At least four Somali government soldiers were killed and four civilians wounded when a roadside bomb hit a military vehicle in Mogadishu June 22. (Xinhua, June 22) Fighting has killed at least 38 since the “peace deal” was concluded in… Read moreSomali PM says peace deal is on —despite continued war
A week after border skirmishes were reported, Djibouti has accused neighboring Eritrea of illegally intruding into its territory. Djibouti’s Foreign Minister Mahmoud Ali Youssef told AlJazeera June 20 that Eritrean troops crossed the border on the strategic Bab al-Mandeb Strait…. Read moreDjibouti charges Eritrea in new incursion
In a bizarre irony for a state that rules in the name of Arab nationalism, Mauritanian authorities detained Mohamed Nema Oumar, publisher of Al-Houriya weekly, June 12, holding him for some 30 hours at a police station in the the… Read moreMauritanian journalist jailed —for protesting Israel
More Nigerian government troops are being mobilized to the Niger Delta region, in preparation for military action against the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), after a militant attack on Royal Dutch Shell’s Bonga oil field forced… Read more“Declaration of war” in Niger Delta
Sri Lanka’s air force launched helicopter attacks on rebel-held territory in the island’s north June 21, as ground troops killed at least four guerrillas of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in Mannar district. “Sri Lanka air force MI-24… Read moreAir attacks in Sri Lanka
In a brief Associated Press account of the sentencing of supposed ELF operative Briana Waters, the New York Times June 20 uncritically uses the loaded term “ecoterrorist” in the headline. If you actually read the blurb, it turns out she… Read more“Ecoterrorist” Briana Waters gets six years
Little more than a week after the Canadian government announced the completion of free trade talks with Colombia, that country’s national daily, El Tiempo, reports [June 14] that the Águilas Negras (Black Eagles), a violent right-wing paramilitary organization, has sent… Read moreParamilitaries threaten Canadian embassy in Bogotá
Two weeks after completing the exhumation of the largest mass grave found in Peru’s history, the Peruvian Forensic Anthropology Team (EPAF) returned to Putis [June 18] to begin work on exhuming four additional graves from a December 1984 massacre. As… Read morePeru: probe continues at massacre site
Chinese mining company Chinalco has gained rights to exploit copper at Peru’s Mount Toromocho, to be used in electrification projects in China. The $3 billion project will entail the removal of the entire town of Morococha (Yauli province, Junín region)…. Read moreChinese mining interest to relocate Peruvian peasants
Riots erupted in Osaka’s Kamagasaki district after a day-laborer was arrested June 12, and reportedly tied to a chair and beaten in police custody. When he was released the next day and told comrades what had happened, a protest of… Read moreJapan: day-laborers clash with police in Osaka
With the near-simultaneous Beijing Olympics and Hokkaido G8 summit about to open, China and Japan announce they have resolved their dispute over gas fields in the East China Sea. What a feel-good globalization-fest we are going to be subject to… Read moreChina, Japan to cooperate in offshore gas exploitation
What a telling medley of articles in the New York Times June 19. First this, from the front page: Deals With Iraq Are Set to Bring Oil Giants Back BAGHDAD — Four Western oil companies are in the final stages… Read moreExxon back in Iraq —ANWR next?
