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Hundreds of thousands of women throughout Ethiopia marched on August 7, staging peace rallies to call for an end to that country's 12-week border dispute with Eritrea. An estimated 100,000 women marched in the capitol city of Addis Ababa, and there were similarly large rallies in every other major Ethiopian city. The demonstrations were intended to pressure both governments to accept mediators' efforts to end the conflict, which escalated into a brief shooting war in early June.--Geov Parrish

Breakthrough, or rip-off? The Canadian government has signed a landmark treaty with the Nisga'a First Nation of far northern British Columbia. Most tribes in that region have extensive land claims and have never signed treaties of any kind with Canadian or provincial governments. The deal would give the Nisga'a an unprecedented amount of self-governance (unprecedented since the Europeans showed up, anyway) over a large swath of land, including some land other tribes claim isn't Nisga'a land to begin with. But the real purpose is buried deep in an Aug. 6 Interpress Third World News Agency article on the deal, an article that spends most of its time quoting enthused federal and tribal leaders. In paragraph 22 of a 23-paragraph story, we learn that "The deal opens up land ceded to the provincial and federal governments to mine prospectors and loggers, who are now sure that governments can grant clear titles to resources."

In other words, the political and economic pressure to seal the deal comes from the same Earth-rapists that have already pillaged many of the more remote parts of what was once a stunningly beautiful province. It's a very familiar story in this country; the system of tribal councils itself was invented by the federal government in the 1930s as a way to find someone to authorize mining and other "resource extraction" industries, usually with scandalously low lease rates and few benefits to the tribe. What little money did flow to tribes usually flowed directly to members of the pliant Tribal Council and their relatives and friends. Much the same story plays out on many U.S. reservations today, and time will tell as to whether the Nisga'a deal is simply the same story on a larger scale.--G.P.

The ambitious, year-long anti-nuclear direct action campaign in Scotland calling itself "Trident Ploughshares 2000," or TP 2000 (One Planet, ETS! #2-45, July 29), kicked into high gear on August 11. Most notably among a series of actions that were to run through this week have been a mass "citizens' war crimes inspection" at Coulport Naval Base, and three TP 2000 divers who penetrated British security on August 18 and actually reached the U.S.-made Trident nuclear sub, HMS Vigilant.

The protests at the Faslane base in Scotland are intended to pressure the British government to abolish their nuclear arsenal, which is primarily a U.S. arsenal operated by the Brits. Further updates on TP 2000 can be found at http://www.gn.apc.org/tp2000/. --G.P.

For those who think the recent nuclear tests in India and Pakistan had unanimous domestic support--or that the commemoration of the anniversary of Hiroshima is a uniquely American guilt trip--some 250,000 reportedly rallied in New Delhi on August 6. The rally, in response to last spring's testing, opposed the subcontinent's new and expensive (and possibly lethal) arms race between two impoverished countries that could be spending the money on far better things.--G.P.

The Dutch are pondering a seemingly simple question: can troops acting as U.N. peace-keepers keep from participating in local bloodbaths? The argument is over the long-running war in the former Yugoslavia. In July of 1995, Serbian troops slaughtered thousands of Muslims near the town of Srebrenica and bulldozed their bodies into a massive shallow grave. The exhumation of these victims has been key in the process of charging Serbian leaders with war crimes, but the Dutch peacekeeping troops assigned to protect Srebrenica are also coming under fire. Evidently, not only did the Dutch troops stand by and let the killing happen, they also may have participated in the slaughter. Four Dutch medics have claimed that they were ordered not to treat wounded Muslim civilians in Srebrenica. The Dutch unit's commander was photographed having drinks with the war criminal, Serbian General Ratko Mladic, who commanded the siege. Now witnesses charge that Dutch peacekeepers drove a tank into a crowd of Muslims, killing 30 people. Also, they've accused the military of deliberately destroying a film that shows Dutch troops helping Serbs separate Muslim men from women for deportation. The Dutch military is, of course, investigating itself--but, if (as it claims) it really wants to live down these charges and has nothing to fear, it should let an independent, civilian board investigate.--Maria Tomchick