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In Damascus, Solidarity with Besieged East Ghouta is Dangerous · Global Voices
Maria Mattar

‘Ghouta,’ painted by Randa Maddah. Used with permission. Source: Women Now.
The following is a series of testimonies from Damascus. It comes following two testimonies from Eastern Ghouta (in the suburbs of Damascus) by a nurse and a dentist, published on February 20 and March 4, 2018, respectively, and published by the Act For Ghouta collective.
Controlled by anti-regime rebels, Eastern Ghouta has been under siege by the Syrian regime and its allies since the end of 2013. But in recent weeks, the violence intensified drastically. Over 120 people have been killed between February 6 and February 8 alone, and February 19 saw the death of over 110 people in a single day. Since February 18, over 650 people have been killed, more than 150 of them children. Civilian infrastructure has also been severely damaged, with more than 25 hospitals and health centers hit, some more than once in four days.
The humanitarian catastrophe in Damascus’ Eastern Ghouta suburbs continues to unfold as Syrian and Russian forces push ahead with a military operation against the rebel enclave under the Syrian government siege since 2013.
Since Feb 2018, 650 people have reportedly been killed. The death toll continues to climb amid relentless ground and aerial bombardment and massive damage to infrastructure. Gruesome footage from inside eastern Ghouta arrives thick and fast, offering a glimpse into the gravity of the situation and the suffering of people there.
On social media, supporters of President Bashar al-Assad issue pleas for the Syrian military to halt rocket attacks on the capital Damascus, referring to those sent by rebels in East Ghouta, which have surged since the relentless Ghouta offensive by the regime began.
Syrian state media has aired interviews with people on Damascus’ streets disgruntled with frequent rocket attacks hitting their city who say they blame the rebels in Eastern Ghouta. They urge their government to ‘stamp out rebel attacks.’
The regime's despotic rule and ubiquitous security agents make it nearly impossible to gauge the scope of the opposition to the Ghouta offensive inside Damascus. Although hard to find, many hushed voices have emerged. The majority remain silent as the regime maintains a military upper hand.
Salam (not her real name), a mother of two living in Damascus, tells Global Voices that her son is developing a phobia from living in constant fear:
My two year old son cries hysterically and clings fast to me when a warplane flies overhead or when an explosion occurs…He has developed a phobia.
She adds that life has gotten difficult in Damascus due to rebel rockets, and that she can't imagine how it must be in Ghouta:
Since the Ghouta operation began, we have been hearing explosions of unusual intensity…the passing of a plane overhead makes buildings shake. It blows my mind to imagine how mothers in Ghouta are coping. If I were there, I would have gone berserk. I am a mother and I understand how mothers feel. I have been watching videos and following Facebook posts from Ghouta mothers. It is impossible for me to not empathize.
Rockets and shells have disrupted life here in Damascus. In some neighborhoods people are no longer sending their children to schools. Just imagine how life is there. Civilians on both sides are paying the price. This madness has got to stop.
Ahmad (not his real name), a government employee originally from Harasta in Eastern Ghouta, left for Damascus with his family soon after the government crackdown on protests in his hometown began. Ahmad spends most of his time glued to his laptop to follow developments in Ghouta and now lives in constant fear for the lives of his relatives as well as workplace paranoia in Damascus:
I have relatives and friends in Eastern Ghouta. They keep posting updates of their hellish conditions on social media. I have already lost three friends since the operation started.
Employees from Ghouta are closely monitored. You have to be careful to not even show sympathy. You have to weigh your words carefully.
When asked what consequences there might be, Ahmad said:
You risk being suspected of having links with ‘terrorists’, you can lose your job if someone tips you off. You risk even detention. Generally speaking, there is a tacit understanding that silence in the safest thing you can do.
He described not knowing how to react when co-workers call for ‘wiping Ghouta out':
When co-workers complain about shells and rocket attacks and call for ‘wiping Ghouta out’ in retaliation for the rockets, all you can do is grin and bear it. I feel deeply embittered. I have friends and relatives there. I have my house which I am sure is a big pile of rubble now. I have my childhood and youth memories there.
Deep down I know I am a coward. But there is nothing we can do. They have military might on their side. Even the UN [United Nations] and international community have proved inept. We are trapped in our helplessness.
Omar (not his real name), a university student who hails from the Qaboun district near Damascus echoes his thoughts:
Back in 2006, I vividly remember when we received a Lebanese family who fled the Israeli war in our house in Qaboun. I remember my brothers engaging in solidarity stands and fundraising for the people of Gaza during Israeli operations. With Ghouta, we are denied the luxury of showing solidarity. I envy people from across the globe who can join protests and shout at the top of their voices in solidarity with Ghouta.
Omar says he set up a fake Facebook account to engage in online campaigns and share accounts by people from inside Ghouta. Active on social media, Omar says he translates accounts, posts and videos of besieged people in the hope of “galvanizing public opinion into action”.
Whenever you turn a blind eye to this tragedy, a boom brings it back to your senses. There is no ignoring it…Geographical vicinity, kinship and humanity dictates it.

author: Maria Mattar


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Language Lessons: Kazakhstan Still Torn Between Tongues · Global Voices
Dina Baidildayeva

Kazakh ruler Nursultan Nazarbayev at the Kremlin. Russian government image.
At the end of last month Kazakhstan's ageing authoritarian President Nursultan Nazarbayev created a stir when he ordered officials to speak in the state language, Kazakh, rather than the country's other ‘official’ language, Russian.
The reasons for the sudden order, as well as its potential consequences, are still being debated in the Central Asian country.
Kazakh has been Kazakhstan's state language since 1989, when it was still a Soviet republic. But even a quarter of a century into independence, Russian still dominates the media, national government and business circles, a legacy of imperial and communist-era ‘Russification’.
Moreover, the continued pre-eminence of Russian has been understood as beneficial for inter-ethnic harmony in the diverse country.
Kazakhs make up just over two thirds of the republic's 18 million population with Russians accounting for a fifth. Other groups including Ukrainians, Uighurs, Tatars and Koreans, are often more used to speaking in Russian than Kazakh, while many Kazakhs living in the country's two largest cities, Almaty and Astana, are also more prone to speaking Russian.
Even Nazarbayev himself, who speaks Kazakh fluently, appears to prefer speaking Russian.
Latest version of the Kazakh alphabet. Prior to last year, the alphabet in the country's state language was rendered, like Russian, in Cyrillic.
The prevalence of Russian in Kazakhstan is also of interest to Russia itself, which views Kazakhstan as an important ally and part of President Vladimir Putin's self-proclaimed “Russian world.”
For these reasons, the snap directive to hold sessions of government in Kazakh “only” on February 26 came as a surprise to many.
Reuters reported the following day that nearly all officials were using the language at a cabinet session, much to the joy of many Kazakh-speaking social media users.
In a typical response to the news, Bakyt Sultan wrote on Facebook that it was “about time” for such a directive. Sultan's post was in Kazakh with a smattering of Russian.
It is about time!!! Unfortunately, it has become a habit for us to speak in Russian because of a few folks who don't speak Kazakh. If we speak in Kazakh those who don't should learn.
Marzhan Usenbay, another Kazakh speaker, wrote simply: “Hurray! Hurray! Wonderful news.”
Moscow is unlikely to be rejoicing. Some see the order to promote the use of Kazakh at the highest level as an attempt to diminish the influence of Kazakhstan's giant neighbour to the north.
Such moves on Kazakhstan's part have grown more noticeable on the back of an unsettling few years that began with the crisis over Ukraine in 2014.
Since that time Kazakhstan has used a number of opportunities to assert its independence from Moscow. In 2015 it celebrated 550 years of statehood in grand style after Putin appeared to question the country's pre-Soviet history.
Nazarbayev with Russian Prime Minister Dmitri Medvedev and Belarusian President Aleksandr Lukashenka. Russian remains the dominant language in Belarus despite the existence of Belarusian. Russian government image.
Others however, see it as yet another manoeuvre  to distract the public from slow economic growth and massive corruption. These sorts of reactions mirrored responses to the government's move last year to switch the alphabet used for Kazakh from Cyrillic to Latin.
A Facebook user with the pseudonym Natsad Napsa cast the directive as a “diversion.”
This is just a diversion! If genuine, they would eliminate Russian from the Constitution. If they don't do this, it's just a distraction!!
Not only parliament and government but the entirety of Kazakhstan including all state structures, mass media, [educational institutions] starting from kindergarten to Nazarbayev University and the president himself and his administration should all speak in Kazakh. Plus, official paper work must be written in Kazakh. If that's not the case then once again, this is just another case of fooling people with declarations.
If Kazakhstan is serious about making the transition from Russian to Kazakh at the top, it will be a rough ride for some highly-placed officials.
Currently, social media users are actively sharing a video from a recent parliament session in which a parliamentary deputy poses a question to central bank chief Daniar Akishev, an ethnic Kazakh whose primary language is Russian.
Akishev replies in Kazakh in an attempt to fulfil Nazarbayev's order, but fails to make himself understood. His response triggered mass ridicule from fluent Kazakh speakers on social media.
However, as the video spread, so too did Facebook posts from users sympathizing with Akishev, and recalling their own difficulties learning to speak the state language.
At any rate, Akishev, who pledged to raise his Kazakh to full proficiency when he was appointed as central bank chief over two years ago, shouldn't feel too glum.
In recent days the government has somewhat toned down the demand for officials to speak “only” Kazakh at government sessions.
Speaking at a March 1 session of the senate, Senator Dariga Nazarbayeva, who is the president's oldest daughter and also a potential successor, noted that “no-one has cancelled” Russian yet, and that the language would continue to be used in official capacities.
She spoke in Russian at the session.
Mixed messages, indeed.

source: news-globalvoices

license: Creative Commons - Attribution - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

author: Dina Baidildayeva


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In Effort to Lift FIFA Ban, Iraq Hosts Saudi Arabia for First Time in Nearly 40 Years · Global Voices
Sali Mahdy

