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Development: On 3 March leaders from the opposition regions of Santa Cruz, Tarija, Pando and Beni announced that they were considering bringing the date for regional autonomy referendums forward to 27 April.

Significance: The opposition prefects are refusing to recognise the recent legislation passed by congress which outlawed regional referenda on the issue of autonomy and set 4 May as a date for plebiscites on the draft constitution and land reform. The prefects' announcement shows they are unwilling to back down over the issue and continue to boycott the institutional process.

The regional votes had initially been set for 4 May - the same date that the government announced for the plebiscites on the constitution and land reform. By moving the date forward, the prefects would gain an advantage over the government, provided the turnout was decent.

If the regional votes go ahead - which is far from certain given the fact that the prefects are acting in clear violation of the country's institutional process - the outcome could also affect the vote on the new constitution.

Leaders from Santa Cruz, Tarija, Pando, Beni, Cochabamba and Chuquisaca are holding regional assemblies this week to determine the course of action to be taken against the government. The assemblies will also discuss the legal implications of pressing ahead with their plans, especially given the fact that the electoral body requires 90 days to prepare for the vote, a fact itself ignored by President Evo Morales when he set the date of 4 May for the two referendum.

The likelihood of a legal resolution to the confrontation became more remote with the resignation on 3 March of one of the two remaining constitutional court justices, Artemio Arias Romano. Arias cited health reasons, his colleague Silvia Salame said his decision owed to pressure. In less than two years, nine constitutional court judges have resigned.

Development: On 7 April US President George W Bush sent his free-trade agreement (FTA) with Colombia to Congress.

Significance: The chances of the Democrat-controlled Congress approving the FTA are very slim. Senior Democrats immediately declared they could not support the trade deal for three reasons: first, because President Bush is trying to fast-track the bill through Congress; secondly, because they believe that now is not the time to be risking US jobs with the economy teetering on the edge of a recession; and thirdly, because they don't believe that Colombia's human-rights record entitles it to such a deal.

Under the fast-track arrangement, Congress has 90 working days to approve the FTA, which was signed by Bush and his Colombian counterpart Alvaro Uribe in February 2006. Upon sending the FTA to Congress Bush said the bill should be passed as soon as possible: "The need for this agreement is too urgent - the stakes for our national security are too high - to allow this year to end without a vote", the president declared.

Although Bush said that the deal would be good for US business since it would reduce Colombian trade barriers for US exports, this isn't the urgency he was talking about. For Bush, the Colombia FTA has considerable strategic significance: the president is worried about the message Congress would be sending to the US's largest ally in South America by rejecting the FTA. "If Congress fails to approve this agreement, it would not only abandon a brave ally, it would send a signal throughout the region that America cannot be counted on to support its friends."

Bush praised Uribe for two achievements in particular: confronting the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (Farc) and standing up to Bush's nemesis in the region, Venezuela's President Hugo Chávez . "We can provide a powerful rebuke to dictators and demagogues in our backyard," Bush concluded. The US president also stressed that approving the FTA would help the Colombian government combat the drugs trade.

The Democrats immediately said that Bush had made a major mistake by introducing the trade deal to Congress. Interestingly, their chief complaint was not about Colombia and its rights record but concerned Bush's attempts to fast-track the bill, which they say displays a lack of respect for the legislature. Senate Democratic Majority Leader Harry Reid complained that: "By thumbing his nose at the basic processes that underlie Congress' willingness to extend fast-track authority to a president, President Bush is dealing a serious blow to US trade policy for years to come."

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Charlie Rangel issued a joint statement explaining why they could not support the Colombia pact "under present circumstances". They said Bush's "unprecedented decision to send a free trade agreement to Congress without following established protocols of Congressional consultation is counter-productive, jeopardizing prospects for its passage". They then complained about the president's "apparent disregard for the economic insecurity faced by millions of struggling Americans".

