The West Indies will host the 14th edition of the ICC Under 19 Men’s Cricket World Cup for the first time ever, as the event which showcases the future stars of the game will see 16 teams travelling to the Caribbean to compete in 48 matches from January 14 to February 5 across four host countries.

The sixteen teams competing will see current holders Bangladesh, England, Canada and the United Arab Emirates form Group A, with debutants Uganda placed in Group B alongside India, South Africa and Ireland. Group C comprises Pakistan, Afghanistan, Zimbabwe and Papua New Guinea and Group D sees host West Indies, Australia and Sri Lanka. Scotland complete the tournament line up in Group D after New Zealand withdrew due to the extensive mandatory quarantine restrictions for minors on their return home.

The four host countries have been confirmed as Antigua and Barbuda, Guyana, St Kitts and Nevis and Trinidad and Tobago with 10 venues hosting matches. The format will see the top two teams from each of the four groups advance to the Super League while the remaining teams feature in the Plate across 23 days of competition.

The 48-match schedule will begin with hosts West Indies taking on Australia, with Sri Lanka facing Scotland in Guyana on January 14. The group stage will take place across Guyana, St Kitts and Nevis and Trinidad and Tobago between January 14 and 22.

Trinidad and Tobago will host the Plate competition between January 25 and 31, with the Super League taking place in Antigua and Barbuda from January 26. The semi-finals will be played on February 1 across two venues; the Sir Vivian Richards Cricket Ground and Coolidge Cricket Ground on February 2. The Final on February 5 will also be held at the Sir Vivian Richards Cricket Ground.

Cricket West Indies President Ricky Skerritt said: “CWI is looking forward to hosting this important global U19 cricket event, which is just around the corner, in January. In partnership with host territorial boards, cricket clubs, and Ministries of Sports, we have been hard at work preparing for this event over the past several months. However, amid so many Covid-related challenges, it has not been easy to finalise the venues and to work out all the related logistics.

“At the same time, our U19 head coach, Floyd Reifer, and his coaching staff have been busy preparing our team for competition, using innovative methods to keep them active even while they were restricted from travel. West Indies has a proud under-19 cricket history, with several bright talents blossoming into international stars over the years. We, therefore, expect our current team of under-19 players to do us proud in the 2022 tournament. I am also confident that our visitors will experience the best of our world-famous Caribbean culture and hospitality in Antigua & Barbuda, Guyana, St. Kitts & Nevis, and Trinidad & Tobago.”

ICC Head of Events, Chris Tetley said: “The ICC U19 Men’s Cricket World Cup is such an exciting and special tournament, bringing together the future stars of the game and giving them an unrivalled experience of competing on the global stage.

“So many of the best players have competed at the U19 Men’s Cricket World Cup including Virat Kohli, Babar Azam, Joe Root and Shimron Hetmyer and we are looking forward to the 2022 edition to see who emerges as the future stars.

“We are delighted that the West Indies will be hosting this event and we wish all the teams the very best in their preparations for the tournament and to Cricket West Indies in organising the event.”

The West Indies have won the title once in 2016, with India being crowned champions four times, Australia three times, Pakistan twice while England, South Africa and Bangladesh have won it once each.

There will be 16 warm-up matches taking place between January 9 and 12 in St Kitts and Nevis and Guyana.

CC U19 Men’s Cricket World Cup Groupings:

Group A – Bangladesh, England, Canada, United Arab Emirates

Group B – India, Ireland, South Africa, Uganda

Group C – Afghanistan, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, Zimbabwe

Group D – Australia, Scotland, Sri Lanka, West Indies

ICC U19 Men’s Cricket World Cup Venues:

St Kitts and Nevis – Warner Park Cricket Stadium , Conaree Cricket Center, (Sandy Point – Warm-up match venue only)

Guyana – Guyana National Stadium, (Everest Cricket Club – Warm-up match venue only)

Trinidad and Tobago – Brian Lara Cricket Academy, Queens Park Oval, Diego Martin Sporting Complex

Antigua and Barbuda – Sir Vivian Richards Cricket Ground, Coolidge Cricket Ground

ICC U19 Men’s Cricket World Cup match schedule:

January 14 – West Indies v Australia, Guyana National Stadium, Guyana; Sri Lanka v Scotland, Everest Cricket Club, Guyana

January 15 – Canada v UAE, Conaree Cricket Center, St Kitts and Nevis; India v South Africa, Guyana National Stadium, Guyana; Ireland v Uganda, Everest Cricket Club, Guyana; Pakistan v PNG, Queens Park Oval, Trinidad and Tobago

