President-elect Barack Obama will meet with Mexican President Felipe Calderon on Monday in Washington. Obama transition officials said the visit was in keeping with the tradition of U.S. presidents meeting with their Mexican counterpart soon after winning election.
Yet another bank cut the 2009 economic growth forecast for Brazil: JPMorgan Chase & Co. downed Latinamerica's largest economy expansion estimate for this year from 2% to 1.5%, as global recession takes its toll on industrial production and business confidence.
Headlines: MBE for dedicated music teacher; Kayakers set out to circumnavigate the Islands
More US workers lost jobs last year than in any year since World War II, with employers axing 2.6 million posts and 524,000 in December alone. The US jobless rate rose to 7.2% in December, the highest in 16 years according to the US Labor Department release.
Bank of England on Thursday cut interest rates to 1.5%, the lowest level in its 315-year history, as it continues efforts to aid an economic recovery. The half percentage point reduction brings interest rates below 2% for the first time since the Bank of England was founded in 1694.
US President-elect Barack Obama has called for drastic action to prevent the US economic situation worsening. In his first major policy speech since being elected, Mr Obama urged Congress to act quickly to pass his 800 billion US dollars stimulus plan.
Brazil's crops of corn and soybean has been downgraded from previous forecasts because of the persistent drought in the southern states, said on Thursday the country's Ministry of Agriculture.
Venezuela expelled on Tuesday the Israeli ambassador to protest against the country's assault on Gaza, after the Venezuelan president described it as a holocaust.
United Status outgoing president George W. Bush will be presenting the Presidential Medal of Freedom to his Colombian counterpart Alvaro Uribe and to the former prime ministers of the United Kingdom, Tony Blair and John Howard from Australia.
Monaco's Prince Albert II spent the first two days of his month-long global warming awareness expedition to Antarctica visiting different country bases in King George Island. On Wednesday he's scheduled to fly over the area and return to Punta Arenas in the extreme south of Chile.