text:
Google Mapping of Public Toilets Is the Latest Effort to Stop Open Defecation in India · Global Voices
Rezwan

A public toilet in India. Image from Flickr by Rezwan. CC BY-NC-SA
Access to public toilets in India is a perennial problem. Almost half of India's 1.2 billion people, especially in rural areas, lack flush toilet facilities inside their home and have to defecate in the open or in dry, unhygienic pits. The practice of open defecation leads to other problems — it fuels harassment of women and girls, keeps inhumane practices like manual scavenging (cleaning human waste by hand) alive, and spread diseases such as diarrhea and encephalitis.
In an effort to put an end to open defecation, Google and the Indian government have teamed up to map public toilets in India to help citizens locate usable ones near them.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has vowed to build more than 12 million toilets across India by 2019 as a part of his ambitious Swachh Bharat (Clean India) mission. But building toilets is the easy part — convincing people to use them is the real challenge. There is still a long way to go in terms of educating people about hygiene.
Not to mention, maintaining a public toilet clean and usable takes work, and sometimes you aren't able to find one when you need it most.
Now, Google and India's Ministry of Urban Development have developed a toilet locator tool within Google Maps that offers the location, address and opening hours of a few thousand communal and public toilets in the Indian capital Delhi and a few other cities.
The initiative launched in New Delhi and the state of Madhya Pradesh on December 22, and soon will be expanded to other places in India. Toilet locations are marked “swachh public toilet” on Google Maps. Each restroom also includes a description of if it is free to use, what kind of toilet it is (a squat toilet or a western-style pot), and a star rating to help users locate the cleaner ones.
Cool! Now, getting around #India just got lighter! #Google #Maps launches public toilet locator! https://t.co/3V07h0RsDK
— C. S. Prakash (@AgBioWorld) December 23, 2016
Some Indians poked fun at the initiative:
Dear Google, just ensure that you dont show every household in your map as a place for public toilet https://t.co/xgmBo2phxl
— KARTHIK S (@karthiks_india) December 22, 2016
While on the news site Quartz India, Ananya Bhattacharya cautioned for people to treat the potential of the feature realistically:
It would be naive to think Google’s efforts will change attitudes and rectify India’s sanitation troubles altogether, especially since nearly 900 million Indians don’t have access to the internet, which is necessary to view the map. But for those who want and are able to reach a nearby toilet, the maps could prove to be a real asset.
As open defecation is an issue elsewhere in the world, it will be interesting to see if Google Maps implements this feature globally.


text:
Imprisoned Iranian Activist Faces New Charges After Complaint About Mistreatment · Global Voices
Center for Human Rights in Iran

Iranian civil rights defender Atena Daemi, who is serving a seven-year prison sentence in Tehran’s Evin Prison for her peaceful activism, faces new charges after filing a complaint against the Revolutionary Guards for using excessive force. Image from ICHRI, and used with permission.
A version of this article was originally published on the website of the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran.
Iranian civil rights defender Atena Daemi, who is serving a seven-year prison sentence in Tehran’s Evin Prison for her peaceful activism, faces new charges after filing a complaint against the Revolutionary Guards for using excessive force.
Daemi was initially arrested on October 21, 2014 by the Revolutionary Guards’ Intelligence Organization and held for 16 months for allegedly meeting families of political prisoners, criticizing the Islamic Republic on Facebook, and condemning the state’s massacre of political prisoners in 1988.
“After my daughter was detained [to start her prison term], she and her father filed separate complaints against the Revolutionary Guards for breaking and entering into our home and taking Atena away without showing a summons,” Daemi’s mother, Masoumeh Nemati, told the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran on December 20, 2016.
“Strangely, their complaints have not been investigated, but the complaint has quickly turned into five new charges against my daughter,” she added.
“They acted as if they had come to arrest a dangerous fugitive,” wrote Daemi in an open letter from prison about her arrest by agents of the Revolutionary Guards’ Sarallah Headquarters on November 26. “When asked to produce a warrant, they attacked me. One of the agents, who I’m embarrassed to say was a woman, started to beat me. Then when my younger sister tried to intervene, she beat her on the chest, too.”
Daemi, 29, appeared at the Shahid Moghaddas Court inside Evin Prison on December 19 and was charged with “insulting the supreme leader,” “insulting state officials,” “spreading lies,” “resisting arrest” and “assaulting the arresting agent.” Her trial is scheduled for early January 2017, said Nemati.
Nemati told the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran that her daughter’s interrogators showed Daemi a film secretly recorded on the day of her arrest as evidence that they had entered her home legally without the use of force. While noting that Daemi intends to sue the Revolutionary Guards’ for “unlawfully” filming her without permission, Nemati added that the film actually contradicts their claims about her daughter’s behavior.
“Atena said she is now being charged with resisting arrest, but the film showed she didn’t resist,” said Nemati. “She is also being charged with assaulting the arresting agent, but she said the film shows otherwise.”
The Appeals Court upheld guilty verdicts against Daemi and three other activists on September 29, 2016 for “assembly and collusion against national security” and “insulting the supreme leader.” Daemi and Omid Alishenas were each sentenced to seven years in prison while Aso Rostami and Ali Nouri were each sentenced to two years.

source: news-globalvoices

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

author: Center for Human Rights in Iran


text:
Praise, Condemnation After Nigeria’s Offer to Grant Corruption Whistleblowers 5% of the Take · Global Voices
Eta Uso

