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Malawi/Zambia: Remembering John Chilembwe, Debate Over Using Yahoo Messenger At Work and ICTs and Gender Based Violence  · Global Voices
Victor Kaonga

Malawian blogger Soyapi Mumba is excited about the introduction of Internet and Pay-Per-View TV services by Malawi Telecom (MTL):
Malawi's Internet infrastructure, especially to people's homes, is very poor and for MTL to provide these service, it means they will either drastically improve the current infrastructure, or introduce new alternatives mostly like wireless-based since it requires less setup and administrative costs. Either way, this is good news to consumers,
REMEMBERING JOHN CHILEMBWE AND DR. MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR.
Looking at the US and Malawi's legacy of struggle for peace and justice, Steve Sharra reflects on the importance of 15th January to both USA and Malawi's history. On this day, the two nations celebrate two black leaders, John Chilembwe and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.:
In Malawi, January 15th is celebrated as Chilembwe Day, in honor of the Reverend John Chilembwe who in 1915 led the first ever uprising against white racism and colonialism in what was then known as Nyasaland. In the United States, January 15th is celebrated as Martin Luther King Jr. Day in honor of the man who led the civil rights struggle in the US, protesting racism, and fighting for the rights of Black people and other minorities in the United States. The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., who won the 1964 Nobel Peace Prize, also protested against US imperial aggression, and its invasion of Vietnam.
Should chatting while at work being banned at a Christian radio station in Malawi? In a post titled,  Debate over VOIP-Yahoo Messenger at the office, Ndagha writes,
To enchance maximum use of time/and ensure smooth performance of computers, staff were advised not to install software like yahoo voice messenger for chats and talks. Some staff had already installed some of these without persmission on the specific digital work stations but later they were warned that the administrator would uninstall such voip's. I sensed disatisfaction among staff and anger.
The debate continues as management felt/feel some staff spend quality productive time chatting which also affects affects the computer's performance. Staff feel this is unfair as the internet availability with voip's helps them connect with other people.
Malawi's journalist at the Malawi Broadcasting Corporation (MBC) bemoans the lack of vision among young people. In his posting on “NEW YEAR AND CHANGES” Joe says:
Young men and women lack solid guidance these days and in the end make wrong decisions and mess up. There are problems of succession in organisations due to petty jealousy and lack of confidence among ageing superiors.
Local Innovation
Afrigadget has a story of a young Malawian man who has created a windmill out of spare parts. He managed to make a small windmill which generated electricity enough to light his dorm. Seeing its success, he planned for a bigger one so that his parents could benefit and some well-wishers gave him money to get some of the materials he needed.”
Malawian Blogger Dies
However, the year has also began with sad news of the departure of northern-Malawi Mzuzu-based blogger Mangaliso Jere who passed away on 18th January. Fellow blogger Austin mourns him in his post titled “Mangaliso's World is Over” as a
A good friend …. I really have no words to describe this brother only that he was a cheerful lad, a hardworking techie and one who loved his motherland. Rest in Peace Dear Brother!
ZAMBIAN BLOGOSPHERE
Zambia blogger and journalist, Brenda Zulu, writes about the intersection of information and communication technologies and gender based violence. She writes about relevant incidents involving SMS, mobile phones, and email:
Ellen Musunga is a trainee journalist who is attached to the public broadcasting station. Her boy friend Chiti Mutale had been coming to pick her up from the news room every knock off time and this time it so happened that when he walked into the newsroom, Ellen was reading an e-mail from her another aspiring candidate who had sent her an e-mail expressing how he felt for her. Realising that Chiti had just walked in the newsroom Ellen just clicked X to log out and this made Chiti suspicious and he demanded to have her password.
Banda argues that when a man in Zambia buys a phone for a woman, the man still thinks that he owns it and has the right to see who has been calling her. This is what has lead to a sad incident like this one:
Charity Banda is not legally married to Gibson Banda who has been supporting and staying together with her and her five children she has from four different men. Charity recently took Banda to the police for assaulting her over answering a call from a male voice on her mobile phone bought for her by Banda. Charity that was five months pregnant with twines was kicked in her stomach by Banda who also beat her up and in the later had a miscarriage and lost the twines that died.
It is true that one can find any information on the Internet, writes  Zambian blogger, waltboo, and adds: But looking for information on the Internet can be daunting. “Where to look? What to look for? And above all HOW TO?”
First I had to learn how to use the Internet. Oh I knew the “www” existed and what it could do but I never used it before. So I decided to learn fast. You can't learn any faster than taking the bull by its horns. And I did that. There is a shared computer in our shared office…and it has Internet connection. That was my target. I burnt hours that turned into days…that turned into weeks…and finally into months. And Voila!

author: Victor Kaonga


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Malaysia: Website Formed to Support Bloggers · Global Voices
Preetam Rai

Mavericksym blog introduces a website called bloggers united that has been launched to support the two bloggers being sued by a Malaysian newspaper for defamation. The support site is run by Susan Loone who says “Take heart my friends. Our movement is growing. This black dot in the history of blogshpere for Malaysians bloggers has a good side to it too. It brings us together. With numbers we can change something. Even if we don’t (yet), we have at least started the ball rolling:”

source: news-globalvoices

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

author: Preetam Rai


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Nepal: Maoists and Mainstream · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Nepali Netbook on the Maoist way of arms and doing things and how it's impacted the mainstream parties and politics. “By the end of 1976, when B.P. Koirala finally fused nationalism and democracy into a plea for reconciliation, it was pretty clear that the Nepali Congress’ principal foreign sponsor had given up on armed action as tool of political change.”

author: Neha Viswanathan


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Nigeria: Nigerians abroad do not need to go home! · Global Voices
Ndesanjo Macha

Omodudu does not think that Nigerians living abroad need to go back home,”Often we hear Nigerians living abroad declare, “I am going home”. I have news for all of you, Nigeria is not in dire need of your presence, actually you may be adding to the problem of overcrowding on the streets of Lagos. Nigeria needs your productivity more than anything else. If you have nothing to offer besides competing with the individuals at home for the already overstaffed service sector jobs, please sit your butt down wherever you are and pay your mortgage LOL.”

author: Ndesanjo Macha


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Palestinian Blogger Without Electricity  · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

Palestinian blogger Fayyad gives us a sneak preview of his visit to Palestine at Kabobfest, where his little village was without electricty for the duration of his stay.

author: Amira Al Hussaini


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Russia: Moscow to Vladivostok on Train · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

Snowsquare recommends both the real and the virtual Moscow-Vladivostok train ride: “6 days, across 9259km, across 2 continents, 14 oblasts and 8 time zones.”

author: Veronica Khokhlova


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Russia: Sochi · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

The world's deepest cave, the Olympics 2014 bid and a lot more – at Sochi Travel Info: Experience the Russian Riviera blog.


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Russia: The Language Issue · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

Ruminations on Russia writes about the language issue in Russia: “The problem is apparently that the near abroad prefer their own language and English to Russian and Russian (strange that), and native Russians (whoever they may be – but that's a different topic altogether) have a nasty habit of eating sala, drinking vodka, not having enough sex, too many abortions, dying early and generally being fewer at the end of the year than at the beginning.  Not so much a dying language, as a population suffering from a collective heart attack.”


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Serbia: The Election · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

Europhobia and Balkan Baby write on the elections in Serbia.


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Sri Lanka: Conflict and Art · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

groundviews on conflict and its impact on art. “Among those artists who regularly emphasize the impact of conflict on society are Sri Lankan duo Bandu Manemperi and Roger Constantine. Their most recent exhibition was based on how human emotions have been numbed by frequent and continuous violence.”


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Tajikistan: IRP Strategy · Global Voices
Nathan Hamm

At neweurasia, Alexander reports on the new political strategy of the Islamic Renaissance Party.

author: Nathan Hamm


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Tajikistan: Pearl of the East · Global Voices
Nathan Hamm

Gulru begins blogging about Tajikistan for neweurasia with a post on the city of Khujand, the Pearl of the East.


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Vietnam: Visiting Hue · Global Voices
Preetam Rai

Virtual Doug gives us a pictorial tour of the alleys in Hue, the former royal capital city of Vietnam.


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What Salvadoran bloggers are saying — on the 15th anniversary of peace accords · Global Voices
Tim Muth

January 16 marked the 15th anniversary of the signing of the Chapultepec Peace Accords which ended El Salvador's twelve year civil war.  The event was marked by official celebrations, conferences, rallies and protests.  The bloggers of El Salvador had much to say about the events and the country's progress.  The general theme in the Salvadoran blogosphere was that of unfulfilled promise.
Jjmar, who posts at the Hunnapuh blog, does not want the significance of the Peace Accords to be underestimated and  describes the accords as the basis for the most important democratic political reform(es) in the modern history of El Salvador.  The accords opened to doors to the growth of democracy, guaranteed political rights and opened space where the FMLN could be transformed from a guerrilla movement into a political party, and the country established a Human Rights Ombudsman.  But in the socio-economic life of the country, the accords had their greatest shortcomings.  The historic structures of Salvadoran society which gave rise to the armed conflict were not abolished by the Peace Accords.
For her part, Ixquic marvels that in a country as small as El Salvador there exist such widely varied opinions(es) about the the same reality.  While she notes that the Peace Accords did accomplish the cessation of hostilities, there has been a failure to cement a new  social, political and economic system.
Many view the treatment of ex-soldiers and guerrillas as one of the failures. Journalist Juan Jose Dalton reflects on the Peace Accords with the story of Bernardo Menjivar(es).  When he was only 11, government forces invaded Bernardo's village in the mountainous province of Chalatenango and massacred the population including his mother, sister and uncles and counsin.   From that point forward, he became a messenger for the FMLN guerrilla forces, passing messages from one front to another.  When he was 16, he lost both legs in an explosion in a mine field.  He was one of the lucky ones though.  Eventually he came under the care of the International Red Cross and was later taken to Cuba where he received treatment and rehabilitation and eventually education and training.
Bernardo viewed himself as fortunate in comparison to other disabled veterans of the war, both ex-soldiers and ex-guerrillas.  The promise of the Peace Accords, to reintegrate them into society with training, health care and support, has not been fulfilled according to Bernardo and Dalton.
Following the festivities of January 16 commemorating the Peace Accords, JJmar could only conclude that post-war reconciliation still had not arrived(es) for El Salvador.  Members of the ruling right-wing ARENA party, including the current president and two of his three predecessors,  gathered in a plaza dedicated in the past year to Roberto D'Aubuisson, founder of ARENA and sponsor of right wing death squads during the civil war years.  They sang their old hymn with the line “El Salvador will be the tomb where the Reds will meet their end.”  Beka Luna could only call it hypocrisy(es) when president Tony Saca went from singing these phrases, to calling for national unity, a short time later in the national celebrations.
Ixquic walked past the festival grounds where the celebrations were taking place,  found them surrounded with razor wire and riot police, and posted the photos she took.  One ironic photo shows protesters beyond the riot police with a banner which reads “la verdadera paz” — “the authentic peace.”
Jjmar decided that the day's events had only been the opening event(es) of the 2009 election campaigns.  A fact he lamented while, for so many thousands of Salvadorans, the signing of the Peace Accords was an incomprehensible act — their concerns are to arrive home without being assaulted, to worry about the next day's meal and the rent payment at the end of the month
The commemorations of the end of the civil war brought numerous interviews and accounts from the civil war.   One news story particularly incensed El Visitador.   The digital periodical El Faro reported an interview(es) with Felipe González Márquez, former prime minister of Spain, who revealed that Fidel Castro had given him a detailed preview of the November 1989 offensive of the FMLN guerrillas into the streets of San Salvador.  El Visitador declares that the silence of the Spanish prime minister(es) about a pending attack by guerrilla forces on the capital city was tantamount to being aware of plans for the 9/11 attacks and doing nothing to stop them.

