LatinNews Daily - 04 February 2019

Preliminary results from El Salvador’s 3 February presidential election show Nayib Bukele, of the centre-right opposition Gran Alianza por la Unidad Nacional-Nuevas Ideas coalition, as the outright winner.... Read More

On 3 February, Venezuela’s de facto president, Nicolás Maduro, publicly rejected the calls by the international community to resign or call a new presidential election insisting that he will not cave in to such pressure.... Read More

* Bolivia’s hydrocarbons minister Luis Alberto Sánchez has revealed that the government led by President Evo Morales has assigned over U$1.4bn this year to go on drilling more than 25 wells for exploratory purposes and strategic investigation to identify more hydrocarbons resources.... Read More

On 2 February, Brazil’s senate elected Senator Davi Alcolumbre, of the small Democratas (DEM) party, as its president until 2021.... Read More

* Brazil’s national statistics institute (IBGE) has released new data which shows that industrial production increased by 1.1% year-on-year in 2018.... Read More

* Costa Rica’s national statistics institute (Inec) has released new figures which indicate that the country’s national unemployment rate was 12% in the last quarter of 2018, up 2.7 percentage points on the same period in 2017.... Read More

On 3 February, Mexico’s national human rights commission (CNDH) issued a statement, calling on the Mexican government to accept the competence of the United Nations Committee on Enforced Disappearances (CED).... Read More

* Mexico’s central bank (Banxico) has released new figures which show remittance inflows totalled US$33.48bn in 2018, up 10.53% on the previous year.... Read More

On 3 February Venezuela’s political opposition increased the moral pressure on Uruguay’s President Tabaré Vázquez to disavow the government led by President Nicolás Maduro.... Read More

* Argentina’s finance minister Nicolás Dujovne has said that inflation in Argentina this year will be “substantially lower” than in 2018.... Read More

Chile: On 24 January, the US Food & Drug Administration (FDA) issued a statement which revealed that as US fruit distributor, Jac Vandenberg, is recalling 1,727 cartons of fresh peaches, 1,207 cartons of fresh nectarines, and 365 cartons of fresh plums all from Chile, “because they have the potential to be contaminated with Listeria monocytogenes” – an organism which can cause serious and sometimes fatal infections in young children, frail or elderly people, and others with weakened immune systems.... Read More