Niger's army reports soldiers shot dead seven Tuareg civilians "by accident" in a fire-fight with rebels from the Niger Movement for Justice (MNJ) in the Tiguidit region, some 80 kilometers northeast of the provincial capital Agadez. Officials say the civilians were shot when their four Toyota pickups strayed onto the battlefield. Two of those killed were well-known Tuareg traders, Sidi Amar and Ousmane Sidi. "This accident has deeply affected the army which has in its ranks a member of the family of one of those killed," read the Defense Ministry's Dec. 10 statement, claiming residents had been warned of military operations in the area.

On Nov. 27, Somali immigrant Nuradin Abdi was sentenced to 10 years in prison in US District Court in Columbus, Ohio, for his role in an alleged plot to bomb a shopping mall. Abdi, a cell phone salesperson before his November 2003 arrest, pleaded guilty in July 2007 of one count of conspiring to provide material support to terrorists. [In 2004, questions were raised about whether Abdi's mental state had been broken through torture while he was in immigration detention—see Immigration News Briefs, July 31, 2004]. Abdi first entered the US in 1995 with a false passport and was later granted asylum "based on a series of false statements," according to the Department of Justice (DOJ). A DOJ spokesperson said Abdi would be deported to Somalia after serving his prison term.

In a 71-page report released on Dec. 7, Human Rights Watch urged the Department of Homeland Security to upgrade its care and treatment of immigration detainees with HIV, the virus associated with AIDS. According to the watchdog organization, the agency fails to monitor medical care for detainees with HIV, and doesn't even know the extent of the problem among the nearly 30,000 people it holds in immigration detention on any given day. "The US government has no idea how many of these immigrants have HIV or AIDS, how many need treatment, and how many are receiving the care that is necessary," said Megan McLemore of Human Rights Watch's HIV/AIDS program.

On Dec. 7, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said he would give landowners in South Texas 30 days to consent to letting federal officials survey their properties to determine whether they are suitable for a planned border fence. If the owners don't give permission, Chertoff said the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) will turn to the courts to gain temporary access. If the agency finds the land appropriate for fencing and landowners refuse to cooperate, the department will seek court action to confiscate the land. (Los Angeles Times, Brownsville Herald, Dec. 8) Chertoff said the DHS needs access to 225 miles of noncontiguous land, most of it in Texas and Arizona, in order to build 370 miles of border fencing by the end of 2008."The door is still open to talk, but it's not open for endless talk," Chertoff said. "We won't pay more than market price for the land," he added.

On Nov. 23 the workers at the Vaqueros Navarra jeans plant in Tehuacan, in the Mexican state of Puebla, voted to be represented by the September 19 Union, which is affiliated with the independent Authentic Labor Front (FAT). The vote was 263 for the September 19 Union, 187 for the Revolutionary Confederation of Workers of Mexico (CROM) and just three for the Revolutionary Confederation of Workers and Campesinos (CROC). The CROM and the CROC are both connected to the centrist Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), the party that ruled Mexico from 1929 to 2000 and continues to dominate politics in Puebla; the CROC was the officially recognized union at the plant before the vote.

The US-owned Star, SA factory in El Progreso, Honduras, has fired 70 pro-union workers illegally since Nov. 7, when workers notified the Honduran Ministry of Labor of their intention to form a legal union. Star is located in El Porvenir Free Trade Zone, an industrial park for the tax-exempt assembly plants known as maquiladoras; the factory's US clients include the Oregon-based Nike, Inc., and the National Football League (NFL) and Anvil Holdings, Inc., which are both based in New York City.

On Dec. 4 the US Senate voted 77-18 to approve the Peru Free Trade Agreement (FTA, or TLC for its initials in Spanish). The House of Representatives ratified the treaty on Nov. 8, and the approval process now only requires the signature of US president George W. Bush, whose government negotiated the agreement. Bush may sign it the week of Dec. 10 in a ceremony attended by Peruvian president Alan Garcia. The FTA is expected to go into effect in July 2008 as the two countries celebrate their independence days, starting a process for eliminating all tariffs which is to be completed in 17 years. Peru exported goods worth $6 billion to the US in 2006; US exports to Peru were worth about $3 billion.

The draft Bolivian constitution approved by the country's Constituent Assembly in Sucre explcitly rejects foreign military bases on the national territory. "Bolivia is a pacifist State, which promotes the culture of peace and the right to peace, and seeks cooperation between the peoples of every region of the world," it reads. The document, yet to be ratified by popular vote, rejects war as a means of addressing international problems, while asserting the right of self-defense in case of aggression.