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It’s official: Brazil, which last hosted a soccer World Cup in 1950, will host the 2014 tournament.
Soccer’s world governing body, FIFA, announced the agreement today in Zurich, its headquarters, sparking joy in the land of jogo bonito (the beautiful game).
 "Soccer is not only a sport for us," said Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who was on hand for the announcement along with other prominent compatriots, including author Paulo Coelho and veteran striker Romario. "Soccer is for us a passion, a national passion."
Lula, whose second term is to end well before the scheduled cup (though there has been talk of a third go-round), wants the tournament to showcase Brazil, reports Folha de S. Paulo
"We are assuming the responsibility as a nation to prove to the world that we have a stable and growing economy," Lula said. "We have many problems, yes, but we are determined to resolve them."
Soccer-crazed Brazilians seek a better result than in 1950, when upstart Uruguay defeated Brazil 2-1 in the final at Maracaná Stadium in Rio de Janeiro. Brazil has won a record five world cups since then, but the Maracanazo, as it is known, has not been forgotten: a humiliation in Brazil, a revelation in Uruguay.
Posted by Patrick J. McDonnell and Andrés D’Alessandro in Buenos Aires
Photo: Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva delivers a speech while legendary player Romario holds the World Cup trophy in Zurich today. Credit: Fabrice Coffrini/AFP/Getty Images
Just when you think the air in Mexico City can't get any more putrid comes this news from local health authorities: The mutts that live in the Valley of Mexico are depositing 300 tons of feces here a day, most of which residents end up breathing after it dries and enters the atmosphere.
That's causing humans all sorts of maladies such as salmonella poisoning and intestinal parasites. Not to mention the hazards to pedestrians who are constantly dodging parting gifts left by Pinto (Spot) on sidewalks and in the city's few precious green spaces.
The problem, of course, isn't with the area's roughly 3 million dogs, rather their 3 million lazy owners. It's the rare person here who bothers to pick up after their pooch, despite the proliferation of signs urging them to do it.
La Plaza spotted one recently that rhymes:
"Si a tu canino sacas a pasear, no olvides su popó levantar." (If you take your dog out walking, don't forget to pick up his poop.)
It's going to take a lot more than catchy slogans to change human behavior. La Plaza calls on all Mexico City dog owners to grab a scooper -- your health may depend on it!
Posted by Marla Dickerson in Mexico City
The tiny island of Barbados, better known for flying fish than filmmaking, has offered up its hugely successful — by local standards — "Hit For Six!" to the American Black Film Festival in Los Angeles this weekend.
A tale of match fixing in West Indian cricket and one man’s journey from score-rigger to redemption, the movie written, acted, directed and produced by Caribbean artists is the first Barbadian entry into a prominent international contest.
Jamaica’s Palace Amusements and Trinidad-based Goldmine Entertainment have secured Caribbean-wide distribution deals and are hoping to vault the Blue Waters Production into global visibility with screenings at Mann Theaters in Los Angeles beginning Saturday.
The movie features an all-Caribbean cast, but some may be familiar to viewers throughout the Western Hemisphere, including MTV Tempo host Jeanille Bonterre of Trinidad and Barbadian actress Alison Sealy-Smith, who now works in Canada.
Posted by Carol J. Williams in Miami
It's a great new engine of democracy that will open up public debate and end politicians' and the mainstream media's information monopoly. No, wait — it's an insidious form of, um, "cybernetic proselytism" that will damage democracy by allowing slanderers and demagogues to stir up trouble.
It seems that El Salvador is in the throes of a debate about the growing role of blogs and the Internet in shaping public opinion, as Wisconsin blogger Tim Muth details in a post at Harvard's very useful Global Voices Online project. Tim himself writes one of the most interesting and informed blogs about any Central American country that La Plaza has come across.
Though most Salvadorans have far more limited Internet access than the average U.S. or European citizen, growing numbers of them are tapping into the blogosphere. The phenomenon is drawing attention from Salvadoran newspaper reporters, some of whom are starting their own blogs. In La Plaza's view, most Latin American countries, including El Salvador, can only stand to benefit from an increase in blog traffic and opinion-sharing.
Most Latin American newspapers have small circulations compared with their U.S. counterparts. For example, two of the largest, Reforma of Mexico City and Folha de Sao Paulo of Brazil, each sell only 200,000 to 300,000 copies. Aside from Cuba (which has its own free-speech problems), many Latin countries also suffer from high illiteracy rates that further impede the swapping of information and ideas. In time, the Internet could help remedy that. La Plaza says: Oye, bloggers, estamos esperando tu opinion!
Posted by Reed Johnson in Mexico City
A lock of hair, a set of fingerprints and a photograph taken of slain revolutionary Ernesto "Che" Guevara's corpse fetched $100,000 at a controversial auction in Texas this week.
 The memorabilia kept for 40 years by a Miami Cuban exile stirred as much controversy as interest among collectors, prompting Heritage Auction Galleries of Dallas to hire extra security for the sale, which drew numerous inquiries but in the end only one bidder. Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez was among those who had expressed interest in the macabre mementos, but they were purchased by Houston book dealer Bill Butler, who maintains a display in tribute to the revolutionary icon at Butler & Sons Books.
