Cochabamba: Evo agrees to meet with Table 18

Bolivia’s President Evo Morales has agreed to meet representatives of the dissident “Table 18” at the Cochabamba climate summit, and hear their demands.

Cochabamba: dissidents push limits of free speech

Defying an official ban, Aymara activists convened the dissident “Table 18” at the Cochabamba climate summit, on social conflicts related to climate change.

Cochabamba: will climate conference recognize “Table 18”?

As the World People’s Conference on Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth opens in Cochabamba, Aymara indigenous leaders are demanding an “eighteenth table” on Bolivia’s social conflicts.

Bolivia: Santa Cruz authorities won’t seat indigenous lawmakers

The conservative opposition government in Bolivia’s lowland department of Santa Cruz is refusing to recognize the election of two indigenous lawmakers to the local assembly

World War 4 Report to blog Bolivia climate confab

World War 4 Report editor Bill Weinberg is in Cochabamba, Bolivia, to cover the alternative conference on climate change that President Evo Morales has called. The conference opens tomorrow, and we hope to be posting daily on-the-scene reports.

Peru: campesinos block roads to protest mining operation

Residents of Islay, Peru, blocked the Panamerican Highway to protest a proposed copper project, which they charge places local water sources and agriculture at risk.

Bolivia: remains of “disappeared” guerilla exhumed

Bolivia’s Justice Ministry announced that the remains of a presumed “disappeared” follower of Che Guevara’s guerilla movement were exhumed in the General Cemetary of La Paz.

Masonic connection seen in Bolivian separatist plot

The government of Evo Morales charges that elite Masonic lodges helped organize and finance the “terrorist” conspiracy to launch a secessionist movement in Santa Cruz department.

Campesino, squatter actions rock Bolivia

One was killed as police evicted squatters in Santa Cruz, while campesinos ransacked the intallations of a Sumitomo-owned mining company in Potosi to protest water pollution.

Colombia: indigenous journalist assassinated

Indigenous journalist Mauricio Moreno Medina, founding member of a community radio station for the Pijao people, was murdered by unknown assailants at his home in Tolima department.

Colombia: FARC to release hostages —despite new government raids

Colombia’s Sen. Piedad Córdoba is overseeing the release of two soldiers held by the FARC guerillas, even as authorities claimed a blow against the FARC’s financial networks.

Colombia: drug recrim on hold —sort of

Colombia’s President Alvaro Uribe announced that pending a decision on the penalty for possession, police will for now only be permitted to confiscate drugs rather than make an arrest.