by Andrew Ehrenkranz 

Mukumbi, a desolate hive of straw huts, looks like a typical village in the Democratic Republic of Congo, one of the poorest countries in Africa. But a few kilometers down a red-dirt road lies a deposit of some of the purest uranium on the planet. The Shinkolobwe mines produced uranium for the first atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. The mine has been closed for decades, but with soaring demand for uranium to power new nuclear reactors and build weapons, this resource is beginning to attract attention. 

The United Nations and the U.S. government, among others, are concerned that uranium from the mines may wind up in the hands of terrorists or rogue nations who want the ore for weapons. Illegal artesian mining has long persisted in Shinkolobwe’s periphery, particularly for minerals like cobalt,  copper, and coltan, increasingly in demand for mobile phones, electronics, and batteries. In recent years there have been reports of uranium being confiscated at neighboring borders that was ultimately traced to Shinkolobwe. This week there have been unconfirmed reports in Kinshasa that the government is seeking foreign help to re-open the mine.

Rolando Andrade/AFP-Getty Images
Protesting Prices: Farmers and their supporters demonstrate against the Government for raising export tariffs on soybean products in Rosario, Santa Fe province

By Brian Byrnes

In Argentina, history tends to repeat itself. Every decade or so, the country implodes in crisis: coup d’etats, dictatorships, hyperinflation, devaluation, crime--all trademarks of Argentina’s self-fulfilling prophecy of repeated and gross governmental failure.
 
The wounds of the 2001 economic collapse--popularly blamed on outside forces like the International Monetary Fund and Wall Street--have just barely healed, but Argentina once again looks to be on track for a meltdown, and this time it could be sparked by a showdown on the Pampas.
 
A conflict between the fledgling government of President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner and Argentina’s influential farming sector over export taxes on commodities has dragged on since mid-March, and decimated the presidenta’s popularity. According to a poll released on May 22 by Poliarquia Consultores, Kirchner’s approval rating sank to 26 percent this month, down from 56 percent in January. This sharp decline was precipitated by the government’s inability to resolve the export-tax stalemate, but it has been deepened by the openly hostile stance that Cristina has taken with the farmers, and just about everyone else.

By Barbie Nadeau

What does it take to get someone to clean the stinking streets of Naples? This week, what it took was a visit from Italy's new-old prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi. True to his pre-election promises, Berlusconi held his first cabinet meeting in his nation's most troubled city. Thanks to an ongoing garbage crisis, the trash has gone uncollected in parts of this city, raising tensions both locally and as far afield as the European Union headquarters in Brussels. Four days before Berlusconi's arrival, angry residents again took matters into their own hands and burned the garbage themselves. But city authorities did their bit too: on the eve of the cabinet meeting, they cleaned the streets in the historic center and along Berlusconi's route into the city. Elsewhere, the city remained buried.

Berlusconi has promised to deal with the crisis. At a press conference after the meeting, he pledged to turn landfills and incinerators in the region around Naples into military zones, protected by armed guards to keep protestors and the Neapolitan Camorra out. He appointed a new trash tsar, the head of the civil protection authority who is tasked to tackle the crisis "as if we are dealing with the aftermath of an earthquake or volcanic eruption".   He also promised to restart work on an incinerator that has been halted pending investigation for Mafia collusion. And he says he can clean up the streets of Naples and surrounding cities within a few months by using a handful of temporary landfills to be kept secret to avoid protests. To combat Neapolitans' "not in my backyard" mentality, he says anyone caught organizing protests to block waste removal will face up to five years in jail.