
President Donald Trump declined Friday to comment on media reports indicating that Russia has been supplying Iran with intelligence on the positions and movements of U.S. troops, ships and aircraft in the Middle East.

Ecuadorian and U.S. military forces bombed and destroyed a training camp belonging to the Comandos de la Frontera, a dissident faction of Colombia's former FARC guerrilla organization, in the Amazon border province of Sucumbíos on Tuesday, both governments confirmed Friday.

Oil became this week’s clearest barometer of the Middle East crisis, with Brent hovering near US$90 a barrel and WTI around US$87.5, putting both contracts on track for their biggest weekly advance since 2020. The same factor sits behind the surge: the de facto blockage of the Strait of Hormuz, through which roughly one-fifth of the world’s oil normally passes.

US President Donald Trump said on Friday that Cuba is going to “fall pretty soon,” while making clear that his immediate priority remains the campaign against Iran, in remarks that widened the White House’s confrontational language toward both the Middle East and Latin America. Trump made the comments in a phone conversation with CNN anchor Dana Bash.

Lionel Messi made his first visit to the White House on Thursday, joining the Inter Miami squad as President Donald Trump honored the club for winning the 2025 MLS Cup, secured in December with a 3-1 victory over the Vancouver Whitecaps.

The United States and Venezuela’s interim authorities have agreed to restore diplomatic and consular relations, in a formal shift that ends a rupture dating back to 2019 and deepens the bilateral thaw that began after Nicolás Maduro was captured by U.S. forces in January. The announcement was made on Thursday by the State Department.

U.S. President Donald Trump will host leaders from 12 Latin American and Caribbean countries in Doral, Florida, on March 7 for the so-called Shield of the Americas Summit, a meeting the White House is framing as a forum on security, migration and hemispheric cooperation. The gathering comes amid a broader U.S. diplomatic and military push in the region and just weeks before Trump is expected to travel to China.

Senator Patricia Bullrich met at her Senate office with Argentine gendarme Nahuel Gallo, who was freed after 448 days in detention in Venezuela, in talks that lasted nearly two hours and focused on his captivity and the process that led to his return. Speaking afterwards, Bullrich said Gallo had “barely told 10% of what he lived through” and indicated the two would meet again.

President Javier Milei appointed Juan Bautista Mahiques, until now the chief prosecutor of the City of Buenos Aires, as Argentina’s new justice minister, replacing Mariano Cúneo Libarona. The change was confirmed after Cúneo Libarona resigned, citing personal reasons.

Local authorities in Uruguay’s Maldonado department are reviewing a proposal by Brazil’s Stehling Racing Team to develop a racetrack built to Formula 1 standards in the Punta del Este–Laguna del Sauce corridor, a plan still at an early stage and without any confirmation that it would translate into hosting a world championship round.