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Twitter Tells Kashmiri Journalists and Activists That They Will Be Censored at Indian Government’s Request · Global Voices
Vishal Yashoda Manve

Kashmiri woman protestor dares a policeman to stop her from moving ahead during restrictions imposed in Srinagar, the summer capital of Indian Administered Kashmir. Photo by Ieshan Wani, used with permission.
Dozens of people who have tweeted about the conflict in Indian-administered Kashmir or shown sympathy for Kashmiri independence movements online may soon be censored on Twitter, at the request of the Indian government.
The US-based social media company sent notices to users explaining that the Indian government had reported certain tweets and Twitter accounts for violating Section 69A of India's Information Technology Act.
Section 69A of India's IT act allows the government to block online content and censor when it believes the ‘said’ content can threaten the security, sovereignty, integrity or defense of the country.
Prominent Kashmiri journalist Wasim Khalid was among those who received notice that his tweet may be removed. In an interview with Anadolu news agency, Khalid explained:
At first, I thought it was a joke, one of those fake emails you keep getting but then I looked more carefully and it was actually an email from Twitter. It is an attempt at intimidating those who post the truth that will never be shown by Indian media. It is meant to close this little window of social media where Kashmir appeared to the world as it exists on the ground. They doesn’t want the world to see how it keeps its hold on Kashmir and that is why they want Kashmiris blocked from social media.
It is an attempt at intimidating those who post the truth that will never be shown by Indian media. It is meant to close this little window of social media where Kashmir appeared to the world as it exists on the ground.
The notices appear to be part of a broader effort by the Indian government to limit online criticism of its military actions in the region. More than half a million Indian military personnel are deployed in India's northernmost state Jammu and Kashmir, where many Kashmiris reject Indian rule over Kashmir and have been fighting for independence or a merger with Pakistan, since 1989. During the recent clashes following elections, the heat of the violence was felt on social media.
In two separate requests, dated 16 August and 24 August, Indian authorities asked Twitter to suspend more than two dozen Twitter accounts and censor more than 100 tweets.
Twitter submitted Indian authorities’ official letter to Lumen, an open database of internet takedown requests. It reads:
Based on recommendations of the committee and looking at the sensitivity of the request, it is hereby directed to Twitter to block/remove 115 Twitter handles/tweets in the interest of public order as well as for preventing any kind of cognizable offense.
Shortly thereafter, Twitter notified the account holders in an email that several of the account holders shared publicly. The email read:
The correspondence claims that your account is in violation of Indian law. Please note we may be obliged to take action regarding the content identified in the complaint in the future. Please let us know by replying to this email as soon as possible if you decide to voluntarily remove the content identified on your account.
None of the official documents released by either Twitter or the Indian government offer case-by-case explanations of why these particular tweets and accounts were singled out. A cursory glance at the accounts reveals a handful of ideological groups that perpetrate extreme violence, but aside from these, many of affected accounts belong to common citizens — activists, journalists, and civilians who have utilized the platform to highlight the atrocities Kashmiris face.
Journalist Muhammad Faysal described rising significance of social media in the Kashmir Valley:
With the increasing reach of the internet and the emergence of social media, particularly Twitter and Facebook, Kashmiris began questioning Indian rule in Kashmir and reporting on human rights abuses. They posted videos of Indian armed forces torturing civilians, mutilating bodies of militants and vandalising public property.
Social media has become a potent tool to counter state-approved and biased narratives of mainstream Indian media, which often likens Kashmir’s armed insurgency to Islamic extremism, and justifies state aggression against Kashmiri civilians.”
Government officials have indeed taken notice of social media's potency in the region. In April and May 2017, authorities ordered mobile internet operators to shut down services in Jammu and Kashmir for days on end. Social networks including Twitter and Facebook also were intermittently blocked.
According to data on internet shutdowns collected by the Software Freedom Law Centre in New Delhi, Kashmir has recorded 29 instances of internet shutdowns since 2012. These figures are the highest in India. Kashmiri activists use social media to highlight violations of human rights and even everyday struggles in the heavily militarised zone. When tensions rise or protests ensue, the internet is often the first casualty.
One especially powerful tweet by Khalid, which was among those reported to Twitter, pertained to an image of a young man being used as a human shield by Indian forces in Kashmir.
A teenager beings used as human sheild by Indian paramilitary man in#kashmir to stop other pro freedom protesters form moving ahead. pic.twitter.com/zUVs7GIn4s
— Wasim Khalid (@WasemKhalid) June 16, 2017
The government also requested that Twitter remove tweets from accounts of people outside of India. Among them were Pakistani journalist and  political analyst Sabena Siddiqi and University of California professor Huma Dar, who is an advocate of human rights for Kashmiris and Dalits (the low caste community in India facing prejudice and attacks.)
American law professor Khaled Beydoun was also on the list, due to this tweet:
Signs of #Rohingya Muslim Genocide.
1st of December pic.twitter.com/1jsf1koJKR
— Khaled Beydoun (@KhaledBeydoun) December 1, 2014
Despite what some may think, a user's citizenship is not a relevant factor in determining the legality of their tweets. Twitter maintains a “country withheld” policy, under which the company may censor specific tweets in just one country, in response to a government order proving that the tweets are illegal under local law.
The policy reads:
Many countries have laws that may apply to Tweets and/or Twitter account content….if we receive a valid and properly scoped request from an authorized entity, it may be necessary to reactively withhold access to certain content in a particular country from time to time….Upon receipt of requests to withhold content, we will promptly notify affected users.
This is not the first time US-based social media companies have grappled with the conflict in Kashmir. In 2016, social media giant Facebook ran into a major controversy after censoring journalists and activists who were posting pro-Kashmir content.
Technology policy expert Pranesh Prakash urged Twitter to challenge the order, citing a similar past effort by Yahoo.
With its resources, Twitter could opt to go to court to challenge this order by the govt the way Yahoo challenged requests for personal info
— Pranesh Prakash (@pranesh) September 5, 2017
Since 1990, an independence movement has been brewing in the Kashmir Valley. The region is the most militarized zone in the world and has faced numerous challenges including arbitrary detentions, forced disappearances and violent use of pellet guns by India's armed forces. In 27 years, more than 70,000 Kashmiris have been killed and many more have been injured or arrested in Indian military crackdowns. The latest weapon in this conflict seems to be the stifling of voices on social media platforms. As Prakash puts it, the question now is whether Twitter will summon the strength to challenge these requests in court.
Also read our Special Coverage: The Kashmiri People Versus the Indian State

author: Vishal Yashoda Manve


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Keeping His Story Alive: The Creative Legacy of Bassel Khartabil · Global Voices
Afef Abrougui

Bassel Khartabil (Safadi). Photograph by Joi Ito (CC BY 2.0)
More than one month after his execution was confirmed, supporters continue to pay tribute to the memory of Syrian developer Bassel Khartabil Safadi and honour his legacy.
An open technology leader in Syria who was active in projects including Creative Commons and Wikipedia, Bassel played a pivotal role in extending online access and open knowledge to the public in Syria. He was detained by the Assad regime on 15 March 2012, and disappeared from his prison cell in October 2015. On 31 July, 2017 his family learnt that he was executed by the Syrian government shortly after his disappearance.
Since then, friends, colleagues and admirers of Bassel and the values that he stood for have found myriad ways to honor his life and continue supporting the kinds of work that most inspired him.
Bassel was remembered at Syrian New Waves, a program of Syrian film, visual art, music and talks that took place at the Eye Film Museum in Amsterdam from September 8-10.
In her opening speech, event curator Donatella Della Ratta, a writer and scholar who was a close friend of Bassel, described how Bassel started filming what was happening, when the uprising in Syria broke out:
I met him several years ago in Damascus behind a computer. He was the smartest computer engineer that I have ever met. He was loved by everyone and wanted by several companies in Silicon Valley.
When the uprising started in Syria in 2011, I was there, I saw him changing from the adorable but very geeky computer nerd that he was to a very dedicated citizen of a country which was trying to undergo a very big change. He took this, the camera phone and started filming, so he became one of those people who film endlessly, and upload and share because they want the world to see what is happening in a country that just dared to ask for more freedom and dignity: very basic needs.
She goes on:
Like Bassel, so many young Syrians have taken mobile phones instead of weapons to fight their struggle against the regime who has treated them as [if] they were carrying weapons and they were enemies of the country.
Bassel loved his country and [he] was killed by a regime who reputed him a traitor for having showed the world that in fact there was indeed once something called a peaceful revolution in Syria. Bassel wanted the world not to ignore Syria and not to forget. He wanted a living evidence of the atrocities committed by the regime and so he made images. He died to produce an image evidence, while the regime is well alive and in a good shape and trying to get rid of all these images and their makers…
The program celebrates the work of a new wave of Syrian filmmakers and visual artists “that places contemporary Syrian image-making in a perspective wider than looking at it as a mere visual evidence from a war-torn country.”
A number of non-profit organizations including the Wikimedia Foundation, Mozilla and Creative Commons announced the Bassel Khartabil Free Culture Fellowship to honour Bassel's contributions to free culture and the open web. The fellowship “will support outstanding individuals developing the culture of their communities under adverse circumstances” and strongly encourages applications from the Levant region of the Middle East. Global Voices is also an organizational partner for the fellowship.
Creative Commons also established the Bassel Khartabil Memorial Fund to support “projects, programs, and grants to individuals advancing collaboration, community building, and leadership development in the open communities of the Arab world”.
Bassel Khartabil was truly an unCommon ally. Thank you #wikimania. Support the Bassel Khartabil Memorial Fund at https://t.co/hfAVpnicBl pic.twitter.com/IJvas5NYcA
— UnCommon Women (@uncommon_women) August 21, 2017
Tributes to Bassel have also come in the form of song. On 5 September, the Disquiet Junto, an open community of musicians released “A Future In Commons: A Tribute To Bassel Khartabil,” a compilation of songs composed over the years that incorporate Bassel's words, his letters and even his own voice.
The group describes the album as an attempt to “extrapolate sound from the poetic language of his correspondence” and to “keep his story alive even after he was no longer.” Here are two songs that we selected from the album:

source: news-globalvoices

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

author: Afef Abrougui


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Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan: Once Deadly Foes, Now BFF? · Global Voices
Akhal-Tech Collective

