The Sudanese military said Jan. 30 that it had "liberated" 14 of the 29 Chinese road workers abducted by guerillas in in an attack on an encampment in the oil-rich border state of South Kordofan. But Chinese state news agency Xinhua quoted embassy officials in Khartoum as saying all the workers were still missing. There is also dispute as to the nature of the attack in which the workers were taken. A spokesman from the Sudan People's Liberation Movement-North (SPLM-N) rebels told the AFP news agency that the workers were captured together with nine Sudanese soldiers when fighters attacked a military convoy. Wang Zhiping, a senior executive of the Power Construction Corporation that employed the workers, told Xinhua the rebels had attacked the workers at their camp. Together, more than 70 road workers, Chinese and Sudanese, were taken. The Chinese firm is building a road into a remote area of the state, despite charges by human rights groups that the Sudanese government is using such infrastructure to rush in troops to crush a growing insurrection.

From AP, Jan. 29:

Florida highway pileup kills at least 10 people
GAINESVILLE, Fla. — A long line of cars and trucks collided one after another early Sunday on a dark Florida highway so shrouded in haze and smoke that drivers were instantly blinded. At least 10 people were killed.

The New York Police Department, under fire from New York City Muslims, has announced that it is ending its program of NYPD-CIA collaboration launched after 9-11. Commissioner Raymond Kelly says the CIA officer working as a special assistant to the department's intelligence program will leave his post in April after nine months. The program has been under scrutiny since it was revealed in a series of stories by the Associated Press, prompting the CIA's own Inspector General to conduct an investigation. The Inspector General's probe found there was insufficient oversight of the program, which included sending plainclothes "rakers" into mosques and Muslim communities. Muslims not suspected of any wrongdoing were put in intelligence databases.

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay charged Jan. 27 that Libya's transitional government must take control of all makeshift prisons to prevent further atrocities against detainees. Pillay says various brigades are holding as many as 8,000 prisoners in 60 detention centers around the country. Pillay added that she is particularly concerned about Black African detainees who are apparently assumed automatically to be Qaddafi-loyalist fighters. She said detainees have been subject to "torture, extrajudicial executions, rape of both men and women." Pillay's statement follows a statement by Amnesty International that "several detainees have died after being subjected to torture in Libya in recent weeks and months... The torture is being carried out by officially recognized military and security entities as well by a multitude of armed militias operating outside any legal framework." Detainees told Amnesty they had been beaten for hours with whips, cables, plastic hoses, metal chains, bars, wooden sticks and given electric shocks.

South Sudan, at an impasse in talks with Khartoum over terms for use of the pipeline linking the two countries, has ordered oil companies to shut down oil production within two weeks. Landlocked South Sudan's President Salva Kiir accuses Sudan of having stolen $815 million worth of the south’s oil. Sudan's President Omar Hassan al-Bashir can no longer tolerate South Sudan exporting its oil for free while the two governments are at odds. Sudan has publicly proposed $36 per barrel, while South Sudan has listed figures under $1 per barrel. Efforts to mediate by Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, current chair of the African Union, have been fruitless. When South Sudan seceded last year, it took with it about 75% of Khartoum's 500,000 barrels per day of oil production. The shutdown could lead to a tightening of the world’s oil supply and cause prices to rise. (Sudan Tribune via AllAfrica, Jan. 27; AP, Jan. 23)

Riot police cordoned off streets in Dakar on Jan. 28 after a night of violent protests that erupted after the Constitutional Council cleared octogenarian President Abdoulaye Wade to seek a third term and opposition leaders vowed to force him from power. As the decision was announced, youths set fire to tires and threw stones at riot police, who responded with tear gas. At least one police officer was reported killed. Reports from the central town of Kaolack said the local headquarters of Wade's Senegalese Democratic Party (PDS) was burned down. Riots were also reported in Thies and Mbour, outside Dakar. "Abdoulaye Wade has declared war on the people," said Amath Dansakho, leader of the leftist Party of Independence and Labor (PIT) and a member of the M23 opposition coalition. "The decision that we have just made will prove to Wade that this is a country of free people. We will render the country ungovernable." Wade responded by telling his opponents to stop their "displays of petulance" and "temper tantrums."

Japan's last nuclear power plant will close in April as reactors are shut for safety checks. Chugoku Electric Power Co. (CEPCO) shut the No. 2 reactor at its Shimane nuclear station Jan. 25, leaving only 6.4% of Japan’s 48,960 megawatts of nuclear capacity on-line. The No. 5 unit at Kashiwazaki Kariwa station, run by Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO) was idled on Jan. 25. The remaining three reactors there are due to go off-line for regular checks during the next three months. The No. 5 reactor at the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear plant in Niigata prefecture was also suspended for scheduled checkups, leaving only one out of a total of 17 reactors run by TEPCO in service. All 17 reactors will go offline by the end of March. Among Japan's 54 commercial reactors, only two others are currently in operation—the No. 3 reactor at the Tomari plant in Hokkaido, the No. 3 reactor at the Takahama plant in Fukui prefecture (Chūbu region).

The US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in Manhattan on Jan. 26 overturned an injunction won by Chevon Corporation to block enforcement of what the US oil company claims is a fraudulent, multibillion-dollar judgment in Ecuador for polluting the Amazon rainforest. In reversing the decision made by the US District Court for the Southern District of New York, the Second Circuit held that Chevron may not challenge the approximately $18 billion Ecuadoran judgment before enforcement of that judgment has actually been sought by the Ecuadoran plaintiffs. In its interpretation of the Uniform Foreign Money-Judgments Recognition Act, the court concluded that judgment-debtors like Chevron can challenge a foreign judgment's validity under the Act only defensively and in response to an attempted enforcement. The court found that an effort of enforcement by the Ecuadoran plaintiffs had not yet been undertaken anywhere, and might never be undertaken in New York. While both Chevron and the Ecuadorian plaintiffs have yet to comment on the decision, Chevron has long contended (press release, PDF) that it has never conducted oil operations in Ecuador and that the allegations of environmental and social harm in the Amazon are therefore false.