
The coronavirus crisis has taken a much heavier toll on jobs than previously feared, the UN said Tuesday, warning that the situation in the Americas was particularly dire. In a fresh study, the International Labour Organization (ILO) estimated that by the mid-year point, global working hours were down 14% compared to last December - equivalent to some 400 million full-time jobs.

A bilateral trade agreement between Colombia and the United Kingdom has passed in Colombia’s plenary senate session and now passes to the Andean nation’s lower house for approval. <br />
The legislation seeks to maintain uninterrupted trade access, terms and conditions between Colombia and the UK that have existed under the Colombia – European Union agreement.

The coastline of famed Mexican beach resort Acapulco was sullied late last week by a large discharge of raw sewage, the ugly scene captured in a viral video, which has prompted local authorities to promise an investigation and to fix its broken drainage system.

The European Union agreed on Tuesday to reopen its borders to 14 countries excluding the virus-stricken US, as the pandemic accelerated globally with more than 505,000 deaths worldwide. Of Latin America the only country included in the list is Uruguay.

South American carrier LATAM has suspended ticket sales on 23 routes across its network, including several domestic routes within Chile and international routes from Brazil, Chile and Peru. At the same time, the Santiago-headquartered carrier has made the bold move to suspend international destinations from five Argentinean destinations to the carrier’s hubs in Santiago, Lima and Sao Paulo until 2021.

Mexico’s economy posted a record contraction in April, official data showed on Friday, as the effects of the coronavirus lockdown devastated economic activity, particularly in manufacturing.

Mexican health authorities are trying to understand how a set of newborn triplets became infected with the novel coronavirus even though neither one of their parents tested positive for the virus. Health authorities called the case unheard of.

Mexico City's chief of police was shot and injured and two of his bodyguards killed in a dramatic assassination attempt early on Friday that he quickly blamed on one of Mexico's most powerful drug gangs, the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG).

The birthplace of the 20th Century leftist revolutionary icon Ernesto Che Guevara has been put up for sale in the Argentine city of Rosario. Current owner Francisco Farruggia said he had bought the 240 sq m apartment in a neo-classical style building in the city centre in 2002.

The coronavirus pandemic has yet to peak in the Americas, the World Health Organization warned on Wednesday, as it said global infections were likely to hit 10 million within a week.