Indonesian cleric Abu Bakar Bashir was sentenced June 15 to 15 years in prison for his involvement with a terrorist training camp in the province of Aceh to prepare Islamic radicals to carry out attacks in Jakarta. Prosecutors said Bashir provided more than $62,000 to the group, which was allegedly planning attacks modeled after the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks and targeting high-profile members of the Indonesian government. Bashir was found guilty of inciting terrorism. He was not convicted, however, of funding terrorist activities because there was not enough evidence to prove Bashir's money contributed to purchasing guns for use at the training camp. The 72-year-old said he would appeal the sentence because it ignores Sharia law.

The US is building a secret airbase "somewhere in the Middle East" from which the CIA can launch drone attacks against terrorist elements in Yemen, the AP reports, calling the move "a hedge against the danger that today’s friendly government could crumble and force America to continue its fight from outside." The US effort against al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) in Yemen is being jointly run by the CIA and the Pentagon's Joint Special Operations Command. JSOC forces have been allowed by Yemen's government to conduct "limited strikes" there (some of which have apparently taken a grave civilian toll) since 2009 . The account states: “The Associated Press has withheld the exact location at the request of U.S. officials. They spoke on condition of anonymity because portions of the military and CIA missions in Yemen are classified.” (Fox News, DoD Buzz, June 15)

Following the issuance of Ministerial Resolution 264 by Peru's Ministy of Energy and Mines (MINEM) on June 14, suspending construction of the Inambari hydro-electric dam in the rainforest region of Madre de Dios, protesters called off their paro, or civil strike, in Macusani, capital of Carabaya province in the neighboring region of Puno. Macusani had been paralyzed since June 8 by protests demanding cancellation of the project, with traffic blocked on the newly paved Interoceanic Highway connecting the region to Brazil.

Walter Aduviri, leader of the Aymara protest movement in Peru's southern Andean region of Puno, is currently under police siege in the studios of Lima's Panamericana TV station. Following an interview the morning of June 15 on the program "Buenos Días Peru," Aduviri was approached by an officer of the Judicial Police, who requested that he follow him. Aduviri—who has been under arrest orders since May 9—declined, and instead returned to the Panamericana studios. Both a large contingent of police and some 60 of Aduviri's supporters gathered outside, and the stand-off continues at this hour. "I am not detained, but under refuge," Aduviri told his supporters in a subsequent interview on Panamericana's Chennel 5. "If I am taken and the population finds out, there will be extreme confrontations, and this we do not want." (RPP, AFP, Living in Peru, June 15)

Officials in Peru this week denied claims by the UK-based Survival International that the government plans to abolish the Murunahua Territorial Reserve, created in 1997 to protect almost 1.2 million acres (482,000 hectares) of Amazon rainforest thought to be home to "uncontacted" bands of the Murunahua and other native peoples. “We have in no way even considered abolishing the Murunahua Reserve,” said José Carlos Vilcapoma, vice-minister for Interculturality, who administers the country’s indigenous affairs department, INDEPA, characterizing Survival's press release as "absolutely false.”

A court in St. Petersburg, Russia sent two members of a neo-Nazi group behind bars for life on June 15. The group was responsible for at least seven murders, the court found. While gang leader Alexej Vojevodin and follower Arťom Prochorenko were sentenced to life in prison, another 10 members were given sentences of between two and 18 years. The gang's victims include a Senegalese student shot in front of a night club in St. Petersburg, a man of North Korean origin who was stabbed to death on the street, and the anthropologist and ethnographer Nikolaj Girenko, who was shot to death in front of his home in 2004. Girenko was killed apparently because he frequently testified as an expert witness in trials of neo-Nazi perpetrators.

A NATO official acknowledged June 14 that the alliance is considering air-strikes on ancient Roman ruins in north Libya, sparking statements of concern from the United Nations. The anonymous official told CNN the alliance would bomb the ruins of Leptis Magna, between Tripoli and Misrata, if it confirmed that war material is being sequestered there by the Qaddafi regime. Rebel sources claim that Qaddafi-loyalist troops have stashed rocket launchers and other military equipment at the site. (CNN, UPI, Time magazine's Global Spin blog, June 14)

We noted last year the FBI raids on activists in the midwest over their alleged ties to the PFLP and the FARC. We've also noted the hardline proclivities of federal prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald, whose harsh "anti-terrorist" measures have bottlenecked free speech before. Now, this story from the Washington Post of June 13 connects the dots. We are not privy to the details, but it certainly doesn't sound good...