Latest South America News
Police shootout at Rio de Janeiro favela kills more than 20
RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Police in Rio de Janeiro raided the Vila Cruzeiro favela before dawn Tuesday. setting off a fierce firefight that authorities said killed more than 20 people. The operation was aimed at locating and arresting criminal leaders, some from other states, police...
19 indicted in international drug money laundering scheme
BOSTON (AP) — Nineteen people have been indicted in a complex money laundering scheme to move millions of dollars in drug proceeds from Colombian cartels through U.S. banks, federal prosecutors said Tuesday. The charges brought in Massachusetts federal court are the result of a...
Vaccines bring optimism as COVID cases soar in South America
BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (AP) — After a reprieve of months, confirmed cases of COVID-19 are surging in the southern tip of South America. But officials in Argentina, Chile and Uruguay hope high vaccination rates mean this latest wave will not be as deadly as previous ones. At the...
People in Brazil's Amazon rainforest again reel from floods
IRANDUBA, Brazil (AP) — For the second straight year, inhabitants of Brazil's Amazon rainforest are being overwhelmed by flooding, with hundreds of thousands of people already affected by waters that are still rising. Heavy rainfall in the Amazon over the past two years is...
Light sentences in 2 US cases targeting graft in Venezuela
MIAMI (AP) — Two U.S. criminal cases targeting Venezuela’s government ended Monday in a four-year prison sentence for a Miami businessman who serviced the country’s Russian fighter jets and a light sentence for another individual who implicated a fierce opponent of President Nicolas Maduro in...
Brazil president announces carbon market, thin on details
RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Brazil’s far-right President Jair Bolsonaro has signed a decree that he says will create a national carbon market to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Brazil ranks sixth in the world for climate pollution, according to Climate Watch . “In this still new...
Argentine president to pay fine for party during quarantine
BUENOS AIRES (AP) — Argentina's president and first lady will pay a fine of 3 million pesos ($24,000) for hosting a party in July 2020 that violated the quarantine orders the head of state himself had ordered to prohibit group gatherings as a way to stem the spread of COVID-19. ...
Court ruling extends uneven treatment for asylum-seekers
EAGLE PASS, Texas (AP) — As the sun set over the Rio Grande, about 120 Cubans, Colombians and Venezuelans who waded through waist-deep water stepped into Border Patrol vehicles, soon to be released in the United States to pursue their immigration cases. Across the border in the...
Bolivian student, 52, jailed in probe of pay from government
LA PAZ, Bolivia (AP) — Max Mendoza has been a remarkably persistent student — and a profitable one: He's been enrolled at a public university in Bolivia for 32 years but never graduated, much of it while being paid a government salary to serve as a student leader. On Monday,...
Ex-rebel emerges as favorite in Colombian presidential race
FUSAGASUGA, Colombia (AP) — Flanked by bodyguards with bulletproof shields, Gustavo Petro stood on a stage and lashed out at Colombia's political elite in a speech to the residents of Fusagasuga, a rural town where farmers are struggling. The leftist presidential candidate spoke of...
