Shaker al-Abssi, leader of the al-Qaeda franchise Fatah al-Islam, was reported killed in the Lebanese Army's assault on a the Nahr al-Bared refugee camp Sept. 2. Lebanese officials said they were awaiting the result of a DNA test before officially issuing a statement. Some 35 members of the Islamist group were also reported killed in the assault. More than 300 people are believed to have died since the army's three-month siege on the refugee camp began. (RIA-Novosti, Sept. 3)

An Aug. 24 Amnesty International press release claimed new photo evidence showing that the Sudanese government continues to deploy offensive military equipment in Darfur, despite the UN arms embargo. "Once again Amnesty International calls on the UN Security Council to act decisively to ensure the embargo is effectively enforced, including by the placement of UN observers at all ports of entry in Sudan and Darfur," said Brian Wood, Amnesty International's Arms Control Research Manager.

More than 670 people were arrested and some 50 people were injured in Santiago and other Chilean cities on Aug. 29 in massive protests against the economic policies of President Michelle Bachelet. The Unitary Workers Confederation (CUT), which organized the protest, charged that Bachelet was following economic policies inherited from the 1973-1990 military dictatorship of Gen. Augusto Pinochet Ugarte; the protesters also demanded the resignation of Finance Minister Andres Velasco. The police attacked marchers with tear gas and water cannons; the injured included two camera operators, National Literature prize-winning poet Raul Zurita and Senator Alejandro Navarro from Bachelet's own Socialist Party.

On July 28, thousands of people marched in Montevideo, Uruguay, to demand the repeal of Law 18.116, which modifies the penal code to impose prison sentences of between three months and three years on people who take part in the occupation of a property not their own. The march was called by the Uruguayan Federation of Housing Cooperatives for Mutual Aid (FUCVAM), together with the Union of Sugar Workers of Artigas (UTAA), the September 10, 1815 Movement of Tacuarembo and residents of the Las Laminas neighborhood of Bella Union in Artigas department.

Two members of Panama's militant Only Union of Construction and Similar Workers (SUNTRACS) were murdered on Aug. 14 and 15. Osvaldo Lorenzo was killed by a member of a company union when Lorenzo was protesting working conditions in the construction of a highway between Panama City and Colon. The Odebrecht company, Brazilian in origin, is running the project. Luigi Arguelles was shot at close range by a sergeant in the National Police in a tourist center in the Las Perlas Archipelago. The center's owner, a Colombian investor, had previously threatened the workers. According to Panamanian sociologist Marco A. Gandasegui, elements in the government of President Martin Torrijos are creating "ghost unions" and using them to destroy SUNTRACS. (Servicio Informativo "Alai-amlatina," Aug. 28). The union has had a leading role in protests against neoliberal economic policies. (See WNU, May 8, 2005)

On Aug. 30 thousands of workers marched in Mexico City from the Angel of Independence to the central plaza, the Zocalo, to protest what they called the "anti-union and anti-worker" policies of President Felipe Calderon Hinojosa, of the center-right National Action Party (PAN). The organizers, the National Workers Union (UNT) and the Mexican Union Front (FSM), timed the march to precede Calderon's first state of the union report, to be delivered on Sept. 2. Police estimated the crowd at 20,000; organizers put attendance at 50,000. Despite several successful demonstrations, the UNT and FSM have repeatedly failed in their efforts to call a national strike against the government's plans for more privatization and other neoliberal economic policies.

A Mexican federal judge in Chiapas sentenced 18 Tzotzil Maya men to 26 years in prison Aug. 28 on homicide and weapons charges for having participated in the massacre of 45 unarmed Tzotzils at the hamlet of Acteal on Dec. 22, 1997. They were also ordered to pay a total of 800,000 pesos (approx. $800) in damages. Of 87 followers of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) detained in Chenalhó municipality in the aftermath of the massacre, 79 remain imprisoned. The longest sentence, 40 years, was brought against Alfredo Hernández Ruiz. (La Jornada, Sept. 2)

Members of the "Other Campaign" activist network marched in Mexico City Aug. 26 in protest of the recent evictions of campesino communities from the Montes Azules Biosphere Reserve in the conflicted southern state of Chiapas. (Expreso Chiapas, Aug. 27) On Aug. 31, Amnesty International issued a statement calling for an "immediate" suspension of evictions from the reserve. The statement expressed concern about the health conditions at the shelter in La Trinitaria where the expelled campesinos—including two pregnant women—are being held. The organization also expressed concern about the six arrested in the evictions, calling for their release and for transparency in the cases against them. (La Jornada, Sept. 2)