Chile and Mexico have the highest level of income inequality among the 34 countries in the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), the group announced on Jan. 23. The other OECD members with the widest gap between rich and poor are Israel, Turkey and the US, according to the OECD's new report, Reducing Income Inequality While Boosting Economic Growth: Can It Be Done? (PDF), Chile and Mexico are the only Latin American countries in the organization, which is mostly composed of higher-income nations. The US is the high-income nation with the worst record on income inequality.

Brazil's government is facing an outcry from rights groups and social movements following a violent Jan. 22 eviction of a favela (informal settlement) that the media have dubbed the "Massacre do Pinheirinho." Some 2,000 troops from the Military Police of São Paulo (PMSP) and the Metropolitan Civil Guard (GCM) of the city of São José dos Campos, in the São Paulo state, invaded the settlement known as Pinheirinho following an order for repossession of the land issued by the state court. Backed up by armored cars and helicopters, the troops evicted an estimated 6,000 from the community on the outskirts of São Paulo city. The troops descended on the site without warning, using tear gas, rubber bullets, and truncheons to disperse frightened residents. But apparently well-drilled to resist eviction, some residents quickly donned improvised weapons and homemade body armor and attempted to block the police advance. The images widely circulated on Brazilian social media, leading to widespread protests in support of the evicted residents.

Brazilian prosecutors plan to file criminal charges against Chevron officials for November's oil spill off the coast of Rio de Janeiro state. Brazilian officials charge that Chevron acted irresponsibly at the Frade oil field in the Campos Basin formation. Up to 12 Chevron officials are expected to be indicted. The filing in federal court in Campos, Brazil, will likely include a request for criminal indictment of George Buck, chief executive of Chevron's Brazil unit, as well as other staff, officials told Reuters. Chevron also faces a $11 billion civil suit over the spill.

Argentine judge Fernando Juan Lima ruled on Jan. 16 that the Buenos Aires city government could continue for now with a 127% increase it had imposed for the subway fare on Jan. 6. A coalition including unions, student groups and political and social organizations had filed for an emergency injunction to halt the increase, which raises the fare to 2.5 pesos (about 58 cents).

A series of raids and house fires in southern Chile followed the filing of a criminal complaint on Jan. 6 by the government of right-wing president Sebastián Piñera implying that indigenous Mapuche activists were responsible for recent major forest fires in the Biobío and Araucanía regions. The complaint was based on an "anti-terrorism" law passed during the 1973-1990 dictatorship of Gen. Augusto Pinochet and used repeatedly to repress protests by Mapuche activists seeking to regain control of ancestral lands being exploited by timber companies.

Following a wave of forest fires in the southern Araucania and Bio-Bio regions that left seven fire-fighters dead this week, Chile's government suggested indigenous Mapuche activists may have been responsible. Interior Minister Rodrigo Hinzpeter speculated that the Coordinadora Arauco Malleco (CAM), a Mapuche group struggling to recover land from timber companies in the affected regions, set the blazes. "Behind this premeditated and criminal conduct there is activity of a terrorist nature," he said. The Mapuche Student's Federation accused Hinzpeter of conducting a "media trial" without any evidence and of trying to "delegitimize" the indigenous movement. President Sebastian Piñera has invoked a Pinochet-era "anti-terrorism" law to pursue those responsible for the fires. (Clarin, Argentina, Jan. 7; BBC News, VOA, Jan. 6)

As of Dec. 22 the US government had sent the Argentine human rights group Grandmothers of the Plaza de Mayo a completely declassified copy of a 1982 US State Department memo discussing the abduction of the babies of alleged leftists during Argentina's 1976-1983 military dictatorship. The document undercuts any claims by former members of the ruling junta that the abductions were not systematic or that the military rulers were unaware of the crimes. The human rights group had asked the US for the memo so that it could be used in trials of former de facto president Gen. Reynaldo Bignone (1982-83) and others.

After eight months of mobilizations, strikes and campus occupations, on Dec. 22 Chilean university and secondary students held their last protest of the 2011 school year, a march through the streets of downtown Santiago. As in previous demonstrations, there were clashes with the carabineros militarized police, who said the students didn't have a permit for the protest; some 10 youths were arrested. With an estimated 1,000 to 4,000 participants, the final mobilization was tiny in comparison with the hundreds of thousands of students, teachers and supporters that had marched in the months before.