Headlines: Ship burns for days; Get behind the Big Salute; Volcanic ash over Islands; Man guilty of sex with child.
Foreign direct investment in Latinamerica reached 106 billion US dollars in 2007, overtaking the record 89 billion of 1999, according to the latest release from the United Nations Latin American Commission, CEPAL.
Bolivian President Evo Morales agreed to a nationwide recall referendum, gambling that Bolivians will re-elect him after just two years in office and confirm support for his plan of reforms which has been condemned by some of the country's richest provinces.
Almost 60% of Chilean women who had children during 2005 were single moms, the Chilean Institute of Statistics, INE reported this week. INE noted that most of the single mothers were between 20 and 24 years old.
The United States banking giant Citigroup announced it wants to sell 400 billion US dollars of assets over the next three years as part of its bid to return to profit. It has 500 billion US dollars of legacy assets that it wants to reduce to 100 billion
Prospects for continued relatively strong growth in emerging and developing economies suggests that demand growth for energy and commodities will remain solid, even as global growth is slowing, according to the International Monetary Fund, IMF, First Deputy Managing Director John Lipsky.
Sugar cane and cane-based ethanol became a more important energy source than hydroelectric power in Brazil's overall energy production last year, topped only by petroleum and oil products according to a report from the government's energy planning agency, EPE.
Chilean authorities are considering the possibility that Chaitén volcano in continuous eruption for over a week might collapse and release a torrent of red-hot pyroclastic material (burning gas and rocks) that could devastate the surrounding area.
Brazilian Consumer Prices Index experienced its biggest increase in four months in April, 0.55% (up from March's 0.48%) because of higher food costs, according to the Brazilian Geography and Statistics Institute, IBGE.
European efforts to promote bio-fuels should be rethought because of the contribution they have made to rising food prices, according to Jeffrey Sachs, a top economic advisor to the United Nations.