Ecuador striker Christian Benitez has died suddenly in Qatar at the age of 27, his agent Jose Chamorro said Monday. …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox World News
Ecuador striker dies suddenly in Qatar – agent
Tag Archives: Ecuador
Stiffening the backbone of DNA nanofibers
An international collaboration including researchers from the NIST Center for Nanoscale Science and Technology and the Universidad San Francisco de Quito, Ecuador have fabricated a self-assembled nanofiber from a DNA building block that contains both duplex (two-stranded) and quadruplex (four-stranded) DNA. This work is a first step toward the creation of new structurally heterogeneous (quadruplex/duplex), yet controllable, DNA-based materials exhibiting novel properties suitable for bottom-to-top self-assembly for nanofabrication, including self-organization of both inorganic materials (nanoparticles) and molecular electronics components. …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Phys.org
Snowden affair dampens US-Latin American ties
America is pivoting to Asia and focused on the Mideast. Yet the region Secretary of State John Kerry once called the U.S. “backyard” is sprouting angry weeds fed by the scandal involving intelligence leaker Edward Snowden.
Venezuela, Bolivia and Nicaragua have already said they’d be willing to grant asylum for Snowden, who is wanted on espionage charges for revealing the scope of National Security Agency surveillance programs that spy on Americans and foreigners. Ecuador has said it would consider any request from him.
U.S. relations with these countries were already testy. But the Snowden affair also has dampened the Obama administration’s effort to improve ties with friendlier nations in the region like Mexico and Brazil.
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox US News
Ecuador to launch first homemade satellite
Plaintiffs' Expert Disavows Evidence In Chevron Ecuador Case, Says Process `Fatally Tainted'
By Daniel Fisher, Forbes Staff
Attorney Steven Donziger’s long quest to wring a settlement from Chevron over oil pollution in the Ecuadorean jungle suffered a potentially fatal blow today after the environmental consultant he relied upon to obtain a $19 billion verdict there disavowed its work, saying the process was “fatally tainted.”
How the Dow's Energy Stocks Have Fared in 2013
By Dan Caplinger, The Motley Fool
Filed under: Investing
If you only expect to see traditional industrial companies in the Dow Jones Industrial Average , then you’re way behind the times. The Dow now includes companies from nearly every sector of the market.
Energy stocks don’t make up a huge portion of the Dow, with only two traditional integrated oil and gas companies in the average. But given their size, those stocks have a big impact on the Dow. Let’s take a look at how these companies have fared so far in 2013 and what their prospects are for the rest of the year and beyond.
Dow Energy Stocks Total Return Price data by YCharts.
It’s no mistake that I’ve included General Electric on this list. Despite the extensive reach that the conglomerate has across many industries, GE has focused heavily on energy as part of its core strategy for boosting its growth. Just yesterday, GE reaffirmed its commitment to energy by making a buyout bid for Lufkin Industries , boosting its presence in the oil services sector and building more capacity as it grows into an energy infrastructure giant. GE‘s exposure to the booming energy sector is a big part of how it has been able to recover so strongly from its financial-crisis depths.
For Chevron and ExxonMobil , on the other hand, production and pricing have been ongoing obstacles to growth. Given their size, it’s incredibly difficult for these oil supermajors to find enough new energy-producing assets to make up for the natural rate of decline in any given well’s production levels. Yet although Exxon is projecting just 2% to 3% annual growth in production over the next four years, Chevron hopes for better results, with its plan to raise its production by a million barrels per day representing growth of between 9% and 10% annually.
Meanwhile, the energy boom has once more heightened environmental concerns over oil and gas production and transportation. Exxon’s recent Arkansas spill from a crude-oil pipeline break and Chevron’s ongoing multibillion-dollar environmental lawsuit in Ecuador highlight the importance of responsible development in avoiding costly damages and a bad reputation.
