On June 27, Ecuadoran President Rafael Correa, at a meeting in Quito with a delegation of the US-based activist group SOA Watch, made the announcement that Ecuador is ceasing to send soldiers to the School of the Americas, the US Army training facility that has officially been renamed the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation (WHINSEC). Ecuador joins Venezuela, Uruguay, Argentina and Bolivia, who have likewise pulled out of the SOA/WHINSEC.

The Ninth Indigenous March, now camped at Yolosa on the edge of the Bolivian Altiplano, held a celebration June 21 of the Aymara New Year festival, Willkakuti or "Return of the Sun"—marking year 5520 in Aymara calendric reckoning. For the first time, the festival was jointly honored by the Aymara and indigenous peoples of Bolivia's Amazon lowlands who have joined together for the Ninth March under the respective leadership of the National Council of Ayllus and Markas (CONAMAQ) and the Confederation of Indigenous Peoples of the Oriente of Bolivia (CIDOB). Leaders of the two groups pledged to renew their commitment to fight for the protection of Mother Earth and indigenous rights in both the Altiplano and Amazon. (CONAMAQ statement [PDF], June 21)

One protester was gravely hurt with a head injury as National Police attacked a demonstration against the planned Conga gold mine project in Peru's northern city of Cajamarca June 21. Seven were arrested as police unleashed tear gas, and protesters responded with sticks and hurled rocks. Authorities said five police officers were also injured in the confrontation in the city's Plaza Bolognes—which came as Cajamarca's regional president Gregorio Santos was leading a rally against the mine in the city's Plaza de Armas, just a few blocks away. (El Comercio, June 21) When two rights attorneys—Genoveva Gómez of the Defensoría del Pueblo (human rights ombudsman) and Amparo Abando of the National Human Rights Coordinator— entered at city's National Police headquarters to inquire after the seven detained, they were themselves attacked by police, both suffering bruises. (Celendin Libre, June 22)

A mutiny by rank-and-file National Police demanding higher wages spread across Bolivia on June 22, with an estimated 4,000 officers occupying barracks. The mutiny began the previous night, when some 30 officers and their wives seized control of the barracks of the elite anti-riot force (UTOP), just a block from the presidential palace in La Paz. Striking officers also sacked and set fire to furniture and documents at a police office in downtown La Paz that processes disciplinary complaints. Officers quickly joined the protest in major cities including Santa Cruz, Cochabamba and Oruro, demanding direct talks with President Evo Morales. The president returned early from the UN climate summit in Brazil to deal with the crisis, and is currently in the palace, protected by rifle-weilding military police.

Now that Julian Assange has taken refuge in London's Ecuadoran embassy and is seeking asylum in the Andean nation, we have three questions. The first, predictably, is only being asked on the political right: Is this supposed champion of transparency and freedom of information going to have anything to say about restrictions on press freedoms in Ecuador? Fox News with great glee quotes Human Rights Watch: "Ecuador's laws restrict freedom of expression, and government officials, including [President Rafael] Correa, use these laws against his critics. Those involved in protests marred by violence may be prosecuted on inflated and inappropriate 'terrorism' charges." Fox also notes that Ecuador has an "insult law" in place known as descato, "which historically has criminalized free speech and expression. Under Descato, which is part of the Ecuadorian Criminal Code, any person who 'offends' the president could be sentenced up to two years in prison and up to three months for 'offending' any government official."

Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad arrived in Bolivia for a brief visit with President Evo Morales June 19, before continuing on to Brazil for the UN summit on sustainable development. Bolivian Foreign Minister David Choquehuanca said the leaders would finalize an accord on increased cooperation between the two nations, which the Iranian embassy in La Paz described as "entering a new stage." The embassy statement notes that Tehran "has realized several infrastructure projects" in Bolivia since normalizing relations with the South American nation in 2007. This constitutes Ahmadinejad's third visit with Morales in La Paz. He will also meet in Caracas with Venezuela's President Hugo Chávez after the Rio+20 conference in Brazil. (AFP, June 19)

A US prosecutor has filed drug trafficking charges against a retired Colombian police general who was former President Alvaro Uribe's security chief, newspaper El Tiempo reported June 15. According to the charges filed before the Eastern District Court of Virginia, retired Gen. Mauricio Santoyo Velasco collaborated with paramilitary organization AUC and Medellín-based crime syndicate Oficina de Envigado between 2000 and 2008. Santoyo was Uribe's security chief between 2002 and 2006 after which he was named military attaché in Italy.

The International Criminal Court (ICC) will analyze information regarding the Colombian army murdering civilians and disguising them as guerillas killed in combat to artificially inflate its enemy kill count. "We are asking [the government] about this issue, they have responded to us about the cases currently under investigation. We are preparing a report about this, but for now we are in the process of analyzing," said the court's outgoing prosecutor, Luis Moreno Ocampo, in an interview with Spanish news agency EFE June 13.