title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: The 2020 Venezuelan National Assembly Delegated Committee election of 5 January, to elect the Board of Directors of the National Assembly was disrupted. The events resulted in two competing claims for the Presidency of the National Assembly: one by Luis Parra and one by Juan Guaidó. Parra was formerly a member of Justice First, but was expelled from the party on 20 December 2019 based on the Operación Alacrán corruption allegations, which he denied. From inside the legislature, Parra declared himself president of the National Assembly, a move that was welcomed by the Maduro administration. The opposition disputed this outcome, saying that quorum had not been achieved and that no votes were counted. Police forces had blocked access to parliament to some opposition members, including Guaidó and journalists. Later in the day, a separate session was carried out at the headquarters of "El Nacional" newspaper, where 100 of the 167 deputies voted to re-elect Guaidó as president of the parliament.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: Guaidó was sworn in a session on 7 January after forcing his way in through police barricades. On the same day, Parra reiterated his claim to the parliament's presidency.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: Russia is the only foreign government to have officially recognized Luis Parra's investiture, while the European Union, the United States, Canada, and most Latin American countries recognized Guaido's re-election.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: On 19 January, Guaidó once again exited Venezuela and arrived in Colombia, planning to meet with Mike Pompeo, as well as traveling to Europe and the United States later, defying his exit prohibition for a second time. Guaidó travelled to Brussels, Belgium, and on 22 January met with Margaritis Schinas, Vice-President of the European Commission, and Josep Borrell, High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs. On 23 January, Guaidó participated in the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. During his trip in Europe, Guaidó also met with Boris Johnson, Emmanuel Macron, and Angela Merkel. Afterwards, Guaidó travelled to Canada and met with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. On February 4, he was invited to President Donald Trump's 2020 State of the Union address to Congress, and was applauded by the crowd, which was composed of members of both Democratic and Republican parties.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: Diosdado Cabello declared that "nothing" would happen to Guaidó when he returned to Venezuela. After meeting with Donald Trump in the White House, Constituent Assembly member Pedro Carreño said that if Guaidó wanted to come back as "commander-in-chief", "we will receive him with this "peinilla"", hitting his podium with a machete. Guaidó was allowed back into Venezuela by officials through Simón Bolívar International Airport on 12 February, despite the travel ban imposed by Maduro's government.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: Security forces installed an anti-aircraft gun in the Caracas-La Guaira highway and blocked the highway; opposition deputies had to reach the airport on foot to receive Guaidó. Due to the block, several ambassadors were also unable to go to the airport. Upon Guaidó's arrival at the Simón Bolívar International Airport, around two hundred Maduro supporters surrounded and jostled Guaidó, his wife Fabiana Rosales and several opposition deputies that waited for him at the airport. Some journalists were also attacked and had their equipment stolen by the group. Tens of military and police officials were present and did not intervene to prevent the attack. Several passengers declared to local outlets that Maduro's administration sent a group of pro-government activists to insult and harass the opposition members with impunity, including employees of the recently sanctioned Conviasa airline. The Inter American Press Association condemned the attacks on the journalists.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: The following day, the opposition and relatives denounced that Guaidó's uncle, Juan José Márquez, had been missing for 24 hours after receiving his nephew in the airport, blaming Maduro's government. His wife declared that Márquez was detained in the migration area and that his whereabouts were unknown. Afterwards, in his television talk show "Con El Mazo Dando", Diosdado Cabello accused Márquez of carrying explosives when he landed in Venezuela. Hours later, a court formalized Márquez's detention, copying Cabello's accusations. Márquez was detained in the Caracas headquarters of the Directorate General of Military Counterintelligence, despite him being a civilian.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: On 29 February Juan Guaidó mobilized a march against the government of Nicolás Maduro in the Juan de Villegas parish, Barquisimeto, Lara state. The day of the march, pro-government colectivos shot at Guaidó, who was in a van at the time of the shooting. Bolivarian National Intelligence Service agents were also reported of having participated in the attack. Guaidó's vehicle received nine gunshots and the shooting left a total of ten wounded.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: The COVID-19 pandemic was confirmed to have spread to Venezuela on 13 March, when the Maduro administration announced the first two cases. On 16 March, Maduro reversed the country's official position against the International Monetary Fund (IMF), asking the institution for US$5 billion to combat the pandemic, a first during Maduro's presidency, being a critic of the institution. The IMF rejected the deal as it was not clear, among its member states, on who it recognizes as Venezuela's president. According to a report by "Bloomberg", the Maduro administration also tried to request aid of $1 billion from the IMF after the first request was denied. Guaidó called for the creation of a "national emergency government", not led by Maduro, on 28 March. According to Guaidó, a loan of US$1.2 billion was ready to be given in support of a power-sharing coalition between pro-Maduro officials, the military and the opposition in order to fight the pandemic in Venezuela. If accepted, the money would go to assist families affected by the disease and its economic consequences.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: On 26 March, the US Department of State offered $15 million on Nicolás Maduro, and $10 million each on Diosdado Cabello, Hugo Carvajal, Clíver Alcalá Cordones and Tareck El Aissami, for information leading to their arrest in relation to charges of drug trafficking and narco-terrorism. Maduro had been offering to hold talks with the opposition about handling the outbreak in the country shortly before the indictment and then called them off.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: After being indicted, retired general Clíver Alcalá in Colombia published a video claiming responsibility for a stockpile of weapons and military equipment seized in Colombia. According to Alcalá, he had made a contract with Guaidó and "American advisers" in order to buy weapons to remove Maduro. Alcalá did not present any evidence and Guaidó rejected the allegations. After wishing farewell to his family, Alcalá surrendered to US authorities on 27 March.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: On 31 March, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said that sanctions did not apply to humanitarian aid during the COVID-19 pandemic in Venezuela and that the US would lift all sanctions if Maduro agreed to organize elections that did not include himself in a period of six to twelve months. Pompeo reiterated US support for Juan Guaidó. The US proposed a transitional government that would exclude both Maduro and Guaidó from the presidency. The deal would enforce a power-sharing scenario between the different government factions. Elections would have to be held within the year, and all foreign militaries, particularly Cuba and Russia, would have to leave the country. The US were still seeking Maduro's arrest at the time of the announcement. Other aspects of the US deal would include releasing all political prisoners and setting up a five-person council to lead the country; two members each chosen by Maduro and Guaidó would sit on the council, with the last member selected by the four. The European Union also agreed to remove sanctions if the deal went ahead. Experts have noted that the deal is similar to earlier proposals but explicitly mentions who would lead a transitional government, something which stalled previous discussions, and comes shortly after the US indicted Maduro, which might pressure him to peacefully leave power. Guaidó accepted the proposal while Venezuela's foreign minister Jorge Arreaza rejected it and declared that only parliamentary elections would take place in 2020. Arreaza said that "decisions about Venezuela would be made in Caracas and not in Washington or other capitals" and that "the most important transition for Venezuela was the one started many years ago from capitalism to socialism."


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: After various members of Guaidó's team were arrested on 30 March, Guaidó denounced a new wave of attacks against him. Following that, Attorney General Tarek William Saab called Juan Guaidó to appear before the Public Ministry on 2 April based on Alcalá's accusations. Guaidó did not accept to appear before the public prosecutor. The day of the citation, two more members of Guaidó's office were arrested, charged for alleged "attempted coup d'etat" and "magnicide." Guaidó's team reported that "With this new assault by the dictatorship, there are now 10 [of its] members that have been detained by security forces. Five of them in the last 72 hours."


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: Reuters reported that during the pandemic allies of both Nicolás Maduro and Juan Guaidó had secretly begun exploratory talks, according to sources on both sides. Guaidó and US Special Representative for Venezuela Elliott Abrams have denied that negotiations have taken place. The Associated Press reported that the National Assembly agreed to establish a monthly $5,000 salary for the lawmakers funded from an $80 million "Liberation Fund" made up of Venezuelan assets seized by the Trump administration. Guaidó's communications team issued a statement denying that such salary had been approved, saying that lawmakers have gone unpaid since Maduro cut off funding after the opposition won the legislature in 2015 and that the deputies would determine an appropriate, as well as communicating it transparently. It also said that the $14 million in funding destined for the National Assembly would cover not only the deputies' personal income, but also office expenses, staff costs, travel and other related legislative expenses.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: Eight former Venezuelan soldiers were killed and seventeen rebels were captured on 3 May, including two American security contractors, after approximately 60 men landed in Macuto and tried to invade Venezuela. The members of the naval attack force were employed as private military contractors by Silvercorp USA and the operation aimed to depose Maduro from power.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: The opposition parties that make up the Democratic Unity Roundtable coalition agreed unanimously not to participate in the election, stating the reason as irregularities and their complaints during the planning of the process and arguing that it was likely the election would be fraudulent. Twenty-seven political parties signed the agreement, including the four largest opposition parties Popular Will, Justice First, Democratic Action and A New Era.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: The opposition criticized the appointment of the members of the National Electoral Council by the Supreme Tribunal, stating that it is under the purview of the National Assembly, and at least seven political parties had their board of directors suspended or replaced by the pro-government Supreme Tribunal of Justice, including Popular Will, Justice First, Democratic Action, and Copei, as well as left-wing political parties, including Tupamaro, Fatherland for All, and Red Flag. Opposition politicians Henrique Capriles and Stalin González initially encouraged participation in the elections. They later withdrew and demanded better electoral conditions.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: The Lima Group, the International Contact Group, the European Union and the United States rejected holding parliamentary elections in 2020, insisting in the necessity of holding elections "with free and fair conditions." The International Contact Group, headed by Uruguay, stated the formation of the Electoral Council "undermines the credibility of the next electoral process." The Organization of American States (OAS) stated the appointment of the Electoral Council was "illegal", rejecting it, and further stated that independent bodies are needed for "transparent, free and fair" elections to take place in the country. In July, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, headed by Michelle Bachelet, said that "the recent decisions of the Supreme Tribunal of Justice diminish the possibility to build conditions for democratic and credible electoral processes" and "appoint new National Electoral Council rectors without the consensus of all the political forces."


