SANTA MARTA, Colombia, Aug 11, 2010 (IPS) - "The Santa Marta breeze cools off any conflict, it calms tempers. The city is the ideal place for the Santos-Chávez summit," Colombian journalist Ernesto McCausland wrote on his Twitter blog ahead of Tuesday's meeting, which indeed patched up relations between Venezuela and Colombia.
Honduras Culture and Politics: Yesterday the Lobo Sosa government failed to close a deal with the International Monetary Fund for standby funding for the government of Honduras for the next 18 months. This was an important test of the government's political capital as well as its economic capital, and it failed.
Paraguay (Boz): This past weekend we learned that Paraguayan President Lugo has lymphoma. He'll be traveling to Sao Paulo, Brazil for tests and will need at least 18 weeks of chemo treatments. Cruel as it is, this brings up a number of political questions for Paraguay. With Lugo leaving the country and undergoing treatment, it is likely that Vice President Franco will assume the duties of president.
ASUNCIÓN, Aug 11, 2010 (IPS) - The Fourth Americas Social Forum kicks off Wednesday in the Paraguayan capital with a colourful march through the streets, as some 12,000 people prepare to take part in the activities organised by 50 local groups and 550 organisations from Argentina to Canada. (...) The personalities who plan to attend the Americas Social Forum include Bolivian President Evo Morales, Argentine political scientist Atilio Borón, the executive secretary of the Latin American Council of Social Sciences (CLACSO) Emir Sader, and two Nobel Peace Prize-winners: Guatemalan indigenous activist Rigoberta Menchú and Argentine human rights activist Adolfo Pérez Esquivel.
MANAGUA, Nicaragua -- Over the past four years, entities controlled by Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega have received at least $1 billion in no-strings-attached donations through an oil deal brokered by President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela. The windfall has helped Ortega mount a vigorous campaign to fight rural poverty and generate electricity -- and to build political support for himself.
El Universal: The Government of Bolivia said on Wednesday that the silver, lead and zinc mine "San Cristobal", of the Japanese Sumitomo Group Corp, had to stop their operations as a result of peasant mobilization that threatened the power supply to industry.
(Reuters) - Surging Chinese investment in Brazil is reshaping ties between the countries as companies seek to secure resources and tap the rising consumer class in Latin America's largest economy.
SAO PAULO (Reuters) - Brazil's biggest state-run bank and two other partners announced an expansion in Africa on Monday in the latest sign of growing financial links between emerging markets. Banco do Brasil, Latin America's largest bank by assets, said in a regulatory filing it will team with local private-sector giant Banco Bradesco and Portugal's Banco Espirito Santo (BES) to tap Africa's growing appetite for consumer loans, credit cards and other products.
Science News: Policies such as those implemented in Brazil in recent years can help preserve those forests, DeFries suggested. Besides stepping up enforcement of the strict laws regarding deforestation in the nation, Brazil has reduced the availability of bank loans to large agricultural producers, boosted incentives to increase agricultural production on lands already cleared and increased public awareness campaigns about deforestation. The result: Deforestation losses in the nation dropped from 28,000 square kilometers in 2004 to about 7,500 square kilometers in 2009, a decrease of almost 74 percent. Brazil's ambitious goal is to reduce the deforestation rate in 2015 to 80 percent of that seen in 2005, said DeFries.
Brazil's ambitious goal is to reduce the deforestation rate in 2015 to 80 percent of that seen in 2005, said DeFries.
