A US anti-kidnapping expert was himself kidnapped in northern Mexico Dec. 10, Coahuila state authorities revealed. Felix Batista—a veteran FBI agent now working for ASI Global Kidnap & Ransom Response of Houston who claims to have helped resolve nearly 100 kidnapping cases—was seized by gunmen in a mini-van when he stepped outside a restaurant in Saltillo to answer a phone call. He was apparently working under contract to private businesses and families. There was no word on whether a ransom has been demanded. (Milenio, Notimex, Dec. 15)

General Motors Mexico will temporarily shut assembly lines at three of its Mexican plants as part of an overall strategy to cut production due to falling demand, the company announced Dec. 15. The plants in San Luis Potosi and Ramos Arizpe (Coahuila state) factories in Mexico, which make Chevrolets, Saturns and Pontiacs, will both go offline from Dec. 22 to Jan. 5. The Silao factory (Guanajuato), which makes Chevrolets, GMC trucks and Cadillacs, will shut down from Dec. 22 to Jan. 8. The three plants have more than 10,000 employees—the bulk of the 13,000 GM jobs in Mexico. GM, now asking the US Congress for immediate cash injections to avoid collapse, announced two days earlier it would slash first-quarter production in North America by 60%. (Reuters, Dec. 15)

Members of the Stop CAFTA Coalition, along with allies in Central America and the Dominican Republic, have compiled a report that describes the trends and impacts of the first three years of the U.S.-Dominican Republic-Central America Free Trade Agreement (DR-CAFTA). The report, titled "DR-CAFTA: Effects and Alternatives” is the third in a series of reports by the Stop CAFTA Coalition; the first was published in September 2006 and the second in September 2007.

The Argentine government, the opposition and grassroots organizations all marked Dec. 10 as the 25th anniversary of the return of democratic rule after a bloody 1976-1983 military dictatorship. The Mothers (Founding Line) and the Grandmothers of the Plaza de Mayo—organizations of women demanding the return of youths disappeared during the dictatorship's "dirty war" against suspected leftists—demonstrated in the Plaza de Mayo to demand justice for the crimes of the period. "Let's look after democracy," said Tati Almayda, one of the leaders of the movement. "And let's get justice now, also, because the perpetrators of genocide are dying of old age—and the mothers are too."

Haiti marked the Universal Declaration of Human Rights' 60th anniversary with an official ceremony organized by the United Nations at the Foundation for Knowledge and Liberty (FOKAL), a nongovernmental organization formerly headed by Prime Minster Michele Duvivier Pierre-Louis. The event included the screening of a film, "The Dream of Water," as the opening of a human rights film festival. The Platform of Haitian Human Rights Organizations (PODH) also organized activities to celebrate the anniversary. (AlterPresse, Dec. 10)

On Dec. 10 human rights organizations in Latin America celebrated the 60th anniversary of the signing of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights by holding ceremonies, staging protests and issuing reports on the situation in their countries.

The Colombian human rights organization CODHES has released a new analysis, entitled "The numbers do not add up," challenging the government's statistics of claimed successes against illegal armed groups (principally the FARC). The armed forced claim some 114,000 killed, captured or surrendered over the last six years. Yet those armed groups, according to previous government estimates, do not exceed 30,000 members. Even allowing for recruiting to replenish depleted ranks, the figures indicate eight fighters killed every single day in Colombia—something not substantiated by any other sources. (Radio Australia, Dec. 14; BBC News, Dec. 13)

Enrique Portocarrero, dubbed "Captain Nemo" in Colombia, is accused of building up to 20 fiberglass submarines for narco-traffickers to haul cocaine to Central America and Mexico. Following a three-year investigation involving US and British intelligence, Colombia's Department of Administrative Security (DAS) arrested Portocarrero last month in the port city of Buenaventura (Norte del Valle department), where he apparently led a double life as a shrimp fisherman. A raid on Portocarrero's hidden "shipyard" in a mangrove swamp down the Pacific coast near Tumaco (Nariño department) turned up two of the vessels, each capable of carrying eight tons. (LAT, Dec. 14)