Daily Headlines: September 14, 2016

* Brazil: Eduardo Cunha, the former Brazilian lower house speaker who helped lead the impeachment process against recently ousted President Dilma Rousseff, was himself expelled from the Chamber of Deputies over corruption allegations.

* Latin America: According to the State Department, seventeen Latin American and Caribbean states are still deemed as “major drug transit or major illicit drug producing countries.”

* United States: A new poll taken in four key battleground states in the upcoming presidential election showed Latino voters overwhelmingly support former senator Hillary Clinton.

* Mexico: Investigators looking into the disappearance and possible massacre of forty-three trainee teachers nearly two years ago have widened their probe to focus on more police officers.

YouTube Source – Transparency International

Online Sources – The Atlantic, InSight Crime, Politico, Reuters

Daily Headlines: June 16, 2016

* Honduras: Approximately 500 people rallied in Tegucigalpa and urged for an international investigation into the murder approximately three months ago of indigenous rights activist Berta Caceres.

* Venezuela: At least four people including a sixteen-year-old teen have died in recent days amid growing protests over food and medicine shortages.

* U.S.: A poll released this week found that a whopping 89% of Latinos view presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump unfavorably.

* Mexico: The new special prosecutor appointed to the case of 43 Ayotzinapa students missing since September 2014 has come under fire for purportedly attending the wedding of Joaquín "El Chapo" Guzmán in 2007.

YouTube Source – ODN (From March 2016: “Thousands of mourners turned out for the funeral of slain Honduran indigenous leader Berta Caceres.”)

Online Sources – Rappler, Al Jazeera English, ABC News, Business Insider

Daily Headlines: May 27, 2016

* Mexico: While questions continue in the official investigation of the 43 Ayotzinapa college students missing since September 2014, one of the survivors of the attack against his classmates has sought political asylum in the U.S.

* El Salvador: The Salvadoran legislature approved issuing $152 million in bonds in order to finance proposals to combat rampant gang violence.

* Brazil: Police are searching for at least thirty suspects behind the gang rape of a sixteen-year-old girl in Rio de Janeiro that was recorded and uploaded on Twitter.

* Panama: The Panamanian Supreme Court urged the federal government to seek the extradition of ex-President Ricardo Martinelli from the U.S.

YouTube Source – AJ+ (Video uploaded in September 2015.  Yesterday marked twenty months since the 43 Ayotzinapa students have disappeared and may have been murdered).
 
Online Sources – The Atlantic, Vice News, euronews, CBC, Reuters

Daily Headlines: April 27, 2016

* Mexico: A few thousand people including some family members of 43 missing Ayotzinapa university students marched in Mexico City yesterday to question the government’s shaky investigation into the case.

* Peru: Peruvian officials will expand a law allowing the military to shoot down civilian planes suspected of drug smuggling to include boats and backpackers.

* Argentina: State-run YPF will export crude oil next month for the first time since 2013 as part of a plan to boost production amid low oil prices.

* U.S.: A new study concluded that the number of Latino children was undercounted in the last Census and this has caused a lack of federal funds to be destined to some communities in need.

YouTube Source – El Universal

Online Sources – Reuters, NBC News, Bloomberg, Voice of America

Daily Headlines: December 9, 2015

* Guatemala: The Guatemalan Constitutional Court tossed out an appeal by the attorneys representing Efrain Rios Montt and stated that the ex-dictator’s genocide trial will go on as scheduled for next month.

* U.S.: A new report found that Latino neighborhoods need greater access to healthier food options sold in markets while Latino youth are more likely to be bombarded by ads promoting unhealthy snacks and drinks.

* Cuba: As part of the diplomatic rapprochement between Cuba and the U.S., envoys from both countries discussed competing claims of billions of dollars in owed assets.

* Mexico: Investigators with the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights said that they found another inconsistency in the Mexican government probe over 43 students from Ayotzinapa missing since September 2014.

YouTube Source – NTDTV (Guatemalan high court judges are expected to resume the genocide and crimes against humanity trial of former strongman Efrain Rios Montt more than two years after the original verdict was overturned).
 
Online Sources – ABC News, The Guardian, USA TODAY, NBC News

Daily Headlines: November 12, 2015

* Chile: Groundbreaking commenced yesterday in the construction of the supersized Giant Magellan Telescope in Chile’s northern Andean region.