The lock of hair and evidence of Guevara’s October 1967 execution by a CIA-backed mission had been collected by Bay of Pigs veteran Gustavo Villoldo, who was part of the team that captured the Argentine-born revolutionary in a Bolivian jungle and killed him two days later.
Guevara fought alongside Cuba’s Fidel Castro to oust a rightist regime from Havana in 1959. It was in his role as Cuban economic czar in the revolutionary government that Guevara ordered the confiscation of the Villoldo family’s auto business, driving the memento collector’s father to commit suicide and the surviving family to flee to Florida.
Posted by Carol J. Williams in Miami
Cozying up to China is paying off big for Costa Rica. President Oscar Arias has been in Beijing this week collecting millions in handouts from communist officials grateful for Costa Rica’s jilting of Taiwan earlier this year.
It’s Arias’ first visit since his Central American nation in June ended a 58-year diplomatic relationship with Taipei and switched its allegiance to Beijing, which views democratic Taiwan as a renegade province that it wants back in the fold. Chinese officials demand that countries with which it has diplomatic relations sever official ties with Taiwan and subscribe to its One-China policy -– that there is but one China and Taiwan is part of China.
(U.S. policy is as convoluted as chow mein noodles. The U.S. recognizes China’s claims on Taiwan. But it continues to sell arms to Taiwan and maintains quasi-diplomatic ties with it through the 1979 Taiwan Relations Act, much to the consternation of China, which does not recognize the legitimacy of this legislation.)
Costa Rica’s new buddies in Beijing reflect China’s growing economic clout in Latin America. Arias admits that Costa Rica dumped Taiwan to attract more Chinese investment and to gain access to China’s vast consumer markets.
It’s working. This week Costa Rica scored $20 million from China for disaster relief from recent flooding, another $27 million for “technical and economic cooperation” and at least $140 million in export contracts for Costa Rican businesses.
China National Petroleum Corp. announced plans to invest millions to help Costa Rica’s state-owned energy company RECOPE boost refining capacity. And the two nations said they are looking into prospects for a bilateral free-trade agreement.
Now that’s checkbook diplomacy.
Posted by Marla Dickerson in Mexico City
 Superstar Juanes' new CD, "La Vida Es un Ratico" (Life Is Just a Moment) was a hit before it went on sale this week.
Universal Music said it had sold more than 6 million digital songs, from legal Internet vendors and cellphone downloads, before the CD’s official release Tuesday, reports La Semana, citing an Associated Press story from New York.
Juanes, asked about translating his songs into English, replied, "I can play my guitar in English, but my songs will always be in Spanish."
Colombia has long been an incubator of original musical styles, notably cumbia and the accordion-accented vallenato, from the Caribbean Coast, with its large Afro-Colombian population.
Currently, the genre sometimes known as tropi-pop — a fusion of traditional Colombian sounds like vallenato with rock and electronic music — is the rage in clubs and on the airwaves. A new generation of singers, such as Mauricio y Palodeagua, Bonka, Fanny Lu and Latin Grammy-winner Fonseca, are drawing fans well beyond Colombia’s borders.
Posted by Patrick J. McDonnell in Bogotá
Photo: Juanes promotes the release of "La Vida Es un Ratico" Oct. 22 in New York
Credit: Brad Barket/Getty Images
The restroom mirrors in an upmarket Italian restaurant in Bogotá deliver a blunt message: "You look horrible when you speak bad about Colombia."
It’s part of an effort by a private foundation to improve the image of a nation often linked to violence, drug trafficking and civil conflict. The foundation’s website says its efforts have "created a school of thought about a Colombia that exists but is often unseen — that capable … intelligent, hard-working, passionate, happy, curious, intelligent and competitive Colombia."
Posted by Patrick J. McDonnell in Bogotá
On Monday, President Bush announced a $1.4-billion funding request to Congress to help Mexico and Central America fight the powerful drug-trafficking organizations that operate with seeming impunity in the region. The details will be revealed in the coming days, though it's clear that helicopters, communications equipment and lots of training for Mexican police and judges will be involved.
The request includes $500 million for Mexico. The Mexico City paper Reforma pointed out that the amount is more than half the annual budget of the attorney general's office but little more than twice as much as the cash seized at my neighbor's house here in Mexico City — the famous $207-million seizure of alleged drug profits in February at the home of Zhenli Ye Gon, currently facing drug-trafficking charges in the United States.
Posted by Héctor Tobar in Mexico City
 Guatemala's presidential race is getting ugly in its final weeks. This reporter is receiving daily, unsolicited messages suggesting that candidate Alvaro Colom, once the clear front-runner, is suffering from various fatal diseases, or that drug traffickers are backing his campaign. Many of these e-mails contain crude caricatures showing Colom as a skeletal, drug-emaciated figure.
Colom, a center-left former businessman, denies all the charges, of course. Earlier in the campaign, he found himself obliged to issue a news release denying claims that he was a Manchurian candidate working on behalf of the devil.
This week, Colom claimed that his rival, rightist former general Otto Perez Molina, sent him 75 death-threat text messages. Earlier this month, an aide to Perez Molina was gunned down in the capital city. Colom won the first round of voting, and polls show the two men running neck and neck ahead of the Nov. 4 runoff.
Posted by Héctor Tobar in Mexico City
The Bush administration is pushing Congress hard to approve a free-trade agreement (FTA) with Colombia, in the face of rising opposition from Democrats, editorial page writers and, according to recent polls, public opinion.
