A Banking App Brought Down Paraguay's President. Washington Cannot Afford to Lose This Ally in the Fallout.

Santiago Peña, a close Trump ally, has been impeached and charged after the collapse of Ueno Bank froze the savings of nearly 3 million customers. His successor, Pedro Alliana, took a call from Secretary Rubio within days. Here is what is at stake for America — and for Taiwan.

By Clara Hughes

In less than a week, Paraguay went from one of South America's most stable governments to its deepest political crisis in more than a decade. The trigger was a bank. Ueno, a digital lender launched in 2021, collapsed this month, freezing the savings of nearly 3 million customers in a country of 6.5 million people, Reuters reported. By Friday, President Santiago Peña — an economist and close ally of President Trump — had been impeached. On Saturday, prosecutors charged him with breach of trust and administration for personal gain, and a judge ordered him held in pretrial detention at a military facility, according to Reuters. Peña