Tension prevailed on both sides of the border after Israeli forces resumed routine activity in the area where deadly clashes took place Aug. 4 between Israeli and Lebanese soldiers. The Israeli forces managed to cut down the tree which ignited the skirmishes, Israel's Army Radio reported. The army said it had the right to remove trees if they hinder visibility and make Israeli forces vulnerable to attacks. Armored vehicles were stationed in the area to protect Israeli machinery used to cut down the tree which ignited the clashes. Israel and Lebanon blame each other for the brief exchange of fire that left one Israeli soldier, two Lebanese troops, and a Lebanese journalist dead.

An illegal Israeli settlement outpost erected near the larger Kiyrat Arba settlement in Hebron was evacuated by Israeli forces on the morning of Aug. 5, sparking violence from squatters. The outpost, a collection of wood buildings and tents in Hebron's al-Buwayra area, was taken down and more than a dozen settlers removed from the area, who proceeded to torch Palestinian lands, witnesses said.

Dozens of Afghan refugees have been reported missing and thousands displaced by severe floods in Pakistan over the past two weeks, according to refugees, aid workers and officials. Khyber-Pukhtunkhwa (KP) province, northwestern Pakistan, where most of the 1.7 million Afghan refugees registered in Pakistan are living, has been worst affected, officials said.

Various river ports have been blocked for the past week by some 2,000 indigenous protesters in Peru's northern region of Loreto, effectively cutting off traffic on the Tigre and Corrientes rivers, to press demands for the titling of native lands and payment to local communities for use of the waterways by oil companies. Local commissioners from the Defensoría del Pueblo (rights ombudsman) have been dispatched to the caserío (settlement) of Paraíso to negotiate with the protesters, who are led by the Federation of Indigenous Communities of Bajo Tigre (FECONABAT). Pluspetrol, Talismán, ConocoPhilips, Cares Perú and Perupetro are among the companies with operations in the area. (Diario La Primera, Lima, July 29)

Nine US human rights activists are holding a vigil at the Tolemaida military base near Bogotá with a 12-foot banner that reads "U.S. MILITARY OUT OF COLOMBIA." The Tolemaida base is one of seven in Colombia to which the US military has been granted access for 10 years under the US-Colombia Defense Cooperation Agreement signed in October 2009.

Colombian union sources report that Alejandro Betancur, president of the Union of Mining Industry Workers (SINTRAMINEROS) in the northwestern department of Antioquia, received a death threat by telephone on July 26 in connection with his union activities. According to Carlos Julio, president of Colombia's Unitary Workers Central (CUT), Betancur was threatened because of his efforts on behalf of about 100 miners employed by companies belonging to Industrial Hullera, which is now in liquidation. The dispute, which has gone on for 13 years, concerns labor rights and pensions. (El Mundo, Medellín, July 31; Adital, Brazil, July 29)

On July 28 Haitians protested in Port-au-Prince, Hinche, St-Marc and other cities to mark the 95th anniversary of the start of the 1915-1934 US military occupation of their country. Dozens of supporters of the Lavalas Family (FL) party of former president Jean Bertrand Aristide (1991-1996 and 2001-2004) held a sit-in in front of the US embassy in the northeastern Port-au-Prince suburb of Tabarre to demand Aristide's return from South Africa, the firing of election officials and the withdrawal of the United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH), a 9,000-member military and police occupation force. Embassy officials met with a delegation of FL leaders, including Maryse Narcisse, who demanded that the US not finance the scheduled Nov. 28 general elections as long as the FL continued to be excluded from the ballot.

Mexico's Foreign Relations Secretariat (SRE) announced on July 31 that the government of President Felipe Calderón Hinojosa was normalizing diplomatic relations with Honduras and that the Mexican ambassador, Tarcisio Navarrete, would return to Tegucigalpa in a few days to resume his functions. Mexico broke off relations with Honduras on June 29, 2009, one day after then-president José Manuel ("Mel") Zelaya Rosales was removed by a military coup d'état.