Two Panamanian men alleged to have laundered more than US$28 million in bribes related to the Brazilian conglomerate Odebrecht’s corruption scandal, have pleaded guilty, the first earlier this monthand the second this week, the U.S Department of Justice revealed in a statement on Tuesday.

A Panamanian national was extradited from Guatemala to the United States on Monday for alleged money laundering and bribery offences totalling roughly US$28 million linked to the Brazilian-based Odebrecht S.A. corruption scandal, according to the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ).

A former chief executive officer (CEO) of Braskem S.A., a Brazilian petrochemical company, was sentenced in a New York court on Tuesday to 20 months in prison for his role in a conspiracy to use US$250 million of his former company’s money to bribe government officials.

Authorities have opened multiple probes, including into Brookfield’s alleged part in floods that deluged the eastern city of Raul Soares.

Photo by Leonardo Augusto

Just days after the opposition leader and former presidential candidate fled the country, prosecutors in Mexico have accused Ricardo Anaya of taking a US$525,000 bribe tied to Brazilian construction company Odebrecht.

Hezbollah has jumped in league with drug trafficking groups operating in South America’s “Tri-Border Area,” a lawless region which bridges the frontiers of Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay, a new report by the Israeli think-tank, the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Research (BESA). 

The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) urged Brazilian officials and their representatives to refrain from harassing members of the press who cover them and rather encourage free reporting. The appeal came after President Jair Bolsonaro’s personal lawyer sent a lengthy and menacing message to a journalist reporting on alleged government corruption.

Brazil will suspend its US$324 million contract for India’s Covaxin COVID-19 vaccine upon the recommendation of Brazil’s Comptroller General office (CGU), Health Minister Marcelo Queiroga said Tuesday.

China Tobacco’s factory in Europe is selling hundreds of millions of cigarettes to companies in Ukraine under investigation for cigarette smuggling.

China is complying with recommendations under a global treaty to decrease the amount of land under tobacco cultivation –– but its massive state-owned conglomerate is shifting production overseas. Brazil has become a major supplier, with farmers working under difficult conditions to grow tobacco for Chinese cigarettes.

A bust of 17 tons of illicit cigarettes in Italy led back to China Tobacco’s European factory — where an executive was working closely with a group of smugglers to help them move cigarettes around Europe. Reporters found the company shipping large numbers of cigarettes to suspicious buyers in Iraq, Montenegro, Moldova, and more.

China Tobacco’s factory in Panama was shut down by authorities after its cigarettes kept making their way onto the black market there. A network of companies sprang up in its place — and have been shipping huge numbers of cigarettes from Panama around the region.

China Tobacco is using advertising, investment, and social projects to influence governments and consumers around the world, while flooding markets in countries where its cigarettes cannot legally be sold — all methods "Big Tobacco" has employed for decades.

China's state tobacco company has quietly set its sights on global domination.

Brazil authorized on Monday the deployment of a special task force to protect the Yanomami indigenous community after illegal miners searching for gold repeatedly entered native lands in the Amazon and attacked the tribe. 

After a cyberattack linked to Russian hacker group REvil forced the world’s largest meat supplier JBS to shut down all of its systems, including plants in North America and Australia, the Brazil-based company has returned to full global operations. An expert said on Tuesday that  attacked companies won’t tell whether they paid ransom.  

The Brazilian Supreme Court (STF) opened on Wednesday a probe into allegations that Environment Minister Ricardo Salles obstructed environmental inspections involving the largest seizure of illegally chopped wood in the history of Brazil. 

Brazil’s Federal Police arrested on Monday one of Italy’s most-wanted mobsters, putting an end to a years-long international chase after Rocco Morabito, a prominent member of one of the world’s most powerful crime syndicates, the ‘Ndrangheta.

Criminal organizations exploited increased air travel in Latin America and the Caribbean to traffic birds, reptiles, mammals and other species outside and within the region, endangering the world’s most-wildlife rich territory, a new report reveals.

Brazil’s Supreme Court ordered federal police to conduct sweeping raids targeting public officials, including Environment Minister Ricardo Salles, and businessmen who are alleged to have participated in a corrupt illegal timber trafficking scheme.