Finally, Pelosi and Rangel questioned whether Uribe had so far done enough to deserve an FTA. Previously Pelosi and Rangel have been quick to slam Uribe's rights record, but on this occasion they were more diplomatic. "Despite progress made by President Uribe, Colombia remains a dangerous place to be a labour activist, and for those who commit these acts of violence, there is little threat of prosecution or punishment. Sustained progress on the ground remains a prerequisite for our support," Pelosi and Rangel said. The two pointed out that they had supported Colombia's economy by twice passing the Andean Trade Preference Extension Act.

The bill is expected to spend 60 working days in the House of Representatives and 30 days in the Senate. Democrats control the Senate by 51-49 and the House by 233 to 198, meaning that the White House and Colombia will have their work cut out if they are to persuade sufficient Democrats to support the deal. Colombia's efforts have hardly been helped by the fact Uribe recently sacked the public relations firm, Burson-Marsteller, which was promoting the deal on Capitol Hill.

Uribe took the decision after the head of Burson-Marsteller, Mark Penn, described his meeting with Colombia's ambassador to the US, Carolina Barco, as an "error of judgement that will not be repeated". Penn resigned from his position as chief strategist to Democrat presidential hopeful, Hillary Clinton, soon afterwards. Both Clinton and the other Democrat challenger, Barack Obama, are staunchly opposed to the Colombia FTA.

Development: On 12 May president-elect Fernando Lugo said that his first action as president would be to produce “genuine solutions" to land disputes.

Significance: Lugo was speaking after talking to various rural activists who were demonstrating in the capital, Asunción . Shortly before this meeting, police reported that landowners in the central department of San Pedro had exchanged gunfire with peasants who were trying to seize their land. The peasants, who belong to some of the organizations with whom Lugo held talks, announced on 10 May their intention to take control of a number of estates in San Pedro that aren't being cultivated.

Lugo, who served as a bishop in San Pedro for many years, refused to condemn the invasions outright, saying that they should only occur as a “last resort". This is a position which conforms with his leftist ideology and his experiences in San Pedro (one of Paraguay's poorest areas), but it violates the protection of private property enshrined in Paraguayan law. Moreover, Lugo's comments might well encourage rural activists to pursue the strategy of land invasions once Lugo comes to power in August, especially if they believe Lugo is failing to keep his promises.

The president-elect has declared that land reform will be a priority of his new government, but there are good reasons to believe that he will not be able to adopt measures as far-reaching as he or the rural poor might like. First, because the rural sector is crucial to the healthy state of the economy; and secondly, because his legislative support, which is based around the centre-right Partido Liberal Radical Auténtico, does not share his leftwing beliefs.

Development: On 17 June President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner announced that she will allow congress to decide whether to approve her government's sliding-scale taxes on agricultural exports.

Significance: This is the government's first major concession in its three-month dispute with the rural sector. Fernández's hand was forced by nationwide protests against her government on 16 June, which were the largest demonstrations since the economic meltdown in 2001.

The president was also under pressure from her own supporters. The vice-president, Julio Cobos, urged Fernández to consult congress over her reform of export duties, which lies at the heart of the row with the agricultural sector.

The four main rural associations, who are expected to end their fourth strike against the government today (18 June), cautiously welcomed Fernández's decision to involve congress. However, they want to see the bill before they make any decisions and are wary of the fact that congress won't be able to modify the tax reforms but instead will only be able to vote for or against and them.

The government controls a majority in both chambers of congress via the Frente para la Victoria coalition. However, Fernández cannot assume that her allies at last year's presidential election will back the bill.

Her government's attitude towards the farmers over the past three months has angered many of its supporters both within the Partido Justicialista (which is now led by Fernández's husband and predecessor, Néstor Kirchner) and from opposition parties who considered supporting the Kirchners to be the best way of securing influence on the government.

Today's rally in Buenos Aires in support of Fernández, which has been organized by Néstor Kirchner, will provide an indication of the unity of Fernández's support base. A number of the government's key allies have said they are reluctant to participate, in part because Kirchner's rally is intended as a counter-protest to the rural sector's national demonstration on the same day and in part because Kirchner has invited some hardline union leaders and activists to take part.

Kirchner himself has continued to take a hard line with the rural protesters even if his wife has belatedly realised the importance of compromise. In a press conference on 17 June the former president derided the anti-government protests of the previous day, railed against the media and once again labelled the rural protesters as undemocratic.

However, Kirchner did least distance the government from comments made by Luis D'Elí­a, the piquetero leader who is loyal to the ruling couple. D'Elí­a this week accused Eduardo Duhalde (a former president and a stalwart of the Partido Justicialista) of attempting to overthrow the government, an accusation which riled a number of the government's supporters and which was a major motivation behind the protests against the government.

Development: On 18 July Michael Chertoff, the US minister  for Homeland Security, denied that Mexico was facing narco-terrorism.

Significance: Chertoff, who is on a three day visit to Mexico, was asked the question in the wake of the discovery of four car-bombs on 16 July and subsequent claims in the Mexican media that Iran's Revolutionary Guards had been training some of Mexico's gangsters.

Chertoff said that the situation in Mexico was not like a country in Middle East or Colombia “where there has, however, been tremendous progress." Chertoff argued that “training" could lie in as little as someone downloading information from the internet. Chertoff argued that the upsurge in violence in northern Mexico this year is because of the pressure the US and Mexico is exerting on the gangs. On 19 July 11 people were killed in less than six hours by gangsters in Chihuahua. So far this year over 2,250 people have been killed by gangsters: in 2007 2,700 were. 

Separately, Chertoff said that the US had helped in the interception of a drug submarine off the coast of Oaxaca. The sub was carrying 5.8t of cocaine. In 2007 the US helped to intercept 40 subs: so far this year 100 have been found.

Development: On 21 August the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (Farc) said it is ready to take part in an exchange of prisoners and released a list of the 29 hostages it is willing to hand over in such an arrangement.

Significance: The Farc has revived the idea of a prisoner swap without making reference to one of its most controversial demands: that the government demilitarise two municipalities where talks over the exchange would take place.

The Farc has previously mentioned this demand every time the prisoner swap is mentioned, and on every occasion President Alvaro Uribe has refused to grant this concession. The fact that the guerrilla group appears to have abandoned the demand underlines that the government now has the upper hand in its dealings with the Farc.

The Farc can at least take satisfaction from the fact that its list of hostages was four names longer than the government expected. The government believed that the guerrilla group was holding 25 politicians, policemen and soldiers, but the list includes an additional four members of the security forces who were previously described as missing in action.

Development: On 24 September the government announced that judicial officials who remain on strike will not receive their salaries.

Significance: The judiciary's strike began on 3 September, when about 42,000 officials blocked the entrance to courts all around the country. Since then more than a thousand people who were been arrested for offenses such as robbery and illegal gun possession have had to be freed, since there are no judges or prosecutors to process their cases.

Asonal Judicial, the judges and prosecutors' union, wants the government to increase their salaries and is demanding that the government respect the independence of the judiciary. After a four-hour meeting on 24 September there was no agreement between the government and the union.

Fabio Valencia Cossio, the minister of interior and justice, reiterated the government offer to raise salaries by Col$66bn (US$31.7m) over the next two years. However, that amount corresponds to just 10% of the pay increase demanded by Asonal Judicial.

The pay dispute deals another blow to the already fragile relationship between the executive and the judiciary. The supreme court of justice and other high-level courts are supporting the strike.

Development: On 29 October Venezuela's attorney general, Luisa Ortega, began a corruption probe into the governor of the western state of Zulia and arch nemesis of President Hugo Chávez , Manuel Rosales.

Significance: The latest allegations come only three days after President Chávez called for Rosales's imprisonment, alleging his involvement in a purported assassination plot against him. Rosales, head of the opposition party Un Nuevo Tiempo (UNT) said the allegations were an obvious plot to discredit him only weeks ahead of municipal elections on 23 November.

Rosales, the two-time state governor of Zulia (and former presidential candidate), is running for the mayoralty of the state capital Maracaibo (Venezuela's second city) in the municipal polls.

