Free Republic

The Uruguayan Senate has passed legislation to decriminalise abortion in the first 12 weeks of pregnancy. A similar move in 2008 was vetoed by President Tabare Vasquez, but current President Jose Mujica has signalled he will sign the bill into law. The legislation now goes to the lower house, which, like the Senate, is controlled by Mr Mujica's allies. Opinion polls suggest a majority of Uruguayans back easing the restrictions on abortion. Under the current legislation, women who have an abortion and the people who assist them face prison. Abortion is only allowed in the case of rape or when...

Supernatural things are coming your way , The stuff dreams are made of but won't fade away \o/ , The supernatural exposed in and through you , Watch now as "I" come into view ! The Ancient of Days The I AM That "IS ONE" ! A Fullness , a Gladness , My Entire Kingdom , For when ever "I" show My Face , There in the midst you shall find "My" Grace , Abounding , Abiding , Sweet and True , The "ALL of ME " all over you ! Genesis 28:10-19 Amplified Bible (AMP) 10And Jacob left Beersheba...

"Democracy is a charming form of government, full of variety and disorder, and dispensing a sort of equality to equals and unequal alike" Plato (BC 427 - 374BC). Open rigging and clinging brazenly to power have become common features of emerging democracies in the world today especially in Africa. Many Countries in Africa have become accustomed to "sit-tight dictators" or military style of leadership, with democracy being propelled by the West for their replacement. This is at the centre of the on-going conflict in many emerging democratic nations. Democratization of the world today as being championed by United States of...

TEL AVIV – Palestinian officials tell WND the Obama administration is only giving lip service to resisting a Latin American declaration recognizing a Palestinian state outside of a the framework of an agreement with Israel. In what amounts to a diplomatic assault on Israel, Argentina and Uruguay last week announced they were joining Brazil in unilaterally recognizing an independent Palestinian state.... Publicly, the U.S. was quick to rebuke the decision by Latin American countries...Palestinian Authority officials, however, told WND the Obama administration has not privately lobbied the Latin American countries against their recognition, with more Central and South American nations...

Not that long ago, when the discussion by Palestinian Prime Minister Fayyad first discussed unilateral declaration of a Palestinian state, French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner stated his intention to recognize such a state. Then, for a stretch, there was silence, that is until this week. Now, Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, Argentinean President Cristina Kirchner, and Uruguayan Deputy Foreign Minister Roberto Conde have all come forward to support the unilateral declaration of a Palestinian state with the 1949 Armistice Lines as a recognized border. Many following these events expect for Bolivia and Ecuador to join the march to...

Following in Brazil’s footsteps from last Friday, Argentina announced on Monday it recognized a “free and independent” Palestinian state, sparking an immediate condemnation from Israel. Argentina’s President Cristina Kirchner told Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas in a letter that her country recognized a Palestine defined by 1967 borders, Argentine officials said. The Argentine Foreign Ministry said in an e-mailed statement that the move was designed to help “definitively advance the negotiation process that will lead to the establishment of a just and lasting peace in the Middle East.” Uruguay announced soon afterward that it would recognize a Palestinian state next...

Hey it's the third place game This applies to Germany and Uruguay, warning bad language.

OK, so to those of you with DVRs etc: In that final desperate, scrum at the end of extra time, prior to the Suarez handball, wasn't a Ghana player (#10 specifically) offside on a when the ball was headed toward him, or do I have the rule mixed up in my head? If so, it means Ghana got away with one before that handball, so it shouldn't have made it that far anyway. Thanks in advance for your answers, v.a.

PRETORIA, South Africa (AFP) - On the anniversary of the Soweto uprising that galvanized the fight for freedom by black South Africans, the World Cup hosts will try to capture an emotional and much-needed triumph. South Africa will face Uruguay with both teams level with Mexico and France in Group A after a pair of opening draws that have left two spots in the second round up for grabs with each team facing two more matches. As if that tension was not enough on the host squad known as "Bafana Bafana" (The Boys), the matchup comes on Youth Day, a...

In a sworn statement detailing his assets, Mr Mujica said he has no bank accounts or other assets and put his small flower farm in his wife's name, only possessing the ageing car, worth £1,300.

