Hundreds have taken to the streets of Mauritania's capital, Nouakchott, shouting and honking car horns in celebration after the army announced it had seized power and ousted long-ruling President Moawiya Ould Tayeh. Convoys of vehicles with people hanging out the sides shouting "Praise Be to God" and making victory signs paraded down one of Nouakchott's main avenues. (Reuters, Aug. 3)

From the Aug. 1 AP. Rights groups are protesting that 15 Uzbek refugees are to be forcibly repatriated from Kyrgyzstan. But this is after 440 were flown to Romania to seek asylum in Europe last week over the objections of Uzbekistan's government. This happened immediately before Uzbekistan announced it was giving the US military the boot—and may have helped precipitate it...

Russia says it is outraged by an interview with Chechen guerilla leader Shamil Basayev broadcast by the ABC TV network, and the foreign ministry summoned a senior US diplomat in Moscow to express its "strong indignation" over the show. In the interview, the warlord—who claimed responsibility for the deadly raid on a school in Beslan, South Ossetia—admitted he was a terrorist but said the Russians were terrorists too.

More than 320 people—half of them children—were killed in the Beslan attack last September. Russia is offering a $10 million reward for the capture of the warlord.

From Weekly News Update on the Americas, July 31:

In a 2-1 decision, a three-judge panel of the Oral Criminal Court in the Chilean city of Temuco acquitted six Mapuche rights activists in a retrial on charges of "terrorist illicit association." The ruling was handed down at the close of the trial on July 22, and was officially announced at a brief hearing on July 27. The regional prosecutor's office had charged lonkos (community leaders) Pascual Pichun and Aniceto Norin, Mapuche activists Jose Llanca Ailla, Jorge Huaiquin Antinao and Marcelo Quintrileo Contreras, and non-Mapuche sympathizer Patricia Troncoso with forming an illegal association to plan and commit "terrorist" acts--including incendiary attacks, theft and other crimes--on behalf of the Arauco-Malleco Coordinating Committee (CAM), a Mapuche land rights group. Most of the alleged crimes were against property and none posed a direct threat to life. "The Chilean government should take careful note of today's verdict and stop using the country's antiterrorism law in cases for which it clearly is inapplicable," said Jose Miguel Vivanco, Americas director for the US-based Human Rights Watch on July 22.

As we recently noted, Paraguay is currently seeing an upsurge of peasant and popular unrest—just as the US has established a new military presence there (ostensibly aimed at chasing down Islamic militants who have supposedly established the country as a base of operations). This report from Weekly News Update on the Americas, July 24, gives a picture of what kinds of landed interests Paraguay's peasants are facing:

The regime of Islam Karimov in Uzbekistan, heretofore attempting to play both sides in the Great Game between Moscow and Washington, appears to have finally and decisively thrown in its lot with the former. From Pakistan's Daily Times, via AFP July 31:

US military evicted from Uzbek air base
WASHINGTON — Uzbekistan has formally evicted the US from a military base that has served as a hub for its combat operations in Afghanistan, The Washington Post reported on Saturday.

A Muslim-owned store in a Leeds suburb was set ablaze the night of July 22 in what police called a racially motivated attack. No one was injured in the fire, which destroyed a convenience store in the suburb of Harehills. But the attack, which occurred across the street from the Bilal mosque in the working-class section of town, is being investigated as a "malicious incident." Iqbal Khan, the owner of the store, said the fire began when four white youths started setting merchandise ablaze, then ran out. He said he was able to escape before the store went up in flames.

Another attempted multiple simultaneous bombing on the London transit system, which fortunately seems to have failed--but not without sparking another death on the Underground, this time at the hands of the police. (Remember when London "bobbies" famously didn't carry guns?) And now police are conducting random searches on the New York subways. (NYT, July 22) A press release from the New York Civil Liberties Union (NYCLU) protests the policy as unconstitutional (thank goodness!), but doesn't say they will challenge it in court. From TruthOut: