Sandinista candidate and incumbent President Daniel Ortega was re-elected to lead Nicaragua Nov. 6. The United Nicaragua Triumphs Alliance headed by the Sandinista party (FSLN) won some 64% percent of the vote, followed by the Independent Liberal Party (PLI) candidate Fabio Gadea with 30%, and the Constitutional Liberal Party candidate Arnoldo Alemán with 6%. The US State Department expressed its "concern" with "reports" of "procedural irregularities and voter intimidation." A youth of 18 was shot in the leg in a clash between Sandinista and opposition supporters in Jalapa, Nuevo Segovia department. Local PLI supporters said soldiers fired on the crowd. Electoral violence was also reported from Totogalpa, Madriz department, where a truck belonging to a local cooperative had its windows smashed.

Retired military general Otto Pérez Molina emerged victorious from Nov. 6 run-off elections for the presidency of Guatemala, vowing a crackdown on crime and drug-related violence. Pérez Molina was elected despite being accused by rights campaigners of having overseen genocide when he commanded military forces at Nebaj, Quiche department, in 1982-3. Pérez Molina will take office the first week of January. The US embassy released a statement congratulating him.

The future of Colombia's FARC guerillas is in question following the death of leader "Alfonso Cano" at the hands of the Colombian army Nov. 4. Local media reports anticipate a power struggle between "Iván Márquez" and "Timochenko." Marquez, FARC's "foreign minister," is portrayed as more moderate than Timochenko, commander of the feared Bloque Magdalena Medio. Both leaders have the geographical disadvantage of being in the northeast of the country or even in Venezuela, far from the FARC's heartland in Colombia's south. Two other possible successors mentioned by analysts are "Pablo Catatumbo," commander of the Western Bloc, and "Joaquín Gómez," commander of the Southern Bloc. Gómez is said to control the FARC's drug trafficking operations in Nariño and Putumayo departments. Catatumbo, said to have been Cano's principal rival, runs the FARC's elite "special forces" that have been carrying out deadly attacks in Cauca and Nariño departments. (Colombia Reports, Nov. 5)

For the first time since the 1999 Seattle protests, a movement in the United States is in the vanguard of global resistance to capital. But this time, the stakes are much higher. Now, from Europe to the Arab world to South America to Manhattan and Oakland, the planet seems headed into a revolutionary situation. Occupy Wall Street, which has brought the struggle to the very nerve-center of world capitalism, has responsibilities on a world scale. There are some things that it is very important that we get right.

At least 63 people were killed in bombings and armed attacks by the Islamist movement Boko Haram in the northeastern Nigerian town of Damaturu Nov. 5. Bombs went off at both civilian targets and the headquarters of the Yobe state police. A Roman Catholic parish priest told the BBC his church had been burnt down and eight other churches also attacked. Suicide attacks also targeted a military headquarters and Christian theological school in Maiduguri, capital of neighboring Borno state. Boko Haram contacted called Nigeria's Daily Trust newspaper to say it carried out the attacks. The attacks come days after Yobe police commissioner Suleimon Lawal denied that Boko Haram had any presence in the state.

All war crimes allegations against NATO, National Transitional Council (NTC), and pro-Qaddafi forces committed during the recent conflict will be investigated "impartially and independently" according to a statement (PDF) by the chief prosecutor for the International Criminal Court (ICC), Luis Moreno-Ocampo. In his statement to the UN Security Council, Ocampo gave an update on the events in Libya regarding the ICC investigation. According to the statement, after obtaining the required documents confirming Moammar Qaddafi's death, the case against him (PDF) will likely be dropped. The statement continued by detailing the cases against Saif al-Islam Qaddafi (PDF), Moammar Qaddafi's son, and Abdullah al-Senussi (PDF), Libya's head of intelligence, and what is being done to secure their capture.

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Colombia's Defense Ministry announced Nov. 4 that the army has killed Guillermo Leon Saenz AKA "Alfonso Cano"—the supreme leader of the FARC guerillas. According to Colombia's Radio Caracol, Cano was killed in a bomb raid and found by ground forces in a rural area of the Suárez municipality, Cauca department. The BBC later reported his body had multiple bullet wounds, suggesting he had been killed by ground forces. Cano, 63. assumed leadership of the FARC in May 2008 after the death of founder "Manuel Marulanda."