What happened
Ecuador broke off relations with Colombia on Monday, a day after Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez sent tanks and troops to his country’s border on Colombia’s other flank. The tensions began when Colombian forces clashed with killed a Colombian guerrilla commander on Ecuadorean soil over the weekend. (The New York Times, free registration)
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
This has the look of the beginning of a war in South America, said Tim Padgett in Time, but “don’t bet on it.” Chavez and Colombian President Alvaro Uribe “hate each other,” and “few world leaders rattle a saber as flamboyantly” as Chavez does. But both sides have plenty of reasons to back away from the brink: Their economies are too interdependent, Colombia’s military is no longer the pushover it once was, and Venezuela can’t afford to do anything to disrupt its oil exports.
Usually “Ch
-
Icarus programme – the ‘internet of animals’The Explainer Researchers aim to monitor 100,000 animals worldwide with GPS trackers, using data to understand climate change and help predict disasters and pandemics
-
Experience Tanzania’s untamed wilderness from Lemala’s luxury lodgesThe Week Recommends The vast protected landscapes are transformed into a verdant paradise during ‘emerald season’
-
Codeword: October 9, 2025The Week's daily codeword puzzle
