From the Committee in Solidarity with the People of El Salvador (CISPES), March 11: Central American Solidarity Activists Dispute Department of Justice Order Washington DC — The Committee in Solidarity with the People of El Salvador (CISPES), illegally targeted in… Read moreJustice Department harasses Salvador solidarity committee
A gay teenager who sought sanctuary in the UK after his boyfriend was executed by the Iranian authorities now faces the same fate after losing his legal battle for asylum. Mehdi Kazemi, 19, came to London to study English in… Read moreGay Iranian teen denied asylum in UK after mullahs hang boyfriend
German activist Martin Kramer, en route to Japan to prepare for the Hokkaido G8 summit protests, was arrested by police in the city of Vanino in the Habarovsk region of the Russian Far East March 3. He was turned over… Read moreAnti-globalization activist detained in Russia, denied entry to Japan
The US State Department’s new annual human rights report accuses China of “extrajudicial killings, torture and coerced confessions of prisoners and the use of forced labor.” Russia and Sudan were also especially criticized. Ten countries were named as under “unaccountable… Read moreWhite House bashes China torture, vetoes bill banning torture
A Chinese passenger jet en route to Beijing from the Xinjiang region (known as Uighurstan or East Turkestan to its indigenous inhabitants, the Turkic and Muslim Uighur people) was forced to make an emergency landing March 7 after the flight… Read moreChina: Uighur militants busted; riots in Tibet
Kenya has largely disappeared from the headlines, and what is reported generally has an optimistic slant—a new power-sharing accord is hoped to end the violence. Meanwhile, the situation seems to be escalating to open war. On March 10, the armed… Read moreKenya: land tenure fuels violence
The Israeli government March 9 approved construction of a 330-unit housing project in Givat Zeev, a West Bank settlement already home to about 10,000 settlers. The project began in 1999 but was suspended when the second Intifada broke out the… Read moreIsrael approves new settlement bloc —”slap in face” to peace process
A town meeting in Brattleboro, VT, voted 2,012-1,795 March 4 to approve a measure calling on the town’s police to arrest and indict Bush and Cheney if they enter the municipality. The smaller village of Marlboro passed a similar measure… Read moreVermont towns vote to arrest Bush, Cheney
With a boycott of the March 9 election called by parties barred from participation because of their presumed links to the armed separatist group ETA, abstentionism in Spain’s Basque Country was at 35%—ten points higher than the national average. Elections… Read moreSpain: Socialists take Basque Country amid widespread abtentionism
At a massive assembly in the Roberto Clemente Coliseum in San Juan on March 5, some 10,000 members of the Teachers’ Federation of Puerto Rico (FMPR) almost unanimously backed the union leadership’s recommendation to suspend a strike that started on… Read morePuerto Rico: “truce” in teachers strike
Colombian trade, industry and tourism minister Luis Guillermo Plata was in New York on March 8 to push the Free Trade Agreement (FTA, or TLC in Spanish). Accompanied by Rep. Joseph Crowley (D-NY) and other officials, Plata participated in a… Read moreNew Yorkers confront Colombian trade minister on FTA
At a Feb. 29 press conference in Mexico City, researchers from the Economic Investigations Institute (IIEC) of the Autonomous National University of Mexico (UNAM) gave a generally negative assessment of the economic impact of the 14-year-old North American Free Trade… Read moreMexico: NAFTA under fire from all sides
