Latin America RoundUp -- April 8

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President Bush began yesterday what could be a long fight to win congressional approval for a free trade agreement with Colombia, as covered here by James Gerstenzang in our Washington Bureau. This Los Angeles Times editorial argues that Congress should approve the trade pact.

Meanwhile, our man in Venezuela, Chris Kraul, writes about how health services in the country have taken a turn for the worse in a nation that is awash with oil wealth.

On an arts note, Reed Johnson in Mexico City surveys the Gabriel Figueroa retrospective at the city’s Palacio de Bellas Artes. The exhibition tracks Figueroa’s prolific 50-year career, which began as a still photographer and included a brief Hollywood sojourn.

North of the border, the exhibition ‘Phantom Sightings: Art After the Chicano Movement’ opened over the weekend (one of the works, ‘Bear Head and Arms Study I’ (2004), a conceptual piece by artist Carlee Fernandez, is pictured here). The Chicano art show gets the treatment here from Los Angeles Times writer Agustin Gurza.

Mexico-based journalist and blogger Daniel Hernandez is already anticipating the show’s arrival in Mexico City on his Intersections blog, and says the impact of the display may be long-lasting.

Deborah Bonello in Mexico City