The week at a glance...Americas

Cartagena, Colombia

Free trade with U.S.: A free trade agreement between the United States and Colombia will go into effect next month, President Obama announced at the Summit of the Americas in Colombia. “This will create thousands, millions of jobs in the United States and Colombia,” said Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos. The U.S. and Colombia agreed to the pact last year, but it was delayed until Colombia improved labor conditions and workers’ rights. U.S. labor leaders insist it still has not done so; at least 30 Colombian union leaders were murdered last year alone. Obama’s announcement “is deeply disappointing and troubling,” said AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka.

Brasília, Brazil

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Abortion restriction eased: Brazil’s Supreme Court has legalized abortions of fetuses that have no brains. Abortion has been illegal in Brazil except in case of rape or when the pregnancy threatens a woman’s life; otherwise it carries a three-year prison term for the woman who undergoes the procedure and a four-year term for the doctor who performs it. Now the court has added a third exception, for anencephalic fetuses, which develop without complete brains and can’t survive outside the womb for more than a few hours. Such pregnancies are rare, but for unknown reasons are slightly more common in Brazil than in other countries.

Buenos Aires

Oil grab: Argentine President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner abruptly left the Summit of the Americas in Colombia last weekend, prompting reports that she was leaving in pique because the summit did not produce a joint statement supporting Argentina’s claim to the British-controlled Falkland Islands. It turns out she had another reason: Kirchner announced she was renationalizing the oil company YPF. “We are the only country in the hemisphere, and nearly the world, that doesn’t control its own natural resources,” Kirchner said. YPF was privatized in 1993 and has been majority-owned by Spanish company Repsol. Spain called the takeover “a hostile move,” and it could trigger EU sanctions, including a boycott of Argentine soy and beef.