Four suyus (traditional Aymara territories) in Bolivia's Oruro department appealed Feb. 15 to the region's Superoir Court of Justice, demanding that authorities recognize the Aymara system of justice. "The mechanism of conflict resolution in the ayllus, markas and suyus of the Department of Oruro has a position of equal rank with ordinary justice," the complaint reads. The suyus of Suras, Jach'a Carangas, Jatun Quillacas and Uru Chipayas brought the case through the National Council of Ayllus and Markas of Qullasuyu (CONAMAQ), demanding modification of Bolivia's Autonomy and Decentralization Law. (El Potosí, Feb. 15)

Some 2,000 Bolivians marched Feb. 20 through central La Paz to the Chilean consulate to demand the liberation of three Bolivian soldiers held since Jan. 25 after crossing the border into the neighboring country. At the consulate, protesters delivered an open letter addressed to Chilean President Sebastián Piñera, demanidng that he comply with his "historic obligation" to answer Bolivian demands for sea access. The march was led by an alliance of popular organizations, including Bolivia's campesino federation, CSUTCB.

International human rights advocates have commended Colombia on the return of usurped lands to 32 displaced families in northwest Córdoba department. Human Rights Watch (HRW) which had previously been critical of the Victims' Law which includes the Land Restitution Law, hailed the occasion as "a major step." The ruling on Feb. 13 by a specialized land restitution tribunal, orders the return of approximately 164 hectares (405 acres) on the Santa Paula finca (plantation), outside the city of Montería. Persons linked to the paramilitary United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC) forced out the 32 families and fraudulently titled their land between 1999 and 2002, according to the ruling—especially naming AUC founders Carlos and Vicente Castaño.

After tense negotiations, the Red Cross transported to safety Feb. 15 two Colombian National Police agents being held by the FARC guerillas since Jan. 25. The release had been delayed due to large groups of journalists in the vicinity of the drop-off point according to leader of Colombians for Peace (CCP), Piedad Cordoba, who helped broker the negotiations. The armed forces had ceased military activity around Miranda in the southwest Cauca department to provide safe passage for the Red Cross. The humanitarian mission will next fly to Pasto to secure the release of a soldier captured by the FARC on Jan. 31 during clashes in southern Nariño department. (Colombia Reports, Feb. 14)

On Jan. 25 Colombian judge William Andrés Castiblanco sentenced Jaime Blanco, a former contractor for the Alabama-based Drummond Co. Inc. coal company, to 37 years and 11 months in prison for masterminding the March 2001 murders of two union leaders in the northern department of Cesar. The court found that Blanco, who supplied food services for Drummond's La Loma mine, had arranged with right-wing paramilitaries, including one known as "Tolemaida," for the killing of Valmore Locarno and Víctor Hugo Orcasita, leaders of the mine's union. Blanco's assistant, Jairo Charris, was convicted in 2009 in the same murder plot and was sentenced to 30 years.

Norma Enríquez, a leader of the Permanent Assembly of Civil Society for Peace, an umbrella of Colombian NGOs and popular organizations, on Feb. 10 called on the government to include the National Liberation Army (ELN) in the talks now underway in Havana with the FARC guerillas. Enríquez told the Mexican news agency Notimex that failure to include the ELN "would be to risk marginalizing one of the expressions of the conflict from the peace dialogue." Initial contacts between the government and the ELN, brokered by the Catholic Church, apparently broke down in November, when the guerilla group took hostage two German nationals in Santander department. (Notimex, Feb. 11; Sexenio, Mexico, Feb. 10)

Peru's Yanacocha mining company—that seeking to develop the controversial Conga project in Cajamarca region—is appealing a ruling of  the National Water Authority (ANA) barring expansion of its existing mine into new lands within its concession area. The lands, at a place called La Quinua Sur, lie within the headwaters of the Río Grande, which supplies water to the city of Cajamarca. Technically, the expansion, dubbed Yanacocha Oeste, was approved late last year by the Ministry of Energy and Mining (MINEM), but ANA denied approval to discharge effluent into local waterways that drain into the river. This effectively bars plans to develop a new open-pit mine at Quinua Sur. 

Bolivia's Aymara indigenous alliance CONAMAQ issued an open letter Jan. 27 to President Evo Morales, the official rights watchdog Defensoría del Pueblo, and the independent Permanent Human Rights Association of Bolivia (APDHB),  charging that the ruling Movement to Socialism-Political Instrument for the Sovereignty of the Peoples (MAS-IPSP) is seeking to divide their organization. The statement warned of the possibility for violence at CONAMAQ's upcoming Mara Tantachawi, or annual gathering. "The MAS-IPSP government of Evo Morales...in the different suyus [regions] is organizing and mobilizing groups of confrontation led by ex-authorities suspended by CONAMAQ...to sabotage [hacer fracasar] this event and take over by force the CONAMAQ council for political ends," the statement reads.