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Mexico Takes a Leading Role in the Oscars (Again!) · Global Voices
J. Tadeo

Guillermo del Toro during the 2013 WonderCon in Anaheim, California. Photograph by Flickr user Gage Skidmore. CC BY-SA 2.0
Once again, the US-based Academy Awards will have a Mexican among its list of most important nominees. This time, it is Guillermo del Toro, writer and director of feature film “The Shape of Water,” which tells the story of a janitor and her relationship with an amphibious creature in a 1960s government laboratory.
The movie has won him 13 Oscar nominations, which year after year the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences presents to the best of the film industry. Mexican movie news site Cinepremiere offered some context:
La forma del agua, la galardonada película de Guillermo del Toro se convirtió en la cinta más nominada de la entrega número 90 de los Premios Oscar. Luego del exitoso viaje que esta historia de amor ha tenido desde Venecia –donde el cineasta mexicano se llevó el León de Oro– The Shape of Water obtuvo 13 nominaciones.
The award-winning film “The Shape of Water” by Guillermo del Toro has become the most nominated film in the 90th edition of the Oscars. After the successful run the love story had at the Venice Film Festival, where the Mexican filmmaker received the Golden Lion, “The Shape of Water” received 13 nominations.
The nominations include Best Original Screenplay, Best Director and Best Picture.
For years, the award ceremony has been dominated by Mexican filmmakers. This continues, despite the dreary outlook that Mexican migrants, and Latin Americans in general, are facing as a result of the anti-Mexican rhetoric and the crackdown on immigration undertaken by current US President Donald Trump and his administration.
In 2015 and 2016, director Alejandro González Iñárritu and cinematographer Emmanuel “Chivo” Lubezki were awarded for their work on “Birdman Or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)” and on “The Revenant.”
Also in 2014, Lubezki (Best Cinematography) along with Mexican Alfonso Cuarón (Best Film Editing, shared with Mark Sanger, and Best Director) received awards for the movie “Gravity.”
This year's good news of Del Toro's work being nominated was celebrated on social media, especially on Twitter, where the hashtag #PorqueSoyMexicano (Because I'm Mexican) was used to share memes of Del Toro. The hashtag echoes a response that the director gave to a question from the press asking how he balances the darkness and terror that are so present in his films and his joyful, loving nature. The answer: “Because I'm Mexican”.
The meme ended up being shared by the United States Embassy in Mexico:
¿Por qué obtengo 13 nominaciones al Oscar con un peliculón? #PorqueSoyMexicano #TalentoMexicano @RealGDT pic.twitter.com/uA9sSnngVX
— Embajada EU en Mex (@USEmbassyMEX) 23 de enero de 2018
Why do I have 13 nominations for an Oscar?#BecauseI'mMexican #MexicanTalent
Twitter users broadened the use of the meme to encompass all manner of statements that in their perspective characterize what it is to be Mexican:
— ¿Por que le echas limón a todo?
— #PorqueSoyMexicanopic.twitter.com/tYTjhm1UGJ
— Carlos Mar (@8carlosmar) 22 de enero de 2018
- Why do you put lemon on everything?
– #BecauseI'mMexican
Álvaro Cano described a typical behaviour seen in cafes and entertainment venues where Mexicans usually prolong their stay and eat or drink more:
–¿Por qué siempre dices «la última y nos vamos», pero nunca es la última y nunca te vas?
– #PorqueSoyMexicanopic.twitter.com/ZNkCUnOaJw
— Álvaro Cano (@alvarocanoe) 23 de enero de 2018
Why do you always say “one last one and then we'll go” but it never is the last one, and you actually never go?
– #BecauseI'mMexican
More reactions and memes can be found in this article written by Darinka Rodríguez.
On the other hand, one user with the Twitter name “no sabe/no responde” (“don't know/don't answer”) pointed out that other works by Del Toro have not received such acclaim in the US because the dialogue was not in English, as in the case of “Pan's Labyrinth”:
Su tal forma del agua es bonita pero de ahí no pasa. Del Toro a estas alturas podría haber hecho algo muchísimo mejor. Pero como los gringos no vieron esa belleza que es El laberinto del fauno porque que pereza leer subtítulos, ahora sí le van a dar un montón de premios.
— no sabe/no responde (@kratzzzz) 23 de enero de 2018
While “The Shape of Water” is pretty, it doesn't go beyond that. Del Toro could have made something a lot better at this stage. But since Americans didn't see the beauty that is Pan's Labyrinth because they are too lazy to read subtitles, they will now give him loads of awards.
Alvaro Ortiz pointed out that American viewers (or “gringos”, as they are called by many Mexicans) could be ignorant of Del Toro's nationality:
Pues a mi me parece que la gran mayoría de los espectadores gringos ni idea tienen de que Guillermo del Toro es mexicano. Simplemente fueron a ver la película de moda, de la temporada de premios
— Alvaro Ortiz (@aortiza77) 15 de enero de 2018
Well to me it seems that most “gringos” have no idea that Guillermo del Toro is Mexican. They simply went to watch a popular movie, during the awards period.
In Mexican daily newspaper La Jornada, Carlos Bonfil wrote a review of the feature film in question, making reference to its message that, in his opinion, speaks in favor of minorities and groups that are usually suppressed:
La forma del agua es, más allá de su evidente tributo al cine de horror de los años 50, y del deleite de revivir, de un modo gozoso, el encanto para muchos ya obsoleto de las comedias musicales de esa misma época, un vigoroso alegato en favor de la tolerancia y del respeto a las minorías (étnicas y sexuales, y también a las mujeres, esa inmensa minoría social –la mitad de la población global– todavía hoy agraviada por una prepotencia masculina).
The Shape of Water is, beyond its clear tribute to 1950s horror and the delight it offers in reliving in such an enjoyable way many people's love for musical comedies of the same era, a vigorous plea for tolerance and for the respect of minorities (ethnic and sexual, including women, this immense social minority — half of the world population — still harmed today by an overly powerful male society).
And around this message, in the context of growing xenophobia in the US, Bonfil wrote:
Cuando la cinta de Del Toro llegue a la ceremonia de entrega de los Óscares, de modo muy destacado y en un clima de fuertes cuestionamientos a una intolerancia social dominante, se entenderá, tal vez, más allá de su jubiloso candor y su poesía visual, la imprescindible urgencia de su mensaje solidario.
When Del Toro's movie gets to the Oscars, in a climate where we are facing some hard questions surrounding the dominance of intolerance in society, we will perhaps understand, beyond the film's joyful candor and visual poetry, the essential urgency of its message for solidarity.
The 90th Academy Awards ceremony will take place on 4 March 2018 in California, US.

author: J. Tadeo


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Netizen Report: The Rising Cost of Cameroon’s Internet Shutdowns · Global Voices
Netizen Report Team

Cloud cartoon from Fundacion Karisma video.
Seven local civil society organizations are suing the Cameroonian government for imposing an internet shutdown on the country's two Anglophone regions for more than three months in 2017, just before both regions planned to make a symbolic declaration of independence. Besides imposing the long-term internet shutdown (along with several shorter shutdowns of platforms such as Facebook and WhatsApp), the government deployed security forces who clashed violently with Anglophone activists.
Cameroon's Veritas Law Offices, working with international NGO the Media Legal Defence Initiative, instituted two separate court actions challenging the internet shutdown in the two English-speaking regions of Cameroon. The respondents include the State of Cameroon, Cameroon Telecommunications (CAMTEL), the Ministry of Post and Telecommunications, and several telecommunications companies in the country.
The suit aims to not only seek reparations for the shutdown, but also help counter the growing trend of using internet shutdowns for political gain.
Other digital rights groups have also filed briefs in support of the suit. Internet Sans Frontières and Access Now.
Peter Micek, General Counsel of Access Now, said of the suit, “Cameroon’s courts have the opportunity to set a global precedent in favor of human rights and the rule of law. By declaring the government’s shutdown order a discriminatory, unnecessary, and disproportionate decree, issued under flawed procedures, the court can provide remedy to Cameroonians and light a path for victims of shutdowns elsewhere.”
The Collaboration on International ICT Policy in East and Southern Africa (CIPESA) estimates that internet shutdowns in 2017 cost the Cameroonian economy USD $1.67 million per day.
More recently, the Philippine National Telecommunications Commission approved a request by the National Police to shut down mobile services during the Dinagyang festival in the Visayas island region on January 27-28, 2018.
In January 2018 alone, similar network shutdowns were imposed during the Feast of the Black Nazarene, Sinulog, and Ati-atihan festivals, writes the Foundation for Media Alternatives (FMA).
The FMA opposes network shutdowns because they violate the right of free expression and access to information, not to mention access to communication networks, which are vital to public safety. The non-profit group also notes there is little evidence that this tactic leads to greater security.
Turkey’s Interior Ministry announced on January 29 that authorities had arrested and detained 311 people that it had identified as having made social media comments criticizing Turkish military efforts to push a Kurdish militia out of Syria's northern Afrin region. Among the detainees, who authorities say were spreading “terrorist propaganda”, are journalists, activists and opposition politicians.
Chanoknan Ruamsap, an anti-junta activist and member of the New Democracy Group, received a police summons on January 18 indicating that she was being charged under Thailand’s notoriously harsh lèse majesté or “royal insult” law for sharing a BBC article profiling King Vajiralongkorn. She had shared the article in December 2016. Upon reckoning with the maximum prison sentence that she could face — 15 years behind bars — the young woman elected to flee the country. She told independent news outlet Prachatai, “I had less than 30 minutes to decide whether to stay or to leave. What is difficult is the fact that I won’t return after this journey.”
A Myanmar man is facing threats online after being arrested arbitrarily by the police and posting about it on Facebook. Police responded with a Facebook post in which they accused the man of fabricating the incident and revealed his name and religion, which is Islam. Given ethno-religious tensions in Myanmar, his left him vulnerable to further online abuse. Though the station has since deleted the post, hate speech comments directed at the man have become more prominent in recent days. Yangon Police say they will conduct an investigation in response.
The #MeToo movement is catching on in China despite the censorship of phrases like “anti-sexual harassment” on social media platforms. Following the dismissal of prominent Beihang University professor Chen Xiaowu over multiple allegations of sexual misconduct, students and alumni from dozens of universities across China are advocating to establish official policies against sexual misconduct in universities (which are very uncommon in China) using the hashtag, #EveryoneIn. Though similar calls have been made in years past, no concrete policies have been introduced thus far.
On January 24, the government of St. Lucia announced the installation phase of the Government Island-Wide Network—a USD $4 million project to establish public internet access across the Caribbean island. The network will provide free or low-cost wireless connection in public areas for both residents and visitors. The project is a partnership with the government of Taiwan, which is contributing USD $3.28 million in funding. The network is expected to be installed within three months.
A new investigative piece by Vice Argentina shows that while the public WiFi network of Buenos Aires’ subway system is indeed free of charge, it collects a barrage of personal data about the user, including the person’s name, home address, phone number, national ID number, geolocation data and — depending on their device settings — potentially much more, including photographs.
When the company that owns the fitness tracker app Strava published a series of heat maps showing where its users were most active, it inadvertently revealed the locations of secret military bases. The company says that the data was made public because users allowed the app to capture this information, arguing that they ought to have “opted out” of tracking while in military zones. The Guardian also reported that the Strava website “allows users to drill down into the tracked runs to find the names of individuals”, raising additional personal privacy concerns.
A New York Times investigation into the obscure US-based company Devumi examines the dark underbelly of social media identity fraud. The firm sells bot accounts to anyone who wishes to “exert influence” in their social network and appears to have used the names, profile pictures, and other personal data of actual Twitter users to create more than 50K fraudulent accounts that it then sells for profit.
CORRECTION [February 5, 2018]: The original version of this report identified Access Now and Internet Sans Frontieres as the NGOs leading the lawsuit regarding internet shutdowns in Cameroon. In fact, Cameroon's Veritas Law Offices and the Media Legal Defence Initiative are leading the suit. Along with multiple local organizations, Access Now and Internet Sans Frontieres have filed briefs in support of the suit.
Afef Abrougui, Ellery Roberts Biddle, Marianne Diaz, Mohamed ElGohary, Rohith Jyothish, Leila Nachawati, Karolle Rabarison, Elizabeth Rivera, Nevin Thompson and Sarah Myers West contributed to this report.

