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On Anniversary of Nagasaki Bombing, Japanese Government Criticized For Refusing to Sign Ban on Nuclear Weapons · Global Voices
Nevin Thompson

Caption: “On the anniversary of the bombing of Nagasaki, calls on Japan to sign the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons—72 years since bombing, calls on government to act.” Subtitle: “We call on the countries that possess nuclear weapons and the countries under the nuclear umbrella (to sign the treaty banning nuclear weapons,” Nagasaki Mayor Taue Tomihisa. Screencap from ANN YouTube channel.
Last week the Japanese government was criticized at the annual memorial ceremony commemorating the August 9, 1945 atomic bombing of Nagasaki, while Prime Minister Abe Shinzo was later chastised by a survivor of the attack. On the seventy-second anniversary of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and as the United States and North Korea are threatening each other with nuclear attacks, the chief complaint in Nagasaki last week was that the Japanese government has refused to endorse the new Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.
On August 9, 1945, an American B-29 bomber dropped an atomic bomb on Nagasaki, just north of the city center. At least 75,000 people died in the blast, and many more were injured.
72年前の今日。1945年8月9日11時02分，長崎原爆投下。長崎市の人口24万人（推定）のうち約7万4千人が死亡，約36%の建物が全焼・全半壊した。動画は16mmカラーフィルムで撮影されたもの。 pic.twitter.com/uPzF5bFOnc
— 渡邉英徳 (@hwtnv) August 8, 2017
On this day 72 years ago. At 11:02AM, August 9, 1945, an atomic bomb was dropped on Nagasaki. Out of a population of 240,000 people, 74,000 people were killed, approximately 36% of structures were incinerated or partially destroyed. Footage is from 16mm color film.
To commemorate the bombings, each year on August 9 several thousand people, including foreign dignitaries, Japanese politicians like the prime minister and hibakusha–the dwindling number of survivors of the atomic  bombing–gather in the large “peace park” in Nagasaki located on a hill overlooking the epicenter of the bombing in the suburb of Urakami.
The ceremony is typically broadcast live on television. Hibakusha survivors are asked to speak, and politicians, including the Prime Minister of Japan, lay wreaths and make their own remarks on the bombing. The mayor of the city also leads the ceremony, and makes a speech, delivering Nagasaki's annual Peace Declaration.
This year, with Prime Minister Abe Shinzo sitting in attendance, the mayor of Nagasaki Taue Tomihisa used the 2017 Nagasaki Peace Declaration to directly criticize the Japanese government for essentially turning its back on the principle of nuclear disarmament:
Despite the fact that the Japanese government has clearly stated that it will exercise leadership in aiming for a world free of nuclear weapons, and play a role as a bridge between the nuclear-armed states and the non-nuclear-armed states, its stance of not even participating in the diplomatic negotiations for the Nuclear Prohibition Treaty is quite incomprehensible to those of us living in the cities that suffered atomic bombings.
While the English-language version of the 2017 Peace Declaration can be read here, Taue's statement is based on Japan's refusal to acknowledge the United Nations Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. Signed in July 2017, the treaty has been described as the first legally binding treaty to abolish nuclear weapons. The treaty was endorsed by 122 UN-member countries, although countries that wield nuclear weapons, as well as many countries that either come under their protection or host weapons, such as Japan, boycotted the negotiations.
Vote on the final draft of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, 7 July 2017. Blue = Yes, Red = No, Black = Abstain, Grey = Did Not Vote. Image by Wikipedia user NordNordWest. License: CC BY-SA 3.0 de.
The main criticism against the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons is that it is unrealistic. Writing for the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, Masako Toki, a research associate in the Nonproliferation Education Program at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies notes:
Opponents of the Nuclear Ban Treaty—including nuclear-armed states and allies under their extended nuclear deterrence—not only boycotted the negotiations (with the exception of the Netherlands) but also criticized the treaty for deepening the division between nuclear weapons states and non-nuclear weapons states. These nuclear-armed states—especially the United States, the United Kingdom, and France—indicated no willingness to join the treaty. In fact, in their joint statement they reiterated their position that they do not “intend to sign, ratify or ever become party to it.” They asserted that the Ban Treaty “clearly disregards the realities of the international security environment.”
While Nagasaki Mayor Taue Tomohisa was expressing his incomprehension that Japan, the only country to ever have suffered nuclear attacks, would ignore an international agreement that would formally work towards abolishing those weapons, Japan has still called for a stronger Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty to deal with what the country considers an emerging North Korean threat.
Besides the city's mayor, some attendees at the August 9 memorial ceremony in Nagasaki were also confused and even angered by the Abe government's refusal to sign the 2017 ban on nuclear weapons. In one exchange that went viral over social media, a hibakusha survivor of the bombings berated Prime Minister Abe in a face-to-face meeting, asking “Whose country are you leader of anyway?”:
【安倍晋三「あなたは　どこの国の総理」被爆者団体・代表ついに怒る！】
「ようやく祈りが実り、核兵器禁止条約！」
唯一の被爆国でありながら
安倍ときたら先日は広島で、今日は長崎で 口を開けば、さも得意げに
「核兵器国が参加してないから、核兵器禁止条約には参加しない」そりゃ怒るわ pic.twitter.com/yfZw4GoT5q
— 水 (@yzjps) August 9, 2017
“Whose country are you leader of anyway?” — representative of hibakusha group lashes out at Abe Shinzo
“Finally, our prayers are bearing fruit! The ban on nuclear weapons was passed!”
Although we are the sole country to ever have been attacked by nuclear weapons, listening to Abe in Hiroshima yesterday and in Nagasaki today, when he opened his mouth he was very skillful with his words:
“Since we as a country do not possess nuclear weapons, we as a country will not ratify the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.”
That's enough to make anyone mad.
Others observed that Prime Minister Abe, in his remarks, did not really understand the significance of the annual memorial ceremony in Nagasaki:
長崎原爆投下の日。
平和祈念式典で、長崎市長が安倍首相を前にし７月に国連で採択された核兵器禁止条約に参加しなかった政府の姿勢を厳しく避難した。
一方、安倍首相は核兵器禁止条約の事はスルー。なのに「核のない恒久平和を誓う」と発言。
不参加なのに？
テレビの前で家族揃って首を傾げた。 pic.twitter.com/dnay7oSoWx
— 菱山南帆子 (@nahokohishiyama) August 9, 2017
The anniversary of the bombing of Nagasaki. At the memorial ceremony, the mayor of Nagasaki, speaking before Prime Minister Abe, strongly (criticized) the Japanese government for its refusal to ratify the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. Prime Minister Abe ignored the Treaty.
Despite that, in his address to the Nagasaki memorial, Prime Minister Abe declared “we vow to create an everlasting peace without nuclear weapons.”
On television you could see the families (of the hibakusha) assembled together all tilting their heads in puzzlement.

author: Nevin Thompson


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Tata Genaro Ramírez: The Farmer Who Revived the Nawat Language in El Salvador · Global Voices
Melissa Vida

Genaro Ramírez in Santo Domingo de Guzmán, El Salvador. Used with permission from Colectivo Tzunhejekat.
The Nawat speaking community in El Salvador lamented the passing of Genaro Ramírez, the Salvadorean who dreamed that the Nawat would still live. He was the first teacher of the language, but not the last, because through his hard work, Ramírez left an important legacy in the revitalization of his ancestral language.
The Nawat Pipil is only spoken by 200 Salvadoreans, according to UNESCO.  The vast majority of them live in a small village called Santo Domingo de Guzmán, or Witzapan, in Nawat.  This is the hometown of Genaro where he worked for the regrowth of the language for more than 40 years. He gave free classes every day of the week, from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.  He had a mission. In the words of Genaro himself:
(…) entendí qué era aquel hoyo que por tanto tiempo sentía en el pecho. Así que tiré mis fierros ahí en la milpa porque sentí que ya no podía seguir así, y […] me dije: ‘Yo debo enseñar el náhuat aunque me muera de hambre
(…) I understood what that hole was that I had felt for so long in my chest.  So I threw my tools in the cornfield because I felt that I could not go on like this, and I […] said to myself: ‘I must teach Nawat even if I’ll starve to death’
Before Genaro, there weren’t any Nawat teachers. The indigenous Salvadorean community had entered a long silence since 1932, when 30,000 people, mostly Nawat pipiles, were executed by the army for having rebelled over the lack of food during the popular revolt in the country in 1932. The uprising was also a peasant revolt and the events, commonly remembered by its perpetrators as La Matanza (“The killing”), are the focus of many debates today.
Global Voices spoke with Werner Hernández, member of the Tzunhejekat Collective, a project that seeks to spread the Nawat language through different means and to make its native speakers aware.  Hernández, a student and close friend of Genaro Ramírez, comments on the situation of the Salvadoran indigenous community:
“[la comunidad indígena] se quedó afectada, se escondió. Ellos cambiaron sus apellidos, su vestimenta… su idioma. Todos todavía hablaban [el náhuat] en voz baja cuando surgió Genaro, el primer profesor de náhuat. Sabía que había nacido para eso.”
[The indigenous community] was affected, it hid.  They changed their surnames, the way they dressed…their language.  Everyone was still speaking [Nawat] quietly when Genaro rose up, the first Nawat teacher. He knew that he was born for that.
Hernández also explained that the first Nawat teacher not only succeeded in redeeming the pride of the indigenous Pipil people for their identity, culture, and language, but also collapsed the walls between the Pipil community and the rest of the country. He built bridges with the outside. It was in this way that other Salvadorans, like Werner, could discover a hidden part of their identity:
“Me ha abierto las puertas a una experiencia maravillosa de conectarme, conmigo mismo, como salvadoreño. Así decimos en nuestro colectivo [Tzunhejekat]: el salvadoreño que habla el náhuat mira el país en tres dimensiones, porque podemos entender nuestra realidad más allá de las palabras.”
It has opened the door to a wonderful experience connecting me, with myself, as a Salvadoran. Thus, as we say in our [Tzunhejekat] collective: the Salvadoran who speaks Nawat sees the country in three dimensions, because we can understand our reality beyond words.
Werner also recalls how the Nawat language is also a gateway to an extensive cultural universe: “There are certain nuances and colors that with only speaking the language, they understand each other.  It’s not the same to go see a ballet performance than reading a review of the show [that's how] reading a translated poem [would be like].” This reflection is also incorporated into debate in the country on the need to invest resources in the ancestral language. “Value and [economic] price is not the same,” Werner adds.
Genaro inspired a new generation of Nawat teachers, he launched the enthusiasm for the documentation of the language, broke taboos, and made the language known in all the political levels of the country:
Paula López y el “Tata” don Genaro Ramírez cantaron en Náhuatl para el Pdte @sanchezceren en #CasaAbierta. pic.twitter.com/l584oWxbT0
— Casa Presidencial (@presidencia_sv) December 6, 2014
Paula López [a known poet who writes in the nawat language] and “Tata” Genaro Ramírez sang in Nawat for President @sanchezceren in #CasaAbierta.
Today, because of the enthusiasm it generated, there are digital initiatives that help spread the language and protect the indigenous Pipil culture. There are collectives, such as Tzunhejekat and the Nawat Carriers Initiative, linguistic websites such as Tushik and its Facebook group, Nawat blogs such as Chachalaka, and videos uploaded on YouTube:
Genaro Ramírez left a favorable ground for the survival of the Nawat language. “The loss of Don Genaro marks our commitment to revitalize the language,” concludes Werner Hernández.

