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Dr. Candice Fast’s research shows that hidden beliefs between leaders and employees significantly shape workplace performance.

Candice Fast on the Hidden Beliefs That Shape Workplace Performance

By Richard Emblin - February 20, 2026

As Latin American companies confront slowing growth, talent churn and the demands of hybrid work, leadership effectiveness is being redefined. Strategy and charisma are no longer enough. Increasingly, performance hinges on something less visible: the assumptions leaders and employees hold about one another. New doctoral research by Dr. Candice Fast suggests those hidden beliefs – […]

Bogotá is home to some 800,000 exiled Venezuelans. Photo: Richard Emblin

Exiled Venezuelans may well support regime change – but diasporas don’t always reflect the politics

By The Conversation - February 18, 2026

Protest and military action raised the prospect of regime change in Iran and Venezuela, and the voices of both countries’ diasporas were heard loud and clear through the media of their host nations. Venezuelan exiles in the U.S. were, according to the popular narrative, broadly behind President Donald Trump and his plan to “run Venezuela,” […]

Over 130 original paintings and sculptures by Colombia's Fernando Botero are on display in Singapore. Photo: Courtesy: Gardens by the Bay.

Fernando Botero Takes on Singapore with Landmark Exhibition

By Richard Emblin - February 16, 2026

Singapore has never been shy about scale. But this season, the city’s appetite for monumentality takes on a distinctly Latin American accent. For the first time, the work of Colombian master Fernando Botero makes his Singapore debut with the largest exhibition of his work ever showcased in Asia. Spanning galleries, inter-active theatres and extensive public […]

Colombia’s Petro Defies Court Suspension of Minimum Wage Hike

By The City Paper Staff - February 16, 2026

Colombian President Gustavo Petro on Sunday mounted a forceful defence of his government’s 23.7% minimum wage increase for 2026, pledging to issue a temporary decree to keep the so-called “vital wage” in place after the Council of State provisionally suspended the original measure. Speaking in a televised address on Feb. 15, Petro said that while […]

Global airlines return to Venezuela, Avianca restores Bogotá–Caracas flight

By Richard Emblin - February 12, 2026

International airlines are rapidly re-establishing services to Venezuela, signalling a cautious but commercially significant reopening of the country’s aviation market. On Thursday, February 12, Colombia’s Avianca resumed a daily direct flights between Bogotá and Caracas. The move restores one of the most important air corridors in northern South America and comes amid a flurry of […]

Colombia’s Blueberry Boom Is Growing Fast, but Exports Lag

By The City Paper Staff - February 12, 2026

Colombia’s goldenberry symbolized the country’s push into high-value fruit exports. Now, it faces a turf war at home from a fruit with far greater global recognition: the blueberry. While blueberry cultivation has expanded rapidly across Colombia over the past decade, producers say the industry remains far from becoming a fully fledged export powerhouse. Colombia currently […]

Extreme flooding in northern Colombia triggers humanitarian crisis

By The City Paper Staff - February 10, 2026

Unseasonal heavy rains and severe flooding across northern Colombia have created a full-blown humanitarian crisis, displacing hundreds of thousands, destroying homes and farmland, and pushing local infrastructure and health systems to breaking point. The disaster has hit hardest in the department of Córdoba, where officials say 156,000 people have been affected and 80% of the […]

Petro and Trump: What next in U.S.–Colombia relations?

By Richard Emblin - February 9, 2026

Nearly a week after Donald Trump hosted Colombia’s president, Gustavo Petro, at the White House, calm has returned to a bilateral relationship that only recently appeared headed for rupture. The insults have stopped. The social media theatrics have faded. Diplomacy, not spectacle, is back in charge. This alone tells us that both governments have agreed […]

All That Glitters Isn’t Trump Nor Petro

By Richard Emblin - February 5, 2026

Colombian President Gustavo Petro appeared on Tuesday to melt into the gilded woodwork of the Oval Office, wearing a gold tie and an uncharacteristically sober dark suit. Seated beside U.S. President Donald Trump, the two-hour meeting appeared—at least on the surface—to be a cordial encounter between political adversaries entrenched on opposite sides of the ideological […]

A diesel tanker washed ashore in Santa Marta during the tropical storms. Photo: Peter Emblin

Tropical storms batter Colombia’s Caribbean coast, flooding tens of thousands of homes

By Richard Emblin - February 4, 2026

Powerful storm surges and weeks of unusually intense rainfall have triggered widespread flooding across Colombia’s Caribbean coast, affecting more than 50,000 families, damaging homes and infrastructure, and placing hundreds of thousands of livestock at risk, authorities said. The floods have hit the Magdalena River basin and large swathes of northern Colombia, forcing beach closures in […]

Local farmers were first to arrive at the crash site of the Satena flight on Wednesday afternoon. Photo: X

Colombia rules out external factors in SATENA crash as probe opens

By The City Paper Staff - January 30, 2026

Colombian authorities said on Thursday they have found no evidence so far of “external factors” contributing to the crash on Wednesday of a SATENA Beechcraft 1900 aircraft on the Cúcuta–Ocaña route , which killed all 15 people on board. The conclusions were presented during a press conference held at Ocaña airport in the northeastern department […]

Bogotá’s No Car and Motorcycle Day Returns on 5 February

By Richard Emblin - January 29, 2026

On Thursday 5 February, Bogotá will once again ask its citizens to imagine the city differently. For 16 hours, from 5.00 a.m to 9.00 p.m., private cars and motorcycles will largely disappear from the streets as Colombia’s capital marks the 28th edition of its Día Sin Carro y Sin Moto. The annual pause, approved by […]

SATENA flight carrying 15 loses contact over Colombia’s Catatumbo

By Richard Emblin - January 28, 2026

A Beechcraft 1900 aircraft operating a domestic flight for Colombia’s state-owned airline SATENA lost contact with air traffic control on Wednesday while flying over the Catatumbo region in the northeastern department of Norte de Santander, an area heavily affected by armed conflict and the presence of illegal armed groups. In an official statement, SATENA said […]

President Gustavo Petro announced Tuesday that his trip to the White House on February 3 will benefit the "life of humanity". Photo: Presidencia

Colombia’s Petro claims U.S. “kidnapped” Maduro during Caracas strike

By The City Paper Staff - January 28, 2026

Colombian President Gustavo Petro said on Tuesday that Nicolás Maduro should be returned to Venezuela to face trial in his home country, calling the U.S. military operation that captured the ousted leader in Caracas earlier this month a “kidnapping” that violated Venezuelan sovereignty. “They have to return him and have him tried by a Venezuelan […]

Colombia, Ecuador locked in trade dispute as pipeline tariff jumps 900%

By The City Paper Staff - January 27, 2026

Ecuador has sharply increased tariffs on Colombian crude oil transported through its pipeline system, deepening a trade and energy dispute between the two Andean neighbours that has already disrupted electricity exports and bilateral commerce. Ecuador said on Tuesday it had raised the tariff paid by Colombia for each barrel of oil transported through the state-owned […]

As Fighting Engulfs Briceño, Colombia, Schools Forced to Close

By The City Paper Staff - January 26, 2026

The school year had barely begun when gunfire forced children in rural northern Colombia to cower under their desks in fear and silence. On the same day students were returning to classrooms after the Christmas and New Year holidays, fighting between illegal armed groups erupted near Briceño, in the northeast of Antioquia. By nightfall, schools […]