Latinnews Daily - 07 February 2018

Development: On 6 February, in a joint press conference alongside Colombia’s President Juan Manuel Santos, US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson praised the Santos government’s efforts to help restore democracy in Venezuela and bring about free elections and added that he had spoken at length with Santos about how the US could work with the Organization of American States (OAS) and the Lima Group to intervene in favour of restoring democracy in Venezuela.... Read More

Ecuador: Ecuador’s national statistics institute (Inec) has issued its latest inflation figures which show that the inflation rate in January stood at -0.09% year-on-year.... Read More

Development: On 6 February, a Brazilian federal appeals court (TRF-4) in Porto Alegre, Rio Grande do Sul state, published a verdict sentencing former president Lula da Silva (2003-2011) from the leftist Partido dos Trabalhadores (PT) to 12 years 1 month in jail.... Read More

* Brazil’s state-owned oil company Petrobras will begin selling the Pasadena refinery in Texas, through its US subsidiary, as part of its asset-divestment plan.... Read More

Development: On 6 February, the international NGO Human Rights Watch (HRW) warned that during a visit to the US, Guatemala’s President Jimmy Morales was carrying out a campaign against the current head of the United Nations-backed International Commisison against Impunity in Guatemala (Cicig), Iván Velásquez, as part of efforts to get him expelled from the country.... Read More

Central America... Read More

Development: On 6 February, Mexico’s ruling Partido Revolucionario Institucional (PRI) announced that Francisco Rojas, a PRI federal deputy and mayoral precandidate in the 1 July general election, had been shot dead by unidentified assailants.... Read More

* Local economists have warned that the sharp falls observed in US stock markets since start of the week could lead to Mexico’s central bank (Banxico) being forced into adopting a more restrictive monetary policy to manage the peso/US dollar exchange rate but to the detriment of domestic economic growth in Mexico.... Read More

Development: On 6 February, Alex Chaván, the spokesperson for Chile’s Carabineros (militarised police), denied that there was any clash with the national state prosecutor’s office over the Operación Huracán scandal which broke weeks earlier.... Read More

Argentina: A transport strike is disrupting grain exports from Argentina.... Read More