Brazil's Senate approved a bill to roll back payroll tax breaks on Wednesday that is a key measure in President Dilma Rousseff's efforts to reduce a gaping fiscal deficit and restore confidence in her government's accounts. The Senate voted 45-27 to pass the bill which was received from the lower house with no changes.
Camargo Correa Construcoes e Participacoes, one of Brazil's largest construction companies, has admitted its role in a massive scheme to overcharge state-controlled oil company Petrobras and agreed to cooperate in the investigation as part of a leniency deal, anti-trust agency Cade said Wednesday.
An improving job market edged the US Federal Reserve closer to an interest rate hike at its July meeting even as policymakers continued to express broad concerns about lagging inflation and the weak state of the world economy, according to minutes released on Wednesday.
Representatives of Colombia's largest guerrilla movement have asked to meet Pope Francis in Cuba in September and have requested the Catholic Church name a permanent delegate to their peace negotiations with the government.
American Airlines which has operated charter flights to Cuba since 1991, said on Tuesday that it plans to begin charter services between Los Angeles and Havana on Dec. 12. But by that time, the U.S. and Cuban governments may be ready to allow scheduled airline flights between the two countries, a practice not allowed for more than a half-century.
Honorary FIFA vice president Chung Mong-Joon says he will clean the sport of football if elected president of FIFA. Chung blames the previous president Sepp Blatter for the recent corruption scandals which have cast shadows over the sport and its organizing body.
A Brazilian judge sentenced Nestor Cervero, former international chief of state-run oil firm Petrobras, to just over 12 years in prison on Monday for corruption and money laundering related to a bribe allegedly paid to the speaker of Brazil's lower house of Congress.
The Brazilian Central Bank weekly Focus Bulletin released on Monday indicates, for the first time, according to the prevailing opinion among financial institutions that the current recession of the country's economy will extend well into 2016. According to Focus the market forecasts a retraction of the Brazil's GDP of 0.15% in 2016.
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump backed the commitment of ground troops if necessary to cripple the Islamic State and complained the US has always come out in support of Saudi Arabia, and while they make 'a billion a day', they are also the world's biggest funder of terrorism.
Uruguay's largest fish processing company Fripur, generating half of the exports in the country's sector, will lay off 960 workers and suspend its activity from Aug. 19, after falling into administration, it was reported in Montevideo.