Daily Headlines: December 30, 2014

* Brazil: The Aurelius Capital hedge fund that was reportedly ‘a leading member of a group of investors that refused to accept a debt restructuring with Argentina” is now campaigning for Petrobras to fall under default.

* Argentina: If you believe that Argentina’s president became the godmother of a Jewish baby to stop him from becoming a werewolf then there’s a bridge in Brooklyn you might be interested in buying.

* Venezuela: According to the Venezuelan Violence Observatory, the South American country ranks only behind Honduras for the highest number of homicides in 2014.

* Chile: President Michelle Bachelet submitted to Congress a labor reform package aimed at promoting unionization and expanding the use of collective bargaining in contract negotiations.

Video Source – YouTube user FRANCE 24 English

Online Sources – New York Daily News; The Guardian; NBC News; Zee News; Reuters

Daily Headlines: December 29, 2014

* Puerto Rico: Will the U.S. follow up the liberation of former contractor Alan Gross by intervening to free imprisoned Puerto Rican activist Oscar Lopez Rivera?

* Venezuela: President Nicolás Maduro named Foreign Minister Rafael Ramirez as the next ambassador to the U.N. days before Venezuela will be represented on the international body’s Security Council.

* Paraguay: “I'm healthy after all this time, I'm calm, I'm okay,” admitted former hostage Arlan Fick who was let go by his EPP rebel captors.

* El Salvador: A Salvadoran man kidnapped by the armed forces at the age of three in 1982 reunited with his biological family last week.

Video Source – YouTube user Fusion (Video uploaded in June 2014).
 
Online Sources – Latin American Herald Tribune; Reuters; teleSUR English; The Latin Americanist; MercoPress

Daily Headlines: December 26, 2014 (Updated)

* Argentina: Former dictator Reynaldo Bignone received a twenty-five year prison sentence for the illegal adoptions of children during the “Dirty War” era.

* U.S.: U.S. immigration officials began a pilot program earlier this month to place GPS tracking devices on undocumented migrants caught crossing the border from Mexico. 

* Colombia: The FARC rebels agreed to release a Colombian soldier who was kidnapped hours before a ceasefire want into effect on December 20th.

Update: Th FARC freed soldier Carlos Becerra Ojeda on Friday.

* Nicaragua: At least two people have died during protests this week against construction of a $50 billion interoceanic canal.

Video Source – YouTube user locomotiv63

Online Sources – The Independent; The Guardian; Voice of America; Latin American Herald Tribune; NBC News

Daily Headlines: December 24, 2014

* Spain: Immigrants from several Latin American counties were among the big winners who will receive about $490,000 from Spain’s $3 billion “El Gordo” lottery.

* Cuba: The U.S. government will pay $3.2 million as part of a settlement to recently liberated former subcontractor Alan Gross.

* Brazil: The first woman to head Brazil’s biggest agrarian lobbying group was selected to become the country’s first female agriculture minister.

* Argentina: Researchers in Argentina have reportedly created “the first prosthetic arm in Latin America to use sensors to respond to nerve impulses.”

Video Source – YouTube user Reuters

Online Sources – Bloomberg; Reuters; The Latin Americanist; ABC News

Daily Headlines: December 23, 2014

* Nicaragua: Work officially began on Monday on a $50 billion interoceanic canal that is backed by China and expected to be completed in 2020.

* Uruguay: At least 1200 cannabis growers have been registered as part of a program allowing the legal cultivation and selling of marijuana.

* Argentina: A U.S. appeals court upheld a ruling forcing the Argentina government to pay millions of dollars to holdout creditors.

* Brazil: President Dilma Rousseff pledged to take “drastic” measures to jumpstart Brazil’s sagging economy and claimed that the corruption scandals hitting Petrobras are “overblown.”

Video Source – YouTube user euronews

Online Sources – Latin American Herald Tribune; Reuters; Voice of America; The Latin Americanist; NBC News

Daily Headlines: December 22, 2014

* Latin America: Argentine dark comedy “Savage Tales” and a Venezuelan biopic on Simon Bolivar were two of the movies selected for the Best Foreign Language Film shortlist at the upcoming Oscars.

* Mexico: Leaders of Mexico's Roman Catholic Church are expected to meet today with relatives of forty-three missing (and possibly massacred) university students.
  
* Dominican Republic: Prosecutors in Poland suspended the investigation against an ex-Vatican ambassador to the Dominican Republic accused of child sex abuse.

* Colombia: Five Colombian soldiers were killed in combat hours before an “indefinite” ceasefire by the FARC went into effect on Saturday.

Video Source – YouTube user TrailerHD

Online Sources – Al Jazeera America; The Latin Americanist; The A.V. Club; BBC News

Daily Headlines: December 19, 2014

* Brazil: According to new government data nearly one in four Brazilians “experienced food insecurity despite advances in the fight against poverty.”

* Haiti: Several hundred anti-government marchers protested yesterday in Port-au-Prince as pressure continues to mount against President Michel Martelly. 

* Colombia: Juan Manuel Santos, Colombia’s president, warned that he wouldn’t fully accept an indefinite ceasefire from the FARC due to the rebels’ demands for independent verification.

* Venezuela: President Nicolás Maduro blasted his U.S. counterpart, Barack Obama, for signing into law sanctions against Venezuelan officials accused of human rights abuses.

Video Source – YouTube user CCTV America
 
Online Sources – Fox News Latino; The Guardian; Latin American Herald Tribune; Reuters

Daily Headlines: December 18, 2014

* Costa Rica: Costa Rica legislators began debating a bill this week that could place a moratorium on the production of genetically modified crops.

* U.S.: A new poll indicated that U.S. President Barack Obama's approval rating among Latinos rose since he announced an executive action that could benefit millions of undocumented immigrants.

* Central America: The U.N. recently warned that Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador face “a creeping humanitarian crisis” due to severe drought conditions.
 
* Colombia: Images of the late Nobel laureate Gabriel Garcia Marquez could soon appear on Colombian currency.

Video Source – YouTube user Scientific American

Online Sources – NBC News; BBC News; Christian Science Monitor; Tico Times

FARC Announce Indefinite Ceasefire

Colombia's FARC will start a unilateral ceasefire on December 20th in a move that could help lead to a peace deal between the rebels and the government.

