Seven Colombian soldiers and 11 guerillas were killed over the March 3-4 weekend in the heaviest combat in recent months. Gen. Alejandro Navas, commander of the military’s Omega joint task force, said engagements began early March 3 with a large… Read moreColombia: new violence on eastern plains
From Friends of Brad Will, March 1: Friends of Murdered US Journalist in DC Advocate for Investigation and End to Impunity The Friends of Brad Will attended the Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere Oversight Hearing Overview of U.S. Policy Toward… Read moreOaxaca: US Congress demands answers in Brad Will case
For the second time in eight days Feb. 26, teachers from Sections 22 and 59 of the National Education Workers Syndicate (SNTE) clashed over control of Technical Secondary School 172 at Benito Juárez, San Pedro Pochutla municipality, on the coast… Read moreOaxaca: more labor violence at divided schools
Diego Arcos Meneses, an indigenous Chol Maya campesino, has been arrested by Chiapas state police and charged with murder in connection with November’s massacre at the rainforest settlement of Viejo Velasco. The Chol campesino organization Xinich protests his innocence. The… Read moreChiapas: charges in jungle massacre; land conflicts escalate
On Feb. 26 the Center for Economic and Political Investigations of Community Action (CIEPAC), a non-governmental organization based in San Cristobal de las Casas in the southeastern Mexican state of Chiapas, received a note reading: “Enjoy your last day. We… Read moreChiapas: rights group threatened
Armed with clubs, rocks and machetes, at least 3,000 Nahuatl indigenous people blocked roads in Soledad Atzompa municipality in the central eastern Mexican state of Veracruz on Feb. 26 and 27 to demand the removal of the military from the… Read moreVeracruz: army accused in rape death
A petition from the Organization of Women’s Liberation in Iran (OWLI): To: all progressive organizations and all freedom-loving people Your help is urgently needed to release 36 women activists in Tehran! 4th March 2007, a gathering of women activists in… Read moreIran: women activists attacked
A statement from the Organization of Women’s Liberation in Iran (OWLI): Azar Majedi in a round table discussion with BBC Radio Scotland: Military attack on Iran is a human and environmental tragedy in the region! On 25 February 2007, Azar… Read moreIran: civil opposition rejects US aggression
A statement from the international women’s rights group MADRE: On February 26, 2007, Houzan Mahmoud, an international representative of MADRE’s sister organization, the Organization of Women’s Freedom in Iraq, received an e-mail signed by Ansar al-Islam, the notoriously brutal jihadist… Read moreIraq: death threats against women’s rights defender
Frederick Vreeland, a former deputy assistant secretary of state for Near East and South Asia affairs and former US ambassador to Morocco, has an op-ed in the March 3 New York Times on the usually obscure crisis in Western Sahara,… Read moreWestern Sahara makes NYT op-ed page —but not Sahrawi perspective
Twelve Islamic militants were convicted of terrorism-related charges in Morocco March 2, including eight with alleged ties to al-Qaeda who supposedly had volunteered to fight in Iraq. The appeals court in Sale handed down prison terms of two to 15… Read moreTerror convictions, clemency in Morocco
Australian “peacekeeping” troops killed four in a raid on rebels in East Timor March 4, but their leader Alfredo Reinado escaped. Reinado, who deserted the army last year and is wanted for his alleged role in deadly clashes that brought… Read moreDisplacement crisis, growing Australian intervention in East Timor