Basra International Stadium, Basra, Iraq. Photo by Yesar Al-Maleki via Wikimedia (CC BY 3.0)
Iraq hosted a football match against Saudi Arabia for the first time in nearly four decades. The friendly match between the two national teams took place in the southern city of Basra with an attendance of 65,000 spectators.
Although Iraq's 4-1 victory over Saudi Arabia was cause for celebration, Iraqi football officials are aiming for a different kind of win. Iraq has been banned by FIFA, the international football governing body, from hosting international competitive matches since the invasion of neighbouring Kuwait in 1990 that led to an international embargo. In August 1990, Iraq entered Kuwait and occupied it for seven months before a United Nations coalition led by the United States intervened to expel Iraqi forces in what became known as the First Gulf War.
While FIFA has recently allowed Iraq to host friendly matches, it still banned it from playing its home matches for the 2018 World Cup qualification stages within the country.
Iraqi officials are hoping that hosting friendlies, renovating stadiums, and outlawing weapons will demonstrate that Iraq has the infrastructure and is safe enough to lift the ban on hosting competitive matches. They invited FIFA chief Gianni Infantino to witness for himself, but he did not attend. They continue to be hopeful ahead of FIFA's decision whether or not to lift the ban later in March 2018.
“I hope that this match will inspire other national teams to visit Iraq, which will help support our case for a total lifting of FIFA's ban on matches in our stadums,” Abdulhussein Abttan, sports and youth minister, told news agency AFP in an interview.
Abttan is also counting on the influence of Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries to make the case for lifting the ban. “Politics is present in every domain and Saudi Arabia has major political weight. We are also counting on the teams of Bahrain, Qatar, and Iran, all of which also have political influence in sports.”
Sheikh Hamad al-Thani, president of the Qatar Football Association, has publicly expressed his support to lift the ban.
In recent years, Iraq and Saudi Arabia have engaged in a historic rapprochement after decades of tense relations.
The two countries reestablished ties in 2016 when the Saudi embassy reopened in Baghdad and have taken important steps to continue pressing forward. Saudi Arabia plans to open consulates in Basra and Najaf and reopened the Arar border crossing to promote trade. In an effort to help Iraq rebuild after years of a devastating war, Saudi Arabia has also offered US $1 billion through its Saudi Development Fund.
While political and economic diplomacy serve to mend ties, it is football diplomacy that is bringing the two nations together on a personal level. Football-starved Iraqis appreciated the Saudi national team making the trip to Basra so that they could watch an international-level match in person and simultaneously bolster their bid to lift the ban.
Iraq has not faced Saudi Arabia on home soil since 1979, a year before the start of the devastating Iran-Iraq war, making it a remarkable event for Iraqi football fans. Prior to the match, Arkan Taqi, a resident of Basra, started a social media campaign under the hashtag دارك_يالاخضر#, which translates to “Greens, you're at home,” ensuring a warm and welcoming reception for the Saudis.
طفل يرسم العلم العراقي على وجهه تتوسطه عبارة دارك يالاخضر التي اطلقت على مواقع التواصل الاجتماعي للترحيب بالمنتخب السعودي – تصوير عبدالرحمن مشبب من جريدة الرياضية #السعودية pic.twitter.com/jilBEOy70F
— Zaid Benjamin (@zaidbenjamin) March 1, 2018
An Iraqi child draws the Iraqi flag on his face with the words “Greens, you're at home” from the social media campaign welcoming the Saudi national team. Photo by Abdulrahman Meshbib from Al Riyadiya.
شباب عراقين يرفعون اعلام السعوديه والعراق
بكميه حب لم تحدث من قبل ٣٠ عام
مشاعر جميله #دارك_يالاخضر#العراق_السعوديه pic.twitter.com/eshjVZ2qeb
— هاله الموصلية #Iraq???????????? (@IRAQPICS1) February 28, 2018
Iraqis raise the Saudi and Iraqi flags with love unseen in 30 years.
An Iraqi carries a sign reading “We'll remain brothers forever.”
#دارك_يالأخضر pic.twitter.com/BYXDRr81aj
— احمد الياسري (@yaseri92) March 1, 2018
#Greens, you're at home
Iraq's hospitality did not go unnoticed by Saudis as they shared their gratitude.
#دارك_يالأخضر
شكراً على حفاوة الترحيب بالمنتخب السعودي وهذا غير مستغرب على الشعب العراقي الكبير ??❤
— ?? ittihad ? (@ittihad_kksa) February 27, 2018
Thank you for warmly welcoming the Saudi national team, this is not surprising coming from the great Iraqi people.
#دارك_يالأخضر
تباً للإعلام الفاسد الذي يصور العراق بصور غير حقيقة ..
نفذت تذاكر مباراة منتخب #العراق_السعودية .
وترحيب كبير يطارد منتخبنا ??
شكراً للعراق والعراقيين
اللهم احفظ العراق والعراقيين ❤??
— عبدالله محسن القرني (@Abdullh_m7sn) February 27, 2018
Curse the corrupt media that paints Iraq in a bad light. The tickets were sold out and our team was warmly welcomed. Thank you and may God protect Iraq and its people.

author: Sali Mahdy


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Is France Finally Facing up to Its Homelessness Problem? · Global Voices
Jade Dussart

A man passes a homeless person sheltering in a phone box, in a snowbound Parisian street.  Photo by Gustave Deghilage, published on Flickr under licence CC BY-NC-ND 2.0
While European media has been having a field day bestowing poetic epithets on the cold wave which has affected the continent for several days — “Moscow-Paris” in France, the “Beast From The East” in the United Kingdom, or the “Siberian Bear” in the Netherlands — the situation of the homeless is fast becoming an emergency.
Since the 1 January 2018, the collective Deaths on the Street has logged almost 70 “persons of no fixed abode” (“sans domicile fixe”, or “SDF”, in French) across France who have died, over a dozen of them in Paris.
No official estimate of the number of homeless people currently exists in France. For Florent Gueguen, the director general of the Federation for Solidarity Actions (Fédération des acteurs de la solidarité), “France is lagging behind on the question“. The last examination by the National Institute for Statistics and Economic Studies (INSEE), which goes back to 2012, concluded there were 142,000 homeless people, a figure which, on top of being dated and partial, does not specifically count rough sleepers.
Even in the absence of reliable figures, the issue of homeless people resurfaces in the French media each winter. Every year without exception, as soon as the temperatures tumble, reports on the homeless facing the cold weather start to appear, just like stories about traffic jams on the holiday routes in August or the return to school in September.
In 2018, however, the coverage of the difficulties encountered by homeless people has intensified, both in traditional media and on social media, owing to a series of declarations made for the first time by the government of political party La République en Marche (The Republic Moving Forward).
Addressing the French people on the evening of 31 December 2017 with his official New Year's Resolutions, President Emmanuel Macron in effect assured them of his commitment to housing rights:
Je veux que nous puissions apporter un toit à toutes celles et ceux qui sont aujourd'hui sans-abri. Le gouvernement s'est beaucoup engagé dans cette direction ces derniers mois et a beaucoup amélioré les choses, mais il y a encore des situations qui ne sont pas acceptables.
I want to see us able to put a roof over the heads of all those who are homeless today. The government has greatly committed itself in this direction over the last few months, and has greatly improved things, but there are still situations which are unacceptable.
Macron was reiterating a promise expressed in a speech at Orléans on 27 July 2017:
La première bataille : c’est de loger tout le monde dignement. Je ne veux plus d’ici la fin de l’année avoir des femmes et des hommes dans les rues.
The first battle is to house everyone fittingly.  I don't want in a year from now for there to be women and men on our streets.
After the New Year's Resolutions speech, advocates and voluntary organizations immediately decried Macron's unrealistic promise, which would be impossible to keep in the light of the means currently accorded to the struggle for housing rights. In response, government spokesperson Christophe Castaner stuck to his guns, justifying the failure to realize this objective, in an interview on BFM TV on 29 December 2017:
Promesse de Macron pour les sans-abris: “Des femmes et des hommes, dans le cadre des maraudes, refusent aussi d'être logés” selon Castaner pic.twitter.com/jen1HznygA
— BFMTV (@BFMTV) 29 décembre 2017
Macron's promise to the homeless: “Women and men, in the tradition of the maraud, are refusing to be housed,” says Castaner.
On social media, people were quick to react to a statement seemingly placing the blame on homeless people:
Les propos de Castaner sont inappropriés et déplacés, sincèrement qui veut vivre dans la rue dans des conditions aussi difficiles ? La question a se poser est de savoir comment se passe l'accueil et le traitements des SDF dans les structures d'accueil…#GGRMC
— Jacques Solay (@keja_solay) 2 janvier 2018
Castaner's remarks are inappropriate and misplaced. Who really wants to live on the streets in such difficult conditions? The question we should be asking is what reception and treatment are the homeless getting on admission…
Deux heures de maraude et une heure au 115 suffiront, M. @CCastaner, pour prendre la mesure de l’indécence de votre affirmation. Merci de ne pas ajouter à la souffrance des personnes sans-abris une propagande niant leur combat quotidien pour rechercher un hébergement pérenne. https://t.co/p8FmlrEm8d
— Bernard Thibaud (@bthibaudsc) 29 décembre 2017
Two hours on the maraud, and one hour on the 115 (emergency housing helpline) are all it takes, Mr. @CCastaner, to gauge your shamelessness in making that remark. Please don't add to the suffering of homeless people by denying their daily struggle to find sustainable accommodation for the sake of propaganda.
Ça suffit, maintenant. Ce n'est parce que certains SDF refusent qu'on les jette dans des hangars inqualifiables d'absence d'hygiène et de violence permanente qu'il faut expliquer par ces cas marginaux l'absence de prise en compte d'une urgence considérable. Un peu de dignité, svp https://t.co/uBnKns93zj
— FondationAbbéPierre (@Abbe_Pierre) 31 décembre 2017
Enough, now!  It's not the refusal of some homeless people to be thrown into unspeakable hangars, where there's an absence of hygiene and permanent violence, which explains, from such marginal cases, your failure to get a grip on a substantial emergency.  A little dignity, please! https://t.co/uBnKns93zj
In November 2017, an article in Catholic newspaper La Croix revealed that only 25% of emergency housing applications were successful in the Parisian region. A tally which varies between 6 and 39% in the other regions of France according to the Federation for Acts of Solidarity.
Furthermore, the squalid state of many accommodation centres is equally to blame: toilet facilities out of order, mould, leaks… For many homeless, the street is still a preferable solution to the reception centres. Some are upset that certain facilities refuse to accept dogs. Others point to the violence that can break out inside the centres some nights. Homeless women don't always feel safe in them.
And yet, living conditions on the street are tough. On top of the cold, the hunger, the invisibility, the the homeless must contend with the adaptations of French inner cities that are meant to keep out a poverty residents don't want to see.
In December 2017, the Abbé Pierre Foundation and Emmaus Solidarity launched a public awareness campaign on social networks entitled #SoyonsHumains (Let's Be Human). Encouraging users to protest against the proliferation of “hostile design” street furniture, the campaign has been followed by thousands of Twitter users nationwide.
#SoyonsHumains Dispositif anti-SDF devant une banque parisienne… @thierry_kuhn @emmaus_france @FSivignon @JoelWeilerMdM @NathGodard_93 @pimpollito8 pic.twitter.com/LzzOisvLEM
— François Berdougo (@FBerdougo) 7 février 2018
#SoyonsHumains Anti-rough sleeper measures in front of a Paris bank…
Est-ce bien nécessaire ? ? #soyonshumains au 54 rue de la Roquette pic.twitter.com/nKhSnTEebu
— SMB (@_StephMB_) 7 février 2018
Is this really necessary? ? #soyonshumains au 54 rue de la Roquette
#soyonshumains la copro du 76 rue Bobillot #paris #notmyparis pic.twitter.com/ypnDGEpcsX
— Cécile Bénoliel (@CecileBenoliel) 1 février 2018
#soyonshumains apartment building 76 rue Bobillot #paris #notmyparis
Dispositif anti-sdf bravo @LCL #soyonshumains 7 rue Jourdain à Paris pic.twitter.com/dOgMMX0gmH
— Fanny Lepoivre (@FannyLepoivre) 27 janvier 2018
Anti-rough sleeper measures – well done @LCL! #soyonshumains 7 rue Jourdain in Paris
Bon ben là, Il y a 2 solutions?
Soit la ville de @Paris veux installer des cages à tigres?
Soit c'est pour empêcher “des gens” de s'abriter de la pluie☔☔☔
Entre le 99/101 avenue de St Mandé 75012. Sous le pont de l'ancienne petite ceinture ?#soyonshumains @Abbe_Pierre pic.twitter.com/rQ00uRcEmx
— Page (@Pagechris75) 21 janvier 2018
OK there are 2 solutions here ?
Either the city of @Paris is trying to erect tiger cages?
Or this is to stop “people” sheltering from the rain☔☔☔
Between 99 & 101 avenue de St Mandé 75012. Under the former goods railway bridge ?#soyonshumains
Three months later, #SoyonsHumains has been able to plot more than 250 hostile design features on an interactive map, constantly updated.
Mapping of hostile design street furniture in Paris, created by the Fondation Abbé Pierre and Emmaüs Solidarité from data submitted by online users. Screen capture from the site SoyonsHumains.fr
In furtherance of this campaign, Christian Page, “Rough Sleeper 2.0″ who has been on the street for two years according to his profile, published a photo on Christmas Day protesting against the presence of barriers round hot air vents customarily used by the homeless to warm themselves:
Salut à tous ?
Rue de Meaux 75019
Grilles d'air chaud ou parfois se posaient les #SDF. Sauf que maintenant voilà ???#soyonshumains @Abbe_Pierre
Sinon venez cet aprèm’ à 15h M° Varennes avec le DAL… Histoire de se faire entendre ? @federationdal
Joyeux Noël ??? pic.twitter.com/DRSAMBmQzb
— Page (@Pagechris75) 25 décembre 2017
Hi all ?
Rue de Meaux, 19th arrondissement
Hot air vents where persons of no fixed abode used to gather. Except now look at them! ???#soyonshumains@Abbe_Pierre
Alternatively, turn up this afternoon at 3 at Varennes metro station with DAL [Housing Rights organization]… Histoire de se faire entendre ?@federationdal
Happy Christmas ???
The photo, re-tweeted more than 2,000 times, got the attention of Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo, who had the obstacle removed two days later:
Paris : un dispositif anti-SDF retiré grâce à un tweet | https://t.co/K6YkmlFfIe #Paris #soyonshumains pic.twitter.com/ypAjVTT4oo
— France 3 Paris (@France3Paris) 27 décembre 2017
Paris: an anti-homeless barrier removed thanks to a tweet
A small victory for Page, who has been relating the daily lives of homeless people in Paris for more than two years, “the good stuff with the shit stuff”:
Salut à tous ?
Je suis #SDF mais je suis aussi un être humain et un citoyen à part entière. Avec des devoirs, certes, mais avec des droits aussi?
J'ai le droit de dénoncer des situations qui me semblent abjectes?
C'est notre forme de liberté ???
Bonne journée ??? https://t.co/YsAVJJu61t
— Page (@Pagechris75) 29 décembre 2017
Hi all ?
I'm #SDF [no fixed abode] but I'm also a human being and full citizen. With duties, I grant you, but with rights too?
I have the right to protest about situations which disgust me ?
It's our form of liberty???
Have a great day ???
On 21 February 2018, First Deputy Mayor of Paris Bruno Julliard unveiled the results of a previously unpublished census of rough sleepers in Paris, carried out from 15 to 16 February. During the Night of Solidarity, organized by social and voluntary workers, there were nearly 3,000 people categorized as homeless, despite the particularly icy temperatures for a February.
While a “Big Cold” plan has been adopted by the French authorities in 68 local government areas, the debate over housing rights and the situation of the homeless in French cities has raged across social networks. Perhaps at last an opportunity has opened up for citizens to demand that the local and national political powers adopt serious measures for the admission and rehabilitation of and solidarity with homeless people in France.

