On Aug. 4, the National Assembly for Peace and Democracy opened at a conference hall in Kamata, a city within the Tokyo metropolitan area. Attended by some 500 activists from throughout Japan, as well as participants from South Korea, the Philippines, Indonesia and the United States, this was the 37th annual National Assembly, better known by its Japanese acronym Zenko. The group first emerged from the struggle against Japanese involvement in the Vietnam war, and history has now brought it full circle, as Washington again calls upon Tokyo to back up a US military adventure—this time in Iraq, where Japan still maintains troops in an officially "noncombatant" role. The most honored guests at the Zenko conference were Samir Adil and Nadia Mahmood, leaders of the Iraq Freedom Congress (IFC), a civil resistance coalition which came together in 2005 to oppose the occupation and demand a secular state. Another luminary was Tokushin Yamauchi, a leading opponent of the US military presence in Okinawa, who was elected to the upper house of the Diet in last month's dramatic turn-around elections that dealt a humiliating defeat to the Liberal Democratic Party of pro-military Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.

On Aug. 3, some 100 activists from the Japanese anti-war group Zenko (National Assembly for Peace and Democracy) gathered near the US embassy in Tokyo's central Shinbashi district to protest the July 4 slaying of Abdelhussein Saddam by US Special Forces troops in Baghdad. Abdelhussein had been the leader of the Safety Force, a civil patrol organized by the Iraq Freedom Congress (IFC) resistance organization to protect their communities from sectarian militias. Among those speaking were two IFC leaders who had been flown in for the 37th annual Zenko conference which opens this week. The principal banner read: "American ambassador, report this protest; give IFC immediate apology and compensation!" Another read: "Do US-Iraqi security forces promote civil rights or Big Brother thuggery? Abdelhussein found out!"

Media revealed this week that at a high-level meeting in Riyadh in January, Saudi officials confronted then-US Iraq envoy Zalmay Khalilzad with incriminating documents on Iraq's prime minister Nouri Kamal al-Maliki. One purported to be an early alert from al-Maliki to radical Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, warning him to lie low during a US troop surge. Another document purported to offer proof that Maliki was an Iranian agent. Khalilzad immediately protested to King Abdullah, contending that the documents were forged. Earlier this month, in an oblique reference to Saudi Arabia, Khalilzad charged in a New York Times op-ed: "Several of Iraq's neighbors—not only Syria and Iran but also some friends of the United States —are pursuing destabilizing policies." (NYT, July 27; The Scotsman, July 29) It seems the Saudis are following through on their longtime threats to arm the Sunni insurgents in Iraq. Nonetheless, on July 28, the Times reported that the US is preparing a major arms deal with Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states worth $20 billion over the next decade, including missile guidance systems, fighter jets and warships. (NYT, BBC, July 28)

Radical students July 27 again occupied Islamabad's Red Mosque—hours before a suicide bomber killed 13 people in a market down the street from the mosque. Seeking a political solution to the multiple converging crises he faces, Pervez Musharraf reportedly met abroad with exiled former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto. Security forces recaptured the mosque after several hours, but scenes of police firing tear gas and protesters calling for jihad recalled the nine-day siege at the Red Mosque that claimed more than 100 lives earlier this month. "The security situation here is getting worse every day," said student Bilal Hassan. "You expect this in the remote areas, but not in our capital." (WP, July 28) On July 18, Bush's top counterterrorism advisor told Diane Sawyer on "Good Morning America" that the US does not rule out sending in US troops if Pakistan allows al-Qaeda continued refuge in the Tribal Areas. "The answer...is what we want to do is work with our Pakistani partners," Frances Townsend said in response to Sawyer's question. "But the president's been very clear. There are no options off the table because job No. 1 is protecting the American people, and nothing will get in our way." (ABC, July 18)

Colombia's imprisoned paramilitary warlords July 24 announced an end to cooperation with prosecutors investigating massacres and other atrocities, throwing into question the country's peace process. The move was taken to protest the July 11 ruling of the Supreme Court of Justice that paramilitary fighters and "parapolíticos" (politicians who collaborate with the paras) are not automatically charged with "sedition"—meaning politically motivated violence, carrying reduced penalties under the legislation establishing the peace process. The peace process has led to the disarmament of some 31,000 paramilitary fighters, but has not yet secured reparations for their victims or won major confessions from some 60 imprisoned warlords.

In another exercise in understatement, this terrifying July 27 Washington Post piece by Walter Pincus is entitled "Bush order on freezing assets is unusually broad." Do those "threatening the peace or stability of Iraq" include striking oil workers and other civil anti-occupation forces?

WASHINGTON -- Be careful what you say and whom you help -- especially when it comes to the Iraq war and the Iraqi government.

Well well, look who's running for the Diet. An almost perfect analogy to the vile Alessandra Mussolini in Italy. She was (officially) "shunned" by the "post-Fascist" National Alliance—even as doing so only helped legitimize and mainstream the party whose roots go straight back Il Duce. Japan's ruling LDP does not have roots in the fascist era, but it is leading a propaganda drive to rehabilitate Japan's World War II role—and a political drive to remilitarize the country. This revealing July 26 USA Today report is rather understatedly entitled "Nationalism gains strength in Japan":

We love how the headlines always say "ex-cop." He was still a cop when he killed Julio Ortega-Moncada. He was sacked because of the incident. From AP, July 25:

Ex-cop gets prison for DWI fatality
NEW YORK - A former police officer will go to prison for killing a pedestrian while speeding drunk in the wrong direction in a closed lane of the Queensboro Bridge.