An Egyptian court on May 22 convicted five police officers in absentia for the death of protesters last year and sentenced each to 10 years in prison. The men were charged with killing protesters during the 2011 revolution. The conviction was a victory for victims' families who have seen many police acquitted on similar charges. Nearly 200 police officers and government officials, including former president Hosni Mubarak, have been charged in connection with the deaths of at least 846 protesters, but acquittals have been common. Last week, 14 police officers were acquitted on similar charges. Out of 10 cases, there have been nine acquittals and one suspended sentence, causing some critics to accuse authorities of failing to pursue justice for the victims. The verdict in Mubarak's case is due next month.

A suicide bomber killed more than 90 Yemeni troops as they practiced for a parade in the capital Sana'a May 21. The bomber was dressed as a soldier and detonated his explosives-packed vest in the middle of a formation of troops from the Central Security Organization, a paramilitary branch of the Ministry of the Interior. The troops were drilling for the upcoming "National Unity Day" parade at a location near the Presidential Palace. Yemen's defense minister and the military chief of staff were planning on greeting the troops at the rehearsal. Ninety-six troops, many from the Central Security Organization, were killed and at least 300 wounded in the blast, with the death toll expected to rise. Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula claimed the attack, according to a statement released by the Madad News Agency, an AQAP propaganda arm. "The primary target of this blessed operation was the Defense Minister of the Sana'a regime and his corrupt entourage, and that it came in response to the unjust war launched by the Sana'a regime's forces in cooperation with the American and Saudi forces," the statement said, according to a translation by the SITE Intelligence Group. (Long War Journal, May 21)

The typical equivocation from NATO at the Chicago summit—acting as if there were a firm 2014 deadline for a withdrawal despite Obama's deal for an extended US (at least) military presence in the country. NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen went through the motions of calling the Taliban "terrorists" virtually in the same breath that he invoked negotiations with them. "I don't know whether the Taliban leadership is prepared to negotiate a solution, maybe not, I don't know, but I think we should give it a try, providing certain conditions," Rasmussen told reporters, without specifying those "conditions." So much for not negotiating with terrorists, but Western leaders have displayed such doublethink before. (Chicago Sun-Times, May 20)

Armed clashes erupted in Beirut between rival Sunni factions May 21, wounding at least six people. The fighting broke out after Sheikh Ahmed Abdul Wahid, a Sunni cleric, and Muhammed Hussein Miraib, both members of the March 14 Alliance, were shot in their car near Tripoli as they reportedly tried to run a government checkpoint. Lebanon's state-run National News Agency said that gunmen were using "bombs and machine guns." The March 14 Alliance, which emerged from the Cedar Revolution, sympathizes with the rebellion against Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad. Residents of the northern region of Akkar also blocked off roads and burned tires to protest against the killings. The Beirut fighting follows a week of sporadic clashes in Tripoli, also between pro- and anti-Assad Sunni groups. Gunfire first broke out in Tripoli May 14 as sympathizers of the Syrian rebellion, apparently including many Islamists, tried to approach the offices of the Syrian Social Nationalist Party—which is basically the Lebanese wing of Syria's ruling Ba'ath Party. The march on the party headquarters was a response to the May 12 arrest of Sunni Islamist activist Shadi al-Mawlawi and five others by Lebanon's General Security Directorate. (AlJazeera, Radio Australia, AP, May 21; Foreign Policy, May 15; Now Lebanon, May 14)

As with the May Day mobilization, "terrorism" charges have emerged from the protests against the NATO summit in Chicago—or so the media are playing it, with headlines sporting the T-word. But it seems Sebastian Senakiewicz was charged with "terroristic threatening" for bad-assing that he had explosives hidden in the hollowed-out interior of his "Harry Potter" book (which he didn't). Mark Neiweem was charged with "attempted possession of explosive or incendiary devices"—basically, he was asking around for material to make Molotov cocktails. So neither of them have actually been charged with terrorism. (Chicago Tribune, NYT, May 20)

The body of Mexican journalist Marco Antonio Avila, kidnapped three days earlier in Ciudad Obregón, Sonora state, was found May 19 along a beachside highway near Guaymas, in a plastic bag, with signs of torture and a threatening "narco-message." He had written for the Ciudad Obregón newspapers Diario Sonora de la Tarde and El Regional de Sonora. It was but the most recent in a wave of attacks on the press in Mexico. One week earlier, the office of El Mañana in Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas, was sprayed with bullets. Days before that, three freelance crime-beat photographers were assassinated in Veracruz. In late April, Regina Martínez, a reporter for the national weekly Proceso, was found dead with signs of torture in her home in Xalapa, also in Veracruz state. (El Dia, Argentina, May 19; BBC News, April 29)

On May 19, the Mexican army announced the arrest of eight suspects in the massacre of 49 people who were decapitated, mutilated and left in plastic bags on the side of a highway in Cadereyta, Nuevo León, just outside Monterrey last week. Among those arrested was suspected ringleader Daniel Elizondo, AKA "El Loco"—said to be a member of the Gulf Cartel. Drugs, guns and hand grenades were seized during the arrests. However, authorities earlier said that the graffito "100% Zeta" found near the bodies indicated that Los Zetas, the Gulf Cartel's bitter rivals, were responsible. At the time of the massacre, local authorities resorted to the now common tactic of playing down its significance. "This continues to be violence between criminal groups," said Jorge Domene, Nuevo Leon's state security spokesman. "This is not an attack against the civilian population." Yet authorities admitted the victims had not been identified, and may have been migrants attempting to cross into the United States. (AlJazeera, May 20; AP, May 19; AP, May 15; CNN, May 14)

Following last month's nationwide campesino mobilization in Honduras, campesinos from Patuca and Catacamas municipalities in the country's sprawling and rugged northeastern department of Olancho held a protest outside the offices of the National Electric Energy Company (ENEE) in Tegucigalpa, the national capital. The April 25 protest demanded cancellation of the planned Patuca III hydro-electic project until land rights in the area have been clarified. The government claims that last year it delivered promised compensation to campesinos whose lands would be flooded by the Patuca III project, on the river of the same name, and is preparing to commence construction. But the protesters say some 320 affected campesinos have received no compensation. Many of these lack official title to their lands, and protesters say the government has not followed through on pledges for a demarcation of peasant lands in the affected zone. (El Heraldo, Proceso Digital, Honduras, April 25 )