South America

"An important opposition deputy this week accused Chile's government of being less than candid with the public about alarming levels of fine particulate pollution found in the nation’s leading cities."

In Brazil's epicenter of deforestation, an environmental group is offering farmers cash to let the forest stand. The question is whether they can make more by clearing the land and farming it.

The indigenous Kamayura tribe in Brazil's rain forest are losing their traditional source of food. The fish are disappearing from their lake as the Amazon region region is made hotter and drier by deforestation -- and some say by climate change.

After Peruvian police opened fire June 5, 2009, on indigenous Amazonian people protesting the taking of their land for oil drilling, killing at least 34, some laws have been repealed and some ministers have lost thier jobs.

Peru remains deadlocked with indigenous groups whose protests of the government's efforts to develop the Amazon region, and a crackdown by police, have left at least 34 dead.