author: Tim Muth


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Why Independence for Quebec but not Guadeloupe? · Global Voices
Alice Backer

Convention pour une Nouvelle Guadeloupe  notes (Fr) that French Socialist presidential candidate Segolene Royal has endorsed the Quebecois party's principle of Quebecois independence. The blog continues: “We notice once more the double standard of socialist conservatives who share the goal of Quebecois Independence but reject the same outcome for  Guadeloupe.” The blog goes on to urge the UN to demand that all its members (and France in this case) respect the international right to decolonization.

author: Alice Backer


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Zimbabwe: what happened to Zimbabwean Pundit? · Global Voices
Ndesanjo Macha

The three month deafening silence on Zimbabwean Pundit blog is explained, “Over the last three or so months, you have come here looking for a new helping of “the world as seen from the eyes of a Zimbabwean” and have been dissappointed to find no new servings. At first you thought it perhaps was a personal difficulty in the real but personal realm of yours truly's life and it'd be over in a few days, but then the days turned into weeks, weeks into months, and sadly, the year too passed on by. I know I've dissappointed you. For that I'm deeply sorry.”


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Afghanistan: State of the Union · Global Voices
Nathan Hamm

Safrang says that Afghanistan was not mentioned enough in President Bush's State of the Union Speech.


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Afghanistan: Unconventional · Global Voices
Nathan Hamm

Joshua Foust says that NATO has realized a bit too late that Afghanistan is an unconventional conflict.


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Argentina: Buenos Aires Blog Roundup · Global Voices
David Sasaki

After a week-long bandwidthless break, Alan Patrick is back with the latest and greatest from anglophone Buenos Aires bloggers.

author: David Sasaki


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Armenia: Dink & the Blockade · Global Voices
Nathan Hamm

David of The Armenian Economist writes that though in the wake of the Hrant Dink's murder the Turkish press is making some encouraging statements regarding relations with Armenians, what would really make a difference for Armenians would be to lift the blockade on the state of Armenia.


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Armenia: Hrant Dink Roundup · Global Voices
Nathan Hamm

Onnik Krikorian rounds up both the Armenian blogosphere and the Turkish blogosphere on Hrant Dink's murder.


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Barbados: Barrow statue · Global Voices
Georgia Popplewell

Bajan Reporter discusses the controversy surrounding a newly erected statue of late Barbadian prime minister Errol Barrow.

author: Georgia Popplewell


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Barbados: “Dear Police Force…” · Global Voices
Georgia Popplewell

In light of revelations that the Barbados police force may be using some of its newly acquired skills to identify the people behind their blog, Barbados Free Press writes an open letter to the constabulary.


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Belarus: Mentioned in the State of the Union Address · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

According to TOL's Belarus Blog, Belarus gets a useless mention in this year's State of the Union address: “It turns out that when things go sour in Iraq, promoting democracy in Belarus and Burma are actually a good card to play for George Bush…”


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Brazil: Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist · Global Voices
David Sasaki

“By all rights, Paulo Coelho's The Alchemist should have single-handedly delivered a knock-out blow to any popular conception that Latin American literature is ‘good’ literature. The novel is, simply put, execrable tripe.” So begins Posthegemony's ranting review of what it terms Coelho's famous work of “anti-literature”. Still, Jon admits that “the Alchemist must do something for someone–perhaps even for 85 million someones.”


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Caribbean: Astrology and cricket · Global Voices
Georgia Popplewell

James Caldwell at Cricketwukup.com enlists the help of astrology in assesing the fortunes of the West Indies in the upcoming Cricket World Cup.


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Chile: First Bloggers Association · Global Voices
Rosario Lizana

A group of Bloggers have decided to make the Chilean Association of Bloggers [ES]. The idea was born from the concern of not having a organized manner of communication. As they explain:
Somos una agrupación de voluntarios con objetivos comunes, que mediante los blogs, buscamos desarrollar iniciativas comunitarias de diversa índole. Fomentar la comunicación y la democracia por medio de la internet, buscar la representabilidad de nuestro pareceres, canalizar nuestras aspiraciones, reparos y posiciones bajo un techo ordenado y pluralista que albergue a todos sin exclusión.
They also declare that there is no political, religious or ideological basis of the organization and that they are committed to the bloggers’ idea of sharing visions through open, participative space.
This group began in November and already has 300 members. They also want to spread the use of technology. They have organized a digital literacy campaign in a school and intend to do more. But their main focus is creating a participative place for everyone. As a non profit organization, they are also looking for sponsors to help them go forward.

author: Rosario Lizana


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Egypt: Protest Against Atrocities Committed by Police · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

Egyptain blogger Asad  informs us of a protest being organised to rally support against atrocitites being committed by Egyptian police at present (Ar). The protest is being held tomorrow (Thursday – January 25) to coincide with celebrations being held to commemorate the Egyptian Police Day.


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Egypt: Sandmonkey Investigates 24 · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

Egypt's leading blogger Sandmonkey has decided to investigate hit series 24 as he heard it was “insane, and according to some people superly racist against Muslims and Arabs”!
He has since promised to engage himself in “seriously dumb & awesome entertainment for 5 straight continous hours.”


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Egypt: Spotlight on Beirut · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

Egyptian blogger Zenobia gives us her two cents on her assessment of the situation in Lebanon. “I don't know why they insist of labeling the opposition with Hezbollah as if they want to scare the west from it,” she writes.


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Estonia: Tartu Real Estate · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

Itching for Eestimaa is looking for an apartment “in the city of Tartu, you know that unappealing hellhole in southeast Estonia where there are no good indie rock bands and the best thing is the road leading to Tallinn?” Some observations on Tartu's real estate are here.


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Europe: Bulgarain Xenophobic MEP · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

“It’s about time EU politics had some entertainment again,” writes Europhobia. The ‘entertainment’ is the 23-year-old Bulgarian MEP Dimitar Stoyanov, known for the anti-Semitic and anti-Roma views he's not trying to hide.


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French Guiana: Aerial Shots of Cayenne and the Forest · Global Voices
Alice Backer

Carnet de Guyane posts (Fr) aerial shots of Cayenne and the guianese forest taken while flying over the country.


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Guatemala: Bloggers at ExpoNet 2007 · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Both SiRGt [ES] and Cvander [ES] will be attending ExpoNet Guatemala 2007 and are quick to point out that all Guatemalan bloggers are invited.


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Haiti: Caribbean Soccer Cup Champion · Global Voices
Alice Backer

Says Collectif Haiti de Provence (Fr): “The national soccer team won the Caribbean Cup by defeating Trinidad in the final 2-1. A deserved victory for the Haitians… In Port-au-Prince the victory was celebrated in the streets. Thousands of fans assembled on the Champ de Mars exploded with joy when the match ended, confirming the victory.”


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Hong Kong: Broadcasting authority PK RTHK · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

ESWN shows the impartial news headlines by mainstream media on the Hong Kong Broadcasting Authority's strong advice against a RTHK television program about its pro-homosexuality bias.

author: Oiwan Lam


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Hong Kong: Impartial rule or discrimination? · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