The Times asked a former Clinton administration official, now a Washington-based political analyst with his ear to the ground, to handicap the deal's chances. Slim to none this year, he said: "The real question is one of timing. Realistically, the chances of moving the FTA before Congress adjourns for the year are limited, due to the congressional calendar and also the complicated politics surrounding the matter."
So that probably throws the U.S.-Colombia FTA into 2008 and the politics of the U.S. presidential elections, when difficult political matters such as trade agreements become even more difficult to pass. Organized labor, a key constituency in Democratic Party politics and one of the most important during the primaries because of money and organization, is dead set against the agreement, thus giving pause to Democratic leaders in Congress who may otherwise seek to bring it up for a vote.
Nonetheless, the administration is pushing for a vote under existing fast track legislation before it leaves office. Ultimately, the agreement will probably pass, because of the significant foreign policy implications it carries, but it will be a close and fierce fight. The main question to be sorted out is this: Does the Democratic candidate for president want to deal with the trade agreement in 2009 after taking office, or would s/he prefer to have it done and out of the way by the time of the inauguration? Politics will determine the timing on this one.
Posted by Chris Kraul in Bogota
 Nearly a year ago, the municipality of Puerto Triunfo, Colombia, where the late drug trafficker Pablo Escobar built his sprawling Hacienda Napoles pleasure palace, issued a worldwide plea for someone, anyone, to take the farm's 16 hippopotamuses off its hands. The town wants to remove them from the lake Pablo built for them so it can open an aquatic and wild animal theme park next month. The hippos are all that are left of the wild animal park Pablo built to entertain his family and friends.
But there have been no takers, partly because of the logistical problem posed by the capture and transfer of the fiercely territorial beasts, which weigh as much as 2 tons. So the town has resigned itself to moving them on its own, to an as yet undetermined location, leaving only three at the new park. As a prelude to moving them, the town and the regional environmental agency are trying to determine how many of the huge beasts live at the park. Since last year, officials say, several baby hippos have been born, offsetting the three males that officials say have fled, chased out by the herd's dominant male. Two of the them were spotted over the summer more than 100 miles up the Magdalena River, presumably looking for mates. The study will also determine the grazing habits of the animals, possibly to determine the optimal time for a capture.
Posted by Chris Kraul and Jenny Carolina Gonzalez in Bogota
Photo by Albeiro Lopera / Reuters
It's been a very bad week in Mexico for Vicente Fox, the former president -- and he isn't even in Mexico. Fox is on a book tour of the United States, promoting his biography, while back home his every move seems to generate new stories about apparent accumulation of wealth.
On Saturday, a group of opposition party activists pushed over a statue that had been erected to honor him in Veracruz. And today his successor, fellow conservative Felipe Calderon, took away his Hummer. Said Hummer became a source of controversy when it was revealed that a Mexico City car dealer loaned it to Mexico's equivalent of the Secret Service free of charge for Fox's use. Embarrassed by the controversy, Calderon said all such loan arrangements had been terminated, effective immediately. Goodbye Hummer.
Fox defended his use of the vehicle in a contentious interview with CNN en Español this week. On Tuesday, he stormed out of an interview with the Telemundo network when reporter Rubén González Luengas asked insistent and probing questions about his wealth. "You're rude, goddammit, and a bad interviewer!" Fox spat as he rose to his feet. (In Spanish: "Eres un vulgar, carajo, y un mal entrevistador!")The interview has been played again and again on Mexico's television networks.
Posted by Héctor Tobar in Mexico City
The Brazilian film "Tropa de Elite" (Elite Squad) has already caused a sensation, with its dark and brutal depictions of corrupt police and drug trafficking in the no-go favelas of Rio de Janeiro. Now comes word that a prison guard was killed during a screening of the film at a multiplex in the northern city of Recife. Witnesses reported hearing a shot at the climactic end of the film. Authorities suspect suicide, reports Folha de S. Paulo. The officer was under investigation in an alleged drug corruption case.
In an interview with Folha de S. Paulo, the film’s director, José Padilha, sends condolences to the prison guard’s family. He says he doubts the film had anything to do with the shooting. The director urges police officers moved by the film to seek help and share their feelings with others.
Posted by Marcelo Soares and Patrick J. McDonnell in São Paulo, Brazil
Authorities say a teenage mom and dad were about to sell their 9-month-old child to a tourist couple when the baby's aunt stopped them, reports O Globo.
The teenagers (she’s 17, he’s 18) said they couldn’t afford to rear the child.
They were allegedly planning to sell the child for about $23, a television and a DVD player, police said.
The tourists were getting ready to leave on a bus with the child when the aunt intervened, O Globo reported.
Police in Juazeiro, the northeastern Brazilian city where the alleged incident occurred, are investigating. The parents were released after being questioned. The infant has been placed in an institution pending the outcome of the inquiry.
Posted by Marcelo Soares and Patrick J. McDonnell in São Paulo, Brazil
A busload of Chinese tourists cruising along an isolated mountain road in southwestern Colombia looked suspicious to Colombian cops — with good reason. Police who stopped the northbound bus at a checkpoint on the Panamerican Highway south of Popayan on Monday found the 30 "tourists" to be illegal immigrants trying to make their way to the United States.
