Free Republic

Amazon explorers uncover signs of a real El Dorado Satellite technology detects giant mounds over 155 miles, pointing to sophisticated pre-Columbian culture Rory Carroll, Latin America correspondent guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 5 January 2010 19.08 GMT An aerial picture of traces of earthworks built by a lost Amazonian civilisation dating to 200AD. Photograph: National Geographic It is the legend that drew legions of explorers and adventurers to their deaths: an ancient empire of citadels and treasure hidden deep in the Amazon jungle. Spanish conquistadores ventured into the rainforest seeking fortune, followed over the centuries by others convinced they would find a lost...

Brazil Air Force prefers Swedish jets-report 8:59am EST BRASILIA, Jan 5 (Reuters) - The Brazilian Air Force would prefer to buy its next-generation fighter jets from Sweden, putting it at odds with President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva's preference for French planes, media reported on Tuesday. The deal, which could initially be worth more than $4 billion, has sparked fierce competition among aircraft manufacturers. An Air Force report presented to Defense Minister Nelson Jobim said Sweden's Saab had presented the best overall project among the three finalists, Folha de Sao Paulo newspaper reported on Tuesday. The U.S.-made Boeing F18 was...

Natural disasters kill 60 in Brazil The death toll from the hotel tragedy on Ilha Grande, a resort island southwest of Rio, has risen to... Views today: 111Sorry, this video is no longer available.REPLAY VIDEORESCUERS have pulled more bodies from an avalanche of thick mud and rock that buried a luxury hotel filled with New Year revellers, one of several landslides in southern Brazil that have claimed about 60 lives. The death toll from the hotel tragedy on Ilha Grande, a resort island southwest of Rio, rose to 26 on Saturday. State officials said another landslide in the nearby city...

U.S. Diplomacy Stumbles in Latin America The Obama presidency was expected to herald closer ties after years of perceived neglect under Bush. But relations have soured amid the Honduran coup and Iran's increasing ties in the region. Paul Richter January 3, 2010 Reporting from Washington - Just eight months ago, President Obama was calling Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva "my man" and suggesting that the South American country could become a leading U.S. partner in the region. Since then, Brazil has criticized the U.S. approach to the coup in Honduras and warned the United States over plans to...

Sea Gripen landing on carrier (image : Scenium) Saab Touts Sea Gripen for India and Brazil Saab is responding to an Indian Navy (IN) request for information (RfI) regarding future carrier-capable fighters with a new development of the Gripen NG, dubbed the Sea Gripen. India's RfI, selectively released to bidders over recent weeks, seeks detailed information on a common aircraft design for conventional aircraft carrier operations and short take-off but arrested recovery (STOBAR) operations. Beyond the (much delayed) entry into service of the INS Vikramaditya (the rebuilt former Russian Navy vessel Admiral Gorshkov ), India has ambitious plans to build...

BRASILIA (Reuters) - The Brazilian Supreme Court's top judge ruled on Tuesday that Sean Goldman, the boy at the center of an international custody battle, must be reunited with his father and return to the United States, a press officer at the court told reporters.

Roubini: Latin America Will Have Killer Growth In 2010 Gus LubinDec. 21, 2009, 9:56 AM Although bearish for the U.S. economy, Nourel Roubini can't get enough of Latin America. To wit, he recently upgraded his growth outlook for Latin America in 2010 from 3.3 to 3.8. The economist explained this upgrade in an interview with the Americas Society: AS: What is behind this increasingly positive outlook for Latin America? Roubini: There are two things. One is that global economic and financial conditions are improving. There is a recovery of growth even if it’s going to be anemic. Commodity prices have...

"Oh, you are all here. I had some things to discuss with all of you so it’s good that you are together in the same room,” US President Barack Obama said as he strode into the room where the BASIC countries — Brazil, South Africa, India and China — were holding their last, intensive meetings in Copenhagen. “We really need a deal,” he said. “It’s better that we take one step forward rather than two steps back. I’m willing to be flexible.” And he rolled up his sleeves and sat down. Obama had come to meet China’s Wen Jiabao, in...