To start performing to their full potential, energy stocks need the support of stronger overall economic growth. Once the global economy starts firing on all cylinders, demand for oil and gas should start supporting prices and creating more profit for Exxon and Chevron. Meanwhile, so long as companies are looking for energy, GE stands poised to help them find it — and take its fair share of the profits in the bargain.
The financial crisis dealt GE a blow, but management took advantage of the market‘s dip to make strategic bets in energy. To help you understand the full implications of that decision, we’re offering comprehensive coverage for investors in a premium report on General Electric, in which our industrials analyst breaks down GE‘s multiple businesses. You’ll find reasons to buy or sell GE today. To …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at DailyFinance
Ultrasonic sounds of the rainforest
Research aimed at developing ultrasonic microphones with insect-like sensitivity is to continue in the rainforests of Colombia and Ecuador. …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Phys.org
Deaths reported in Ecuador jungle attack
The director of a foundation that works in Ecuador‘s rainforest says Amazon tribesmen apparently carried out a revenge attack and killed an undetermined number of people from a rival indigenous group that lives in voluntary isolation.
Foundation director Milagros Aguirre says Huaorani war party attacked a settlement of Taromenane, likely over the weekend. She says an unknown number of people were killed and at least two children were carried off in retaliation for the March 5 spearing deaths of a Huaorani couple.
It is common for the region’s tribes to kidnap foes’ offspring as war trophies.
An Ecuadorean Justice Ministry official said Wednesday the Huaorani involved had refused to receive a government delegation trying to investigate the attack in the Pompeya region, about 120 miles east of Quito.
Ecuador to China Oil Barons: Amazon Rainforest for Sale
By Evann Gastaldo 
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Newser – Home
Peru declares Amazon oil contamination emergency
Peru‘s government has declared an environmental state of emergency in an Amazon jungle region due to years of contamination from oil drilling it blames on Pluspetrol, the country’s biggest oil and natural gas producer.
Environment Minister Manuel Pulgar-Vidal deemed inadequate Argentine-owned Pluspetrol’s cleanup of oil spills in the Pastaza river region bordering Ecuador.
Local indigenous groups have been complaining for years about the contamination and the government‘s failure to address it.
Pulgar-Vidal said Pluspetrol would be obliged to clean up contaminated jungle. He did not describe the extent of the contamination.
The government announced the 90-day emergency on Monday, a week after a congressional commission toured the region.
Pluspetrol has been operating there since 2001. Previously, Occidental Petroleum operated there.
Pluspetrol did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Syria's Assad vows to cleanse nation of extremists
President Bashar Assad vowed Friday to “wipe out” Muslim extremists in Syria, blaming them for a suicide bombing at a mosque that killed dozens of people, including a top cleric who supported the embattled regime in the civil war.
The death toll from Thursday night’s bombing — the first suicide attack on a mosque in two years of violence in Syria — rose to 49 after seven of the wounded died overnight, the Health Ministry said.
Sheik Mohammad Said Ramadan al-Buti, a top Sunni preacher, was killed as he was giving a sermon in the mosque in the heart of the capital, Damascus. The blast, which also wounded nearly 80 other people, was one of the most brazen assassinations of the civil war, which has seen a number of suicide bombings blamed on Islamic extremists.
Al-Buti, 84, was the most senior religious figure killed in the civil war, and his slaying was a major blow to the president.
The preacher supported the regime since the early days of Assad’s father and predecessor, the late President Hafez Assad, providing a Sunni cover and legitimacy to their rule. Sunnis are the majority sect in Syria while Assad is from the minority Alawite sect — an offshoot of Shiite Islam. Al-Buti’s grandson was among the dead.
In a statement on Syria‘s state-run SANA news agency, Assad said al-Buti represented true Islam in facing “the forces of darkness and extremist” ideology.
“Your blood and your grandson’s, as well as that of all the nation’s martyrs will not go in vain because we will continue to follow your thinking to wipe out their darkness and clear our country of them,” Assad said.