source: news-globalvoices

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

author: Melissa Vida


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A Viral Rap Battle Has Everyone in Russia—Including Business Journalists and Politicians—Talking · Global Voices
Alexey Kovalev

Record-breaking Russian rap battle: Oxxxymiron VS Gnoyny. Screenshot of video uploaded by versusbattleru to YouTube.
Early on Monday, August 14, readers of Vedomosti, one of Russia’s leading business publications and one of the few remaining independent media in the country, saw a headline that elicited many confused reactions from its loyal audience.
“Battle Between Oxxxymiron And Gnoyny Attracts 2.7 Million Views Overnight,” the article's headline said, looking quite out of place in a publication that normally covers initial public offerings, mergers and hostile takeovers by state-owned conglomerates.
The event in question was an hour-long YouTube video of a highly anticipated rap battle between two prominent Russian hip-hop performers: Oxxxymiron, whose real name is Miron Fyodorov, and Gnoyny, whose artistic handle translates to “The Festering One” and who also is also known by the monicker Slava KPSS (a play on the diminutive form of popular Russian names like Vyacheslav and the Soviet-era slogan “Glory to the Communist Party of the Soviet Union”). Both contestants exchanged colorful poetic barbs in a smoke-filled bar, with Gnoyny declared the winner by the judges.
Even for native Russian speakers, the hour-long verbal ping-pong is difficult to understand in full, as a most of it deals with obscure subculture references, as well as in-jokes and insults recognizable only to someone fully versed in contemporary Russian hip-hop. For example, around the 15:33 mark Gnoyny delivers a scathing, rhymed review of Oxxxymiron's latest full-length concept album “Gorgorod,” finally released after a four-year hiatus:
Поговорим о твоём альбоме, разберём с хладнокровием Лаврентия Берии. Ты плохо учился в своём Гриффиндоре, если русские что и умеют, так это разваливать империи! Все ждали четыре года, он как мог нагнетал интригу, и всё, что ему пришло в голову — записать аудиокнигу! Причём банальную антиутопию, такой уровень дискурса больше подходит Джамалу и Лоику! С сюжетом, что по силам каждой недалёкой педовке! Твой рэп — дешёвая литература в мягкой обложке! Это набор самых скучных клише, которые существовали в истории! Оригинальный сюжет — трагическая любовь посреди антиутопии! Блять, такого же ни у кого не было, да? Ни у Оруэлла, ни у Замятина, это попсовый мотив, который заебал уже окончательно!
Let’s talk about your album, let’s dissect it with the cold-blooded composure worthy of Lavrenty Beria [Joseph Stalin’s chief of secret police]. You were a bad student at your Gryffindor [a reference from the “Harry Potter” book series] — if Russians have ever been good at anything, it’s tearing down empires! Everyone waited for years, he was building up suspense — and the best he could come up with was an audio book! And a banal one at that, a dystopian novel, such level of discourse better befits Jamal and Loic [rival hip-hop performers]! With a plot that looks like it's been put together by a dim-witted hustler! Your rap is pulp literature at best! It’s a collection of the most tired cliches in history! Oh, it’s such an original plot, look at it — a tragic love story in a dystopian setting! Fuck me, I’m sure no one yet has come up with anything of the sort, right? Not [Russian writer Yevgeny] Zamyatin, not [English writer George] Orwell! It’s a pop motif that’s just pissing everyone the fuck off!
Soon, Vedomosti’s news brief was picked up by many other outlets, including state-owned news agencies like RIA Novosti. At the time of writing RIA Novosti dedicated at least 12 separate articles to the battle, from incremental updates on the number of YouTube views to sympathetic analysis and commentary from music experts.
As the YouTube clip of the battle was accumulating more views — almost 12 million as of August 15 — it attracted unprecedented attention from general interest Russian media, both state-owned and independent. The Interfax news agency reported that the Oxxxymiron-Gnoyny battle set an absolute record for coverage of such a niche subject: more than 800 articles in a single day across the whole spectrum of Russian news outlets.
Many on Russian social media pointed to the contrast between the “serious” nature of news outlets like specialized business publications and state newswires and the “lowly” subject of reporting. Reporters and editors argued on Twitter whether a rap battle was a topic for “proper” news outlets to cover, or whether such incremental updates were indeed newsworthy.
А про пять миллионов будет новость? А про шесть? https://t.co/1uOApvirK4
— I.K. (@Vorewig) 14 августа 2017 г.
Will there be a news update about 5 million views? What about 6 million?
Professional reviews of the rap battle appeared in publications like Kommersant, post-Soviet Russia’s oldest business newspaper, and Republic.ru, another prominent independent business and general interest news outlet. Reviews have been mostly positive, highlighting the fact that both contestants used complex, multi-layered allusions to classic Russian poetry and the affair wasn't just an exchange of profanities between two people with bizarre nicknames, as many have complained. Yevgeniya Albats, the veteran editor of a prominent opposition magazine The New Times, complained in a Facebook post about the distasteful monickers of the contestants:
Что это за человек, который выбирает себе кликуху “Гнойный” ? И почему 7 млн интересуются высказываниями человека, который сам себя обозначил столь мерзким определением?
What kind of a person chooses ‘The Festering One’ for a nickname and why would 7 million people be interested in anything from someone with such a disgusting self-designation?
The battle even attracted some high-profile political attention. Russian opposition leader Alexey Navalny praised the battle in a blog post on his website:
Получил большое удовольствие и больше всего от мысли, что русская культура жива и развивается. […] Разве это не прекрасно? Ну да, мат. Ну да, довольно часто весьма низкопробный юмор. Тем не менее, всё равно это конкурс русских поэтов. […] В любом случае, это в сто раз больше культура, чем комедийные и песенные шоу на федеральных каналах телевидения.
I did enjoy the fact that Russian culture is alive and thriving. […] Isn’t that just beautiful? Yes, there’s a lot of profanity and below-the-belt jokes. But that’s what Russian poetry competitions look like. […] In any case, that’s 100 times more cultural than any comedy show or song contest you see on state television.
State officials also chimed in. Gennady Onischenko, formerly the head of the state consumer watchdog Rospotrebnadzor and now a parliament member for the ruling party, complained about the same aspects of the rap battle that Navalny praised. In a radio interview on August 14, Onischenko said:
Убогий язык, законы русской разговорной речи, культуры там даже и близко не ночевали.Интернет сегодня отражает ту убогость духовную, которая есть в нашем обществе, раз это находит такой широкий отклик.
[In this video clip] the speech is stilted, it has very little to do with the laws of our language and culture. Today’s internet lays bare the moral poverty in our society if [these videos] are in such demand.
Onischenko — infamous for his constant demands to ban or outlaw aspects of modern life, food products or gadgets as immoral or unwholesome — then went as far as demanding to reprimand the outlets which had reported on the battle.
Social media users quickly responded to Onischenko’s statements with ridicule:
В Думе критикуют баттл Оксимирона и Гнойного. Законы русской разговорной речи депутатов ебут, а плохая жизнь русских людей депутатов не ебёт pic.twitter.com/Vo8bE41of7
— Сталингулаг (@StalinGulag) 14 августа 2017 г.
Duma criticizes the Oxxxymiron vs Gnoyny battle. So parliament members do give a damn about laws of Russian language, but not about Russians’ wretched life.
Rap battles are an increasingly popular phenomenon on Russian YouTube, with one of the earlier battles involving Oxxymiron having so far generated an unprecedented 38 million views. Independent publication The Bell offers an explanation as to why the news was picked up by business publications: rap battles are serious business, with ad contracts from major clients like Tinkoff Bank and BMW potentially bringing in up to 5 million rubles ($83,480) to the organizers of Oxxxymiron vs Gnoyny alone.

author: Alexey Kovalev


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‘Dagdag Gastos’ Calculator Debunks Philippine Government Claim That Tax Reform Will Benefit the Poor · Global Voices
Karlo Mongaya