難道同性戀的傾向是高度傳染的病菌？就連看一看也會受感染？
One Jan 20, the Broadcasting Authority (BA) issued a strong advice concerning RTHK’s television programme “Hong Kong Connection”(鏗鏘集). There were very strong reactions from the local blogsphere against BA's advice.
The BA’s explanations were published in the press release:
1. the programme was biased towards homosexuality, promoted homosexuality and contained discriminating elements;
2. it was unsuitable for broadcast at the scheduled time and exerted a bad influence on children and youths;
3. it was unfair to Christians as a whole as the reference to opposition from a Christian in the programme gave viewers a misleading impression that all Christians were irrational;
4. it did not mention the undesirable aspects of homosexuality such as AIDS; and
5. it did not contain a warning caption.
The BA considered that the programme was presented in the form of a documentary and that the contents of the programme about homosexuality and the legalization of homosexual marriage were controversial in many societies including Hong Kong. The programme was therefore a factual programme dealing with matters of public policy or controversial issues of public importance in Hong Kong and should be subject to the impartiality rule under the relevant code. However, the programme presented only the merits of homosexual marriage and featured only the views of three homosexuals on the legislation of homosexual marriage, rendering the presentation unfair, partial and biased towards homosexuality and having the effect of promoting the acceptance of homosexual marriage.
The BA also considered the programme unsuitable for broadcast within the Family View Hours as children and young viewers watching the programme might have no knowledge of homosexuality and might be adversely affected by the partial contents of the programme if parental guidance was not provided.
RTHK was strongly advised to observe more closely paragraph 2 of Chapter 2 (family viewing policy), paragraph 1 of Chapter 7 (likely effects of all material shown on television on children), and paragraphs 2 and 3 of Chapter 9 (impartiality) of the Generic Code of Practice on Television Programme Code.
There were very strong reactions from the local blogsphere on the issue:
Anson comments that under the BA’s logic:
任何人報導不同性傾向人士的應有權益作為基本人權，都是「偏私的」，「不客觀的」，這個，是很恐怖的事。
Jovisky rushed to see the programme after she read about the BA advice:
我真搞不懂了，節目內容有些什麼特別？若果主角不是同性戀者而是別的身份，比如是來港要求政治庇護的非洲國家人民，說他們在港生活面對的問題，工作上遇見的困境，又或他追求香港女人而被受白眼…… 如是又可會被投訴節目內容「偏袒」？
Orangutan house said:
明明在介紹印度咖哩，為免報道不公，所以要特別加插一碟鹽焗雞？說到明是《同志．戀人》，不訪問同性戀者，難道找幾個明星唱唱歌，玩玩遊戲？用不是邏輯的邏輯，去為偏見找藉口，真的很醜．
Simon yip criticizes the Christian groups that launched the complaint:
或許這是一個新聞中立的問題,給左派說10分鐘,必先給右派說10分鐘.
但是同性戀跟異性戀從不是對立,從可處可以偏袒同性戀?
大概只是冒犯了基督教的尊貴教義
As a media worker, Florence worries that the advice is a threat to freedom of speech:
今日話你鼓吹同性戀，明日可以是鼓吹反共。撇開政府又多一個整頓港台的口實，作為傳媒工作者之一，我不免擔心…
以廣管局上述裁決的邏輯，曾蔭權是否適合做特首，是否一位有賢能的特首，備受公眾爭議，報道必須持平。但，「特首的一天」只展示特首好的一面，並只講述特首及其身邊人對特首公務的意見，這又是否「使報道內容不公、不完整和偏袒特首曾蔭權，並產生鼓吹接受曾蔭權的效果」？
A reader, little rain, posted his / her very long and well written complaint letter to BA at inmediahk.net's comment:
This issue reminds me of the painful fight for racial equality in other countries decades ago. Back then in countries like the US and the South Africa, the majority (the whites) also thought that the discriminatory treatment of the blacks was rightful. People who advocated racial equality were condemned. The voices of the blacks were nowhere to be heard. The change from racial discrimination to racial equality was a long fight.
Changes, as always, are painful. Accepting novel ideas are painful, admitting old views as obsolete and inapplicable are not easy. It takes years of education, and communications is the first step. Sadly speaking, in the past years, Hong Kong has not moved forward in addressing sex orientation discrimination.
Hong Kong takes pride in its ability to embrace diversity, it is very painful to see that in this issue, our regulator who is supposed to be impartial is depriving the society of hearing about voices of the minority. It is painful to see how a regulator can act so brashly upon 22 individual complaints. I do not criticize people who make the complaints, it is absolutely understandable that some individuals are less informed and less familiar about this topic and may find such discussion uncomfortable, what surprised me was the ignorance of the regulator in making this decision.
I am very very disappointed by HKBA’s decision, I strongly believe this is a mistaken one and I urge the Obudsman to investigate thoroughly and to restore justice to RTHK.


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Hong Kong: Star ferry MTV · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

A MTV in youtube via inmediahk.net on the anti demolition of star ferry and queen's pier campaign.


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Iran: A video of Iranian nuclear facilities · Global Voices
Fred Petrossian

This video clip is  part of an Iranian TV documetary showing Iranian nuclear facilities.Thanks to FarsiTube I have found it.

author: Fred Petrossian


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Iran:More Academics Under Pressure · Global Voices
Fred Petrossian

Azar says that not only students are under pressure by authorities but academics and university professors get fired for different reasons[Fa]. The blogger writes, sometimes, the academics are accused of immoral behaviour by authorities.It is a new way to get rid of them and no news are in media.


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Iraq: Olive Branch’s First Anniversary · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

The Olive Branch Network celebrates its first anniversary tomorrow (Thursday, January 25), says Iraqi blogger Khalid Jarrar.
The network is all “about bridging the gap between cultures and making the world understand Iraq and Iraqis better.”


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Israel: Segregated Bus Lines  · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

Writing in Jewlicious, Israeli blogger Laya complains about segregated buses, in which men sit in front and women at the back in Israel.
“(W)omen have reported being threatened, harassed and intimidated for exercising their right to sit where they want. They are public buses, after all,” she writes.


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Jamaica: Patties · Global Voices
Georgia Popplewell

Stunner offers a crash course in Jamaican patties.


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Jamaica, St. Lucia, Barbados: Post-independence  · Global Voices
Georgia Popplewell

Geoffrey Philp takes on the subject of post-Independence literature in the Caribbean, noting the particular significance of the work of poets Kamau Braithwaite, Derek Walcott and Mervyn Morris.


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Kurdistance: The End of Saddam · Global Voices
Deborah Ann Dilley

Since the hanging of Saddam Hussein at the beginning of this year, Global Voices has covered what the world has had to say about it, the only group left now is the Kurds. Kurdish reaction was fairly slow to develop. I believe this was because of shock. But don't take my word for it, read what the Kurds have to say….
From Bilal at Better Kurdistan and Iraq:
Saddam Hussein was hanged last night. To many Iraqis his reign looks like distant history compared to how long and bloody post-Saddam Iraq seems. The Iraqi Special Tribunal trying Saddam and his top aides for crimes against humanity meant to offer justice to the victims of his rule. Justice and accountability are what his victims wanted. In our meeting with President Bush last December on Iraqi election day, one angry student retorted that Saddam Hussein must not be given a trial at all but rather executed right away. The President advised him that new Iraq would set an example that even Saddam-like individuals will get a fair trial. Fair or not, thousands of Kurds are denied justice.
Today is Eid Al-Adha, although Shiites will celebrate tomorrow. Culturally and religiously, Eid is a day of reconciliation and feasting. This day has often been a day in which Iraqi governments offer amnesties to prisoners, or allow them to visit their families. Saddam’s execution today breaks that norm, rendering the execution out of place. The date will fulfill Saddam’s wish that he will be a “sacrifice” of the day, in reference to the Eid sheep sacrificing ritual. ….
Above all, the Kurds are cheated. Kurds were Saddam Hussein’s primary victims. He gassed the town of Halabja in 1988 and killed five thousand people, mostly women and children, instantly. Residents of Halabja still suffer form diseases and women from miscarriages. I recently lost a friend who was diagnosed with Leukemia from exposure to polluted soil. Although he escaped the immediate attack, the gas killed him years later. Saddam Hussein’s regime is also responsible for the death and disappearance of thousands of Kurds in the so-called Anfal operation. His bulldozers razed four thousand Kurdish villages. As a Kurd, you were naturally guilty unless proven innocent. Saddam’s treatment of the Kurds is genocide and cannot be excused on any pretext. The trial was a chance to let the world, especially the Arabs, know why we Kurds have issues with Saddam.
But Saddam Hussein was put to death for the killing of comparatively few in retaliation for an assassination attempt while his major crimes are dismissed. After his death, the case of Anfal is automatically closed, and with it the unknown fate of thousands of Kurds.
From Iraqi Thoughts:
I am not unhappy he is dead, I am just saddened how a political party’s vendetta took a whole country’s hate for Saddam and used it to finally do what they have been hoping to do for so long.
May all those who died or have suffered under the hands of Saddam and his stooges rest in peace. Your memories sadly will be only remembered by your families and those Iraqis in the same boat as you but thanks to politics the whole world will never really understand the tyrant Saddam Hussein really was.
Kurdish Aspect simply asked “What do you think?”, here are some of the comments left on his blog:
Showan said…
I am just happy that he is dead and gone. I am just sorry they executed him so quickly. He should have been stoned to death by the survivors of Halabja
11:08 AM
Chaya said…
I didn't know that! The trial should have continued with the horrendous story of the Kurds revealed to the world!!
11:12 AM
Dr. Kamal Artin said…
It is a shame to execute somebody whose expertise was execution. The lesson for him and people like him would have been to rise above his level, to keep him alive, and to teach him and his likes to appreciate life. I am glad it was not done in the name of Kurds.
Mizgin from Rasti expresses anger at the legal effects of Saddam's death:
Of course, they aren't going to try Saddam posthumously. His execution removed him from the defendant's list in the Anfal trial. I mean, come on . . . Legitimacy!
Since the Baghdad government doctored up some “letter” to let Talabanî slip out of his presidential duties, and since it violated its own law by executing on a religious festival, then it could have doctored up something or violated its own law again by keeping Saddam alive until all the other trials were concluded . . . including the Anfal trial.
The Baghdad government is Sadrist and al-Maliki is Moqtada's man. Again, how is it that Kurdistan can remain in thrall to a government that pushed for a swift execution for Saddam's murder of 148 Shi'a, while he was still on trial for the murder of 182,000 Kurds? And while other trials, for the Marsh Arabs and the 1991 uprising, were on the horizon?
Let's face it: Kurds don't rate, especially with the Kurdish leadership, who have beat a hasty retreat instead of demanding justice for 182,000 Anfalized Kurds, their survivors, and the entire Kurdish people.
Scandalous and disgusting!
Hiwa expresses anger over the execution as it shows how weak the new state of Iraq really is.
He asked for a firesquad…instead they hang him!
I have numerously said that Iraq is an illusion and its a too old idea for the British and the US to make a country (even dictatorship) out of Iraq. They [US and UK] have not properly studied the story of Ali and Muawiya nor they had studied properly what Saddam had achieved within the 30 years of his dictatorship. They did not know these facts very well in 1920s nor they know it up until now!
Saddam was executed in revenge for the Shiites he killed from his first day in power to the day he was found by the US soldiers. The ministers were shouting “go to hell” and “long live Muhammad Baqr Assadr”. The Americans have now given the power to the Shiites to execute the man whom the world fought against in 1991 and was still worth of remaining in power.
The last word goes to Vladimir of From Holland to Kurdistan:
Recently Saddam was hanged. But why was he hanged? The Anfal trial will resume on January 8 without Saddam. But Kurds have every right to be worried….
After the hanging of Saddam, suddenly everybody was talking about Halabja and Anfal in America. But Rasti wonders why nobody cared about Kurds, when Saddam was fighting Iran…
And while the whole Arabic world is whining about America and Zionists, the poor Palestinians demonstrate in favour of Saddam Husseyn. They even carry banners of Chemical Ali, the Butcher of Kurdistan. Not only the Americans know how to pursue amoral politics, but also the Palestinians. When a Kurd showed the photo's of killed Kurds to the late Yasser Arafat, he didn't believe the Iraqi regime killed the Kurds. Some Arabs even say that the execution of Saddam shows that the Iranian Mullahs are allied with the Zionists. While the Mullahs like to use that word “Zionist” too, despite that they also oppress Arabs, Kurds, Azeri's, etc. Also the Mullahs like amoral politics.. The Iranian ambassador in Holland was talking about Israeli's killing Palestinian kids in Gaza. I was thinking about the Iranian army killing Kurdish children in peaceful demonstrations.
And why America immediately rejected the ceasefire of the militant organization PKK? Is there a conflict of interests? Why America doesn't force Turkey to accept the Kurdish people and peace? Is it because of the new weapon contracts?
Don't believe me wrong. I am not thinking in a black and white way. It's good that America finally destroyed Saddam. But they should have listened to Peter W. Galbraith during Anfal and Halabja. They should have destroyed Saddam a long time ago.
…..
Kurds should never forget their own mountains..
That is very true, and a sentiment that I got from all of the Kurdish blogs I viewed on this topic…the Kurds need to be true to themselves, and never forget.

author: Deborah Ann Dilley


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Latin America: Professor Blog Directory · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Blogfesores [ES] is a Spanish-langage directory of weblogs authored by professors. The directory is categorized by topics such as Adult Education, Classics, and Mathematics.


