The number of trees cut down in the Brazilian Amazon in January far exceeded deforestation for the same month last year, according to government satellite data.

The area destroyed was five times larger than 2021, the highest January total since records began in 2015.

Environmentalists accuse Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro of allowing deforestation to accelerate.

Protecting the Amazon is essential if we are to tackle climate change.

Trees are felled for their wood as well as to clear spaces to plant crops to supply global food companies.

At the climate change summit COP26 in Glasgow last year, more than 100 governments promised to stop and reverse deforestation by 2030.

The latest satellite data from Brazil’s space agency Inpe again calls into question the Brazilian government’s commitment to protecting its huge rainforest, say environmentalists.

“The new data yet again exposes how the government’s actions contradict its greenwashing campaigns,” explains Cristiane Mazzetti of Greenpeace Brazil.

Greenpeace are calling on supermarkets in the UK and elsewhere to drop suppliers who are involved in deforestation from their meat and dairy supply chains suppliers.

Deforestation totalled 430 square kilometres (166 square miles) in January – an area more than seven times the size of Manhattan, New York.

Felling large numbers of trees at the start of the year is unusual because the rainy season usually stops loggers from accessing dense forest.

Brazil’s vast rainforest absorbs huge amounts of greenhouse gases from the atmosphere, acting as what’s known as a carbon sink. But the more trees cut down, the less the forest can soak up emissions.

But the area is also home to communities who say they need to use the forest for mining and commercial farming in order to make a living.

At the same time, indigenous communities living in the Amazon fight to protect the rainforest and their ways of life.

Mr Bolsonaro has weakened environmental protections for the region and argued that the government should exploit the area to reduce poverty.

There are a number of factors driving this level of deforestation.

Strong global demand for agricultural commodities such as beef and soya beans is fuelling some of these illegal clearances – Another is the expectation that a new law will soon be passed in Brazil to legitimise and forgive land grabbing.

The Brazilian government argues that in the period between August last year and January 2022, overall deforestation was lower compared to the same period twelve months ago.

Environmentalists say that they are not surprised by the record January felling, given that President Bolsonaro has significantly weakened legal protections since he took office in 2019.

At the COP26 climate summit in Glasgow last year, Mr Bolsonaro was one of the world leaders who promised to halt and reverse deforestation by the end of this decade.

Political observers argue that despite this change in tone, the policies on the ground remain the same.

As members of the press arrived for a government-organised tour of a luxury hotel on the Cuban beach resort of Cayo Guillermo, they were greeted by a dance troupe in fishnet tights and high heels.

Above the entrance, the rainbow flag, the international symbol of gay pride, fluttered in the warm Caribbean breeze.

The Rainbow Hotel, described as Cuba’s first LGBTQ hotel, reopened in December.

While guests enjoyed the five-star service by the pool or a walk along the pristine sands, Cuba has not always been so welcoming to the gay community. In the early part of communist leader Fidel Castro’s rule, homosexual men and women were sent to work camps for supposed “re-education”.

Of course, since those dark days, attitudes on the island have markedly improved. The Cuban government and MGM Muthu Hotels, the company behind the Rainbow Hotel, say it exemplifies that change in attitude.

A joint venture between Muthu Hotels and Gaviota, Cuba’s military-run tourism company, the Rainbow Hotel was placed on a US government list of sanctioned entities in Cuba even before it was inaugurated in 2019.

Then the coronavirus pandemic struck and it lay empty and unused for the next two years. Now though, tourists are arriving. “It’s nice to be able to be in a place where you feel welcome and encouraged to be yourself,” Kevin McGarth, from Toronto, says, describing the hotel as “an oasis in the Caribbean”.

“When we got here we signed a waiver saying tolerance is the only way here and that if you’re not tolerant of people you’ll be asked to leave.”

Beyond the hotel’s perimeter, however, tolerance has been noticeably absent in Cuba recently.

Following island-wide anti-government protests in July, the authorities have clamped down on all forms of dissent. Mass trials of detainees have been held behind closed doors with the state seeking decades-long prison sentences for some defendants, including minors.

In November, a second protest was stopped before it could begin by a huge presence of state security and police on the streets. One of the organisers, Yunior García, was forcibly kept inside his home, unable to even signal from his window before government supporters placed a huge Cuban flag across the building.

