Mexico's National Human Rights Commission (CNDH) July 11 issued eight recommendations to the Secretary of National Defense (SEDENA) concerning grave violations of basic guarantees—including homicide and torture—in anti-crime operations in the states of Sinaloa, Sonora, Michoacán and Tamaulipas.

On June 20, West Palm Beach resident Valery Joseph died while in the custody of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) at the Glades County Detention Center in Moore Haven, Florida. The 23-year-old Haitian immigrant had been living in the US since he was eight, said his mother, Jacqueline Fleury. At a news conference in Miami's Little Haiti neighborhood on July 8, the day Joseph would have turned 24, US Rep. Kendrick Meek joined Joseph's family members and immigrant rights advocates in calling for an independent investigation into what Meek called Joseph's "untimely death."

On July 10, US District Judge William Dimitrouleas in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., sentenced former ICE agent Wilfredo Vazquez to 87 months in prison for sexually assaulting a female immigration detainee in his custody. Vazquez pleaded guilty in April to two counts of sexual abuse; he admitted that in September 2007, while transporting the Jamaican detainee to a Broward County holding facility, he first took her to his home and forced her to submit to sex. (See INB, Nov. 26, 2007). The woman's identity has not been revealed; she is identified in court papers as "M.C."

On July 9, ICE agents joined Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agents in raiding two marine companies in Port Arthur in southeastern Texas, near the Louisiana border. The operations took place at the R & R Marine Fabrication and Drydock facility on Procter Street and at a Cal Dive International facility on Yacht Club Road. The agents arrested 37 immigrant workers at R & R and took them to the ICE holding facility at a private jail in nearby Beaumont; from there the workers were to be transferred to the Houston Detention and Removal Facility. It was not clear whether any workers were arrested at Cal Dive.

The New York Times scored a media coup July 1 with a front-page story on the revival Algeria's Islamist militant underground following its transformation into an al-Qaeda franchise, "Ragtag Insurgency Gains a Lifeline From Al Qaeda." The front-page story featured an interview (carried out by an intermediary using a tape recorder) with Abdelmalek Droukdal, who in 2004 "sent a secret message" to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, leader of "al-Qaeda in Mesopotamia," resulting in "what one firsthand observer describes as a corporate merger." The fruit of this union was "al-Qaeda in the Islamic Magreb," which has since been wracking up high-profile attacks in Algeria. But many in Algeria are furious at the Times now, deeming the account free advertising for the terror franchise.

An investigation by Afghanistan's President Hamid Karzai has confirmed reports that a US air strike in the Deh Bala district of Nangarhar province July 6 killed 47 members of a wedding party, including the bride. The investigation found that 39 of the dead were women and children. NATO still maintains the victims were insurgents. (The Independent, July 13) Karzai has also ordered an investigation into a July 4 helicopter strike in Nuristan in which the provincial governor said 22 civilians were killed and seven wounded. (NYT, July 7)

At least 20 were killed July 12 in fighting between Pakistani security forces and Taliban insurgents following an attack on an army convoy near Zargari, North-West Frontier Province. The violence came during an unannounced, one-day visit to Pakistan by Adm. Michael Mullen, the Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman. Mullen met with President Pervez Musharraf and army chief Gen. Ashfaq Kiyani. (WP, July 13) Foreign Minister Mahmoud Qureshi said he has ruled out allowing US military personnel to hunt for Osama bin Laden on Pakistan's territory. "People will not accept it," Qureshi said. "Questions of sovereignty come in." (AlJazeera, July 13)

West Bank wall still defies World CourtFour years after the ruling of the International Court of Justice at The Hague was handed down, Israel's West Bank "separation barrier"—derided by critics as the "apartheid wall"—has not been moved or dismantled in any of the sections that were held to be in breach international law, the Israeli human rights group B'Tselem said in a press release July 9. B'Tselem reiterated its call for the Israeli government to dismantle every section of the barrier that penetrates the West Bank, cancel the travel permits regime that is part of the barrier project, and compensate the Palestinians who were harmed as a result of the barrier's construction.