Protests against the Philippine government's tax reform measure. Photo Credits: Bulatlat.com. Used with permission.
The Computer Professionals’ Union (CPU) has launched a website that aims to inform Filipino taxpayers about the additional expenses they will have to pay based on the proposed new taxes of the Philippine government.
While the government of President Rodrigo Duterte has touted the proposed tax reform measure as a boon to the poor, who would supposedly benefit from the changes in the income tax rates, various groups have opposed the measure for imposing higher taxes on essential consumer items that would affect the poor.
If approved, the reform will mean a ₱6 (US$0.12) per liter additional excise tax on petroleum products beginning January 2018. This will come on top of the 12 percent value-added tax already being collected from petroleum products. Sugar-sweetened beverages will have a ₱10 (US$0.2) per liter excise tax. Apartments, houses, and other properties rented out at ₱10,000 (US$200) a month and lower will also be levied taxes.
CPU’s Dagdag Gastos (Additional Expense) Calculator is a modification of the online tax calculator released by the Department of Finance early this year to popularize the government's tax reform measure. CPU explains their objective in launching the website:
We hope that with the Dagdag Gastos Calculator, more Filipinos will see that the promised relief offered by the tax reform is effectively narrowed down by DOF’s insistence on value-added tax (VAT) and excise taxes that impacts everyone regardless of income. Ultimately, more Filipino families will have to shoulder added expenses to their already gravely inadequate incomes.
Like the Department of Finance’s tax calculator, CPU’s Dagdag Gastos Calculator asks users about their taxpayer profile such as marital status, monthly salary, employer type, and number of dependents to determine one’s income tax.
But the similarity ends here. CPU's calculator also asks for one’s monthly expenses in terms of food, house rental, and utilities to calculate the additional household expenses resulting from the imposition of new taxes.
Let's look at an example. If a poor head of household with four dependents in the Philippines earning a monthly income of ₱5,000 ($100) uses the Department of Finance tax calculator, their results will show that they are not affected by the tax reform package at all. They are not levied any income tax under the current tax scheme and will still not be burdened with any under the new scheme.
Now: ₱0.00 will be deducted from you. Under the tax reform: you will give ₱0.00 for the public!
The Department of Finance tax calculator shows poor people — as defined by government think tank Philippine Institute for Development Studies (PIDS) — to be the least affected by the tax reform. According to the government institute, the poor are those who live on less than the official poverty threshold of ₱7,890 (US$157.8) per month or ₱263 (US$5.26) a day.
However, this doesn't take into account the added burden that additional taxes would impose on those living below the poverty line. According to the government’s 2015 Family Income and Expenditure Survey (FIES), families with an annual income of ₱60,000-99,999 (US$1,200-1,999) spends 58.8 percent of their income on food, 9.6 percent on house rental, 7.6 percent water, electricity, gas, and other fuels, and 3.9 percent on transportation.
Using these estimates with the Dagdag Gastos calculator, we see that a poor family with a ₱5,000 ($100) monthly income would actually pay an additional ₱135.30 (US$2.70) expenses from the new taxes on top of the ₱3,995 (US$79.90) total expenses before the new taxes are imposed.
Your current expenses in home rental, food, LPG [gas], transportation, and utilities may increase!
Previous amount: ₱3,995.00 (US$79.90)
Amount due to the tax reform: ₱4,130.30 (US$82.60)
Overall additional expenses: ₱135.30* (US$2.70)
*This is from:
The tax reform also includes the removal of most VAT exemptions and additional taxes on new vehicles and petroleum products.
A hypothetical middle-income family with four dependents earning ₱40,000 (US$800) a month is shown in the Department of Finance tax calculator to have drastically decreased expenses with cuts in their income taxes. With the implementation of Duterte's tax reforms, income taxes would be reduced by P1,944.06 (US$38.88)  from the current ₱5,831.03 (US$116.6) to only ₱3,886.97 (US$77.74).
Because you have saved ₱1,944.06 (US$38.88) you can do the following:
Go to the spa and relax!
Go out of town with friends and family!
Save for your insurance!
But like the previous examples, the Department of Finance tax calculator does not show the additional expenses entailed by the new taxes. According to the 2015 FIES, families with an annual income of over ₱250,000 (US$5,000) would spend 35.3 percent of their total income on food, 13.2 percent on house rental, 7.9 percent on water, electricity, gas, and other fuels, and 6.9 percent on transportation.
Using these estimates with the Dagdag Gastos calculator shows that a middle-income family with a ₱40,000 (US$800) income would be slapped with an additional ₱1,091.56 (US$21.80) in expenses from new taxes on top of the ₱25,320 (US$506.40) in total expenses before the new taxes are imposed. PIDS define middle-income families as those living between four to 10 times the poverty line: ₱31,560 (US$631.20) to ₱78,900 (US$1,578) per month or ₱1,052 (US$21) to ₱2,630 (US$52.60) per day.
It thus becomes clear in this example that the tax reform takes with the right hand what is given with the left. As independent think-tank Ibon Foundation claims, it is the unemployed, underemployed, the poor, and middle classes who will bear the brunt of the new taxes, while big companies will continue to enjoy tax exemptions and other incentives.
The tax reform measure was quickly approved by the pro-Duterte supermajority in the Congress’ lower house with a vote of 246 in favor, nine opposed, and one abstention, awaiting only further deliberation and approval in the upper house or Senate.
This tax legislation aims to generate revenues for Duterte’s “build, build, build” program that will create massive infrastructure projects in a bid to attract more foreign investors to the country. The DOF expects to get up to ₱600 billion (US$11.9 billion) from the tax reform measure by 2019.
As an alternative, critics like Ibon Foundation propose a more progressive tax system that bases collection on a citizen’s capacity to pay rather than an expansion of uniform tax coverage for all, which hits the poor the hardest.

author: Karlo Mongaya


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Family Farmers in Paraguay Facing Debt Crisis Demand Government Accountability · Global Voices
Fernando Ferreira

Photograph from the “En sus zapatos” (In their shoes) collection, taken from Kurtural's website. Photograph used with permission.
In Paraguay, thousands of farmers have been marching in the streets of Asunción since early July. As small producers, they decry the failure of the government to meet an agreement signed in April 2016, which promised the refinancing of agricultural debts of approximately 18,000 producers. A year later, labourers have returned to the streets claiming the agreement has failed.
In Paraguay, approximately 2.6 million people currently live in rural zones, accounting for over 30% of the total population. Residents struggle against rising levels of land concentration in the countryside as one of their biggest problems. Agricultural businesses use 94% of arable land which produces food for exportation, while family farmers only use 6% for family farming, according to Oxfam's report Yvy Jára: Los dueños de la Tierra en Paraguay (“Yvy Jára: The owners of the Land in Paraguay”).
The government's inadequate agricultural policies and a lack of information created by businesses linked to land concentration groups aggravate the situation:
The farmers have captured Paraguay's attention and solidarity is pouring in:
Universitarios de distintas facultades se reúnen en plenaria en la explanada de la UCA para discutir y solidarizarse con la #MarchaCampesina pic.twitter.com/OqaT4CfaMO
— RTV (@rtvparaguay) August 7, 2017
Students from different faculties are gathering in front of the Catholic University of Asunción to talk and show solidarity with the #FarmersMarch
- RTV  (@rtvparaguay) August 7, 2017
But some government members have referred to demonstrators as ‘cavemen‘ and the police have repressed the demonstrations:
#Urgente Policia Cartistas se preparan para reprimir. pic.twitter.com/l4tK0f8Afo
— Coord.Intesectorial (@CoordinadoraCNI) August 8, 2017
#Urgent The police are getting ready to suppress: pic.twitter.com/l4tK0f8Afo
— Coord.Intesectorial (@CoordinadoraCNI) August 8, 2017
It is not the first time farmers have organized marches to fight for farmers’ rights. This year's marches are the result of an unfulfilled 2016 agreement signed by the government which aimed to solve labourers’ debts allegedly incurred from a series of state scams.
The farmers complained that the Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock distributed damaged seeds, promised technical assistance never arrived, and when selling their harvest, market prices were higher than expected. This made it impossible for many farmers to pay off their public and private debts.
In 2016, after nearly a month of demonstrations, President Horacio Cartes’ government reached an agreement with the farmers consisting of panel discussions to hear farmers’ complaints and the creation of new laws to support rural farming. During these talks, the government promised firm support of the farming sector.
Farmers now complain that the agreement has not been honoured and small producers from other sectors are in similar situations, strained by a lack of public policy, growing inequality in the countryside, and the absence of markets and government assistance in times of flood and frost.
In Paraguay, the state must promote rural farming as detailed in the national constitution. It expresses the need for agricultural reform consisting of ‘the effective incorporation of the farming population into the economic and social development of the nation.’ Moreover, it promises to commit to taking measures that ‘stimulate production, discourage land concentration and guarantee the development of small and medium-sized rural properties.’
Many farmers face losing their land and livelihoods to pay off their debts if they don't find a solution to this crisis soon, and fear they will become part of a growing poverty epidemic in Paraguay.
But farmers face more than just problems of debts and subsidies.
One farmer's statement shared by the group Ápe Paraguay on Facebook reveals many of the limitations of working on the land in Paraguay:
Pasa que lo nacional no les interesa tanto, traen todo del exterior. Por ejemplo estos proveedores, que son millonarios, traen locote y tomate del exterior. Ellos declaran unos pocos, y meten como 20 mil kilos semanalmente. […] Yo traigo por ejemplo 3 mil kilos y no puedo meter en el mercado. Así ellos nos joden porque meten del exterior y nuestra producción nacional no vale. Eso es lo que un gobierno debe ver para ayudarnos. En nuestro país, la plata es lo que vale, por eso el contrabando no se detiene. Yo sé bien, porque traje una vez 5 mil kilos producción nacional y me detuvieron y me llevaron por tres días detrás de los papeles, haciéndome perder gran parte de la producción; luego vino otro de contrabando que pagó dos o tres millones y pasó. Tuve que estar aquí 3 días porque supuestamente no tengo documentos. Imaginen, traer de Concepción, de tan lejos, el gasto que representa
Local produce doesn't interest them because they can import everything. For example, these providers, who are millionaires, import peppers and tomatoes from overseas. They declare a few of them but sell like 20 thousand kilos every week. […] I produce roughly 3 thousand kilos and I can't sell it at the market. So they screw us over because they sell things from overseas and our own national production becomes worthless. The government should see this and help us. In our country, money is what matters, so smuggling isn't punished. I know this, because I once brought 5 thousand kilos of national produce and they detained me and kept me there for three days asking for papers [which spoiled] a lot of my produce; then another load came that was smuggled in and they paid two or three million [Paraguayan guaranies] and passed by. I had to wait there for three days because I supposedly didn't have documents. Imagine, bringing produce all the way from Concepción, the cost that represents…
Farmers demand a ‘write-off’ of their debts under a financial rehabilitation law designed to protect vulnerable populations from abusive lending practices. The Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock is responsible for creating a list of potential beneficiaries who meet specific criteria. They must own less than 30 hectares of land and possess debts no higher than 51 million PYG (approximately 9,170 USD), the equivalence of 25 monthly minimum wages.
Only debts linked to agricultural activity will be recognized, limiting a significant number of potential beneficiaries. Debt-relief could affect at least 17,000 of the 196,000 small agricultural producers on the National Register for National Farming, the database used to determine beneficiary eligibility, though the exact number is unknown.
Paraguay took on Azucarera Iturbe's 15 billion PYG debt, considered by President Cartes to be ‘the biggest in the history of Paraguay.’ Complaints in newspapers lament the subsidy of Petropar's diesel fuel to soy producers has reached 140 million USD, a group who received economic support even before the beginning of democracy in 1992. Similarly, the Paraguayan government has subsidized new buses for public transport and continues to subsidize fares.
Parliament passed a decision to subsidize farmers on the 2nd of August, but President Cartes vetoed it two days later, dismissing the farmers’ demands. He justified the veto by saying the decision countered the appropriate application of the financial rehabilitation law. Cartes also argued that the cost of the subsidy ‘could be more than 3.2 billion USD, approximately 25% of Paraguay's budget.’ However, a careful look at the numbers behind Cartes’ statement proves the president wrong.

author: Fernando Ferreira


text:
Reformist Members of Iran’s Parliament Push to Free Green Movement Leaders Under House Arrest · Global Voices
Center for Human Rights in Iran