Syria‘s main opposition group, the Syrian National Coalition, condemned the blast and expressed solidarity with the Syrian people, hinting that the bombing was the work of Assad’s regime.
The Assad regime doesn’t “hesitate to bomb mosques, universities, bakeries and residential areas with Scud missiles,” said an English statement by the group. “This regime is not deterred by anything to carry out bombings, killing the Syrian people without guilt.”
Syria‘s crisis started in March 2011 as peaceful protests against Assad’s authoritarian rule. The revolt turned into a civil war as some opposition supporters took up arms the fight a harsh government crackdown on dissent. The U.N. says more than 70,000 people have been killed since.
In Geneva, the U.N.’s top human rights body on Friday extended its probe into suspected abuses in Syria. By a vote of 41-1, the 47-nation U.N. Human Rights Council reauthorized the investigation, which is being conducted by a panel of four independent experts, until March 2014, a half-year longer than originally proposed.
Those in favor of the extension included the United States, Germany, Libya, Pakistan, Qatar and United Arab Emirates. Only Venezuela was opposed. Abstaining were Ecuador, India, Kazakhstan, Philippines and Uganda.
Earlier this month, the panel, which began its work in August 2011, said it was collecting evidence on 20 alleged massacres in Syria, a reflection of the civil war’s growing brutality.
An official at the ministry of religious affairs said …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox World News
UN rights body extends Syria probe to March 2014
The U.N.’s top human rights body has extended its probe of suspected abuses in Syria for another year.
By a vote of 41-1, the 47-nation U.N. Human Rights Council reauthorized the probe by a panel of four independent experts until March 2014, a half-year longer than originally was proposed.
Those in favor Friday included the United States, Germany, Libya, Pakistan, Qatar and United Arab Emirates. Only Venezuela was opposed. Abstaining were Ecuador, India, Kazakhstan, Philippines and Uganda.
Earlier this month the panel, which began its work in August 2011, said it is collecting evidence on 20 massacres in Syria, a reflection of the civil war’s growing brutality.
The United Nations estimates more than 70,000 people have been killed in the conflict, which started two years ago as a popular uprising.
PocketFinder Accompanies Recovered Picasso from Houston, Texas to Washington, DC
By Business Wirevia The Motley Fool
Filed under: Investing
PocketFinder Accompanies Recovered Picasso from Houston, Texas to Washington, DC
IRVINE, Calif.–(BUSINESS WIRE)– Location Based Technologies, Inc.’s (OTCBB:LBAS) PocketFinder device was used by the United States Secret Service to monitor a recovered Picasso painting as it made its way from Houston, Texas to Washington, D.C. The Secret Service used Ramo Carriers, Inc. to transport the recovered painting.
“We gave the United States Secret Service access to LBT‘s App to view a highly valued Pablo Picasso painting,” said Omar Gonzales, owner of Ramo Carriers. “The agents told me that PocketFinder was the best GPS tracker they’d ever seen.”
Ramo Carriers has also used PocketFinder to keep tabs on a $28.9 million dollar shipment of recovered counterfeit watches as well as a shipment of priceless Egyptian Mummies.
“Customers are continuing to use our devices in new and unique ways,” said Location Based Technologies CEO, Dave Morse. “For instance, we recently learned that some customers are using Pocketfinders to stay connected with their families on the ski slopes; what a tremendous market that could become for us. Additionally, Viper Securities in Colombia, South America, uses our devices to enhance their protection response, and companies in Ecuador will be using our newest device (the LBT-886) to track and monitor shipping conditions of fresh cut flowers. LBT‘s peerless devices are providing the controls and connectivity that businesses and families need around the world.”
See how other companies are benefiting from LBT‘s tracking solutions by visiting, http://www.locationbasedtech.com/news/testimonials/.
About Location Based Technologies, Inc.