Note: The following text is a quote: FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASEThursday, December 17, 2009 Guyanese National Charged with Smuggling Indian Nationals to the United States A Guyanese national has been indicted on charges of conspiracy and alien smuggling in connection with her role in the smuggling or attempted smuggling of four Indian nationals to the United States. Annita Devi Gerald, aka Annita Rampersad, 52, was charged in a nine-count indictment returned yesterday by a federal grand jury in the Southern District of Texas. Gerald was arrested by ICE special agents in Houston on Nov. 17, 2009, and has been held without...

WASHINGTON -- After a day spent frantically darting around Copenhagen trying to locate world leaders, getting snubbed by China's premier and crashing a meeting where he had initially been kept out, President Obama heralded a last-minute, largely toothless UN global-warming summit deal that drew fast fire from all sides as a sham. Almost no one was happy with the outcome of the two-week confab and even the president, who was slammed by liberals and Republicans alike, along with other world leaders, admitted that the pact doesn't legally commit any of the nations involved -- the point of the summit in...

Southerners flee postwar woes to build lives in Brazil Plagued with economic ruin, psychological terror and personal tragedy at the end of the Civil War,many Southerners began to dis-cuss packing up their war-torn lives and emigrating to foreign lands as an antidote for their suffering. Southern diarist Mary Boykin Chesnut wrote about Confederate officers going to Mexico and Brazil,and Scarlett O'Hara twice considered the idea of fleeing to Latin America in the epic novel "Gone With the Wind." One Southern girl confided in her diary:"The men are all talking about going to Mexico and Brazil." Another addressed the same theme:...

Peru to purchase Chinese tanks and Brazilian fighter planes Peruvian president Alan García defended his government’s decision to purchase Chinese tanks and Brazilian fighter planes just a few weeks after accusing Chile of an arms race and proposing an initiative to limit military expenditure in the region. García who presented his anti arms initiative to the Union of South American Nations, Unasur, argued that the purchase of Chinese tanks is not incoherent with his country’s policy, since it is only geared to replenish an obsolete military arsenal. “This does not contradict our commitment to stop an arms race in the...

Brazil and Bolivia reacted strongly to the US message to Latinamerica about “flirting” with the Iran regime. Brazil is “minimizing” the Monday visit of a top US Department official and Bolivia said that it is sovereign and practices a “dialogue culture” with all countries. US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton last week warned Latinamerican countries “to think twice” about strategic alliances with Iran, which she described as the “world’s leading promoter and exporter of terrorism”. Last month Iranian president Mahmud Ahmadinejad was on an official tour of Brazil, Bolivia and Venezuela. The US and Israel are fearful of the Teheran...

Signs of what could be a previously unknown ancient civilisation are emerging from beneath the felled trees of the Amazon. Some 260 giant avenues, ditches and enclosures have been spotted from the air in a region straddling Brazil's border with Bolivia. The traditional view is that before the arrival of the Spanish and Portuguese in the 15th century there were no complex societies in the Amazon basin – in contrast to the Andes further west where the Incas built their cities. Now deforestation, increased air travel and satellite imagery are telling a different story."It's never-ending," says Denise Schaan of the...

Andres Oppenheimer of the Miami Herald wrote an intriguing piece recently on the splash effect of the coup, or crisis, or whatever term least offends someone of Honduras’ new leadership and recent election, and how the major powers in Latin America have tried unsuccessfully to remedy the situation. Oppenheimer argues that the US, Brazil and the OAS have all succeeded in failure in their own unique ways. Failure for the three comes as follows. For Brazil, its “hypocrisy” of recognizing Iran’s and Cuba’s undemocratic leadership, while criticizing Honduras’ recent elections. For the US, the “flip-flopping” that comes with a constant...

Honduras' deposed President Manuel Zelaya said on Sunday that he would stay in the Brazilian embassy in the Honduran capital for as long as Brasilia allowed him to and that he would be willing to talk to the new president-elect. Leftist Zelaya, who was ousted by the army in a coup on June 28, slipped back into Honduras in September and took refuge in the Brazilian embassy in Tegucigalpa, from where he has been demanding his reinstatement. The United States and Brazil have been pushing for Zelaya's return to power but his fate remains uncertain after the Honduran Congress voted...