Reformist members of the Iranian parliament want to free the Green Movement leaders under house arrest. Image from ICHRI and used with permission.
This report was first published on the Center for Human Rights in Iran website.
Reformist members of Iran’s Parliament have established the “Committee to Seek an End to House Arrests” following the recent hospitalization of 79-year-old political opposition leader Mehdi Karroubi.
“We want resolve this matter without any media sensationalism or political hype,” said Ghasem Mirzaei Nikoo in an interview with the state-funded Iranian Labor News Agency on August 8, 2017. Nikoo is a member of the Parliament's Hope Faction, which supports Iranian President Hassan Rouhani.
The reformist member of parliament added that the committee had already held a preliminary meeting with Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani to discuss ways to move forward.
Karroubi, along with fellow opposition leaders Mir Hossein Mousavi (75) and his wife Zahra Rahnavard (71), has been isolated under state security in their homes since 2011 for encouraging the peaceful protests of the Green Movement against the results of the widely disputed 2009 presidential election. Both he and Mousavi ran for the presidency in 2009.
Karroubi was taken to a hospital in Tehran on July 24 for low blood pressure. Two days after he was admitted, he underwent a TIPS procedure that corrected a vein blockage, according to his son, Hossein Karroubi.
He was discharged on July 28, but within hours his condition took a turn for the worse and he was taken back to the hospital where he received an angiography on July 31.
Mir Hussein Mousavi (right) became the “leader” of the Green Movement after he changed his campaign colours to be the same as those of the protests against what millions perceived were fraudulent elections. Mousavi, his wife Zahra Rahnavard (middle), and another reformist candidate, Mehdi Karroubi (left), were arrested for “inciting sedition.”
President Hassan Rouhani, who promised to work towards releasing political prisoners during his 2013 election campaign, has been silent on Karroubi’s hospitalization. On August 1 his government spokesman Mohammad Bagher Nobakht expressed hope for his recovery.
“While we wish these dear individuals will be healthy, we hope nothing will happen to upset their families or the people,” said Nobakht. “We should make efforts to protect national interests and bring peace to society.”
“The door is open [for a resolution],” he added. “The supreme leader has not declared any solution impossible.”
According to comments by officials familiar with the case, Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has long insisted that the three must apologize for their role in the peaceful mass protests of 2009, which were violently repressed by the state.
Gholamreza Heidari, a member of the “Committee to Seek an End to House Arrests,” told the Iranian Labor News Agency he was disappointed in Rouhani’s lack of action.
“It is paradoxical that the people have demanded an end [to the house arrests] and the president himself has made some favorable statements, but we are not aware of him taking any action in this regard,” he said:
We are not saying that only the president should do something about this, but after all he is the head of the Supreme National Security Council and he has made some promises in his 2013 and 2017 campaigns, and under the constitution he has a duty to protect the basic rights of the people.
During the campaign that led to his re-election in May 2017, Rouhani indirectly suggested he wanted the case resolved as crowds chanted for an end to the house arrests. “We will go to the voting booths to end captivity,” he said at a rally in Zanjan on May 15.
Rouhani was more direct during his 2013 presidential campaign.
“We can provide conditions such that over the next year, individuals who were imprisoned or put under house arrest for the 2009 events are released,” he said at a campaign rally at Sharif University in Tehran on May 13, 2013.
Several legislators as well as political and civil rights activists tried to visit Karroubi at the Rajaei Cardiovascular, Medical & Research Center in Tehran while he was receiving treatment in late July. Many were turned away.
Karroubi was discharged from the hospital and returned to house arrest on August 10, 2017.

author: Center for Human Rights in Iran


text:
Three Generations of Jamaican Textile Artists Reflect Strong Women’s Voices · Global Voices
Emma Lewis

(Left to right): Artists Miriam Hinds-Smith, Margaret Stanley and Katrina Coombs at the opening of their exhibition “3 Generations of Textiles and Fiber Arts” at the Grosvenor Galleries, Kingston, Jamaica on June 24, 2017. Photo by Andrew P. Smith, used with permission.
An unusual exhibition took place recently at Kingston's Grosvenor Galleries: “3 Generations of Textiles and Fiber Arts” brought together Kingston-based artists Margaret Stanley, Katrina Coombs and Miriam Hinds-Smith for a vibrant expression of their personal aspirations and perspectives of society.
Stanley, 66, holds a degree in Fashion/Textiles from the Ravensbourne College of Art in London, England. She lectured at Jamaica's prestigious Edna Manley College for the Visual and Performing Arts (EMCVPA) from 1989-2017 and has exhibited widely in both the United Kingdom (UK) and Jamaica. Kingston-born Coombs, 31, was educated in Textile and Fiber Art and Curatorial Studies at the EMCVPA. She also holds a Master of Fine Arts (MFA) in Creative Practice from the University of Plymouth in the UK, via New York's Transart Institute. She has exhibited widely since 2008 and was featured in the Young Talent 2015 exhibit at the National Gallery of Jamaica. Hinds-Smith, 48, was also educated at EMCVPA and received her MFA degree from the Winchester School of Art at the UK's University of Southampton.
Global Voices asked the three artists about the development of their individual work, feelings about each others’ art and views on a recent nationwide controversy related to a “tablecloth.”
Global Voices (GV): Congratulations on a great exhibition! What moved you to take up textile art? Was it a process? Did you start out in textiles or in other art forms?
Margaret Stanley poses next to two of her pieces at the opening of the exhibition “3 Generations of Textiles and Fiber Arts” at the Grosvenor Galleries, Kingston, Jamaica on June 24, 2017. Photo courtesy Grosvenor Galleries, used with permission.
Margaret Stanley (MS): I originally wanted to be a fashion designer. My chosen course at college in the UK also offered textiles. I focused on making hand printed textiles for my fashion graduation show. Then I worked briefly in the fashion industry, but soon realised I wanted to make textiles. I did not know much about Textile ‘Art’, but fell into making large appliqué pictures, which over the years just developed into the work I do now.
Katrina Coombs (KC):  I first started textiles and fiber art in high school, when I was introduced to macramé. I immediately found a love for fibers, tying knots and creating pieces.
Miriam Hinds-Smith (MHS):  I am from a family of tailors and seamstresses. My mother sewed for us as children, and in my formative years, I had the fancy idea that I would become a fashion designer. This peaked in high school, where I made everything for myself. But I would say it was a gradual process. My initial decision to pursue a path in the arts was from a completely different angle. I wanted to become a graphic designer. But at the School of Visual Arts I had greater exposure to other art forms. I knew I wanted to do something far more expansive. It was a kind of returning to something I was innately responding to when I really fell in love with textiles. I loved every facet of it — designing, creating, imagining. There are cathartic aspects to working with this medium. It provided me with a voice that was quite poignant, quite auditable, unscripted, ephemeral yet tangible.
GV: To what extent does your work reflect your personal outlook or situation — or do you see it as a broader reflection of society?
Katrina Coombs with her pieces at the opening of the exhibition “3 Generations of Textiles and Fiber Arts” at the Grosvenor Galleries, Kingston, Jamaica on June 24, 2017. Photo courtesy Grosvenor Galleries, used with permission.
MS: My work mainly reflects my personal outlook. However, as I am part of Jamaican society, obviously it would also reflect my daily thoughts and observations.
KC: The works are generally a broader reflection of society as they deal with issues of ‘othering’ faced by all women at some point in their life. However, the first reference is the self and as such, the pieces are directly speaking to issues I have faced as a woman attempting to find my identity.
MHS:  It is a mix of both, my personal references and what I know — what WE know — is happening in society. It is all in front of us. For some, it does not impact directly; it's a distant thing that you hear on the news. Truth be told, the effect is often closer to home — but we either sweep it under the rug or find ways of rationalising the situation away. Unresolved injustices are not acceptable. My work has moved from the very visceral and stridently literal. With this exhibition, I chose to focus on creating a space for healing, of sanctuaries for those to whom justice has been unrequited.
GV: How do you feel the medium of textiles enhances artistic expression?
Miriam Hinds-Smith poses next to her pieces at the opening of the exhibition “3 Generations of Textiles and Fiber Arts” at the Grosvenor Galleries, Kingston, Jamaica on June 24, 2017. Photo courtesy Grosvenor Galleries, used with permission.
MS: Textiles are important in all our lives, from birth to death. Special garments and fabrics in all societies have historical, cultural and emotional significance. Although I use many traditional techniques in my work, mostly in non-traditional ways, the layering of fabrics of differing colours, patterns and textures is an important inspiration.
KC:  Textiles and fiber are used by artists as any other medium. One must first understand the material for all its characteristics — and through that understanding, be able to express oneself artistically.
MHS: The medium of textiles is canonised by Western culture as residing in a feminine domain — a specifically feminine expressive media. This is in stark contrast to other cultures where the medium (or interactions with textiles) resides in the male domain. I find textiles a pliable and eloquently responsive medium that communicates immediately. It has many nuances that allow for a multi-layered conversation.
GV: Do you feel that textile/fiber art gets the recognition it deserves in Jamaica?
MS:  Skills in traditional textile techniques like embroidery are still appreciated by the older generation. Textile Art? Not so much! However, with exposure from foreign experience and the Internet, more fine artists are using textile techniques in their work. This has led to more acceptance. The average Jamaican, however, is still more comfortable with painting!
KC:  Recently, textiles and fiber have been put in the forefront of some exhibitions by some artists. This has been a slow process; however, it is beginning to get the recognition it deserves. With more artists exhibiting textile and fiber art-based works […] there will be more recognition.
MHS: Good Lord, no! I recall having a conversation with someone who considers himself an ‘art connoisseur’. He was concerned with the resale value of fiber-based art work. My preoccupation is to have works of art that speak to the issues, in places that will stir further conversations and awareness. Not the sale and ‘art as object’ scenario.
GV: How do you feel about the work of the other two artists in the exhibition? Where do you see the contrasts and similarities in your cross-generational work?
MS: I feel Katrina’s pieces work on many levels. Her concept is not necessarily what the viewer might take away. The visual experience is strong. Miriam’s work, to me, seems more cerebral and needs closer examination. Both artists use textiles, threads and fabrics in very creative ways.
KC: There are three powerful voices speaking through the works, which highlight very personal issues for all three of us. The works themselves reflect our identities as women and the different stages we are at in the process of our development — as well as our different generations. I have always admired Margaret and Miriam for the works they produce, the energies that flow through them and into their works. From being trained by them both, it was an honour being able to exhibit alongside them.
MHS: …The contextual synergy of the exhibition is interesting, considering we really had no prior discussion of theme, any concerns of the sort or any other area that would create forms of alignment. There are similarities across our work from a purely generic frame, being all textile-based. However, Katrina’s poignant fiber-based constructs are very powerful and allude to the tenuous yet robust feminine quality of her concerns. Yet, they are carefully positioned in a very contemporary context, speaking to issues that need to be confronted. I enjoy Margaret’s work, as she employs traditional techniques — but her approach is mixed, creating her unique play with these mediums. Her work is whimsical yet stoutly satirical; a reflective commentary on the every day and the celebratory nature of accepting self, our independence to change, and the cadence of our evolution as women.
GV: Lastly, what are your thoughts on the recent controversy over Jamaica's bandana fabric? (A  dancehall star recently sparked controversy when she disparagingly called the Jamaican bandana a “tablecloth.”)
MS: Bandana is just one colour combination of a traditional woven Indian Madras fabric called Cotton Madras. It has a link with colonialism but has become a symbol of the Jamaican culture. It is similarly used in other Caribbean islands. It is a wonderful, very useful fabric.
KC:  This relates back to the issue of textile and fiber being recognised. Firstly, the bandana is a plaid printed cloth. It was originally woven, but due to manufacturing processes it is now easily found in print. It is labeled as our national dress; however, it is hardly ever used in any of Jamaica's ‘branding’. I think the controversy has brought some needed dialogue and recognition to the material and its values for our country.
MHS: “…My concern [is] that as an independent nation, as a signifier of our national identity, we still utilise, like all the other islands, one of the remnants of colonial domination — the ‘Madras’ cloth. It comes from Chennai which was renamed Madras by the British during the mid-19th century. Now Jamaica, an independent country celebrating 55 years of nationhood, still struggles with issues of identity and who we are as a people.
I did not hear the unfortunate ‘tablecloth’ incident first-hand [the comment was made on an Instagram post] but this singer referred to ‘not wearing a tablecloth like Miss Lou’. I don’t believe she meant to disrespect Miss Lou personally. In her own way, though, she was speaking out against the cloth forced on us as a label.
The Madras identified us as property of the colonial empire. Back then, each island was assigned a specific pattern. Now let us look at Miss Lou: an iconic stalwart, a defender of our spoken language patois, dressed in this Madras costume, reciting ‘Colonisation in Reverse’ (one of my faves!). To me, this is an ironic satire of her redefining who we are through wearing this costume. Miss Lou is saying the labeled slave now speaks with a voice that stands strong, resolute and independent — not celebrating the cloth, but what the wearer of the cloth has become.

