LatinNews Regional Monitor: Brazil & Southern Cone - 31 January 2018

Development: On 30 January, a judge from Brazil’s supreme court (STF) rejected a request from the leftist Partido dos Trabalhadores (PT) to block the arrest of former president Lula da Silva (2003-2011) for corruption and money laundering.... Read More

* President Michel Temer has sent a police task force to enhance security in the north-eastern state of Ceará following a series of violent incidents linked to drugs-related crime.... Read More

Development: On 30 January, Chile’s interior ministry announced it was calling for an investigation into the Carabineros militarised police to be re-opened amid claims that they tampered with evidence in relation to an operation carried out last year in the southern Araucanía area in which eight indigenous Mapuche leaders were arrested.... Read More

Paraguay: The public works & communications ministry (MOPC) has called a meeting with representatives from the Asociación de Camioneros del Paraguay, the local lorry drivers’ union, to try to resolve the conflict caused by its recent decision to authorise from 20 February the circulation of long combination vehicles (LCVs) - double trailer lorries - from Brazil in the country.... Read More

On 8 January Donald Trump completed his first year in office as President of the United States.... Read More

Brazil’s Rio de Janeiro state is one of the country’s most violent areas.... Read More

Brazilian army commander General Eduardo Villas Bôas has expressed concern over the danger of corruption and politicisation of the military in an election year.... Read More

With the October 2018 elections approaching, there has been increasing concern in Brazil over the impact of ‘fake news’.... Read More