source: news-globalvoices

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

author: Netizen Report Team


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A 10-Year-Old Was Already Suing the US Government Over Climate Policy. Then Climate Change Really Hit Home. · Global Voices
PRI/PRX's The World

10-year-old Levi Draheim is the youngest plaintiff in a lawsuit filed by 21 youths who claim the federal government has violated their constitutional rights by supporting the continued use of fossil fuels that contribute to global warming. Credit: Deepa Fernandes/PRI
This story by Deepa Fernandes originally appeared on PRI.org on January 23, 2018. It is republished here as part of a partnership between PRI and Global Voices.
Ten-year-old Levi Draheim is a whizz at math, even though he doesn’t particularly like it. He plays a steady Dvořák’s “Humoresque” on the violin and he has a pet crab, JJ. Like most kids, Draheim hates cleaning his room.
Yet Draheim isn’t like most 10-year-olds in one main way — he’s suing the United States federal government for violating his constitutional rights by supporting the continued use of fossil fuels that contribute to global warming.
Draheim lives on a barrier island on the state of Florida’s central east coast. Sea level rise projections combined with beach erosion escalation means his home will likely be sitting in water in 30-40 years and his island will likely be completely submerged by the end of the century. It’s a reality even most adults in threatened Florida cities aren’t doing much about, which makes this child’s activism even more unusual.
The changing climate is something Draheim has witnessed first hand. When Hurricane Irma ripped through Florida in September 2017, it hit his town of Satellite Beach pretty hard. A week after the hurricane, came a torrential downpour that flooded many streets. Draheim and his family had to evacuate and his street flooded.
“It was so deep that … it was like up to the like middle of the car,” he said.
Draheim’s school also flooded pretty badly and had to close.
Before the flood, Draheim went to school three days a week and was homeschooled the other two. Going to school was a highlight because he got to hang out with other kids. But he won't get to see these kids as much anymore. The school was damaged beyond repair. So his mom, Leigh-Ann Draheim, has to homeschool him full time for now.
But that’s the least of her worries.
“Our whole street was under water, we had sandbags out and things like that,” she said. “We’re worried that if it rains hard then we’re going to have that issue again and again.”
The family lives on what’s called a barrier island, a long thin strip of sand off the mainland. Projections for sea level rise are not good for this part of the Florida coast.
“The barrier island will go away eventually because it’s at sea level,” Leigh-Ann said. Draheim jumped in to explain more.
“Well, there’s like these maps and stuff like that and it shows that this whole entire street will be completely under water. We’re zero feet above sea level. So even if the polar ice caps melt a little bit it will go into the ocean which is going to go into the Indian River Lagoon which is going to flood our home,” Draheim said.
One natural protection against rising sea levels are solid sand dunes, but even those are eroding in Satellite Beach.
Draheim wanted to show me how the sand dunes, which make like a wall on the Atlantic side of the island, are getting eaten away.
He and his mom took me to a part of the beach where the dunes are pretty eroded.
“The sign right here says Keep Off the Dunes,” Draheim said.
Draheim doesn’t just talk about climate change, he’s also trying to fight it. Among other things, he and his mom have helped with dune restoration work, planting a type of grass called Sea Oats in the sand.
”[Sea oats] are what really holds the dunes together, like with erosion, the sea oats are all that holds it in, really,” Draheim said.
But it’s not all work and no play. Draheim can ride his bike to the beach, he boogie boards when he wants. He loves his life here.
Yet there’s no denying he’s living the impacts of sea level rise and extreme weather. In many ways, he was a natural to join the 20 other kids from around the country suing the federal government over not doing enough to stop climate change. Of the group, he’s the youngest.
“I think climate change is basically like a national disaster, and it’s going to affect everybody,” Draheim said. “Like in Florida you can see obvious effects, like two hurricanes in the same year and we had to evacuate for that, and beach erosion, stuff like that.”
In this case, Draheim actually doesn’t have it quite right. Scientists don’t think climate change is causing more hurricanes. But there is evidence that in general, it’s making them and other storms worse.
Draheim is not just a cute young face for the movement. He’s constantly trying to learn more, he said, so he can do more. He listens to the news, pushes his mom to teach him climate concepts at home, and he listens intently when his older plaintiff compatriots talk.
Draheim joined the youth lawsuit by nonprofit, Our Children’s Trust, after his church minister told his mother about it. Leigh-Ann asked Draheim if he wanted to be involved and the then 9-year-old didn’t hesitate.
Draheim and his mom are members of a local Unitarian Universalist church. It’s a pretty relaxed, liberal church. During the mass, Leigh-Ann is barefoot and Draheim bounces a ball the entire service. At morning tea after mass, the congregants discuss Draheim’s activism with pride.
He’s one of the only kids at church, but he’s treasured.
The trial is slated to begin February 5, 2018. Draheim said whether they win or lose, he for one hopes that US President Donald Trump is watching.
“It’s kind of hard that the most powerful person in the world denies that climate change is ever a problem and ever will be a problem,” Draheim said. “And so, it’s just kind of hard.”
Whatever happens, Draheim said he’s going to keep fighting. He doesn’t want his island paradise to disappear.
Then he shoots off, razor wheels attached to his shoes, and lands under a blackberry tree where he fills his mouth with sweet, juicy berries.

author: PRI/PRX's The World


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It Is Not Only LGBT Jamaicans Who Welcome the Government’s Ban of Controversial U.S. Preacher · Global Voices
Emma Lewis

A screenshot from a YouTube video chronicling some of controversial American fundamentalist pastor Steven Anderson's anti-gay rants.
Human rights activists, online campaigners — and many other Jamaicans — were pleased with the government's recent decision to deny entry to American fundamentalist pastor, Steven Anderson. While concerns regarding free speech linger, it was not just the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender (LGBT) lobby that expressed satisfaction at the decision to keep out Anderson, who has a reputation for extreme homophobia, and preaches a volatile stance against homosexuality.
News of the ban (Jamaica is the fifth country to have done so) broke via the change.org website on January 29, 2018. The petition to deny Anderson entry to the island, which was started by a Jamaican gay rights activist, had garnered 38,682 signatures by that date.
The petition website posted a video from Anderson, informing viewers that during a layover in the United States on his way to Jamaica, he learned that he would not be allowed to enter the country. In the video, Anderson expressed surprise, as he was under the impression that Jamaica was “the most homophobic country in the world” and that Jamaicans would therefore welcome him. “Obviously this was an outside influence,” he said, inferring that the Jamaican government was pressured to make the decision, against the wishes of its people.
Reactions to the ban were mixed. Given Anderson's well-known views on homosexuality, LGBT organisations warmly welcomed the news:
Pastor Steven Anderson has called for homosexuality to be punishable by death. He was planning on spewing his #hatespeech in Jamaica, but those plans were canceled when the country barred his entry. #LoveWinshttps://t.co/923CROjy9o
— One Equal World (@everyone_equal) February 2, 2018
The influential Gleaner newspaper, while describing Anderson as “a holdover from the Stone Age,” contended in an editorial that — in the interests of freedom of speech and religion — he should have been allowed entry. The author of its Letter of the Day agreed, saying, “We are now witnessing Jamaica's hypocritical conniving and a foreseeable acceptance of gay rights over biblical and moral stands.”
However, another Letter to the Editor clapped back against this view by citing Anderson's hate speech and incitement to violence:
Unless the Jamaican Government is prepared to license the execution of those deemed gay, his banning, quite naturally, strikes a chord of sense and sanity, as well as advancing the Government's interest of security of all citizens.
One can only wonder if said man were to advocate the fatal stoning of Gleaner journalists, whose ‘fake news’ would deem them irredeemably guilty, would this newspaper argue, with equal fervour, that all views must contend? I imagine not.
As any mature scholar of government would tell you, limits on democratic actions need not necessarily undermine the project of democracy itself.
The Jamaican Government has historically failed to protect the rights and dignity of countless gay Jamaicans. In one of the few notable moments that it has, as seen with the Anderson ban, can we not mar this occasion with mechanic logic and vacuous claims of free speech denial, but instead applaud the Government's resolve to value all its citizens’ welfare?
Not everyone agreed with this perspective:
Dem fight out Pastor Steve. To block him from speaking in Jamaica is great injustice. His views may be different but he aint no terrorist. There is a space for contrasting views/opinions and we must encourage dialogue around differences. Sad state Jamaica is in.
— PREKI (@ThisisPreki) January 30, 2018
Sharing the Gleaner editorial, one blogger tweeted:
Editorial | Going too far on Anderson travel ban//  Ban was bad decision; said so before. Jamaica now also the hypocrisy capital of the world? ???? https://t.co/nWHKLLQpBF
— DGJmyideasaremyown (@dennisgjones) January 31, 2018
One domino effect of the Jamaica ban might be the enhancement of Anderson's celebrity status among his followers — or at least, the pastor seems to be trying to steer the narrative in that direction. After booking another flight to a “different Caribbean country”, he began a contest on his blog: “Where in the world is Pastor Anderson???” He also posted a series of memes on his Facebook page, about being banned from Jamaica — including one quoting the government as saying, “Pastor Anderson's comments are not conducive to the current climate”.
However, via the posts on Anderson's Instagram page, it became clear that some of his followers had travelled to Jamaica ahead of his scheduled arrival, and had apparently done some preaching at a school. It was subsequently revealed that a venue at the University of the West Indies (UWI) campus had been booked — through an unnamed local church — for an Anderson-approved film screening scheduled for February 2. The university was at pains to disassociate itself from the event, and quickly withdrew its permission.
An Anglican priest with a strong human rights focus, Sean Major-Campbell, offered this perspective:
This man's history of promoting stigma and discrimination, homophobia and misogyny, is an insult to the human dignity of our women and sexual minorities. If he were a Jamaican dancehall artiste, do you believe that his ‘work’ would be welcomed from a foreigner to his homeland? Should Jamaica remain spineless and silent? […]
The Caribbean region has had a long history of oppressive teachings in the name of church and evangelism. We now need to facilitate healing and protection from further division, pain, and tragedy that is often motivated by characters with a history of preaching hate.
One Jamaican summed up the views of many of his compatriots who were not necessarily part of the LGBT community:
Now there are some who are displeased that ‘Pastor’ Anderson was banned from Jamaica and speak about the powerful agents of the LGBTQ who have triumphed in stopping him with a petition signed by nearly 37,000. I am neither member of J-FLAG nor a powerful figure but I signed it out of the common humanity shared in the fact that we don't facilitate someone who advocates for the death and murder of others they hate. Hell No! That should be a no-brainer. […] Free Speech does not give anyone the right to perpetuate evil and hate, especially in a state where crime, violence and hate is common among some people. Jamaica should be praised having shown signs of positive change from its days of ignorance!
On the basis of Anderson's hateful rhetoric, many more applauded the government's decision. One Facebook user shared:
Well at least the govt did a good thing blocking this Pastor Steven Anderson from landing here. What a scary backward trumpian person. […]
There is no doubt that the pastor's aborted visit has sparked an interesting, well reasoned — and perhaps necessary — national online debate on democracy, freedom of speech and the limits of hate speech, and human rights. But Anderson is quickly falling off the radar as Jamaicans remain preoccupied with a range of security issues that shows no signs of going away as quickly as the American pastor did.

