On July 11 seven US trade associations—including the American Apparel & Footwear Association (AAFA), the US Association of Importers of Textiles and Apparel (USA-ITA) and the US Chamber of Commerce—sent a letter to US president Barack Obama on the situation in Honduras. The letter stressed the "particular importance" Honduras has "for the US textile and apparel supply chain" and called it "the linchpin to the Western Hemisphere supply chain for this sector. Honduras is the third largest market for US textile mill products (US exports were $1.4 billion in 2008), the fourth largest supplier of apparel to the US market and the largest DR-CAFTA [Dominican Republic-Central America Free Trade Agreement] supplier to the United States."

Two men armed with pistols shot Colombian indigenous leader Héctor Betancur Domicó dead the night of July 6 as he was leaving the offices of an indigenous organization in Tierralta in the northwestern department of Córdoba. Betancur Domicó was the leader of the Katío Embera community of Changarra, one of 17 small communities in the region, which has a total population of about 5,000 Katío Embera. The National Indigenous Organization of Colombia (ONIC) reported that more than 1,254 indigenous people have been killed by armed groups in Colombia since January 2002. (La Raza, Chicago, July 11 from AP)

The Los Angeles Times runs an op-ed July 10 entitled "Honduras' non-coup," by Miguel A. Estrada, identified as a partner at the Washington office of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher, a native of Honduras, and a member of the official US delegation to President Zelaya's 2006 inauguration. The kicker reads "Under the country's Constitution, the ouster of President Manuel Zelaya was legal." His argument is the same one we've heard over and over:

A former Bolivian interior minister Luis Arce Gómez, 71, was deported July 9 to La Paz, where he is accused of human rights violations. "I hope last night's removal brings justice to the people of Bolivia who were victimized by the reprehensible acts that this man committed," Michael Rozos, director of the US Immigration and Customs and Enforcement (ICE) office of detention and removal in Florida, said in a statement.

Colombian bounty hunters shot and killed one of three hippopotami which escaped from a private zoo owned by the late Medellín Cartel kingpin Pablo Escobar. The hippos broke out of the zoo, on the drug lord's Hacienda Napoles in Antioquia department, in 2006 and thrived in the nearby Magdalena River. Officials say the animals are a threat to people and crops, and that all three have to be destroyed. Colombian TV broadcast images of the carcass of the fully grown male hippo, surrounded by hunters and soldiers. Animal rights groups reacted angrily to the killing. "They could have been captured and kept in a safe place until a permanent refuge was found for them," said Marcela Ramírez of the local Animal Protection Network.

Heavily armed gunmen tossed grenades and opened fire with AK-47 assault rifles on Mexican federal police bases and checkpoints in the state capital of Morelia and in five other towns in Michoacán in the wee hours of July 11, immediately after the arrest of Arnoldo Rueda Medina, an alleged high-ranking member of La Familia drug cartel. Attacks were reported in Zitácuaro, Lázaro Cárdenas, Pátzcuaro, Taretan, Huetamo and Apatzingan—where assailants shot up a hotel where federal agents were staying. Five federal police agents and two soldiers were killed, with several more injured.

Followers of the Popular Assembly of the Peoples of Oaxaca (APPO) and Section 22 teachers' union marched in Oaxaca City earlier this month to protest the imprisonment of local activist Juan Manuel Martìnez Moreno in the 2006 slaying of New York video journalist Brad Will. Judge Salvador Cordero Colmenares issued an order June 20, condemning Martìnez Moreno to prison while the case against him is pending. An appeals court judge, Rosa Ilena Noriega Pèrez, on July 2 refused to issue an amparo, or judicial order protecting Martìnez Moreno pending further investigation—despite a history of serious irregularities in the case.

CIA director Leon Panetta met Philippine President Gloria Arroyo July 12 for a closed-door security meeting—days after the UN World Food Program suspended aid work in Mindanao in response to a wave of deadly bombings. Panetta's visit came just hours after Islamist militants in conflicted region freed an Italian Red Cross worker they had held for six months.