The tousled 30-year-old works a homemade gold-mining dredge along the banks of the Tambopata River, a tributary of the Amazon, keeping watch over a sluice box that catches gold flecks in the slurry sucked up from the river bottom.

The price of gold has increased 50 percent in the past two years and tripled over the past five, as global investors look to hedge against a falling dollar. Gold hit historic highs this month. That surge has spurred a new Amazon gold rush, with illegal miners pouring into the region and setting up camp along riverbanks, highways and footpaths reaching deep into the rain forest of the Peruvian Amazon.

There are signs of positive change. The Economist featured Brazil in a special edition, lauding the country for its economic, political, and social progress and essentially deeming it a country to be taken seriously, the “country of the future” that has finally arrived.

The introduction of new anti-drug initiatives as well as greater multilateralism were two of the conclusions identified at an American Foreign Relations Council on Organized Crime in the western hemisphere, at which Pardo was present. The council was held on Tuesday as an independent arena for discussion on international relations.

The former minister and current director of Cambio magazine signaled that he believed people have lost interest in Colombia’s drug problem, reported news site The Houston Chronicle.

“In Colombia we are tired of the drug strategy. This demonstrated that what we have done has not worked ... We have put so much money and effort into it yet the statistics remain the same, depite suc

Deputy Foreign Minister Francisco Arias Cardenas said they were members of Colombia’s DAS state security agency.

He said they were “captured carrying out actions of espionage”, without giving any further details.

Ties between the two nations have been frozen since July when Colombia said it would let the US army use its military bases for anti-drugs operations.

The agreement has caused alarm among some of Colombia’s neighbours, who object to an increased US military presence in the region.

Some 1,000 people chanted “Don’t mess with my kids!” and urged members of the predominantly pro-Chavez National Assembly to reconsider the proposed legislation. The bill, which would affect both state and private schools, is expected to receive final approval in the coming weeks.

Under the bill, teaching would be based on “the Bolivarian Doctrine” — a term used by Chavez to describe his socialist political movement named after 19th century independence hero Simon Bolivar.

The legislation would also give state-funded neighborhood-based assemblies — called “communal councils” — a key role in the “administration, maintenance, evaluation and supervision” of schools in their communities.

A Neolithic, Indian camp right in the city centre is unthinkable, but there it is, like a dangerous cancer, spreading bad smells, destruction and contamination. The city’s being punished, for no reason, and it shouldn’t have to pay for it. The Indians have to learn to live like people, or get back to the jungle.

Citing positive points in the report by IAEA Director Mohamed ElBaradei, Mohammad Khazaei told IRNA that measures taken by the UN Security Council against the Islamic Republic lack legality.

The UN nuclear agency reported on Friday that it had made “quite good progress” in its long-running probe into Iran’s nuclear program.