Mirziyoyev and Atambayev in Bishkek. Photo from the website of the Kyrgyz President, creative commons.
It wasn't just about the first ladies and their matching shoes, although that didn't go unnoticed; Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev's visit to Kyrgyzstan last week marked a sea change in relations between two Central Asian countries that up until recently, lived in the long shadow cast by his uncompromising predecessor.
Islam Karimov, who ruled Uzbekistan from before independence from the Soviet Union in 1991 until his death last year, had few nice things to say about Kyrgyzstan.
Locked in seemingly perennial struggles over land and water, Karimov once talked up a war with both Kyrgyzstan and neighbouring Tajikistan over the impoverished pair's plans to build giant hydroelectric dams upstream from Uzbekistan.
A meeting of ex-Soviet heads of state in 2015 in Moscow during which Karimov rebuked Atambayev in humiliating fashion following a perceived slight — even poker-faced Russian President Vladimir Putin can be seen wincing at the awkwardness of the situation — offers a taste of the bad old days of bilateral relations.
At one point during Karimov's tirade, Atambayev protests, “I was only expressing an opinion”, to which the septuagenarian dictator responds in schoolmasterly fashion:
Very pleasant. We have known your opinion for a long time.
One video of the exchange titled Karimov Atambayev Fight has over 1.3 million views and features heated arguments among Kyrgyz and Uzbeks in the comments section. Relations between leaders can set the tone for relations between peoples.
That is why the visit to the Kyrgyz capital Bishkek of Mirziyoyev, Karimov's former Prime Minister of more than a decade, was so significant.
Central Asia-focussed website EurasiaNet.org reported two key results of the September 5 meeting:
Mirziyoyev’s visit to Bishkek resulted in an agreement to delineate 85 percent of the two nations’ shared 1,170-kilometer border. The border issue had long been an irritant in relations.
But Mirziyoyev dangled the prospect of something potentially even more momentous when he spoke about Uzbekistan’s potential involvement in Kyrgyz hydropower projects. The late Uzbek leader Islam Karimov had steadfastly opposed such plans on the grounds that they could disrupt Tashkent’s economically important agricultural sector, especially the cotton crop.
On Twitter, Kyrgyz citizens hailed the first bilateral meeting between leaders of the two countries since 2000. Kyrgyzstan has had four presidents during that period, two of them overthrown in street protests.
Сенсация в доброй воле узбекского лидера. Мирзиеев настолько открыт, дружелюб и доброжелателен, что это не может не вызывать восторга!??❤?? https://t.co/3THDKZjApF
— Edil Baisalov (@baisalov) September 6, 2017
The sensation is in the goodwill of the Uzbek leader. Mirziyoyev is so open, friendly, and well-wishing that it can only bring us delight!
Мирзиёев: Между Кыргызстаном и Узбекистаном было много вопросов, которые вроде бы решались, но решались не так, как нужно было.
— Eldiyar Arykbaev (@arykbaevKG) September 5, 2017
Mirziyoyev: There were many issues between Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan that should have been solved, but weren't solved in the way they ought to have been.
The following day, the two countries reopened a crossing of their shared border that had been closed since political turmoil enveloped Kyrgyzstan in 2010. The opening was attended by thousands of local residents on either side of the frontier.
Kyrgyz-Uzbek border crossing point “Dostuk” in Osh province this afternoon. pic.twitter.com/JFTTsb99jN
— Ryskeldi Satke (@RyskeldiSatke) September 6, 2017
One lasting image from the bilateral visit was the sight of Kyrgyz first lady Raisa Atambayeva and Uzbek counterpart Ziroatkhon Hoshimova walking hand in hand after the Uzbek delegation touched down, apparently wearing matching shoes.
Kyrgyz social media was bowled over by the stylishness of the Uzbek first lady, who one online outlet sent up using the title of a 1990s pop song popular in karaoke restaurants across the former USSR: Ah What a Woman!
Hoshimova walks on Atambayeva's left hand side in the footage below.
Первые леди Кыргызстана и Узбекистана – Раиса Атамбаева и Зироатхон Хошимова pic.twitter.com/rk3MfcKIp3
— АКИpress (@akipress) September 5, 2017
Uzbekistan is still a fairly brutal dictatorship by global standards, even if there have been some signs of a so-called ‘thaw’ in the country's domestic politics.
The advantage of this from the perspective of Kyrgyzstan is that Mirziyoyev, who has made regional relations his foreign policy priority, is likely to be in power for as long as he lives.
That is also good news for Tajikistan, which has yet to receive Mirziyoyev over a year after he came to power, but is also hopeful that better relations are in the pipeline.

author: Akhal-Tech Collective


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Taiwanese Activist Was Forced to Confess on Camera to ‘Smearing the Chinese Government,’ Allies Say · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

Taiwanese activist Lee Mingche reads his confession in a mainland Chinese court. The videotape of the trial was released on various social media platforms. Screen capture from Miaopai.
After more than five months in detention, Taiwanese activist Lee Mingche pleaded guilty to writing articles that Chinese authorities say “subverted state power.”
The trial, held September 11 in a court in Yueyang city in China's southern Hunan province, was videotaped and streamed for the public on various social media platforms including Weibo, a popular service similar to Twitter.
In front of the camera, Lee read a statement that praised the mainland Chinese judicial system and said he was deeply regretful of what he had done. His wife and and human rights defenders say the confession was forced.
In the statement, Lee confessed to the “subversive act” of circulating and writing articles that “attacked and wickedly smeared the Chinese government” and “promoted Western-style multi-party democracy” on various social media platforms since September 2012.
The indictment also accused Lee and his co-defendant Peng Yuhua of incorporating a company called “Plum Blossom” in October 2012 and drawing up a plan to advocate for regime change in China. Peng, like Lee, pleaded guilty.
Lee went missing in southern China on March 19, 2017. Ten days later, Beijing confirmed his detention, saying that he was engaged in activities that were “harmful to national security”. In May, authorities said that Lee was being held in Hunan province under investigation for “subverting state power.” He will receive his sentence later this year.
Lee’s wife Lee Chingyu has been advocating for her husband's release. Before she traveled to mainland China to attend the trial on September 9, she preempted the “forced confession” in an open statement:
此時此刻，我也要懇求國人，如果看到李明哲在非自由意志下，在法庭做出或說出某些難堪的言行，請國人體諒，那就是中國政府的拿手好戲「被認罪」而已。
At this moment, I urge all the Taiwanese, if you see Lee Mingche confess against his will in court, with shameful words and behaviors, please forgive him. This is just another drama staged by the Chinese government, it is called “forced confession.”
After attending the trial, Lee Ching-yu briefly met with her husband. The meeting was videotaped and footage showing him asking his wife not to make further comments on the case was also released online. Lee Ching-yu says he also made these remarks against his will.
Chinese human rights observers have characterized Lee's trial as a political show. Maya Wang, a senior researcher at Human Rights Watch, commented on Twitter:
中国政府对 #李明哲 的庭审，是一场经典的表演审判，庭审上是有律师检察官法官，但有名却无实。起诉方迄今为止没有提供任何有说服力的证据，证明李的言行超越其和平表达和结社的基本权利，这是都是中华人民共和国宪法第35条中受到保障的人权。中国政府应立即释放李明哲。
— Maya Wang 王松莲 (@wang_maya) September 11, 2017
The Chinese government’s trial of Lee Mingche is a classic performative trial, the judge, prosecutors and lawyers are just actors who have no judicial function. To this day, there has been no hard evidence that Lee’s speech and actions, which are all peaceful in nature, went beyond the right to free expression and assembly as protected by Article 35 of the mainland Chinese constitution.
Though Taiwanese people were prepared to see Lee being “forced to confess,” many still expressed sadness watching the confession video. Chang Tieh-chih, a human right activist in Taiwan, exclaimed on Facebook:
關於李明哲，不敢想像一個人是受到什麼樣的殘酷對待，才會說出與他信念相反的話。真是太令人難過。
About Lee Mingche, it is hard to imagine what kind of cruelty he has gone through that makes him says something that is opposite of his personal beliefs. This is so sad.
If the trial was, as some have claimed, a political show, what exactly was the message it was trying to get across? A September 12 editorial from People’s Daily, the official newspaper of the Chinese Communist Party, stressed that Lee's trial was a demonstration of China’s power in using law:
从11日公开的庭审现场看，中国的法治力量令人信服。任何想要借本案进行舆论发酵、抨击中国政治和法律制度，甚至意图借此案炒作达到自己目的的人，则已经被宣判了失败。
更不可否认的是，本案公开、透明的一审彰显了无论港澳台人士、大陆公民还是外国人，任何企图颠覆中华人民共和国国家政权的违法行为都将依法受到严惩，任何利用李明哲案进行政治操作以达到影响两岸关系的企图更是绝无可能。
Judging from the open trial on September 11, China’s power in using law is convincing. Any effort that attempts to criticize the Chinese political and legal system using this case, or to use the case to achieve personal gain, has failed.
What can’t be denied is that the openness and transparency of the trial shows that no matter if the person is mainland Chinese, or from Hong Kong, Macau, Taiwan or other countries, any act that attempts to subvert the regime of the People's Republic of China will be punished. Using Lee Mingche’s case to manipulate cross-strait relations [between China and Taiwan] is doomed to fail.
Others think the case shows that using the right of free expression to criticize the Chinese government and the right to assembly is subversive to the state. As Hong Kong-based human right activist Natalie Hui pointed out on Facebook:
中國在法庭上所舉出的「罪證」，發貼文四十條､組社交媒體QQ社群，這個台灣人每天都在作，如果這樣就叫「顛覆國家政權」，全台灣人每天上千萬則批評中國的貼文，中國應該早滅亡了才對。
The “evidence” presented to the Chinese court are 40 posts published online, using social media QQ to form e-groups. These are usual online activities that all Taiwanese are doing every day. If this is called “subverting state power,” there are tens of thousand posts criticizing China every day, the Chinese government should be overturned.
Instead of strength, Taiwan professor Chen Ming-fong believed that the trial betrayed China's weakness. Twitter user @BelleSu9 quoted him saying the following:
台灣政治大學教授陳芳明：中國表面看來那麼強大，但是政治體質是那麼脆弱。這樣的定罪，等於是台灣所有的人民都被定罪。這次公開審判，正是在台灣與中國之間劃清了界線。我們都站在李明哲這邊，因為我們都站在民主與人權這一邊。#李明哲　#三個自信在哪　#中共快放人
— Belle Su (@BelleSu9) September 11, 2017
Professor Chen Mingfong from Taiwan National Chengchi University: China only looks strong on the surface. Its political system is very fragile. Such a conviction is to convict all Taiwanese as guilty. The open trial has drawn a line between China and Taiwan. We are all standing by Lee Mingche because we are all standing by democracy and human rights.