author: Jade Dussart


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Murder of Investigative Journalist Ján Kuciak Shakes Slovak Society · Global Voices
Tibor Blazko

Killed Slovak journalist Ján Kuciak. Photo by Aktuality.sk, used with permission.
On February 25, Slovak journalist Ján Kuciak and his fiance Martina Kušnírová were found shot dead in their home about 65 km east of the capital Bratislava. The murders caused widespread shock and protests throughout the country.
Kuciak, 27, had worked for the news site Aktuality.sk. More than a week after the murder, there has been no headway in the official investigation.
According to BBC, between 10,000 and 20,000 people took to the streets across Slovakia on Friday in protest vigils in Kuciak’s memory, with some calling for the resignation of Prime Minister Robert Fico, the leader of the political party Direction – Social Democracy (SMER-SD).
Thousands of people are marching in Bratislava. This is huge reaction on murder of Slovak investigative journalist #JanKuciak and his fiancée Martina Kušnírová. It's probably biggest demonstration since independence of Slovakia.
(Photo credits: Tomáš Benedikovič, @dennikN) pic.twitter.com/TAFY4ZzSHR
— Filip Struhárik (@filip_struharik) March 2, 2018
Police and people close to Kuciak suspect his death was related to his work. His most recent investigation, which had yet to be published, looked at connections between Slovak government politicians and Italian mafia interests in eastern Slovakia, aimed at defrauding European Union (EU) subsidies for agriculture.
Several days after the murder, Slovak police arrested but then released Italian citizens Antonino Vadala, Bruno Vadala, and Pietro Catroppa who all are allegedly connected to the large-scale Italian organized crime group ‘Ndrangheta, which Kuciak was investigating prior to his death.
Various independent voices online since have pointed to connections between the ruling party and the Italian mafia.
Some comments have focused on Antonino Vadala, who once referred to Slovakia's ruling SMER party as “our party”. Shortly thereafter, multiple politicians released statements saying they had no connection to Vadala.
Blogger Jiří Ščobák observed while lead parliamentarian Andrej Danko had posted an image of a candle on his Facebook page, to honor Kuciak, he had in fact previously been friends with Vadala. Ščobák juxtaposed a screenshot of the recent post, alongside a screenshot showing that they had been Facebook friends.
Connections with the Italian mafia is a taboo topic for Slovak media. Kuciak continued investigating them after journalist Ivan Mego from Plus 7 Dní weekly got orders from his superiors to stop his inquires on this topic, and was sacked in February.
Ján Kuciak's colleagues from Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) and his outlet, Aktuality.sk, defied this norm and decided to posthumously publish the last story he was working on.
You can kill a journalist, but you will never kill the story. We are proud to publish Jan's last, unfinished investigation. https://t.co/mpwpW5D9t7
— Ilya Lozovsky (@ichbinilya) February 28, 2018
Kuciak was not the kind of investigative journalist who worked with many secret sources. His style was rooted primarily in collecting and connecting information from public archives.
Last September, he filed a criminal complaint because of verbal threats from a known Slovak entrepreneur.
The tax office about which assassinated journalist Jan Kuciak was investigating is up in flames today. Below, evidence burning:#JanKuciak https://t.co/2xLeuyrCcx
— Emmanuelle Chaze (@EmmanuelleChaze) February 27, 2018
Slovak left-wing populist Prime Minister Róbert Fico is known for his verbal attacks on journalists, calling them “hyenas”, “dirty anti-Slovak prostitutes” and even “toilet spiders”.
Nevertheless, just two days after Kuciak's killing, he put up a reward of one million euros from the state budget for information about the murder.
How is it even possible for PM to take 1 million € from the state treasury in CASH and put it on the table during a press conference? What law allowed him to do this with taxpayers’ money? #JanKuciak pic.twitter.com/YtQfWFGH9S
— Filip Struhárik (@filip_struharik) February 27, 2018
Two people with close ties to Fico figured prominently in Kuciak's stories — Mária Trošková, a former girlfriend of Antonino Vadala, and Viliam Jasaň, who served as the chief of crisis management and state security, and had ties with a Vadala's company.
Trošková and Jasaň have voluntarily left their posts in the government, pending the conclusion of the investigation of the journalist's murder. When asked to explain their departure, which they say is temporary, both cited pressure from the media, arguing that “their names are abused in political struggle against Fico”.
Blogger Milan Ftorek pointed to contradictions in the PM's public behavior:
Slovenský premiér sa zbláznil ,,, keď sa počas jednej tlačovky dokázal stavať do role toho, čo chce odhaliť Kuciakovych vrahov, no zároveň obhajoval tých, na ktorých sám Kuciak ukázal prstom?
Has the Slovak Prime Minister gone mad? …during one press conference he managed to both play the part of a person who wants to expose Kuciak's killers, but at the same time he defended those who were the subject of Kuciak's investigations?
Newspapers, political opposition voices and many members of the general public reacted with outrage, organizing memorials, marches and protests in Slovakia and abroad, honoring Kuciak and Kušnírová.
#AllForJan webpage set up by Aktuality.sk commemorating Jan Kuciak (27), and Martina Kušnírová (27)
Kuciak's media outlet Aktuality.sk is using the hashtag #AllForJan, while many have simply been using a hashtag with the journalist's name #JanKuciak.

author: Tibor Blazko


text:
Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras Honors the First Pride March Marred by Police Violence 40 Years Ago · Global Voices
Kevin Rennie

Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras 2018. Image from their Facebook page by Jeffrey Feng Photography, used with permission.
The Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras 2018 has been an event with dual purposes — a colorful celebration of the gay and lesbian community, and a commemoration of the 40th anniversary of the original 1978 street march at which 53 participants were arrested and charged by police.
Some of those arrested were forcibly outed and lost their jobs after the Sydney Morning Herald daily newspaper published the names. A list of those who participated now represents an honour roll.
An assistant commissioner of the New South Wales police apologised before this year’s parade:
NSW Police Assistant Commissioner Tony Crandell: “The NSW Police force got it wrong in 1978. We’ve come a long way since then. We’ll be looking forward to making sure everybody’s safe and has a happy Mardi Gras.” pic.twitter.com/aZH6RtJW39
— Sydney Mardi Gras (@sydneymardigras) March 1, 2018
However, two of those who were beaten and arrested in 1978, Peter Murphy and Sandi Banks, have expressed their concern that it did not come from the very top, namely the police commissioner himself. William Brougham posted video to YouTube in which Sandi Banks describes “two faces of the parade. One was light and joyous and frivolous. The other was extreme violence”:
William has also produced a 22 video interviews with the 78ers, as they're called. Many are over an hour long. The playlist of these oral histories is on his YouTube channel.
For well-known activist and 78er Wendy Bacon, the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras 2018 was also a family occasion:
It’s pretty good as a #78ers when you’re on the crowded/ excited #Newtown train to meet your daughter at #MardiGras40 who is also in parade
— Wendy Bacon (@Wendy_Bacon) March 3, 2018
It was also a family affair for two Ingram siblings:
HAPPY MARDI GRAS FROM (TWO OF THE) INGRAM SIBLINGS #MardiGras40 pic.twitter.com/SwDhDzUlep
— Lauren Ingram (@laureningram) March 3, 2018
The Foster twins were the same:
Amazing time with my identical twin at #mardigras2018 ?❤ #LoveIsLove #Twinning pic.twitter.com/C8CNsDos54
— Drew Foster (@Justdr3wit) March 4, 2018
Paul Kidd thanked the history makers:
Shoutout to the #78ers. Shoutout also to the ’70s LGBT activists who weren’t at the first #MardiGras for whatever reason. Shoutout to the str8 allies who rocked up to the Darlo cop shop, raised bail money, stuck up for us. We all stand on the shoulders of giants. #MardiGras40
— Paul Kidd (@paulkidd) March 2, 2018
In addition, the parade is the first one since the legalisation of same-sex marriage in Australia. There was the inevitable wedding at the Mardi Gras:
Couple Wed In Mardi Gras Parade's First Legal Same-Sex Marriage. Check out more on https://t.co/0qSJ3O70Sf #Cher #JamesBrechney #SamesexWedding #SydneyGayAndLesbianMardiGras pic.twitter.com/enWsfmRhhj
— QNews Magazine (@QNewsMagazine) March 4, 2018
Most of the national political leaders joined the festivities. Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull took a signature selfie with headline celebrity Cher, who is considered something of an icon among the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (LGBTQ) community:
Welcome to Sydney, Cher! @GladysB Lucy and I and all your fans thrilled to be with you at the 40th Mardi Gras & first since Australia achieved marriage equality. pic.twitter.com/EIYDaq2OTG
— Malcolm Turnbull (@TurnbullMalcolm) March 3, 2018
It was not to everyone’s taste, especially those who blame him for the “unnecessary” postal survey that preceded the same-sex marriage vote in parliament:
@TurnbullMalcolm Second Greatest Insult To The #LGBTQI Community After The #MarriageEquality Post Vote , ” My Love Affair With Lucy Is Because Of #MardiGras ” https://t.co/b30n8M2UuG @randlight @nobby15 @RBJRON @lynlinking @housinghellcom @WhteRbbnAdvocat @davidbewart #auspol
— Rick Lane (@ricklevy67) March 4, 2018
The Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras Facebook page has posted an album of photos from the night:
First big album of PARADE photos online on our Facebook page now with many more to come: https://t.co/rAH2sgwQoS #MardiGras40 pic.twitter.com/eqLUSDAaGp
— Sydney Mardi Gras (@sydneymardigras) March 4, 2018
It is appropriate to finish with a shot of the original 78ers:
Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras 78ers. Image from their Facebook page by Jeffrey Feng Photography, used with permission.

author: Kevin Rennie


text:
What Were Global Voices’ Readers up to Last Week? · Global Voices
L. Finch

“Reader!” Photo by Flickr user David Holmes. CC BY-ND 2.0
At Global Voices, our community researches, writes, edits, and translates stories with a mission to support human rights and build bridges of understanding across countries, cultures, and languages.
We don't publish just to grab clicks or follow a news trend. We do, however, like to keep track of the ways in which our hard work has impact around the world.
To that end, one useful metric is how readers respond to our stories and translations. So let's take a look at who our readers were and what caught their attention during the week of February 26-March 4, 2018.
Last week, our stories and translations attracted readers from 204 countries! The top 20 countries represented across all of Global Voices’ sites were:
1. United States
2. Brazil
3. France
4. Mexico
5. Japan
6. Spain
7. Colombia
8. Germany
9. United Kingdom
10. Philippines
11. Italy
12. India
13. Taiwan
14. Canada
15. Russia
16. Peru
17. Bangladesh
18. Argentina
19. Indonesia
20. Ecuador
But that's only a small slice of the diversity of our readership. Let's use the True Random Number Generator from Random.org and take a look at a few other countries on the list:
106. China
76. Ireland
129. Martinique
33. Poland
184. Central African Republic
The English-language site is where the majority of original content is first published at Global Voices. The top five most-read stories of last week were:
1. “Stop Bombing Syria!” Berlin Protest Demands Immediate Ceasefire in Ghouta and Afrin
2. “Do Others Know We Exist?”: A Nurse’s Testimony from Syria’s Besieged Eastern Ghouta
3. A Sudanese Village Arts Festival Looks Back to the Future
4. All of the Soviet Union’s Academy Award-Winning Films Are Legally and Freely Available Online
5. A Suicide Mentality, on the Precipice of War in Northeast Asia
Lingua is a project that translates Global Voices stories into languages other than English. There are about 30 active Lingua sites. Below is last week's most-read story or translation on each active language site.

author: L. Finch


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A Record Number of African Athletes Participated in Pyeongchang 2018 Winter Olympic Games · Global Voices
Abdoulaye Bah

Nigeria Team at the opening ceremony of the Games – Public Domain
African countries who participate in the Winter Olympics face major hurdles to participation. Weather conditions, lack of funding and the unpopularity of winter sports are all obstacles for those looking to participate in the games at the Olympic level. In 1960, South Africa became the first African country to participate in the Winter Olympic Games in Squaw Valley, California (United States).
However, at the Pyeongchang 2018 Winter Olympics in South Korea which began on February 9, more African nations will be represented than ever before. A total of 13 athletes from eight African countries will be present at the games including South Africa, Eritrea, Ghana, Kenya, Madagascar, Morocco, Nigeria, and Togo. The following video (in French) explains how the athletes qualified, a first for the nation of Eritrea,  and how these representations compared to the previous winter games:
Winter sports are not easily accessible to those who grow up and live in non-winter climates. Athletes must consider many factors when training for winter sports at the Olympic level such as access to adequate facilities and the financial burden of the training process. The majority of African athletes train and develop their abilities far away from the countries represented. Carole Kouassi, a journalist for AfricaNews.com  reveals some of the problems athletes face, from the creation of federations for their disciplines to issues with funding:
Une fierté pour le continent qui n‘éclipse cependant pas les difficultés auxquelles les athlètes africains, notamment subsahariens, ont fait ou feront face. En premier lieu, les températures glaciales des pays qui abritent ces jeux, aux antipodes de celles rencontrées en Afrique subsaharienne. Conséquences, la majorité des athlètes représentant le continent sont nés ou ont été formés hors de l’Afrique.
Autre difficulté, le manque de financement. Le cas de l‘équipe nigériane de bobsleigh est le plus patent. Les trois jeunes dames qui composent cette équipe, ont dû lever une collecte de fonds pour payer leurs séances d’entraînement et leurs équipements.
Avant elles, des sportifs africains ont dû faire face aux mêmes obstacles. En 1984, le Sénégalais Lamine Guèye, le premier Africain noir à participer aux Jeux olympiques d’hiver, a créé la fédération sénégalaise de ski et, plus récemment, Robel Teklemariam a créé la fédération éthiopienne de ski avant de faire ses débuts aux JO d’hiver 2006.
A pride in the continent which doesn’t diminish the difficulties faced by African athletes, particularly the sub-Saharan ones, face, or will face. First, the frigid temperatures of the countries playing host to the games, the polar opposite of what one finds in sub-Saharan African. As a result, the majority of athletes representing the continent are born or receive training outside Africa.
Another challenge, the lack of funding. The case of the Nigerian bobsleigh team is the most obvious example. The three young women who make up the team had to do fundraising to pay for their training sessions and equipment.
Before them, African athletes had to deal with the same difficulties. In 1984, Senagalese athlete Lamine Guèye, the first black African to participate in the Winter Olympic Games, created the Senegalese ski federation and more recently Robel Teklemariam established the Ethiopian Ski Federation before competing at the 2006 Winter Olympic Games.
For some athletes, participating is not just about being in the games for the first time, it's also about who will take home a medal:
While Mathilde-Amivi Petitjean and Adam Lamhamedi are veterans of sorts having represented Togo and Morocco respectively at the 2014 games in Sochi, Russia, at this year’s games, a number of African athletes will be history makers just by being there. Akwasi Frimpong will become the first Ghanaian to compete in Skeleton while Sabrina Simader and Mialitiana Clerc will become the first women to represent Kenya and Madagascar respectively. Nigeria’s bobsled team will also become the first Africans to participate in the sport at the games.
But there’s a bigger record up for grabs for all 13 African athletes in Pyeongchang, South Korea: becoming the first African to win a Winter Olympics medal.
Vincent Deguenon, a reporter from Benin,  explores the stories of individual African athletes, looking at their journeys and what it's like to represent countries some know little about:
Certains de ces athlètes pratiquent des sports inconnus dans le pays qu’ils représentent. Nombre d’entre eux sont nés et/ou ont grandi à l’étranger, sous des latitudes plus propices aux sports d’hiver, et ont choisi de participer à ces Jeux, pour certains en passant simplement d’un drapeau à un autre, pour d’autres en redécouvrant leurs racines…
Seun Adigun, Ngozi Onwumere et Akuoma Omeoga, toutes trois américano-nigérianes, participeront à l’épreuve de bobsleigh à deux. Née à Chicago, Adigun était déjà présente pour le 100 m haies des Jeux d’été 2012 à Londres. Avec Onwumere, originaire de Dallas, et Omeoga, du Minnesota, elles forment la toute première équipe africaine de l’histoire du bobsleigh olympique.
Simidele Adeagbo, participera à l’épreuve féminine de skeleton. Née à Toronto de parents nigérians et ayant vécu au Nigeria pendant son enfance, Adeagbo a mis à profit son expérience de coureuse pour participer, il y a seulement trois mois, à la première course de skeleton de sa vie et se qualifier à 36 ans dans l’équipe olympique nigériane.
Some of these athletes are involved in sports which are unheard of in the countries they represent. A number of them were born or grew up abroad, at latitudes more favourable for winter sports, and have chosen to participate in these winter games, for some simply changing from one flag to another, while for others it’s about rediscovering their roots…
Seun Adigun, Ngozi Onwumere and Akuoma Omeoga, all three of them American-Nigerians, will participate in two-man bobsleigh event. Born in Chicago, Adigun already participated in the 100m hurdles at the London Summer Olympics in 2012. With Onwumere, from Dallas, and Omeoga from Minnesota, they will form the first-ever African team in the history of Olympic bobsleigh.
Simidele Adeagbo will participate in women’s skeleton. Born in Toronto to Nigerian parents and having lived in Nigeria during her childhood, Adeagbo took advantage of her experience as a runner to participate, only three months ago, in the first skeleton race of her life and to qualify at 36 years old for the Nigerian Olympic team.
Born in Pieve di Cadore, a town in the province of Belluno in the Venice region of Italy, Dipol represented Togo in the women’s giant slalom (a ski race down a winding course marked by flags or poles). She was also affiliated with the Italian Federation of Winter Sports and the Indian Ski Federation. At the age of 18, at the Sochi Games in Russia, Dipol managed to finish 53rd and was also the flag bearer for her adopted country.
Dipol explains how she became a Togolese representative:
Mon père a une usine de vêtements de sport au Togo. Il tient à cette nation et je suis fière de l’opportunité que j’ai de concourir pour le Togo », a-t-elle confié. « Même si je suis née en Italie, que j’y vis et m’y entraîne, je serai désormais toujours avec le Togo, qui est comme une famille d’adoption.
My father has a sport clothing factory in Togo. He cares about the country and I’m proud to have the opportunity to compete for Togo. Even if I was born in Italy, living and training there, Togo will always be a part of me, it’s like my adopted family.
In a message she published in January 2018 on her blog, she didn't hide her enthusiasm and attachment to the country she represents at the Olympics:
Ragazzi manca sempre meno alle Olimpiadiiiiii!!!!!! Noi del Team Togo ci stiamo preparando al meglio per questo super appuntamento!!! Dobbiamo sistemare ancora delle cose e poi siamo prontissimi per vivere questa magnifica avventura!! E voi come vi state preparando??
Friends, there’s less and less time until the OLYMPIIIIICS!!!!!! On the Togolese team we’re are getting as ready as we can for this incredible event!!! We still have to arrange some things and we’ll be ready for this marvellous adventure!! And how do you get ready?