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Lebanon: General Strike · Global Voices
Moussa Bashir

A general strike that was called for by the opposition brought Lebanon to a standstill today.
Bloggers posted photos, video clips, analysis and updates on the strike and the activities that ensued.
MFL updates and writes about how the strike effected various places and aspects of Lebanese society.
The Opposition are differing whether this is going to be 48 hours or all week. Nevertheless, both camps proved how they are reactionary and the workers are facing each other. Today also proves that the demand on Hezbollah to disarm is not logical, rather, all parties should disarm.
Blogging the Middle East posts photos of the protests and has this to say:
Yesterday I was telling a few people how the opposition will never succeed with its pacifist attitudes and behaviour in toppling the government, and that if they want to achieve anything, they will have to shift onto a militant stance. Well, it seems they finally heard me. And about time that they did something like this.
Beirut to Beltway reports on the riots during the strike:
Hundreds of hooded men are setting fire to tires and dumpsters after filling them with fuel in Beirut and other areas. Eyewitnesses told me that they saw bulldozers assisting the protestors by shoveling dirt and dumping it on some of the roads. Trucks were also seen transporting tires and metal barriers to various points in the capital. They were not intercepted by the army or security forces.
The Lebanese army so far has been letting the protestors block the roads for a while, to then re-open them, although not in Beirut so far. This seems to be their “neutral” strategy.
Blogging Beirut posts video clips of protests in some areas he was passing by:
On my way to work, I found myself surrounded by Stone Throwers in the Hazmieh area of Beirut, Lebanon.
Roadblocks were set up with charred cars and tire ash.
On one side, a predominantly Hizballah crowd.
On the other, Hazmieh residents.
This is a Video Account of the events as they unfolded. No Comment.
From Lebanon had the following experience in the morning while going to work:
This morning when I left my house to go to work, I had to pass through burning tires and people obviously agitated throwing stones on passing cars. I had to walk because there was no public transportation. Since I work in an NGO, we can not have the senior citizens and children waiting without being welcomed and served.
Finally I arrived at work, where I still am.
And as to what may have caused this escalation of protests in Lebanon Remarkz wrote this a day before today’s strike
But whatever you say, whether somebody decides to close his shop and go down to the streets, is a matter of a thought-of decision due to a specific social and economic condition in which he’s been living in since who knows when. And this is something no one tried to understand.
And UrShalim also has this article about some of the reasons that may have added to the tensions which resulted in today’s violent protests.

author: Moussa Bashir


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Malawi: Malawian Blogger Passes Away · Global Voices
Steve Sharra

January 18th, 2007 the Malawi blogosphere was robbed of one of its prominent bloggers, Mangaliso Jere (27), whose blog, Mangaliso’s World, covered different topics of interest including information technology in Malawi. The news was broken by a Malawian blogger Austin Madinga on his blog Austin Madinga’s Big Mouth, where he announced, “Mangaliso’s world is over”:
A good friend and fellow blogger, Mangaliso Jere, left this world today in Mzuzu! I really have no words to describe this brother only that he was a cheerful lad, a hardworking techie and one who loved his motherland. Rest in Peace Dear Brother!
The news quickly spread onto Malawian listservs, including IT Malawi, where Mangaliso was a frequent contributor. According to Boster Sibande, IT Malawi contibutor, Mangaliso, emailed his colleagues on Thursday morning telling them he would report late for work, as he had a doctor’s appointment that morning. He was scheduled for surgery to remove a growth from his nose. According to Boster Sibande, quoting Mangaliso’s workmates, Mangaliso never woke up from the surgery.
A comment on his blog questions the integrity and professionalism of the doctors who operated him:
It is sad that you had to be taken out of this world exactly seven days after posting this article. Unfortunately, its not the malaria that took you per se, if it wasnt for those careless medics at mzuzu central hospital who decided to operate on your sinus and convinced you it was a minor surgery. Where on earth can opening ones nostrils be categorised as minor surgery? am not a medic but lol.. i tend to doubt the integrity and professionalism of some of our medical practitioners considering my aunt was prescribed wrong medication for a different ailment at the same hospital which also almost cost her life. But am sure God is watching over you and its a matter of time that we shall be together in the heavenly glory.
I will miss your jokes now and forever more.
May your soul rest in eternal peace my bururu!
An anonymous reader demands an explanation:
somebody at mzuzu hospital need to explain why?? what on earth the so called doctor was thinking about, Russian agent or what??
Guilty>>> you are for killing such a young man who had full of life a head of him.
My he RIP
In order to keep Mangaliso's dreams alive, a UK based blogger, Nyumbazi, has started a new blog dedicated to him, Mangaliso's World 2. Her fist post is Mangaliso Jere Eulogy:
I will start with CEREBRATING your life.
You are A Ngoni who was proud of who you are, a man who had the heart to accommodate everybody, a man who found the meaning of life at very young age, a man who found a purpose for his life, a man who realised his potential very well ahead of most the people I know, a man who loved wisdom and knowledge, a man who brought me laughter, a Manchester United Fun, a gentle man, a man who was informed about currents affairs, a man who had big dreams, a man who has gone through tough experiences in life at a very young age, a man who came out shoulders high a against all odds, you embraced the seasons of change in your life integrity beyond your age. I can go on and on.
Still in shock about his death, Nyumbazi writes:
Dear Mangaliso
Your voice still fresh in my ears when we spoke to eachother about you going for surgery.
Can't understand what went wrong during your op.
The son of a former Malawi High Court Judge and a retired Senior Matron at the Kamuzu Central Hospital, Malawi’s second largest hospital, Mangaliso started his blog in July 2005, and posted his last entry on January 14th, 2007. Mangaliso was a man of diverse interets, as evidenced in his posts. He was very proud to call himself a Malawian and an African, and wrote on topics as wide ranging as debt relief, Malawian politics, world football, and events in his work life. But his greatest passion was technology and the Internet in Malawi.
In one of his posts, he blogged about Internet café rates in Malawi, noting that the price of bandwidth in the Malawi’s northern city of Mzuzu, where he had moved just months prior, were going down.
Mangaliso worked as assistant network engineer for the Malawi Sustainable Development Network Programme (SDNP), one of Malawi’s biggest Internet service providers. Mangaliso worked in SDNP’s office in Mzuzu, Malawi’s third largest and youngest city. According to SDNP’s website, Mangaliso’s academic and professional qualifications included a Diploma in Information Technology obtained from the University of Malawi in 2001; and an ACCA Accounting Technician Diploma.
Mangaliso was experienced in user support, leased connections, wireless, mstreams data lines, and dial-up Internet services, and networks. As a student at the University of Malawi, Mangaliso was a member of the Polytechnic Student Union Council, according to Dr. Matthews Mtumbuka’s post in MalawiTalk, a Malawian email listserv. Dr. Mtumbuka served as president of the students’ union council there at the time Mangaliso was a member.
Messages have been appearing on Mangaliso’s World from friends and colleagues, expressing shock at his unexpected death, and noting that he did not even fall sick, as he had been sending routine text messages to friends only the day before. Mangaliso leaves behind a mother, a brother and two sisters, according to close family friend Bonaventure Mkandawire. One reader left this message on his blog:
Anemwechi! as we fondly used to call each other,
Exactly four days after posting this comment, you decided to answer Gods call to go and be with him, leaving behind your dream of meeting Keith Wallis.
If atleast you told me you were going for surgery in that last SMS you sent me a day just prior to thet fateful afternoon, i would have discouraged it in the strongest terms. I called too late to be told you are in a ward and that guy couldnt let me talk to you.
I really feel guilty for not having called in time to hear your plans.
God will forgive all the misdeeds am sure.
Rest In Eternal Peace captain.
He is going to be missed by not only his close family and friends, but also fellow IT specialists in Malawi, and fellow Malawian bloggers.
This is probably the second time the African blogosphere loses one of its own. Last August, Kachumbari, a Kenyan village blogger, was killed in a car accident in Nairobi, Kenya. Kachumbari started to blog in January 2006 and quickly added a rare voice in the African blogosphere, that of an African villager. According to a post in his memory on Kenya Unlimited site, his work did not go unnoticed. His blog was featured in the Daily Nation of Kenya in March, 2006 and on BBC in June, 2006:
Kachumbari joined KBW in February 2006 but his blog had been in existence for at least a month before. His entry of January 13, 2006 entitled Karibuni Shaggs (trans. Welcome to the Village) aside from giving some insight into the man behind the blog, established Kachumbari as one of the few bloggers blogging from a Kenyan village. His unique perspective did not go unnoticed and in March 2006 his blog was featured in a Daily Nation article on Kenyan Bloggers. In his inimitable style, Kachumbari cited the frequent use of newspapers ‘to wrap meat at the butchers’ and the fact that ‘some villages see only the Sunday paper, the Kiswahili one- Taifa Jumapili’ as part of the reason why it took him almost two months to obtain a copy of the article.

author: Steve Sharra


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Malaysia: Foreign Students · Global Voices
Preetam Rai

Rajan counters fellow Malaysian blogger Rauff's comments against foreign students. Rauff suggests that foreign students increase social problems and local kids would learn from them. Rajan says foreign students “add to the diversity of a university in a meaningful way“.


