Royal Dutch Shell has shut down a tenth of Nigeria’s oil production, after armed militants kidnapped four foreign oil workers and blew up a major pipeline Jan. 11. The incidents followed attacks on pipelines owned by the Nigerian state-owned oil… Read moreNigeria: headed for civil war?
New York’s Jewish weekly The Forward weighs in on the recent imbroglio over supposed anti-Semitic comments by Venezuela’s President Hugo Chavez. Venezuela’s Jews Defend Leftist President in Flap Over Remarks By MARC PERELMAN January 13, 2006 The Venezuelan Jewish community… Read moreVenezuelan Jews defend Chavez in anti-Semitism flap
From Reuters, Jan. 10: U.S. soldiers fed up with almost daily bomb attacks on their patrols near Iraq’s main oil refinery are taking drastic measures to fight their shadowy enemy — they’re walling in an entire town. Army bulldozers have… Read moreIraq: US walls off towns with sand berms
From DPA, Jan. 9, via United Arab Emirates’ Khaleej Times: ISLAMABAD – Pakistan on Monday said it has launched a strong protest with the Afghan-based Coalition Forces over weekend firing from across the border that killed eight people in the… Read moreAfghan war spills into Pakistan
From Newsday, Jan. 9: [A] French engineer abducted Dec. 5 apparently was dumped on a Baghdad street by his fleeing captors and recovered by U.S. troops, who turned him turned over to the French Embassy on Sunday, according to Iraqi… Read moreIraq: jihadis don’t read newspapers
Zapatista leaders and family members held a small, private funeral for Comandante Ramona somewhere in the territory of the mountain hamlet of Oventic Jan. 7. The exact location was not revealed. (El Universal, Jan. 7) In a Jan. 9 communique,… Read moreZapatistas mourn Ramona; national tour rescheduled
Talli Nauman writes for Mexico’s El Universal, Jan. 7 via Chiapas95: Representatives of the first peoples of northern Mexico and the southwestern United States have issued a joint communique’ they hope will set the new year’s agenda for protection of… Read moreIndigenous peoples set environmental agenda for US-Mexico border
On Jan. 6, just as the Zapatista national tour (dubbed the “Other Campaign” in reference to the presidential campaigns now underway in Mexico) had reached the town of Tonala, in the Pacific coastal zone of Chiapas state, word arrived that… Read moreZapatista tour halts for funeral of Comandante Ramona
Chadian gunmen killed an African Union peacekeeper and wounded at least 10 others in an attack in the Darfur region near the Sudan-Chad border, Sudanese authorities said Jan. 7. It was not clear whether the attackers were from the Chadian… Read moreChad in “state of war” with Sudan; World Bank yanks pipeline loan
As if the controversy over the Basque country wasn’t enough, now a Spanish general rattles the proverbial sabre over moves by Catalonia, Spain’s most industrialized region, to seek greater autonomy from Madrid. A lovely irony: as the world waits for… Read moreSpain: top general warns of war over Catalan autonomy
From Reuters, Jan. 5: New Orleans residents and supporters angrily confronted demolition workers in one of the city’s hardest-hit neighborhoods on Thursday amid heated debate over the proposed razing of houses destroyed by Hurricane Katrina. Officials said the demolition workers… Read moreNew Orleans: residents resist demolition in Lower Ninth
From CNN, Jan. 5: Television evangelist Pat Robertson suggested Thursday that Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s stroke was divine retribution for the Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, which Robertson opposed. “He was dividing God’s land, and I would say, ‘Woe unto… Read moreRobertson: God smote Sharon