The allegations, which centre on extortion and the misuse of public funds (and include the illicit acquisition of a string of landholdings and properties via front men) were made by the current Chavista mayor of Maracaibo, Gian Carlo di Martino. Di Martino is running to replace Rosales as state governor in the forthcoming elections.

Somewhat bizarrely, Di Martino also accused Rosales of being behind the recent (1 October) assassination of a University of Zulia student leader and UNT member, Julio Soto.

The attorney general said she would encourage prosecutors to decide whether to file criminal charges against Rosales by the end of the year.

Rosales was dismissive of the allegations, and of supposed intercepted phone calls broadcast on state television, saying they had been 'manufactured' in the basement of the Disip (the secret police), with the help of 'Cuban agents'.   "They have always dreamed of taking me out of the political game," said Rosales, the most powerful of the four opposition governors in Venezuela's 23 states. "They can't win with votes, so they will try to win instead with tricks."

The latest allegations came as the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), held three sessions on Venezuela with regard to internal security, the human rights situation and freedom of expression. The hearings (on 29 October) were held at the request of various civil society organisations and non-governmental organisations in the country.

The first session addressed citizen security and violence; the second the situation of human rights defenders and institutions and human rights guarantees; and the third the situation of the right to freedom of expression and information.

The Venezuelan government requested that the latter two sessions be held behind closed doors.

The Chávez administration has lately come under renewed scrutiny for human and political rights as well as its treatment of the opposition media. On 16 October the European parliament issued a resolution criticising Venezuela's comptroller general's decision to bar some 272 (mostly) opposition candidates from running in the municipal elections this year on the basis of corruption charges.

The comptroller general, backed by Chávez , defended his actions as justified under anti-corruption and electoral laws.

Development: On 1 December President Rafael Correa had a three hour long private meeting with Ingrid Betancourt, a former hostage held by the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (Farc).

Significance: There was not a joint communiqué or press conference after the meeting, so it is not clear whether Betancourt brought a proposal from President Alvaro Uribe of Colombia to end the diplomatic breach between the two countries. Ecuador broke off diplomatic relations with Colombia after Colombia raided a Farc camp in Ecuador on 1 March.

Betancourt's trip to Quito appears to have been the result of a sudden decision. She herself denied that she was a mediator and said that she was touring seven countries in the region. She is due to visit Argentina, Chile, Brazil, Peru, Bolivia and Venezuela. Betancourt herself said in Quito, after her meeting with Correa, that the Farc was “staring into the abyss" and that if it wanted to retain any relief it needed to make major changes to its strategy, starting with the release of hostages.

All Correa said after the meeting was that the solution to the Colombian problem was the release of all the hostages. Correa said that although Betancourt, a former Colombian presidential candidate, was the most prominent of the Farc's hostages, there were still 3,000 people held in Colombia. Betancourt said that the Farc held about 1,000 hostages.

Development: On 14 January, the president of the ruling Partido dos Trabalhadores (PT), deputy Ricardo Berzioni, called on its main coalition partner, the Partido Movimiento Democratico Brasileiro (PMDB) to support the PT candidate for the senate leadership, Tião Viana.

Significance: Elections for the leaders of the upper and lower house are due on 2 February . The PT and President Lula da Silva are anxious to preserve the PT-PMDB alliance ahead of the general elections in 2010. However, the PMDB , the biggest party in congress, has its own agenda.

As part of efforts to keep the PMDB on side, Lula last year accepted a deal in which the PMDB's nominees would head the lower house of congress while the PT would take the senate presidency, reversing the 2008 apportionment. This deal would mean deputy Michel Temer heading the lower house, and Tião Viana, from the PT, taking over as senate president. The PMDB has however decided instead to push former president José Sarney (1985-1990) as its own candidate, giving it administrative control of both houses.

The PT is tiring of the PMDB throwing its weight about. With the parties firing barbed insults at each other since the New Year, Lula will probably have to settle the dispute himself.

The assumption was always that the PMDB would take the vice-presidential slate in 2010, however following its strong performance in the October 2008 municipal elections, the PMDB is now reconsidering. It may even opt for an alliance with the main centre-right opposition Partido da Social Democracia Brasileira (PSDB) if it considers that the best way to remain in power.