A publicly traded company, Location Based Technologies (OTCBB: LBAS) designs and builds dedicated GPS products and services that are affordable and easy to use. The Company’s consumer products are sold under the PocketFinder brand, and its commercial products are sold under the LBT brand. For more information, visit: www.pocketfinder.com or www.locationbasedtech.com.
PocketFinder and Location Based Technologies, Inc. are trademarks of Location Based Technologies, Inc. registered in the U.S. and other countries.
This news release contains forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties. Actual results and outcomes may differ materially from those discussed or anticipated. For a more detailed discussion of these and associated risks, see the company’s most recent document filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Pollo Tropical® Opens Its 93rd Company-Owned Location in Fort Myers, Florida
By Business Wirevia The Motley Fool
Filed under: Investing
Pollo Tropical® Opens Its 93rd Company-Owned Location in Fort Myers, Florida
Gulf Coast Town Center Location marks the brand’s fourth location in Southwest Florida
MIAMI–(BUSINESS WIRE)– Pollo Tropical® recently opened its 93rd company-owned location in Fort Myers, Florida at the Gulf Coast Town Center, to much Florida fanfare! Pollo Tropical is a Caribbean-themed quick-casual restaurant, famous for its marinated flame-grilled chicken, guava barbecue riblets, roast pork and many more Caribbean-inspired favorites.
To celebrate its Fort Myers arrival, Pollo Tropical hosted a free Taste of the Tropics Beach Party.
Festivities began early in the morning, as the first 100 customers in line were entered to win free Pollo Tropical Chicken for a Year. Additionally, each of the first 100 customers received certificates good for a Create Your Own Family Meal on their next visit.
“Fort Myers is a natural compliment for our Pollo Tropical brand presence in Southwest Florida,” said Danny Meisenheimer, Chief Operating Officer of Pollo Tropical. “We look forward to serving loyal fans of Pollo Tropical there as well as new customers for years to come.”
The Fort Myers Pollo Tropical location is open seven days a week, from 10:30 a.m. to Midnight, serving the ever-popular Pollo Tropical marinated, flame-grilled chicken, roast pork, made-from-scratch side dishes and much more. The restaurant also offers beer, wine, sangria, free limited table service, complimentary Wi-Fi and much more. Customers can dine in, take out or use the restaurant’s convenient “Pollo on the Go” drive thru. For more information, visit www.pollotropical.com.
About Pollo Tropical
Pollo Tropical, a part of Fiesta Restaurant Group® (NAS: FRGI) , owns and operates 93 locations in the United States (Florida, Georgia and Tennessee) plus four licensed units located on college campuses in Florida. The company has 32 international franchised locations in Puerto Rico, the Bahamas, Ecuador, Honduras, Panama, Trinidad & Tobago, Venezuela and Costa Rica and has agreements in place for additional franchised units in Aruba, Bonaire, Curacao, Guatemala and N. India. The first Pollo Tropical restaurant opened in 1988 in Miami, Florida. The unique restaurant concept is known for its fresh, never frozen, open-flame grilled chicken, marinated in a proprietary …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at DailyFinance
Global Street Art: MOCAtv Series Navigates Unseen Graffiti From The Corners Of The Globe, Starting With Cairo (VIDEO, PHOTOS)
By The Huffington Post News Editors
Maybe you are familiar with the names of American street art’s key players, from Barry McGee to Swoon, but can you name the equivalent artists revamping the streets of Chile, Egypt or Palestine?
A new series from MOCAtv titled “Global Street Art” will pick up where “Art in the Streets” left off, providing a virtual tour of the world’s most colorful urban canvases — from Chile, Ecuador, Egypt, Indonesia, Japan, Lebanon, Libya and Palestine.
The series begins with an exploration of Cairo’s vibrant graffiti as navigated by obsessive street art archivist Soraya Morayef, the maven behind the blog Suzee In The City. Morayef, who grew up in both Cairo and Alexandria, uses social media, street savviness and what she describes as “internet detective work” to hunt down the Middle East‘s most compelling living walls.
