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Exclusion in access to public information for marginalized groups in India · Global Voices
Subhashish Panigrahi

Field documentation in Goa, India (Veethika Mishra, CC-BY-SA 4.0)
This post was first published at Yoti as a part of Subhashish Panigrahi's Digital Identity Fellowship. It has been edited for Global Voices.
Digital identity programs are touted as a way for governments to streamline their processes and provide services to their citizens in a more efficient manner. However, in India and around the world, these programs are surfacing questions about digital rights and social exclusion because of the potentially life-altering consequences they have in people's lives.
India's Aadhaar is a 12-digit unique identity number that the residents are expected to enroll in and obtain by providing their biometric and demographic data. Though Aadhaar is yet to be mandated for all the citizens in the Indian constitution by the supreme court, various social welfare benefits are already linked with it and public and private institutions have already started to make use of Aadhaar as a de facto authentication identity. Aadhaar raises the concern of endangering human rights, particularly privacy and security, and has been criticised as a tool for mass surveillance. Serious issues of common people being denied their rights include refusing school kids free lunches when they fail to produce their Aadhaar.
What does an ordinary member of the public go through while accessing vital information provided by the Indian government? What if this person in question is either a monolingual speaker of an indigenous language that is not the official language of their region or is illiterate or has a visual impairment or is subject to any kind of systemic oppression?
To research access to public information in India from the lens of social exclusion, indigenous and linguistic rights, disability and technical hindrance, Subhashish Panigrahi conducted interviews with marginalized communities and other stakeholders (from linguists, activists and technical experts) that are key to the digital identity discourses.
India is home to the largest number of indigenous peoples in the world. 22% of the country’s terrain is home to 705 indigenous groups (about 104 million constituting 8.6% of the population as per the 2011 Census). These groups speak more than 419 different languages and most of these languages are oral in nature. Out of the 780 languages spoken across India, only 22 are officially recognized by the constitution. This recognition is critical in that it enables them to be used for governance. Though some from these 419 languages are multilingual, many are not. The official Aadhaar website (uidai.gov.in) is currently partially-translated into 12 out of the 22 official languages, with no inclusion of even one indigenous language.
Article 2 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights…identifies access to information in one's own language as a fundamental right.
Article 2 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, a 1948 document that was drafted by representatives made up of diverse legal and cultural backgrounds identifies access to information in one’s own language as a fundamental right.
In a recent interview, noted linguist Dr. Mandana Seyfeddinipur – who heads the Endangered Languages Archive (ELAR) at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London – said, “you cannot send out a pamphlet in majority languages during an emergency due to an epidemic”. She further emphasized by providing the example of the 10-12,00 people that live in a 10 km2 area in Lower Fungom region of Cameroon who, on a daily basis, speak about nine languages. When Dr. Seyfeddinipur identifies the issue of creating and updating information in the 7,000 languages spoken in the world, she emphasizes the need to identify the language that each community of an administrative region understands—indigenous or a majority language—while developing public information.
While Aadhaar gradually becomes the go-to authentication system in both government and private sectors, the official website currently has no audio-based information available to help indigenous oral language speakers or people with illiteracy. This represents not just a linguistic barrier but also a digital accessibility hindrance. It is important to note that India is home to the world’s largest number of people (15 million) with visual impairment and screen readers that help people hear the text while accessing text-based information that is absent in the majority of the languages.
The lack of linguistic and digital accessibility resources constitutes a large part of the initial field research in India.

author: Subhashish Panigrahi


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‘Jump high and shake your manifesto’: The rhythms of Trinidad & Tobago elections · Global Voices
Georgia Popplewell

Image remixed by Georgia Popplewell. Musical Note by Dávid Gladiš from the Noun Project.
To paraphrase the calypsonian Bally, in Trinidad and Tobago “it is party time once again across the land.” On December 2, 2019, Trinidad and Tobago will hold its local government elections, in which candidates from four political parties will contest as many as 139 electoral districts across 14 municipal corporation electoral areas.
Over the last several weeks, the nation has been bombarded with political messages on TV, radio and social media, posters plastered in public spaces, pamphlets stuffed in mailboxes, and in mass rallies. And massive mobile sound systems adorned in party colours have been roving around blaring soca music and soliciting support during neighbourhood canvassing exercises.
In Trinidad and Tobago, party politics and popular music have a long and sometimes uneasy relationship. In the decades leading up to independence in 1962, calypsonians played an important role in documenting and resisting colonial policy. Just prior to and after independence, “loyalist” calypsonians such as the Mighty Sparrow and Duke helped legitimise the fledgling political movement led by Dr. Eric Williams in the minds of the party’s urban, Afro-Trinidadian base, with figures such as the Mighty Chalkdust making a career in later years of chronicling the government’s shortcomings.
The thrust and parry continues to this day, with party loyalists facing off against establishment critics in the annual calypso monarch competition, and chutney performers injecting the East Indian point of view into the national mix.
Soca, calypso’s more upbeat successor, may appear on the surface to be less politicised than calypso, but the genre and its practitioners have also been quite amenable to political use. Soca songs are frequently repurposed to convey political party messages, and singers strike lucrative deals with political parties to compose campaign songs and perform at rallies. For the East Indian political parties, calypso and soca have also offered a means of identifying with the culture and concerns of Afro-Trinidadian voters.
Here are a few notable appearances of calypso and soca in Trinidad and Tobago election campaigns over the years:
Up until 1986, no political party in independent Trinidad and Tobago had succeeded in unseating the People’s National Movement (PNM), which had been in power since 1962. That year, the National Alliance for Reconstruction (NAR), an assemblage of political veterans and newcomers, rode an economic recession and the growing mood of discontent in the country to victory over a PNM debilitated by the 1981 death of its revered leader, Eric Williams.
The NAR rode to victory to the rhythms of two calypsos: Déplé’s “Vote Dem Out”, commissioned specially for the occasion, and Gypsy’s “The Sinking Ship”, a hit from that year’s carnival season.
The message of “Vote Dem Out” was clear:
Vote dem out with total scorn and utter disdain/Let’s put our country together gain/Vote them out of power, terminate their reign/Let’s put our country together again.
“The Sinking Ship” was marginally more subtle, using the metaphor of a ship foundering at sea:
Captain, the ship is sinking/Captain, the seas are rough/We gas tank almost empty/We oil pressure reading low/Shall we abandon ship, or shall we stay on it?
Calypsonian Bally would chronicle the 1986 election season for the 1987 carnival in the classic “Party Time Again”, which likened election campaigns to parties of the reveling kind:
Dem promoters/All of them have silver tongue/They made you feel/Their fête was the best around/With promises of utopia and song/All because of party time/You shoulda hear dem/Jump high, jump up low and/Shake your manifesto…
By 1999, Trinidad and Tobago had experienced an attempted coup d’etat and two changes of government. The United National Congress, the leading Indo-Trinidadian party, was in power under Prime Minister Basdeo Panday, the party's founder, after having formed a coalition with the NAR following the 1995 general election.
For the 1999 local government elections, both the UNC and the PNM (then the country's opposition party) co-opted existing songs and repurposed their messages for use on the campaign trail.
The PNM chose Kurt Allen’s high-energy “Stampede (Dus’ Dem)”, which had been a huge hit during that year’s carnival season. The song's rather odd imagery urged listeners to chase away a swarm of bees by waving a rag (handkerchief) and dancing with reckless abandon. It was clear who voters were supposed to chase away by waving their PNM-branded bandanas.
The UNC selected David Rudder’s more earnest mid-tempo calypso “The Ganges and the Nile”, also a hit from that year's carnival season. The song’s lyrics described Trinidad as a fragile but ultimately successful amalgamation of Indian and African influences symbolised by the two great rivers of the title:
Many rivers flowed/to this naked isle/bringing fear and hate/but also a brand new style.
The UNC had been less tolerant than previous administrations of the barbs fired at them by calypsonians, and in 2000 proposed to amend the Equal Opportunity Bill by adding a clause that many believed were designed to suppress free speech among calypsonians.
For the 2000 general election, the UNC would commission two calypsonians, Gregory “GB” Ballantyne, and M’Ba, to compose new songs for their campaign. GB’s “Double or Nothing”, chronicled the UNC’s achievements during their term in office, and M’Ba’s “Put We Back” exhorted listeners to vote the party back for a second term.
Neither song has stood the test of time, and both singers were branded traitors by some of the Afro-Trinidadian peers. The UNC would win that election, but within a year the country would find itself back at the polls, voting in an election which resulted in a tie between the UNC and the PNM, and which ended up being settled in the latter's favour by President A. N. R. Robinson.
In 2010, the leader of the then incumbent PNM, Patrick Manning, famously misread the mood of the public and called an early election and ended up being roundly defeated by the UNC.
During the campaign season, the popular calypsonian Crazy joined the UNC on the hustings to perform “Patrick Manning Have To Go” with lyrics allegedly written by Jack Warner, the controversial former FIFA vice president who was then the party's chairman. Warner is glowingly referenced in the song, along with UNC leader Kamla Persad-Bissessar.
The PNM shot back with “Manning Going Back” performed by Terri Lyons, which listed the accomplishments of the Manning administration. But it wasn't enough to turn the tide in the face of growing discontent with the PNM, and, as was discovered later, behavioural manipulation carried out on the UNC's behalf by the infamous Cambridge Analytica.
A sinking ship is perhaps the perfect opposition party metaphor, and Gypsy’s calypso, first used during the 1986 general elections, has proven to be exceptionally versatile.
Gypsy, whose given name is Winston Peters, would enter politics in 2007, serving as a member of parliament for the UNC and a government minister under the UNC-led People’s Partnership coalition (PP) from 2010. Gypsy and the UNC would split acrimoniously in 2015 after he was passed over as a candidate on that year’s election slate.
The 2015 election season would find Gypsy performing “The Sinking Ship” on behalf of the eventually victorious PNM, taking a dig at Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar with the addition of the lyric “Kamla, the ship is sinking”.
Gypsy also appeared on stage that season at a rally for Jack Warner’s short-lived Independent Liberal Party, where he performed a chutney-flavoured song he had written about Persad-Bissessar called “Neemakharam”, a version of the Hindi word namakharam, or ungrateful.
“The Sinking Ship” has since been repurposed again, in a new recording by Gypsy for the United Workers Party 2016 election campaign in St. Lucia.

