![Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro replaced the state-controlled Petrobras's market-friendly CEO with a retired army general [File: Sergio Moraes/Reuters]](/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/petro.jpg?resize=570%2C380)
The selloff came after Bolsonaro criticised the firm’s fuel policies as being only pleasing to financial markets.
Jair Bolsonaro
![Argentina's economy shrank 10.4 percent in 2020 and is forecasted to grow by 4.5 percent this year, according to figures from the International Monetary Fund [File: Agustin Marcarian/Reuters]](/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/buenos.jpg?resize=570%2C380)
The region’s 4.1% forecasted growth for 2021 is dependent on effective vaccine roll-outs and recovery of the US economy.
![An elderly resident recieves the Sinovac's coronavirus vaccine at a drive-through vaccination station for senior citizens in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil [File: Pilar Olivares/Reuters]](/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/2021-02-05T193122Z_1599463657_RC2JML90D71P_RTRMADP_3_HEALTH-CORONAVIRUS-BRAZIL.jpg?resize=570%2C380)
President Jair Bolsonaro’s handling of pandemic and slow vaccine distribution has led to protests and investigation.
![The probe into Bolsonaro and his Health Minister Eduardo Pazuello follows requests by eight federal congressmen from the far-left Communist Party of Brazil for an investigation to be started [FileL Adriano Machado/Reuters]](/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/2021-01-27T131115Z_890991710_RC2DGL9XR1J2_RTRMADP_3_HEALTH-CORONAVIRUS-BRAZIL-VACCINES.jpg?resize=570%2C380)
Prosecutor-general probing government response after COVID-19 outbreak pushes hospitals in the Amazon to breaking point.
!['Prices soared after the Health Ministry expressed an interest in buying syringes," Bolsonaro wrote on social media [File: Eraldo Peres/AP]](/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/AP_20007638548499.jpg?resize=270%2C180)
Brazil’s government failed to buy hundreds of millions of syringes via auctions for its COVID-19 vaccination drive.
![Destruction of the Amazon rainforest rose to 11,088sq km (2.7 million acres) in 2020 [File: Andre Penner/AP Photo]](/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/AP_20228726943013.jpg?resize=270%2C180)
Destruction of the world’s largest rainforest in 2020 rose 9.5 percent from a year earlier according to government data.
![Weeks after Democrat Joe Biden defeated President Donald Trump in the United States election, Bolsonaro (left) still has not recognised Biden's victory [File: Kevin Lamarque/Reuters]](/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/2019-03-19T183908Z_1143068894_RC1D17EE2A00_RTRMADP_3_USA-BRAZIL.jpg?resize=270%2C180)
Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro has made a show of his admiration for and close ties to US President Donald Trump.
![Brazil's President Jair Bolsonaro leaves a polling station after voting in municipal elections in Rio de Janeiro [Ricardo Borges/AP Photo]](/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/AP_20320514289546-e1605556011735.jpg?resize=270%2C180)
Traditional parties score the most votes in Brazil’s two most populous cities in municipal elections.
![Deforestation in Brazil's Amazon increased in October for the first time in four months, government data showed on Friday [Amanda Perobelli/Reuters]](/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/2020-09-14T100306Z_457303423_RC2AYI9E64RQ_RTRMADP_3_CLIMATE-CHANGE-BRAZIL-PANTANAL-1.jpg?resize=270%2C180)
Brazilians are clearing the Amazon faster amid Jair Bolsonaro’s weakened environmental enforcement.
![A burning tract of the Amazon jungle near Apui, Amazonas State, Brazil [Ueslei Marcelino/Reuters]](/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/2020-09-07T120154Z_3964098_RC2OTI9EEQK4_RTRMADP_3_CLIMATE-CHANGE-BRAZIL-ANIMALS.jpg?resize=270%2C180)
Government agency records 17,326 hot spots in the rainforest in October, more than double the number of fires last year.
![Brazil's vice president Hamilton Mourao contradicted President Jair Bolsonaro by saying 'the government will not run away' from the vaccine it has invested resources in producing [File: Amanda Perobelli/Reuters]](/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/2020-06-25T000000Z_498761739_RC2CGH9GVHS7_RTRMADP_3_HEALTH-CORONAVIRUS-BRAZIL-VACCINE.jpg?resize=270%2C180)
The vice president’s comments come a week after Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro said Brazilians are not ‘guinea pigs’.
![Bolsonaro has presided over a surge of deforestation in the Amazon rainforest [File: Eraldo Peres/AP]](/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/AP_20237578891613.jpg?resize=270%2C180)
President Jair Bolsonaro took to social media to slam the Chinese-made vaccine his health ministry had agreed to buy.
Under the so-called ‘Car Wash’ operation dozens of company executives and politicians were jailed for taking bribes.
US Democratic presidential candidate criticised deforestation of the Amazon rainforest in the first debate with Trump.