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Four southern African nations petition to lift the international ivory trade ban · Global Voices
Prisca Daka

Photo of an African elephant. Creative Commons/Pixabay.
As the world prepares for the 18th annual Convention on the International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) and their Conference of Parties (CoP18), four southern African countries — Zimbabwe, Botswana, Namibia and South Africa — have submitted a petition and proposal seeking to remove restrictions and allow international trade in registered raw ivory of their elephants.
CITES is an “international agreement between governments to ensure that international trade in specimens of wild animals and plants does not threaten their survival,” and the convention will take place in Colombo, Sri Lanka, from May 23 to June 3,  2019.
The 12-page proposal seeks to amend the annotation to the listing of the elephant populations of Botswana, Namibia, South Africa and Zimbabwe in Appendix II. It states that the four southern African nations combined hold the world's largest elephant population with an estimated 256,000. This is equivalent to 61 percent of all African elephants.
CITES has rejected past proposals by Zimbabwe and Namibia to allow ivory trade with looser controls and this year's CoP18 promises to see the continuation of a battle that has been ongoing for 30 years now since the 1989 international ban in the ivory trade.
Will things be any different this time around? The international ban was imposed because of the decrease in the elephant population due to the poaching crisis. According to the African Wildlife Foundation, 35,000 elephants are killed for their tusks yearly. The proposal has triggered a clash between elephant conservationists and those who favor the ivory trade for economic reasons.
This will be signing the death warrant of elephants
— Christina (@CWitvrouwen) February 6, 2019
Cmon guys… This doesn't necessarily mean that elephants have to be killed. These countries may have large caches of ivory. And trade would allow these countries to do more for wildlife in these countries.
— ? (@MarlonT9) February 6, 2019
Before the ban, ivory trade in Africa flourished under lax regulations and so did poaching. The Humane Society International reported that between 1979 and 1989, the number of African elephants plummeted from approximately 1.2 million to about 600,000. This is what led to the 1989 CITES ban in the commercial trade of ivory by placing elephants on a list of species threatened with extinction.
One of the major asks from the four countries is permission to trade in registered raw ivory — meaning, they want to be allowed to sell raw ivory from elephants who die naturally. This raw ivory will be obtained from government-owned stocks excluding seized ivory and ivory of unknown origin.
In addition, the trade will only be done with trading partners that have been verified by CITES Secretariat. Proponents suggest these types of security measures ensure compliance and eliminate the possibility of selling illegally-sourced ivory.
Those against the trade of wild animal products draw their arguments from what happened when CITES approved a one-off legal ivory sale to China and Japan in 2008. The reason for the one-off sale was to flood the market, crash ivory prices and ultimately stop any financial benefit from poaching. Fifteen million United States Dollars were raised from the sale of 102 tons of government-owned stockpiles from the four southern African countries.
However, this caused a dramatic increase in elephant poaching. Those against lifting the ban point to this history to show that ivory trade does more harm than good to African elephants — even with suggested security measures.
Elephants are targeted for their ivory, which is highly prized in countries like China and Hong Kong. According to the BBC:
Ivory is seen as a precious material and is used in ornaments and jewelry. It's also sometimes used in traditional Chinese medicine. Some rich Chinese people think that owning ivory makes them look more successful. Others think that ivory will bring them good luck.
The ivory trade debate has already created major divisions on the African continent with some nations supporting it while others argue that the sale of some ivory can actually contribute to anti-poaching expenses.
Kenya is expected to strongly oppose this proposal as a member of the African Elephant Coalition, a consortium of 29 African member countries who do not support any form of trade in ivory and seek to seek to promote non-consumptive use of elephants. The group advocates for activities such as wildlife photography and general wildlife observation as opposed to game hunting.
The heart of the ivory trade ban debate centers around the fact that African elephants have and still face major threats to their survival through habitat loss and poaching.
Petitions to lift the ban have been met with rejection partly because African nations have failed to demonstrate substantial success toward reductions in illegal ivory trafficking. According to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime 2016 World Wildlife Crime Report:
Every year law enforcement authorities in Africa and Asia make large ivory seizures, many measuring over 500 [kilograms]. Between 2009 and 2014 CITES Elephant Trade Information System (ETIS) recorded 91 seized shipments, totalling 159 metric tons of ivory. This represents ivory from at least 15,900 elephants.
Still, some African countries like Zimbabwe argue that their elephant population is healthy and therefore favor the petition to revisit the ban on the ivory trade. Zimbabwe's Zimparks spokesperson stated that elephants have actually exceeded their carrying capacity:
Our elephants are not endangered. Our jumbos have exceeded the carrying capacity
— Tinashe Farawo (@FarawoTinashe) February 6, 2019
The authorities state that the current population of elephants in Zimbabwe stands at 84,000 when in fact there are approximately 50,000.
Most state agencies responsible for conservation in these four southern African nations struggle to fund elephant conservation and management. They argue that revenue generated from ivory trade could be used to benefit conservation efforts. The funds could also be used toward increasing law enforcement that targets poachers, dealers, smugglers and increased field rangers on the ground.
These arguments may lead other countries to break away from the CITES international agreement. For example, toward the end of 2018, Japan decided to pull out of the International Whaling Commission, following the rejection of its proposal to resume commercial whaling on September 14, 2018.
Some argue that the CITES focus has shifted from consumptive use to preservation of wildlife, something which the four African countries oppose. A few critics even suggest that Africa should withdraw from CITES altogether, saying the policies hurt emerging economies.
If CITES rejects their proposal, these four southern African countries could follow Japan's footsteps and pull out.

author: Prisca Daka


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#MetooUyghur campaign asks Chinese government to prove that Xinjiang detainees are still alive · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

A collage of missing Uighurs in Xinjiang. #MetooUyghur campaign image circulate on social media.
As stories of ill treatment and torture in China's “re-education camps” in the western Xinjiang province continue to circulate, Uyghur communities outside of China are demanding that Beijing release information about their missing relatives and friends.
The #MeTooUyghur social media campaign was prompted by the release of a video, from Chinese authorities, in which prominent musician and camp detainee Abdurihim Heyit told viewers that he had not been tortured to death in a Xinjiang prison.
Rumors that Heyit had died were viral on various social media platforms on February 8 and 9. Then on February 10, Turkey's Foreign Ministry issued a strong statement criticizing China’s Xinjiang policy and calling for an end to the re-education camps.
Spokesman Hami Aksoy said:
Systematic assimilation policy of Chinese authorities towards Uighur Turks is a great embarrassment for humanity…It is no longer a secret that more than one million Uighur Turks, who are exposed to arbitrary arrests, are subjected to torture and political brainwashing in concentration centers and prisons.
Aksoy went on to assert that Hyeit had died:
In such an environment, we’ve learned with great sorrow that dignified poet Abdurehim Heyit, who was sentenced to eight years in prison for his composition, died in the second year of his imprisonment.
Heyit is a master dutar player who he was sentenced to eight years in prison for one of his songs.
The next day, Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying released a video to prove that Abdurehim Heyit is still alive. In the video, the Uyghur poet said he had not been tortured and is in good health.
Hua called Turkey’s statement a “very big mistake” and said the reports about Heyit’s death were an “absurd lie.” She said that Heyit was under investigation on national security grounds.
The release of video has not quelled public tension around the treatment of detainees. Uyghur communities from all over the world have begun using the #MetooUyghur hashtag to urge the Chinese government to prove that their missing friends and relatives are still alive in Xinjiang.
@HalmuratU, a Finland-based human rights activist whose father is missing in Xinjiang, announced the campaign on Twitter:
Please join our social media campaign- #MeTooUyghur!
As you know Chinese authority responded Abdurehim Heyts scandal by released a video to show he is alive.
Are millions of detainees too alive?
Small action, big impact! You action count, please join us! #MeTooUyghur pic.twitter.com/jtpvAX0oPM
— Halmurat Harri Uyghur (@HalmuratU) February 11, 2019
The campaign has received a lot of attention and echoes. @TarimUyghur posted photos of their father, mother, brothers and sisters on Twitter and asked Beijing to show videos of them, to prove that they are still alive:
#MeTooUyghur
CCP, where is my father, mother, brothers, and sisters.
China’s government, show their videos too the way you did with#AbdurihimHeyit
Where are they?#SaveUyghur #MeTooUyghur pic.twitter.com/uHB1mNqfbg
— Mustafa Tarim Uyghur (@TarimUyghur) February 13, 2019
The Chinese government has taken notice of the campaign. Foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying told reporters on February 12:
China has more than 1 billion people, do we need to release a video of everyone?
@ferkat_jawdat, whose mother is still in a Xinjiang re-education camp, repeated the call with a cheeky reference to the massive surveillance apparatus that China has deployed in Xinjiang:
At a regular news briefing on Tuesday, Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said of the #MeTooUyghur campaign, “China has more than 1 billion people, do we need to release a video of everyone?” YES, you can, since u have 2 camera for every person!!!
— Ferkat Jawdat (@ferkat_jawdat) February 12, 2019

source: news-globalvoices

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

author: Oiwan Lam


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Users flood Reddit with China censorship memes, balk at $150 million investment from Tencent · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

