Brazil

Following the outbreak of World War I in 1914, the German Army opened the Western Front by first invading Luxembourg and Belgium, then gaining... military control of important industrial regions in France. The tide of the advance was dramatically turned with the Battle of the Marne. Following the race to the sea, both sides dug in along a meandering line of fortified trenches, stretching from the North Sea to the Swiss frontier with France. This line remained essentially unchanged for most of the war. Between 1915 and 1917 there were several major offensives along this front. The attacks employed massive artillery bombardments and massed infantry advances. However, a combination of entrenchments, machine gun nests, barbed wire, and artillery repeatedly inflicted severe casualties on the attackers and counter attacking defenders. As a result, no significant advances were made. In an effort to break the deadlock, this front saw the introduction of new military technology, including poison gas, aircraft and tanks. But it was only after the adoption of improved tactics that some degree of mobility was restored.
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The War of Canudos was a conflict between the state of Brazil and a group of some 30,000 settlers who had founded their own community in the... northeastern state of Bahia, named Canudos. After a number of unsuccessful attempts at military suppression, it came to a brutal end in October 1897, when a large Brazilian army force overran the village and killed nearly all the inhabitants. This was the deadliest civil war in Brazilian history. The conflict had its origins in the settlement of Canudos in the northeast tip of the state of Bahia. Bahia at this time was a desperately poor zone, with a depressed economy based on subsistence agriculture and cattle raising, no large cities, and a disenfranchised population composed largely of white Brazilian and mestizos. It was a likely background for dissatisfaction with the recently installed Republican regime.
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The Paraguayan War , also known as War of the Triple Alliance , was a military conflict in South America fought from 1864 to 1870 between Paraguay... and the Triple Alliance of Argentina, Brazil, and Uruguay. It caused more deaths proportionally than any other war in modern history, and particularly devastated Paraguay, killing most of its male population. Several theories exist regarding the origins of the war. The traditional view emphasizes the aggressive policy of Paraguayan president Francisco Solano López towards Platine matters. Conversely, the Paraguayan traditional view and Argentine revisionism since the 1960s give a preponderant role to the interests of the British Empire. The war began in late 1864 with combat operations between Brazil and Paraguay; from 1865 onwards, one can properly refer to the "War of the Triple Alliance".
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The Second Battle of Guararapes was the second and decisive battle in a conflict called Pernambucana Insurrection, between Dutch and Portuguese... forces in 1649 at Jaboatão dos Guararapes in the state of Pernambuco, ending the Dutch occupation of Brazil. Though the Dutch West India Company fielded a larger, better equipped force, they suffered morale problems as most of their army was made up of mercenaries from Europe who felt no real passion for the war in Brazil, as opposed to the Natives and Portuguese settlers who considered Brazil to be their home and were fighting for a patriotic cause. The Dutch force was also unused to fighting in the dense jungle and humid conditions of the country, wearing thick, brightly coloured European clothing and heavy metal armour which inhibited their dexterity. Contemporary accounts describe Dutch troops at the battle as "pale and sickly". The Dutch army at Guararapes were armed with pikes, cannon and an assortment of bladed weapons. It is thought by historians that the use of short blades by the Dutch was an attempt to imitate previously successful Portuguese weaponry and tactics.
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The African Development Bank Group is a development bank established in 1964 with the intention of promoting economic and social development in... Africa. The Group comprises the African Development Bank , the African Development Fund , and the Nigeria Trust Fund . AfDB provides loans and grants to African governments and private companies investing in the regional member countries in Africa. It is owned and funded by member governments, and has a public-interest mandate to reduce poverty and promote sustainable development. Following the end of colonial period in Africa, growing desire for more unity within the continent led to the establishment of two draft charters, one for the establishment of the Organisation of African Unity , and for a regional development bank. A draft accord was submitted to top African officials, then to African Ministers, before being cosigned by twenty-three African governments on August 4, 1963, in the form of an agreement establishing the African Development Bank.
