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MercoPress, en Español

Montevideo, September 12th 2026 - 23:17 UTC

Stories for August 2026

  • Monday, August 24th 2026 - 07:44 UTC

    Unemployment displaces inflation as Argentines' main concern

    Fear of job loss extends into households: 64% said they were concerned a member of their family could lose their job in the coming months

    Unemployment has become the leading problem Argentines want the government to solve, well ahead of inflation, according to the economic expectations report by the polling firm Opina Argentina released over the weekend. Thirty-six percent of respondents placed it first, followed by corruption on 32%, while inflation fell to 11% and insecurity to 9%.

  • Monday, August 24th 2026 - 07:32 UTC

    Almost half the minors recruited by armed groups in 2025 were approached via social media

    The 124-page document, titled “I Thought I Would Never See My Mother Again,” draws on 184 interviews with officials, humanitarian workers, indigenous and community leaders and child protection staff

    Some 44% of children and adolescents recruited by armed groups in Colombia during 2025 were approached through social media or platforms such as TikTok and Facebook, according to data from the Special Jurisdiction for Peace cited in a Human Rights Watch report published on Monday.

  • Monday, August 24th 2026 - 07:28 UTC

    Burnham picks Kyiv for his first foreign trip as British prime minister

    Burnham announced that his government had authorised defence firm MBDA to declassify information on British-made components of the long-range SCALP missile

    British Prime Minister Andy Burnham arrived in Kyiv on Monday on his first trip abroad since taking office in July, coinciding with the 35th anniversary of Ukraine's independence. He met Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha and is due to meet President Volodymyr Zelensky and chair his first meeting of the so-called coalition of the willing, set up by London and Paris under his predecessor, Keir Starmer.

  • Monday, August 24th 2026 - 06:53 UTC

    Two newly detained men testify in the case over the shooting of the Bolivian lawyer

    Beller was shot three times on August 10 outside a hotel in Santa Cruz and spent five days in hospital

    Two men held as part of the investigation into the shooting of Bolivian lawyer Nadia Beller gave statements to prosecutors in Santa Cruz de la Sierra on Sunday. One is accused of supplying the weapon used in the ambush; the other, a Colombian national identified as a possible gunman, turned himself in after learning he was being sought.

  • Monday, August 24th 2026 - 06:22 UTC

    Argentina retires the jets that sank two British ships in the 1982 war

    The retirement forms part of the Plan Dédalo, a five-year restructuring of Naval Aviation drawn up from a study begun in 2025 and approved by the Navy's General Staff

    Argentina's Navy has announced the definitive retirement of its Super Étendard strike aircraft, the French-built jets that attacked the British fleet with Exocet missiles during the 1982 Falklands war. The announcement was made on August 20 by the commander of Naval Aviation, Rear Admiral Román Enrique Olivero, at a ceremony at Punta Indio Naval Air Base. The withdrawal will take place this year, on a date yet to be set.

  • Monday, August 24th 2026 - 02:11 UTC

    The Evolution of Online Casino Sites

    The online gambling industry has grown from a handful of experimental websites into one of the fastest-expanding segments of the global digital economy. Over roughly three decades, it has passed through distinct phases shaped by technology, regulation, and changing consumer habits. Its trajectory offers a useful case study in how a lightly regulated digital sector matures, fragments across jurisdictions, and adapts to successive waves of enforcement and innovation.

  • Sunday, August 23rd 2026 - 22:41 UTC

    Argentina votes this week on the reform barring the central bank from funding the Treasury

    The bill also prohibits the purchase of national, provincial or municipal government bonds on the primary market, the mechanism through which the central bank has historically financed the Treasury

    Argentina's Chamber of Deputies will on Wednesday debate the reform of the central bank's charter promoted by Javier Milei's government, which bars the monetary authority from financing the fiscal deficit through money creation and restores preservation of the value of the currency as its sole objective.

  • Sunday, August 23rd 2026 - 22:32 UTC

    The Mercosur-Singapore trade agreement reaches Argentina's Congress

    The request carried signatures from nine groups, among them PRO, the Unión Cívica Radical, Provincias Unidas, Innovación Federal, Por Santa Cruz, La Neuquinidad and Adelante Buenos Aires

    Argentina's Chamber of Deputies will on Wednesday take up ratification of the free trade agreement between Mercosur and Singapore, signed in December 2023 and still awaiting parliamentary approval. It is the first trade treaty the bloc has concluded with a Southeast Asian country.

  • Saturday, August 22nd 2026 - 08:47 UTC

    Colombia's earthquake toll rises to 329 dead and more than 300,000 affected

    Records of material damage have also risen substantially: 171,273 homes damaged, 31,183 destroyed and 553 buildings collapsed, mainly in Cali and Pereira, the two worst-hit cities

    The magnitude 7.4 earthquake that struck western and central Colombia on August 10 has left 329 dead, 4,600 injured and 247 missing, according to the National Disaster Risk Management Unit's assessment as of Friday. The number of people affected stands at 314,751, from 154,014 families, across 481 municipalities in 16 of the country's 32 departments.

  • Saturday, August 22nd 2026 - 08:40 UTC

    Colombia's government objects to the law barring lower requirements for senior posts

    The presidency's legal secretary, Andrés Barreto, said the initiative “encroaches on exclusive powers of the national government, such as barring the government from organising public employment.”

    Colombian President Abelardo de la Espriella this week objected to the first bill sent to him for signature since he took office on August 7: legislation prohibiting any reduction in the minimum education and experience requirements for senior positions in the public sector and in companies with state participation.