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: As a response to the position of the Popular Will party of focusing on a timetable for presidential, parliamentary and regional elections, Leopoldo López said that "telling us from Europe that we are maximalist because we want freedom is a colonialist comment [...] that we should renounce our dream of freedom when you already have it.”


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: On 5 August 2021, Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador announced that Mexico would host talks between the Maduro government and the political opposition.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: On 11 June 2022, pro-government followers attacked Guaidó after an opposition march in San Carlos, Cojedes state, throwing objects at him and violently removed from the restaurant he was holding a meeting in. Nosliw Rodríguez, former PSUV deputy and candidate for the Cojedes governorship, was identified as one of the people that led the attack against Guaidó.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: As of October 2020, Guaidó is recognized as the interim president of Venezuela by 57 countries, "including the US, Canada and most Latin American and European countries". Other countries are divided between a neutral position, support for the National Assembly in general without endorsing Guaidó, and support for Maduro's presidency; internationally, support has followed traditional geopolitical lines, with Russia, China, Iran, Syria, Cuba, and Turkey supporting Maduro, and the US, Canada, and most of Western Europe supporting Guaidó.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: The European Parliament recognized Guaidó as interim president. The European Union unanimously recognized the National Assembly, but Italy dissented on recognizing Guaidó. The OAS approved a resolution on 10 January 2019 "to not recognize the legitimacy of Nicolas Maduro's new term". In a 24 January special OAS session, sixteen countries including the US recognized Guaidó as interim president, but they did not achieve the majority needed for a resolution. The United Nations called for dialogue and deescalation of tension, but could not agree on any other path for resolving the crisis. Twelve of the fourteen members of the Lima Group recognize Guaidó; Beatriz Becerra—on the day after she retired as head of the human rights subcommittee for the European Parliament—said that the International Contact Group, jointly sponsored by Uruguay and Mexico, had been of no use and "has been an artifact that has served no purpose since it was created". She said there had been no progress on the 90-day deadline for elections that the group established when it was formed, and she considered that the Contact Group should be terminated and efforts coordinated through the Lima Group. During the 49th General Assembly of the Organization of American States, on 27 June, Guaidó's presidency was recognized by the organization.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: The Venezuelan Observatory of Social Conflictivity stated that there were on average 69 protests daily in Venezuela during the first three months of 2019, for a total of 6,211 protests, representing a significant increase over previous years (157% of protests for the same period in 2018, and 395% relative to the number in 2017).


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: Following the failed uprising on 30 April, support for Guaidó declined, attendance to his demonstrations subsided and participants in committees organized by Guaidó stated that there has been little progress. "Reuters" reported in June that analysts have predicted that Maduro would maintain his position as he gains confidence that his actions against the opposition go "relatively unpunished".


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: By the end of 2019, support for Guaidó dropped, with protests organized by his movement resulting with low participation. Pollster Datanálisis published figures showing that support for Guaidó decreased from 61% in February to 42% in November 2019. According to Jesús Seguías, the head of the Venezuelan analysis firm Datincorp, "For years Washington and the Venezuelan opposition have said that Nicolás Maduro, and before him Hugo Chávez, were weak and about to fall [...] but it’s clear that’s not the case". Analyst Carlos Pina stated that as "[t]he military support to President Maduro remains intact", the opposition will need to "rethink its strategy" and that "Guaido has also been very limited in suggesting or proposing a strategy that could change the current [status quo]." Into December 2019, Venezuelan pollster Meganálisis surveys showed that 10% of respondents approved of Guaidó, compared to 9% who supported Maduro.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: The "Miami Herald" reported that dozens of arrests were made in anticipation of a military uprising, and Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino López ordered a counterintelligence effort to locate conspirators or possible defectors. According to "France 24", Maduro declared "military deserters who fled to Colombia have become mercenaries" as part of a "US-backed coup". Guaidó declared that the opposition had held secret meetings with military officials to discuss the Amnesty Law.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: Hugo Carvajal, the head of Venezuela's military intelligence for ten years during Hugo Chávez's presidency and "one of the government's most prominent figures", publicly broke with Maduro and endorsed Guaidó as acting president. During the 30 April 2019 uprising attempt, Manuel Cristopher Figuera, the Director General of Venezuela's National Intelligence Service, SEBIN, broke with Maduro.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: Certain top military figures recognized Guaidó, and around 1,400 military personnel have defected to Colombia, but the top military command stays loyal to the government.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: Following the 23 January events, some Venezuelan diplomats in the United States supported Guaidó; the majority returned to Venezuela on Maduro's orders.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: In early 2019, with Cuban and Russian-backed security forces in the country, United States military involvement became the subject of speculation. Senior U.S. officials have declared that "all options are on the table", but they have also said that "our objective is a peaceful transfer of power". Colombian guerrillas from National Liberation Army (ELN) have vowed to defend Maduro, with ELN leaders in Cuba stating that they have been drafting plans to provide military assistance to Maduro.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: Article 187 of the Venezuelan Constitution provides that "[i]t shall be the function of the National Assembly: (11) To authorize the operation of Venezuelan military missions abroad or foreign military missions within the country." In every demonstration summoned by Guaidó, there have been numerous signs demanding the application of Article 187, and a March poll showed 87.5% support for foreign intervention. Venezuelan politicians such María Corina Machado and Antonio Ledezma, former mayor of Caracas, have also demanded the application of the article.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: According to Giancarlo Fiorella, writing in "Foreign Affairs", the "loudest calls for intervention are coming not from the White House and its media mouthpieces but from some members of the Venezuelan opposition and from residents of the country desperate for a solution—any solution—to their years-long plight." Fiorella states that "talk of invoking article 187(11) has become commonplace" in Venezuela, adding that "the push for a military intervention in Venezuela is most intense not among hawks in Washington but inside the country itself."


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: Guaidó has said he would call for intervention "when the time comes", but in media interviews, he has not stated he supports removing Maduro by force. The National Assembly approved in July 2019 the reincorporation of Venezuela to the Inter-American Treaty of Reciprocal Assistance, a mutual defense pact signed in 1947 that has never been enacted and from which Venezuela retired in 2013. Venezuela's reincorporation to the pact "can be used to request military assistance against foreign troops inside the country."


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: In a 4 December 2019 interview with Vox, Guaidó stated: "We sense a firm commitment from the United States. [...] I think they’re doing everything they could be doing under these circumstances, as are Colombia and Brazil." When asked if he was nearer from removing Maduro from power than in January 2019, Guaidó replied: "Absolutely. Back then we didn’t have multiple countries recognizing and supporting us. [...] Today, we have way more tools at our disposal than we did one year ago." Bloomberg News reported two days later that the Trump administration began to doubt that an opposition led by Guaidó would remove Maduro from office. The United States reportedly had no military option regarding Venezuela, although it began to debate on whether to partner with Russia to encourage Maduro to leave office or to increase pressure on Cuba, which is the Maduro government's main supporter.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: According to professor Erick Langer of Georgetown University, "Cuba and Russia have already intervened." A Cuban military presence of at least 15,000 personnel was in Venezuela in early 2018, while estimates ranging from hundreds to thousands of Cuban security forces were reported in 2019. In April 2019, Trump threatened a "full and complete embargo, together with highest-level sanctions" on Cuba if its troops do not cease operations in Venezuela.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: Two nuclear weapon-capable Russian planes landed in Venezuela in December 2018 in what Reuters called a "show of support for Maduro's socialist government."


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: According to the Kremlin, there are about 100 Russian military personnel in Venezuela "to repair equipment and provide technical co-operation". On 23 March 2019, two Russian planes landed in Venezuela carrying 99 troops and 35 tonnes of matériel. Alexey Seredin from the Russian Embassy in Caracas said the two planes were "part of an effort to maintain Maduro's defense apparatus, which includes Sukhoi fighter jets and anti-aircraft systems purchased from Russia."


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: National Assembly deputy Williams Dávila said the National Assembly would investigate the "penetration of foreign forces in Venezuela."