Political satire about the censorship of Winnie the Pooh in China. Illustration by @Badiucao, used with permission.
If you search “China” on Reddit this week, you'll find a deluge of political memes — from the Tiananmen Square “Tank Man” photo to Winnie the Pooh to the Terminator.
These are all in protest of Reddit's recent decision to let Chinese tech giant Tencent invest $150 million into the company.
The top item in a “China” search on Reddit is Tank Man, a news photo taken at Beijing's Tiananmen Square in 1989 when the Chinese military unleashed a violent, fatal crackdown on peaceful protesters. Such images are nearly impossible to find online in China.
Screen capture of “Tank Man” post by @FreeSpeechWarrior on Reddit. Original photo by Jeff Widener, Associated Press. Reproduced under Fair Use.
Reddit user Free Speech Warrior explained why he posted the photo on Reddit:
Given that reddit just took a $150 million investment from a Chinese censorship powerhouse, I thought it would be nice to post this picture of “Tank Man” at Tiananmen Square before our new glorious overlords decide we cannot post it anymore.
In its latest funding round, Reddit garnered a total of $300 million in investments, half from Tencent and half from the company’s former investors, including Sequoia, Fidelity, Tacit and Snoop Dogg.
The platform has 330 million active users with 14 billion screenviews per month, but it is inaccessible in China due to the country's robust internet censorship regime. All major foreign social media platforms including Facebook, Twitter and YouTube are blocked by China's so-called Great Firewall.
Tencent is behind the country's most popular social media app, WeChat, and online game League of Legends. The corporation strictly abides by the Chinese law in domestic censorship measures and in recent years has attempted to extend its mobile apps to the international market.
While Chinese companies regularly invest in US media companies, this makes for an unusual match.
Although there is no indication that Tencent would have the power to promote Chinese-style censorship on Reddit, the idea of Reddit and Tencent having any sort of business relationship still feels like a paradox. Tencent is a major enforcer of China's massive social media censorship regime, while on Reddit, almost all ideas and speech are welcome. And right now, a whole lot of those ideas are coming from Reddit users who fear that the investment will lead to more censorship on the platform.
The Tank Man post on Reddit was viewed more than 203,000 times and prompted many users to post related political messages.
In one comment thread, @SpunTheOne invited people to share tricks for getting around China's Great Firewall. And another user reminded people of the security risks of using made-in-China computer devices:
China is something else. You can buy a Chinese tablet straight from China and it will have locks for accessing Google or installing the US play store. Their firmware is totally censorship driven.
A photo showing a “re-education camp” in China's Xinjiang region posted by @thehazardbal triggered another popular protest on Reddit. The Reddit user expressed worries over potential content screening with Tencent's investment:
The Chinese are baselessly putting Uighurs into internment camps just because they are Muslims. Figured I would put this out there before it becomes banned.
Other Reddit users reflected on the power of big tech companies in this discussion thread:
Tech companies are in a dilemma here, on one hand China is like the golden whale of untapped potential for $$$. On the other hand working with them often means giving tacit, outright support or even assistance to the moral and ethical failures of their government. more and more tech companies are showing that they are no better than previous corporate industries by supporting this regime which has an absolutely brutal human rights record.
A pro-Taiwan independence user also took the opportunity to promote their political position. @Foxeydog said:
Since Reddit has accepted Chinese censorship money. Need to get this out there. SUPPORT AN INDEPENDENT TAIWAN
Winnie the Pooh, a censored meme on Chinese social media, also made an appearance:
Since Reddit took a $150 million investment from Chinese Censorship company Tencent, please welcome our leader President Xi.
The cartoon bear was censored on Chinese social media after users began to (mockingly) compare his tubby body type to that of Chinese president Xi Jinping.
The meme protests have amassed plenty of attention online, despite there being little evidence that Tencent will intervene in Reddit's content moderation practices. Nevertheless, @Dariusz2K reminded the protesting Reddit fellows:
Terminator meme.


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Athan: A youth group promoting freedom of expression in Myanmar · Global Voices
Mong Palatino

Athan means ‘voice’ in Burmese language. Source: Facebook
One of the groups actively promoting freedom of expression in Myanmar is a youth-led group called Athan — which means ‘voice’ in the Burmese language.
Although recently established in 2018, Athan has already gained credibility for publishing reports about the state of media freedom in Myanmar under the government of the National League for Democracy (NLD). NLD is headed by Aung San Suu Kyi, a Nobel Laureate and former democracy icon who fought the junta which ruled the country for several decades.
Athan’s free speech advocacy has been acknowledged not only within Myanmar but also by international institutions which are monitoring the country’s transition to democracy.
Athan celebrated its first anniversary on 15 January 2019 by highlighting the reports it published about the country’s media situation. It noted that threats to freedom of expression had worsened despite the landslide victory of NLD in 2015. Maung Saungkha, founder and executive director of Athan, summarized the group’s 2018 report in an email interview with this author:
According to Athan’s collected statistics, there were 53 prosecutions and lawsuits under Telecommunications Law, 36 prosecutions against 124 activists under Peaceful Assembly and Peaceful Procession Law in 2018 only. Besides, 2018 saw 12 journalists were sued and prosecuted for allegedly breaking controversial and draconian laws of Myanmar. In fact, there were 153 cases under the Telecommunications (Law) since the time the new government was formed by NLD after the 2015 general elections.
Global Voices has previously reported some of the issues tackled in Athan’s report such as the continued use of Junta-era laws to restrict the work of media and the harassment of activists.
Maung Saungkha was among those who were arrested in 2015 using Article 66(D) for creating and publishing a poem online. He founded @athan_info a freedom of expression activist group in Myanmar, that just recently won the Human Rights Tulip Award.#saynoto66d #digitalrightsMM pic.twitter.com/Ajo9SbYBId
— EngageMedia (@EngageMedia) December 12, 2018
Asked about what reforms are needed to improve the media situation in Myanmar, Maung Saungkha reiterated the recommendations of Athan about the amendment of several repressive laws:
According to Athan’s findings, there have been 44 journalists charged under 28 prosecutions and lawsuits under various controversial laws of Myanmar under this current government. A journalist was murdered and some journalists were fired for covering news or expressing their own opinions on social media too. These statistics show existing Media Law has weaknesses which are used by government officials, military personnel and business companies to silence and arrest journalists.
So, Media Law must be amended in parliament. All lawsuits filed against journalists must be withdrawn. All journalists staying under detention including Reuters journalists must be released unconditionally. Defamation must be decriminalized in accordance with international standards.
The case of the detained Reuters journalists refers to Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo who were convicted for investigating the massacre of civilians in a Rohingya village. The Rohingya are not recognized as a minority ethnic group in Myanmar.
Athan and other CSOs gathered in downtown Yangon yesterday to mark the first anniversary of the arrest of Reuters journalists #FreeWaLoneKyawSoeOo @maung_saungkha @AungNaingSoeAns @thevmilko @LLakhdhir @seapa @Shoon_Naing @malkhin pic.twitter.com/p0TEBUBYAy
— ATHAN (@athan_info) December 13, 2018
Athan’s work also includes lobbying with local and national agencies to push for the removal of obstacles to freedom of expression. But Maung Saungkha has expressed concern that the space for citizen engagement is shrinking:
Main challenge is difficulty to meet and discuss with parliament and committees of parliament. We have experienced parliament denying our several submissions. One of the other challenges is people’s misunderstanding and misinterpretation on human rights. This is why Athan is organizing trainings, workshops on freedom of expression for students and political activists, and to inspire them to fight for freedom of expression.
Recognizing these challenges, Athan has stepped up its media advocacy work, its partnership with international networks, and its organizing of community education programs.

author: Mong Palatino


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Australia revokes Chinese tycoon’s citizenship over alleged political interference in Australian politics · Global Voices
Chinese Border-crossing Question and Answer

Huang Xiangmo. Screenshot from HK Apple TV.
The news concerning Chinese tycoon Huang Xiangmo's revoked Australian citizenship has shaken the Chinese overseas and diasporic communities last week. Huang is now settled in Hong Kong and told the media that the ban from entering the country was “grotesquely unfair” and “based on unfounded speculations that are prejudiced and groundless”. However, the Australian government and many researchers feel that Huang was unfairly using political ties to push Chinese Communist Party interests within the country.
The Chinese Border-Crossing Question and Answer project hosted by the Hong Kong based Culture and Media Education Foundation (CMEF) interviewed Perth-based researcher W.L Yeung to explain the context of the incident.
CMEF: Who is Huang Xiangmo? How has he made his reputation in Australia?
W.L Yeung (WLY): Huang Xiangmo, whose legal name is Huang Changran (黄畅然), is a property developer, a Director of the Yuhu Group (玉湖集团), a political donor and a lobbyist. He relocated to Australia from China around 2011. The Australian public first heard of him when he splashed AUD$12.8 million on a mansion in a prestigious Sydney suburb in 2012. This real estate transaction had stimulated a buying spree of similarly expensive properties among Chinese investors.
Huang caught public attention again in 2014 when he donated AUD$1.8 million to the University of Technology Sydney to replace an existing China research centre, famous for its independent critical research, with a pro-Beijing Australian-China Relations Institute (UTS ACRI) headed by Huang’s handpicked Director, Australia’s former foreign minister Bob Carr.
He subsequently donated another AUD$4.5 million to several universities. Among the beneficiaries of his generosity is a former Australian diplomat who had once been a vocal critic of the Confucius Institute.
Mainstream media did not start to look seriously into him until 2016 when a Fairfax reporter discovered that Huang had made more than AUD$1 million donations to both major political parties from 2012 to 2015. Since then the total sum surged to around AUD$3 million.
The Fairfax report also revealed details of how Huang was caught up in a corruption scandal in his hometown of Jieyang in Guangdong Province prior to his departure for Australia.
CMEF: The Australian government's decision is based on security advice that he was “amenable to conducting acts of foreign interference”. What are the “acts of foreign interference” has Huang done in Australia?
WLY: I believe the “acts of foreign interference” here refer to Huang’s united front association and the pattern of his donations, both of which suggests he has been actively seeking political influence in order to promote the interests of the Chinese Communist Party.
Huang was head of the Australian Council for the Promotion of Peaceful Reunification of China (ACPPRC) and is currently head of the Oceanic Alliance of the Promotion of Peaceful Reunification of China (OAPPRC). Both organizations are official branches of the China Council for the Promotion of Peaceful National Reunification (CCPPNR) in Beijing run by the United Front Work Department of the CCP Central Committee. Huang’s membership in these groups was mentioned by the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) as one of the reasons for cancelling Huang’s permanent resident status.
A 2016 protest rally in support of China’s sovereignty at the South China Sea (SCS) was staged by the Melbourne branch of the ACPPRC. It also links to other protest activities, including protests against the visits of the Dalai Lama to Australia.
During parliamentary debates into the Sam Dastyari scandal in 2016, alarming evidence had emerged, pointing to ways in which Huang used his friendship with politicians to solicit policy endorsement in alignment with Beijing’s interests:
Government records also indicated that Dastyari had attempted to use his political influence to fast-track Huang’s citizenship application.
CMEF: Huang has been active in Australia for many years. Why does Australia government decide to take act until now? Has there been any political and legal development recently that leads to the current decision?
WLY: Australia’s counter-espionage legislation was seriously out of date in the past. Foreign donations were permitted in Canberra as as well as in most states (except NSW). Following months of intense debates and reviews, a new set of legislation on foreign political interference was passed in June 2018 which bans foreign political donations. The new legislation gives a clear definition of political interference, provides law enforcement the necessary tools to investigate and prosecute offenders, as well as the legal basis for the government to force foreign agents to register and to prosecute them when they fail to comply.
Diplomatic relations between China and Australia is now at an all-time low. China seems to take an offence at Australia banning Huawei from taking part in future 5G mobile infrastructure rollout and the passing of the foreign political interference legislation.
What is the general public reaction to the revoke of Huang’s permanent residence? How does the Chinese community react to the news in particular?
Yeung: Public opinion supports the government’s decision. Prime minister Scott Morrison’s personal rating had slightly improved since Huang’s ban was made public, even though Liberal continues to trail behind Labor in opinion polls.
The Chinese dissident community is jubilating. A Chinese-Australian community group, the Australian Values Alliance, has just issued a statement to welcome the decision. Outside of the dissident circle, however, Chinese communities nationwide are rather quiet, reflecting a sense of uncertainty and insecurity over the impact of the new legislation.
Pro-Beijing Chinese media in Australia have fired some pathetic shots. A widely circulated WeChat post from a Perth-based public news platform attempted to rouse sympathy by claiming that Huang, a respectable community leader, had been treated worse than a serial killer. The WeChat platform is owned by the general secretary of the WA Shanghai Federation, a powerful united front group whose president is an honorary advisor of the WA branch of the ACPPRC.
Phoenix TV has also posted a video interview with Keith Suter, who called himself an Australian scholar of international studies. However, the Australian international studies community on Twitter was unable to verify Suter’s qualification and his institutional affiliation. During the interview, Suter argued against the legality of ASIO’s ruling.
CMEF: What is the implication of the decision to Australian domestic politics and diplomatic relation with China? Would there be further action taken to reduce China’s interference in Australia?
WLY: A part of the new legislation contains a transparency scheme, modeled in part on the United State’s foreign agents registration act. It will require individuals or institutions to make a declaration if they are acting on behalf of foreign power to influence the political processes of Australia. Those who are currently lobbying for foreign governments in Australia have a six-month grace period to register. It is expected that some individuals or institutions who have failed to comply will be prosecuted. So yes, I believe this will go a long way in protecting Australia against interference from most foreign countries including China.
I am one of the Australian scholars of China, the Chinese diaspora and China-Australia relations who signed a joint letter in March 2018 to support the new foreign interference legislation. I share with other cosignatories a firm believe that “identifying, recognizing and winding back CCP interference as an unacceptable and counterproductive part of bilateral engagement is a step towards developing a healthy China-Australia relationship over the long term”.


