Abdurraheem el-Keib, a dual US-Libyan citizen, was elected prime minister of Libya by leaders of the National Transitional Council who voted in a televised event Oct. 31, dropping ballots into a transparent box. Keib, described favorably as a "technocrat" by the Washington Post, attended the University of Tripoli in 1973, earned his MS at the University of Southern California in 1976, and his Ph.d. at North Carolina State University in 1984. He has taught at the University of Alabama and the American University of Sharjah in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). Most recently, he served as chair of the Electrical Engineering Department at the UAE's Petroleum Institute before joining Libya's interim council in the spring. His research has been funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF), the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI), the US Department of Energy (DoE), Southern Company Services (SC), and the Alabama Power Company (APCO). (AntiWar.com, Nov. 1; WP, Oct. 31; The Petroleum Institute)

Colombia's Department of Administrative Security (DAS) was officially eliminated Oct. 3 after years of scandals concerning paramilitary ties, assassinations, illegal wiretapping and corruption. President Juan Manuel Santos and DAS director Felipe Muñoz formally announced the disbanding of the agency at the Presidential Palace in Bogotá. Replacing the 58-year old DAS will be a new intelligence agency headed by former commander of the navy, Adm. Alvaro Echandia. Interior Minister Germán Vargas Lleras said on Twitter that it will be called the "National Agency of Protection." Meanwhile, 2,300 DAS employees will be transfered to the Technical Investigation Corps (CTI) of the Fiscalia, Colombia's justice department.

Haitian police arrested legislative deputy Arnel Bélizaire at Port-au-Prince's international airport on Oct. 27 as he returned from an official visit to France; the agents then took him to the National Penitentiary in the capital. Chamber of Deputies president Sorel Jacynthe and a delegation of other legislators were kept from entering the airport to welcome Bélizaire, while several hundred demonstrators protested outside and chanted slogans against Haitian president Michel Martelly. The president himself left for the US the same day for unexplained health reasons. This was his second medical trip to the US since he took office in May; he was expected to return on Nov. 6.

A dispute between the government of right-wing Panamanian president Ricardo Martinelli and the Ngöbe-Buglé indigenous group flared up again the week of Oct. 24 as the National Assembly began to debate changes to the Mining Code. Militant protests by the Ngöbe-Buglé and others last February and March forced the Assembly to rescind a law which opponents said would encourage open-pit mining for metals by foreign companies and endanger the environment.

On Oct. 26 Mexican officials emphatically denied that US agencies were violating Mexican sovereignty by carrying out undercover operations aimed at Mexican drug cartels. The presence of agents from the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) in Mexico "isn't something new, it's been happening since a long time ago," Foreign Relations Secretary Patricia Espinosa Cantellano said at a press conference in Mexico City that was meant to be about Mexico's participation in a Group of 20 meeting in Cannes, France, and in the Iberian-American Summit in Asunción, Paraguay. Espinosa Cantellano said she couldn't reveal the number and location of the agents for security reasons, "but of course the government knows about this presence and we are very strict in watching out that the legal framework is applied."

OK, we asked our readers to either show us some support or offer some criticism on what we are doing wrong. So far, eight of you have responded. Do we really only have eight readers? Our web states indicate we have thousands. We need to hear from you. Other lefty websites can reliably raise much, much more than the mere $5,000 we are asking. We really don't get it.

Kyrgyzstan's newly elected president, Almazbek Atambayev, announced upon his victory Oct. 31 that he will close Manas air base, which has been critical to the US campaign in Afghanistan. Atambayev said the lease for the US lease will not be renewed after it expires in 2014. He told the BBC: "The US base should be shut down. What if there is a war between the US and Iran, and in response Iran bombs the Manas? What will happen to us?" Atambayev served as prime minister under interim leader Roza Otunbayeva following last year's revolution, and has steered a course closer to Russia, which also has military forces in Kyrgyzstan.

At least five people, including three children, were killed when a displaced persons camp at Jilib in southern Somalia was bombed yesterday, the charity Doctors Without Border (MSF) says. Now, predictably, the Kenyan army and Shabab rebels are blaming each other. Kenya's military released a statement saying the camp had come under fire by a Shabab "technical battle wagon" mounted with an "anti-aircraft gun." Sheikh Abukar Ali Ada of the Shabab countered: "Kenya has brutally massacred civilians already displaced by hardship. We will ensure that Kenya mourns more than we did." (The Telegraph, BBC News, Capital FM News, Nairobi, Oct. 31)