Associated Press - By TRENTON DANIEL - July 6, 2011

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) ? Haitian President Michel Martelly has chosen a
former justice minister as his nominee for prime minister in his second
attempt to fill the position, a government official said Wednesday.

A man with his face covered takes part in a demonstration in the town of Cherán, Mexico.

Photograph: Clayton Conn

Since April this year the Mexican town of Cherán has been defending itself against illegal loggers backed by a local drug cartel. Increasingly isolated and running out of supplies townspeople opened up the town on 26 June to welcome Javier Sicilia's caravan of peace

A man looks out over a balcony from a house in Cuba where Cuban officials plan to let Cubans buy and sell their own homes for the first time in 50 years

Photograph: Ben, a Cuban in Europe. http://bendeasis.blogspot.com

At the beginning of the month Cuban officials opened up discussion on housing rights in Cuba, where people are not allowed to buy or sell their own homes. While citizens have welcomed the move it has also created suspicions. Cuban blogger, Yoani Sanchez, gives her thoughts

Cuban conductor, Zenaida Romeu. Image taken from Yoani Sanchez's blog

By Yoani Sanchez, Cuba

Glancing at the TV I was caught by a phrase from Zenaida Romeu, director of the chamber group that bears her name. It's Tuesday and the energy of this woman, a guest on the program With True Affection, Two... had me sitting in front of the screen while the potatoes burned on the stove. She answered the questions skillfully, with a language far from the boring chatter that fills so many other spaces. 

Coco Fariñas takes his first sip of water, Santa Clara hospital, Cuba. Photo: Yoani Sanchez

On Surfari Haiti from Russell Brownley on Vimeo.

Martin Nesirky, spokesman for the UN secretary-general, said Thursday the website is intended to help the Haitian government address the challenges linked to the management of foreign aid.

The site is intended to help hold donors to their promises and ensure transparency and accountability in the use of the money.

At the March meeting, nearly 50 donors pledged a total of $9.9 billion in aid to help Haiti recover from the 7.0-magnitude earthquake that devastated the capital Port-au-Prince. The Jan. 12 quake killed more than 200,000 people and left 1.3 million homeless.

The site's address is . http://www.refondation.ht

Christopher Columbus is on the move again in the New World, after numerous rejections in a nearly two-decade quest to find him a suitable spot, the Associated Press reports. A towering statue of the explorer -- twice the height of the Statue of Liberty without its pedestal and shunned by several U.S. cities -- might be erected on Puerto Rico's north coast. 

Haïti, une traversée littéraire [Haiti, a Literary Voyage] is a new book by Louis- Philippe Dalembert and Lyonel Trouillot (Éditions Philippe Rey/Culturesfrance, Paris, 2010).

Description: Haiti is not only the country where "Négritude stood up for the first time," in the words of Aimé Césaire. The former French colony of Saint Domingue, which became independent in 1804, has since maintained an extraordinary flourishing of literary creation. Thus, from d'Anténor Firmin (De l'égalité des races humaines) to Marie Vieux-Chauvet (Amour, Colère, Folie), along with Jean-Price Mars (Ainsi parla l'oncle) and Jacques Roumain (Gouverneurs de la rosée), the dynamism of this literature is well documented. Today, it is written in both languages of the country, French and Creole, in Haiti as well as in its diaspora. French publishing houses tout, for example, the works of Georges Castera , Dany Laferrière , Yanick Lahens , Gary Victor, Kettly March, Edwidge Danticat, Evelyne Trouillot, and many others. Haïti, une traversée littéraire presents a journey through this literature as it was created, is created, and distributed today. An anthology of selected texts by Louis -Philippe Dalembert and Lyonel Trouillot, an audio CD, and a sound archive, complete the literary journey. The audio CD includes the voices of René Depestre, Frankétienne, Emile Ollivier, the sound archives of INA plus an excerpt from "Pierrot le Noir" by Jean -Richard Laforest, Émile Ollivier, and Anthony Phelps.

The anthology was published with the collaboration of Yves Chemla, teacher, researcher, and author of La Question de l'Autre dans le roman haïtien contemporain (Ibis Rouge éditions, 2003).

Representatives of the Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture (IICA) and the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) based in Haiti and the Dominican Republic have reached agreement on the preparation of a binational project that will focus on the border region. The initiative will center on transboundary diseases that limit trade in agricultural products; the promotion of agribusinesses for generational change in the countryside; and agricultural technology to cope with climate change.

The online whistle-blowing organisation Wikileaks has made public more than 90,000 reports, detailing the war in Afghanistan. The documents, extracts of which were published by the New York Times, the Guardian and Der Spiegel, expose the unseen side to the Afghan war.

The New York Times writes on how these secret documents show a bleaker view of the war. 

Deep in the ravine amid the narrow corridors and chaotic construction, workers in T-shirts push wheelbarrows up and down a newly carved dirt path as rubble-filled buckets are passed in a human chain. At the top of the steep hill, a clear view of the crumbled presidential palace and near-collapsed capital emerge as empty lots replace mounds of rubble.