Argentina: Industrial production fell 6.1% month-on-month, the biggest monthly fall since January 2001. It felll 4.4% year-on-year, the first annual decline since 2002, according to the national statistics institute.

Mexico:Retail sales fell 3.3% year-on-year in December 2008, the steepest such drop since March 2002, according to latest official figures.

Development: On 1 April world leaders descended on London for the G-20 presidential summit.

Significance: President Lula da Silva arrives at the summit having made developing country demands for reform of the global financial system very clear. The result of the summit, however, will largely be dictated by the outcome of US-China talks on the margins of the main meeting.

Lula's comments last week that the crisis was largely created by “white, blue-eyed bankers" were widely relayed around the world and, while controversial, confirmed his long sought position as one of the most high profile voices of the developing world.

Ahead of the summit, Lula has impressed upon the leaders of US, the UK, and France the need not only for a new global financial architecture to better regulate the international banking system, but also the urgency of boosting global trade flows, which threaten to drag commodity powerhouses like Brazil into recession this year.

He has also spearheaded efforts to re-start the failed Doha round of global trade talks, and railed against global protectionism. The developing world will make a renewed push in favour of trade talks in London.

“How are we going to establish reliability in the American consumer and the European consumer? How can we establish the credit so that we can bear the changes in the trade balances of these countries?" Lula said ahead of the summit. “This is a problem that we cannot by-pass in London," he commented.

Development: May 9 was the deadline for submitting candidate lists for midterm congressional elections to renew half of the 257 seats in the lower house, and a third of 72 seats in the senate.

Significance: President Cristina Fernández's government is desperate to avoid losing its - already slim - majority in both houses of congress in June, when some 53% of its seats in the lower house and 25% of its seats in the senate are up for renewal. As expected, Fernández's husband, predecessor and main political strategist, Néstor Kirchner, is heading the government's list of candidates for the lower house in the Buenos Aires province, Argentina's most important electoral district. A victory in the province will be crucial to offset expected losses for the government in the country's other three main electoral districts: Buenos Aires city and the provinces of Córdoba and Santa Fe.

Kirchner will head the lower house slate for the ruling Frente Para la Victoria (FPV), a faction of the Partido Justicialista (PJ, Peronists), followed by the incumbent provincial governor, Daniel Scioli, and Nacha Guevara, 68, an actress and singer with little political experience who is famous for her interpretation of Eva Perón in musicals. Fernández's cabinet chief, Sergio Massa, takes fourth place. He is followed by Héctor Recalde, a lawyer of Argentina's largest umbrella trade union, Confederación General del Trabajo (CGT). This is a clear gesture to the CGT's leader and close ally of Kirchner, Hugo Moyano.

Both Scioli and Massa are running as so-called “testimonial candidates". According to this strategy, devised by Kirchner, these candidates will use their status - and probably resources - to canvass votes but will not then take their seats should they get elected. Their seats would instead be filled by candidates lower down the list. This forms part of a government strategy to sell the midterms as a referendum on Kirchnerismo; the risk is, of course, that if the government loses its defeat will be all the more damaging.

Some 45 Buenos Aires province mayors have agreed to follow Scioli's lead. This is fewer than the government had hoped for (it had suggested that between 50 and 80 of the mayors in the province would run as candidates). Kirchner has, however, succeeded in securing the 'testimonial' candidacy of 18 of the 24 mayors of the 'conurbano', the Buenos Aires suburbs whose working class population is the bedrock of government support and where the Peronist party enjoys a vast patronage network.

The congressional majority of the government of President Cristina Fernández will hinge on the Buenos Aires province race. Currently, the FPV controls 46% of the province's seats (32 of 69). If the government wishes to hold on to its majority in the lower house, it must repeat this success; of 61 FPV seats up for renewal nationwide, 20 of these are in the province of Buenos Aires. Recent polls have, however, showed that the government's lead in the province is gradually eroding. Some pollsters place Kirchner's list only a few percentage points ahead of its nearest opposition, the centre-right dissident Peronist alliance, Unión Peronista, whose party list is headed by the millionaire businessman, Francisco De Narváez, followed by 2011 presidential hopeful Felipe Solá.

