The Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) guerillas have declared a unilateral cease-fire, while still maintaining the right to “self-defense” against Turkish forces. “We are renewing our declaration to halt attacks against the Turkish army,” said PKK official Abdul Rahman Chaderchi, speaking… Read morePKK declares unilateral ceasefire
Leave it to Bollywood. Someone actually went and did it. At least “Springtime for Hitler” was satire. This wasn’t, I don’t think. Yesterday I was eating lunch at one of the fast-food curry joints in Little India (Lexington Ave. in… Read moreAuschwitz: The Musical
In what is being hailed as a landmark decision, a 4th US Circuit Court of Appeals panel ruled 2-1 that the federal Military Commissions Act doesn’t strip Ali al-Marri, a legal US resident, of his constitutional right to challenge his… Read more4th Circuit rules for “enemy combatant”
Despite recent denials by the Ethiopian regime, Der Spiegel corroborates June 11 that “terror suspects have been questioned by US officials in Ethiopia after being transferred from Somalia and Kenya. The captives included Europeans who were detained, interrogated and then released without charge.” Up… Read moreUS agents interrogate “renditioned” suspects in Ethiopian prisons
On May 28, some 200 Nicaraguan women marked International Day of Action for Women’s Health with a protest in Managua to demand the decriminalization of therapeutic abortion. Dozens of vehicles formed a caravan that drove past the Supreme Court, the… Read moreCentral America: women protest abortion bans
On June 1 a group of Mexican soldiers opened fire on an extended family riding in a van in Sinaloa de Leyva municipality, in the northwestern state of Sinaloa. According to the Secretariat of National Defense (SEDENA), the soldiers fired… Read moreMexico: six killed at army roadblocks
As of June 6 Mexican authorities had still not arrested four suspects in the May 15 murder of environmental activist Aldo Zamora, despite pressure from Greenpeace Mexico, human rights groups and federal legislators. Four assailants ambushed Zamora and his 16-year-old… Read moreMexico: environmental activist murdered
Erick Sosa Villavicencio, a leader of the protest movement in Oaxaca, was freed at dawn on June 9 from the Federal Center of Social Readaption in the Mexican border city of Matamoros. The brother of Flavio Sosa Villavicencio, director of… Read moreMexico: Oaxaca protest leader Erick Sosa released
Two Colombian soldiers assigned to counter-guerilla operations in the southern part of the country were arrested June 10 for slaying six unarmed civilians, including a child, during a killing spree early the previous day. The soldiers appeared to be drunk… Read moreColombia: soldiers arrested in killing spree
A suspected suicide blast in the middle of a Nairobi street June 11 has left at least one dead and dozens injured. The blast occurred during rush hour near the Ambassadeur Hotel in the city’s packed central business district. It… Read moreNairobi terror blast: Islamists or Mungiki?
The rights group Global Witness charges in a new report that cocoa profits fueled the brutal civil war in Ivory Coast just as diamonds did in Liberia, with both the government and rebels profiting from the trade. The study finds… Read moreIvory Coast: “blood chocolate” fuels civil war
A Sri Lankan probe into rights abuses blamed on both security forces and Tamil Tiger rebels fails to meet international standards, foreign observers say. Experts appointed by the international community to observe the presidential commission’s investigation charge the most serious… Read moreSri Lanka: abuse probe inadequate
