News and reports from North, Central and South America.
The number of unemployed in the US continues to swell while jobs to the Indian sub-continent are increasing. Market evolution or cruel corporate cost cutting? Chase Morrison investigates… Here in 2009, the unemployment office beckons. Inside you see not the dishevelled computer programmers and office clerks. Instead, there are men here with custom tailored suits, […]
Continue ReadingBrazilian banks are betting on a growing economy for 2004. But President Lula da Silva’s economic advisers are warning a continuous devaluation of the dollar represents a danger to the economy. An influential group of businessmen at the Council of Economic and Social Development want an exchange of around 3 reais per dollar. However, if […]
Continue ReadingBrazilian President Luis Inacio Lula da Silva’s recent assertion that he would not interfere in Cuba’s internal affairs has infuriated relatives and friends of Cuban dissidents and human rights campaigners. Most of the Brazilian press seems convinced, however, that the all-important issue of human rights in Cuba will eventually be discussed between Lula and the […]
Continue ReadingOn the 20th anniversary of the overthrow and execution of Grenada’s leader and the US invasion that followed, Dominic Bascombe looks at how events are remembered. Twenty years ago, the tiny spice isle of Grenada became the centre of international controversy. Its Prime Minister was killed in a dramatic, bloody counter coup and within mere […]
Continue ReadingControversial plans to offer state help to Rio de Janeiro’s gays have stunned Brazil. Proposals put to Rio’s Legislative Assembly by state deputy Edino Fonseca suggest providing psychological support to would-be heterosexuals. Gay rights campaigners have reacted angrily and have pledged to stage a protest against the proposals at a debate on laws relating to […]
Continue ReadingBrazilian leftist president, Luis Inacio Lula da Silva, told an audience of US investors those who bet against the Brazilian Government will end up losers. Brazil’s problems are not the fault of the US or anybody else, he said. He also promised that Brazil will grow once again. In the audience of the New York […]
Continue ReadingDeath squads are operating in at least 15 Brazilian states, according to a document passed to the United Nations by the Brazilian Government this week. The document also confirms that in Rio de Janeiro, the country’s second largest city, 95 per cent of death squad-related crimes are never investigated. The admission comes as a UN […]
Continue ReadingThe news focus on Chile concerning the detainment of General Pinochet in London has until now paid no attention to the fate of the British defence journalist Jonathan Moyle, who was found hanged in his Santiago hotel room on April 1 1990. Both the sequence of events that may have led to his death and […]
Continue Reading"The UN official only left the plane at Santiago airport moments before the door closed. We never felt safe. Even when our plane landed in Rio we were very scared as people had been abducted there in the past and disappeared." These are the words of Rodrigo Sanchez, who fled Chile with his mother for […]
Continue ReadingA summit of Chile’s security forces chiefs have met in Santiago to discuss their former commander’s continuing detainment in London. The leaders of the army, navy, air force and police constitute the National Security Council, a body that has met only five times since Chile’s return to Parliamentary rule in 1990. It is widely believed […]
Continue Reading