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Myamar: South Africa’s Support for Burmese UN Vote · Global Voices
Preetam Rai

New Mandala highlights South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu's remarks on his government's vote against the US and British backed UN Security Council resolution on Myanmar.


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Nepal: Strikes and Traffic · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Traffic comes to a sluggish halt because of a strike called in Nepal. United We Blog! on the situation and with a video. “The National Federation of Nepal Transport Entrepreneurs have called an indefinite traffic strike (chakka jam) today to protest the torching of public vehicles in Lahan on Friday (19 Jan).”


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Nepal: Tiananmen Square Being Staged in Lahan · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Madhesh.com has concerns about violence against citizens. “In Lahan, more than hundred innocent peaceful Madheshi protestors have been seriously injured from the brutal attack by government's armed forces to suppress their voices and peaceful protests.”


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Peru: The National Marinera Competition · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Alejandro of Peru Food takes a break from cuisine to focus on the upcoming National Marinera Competition In Trujillo. Included are several videos of the dance including one from Trujillo's Coliseo Gran Chimú, where the competition is held.


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Philippines: Election season begins · Global Voices
Mong Palatino

It’s already election season! Campaigning for midterm elections will begin next month. On May 14, Filipinos will vote for members of  Senate, Lower House and local government units.
The Administration hopes to keep its majority lead in the Lower House to block a possible impeachment case this year. The Opposition wants the coming elections as a referendum for the current government accused of poll fraud, corruption and human rights violations.
Disagreements over the line-up of the Opposition for the Senatorial race led to proposals to create a ‘third force’ which is neither pro-Administration nor pro-Opposition.
Our Times explains why she is against a ‘third force’ in the coming elections:
“Opposition leaders as well as re-electionist senators must rise above varying degrees of self-righteousness and agree on the more expedient and efficient route of a unified ticket. A third force, no matter what you call it, boils down to this: an unnecessary distraction.”
Iloilo City Boy is supportive of a ‘third force’:
“I believe that a “third force” ticket has never been a more attractive and viable idea, especially in the context of the malaise that is plaguing our politics today. Never before have I seen such hopelessness, pessimism and cynicism in our people – and we are supposed to be an inherently optimistic people! They are looking for other alternatives besides the current politicians who cannot seem to let go of the past and only want to prolong the acrimonious atmosphere in politics.”
Out of my Mind believes a ‘ third force’ will be a futile effort:
Under a mature democracy, a third alternative is definitely a good idea. But let’s do a quick reality check once again: The May elections are not just about the Senate and any third force needs to have effective machinery that has presence nationwide and impact on the grassroots level. And in a setup where votes can be bought, where political dynasties and patronage are a shameful reality for which politicians do not even bother making even half-hearted apologies for, a third force can be likened to the futile efforts of Don Quixote battling the windmills.
By Jove has an ‘inside story’ on the negotiations for recruiting candidates that will comprise the ‘third force’.
The Philippine experience thinks the Opposition is on the “verge of self-destruction” :
“The Opposition should get its act together to keep its overwhelming advantage. But it seems they have played into the administration's ploy. The disgraced senators who were dumped by the people before are emerging from their cocoons and raring to have another go.”
James Jimenez, a government official, has a proposal on how to deal with premature election campaigning:
“The Comelec should ask every politician who has gone on record – with the media, mostly – as intending to run should immediately take down his posters and refrain from putting up new ones until the start of the election period. I’m thinking shame campaign, or it’s slightly more politically correct cousin, a campaign of moral suasion. However, considering the need for the Comelec to remain strictly neutral, it would be exceedingly difficult to conduct such a shame campaign while maintaining the kind of objectivity we need to preserve. The solution, I think, lies with the youth and advocacy groups. After all, these pols are just courting votes. Think of it as an exercise in consumer power.”
Comelec ako is disgusted with campaign streamers disguised as greeting materials:
“Aesthetically, well, those damned things are just plain ugly to look at. I mean, I can do without having the face of some washed out politician looking down on me from every light post, thank you very much. It's my city too, you know.”
Cyberbaguioboy reports internet voting has been approved in principle. Overseas Filipino workers and migrants in Singapore will be the first to try out Internet voting.
Luis Teodoro gives a backgrounder on Philippine politics and elections:
“Philippine political parties may not have ideologies, but they do have an ideology. It’s the ideology of the wealthy and the powerful, of those who benefit the most from the way things are. There’s no talk of ideologies or programs among the mainstream parties and during Philippine elections because the ideology pro status quo is taken for granted. Those who don’t agree with that ideology can count on the police and the military to bash their heads in, file sedition charges against them, look the other way when they’re assassinated–or even encourage, abet, fund and carry out their elimination. All in the name of democracy, of course, a concept about which the political class and its minions haven’t the foggiest, but to which they constantly refer after the usual paeans to God and Country.”
Election laws, resolutions and orders promulgated by the Commission on Elections, as well as voters’ list and precint location are uploaded in Inside the Comelec.
Philippine Eleksiyon 2007 monitors updates in elections plus some information on candidates. Manuel L. Quezon III gives a daily round-up of the most important election news.

author: Mong Palatino


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Russia: Conversation With Litvinenko’s Widow, Part 4 · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

David McDuff of A Step At A Time translates the fourth installment of a Russian-language interview with Aleksandr Litvinenko's widow Marina.


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Russia, Estonia: Advice to Teens · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

Itching for Eestimaa has some advice for the Russian youth: “I guess every country needs its enemies. But the idea of tiny Estonia being enemy enough to evoke ire among Russian teenagers is cause for concern. Haven't they got better things to do? Discoteques to attend? Ladies to romance? Careers to pursue? Guys, take it from me. Get a life.”


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Russia: Krasnaya Polyana Ski Resort · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

Sochi Travel blog writes on the quite dysfunctional Krasnaya Polyana skiing resort.


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Russia: TP Ads · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

Russian Marketing Blog links to an eye-catching toilet paper ad campaign: “Toilet paper production is not only trade but also art.”


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South Korea: teachers arrested for mind crime · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

Two Korean middle school teachers have been arrested since 18 of Jan for quoting North Korea's view on the nuclear test. interlocals.net has some background about the issue.


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Sri Lanka: Art and the Tamil Tiger · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Biting sarcasm at ravana, as contribution of Tamil Tigers to art is discussed. “The head of HR confirmed that for functional artisans and pure artists alike, immediate post mortem appreciation is guaranteed with the LTTE’s rewarding martyrdom retirement plan.”


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Sri Lanka: Peacemaking and Religion · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Infoshare Research Unit points to a research titled “Religious Contributions to Peace Building”.  “The report expresses both the difficulties and the successes of religious peacemaking, and show that properly conducted religious efforts can bear much fruit.”


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Tajikistan: Glimpse of a Wedding · Global Voices
Nathan Hamm

Gulru offers a glimpse of a Tajik wedding at neweurasia.


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Trinidad & Tobago: Will Elton John be safe? · Global Voices
Georgia Popplewell

Jessica is certain that the early January assault on a Dutch model during a photo shoot in rural Trinidad was “a homophobic attack by a group of ignorant ruff necks who saw a ‘pretty’ foreigner and his artsy entourage and fell into a fit of dance-hall fueled, ‘chi-chi man’ fury,” which leads her to wonder whether flamboyant pop star Elton John, who is scheduled to appear at a music festival in Tobago later this year, will be safe from harassment during his visit.


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Ukraine: Solotvyno Salt Mine · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

Ukraine List writes about the Solotvyno Salt Mine, located near the Romanian border, home to the deepest speleotherapy facility in the world: “Speleotherapy in Solotvyno essentially uses the micro-climates in the underground salt mines to treat respiratory and lung ailments. […] Anywhere from three to five thousand people are treated every year at the facility, and there is often a waiting list to get treatment.”


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Yazan: Arabs have an Identity Crisis · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

Syrian blogger Yazan thinks Arabs suffer from an identity crisis dictated by a ‘superior’ past which is crushed by an ‘inferior’ present.
“A superiority, that soon begins a never-ending fight with another complex. A complex of inferiority, towards a winner West a brutally developed and civilized West,” he explains.


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Arabisc: Hijab-clad Doll Under Fire in Tunisia  · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

This is Fulla, the Hijab-clad Arab Muslim adaptation of the decadent West's Barbie doll.
Our Barbie wears the Hijab (head scarf) and Islamic attire – a long dress with long sleeves. While she is a blessing to many parents in the Muslim world who are happy to see their children playing with a doll which conforms to social traditions and religious obligations, Egyptian blogger Ahmed Shokeir registers his disgust against Tunisian authorities who aren't happy with the doll and are conducting a witch hunt and confiscating it from stores.
Still in Egypt, but on a more contemporary note, blogger Kareem Nabeel Suleiman was back in court today (Thursday, January 25), where the judge refused to release him on bail.
Suleiman, 22, was arrested in November for articles he wrote online, and is being charged with a list of allegations – which extend from writing blasphemous articles against Islam to defaming the President of Egypt.
Fellow blogger Wa7da Masrya was at court and describes to us what happened. Along with his lawyers, journalists and other bloggers, Wa7da Masrya  arrived in court at 9am.
The trial, said Wa7da Masrya, started at noon.
Away from Egypt and its ‘issues’, Abu Dhabi-based Ben Kerishan has decided to take a short winter break to Beirut, Lebanon, with a friend.
With alcohol consumption being a top No-No in Islam, Bin Kerishan's first challenge is to be able to consume it on the flight despite the presence of his friend's relative on board.
To conceal the alcohol, Bin Kerishan orders a Buck's Fizz (a champagne-orange juice mixture).
Although they had a full plan to make the most of their short break, drinking, gambling and dining, they seem to have forgotten that Lebanon was facing a stand off between the government and opposition.
Our final stop is in Yemen, where Thamud  thinks he was ripped off after spending $150 to learn how to drive at the state-run driving school.


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Armenia: Bangladesh · Global Voices
Nathan Hamm

Tirami Su explains how Yerevan ended up with a neighborhood called Bangladesh.


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Armenia: Reconciliation · Global Voices
Nathan Hamm

Zarchka writes about the astonishment and admiration in Armenia prompted by the number of Turks who came out to mourn Hrant Dink. She hopes that Dink's final legacy will be reconciliation between Turks and Armenians.