"We have resolved to declare a unilateral ceasefire and an end of hostilities for an indefinite period,"
according to a statement issued by the FARC on Wednesday and read by chief guerilla negotiator alias "Ivan Marquez." The militants called on Pope Francis, the UNASUR bloc, the Red Cross and other international organizations to monitor compliance with the ceasefire.

The FARC expressed their hope that the ceasefire could lead to "an armistice" in Colombia's decades-long armed conflict but warned that they would resume hostilities if the rebels are attacked by the military. 

Negotiations between the FARC and the Colombian government began in November 2012, and both sides have reached partial pacts in areas like land reform and political participation. Discussions were suspended for a few weeks over the kidnapping of a Colombian army general but were renewed following his liberation.

More than 200,000 people have died in the past fifty years of conflict in Colombia.

Online Sources - FARC-EP; MercoPress 

Alan Gross Freed Amid Historic U.S.-Cuba Rapprochement

Cuban authorities freed imprisoned U.S. subcontractor Alan Gross on a day when the leaders of both countries vowed to improve bilateral relations.
 

The sixty-five-year old was released on humanitarian grounds as part of a prisoner exchange that also included an unnamed U.S. intel agent. Three convicted Cuban spies were let out of prison as part of a purported deal between the U.S. and Cuba. 

Gross was detained in 2009 on charges of spying and sentenced to fifteen years in prison. His detention served as one of the main points of diplomatic tension in recent years between Washington and Havana. 

"What a blessing it is to be a citizen of this country," exclaimed a relieved Gross in a press conference from Andres Air Force Base.

"Today is the first day of Hanukkah, and so far it's the best Hanukkah that I’ll be celebrating for a long time," added Gross who also thanked all those who helped secure his release.
 
Cuban-American Senators Bob Menendez and Marco Rubio heavily criticized the prisoner swap as well as the Obama administration's push to reestablish diplomatic ties between the U.S. and Cuba.  For Gross, however, the White House's actions were the correct actions to take:

Daily Headlines: December 17, 2014

* Brazil: The presidents of Guatemala and Costa Rica could be implicated in a multibillion-dollar bribery scheme allegedly carried out at Brazilian state-run energy giant Petrobras.

* Haiti: Prime Minister Laurent Lamothe may have resigned but that didn’t stop thousands of Haitians from participating in anti-government protests on Tuesday.

* Mexico: At least eleven people died in clashes between rival “self-defense” groups in Michoacán state.

* Panama: The World Bank’s International Finance Corp will provide $300 million in financing for construction of a Panama wind farm that will be the largest in Central America.

Video Source – YouTube user AFP
 
Online Sources – Reuters; Al Jazeera; Tico Times; euronews

Daily Headlines: December 16, 2014

* Honduras: Julian Pacheco Tinoco will become the first serving general to act as security minister in a country with the world’s highest murder rate.

* Latin America: A new report from the Pan American Health Organization and World Health Organization found that the number of babies born with HIV in Latin America and the Caribbean dropped by 78% between 2001 and 2013.

* Colombia: Armed groups illegally recruited at least 110 minors this year according to new data from the Colombian government.

* Venezuela: “They can shove their U.S. visas where they should be shoved,” thundered an angry President Nicolás Maduro over planned sanctions against Venezuelan officials accused of human rights abuses.

Video Source – YouTube user Associated Press

Online Sources – Reuters; Fox News Latino; euronews; Jamaica Observer

Daily Headlines: December 15, 2014

* Haiti: Prime Minister Laurent Lamothe resigned amid growing anti-government sentiment and calls for President Michel Martelly to also step down.

* Venezuela: The Venezuelan government has yet to officially respond to the asylum request of Arturo Pierre Martinez, a U.S. man who illegally crossed into North Korea.

* Ecuador: At least thirteen people including ten of Chinese origin died at a construction accident in an Ecuadoran hydroelectric station.

* Brazil: The former head of Petrobras' distribution subsidiary, a Brazilian lobbyist and two others were charged today for their alleged roles in a multibillion-dollar bribery scheme.

Video Source – YouTube user euronews
 
Online Sources – CNN; SBS; The Guardian; NBC News

Daily Headlines: December 12, 2014

* Vatican: Argentine-born Pope Francis presided over an extraordinary mass at the Vatican in honor of the day of the patroness of Latin America, Our Lady of Guadalupe.

* Cuba: Cuban musician Aldo Rodriguez Baquero denied receiving money from an allegedly secret U.S. program to fund hip-hop artists and promote anti-Castro sentiment among young people.

* Argentina: Government spokesman Jorge Capitanich claimed that Argentina will not give in to “extortion” from creditors involved in a tense debt dispute.

* Mexico: Malala Yousafzai acknowledged that there are “problems in Mexico” after a young man carrying a Mexican flag briefly interrupted the Nobel Peace Prize acceptance ceremony on Thursday.

Video Source – YouTube via Rome Reports (“Argentinian singer Ariel Ramírez composed the 'Creole Mass' 50 years ago. His son Facundo, along with Argentinian pop singer Patricia Sosa interpreted the music in St. Peter's Basilica, as Pope Francis celebrated the Mass in honor of Our Lady of Guadalupe.”)

Online Sources – Fox News Latino; Miami Herald; CBC News; Latin American Herald Tribune

Daily Headlines: December 11, 2014

* U.S.: Television newcomer “Jane the Virgin,” which is an adaptation of a Venezuelan series, received two Golden Globe bids including a best comedy actress nomination for Gina Rodriguez.

* Latin America: Several thousand marched in Nicaragua against the construction of an interoceanic canal while hundreds of Catholic Dominicans participated in an anti-abortion protest.

* Venezuela: U.S. President Barack Obama will likely sign into law a bill passed by Congress this week to place sanctions against Venezuelan officials accused of human rights abuses during political unrest this year.

* Brazil: Mines and Energy Minister Edison Lobão claimed that the government is working on a plan to help Petrobras refinance about $3.4 billion in debt.

Video Source – YouTube user The Paley Center for Media
 
Online Sources – Financial Times; Variety; Time; Dominican Today; NBC News

Daily Headlines: December 10, 2014 (Update)

* Peru: Peru’s government are none too pleased with Greenpeace activists who placed a massive banner next to the iconic Nazca lines.

