A damning report on the parlous state of Caracas hospitals broadcast on 29 July by the UK’s award-winning Channel 4 News, not exactly known for its sympathies with the Right, doubtless would be received with scorn by President Nicolás Maduro as part of the international conspiracy against the...
Colombia's national budget proposal for 2016 could open the door to several years of austerity.
After a decade of strong government spending, Colombia faces several years of tight budgets. On 14 July the National Council for Economic and Social Policy (Conpes) approved the finance ministry’s...
Trouble for Odebrecht and Andrade
The presidents of two of Brazil’s largest construction companies, Marcelo Odebrecht (of Construtora Odebrecht) and Otávio Azevedo (of Andrade Gutiérrez) were arrested by police on 21 June. Reports said they were held as part of the on-going investigation...
“An offensive, reckless xenophobe.” This was how the president of Mexico’s ruling Partido Revolucionario Institucional (PRI), César Camacho, described the US business tycoon Donald Trump on 18 June for remarks he made during a speech to launch his presidential campaign a day earlier. Camacho was...
Odebrecht and FCC win Panama Metro contract
Brazil’s civil engineering giant Construtora Norberto Odebrecht, in partnership with FCC Construcciones of Spain, was declared the winner of the bidding for the Línea 2 Panama City Metro contract, with a US$1.86bn proposal. The consortium led by the two...
Petrobras, the troubled Brazilian state oil firm, was one of the big winners this week following the visit of Chinese premier Li Keqiang. While other former investors are suing Petrobras over its management’s cover-up of the massive corruption scandal at the firm, China is betting that the...
Chile is considered one of the least corrupt countries in Latin America. Yet all of a sudden there are three major cases in the headlines, and an embarrassed government is promising new measures to strengthen ethical standards.
The first case, known as the Caval affair, was revealed by the...
Development: On 27 March, El Salvador’s supreme electoral tribunal (TSE) finally announced the official results of the country’s legislative and municipal elections, nearly a month after they were staged on 1 March.
Significance: The painstakingly slow count was compounded by the fact that the...
A confrontation on 10 February between local police and the community in Pichanaki, (province of Junín), could have major implications for oil and gas production in Peru. According to the government, around 500 people invaded Peruvian army barracks temporarily leased to Pluspetrol, an Argentine...
Development: On 26 February, as a Buenos Aires judge dismissed the obstruction of justice case brought against President Cristina Fernández, she announced a small ministerial reshuffle.
Significance: Yesterday was a good day for the embattled Argentine president: the decision by Judge Daniel...
Uruguay has offered Paraguay full access to its diplomatic network and infrastructure in mainland China. The announcement by Uruguay’s foreign minister, Luis Almagro, has raised hopes that this may help save a Paraguayan woman facing a death sentence in China. It has also sparked speculation that...
By most metrics, Guyana's economy has performed well in recent years. Progress through 2015-2017 will depend significantly on two factors. One is the arrangement of finances for the Amaila Falls Hydroelectric Project (AFHP). The other is the possible lack of access to credit through Venezuela’s...
Belizeans seem unsure about how to assess the public security situation over the past year. Some celebrate the fact that the country’s homicide rate per 100,000 inhabitants was the third-lowest since 2008 while others note that the number of homicide cases was 22% higher than in 2013 — a year when...
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...
Barack Obama has made history – and cast his legacy – by becoming the first US President to make a decisive move to end the last Cold War anachronism in the Americas. On 17 December President Obama used his executive powers to decree a major change in US-Cuba policy, paving the way for the...
In November some 500 Bolivian quinoa producers from Oruro and Potosí – Bolivia’s two main quinoa growing regions – held demos outside the presidential palace demanding that the government led by President Evo Morales stem an influx of cheap non-organic Peruvian quinoa into the country. This has...
The ‘militarisation’ of policing has become a matter of concern in much of Latin America, where the recourse to the military to deal with internal security matters has been spreading. Fears have been voiced by some about the potential for abuse and violation of human rights, by others about its...
Development: As widely trailed in advance, Saudi Arabia exercised its muscle at the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec) on 27 November, rejecting any cut in the group’s 30m barrel per day (b/d) output target.
Significance: For Latin American oil producers the news is uniformly...
The 16 October murder of an investigative journalist and his assistant by suspected contract killers working for a local mayor has prompted serious concern about just how far organised criminal groups may have infiltrated authorities in Paraguay. With a string of national deputies and even a...
LatinNews is excited to announce a new partnership with the Legatum Institute, a London-based public-policy think-tank that produces the highly regarded Prosperity Index, the 2014 issue of which launches this week.
Subscribers to LatinNews will enjoy strong added-value from this collaboration,...
