AP - An electoral official accused President Hugo Chavez and his allies of breaking campaign laws by using state-run media to berate rivals and praise friends ahead of this month's legislative elections.

Reuters - At least 25 suspected drug gang members were killed in an army raid in rural northeastern Mexico on Thursday, the army said in a press release.

Reuters - Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez defended his socialist government's security record on Thursday, rejecting pre-election claims by the opposition that crime had risen sharply during his 11 years in power.

AFP - A clash between soldiers and gang members near Mexico's northern city of Monterrey left 25 dead, local media reported Thursday.

AP - One of two known survivors of a drug gang's massacre in northern Mexico of 72 undocumented Central and South American migrants urged others in an interview broadcast Thursday not to attempt the journey to the United States.

AFP - The 33 Chilean miners trapped underground longer than anyone on record will soon be able to see and talk to loved ones through a video link, Health Minister Jaime Manalich said Thursday.

AFP - Mexican President Felipe Calderon admitted drug violence was worsening in Mexico but said the cartels had been weakened by the toppling of several major drug bosses, in his annual address Thursday.

Reuters - Hermelindo Maquin set out from his home in the Guatemalan countryside in early August, leaving behind his small farm and pregnant wife as he began the long, perilous journey to the United States.

AFP - The morale of 33 miners trapped in Chile soared after music and hot meals were supplied, while NASA advisers praised their "courage" and provided advice on daylight deprivation, as a rescue drill inched closer.

AFP - A captured Mexican drug kingpin admitted to "investments" in Colombia and said he had received trailers full of dollars from the United States, in a first interrogation video released here.

Eight teens that recently went on the 3rd annual Duttenhaver Animal Conservation Field Study program presented by the Greater Los Angeles Zoo Association will have no trouble writing something interesting for their "How I spent my summer vacation" essays.

Honduras has called Ecuador President Rafael Correa "irresponsible" for revealing that a second person survived a massacre in Mexico last month.

Relatives of the miners trapped underground in a copper and gold mine gather around a screen that shows miners inside the mine at Copiapo, some 725 km north of Santiago, August 26, 2010.

Brazilian police have arrested almost the entire local council in the southern city of Dourados, leaving an unprecedented power vacuum.

In this book cover image released by Palgrave Macmillan, "Brazil on the Rise" by Larry Rohter is shown.

An 11-year-old girl injured when a jetliner carrying 131 people crashed on Colombia's San Andres Island last month has died, raising the accident's death toll to two.

"The people here have the best legs in Chile," a local tells me as we climb up a cobbled side street in Valparaiso.

Enjoy Casino & Resort is the leading company in Chile's gaming and entertainment industry, with five modern and distinctly different resorts in all the major tourist destinations in the country.

With exquisite timing, seismologists warned last year that "the ConcepciA3n-ConstituciA3n area of south central Chile is very likely a mature seismic gap". In layman's terms, it was ripe for an earthquake.

An Israeli-Arab lawmaker said Tuesday she told U.N. investigators probing Israel's deadly raid on an aid flotilla bound for the Gaza Strip that its commandos were on a mission to kill.

In Portuguese, the sign reads "mango juice." Unfortunately, the word "manga" is also Portuguese for "sleeve." I haven't been invited to give many graduation speeches since becoming the Frugal Traveler, and I think I know why.

Just six months ago, one of the largest earthquakes in a century tore Chile apart, physically ripping the ground, triggering a deadly tsunami and leaving in the wreckage a divided society and government trying to decide whom to blame.

A former Argentine navy lieutenant wanted for prosecution in his homeland for his alleged role in a 1972 massacre of leftist guerrillas has committed no crime and should not be sent back, his attorney told a U.S. judge Tuesday.

Agricultural equipment makers and customers worldwide gathered in Orlando in January to meet, greet, sell and buy at the trade show AG Connect Expo.

What does the current murder rate and motives tell about living in Guyana? A country's murder rate is an infallible indicator of the value that its people place on human life.