Update: Greenpeace has apologized "without reservation" for the protest.

* Mexico: “Please, Malala, they are killing us. Don't forget Mexico!” declared a man carrying a Mexican flag who briefly interrupted the Nobel Peace Prize acceptance ceremony.

* Argentina: Malaysia’s Petronas signed a $550 million agreement with YPF to develop extensive shale resources in Argentina.

* Latin America: According to the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization, the number of people in Latin America and the Caribbean suffering from hunger has nearly fallen in half over the past twenty years.

Video Source – YouTube user No Comment TV

Online Sources including Update – U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization; Financial Times; Mashable; The Guardian; BBC News

Daily Headlines: December 9, 2014

* Venezuela: The U.S. Senate approved imposing sanctions against Venezuelan officials accused of human rights abuses but it could be all for naught unless the bill is passed by the House this week.

* Brazil: The World Cup held in Brazil and the country’s presidential election was among the top three topics most discussed among Facebook users this year.

* Puerto Rico: Legislators on the cash-strapped commonwealth passed a $2.9 billion borrowing plan that includes financing public transportation.

* Latin America: Seven Latin American countries including Costa Rica, Peru and Mexico vowed to protect about 49 million acres of degraded land.

Video Source – YouTube user AFP (“Protesters take part in a demonstration in front of the White House in Washington, on May 9, 2014, urging US President Barack Obama to impose sanctions on those responsible for human rights abuses against protesters in Venezuela.”)
 
Online Sources – Bloomberg; ABC News; Miami Herald; Inside Costa Rica

Daily Headlines: December 8, 2014

* Haiti: Thousands of people marched in anti-government protests over the weekend and called on President Michel Martelly and Prime Minister Laurent Lamothe to resign from their posts.

* Bolivia: Survivors of one of the worst floods to hit Bolivia in decades last February reportedly “have found themselves destitute, hungry, thirsty, and prone to fevers, infections and mosquito-borne diseases.”

* Uruguay: President José Mujica said that six Guantanamo military prison detainees that arrived in Uruguay yesterday are classified as refugees and, hence, “can leave the country whenever they wish.”

* Mexico: Culture, education and technology are the three primary themes of the latest Ibero-American Summit starting today in Veracruz, Mexico.

Video Source – YouTube user euronews
 
Online Sources – MercoPress; euronews; The Guardian; Al Jazeera

Mexico: Investigators ID One of 43 Missing Students

Forensic experts in Argentina have reportedly identified the charred remains of Alexander Mora Venancio, one of forty-three Mexican students missing since September 26th.

According to a post published on December 6th on the Escuela Normal de Ayotzinapa Facebook post, what was left of Mora was found amidst where in a garbage dump where three detained hit men claimed that the young adults where tortured, killed and had their remains burnt.

Mexican Attorney General Jesus Murillo Karam confirmed the news at a December 7th news conference. He claimed that the remains of the twenty-one-year-old were identified by a team from Austria that compared a bone fragment with the DNA of Venancio's parents.

"Using data from the University of Innsbruck, it was determined that the remains belong to a male with a probability a billion times higher, that’s ‘b’ for billion, of being the biological son of Ezequiel Mora Chavez and the sibling of Omar Mora Venancio and Hugo Mora Venancio than for any other unrelated person,"  asserted Murillo Karam.

He also claimed that the results support his hypothesis presented last month alleging that the students were allegedly kidnapped by police from the town of Iguala and subsequently massacred by a local drug gang.

"This is scientific proof that the remains found at one of the scenes (of the crime) along with the confessions of some of the detained suspects coincide with our investigation," Murillo Karam said.   
Austria team though the result were tipped off to a parent of one of the missing students.

Today's Video: The Holiday Spirit

Nearly three thousand people gathered in Honduras on December 1st to break the Guinness world record for the world's largest human Christmas tree.  The 2945 participants dressed in red, green and other holiday colors as they broke the previous record done in Argentina last year.



"In Honduras, we can live in peace and tranquillity with opportunity to earn an income, to be happy and to give our children and our children's children a Honduras that will always has faith and hope," declared President Juan Orlando Hernandez after receiving recognition of the new record from a Guinness representative.  Despite the lovely gesture, it will take much more than a large human tree to bring "peace and tranquillity" to a country wracked by rampant violence.

Daily Headlines: December 5, 2014 (Updated)

* Uruguay: According to an Uruguayan media report the country will take in six Guantanamo military prison detainees before the end of this month.

Update: U.S. defense officials on December 7th confirmed the transfer of the six Guantanamo prisoners to Uruguay.

* Mexico: President Enrique Peña Nieto visited Guerrero state for the first time since forty-three students went missing about ten weeks ago but did not go to the village of Iguala where the disappearances occurred.

* Latin America: International Monetary Fund chief Christine Lagarde warned that shifting “economic and financial conditions worldwide” could affect Latin America in the near future.

* U.S.: The Latino unemployment continues to decline and fell to 6.6% last month, which is more than 2% compared to November 2013.

Video Source – YouTube user teleSUR English (Video uploaded in August 2014).

Online Sources – Bureau of Labor Statistics; BBC News; Times of India; ABC News

Daily Headlines: December 4, 2014

* Venezuela: The U.S. State Department condemned the Venezuelan government for charging opposition activist Maria Corina Machado with conspiring to kill President Nicolás Maduro.

* Latin America: According to Transparency International, Uruguay and Chile are the least corrupt countries in South America while Paraguay and Venezuela are the region’s most corrupt.

* Colombia: The FARC guerillas and Colombian government agreed to resume peace talks that were suspended following the capture of several hostages including an army general.

* Chile: Four women tortured during the military dictatorship led by Gen. Augusto Pinochet are seeking stronger punishments for those accused of raping political prisoners.

Video Source – YouTube user euronews (English)

Online Sources – U.S. Department of State; Fox News Latino; The Guardian; Transparency International

Daily Headlines: December 3, 2014

* Peru: As the U.N. Climate Change Conference is underway in Lima, Peruvian officials have tried to downplay the country’s environmental problems.