source: news-globalvoices

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

author: Georgia Popplewell


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Pope Francis visit highlights Nagasaki’s long Catholic history · Global Voices
Nevin Thompson

Pope Francis visits Nagasaki. Photo by Koga Masao, used with permission.
The first papal visit to Japan in nearly four decades highlighted the country's historical Christian heritage, identified major challenges faced by the rest of the world, and provided an opportunity for both the Pope and the people of Japan to buy some great Pontiff-themed kitsch.
Pope Francis began his four-day tour of Japan on Saturday, November 23, the first papal visit to Japan since St. John Paul II in 1981. The first major stop of the trip was the western city of Nagasaki, where the Pontiff held an outdoor mass in a baseball stadium that attracted at least 30,000 people.
Pope Francis visits Nagasaki. Photo by Koga Masao, used with permission.
Koga Masao, a resident of Nagasaki, attended the mass and shared his thoughts about the experience on Facebook (extract published with permission):
POPE IN JAPAN 2019 長崎県営野球場を取材？雷雲が過ぎるのを待って出かけた。野球の試合観戦はスタンドだけだがフィールドがメインのミサ。人ひとひとで、ディズニーワールド！久しぶりに行列に並ぶ。
勝手が分からず、スタンディングのタイミングがやや遅れた。進むに連れ、あの日も見ていただろう岩屋山が雲間に現れ、晴れ間が広がった。1981年2年26日を思いやった。
演出の凄さ、聖体拝領に感動しながら、バックネット上部を見た。長崎新聞の号外を頂いて帰路に着いた。勿論3万人を超す人の波に心撃たれながら。
POPE IN JAPAN 2019
Should I go to Nagasaki Baseball Stadium to take some photos? I waited for the thunderclouds to pass before setting out. It was standing room only, with the main mass out on the playing field. We entered the stadium one by one, just like Disney World! It was the first time in a long time that I had lined up for anything.
I was a little unsure about what to do during the mass, and rose to my feet a little late. As things progressed, the clouds cleared and the blue sky appeared, and the same Mount Iwaya that witnessed the bombing of Nagasaki now observed Pope Francis conducting a mass for the citizens of Nagasaki. And it made me nostalgic for February 26, 1981 (when St. Pope John Paul II came to Nagasaki).
Watching from the outfield, I was impressed by the grandeur of the production and by the communion. I got an extra commemorative edition of the Nagasaki Shimbun newspaper and made my way home. I was struck by a wave of over 30,000 people who had also come to see Pope Francis.
During his address, Pope Francis made explicit reference to the bombing of Nagasaki on August 9, 1945, just days after the bombing of Hiroshima. At least 35,000 people were instantly killed when a U.S. airplane dropped an atomic bomb on Nagasaki, directly above a Roman Catholic cathedral in a southern suburb of the city.
The remains of Urakami Tenshudo cathedral on January7, 1946. Photo by AIHARA,Hidetsugu. (1909-). Image is public domain.
In his address, Pope Francis warned that the world is at greater risk than ever before from the threat of nuclear weapons:
There is a need to break down the climate of distrust that risks leading to a dismantling of the international arms control framework. We are witnessing an erosion of multilateralism which is all the more serious in light of the growth of new forms of military technology.
The Pope's visit to Nagasaki highlighted the human experience of nuclear war, and included an effort to find a boy who was famously photographed carrying his dead brother to be cremated in the days following the bombing of the city:
Nagasaki searches for boy from Pope Francis’ photo https://t.co/959yM6jBbo pic.twitter.com/dVp5fpg0PF
— Aleteia (@AleteiaEN) November 26, 2019
However, Nagasaki has a deeper connection with Pope Francis and the Catholic church. The city and its surrounding region was the first point of contact between Japan and European traders, with Portuguese merchants arriving in the area in 1543. Jesuit missionaries — Pope Francis is also a member of the Society of Jesus, or Jesuits — arrived just a few years later to proselytize and convert Japanese people to Christianity.
This period in Japanese history is receiving new attention thanks to new books and an upcoming movie starring Black Panther star Chadwick Boseman as Yasuke, the first African samurai in Japan.
Ōura Church (大浦天主堂), also known as the Basilica of the Twenty-Six Holy Martyrs of Japan, in Nagasaki. Photo by Nevin Thompson.
The Jesuits and other Catholic missionaries were successful in converting hundreds of thousands of local peasants, townspeople, warriors and aristocrats. As a result, Nagasaki is home to Japan's largest remaining Christian community, and many churches and cathedrals still dot the landscape around the region.
Kaminoshima Catholic Church (カトリック神ノ島教会), near the city of Nagasaki. Photo by Nevin Thompson.
For Pope Francis and other Roman Catholics, however, Nagasaki is more than a Christian outpost in the largely non-Christian country of Japan. Nagasaki is also a symbol of martyrdom and the triumph of Christian faith.
As mostly recently explored in Martin Scorsese's film adaptation of Endo Shusaku's novel Silence, following the end of Japan's Warring States period in the early 1600s, Japan's military government ruthlessly persecuted Christians in a successful attempt to limit foreign influence.
Upper River Spring (上の川湧水) in Obama, Nagasaki. The spring is said to be the final rest area for regime officials before marching Christian martyrs to the top of Mount Unzen to be crucified.
Nagasaki became the center of a sustained campaign of terror against Japanese Christians, who were tortured and crucified in nearby hot spring “hells” such as Mount Unzen.
Unzen “hell” hot springs in Nagasaki prefecture, similar to where Japanese Christians were tormented and crucified in years past. Photo by Nevin Thompson.
The “hidden Christians” of Kyushu still managed to preserve and pass on their faith, which lives on in Nagasaki and the rest of Kyushu today.
二百数十年もの間、隠れキリシタンの人々が九州各地の離島や山奥でどうやって信仰を伝承してきたかについて。
それから隠れキリシタンの地域で密かに謳い続けられたオラショとか、九州の方言と入り混じって残っている南蛮の言葉とか、口承文化や言語面からみたキリシタン史。
#気になるキリシタン史 pic.twitter.com/QNshhK4CzL
— ユメノマタ夢 (@yumenoyume09) November 24, 2019
For hundreds of years, the Hidden Christians passed on their faith in secret in the remote islands and mountains of Kyushu. “Oratios” (オラショ, from the original Latin, for prayers, etc.) passed on in secret in the region have, along with Portuguese, Dutch and Spanish words first introduced from so long ago, become integral parts of Kyushu dialect.
Nagasaki is still identified as Japan's most Christian city, making for a brisk trade in Catholic-themed souvenirs.
Souvenir “CRUZ Crunch Chocolate” from Nagasaki, a “miraculous sweet that combines both exoticism and local flavors.” Photo by Nevin Thompson.
Following his visit to Nagasaki, Pope Francis traveled on to Hiroshima, also bombed with nuclear weapons during the Second World War, and then to Tokyo, where he held a mass for 50,000 people.
5万の人々で埋め尽くされた東京ドーム。大歓声の中、フランシスコ教皇様が入場して来られました＼(^o^)／ pic.twitter.com/kbuFOmJai5
— 片柳弘史 (@hiroshisj) November 25, 2019
The Tokyo Dome is filled with 50,000 people. When the Pope appeared he was greeted with a loud cheer!
The papal visit concluded with great opportunities to purchase kitsch.
Pope in Japan 2019 merchandise at Tokyo Dome. I don't see any “Frozen 2″ collaborations, which seems a missed opportunity. pic.twitter.com/HEktvTDViz
— Mulboyne (@Mulboyne) November 25, 2019
Pope Francis was presented with a papal-themed traditional happi-coat before his visit ended with a meeting with Japan's new Emperor Naruhito.
The opinion seems to be, the Pope looks a bit like a clerk from an electronics store. pic.twitter.com/TbeDEjZWIn
— Mulboyne (@Mulboyne) November 25, 2019

author: Nevin Thompson


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Sexual harassment case in Trinidad & Tobago highlights need for better policies · Global Voices
Jada Steuart

