LatinNews Regional Monitor: Brazil & Southern Cone - 25 July 2018

Development: On 24 July the local media reported that, in an interview with a local radio station in Brazil’s north-eastern state of Maranhão, Ciro Gomes, the presidential candidate of the leftist Partido Democrático Trabalhista (PDT) party, said that only his election in the 7 October general election offers a chance for former president Lula da Silva (2003-2011) to get out of prison.... Read More

* In an interview with local media, Sandro Kolher Marcondes, the director of finance and investor relations at Brazilian energy firm Neoenergía (owned by Spain’s Iberdrola), said that the firm plans to invest some US$6.75bn in upgrading its distribution networks and electricity generating facilities in 2018-2022.... Read More

Development: On 24 July the Brazilian government called on its Nicaraguan counterpart to provide an explanation for the death in Nicaragua of a Brazilian medical student Raynéia Gabrielle Lima and condemned the continuing violence.... Read More

Development: On 25 July Paraguay’s President-elect Mario Abdo Benítez denied that there had been electoral fraud benefitting him and the ruling Asociación Nacional Republicana-Partido Colorado (ANR-PC) party in the 22 April general election despite the opening of a new formal investigation into these claims.... Read More

Argentina: Argentina’s national statistics institute (Indec) has revealed that in May economic activity measured by its monthly economic activity estimator (Emae), a GDP proxy measure, fell by 5.8% relative to the same month in 2017.... Read More