* Guatemala: A court ruled that former strongman Efrain Rios Montt can remain under house arrest until a new trial to face charges of genocide and crimes against humanity.

* Cuba: The White House and several Cuban-American legislators have called on the prompt release for aid worker Alan Gross as today marks the fifth anniversary of his capture.

* Dominican Republic: Francisco Dominguez, the Dominican Republic’s top prosecutor, reportedly met with his Vatican counterpart to discuss the case against an archbishop accused of sexual abuse.

Video Source – YouTube user DW (English)

Online Sources – Deutsche Welle; GlobalPost; USA TODAY; Radio Vatican

Daily Headlines: December 2, 2014

* Mexico: As Enrique Peña Nieto enters his second year as Mexico’s president, ten of thousands of protesters in Mexico City called on him to quit and leave office.

* Latin America: Thirty-four prisoners reportedly broke out of a Haitian jail while a Venezuelan human rights group claimed that forty-one inmates died after being intoxicated last week.

* Brazil: President Dilma Rousseff chose Armando Monteiro, the former head of Brazil’s “most powerful business lobby”, as the next minister of industry and trade.

* Colombia: General Ruben Dario Alzate resigned from his post in the Colombian military about thirty-six hours after he was released by the FARC guerillas.

Video Source – Fusion via YouTube

Online Sources – Bloomberg; ABC News; Reuters; The Guardian

Daily Headlines: December 1, 2014

* Uruguay: Tabaré Vazquez returns to the Uruguayan presidency, and will surely continue plans for a law legalizing the production and sale of marijuana.

* Venezuela: President Nicolás Maduro announced last Friday that government spending will be slashed amid plunging oil prices but ruled out cuts to social programs.

* Puerto Rico: San Juan’s public transportation system is paralyzed today as a result of a strike over a proposed oil tax increase.

* Mexico: The China Railway Construction Corporation will reportedly bid again on a high-speed railway line even though Mexican officials recently revoked a Chinese-led bid.

Video Source – euronews via YouTube
 
Online Sources – MercoPress; ABC News; Reuters

Mexican Comic Icon "Chesprito" Dies

Famed Mexican comedian Roberto Gómez Bolaños passed away on Friday at the age of eighty-five at his home in Cancún.

Prior to becoming an actor, Bolaños was an amateur boxer, studied engineering in college and wrote scripts for film and TV.  He short stature and prolific writing earned him a nickname that was a play on words from "Little Shakespeare" and would remain with him throughout his life: "Chespirito".

His big break came in 1968 with a sketch comedy show that allowed him to develop numerous comic characters over the years including wacky medic "Dr. Chapatín", petty crook "El Chompiras" and bumbling superhero "El Chapulín Colorado". Yet he was best known for his role as "El Chavo del Ocho", an orphan who resided in a barrel located inside a lower-class Mexico city neighborhood.  An episode of El Chavo often showed his good-nature hijinks with his child friends and adult neighbors though his penchant for wordplay sometimes masked social commentary.

"El Chavo interprets every word in the literal sense and, thus, suffers the injustice of the world.  He questions society and our relations of power and friendship by emphasizing the significance of language," noted Colombian television critic Omar Rincón.

Bolaños' humor made him a superstar across the Spanish-speaking world where numerous countries still show his programs even though he stopped recording TV material roughly twenty-five years ago.  El Chavo-themed restaurants in Puerto Rico and Colombia have dishes named in honor of the characters from the program homage while visitors can travel to an official Chavo theme park in Venezuela. Bolaños himself claimed in a 1999 interview "this may sound blasphemous in Mexico but in Peru I'm seen as the most important Latin American comic of the millennium. And I believe it."

The First Thanksgiving

The following post was first published in 2013:

Today is the Thanksgiving holiday in the U.S. and it is generally believed that the first Thanksgiving feast took part between the Pilgrims and Native Americans in Massachusetts in 1621.  But as we first mentioned back in 2007, the first Thanksgiving really occurred in 1565 when Spanish explorers and Timuca natives in St. Augustine, Florida got together and dined on bean soup.

The following brief video via the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette delves into the history behind the first Thanksgiving nearly 450 years ago:

Although Thanksgiving is not typically celebrated in Latin America, many Latinos in the U.S. do celebrate the holiday.  Some households modify the holiday and add traditional Latin American details such as feasting on tamales or (in the case of my family) serve yellow rice as one of the side dishes to the Thanksgiving turkey.

Video Source - The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette via YouTube

Online Source - The Latin Americanist; Latino Post

Daily Headlines: November 27, 2014

* Brazil: A spokesman for Brazilian soccer legend Pelé confirmed that he was taken to a “special care” unit of a Sao Paulo hospital in order to be treated for a urinary tract infection but is soon expected to be discharged.

* Venezuela: At least thirteen Venezuelan inmates who had gone on hunger strike to protest prison conditions died after breaking into an infirmary and ingesting medications.

* Peru: The Peruvian Supreme Court refused to listen to appeal from president Alberto Fujimori seeking to overturn his twenty-five year prison sentence for human rights abuses.

* Cuba: Several Cuban dissidents thanked Spanish Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Garcia-Margallo for urging the island's government to permit former political prisoners to safely leave the country.

Video Source – YouTube user FRANCE 24 English (“The 74-year-old football legend admitted 3 days ago with a urinary infections suffers from complications after surgery and has been transferred to the 'special care unit' in hospital.”)

Online Sources – ABC News; GlobalPost; Latin American Herald Tribune; Reuters

Daily Headlines: November 26, 2014

* Mexico: Human rights groups accused the authorities of cracking down against protesters marching at a rally on November 20th to protest the disappearance of forty-three students missing for more since September 26th.

* Cuba: Spanish Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Garcia-Margallo urged the Cuban government to accelerate economic reforms and allow previously imprisoned dissidents to leave the country.

* South America: Will the South American Pacific Alliance and Mercosur trading blocs soon merge together?

* El Salvador: Salvadoran police blamed gang violence for the murders of eight people at a graduation party on Tuesday.

Video Source – Fusion via YouTube 

Online Sources – The Guardian; The Washington Post; Buenos Aires Herald; Reuters

Daily Headlines: November 25, 2014

* Colombia: The FARC freed two recently kidnapped soldiers this morning in an action that could help renew the suspended peace talks between the rebels and the Colombian government.

