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It was just 18 months ago that Daniel Noboa, 37, won Ecuador’s presidency, becoming the youngest man ever elected to the office.

Now, on Sunday, he faces the polls once more.

This time, however, a bigger prize is at play: a full four-year term in the presidential palace. Since Noboa’s last victory was in a snap election, he has been limited to serving out the remainder of his predecessor’s term.

In Sunday’s race, Noboa will face off against 15 contenders, including left-wing lawmaker Luisa Gonzalez, his main competition in the last election. The outcome of his so-called brief presidency is likely to be decided by the vote.

Noboa spearheaded several initiatives that expanded the scope of law enforcement, sometimes at the expense of oversight and civil liberties, when she took office. However, high levels of organized crime and violence have persisted in Ecuador.

Who are the candidates? What issues are voters’ primary concerns? What can polls reveal about the status of race, then? In this brief explanation, we answer all of those questions.

What is Ecuador’s voting process?

On Sunday, February 9, there will be the first round of voting. A candidate must have a 10-point advantage over the candidate in second place in order to win with all or more of the vote, or at least 40 percent of the vote.

On April 13th, a second round of voting will feature the top two candidates if a candidate does not pass that threshold in the first round.

Is there only one job available in the presidency?

No. This is a general election. The 151-member National Assembly will also have open seats for all members, and those elected to the legislature will also have four-year terms.

Why has Noboa’s term in office been so short?

President Noboa was first elected in October 2023 after his predecessor Guillermo Lasso, faced with impeachment proceedings, invoked a constitutional mechanism known as the “muerte cruzada” or “crossed death”.

No previous president had used the Muerte Cruz. Not only did it end Lasso’s term, but it also dissolved Ecuador’s legislature, triggering snap elections.

At the time, Noboa was a first-term member of the National Assembly, and he was among the elected officials affected by the muerte cruzada.

Noboa, the heir to a banana-business family, eventually founded his own party and ran for president, winning in a close race that made it to the second round. He was 35 years old at the time.

He then completed what would have been the remainder of Lasso’s term, a period of 18 months. Now, he is seeking a full four-year term of his own.

What do the polls say?

A sizable field of candidates will challenge Noboa. However, Luisa Gonzalez is likely to be his main rival, despite the fact that he lost to her in 2023 by less than four points.

Gonzalez represents the Citizen Revolution, a left-leaning organization that was founded by Rafael Correa.

Most polls indicate Noboa is in the lead but not enough to avoid a run-off. The election will likely move on to a second round, which pits Noboa against Gonzalez, just like it did in 2023.

Polls show no other candidate with enough support to challenge the frontrunners, but pre-election polling doesn’t always tell the whole story. Before the first round of voting in 2023, Noboa himself figuratively lacked voter intention registration.

Who else is running?

Some familiar faces are in the lineup. Jan Topic, a right-wing businessman who ran in 2023, is competing again, reprising his call for iron-fisted – or “mano dura” – policies to combat crime.

Leonidas Iza, president of the country’s powerful Indigenous confederation CONAIE, is also a returning candidate. He campaigned for greater sovereignty and opportunities for indigenous peoples and was a well-known critic of former President Lasso.

Another candidate is likely to serve as a reminder of Ecuador’s struggles with violence.

In 2023, the presidential race was rocked when an anticorruption candidate, Fernando Villavicencio, was shot and killed after leaving a rally, shortly before the vote. He had aimed to draw attention to the link between government corruption and organized crime.

His former running mate, Andrea Gonzalez, will be in the race on Sunday.

What are the results of the polls regarding the National Assembly?

The Noboa and Gonzalez parties take the lead over the rest of the field in the race for control of the legislature.

Most polls in January showed Noboa’s National Democratic Action (ADN) party leading Gonzalez’s Citizen Revolution (RC) by varying margins. In just one poll, the RC surpassed the ADN by about three points.

