From AP, July 23: Republican John McCain on Wednesday credited the recent $10-a-barrel drop in the price of oil to President Bush’s lifting of a presidential ban on offshore drilling, an action he has been advocating in his presidential campaign…. Read moreOffshore designs or Iran diplomacy behind falling oil prices?
From the Uyghur American Association, July 21: Bus Blasts Kill Two in Southwestern China BEIJING — Two public buses exploded during the Monday morning rush hour in the city of Kunming, killing at least two people and injuring 14 others… Read moreChina: Kunming blasts signal growing unrest in countdown to Olympics
The 4th Circuit US Court of Appeals in Richmond, VA, issued a 5-4 ruling July 15 finding that if the government’s allegations against Ali Saleh Kahlah al-Marri are true, the president is empowered by Congress to hold al-Marri in a… Read more4th Circuit upholds indefinite detention of “enemy combatants”
On July 16, ICE agents arrested 18 immigrant workers at Colorado Precast Concrete Inc. in Loveland, Colo., after executing an administrative search warrant at the plant. The workers were arrested on administrative immigration charges. One is from El Salvador; the… Read moreICE raids Colorado concrete company
On July 15 at 5 PM, 50 agents from US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and 12 detectives from the Rhode Island state police simultaneously raided all six of the state’s courthouses, arresting 31 immigrants employed as maintenance workers by… Read moreICE raids at Rhode Island courthouses protested
From Human Rights Watch, July 21, via Congo Planet: Congo Peace Accord Fails to End Killing of Civilians Brussels — The killing and rape of civilians in the eastern province of North Kivu in the Democratic Republic of Congo continues… Read moreHuman Rights Watch: rapes, killings continue in Congo
New York’s Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) protests that detainees are being deported to countries that practice torture. On July 2, two Algerians were transferred from Guantánamo to the custody of the Algerian government—the first Algerians transferred from Guantánamo to… Read moreGitmo deportees “disappeared” in Algeria
Salim Ahmed Hamdan, a Yemeni who has admitted to being Osama bin Laden’s chauffeur in Afghanistan, went on trial at Guantánamo Bay July 21, in the first US war crimes trial since World War II. Hamdan pleaded not guilty to… Read moreAfghan interrogations ruled inadmissible in Gitmo tribunal
Wartime Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic was detained July 21 in Serbia, government sources in Belgrade report. He has been wanted by international authorities since 1996 on genocide charges. A statement by Serbia’s National Security Council, headed by President Boris… Read moreSerbia: Radovan Karadzic reported arrested
On the morning of July 17, after 16 hours of debate, Argentina’s Senate rejected a law proposed by President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner to raise the tax on soy exports from 34% to 44%. The Chamber of Deputies had approved… Read moreArgentina: senate kills export tax following farmer protests
In mid-July Citgo—the US oil distributor owned by the Venezuelan state oil company, Petroleos de Venezuela, SA (PDVSA)—began a program to distribute compact fluorescent lightbulbs (CFLs) to low- and middle-income families in Houston and Corpus Christi, Tex.; Lamont, Ill.; Lake… Read moreVenezuela’s Citgo gives U.S. families energy-efficient lightbulbs
Brazilian president Luiz Inacio Lula de Silva arrived in Bogotá on July 18 for a three-day visit to Colombia that included joining Colombian president Alvaro Uribe in the inauguration of a meeting of business leaders from the two countries. On… Read moreColombia hosts meetings on Amazon security
