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Panama: 37th OAS General Assembly, A Trail of Poisoned Medicine and Update on the New Immigration and Health Laws · Global Voices
Melissa De León

# At the same time the OEA (OAS, Organization of American States) celebrated their thirty-seventh Regular Session of the OEA General Assembly in Panama from June 3-5, 2007, there were many congregations of groups peacefully protesting against the recent developments in Venezuela, involving the closing of RCTV which, to many, limits and conditions free speech and freedom. The local TV stations ceased operations for 30 seconds in the morning and 30 seconds in the afternoon, showing only the image we are sharing here. The message reads "Sin expresión no hay libertad, ni en Venezuela ni en el resto del mundo," which means "Without free speech there is no freedom, in Venezuela or in the rest of the world."
Local newspapers in their websites and a group of bloggers also participated with the initiative. Learn more by visiting Diablo Rojo.
# Suntracs.org shares the audio file (ES) of the speach Canciller Maduro from Venezuela gave at the OEA's General Assembly meeting in Panama.
# From LaPrensa Blog, a very controversial issue is exposed. ¿Cómo evalúa usted las investigaciones por las muertes con medicamentos contaminados? (How do you evaluate the investigations of the deaths by contaminated medication?)
El tema de los medicamentos contaminados que provocaron la muerte a un centenar de panameños, cada día toma un giro distinto. Éste semana el Ministerio Público ordenó la detención de actual director de la Caja de Seguro Social, René Luciani, para ser indagado con respecto al tema. Igualmente se ordenó la detención de los ex directores Rolando Villalaz y Juan Jované.
Sin embargo, el proceso ha estado caracterizado por su lentitud, han pasado ocho meses desde que se supo del caso y la fecha todo sigue confuso y sin vistas de ser aclarado.
This process of investigating the death of more than a hundred Panamanians by the ingestion of contaminated medication takes a new turn every day. This week the detention of Rene Luciani was ordered, the current Director of the Caja de Seguro Social (Social Security Agency) to give testimony about the case. Rolando Villalaz and Juan Jovane, ex directors of the same institution were also called for the preliminary inquiries.
Nevertheless, the characteristic of this process has been slowness, it has been eight months since we learned about the case and to date it remains confuse and unsolved.
Head over to LaPrensa Blog to read the complete report and the array of interesting comments.
# The Noriegaville News meditates on the new immigration law and new health regulations from a different perspective: Panama stands firm against dangers of tourism.
First of all, if visitors came to Panama with the idea to stay for six weeks or so to find property or spend a couple of months in their condo or vacation home, they will find that a freshly implemented law makes this a criminal activity. The duration of the tourist visa has been reduced from 90 days (the standard all over Central America) to 30 days only, and for an extension one has to go through the nightmarish bureaucracy at the Immigration service.
Carry your obligatory vaccination card!The new visa regime is not the only measure the government takes against tourists entering the country. A new law is being debated in the National Assembly that makes it obligatory for anyone in Panama or entering Panama to carry a "vaccination card" as proof of having been vaccinated against unspecified diseases. Read more…
# Panama Guide reports on the changes on immigration law in Panama: Update on the 30-Day Tourist Visa Issue.
Today I interviewed Lic. Karen Zamora, the Chief of Investigation for Panama's Department of Immigration, regarding the recent changes to the tourist visa law. She said they can instantly check the status of any tourist in Panama using a new and sophisticated computer system. They capture the tourist movement data at entry points such as Tocumen Airport and Paso Canoas for every entry and exit, and they have the technology to instantly check on the status of any tourist in the country at any time (pretty cool). She demonstrated the technology using a mock suspect, and said "he last entered in January and has not left, so he's currently illegal." They can also now easily see the multiple tourist entries and exits over time, so they know who are the "perpetual tourists." She added that anyone who enters Panama after 22 May 2007 falls under the new law and regulations, and that anyone who was in the country prior to that date will be treated under the old regulations. She said that they know this is a period of transition and that there are people who have gotten "caught in the change" to the new law. Read the complete article…
# Panama Guide shares some vital information: FAQ: What Shots Do I Need For Panama?
Panama's Ministry of Health is tasked by law to specify what vaccinations are required. Their program is called the "Programa Ampliado de lnmunizaciones" (PAI) (Extended Immunization Program). Within this program they publish the "Esquema Nacional de Inmunizaciones" (National Immunization Scheme), which specifies what vaccinations are required by who, at what age, special conditions, etc. So far I have not been able to find a link to this document (but I know it's there somewhere.) The new law as published does not contain a comprehensive list of required vaccinations, but rather simply talks about new vaccinations that will be funded through the law and provided to the Panamanian population through the new immunization program. There are, however, other sources that will work as a start for now. Read more…
# Boquete Guide finds an unique place in Volcan, Chiriqui: Road Trips from Boquete: Sitio Barriles, an amazing archeology site which lays secret to most of visitors and residents.
Of all the places I have been so far in Chiriqui this site is most amazing. Three distinct cultures inhabiting this one area in a 2600 year span. Distinct cultures if their images and artifacts are indicative. It is theorized one was Asian and another African both in about the same time frame. And then Mayan at about 900 AD.
I cannot recommend this day trip enough if this bit of history is of interest to you. Edna takes her time to explain it all and answers questions. Oh cost, we never asked and even after Jennifer bought some trees and other plants and I gave a large gratuity the cost was far less than Finca Dracula. Read on…

author: Melissa De León


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Poland: “More Pope, Less Literature” · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

“More Pope, less literature…” This, according to the beatroot, is what Polish kids would be reading if Poland's education minister prevails.

source: news-globalvoices

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

author: Veronica Khokhlova


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Poverty in Morocco, and a Moroccan Family Living in a Toilet · Global Voices
Jillian C. York

A BBC article about a Moroccan family living in a toilet as well as a blogger's experience with smelly bus rides (Knarf in the City: “Rush Hour“) sparked a discussion about poverty in Morocco.
Cat in Rabat remarked upon unpleasant smelling classes, and continued:
Having said that, the children and their clothes were, at least, superficially clean and always wore their ‘Sunday best'; in fact, they often wore the same outfit every class probably because they only owned one set of decent clothes.
Why did they smell? Many of Morocco's poor rely on a weekly trip to the hammam (public bath) to get scrubbed and scoured and splashed clean…
The blogger quoted an earlier post from The Morocco Report in which the worst jobs in Morocco were discussed, naming “hammam attendant” as #1:
Imagine scrubbing the dead skin off human bodies all day long, sitting in wet clothes and sweat, pausing only for a sip of water or an orange, because for every body you scrub, you might get ten or twenty dirhams. Such is the life of a hammam worker.
Cat in Rabat transitioned into a discussion about the aforementioned BBC article…
…A family of toilet squatters who were barricaded from their ‘home’ (a home replete with a noxious zoo of various vermin and god-knows what airborne distempers) with cement and concrete. Why such draconian measures? What was their crime? – Mr. Baja had had the effrontery to go to the press seeking assistance in raising public awareness to their plight. Blocking access to the toilets was a bit of a double whammy: not only is a family now out on the street, but Mr. Baja no longer has the means to earn his bread – a living which had hitherto been less than $30.00 a month.
And Mr. Baja? – he just wants to get the hell out of Dodge. Of course, he has no money and no way of acquiring the legal means to emigrate so, instead, he's considering crossing the Straits of Gibraltar in the rusty hull of a freighter (which will probably be apprehended) or in a rickety fishing boat (which will probably capsize). He has run out of alternatives.
The Morocco Report also blogged the story, saying:
Anyhow, after that there’s the poor. Not a whole lot of in-between. The poor sometimes live in the medina homes their families have owned for literally hundreds of years, usually without modern plumbing, sometimes without electricity. Other times they live in shanty towns or slums, with corrugated metal roofs held down by rocks. And then there are the homeless.
Daniel Sturgis: The Struggling Beach Buggy Travel Writer in Morocco had a different take on the article:
I wouldn't put too much stock in what the “toilet guy” says. Perhaps, events in some form or another like he said might have happened. I doubt he'd pass a lie detector test on all the facts however.
First of all, what are these toilets and how did he get his job? Likely, he came off the street and worked for tips, one of countless toilet people who leave a dish for tips on a rickety wooden chair outside public toilets. Inside, the toilets always seem to remain filthy and stinking. The “toilet cleaners” don't put their “not so hard” earned money to good use and invest in a bottle of bleach every so often.
In a final comment about poverty in Morocco, I will share this poignant comment from Everything Morocco posted at The Morocco Report:
Having lived in Fez medina for a long time now, I have to comment on this matter of people smelling bad or clothes not being clean – and pardon me if this gets long.
First, not all homes have water or can afford it if they do, so the family carries it to the house from the public fountain – my neighborhood is an example. Public water is free. Nor do they have washing machines (or laundromats) so all clothes are scrubbed by hand – at the public fountain. Everything is done at that fountain that can be done to stretch the family’s income.
Deodorant at 30 dh minimum per can is a whole day’s wages for an illiterate unskilled laborer. Food – or deodorant? Also, when I lived in Germany in the 80s, the buses were as rank as any here and that’s because they just didn’t want to buy a cosmetic product they considered luxurious.
Soap is cheap, yes, but again, cold water and a bucket at the public fountain – and wearing the same clothes you’ve worn all week anyway. Maybe the only clothes you own. And even if you have two sets, how much work can a woman raising a family of four, five or six kids handle anyway? And all that washing wears the clothes out faster and they may not have the money to replace them.

author: Jillian C. York


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Russia: G8 Summit · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

Edward Lucas writes about the Russia problem at this year's G8 summit in Germany: “Most G8 summits produce a welter of carefully honed platitudes, in which differences are finessed and blurred as much as possible. This one is likely to be no exception.”