A local market in Abuja, Nigeria. Corruption affects the poor the most. Creative Commons image by Flickr user Jeff Attaway.
A few days ago, Nigeria's Federal Executive Council (FEC) approved a new whistleblowing policy aimed at exposing fraud and other related crimes in the private and public sectors. Announcing the policy, Nigeria's Finance Minister, Kemi Adeosun said:
If there is a voluntary return of stolen or concealed public funds or assets on the account of the information provided, the whistleblower may be entitled to anywhere between 2.5 per cent (minimum) and 5 per cent (maximum) of the total amount recovered.
She also noted that the 5% reward to whistleblowers was to encourage the country's citizens to buy into the whistle blowers scheme.
To take advantage of this system, whistleblowers are expected to submit information via an online portal. In addition, individuals who make reports via the portal would be able to track the status of their reports online. Submissions by phone and email would also be accepted.
Global Financial Integrity estimates more than US$157 billion has left Nigeria through corruption in the past decade. The country is the 136th least corrupt country of 175 countries surveyed in the 2015 Corruption Perceptions Index of Transparency International.
However, while the new whistleblowers scheme and accompanying commission might seem like an incentive for Nigerian citizens to participate in the fight against financial and related crimes, the scheme has seen a range of reactions, from sarcasm and outright condemnation, to praise, online.
Reno Omokri, a writer and former Nigerian government spokesman based in California, USA, tweeted:
With President Buhari's new policy, will @DinoMelaye get ₦13.5 million for exposing the SGF's alleged ₦270 million grass cutter corruption?
— Reno Omokri (@renoomokri) December 22, 2016
Omokri was referring to a scandal involving the use of  N270m (about US $850,000) to clear grass by the office of the Secretary to Government of the Federation (SGF).
Sandy Gold, a staunch social media commentator and supporter of Nigeria's major opposition party, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), had this to say:
Flash: Nigerian govt have finally adopted MMM to improve the lives of the citizens
Expose corrupt Nigerians & get 5% of the recovered loot
— Sandy Gold (@SandraSandygold) December 23, 2016
‘MMM’ (Mavrodi Mondial Movement) as mentioned by Sandy Gold is a popular get-rich-quick scheme in Nigeria that promises 30% profit on any capital invested after a thirty-day cycle.
Olusegun, a controversial political commentator, tweeted in humour:
If you have a sugar daddy/mummy that has not been “providing help” and you have credible information on his/her ill gotten wealth. DM Me!
— D.O (@DOlusegun) December 22, 2016
Remi Sonaiya, presidential candidate in the 2015 general elections in Nigeria, was displeased with the monetary rewards offered through the whistle blower scheme, and had the following questions:
1. Re. 5% of recovered loot for whistleblowers. Q: What's supposed to motivate whistle blowing – monetary gain? Love of truth & fairness?
— Remi Sonaiya (@oluremisonaiya) December 22, 2016
2. Ephesians 5:11 encourages whistle blowing: Have nothing to do with the works of darkness, but rather, expose them. Why don't we do it?
— Remi Sonaiya (@oluremisonaiya) December 22, 2016
3. Must everything bring a monetary reward? How about values like patriotism? Primarily, whistle blowers need protection…
— Remi Sonaiya (@oluremisonaiya) December 22, 2016
Jackson Ude, a Nigerian journalist and political commentator based in New York, USA, tweeted with a dose of sarcasm:
PMB is about to fulfill his promise by employing every Nigerian on a part-time to work for EFCC, Police & DSS to earn 5% of looted funds!
— Jackson Ude (@jacksonpbn) December 21, 2016
PMB refers to reformist President Muhammadu Buhari, EFCC is the Economic and Financial Crimes Commision and DSS is the Department of State Services (State Security).
Ahmed Umara joked:
5% commission for reporting looted funds ? people will start snitching on their uncles ?
— Ahmed Umara (@AhmedCastiel) December 21, 2016
Some Nigerians like Yunus saw the scheme as a profitable business venture requiring no investment:
Hello MMM Members, here is a better way of making money without puting kobo. ???
PMB Promise Whistleblower 5% of recovered looted funds.
— Yunus Jnr. |PMB (@yunusxonline) December 22, 2016
Kobo is a monetary unit of the Nigerian Naira, equal to one hundredth of one Naira.
Mr. Omojuwa, an analyst, brand influencer and self acclaimed certified ruffler of feathers, felt the 5% commission to whistleblowers could be too much depending on the size of the recovered loot or asset. He tweeted:
5% is too much. Otherwise there has to be a cap. 5% of a N10b loot is N500m. That's a lot. @officialEFCC should get ~ 1% of recovered loot. https://t.co/5VailXKeq1
— JJ. Omojuwa (@Omojuwa) December 21, 2016
All in all, while most Nigerians are pessimistic about the way the scheme will be implemented, others are optimistic it will motivate ordinary citizens to bring endemic corruption to light. After all, there are precious few alternatives at the moment.

author: Eta Uso


text:
Serbian Government Backtracks on Russia-Inspired Anti-Abortion Council · Global Voices
Filip Stojanovski