Mr García left the island soon after. In fact, many activists and independent journalists have gone into exile in recent months, saying the authorities have made their lives unbearable.

Amid such harsh treatment, some Cuban gay rights’ activists say the Rainbow Hotel is an attempt by the state to mask its poor human rights record.

“Every visitor to Cuba is, of course, very welcome here,” says Jancel Moreno, a LGBTQ activist in the city of Matanzas. “But I’d invite the hotel guests to investigate a little into the repression we receive as independent activists.”

Any type of protest or gathering or even writing a report into human rights, he says, is met by uncompromising authoritarian control. “I’d ask them to see all that and to look beyond just the beautiful beaches or the number of stars a hotel has,” Mr Moreno adds.r

Away from the beaches, Old Havana normally bustles with tourists. But amid an estimated 70% slump in tourism over the past year, a long line of 1950s convertibles lies idle outside Parque Central.

Normally they would be doing a roaring trade taking scores of visitors to see the city’s landmarks, tour operator Mario Lopez says. We chat in front of the Hotel Telegrafo, due to be unveiled soon as Cuba’s second LGBTQ hotel as the state doubles down on its pursuit of the gay tourist dollar.

If the government’s push towards gay tourism can help reignite business, says Mr Lopez, he is all for it. The last two years have been brutal.

“The normal price for one hour’s tour is about €60 (£50; $70). But that was before coronavirus,” he says in fluent English. “Now I can only ask €20. It’s hard for the Cuban people right now.”

The inauguration of gay hotels comes as the government is about to put a change to the country’s “family code” before the people. A national debate on modernising the law is due this month which could lead to a referendum on legalising same-sex marriage later this year.

Activists, including Jancel Moreno, are hopeful that the long-awaited change may soon become law. Yet, he says, even the gay rights struggle in Cuba has been co-opted by the state.

Raúl Castro’s daughter, Mariela Castro, heads the state’s sexual health institute, Cenesex, which acts as the officially-accepted lobby for LGBTQ rights.

In 2015, symbolic same-sex weddings were held at Havana’s government-sanctioned gay pride march. But an independent gay pride march a few years later was quickly shut down.

Back at the Rainbow Hotel, most guests have set aside such debates as they enjoy some rest and relaxation. Yet activists see that as part of the problem.

Gay tourism is lucrative and Cuba certainly needs the income. They just hope all visitors – whether gay or straight – make themselves aware of the wider human rights context of their trip.

BBC- Former Nicaraguan rebel leader Hugo Torres has died in prison aged 73, eight months after being detained on treason charges.

The retired army general fought alongside current President Daniel Ortega during the country’s revolution, helping free him from jail in 1974.

But he later accused Mr Ortega of becoming a dictator and founded an opposition party.

He was one of the opposition figures arrested ahead of last year’s election.

Torres had been transferred to a hospital after his health deteriorated and died there of an undisclosed illness, the government said.

Torres’ children expressed their “deep pain over the death of our beloved father”.

Torres was seen as one of the heroes of the Sandinista Revolution against the brutal dictatorship of Anastasio Somoza in the 1970s.

He took part in a risky operation to free Mr Ortega, who was being held by Somoza’s regime.

But Torres was among 46 former rebels arrested in June in what critics called a crackdown on opponents of Mr Ortega. They were prevented from contesting elections which saw Mr Ortega elected for a fourth consecutive term.

Torres – then vice-president of Unamos, an opposition party created after the spit from Mr Ortega in 1995 – was charged with “conspiracy to undermine national integrity”.

Unamos said Torres had been subjected to “physical and psychological torture” since he was detained. The party said it asked the government about his declining health last month, but it did not respond.

Torres had been “denied freedom in inhumane conditions and subjected to a legal process with no guarantees”, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet said.

Many jobs have change as a result of the pandemic, and this coupled with a drive to reducing carbon emissions, should we changing how we work be reviewed? The Future Generations Commission says a four-day working week should be trialled in Wales as it can make staff healthier and happier, and businesses more productive. The Welsh government says it’s considering the progress of pilot schemes in other countries.

Cuba’s first LGBTQ hotel lay empty and unused for two years when the coronavirus pandemic struck. It’s reopened and tourists are arriving, with one saying: “It’s nice to be able to be in a place where you feel welcome and encouraged to be yourself.” But can tourists ignore the country’s poor human rights record? We’ve investigated.