author: Emma Lewis


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Top Secret Australian Government Cabinet Files Accidentally Sold Inside Filing Cabinets · Global Voices
Kevin Rennie

The Australian Cabinet in session. Courtesy David Foote, AUSPIC/DPS (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0 AU) & Top Secret (Wikimedia Commons CC BY-SA 3.0)
As the cliché goes, you couldn't make this stuff up. Classified documents from five Australian administrations covering nearly 10 years were accidentally sold in two locked filing cabinets at a second-hand furniture shop. Most were either “top secret” or “AUSTEO” (Australian Eyes Only).
The Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) obtained them and published some of their contents online, but withholding others for national security reasons. The Australian Security and Intelligence Agency (ASIO) have since taken custody of the original files following an agreement between the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet and the ABC. The agreement protects the identity of the source who bought the filing cabinets.
Many on social media have been bemused by this bizarre breach of security:
I can't help but laugh at the incompetence of the Australian Government. It's like something out of a sitcom. #cabinetfiles #auspol
— Josh Freeman (@Jengo5674) January 31, 2018
Can a journalist check if there's been a rush on the purchase of ex-government filing cabinets in Canberra over the last few hours – particularly by foreign nationals… https://t.co/9eAM1ve1j2 #auspol
— Craig Thomler (@craigthomler) January 31, 2018
Are you kidding me? All these cabinet leaks came from an actual filing cabinet sold at a government auction. What's the point of draconian security laws when you're giving the stuff away?https://t.co/IOCkdo5iQu
— Tom Whitty (@twhittyer) January 31, 2018
The files didn't only spark jokes. Former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd is suing the ABC over its reporting of one of the documents which warned of “critical risks” concerning a contentious home insulation scheme during the global financial crisis in 2009. Four young installers working as part of that scheme died in separate incidents from electrocution and hyperthermia. Rudd claims that the document was referring to financial issues, not safety.
Rudd’s legal action has brought its fair share of criticism:
Now @MrKRudd is suing @abcnews over the reporting of #CabinetLeak. By the sounds of it, just because he doesn't like the fact this info became public. Having a hissy fit. https://t.co/hgsl4wwVL4
— Byorgen Druffeldroff (@bastardsheep) January 31, 2018
A second sensitive document concerns an audit of the Australian Federal Police (AFP) revealing that the agency had apparently lost 400 files from the Cabinet’s National Security Committee (NSC) between 2008 and 2013. The AFP responded publicly, saying that the document was outdated and that the final number of files that remained unaccounted for was 33.
None of their missing files was in the ABC haul. “These documents have been destroyed, but there is no official record to indicate that this destruction occurred,” the agency said in a press release.
A Twitter user named Dave The Happy Singer appreciated the irony:
My favourite part about the cabinet files lost in the second-hand filing cabinet is that one of them is about other lost cabinet files.
— Dave The Happy Singer (@HappySinger) January 31, 2018
Chris Duckett, editor of ZDNet and TechRepublic Australia, took a sober tone:
The gravity of this scenario cannot be overstated. These are some of the most secret documents that the Australian government creates, usually locked up for 20 years before being released to the public due to their sensitively and to put a bit of time between the actors and their actions, yet here they were, up for sale in suburban Canberra.
Noely joined a chorus on Twitter of those worried about the security of data that the government collects from its citizens:
So have I got this right?
Both the Government and AFP want to hoover up all our data whenever they wish, without any proper oversight, but they can't even keep their own shit secure?#WeAreDoomed#CabinetFiles https://t.co/ZSRp031AOy
— Noely (@YaThinkN) January 31, 2018
Concerns have also emerged about whether Australia's allies can trust the country's ability to keep a secret. Defence Connect, a defence industry information site, pointed out:
The ABC has said one file contained highly classified documents that revealed insights into the National Security Committee, which is charged with decisions related to intelligence and security.
When pressed by media in Adelaide, Defence Industry Minister Christopher Pyne refused to comment on what the revelations will mean for Australia's relationships with key allies.
At news analysis site The Conversation, Professor Patrick Weller explored the importance of cabinet confidentiality for good decision-making:
Cabinet government requires confidentiality. Ministers have to be able to discuss alternative options to solve the problems they must manage. They have to able to express opinions and probe proposals.
[…] We still need to balance a legitimate desire for transparency with the need for free and thoughtful debate (or rather, the possibility of thoughtful debate).
Despite these attempts at thoughtful analysis, humour has continued to dominate online responses:
The Federal Cabinet met earlier today to discuss classified document security policy. The Prime Minister later said the outcome was secret and then sprayed water on reporters from the fake flower in his lapel.#CabinetFiles #auspol #Canberra pic.twitter.com/bxxlH1lPWx
— TimeStorm (@StormingTime) February 2, 2018
However, Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull is unlikely to joke about government leaks in future after his unintended second sight earlier in the week:
This is very awkward in hindsight. On Monday Australia's PM Malcolm Turnbull joked about the few cabinet docs the ABC had published as coming from “someone's bottom drawer” ? pic.twitter.com/lPqvarkN40
— Paul Farrell (@FarrellPF) January 31, 2018
The Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet has admitted that it was responsible for the loss of the files. In a media statement, the department secretary Martin Parkinson confessed:
This casts the Department in a poor light and this failure has implications for the rest of the Australian Public Service.
Meanwhile, the ABC has revealed the back story of how they came into possession of the files. It's a great tale in itself. A “bushie” now living in Canberra bought them at auction for $AU 10 (8 US dollars) each. (A bushie is someone who comes from a rural araa of Australia.) After his own research into the contents, he contacted Michael McKinnon, the ABC's freedom of information editor. In McKinnon's words, “This one was a cracker”.
Proving once again that everything is connected, it turns out that one of McKinnon's brothers is “a deputy secretary of the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet who is currently in charge of national security for the Federal Government.”

author: Kevin Rennie


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A Judicial Coup? Maldives Court Orders Retrial and Immediate Release of Jailed Opposition Leaders · Global Voices
Rezwan