Note: The following text is a quote: May 28, 2010 Charlotte ICE gang operation yields 12 arrests CHARLOTTE, N.C. - U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents assigned to the Charlotte Gang Unit continue making arrests in North Carolina with its recent weekend effort yielding 12 arrests and the seizure of cocaine, marijuana and brass knuckles. Among the 12 arrests last weekend were four gang members and affiliates: one Asian Boyz gang member, two MS-13 gang members and one MS-13 affiliate. All four are foreign-born nationals from Vietnam, Uruguay and Honduras. One is a naturalized U. S. citizen, one has...

SNIPPET: "President Chávez also announced during the visit that Venezuela is working on a preliminary plan for the construction of a “nuclear village” in Venezuela with Iranian assistance so that “the Venezuelan people can count in the future on this marvelous resource for peaceful purposes.” The transfer of Iranian nuclear technology from Iran would be a violation of U.N. Security Council Resolutions - 1737 (2006), 1747 ( 2007), and 1803 (2008) - that imposed restrictions on Iran’s nuclear technology transfers. In late September 2009, comments by Venezuelan officials offered conflicting information about Iran’s support for Venezuela’s search for uranium deposits....

The Govern­ment’s investigations into the stolen Royal Malaysian Air Force RMAF F5E jet engines in Uruguay has turned up evidence, in the form of documents and witnesses, necessary for instituting criminal proceedings here. “We visited the military facility where the engines are kept under the custody of the Uruguayan judicial authority and have positively identified them as belonging to the Government of Malaysia,” said Attorney-General Tan Sri Abdul Gani Patail. Abdul Gani, who visited Uruguay and Argentina from Feb 15 to Feb 19, said they had drafted two mutual legal assistance requests for the return of the engines as well...

Note: Contact info deleted by me. # Note: The following text is a quote: Secretary Napolitano Designates 11 New Countries as Eligible for H-2a and H-2b Nonimmigrant Visa Programs Release Date: January 22, 2010 For Immediate Release Office of the Press Secretary Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Janet Napolitano this week designated 11 new countries as eligible to participate in the H-2A and H-2B nonimmigrant visa programs, which allow U.S. employers to bring foreign nationals to the United States to fill temporary or seasonal jobs for which U.S. workers are not available. The 11 newly designated countries—Croatia, Ecuador, Ethiopia,...

MONTEVIDEO, Uruguay – A plain-talking former leader of leftist guerrillas who once sought power through kidnappings and bombings is now the president-elect of Uruguay. Jose Mujica won more than 50 percent of the votes cast in a run-off election Sunday, according to exit polls by the South American country's three leading pollsters, giving the center-left Broad Front coalition five more years in power.

A United Nations plane has crashed in western Haiti, killing all 11 people on board, UN officials say. The Uruguayan surveillance plane was monitoring the Dominican Republic border as part of its tasks with the UN peacekeeping mission in Haiti. Most of those on board the plane were military officers from Uruguay and Jordan, officials told the BBC. More than 9,000 UN personnel are stationed in Haiti, which has long been ravaged by violence and instability. Police officer Cadostin Marc-Andre told the AFP news agency the plane had been nearing the municipality of Ganthier when it came down. UN spokeswoman...

Lawmakers in Uruguay passed a measure last week that would allow homosexual couples to adopt children, despite the strong opposition from the Catholic Church, voiced recently by Archbishop Nicolas Cotugno of Montevideo and other community leaders. The measure passed by a vote of 53-40 and was a modified version of the bill approved by the Uruguayan Senate on July 15. Now it must be sent back to the Senate for debate. In response to the bill’s passage, which comes two years after the country legalized gay unions, the spokesman for the group National Coordinator for Life, Nestor Martinez, called it...

Ecuador aligns itself with Venezuela, Bolivia, and Cuba In speeches against imperialism and neoliberalism, the presidents of Venezuela, Hugo Chavez, and Bolivia, Evo Morales, and the Ecuadoran President-Elect Rafael Correa, who should assume the government of his country Monday, expressed common ideological and political agreement Sunday. Chavez, Morales, and Correa, who also exalt the figure of Cuban leader Fidel Castro, met together in Zumbahua, an indigenous [Ecuadoran] locality 90 kilometers south of Quito, for a symbolic inauguration of Correa before the indigenous peoples [of Ecuador]. In a speech before a multitude congregated in the central plaza, Correa emphasized that "[Latin]...