Currently, the National Assembly has 137 spots, and Citizen Revolution holds the most seats of any single party: 48. But after Sunday’s election, the National Assembly will expand to 151 seats, and Noboa’s party is expected to make significant gains.

What issues are most important to voters?

A number of issues have come up as top priorities in recent polls, including the rising cost of living, a lack of good economic opportunities, and a number of electrical blackouts that have hampered locals’ lives.

However, a survey conducted by the data provider Comunicaliza in January found that crime and insecurity are two issues that stand out above all others. It outranked the second-highest concern, the lack of employment opportunities, by about 14 points.

According to Ivan Briscoe, an expert on Latin American politics at the International Crisis Group, “this is concern number one” in survey after survey, it has been proven.

Why is it that Ecuador has such a problem with violence?

Ecuador was once perceived as a safer and more stable nation than other South American nations. In a region otherwise known for cocaine trafficking and cultivation, it gained the reputation of an “island of peace.”

The nation has been shocked by an increase in violence and organized crime in recent years, though.

“Ecuador had 7, 000 murders last year with a population of 18 million people, making it the highest murder rate in South America. And that’s in a country which for decades was known as a peaceful country”, Briscoe said.

“It throws a light on the state’s inability to respond, but also raises the question of the complicity of state officials in criminal ventures and, thus, the scale of corruption”.

Ecuador sits on the Pacific coast between Colombia and Peru, the world’s largest producers of cocaine.

In the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic, experts say drug-trafficking groups started to push into Ecuador’s territory, seeking to take advantage of the country’s ports.

Many young people in Ecuador were left without jobs and vulnerable to recruitment from criminal networks as a result of the pandemic.

Noboa has held his predecessors accountable for allowing the growth of cocaine in Ecuador. In October, his government announced that the production of coca – the raw ingredient for the drug – was detected on approximately 2, 000 hectares (4, 942 acres) of land.

What solutions have been put forward?

Voters have largely believed in harsh solutions.

For instance, the nation voted largely in favor of reforms that would formalize the military’s role in public security and impose harsher penalties for crimes like drug trafficking in April.

Noboa has publicly stated his desire to impose stricter civil laws in order to advance security.

Noboa declared a state of internal armed conflict in January 2024, expanding the scope of the military’s influence on law enforcement activities and declaring that the nation was “at war” with criminal organizations.

Thus far, the results have been mixed. The murder rate is still significantly higher than it was before the pandemic, despite a slight decline in 2024.

Additionally, allegations of abuses have surfaced that raise questions about the military’s growing authority. In one case, Guayaquil’s port city of Guayaquil’s surveillance footage showed a military truck kidnapping four teenagers. Later, charred remains were discovered close to a military installation.

But Briscoe said that, for the time being, Ecuadorean politics is dominated by tough-on-crime rhetoric and ideas.

Nobody will recommend engaging in negotiations with criminal organizations. That is not on the agenda of any candidate”, he said.

He added, however, that addressing the root causes of crime in Ecuador would not be enough.

“When you can’t leave your house because of crime, you will want the state to respond”, he said.

A task force has been established under the leadership of United States President Donald Trump to combat what he called “anti-Christian bias” within the government.

Trump made the announcement on Thursday at the annual gathering of government leaders and religious organizations in Washington, DC.

Trump&nbsp stated in his speech that he would designate US Attorney General Pam Bondi to lead the effort and that he would sign an executive order later in the day.

The Department of Justice (DOJ) and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), two other government entities that may be subject to scrutiny as a result of the effort, he also referred to.

“The mission of this task force will be to immediately hold all forms of anti-Christian targeting and discrimination within the federal government, including at the DOJ, which was absolutely terrible, the IRS, the FBI and other agencies”, Trump said.

Bondi added that he would work to “peace the rights of Christians and religious believers all over the world and to fully prosecute anti-Christian violence and vandalism in our society.”

Trump’s proposed executive action may raise questions about the separation of church and state, even though it did not provide examples of what constitutes “anti-Christian bias.”

