National Police troops in Peru's northern Cajamarca province on Sept. 17 clashed with residents of Quishuar Corral hamlet who were conducting reconassiance of mountain trails on their communal lands, which they suspected the Yanacocha mining company of illegally closing to facilitate expansion of its operations. Four of the villagers were injured, and two hospitalized. Witnesses said the police troops opened fire without warning with rubber bullets and tear-gas cannisters. (RPP, Sept. 17)

Over one and a half million Catalans on Sept. 11 celebrated their Diada Nacional—the national day marking the 1714 Siege of Barcelona—by forming a human chain stretching 400 kilometers across the territory, from Tarragona in the south to El Pertús on the border with France. The chain, dubbed the "Via Catalana," was the climax of days of demonstrations calling for independence from Spain, and was inspired by the 1989 Baltic Way chain across Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia that launched the drive for independence from the USSR.

We've noted before that numerous experts have linked the Darfur conflict to climate change, but now a less obvious climate connection to the Syria crisis is persuasively argued by Peter Sinclair of the blog Climate Denial Crock of the Week. As the name suggests, it is generally dedicated to shooting down climate change denialism, but in this Sept. 5 entry he attempts to trace the Syrian explosion—indeed, the entire Arab Revolution—to an atmospheric phenomenon. Sinclair reminds us that in the summer before the wave of revolution swept through Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, Yemen, Bahrain, Syria and beyond, Russia experienced a "1,000-year heat wave" (Bloomberg, Aug. 9, 2010) that shrivelled its crops and prompted Moscow to halt wheat exports (Washington Post, Aug. 6, 2010).

On Facebook in recent days, I have been having a spirited exchange regarding Syria with Kevin Zeese of the website Popular Resistance, which we recently had to call out for running de facto Assad regime propaganda, filled with blatantly distorted claims. Zeese is the "Attorney General" in the Green Shadow Cabinet, an entity we called out here and here for similarly serving as a stateside amplifier for regime propaganda. Much of this is recycling media accounts that attempt to excuplate the regime in the Ghouta attack. For instance, Popular Resistance reprints a Guardian story, based on conveniently anonymous sources, "German Intelligence: Assad Did Not Order Chemical Weapons Attack." If you actually read past the headline, the unsourced claim is only that Assad didn't personally order the attack. Another Guardian piece picked up by Popular Resistance speculates that the US finding that Assad was behind the attack may be tainted by Israeli intelligence.

Tens of thousands of Chileans marched down the Alameda avenue in central Santiago on Sept. 8 in one of a series of events marking the 40th anniversary of the US-backed Sept. 11, 1973 coup that installed the military dictatorship headed by Gen. Augusto Pinochet Urgarte (1973-1990). The marchers, some carrying signs reading "40 years since the coup, nothing and no one is forgotten," demanded justice for the victims. The organizers said 60,000 people participated in the action, which is sponsored each year by the National Assembly for Human Rights, while the police put the number at 30,000. A confrontation broke out at the march’s end between agents of the carabineros militarized police and masked protesters; 31 people were arrested and seven agents were injured, according to the police. (La Jornada, Mexico, Sept. 9, from AP, AFP)

Carrying plastic shields and armed with nightsticks and tear-gas canisters, some 3,600 helmeted Mexican federal police moved in on Mexico City’s main plaza, the Zócalo, at 4 PM on Sept. 13 to clear out an encampment teachers had set up as a base for actions that they had been carrying out since Aug. 21 to protest changes in the educational system. The National Education Workers Coordinating Committee (CNTE), the dissident union group leading the protests, had negotiated an agreement with the government to vacate the plaza in time for the Sept. 15-16 ceremonies that traditionally celebrate Mexico's independence from Spain, but a smaller group of teachers from the militant locals in the southern state of Oaxaca tried briefly to hold out against the police. Confrontations followed for several hours involving police agents, teachers and local anarchists. National Security Commission (CNS) head Manuel Mondragón gave a preliminary count of 29 people arrested. (Los Angeles Times, Sept. 13, from correspondent; La Jornada, Mexico, Sept. 14)

Some 50 Mexicans and local supporters protested in front of the Mexican consulate in New York City on Sept. 13 to demand money that they say the Mexican government owes them from a 1942-1964 program that brought Mexicans into the US as farmworkers. The guest workers, known as "braceros" ("laborers" or "farmhands"), had 10% deducted from their wages by the US government; the money was supposed to go to Mexico's Campesino Savings Fund for their pensions. The US says it sent the deducted funds to the Mexican government, but the braceros and their survivors say the workers never got their pensions.

Eleven months after it was officially opened, the Caracol Industrial Park (PIC) in Haiti’s Northeast department has failed to live up to the promises made by its promoters, according to an article by Jonathan Katz, a former Associated Press correspondent in Haiti. The project, for which the US Agency for International Development (USAID) and the Inter-American Development Bank (IADB, or BID in Spanish) have set aside $270 million, has only generated 1,500 jobs to date, far short of the 65,000 jobs the US State Department claims will eventually appear in Caracol. Wages for piece-rate workers at the industrial park are based on a minimum wage of $4.56 a day, even though under a Haitian law that took effect last October their minimum wage should be about $6.85 a day.