Latin America

• Sunday, June 3rd 2007 - 21:00 UTC

  Chavez threatens to end more private media broadcast licenses

  President Hugo Chavez threatened to terminate the broadcast licences of private media outlets seen as sowing unrest in Venezuela, just days after the nation's oldest private TV station was forced off the air when the Venezuelan government refused to renew its broadcast license.

• Saturday, June 2nd 2007 - 21:00 UTC

  Chile returns to the Andean fold but as an “associate” member

  

  Bolivia's Foreign Affairs Minister David Choquehuanca announced Friday in La Paz that Chile had formalized its intention of returning to the Community of Andean Nations, CAN, which she abandoned 31 years ago.

• Friday, June 1st 2007 - 21:00 UTC

  Chile invites corporations to look for oil and gas in Magallanes

  

  Next week Chile will officially invite international corporations to participate in the exploration and production of hydrocarbons in the Magallanes Region. Chilean Minister of Mines Karen Pniachik will be in Punta Arenas for the opening ceremony.

• Friday, June 1st 2007 - 21:00 UTC

  Alternative route to Torres del Paine Park cuts distance by half

  

  A new alternative route linking Puerto Natales with the renowned Torres del Paine National Park, cutting in half the distance from 140 to 70 kilometres, was opened this week in Magallanes Region in the extreme south of Chile.

• Friday, June 1st 2007 - 21:00 UTC

  Diplomatic incident brewing between Brazil and Venezuela

  Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva instructed the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to summon Venezuela's ambassador Julio Garcia Montoya “for the indispensable clarification” of President Hugo Chavez' reference to the Brazilian Senate as “a parrot that repeats whatever Washington says” adding that the Brazilian Congress was “controlled by the right wing”.

• Thursday, May 31st 2007 - 21:00 UTC

  Shipments to Chile resumed

  Argentina resumed shipments of crucial natural gas to Chile's populous central region yesterday, Chilean energy officials said, easing fears that an acute energy shortage could worsen.

• Wednesday, May 30th 2007 - 21:00 UTC

  Chile to double financing of Antarctic scientific research

  Chile is planning to double Antarctic scientific research funds this coming season 2007/08 revealed this week in Punta Arenas Jose Retamales, director of the Chilean Antarctic Institute.

• Tuesday, May 29th 2007 - 21:00 UTC

  Chile's gas crisis intensifies

  Chile is looking to acquire Uruguay's unused natural gas permits with Argentina in order to secure a steady supply of gas for Santiago. This proposal comes on the heels of an intensifying energy crisis, with the country's capital city facing possible residential and commercial gas cuts.

• Tuesday, May 29th 2007 - 21:00 UTC

  Venezuelans protest as TV station shuts

  

  Venezuelan police fired tear gas and plastic bullets Monday into a crowd of thousands protesting a decision by President Hugo Chavez that forced a television station critical of his leftist government off the air.

• Tuesday, May 29th 2007 - 21:00 UTC

  Chavez threatens to sanction another television network

  Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez threatened Tuesday to sanction Globovision television station if they continue “to incite a murder attempt on his life” and insisted that the students' rioting allegedly to protest the taking out of the air of another network was part of a “de-stabilization plan”.