
Petrobras, Brazil's state oil company, has agreed to pay more than US$ 853m to the United States and Brazil, ending a long-running corruption investigation. The probe stemmed from a bribery scheme at the firm, which involved millions in payments that were concealed from investors and regulators.

President Mauricio Macri on Thursday asked Argentines for patience in weathering an economic crisis this year and pledged to increase social spending in the coming months, a day after reaching a US$ 57.1 billion deal with the International Monetary Fund.

Brazil presidential election candidate Ciro Gomes left hospital in Sao Paulo on Wednesday, a day after undergoing surgery on his prostate. Currently running third in opinion polls ahead of the October 7 election first round, 60-year-old Gomes underwent a minimally invasive procedure that involved the “cauterization of blood vessels,” his center-left PDT party said in a statement.

US President Donald Trump confirmed on Wednesday that he had refused to meet Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly, accusing Canada of treating the United States very badly.

Brazil’s far-right presidential candidate Jair Bolsonaro has only a six-point lead over surging Workers Party candidate Fernando Haddad, and would lose a second-round runoff against him next month, a new opinion poll showed on Wednesday. However both leading candidates lost one percentage point over last week's poll and only Ciro Gomes climbed from 11% to 12%

Daimler, the German car maker that owns Mercedes-Benz, will be run by a non-German for the first time next year. Dieter Zetsche, 65, will be replaced by Ola Kaellenius, a 49-year-old Swede, as chief executive in a succession plan announced on Wednesday.

The Scottish Secretary David Mundell started a four-day trade mission to South America, where he will be meeting politicians and business leaders in Uruguay and Chile. Mr. Mundell will be promoting trade links on the visit undertaken on behalf of the UK Government’s Board of Trade, and will be looking into how UK can support new post-EU trade opportunities in South America, promoting Scotland as a great exporter and the UK being open for business.

Mark Menzies, the UK Prime Minister’s Trade Envoy to Peru, Chile, and Colombia, is in Lima this week with a delegation of 15 representatives of British government and businesses, including Arup, MACE, Clifford Chance, Crossrail, UK Export Finance, and the City of London. He will seek to identify new areas to boost UK-Peru trade and investment.

President Donald Trump should stop interfering in the Middle East if he wants the price of oil to stop rising, Iranian Oil Minister Bijan Zanganeh was quoted as saying on Wednesday.

World leaders meeting at the United Nations (UN) General Assembly have committed to ensure that 40 million people with tuberculosis (TB) receive the care they need by end 2022. They also agreed to provide 30 million people with preventive treatment to protect them from developing TB.