Latin America

• Wednesday, September 29th 2010 - 19:15 UTC

  Latam forecasted to grow 5.5% to 6% this year, spurred by Mercosur members

  

  World Bank's Chief Economist for Latin America and the Caribbean Augusto de la Torre said that the Latin American economy will grow between 5.5 and 6% this year spurred mostly by a good performance from Mercosur members.

• Wednesday, September 29th 2010 - 02:27 UTC

  Latin America Looks for More Tourists at FITA 2010

  

  *Exclusive Report for MercoPress by Peter Lowy.
  International tourism is rebounding across Latin America this year, and to help ensure that the upward trend continues, 10 nations across the region participated in the inauguration last week of FITA, the International Tourism Fair of the Americas, in Mexico City.

• Wednesday, September 29th 2010 - 00:20 UTC

  A woman mayor for Lima, where a third of Peruvians live

  

  Regional and municipal elections in Peru this coming Sunday are expected to result in the first female mayor of Lima since the military dictatorship of the 1960s, as two women compete for the office in the final days of the campaign.

• Tuesday, September 28th 2010 - 21:35 UTC

  Chinese freighter ‘Fortune Plum’ the millionth vessel to cross the Panama Canal

  

  A Chinese freighter has become the millionth vessel to cross the Panama Canal three years ahead of the waterway's 100th anniversary, the Canal authority said Monday. The vessel actually crossed the canal September 4 with a load of 40.000 tons of steel products from the Pacific to the Atlantic but the authority announced the news only Monday.

• Tuesday, September 28th 2010 - 21:18 UTC

  Maersk Line increasingly serving Latin America to tap growing trade

  

  The world's biggest container shipper, Maersk Line, is increasingly serving Latin America and Africa with ships sailing directly from Asia to tap accelerating growth in those markets, the Financial Times said.

• Tuesday, September 28th 2010 - 21:11 UTC

  FARC names new military chief; US has a 2.5 million reward on his head

  

  Colombia's narco-terrorist guerrilla group Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) has named a successor to one of its top military commanders who was killed in a military air strike five days ago.

• Tuesday, September 28th 2010 - 21:08 UTC

  Sunday’s results change Chavez prospects for the 2012 presidential election

  

  President Hugo Chavez Venezuelan United Socialist Party, PSUV finally obtained 98 seats in last Sunday’s legislative election while the opposition managed 65, according to the primary proclamations based on official data from the country’s different regions.

• Tuesday, September 28th 2010 - 20:55 UTC

  Fidel: great victory for Chavez; the ‘empire’ is after Venezuela’s oil

  

  The leader of the Cuban Revolution, Fidel Castro described last Sunday’s legislative elections in Venezuela as a clear victory for the Bolivarian Revolution and its leader, Hugo Chavez.

• Tuesday, September 28th 2010 - 05:07 UTC

  Unasur chairman Kirchner condemns FARC and its ‘pre-Cold War’ attitude

  

  UNASUR (Union of South American nations) Secretary General Nestor Kirchner currently in New York with the Argentine delegation for the United Nations General Assembly, said that the Colombian guerrilla FARC “are so back in time, that they are even far behind the Cold War”

• Tuesday, September 28th 2010 - 04:52 UTC

  Spain presents draconian budget with unemployment remaining above 19%

  

  Spain presented a tough 2011 budget, deepening an austerity drive and taxing the rich more heavily as it seeks to boost confidence in a fragile economy ahead of a general strike.