* U.S.: A poll released yesterday showed that 89% of Latino voters including solid majorities across all major political party affiliations favor President Barack Obama’s executive action on immigration.

* Chile: A rematch of the Brazil-Colombia 2014 World cup quarterfinal and the traditional Argentina-Uruguay rivalry will be two of the more highly anticipated group stage matches at next year’s Copa America.

* Puerto Rico: According to police data the estimated 688 homicides for this year is expected to be 25% less than 2013 and at least 40% less than the record 1164 murders committed in 2011.

Video Source – The Economist via YouTube
 
Online Sources – Rappler; NBC News; Fox News Latino; SBS

Daily Headlines: November 24, 2014

* Mexico: “We will not rest until we find them alive…because we don’t want one of you to become the 44th (victim),” said one of the relatives of the missing Ayotzinapa students during an appearance on stage at a Calle 13 concert last Friday.

* U.S.: According to the Pew Research Center at least half of undocumented migrants from Mexico and Central America will receive temporary benefits from an executive action first announced last week by U.S. President Barack Obama.

* Ecuador: The Ecuadoran government will continue to offer a safe haven to Wikileaks founder Julian Assange who has been residing in Ecuador’s embassy in London since June 2012.

* Uruguay: Polls indicate that former President Tabaré Vasquez will easily win the November 30th presidential runoff election.

Video Source – La Jornada via YouTube

Online Sources – teleSUR English; Pew Research Center; SBS; Voice of America

Daily Headlines: November 21, 2014

* Mexico: Tens of thousands protested in Mexico and abroad on Thursday in support of forty-three students missing for nearly two months and possibly massacred by drug gang hitmen.

* U.S.: Despite receiving nine Latin Grammy nominations, Calle 13 failed to win an award as they were upset by Enrique Iglesias for best urban song and the late Paco de Lucia for album of the year.

* Colombia: Preparations are underway for the liberation of five people recently kidnapped by the FARC including a Colombian army general.

* Nicaragua: Officials claimed that construction of a $50 billion interoceanic canal will begin in December and rejected concerns over possible environmental damage.

Video Source – YouTube user Newsy World
 
Online Sources – Latin American Herald Tribune; ABC News; Reuters; CBC

Daily Headlines: November 20, 2014

* Chile: A Chilean court ruled that the state should pay around $7.5 million to the families of thirty ex-political prisoners incarcerated on a remote island during the military rule of Augusto Pinochet.

* Venezuela: President Nicolás Maduro decreed twenty-eight laws this week including ones that would raise taxes on luxury items and increase international reserves.

* Mexico: President Enrique Peña Nieto will reportedly release details of his personal wealth following the controversy over first lady Angelica Rivera’s ownership of a $7 million mansion.

* Colombia: An agreement was reportedly reached for the liberation of a Colombian army general and four others captured by the FARC, and whose kidnapping led to the suspension of peace talks between the government and the rebels.

Video Source – YouTube user comunaburguesa (Footage circa 1973 of detainees at the prison on Chile’s Dawson Island, which was located near the southernmost tip of South America).

Online Sources – BBC News; Bloomberg; ABC News; The Guardian

Daily Headlines: November 19, 2014

* Venezuela: President Nicolás Maduro announced plans to arrange a meeting with countries excluded from the OPEC cartel in order to discuss the plummeting prices of oil.

* Brazil: Eike Batista, the man once named as Brazil’s wealthiest person but is allegedly $1 billion in debt, went on trial over charges of insider trading. 

* Mexico: Mexican first lady Angelica Rivera said that she would sell her shares in a $7 million mansion built by a construction firm that received government contracts under President Enrique Peña Nieto.

* Honduras: Police discovered the bodies of the reigning Miss Honduras, Maria Jose Alvarado, and her sister who had been missing for approximately one week.

Video Source – CCTV America via YouTube

Online Sources – BBC News; The Guardian; Bloomberg; ABC News

Daily Headlines: November 18, 2014

* Peru: A new report published two weeks before Peru hosts a U. N. climate conference found that the country is the world’s fourth most dangerous state for environmental activists.

* Brazil: Approximately 400,000 signatures have been gathered on a public petition to prevent a controversial pick-up artist from speaking in Brazil.

* Venezuela: Venezuelan state-owned oil firm PDVSA agreed to sell 1.6 million tons of oil and nine tons of petroleum derivates to Russia over the next five years.

* U.S.: The U.S. Border Patrol has allegedly conducted at least ten thousand drone flights along roughly nine hundred miles of the border region near Mexico. 

Video Source – Pulitzer Center via YouTube (Video uploaded in 2012),
 
Online Sources – BBC News; The Guardian; Latin American Herald Tribune; The Huffington Post

Daily Headlines: November 17, 2014

Note: Before we list some of the main stories from the Americas, we would like to apologize for not publishing this post earlier in the day. Unfortunately we were affected by technical difficulties.  Thank you for your kind attention.

* Colombia: The Colombian government suspended peace talks with the FARC after President Juan Manuel Santos blamed the rebels for kidnapping an army general.

* Mexico: The disappearance and possible massacre of forty-three university students is reportedly hurting tourism in the state of Guerrero.

* Brazil: The head of Petrobras claimed that the company would full investigate with the latest corruption scandal to rock the Brazilian state-run oil giant.

* Haiti: A one report found that Haiti is the country with the world's third-highest proportion of slaves compared to their population.

Video Source – euronews via YouTube
 
Online Sources – BBC News; The Latin Americanist; Christian Science Monitor; NPR; Reuters

Daily Headlines: November 14, 2014

* Latin America: A new Pew Research Center report found that most Latin Americans identify themselves as Catholic though their proportion has dropped by 25% since 1970.

* Venezuela: A Venezuelan judge refused to free opposition figure Leopoldo López who has been in jail and awaiting trial since giving himself in to authorities last February.

* Brazil: The real fell to weakest level since April 2005 reportedly due to investor worry over who will be appointed as Brazil’s next Finance Minister.

* Mexico: The Supreme Court ruled that three people convicted over the 1997 Acteal massacre should be immediately released due to violations of their rights to due process.