author: Abdoulaye Bah


text:
Ecuador’s Judicial System Leaves Crimes of Torture Against the LGBTQ Community Unpunished · Global Voices
Carlos E. Flores

Judicial entities create great difficulties for LGBTQ organizations in Ecuador, letting those responsible for committing torture in so-called “de-homosexualization clinics” go unpunished by the law. Illustration by Mónica Rodríguez. Used with permission.
The following is the second part of a three-part series, a re-issue of a report written by Carlos E. Flores that was originally published by Connectas and re-edited with the author's help. The full report relates data and case analyses that contrast with the position Ecuador presents before international institutions that protect human rights. The first part of this series features the testimonies of victims of forced imprisonment and can be read here. This installment is devoted to exposing the legal circumstances that keep LGBTI people vulnerable, leaving them subject to kidnapping and torture by “de-homosexualization clinics”.
Over the course of a decade, La Fundación Causana (The Causana Foundation), an organization dedicated to the defense of the rights of LGTBI people in Ecuador, has documented fifty cases of homosexuals confined against their will. This organization believes that there is not enough information on the judicialization of the cases presented.
The situation has attracted the attention of bodies within the United Nations (UN) in terms of fulfillment of the Ecuadorian State code of law, which punishes torture and hate crimes with imprisonment in accordance with the country’s Comprehensive Organic Criminal Code.
An Alternative Report created in December 2016 by several social organizations for the UN Committee against Torture states that the first documented complaint against so-called “de-homosexualization clinics” dates back to the year 2000.
However, only six cases involving these clinics were processed through the Council of the Judiciary, with only those culpable in one case being sentenced on abduction charges. The punishment consisted of ten days of correctional prison and the payment of a fine (the equivalent of 6 USD).
For this and other reasons, LGBTQ organizations insist that there is no effective response from the law, nor is any conclusive information provided by authorities when information about convictions is requested.
One of the centers closed by the authorities was the same in which Jonathan Vásconez was detained and suffered violent abuse and harassment in 2010 (Vásconez’ testimony was included in the first part of this series).
The center was closed in April of 2012 after government authorities visited and took the measure for “breach of rules and requirements” as published on the website of the Ministry of Public Health. Not a word was said about the crimes experienced by people like Vásconez, who says he endured physical and psychological torture. The only defendant tried in the case, the director of the institution, was dismissed.
The Prosecutor's Office initially tried a torture charge but inevitably settled on a kidnapping charge, according to the sentence issued in court. The court dismissed the case because, among other reasons, the internment of the victim was requested by the family.
In May 2017, when Ecuador distributed the Universal Periodic Review III (UPR) for the Human Rights Council of the United Nations, Ecuador did not provide any information regarding punishments against those responsible for employing sexual reorientation “therapies”. The same response was given by the Ecuadorian State in the UPR II of 2012 and the UPR I of 2008.
However, the Ecuadorian State did provide information before the Human Rights Committee in August 2016.  It was noted that Ecuador judicialized four cases, although it “[regretted] not having received detailed information about the penal actions taken against those responsible for these ‘treatments’ and their results.”
In January 2017, the UN Committee against Torture said it was:
concerned about allegations of forced internment and ill-treatment of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people in private centers where so-called ‘therapies of sexual reorientation or dehomosexualization’ are practiced. Despite the closure of 24 centers of this type, the Committee notes with concern that to date the proceedings initiated by the Prosecutor’s Office have not resulted in any conviction.
At the time of the publication of this report it is not known which 24 centers were closed, the reasons why they were closed, who were the culpable individuals, or if they have continued to offer services under another name.
In June of 2017, the Council of the Judiciary, through information obtained from the Prosecutor's Office of Procedural Management, provided a list of six cases that occurred in the provinces of Pichincha, Napo, Guayas, El Oro and Manabí.
The cases only bear the initials of the aggrieved, and it is evident that half of the proceedings were neglected. The clinics in question were not specifically identified and the reasons for the inquiries were only clarified in three of the cases: two corresponded to bodily torture and one to kidnapping.
Official data on judicial processes are scarce and generate concern among human rights organizations and the LGBTQ community.
According to Ane Barragán of La Fundación Causana, the lack of information on the part of the Prosecutor's Office complicates things:
for us, civil society, it is very difficult to get closer to all these details. The Women's Communication Workshop, according to a document issued in Ecuador’s last UPR, stated that the sanctions against these centers have been ‘mostly administrative in nature, and there is no data on any case that had been prosecuted.’
In an added layer of complication, victims’ direct relatives often support the imprisonment. Generally, the aggrieved do not want to subject their own relatives to legal proceedings. In the end, they decide not to report their crimes, instead choosing to distances themselves from their families.
A decade ago, addiction treatment centers could force sexual identity change therapies with zero regulations. Efraín Soria of Fundación Equidad (Equality Foundation) explains:
Little by little the State and the government […] were taking matters into their own hands and were making some steps – among them, creating rules for clinics, [a thing] that had not existed before.
The National Council of Psychotropic Substances and Narcotics used to supervise addiction centers until the Ministry of Public Health took over guardianship and issued Regulation 339 in 2010. This regulation stipulated homosexuality as being a condition to be treated in these clinics, and activists insist this regulation is ambiguous.
The ninth article indicated that the creation of specialized centers would be encouraged for patients including those “people with disorders in their identity or sexual orientations that are primary to their addiction…”
The aforementioned regulation was repealed two years later when Carina Vance, a lesbian activist, took over as health minister. Under her management, Ministerial Agreement 0767 was approved, which eliminated any trace of ambiguity and, furthermore, established a series of procedures for monitoring the clinics with the interaction of different state bodies and the participation of collectives and social organizations.
During Vance’s administration, there were 290 inspections according to a Ministry of Health report, a level of deployment that does not occur these days. According to Patricio Aguirre, Ministry of Health’s National Directorate of Human Rights, Gender and Inclusion, these regulations (the ones pushed by Vance) have helped to supervise these clinics properly, reducing the need for surprise inspections.
However, substantial changes are necessary within a society that continues to view homosexuality and variant gender expressions as behaviors that must be punished or shut away.
Insufficient laws make it difficult to protect the rights of the persecuted, especially when their own family members participate in their persecution under the guise of social conventions.

author: Carlos E. Flores


text:
Slovak Bloggers and European Leaders Demand Justice for Slain Journalist Ján Kuciak · Global Voices
Tibor Blazko

