From AP, Dec. 14 via Chiapas95:

MEXICO CITY -- A group of about 300 Mazahua Indians briefly seized a water treatment plant on Mexico City's western outskirts Wednesday and temporarily cut off one of the main sources of water for the metropolis of 18 million people, the National Water Commission said.

From The Telegraph, Dec. 14, emphasis added:

Saudi Arabia would respond to an American withdrawal from Iraq by funding and arming Sunni insurgents to prevent them being massacred by Shia militias, the kingdom has told the White House.

Another turn of the screw. From AlJazeera, Dec. 13, emphasis added:

A Guantanamo prisoner who won a landmark US Supreme Court ruling in June lost his bid to challenge his detention when a federal judge dismissed the case because of a new anti-terrorism law signed by George Bush, the US president.

Another sign of de-escalation in Oaxaca? From AP, Dec. 11:

OAXACA - A labor group allied with the government of the southern state of Oaxaca announced on Monday that it was ending a controversial, 1 1/2-year blockade of the offices of Noticias, a newspaper frequently critical of state authorities.

From Afrol News, Dec. 11:

An Algiers bomb attack against oil workers that killed an Algerian driver and wounded nine people, including several Western citizens, has raised fears that Algeria's trend towards peace and stability may end. As the US Embassy in Algeria today advises Americans to review their personal security, foreign oil companies already have decided to invest into protection against terrorist attacks.

From The Guardian, Dec. 13:

Bushmen forced out of the Kalahari desert by Botswana's government won a landmark legal victory today as the country's high court ruled they had been illegally removed and should be allowed to return.

A press release from the International Human Rights Clinic (IHRC) at Harvard, Dec. 13:

Retaliatory Attacks Also Kill Highlanders in Gambella Region
Cambridge, MA – Soldiers in the Ethiopian military have killed, raped, and otherwise abused hundreds of Anuak civilians in the Gambella region of the country, the International Human Rights Clinic (IHRC) of Harvard Law School’s Human Rights Program said today.

Hermann Bellinghausen noted some salient comments in his report from Zapatista Subcommander Marcos' tour stop at Bagdad Beach (on the Rio Grande, just outside Matamoros) for La Jornada, Nov. 24. Via Chiapas95:

BAGDAD, Tamaulipas - December 1, the day that Felipe Calderon takes office, will be "the beginning of the end for a political system that, since the Mexican Revolution, became deformed and began to cheat generation after generation, until this one arrived and said, 'Enough,'" warned Subcomandante Marcos during a press conference. Calderon, he added, "will begin to fall from his first day."