MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

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Headlines:
Unemployment up and reaches 10.1% in Brazil; Bombs in the eve of Argentina's 1976 coup anniversary;
US Homeland Security to help Brazil.

Unemployment up and reaches 10.1% in Brazil

Brazil's unemployment rate was above 10% in February, the highest level in the last nine months, reported Thursday the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics. The 10.1% is one full point above January's 9.2% but below the 10.6% of February 2005. Unemployment, which had dropped to 8.3% last December climbed in February to its highest since May 2005, when it was 10.2%. The rise in unemployment last month was attributed to a seasonal cutback in temporary sales and factory positions. Those jobs are normally scaled back following the hiring rush to meet end of the year demand. The official IBGS monthly unemployment rate measures the number of people seeking work in Brazil's six largest metropolitan areas, Sao Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Belo Horizonte, Porto Alegre, Salvador and Recife, and does not account for those employed in the informal sector, which in Brazil is estimated to be roughly half the country's workforce.

Bombs in the eve of Argentina's 1976 coup anniversary

Two homemade bombs exploded Thursday outside Buenos Aires car dealerships, a day before the 30th anniversary of the coup that opened the way for a seven year military dictatorship, one of the bloodiest in recent Argentine history. No victims were reported from the explosions but the two dealerships suffered extensive damage. The bombs, according to pamphlets left at the place, were attributed to the previously unknown "Rodolfo Walsh Command", informed the police. "The economic power behind the dictatorship must pay. Companies like (U.S. automaker) Ford and (Germany's) Mercedes-Benz were allies of the dictatorship, accomplices in the disappearance of workers. Thirty years have elapsed and they still enjoy impunity", said the pamphlets. The first bomb went off at the door of a Ford dealership Thursday morning and a few later, police experts detonated a similar device outside the Mercedes-Benz main building in Buenos Aires. In February civil lawsuits were filed in Argentine courts against Ford and its Argentine subsidiary for the alleged 1976 kidnapping of union organizers. A similar demand has also been filed against Mercedes-Benz for the alleged disappearance of 14 workers from its factory during the 1976-83 military regime. The group that took credit for the bombs is named after journalist and author Rodolfo Walsh who went missing on March 25, 1977. He was kidnapped by a paramilitary squad after publishing an "open letter" on the first anniversary of the coup in which he denounced the "atrocities" of the dictatorship. The 1976/1983 Argentine dictatorship is blamed for the capture and summary execution of between 10,000 and 30,000 suspected subversives.

US Homeland Security to help Brazil

Agents from the United States Department of Homeland Security will soon be helping Brazil, Argentina and Paraguay combat money laundering and terrorism financing, said the United State Embassy in Brasilia. The focus is the porous border region where Brazil, Paraguay and Argentina meet an area US authorities have long considered a source of fundraising for radical Islamic groups. "It is also believed to be South America's busiest contraband and smuggling center, where billions of dollars annually are generated from arms trafficking, drug smuggling, counterfeiting, intellectual property-rights violations, and other crimes," the embassy said in a statement. Agents are due to arrive in Brazil within two months, and in neighboring Argentina and Paraguay shortly after. Working with local law enforcement and customs officials, they will set up units to investigate and prosecute an array of financial crimes that also include contraband smuggling and tax evasion, the embassy said. Money and explosives for two of the worst terrorist attacks that left dozens killed and injured in Buenos Aires in the nineties are believed to have come through the triple border area. One of the targets was the Israel Embassy (1992) and the second the Argentine Jewish Community Association, (1994). According to the U.S. embassy, the effort was agreed to by a permanent working group representing Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay and the United States. The Brazilian Federal Police had no immediate comment.