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: Venezuela's third-largest export (after crude oil and refined petroleum products) is gold. The World Gold Council reported in January 2019 that Venezuela's foreign-held gold reserves had fallen by 69% to US$8.4 billion during Maduro's presidency. In 2018, Maduro's government exported $900 million worth of gold out of Venezuela into Erdoğan's Turkey. In April 2019, Rubio warned the United Arab Emirates and Turkey not be "accomplices" in the "outrageous crime" of exporting Venezuela's gold.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: In mid-December 2018, a Venezuelan delegation went to London to arrange for the Bank of England to return the $1.2 billion in gold bullion that Venezuela stores at the bank. Unnamed sources told Bloomberg that the Bank of England declined the transfer due to a request from US Secretary of State Pompeo and National Security Adviser Bolton, who wanted to "cut off the regime from its overseas assets". In his memoir "The Room Where It Happened", Bolton said UK Foreign Minister Jeremy Hunt was "delighted to cooperate on steps they could take, for example freezing Venezuela's gold deposits in the Bank of England, so the regime could not sell the gold to keep itself going". In an interview with the BBC, Maduro asked Britain to return the gold instead of sending humanitarian aid, saying that the gold was "legally Venezuela's, it belongs to the Central Bank of Venezuela" and could be used to solve the country's problems. Guaidó asked the British government to ensure that the Bank of England does not provide the gold to the Maduro government. Maduro also said that the US have frozen $10 billion in Venezuelan accounts through its sanctions.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: In mid-February 2019, a National Assembly legislator Ángel Alvarado said that eight tonnes of gold worth over US$340 million had been taken from the vault while the head of the Central Bank was abroad. In March, Ugandan investigators reported that the gold could have been smuggled into that country. Government sources said another eight tonnes of gold was taken out of the Central Bank in the first week of April 2019; the government source said that there were 100 tonnes left. The gold was removed while minimal staff was present and the bank was not fully operational because of the ongoing, widespread power outages; the destination of the gold was not known.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: In 2009, Venezuela's foreign reserves peaked at US$43 billion; by July 2017, they had fallen below $10 billion "for the first time in 15 years", and as of March 2019, they had dropped to US$8 billion. About two-thirds of Venezuela's reserves are in gold. Part of Venezuela's remaining reserves are held by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in financial instruments called SDRs. In 2018, Venezuela had almost $1 billion in IMF SDRs, but it had drawn US$600 million in one year. To access SDR reserves, IMF rules require than a government be recognized by a majority of IMF members, and there is no majority recognition for either man claiming the Venezuelan presidency; the IMF denied Maduro access to the remaining US$400 million—"one of the regime’s last remaining sources of cash" according to Bloomberg. The IMF has not recognized Guaidó; Ricardo Hausmann—Guaidó's representative recognized by the Inter-American Development Bank—said the "IMF is safeguarding the assets until a new government takes over. 'Those funds will be available when this usurpation ends.'" The US has given Guaidó control of "key Venezuelan bank accounts", and has said it will give Guaidó control of US assets once his administration is in power.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: The Portuguese bank Novo Banco stopped Maduro's attempt to transfer over US$1 billion through BANDES subsidiary, Banco Bandes Uruguay, in early 2019. Over two months later, Maduro responded that Portugal had illegally blocked the money, and asked that it be returned to buy food and medicine.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: In 2020, the English High Court ruled in favor of Juan Guaidó in a hearing over whether Guaidó or Nicolás Maduro should control $1 billion of its gold stored in the Bank of London.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: In 2022, the United Kingdom Supreme Court ruled in favor of Juan Guaidó again regarding the control of the gold stored in the Bank of London.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: During the crisis in Venezuela, the United States, Canada, Mexico, Panama, Switzerland individually, and the countries of the European Union collectively, have applied sanctions against people associated with Maduro's administration, including government officials, members of the military and security forces, and private individuals. As of 27 March 2018, the Washington Office on Latin America said 78 Venezuelans associated with Maduro had been sanctioned by several countries. Through April 2019, the U.S. sanctioned more than 150 companies, vessels and individuals, in addition to revoking visas of 718 individuals associated with Maduro.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: Christian Krüger Sarmiento, director of Colombia Migration, announced on 30 January 2019 that the Colombian government maintained a list of people banned from entering Colombia or subject to expulsion. As of January 2019, the list had 200 people with a "close relationship and support for the Nicolás Maduro regime", but Krüger said the initial list could increase or decrease.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: As the humanitarian crisis deepened and expanded, the Trump administration levied more serious economic sanctions against Venezuela. In January 2019, during the presidential crisis, the United States imposed sanctions on the Venezuelan state-owned oil and natural gas company PDVSA to pressure Maduro to resign.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: On 15 April 2019, Canada announced that another round of sanctions on 43 individuals were applied on 12 April based on the "Special Economic Measures Act". The government statement said those sanctioned are "high ranking officials of the Maduro regime, regional governors and/or directly implicated in activities undermining democratic institutions".


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: The United States Department of the Treasury has also placed restrictions on transactions with digital currency emitted by or in the name of the government of Venezuela, referencing "Petro", a DIGITAL token. and on Venezuela's gold industry. After the detention of Guaidó's chief of staff, Roberto Marrero, in March 2019, the US also sanctioned the Venezuelan bank BANDES and its subsidiaries.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: The Treasury Department sanctioned seven additional individuals for their involvement in the disputed internal parliamentary elections of the National Assembly in January 2020.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: An October 2020 report published by the Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA) by Venezuelan economist Luis Oliveros found that "while Venezuela’s economic crisis began before the first U.S. sectoral sanctions were imposed in 2017, these measures 'directly contributed to its deep decline, and to the further deterioration of the quality of life of Venezuelans' ". The report concluded that economic sanctions "have cost Venezuela’s government as much as $31 billion since 2017"


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: The Venezuelan press workers union denounced that in 2019, 40 journalists had been illegally detained as of 12 March; the National Assembly Parliamentary Commission for Media declared that there had been 173 aggressions against press workers as of 13 March. As of June 2019, journalists have been denied access to seven sessions of the National Assembly by the National Guard.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: Between 12 January and 18 January, Internet access to Wikipedia (in all languages) was blocked in Venezuela after on the Spanish Wikipedia was edited to show him as president. Later on 21 January, the day of the National Guard mutiny in Cotiza, Internet access to some social media was reported blocked for CANTV users. The Venezuelan government denied it had engaged in blocking. During the 23 January protests, widespread Internet outages for CANTV users were reported.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: Live streams of the National Assembly sessions and Guaidó's speeches have been regularly disrupted for CANTV users. Since 22 January, some radio programs have been ordered off air; other programs have been temporarily canceled or received censorship warnings, including a threat to close private television and radio stations if they recognized Guaidó as acting president or interim president of Venezuela.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: The website "Voluntarios X Venezuela" was promoted by Guaidó and the National Assembly to gather volunteers for humanitarian aid. Between 12 and 13 February, CANTV users that tried to access were redirected to a mirror site with a different URL address. The mirror site asked for personal information, including names, ID, address and telephone numbers. The phishing website used the .ve domain controlled by Conatel. This manipulation was denounced as a technique to identify dissidents to the government. Following the phishing incident, the official site was completely blocked for CANTV users on 16 February.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: During the 2020 election to choose the president of the National Assembly, independent journalists were also impeded from covering the event. Maduro's Ministry of Information, which has no relationship to the National Assembly, allowed reporters from state-run media to enter the legislative palace. Other reporters were not allowed in and told to watch it on a live feed from outside. State communications service CANTV reportedly blocked access to social media sites Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube on the day of the election. Block tracking website NetBlocks reported that the block began as the National Assembly session did.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: During the COVID-19 pandemic in Venezuela, the National Assembly created a webpage to provide information on the coronavirus disease 2019 to the public. The access to the site was restricted for CANTV users. During Juan Guaidó's return to Venezuela in February 2020, after his second international tour, various media workers were insulted, harassed, robbed and physically aggressed by a group of supporters and pro-Maduro agitators that received him in the airport. According to the Venezuelan Press Working Union (SNTP), Venezuelan security forces were present and witnessed the attacks, but did not intervene. When journalists were going to file the complaint to the authorities, security forces impeded their access to the prosecutor office.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: In September 2020, Facebook closed 55 accounts, 42 pages and 36 Instagram accounts linked to CLS Strategies, a Washington-based public relations firm. Facebook said these were fake accounts used to secretly manipulate politics in Bolivia, Venezuela and Mexico in violation of Facebook's prohibition on foreign interference. The Stanford Internet Observatory, a disinformation research group, reported that CLS Strategies employees had previous professional ties to opposition political leaders in Venezuela.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: Roberto Marrero—Guaidó's chief of staff and Leopoldo López's attorney—was arrested by SEBIN during a raid on his home on 21 March. Gilber Caro, an alternate deputy and member of Guaido's party, Popular Will, was re-arrested by the Bolivarian Intelligence Service on 26 April 2019. Eleven other members of Guaido's team have been summoned to appear before SEBIN.Most of the individuals who were seen with Guaidó during the attempted uprising and many legislators were either arrested or in hiding. In May 2019, the TSJ ordered the prosecution of seven National Assembly members for their actions on 30 April. The rival Constituent Assembly stripped the members of their parliamentary immunity. The National Assembly dismissed the sentence, holding that the members of the Tribunal are illegitimate and that their ruling violates the parliamentary immunity of the deputies. As of 2 May 2019, there were 205 arrests related to protests.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: National Assembly Vice President Edgar Zambrano was arrested on 8 May 2019. With the seven deputies charged several crimes, an "El País" article stated that the Venezuelan parliament, elected to a majority in the 2015 elections, has been "systematically blocked" and dismembered by "political persecution" of 60% of its elected members. There was no preliminary merit hearing as required by law; an additional three deputies were indicted without a preliminary merit hearing. Three of the recently sanctioned members sought temporary refuge in foreign embassies.


title: Venezuelan presidential crisis

text: On 13 July 2019, two of Guaidó's security guards were arrested in Caracas. According to Information Minister Jorge Rodríguez, the two guards had attempted to sell rifles that had been taken from a National Guard armory ahead of the failed uprising on 30 April 2019. Guaidó said that the guards were arrested while protecting his family during his tour around the country. He dismissed the weapon sale allegations and speculated that the authorities would torture and frame the two men by planting weapons on them. Rodríguez announced that evidence would be presented during the next round of talks.


title: Boots (company)

text: Boots UK Limited (formerly Boots the Chemists), trading as Boots, is a British health and beauty retailer and pharmacy chain in the United Kingdom and other countries and territories including Ireland, Italy, Norway, the Netherlands, Thailand and Indonesia.


title: Boots (company)

text: The parent company, The Boots Company plc, merged with Alliance UniChem in 2006 to form Alliance Boots. In 2007, Alliance Boots was bought by Kohlberg Kravis Roberts and Stefano Pessina, taking the company private, and moving its headquarters to Switzerland, making it the first-ever FTSE 100 company to be bought by a private equity firm. In 2012, Walgreens bought a 45% stake in Alliance Boots, with the option to buy the rest within three years. It exercised this option in 2014, and as a result Boots became a subsidiary of the new company, Walgreens Boots Alliance, on 31 December 2014.


title: Boots (company)

text: Boots is one of the largest retailers in the UK and Ireland, both in terms of revenue and the number of shops. It has 2,200 shops across the United Kingdom and Ireland ranging from local pharmacies to large health and beauty shops in 2022. Its shops are primarily located on the high streets and in shopping centres. It sells many health and beauty products, and also provides optician and hearing care services within shops and as standalone practices. Boots also operates a retail website and a loyalty card programme called the Boots Advantage Card.


title: Boots (company)

text: Boots was established in 1849, by John Boot. After his father's death in 1860, Jesse Boot, aged 10, helped his mother run the family's herbal medicine shop in Nottingham, which was incorporated as Boot and Co. Ltd in 1883, becoming Boots Pure Drug Company Ltd in 1888. In 1920, Jesse Boot sold the company to the American United Drug Company. However, because of deteriorating economic circumstances in North America Boots was sold back into British hands in 1933. The grandson of the founder, John Boot, who inherited the title Baron Trent from his father, headed the company. The Boots Pure Drug Company name was changed to The Boots Company Limited in 1971.