Video Source – Pew Research Center via YouTube

Online Sources – ABC News; The Guardian; Latin American Herald Tribune; Bloomberg

Daily Headlines: November 13, 2014

* Brazil: A new report from the Brazilian Forum on Public Safety accused the police of killing on average about six people each day over the past five years.

* U.S.: Family members of some of the 265 victims of the Flight 587 crash commemorated yesterday the thirteenth anniversary of the accident that occurred as the plane was en route to the Dominican Republic.

* Panama: Researchers believe that more than two million migrating raptors including hawks, eagles and falcons flew above Panama City this past Sunday.

* Venezuela: The start of the trial against Maria Lourdes Afiuni, a Venezuelan judge seen by the opposition as “among the country's highest-profile political prisoners,” continues to be delayed.

Video Source – InSight Crime via YouTube

Online Sources – UPI; NY1; BBC News; ABC News

Daily Headlines: November 12, 2014

* Colombia: According to a new poll two in every three Colombians back the peace process between the government and the FARC despite the uproar over a deadly rebel attack on an indigenous community last week.

* Peru: The Committee to Protect Journalists condemned the recent murder of a Peruvian journalist reportedly investigating on violence caused by local gangs.

* Venezuela: A music lecturer at a British university accused Venezuela’s famed El Sistema youth music program of being “a cult, a mafia and a corporation.”

* Argentina: More than seventy banks, currency exchange locales and other financial institutions were raided as part of a tax fraud investigation.

Video Source – CCTV America via YouTube
 
Online Sources – teleSUR English; Al Jazeera English; BBC News; The Guardian; The Committee to Protect Journalists

Mexico: Social Media Outrage Over Offensive Missing Student Tweets

Social media has been beneficial for businesses looking to promote their brand, increase sales and gain an advantage above their competitors.  But it can also be a double-edged sword for companies that either inadvertently or purposefully post controversial messages in the aftermath of tragedies. This is a lesson that at least two Mexican companies faced after publishing a tweet alluding to the possible massacre forty-three students.

Marca de chocolates Crunch publica tuit de burla sobre los normalistas http://t.co/AKNIJDC79g
— Proceso (@revistaproceso) November 9, 2014

As seen above, the original message posted Sunday just after midnight on the twitter account for Mexico’s Nestlé Crunch roughly translates to “We Crunched the ones from Ayotzinapa.” The offending tweet was removed approximately two-and-a-half hours later and Nestlé apologized in four subsequent tweets.

“We regret for the recently published content and offer our deepest apologies. We are united with the families (of the disappeared)…and extend our apology to all of the brands affected by this bad joke,” read some of the content tweeted by Nestlé. Yet another message alleged that the Twitter account was hacked and that Nestlé was going to take all measures to prevent future infiltration.  This excuse did not sit well with some netizens who voiced their anger at the candy company.

“Hahahaha ‘we were hacked’ hahaha,” “You finally got what you wanted … to make some noise” and “I will never again buy your product…and I hope you fire the idiot (behind the tweet)” were just some of the messages left behind by indignant social media users to the Mexican Nestlé Crunch twitter account.

Mario Vera, vice president for communications of Nestlé in Mexico, later told the press that the company would investigate if the “offensive message” came from someone within Nestlé or via a hacker.

Meanwhile, a Mexico City pizzeria belonging to the 50 friends chain of eateries also came under fire following an insulting tweet regarding the missing and reportedly murdered students.

Daily Headlines: November 11, 2014

* U.S.: Cuban-born slugger José Abreu was unanimously selected as the American League Rookie of the Year following a stellar season where he batted .317 with 36 home runs and 107 RBI.

* Peru: Production in Peru’s vital copper industry has been affected by an indefinite strike that started yesterday at the country’s Antamina mine.

* Colombia: An ex-drug smuggling pilot testified in court that former capo Pablo Escobar allegedly framed a British businessman imprisoned since 1986 on murder charges.

* Brazil: FIFA will create a $100 million development fund for Brazil months after the soccer’s global governing body earned more than $4 billion in sales from the World Cup.

Video Source – MLB via YouTube

Online Sources – USA TODAY; Reuters; The Guardian; Bloomberg

Daily Headlines: November 10, 2014

* Guatemala: President Otto Perez formally apologized to thirty-three indigenous communities whose residents were forcefully displaced and killed in the construction of the Chixoy hydroelectric dam.

* Brazil: The Brazilian army will start today a drill in the Amazon rainforest reportedly in order to train against any foreign military threat.

* Chile: Inflation in Chile skyrocketed by 1.0% percent from September to October and caused the annual inflation rate to hit its highest point in nearly six years.

* Uruguay: A new study found that Uruguay is Latin America’s most prosperous country and placed ahead of Chile, Argentina and Brazil.

Video Source – YouTube user rightsaction

Online Sources – U-T San Diego; The New York Times; Reuters; MercoPress

Missing Mexican Students Murdered Says Attorney General

Forty-three Mexican students missing for forty-one days were reportedly murdered according to Attorney General Jesús Murillo Karam.

At a press conference on Friday, Karam presented videos of two suspects who confessed to allegedly carrying out the killings of the students. They claimed that the students from Ayotzinapa were taken in large trucks to a dump in nearby village of Cocula where some of them where shot dead while others died from bags placed over their heads. The corpses were then thrown into the dump and burned for six to fifteen hours before being disposed into a river.

"The confessions we have gathered ... very sadly point to the murder of a large number of people," said Karam.

Despite the confessions, Karam kept open the investigation while forensics tests are conducted to properly identify the remains.

On September 26th, several dozen students were riding local buses back to their school following a protest over job discrimination in Iguala.  That evening, armed men from the town of Iguala fired upon the buses and killed three passengers while others fled in terror.  Eyewitnesses claimed that local police shot at some of the escaping students while others were caught and bundled into police vehicles.

Daily Headlines: November 7, 2014

* Mexico: Construction of a $4.3 billion high-speed rail line will be up for bids again three days after Mexican authorities awarded the contractor the project to a Chinese-led consortium.

* Brazil: Recently reelected Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff promised to fight inflation with fiscal measures and make cuts to public spending.

* U.S.: According to the U.S. Labor Department the Latino unemployment rate fell to 6.8% in October, which marks the first time in over six years that the rate is below 7% for two consecutive months.