author: Emma Lewis


text:
Deadly Floods in Bangladesh, India and Nepal Wreak Havoc · Global Voices
Rezwan

Flood in Biratnagar Airport, Nepal. Screenshot from YouTube video by Deo Creations.
A series of terrible floods in Bangladesh, India and Nepal are disrupting lives of hundreds of thousands of people, displacing them and causing serious damage to property and infrastructure.
Heavy monsoon rain in southern Nepal and northern India caused flash floods and landslides, and the flood waters swept across downstream rivers in Bangladesh, killing at least 175 people in these three countries.
At least 6 million people were affected by the floods in Nepal's Terai region and more than 48,000 homes were submerged. A section of the Mahendra Highway, the most important east-west connection in Nepal, was washed away by torrential rains. Several villages and settlements were without help or relief as rescuers found it difficult to reach remote areas. The telecommunications and electricity services were down and connecting roads had been washed away.
People are sharing images and videos of the devastation on social media.
A man carries his cattle on his shoulder as he moves to safer ground in Saptari,Nepal,12 August 2017. #nepalflood #epaphotos pic.twitter.com/Cb6iOMOE3p
— Narendra Shrestha (@Narendraphoto) August 12, 2017
Father & son try to protect their goats after flood water gushed into their settlement in Sunsari, #Nepal (? by Madhav Ghimire) #NepalFlood pic.twitter.com/bOUqPjEnlh
— Nepal Pix (@NepalPix) August 12, 2017
Terai in trouble! Flood everywhere!small help can bring big change in their lives!lets help! @iamsrk u r the reason behind this unity! Thnx! pic.twitter.com/TSeo6H7BDu
— SRK Fan Club NEPAL (@club_nepal) August 12, 2017
A slideshow about #NepalFlood from our team @tuluprotocol https://t.co/9AO7HlGQA8
— Puru Shah (@digitalsubway) August 14, 2017
#NepalFlood Death toll reaches 91, injured 25 missing 38.
2.8K house damaged, 3K infrastructures partially damaged. 26K rescuers mobilized. pic.twitter.com/O1MX2tE37u
— Ashok Dahal (@ashokpillar) August 14, 2017
Lucky Deepak shared this YouTube video showing landslides and flood damages in Nepal:
Some are trying to crowdsource funds and relief goods to help the Nepal flood victims:
Help Flood Victims in Nepal – 2017 https://t.co/YaOKifZv2K
— Pramod Shah (@Hellowpramod) August 15, 2017
Meanwhile, In India, continuous rainfall triggered landslides in Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh and caused flooding in the eastern and northeastern states of Assam and parts of Bihar and West Bengal. At least 99 people died and over 2 million people were affected across 21 districts of the Indian state of Assam. At least 41 people died and 180,000 people were evacuated in the Indian state of Bihar after flooding in 10 districts. This is the third wave of flooding since the start of the 2017 monsoon.
In photos: Flood situation worsens in Bihar, West Bengal, Assam, rail and road services disrupted https://t.co/xQDLpw0Zih pic.twitter.com/wq41UX1Oqy
— scroll.in (@scroll_in) August 14, 2017
Assam flood: Embankment breach at nigh creating havoc…. pic.twitter.com/Nr2rEugOCM
— peter alex todd (@peteralextodd) August 13, 2017
@narendramodi @PMOIndia Sir if u hv time pls hv a look.U will know why Assam needs a permanent solution of t floods #AssamFlood pic.twitter.com/TmnWZbTYxZ
— Assamesenomad (@Assamesenomad) August 14, 2017
Downstream in Bangladesh, water levels in most of the major river systems sharply rose, caused by the overflow of flood water from India and Nepal and some heavy monsoon rain. More than 1 million people had been affected by flooding after rivers burst their banks following days of heavy rain in Bangladesh. Experts predict that the country is headed for a major flood, similar to the one in 1988.
Unusual flood in four northern districts; In Bangladesh, major floods like 1988 are coming… https://t.co/HLyRDQPfTy pic.twitter.com/WKHdLkwf1U
— juwelishlam (@blogbanglamail) August 14, 2017
#Flood situation worsened in 20 districts in #Bangladesh. It might get even worse. https://t.co/UqngoQWHNo pic.twitter.com/0iF2nngAhx
— Ahmede Hussain (@ahmedehussain) August 14, 2017
This YouTube user posts a video showing the extent of floods in Dinajpur, a northern Bangladeshi district:

author: Rezwan


text:
Global NGOs Call for the Release of Cambodian Land Rights Activist Tep Vanny · Global Voices
Mong Palatino

Tep Vanny's supporters calling for her release. Photo from LICADHO, a human rights group in Cambodia.
At least 65 civil society organizations (CSOs) and non-government organizations (NGOs) from across the world have already signed a unity statement urging the Cambodian government to release land rights activist Tep Vanny, who has been in detention for the past 12 months.
Tep Vanny is a prominent human rights activist who has been campaigning on behalf of marginalized farmers and displaced small landholders in Cambodia. She was arrested last August 2016 for leading the ‘Black Monday’ protest which was organized to call for the release of five human rights defenders accused of interfering in a government case involving an opposition leader.
The court convicted Tep Vanny of “insulting a public official” and sentenced her to six days in prison. But during her detention, the government revived a 2013 case against her when she led a protest in front of the prime minister’s house over the eviction of Boeung Kak Lake residents. A government reclamation project in Boeung Kak Lake, located in the capital city of Phnom Penh, has displaced thousands of residents living around the area.
On February 23, 2017, Tep Vanny was found guilty of committing “intentional violence with aggravating circumstances” during the 2013 protest, and she received a prison sentence of two years and six months.
On August 8, 2017, the court affirmed the decision to convict Tep Vanny. It was also reported that Tep Vanny could face a third trial for another revived case related to a 2011 protest in a Boeung Kak Lake community.
“Even though I am in jail, I am handcuffed and I am wearing prison uniform, the reality is that I am forever innocent.” #FreeTepVanny https://t.co/PCXixwZSFR
— Lorenzo Urbinati (@LorUrb) August 15, 2017
Tep Vanny’s prolonged detention is seen by some activists as part of a government plan to silence the opposition and spread fear among the people in time for the 2018 general elections. Cambodia’s ruling party has been in power for the past three decades, but it lost a significant number of seats in the 2013 elections.
The joint statement signed by 65 CSOs and NGOs warned that Tep Vanny’s detention “contributes to creating an atmosphere of fear for human rights defenders throughout Cambodia.” It also emphasized that dissent and peaceful activism should not be criminalized:
As a result of her imprisonment, Tep Vanny is prevented from carrying out her peaceful and valuable work as a woman human rights defender. Peaceful protest and expressions of dissent are not a crime, and human rights defenders should not be penalized for the exercise of their human rights.
The Asian Forum for Human Rights and Development noted that Tep Vanny’s trial violated international norms:
The fabricated charges against Tep Vanny and her arbitrary detention are politically motivated attempts to silence and restrict her activism as a human rights defender. The trial itself did not meet international standards for a fair trial.
Aside from local human rights groups, activists and residents in Boeung Kak Lake have been petitioning the offices of UN agencies and various embassies in Cambodia to seek help in pressuring the Cambodian government to release Tep Vanny.
Cambodian social media users are also encouraged to replace their profile photos with icons of the campaign.
pic.twitter.com/rzQYvtHjJQ
— FreeThe5KH (@FreeThe5KH) August 15, 2017

author: Mong Palatino


text:
Indigenous Nepali Language With Only Two Fluent Speakers Sees Pages of Hope in Newly Launched Dictionary · Global Voices
Sanjib Chaudhary

