Politics

• Wednesday, July 31st 2013 - 06:09 UTC

  Ecuador’s Correa pondering whether to join Mercosur or the Pacific Alliance

  

  President Rafael Correa said that the determining factor for Ecuador to join as full member of Mercosur or the Alliance of the Pacific is the ‘flexibility’ granted in certain admission conditions, taking into account the fact that Ecuador does not have a national currency.

• Wednesday, July 31st 2013 - 05:49 UTC

  In Mexico, Latam second largest economy over half the are catalogued as poor

  

  Poverty in Mexico, including extreme cases, decreased slightly between 2010 and 2012, reported the National Council for Evaluation of Social Development Policy. Official stats show that poverty in Mexico, Latam’ second largest economy went from 46.1% of the population in 2010 to 45.5% in 2012, while extreme poverty fell from 11.3% to 9.8%.

• Wednesday, July 31st 2013 - 05:43 UTC

  Assange criticizes Pte Manning’s conviction as a ‘dangerous precedent”

  

  Julian Assange, founder of the anti-secrecy organisation Wikileaks, has said the conviction of US Army Private Bradley Manning on spying charges is a “dangerous precedent”.

• Wednesday, July 31st 2013 - 05:12 UTC

  Insulza meets Hague and presents report on the Drug Problem in the Americas at Chatham House

  

  Secretary General of the Organization of American States (OAS), José Miguel Insulza, on Tuesday presented in London the Report on the Drug Problem in the Americas during a forum organized by Chatham House in which political authorities and experts in the issue took part.

• Wednesday, July 31st 2013 - 05:05 UTC

  UK plans to expand education-exports industry and attract 90.000 extra overseas university students by 2018

  

  An ambitious strategy to expand United Kingdom’s education exports industry – revealed for the first time as worth £17.5 billion to the economy – has been published.

• Wednesday, July 31st 2013 - 04:56 UTC

  Spain warns Hague that it will continue to enforce strict Gibraltar border checks

  

  Foreign Affairs minister José Manuel García-Margallo has told his UK counterpart, William Hague that Spain will continue to enforce strict Gibraltar border checks “whenever necessary” because this was in line with Madrid’s EU obligations and that Guardia Civil officers were searching for contraband.

• Tuesday, July 30th 2013 - 03:54 UTC

  Mujica in veiled message tells Paraguay to return to Mercosur and remember it’s a landlocked country

  

  Uruguayan president Jose Mujica was ironic about the conditions Paraguayan president elect Horacio Cartes demanded for his country’s return to Mercosur, but also in a veiled message called for ‘intelligence and pragmatism’ recalling that Paraguay is a landlocked country.

• Tuesday, July 30th 2013 - 03:50 UTC

  “The party is over” for Latam countries China-dependent on their exports

  

  “The party is over” and Latinamerican countries should be concerned since the Chinese economy is slowing down, apparently entering a low growth period and many in the region have become notoriously ‘China-dependent’ after a decade of strong expanding sustained bilateral relations.

• Tuesday, July 30th 2013 - 03:07 UTC

  Uruguay needs ‘a dollar at 25 Pesos’ if it wants to remain competitive warn economists

  

  Uruguay is too expensive in dollar terms and needs to adapt quickly because the adjustment will come anyway ‘and will be painful’ unless inflation is brought under control and costs equilibrium is reached with Brazil with a competitive dollar at 25 Pesos.

• Tuesday, July 30th 2013 - 03:03 UTC

  Eclac joins the club of Argentine government official stats disbelievers and says inflation is 20.5%

  

  Following on the steps of the IMF (and World Bank) which has strongly questioned Argentine official stats (mainly inflation and GDP growth), the United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean, Eclac, also joined the club of disbelievers since in its last report on the regional economy appealed to other stats’ sources.