Colombia's former President Alvaro Uribe on Nov. 3 was subpoenaed to testify in a civil case against Alabama coal giant Drummond over the company's alleged ties to paramilitary death squads. A group of 500 Colombian victims of the paramilitary violence demand compensation from Drummond and claim Uribe "has direct knowledge of a number of key cases, including until what point the armed forces supported the paramilitary protection of mining properties of Drummond," Terry Collingsworth, the attorney of victims of the paramilitary organization AUC, told radio station La FM. The former president "knows the levels of cooperation between the armed forces and the AUC, specifically in regions like Cesar where Drummond was active," the lawyer added.

From the Oakland Tribune, Nov. 4:

Two killed in East Oakland after CHP chase
OAKLAND -- Mark Aragon was driving to one of two jobs he worked to support his wife and three stepdaughters when he died in an East Oakland car wreck Thursday morning, a family member said.

The Oklahoma chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) filed a lawsuit Nov. 4 challenging the constitutionality of State Question 755, which amends the state constitution to ban the use of Islamic or international law in state court decisions. The suit, filed in the US District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma, seeks to block the Oklahoma State Board of Elections from certifying this week's election results, in which voters approved the measure by a vote of 70 to 30%. CAIR argues that the law violates the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment. The law would prevent Oklahoma courts from "look[ing] to the legal precepts of other nations or cultures," requiring them only to look to legal precedents of other states for guidance, provided that state does not use Islamic law.

Lawyers acting for more than 140 Iraqi civilians are challenging the British government's refusal to hold a public investigations of the treatment of detainees in British-occupied areas of Iraq following the 2003 invasion. The British government has already held one inquiry into claims of abuse, with a second due to hold hearings next year. But Public Interest Lawyers say the two inquiries only cover a fraction of the cases, asserting that at the current pace it would take more than 100 years to hear them all. (AP, Nov. 5)

President Hosni Mubarak on Nov. 6 condemned threats by the al-Qaeda franchise in Iraq against Coptic Christians in Egypt and promised to protect them. The Islamic State of Iraq, claiming responsibility for a bloody hostage taking in a Baghdad church last weekend, threatened to target the region's Christians if the Coptic church did not release two women the group claimed had were being held against their will after converting to Islam. Mubarak told Pope Shenouda III in a phone call that he rejected "pushing Egypt's name into the terrorist act that targeted a church in Baghdad."

A three-judge panel for the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit on Nov. 5 ordered further review of a lower court decision to release Guantánamo Bay detainee Mohamedou Olud Slahi, allegedly linked to the 9-11 terrorist attacks. The order vacated US District Court Judge James Robertson's decision to release Slahi and remanded the case, instructing the court to conduct further review to see if Slahi has abandoned ties to al-Qaeda, to which he swore an oath of allegiance in the early 1990s.

California voters defeated Proposition 23 in the Nov. 2 elections, voting 61.3% in favor of keeping the state's 2006 greenhouse gas reduction law, the Global Warming Solutions Act (AB32), considered the strongest in the nation. A "yes" vote on Prop 23, backed by Texas oil money, would have suspended the law until the state's unemployment rate stayed at or below 5.5% for four consecutive quarters. Assembly Bill 32 requires industry to report and reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and is set to go into effect in 2012.

The Iraqi oil ministry's auction of three natural gas fields last week has been angrily opposed by all the governorates in which they are located, with provincial officials threatening legal action against Baghdad and warning that they will refuse to cooperate with the developers. Bids were granted to companies from Turkey, Kuwait, Kazakstan and South Korea to develop gas fields holding approximately 10% of the country's reserves. The fields in Anbar, Diyala and Basra are primarily being developed for domestic consumption to improve Iraq's feeble power supply, oil ministry officials said.