title: Boots (company)

text: Between 1898 and 1966, many branches of Boots incorporated a lending library department, known as Boots Book-Lovers' Library.


title: Boots (company)

text: Boots diversified into the research and manufacturing of drugs with its development of the Ibuprofen painkiller during the 1960s, invented by John Nicholson and Stewart Adams. The company was awarded the Queen's Award For Technical Achievement for this in 1987. A major research focus of Boots in the 1980s was the drug for congestive heart failure, Manoplax. The withdrawal from market of Manoplax due to safety concerns in 1993 caused major pressure from investors, and in 1994, Boots divested its prescription drugs division, which had become no longer viable, to BASF. In 2006, it sold the Nurofen brand to Reckitt Benckiser. The 2006 sale of Boots Healthcare International included everything made by Crookes Healthcare, based on the Nottingham site.


title: Boots (company)

text: In 1968, Boots acquired the 622-strong Timothy Whites and Taylors Ltd chain. Boots expanded into Canada by purchasing the Tamblyn Drugs chain circa 1978. Most Canadian Boots shops were converted to Pharma Plus in 1989 after sale to Oshawa Group, although a handful of locations remained as late as 1993, if not later. Boots products briefly surfaced in Canada when it was sold at the short-lived Target foray into Canada. In 1982, the company opened a new manufacturing plant in Cramlington, Northumberland. In the early 1990s, Boots began to diversify and bought Halfords, the bicycle and car parts business in 1991. It also developed the Children's World business of larger out of town superstores in the 1980s, but sold this chain to Mothercare in 1996. Halfords was sold in 2002.


title: Boots (company)

text: Boots Opticians Ltd was formed in 1987 with the acquisition of Clement Clarke Ltd and Curry and Paxton Ltd. Boots Opticians became the UK's second-largest retail optics chain. In 2009 Boots Opticians acquired Dollond & Aitchison, an optician chain that was founded in 1750.


title: Boots (company)

text: Boots diversified into dentistry in 1998, with a number of shops offering this service. Boots sold the Do-It-All DIY chain to Focus DIY in 1998. Boots also made a venture into "Wellbeing" services offering customers treatments ranging from facials, homoeopathy, and nutritional advice to laser eye surgery and Botox but these services were abandoned in 2003, despite a launch that included a dedicated Freeview and Sky TV channel of the same name, and even redirecting web traffic from boots.com to wellbeing.com


title: Boots (company)

text: In October 2005, a merger with Alliance UniChem was announced by the then chairman, Sir Nigel Rudd. The CEO Richard Baker left, and the new group became Alliance Boots plc. The merger became effective on 31 July 2006.


title: Boots (company)

text: Alliance Boots was purchased by Kohlberg Kravis Roberts and Stefano Pessina, the deputy chairman of the company, in April 2007 for £11.1 billion, taking the company private and beating a rival bid from Guy Hands's Terra Firma Capital Partners. This was the first ever instance of a FTSE 100 company having been bought by a private equity firm. In June 2008, the group headquarters were moved to Zug, Switzerland. According to John Ralfe, Boots' former head of corporate finance, "the UK has lost about £100m a year in tax as result".


title: Boots (company)

text: 'Boots the Chemists Limited' was re-registered under the name 'Boots UK Limited' on 1 October 2007. Management of all staff was moved to Boots Management Services Limited on 1 July 2010.


title: Boots (company)

text: In June 2012, it was announced that Walgreens, the United States' largest chemist chain, would purchase a 45% stake in Alliance Boots for US$6.7 billion. The deal was said to be a long-term plan to give maximum exposure to both brands, Boots more so in the US and, Walgreens more so in the UK and in China through Boots' presence in that market. The deal gave the option to complete a full merger of the organisations within three years costing an extra $9.5bn. Walgreens confirmed on 6 August 2014 that it would purchase the remaining 55% and merge with Alliance Boots to form a new holding company, Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc. Walgreens and Boots both become subsidiaries of the new company on 31 December 2014.


title: Boots (company)

text: In April 2019, Boots announced it would sponsor the England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and Republic of Ireland women's football teams in a multi-million pound/euro deal. The deal was to last three years and cover the 2019 FIFA Women's World Cup and the UEFA Women's Euro 2021 competitions.


title: Boots (company)

text: Profits for 2019 were £167 million, 47.3% less than in 2018. The company blamed "lower volume and lower revenue item growth and continuing UK government reimbursement pressure".


title: Boots (company)

text: In July 2020, the group announced that it would be cutting 4,000 jobs and shutting 48 optician stores in the UK.


title: Boots (company)

text: Since September 2018, Sebastian James has been a senior vice president of Walgreens Boots Alliance, and president and managing director of Boots.


title: Boots (company)

text: In November 2020, Boots Ireland appointed Stephen Watkins as managing director for Ireland succeeding Bernadette Lavery who has been appointed director of pharmacy with Boots UK.


title: Boots (company)

text: The Alshaya Group, a franchise operator based in Kuwait, operates a number of Boots-branded stores throughout the Middle East, including in Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, while Boots-branded stores throughout Indonesia are operated by PT Mitra Adiperkasa Tbk.


title: Boots (company)

text: The company funds the Boots Charitable Trust, which is an independent registered charity in the UK, administrated by Nottinghamshire Community Foundation. The trust was established in the early 1970s to fund registered charities benefiting people who live in Nottinghamshire.


title: Boots (company)

text: Supporting "WE Feel Good" The Prince's Trust, the Boots Orchestra in Nottingham, and the Boots Benevolent Fund.


title: Boots (company)

text: The Boots Factory Site, near the Nottingham suburb of Beeston, features a range of listed buildings. This includes the two principal factory buildings, D6 and D10, designed by Sir Owen Williams and built in 1932 and 1935–38 respectively. Both are Grade I listed. The former fire station of 1938, D34, is also by Williams and is Grade II listed. The headquarters office building known as D90 is Grade II* and was built to designs by Skidmore, Owings & Merrill in 1966–68.


title: Boots (company)

text: Staff have a restaurant, coffee and snack shops, newsagent, a branch of Boots the Chemist, an opticians branch and cash point situated within landscaped grounds. The grounds include the Millennium Garden, which features a herb garden (with some plants that Jesse used in his original herbal remedies) in the shape of a goose foot – harking back to Jesse's original shop on Goose Gate, Nottingham.


title: Boots (company)

text: The Boots Museum is now closed; however, historical items are in storage or on display in the reception area of the D90 building.


title: Boots (company)

text: Professor Chris Griffiths' University of Manchester team found the "Serum", formerly, "No. 7<ref name="theguardian/2012/apr/16/history-no7"></ref> Refine & Rewind Beauty Serum" stimulated the production of fibrillin-1 and appeared to smooth out wrinkles, (published in the British Journal of Dermatology).<ref name="news.bbc.co.uk/8022644"></ref><ref name="theguardian/2009/apr/28/boots"></ref> In 2007, BBC Horizons independent investigation caused a run on a product in the same product range after it was found to be the only one to have a beneficial effect.<ref name="goodhousekeeping/a568183"></ref><ref name="news.bbc.co.uk/6623709"></ref><ref name="harpersbazaar/a27096393"></ref> Richard Weller, an Edinburgh University dermatologist, said it was unlikely to be as effective as prescription retinoids.


title: Boots (company)

text: In 2009 Boots Superintendent Pharmacist Paul Bennett was interviewed by the House of Commons Science and Technology Committee about the company's sale of homeopathic medicines. He told the committee that the company had no evidence to suggest that homeopathic medicines are efficacious but Boots sold them anyway, for reasons of "consumer choice". The comments attracted significant media attention.


title: Boots (company)

text: In April 2016, the Pharmacists' Defence Association stated that company managers were exploiting the NHS by insisting that each outlet carry out medicine use reviews, even if patients didn't need them. The NHS pays £28 per review up to a maximum of 400 per shop per year. "The Guardian" said that the General Pharmaceutical Council was poised to investigate.


title: Boots (company)

text: At the same time as the article about medicine reviews, "The Guardian" published a longer report on the same day called 'How Boots went Rogue', which told the story from the eyes of a Boots pharmacist talking about working conditions at the company. It also covered the buyout of the company and the owners' financial approach. Four days later it published an articles with emails from pharmacists. Pharmacists had written about how "the chain allegedly compels staff to compromise ethics for targets". The article said "The letters editor believes this may be the largest haul of mail he has ever received about a single article. Others rang in." There were two further follow-up articles in the days following. The paper subsequently noted a letter purporting to be from an "independent pharmacist" criticising its stance on the issue which it identified as having been edited and amended by one of the firm's vice-presidents. The letter was emailed as a Word document and contained tracked changes.


title: Boots (company)

text: Following the "Guardian" reports, Boots announced the departure of UK operations director, Simon Roberts, in June 2016.


title: Boots (company)

text: On 8 January 2018, the BBC showed a documentary called "Boots: Pharmacists under Pressure?" about the deaths of three patients following dispensing errors. It also featured accounts from three whistleblowers, who alleged that there were staffing issues at the company. One of the whistleblowers, who had formerly worked in a patient safety role, stated that Boots had calculated that in excess of £100m additional investment in staffing was required each year in its pharmacies and to meet the company's expectations of its staff. The BBC also published two articles on the same day.


title: Boots (company)

text: A separate article almost three weeks later told the story of a patient who was given the wrong medicine in December 2017 by a "frazzled" pharmacist. The patient said there was clearly a staffing issue.


title: Boots (company)

text: Boots had told the BBC documentary makers that there had been no further patient deaths associated with dispensing errors since 2015. However, in July 2018, it was reported that an error had occurred in 2016 in which two lots of the same medicines were dispensed and supplied to the same patient, Richard Lee, who subsequently died. The error was found at a coroner's inquest to have contributed to his death.