Richard Lemos went to authorities to report a crime, believing he was doing the responsible thing. In return for his efforts, he was given a deportation order. Lemos, originally from Uruguay, is one of 28 undocumented immigrants living in Utah who are being deported after testifying against a woman who allegedly made tens of thousands of dollars scamming people desperate to find a legal way to stay in the country. It is a classic illustration, critics say, of one of the pernicious realities of current U.S. immigration policy: People living here without proper documentation are exploited by criminals emboldened by...

Just two days after US President Barack Hussein Obama shared a controversial and landmark handshake with Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez at the Summit of the Americas, the Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center has released a study analyzing the flowering alliance between the increasingly anti-Western Latin America and the virulently anti-Israel Iran. The study was conducted at the Israel Intelligence Heritage & Commemoration Center (IICC), a non-governmental organization dedicated to Israeli intelligence and terrorism issues. According to the study, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is using anti-Western Hugo Chavez as a springboard into several Latin American countries, such as Bolivia, Nicaragua, and...

Montevideo, Nov 14, 2008 / 11:16 am (CNA).- President Tabare Vasquez of Uruguay has vetoed a controversial law on sexual and reproductive health that legalized abortion and had been approved by the country’s House of Representatives by a vote of 49-48. Likewise, as she had recently announced, the Minister of Public Health, Maria Julia Munoz, and the Minster of the Interior, Hector Lescano, also signed the veto in support of the president’s decision. According to the newspaper El Observador, the veto applies to all sections of the bill except for the first chapter, which deals with sexual and reproductive health. Article...

MONTEVIDEO, Uruguay - One of South America's smallest countries proved on Sunday it can hold the biggest barbecue in the world. Some 1,250 Uruguayan grillmeisters sizzled up 26,400 pounds (12,000 kilograms) of beef Sunday, beating a 2006 record set in Mexico. "It's all so beautiful. It's a record," Guinness World Records judge Danny Girton said after the chefs, in white hats and aprons, smoked and barbecued their way into the record book with help of 6 tons of charcoal and 1,500 metal barbecue stands. The barbecue was so big that firefighters were called in to light the grills and make...

CARACAS, Venezuela – The Venezuelan government on Friday denied any link to a businessman who was stopped at an Argentine airport carrying a suitcase filled with nearly $800,000 in cash. The Venezuelan businessman, Guido Alejandro Antonini Wilson, carried the money from Caracas to Buenos Aires on a flight chartered by the Argentine government, and the undeclared funds were seized by customs agents last weekend. “We don't have anything to do with that plane or with that trip ... nothing to do with that businessman,” Venezuelan Finance Minister Rodrigo Cabezas told reporters. The incident has shaken the Argentine government, prompted one...

After fleeing poverty in his native Uruguay, Miguel Angel Ortiz settled in Hampton Roads and established himself as an expert welder. He formed his own business and obtained shipyard contracts worth more than $1 million. Married with three children, the youngest about 10 months old, he had been living in a stately waterfront home in Virginia Beach. Two full-size bronze lions were perched out front near a four-tier fountain. He drove a Hummer and had a spare in the driveway. Ortiz built this life using someone else’s identity and after racking up an extensive arrest record in this country.His case...

Jul. 11, 2007 (CWNews.com) - Legislators in Uruguay have taken up discussion of a bill that would legalize abortion. A senate commission is considering a bill on sexual and reproductive health that would allow for legal abortion. The country's Catholic bishops have made an appeal to protect the current ban on abortion. Uruguay is governed by a center-left coalition, which includes the Christian Democratic Party.

Montevideo, Uruguay (LifeNews.com) -- Activists in the South American nation of Uruguay have begun another campaign in an attempt to legalize abortion there. Like most counties in the region that are strongly Hispanic and Catholic, Uruguay prohibits abortions in virtually all cases exception when a woman's life is in danger or she is a victim of rape. Abortion advocates launched their latest campaign after news surfaced that a 20 year-old woman was criminally charged for having an illegal abortion. Lawmakers who are sympathetic to their cause have introduced a bill removing the nation's pro-life protection for unborn children but it...

ESTANCIA ANCHORENA, Uruguay – Over lamb chops and cuts of beef, President Bush chatted amiably Saturday at this presidential retreat with a former leader of a legendary band of leftist guerrillas known as the Tupamaros. "I respect you and I'm proud to be in your country," Bush told Jose "Pepe" Mujica, now Uruguay's minister of agriculture and livestock, according to a White House aide. Mujica was pleased to give Bush an expansive overview of this tiny nation's agricultural needs, the aide said. This is the same Mujica who, in comments to media here, has acknowledged feeling odd about the notion...

