Brazilian president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva made a brief official visit to Haiti on May 28. During the few hours before he headed off for a tour of Central America, Lula had a private conversation with Haitian president Rene Garcia Preval, took part in a signing ceremony for six agreements (including accords on agriculture, education and women's rights), and visited the headquarters of the United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH), a 9,000-member military force headed by Brazil.

On May 26 Chilean judge Victor Montiglio ordered 98 former police agents and military people to face trial for their involvement in the 1975 "Operation Colombo," in which 119 opponents of dictator Gen. Augusto Pinochet were kidnapped and murdered. This was the largest number of people tried to date in Chile for human rights violations committed under the 1973-1990 military regime, which executed or disappeared more than 3,000 people. The trial specifically cites the "permanent kidnapping" of 42 victims whose bodies have never been recovered.

Our May issue featured William Wharton's book review of A Tibetan Revolutionary, memoirs of Bapa Phuntso Wangye—a Chinese Communist Party militant who became a dissident and advocate of autonomy for his native Tibet. Our May Exit Poll was: "Will Tibet explode again during the Beijing Olympics? Is there potential for an alliance between the Tibetans and Han Chinese workers and peasants against the Beijing bureaucracy? How about between the Tibetans and the Palestinians?" We received the following response:

On May 28, a court in Salamá, Baja Verapaz, Guatemala, sentenced five former members of the Civil Patrols, a paramilitary network established by the army during the counter-insurgency war, each to 780 years in prison for the killing of 26 indigenous Maya villagers in the 1982 Río Negro massacre, in which 177 women and children lost their lives. The five, former Civil Patrol members from the hamlet of Xococ, will serve 30 years, the maximum allowed by law, and will have to pay damages to the families of the victims. Arrest orders have also been issued for army captain José Antonio Solares, who oversaw the patrol and remains at large.

A group of some 50 indigenous mayors, town councillors and community leaders, gathered in Sucre, Bolivia, for an appearance by President Evo Morales May 25, were subjected to public humiliation by a right-wing mob—forcing cancellation of the public ceremony called to deliver 50 ambulances and other aid for rural communities. Organized groups opposed to Morales surrounded the stadium where he was to appear, confronting police and soldiers with sticks, stones and dynamite. Morales cancelled his visit, and the security forces were withdrawn to avoid bloodshed.

At a May 13-16 People's Summit in Lima, Peru's indigenous organizations launched a a new alliance to defend their collective rights—and win power in the 2011 presidential elections. "We want a political instrument that is different from conventional parties. We are seeking a plurinational state that will include us," indigenous leader Miguel Palacín, the chief organizer of the summit, told IPS.

'Uncontacted' Amazon tribesmen" title="'Uncontacted' Amazon tribesmen" class="image thumbnail" height="75" width="100">'Uncontacted' Amazon tribesmenMembers of one of the world's last "uncontacted" peoples were spotted and photographed from the air in a remote part of Brazil's Acre state near the Peruvian border. The flights were undertaken by the Brazilian government to prove the existence of uncontacted tribes in a region under danger from illegal logging. One of the images, released May 29, shows two men covered in bright red body paint poised to fire arrows at the aircraft. Another photo shows about 15 near thatched huts, some also preparing to fire arrows at the aircraft.

On May 24, campesinos from Ejido Huizopa, Madera municipality, in the northern Mexican state of Chihuahua, launched a protest occupation of the Minera Dolores company's giant open-pit gold mine, which they say has been illegally established on their lands. The decision to launch the blockade was taken after two ejido leaders, Enrique Torres González and José Armando González, were arrested by Federal Preventative Police, later released without charge. The local company director Carlos García Droguett said the occupation places at risk a $200 million investment in the zone. (Excelsiór, May 29) Minera Dolores is owned by the Minefinders Corporation of Vancouver. (GeoMex.com)