author: Oiwan Lam


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Among a Rising Tide of Extremism in Syria, Women’s Freedoms Hang in the Balance · Global Voices
Julie Saleh

The widely shared photo first shared by a Hezbollah soldier reads “From Juroud Arsal salute to every woman who is not using her own photo as a profile picture on Facebook. Hezbollah.” Source: Diana Moukalled.
In early September 2017, a piece of paper with a potent message targeted against women, held by a group of Hezbollah fighters in Juroud Arsal, Eastern Lebanon, went viral.
The message, which celebrates “every woman who is not using her own photo as a profile picture on Facebook,” emerged as pitched battles raged between Hezbollah, the Iran-backed Shiite militia and the Syrian Sunni al-Nusra Front (officially a former Al Qaeda affiliate) in the area straddling the Syrian-Lebanese border.
This came on the heels of a widely-circulated video of Sami Khadra, a renowned Shiite Lebanese cleric, asking women to replace their photos on Facebook, considered inappropriate and profane, with images of “trees” and Quranic verses.
The video came under attack by social media users and women's rights activists, igniting a storm of sarcastic comments, but also some support.
One woman retorted, “you put a tree” while another woman posted a photo of herself next to trees saying “I tried looking for a photo with lots of trees.” One man, however, said that the cleric's words “are beautiful and represent true Islamic thinking.”
Badia Hani Fahs, a writer for the Lebanese An-nahar newspaper and daughter of the renowned late anti-Hezbollah Shiite cleric Hani Fahs, lashed out in a Facebook post at Sami Khadra's remarks:
Use a tree instead of your photo…A piece of wood, a table…Use an image of a monkey, a female dog or a jennet [female donkey]…May Allah curse their empty turbans!
Lebanese journalist and filmmaker Diana Moukalled mocked the picture of Hezbollah fighters in a tweet, poking fun at their claims of liberating women from’ takfiri’ (infidel in Arabic) while aping their conduct.
من جرود عرسال دعوة للنساء بان لا يضعن صورهن عفايسبوك .. بس اهم شي انو حزب الله انقذنا من التكفيريين اللي بيسبوا النساء #كذبك_هز_الدني https://t.co/JoMrK1UYhr
— diana moukalled (@dianamoukalled) July 28, 2017
From Juroud Arsal a call for women not to post their photos on Facebook…[It is laughable that] these are the same people claiming to be saving us women from takfiris who take women as sabaya (women captured during war).
Fighters in the heat of a raging battle with time to consider women's social media habits seemed so far-fetched and ironic that critics drew comparisons with the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) and other extremist groups. Many others derided the Shiite group's alliance with the Syrian regime that has long boasted its secularity.
In Idlib province, a painted sign reading “The Woman is Awra” made its rounds in 2015.
“Awra” refers to the parts of a woman's body that must be covered under Islamic law. The sign, produced by a group affiliated with the al-Nusra Front, implies that all of a woman's body must be covered. Raseef22 translated it as ‘“Women Must be Covered to the Nails”.
“A Woman is Awra” followed by “Idlib Religious Mission and Endowment.” Source: Raseef22.
Both ISIS and al-Nusra impose austere dress codes on women based on a rigid interpretation of Sharia law. Proponents claim the code is intended to “protect” women as “jewels” and “hidden pearls.”
This claim, however, is considered an outright human rights violation by all major human rights organizations as well as Article 1 of the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
In June 2017, independent Syrian news outlet Enab Baladi commented:
Despite the spread of a large number of civil society organizations dedicated to supporting the role of women and bolstering their participation and position in society in opposition areas, women's role in the Syrian workplace has not registered a notable advance, but has actually seen a relative decline.
Groups such as Hezbollah, al-Nusra, and ISIS, all stakeholders in the current Syrian war, have consistently promoted discriminatory views against women. These groups promote policies that treat women as inferiors and restrict their basic rights including movement, dress and the use of social media.
Failing to comply carries grave consequences, the mildest being social and religious shaming while the harshest amounts to whipping and fines.
In 2015, breath-taking videos showed elated Syrian women ripping off Islamic garments after escaping persecution under ISIS, a public outpouring of ecstasy that captured the world's attention:
While some Syrian women celebrated liberation from ISIS-controlled areas, the emergence of new messages targeted at women sparks pessimism among women and women's rights activists concerned about their futures under any of the warring groups.
Five years ago, four Syrian women dressed in bridal gowns staged a peaceful march in the heart of Damascus to demand wider freedoms and an end to military operations. Yet today, many Syrian women still grapple with authorities to secure their most basic human rights.
As Liesl Gerntholtz, women's rights director at Human Rights Watch put it:
Extremist groups like ISIS and al-Nusra are undermining the freedoms that Syria’s women and girls enjoyed, which were a longtime strength of Syrian society. […] What kind of victory do these groups promise for women and girls who are watching their rights slip away.
Any hope kindled by early pro-democracy protests has dwindled, making it difficult to ameliorate the situation for Syrian women. Political parties whose agendas neglect women's rights have seized control of the indefinite future.

author: Julie Saleh


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Teen Killings Show How Vulnerable Communities Suffer the Brunt of the Philippine Government’s ‘War on Drugs’ · Global Voices
Karlo Mongaya

Protests during Kian delos Santos's burial. Photo credit: Kathy Yamzon. Used with permission.
Public anger is rising in the Philippines over the successive killings of teenagers while under police custody.
Kian delos Santos, 17 years old; Carl Angelo Arnaiz, 19; and Reynaldo de Guzman, 14 years old, were allegedly slain by police officers in relation to the country's anti-drug campaign (Oplan Tokhang).
President Rodrigo Duterte's directive to end the drug menace has claimed the lives of almost 13,000 people, most of them coming from poor urban communities.
In the case of Kian delos Santos, police reported that the teenager was a drug courier who was killed in a shootout during an anti-drug raid.
However, a CCTV recording in the crime scene showed a defenseless teenager being dragged by the police before ending up dead.
Delos Santos was killed in Caloocan City last August 16, 2017, in the same week that Tokhang achieved the highest death toll on a single day in Bulacan, a province to the north of Manila. President Duterte praised this bloodbath:
Maganda ‘yun. Makapatay lang tayo ng mga [That was good. We could just kill] another 32 everyday then maybe we can reduce what ails this country.
Duterte has told the police on various occasions to shoot drug suspects who fight back, make them fight if they don’t, give a gun to suspects who are not armed and to shoot them if they retaliate. Delos Santos’s killing exposed how the police has been planting guns and other evidence against suspected drug peddlers.
Just days after Delos Santos’s death, Carl Angelo Arnaiz, a state scholar from the University of the Philippines, was found dead on August 28, 2017 in a Caloocan morgue after going missing for 10 days. He was last seen leaving his house to buy food with Reynaldo De Guzman, who was found dead 20 days later in a creek in Gapan, Nueva Ecija, a province located north of the capital Manila.
De Guzman's head was wrapped with tape and his body has 30 stab wounds. This was about 113 kilometers away from their residence in Cainta, Rizal.
Official police reports say Arnaiz was killed in a shootout with police after he tried to rob a taxi driver. An autopsy report points to Arnaiz’s body bearing signs of torture before being shot five times execution-style.
Fellow high school students, family, friends, and sympathizers light candles for Kian during his wake. Photo credit: Manila Today. Used with permission.
These deaths have sparked public outrage against the “war on drugs,” which is denounced by many as a bloody conflict waged by the Duterte government against the country's vulnerable populations like the poor and children. Various human rights groups have also hit at Duterte for repeatedly vowing to save police officers who commit abuses during Tokhang operations. The youth group Anakbayan said in a statement:
This could happen to anyone as bloodthirsty Duterte continually encourages the police to kill without due process, plant evidence, and cover up in the course of his bloody “war on drugs”. We must stand up against Duterte’s madness to save the country’s youth.
Many decry the way members of disadvantaged communities are killed with impunity while prominent personalities linked to the illegal drug trade, including Duterte’s own son, Davao City Vice Mayor Paolo Duterte, are given due process.
Paolo Duterte recently appeared in Senate hearings to deny his alleged involvement in the smuggling of US$125 million worth of illegal drug substance methamphetamine, popularly known in the Philippines as shabu.
Duterte’s troll army at first branded the murdered teenagers as criminals who deserved to die,but later on, as public anger escalated, they modified their stance and claimed it was Duterte’s political rivals who orchestrated the killings.
Faced with growing uproar over the killings, Duterte himself changed his position by meeting the parents of delos Santos and then Arnaiz and assuring them that he would go after erring police officers. Duterte subsequently claimed that “malignant” forces are sabotaging his anti-drug campaign.
State scholars from the University of the Philippines hold a protest at the Department of Justice in Manila City. Photo credit: Manila Today. Used with permission.
Meanwhile, more and more are overcoming the atmosphere of silence and fear by expressing their anger over the killings. Various people’s organizations, church groups, and ordinary individuals have joined forces in launching the broad alliance Movement Against Tyranny to oppose rights abuses and the country's slide into strongman rule under Duterte.
The group will hold a big protest at Luneta Park on September 21, the anniversary of the declaration of martial law by the late dictator and Duterte's idol, Ferdinand Marcos.

author: Karlo Mongaya


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The 17th-Century Peruvian Saint With a 21st-Century Social Media Presence · Global Voices
Gabriela García Calderón Orbe

Saint Rose of Lima church in Lima. Image from Flickr by user Natalia Cartolini (CC BY 2.0).
Saint Rose of Lima may have died more than 400 years ago, but she has online wishing well, a mobile app, and accounts on Facebook, Twitter, and even WhatsApp.
This Catholic saint is an important figure in Peruvian culture, and devotion of Saint Rose offers a clear example of how long-held traditions in Peru have been incorporated into a modern world of quickly advancing technologies and social media.
Saint Rose of Lima was born as Isabel Flores de Oliva on April 20, 1586, when the city was the capital of Spain's Viceroyalty of Peru and was the first person born in the Americas to be canonized as a saint. She passed away on August 30, 1617 and was canonized in 1671. She was named patroness of Peru in 1669, and of the New World and Philippines in 1670. In the Roman Catholic Church, a patron saint is regarded as the heavenly advocate who intercedes on behalf of of a person, group, country, craft, etc. before God.
Saint Rose is also the patroness of the Peruvian Police Force, and appears in the highest banknote denomination. In fact, she's the only woman represented on Peruvian currency.
Saint Rose's house in Quives. Image from Flickr by user Lucerito Corrales (CC BY 2.0).
Saint Rose was the fourth of 13 children. Her father was Gaspar Flores, from Spain, and her mother was María de Oliva y Herrera.
She spent most of her childhood and teen years with her family in Quives, in the highlands of the department of Lima, where her father worked as the manager of a mine:
[…] reducción indígena ubicada en la sierra de Lima, entre la confluencia de los ríos Chillón y Arahuay. Hasta allí se trasladó la familia […]. De niña, la futura Santa Rosa de Lima sufrió una enfermedad que le imposibilitaba la movilidad de las piernas. Su madre quiso aliviarle con una receta local, cubriéndole las piernas con pieles de buitre, medida que finalmente agravaría los males de la pequeña, sufriéndolos en silencio. Recibió en 1598 el sacramento de la confirmación […] de manos del arzobispo Toribio de Mogrovejo, también futuro santo.
[Quives is an] indigenous settlement located in the Lima highlands, at the confluence of rivers Chillon and Arahuay. The family relocated there […]. As a child, the future Saint Rose of Lima suffered from an illness that made it impossible for her to move her legs, Her mother wanted to offer her some relief with a local remedy, and covered Rose's legs with vulture skins, something that would eventually aggravate the little girl's woes, which she suffered in silence. In 1598, she received the sacrament of confirmation […] from Archbishop Toribio de Mogrovejo, who would also become a saint himself.
Her family had long called her Rose, but she also received the name for her confirmation in the Church, one of the most important rites of passage in Catholicism:
[…] Rosa, apelativo que sus familiares empleaban prácticamente desde su nacimiento por su belleza y por una visión que tuvo su madre, en la que el rostro de la niña se convirtió en una rosa. […] asumiría definitivamente tal nombre más tarde, cuando entendió que era “rosa del jardín de Cristo” y adoptó la denominación religiosa de Rosa de Santa María.
[…] Rose, a name that her family used practically since she was born due to her beauty, and because of a vision her mother had in which the girl's face became a rose […] would end up assuming that name definitely, when she understood she was a “rose from Christ's garden” and adopted the religious denomination of Rose of Saint Mary.
As Rose's devotees know, she used to torment herself from a very young age: She would refuse to eat or would wrap her body with a spiked cilice, she would apply spicy pepper on her eyes to avoid leaving her house, she would ingest pus from ill people and she even put an iron chain around her waist, locked it and threw the key deep into a well.
Given these behaviors, renowned Peruvian psychiatrist Mariano Querol thinks Saint Rose may have suffered from schizophrenia:
Para mí fue una persona que padeció trastornos mentales muy difíciles de clasificar y catalogar. Presentó graves disturbios de personalidad, disturbios emocionales, de conducta, de autoflagelación, impulsos masoquistas enormes, incluso iluminaciones, posesión divina.
In my opinion, she suffered from a mental disorder, one difficult to classify or categorize. She had serious personality disturbances, emotional and behavioral disturbances, self-flagellation, huge masochistic impulses, even enlightenment and divine possession.
Despite her history of self-harm, the saint's devotion remains strong and has carried over into the 21st century. Her followers believe she fulfills wishes that are deposited every August 30 in a well located at the Basilica of Saint Rose. The tradition attracts a number of people and lines are always long, as blogger Cyrano recalled:
Al lado del templo (de Santa Rosa] existe una casa donde la creencia popular afirma que Santa Rosa pasó gran parte de su vida. […] Dentro de la casa, que recibe visitas durante todo el año, existe un pozo llamado el Pozo de los Deseos en donde los fieles lanzan papeles de distinto tipo y tamaño que contienen sus más íntimos deseos u ofrecimientos para que Santa Rosa se los cumpla. No son cientos sino miles los que arrojan el 30 de agosto su papel al pozo. Ya se imaginan el alboroto que causa esta tradición.
Besides [Saint Rose's] there is a house where popular belief says Saint Rose spent part of her life. […] Inside the house, which can be visited all along the year, there is a well named Well of Desires, where believers throw little pieces of paper, of all kinds and sizes, containing their most intimate desires or offerings so Saint Rose may grant them. There are not hundreds but thousands of people throwing their papers into the well each August 30. You can imagine the fuss that comes from this tradition.
But there is good news for those who wish to participate but, for whatever reason, can't go all the way to the Saint Rose's temple: They can deposit their wishes online on the saint's official website:
Millones de personas dan fe de las gracias, tanto espirituales como materiales que Rosa brinda, si ésta está en los planes de la Providencia divina.
¡Envíanos tus peticiones, agradecimientos o tu testimonio!
Millions of people attest the graces, both spiritual and material, that Rose brings if they are in the plans of the divine Providence.
Send us your requests, your messages of gratitude or your testimony!
The saint also is present on Facebook, Twitter and WhatsApp, and offers a mobile app for download:
¡Pasamos los 100 mil likes y 100 mil seguidores en Facebook!
!sigamos compartiendo!https://t.co/uBWEXVxGZX#SantaRosaDeLima pic.twitter.com/hbXKuTikPc
— Santa Rosa de Lima (@SantaRositaLima) 1 de septiembre de 2017
We have more than 100,000 likes and 100,000 followers on Facebook!
Let's keep sharing!
Mantente conectado y encuentra las ultimas noticias,de nuestra Santa!
Descarga la app (para android):https://t.co/9PI4s4R3HJ pic.twitter.com/IZE7lnKX76
— Santa Rosa de Lima (@SantaRositaLima) 28 de agosto de 2017
Image: Saint Rose of Lima – 400 years making intercessions for you.
Download the app.
Visit the website www.rosadelima.pe
Tweet: Keep in touch and find the latest news from our saint!
Download the app (for Android)

author: Gabriela García Calderón Orbe


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The Indigenous Tharu People of Nepal Risk Losing Their Once-Mandatory Art of Tattooing · Global Voices
Sanjib Chaudhary

Kalarvati Chaudhary, 61, remembers her younger days when talking about the tattoos of betel nut palm, peacock and other motifs inspired by nature on her body. Photo: CK Kalyan Tharu. Used with permission.
For centuries, tattooing has been an integral part of life for the indigenous Tharu people living in the southern plains of Nepal. Now, as the Tharu people face modernization, the tattooing practice is losing its importance among younger generations.
Tharu women wear tattoos on their arms, legs, and chests as a beautification practice. The tattoos, called khodaha and godna in the Tharu language, are inspired by nature. The most common tattoo motifs are lines, dots, crosses and other various natural elements.
The names of the tattoo patterns echo their natural counterparts: badam butta (groundnut shrub), suruj ke daali (rays of the sun), thakari mutha (a handful of hair combing materials), supari ke gachh (betelnut palm), and majur (peacock) among others.
A post shared by Shankar Chaudhary (@iamshankarchaudhary)
A post shared by Shankar Chaudhary (@iamshankarchaudhary)
Traditionally, young women could decide to wear tattoos as permanent jewelry, whereas all married women must have compulsory tattoos on their legs applied prior to marrying, typically in the month of March during the wedding season (the months of Falgun-Chaitra in the Bikram Sambat calendar). Today, however, neither the married nor the young Tharu girls choose to wear tattoos.
In ‘Tatooing Among the Tharus of Dang Deokhuri, Far Western Nepal’ a paper published in 1975, researcher D.P. Rajaure captures the aesthetic essence of tattooing among the Tharu:
The main reason for tattooing among these Tharus is aesthetic. According to them, young and unmarried girls do not need and hence do not have to decorate themselves by tattooing because their bright and colourful cholyas (a kind of blouse with its opening in the back) are beautiful and decorative; but a married woman has to get herself tattooed to compensate for the lack of beauty or decoration brought about by donning jhulwa or dainaha jhulwa, a kind of ladies’ shirt with full sleeves, double-breasted and opening in the front.
The tattoos on the lower part of the legs generally represent sitha (stick or straw), chulha (stove) and phunna (hanging motifs), whereas tattoos on the middle part represent majur (peacock) and sithas in between and tattoos on the top part of the legs represent a single peacock in the centre and some phunna or other motifs on three sides of it, making a frame for a single peacock at the centre.
Traditional tattooing practices were painful and gruesome. Tikaniya (tattooers in Tharu) used tattooing needles and natural black ink obtained from the soot of a mustard lamp. The slow process sometimes caused fainting.The artist rubbed the body part to be tattooed with cow dung and later cleaned the area with water. After drying, mustard oil was applied to soften the surface of the skin. The tikaniya then marked the designs and pricked the skin with tattooing needles.
One Tharu elder from Chitwan, Nepal recollects:
In the old days, when girls of my age were young, a man from India would come and do these tattoos in our bodies. When my friend was being pierced, I could see tears in her eyes because of the pain and I remember being afraid as I was next. That night I couldn't sleep. The next day I asked my mother why I had to get the tattoo. She said, ‘Who will marry a girl without a tattoo? No one will take you unless you have them.’
A post shared by Stories of Nepal (@storiesofnepal)
Aside from beautification, another key reason Tharu women tattooed themselves was to avoid the attention of The Royal Nepalese, who hated tattoos associated with tribal and indigenous peoples. Tharu tattoos prevented nobles from abducting and keeping them as sex slaves.
A post shared by Sanjib Chaudhary (@sankuchy)
Despite a rich tattooing history, Tharu youngsters do not get tattooed. Experienced tikaniyas are no longer found in the villages and younger generations have not yet come forward to steer this age-old tradition.
However, as tattoos become increasingly more fashionable with safer, quicker and easier technology, it's trendy now to document and post tattoo patterns worn by Tharu women elders online, sparking a renewed interest in the art form.
Journalist and photographer ‘Travelin’ Mick,’ heavily tattooed himself, has been traveling and documenting the last remaining tattoo cultures throughout the world for the last 15 years, including Nepal. Here's a look at an array of intricate traditional tattoo patterns that may fade into memory if the Tharu art of tattooing disappears:
A post shared by Travelin' Mick (@travelinmicktattoo)
A post shared by Travelin' Mick (@travelinmicktattoo)
A post shared by Travelin' Mick (@travelinmicktattoo)
A post shared by Travelin' Mick (@travelinmicktattoo)
A post shared by Travelin' Mick (@travelinmicktattoo)
A post shared by Travelin' Mick (@travelinmicktattoo)
A post shared by Travelin' Mick (@travelinmicktattoo)
Perhaps as young Tharu are reintroduced to the art of tattooing via social media, incorporating new colors, designs and patterns inspired by traditional designs may reignite this age-old tradition.
A variant of this story was published in the ECS magazine.