Gyani Maiya Sen is one of the two fluent Kusunda language speakers. Screenshot from a video by Felix Gaedtke.
A newly launched book-cum dictionary of the Kusunda language, one of several endangered languages in Nepal, is helping prevent the language from dying out with a whimper. The origins of the isolated language, which bears no obvious relation to any other spoken language in the world, continues to be a source of bafflement to linguists.
पाँच वर्षको प्रयासपछि तयार भयो कुसुण्डा भाषाको शब्दकोष
Gyani Maiya Sen is one of the two fluent Kusunda language speakers. Screenshot from a video by Felix Gaedtke.cZv”>https://t.co/OFcXajCcZv pic.twitter.com/g6mt1fOejq
— Thaha Khabar (@ThahaKhabar) July 30, 2017
It took five years of effort to compile the Kusunda dictionary
Though the 2011 Census shows the population of Kusunda people in Nepal as 273 and indicates 28 people speaking the Kusunda language as their mother tongue, field studies suggest there are actually only 150 Kusundas of which only two people are fluent speakers of the language.
Kusunda language is an oral language without any script and there are no written records, documents or books available. The living Kusundas dispersed to different parts of the country and they do not get the opportunity to speak in their mother tongue. They had to assimilate in ways of life and cultural practices of the places where they live now. As a result, the Kusundas do not even speak their mother tongue at home.
According to Uday Raj Aale, the author of the book, the only two fluent speakers alive are Gyani Maiya Sen Kusunda, 81, from Deukhuri, Dang and Kamala Sen Khatri, 48, from Rolpa. Currently, Kusundas live in the Kapilvastu, Arghakhanchi, Pyuthan, Rolpa, Dang, and Surkhet districts of Nepal.
Jacket of the book on Kusundas. Used with permission.
The Kusundas, known as Ban Raja (kings of the forest), led a nomadic hunter-gatherer lifestyle in the hill forests of Nepal’s central and mid-western development regions until only few decades ago. Their lifestyle, patterns of habitation, and the distinct and unique Kusunda language suggest that they have been living in Nepal since ancient times.
The Kusundas also refer to themselves as ‘kings of the forest’, albeit in the Kusunda language, rendered Gilangdei Myahak and claim equal status and relationship to the Thakuris, the ruling clan in Nepal. According to the Kusundas, the Thakuris are kings of cultivated land, while they have dominion over wooded lands. Kusundas have typically taken Thakuri surnames such as Shahi, Sen, and Khan.
The book by Aaley talks about the history, language, culture, and tradition of the Kusundas and has a collection of more than 2,500 words from the Kusunda language. However, Aaley is not the only person studying the Kusundas. Brian Houghton Hodgson, Johan Reinhard, David Watters, B.K. Rana and Madhav Prasad Pokharel are among the other academics that have worked to shed light on the mysterious language.
This video made by Felix Gaedtke and Gayatri Parameswaran features interviews with Gyani Maiya Sen, her son and Professor Pokharel from Tribhuvan University’s Central Department of Linguistics.
This year’s local elections brought some good news for Kusundas. Dhan Bahadur Kusunda, founder of the Nepal Kusunda Development Society, was selected as a representative for the executive committee for the municipality of Ghorahi, Nepal’s seventh largest city, under the marginalized community category quota.
While the Kusunda language is still effectively facing extinction, the representation of Kusundas in local government and efforts like the compiling of the Kusunda dictionary will help to preserve the Kusunda culture and tradition as well as the language itself.

author: Sanjib Chaudhary


text:
Register Now for the Global Voices Summit 2017: December 2-3 in Colombo, Sri Lanka! · Global Voices
Georgia Popplewell

Colombo, Sri Lanka. PHOTO: Amila Tennakoon (CC BY 2.0)
The 2017 Global Voices Summit is open for registration!
We'll be gathering this year in Colombo, Sri Lanka on December 2-3 to discuss the evolving state of the open Internet, online civic movements and human rights in the digital age. In interactive sessions, panels, and debates, we will explore issues ranging from misinformation/disinformation, to corporate control of the internet, to legal threats against bloggers and activists—all challenges that could make or break the future of the internet.
Joining us will be communities and organizations central to the history and future of the open internet, both globally and regionally, including Creative Commons, Mozilla, Wikipedia, the Web Foundation, the Association of Progressive Communications, IFEX, the MIT Media Lab, the Digital Asia Hub, in addition to the leading lights of Sri Lanka’s internet culture, and many others.
The Summit will take place at TRACE Expert City, a technology hub and incubator in Colombo's Maradana district.
Visit our registration page to reserve your spot at the Global Voices Summit 2017, and keep checking in on the Summit web site over the coming weeks as we develop the Summit programme and post stories, audio and interviews.
We’ll see you in December!
#srilanka #colombo #tracecity #traceexpertcity #retro #architecturephotography #architecturelovers #architecture #colonial #colonialhouse #colonialstyle
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The Global Voices Citizen Media Summit 2017 has been made possible thanks to the generous support of the Ford Foundation, Mozilla, MacArthur Foundation and Groundviews/Centre for Policy Alternatives.

author: Georgia Popplewell


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Why Is the Biggest Sugar Mill in Western Cuba Economically and Environmentally Inefficient? · Global Voices
Periodismo de Barrio

Héctor Molina plant photo: Geisy Guia Delis. Published with permission.
The sugar industry has been a cornerstone of Cuba's economy since the colonial period until today. During its best years, it provided 25% of all the sugar in the world. In towns with sugar mills, residents find that their future, for good or for bad, is tied up with the industry.
Below is an excerpt of the article “Sugar Days,” which examines the environmental impact of the biggest sugar mill in Western Cuba. You can read the original Spanish-language article in full here and other articles by Geisy Guia Delis here.
In October 2002, the Cuban government’s decision to restructure the sugar industry and shut down all factories that were unable to produce sugar at a cost of 4 cents a pound or less was made official.
Before then, the Héctor Molina Agro-Industrial Complex, in the western province of Mayabeque, showed signs of underperformance. However, it continued to stay afloat thanks to the proper functioning of the surrounding arable land, available labor and transportation infrastructure.
For the people of San Nicolás de Bari, that was the best thing that could have happened.
But for years, the biggest sugar mill in the region has produced the worst harvest because it has constantly failed to meet the plans it has proposed, it’s an excessive consumer of water and electricity, and because constant equipment breakdowns cause significant economic losses.
Since the sugar mill was founded in 1850, the settlers constructed an irrigation system to water the sugarcane with the wastewater. Then a distillery was added to the plant, injecting the water with highly corrosive substances, capable of raising the soil’s acidity level and damaging crops. Over the years, with the looming possibility that the water contained heavy metals harmful to human health, the city’s Ministry of Science and Technology committee prohibited the use of this wastewater for irrigation.
“I’ve been here 15 years and all that time we have used the wastewater,” admits Rodobaldo León Aguilar, president of the Cuba-Nicaragua Cooperative of Agricultural Production. “We’re using them practically without treatment, raw. Before I got here, this cooperative used them for the rice paddies and other crops. I know it’s a serious risk. I use them because they cost me nothing.”
Rodobaldo acknowledges that they have wanted to use organic fertilizers such as cachaza, which is another residual of the harvest. However, doing this would mean losses, because the cachaza is very expensive and he has no way to irrigate it in the field.
In his 2014 thesis “Endangered Good Soils: The Degradation of Ferralitic Red Soils in Western Cuba,” Dr. Cs. José M. Febles González pointed out that during the last 30 years, the red ferralitic soils of Mayabeque and Artemisa have suffered intense degradation. “However, specialized literature continues to classify this type of soil as ‘non-eroded,’ which has led to the sequential degradation of Cuba’s most productive soils.”
Ana Julia Castillo, division head of the city’s Ministry of Science and Technology committee (CITMA), is responsible for enforcing CITMA’s provisions and their delegation throughout the province. The measures aimed at reducing the pollutant load of the plant started to be implemented in 2015. Now they are monitoring the liquid waste and some time ago, they began the construction of two oxidation ponds, a fertigation system, grease traps and a solid waste management system such as bagasse. In the ponds, the heavy materials must sediment out, so that the water, when passing through the irrigation, is suitable for use in the fields.
Days before a new harvest began in November 2016, the work was not yet finished. “If there is no solution to the residuals, the plant will not mill,” Ana Julia said on that occasion.
But the decision was not up to the city’s CITMA, but to the province’s CITMA and government, or to the State Council. On November 15, 2016, the boilers whistled, signaling the start of the milling. At that time, residuals were a minor problem compared to the cost of having a paralyzed plant.
In each city, there is a Center for Hygiene and Epidemiology. Pastor Soto Fernández is one of the specialists of that institution in San Nicolás de Bari. According to him, it is almost impossible for them to monitor the plant’s activity comprehensively. They don’t have any equipment to measure air quality, ambient noise levels, soil contamination, or the aggressiveness of the residuals.
The plant itself is not aware of the extent to which it is reducing its pollutant load, according to the director, chemical engineer Alexis Rodríguez. Laboratory tests are performed to check that the acidity values of the water are maintained at a level that allows them to continue to produce. Other than the waters, nothing else is measured. It is expected that with the oxidation ponds and the construction of the fertigation, there will be a clear short-term result, but without numbers, there is no way to confirm it.
Alexis acknowledges that they are not yet in a position to comply with the environmental policies. He has been directing the Héctor Molina plant for two years and is aware that he is at Cuba’s worst sugar mill, “or at what they say is the worst.”
“First you have to prove you make sugar. Then you have to develop a culture of saving energy and water. The system must be geared toward that. And that your people are happy.”
The plant is the city’s main source of employment. Most workers depend on whether or not there is a harvest. Everyone knows that if the plant stops, if they close it down due to inefficiency, this will become a ghost town, as has already happened in other villages.
Before heading the plant, Alexis ran the distillery. In 2016, he won a CITMA award for creating a plant that uses the residuals of this industry in the manufacture of pig food. He claims to have a penchant for environmental conservation, but now he is faced with more urgent challenges: “I have to make sugar to make money.”

author: Periodismo de Barrio


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Banning School-Going Mums Probably Won’t Reduce Teen Pregnancy in Tanzania · Global Voices
Mwegelo Kapinga