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Bahrain: Authorities Looking for Asian Aids Victim · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

Bahrain's top CID chief Farooq Al Maawda issued a warning against an Asian woman thought to be inflicted with Aids who may have sneaked back into the kingdom, wrote Mahmood Al Yousif.
In a racial slur, the CID official said it was be difficult to find the woman as “people of this nationality all look approximately the same!”


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Bahrain: Being Update Man is Not Fun · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

Bahraini Rants was appointed official Update Man  for a day – while his friend's wife was in labour. He was charged with updating colleages and friends with the birth progress, which lasted about 12 hours.


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Bangladesh: The Bubble · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Salam Dhaka on the gaps observed in Bangladesh. “There is a huge gap between what the political circles, elites and “intellectuals” want to talk about and what the middle and lower middle class care about. If you talk to people in the lower middle class then the disconnect gets worse.”


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Bangladesh: ULFA and Assam · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

A separatist armed outfit in India causes trouble for Bangladesh. Rezwan on how the government needs to make it's position clear. “With their involvement in the terrorist attacks in Bangladesh or the killing of the poor Biharis in Assam, ULFA is proving that they are just a mercenary group quite deviated from their agenda of liberating Assam.”


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Barbados: Calypso for Desmond Haynes · Global Voices
Georgia Popplewell

Robert Frische at Cricketwukup.com remembers a calypso written by a Barbadian singer in honour of great West Indies cricketer Desmond Haynes, who, near the end of his career, was both passed up for the captaincy and dropped from the team. You can hear the song as well — an MP3 is attached to the post.


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Belize: “Third parties” emerge · Global Voices
Georgia Popplewell

Melody at the Belize News Blog encourages readers to download the latest issue of the recently launched Belize Independent Newspaper, which is devoted to the emergence of new political parties in Belize and the challenge they represent for the two-party status quo.


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Bolivia: 1/11: An Eyewitness Account · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Jim Shultz on the violent protests that broke out in Cochabamba two weeks ago: “Since then I have also spoken to a half dozen people who were eyewitnesses to those events. One of those accounts, from a non-participant, Jonas Brown, a US citizen who lives in the exact spot where the fighting began, stands out. I asked him to write it up for our readers and he agreed to do so. I post it here, unedited. I think it is an important contribution to the record of what happened here two weeks ago today.”


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Cambodia: Paying Fair Wages  · Global Voices
Preetam Rai

Diana at Cambodia Calling compares her life in her former home Singapore to her current home Cambodia. The blogger also describes why her company, a garment manufacturing unit, believes in paying fare wages to the workers.

author: Preetam Rai


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Central Asia: European Policy · Global Voices
Nathan Hamm

Registan.net writes about German proposals for a new European Union policy on Central Asia, and neweurasia responds, wondering why we don't hear more on Europe's efforts to renew ties with the region.


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Chilean Senator Explores World of Warcraft: Scholastic Team Building or Time Wasting? · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Online, multi-player games like Second Life and World of Warcraft have attracted some authentic popularity in the form of subscription-paying registered users and a disproportionate amount of hype from techno-utopian bloggers, the-next-big-thing media futurists, and sociology professors turned computer geeks. So much hype as a matter of fact that New York University Professor Clay Shirky has frequently questioned the real number of returning visitors to Second Life as well as its potential as an influential communal space and educational tool as the Internet grows up.
While some university professors, like Harvard Law School's Charlie Nesson, have been exploring the potential of multi-player online games within the academic setting, other big name bloggers like Joi Ito, Cory Doctorow, and Global Voices co-founder Ethan Zuckerman have been critical of the proprietary nature of how content is stored in the games.
While the pros and cons of multi-player games continue to be debated by cutting edge commentators, a well known Chilean author, blogger, and senator has expressed [ES] his interest in establishing a “guild” within World of Warcraft composed of multidisciplinary users from around the world.
Among North American internet aficionados, Fernando Flores might be best known for his book Disclosing New Worlds: Entrepreneurship, Democratic Action and the Cultivation of Solidarity, a passage of which became the “corporate philosophy” of Ludicorp, the original creators of Flickr before it was sold to Yahoo!. But for Chileans, Flores is a political legend whose own life mirrors the trials, tribulations, and resilience of their country. He was Finance Minister under the leftist administration of Salvador Allende, political prisoner during the Pinochet dictatorship, Silicon Valley entrepreneur in exile, and now once again a politician based in Santiago who was most recently lauded for withdrawing from the scandal-ridden Party for Democracy. You can learn more about the Senator/Blogger in Rosario Lizana's two part interview featured here on Global Voices. For now, I leave you with Senator Flores’ post and proposal regarding World of Warcraft:
In the last few weeks I have been playing World of Warcraft, one of the most popular online multiplayer games (along with Second life which we have already mentioned [ES] on this blog) on the Net.
“World of Warcraft” is a creation of the North American company Blizzard, which belongs to Universal Vivendi and last week announced that this game has already surpassed eight million registered users (paying subscription) throughout the world but mostly in the United States, Asia, and Europe.
The purpose of the game is to adopt the role of a virtual personage who must interact with other personages (players) and situations in a fantasy world. And the idea is that we will develop the personage that we adopted according to our tastes.
[Players] can belong to one of the two factions by which the game is divided. One is The Alliance, where a “race” must be chosen (Elf, Dwarf, Gnome, or Human). And the other faction is The Horde, where the races to choose from are Tauren, Undead, Orc, or Troll. Later, one must choose the gender that the personage will have and the class it will belong to, while also specifying other characteristics like skin color, hair style, face structure, and finally, choosing his or her name.
Then, with these previous steps complete, we are inside and we can begin to play. The purpose is to ascend levels, passing through different zones with their respective challenges that gradually increase in difficulty. An inexperienced player begins at level 1, which means a long path ahead if she wants to surpass the barrier of level 60. With the pace in which she advances, the completed missions provide not only experience, but also objects to survive (weapons, food, etc.), so that the greater our level, the more difficult it is to skip to the next one.
Furthermore, in this game it is possible to train and specialize in certain tasks, first learning a talent and then a skill. In this way it is possible to advance more efficiently.
However, one of the most attractive aspects of World of Warcraft is that it offers the option of facing challenges in a group along with other players who are playing simultaneously, especially for those missions with a greater difficulty.
This aspect is important because it builds team participation so that a diverse but cohesive group can be very useful. Imagine working together on challenges with different classes, each one with its characteristics, but all working together since the deficiencies of some classes can be the strengths of others and vice-versa.
This is how the game invites us to cross its geography and look for other players to form a group, thus creating a “list of contacts.” Within the game you can chat internally and even converse with audio.
As you can see, World of Warcraft offers us an ample range of content, where playing is equivalent to learning, socializing, and managing.
For that reason, and to further explore this area, I am thinking of forming a multidisciplinary group with people from several countries to participate collectively in the game as a laboratory in which we can analyze certain type of life scenarios.
If somebody is interested in this game, I await your comments.
For now, I request your patience because I will pick up this project again in March.
What do you think? Is World of Warcraft a viable way to make learning fun again? Would it promote team-building and cooperation in schools or merely subject students to violence and an unhealthy spirit of competition. Should Senator Flores choose World of Warcraft, which charges its users, or a lesser developed, but free and open-source alternative like OpenCroquet? Here's your chance to influence the thinking of an individual with the political capital to make things happen.


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China: Danwei and private life · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

Recently a policewoman in Xian was forced to resign because the police unit (Danwei) found out that she had practiced sexual partner exchange activities. Li Yin-he criticizes that Danwei shouldn't interfere into a person's private life (zh).


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China: slogan banners · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

Joel Martinsen from DANWEI blogs about the political culture of slogan banners in China.


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Elections in Serbia · Global Voices
Ljubisa Bojic

