Afghan troops tore down part of a new "anti-Taliban" fence being erected by Pakistan on the border between the two countries April 19, leading to an armed clash with Pakistani forces. An Afghan defense ministry statement said the fighting took place between the Afghan border town of Shkin and Angoor Adda in Pakistan's Tribal Areas. "Today at 9:30 AM the Afghan army moved to the area and removed the fence," the defence ministry statement said. "Pakistani troops fired on our forces, and the Afghan army returned fire." Islamabad said the clash started when Afghan troops fired on a Pakistani border patrol. Pakistani military spokesman Gen. Waheed Arshad, told the BBC that the clashes were unconnected with the fence, which in any case was deep inside Pakistani territory. No casualties have been reported by either side.

Canada has officially protested the sentencing a Canadian Uighur rights activist to life imprisonment in his native China. Huseyincan Celil was convicted on charges of "splitting the motherland" and participating in terrorist groups. Celil, who was born in China's Xinkiang autonomous region but won Canadian citizenship as a political refugee, was arrested in Uzbekistan and deported to China last May. Canadian officials have since been trying to gain access to him, and are angry that he had to appear at his trial—in the Urumqi Intermediate People's Court in Xinkiang—without a Canadian diplomat present. Canada also said it was concerned about claims that Celil had been tortured.

Protesters demanding a share of taxes from Bolivian natural gas field remain in control of the key Yacuiba plant that pumps gas to Argentina. The protesters freed some 50 police officers held hostage for over 20 hours, but have not surrendered the pumping plant operated by Transredes, a Royal Dutch Shell subsidiary. A spokesperson for Transredes told Reuters that company officials had to "run for their lives" and that protesters looted the site, destroyed documents and set several vehicles on fire. The government has sent hundreds of troops to the scene. The government says the plant continues to function despite the protest and that exports to Argentina have not been interrupted. The government, which moved to nationalize Bolivia's energy sector last year, appealed for calm and invited protesters to a meeting in the La Paz.

The recent media coverage of para-politics in Colombia may be the final nail in the coffin for a proposed US-Colombia free trade agreement. Colombia's President Alvaro Uribe, Bush’s strongest ally in the region, not only has an administration filled with people conspiring with right-wing death squads, but allegations are surfacing that his family members housed paramilitary groups on their land in the 1990’s. Colombia's paramilitary state has made the South American nation the most dangerous place in the world for trade unionists. [Bloomberg, April 17]

Colombia's government announced April 18 an "experimental" cease-fire with the National Liberation Army (ELN) following talks in Havana. "The president has asked me to accept the ELN's experimental and temporary cease-fire proposal," Colombian peace negotiator Luis Carlos Restrepo told reporters. But Restrepo added that the government is still demanding that the ELN concentrate its fighters in a geographic area as part of any longterm peace accord. Chief ELN negotiator Pablo Beltran said earlier in the week the group was willing to temporarily halt attacks, but that to gather its fighters in one place would be "suicide." (Reuters, April 18)

A court in Urumqi, the capital of China's restive Xinkiang autonomous region, has sentenced the son of exiled Uighur nationalist and Nobel Peace Prize nominee Rebiya Kadeer to nine years in prison for secessionist activities. Ablikim Abdiriyim was found guilty of posting articles advocating secessionism on the Internet and related (nonviolent) offenses. (Radio Australia, April 18)

Hundreds of Buddhist monks rallied outside the parliament building in Bangkok April 17 calling for Buddhism to be enshrined in the constitution as Thailand's national religion. The country's military-appointed government plans to unveil a new national constitution this month. In 1997, a campaign to make Buddhism the national religion was dropped amid concerns that it would divide the country. Since then, an Islamist insurgency has flared in Thailand's south, leaving more than 2,000 dead in the last three years. Previous Thai constitutions have never declared a state religion, although the current constitution states that the king must be a Buddhist and upholder of all religions. (MWC News, April 18)

Some 25 Islamist militants calling themselves the "Taliban" have been killed in an army offensive near the northern city of Kano, Nigeria. Militants took an area of the city after attacking a police station on April 17. Nine Islamists have been captured, as well as a quantity of arms, the army says. Authorities say the action was launched to avenge the assassination of a radical Islamic cleric shot dead April 13. The militants, numbering some 300, killed at least ten when they took the police station. The unrest adds to rising tension, with opposition parties threatening to boycott the upcoming presidential polls. Islamists have maintained a low-level insurgency in the Kano region for last few years.