Brazil

• Monday, September 7th 2009 - 14:49 UTC

  Brazil has the “knowledge to build an atomic bomb”

  

  Brazil has the necessary knowledge to build an atomic bomb according to an article in Sunday’s edition of Jornal do Brazil. The statement is based on a doctoral thesis presented recently at the Military Institute of Engineering IME.

• Saturday, September 5th 2009 - 06:03 UTC

  Brazil’s begins process for the construction of a 510 kilometres “bullet train”

  

  The Brazilian government officially established this week a maximum timetable of six years for the construction of the high speed train, HST, planned to link the country’s main populated corridor which includes, Sao Paulo, Campinas and Rio do Janerio.

• Friday, September 4th 2009 - 09:24 UTC

  Rio do Janeiro and Buenos Aires among world’s ten happiest cities

  

  Brazil’s Rio do Janeiro and Argentina’s Buenos Aires open and close the Forbes list of the world’s ten happiest cities according to a recent survey conducted by policy advisor Simon Anholt and market researcher GfK Custom Research North America.

• Friday, September 4th 2009 - 09:08 UTC

  Rio do Janeiro will have Latinamerica’s largest marine aquarium

  

  Brazil’s Rio de Janeiro city will build the largest marine aquarium in Latinamerica, municipal authorities announced on Wednesday. To be named AquaRio, the aquarium is part of a plan to revitalize the city.

• Friday, September 4th 2009 - 07:47 UTC

  Brazilian Senate condemns Venezuela further delaying its Mercosur bid

  

  The Brazilian Senate released a statement criticizing Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez for the measures implemented by his government against private media. The decision by the Senate’s Foreign Affairs Committee could further delay Venezuela’s incorporation to Mercosur.

• Thursday, September 3rd 2009 - 13:18 UTC

  Brazil leaves rates unchanged confident of non-inflationary recovery

  

  Brazil's Central Bank decided on Wednesday to keep its benchmark lending rate unchanged at a record low 8.75%. The monetary policy committee, Copom, voted unanimously to leave the so-called Selic rate steady, in line with analysts' expectations.

• Thursday, September 3rd 2009 - 03:13 UTC

  Brazil claims Amazon deforestation is down, but satellites say otherwise

  

  Brazil's Environment minister claims increased policing have brought a sharp drop in Amazon deforestation over the past year, despite July's jump in logging. Predicting 2009 will witness a significant decline in clearing, Carlos Minc said there had been a 46% fall in the jungle's destruction since July 2008, with just 4375sq km cleared.

• Tuesday, September 1st 2009 - 07:51 UTC

  A black woman poised for presidential candidate in Brazil

  

  “During the US Democrat party primaries, when Hillary Clinton was running against Barack Obama, a friend of mine said the US would have to choose between a woman and a black person, but if I was to be presidential candidate in Brazil, we wouldn’t have that problem, because I’m a woman and black”.

• Tuesday, September 1st 2009 - 06:58 UTC

  Lula da Silva unveils sub-salt oil policy and heralds “new Independence Day”

  

  Brazil has unveiled plans to bring more state control to its oil industry and take advantage of offshore reserves. President Lula da Silva proposed Monday switching to a system which would see the government own a part of all oil produced by changing concessions for production-sharing agreements.

• Tuesday, September 1st 2009 - 05:47 UTC

  WTO confirms ruling favouring Brazil in cotton dispute with US

  

  United States faces annual trade sanctions of about 295 million US dollars for failing to scrap illegal subsidies paid to its cotton growers. However the punishment, imposed by the World Trade Organization (WTO), is far less than the 4 billion USD that Brazil, which brought the case, had wanted.