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Japanese ads aimed at women criticized for misogyny. Again. · Global Voices
Sarah Lee Stones

A Valentine's Day ad depicts female friendship as feuding and catty. Screenshot by IT media, fair use.
A now-pulled Valentine's Day advertisement from the department store chain LOFT is the latest in a long line of Japanese ad campaigns that have sparked controversy online for alleged anti-women messaging.
The offending advertisement was released on January 20 and taken down on February 4 after facing a wave of criticism on Twitter.
The advertisement's main image was a group of five blonde women clad in pink, released with the accompanying message, “Being a girl is fun!” (女の子って楽しい!), calling for women to celebrate the holiday with their female friends. On the surface, the advertisement appeared to depict a group of friends enjoying Valentine's Day together, an image that aligns with the ad copy. However, the accompanying video (now removed from YouTube and elsewhere online) implied something more insidious.
The video featured interactions between the friends like the following exchange (screenshots by IT Media, which reported on this story):
“Isn't my boyfriend so handsome?”. Image: screenshot by IT media.
“Yeah, he seems like a nice guy.” Screenshot by IT Media, fair use.
These interactions end abruptly with the phrase zuttomo (ズッ友), a slang abbreviation of zutto tomodachi (ずっと友達) meaning “friends forever.” The use of the phrase is implied to be ironic, considering the strained nature of the conversations it proceeds.
The video's closing image was one of the five friends celebrating together while remarking, “It's so nice having just us girls!”
“It's so nice having just us girls!.” Screenshot by IT Media, fair use.
This surface-level affirmation of the virtues of female friendship is soon undermined, however, when the curtain pulls back to reveal the friends locked in a petty power struggle, tugging at each other's hair and clothing, with one girl even pulling up another's skirt.
Screenshot by IT Media, fair use.
This depiction of female friendship as feuding and catty thinly veiled by a sugary facade rubbed more than a few people the wrong way, with some calling the views espoused by the ad outdated and misogynistic.
「女の友情は表面的」「異性から選ばれるべき客体」「同性同士だからスカートめくりも笑いで済まされる」というヤバすぎる感性の宝庫になってる。これ「loftでチョコ買ってバレンタインを楽しもう！」って趣旨のコンテンツじゃないの？なぜ女を敵に回した？ #午後ティー女子 の炎上を思い出すね。 https://t.co/k0i4RbQ6q8
— びーちょ (@RdNrwciwxst046S) 2019年2月2日
This is a virtual treasure trove of extremely problematic notions like, “Female friendship is shallow”, “Women are objects for male desire” and “If a girl pulls up another girl's skirt, it'll just be laughed off.” In what way does this make people want to buy Loft chocolates and celebrate Valentine's Day? What have advertisers got against women? This reminds me of the Go Go Tea fiasco.
#午後ティー女子 が非難されても尚、ゾンビの如く蘇ってくる女性をネタにした炎上マーケティング、イイ加減終わりにしてもイイと思うのだが>ロフトのバレンタイン広告に戸惑いの声　「女は陰湿という考えが透けて見える」「なんの意図？」 https://t.co/ny0LQXJ7jG
— 墨汁 (@vok_zehn) 2019年2月2日
Even after we've put the Go Go Tea controversy behind us, it seems it's back from the dead like a zombie with more inflammatory marketing making fun of women. Don't you think it's time we put an end to this kind of thing?
As many Twitter users have remarked, this latest incident is reminiscent of earlier controversies, such as the one surrounding an ad campaign for Kirin's Go Go Tea.
The 2016 commercial featured illustrated caricatures of the type of women who drink their tea, including “The Conceited Girl Who Thinks She's a Model” and “The Girl Who Depends on Her Friends for Everything.”
The Kirin tea campaign took to Twitter with a call to retweet if you knew anyone who fit any of the descriptions, but after a backlash from consumers the tweets were deleted and Kirin issued an apology.
HuffPost Japan reported:
「午後の紅茶を買ってる女性を馬鹿にしてるようにしか見えない」、「顧客を悪く描いて何が楽しいのか」「企画段階で誰もストップをかけなかったのが理解できない」などと顧客への向き合い方を疑問視する声や「イラストを見て不快になり正直買いたくなくなりました」、「女性をモノ化し、批判し、馬鹿にしている広告ですね。（中略）残念ですがもうKIRINの商品買いません」などの不買を表明する声があがった。
Many questioned Kirin's treatment of its customer base with comments like, “I can't interpret this as anything other than Kirin making fun of the women who buy Go Go Tea”, “What's so fun about painting your own customers in a bad light?” and “I can't understand how this one made it past the drawing board stage”, while others expressed an intent to boycott Kirin products: “I was so offended by these illustrations that I honestly don't want to buy their products anymore” and “This advertisement objectifies, passes judgement on, and pokes fun at women.” […] Unfortunately, I won't be buying Kirin products anymore.”
Another ad campaign that drew similar criticism was a (now removed) commercial for department store chain Sogo & Seibu, released in December 2018.
Starring actor Sakura Ando, the video was intended to promote gender equality, yet it did so by downplaying the importance of a familiar rallying cry for greater opportunities for women when it asked: “We don’t need an Age of Women, do we?”
Screenshot from the now-pulled commercial, courtesy of Japan Today.
The choice of visuals is indeed a puzzling one, as having cream pies hurled at one's face probably isn't most people's idea of empowerment. The implication that an “Age of Women” is unnecessary, especially in a country that ranks 110th among 149 nations in gender equality, is perhaps premature.
One Twitter user has a theory about the apparent prevalence of sexist advertising in Japan.
loftにしろ西武、午後ティーにしろ、「女性向け広告が悉く女性を怒らせる、ミソジニーにまみれてる」問題。
これ、一つに「バブル絶頂期に新社会人となりイキった万能感を持ち、崩壊後も“勝ち抜いて”来た自認のバブル親父が広告屋のトップに居るから」ての、大きいと思う。
— へぼやま (@heboya) 2019年2月4日
Whether it's [L]oft, Sogo & Seibu, or Go Go Tea, we have a problem with advertisements aimed at women yet steeped in misogyny and almost universally offensive to women. Perhaps one of the reasons for this is the cocky old guys at the top of the advertising firms who started working at the height of the bubble economy and are still congratulating themselves for sticking it out after the bubble burst.
Others have shared a more charitable interpretation of the Sogo & Seibu ad, seeing the plates of cream as metaphors for the challenges life throws at us and applauding Ando's toughness as she continues moving forward.
ロフトの広告が炎上したって記事見てたら西武そごうの広告も賛否両論だったって知ってびっくりした
西武のあの広告かっこよくて好きだったけど…
— はる(Hume) (@RitHume) February 6, 2019
I was reading an article about the Loft advertisement controversy and saw that the Sogo & Seibu ad also stirred up quite a bit of debate. I was surprised as I thought the ad was cool and quite liked it myself…
The conversation can be followed on Twitter.

author: Sarah Lee Stones


text:
Netizen Report: Will India’s regional internet shutdowns ever end? · Global Voices
Netizen Report Team