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The Andean Community is a customs union comprising the South American countries of Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador and Peru. The trade bloc was called... the Andean Pact until 1996 and came into existence with the signing of the Cartagena Agreement in 1969. Its headquarters are located in Lima, Peru. The Andean Community has 98 million inhabitants living in an area of 4,700,000 square kilometers, whose Gross Domestic Product amounted to US$745.3 billion in 2005, including Venezuela, . It's estimated GDP PPP for 2011 amounts to US$902.86 billion, excluding Venezuela. The original Andean Pact was founded in 1969 by Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador and Peru. In 1973, the pact gained its sixth member, Venezuela. In 1976, however, its membership was again reduced to five when Chile withdrew. Venezuela announced its withdrawal in 2006, reducing the Andean Community to four member states. Recently, with the new cooperation agreement with Mercosur, the Andean Community gained four new associate members: Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay.
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The United Nations Stabilisation Mission In Haiti , also known as MINUSTAH, an acronym of the French translation, is a United Nations peacekeeping... mission in Haiti that has been in operation since 2004. The mission's military component is led by the Brazilian Army and the force commander is Brazilian. MINUSTAH's mandate was most recently extended by United Nations Security Council Resolution 1944 past its October 15, 2010 deadline amid fears of instability. The mission's current mandate runs through October 15th, 2011 with the intention of further renewal. The force is composed of 8,940 military personnel and 3,711 police, supported by an international civilian personnel, a local civilian staff and United Nations Volunteers. Following the 2010 Haiti earthquake, the United Nations reported that the headquarters of the mission in Port-au-Prince had collapsed and that the mission's chief, Hédi Annabi of Tunisia, his deputy Luiz Carlos da Costa of Brazil, and the acting police commissioner, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police's Doug Coates of Canada, were confirmed dead.
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The Union of South American Nations - UZAN, Portuguese: União de Nações Sul-Americanas - UNASUL, Spanish: Unión de Naciones... Suramericanas - UNASUR is an intergovernmental union integrating two existing customs unions: Mercosur and the Andean Community of Nations , as part of a continuing process of South American integration. It is modeled on the European Union. The UNASUR Constitutive Treaty was signed on May 23, 2008, at the Third Summit of Heads of State, held in Brasília, Brazil. According to the Constitutive Treaty, the Union's headquarters will be located in Quito, Ecuador. The South American Parliament will be located in Cochabamba, Bolivia, while the headquarters of its bank, the Bank of the South are located in Caracas, Venezuela. The combined population of the 12-member Union as at 1 July 2010 was estimated at 396,391,032. On 4 May 2010, at an extraordinary heads of state summit held in Campana, 75 km north of Buenos Aires, former Argentine President Néstor Kirchner was unanimously elected the first Secretary-General of UNASUR for a two-year term.
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Pontifícia Universidade Católica de Minas Gerais is a private and non-profit Brazilian Catholic university located in Belo Horizonte,... state of Minas Gerais. It is one of the largest and most prestigious Brazilian universities. In 2006 and 2010, PUC-MG was chosen the best private university in Brazil. It is maintained by the Catholic Archdiocese of Belo Horizonte. The Catholic University is a very important higher education institution in Minas Gerais, where it owns more than one hundred buildings to host labs, libraries, a museum, a TV channel, a long distance teaching center, multimedia rooms, theaters, auditoriums, a veterinary hospital, a clinic for psychotherapy, odothological and psychological treatment and other. One of the best universities in Brazil, PUC-MG was rated 4 by the Brazilian Ministry of Education index for higher education schools. The highest rate is 5 and it is almost exclusively regarded to public universities.
