First Nations activists could target the 2010 Vancouver Olympics for protests similar to the pro-Tibetan demonstrations surrounding the upcoming Games in Beijing, warned Phil Fontaine, chief of Canada's Assembly of First Nations. Speaking in Ottawa, Fontaine said Native leaders could follow the lead of pro-Tibet groups who have repeatedly disrupted the torch relay for the Summer Games. "We find the Tibetan situation compelling," he said.

South African dock workers are refusing to unload a Chinese cargo ship carrying 77 tons of small arms destined for Zimbabwe. The arms, including three million rounds of ammunition for AK-47s and 1,500 rocket-propelled grenades, were ordered by the Zimbabwean military at the time of the March 29 election—which the UK and other Western powers have accused Robert Mugabe of trying to rig. The arms arrived at Durban April 16 aboard the Chinese-owned An Yue Jiang and must be taken by road to landlocked Zimbabwe, where the government is accused of arming rural militias before a possible run-off vote for the presidency. The opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) has accused Mugabe's Zanu-PF of preparing for a "war."

Alak Khasutsang, disappearedProtests against the Olympic torch continue to make global headlines. Some 100 protesters braved an overwhelming police presence of several hundred, as well as a large force of pro-Chinese counter-demonstrators, outside the local UN offices as the torch arrived in Bangkok April 19. (Bloomberg, April 19) Two days earlier, up to 180 Tibetan activists were arrested in protests as the torch arrived in New Delhi. Thousands of police and guards made the route virtually inaccessible to the public. Another 46 Tibetans were arrested in Mumbai as they tried to storm the Chinese consulate. (News.com.au, April 17) Ironically, as the torch spectacle grabs media attention, harsh repression continues in the Tibetan lands of the People's Republic, with over a hundred new arrests, monks beaten and disappeared—and the world paying little note...

An agreement on a draft oil law for Iraq may finally have been reached this week, bringing multinationals like BP and Royal Dutch Shell closer to long-sought contracts, Forbes reports. Iraqi government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh told United Press International April 16 that a new understanding had been reached between Baghdad and the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), after a year of deadlock over the future of the country's oil industry.

Nicaragua, an outspoken member of the new anti-imperialist bloc in the western hemisphere, last month won the backing of the 33-member Latin American and Caribbean group at the UN for presidency of the General Assembly—nearly assuring it of election to the one-year post in June. The man Nicaragua has put forward to be the new GA president this fall is Rev. Miguel D'Escoto Brockmann, a Catholic priest who was foreign minister of the Sandinista government from 1979 to 1990 and last year became a foreign affairs adviser to Daniel Ortega, the first Sandinista president, when he returned to office.

Which is worse: that Absolut vodka is commodifying Mexico's claim to its lost northern territories (Aztlan), or the predictable uptight gringo backlash? From the Daily 49er, the Cal State Long Beach student newspaper, April 15:

Mexican booze ad not intoxicating to U.S. buyers
A recent Absolut Vodka ad running in Mexico City has shaken, not stirred, some of the American public. With its recent advertising campaign strategy, Absolut attempts to tap into some very real nationalistic sentiment of Mexico.

James McKinley reports for the New York Times April 16 that cartel wars for control of Ciudad Juárez are reaping a "Wild West Blood Bath" in the border city, with more than 210 lives lost in the first three months of this year. The number of homicides this year is more than twice the total number for the same period last year. Mass graves hiding a total of 36 bodies have been discovered in the backyards of two raided cartel safe-houses. At the height of the violence, around Easter, bodies were turning up every morning—at a rate of nearly 12 a week. Mayor José Reyes Ferriz and Chihuahua state authorities have asked the federal government to intervene. "Neither the municipal government, nor the state government, is capable of taking on organized crime," Reyes Ferriz said. In late March, President Felipe Calderón sent in 2,000 soldiers and 425 federal agents, who patrol in convoys of Humvees and pickup trucks, wearing ski masks to hide their faces.

Rights workers in Guatemala are calling upon the government to protect a Roman Catholic bishop from assassination after a rash of threats. Mgr. Álvaro Ramazzini, Bishop of San Marcos, has been warned that he will be killed unless he withdraws his support for landless peasants who are protesting the issuance of mining permits to a Canadian multinational corporation (Goldcorp Inc.).