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Russia: The Temple’s “Online Feeder” Nearly Wrecked by Bloggers · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

While looking for information on LiveJournal's recent blackout, I ran into this unrelated item (RUS) by Anton Nossik (LJ user dolboeb), one of the people in charge of Sup, the Russian online media company running the “Russian-speaking” segment of LiveJournal in partnership with Six Apart:
The Temple's Money Changers Have Hidden Away the Price Tags
The price list for commercial services rendered at [Moscow's Cathedral of Christ the Savior], which had been dug out by the dogged bloggers […], didn't stay there to delight our eyes for too long. It hasn't even been a week yet, and the price list has been quietly taken out of the Internet users’ sight. But it appears that the commercial department of the God's Temple did manage to overcome the pressure from the bosses embarrassed by the leak and prevented the final bankruptcy of its online feeder.
As a result, we have something extremely strange. The price list page is now empty, and the only way to learn about the prices is by reading bloggers’ accounts, or by looking into Google's cache. At the same time, the rest of the advertising pages have been left intact and are promoting different kinds of the Temple's money changers’ activities. Here, for instance, is an advertisement of services for those who'd like to rent conference halls of [the Cathedral] (with pictures). And here's an ad of the underground garage where some God-fearing Russian oligarchs are hiding their Maybachs, Lamborghinis and Maseratis from the wrath and envy of fellow citizens (the price list for this service is also empty now, but there's a phone number that one can call to specify the prices).
[…]
There's even a dry cleaning service at Moscow's Christ the Savior Cathedral.
LJ user breqwas offers an explanation (RUS) of why so much commerce is taking place inside Russia's main church:
You see, [Christ the Savior Cathedral] does not belong to [the Russian Orthodox Church]. It belongs to the city and is managed by the Christ the Savior Cathedral's Fund, through which they were raising funds for its construction at one point. It was not given over to [the Russian Orthodox Church] allegedly because it costs a lot to maintain such a huge thing, and our Church is poor. And this is why this Fund is raising money the way it can. Why are they doing it like this? First, because it's a free country, and second, because it's Russia. […]


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Rwanda: this is Kigali · Global Voices
Ndesanjo Macha

The Soujourner Dispatch on entering Rwanda from Uganda: “Easy, just plain easy. Getting from Uganda to Rwanda was a breeze, and we didn’t even pay for a visa! Looks like Bush and Kagame (the Rwandan President) are chummy. Once again the physical border was porous. Immigration and Customs appeared to be optional as some people stopped, but many more just walked by.”

author: Ndesanjo Macha


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Serbia: Buses, Barbers & Doctors · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

Buses, barbers and doctors in Belgrade, “the bestest city in the world”… Read three anecdotes at Anegdote.


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Serbia: Tennis Players · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

After the Eurovision victory, Serbia has moved on to tennis: four Serbian players are currently in the Roland Garros semifinals draws (men's and women's singles, and men's doubles). Belgrade 2.0 tells the world about these and other rising stars.


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Tajikistan: Panj Bridges · Global Voices
Nathan Hamm

Are bridges across the Panj River to Afghanistan good or bad for Tajikistan? Vadim of neweurasia examines the issue.

author: Nathan Hamm


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Thailand: Celebrity Spotting · Global Voices
Preetam Rai

The lost boy is at a Bangkok opening ceremony and asking readers to help him identify the celebrities he spotted there.

author: Preetam Rai


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Thailand: Thailand Like Sim City · Global Voices
Preetam Rai

Mr. Pavee says Thailand is like the Sim City game. The blogger provides various game scenarios for Bangkok. “Lets assume we have an established (but messy) city like Bangkok as one of the playable scenario. Now try the following:# 1. Disaster Menu > Riot: Wow we just summoned a mob! Goes in line with rent-a-mob theory of Mr Thaksin, oh except we don’t have to pay anything in the game.”


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The Balkans: War Criminals News · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

In the former Yugoslavia last week, one war criminal escaped from prison and another was caught. Read more about Radovan Stankovic and Zdravko Tolimir at A Fistful of Euros.


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Trinidad & Tobago: Religion & Education? · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

“The school classroom is not the place for religious instruction: that belongs in the mosque, the temple, the church. In a multicultural society like T&T, children of different faiths and cultures need to mix, not to be confined to educational ghettoes.”  Jeremy Taylor makes a case for keeping religious instruction out of schools.

author: Janine Mendes-Franco


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Trinidad & Tobago: Soca Star Released on Bail · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

“We often hear rumors about celebrities behaving badly, but then it appears that they never suffer any repercussions for these alleged actions as no one ever comes forward to separate fact from fiction.”  Trinidad Carnival Diary reports on the assault charges facing soca star Machel Montano.


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Tunisia: Allergic to Dr Phil · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

“My husband is allergic to Dr Phil, Oprah, and The View. He can’t stand them especially, the View.When I happen to have the TV tuned into The View, and he is around, he clutches his ears like they are burning and begs me to turn it off. I believe the sound of Rosie’s voice actually caused him physical pain,” writes Tunisian blogger Leilouta.

author: Amira Al Hussaini


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Vietnam: The Mystery of the Undersea Cable · Global Voices
Preetam Rai

There has been a slowdown in Internet speeds in Vietnam. Itsthefinalworld explains the reason behind the slowdown.


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Bahrain: Defamation Case Thrown Out of Court  · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

“The High Court dismissed a defamation case brought by the president of the Arabian Gulf University Dr Rafia Ghubash against journalist Hisham Al-Zayani. I wish to offer my congratulations to Mr. Al-Zayani for winning the case, even though the decision has taken over 2 years to be determined. This rare victory for the written word should be guardedly welcomed as the current Press and Publications Law still allows for the imprisonment of journalists and it is high time that it is changed,” reports Bahraini Mahmood Al Yousif.


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Bahrain: Linux User Group Meet  · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

“The Bahrain Linux User Group [BLUG] is happy to announce that the inaugural group meeting will take place on the 9th of June at 4PM in Al-Bareh Café. For more information, please visit the newly launched group website at http://reblug.com,” reports  Bahraini Mahmood Al Yousif.


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Bangladesh: McKaaba? · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

a bengali in TO is provoked by the news of a kid who interprets the influence of corporate giants on religion. “It was a near riot. Shouting, gesturing, threatening the student who made the exhibit with dire consequences, they forced the principal to act. She of course marched to where the exhibit was being held, told the student in no uncertain terms that exhibits were meant to foster the learning spirit and not to insult, and asked her to take down the exhibit. The mob went back to whatever they were doing.”

author: Neha Viswanathan


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Barbados: Caribbean Vacation?   · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

Barbados Free Press quotes the Caribbean Tourism Organisation's Secretary-General to make the point that since US citizens are required to have passports for air travel, the Caribbean is no longer their preferred destination.


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Cambodia: Stars on Myspace · Global Voices
Preetam Rai

Mungkol is surprised by the number of Cambodian pop stars on Myspace.


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Cambodia: Vietnam Stops Sand Export · Global Voices
Preetam Rai

Socheta at KI Media translates a Radio Free Asia story that says Vietnam is not allowing Cambodia to ship sand to Singapore. Singapore usually imports sand from larger South East Asian neighbors for its construction projects. Vietnam is citing environmental damage to Mekong river as the reason for its action.


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China: Chengdu Classified Ads · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

A tiny classified advertisement paying respect for the ‘strong mothers’ of the Tiananmen managed to publish at Chengdu Daily on June 4. DANWEI translated a short note of wang xiao feng's comment on learning history.

author: Oiwan Lam


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China: Exam and Social Mobility · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

Today is the college entrance exam day in China. Granite Studio has a post discussing about  exams and social mobility in Chinese history.


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China: Flickr filtered · Global Voices
John Kennedy

The distinct 2.0ness with which an unprecedented environmental protest was carried out last week in southern China's seaside Xiamen city seems to have resulted, as of June 7, in the service of two websites key to the exclusive blog coverage of the event being disrupted: Bullog.cn, where live updates from the streets of Xiamen were being posted, and Flickr, where searches for keywords like ‘antipx’ and ‘xiamen’ bring back hundreds of images from the demonstration and later clashes with police and soldiers.
Lian Yue, columnist for Guangzhou‘s Southern Metropolis Daily and Bullog blogger had his personal blog blocked in early May, at the peak of many articles he wrote on the planned Px chemical plant.
Asks prominent bridge blogger and Fujian native Yee:
“Any reasons of baning this excellent photos share websites? So many! Especially in this June, like Xiamen people's march against PX project happened on 1st June and someone did a live report of the whole process on flickr.”
Buchong, one of the few bloggers who brought the Chinese blogsphere the Xiamen protest updates, at just before midnight Beijing time on June 7 writes on his Fanfou—a Chinese version of Twitter—of speculation that Bullog's having been blocked might not have been an official move:
【内幕】牛博遭到攻击，疑似方粉所为。罗方的粉丝都将拥戴对象的缺点全面继承、发扬光大了，且都有不理性的行为。这种事情发生在科学发展观的旗帜之下，真是莫大的讽刺。
A look at ex-Bullog blogger He Caitou's personal blog shows a post today, via a far more detailed version at the highly-read wikipedian Shi Zhao's blog, telling readers how to get past the Flickr block:
根据经验，只要哥哥你耐心地等待哟，心上的人儿就会到来哟！这一次，是《半亩塘闲话》shizhao达人。他不单给出了让你自己看的办法，还给出了让别人看的办法。请访问：
《显示flickr图片的临时解决方法》
Tips：对于很菜的菜鸟
在XP系统中，Hosts文件的位置一般是在：C:\WINDOWS\system32\drivers\etc
修改的时候，选择记事本或者写字板打开这个文件，你将看到：
127.0.0.1 localhost
然后请在下面加两行，加好以后应该是这样的：
127.0.0.1 localhost
farm1.static.flickr.com 68.142.232.116
farm2.static.flickr.com 69.147.90.156
In the Windows XP system, the Hosts file is usually located at: C:\WINDOWS\system32\drivers\etc
While you're making changes, open the file [Hosts] in either Notepad or Wordpad and you will see:
127.0.0.1 localhost
Then below that add these two lines so that in the end it looks like this:
127.0.0.1 localhost
farm1.static.flickr.com 68.142.232.116
farm2.static.flickr.com 69.147.90.156
Then save, presumably.
On top of Bullog being gone for the moment and Flickr photos showing up empty boxes, service was temporarily disrupted on June 7 at several English-language China-based blogs hosted by DreamHost—Bokane, Sinosplice and the China Blog List—as well as expat blog Sinocidal having seemingly been blocked the same day.

author: John Kennedy


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China: SMS charged  · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

A resident near Tai-hu sent out a SMS message that the water in the highly polluted lake contains cancer causing element 200 higher than standard level. He was detained for 10 days under the charge of disturbing public order. Wei Ying Jie from my 1510 criticised that such suppression of “rumor” wouldn't help solving the problem.


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Cuba: Castro’s TV Appearance · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

Babalu Blog reports on the differing reactions to Fidel Castro's first television appearance since his illness.