* Venezuela: President Nicolas Maduro blamed “imperialist ambushes” for the arrest of two nephews of first lady Cilia Flores for allegedly attempting to smuggle drugs into the U.S.

* Puerto Rico: The homicide rate in Puerto Rico has fallen by 15% compared to last year and 40% in relation to 2012 according to Gov. Alejandro Garcia Padilla.

* Mexico: A new exhibition at a Mexico City museum attempts to link the 1968 Tlatelolco massacre with the disappearance of 43 Ayotzinapa students missing for nearly fourteen months.

YouTube Source – Marca Chile

Online Sources – Reuters, Latin American Herlad Tribune, Endgadget, The Guardian

Daily Headlines: November 9, 2015

* South America: Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos apologized the military’s role during the deadly 1985 Palace of Justice siege, while Ecuador will start its first trial for crimes against humanity relating to state actions some three decades ago.

* Peru: Diplomatic tensions have heightened between Peru and Chile over a disputed border area that has a population of approximately 15,000 people.

* Nicaragua: The Nicaraguan government gave permission for an environmental impact assessment on a planned interoceanic canal that critics claim will damage land and displace thousands of people.

* Mexico: Were remains of some of the 43 disappeared Ayotzinapa students missing since September 2014 located in a shallow grave in Guerrero state?

YouTube Source – teleSUR English
 
Online Sources – The Guardian, Fox News Latino, The Yucan Times, BBC News, teleSUR English

Daily Headlines: October 20, 2015

* Canada: The incoming Liberal government under Justin Trudeau could affect Canadian mining interests in Latin America as well as the North American state’s growing Latino immigrant population.

* Mexico: Parents of some of 43 Ayotzinapa students missing for over a year have called on a boycott against a documentary that they claim relies on a “false” version of events.

* Cuba: Cuba’s Foreign Ministry rejected unconfirmed claims that troops from the island were sent to Syria in support of President Bashar al-Assad.

* Venezuela: Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro railed against Lorenzo Mendoza, the head of the Empresas Polar food conglomerate, for suggesting that the country needs an international economic bailout.

YouTube Source – Associated Press
 
Online Sources – Newsweek, Voice of America, Reuters, teleSUR English, Latin American Herald Tribune

Daily Headlines: October 14, 2015

* Mexico: A recently released report from the Mexican Attorney General ‘s office on the 43 missing Ayotzinapa students has shown numerous contradictions with the results of the official probe.

* Latin America: Three people died and fourteen inmates escaped from a Brazilian prison during a riot, while four suspected gang members died during an uprising in a Salvadoran correctional facility.

* Colombia: U.S. Ambassador to Colombia Kevin Whitaker said that his country will not push for the extradition of FARC rebel commanders though Washington will seek alleged criminals.

* U.S: A new Nielsen study found that Latinos over the age of fifty are growing in numbers, represent a burgeoning consumer base and are healthier than initially believed.

YouTube Source – teleSUR English (Thousands of marchers took to the streets of Mexico city last month on the one-year anniversary of the disappearance of 43 Ayotzinapa students.)
 
Online Sources – Tico Times, oneindia, Fox News Latino, BBC News, Latina Lista

Daily Headlines: September 24, 2015

* Mexico: Parents of some of the 43 missing (and possibly killed) Ayotzinapa college students who disappeared nearly one year ago went on a hunger strike.

* Central America: The expanded Panama Canal is still scheduled to reopen next April despite multiple setbacks, while the start of construction on a Nicaraguan interoceanic waterway has been delayed to early 2016.

* Puerto Rico: Puerto Rico’s debt-ridden economy may explain why the number of residents who left the island for the U.S. mainland in 2014 spiked by 31% to a record 64,000 people.

* Argentina: Canadian mining firm Barrick’s operations in Argentina were partially suspended following the spill of some 35,000 cubic feet of cyanide.

YouTube Source – EFE

Online Sources – ABC News, Fox News Latino, Latin American Herald Tribune, HIS Maritime,
Yahoo News

Daily Headlines: September 22, 2015

* Mexico: Police and protesters in Mexico’s Guerrero state clashed days prior to the one-year anniversary of the disappearances of 43 college students.

* Cuba: Pope Francis ended his visit to Cuba with a call for family unity and reconciliation among the island’s residents.

* Brazil: Brazil’s currency sunk to a record low today amid an economy hampered by recession and rising inflation.

