The US Department of Defense on Dec. 27 announced the repatriation of four Guantánamo Bay detainees to Afghanistan. The prisoners—Shawali Khan, Khi Ali Gul, Abdul Ghani and Mohammed Zahir—were released after a review of their cases. Although originally detained on suspicion of being associated with groups such as the Taliban and other terrorist organizations, they had been cleared for transfer for quite some time. They were considered "low-level detainees" and not security risks in their home country. With the release, the population of Guantánamo has been reduced to 132 prisoners. The release of the four men is part of an effort by the Obama administration to close Guantánamo Bay, despite restrictions in the latest defense spending bill, which President Obama signed Dec. 19 with a statement that expressed dissatisfaction over the provisions.

Kenya's parliament on Dec. 18 passed a sweeping new anti-terrorism law after some of its members engaged in a shoving match that led to blows being exchanged. Those opposed to the law, citing violations of free speech and other civil liberties, shouted, threw water, and even threw books at the Speaker in protest of the bill. The law allows security services to detain suspected criminals without charging them for up to 360 days, allows media members to be persecuted for publishing material that is likely to cause fear or alarm, and enables a domestic spy force to carry out secret operations. President Uhuru Kenyatta has backed the bill due to increased pressure to improve security in the country after a 2013 terrorist attack by Somali al-Shabaab rebels that killed 67 people.

The UN General Assembly on Dec. 20 approved a resolution calling upon Israel to pay Lebanon over $850 million in damages for an oil spill caused by air-strikes on storage tanks at the Jiyyeh power station during the 2006 war. The assembly voted 170-6 in favor of the nonbinding resolution, with three abstentions. Only Israel, the United States, Canada, Australia, Micronesia and Marshall Islands voted "no." The resolution called the oil slick that covered the entire Lebanese coast and extended into Syria an "environmental disaster." Some 15,000 tons of oil were released into the Mediterranean in the July 2006 air raids. (Middle East Eye, Al Jazeera, BBC News, AP via Times of Israel, Dec. 20)

In a reversal for Peru's Yanacocha mining company, campesina Máxima Acuña de Chaupe and her family, convicted of land usurpation against the company by a local court, had their sentence overturned by the Cajamarca Supreme Court of Justice on Dec. 18. Acuña de Chaupe and three family members faced two years and eight months in prison and a $2,000 fine. The regional high court also ruled that no move should be made by Yanacocha on the disputed plot, although it stopped short of actually overturning the charge against the Chaupe family. The plot, long part of a predio (collective holding) called Tragadero Grande, is coveted by Yanacocha for infrastructure related to the controversial Conga open-pit project. Máxima Acuña de Chaupe became a symbol of the struggle against the Conga project, hailed as the "Lady of the Lagunas." (La Republica, Dec. 18)

Ecuador's government announced Dec. 11 that the country's leading indigenous organization had two weeks to abandon the headquarters it has held for almost a quarter of a century. The announcement came in a letter from the Ministry of Economic and Social Inclusion (MIES) to the Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of Ecuador (CONAIE) stating that it needs the building on the northern outskirts of Quito as a shelter for street children. CONAIE president Jorge Herrera responded that the building "has been a symbol of the construction of a relationship between the state and indigenous peoples," and denounced the impending eviction as a "persecution of the indigenous movement." With the deadline approaching, CONAIE leader Floresmilo Simbaña pledged to resist removal. "We want to avoid confrontations and acts of violence," he said. But he added: "We are going to defend this place." The offices are currently occupied around-the-clock by CONAIE supporters, with banners and flags draped from the balconies.

Colombia's army accused the FARC on Dec. 19 of killing five soldiers only hours before confirming a unilateral and indefinite rebel ceasefire to start the next day. The combat took place in Santander de Quilichao, Cauca, where a local army patrol was ambushed by members of the FARC’s 6th Front and its Teofilo Forero elite unit. One more soldier is missing in action and may have been taken prisoner by the guerrillas. The same FARC unit had earlier that day blown up the Panamerican highway at Caldono, leaving a lane-wide crater. Additionally, presumed FARC guerillas left Valle del Cauca's Pacific port city of Buenaventura without electricity after blowing up a key transmission tower on Dec. 18.

Nineteen officers of Colombia's National Police force have been arrested this week in Medellín, the latest busts in an ongoing sweep of corrupt officers. Another 27 were arrested along with the officers, accused of being their handlers for criminal bosses. The targetted officers, associated with the downtown Candelaria police station, are accused of collaborating with Los Urabeños narco-paramilitary gang. Prosecutors say the officers were paid to turn a blind eye to criminal activity in the plazas of downtown Medellín, and to provide tip-offs on planned raids. The arrests come under the National Police force's new "Transparency Plan." National Police commander Rodolfo Palomino tweeted: "They deserve to be treated like Judas, public officials of any institution that are thrown into the maw of corruption." Last month, 25 National Police agents were arrested in the crackdown nationwide. (Colombia Reports, Dec. 4; Colombia Reports, Nov. 20)

The decades-long civil war in the Democratic Republic of Congo shows signs of winding down, but is apparently leaving in its wake a good old "anti-crime" police state that sees impoverished youth as a threat and seeks to exterminate them. Human Rights Watch reported last month that police in the DRC summarily killed at least 51 youth and "forcibly disappeared" 33 others during an anti-crime campaign that began a year ago. "Operation Likofi," which lasted from November 2013 to February 2014, was officially a crackdown on criminal gangs in Congo's capital, Kinshasa. HRW's report, "Operation Likofi: Police Killings and Enforced Disappearances in Kinshasa," details how uniformed police, often wearing masks, dragged suspected gang members—known as kuluna—from their homes at night and executed them. Police shot and killed the unarmed young men and boys outside their homes, in open markets where they slept or worked, or in nearby fields or empty lots. Many others were taken without warrants to unknown locations, never to be seen again.