India internet shutdown map, January 2010 – March 2017. Created by National Law University Delhi and the Centre for Communication Governance (CC BY)
The Advox Netizen Report offers an international snapshot of challenges, victories, and emerging trends in technology and human rights around the world. This report covers news and events from February 8-14, 2019.
Since the start of February, authorities in at least three Indian states — Rajasthan, Jammu and Kashmir, and Manipur — imposed temporary shutdowns of all mobile internet services, all in apparent response to political tensions.
Protests in Manipur against a controversial citizenship amendment bill triggered a mobile internet shutdown on February 11, as demonstrations reached boiling point, with authorities imposing a curfew after protesters began blocking roadways in 24-hour shifts.
Proposed and promoted by the Modi government, with national elections fast approaching, the bill has sparked criticism in border states like Manipur (which shares a border with Myanmar) that have large populations of migrants from other parts of Asia. The citizenship amendment bill would create a new pathway to citizenship for people from certain religious groups who migrated to India due to religious persecution.
Some in Manipur oppose the bill for fear that it would cause an influx of migrants in the already resource-burdened state. Others oppose the bill on grounds of religious discrimination — the bill includes a list of protected religious minorities that would benefit from the reform, which includes Buddhists, Christians, Hindus and Sikhs, but not Muslims.
Meanwhile in Rajasthan, ethnic Gujjars staged large-scale labor protests to secure stronger protections for jobs for Gujjar workers under state statute. Along with other tactics, demonstrators conducted a five-day sit-in on a major railway, blocking the track for trains that run between Delhi and Mumbai. This led to a day-long shutdown of mobile internet services, also on February 11.
And in Jammu and Kashmir, networks went dark in the Kashmir Valley when Indian PM Narendra Modi visited the conflict-rattled area on February 3. This is nothing new for residents, who have been the worst affected by India’s internet shutdown blitz over the past two years. In 2018 alone, the New Delhi-based Software Freedom Law Centre documented 65 mobile internet shutdowns in Jammu and Kashmir.
Maria Ressa, the founding editor-in-chief of independent media site Rappler and CNN’s former bureau chief for Manila and Jakarta, was arrested on February 13 after the Philippine Department of Justice filed charges of “cyber libel” against Rappler, Ressa and former Rappler staffer Reynaldo Santos. The charges stemmed from a complaint from businessman Wilfredo D. Keng about a 2012 Rappler story that linked Keng to illegal drugs and human trafficking.
Ressa was released from detention after she posted bail on February 14. In a statement to reporters, she said: “This is the sixth time that I have posted bail and I will pay more bail than convicted criminals. I will pay more bail than Imelda Marcos.”
Rappler has aggressively covered extrajudicial drug killings in the Philippines and has been a frequent target of attacks by President Rodrigo Duterte, who has several times publicly accused Rappler of being a “fake news outlet”.
On February 12 and 13, internet experts from Venezuela reported multiple unusual incidents on key websites for people and politicians that oppose the Maduro government. The official website of Venezuela’s National Assembly has been offline and online intermittently, on both domestic and international networks.
The more peculiar incident occurred on VoluntariosxVenezuela, an opposition-aligned organizing platform for Venezuelans seeking to bring food and medical supplies to people in need. On February 12, people trying to access the site over Venezuela’s state-owned internet service provider, CANTV, found that when they entered the accurate URL for the site [voluntariosxvenezuela.com], they were automatically redirected to voluntariovenezuela[dot]com, an imitation of the real thing. Technical evidence gathered and reported by Andres Azpurua at VESinFiltro indicated that the redirect resulted from a DNS spoofing maneuver, with the likely objective “phishing” or collecting the personal data of people interested in opposition activities. The imitation site, which was hosted by Digital Ocean, is no longer accessible.
VESinFiltro and NetBlocks both reported that Google services, including YouTube, have been intermittently unavailable on CANTV as well.
On February 8, Facebook banned 732 accounts that bore the name of Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and were reportedly spreading rumors and false information. According to government sources, the removals came at the request of the National Telecommunication Monitoring Cell. In contrast to other recent mass account removals on “disinformation” grounds (in Iran, Indonesia and Myanmar), this was not reported on Facebook’s company blog.
In January 2019, five people were arrested in Bangladesh after they created Facebook accounts under the names of the PM and her family members, and allegedly used the accounts to spread disinformation and engage in financial extortion.
The Vietnamese blogger Truong Duy Nhat, who writes a political commentary blog for Radio Free Asia, has not been heard from since January 26. Nhat had traveled to Bangkok on January 25, to apply for an asylum with the United Nations High Commissioner of Refugees.
A former journalist and activist, Nhat was jailed in Vietnam from 2014-2015 for “conducting propaganda against the state” and “abusing democratic freedoms.”
The number of people using the internet in Uganda has dropped by more than 12 percentage points — from 47% to 35% — since July 2018, when the country's so-called “social media tax” was put into force. The scheme requires people to pay a daily tax in order to use social media and IP-based chat services like WhatsApp.
For many, the tax violates freedom of speech and creates a burden of double taxation, as citizens already pay a tax on data bundles to access the internet. Before it was imposed, opposition members of parliament, journalists, activists and the general public argued that the tax would lock thousands of people out of online services — especially youth, who make up more than 70 percent of the population. Internet usage data from the third and fourth quarters of 2018 seem to prove their point.
Ellery Roberts Biddle, Marianne Diaz, Rohith Jyothish, Rezwan Islam, Mong Palatino, Georgia Popplewell and Laura Vidal contributed to this report.

author: Netizen Report Team


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The Caribbean needs to work on its homophobia, but it doesn’t need a lecture · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

A screenshot of West Indies cricketer Shannon Gabriel, taken from the YouTube video titled “Gabriel enters WINDIES record books: best figures EVER on Windies Soil | Windies Finest”, posted by Windies Cricket.
The test cricket fixture of the Wisden Trophy Test Series is now over, with the West Indies beating England in two of three matches to emerge the winners. But the spotlight on the two teams has intensified, thanks to a verbal exchange between West Indies bowler Shannon Gabriel and English captain Joe Root. Some news outlets are alleging Gabriel used a homophobic slur, something the player vehemently denies.
The resulting demerits for “personal abuse of a player […] during an international match”, and Gabriel's acceptance of the sanction, means that he will be subject to a four-match ban for the five-match one-day international (ODIs) series starting on February 20. The International Cricket Council (ICC) also docked 75 per cent of Gabriel's match fee.
Gabriel has since apologised and explained what happened:
The pressure was on and England’s captain Joe Root was looking at me intensely as I prepared to bowl, which may have been the usual psychological strategy with which all Test cricketers are familiar.
I recognise now that I was attempting to break through my own tension when I said to Joe Root: ‘Why are you smiling at me? Do you like boys?’
Root's retort?
“Don't use it as an insult. There's nothing wrong with being gay.”
Joe Root responds to sledging from Windies bowler Shannon Gabriel.
Full story: https://t.co/nRfSmWU5q6 pic.twitter.com/ghoDyGxUOi
— Sky Sports Cricket (@SkyCricket) February 12, 2019
The resulting narrative has seen Root emerge as an unexpected gay icon and moral champion, while Gabriel comes off as unenlightened at best, despite his insistence that he told Root, “I have no issues with that, but you should stop smiling at me.” Gabriel said that neither he nor Root “ever expected the [issue] to escalate to the point that it has.”
The incident is generating discussion about the bigger issue of the Caribbean's approach to the LGBTQIA+ community.
Sports journalist Lasana Liburd, who, like Gabriel, is Trinidadian, noted that although he'd give no marks for guessing which of the two players “was derided as the backward (add stereotype here), regional cricket fans must resist the urge to make Gabriel […] the martyr of a global conspiracy.”
Acceptance of the LGBTQIA+ community in Caribbean nations has been somewhat fraught and slow in coming. Many regional territories still have “buggery” laws that criminalise anal sex. In St. Lucia, where the match in question was played, those laws specifically define “buggery” as “sexual intercourse per anus by a male person with another male person”.
It was only in April 2018 that Trinidad and Tobago took a historic step towards equality when Justice Devindra Rampersad ruled, in the case of Jason Jones vs. the Attorney General of Trinidad and Tobago, that certain sections of the country's Sexual Offences Act Chapter 11:28 which criminalise anal sex between consenting adults are unconstitutional.
In his post, Liburd gave several examples of the pervasive attitude towards LGBTQIA+ people in the heavily religious Caribbean, advising:
Be open minded. We get smarter and more aware of our misperceptions as we age. If not, we are doing it wrong.
My pity is not for the LGBTQI community; but for those who view them through their own ignorance. I pray they critically challenge those biases one day.
He continued:
To Gabriel’s credit, he […] accepted he was wrong. That is a solid first step. Trinidad and Tobago, collectively, cannot afford to give mixed messages to our young men and women on issues like this.
On Twitter, international cricket fan Abraham Jos added:
@windiescricket #bowler #ShannonGabriel rightly punished by @ICC 4 his #homophobic comments against @englandcricket #batsman #JoeRoot.
Looking forward for similar scale of punishment by #ICC for a similar breach of conduct by non-black, non-brown players!!#lgbt #gay #sexuality pic.twitter.com/6ZbhNTyv3q
— Abraham Jos (@AbrahamJos73) February 14, 2019
Liburd also noted the double standard, recalling an incident years ago in which “top Australia pacer Glenn McGrath decided to spend as much time as possible questioning the sexuality of legendary West Indies and Trinidad and Tobago batsman Brian Lara”:
The Caribbean does not need lessons in morality from the likes of the ICC or the British media. But that does not absolve us from the responsibility to do the right things for ourselves.

author: Janine Mendes-Franco


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Venezuelans see the politics of humanitarian aid play out in online attacks · Global Voices
Laura Vidal

“Some shelves looked empty in this supermarket at the east of the city. Authorities have underlined that there will be no shortage of food and medicine the next days. Those statements have slowed down hoarding.” Photo by Eneas de Troya (CC BY 2.0)
As the political crisis in Venezuela continues to unfold, several major websites are facing destructive technical tampering and censorship.
Since February 12, the website of Venezuela's opposition-controlled National Assembly has been intermittently inaccessible on all networks; opposition-aligned humanitarian aid site VoluntariosxVenezuela, suffered a DNS spoofing attack; and multiple Google services including YouTube have been intermittently inaccessible on CANTV, the country's state-owned internet service provider.
Digital rights organizations and human rights activists monitoring the online disruptions are alert and alarmed, as they expect more attacks in the days ahead.
Observers have seen an overall rise in disruptions of media sites and social media services since a major wave of protests took place on January 23, when opposition leader Juan Guaidó invoked the Constitution‘s Article 233, to declare he was entitled to take presidential powers and call for new elections (and was soon after recognized by the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, and most Latin American states).
The move has sent the country into a new cycle of its longstanding political crisis, as the country's military continues to support president Nicolás Maduro, who has been in office since 2013.
Censorship and DDoS attacks targeting opposition and independent media sites are not a new tactic in Venezuela — they have occurred in the past, typically during protests or in other moments of high political tension. But the recent power struggle marks the biggest political challenge for Nicolás Maduro's government yet, and perhaps appropriately, has brought some of the most sophisticated and high-impact internet disruptions in recent memory.
With broadcast media almost entirely controlled by or at the mercy of state authorities, and print media all but non-existent, the internet is an essential space for communication and information for all Venezuelans, regardless of their political leanings.
A unique and technically sophisticated attack this week targeted VoluntariosxVenezuela's site, put in place to helps volunteers organize themselves to deliver food and medicine to people in need.
Why would anyone want to undermine this work? Because everything in Venezuela — even humanitarian aid — has become political.
The country's astronomical inflation levels and crumbling trade relations have led to a deep economic crisis, claiming lives inside of Venezuela for lack of medicine and food, and driving more than three million people to leave the country. The numbers of those affected by the humanitarian emergency are difficult to estimate, given the lack of official data and the complexity of the crisis. According to the UN's World Food Program director, only on the border with Colombia, 1.2 million people have arrived “starving […] with no money, no food, no medicine.”
But where there is need, there is often political opportunity. On February 5, Juan Guaidó announced that a shipment of food and medical supplies was on its way from Colombia, a US ally. Both countries have recognized Guaidó as Venezuela's interim leader.
For Maduro and his supporters, accepting humanitarian aid from any state or agency on these terms would be equivalent to opening the gates to military intervention. In short order, Maduro's military placed an oil tanker and two massive shipping containers on the major roadways that connect the two countries, effectively blocking the aid shipment. Soon thereafter, opposition activists created VoluntariosxVenezuela, so that people could organize teams to deliver the supplies on foot and by other means.
On February 12, people trying to access the site over Venezuela’s state-owned internet service provider, CANTV, found that when they entered the accurate URL for the site [voluntariosxvenezuela.com], they were automatically redirected to voluntariovenezuela[dot]com, a clone or imitation of the real thing.
Technical evidence gathered and reported by internet researcher Andres Azpurúa at VESinFiltro indicated that the redirect resulted from a DNS spoofing maneuver, with the likely objective of “phishing” or collecting the personal data of people interested in opposition activities. The clone URL was no longer working as of February 14.
This type of technical manipulation goes above and beyond tactics that researchers have previously seen in the country, as it requires the exploitation of domain name servers, a key component of internet functionality. Attackers with these capabilities could theoretically apply this tactic to all kinds of websites, effectively undermining people's abilities to use any web service to communicate or access information. Experts fear this may signal a new level of sophistication and determination on the part of those seeking to squash the opposition online.
Azpurúa also assessed the block on YouTube, which technical researchers proved to have taken place during a public speech by Guaidó, referencing the aid effort:
Confirmed short-lived #block of @youtube affecting other google properties like Drive and Gmail .#venezuela again blocks #youtube when @jguaido gives public speeches, stops when it ends. #KeepItOnhttps://t.co/NAAbWVKzZC pic.twitter.com/LqM1DijBNB
— Andres Azpurua (@andresAzp) February 14, 2019
Researchers also confirmed that multiple other general use and information websites and social media services suffered similar attacks, that again appeared to have been designed to “phish” or obtain private information from users. José Luis Rivas explains through a thread on Twitter how they were able to see some of the traces:
El phishing del chavismo no se limita a voluntariosxvenezuela.
Gmail, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, Hotmail.
Se descuidaron y se cayeron con los kilos.
Ya les voy a mostrar. (Se viene hilo)
— Jose-Luis Rivas (@joseluisrivas) February 13, 2019
Chavismo's phishing doesn't stop with “Voluntarios x Venezuela”. [It includes] Gmail, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, Hotmail. They were careless and they were caught with their pants down. Let me show you (See thread bellow)
Venezuelan free speech NGO Espacio Público published an analysis of this attack and other similar incidents that have been taking place since mid-2018. The group condemned the use of the DNS spoofing technique and placed blame on the Maduro government:
La información verificada implica que el gobierno de Nicolás Maduro está robando información personal de usuarios en Internet desde al menos, septiembre de 2018. El Estado….utiliza fondos públicos para violar la privacidad de quienes ingresan a servicios de correo electrónico y redes sociales.
The information verified [by researchers] implies that the government of Nicolas Maduro has been stealing personal information of internet users since at least September 2018. The state….is using public funds to violate the privacy of those who log into email and social media services.
UPDATE: This story was updated shortly after publication to acknowledge that Colombia has recognized Guaidó as Venezuela's interim leader.

author: Laura Vidal


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Biryani Stories: In search of the origin of Biryani · Global Voices
Rezwan

Chicken Biryani from the streets of Hyderabad, India. Image via Wikimedia Commons by FoodPlate. CC: BY -SA 4..0
This is the second article of our series, “Biryani Stories”, which looks at the common culinary culture in South Asian countries. In this installment, we explore the various types of Biryani that exist in India.
While a debate rages over whether Biryani, the king of South Asian cuisine, originated in Persia (present-day Iran), history suggests that this mixed rice dish has its origins among the Muslims of the Indian subcontinent — part of the Mughlai cuisine for which India is famous.
This does not discount the strong logic behind the claim that Biryani originated in Persia. The word comes from the Persian word “birian”, which means “fried before cooking” — but Iranian Biryani street food no longer contains rice; rather, it has evolved into chunks of meat cooked in an envelope of paper-thin bread. Of course, it is also possible that the food may have traveled with pilgrims from central Asia to the Deccan region in south India.
The current Indian subcontinent versions of Biryani were developed from the 15th century to about the 19th century, during the reign of the Mughal Empire.
The origin & Journey Of Biryani http://t.co/xb6YsRApLk pic.twitter.com/80ez6oQjzI
— Reddit India (@redditindia) August 7, 2014
India is a diverse country in terms of culture and culinary flavors. Northern Indian food varieties, for example, have been influenced by the Mughlai cooking techniques like Dum Pukht (slow cooking in a sealed pot) and butter-based curries, while Southern Indian people are fonder of using more vegetables, rice, and seafood.
One of the most famous Biryanis in India is Lucknowi Biryani, named after Lucknow, the capital of the north Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. In both flavor and aroma, it is considered one of the best Biryanis: the textures are softer and the spices milder.
Yummy #Hyderabadi #Chicken Biryani.#foodie #Cuisine #Deccan #Charminar #Hyderabad #OldCity #Telangana#India pic.twitter.com/V21iFc3Ond
— CharminarClassifieds ✈ (@CharminarBlog) January 18, 2019
Hyderabadi Dum Biryani originated as a blend of Mughal and Iranian cuisine during the reign of the Mughal viceroy Asif Jah, who was known as the Nizam of Hyderabad back in the 18th century. His royal cooks would marinate meat with spices overnight and soak it in yogurt before layering it with long-grain, aromatic Basmati rice and placing it in a sealed handi (cooking pot), where it was cooked to perfection in Dum Pukht style.
Hyderabad also has some offbeat flavors of Biryiani, especially Doodh Ki Biryani, which is the polar opposite of the spicy Hyderabadi Dum Biryani: because it is flavored with creamy milk, roasted nuts, and minimal spices, it tastes rather mild.
Towards the south of India, the Biryani recipes start to vary wildly, incorporating ingredients like vegetables and seafood. Take the example of Bhatkali Biryani from Bhatkal, a tiny coastal town in Karnataka state. For this dish, the meat, the spices, and the rice are all cooked separately without using oil and ghee, and mixed only seconds before serving.
Further south in Mangalore, a coastal town in Karnataka, there are seafood varieties of Biriyani. In this Pukki Biryani, where half-cooked fish is layered with rice in a sealed handi and slow-cooked, spices like fennel and coriander are common, as is the use of rice varieties other than the traditional long-grained Basmati.
The Ambur Biryani from the Arcot region of Tamil Nadu is basically Pukki Biriyani (rice cooked separately) with a distinctive feature: it uses a short-grained Seeraga Samba rice.
Further southeast, in Kerala, the Thalassery Biryani uses Jeerakasala rice — a short-grained local variant, which is cooked separately from the meat, then combined with the famous spices of Kerala and garnishes like fried onions, cashews, and raisin to blend the flavors. The Kozhikode Biryani (Calicut Biryani) uses Khyma Rice and is tempered with several Kerala spices that give it its signature spicy taste.
The Memoni trading community of Sindh-Gujarat in northeastern India has Memoni Biryiani, made with lamb, yogurt, fried onions and potatoes, and fewer tomatoes compared to the famous Pakistani Sindhi Biryani. The distinguishing factor in the western Indian Bohri Biryani cooked in Dum style is the moist, smoked meat.
The Kolkata (Calcutta) Biryani from West Bengal is similar to the Lucknowi Biryani, but more subtle in taste, with fewer spices and the addition of potato and egg.
In India's northeast, the Kampuri Biryani is a simple, colorful dish prevalent in the Muslim town of Kampur in Assam. First, the chicken is cooked separately with peas, carrots, beans, potatoes, and bell peppers, and spiced with mild cardamom and nutmeg. It is then mixed with Basmati rice and cooked over a slow fire.
The traditional Mughal Biryani was a meat dish, which strictly vegetarian Hindu officers of the court could not have. For them, there was Tehari or Tehri dish, in which the meat was substituted with potatoes. This vegetarian version of the cult dish remains a popular street food in Kashmir and Uttar Pradesh.
Mutanjan Biryani, which uses almost equal amounts of mutton, rice, and sugar, is very popular in Kashmir and Lucknow. It is blended with cream, spices, saffron, screwpine water, and rose water.
There are also instances of Biryani being used in temple offerings:
Biryani is part of the holy offering in this temple https://t.co/Y3iOt2ZBu1? #India #food
— Manasi (@ManasiGopal) January 18, 2019
Though social media users quibble about its origins, there is little doubt that Biryani is considered a trademark dish from the Indian subcontinent:
There are at least 20 + varieties of biryani like Bombay biryani, Afghan biryani, Hyderabadi biryani, Sindhi biryani, Kacchi Biryani etc & karachiites should realize that they did not invent it or own its rights. Its origin is Mughlai & Awadhi cuisine from Delhi & Lucknow.
— Aaria? (@Aariaa_) November 20, 2017
Although Biryani may be a Persian import, the origin may go back to 2 A.D to a dish called 'Oon Soru', recorded in Sangam literature.
A meat and rice preparation cooked with Black Pepper and Coriander and more. Could India's almost national dish have been invented in Tamilakam? pic.twitter.com/cWc5w1a0SU
— MALA-AKBARI (@akbari_mala) November 14, 2018
The debate may go on, but no one will ever turn down a Biryiani treat.

author: Rezwan


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Cameroonian justice minister rationalizes Holocaust on national television · Global Voices
Lova Rakotomalala

Jean de Dieu Momo, Minister Delegate for Justice of Cameroon. Official photo from the Cameroonian government website.
On February 3, in an interview on public television in Cameroon, Jean de Dieu Momo, minister delegate for justice, provoked quite a stir when he warned opposition leader, Maurice Kamto, that he was leading Cameroon's Indigenous Bamileke people to a fate similar to that of the Jewish people during the Holocaust in World War II.
Momo made the comment on a public television program called News Weekly in a discussion with Kamto on the state of Cameroon and the ongoing conflict between Francophone and Anglophone regions that has gripped the nation.
Anglophone Cameroonians, who make up 20 percent of the population, have felt increasingly marginalized by the Francophone-majority government. The crisis has led to a crackdown on English-speaking regions of Cameroon and renewed an Anglophone secessionist movement after “hundreds have died, close to 500,000 have been displaced, and activists have been rounded up and jailed,” according to the Washington Post.
The televised discussion began to focus on a more specific ethnic tension between two of Cameroon's major ethnic groups, the Beti and the Bamileke people. The Beti align with Francophone Cameroon and Cameroon's President Biya, also a Beti. The Bamileke align more with Anglophone Cameroon and are most notably represented by Biya's main political opponent, Maurice Kamto, a Bamileke.
After about 20 minutes into the discussion, Momo said:
In Germany, there was a people who were very rich and who had all the economic levers, it was the Jews. They were so arrogant that the German people felt a little frustrated. Then one day came to power a certain Hitler, who put these people in gas chambers. Educated people like Mr. Kamto need to know where they bring their people.
Below is the interview in French:
Ironically, Momo himself is also Bamileke. Given his powerful position, political analysts say his outrageous comments functioned as a warning to his community not to aggravate an already tense and fragile ethnically-charged situation.
Bamileke were, in fact, victims of genocide 50 years ago. Experts believe that between 100,000 to 400,000 Bamileke people were killed between 1959 and 1964 during France's “secret war” in Cameroon. The French and their local allies enacted these killings mostly in western regions of Cameroon, where Bamileke have lived for centuries.
Bamileke people have continued to experience discrimination, neglect, and lack of representation in political and social spaces and were targeted in 2012 with expulsion from Yaoundé, the capital.
Momo's anti-Semitic remarks disturbed many and caught the attention of the embassy of Israel in Yaoundé. The embassy published an official statement expressing its outrage and requested an immediate apology.
Israel has a diplomatic presence in 11 out of 54 African countries and has sustained prolonged diplomatic ties with Cameroon since 1986. The Israeli embassy says the relationship dates back to Cameroonian independence from France in 1960, however.
The Cameroonian government disavowed the minister, stating that Momo “spoke in his personal capacity” and did not represent the views of the government. Authorities further denounced his “inappropriate words,” dissociating itself entirely from the anti-Semitic declaration but have not yet issued Momo any kind of official reprimand.
The Middle East Monitor reports that President Biya “has used special security and military units trained by Israeli security companies to quell demonstrations against his rule,” mostly in English-speaking parts of the country.
Momo's provocative comments spread like wildfire on social networks, calling his expertise into question as someone familiar with genocide and crimes against humanity cases. Momo is best known for his work as a lawyer at the United Nations International Court of Justice for Rwanda since 2006 and his activism on the issue of human rights.
Yet, his remarks feed into the global rise of far-right movements that have revived racist tropes that the Jewish community controls the finance world. His comments, under the pretense of “real talk”, seemed at odds with his prior experience and his identity as a Bamileke, a historically oppressed group.
Dibussi Tandé, Cameroonian Global Voices author, tweeted:
Momo Jean de Dieu #Cameroon Minister Delegate of Justice warns the Bamileke ethnic group that they might end up like “arrogant” Jews whom Hitler put in gas chambers. @IsraelinCM has condemned Momo's statement, saying it rationalizes the #Holocaust and treats it with levity. pic.twitter.com/SncwtspwV8
— Dibussi Tande (@dibussi) February 4, 2019
Twitter user Adjani Okpu-Egbe also lamented the ignorance of Momo's comments:
How ignorant especially coming from the Minister of Justice! So long as #Biya’s regime is in control, #minorities wld be wiped off the surface of #CameroUn & significant progress has been made with active #Genocidal offensives in #SouthernCameroons. @SAdamsR2P @JewishNewsUK
— Adjani OKPU-EGBE (@Adjani_OkpuEgbe) February 4, 2019
Others were not as repulsed:
Il n'a rien dit de si grave, j'ai écouté l'extrait. Soyez moins frileux.
— Luc BEBITE (@lucbebite) February 5, 2019
Nothing serious here, don't be such a snowflake.
And one commented on the complexity of calling out “anti-Semitism” in light of Israel's discriminatory policies toward Palestinians:
#Israel keep quiet. what he did was wrong, but i am tired of u using this word “antisemitism” and the holocaust to justify your atrocities against the palestinians. More people were killed during the Belgian genocide in Congo
. Stand up for justice in Cameroon #anglophonecrisis
— Okiwah Boris (@BorisOkiwah) February 4, 2019
Meanwhile, “both ministers failed to apologize to the Bamileke people,” according to AllAfrica. As Cameroon remains embroiled in economic, social, political and ethnic conflict, its citizens wrestle with a lack of clear leadership that could end the protracted suffering and violence.

author: Lova Rakotomalala


text:
Nigeria postpones 2019 general elections hours before polls open, citing ‘logistics and operations’ concerns · Global Voices
Nwachukwu Egbunike

