BOGOTÁ, Colombia – Colombia's President Juan Manuel Santos made plans to fly to a border city Saturday amid soaring tensions with Venezuela that have triggered an exodus of Colombian residents.
By now Venezuelans have grown accustomed to President Nicolás Maduro's penchant for pinning his country's economic crisis on a gamut of devils, from native capitalist speculators to Yanqui meddlers. But by sending troops to round up and deport Colombian nationals, toppling homes and separating families in the process, he may have outdone himself.
Venezuela had 68 percent of its international reserves in bullion as of August, according to the World Gold Council. That's a big worry because the price of the precious metal has tumbled 15 percent from this year's high in January as the global slump in commodities deepened.
Latin America has been plagued by corruption for centuries, ever since it emerged from what the Mexican poet Octavio Paz called the “patrimonialist” nature of Spanish and Portuguese colonial rule. What is different today is the response to it, with societies and institutions refusing to remain complicit in corruption, or resigning themselves to its inevitability.
During a moment of peak tensions between Colombia and Venezuela, Vladimir Putin told the late Hugo Chávez to count on his support if war broke out, according to a new biography of José Mujica, the popular ex-Uruguayan president who was close to his Venezuelan counterpart.
CARACAS, Venezuela – Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro lashed out Thursday at U.S. billionaire and presidential candidate Donald Trump for saying Mexican immigrants were bringing crime and drugs to the United States.
The stunning collapse of Venezuela's bolivar in black market trading this month -- it fell to as low as 423 bolivars per dollar from 279 at the start of the month -- has left Venezuelans scratching their heads, with many wondering why it has sunk below the value of gold and hard currency the central bank has to back it.
With oil prices slumping, the final straw for many Colombians was Maduro's ban on remittances last year in an attempt to save scarce foreign reserves and stave off default.
It’s surprising how much of the international community has remained silent about recent political imprisonments in Venezuela. No commitment to democracy is meaningful if political imprisonment is tolerated anywhere. In the case of Costa Rica, the silence is shameful.
MIAMI – Several Venezuelan newspapers are at risk of imminent closure, the Inter-American Press Association warned Thursday, accusing leftist President Nicolás Maduro of impeding access to newsprint and discriminating against publications critical of his government.
