Four people were wounded in an armed clash between rival factions of Tzotzil Maya settlers in the outlying colonia (neighborhood) of Molino de los Arcos in the Chiapas Highland city of San Cristobal Dec. 21. The settlers are originally from the nearby village of San Juan Chamula, but were forced to occupy lands on the outskirts of San Cristobal after being expelled by Chamula's authorities for practicing evangelical Protestantism. One faction in the land conflict was said to be led by the Council of Indigenous Representatives of the Chiapas Highlands (CRIACH), and the other by the National Union of Agricultural Workers (UNTA). Domingo Lopez Angel, director of CRIACH, said the violence began when members of his organization, who had gathered in Los Arcos to build a church, were set upon by a group led by UNTA director Mariano Lopez Cruz, armed with clubs and pistols. Two of the injured received bullet wounds. (La Jornada, Dec. 22)

From AP, Dec. 23:

OVENTIC, Mexico - About 5,000 Zapatista rebels, many in black ski masks, gathered in this village in southern Mexico to show their support for protesters in the historic city of Oaxaca who are trying to oust the state governor.

Thousands of supporters of the Popular People's Assembly of Oaxaca again took to the streets of southern Mexico's Oaxaca City Dec. 22 to demand the resignation of Gov. Ulises Ruiz, as well as the release of "political prisoners" arrested in the protests and the withdrawal of federal police from the city. (La Jornada, Dec. 23) It was part of an international mobilization, with protests in solidarity with the APPO reported from some 35 countries around the world, including the USA, Canada, France, Spain, Italy, Germany, Austria, Greece, Argentina, Brazil and Peru. (La Jornada, Dec. 23)

This is why the European laws against Holocaust denial are completely counter-productive. They just provide a media spotlight (and therefore a voice) to these sinister charlatans—and worse, allow them to legitimately accuse the establishment of silencing them. Every turn in David Irving's legal fortunes has provided another opportunity for him to play the victim and spew his filth into extended microphones. From The Australian, Dec. 21, emphasis added (superfluously, we hope):

This Dec. 22 account from the Russian daily Kommersant reveals another recent win for Moscow in its bid to rebuild influence in the "near abroad" of Central Asia, and beat the American and European competition to the punch in securing strategic control of its hydrocarbon resources. This ups the ante on the US to exploit that passing of Turkmenistan's wacky despot Saparmurat "Turkmenbashi" Niyazov to effect another pro-West "revolution" in the region. We will be watching Turkmenistan closely in the weeks to come:

Iraq's government is drafting a new hydrocarbons law that will chart the course for the country's oil sector and determine how its revenues will be apportioned. The law would put much of Iraqi oil into the hands of foreign companies, allowing "production sharing agreements" (PSAs) between the Iraqi state and the multinationals. OPEC estimates Iraq has some 115 billion barrels of reserves, and only a small fraction of its oil fields are in use. Writes Joshua Gallu for Der Spiegel: "By signing oil deals with Iraq, oil companies could account for those reserves in their books without setting foot in the country—that alone is enough to boost the company's stock. And, by negotiating deals while Iraq is unstable, companies could lock in a risk premium that may be much lower five or ten years from now."

The quaint traditions of Saddam's Iaq survive in the US-created new order. From Los Angeles Times, Dec. 15:

NAJAF — The audience knew what to expect when Iraqi commandos took the stage at the stadium here Wednesday with frogs and a rabbit in hand, preparing to celebrate with a bloody flourish the transfer of local authority from U.S. to Iraqi troops.

But the Americans were in for a surprise.

Nine years after the Dec. 22, 1997 massacre of 45 unarmed Maya Indians at the Chiapas highland hamlet of Acteal, Chiapas, the confessed intellectual author of the attack, Antonio Vazquez Secum, remains free and was never called to testify in the still-open judicial investigation. He is among six who confessed to being the athors of the crime, but whose confessions were rejected by the Prosecutor General of the Republic (PGR). Amid mounting charges of irregularities in the case, Ricardo Raphael, leader of an association of Mexican jurors, is calling for the intervention of the Supreme Court of the Nation. (El Universal, Dec. 21) More than 60 have been sentenced in connection with the massacre, but deny their involvement. 38 remain at Chiapas' harsh Cerro Hueco prison. (El Universal, Dec. 18)