Latin America News

HAVANA - Looking in the mirror used to make Yiliam Gonzalez sick to her stomach.

BRASILIA (AFP) - An Italian ex-militant wanted for murder in his home country was sentenced here Friday to two years in prison for passport fraud, sparking an extradition row days ahead of a visit by Italy's prime minister.

San José, Costa Rica - Conservative talk-show host Rush Limbaugh said this week he’d go to Costa Rica for medical treatment if Congress passes proposed reforms to the US healthcare system.

RIO DE JANEIRO - Officials say the cost of building a huge dam in Brazil's Amazon has jumped $2 billion because of new environmental protections.

Mexico City - The visit by US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in Brazil Wednesday was billed as an effort to forge ties with a country that is increasingly emerging as a recognized global power.

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AFP) - Two European women aid workers were kidnapped in Haiti last week but freed on Thursday, their organization, Medecins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders) told AFP.

LONDON (AFP) - Oil giant BP said Thursday it will pay US firm Devon Energy $7 billion (£4.7 billion) for assets in Brazil, Azerbaijan and the Gulf of Mexico.

RIO DE JANEIRO (AFP) - Brazilian authorities reportedly placed an international cruise ship under isolation at a tourist resort when nearly 200 passengers came down with gastrointestinal illness.

STRASBOURG, France - The European Parliament voted Thursday to condemn Cuba for the "avoidable and cruel" death of a dissident hunger striker, earning a stinging response from Havana, which said it did not appreciate the lecture and would not respond to international pressure.

HEMET, Calif. - Two fugitive teenagers wanted in the 2009 killing of a 16-year-old boy have been found in Mexico and returned to authorities in Riverside County after a four-month manhunt.

BRASILIA (Reuters) - Secretary of State Hillary Clinton failed to win Brazil's support on Wednesday for more sanctions against Iran and said Tehran would not talk seriously about its nuclear program until the United Nations took new action.

PORT-AU-PRINCE (Reuters) - Two foreign aid workers with Doctors Without Borders in quake-hit Haiti were kidnapped and held for nearly a week before being freed early on Thursday, the international medical charity said.

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Mexican tycoon Carlos Slim is the world's richest person, knocking Microsoft founder Bill Gates into second spot, as the wealth of the world's billionaires grew by 50 percent over the last year, Forbes magazine said on Wednesday.

BRASILIA, Brazil - Brazil rebuffed a U.S. appeal for new sanctions on Iran over its nuclear program, vowing during a visit from U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton not to "bow down" to gathering international pressure.

SANTIAGO (Reuters) - Chile's navy lifted a tsunami warning for the country's coast after strong aftershocks shook the capital Santiago on Thursday, following the swearing in ceremony for new President Sebastian Pinera.

PHOENIX - Authorities say five of the six people killed in an Arizona bus crash were California residents, and all were Mexican citizens.

BRASILIA (AFP) - Brazil and the US clashed Wednesday over how to rein in Tehran's suspect nuclear ambitions as Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva warned the world not to "push Iran into a corner."

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Chevron Corp may pursue an international arbitration claim over environmental pollution allegations in Ecuador, a judge ruled on Thursday, part of a long-running case that carries a potential $27 billion liability for the second-largest U.S. oil company.

LOS ANGELES - A well-dressed man who talked his way into a Florida sugar baron's hotel room and stole tens of thousands of dollars worth of jewelry may be the same person who pulled similar scams on a Mexican soccer team, a salsa band and an Israeli basketball team when they visited Los Angeles, police said Tuesday.

BRASILIA, Brazil - Brazil's president says Iran should not be "pushed against a wall" by the international community for its controversial nuclear program.

CARACAS (Reuters) - Homicides in Venezuela have quadrupled during President Hugo Chavez's 11 years in power, with two people murdered every hour, according to new figures from a non-governmental organization.

PORT ARTHUR, Texas - An 800-foot tanker struggling with poor visibility and strong winds apparently failed to center itself in a narrow waterway off the Gulf of Mexico, possibly contributing to a collision with a tugboat that caused the largest oil spill in Texas in 15 years, according to testimony and evidence presented at a Coast Guard hearing on Tuesday.

LONDON (AFP) - Brazil coach Dunga admits his side must raise their game to an even higher level to live up to their billing as World Cup favourites.

SAO PAULO (AFP) - Canada's Bombardier has won a 22 million dollar contract for signaling systems for an electric railway system in the Peruvian capital, a company official told AFP Thursday.

RIO DE JANEIRO - It's confirmed: Paris Hilton is too hot for Brazil.

DENVER - A man charged with helping smuggle millions of dollars worth of cocaine from Mexico to the United States has pleaded not guilty in Denver federal court.

WASHINGTON (AFP) - The United States asked nations like China, India and Brazil on Monday to clarify their market-access measures in a bid to break the deadlock on the long-stalled Doha Round of global trade talks.

VALPARAISO, Chile (AFP) - A powerful 7.2 magnitude aftershock and four smaller ones rocked central Chile Thursday, prompting a tsunami warning minutes before Sebastian Pinera was sworn in as the new president.

MEXICO CITY - A Mexican lawyer said Monday he has resigned from handling the case of a woman and her sons who claim the males were sexually abused as boys by the founder of a conservative Roman Catholic religious order.

RIO DE JANEIRO - Thousands of dead fish washed up on the shores of a popular beachside lagoon in Rio over the weekend, offending joggers' olfactory senses and leading the city to fight the stench with disinfectant.