PRESIDENTIAL NEWS OF THE DAY: President and Mrs. Bush visited Uruguay today where they had lunch with that country's president and other dignitaries. GWB and the Uruguayan leader held trade talks before participating in a joint press conference. The following article presents a summary of President Bush's visit: Bush talks trade in Uruguay as Chavez stokes protests CNN.com, World, POSTED: 2:07 p.m. EST, March 10, 2007 ANCHORENA PARK, Uruguay (AP) -- President George W. Bush launched talks Saturday with Uruguayan President Tabare Vazquez focused on expanding trade with this tiny coastal nation. It was the second stop on a five-country...

While President Bush did the talking, the first lady did the walking. Laura Bush played tourist Saturday on a foot tour of a UNESCO World Heritage Site, the ruins of a 17th century Portuguese fort with a view of the broad River Plate and Argentina on the opposite bank. As her husband met with Uruguayan President Tabare Vazquez at a nearby countryside retreat, the first lady strolled in a violet-colored pantsuit down quaint cobblestone streets of the old town of Colonia de Sacramento. Uruguay’s first lady, Maria Auxiliadora Delgado, escorted her. They both smiled as tourists and residents applauded them....

Thousands of protesters greeted Mr Bush's arrival US President George Bush has met his Uruguayan counterpart, Tabare Vazquez, as part of his five-nation Latin American tour to promote trade.Mr Bush arrived in Montevideo from Brazil - where he signed a deal to develop alternative fuel sources. Uruguay is keen to sign free trade deals with the US, even if it means leaving the Mercosur trade bloc. The tour attracted protests in Brazil and about 5,000 protesters gathered in Uruguay for Mr Bush's visit. Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez is conducting his own tour of the region and addressed 40,000 anti-Bush...

Brazilian ambassador in Chile described as mere “fantasy” alleged statements by President Lula da Silva particularly offensive towards Chile, Argentine president Nestor Kirchner and former Uruguayan president Jorge Batlle. “I can assure you it is all mere fantasy”, said Ambassador Mario Vilalva in Santiago adding that “I can back my words because I happened to be at the official dinner at the Brazilian Embassy in Tokyo”, when the alleged incident took place. In a book released this week titled “Travels with the President” two Brazilian journalists, Eduardo Scolese and Leonencio Nossa wrote that President Lula in the Embassy in Tokyo...

A runaway train killed seven people and injured at least 11, severing some of their limbs, during the filming of a TV show in Uruguay, police said. The accident occurred during a "test of strength" challenge to raise money for a hospital in Young, 380km (235 miles) west of the capital, Montevideo. Contestants were pulling a train and two carriages when the locomotive gained speed and ran them over. Local authorities have declared three days of mourning. Participants in the programme, called A Challenge to the Heart, raise funds for local charities by completing difficult tasks set by the network...

Judging from last week's jubilant, nearly identical headlines the press was having a picnic over the recent Bolivian elections: "Latin America Continues Drift To The Left." "Morales Victory Continues Leftward Drift." The consistent theme running through the reports was indistinguishable too and unmistakable: Socialism is on the march! Take that free marketeers! Apparently the election of Juan Evo Morales Ayma as Bolivian president makes it official. Free market capitalism is on the ropes. Like the proverbial Siamese dominoes Latin American countries -- Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay, and Venezuela -- have fallen to the red menace. And 11 of the region's countries...

Uruguay roes its way to epicurean success BAYGORRIA, Uruguay (AFP) - Uruguayan caviar, once a local family's long-shot business venture, has swum its way onto the epicurean map and is poised to become the toast of the world's gastronomes. ADVERTISEMENT The idea was spawned just about a decade ago, when Russian satellite images showed that Uruguay could be an ideal place to breed sturgeon. Soon after, the Alcaldes became the first family in the southern hemisphere to produce caviar. Now they are trying to corner the world market through their company Black River Sturgeons -- ERN by its Spanish acronym.)...