#AllForJan webpage set up by Aktuality.sk commemorating Jan Kuciak (27), and Martina Kušnírová (27)
Outrage over the killing of Slovak journalist Ján Kuciak and his fiance Martina Kušnírová continues to reverberate both within their native Slovakia and across Europe, with increasing demands for accountability by authorities at the national and European Union levels.
The couple was found dead on 25 February 2018 in their home in Veľká Mača in Slovakia.
Human Rights Watch European Media Director, Andrew Stroehlein, described the crime scene:
The murderers placed bullets around the bodies as a warning to others who might think about investigating what #JanKuciak was investigating.
— Andrew Stroehlein (@astroehlein) February 26, 2018
Member of European Parliament Roberta Metsola has likened Kuciak's murder with the October 2017 assassination of Maltese journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia, who was also an investigative reporter working on stories about government corruption and organized crime.
After assassination of #DaphneCaruanaGalizia in #Malta, shocking to see another anti-corruption journalist murdered in our EU, this time it was #JanKuciak in #Slovakia
We need strong EU mechanisms to protect #MediaFreedom & defend the #RuleofLaw. We will keep fighting. https://t.co/jO3Y2GtDFK
— Roberta Metsola MEP (@RobertaMetsola) February 26, 2018
Andrew Caruana Galizia, Daphne's son, wrote a Twitter thread summing up a similar position and demanding EU-wide response:
Anger is what I felt when I read the news. #JanKuciak‘s execution could have been prevented. My mother’s should have been the last in the EU. That’s why I’ll avoid the word tragic. These crimes are foreseeable and preventable. We know what causes them: law enforcement failure.
The social cost of a journalist's assassination is immeasurable. The mass trauma society suffers, the devastating impact on our right to know, the impunity which it confirms and in turn breeds, the message it sends that the most selfless among us will be the first to die and the human suffering that any innocent life cut short brings to victims’ families, are worth any political price to prevent. Supranational law enforcement tools must be established urgently to punish the killers. Strong words won't deliver justice, neither will they stop the executions.
A number of Slovak bloggers have been tackling the issue of the journalist's murder, including Peter Juščák:
Vražda novinára Kuciaka a jeho partnerky je šokom. Je to brutálny čin s ohlasom v celej Európe. Len Ficova vláda, ktorá celé roky budovala a chránila oligarchický režim ešte nepochopila, kam doviedla túto krajinu.
The murder of journalist Kuciak and his partner is a shock. It is a brutal act that has triggered reactions throughout Europe. Only the Fico government, which has been building and protecting the oligarchic regime for years, has yet to understand where it has taken this country.
Ján Benčík warned that the neo-Nazi People's Party for Our Slovakia is spreading a new conspiracy theory through their Facebook page:
Správca stránky „Kotleba – Ľudová strana Naše Slovensko – Bratislavský kraj“ na otázku aké je stanovisko ĽSNS k vražde dvoch mladých ľudí, investigatívneho novinára z portálu Aktuality.sk a jeho snúbenice, odpovedal: „V podstate bol popravený medzinárodný zločinec… Tieto sakrálne obete poslúžia ako pokus eurocentralistov zneužiť vraždu na upevnenie moci Bruselu tým, že nad nami preberú moc trestné orgány Bruselu.”
Administrator of the page “Kotleba – People's Party Our Slovakia – Bratislava Region” posted this reply to a request for comment from their party on the murder of investigative journalist for web portal Aktuality.sk and his fiancee: “In essence, an international criminal has been executed… These sacrificial victims will be used as a justification by the Eurocentralists for strengthening the power of Brussels and given Brussels’ criminal authorities power over us.”
Slovak Prime Minister Róbert Fico offered a 1 million euro (USD $1.2 million) reward for information leading to solving the murder case and even put the money on display at a press conference:
Police officer guards 1 million euros in cash after press conference with PM, Interior Minister and Police President. Dishonorable. Insensible. Vulgar. Loss of sense of reality. Great symbol of their mental world. Slovakia 2018. #JanKuciak pic.twitter.com/SNXf8NmmNF
— Filip Struhárik (@filip_struharik) February 27, 2018
Blogger Slavomír Repka also expressed doubt as to Fico's motives:
Dnešná Ficová tlačovka nebola určená novinárom, nebola určená Janovi Kuciakovi a jeho partnerke Martine… Dnešna Ficova tlačovka s miliónom … bola určená Ficovým voličom a kontinuálne sa znižujúcim preferenciám …
Today Fico's press meeting was not intended for journalists, it was not intended for Jan Kuciak and his partner Martina … Today Fico's press conference with million [euro] … was for Fico's voters and [intended to curb] continuously decreasing support…
Richard Malý replied to Prime Minister's call:
- Komu je prospešné, pán premiér, vyhýbať sa faktom, o vplyve talianskej mafie na chod našej krajiny?
– Aký má premiér SR prospech zo sexice Troškovej? A aký má ona a jej ľudia prospech z premiéra?
– Aký má prospech rodina zavraždených z toho, že vyšetrovanie vraždy riadi policajný prezident, o ktorého švagrovi zavraždený novinár písal v súvislosti s tunelovaním štátnej kasy?
– Aký máme prospech z toho, že šéf bezpečnostnej rady štátu má najvyššiu možnú bezpečnostnú previerku a pritom kšeftuje s talianskou mafiou?
- To whom is it beneficial, Mr Premier, to sidestep the fact that the Italian mafia has an influence on the course of our country?
– How does the prime minister of the Slovak Republic benefit from sexy Trosková? And how do she and her people benefit from the Prime Minister?
– How does the victim's family benefit from the fact that the murder investigation is being conducted by a police chief whose brother-in-law wrote was once a subject of the journalist's investigations?
– How can we benefit from the fact that the head of the state security council has the highest possible security clearance and is scalping with the Italian mafia?
Some of Fico's close associates, like Maria Trošková, a former girlfriend of Italian mafia figure Antonino Vadala, have been temporarily suspended from their government posts until the conclusion of the investigation.
Blogger Peter Jarunek commented on the suspensions:
Trošková a Jasaň odstupujú.. Ale.. Len do vyšetrenia vraždy?? Veď oni majú dokázateľné vzťahy s ľuďmi dôvodne podozrivými z rozsiahlych trestných aktivít aj bez vraždy! … Ako mohol dostať Jasaň bezpečnostnú previerku na najvyšší možny bezpečnostný stupeň?? Ak ju dostal takýto človek, znamená to, že ten proces niekde zlyháva.
Trošková and Jasaň are resigning. But…just until investigation of the murder concludes? They have proven connections with people reasonably suspected of widespread criminal activities even without murder! …How could he get Jasaň the safety check to the highest possible security level? If it was given to such a person, it means that the process somewhere fails.
The official in charge of the investigation is police chief Tibor Gašpar.
Transparency International Slovensko reminded the public that in 2012, Ján Kuciak expressed a very unfavorable opinion about Gašpar's appointment:
Nominácia Tibora Gašpara na pozíciu prezidenta Policajného zboru je výsmech všetkým, ktorí o gorilie protesty čo i len zavadili, nieto ešte vymrzli a zničili si hlasivky na námestiach. „Kauza desaťročia” má na Slovensku príznačné vyznenie: Jeden z jej aktérov odteraz dozerá na poriadok v štáte. … A dnes Kaliňák … vymenoval za šéfa polície Tibora Gašpara. To je zase ten, čo mal odpratať spis do Nitry, čo mal mať prsty v skartovaní…jednoducho ten, čo ako šéf Úradu boja proti korupcii korupciu nie že neriešil, ale utajoval.
The nomination of Tibor Gašpar as President of the Police Force is a mockery for all those who had just minimal connection with the [anti-corruption movement called] Gorilla Protest, to say nothing of those who froze and destroyed their vocal cords in the squares. “The Decade Case” has in Slovakia a distinctive expression: One of the actors now cares about order in the state. … And today [Minister of Interior] Kaliňák… appointed Tibor Gašpar as police chief. He was supposed to be moving files to Nitra, but instead was shredding them…as the head of the Office for fighting corruption, he didn't solve, but instead hid the corruption.
Café Európa criticized police chief Gašpar's public statement in which he talked about cooperation of the police with journalists:
Polícia s novinármi nespolupracuje. Existuje jasnejší dôkaz tohto tvrdenia ako fakt, že zavraždený Ján Kuciak podal 7. septembra 2017 trestné oznámenie za vyhrážanie sa a do jeho smrti nemal tento prípad ani len konkrétneho vyšetrovateľa?
Skúsenosti novinárov s políciou sú skôr negatívne. Polícia často namiesto vyšetrovania káuz, na ktoré investigatívci upozornia, strávi množstvo času a energie vypočúvaním samotných novinárov, na ktorých osoby označené v ich článkoch podávajú žaloby za ohováranie.
The police do not cooperate with the journalists. Is there any clearer evidence of this claim than the fact that the murdered Ján Kuciak filed a criminal complaint on 7 September 2017 for threats, and until his death that case did not even have a specific investigator?
The experience of journalists with the police is rather negative. Police often spend a lot of time and energy investigating the journalists themselves, instead of investigating the causes for such harassment.
Alexandra Mravíková also related the experiences of journalists with the Slovak police:
Je nechutné, aby Gašpar ponúkal novinárom ochranu. Je to výsmech. Po tom, ako Kuciak podal trestné oznámenie a nikto ho neriešil. Iba idiot by zažiadal Slovenskú republiku o ochranu, keďže je už úplne jasné, že je to naopak hrozba.
It is disgusting for Gašpar to offer journalists protection. It's a mockery. After Kuciak filed a criminal complaint and nobody questioned him. Only an idiot would ask the Slovak Republic for protection, as it is already quite clear that this is a threat.
Former policeman Branislav Diďák also wrote:
… ako človeka a bývalého príslušníka Policajného zboru sa ma táto tragédia osobne veľmi dotkla.
… Čo robili elitné bezpečnostné zložky nášho štátu, keď na východnom Slovensku existuje takáto silná medzinárodná mafiánska skupina? … Môžeme si za to sami. Presne týmto prístupom, politickými nomináciami, známosťami a hraním sa na vlastnom piesočku.
…as a human being and a former member of the Police Force, this tragedy touched me personally.
…What did the elite security forces of our state do when there was such a strong international mafia group in Eastern Slovakia? …We alone are responsible for it. Exactly with this approach, political nominations, acquaintances, and playing on your own sand.
Martin Ďurko was also candid about his feelings:
Súdiac podľa minulých káuz na Slovensku a aj skúseností s podobnými udalosťami vo svete je veľmi málo pravdepodobné, žeby sme sa dočkali spravodlivosti. Avšak v záujme zachovania vlastného psychického zdravia zostávam optimistom …
Based on past experience in Slovakia, as well as experience with similar events in the world, it is very unlikely that we will see justice. However, in order to maintain my own mental health, I remain optimistic…
Pavel Kolesár urged his fellow citizens not to give in to apathy:
Nemôžeme to predsa teraz vzdať. Udialo sa toho toľko, že to predsa nemôžeme nechať na náhodu.
Ak by sme to vzdali, odišli, nechali to len tak, tak si uvedomia, že si tu, v našej krajine, môžu robiť čokoľvek. Nikdy by ich už nič nezastavilo a zo Slovenska by sa stalo malé Rusko. Preto je teraz dôležité nevzdať sa, podporiť tiché pochody, uctiť si pamiatku mladého, ale veľkého novinára a jeho priateľky a bojovať za našu zabudnutú krajinu. Politici robia len to, čo im ľudia dovolia. Myslím, že to čo sa udialo, by sme im nikdy nedovolili, a preto to treba ukázať.
We can not give up now. So much has happened, that we can't leave it to chance.
If we surrender, leave, just let it be, they will realize that here, in our country, they can do anything. Nothing would ever stop them and Slovakia would become a small Russia. Therefore, it is now important that we not capitulate, that we encourage silent marches, that we hold onto the memory of a young but great journalist and his girlfriend and to fight for our forgotten country. Politicians do just what people let them do. I think that what happened, we would never allow them, and that's why we have to show it.
Kristína Bartová echoed these sentiments:
Je pravda, že ani ja neviem nadiktovať presné riešenie, ako konečne naše Slovensko zmeniť a žiť v naozajstnom právnom štáte, ale viem, že musíme jasne vyjadriť, že tento stav už naďalej nebudeme tolerovať. … Myslím si, že Janko si to za svoju prácu pre nás zaslúži!
It is true that I too can not dictate the exact solution of how to finally change our country and live in a real country of law, but I know that we must clearly articulate that we will no longer tolerate this state… I think Janko deserves it, as all his work was for our common benefit!