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Egypt: Banned Documentary, Cairo Metro Strike, Torture Trial and More · Global Voices
Freedom For Egyptians

Egyptian bloggers continue this week to blog on human rights and freedom issues among other interesting topics.
Due Thank You note by Egyptian blogger Abdel Monem Mahmoud: Following his release from prison, he wrote his first blog titled “Ana ikhwan… I am free”. He thanked all fellow bloggers and organizations that showed support. He was extremely surprised and happy to receive a huge number of congratulations messages. He had the intention to write about his last experience in detention, however he felt so overwhelmed with the sincere feelings from everyone around that he could not write but to thank everyone.
He concludes his post saying that freedom is truly invaluable and it deserves more sacrifice so that all the oppressed in this country (Egypt) can have their freedom and not only him. He says “we must give our best so that the Egyptian people can be able to enjoy freedom and dignity…Egypt needs freedom.”
Monem blogs under the name of “Ana Ikwan”. Ikhwan in Egyptian Arabic means Muslim Brotherhood. He was detained in prison for more than 45 days for political allegations.
Freedom of worship in Egypt: Baha’i Faith in Egypt blog reports on the release of a new documentary film in Egypt. “An independent Egyptian film maker, named Ahmed Ezzat, has just released a documentary on the struggle of the Egyptian Baha'is. The film, banned by the Egyptian authorities, is entitled “Identity Crisis:My Religion or My Country: The Baha'i Quagmire in Egypt.”
On December 16, 2006, the Supreme Administrative Council of Egypt ruled that the government may not recognize the Bahá'í Faith in official identification numbers (ID documents). Consequently, Egyptian Bahá'ís are unable to obtain government documents, including ID cards, birth, death, marriage or divorce certificates, or passports, all of which require a person's religion to be listed.
Unlike so many world countries, in Egyptian IDs, religion must be listed.
Wael Abbass continues his anti-torture campaign: Egyptian citizen Emad Al Kabir, microbus driver, was tortured in a police station. After the release of his torture video on blogs and due to public opinion and press media pressure, the officer responsible for torturing Emad Al Kabir now is in court for trial.  Wael Abbass, a popular Egyptian blogger, who uncovered several torture incidents against citizens in some police stations, continues his anti-torture campaign on his blog. This week was another court session where Islam Nabih, the officer accused of torturing Al Kabir, was trying to defend himself. Wael Abbas says that he is so surprised to learn that the officers at the Ministry of the Interior who torture citizens form a kind of a network to defend each other. Abbass said he always ridiculed the idea until he saw another officer sitting next to Nabih in his support in the court hearing. Wael met this officer before and was told by him that all those torture videos are fabricated and do not exist. Wael’s point is despite how clear cut these videos are, some sympathizing police officers are still denying them instead of acknowledging committing grave mistakes against innocent citizens.
Cairo Metro Strike: Cairo is one of the most populous capitals in the world. Millions rely daily on Cairo metro or subway. Arabawy yesterday reported a train drivers strike due to the injury of one their colleagues. However in this update, he says that the strike was contained. Few years ago, I remember it was a rare incident if almost non-existent to hear about strikes within any category of workers or professionals.
Finally a call to Renew old Friendships: Tarek of gr33ndata blog calls on continuing to socialize electronically and enjoy your friends and abandon all those conspiracy theory of organizations trying to spy on you.  Tarek thinks it is really fun to find friends over the internet and renew old friendships using Facebook, Flicker and blogging technologies!

author: Freedom For Egyptians


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Egypt: Free Kareem Site Hacked · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

“Unfortunately, someone gained access to our FTP, databases, and host panel and managed to take down all our websites, including this one. Everything was affected: files, plugins, backups, posts. Lalith our webmaster is still in the process of recovering our data. Please be patient with us if you note any problems with the site; we are aware of the issues and we are working on fixing it,” is the announcement you will find today at the Free Kareem site, put up by volunteers to pressure Egypt to release blogger Kareem Nabil Sulaiman, who has been sentenced to four years in prison for articles he wrote online.


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Egypt: Remembering POWs · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

Egyptian blogger Zeinobia pays tribute to her country's POWs from the Six-Day War with Israel here.


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Guyana: Curry Favour?   · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

Guyana-Gyal is engaged in a war of words with the most unlikely of characters…


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Korea: Have You Ever Killed a Person? · Global Voices
Hyejin Kim

A sixteen year-old Korean girl who became famous due to the extreme success of losing weight killed herself. To please her grandmother who was worried about her grand-daughter’s heavy weight, the girl lost about 40 kilograms in three months. Her story was introduced on a TV entertainment program. At that time, she took a photo with one of her favorite singers. Her death is assumingly caused by netizens’ ak-peul (notorious reply: trackbacks or comments which netizens abuse targeting specific people or events). The jealousy of the singers’ fans left ak-peul related to her news in internet and her internet homepage. Some of them even harassed her on her phone.
The exact reason for her death has not been cleared yet. But according to her friends and families, she has been depressed due to ak-peul. Recently several entertainers committed suicide due to ak-peul and depression. Some of the entertainers are suing a group of ak-peul-reo (people who do ak-peul). Bloggers brought the problems of netizens’ attitudes out.
A blogger, your inside, posted a netizen’s response right after her death with a picture that caused the problem.
다른 죄를 지은 것도 아니고 방송에 나와서, 그 기념으로 누구나 사진찍을 수 있는거 아닌가요? 밑에는 자살 후, 악플 단 사람의 글.
이미죽었는데 엘프가 미안하대서 살수도 없는거고 자살하신 여자분에겐 죄송하지만 어느누구라도 어느 누구 팬일지라도 그랬을거예요 몇명은 솔직히 질투나잖아요. 누군 아무리 만나고 싶어도 못 만나는데 고인의 명복을 빕니다. 하지만 그 정도는 예상하고 나오셨어야죠.
Her friend left her feeling on the internet and appealed to ak-peul-leo.
스타킹 출연 40kg자살한 소녀……….
제 친굽니다…………
듣는 순간 기분이 아득해지더군요.
나에게 왜 문자하나 하지 않았을까
하기만 했어도 난 널 막아줄 수 있었을텐데.
왜…. 왜 죽었는지…… 아니 왜 죽어야 했는지…. 악플 단 사람들이
협박 전화한 사람들이 그 사람들이 나쁜 사람들인데 왜 그 애가 죽어야 했는지.
외모로 사람들이 차별해도 살 빼고, 빼고…….빼…고…..
원망하지 않은 아이였는데…
그래도 이런 거 알려드리고 싶었어요. 여러분 제발 부탁이에요.
압니다. 여러분 싫어하시는 가수, 연예인 욕하고 싶은 거 이해해요.
그래도 제발 좋은 말로 해주세요.
A blogger shared his experience, which reflected fear of ak-peul.
비록 제 일은 아니라고 하지만 이것은 곧 말하자면 우리 모두가 언제라도 피해자가 될 수 있다는 뜻이기에 덮어 둬서는 안될 일이라고 봅니다. 길을 지나치다 여중고생들을 봤을때, 가끔은 등줄기에 식은땀이 흐른다. 저 여학생들 중 누가 글쓴이의 블로그에 들어와 욕을 퍼부었을지 모르는 일이기 때문이다.
소녀의 ‘원죄’는 “사진을 찍은 것”이었다. “네가 뭔데 우리 오빠와 사진을 찍느냐”는 것이다. 글쓴이도 매일같이 경험했던 것이다. “네가 뭔데 우리 오빠들을 욕하느냐”는 이야기는 소녀팬들과의 전쟁을 치룰 때, 하루도 빠짐없이 고장난 라디오처럼 들었던 뻔한 이야기였다. 하지만 소녀는 단지 사진을 찍었다는 이유만으로 욕을 먹어야 하는 사실, 그것도 문자메시지와 미니홈피에까지 도배되는 욕을 견뎌내야만 하는 사실을 감당할 수 없었을 것이다. 그 테러를 견디지 못한 소녀는 자살을 선택했다.
A blogger even suggested that schools should offer “how to deal with ak-peul” as classes.
제 1교시
우리는 악플에 노출될 수 밖에 없습니다.
과연 악플이 무엇이고 어떻게 대처해야 하는지 숙지해야 합니다.
제 2교시
적극적인 대처방법과 소극적인 대처방법이 있습니다.
예. 소극적인 방법은 악플에 노출이 되지 않도록 하는 것이겠죠.
적극적인 방법은 악플러들을 고소하는 것입니다.
그런데, 이것은 시간과 비용이 들기 때문에 현실적으로 어렵겠죠.
제 3교시
자 명상의 시간 악플을 보거든 마음의 평정을 찾고 절대 이성을 잃어서는 안됩니다.
호랑이에 잡혀가도, 정신만 차리면 산다고 하지 않습니까.
바로 그런 자세로 악플을 보더라도 정신을 잃지 말아야 합니다.
악플러 – 그 행동의 결과는 반드시 그에 맞는 책임을 지게 되어 있다.
Some of them say that the main reason for her death was depression after the serious diet.  But the problems of ak-peul have become serious social issues in Korea.
Enjoy a music video and comics that bloggers made to criticize ak-peul-leo.

author: Hyejin Kim


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Hong Kong: Art Painting Removed in University · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

This is probably the reason why Hong Kong can never be successful in creativity. Byran blogs an incident that a painting by one of the Master of Fine Art (MFA) student was forced to remove by the school administration because nudity is a problem. You can check out the painting by yourself.


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India: Google and Me · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Dina Mehta is concerned by Google's apparent disregard for user privacy, given their common login protocols across their services. “In countries like India however, where for the large part, computers are shared at work and home – this could become a problem. Not everyone has the know-how or the presence of mind to set up different logins and user accounts at boot up.
Look at Google's acquisition over the years – they are buying up the best really. And our lives are enriched and simpler as a result. I love using many of these and it makes my life better. But yesterday's experience with setting up my friend's blog got me thinking in the longer term – and I kept pondering over – what cost? “


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India: Protests at G8 · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

a reader's words on the protests at the G8 venue. “Why are these people protesting? The answer is very simple- even as globalization creates islands of the first world in the malls in Shanghai and Bangalore, it is also creating a Third World-like underclass in the developed world.”