The itinerary of the group, which included 12 minors, shows the lengthy, serpentine paths that Chinese are willing to follow to reach the United States. They apparently disembarked in Peru, then made their way up through Ecuador and into Colombia, avoiding detection by border officials. They were en route to the Colombian port city of Buenaventura and on to Panama when they were seized.
In the immigrants' possession, police found $1.8 million in cash.
Earlier this year, Colombia served as a short-lived trampoline for illegal Chinese immigrants headed for the States when in January it began allowing Chinese to enter the country without a visa. The country reimposed the visa requirement in May after noticing a spike in Chinese tourists who entered but never officially left, the assumption being they clandestinely departed for the U.S. Several months ago, authorities found 160 Chinese illegals crammed into several houses in suburban Bogota, apparently awaiting an opportunity to be hustled north.
Posted by Chris Kraul in Bogota
Since taking office in December, the leftist government of Mexico City Mayor Marcelo Ebrard has taken up several issues meant to improve the quality of life in this overcrowded city. The city, together with the government of the neighboring state of Mexico, rewrote its traffic code earlier this year, imposing new fines for violations and a point system that will deprive repeat offenders of their licenses. And the city will soon being issuing driver's licenses with actual expiration dates (the current licenses are issued for life). The new traffic code is widely seen here as a well-intentioned effort that will only serve to increase the bribes paid to police officers. And now a tough new anti-smoking ordinance is being greeted with skepticism too, as shown by a new study by the respected polling firm of Maria de las Heras. The Las Heras poll for the newspaper Milenio found that 70% of respondents felt that the new law, which requires restaurants to establish nonsmoking areas separated by a wall from smoking areas, was "just a pretext so that [city] inspectors can ask for more bribes." Smokers made up only 22% of the respondents.
Posted by Héctor Tobar in Mexico City
Panama's corruption and weak rule of law could threaten its promising future, the U.S. ambassador to the country, William Eaton, said in a speech today to the Panamanian Chamber of Commerce, Industry and Agriculture. He is not the first ambassador to issue such a warning. But his plea for judicial, labor and environmental reform comes at a time when Panama is at a crossroads, its economy booming and foreign investment starting to climb.
Eaton said Panama stood to make make significant economic strides by virtue of the widening of the Panama Canal and from the influx of foreign companies and retirees. But that prosperity could be stillborn, he said, unless potential investors feel they can get a fair shake from the legal system.
That's not the case now, Eaton warned. Although he mentioned no specific cases, U.S. Embassy staffers have said they are alarmed by the growing number of complaints from real estate investors who say they have been ripped off by unscrupulous developers taking advantage of Panama's murky real estate title laws, and who find no recourse in the judicial system. Many of those investors are U.S. retirees drawn to Panama in recent years by favorable tax and cost of living breaks.
It was hoped that provisions of the pending U.S.-Panama free-trade agreement would bring some relief since it includes the installation of dispute resolution mechanisms to which U.S. investors could appeal. But the deal, which still requires U.S. congressional approval, has been in serious trouble since last month, when Panama's National Assembly elected Pedro Miguel Gonzalez as its president. Gonzalez was indicted by a U.S. grand jury on murder charges in connection with the 1992 killing of an American soldier in Panama, and U.S. officials say passage of a free-trade bill won't happen as long as Gonzalez holds the exalted post.
Posted by Chris Kraul in Bogota
With less than three weeks left before the Nov. 4 presidential runoff in Guatemala, it looks like the race is headed for a tight finish. According to a poll published Friday by the Guatemala City newspaper El Periodico, rightist and former army Gen. Otto Perez Molina has a very narrow lead over center-left-leaning former businessman Alvaro Colom. The poll has Perez Molina at 39.8%, Colom at 37.3% and more than 22% undecided, a lead well within the margin of error. Another poll, released a week earlier by the firm CID-Galllup, has the positions reversed, with Colom at 44.7% and Perez Molina at 42.1%. Colom won the first round of voting Sept. 9 by 4% over Perez Molina but fell far short of the majority needed for an outright victory.
Posted by Héctor Tobar in Mexico City
There is no end in sight in the war of words between Washington and the leftist government of Bolivian President Evo Morales.
The latest flap involves Philip S. Goldberg, the U.S. ambassador in La Paz, who declared he wouldn’t be surprised if Morales sought to move Disneyland. This followed the Bolivian leader’s suggestion last month that the United Nations headquarters be relocated from New York.
Goldberg says he was just trying to introduce some levity, but the Bolivian government didn’t appreciate the joke.
Bolivian Foreign Minister David Choquehuanca labeled the comments "racist" and offensive to "the peasant and indigenous movement of the continent."
Morales now regards Goldberg as unwelcome in the presidential palace until a formal apology is rendered, reports La Razón newspaper.
Said Morales: "We have decided that the ambassador should ask forgiveness from the people.... The anti-imperialist, anti-neo-liberal battle is going to continue, and we will not be frightened."
