump pressured Ukraine’s president to investigate his political rival Joe Biden.

“I would say, ‘You are obviously a person of integrity and you take it seriously when you hear about wrongdoing,‘” Brockovich, the environmental and consumer activist, said in a recent telephone interview. “The name ‘whistleblower’ gets a bad connotation, and I’ve never understood that.”

WASHINGTON (AP) — Setting a defiant tone, the Trump administration resisted Congress’ access to impeachment witnesses Tuesday, even as House Democrats warned such efforts themselves could amount to an impeachable offense.

ST. LOUIS (AP) — A Missouri inmate was executed Tuesday for killing a man in 1996 in a string of violence that included several other crimes, despite concerns that the prisoner’s rare medical condition would cause a gruesome lethal injection.

Russell Bucklew was put to death at the state prison in Bonne Terre. It was Missouri’s first execution since January 2017.

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) — The operation dubbed “Find Jovenel Moïse” organized by opposition leaders demanding the resignation of Haiti’s president ended abruptly when he appeared at the National Palace early this week following violent protests in which several people were killed.

Haitians had become so accustomed to not seeing their president in person amid a deepening political and economic crisis that his arrival at the palace Tuesday took protesters by surprise, with only a handful of them present to pelt his convoy with rocks.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Bernie Sanders raked in $25.3 million over the past three months, putting him on top of the Democratic presidential fundraising field for now. But in a sign of what he and his rivals are up against, President Donald Trump and his allies raised $125 million.

Other leading Democrats, including former Vice President Joe Biden and Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, have yet to reveal their fundraising figures for the third quarter.