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Iran: Second Cultural Revolution Coming? · Global Voices
Fred Petrossian

Universities in different parts of Iran are experiencing a new wave of repression by security forces. Between 6-8 student activists, members of student associations, and independent professors who dare to think and express their ideas differently than the Iranian establishment, have been arrested in recent weeks, or are awaiting court hearings and decisions from disciplinary committees – some for allegedly failing to respect strict Islamic dress code.
There have in fact been calls by some Basiji and conservative forces to begin a second Cultural Revolution to purge universities of secular and reformist thought. After the Islamic Revolution in 1979, Ayathollah Khomeini, the founder of the Islamic Republic, declared  the need for a Cultural Revolution in all universities throughout the country. Universities were shutdown for two years and many students and professors were fired.
Several bloggers share their concerns and ideas about recent events.
Several jailed students in Amir Kabir
In the run up to the Islamic Student Association-Independent Student Association- annual elections at Amir Kabir University, several students were accused of publishing articles in university magazines that were insulting to the Islamic Republic. Jailed students say their magazine logos were falsified to destroy their free student associations.
Cityboy talks about the growing violence against students at Amir Kabir University. He writes:
when Arman Sadeghi and Ismail Salmanpour, both members of the Islamic Student Association activist body at Amir Kabir University in Tehran, tried to enter the university they were attacked by the university’s security guards.
There is a video film about this event:
The blogger writes:
some students at Amir Kabir University in Tehran went on a hunger strike to protest against the arrest of the seven student activists currently held in the notorious Evin Prison, and also against the increasing pressure on other active academics using harassments, banning and eviction of the active students from the university campus and dormitories and the recent beatings of active students.
Remember the first Cultural Revolution
Ahmad Shirzad, former reformist deputy in Parliament says [Fa] that people who encourage a second Cultural Revolution should think of what resulted from the first Cultural Revolution in early years of Islamic Revolution. Shirzad writes that many Iranian students and academics were fired and asked to follow strict rules, but after a few years the authorities turned back on their decisions when they realised the Cultural Revolution did not work.
Respect or Humilation?
Kadivar feels [Fa] universities are in deep trouble. She cites the arrests of students, a speech by the Iranian President, Ahmadinejad, urging confrontations with secular professors, the firing of some professors, suspicious deaths of three students, sending students to disciplinary committees, and violent security forces attacks on universities.
The blogger says the Iranian government imposes its power on institutions in  civil society. Kadivar adds it is exactly the same way Iranian authorities act in foreign policy. She says in the long term this kind of policy will only create problems and more crises. Nothing more. The blogger concludes it is better for the government to respect students than to humiliate them.
No Political Discussion Please
Retorik says[Fa] that at his Modares University  several academics and professors are under pressure or already suspended. He finds it really unbelievable that they cannot discuss politics during political sciences lessons at his university.
Sanjaghak says[Fa] students at her university are worried whether they will be called by the disciplinary committee tommorrow or not. “We are so miserable, to defend our rights we should organise meetings and expect to be beaten up,” she writes.
We need Cultural revolution
Contrary to previous bloggers, Mohammad Masih, a member of Muslim Bloggers Association says[Fa] a second Cultural Revolution is needed. The blogger says problems started when a reformist president came to power and the Cultural Revolution stopped. He complains that people who do not pay taxes or do anything for the security of Islamic Republic are in these universities, protesting against the Iranian State.

author: Fred Petrossian


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Iran:False Obsession over being Aryan · Global Voices
Fred Petrossian

IranianTruth reports when in the world have Iranians ever obsessed about being “Aryan”?  This clearly seems like a modern phenomenon born out a sense of inferiority to Western nations.  The man correctly noted that if we look at the vast majority of our past dynasties had no ethnic tie to any Aryan tribe.The blogger continues   So for those of you who hold yourselves out as being non-Arabs, Aryans, or Persians…remember your past and your present.  To be Iranian is a national identity filled with various cultures and ethnicities, including Kurds, Arabs, Turks, Armenians, and Arabs.


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Iran:Statistics Do not Mean Anything · Global Voices
Fred Petrossian

Ahmad Seyf says [Fa] it seems Iran did not enter in the age of statistics.The blogger writes Minister for Employment
each time presents a different statistic about unemployed people and how many jobs should be created.


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Iran:Students support jailed workers · Global Voices
Fred Petrossian

According to[Fa] Kaargar blog,some students in Amir Kabir University started to collect money for 3 jailed workers.Students are going to ask money one by one because security forces do not let them to collect money in an organized way.


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Iraq: Red Cross Scam · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

“Apparently there is a new scam going on where someone pretending to be the Red Cross calls the wife of a deployed service member in Iraq. They notify the wife that the husband has been hurt and has been sent to Germany for treatment, but that he cannot receive treatment until the paperwork is correct. They then ask to verify the service-member's name and social security number….and boom! Their identity is stolen,” writes Delal at Turkish Delight.


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Iraq: Treating Children  · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

Iraqi blogger Alaa alleges that 10 per cent of Iraqi families discriminate between boys and girls in the treatment of their children.
“DAY-BY-DAY IRAQIS LEARNED TO NOT MAKE DIFFERENETIATION BETWEEN BOY AND GIRL.
THERE IS DIFFERENETIATION BETWEEN WOMAN AND MAN IN IRAQI COMMUNTY BUT TODAY FATHERS TREAT THEIR SONS AND DAUGHTERS IN SAME WAY, AND LOVE THEM IN SAME VALUE, BUT STILL SOME FAMILIES HAS DIFFERENETIATION BETWEEN SON AND DAUGHTER, IT IS 10% OF IRAQIS,” he notes.


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Israel: First Day in the Army  · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

“My daughter was drafted yesterday into the army. I thought there would be more fanfare – ceremonies, large crowds, music, speeches. There were just a few families there with their about-to-be-soldier daughters at the place where we were at in Jerusalem.
“We (her father, boyfriend, sister and I) looked at the small crowd and joked that this is perhaps the “special needs unit” – low profiles, too overweight, too underweight, dysfunctional, dropouts, etc. She missed the “normal” profile by being underweight one kilo,” writes Jerusalem Gypsy from Israel.


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Israel: Hair Drive  · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

Blogger Jameel @ The Muqata from Israel is proud his daughter cut her long hair and donated it for children who have lost their hair after cancer treatments.


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Israel: Torture for Prisoners  · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

“Israel is now using methods of torture that makes the Dark Ages look civilised. In accordance with a High Court's approval of torture against Palestinians, the practice continues. One of the latest victims was fortunate enough to have his suffering get the attention of two local human rights groups; Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) and The Public Committee against Torture in Israel,” writes Desert Peace from Israel.


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Jamaica: Customs Woes  · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

The alleged involvement of Caribbean nationals in the recent JFK terror plot complicates Jamaican Marlon James’ entry into the US:  “Maybe I do come to the States too much. I have never been to Europe, or Africa, or South America or even most of the Caribbean. Why was I coming to spend quality time with customs officers when I could be hiking through Europe or teaching English in Shanghai?”


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Japan: Ancient Japan Blog · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

K. M. Lawson from Japan history blog posted his brief interview the writer of Ancient Japan Weblog: the material appearing on the blog stretches from the Jomon to the Kofun period.


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Japan: More vulnerable to disasters · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

Paul Nicholls from Japundit blogs a government report on Japan's vulnerability to natural disasters: it is  is increasing as skyscrapers mushroom in cities, shopping malls go underground and the population ages.


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Japan: Surveillance of Citizen Groups · Global Voices
Chris Salzberg

Japan Observer compares coverage of revelations that “a special Japanese Ground Self-Defense Forces (JGSDF) unit conducted surveillance against citizens’ groups and political parties opposed to the dispatch of JSDF troops to Iraq”, noting that, whereas the newspaper Asahi shimbun devoted the entire editorial page to the issue, Yomiuri shimbun buried it on p. 33.

author: Chris Salzberg


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Japan: The Matsuoka Suicide · Global Voices
Chris Salzberg