In July 2017, Police officers and soldiers in riot gear forcibly dragged out opposition lawmakers from the parliament building. Image via Flickr User Dying Regime. CC BY 2.0
On Thursday, February 2, 2018, the Supreme Court of the Maldives ordered the immediate release of former president Mohamed Nasheed, former vice president Ahmed Adeeb and several other high profile opposition leaders, explaining that their trials had violated the constitution and international law. In addition, the court nullified an anti-defection ruling in which 12 legislators lost their parliamentary seats for defecting last July from the ruling party. The court has also ordered new trials for the accused opposition leaders, but the government appears to be stalling for time.
The situation is being called a judicial coup, as it may lead to the impeachment of the incumbent president, Abdulla Yameen Abdul Gayoom. Last year, a process of impeachment was stalled by the anti-defection ruling by the Supreme court restricting members of parliament from crossing the floor — so the number of Members of Parliament (MPs) required for impeachment was not available. These recent events are the latest in the political roller coaster the Maldives has witnessed in the last few years.
Global Voices talked to an activist in Malé who discussed this alleged judicial coup in a private update. (The activist's name and the link to the restricted social media statement have been withheld for safety reasons):
It is four hours past midnight in the Maldives, and here in Malé, the capital city, the sound of police sirens are heard in the distance as another coup is unfolding. It is a judicial coup this time; the country’s Supreme Court has ruled tonight to release all high-level political prisoners and that no parliamentarian would lose the seat for switching her or his political party. Ironically it is the same Supreme Court which had ruled a couple of months ago that parliamentarians would lose seats for floor crossing and kept the status of some 12 MPs in limbo when they tried to defect from the ruling party to the opposition. That ruling was a lifeline for the increasingly sidelined autocratic president Yameen Abdul Gayoom. It is also the same Supreme Court which had meddled in the presidential election of 2013, paving the way for Yameen to come to power in the first place. While some of the opposition supporters have hailed the Supreme Court judges as heroes tonight, it must be remembered that their actions are significant in the slide of Maldives back to a dictatorship. They have been known to take over new powers and authority which were never granted to them by the constitution and to encroach on the powers of the parliament to the extent that the Supreme Court had morphed into a lawmaking body.
Meanwhile, the prisoners still have not been released, and the Maldivian government is claiming that the top court document needs to be validated before it can implement the court's orders. Ibrahim Hussain Shihab, the international spokesperson for President Abdulla Yameen, said that the government would “engage, and consult with, the Supreme Court in order to comply with the ruling in line with proper procedure and the rule of law.”
Refusal to enforce the Supreme Court's recent orders,only portrays of how much @PresidentYAG disrespects and disregards the constitution and the rule of law. The whole world is watching of what a failed leader you are !#SupremeCourtAmuru @USAmbKeshap @UKinMaldives @CanHCSriLanka pic.twitter.com/VOVmjzjIwo
— Safaath Ahmed (@safaathahmed) February 1, 2018
Ex-president Mohamed Nasheed supported the view of the Supreme Court:
Welcome tonight’s SC ruling calling for the immediate release of political prisoners and the restoration of their civil and political rights. President Yameen must abide by this ruling and resign. Urge all citizens to avoid confrontation and engage in peaceful political activity.
— Mohamed Nasheed (@MohamedNasheed) February 1, 2018
Some members of the international community also welcomed the decision. Imthiyaz Fahmy appreciated the sentiments expressed in a tweet by the United States’ ambassador to the Maldives:
Thank you Ambassador for all your support throughout to the people of #Maldives ? https://t.co/gZU3Nxj17Q
— Imthiyaz Fahmy (@Imthiyazfahmy) February 1, 2018
Soon after the verdict was published online, hundreds of people gathered at the opposition Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) headquarters to celebrate. Police officers at the scene fired tear gas to disperse the crowd and arrested a number of people.
Several people arrested. pic.twitter.com/at7J78anok
— Junayd ?? (@mjunayd) February 1, 2018
#supremeCourtAmuru
List of people to be released
1. Mohamed Nasheed
2. Mohamed Nazim
3. Imran Abdulla
4. Ahmed Adeeb Abdul Gafoor
5. Muhthaaz Muhsin
6. Gasim Ibrahim
7. Ahmed Faris Maumoon
8. Ahmed Nihan
9. Hamid Ismail
— Wathanee hiyaaleh (@dhivehikalo) February 1, 2018
The United Nations (UN) Human Rights Chief expressed concern over the “heavy-handed” reaction by security forces.
The Maldives transitioned from an autocracy to a democracy in 2008, but experienced political instability after its first democratically elected president, Mohamed Nasheed, was forced out in an alleged “coup” in 2012. President Abdulla Yameen won the controversial presidential election in 2013. The country is once again tilting toward authoritarianism as growing accusations mount against President Yameen for silencing dissent and imprisoning political opponents — including Nasheed — under allegedly made-up charges.
The Maldives United Opposition (MUO), a coalition of opposition parties led by exiled leader Mohamed Nasheed, is demanding the removal of President Abdulla Yameen Abdul Gayoom through legal means and trying him for money laundering and other charges.
In September 2016, “Stealing Paradise,” an investigative exposé by Al Jazeera, revealed how President Yameen and his associates embezzled millions of dollars, bribed judges and other high-level officials, and used influence to remove government workers who stood in their way.
To further complicate matters, Police Commissioner Ahmed Areef was relieved from his duty and Deputy Commissioner Ahmed Saudhee replaced him. Apparently, the police chief's removal came after the Maldivian police, in a tweet, gave assurances that it would abide by the court order and said that it had started the process to release the political prisoners.
Woah. Maldives Attorney General announces the firing of the police chief. Maldives police had tweeted that they would enforce the Supreme Court ruling.
— Devirupa Mitra (@DevirupaM) February 1, 2018
Situation in #Maldives #SupremeCourtAmuru #SupremeCourt #kunooz pic.twitter.com/YHQzKU8Qus
— Minivan Media (@MinivanMedia) February 2, 2018
In examining the impasse, the Malé-based activist did not let either side of the political divide off the hook:
As the coup unfolds, on one side stands the solitary figure of the incumbent president Yameen, while on the other side is the opposition coalition in which there are so many politicians who must be held responsible for destroying the fabric of Maldivian society in recent years. At times political foes and at times friends, they have orchestrated coups, looted the treasury and made local politics dirtier. As for Yameen, the lesson he had learned from Machiavelli’s The Prince seems to be to become a leader who is feared rather than a leader who is loved. In his four years in power, he has reduced independent institutions to mere puppets, imprisoned all political opponents, introduced laws to block independent media and unbiased reporting, and consolidated his power with the assistance of the judiciary. He kept China close, upsetting India and the United States. Recently his government signed a free trade agreement with China, which has been criticised by the former president Mohamed Nasheed’s party as inviting China to grab lands in the Maldives. Ironically it was with the assistance of Nasheed’s party MDP that the government was able to pass the laws which facilitate such land grabs.
Yameen also ventured into a taboo territory recently when he cracked down on some tourist resorts, sending police and customs officials to search the resorts and confiscate the liquor there. While he ordered this as a crackdown against a tycoon who happens to be one of his political opponents, this move must have unnerved the influential businessmen in the tourism industry […] it is those tycoons who wield the real power in the Maldives and any threat to their resorts or their businesses is bound to have repercussions.
[…] Yameen is playing his last card by unleashing the police on opposition protesters, spraying them with tear gas and brutally beating them. He has fired the Commissioner of Police and is attempting to delay the enforcement of the Supreme Court’s rulings while he is looking for options to either arrest the Supreme Court judges or to replace them.
Some local media also received threats:
Maldives broadcasting commission threatening to shut broadcasters! pic.twitter.com/UgNJa2ZiT6
— RaajjeTV (@Raajje_tv) February 1, 2018
#BREAKING: Police now inside MDP party headquarters in #Maldives and arresting using excessive force, MDP senior leaders tell me. Unprecedented fluid developments after SC ruling. State security provided under the constitution for Supreme Court judges withdrawn by the President. pic.twitter.com/LHrk7ENmvM
— Aditya Raj Kaul (@AdityaRajKaul) February 1, 2018
On February 2, the Maldivian police tweeted a press statement, which it seems will buy the president some time:
Press Statement: PMC/2018/02 pic.twitter.com/2I0yuSWrrU
— Maldives Police (@PoliceMv) February 2, 2018
Rough translation: The police service is trying to implement the Supreme Court's court order after consulting with the Attorney General and the Prosecutor General, and after following due process.
It remains to be seen how this court ruling will affect the Maldives’ political prospects. The opening of the parliament for this year on February 5, 2018 has been indefinitely postponed citing security reasons. Azim Zahir, a Ph.D. student, tweeted:
What matters less is deciding whether Maldivian SC order is legitimate or not. The system as a whole suffers from a legitimacy crisis. What matters more is how that order & joining of different forces as an opposition to the regime open up or foreclose democratic possibilities.
— Azim Zahir (@aazimzahir) February 2, 2018
With the loss of political legitimacy by abrogating democratic rules n norms, loss of coalition support, the parliament majority, and Supreme Court support for Pres Yameen, his gov effectively rules as a military-police state through sections of the security apparatus.
— Azim Zahir (@aazimzahir) February 2, 2018

author: Rezwan


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Decades After US Immigration Policy Separated His Family, a Man Searches for His Ancestral Village in China · Global Voices
PRI/PRX's The World

After a long search, 64-year-old Russell Low (left) visited his great-grandfather's ancestral home in Guangdong Province in southern China in May 2016. Low met village elders and learned that his grandfather's three younger brothers also ended up in the US, though no one knows what became of them. Credit: Courtesy of Russell Low
This story by Violet Law originally appeared on PRI.org on February 1, 2018. It is republished here as part of a partnership between PRI and Global Voices.
In May 2016, Russell Low crossed the Pacific from his home in San Diego, California, and trekked to two remote villages connected to his great grandparents’ families in southern China's Guangdong Province. For the 64-year-old Low, this was a quest that has lasted a quarter century.
Once in China, Low had no doubt he’d found a part of the family tree where he belongs.
“My whole life I was told I don’t look like other Chinese. But over there, everybody looks like me. This is where from I came from,” says Low about the visit to his ancestral home.
Low’s family was one of the tens of thousands torn apart by the United States’ nascent legislative push to restrict immigration more than a century ago. The Chinese Exclusion Act thwarted generations of Chinese from uniting with family in the US. Those who managed to enter the country through loopholes and illegal means scattered like sand.
As the Trump administration pushes to halt family-based immigration, what some conservatives refer to as chain migration, scholars and immigration experts say it’s important to remember how such policies can impact families for generations. Such restrictive rules, they say, harken back to the days of the Chinese Exclusion Act, which placed a moratorium on immigration from China and splintered immigrant families for generations.
“The history of human migration is the history of ‘chain migration,'” says Erika Lee, director of the Immigration History Research Center at the University of Minnesota. “Family members, friends, neighbors have followed each other to the same cities, regions and countries since humans started migrating. It's only been recently that the term has become a dirty word promoted by politicians with an agenda. Chinese immigrants did not have the opportunity to follow each other very easily during the exclusion era.”
President Donald Trump spoke out against family-based migration after an alleged subway attack late 2017 by a Bangladeshi immigrant who had arrived in the US years earlier to join his uncle and cousins. Trump latched on to the attack by criticizing the current policy that allows naturalized immigrants to sponsor family members into the US.
Lucy Salyer, an associate professor of history at the University of New Hampshire who has written extensively on the exclusion act, says back then it was the Chinese who were seen as a threat to national security. Chinese immigrants were also accused of stealing jobs from the native-born, grievances that were fueled by discriminatory attitudes.
“The group [being targeted] might shift, but you still have the same kind of rhetoric,” says Salyer. “There’s a continuation of the fear factor. We need to be aware how much race has shaped our immigration and citizenship policy.”
The exclusion act, in effect from 1882 to 1943, barred Chinese Americans from becoming citizens; most new immigrants from China were turned away.
The law also gave shape to the country’s modern-day immigration apparatus. The “return certificate,” issued to only those Chinese Americans deemed eligible for re-entry, was the precursor to the green card.
Later, the exclusion act was used as a model for the Immigration Act of 1895, which officially ushered in the gatekeeping regime. Exclusion became the norm and marked what some would call an about-face from the ethos that America embraces all immigrants.
The ban resulting from the exclusion act made it impossible for Low’s paternal great-grandfather, Hung Lai Wah, to send for his three other younger brothers after leaving China in the 1860s as a teenager for San Francisco to build the Transcontinental Railroad. Growing up, Low knew little about his family’s roots in southern China.
During his visit in 2016, Low stood inside the grey brick home where Hung grew up nearly 200 years ago. He bowed in front of the ancestral altar and clasped hands with a village elder, who told him, “You’re the first descendant who ever came back to the village.”
Russell Low (middle) stands with distant relatives in front of the home of his great-grandfather, Hung Lai Wah, in China's Guangdong Province during a visit in May 2016. It's the first time that he visited the village where his great-grandfather came from. Credit: Courtesy of Russell Low
Only in the village did Low learn that Hung’s brothers also emigrated on their own efforts, though they were never heard from again.
“What happened to them? They had no idea,” says Low, reflecting on his lost great-granduncles. “This points to the separation created by the exclusion act.”
The exclusion act was finally revoked in 1943. The Immigration and Naturalization Act of 1965 ended the race-based quota and was hailed as a civil rights triumph; however, it proved short-lived.
“As drastic the [Trump’s] proposals are, they represent a continuing trend in immigration policy for the past 30 years,” says Lee. “Immigration policy still is and continues to be a very effective way to define who is worthy of being American, and who we want to keep out.”
Ironically, just as the Trump administration sets to wall off the border with Mexico, in recent years fewer immigrants have arrived from there than those who returned home.
Now, the largest increase in the ranks of new immigrants come from China, with about 40 percent gaining entry through family unification.
Advocates like Hong Mei Pang, of the San Francisco-based nonprofit Chinese for Affirmative Action, worry that an end to family-based immigration would hurt those her group serves the most.
To Pang, the current anti-immigration push echoes the same virulent veins of nativism that led to the exclusion act. In May 2017, Pang's organization led efforts in organizing local groups to form “No More Exclusion Coalition” to march in downtown San Francisco to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the passing of the exclusion act.
Meanwhile, the coalition is working to build a united front on immigration in the diverse Chinese community, which is made up of both new arrivals and Chinese Americans going back generations.
Even as a fourth-generation Chinese American, Low always felt the exclusion act's legacy on his family. In 2015, he sought out Sue Lee, former executive director of the Chinese Historical Society of America in San Francisco, for help in relocating his ancestral village — with only a 40-year-old photo of the village and its phonetic name.
“If we can get a better understanding of the early experiences of our ancestors, it enriches your own experience,” says Lee, who also traces her family roots to a nearby township. “We know we didn’t pop out of nowhere.”
Low’s efforts to search for his roots shows just how the rupture in the Chinese community and beyond can be surmounted.
“We can rally around our collective history,” says Pang. “Our goal is to build solidarity for all the communities that are systematically excluded.”
The family of Hung Lai Wah is pictured in San Francisco in 1903. Hung Lai Wah was one of the few men who found a wife and eventually married. Russell Low, a descendant of Hung Lai Wah, traced the family's roots to a village in southern China in 2016. Credit: Courtesy of Russell Low


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Nina Paley’s ‘Seder-Masochism’ Film Explores Patriarchy in the Book of Exodus Through Animated Ancient Idols · Global Voices
Subhashish Panigrahi

Screenshot from the song sequence “You Gotta Believe” by Nina Paley on Vimeo.
Global Voices interviewed American free culture activist and filmmaker Nina Paley about her new animated film “Seder-Masochism.” It is loosely based on the Book of Exodus from the Torah/Bible and exposes the veiled patriarchy in the religious text.
Paley is the director of the 2008 full-length animated film “Sita Sings the Blues” which she released to the public domain in 2013. The film narrated the Indian epic poem Ramayana by using the 1920s jazz songs of Annette Hanshaw. It brought Paley worldwide fame because of its feminist interpretation of the epic and her long battle against the copyright claims tied to the songs of Annette Hanshaw used in the movie. Paley had to pay a negotiated amount of at least US$50,000 by loaning the sum. She eventually reclassified the film’s license from Creative Commons Attribution-Share-alike 3.0 Unported (CC-BY-SA 3.0) to Creative Commons CC0 (equivalent to public domain).
In an interview with Jewish podcast station Judaism Unbound, Paley said that “Seder-Masochism” is her take on the Exodus, which she first learned during Passover Seders. The Passover Seder is a Jewish ritual that involves the retelling of the liberation of Israelites from slavery in ancient Egypt. She added in the interview that “she identifies herself as a “born-again atheist” and explains the ways in which her recent study of the Book of Exodus has left her uncomfortable.
Several songs and scenes from the film “Seder-Masochism” have been uploaded by Paley to the Internet including the song sequence “You Gotta Believe” which turns Minoan stone goddess idols into flash animation. It features Moses and “singing” ancient goddesses who find themselves about to be defeated by patriarchy.
Global Voices reached out to Paley to learn more about her second film.
: Once again I'm producing, directing, writing, animating, everything-ing…I'm hoping the sound designer for “Sita Sings the Blues“, Greg Sextro, is able to do more sound design for Seder-Masochism. The music is all “found” and used without permission [at the moment]. Much or all of my use is Fair use, but ultimately that can only be determined in court.
Seder-Masochism is about the Book of Exodus from the Torah/Bible, and indirectly the Quran (Moses is a prophet of Islam). My interpretation of Exodus is that it's the establishment of complete patriarchy, the elimination of any remaining goddess-worship from older times.
Some of clips from the feature-in-progress are here.
Sita Sings the Blues was denounced by fundamentalists who called my collaborators “self-hating Hindus.” As a Jew, that rhetoric was familiar to me – Jews *invented* that “self-hating” nonsense. Since I'm not a Zionist, I've been called a “self-hating Jew” too. Also, the Hindutvadis called me a “white Christian woman who hates Hindus”, and sent hate emails saying “how would you like it if someone made a film about YOUR religion?!” Of course I love it when someone makes a good film about Abrahamism - Monty Python's Life of Brian is the best I can think of.  I was (am) also frequently accused of “cultural appropriation“, implying that only those of Hindu/Asian descent are qualified to work with Hindu/Asian stories. So it seemed that everyone, right and left, wanted me to make a film about “my” religion, Judaism! I figured if they're offended by Sita Sings the Blues, they'll be REALLY offended by that. I printed up a Jew Card so I could “play” it for this project.
Ancient goddess gif by Nina Paley. Source: Nina Paley/Wikimedia Commons
: There are already goddesses in the Flash sections of Seder-Masochism I animated a couple of years ago. I needed to put more “goddess” into the film, and was tediously redrawing the Flash goddesses in Moho, the software I'm using now. It occurred to me that instead of redrawing them I could use the source images they're based on, I spent a few days finding the highest resolution images I could, and a few more days manually removing the backgrounds in GIMP. Moho can do things Flash can't, such as this type of animation with raster images. Anyway, they looked cool so I'm using them in the remaining Seder-Masochism scenes.
The goddesses in flash animation can be downloaded on Wikimedia Commons.
As Paley is producing the film on her own, she is also working with other free culture activists like the United States-based nonprofit QuestionCopyright.org to raise funds, apart from launching a Kickstarter campaign. She is uploading segments of the film publicly on the Internet as the film is being developed.
A previous version of this article incorrectly identified the origin of the goddesses. They are Minoan, not Egyptian.

author: Subhashish Panigrahi


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A Palestinian Cultural Space in Haifa Reclaims Authentic Artistic Voice · Global Voices
Mangal Media

Scenes from Manjim. Al photos used with permission from Rana Asali.
The following is a post originally published by Mangal Media. It is republished on Global Voices with permission.
Emerging artists, curators, crazy scientists and anyone seeking the exchange of ideas, there's an exciting new venue in the city of Haifa, one that aims to be a safe haven for experimentation and alternative art.
Manjm (منجم), which translates as a “mine” or a “rich seam,” is an artistic laboratory which attempts to defy all expectations. Situated next to the Haifa Train Station (once part of Hijaz railways), the Al Istiqlal mosque, King Faisal Monument, Haifa Flea Market and the Wadi Salib Neighbourhood. Manjm was founded by founders Rabia Salfiti and Tamer Kais, who conceived the space as a “Temporary Autonomous Zone” in a nod to poet and anarchist Hakim Bey.
Scenes from Manjim. All images used with permission from Rana Asali.
Manjm is a deep and welcoming basket for ideas. The creative space’s programmes include an art gallery and a laboratorium — a space to explore the vast world of art and culture through the lens of various viewpoints in activities ranging from storytelling sessions, workshops, discussions, talks and interactive experiences. Other programs include secret dinners, and underground film and movie screenings organised by curators rotating each month. At the end of each screening, a discussion and an art performance take place. Assisting the powerful founding quartet is a stream of friends who volunteer to make things happen.
“When walking into the space you feel as if it is still a work in progress, and this is exactly how we want it to be, you’re walking into an unfinished gallery, a space where you can easily try out things. This is how a community is built,” says Rabia Salfiti, one of the founders and a conceptual avant-garde artist. “An unfinished space invites people to contribute, to be at ease and to feel part of the place.”
Scenes from Manjim. All images used with permission from Rana Asali.
Creating collective momentum is vital for Manjm. The space is funded through a mixture of grants and contributions from its founders and it depends on community participation to spread the workload.
The wooden floor — laid by the founders and their friends rather than professional craftsmen — testifies to the groups determination to create a space reflective of their own ideas and collaborative will.
Haifa, the city of 300,000 people that hosts Manjm, is part of the modern-day state of Israel that is nestled firmly within the boundaries of historic Palestine. The city has seen a Palestinian art and culture boom in recent times, as Palestinian residents of the city are reclaiming culture, identity and space.
As is typical in settler colonial states, Israel is appropriating Palestinian art and culture and serving it back again to Palestinians, stripped of any signs of identity and belonging. This is where Manjm wants to provide its independent, unapologetic and authentic art and culture.
Scenes from Manjim. All images used with permission from Rana Asali.
Other Haifa institutions that share the same cause as Manjm include Kabareet, a bar and a night club founded by the underground group Jazar Crew; The Khashabi theater, an independent collective of Palestinian theater makers; The Scene Music Bar; Haifa Independent Film Festival; and a number of other independent and underground workshops and zines. These institutions are all are working together to decolonize the minds and souls of Haifa’s residents.
This is an organic and a natural process, a product of a natural harmony, and the continuation of Haifa in the 1930s and 1940s, when pan-Arab cafes and clubs prospered across the city. This was cut short by the Israeli settler colonialism — the Nakba — in 1948.
Scenes from Manjim. All images used with permission from Rana Asali.
Manjm invites all the “wild children” from all over the world to take part. In the words of American poet and anarchist Hakim Bey, “Wild children are the only ones who actually wish to share the mischievous destiny of those savage runaways or minor guerrillas rather than dictate it, the only ones who can understand that cherishing & unleashing are the same act–these are mostly artists, anarchists, perverts, heretics, a band apart (as much from each other as from the world) or able to meet only as wild children might, locking gazes across a dinner table while adults gibber from behind their masks”.
In its two months of existence,  the venue has managed to host two art exhibitions (each lasting a month), a Palestinian food market (called the Kayan Project), two film screening evenings (Cinema Al Bahja), and five workshops and experimental art events. An official launch event is slated to take place on the February 27, 2018.
At this pace, it seems Haifa is going to be very beautiful and vibrant this summer.

author: Mangal Media


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In Afghanistan, Governors Don’t Just Step Down Because the President Asks Them To · Global Voices
Ezzatullah Mehrdad

