The US House of Representatives voted 285 to 132 on Nov. 8 to approve the Peru Free Trade Agreement (FTA, or TLC for its initials in Spanish). The agreement, which eliminates tariffs and establishes new rules for foreign investment, was approved by Peru's Congress in June 2006. It still requires ratification by the US Senate, but the measure is expected to pass when it comes up for a vote the week of Nov. 12.

On Nov. 7 Chilean authorities suddenly moved prisoners José Huenchunao and Patricia Troncoso Robles to the hospital in Angol in Region IX, apparently because of the effects of a 28-day hunger strike. Along with three other prisoners—José Millalen, Jaime Marileo and Hector Llaitul—Huenchunao and Troncoso started an open-ended hunger strike on Oct. 10 to demand the release of more than 20 indigenous Mapuche activists they consider political prisoners; an end to the militarization of the traditional Mapuche territories; and an end to repression.

From the all too appropriately named political blog Morons.org, Nov. 12:

We apparently have a new Attorney General....
Last Thursday, Judge Michael Mukasey was confirmed as Attorney General by the Senate in a vote of 53-40 in the dead of night, at 11:04PM. This happened just two days after Mukasey was approved by the Senate Judiciary Committee, making it an unusually quick confirmation. So quick, in fact, that none of the Senators running for President were able to return to Washington in time to vote on it. So quick that no one had any time to arrange a filibuster, should they have desired to block the nomination.

Some 400 neo-Nazis were blocked from marching in Prague by a group of approximately 2,000 anti-fascist activists Nov. 10—the anniversary of Kristallnacht. Six were reported injured in clashes between the two camps. The far-right Young Nationalist Democrats (MND) received back-up from two busloads of German supporters for their march on Prague's Jewish Quarter. Clashes broke out in front of the 13th-century Old New Synagogue—Europe's oldest Jewish house of worship—after one of the Nazis used pepper spray against a counter-protester. Two neo-Nazis lay in a pool of blood after being beaten by a group of German anarchists. Police arrested over 40 neo-Nazis, and reported some of them carried weapons such as iron rods and explosives. Prague authorities had banned the march, and sealed off subway stations to prevent neo-Nazis from reaching the quarter.

The government of Niger reports three soldiers were wounded and four are missing after Tuareg rebels attacked a civilian convoy escorted by the military Nov. 9. The rebel Movement of the People of Niger for Justice (MNJ) claimed it had killed 15 soldiers and captured four. They also said they had destroyed three military vehicles and seized another, but denied having attacked civilians. The ambush took place on the road between Agadez, the regional capital of the desert region of that name, and Arlit to the north.

Uzbekistan's incumbent President Islam Karimov was unanimously nominated to run for a third seven-year presidential term this December by his Liberal Democratic Party Nov. 6. Karimov is constitutionally barred from seeking a third term, and the New York Times writes that "election officials have not yet explained the legal mechanism justifying his nomination." (NYT, Nov. 7; Interfax, Nov. 6) Meanwhile, Human Rights Watch is urging the UN Committee Against Torture, now convening in Geneva, to condemn Uzbekistan for flagrantly violating the global ban on torture. In a 90-page report issued Nov. 7, "Nowhere to Turn: Torture and Ill-Treatment in Uzbekistan," HRW accuses the Uzbek government of using a wide range of methods against detainees, including beatings with truncheons, asphyxiation with plastic bags and gas masks, electric shocks, and sexual humiliation. HRW director Juliette De Rivero said that ill treatment of detainees in Uzbekistan is "endemic." (RFE/RL, Nov. 7)

In our last post on China, we noted that it is now the key nation falling under the rubric of the 1992 Pentagon "Defense Planning Guide" drawn up by Paul Wolfowitz and Scooter Libby which said the US must "discourage advanced industrial nations from challenging our leadership or even aspiring to a larger regional or global role." In our last post on the global struggle for control of oil, we noted that the national company PetroChina is rapidly gaining on Exxon as the world's largest oil company. Now, Defense Secretary Robert Gates, after meeting in Beijing with his counterpart, Gen. Cao Gangchuan, tells a news conference he had raised "the uncertainty over China's military modernization and the need for greater transparency to allay international concerns." In its coverage of the meeting, the New York Times Nov. 6 said "Pentagon officials describe China as a 'peer competitor'..." An analysis on the visit in the previous day's edition quoted Michael J. Green of the Center for Strategic and International Studies saying, "If you are sitting in the Pentagon, China is a potential peer competitor."

Nearly two dozen high school students in Illinois have been suspended and face possible expulsion for holding a peaceful protest against the war in Iraq. On Nov. 1, students at Morton West High School in the town of Berwyn locked arms and sang protest songs in an approved area on school grounds. One participant said the group had been told they would face no more than a Saturday detention for missing class. But they were each given ten-day suspensions and told they could be expelled. The American Civil Liberties Union says it may take up the case. (Democracy Now, Nov. 7)