title: Boots (company)

text: In July 2017, the British Pregnancy Advisory Service (BPAS) revealed that Boots was selling emergency contraceptive medication at four times the cost price and had refused requests to join rival pharmacy retail chains, including Superdrug and Tesco, which had agreed to cease profiting financially in this way. In a written response to BPAS, Boots revealed that they were frequently contacted by individuals who disapproved of the dispensing of such medication, which might be viewed as "incentivising inappropriate use", an assertion which campaigners described as "insulting and sexist". BPAS called on the public to boycott the company and email them requesting that they reverse the policy. Following the boycott's launch, lawyers representing Boots alleged that the online complaint form created by BPAS had resulted in a "torrent of abuse" to five of Boots' senior managers and that BPAS had facilitated and tacitly encouraged harassment by naming individual staff members on the form. In response, BPAS stated that Boots had "failed to provide any evidence of abuse sent through the campaign". In November 2017, more than 130 Labour politicians signed a letter criticising Boots' failure to fulfil its promise to stock a low-cost alternative in its shops by October. At the end of January 2018, Boots confirmed that it was now offering the cheaper medication in all of its pharmacies.


title: Boots (company)

text: Throughout the media coverage, a May–July 2017 pricelist from its wholesaler and sister company Alliance Healthcare stated that the "Normal Retail Price inc. VAT" of Levonelle One Step was £12.72.


title: Boots (company)

text: On 25 October 2017, a debate was held in the House of Commons about pharmacists' mental health and the support that employers give to employees. Much of the discussion concerned the suicide of a Boots pharmacist, Alison Stamps, in May 2015, and Boots' response was criticised. Part of a letter from Alison Stamps’ parents was read out by MP Kevan Jones, which said: "It is clear that Alison was a victim of corporate greed and collateral damage by an uncaring company intent only on its own agenda."


title: Boots (company)

text: In February 2018, Boots was criticised for charging excessive prices for low-value products supplied to the NHS: in one case, it was found that the pharmacy was billing in excess of £1,500 for a moisturiser which normally retailed at less than £2. In May 2018, a further investigation by "The Times" found that on at least five occasions between 2013 and 2017, Boots had charged over £3,200 for a medicinal mouthwash used to treat mouth ulcers in chemotherapy patients, in comparison to an independent supplier which had charged the equivalent of £93 for the same product. The investigation found that Boots had ordered the product from Alliance Healthcare, a supplier owned by Boots' parent company. In response, a spokesman for Walgreens Boots Alliance rejected accusations of overcharging the NHS and claimed that the bespoke nature of the orders, often requested at short notice, results in the high cost.


title: Black Manta

text: Black Manta is a supervillain appearing in American comic books published by DC Comics. The character was created by Bob Haney and Nick Cardy, and first appeared in "Aquaman" #35 in September 1967. He has since endured as the archenemy of the superhero Aquaman.


title: Black Manta

text: Black Manta has had numerous origin stories established throughout his comic book history, having been a young boy kidnapped and enslaved by abusive pirates on their ship; an autistic child subjected to experiments in Arkham Asylum; and a ruthless mercenary caught in a mutual cycle of vengeance with Aquaman over the deaths of both their fathers. Despite these differing versions of his past, Black Manta is consistently depicted as a cutthroat underwater villain who uses a high-tech armored suit in his obsessive quest to destroy Aquaman's life.


title: Black Manta

text: The character has been adapted in various media incarnations. Yahya Abdul-Mateen II portrayed Black Manta in his live-action cinematic debut in the 2018 DC Extended Universe film "Aquaman", and will reprise the role in the upcoming 2023 sequel "Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom". Kevin Michael Richardson, Khary Payton and others have provided the character's voice in media ranging from animation to video games.


title: Black Manta

text: Black Manta had no definitive origin story until #6 of the 1993 "Aquaman" series. In this origin, the African American child who would become Black Manta grew up in Baltimore, Maryland, and loved to play by the Chesapeake Bay. In his youth, he was kidnapped and forced to work on a ship for an unspecified amount of time, where he was physically abused by his captors. At one point, he saw Aquaman with his dolphin friends and tried to signal him for help but was not seen. Finally, he was forced to defend himself, killing one of his tormentors on the ship with a knife. Hating the emotionless sea and Aquaman, whom he saw as its representative, he was determined to become its master.


title: Black Manta

text: An alternative version was given in #8 of the 2003 "Aquaman" series. In this origin, the boy who would become Black Manta was an autistic orphan placed in Gotham City's Arkham Asylum. He felt comfortable in freezing cold water but found cotton sheets excruciatingly painful. Because the attendants at Arkham did not know how to deal with autism, they would end up restraining him to the bed as he struggled and screamed whenever they tried putting him to bed. In this version, young Black Manta was also fascinated when he saw Aquaman on television.


title: Black Manta

text: The boy would end up being subjected to experimental treatments. One treatment seemed to clear the boy's head, but left him violent as a result; he killed the scientist who had administered the treatment and escaped from Arkham.


title: Black Manta

text: As an adult, the man who would become Black Manta designed a costume (primarily a black wetsuit with a bug-eyed helmet, that was able to shoot rays from its eyes) and fashioned a high-tech submersible inspired by manta rays. Taking the name Black Manta, he and his masked army became a formidable force, engaging in at least one unrecorded clash with Aquaman prior to his first appearance as a rival to the Ocean Master (and before joining the short-lived Injustice League in the retcon "Silver Age" third-week event).


title: Black Manta

text: His first name, David, is revealed in the 2010 "Brightest Day" storyline, although his last name has not been revealed.


title: Black Manta

text: Black Manta and Aquaman battled repeatedly over the next several years. During one of these clashes, it is revealed that Black Manta is actually black, whose stated objective at one point was for black people to dominate the ocean after having been oppressed for so long on dry land; though it was soon revealed by Cal Durham, one of his more idealistic henchmen, that Manta was more obsessed with his own personal desires. During most of his appearances, his main goals are defeating Aquaman and gaining power for himself through the conquest of Atlantis. Finally, Manta kills Arthur Curry, Jr., Aquaman's son, which leaves Aquaman obsessed with revenge.


title: Black Manta

text: Black Manta is later transformed into a human/manta ray hybrid by the demon Neron in exchange for his soul, though after a while he returns to wearing his original outfit, which covers his new appearance. At one point he engages in drug smuggling from his new base in Star City, where he is opposed by a returning Green Arrow and Aquaman.


title: Black Manta

text: In a later confrontation, Aquaman, sporting the Lady of the Lake's Healing Hand, reverses Neron's alterations to Black Manta and rewires Manta's afflicted brain, rendering him neurotypical for the first time in his life. Unfortunately, Manta remains a violent criminal, lulling Aquaman into a false sense of partnership and almost killing the Sea King in the process.


title: Black Manta

text: In later events, Black Manta is used as a genetic manipulation test subject to make water breathers. This succeeds; since then, Black Manta has returned to the oceans to face Aquaman once again.


title: Black Manta

text: Black Manta causes a disturbance in Sub Diego in which Captain Marley is severely injured. Aquaman summons various predatory sea-life to attack Black Manta and leaves him for dead. It is later revealed that Black Manta was able to survive by generating an electric charge with his suit.


title: Black Manta

text: When Aquaman dies at the end of the 2003 series, Black Manta begins working for Libra as part of the Secret Society of Super Villains. However, after Libra betrays the group and helps Darkseid conquer the Earth, Black Manta quits.


title: Black Manta

text: In a 2011 "Brightest Day" storyline called "Aquawar", Black Manta has retired from his criminal ways. He has opened a fish market to earn an honest living. When he discovers that Aquaman has been resurrected following the end of the "Blackest Night", Black Manta murders the customers in the store and burns down his shorefront house as he resumes his criminal career and vendetta against Aquaman. Black Manta is seen later at the grave of Thomas Curry, Aquaman's father, where he is approached by Siren and her Death Squad after demolishing the tombstone. The Death Squad battles Black Manta, but before the fight continues too long, Siren stops them. She informs Black Manta that they need to work together to find his son, showing him a hard water image of Jackson Hyde.


title: Black Manta

text: Black Manta and Siren locate Jackson and attempt to kill his foster father. Jackson (using his ability to create hard water constructs) fights back but is unable to stop Black Manta from shooting a trident-shaped dart at his foster father. At the last moment, Aquaman intervenes, blocking the fatal shot. Black Manta then faces his old nemesis again. During the battle, Aquaman pulls Jackson and his foster father to safety.


title: Black Manta

text: In a flashback, it is revealed that Black Manta was once a treasure hunter who, along with his wife, was captured while exploring the Bermuda Triangle. Their captors were the other-dimensional residents of Xebel, and the two were tortured mercilessly. The captors experimented on Black Manta's pregnant wife which gave the unborn child powers similar to those of the residents of Xebel. Fearing the child (Jackson) would be used as a pawn in an invasion of Earth, Xebel princess Mera kidnapped the child and took him to Earth, where she arranged him to be adopted and raised far away from water in order to keep him from her people. Black Manta ultimately escaped from Xebel, though his wife ultimately died.


title: Black Manta

text: After Jackson learns the truth behind his origin, Aquaman and Jackson (now calling himself Aqualad) are ambushed by Siren and the Xebel soldiers on a California beach, where innocent citizens become caught in the crossfire. As Aquaman is about to strike back at Siren, Black Manta springs from the water and severs Aquaman's right hand. Jackson attacks his father, berating him for siding with the people who killed his own wife, only for Black Manta to throw Jackson to the ground and coldly state that both he and his mother meant nothing to him. As Black Manta prepares to impale his son with one of his blades, Mera arrives with Aquagirl, who saves Jackson by striking Black Manta in the face. Jackson and Mera work together to seal Black Manta, Siren, and the rest of the invaders away in the Bermuda Triangle. Black Manta vows from within the prison to get his son, Jackson.