Screenshot of INEC Chairman Professor Mahmood Yakubu, announcing the postponement of the Nigerian General Elections on February 16, 2019 in Abuja, Nigeria.
Nigerians woke up on Saturday, February 16, to news that presidential elections will no longer be held as scheduled for that day.
The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) announced that that the presidential and national assembly elections will now be held on February 23, one week later, while the governorship and state house of assembly will be held on March 9. The electoral commission has halted the elections due to its inability to implement “logistics and operational plans” ahead of the elections.
Breaking News: The #NigeriaDecides2019 Elections now to hold on; 23rd February, 2019 for Presidential and National Assembly while the Governorship, State House of Assembly and the FCT Area Council Elections is to hold on 9th March, 2019. pic.twitter.com/6zhvBLQe2a
— INEC Nigeria (@inecnigeria) February 16, 2019
The 2015 presidential elections were delayed for six weeks over security challenges. However, this is the first time in Nigeria's history that an election will be canceled less than five hours before the commencement of polls.
There had been unconfirmed fears that the elections might be postponed. However, in September last year, INEC denied having such plans. Similarly, on January 19, the head of commission Professor Mahmood Yakubu during a video interview stated that “we started this long ago and we have gone ahead with our preparations … there's no possibility of a postponement.”
#ThrowBack
The 2 times @osasuigbinedion asked @INECNigeria Chairman if the elections would be postponed.
Watch his response
Full interview available on our website https://t.co/gmgkKRwWUA#NigeriaDecides2019 #INEC pic.twitter.com/sQFu80kXv2
— The Osasu Show (TOS) (@TheOsasuShow) February 16, 2019
These fears persisted until the eve of the elections on social media. But Tolu Ogunlesi, head of digital media in the presidency, dismissively branded it as propaganda from the opposition.
#NigeriaDecides2019 going on as planned tomorrow. Don’t listen to any #DubaiStrategyOfLies peddling gist of a postponement. Thank you and God bless the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
— tolu ogunlesi (@toluogunlesi) February 15, 2019
The coordination of the election by the electoral commission encountered many challenges. Less than two weeks before the elections, there were fire outbreaks in INEC offices in Plateau, Abia, and Anambra States, which destroyed electoral materials like uncollected Permanent Voters Cards, smart card readers and ballot papers.
Also, on the eve of the elections in Kaduna State on February 15, 66 people — including 22 children and 12 women — were allegedly killed by unknown gunmen. These killings have not yet been independently verified.
This led credence to the rumour that elections may be deferred to a later date in affected states.
Staggering the elections is a recipe for disaster! INEC must resist any attempt to get it conduct elections in a few states tomo. Elections must be conducted in every part of Nigeria whatever it takes. Burning Card Readers is just a strategy.
— Mazi Chima Amadi Ph.D (@AMADICHIMA) February 15, 2019
WhatsApp broadcast and group messages, largely adopted by political parties during this election to win support, aggravated this apprehension. These social media groups have stoked rumours and spread misinformation and disinformation.
Main opposition candidate Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party described the cancellation as “obviously a case of the hand of Esau but the voice of Jacob.” Abubakar stated:
The Buhari administration hopes to disenfranchise the Nigerian electorate in order to ensure that turn out is low on the rescheduled date.
On the other hand, the ruling party All Progressive Congress condemned the “tardiness of the electoral umpire” and also insinuated that INEC had “orchestrated” the postponement “in collusion with the main opposition, the PDP.”
Nigerian netizens have reacted strongly against the last minute rescheduling of the presidential polls by INEC.
“Excuses don't cut it!”
Excuses do not cut it. This isn't the first time general elections are being held in Nigeria. INEC failed to do its job, of providing the required logistics support for the process. I have never heard of election postponement, barely 5 hours to the opening of ballots. SHAMEFUL!!
— dipo (@oladipo112) February 16, 2019
Why wait till the last minute?
I'm trying really hard to be positive about this but I don't know how I'm going to manage it.
Why on earth would elections be postponed with just a couple of hours left? At what point did they realise that they had issues and why did they wait until the last minute?
— Adérìnsólá Abíólá (@RinsolaAbiola) February 16, 2019
Waste of resources
Waste of time and resources for candidates, supporters, traveling voters, and even the government itself.
— ‘Kayode Adegbola (@kayodea) February 16, 2019
INEC lacked the courtesy to even apologize
Would it have killed the person who drafted that @inecnigeria letter to add “The Commission understands that this decision has been announced rather late and sincerely apologizes to all voters and election stakeholders for any inconvenience caused” at the end?
— Amara Nwankpa (@Nwankpa_A) February 16, 2019
Wicked!
This is the most wicked and barbaric evil action against the Nigerian people.
Budget was spent
International observers arrived Nigeria
People left their business and travelled so as to vote!!
Youth corpers slept in the cold etc
We are disappointed in #INEC #NigeraDecides2019 pic.twitter.com/uPMvWJtDLJ
— Bose Tinubu (@BoseTinubu) February 16, 2019
Questions for INEC
Questions for @inecnigeria
1. What are the logistical issues?
2. Which states where affected?
3. What will happen to sensitive ballot material already deployed?
4. Who guarantees safety & sanctity of ballot material already distributed? 5. What is cost of postponement?
— Ayisha Osori (@Naijavote) February 16, 2019
INEC is not saying the truth!
This is preposterous. You had years to plan for this. We are not seeing the truth.
— Engr. Blaise Aboh ? (@AimLEGEND_) February 16, 2019
Apathy is not an option. We'll vote next week!
This is exactly what they want. They already planned to use voters apathy as a weapon, but it won't work. I drove over 2hrs to come and vote, next Friday am doing it again. This incompetent government must be rid off. #BuhariMustGo #NigeriaDecides2019 #AtikuOurPresident #Nigeria
— Ọmọ Nìjíríà gidi (@parpeshe) February 16, 2019
Nigeria's electoral commission left many questions unanswered. The decision spiked tensions and casts doubt on the credibility of the presidential elections. It also reinforces the need for a genuinely independent electoral commission. Until INEC is completely weaned from executive manipulation and interference, election postponements will continue to happen in Nigeria.

author: Nwachukwu Egbunike


text:
‘Space ventures can improve the quality of life on Earth’ — an interview with International Space University president · Global Voices
Gwenaëlle Lefeuvre

From a promotion for the space studies program at the International Space University. Photography courtesy of International Space University and used with permission.
This is the first of two parts of a Global Voices interview with Juan de Dalmau, president of the International Space University (ISU).
In 2019, space is no longer the final frontier, but already well and truly a realm for exploration and exploitation.
According to the registry maintained by the United Nations Office on Outer Space Affairs, about 20,000 human-made objects are currently in orbit around the Earth, and a hundred more are orbiting other bodies of the solar system.
Eighty nations, or supranational organizations, have launched their own satellites. Purposes of these satellites already cover a wide range of human activities: telecommunications, military surveillance of territories, prevention of natural disasters, scientific research, ecology, and more.
The International Space University (ISU) is a private university founded in 1987, the aim of which is to train future leaders in the exploration and development of space. Global Voices spoke with university president Juan de Dalmau on his efforts to continue his institution's traditions of interdisciplinary and peaceful development.
Global Voices: How did an American university decide to establish its main campus in Strasbourg, France?
Juan de Dalmau (JdD) : This was actually decided by the results of a competition. The founders had already decided that the growth of the ISU would be accomplished through a central campus, paired with a network of collaboration with universities around the world.
In the 1990s, a contest was launched to choose the city to host the central campus: Strasbourg was the winner, over other candidate cities from Canada, Japan, Italy, or other regions of France. In an initiative strongly supported by its mayor at that time, Catherine Trautmann, Strasbourg took on the task of constructing a building for the ISU, which would suit the criteria of the university, and for which the funding was already guaranteed.
However, the university has also kept a significant presence in the United States, and thus, a rotating course program returns to the United States once every three or four years. Former students, and a collaborative network of companies in the aerospace industry, as well as NASA [National Air and Space Administration] sponsor courses, or send their collaborators to attend.
GV: Where do your students come from? What do these future space leaders bring in their luggage?
JdD: The master's degree program in space studies [of 12 or 24 months of study] this year has a class of 45 students, who come from twenty different nations. They bring with them quite a variety of luggage. A bit less than half of the students have had a scientific or technical education, and the other half is more varied: economics, life sciences, medicine, management, architecture or teaching.
From the beginning, the ISU decided to teach by creating connections between disciplines. That was the vision of the founders, who were at that time students in MIT [Massachusetts Institute of Technology]. A vision of multidisciplinary learning.
The program is therefore designed to provide a general culture for everyone. Which is to say, engineers will have to attend basic engineering courses, but through which, they will also have to put themselves in the shoes of a lawyer, or an economist. And that has the additional advantage of putting everyone at the same level for practical work.
For example, our students have to imagine missions for fleets of mini-satellites [cube-shaped space devices as small as 10 centimeters on a side] which can be used for sustainable development initiatives of the United Nations, designed for developing nations.
Today, the International Space University has more than 4,600 former students, and of those, more than 80 percent are working in space industries. From ISU, they have taken with them in their luggage the versatility to work in many different ways, whether it be with other countries, disciplines, or ways of thinking. And in knowing how to find the right person in the right country, due to an informal but well-maintained professional network.
Entities which were at first hesitant, or did not really believe in the ISU, are now the ones who come to us, and want to work with us. This development of our image and our reputation can be credited largely to the accomplishments of our former students.
Thus, in September 2018, we signed a collaboration agreement with the European Commission, which they initiated, that allows us to propose internships to the Commission, to facilitate interventions by Commission officials, to give courses or to enter as participants. Or even to conduct joint space research projects as a tool for dialogue, international cooperation and diplomacy with non-member countries.
GV: What is the attitude of developing countries toward the conquest of space? Can the ISU ensure that they participate fully in the development of their nations through space?
JdD: Space exploration has become much more democratic. A country like India immediately comes to mind, since India has developed its own space technology, without buying it abroad. It has built its own satellites, to monitor its territory in case of natural disasters, and to develop telecommunications in rural areas.
GV: Are you talking about a development of the space industry outside any Cold War context or military application?
JdD: Yes, quite so. We can do a lot of good with civilian satellite programs. More and more developing countries are investing in space technology and education, to avoid buying it. Mexico, Thailand, Nigeria, South Africa, Bolivia and Colombia are implementing programs to benefit their national quality of life. They do not want to “miss the train of space” because space ventures can become a source of well-being and a better quality of life.

author: Gwenaëlle Lefeuvre


text:
Dapper former eye surgeon retrains sights on Afghanistan’s presidency · Global Voices
Ezzatullah Mehrdad

CEO of Afghanistan Abdullah Abdullah gives a welcome speech at the London Conference on Afghanistan in 2014. Photo by Patrick Tsui/FCO. CC Open Government Licence.
With one of the world's longest-running conflicts continuing to define everyday life in Afghanistan, it is no wonder that many citizens are unenthused by the upcoming leadership election.
Adding to the sense of malaise is a cast of familiar faces who have done little to change the country for the better in the last five years.
The Chief Executive of Afghanistan’s National Unity Government Abdullah Abdullah entered the presidential race for the third consecutive time on January 20, 2019, the last day of candidate registration for the July vote.
He will be one of the more serious challengers for race favourite and incumbent President Ashraf Ghani — his bitter rival from the 2014 race. That was the second time Abdullah Abdullah had tasted electoral defeat, having also run and lost in 2009.
But 2014 was especially painful for Abdullah as he had fallen just short of a first round victory with 45% of the votes.
He accused Ghani and the Independent Election Commission of conspiracy and fraud after his defeat in the second but later struck a deal to form a National Unity Government (NUG) in which he took the newly created position of Chief Executive.
Abdullah, whose confusing position is sometimes likened to that of a prime minister, has earned a reputation for style over substance during that period.
A sizable global gathering such as @wef, a panelist of any background must have a globally known appropriate attire, I admire @afgexecutive for being a ‘dress to impress’ champion among the rest of the Afghan politicians, pic.twitter.com/gvIdMICrU9
— Wayand (@Wayand_) January 23, 2019
Now 58-year-old Abdullah seems determined to chance his arm once more in the country where he trained as an eye doctor.
A Kabul native, Abdullah is seen by many as a culturally Tajik despite his father's Pashtun heritage. His mother was from Panjshir, a region dominated by the Tajik ethnic group, where his father served as a government employee.
Abdullah attended Kabul Medical University and began working in a hospital in Kabul, but like so many others, was forced to evacuate to Pakistan shortly after the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan.
Later on in the 1980s he would provide treatment and healthcare for resistance fighters. It was during this period that he became associated with the leader of Tajik resistance forces Ahmad Shah Massoud. Eventually, he became an advisor, translator, and close aide to the commander, who was assassinated in 2001. Abdullah's close relationship with Massoud is one of the main sources of his political capital among Tajiks, the second largest grouping in Afghanistan after Pashtuns.
In 1992, the Northern Alliance along with other resistance forces against the Soviets formed a government in which Abdullah was appointed as foreign minister. During the Taliban’s rule, he continued serving as foreign minister in exile until the group was toppled by the U.S.-led coalition forces in 2001.
From 2001 to 2006, Abdullah served as foreign minister under President Hamid Karzai, a position he left in order to compete in the 2009 vote.
But many political commentators have argued that Abdullah's political brand has not been helped by half a decade in the National Unity Government which has appeared hapless in its efforts to combat a swelling insurgency and provide basic services.
A miscalculation if @afgexecutive & a JIA fraction think they can win #elections with photos of Khalili & Dostum.He doesn't have a heavyweight Pashtun & it makes it impossible 4 him 2 become president. Possible that he may withdraw & support @ashrafghani‘s main challenger Atmar.
— Zaki Shahamat (@ShahamatZ) January 22, 2019
Back in 2014, many had said that the ethnic composition of the electorate, favoring candidates from the dominant Pashtun group, meant that Abdullah would not survive a second-round contest against a strong Pashtun candidate.
That turned out to be the case. Now many believe 2014 was Peak Abdullah, and that he will fall at the first hurdle this time.
Ran a poll that received 687 votes. Majority said the runoff in AFG presidential election tb contested by @ashrafghani and @MHaneefAtmar. Only 25% believe @afgexecutive will make to the second round with AG. 7% bet on @RahmatullahN whereas only 9% thought it may be AA and MHA. https://t.co/H1iI7ZKOGu
— Harun Najafizada (@HNajafizada) January 21, 2019
That is a shame for voters who would like to see a strong alternative to Ghani, whose administration has not delivered on his own promises of reform and a battle against corruption five years ago.
Ghani's most likely challenger, Hanif Atmar, is another Pashtun political insider who has struck a conciliatory tone with extreme conservative groups, including the Taliban, who he is keen to bring to the table for talks.
Former Northern Alliance man Abdullah, meanwhile, is catching more eyes for his dress sense than his leadership bid.
It would be great for you to join fashion and modeling as your future job.
— Tila (@Tila77548804) January 25, 2018