Posted by Patrick J. McDonnell and Andrés D’Alessandro in Buenos Aires
Click on this link and you'll see something you don't see every day: a score of cops being arrested all at once by other cops, in the northern Mexican city of Tampico. The green uniformed officers lined up in the foreground are members of Mexico's Federal Preventive Police. Look closely and you'll see the handcuffs and chains on their wrists. They're being placed under arrest by the blue-uniformed members of the Federal Investigative Agency, Mexico's equivalent of the FBI, standing just behind them. The alleged bad cops were working on behalf of Mexico's notorious Gulf Cartel of drug traffickers, according to news reports, and were allegedly providing "counterintelligence" and protection to the traffickers. Twenty-five federal cops were arrested in all. They were allegedly receiving between $500 and $1,200 in monthly payments from the traffickers.
Posted by Héctor Tobar in Mexico City
An atomic submarine targets Bolivia, the "capital of Iran."
A flotilla of female Bolivian produce vendors comes to the rescue, pounding the yanqui sub with fruits and vegetables.
"I’m the Bolivian Yoko Ono," muses a defiant Bolivian named Catalina, confronting the yanqui invader in the nude while brandishing a "Peace" sign.
That improbable scenario played out this week in the satirical comic strip La Nelly, carried in Clarin, Argentina’s largest newspaper.
Not funny, concluded the outraged Bolivian Embassy in Buenos Aires, which sent a letter assailing the strip’s "racist connotation" and declaring that Bolivian President Evo Morales (who recently opened diplomatic relations with Iran) "is against arms, terrorism, narco-traffic, violence, the use of deadly technology." The letter was posted on the embassy’s website, along with the offending caricature and an article from the Bolivian daily Los Tiempos about the controversy.
Clarin Editor Ricardo Kirschbaum was unapologetic, responding in a column today that the Catalina character is "intelligent, audacious, informed. The contrary of a discriminatory stereotype."
Concluded the editor: "It's a pity that the diplomat … has confused the absurd with reality."
Posted by Patrick J. McDonnell and Andrés D’Alessandro in Buenos Aires
The news keeps getting worse for former Mexican President Vicente Fox, currently on a book tour of the United States. It seems he will now be the subject of an ethics and corruption investigation to be carried out by Mexico's Congress, according to media reports today. Fox has come under fire for the perceived wealth he accumulated during six years in office, though he insists his finances are open to the public.
According to Reforma (subscription required), two members of Fox's own conservative National Action Party will be on the commission. And, in what is surely a bitter irony for Fox, the commission will be chaired by a member of the Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI: Fox ended the seven-decade reign of the notoriously corrupt PRI when he was elected in 2000.
Less than a year after his term as president expired, it seems every aspect of Fox's personal life is coming under question, with El Universal's front page taking up the matter of Fox's "luxurious" Hummer. It seems said Hummer, valued at $49,000, magically appeared in Mexico last year without the required paperwork and no official record of how it entered the country. Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, the losing leftist presidential candidate, said earlier this week that the Hummer had been seized by Mexican customs officials at the U.S. border last year and then handed over to Fox as a "gift."
Update: Late Thursday afternoon, the lower house of Congress, the Chamber of Deputies, voted to create the commission. It will be known by an incredibly unwieldy name: the Special Commission to Investigate the Accusations of Alleged Inappropriate Use of Public Office Within the Presidency of the Republic, During the Administration of Citizen Vicente Fox Quesada.
Posted by Héctor Tobar in Mexico City
The United States may have trailblazed the elevation of celebrities to politics (Ronald Reagan, Arnold Schwarzenegger), but Brazil is taking the concept to new heights.
Folha de S. Paulo reports that prospective 2008 candidates in various races include a diverse potpourri of TV personalities, ex-soccer stars and hipsters, most on the downside of their careers but still boasting that all-important attribute: name recognition.
A few would-be pols:
— Gretchen, a.k.a. "Butt Queen," veteran chanteuse famed for her derriere-shaking renditions of popular tunes like "Freak Le Boom Boom." She has since evolved into a "mature" porn star.
— Former teen-singing sensation Rafael Ilha, now a recovering addict.
— Ronaldo Esper, famed bridal gown designer to the rich, who had a spot of bad luck when arrested for allegedly stealing flower vases from a cemetery. He said he was just tidying up and was acquitted.
— Sabrina Sato, ex-contestant in the "Big Brother" television series.
— Renata Banhara, who gained fame for her bikini-clad, pseudo-wrestling matches with celebrities in hot tubs.
All that is not to say Brazilian politics are being cheapened, a contention that has surfaced from time to time, notably when ex-representative Angela Guadagnin broke into her "pizza dance" in the House of Deputies after a colleague was cleared of corruption charges.
Vowed Roberto Freire, president of the Popular Socialist Party (PPS): "The PPS will not have pizza dances."
Posted by Marcelo Soares in São Paulo and Patrick J. McDonnell in Buenos Aires
The steady march of foreign companies into Panama continued unabated this week as Hewlett-Packard and Caterpillar each announced they were relocating major new operations and distribution centers to Panama. Total new jobs to be created by the two firms could total 1,800 over the next two years.
Well-placed sources say the next multinational giant to announce entry here will be Procter & Gamble with a new Latin America distribution center. In recent weeks, other international companies have announced relocation or expansion, including China's Sinopec and French pharmaceutical firm Sanofi-Aventis. The country is also attracting increasing numbers of call centers and is now home to 24 such companies employing 15,000 workers.
