Rio de Janeiro, Brazil | AFP | Brazil is bubbling over the release of a recording that purports to show President Michel Temer approving payment of hush money to a politician jailed for corruption. In a matter of days, eight lawmakers have called for impeachment proceedings against the president, the …
Read More »World Cup, Olympic stadiums in Brazil corruption scandal
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil | AFP | Brazil was proud of its football World Cup and Olympics stadiums, but the shame of the country’s corruption saga has engulfed even these monuments to fair play. A bribery scandal linked to construction firm Odebrecht that has swept up scores of politicians has …
Read More »Brazil top FIFA rankings for first time since 2010, Uganda moves to 72nd
Zurich, Switzerland | AFP | Brazil surged to the top of the FIFA world rankings for the first time in seven years on Thursday, made all the sweeter as it usurped great rivals Argentina. It caps a terrific week for forward Neymar and Brazil — last week they became …
Read More »‘Ghosts’ drive Brazil’s president from residency
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil | AFP | Brazil’s President Michel Temer blames bad vibes and even ghosts for driving him from his sumptuous official residence in the capital Brasilia, a Brazilian news weekly reported Saturday. Temer surprised Brazilian politics watchers this week with the revelation that he has decamped from the …
Read More »Rio carnival fantasy hides dirty reality
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil | AFP | Rio’s Sambodromo parades are a fantasy of beautiful bodies and dreamlike costumes but the self-declared greatest show on Earth is prepared in a dirty street next to an open sewer. The contrast between what happens inside Rio de Janeiro’s specially built samba stadium …
Read More »Brazil’s economy puts damper on Rio carnival
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil | AFP | The Rio carnival is a celebration of joyful excess but deep recession in Brazil means that samba schools are thinking about their budgets as much as their dance moves. “Here the key word is austerity,” says Luiz Carlos Magalhaes, president of the Portela …
Read More »Brazil Riot: 60 inmates killed, many beheaded
Manaus, Brazil | AFP | Rioting inmates in Brazil decapitated and brutally assaulted their rivals, killing at least 60, when fighting erupted between two gangs at a prison in the Amazon region, officials said Monday. The 17-hour riot broke out Sunday afternoon and lasted through the night at a prison …
Read More »Samba gets new rhythms 100 years after first recording
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil | AFP | Monday nights feel like Saturdays in Rio’s Little Africa neighborhood when the sun sets and the samba starts to play. Surrounded by a mostly young crowd, seven musicians sit around a table with the small four-string guitar called a cavaquinho, the cuica drum …
Read More »Amina Mohammed, two other women named to top UN posts
United Nations, United States | AFP | Incoming UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Thursday announced the appointment of Nigeria’s Environment Minister Amina Mohammed to be the UN’s number two official and tapped two other women for key leadership posts. Guterres has made gender parity a priority of his tenure which …
Read More »Sudamericana title given to Chapecoense plane crash team
Asuncion, Paraguay | AFP | South American football confederation CONMEBOL agreed Monday to award the Copa Sudamericana to Brazilian club Chapecoense, whose team was wiped out in a plane crash while heading to the final. “CONMEBOL awards the title for the 2016 Copa Sudamericana championship to Chapecoense,” including the $2.0 …
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