On April 13, some 10,000 people turned out in Moscow for an anti-Kremlin rally to denounce Russian state television's coverage of the Ukraine crisis—which portrays the new government in Kiev as a "fascist junta" under the control of the US. Some of those who took part in the "March of Truth" carried blue-and-yellow Ukrainian flags. One woman, wearing a traditional Ukrainian wreath of flowers on her head, held a sign with President Vladimir Putin's picture and the words: "Stop lying." Among those who spoke to the crowd was Andrei Zubov, a history professor who was fired from the prestigious Moscow State Institute of International Relations last month after criticizing Russia's military intervention in the Crimea, comparing it with Nazi Germany's annexation of Austria on the eve of World War II. Zubov told the crowd that by lying to the Russian people on television, the government is leading the country toward "an abyss." (AP, April 13; Global Voices Online, March 27; Reuters, March 24)

Spontaneous protests broke out in the town of Celendín, in the highlands of Peru's Cajamarca region, after the April 8 arrest at a National Police road checkpoint of six members of the "Guardians of the Lagunas," the campesino vigilance committee that has established an encampement to protect lakes threatened by the Conga gold mine project. The six, stopped on their way to the encampement, were charged with "crimes against the public peace" and illegal bearing of arms. They were removed from the region to the coastal city of Chiclayo, where they continue to be held. Among the detained is Fredy García Becerra, mayoral candidate for the local municipal district of Huasmín with the Frente Amplio party. (Celendin Libre, April 11; La Republica, April 10; Celendin Libre, April 9; Celendin Libre, April 8)

Emilio Marichi Huansi, the apu or traditional chief of the indigenous Shawi community of Santa Rosa de Alto Shambira (Pongo de Cainarachi district, Lamas province, San Martín region), was assassinated April 5—two days before the opening a meeting of apus that had been called by the Shawi Regional Federation of San Martín (FERISHAM) to discuss the process of demarcating and titling the group's ancestral territories. FERISHAM said in a statement that he was killed by sicarios (hitmen) and that he had received threats from local "mafias" and "traffickers in land" who oppose the process of demarcation. (Kaos en La Red, April 12; Servindi, April 10)

More than 1,500 Military Police were mobilized April 11 to evict thousands of squatters who had recently taken over an abandoned office complex in Rio de Janeiro. Brazilian media reported that most of the squatters left peacefully, but others resisted, sparking pitched street battles with police. Protesters chanted "We want houses!," and some hurled bricks and Molotov cocktails at police and set several vehicles on fire. Four buildings were also set aflame.  Authorities reported 12 injured and 26 detained, including six minors. The squatted complex was known as Telerj Favela, because it had been the offices of the Telerj, the state telecommunications company, before it was recently vacated. (SMH, April 12; Europa Press, April 12; EuroNews, April 11)

A Colombian activist for restitution of usurped lands who was supposedly under special government protection was killed April 9. Colombia's official human rights ombudsman said Jesús Adán Quinto—who had previously reported that agents assigned to protect him had failed to show up—was killed by sicarios (hitmen) as he stepped outisde his home at Turbo in Urabá region of Antioquia department. Quinto was a leader of the displaced population from Cacarica (Riosucio muncipality, Chocó department), a self-declared "peace community" where the Afro-Colombian campesinos have been massively targetted by paramilitary forces since announcing their non-cooperation with all armed actors in 1999. Quinto's fellow activist Carmen Palencia told AFP news service that the people now occupying the lands of the displaced are hiring assassins to terrorize those those who demand return of usurped properties. She said there have been 70 people associated the peace community killed in similar circumstances since 2005. The violence-torn region of Urabá straddles the north of Antioquia and Chocó departments. (AFP, El Espectador, Justicia y Paz Colombia, April 9)

Peru's President Ollanta Humala on April 10 announced that a special police operation has resulted in the arrest of 24 operatives of the Sendero Luminoso guerilla movement. Speaking from Canada, where he was on an official visit, Humala said the detained were leaders of the Movement for Amnesty and Fundamental Rights (MOVADEF), which advocates for prisoners held in connection with the guerilla movement. The operation, dubbed Perseo 2014, coordinated armed forces and National Police units, netting arrests in Lima and five other regions of the country. Among the detained are MOVADEF co-founders Alfredo Crespo and Manuel Fajardo, both attorneys who defended imprisoned Sendero leader Abimael Guzmán. Local media in Peru reported that also among the detained was Walter Humala, a popular folksinger and cousin of the president, who has declared himself an admirer of Guzmán. Authorities said they had proof that MOVADEF is an organ of the guerilla movement, with a police source saying that Crespo went by the code-name "Lucas" in his dealings with Sendero leaders, and Fajardo by the nom de guerre "Bartolo." (EFE, Perú21, April 10)

A court in Salto de Guairá, Paraguay, on April 9 refused to grant house arrest to five imprisoned campesinos held since 2012 despite having never been brought to trial or convicted. The denial of their petition came on the 55th day that the five prisoners have been on hunger strike. The five, Adalberto Castro, Felipe Benítez, Néstor Castro, Rubén Villalba and Amado Quintana, were arrested during the June 2012 violent eviction of peasant squatters at Curuguaty, in which 11 campesinos and five police offers lost their lives. The five, who deny their guilt in any slayings, have been tranferred against their will to a military hospital. (Prensa Latina, April 9; Radio Mundo Real, March 14)

The Aché indigenous people of Paraguay on April 8 brought suit in a court in Argentina demanding reparations for "genocide" carried out under the late Paraguayan dictator Alfredo Stroessner. The Aché are being represented by Spanish jurist Baltasar Garzón, and chose to bring the case in Argentina under the doctrine of "universal jurisdiction" for crimes against humanity, asserting that justice is not possible in Paraguay's own courts. "We still feel enormous pain in our hearts and minds," said Aché leader Ceferino Kreigi Duarte in a press conference announcing the suit. "For this reason we today demand the Paraguayan state must answer for all this damage, not only to our community but to all the peoples of Paraguay who were victims of the dictatorship." Under Stroessner's 1954-1989 rule, the Aché people, who live in the riverine forests of Paraguay's east, saw their population diminish by 60% due to forced relocations, seizures of traditional lands, and abduction of the young to serve as virtual slaves in domestic labor. Most of the population plunge took place in the first five years of the 1970s. (AP via Excélsior, Mexico; EFE via Radio Caracol, Colombia, April 8)