Credit: PesaCheck.org
This article was originally published on PesaCheck.org, East Africa’s first fact-checking initiative.
Tanzanian President John Magufuli has called for teen mothers who get pregnant while they are still in school to be banned from returning once they have given birth.
Speaking at a rally in Chalinze, a small town in the eastern region of Pwani, President Magufuli chastised NGOs in Tanzania for encouraging teenage mothers to go back to school, stating that they were “finishing the country” and leading to a state of “moral decay” in Tanzania:
If a girl gets pregnant, if it is deliberate or by accident, gives birth and then returns to school, she will teach these others who haven’t given birth that this is okay. The same girl can then go again and get pregnant, give birth and go back to school. And again for a third time. Are we educating parents?
The president added that teen moms attending either primary or secondary school would be banned from going back once they have given birth:
I want to tell them, and those NGOs as well, that during my administration, no girl who has given birth will be allowed to go back to school .
The president went on to say that teen mothers could go elsewhere if they want to get an education, such as the Vocational Educational and Training Authority, or even taking up farming.
The announcement sparked outrage on social media, with Tanzanians using the #ArudiShule (return to school) hashtag to criticize the move, especially considering that over 8,000 Tanzanian girls drop out of school every year due to pregnancy according to a Human Rights Watch report.
So, the question is, do student-mothers influence other students’ reproductive behaviour?
PesaCheck has researched the issue, with input from citizen-centered initiative Twaweza, and finds that President Magufuli’s statement is MISLEADING for the following reasons:
According to the Tanzania Health and Demographic Survey (THDS) 2015–16 the rate of adolescent pregnancies in mainland Tanzania is considerably high at 27%. What factors contribute to this figure?
A publication by HakiElimu found citizens opinion on the key contributors to teen pregnancies includes low household income. The publication states that nearly 31% of the respondents (including parents and teenage girls) thought that poverty was a key factor, with difficult economic situations driving parents to marry off their children as they are not able to meet the basic needs of the female children.
The THDS report also shows that fertility varies with economic levels, decreasing with increasing household wealth. Wealthier households also have a higher age at first birth, meaning that poorer households are more likely to have younger mothers, most likely of schoolgoing age.
Corroborating this fact, a UNICEF report shows that one in six young women aged 15–19 is married in Tanzania. These girls get affected psychologically, meaning that many of them are unable to return to school once they drop out.
Another factor in the HakiElimu publication was “poor upbringing and teenage girls own personal desires”. They found that some parents don’t spend time on their children’s morals and upbringing. Another finding was the lack of reproductive education which helps teens to fully understand puberty. “A lot of parents in villages don’t speak to their female children who are going through puberty.” TDHS 2015 data shows that over half of women already experience sex before the age of 16.
The HakiElimu report also found another contributing factor to be the societal view of a girls child’s value is in being married and being a mother.
The TDHS 2015–16 report shows that fertility rates are strongly related to the level of education. It states that women with no education have 3.3 times more children than women with secondary education. Adolescent women with no education are 5 times more likely to have begun childbearing compared to those with secondary or higher education. TDHS 2010 as stated in the UNICEF report (p.12) found that for a majority of the girls who give birth while they are “still children themselves” are in fact not in school.
According to the THDS, Zanzibar has a significantly low rate of adolescent pregnancies at 8% compared to mainland Tanzania. Zanzibar introduced a return to school policy in 2010 as a measure to reduce dropouts. Kenya is just in between Tanzania mainland and Zanzibar with 18% adolescent pregnancies. In both these places student mothers are going to school and the adolescent fertility is much lower.
Therefore the statement that student mothers returning to school will influence other students and lead to a rise in teenage pregnancies is MISLEADING. Most research around adolescent pregnancies attribute teen pregnancies to economic factors and the community attitude and upbringing of female children.
Do you want us to fact-check something a politician or other public figure has said about public finances? Fill this form, or reach out to us on any of the contacts below, and we’ll help ensure you’re not getting bamboozled.
This report was written by PesaCheck Fellow Mwegelo Kapinga, a development consultant, researcher and writer. Mwegelo has previously worked for Twaweza East Africa as a research analyst. The infographics are by PesaCheck Fellow Brian Wachanga, who is a Kenyan civic technologist interested in data visualisation. This report was edited by PesaCheck Managing Editor Eric Mugendi.
PesaCheck, co-founded by Catherine Gicheru, is East Africa’s first fact-checking initiative. It seeks to help the public separate fact from fiction in public pronouncements about the numbers that shape our world, with a special emphasis on pronouncements about public finances that shape government’s delivery of so-called ‘Sustainable Development Goals’ or SDG public services, such as healthcare, rural development and access to water / sanitation. PesaCheck also tests the accuracy of media reportage. To find out more about the project, visit pesacheck.org.

author: Mwegelo Kapinga


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In Tunisia’s ‘State of Emergency’, a New Police Protection Law Could Allow More Abuse — With Impunity · Global Voices
Afef Abrougui

Tunisian riot police in the capital Tunis on 6 February 2013. Photo by Amine Ghrabi (CC BY-NC 2.0)
Tunisia has seen many improvements to human rights protections since the 2011 toppling of Zine el Abidine Ben Ali. But the abuse of power by police and security forces remains a serious problem.
The parliament is now considering a law that could make it even easier for police to take advantage of their power, with little accountability to the public.
The new draft law on the “repression of attacks against armed forces” would reinforce criminal penalties for various acts that endanger police and security forces, punish speech that is deemed “denigrating” towards the police, and exempt security forces from criminal liability when they use excessive force.
Originally submitted to the parliament by the former government of Habib Essid in April 2015, the law resurfaced on the parliament's agenda in July and has the support of the country's interior ministry and unions representing security forces.
Draft Law on Repression of Attacks Against Armed Forces: Key Articles
If adopted, the law could have a chilling effect on free expression, artistic freedoms, and media and press freedoms. The bill would also give security forces a green light to act with even more impunity than it already has.
Despite reforms intended to curb rights violations following the 23-year rule of Ben Ali, police abuse remains very common.
Under Tunisia's ongoing state of emergency, implemented after multiple militant attacks in 2015, authorities have the power to suspend protests, restrict the right to assembly and freedom of movement, ban publications, and arrest anyone suspected of violating public order.
A report released earlier this year by Amnesty International documented several abuses committed in Tunisia's state of emergency including the use of excessive and unnecessary force, house raids without judicial authorization, travel bans, arbitrary arrests, torture and ill treatment.
On top of this, the law addresses several issues that are already covered in other sections of Tunisia's penal code and in the general statutes of the internal security forces. Even before the state of emergency began, authorities were not afraid to put these laws to use.
Blogger Yassine Ayari was imprisoned in 2014 for “defaming the army” and “insulting military high command” through Facebook posts. In 2013, a court sentenced rapper Weld El15 to two years in prison over a rap song in which he called police dogs.
Current laws on police and security forces
These laws have been used to persecute bloggers, journalists, artists and activists for their criticism of the police or the military institution. And existing provisions in the penal and military codes make it difficult to question police conduct or file complaints against members of the security forces.
It is easy to imagine how a new law reiterating some of these provisions, increasing punishments for violations, and introducing even stronger protections against liability for security officers could be abused even further.
If the police and the military are already legally protected from criticism regarding their conduct, why are they seeking to push forward this new law?
Part of their impetus comes from rising fears about security and threats to the safety of security officers. Since late 2012, dozens of security officers and soldiers have been killed in attacks perpetrated by militant groups or while conducting operations against them. In November 2015, 12 presidential guards were killed in a bus bombing claimed by ISIS. A few months prior, attacks on the Bardo Museum in Tunis and on a beach resort in the coastal city of Sousse injured and claimed the lives of dozens of people, most of them foreign tourists.
This past June, police officer Majdi Hajlaoui was injured while on duty during tribal clashes in Sidi Bouzid and later succumbed to his injuries. His death prompted hundreds of police officers to protest outside the parliament on 6 July 2017, demanding better protections and bringing the debate about the bill back to the table.
In its current form, the bill would not offer more protections to police officers on the ground. But it would better shield them from criminal liability when they use lethal force.
Mehdi Bechaouch, a leader at the syndicate representing officers at the General Directorate of Intervention Units, told privately-owned Shems FM radio that police officers “should not find themselves in jail when implementing the law,” and that the state should compensate officers whose properties are attacked in retaliation for their work.
He reasoned that the bill, if adopted, would “deter” such attacks:
It is true that assaulting a public officer [is already a crime]…but a security officer carries weapons, and assaults on a security officer or headquarters could result in the seizure of weapons…[The bill's aim is to] send a clear message to people that an assault on security officers is not an easy thing and that it could pose a great danger to the security of society
Bechaouch specified that the police union supports the criminalization of physical attacks against security forces, but does not support other parts of the law, which was written under a previous government. He said that his union supports the removal of provisions that criminalize the “denigration” of the police as well as the law's second chapter, which criminalizes unauthorized filming and the disclosure of national security secrets.
The union's voice on this issue could have greater impact on decision-making in parliament, as this December will mark the first time in Tunisia’s history that security forces will be able to vote in local elections.
With the parliament in summer recess until 1 October, it is unclear when the bill will be discussed in plenary session. The bill has so far only been discussed at the parliament's general legislation committee, which on 13 July heard the interior minister and representatives of police unions. The committee also plans to hear representatives of civil society and human rights groups who reject the bill.
The National Union for Tunisian Journalists, the Tunisian Organization Against Torture, the anti-corruption NGO I-Watch, and Reporters Without Borders released a joint statement on July 14 calling on the Tunisian parliament to “immediately withdraw” the “repressive” bill which “would lay the foundation for a dictatorial police state.” Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have also separately called on the parliament to reject this bill.
Parliamentarians are also voicing concern about the bill. On July 18, multiple lawmakers stressed the need to respect human rights at a session of the general legislation committee:
وأكّد بعض النواب من جهة أخرى ضرورة تبنّي المشروع لآليات ناجعة تتعلّق بحفظ حقوق عائلات الأمنيين والإحاطة الاجتماعية بهم، مشيرين إلى وجود مقاربة يصعب التوفيق بين مكوّناتها وهي من جهة ضرورة توفير الإطار القانوني لزجر الاعتداءات على الأمنيين وعلى المقرات السيادية وحماية الحرية العامة وحقوق الإنسان من جهة اخرى.
A number of members of parliament emphasized that it is necessary for the draft to include effective mechanisms to protect the rights of the families of police officers and provide them with social protection, while pointing to a difficult juxtaposition of the need to provide a legal framework to repress attacks on security officers and headquarters of sovereignty with the need to protect public freedoms and human rights.
During that session, Member of Parliament Hassouna Nasfi said that the bill does not really bring “anything new” and does not provide enough protections to security forces in terms of reparations and compensations prescribed to officers who suffer attacks.
Parliamentarian Mourad Hmaidi, from the leftist opposition Popular Front party, agreed. Hmaidi told the National TV that the bill would not bring much benefit and rather would threaten freedoms. “What the police officer and internal security forces and their families need in general is insurance coverage for risks while they are performing their duties,” he said.
In its current form, the bill does not bring meaningful changes to the criminalization of attacks against security forces or to insurance coverage from risks associated with security forces’ work.
The most significant elements of the bill would only shield the security apparatus from criticism, at a time when Tunisia is in need of an open debate about police abuse and misconduct to bring about much needed reforms to the security sector.

author: Afef Abrougui


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Palestinian Journalists Become First Targets of Controversial Cybercrime Law · Global Voices
Marwa Fatafta