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The Fluminense Federal University is one of the four federally funded public universities in the State of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The university was... established by federal law on December 18, 1960. It's the former union of five federal colleges and three state colleges. It has about 50.158 undergraduate students, 11.675 graduate students and 2.852 faculties . It has six campii in the city of Niterói, on the South-East side of Guanabara Bay and other 12 satellite campii in various towns of the State. There are currently 68 undergraduate and 208 graduate programs available at UFF in Natural and Social Sciences. The word Fluminense in Portuguese, from Latin flumen , is the native adjective for the State of Rio de Janeiro. The Law School of Fluminense Federal University was founded in 1912 and it's one of the most traditional Brazilian Law schools, having an important role in Brazilian Public Law. It is also one of the most vibrant sources of Labour Law doctrine.
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The Federal University of Rio de Janeiro is one of the largest federal universities of Brazil, where public universities comprise the majority of... the best and most qualified institutions. It is seated in the city of Rio de Janeiro, with three campi and two more independent buildings in downtown Rio. It was founded on September 7, 1920, by President Epitácio Pessoa, upon gathering a number of previously independent public institutions of higher education in the city. By then, Rio was the Brazilian capital and the federal government sought to stimulate scientific production in the nation's booming economy. Some of the colleges and schools which form UFRJ date back to the United Kingdom of Portugal and Brazil and to the Brazilian Empire, such as the [Escola Politécnica] , Faculdade Nacional de Direito , Escola Nacional de Belas Artes and the Faculdade de Medicina .
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Zélia Duncan , born Zélia Cristina Gonçalves Moreira, is a Brazilian singer and composer. Zélia was born in Niterói, in the... state of Rio de Janeiro. She moved with her family to Brasília, where she lived for 16 years. She started her professional career in 1981 after she won a contest organized by the Fundação Nacional de Artes . When she was 22 years old, she returned to Rio. Using the name "Zélia Cristina", she first performed as a soloist in Botanic in Rio de Janeiro. In 1990 she launched the LP "Outra Luz" , and she began performing in cities like São Paulo, Florianópolis, and Porto Alegre and participating in tv shows. In late 1991, she accepted an offer to go play in the United Arab Emirates. She stayed there for 5 months, returning to Brazil in May 1992. It was in this year that she recorded a track in the songbook of Dorival Caymmi, and she also adopted the name Duncan, the maiden name of her mother. In 1994, she launched her first CD, Zélia Duncan, and two years later she recorded Intimidade , which made her spend a season in Europe and Japan.
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Gisele Bündchen was born in July 20, 1980 in the town of Horizontina in Rio Grande Do Sul, Brazil. She´s a super model that has been the... face for more than 20 brands like Nivea, Colcci Christian Dior and Victoria´s Secret among others. Gisele was listed in the Guinness Book of World Records as the "World´s Richest Model" and Forbes called her the "Best Paid Model of all time". As a child she wanted to be a Volleyball player but then in 1993 she joined a modeling course with her sisters and then in 1994 while in a school excursion in a shopping mall in Porto Alegre, Brazil she was discovered by a modeling agency. Her first time appearing as a model was in a national contest "Elite Look of the Year", where she got the second place. Then in 1996 she moved to New York City to pursuit her modeling career and debuted at the Fashion Week. Gisele owns a footwear brand for women called "Ipanema" and she owns a Hotel in Rio Grande do Sul: "Palladium Executive Flat". As well a being a model Gisele has had experience working in movies such as "Taxi" and had a small part in "The Devil Wears Prada".
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Angel is from Killeen Texas . He plays Ibanez and ESP 7 strings with Curt Mangan strings and Marshall amps. Angel resides in Corpus Christi when not... touring with Sa Sanctuary.