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Sri Lanka Declares a State of Emergency Following Anti-Muslim Violence · Global Voices
Rezwan

Houses belonging to Muslim families allegedly burnt down by a Buddhist mob in Aluthgama, Sri Lanka in June 2014. Image via Flickr by Vikalpa|Groundviews|Maatram. CC BY 2.0
On Wednesday, March 7, 2018, the Sri Lankan government declared a nationwide state of emergency for 10 days to stop the communal violence between Buddhists and Muslims in central Sri Lanka and bring the perpetrators to justice:
#SriLanka forced to declare 10 day emergency following #AntiMuslimViolence #lka #Digana #Teldeniya https://t.co/KDrwtXhQql pic.twitter.com/iD4W6kq0Ib
— JDS (@JDSLanka) March 6, 2018
BBC reporter and producer Sinhala Azzam Ameen tweets:
Sri Lanka declares its first state of emergency in 7 years, Under the state of emergency, the authorities are able to arrest and detain suspects for long periods, and deploy forces where needed https://t.co/k2h6hJqzsY
— Azzam Ameen (@AzzamAmeen) March 6, 2018
The violence began on the night of Sunday, March 4 in several villages of the Kandy district in the Central Province of Sri Lanka, as Buddhist mobs attacked dozens of Muslim businesses, a few mosques, and houses.
The root of the violence lies in an altercation between three or four of allegedly drunk youths in a three-wheeler and Heepitiyegedara Kumarasinghe, a 41-year-old Sinhalese lorry driver, that took place on February 22 in the village of Teldeniya near the city of Kandy.
Reportedly, the altercation was due to a traffic incident and was not racially or ethnically motivated. Kumarasinghe and his assistant were beaten up by the group of youths and admitted to hospital. Police have so far arrested three suspects in connection with the crime. The suspects are all Muslim youth from Digana, Kandy.
Location of Kandy in Sri Lanka. Image via Wikimedia Commons by user NordNordWest,. CC BY-SA 3.0
On the night of Friday, March 2, Kumarasinghe succumbed to his injuries while undergoing treatment at Kandy General Hospital, which prompted local protests. Reportedly, Kumarasinghe's family was compensated and the matter was amicably settled between the local Muslim and Buddhist communities to relieve any tension between these groups.
However, violence erupted on Sunday night into Monday on March 5 in places like Teldeniya and the village of Digana in the Kandy district, with many Muslim shops and houses burned to the ground by radical Sinhalese Buddhist mobs.
Local schools remained closed in the wake of the violence. Local leaders say that mobs came in from other parts of the country to instigate the riot and police did not do enough. Tisaranee Gunasekara wrote on Groundviews:
If the anti-Muslim riot in Teldeniya was a spontaneous explosion of anger, it should have happened either on the day of the assault or on the day the victim died. But up to the evening of March 4th, Teldeniya didn’t explode.
On the evening of March 4th Bhikku (Monk) Galagoda-Atte Gnanasara (Secretary General of Bodu Bala Sena, a Sinhalese Buddhist nationalist organisation) visited the funeral house. A couple of hours later the first attacks began.
In Teldeniya village, social media pages rallied Sinhalese Buddhist mobs to assemble at 10am on March 5, 2018. From around 1am, the destruction of Muslim properties began.
Journalist Dharisha tweets:
Government condemns hate and misinformation campaigns carried out especially via social media, targeting the Muslim community in particular in another statement issued tonight #Digana
— dharisha (@tingilye) March 5, 2018
At least one death has been reported due to the riots. The body of 24-year-old Muslim youth Abdul Basith was pulled out of the rubbles as his home was destroyed by arson. Police arrested dozens of people connected to that incident. The police fired tear gas to disperse crowds at Teldeniya police station who gathered to appeal for those arrested to be freed. When they could not control the situation, the army had to be called in and a local curfew was imposed.
By March 7, a total of four mosques, 37 houses, 46 shops and dozens of vehicles were damaged or destroyed as a result of the riots in both Digana and other locations in the Kandy District. A group of Sinhalese Buddhist citizens and Buddhist clergy held a protest demanding the release of all Buddhist suspects arrested for their involvement in the riots.
“Four mosques, 37 houses, 46 shops and 35 vehicles damaged in Digana and Teldeniya area due to attacks,” Central Provincial Councillor Hidaayath Satthar #Digana pic.twitter.com/oQBZGjDlYp
— Azzam Ameen (@AzzamAmeen) March 6, 2018
This video shows some of the damage as a result of the violence in Teldeniya:
Muslims make up roughly 10 percent of Sri Lanka's population of about 21 million. 70 percent of the population adheres to Buddhism (predominantly from the Theravada school), while the rest of the population adheres to Hindu traditions. Ethnically, 75 percent of Sri Lankans are Sinhalese, about 10 percent are Sri Lankan Moors (Muslim, Tamil-speaking) and almost 15 percent are Tamils (Sri Lankan and Indian).
Distribution of Ethnic Groups in Sri Lanka according to the Census 2012. Image via Wikimedia Commons by user BishkekRocks. CC BY-SA 4.0
Muslims and Buddhists have been living peacefully side-by-side in Sri Lanka for decades. But tensions have risen between the two communities in recent years. In 2014, at least three Muslims were killed and more than 74 injured in sectarian violence in Aluthgama, a coastal town in the Kalutara District in the Western Province of Sri Lanka. The Buddhist hardline group Bodhu Bala Sena (BBS), played a leading and violent role in the anti-Muslim riots.
Last year a number of attacks on Muslims, including arson at Muslim-owned businesses and petrol-bomb attacks on mosques have been recorded in the country. In some cases, Buddhist hardliners targeted the Muslim community with accusations of forcing people to convert to Islam and vandalizing Buddhist archaeological sites. In November 2017, clashes between the two communities took place in the coastal town of Gintota in Galle State.
In early March, ethnically motivated violence was reported in Ampara in the Eastern Province. Many hardline Buddhist organizations connected to these recent instances of violence are supporters of former president Mahinda Rajapakse, whose political front Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (Sri Lanka Peoples’ Front) did well in the recent local government elections.
Creative director and consultant Aman Ashraff warns:
For 30 years #SriLanka you witnessed your streets run red with the blood of your children. Have you forgotten the loss? The fear? The pain? The suffering? Have you learned nothing? When will you see reason? When will you act? #StandAgainstRacism #OneNationOnePeople #lka pic.twitter.com/hJefq0d14G
— Aman Ashraff (@amanashraff) March 5, 2018
However, there is a heartening update on the situation in Dingana:
Despite many incidents during curfew a Muruthalawa resident say a Buddhist monk and young Sinhala boys spending the night at mosque to ensure its safety #SriLanka
— Azzam Ameen (@AzzamAmeen) March 6, 2018
Sri Lankan President Maithripala Sirisena has asked for an impartial and independent investigation into the incident. The Sri Lankan leader of the opposition R. Sampanthan mentioned that the anti-Muslim attacks were indicative of a sense of impunity among the perpetrators that they can get away with this.
It remains to be seen whether those instigating the riots are brought to justice.

author: Rezwan


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Ulises Padrón: “In [Cuban] Society, LGBTQI People and Groups are Becoming More Visible” · Global Voices
Sandra Abd'Allah-Alvarez Ramírez

“The debate is not whether people want to get married, but rather that people have the right to use that institution whenever they want. Nobody gets sick every day, but in Cuba, it's safe to say that a hospital will never leave you lying at the door for being black, lesbian, or poor. It’s about being covered and protected under the law.” Photo of activist Ulises Padrón Suárez, courtesy of Padrón.
Ulises Padrón Suárez is the young founder and coordinator of the Youth Network for Health and Sexual Rights of the National Center for Sexual Education (CENESEX) in Cuba. Before joining the institution, he participated in courses and workshops taught there, transforming him into a health advocate and seasoned activist. After seven years of activism, Global Voices (GV) is interested in hearing Suárez’ opinions about same-sex marriage which is still illegal in Cuba, yet becoming an increasingly more important issue in the country.
Global Voices (GV): I assume you are interested in there being a way for people of the same sex to legalize their relationship in Cuba; in your opinion, why should this possibility be considered?
Ulises Padrón Suárez (UPS): Unfortunately, public opinion in Cuba continues to be that marriage between people of the same sex/gender should go to a referendum before becoming law, as if this approach weren't crudely manipulated by the hegemonic and heterosexist consensus of the insular establishment (where you'll find not only the power elite, but also academics, journalists, among others). However, in our society, LGBTQIA [Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Queer, Intersex, Asexual] people and groups are becoming more visible and, of course, demands are gaining strength in the public sphere. Ignoring them or not giving them the attention and respect they deserve is to deny the full rights to citizens who find their social action limited.
Addressing human rights in Cuba has invoked a series of conflicts for organic legal knowledge and expression (which we are still far away from) between activists and government decision-makers. Accordingly, although the country recognizes, covers and protects an important set of rights (health, education, culture, employment), there are others that fall to the wayside in the current national and regional situation.
GV: Do you know of any case in Cuba or an anecdote in which people who, because they were not legally married, suffered some injustice?
UPS: Yes, couples, in which one of the two dies and the family of the deceased strips the survivor of all of their common assets because there are no regulations protecting against these situations.
GV: Do you think there should be a referendum to decide whether or not marriage should be legal in Cuba between people of the same sex/gender?
UPS: I don't think so, no. I believe that it should become a law directly, and an institutional infrastructure that secures and protects this and other rights should be built. Marriage legalization, legal unions, or whatever you want to call it must be non-discriminatory and broad enough so that all citizens can enjoy it.
GV: We know that in the proposal of the new Family Code, which has not yet been presented to the Cuban parliament, Equal Marriage is not included but “consensual union” is proposed. What is your opinion about that?
UPS: It's discriminatory! Above all, if we understand that our State has been secular since 1901 and therefore, all of us should have the same institution to formalize our union, that is, marriage — without adjectives, without qualifications.
Marriage is also not the panacea and, as a heteronormative institution, it has been in crisis for centuries. All of us will have to think of alternative institutions that recognize polyamory, for example, or make asset protection more humane in the face of conflicts due to death, family or the State.
GV: Commentator Ernesto Martínez Hernández stated in the article “We Have to Stop Looking at Ourselves in a Segmented Way,” by journalist Lisandra Fariñas, published in the newspaper Granma (an entity of the Communist Party of Cuba) writes: ‘Allowing gay marriage is disrespectful to society, just like allowing legal contracts between people and animals is not normal. It should not be legalized because it is not natural. [Correction] There are couples who live their whole lives without getting married [why] fighting to legalize something that is not normal by nature? How would you respond to this commentator?
UPS: I couldn't find the article, I imagine they took it down for not being “politically correct.” But his disrespect and ignorance are egregious.
What’s normal has been imposed by men (historically speaking), therefore, it can change, like in the middle ages when it shifted from the Ptolemaic paradigm to the Copernican. It has to do with where you align and the alliances you make. Otherwise, you cannot have a conversation with that man. I really hope he’s not zoophilic.
The debate is not whether people want to get married, but rather that people have the right to use that institution whenever they want. Nobody gets sick every day, but in Cuba, it's safe to say that a hospital will never leave you lying at the door for being black, lesbian, or poor. It’s about being covered and protected under the law.