* Argentina: Daniel Scioli, the presidential candidate for the ruling coalition, said that he would continue the current regime’s legal battle against “vulture” debt holders.

YouTube Source – teleSUR English (“In an expression of mounting frustration with the lack of results in the official investigation into the enforced disappearance of the 43 Ayotzinapa students, protests escalated in the southwestern Mexican state of Guerrero where the tragic events occurred.")
 
Online Sources – Bloomberg, The Latin Americanist, BBC News, GlobalPost, CNBC

Daily Headlines: September 18, 2015

* Chile: Areas of the Chilean port city of Coquimbo were declared disaster zones after an 8.3-magnitude earthquake Wednesday night left at least eleven people dead and one million evacuated.

* Mexico: Mexican authorities announced the capture of Gildardo Lopez Astudillo, the suspected head of the Guerreros Unidos gang behind the disappearances of 43 Ayotzinapa college students one year ago this month.

* Cuba: Jose Cabanas, the head of the Cuban interests section in Washington, has been named as Cuba’s first ambassador to the U.S. since 1961.

* U.S.: The Copa America Centenario tournament is still scheduled to be played next year in the U.S. despite numerous indictments against current and former regional soccer body officials.

YouTube Source – Times of Oman (“New aerial video shows the devastation in the coastal town of Coquimbo after Chile's 8.3 earthquake.”)
 
Online Sources – teleSUR English, BBC News, Tico Times, The Latin Americanist, CBS News

Daily Headlines: September 7, 2015 (Updated)

* Mexico: Families of 43 Ayotzinapa college students missing for nearly a year have called on meeting with Mexico’s president after an independent probe contradicted the official investigation.

Update: President Enrique Peña Nieto said on Monday that he would be willing to meet again with families of the missing students and claimed that the government's investigation into the disappearances remains open.

* U.S.: While some politicians on the campaign trail deride immigrants, a recent study found that “immigrant adolescents are actually less likely than native-born peers in the United States to commit crimes, use drugs or behave violently.”

* Latin America: Representatives from seventeen nations celebrated the tenth anniversary of the Petrocaribe oil alliance that has been shaken by the low price of crude and Venezuela’s economic problems.

* Colombia: FBI agents reportedly placed the late Nobel laureate Gabriel García Márquez under surveillance including monitoring his ties to then-Cuban president Fidel Castro.

YouTube Source – euronews
 
Online Sources including Update – El Universal, The Latin Americanist, Latina, The Washington Post, Xinhua, Excelsiór (in Spanish)

Daily Headlines: August 18, 2015

* Peru: Peru may have registered a 30% drop in coca cultivation over the past two years yet hundreds of coca growers accuse authorities of providing them insufficient compensation to grow other crops.

* Caribbean: Cuba’s civil defense system was placed on alert due to the effects of a year-long drought, while Puerto Rico sought U.S. Defense Department aid to combat one of the worst droughts in the island’s history.

* Ecuador: Senior disaster official Maria del Pilar Cornejo claimed that about 325,000 people living near the active Cotopaxi volcano are at risk of being hit by possible mudslides and rock flows.

* Mexico: The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights accused the Mexican government of preventing them from fully investigating the disappearances of 43 missing (and possibly murdered) students from Ayotzinapa.

YouTube Source – VICE News (“Despite the United Nations confirming in 2013 that Peru has overtaken Colombia as the world's top coca and cocaine producer, the country’s place atop the drug supply chain has — at least so far — not included the levels of violence seen in Colombia, Mexico, and other international narcotics hubs.”)
 
Online Sources – Reuters, ABC News, Business Insider, Fox News Latino, BBC News

Daily Headlines: July 30, 2015

* Mexico: At least 129 corpses in 60 graves have been found in Mexico since September 2014 though none belong to 43 missing Ayotzinapa students according to data from the attorney general’s office released on Monday.

* Latin America: The U.N.’s 2015 economic growth forecast for Latin America and the Caribbean was halved to 0.5%, which would be the lowest level in six years.

* Venezuela: President Nicolas Maduro called on the U.N. to mediate a border dispute with Guyana that the opposition claims is a distraction from Venezuela’s domestic problems.

* Chile: Twelve former Chilean soldiers were arrested and charged with burning to death two protesters marching against the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet in 1986.