January 16 – Bangladesh v England, Warner Park Cricket Stadium, St Kitts and Nevis; Afghanistan v Zimbabwe, Diego Martin Sporting Complex, Trinidad and Tobago

January 17 – West Indies v Scotland, Warner Park Cricket Stadium, St Kitts and Nevis; Australia v Sri Lanka, Conaree Cricket Center, St Kitts and Nevis

January 18 – England v Canada, Warner Park Cricket Stadium, St Kitts and Nevis; South Africa v Uganda, Queens Park Oval, Trinidad and Tobago; Afghanistan v PNG, Diego Martin Sporting Complex, Trinidad and Tobago

January 19 – Australia v Scotland, Conaree Cricket Center, St Kitts and Nevis; India v Ireland, Brian Lara Cricket Academy, Trinidad and Tobago

January 20 – England v UAE, Warner Park Cricket Stadium, St Kitts and Nevis; Bangladesh v Canada, Conaree Cricket Center, St Kitts and Nevis; Pakistan v Afghanistan, Brian Lara Cricket Academy, Trinidad and Tobago; Zimbabwe v PNG, Diego Martin Sporting Complex, Trinidad and Tobago

January 21 – West Indies v Sri Lanka, Conaree Cricket Center, St Kitts and Nevis; South Africa v Ireland, Brian Lara Cricket Academy, Trinidad and Tobago

January 22 – Bangladesh v UAE, Warner Park Cricket Stadium, St Kitts and Nevis, India v Uganda, Brian Lara Cricket Academy, Trinidad and Tobago; Pakistan v Zimbabwe, Queens Park Oval, Trinidad and Tobago

Plate and Super League fixtures to take place between January 25 and February 4 at the Sir Vivian Richards Cricket Ground and Coolidge Cricket Ground in Antigua and Barbuda and Brian Lara Cricket Academy , Queens Park Oval and Diego Martin Sporting Complex  in Trinidad and Tobago.

February 1 – Semi-Final, Sir Vivian Richards Cricket Ground, Antigua and Barbuda

February 2 – Semi-Final, Coolidge Cricket Ground, Antigua and Barbuda

February 5 – Final, Sir Vivian Richards Cricket Ground, Antigua and Barbuda

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WASHINGTON, Nov 16 (Reuters) – President Joe Biden on Tuesday banned members of the Nicaraguan government from entering the United States as he issued a broad proclamation in response to an election that Washington has denounced as rigged in favor of Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega.

Biden’s travel ban applied to all of Nicaragua’s “elected officials,” apparently including Ortega and his wife, Vice President Rosario Murillo, in addition to security force members, judges, mayors and others seen as undermining democracy in the Central American nation.

“The repressive and abusive acts of the Ortega government and those who support it compel the United States to act,” Biden said in the decree.

Biden’s order came just a day after the United States, Britain and Canada imposed targeted sanctions on lists of Nicaraguan officials in a concerted response to the Nov. 7 election that many countries have called a sham. read more

They took action after Ortega’s re-election to a fourth consecutive term after jailing political rivals and cracking down on critical media.

Ortega, a former Marxist guerrilla leader, has derided his U.S. critics as “Yankee imperialists” and accused them of trying to undermine Nicaragua’s electoral process. Cuba, Venezuela and Russia have offered Ortega their backing.

Previous sanctions, asset freezes and travel bans on certain Nicaraguan officials imposed by Biden and his predecessor, Donald Trump, have failed to deter Ortega, and many analysts are skeptical whether new measures will have much impact.

The Organization of American States (OAS) adopted a resolution on Friday saying Nicaragua’s election lacked “democratic legitimacy.” Twenty-five nations voted in favor and seven abstained, including Mexico, Honduras and Bolivia.

In his proclamation, Biden said he had determined it was in U.S. interests to bar entry to all those “who formulate, implement or benefit from policies or actions that undermine or injure democratic institutions or impede the return to democracy in Nicaragua.”

His order also bans their family members from the United States.

Biden’s proclamation cited security forces, saying they “abuse persons to further the Ortega government’s authoritarian agenda,” and said that municipal officers “directed violence against pro-democracy protesters.” It accused the judiciary of “aiding and abetting” politically motivated arrests.

U.S. officials have made clear that further sanctions are in the works and that the administration intends to use other provisions in a bill the president signed last week to further ratchet up pressure on Ortega.