Under the First Amendment of the US Constitution, the government protects freedom of religion.

Legal experts have frequently cited the “establishment clause” of that amendment as outlawing the government from imposing or promoting religious beliefs. It states that no law shall be passed by Congress “shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion.”

However, some evangelical supporters claim that the US government system is inseparably shaped by Christianity. Throughout his presidential campaigns, Trump has cultivated that interest.

On Thursday, Trump urged Americans to “bring God back” into their lives. He also announced the establishment of a commission on religious liberty, along with the new task force.

“If we don’t have religious liberty, then we don’t have a free country”, Trump said.

After two unsuccessful assassination attempts last year, he said it “changed” him and that religion had also helped him.

“I feel even stronger”, Trump, a nondenominational Christian, said. “I believed in God, but I feel, I feel much more strongly about it. Something happened”.

Trump later said, “It was God that saved me,” at a second prayer breakfast that was organized by a private group.

He also took aim at his predecessor, Democratic President Joe Biden, accusing him of “persecution” for his administration’s prosecution of anti-abortion rights advocates accused of blockading reproductive healthcare clinics.

Trump’s new task force on “anti-Christian bias” has already drawn criticism.

“Rather than protecting religious beliefs, this task force will misuse religious freedom to justify bigotry, discrimination, and the subversion of our civil rights laws”, Rachel Laser, the president of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, said.

Andrew Seidel, a lawyer at the Freedom From Religion Foundation, also questioned the motivation behind the new task force.

In a post on X, he wrote, “This task force is not a response to Christian persecution; it’s an attempt to restore their declining Christian privilege and supremacy.”

In this nation, Christians still make up the majority. In Congress and essentially every other government institution, they are overrepresented. But the demographics are shifting. Rapidly. And that’s precisely why we are seeing this rise of Christian Nationalism”.

Several religious leaders have already come into conflict with President Trump and his administration. The day after his second inauguration, for instance, Trump attended a sermon delivered by Reverend Mariann Budde at the Washington National Cathedral, where she called for “mercy” for members of the LGBTQ+ community and undocumented immigrants.

On his online platform Truth Social, Trump later called Budde a “Radical Left hardline Trump hater.”

Catholic Vice President JD Vance has also had a conversation with the top US pastors in his own church about immigration issues. Concerns have been raised by other clergy in the nation about having churches removed from lists of places that were previously protected from immigration enforcement.

The Congo River Alliance’s leader, which includes the M23, is wanted on international arrest warrants for war crimes and treason, according to a military court in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

According to a report released on Thursday, Corneille Nangaa’s arrest warrant was made for massacres it claimed he carried out in eastern DRC’s North Kivu and, more recently, South Kivu regions, which are crimes under both international and domestic law.

Nangaa is being detained wherever he may be located and transported to Congolese territory by the court.

Two weeks ago, when the M23 fighters launched a major offensive against government forces in Goma, a city of two million people in eastern DRC, violence broke out.

According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, at least 2,800 people died in Goma as a result of the violence on Wednesday.

Additionally, many people have fled to neighboring Rwanda, including staff from international organizations like the UN and the World Bank, with thousands of others having already been displaced.

Three of its local employees were killed in a recent attack in Rutshutu Territory, which the M23 fighters had earlier taken control of, according to Swiss Church Aid on Thursday. The aid group, also known as HEKS/EPER, did not say who was responsible for their deaths.

After fighting the Congolese army for Goma’s control, the M23 declared a ceasefire on Monday. &nbsp, But on Wednesday, it seized control of Nyabibwe, a mining town in eastern DRC’s South Kivu province, in an apparent violation of the unilateral ceasefire.

Eight people, including local officials, a civil society representative, rebels and an international security source, confirmed that Nyabibwe had fallen to the rebels.

