Latin America

The Haitian government, humanitarian agencies and the Mission of the UN Stabilization in Haiti (MINUSTAH) put in place a contingency plan for dealing with Hurricane Tomas, which is close to the island and may affect up half million people.

With conservatives likely to be the biggest winners in Tuesday’s U.S. congressional elections, efforts to achieve a more compassionate national immigration policy may be one of the biggest losers.

“It’s painful to build an altar of offerings to your dead child,” Abraham Fraijo, one of the leading activists in a citizens’ movement against violence and impunity in Mexico, wrote in his Twitter account while taking part in a series of protests during the celebrations of the Day of the Dead.

Dilma Rousseff is the sixth woman in Latin America to reach the presidency. Argentina and Costa Rica are currently governed by women — Cristina Fernández and Laura Chinchilla — and Michelle Bachelet completed her term in March in Chile.

In Brazil, 136 million voters will head to the polls in Sunday’s presidential runoff election, after a campaign heavy on recriminations and moralistic attacks and weak on substantive issues.

When China’s new ambassador to Bulgaria assumed his post in mid-September he made headlines reminding the nation of a fact that may have been intentionally neglected by Bulgarian governments in the post-communist years of reform.

In the run-up to the U.S. elections set to take place Nov. 2, the amount of money being spent and eccentricities on display have reached record levels. This has been particularly obvious in debates over energy and climate change.

The death of former Argentine President Nestor Kirchner (2003-2007) Wednesday brought to an end the political partnership he formed with his wife, President Cristina Fernández. Now all eyes are on her.

Every vote counts for the two candidates competing for the presidency of Brazil in next Sunday’s runoff, and the governing Workers’ Party (PT) is galvanizing its electoral base into active campaigning, after the complacency instilled by eight years in power.