US citizen and accused al-Qaeda member Christopher Paul was sentenced to 20 years in prison for conspiring to conduct a terrorist bombing campaign against targets in the US and Europe.
An unexploded bomb forced the evacuation of the airport in in Mexico’s violence-torn Ciudad Juárez, while a bomb threat cleared the border city’s courthouse as federal officials were holding a security meeting.
Convicted drug kingpin Miguel Caro Quintero AKA “Michael Jackson” was extradited to the US after eight years in a Mexican prison. With his brother Rafael, he is said to have led the Guadalajara Cartel.
Federal, state, and local law enforcement in California, Minnesota, and Maryland arrested 50 people who the US Justice Department claims are operatives of Mexico’s Sinaloa Cartel.
An appeals court in Paris overturned the terrorism convictions of five French nationals formerly detained at Guantánamo Bay, finding that they had been improperly questioned by French authorities at the camp.
International arms smuggler Monzer al-Kassar was sentenced to 30 years in prison for conspiring to sell millions of dollars worth of weapons to Colombia’s FARC guerillas.
A prominent Kurdish lawmaker gave a speech in his native Kurdish in Turkey’s Parliament—in defiance of the law. Turkey’s state TV network cut off the live broadcast of the official, Ahmet Turk.
Having already barred pro-independence parties from the Basque Country’s regional elections, Spanish judge Baltazar Garzón went further and banned all their activities, closing their offices and websites.
Colombian President Álvaro Uribe clashed with the country’s Prosecutor General over the head of state’s proposal to re-criminalize possession of personal quantities of drugs.
French president Nicholas Sarkozy met in Paris with elected officials from Guadeloupe after the general strike in the French overseas department turned violent, with one union leader shot dead at a roadblock.
Haiti’s Provisional Electoral Council barred Lavalas candidates from the upcoming senate race, insisting it needs official confirmation from the party’s leader, exiled ex-president Jean-Bertrand Aristide.
A US federal judge placed 30,299 Haitians under final deportation orders, lifting a suspension of deportations instated in September, after four tropical storms ravaged Haiti in one month.