NEW DELHI/LONDON (Reuters) – China and other big developing nations rejected core targets for a climate deal such as halving world greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 just five days before talks start in Copenhagen, diplomats said on Wednesday. China, the world's top emitter, together with India, Brazil and South Africa demand that richer nations do more and have drawn "red lines" limiting what they themselves would accept, the diplomats told Reuters. The four rejected key targets proposed by the Danish climate talks hosts in a draft text -- halving global greenhouse gases by 2050, setting a 2020 deadline for a...

LONDON, Dec 2 (Reuters) - China, India, Brazil and South Africa oppose setting a goal of halving world greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 at a Copenhagen climate conference starting next week, European diplomats said on Wednesday. A document by the four big developing nations also said they opposed setting a goal of a global peak in emissions by 2020 and a target of limiting global warming to a maximum of 2 Celsius (3.6 Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial times, they said. "The paper is defensive. It lays out the red lines for those emerging economies," one European diplomat with knowledge of the...

Robin Williams went out on a limb defending Chicago's Olympic bid, and now Rio de Janeiro wants to sue him. Williams told David Letterman during an appearance on the Late Show that he wasn't surprised Rio won the bid instead of Chicago. "Chicago sent Oprah and Michelle Obama," Williams said. "Rio sent 50 Strippers and a pound of blow. It wasn't really fair, you know?" Williams' comments have been replayed several times on news shows across Brazil on Tuesday, while city mayor Eduardo Paes says Williams is envious of Rio's achievement.

Honduras' disputed presidential election is likely to set Washington against emerging Latin American power Brazil over whether to recognize the winner of a vote promoted by the leaders of a June coup. Conservative opposition leader Porfirio Lobo easily won the election on Sunday, but he will struggle to get recognition in Latin America where many leftist governments see the election as a nail in the coffin of ousted President Manuel Zelaya. The United States has tried and failed to have Zelaya, a leftist, reinstated and now looks resigned to backing the election as the best way for Honduras' to get...

Note: The following text is a quote: Former State Department Official and Wife Arrested for Serving as Illegal Agents of Cuba for Nearly 30 Years Couple Allegedly Conspired to Provide Classified Information to Cuban Government A former State Department official and his wife have been arrested on charges of serving as illegal agents of the Cuban government for nearly 30 years and conspiring to provide classified U.S. information to the Cuban government. The arrests were announced today by David Kris, Assistant Attorney General for National Security; Channing D. Phillips, Acting U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia; Joseph Persichini, Jr.,...

Brazilian Jewish teenagers this week protested what they called their "exclusion" from a national exam for high school graduates set to take place on Shabbat, after a Brazilian court said providing Jews with an alternative date would "undermine equality." "In some areas in Brazil, such a Rio de Janeiro, observant Jewish students cannot apply to some of the leading universities," said Alex Kingel, 17, from Sao Paulo, who will not be taking the test. Kingel explained that because Rio de Janeiro's leading university is a federal one - funded by the central government - applicants must take the test, known...

Brazil's president says "gringos" should pay Amazon nations to prevent deforestation, insisting rich Western nations have caused much more past environmental destruction than the loggers and farmers who cut and burn trees in the world's largest tropical rain forest. "I don't want any gringo asking us to let an Amazon resident die of hunger under a tree," Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva said ahead of an Amazon summit. "We want to preserve, but they will have to pay the price for this preservation because we never destroyed our forest like they mowed theirs down a century

Brazil's president said Thursday that "gringos" should pay Amazon nations to prevent deforestation, insisting rich Western nations have caused much more past environmental destruction than the loggers and farmers who cut and burn trees in the world's largest tropical rain forest. President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva made the comments just before an Amazon summit in which delegates signed a declaration calling for financial help from the industrial world to halt the deforestation that causes global warming. "I don't want any gringo asking us to let an Amazon resident die of hunger under a tree," Silva said. "We want to...