* Venezuela: One hundred nineteen Palestinian students arrived in Caracas on Thursday where they will study medicine with grants from the Venezuelan government.

Video Source – CCTV News via YouTube (Video uploaded on November 4th, three days prior to the Mexican government’s decision to put the contract back up for bids).
 
Online Sources – Bloomberg; Fox News Latino; Latin American Herald Tribune; The Latin Americanist; Xinhua

Daily Headlines: November 6, 2014

* Dominican Republic: The Dominican Republic withdrew as a member of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights weeks after the tribunal criticized a 2013 decision that stripped the citizenship of many Dominicans of Haitian background.
 
* U.S.: Exit polls indicated that there was a small increase in Latino voters participating in Tuesday’s midterm elections compared to 2010 while the number of Latinos in Congress rose from 28 to 29.

* Mexico: An estimated 65,000 university students participated yesterday in the first day of a three-day strike to protest the government’s actions in failing to locate 43 missing students.

* Brazil: Authorities in Brazil are investigating whether a Belem police officer went on a six-hour killing spree to avenge the death of a colleague.

Video Source – teleSUR English via YouTube (Video uploaded in October 2013).
 
Online Sources – ABC News; The Latin Americanist; Fox News Latino; GlobalPost; BBC News

Daily Headlines: November 5, 2014

* U.S.: The Election Protection Coalition reported receiving at least 14,000 phone complaints of problems during yesterday’s midterm elections including “reports of poll workers treating Latino voters rudely or failing to help” in Kentucky.

* Colombia: The head of the European Council announced that the E.U. will back the Colombian government’s peace talks with the FARC rebels.

* Mexico: The Mexican National Human Rights Commission will investigate the recent deaths of four people including three U.S. citizens and that may have been involved the Matamoros police.

* Venezuela: Operations at Venezuela’s largest oil refinery were suspended on Tuesday due to a blackout.

Video Source – AFP via YouTube
 
Online Sources – U-T San Diego; Reuters; teleSUR English; Los Angeles Times

Daily Headlines: November 4, 2014

* Mexico: Police apprehended the fugitive former mayor of Iguala and his wife who are believed to have ordered the disappearances of 43 students missing since September 26th.

* Bolivia: Ombudsman Rolando Villena expressed his worry over an apparent increase in violence against women in Bolivia including the recent rape and murder of a four-year-old girl.

* Venezuela: President Nicolás Maduro announced that the Venezuelan minimum wage will be increased by 15% in a move that comes a week after he boosted military salaries by 45%.

* Cuba: Cuban officials presented a list of 246 projects that will require some $8.7 billion in foreign investment to the island.

Video Source – PBS NewsHour via YouTube

Online Sources – BBC News; NBC News; The Latin Americanist; NPR; Fox News Latino

Daily Headlines: November 3, 2014

* Latin America: Residents in countries like Mexico and Guatemala over the weekend commemorated their respective holidays to honor and respect the deeds.

* Argentina: The Argentine government suspended the operations of Procter & Gamble after accusing the household products giant of committing $138 million in tax fraud.

* Puerto Rico: Gov. Alejandro Garcia Padilla urged Puerto Ricans to unite and work harder to overcome the commonwealth’s “worst fiscal and economic crisis ... since the 1940s.”

* Brazil: Several hundred people took to the streets of Sao Paulo to protest water shortages and perceived inaction by local officials.

Video Source – YouTube user Charles and Ray Eames (1957 short film by famed industrial design duo Charles and Ray Eames on Mexico’s Day of the Dead holiday).
 
Online Sources – euronews; Latin Post; Reuters; Hispanically Speaking News; Fox News Latino

Nuestro Cine: Battle of the Vampires

What happens when the Cuban musician nephew of Dracula finds a secret potion that allows vampires to be able to live under the sun's rays?  The answer to this can be seen in the 1985 animated movie ¡Vampiros en La Habana! (Vampires in Havana).  The film provides a satirical look at both capitalism and Communism when competing factions of vampires - a Chicago mob and a European cartel - seek to get their claws on the "Vampisol" concoction from Joseph Amadeus von Dracula.  Featuring trumpet playing by the legendary Arturo Sandoval, ¡Vampiros is not your usual scary Halloween flick but is instead a funny spoof of horror and gangster films.

¡Vampiros can be seen in the following video in Spanish and with English subtitles.  (Note that the movie has some adult themes; hence, it's NSFW and probably not recommended for young children).
Video Source - YouTube user R Delgado

Online Source - imdb.com

 

Daily Headlines: October 31, 2014

* South America: Venezuela’s PDVSA will import light crude allegedly as a “cost-saving” measure while Argentine legislators approved an energy reform bill that reportedly could help boost the country’s shale oil production.

* Colombia: The FARC rebels admitted to “assuming their role” in Colombia’s armed conflict but claimed to have never purposefully targeted the civilian population.

* Nicaragua: How has Nicaragua avoided the rampant gang violence that has led to high crime rates in other Central American countries?

* Panama: Regulators in Panama fined a U.S. firm seeking to sell the world’s first genetically modified salmon for human consumption.

Video Source – CCTV America via YouTube
 
Online Sources – Reuters; Bloomberg; NPR; Latin American Herald Tribune; Inter Press Service

Daily Headlines: October 30, 2014

* U.S.: According to a new Pew Research Center poll, Latino voter support of the Democratic Party has diminished slightly while more respondents believe that there is no difference between the Democrats and the rival Republican Party.

* Brazil: The Brazilian central bank rose interest rates as a possible sign that President Dilma Rousseff is seeking too woo investors spooked by her recent reelection.

* Dominican Republic: At least one person was killed during protests where demonstrators called for improvements to social services.

* Chile: 850 marijuana seeds were planted as part of a pilot program in a Santiago municipality to grow medical marijuana for cancer patients.

Video Source – AFP via YouTube 

Online Sources – Pew Hispanic Center; ABC News; BBC News; GlobalPost; The Latin Amercanist

Ongoing Protests in Solidarity with Missing Mexican Students (Updated)

University students in several parts of Mexico are protesting on Wednesday as part of a continuing push for the safe return of 43 young adults missing for more than a month.