The Hall of Justice in Port of Spain, Trinidad. Photo by Klaas Vermaas, CC BY-ND 2.0.
A recent sexual harassment case in Trinidad and Tobago has sparked a debate on the country's workplace sexual harassment policies, especially as they affect members of the lesbian, gay, bi-sexual, transgender and queer (LGBTQ) communities.
The case was brought by Rishi Persad Maharaj, who worked in customer service with Banquet and Conference Centre Limited (BCCL), located on the property of the Cascadia Hotel. Maharaj claims that his director of operations, a female, made inappropriate remarks and gestures toward him. In 2015, Maharaj made a complaint to the country's Equal Opportunity Commission (EOC), on the basis of “discrimination in employment based on sexual harassment and victimisation”.
In the interviews prior to the hearing, the defendant's attorneys portrayed her as an upstanding, educated citizen, wife and mother, with “zero tolerance” for discrimination and demoralising behaviour. They also highlighted the fact that Maharaj was gay— a claim he has not disputed.
His sexual orientation was a major factor because the Equal Opportunity Act does not define “sex” and the tribunal claimed they could not interpret the term to include gay men. The case was therefore dismissed and Maharaj had to pay the defendant's legal costs.
The case was murky: Maharaj had allegedly already settled the dispute before returning to court and the judge ruled that Maharaj had wrongly named the hotel as the defendant. But the laws governing the Equal Opportunity Tribunal's review process — at the centre of the court decision — have come under scrutiny.
Maharaj's sexual orientation became a focal point of discussions on social media. According to Leela Ramdeen, who formed part of the tribunal that assessed the case, the Equal Opportunity Act does not cover sexual harassment, nor does it include sexual orientation.
Ramdeen called for legislation “specifically to deal with sexual harassment” and to define what “sex” means, adding, “We, the tribunal, cannot stretch ‘sex’ to go beyond male and female.” For many social media users, her comments suggest that anyone who sits outside this spectrum has no protection under the current legislation.
Ramdeen insisted that the draft policy on sexual harassment, presented in parliament in March 2019 by the minister of labour and small enterprise development Jennifer Baptiste-Primus, is not enough, saying that legislation was needed to give the policy teeth.
The topic of workplace sexual harassment has come up a lot in recent years in what Gabrielle Hosein, of The University of the West Indies’ Institute for Gender and Development Studies, calls “the hetero, patriarchal, masculinist nature of the Caribbean state.”
Back in 2017, Hosein noted that sexual harassment legislation, which “particularly challenges the kind of privileges that have been part of the male exercise of power,” has not been at the forefront of law-making in the country.
Although Trinidad and Tobago has a National Workplace Policy on Sexual Harassment, which references past trade disputes which define sexual harassment, tougher legislation is lacking, as are effective sexual harassment policies both in and out of the workplace environment. However, a policy is not legislation — which means it lacks set standards and guidelines.
This specific case was set in front of the Equal Opportunities Tribunal in order for it to be dealt with by legislation. However, the Equal Opportunities Act does not have any details on sexual harassment and even more so, on discrimination for members of the LQBTQ+ community.
In fact, the only Caribbean territories that have sexual harassment legislation in place are Belize, Barbados and Jamaica (currently being updated).
When a new draft policy on sexual harassment was introduced in Trinidad and Tobago's parliament earlier this year, the Association of Female Executives of Trinidad and Tobago (AFETT), weighed in:
We […] are of the view that sexual harassment in the workplace is everyone’s business, simply because it has attending societal, environmental, economic, health and safety consequences.
AFETT recommended that the draft policy should offer holistic protection, as well as “avenues for penalties for persons making false allegations and for those persons who use the policy maliciously:”
This is especially as we believe that there is such an issue as reverse sexual harassment where persons can use allegations of such an act as instruments of manipulation.
Under the Equal Opportunity Act, there are no sections regarding workplace sexual harassment. Section 11 of the Act details “discrimination in employment” specifically on the basis of sex. However, the word “sexual harassment” does not appear. This also means such cases do not fall within the jurisdiction of the Equal Opportunity Commission (EOC), a branch of government dedicated to workplace discrimination.
The Equal Opportunities Tribunal exists for citizens to settle discrimination in workplace disputes in a fair, efficient and more affordable way, but in many cases, policy gaps mean that the tribunal's influence is limited by laws that need reform — which is also why so many people feel they cannot speak up.
In one recent, high-profile case regarding chairman Rolph Balgobin of Angostura Holdings Limited, his ability to keep his role hung in the balance after a female employee accused him of sexual harassment. He was subsequently cleared of the allegations, and company audits reportedly revealed that his accuser's claims coincided with her being questioned about improper financial practices at the company. The female executive who accused him was later sacked.
Instances like these only underscore the point that sexual harassment is a complex issue, highlighting the need for the government to properly deal with legislation rather than to allow companies alone to settle these cases.
Perhaps once proper laws are in place, citizen fears of reporting cases of sexual harassment will diminish, as people of all genders and orientations find themselves protected.

author: Jada Steuart


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Chilean photographers continue legacy of documenting human rights violations · Global Voices
Global Voices Latin America

Photo from the “Mesada” album, in commemoration of the one-month anniversary of the 2019 uprising in Chile. Used with permission.
In 1981, during Augusto Pinochet's US-backed dictatorship in Chile, a group of photographers that included co-founder Paz Errázuriz created the Association of Independent Photographers (AFI for its initials in Spanish) to visually document human rights abuses happening on the streets of the capital Santiago.
Almost thirty years later, during the 2011-2013 student protests across Chile, another group of professional and amateur photographers revived the name and created AFI Santiago for a similar purpose. Sharing their photos on social media, the group has an extensive gallery on their Facebook page from various ongoing conflicts. In an email interview with Rodrigo Segovia, a member of the group, AFI Santiago states that its aim is to “create independent, consistent, and truthful media with the national and international community, planting a seed in new generations of greater awareness and respect for the fundamental rights of humans.”
AFI Santiago recently published an album titled “Mesada” in commemoration of the one-month anniversary of the current uprising, which focuses on economic inequality. Police crackdown has left 23 people dead and thousands injured across Chile so far.
The following photos have been shared by AFI Santiago for republication and spans the time period from their launch to the present day.
A 2012 photo of a young Mapuche “weichafe” or warrior facing a military police with a stone during a Mapuche land recovery. Used with permission.
Joven mapuche se enfrenta con un carro policial de las Fuerzas Especiales en el Ex Fundo La Romana. El pueblo mapuche lleva más de quinientos años resistiendo. Progresivamente desde la llamada “Pacificación de la Araucanía” del siglo XIX, se los fue despojando de sus tierras. Latifundistas extranjeros, grandes empresas forestales y termoeléctricas han usurpado su territorio y destruido su ecosistema. Hoy, las comunidades en resistencia mantienen una gran lucha reivindicativa que los lleva a enfrentarse a sangre y fuego contra el estado chileno y los capitales extranjeros para defender su cosmogonía, su cultura y sus tierras ancestrales.
A Mapuche youth faces off with a police car of the Special Forces in the Former Fundo (hacienda) La Romana. The Mapuche people have been resisting for more than five hundred years. Since the so-called “Pacification of the Araucanía” of the nineteenth century, they were progressively stripped of their lands. Foreign landowners, large forest and thermoelectric companies have usurped their territory and destroyed their ecosystem. Today, the communities in resistance maintain a great struggle that leads them to face off with blood and fire to defend their cosmogony, their culture and their ancestral lands against the Chilean state and foreign capitals.
Student detention during the high school protests of 2013. Used with permission.
Protests by the Association of Families of the Detained-Disappeared (AFDD) in front of the Chilean presidential palace calling for the government to release more information about those who were detained and disappeared during the Pinochet dictatorship. (2016). Used with permission.
El compromiso de verdad, justicia y reparación parecen esconderse tras los muros de una administración que no avanza en poner fin a la impunidad y a las garantías que hoy tienen los violadores a los Derechos Humanos en Chile.
The commitment of truth, justice, and reparation seems to hide behind the walls of an administration that is not advancing in ending impunity and in ending the security that violators of Human Rights have in Chile today.
Families cooking in a common pot to share among the families during a protest for land rights. Used with permission.
Photo of a 2019 protest march in the city of Osorno, Chile, included in the “Mesada” album mentioned above (2019). Used with permission.
Al cumplirse un poco más 30 días del levantamiento social en Chile, son miles las imágenes que han dado la vuelta al mundo mostrando como un pueblo fue capaz de despertar al sonido de los estudiantes que nos enseñaron que “Evadir” es una forma válida de lucha y que al compás de las cacerolas, más de 1 millón de personas pueden marchar libremente a la sombra de nuevas banderas.
La frase: “Porque nos robaron todo, incluso el miedo”, se establece como única estrategia de enfrentamiento civil hacia las balas de un sistema represivo que se niega a oír los sonidos de la calle. Elegir nuestro propio destino es la base de cambio estructural que la primera línea no esta dispuesta a tranzar.
Chile cambió en un mes y lo hizo para siempre.
Este es un homenaje a quienes murieron, fueron torturados, abusados, desaparecidos y perdieron su vista en esta lucha de transformación social. A todos ellos, sus familias y un país entero, nuestro respeto y compromiso a través de estas imágenes.
After completing a little more than 30 days of the social uprising in Chile, there are thousands of images that have been shared around the world showing how a people was able to wake up the sound of the students who taught us that “Evading” is a valid form of struggle and that with the pots and pans (for the cacerolazo), more than 1 million people can march freely in the shadow of new flags.
The phrase: “Because everything was stolen from us, even fear,” is established as the only strategy of civil confrontation against the bullets of a repressive system that refuses to hear the sounds of the street. Choosing our own destiny is the basis of structural change that the first line is not willing to cross.
Chile changed in the course of a month and it has forever.
This is a tribute to those who died, were tortured, abused, disappeared and lost their sight in this struggle for social transformation. To all of them, their families and an entire country, our respect and commitment is shown through these images.

author: Global Voices Latin America


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Death toll in Albania earthquake reaches 51 as search and rescue operations end · Global Voices
Ardi Pulaj

International rescuers searching for survivors in Durres, Albania on November 27, 2019. Photo by Dipartimento della Protezione Civile, the national body in Italy that deals with exceptional events, (CC BY 2.0)
The search and rescue operation following the catastrophic 6.4-magnitude earthquake that hit Albania before dawn on November 26, 2019, ended on Saturday, November 30. The ministry of defense reported that the death toll in the port city of Durrës and the nearby town of Thumane reached 51, with thousands left injured and homeless and over 2,400 buildings damaged.
The search and rescue operation for earthquake survivors in Albania has ended, the prime minister said, with the death toll at 51 and no more bodies believed to be in the ruins. https://t.co/xJ6d9iLM4I
— ABC News (@ABC) December 1, 2019
The small town of Thumane experienced the highest death toll from Tuesday's quake with 26 people killed, six of whom belonged to one family, and but one of whom was under age 30. They were buried Friday, the VOA reported.
Gjatë së premtes në Thumanë është bërë varrimi i 11 personave që humbën jetën si pasojë e tërmeteve që goditën Shqipërinë. Deri më tani, së paku 49 persona kanë vdekur dhe mijëra të tjerë janë plagosur nga tërmetet që goditën Shqipërinë që prej orëve të para të mëngjesit të së martës.
A post shared by  Radio Evropa e Lirë (@radioevropaelire) on
The funeral of 11 people who lost their lives as a result of earthquakes striking Albania was held in Thumana on Friday.
Preliminary figures showed more than 1,465 buildings in the Albanian capital Tirana, and about 900 in nearby Durrës, were seriously damaged in the quake. About 2,000 people were injured and at least 4,000 are homeless. About 2,500 people whose homes were damaged have been relocated to hotels. Others have been taken to neighboring Kosovo or have moved to areas in eastern Albania, AP reported.
Drone view in one of the most damaged parts of the earthquake in Thumanë, Albania ???#Albania #earthquake pic.twitter.com/IAXAs4wcwz
— Igli Lime?? (@IgliLime) November 26, 2019
Save the Children announced through a press release that 9,000 children are in need following the earthquake.
PRESS RELEASE: 9,000 children in need following devastating earthquake in #Albania. “They [children] tell me they are very scared and worried… People need tents, beds, blankets and hygiene kits urgently as well as emotional and mental support.” > https://t.co/PmLNj5Smde
— Save the Children (@save_children) November 29, 2019
In a cabinet meeting, Prime Minister Edi Rama said that the homeless will be re-housed by mid-December and Lek 1 million (USD~8,985) compensation would be given to the families of people who lost their lives.
Humanitarian aid has been pouring in from all over the world, especially from Albania's neighbor countries. Thousands of homeless Albanians are staying in camps set up by Kosovo's government in the city of Prizren and elsewhere.
The Mayor of Durrës, Valbona Sako, resigned on Sunday after a statement she made on live TV that “we are happy we only had 50 victims” (at the time of the interview) from the earthquake. While she meant to say that it could have been much worse, her unfortunate choice of the word “happy” in relation to the disaster was received with furry by netizens:
1) Mayor of #Durres Valbona Sako has resigned citing negative reactions after she told interviewer “we are happy with 50 victims”, meaning could have been much worse in #AlbaniaEarthquake. She made the announcement in a Facebook post pictured below. pic.twitter.com/cmeEkbSH9V
— Global355 (@Global355) December 1, 2019
Facebook post translation: Hurt by the overwhelming negative reaction to my statement, under stress that transcends my powers, I resign from the office of Mayor of Durrës.
Thanks from my heart to all those who believed in me and I hope for understanding by everyone.
Another statement by Sako that the affected people were accommodated in 5-star hotels, was received with vitriol and sarcasm:
Shyqyr na prishi shpin termeti qe t’na coj @ValbonaSako neper hotele me 5 yje, se ne kushte normale nuk do i kishim perballuar as per pushime.
— popshampanja (@popchampagne01) November 30, 2019
We are grateful that the earthquake destroyed our homes so Valbona Sako can take us in 5-star hotels; in normal conditions we could have not afforded not even for holidays
As the authorities and foreign experts are assessing the damages, the government has established a special web site to collect donations to help the affected families. Besides offering a way to donate securely and directly, the government's system also enables users to register to volunteer, donate food, clothing and toys, and sign up to “adopt” —i.e. offer shelter to—people have lost their homes.
Establishing a single official point for online donations designed to foster trust and prevent misuse of the goodwill of Albanian and other contributors in the region. During similar disasters in the Balkans, like the 2016 flood in Skopje, portions of the humanitarian aid were intercepted and appropriated by local corrupt structures or online swindlers.
Donate online at e-albania portal and help relieve the earthquake's aftermath!https://t.co/Idul8rEnIA
You can donate in three categories provided for funds collecting, using a credit or debit card according to the guidelines.#SolidaryAlbania pic.twitter.com/FEdoW6lmjp
— Albanian MEFA ?? (@AlbanianDiplo) November 27, 2019
Private donation initiatives have also been launched, especially by members of the Albanian diaspora:
I am so greatefull for your support. With your help we managed to raise $1 MILLION for the victims of the #Albanian Earthquake. Thank you all! God bless you all! https://t.co/DddUefAbt0 @SIGOPChairman @siadvance @amNewYork @NYTMetro @brooklynpaper @brooklynpaper @KingsCountyPols pic.twitter.com/8rCWdr9tgc
— Marko Kepi® (@MarkoKepi) November 27, 2019
Celebrities of Albanian origin such aas Dua Lipa, Rita Ora and Bebe Rexha also have launched appealed for donations from their fans around the world.
pic.twitter.com/4YwEIR5uHV
— DUA LIPA (@DUALIPA) November 28, 2019

author: Ardi Pulaj


text:
Greta Thunberg impersonators attempted to dupe Macedonian PM with fake phone call · Global Voices
Metamorphosis Foundation

Collage of photos of Prime Minister of Republic of North Macedonia Zoran Zaev (Public Domain photo by Government of RNM) and the activist Greta Thunberg (photo by European Parliament, CC BY).
This story originally appeared on Meta.mk News Agency, a project of Metamorphosis Foundation. An edited version is published below as part of a content-sharing agreement. Metamorphosis Foundation organized the International Conference e-Society mentioned in this story.
On November 29, the Macedonian government informed the public that two people attempted to deceive Prime Minister Zoran Zaev by falsely presenting themselves as Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg and her father.
The announcement was made during the International Conference e-Society.mk: Open Institutions and Accountability by Marjan Zabrchanec, a special adviser of the PM, who did not specify what date exactly the telephone conversation took place.
The adviser added that the conversation was scheduled through a Macedonian diplomatic mission and that Zaev realized mid-call that he wasn't speaking with the actual Greta Thunberg.
Zabrchanec said an investigation concluded the incident was a “hybrid attack” against Macedonian institutions, and that its perpetrators used a US phone number and “branded channels.”
Following the investigation, the government of North Macedonia notified the Thunberg family.
Zabrchanec said that the attack was “even more sophisticated than the one conducted by the Russian pranksters,” in reference to occasions in 2018 and early 2019 when Russian media personalities Lexus and Vovan held lengthy phone conversations with Zaev pretending to be then-president of Ukraine, Petro Poroshenko.
Marjan Zabrchanec speaking at the e-Society.mk conference organized in Skopje, North Macedonia, by Metamorphosis Foundation. Photo by Vančo Džambaski, CC BY-NC-SA.
After the Russian duo revealed the stunt in July 2019, Zaev apologized to the public about the lapse in his security protocol, claiming he was deceived by “a well-organized and inventive structure, which is directed at people and countries aligned towards Euro-Atlantic aspirations in order to cause damage.”
The duo also targeted French President Emanuel Macron with a similar impersonation in April 2019.
Local experts consider these activities a form of Kremlin propaganda. The goal of such attacks is to extract embarrassing quotes from public figures and demonstrate the ineptitude of the targeted institutions, ultimately undermining public trust.
On July 27, North Macedonia announced a new plan to curb the spread of disinformation which included “revising the existing and creating new, where needed, internal security protocols for communication in the institutions and communication with external entities.”
The 16-year-old activist Greta Thunberg is the founder of the #FridaysForFuture movement, which recently mobilized millions of children and adults from around the world to demand their governments take action against the climate crisis. On September 23, she made an emotional speech at the UN Climate Summit in New York, United States, summoning all world leaders to help halt global warming.
According to EUvsDisinfo, a project by the East Stratcom Task Force funded by the EU, Greta Thunberg has become a target of Russian disinformation campaigns:
Greta Thunberg is a trigger for the pro-Kremlin disinformers not only because she refuses to bow down to the stereotypes of what a 16-year-old girl should say or do (although chauvinism and disinformation are two peas in a pod). Greta is a target because she is the face of a global grassroots movement – a genuine popular protest, the possibility of which the pro-Kremlin media simply cannot accept. Doing that would expose just how viciously Russian citizens are denied the right to peaceful protest.
Following the activist's appearance at the UN, an anchor of a Russian state TV channel described her as a “sick girl who is as stupid as she is naïve,” “the prophet of a new totalitarian wave” and “illiterate, fanatic Messiah.”
Russian media proxies in the Balkans have also replicated similar insults against Thunberg.
The timing of the suspicious phone call to Zaev coincided with preparations for the November 29 #FridaysForFuture protest in Skopje.

author: Metamorphosis Foundation


text:
On Twitter, this Brazilian writer illuminates stories from black history · Global Voices
Fernanda Canofre

Ale Santos, researcher and writer. Photo by Paulinho, used with permission.
There is a tree that grows in Africa, the Middle-East, and Australia called baobab (adansonia). Some African peoples used to believe that if you walked around it, you would forget something about your life. Before forcing captured people into their ships, slavers would force them to walk in circles around the tree of oblivion so that they'd leave their culture and lives behind.
Brazilian writer Ale Santos tells that anecdote in the preface of his book Rastros da Resistência (“trails of resistance,” in Portuguese), a collection of 20 stories about real-life black heroes, published in October in Brazil.
Despite European efforts to erase the identities and roots of the people enslaved, Santos says in the book, an oral tradition kept the history of Africa and its diaspora alive; stories such as that of the baobab are now crucial to reimagine cultural realms once considered lost. He writes:
Na África Ocidental, haviam os griots (ou djéli, na ortografia francesa), guardiões das tradições orais. Eles tinham uma posição de destaque e por vezes também excerciam outras funções, como as de mensageiros, arautos, conselheiros de guerra, artífices. Mas, mais importante, eram registros vivos dos principais acontecimentos de seu povo.
In Western Africa, there were the griots (or djéli, in French), guardians of the oral tradition. They had a prominent position and sometimes also performed other jobs, such as messengers, heralds, war councillors, artisans. But, most importantly, they were the living record of the main events of their people.
The book was the result of a year and a half of research and models Santos’ Twitter account, @savagefiction, which is well-known in Brazil for its threads on Africa and its diaspora's history.
Santos first began to narrate those historical events on WhatsApp, in small groups with his friends. In June 2018, he decided to move the storytelling to Twitter. A thread about the genocide of 8-10 million people in present-day Democratic Republic of the Congo between the late 19th and the early 20th century, perpetrated by Leopold II of Belgium, was Santos’ first thread to go viral:
Existe muita injustiça Histórica contra o povo africano, considerar o Holocausto Judeu como o maior crime da humanidade é um grande erro. Leopoldo II foi um monstro muito mais sanguinário. Essa thread é triste, mas e necessária pra quem ainda não conhece o Holocausto no Congo pic.twitter.com/QciMABy7fO
— Ale Santos (@Savagefiction) June 7, 2018
There is so much historical injustice against the African people, to consider the Jewish Holocaust as the greatest crime against humanity is a mistake. Leopold II was a far bloodthirstier monster. This is a sad thread, but necessary, to those who still don't know the Congo's holocaust.
Santos then realized that stories were a powerful weapon of knowledge. After the King Leopold's thread, he wrote about human zoos, where natives from regions colonized by Europe were displayed like animals:
Europeus devem se entusiasmar com a falta de memória histórica dos países colonizados. É fácil esquecer o passado cruel e devastador quando ninguém conta. Essa thread é para quem não conhece os desumanos zoológicos racistas que existiram pelo mundo. pic.twitter.com/DbAMOckhbC
— Ale Santos (@Savagefiction) July 12, 2018
Europeans must be enthusiastic about the lack of historical memory in colonized countries. It's easy to forget the cruel and devastating past when no one talks about it. This thread is for those who don't know about the inhumane racist zoos that existed around the world.
Santos mainly focuses on little-known Brazilian historical figures, such as Dragão do Mar (“dragon of the sea”), a leader of raft workers who stopped the slave trade in the northeastern state of Ceará, and Tereza de Benguela, queen of a quilombo (settlements from the colonial times, whose inhabitants were, mostly, people who had escaped slavery); one time, he wrote about the politics of population whitening in early 20th century Brazil, or events such as the mass killing of 111 inmates in a São Paulo prison in 1992.
Muita gente não sabe, mas o Brasil tem histórias de abolicionistas que fariam qualquer negro estremecer e acender uma chama ancestral de orgulho com nossa luta. Uma delas eu vou contar nessa thread, um guerreiro destemido conhecido como uma fera mitológica: Dragão do Mar pic.twitter.com/oe5ZsIumtX
— Ale Santos (@Savagefiction) August 8, 2018
Many people don't know, but Brazil has stories of abolitionists that would make any black person shiver and light a proud ancestral flame for our struggle. I'll tell one of them on this thread, about a fearless warrior known as a mythological beast: Dragão do Mar (dragon of the sea)
In 2003, a law made African-Brazilian History and Culture a mandatory subject on the national curriculum. Sixteen years on, it’s not yet implemented on all schools, usually depending on isolated individual initiatives.
Brazil was the last country in the Western hemisphere to abolish slavery, in 1888, and the highest receiver of enslaved African people: the Slave Voyages database says that 5,099,816 people were disembarked as slaves in the country from the 1500s until 1875.
As Santos told Global Voices via WhatsApp, there is an unfortunate tradition of recounting history from the perspective of the colonizers. Eurocentrism left deep scars in every country that went through colonization, which stole their diversity and culture were stolen, he says.
Contar as narrativas que vivem à margem da historiografia é dar uma nova dignidade para esses povos, recolocar eles dentro da importância, em um movimento democrático, um ambiente onde todos se sintam valorizados.
Realmente, isso impacta no indivíduo. Vai impactar como a sociedade enxerga esse indivíduo, isento de estereótipos, reconhecendo a sua ancestralidade, reconhecendo seu valor cultural dentro da sociedade, de qualquer democracia.
To tell the stories that exist marginally to historiography is to give those people a new dignity, reestablish their importance, in a democratic movement, an environment where everyone feels appreciated.
Really, that impacts the individual. It impacts the way society sees that individual, free of stereotypes, acknowledging their ancestry, their cultural value within the society, in any democracy.
Santos also received praise from Brazilian rapper Emicida. Writing for on the book's dust jacket, the rapper compares the erasure of black identity and tradition by the slavery system with walking around with only your shadow to look at, without any reflection in the mirror.
O racismo estrutural mira corpos não brancos, o cultural tem como alvo nosso imaginário. É ali onde ele tenta te derrubar antes que você suba no ringue. Num esforço conjunto, ambos tentam fazer com que a frase de René Descartes – “Penso, logo existo” – não faça sentido algum para você. Os seres humanos inventaram quem eles são graças à habilidade de moldar o imaginário de nossos iguais através de histórias.
Structural racism takes aim at non-white bodies, the culture targets our imaginary. It is there where it tries to knock you out before you can even step into the ring. In a joint effort, they both try to ensure that René Descartes’ sentence — “I think, therefore I am” — doesn't make any sense to you. Human beings invented who they are thanks to the ability of shaping the imaginary of our equals through stories.

author: Fernanda Canofre


text:
‘They call for my slaughter’: Somali atheists living in fear · Global Voices
Katie McQue

A boy reads from his Quran at a mosque in Mogadishu, Somalia, during the holy month of Ramadan on July 11, 2013. African Union/United Nations photo by Ilyas A. Abukar, public domain via Flickr.
Hassan dreads each sunset. When the skies darken in Nairobi, Kenya, the threats begin.
He is too scared to leave his home but his taunters, mostly his neighbors, find him: They pummel the walls and metal door of his room in a concrete five-story building. Hassan, a 25-year old Somali refugee, has only lived in Nairobi a few months, but his neighbors — who are all Somali Muslims —  have found out he has renounced Islam. To some of the most devout Muslims, being an atheist is punishable by death.
“My life has been a living hell. They are spreading that I have left the faith,” Hassan, who is using a pseudonym for fear of reprisals, told Global Voices. “I’ve reported it to the police, but nobody got arrested.”
As religious fundamentalism intensifies in Somali communities, in the country and abroad, some Somali atheists face harassment and threats on and offline. The Somali atheist community spans the globe with many still “in the closet,” hiding their beliefs from their families, friends and neighbors for fear of repercussions. Many seek solace through online communities, such as Facebook groups, Reddit threads, and YouTube channels, using pseudonyms.
Hassan’s troubles began in Dadaab, the sprawling Kenyan refugee camp where he grew up. His childhood experiences of living in poverty and as a refugee made him question the existence of God when he was a teenager, he says. When a cousin discovered he had left his faith, some of his family became hostile.
Word of his atheism soon spread throughout his community at Dadaab. Soon after, he was attacked while fetching water from a communal tap. His attackers hit him on the back of the head with a stone and knocked him out. His arm also broke.
To verify Hassan’s story, Global Voices has seen a copy of his refugee identity card, and the medical and police reports of his attack, as well as a photograph of his injuries.
“Religious fundamentalism is just getting worse in the camps. The situation is very bad,” says Hassan. “The community doesn’t seem to care about what is going on, as they are mostly Muslims. And they enjoy outing people.”
Hassan managed to escape Dadaab by gaining a scholarship to study for a bachelor’s degree at a university in Nairobi. Unfortunately, the harassment and death threats followed him to the city. In the closely-knit communities of Somali diaspora, locals soon found out about his atheism.
Dadaab is the world's largest refugee complex. Somali refugees arrived here as early as 1991. Those who denounce their faith face targeted harassment. Photo by the European Union, January 22, 2016, via Flickr CC BY 2.0.
There are an estimated 1.2 million Somali atheists active on social media, says Halima Salat, the founder of Ex-Muslim Somali Voices, an online platform with a Youtube and Facebook presence.
“However, there are trolls that infiltrate the internet safe spaces to try to ‘out’ atheists [who] typically use an alias. Fundamentalist Somali Muslims are policing the community online,” Salat, who is based in Western Europe, says. “Somalis, wherever they are [in] the world, are always looking over their shoulders.”
Hassan has experienced this. His details, including his phone number, have been posted on Facebook pages, along with calls for his slaughter.
Younger Somali Muslims living outside of East Africa also fear their families will subject them to dhaqan cells— a term in Somali language meaning “return to culture”— if they are found out. Typically, they are sent to Somalia by their parents under the guise of visiting relatives for a vacation. Only once they’ve arrived they find they are unable to leave, some are sent to institutions meant to “rehabilitate” them into more traditional ways of life, Salat says.
“Some get yanked out of Western culture and forced into Somali life [in Somalia]. Dhaqan cells can mean gay conversion therapy, female genital mutilation, forced marriage, or strict Islamic teachings,” Salat says. “Often they are physically abused, have their phones and other means of communications taken away.”
Salat says the experiences of Somalis leaving Islam are especially brutal. Older generations object to seeing younger Somalis who are more liberal. Somalia has a large diaspora, with many suffering the trauma of fleeing conflict. Islam is intertwined with Somali national identity, and elders strive to protect this identity, she adds:
Their message is: ‘Don’t be Westernized.’ Many of the younger generations have decided they want to lead a less devout life, such as young women not wanting to cover up. Their communities look upon this as betrayal.
Before the civil war broke out in the early 90s, Somalia was largely secular under President Siad Barre, says Salat. Because of this, a popular belief among Somalis is that a lack of God caused the war. Older generations tried to be closer to God and it’s difficult to move away from what you’ve been taught, says Nuriya Benson, a Sydney-based Somali-Australian model and presenter of the “Waaq Nation” podcast, who lives publicly as an atheist.
Somalis who became refugees due to ongoing civil war are also vulnerable to the more extreme versions of Islam propagated by some charities associated with radical Wahhabi and Salafi teachings.
“Somalis were more liberal before the war. Afterward, they became influenced by more established Islamic communities,” Benson told Global Voices.
Soldiers stand in front of a mosque on the grounds of Kismayo University in the southern Somali port city of Kismayo on October 7, 2012. As the civil war intensified in Somalia, religious fundamentalism has also increased, according to some Somali atheists living in the diaspora. Photo by Stuart Price via African Union / United Nations, public domain via Flickr CC BY-ND 2.0.
In Europe, North America and Australasia, females bear much of the brunt of the threats and intimidation for being nonbelievers.
“Women get slut-shamed. I get rape threats [online]. I am seen as a property of Islam. There are threats from Somalis all over the world. Through modesty culture, rape culture ensues, I was taught I am responsible for my own rape by not wearing a hijab,” she says.
In Benson’s experience, people from non-Muslim backgrounds, including White-centric feminists, have also contributed to shutting down the conversation about the issues ex-Muslim women face, leaving them to feel excluded from women’s rights movements.
“I don’t understand why Westerners have no sympathy for us,” she says. “Western women would not stand for being told what to wear, to cover up. What is allowed for one group wouldn’t be allowed for another,” she says.
A famous example of this is the case of Dorsa Derakhshani, an Iranian chess grandmaster, who was kicked off her team for refusing to wear a hijab at a tournament two years ago. Western feminists were largely silent over her treatment.
White people, both online and in-person, regularly tell Benson she’s betrayed her culture, she says. This compounds the subjugation faced by ex-Muslims and makes already difficult conversations nearly impossible.
“It is very difficult for victims of harassment to talk about this to outsiders. There is also a ‘never snitch’ culture among Somalis. Most of the kids don’t want to carry the burden,” says Salat.
“Whenever you take the initiative to publicly say it, there is a backlash.”

author: Katie McQue


text:
After struggling for 20 years, a Mon-language newspaper in Myanmar is fighting to survive · Global Voices
The Irrawaddy

