Argentina

• Tuesday, March 20th 2012 - 01:24 UTC

  Rousseff administration will promote “buy Brazilian” policy to defend industry

  

  “As of this year Brazil will follow the US example giving a 25% margin of preference to local goods in government procurement”, said Fernando Pimentel, Minister for Development, Industry and Foreign Trade.

• Tuesday, March 20th 2012 - 01:16 UTC

  Argentine truckers call for indefinite strike as soy bean crop was taking off

  

  Argentina’s truckers called Monday an indefinite strike to demand higher pay rates, parking their rigs in protest just as exporters were counting on them to haul freshly harvested soybeans to port.

• Monday, March 19th 2012 - 11:18 UTC

  Maverick Norwegian yachtsman Jarle Andhoy is in trouble again.

  

  According to press reports from Norway and New Zealand over the weekend, the 54-foot yacht steel yacht Nilaya is reported to be sailing off Antarctica with a broken boom and is heading for an unspecified Argentine Antarctic base to carry out emergency repairs and to refuel.

• Monday, March 19th 2012 - 06:54 UTC

  Recalling the phrase “Argentines are crooks from the first to the last”

  

  “You were right, or at least that is what Argentines I come across in the street tell me”, said former Uruguayan president Jorge Batlle. In effect Batlle became world famous in 2002 for his phrase describing the River Plate neighbours: “Argentines are a bunch of crooks, from the first to the last, from A to Z”.

• Sunday, March 18th 2012 - 19:59 UTC

  Paraguay calls on Argentina for “reflection and dialogue” regarding trade restrictions

  

  The Paraguayan government called for “reflection and dialogue” from the Argentine government in order to find a solution to the commercial restrictions in place on imported products, “we don’t need any more walls”.

• Sunday, March 18th 2012 - 19:55 UTC

  “The Argentine government doesn’t understand what is going on” says former official

  

  Former Argentine Cabinet Chief Alberto Fernández assured on Sunday today that “the Government has difficulties understanding what is going on, and gives fallacious speeches that are far from reality,” and blasted the cutback of subsidies on public services and the bill that seeks to reform the Central Bank's charter

• Sunday, March 18th 2012 - 19:48 UTC

  Unasur supports Argentine Malvinas and call on UK to resume negotiations

  

  Foreign ministers from the Union of South American Nations (UNASUR) reaffirmed their support for Argentina over the Malvinas Islands sovereignty dispute at the annual meeting held in Asunción, Paraguay.

• Saturday, March 17th 2012 - 07:21 UTC

  YPF is an Argentine asset run by Spanish investors, De Vido tells Madrid

  

  Argentine Planning Minister Julio de Vido lashed out at Spanish Industry Minister José Manuel Soria by saying that oil company YPF is an Argentine corporation run by Spanish investors and should not be considered an asset of the European country.

• Saturday, March 17th 2012 - 06:13 UTC

  EU/Mercosur will exchange market access proposals when Brazil chairs the round

  

  The European Union and Mercosur concluded Friday in Brussels the eighth round of negotiations for a free trade agreement with the commitment to begin exchanging market access proposals at the next meeting.

• Saturday, March 17th 2012 - 06:10 UTC

  US confirms ‘neutral position’ in Falklands’ dispute; hopes for cooperation on practical issues

  

  United States stated that it maintains its “neutral position” over the Falklands/Malvinas Islands dispute between Argentina and UKand hopes for an agreed solution, an official source of the US government assured after the three day visit of British Prime Minister David Cameron which included several meetings at the White House