author: Sanjib Chaudhary


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Ugandan Police Investigate a Serial Murder Spree Targeting Women · Global Voices
James Propa

A screenshot of a YouTube video of the Inspector General of Police, Kale Kayihura, addressing the public in Nansana, Wakiso district, where several women have been murdered.
Uganda finds itself in the midst of a serial murder mystery targeting women. Between June 7 and September 5, twenty women have been found brutally murdered in the cities of Entebbe and Nansana, located 30 and 20 kilometers respectively from Kampala, the capital.
Local television station NTV Uganda reports on the first nine murders of women ranging in age between 17-32 who were all killed in similar ways including strangulation and the insertion of sticks in the mouth and genitals, implying alleged acts of rape.
Several arrests have been made in relation to the murders in both cities, but the suspects’ guilt has not yet been confirmed. Despite these arrests, more murders have taken place since these individuals have been on remand. Police in Nansasa are holding 8 suspects including boyfriends, husbands, and friends of four of the deceased, indicating ‘jilted lovers’ as a motive.
Witchcraft is another theory. Inspector General of Police Kale Kayihura suggested that a businessman may have contracted hitmen to kill women to secure blood to perform wealth-generation rituals. The Daily Monitor, a local newspaper, reports:
“The suspect confessed that he had killed eight women on orders of a businessman here in Nansana. The blood is to feed his rituals to get more wealth,” Gen Kayihura said. The police should be commended if such a suspect exists and a confession to that effect was extracted. However, the public is not interested in such public pronouncements.
In response, reader Ahamushozi Kanungu posed a question:
Why are they not arresting the moneyed man?! Since they are aware of him and yet they are in a rush to arrest innocent people without clearly formulated motive!!
Furthermore, distrustful residents dubious about their authorities have engaged in community policing activities to curb criminal offenses in their communities. Kayihura, the Inspector General of Police, further stressed this point at a recent community meeting in Nansana, as reported by NTV Uganda's Raymond Mujuni. Kayihura announced:
“We have put in place security measures aimed at enhancing popular vigilance — participation of the people — as well as increasing police visibility and effectiveness so as to protect the communities in the areas affected…”
On Tuesday, September 5, parliamentarians voted to suspend activities until the Minister of Internal Affairs and internal security officials come up with a comprehensive report on the murders. This directive comes on the heels of landslides in Eastern Uganda and floods in the North competing for attention from the Parliament.
During the session, Rosemary Seninde, an MP representing the Wakiso district where murders have occurred said:
It is so saddening that we have not got the actual suspects. The manner in which some of the women are being killed is very terrible and humiliating to those of us who see them.
Anger over the mysterious murders erupted on Twitter:
Twitter user @ndix_devar called on police to bring back ASP Muhammad Kirumira to Nansana, citing his record of significantly reducing crime rates in the area during his tenure.
Endless killings especially in Nansana munucipity. Why don't we bring back Afande Kirumira to conclusively deal with these idiots
— Ndix_devar (@ndix_devar) September 4, 2017
Michael Kategaya shared a chart showing the age ranges of victims between 17-32 years old and from low incomes backgrounds:
Who's killing women in Ebbs and Nansana? What does available data on victims tell us about potential victims? #WakisoKillings pic.twitter.com/4M1BI1b3rA
— Michael Katagaya (@mkatagaya) August 31, 2017
Ngoboka Solomon expressed concern over citizens’ security:
It's very unfortunate for Entebbe and Nansana, but Police should spend more sleepless nights and reassure us of safety!!#nbsfrontline
— NGOBOKA SOLOMON (@NGOBOKAS) August 31, 2017
The recent serial murders of women happened barely six months after Uganda's Assistant Inspector General of Police Andrew Felix Kaweesi was murdered with his driver and bodyguard on his way to work. Police linked this murder to the murders of Muslim clerics between 2015 and 2016 who were all killed by people riding on motor bikes with guns.

author: James Propa


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Adopted Georgian Journalist Launches Bid for City Assembly in Capital Tbilisi · Global Voices
Akhal-Tech Collective

Erstwhile Global Voices Joseph Alexander Smith has been giving plenty of interviews in the mellifluous Georgian language this month as he explains to local media his decision to run for a seat in the Tbilisi city assembly.
Powered by social media, Smith, who was born in Britain and became a citizen of Georgia earlier this year, hopes the campaign will bring attention to a number of pressing issues in the elegant capital of the South Caucasus country.
In an interview with Global Voices, he explains why he decided to get involved in the cut and thrust of Georgian municipal politics ahead of the Tbilisi elections on October 21.
GV: Why did you decide to run?
J.A.S: For the last few years I’ve been involved in urban activism on a range of issues – everything from urban cultural heritage to pedestrian rights and road safety. I first got involved around the time that protests were growing against the “Panorama Tbilisi” project – a gross invasion of private commercial interest in the historic heart of Tbilisi. The process of approving the project broke with all acceptable norms of urban planning and public involvement in decision-making, but the ruling party’s comprehensive hold over city government meant that politicians felt no obligation to hear our concerns.
I realized that eventually, activists would have to go into politics in order to change the way our city government makes decisions on our behalf and I resolved to run in future elections. This year, however, once it became clear that the only independent deputy in the City Assembly (Sakrebulo), Aleko Elisashvili, would be running for mayor and no longer eligible to run for a seat in Sakrebulo, I realized that I might have to bring my plans forward, and with no other independent candidates coming forward, I decided to put my head on the block, as it were.
Smith makes notes during his pre-election campaign.
GV: What is at stake?
J.A.S: With the disintegration of the ruling Georgian Dream coalition after the last local elections in 2014, we have inherited a fairly diverse Sakrebulo with a number of parties represented, albeit with a huge majority from the ruling party. This diversity is now under threat, given the privileged position of the ruling party, and we can reasonably expect that Georgian Dream will all but sweep the board in both the majoritarian and party-list contests (the Sakrebulo is made up of 25 deputies elected by districts, and 25 elected according to a proportional, party-list system).
Although I’m sure some opposition parties will get through, it’s also important to increase the diversity of opposition in local government, and have independent deputies there too – people who are accountable only to the electorate and not to their party boss.
The other reason why I think it’s important to run as an independent, is because the dominance of national parties in local government creates a devaluing effect on local government institutions. Tbilisi’s Sakrebulo has become an attractive place for ambitious minor party figures with little or no interest in urban management processes. Sometimes they have business interests or hopes for career advancement with the party or national government, and this means that not only is the important task of urban management neglected, it is damaged and undermined by other interests.
This is why it’s vitally important for independent, non-party candidates to stand, so that the electorate has the option to elect a representative that only  has their interests at heart.
Smith meeting and greeting residents of Sakrebulo district in Tbilisi. Photo from official Facebook page.
GV: What demographic are you expecting support from?
J.A.S: I chose to run in Saburtalo because it has a very broad demographic which is largely representative of the city as a whole. The problems that face Saburtalo – chaotic construction, urban transport and a lack of green cover – are the problems which face the city as a whole. Apart from this, the district I’m running in already has experience of electing an independent candidate, Aleko Elisashvili, in 2014.
Smith interviewed by Georgia's Iberia TV channel.
GV: Describe your next steps…
J.A.S: To push on with the campaign and make it as effective as possible – I’m currently putting final touches to the campaign program (manifesto), campaign visuals, the official launch event and timetable for campaign events. It’s a huge challenge, because I’m doing this for the first time ever, I don’t have a lot of money (or really any at this point) and I’m very dependent on volunteers – who have been doing a brilliant job.
Still, I don’t think this is an issue, as I benefit from being a new face and my story – a foreigner who arrived in Georgia only a few years ago, became nativized and who has no links to any political party – is very attractive to many. Still, none of that replaces the hard work of going door-to-door and meeting voters, being asked tough questions about my program, and working on solutions to specifically local manifestations of city-wide problems. I’m itching to get stuck in on that, and I’m having my shoes re-soled ready for some serious walking!
Smith at a recent rally in Tbilisi. Photo by GV partner Open Caucasus Media.
GV: What are Georgia’s rules on foreigners obtaining citizenship?
J.A.S: Although there is no legal concept of dual citizenship in Georgia, the constitution has a provision for citizens of foreign countries to be granted Georgian citizenship, if it’s in state interests, by presidential decree. I applied back in 2013, admittedly not long after arriving, and was turned down. I applied again late last year once I’d already started doing TV and media appearances and talking about urban problems in our city, and luckily received a positive answer and became a Georgian citizen in February this year.
I think it was probably the happiest day of my life so far to officially and legally become part of the country I love so much and have no plans to leave. Since citizenship means so much to me, I promised to use every legal right and possibility that citizenship entails to do something good and positive for society. I hope that even if I don’t make it into Sakrebulo, my candidacy will have at least shown that it’s not a second-rate institution – it’s a place that some people really dream of working, and if that helps sloppy politicians up their game, then all the better!


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Netizen Report: Online Supporters of Myanmar’s Rohingya Face Censorship, Legal Threats · Global Voices
Netizen Report Team

Satellite image from Human Rights Watch. “The Burmese military is directly responsible for the mass burning of Rohingya villages in northern Rakhine State,” said HRW deputy Asia director.
Violence in northwest Myanmar has dominated headlines in recent weeks. More than 100,000 people from the ethnic minority Rohingya group have been displaced from their homes due to clearing operations of the Myanmar military, in response to attacks by a pro-Rohingya insurgent group. Tens of thousands of Rohingya refugees, who are mostly Muslim, are crossing into Bangladesh to escape the fighting.
There is plenty of coverage of the situation by various media, ranging from mainstream wire services to independent Rohingya-run outlets like Rohingya Blogger. But it is still difficult to obtain accurate information about the conflict, as journalists both from the region and from abroad have been struggling to gain access to the conflict areas, and local media have a history of being punished for — and barred from — covering the Rohingya. Aung San Suu Kyi, the de facto leader of Myanmar, has even accused various media of circulating “fake news” on the topic. Her government has established a Facebook page, known as the ‘Information Committee’, that claims to offer verified information about the conflict.
Ample anti-Rohingya propaganda has also spread online, reinforcing the Myanmar government’s contention that Myanmar-born Rohingya are in fact “Bengalis,” or undocumented immigrants from Bangladesh. While many such messages have spread organically, researchers saw a spike of 1,500 new Twitter accounts after clashes broke out on August 25. The accounts are spreading pro-Myanmar government messages and feature hashtags such as #Bengali and #BengaliTerrorists. It is unclear who is behind the new accounts.
The conflict is a hot topic in South and Southeast Asian social media circles, and has proven to be a divisive issue for both citizens and governments in the region.
In Indonesia, which is majority Muslim, a veteran journalist was accused of defamation for comparing former Indonesian President Megawati Sukarnoputri to Myanmar's Aung San Suu Kyi in a Facebook post.
In the post, journalist and documentary filmmaker Dandhy Dwi Laksono wrote that if Myanmar’s government is being criticized for its treatment of ethnic Rohingya, the Indonesian government should similarly be held liable for suppressing the independence movement on the Indonesian island of West Papua. He further compared Suu Kyi’s silence on the persecution of the Rohingya to Megawati’s role as party leader of the government, which has recently intensified the crackdown on West Papuan independence activists. If he is prosecuted for and convicted of defamation, Dandhy could face up to four years in prison.
Signs of #Rohingya Muslim Genocide.
1st of December pic.twitter.com/1jsf1koJKR
— Khaled Beydoun (@KhaledBeydoun) December 1, 2014
At the other end of the spectrum, the Indian government requested that Twitter locally censor the above tweet expressing solidarity with the Rohingya. An estimated 40,000 Rohingya live in India, where their citizenship status has been in legal jeopardy due to recent efforts by conservative legislators to render them “illegal” immigrants.
Palestinian human rights activist Issa Amro was arrested by the Palestinian Authority for criticizing a journalist’s arrest in a Facebook post. The post, which is no longer visible on the platform, denounces the arrest of Ayman Qawasmi, who was arrested after openly criticizing the PA and calling for the resignation of Palestine’s President and Prime Minister. Qawasmi was released, but Amro remains under arrest, charged with stirring sectarian tensions and “speaking with insolence”.
Amro is also facing challenges in an Israeli military court on disputed charges relating to his political protest activities. The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights published a statement expressing concern at his arrest and urging his release.
El Faro and Revista Factum, two highly regarded independent news websites in El Salvador, received violent threats on social media targeting specific journalists who have been covering corruption in the country’s criminal justice system. One threatening tweet said Factum and El Faro journalists would “end up like Christian Poveda,” a French-Spanish journalist killed by members of the Mara Salvatrucha gang in 2009.
The Head of the Salvadoran National Police, Howard Cotto, and Vice President Oscar Ortiz said they were aware of reports of illegal activity by police officers and promised to open an investigation.
Demonstrators gathered outside Twitter’s Japan headquarters in Tokyo, demanding the company take more action to rein in hate speech. Tokyo No Hate, a volunteer collective of activists, led the demonstration by covering the sidewalk in front of the office with printouts of abusive tweets. Protesters symbolically stomped on the tweets before crumpling them up and depositing them in recycling bins.
A secret decree by the Chilean government recently made public by investigative journalists modifies the country’s law about the interception of communications. It extends requirements for companies to retain data on digital communications made in Chile from one to two years, and asks companies to store additional metadata on communications. It also contains provisions that could stymie the use of encryption technologies that would hinder the delivery of this information. The Santiago-based digital rights group Derechos Digitales says the law may be unconstitutional.
New regulations in China will make chat group administrators responsible — and even criminally liable — for messages containing politically sensitive material, rumors, violent or pornographic content, and news from Hong Kong and Macau that “has not been reported by official media outlets.” This represents a bold policy shift by extending the work of regulating online content beyond government workers and companies to the users themselves.
The new rules also require Internet chat service providers such as WeChat and QQ to verify the identities of users and keep a log of group chats for at least six months. The rules require the companies to moderate users’ access to chat services depending on their “social credit” rating: those who break rules may see their rights to manage group chats suspended and be reported to the government. Group managers will be seen as responsible for the management of the group.
Mahsa Alimardani, Ellery Roberts Biddle, Oiwan Lam, Mong Palatino, Elizabeth Rivera, Nevin Thompson and Sarah Myers West contributed to this report.

author: Netizen Report Team


text:
Thousands of Indians Take to Streets Seeking Justice for Murdered Journalist Gauri Lankesh · Global Voices
Inji Pennu

Screenshot from YouTube video “Silence is not an Option” uploaded by lumiphernia.
Nearly 15,000 people demonstrated in Bangalore on September 12, 2017 to condemn the murder of veteran journalist Gauri Lankesh the week before.
The protest gathered people from various walks of life, including journalists, academicians, filmmakers, actors, students, and farmers around a single message, “I am Gauri,” to demand justice in the case.
Lankesh, 55, was the editor of a Kannada-language newspaper called Gauri Lankesh Patrike that was vocally critical of the right-wing politics of Hindu nationalist organizations and Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
#IAmGauri: Mile-long procession to protest killing of #GauriLankesh winds its way past Anandrao Circle, in Bangalore pic.twitter.com/eADs7c8GVt
— churumuri (@churumuri) September 12, 2017
The newspaper that Lankesh edited and published did not take advertisements but relied on subscribers who were mostly from the lower class. A commemorative edition was launched during the Bangalore rally.
#IAmGauri
Commemorative edition of Gauri Lankesh Patrike released at bangalore resistance event
Her mother says ‘you are all gauri’ pic.twitter.com/ioVZiS0SrD
— Deepa Kurup (@deepakurup) September 12, 2017
On the same day, journalists and friends such as Sudhamshu Mitra, Sudipto Mandal and others launched a blog to aggregate translations of Lankesh's writing and mainstream and social media mentions of her.
Lankesh's death by assailants riding motorcycles on September 5, 2017, has highlighted how increasingly dangerous India is becoming for reporters and how their civil rights are being deteriorated in a climate dominated by Hindu nationalists.
She had expressed concerns in a series of recent interviews with various Indian publications including TheWire.in and NewsLaundry about the state of free speech in India. She herself had been convicted of defaming two politicians from the ruling political party Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in November 2016 and sentenced to six months in prison. According to reports, she had secured bail and was appealing the case.
In the wake of her killing, Prime Minister Modi and the BJP have faced renewed accusations of creating an atmosphere of hatred and polarisation across the country that has lead to persecution and violence against minorities, including Dalits and Muslims, and anyone who promotes a secular, diverse India.
But the BJP has pushed back against linking their politics to Lankesh's murder.
In the lead-up to the protest in Bangalore, a spokesperson from BJP, Ashwath Narayan held a media conference where he announced that protesters’ speech would be “monitor[ed]” and warned anyone who blamed the “Sangh Parivar” — referring to the family of Hindu nationalist organisations — would be sued.
Also before the protest, the youth wing of BJP served historian Ramchandra Guha a legal notice threatening him with civil and criminal defamation suits if he didn't apologize for linking the most prominent Hindu nationalist organisation, Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), to Lankesh's murder.
Cartoonist Satish Acharya took a jibe at this development with his graphics:
I am Gauri! #IAMGauri #GauriLankesh @sifydotcom cartoon pic.twitter.com/3SaP85HYv9
— Satish Acharya (@satishacharya) September 12, 2017
Note: It is the face of Gauri Lankesh on the floor, as she was murdered, merging with a lot of people as she bloomed into a crowd – all of them being silenced. The non-English speech bubble says “I am Gauri” similar to the English speech bubble.
At the protest in Bangalore, which was organized by various civil society groups under the umbrella of “Gauri Hatye Virodhi Vedike” (“The opposition movement against Gauri's murder”), speakers warned about the dangerous times India is living in. Journalist  P. Sainath said:
There has rarely been a period of such constructed, deliberate terror and hatred. We are up against the largest machine of hate. There will be incredible provocation in coming days, but you should not fall for those traps of hatred.
An installation comprising black umbrellas was made by protesters, as tweeted by journalist Sagarika Ghose:
Umbrella installation at #IAmGauri protest this afternoon pic.twitter.com/Zya2X8IvBW
— Sagarika Ghose (@sagarikaghose) September 12, 2017
Journalist Anusha Ravi provided a glimpse of the protests:
Massive is probably an understatement for the numbers gathered for #IAmGauri protests in Bengaluru. pic.twitter.com/6tjfWQXzSG
— Anusha Ravi (@anusharavi10) September 12, 2017
Activist Kavita Krishnan applauded the spirit of the protests:
Massive #IamGauri rally & convention in Bangalore today. So many young students, rainbow of people's movement groups rallied against fascism pic.twitter.com/RhkK3KlTib
— Kavita Krishnan (@kavita_krishnan) September 12, 2017
Sidharth Chadha, who lives in Sweden, shared a short video created with the images of the rally with the following message:
Silence is not an option.
In solidarity with friends and journalists in Bangalore.
And Rekha Raj, an eminent Dalit feminist writer working for Amnesty International, participated in the protest and posted photos on Facebook:
Meanwhile, many supporters of BJP and other Hindu nationalist organisations took jibes at Lankesh and the protest:
#IAmGauri
I used to abuse Hindus , RSS & BJP – nothing happened to me except some court cases.
I abused ultra Left and was instantly killed
— Rishi Bagree ?? (@rishibagree) September 12, 2017
Hate speech in public discourse in India is growing, and Lankesh's murder is seen as a clear warning to the voices in India who express dissent that intolerance is growing. If the space for civil debate continues to be squeezed, the country risks violence and intimidation by the people in power becoming the new normal.

author: Inji Pennu


text:
What’s the Value of Human Rights? According to the Philippines House of Representatives, $20. · Global Voices
Julius Rocas

