Briefly

ECUADOR

Correa suggests base in Miami

NAPLES — Ecuador’s leftist president, Rafael Correa, said Washington must let him open a military base in Miami if the U.S. wants to keep using an air base on Ecuador’s Pacific coast.

Mr. Correa has refused to renew Washington’s lease on the Manta air base, set to expire in 2009. U.S. officials say it is vital for counternarcotics-surveillance operations on Pacific drug-running routes.

“We’ll renew the base on one condition: that they let us put a base in Miami — an Ecuadorean base,” Mr. Correa said during a trip to Italy.

BRAZIL

Clash at seed farm leaves two dead

SAO PAULO — Activists trying to invade a Swiss-owned biotech seed farm clashed with guards and at least two persons were shot dead, authorities and the company said yesterday.

One activist opposed to the farm’s work with genetically modified seeds died, and a security guard also was killed in the clash on Sunday at the 304-acre farm owned by Syngenta AG.

Brazil’s Landless Workers Movement, a close ally of Via Campesina, said that the invaders shot off fireworks as they entered the farm and that a bus arrived later with gunmen who opened fire.

CHILE

Eight teens die in detention center fire

SANTIAGO — Eight teenagers died in a fire they started in a juvenile-detention center in southern Chile, a local official said yesterday.

The blaze broke out about midnight on Sunday in the city of Puerto Montt. Guards tried to enter the burning building but the teenagers had blocked the doors with furniture and mattresses as part of a protest, Ledi Barria, a local government official, told Radio Cooperativa.

“They died of asphyxiation from the smoke from the fire which they themselves started,” Mr. Barria said.

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