Venezuelan Justice Minister Tarek El-Aissami said Oct. 16 that six, including three army intelligence officials and a police officer, have been detained in the killing of an opposition student leader. El-Aissami said that the presumed murder weapon was also recovered and that the authorities were investigating two additional suspects. The student leader, Julio Soto of the University of Zulia, died Oct. 1 when his vehicle was sprayed with gunfire. He had helped organize protests with the COPEI opposition party against constitutional amendments proposed by President Hugo Chávez last year. (AP, Oct. 16; AP, Oct. 6)

Thousands of relatives of inmates staged sit-ins Oct. 14 at prisons across Venezuela to protest poor conditions and rights abuses. Hundreds of inmates die each year in prison violence—including 500 last year. This has fueled complaints that President Hugo Chávez has done too little to address the situation and improve the judicial system—which often allows people to languish in prison for years without a trial. The protest, which began last week with a hunger strike at Yare prison outside Caracas, has spread across the country, according to Venezuelan Prison Observatory, a nonprofit group that monitors prisons. The Interior Ministry said 6,500 participated in sit-ins at eight prisons. (Reuters, NYT, Javno, Croatia, Oct. 14)

On Oct. 15, Bolivian President Evo Morales voiced defiance in the face of Washington threats to remove Bolivia's trade preferences as a punitive measure for failing to meet US narcotics enforcement standards. "We can't kneel down for $63 million," said Morales during the opening in La Paz of a textile factory that will be run by workers. The US Congress voted last week that Peru and Colombia—South America's top coca producers—will benefit for another year from the trade preferences. Bolivia and Ecuador were provisionally approved for only six months, which can be extended for another six with Congressional approval.

Bolivian President Evo Morales Oct. 13 led the opening rally at a cross-country march from the city of Caracollo, Oruro department, to La Paz in support of a referendum on the country's pending new constitution. "If from here we begin with 5,000 demonstrators, for sure we will arrive in La Paz with more than one million," Morales said, adding that the march would "persuade that small group of opposition to allow us to change the country." The president called on farmers along the route to provide food and accommodations for the marchers, who are expected to arrive in La Paz on Oct. 20 after traveling some 200 kilometers. Representatives of social organizations from all nine of Bolivia's departments are participating in the march. (Xinhua, Oct. 14; Prensa Latina, Oct. 13)

Latin American markets continued to be shaken by a global financial crisis set off in September by bad mortgages in the US. On Oct. 7 the stock exchange in Sao Paulo, Brazil, fell 4.66%; Mexico's market was down 3.97%; stocks in Santiago, Chile, fell 4.29%; and the market in Buenos Aires, Argentina, lost 2.72%. Latin American losses that day were smaller those in New York, where the Dow Jones lost 5.11%. (La Jornada, Oct. 8 from Reuters, AFP, DPA and Notimex) But fallout from the global crisis is likely to get worse. Speaking in Durango on Oct. 6, Mexican Labor Secretary Javier Lozano Alarcón said his department expected some 200,000 Mexicans now working in the US to come home during the next year; he denied the number would be in the millions. (LJ, Oct. 7)

Iran's top diplomat in Bolivia says his country will open two health clinics in the Andean nation as a base for future Red Crescent projects in South America. The agreement was signed by Iranian business attaché Hojjatollah Soltani and the Bolivian Health Minister, Ramiro Tapia, in the presence of President Evo Morales at the Presidential Palace in La Paz Oct. 10. Soltani signed the agreement on behalf of the Iranian Red Crescent.

At least 18 were killed, including 12 soldiers, when Sendero Luminoso guerillas ambushed a Peruvian army convoy late Oct. 9, military sources say. A child was among six civilians killed in the ambush on four trucks transporting troops and civilians to Cochabamba Grande base in Huancavelica region. Authorities said the convoy was passing through the Apurimac-Ene River Valley (VRAE) in the area of Tintaypunco, Tayacaja province, when the guerillas detonated a roadside bomb and then strafed the stricken vehicles with machine-gun fire. Those troops not killed in the blast fought the guerillas for hours before they retreated back into the jungle in what was the deadliest clash between Sendero and the security forces in a decade.

Calling his corrupt underlings "rats," Peru's President Alan García has dismissed his entire cabinet in what the local media have dubbed the "Petrogate" scandal, and appointed a popular left-wing regional governor as prime minister. Allegations of kickbacks in the granting of concessions to Norwegian company Discover Petroleum arose after local TV aired a series of audio tapes in which two members of García's APRA party discussed the apparent payments. The company denies it paid any bribes. The government has called a special commission to investigate all oil concessions granted since 2006.