Tibisay Zea

Reporter

The World

Tibisay Zea is a reporter with The World based in Boston.

Tibisay Zea is a reporter with The World based in Boston.She has experience reporting stories about Latin America and immigration in the United States.Before joining The World, Tibisay covered a breadth of issues critically important to Greater Boston, such as wealth inequities, housing instability, climate change and social determinants of health.As a community fellow at the MIT Center for Constructive Communication, shedeveloped a guide for journalists to report on communities of color.Tibisay grew up in Venezuela and attended journalism school in Spain. She is fluent in Spanish and Portuguese and is an active member of the NationalAssociation of Hispanic Journalists.She is also a classically trained pianist and singer and likes to play music from Latin America. 


In Mexico, Mother’s Day is a sad reminder for the mothers of the disappeared

Violence

Last week, Mexican officials were able to find the bodies of three missing tourists from Australia and the US in less than a week. But many Mexican mothers have been searching for their children who have gone missing in Mexico for years — even decades — and can’t seem to get help from the authorities.

Once the epicenter of hydraulic engineering, Mexico City is now running out of water

Environment

Extortion and predatory lending have skyrocketed in Peru

Migrants say crossing Mexico has become increasingly challenging

Migration
Mazatlán draws a lot of tourists — mainly from Mexico —  who come for the beaches, great food and a party scene. But thanks to the April 8 total eclipse, thousands came from all over the world, including many scientists and astronomy enthusiasts. 

A total solar eclipse in Mazatlán draws thousands of international tourists 

Science
shelves with folders

How the asylum system became the main avenue for mass migration to the US

Immigration

A record of about 2.5 million migrants showed up at the US-Mexico border in 2023, and many of them are requesting asylum. The system is now overwhelmed, with a backlog of about 3 million asylum applications pending in courts. 

Florida is home to the largest Haitian community in the US with more than 300,000 people of Haitian ancestry.

Miami’s Little Haiti: What is lost when a community is displaced?

Diaspora

The Haitian population of Miami has remained unchanged since the beginning of the century, with about 30,000 people. But little remains of the neighborhood that Maria and Viter Juste founded in the 1970s that came to be known as Little Haiti.

street view

Cubans worry about inflation explosion after government austerity measures

Cuban government officials announced a new package of austerity measures, which includes massive hikes for transportation fares, as well as fuel, electricity and natural gas, and further restrictions on businesses. The new plan will go into effect on Feb. 1. 

Scores of African migrants crowd in winter-wear at a US border wall

‘My life is in danger’: More Africans are choosing to migrate to the US

Migration

Migrants from African countries represent a very small fraction of the people crossing the US southern border, but their numbers have significantly increased in the past year. A combination of factors is causing this trend.

Nathalie Vilgrain, sixth from left, is the head of Marijàn, a feminist organization in Port-Au-Prince that is sheltering about 150 women who have been displaced by sexual violence.

In Haiti, sexual violence is devastating women and girls

Sexual violence

Gender-based violence has become a systematic problem in Haiti, with rape incidents on the rise. Activists say the documented cases are just the tip of the iceberg.