Arizona's Gov. Jan Brewer on Aug. 27 called on Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to remove any mention of Arizona and its passage of SB 1070 from a human rights report issued by the State Department. The report, submitted to the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights as part of a universal review, discussed the passage and current injunction of portions of SB 1070 within a section entitled, "A commitment to values in engagements across our borders." Brewer's sternly-worded letter called inclusion of any mention of SB 1070 "offensive" in light of the membership of the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC), including Cuba and Libya.

From Global Exchange, Aug. 17:

The Iraq Debacle: The Legacy of Seven Years of War
We, the undersigned organizations and individuals, mark the August 31st withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq with the following evaluation and recommendations:

Iraq's Oil Ministry said on Aug. 29 the agreement Germany's RWE public utility signed with the Kurdistan Regional Government, which included possible future gas supply for the Nabucco pipeline project, is illegal. RWE announced two days earlier that it had signed a gas cooperation agreement with Iraq's autonomous Kurdish government.

Our August issue featured the story BP: The Case for Public Ownership by Billy Wharton, a reprint from In These Times. Our multiple-choice Exit Poll was: "Should BP be nationalzied?" We received 16 votes. The results follow:

In the largest protest to date by Haitians left homeless by the massive Jan. 12 earthquake, hundreds of people marched in Port-au-Prince on Aug. 26 to demand that the authorities take immediate measures to provide decent housing. The protesters threatened not to take part in presidential and legislative elections scheduled for Nov. 28. "There can be no elections with 1.5 million people living in tents," demonstration organizers said.

Honduran police arrested some 150 people while using tear gas and water cannons to disperse a demonstration by teachers, students and others in Tegucigalpa on Aug. 27, the 23rd day of a strike by teachers over their pension fund and other issues. The protest, which blocked Central America Boulevard for three hours, was called by the Federation of Teachers Organizations of Honduras (FOMH), which includes six unions, and the National Popular Resistance Front (FNRP), a coalition that formed last year to oppose the June 2009 military coup against then-president José Manuel ("Mel") Zelaya Rosales.

A one-day strike by Puerto Rican teachers over budget issues and the need for additional teachers shut down about 90% of the island's 1,500 public schools on Aug. 26, according to the Teachers' Federation of Puerto Rico (FMPR). The walkout was the largest teachers' strike since early 2008, when the FMPR led a militant 10-day strike. Interim education secretary Jesús Rivera Chávez called the Aug. 26 strike's effect "devastating."

Private security firm Blackwater violated US arms trafficking regulations when training Colombian military personnel in 2005, a State Department report indicates. The controversial firm, renamed Xe Services LLC in 2009, is to pay $42 million for violating US law, including the unauthorized military training of Colombian soldiers—evidently for private service in Iraq and Afghanistan—in April and May 2005.