The UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) announced a new peace initiative in Burma's eastern Shan state June 28, aimed at facilitating poppy eradication in the world's second largest opium producer. The government has pledged to cooperate with the Restoration Council of Shan State (RCSS), whose Shan State Army (SSA) fought for regional autonomy from 1964 until a 2011 ceasefire. Both parties and the UNODC agreed to help destitute farmers with alternative development programs. The anticipated multi-million dollar four-year plan seeks to improve the state's infrastructure, health and education. "There are increasing rates of poverty and food insecurity," said UNODC country coordinator Jason Eligh. "Opium farmers are not bad people, they are just poor and hungry."

The annual report of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), released June 26, says that Afghanistan remains the world's top opium cultivator, accounting for 75% of global illicit production in 2012. The report noted that plant diseases in Afghanistan—rather than eradication efforts—reduced global opium production by 30% compared to 2011. However, the poppy-cultivation area in the country jumped by 14%. Most of the country's opium is produced in the southern Helmand province—which also happens to be the heartland of the Taliban insurgency. Use in the country is also on the rise, with over 1 million addicts. "Afghanistan itself has become a consumption country and has one of the highest levels of addiction, globally speaking," said UNODC representative Jean-Luc Lemahieu. (VOA, June 27; RFE/RL, June 26; UNODC, June 22)

Colombia's federation of cattle ranchers, representing the country's large land owners, on June 28 rejected the government's recent agrarian deal with the FARC, charging that it could lead to Venezuela-style expropriations of private property. José Felix Lafaurie, president of FEDEGAN, said the joint report from the negotiating table in Havana "generates more questions than answers," and opens the door to legally acquired land being expropriated. His letter to chief government negotiator Humberto de la Calle Lombana also warns that FARC and other illegal armed groups are concentrating land ownership, saying that ranchers will not accept losses of land while illegal groups benefit.

The tranquil fishing town of Huarmey on Peru's coast, in Áncash region north of Lima, burst into the headlines this week with the discovery by an archaeological team of a burial chamber in a ruined temple, which yielded 60 sets of human remains, including three queens of the ancient Wari culture, interred along with a trove of gold, silver and brilliantly-painted ceramics. The site, known to locals as El Castillo de Huarmey, has been dubbed the "Temple of the Dead" by the research team, led by Milosz Giersz of Poland's University of Warsaw and Krzysztof Makowski of the Pontifical Catholic University of Peru. The Wari (Huari) empire ruled the central Andes between 700 and 1000 CE, centuries before the rise of the Incas. (RPP, El Comercio, BBC News, June 28; Peru21, USA Today, June 27) But a close reading of the coverage in Peru's press reveals that the excavations were conducted in secret to keep the site from being looted by huaqueros—the Peruvian word for tomb-raiders who engage in an illegal traffic in pre-Columbian relics. Huaqueros had even dug pozos, or shafts into the structure; the archaeologists were apparently in a race with the tomb-raiders to find the riches-filled chamber. (El Comercio, June 28)

At least 10 people were killed June 25 when elite troops from the Special Operations Battalion (BOPE) of Brazil's Military Police raided the Nova Holanda favela in Rio de Janeiro's sprawling northern district Complexo da Maré. Authorities said the deaths occurred following a gun battle between police and criminals taking advantage of protests sweeping through the city to loot and steal. One police officer was reportedly among the dead. Protests continue throughout the city; on the day of the clash, hundreds blocked streets for several hours in the outlying districts of Capao Redondo and Campo Limpo. The following day, violence exploded as some 100,000 marched in Belo Horizonte, where Brazil played Uruguay in Confederations Cup semi-finals. Stores were looted, vehicles burned, and one protester killed when he fell from an overpass. (Zero Hora, AP, June 27; Al Jazeera, June 26; Correio do Brasil, June 25)

Following two weeks of escalating protests by local campesinos, two were killed as National Police troops opened fire June 23 at Ocaña in Colombia's Norte de Santander department. There were reports of injuries on both sides in similar clashes in recent days. At least 10,000 from the Catatumbo Valley have joined the protests that erupted on June 10, demanding the government declare the area an autonomous "campesino reserve zone," and halt the eradication of coca crops. Protesters claim that cocaleros have not been offered alternatives to provide for their families. Juan Carlos Quintero, vice president of the Catatumbo Campesino Association, said "we directly blame President Juan Manuel Santos" in the deaths, accusing him of having ordered the repression. Authorities said that protesters had set fire to the municipal building and the local prosecuter's office in Tibu, and also charged the FARC is involved in the campaign. The FARC, whose leader "Timochenko" is believed to be operating from the Catatumbo area, issued a statement calling on authorities to lower the level of violence. (Colombia Reports, AP, June 23)

Guatemala's President Otto Pérez Molina said he is considering imposing a state of emergency in Salcajá, Quetzaltenango department, after an armed attack on a substation of the National Civil Police (PNC)  left eight officers dead and their commander abducted June 14. Authorities said the slain officers were disarmed, made to face down on the ground, and then shot in the head, execution-style. Pérez Molina attributed the attack to drug gangs operating in the area, with possible links to Mexican criminal networks such as the Sinaloa Cartel or Los Zetas. Jorge Santos of the International Center for Human Rights Research (CIDH), set up to secure political rights after Guatemala's civil war, said he hoped "this terror will not lead to greater levels of social control by the executive."

The union of lawyers in the West Bank announced June 13 that attorneys would suspend all their activities this weekend after anti-drug police in Bethlehem assaulted a lawyer. The union said in a statement that all its offices would be shut down in all West Bank districts, and called upon all members of the union's general assembly to join a sit-in in front of the district attorney's office. "We were shocked and couldn’t believe that a group of anti-drug police officers in Bethlehem assaulted a lawyer and strip searched him in a humiliating manner," the statement said. "What shocked us even more was that the district attorney was present and the attackers received instructions directly from the attorney general."