
Britain will protect the people of the disputed Falkland Islands for as long as they want to remain British citizens, Defence Secretary Liam Fox said on Wednesday speaking at the annual conference of the ruling Conservative Party.

Student leaders, the opposition and several judges expressed outrage this week after Chilean President Sebastián Piñera proposed on Sunday to reform the Penal Code to impose harsher punishments on those involved in the occupation of schools and universities, newspaper La Tercera reported.

Palestinian Authority president Mahmud Abbas flew to Europe on Tuesday to kick off a week-long tour which will also take him to Latin America to shore up support for his UN membership bid.

Juan B Yoffre, an Argentine journalist, businessman and politician (he was Intelligence chief for two years with former President Carlos Menem) has written a book “1982” on the Falklands/Malvinas conflict where he reveals how the idea of the military invasion was secretly elaborated and implemented.

Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez seems to be fully active recovering the initiative impetus of his pre-chemotherapy treatment. On Monday he was on national television in a meeting with a business delegation from Byelorussia. Last Saturday he was seen giving away home appliances and in the evening chairing a cabinet meeting.

A Chilean plan for modernizing and upgrading its defense forces is under way with one of the first major contracts going to BAE Systems for the supply and refurbishment of 12 U.S.-made M109A5 howitzers. The 15.8 million dollars contract has been implemented for the Chilean Government through a US foreign military sales contract.

Brazil’s Sao Paulo University, USP, ranks as the top higher education institution in Latin America according to a list published by QS, and which includes universities from Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Mexico and Argentina.

The Argentine Supreme Court on Tuesday rejected a French request to extradite former navy captain Alfredo Astiz, who was convicted in absentia in Europe for killing two French nuns during the 1976-1983 Dirty War.

Brazil and the European Union must take concerted action to calm markets fearful of global contagion spreading from Europe's debt crisis, leaders from both sides said on Tuesday.

Greece’s striking public sector workers blockaded the entrance to several ministries in Athens on the second anniversary of the ruling Socialist party's election victory, disrupting talks with EU and IMF inspectors on the next aid tranche.