Brazil

• Thursday, January 21st 2010 - 06:46 UTC

  Brazil inaugurates first commercial ethanol-fuelled power plant

  

  Brazil inaugurated this week the world’s first ethanol-fuelled power plant in the state of Minas Gerais. The flex-fuel turbine, which was converted from running solely on natural gas, began operating on December 31 and is currently in its optimization and testing phase.

• Wednesday, January 20th 2010 - 12:49 UTC

  Lula da Silva announces campaign to promote protégé Dilma Rousseff

  

  With less that a year for presidential elections Brazilian leader Lula da Silva announced a spree of “public works inaugurations” until April, with the purpose of promoting the candidacy of his cabinet chief Dilma Rousseff.

• Wednesday, January 20th 2010 - 12:38 UTC

  Brazil promises to find killers of journalist and compensates family

  

  The Inter American Press Association IAPA praised Governor Jaques Wagner from the Brazilian state of Bahia for the enactment of legislation which provides for payment to the widow and children of journalist Manoel Leal de Oliveira murdered in 1998.

• Tuesday, January 19th 2010 - 13:45 UTC

  Argentina/Brazil review bilateral trade in February

  

  Argentina and Brazil will be meeting early February in Buenos Aires to assess how bilateral trade has been evolving and to plan the following steps to keep improving trade relations between Mercosur senior members.

• Tuesday, January 19th 2010 - 01:57 UTC

  Lula da Silva absent from Bolivia’s Morales taking office ceremony

  

  Brazilian president Lula da Silva will not be participating this week at Bolivia’s Evo Morales taking office ceremony. He will be represented by his foreign affairs advisor Marco Aurelio García, according to Valor Economico, a financial publication from Sao Paulo.

• Monday, January 18th 2010 - 11:35 UTC

  Brazil Catholic Church attacks government initiative on abortion and gay rights

  

  Brazilian president Lula da Silva and his National Program on Human Rights which last week apparently overcame military intransigence, now faces another formidable voice in the country’s politics: the Brazilian Episcopacy, disappointed with the abortion and gay marriage proposals.

• Saturday, January 16th 2010 - 06:54 UTC

  Lula da Silva yields to military eliminates “political repression” term

  

  Brazil’s President Lula da Silva said that he’s not sponsoring a “witch hunt” when he proposes the creation of a Truth Commission to investigate cases of torture and killings of political prisoners during the long military dictatorship from 1964 to 1985.

• Friday, January 15th 2010 - 09:38 UTC

  Brazilian project to cut poverty to “developed countries’ level” in six years

  

  Brazil could achieve social indicators similar to those of developed countries by 2016 if the country is able to maintain the same rate of extreme poverty reduction and income redistribution as recorded during the 2003/2008 period, according to an official report from the Presidential Strategic Affairs Secretariat.

• Thursday, January 14th 2010 - 12:07 UTC

  Petrobras expands its operations to Portugal and Turkey

  

  Brazil’s government managed oil giant Petrobras is in talks to buy a stake in Portugal’s Galp Energia, Brazil’s Mines and Energy Minister Edison Lobao told reporters Wednesday in Brasilia.

• Thursday, January 14th 2010 - 12:00 UTC

  Brazil elected to board of directors of Bank for International Settlements

  

  Brazil’s Central bank president Henrique Meirelles was elected to the board of directors of the Bank for International Settlements, a further sign of the country's increasing clout in the world economy.