Slavica Ðukić Dejanović. Photo by OSCE Parliamentary Assembly, CC BY-NC-SA.
Serbian government officials are claiming that uproar over alleged plans to establish a state body to persuade women to avoid abortions is all a misunderstanding.
Slavica Đukić Dejanović, a minister without portfolio responsible for demography and population policy, reportedly told pro-government tabloid Informer confirming that the state would “form a body that would raise awareness of all women about the harmful side effects of abortions.” Several other media outlets then picked up on the statement. According to news portal Alo.rs, the council would provide counseling on pregnancy and its termination, and “would include the civil sector, priests and various experts that would be able to help.”
With a population of about 7 million inhabitants, domestic media claim Serbia has one of the highest abortion rates in Europe, allegedly with 200,000 procedures per year that mostly go unreported. The official figure from the Institute for Public Health for 2015 is 16,863 abortions.
Initial news about this council claimed that the idea came from Russia, “a leading country by number of abortions.” Alo.rs quoted demographer Biljana Spasić, who praised the Russian model based on cooperation between the state and the church. According to her, mandatory counseling by psychologists and priests who “encourage women to preserve the life they carry in their belly” lowered the number of abortions.
Public reactions to the proposed counseling body were harsh.
Bilo kakva zabrana abortusa bi povećala broj NELEGALNIH intervencija, rizik od infekcija i veću smrtnost žena.#Abortus #Zdravstvo
— Dusan Milisavljevic (@DusanORLDusan) December 23, 2016
Any kind of prohibition of abortions would increase the number of ILLEGAL interventions, risk of infections and mortality of women. #Abortion #Health
Znate šta je posledica zabrane abortusa? Klinike u susedstvu trljaju ruke, a priučeni kasapi se igraju sa životima sirotinje.
— AleksandarStevanovic (@Stevanovich_A) December 24, 2016
You know the consequence of prohibition of abortion? Profit for the clinics in neighboring countries, and semi-skilled butchers playing with the lives of the poor.
Renowned film director Srđan Dragojević addressed the role of the Serbian Orthodox Church and its tax-exempt status.
Crkva bi mogla da placa porez a da ta davanja idu za mere koje pospesuju natalitet. A ne – borba protiv abortusa. Sve, zaboga, Naopako!
— Srdjan Dragojevic (@srdjandrago) December 23, 2016
The Church could start paying taxes, and those funds could be spent for measures that would increase the birthrate. But no, they choose to fight abortion. Everything, for God's sake, is turned upside down!
Minister Đukić Dejanović then issued a denial, published by Informer, noting that women's right to continue or terminate her pregnancy is “unalienable”:
- Neće biti formiran savet kao posebno telo, već će se pojačati rad u savetovalistima koja već postoje i u koja ćemo uključiti eksperte drugih struka – rekla je ona.
No council would be formed as a separate body, but the government intends to increase the counseling work in existing clinics, and we'll include experts from other fields, said the minister.
Serbian Deputy Prime Minister Zorana Mihajlovic also issued a statement, reaffirming the last message by the minister. She said that no anti-abortion council would be formed, but that the country needs a council for increasing the birthrate. She also denied collusion of the state with the church (which advocates prohibition of abortion) because “the next step would be campaigns that would put women who abort on the Pillar of Shame,” which would be undemocratic.
Serbian officials who want to clamp down on abortion wouldn't have to look far to see what possible consequences lie in wait. In 2013, Macedonia made changes to the country's abortion law that stipulated increased bureaucratic procedures including mandatory counseling sessions intended to persuade women not to abort, as well as threats of punishments for doctors. In parallel, anti-abortion media campaigns fueled the abortion stigma. Since then, the number of illegal abortions has risen, as well as in number of documented cases of women whose health was endangered due to denial of abortion.
Macedonia also has one of the highest infant mortality rates in Europe, and in recent years media have been reporting an increase in the number of infant deaths in state clinics. Some observers have suggested this is related to serious birth defects in infants who would have been a candidate for abortion if proper screenings and procedures were undertaken on time.
Most nationalist ideologies found in the Balkans include a segment that tries to incite feelings of guilt in young people who choose not to give birth to “enough” children to maintain “ethnic balance.” In Croatia since the 1990s and in Macedonia after 2006, anti-abortion projects have become part of state policies. Such policies rarely take into account the factors forcing young people to migrate from their home countries in droves, reducing the number of potential would-be-parents.
