Opium production in Afghanistan has hit a record $3 billion this year, accounting for more than 90% of the world’s illegal output, according to a new report from the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC). Production is concentrated mainly… Read moreUN: Afghan opium bumper crop
The self-declared “autonomous municipality” of San Juan Copala and the Popular People’s Assembly of Oaxaca (APPO) announced they will hold a national meeting of autonomous municipalities, to take place at the indigenous mountain village September 15-16. APPO also said they… Read moreAPPO, Zapatistas hold national meetings on autonomy
The Colombian Army’s Third Brigade, based in Cali, was deeply penetrated by drug trafficking mafia, according to a recent criminal investigation. “What the prosecutors’ investigation has shown as it progresses,” reported Bogota’s Semana magazine Aug. 4, “is that ‘Don Diego‘… Read moreColombia: SOA instructors served narco mafia
Starting Aug. 20, Presidents George W. Bush and Felipe Calderon and Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper met in Montebello, Canada, to discuss North American integration. The purpose was to advance the little-known second phase of the North American Free Trade… Read moreEnergy, security top secretive NAFTA talks
On Aug. 9, 98 detainees at the federal immigration detention center in San Pedro, California refused to return to Pod 5 in an act of peaceful protest for health and dignity in their living conditions. Over 100 police, immigration and… Read moreICE detainees protest as deaths mount
On the afternoon of Aug. 19, ICE agents arrested activist Elvira Arellano on a city street in downtown Los Angeles and deported her to Tijuana, Mexico within hours. Arellano became an activist shortly after she was arrested in 2002 during… Read moreICE deports sanctuary activist
A string of blasts tore through the southern Indian city of Hyderabad Aug. 25, killing at least 38 people and injuring 60. Three bombs exploded in a packed auditorium where a laser show was under way at Lumbini Park, an… Read moreMore terror in Hyderabad
In a victory for the Bush administration, the full 4th US Circuit Court of Appeals will reconsider a ruling that the government should charge Ali al-Marri, a legal US resident and the only suspected “enemy combatant” on American soil, or… Read moreFeds intransigent on “enemy combatant”; apologize on bogus detention
Israel Corp., one of Israel’s major holding companies, is evaluating the acquisition of Peruvian utility Electroandes’ four hydroelectric plants, the government paper El Peruano quoted the Israeli company’s president Idan Ofer as saying. The US-based Public Service Enterprise Group (PSEG)… Read moreIsrael buys into Peru’s energy sector
In an operation dubbed “Hurricane,” Peruvian national police arrested at least 20 suspected Shining Path guerillas linked to cocaine trafficking in a series of simultaneous raids in Lima and the eastern rainforest region Aug. 13. More than 200 agents took… Read morePeru: raids target Shining Path
Peru’s President Alan Garcia, “afraid of foreign investors,” is sitting idly by as a U.S. corporation devastates the city of La Oroya. Missouri-based Doe Run’s toxic lead smelting operation has children breathing sulfur dioxide pollution up to 300 times the… Read morePeru: toxic pollution linked to US corporation
About 50 demonstrators gathered outside the Mexican consulate in New York City on Aug. 18 in an attempt to prevent Oaxaca governor Ulises Ruiz Ortiz from participating in a press conference and a meeting with local Mexican community leaders. Ruiz… Read moreNYC too hot for Oaxaca gov?