Pointer: The centre-left opposition Unión Radical Cí­vica Coalición Cí­vica (UCR-CC) coalition plan to file a court challenge against the government's so-called testimonial candidates today (11 May). Ricardo Gil Lavedra, who is second on the coalition's list of lower house candidates in Buenos Aires City, described the strategy as “a fraud" which “directly violates" representative government.

Development:   On 16 June the president of the Chamber of Industries (CICR), Juan Marí­a González, asked the external trade ministry (Comex) to end the current talks on a Free Trade Agreement (FTA) with China, saying it was not a reliable partner.

Significance:     The external trade minister, Marco Vincio Ruí­z, has accused local business leaders of using “extortion" tactics, hinting that they were motivated by protectionist sentiment. Local business leaders fear that a flood of cheap Chinese manufacturing and consumer goods onto the local market will put them out of business.

Costa Rica and China began a third round of talks on Monday, 15 June, due to end today (17 June). The two sides hope to complete talks within a year, with a scheduled eight rounds.

In a press conference, González, flanked by colleagues from the chambers of food industries, plastics, metallurgy and metals and graphics, said that Chinese goods were not trustworthy and could have pernicious effects on local consumers, pointing out that Chinese raw materials, inputs and finished goods had caused problems and even deaths around the world and that the Chinese were incapable of ensuring the quality and security of their exports.

He suggested that Costa Rica should instead negotiate a partial trade agreement with China and insist on the inclusion of labour and environmental chapters.

China is Costa Rica's second most important trading partner after the US, with the bilateral trade balance traditionally in favour of Costa Rica.

Development: On 23 July the Mexican army announced that since 2006 it has convicted 12 soldiers and prosecuted a further 52 for a variety of offences.

Significance: The army is responding to human rights organisations, which are deeply unhappy that in Mexico soldiers are subject to military justice even when they are operating as auxiliary police officers, fighting organised crime inside Mexico.

The statement on the convictions and prosecutions came from General Jaime Antonio López Portillo, the director for human rights at the Secretaria de la Defensa Nacional (Sedena). He said that the convictions had been for crimes such as murder, kidnapping and torture. He admitted that the number of complaints against soldiers had increased since they were deployed in the streets. President Felipe Calderón sent troops onto the streets on 1 December 2006, when he took office.

Since then, the government has deployed 45,000 troops and 30,000 federal police in the most violent states in an effort (so far fruitless) to wrest control of tracts of the country back from gangsters.

According to Portillo, two commanders were convicted, as were six officers and four ordinary soldiers. They were sentenced to terms ranging from three months to 20 years in prison.

Portillo also pointed out that of the 559 complaints filed by the national human rights commission (CNDH) against military personnel in the first half of this year, 395 had been found not to involve military members.

Development: Venezuela's imports of essential Colombian foods have fallen since President Hugo Chávez 'froze' relations with Bogotá in late July, according to a report in the Venezuelan press on 2 September.

Significance: Local food associations report that Colombian exporters have begun to suspend their US dollar based credit lines for Venezuelan companies, due to the mounting debts owed by these firms.

Dairy products and beef imports are worst affected, although poultry products are arriving as normal. Local firms say they can hold out until December and are looking to Brazil, rather than Argentina (with which President Hugo Chávez recently signed a US$1.1bn trade deal aimed at substituting Colombian imports), for alternative products.

While the report in the daily El Universal is largely anecdotal, trade with Colombia was already stagnating in the first half months of the year.

According to Colombia's National Statistics Department (Dane) in the first half of 2009, exports to Venezuela were worth US$2.68bn, virtually unchanged on the same period of 2008 (-0.2%). (Imports from Venezuela fell 49.4% in first half to US$295.4m.)

Much of this stagnation was due to the fact that Venezuela's official exchange rate agency, Cadivi, has restricted sales of US dollars to importers this year, in an effort to limit non-essential imports.

The Chávez government also delayed approval of new import quota for the Colombian auto sector.