author: Ezzatullah Mehrdad


text:
Russian public sector workers ordered to ‘like’ social media posts promoting the 2019 Winter Universiade · Global Voices
RuNet Echo

The Kremlin attaches special importance to international sporting events like the Universiades // kremlin.ru, under CC2.0
Public sector workers in Krasnoyarsk, Russia, will be ordered to ‘like’ and ‘leave positive comments’ under social media posts promoting the 2019 Winter Universiade, an international multi-sports event for university athletes, according to minutes of the meeting at Krasnoyarsk city council posted online by one of its former members.
Земляки, предлагаю поддержать лайками все материалы в соц сетях связанных с Универсиадой в нашем городе. Это важно. Тем…
Geplaatst door Владимир Владимирович Владимиров op Donderdag 14 februari 2019
Земляки, предлагаю поддержать лайками все материалы в соц сетях связанных с Универсиадой в нашем городе. Это важно. Тем более 3 пункт предписывает это чинам и ответственным. Но мы то с вами понимаем и без этого, что событие международное и его важно провести хорошо, чтобы остались хорошие эмоции и впечатления.
Fellow citizens, I suggest that we support with our Likes all the materials posted on soc[ial] media related to the Universiade in our city. It is important. All the more because item 3 orders the responsible public servants to do so. But we don’t need instructions to understand that this is an event of international importance and it’s crucial that its execution is proper and leaves a good impression.
The minutes, signed by Krasnoyarsk city hall’s head for cultural affairs, put forward a social media strategy for promotion of cultural events to be held in the city alongside the Universiade in early March 2019. The core of this strategy, focused solely on Vkontakte, Russia’s biggest social network, is twofold.
Items 1 and 2 of the agenda describe government-mandated “content creation” by municipal cultural institutions, among them music schools and museums, on their Vkontakte pages to promote the Universiade. Item 3 puts the responsibility on the heads of these institutions to supply “likes and positive comments” to posts by official Universiade accounts “as part of the loyalty programme.”
In other words, teachers and museum workers will be forced to act as “human bots” to promote a government-sponsored event.
This is not the first time something like that has happened in Russia. Last year, Meduza reported that teachers and civil servants in the Moscow region were ordered to ‘like’ posts on social media by state officials, keep track of their ‘likes’ and regularly submit performance reports.
Moscow mayor’s office also employs a network of “human bots”: pro-government activists who participate in online campaigns praising the mayor in exchange for a promise of a career in the government.

author: RuNet Echo


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Censored on WeChat: As tensions in China-US trade conflict rose, so did WeChat censorship · Global Voices
Wechatscope

Free image from pixabay.
This post was written by the research team of WeChatscope, a censorship monitor project, led by Dr. King-wa Fu, at The University of Hong Kong.
With more than 1.0825 billion individual users, along with more than 20 million registered public accounts, WeChat has the largest number of domestic users and the most extensive coverage of any social media service in China. As such, it has become a chief component of China's rigorous censorship regime.
In 2017, our team at the University of Hong Kong built a technical web “scraping” system for studying censorship on WeChat's publicly accessible pages. Throughout 2018, we tracked more than 4,000 public accounts covering daily news and preserved censored posts in a publicly accessible database, WeChatscope. This article is the second in a partnership series with Global Voices.
The most censored topic in the 2018 WeChatscope dataset was the China-US trade war. This high-profile conflict has triggered heated public discussions on Chinese social media, with state-affiliated media outlets covering the news extensively and accusing the US of preaching unilateralism and protectionism.
Many of these outlets publish directly to WeChat. As such, thousands of stories about the China-US trade conflict posted on WeChat public accounts are removed by WeChat operators shortly after publication.
These trends indicate that the channeling of public opinion and censoring of independent expression go hand-in-hand.
Our results are also consistent with the findings of other organizations. In June 2018, China Digital Times revealed that Chinese propaganda authorities issued a detailed set of instructions to media outlets after China announced a 25 percent tariff on 659 products, in retaliation for tariffs set by the US Trade Representative.
Authorities told Chinese journalists not to report on or react to comments made by Donald Trump or officials from the US. The censorship instruction stressed:
The trade conflict is really a war against China’s rise, to see who has the greater stamina. This is absolutely no time for irresolution or reticence.
At the same time, it also warned against overheating patriotism against the US:
Don’t attack Trump’s vulgarity; don’t make this a war of insults.
When one cross-references the censorship timeline (figure III) and the trade war timeline, a pattern emerges. Upsurges in censorship all took place in close proximity to the peak moments of the China-US confrontation.
In figure 1 (below), the first surge appears after US President Donald Trump announced on March 22 that the US would impose a tariff on USD $60 billion worth of goods imported from China.
On April 2, the Chinese Ministry of Commerce reacted with a counterattack, levying a tariff on 128 kinds of imported goods from the US.
Figure 1. Timeline of censored content related to China-US trade war
From April until the end of May, the curves measuring censorship and the intensity of trade talks are mirror images of one another. There was a clear surge of censorship after the US Department of Commerce concluded that Chinese telecom company ZTE violated US sanctions on April 16. This subsided and then re-emerged in early May, when the US demanded that China reduce the trade gap by USD $200 billion within two years.
Many posts censored during this period contained the views of economic experts such as Gao Shanwen, a researcher from the People's Bank of China, and real estate tycoon Ren Zhiqiang.
Gao Shanwen's post “Deep friction between China and the United States” (中美贸易摩擦深处的忧虑), removed from WeChat on August 2, analysed key conflicts, from global trade to technology markets, between the two countries. Ren Zhiqiang discussed the Sino-US trade war (任志强谈中美贸易战，能不能听懂是你们的事) and criticized China's closed-door policy of recent years. This post was removed from WeChat on October 17.
But they were in good company — pro-Chinese government nationalistic pieces were also censored. A piece entitled “Are China and the United States still in the same boat?” (北方青杨：中美还在一条船上吗？), which boasted about China's strength in resisting US hegemony, was also removed from WeChat on August 18.
Figure II. The word “tariff” is central to the censorship of trade war.
Another spike took place in late June after China announced a 25 percent tariff on 659 products as a retaliation against the US tariff-imposition list. The timing of the spike coincided with the propaganda department's issuing of censorship instructions on the China-US trade war.
The most frequently mentioned keywords to appear in the censored posts are “tariff” (see figure II), “Huawei” and “ZTE” (figure III).
Censored keywords “tariff”, “ZTE” and “Huawei” in relation to China US trade war censorship.
Another spike was seen around July 6 after the Trump administration imposed a China-specific tariff list that placed a 25 percent tariff on 818 imported Chinese products valued at USD $34 billion.
The overall volume of censorship remained at high levels between July and September, as both China and the US kept introducing new tariff lists.
Stories about the negative impact of the war in China were also a top target for censorship on WeChat. A number of posts about the fall of the Chinese stock market in June 2018 were deleted. One post entitled “Trump imposed China's 200 billion commodity tariffs. 2 trillions in the stock market just evaporated overnight!” (特朗普再收中国2000亿商品关税 股市一夜蒸发2万亿！千股跌停) was published on WeChat on June 20 and removed the next day.
After China cancelled trade talks with the US on September 22 and issued a white paper accusing Washington of economic bullying, overall levels of censorship dropped slightly, leaving some space for channeling public opinion against US economic power.
But then, the sharpest spike in censorship appeared in early November when the US and China resumed trade talks in a phone call between US Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin and Chinese Vice Premier Liu He. This particular spike was likely intended to cool down the propaganda war against the US and to prepare the public for a deal.
At the G20 summit on December 1, 2018, the heads of both sides finally reached an agreement on a 90-day armistice negotiation period. After that, the most commonly censored content in our dataset was about the arrest of Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou in Canada.
All told, it is clear that Chinese authorities have been very careful in maneuvering public sentiment on WeChat. Across the board, they have worked to protect China's image as a strong country and to blame the US for triggering the trade war. Yet they have also worked to prevent excessive resentment against the US, for fear that the public would view any compromise by the Chinese government as a defeat.
In our next post, we will take a closer look into the ZTE and Huawei's censorship pattern.

author: Wechatscope