Americas

Ecuador's foreign minister Ricardo Patino addresses the current situation and perspectives for the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) and the progress of Ecuador’s Citizens’ Revolution in a special interview regarding the criminal behavior of American companies Chevron and Texaco in the Amazon region.

President Barack Obama nominated Janet Yellen as new Fed chief. The writer, a money and metals commentator, briefly gives what Yellen can expect to face -- a pithy, questioning reminder of whether U.S. central bankers provide us with any value at all.

Ben S. Bernanke, the world’s most- powerful central banker, says he doesn’t understand gold prices. If his peers had paid attention, they might have stopped expanding reserves that lost $545 billion in value since bullion peaked in 2011.

The CIA is expanding a covert effort to train opposition militant groups active in Syria amid concern that "moderate, U.S.-backed militias are rapidly losing ground in the country’s civil war, U.S. officials say.

The US National Security Agency (NSA) vast data storage facility in Utah suffers delaying its opening due to widespread technical failures, including 10 “meltdowns” within the past 13 months according to a report.

Why is the world’s biggest seed company, Monsanto, investing nearly $1 billion on a Big Data Weather Analytics startup?

Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro announced the expulsion on Monday night of three diplomats from the United States Embassy in Caracas for their involvement in acts of conspiracy against national security in conjunction with members of opposition political parties.

The White House budget director has ordered federal agencies to begin closing down after Congress failed to pass a budget to avert a government shutdown at midnight Monday to deal with the budget spending bill. The move will have an impact on the daily lives of Americans, jeopardizing the paycheques of more than 800,000 Americans, as well as the country’s economic recovery.

Qwest is the only one major American telecommunications company that refused to participate in a legally dubious NSA surveillance program in 2001. The refusal was not taken lightly. A few years later, its CEO was indicted by federal prosecutors, was convicted, and served four and a half years. He was released this month. To this day, Joseph Nacchio insists that his prosecution was retaliation for refusing to break the law on the NSA's behalf and feels vindicated by Edward Snowden leaks.

In another blatant disregard to international law, other nations' sovereignty, world leaders and anyone with diplomatic privileges, US denied President Nicolas Maduro's aircraft, which was en route to China for bilateral talks, to travel over Puerto Rico’s airspace, a US territory, and was forced to find an alternate path.

U.S. Senator John McCain, the chief cheerleader for military attack on Syria and any kind of warmongering, accused Vladimir Putin of allying himself with "tyrants" and "ruling through violence and repression", in a retort to the Russian President's editorial.

Why the political elite world is laughing at USA and Obama needed rescuing from total embarrassment: John Kerry's and John McCain's source and go-to "Syria policy expert", "Dr." Elizabeth O’Bagy, who worked at Institute for the Study of War (ISW), an influential neoconservative-aligned think tank, is a FAKE. Her PhD was fabricated, yet the "pundit" made regular appearances on Fox News and being published in Foreign Policy, The Atlantic, and well, The Wall Street Journal and had become known as a go-to expert on the Syrian rebels among foreign policy experts. Here's the inside story.