Greening the blues: What business can learn from Avatar
Norm Borin of California Polytechnic State University and Arline Savage of the School of Business at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, argue that the fictitious mining company in the 2009 James Cameron movie, Avatar, makes a perfect case study for how not to be a sustainable company and offers lesson to more down to earth corporations hoping to gain green credentials as opposed to the blues. We hear a lot about indigenous peoples (the Na’vi in the movie) whose health and lives are all but destroyed by invading corporations such as Resources Development Administration (RDA) in the movie. The researchers draw a parallel between the problems faced by the Na’vi and the pollution and deforestation, facing people from Alberta to Ecuador, from Kenya to the Philippines and beyond. …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Phys.org
IAPA: Latin America press freedom is under attack
The Inter-America Press Association says attacks on press freedom have intensified in Mexico, Central America, Brazil, Argentina and Ecuador.
The group says assassinations and assaults on journalists continue in Mexico, Honduras and Brazil, while the governments of Ecuador and Argentina have put legal and economic restrictions on media, especially those that don’t go along with government interests.
The nonprofit press group says the worst situation is in Mexico, where 127 journalists have been attacked the last 12 years.
IAPA says such incidents have continued under new President Enrique Pena Nieto, who canceled an appearance at the group’s conference in Puebla, Mexico. In recent days, a journalist was killed in the Mexican border town of Ojinaga and attacks were staged on the two newspapers, Diario de Juarez and Siglo de Torreon.
Argentina's Menem found guilty of arms trafficking
Former Argentine President Carlos Menem and 11 others were found guilty by an appeals court on Friday of smuggling weapons to Ecuador and Croatia in violation of international embargoes in the 1990s.
Menem, now 82 and enjoying immunity as an Argentine senator, had been acquitted at trial in 2011, but the appellate court said much of the evidence had been mistakenly dismissed, and that there is no logical way the weapons could have been smuggled without Menem’s direct participation and approval.
Menem acknowledged signing secret decrees to export weapons to Venezuela and Panama, but said he had no idea that the tons of rifles and ammunition made in Argentina would end up in Ecuador and Croatia, countries subject to international embargoes at the time.
The appeals court called his defense “incomprehensible,” given voluminous evidence that customs procedures weren’t followed amid pressure from the presidency. The court found that Menem’s brother-in-law and “man of confidence,” Emir Yoma, acted as his intermediary with the government authorities and others involved in the scheme, and that Yoma also collected money from the companies involved.
“The only person with enough power to influence simultaneously, and over all these years, three different government ministries, their various agencies, the Argentine Army and even Congress, was the President of the Nation, Carlos Saul Menem, through Yoma,” the appellate court ruled.
Friday’s 237-page ruling by the three-judge panel convicts the former president as “co-author of the crime of smuggling, aggravated by the fact that it involved military weapons and required the intervention of public officials.”
Prosecutors had asked for a sentence of eight years if Menem were convicted. The appellate court remanded the case to the trial judges for sentencing, taking into account the former president’s age and conduct as well as the aggravating circumstances.
In any case, Menem can serve time only if the Senate, which is controlled by the government of Cristina Fernandez, votes to remove the immunity he enjoys as an Argentine lawmaker. Fernandez often criticizes the decisions of Menem’s presidency, but as a senator, Menem has been a dependable ally of Fernandez, providing a swing vote on critical issues.
Menem’s former defense minister, Oscar Camilion, was among those convicted Friday after being found not guilty two years ago, but the appellate court upheld the decision to absolve Yoma, and declared that too much time had passed to pursue criminal charges against …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox World News
GTSO Takes its Urban Mining Initiatives International with Chilean LOI
By Business Wirevia The Motley Fool
Filed under: Investing
GTSO Takes its Urban Mining Initiatives International with Chilean LOI
SAN JOSE, Calif.–(BUSINESS WIRE)– As part of a dedicated effort to expand its recycling operations into the booming Latin American market, Green Technology Solutions, Inc. (OTCBB: GTSO) signed a letter of intent this week to finalize due diligence and begin negotiating deal terms with a major electronic waste recycling—or “urban mining”—company in Chile.
