A top Lebanese security official who was bitterly opposed to Syrian leader Bashar Assad was killed Oct. 19 in a car bomb in Beirut that also claimed the lives of seven others and left 80 more wounded. Gen. Wissam Hasan, head of the Information Branch of the Internal Security Forces, was one of eight killed in the mid-afternoon attack in the Christian district of Ashrafieh. The blast was the first car bombing in Beirut since 2008. Hasan led the investigation that implicated Syria and Hezbollah in the 2005 killing of former prime minister Rafik al-Hariri, and he had also been a close aide to Hariri. Al-Jazeera reported that he was believed to be involved in organizing support for the Syrian insurgents. The opposition March 14 coalition accused Damascus of being behind the attack. "Assad has repeatedly threatened to set fire to the region if the noose tightened on him," March 14 leader Fares Souaid told a television station. (Reuters, Lebanon Daily Star, Daily Star, Al-Jazeera, Oct. 19)

Provincial police have been mobilized to a spot on Highway 138 in northern Quebec where local Innu erected roadblocks outside the town of Sept-Îles over the weekend. Dissident Uashat-Maliotenam band members who say they've been shut out of the province's resource-development plan used trees, traffic cones and debris to block the highway, only allowing emergency vehicles to pass. The Uashat-Maliotenam band council distanced itself from the demonstrators, saying "in the immediate future, the band prefers mediation to resolve this crisis." Protesters say they have been systematically excluded from talks related to Quebec's Plan Nord, a mega-scheme to exploit natural resources in the region. Quebec wants to exploit mining, forest and energy resources in a 1.2-million-square-kilometer zone—an area more than twice the size of France. By the end of 2010, a total of 24 of the 33 First Nation communities in the impacted territory had signed agreements with the provincial government. (Sun News, Canada, Oct. 16)

After a three-and-a-half-year legal battle waged by Israeli human rights group Gisha, Israel's Ministry of Defense turned over a document entitled "Food Consumption in the Gaza Strip—Red Lines," detailing the policy of restricting the entrance of food to the Gaza Strip. Two versions of the document, in the format of PowerPoint presentations, were provided to Gisha over the Sukkot holiday, after the Israeli Supreme Court rejected the state’s appeal against disclosing the document on Sept. 5. The documents, produced in January 2008, established the minimum caloric intake required for the survival of residents. They cited a daily average of 2,279 calories per person, which could be supplied by 4 pounds of food, or 2,575.5 tons of food for the Gaza Strip's entire 1.7 million population. The Israeli Defense Ministry, which fought to keep the Red Lines documents classified, had argued to the court that Israel had a right "to adopt a policy of economic warfare" against Gaza's Hamas leadership. (UPI, Oct. 18; Gisha, Oct. 17)

Gunmen attacked a mosque in a village in Dogo Dawa village in Nigeria's northern Kaduna state Oct. 14, killing 22 worshippers as they were leaving after prayers. Authorities called it an attack by a criminal band against followers of a vigilante group rather than sectarian violence. But that same day saw multiple attacks in the northeastern city of Maiduguri, including an armed assault on a church that killed a married couple and their child in the city Gwange area. In a separate incident, the traditional chief in Gwange, Mala Kaka, was gunned down in his home. Kaka was close to Umar Garbai el-Kanemi, a local cleric who was the intended target of a suicide blast in July. The suicide attack, attributed to Boko Haram, killed five but left Kanemi unharmed. (AFP, Oct. 15; Reuters, Oct. 14)

In an Oct. 15 statement, Human Rights Watch called on Tunisian authorities to investigate a series of attacks by religious extremists over the past 10 months and bring those responsible to justice. The statement noted a letter sent in July to the ministers of justice and interior, detailing six incidents in which apparent Islamists assaulted artists, intellectuals and activists. Human Rights Watch said no progress had been made in these cases, and it meanwhile received reports of another such attack against the organizers of a festival in August. "The failure of Tunisian authorities to investigate these attacks entrenches the religious extremists’ impunity and may embolden them to commit more violence," said Joe Stork, deputy Middle East and North Africa director at Human Rights Watch.

Campesinos in Cajamarca, Peru, continue to organize round-the-clock vigilance at the proposed site of Yanacocha company's Conga gold mine, in response to reports of construction work at the concession bloc despite official assurances that the project is suspended. Organized in rondas (self-defense patrols), the campesinos are monitoring activities at the high-altitude lakes that would have to be destroyed for the project to proceed. Idelso Hernández of the Cajamarca Unitary Struggle Front said Oct. 12, "Now there are 1,200 people mobilized to protect the lakes. The comuneros have decided to maintain a permanent presence in the zone to block any effort by Yanacocha to transfer workers or equipment there." Some 600 National Police troops have also been deployed to the site.

Creditors of the troubled Doe Run Peru company voted to sell the controversial metal smelting complex at La Oroya, Junín region, to Citibank, Peru's Energy and Mines Ministry (MEM) announced Oct. 11. The New York financial giant will have responsibility for reorganizing the smelter's debts and environmental management plan, as well as those of another scandal-ridden project that will be transferred, the Cobriza gold and copper mine in neighboring Huancavelica region. After three years of being idled by government order over pollution concerns, the decrepit Oroya smelter, which has been dubbed "Peru's Chernobyl," resumed limited operations in July. The local dispute over the issue bitterly divided the local community, pitting campesinos who oppose the smelter against residents employed by Doe Run, who were laid off when the plant was ordered shut. Last year, Doe Run Peru was cited by MEM for resuming construction of a tailings containment area at Cobriza without approval. The mine is still officially halted pending an environmental impact review. (Diario 16, Oct. 13; La Republica, Andina, Oct. 12; MineWeb, July 30; El Comercio, Oct. 18, 2011)

On Oct. 10, the US Justice Department announced the seizure of more than $31 million in funds allegedly "connected to an international money laundering scheme run by a drug trafficking organization operated by members of the Sánchez-Paredes family," a Peruvian clan deemed by US law enforcement to be a drug trafficking organization (DTO). The funds were held in nine US banks, including Bank of America, Wells Fargo, and JPMorgan Chase, none of which have been charged with any wrongdoing. Additional moneys in three Peruvian bank accounts have also been frozen. The US Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York found that the family was using its gold mining interests as a front for cocaine trafficking: