PORT-AU-PRINCE — The United States, France, Canada and governments across Latin America were gearing up to help Haiti, after a massive 7.0 earthquake leveled buildings and caused an unknown number of casualties.
US President Barack Obama said his government stood “ready to assist the people of Haiti,” as the State Department, USAID and United States Southern Command mobilized, the White House said, “to coordinate an assessment and any such assistance.”
In Paris, Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said France “expresses its complete solidarity” with Haiti, adding that his ministry’s crisis center had begun working “to mobilize and dispatch without delay urgent aid to Port-au-Prince.” Read the full story
* Brazil says hunger a “weapon of mass destruction”
* Summit declaration dilutes hunger and farm aid targets
* Berlusconi the only G8 leader attending
By Silvia Aloisi and Daniel Flynn
ROME, Nov 16 (Reuters) – The United Nations said on Monday that agreeing a climate change deal in Copenhagen next month is crucial to fighting global hunger, which Brazil’s president described as “the most devastating weapon of mass destruction”.
Government leaders and officials met in Rome for a three-day U.N. summit on how to help developing countries feed themselves, but anti-poverty campaigners and even some participants were already writing off the event as a missed opportunity. Read the full story
Though journalists, international affairs professionals, travel lovers, and international businessmen are already well aware that Brazil is the country to watch, there are still many gringos who aren’t tuned in to Brazil’s ascent or don’t quite understand the country’s importance. This list is for those gringos.
10. Rio de Janeiro, Brazil’s cultural capital (but not the national capital – that’s Brasília) is an excellent urban case study when learning about the developing world. It shares certain characteristics with other developing cities that provides many important lessons and a useful perspective on urban conflicts, like inequality, violent crime, and drug trafficking, as well as positive changes like a growing middle class, increased purchasing power of the average consumer and social movements. Read the full story
US plans to increase the number of troops in Colombia is drawing opposition, not just from left-wing populist leaders in the region but also from moderate governments like Brazil’s Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva prompting Colombian President Alvaro Uribe to tour the region to try to ease concerns.
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