For instance, Brian Nichols, assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere Affairs, told a House of Representatives subcommittee on Tuesday the administration will seek to prevent Nicaragua from obtaining funds from international financial institutions where Washington has a vote.

The so-called RENACER Act also requires that the U.S. government report on alleged corruption by the Ortega family and calls for a review Nicaragua’s participation in the Central America Free Trade Agreement, which gives preferential treatment to exports to the United States.

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NORTE DE SANTANDER, Colombia, Nov 16 (Reuters) – Camouflaged Colombian troops with guns and anti-COVID masks creep through dense vegetation in suffocating heat, ready for their many enemies crisscrossing the Venezuelan border.

The soldiers are part of a 14,000-strong military unit created last month to stem rising bloodshed in the northeastern province of Norte de Santander: Colombia’s new epicenter of conflict, fueled by rising cocaine production.

“Any of the illegal armed groups in this area involved in drug trafficking could attack us,” said their sergeant, a 20-year army veteran, speaking under the shade of a tree near a river dividing Colombia and Venezuela.

Vulnerable to mines, snipers and ambushes, 16 soldiers have died this year in around 30 attacks in Norte de Santander.

Nineteen members of illegal armed groups have also died and dozens of soldiers, rebels and gang members been injured, according to Defense Ministry figures.

The military surge and sacrifice may not be the right tactic though: eradication of coca leaves, the raw ingredient for cocaine, is actually falling amid resistance from locals who say they have few other viable options to live off.

Furthermore, Colombia’s army has a checkered history, at times committing rights abuses while opposing rebels, traffickers and criminal gangs for more than half a century.

President Ivan Duque’s government is furious with Venezuela, accusing President Nicolas Maduro’s administration of providing a safe haven for gangs over the border and conniving in drugs shipments to the United States and Europe for a cut of profits.

Venezuela’s collapsed economy and rampant crime also fan the border violence, Colombian officials say. Reuters showed in a recent investigation how the rebel National Liberation Army (ELN) functions as a de facto local government and leading employer in some Venezuelan towns.

Caracas vigorously denies responsibility, saying Colombia’s right-wing “oligarchy” fails to curtail armed groups in a deliberate strategy to destabilize leftist-ruled Venezuela.

‘CONFLUENCE OF INSTABILITY’

Colombia hopes the troop buildup in Norte de Santander will provide a roadmap for pacifying other parts of a nation whose long civil war has now fractured into local battles against transnational insurgents and criminals.

“In Norte de Santander, there’s a confluence of various factors of instability,” General Luis Fernando Navarro, head of the armed forces, told Reuters in his Bogota office.

A porous frontier and weak law enforcement in Venezuela allow guerrillas from the ELN and dissident Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) rebels – who reject a 2016 peace agreement – to strike and then flee across the border, he added.

About half the ELN fighters and 30% of the FARC dissidents operate from there, protected from bombing raids, Navarro said.

On the Colombian side, groups fight each other for control of rising coca production. One area, Catatumbo, now has capacity to produce 312 tonnes of cocaine per year, a quarter of Colombia’s output, according to U.N. data.

Murders in Norte de Santander rose to 576 last year, compared with 539 in 2019. Through September 2021, 436 people have been slain, according to the defense ministry.

Twenty-two human rights activists have been assassinated since the beginning of 2020, while fighting has displaced some 6,500 people, according to activist groups.

“What’s behind this overflow of violence is this whole criminal dynamic,” said Wilfredo Canizares, director of human rights group Fundacion Progresar.

In two brazen attacks in June, former rebels bombed a military barracks in regional capital Cucuta and a sniper tried to shoot down a helicopter carrying Duque and other officials.

A FARC dissident commander took responsibility for the attacks, saying they targeted the U.S. presence. read more

MILITARIZING ALONE ‘A FAILURE’

The recent capture of “Otoniel”, leader of a major gang called the “Gulf Clan”, may not stem violence by his group, which police say has alliances with criminals in more than two dozen countries. The arrest might even increase fighting, regional analysts say, as the gang retaliates against security forces or members fight for power among themselves.

Security consultant John Marulanda, a retired army colonel, said groups attack high-profile targets to draw authorities away from drug production zones and the routes to clandestine airstrips in Venezuela.

The military’s new Specific Command for Norte de Santander (CENOR) will bring together four previously separate units, which the army says will allow better, faster coordination of logistics and intelligence with more patrols, offensive operations and air support.

The military says increased troops – with on-the-ground U.S. military advisors – will go hand-in-hand with investments in roads, schools and other programs.

But there are detractors.