Youth protest against drug-related extrajudicial killings. Source: Anakbayan. Used with permission
Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte's allies in the House of Representatives led by Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez have voted to give 1,000 pesos (20 US dollars) to the 2018 budget of the Commission on Human Rights (CHR), a constitutional body tasked to ensure that the state is upholding various human rights laws and treaties.
Around 112 lawmakers joined the house speaker in the vote to render the agency practically useless in performing its mandate. The CHR has been consistently voicing its concern over the excesses of Duterte's “war on drugs,” which has already killed 13,000 drug suspects.
The CHR was created by the 1987 Philippine Constitution to prevent a repeat of the massive human rights abuse committed under the 21-year dictatorship of Ferdinand Marcos. Duterte has repeatedly said he looks up to the former strongman whom he allowed to be buried at the Libingan ng mga Bayani (Heroes’ Cemetery) in 2016.
The meager budget is all but the latest blow from the Duterte administration, which has deemed the CHR as a nuisance to its campaign to fight illegal drugs.
But the CHR is not alone in condemning the extrajudicial killings of suspected drug personalities. Aside from the political opposition, church groups, and various civil society organizations, Duterte's bloody “war on drugs” has also earned the disapproval of the international community such as the European Union and the UN Commission on Human Rights.
During a media interview, Speaker Alvarez explained the reasons why the majority decided to defund the CHR:
Wala akong makitang dahilan para sustentohan kayo ng gobyernong ito. Mas gusto niyo pa protektahan ang mga karapatan ng mga kriminal, hindi ang mga biktima
I see no reason for this government to fund [CHR]. You prefer to protect the rights of criminals instead of the victims.
Commission on Human Rights logo
Responding to the criticism of some Congress members, the CHR clarified its official duty:
We regret that despite continued clarifications on our mandate, they have wrongly perceived our role as combative rather than a collaborative effort to bolster Philippine democracy by ensuring that all public officials are honest in the performance of their duties and adhere to universally accepted principles of human rights.
The CHR said it will continue to perform its mandate even with the small funding:
Despite these circumstances, we will not turn our backs on our Constitutional duty to render justice for all and give everyone their due. The concern for human rights is beyond partisanship or disagreement. We shall seek means to move forward and navigate through the hurdles mindful of our oath to serve the people and the Republic—because it is what is right and what is needed of the times.
After the media reported the 1,000-peso budget of the CHR, Filipinos quickly took to social media to express their outrage.
Ted, a young professional, criticized the government on Facebook:
The 1000-peso CHR budget means the government is crap and has no regard for human rights.
Facebook user Kim Tanhui urged fellow Filipinos to stop tolerating human rights abuses:
EVERY person's rights as a human must be protected, whichever official, candidate, or party he or she may be supporting.
This is about the public tolerating this blatant disregard for human rights and morality, which unfortunately, has become the norm during the recent months. Wake up, people! This is your government telling you that your human rights is worth only P 1,000. This is your government rendering the CHR, the body which was designated to protect you from government abuses, powerless.
Twitter user @DonyaJemimah did some quick number crunching to highlight how much Duterte's allies have valued human rights:
1K = CHR'S BUDGET (HUMAN RIGHTS)
1K = 103M FILIPINOS = 0.000009 EACH
APPARENTLY, 1 VFRESH CANDY IS MORE EXPENSIVE THAN OUR HUMAN RIGHTS ?
— sushi (@DonyaJemimah) September 13, 2017
Even United Nations special rapporteur for extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, Agnes Callamard, posted her dismay:
Reprehensible and unconscionable: #Philippines Congress slash annual budget of Commission for Human Rights to 20 USD @UNHumanRights
— Agnes Callamard (@AgnesCallamard) September 12, 2017
Even some supporters of the president expressed their shocked by the brazen move of the Lower House. With the Lower House essentially done with their part of the budget process, the ball is now with their counterparts in the Senate, the upper chamber of the Philippine Congress whose members are able to move with more flexibility away from the president's line as they enjoy a broader and nationwide constituency. Some senators have already committed to restoring the CHR's original proposed budget of 678 million pesos ($13.2 million) once they resume their budget deliberations.
Will this outrage be sustained and help opposition senators in giving the CHR a more appropriate budget? How will the Duterte administration maneuver to ensure the CHR is rendered useless with its $20 budget? With activists and various cause-oriented groups gearing up for a big gathering this coming September 21 to commemorate the 45th anniversary of the declaration of martial law, which ushered in massive human rights abuses by the Marcos dictatorship, this move by the Duterte administration will certainly be not forgotten.

author: Julius Rocas


text:
Estonian President Warns of ‘Self-Occupation,’ Prompting Praise and Political Spin · Global Voices
Freya Yost

Estonian President Kersti Kaljulaid giving a speech in June 2017. Photo by Estonian Foreign Ministry, CC-BY.
In her recent independence day speech, Estonian President Kersti Kaljulaid spoke on technological change, the globalization of labor, and the dangers of close-minded nationalism. This last point has dominated global reactions to her remarks.
In her national address, which marked the 26th anniversary of Estonian independence from the Soviet Union, President Kaljulaid talked about the perceived contradictions between national and socially liberal values. Her remarks were concrete and straight forward, emphasizing the possibility of preserving Estonian culture “without inhibiting democracy.”
“I am proud that I am an Estonian and I do not see any contradiction in also being part of an international value-based community,” she said.
She continued:
Iseseisvus tähendaski muuhulgas võimalust olla ka eri meelt. Üks idee, üks arvamus, üks õigus – see oli see, millest me tahtsime vabaks saada. Toona tundsime sarnases mõttelaadis ilmeksimatult ära totalitarismi.
Täna, 26 aastat hiljem, oleme millegipärast hakanud arvama, et me ei vajagi oma erimeelsusi. Tundub ka, nagu ei oskaks me enam leida mõistlikke kompromisse. Selliseid, mille puhul võimalikult paljude süda oleks ikkagi rahul.
Among other things, independence also means the opportunity to disagree. One idea, one opinion, one right – this is what we wanted to be free of. At that time [when Estonia gained independence from the Soviet Union], we explicitly recognised that this way of thinking meant totalitarianism.
Today, 26 years later, we have for some reason started to think that different opinions are no longer necessary. We seem unable find any reasonable compromises anymore – ones that many people would be happy with.
Kaljulaid outlined current, nationalist attitudes in Estonia that are also being felt around the world. Instead of supporting socially inclusive choices, she observed that the emphasis these days seems to be on everybody’s right to make their own choices.
She drew on Estonia’s history and the Baltic states’ fight for freedom, saying how the struggle from Soviet occupation allowed for democratic states that easily adopted governments that “follow the rule of law, value personal liberties, free media, and keep the power of state within a predictable framework.”
Now, Kaljulaid warned, Estonians are threatened by a “self-occupation” that can be brought on by the restriction of freedoms in the name of an idea.
“One cannot aspire to lead the society and then make compromises related the Estonia's long-term future in the name of one's own short-term political interests. Victory is accompanied by the obligation to make sure that the losers do not feel they have been sacrificed for the interests of others,” she said.
She continued:
Iseenda okupeerimine, see algab ühe idee nimel, ühe mõtte taha koondununa teiste ideede ja mõtete kuulamata jätmisest. Järgneb selle tüütu pirina, mis on eriarvamus, kinni keeramine. Sest kui nagunii ei kuula, siis saab teistest mõtetest müra. Ja valmis ta ongi. Demokraatiast saab minevik.
Me näeme sellist iseenda okupeerimist riikides, kelle kohta me oleme arvanud, et meiega sarnane raudse eesriide kogemus aitab niisuguseid arenguid vältida. Me oleme olnud veendunud, et demokraatiat neis riikides, nagu ka meie riigis, saaks hävitada vaid võõras võim.
Sellepärast on oht, et me ei pane pahaks sarnaste arengute toetamist nende poolt, kes kõnelevad meiega sama keelt. Iseenda okupeerimine, see käib hiilivamalt kui siis, kui okupant on võõras. Vabaduste piiramine mis iganes püha idee nimel, olgu selleks puhas eestlus või parem toiduvalik – see on iseenda okupeerimise algus.
An occupation is usually initiated in the name of an idea, mobilising behind a concept without listening to other ideas or concepts. This is followed by shutting off the annoying buzz of dissenting opinions, because if you don't listen, the ideas of others will just turn into noise. That's all it takes. And democracy is consigned to the past.
We see this self-occupation occurring in countries where we thought that our similar experience behind the Iron Curtain would help them avoid such developments. We had been convinced that democracy in those countries, as in ours, could only be destroyed by a foreign power.
And therefore we are in danger of not taking offence at the support for such developments if those promoting them speak the same language we do. Self-occupation moves more stealthily than occupation by a foreigner. The restriction of freedom, in the name of any sacred idea, be it pure Estonianism or a better choice of food – can mark the start of self-occupation.
The speech resonated within the country and the neighboring region. Estonian historian, politician and journalist Toomas Alatalu remarked:
Pres Kaljulaid määratles galantselt Eesti tänase tsensuuri = iseenda okupeerimine elik näed vaid oma ideed ja mõtet ning sulged teistel suud
— Toomas Alatalu (@toomasalatalu) August 20, 2017
Presid. Kaljulaid defined new censorhip – self-occupation/occupy yourself = all is initiated in the name of own idea shutting off all others.
Latvian financier, politician, and former basketball player Mārtiņš Bondars praised the speech on Twitter:
Liels prieks, ka mūsu kaimiņiem ir tāda līdere … lieliska runa! https://t.co/qXaWiL3Elq
— Mārtiņš Bondars (@MartinsBondars) August 24, 2017
It is a great pleasure that our neighbors are such a leader … a great talk!
In contrast, Russian-language media latched onto the introduction of the term “self-occupation”. Outlets such as Lenta.ru linked it to the ongoing initiative by Baltic countries to ask for compensation for damage incurred during the period between 1940-1990 when they were forcibly made part of the Soviet Union, and to Baltic efforts to integrate the term “Soviet occupation” into official European language historicizing totalitarianism and honoring its victims. As the Russian government considers Russia an heir to both the Russian Empire and the USSR, this is likely seen as a direct affront to its reputation.
Kaljulaid also spoke to concrete challenges that Estonia faces, including current and future technologies that are set to globalize workforces and make geography and place obsolete.
Since Estonia’s independence in 1991, the country has been an active participant in the global community especially via digital technologies. Estonia has one of the world’s fastest broadband services and was the first country to declare internet access a basic human right. Kaljulaid herself often speaks of “cyber hygiene” and digital societies – as opposed to digital technologies – that are inclusive of everyone.
Estonia began offering e-government services in 1997, and began providing nationwide free wi-fi in 2002. Online voting began in 2005. In 2012, fiber optic infrastructure was laid out and today 99% of state administrative services can be accessed online. Estonia is set to create the world’s first data embassy in Luxembourg – a center that stores the country’s data and is capable of re-booting the country in case of a cyber attack.
Having already established such high digital literacy, connectivity, low usage prices and e-services, Estonia is turning to some of the more challenging questions raised by the digital transformation such as citizens rights, security, and the protection of private information.
Estonia has now assumed the presidency of the Council of the European Union, helping to nurture the development of a digital society in the EU as Estonia has. These issues indeed may become central to how Europe and the rest of the world navigate widespread nationalist attitudes on a global stage.