Photo from The Irrawaddy website
The original version of this article by Lawi Weng was published on The Irrawaddy, an independent news website in Myanmar. An edited version is republished on Global Voices as part of a content-sharing agreement.
Myanmar's Mon-language weekly newspaper Guiding Star has just celebrated 20 years in operation. We spoke to Nai Kasauh Mon, the chief editor and founder of the paper, about the challenges of operating a Mon-language publication in an often hostile environment.
Myanmar has about 2 million ethnic Mon, and around 10 percent of them read Guiding Star, which is based in Mawlamyine, the capital of Mon State.
More people now consume news on their phones and few today still buy newspapers, according to Nai Kasauh Mon.
The print media has faced major problems as people move towards digital.
Circulation has fallen to around 1,200 from approximately 5,000 in 2014.
We are no longer covering costs. In the past we were able to pay our journalists from our marketing journals and sometimes able to save some money.
He said that the publication has also been the victim of state crackdowns and the arrest of its journalists as it challenged the military regime.
Nai Kasauh Mon said many ethnic Mon cannot read the language and the readership is now dominated by Mon Buddhist monks. The Mon language has not been recognized for official use, so for the young, learning it began to feel useless, he added. He blames the lack of a federal system and the dominance of the Burmese language. He regards Guiding Star as a key preserver of the Mon language.
Our readers love the language and it increases their ability to read more Mon literature.
Guiding Star is soliciting donations to pay wages and Nai Kasauh Mon said it will stop production if sales fall below 500.
If we could find 50 million kyats (US$33,200), we would use it to keep printing. If we could get 20 million kyats per year, we could deliver our journal for free to ethnic Mon.
Guiding Star covers mainly Mon issues but also translates some international news. It publishes opinion pieces, business coverage, interviews and an entertainment section.
The paper has 15 office staff and 25 distributors. It also has staff in Sangkhlaburi, a Thai border town with a large Mon community.
Some readers have suggested ways for Guiding Star to ensure its long-term survival.
Nai Banyar Hongsar from Australia, a former Guiding Star staffer who has trained Mon journalists, said journalism should be based around people’s lives, not ethnicity. Any publication would fail if it did not interest the readers, he said—media groups were closing around the world because they were failing to write about issues that affected people’s lives.
Journalists just wrote about easy subjects and ignored the big issues, which were important for the people. They did not write about news which has a big impact and the people lose interest in the newspaper.
He said drug problems, falling rubber prices, unemployed migrant workers and how flooding has destroyed paddy fields were important issues.
We did not write about their difficulties, but we did write about the seasonal festival. They knew already about the festival so we did not have to report it. Young reporters sometimes do not know what they should write about.
The front page of Guiding Star shows how the quality of the newspaper had declined, he added.
Mon Ashin Popphahongsa, a senior Mon Buddhist monk, said:
We read and support Guiding Star so we can find out about Mon issues. We believe it is more reliable than other media groups on Mon issues.
The monk said he liked the news and opinion pieces and the political coverage. To ensure its survival he suggested Guiding Star invest in distribution and extend its network, and not prioritize profit-making.
Min Jotamoi Anin from Ye Township said the paper’s marketing strategy must improve.
Social media is to blame. There are ethnic Mon who want to read Guiding Star, but they cannot buy it because of the poor distribution. I donated money this year to buy Guiding Star for our Mon national school.
Others feel the same, but are unaware they can buy Guiding Star for Mon national schools, Min Jotamoi Anin said.
Nai Kasauh Mon initially worked for human rights groups in Sangkhlaburi, across the Thai border. He decided that citizens should not just know about human rights but also Mon politics, economics, education and about migrant workers in Thailand.
In September 1999, aged 31, he set up Guiding Start with three colleagues.
The Mon alphabet didn't exist in Microsoft Word, however, and Nai Ork Paing, a friend of Nai Kasauh Mon, worked to create it.
Nai Kasauh Mon contacted Mon monks in Yangon with media experience.
Some Mon monks worked for a Mon magazine in Yangon. They knew how to write articles and were well-educated in the Mon language. I invited a monk [Nai Bee Htaw] to secretly work for us on the border. We told him how we wanted to run our publication and he served as editor.
At the time, if the military discovered that someone was working in the news media across the border, the punishment could be severe.
Guiding Star lacked the resources to print many copies, and a Thai-based Mon helped to type and print the newspaper in Bangkok.
He worked for us for free at first. After printing, he sent it back to the border and even distributed it to Mon migrants.
Guiding Star initially printed 500 copies of each issue, which were mainly distributed at the border. Nai Kasauh Mon, meanwhile, was working at the Mon Relief and Development Committee and Distance Education Program.
I saved some money from my work and helped fund the newspaper. We almost gave up at that time as there were many difficulties.
Nai Kasauh Mon lacked the documents to enter Thailand, so he had to receive the copies at the border.
Guiding Star started with eight pages in black-and-white. In 2001, with funding from the Burma Relief Center NGO it was able to expand to 12 pages.
In 2008, the paper was secretly printed inside Mon State for the first time with the help of monks, and awareness grew.
“There were many risks for the monks that helped us,” Nai Kasauh Mon said.
In 2010, some monks tried to boycott the general election, which they said was not free and fair. Those monks called on  ethnic Mon to join the boycott.
One monk who led the boycott was arrested was involved in distributing the newspaper. The authorities searched his monastery and found computers and printers. The monk was sentenced to over 10 years in prison on several charges.
Another distributor who was a member of the New Mon State Party (NMSP) was arrested in 2003. He was detained for a month but was released after the NMSP negotiated with the regime.
The administration of former president U Thein Sein, who came to power in 2013, allowed more press freedom, especially for ethnic publications.
The reforms allowed Guiding Star staff to return from exile. Meetings were held with Mon community leaders to discuss how Guiding Star could settle inside Mon State.
“The road to Mon State was bad at the time. We took a boat for the trip,” Nai Kasauh Mon remembers.
Guiding Star set about regrouping its former network of about 100 volunteers who had distributed the newspaper under the military regime.
The organization sold 5,000 copies per issue for 500 kyats ($0.33) each. Guiding Star has been based in Mon State for six years, following 14 years on the other side of the Thai border.
They welcomed us back. We feel strong support from the Mon. Among ethnic-minority news publications, we were the first to publish inside the country.

author: The Irrawaddy


text:
Fact-checking service blames Croatian government for using EU money to fund online portal that spreads disinformation · Global Voices
Advox

Flags of European Union, Croatia and NATO waving in front of the Ministry of Defense of Republic of Croatia, Zagreb, May 17, 2019. Photo by Global Voices, CC-BY.
This story originally appeared on Faktograf.hr, a fact-checking media outlet from Croatia and a certified signatory of the Code of Principles of the International Fact-Checking Network. An edited version is published below based on the Creative Commons attribution license.
On October 31, the fact-checking service Faktograf reported that the Croatian Ministry of Economy, Entrepreneurship, and Crafts granted around 13,200 euros [the equivalent of 14,500 USD] in subsidies from EU structural funds, to the portal Dnevno.hr, “one of the leading producers of disinformation in the Croatian media space.”
The money from the European fund for Regional Development was granted to Dnevno.hr to redesign their website in order to help their readers reach “information of interest” more quickly and easily, and to help the publisher increase their revenues.
Faktograf blames the Croatian Government for using EU money to help a portal known for spreading disinformation that often contains hate speech. The grant to Dnevno.hr was approved as part of a project called named “WWW vouchers for SMEs” (Small and Medium Enterprises), launched in August 2018. The grant contract with the company Motus d.o.o., which is the publisher of portal Dnevno.hr and several other digital media, was signed in October 2018. The grant was approved during the mandate of the current minister of economy Darko Horvat, from the ranks of the ruling Croatian Democratic Union party (HDZ). Horvat was appointed a minister in May 2018, after his predecessor Martina Dalić had to resign due to the corruption scandal known as Agrokor affair.
Faktograf finds it ironic that EU money has been used to finance a web portal which has been regularly and frequently deceiving the public and spreading disinformation about the EU.
Prior to the European Parliament Elections of May 2019, Dnevno.hr served as a seeding site for disinformation which then spread on social media platforms. For example, they promoted bogus claims that the current European Commission (EC) Vice-President Frans Timmermans — who was then the lead candidate of the Party of European Socialists (PES) for the position of EC President —advocated for the “mass settlement of Muslim males” as a means “to achieve a goal of disappearance of one-nation states.” They also claimed that German Chancelor Angela Merkel was attempting to deprive Croatia of its sovereignty, and that billionaire George Soros is to blame for migrations from Muslim-majority countries to Europe.
None of these claims have been proven true, and they are just some of the disinformation that had been identified as untrue by Faktograf.
For instance, in October 2018, Faktograf fact-checked ten different disinformation items published by Dnevno.hr, all proven untrue. In some instances, bogus claims first published as far back as May 2017 had been recycled by repeated sharing over social networks. They range from climate crisis denial, to glorification of Russian President Vladimir Putin, and incitement against refugees and migrants from Africa and the Middle East.
Billboards in Zagreb advertising different political options for the European Parliament Elections, May 2019 in Zagreb, Croatia. Photo by Global Voices, CC-BY.
On October 18, Faktograf submitted a Freedom of Information (FOI) request to the Croatian Ministry of Economy, asking whether the jury that granted the EU money to the Dnevno.hr took into account the quality and factual accuracy of their contents. The state institution failed to answer the question and contrary to the law did not provide a copy of the contract signed with the publisher of Dnevno.hr.
The only information the ministry provided as a response to the FOI request on 23 October, was a document with a general description of the conditions of distributing grants under the “WWW vouchers for SMEs” call. Faktograf repeated their request on the same day, asking for the actual information, but has not received a response so far.
Faktograf also wrote to the European Commission, addressing the spokespersons in charge of the allocations of funds at the European Fund for Regional Development. The fact-checking initiative asked if spending European funds on disinformation outlets is legal, and whether member states can use the funds to finance people who spread disinformation and incite hatred.
The European Commission responded that they can't comment on this specific case. Their official answer stressed that “the struggle against disinformation is a common and long-term challenge all EU institutions and member states must jointly face.”
According to unofficial information received by Faktograf from anonymous sources within EU institutions,  the EU cannot do anything in this case because the initial rules for the distribution of the grants from European funds had not anticipated such a situation. Nobody thought before that the provisions would need to contain an explicit ban on spending EU funds to spread disinformation. By the logic that everything that has not been explicitly forbidden is allowed, it turns out that the Croatian government has not misused the money by giving it to the portal Dnevno.hr, with the goal of boosting revenues.
By using EU funds to spread falsehoods and conspiracy theories whose purpose, among others, includes the destabilisation of the European Union, it seems that for Dnevno.hr and its publisher, it is sometimes useful to ”bite the hand that feeds you”.
The portal Dnevno.hr is part of a media network founded by controversial businessman Michael Ljubas, known for taking over and bankrupting Elektroproment, a company from Zagreb which in its heyday had over 300 employees and almost 15 million US dollars in assets. Ljubas founded the portal's parent company Portal Dnevno d.o.o. in 2010, long before the term “fake news” became fashionable. The increasing awareness about the impact of disinformation as a major threat to democracy has not affected its business.
“Dnevno” means “daily” in Croatian, Serbian and Bosnian, and the media company owned by Ljubas also included web portals with the same name in Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Bosnian media fact-checking service Raskrinkavanje.ba maintains a database documenting sources of disinformation affecting the country with over 1500 entries collected since November 2017. According to this data, the Croatian (Dnevno.hr), Bosnian ( Dnevno.ba) and Serbian ( Dnevno.rs) versions of Dnevno all spread disinformation about Bosnia and Herzegovina, including political manipulations, sensationalist content for click-bait to conspiracy theories and the promotion of pseudoscience. The Croatian version spread most of the disinformation spread by the different portals with 23 entries, followed the Bosnian version with 14 entries, and the Serbian version with 3 entries.
According to Faktograf, all three portals are infamous for inflaming nationalism and publishing disinformation. The Croatian version incites hatred against Serbs, while at the same time the Serbian version incites hatred against Croats, deepening the divide between the peoples whose states were involved in the bloody war following the breakup of Yugoslavia in 1992. Croatian Journalists’ Association (HND) warned in 2013 about the damage caused by the portal Dnevno.hr to the already polarized Croatian society. HND said:
Attacks and defamation by that portal and to a lesser degree the printed weekly ‘7Dnevno’ against individuals, associations and groups who don't adhere to their conservative right-wing positions bring our society to the 1990s and often lower the culture of public communication to the level of hate speech used by tabloids Slobodni tjednik and Imperial during and after the war
The original parent company Portal Dnevno d.o.o. filed for bankruptcy and had been closed down in 2019. One of the reasons why Dnevno.hr went bankrupt was the loss of money on paying damages to people who sued it for defamation after publishing untrue and slanderous claims. However, the plaintiffs could not receive the damages because by May 2017 Ljubas had already sold the Dnevno.hr brand to Marija Dekanić, owner of digital marketing agency Logobox. She was a former member of the Croatian People's Party (HNS), a junior partner of the Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) in the current ruling coalition. Dekanić is the owner of the company Motus d.o.o., the current publisher of the portal Dnevno.hr, which was the recipient of the resources from the European Fund for Regional Development for the redesign of the portal.

