Even after the Justice Department has blinked in the case of whistle-blowing FBI translator Sibel Edmonds, declassifying her claims and allowing her suit to go ahead, the judiciary is now blocking public accesss to the proceedings...

The New York Times is seemingly allergic to the word "occupation" when it comes to describing the Israel-Palestine conflict. It rarely mentions that all Israeli settlements, including those in East Jerusalem, violate international law. Daniel Okrent, the Times' public editor, appears to see no problem with that. When describing Israel's occupation of the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip, NYT is reduced to writing stuff like Israel annexed East Jerusalem in 1967 and 200,000 Israelis now live there and Palestinians claim this land as theirs, ignoring completely that the weight of international law and all respected human rights organizations consider East Jerusalem occupied, and reducing the conflict to a matter of he-said, she-said.

From a blogger working with the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) and other groups comes this April 16 appeal on the case of two teenage Muslim girls detained on immigration charges following spurious claims they had been considering suicide-terror martyrdom:

Ethnic tensions are rising in southwest Iran's Khuzistan province along the Iraqi border, where violence has left three dead and injured in recent days. Protests by the region's Arab minority were sparked by reports that authorities were planning to colonize the city of Ahvaz with ethnic Farsies. Nationwide operations of Qatar-based Al-Jazeera TV were suspended by the government April 18 on charges of inciting the unrest. (AP, April 18)

Hours after polls closed in Saudi Arabia's third and final round of quasi-democratic elections, presumed Islamic militants attacked a security checkpoint in the holy city of Mecca, sparking a gunbattle in which one police officer was killed and several wounded. Up to 15 police and civilian vehicels were also reported destroyed. The battle reportedly began when a group of men in a taxi attempted to run the checkpoint.(AP, AHN, April 21)

Italy has finally blinked. Afer two generations of delay, the first of three pieces of a third-century Ethiopian obelisk plundered by the Italian fascist occupation in the 1930s has touched ground in the ancient city of Axum, where it was met by a cheering crowd and pealing church bells. Engineers extended the runway to accomodate the four-engine cargo plane carrying the precious cargo from Rome. The remaining pieces are to arrive shortly, Italian authorities pledge. (UK Telegraph, April 21)

Unfortunately, the recent victory for indigenous land rights in Brazil may be followed by a rollback of recent gains for indigenous peoples in Botswana--where the world is paying even less attention. Reads an April 18 alert from Survival International:

Botswana's government is pushing a bill through Parliament to scrap the key clause in the Constitution which protects Bushmen's rights. The move comes half way through the Bushmen's landmark legal action against the government, in which the same clause forms a major plank of the Bushmen's case. The trial marks the first time in Botswana's history that the clause has actually been tested in court, but the government aims to scrap it within a few months.

An important victory is reported from the Brazilian Amazon, which has been the scene of recent violence linked to struggles for control of land and resources. From the BBC, April 15:

President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has signed a decree creating an Amazonian Indian reserve the size of a small country in northern Brazil. The reserve, Raposa Serra Do Sol, is called "the land of the fox and mountain of the sun" by the 12,000 Indians who live there. Its hills, rivers and forests cover 17,000 sq km (6,500 square miles).