Uruguay
An overhelmingly agricultural nation, Uruguay is known in some circles as the Switzerland of South America, not presumably for its record in banking but for the relative calm that transpired after peace accords between the government and the leftist guerrillas in the 1980s. In the 2010 elections a former rebel combatant Jose Mujica won the presidency for the Frente Amplia. Reliant on the stability of the economies of neighboring Argentina and Brazil, Uruguay pulled itself out of an almost decade long recession in 2009.
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Richard McColl - I am a freelance writer from deepest darkest London but for the past 10 years or so I have been maintaining my extended "writing break" ...