Brazil will start manufacturing unmanned aircrafts with the help from Israel, thus allowing the South American country to control drug trafficking on its border areas. However, the Brazilian authorities may not sell them neither to Bolivia nor to Venezuela, as instructed by the Israeli government. Miki Bar, a representative of state-run company IAI, which manufactures the unmanned aerial vehicles Vants, said that Tel Aviv authorized the manufacturing and export of the aircrafts to Brazil,...

Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas said Friday that a recent wave of nations recognizing a Palestinian state based upon 1967 borders is pressuring Israel and the U.S. to return to negotiations and reach a peace deal. Abbas, in Brazil to lay the cornerstone of a Palestinian Embassy and attend the inauguration of President-elect Dilma Rousseff, told The Associated Press in an interview that recent recognition of a Palestinian state by several Latin American nations would help push the U.S. and...

The battle for Latin America between pro-Israel and pro- Palestinian factions is set to enter a new phase on Friday when Palestinians hold a cornerstone- laying ceremony for an embassy in the Brazilian capital of Brasilia, the first state-level Palestinian diplomatic mission on the continent. Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas is expected to take part in the event and later attend the swearing-in ceremony of Brazilian President-elect Dilma Rousseff, AFP reported. Members of...

The South American trade bloc Mercosur on Thursday opened talks with Syria and the Palestinian Authority on free trade agreements, an Argentine official, Luis Kreckler, told reporters. The bloc -- comprising Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay -- signed formal agreements on the negotiations with Syrian and Palestinian officials on the sidelines of a Mercosur meeting underway in the southern Brazilian town of Foz de Iguacu. The accords follow the controversial recognition by Brazil and...

Between 1995 and August 2010, 258 journalists were killed - or kidnapped and assumed killed - in Latin America, but only 59 of those cases have been successfully prosecuted. These numbers from the Inter American Press Association (IAPA) back up a new analysis from journalist Tyler Bridges who in his report referred to the “worst wave of violence against journalists ever in Latin America." This is the setting which prompted IAPA to develop the Impunity Project. The $7.6 million...

Brazil's government is investigating a group of about 20 Brazilians who are suspected of having received training and money from Islamic organizations for terrorist activity in the country, Folha de S. Paulo reported without saying how it obtained the information. They traveled to Iran in 2008 sponsored by Hizbollah and Islamic Jihad to learn how to develop political and armed cells, the Sao Paulo newspaper said, without citing the source. The country's federal police opened an inquiry to...

A Reuters photographer sustained a gunshot wound to the shoulder and one of the fugitive murderers of TV Globo reporter Tim Lopes was arrested during a six-day operation by soldiers and elite police units against drug traffickers in the Morro de Alemão complex of favelas in northern Rio de Janeiro that ended on 26 November. The operation against one of the city’s biggest drug trafficking strongholds was aimed at dislodging the headquarters resulting from an alliance between two...

Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos on Wednesday met with Brazilian presidential candidate Dilma Rousseff, who promises to combat guerrillas and drug trafficking on the shared border if elected in October. According to the presidential front-runner, she and Santos "share the idea that border security is crucial. The participation of Brazil in this area must increase," to avoid Colombian organized crime spreading to the neighboring country, she told reporters. Rousseff said...

The editor of the newspaper Correio de Notícias, Afonso Locks, was followed and beaten last week in the city of Cerejeiras (in the state of Rondonia ), by persons linked to ex-Mayor José Eugênio Zigue de Souza, reported Folha de Rondônia, where the journalist also is a correspondent. On July 30, Locks was followed by two vehicles and then beaten in front of a radio station, the article said. According to the site Rondonotícias, among the aggressors was the son...

President Bashar al-Assad on Wednesday held a session of talks with President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva of Brazil on bilateral relations and means to develop them in addition to the latest regional and international developments. The two Presidents underlined the importance of intensifying work by both countries' governments to boost up bilateral relations in all domains, particularly on the economic level to match up with the political relations. They called for encouraging trade and...