The recent interest has been generated by bright economic prospects, including the beginning of the $5.25-billion expansion of the Panama Canal and how that will boost the country's standing as an international transportation and communication hub. Another stimulant is the possibility that Occidental Petroleum and the government of Qatar will build a $7-billion refinery in western Panama. Sources say that the partners are "very pleased" with the results of preliminary engineering and cost studies and that they will make a final decision on whether to build by mid-2008.
A third major economic stimulant is the prospect of a free-trade agreement between the United States and Panama, a deal that has hit a speed bump, however, since the Sept. 1 election of Pedro Miguel Gonzalez as president of the National Assembly. Gonzalez is wanted on murder charges in the United States for allegedly killing a U.S. soldier in 1992. Bush administration officials and members of Congress say the deal is dead unless Gonzalez resigns.
Posted by Chris Kraul in Bogota
According to a long tradition, Mexican presidents don't just retire once their term ends: They are expected to completely disappear from public life. Vicente Fox, president of Mexico until December 2006, has broken that tradition this week with the publication in the United States of his book "Revolution of Hope: The Life, Faith and Dreams of a Mexican President." In his review of the book for The Times, Reed Johnson called Fox "a kind of Mesoamerican Mikhail Gorbachev." But Fox's attempt to claim his place in Mexican history, and to remain a relevant figure in Mexico's political life, has not gone over well in Mexico. After watching news reports of Fox's appearances this week on CNN's "Larry King Live," Comedy Central's "The Daily Show" and other outlets, at least one top member of Fox's own National Action Party declared he'd heard enough. Asked about Fox's media blitz, the country's interior minister told reporters Wednesday that Fox had gone too far. "All of us should understand that he who leaves [office] should stay quiet," said Francisco Ramirez Acuña, who is arguably the second-most powerful person in the country, after President Felipe Calderon. "And we should all learn to shut up once our official duties are completed." Fox's book tour will take him to Caltech on Tuesday.
Posted by Héctor Tobar in Mexico City
As anyone who's ambled through Mexico knows, the country has an obesity problem. Now the leftist Democratic Revolution Party, or PRD, wants to take action at what it says is one key aspect of the problem: television advertising for junk food that's targeted at children. According to the bill proposed by legislator Alejandro Sanchez Camacho, Mexican boys and girls see 140 commercials each day for junk food (comida chatarra). Four in 10 Mexican children are obese, the lawmaker says. The proposed law would ban ads in electronic and print media "for products of low nutritional value." Mexico's powerful and well-connected food industry is sure to resist the measure.
Posted by Héctor Tobar in Mexico City
Roberto Madrazo, the third-place candidate in Mexico’s presidential election last year, has finally responded to the controversy surrounding his first-place finish in the 55-and-over category of the Berlin Marathon on Sept. 30.
 A computer chip in his shoe showed he had taken a shortcut and skipped several miles of the course, making him the butt of jokes in the Mexican and German press. On Monday, race officials stripped him of his apparent "victory" in the senior category.
In a seven-page letter Wednesday to "Mexico’s Sporting Community," Madrazo said he never intended to run the entire course in Berlin. Before the race, his doctors told him to rest, but he went to Berlin anyway, he says. "The result: I had to stop at kilometer 21 [about halfway] and I went directly to the finish line to get my clothes and my participant’s medal, which is given to all runners, without exception."
Madrazo didn’t explain why he opened his arms wide in the victory pose captured by a wire service photographer, or why he allowed the controversy to fester on the front pages of Mexico’s newspapers for more than a week before responding.
Posted by Héctor Tobar in Mexico City
Photo: Roberto Madrazo crosses the finish line at the Berlin Marathon on Sept. 30; Credit: AP
It was no secret that the late Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet was an admirer of Napoleon — and, according to some, this self-designated "captain general" from a modest background may have harbored somewhat of a Napoleon complex. Other grandiose role models included Julius Caesar and Francisco Franco.
Now comes word that Pinochet’s fondness for Bonaparte took on decadent dimensions. A judge last week ordered the arrest of 23 Pinochet relatives and former associates in connection with the alleged misappropriation of more than $20 million in government funds, mostly stashed in U.S. accounts via the use of false identities and passports. The cash was allegedly used to buy everything from apartments and clothing to hearing aids, watches, shoes … and "statues or busts" of Napoleon, reports La Cuarta in Santiago, along with El Mercurio.
The allegations have further tarnished the already-sullied reputation of Pinochet, who died in December at age 91 while fighting human rights and graft charges. Critics say he was no better than other kleptocratic U.S. Cold War allies (Somoza, etc.).
Even die-hard supporters who declare that the Pinochet-led coup of 1973 had "saved" Chile the fate of becoming "another Cuba" could not excuse the alleged wholesale looting of the national treasury.
The Chile Documentation Project at the National Security Archive has studiously tracked secret U.S.-Pinochet dealings, unearthing thousands of documents. At one point, notes Peter Kornbluh, who heads the project, a U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency biographic sketch of Pinochet labeled the strongman "very honest, hardworking, dedicated … lives very modestly."
Posted by Patrick J. McDonnell in Buenos Aires
Almost half (45%) of Rio de Janeiro residents say they frequently hear gunshots, according to a new poll, reports Folha de S. Paulo. Fewer than 1 in 5 (18% ) cariocas "never'' hear gunfire, the study says.
