A Virginia military jury on May 6 acquitted US Navy SEAL Matthew McCabe on charges of assaulting a high-profile Iraqi detainee. Petty Officer 2nd Class McCabe was accused of punching Ahmed Hashim Abed, implicated in the killing of four American contractors in Fallujah in 2004. McCabe was charged with assault, dereliction of duty, and lying to investigators, and he could have faced up to a year in prison if convicted. The prosecution's key witness testified that he saw McCabe punch Abed, but the testimony was contradicted by several defense witnesses. The jury deliberated for an hour and 40 minutes before returning a verdict of not guilty.

Members of the Mauritanian diaspora in the United States are organizing a demonstration to protest against the recent incendiary statement of Prime Minster Moulaye Ould Mohamed Laghdaf that his government will generalize the use of Arabic at all levels of the administration and educational system. "If such a policy is implemented, it will amount to a cultural genocide against Black Mauritanians who have been discriminated against for too long," reads a statement by protest organizers. The statement also notes a recent comment by Minister of Culture and Youth Cisse Mint Boide that "The national languages are obstacles to the emergence of the Arabic language."

The Greek Parliament passed a package of austerity measures on May 6, one day before leaders of the 16-member euro-zone meet in Brussels to discuss final details of a rescue package for the Hellenic Republic. But with protesters gathering outside Parliament's doors, the measure's passage sparked fears of a long summer of social unrest. The deaths of three bank workers in a fire set by protesters May 5 has polarized Greece. (Tehran Times, May 8)

Western Sahara's Polisario Front rebels on May 2 condemned the UN Security Council for not including human rights in resolution 1920, extending by one year the mandate of the UN mission for the Morocco-occupied territory, MINURSO. But in a victory for Morocco, the text makes no mention of any explicit mechanism to monitor allegations of human rights violations. "Unfortunately, we believe this is a scandal for the credibility of the United Nations and the Security Council," Polisario Front's Mohamed Abdelaziz told AFP at a refugee camp for Western Sahara refugees in Algeria.

The Spanish government on May 6 extradited pilot Julio Alberto Poch to Argentina to face trial for his alleged role in the nation's 1976-83 "Dirty War." Poch was a navy officer at Argentina's Naval Mechanics School, one of the most notorious detention centers of the military dictatorship, and is believed to have piloted flights known as "death flights," which were used to dump the military junta's political opponents into the Plata River and the Atlantic Ocean. Poch holds dual Dutch and Argentine citizenship, which had protected him from earlier attempts at extradition, but he was arrested and imprisoned last September when he landed in Valencia while en route to the Netherlands. A Spanish court agreed to his extradition in January, finding that there are adequate measures in place to guarantee that Poch will receive a fair trial in Argentina. Poch continues to deny the charges against him.

US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents on May 5 arrested a South Florida man accused of involvement in Guatemala's December 1982 massacre that left more than 250 dead. Authorities claim that Gilberto Jordan illegally concealed his past military service and involvement in the killings on his US immigration forms. Jordan is accused of being one of 20 Guatemalan special forces soldiers known as "Kaibiles" who killed men, women, and children in the village Dos Erres (Petéñ department) during Guatemala's civil war.

Paris-based Reporters Without Borders (RSF), in a survey of global press-freedom "Predators" released May 3, ranks Eritrea's President Issaias Afeworki as the world's worst abuser of media freedom. RSF charges that Eritrea permits no independent media and the state-run newspapers and television network do not allow stories that challenge the nation's leadership or its policies. The government has described a free press as "incompatible" with Eritrean culture and last year President Isaias said no Eritrean should want or need to attack their own country.

The US Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces on May 3 heard arguments in the appeal of Army Spc. Charles Graner, sentenced to 10 years for abuses committed at Baghdad's Abu Ghraib prison. Graner, alleged ringleader of the Abu Ghraib abuse, was convicted in 2005 of conspiracy, assault, maltreating prisoners, dereliction of duty, and committing indecent acts. Graner's lawyer argued that the defense was denied access to classified documents that may have shown some of the detainee treatment was actually part of the "enhanced interrogation techniques" approved by then-Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. The government argued that the defense had access to the documents before the trial. A ruling is expected by August.