In the 1990s in Serbia, during the reign of Slobodan Milošević, state propaganda used the term “White Plague” (“bela kuga”) analogous to the Medieval Black Death, to increase the level of fear over depopulation. Current Serbian Prime Minister Aleksandar Vučić served as minister of information under that regime (1998-2000).

author: Filip Stojanovski


text:
What Worried Latin Americans in 2016? · Global Voices
Elizabeth Rivera

What worried Latin Americans in 2016?
A photo posted by Pictoline (@pictoline) on
Pictoline illustrated what, according to Google, were the top searches in some countries of Latin America on the web browser:
Mexico: “How to download Pokemon Go”
Costa Rica: “What happens if volcano Turrialba erupts?”
Panama: “How to make wooden beds?”
Colombia: “What is the Fellowship of the Ring?”
Peru: “How to make dog clothes?”
Chile: “How to make a concept map?”
Argentina: “How to lose the tummy?”
Uruguay: “How to decrease my internet use?”
Brazil: “What is love?”
On Facebook users commented on the results.
From Acapulco, Mexico, Diana Soto shared her despair regarding Mexico's result:
Diana Soto: Me dio risa el “¿Cómo hacer un mapa conceptual?” Pero luego vi a México con Pokemon Go y se me fue la risa.
Diana Soto: “How to make a concept map?” made me laugh. But then I saw Mexico with Pokemon Go and I lost the smile.
Gris Simonds-Gómez also felt Mexico's worries were trivial and posted ironically:
Gris Simonds-Gómez: A la mierda el narco, la inseguridad, la corrupcion, la obesidad y la miseria, yo quiero saber como bajar el pokemon go!
Gris Simonds-Gómez: Fuck the narco, insecurity, corruption, overweight and misery, I want to know how to download pokemon go!
While Adolfo Meza sarcastically commented on Peruvians’ searches:
Adolfo Meza: ammm al menos tendremos los perros mas fashion de américa…
Adolfo Meza: well, at least we'll have the most fashionable dogs in America…
Meanwhile Felipe Maluenda, from Antofagasta, Chile jokingly admitted his contribution to his country's top search results:
Felipe Eduardo Maluenda Bravo Yo soy el culpable de “¿Como hacer un mapa conceptual?”, todo el maldito año busqué eso para hacer mis tareas y aún no sé cómo se hace
Felipe Eduardo Mauelanda Bravo: I am the one responsible of “How to make a conceptual map?”, I looked for it all year long so I could do my homework and still haven't figured it out.
From Cordoba, Argentina, Alejandro Pablo Drallny reflected on the interest Argentineans have in their looks:
Alejandro Pablo Drallny: Argentina país careta, preocupados por bajar la panza (y como soy argentino y tengo panza, si alguien sabe como hacerlo, avíseme)
Alejandro Pablo Drallny: Argentina, a superficial country, everyone worried about how to lose the tummy (and since I am Argentinean, if someone knows how to do it, let me know)
Diego Bautista commented on Costa Rica's search preferences:
Diego Bautista: ‘¿Cómo hacer una cama de madera?’
Solo un país buscando algo útil que hacer.
Diego Bautista: “How to make a wooden bed?”
Just one country looking for something useful to do.
René Vaca Cardozo, from Bogotá, Colombia, explained why Colombians were so worried about the Fellowship of the Ring:
René Vaca Cardozo: No vayan a pensar que los colombianos están preocupados por la literatura Tolkiana. La Comunidad del anillo es el nombre que medios le pusieron a un escándalo sexual y de homicidios que ocurrió al interior de la policía.
René Vaca Cardozo: Don't think that Colombians are worried about Tolkien's literature. The Fellowship of the Ring is the name that the media gave to a sexual and homicide scandal in the police force.
Ruben Pintos Guerra, from Montevideo, Uruguay pointed out:
Ruben Pintos Guerra: Tenemos el mejor Internet de la Region y preguntamos como disminuir el consumo… URUGUAY NOMA!
Ruben Pintos Guerra: We have the best Internet of the region and we asked how to reduce our consumption… COME ON URUGUAY!
From Costa Rica, Mar Barquero reflected:
Marc Barquero Suárez: Brasileños más profundos … mientras nosotros moriremos quemados por lava
Marc Barquero Suárez: Brazilians are more profound… meanwhile we'll die burnt with lava
Andrea Marysenka also had a message for Brazilians:
Andrea Marysenka: Para Brasil solo me queda decir: baby don't hurt me. Don't hurt me. No more.
Andrea Marysenka: To Brazil, all I have to say is: baby don't hurt me. Don't hurt me. No more.
Others talked about changes in priorities:
Alvaro Alatorre: Si ya no se busca el: “¿Como saber si novia está embarazada?” Se están perdiendo los valores y el verdadero uso de San Google. Que tristeza.
Alvaro Alatorre: If we are no longer looking for: “How to know if my girlfriend is pregnant” we are losing the value and true use of Saint Google. How sad.
Ihasser Lara: Ya nadie busca “Evidencias de duendes reales” o “Videos de fantasmas reales” y menos “Videos de extraterrestres”…. Charles: “El mundo ya no es como antes!!”
Ilhaser Lara: Nobody is looking for “Evidence of real goblins” or “Videos of real ghosts” and not even “Videos of aliens”… Charles: “The world isn't what it used to be!!”
While Ariel Aguilar summed up wistfully:
Ariel Aguilar: Pero que filosóficos, que profundas dudas asaltan a las mentes latinas de nuestros tiempos.
Ariel Aguilar: How philosophical, how profound the doubts that trouble the Latin American minds of our times are.

