The week at a glance...Americas

last updated 8 January 2015

Mexico City

Hold your fire: A district of Mexico City has banned celebratory gunfire after a stray bullet killed a child. Officials in Iztapalapa, where 2 million people live, said residents may no longer fire guns during street, religious, or civil festivals. “Authorities are not against their practices and customs and traditions as such,” said public safety coordinator Carlos Candelaria López. “But firing bullets is not a tradition.” The child died after a bullet that had been shot into the air came down directly through the roof of a movie theater and struck him in the head.

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Earthquakes persist: Guatemala is being rocked by daily aftershocks from an earthquake earlier this month that killed more than 50 people. As a result, President Otto Pérez Molina has asked the U.S. to stop sending undocumented Guatemalans back home, since much of the country is a disaster zone. The 7.4 magnitude quake, centered off the coast, was the strongest the country suffered in decades. It destroyed thousands of homes and left at least 13,000 people without power or water. So far this year, the U.S. has deported more than 35,000 people back to Guatemala.

Bogotá, Colombia

FARC lays down arms: After five decades of fighting that killed more than half a million people, the Colombian rebel group FARC this week called a unilateral cease-fire. Though Colombia’s Defense Ministry said it would continue “to pursue all criminals who have violated the Constitution,” FARC’s declaration is the biggest breakthrough in years toward resolving the conflict. But the two sides have not resolved the legal situation of the rebels, how to dismantle the illegal drug trade that funded them, and how to compensate war victims. FARC has been severely weakened in recent years by a U.S.-backed Colombian military offensive.