A photo collage of the journalists arrested by the Palestinian Authority. Captions read: “journalism is not a crime” and “where are the journalists”. Source: Quds News Network on Twitter
Just a few weeks after it adopted a controversial cybercrime law, the Palestinian Authority (PA) has gone after five journalists alleging that they “leaked information to hostile entities.”
The government did not identify the entities in question, but four of the journalists arrested work with media outlets affiliated with Hamas, the political rival of the ruling party in the West Bank, Fatah.
On the evening of 8 August, agents from the Palestinian Intelligence Service arrested the five journalists from various cities in the West Bank. The security forces raided their homes and places of work, and confiscated their phones and laptops.
These journalists include Mamdouh Hamamrah from Bethlehem and Ahmed Halayqah from Hebron, both reporters for Al-Quds TV channel; Tariq Abu Zaid from Nablus, a reporter at the al-Aqsa TV channel; Amer Abu Arafah from Hebron, a reporter at the Shehab News Agency; and Qutaibah Qasem from Bethlehem who is a freelance journalist and a blogger for Al Jazeera.
Their arrests come just weeks after President Mahmoud Abbas signed a highly controversial cybercrime law that stifles Palestinians’ freedom of expression online by criminalizing speech deemed harmful to “social harmony”, “state security” and “public order”. While the Public Prosecutor’s office denied at first any link between the new law and the arrest campaign, it later referred to Article 20 of the law as the justification for the journalists’ arrests.
Article 20 stipulates that any person who uses information technologies to publish news that would “endanger the safety of the state, its public order or the internal or external security of the state” will be imprisoned for at least a year or will be fined a minimum of $1400 USD.
The Reconciliation Court issued orders to keep the journalists in detention for a number of days, but they were then released instead on bail on 15 August with no indictment. Relatives of the journalists believe the arrests were a politically motivated retaliation for the June 8 arrest of journalist Fouad Jaradeh, a reporter for the PA's official broadcast TV, who was arrested in Gaza by Hamas officers.
The clamp down on journalists has caused an uproar among other Palestinian journalists and activists who have launched a campaign on social media platforms under the Arabic-language hashtasg #وين_الصحفيين ( ‘where are the journalists’) and #الصحافة_ليست_جريمة (‘Journalism is not a crime’), to demand the immediate release of the journalists, and denounce the PA's use of the cybercrime law to repress media freedom.
قانون الجرائم الإلكترونية الذي طبقته السلطة على الصحفيين هدفه إسكات كل صوت معارض للسلطة أو محرض على مقاومة الاحتلال#الصحافة_ليست_جريمة
— Lama Khater لمى خاطر (@lama_khater) August 12, 2017
The goal of the cybercrime law, which the authority enforced against the journalists, is to silence any voices opposing the government or inciting resistance against the occupation #Journalism_is_not_a_crime
تقييد حرية الصحافة واعتقال الصحفيين تحت قانون فضفاض جريمة.#قانون_الجرائم_جريمة #الصحافة_ليست_جريمة
— مجد عرندس (@majdarandas) August 12, 2017
Restricting press freedom and arresting journalists under a vague law is a crime #cybercrime_law_is_a_crime #journalism_is_not_a_crime
قانون الجرائم الالكترونیة یلزم الصحفي وضع قفل على فمه وقلمه#الصحافة_لیست_جریمة#قانون_الجرائم_جریمة pic.twitter.com/4yAJ7QZTp4
— سجى زهير#غزة (@sajazuhair9) August 12, 2017
The cybercrime law compels journalists to lock their mouths
Holding signs that read “journalism is not a crime”, families of the arrested journalists as well as other activists and journalists protested in Ramallah on 12 August against the PA’s rising repression of media and public freedoms and its passing of the new cybercrime law.

author: Marwa Fatafta


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A Day After the Attack at Las Ramblas, Barcelona Says #NoTincPor: ‘I Am Not Afraid’ · Global Voices
Elizabeth Rivera

Barcelona mourning meme widely shared on Twitter under the hashtag #NoTincPor
Catalonia and all of Spain are in a process of mourning and resistance. The attack on Thursday, August 17, on one of the busiest streets in Barcelona, Las Ramblas, left 13 people dead and continues to keep authorities on high alert. Residents and visitors of Barcelona, one of the most touristic cities in Europe, are in shock. Just a few hours afterwards, another attack followed on the resort city of Cambrils, where six people, including a policeman, were hurt and one died. The attack in Cambrils was stopped by Catalonia's security forces, the Mossos d'Esquadra, but its effect was strongly felt.
In spite of the recent events, Plaza Cataluña was packed with people who came out to honor the victims with a minute of silence. The homage ended with expressions of collective strength and solidarity reflected in the impromptu chant, No Tinc Por: We are not afraid.
Soon Twitter echoed the people at the Plaza. Users shared several support messages under the hashtag,  #NoTincPor, which became a global trending topic:
#BarcelonaAttacks#Cambrils#Spain
Thousands are chanting “I'm not scared” in #Barcelona
No tenemos miedo. We are not afraid. #NoTincPorpic.twitter.com/bRS12VT3RQ
— The Invisible Man (@invisibleman_17) August 18, 2017
Retaking the Rambla, along with thousands of others, people chanting “I am not afraid” #NoTincPor#Barcelonapic.twitter.com/SV4Qgeh4vD
— Liz Castro (@lizcastro) August 18, 2017
# Barcelona #Notincpor Todos contra el terror que unos pocos quieren sembrar por el mundo!
— NoeCosta (@NoeCostaRiu) August 18, 2017
#Barcelona #Notincpor Everyone against the terror that a few want to sow in the world!
And the Mayor of Barcelona, Ada Colau, emphasized:
El miedo no vencerá. Volvemos a pasear por las #Ramblas y lo hacemos con libertad y amor por nuestra ciudad y por nuestra vida. #NoTincPorpic.twitter.com/CvWRyJpFNU
— Ada Colau (@AdaColau) August 18, 2017
Fear will not triumph. We walk again at las #Ramblas and we will do it with freedom and love for our city and our lives. #NoTincPor
Others took time to write more extensively about the possible meaning of the attacks that have happened in Europe in the last years. Ideas of differences, migration policies, international alliances, recent history and the hard shock of losing innocent lives moved Martí Rodríguez Vidal, like many other online contributors, to share his reflections.
… la verdad -en toda su pureza y en toda su dureza- es que en días como hoy, lo que realmente le apetecería a uno es bajarse del mundo. […] Pero además, a uno le gustaría bajarse de esto por la tremenda pereza intelectual de hacer un juicio justo. De poner matices y no generalizar. Hay que buscar más causas que el puro odio irracional. Porque si sembramos la venda en los ojos, los pasos de página y las vueltas a la normalidad, recogeremos más atentados. Seguro. La dinámica terrorista está en marcha y se retroalimenta. […] ¿Quién, en una situación normal, toma la decisión de matar a desconocidos? […] ¿En qué momento piensa que los culpables de su fracaso social son los que le rodean? ¿Es posible que el que vive en el Raval pueda sentirse abandonado por la sociedad?
…the truth is — in all its purity and rawness — that on days like this, what really comes to mind is to step away from the world. […] But also, one would like to step away from this because of extreme intellectual laziness in the face of the effort it takes to come to a fair judgement. To look at nuances and avoid generalizations. We have to look for more causes other than pure irrational hatred. Because if we put a blindfold on our eyes, turn the page and go back to normal, we will get more attacks. Sure. The terrorist dynamic is ongoing and feeding itself. […] Who, in a normal situation, makes the decision to kill unknown people? […] In which moment does this person think that the people around him are guilty for his social failure? Is it possible that someone who lives in El Raval feels abandoned by society?
Martí continues:
… los que tenemos el atrevimiento de escribir tenemos el deber de hablar de la esperanza. No por imperativo sintáctico, ni moral; sino por pura humanidad. ¿Saben que hoy un taxista musulmán ha hecho varios viajes para transportar a los afectados del atentado, no les ha cobrado nada y les ha dicho “no todos somos iguales”? ¿Que los hoteles de la zona del atentado han abierto sus puertas a los afectados y les han dado habitaciones gratuitamente?¿Que decenas de policías y Mossos de Esquadra se han jugado la vida por nuestra seguridad?¿Que en apenas un par de horas todos los hospitales han alcanzado el límite de la sangre que pueden almacenar por la respuesta masiva de la gente que ha ido a donar sangre?
Eso también son preguntas. Y son esperanza.
Those of us who dare to write have the duty to talk about hope. Not because of a moral or syntactic imperative, but simply for pure humanity's sake. Do you know that a Muslim taxi driver transported a lot of the people affected by the attack, he didn’t charge them and told them “not all Muslims are the same”; or that the hotels in the area opened their doors and made their rooms available for free? [Did you know that] dozens of policemen and Mossos de Esquadra (a local police force) risked their lives for our safety? Or that in a couple of hours all the hospitals reached the limit of blood they can store because of the massive response of people going to donate their blood?
Those are also questions. And they are also hope.
During the attack, Spain's national police force shared this note of thanks for the respectful treatment given to the victims:
GRACIAS a todos los medios y particulares que estáis pixelando y obviando imágenes duras de víctimas y de operativo policial. #RESPETO
— Policía Nacional (@policia) August 17, 2017
Thank you to the media and the users that are pixelating and putting aside harsh images of victims and the police operations. #RESPECT.
Today, Twitter user ‘Dora’ reported that the supermarket chain Caprabo, refused to sell Spanish newspapers with graphic images of victims.
Respecte #notincpor#Barcelona#Cambrilspic.twitter.com/UNC2xKNJ3v
— Dora (@scervell) August 18, 2017
Respect.
In the image: Out of respect for the victims of yesterday’s attack in Barcelona, we won’t sell some of the newspapers that have sensationalist and explicit images on their first pages.
During police operations, social media also avoided sharing pictures and videos of the attack, both out of respect and also to avoid sharing sensitive information with the perpetrators. They were inspired by the people of Brussels, who after the attack they suffered in 2015, shared only pictures of cats and pets.
Expressions of solidarity online and the banding together of those in the city, seem to show that the people of Barcelona and its visitors will always remember Las Ramblas in the same way that beloved Spanish poet Federico García Lorca did:
La calle más alegre del mundo, la calle donde viven juntas a la vez las cuatro estaciones del año, la única calle de la tierra que yo desearía que no se acabara nunca, rica en sonidos, abundante de brisas, hermosa de encuentros, antigua de sangre: Rambla de Barcelona.
The most joyful street in the world, the street were all the four seasons live together. The only street I wish would never end. Rich in sounds, abundant in breeze, beautiful in its encounters, old in its blood: Rambla de Barcelona.

author: Elizabeth Rivera