In an operation dubbed "Hurricane," Peruvian national police arrested at least 20 suspected Shining Path guerillas linked to cocaine trafficking in a series of simultaneous raids in Lima and the eastern rainforest region Aug. 13. More than 200 agents took part in the sweeps targeting 48 suspects allegedly tied to a regional Shining Path boss known as "Artemio." Some escaped, but President Alan Garcia claimed it as a major blow against the Maoist guerillas. "Archaic communists who are anti-social and bent on ending the economic and social advancement of Peru have been knocked down once again," he said. (Reuters, Aug. 15)

Peru's President Alan Garcia, "afraid of foreign investors," is sitting idly by as a U.S. corporation devastates the city of La Oroya. Missouri-based Doe Run's toxic lead smelting operation has children breathing sulfur dioxide pollution up to 300 times the level permitted by the World Health Organization. [EarthJustice, March 21] In addition, newborn babies are being born with lead poisoning inherited from their mothers, local residents and company employees are dying prematurely, the air quality is tainted with dangerous levels of arsenic, cadmium and lead, while parts of the water supply are contaminated by a toxic cocktail of chemicals. [The Observer, Aug. 12]

After last month's deadly Con Ed blast, another eerie sense of deja vu for jittery New Yorkers—this one cutting even closer to home. From AP via Newsday, Aug. 20:

Investigators probe cause in fire that killed 2 NYC firefighters
NEW YORK - Fire marshals went back into a condemned ground zero skyscraper Monday in hopes of learning more about a blaze that killed two firefighters as details emerged about numerous unsafe working conditions at the troubled demolition site.

About 50 demonstrators gathered outside the Mexican consulate in New York City on Aug. 18 in an attempt to prevent Oaxaca governor Ulises Ruiz Ortiz from participating in a press conference and a meeting with local Mexican community leaders. Ruiz has been the target of militant protests by Oaxacan unionists, social activists and indigenous groups for more than a year. Many of the New York protesters were friends and colleagues of New York-based journalist Brad Will, who was killed in Oaxaca in October 2006 while covering the protests. Gov. Ruiz was scheduled to visit New York as part of tour to US cities by the migration committee of the National Governors' Conference (Conago).

Mineworker Reynaldo Hernandez Gonzalez was killed and several workers were injured on Aug. 13 in a violent confrontation between rival groups of miners at Grupo Mexico's La Caridad mine in Nacozari, in the northwestern Mexican state of Sonora. There were 15 arrests, and about 20 workers reportedly disappeared. The violence broke out when a group of fired workers who were loyal to the main mineworkers union, the National Union of Mine and Metal Workers of the Mexican Republic (SNTMMRM), returned to the mine to demand that they be rehired. Apparently they fought with supporters of a company union.

An Aug. 13 statement from the National Lawyers Guild calling for repeal of the "Protect America Act" signed into law by George Bush Aug. 6:

Congress put its stamp of approval on the unconstitutional wiretapping of Americans by amending the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) in the "Protect America Act of 2007."

Freedom's on the march. From Reuters, Aug. 18:

BAGHDAD — Rare footage from inside a Baghdad prison camp shows hundreds of inmates packed into wire-mesh tents, protesting their innocence.

The Iranian military has shelled territory in Iraqi Kurdistan intermittently over the past three days, wounding two women and forcing the evacuation of 200 families, local officials reported Aug. 18. Hussein Ahmed, the mayor of Qal'at Dizah, a town close to the Iranian line, said several thousand Iranian soldiers could also be seen near the border. There was no immediate comment from Tehran or Baghdad on the reports. Jabar Yaour, undersecretary at the Ministry for Peshmerga Affairs in Iraq's autonomous Kurdistan region, said the shelling took place across a range of about 50 kilometers (30 miles). "Damage has occurred in Kurdish villages on the Iraqi side and resulted in the evacuation of more than 200 families from these villages," Yaour told Reuters.