Daily Headlines: August 19, 2016

* Bolivia: The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization believes Bolivia is safe from food shortages despite going through one of its worst droughts in decades.

* Colombia: Polls show most Colombians would back voting in a plebiscite for a planed peace deal with the FARC though support varies from a little more than half to as high as 67%.

* Mexico: Mexico’s National Human Rights Commission accused the police of killing twenty-two people in extrajudicial executions last May and trying to cover up the murders.

* Honduras: Approximately one-third of the senior police officers in Honduras have been fired as part of a push to eliminate corruption within law enforcement.

YouTube Source – CCTV News (From March 2016: “Lake Poopo was Bolivia’s second largest. It started to dry up in late 2014, and by December last year it evaporated. Scientists said a drought linked to El Nino, as well as the diversion of rivers for mining and farming, have all played a part in Lake Poopo’s latest disappearance.”)
 
Online Sources – Deutsche Welle, Xinhua, BBC News, Colombia Reports

Daily Headlines: August 18, 2016

* Haiti: The United Nations admitted to have “played a role” in a cholera outbreak that has killed at least 10,000 people in Haiti but stopped short of admitting peacekeepers caused the epidemic.

* El Salvador: The Salvadoran Supreme Court unanimously ruled to send former Colonel Guillermo Benavides to prison over civil war crimes and refused an extradition request from Spain relating to the 1989 massacre of a group of Jesuit priests.

* Venezuela: “Venezuela will represent a growing supply risk for oil markets in 2017,” concluded a recent report from Columbia University’s Center on Global Energy Policy.

* Paraguay: Several hundred protesters participated in an anti-government march on the second anniversary of the inauguration of President Horacio Cartes.

YouTube Source – AFP (From January 2015: “Five years since the 2010 earthquake, the cholera epidemic in Haiti is still claiming lives, and there are recriminations over who was responsible for bringing it to the country.”)
 
Online Sources – Fox News Latino, Bloomberg, Reuters, The New York Times

Daily Headlines: August 17, 2016

* Bolivia: Landlocked Bolivia took a big step towards being the world’s largest exporter of lithium following its first shipment of the metal to China.

* Brazil: Suspended President Dilma Rousseff proposed early elections though that may not be enough to prevent her from possibly being removed from office by the Brazilian Senate later this month.

* Puerto Rico: At least 500 passengers were evacuated from a ferry that caught fire off the Puerto Rican coast this morning.

* Nicaragua: Opposition parties have called for a boycott of Nicaragua’s upcoming presidential elections that critics claim are rigged to create a “dynastic dictatorship” for current leader Daniel Ortega.

* Mexico: Is the kidnapping of six people including the son of imprisoned capo Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman a sign of increased violence between Mexican drug gangs?

Daily Headlines: August 15, 2016

* Argentina: Human rights group the Mothers of Plaza de Mayo held their 2000th weekly march in Buenos Aires days after the United States (US) declassified hundreds of documents related to actions during the “Dirty War” era.

* Cuba: Former Cuban president Fidel Castro made a rare public appearance to celebrate his 90th birthday and also penned a letter thanking his compatriots “for the signs of respect, greetings, and gifts” he has recently received.

* Puerto Rico: The US government declared a public health emergency in Puerto Rico due to the spread of the Zika virus that has infected at least 10,000 people there.

* Guatemala: A Canadian legal aid group has called on the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to probe a local mining firm accused of allegedly using legal chicanery to prevent a referendum over a Guatemalan mine.

YouTube Source – teleSUR English

Online Sources – BBC News, The Bubble, Vice News, The Toronto Star, The Atlantic