Atta Mohammad Noor, former governor of Balkh Province, right, pays respect to Afghan flag in Balkh province. Creative Commons. U.S. Air Force photograph by Staff Sgt. Jeff Nevison.
As Mohammad Daud begins his fiftieth day in office as governor of Afghanistan's Balkh region, he may wonder whether he will ever receive the keys from his predecessor.
President Ashraf Ghani officially announced Daud as a replacement for long-serving Ata Mohammad Noor on December 18, 2017, but the popular Noor did not feel like a job change.
For the past month, Balkh’s had 2 governors (3 if u count the Taliban shadow gov). One’s ruled the province like a king, now refusing to leave, trying to emerge larger in defying Ghani. His successor – ready in a 3-piece suit & dyed beard – cant get it inhttps://t.co/zbBJcl8PBN
— Mujib Mashal (@MujMash) January 16, 2018
In addition to refusing to step down from a position he has held for over 13 years, Noor ordered Daud's arrest on murder charges. Local authorities in Balkh seem more inclined to cooperate with the old governor than the new one, making it virtually impossible for Daud — presently working out of Kabul — to step foot in Balkh.
Noor has said the decision to sack him is “without legitimate basis” and attributes the move to Kabul's preparations for elections in 2019. Speaking to Reuters, he said:
This is about the 2019 presidential election. [Allies of Ghani] have no grassroots support among the people and they are afraid of public figures who do.
He also said he offered his resignation to Ghani months ago, but on several conditions — the appointment of key allies to top posts in government — which have not been met.
At the heart of the standoff is a rivalry between leaders of the two ethnic groups that dominate Afghan politics — Pashtuns and Tajiks.
Noor is a senior leader of the Tajik-dominated Jamiat Party, whose candidate Abdullah Abdullah lost a bitterly contested presidential election to Ghani, a Pashtun, in 2014.
Ever since this victory, Ghani and his allies have seemed on a mission to exploit the divisions in the Jamiat Party in order to break it up.
Noor, for instance, is no longer on speaking terms with the party's former nominee, Abdullah, who accepted the consolation prize of Chief Executive Officer after initially contesting the result of the 2014 vote.
Daoud, Balkh's de jure governor, is also an ethnic Tajik and a member of Jamiat, but one who owes his new position to Ghani, rather than the party.
Officially the Jamiat Party has spoken out against Noor's dismissal and accused Ghani of centralizing power. They also claim authorities are out to destabilize Balkh region, which has traditionally been one of Afghanistan's most politically stable, emerging as a northern economic hub during Noor's time in charge.
Nevertheless, the fact that so many Jamiat members are in the government has compromised its stance on the issue and weakened it as a potential opposition force.
Jamiat is 50% of the current govt, which means they are also 50% responsible towards everything. If they criticize the govt, they criticize their authority as well… Get this simple formula! Don’t spit in the wind…
— Spozhmai S Stanakzai (@SStanakzai) January 10, 2018
Party interests aside Jamiat should also disdain from parallel power hubs, if they are visionary they should seek centralization of power otherwise tomorrow if a Jamiat member is elected as the president the same will repeat but in different parts of Afg.
— Arsalan (@Ghil_zai) January 16, 2018
These demands of Jamiat-I-Islami shows that talks will fail eventually and the president will be left with no option but to remove Atta Noor through the use of power.https://t.co/HlLgCtcLZg
— Zia Wahaj (@WahajZia) January 13, 2018
It is believed that the Jamiat will agree to Noor's dismissal only if the party itself, rather than Ghani, is able to name his successor.The party also wishes to reform the constitution of Afghanistan, by holding traditional grand council (Loya Jirga).
Face-to-face talks between Jamiat and Ghani's office have yet to result in any breakthrough, however.
Afghanistan is heavily dependent on American civilian and military aid and Washington has intervened in a number of domestic political standoffs.
On January 16, the White House produced a readout of US Vice-President Mike Pence's phone conversation with Ghani, touching on the situation with Noor:
Vice President Pence and President Ghani discussed the political leadership in the Balkh province. The Vice President emphasized his support for the Afghan government to engage with Balkh Governor Atta and conduct a peacefully negotiated transition of leadership.
Afghan security analyst Bashir Bezhen pointed out that Pence’s legitimising reference to Noor as governor made it unlikely that Kabul would resort to force to dislodge him.
There was fear before the phone call that the government will resort to a military move to oust Atta, and his supporters would respond with force…Now that fear is gone.

author: Ezzatullah Mehrdad


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Justice Deferred: Uproar After Turkish Court Releases, Re-Arrests Amnesty International’s Taner Kilic · Global Voices
Arzu Geybullayeva

Supporters gather outside the courthouse in Turkey. Photo by Arzu Geybullayeva.
A small crowd was gathered outside Caglayan court. They held “Free Taner” signs while representatives from the Amnesty International's Turkey office were read their demands out loud.
“We demand an unconditional release for Taner,” said one of the human rights defenders, speaking to a group of journalists at the January 31 gathering.
There was a palpable burst of surprise and relief among family and friends when the court ordered the conditional release of Taner Kilic, chair of Amnesty International Turkey, who has spent eight months in prison. He was the only one left behind bars after the court released all members of the #Istanbul10 human rights defenders group in October of last year.
This joy was short-lived, however. The prosecutor — who had already requested that Taner be kept in detention — immediately appealed the decision, and the second court granted the request.
Just a day later, the first court accepted the second court's decision to continue his detention. Kilic is now likely to remain in jail until the next hearing, which is scheduled for June 21, 2018.
@OSCEPA Human rights chair @NachoSAmor concerned about reversal of court decision on @Amnesty Turkey head #TanerKilichttps://t.co/Vz2sdJj5y7
— OSCE PA (@oscepa) February 1, 2018
In a statement following the reversal, Amnesty's Secretary General Salil Shetty said:
This is the latest example of the crisis in Turkey's justice system that is ruining lives and hollowing out the right to a fair trial. To have been granted release only to have the door to freedom so callously slammed in his face is devastating for Taner, his family and all who stand for justice in Turkey.
Kilic is accused of being a member of a terrorist group, a charge that his supporters and the international human rights community have broadly dismissed as bogus. More precisely, Kilic is accused of using a messaging app called ByLock that was allegedly used by coup plotters in July 2016.
Kilic and his lawyers argued no such app was ever downloaded on his phone during the hearing yesterday.
Taner presents the evidence that he didn’t download or use ByLock. The prosecution hasn’t presented any that he did. Despite this, the prosecutor requests that Taner remains in pre-trial prison detention.
— Andrew Gardner (@andrewegardner) January 31, 2018
Taner’s lawyer presents a third expert witness report to the court that again concludes that Taner didn’t use ByLock. This one shows that Taner had two ‘mor beyin’ apps known to falsely show connections to ByLock. It is absolutely clear that Taner didn’t have ByLcok.
— Andrew Gardner (@andrewegardner) January 31, 2018
Kilic joined the hearing via video link as he was bring held in a prison in the western province of Izmir. He has denied using the app on many occasions, including on January 31. After several hours of witness questioning, the court took a brief recess, after which it announced its ultimately short-lived decision to release Kilic on bail.
At that moment, a collective burst of joy could be felt in the air and online:
Court rules to release Amnesty Turkey chair Taner Kılıç. At last!!!
— Andrew Gardner (@andrewegardner) January 31, 2018
The brother and daughter of #TanerKılıç overjoyed at the news of Taner’s release. One step towards justice! pic.twitter.com/OnwabX2pIi
— May Carolan (@may_carolan) January 31, 2018
Great news, long overdue. Congratulations to Team Turkey and all our campaigners and activists who worked so hard over the 8 month period of unjust confinement! The fight for human rights in Turkey continues. Too many human rights defenders still in jail. https://t.co/Ohmvmw1wHY
— Salil Shetty (@SalilShetty) January 31, 2018
Just hours later, the news of the new court decision sent a devastating blow to Taner's family:
To have been granted release only to have the door to freedom so callously slammed in his face is devastating for Taner, his family & all who stand for justice in Turkey.” @amnesty‘s @SalilShetty on the re-arrest & re-detention of #TanerKılıç. #FreeTaner: https://t.co/sIu7zAZGAn pic.twitter.com/s9ptMI7wEj
— Amnesty UK (@AmnestyUK) February 1, 2018
The last 24 hours:
1. Court A orders the release of Amnesty’s Turkey chair Taner Kilic (yesterday) after nearly 8 months in prison
2. After prosecutor appeals, court B orders Kilic to remain in custody (last night)
3. Court A overturns its original verdict (this morning). https://t.co/FcuJA9baKY
— Piotr Zalewski (@p_zalewski) February 1, 2018
Here we are. Our colleague, @amnesty Turkey chair #TanerKılıç will NOT be released. The court changed its mind… Why? Who knows, no grounds provided. Devastating for the family and an affront to justice. #FreeTaner https://t.co/G5iuVmA6dI
— Gauri van Gulik (@GaurivanGulik) February 1, 2018
This is not the first time a court has overruled its own decision.
Too sorry for Taner and for Turkish Judiciary Unfortunately it is not a new issue , several release decision have not been enforced in Turkey . pic.twitter.com/DrnEwh12kF
— Cansu İpek – LAWYER (@cansuipek40TR) February 1, 2018
Utterly shocking! Ordering prisoners’ release and immediately throwing them back to jail seems to become a habit of #Turkey‘s judiciary. This was applied to several #journalists last year.
Stop this cruel game, #FreeTaner! #FreeRightsDefenders #FreeThemAll https://t.co/YqRmWUjUDD
— RSF_EECA (@RSF_EECA) January 31, 2018
The author of this article attended the January 31 hearing at the Caglayan courthouse in Istanbul.

author: Arzu Geybullayeva


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Kenyan TV Networks Censored for Airing Symbolic ‘Swearing In’ of Opposition Leader Raila Odinga · Global Voices
Diphus Ng'eny

