On August 11, 2014 Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto signed into law new rules governing the historic reordering of Mexico’s state-owned oil, gas and electricity sectors, opening them to levels of participation by foreign and private companies not seen since the 1930s.  In 1938 President Lázaro Cárdenas nationalized the Mexican oil industry, taking over from

The July 30, 2014 deadline for Argentina and its hold-out “vulture” creditors to come to an agreement and comply with the order of U.S. Federal Judge Thomas Griesa came and went.  In the lead up to the deadline Argentina remained defiant.  Argentine Cabinet Chief Jorge Capitanich stayed on message and insisted that the vulture funds

The tens of thousands of children showing up on the United States/Mexico border have generated plenty of interest in the Latin American media.  News outlets there have noted U.S. reactions, over reactions, and lack of reaction, the question of “security,” President Obama’s trip to Texas, and the political implications of the crisis.  They have explored

In mid June the U.S. Supreme Court declined to consider Argentina’s appeal of the ruling by U.S. Federal Judge Thomas Griesa of the Southern District of New York that it must pay holdouts to the restructuring deals it reached with creditors in 2005 and 2010.  The problem looming over the conflict is that if Argentina

The forty-fourth regular session of the General Assembly of the Organization of American States was held in Asunción, Paraguay from June 3 to June 5, 2014.  The theme proposed by the Paraguayan Foreign Ministry for general debate was “Development and Social Inclusion.”  Member states had various things to say about democracy, economic growth, inequality, and

In the months before the first round of Colombia’s presidential elections, incumbent Juan Manuel Santos of the Partido de “la U,” seemed headed for an easy victory, since his first term had benefited from steady economic growth, and he personally had gained popularity for initiating serious peace negotiations with the FARC guerrillas that have the

Demonstrations continued in Venezuela in early May 2014, as the government of President Nicolás Maduro moved to dismantle protest camps created by students.  His government also started to come under more international criticism of its handling of the crisis.  While Maduro contends that opposition forces want to destabilize the country, human rights groups, the United

The death of Gabriel García Márquez was a major seismic event that generated a tsunami of coverage in the Latin American media.  It focused the attention of the entire region, and was the top story in every major paper in Spanish-speaking Latin America (and Spain, as well).  Stories about Gabo will likely continue to pour

Though the real troubles had started in 1960, a process began on March 31, 1964 that led to the overthrow of President João Goulart by the Brazilian military (with the backing of the United States) on April 1, 1964.  The coup put an end to the government of Goulart, also known as Jango, because the

Gustavo Petro, former M-19 guerrilla, senator, and mayor of Bogotá was finally removed from power on March 19, 2014.  Petro was dismissed from his post by Attorney General Alejandro Ordóñez (also called the inspector general) in December 2013 over fallout from a botched attempt to overhaul the management of the city’s trash collection services, but