author: Elizabeth Rivera


text:
China’s Glass Tycoon Cao Dewang ‘Escapes’ to the US for Cheaper Taxes · Global Voices
Jack Hu

Cao Dewang from Chinese state-owned Central Television's Weibo.
Recently, Cao Dewang, a billionaire who makes his fortune by making glass, decided to make a more than US$1 billion investment and open a factory in a suburb of Dayton in Ohio. He's just one of several Chinese manufacturers who have opted to invest in the US because of the country's friendly tax code and cheap land prices.
As the economy is slowing down in China, the move has been perceived as a warning signal, and his complaints over heavy manufacturing taxes have been circulating on major Chinese social media platforms. The phrase “Cao Dewang has escaped” has even become a hot topic, echoing the concerns of China's economic elite over the manufacturing slump.
Cao Dewang told China Business Network in an interview that “the tax burden for manufacturers in China is 35% higher than in the US” when explaining his decision to invest 600 million yuan in the US, including taking over a former General Motors plant. Cao’s Fuyao Group investment was announced after President-elect Donald Trump threatened to slap 45 percent punitive tariffs on Chinese imports to protect American jobs.
The Chinese government has made reforms to its tax code in recent years, promoting them as a tax-cutting move that would reduce burdens on businesses. But according to Cao, tax rates are still high, making profits in manufacturing “very thin.”
Cao Shanshi, a well-known commentator on popular social media site Weibo, cited the glass tycoon's main points in his status update:
曹德旺今晚连线媒体，说了很有价值的几点：1、中国制造业的综合税负比美国高35%；2、问题主要就出在增值税上；3、中国劳动力不比俄罗斯、波兰、中欧成本低；4、房地产过热使得中国制造业丧失劳动力优势；5、说这些是为了提醒政府，也提醒企业家，提醒大家危机感，告诉大家要小心。
Cao Dewang delivered valuable points: 1. China's comprehensive taxes on manufacturing are 35% higher than in the US; 2. The problem mainly results from value-added tax; 3. China's labor is no longer cheaper than that in Russia, Poland and central Europe. 4. Overheating in the housing market has caused China's factories to loose its labor cost edge; 5. He wanted to remind the government and entrepreneurs of the risks and tell them to be careful.
Liu Shengjun, an economist and advocate for deeper tax reform, also applauded Cao Dewang’s views:
【玻璃大王曹德旺：中国制造业综合税务比美国高35%】美国没有增值税，只有40%所得税；美国土地基本不要钱；能源方面，美国电价是中国一半，天然气只有中国的1/5；劳动力成本方面，美国蓝领是中国8倍，白领是中国的2倍多。算起来，在美国生产玻璃会多赚百分之十几
China’s glass magnate Cao Dewang: China’s comprehensive taxes on manufacturing are 35% higher than in the US. America only has 40% income tax, it does not have value-added tax; Basically, a company doesn’t need to pay for the land in America; as for energy, electricity prices in the US are half the price in China, natural gas prices are just one-fifth of China; about labor costs, blue collar wages in the US are eight times higher than in China, and white collar wages two times higher than in China. In sum, producing glass in America could earn more than 10%.
Since the current administration took office in 2012, the Chinese government has launched a value-added tax reform to reduce taxes on private companies and made further promise to loosen up regulations on businesses. However, many businessmen have complained that there hasn't been any real tax cuts; meanwhile, the country’s tax revenues have kept growing at a pace faster than gross domestic product (GDP) growth.
Zong Qinghou, China’s beverage king and one of China’s richest billionaires, also recently complained about rising taxes and costs to real economy enterprises, or those that produce goods and services, during an economic seminar held by online news portal Netease. Liu Shengjun summed up Zong's view on Weibo:
宗庆后：当前做实体经济税费比较高、利润率很低，导致一些企业生存不下去，很多人不愿意干实体经济。今年的费的部分跟去年的费相比没有任何下降。而且有的费还增加了，特别是环保费增加太多。现在工业用地也需要几十万、上百万一亩，这么大的投资成本谁敢去投？而且水电气都是国有的垄断企业，用水电气、建设工厂都需要高额的费用，审批的不少环节还需要花不少钱；请第三方评估出报告，环评、能评、清洁生产等等一系列审批都要费用。面对如此高的投资成本，如果企业对盈利又没把握，谁还敢贸然投资。
China’s taxes and costs to the real economy are so high and profits are so low that some companies can’t survive and many businessmen are unwilling to do real economy. Charges have never dropped this year; instead some charges are increasing, especially the environmental protection charges, which are rising too much. One mu (about 667 square meters) of land costs as high as hundreds of thousands of yuan or even over 1 million yuan. Who dares to invest under such high costs? All of the water, electricity and natural gas are monopolized by state-owned enterprises. Using them and building factories would cost a lot. Still, you need to pay for various official approvals. Still, you need to pay the third-party evaluations on environmental protection, energy efficiency and clean production. Who dares to invest when investment costs are so high and profit isn't guaranteed?
China's state-run media quickly responded in order to dampen the public's increasing anger over hefty burdens placed on companies by the government. Global Times, a tabloid controlled by the Communist Party, posted an article saying the labeling of tax rate being “deadly” was too exaggerated. @BlueWhale, an economic journalists’ platform, highlighted the Global Times’ arguments:
1、与发达国家比，中国的宏观税负不算高，单就制造业和美国比，中国企业承担的税负的确高些。
2、这些年来，中国企业需要缴纳的税收不但没增加，反而在不断降低。
3、在某种程度上，减税的幅度比不上一些企业盈利下降的幅度，因而显得税负重了。
4、“高税负逼走制造企业”，是对中企对外投资的错误解读。国内产能过剩，往外走是自然的。
5、中央经济工作会议已明确定调，未来还会进一步降低税费。
6、体制与机制的不顺畅，才是造成企业成本居高不下的重要原因。
1. China’s macro tax burden is not too high compared with developed countries, but China’s manufacturing taxes are really higher than that in the US.
2. China’s corporation taxes have gradually dropped in recent years.
3. In a sense, the pace of tax cuts hasn't matched the pace of profits dropping, so some companies feel that taxes have become heavier.
4. “Heavy taxes force manufacturers to run away” is a distortion of Chinese companies’ overseas investments. Overcapacity at home naturally leads to going out of the country to expand.
5. The central economic conference has decided to further drop corporation taxes.
6. It’s the clash between the system and operating mechanism that has caused high costs for corporations.
For some liberal economists like Xu Chenggang, however, the problem with China's economy goes beyond tax rates. He called for a genuine reform to address China’s urgent economic problems in an interview with Caijing, a Chinese well-known economic media outlet. Weibo user Caijing summed up Xu's view in a nutshell:
【许成钢：以“真改革”释放经济活力】改革的设计不能绕过制度改革，否则所有措施都是权宜之计，没有办法真正解决问题。产能过剩的大部分是国企，不会破产，如果不触碰制度问题，在这种条件下采取改变管理方式等没太大用处，强迫这个厂子限产，强迫那个厂子转产等等，都不是改革。
The design of reform can't avoid system reform, otherwise all measures would become expedient, unable to solve real problems. It's largely the state-owned enterprises that have created overcapacity, but can't go bankrupt. Without treating systemic problems, just changing management measures would have little effect. Only forcing factories to limit capacity or change production shouldn't be called reform.
For Xu and others, a genuine reform of the system is the privatization of state-owned enterprises so as to rejuvenate a competitive market.

