WORLD AGENDA AUGUST 2010

August 1, United States: Deployment of 1,200 army and National Guard troops along the U.S.'s 2,000-mile border with Mexico begins. President Barack Obama announced the $500 million, year-long crackdown on immigrants and smugglers in May.

August 1, Ukraine: Domestic gas prices rise by 50 percent as part of the country's attempts to cut its budget deficit. The move comes as the government sheds Soviet-era subsidies in an effort to secure a $14.9billion loan from the International Monetary Fund.

August 4, Nairobi: Kenyans are widely expected to vote yes in a referendum on a new constitution designed to address political corruption and land ownership scandals. Approval of the new charter is seen as key to investor confidence in east Africa's largest economy.

August 7, Bogota: Colombia's strained relations with Venezuela look set to improve as pragmatist Juan Manuel Santos is sworn in as the country's new president. He replaces fellow U.S.-friendly conservative Alvaro Uribe, who believed his left-wing neighbours harboured Colombian guerrillas.

August 9, Kigali: Controversy surrounds presidential elections in Rwanda after one opponent was murdered and others were barred from standing. President Paul Kagame, credited with restoring stability after the 1994 genocide, is seen as showing increasing signs of repression.

August 11, Anchorage: Environmentalists say caribou, wolves and waterfowl are threatened by a lease sale offering oil and gas exploration rights to 1.8 million acres of land in northern Alaska. Campaigners say the reserve is the U.S.'s largest intact unprotected wilderness area.

Mid-August, Gulf of Mexico: The date by which BP says a permanent seal will fix the ruptured wellhead that has spewed oil into the sea since an explosion in April. Urgency over the cleanup of the environmental disaster intensifies as the hurricane season looms.

August 21, Johannesburg: Soccer City, one of six stadiums built in South Africa for the World Cup, hosts the country's rugby world champions, the Springboks, in a Tri-Nations game against New Zealand's All Blacks. The ground was once scene to black freedom rallies.

August 31, Iraq: The official end of U.S. combat operations sees the withdrawal of 27,000 troops, leaving 50,000 involved in "stability operations", despite continued violence in northern provinces. Full military departure is planned by 2012.

Early August (undated), Warsaw: Bronislaw Komorowski is sworn in as Poland's new president following the death of  his predecessor Lech Kaczynski in a plane crash that killed 96 people in April. Komorowski beat Kaczynski's identical twin brother Jaroslaw in a presidential election run-off July 4.
/ENDS