The story is now over a week old, and yet the sensational suicide of Agriculture Minister Matsuoka Toshikatsu, who hung himself in his apartment on May 28th and later died in hospital, is continuing to ripple through Japanese society. As others have noted elsewhere, while the rate of suicide within Japan is high, this is the first serving cabinet member in Japan's postwar government to commit suicide, and is one of the most high-profile cases in Japan's history. Adding to the sensationalism of this case is the series of scandals tied to Matsuoka himself (notably related to a project by the so-called Japan Green Resources Agency, or J-Green), which almost certainly played a key role in driving him to take his own life. Also notable is the subsequent suicide of the former executive director of a predecessor of J-Green, Yamazaki Shinichi, as well as the (less widely reported) suicide of Matsuoka's former classmate Uchino Yukihiro, also possibly related.
The news of Matsuoka's suicide was covered extensively by mainstream news and also picked up and discussed in numerous blogs within the English-language blog scene in Japan (see for example the roundup posted at Liberal Japan). Blogger Adamu at Mutant Frog Travelogue quotes from portions of two of the eight suicide notes discovered thus far:
“People of Japan and everyone in my support club… I am very sorry and take the blame for everything. I apologize for causing so much trouble. Please take care of things after I’m gone.” And another note states: “My wife knows the circumstances behind this. Please don’t look for the whys and wherefores. Please be gentle.”
Commentary on the suicide by Japanese bloggers was diverse and, given the sensationalism and heavy coverage of the story, very extensive. It is fair to say that many Japanese bloggers, while certainly shocked by the news, were none too sympathetic with the beleaguered Minister of Agriculture. Blogger nike_mild expresses the frustration of many in this passage:
今回自殺した松岡農水相は我ら国民の税金を懐に入れて私腹を肥やした犯罪者だ。本来なら司直の手にかかって法の裁きを受けなければならない。
本人のみが知る様々な悪事を自分の口から漏れないように「自らが口封じ」した事件なのだ。（自殺だとしてだが・・）
国民には知る権利がある。その私たちの権利を行使させないために「自殺」した。これが卑劣な行為だとはいえないのかね？
Blogger kazu discusses reactions to the suicide, highlighting certain strengths of the former agriculture minister while also condemning the many scandals in which he was involved:
個人的には｢開いた口がふさがらない、情けない｣といった感想しか出てこない。同情すべき点が全くないわけではない。彼の場合は農政族の中でもかなりのやり手だったらしい。今進めている農業の自由化に関する案件でも世界と対等に交渉できるの力を持っているのは彼くらいだという声すら挙がっている。それだけに、本業以外で負の脚光を浴びたことは非常に残念だ。
だからといって、一連の｢政治とカネ｣の問題がなくなるわけではない。彼は死を以ってこの問題をチャラにしてしまった。ほんとに政治家として最悪の幕引きをしてしまった。多くの人が考えているように最初から本当のことを言ってしまえばこんなことにはならなかったはずだ。
しかし、今回の死がもつ意味というのは非常に大きなものがあるような気がする。というのも、今回の彼の死でもって一連の疑惑を自ら認めることになったからである。本当に彼の一連の疑惑に対して自らの身の潔白を主張し、野党からの証拠提出要求に応じ、国民にわかりやすく説明したなら彼はこのような決断をする必要はなかった。しかし、彼は一貫して｢法律｣を盾に言い訳を続け、自分で自分の首を締めていったのである。
Blogger kikkuri, in a post which garnered a large number of comments and trackbacks, concludes by pointing to the opposition parties and the media in finding an explanation for what happened:
確かに松岡さんが追及されるのは当然だったし、安倍さんの任命責任も免れないのでしょうが、野党もメディアも人の死を（しかも亡くなった当日に）ここぞとばかりに安倍批判に利用してるような印象が否めず、何だかなぁと思います。
Some bloggers were sympathetic, and many even paid their respects to Matsuoka. Blogger banmakoto writes:
松岡利勝農林水産相（62）が自殺した。
古いタイプの自民党を代表するような政治家だった。
その政治スタイルは「利益誘導型」。
[…]
松岡氏の自殺は「喪失感」が原因だと思う。
懸命に人生を生きてきた人間が、すべてを失くしてしまいそうな状況に直面した時、乗り越えようのない「喪失感」に襲われる。
[…]
松岡氏は、すべてを背負ってあの世に旅立った。
そして今日、談合の指南役とも言われていた山崎進一・元緑資源機構理事（76）が自殺した。
松岡氏は、過疎地の企業を支援しようとしたのか、それとも税金を食い物にしようとしたのか・・・
何とも後味の悪い自殺だった。
松岡利勝氏と山崎進一氏のご冥福を祈る。
Mr. Matsuoka left this world with everything on his back.
And then today, Yamazaki Shinichi (Japan Green Resources Agency), who, it is said, was the brains behind the bid-rigging scheme, also committed suicide.
Was Mr. Matsuoka trying to support companies in underpopulated areas, or was he trying to steal our tax money…
His suicide ended things on a sour note.
I am praying for the souls of Mr. Matsuoka Toshikatsu and Mr. Yamazaki Shinichi.
And yet, other bloggers were not quite so sure that Matsuoka's soul deserved to be prayed for. At Tomorrow is Another Happy, one blogger reflects on the question of “praying for the soul” of politicians like Matsuoka:
「松岡大臣のご冥福をお祈りします、って書いてる人多いけど、ホントに祈ってるのかなぁ」と夫がつぶやいた。
私はなんだか、痛いところを突かれた気分になった。
私の尊敬するブロガーさんたちの中にも記事の冒頭に「松岡大臣のご冥福をお祈りします」って書いている人は多い。夫の問いかけは、そうした記述に行き当たるたび、私が感じていた劣等感に触れた。
My husband mumbled to me: “A lot of people write that they are praying for [Agriculture] Minister Matsuoka, but are they really praying for him?”
For me, this kind of hit a nerve.
Among the group of bloggers who I have respect for, many began [their blog entries] with the sentence: “I am praying for [Agriculture] Minister Matsuoka to rest in peace.” My husband's question, while confronting these types of comments, also touched on feelings of inferiority that I had.
Later in the same post, the blogger reproduces a conversation between herself and her husband about the idea of praying for the soul of Matsuoka:
私「祈ってるんじゃないかな。ひとつの命が失われたことに対して、自殺まで追い込まれたのだということに対して、ひとりの人間として同情を禁じ得ない、って感じなんじゃないのかなぁ」
夫「そんなもんかなぁ。自殺した人のご冥福って祈れる？」
私「祈れるよ。いじめで自殺した子どもたちとか」
夫「それはそうだよね。じゃあ、みーちゃん、ぼくが自殺したらどう思う？」
Me: “Not praying for him, are they? In terms of the loss of one life, of someone being driven to commit suicide, as another human being, it's hard not to feel compassion for him, isn't it?”
My husband: “Is it really? Can you really pray for the souls of people who commit suicide?”
Me: “Yes I pray. Children who commit suicide because they are bullied, for example.”
My husband: “That's true. So, Mii-chan [the author of the blog], if I committed suicide, what would you think?”
私「なに考えてんねん！って怒る！！」
夫「そうだろう？まず怒るよね。自分に関わってる人間が理由がわからず自殺したら」
私「うん、でも、松岡大臣に対しても、私は怒ってる」
夫「彼は大臣だからね。ぼくたちの生活に関わってる人だから」
Me: “I would get angry and be like: What were you thinking!!”
My husband: “Oh really? So you would get angry — if someone that you knew committed suicide, with no clear reason.”
Me: “Yes. But about Minister Matsuoka, I am angry with him.”
My husband: “Because he's a Cabinet Minister, right? Because he's involved in all of our lives.”
私「あ、そうか。でもね、怒っててもね、松岡大臣の家族には、ご冥福をお祈りします、って言うと思うよ」
夫「それはそうだよね。人として。でも、彼個人から遠い、ひとりの国民としては、怒りが先だよ」
私「でも、松岡大臣は犠牲者かもしれないよ。本当は辞めたかったのに内閣支持率のために辞めさせてもらえなかったのかもしれない。そんな中、自殺まで追い込まれたのだとしたら、お気の毒だと私も思う」
夫「それが事実ならね。でも、今は何もわかってないんだよ。結局は彼の自殺によって、うやむやになることは多いよね。彼が追いつめられていたのなら、その事実がわかってはじめて、ご冥福をお祈りする気持ちになれるんじゃないのかな」
Me: “Ah right, I guess so. But you know, even though I am angry at him, I think I can say that I am praying for his family.”
My husband: “That's a good point. [Pray for them] as people. But he himself is far from individual people — as a Japanese citizen, the anger comes first.”
Me: “But perhaps Minister Matsuoka was a just a victim. Maybe he really wanted to quit, but was not allowed to do so, because the government wanted to maintain its approval rating. In that context, as someone who was driven to commit suicide, I have to feel sorry for him.”
My husband: “If that was the truth of the matter, then yes. But right now, we really don't know anything. In the end, as a result of his suicide, many things are being hushed up. He was being chased down, but maybe if we had, for the first time, actually learned something, then we would feel like praying for him, no?”
私「そうかもしれない。でも、松岡大臣に同情的な姿勢を取ることで、安倍総理への糾弾に持っていけるんじゃないのかなぁ」
夫「だから、戦略的に、ご冥福をお祈りします、って言うの？　それもぼくはできないなぁ。日本国万歳なんて遺書じゃなく、全てを明るみに出してほしかったよ、ぼくは！」
Me: “Yes, maybe so. But if you take a sympathetic position with respect to Cabinet Minister Matsuoka, then it is possible to take a position condemning Prime Minister Abe, I think.”
My husband: “So are you saying that you should strategically pray for him? That is something that I can't do. I didn't want some “Japan Banzai!” farewell note, I wanted him to uncover the whole truth!”
She then concludes the post with the following note:
その後、鈴木宗男氏の話や石原慎太郎の話などを色々して、なんとか話を一段落させて寝たのだけれど、どうもこの「ご冥福」が私の頭にこびりついてしまって、夢の中でまであれこれ考えている始末。あきらめて起き出して、とりあえず文章にしてみた。
「ご冥福をお祈りします」という一文がどうしても書けなかった自分のことを、私はそんなに嫌いではない。でも「ご冥福をお祈りします」と書ける人間になりたいと、やはりどこかで思う。
もし、私が「ご冥福をお祈りします」と、書き加えることができていたなら、私は何を手に入れて、何を手放すことになったのだろう。
After this, the conversation turned to various topics such as Suzuki Muneo [Liberal Democratic Party MP who talked to Matsuoka a few nights before he died] and Ishihara Shintarou [Mayor of Tokyo], then the talk somehow quieted down and we went to bed. But for some reason, this [talk of] “happiness in the next world” stuck in my head, and I even had dreams about it. I finally gave in, got out of bed, and wrote this text.
But even I, who could not bring myself to write the sentence: “I am praying for him to rest in peace” — I don't really hate myself that much for [not being able to do] that. However, I still want to be someone who can write: “I am praying for him to rest in peace.”
If I became someone who was able to insert the line “I am praying for him to rest in peace”, then what would I get for it, and what would I lose?


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Jordan: What’s Next for Facebook  · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

“The supposedly simple answer is finding a way to make money for the site owners- to sustain and develop the service- and for users- along the lines of Google Adsense and other profitable tools used by bloggers. Why? Because holding a user’s interest in this age of cluttered media and hundreds of similar websites must come down to superior services and money making!” notes   Zeid Nasser from Jordan.


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Kuwait: Call for Blood · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

Kuwaiti blogger BLasSha  made an appeal for type B- blood on behalf of her uncle, who is in hospital. Kuwaitism spreads the word here.


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Liberia: drama at Charles Taylor’s trial · Global Voices
Ndesanjo Macha

Latest from Charles Taylor blog: “In a dramatic opening to the Charles Taylor trial today, the man long-awaited to confront criminal charges brought against him in the Hague elected not to appear.  And his lawyer, Karim Khan,  interrupted the opening statement of the Special Court for Sierra Leone’s Chief Prosecutor, Stephen Rapp, by walking out of the courtroom in defiance of a court order to continue representing Taylor for the day — in an unexpected move, Taylor sacked Khan and asked to represent himself.”


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Palestine: Israel Investigating Soldier · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

“Israel is Investigating soldier use of Palestinian human shields.
Remember the video that showed some IOF using some Palestinian Youths as Human Shields in Nablus? Finaly, Israel is now investigating soldier for this crime. I have no doubt that the soldiers will face no charges or get sentence for such crimes, but I hope that I will be proven wrong,” writes Palestinian blogger Haitham Sabbah.


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Russia: Gorbushka · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

Two-Zero and The Turkish Invasion write about what looks like a semi-end of the golden age of Gorbushka, Moscow's legendary “pirate DVD empire.”


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Russia: “The Azeri Option” · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

Sean's Russia Blog reports that at the G8 Summit, Bush and Putin “appeared to come to some agreement over the placing of missile defense systems in East Europe” – thanks to the surprise “Azeri option.”


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Russia: The New Times Money Laundering Text 2 · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

Robert Amsterdam posts the translation of The New Times’ second investigative piece on the probe into Raiffeisen's alleged ties to money laundering.


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Serbia: The Lustration Law · Global Voices
Sinisa Boljanovic

As time goes by, the issue of lustration in Serbia is becoming more and more interesting. The country's parliament passed the Lustration Law in 2003 – but it has still not been implemented.
The Serbian public knows that the Serbian Radical Party and the Social Party of Serbia are against the implementation of the Lustration Law, while the liberal Democratic Party continues to be in its favor. What the Serbian public does not know is why the Serbian government, which, naturally, has to carry out an order of the parliament, does not put the Lustration Law into effect.
Goran Miletic, a Serbian blogger, wrote (SRP) this at his B92 blog on June 1:
[…]
[The government representatives’] today’ s statements have shown one of these three things:
1. They don’t know what lustration is.
2. They do know what lustration is, but they are trying to lead us to believe it is not the best option.
3. They do know what lustration is, but they will repeal the Lustration Law for the sake of a compromise with [Vojislav Kostunica’s Democratic Party].
For the uninformed, Božidar Đelić [Vice-president of Government of Serbia] said [the quote in English is from this B92 story]:
“The law is one thing, the other thing is that we have elements that deal with the legislature and many other services. Commonly, when we speak about lustration, we speak about people who have criminally or morally done wrong, and we have a series of laws that can and must be implemented.”
His [Democratic] party colleague, the new justice minister Dušan Petrović, made a statement that the former minister Stojković would have agreed with:
“We will do everything possible to improve public life in Serbia, for the nation to be healthier than before, that is why we entered the government. If we can apply the laws in practice, we will apply, if we cannot apply the laws in the practice, we will change them. We want to change life in Serbia, because Serbia has to be a civilized European country.”
I don’t know what we can conclude from their statements. From the first, I concluded that they attempt to introduce criminal responsibility instead of lustration – which is not same. Crimes are dealt with according to the Criminal Law. Those politicians who had an opportunity to violate the elementary human rights (and who had done it), have to by judged according to the Lustration Law and they have to be excluded from politics for a certain period. Those people could work but they should not be allowed to go into politics. If some of those people participated in the election fraud, they would not serve as judges. If some of them gave notice to the policemen who refused to carry out orders and did not go into Kosovo, they would not be engaged with the police. The intelligence services are a special story.
The second conclusion is very simple. From the statement of the justice minister, I think that the ruling coalition will repeal this law. That is really the greatest shame for the Democratic Party.
The Lustration Law was passed in the parliament at the only time possible – after the assassination on Zoran Đinđić. […] It's a shame that [the Democratic Party] is playing with it.

author: Sinisa Boljanovic


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Sri Lanka: Prof VK Samaranayake · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Open Maze and other blogs on the death of Prof. V.K. Samaranayake. “This is shocking news; he was the founder of the BIT (Bachelor of Information Technology- External) program at the University of Colombo (UCSC). Thanks to him lots of people, including me got the opportunity to step into the IT world. “


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Sri Lanka: State Sponsored Abductions · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Lanka Whistle-Blower on what appear to be state sponsored abductions. ” It started with abductions of Tamil businessmen, and extended to the Muslim community, and has now made the transition to the Sinhalese as well.What is all the more shocking — no wait, I take that back. What is all the more interesting is the little or no effort done by the authorities to stem these recent developments. The little or no effort, however, can be attributed to the growing perception that the government and the security forces are indeed behind these activities.”


