Opium production in Afghanistan has hit a record $3 billion this year, accounting for more than 90% of the world's illegal output, according to a new report from the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC). Production is concentrated mainly in the strife-torn south of the country, where the Taliban—who banned poppy cultivation when they were in power—now profit from the trade, the report alleges. The reports says the area under opium cultivation rose to 193,000 hectares from 165,000 in 2006, while the harvest soared by more than a third to 8,200 tons from 6,100 tons. The amount of Afghan land used for growing opium was larger than the total under coca cultivation in Latin America, the report says.

The self-declared "autonomous municipality" of San Juan Copala and the Popular People's Assembly of Oaxaca (APPO) announced they will hold a national meeting of autonomous municipalities, to take place at the indigenous mountain village September 15-16. APPO also said they will send representatives to the Zapatista Encuentro of the Peoples of America, a summit on indigenous rights to be held at the Yaqui village of Vicam in Sonora state Oct. 11-14. (La Jornada, Aug. 17)

The Colombian Army's Third Brigade, based in Cali, was deeply penetrated by drug trafficking mafia, according to a recent criminal investigation. "What the prosecutors' investigation has shown as it progresses," reported Bogota's Semana magazine Aug. 4, "is that 'Don Diego' [a drug mafia kingpin] didn't just buy these officers in exchange for one-time favors, but that many of them belonged to his organization. They were part of the mafia and put their jobs in the Army at its service." Brigade commander Leonardo Gomez Vergara resigned Aug. 16 as a result of the investigation, and a dozen other officers have been arrested or are under investigation.

Starting Aug. 20, Presidents George W. Bush and Felipe Calderon and Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper met in Montebello, Canada, to discuss North American integration. The purpose was to advance the little-known second phase of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), called the "Security and Prosperity Partnership" (SPP).

On Aug. 9, 98 detainees at the federal immigration detention center in San Pedro, California refused to return to Pod 5 in an act of peaceful protest for health and dignity in their living conditions. Over 100 police, immigration and Coast Guard officials responded with threats and aggression against the protesters, according to activists from the Los Angeles-based group Homies Unidos, which organized support for the detainees. Homies Unidos activists said Coast Guard snipers armed with M-16s were on the roof of the detention center and in boats surrounding the facility during the protest, and one detainee was beaten by guards. Detainees' demands included adequate and nutritional meals; proper clothing; adequate medical treatment; respect and dignity; an end to persistent overcrowding; provision of necessary hygiene supplies; timely processing of their immigration cases; and recreation equipment to ensure mental and physical health. (Homies Unidos media alert, Aug. 12 & e-mail alert, Aug. 14)

On the afternoon of Aug. 19, ICE agents arrested activist Elvira Arellano on a city street in downtown Los Angeles and deported her to Tijuana, Mexico within hours. Arellano became an activist shortly after she was arrested in 2002 during a federal sweep at O'Hare International Airport, where she cleaned airplanes. She gained national fame when she took sanctuary in a Chicago church on Aug. 15, 2006, in an effort to avoid being deported away from her US-born son Saul, now eight years old. Her activism has since spurred churches around the US to initiate what they are calling a "new sanctuary movement" to defend immigrants and end deportations, especially those that separate immigrant parents from their US-born children.

A string of blasts tore through the southern Indian city of Hyderabad Aug. 25, killing at least 38 people and injuring 60. Three bombs exploded in a packed auditorium where a laser show was under way at Lumbini Park, an amusement park filled with weekend crowds. Minutes later, two other bombs ripped through a Gokul Chat restaurant, a popular eatery also filled with a Saturday night crowd. Indian President Pratibha Patil said the attacks were aimed at disturbing harmony in the city which has a mixed Muslim and Hindu population. (AFP, Aug. 25; IANS, BBC, Aug. 26)

In a victory for the Bush administration, the full 4th US Circuit Court of Appeals will reconsider a ruling that the government should charge Ali al-Marri, a legal US resident and the only suspected "enemy combatant" on American soil, or release him from military custody. The administration had asked the full 4th Circuit to review a three-judge panel's June 11 ruling. The Justice Department had argued that national security will be threatened if the administration is not allowed to indefinitely hold "enemy combatants" within the US.