author: Sandra Abd'Allah-Alvarez Ramírez


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WordFrames: Are ‘Teens’ Getting a Bad Rap? · Global Voices
Andrea Chong Bras

Photo by StockSnap. CC0 Creative Commons.
The WordFrames series explores media conversations around related word groups, comparing and contrasting their use and possible meaning in public discussions.
What do you think when you hear the word teen? For many people, teens are a complete mystery. It is an age group that is often talked about and frequently misunderstood, especially by those of us who are no longer teens.
As part of our work at NewsFrames, we look at the ways certain groups are represented by the media and what, if any, effects that representation might have on the way we think about and relate to them.
In this first story in our new WordFrames series, we explore media conversations about teens, and examine whether or not the coverage around the topics varied in conjunction with other terms like adolescent and youth. How is the media framing issues around young people and does that framing have any effect on the way we think about teenagers?
What is Media Cloud?
Media Cloud is an open source platform developed by the MIT Center for Civic Media and the Harvard Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society. Media Cloud is designed to aggregate, analyze, deliver and visualize information while answering complex quantitative and qualitative questions about the content of online media.
To begin our exploration, we used the Media Cloud data analysis tool (see box) to search for topics surrounding the family of words beginning with “teen” (e.g. teens, teenagers) in global English-language news sources from July 2017 to February 2018. Media Cloud allows us to explore conversations around search topics and generate word clouds that visualize the relationship between our core search topic and other keywords in the media ecosystem. As we looked through the data around teen and the stories associated with it, we began to notice an interesting pattern.
Word Clouds help us understand how the conversation around a topic may be framed. They are made up of keywords that appear more frequently alongside specific search terms. The larger the word in a Word Cloud, the more often it appears in the Media Cloud database sample of news reports, blogs, and other media.
This word cloud represents topics that appear alongside the term “teen” in order of prevalence in a sampling of stories from the Media Cloud of ABYZ Global English Sources for “teen” from July 2017- February 2018 (original query). [View Larger Image]
As you can see in the word cloud above, our search for teens returned a number of related terms that have negative connotations, such as rape, assault, crime and suicide. We also saw articles and results about bullying, sexual abuse and topics related to death:
Our search also captured a number of events that occurred over the past year, including Roy Moore, a Senate candidate in Alabama who was accused of sexually assaulting numerous teen girls. The related topics here seem to cast teens as both victims of violence or danger and as perpetrators of violence, conveying a sense of both fear of teens and fear for teens.
Are the negative connotations around the term “teen” anomalies, or a part of a larger pattern? Are teens actually at a higher risk for violence and crime or do we just think they are?
We then decided to look at other terms referring to teens to see if any other trends appeared. And, in fact, our exploration of the term youth revealed some more positive, or at least neutral, topics, including sports and articles about civic societies and education.
This frequency pulse shows us how many sentences match our query every day as in the graph above. It also provides an overall idea of the number of times a term appeared within our time period, which in our case was: teen*: 203115 stories, youth: 187716 stories, adolescent: 7924 stories found. (View larger image)
The results for youth include stories about initiatives targeted to youth or spearheaded by young people, such as this article about Nigerian beauty queen Chioma Obiadi, urging then Acting President Osinbajo to create cultural programs directed at the youth:
Of course, the term teen refers to a specific age range, whereas what qualifies as youth is more flexible and depends on culture. This difference makes any strict comparison of the word “teen” and “youth” difficult. Nonetheless, we noted that many overlapping keywords in our search of the terms “teen” and “youth” included negative keywords such as “abuse,” “crime,” “violence,” and “addiction.”
Our comparison of the terms teen and adolescent reveals some additional trends. The term adolescent includes more medical results, such as HIV, obesity, and psychiatry.
This word cloud represents topics that appear alongside the term “teen” and “youth” in order of prevalence in a sampling of stories from the Media Cloud of ABYZ Global English Sources for “teen” and “youth” from July 2017- February 2018 (original query). The word cloud labeled “both” is a compilation of keywords that appear in both “teen” and “youth” term searches. [View Larger Image]
Articles associated with adolescent often took on a more medical or academic tone such as this post about adolescent health education in India:
This word cloud represents topics that appear alongside mentions of “teen” and “adolescent” in order of prevalence in a sampling of stories in the Media Cloud of ABYZ Global English Sources collection from July 2017- February 2018 (original query). The word cloud labeled “both” is a compilation of the overlapping dominant keywords from both searches.[View Larger Image]
The results for adolescent often seemed more neutral or scientific in nature compared to the generally more negative results surrounding the term teen.
However, when the search terms overlap, results for both terms include a number of negative keywords such as abuse, suicide and violence. Nonetheless, the word teen itself, and the specific age range it generally implies continued to be a focal point for negative content, especially in contrast to the terms youth and adolescent.
To definitively say that teens are portrayed negatively in the media still remains a question. But our preliminary exploration suggests that certain themes are common to English-language coverage involving teens. In fact, a recent study helped US news writers reflect on the misconceptions around US Teens:
This study in Child Development, which seemed to counter some of the common themes (and fears) surrounding teens, intriguingly still ended up taking on a negative cast in some media outlets. Now, instead of fretting over teenage sexual behavior or drinking, stories like the one below fretted over how teens weren't “adult” enough in their behavior and were failing to show independence:
And even though the brunt of the negative connotations appeared in our search around teen, the queries of both youth and adolescent still seemed to include significant themes of violence, victims and crime.
Our exploration really just left us with additional questions, ones that cannot be answered with this data alone. Questions such as: Where were all the stories about the positive accomplishments coming from teens? What is the trend of positive reporting on teens and young people, in general? And what are some of the driving motivations behind the stories about teens we are currently seeing? Is it fear of, or for young people? Are there underlying social anxieties that the media often projects onto young people?
It is interesting to think about how the terms themselves might dictate how we perceive this age group. As an alternate perspective, we would like to leave you with some Global Voices articles that are positive about teens, youth, and adolescents for you to explore on your own:

author: Andrea Chong Bras


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A Struggle for Dignity: Women’s Rights in Afghanistan · Global Voices
Rustam Ali Seerat

Flickr image. Women’s photojournalism course in Farah City, Afghanistan A young Farahi girl stares into the camera at a local returnee and refugee village, Feb. 9.
As the #MeToo movement triggered heated debates about sexual harassment around the world, feminists in Afghanistan were largely confined to watching its impact from the sidelines. Gains for women's rights in the country in recent years have been incremental and accompanied by regular setbacks.
As such, an indigenous #MeToo-type moment looks a long way off in a republic where deeply ingrained social conservatism and political power act to reinforce each other.
Towards the end of last year, for the first time, three women won seats at the Maidan Wardak provincial council, in what was trumpeted as an important gain for women in local elections. At the beginning of the year, the national legislature had thrilled many civic campaigners by passing an anti-harassment law. But in December the same body rejected the sole woman candidate and accepted all 11 men after President Ashraf Ghani drew up nominations for 12 cabinet ministers.
One of the most tragic stories of female suffering last year came a month before that in November when Zahra Khawari a young student at Kabul University, committed suicide after her research thesis was rejected by her supervisor multiple times for no discernible reason. Other students in the dormitory confirmed that she had faced both racial and gender discrimination during her studies.
Gender struggles are sometimes manifested in rows over popular culture, which receive extra resonance.
On August 20, 2017, clergymen organised a rally to stop pop singer Aryana Sayeed from conducting a concert in the capital and accused her of corrupting Afghan youth. Their bid, which eventually failed, was due to Sayeed's appearance and dress, which they considered out of sink with national and religious culture.
But it was yet another incident that perhaps best highlighted the plight of women in the country. In  November 2017 a video entered the public domain showing a lieutenant in the Afghanistan National Army sexually exploiting a young female said to be his subordinate.
In response, large swathes of Afghan social media turned to victim-blaming, calling the young woman immoral and accusing her of seeking a promotion through sex. A more left-field theory that gained traction on social media even posited that she was working on behalf of one of the lieutenant's political rivals.
قرار ویدیو های منتشر شده از دگروال لغمانی و دیگر دگروالها در فضای مجازی، احتمالاً مفعول یک نفر است و اگر چنین باشد دختر به دستور کسی یا به رضایت خود با هرکی دلش خواسته است رابطه ایجاد کرده است نه بخاطر وظیفه و مجبوریت.
Posted by Hussain Warasi on Tuesday, October 31, 2017
Based on the leaked videos of lieutenant Laghmani and other lieutenants on social media, the object (receiver) is a real piece of work. If it is so, it seems the girl is recruited by someone else or she has had these relations of her own will, not because of being forced or in exchange for promotion.
Conventional wisdom suggests that the rule of the Taliban from 1996 to 2001 represented a huge step backwards for women's rights and their overthrow a huge step forward.
But while Afghanistan's post-Taliban government did much to please its Western backers — 25% of parliament sets were allocated for women in the country's constitution, for instance — public institutions and especially the security institutions, remain systemically women-unfriendly.
Last September, for instance, the U.S. Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) reported that some widows of Afghan National Army soldiers killed in the battle have been forced to perform sexual favours for officials before they could obtain the official pension benefits slated for the bereaved families. This report puts the leaked video featuring Laghmani and the young woman into context.
President Ghani was expected to push harder for women's rights, partly because of the hoped-for influence of his foreign-educated spouse, Rulha Ghani, who regularly speaks on the topic.
Nevertheless, in a speech aiming to shame political opponents last year, Ghani controversially said that “whoever claims that there are people in the government who cooperate with ISIS should come up and prove it, otherwise he must wear a Chadur [female veil].”
…اشرف غنی واضح به این نوع پوشش اهانت کرد. او به زنان سراسر مملکت توهین نمود. به نفع اوست و به نفع حکومت اوست که از گفته ی خود معذرت بخواهد. این حد اقل کاری است که می تواند.
Ashraf Ghani clearly insulted women's veil. He insulted all the women accross the country. Apologizing to women benefits him and his government. This is the least he could do.
Posted by جعفر رسولی Jafar Rasouly on Saturday, December 2, 2017.
His spokesman soon half-apologised for the comment on his Facebook page, maintaining the remark that sparked a backlash from progressives had been misinterpreted.
But with Ghani far from the worst chauvinist among the big hitters of Afghan politics, this apparent slip of the tongue seems sadly symbolic of the long-term struggle women in the country face. The journey to claim their rights and dignity is a long one.

author: Rustam Ali Seerat