The Brazilian economy will experience a robust growth in 2010 and 2011, in the range of 4.5%, while Mexico will recover from deep recession beginning next year with a GDP expansion of 2.7% and 3.9% in 2011, according to the Organization for Economic and Development Cooperation, OECD.

I must confess that almost a decade ago when I moved to New York, I had a very small collection of Brazilian music among my many CDs (a total of about 300 back then). There were a couple of discs by Caetano Veloso, Rita Lee, Lulu Santos, Chico Buarque, a handful of bossa nova classics and little else.

For the first time since January 2008, the Economic Climate Index (ECI) in Latin America, (developed in partnership between the German Ifo Institute and Brazil's Getúlio Vargas Foundation) rose to 5.2 from 4.0 points between July and October 2009, exceeding , the average of the last ten years (5.1 points).

The Brazilian Congress is scheduled to receive the official visit of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, president of the Islamic Republic of Iran, this Monday, November 23. The presidents of the Lower House, Michel Temer and of the Senate, José Sarney, will welcome the Iranian leader at 3:45 pm in the Senate's Noble Hall, in Brazilian capital Brasília.

Mahmoud Abbas, the president of the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) has arrived in Brazil this Wednesday night. He already had dinner with Brazilian president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and starting today should be received by several authorities.

Brazilian women stay slim, while men are getting fatter and fatter. Mal-nutrition and child mortality are falling, but diabetes is on the rise. This is one of the conclusions of a study released this Thursday, November 19, by the Brazilian Health Ministry, portraying the state of the population's physical condition.

The president of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, arrives this weekend in Brazilian capital Brasília accompanied by a group of 300 people, most of them business men. But more than just doing business, the Iranian leader would love to be able to create a new image for himself.

At the request of senator Arthur Virgílio, the leader of the opposition party PSDB (Brazilian Social Democracy) the Brazilian senate is summoning a psychic service to help elucidate what caused the massive blackout last week, which left 18 of Brazil's 26 states in the dark.

The Brazilian government has just taken another measure aimed at containing the appreciation of its currency, unveiling a 1.5% tax on certain trades involving American Depository Receipts, ADR, issued by Brazilian companies. Finance minister Guido Mantega said the tax will be charged when foreign investors convert ADRs for Brazilian companies into receipts for shares issued locally.

By 5 votes to 4 the Brazilian Supreme Court (STF) ruled that former Italian guerrilla Cesare Battisti, condemned in Italy for killing four people, should be extradited to Italy. The president of the Supreme Federal Tribunal, Gilmar Mendes, gave the decisive vote.

The president of Brazil, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva said that Latin America's largest economy not only has left the global crisis behind, but also in the third quarter has expanded at a "Chinese rate", close to 9%.

The governments and businessmen from Brazil and Argentina have to learn that both countries depend on each other and both should be interested in seeing the other side growing because the two sides will profit from this. This was the message from Brazilian president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva talking alongside his Argentinean counterpart in Brasília.

Exporters from Argentina claim they are losing huge sums of money because of Brazilian delays at Customs posts and in extending import licenses. According to them, this is particularly sensitive for fruit and other perishable goods.

Starting next month an unmanned "spy" aircraft will overfly the favelas (shantytowns) of Rio de Janeiro, in southeastern Brazil, at a height of 7.000 meters (23,000 feet), well out of range from the drug gangs and trades that last month shot down a police helicopter killing three men on board. The announcement was made by the Brazilian Federal Police.

Brazil has improved its position in the Transparency International's annual rank of world's most corrupted countries. Brazil went up five points when compared to 2008, which took the country to number 75 among 180 nations instead of 80, last year. The country, however, is still seen as highly corrupt.

Father Andress Tamayo, a priest from El Salvador, has left on November 16 the Brazilian embassy in the Honduran capital, where he was living since September 21st, when he moved in together with  ousted president Manuel Zelaya. Tamayo used to celebrate mass, every Sunday, in the embassy.

Brazilian president's special adviser for International Affairs, Marco Aurélio Garcia, told reporters this Tuesday, November 17, in Brazilian capital Brasília, that the visit of Iran president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to Brazil, scheduled for this coming Monday has been confirmed.

Talking in Rome during a food security conference, Brazilian president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva complained that the leaders of the First World give little attention to world hunger and accused those countries of sabotaging the agriculture of poor nations.

Brazil is not lacking law to guarantee the human rights of all of its citizens. The country has an "impressive" set of laws and policies to promote human rights and improve socioeconomic well-being, indigenous groups and Afro-Brazilians face serious discrimination, injustice and violence, warned the United Nations human rights chief.

On Friday, October 30, U.S. and Colombian officials signed the controversial Defense Cooperation Agreement (DCA), granting the U.S. armed forces access to seven Colombian military bases for the next ten years. The deal has been the subject of anxious speculation and heated debate since talks were first confirmed over the summer, as many policymakers throughout the hemisphere are now grappling with the reality of a heightened U.S. military presence in South America.