Colombia has sent a copy of a video, in which a leftist rebel says the guerrillas supported the presidential campaign of Ecuadorean leader Rafael Correa, to the OAS and Interpol, the government said on Sunday. Correa says the video is a setup and has denied receiving any funds from the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC. Friday's release of the video, in which a top rebel chief says the FARC gave money to Correa's campaign, has heightened tensions between the the Andean...

Amnesty International has urged the Haitian authorities to investigate alleged human rights violations committed by former president Jean-Claude Duvalier, also known as 'Baby Doc', after he was detained in Port-Au-Prince. Jean-Claude Duvalier, who has been accused of presiding over numerous human rights violations during his rule from 1971 to 1986, was detained after being questioned by police on Tuesday 18 January. It is not yet clear what charges he will face. “This landmark...

The government should regard two grenade attacks this week on news media in northern Mexico - one against Televisa in Piedras Negras and one against a local newspaper in Monterrey - as a serious warning and should speed implementation of a federal-level convention on the protection of journalists that was signed in November. There were a total of seven direct armed attacks on news media in 2010 alone, compared with 18 over the last five years, according to the National Human Rights Commission...

The Spanish Civil Guard confirmed that Iraitz Gesalaga Fernández, aka 'Tximas', visited Venezuela between September 11 and October 11, 2008 to establish, among other things, secure channels between ETA and the members of the armed Basque separatist movement in the South American country, as reported by Spanish newspaper El Mundo. The alleged computer expert of the Basque terrorist group ETA met in Caracas with Arturo Cubillas, the head of security at the National Lands Institute, an...

San José- The country is bolstering defenses close to its border, where it’s locked in a dispute with neighboring Nicaragua, Costa Rican Security Minister José María Tijerino said. Tijerino said security forces have established several landing areas for helicopters close to Calero Island in the delta of the San Juan River, which is at the heart of the dispute. Costa Rica does not have military. Nicaraguan military personnel were deployed to the island last year,...

A poet who led protests against the unsolved killings of women in the violent border city of Ciudad Juarez has herself become the victim of a bizarre slaying, her body found strangled and her left hand severed after a night of partying with three teens. The body of Susana Chavez, 36, was left last week in the center of the city but was not identified until Tuesday, authorities said Wednesday. Her head was covered with a bag, and the cause of death was strangulation. Three suspects, all 17,...

Itxaso Urtiaga, the girlfriend of alleged ETA’s computer expert Iraitz Guesalaga, was arrested on Tuesday in Zarautz because of her links to Basque separatist group ETA (Photo: Efe) A day after ETA, the armed Basque separatist movement, announced a new ceasefire, the French and Spanish security forces detained the alleged "computer brain" of the Basque armed group, who is suspected of training members of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) in Venezuela. ...

US Senator and former presidential candidate John McCain (R-AZ) said that Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez is "undemocratic" because he requested a new enabling law that allows him to pass laws by decree without the approval of the National Assembly. "His latest recent move to obtain powers to rule by decree is certainly undemocratic," the Republican Senator said when asked whether he believed that "Venezuela is becoming a dictatorship," according to...

Extraordinary ruling powers granted to Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez by a lame duck National Assembly are "an anti-democratic measure" that violates the Inter-American Democratic Charter of the Organization of American States (OAS), said Arturo Valenzuela, the US Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs. United States is willing to have a "candid dialogue" with Venezuela. Therefore, Washington "regrets" that the Venezuelan...

A group of members of the US House of Representatives addressed a letter to Rafael Ramírez, CEO of state-run company Petróleos de Venezuela, S.A. (Pdvsa), expressing their "concern" regarding reports that Pdvsa "is continuing to do business with Iran that is subject to sanctions under the provisions" of two US laws. In a letter signed by five House members dated September 24, 2010 they encouraged Ramírez "to provide a written report" that...