A UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) mid-year report (PDF) released on July 31 indicated a 23% rise in the number of Afghan civilian casualties over the first six months of 2013 as compared to the same period last year. The report noted that many civilian deaths have been caused by the increased use of improvised explosive devices. Women and children are also increasingly the victims in the country's war, with a 30% increase in the number of children killed. Additionally, almost 75% of civilian deaths during this time period were caused by "Anti-Government Elements" such as Taliban fighters, who were increasingly targeting civilians that they viewed as cooperating with the government. The report calls on the Afghanistan government to "continue to disband and disarm all armed groups and to take measures to ensure accountability for human rights abuses carried out by these groups."

The First Supra-provincial Court of Lima on July 30 issued an order of preventative detention against ex-lawmaker Nancy Obregón, on suspicion of narco-trafficking and "collaboration with terrorism." Obregón, who rose to prominence as a leader of peasant coca-growers, was taken into custody by troops of the National Anti-drug Directorate (DINANDRO), and turned over to judicial authorities for interrogation. Her case will then return to a judge who will decide whether she is to be held for the full 15 days permissible under Peruvian law.

Numerous media sources on July 29, e.g. CBS News, reported that the rebel monks occupying the sanctuary of Mount Athos in northern Greece attacked bailiffs who came to evict them, hurling rocks and petrol bombs. The mount's  Esphigmenou Monastery, a World Heritage Site, has for years been held by ultra-orthodox monks who reject Eastern Orthodoxy's current Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I (also rendered Vartholomeos) over his efforts to improve relations with the Vatican, Times of Malta informs us. The NFTU website, with a kicker of "True Orthodox and Ecumenical News" (the word "true" being a tip-off that they actually reject ecumenicalism), runs a statement from the rebel monks asserting that no bombs were thrown, but that security forces showed up with a bulldozer that "attacked the property and attempted to smash down the front door."

Military Judge Denise Lind on July 30 found Army Pfc. Bradley Manning guilty of violations of the Espionage Act for his disclosure of classified information to anti-secrecy organization Wikileaks. The judge, however, acquitted Manning of the more serious charge of "aiding the enemy." In 2010 Manning leaked more than 700,000 government documents, diplomatic cables and a controversial classified video of a 2007 US helicopter strike in Iraq that resulted in the deaths of numerous civilians and two Reuters journalists. The US Army formally charged Manning in July 2010, but his bench trial did not begin until last month at Fort Meade, Md., nearly three years after his initial arrest. Manning faces 136 months to life in prison. The court is expected to sentence Manning on later this week. Several advocacy groups have decried the verdict, with Wikileaks terming it "extremist," while members of the US government have praised it as evenhanded.

Some 1,500 to 2,000 protesters demonstrated against the Rio de Janeiro state government and militarized police the evening of July 22, the first day of Pope Francis' weeklong visit to Brazil. The protest, reportedly called by the anarchist groups Anonymous Rio and Anonymous Brazil, started as Francis, on his first international trip since he took office in March, was meeting with Brazilian president Dilma Rousseff and Rio state governor Sérgio Cabral in the Guanabara Palace, the state's main administrative building, in the city of Rio de Janeiro. Shortly after the pope left the meeting, someone hurled a molotov bomb at line of police agents, who responded with tear gas and water cannons. Two agents were injured by the bomb, and other people were hurt in the melee that followed, including a photographer from the Agence France-Presse wire service.

Indigenous communities in Arauco province in Chile's central Biobío region have announced plans for a march on Aug. 2 to protest a proposal before the National Congress to extend Forestry Decree 701 for another 20 years. Community residents, who belong to the Mapuche group, Chile's largest ethnicity, say the forestry laws have allowed timber companies to take over traditional Mapuche lands starting in 1974 under the 1973-1990 dictatorship of Gen. Augusto Pinochet. The most important of these companies are Arauco (Celulosa Arauco y Constitución), largely owned by the Angelini family, and Forestal Mininco, controlled by the Matte family. According to Mapuche activists, there is little chance that the forestry proposal will be defeated, since many of the congressional candidates from Mapuche areas in the upcoming Nov. 17 elections are being financed by these two powerful families. (El Cuidadano, Chile, July 27)

A panel of Guatemala's Civilian and Mercantile Appeals Court issued a restraining order on July 24 that is likely to keep Vancouver-based Tahoe Resources Inc. from opening its El Escobal silver mine in August as scheduled. The court backed a complaint filed by Kelvin Jiménez, a member of the indigenous Xinka group, that the Energy and Mining Ministry failed to deal with 250 appeals against the operation when it granted a 25-year license for the mine on April 3. The court's decision gave the ministry three days to begin proceedings on the appeals. The Legal and Environmental Action Center (CALAS), a Guatemalan organization that assisted Jiménez in the legal action, said the July 24 decision would suspend operations at the mine; a spokesperson for Tahoe downplayed the ruling, saying the company's Guatemalan subsidiary, Minera San Rafael, would appeal, although the spokesperson admitted that the process might take several weeks.

On July 27, the day before Peru's independence day celebrations, the country's General Workers' Confederation (CGTP) and the activist network #Tomalacalle (Take the Streets) marched through the center of Lima, seizing avenues in defiance of riot police backed up with armored vehicles, to protest the new Civil Service Law passed earlier this month. CGTP secretary-general Mario Huamán pledges to launch a general civil strike in August to demand repeal of the law. The bill's passage in early July saw angry protests in cities throughout the country, with tear-gas used to disperse demonstrators in Arequipa and elsewhere. The law, introduced to Congress by President Ollanta Humala, limits collective bargaining for public-sector employees to work conditions and not wages, yet restricts the right to strike to only after "mediation or negotiation mechanisms have been exhausted." It also imposes strict evaluation measures the CGTP says threaten job security. Lawmaker Verónika Mendoza (Popular Action/Broad Front) is preparing a measure to have the law annulled as unconstitutional. (La Republica, July 28; Peru21, July 27; El Comercio, July 19; El Comercio, July 4; La Republica, July 3)