RIO DE JANEIRO, July 29 - As he campaigned for the presidency in 2002, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva boldly pledged to clean up the sordid politics of Brazil. His, he vowed, would be an ethical, honest and moral government the likes of which Brazil had never seen. That pledge helped him win the votes of more than 50 million Brazilians and a sweeping mandate. But now, in a gloomy echo of what has happened time and again across Latin America, Mr. da Silva's government is mired in the biggest, most audacious corruption scandal in his country's history. A congressional...

SUMMARY In early June, Bolivia's government, led by the interim president, Carlos Mesa, collapsed amid widespread popular protests. The trigger was the enactment of a controversial hydrocarbons law which, although it sharply increased levies on foreign companies, was seen by radical protestors as not going far enough. The effective royalty rate was raised from 18% to 50%. The increase will be contested by foreign oil companies which claim it contravenes the terms of existing contracts. However, Bolivia's more radical groups are pressing for outright nationalisation. The future management of the privatised hydrocarbons industry has become a bitterly divisive issue in...

MONTEVIDEO, URUGUAY - One of 16 survivors of a 1972 Andes plane crash made famous by the book Alive: The Story of the Andes Survivors by Piers Paul Read has gotten his wallet and jacket back 32 years. Eduardo Strauch, who survived 72 days in mountain snows, got the aged wallet, drivers license and other personal items Wednesday, a week after they were found in the Andes by a mountain climber. Mr. Strauch, 57, was aboard a flight with fellow rugby players, relatives and friends when their plane crashed high in the Andes on Oct. 12, 1972.

COLONIA, Uruguay - In his opening weeks as Uruguay's first socialist president, Tabare Vazquez has mirrored the economic orthodoxy of his centrist predecessor while making populist political gestures, especially to labor unions and the poor. Mr. Vazquez, 65, an oncologist, heads the leftist coalition Frente Amplio (Broad Front, in Spanish). He was sworn in March 1, ending 180 years of two-party rule. His election in October produced an epidemic of euphoria in this town and throughout the tiny nation of more than 3 million. It also bolstered the so-called "pink tide" of leftist governments taking power in several Latin American...

China's Latin influence is growing, general says China is taking advantage of a U.S. influence vacuum in Latin America because of aid cuts, the commander of the Southern Command says. By PABLO BACHELET pbachelet@herald.com WASHINGTON - The head of the Miami-based U.S. Southern Command Wednesday warned that China was increasing its influence among Latin American militaries, and partly blamed a policy that cuts military aid to countries that refuse to exempt U.S. citizens from International Criminal Court jurisdiction. In his first testimony before a House panel, Army Gen. Bantz Craddock, who heads the United States Southern Command, offered an unusually...

Austrian economist Ludwig von Mises reminded in 1932 that the socialist movement takes great pains to frequently circulate new labels for its "ideally constructed state." Seventy-three years later, socialists still are playing that game. Just as socialists masquerading as liberals in the United States now call themselves "progressives," apologians for this particularly odoriferous political philosophy in Latin America now call themselves "pragmatists." Sadly, some in the media have become willing accomplices. Uruguay last week became the sixth South American nation to install a socialist president. He's Tabare Vazquez, 65, a former cancer doctor who rose to power as so many...

BUENOS AIRES, March 4 (RIA Novosti correspondent Yury Nikolayev) - Russia and Uruguay have agreed to draw up a cooperation program for the period from 2005 to 2010. The parties reached this agreement at a meeting between Russian Central Election Commission chief Alexander Veshnyakov and Uruguayan President Tabare Vazquez on Thursday, reported the Russian embassy in Uruguay. Veshnyakov heads the Russian delegation at the inauguration ceremony of the new president of Uruguay Tabare Vazquez. Mr. Veshnyakov handed over President Vladimir Putin's message to his Uruguayan counterpart. Mr. Veshnyakov updated President Vazquez on prospects and areas of cooperation in the energy...

(AP) Uruguay's President Tabare Vazquez opens his arms to supporters from the balcony of the Government... MONTEVIDEO, Uruguay (AP) - A doctor took office as Uruguay's first socialist president Tuesday, joining the ranks of left-leaning leaders in Latin America - now six in all - governing a majority of the region's people with a cautious approach to U.S.-backed free-market policies. In one of his first official acts, Tabare Vazquez restored full diplomatic ties with communist Cuba, more than two years after a diplomatic row divided the countries. Thousands of Uruguayans - many waving flags and chanting "Ur-u-guay!" - filled Montevideo's...