author: Jack Hu


text:
Empathy Was All Around in 2016 for the French-Speaking World, Too · Global Voices
Lova Rakotomalala

Resilience by Alan levine on Flickr – CC license – NC-2.0
As the year ends, you'll find many reviews suggesting that it was one of the most dreadful years in recent memory. And, yeah, no kidding. In many ways, 2016 was a series of punches to the gut. But there were also more than a few wonderful things that happened throughout the French-speaking world — stories that were lost in the mayhem of tragedy. It would be a shame to ignore 2016's less publicized, but still important events, and so here goes our look back at the good stuff this past year.
Defiant, Disappointed, and Mourning—Burkina Faso Remembers Victims of the January Attacks
On Jan. 15, armed adolescents who pledged allegiance to Al-Qaeda in Maghreb AQMI attacked three businesses in downtown Ouagadougou, the capital of Burkina Faso. The gunmen hit the Bush Taxi Bar, Cappuccino café, and Splendid Hotel, killing 30 people and injuring scores more. When the dust settled, the city's residents vowed to not let the violence tear apart their home, rallying to help the three attacked businesses get back on their feet. The campaign spread on social media, with the help of the slogan: “Every morning, we will be drinking cappuccino within the splendid beauty of Burkina.”
When Never Forgetting the Attacks on France, Try to Remember the Heroes, Too
There have been multiple attacks in France over the past two years. The deadliest one yet occurred in July, with the massacre in Nice. When the violence broke out, many individuals acted bravely and selflessly to help others. For instance, in what became known as #portesouvertes (“open doors”), locals opened their doors to stranded tourists, when police responded with a citywide curfew. Others, like Ludovic Boumbas, paid the ultimate price, sacrificing his life to save his friends and family.
Antoine Leiris on Facebook – Public domain
Antoine Leiris lost his wife during the attacks at the Bataclan in November 2015. Two days after her death, Leiris wrote an open letter to his wife's killers on Facebook. While paying tribute to the mother of his son Melvil (17 months at the time of the attacks), Leiris also explained why he choose to not embrace hatred:
“Vous n’aurez pas ma haine”
Vendredi soir vous avez volé la vie d’un être d’exception, l’amour de ma vie, la mère de mon fils mais vous n’aurez pas ma haine. Je ne sais pas qui vous êtes et je ne veux pas le savoir, vous êtes des âmes mortes. Si ce Dieu pour lequel vous tuez aveuglément nous a fait à son image, chaque balle dans le corps de ma femme aura été une blessure dans son coeur.
Alors non je ne vous ferai pas ce cadeau de vous haïr. Vous l’avez bien cherché pourtant mais répondre à la haine par la colère ce serait céder à la même ignorance qui a fait de vous ce que vous êtes. Vous voulez que j’ai peur, que je regarde mes concitoyens avec un oeil méfiant, que je sacrifie ma liberté pour la sécurité. Perdu. Même joueur joue encore.
Je l’ai vue ce matin. Enfin, après des nuits et des jours d’attente. Elle était aussi belle que lorsqu’elle est partie ce vendredi soir, aussi belle que lorsque j’en suis tombé éperdument amoureux il y a plus de 12 ans. Bien sûr je suis dévasté par le chagrin, je vous concède cette petite victoire, mais elle sera de courte durée. Je sais qu’elle nous accompagnera chaque jour et que nous nous retrouverons dans ce paradis des âmes libres auquel vous n’aurez jamais accès.
Nous sommes deux, mon fils et moi, mais nous sommes plus fort que toutes les armées du monde. Je n’ai d’ailleurs pas plus de temps à vous consacrer, je dois rejoindre Melvil qui se réveille de sa sieste. Il a 17 mois à peine, il va manger son goûter comme tous les jours, puis nous allons jouer comme tous les jours et toute sa vie ce petit garçon vous fera l’affront d’être heureux et libre. Car non, vous n’aurez pas sa haine non plus.
On Friday night, you stole the life of an exceptional being, the love of my life, the mother of my son, but you will not have my hate. I don’t know who you are and I don’t want to know. You are dead souls. If this God that you kill for with blind rage really made us to be like her, each bullet that hit the body of my wife would have been a blow to her heart. I would not do you the favor of hating you. You would have surely deserved it but to respond to hatred with anger would be yielding to the same ignorance that made you what you are.
You would like me to be scared, for me to look at my fellow citizens with suspicious eyes, for me to sacrifice my liberty for my security. You have lost. I saw her this morning. At last, after nights and days of waiting. She was as beautiful as when she left on Friday evening, as beautiful as when I fell head over heels in love with her more than 12 years ago.
Of course I am devastated with grief, I grant you this small victory, but it will be short-lived. I know she will be with us every day and we will find each other in heaven with free souls which you will never have. Us two, my son and I, we will be stronger than every army in the world. I cannot waste any more time on you as I must go back to Melvil [my son] who has just woken from his sleep. He is only just 17 months old, he is going to eat his snack just like every other day, then we are going to play like every other day and all his life this little boy will be happy and free. Because you will never have his hatred either.
Madagascar has been hit with one of the world's worst famines in the last decade. Addressing the tragedy, the country's most celebrated poet wrote a now famous poem, describing enduring love as resilience through a drought. His poem was shared widely on social media this year as a tribute to the country's suffering:
Voninkazo adaladala, Voninkazo tsy misaina, Fa maniry samirery, Eny an-tany karankaina,  Ny manodidina rehetra, Efa ringitra avokoa, Efa tapitra matory, Izy irery no mifoha, Ity foko koa adala, Tsy mba manadino e ! Ny rehetra raha mangina, Izaho mbola mino e ! Mbola tena mahatsiaro, Ilay fitiavako taloha, Mbola velona ao am-poko, Tsy mitsahatra mamoy Voninkazo, adaladala e !
Wildflower, carefree flower, Which keeps growing on fallow land. Everywhere, all that surrounds now is desolation, and all lies dormant. And alone, she alone remains awake. And still exists somewhere. My whole heart has been driven wild as well, and refuses to forget. Silence remains around the one whom I love, but I continue to believe. I keep this in memory, and I will always remember my lost love, in whom I have always believed. This love is still going strong, and keeps me awake at night.

author: Lova Rakotomalala


text:
For a Limited Time, Croatians Get Free Access to a Digital Library of 100,000 Books · Global Voices
Filip Stojanovski

A woman reading in “A Moment's Distraction” by Croatian painter Vlaho Bukovac (1855-1922), PD.
In December, Croatia became a “Free Reading Zone” for all its residents willing to install a special mobile app that provides access to a rich e-book library.
Free Reading Zones are set up by a company called Total Boox, which offers access to its virtual library to various audiences through specialized apps. For patrons of its partners such as libraries and other institutions, access is free. For others, they have a model of “pay only for what you read: if you read 10% of the ebook, you will pay 10% of the price.”
In June 2016, Total Boox established a Free Reading Zone in the US state of Texas, in cooperation with the Brazoria County Library System.
Then in September, a cafe in Zagreb served as a pilot for a Free Reading Zone in Croatia. The zone was expanded to the whole country for the month of December with the publication of the mobile e-reader app Croatia Reads, available for Android and IOS.
The Croatia Reads app provides free access to 100,000 books, mostly in English, to its users based in Croatia. These include top titles by contemporary domestic and international authors. A special section of its library contains about 260 e-books from Croatia, in Croatian. In cooperation with local publishers, new titles are added every Friday.
In exchange, users do not pay money to use the app, but are required to relinquish access to their personal data. So far, it has between 10,000 and 50,000 thousand installs.
According to the leading Croatian ICT portal Netokracija, the Croatian Free Reading Zone for the current month is sponsored by the portal No Shelf Required. Continuation of free access depends on finding other sponsors.
Mirela Rončević speaking at 2013 E-Summit organized by New Jersey Public Library. CC BY-NC.
The whole Free Reading Zone initiative has deeper Croatian roots. It's the brainchild of content specialist and free access advocate Mirela Rončević, a Croatian immigrant to the US. Coming from a small town in Dalmatia which does not have a bookshop, she combines her personal desire to enable access to knowledge as a basic human right with innovative approaches to business:
Još uvijek pristup knjizi ovisi o tome gdje se nalazite i kojoj instituciji pripadate. Ali kada se knjige svijeta otvore u digitalnom formatu, stvaraju se nove mogućnosti koje svako društvo treba maksimalno iskoristiti.
I still think that access to books depends on where you reside or which institution you belong to. But when all the books of the world become open in digital format, new opportunities arise which any society needs to utilize to the maximum.
The app offers value for smartphone users who are not based in Croatia, also. While many of the e-books are available through the pay-per-read model, the Croatian books are all free of charge.
Unrelated to this development, some of the international authors whose books are included in the Total Boox's collection had already made them available online for free via a Creative Commons license. One such example is the book “Overclocked” by Canadian sci-fi writer and privacy activist Cory Doctorow, which is available for download in multiple formats on his website.