The M23 rebels, according to DRC communications minister Patrick Muyaya, were facing opposition from Congolese armed forces close to Nyabibwe because they broke the ceasefire at night.

Worse humanitarian situation

UN human rights experts expressed concern about the worsening humanitarian situation in the eastern DRC on Thursday as a result of the renewed fighting.

They criticised reports of indiscriminate attacks, targeted killings, conflict-related sexual violence, forced conscription and arbitrary arrests of displaced persons.

As the humanitarian crisis in eastern DRC escalates, displaced people have no safe haven left, they said in a statement, highlighting the disproportionate impact on women and girls.

They also highlighted severe shortages of food, shelter, electricity and drinking water, warning of the increased risk of disease outbreaks.

Speaking to reporters at UN headquarters in New York on Thursday, UN chief Antonio Guterres, told reporters that the situation is “deeply concerning”.

“We are at the pivotal moment and it’s time to rally together for peace”, he said.

“Sussuring thousands of people’s homes have been forced out, and thousands have been killed.” Additionally, other armed groups, whether domestic or foreign, continue to threaten us. There is a significant human toll caused by everything.

In response to reports of potential war crimes committed during the Battle for Goma, international criminal court prosecutors have also stated that they were closely monitoring events.

President of Rwanda, Paul Kagame, stated on Wednesday that he and European Council head Antonio Costa had discussed the situation in eastern DRC and that they “agreed on the necessity of effective de-escalation and a resolution to the conflict that… guarantees lasting peace.”

He and his DRC counterpart, Tshisekedi, are due to attend a summit of the eight-country East African Community and 16-member Southern African Development Community in the Tanzanian city of Dar-es-Salaam on Saturday.

Iran: President Trump has quickly resurrended his pressure campaign against Iran while reiterating his opposition to Tehran’s nuclear program.

Unsurprisingly, Iranian authorities have indicated that they don’t plan to capitulate and that they have left room for dialogue despite the country’s official policy of not pursuing a nuclear bomb.

Let’s examine the complex situation in place almost seven years after Trump first pursued the “maximum pressure,” a policy Tehran maintains has failed.

What did Trump’s White House remarks about Iran suggest?

Trump asserted on Tuesday that he was reluctant to approve a new pressure campaign against Iran for unspecified reasons, but he also promised to raise Iranian oil sanctions to “zero.”

He added that Iran’s only concern is that it doesn’t get nuclear weapons.

Trump responded to questions about alleged Iranian retaliation for ordering the murder of top general Qassem Soleimani in 2020, saying he has given instructions for Iran to be “obliterated” if he is expelled.

The US president put his new maximum pressure on Iran policy under the sign of a presidential memorandum on national security on Tuesday. The memorandum lacked many details on what “maximum pressure” would entail, but Trump hinted that the measures would be tough, saying he was “torn” and “unhappy” about signing it, and adding that he hoped “that it’s not going to have to be used in any great measure at all”.

Trump unilaterally abdicated Iran’s nuclear deal with the world powers in May 2018, in exchange for lifting some sanctions and suspending others.

Nuclear-peace agreement

The US president stated in a statement on his Truth Social account that he wants Iran to be a great, prosperous nation without nuclear weapons.

“Reports that the United States, working in conjunction with Israel, is going to blow Iran into smithereens, ARE GREATLY EXAGGERATED”, the post reads.

A “nuclear peace agreement” that would cause celebrations throughout the Middle East was also mentioned by him.

The&nbsp, Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), the landmark accord signed between Iran and the P5+1 (US, China, Russia, United Kingdom, France and Germany) in 2015 after years of negotiations, put tough limits on Iran’s nuclear programme in exchange for the lifting of United Nations sanctions.

It put a uranium enrichment cap of 3.67 percent on Iran, vastly restricted its stockpile of low-enriched uranium, limited deployment of centrifuges to first-generation IR-1 models, and converted the key Fordow enrichment plant into a research centre. It also introduced heavy water and plutonium restrictions, banned new enrichment facilities, and envisioned one of the most stringent nuclear inspection regimes worldwide.

