Iran announced it will lodge a formal complaint at the UN against remarks by US President Barack Obama that Washington could use nuclear weapons against Tehran. "We will submit our formal complaint against this kind of threats to the United Nations," said Foreign Ministry spokesman Ramin Mehman-Parast in an interview with the Fars News Agency, calling the remarks "a threat to global security."

Israel's leading human rights groups are mobilizing to halt two new military orders that are to take effect April 13, which will make any resident of the occupied West Bank who does not have an Israeli-issued permit liable for deportation or imprisonment. The new "Order Regarding Prevention of Infiltration" and "Order Regarding Security Provisions" have "severe ramifications," the rights groups say. Palestinians, and any foreigners living in the West Bank, could be labelled infiltrators and deported within 72 hours or imprisoned for seven years if they are found without the correct permit. But the orders do not define what Israel considers a valid permit.

Former Kyrgyz foreign minister Roza Otunbayeva announced April 8 that she will lead an interim government in Kyrgyzstan after violent protests the previous day apparently ousted president Kurmanbek Bakiyev and his administration. Otunbayeva, leader of the opposition Social Democratic Party of Kyrgyzstan, urged Bakiyev to resign and said that her temporary government will rule for six months until the country holds democratic elections. Bakiyev, who has fled the capital Bishkek for the southern city of Osh, said in a statement that he will not resign.

Turkish politician and Kurdish rights activist Leyla Zana was sentenced April 8 to three years in prison for spreading terrorist propaganda. Zana was convicted by a court in the city of Diyarbakir for two speeches delivered at a Kurdish political congress in 2008. Zana has previously been convicted for spreading propaganda under Turkey's anti-terrorism laws, most recently facing a 10-year sentence in 2008 for supporting the Kurdistan Worker's Party (PKK). She remains free pending appeal.

A private guard shot Honduran campesino Miguel Alonso Oliva dead on April 1 when a group of campesinos attempted to occupy an African palm farm in the northern Honduran department of Colón, according to the German-based organization FoodFirst Information and Action Network (FIAN). The victim was a member of the Unified Campesino Movement of the Aguán (MUCA), a group based in the Aguán River Valley that has fought since 2001 for some 20,000 hectares of land it claims were bought illegally by a group of influential landowners, Miguel Facussé, Reinaldo Canales and René Morales. Morales holds the title to the farm where the April 1 killing took place.

Up to 3,000 Dominicans marched in Cotuí in the central province of Sánchez Ramírez on Apr. 3 to protest against the Pueblo Viejo gold mine, which is operated by the Toronto-based Barrick Gold Corp. Many of the protesters were local, but several dozen youths had walked the 105 kilometers from Santo Domingo, starting on March 31. An encampment was set up in Cotuí by the same young activists that successfully demonstrated last year for a suspension of construction of the Consorcio Minero Dominicano's cement factory near Los Haitises National Park.

On the morning of March 29 unidentified people assaulted and stabbed Silvia Suppo in her crafts shop in the small town of Rafaela in Argentina's northeastern Santa Fe province; she suffered 22 knife wounds and died later that day in a hospital.

World War 4 Report will be at a reduced level of activity for the month of April while editor Bill Weinberg is traveling overseas, including to attend the alternative conference on climate change that Evo Morales has called in Bolivia. Please check back with us periodically, and feel free to make a small donation to facilitate this work.