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad vowed Wednesday beside firebrand President Hugo Chavez that Iran and Venezuela would "stand together until the end" in the face of US "imperialism." Ending a tour of Latin American allies, Ahmadinejad praised his "brave brother" Chavez, saying: "Today the people of Venezuela and Iran, friends and brothers in the trench warfare against imperialism, are resisting. "We'll stand together until the end," he yelled, raising Chavez's hand in front of the television cameras and shouting in Spanish: "Viva Venezuela! Viva Chavez!" Before arriving in Caracas late Tuesday Ahmadinejad was in Bolivia, where he and President Evo Morales,...

BRASILIA (Agencies) – Brazilian President Luis Inacio Lula da Silva has offered his backing for Tehran’s nuclear program. Speaking at a joint news conference in the capital Brasilia on Monday after holding talks with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, his visiting Iranian counterpart, Lula said Brazil backed Iran’s quest for “peaceful nuclear energy in full respect of international accords”. According to Al-Jazeera, Lula urged Ahmadinejad to “continue contacts with interested countries for a just and balanced solution on the nuclear issue in Iran”. In his weekly radio address earlier, Lula said engaging Iran instead of isolating it was the way to push for...

THIS outrageous footage shows Miss Gay Brazil being attacked by a jealous rival. The competition winner was being interviewed by TV crews when a losing contestant ran up behind her and pulled her wig clean off. She then storms off - quickly pursued by the competition winner's angry entourage.

Ahead of Iranian president's arrival in country, protestors from pro-Israel organizations and groups for homosexuals' rights gather in Rio de Janeiro, urge Brazilian president to teach his guests that 'racism is a crime'. Thousands of demonstrators from different religions took part Sunday in a march for peace and against Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, on Ipanema beach in Rio de Janeiro. Faced with mounting pressure over his country's atomic ambitions, Ahmadinejad left on a five nation tour Sunday, in a bid to boost ties with Latin America's biggest economy and a rare backer of Tehran's nuclear program.

Brazil sparks wider currency control fears By Peter Garnham Published: November 19 2009 11:37 | Last updated: November 19 2009 11:37 Asian currencies came under pressure on Thursday as a move from Brazil to further curb foreign inflows sparked fears that other countries would follow suit. Brazil moved overnight to close a loophole that had allowed investors to avoid a 2 per cent tax on foreign investment in equities and bonds announced last month. The government announced a 1.5 per cent tax on American Depositary Receipts. Guido Mantega, Brazil’s finance minister, said some foreign investors had been buying ADRs to...

Within minutes, six-year-old Rubjit Thindal went from happily chatting in the back seat of the car to collapsing and dying in her father's arms. "If we had known it was so serious, we would have called 911,'' Kuldip Thindal, Rubjit's distraught mother, said in Punjabi yesterday. "She just had a stomach ache -- she wasn't even crying.'' Rubjit was pronounced dead at hospital barely 24 hours after showing signs of a fever. Later, doctors told her parents she had the H1N1 influenza virus. She is believed to be the youngest person in Canada with the virus to have died.

This week's 60 Minutes broadcast should make everyone afraid, very afraid, of the real, looming specter of cyberwarfare attacks. As I recently blogged, government agencies are already going full-bore to come up with guidelines to protect federal networks. So when an Admiral goes on national television to say hackers have the ability to take down our power grid, he's doing it to deliver a warning. I was actually poised to turn off the segment, which I happened upon by accident following Sunday's last-minute Giants loss. Half-expecting the usual security for dummies piece, I was surprised to see an unusually detailed...

RIO DE JANEIRO — A massive power failure blacked out Brazil's two largest cities and other parts of Latin America's biggest nation for more than two hours late Tuesday, leaving millions of people in the dark after a huge hydroelectric dam suddenly went offline. Paraguay was also affected when the Itaipu dam straddling the two nations' border stopped producing 17,000 megawatts of power, resulting in outages in Rio de Janeiro, Sao Paulo and at least several other big Brazilian cities, Brazilian Mines and Energy Minister Edison Lobao said. The cause of the failure had not been determined, but Lobao said...

