More fodder for our ongoing Irony Watch. We have little doubt that Mengistu is guilty of genocide. But—as we have had the unfortunate duty to point out—so, it seems, are Ethiopia's current rulers, if not quite on the same scale. From AlJazeera, Dec. 12:

An Ethiopian court has found exiled Mengistu Haile Mariam, the former Marxist ruler, guilty in absentia of genocide, ending a 12-year trial.

In our last post about the Holocaust denail confab in Iran, we asked whether the rumors are true that anti-Zionist writer Norman G. Finkelstein is participating. Alan "torture could be justified" Dershowitz explores the question on the ostensibly liberal Huffington Post blog:

Mexican federal police searched the offices of Oaxaca's state police forces Dec. 8, seizing hundreds of weapons. The federal Public Security Secretariat said in a statement that the search was carried out to check the permits for weapons used by the state police. Ballistics experts also checked the seized weapons to match them against bullets used in recent shootings, the secretariat said.

From India's Zee News, Dec. 10, link added:

LONDON -- Protests are planned around the world on Sunday against the mass rape of women and girls allegedly by Sudanese government soldiers and allied militiamen in Sudan's western Darfur region.

Got your scorecard out? Quick, which side is the US backing here? From Reuters, Dec. 9:

N'DJAMENA - The Chadian army clashed with rebels in eastern Chad on Saturday during several hours of heavy fighting in the desert, rebel and government sources said.

The US and Ethiopia appear to be grooming the northern autonomous regions of Somalia—Puntland and Somaliland—as proxies to fight the Islamic Courts Union that controls the traditional capital, Mogadishu. So: should we be supporting this as a defense of freedom against Islamist totalitarianism, or opposing it as destructive imperialist meddling? Sound off, readers. From the independent Shabelle Media Network, Mogadishu, Dec. 7, via AllAfrica:

From NYC's The Villager, Dec. 6-12:

Drunk driver on Hudson Park bike path mows down cyclist

In a city where speeding cars and trucks rule the road and bicyclists ride at their own risk, the Hudson River Park bike path would seem to offer one of the safest places to cycle.

Pretty much dumb luck that they gunned this guy down before he hit anyone, which is why this isn't in the headlines. Perhaps blowback from Yemen's embroilment in the joint US-Ethiopia proxy war in Somalia? From SomaliNet, Dec. 6:

A gunman opened fire outside the U.S. Embassy early Tuesday, but was shot by Yemeni security guards and arrested before anyone else was wounded, an Interior Ministry official reported.