
Brazil's state oil giant Petrobras remains Latin America's top company in revenues, but has lost its position as the profit leader after posting record losses last year due to a growing corruption scandal and administrative inefficiencies, according to a new ranking of the region's 500 largest companies from digital publication Latinvex.

The Inter American Development Bank, IDB, has organized a seminar to discuss industrial policies in Latin America and the Caribbean in a post Washington-Consensus framework. Anemic economic growth in the region is in need of policy shot in the arm.

Bolivia is closer to becoming a full member of Mercosur following on Argentina's ratification of the Adhesion Protocol.

The biggest global school rankings have been published, with Asian countries in the top five spots and African countries at the bottom. Singapore heads the table, followed by Hong Kong, with Ghana at the bottom. The UK is in 20th place, among higher achieving European countries, with the US in 28th.

The criminal case against President Cristina Fernandez was closed Tuesday when federal judges from Cassation Court accepted a prosecutor’s decision not to pursue accusations that she had conspired to shield Iranians suspected of planning the 1994 bombing of a Jewish community center in Buenos Aires.

Argentina's Lower House Impeachment Committee has approved a motion to begin evaluations on the health of Supreme Court Justice Carlos Fayt, in order to determine whether the judge has the physical and mental capacity to continue in his post.

Prime Minister David Cameron will hold an early referendum on membership of the European Union if he can first reach a deal that satisfies his demands for major changes in Britain's relationship with the bloc, his spokesman said yesterday.

In a move which has been interpreted as a right turn, economist Rodrigo Valdes was named as Chile's finance minister on Monday by President Michelle Bachelet, in a sweeping cabinet reshuffle in which four of her closest ministers were sacked or shifted into other roles. On Valdes' immediate to-do list is an upcoming 1.26 billion dollars international debt issue.

Former United States President Jimmy Carter ended an election-monitoring trip to Guyana early and flew home on Sunday after falling ill, the Carter Center, his nonprofit organization, said in a statement. The Carter Center provided only sketchy information on Sunday about the condition of the 90-year-old former president.

Guyana voted Monday in early elections pitting embattled President Donald Ramotar against an upstart opposition alliance seeking to unite voters across racial lines with its calls to end corruption.