<p>RIO DE JANEIRO — Brazil's two largest cities have been hit by a massive blackout that has also affected other parts of Latin America's largest nation.</p> <p>Media reports say problems at a huge hydroelectric dam are to blame for the electrial outages affecting large parts of Rio de Janeiro, Sao Paulo and other cities in several states.</p>

Swine flu has hit an isolated tribe of Indians in the Amazon jungle, with seven dying in the last two weeks, Survival International said on Wednesday. A further 1,000 members of the Yanomami tribe in Venezuela are believed to have caught the flu, the indigenous peoples rights group said. It is feared the flu could sweep through the area and kill many more Yanomami as the Indians have little resistance to introduced diseases. About 32,000 Yanomami live in the Venezuela-Brazil border region and form the largest relatively isolated tribe in the Amazon. Survival director Stephen Corry said the situation was...

When Islamists made their roots south of the border... Venezuela's dictator: H. Chavez that "sees" only money, oil and Anti-Americanism-Power, does "serve" the Islamic Iranian Republic well, giving out passports to anyone. From that "port" it is quite easy for an Islamic Iranian AGENT to arrive into any other Latin American country as a... "Venezuelan". A "random" different case (of a Muslim trying to "blend" into Latin America), a year ago, a Jordanian Arab that "met" a Costa Rican (Tica) girl in Spain (she vouched for him in CR, asw this man came from the area in Jordan where a...

Educational slavery for four-year-old children Trojan horse in the Brazilian Congress alters Constitution to establish compulsory institutionalization of young children By Julio SeveroCongressional measure PEC 96A/03, which increases the education budget, was approved 28 October 2009 in the Brazilian Senate. The vote had the participation of 52 senators, who unanimously approved the budget increase — an increase that will cause more sacrifices from the pocket of the Brazilian taxpayer.Yet, it is not just in their pockets that Brazilians will be hit. PEC (which means Proposta de Emenda à Constituição [Constitutional Amendment Proposal]) makes, according to the liberal newspaper Folha de...

SNIPPET: "Lula and Chavez have established a "strategic relationship," and recently agreed upon a joint Brazilian-Venezuelan oil venture worth billions of dollars. Lula and Chavez have joined with Daniel Ortega, the returned Nicaraguan Marxist dictator, to form an anti-U.S. Latin American military alliance - all with Russian assistance - funded by the region's abundant oil reserves. Brazil is engaged in its own arms build-up and Lula is determined that Brazil will become at least a first-rate regional power. Unfortunately, Lula is establishing Brazil as an anti-American military power by aligning with nations hostile or potentially hostile to the U.S. Lula...

Curitiba, PR, Brazil - A man robbed a woman on the street and, after punched her, escaped on his motorcycle. The Mercedes' driver witnessed the crime and chased the biker for some kilometers. When had the chance, he slammed his car into the biker, crushing him against a wall. Video: http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=73d_1256171735 And not a scratch or dent on the Mercedes!

Super Hornet favourite in Indian and Brazilian tenders By Reuben F Johnson The Boeing F/A-18E/F Super Hornet is well placed to fulfil both the Indian and Brazilian fighter requirements, the company and its industry partners said on 28 October. Boeing and its Team Super Hornet partners – Raytheon and General Electric (GE) – presented a broad-ranging review of the F/A-18E/F's position in both the Indian Air Force's (IAF's) Medium-Multirole Combat Aircraft (MMRCA) programme for 163 aircraft plus 63 options and the Brazilian Air Force's F-X2 tender for the first 36 of what is projected to be a total of 120...

A German man reportedly dumped by a Brazilian woman he met on the Internet camped out in an airport for 13 days before being taken Thursday to a hospital for a psychological evaluation. The man, identified by authorities as Heinz Muller, was out of money and wouldn't say when he planned to leave, according to airport workers, some of whom brought him meals from the food court. The 46-year-old former pilot spent his time wandering the airport in Campinas, an industrial city about an hour's drive from Sao Paulo, and using his laptop perched on a luggage cart. Occasionally he...