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Demian Maia Baptista is a Brazilian mixed martial artist and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu practitioner. He currently fights for the Ultimate Fighting... Championship. Maia is currently ranked the #6 middleweight in the world by Sherdog and Yahoo! Sports., and the #8 middleweight fighter in the world by MMAWeekly. Born in São Paulo, Brazil, Maia trained in Judo as a child. When he became a teenager, he also began studying Kung Fu and Karate. By age nineteen, Maia was introduced to Brazilian Jiu Jitsu by his cousin. After four years and seven months, Demian received his black belt under Fabio Gurgel. Demian Maia finished college and graduated with a degree in Journalism. He is currently a third degree black belt in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and has won several major tournaments under Team Brasa. He won the 77–87 kg weight division at the 2007 ADCC Submission Wrestling World Championship, defeating Yushin Okami, Rafael Lovato, and Tarsis Humphres before armbarring Flavio Almeida in the finals.
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Venezuela /ˌvɛnɨˈzweɪlə/ , officially called the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela , is a tropical country on the... northern coast of South America. It borders Colombia to the west, Guyana to the east, and Brazil to the south. Its northern coastline of roughly 2,800 kilometres includes numerous islands in the Caribbean Sea, and in the north east borders the northern Atlantic Ocean. Caribbean islands such as Trinidad and Tobago, Grenada, Curaçao, Bonaire, Aruba and the Leeward Antilles lie near the Venezuelan coast. Venezuela's territory covers around 916,445 square kilometres with an estimated population of 29,105,632. Venezuela is considered a state with extremely high biodiversity, with habitats ranging from the Andes mountains in the west to the Amazon Basin rainforest in the south, via extensive llanos plains and Caribbean coast in the center and the Orinoco River Delta in the east. Venezuela was colonized by Spain in 1522, overcoming resistance from indigenous peoples.
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Suriname /ˈsɜrɨnɑːm/ , officially the Republic of Suriname , is a country in northern South America. It borders French... Guiana to the east, Guyana to the west, Brazil to the south, and the Atlantic Ocean to the north. Suriname was a former colony of the British and of the Dutch, and was previously known as Dutch Guiana. Suriname achieved independence from the Netherlands on 25 November 1975. At just under 165,000 km Suriname is the smallest sovereign state in South America . It has an estimated population of approximately 490,000, most of whom live on the country's north coast, where the capital Paramaribo is located. The name Suriname may derive from a Taino group called "Surinen" who first inhabited the region prior to European arrival.
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Uruguay /ˈjʊərəɡwaɪ/, officially the Oriental Republic of Uruguay, sometimes the Eastern Republic of Uruguay; Spanish:... República Oriental del Uruguay pronounced: [reˈpuβlika oɾjenˈtal del uɾuˈɣwai] is a country in the southeastern part of South America. It is home to some 3.3 million people, of whom 1.8 million live in the capital Montevideo and its metropolitan area. An estimated 88% of the population are of European descent. Uruguay's only land border is with Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil, to the north. To the west lies the Uruguay River and the estuary of the Río de la Plata to the southwest. To the southeast lies the southern part of the Atlantic Ocean. With an area of approximately 176,000 square kilometres , Uruguay is the second-smallest nation in South America by area, after Suriname. Colonia del Sacramento, one of the oldest European settlements in the country, was founded by the Portuguese in 1680. Montevideo was founded by the Spanish in the early 18th century as a military stronghold. Uruguay won its independence in 1811–28 following a three-way struggle between the claims of Spain, Argentina and Brazil.
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Argentina /ˌɑrdʒənˈtiːnə/, officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by... land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires. It is the eighth-largest country in the world by land area and the largest among Spanish-speaking nations. Argentina's continental area is between the Andes mountain range in the west and the Atlantic Ocean in the east. It borders Paraguay and Bolivia to the north, Brazil and Uruguay to the northeast, and Chile to the west and south. Argentine claims over Antarctica, as well as overlapping claims made by Chile and the United Kingdom, are suspended by the Antarctic Treaty of 1961. Argentina also claims the Falkland Islands and South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands, which are administered by the United Kingdom as British Overseas Territories. A recognised middle power, Argentina is Latin America's third-largest economy, with a "very high" rating on the Human development index.
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