URUGUAY, once South America’s most prosperous country, plays host to an unlikely gathering of left-wing leaders tomorrow as it prepares to break with 170 years of history and swear in its first socialist President.Tabaré Vázquez, a 65-year-old professor of medicine who was elected last October with 50 per cent of the vote, will be inaugurated as head of the Broad Front coalition, whose biggest component is a party founded by the former Marxist Tupamaro guerrilla movement. The new head of the country’s Senate is José Mújica, a former Tupamaro leader who was held in a deep well for seven years...

MONTEVIDEO, Uruguay (AP) -- One of 16 survivors of a 1972 Andes plane crash made famous by a book and movie has gotten his wallet and jacket back 32 years after leaving them in the mountain snows. Eduardo Strauch, who survived 72 days in high mountain snows, received the aged wallet, drivers license and other personal items Wednesday, a week after they were found in the Andes by a mountain climber. Strauch, now a 57-year-old architect and father of five, was aboard a flight with fellow rugby players, relatives and friends when their plane crashed high in the Andes on...

The U.S. Commitment to Uruguay and Latin America John B. Taylor Under Secretary of Treasury for International Affairs Remarks at Embassy of Uruguay on Receipt of the “Medal of the Oriental Republic of Uruguay” Washington, DC February 14, 2005 Thank you very much for inviting me here today and for this honor. I am pleased to have had the opportunity to work with Ambassador Fernández-Faingold, Minister Alfie, and other members of the Uruguayan government to help Uruguay through the difficult period in 2002. President Batlle and his economic team deserve high marks for their achievements in putting Uruguay back on...

Communism's Resurgence By William F. Jasper The New American, January 24, 2005 Communism is not dead in Latin America. In fact, the dominoes are falling south of the border, but no one seems to be noticing. "It's a new day. Communism is dead. It's even dead in Cuba." So declared Senator Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) at a Senate Commerce Committee hearing in May 2002. "I hate to say it," she continued, "it's dead." The senator's proclamation was a surprise, no doubt, to Fidel Castro, whose regime was (and is) alive and as Red as ever. It also must have come as...

Communism is not dead in Latin America. In fact, the dominoes are falling south of the border, but no one seems to be noticing. “It’s a new day. Communism is dead. It’s even dead in Cuba.” So declared Senator Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) at a Senate Commerce Committee hearing in May 2002. “I hate to say it,” she continued, “it’s dead.” The senator’s proclamation was a surprise, no doubt, to Fidel Castro, whose regime was (and is) alive and as Red as ever. It also must have come as welcome news to the people of Cuba, still suffering, after nearly half...

MONTEVIDEO, Uruguay – Uruguayans elected Tabare Vazquez as the nation's first leftist president, vote tallies showed Monday, breaking a 170-year lock on power by two traditional parties and strengthening Latin America's shift to the left. Sunday's vote highlighted a dramatic change for this longtime U.S. ally. Relations with the United States blossomed under outgoing President Jorge Batlle, a centrist, at a time when leftists took power in Argentina, Brazil, and Venezuela, emphasizing greater distance from Washington on a range of economic, trade and foreign policy issues. Uruguay's vote coincided with elections in three other South Americans that saw wins for...

MONTEVIDEO, Uruguay (Reuters) - The left made more inroads into Latin America in four elections this weekend as crisis-weary voters tired of decades of U.S-backed market reforms warmed to pragmatic platforms of economic growth with better distribution of wealth. Tiny Uruguay became the latest South American nation to elect a leftist leader in a historic shift while the left notched up victories in local elections that could set the tone for future presidential votes in Brazil, Chile and Venezuela. Tabare Vazquez, who will be Uruguay's first leftist leader, won the presidency in his third attempt after toning down some earlier...

Seven U.N. peacekeeping troops from Uruguay who are under investigation for stealing from a church in northeastern Congo will be transferred to the capital, Kinshasa, the United Nations said Thursday. The soldiers could be repatriated to Uruguay for disciplinary action by their national military authorities if the allegations are found to be true by military investigators, U.N. spokesman Fred Eckhard said. A priest informed U.N. military officials in the northeastern town of Bunia that Uruguayan soldiers broke into a Roman Catholic chapel, drank communion wine and stole items used in the celebration of Mass, the deputy commander of U.N. forces...