Latin America

Venezuelan VP, Nicolás Maduro revealed over the weekend that President Hugo Chavez, met members of his government team for five and a half hours, and gave his orders in writing, reported PULSAR news.

Despite being the Arab world’s most populous country, Egypt had never previously hosted the Islamic Summit. And the conference was given further historic resonance thanks to the attendance of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran.

Welcome to this Week in Palestine, a service of the International Middle East Media Center, www.imemc.org, for February 16th to 22nd 2013.

Wall Street Journal journalist Jess Bravin reports on the controversial military commissions at Guantánamo. Describing it as “the most important legal story in decades,” Bravin uncovers how the Bush administration quickly drew up an alternative legal system to try men captured abroad after the Sept. 11 attacks.

Democracy Now! correspondent Sharif Abdel Kouddous joins us to discuss his recent trip to Bahrain, where the Sunni monarchy continues its crackdown on a two-year-old uprising. Since February 2011, at least 87 people have died at the hands of U.S.-backed forces.

An international scandal is growing after an Australian-Israeli man with ties to Israel’s spy agency, the Mossad, died inside a maximum security prison in Israel. For more than two years, the Israeli government imposed a strict gag order on his 2010 death, but now the secret is leaking out.

Linor Abargil, an Israeli national, was crowned Miss World in 1998 just two months after she was abducted and raped in Italy. After winning the title, Abargil would go to become a global advocate in the fight against sexual violence.

Protesters from across the United States and Canada urged President Obama to reject the proposed Keystone XL tar sands pipeline, which would deliver tar sands oil from Alberta to refineries along the Gulf Coast.

Rafael Correa won reelection in Ecuador with 56.5% of the vote on Sunday, reported Publico.es on Monday with 95% of the ballots tabulated. Correa appeared before thousands of cheering Ecuadorians on Sunday evening in Quito’s Independence Plaza saying: “I’m not going to disappoint you” and “nobody or nothing will stop this revolution.”