author: Advox


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Failed promises on electoral system reform prompts new wave of protest in Georgia · Global Voices
Maxim Edwards

A protest against Georgian Dream and its leader Bidzina Ivanishvili outside the parliament building in Tbilisi, November 2019. Photo (c): Mari Nikuradze / OC Media. Used with permission.
Protests continue in Georgia's capital of Tbilisi after the ruling Georgian Dream party reneged on a promise for electoral reform.
On at least two occasions last week, police used water cannons against protesters, who have been picketing the parliament building to demand that the government transition to a fully proportional electoral system. As tensions have risen, metal barricades have been erected around Georgia's parliament. Online, heated debate has erupted around the hashtags #GeoElectoralCrisis and #სირცხვილია (“It's a shame” in Georgian).
Electoral reform was one of the promises made by Bidzina Ivanishvili, the influential chairman of the country's ruling Georgian Dream party, following violent clashes between police and protesters in June. But when a parliamentary vote was held on November 14 concerning the new electoral system, it was very narrowly defeated, with 101 votes for, three against, and multiple abstentions. Ivanishvili expressed regret about the result, but some observers doubted that Georgian Dream's parliamentarians would have brazenly voted against their own government's proposal without prior approval. Since that vote, 12 MPs have since left Georgian Dream, including prominent former ministers.
Georgia's parliament consists of 150 seats; 115 of which are currently held by a Georgian Dream-led coalition. According to calculations by Open Caucasus Media, a partner of Global Voices, Georgian Dream would have held 74 seats had the 2016 elections been held under a proportional electoral system. Georgian Dream has since argued that the current mixed electoral system cannot be put to another vote in time for parliamentary elections in October 2020. Although party leaders have voiced support for amending the constitution to allow the 2024 parliamentary elections to use the new system, they have also launched a PR campaign arguing that the so-called “German model” proposed by the opposition is unconstitutional.
However, as a gesture of goodwill, Ivanishvili promised that the party would stand down its candidates in certain constituencies to enable a more diverse selection of views to be heard in parliament.
Protesters say that simply isn't good enough:
ჩვენი მოთხოვნა უცვლელია – ჩვენ ვითხოვთ პროპორციულ არჩევნებს, როგორც გარანტს, რომ ამ ქვეყანაში ვერცერთი პარტია ვერ მოახერხებს საკონსტიტუციო უმრავლესობის ხელში ჩაგდებას და ხალხის საკუთარ ნებაზე მართვას!
ჩვენ ვპირდებით ქართულ ოცნებას, რომ მათი ზამთარი გაუსაძლისი გახდება.
Our demand is unchanged – we demand proportional elections as a guarantee that no party in this country will be able to seize a constitutional majority and govern against the people's will!
We promise Georgian Dream their winter will be unbearable.
From the Facebook page “For Freedom”, 26 November 2019
They maintain that the parliamentary vote was a ploy, enabling Ivanishvili and his party to stay in power despite low approval ratings.
OC Media's editor Mari Nikuradze pointed out that a long-awaited meeting between Georgian Dream officials, opposition members, and foreign diplomats did not include protest organisers:
This is the meeting between GD, opposition and diplomats. #TbilisiProtests organisers weren't even invited. Nothing to expect I guess. pic.twitter.com/SmF48jXKVd
— Mari Nikuradze (@mari_nikuradze) November 30, 2019
Since that meeting, protests have continued in the Georgian capital. On the evening of December 2, demonstrators in central Tbilisi were attacked by a group of men who, according to one OC Media journalist, were Georgian Dream supporters.
Georgian Dream has ruled Georgia since 2012, when it defeated Mikheil Saakashvili's United National Movement (UNM) in parliamentary elections. Saakashvili fled Georgia shortly thereafter, and was sentenced by a Georgian court of abuse of power in 2018 on charges widely considered politically motivated.
Ivanishvili sought to distance himself from his predecessor as far as possible. That wasn't difficult. Saakashvili, an American-educated lawyer, has quite a different background from Ivanishvili, whose fortune, estimated at $5.4 billion, was largely earned in Russia. For the people of Tbilisi, his glass mansion towering above the historic district of Sololaki is a daily reminder of the influence he enjoys in this South Caucasus state of 3.7 million.
In recent years, that influence has become a subject of great contention. Despite a brief stint as prime minister in 2012-13, Ivanishvili's power has largely been informal or exercised through his chairmanship of Georgian Dream, a role he has occupied and renounced several times. Georgia has had many prime ministers since Ivanishvili left that post, and it has not gone unnoticed that his four successors and several current and former government ministers have had close business and personal ties to the billionaire, particularly via his former company CARTU management. This situation is now being described by Transparency International Georgia as one of “state capture.”
The year 2019 has been one of the rockiest for Georgian Dream's rule. In late June, mass protests broke out when the Russian politician Georgy Gavrilov was invited to address the Georgian parliament. Given that Russian troops are present on 20 per cent of Georgian territory, in the regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, it was a provocative move. Police responded with a violent crackdown in which several of the 20,000 protesters lost their eyes after being shot with rubber bullets. The symbolism was important; Georgian Dream had come to power on a wave of popular anger at the increasingly heavy-handed rule of the UNM government, particularly its violent repression of a protest in Tbilisi in 2007. Now, it seemed to be following their lead.
The UNM's line, articulated by Saakashvili from his European exile, is that Ivanishvili is pro-Russia and therefore a threat to Georgian sovereignty. A softer version of this argument holds that such heavy handed rule inherently follows a Russian model. The tenor of the criticism and the leanings of the critics may differ, but several observers of Georgian politics told GlobalVoices that they felt Ivanishvili had overreached in consolidating control of Georgian politics, triggering a backlash.
Ghia Nodia, director of the International School for Political Science at Ilia State University in Tbilisi, stressed the geopolitical aspect:
This crisis was started by cheating, Ivanishvili is seen as a person who played a trick on the people. This means he cannot be considered a trustworthy person (not that he was really trusted before, but this time he crossed another important red line). On the other hand, he is prepared to do anything to maintain power. [The opposition] also did not know what exactly to do to counter Ivanishvili’s unexpected move. This was a recipe to radicalization: the strategy appears to be to discredit Ivanishvili further. The Russian factor is also very prominent in the discussion. Ivanishvili is seen as somebody who is bringing Georgia closer to Russia. This means making Georgia more autocratic, that is Russia-like; but this also means that Ivanishvili has alienated the West and is indeed more isolated than ever before – which means that this moves him closer to Putin’s Russia also in a geopolitical sense.
Kornely Kakachia, Professor of Political Science at Ivane Javakhishvili State University in Tbilisi, stressed the personal nature of the confrontation. Ivanishvili's rivalry with Saakashvili, he says, has escalated into a dangerous zero-sum game:
Due to the highly polarised nature of Georgian politics and Ivanishvili's personal feud with Saakashvili, both consider that they can't afford to lose an election. At the end of the day, this is about survival not only of the regime, but of his personal wealth, security, and privileges. So when he promised proportional representation under pressure, he miscalculated. He's now calculating his chances more carefully. But Georgian Dream is very eclectic, a marriage of convenience which almost collapsed without his financial support. I think it's too late for him, and he thinks that by demonising Saakashvili and the UNM he can still cling onto power. But he's lost a lot of credibility, and unlike his predecessors, he doesn't know how to leave with grace.
This confrontation is perhaps why Georgian Dream politicians and their supporters have often presented the protests in the capital as nothing more than an attempt by the disgraced UNM government to return to power outside the ballot box. Some participants emphasised to Global Voices that while UNM supporters are present on the streets, the movement is diverse, including libertarians, social democrats, socialists, and neo-nationalists.
Grigol Gegelia, a historian and politician from Lelo, a recently founded centrist party in Georgia, told GlobalVoices that the country “had a chance to adopt a progressive, inclusive electoral system which would have enabled our feeble democracy to move beyond the two-party dichotomy which has harmed our political culture in radical ways.” This was not, stressed Gegelia, a “Mishist” (Georgian term used for supporters of Saakashvili — ed.) movement.
Similarly, some commentators disillusioned with Georgian Dream are no less disturbed by Saakashvili's seeming ability to regard every political protest in Georgia as a referendum on his return:
შევხედოთ ვინ არის „ქართული ოცნების“ ალტერნატივა?! მე არც ის მინდა, რომ ესენი სამუდამოდ დარჩნენ და არც ის მინდა, რომ „ისინი“ მობრუნდნენ. ალტერნატივა უნდა შეიქმნას საზოგადოების წიაღში. […] აქვე უნდა ითქვას ისიც, რომ „ქართული ოცნება“ ეს არის უსერიოზულესი პრობლემა, ძველი ხელისუფლება კი იყო ტრაგედია – სწორედ ესაა განსხვავება: პრობლემის მოგვარება შეიძლება, ტრაგედიას კი ვერ მოაგვარებ, ტრაგედია უნდა გადაიტანო
So let's look: who is the alternative to Georgian Dream?! I don't want these guys to be in power forever, but I also don't want ‘them’ to return. […] An alternative must take root in the hearts of society. […] It must also be said that Georgian Dream is a serious problem, while the last government was a tragedy. That's the difference: a problem can be solved, but a tragedy cannot be resolved.
- Poet David Maghradze to Interpressenews, November 17, 2019
In the words of Sopo Japaridze, a Tbilisi-based activist with the Solidarity Network, an independent trade union, the rivalry between Georgian Dream and the UNM has largely focused on “on who the parties are compared to what they do.” This was why some members of the wider Georgian Dream coalition, in which the party of the same name was the largest force, have switched allegiance in recent years. Beka Natsvlishvili, an independent MP who quit the ruling coalition in February, told Global Voices that his hopes for a more socially-oriented government after the fall of Saakashvili had been dashed:
I hoped that Georgian Dream would change the neoliberal path chosen by Saakashvili. Any of my suggestions in this regard were rejected so I found no reason to stay in the [parliamentary] majority. Georgian Dream is a party of power, without any ideology, typical for Georgia and the post-Soviet space. When they lose power, they disappear, because supporters have no reason to stay with [such a party]; it can no longer ensure you a job in the state sector or any other services. This has happened with almost all ruling parties in Georgia. The exception is the United National Movement, because they elaborated an ideology of neoliberalism combined with anti-Russian nationalism.
Georgian Dream's support is just based on fear that UNM could regain power and take revenge on its opponents. So because Georgian Dream improved the human rights situation, it did almost nothing to improve social rights. We have now neoliberalism with a human face. Because of this dominant discourse, dominant parties offer no real programmes to solve people's problems.
In a country where the average monthly wage is just equivalent to 400 USD, social inequality can easily boil over into political resentment.
Just as in 2004, when Saakashvili's UNM and its allies toppled the ailing Eduard Shevardnadze in the Rose Revolution, Georgian Dream presented itself as the saviour for a country with a broken social contract. And as Georgians seemingly become disillusioned with Georgian Dream, it is unclear who their next saviour will be. As the long-term observer Stephen Jones has written, that cycle of salvation and betrayal is the ultimate tragedy of Georgian politics today: “A widening chasm between leaders and led which leads in the end to a popular explosion.”

