Daily Headlines: September 1, 2016

* Venezuela: Several hundred thousand people are marching at a protest in Caracas against the regime of President Nicolas Maduro and calling for his resignation from office.

* South America: Qualifiers for the 2018 World Cup resume today with matches including the latest battle between neighbors Uruguay and Argentina, and Ecuador looking to continue their historic home field advantage in Quito versus Brazil.

* Costa Rica: Costa Rica has been running its electrical grid using renewable energy sources for at least 121 days and officials are hoping to stretch that out to a full year.

* Latin America: A new report found that operations by special U.S. military forces including Green Berets and the Navy SEALs have tripled in Latin America between 2007 and 2014.

YouTube Source – Agencia EFE 

Online Sources – Reuters, Xinhua, Goal.com, The Independent, Common Dreams

Rousseff Ousted from Brazilian Presidency, Temer Takes Over (Updated)

By a 61-20 vote, the Brazilian Senate voted Wednesday afternoon to oust Dilma Rousseff as the country's president over charges of illegally manipulating government accounts.

Rousseff, who has been suspended since May as part of the impeachment process, also awaits a separate vote by the Senate to further suspend her from public office.

Update (1:15 pm): The Senate was unable to obtain the two-thirds approval needed to suspend Rousseff from public office for eight years. 

She had intervened on the Senate floor during a marathon session on Monday and compared the treatment of her detractors to the torture she underwent during the military regime of the 1970s. She also implied that former running mate turned adversary and then-acting leader Michel Temer was an "usurper" plotting with her opponents to enact a "coup" against her.

Update (2:20 pm): President Rafael Correa tweeted his ire over the removal of Rousseff and announced the recall of his country's ambassador to Brazil. 

Ecuador thus becomes the second Latin American state to recall their ambassador to Brazil after Bolivian Evo Morales tweeted he would do the same.  

Update (3:45 pm): And Venezuela makes three.

[More updates below the page break]

Daily Headlines: August 31, 2016

* Cuba: Direct commercial flights from the United States to Cuba will resume on Wednesday for the first time since 1961 and could soon reach as many as 110 per day.

* Haiti: Jean-Bertrand Aristide, the former Haitian president ousted on two separate occasions, made a rare public appearance to back Maryse Narcisse in the race for the country’s next president.

* Colombia: “Today we have a slogan that ... we will not forget the disappeared during peacetime,” said a human rights campaigner calling attention to the more than 45,000 missing people during Colombia’s decades-long armed conflict.

* Venezuela: Several opposition activists have been detained and three journalists were expelled from Venezuela on the eve of what is expected to be a massive anti-government protest in Caracas on Thursday.

YouTube Source – AFP (“US secretary of transportation Anthony Foxx will travel to Cuba August 31, 2016, on the occasion of the first regular flight between the two countries after more than 50 years of suspension, according to local authorities.”)

Online Sources – ABC News, Fox News Latino, Reuters, CNN

Daily Headlines: August 30, 2016

* Brazil: A defiant suspended President Dilma Rousseff defended herself during a marathon session of Brazil’s Senate but it may not be enough to prevent her from being ousted as soon as later today.

* Puerto Rico: Monica Puig made made history this month by earning Puerto Rico’s first ever gold medal but the tennis star was shockingly eliminated in the first round of the U.S. Open.

* United States: A federal appeals court upheld an order denying asylum to twenty-eight immigrant mothers and their children who claimed they would face danger if deported to their Latin American countries of origin.

* Mexico: Federal police chief Enrique Galindo was fired from his post over denunciations against officers accused of the extrajudicial killings of twenty-two suspected drug gang members last year.

YouTube Source – euronews (“Brazil's suspended President Dilma Rousseff has accused her critics of using trumped charges against her to trample on the country's democracy.”)

Online Sources – Daily Telegraph, ABC News, Reuters, USA TODAY

Daily Headlines: August 29, 2016 (Updated)

* Mexico: Juan Gabriel, the iconic Mexican singer and songwriter known for such hits as “Siempre en mi Mente” and “Querida”, died on Sunday at the age of sixty-six.

* Colombia: FARC commanders issued a definitive ceasefire to begin on Monday and days after the rebels and the Colombian government reached a historic peace deal that awaits approval via a plebiscite this October.

* Argentina: An Argentine court convicted thirty-eight ex-military officers last week for their role in the kidnapping, torture, and murder of several hundred victims during the oppressive “Dirty War” era.

* Venezuela: A U.S. Department of State spokesman condemned moving opposition figure Daniel Ceballos from house arrest to prison in an action he deemed as trying to “intimidate and impede the Venezuelan people's right to peacefully express their opinion” ahead of a September 1st rally.

Update: The Venezuelan government replied to the criticism by accusing the U.S. of promoting "instbaility" and plotting a coup during the September 1st anti-government march.

YouTube Source – JuanGabrielVEVO

Online Sources including Update – Fusion, ABC Online, The New York Times, Reuters, 20minutos.es