The first preliminary results of the Serbian parliamentary poll arrived less than an hour after the ballots closed at 20:00 on January 21. Some started celebration while members of the parties that got less than the required 5 percent of the votes burst into despair. The Democratic Party (whose slogan is “Because life can’t wait”) lost in its stronghold, the capital city of Belgrade. The Serbian Radical Party (“50% + your vote”) didn’t win more than 50 percent of the vote, which would have enabled them to rule the country. The ruling coalition led by prime minister Vojislav Kostunica (and inspired by the slogan “Long live Serbia”) won fewer votes than in the previous election.
Jelica Grgenovic calls in with the first preliminary results during the election night (SRP):
[…] Here you are, Cesid has announced [the first results at] 21:55. Still, votes in major cities have to be counted, which could improve the results of [self-proclaimed] democratic parties. But at the end, it will not have a major impact on the overall result. [60 percent of the votes have been counted], the result would be as follows: SRS (28,5%), DS (22,9%), DSS (17%), G17+ (6,5%), SPS (6,1%) and the coalition gathered around LDP (5,0%) […].
Dule Nedeljkovic sparks up a dilemma. Will the current PM and the president agree about the Prime Minister position? He states (SRP):
[…] I foresee new elections. There is no chance to have [Vojislav] Kostunica and [Boris] Tadic agree about PM position. That is at least what I think. […]
Aleksandra Mitrovic replies:
I can’t really understand how they are not ashamed to organize elections over and over again, to spend enormous amounts of money, especially when we have the same people with identical stories. They all rotate political functions, outcome doesn’t change. It would be interesting to check how expensive every election campaign has been. I would sum up the money. One could realize it would be better to spend that money on pensions, improvement of social care and other necessary things… it is sad to hear about all the wasted money. The majority of my friends from Serbia hope I will change my mind and get beck to my home country …but… I would not like to be ruled by these creatures. I can’t see any reason for celebration… […]
Manitu adds:
[…] of course – the same crew will stay on the scene! It was the same since [1992], with small variations – when somebody dies – or when somebody steps in by purchasing votes. Same faces, same capacity, well-known ranges, modest references. That is problem. The voters and citizens are just for decor's sake. Politics is a bureau for unemployed, an asset for quasi-privatization, and different lucrative acts. […]
Jelena Krajsic hopes the aliens would arrive soon (SRP):
For a long time and especially since the preliminary poll results, I am waiting for the aliens from planet Volcanoes. It would make us, people from the earth, finally united. I hope our visitors would want to share their technological achievements with us. I expect Phoenix to fly before Serbia becomes member of the EU. My other expectation is to have Enterprise boldly, take the crew where no man has gone before just after that. Stephen Hawking stated in December for BBC radio that we would have to populate planets within other solar systems, “traveling there using Star Trek-style propulsion, or face extinction.” This all is required not because bad moves of some governments but because we will be torn apart by meteor/asteroid/comet/some whatever rock or be swallowed by black hole. Still, moves made by some governments could trigger some dangerous events for all humans such are nuclear wars, viruses or global warming. That is why we have to think about the words of the British cosmologists. I think about his statement not because all of these reasons but because of the election results in my problematic country. […] If nothing else, I suggest we all join and become candidates for the next elections.
Branislav Kovacevic Cole was a candidate of the Liberal Democratic Party for the Serbian parliament. He is a bit disappointed with the election results, as there are small chances something will change (SRP):
Fears of the democratic Serbia of having a “status quo” are more or less a reality, our expectations are confirmed… National block, whatever this means, has a strong position, I would say century-strong, within the majority of Serbian population. On the other hand, reformists, and the ones who want to modernize Serbia, are marginalized and considered obsolete.
There are numerous reasons that would explain the stage of the current spirit [of the nation]. Europe and the world will say that the situation in Serbia is improving, that the election got through with not so many irregularities, that the media were more or less just towards all the parties, especially when compared with what we had during the [Slobodan] Milosevic era. [Vojislav] Kostunica lost some support of voters, but he retained power, [Boris] Tadic received more votes compared to the last election, but he didn’t get the power… I assume, the following days or months will be marked by bargaining [negotiations] of [Vojislav Kostunica and Boris Tadic] followed by enormous pressure by the international community to make them agree [about the new government] and escape the new election situation. [Vojislav] Kostunica will back off where he has to, he will give everything for the PM chair, he might [even] sacrifice [justice minister] […] and some other [high-profile ministers] but he will keep [Velimir Ilic and Dragan Jocic]. [Boris] Tadic would have to agree to get [his man] as minister of defense, while [Mladjan] Dinkic of G-17+ and [Bozidar Djelic of DS will bargain about the ministry of finance and the Central Bank. [Liberal Democratic Party] will be the radical opposition. The first challenge this government will have to face would be adopting the new budget, which would make [a hard start], considering additional Kosovo [and Metohia] and human resources issues. […]
James Lyon looks at the Serbian politics from a distance. His point of view enables him to see how things really stand:
[…] The Serbian election result is anything but clear. There is a significant chance that a government may not be formed within the 90-day statutory limit, thereby triggering new elections. If a government is formed it may be a minority government with a Premier from the DS (possibly Djelic) in coalition with G17+ and LDP, with support from DSS. It appears that Kostunica will participate in a majority government with DS only if he is named Premier, and then only without the participation of the LDP. It is quite probable that the minority parties will go into coalition with whoever forms a government. At present the parties are just beginning to assess their initial positions and post-election results and rumours are running rampant. One important point of interest: for the first time ever the DS did poorly in their traditional stronghold of Belgrade, with more people voting for the Radicals than for the DS. Does anyone in the DS realise how serious this is?
[…] There is strong international pressure on the parties to form a government, which is resulting in an awkward Catch 22. The International Community (IC) wants Serbia to form a government so that the IC can move forward with Kosovo status, while the Serbian parties want the IC to move forward with Kosovo status so that they can form a government.
[…] The term “democratic” block is a misnomer and creates an inaccurate representation of political life, as all the parties are “democratic” to one degree or another. There are in fact two blocks in Serbian politics. The first is comprised of pro-western parties that favour liberal democracy. The second is anti-western parties that favour a paternalistic authoritarian Russian-style of “democracy”. The first block is comprised of DS, G17+ and LDP. The second block is made up of DSS, SRS and SPS.
[…] Many people ask what the difference is between the DSS and the SRS. As nearly as I can tell, the only significant ideological difference is that while the SRS still claims Croatia and Bosnia for a Greater Serbia, the DSS wants only Bosnia and has dropped Croatia from the list. In all other respects they appear to be ideologically and philosophically identical. It seems that there are only two reasons that they are not joined together as one party. First is Seselj’s personality. Second is snobbishness: the SRS is comprised primarily of the lumpenproletariat and refugees, while the DSS is primarily pseudo-intellectuals and middle class. Although both think alike, they wouldn’t be caught dead at the same parties or slavas. In other words, the main difference between the SRS and the DSS is one of social class distinction. […]
In his blog, Chris Farmer architects a new ruling system for Serbia:
[…] we also have to make up a whole bunch of new ministries to employ all the different ministerial candidates from all three parties of all three PMs. The usual ministries can be assigned on the basis of a Lucky Draw and the rest can choose from a list of new ministries: Ministry of Fiction, Ministry of Unusual Occurrences, Ministry of Obstruction, Ministry of Branding, Ministry of Potato Pie and Sarma, and a few other HUGELY important ministries that we have been missing all these years. I for one would like to nominate myself for Minister of Parking – about which I have a few things to say.
Once all this is done – and I am shooting for Wednesday afternoon at 15.30 – life can get back to normal here in Serbia and in the White City.
When Carla [Del Ponte] comes to call, asking about [Ratko] Mladic, the Three Prime Ministers will give her three prime answers. When foreign dignitaries fly in for a visit, they will get THREE ceremonial lunches and go home drunker than they have ever been before. And when the International Donors show up, they will be treated to a chorus of, “Yes, we have no bananas!” from all three. No one who visits Serbia from abroad will go away disappointed as someone will always tell him what he wants to hear.
As an alternative, and as a way to keep us free of further bothering with elections for the foreseeable future, we could propose a government with 20 Prime Ministers. But that might be stretching the point a little…

author: Ljubisa Bojic


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Former Soviet Union: Cockroaches and Living Conditions · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

Russian Marketing Blog writes about cockroaches and life in the former Soviet Union: “I don’t know if there’s any other country outside the Soviet block where doctors, drunks and mad babushkas live side by side.”


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Guatemala: Video Shows Natural Beauty · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Engasado, in a post titled “Guatemala, soul of the earth”, posts a video of the country's many attractions.


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Honduras: It’s a contest! · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Head over to La Gringa's Blogicito guess what she has posted a photo of, and win something nice.


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India: Cricket Advert Gone Bad · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

The advertisements for the India-West Indies cricket series don't quite do the trick. Almost As Good As Chocolate on all that is wrong with the advert. “At worst, these ads are racist. At best, they shout out a message that Indians are not hospitable and treat our guests terribly.”

author: Neha Viswanathan


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India, Latin America: Bangalore, a Role Model? · Global Voices
David Sasaki

Kamla Bhatt, a resident of Bangalore herself, is intrigued by an argument set forth by Miami Herald columnist Andres Oppenheimer who calls the Indian tech metropolis a “role model for Latin America.” Boli-Nica, who usually writes in English, this time addressed [ES] his Spanish-speaking readers with a comparison of Oppenheimer's pro-market stance and Hugo Chavez's recent rhetoric in favor of nationalization.


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India: Mylapore Festival 2007 · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

Metroblogging Chennai has notes from Mylapore Festival 2007. “Outside, once you cross the archway that proclaims the Mylapore Festival, the city follows the usual Mylapore routine: rickshaw and cycles tinkle along the roads pedestrians squeeze by after office hours and harried home-makers and office-goers alike stop by the pavement to stock on their quota of vegetables.”


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Iran:Iranian Journalist and Dissident Akbar Ganji   · Global Voices
Fred Petrossian

Nikahang writes that Akbar Ganji, journalist and dissident,Thursday, will accept the prestigious International Press Freedom award from Canadian Journalists for Free Expression (CJFE) awarded to him in 2000.He could not take award sooner because he was in prison.


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Jordan: Segregated Weddings · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

Jordanian blogger Khalidah Mufleh is just back from a segregated wedding in Jordan, where the women and men attend separate parties.
“I am against these kinds of parties because chaos conquers in them. I believe that it is tidier and classier for the whole family to be seated on the table rather than the man sitting in a room and the woman and kids in a different one,” she writes.

author: Amira Al Hussaini


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Kenya: an update from the World Social Forum · Global Voices
Ndesanjo Macha

An update from the World Social Forum, “Sometimes a little action can go a long away. The youth groups’ protest to the WSF Organising Committee has generated a positive change in policy. Yesterday, the gates were open to Kenyans for free. As the word had not spread not too many people took advantage of the offer. However the youth groups came with their members/friends/neighbours and all got in for free.”

author: Ndesanjo Macha


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Kenya: challenges of being young entrepreneur · Global Voices
Ndesanjo Macha

An interview on Kenyan Pundit highlighting the challenges of being a young entrepreneur in Kenya.


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Kenya: conscious music from the slums · Global Voices
Ndesanjo Macha

From Pambazuka News at the World Social Forum, “As part of our special reports from the World Social Forum, conscious musicians Hope Raisers speak to Robtel Pailey from Pambazuka News about their music, justice and the obstacles they face being political artists living in the slums of Nairobi.”


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Laos: Revisiting Laotian Modern History · Global Voices
Preetam Rai

The New Mandala links to a story from from the Boston Phoenix about the conflict in Lao between the US backed Lao Army forces and North Vietnamese backed Phathet Lao. The story was first published in 1972 and features a Lao Army officer talking about the lack of morale in the army to fight fellow Laotians.


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Latvia: Border Dispute · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

Marginalia writes about Latvia's border dispute with Russia and about “putting things in order”: “When a state “puts things in order,” it has a sad tendency to forget real people and real places, methinks.”

author: Veronica Khokhlova


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Lebanon At the Brink of a Civil War  · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

Lebanon is at the brink of a civil war, writes Jordanian blogger Tololy.
To add insult to injury, she adds: “There is occupation and civil war in Iraq, occupation and apartheid in Palestine, internal turmoil in Egypt, war in Somalia, multiple problems in Jordan, backwardness in Saudi Arabia, armed division in Sudan, separatism in Algeria, estrangement in Morocco and Tunisia, painful neutrality in the United Arab Emirates and other Gulf states, and now — what seems to be a hideous incarnation of civil war in Lebanon.”


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Madagascar: WordPress in Malagasy · Global Voices
Alice Backer

Says L'Odyssee de Tattum (Fr): “Our national webmaster, Hery, has struck again! And it's all for the better! He redid and finalized the WordPress in Malagasy project begun by [blogger] Many to come up with: Blaogy.org, a new blogging platform powered by WordPress.”


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Malaysia: Helping Flood Victims · Global Voices
Preetam Rai

Kenny Sia is asking his readers to assist in the flood relief efforts in Southern Malaysia. “Getting hit by the flood is bad, but getting hit by the flood twice in a week is even more suay. While we're wondering where to go for a night out drinking, those kids affected by the flood are wondering how they're gonna even go to school when all their belongings are washed away.”


