Argentina’s president was recovering tonight after an operation to remove her cancerous thyroid gland.

President Cristina Fernandez has thyroid cancer, but test results show that it remains limited to a lobe in the right side of her neck, and has not metastasised or spread into her lymph nodes, her spokesman said.

Paraguayan president Fernando Lugo has been diagnosed with cancer and will be required to undergo chemotherapy.

Former Roman Catholic bishop Fernando Lugo won a historic victory in Paraguay’s presidential election today, ending more than six decades of one-party rule with a mandate to help the nation’s poor and indigenous.