Pope Benedict marked World Day for Peace and the feast of Mary Mother of God Thursday appealing for a reworking of the global financial system and a spiritual and moral revolution that puts solidarity for the poor in pride of place.
Brazilians start 2009 facing the task of learning new spelling rules that have just come into effect.
Cuba's revolution is stronger than ever the country's president has said, as he led ceremonies marking the 50th anniversary of the overthrow of the US-backed government.
The Argentine Darwin cemetery in the Falkland Islands has been formally declared a national historic site in a decree signed by Argentine president Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner according to reports in the Buenos Aires press.
The president of the Mercosur Parliament has stated that Brazil should have four times the number of representatives from Paraguay and Uruguay. Deputy Doctor Rosinha argued that since Brazil has a population of 187 million, it should have 75 representatives, Argentina 33 and Paraguay and Uruguay, 18 each.
Brazil is willing to correct with Paraguay some practical distortions in the implementation of the Itaipú shared hydroelectric dam system, but not the Treaty, said Marco Aurelio Garcia, President Lula da Silva's main international affairs advisor.
The British Foreign office actively colluded with the Argentine Junta in the late seventies to cover up the occupation of a remote Falkland Islands dependency, Southern Thule, according to The Telegraph based on newly declassified files.
As the scientific world prepares to mark Charles Darwin's bicentenary, the author of On the Origin of Species is facing accusations of plagiarism and unjustly claiming credit as the father of evolutionary theory.
Several cases of people listed as missing victims of Chile's dictatorship which have either been located or died under unrelated circumstances has shocked the country's public opinion and caused political turmoil.
Mercosur expressed concern and repudiation towards the spiral of violence in the Gaza Strip, and also regrets the tragic results of the Israeli bombardment of the Palestinian territory.