On Oct. 10, rural popular organizations mobilized in several regions of Colombia, marching towards the capitals of their respective departments. They are protesting the pending free trade agreement with the United States, legislation which would roll back Colombia's agrarian reform program, and continuing repression by the army and paramilitary groups. Among their demands are the resignation of President Alvaro Uribe. Tens of thousands are said to be participating. The call for the protests was put out by the Campesino Association of the Cimitarra Valley (ACVC). (IMC, Oct. 9)

The UN International Court of Justice (ICJ) at The Hague, Netherlands, Oct. 8 awarded Honduras sovereignty over four cays in the Caribbean Sea and delineated its maritime boundary with Nicaragua as part of a ruling on a longstanding border dispute. The 17-member court ruled unanimously that Honduras has sovereignty over Bobel Cay, Savanna Cay, Port Royal Cay and South Cay. The ICJ also ruled by majority on the starting point and outline of the maritime boundary. The ruling set the starting point three nautical miles out to sea from the point identified by a 1962 commission as the end of the land boundary in the mouth of the Rio Coco. Shifting deposits left by the Rio Coco makes the exact site of the river mouth uncertain, the ICJ found, instructing Nicaragua and Honduras to open negotiations on the line between the endpoint of the land boundary and the start of the maritime boundary three miles out. At issue are fishing rights, and potential oil resources. (UN News Centre, Oct. 8)

Three workers from the Mexican oil monopoly Pemex were killed by inhaling toxic fumes when the gas pipeline they were working on suffered a leak Oct. 8. The workers were repairing the Potrero del Llano-Naranjos pipeline in Alamo Temapache, Veracruz, which had ruptured Sept. 26. Pemex said there was "no risk to the population." Veracruz state authorities complained that the workers had not been outfitted with proper safety equipment. (EFE, Milenio, Oct. 8)

Nathaniel Deutsch, professor of religion at Swarthmore College, writes for the New York Times, Oct. 6:

Save the Gnostics
The United States didn’t set out to eradicate the Mandeans, one of the oldest, smallest and least understood of the many minorities in Iraq. This extinction in the making has simply been another unfortunate and entirely unintended consequence of our invasion of Iraq — though that will be of little comfort to the Mandeans, whose 2,000-year-old culture is in grave danger of disappearing from the face of the earth.

A very important story by Kimia Sanati from InterPress Service, Oct. 3:

Islamist, Socialist Revolutions Don't Mix
An attempt to rope in the son and daughter of the Argentine revolutionary Ernesto Che Guevara to forge a parallel between Iran's Islamist revolution and the socialist revolution in Latin America through a four-day conference has ended in fiasco.

The UK warned Darfur's rebel groups Oct. 8 they could be excluded from the peace process if they boycott talks due to be held in Libya later this month. London's Minister for Africa, Lord Malloch Brown, said those who opted out "should understand the consequences." (BBC, Oct. 8) The comments came the same day Sudanese government troops and allied militias attacked and overran Muhajiriya, a town controlled by the Minni Minnawi faction of the Sudan Liberation Army (SLA)—the only faction to sign the 2006 peace deal. Khalid Abakar, a senior representative from the SLA, said: "Government planes have attacked Muhajiriya, which belongs to us, and government forces and Janjawid militia are fighting our forces." A UN official said the assault may be retaliation for a rebel attack on an African Union peacekeeper base to the north in Haskanita last week. Some members of the rebel factions involved in the attack are believed to have moved into Muhajeria. (AlJazeera, AP, Oct. 8)

Egyptian police detained at least 40 after thousands of angry Bedouins stormed government buildings in north Sinai Oct. 7 to protest police inaction after a shooting by a rival clan. The ruling National Democratic Party headquarters in the city of El-Arish was sacked and pictures of President Hosni Mubarak burned, prompting police to fire tear gas to break up the crowd. The city council building was also damaged by stone-throwing protesters, who burned tires and smashed shop windows throughout the city. Authorities said the detained were from both the Tarabin and Fawakhriya tribes. Witnesses said the violence began after the breaking of the Ramadan fast, when armed Tarabin tribesmen from central Sinai arrived in El-Arish in 15 trucks and began to shoot at members of the Fawakhriya tribe. Abdel Hamid Selmy of the Fawakhriya tribe, a member of the Egyptian parliament's upper house, said the violence "is an expression of the frustration felt by Bedouins due to the constant neglect by authorities." (AFP, Oct. 7)

Commemorations taking place nearly throughout Latin America 40 years after the death of Ernesto "Che" Guevara on Oct. 8, 1967, indicate just how much the world has changed since then—for better and for worse. Most significantly, in Bolivia—where he met his death, and where his name and image were anathema under military dictatorships and conservative regimes a generation thereafter—the official ceremony celebrating the legendary guerilla was presided over by the populist President Evo Morales. The commemoration was held at the village of Vallegrande in Santa Cruz department, where Guevara was captured, tortured and killed by Bolivian soldiers overseen by CIA agents.