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Malaysia: Prime Minister Comments on Blogger’s Responsibilities · Global Voices
Preetam Rai

Unspun posts a part of Malaysian prime minister Abdullah Badawi's recent speech where the prime minister stressed that the bloggers are subject to the laws of the country.


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Nigeria: Nigeria’s top models · Global Voices
Ndesanjo Macha

Bella Naija blogs about Nigeria's top models, “Years after veterans like Linda Ikeji and Uri Jones paved the way, the modelling industry in Nigeria is booming. Yes, there are Nigerian models repping us in South Africa, Europe and New York but there are some top notch Nigerian models who are choosing to stay in Nigeria and are enjoying lucrative careers. With companies like MTN and Celtel willing to pay top-dollar (or should I say top-naira) to models who feature in their advertising campaigns. I am sure this is enough motivation to keep these models in Nigeria.”


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Pakistan: A Nobel for Edhi · Global Voices
Neha Viswanathan

All Things Pakistan hopes that Edhi gets a Nobel Prize and urges his readers to contribute to an ongoing initiative. “Irrespective of whether Abdul Sattar Edhi is a Pakistani or not, irrespective of how much most Pakistanis hold his selfless zeal in reverence – and irrespective also of all the ways in which a few have tried to malign him – I believe that Abdul Sattar Edhi deserves a Nobel Peace Prize. I need your help in putting together a nominations package.”


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Poland: HIV and Politics · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

The beatroot writes about the politics surrounding the case of the African refugee infecting women with HIV: “This time it's not AIDS and gays, however, it’s AIDS and Africans.”


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Poland: The Pope’s Miracles and Retirement · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

The beatroot writes on John Paul II, retirement and miracles.


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Puerto Rico: Two poems · Global Voices
Georgia Popplewell

Puerto Rican writer Elidio La Torre-Lagares posts two interesting poems in English.


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Russia: Conversation With Litvinenko’s Widow, Part 5 · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

David McDuff of A Step At A Time translates the fifth installment of the Russian-language interview with Aleksandr Litvinenko’s widow Marina.


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Russia: Driving in Moscow · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

Russia Blog writes about the new law banning migalki and posts pictures taken in Moscow during a recent visit.


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Russia: Images from Siberia and Vladimir · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

From Russia With Blog posts image videos from Siberia and Vladimir.


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Russia: “Kremlin, Inc.” · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

Robert Amsterdam scans and posts a 14-page New Yorker article on Russia, which is not yet available online (“Kremlin, Inc.: Why are Vladimir Putin's Opponents Dying“).


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Russia: More on Being in Russia for Too Long · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

Ruminations on Russia contributes to the 42 “you know when you've been in Russia too long when.”


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Russia: Vladivostok and Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

White Sun of the Desert offers a Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk perspective on the city of Vladivostok.


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Senegal: Flooded by Chinese Products · Global Voices
Alice Backer

Blog Politique du Senegal is worried (Fr)about imports from China “flooding” local markets: “China has extremely low production costs … By opening its doors wide to Chinese products, Senegal is preventing itself from developing a national production. Meanwhile, the country's industrialization is the only means of providing work to thousands of under- or unemployed youth.”


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South Africa: future of online media industry · Global Voices
Ndesanjo Macha

This is probably the beginning of the future of online media industry in Africa, “Since December I have been in the trenches at the Mail & Guardian Online, looking for new ways to leverage the huge audience and vast amounts of content that the site has. My goal is simple: forge something spectacular for the end-user and then hand it over to our business team for monetization.”


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South Asia: Human rights, blogosphere, traditions, democracy, discrimination, travel and festivals · Global Voices
Rezwan

Picks from different blogs from the following South Asian Countries:
Bangladesh:
After 5 years detention in Guantanamo, one Bangladeshi (Mobarak) was recently released by the US authorities. However he was arrested again by Bangladesh Airport police for interrogation as soon as he arrived in Dhaka. Naeem of Drishtipat blog is surprised by silence of the Bangladeshi bloggers about Mobarak's case. He asks:
Are we silent because he is religious, trained at a madrassa, therefore falls outside our human rights box? Is it because we are afraid to take on cases that confront US foreign policy?
Angelmorn informs about “the Dhaka project” a wonderful initiative taken by an airhostess of the Emirates Airlines to help the under privileged in Dhaka.
Ershad Ahmed writes on the intriguing traditions and cultures of Henna/Mehendi and its importance in the Indian sub-continent.
Mezba coins a Desi Marriage FAQ For Dummies.
Bhutan:
Diva of the Kuzu-Bhutan Weblog describes how Bhutan is dancing on its way to democracy.
Pedup is not happy with the recent bans imposed by the Bhutanese Kingdom and asks are there more?
India:
Dina Mehta shares the discriminations faced during buying a property in Mumbai.
Jabberwock writes on the Jaipur Literature Festival 2007.
Mridula of Travel Tales from India has found the  World's Highest ATM machine at Thegu (Sikkim, India).
Sujatha Bagal has some tips for traveling with children.
Nepal:
Neppal provides a perspective on the bloggers and blogosphere in Nepal.
Sara Isman of Nepali Experiences shares her experience of a visit to a Nepali prison.
Pakistan:
Ayesha of Red white and Black blog discusses Pakistan premiere Musharraf's proposal for the Kashmir.
Bilal Zuberi of All Things Pakistan shares his thoughts on the possibility of promoting the low cost Bicycle Ambulance in the remote areas of Pakistan.
Sri Lanka:
Manshark describes her accounts of one day at the Galle Literary Festival.
Dimithri Perera discusses his view of sex in Sri Lanka.

author: Rezwan


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The Arabist: Saudi Arabia Persecuting Ahmadis · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

The Arabist reported today a Human Rights Watch plea to the Saudi monarch urging him to stop presecuting Ahmadis. According to the letter, “Saudi Arabia has so far arrested 56 non-Saudi followers of the Ahmadi faith, including infants and young children, and deported at least 8 to India and Pakistan.”


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The Iranian Nuclear Crisis · Global Voices
Fred Petrossian

The United Nations Security Council unanimously voted to impose sanctions against Iran over its failure to halt its uranium enrichment programme on December 23, 2006.
Despite the gravity of the situation, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad described the UN’s decision as unimportant and vowed to continue uranium enrichment.
As a result, tension between the US and Iran is growing and many people are worried about another war in the Middle East. Iranian bloggers have discussed this issue and share their growing concern over the future of their country.
In Forever Under Construction,we learn aboout an anti-war campaign: Enough fear.This campaign begins with individuals willing to stand up and say no. This website will collect and display photos of people from the US, Iran and other countries holding up a hand in the universal symbol for “stop!”
In his blog, Robo wrote:“I’m worried these days. You are too. These days we’re all too worried and distracted to focus on our daily affairs.
I’m only a simple florist without the means to weather the hardships of war. I haven’t forgotten my childhood spent in ‘potato years’ – my word for the 80’s. I can’t bear the loss of my friends and countrymen. I am against the war. I don’t want a heavy conscious when I die.”
Pouya [Fa] says US Foreign Secretary Condoleeza Rice's trip to Middle East was successful enough to unite small and large Arab countries against Iran. The blogger says when the US was in Middle East, Iranian President took a useless trip to Latin America. The blogger adds Iranian people are confused about the current situation.
According to Pouya
on one side their instinct tell them that all these warship and military prepration in the Persian Gulf cannot only be a  game and other side the Iranian regime makes propaganda that it is all a game…Maybe the regime welcomes a limited war to fortify ther position inside and outside country….a few billions of damage due to bombings would be covered by selling oil.
Haji Washington [Fa] says Iran should not be afraid of the US as Arab countries in the Persian Gulf are the bigger threat.The blogger adds there is an international coalition against Iran and western banks are pressing sanctions while Japan is reducing its economic activities.
Ali Mazroi [Fa], a reformist politician, talks about Iran's miscalculation in handling its nuclear crisis. He says the US was not in a rush to send the Iranian nuclear case to the Security Council. According to the blogger, the US convinced all countries that the only solution for the Iranian nuclear crisis was the Security Council.
Ali Mazroi says,as a citizen:
I am worried to see that the governing institutions in Iran are pushing the country and Islamic Republic into an endless hole.
View from Iran  writes with sarcasm about a conversation between friends about the coming war: “I sure hope Iran doesn’t use any Shahab missiles. If they do, it will be the start of WW 3, a friend says. Why do you think that? They’ll hit everything but their intended target. A missile aimed at Israel will hit Saudi Arabia or Russia or some other country. Everyone laughs. Everyone goes about their daily business: hoarding saffron and tuna fish.”
Mohammad Ali Abtahi, a reformist politician and blogger, says former presidents Khatami and Rafsanjani as well as Karoubi, the former Iranian Parliament Speaker, have organised several meetings with former heads of states and foreign affairs officials to discuss these very dangerous circumstances.
Abthai reports that according to Mr Sadr, a former vice foreign affairs minister, Iran cannot count on Syria because when they feel they are in danger they will make a deal with US. He adds that it is the first time there are international sanctions imposed against Iran.


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Trinidad & Tobago: National shutdown organiser arrested · Global Voices
Georgia Popplewell

Attillah Springer confesses to a sense of unease as the organiser of today's national shutdown in Trinidad and Tobago is charged under the country's anti-terrorism act.


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Trinidad & Tobago: National shutdown · Global Voices
Georgia Popplewell

Taran Rampersad, Roslyn and Hassan Voyeau weigh in on the national shutdown which is supposed to be taking place in Trinidad and Tobago today. Taran has also posted a photo of the promotional flyer on Flickr.


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Turkmenistan: Party Time · Global Voices
Nathan Hamm

At neweurasia, Peter says that Turkmenistan's acting president is continuing to push liberalizing reforms.

author: Nathan Hamm


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Uganda: the importance of blogging in Africa · Global Voices
Ndesanjo Macha

Jackfruity writes about the importance of blogging in Africa, “My thoughts on the impact of blogging in Africa? Many of the blogs that do exist are shaping the way people think and contributing to major debates in their countries — just look at Sub-Saharan African Roundtable or Weichegud. The reason blogging isn't as popular as it is in North America is simple — in a country where fewer than 2% of the population has access to internet and only 70% is literate, creating and sustaining a thriving blogosphere is difficult.”