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Thailand: Don’t Criticize the Judges · Global Voices
Preetam Rai

The Lost Boy updates us on the latest happenings in Thailand where a constitutional tribunal is asking members of the public to avoid voicing out criticism against the tribunal's decision to ban former prime minister Thaksin's party.


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Thailand: Visiting Tiger Cave Temple in Krabi · Global Voices
Preetam Rai

Thaizer encourages visitors to Krabi to try going to the nearby Tiger Cave Temple. “Set in a tropical forest 10 kms outside of Krabi Town, the main cave and temple is interesting without being particularly special”


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Trinidad & Tobago: Effective Lobbying  · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

Jeremy Taylor uses the protests against the proposed Alcoa smelter plant to put forward a simple solution for enforcing change: “These problems are never going to be solved by individual voices crying in the wilderness. If we want to solve them, if we really want to know ‘what can we do’, the answer is very simple: organise.”


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Ukraine: “Emergency Assistance for Street Children” · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

Scenes from the Sidewalk reports on the work of a newly-created “mobile unit” whose aim is to assist Kyiv “street children or children in at-risk situations.”


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Ukraine: Rusyns · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

Dykun returns to blogging with a post on the plight of Ukraine's Rusyns, who were recently recognized as an indigenous nationality of the Transcarpathian region.


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Afghanistan: RAWA’s History · Global Voices
Nathan Hamm

Ronin says a fellow blogger has it wrong on RAWA, and corrects the record.


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Africa: critical look at the quest for alternative energy · Global Voices
Ndesanjo Macha

Alternative energy and the future of Africa's forest: “It’s the final day of the Summit, and so far we’ve heard the G8 leaders’ views on climate change and HIV funding. Richard M Kavuma hopes that in their quest for ‘alternative energy sources’ the G8 does not jeopardise Africa’s remaining forests.”


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Africa: who is listening to African women? · Global Voices
Ndesanjo Macha

An interview of one the African journalists blogging the G8 Sumit 2007: “One of the AfricaVox journalists, Zinhle Mapumulo, has been interviewed for openSummit, a blog covering the G8 process from a woman’s perspective.
Zinhle talks about her motivation for covering this year's Summit and her experiences so far….”


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Algeria: On the Kurds in Iraq · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

“With the situation between Turkey, the PKK, and Iraqi Kurdistan heating up, with regular engagements between Turkish and PKK forces along the Turco-Iraqi borderlands and the Iraqi President Jalal Talabani and Kurdistan regional president Massoud Barzani claiming that a Turkish invasion of Kurdistan “would be first of all an attack on Iraqi sovereignty and then an attack on the Kurds,” one must wonder what Dr. Kissinger would say about the situation,” writes Algerian blogger Nouri.


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Armenia: Football Victory · Global Voices
Nathan Hamm

Blogrel writes about Armenia's surprising victory over Poland in the Euro 2008 football qualifiers.


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Bahamas: Is Fair Trade Fair?   · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

“I am a believer in Free Trade. Not trade with more bureaucracy, but mutually agreed trade between parties. You have something to sell, I want to buy it and we agree a price for the satisfactory goods.”  WeblogBahamas.com says that the principles of Free Trade may not always be so simple.


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Bahrain: Bird Haven  · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

Bahraini blogger Mahmood Al Yousif keeps us entertained with a new couple of birds, nesting in his garden.


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Bahrain: Eat Shawarma at Your Peril! · Global Voices
Ayesha Saldanha

Bahrain, not normally the focus of the world's attention, was featured on CNN this week. LuLu gives her opinion of the report:
On June 1st, CNN aired what it called an “in-depth look” at Bahrain, in an 8 minute segment that can be viewed here.The program started with an assertion that Bahrain, despite being one of the world's richest countries in terms of per capita GDP, has a “hidden population.” Political and economic issues in Bahrain were reduced to “long-standing tensions” between the “poor Shi'a majority” and the “ruling Sunni elite.” And that's that.
First of all, let's just say that an 8-minute segment cannot possibly present an “in-depth” look into anything, even as small as Bahrain. Most importantly, though, looking at the political, social, and economic tensions in Bahrain from a black-and-white, Sunni-vs-Shi'i lens just misses the realities on the ground. Poverty is not an exclusively-Shi'a phenomenon as it was presented on the program. The Sunnis are not an “elite” enjoying exclusive access to power and wealth. Classifying the Sunni-Shi'a tensions as “long-standing” in Bahrain, moreover, is just plainly ignorant of Bahrain's history and social structure. … Reform, if that's what we're looking for, will not happen if the opposition alienates a whole section of the population. “Driving” all the Sunnis in the government arms by manipulating their fear of a “Shi'a” threat is a catastrophic strategy. Whether we like it or not, the political system of Bahrain is authoritarian. If you're in the opposition, chances are you will be repressed and silenced, whether you are Sunni or Shi'i. CNN seems to have missed this basic fact. … The opposition should definitely not allow itself to be sucked into reverse-sectarianism. In Bahrain in particular, our opposition cannot afford to alienate the Sunni population. We are too small to turn our political struggle into civil strife.
Yagoob is also frustrated at the report:
I normally don’t write about politics, it’s not my thing because 1) I’m not a politician nor a freedom fighter  2) I believe there are way better things to talk about and learn, but anyhow I just feel pissed off! … CNN are blatantly trying to capitalise on the ever growing Sunni-Shi’aa tear in the Arab World and Bahrain seemingly absorbs every conflict in the region and localises it.
He has even written a letter to CNN to complain:
Shi’aas and Sunnis in Bahrain’s history have always lived side by side and even have blood relations between the two Islamic sects.
Things in Bahrain are not exactly rosy, let’s me realistic but I feel that you have not showed the whole story. … The biggest problem we face in Bahrain is that we still think we live in the bloody nineties! Times have changed and we are going in the right direction regards democracy and human rights, slowly by surely…
Mahmood raises the ever-relevant issue of employment in Bahrain, and the labour reforms on the way:
The biggest change that that package will introduce is the employers’ ability to hire and fire based on performance, regardless of nationality and gender. And it is this – in particular – that will ultimately force the Bahraini worker to re-evaluate his and her position and become more productive. Believe me when that happens, we will rule the world, because – ironically – we are not lazy, we just needed that huge chip to be knocked off our shoulder!
Silly Bahraini Girl is impressed with the debate taking place on Bahraini blogs regarding this matter, and she wants to take things a step further:
Everyone has strong opinions when it comes to jobs, the job market, work ethics, education, training and lazy Bahrainis who want everything handed to them on a golden platter.
We have had a good debate going on in Bahraini blogs over the past few weeks.. and to put all the ideas together and generate more of an interest and feedback as well as tangible ideas and perhaps even a job's market where people can post vacancies and we can put them in touch with potential employees, yada yada yada .. I am ready to volunteer my time and effort to develop an online forum .. erm .. a blog .. and put all those ideas under one roof.
Mohammed AlMaskati, who has a job, doesn't think he should pay to support those who don't:
The invisible hand of the government will soon find its way to my pockets yet again. Confiscating 1% of my monthly income with a new excuse, an “Unemployment Scheme” that will “put Bahrain on a par with advanced countries in terms of social insurance for its citizens” according to the GDN. … But it isn’t the state that will safeguard the ill-fated, the poor performing, or the unfit for the market graduates that literally paid their way through colleague; It is I, along with 450 thousand other employees (Bahrainis and expatriates alike) that are obligated to pay to preserve peace and stability to the corrupt, wasta-infested local labor market and get Bahrain in par with advanced countries. It is us that have to pay for the mistakes and corruption of the government over many years for the benefit of a very limited category of people. We are supposed to be living in a tax free paradise mind you; and it hasn’t been even 3 months since the increase in the mandatory GOSI contribution to 6% endured by my poor soul. … Yes ladies and gentlemen, we live to see the “Global Practice” card played upon us once again, to the benefit of the government this time. The very same government that turned a blind eye to the “Global Practices” that dictated keeping military personal off the voting booths to ensure the neutrality of the elections, the very same government that turned a blind eye to the “Global Practice” commanding that the parliament is to be headed by an elected member of the largest elected bloc.
Scarlett Cyn also has employment-related problems. It seems there has been a lot of upheaval at work recently, and she is left wondering who she can trust:
There have been so many things going on at work lately, in general all of them bad to varying degrees. Things I unfortunately and most certainly cannot speak about here on my blog. But suffice to say, I’m not altogether thrilled.
Also, 7 employees resigned this week, two of whom are department heads. My friends and I were counting on Thursday (on our hands because we were sure we were miscounting, but…) we have 6 ‘acting heads’ of departments now. And just as many fixed. Personally, the 50-50 ratio makes pretty much everyone nervous.
And Maroon Al Ras has discovered that his so-called ‘friends’ perhaps don't deserve that title, after a period in which he could only receive calls on his mobile – and most of them were business-related:
There is yet more disappointment in store. Mohammed AlMaskati asks us an uncomfortable question – do we know what's in the shawarma we all love eating?
Shawarmas are little pieces of heaven right here on god’s green earth. The unique mixture of the animal fat, the greased slices of spiced and marinated beef or chicken, a slight touch of taheena, pickles, vegetables or even taboula wrapped in a thin slice of pita bread is just unmistakable. A true signature dish of the Middle East, our very own burrito sandwich!
And it does more than tickling your taste buds, Shawarmas are by far the worse type of junk you could feed your body. If we overlook the nutritional facts, the beef or chicken used are often stored in extremely bad conditions, laid out to marinate for weeks in vinegar and lime. Often covered by nothing more than a dirty cloth or some paper they use to wrap the sandwiches in, one night after the other before the full large cone of meat is sold out at ridiculously low prices after hours of exposure to all sort of pollutants of the streets, all of which at room temperature.
Silver is also thinking about food, but sensibly he is focusing on home cooking, and he has some advice for young women today:
Every weekend, I wake up around 9-10 o’clock, just grab a small bite and take care of some stuff waiting for the highlight of the weekend, MY MOM’s COOKING. It's either Majboos, Beryani, Safi or other Bahraini dishes.
If you think about it, you will realize that, most of my mom’s generation knows how to cook, and you will also realize that each of them have their own touch when it comes to cooking. You can really notice that in Ramadan, when the neighbors and family send food. You will find 4 dishes of majboos but all taste different. That’s what I call the “Art of Bahraini cooking”.
I have noticed that most of our generation girls (age between 21-30) don’t really know how to cook. I wasn’t sure about this assumption, so I ran small test at the place I used to work. I asked the girls a simple question “do you know how to cook eggs”, very simple thing to do right?? Wrong, I got crazy responses. … I know these days girls don’t have to cook, we are not living in the stone age but let me give you a piece of advice, if you love your man, cook for him. This is one of the best you can do for him, Guys will love it. You do want to make your man happy right?? Cooking is a start!
From saving relationships to saving energy – TechZ wants us to take responsibility for the environment:
It seems with the recent loss of Alba’s power/water contribution to the local supply due to maintenance, not to mention one of Bahrain’s own plants under maintenance, a lot of us are having huge issues with electricity and water shortages. … This is the time, the time we ‘have not’, that we appreciate what we take for granted so much on a daily basis. Flip a switch, turn a knob, power and water, basic requirements for our daily life.
Bahrain’s population, rich or poor have been taking it easy with regards to water/power usage. We need to start getting this wastage of a non-renewable resource under control. … We all need to take part, recycling has to get more ‘in your face’ as in Europe, where every trash can comes with 3 separate units to dispose glass, paper and plastic. Proactive rather than the traditional laid back Reactive is what's needed.
Silver likes the idea of a metro system in Bahrain, and reports on a team of Bahraini experts who recently went over to Dubai to examine the plans for one there:
They all agreed that such a system is desperately needed in Bahrain. They all also said it requires in-depth planning or such a project will backfire. Most experts believe such a project will require 10 years to complete and given how slow construction is in Bahrain, we can tag 5 more years to give us a total of 15 years.
Experts believe that such a system will cost billion of dollars but the benefits is worth the investment. No serious feasibility study has been done on the benefits but according to Reem Akbari, “we did a pool asking people if they will use such a system and we got 50% saying yes”.
I have talked about the metro system in a previous article, I think if done well, it will be very beneficial to our country and economy. We have 300,000 cars on the road with an increase of 10% yearly, the road upgrades alone will not solve the problem. We need someone to take a bold decision, like Dubai did .
Finally, Abadi recounts a day of waiting around, expressing his disappointment that bureaucracy in Bahrain takes as long as in other parts of the Arab world – but that it helps if you're a woman:
Yesterday was a day of waiting … waiting … and even more waiting.
It all started around 11ish when a friend passed by me and took me with him to start working on getting my driving license. We arrived there at around 11:20 and i started filling up the application which went really smoothly and then finished the eye test which all in all took around 15 minutes. I was actually happy that things are going smoothly but then things took a turn to the worst and I realized Bahrain is the same as Kuwait and Lebanon.
I took a number to go to the counter so that i can be served. Number 675!! They were serving number 651 when I took the number so any normal person who sees 4 counters and number 651 in front of him would assume that this is not going to take long. Well it did take long, two hours long… the people working there took their sweet time talking to each and people they are serving joking and laughing which prolonged the usual 5 minutes (I timed it) needed to serve a person to around 15-20 minutes. Furthermore these government employees seem to have a special liking to women. Women simply walk in without doing anything or taking any number and their applications would be filled out by the officials and their papers processed as fast as possible … now isn’t that gender discrimination !!!
And now we're going to make you wait – a whole week, until the next round-up from Bahrain!