On 18 August the president of Venezuela's leading private sector association, Fedecámeras, Noel Alvarez, called on the Chávez government to consider the ramifications of the trade freeze, warning of imminent shortages. Alvarez was dismissive of the new deal signed by Chávez and Argentina's Cristina Fernández (on 11 August), suggesting it was “unrealistic", in terms of the logistics involved and the actual availability of many goods.

While imports from Colombia typically take two days by road, they take six days by boat from Brazil or Argentina, followed by another trip by road.

Development: On 9 October the foreign ministers of Colombia and Ecuador had another fruitful meeting, this time at Ipiales, on the Colombian side of the border.

Significance: Colombia and Ecuador are working slowly but surely towards restoring diplomatic relations, broken off by Ecuador after Colombia's 1 March 2008 military raid on a Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (Farc) camp inside Ecuador.

Both sides are being very careful about what they say. The Colombians are quietly pushing Ecuador to drop its warrant for the arrest of Juan Manuel Santos, the former defence minister, who revelled in the success of the 1 March raid. Ecuador appeared to drop its demand for Interpol to exercise the warrant at the Interpol general assembly in Singapore on 10 October.

In an interview with a Colombian newspaper, El Tiempo, Colombia's foreign minister, Jaime Bermúdez, said that the focus of talks is to combat the illicit drugs trade and terrorism. Coincidentally, on 10 October, Ecuador announced that the police had found 4.3 tonnes of cocaine in a house in Quito, after a tip-off. The house may have functioned as a drug lab. Five Ecuadoreans and two Colombians were arrested.

Development: Today (23 November), Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad arrives in Brasí­lia on the first leg of a regional tour, his first trip abroad since his controversial re-election in June.

Significance:  Brazil's Lula da Silva is walking a fairly fine line, both internationally and at home, with the Ahmadinejad visit. Critics say Ahmadinejad, who has very bad relations with his own Middle East neighbours, notably the US-allied Saudi Arabia, will benefit more by gaining legitimacy following the controversial June election. The US is also wary of Ahmadinejad's efforts to promote Iran-Latin America ties.

On the one hand, Lula is defiant, stressing Brazil's growing global economic clout, its desire to boost independent 'South-South' commercial ties and emphasising the importance of engagement with 'rogue' leaders, like Ahmadinejad. The visit by the Iranian leader, who was preceded in Brasí­lia by Israel's President Shimon Peres and Mahmoud Abbas, the president of the Palestinian Authority, must also be seen in the context of Lula's longstanding ambition to carve out for Brazil (and for himself) an important political role on the world stage - including a permanent seat on the UN Security Council. On 11 November, upon Peres's visit, Lula offered his services as a mediator in the Middle East peace process. President Barack Obama has also reputedly sought to enlist Lula's help in the US-led efforts to bring Ahmadinejad to the table over Iran's nuclear programme.

Critics say Lula cannot have it both ways. Ronald Lauder, president of the World Jewish Congress, who also made his first trip to Brazil last week (19-20 November), said, “Brazil can't be a world player and expect to receive Ahmadinejad and have nobody notice. Everyone will notice and none of the reactions will be positive."

The Ahmadinejad trip has also prompted strong reaction at home, with protests in Brasí­lia and Rio de Janeiro yesterday. Notably, the leading presidential candidate for the 2010 elections, São Paulo's state governor José Serra (of the centrist opposition Partido da Social Democracia Brasileira), has come out strongly against the visit, suggesting it will damage Brazil's international interests. Serra hosted Ronald Lauder last week, and also met Peres the week before.

Development: On 12 January a massive 7.0 magnitude earthquake, the worst to hit Haiti in over five decades, struck about 15km south-west of the capital, Port-au-Prince, causing damage of “catastrophic" proportions.

Significance: With communication infrastructure destroyed, airports closed and the country in chaos, the estimated death toll is unknown, although there are fears that it could run into thousands. Raymond Joseph, Haiti's envoy to the US, said that the cost of the quake, which struck just before 5pm local time (just before 10pm GMT) and was soon followed by two powerful aftershocks of 5.9 and 5.5 magnitude, would run into billions of dollars. The quake will set back Haiti's recent fledgling attempts to restore some political and economic stability.