text:
Russia’s Top Ten Memes in 2016 · Global Voices
Kevin Rothrock

Google Trends has announced the top ten memes of the year in Russia. Some are borrowed from the American Internet, while others are entirely Russian and based on linguistic subtleties so small or obscure that explaining the logic robs the memes of all their appeal. In the spirit of 2016, however, RuNet Echo will risk ruining everything in an effort to make sense of these online trends.
Photo: Kremlin Press Service, edited by Kevin Rothrock
Like many of the items on this year’s list, the origins of this meme predate 2016. Also like many of the most popular memes, this one recycles an amusing misspelling. Typos and grammatical errors have long mesmerized Internet communities, where native speakers’ sloppiness and newcomers’ incompetence makes for wonderful slapstick.
The misspelled phrase “moe uvozhenie” (a corruption of the Russian phrase “my respect”) allegedly first appeared in 2015 in a “stickers” collection on the Russian social network Vkontakte, where it was used as a caption on a picture of a man tipping his hat as a greeting.
In late 2015, the meme got a boost when Russian Internet users started sharing a video created using Zoobe.com, which allows users to match animations to short phrases. The video features Paddington Bear uttering the phrase “moe uvozhenie,” as he lifts his hat to say hello. As he does this, a snowball sails over his head, under his hat, narrowly missing him.
It’s a pointless, boring video, and people ate it up.
The meme has passed its heyday, but you can still find it used occasionally in photographs showing anyone removing or tipping their hat, or in circumstances when someone wishes to express their respect for someone sarcastically.
This meme, featuring a skeleton playing a flaming guitar in a cemetery, comes from the gamer community. The skeleton is a character from “Garry’s Mod,” a 2004 modified version of the classic game Half-Life 2. The guitar in his hands can also be found in the Steam Workshop, the account-based hosting service that makes it possible to play Garry’s Mod. For unclear reasons, the setting for the image is a scene from the 1998 Nintendo 64 game “Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time.”
Hilariously, Internet users have even “geolocated” the image within the Zelda world.
Image: Vkontakte
The meme, which allegedly emerged in October 2015, is pretty self-explanatory: a skeleton is rocking out in a graveyard, on fire. Get fired up, people.
There’s some disagreement about the origins of this meme, which lie either in 2010 or 2015.
In May 2010, footage appeared on YouTube showing a man who called local paramedics to help his friend, “Lyosha,” who he said was trapped nearby. When a news team arrived on the scene, he brought them to an empty spot outside an apartment building, where he pointed at a wall, which he claimed was his trapped friend. Throughout the video, the reporter, apparently confused, keeps asking, “Where is he?”
Responding emergency workers then led away the clearly mentally ill man, offering to treat him to “analysis.”
But the more likely reason Russian Internet users asked Google about “Gde Lekha” in 2016 was the following video, shared on YouTube in October 2015 and filmed by a man watching his friend steer a small motor boat upstream, only to topple against the strong current.
The man’s narration, laced with obscenities, is strangely calm, despite witnessing an accident that may have killed his friend, for all he knows. “Where the fuck is Lyosha?” he asks at the end of the clip, as the capsized boat drifts downstream.
This meme is one of Google’s two top-ten RuNet trends that is both overtly political and traceable to Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, who continues to influence Russian online culture, despite the fact that his brief presidency is now little more than a distant memory.
In November 2016, Medvedev met with the prime ministers of Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Kyrgyzstan, telling them that the phrase “Americano coffee” sounded “politically incorrect” to him, channeling the same chauvinism that led American lawmakers to rename French fries “freedom fries,” during the Bush years.
After Medvedev's remark, a diplomat in the Armenian delegation then joked that the drink should be called “Rusiano,” instead.
Never one to miss an advertising opportunity, Burger King immediately introduced Rusiano coffee at some of its restaurants in Russia, selling the drink for roughly a third the price it chargeed for Americanos.
If you thought the RuNet would be satisfied with just one skeleton-based meme, think again. This one is the product of “3D Movie Maker,” a computer-graphics software program that gifted the world classic memes like “Dancing Baby.”
Mr. Skeltal — or “Skull Trumpet,” as he’s known on the English-language Internet — gained popularity outside Russia in 2011 as a crude video meme, featuring the skull image blasting a trumpet cacophonously along to various songs.
In Russia, the meme is more popular as a still image or a GIF, which Internet users upload as a way to extend comments on imageboards (where new comments are needed to keep conversation threads active), or to provoke other users to add their own comments. People who write “thank you, Mr. Dudets” in comments are promised the gratitude of this ancient, musical skull.
This meme is likely familiar to readers who haven’t the foggiest idea about Russian Internet culture. An animated GIF series featuring Travolta’s character from the film “Pulp Fiction,” this meme isn’t even loosely Russian, though Russians embraced it hard in 2016, after it achieved superstar status in November 2015, thanks to the work of Imgur user “ILikeToWonkaMyWilly,” who used the GIF to describe his attitude when choosing “a doll” for his daughter’s Christmas present.
One of the most memorable Russian adaptations of the “Confused Travolta” meme came in February 2016, the day after demolition crews hired by the city of Moscow tore down hundreds of kiosks and small shopping centers all in a single night. Many of these small businesses sold “street meat,” like shawarma and other Middle Eastern dishes.
In the Russian meme’s reimagined version of Pulp Fiction’s famous “quarter pounder with cheese” scene, Samuel L. Jackson’s character tells Travolta, “When you’re in Moscow, try the shawarma.”
But the shawarma is gone, Johnny.
“Vaping,” or the use of electronic cigarettes, isn’t unique to Russia, though the term has gained popularity on the Russian Internet, where people like to talk about it, and talk about how awful it is. The seriousness with which many vaping enthusiasts approach the activity has led to a backlash online, where critics compare the use of e-cigarettes to hard drugs, religious cults, and various forms of degenerate behavior.
Like the “moe uvozhenie” meme, the humor here is based on misspoken, misspelled Russian. In this meme, the phrases “dratuti” and “dotvidaninya” are captions added to mirrored photos of a piece of wood. Like an image of Jesus Christ burned into toast, the knots in this wood resemble the face of a sweet but stupid looking dog — hence the misspelled “gweetings” and “guhbeye.”
The phrase allegedly originated in August 2016, but some bloggers have argued that the meme dates back to 2005, developing from an episode of the comedy TV show “Gorodok.” YouTube user Batya8k even tracked down TV footage showing the phrase “dratuti” in use on the show.
In May 2016, Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev committed what is perhaps his most memorable gaffe, failing utterly to comfort a pensioner in Crimea who confronted him about weak social security in Russia. “There’s just no money right now,” Medvedev told the woman, before adding in a rush to leave, “you hang in there.”
The exchange even inspired a satirical song by the Russian comedian Semen Slepakov. You can listen to the song below and read a rhyming translation of his lyrics here.
In June, the media-monitoring company Medialogiya crowned Medvedev’s comments “the meme of the year,” noting that Russia’s mass media mentioned the phrase more than 4,400 times since May.
Already widely ridiculed in Russia as the feeble placeholder between Vladimir Putin’s presidencies, Dmitry Medvedev had a rough summer in 2016. The RBC news agency even reported that the prime minister’s adversaries intentionally drummed up the negative publicity surrounding his visit to Crimea. Ever since swapping roles with Putin in 2012, Medvedev has faced rumors that Kremlin insiders are scheming to steal his job. So far, gaffes aside, he’s managed to keep his job, and remain one of Russia’s most prominent national figures.
The biggest RuNet meme of the year ought to come with an apology. After breezing through nearly a dozen other inventive and bizarre Internet inventions, we’re left with the viral music hit “Patimeiker,” a dance song with lyrics inane as the rhythm is infectious. “Hey, DJ. Hey, beatmaker. Hey, street dancer. Hey, partymaker,” sings Vitalik Pika, the man behind the hit tune.
On YouTube, the song’s official music video has more than 13 million views. Before watching it, you should be warned that you might never get the beat out of your head. Not ever.

