Guatemala's anti-drug chief and two of his senior officials were arrested Nov. 16 on charges of conspiring to import and distribute cocaine in the United States. The Guatemalan government assisted in the investigation but the arrests were an embarrassment for President Oscar Berger, who has tried to clean up the country's image as corrupt.

Weeks after India and Pakistan agreed to open the Line of Control in Kashmir in the wake of the devastating earthquake, families divided by the de facto border remain frustrated that only relief workers have been allowed to cross—not local residents. Now, following weeks of pressure, Pakistani authorities have alloweds 83 residents from the Indian side of the line to cross over to meet with their kin in stricken villages. The case of some 100 residents seeking to cross from Pakistani to Indian controlled territory remains pending. (Reuters, Nov. 16)

Within hours of the announcement, four people were killed and 45 wounded when a car bomb exploded on a busy intersection in Srinagar, capital of Indian Kashmir. Al-Arifeen, claimed responsibility for the explosion in a telephone call to the Kashmir News Service. Police said that it was a front for the banned group Lashkar-e-Taiba. (Pakistan Daily Times, Nov. 17)

Human rights groups have strongly condemned the ruling by Uzbekistan's supreme court finding 15 defendants guilty of terrorism and sentencing them up to 20 years for their role in the May violence in Andijan. "It was expected and some could even have been given the death penalty, but as the case had received such wide international publicity the authorities did not dare to give capital sentences," said Tolib Yakubov, head of the Human Rights Society of Uzbekistan (HRSU). "The trial was orchestrated."

Spain has joined Italy in launching an investigation of claims the CIA is operating a "rendition fleet" to transfer detainees to facilities in a secret gulag maintained in various host countries. From the AP, Nov. 15:

MADRID, Spain — The interior minister said Tuesday a judge is investigating alleged CIA use of a Spanish airport as part of a covert program for transporting suspected Islamic terrorists.

In today's headlines, up to 200 malnourished Iraqi detainees bearing signs of torture were found in a secret prison in the basement of a government building in Baghdad. The discovery came after US troops surrounded and took control of an Interior Ministry building in the Jadriya district of the capital on the night of Nov. 13.

When US troops arrived at the facility, officials there told them some 40 detainees were being held. As they searched the building they discovered at least 200, mostly Sunni Arabs and many in very poor health. The US foces had apparently been tipped off to the prison’s existence by relatives of those detained there.

Two Iraqi men arrested in Iraq in 2003 but never charged with any crimes now say US troops put them in a cage with lions, subjected them to a mock execution, and humiliated them during interrogations at various detention facilities. Sherzad Khalid, 35, and Thahe Sabber, 37, charge they were brutally beaten over several months at Camp Bucca, Abu Ghraib and another detention facility at the Baghdad airport. They said the abuse began when they were unable to tell US interrogators where Saddam Hussein was hiding or the whereabouts of weapons of mass destruction.

A powerful blast outside KFC fast-food franchise killed three people and wounded at least 15 others in Pakistan's southern port city of Karachi early Nov. 15. The Baluchistan National Army, a separatist guerilla group in restive southwestern Baluchistan Province, claimed responsibility for the attack. But Pakistani officials deny the existence of the group. "We did it to protest, and we did it to pressure the government for our rights," a guerilla spokesperson, identified as Chakar Azam, told the AP. Pakistani officials dismissed the claim.

Police and troops in Kampala, capital of Uganda, are reported to be firing live and plastic bullets in running battles with protesters angered by the arrest on treason charges last night of the president's main political rival, Kizza Besigye. The government charges that Besigye's supporters are ransacking businesses, burning tires and throwing stones and at security forces. Police are said to have shot dead at least one protesters, although authorities said he was shot by a secuity guard while trying to break into a shop. Some 60 have been arrested, and several others hospitalized.