Recent events in Honduras demonstrate, clearer than any other problematic political situation in Latin America, the moral fickleness of the so called international community and the media. For that country’s independent and sovereign institutions, read the Supreme Court, the Attorney General’s Office and Congress, ruled, unanimously in the case of Congress, in favor of removing Manuel Zelaya from power, owing to his violations to Honduras constitution. This crucial fact notwithstanding, we have seen universal condemnation of the new administration of Honduras. It comes relentless from all quarters, from all locations, from across parties, it is an issue that has exemplified,...

SA could benefit if Brazil chooses Gripen over French fighter By: Keith Campbell 16th October 2009 Should Swedish aircraft manufacturer Saab win the current Brazilian FX-2 contest for a new fighter with its Gripen NG, a docu- ment leaked to media in Brazil indicates, part of the aircraft would be made in South Africa. The document, obtained by the defence news website, Defesa@Net, shows that Saab is propos- ing that part of the airframe for Brazilian Gripens be built in South Africa. The Swedish company is also proposing the use of some South African mission equipment and weapons systems. Saab...

Brazilian brigadier bashes US defense export policies on YouTube By Stephen Trimble on October 8, 2009 9:07 PM | A video has surfaced on YouTube showing a senior Brazilian officer expressing deep frustrations with the US government's technology transfer policies for military equipment. Complaints about the US government's technology transfer policies are widespread globally, but this video is remarkable for citing examples in such specific detail, including showing photocopies of US government denial letters. The two-day-old clip is attributed to a lecture presented last December by Brigadier Engineer Venancio Alvarenga Gomes, the director of projects for Brazil's command-general for aerospace...

Yesterday, Paul-Emic, a conservative French Blogger (Politique, émois et moi) alerted our readers on the below Journal du Dimanche (JDD) articles that were causing quite an stir from Paris to Rio. I have attempted to translate from French to English each of the articles. Please remember Pilots are called “Drivers” in the translation. I have also included a You Tube video for a F14 “Flat Spin” to illustrate a “Flat Spin”. I seriously doubt the FO as well as most pilots would have been able to pull out of a flat spin. The best way to get out of a...

Rio de Janeiro will host the 2016 Olympics after the Brazilian city won a landslide victory over Madrid in the final round of voting on Friday. -snip- Chicago went out after polling just 18 votes in the first round, despite the eloquent speeches on their behalf made by Obama, the first sitting U.S. president to address an IOC session, and first lady Michelle Obama.

While his trip is certainly within the province of presidential duty, it begs the question, why did he do it? As the Brazilians celebrate, he looks foolish, not to mention weak to the world. If the president had been able to peddle his influence and bring the games to Illinois, he would have looked effective now, and not coincidentally, effective at the end of his second term (provided he wins one) when the games would take place.-- Talk about historic grandeur and a sure way to memorialize one’s legacy!

Who holds the most votes, as a block, in the IOC and what is the politics of their current governments? Why Brazil and why at this time? Was it a vote to reward Brazil's leaders for their attempt to put a Marxist thug back in power in Honduras?

SAO PAULO (AP) -- Brazil says unemployment has decreased for the third month in a row, showing that Latin America's biggest economy is recovering from the global crisis. The government's statistics agency says the jobless rate decreased to 8.1 percent in June from 8.8 percent in the previous month, the third consecutive reduction since it reached 9 percent in March. There was no change compared to June last year. The economy has been rebounding in part because of tax breaks in the automobile, construction and home appliance sectors, increased government spending and easier access to credit for small businesses. snip...

FOR MY FREEPER FRIENDS - A LITTLE CHICAGO MUSIC & BLUES MRS. OBAMA: I was born and raised on Chicago’s South Side, not far from where the Games would open and close. Ours was a neighborhood of working families — families with modest homes and strong values. Sports were what brought our community together. They strengthen our ties to one another. Growing up, when I played games with the kids in my neighborhood, we picked sides based not on who you were, but what you could bring to the game. Sports taught me self-confidence, teamwork, and how to compete as...