Federal government and Rio de Janeiro State authorities agreed last week to create a joint working group to target the cash flow of criminal rings operating in the area, Agencia Brasil reported. The measure was adopted after three people were killed during a gunfight with Rio Police.
Argentine authorities have filed a criminal complaint against former Bolivian President Evo Morales for the alleged rape and human trafficking of four teenage girls while he was under asylum in the country, Security Minister Patricia Bullrich announced during the weekend. Morales will be prosecuted for allegedly committing crimes of human trafficking and sexual abuse, Bullrich explained.
Paraguay's Foreign Minister Rubén Ramírez Lezcano had a busy week in Montreal, Canada, where he participated in the Ministerial Conference on the Human Dimension of the Ukraine Peace Formula and met with British Foreign Office Director General for Latin America Harriet Matthews on the event's sidelines, among other engagements.
Former Bolivian President Evo Morales announced Friday that he would go on a hunger strike as the conflict between him and his former Minister of Economy and ally, and current president, Luis Arce Catacora, continues to escalate.
Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado thanked Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani for supporting an orderly transition from the Bolivarian regime, which intends to cling to power through a fraudulent vote count after the July 28 elections.
After a fortnight virtually in hiding, Chile's former Undersecretary of the Interior Manuel Monsavle came back into the limelight Friday in Viña del Mar. His whereabouts had been unknown since resigning following rape charges filed against him.
Uruguayan President Luis Lacalle Pou, months from completing his term, hinted at a possible return in the 2029 presidential election but left the door open.
El Salvador's Congress gave its nod this week to the sending of troops to help violence-torn Haiti where crime gangs reign supreme. At first, El Salvador's assistance will be focused on medevac operations in coordination with the United Nations (UN) blue helmets deployed in the Caribbean country. The Parliamentarian decision thus ratified with 57 votes out of 60 the so-called ”Agreement on the Condition of the Multinational Security Support Mission (MMAS) in Haiti” signed by the diplomatic missions of El Salvador and Haiti to the Organization of American States (OAS).
According to a report from Brazil’s Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE) released Thursday, unemployment in South America's largest country fell to 6.4 % in the third quarter of 2024 (from July to September), Agencia Brasil reported. These figures are 0.5 percentage points lower than between April and June, when it stood at 6.9%. Compared to July–September 2023, the drop is 1.3 percentage points. In that quarter, the rate was 7.7%.
With a blinding arc of light as the laser cutter sliced through steel plate, work started this week on the Royal Navy’s new frigate HMS Formidable. Watched by political, military and business leaders – as well as the hundreds of skilled engineers and technicians – local MP Graeme Downie pressed the button to set the machine in motion at Babcock’s state-of-the-art facility in Rosyth.