A Lebanese man held in Brazil for three weeks for posting anti-US comments on the Internet is not a member of al-Qaeda, as one Brazilian newspaper reported, federal prosecutors said May 27. The man, identified only as "K," is a self-employed computer technician with permanent residency in Brazil, where he lives with his Brazilian wife and daughter, officials and his lawyer said. He was released on May 18 this week after being arrested three weeks ago in Sao Paulo.

A district attorney in Argentina filed a request with a judge to order an international arrest warrant for a Colombian suspected of involvement in the 1994 bombing of a Jewish center in Buenos Aires, the government news agency Telam reported May 20. The prosecutor, Alberto Nisman, asked the federal judge, Rodolfo Canicoba Corral, to issue an order to capture the suspect, Samuel Salman El Reda. Nisman said El Reda is part of the "most radicalized nucleus of the Muslim community" in Argentina and "the maximum reference on a local level" for the group that masterminded the attack. Telephone calls El Reda made in the two weeks before the attack link him to Hezbollah leaders in Lebanon, according to Nisman. The July 1994 bombing of the Asociación Mutual Israelita Argentina (AMIA), which left 85 dead and some 300 wounded, was the country’s deadliest terrorist attack. (NYT, CNN, JTA, May 21; Clarin, Buenos Aires, May 20)

A Brazilian cattle-ranching company is seeking permission from Paraguay's government to destroy forest inhabited by one of the world's last uncontacted tribes. The company, Yaguarete Pora S.A., has applied to Paraguay's Environment Ministry for a licence to work in an area where uncontacted Ayoreo-Totobiegosode Indians live. Yaguarete own the land, but its licence to work there was withdrawn last year after the publication of satellite photos showing its destruction of the forest, and pressure from local organisations. Yaguarete also prevented an investigative team from the Environment Ministry from entering the area.

In Latin America, as in much of the world, the traditional International Workers Day marches this May 1 focused on the global economic crisis and especially on increases in the unemployment rate, which is approaching 10% in many areas.

Chilean judge formally charged three retired military officers in Santiago on April 20 with the murder of 14 prisoners in Antofagasta in northern Chile on Oct. 19, 1973, near the beginning of Gen. Augusto Pinochet's 1973-1990 military dictatorship. The deaths of the 14 prisoners, mostly members of the Socialist Party, occurred on the "Caravan of Death," in which a military group headed by Gen. Sergio Arellano Stark executed more than 90 political prisoners as it traveled through the country.

After a five-day visit to Chile the week of April 6, United Nations special rapporteur for indigenous rights James Anaya said there was evidence that police agents use excessive violence against the indigenous Mapuche communities, which make up about 4% of Chile's population. Chilean human rights groups and international organizations like Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have reported that the police break up Mapuche street protests violently and have raided Mapuche communities without proper authorization.

An urgent plea for the protection of the lands of uncontacted indigenous peoples in the Gran Chaco, a region of scrub forest and arid plains in western Paraguay, has been issued by nine local organizations after round-table talks sponsored by the United Nations Development Programme. The Totobiegosode, a sub-group of the Ayoreo, are living in voluntary isolation as Brazilian cattle ranchers encroach on their territory.

In the wee hours of March 8, International Women's Day, 2,000 campesina women occupied a eucalyptus plantation belonging to the Aracruz Celulosa plant, a large paper and pulp mill in Barra do Ribeiro, 56 kilometers from Porto Alegre in southern Brazil. Seven hours later, the women, in an action coordinated with the international group Vía Campesina, marched through Porto Alegre to the Catholic University, where the second International Conference on Agrarian Reform and Rural Development (ICARRD) is taking place, organized by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). The protesters found the gate to the university blocked by police. A tense stand-off and scuffle ensued.