In one of his boldest moves since his swearing-in three months ago, Turkmenistan's President Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov has sacked a top security official who helped build the oppressive regime of the late Saparmurat "Turkmenbashi" Niyazov. Official media announced that Akmurad Rejepov, head of the presidential security service, is being transferred to "another job," which was not specified. Nor was a replacement announced. Analysts cautiously view this as evidence of a post-Niyazov political opening.

Taliban leader Mullah Omar has formally confirmed the death of top commander Mullah Dadullah, through a spokesman, and nominated Mullah Bakht Mohammad as his replacement. The elusive Mullah Omar also claimed there are thousands of fighters ready to avenge Dadullah's death and called for an immediate return of Dadullah's corpse to his family. Dadullah's brother, Shah Mansoor, and two other senior Taliban officials released from prison in exchange for the safe release of a foreign journalist in March have also been killed, according to Afghan intelligence officials. The trio, including commanders Mullah Ghaffar and Mullah Hamdullah, were killed hours before US forces killed Mullah Dadullah in Helmand province on May 12. (Afgha.com, May 16)

During the May 15 Republican presidential debate at the University of South Carolina, Libertarian gadly Rep. Ron Paul (TX) dared to speak logic about the reasons behind 9-11—and made clear that he, at least, has actually read al-Qaeda's communiqués. "Have you ever read the reasons they attacked us? They attacked us because we've been over there; we've been bombing Iraq for 10 years." Of course he had to play a stupid xenophobia/Orientalism card, and paradoxically invoke to his defense Ronald Reagan, whose imperial intrigues in the Islamic world only helped create al-Qaeda: "I think Reagan was right. We don't understand the irrationality of Middle Eastern politics." But he quickly rescued himself with some simple logic and humanity: "So right now we're building an embassy in Iraq that's bigger than the Vatican. We're building 14 permanent bases. What would we say here if China was doing this in our country or in the Gulf of Mexico? We would be objecting. We need to look at what we do from the perspective of what would happen if somebody else did it to us." Of course, no good deed goes unpunished—and Paul's punishment came swiftly...

New satellite analysis shows that at least once in the past several years, masses of unusually warm air—up to 40 degrees Fahrenheit—pushed to within 300 miles of the South Pole, melting surface snow across an expanse the size of California. The warm spell, which occurred over one week in 2005, was detected by scientists from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in California and the University of Colorado at Boulder. The findings were based on data from NASA's QuickSCAT satellite system which uses radar to distinguish the ice signatures of melting in the Antarctic snow. This is the first time melt zones have been detected so far inland. "It is too soon to know whether the warm spell was a fluke or a portent, said JPL scientist Son Nghiem. "It is vital we continue monitoring this region to determine if a long-term trend may be developing." (NYT, May 16)

On May 15, wealthy landowner Vitalmiro Bastos de Moura was given the maximum sentence, 30 years, for being one of the masterminds of the February 2005 murder of US-born nun Dorothy Stang, a 73-year-old defender of the Amazon rainforest and landless people. It is the first conviction of a member of Pará state's landed elite in a wave of killings of peasant leaders and forest defenders in recent years.

Imprisoned Colombian paramilitary leader Salvatore Mancuso fingered the nation's vice president, defense minister and two of it's top conglomerates as collaborators in an explosive judicial hearing. He also said the paramilitaries, branded "foreign terrorist organizations" by Washington in 2001, were aided by top army brass in training and logistics. Mancuso said he would offer details later. In press interviews last week, he promised details of how multinational companies including all banana exporters helped bankroll the paramilitaries. President Alvaro Uribe said in a radio interview that he had "every confidence in the honesty and moral fiber" of Vice President Francisco Santos and Defense Minister Juan Manuel Santos.

Sonora state police killed 15 in a fierce gunbattle just south of the Arizona border May 16 after tracking into the hills a group of heavily-armed gunmen who earlier that day killed five municipal police in Cananea. Three Cananea residents who had been aducted were freed. Police seized 15 assault rifles following the hours-long shoot-out near the village of Arizpe. Meanwhile in Coahuila, four men in the black unforms and insignia of the Federal Agency of Investigation (AFI) kidnapped the state‘s chief anti-kidnapping investigator, Ruiz Arevalo, in Torreon. (El Universal, El Tiempo, AP, May 16)

Two years ago, following rumors that Osama bin Laden had taken refuge in Nuristan, we warned that the remote mountain region immortalized as "Kafiristan" in Rudyard Kipling's The Man Who Would Be King would be drawn into Afghanistan's war. Now, alas, our prediction has been vindicated. A roadside bomb killed seven Afghan soldiers in Nuristan's Kamdesh district May 14, and the following day Afghan soldiers killed six Taliban insurgents in the province, governor Tamim Nuristani said. Over 1,300, mostly said to be Taliban militants, have been killed in Afghanistan this year. (Pakistan Online News, Reuters, May 16)