Activists say boots on the ground mean little without anti-poverty measures and more support for voluntary substitution of coca crops. “It’s proven it’s a failure to insist on militarizing territory as the only answer,” said Fundacion Progresar’s Canizares.

It is indefensible that murders, mass killings, displacements and drug trafficking continue despite a large, long-term military presence in the province, he added.

Farmers outside the municipality of Tibu, home to Colombia’s largest coca plantations, recently held 180 soldiers on an eradication mission hostage for several hours in protest at removal of a crop that is one of few ways to make ends meet.

And eradication efforts overall in Norte de Santander are floundering, falling to about 30 square km so far this year, from 95 in 2020, largely due to opposition from locals.

Figures from the military and defense ministry also show the number of clandestine labs – usually deep in the jungle – destroyed in the first nine months of 2021 was 458, compared to 694 in 2020.

Seizures of cocaine in Norte del Santander in 2021 – 24.8 tonnes – have outpaced 16.6 in 2020 and 22.4 in 2019. But the increase is partly due to more production, officials said, as well as improved U.S. satellite data.

As locals clamor for land titles, loans for crop-switching and more public works, authorities insist the security strategy will be backed by social investment.

For example, provincial governor Silvano Serrano, with help from the national government, is spending $8 million on a program to encourage cacao production. It will give farmers seeds, technical assistance and guaranteed, fixed-price sales.

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MERRITT, British Columbia, Nov 16 (Reuters) – Floods and landslides that have killed at least one person have cut all rail access to Canada’s largest port in the city of Vancouver, a spokesperson for the port said on Tuesday.

Two days of torrential rain across the Pacific province of British Columbia touched off major flooding and shut rail routes operated by Canadian Pacific Rail (CP.TO) and Canadian National Railway (CNR.TO), Canada’s two biggest rail companies.

“All rail service coming to and from the Port of Vancouver is halted because of flooding in the British Columbia interior,” port spokesperson Matti Polychronis said.

At least one person was killed when a mudslide swept cars off Highway 99 near Pemberton, some 100 miles (160 km) to the northeast of Vancouver.

Two people were missing and search and rescue crews were combing through the rubble, officials said.

Vancouver’s port moves C$550 million ($440 million) worth of cargo a day, ranging from automobiles and finished goods to essential commodities.

The floods temporarily shut down much of the movement of wheat and canola from Canada, one of the world’s biggest grain exporters, during a busy time for trains to haul grain to the port following the harvest.

Drought has sharply reduced the size of Canada’s crops this year, meaning a rail disruption of a few days may not create a significant backlog, a grain industry source told Reuters.

Del Dosdall, senior export manager at grain handler Parrish & Heimbecker, said he expected some rail services could be restored by the weekend. Another industry source said he expected the shutdown to last weeks.

OIL PIPELINES SHUT DOWN

Floods have also hampered pipelines. Enbridge Inc (ENB.TO) shut a segment of a British Columbia natural gas pipeline as a precaution.

The storms also forced the closure of the Trans Mountain pipeline, which carries up to 300,000 barrels per day of crude oil from Alberta province to the Pacific coast.

Copper and coal miner Teck Resources Limited (TECKb.TO) said the floods had disrupted movement of its commodities to its export terminals, while potash exporter Canpotex Ltd said it was looking for alternatives to move the crop nutrient overseas.

Directly to the south of British Columbia, in the U.S. state of Washington, heavy rain forced evacuations and cut off electricity for more than 150,000 households on Monday.

The U.S. National Weather Service on Tuesday issued a flash flood in Mount Vernon, Washington, “due to the potential for a levee failure.”

Some areas of British Columbia received 8 inches (20 cm) of rain on Sunday, the amount that usually falls in a month.

Authorities in Merritt, some 120 miles (200 km) northeast of Vancouver, ordered all 8,000 citizens to leave on Monday as river waters rose quickly, but some were still trapped in their homes on Tuesday, said city spokesman Greg Lowis.

Snow blanketed the town on Tuesday and some cars could be seen floating in the flood waters up to 4 feet (1.22 m) deep.

The towns of Chilliwack and Abbotsford ordered partial evacuations.

Abbotsford also issued an emergency warning on Tuesday night, asking all residents to evacuate the Sumas Prairie region immediately as deteriorating conditions posed a significant threat to lives.

Rescuers equipped with diggers and body-sniffing dogs started clearing mounds of debris that have choked highways.

The landslides and floods come less than six months after a wildfires gutted an entire town in British Columbia as temperatures soared during a record-breaking heat dome, raising new worries about climate change.

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