title: Black Manta

text: In The New 52 (a 2011 reboot of the DC Comics universe), Black Manta kills a woman named Kahina the Seer, a former teammate of Aquaman, and steals her Atlantean relic. He then vows to kill her entire family before getting his revenge on Aquaman. A flashback shows that Aquaman created a team known as the Others (forged of six Atlantean relics from the Dead King's tomb) who are trying to catch Black Manta, but they fail and Black Manta escapes. Black Manta goes after Aquaman's former teammate Prisoner-of-War in Heidelberg.


title: Black Manta

text: It is then revealed that Aquaman killed Black Manta's father by accident in retaliation for attacking Aquaman's father. Seeking revenge, Black Manta attempted to kill all of Aquaman's family and friends. When Black Manta chased Prisoner-of-War, he was confronted by Aquaman in a battle. During the attack, Black Manta stole one of Ya'Wara's Atlantean relics and teleported to Stephen Shin, Aquaman's former friend. Black Manta then tasered Mera and pulled Shin to him in order to teleport away.


title: Black Manta

text: Meanwhile, the Others were reunited and discovered that there was a seventh Atlantean relic in the Dead King's tomb. Manta took Shin captive in the Dead King's tomb in order to find the seventh relic and located in the Dead King's throne. Manta prepared to kill Shin but was thwarted when Aquaman and the Others attacked his henchmen. Black Manta killed Vostok-X and escaped with the relic scepter. After Vostok-X's death, Aquaman, through tears, swore that he would kill Manta in revenge. Black Manta delivered the relic scepter to a mysterious Atlantean, who was revealed to be his employer, but the Others ambushed them and attacked. The mysterious Atlantean managed to grab the relic scepter and escape while Black Manta was forced to battle the Others, resulting in Manta and his henchmen being taken away by the authorities. While in Belle Reve Prison, Black Manta refused to join Amanda Waller's Suicide Squad.


title: Black Manta

text: During the "Forever Evil" storyline, Amanda Waller approached Black Manta again to join the Suicide Squad. Black Manta declined again at the same time as Deathstorm and Power Ring invade Belle Reve. After hearing Amanda Waller's offer to join the Suicide Squad, Black Manta retrieved his equipment during Belle Reve's prison break and accepted the Secret Society's coin. At the Justice League's Watchtower, after claiming Aquaman's trident, Black Manta tossed the coin in the ocean. Black Manta took the trident to his father's grave stating his quest to kill Aquaman was over. Looking up, he witnessed Ultraman moving the moon in front of the sun resulting in the creation of massive tidal waves. The waves washed the grave of Black Manta's father away which gave him a new purpose: to destroy the Crime Syndicate. After retrieving Black Adam's body from the ocean, Black Manta met up with Lex Luthor, the Kryptonian clone that Lex Luthor created, and Captain Cold, where he informed them of what Ultraman's actions did to his father's grave. Lex Luthor realizes that with the help of his Kryptonian clone, Black Adam, Black Manta, and Captain Cold, he might be able to stop the Crime Syndicate.


title: Black Manta

text: Black Manta's first "Rebirth" appearance was in the one-shot "Aquaman: Rebirth" #1, acting as the narrator until he reveals himself at the very end. Manta later appeared in "Aquaman" vol. 8 #1, in which he attacks Spindrift Station, an Atlantean embassy built by Aquaman near his hometown of Amnesty Bay to promote relations between Atlantis and the surface. Black Manta fights with Aquaman, and even wounds him, but the fight is ended with words about how hollow and empty Black Manta's purpose in life truly is. He's eventually taken into custody by the U.S. military, but the vehicle transporting him is attacked by N.E.M.O forces. A woman named Blackjack takes him to the organization's base in Antarctica, where he meets the Fisher King. N.E.M.O plans to discredit Aquaman in the eyes of the world by manipulating conflicts with the United States and other surface nations, and Black Manta decides to continue this mission after killing the Fisher King and claiming the title for himself. In "Aquaman" vol. 8 #7, Manta appears at a meeting of the N.E.M.O board in Venice, Italy, where he kills those who oppose his rule as the Fisher King and commands the Shaggy Man to attack Atlantis. Later, Manta oversees N.E.M.O's usage of Atlantean pretender forces against the U.S, which prompts the nation to declare war on Atlantis. After a team of American Aquamarines, super soldiers who can take on the form of sharks and other aquatic creatures, fails to assassinate Aquaman, the Atlantean king attacks Black Manta on his ship in the Azores in issue #15. Rather than surrender, Black Manta blows up the ship and all aboard, but Aquaman and Blackjack escape.


title: Black Manta

text: It is revealed that Manta survived the explosion, perhaps with the help of Blackjack, and has become obsessed with finding his illegitimate son Jackson Hyde, who has joined the Teen Titans. Manta's desire to find him stems from his remembrance of a lost relic with power over the sea itself, The Black Pearl, a weapon which can bend the very oceans to the user's whim, which once belonged to a notorious Atlantean pirate who died in Xebel. Knowing only a denizen of Xebel had the map to its keep and only Xebelian hands could unseal it, he nearly murdered Hyde's mother in order to get to him. With his son in tow, Manta and Jackson set out to find his prize, needing his son to unlock the trove that the pearl was sealed in. Eventually, a clash broke out between him and the Teen Titans after achieving his goal and with it, power to dominate the world. He was finally bested by Aqualad, who near fatally electrocuted him before taking the pearl ring from his hand.


title: Black Manta

text: He's later seen having joined up with "The Secret Society", who've recently sent for Deathstroke due to previous misconduct against fellow member Deadline.


title: Black Manta

text: Black Manta possesses a keen scientific mind and is an expert in mechanical engineering and military tactics. Despite being a skilled hand-to-hand combatant and swordsman, he generally relies more on technology and strategic planning than direct physical confrontations.


title: Black Manta

text: As a result of the serum that cured him of his autism, Black Manta possesses some degree of advanced stamina and endurance. He utilizes a nigh-invulnerable battle suit that further enhances his physical strength and durability to superhuman levels, allowing him to lift and throw cars with ease. Due to this, David with his suit can lift an additional 5000 Ibs more than without the suit. This armor is adapted to an oceanic environment, providing complete resistance to deep sea pressures and granting Black Manta the ability to breathe underwater. The suit also includes a jet pack propulsion system that functions in or out of water, a telepathic scrambler, and a wide array of different weapons and gadgets including twin swords, a hand trident, a wrist-mounted speargun on the right arm, a harpoon, deployable miniaturized torpedoes, and a diving helmet that can discharge powerful optic blasts from the eye lenses. Black Manta often uses unique vehicles, such as a modified manta ray-shaped submarine, for traveling underwater.


title: Black Manta

text: At one point, Black Manta was transformed by the demon Neron into a human-manta ray hybrid in exchange for his soul, which allowed him to breathe underwater without the use of his suit. This transformation has since been undone by Aquaman. For a brief time, Black Manta possessed a powerful mystical relic named "The Black Pearl", a powerful Atlantean artifact that allowed him to control the oceans at will.


title: Black Manta

text: Black Manta appeared as one of the major villains in the 2005-2006 "Justice" miniseries by Alex Ross and Jim Krueger as part of the Legion of Doom. This version appears to be based on the time period when Black Manta fought for African Americans as shown by all of his henchmen being black and his city being completely populated by African Americans. He is first seen luring Aquaman into an ambush and controlling Aquaman's sharks into attacking him before taking Aquaman to Brainiac. When Lex Luthor makes his speech to the world to join him in saving it, Black Manta is one of the villains alongside him.


title: Black Manta

text: As the Legion begins kidnapping the people close to the heroes, Black Manta takes control of Garth and forces him to assault Mera and kidnap Aquaman's son. During the Justice League's attack on the Hall of Doom, Black Manta faces off against Aquaman for the entire battle. Black Manta is one of the few villains to escape the Justice League and teleport to his city along with Aquaman's son, who follows behind him. Aquaman eventually finds Black Manta's hideout, but Black Manta's men savagely beat him in front of his son, comparing it to the treatment of his own people. Aquaman counters Black Manta is doing the same by using Doctor Sivana's technology to control his men, smashing the pack on Black Manta's suit to free his henchmen from Black Manta's control. Black Manta realizes that Aquaman was right, but makes one last effort to kill him in desperation. He is quickly struck down by Aquaman, saying that Black Manta never really had a chance to begin with.


title: Black Manta

text: In the alternate timeline of the "Flashpoint" event, Black Manta was an inmate at the Doom prison before the prison break.


title: Black Manta

text: Black Manta is featured in the DC Extended Universe, portrayed by Yahya Abdul-Mateen II. This version is David Kane, a pirate whose grandfather served as a frogman for the U.S. Navy during World War II under the nickname "Manta".


title: Ticker symbol

text: A ticker symbol or stock symbol is an abbreviation used to uniquely identify publicly traded shares of a particular stock on a particular stock market. In short, ticker symbols are arrangements of symbols or characters (generally Latin letters or digits) representing specific assets or securities listed on a stock exchange or traded publicly. A stock symbol may consist of letters, numbers, or a combination of both. "Ticker symbol" refers to the symbols that were printed on the ticker tape of a ticker tape machine.


title: Ticker symbol

text: Stock symbols are unique identifiers assigned to each security traded on a particular market. A stock symbol can consist of letters, numbers, or a combination of both, and is a way to uniquely identify that stock. The symbols were kept as short as possible to reduce the number of characters that had to be printed on the ticker tape, and to make it easy to recognize by traders and investors.


title: Ticker symbol

text: The allocation of symbols and formatting conventions is specific to each stock exchange. In the US, for example, stock tickers are typically between 1 and 4 letters and represent the company name where possible. For example, US-based computer company stock Apple Inc. traded on the NASDAQ exchange has the symbol AAPL, while the motor company Ford's stock that is traded on the New York Stock Exchange has the single-letter ticker F. In Europe, most exchanges use three-letter codes; for example, Dutch consumer goods company Unilever traded on the Amsterdam Euronext exchange has the symbol UNA. In Asia, numbers are often used as stock tickers to avoid issues for international investors when using non-Latin scripts. For example, the bank HSBC's stock traded on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange has the ticker symbol 0005.


