More than 500 villagers held a march in eastern Cambodia's Kompong Cham province June 29 to protest a controversial dam project on the Mekong River in Laos that they charge is under construction despite a pledge to halt progress while officials conduct a new impact study. The protest against the $3.8 billion Xayaburi Dam was led by monks and included students, peasants, and activists nongovernmental organizations. The protesters called on the leaders of the four nations downstream from the dam—Laos, Thailand, Cambodia, and Vietnam—to demand a halt to construction at the site, citing concerns that the project would negatively impact millions of people in the region and irreparably damage the environment. Laos committed to the review by a Japanese firm in December at the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) summit in Indonesia after drawing criticism that its own environmental impact study was inadequate.

Islamist fighters of Ansar Dine have completely pushed Tuareg rebels of the MNLA out of Timbuktu, the jihadist organization announced June 27—days after a loosely allied Islamist faction, the MUJAO, took control of Gao from MNLA forces. A convoy of Islamist fighters is now said to be headed to Gao from Kidal, to drive the last remaining MNLA forces from the territory. Ansar Dine fighter Oumar Ould Hamaha told AP by telephone that the group now commands the northern half of Mali, an area larger than France, and plans to fully impose Islamic law. "Our fighters control the perimeter. We control Timbuktu completely. We control Gao completely. It's Ansar Dine that commands the north of Mali," said Hamaha, chief of security for the group in Gao. "Now we have every opportunity to apply shariah." Last week in the city of Gao, an unmarried couple was publicly lashed 100 times by the militants, according to AP.

At their recent meeting in La Paz, Bolivia's Evo Morales and Iran's Mahmoud Ahmadinejad signed a bilateral agreement for the Islamic Republic to provide counter-narcotics aid to the Andean nation. According Bolivia's drug czar Felipe Caceres (officially vice-minister for Social Defense and Controlled Substances), the Iranian military will train 10 officers in intelligence and planning operations. Iran will also provide communications equipment for Bolivian anti-drug efforts. Reports did not make clear if the aid will be going to Bolivia's army or National Police. Caceres also credited Brazilian reconnaissance drones for recent successful raids on narco-traffickers in Bolivia's east, with more than 240 cocaine labs claimed destroyed in Santa Cruz department this month. Caceres did not provide details about the unmanned aerial vehicles other than to say they are Israeli-made, patrol the border, and also enter Bolivian airspace. (InSight Crime, June 21; AP, June 20)

Aymara comunarios (communal pesants) from the pueblos of Karikari and Calachaca, in Bolivia's Potosí department, on June 28 seized two engineers at the local Malku Khota mining operation, owned by South American Silver of Canada, to press their demand for the release of their leader Cancio Rojas, who was arrested late last month on charges related to protests against the mine project. A South American Silver statement said the two men had been "kidnapped," and that they are "at serious risk given the aggressiveness and intolerance with which these groups behave." Interior Minister Carlos Romero also said, "What they have done is a kidnapping, it's an offense, it's a crime." He added that Cancio Rojas "is detained by the order of a competent judicial authority because he is accused of kidnapping, torture and other offenses."

A "humanitarian caravan" from Bogotá arrived in Colombia's southern Andean department of Cauca June 28, bringing food and other aid to hundreds of indigenous campesinos who have been maintaining a protest encampment to prevent the military from establishing a new base at Tres Cruces, in a conflicted area of Miranda municipality. The caravan, which includes many international supporters from Europe and elsewhere, is being organized by former senator Piedad Córdoba's group Colombians for Peace. The same group on April 23 held a "Patriotic March" in Bogotá, attended by some 100,000, calling for a negotiated end to the conflict with the FARC guerillas. (AFP, El Espectador, Bogotá, June 28; FOR, June 1)

On his 50th birthday June 28, the day after presiding over a massive rally of his supporters in Lima's Plaza San Martín, Peru's President Ollanta Humala flew to Junín region to officiate over the unveiling of a water development project—where he offered comments on the conflict in northern Cajamarca region, now nearly one month into a civil strike to oppose the pending Conga gold mine project. He had words of admonition for Newmont Mining of Colorado that hopes to develop the project: "The mining companies sometimes do not understand the concept of social responsibility, and generate a lack of confidence." But calling on Newmont's local subsidiary Yanacocha to "comply with its commitments to win the confidence of the people," he also called on "all the leaders" of the region to enter into a dialogue—without specifically mentioning Cajamarca's regional president Gregorio Santos, a key figure of the movement against the mine. (La Republica, June 28; El Comercio, June 27) Protesters in Cajamarca meanwhile marked Humala's birthday by holding a mock funeral for him—marching through the city with a cross and casket marked with his name. (Caballero Verde, June 27)

In a second day of mobilization, some 20,000 informal gold miners from the communities of Rinconada, Lunar de Oro, Limbani and Phara filled the streets of the city of Puno in southern Peru, demanding that the regional government support their demands for "free sale" of gold—meaning a lifting of all government controls on its purchase and trade. Miners leader Víctor Mejía Chambi warned regional president Mauricio Rodrigues that "other methods" would be considered if their demands were not met. (Los Andes, RPP, June 26)

Venezuelan activist website APORREA reported June 23 the murder of Yukpa-Wayuu indigenous activist Alexander Fernández Fernández and two others, who were leaders of the Yukpa movement fighting for their land in Machiques de Perija municipality, Zulia state, near the Colombian border. The victims had been living on recovered land since December last year. Their families have stated that wealthy nearby ranchers wanted to invade the land, originally owned by the Yukpa people, and have accused the ranchers of being behind the crime. Fernández was briefly jailed with Yukpa chief Sabino Romero in 2010, in what their followers have labelled "political persecution."