The presidential palace, the tax office, the ministry of commerce and the foreign ministry were among the buildings destroyed, while the headquarters of the UN's stabilisation mission (Minustah), led by Brazil, which plays a vital role in ensuring security in Haiti, also collapsed. The Brazilian government said its 1,300 troops were unharmed and would support the emergency relief efforts.

A “large number" of UN personnel have also been reported missing, including its head, Hédi Annabi. Tens of thousands of people in the capital (pop. 1m) are also thought to have lost their homes.

The poorest country in the Western Hemisphere, Haiti has a history of destructive natural disasters, long exacerbated by political instability, and has yet to recover from the devastation wrought by storms and hurricanes in 2008 that left 900 dead and many thousands homeless. The effects of the latest quake are compounded by the density of the population, the lack of emergency capacity and the poor quality of construction. In November 2008, following the collapse of a school in Petionville, the mayor of Port-au-Prince estimated that up to 60% of the buildings were so shoddily built as to be considered unsafe in normal circumstances.

So far, Haiti has received pledges of emergency aid totalling US$400,000 from the Inter-American Development Bank and the US Red Cross. Along with the promise of aid from other governments from the region and beyond, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) said it was dispatching a disaster assistance response team along with a search-and-rescue team of at least 72 personnel and six rescue dogs. Venezuela also said it would send a 50-member humanitarian assistance team to Haiti in the next few hours. Neighbouring Cuba and coastal US states were also on Tsunami alert last night.

Pointer: Although the Caribbean is not usually considered a seismic danger zone, it has a history of large, devastating earthquakes separated by hundreds of years. Most of Haiti lies on the Gonave microplate, a sliver of the earth's crust between the much larger North American plate to the north and the Caribbean plate to the south. Paul Mann, a scientist from the University of Texas told the New York Times that yesterday's earthquake occurred when what appears to be part of the southern fault zone broke and slid. The largest recorded earthquake in modern times on the island of Hispaniola (which Haiti shares with the Dominican Republic) was an 8.1-magnitude temblor that produced a tsunami and killed 1,790 people in 1946, while the last quake to hit Haiti's capital specifically was of magnitude 6.7 in 1984.

Development: On 24 February leading dissidents reported on increased and intrusive security measures by the Cuban authorities following the death from hunger strike a day earlier of a 42-year old prisoner Orlando Zapata Tamayo, listed by the international human rights NGO Amnesty International as a prisoner of conscience.

Significance: The Cuban opposition is fervently hoping that this case will force the international community to put stronger pressure on the Havana government.

The US and the European Union (EU) quickly responded with strong condemnation but key actors like Spain's leftwing government, which currently holds the EU presidency, insisted that Spain should maintain relations with Havana, arguing that a boycott would be counterproductive.   Spain's push for an end to the 1996 EU Common Position on Cuba, which conditions political and commercial relations on advances in human rights and democratic reform, will now likely be forced on the backburner by sceptical EU partners.

The Cuban exile community in Miami will also pressure the US government to end its tentative rapprochement with Cuba. Senior US state department officials were in Havana last week (26 February) for another round of migration talks and on 23 February a new bill went before congress seeking to further liberalise US agricultural trade with Cuba.

Unusually, President Raúl Castro, in the company of a visiting President Lula da Silva of Brazil, commented on the case yesterday, saying he “lamented" the death, but insisted that there was “no torture, no executions" in Cuba. He reiterated that he was willing to talk to the US “about everything", as equals.

The website Cubadebate later published a strongly worded article accusing the Cuban dissident community (or 'mercenaries') of using Zapata, “a common criminal", for their own ends. “Transformed into a 'political activist' after many spells in prison, Zapata was the perfect candidate for self-execution", it argued.   “He was 'dispensable' and easy to convince_.Zapata's corpse is now exhibited with cynicism as a collective trophy", declared the author, a blogger identified as Enrique Ubieta Gómez.