Venezuela
.jpeg){kind=spacer}
US and Venezuela strike kills Tren de Aragua chief in joint operation
The US military has killed Héctor Rusthenford Guerrero Flores, the leader of the Tren de Aragua criminal gang, in a co-ordinated military operation conducted with Venezuelan forces in the south-eastern state of Bolívar, President Trump revealed.
_Cropped.jpg){kind=spacer}
El Salvador's Bukele tops regional approval rankings for June
El Salvador's Nayib Bukele remains the most popular president in Latin America, with a 69.1% approval rating, according to the June ranking published last week by pollster CB Global Data, which surveyed between 1,988 and 2,674 people in each country.
Maduro taps P Diddy's acquittal lawyer as Venezuela drug trial looms
Ousted Venezuelan strongman Nicolás Maduro has recruited a lawyer from Sean "Diddy" Combs' defence team as he fights US drug charges from a Brooklyn jail cell.
Venezuela's Rodríguez visits India to seal Caracas's oil comeback
Behind Delcy Rodríguez's New Delhi visit lies a bigger story: how Venezuela's resurgent oil exports fit into Washington's strategy to wean India off Russian crude.
.jpeg){kind=spacer}
Washington turns Venezuela playbook on Cuba, but finds a harder nut to crack
Indictment, warships, a poisoned chalice of aid: the Trump administration turned every screw on Cuba in a single day. But Cuba is no Venezuela — and Washington may be about to find that out the hard way.
Venezuela unveils draft oil rules to guide foreign investment push, economy expands
Venezuela has begun circulating draft regulations linked to its newly approved hydrocarbons law.
Spain widens Zapatero graft probe to implicate Venezuela's acting president in oil scheme
Spain's National Court has widened a corruption investigation to implicate Venezuela's acting president Delcy Rodríguez as a central figure in an alleged international network that used political influence to facilitate Venezuelan oil sales.
.jpeg){kind=spacer}
Venezuela hands Maduro's financier to US in show of loyalty to Trump
Venezuela's interim government has deported Alex Saab, the Colombia-born businessman who served as a close financial associate of ousted president Nicolás Maduro, to the United States.
_1_1778842237.jpg)
Did Trump just sell the world in Beijing?
Trump's two-day Beijing summit was sold as stabilisation. From Riyadh to Warsaw and from Caracas to Astana, it has been read as something else: the spectacle of Washington and Beijing dividing up the world without the consent of those affected by it.
Venezuela launches debt restructuring in bid to end decade of default
Venezuela's interim government has announced it will begin a formal restructuring of the country's external public debt, including obligations tied to state oil company PDVSA, in what could rank among the largest sovereign debt workouts in history.
Latin America's democracies face silent erosion from within, UN warns
Latin America and the Caribbean's political systems are experiencing a gradual institutional decay that rarely manifests as outright democratic collapse but instead hollows out governance from within, the UNDP has warned in a new report.
Income share of world’s richest 10% vs 0.1% in Latam - OWID
One way to measure income inequality is to look at the share of all income that goes to the top income earners. The chart plots this for all seven South American countries with comparable 2022 pre-tax income estimates.
_1777385484.jpeg){kind=spacer}
ECLAC cuts Latin America growth forecast as Middle East war fans inflation
ECLAC trims Latin America's 2026 growth forecast to 2.2%, warning that soaring oil prices, tighter credit and slowing global trade are locking the region into a fourth consecutive year of sluggish expansion.
Latin America's unfinished battle with inflation leaves the region exposed to the Iran shock
The Middle East conflict has landed on Latin America at an awkward moment. After two years of gradual progress bringing inflation under control, the region's central banks now face the prospect of that effort being undone by an external conflict.
Venezuela presses IMF to unfreeze $5bn in assets as Chavista ranks show strain
Venezuela's Chavista government, which spent decades demonising the IMF, is now pressing it to unfreeze $5bn in assets. The ideological U-turn is straining revolutionary ranks.
Latin America oils up as Hormuz crisis reshapes global energy supply
From Vaca Muerta to the Orinoco, Latin America is sitting on the world's most coveted untapped crude. The Iran war may finally force it to act.
IMF raises Latin America growth forecast but warns of uneven impact from Middle East war
The IMF raised its 2026 growth forecast for Latin America and the Caribbean by a tenth of a percentage point to 2.3%, while cautioning that the economic consequences of the war in the Middle East will most impact the region's smaller economies.
Venezuelan opposition calls for elections citing "absolute absence" of Maduro
Venezuela's opposition moved on April 10 to force the question of presidential elections, arguing that the constitutional window for addressing the power vacuum left by the removal of Nicolás Maduro has now closed, and that a vote must follow soon.
Latin America growth slips as weak investment persists, World Bank says
The World Bank has cut its 2026 growth forecast for Latin America and the Caribbean to 2.1%, down from 2.4% recorded last year, warning that the region faces a toxic combination of weak investment, tight fiscal space, and productivity deficits.
Jurong Island’s output cut triggers $1.64 petrol spike in Australia
Singapore’s reclaimed oil refining region, the 32-square-kilometre Jurong Island, has become the primary driver of record-high petrol prices in Australia as Middle East supply shocks ripple through the Asia-Pacific energy corridor.