Americas | GlobalPost

Welcome to Ciudad Mariche

Charlie DevereuxApril 7, 2010 20:51Updated May 30, 2010 13:28

Opinion: Haiti stands alone

Joel BrinkleyApril 10, 2010 12:18Updated May 30, 2010 13:28

Heavy rains flooded Rio de Janeiro state last night and into today, causing an ever-growing number of deaths and injuries and paralyzing the city. The current death toll is 95, according to Globo’s G1 news site, which has been posting photos and videos of the flooding.

Worldview: My old man

Paul SalopekApril 7, 2010 07:34Updated May 30, 2010 13:28

CIUDAD JUAREZ, Mexico — Five thousand people have been murdered in this dying border city since 2008. The local newspaper, El Diario de Juarez, published this bleak statistic last week. The news coincides with reports that several U.S. border states are clamoring for more troops to cordon off Mexico’s unprecedented drug violence. Only the violence isn’t unprecedented. Nor is the deep American denial as to its origins.

Venezuela's socialist cities

Charlie DevereuxApril 8, 2010 06:24Updated May 30, 2010 13:28

CARACAS, Venezuela — Just last year Sudeibi Salazar lived with her husband and son in a rat-infested shack. Today her home is a three-bedroom apartment in a gleaming white block a few miles up the road. "When it rained everything got wet and the rats came in," she said describing her former home. "This is a total change."

Chile is accused of violating a lesbian judge's rights

Pascale BonnefoyApril 6, 2010 11:53

The Inter American Human Rights Commission ruled that Chile violated the rights of a judge who lost custody of her children solely because she was a lesbian. In its final report — issued late December but revealed only Monday — the OAS Commission recommends the State of Chile to fully compensate magistrate Karen Atala for having “violated her right to live free from discrimination.” Atala filed the case at the Commission in November 2004 after the Chilean Supreme Court revoked her custody over her three daughters because she was gay.

In the land of cocaine and cartels, two math professors could change the equation

John OtisApril 5, 2010 12:46

BOGOTA, Colombia — In the land of cocaine cartels and kidnappings, why are two mathematics professors dominating the headlines? It turns out that a political alliance between the two profs — former Bogota mayor Antanas Mockus and former Medellin mayor Sergio Fajardo — could change Colombia’s electoral equation.

Update on "Brazil: Public Accusations of Corruption"

Seth KugelApril 2, 2010 17:45

The following is an update to the story originally published on Dec. 18, 2009. On Jan. 12, 2010, Henrique Flory and Ronaldo Bianchi arrived at a settlement to Bianchi’s lawsuit against Flory for defamation in a letter he had written to Joao Sayad, the Sao Paulo State Secretary of Culture and Bianchi's boss.

Five Frames: Best photos of the week

News DeskApril 3, 2010 09:42Updated May 30, 2010 13:27

BOSTON — From GlobalPost's editors, a selection of the best pictures of the week. Penitents prepare their costumes before a procession during Holy Week in Bilbao, March 29, 2010. In Ireland, for the first time in nearly a century, bars in Limereck were allowed to serve alcohol on Good Friday. (Vincent West/Reuters)

Remains of Easter

John OtisApril 2, 2010 13:13

BOGOTA, Colombia — Easter Week is the holiest — and quietest — time of year in Latin America. People hole up in churches or evacuate the cities to stake their sandy claims on crowded beaches. The end result for on-duty journalists is a news vacuum. But this week, Colombian reporters have been scrambling. Courtesy of the FARC guerrillas, the nation has been treated to a macabre spectacle on live television in which the rebels handed over two live hostages and one dead one.