Daily Headlines: August 29, 2012

* Brazil: Work is expected to resume at the site of what will be the world's third largest hydroelectric dam despite opposition from environmentalists and local indigenous groups.

* Venezuela: Oil Minister Rafael Ramirez said that firefighters extinguished a massive blaze at a major oil refinery that killed at least forty-one people.

* Mexico: President-elect Enrique Peña Nieto said that he will step into the case of a Mexican woman sentenced to ninety-nine years in prison for murder in Texas.

* Cuba: According to the Cuban Tourism Ministry the number of foreign visitors to the island in 2011 surpassed the two million-person mark for the ninth consecutive year.

Video Source – YouTube via Al Jazeera English (In June about 150 indigenous protesters opposed to the Belo Monte dam occupied the project’s construction site).

Online Sources- BBC News, Bernama, The Latin Americanist, ABC News, Fox News Latino