author: Maxim Edwards


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As NATO turns 70, changing priorities jeopardize security of smaller member nations · Global Voices
Aliide Naylor

World leaders flocked to London on December 3 and 4, 2019 to mark the 70th anniversary of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) amid uncertainty about the alliance’s future.
NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg delivers remarks at a reception to celebrate NATO's 70th Anniversary at Andrew W. Mellon Auditorium in Washington, D.C., on April 3, 2019. [State Department photo by Michael Gross/Public Domain] via Wikimedia Commons.
Born out of the end of World War II and the Cold War as a counterweight to the Soviet Union’s increasing global influence, NATO was initially intended to serve as a defensive pact. In 1949, the US, Canada, and nations in western Europe united around the commitment that an attack on one nation would require a collective response, effectively establishing Article 5: “an armed attack against one or more of them in Europe or North America shall be considered an attack against them all”.
This week, the UK welcomed the leaders of major NATO powers, including US President Donald Trump, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, all of whom have expressed some apprehension about NATO’s global role. Since 1949 NATO has expanded widely, but in recent years the leaders of these key constituent nations have sporadically disparaged the alliance, although the threat from Russia in the east remains more pertinent than ever. Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014 showed the world that it could, at will, seize territory on its western border and evoke little global reaction beyond condemnation, rousing the concern of NATO’s smaller members.
On its 70th anniversary, therefore, the alliance is in a vastly different shape from when it was initially established.
Trump frequently called the alliance obsolete in the lead-up to his election in 2016. He has placed a heavy focus on members’ defence spending, effectively weakening NATO through his emphasis on economics over ideology. And, at the beginning of November, Macron told The Economist that “what we are currently experiencing is the brain death of NATO,” on account of the apparent US reluctance to support European members of the alliance.
Trump jumped to NATO’s defence on Tuesday, December 4, saying that the alliance “serves a great purpose” and that Macron’s comments were “very insulting to a lot of different forces.” External, international support is imperative for key border nations in northern and eastern Europe. To question unconditional US support is deeply concerning – as are French and German proclivities to ignore the full extent of Russia’s threat.
The Baltic states, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, all joined the alliance in 2004, alongside Bulgaria, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia. Today, NATO comprises 29 member states. All three Baltic countries are currently meeting the pledge to spend 2 percent of their Gross Domestic Product (GDP) on defence: the Baltics know all too well from decades of occupation the consequences of underestimating the power on their eastern borders.
However, only eight countries out of the 29, including the US, are meeting this target, with major players such as France and Germany still lagging behind. In short, while the “great” nations engage in more “pressing” power struggles, it is these smaller nations that feel most threatened by Russia, and that are most heavily invested in the future of the alliance as a defensive pact.
France, Germany and the US still haven’t quite come to an agreement over whether to treat Russia as an adversary or an ally. Germany is facilitating the construction of a gas transit pipeline from Russia, despite an alleged Russian assassination on German soil; and Macron recently asked, “is our enemy today Russia? Or China? … I don’t believe so,” adding, “our common enemy today in NATO is terrorism.” But in doing so the heads of state wilfully disregard incidents such as the allegation by German authorities on December 4, the second day of the Summit, that Russia was behind the assassination in Berlin of a former Chechen fighter, not to mention the poisoning of former KGB agent Sergei Skripal in the UK.
As attention is diverted away from Russia’s threat abroad, countries such as Turkey have arguably been seeking greater clout in NATO through acting as a southern buffer, while cosying up to Russia through acts such as the purchasing of a Russian S-400 missile system. Turkey was arguably holding fellow NATO members hostage until Wednesday, with Ankara demanding NATO support its effort to suppress the Syrian Kurd forces that Turkey terms “terrorist” organisations.
Prior to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s departure for the NATO meeting, the country refused outright to support NATO’s defence plan for the Baltics and Poland, denying that it was blackmailing fellow members. If the Baltics were nervous, they did not show it. “We are working together with the countries of our region, as well as other allies, to soon obtain approval for the updated defence plans,” Estonian Prime Minister Jüri Ratas said in a statement on Tuesday.
But there was still hope for the Baltic nations. NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg reassured reporters on December 3 that NATO did have a plan to defend the Baltic countries. “We are proving every day that this alliance is agile, is active and is delivering,” Stoltenberg said. “For the first time in history we have combat-ready troops in the eastern part of the alliance,” referring to NATO’s Enhanced Forward Presence in the Baltics.
Later on December 4, Turkey dropped its demands. “Today we took an important step,”  Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda said in a statement, “During the meeting we agreed that NATO defense plan for the Baltic States and Poland would be approved. This is a huge achievement not only for our country, but for the whole region, because it ensures security of our citizens.”
The priorities of NATO are certainly changing in a rapidly changing world, but this meeting has shown that it can still pull through for its most committed member states. Whether that will continue remains to be seen.

author: Aliide Naylor


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Join Global Voices’ #WritingTowardFreedom Twitter chat on December 11, 2019 · Global Voices
Nwachukwu Egbunike

Global Voices Twitter Chat #WritingTowardFreedom will discuss politics and digital rights in Africa on December 11, 2019.
Global Voices will host a Twitter chat to discuss “WritingTowardFreedom: Politics and Digital Rights in Africa,” on December 11, 2019.
This Twitter conversation will be anchored by Global Voices’ sub-Saharan and North African contributors. The discussants are: Amanda Leigh Lichtenstein (United States/Tanzania), Dércio Tsandzana (Mozambique/France), Sandra Aceng (Uganda) and Yosr Jouini (Tunisa). Nwachukwu Egbunike (Nigeria) will moderate the conversation.
Lichtenstein (@travelfarnow), Global Voices editor for sub-Saharan Africa, is the global security editor for Public Radio International's The World. As a freelance writer and poet, she has worked on a variety of literary arts advocacy initiatives in Zanzibar, Ethiopia, and the United States. Tsandzana (@derciotsandzana), Global Voices Lusophone Africa editor, is a doctoral candidate at France's University of Bordeaux. Aceng (@sandraaceng) is a gender and ICT policy advocate in Uganda. Jouini (@thisisyosr), a software engineer from Tunisia, focuses on the intersection of technology and human rights. Egbunike (@feathersproject), Global Voices Community Manager for Sub-Saharan Africa, is a social media researcher and author of Hashtags: social media, politics and ethnicity in Nigeria.
The chat begins at 4 p.m. (UTC) on Wednesday, December 11, on Twitter, using the Global Voices sub-Saharan Africa handle: @gvssafrica.
Press freedom and online freedom of expression have consistently been under threat in Africa. In 2018, Global Voices Special Coverage revealed that jailing journalists, shutting down the internet and taxing social media is the new “internet paradigm” on the continent.
Ethnic hate speech, mis- and disinformation, and government trolling also increasingly interfere with freedom of expression, access to information and political discourses online, as revealed in the series of articles written by GV contributors to the #WritingTowardFreedom project.
These interferences spike during political events like elections or protest movements. According to the project's initial findings, which covered seven African countries: Algeria, Ethiopia, Mozambique, Nigeria, Tunisia, Uganda, and Zimbabwe:
The #WritingTowardFreedom project is funded by the Africa Digital Rights Fund of The Collaboration on International ICT Policy for East and Southern Africa (CIPESA).
The discussants for the Twitter conversation contributed to this project as writers and editors. They will shed more light on the findings that emerged from the stories and engage a larger conversation on the intersection between politics, freedom of expression and digital rights.

author: Nwachukwu Egbunike