AP - Egypt has banned at least 10 Americans and Europeans from leaving the country, including the son of U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, hiking tensions with Washington over a campaign by Egypt's military against groups promoting democracy and human rights.

The United States warned on Thursday that the campaign raised concerns about Egypt's transition to democracy and could jeopardize American aid that Egypt's battered economy needs badly after a year of unrest.

The travel ban was part of an Egyptian criminal investigation into foreign-funded democracy organizations after soldiers raided the offices of 10 such groups last month, including those of two American groups.

REUTERS - A suicide bomber detonated his explosive-filled taxi near a Shi'ite funeral procession in Baghdad on Friday, killing 31 people and bringing the death toll from violence since an Iraqi political crisis erupted in December to more than 400.

The bomber exploded his vehicle near the group of mourners passing by a small market street in the mainly Shi'ite Zaafaraniya neighbourhood in the south of the Iraqi capital, police officials and hospitals said.

The Shi'ite-led government often blames Sunni Islamist insurgents for attacks targetting Shi'ites, saying they are trying to stoke the kind of sectarian slaughter which killed tens of thousands of Iraqis at the peak of the war in 2006-2007.

AP - Newt Gingrich cast Mitt Romney as the most anti-immigrant candidate of the four contenders for the Republican presidential nomination in a heated campaign debate in Hispanic-heavy Florida.

The former Massachusetts governor shot back, showing newfound emotion and combativeness compared with his earlier debate performances.

"That's simply inexcusable" and "repulsive," Romney said. "My father was born in Mexico. I'm not anti-immigrant."

Romney quickly added that Gingrich's campaign had stopped running a radio ad that made the "anti-immigrant charge" after Cuban-born Florida Sen. Marco Rubio called on him to do so. Romney said to Gingrich concerning the ad, "I think you should apologize for it."

GUATEMALA CITY, Jan 27, 2012 (IPS) - After a hearing that lasted more than 11 hours, a Guatemalan court ordered the trial of former dictator Efraín Ríos Montt (1982-1983), who could face up to 30 years in prison if he is convicted of genocide and crimes against humanity. "On Mar. 25, 1982 they killed my three sisters, my mom, and five brothers who were all kids. First they were questioned by (military officers), who tried to get them to give up the guerrilla members (they were looking for); and when they couldn't give them what they wanted, they were shot on the spot," Elena Chávez, a survivor of a 1982 army raid and mass killing in western Guatemala, told IPS.

Colombia Reports: Former Colombian President Alvaro Uribe has sent a team of lawyers to Panama to defend his ex-spy chief, amid calls for her extradition to face charges over illegal wiretapping. The announcement, made through Uribe's Twitter account, comes two days after wiretap victims flew to Panama to petition the government of President Ricardo Martinelli to revoke the political asylum granted to Maria del Pilar Hurtado, the former director of Colombia's now defunct DAS intelligence service.

(Reuters) - A Brazilian prosecutor plans to file criminal charges against Chevron Corp and some of its local managers within weeks, adding the threat of prison sentences to an $11 billion civil lawsuit as punishment for a November offshore oil spill.

Chevron Loses Injunction Against Ecuador Judgment Collection:
A three-judge panel of the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New York unanimously ruled Thursday that U.S. Federal Judge Lewis Kaplan had erred last March when he blocked enforcement of an Ecuadorian court's February 2011 $18 billion judgment against Chevron for environmental contamination

MercoPress: Brazil issued a tourist visa to a dissident Cuban blogger a few days before President Dilma Rousseff is scheduled to travel to the Castro family island in a visit being dominated by human rights concerns.

MercoPress: The administration of US President Ronald Reagan was aware of the "planned" stealing of babies born in captivity from jailed political prisoners, during the Argentine military dictatorship (1976/1983), since there was a "clear decision" to hand them to families considered faithful and reliable to the regime, said a former top US official.

SAO PAULO - A subsidiary of Brazilian state-controlled energy giant Petrobras said an oil leak occurred off the coast of the southern state of Rio Grande do Sul.

The Economist: Amid this inferno Nicaragua, the poorest country in mainland Latin America, is remarkably safe. Whereas Honduras's murder rate in 2010 was 82 per 100,000 people, the world's highest in over a decade, Nicaragua's was just 13, unchanged in five years. That means it is now less violent than booming Panama, and may soon be safer than Costa Rica, a tourist haven. What explains the relative peace?

NYT: IT'S time to acknowledge the foreign policy disaster that American support for the Porfirio Lobo administration in Honduras has become. Ever since the June 28, 2009, coup that deposed Honduras's democratically elected president, José Manuel Zelaya, the country has been descending deeper into a human rights and security abyss. That abyss is in good part the State Department's making.

Thanking all of you for your support, I'm glad to report that my career has finally turned that all important corner!

"Beware of the man who does not talk, and the dog that does not bark." Cheyenne