CHILE | New investment promotion law. On 13 January Chile’s President Michelle Bachelet announced that her government would soon submit to the national congress a bill that will seek to enhance and promote foreign investment in the country. Bachelet made the announcement during an international foreign investment forum, organised by Chile’s foreign investment committee (CIE) and attended by 60 executives from 40 foreign companies interested in investing in Chile. The CIE is a government agency that deals with foreign investors and helps to position the country as an attractive destination for foreign investment and international business. Bachelet explained that the…

President Cristina Fernández, and other senior government officials, “covered up” the involvement of Iranians in the 1994 bombing of the headquarters of the Amia Jewish association in Buenos Aires, according to Alberto Nisman, the lead prosecutor in the investigation into the attack. In a document released on 14 January, Nisman demanded a freeze of Arg$200m (US$23m) of Fernández’s assets and the right to question her, foreign minister Héctor Timerman, and the head of the Kirchnerista youth group, Andrés Larroque. According to Nisman’s report, the government sought to “ease” Iran out of the Amia case in order to ensure good trade…

Since former president Lula da Silva left office in 2010, relations between the ruling Partido dos Trabalhadores (PT) and the perennial kingmakers of the Partido do Movimento Democrático Brasileiro (PMDB) have not been good. During the run-up to President Dilma Rousseff’s re-election campaign, only a narrow majority of the party voted to support her candidacy. Now, stung by what the party chiefs see as a “humiliating” division of ministerial spoils at the start of Rousseff’s second term, the relationship between the two parties is deteriorating fast. One of the key players who has long argued for a resetting of the…

Can President Dilma Rousseff implement her promise of fiscal responsibility without triggering social unrest? No matter how many times her new economic team warns of the pain to come, Rousseff’s real test will be when prices, or taxes, start to shoot up. Joaquim Levy, the new finance minister, has made it abundantly clear that taxes will have to rise, but he has also promised there will be no “bagful of horrors” for Brazilians in Rousseff’s second term. Protests The first significant price hike of the year had nothing to do with the new finance minister. Bus fares have risen in…