author: Ayesha Saldanha


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Bahrain: Loving Tribute  · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

Bahrain-based Bint Battuta pays tribute to her inspirational father who passed away three years ago after a struggle with cancer in this moving post.


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Bahrain: Premier’s Website  · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

Bahraini blogger Abdulhadi Khalaf links to a website which celebrates the life and achievements of Bahraini Prime Minister Shaikh Khalifa bin Salman Al Khalifa.


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Bahrain: Spotlight on Art  · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

Bint Battuta from Bahrain gives us a taste of a young Bahraini artist's work here.


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Barbados: Government Responds to Police/Media Clash  · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

In response to government statements following a police/media clash outside Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Barbados Free Press writes: “Journalists are not ‘ordinary citizens’ when they are covering public events. A free media is a defender of citizens’ rights and freedoms and the police should realise this if they cared about our democracy at all.”


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Barbados, Trinidad & Tobago: UK Travel Advisory  · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

In response to the UK issuing a travel advisory about Trinidad and Tobago in the wake of the JFK terror plot, Bajan Reporter says: “I am not saying that anywhere is peaceful and idyllic, but to jump on a bandwagon because the American media have found a few fringe lunatics…is really kinda irresponsible and perhaps more research is needed before sounding an alarm.”


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Bermuda: Dame Brown Evans Laid to Rest  · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

“Individuals and families I spoke with said they simply had to attend this ‘historic event’ and wanted their children to be a part of this ‘history in the making'”: Charlotte Andrews is one of many who lined the streets of Hamilton, Bermuda to pay their last respects to Dame Lois Brown Evans.


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Blog Profit Model in Korea · Global Voices
Hyejin Kim

A “blog profit model” is offered by Iguacu. The chart on the post has descriptions for different ad services in Korea.[ko]


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Bolivia: Interactive Map · Global Voices
Eduardo Avila

Miguel Buitrago (MABB) links to a new site called Bolivia En Tus Manos, which shows interactive graphs and can allow one to see the sad state of road infrastructure in Bolivia.

author: Eduardo Avila


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Bolivia: New Sites Following FIFA Ban · Global Voices
Eduardo Avila

A new blog has emerged to follow the controversial ban handed down by FIFA. Futbol de Altura [ES] is a blog started by Hugo Miranda that collects the most recent news of the ban.  The page also includes YouTube videos of important games played in La Paz.  One such video is labeled “Bolivia's Sin: Bolivia 2, Brasil 0,” which insinuates that the ban was supported by the Brazilian Federation because of its past problems playing in La Paz's altitude.


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Caucasus: Tourism Index · Global Voices
Nathan Hamm

Social Science in the Caucasus summarizes how the Caucasus states fare on the World Economic Forum's new tourism index.


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China: Flickr photos cannot be displayed · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

Bingfeng reports that flickr is filtered in China: to be more precisely, the site was not 100% blocked, you can still get most of the content (like the title of photos) except that all photos can not be displayed.


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China: Google and Baidu · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

Kuangfeng comments on an evaluation report of google and baidu's service in China (zh). The report shows that google has provided much better service than baidu, but it has lost in the market. The reason is mainly because of various compromises that google has to make for entering China market, such as the failure in providing cache searching.


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China: Property market · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

In the past few days, the stock market went down because of state regulation, however, the property market is going up. Zengying points out that the property market is more difficult to regulate than the stock market as people consider property as the primary investment (zh).


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Collection of images from anti-smoking campaigns around the world · Global Voices
Hyejin Kim

Z Rock talks about quitting smoking and offers a collection of images from anti-smoking campaigns around the world. [ko]


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Eastern & Central Europe: Children’s Books in Romani · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

Children's books in the Romani language are a rarity, writes TOL's Romantic, but a teacher from Ukraine has recently published a few items.

author: Veronica Khokhlova


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Eastern Europe: Trouble With the Presidents · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

An Alaskan Abroad notes on how CNN got the Czech president's name wrong: Klaus Topolanek instead of Vaclav Klaus. (Mirek Topolanek is the Czech premier.) Also, a photo from Kyiv, of an anti-Yushchenko protest sign that says Ukraine's president should be sent off to Alaska, of all places.


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Egypt: Deserted Cairo Streets  · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

“Friday usually the streets are crowded but today there wasn't any crowded streets ,a strange thing for sure ,it only happens in Eid or in Ramadan before the breakfast by 5 minutes.
“Where are the people ?? I asked myself , yet I remember tomorrow Saturday is the big day , the scariest day,the day the  general secondary certificate exams will start , the third stage of the general secondary stage “don't even ask about that silly name” will begin across the country,” reports Zeinobia from the deserted streets of Cairo.


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FA Cup in Africa, .cm domains, Fathia Nkrumah, The Trial of Charles Taylor, and more from West Africa  · Global Voices
Oluniyi D. Ajao