author: Freya Yost


text:
Vending Machines Around the World that Japanese People Find Surprising · Global Voices
Nevin Thompson

“Here's a vending machine in a mall for buying Likes for your Instagram pics.” — Alexey Kovalev, Global Voices Russia Editor. Image courtesy Vasily Sonkin.
Deserved or not, Japan has long had a reputation for being the home of weird and wacky vending machines. What is not as commonly understood, however, is what Japanese people think about vending machines in other countries.
One member of Naver Matome, a popular Japanese blogging site, decided to find out. In an post titled “Vending Machines That Even Japanese People Are Surprised By” (日本人もびびる) — which has been viewed several hundred thousand times already — vortexxx collected a series of images posted by Japanese Twitter users.
The first photo of a remarkable vending machine (at least from a Japanese point of view) is from Hitoki Nakagawa, the Vladivostok bureau chief for Asahi Shimbun, a well respected daily newspaper. The machine in his photo sells ultra-expensive caviar:
ウラジオストクに帰るため、モスクワのシェレメチボ空港にいます。気づいたのですが、キャビアの自動販売機が。今日は品切れでしたが高いもので20000ルーブル。今のレートでも4万円以上。猫には食べられませんが、こんな高額品をここで買うかな pic.twitter.com/fqnMrRSd6z
— 中川仁樹 Hitoki NAKAGAWA (@HitokiNAKAGAWA) January 1, 2015
I'm at Sheremetyevo International Airport in Moscow on my way back to Vladivostok. And what's before me but a caviar vending machine. While it's sold out today, there is one super expensive kind worth 20,000 rubles, which based on today's exchange rate is about 40,000 yen (about US$400). While I'd never feed it to a cat, I wonder if anyone ever buys such luxury goods here.
Caviar vending machines seemed to spark interest among many Japanese social media users. Here, someone else found a machine that sold slightly cheaper products:
モスクワの空港でキャビアの自販機発見。1番安いので2000ルーブル、日本円で4000円。直径5~6センチの小さいやつ。
1番大きのは直径10センチくらい？値段は高すぎて忘れた(´Д` )
買わずに撮影しただけw pic.twitter.com/MBO4YIW3QG
— 小越なつえ (@ogonatsu) September 25, 2016
A caviar vending machine at the airport in Moscow. The cheapest variety costs 2,000 rubles, about 4,000 yen (approximately US$40). The cans are small, only 5-6 centimeters in diameter. How much for the biggest can, about ten centimeters across? I forget the price, it was too expensive. (´Д` )
I didn't buy anything, just snapped a photo.
Some Japanese travelers also noticed vending machines selling patriotic Russian kitsch:
Sheremetyevoのヘヴィーユーザーの私がオススメするこの空港のスポット
「プーチン大統領のTシャツの自販機」 pic.twitter.com/LbtgMgZmm8
— マルーン (@maroondqx) January 10, 2017
As a heavy user of Sheremetyevo airport I recommend checking out the ‘President Putin T-Shirt vending machine’.
Others remarked on how practical some of the vending machines were:
ロシア…24時間スーパーの自販機で使い捨てコンタクト売ってるの便利すぎますわ… pic.twitter.com/KC2ye8wX48
— kirin? (@kirin6273) April 20, 2017
In Russia, there's a vending machine in a 24-hour supermarket that sells contact lenses… Super useful!
The most noteworthy vending machine of all was one that sold space food:
モスクワの空港で発見。宇宙食の自販機。「ボルシチ」、「肉とソバの実」、ドライフルーツのコンポート」などのチューブ入り宇宙食が400ルーブル（＝約800円）でした。#ロシア　#モスクワ　#宇宙食　#ボルシチ pic.twitter.com/LveGhsPLWo
— miki karasawa (@mikikparis) April 3, 2017
I discovered this at the airport in Moscow. A ‘space food vending machine’ that sells borscht, beef and buckwheat soup, dried fruit kompot and other foods sold in a tube as space food for 400 rubles.
The Naver Matome blog post also collected a few Twitter posts of other vending machines around the world that Japanese travelers found interesting. One vending machine in Germany sold Lego:
LEGOの自販機だって！ドイツいいなぁ〜(*☻-☻*) pic.twitter.com/usigjHaq
— 恵美 (@aqua__aqua) January 25, 2013
A Lego vending machine! Germany is awesome! (*☻-☻*)
Another, in Italy, provoked pangs of hunger:
イタリアにあるピザ自動販売機のピザ食べたい。
これは鬼アツ pic.twitter.com/GjnyLRvE4m
— むんご (@ikaretamungo) March 21, 2016
Here's a pizza vending machine in Italy! Now I want to eat pizza!
One of the most unusual vending machines, which a Japanese Twitter user observed in the United States, sells something that can only be bought in certain places in the country: pot.
アメリカのシアトル市に設置された医療用マリファナを販売する自動販売機。お値段1ドルからhttp://t.co/EKIuSljKku pic.twitter.com/yORTjM3IRY
— さいたま (@saitamakita) February 19, 2015
A medical marijuana vending machine in Seattle. Prices start from $1
More vending machines from around the world can be found at Naver Matome.

author: Nevin Thompson


text:
A Conversation with Paraguayan Artist Enrique Collar and His Search for Identity · Global Voices
Kurtural

Enrique Collar. Photograph by Juanma López Moreira, originally published in Kurtural, used with permission.
This is an abrdiged version of an interview with Paraguayan artist Enrique Collar originally published by Kurtural under its series “Artifices”. Interview by Sofía Hepner, Silvia Sánchez Di Martino and Juanma López Moreira.
In 1964, in the Paraguayan province of Iguazú, Enrique Collar was only four or five years old when Crescencia, his mother, was working in Buenos Aires, Argentina, just like almost one million other Paraguayans had done back then. During one of Crescencia's visits to the family back in Paraguay, she intended to go out with friends, and Enrique protested hiding her shoes to prevent his mother from ever going away again.
By 1971 Crescencia moved her child with her to Buenos Aires, where he attended college, majoring in graphic design and fine arts at Manuel Belgrano College while holding a job as a painter. He started publishing his art in 1990 in Asuncion, Paraguay while commuting between Buenos Aires and Asuncion until 1999, when he finally moved to Asuncion. He lived there until 2003, when he moved to Rotterdam, The Netherlands, where he currently lives with his wife Mireille, his daughters Roos and Lila, and their adopted puppy Sisi.
The making of this interview took about a week. Meanwhile, we shared stories and trips with the artist. We traveled via train from Rotterdam, his current place of residence, to Utrecht, the place that hosts famous paintings by the baroque Dutch painter Frans Hals to Delft, and the birthplace of Jan Vermeer. During that time, we were joking with Enrique about his life stages: an older Enrique that does not exist yet, the middle-aged Enrique, providing us with this interview; and Enrique the young, the main character of his past story, the painter hopping back and forth between Buenos Aires and Asuncion.
Kurtural: A young Enrique started painting back in Paraguay and Argentina carrying an easel in the time between attending fine arts college and your job at the painting workshop at San Telmo, the social gathering place for commoners at Paraguay. How did that happen?
Enrique Cuellar: It was the perfect environment to recover my identity in just every way. Argentina had lost the Malvinas, something that made them remember that Argentina was in fact part of Latin America. Charly Garcia started hanging out with Mercedes Sosa, folk and rock and roll were merging too, and the postmodernism was gaining popularity. I honestly had no idea what was going on in the art circles in Paraguay, but I would hang out with ordinary people. That gave me a bridge with my old childhood memories – paint the Lapachito (the National tree of Paraguay), paint the wagon they'd ask me. At the beginning, I was not in tune with any of that, but somehow, it turned into my motivation to find myself again, to get back my first six years in the countryside. There was a connection with these people because most of them were, just like me, from the province. It was a conscious decision to start capturing Paraguay in my paintings, but even deeper than that, I started fantasizing with a world where I could find familiar elements such as my grandmother and other town’s iconic people.
My first production in 1989 was done this way. I had a day job as a graphic designer for publishing houses while painting in my spare time. It was during a vacation in Paraguay with my mother that I took 10 or 15 of my pieces. Once in Asuncion, I visited several galleries, I met Belmarco then [a reknown gallerist], who showed some interest on my work. My first exposition was a total success with the critics and the media. When I returned to Buenos Aires I had extra money in my pocket, but one less painting. I remember thinking: “What have I done?, I’ve sold my soul to the devil!” This feeling came from the teachings of my professors at the fine arts college in Buenos Aires. They'd never sell their work. It's like a sin for them. They say that artwork should be sacred. For me, however, I feel that working should mean making a living out of what we do, right?
K: You say that you do not paint Paraguay anymore because you have closed that chapter in your life, and have paid that debt. What was that debt?
EC: I closed the chapter in regards to the visual arts, but I have taken my experience into audiovisual arts. About the debt, I feel that it is something that sooner or later happens to all of us who emigrate from our birth places. I feel that all human beings, especially if you have a certain amount of sensitivity, move from their birthplace due to need, or forced by circumstances, or simply to try on new adventures. However, with time, you feel the need to give something back to your place of origin. This is somehow romanticized, and Paraguayans dream of returning to that place, with building a home for their family, and give back as much as they can.
My decision to paint Paraguay was about regaining my first six years of life. All that work of a young Enrique had satisfied that need for me. I think that sensitive Latin American artists feel a need of transforming their societies in some way. After more than 200 pieces, and the movies I’ve made, I feel that my responsibility of leaving behind a legacy has been fulfilled. Now living in Europe things have changed for me once more. Here the dreams of Latin American artists are carried out in different ways. Here, needs and contexts are different, the artist has permission to be more individualistic; it is more about you as a person. When I arrived here I felt that the external need of giving had been satisfied.
K: Do you think there's a difference between the art people in Paraguay and those in other countries?
EC: I think you needn't think about the audience. You need to think about art history, about what's universal. The artist who paints for a specific audience, to sell, is underestimating him or herself. I paint for myself, I don't know who I paint for.
I have painted works that are unsellable for the “lapachito” and the “decorative style” way of thinking, and they were sold anyway. I have no Paraguayan works with me right now, everything was sold, even those that were impossible to sell. The audience is always open to new things. Painting for selling translates into comfort, and art is uncomfortable, you can never feel comfortable.
Further detail on Collar's testimony and work in the following video created by Kurtural as a part of the series (English subtitles are available):

author: Kurtural