YouTube Source – teleSUR English (“The 2011-2015 class of the Ayotzinapa Rural Teachers Training College graduated (on July 18th), with 43 fewer students than would have been the case had they not been forcibly disappeared 9 months ago, sparking a huge nationwide and international protest.”)

Online Sources – The Guardian, Reuters, Vice News

Daily Headlines: July 1, 2015

* Mexico: The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights accused the Mexican government of acting too slowly in the investigation over forty-three Ayotzinapa university students missing since last September.

* Brazil: The presidents of Brazil and the U.S. met at the White House two years after a diplomatic rift over U.S. intelligence surveillance on the South American country.

* El Salvador: The Chalatenango region may be immune from most of the modern-day violence in El Salvador but the scars still remain from the country’s brutal civil war.

* South America: Chile will be seeking its first Copa America title against an Argentine side that walloped Paraguay 6-1 in their semifinal match last night.

YouTube Source – teleSUR English
 
Online Sources – Fox News Latino, New Scientist, The Latin Americanist, PRI, CNN

Daily Headlines: April 21, 2015

* Mexico: The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights called on the Mexican government to investigate supposed coercion against the families of the 43 missing Ayotzinapa students.

* Argentina: The prosecutor who took over for the late Alberto Nisman dismissed allegations claiming that Argentine officials helped protect suspected Iranian involvement in the 1994 AMIA bombing.

* Haiti: The U.S. State Department is none too pleased over a Haitian court dropping charges against a man accused in a kidnapping ring with close ties to the family of President Michel Martelly.

* Venezuela: The President of Venezuelan state-run oil company PDVSA claimed that they are exporting around 2.5 million barrels of crude each day.

YouTube Source – user AJ+
 
Online Sources –The Latin Americanist, Reuters, Latin American Herald Tribune, CNN

Daily Headlines: March 24, 2015

* U.S.: According to a new study about forty million people in the U.S. speaks the blend of English and Spanish known as “Spanglish.”

* Uruguay: Uruguay will reportedly not take in more former Guantanamo detainees as President Tabaré Vasquez seems to distance himself from the policies of his predecessor, José Mujica.

* Argentina: The recent archeological find of an allegedly secret Nazi hideout in northern Argentina appears to be more a case of fiction rather than fact.

* Mexico: Family members of some of the missing and possibly massacred forty-three Ayotzinapa students continued their U.S. tour by protesting over the past few days in New York, Los Angeles and other cities.

Video Source – YouTube user NCLLP
 
Online Sources – UPI; Dominican Today; The Guardian; KTLA

Daily Headlines: February 5, 2015

* Mexico: Mexican priest Gregorio Lopez Geronimo protested outside of the White House yesterday in order to call attention to the case of forty-three students missing for more than four months.

* Dominican Republic: Activists denounced as a “failure” government efforts to naturalize tens of thousands of Dominican-born people of Haitian descent whose citizenship was stripped in a controversial 2013 court ruling.

* Venezuela: Ex-mayor Enzo Scarano was freed from prison nearly one year after he was convicted for allegedly inciting violence during anti-government protests.

* Panama: Will former President Ricardo Martinelli return to Panama where he’s accused of being a key figure in a growing corruption scandal?

Video Source – YouTube user teleSUR English (“Protests demanding the safe return of the 42 missing Ayotzinapa students were held in 20 US cities (last month) to coincide with the visit to Washington by Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto”.)
 
Online Sources – Fox News Latino; GlobalPost; El Universal; Stuff.co.nz

Daily Headlines: February 3, 2015

* Mexico: New doubts have been raised in the government’s findings of the 43 missing Ayotzinapa students after a Mexican magazine claimed detained suspects were tortured into confessing.

* Argentina: In one of the latest twists in the Nisman murder case, an Argentine judge refused to handle allegations of a cover-up by President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner in the investigation of the 1994 AMIA bombing.

* Cuba: Cuban state media published the first photos of former president Fidel Castro to appear publicly since August of last year.

* Venezuela: The already weakened diplomatic ties between the U.S. and Venezuela have worsened following the expansion of travel bans against members of the Maduro administration.

Video Source – YouTube user teleSUR English (“Family members of the 43 missing Ayotzinapa students are in Geneva, Switzerland, taking their case to the UN Committee on Forced Disappearances.”)

Online Sources – The Huffington Post; Voice of America; CNN; MercoPress; The Latin Americanist