On July 27 voters in Mexico's Federal District (DF, Mexico City) and nine states were scheduled to vote in a non-binding referendum on President Felipe Calderón Hinojosa's proposals to allow more involvement the state oil monopoly, Petroleos Mexicanos (PEMEX), by local and foreign private companies. Voters were to answer yes or no to two questions: "1) Currently the exploitation, transport, distribution and refining of hydrocarbons are exclusively activities of the government. Do you agree or not that private companies should now be able to participate in these activities? 2) In general, do you agree or not that the initiatives currently being debated in Congress relating to energy reform should be approved?"

The body of Colombian unionist Guillermo Rivera Fuquene was found buried in a garbage dump in a rural area of Ibague, Tolima department, on July 15. Rivera Fuquene, an economist in the Bogotá Controller's Office and the president of the Public Services Union of Bogotá (Sinserpub), disappeared on April 22 after putting his daughter on a school bus in the Tunal section of the capital. According to his wife, Sonya Betancur (also given as "Sonia Betancourt"), the last news she heard after his disappearance was that he had been detained by the police. The center-left Democratic Alternative Pole (PDA), of which Rivera Fuquene was a member, said it had indications from a witness and videotapes that the Bogota police were involved. The authorities in Ibague determined that Rivera Fuquene was strangled and then buried on April 28.

On July 14 former US Congress member James "Jim" Courter (R-NJ, 1979-1991) resigned from the presidential campaign of Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), in which he was one of 20 national finance co-chairpeople. The resignation followed a July 9 decision by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to fine IDT—the New Jersey telecommunications company of which Courter is CEO—$1.3 million for failing to file a contract for telephone service to Haiti in 2004, during the administration of President Jean Bertrand Aristide.

On July 25 a jury in Brooklyn, New York, convicted right-wing paramilitary leader Emmanuel ("Toto") Constant of mortgage fraud. He faces a 5-to-15 prison sentence in New York, followed by deportation to Haiti. "The trial proved there is rampant fraud in the mortgage industry," said Constant's lawyer, Samuel Karliner. "His role was minor." But attorney Jennie Green from the New York-based nonprofit Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) expressed a "hope that after [Constant] serves a stiff sentence in New York, he faces trial" for crimes in Haiti that included "murder and rape and other torture of thousands." (New York Daily News, July 25; CCR press release, July 25)

Suicide bombers struck Shi'ite pilgrims in Baghdad and a Kurdish rally in Kirkuk July 28, killing at least 57 people and wounding nearly 300, police said. Three female bombers detonated their explosive vests in the middle of a group of pilgrims in Baghdad, moments after a roadside bomb attack. At least 32 were killed and wounded 102. In Kirkuk, 25 were killed and 185 wounded when a blast tore through a crowd of Kurds protesting against a draft provincial elections law. Authorities said the Kirkuk bomber was also a woman. (Gulf Daily News, July 29)

The Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) denied involvement in two bombs that exploded in a busy Istanbul suburb on July 27, killing 17 people. "The PKK has nothing to do with this event," the group's leader, Zubeyir Aydar, said in a statement. Nobody has yet claimed responsibility for the attack, the deadliest in Istanbul since the November 2003 car bomb attacks on British and Jewish targets that left some 60 dead. But Istanbul's Gov. Muammer Guler said, "There appears to be a link with the separatist organization," referring to the PKK. "We are working on that."

Ahmedabad, capital of the Indian state of Gujarat, was hit by 17 blasts in a space of 70 minutes July 26, killing at least 45 and leaving some 150 injured—one day after eight near-simultaneous explosions rocked the southern city of Bangalore, killing one and wounding six. In an e-mail sent to New Delhi's Intelligence Bureau, a group calling itself the "Indian Mujahedeen" claimed responsibility for the Ahmedabad blasts. The same group also claimed responsibility for recent deadly bombings in Jaipur and Uttar Pradesh.

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) announced July 24 that it had received eight of ten persons detained by the FARC guerillas July 17 when their boat was stopped on the Río Atrato in Chocó departament. The captives, all civilians, were students, teachers, local functionaries and merchants from Quibdó, capital of Chocó. Their capture sparked a large mobilization of government troops to Chocó. (ANSA, July 24)