Members of the "Other Campaign" activist network marched in Mexico City Aug. 26 in protest of the recent evictions of campesino communities from the Montes Azules Biosphere Reserve in the conflicted southern state of Chiapas. (Expreso Chiapas, Aug. 27) On Aug. 31, Amnesty International issued a statement calling for an "immediate" suspension of evictions from the reserve. The statement expressed concern about the health conditions at the shelter in La Trinitaria where the expelled campesinos—including two pregnant women—are being held. The organization also expressed concern about the six arrested in the evictions, calling for their release and for transparency in the cases against them. (La Jornada, Sept. 2)

Juan Carlos "El Konan" García Cruz, a member of the Popular People's Assembly of Oaxaca (APPO) was sentenced to three years in prison by a Mexican federal court in Oaxaca City Aug. 26 on arms possession charges. While several APPO supporters remain behind bars pending charges, García Cruz is the first to be formally sentenced. APPO legal spokesman Gilberto Hernández Santiago called the sentence "inadmissible," saying that García Cruz had been illegally arrested by unaccountable plainclothes paramilitary forces, that he had been tortured, and the arms "planted" on him. (La Jornada, Aug. 28)

State police in Guerrero, Mexico, announced they had discovered a cache of 14 firearms with home-made bombs and camo uniforms hidden in a corn warehouse (bodega de maiz) in the community of Chamacua de Michelle, Coyuca de Catalán municipality. Authorities said insignia identified the cache as belonging to the Revolutionary Army of the Insurgent People (ERPI). One resident, Arturo Duque Alvarado, was detained on charges of belonging to the guerilla organization. (Cronica de Hoy, Aug. 27; La Jornada, Aug. 26) Meanwhile in Santiago Pinotepa Nacional, Oaxaca, soldiers of the 47th Infantry Battalion carried out searches in districts under the control of the Democratic Civic Union of Barrios and Colonias (Ucidebac), on suspicion that the neighborhood organization is collaborating with armed groups. Ucidebac leader Librado Baños Rodríguez accused soldiers of menacing residents at gunpoint. (La Jornada, Aug. 29)

On Aug. 29, the Tzotzil Maya community of Ejido 28 de Junio in the municipality of Venustiano Carranza, Chiapas, was occupied by troops of the Mexican federal army, who arrived in two trucks and four armed personnel carriers. Establishing checkpoints at the entrances to the community, the troops then spread out through the streets and surrounding fields, questioning residents about the supposed presence of Popular Revolutionary Army (EPR) guerillas. Helicopters conducted overflights, searching for a supposed EPR training camp.

It seems the US has been inadvertently arming the PKK these past four years since the Iraq invasion—the same quasi-Maoist Kurdish separatist group that is seeking to secede from NATO ally Turkey and is on the State Department "foreign terrorist organizations" list. Has Washington been playing the Kurds for fools, or the other way 'round? From AFP, Aug. 30:

When Pfc. Lynndie England was convicted two years ago, we called her a scapegoat. Now, a military jury at Ft. Meade has found Lt-Col. Steven Jordan—the only officer to be court-martialled over the Abu Ghraib case—guilty of disobeying an order to keep silent about the abuse investigation. But they simply reprimanded him, sparing him a prison term. A day earlier, Aug. 28, he was acquitted of failing to control lower-ranking soldiers who abused and sexually humiliated detainees at the prison near Baghdad in autumn 2003. (The Scotsman, Aug. 30) Contrast the treatment dished out to his subordinates. From AP, Aug. 29:

Two residents, including an 11-year-old boy, are dead following riots at the village of Cubulco in Guatemala's Baja Verapaz department. Protesters torched the home of the mayor, Rolando Rivera, and the village remains occupied by a large detachment of the National Civil Police (PNC) and elite Special Police Forces (FEP). Police used tear gas in clashes with residents who responded with Molotov cocktails. The deaths apparently occurred when Rivera's private security force opened fire on protesters. The protests were sparked by Rivera's plans to renovate the town's central park two weeks before the municipal elections, in which he is running again with the right-wing Patriot Party (PP). (Prensa Libre, Aug. 28) Forty have been murdered nationwide in political violence during the presidential campaign now underway, in which a leading candidate is the PP's Otto Perez Molina, a former military intelligence chief who promises a security crackdown under the slogan of "The Iron Fist." (The Telegraph, Aug. 26)

We recently posed the question of whether the relentless bloodshed in Iraq is fundamentally a national liberation struggle or a sectarian civil war. Which does it look like to you? From AP, Aug. 28:

31 killed at Iraqi religious festival
BAGHDAD — A power struggle between rival Shiite groups erupted during a religious festival in Karbala on Tuesday, and at least 31 people were killed by gunmen with machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades who fought street battles amid crowds of pilgrims.