People across the northern Caribbean are digging out from the destruction caused by Hurricane Melissa as deaths from the storm climbed.

COMMENTARY Trinidad and Tobago's Persad-Bissessar should be applauded for steering away from Venezuela's Maduro — but questioned for steering into Trump's potential legal whirlpool.

A vote Wednesday softened Washington's isolation on a longstanding issue in the Caribbean while new friction grows around the U.S. military buildup there. The vote was 165-7, with 12 abstentions. Last year, it was 187-2, with "no" votes from the U.S. and Israel and one abstention. Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez told AP that the U.S. mounted a campaign to influence the vote.

Updated: Hurricane Melissa has caused severe flooding and storm surge in Cuba after leaving Jamaica with power outages and killing at least 40 people in Haiti.

The Trump administration asserted without providing any evidence that the boats were carrying illegal drugs. Fourteen boats that the administration alleged were being operated by drug traffickers have been struck, killing 43 people.

An estimated 2,000 Colombian soldiers, like 32-year-old Deivis, have signed up to defend Ukraine against Russia, for life-changing pay. He tells WLRN why he joined the fight, how he lost his leg on the battlefield and his new life playing soccer in Ukraine's "League of the Mighty."

Over the decades, the U.S. government has sent billions of dollars in aid to Colombia to help the country stamp out its cocaine industry. Now President Donald Trump is threatening to cut off aid to Colombia, jeopardizing the longtime antidrug cooperation and other security arrangements, including what analysts say is a covert CIA presence in the country.

The 185 mph winds that Melissa packed on landfall made it the most powerful recorded hurricane to ever hit Jamaica — challenging the mettle of the island's most storm-hardened denizens.

An estimated 2,000 Colombian mercenaries serve on Ukraine's front lines, defending against Russia's aggression. They face death or serious injury on the conflict's brutal battlefields, for pay that could change their lives on the return home. It's also a chance to "defend freedom" and be on the side of the "good guys," they tell WLRN.

Melissa is a monster, and images start to emerge as Melissa moves through the island: landslides, flash floods, storm surge, and violent winds.