The City Council of Berkeley, Calif., is to vote Feb. 15 on a resolution to invite Guantánamo Bay detainees who have been cleared of wrongdoing to resettle in the town. Of the 38 detainees that have now been cleared, Berkeley would invite two: a Russian ballet dancer and an Algerian who was once a top-rated Italian chef in Austria. "Our hearts are with all those people who were never tried, held for years and in some cases tortured," said Wendy Kenin, chair of the city's Peace and Justice Commission. "As a municipality, this is one thing we can do to right some wrongs of our federal government."

Speaking at the University of Utah's Hinckley Institute of Politics on Feb. 7, US Army Undersecretary Joseph Westphal—the army's second highest ranking civilian official—invoked an "insurgency" mounting in Mexico. His talk focused on the Middle East and South Asia, but in response to a student's question about strategic blind spots in US foreign policy, Westphal said: "One of them in particular for me is Latin America and in particular Mexico. As all of you know, there is a form of insurgency in Mexico with the drug cartels that’s right on our border."

In recent days, Facebook groups numbering several hundred members have been calling for "day of rage" protests in Libya on Feb. 17. An initiator of the call, Jamal al-Hajji, who has joint Libyan and Danish citizenship and has spent time in prison in the past for his criticism of the Moamar Qadaffi regime, was detained on Feb. 1 for an alleged hit-and-run accident, which he denies. International human rights observers say he has been targeted for his activism.

Hundreds of thousands of demonstrators flooded Cairo's iconic Tahrir Square and towns across Egypt Feb. 8, in the biggest show of defiance to President Hosni Mubarak since the protests began. The immense crowd hailed as a hero Google executive Wael Ghonim whose Facebook site helped launch the protest movement on Jan. 25, and who was released the previous day after having been detained and held blindfolded for 12 days. Many protesters carried the symbols of the Internet social networks Facebook and Twitter, which have been vital mobilizing tools for the opposition. While larger crowds gather daily to protest, several thousand occupy Tahrir Square around the clock, sleeping under plastic sheets or under army tanks. (AFP, BBC News, Feb. 8)

Venezuela's President Hugo Chávez threatened to throw Coca-Cola out of the country if the company does not settle a pay dispute with striking workers. In comments broadcast on state TV Feb. 4, Chávez said his government would support the strikers in their "fight against capitalism." He added: "If Coca-Cola doesn't abide by the constitution and laws then we can live without Coca-Cola. Coca-Cola is not indispensable. Who said you need Coca-Cola to live? Sugar cane juice is really good, or guava juice—I just had one."

Since early December, hundreds of private contractors of multinational banana corporation Banacol have illegally invaded and occupied the lands of Afro-Colombian "peace communities" in the Curvaradó river basin of Chocó department, in order to clear the area for banana cultivation. The lands are part of a "humanitarian zone" declared by the local communities, where all armed actors in Colombia's civil conflict are unwelcome. Since the new wave of land invasions began, there has been a visible presence within this zone of right-wing paramilitary groups.

Egyptian security forces in Rafah, the Sinai peninsula town bordering the Gaza Strip, came under attack Feb. 7 by gunmen believed to be from the radical Islamist group Takfir Wal-Hijra. An officer and a civilian were injured in the two-hour clash, which began when militants fired rocket-propelled grenades at a military patrol. The Rmeilat Bedouin tribe reportedly joined with with the security forces to push back the militants.

Adherents of the Ecuadoran indigenous federation CONAIE rallied outside a Quito courthouse Feb. 7 to demand the release of three leaders of the Shuar people from the Amazonian province of Morona Santiago who were arrested last week in the September 2009 slaying of a local teacher in the region, Bosco Wizuma. One of the three, José Acacho, is charged with "terrorism" for inciting protests over La Voz de Arutam radio station which allegedly resulted in the killing. CONAIE leader Marlon Santi threatened protests that would "shake the country" if the men are not freed. The Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of the Ecuadoran Amazon (CONFENAIE), a regional CONAIE affiliate, accused President Rafael Correa's government of "criminalizing protest," and called for the Inter-American Court of Human Rights to intercede in the case. (El Telégrafo, Quito, AFP, Feb. 7; AFP, Feb. 4)