Meantime, a human rights commission linked to Brazilian government is looking at how the intermittent drug wars in the Alemão shantytown violate residents' right to education, Folha reports. (TV Globo reporter Tim Lopes was killed in 2002 while researching drug trafficking in the favela, notes this account from Reporters Without Borders.) Drug violence often results in schools being shut down. The commission report will be presented to the Organization of American States.
Last month, the OAS accepted a human rights case in the unsolved killing of a young man who was arrested in the juvenile institute of São Paulo (Febem) during an attempted mass breakout in 2003.
Posted by Marcelo Soares in São Paulo and Patrick J. McDonnell in Buenos Aires
The decision of Mexico's federal government to raise gasoline taxes here by 5.5% has drawn fierce criticism from the public. Now President Felipe Calderon is catching flak from some analysts for his decision to put off that hike until next year.
Calderon is trying simultaneously to raise revenue, control inflation and manage public opinion — a delicate balancing act that so far is pleasing no one.
Mexico desperately needs more tax money to fund infrastructure and other social spending to spur economic growth. But its inflation rate has been running near 4%, significantly higher than the 3.5% upper limit preferred by the nation’s central bankers.
By stalling the increase in the pump tax, as well as some previously scheduled increases on electricity and natural gas, Calderon is helping to keep a lid on inflation. Moreover, he’s trying to mollify a public that’s already fuming over rising prices for basics like tomatoes, milk and tortillas.
But critics say he’s undermining the potential of his new fiscal reforms to speed economic growth by postponing the very increases his administration fought hard to get through Congress.
Calderon would do well to heed an old Midwestern expression: If you’re going to be a bear, be a grizzly.
Posted by Marla Dickerson in Mexico City
The 40th anniversary of the death of revolutionary icon Ernesto "Che" Guevara has sparked an abundance of retrospectives in the Latin American media, notably in Argentina, where he was born and reared, and in Bolivia, where he was executed on Oct. 9, 1967.
 The La Paz newspaper La Razon daily refers to "the Asthmatic Quijote," referring to Guevara’s lifetime struggle with asthma.
A survey by the Argentine newsmagazine Veintitres looks at the women in Guevara's life. The magazine named Guevara, rugby-loving son of a genteel family of aristocratic pedigree, Argentina’s top political figure of the 20th century, topping another legend, Eva Peron.
Pagina/12 newspaper examines Guevara’s mixed cinematic legacy.
The Brazilian newsmagazine Veja looks behind the myth in a critical take on Guevara.
The Argentine daily Clarin traces Guevara’s footsteps in Bolivia during a youthful trip (1953) with boyhood pal Carlos "Calica" Ferrer, part of a big multimedia package. Clarin even got a rare glimpse at the original copy of Guevara’s poignant diary of his Bolivian guerrilla campaign. The original notebooks, which at one point were rescued from the auction block at Sotheby’s in London, are now safely ensconced at the Central Bank of Bolivia.
A decade ago, Cuban forensic anthropologists in Bolivia solemnly removed what were believed to be Guevara’s remains, along with those of six fellow guerrillas: three Cubans, two Bolivians and a Peruvian. A mausoleum now houses the remains in Santa Clara, site of Guevara’s signature military triumph during the Cuban revolution. Guevara reigns as a kind of selfless, secular saint of the revolution. But the Spanish newspaper El Pais raises doubts about whether the bones in Cuba really are Guevara’s, to the dismay of Cuban officials.
Posted by Patrick J. McDonnell and Andrés D’Alessandro in Buenos Aires
Photo: Guevara's face is everywhere in the Andean hamlet of La Higuera, where villagers sell memorabilia bearing his image or offer to show visitors stops on the "Che Tour."
(Andrés D'Alessandro / For The Times)
A well-known U.S. meteorite hunter says he legally purchased pieces of the meteorite that struck near Lake Titicaca last month, reports Andina, the official Peruvian government press agency.
"It’s not true that I robbed part of the meteorite," Michael Farmer, a.k.a. "the meteorite guy," was quoted as saying.
Farmer said he paid "more or less" $1,000 for 300 grams of meteorite fragments. He said local cops were among those who sold him the extraterrestrial rubble. Much of the meteorite had already been sold to other meteorite hunters by the time he arrived, he said.
"I bought a lot of pieces from the police and now they’re denouncing me as if I was a thief," said Farmer, in comments also picked up by the Living in Peru website.
Farmer said he had to "escape" to Bolivia. The presence of meteor hunters sparked an outcry in Peru among officials and others who said the meteorite should remain in the country as part of its cultural patrimony.
Posted by Adriana León in Lima and Patrick J. McDonnell in Buenos Aires
Thanks to the philanthropy of a California trust, the government of Puerto Rico has bestowed protected status to a pristine 270-acre beach that is a nesting area for endangered leatherback sea turtles.
The first section of the planned Northeast Ecological Corridor was dedicated this week by the U.S. territory’s governor, Anibal Acevedo Vila, who proclaimed its environmental and ecotourism value a priority over the development of more beachfront resorts. Four Seasons Hotels Inc. and Marriott International Inc. had been eyeing the sugar-white sands 20 miles east of the capital of San Juan but faced a celebrity-led rebellion against development. Actor-activists Benicio Del Toro and Edward James Olmos, as well as environmental lawyer Robert F. Kennedy Jr., spearheaded the campaign to preserve what will eventually include 3,200 acres of beach and tropical forest.
The parcel, near Luquillo Beach, was purchased by the San Francisco-based Trust for Public Land for $12.5 million and given to Puerto Rico to inaugurate the rescue. The island government now has eight years to arrange financing for the rest of the preserve.
Posted by Carol J. Williams in Miami
After months of wrangling, Congress finally seems ready to move forward on a free-trade pact with Peru. Late Thursday, the Senate Finance Committee voted to send legislation for the U.S.-Peru deal to the full Senate for consideration. The House committee that oversees trade is expected to act on the accord within weeks. Under special "fast track" rules, Congress is working under a tight 90-day deadline to approve the deal and can't make changes to it. The Peru trade pact is the first to move since Democrats took control of Congress, and it still faces opposition from Democrats who feel its labor and environmental standards aren't tough enough. Even so, it's expected to pass. A similar trade pact the Bush administration signed with Colombia faces much stronger opposition in Congress.
Posted by Nicole Gaouette in Washington
In the 4-year-old "Canape War" being waged in the Old World elegance of Havana's diplomatic salons, the latest victory goes to the regime of Fidel Castro.
Spain announced today that it won't be inviting Cuban dissidents to its Oct. 12 National Day reception at the embassy in Havana — a bow to the fidelistas' angry rejection of any challenge to the Communist Party's monopoly on power.
Most European Union countries have included the beleaguered activists in their annual celebrations in a gesture of solidarity with Cuba's fledgling pro-democracy forces. The invitations have also been a silent reproach of the Castro government's March 2003 crackdown on dissenters that resulted in the arrests of 75 regime critics and the summary execution of three men who sought to hijack a plane to Miami.
Cuban government officials have boycotted or stormed out of receptions where political opponents were invited, prompting Spain — Cuba's third-largest trade partner and a key investor in the island's tourism industry — to break ranks with other EU nations and resume official contacts.
An April visit to Havana by Spanish Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratino resulted in a pledge by Madrid to engage with the Cuban government "without conditions," spurring protests among Miami's stridently anti-Castro Cuban exiles and by Eastern European EU member states that suffered under decades of communist rule.
Posted by Carol J. Williams in Miami
 Former TV anchor Monica Veloso rejects comparisons to the fictional Bebel, the much-endeared prostitute in the popular soap opera "Paraiso Tropical."
"I don’t have anything to do with that character," Veloso told Folha Online.
Some 56 million Brazilians viewed the final episode of "Paraiso Tropical" last week in part to learn the fate of Bebel, played by heartthrob Camila Pitanga. In the closing installment, Bebel appears before a Senate ethics panel, testifying as a senator’s mistress and announcing she would pose nude for an adult magazine.
It all seems a lot like the real-life adventures of Veloso, O Globo noted.
 The Brazilian edition of Playboy is highlighting Veloso as its October cover girl. "The woman who shook the Republic," blares the magazine.
The ex-anchor’s out-of-wedlock child with Senate President Renan Calheiros has sparked a corruption scandal. The senator has denied charges that a lobbyist made child-support payments.
Veloso is said to be working on a tell-all book. Echoing Edith Piaf, Veloso declared, "I regret nothing."
Posted by Marcelo Soares in São Paulo and Patrick J. McDonnell in Buenos Aires
Photos: Monica Veloso at a Playboy press conference; Credit: EPA
Monica Veloso on the cover of the Brazilian edition of Playboy; Credit: Playboy
Even criminals fall in love, though prison makes for peculiar nuptials.
Last weekend, Luiz Fernando da Costa — a.k.a. Fernandinho Beira-Mar, the notorious alleged Rio drug trafficker — was married in a Brazilian penitentiary to his fiancee, Jaqueline Alcântara Moraes, reports Folha Online.
Groom and bride were permitted to invite two relatives each to the half-hour ceremony. Two family photographers were also present. Cakes, pastries and soft drinks passed a "rigorous inspection," authorities said.
Alas, plastic cups had to serve for the nonalcoholic toast. After the event, the groom was obliged to leave his ring with prison officials.
But, as a honeymoon, the couple were allowed a two-hour "intimate visit."
Posted by Marcelo Soares in Sao Paulo and Patrick J. McDonnell in Buenos Aires
Last November, an odd left-right alliance in Nicaragua enacted one of the strictest anti-abortion laws in the Americas. Backed by Daniel Ortega and the Sandinistas (who later won Nicaragua's presidential election), the law prohibits abortion in any and all cases, including when a woman's life is placed at risk.
On Tuesday, the Washington-based Human Rights Watch held a press conference in Managua, Nicaragua's capital, announcing the results of a study on the law's impact. The report, titled "Over Their Dead Bodies," documents how the ban has made women with complications in their pregnancies "afraid to seek even legal health services." Fearing prosecution under the new law, "doctors are unwilling to provide necessary care," the report says.
The report recounts the death of a woman at a Managua hospital who went into "septic shock" and died in March because no doctor there would terminate her pregnancy "because the fetus was still alive."
Posted by Héctor Tobar in México City
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Chris Kraul
Buenos Aires:
Patrick McDonnell
Caribbean:
Carol Williams
Mexico City:
Hector Tobar
Deborah Bonello
Marla Dickerson
Ken Ellingwood
Reed Johnson
San Diego:
Richard Marosi
Washington:
Nicole Gaouette