title: Ticker symbol

text: Symbols sometimes change to reflect mergers. Prior to the 1999 merger with Mobil Oil, Exxon used a phonetic spelling of the company "XON" as its ticker symbol. The symbol of the firm after the merger was "XOM". Symbols are sometimes reused. In the US the single-letter symbols are particularly sought after as vanity symbols. For example, since March of 2008 Visa Inc. has used the symbol V that had previously been used by Vivendi which had delisted and given up the symbol.


title: Ticker symbol

text: To fully qualify a stock, both the ticker and the exchange or country of listing needs to be known. On many systems both must be specified to uniquely identify the security. This is often done by appending the location or exchange code to the ticker.


title: Ticker symbol

text: Although stock tickers identify a security, they are exchange dependent, generally limited to stocks and can change. These limitations have led to the development of other codes in financial markets to identify securities for settlement purposes. The most prevalent of these is the International Securities Identifying Number (ISIN). An ISIN uniquely identifies a security and its structure is defined in ISO 6166. Securities for which ISINs are issued include bonds, commercial paper, stocks, and warrants. The ISIN code is a 12-character alpha-numerical code that does not contain information characterizing financial instruments, but serves for uniform identification of a security at trading and settlement.


title: Ticker symbol

text: The ISIN identifies the security, not the exchange (if any) on which it trades; it is therefore not a replacement for the ticker symbol. For instance, Daimler AG stock trades on twenty-two different stock exchanges worldwide, and is priced in five different currencies; it has the same ISIN on each (DE0007100000), though not the same ticker symbol. ISIN cannot specify a particular trade in this case, and another identifier, typically the three- or four-letter exchange code (such as the Market Identifier Code) will have to be specified in addition to the ISIN.


title: Ticker symbol

text: While usually a stock ticker identifies a security that can be traded, stock market indices are also sometimes assigned a symbol, even though they can generally not be traded. Symbols for indices are usually distinguished by adding a symbol in front of the name, such as a circumflex (or 'caret') or a dot. For example, Reuters lists the Nasdaq Composite index under the symbol ".IXIC".


title: Ticker symbol

text: 3 character base symbol with the first and third character being alphanumeric and the second alphabetic. ETFs, ETMFs can be either 3 or 4 characters. Exchange-traded warrants and exchange-traded options are 6 characters. ETOs can have numbers in the sixth character.


title: Ticker symbol

text: In Canada the Toronto Stock Exchange TSX and the TSXV use the following special codes after the ticker symbol:


title: Ticker symbol

text: In the United Kingdom, prior to 1996, stock codes were known as EPICs, named after the London Stock Exchange's Exchange Price Information Computer (e.g.: "MKS" for Marks and Spencer). Following the introduction of the Sequence trading platform in 1996, EPICs were renamed Tradable Instrument Display Mnemonics (TIDM), but they are still widely referred to as EPICs. Stocks can also be identified using their SEDOL (Stock Exchange Daily Official List) number or their ISIN (International Securities Identification Number).


title: Ticker symbol

text: In the United States, modern letter-only ticker symbols were developed by Standard & Poor's (S&P) to bring a national standard to investing. Previously, a single company could have many different ticker symbols as they varied between the dozens of individual stock markets. The term "ticker" refers to the noise made by the ticker tape machines once widely used by stock exchanges.


title: Ticker symbol

text: The S&P system was later standardized by the securities industry and modified as years passed. Stock symbols for preferred stock have not been standardized.


title: Ticker symbol

text: Some companies use a well-known product as their ticker symbol. Belgian brewer AB InBev, the brewer of Budweiser beer, uses "BUD" (symbolizing its premier product in the United States) as its three-letter ticker for American Depository Receipts. Its rival, the Molson Coors Brewing Company, uses a similarly beer-related symbol, "TAP". Likewise, Southwest Airlines pays tribute to its headquarters at Love Field in Dallas through its "LUV" symbol. Cedar Fair Entertainment Company, which operates large amusement parks in the United States, uses "FUN" as its symbol. Harley-Davidson uses "HOG", an abbreviation for the corporate-sponsored Harley Owners Group. Yamana Gold uses "AUY", because on the periodic table of elements, "Au" is the symbol for gold. Sotheby's (the famous auction house) uses the symbol "BID". Petco uses the symbol "WOOF," a reference to the sound made by dogs.


title: Ticker symbol

text: While most symbols come from the company's name, sometimes it happens the other way around. Tricon Global, owner of KFC, Pizza Hut and Taco Bell, adopted the symbol "YUM" to represent its corporate mission when the company was spun out of PepsiCo in 1997. In 2002, the company changed its name to match its symbol, adopting the name Yum! Brands.


title: Ticker symbol

text: Symbols sometimes change to reflect mergers. Prior to the 1999 merger with Mobil, Exxon used a phonetic spelling of the company "XON" as its ticker symbol. The symbol of the firm after the merger was "XOM". After Hewlett-Packard merged with Compaq, the new firm took on the ticker symbol "HPQ". (The former symbols were HWP and CPQ.) AT&T's ticker symbol is simply "T"; accordingly, the company is referred to simply as "Telephone" on Wall Street (the T symbol is so well known that when the company was purchased by SBC, it took the AT&T name, capitalizing on its history and keeping the desired single letter symbol).


title: Ticker symbol

text: Formerly, a glance at a U.S. stock symbol and its appended codes would allow an investor to determine where a stock trades; however in July 2007, the SEC approved a rule change allowing companies moving from the New York Stock Exchange to the Nasdaq to retain their three-letter symbols; DirecTV was one of the first companies to make this move. When first implemented, the rule change did not apply to companies with one or two-letter symbols, but subsequently any stock was able to move from the NYSE to the Nasdaq without changing its symbol. CA Technologies, which traded under the symbol CA before it was acquired in 2018, moved from the NYSE to the Nasdaq in April 2008 and kept its two-letter symbol.


title: Ticker symbol

text: In countries where Arabic script is used, and in East Asia, transliterated Latin script versions of company names may be confusing to an unpracticed Western reader; stock symbols provide a simple means of clear communication in the workplace. Many Asian countries use numerical or alphanumerical ticker symbols of only digits and Roman letters to facilitate international trade.


title: Izakaya

text: An () is a type of informal Japanese bar that serves alcoholic drinks and snacks. are casual places for after-work drinking, similar to a pub, a Spanish tapas bar, or an American saloon or tavern.


title: Izakaya

text: The word entered the English language by 1987. It is a compound word consisting of ("to stay") and ("sake shop"), indicating that originated from sake shops that allowed customers to sit on the premises to drink. are sometimes called ('red lantern') in daily conversation, as such paper lanterns are traditionally found in front of them.


title: Izakaya

text: Anecdotes and songs that appear in the show that -style establishments existed in Japan at the early 700s. There is a record dating to 733 when rice was collected as a brewing fee tax under the jurisdiction of the government office called . In the , written in 797, there is a record of who got drunk and was murdered in a tavern in 761.


title: Izakaya

text: The full-scale development of began around the Edo period (1603-1867). At liquor stores that used to sell alcohol by weight, people began to drink alcohol while standing. Gradually, some began using sake barrels as stools for their customers, and gradually began to offer simple snacks called . Historian Penelope Francks points to the development of the in Japan, especially in Edo and along main roads throughout the country, as one indicator of the growing popularity of sake as a consumer good by the late 1700s.


title: Izakaya

text: An in Tokyo made international news in 1962, when Robert F. Kennedy ate there during a meeting with Japanese labor leaders.


title: Izakaya

text: Depending on the , customers either sit on tatami mats and dine from low tables, as in the traditional Japanese style, or sit on chairs and dine from tables. Many offer a choice of both as well as seating by the bar. Some restaurants are also style, literally translated as "drinking while standing".


title: Izakaya

text: Usually, customers are given an (wet towel) to clean their hands; the towels are cold in summer and hot in winter. Next, a tiny appetizer, called an in the Tokyo area or in the Osaka-Kobe area, is served. It is local custom and usually charged onto the bill "in lieu" of an entry fee.


title: Izakaya

text: The menu may be on the table, displayed on walls, or both. Picture menus are common in larger . Food and drink are ordered throughout the course of the session as desired. They are brought to the table, and the bill is added up at the end of the session. Unlike other Japanese styles of eating, food items are usually shared by everyone at the table, similar to Spanish tapas.


title: Izakaya

text: Common styles of dining in Japan are ("all you can drink") and ("all you can eat"). For a set price per person, customers can continue ordering as much food and/or drink as they wish, usually with a time limit of two or three hours.


title: Izakaya

text: Some establishments offer a bottle keep service, where a patron can purchase an entire bottle of liquor (usually or whisky) and store the unfinished portion for a future visit.


title: Izakaya

text: food is usually more substantial than tapas or "mezze". Many items are designed to be shared. Example menu items may include:


title: Izakaya

text: Rice dishes such as and noodle dishes such as are sometimes eaten at the end to round off a drinking session. For the most part, Japanese customers do not eat rice or noodles ("staple food") at the same time as they drink alcohol, since sake, brewed from rice, traditionally takes the place of rice in a meal.


title: Izakaya

text: were traditionally down-to-earth places where men drank sake and beer after work. However, modern customers are more likely to include independent women and students. Many today cater to a more diverse clientele by offering cocktails and wines as well as a sophisticated interior. Chain are often large and offer an extensive selection of food and drink, allowing them to host big, sometimes rowdy, parties. Watami, Shoya, Shirokiya, Tsubohachi, and Murasaki are some well known chains in Japan.


title: Izakaya

text: Cosplay became popular in the 2000s. The staff wear costumes and wait on customers. In some establishments, shows are performed. Costumes include those for butlers and maids.


title: Izakaya

text: Establishments specialising in are called . They usually take the form of street stalls with seating and are popular in winter.


