Mexico City
Burger ad offends: Burger King has agreed to pull a commercial running on European television after Mexico formally complained that it used a negative stereotype of Mexicans. The commercial, for the “Texican Whopper,” shows a short wrestler dressed in a cape resembling a Mexican flag. The wrestler teams up with a lanky American cowboy almost twice his height, to illustrate the cross-border blend of flavors. “We have to tell these people that in Mexico we have a great deal of respect for our flag,” said Jorge Zermeno, Mexico’s ambassador to Spain. In the 1990s, Mexico complained about a Taco Bell ad using a Chihuahua that spoke with a Mexican accent.
La Paz, Bolivia
President ends hunger strike: Bolivian President Evo Morales ended a five-day hunger strike this week after the legislature approved the changes he wanted in the election law. The new law allows Morales to run for a second term and reserves seats in Congress for indigenous people, his main support base. The opposition, which said the law would give Morales too much power, had initially refused to show up for the vote, denying the needed quorum. That prompted Morales, who called his opponents “racist, fascist, and selfish,” to start his hunger strike. Morales spent the five days sleeping on a mattress on the floor of the presidential palace and chewing coca leaves to dampen hunger pangs.
Asuncion, Paraguay
Presidential love child: Paraguayan President Fernando Lugo has admitted that he fathered a child with a much younger woman while he was a Roman Catholic bishop. “I assume all responsibilities and recognize the paternity of the child,” Lugo said. The admission came five days after the child’s mother, Viviana Carrillo, filed a paternity suit. Carrillo, now 26, says she began a sexual relationship with Lugo when she was 16. Lugo, 57, renounced his status as bishop in 2006 in order to run for president, but the Vatican did not release him from his vows until last year, shortly before he took office as president.