This week's West African blog round-up starts from Burkina Faso where Stephen Davies of Voice in the Desert blogs about Africans’ penchant for football leagues in Europe in “FA Cup Final in Ouagadougou“:
African men care very deeply about their football teams, including the teams they ‘adopt’ from abroad. In Ouagadougou there are passionate Manchester United supporters and equally passionate Chelsea supporters, and today they got together for the Cup Final.
Sparks flew…
From Burkina Faso to Cameroon, Scribbles from the Den blogs about “How Cameroon Auctioned Its Internet Namespace…“
Early in August 2006, the Internet was awash with reports of a “typo-squatting” scheme involving Cameroon. According to these reports, “Internet authorities in in the West African nation that owns the .cm top level domain (TLD) have been accused of authorizing a DNS wildcard that has the effect of redirecting all accidental .cm traffic instead of returning an error.”
In layman’s terms, Cameroon Internet authorities were redirecting all misspelled .com addressed (e.g. www.dibussi.cm instead of www.dibussi.com ) to an advert-based website (agoga.com), where they were making millions of dollars in pay-per-click advert revenue (Pay-per-click is an advertising system where advertisers pay an agreed amount for each click delivered to their site).
While not technically illegal, since the misspelled domain names are not being registered but simply redirected to another site, these actions raised serious ethical concerns.
Still in Cameroon, another Cameroonian blogger highlights the recent woes of ex-World Bank President, Paul Wolfowitz and the nominant of his replacement, Robert Zoellick.
Enanga's Pov blogs about Robert Zoellick and the World Bank: Putting the Fox in Charge of the Hen-House
In Cameroonian Pidgin English, when a person refuses to give up on something, he is said to “hold grass”. This image is drawn from small animals clinging desperately to grass to avoid being washed away by water.
We all saw how Mr. Paul Wolfowitz, (now, thankfully, former) head of the World Bank, held grass for weeks after it was brought to public notice that he was embroiled in a sordid scandal involving a female companion. Well, Mr. Wolfowitz was swept away by the flood of public opinion. And now the US government is offering to replace him with someone who is, as evidenced by the article below, even worse, especially for the Third World.
The grass-holding of the US government, which in the past few years has squandered whatever moral currency it ever garnered as the leader of the “free world”, should be a cause for great concern for those of us who cannot hold grass when faced with an unprincipled giant.
From Cameroon to Ghana, where Paa.kwesi's blog pays a brief tribute to the late wife of Ghana's 1st President Dr Kwame Nkrumah (also late) in Thinking in English : Fathia Nkrumah, icon of an era.
Fathia Nkrumah is dead. 8:07pm GMT, the message arrived in my email inbox.
Perhaps, the last iconic survivor of an idealist era in Ghana's history, her passing should remind us of the highs and lows of our recent existence and that there is a difference between promise and fulfilment. May we the living pay her tribute by recognizing that because we are neighbors, we must get along, share in each others’ pains and joys. No, we are not descended from one ancestor, do not speak the same languages, eat different foods, celebrate different Gods; but we do share the same space. May our dealings with each other display this understanding that after all is said and done if my house is burning you will necessarily feel the heat. We are in each other's business all the time. Let's all be friends.
My respects and condolences to her family. Due! Fathia, rest in peace.
Now to Liberia. A new blog named The Trial of Charles Taylor has been set up to provide news and analysis on the war crimes trial of former Liberian President, Charles Taylor. We're highlighting the Dramatic start to first day of Taylor trial which was posted on 4th June 2007.
In a dramatic opening to the Charles Taylor trial today, the man long-awaited to face justice in the dock in The Hague failed to show.  And his lawyer, Karim Khan,  interrupted the opening statement of the Special Court for Sierra Leone’s Chief Prosecutor, Stephen Rapp, by clumsily walking out of the courtroom in defiance of a court order to continue representing Taylor for the day — in an unexpected move, Taylor sacked Khan and asked to represent himself.  Rapp, and his Sierra Leonean colleague, Mohamed Bangura, continued to methodically present the prosecution case, reading out prepared statements across the room from an empty defense section — bar the court-appointed duty counsel, Charles Jalloh, who throughout the proceedings continued to sit back in the second row from where Khan originally sat, and three seats back from the gallery.  Jalloh, from the Special Court ’s Principal Defender’s office, took over on instruction by the Chamber to represent Taylor in the absence of the accused, and after Khan walked out despite a threat of contempt of court by Presiding Judge, Julia Sebutinde.
Nigerian blogger, Trae, concluded a two-part piece of things he dislikes about his country Nigeria in Things I hate 2: Nigerian styled importation
I hate the importation craze in Naija; yes I really do hate it.
I know importation is necessary in a globalized economy. What, with the comparative advantage theory and all; but Nigerians have taken it too far. Sometimes when I’m walking by and sight stacks upon stacks of imported items, a lot very storage dusty I shake my head and wonder when they’ll ever be completely sold out. In my opinion supply enormously outnumbers demand. As some people say all that remains now is for us to start importing tooth picks. Close your eyes and imagine Dayo Adeneye and Kenny Ogungbe of Kennismusic bragging about their imported tooth picks (P. Diddy style) on TV and you’d get my drift.
I hate it when I hear Nigerians say with relish (instead of with shame…well that’s how I opine they should feel because that’s definitely how I feel when I hear them) that the goods they’re selling are imported or the stuff they’re working with are imported, can’t be gotten any where in the country and so them and their business are the real deal.
I also hate the customer obsession with owning or identifying with imported stuff. Close your eyes here and Imagine Nike and Doshima of Cool FM Abuja on the radio program Girl Talk with their phonetics, annoying girlish demeanor and all.
Upwardly Mobile is the blog of Yomi Adegboye, who describes himself as “a non-conformist pastor & entrepreneur”. He discusses “A Different Type of Pyramid Scheme“. He starts by defining his topic:
You may already be aware of the numerous pyramid schemes being run in the country and around the world. For benefit of doubt, here is the definition of a pyramid scheme: a fraudulent scheme in which people are recruited to make payments to others above them in a hierarchy while expecting to receive payments from people recruited below them.
He then goes on to highlight what he sees as a similar trend, in some churches in Nigeria today.
What may amaze many church people is the fact that such a similar scheme has been run in church circles for years. The ‘gospel’ of sowing and reaping was introduced to the church not too long ago. The basic idea is if you ’sow’ financially or materially into the life or ‘ministry’ of a ‘man of God’, you will reap multiples of what you have sown. If you do it regularly, then you can expect a steady flow of financial and material harvest.
Of course, this is not a Biblical doctrine or practice. The whole idea was formulated into a doctrine by misapplying a few Bible verses as usual. Teaching it as a doctrine guaranteed that this man-made scheme would work perfectly. The result is a self-sustaining pyramid scheme.
Usually sitting at the top of the pyramid is one regarded as a ‘great man of God’ that the next level of preachers and christians give to. Then the lesser ‘men of God’ give to those on this level, and so on and so forth. At the bottom of the pyramid are regular church members who are told that they cannot be blessed by God if they do not keep their pastors in comfort (read: luxury). Of course, like any other pyramid scheme, those at the bottom have to climb up at least one step of the ladder before they can start ‘reaping’ anything, but it so nicely presented that most professing believers in this setup do not even realise that they are part of a pyramid scheme.
The concluding paragraph of the blog entry sums up his thought about this phenomenom.
It is a truly awesome and elaborate scheme. It is coated with Bible verses to give it legitimacy, but it is a pyramid scheme all the same, the product of ’smart’ carnal-minded men who see Christianity as a means of getting rich.

author: Oluniyi D. Ajao


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Google in Korea · Global Voices
Hyejin Kim

How does Google do in Korea? Trend25 discusses how Google started off behind in Korea but is rapidly catching up to local players. [ko]


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Hong Kong: Save Wikipedia Declaration · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

Tiney protested in his blog against the Chinese Wikipedia policy in deleting items because of “lack of popularity / significance” (zh). The debate is triggered from the debate about an item on “Fuk-guy always have yours” (a popular video spoofing Hong Kong government's propaganda video “Hong Kong always have yours”.


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Hong Kong: The Fall · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

Fongyun describes the recent comment of Wu Bangguo, chairman of the NPC Standing Committee, on Hong Kong's autonomy as “the Fall of Hong Kong”. As the Central government has already given autonomy to Hong Kong through the Basic Law, Wu's comment in reaffirming Central government say in Hong Kong politics seems to turn against the previous agreement.


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Iran: Why Iranians use the term of Persia? · Global Voices
Fred Petrossian

Plateau writes that most Iranians in using the term “Persia” nowadays want to distance themselves from the Islamic Republic Regime of (Iran) and the likes of Ahmadinejad, in the eyes of those non-Iranians who cannot or will not make a distinction between Iranian People and the despicable regime ruling Iran.The blogger continues   there is absolutely nothing wrong with calling oneself “Persian” or “Kurd” or “Azari” – these are various ethnic groups in Iran. However, Iranian is the correct term as it is all encompassing and includes many different ethnicities that are part of Iran-land.


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Iran:Iranian government cancels women’s football game in Berlin · Global Voices
Fred Petrossian

Haji Kensington says [Fa]that Iranian government cancels Iranian women's football game in Berlin.The blogger asks why Ahmadinejad,Iranian president, is so afraid of cultural exchange? You can find an article about this story in English with a photo here.


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Iraq: Oil Workers on Strike  · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

Issandr El Amrani, from Egypt, updates us on the latest regarding a strike by oil workers in Iraq.


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Israel: Anticipating End of Term  · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

Israeli blogger Yael is waiting for good news.
“Someone please tell me that the end of the semester is in sight. I need assurances that the nightmare will end. There are many of my students that I like. There are many that I could happily beat across the country. And there are even a few that I like that I could occasionally happily beat across the country. But this is the deal: while I may be paid slave wages, I am not your slave,” she explains.


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Israel: Hands off my Mouse! · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

Hands off my mouse, warns Israeli blogger Lisa Goldman, who provides an excellent review of what bloggers in her country are saying about a new bill which aims at restricting Internet access.


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Isreal: Putting Differences Aside · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

Jewilicious puts aside its ideological differences with Kabobfest and notes: “However, earlier this week Fadi wrote about the upcoming Arab-American Anti-Discrimination committee’s annual convention in Washington DC this Saturday. Fadi expressed offense at the fact that Princess Haya Bint Al Hussein is set to accept the ADC Global Leadership Award on behalf of her husband HH Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, the ruler of Dubai. Fadi also doesn’t like the fact that Queen Rania of Jordan will also be on the program.”


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Jamaica: The Beauty of Politics · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

“What does beauty have to with political representation?” asks City Girl, upon hearing the news that a former Jamaican Miss World has been chosen to represent a key political constituency.


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Jordan: A Gem of a Museum  · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

Jordanian Ahmed Humeid takes us inside Jordan's Children Museum, which will sure bring his country pride.


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Jordan: Is Islam the Solution?  · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

“When people say that Islam is the solution I get sudden mental flashes of the morality police marching down streets burning books, whipping indecently clothed men and women, and the strict application of an extreme interpretation of Islam. Because this is where we are today. Islam is not being introduced by degrees nor is it progressing as it once did. Instead, the religion remains in center field while society swings from one extreme to another; like a pendulum that never comes to a complete stop,” rants Jordanian blogger Naseem Al Tarawnah.


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Kazakhstan: Aliev Intrigue · Global Voices
Nathan Hamm

Bonnie Boyd reports on some of the business-related intrigue in the conflict between Kazakhstan's president and his son-in-law, Rakhat Aliyev.


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Kuwait: A Week’s Worth of Shopping · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

Kuwaiti blogger Forza  informs us how much an average Kuwaiti family spends on food every week.


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Kuwait: No More Blogging for Zizo · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

Zizotime from Kuwait has announced that he is giving up blogging in this short post.


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Libya: Digging for Gold  · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

Libyan blogger Khadija Teri  is digging for gold. Click on the link to see how.


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Live Webchats from Palestine  · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

Palestinian blogger Haitham Sabbah announces that there will be live webchats from Palestine, thanks to efforts spearheaded by the Arab American Institute.


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Oman: Sohar After the Storm  · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

“Unlike Sur and Muscat, fortunately nothing serious happened in Sohar during the Cyclone Gonu's visit to Oman, the tide flooded a number of areas near the sea for a short while and the electricity was down for a couple of hours only, we have no water problems around here. Thieves took the opportunity to steal some houses that were evacuated during the crisis, but that's about it,” reports Blue Chi from Oman.