WW4 REPORT editor Bill Weinberg will be speaking Thursday, April 6 on New York's Lower East Side, on "International Solidarity with Iraq’s Freedom Struggles." The presentation will also include a screening of the new DVD Go Forward, Iraqi Freedom Congress!, produced by Japanese peace activsts and documenting the activities of a new anti-occupation civilian coalition in Iraq. Weinberg recently returned from a conference in Japan where he met with and interviewed leaders of the Iraqi Freedom Congress.

From DPA, April 3:

ANKARA - Three people were killed and one badly injured when suspected Kurdish assailants threw Molotov cocktails at a bus in Istanbul Sunday night, the NTV television station reported.

From The Independent, April 3:

WASHINGTON - The Pentagon has revealed that coalition forces are spending millions of dollars establishing at least six "enduring" bases in Iraq.

Agents of the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) arrested Puerto Rican nationalist Antonio Camacho Negron on March 28 on a street in Rio Piedras, near San Juan, after he had addressed the opening of the First National Congress for Decolonization at the University of Puerto Rico. Camacho is a former leader of the rebel Popular Boricua Army (EPB)-Macheteros ["cane cutters"]; he served 15 years in a US prison for transporting money stolen in 1983 when the group robbed $7.2 million from a Wells Fargo depot in Connecticut. US authorities released Camacho on parole on Aug. 17, 2004, but he refused to accept the parole's terms. The US issued a warrant for his arrest on Aug. 20, 2004, after he missed his first appointment with a parole officer.

More than 500,000 people marched in Los Angeles on March 25 to demand legalization for out-of-status immigrants and protest anti-immigrant legislation being considered by the Senate. Police estimated the crowd size using aerial photographs and other techniques, police commander Louis Gray Jr. said. (AP, March 26) The LA demonstration was the largest of a wave of protests sweeping cities across the US, starting with Feb. 14 rallies and strikes in Philadelphia and Georgetown, Delaware, and energized by a massive March 10 rally in Chicago. According to a March 25 article by New American Media, more than 50 demonstrations took place over the previous few weeks, including in Minneapolis, Knoxville, Seattle, St. Louis, Portland (OR), Staten Island (NY) and Grand Rapids (MI).

From La Jornada, March 31, via Chiapas95 (our translation):

CANCUN — Mayan priests tonight carried out "a cleansing against the wickedness of George W. Bush," in the culmination of the first day of protests against the presence of the American leader in this city...

From El Universal, March 31, via Chiapas95:

SAN CRISTOBAL DE LAS CASAS, Chiapas. Thousands of campesinos in southern Mexico blocked roads and bridges Wednesday to protest the alleged failure of the central government to help them cope with the aftermath of Hurricane Stan.

From The Dominion ("Canada's Grassroots Newspaper"), March 25:

Potable Politics
Will water put the Zapatismo into Mexico's big city politics?

by Van Ferrier

The 4th World Water Forum has drawn to a close in Mexico City, but the debate over who will provide clean drinking water in regions throughout the country has only just begun. In Guadalajara, Mexico's second most populous city, drinking water is a private business. The local water company was sold to multi-national corporations in 1998, since then the price of water has doubled, causing public uproar.