
Iceland has awarded two licences for oil and gas exploration and production in the waters off the north east coast of the Atlantic island.

Only four years ago 100.000 South Koreans lined the streets of Seoul to protest the return of US beef to Korea. Consumer confidence in US beef was at an all-time low to the extent that media outlets would not even accept paid ads promoting the products for fear of getting pulled into the protest backlash – instead joining the outrage by declaring US beef to be unsafe from BSE (bovine spongiform encephalopathy) or ‘mad cow’.
![At 45.410 NZ dollars (approx 37.000 US dollars), the average farm employee earned 8.567 NZ dollars more than the average personal [mean] annual wage and salary income earner](/data/cache/noticias/38999/260x165/nz-farmers.jpg)
New Zealand farm workers are doing better than their counterparts in other industries when it comes to wage rises. A Rabobank-Federated Farmers survey has shown farm workers recorded an overall average salary rise of 4.9% in the year to October, 2010.

Argentina’s dredgers union assured a safe passage for when the Navy’s flag ship ARA Libertad arrives to Mar del Plata next 9 January to a big reception party headed by President Cristina Fernandez. There were concerns that the depth of the access channel wouldn’t be enough.

In a full page advert published exclusively in Friday’s Buenos Aires Herald, in English and Spanish, leading British tabloid The Sun admonishes President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner with a “Hands off!” from the Falkland Islands, in response to the Argentine president’s letter to Prime Minister David Cameron, published on Wednesday in several British dailies.

The European Union expects to advance cooperation and trade discussions with Mercosur late this month in Chile in the sidelines of the EU/Celac (Community of Latin American and Caribbean States), said EU ambassador in Chile, Rafael Dochao Moreno.

Switzerland's oldest bank is to close permanently after pleading guilty in a New York court to helping Americans evade their taxes. Wegelin, which was established in 1741, has also agreed to pay 57.8m dollars in fines to US authorities. The bank had admitted to allowing more than 100 American citizens to hide 1.2bn dollars from the Internal Revenue Service for almost 10 years.

Argentine president Cristina Fernandez has been left “frustrated” by the refusal of other Latin American nations to back Argentina’s long-standing claim to the Falkland Islands, Klaus Dodds, Geopolitics at Royal Holloway, University of London, said.

A day after Argentine President Cristina Fernández sent an open letter to be published as an advert in several UK newspapers calling on PM David Cameron’s government to re-open negotiations over the Falkland/Malvinas Islands, the UK responded: “the Islanders remain free to choose their own futures.”

A record number of journalists, 141 in 29 different countries, were killed globally in 2012, according to data of the Swiss-based Press Emblem Campaign (PEC), which fights for the protection of journalists. At least 28 of them were killed in Latinamerica.