Tens of thousands of indigenous people and their allies focused on neoliberal economic programs, US foreign policies and local issues in protests throughout the Americas on Oct. 12, the 514th anniversary of the arrival of European colonizer Christopher Columbus in the hemisphere.

Thousands of Bolivians marked Oct. 12 with a demonstration in a central plaza in La Paz which was also a show of support for leftist president Evo Morales, the country's first indigenous president. Accompanied by indigenous leaders from 12 countries--who were attending the Continental Meeting of Indigenous Peoples and Nationalities of AbyaYala (an ancient indigenous name for the Americas)--Morales announced that the date had gone from marking the "misfortune" of the European colonization to marking the "liberation" of the indigenous people of the continent. About 10,000 people participated, according to the Spanish wire service EFE, far less than the 100,000 the government had anticipated.

As of the evening of Oct. 15, early returns from Ecuador's general election that day showed banana magnate Alvaro Noboa leading leftist economist Rafael Correa by about 27% to 22% in the voting for president, virtually guaranteeing that the race would go to a second round. (Radio France Internationale, Oct. 15) A poll taken by the private Cedatos-Gallup company Oct. 11-13 had shown Correa leading the list of 13 candidates with 31.1% of the vote, followed by Noboa with 25.2% and the socialist Leon Roldos with 19.1%. Based on the poll, which had a margin of error of three percentage points, the company predicted that Correa and Noboa would face each other in a second round on Nov. 26. To win in the first round a candidate would need to get at least 40% of the vote.

Chiapas is now the third Mexican state to adopt a statewide alliance of popular organization with the aim of establishing parallel power on the model of the Popular Assembly of the People of Oaxaca, following Guerrero and Oaxaca itself. The launching of the "Popular Assembly of the People of Chiapas" (APPC) was announced in a statement by 15 social and labor organization, including local Section 7 of the national teachers union, local Section 50 of the health workers union, and the Frente Campesino y Popular de Chiapas, whose leader Romero Farrera Vicente pledged to hold meetings to build the new organization in every region of the state.(Cuarto Poder, Chiapas, Oct. 17)

An official investigation by Mexico's National Human Rights Commission (CNDH) has confirmed the participation of military troops in May's deadly police operation at the village of San Salvador Atenco. The CNDH reports it has uncovered a document in which the Federal Support Forces (Fuerzas Federales de Apoyo), an agency which provides back-up to state police forces in emergencies, called for troops of the Third Military Police Brigade to join Mexico state police in putting down the protests at Atenco. CNDH chief Jose Luis Soberanes Fernandez said that authorities must not only clarify the facts, but bring criminal charges against those responsible for the beating and sexual abuse of 26 detainees. (APRO, Oct. 17)

As odds for the legal removal of Gov. Ulises Ruiz seemed to narrow Oct. 16, Oaxaca activists camped out in Mexico City's historic center began a hunger strike aimed at pressuring the federal government to find a solution to the five-month crisis. Senate sources indicated to the daily El Universal that a bid to declare the Ruiz administration unable to govern will likely fail in the looming vote. The paper reports that a subcommittee majority has prepared a report concluding that no "disappearance of powers" is justified in Oaxaca. However, Government Secretary Carlos Abascal, who is charged with settling the Oaxaca conflict, seemed to differ with the Senate committee, saying, "The local authorities haven't had the capacity to maintain peace, order and security. That's why what's happening in that state is happening."

Now that it has pretty much been confirmed that North Korea did explode a nuclear bomb, if a very small one, comes the news that it may be ready to repeat the feat on short order. Yes, this is deeply disturbing, but Selig Harrison (who has a penchant for saying things the Washington elite doesn't want to hear) warned weeks before the blast that it was coming, and that it would be a tactic by Pyongyang to press Washington for direct negotiations—another possibility we have noted before. If this is true, Bush's intransigence essentially prompted North Korea to cross the nuclear threshold. From AlJazeera, Sept. 23:

From UPI, Oct. 17:

Hit-and-run deaths at 10-year high

WASHINGTON, DC -- Data from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration in Washington show that hit-and-run pedestrian deaths have risen 20 percent since 2000.