On July 1 the Peruvian government notified Father Paul McAuley, an environmental activist in the northern Amazonian department of Loreto, that the Interior Ministry is rescinding his residency, which he has held since 2006. The order to expel the British priest, who has called Peru home for the past 20 years, comes on the heels of his efforts to ensure accountability for the massive June 19 PlusPetrol oil spill, which contaminated several rainforest communities.

On July 21, over 80 indigenous Yukpa people arrived in Caracas for the third time from the Sierra de Perijá and began a protest vigil in front of the Venezuelan Supreme Court. The protesters are demanding a ruling on an appeal introduced in February to determine that three arrested Yukpas can be judged under indigenous law rather than the national legal system.

Thousands of people marched in front of the Puerto Rican police headquarters on Franklin D. Roosevelt Avenue in San Juan's Hato Rey neighborhood on July 18 to demand the removal of police chief José Figueroa Sancha and his second-in-command, José Rosa Carrasquillo, and the disbanding of the Tactical Operations Unit. The marchers started at three different points in the city, including a campus of the University of Puerto Rico (UPR); students from the UPR's 11 campuses defeated a proposed austerity plan with a two-month strike this spring. Some organizers said more than 5,000 people participated in the march, while police sources put the number at 3,000.

After 90 days, a mass hunger strike by laid-off electrical workers in the center of Mexico City came to an end on July 23 following a preliminary agreement between federal governance secretary José Francisco Blake Mora and the Mexican Electrical Workers Union (SME) the night before. Although dozens of workers and supporters had taken part in the strike at various times, only 11 men and three women remained at the end. Most were taken to the Centro Médico Nacional Siglo XXI, a hospital run by the Mexican Social Security Institute (IMSS), but Cayetano Cabrera Esteva, the only striker to last out the full 90 days, refused to accept care from a government facility and was being treated by a private medical service.

Three months have now passed since the Deepwater Horizon oil gusher began in the Gulf of Mexico. The "spill" (as it is generally called, not quite accurately) was only last week brought under tentative and temporary control. Politicians exploit the disaster, while some environmentalists warn (hyperbolically, we hope) of a potential "Earth extinction event" if it isn't contained. Our June Exit Poll (extended into July for lack of responses) was: "Will future generations note April 20, 2010 as a greater turning point than Sept. 11, 2001?" We finally received the following responses:

Police raided and shut down electrical workers unions across Iraq in mid-July, carrying out an order from the Ministry of Electricity that prohibits "all trade union activities at the ministry and its departments and sites" and authorizes police "to close all trade union offices and bases and to take control of unions' assets properties and documents, furniture and computers."

Rallies have been held in London, Paris, New York, Berlin, Ottawa and other cities around the world to support Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani, an Iranian woman sentenced to death by the Islamic Republic for adultery. Ashtiani has been incarcerated since 2005 and has already received received 99 lashes. She was initially sentenced to death by stoning, but the execution was put on hold earlier this month after an international outcry. "We do want to save her life," said Maryam Namazie, a protest organizer in London. "We are hoping this will be a stepping tone to ending stoning and executions in Iran once and for all."

US drones fired missiles at a target in the Angoor Adda area of Pakistan's South Waziristan region July 24, killing 18 suspected militants. (PTI, July 24) According to a count by the BBC Urdu service, nearly 2,500 people have been killed in Pakistan by US drone strikes and Taliban attacks since January 2009. (Pakistan Daily Times, July 24)