At least one hundred protesters have taken control of several highways of access Mexico City today and have allowed motorists to avoid paying at the tollbooths. The demonstrators reportedly include pupils from the Instituto Politécnico Nacional (IPN) and are calling for support of the students from Ayotzinapa, Guerrero state who have disappeared since September 26th. 

In addition, students from the IPN and Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM) plan to take control of the radio stations to their respective schools and provide messages of support for the families of those missing.  Meanwhile, both teachers and students at one of the campuses of the Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana (UAM) have suspended classes today as part of their own protest.

Today’s events are part of three days of action planned by several universities with the aim of calling to justice those responsible for the missing students, defend public education and criticize state-sponsored violence.  Students, teachers and other demonstrators plan to march in Mexico City on Friday, for example.

On September 26th, were riding local buses back to their school in Ayotzinapa following a protest over job discrimination in Iguala.  That evening, armed men from the town of Iguala fired upon the buses and killed three passengers while others fled in terror.  Eyewitnesses claimed that local police shot at some of the escaping students while others were caught and bundled into police vehicles.

Daily Headlines: October 29, 2014

* Cuba: Another year, another overwhelming rejection of the U.N. General Assembly against the decades-long U.S. trade embargo on Cuba.

* Brazil: Will the reelection of Dilma Rousseff to the Brazilian presidency improve U.S.-Brazil diplomatic relations that have been fractured since last year?
 
* Colombia: A World Bank report found that Colombia is the best country in Latin America and Caribbean to do business in.

* Venezuela: Leopoldo Lopez, an opposition activist imprisoned since February, refused to appear in court this week as a sign of protest.

Video Source – Reuters via YouTube

Online Sources – Fox News Latino; Miami Herald; The Latin Americanist; ABC News

Daily Headlines: October 28, 2014

* Uruguay: The ruling Frente Amplio maintained its majority in the Uruguayan legislature, which could be very good news for Tabare Vazquez who is the odds on favorite to return to the presidency in November’s runoff election.

* Nicaragua: A new World Economic Forum report ranked Nicaragua as the world’s sixth best country in the world for gender equality and the best among Latin American and Caribbean states.

* Peru: The bodies of eighty victims of Peru’s Dirty War between the military and Shining Path rebels were returned to their families.

* Argentina: Daniel Filmus, the Argentine secretary regarding the Falkland Islands, blasted British efforts to allow for the offshore drilling of hydrocarbons near the contested archipelago.

Video Source – teleSUR English via YouTube

Online Sources – MercoPress; Inside Costa Rica; Bernama; The Guardian

Daily Headlines: October 27, 2014

* Dominican Republic: Top St. Louis Cardinals prospect Oscar Taveras and his 18-year-old girlfriend died in a car crash yesterday near the ballplayer’s hometown in the Dominican Republic.

* Venezuela: The Venezuelan government backed down from plans to sell Citgo, which is valued at approximately $10 billion.

* Ecuador: A 22-year-old Ecudoran woman became the second person to die from an attack last Wednesday in the Israeli capital city of Jerusalem.

* Colombia: A U.S. federal judge last week sentenced a FARC commander to 27 years in prison for his role in the 2003 kidnapping of three U.S. citizens in Colombia.

Video Source – MLB via YouTube (Oscar Taveras followed his first rookie season in the majors by going 3-for-7 in the postseason including hitting a game-tying home run in the National League Championship Series).

Online Sources – SI.com; Bloomberg; NDTV; LAHT

Dilma Rousseff Reelected to Brazilian Presidency

President Dilma Rousseff has won Sunday's runoff election by a narrow margin ahead of opposition rival Senator Aécio Neves of the PDSB.

With 99.57% of the votes counted, Brazil's first female president garnered 51.59% of the votes versus 48.41% for the former governor.

“Thank you very much!” tweeted a grateful Rousseff whose triumph means that the Workers' Party will command the presidency for a fourth straight term.

Even though the runoff was the tightest election since 1989, Rousseff rejected the notion that “these elections have divided our country in half”.

“Instead of broadening our differences, I have the strong hope that we can create the conditions to unite,” she added.

According to opinion polls Rousseff and Neves have been running neck to neck since the first round was held three weeks ago.  Most polls taken in recent days have given the incumbent a slight but growing advantage though a Senus survey published on Friday gave Neves a nine percent lead. (An October 13 Senus poll taken prior to his endorsement from ex-candidate Marina Silva had Neves up by double digits).

“I fought the good fight,” noted Neves in a speech govern shortly after he called Rousseff to his conceded the election.  He also seemed to echo the victor’s remarks by noting, “The main priority is to unite Brazil and work on a project to dignify all Brazilians.”

Daily Headlines: October 24, 2014

* Haiti: Oral arguments began yesterday in a lawsuit filed in a U.S. court by Haitian victims of a cholera outbreak purportedly caused by U.N. peacekeepers from Nepal.

* Panama: Panama became the latest country from Latin American and the Caribbean to prohibit the entry of travelers from three West African states affected by a Ebola epidemic.

* Peru: Researchers found what had been described as “the world's highest known Ice Age settlements” located about 14,000 feet above sea level in southern Peru.

* Latin America: According to the U.N. foreign direct investment in  Latin America and the Caribbean declined by 23% in the first six months of this year compared to the same period in 2013.

Video Source – Al Jazeera English via YouTube
 
Online Sources – Voice of America; GlobalPost; Reuters; Fox News Latino

Daily Headlines: October 23, 2014

* Honduras: According to the Red Cross, more than half a million people in Honduras are at risk of suffering from hunger due to a major regional drought that has decimated crops and raised the prices of food. 

* U.S.: Latino voters might “sit out” of next month’s midterm elections but they could make a key difference in several hotly contested races.

* Latin America: The ALBA-TCP bloc of Latin American and Caribbean nations called for a stronger effort to combat the Ebola outbreak from spreading beyond Western Africa.

* Brazil: Could the revelation today of an “unexpected” decline in the Brazilian unemployment rate last month affect the outcome of Sunday’s runoff election between Senator Aecio Neves and President Dilma Rousseff?

Video Source – CCTV America via YouTube

Online Sources – The Huffington Post; Los Angeles Times; Houston Chronicle; Miami Herald; Bloomberg