Nine National Police officers on a coca eradication mission were killed near Landazuri in Colombia's northeast Santander department May 9, when a roadside bomb exploded, destroying their truck. Six other officers were injured. All were members of a mobile unit operating out of Bucaramanga. Authorities immediately blamed the Colombian Revolutionary Armed Forces (FARC). Police Sgt. Alberto Cantillo told reporters: "Where there's coca, you'll find guerillas." Among the dead was the brother of top Colombian football star Luis Yanes, who plays for Santa Fe in Bogota. The attack is another blow for President Alvaro Uribe, who has vowed to crush the FARC by the end of his term in 2010. Last year, 26 military and police officers were killed while on coca eradication missions. (BBC, AlJazeera, May 10)

Pirates off Somalia's coast have hijacked a cargo ship headed for Mogadishu, the third attack since January. Andrew Mwangura, coordinator of the Mombasa-based Seafarers Assistance Program (SAP), said the UAE-registered freighter was seized and taken to Hobyo, a well-known pirate base about 400 kilometers northeast of Mogadishu. The vessel, carrying cargo for Somali traders, had originated in Dubai. Piracy continues unabated off Somalia, even as a degree of stability has come to Mogadishu in recent weeks. (Xinhua, IOL, May 10)

One of the seven US marines facing charges related to the killings of 24 Iraqi civilians in Haditha has admitted to lying about the deaths of five of them. Sgt. Sanick Dela Cruz said he saw squad leader Sgt. Frank Wuterich shoot dead five men while they had their hands up to surrender. Cruz, granted immunity from prosecution, also admitted to urinating on one of the dead bodies and pumping bullets into all five of them after a squad member was killed in a roadside bombing. Wuterich, who reprotedly told Sela Cruz to blame the Iraqi army for the atrocity, is facing multiple murder charges. Cruz was testifying in a preliminary hearing on charges against Cpt. Randy Stone, accused of failing in his duty to investigate and report the 24 deaths. (AlJazeera, May 10)

Some 900 German federal police troops raided 40 sites in Berlin, Brandenburg, Hamburg, Bremen, Schleswig-Holstein and Lower Saxony, in a move against 21 anti-globalization militants allegedly suspected of setting up an organization to launch arson attacks at the Group of Eight summit in Heiligendamm next month. Arrests were made, but authorities would not say how many. (FT, Reuters, Xinhua, May 10)

The conservative Washington Times exploits the arrest of four Kosovar Albanian youth in the apparent Ft. Dix terror conspiracy, raising once again Slobodan Milosevic's specter of a Balkan jihad. Good timing, just as Kosova is poised to become Europe's first Muslim-led state. Perhaps the WT's perverse glee will be shared by their counterparts on the "left"—like Ed Herman and Noam Chomsky. Bill Gertz writes May 9:

What a bizarre irony. The international press are playing up the lovefest between the once-implacable enemies who have united to revive the "devolved" government at Stormont for the first time since the power-sharing assembly was suspended in October 2002: new First Minister Ian Paisley of the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) (who in 1998 was forcibly ejected from his Europarliament seat for calling Pope John Paul II the "anti-Christ"—to his face!) and Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness of Sinn Féin (a former IRA commander who was convicted on "terrorism" charges in 1973). Meanwhile, protesters who gathered outside the Stormont parliament building to condemn the swearing-in ceremony as a sell-out included both veteran IRA militants who decried the betrayal of Republicanism and a group called "Justice for Protestants" made up of Ulster Defence Regiment veterans—paradoxically united by their mutual desire to avoid uniting with each other. Just to add to the fun, a group of anti-war protesters also showed up to protest Tony Blair's appearance at the affair. (Canberra Times, May 10; Belfast Telegraph, May 9; RTE News, May 8; BBC News Profile: Martin McGuinness)

A US helicopter opened fire on an elementary school in Diyala province May 8, killing seven students and wounding three, according to Iraqi security sources and local residents. Iraqi sources said the helicopter was fired on from the ground and hit the school when it returned fire. Spokesman Lt. Col. Christopher Garver said the military was investigating the reports.

An air raid killed 21 civilians in Afghanistan's southern province of Helmand May 8, the provincial governor charged. "Twenty-one civilians, including women and children, were killed" in the raid on a village in Sangin district, Gov. Assadullah Wafa said. AlJazeera TV said it was not clear whether the raid was by NATO's International Security Assistance Force or the separate US-led coalition. NATO denied knowledge of the raid.