The Mexican government is violating its own laws on genetically modified organisms (GMO) in the way it handles experimental corn crops, according to a complaint the Greenpeace organization has filed with federal environmental protection authorities. The group charges that the government has failed to monitor experimental transgenic corn adequately, has allowed the corn to be planted on private farms, and hasn't ensured that the plants are disposed of properly after cultivation.

Honduran campesino Henry Roney Díaz was killed on May 7 when soldiers, police and private guards tried to remove campesinos occupying an estate in the Aguán River Valley in the northern department of Colón. Díaz was a member of the El Despertar cooperative, one of the groups forming the Authentic Claimant Movement of Aguán Campesinos (MARCA). Manuel Vásquez, another member of the cooperative, was wounded in the same clash.

Popular Haitian singer Michel Martelly ("Sweet Micky") was sworn in as his country's 56th president on the morning of May 14 in a ceremony attended by outgoing president René Préval, members of Parliament and a group of foreign dignitaries, including Dominican Leonel Fernández, Honduran president Porfirio Lobo, Surinamese president Desiré Bouterse and former US president Bill Clinton. The event was held in a temporary structure set up in downtown Port-au-Prince for the Parliament after a January 2010 earthquake destroyed much of the capital. The actual administration of the oath of office took place without electric lights or a working sound system because of a brief power outage in the building. (AlterPresse, Haiti, May 14; Radio Kiskeya, Haiti, May 14; Radio Métropole, Haiti, May 14)

As of May 12 a group of Haitians left homeless by a massive January 2010 earthquake were facing possible expulsion from their displaced persons' camp at the Palais de l'Art, in Delmas 33 in the northeast of Port-au-Prince. A lawyer for the property's owner said he was asking the Interior Ministry to remove the camp residents within eight days. The residents reported that the owner had already started harassing them: on May 9 they found the doors to the toilets locked, and on May 10 the front gate was locked, trapping them in the camp. More than 150 families have been living at the site, according to the Jesuit Refugee Service (JRS).

This year many of the traditional International Workers Day marches on May 1 focused on demands for wage increases and for fighting the high cost of living following recent jumps in food and fuel prices.

Following up on earlier efforts to highlight human rights abuses in Puerto Rico, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) hosted a high-publicity fact-finding delegation in San Juan on May 2 and 3. The group, which included ACLU executive director Anthony D. Romero, political scientist Angelo Falcón, actress/choreographer Rosie Perez and recently retired baseball player Carlos Delgado, interviewed University of Puerto Rico (UPR) students, UPR rector Ana Guadalupe, union leaders, journalists, police chief José Figueroa Sancha and others.

Quetzalcóatl Leija Herrera, the president of the Center of Studies and Projects for Integral Human Development (Ceprodehi) in the southern Mexican state of Guerrero, was found dead in the early morning of May 4 near the main plaza in Chilpancingo, the state capital. According to the Forensic Medical Service, he was been badly beaten, especially on the head, and died of the injuries.

Tens of thousands of people participated in a silent "March for Peace With Justice and Dignity" in Mexico City on May 8 to call for an end to the US-backed militarization of Mexico's fight against drug trafficking. Protesters, most of them dressed in white, carried signs reading: "No more blood," "Justice," "Peace," "Let's stop the bullets," "Life isn't trash" and, above all, "We've had it up to here" (estamos hasta la madre). More than 35,000 Mexicans have died in drug-related violence since President Felipe Calderón Hinojosa sent troops into the streets soon after taking office in December 2006.