Chilerecicla was founded in 2009 and opened the first e-waste recycling plant in Southern Chile. Based in the city of Chillán, 400 kms south of Santiago, Chilerecicla specializes in the direct removal of electronic waste from clients’ offices facilities for transport to its central plant as well as the sale of reusable materials. From handheld mobile devices to aerospace instrumentation, the company is capable of safe removal of a wide variety of e-waste (including hazardous materials) for reuse.
“We’ve targeted Chile for investment for some time now due to the extremely favorable market conditions we’ve identified there, including strong government support,” said GTSO CEO Paul Watson. “The country has bounced back strong from the global recession, and its fledgling recycling industry is open for business. Limited access to credit has prevented any single company there from establishing a dominant market position in the urban mining sector, however.
“With funding and assistance from GTSO, we envision Chilerecicla potentially emerging as the leader of the pack in a nation where demand for e-waste recycling is growing at an unbelievable rate,” he added.
GTSO has thoroughly scouted business opportunities in Chile due in part to its high rate of industrialization and local government support. The nation enjoys easy access to cheap raw materials for processing—such as discarded mobile phones—from neighbors including Peru, Ecuador and Bolivia with few processes and regulations for e-waste management.
“Right now, much of Latin America‘s hazardous e-waste ends up in the trash,” Watson said. “We’re interested in turning that trash into cash and applying this company’s best practices to our U.S. operations, as well.”
Urban mining is key to GTSO‘s plans to compete alongside major international corporations striving for sustainable waste solutions, such as Industrial Services of America (NAS: IDSA) and Sims Metal Management Ltd. (NYS: SMS) . Late last year, GTSO acquired the company Green Urban Mining to handle its domestic recycling and resale operations.
About Green Technology Solutions, Inc.
…read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at DailyFinance
California couple missing in Peru reportedly spotted in remote village
A California couple that vanished while on a biking trip in Peru and were feared kidnapped have reportedly been spotted in a remote village.
Garrett Hand and Jamie Neal were last heard from Jan. 25 while traveling from the highlands city of Cuzco to Lima, but U.S. Embassy spokeswoman Leslie Goodman said Tuesday that Peruvian police say the two had been spotted in the Amazon.
Reuters reports Peru‘s tourism ministry issued a separate statement Tuesday, saying, “the American tourists are continuing to enjoy their trip in the Peruvian Amazon” and were safely on their way by river boat north to the border with Ecuador.
National police spokeswoman Betty Lazo tells the Associated Press she was told by the hostel manager in the jungle city of Iquitos that the two departed on a boat trip on the Napo river.
However, Hand’s mother says that until the family has “proof of life” they will not stop their search.
“Proof of life is my son’s voice on the phone and a picture of him holding the missing poster,” Francine Fitzgerald said in a statement.
Fitzgerlad said she was told a plane was being sent to meet the couple but that she was given few other details of their whereabouts or well-being.
Hand and Neal left for Peru in December and were said to have vanished while en route to Lima
from Cusco, an area where U.S. citizens have been warned by the embassy of kidnapping risks.
“The information told to me is that they are on a boat on the river and that they are sending a plane to find them. I am told to expect information by tomorrow sometime,” Fitzgerald’s statement reads. “While I appreciate the extraordinary efforts of the media, the U.S. and Peruvian governments, until I hear from and see my son directly, we will not stop.”
Friends and family have said they were worried the pair had been abducted and that their bank accounts had remained idle since they went missing.
Reuters reports Peru‘s ministry of tourism said in its statement that the couple were in good health and surprised to learn that they had been reported as missing.
Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.