title: Izakaya

text: appear in Japanese novels with adaptations to TV drama and film. They have also inspired manga and . A modern novel, is an example where the main character manages an ; in the film adaptation, Ken Takakura played the part of Chōji. A TV drama was produced in 1992 on Friday Drama Theater, Fuji Television. Another film, , starring Kenichi Hagiwara, is a comical ghost story; a typical in Yokohama is run by the owner, his new wife and the ghost of his former wife.


title: Izakaya

text: Images of in novels and films reflect the modern drinking and dining style of today sitting at tables. This was not often seen in countryside, aside from station towns along highways in the 17th to mid-19th century. Capacities at were restricted in major cities in the period that TV shows and films/movies set in Edo.


title: Izakaya

text: The 2006 manga series depicts the manager of a 12-seat in Shinjuku, Tokyo, that only opens from 12pm to 7am. The manga was later turned into a TV show, which was widely distributed throughout Asia and the internationally on Netflix, followed by two films. There were also several remakes made in countries such as China and Korea.


title: Izakaya

text: The 2012 manga series (Alternate World Bar "Nobu") depicted a new whose front door opened to a parallel world, vaguely reminiscent of 15th century Germany. The featured a wide range of food and drinks from Japan. An anime adaptation premiered in 2018 and a live-action adaptation premiered in 2020.


title: Andy Ngo

text: Andy Cuong Ngo ( ; born ) is an American conservative journalist, author, and right-wing social media influencer known for covering and video-recording demonstrators. He is the editor-at-large of "The Post Millennial", a Canadian conservative news website. A regular guest on Fox News, Ngo has published columns in the "New York Post" and "The Wall Street Journal".


title: Andy Ngo

text: Ngo's coverage of antifa and Muslims has been controversial, and the accuracy and credibility of his reporting have been disputed by other journalists. He has been frequently accused of sharing misleading or selective material and described as a provocateur.


title: Andy Ngo

text: Ngo was born and raised in Portland, Oregon. His parents fled Vietnam in 1978 as Vietnamese boat people after they had been forced into labor and re-education camps by the communist government. His mother came from an educated middle-class family that ran a jewelry business. His father had been a police officer in a small coastal town in Vietnam. His parents first met amid a six-month stay at a United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees camp near Tanjungpinang, Indonesia, prior to their arrival in the United States in 1979.


title: Andy Ngo

text: Raised in a Buddhist family, Ngo converted to Christianity in high school. After a period of time as an evangelical Christian, he became disillusioned and took an interest in skepticism. He subsequently became an atheist and was strongly against organized religion, which was reflected in his social media activity in the form of what Ngo later described as "inflammatory language", with Reddit comments such as "Islam needs to be neutered like Christianity". In 2019, Ngo said that his earlier social media activity "represented my simplistic views at the time" and that his comments no longer represented his beliefs.


title: Andy Ngo

text: While attending the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), Ngo volunteered with AmeriCorps. He graduated from UCLA in 2009 with a graphic design degree. After graduation, he experienced a period of unemployment and worked as a photographer at a used car dealership. In the mid-2010s, Ngo came out as gay while visiting relatives in rural Vietnam. He began volunteering as a photographer at the Center for Inquiry in Portland in 2013.


title: Andy Ngo

text: In 2015, Ngo enrolled in a master's program at Portland State University for political science, with a focus on international relations and comparative politics. While attending the school, he joined the Freethinkers of Portland State University, a student organization that worked closely with professor Peter Boghossian.


title: Andy Ngo

text: Ngo has been described by critics as a disciple of James O'Keefe, the founder of Project Veritas, a right-wing activist group.


title: Andy Ngo

text: While enrolled at Portland State University (PSU), Ngo worked as a multimedia editor at the "Portland State Vanguard", a student newspaper. In 2016, he reported on a demonstration organized by Don't Shoot Portland in which a man pulled a gun on a crowd of protesters.


title: Andy Ngo

text: In 2017, Ngo drew national attention after he was fired from the "Vanguard" and accused the newspaper of firing him over his conservative political beliefs. He attended an April 26 interfaith panel at the university, then used his personal account to tweet a video clip of a Muslim student's remarks. In the clip, the student states, in part, "in a Muslim country, in a country based on the Koranic laws, disbelieving, or being an infidel, is not allowed so you will be given the choice [to leave]." Alongside the video, Ngo wrote: "At @Portland_State interfaith panel today, the Muslim student speaker said that apostates will be killed or banished in an Islamic state." "Breitbart News" picked up and circulated the video within 24 hours of Ngo's posting, which led to a "social media firestorm". Four days later, the "Vanguards" editor, Colleen Leary, fired Ngo and stated that he was dismissed because his summary of the Muslim student's remarks reflected a reckless oversimplification and violation of journalistic ethics, and was meant to incite a reaction. She said that the dismissal was "not partisan".


title: Andy Ngo

text: In May 2017, Ngo wrote an op-ed for the "National Review" on the subject titled "Fired for Reporting the Truth". He also took part in online discussions about the incident on the pro-Donald Trump subreddit /r/The Donald, where he called the firing part of a "trend towards self-censorship in the name of political correctness". Leary reported that since the incident did not receive much attention on campus, it left her with questions about the relationship between "Breitbart News" and Ngo. Ngo has said that he did not contact "Breitbart News" about his tweet.


title: Andy Ngo

text: With his student group the Freethinkers of PSU, Ngo helped organize a January 2017 campus event with Dave Rubin, Peter Boghossian, and Christina Hoff Sommers. According to Ngo, Rose City Antifa used social media to launch a phone campaign aimed at administrators in an unsuccessful effort to shut down the event.


title: Andy Ngo

text: Ngo and the Freethinkers of PSU hosted several speakers at a campus event on February 17, 2018, that included the headliner James Damore, a former Google engineer and author of "Google's Ideological Echo Chamber", an internal memo on diversity and gender that the company fired him for after they determined it was discriminatory and had elements that constituted sexual harassment. The day before the event, Ngo wrote an op-ed in "The Wall Street Journal" in which he stated that there had been threats of violence against the event on Facebook and Twitter, which had led campus police to deny organizers' request for a larger venue to accommodate the expected crowd. During the event, a portion of the audience walked out in protest, and one protester attempted to vandalize the audio system on her way out. Jason Wilson of "The Guardian" stated that the Damore event was one of several that appeared to have been "calculated to provoke Portland's progressive activists" and that Ngo's widely circulated videos fit into a pattern of actions where Ngo had "shrewdly inserted" his coverage "into the workings of the rightwing outrage machine" several times within the preceding year. Afterwards, Ngo wrote an article about the incident for "Quillette", and the story was covered by YouTuber and political commentator Tim Pool.


title: Andy Ngo

text: As a PSU graduate student, Ngo filmed a talk on March 5, 2018, at Lewis & Clark Law School in Portland by Christina Hoff Sommers, a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute known for her criticism of the women's movement. The event was disrupted by student protesters engaging in no platforming tactics, who forced the talk to end early. Ngo posted photos and video clips of students gathering on the stage and drowning out Sommers' talk with chanting and music. Ngo, who had covered protests at several talks given by Sommers, expressed interest in what he called "illiberal reactions" which he said restrict freedom of thought or behavior.


title: Andy Ngo

text: On August 29, 2018, Ngo wrote an op-ed titled "A Visit to Islamic England" for "The Wall Street Journal". In the article, Ngo described his experiences in two neighborhoods in East London, including visits to a mosque and an Islamic center. From these experiences, he concluded that London was afflicted with "failed multiculturalism". He mistakenly connected alcohol-free zones in parts of London to the Muslim-majority populations, subsequently issuing a correction acknowledging that alcohol-free zones "appear in many English neighborhoods, irrespective of Muslim population." Ngo's opinion piece was widely said to have been Islamophobic. Alex Lockie from "Business Insider" criticized Ngo's article for "fear monger[ing] around England's Muslim population" and cherry-picking evidence, and for mischaracterizing the neighborhood near the East London Mosque. Steve Hopkins from "HuffPost" stated that "some of his [Ngo's] assertions have already been disproved".


title: Andy Ngo

text: In October 2018, Ngo started a podcast entitled "Things You Should Ngo". His interviewees included Jordan Peterson, Dave Rubin and Carl Benjamin (who uses the pen name "Sargon of Akkad" online).


title: Andy Ngo

text: In 2017, Ngo began filming rallies held by Patriot Prayer, a Portland-area far-right group known for holding pro-gun, pro-Trump rallies that have devolved into violence and street fighting. The Patriot Prayer gatherings (whose early rallies were used by white nationalists as recruitment events) were met by Portland's anti-fascists and anarchists known to support direct action, including violence. November 2018, Ngo live-streamed video coverage of the Him Too rally organized by a Patriot Prayer member in downtown Portland, and was sprayed with silly string and harassed by antifa protesters. By 2019, Ngo routinely attended and live-streamed events at Portland protests.


title: Andy Ngo

text: On May 1, 2019, Ngo attended demonstrations and counter protests in Portland associated with International Workers Day or May Day. He reported being punched and blasted with bear spray while filming two separate May Day events, including a brawl between left-wing activists and members of Patriot Prayer, outside the Cider Riot pub. Bellingcat stated that Ngo's tweets framed the brawl as an unprovoked assault by anti-fascists. Prior to the fight, Ngo was filmed standing in the presence of members of Patriot Prayer as they planned an attack on antifascists following the protests. Ngo did not report on the actions of Patriot Prayer. Five members of Patriot Prayer were charged with felony riot incitement for their actions on May Day 2019, including the group's leader Joey Gibson.


title: Andy Ngo

text: On June 29, 2019, Ngo covered protests at a rally organized by the far-right group Proud Boys in Portland. A group of counter-protesters also organized, some of whom physically attacked Ngo, who was present filming. Ngo was punched in the head, kicked and hit with at least one milkshake. He blamed his injuries on antifa counter-protesters. No individual attackers were identified. He walked away and reported what happened in a livestream, during which a medic arrived to check on him. The video of the June 29 incident where Ngo was assaulted by masked demonstrators went viral and led the Proud Boys, a group designated as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center, to organize a follow up event in Portland known as the End Domestic Terrorism rally for August 17, 2019.