In the latest in a string of violent incidents related to land disputes in Venezuela's western Sierra de Perijá, on June 30 Yukpa indigenous leader Carmen "Anita" Fernández Romero and her son Luis Adolfo were wounded in an attack near her village of Kuse. According to reports, some 50 men armed with rifles and machetes set upon an encampment Fernández Romero and her family had established on the local hacienda El Carmen, which she asserts is on usurped Yukpa traditional lands. Members of the army and Boliviarian National Guard reportedly werre on hand, but did not intervene as the men began beating Fernández Romero and her son. Just four days earlier, another of Fernández Romero's sons, Cristóbal Fernández Fernández, 19, was killed—reportedly in a beating by National Guard troops. He was the third of Fernández Romero's sons to have met a violent death in the past five years. Fernández Romero is currently hospitalized, recovering from her injuries. She has been under an official order of protection since July 2012 following threats against her, but local environmental group Sociedad Homo Et Natura, which supports the Yukpa land struggle, asserts that it is going unenforced. (Entorno Inteligente, La Guarura, Aporrea, July 1; Aporrea, June 24)

Peru's Unity Pact of National Indigenous Organizations on July 7 called on President Ollanta Humala not to enact Bill 3627/2013-PE, approved the previous day by the Congressional Permanent Commission. The Unity Pact said the approval represents "a huge environmental setback and a blow to the democratic rule of law." The statement charged: "Instead of strengthening environmental institutions, management and monitoring, these measures promote extractive activities, reward those who violate the law, reduce fines and relax the environmental standards." The bill's preamble states that it seeks to "simplify procedures and permits for the promotion and revitalization of investment in the Country." Among other measures, it would limit the period for the evaluation of environmental impact studies to 45 days, which the Unity Pact calls an unconstitutional abrogation of the right to public participation. (InfoRegión, July 8; Servindi, July 7; Los Andes, June 29)

Press reports in Peru that judicial authorities have opened an investigation into Interior Minister Daniel Urresti in connection with the murder of a journalist have sparked calls for his resignation. The former army general is reportedly suspected of being "intellectual author" of the slaying of Hugo Bustíos, a writer for Caretas magazine, who was attacked Nov. 24, 1988 by what is presumed to have been a group of soldiers in civilian dress at the hamlet of Quinrapa, Huanta district, Ayacucho, where he was covering the war against the Shining Path guerillas. Peru's Press and Society Institute issued a statement calling it "rudely offensive to the values of a democratic state" that Urresti remain at his post while facing a murder probe. The National Association of Journalists also called for Urresti to step down. The National Coordinator of Human Rights added that Urresti's continuation as interior minister, overseeing the country's National Police, "constitutes a grave risk for the security of family members and witnesses" that will be called in the investigation. Urresti, who took office in late June, denies any involvement in the slaying. President Ollanta Humala has stood by him.

Officials in Brazil warned June 26 that isolated indigenous groups in the Amazon rainforest face imminent "tragedy" and "death" following a rash of sightings in the remote area near the border with Peru. Experts with Brail's indigenous affairs agency FUNAI say the "uncontacted" indigenous bands are fleeing towards the border in response to incursions by illegal loggers into their lands. Asháninka communities in Acre state report a growing number of previously isolated bands appearing in their territories. FUNAI official José Carlos Meirelles said: "Something very serious must have happened. It isn't usual for such a large group of uncontacted indigenous people to approach in this manner. It is a disturbing and completely new situation, and right now we do not know what has provoked it."

Three leaders of Peru's Shining Path guerrilla movement were indicted July 1 in US District Court for the Southern District of New York. Those charged are Florindo Eleuterio Flores Hala, who was captured by Peruvian security forces in February 2012; and the brothers Victor and Jorge Quispe Palomino, who remain at large. The charges include conspiracy to provide material support to a foreign terrorist organization; narco-terrorism conspiracy; and two counts of use of a firearm in relation to a crime of violence. (Newsweek, July 2)

Mexico's El Universal reports June 18 that a protected witness testified to the Prosecutor General of the Republic (PGR) that members of the US Border Patrol collaborated with the Sinaloa Cartel in arms trafficking to the powerful criminal organization. The sworn testimony is being used as evidence in the case against the cartel's recently apprehended kingpin, Joaquin Guzmán Loera AKA "El Chapo"—who is accused, along with numerous other charges, of supervising the Gente Nueva gang, the cartel's armed wing.

Some 40,000 protested outside Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's office June 30 to oppose the government's official reinterpretation of the constitution to allow Japan's military a larger international role. Protesters chanted "Protect the constitution!" and "Stop war, stop Abe!" The change was officially announced the next day, asserting a right to "collective self-defense"—essentially, allowing use of the Self-Defense Forces in wars beyond Japan's shores. In announcing the change, Abe counterintuitively stated that "the risk that Japan will be involved in a war will be reduced further with [today's] Cabinet approval." Legal scholars contend the "reintrepetation" has no legitimacy without an actual change to the constitution, and Diet approval. (Japan Times, July 2; DW, Asahi Shimbun, July 1; Revolution News, AP, June 30) In reaction to Abe's proposed change, Japanese activists earlier this year submitted a Nobel Peace Prize nomination for Article 9, the constitutional provision under which Japan "forever renounce[s] war as a sovereign right of the nation." The Nobel Prize Committee has officially accepted the nomination. (Kyodo, April 11)

Leaders of indigenous tribes within the proposed Bangsamoro territory in Mindanao are demanding that their ancestral lands be excluded. "We cannot accept Bangsamoro as our identity. We have our own identity and this is the Erumanen ne Menuvu," datu (traditional elder) Ronaldo Ambangan said as he read the declaration of the Erumanen ne Menuvu tribe at the June 24 congressional consultations on the proposed Bangsamoro in Midsayap, North Cotabato. In Davao City, Timuay Alim Bandara, a Teduray leader, told the June 26 congressional committee hearing in Davao City that the Philippines' Indigenous Peoples' Rights Act had never been resepcted within the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM), the previous autonomous zone instated following the last peace accords with Moro rebels 15 years ago. He said indigenous peoples are expressing "our discomfort on the previous peace agreement," and demanding that their rights be respected under the new one. (Inquirer, Philippines, June 29)