Raila Odinga speaks at the 2013 World Economic Forum. Photo by WEF via Flickr (CC BY-SA 2.0)
When Kenyan opposition leader Raila Odinga was symbolically — if not legally — sworn in as the “people's president” on January 30, three major broadcasting networks were unplugged by the Government of Kenya.
Uhuru Kenyatta was sworn in for a second term as president on November 28, 2017 after winning a controversial re-run election, which was held in October 2017 after the country's Supreme Court annulled the results of the initial August 2017 vote, having found “irregularities and illegalities”. Raila Odinga did not participate in re-run, arguing that systemic flaws that produced these irregularities had not been addressed. The elections were marked with protests, multiple incidents of violence and destruction of property.
After months of uncertainty, incumbent president Uhuru Kenyatta remains in power. But supporters of Raila Odinga remain committed to his campaign and cause.
On January 30, 2018, thousands of Kenyans flocked to the famous Uhuru Park to witness a symbolic swearing-in ceremony for Raila Odinga of the National Super Alliance (NASA). The majority of attendees were mainly people from Western, Nyanza, Coast and Eastern parts of Kenya where NASA enjoys sizable support.
Some Kenyans did not go to work and decided they were going to watch this historic event from the comfort and safety of their homes. To their disappointment, the government decided to disconnect all the major broadcasting stations in the country including KTN News, Citizen TV and Inooro TV (both owned by Royal Media Services) and NTV, preventing them from effectively airing live coverage of the event.
Raila Odinga being “sworn in” as the Kenya's People's President [Screen shot taken on February 1, 2018]
According to Kenya's Attorney general, the mock ceremony was “treasonous” and therefore, in their view, had no place on national television.
The Committee to Protect Journalists reported that President Kenyatta and other executive staff “summoned media managers and editors on January 26 and threatened to shut their stations down and revoke their licenses” if they proceeded with the broadcast.
This raised a loud uproar from civil society organizations and Kenyans in general from all walks of life and different political affiliations. The freedom of media is well-anchored in Kenya’s 2010 constitution, but this did not stop the Kenyatta government from denying Kenyans access to information
While Odinga indeed does not hold the office of the President in Kenya, the ceremony at hand was more than just a show of support for Odinga and the NASA.
It came as the result of the People's Assemblies Bill, a motion tabled in all opposition-controlled counties that legalized “the formation of the people's assemblies in the devolved units”. The People’s Assemblies bill has been passed by at least 20 county governments out of 47.
According to the People’s Assemblies bill, the power is vested in the people and their assemblies will have the power to recognize a leader of their choice. Though this move by a select number of counties was perceived to be unconstitutional, it received substantial national support. The law also allows anybody of the capacity of a high court judge to administer the oath.
Most of all I thank the good Lord, my family and all those who have undertaken this journey with us. We have arrived in Canaan; thank you for staying the course with us. Asanteni sana. pic.twitter.com/6gdZBfxVAv
— Raila Odinga (@RailaOdinga) January 30, 2018
The swearing in ceremony of Mr. Odinga was meant to be held in 2017, but it was delayed due to a deep divide between Odinga and his core principals.
In the January 30 swearing-in ceremony, Mr. Odinga’s running mate, Stephen Kalonzo Musyoka and other NASA core principles, Musalia Mudavadi and Moses Wetangula, did not turn up to the historic event. This kept Odinga waiting for too long, and infuriated the highly-charged crowd.
With advice from his key supporters, Odinga decided to take an oath of office as the people’s president in the absence of his running mate Stephen Kalonzo Musyoka and other NASA principles. Musyoka claimed they did not turn up at the Uhuru Park for the swearing in ceremony because their security guards were withdrawn by the state:
I was left alone. I stayed (at home) until about 11 am, and that is the time journalists came to my home. I left. We had spoken on phone with Hon Raila, Wetang’ula and Mudavadi to plan our journey to Uhuru Park. We did not get there. We found ourselves, Wetang’ula, Mudavadi and I, because we did not have bodyguards, unable to leave the room. That is what happened…
On the other side, the ruling government insisted that the move is unconstitutional and warned that it is treasonous and “a mockery” to take oath of office when there is a legitimate government in place. The Cabinet Secretary, Fred Matiang'i,  threatened that those who engaged in the exercise would be arrested and charged in a court of law.
True to his words, the member of parliament for Ruaraka T.J Ojwanng who led the “swearing-in” was arrested on 31 January 2018 in a local restaurant in the city.
Contrary to the popular view that blood would be shed, the symbolic swearing-in exercise was peaceful. The police kept away from Uhuru Park where the ceremony took place. This was a strategic move by the government as they knew that if the police were present in the venue, this would have provoked confrontation between the NASA supporters and the police. This could have resulted in major casualties.
A statement by the Kenya's Editors Guild charged that President Kenyatta had “threatened to shut down and revoke the licences of any media house” that airs the swearing in of Odinga:
The media remains a mere messenger and a chronicler of any events happening in our country. Our country's vibrant media is made up of competent professionals in journalists and editors that continue to make sound decisions on what constitutes news, in public interest… The Guild is appalled by the details of the meeting which was held under an atmosphere of intimidation for the media representatives present… We condemn and reject the threats and purported instructions issued at the State House on Friday…
Fred Matiang'i, the interior cabinet secretary, announced that the “media houses will remain closed until we complete investigations.”
Three journalists at NTV told Reuters that plainclothes security officers came to their office and hovered outside the entrance, leaving the three fearful that they would be arrested if they tried to exit the building. The journalists — Linus Kaikai, Larry Madowo and Ken Mijungu — reported that security sources had warned that they'd be arrested. Linua Kaikai is the managing editor for NTV, and also serves as the chair of Kenya's Editors’ Guild.
The Kenya Media Council has condemned the network suspensions and muzzling of the press by the government and called for the stations to be “switched on“:
The media council is shocked that at the recent turn of events in Kenya, a political contest has turned out into the greatest threat and assault on freedom of expression… While it was initially alleged that the switch off was to stop media houses from airing live the swearing in of Raila Odinga, more than 24 hours their signals have not been restored and no explanation put forward as to when they will be allowed to resume operations.
On February 1, Kenya's High Court suspended the shutdown of the affected stations. The government has, however, defied the court order. According to the New York Times, a spokesman for the ministry of interior suggested that the government could appeal its case, since relevant representatives were not in court at the time of the suspension order.
The persecution of the press in Kenya is a sad reminder of the authoritarian rule that once characterized that East African country under the civilian dictatorship of President Arab Moi.
Writing for Al Jazeera, Nanjala Nyabola asserts that the move was “painful, self-destructive and counterproductive”:
The Jubilee administration doesn't need another battlefront given the legitimacy questions leftover by [the] contentious 2017 election, and it is unclear from a purely instrumentalist perspective why they would open one up. By responding with so much force, the administration unwittingly signalled that the NASA event rattled them even while the actual “inauguration” was rather anticlimactic. Odinga was only on stage for about 15 minutes. None of the other NASA principles turned up. For most of the morning, viewers were treated to panoramic images of the crowd gathering at Uhuru Park and a gaggle of men offering in-studio analysis. Switching off three media houses just because you can is the definition of swatting a fly on your head with a hammer – painful, self-destructive and counterproductive.

author: Diphus Ng'eny


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‘According to the Digital Security Law, I am a Spy’: Bangladeshi Journalists Defend Their Right to Investigate · Global Voices
পান্থ রহমান রেজা (Pantha)