Trump, cheered on by Israel and its Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, unilaterally withdrew from the deal without offering a replacement, and imposed the harshest-ever US sanctions on Iran.

Washington can apply what pressure more?

The sweeping sanctions imposed during Trump’s first term encompassed the entire Iranian economy, and did not let up even during the COVID-19 pandemic, when Iran was hit particularly hard.

The administration of former US President Joe Biden continued to impose the sanctions despite being consistently accused by its Republican rivals of being lax in enforcing them in indirect negotiations to revive the JCPOA, which has since remained comatose but not officially dead. By implementing a “snapback” mechanism in the JCPOA, a significant sunset clause of the agreement expires in October of this year, preventing the US and the European Union from being able to immediately rescind its sanctions.

The sanctions have caused years of uncertainty for the Iranian economy, which was beginning to stabilise after the nuclear agreement.

As a result of widespread inflation, tens of millions of Iranians continue to see their purchasing power decline. This week, the national currency hit new lows of about 840, 000 rials per US dollar in the open market. That rate was lower than 40, 000 rials per US dollar before the sanctions.

A lingering energy crisis that has resulted in sporadic shut downs of important services across Iran has significantly increased levels of air pollution, particularly in the capital.

However, the Trump administration seems determined to impose new designations and strict enforcement of Washington’s sanctions regime, cutting billions more from Iranian accounts.

Potential targets include the so-called “ghost fleet” of Iranian-managed ships, which frequently fly under other states’ flags and are registered in third countries to discretely transport crude oil.

It might even lead to US seizing more vessels, something Iran has called “piracy” and has retaliated against by also seizing them.

Since China has been the biggest buyer of Iranian oil for years, Washington is likely to consider putting even greater pressure on it. But as Trump signals he is ready for another trade war with Beijing, his plans to drive Iranian crude exports to “zero” look far-fetched.

What is Iran signalling?

Iran, one of the world’s largest oil producers, is a founding member of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), which represents some of the world’s largest oil producers. In a meeting with the head of the organization in Tehran on Wednesday, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian urged OPEC members to unite against potential US sanctions.

The centrist president also stated that his administration would try to strengthen ties with neighbors and other partners in order to withstand the sanctions, winning an election in July after Ebrahim Raisi’s death in a helicopter crash.

If Trump only wanted an Iran without a nuclear weapon, according to foreign minister Abbas Araghchi, that is “achievable and not challenging.”

Mohammad Eslami, Iran’s nuclear chief, said Trump’s insistence against a bomb was “stating the obvious”.

“We have declared that we are not pursuing and will not pursue nuclear weapons, and we remain engaged” with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), he said.

Government spokeswoman Fatemeh Mohajerani did not specifically comment about the possibility of direct talks with the US, or a Pezeshian-Trump meeting, only saying Tehran’s foreign policy is based on “three principles of dignity, wisdom and expediency”.

Iran is now enriching up to 60% of the uranium needed for a bomb, a short technical step after years of retaliation against Israeli-sponsored sabotage attacks on its nuclear facilities and Western-backed condemnations issued by the IAEA’s board.

The world’s nuclear watchdog and Western intelligence claim that it also has enough fissile material to make multiple bombs, but it hasn’t attempted to build a nuclear weapon.

Iranian diplomats held consultations with European countries last month to learn more about the nuclear issue and other issues, with both parties agreeing to continue speaking up soon.

In the aftermath of the fall of former President Bashar al-Assad in Syria and the blow it dealt to the Tehran-led “Axis of Resistance”, Iran’s armed forces have been holding large-scale military exercises, which are expected to continue during the coming weeks.

Although the drills primarily focused on air defense, offensive capabilities were also revealed, such as an underground missile base with a range of projectiles capable of reaching Israel, a new drone carrier, and speedboats capable of carrying anti-ship missiles.