
Argentina and South Africa signed on Saturday on board a South African navy vessel docked in Buenos Aires a wide ranging agreement on defense development and military co-operation.

Brazil has always recognized Argentine sovereignty over the Falkland/Malvinas Islands but was reluctant to include South Georgia and South Sandwich Islands however that is over, according to a top official from the Argentine Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Trade.

Uruguayan president Jose Mujica underlined the strong common links going back to the birth of Argentina and Uruguay and called for an end to the “ports’ war” (Montevideo vs Buenos Aires) a rivalry born when the two countries were provinces of the colonial Spanish empire.

Argentina's economy activity expanded strongly in September but at a slower pace than in previous months, according to a Friday release from the country’s Statistics Office, Indec.

President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner (CFK) ratified the current economic development model with strong government intervention and supported her position with the latest data on unemployment and growth.

Brazilian president-elect Dilma Rousseff gathered information and advised guerrilla groups bank hold-ups in the sixties when the country was ruled by a military dictatorship according to reports published Friday in O’Globo media group.

Brazilian central bank president Henrique Meirelles will not accept any invitation to remain as head of the bank unless president-elect Dilma Rousseff gives him full guarantees of “absolute autonomy” in running the institution. He also rejects the idea of holding on the job during the first quarter of 2011 until a definitive successor is named.

Venezuela may formally devalue its currency “at least” 15% in early 2011, Barclays Capital said in a report sent via e-mail, changing its position after meetings with Finance Ministry and central bank officials in Caracas.

The “dangerous behaviour” of the presidents of Venezuela, Nicaragua, Bolivia and Ecuador shows “an undeniable link between the decline of democratic freedoms and human rights and the increase of tangible risks to the security of our region,” said US Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fl), a Cuban-American lawmaker.

Brazil’s ruling Workers Party main ally in Congress Brazilian Democratic Movement, PMDB, has formed its own legislative group hoping to dispute some of the most strategic posts in the new congress that takes office next January first.