Screenshot from Facebook – people protesting with #আমিগুপ্তচর (#IAmSpy) hashtag
Since January 29, dozens of journalists in Bangladesh have claimed, in their social media profiles, that they are spies.
Holding placards bearing the #আমিগুপ্তচর hashtag (pronounced “Ami Guptochor”, and meaning “#IAmaSpy” in the Bengali language) they are speaking out against a newly proposed law that would criminalize key research practices of investigative journalists.
The 2018 Digital Security Act, still in draft, is said to target digital crimes. The current draft was approved by the Council of Ministers of Bangladesh government on January 29 and is scheduled to be submitted to the Jatiya Sangsad (National Parliament) for approval. The act is expected to be approved without opposition, thanks to the majority held by the ruling Bangladesh Awami League party.
The Act is intended to replace the 2006 Information and Communication Technology Act (amended in 2013), which has drawn much criticism over the past years. The notorious Section 57 of the law prohibits digital messages that can “deteriorate” law and order, “prejudice the image of the state or person,” or “hurt religious beliefs.” For these non-bailable offenses, the punishment is a minimum seven years in prison and a hefty fine. These vague terms paved the way for dozens of journalists and hundreds of bloggers and online activists to be prosecuted for their writings and comments on social media. The Law Minister Anisul Huq promised in July 2017 that Section 57 would be scrapped.
The Section 32 of the proposed act stipulates:
If a person enters any government, semi-government or autonomous institutions illegally, and secretly records any information or document with electronic instruments, it will be considered as an act of espionage and he/she will face 14 years of imprisonment or a fine of BDT 2 million (US$ 24,000) or both.
Many journalists and online activists fear that their investigative work to expose irregularities by government employees and politicians could be regarded as espionage.
৫৭ থেকে ৩২, প্রতিবাদ থেকে ধিক্কার। ডিজিটাল নিরাপত্তা আইনের ভাষায়, এখন আমি গুপ্তচর!
আসুন স্বঘোষিত এই গুপ্তচরকে গ্রেফতার করুন এবং সাংবাদিকতাকে গলা টিপে হত্যা করার মিশনে সফল হয়ে দেশকে এগিয়ে নিয়ে যান। #আমিগুপ্তচর pic.twitter.com/dupCdfBdeI
— Al Mamun Shaon (@shaon1news) February 2, 2018
From Section 57 to Section 32, from protests to shaming. According to the Digital Security Act, I am a spy! Come arrest this self-proclaimed spy and let this country progress by strangling the journalists.
Journalist Parvez Reza, Special Correspondent at Ekattor Television, is believed to be the person who started the trend. He wrote in a Facebook post:
অনেকেরই প্রশ্ন, কেন সাংবাদিকরা নিজেকে গুপ্তচর হিসেবে স্বীকার করে নিচ্ছে? সহজ উত্তর, সরকার, রাষ্ট্র এখন আইনের মাধ্যমে আমাদের গুপ্তচর বৃত্তির অভিযোগে অভিযুক্ত করার পায়তারা করছে।[…]
Many are asking, “why are journalists calling themselves spies?” The answer is simple, the government is trying to criminalize our investigative work by booking us as spies.
Investigative journalist Badruddoza Babu fumes:
#আমিগুপ্তচর। আমি বদরুদ্দোজা বাবু। অনুসন্ধান করি, সাংবাদিকতা করি। মানুষের স্বার্থে কাজ করি। অনিয়ম আর দুর্নীতি খুঁজি। ফলে আমাকে সরকারি অনেক নথি জোগাড় করতে হয়! ডিজিটাল নিরাপত্তা আইনের ভাষায়, এখন আমি গুপ্তচর!
#IAmSpy. I am Badruddoza Babu. I investigate, I am a journalist. I work for the people searching for irregularities and corruption. I have to get a lot of evidence secretly. According to the latest Digital Security Law, I am a spy.
Journalist Rozina Islam told BBC Bangla in an interview that the Digital Security Act will make the process of obtaining evidence for news articles very difficult.
There are 48 sections in the proposed Digital Security Act. The journalists initially reacted to its section 32, which says that unsolicited collection of information from any government, semi-government or autonomous institutions using electronic devices will be defined as digital spying.
There are a number of other sections in this new act that could threaten online free expression and media rights in the country. Section 57 of the soon-to-be-scrapped ICT Act stipulated a maximum sentence of 14 years in prison for offenses such as defamation, hurting religious sentiments, causing deterioration of law and order and instigating against any person or organization. The draft of Digital Security Act splits these offenses into four separate sections with punishment ranging from three to 10 years’ term. Some of the other more striking portions of the law include:
- Section 27: Material in websites or in electronic devices that hurts religious beliefs. The offense is non-bailable and punishment is 5 years imprisonment and BDT 1 million (USD$ 12,000) fine or both.
- Section 28: Publication of false and degrading remarks in media. The offense is bailable and punishment is 3 years imprisonment and BDT 300,000 (USD$ 3,600) fine or both.
-  A lifetime prison sentence for spreading negative propaganda against the Liberation War or the Father of the Nation using digital devices
- Authorization for security agencies to search or arrest anyone without any warrant if a police officer believes that an offense under the Act has been committed or there is a possibility of crimes
Barrister Jyotirmoy Barua, an advocate of Supreme Court in Bangladesh says in an interview with Monitor:
The Digital Security Act is an Eyewash. It is section 57 for all intent and purposes. All the provisions have merely been redistributed among other sections. Its approval will ensure that people lose their freedom of speech.
Barua also mentions in an interview with Dhaka Tribune:
Why won’t I be able to record something wrong happening before my eyes? If I try to copy classified government records, we have the Official Secrecy Act for that.
Screenshot from Facebook
Journalist and blogger Maskwaith Ahsan observed that the government is following the colonial era official secrets act in this new act. He writes in Facebook:
ডিজিটাল নিরাপত্তা আইন ২০১৮ প্রণয়ন দেখে অনুভূত হয়; সরকার ২০১৮ সালের বাস্তবতায় বসে ১৯১৮ সালের তামাদি শাসন কৌশল অনুসরণের চেষ্টা করছে। বৃটিশ শাসনে অফিশিয়াল সিক্রেসি এক্ট বা দাপ্তরিক গোপনীয়তা আইন প্রণীত হয়েছিলো। ঔপনিবেশিক অপশাসন চালিয়ে যাবার জন্যই জনগণের স্বার্থে পরিচালিত সরকারী দপ্তরের তথ্য জানার অধিকার থেকে জনগণকেই বঞ্চিত করার অপচেষ্টা চালানো হয়েছিলো এই আইনের মাধ্যমে।
Seeing the Digital Security Act 2018 passed, it seems that the government is trying to follow the tactics of the governance of 1918 in the reality of 2018. During the British colonial rule, this official secrets act was introduced. The main focus of this law was to expand colonialism and prevent the common people from obtaining information in government offices.
Journalist Aditya Arafat feels that section 32 is the last nail in the coffin to restrict investigative journalism. He writes:
এ ধারায় অনুসন্ধানী সাংবাদিকতা বলতে কিছুই থাকবে না। সারাবিশ্বেই অনুসন্ধানী বা অনিয়ম-দুর্নীতি নিয়ে রিপোর্টিংয়ের তথ্য সাংবাদিকরা জনস্বার্থে গোপনেই নিয়ে থাকেন। এ ধারার প্রয়োগে কোনো দুর্নীতির সংবাদের তথ্য সংগ্রহ করা যাবে না। এমনিতেই দেশে অনুসন্ধানী সাংবাদিকতা, দুর্নীতি বিরোধী রিপোর্টং করা অনেক ঝুঁকির। থাকে মামলা হামলার শংকা। [..]আর যাই হোক ধারাটি যারা তৈরি করেছেন তারা অসৎ সরকারি কর্মকর্তা-কর্মচারি এবং দুর্নীতি পরায়ন ব্যক্তিদের বাহবা পাবেন, হয়তো পাচ্ছেনও।
If this law is implemented there will no more be any investigative journalism. In other parts of the world, journalists obtain information on corruption or irregularities secretly in public interest. This law will not let information be collected. The process of investigative journalism and reporting against irregularity are very dangerous in this country. The journalists brave the fear of the lawsuits. Those who wrote this law will get accolades from the corrupt and dishonest officials and maybe already they have.
Parvez Reza reacted to the Law Minister's statement in an interview with online site Sarabangla.net:
আইনমন্ত্রী বলছেন, ” গুপ্তচরবৃত্তি আর সাংবাদিকতা এক নয়, দুর্নীতির খবর করলে এই আইন প্রযোজ্য হবে না।” আপনি কিভাবে নিশ্চয়তা দিচ্ছেন মন্ত্রী বাহাদুর? আইনের প্রতিটা প্রয়োগ কি আপনাকে জিজ্ঞেস করে হবে? ৫৭ ধারা অপপ্রয়োগের শিকার কিন্তু সাংবাদিকরাই বেশি হয়েছেন।
The law minister said “espionage and journalism are not the same, this law will not be applicable for reporting about irregularities”. How can you be sure Mr. Minsiter? Will every imposition of the law be controlled by you? Journalists were at the receiving end of the misuse of the section 57 of the ICT act.
ডিজিটাল নিরাপত্তা আইন-২০১৮ এর বিরুদ্ধে প্রতিবাদ জানাই।
মুক্ত থাকুক অনুসন্ধানী সাংবাদিকদের কলম।#আমিগুপ্তচর
— MUHAMMAD NABIL (@nabilbdOFFICIAL) January 31, 2018
I protest the Digital Security Act 2018. Let the pen of the investigative journalist live on. #IAmSpy
Scenes of protest. The police did not allow the use of microphones.
Along with journalists, various political parties, members of the civil society and ordinary people are protesting the law. An editorial published by The Independent notes that “recommendations of stakeholders were ignored in the formulation of the draft act”. They have urged the government to hold a public consultation before enacting the law.

author: পান্থ রহমান রেজা (Pantha)


text:
Deki the Balkan Lynx Is All Grown Up, Photos Show, but His Species Remains in Trouble · Global Voices
Filip Stojanovski

Deki the lynx from Macedonia's Mavrovo National Park, pictured as a cub in 2013, and as an adult 2017. Photos by Macedonian Ecological Society, used with permission.
They are among the Balkans’ most reclusive residents. That's why environmentalists in Macedonia and Albania and their allies in Western Europe are highlighting recently captured images of a lynx called Deki to generate support for protection of the critically endangered species.
During the first week of February 2018, the Macedonian Ecological Society – MES released before-and-after photos of Deki, shot using camera traps in Mavrovo National Park. The first photo from 2013 shows him as an eight-month-old cub trailing his mother, while the second shows him as a fully grown individual. In 2015, MES used a GPS collar to track his movements and discovered that Deki “owns” far greater territory than the neighboring lynxes, covering a range of 888 square kilometers (343 square miles).
There are only an estimated few dozen individual lynx in the wild. For 12 years now, the felines have been the focus of the Balkan Lynx Recovery Program, an effort made up of activists on both sides of the Macedonia-Albania border. The organizations directly involved have been using the materials produced during field research to raise awareness of the need to expand protections in existing national parks, as well as add new ones in order to connect the areas where the Balkan lynx lives.
Cypriot nature photographer Silvio Rusmigo documented the process of setting up the cameras and box traps in Macedonia. Scientists use the box traps to temporarily capture the animals in order to study and tag them with GPS radio collars. In an article relating the experience, Rusmigo wrote about the difficulty of encountering lynx:
Deforestation is one of the main threats to the area’s wildlife; one that is swiftly noticed as one arrives on the south-west Balkan Mountains. Logging activities carried out on horseback, owing to the inaccessibility of these mountains, leave the sight of wounded trees of which only fragments can be transported down. As evident as the thinning of the forest, is the despair outlined on the faces of those working hard for the cat’s protection. Joining the 2017 spring fieldwork and listening to their stories, the conservationists’ disappointment far surpasses that caused by employing a whole team to drive for hours and hike up to a remote location following the trigger of a box trap, only to find that it was activated by a passing owl. The agony of the confused owl may vanish after its release; but for the Balkan Lynx team, the let-down brought about by years of efforts on a road filled with elements that hinder their fruition, such as the seizing of a box-trap which took place during my short stay, lingers on and makes one wonder of their persistence to carry on.
During 2017, the Protection and Preservation of Natural Environment in Albania – PPNEA, which is part of the Balkan Lynx Recovery Program, released camera trap photos of lynx from Nikaj-Merturi regional nature park in northeastern Albania, which borders Kosovo. The brown bear, the wild boar, the roe deer and the red fox also live in the area, which is connected to Valbona National Park. Activists had been protesting to prevent construction of hydro-power plants there that they fear would destroy the ecosystem.
Balkan lynx mother and cub on Jablanica Mountain, Macedonia. Photo by Macedonian Ecological Society, used with permission.
Most of the lynx population in Macedonia has been documented in Mavrovo National Park. In 2010 the former Macedonian government initiated a major hydro-power project in the area; however, a successful advocacy campaign lead by the NGO Eko-svest managed to prove the negative environmental impact to the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), which canceled the loan, effectively terminating the project.
In addition, MES had been publishing photos of lynx appearences outside of the Mavrovo National Park. In June 2017, their releases showed a lair with a small cub near Kichevo, in the area of Ilinska Mountain. In November 2017, they also published night photos of a mother and a cub from the unprotected mountain of Jablanica, which borders a national park on the Albanian side. Macedonian Ecological Society representative Dime Melovski said in response that it's a positive sign that lynx reproduction is taking place outside of the core Mavrovo National Park area.
Another Macedonian NGO, Ploshtad Sloboda, released an online documentary to advocate granting national park status to Shar Planina, a mountain range that runs through Kosovo, Macedonia and Albania, in order to grant the lynx protection. This film is in Macedonian, but also uses English subtitles:
The following map, compiled by Global Voices team, illustrates how areas where lynx have been photographed are not connected:
Balkan lynx ‘captured’ by camera traps in Macedonia and Albania since 2012. Map made by Global Voices, based on Wikipedia map of the region, data by EuroNatur and fair use of photos by Macedonian Ecological Society – MES (2, 4, 5) and Protection and Preservation of Natural Environment in Albania – PPNEA (1 and 3). CC BY.
Besides loss of habitat, wildlife in the Balkans had been subject to poaching, in particular due to political corruption that allowed local strongmen to indulge in proving their “macho” attitudes with impunity. Recently in Macedonia, hunters who bragged on Facebook about killing endangered species, such as chamois, and uploaded photos were heavily criticized, but there's no public record of any follow-up by police on their claims.
A decades-old stuffed lynx and other local animals adorn the reception desk of a hotel in Mavrovo Ski Resort, located within the National Park. Photo by Global Voices, CC-BY.
In December 2017, the 37th Standing Committee meeting of the Bern Convention on the Conservation of European Wildlife and Natural Habitats accepted an initiative by the Albanian Ministry for Tourism and Environment to include the Balkan lynx (Lynx lynx balcanicus) in Appendix II of the convention. This will serve as basis for expanding international efforts to save the species, while activists also interpreted it as form of recognition of their efforts.
Yesss!#Balkan #lynx enlisting to appendix 2 of #BernConvention just adopted unanimously!
Success!!! @ContactMES
— Eko-svest (@Eko_svest) December 5, 2017

author: Filip Stojanovski