author: Kevin Rothrock


text:
Saudi Arabia Promises to Stop Using British-Made Cluster Bombs in Yemen · Global Voices
Viridiana Lopez

Image: Amnesty International's report, “Yemen: Cluster Munitions.” Source: YouTube.
Saudi Arabia has promised to stop using British-made cluster bombs, which are prohibited by the Convention on Cluster Munitions, in its air strikes in Yemen. Since 2015, Saudi forces have been using the weapons, which 100 nations have banned. The announcement comes months after Amnesty International's May 2016 report accused the Saudi government of dropping cluster bombs in Yemen, threatening the lives of civilians.
In its report, Amnesty International claimed:
Children and their families returning home in northern Yemen after a year of conflict are at grave risk of serious injury and death from thousands of unexploded cluster bomb submunitions, Amnesty International said, following a 10-day research trip to Sa’da, Hajjah, and Sana’a governorates.
International assistance is urgently needed to clear contaminated areas and countries with influence should urge the Saudi Arabia-led coalition forces to stop using cluster munitions, which are internationally banned and inherently indiscriminate.
“Even after hostilities have died down, the lives and livelihoods of civilians, including young children, continue to be on the line in Yemen as they return to de facto minefields. They cannot live in safety until contaminated areas in and around their homes and fields are identified and cleared of deadly cluster bomb submunitions and other unexploded ordnance,” Lama Fakih, a senior crisis advisor at Amnesty International, said in a press release.
The report was accompanied by a video:
Amnesty International reported that coalition forces have used UK-manufactured BL-755 cluster munitions:
The BL-755 was manufactured by Hunting Engineering Ltd in the 1970s. This variant, designed to be dropped from the UK Tornado fighter jet, contains 147 sub munitions designed to penetrate 250mm of armor while at the same time breaking into more than 2,000 fragments which act as an anti-personnel weapon. The weapon is known to be in the stockpiles of both Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
Another report released by the UK-based ITV News on October 26 further confirmed the accusations against the Saudi government.
The munitions were sold to the Saudis by the British government in the 1980s, decades before the Convention on Cluster Munitions entered into force in 2010. Whereas the U.K. joined the convention in 2008, Saudi Arabia never did.
After pressure from reporters at The Guardian, British and Saudi officials insisted publicly that “no law has been broken.” Despite the evidence, the Saudi government said it wasn't using cluster bombs in civilian areas:
المتحدث باسم التحالف :
لم نستخدم الذخائر العنقودية في المناطق السكنية باليمن .#التحالف #اليمن
- pic.twitter.com/U0WyDy2fKH
— أخبار السعودية (@SaudiNews50) 19 December 2016
Coalition spokesperson:
We do not use cluster munitions in civilian areas in Yemen. #Coalition #Yemen
Finally, on Dec. 19, following a long campaign by London and different NGOs, the Saudi-led coalition fighting in Yemen announced an end to its use of the British-made cluster bombs.
In a statement published on the state news agency SPA, the Saudi government said:
The government of Saudi Arabia confirms that it has decided to stop the use of cluster munitions of the type BL-755 [UK-made] and informed the United Kingdom government of that.
The announcement came days after the U.S. government announced it would halt some arms sale to the Saudi government because of reported concerns about civilian deaths. Quoting two sources in the Obama administration, CNN reported:
The suspension includes precision-guided munitions, the officials said, citing systemic problems with Saudi targeting in the campaign in Yemen.
[…]
But as Human Rights Watch researcher Kristine Beckerle pointed out, the Saudi government did not mention the Brazil-made cluster weapons that it also possesses and uses in Yemen.
قال التحالف بقيادة #السعودية إنه سيوقف استخدام الذخائر العنقودية البريطانية. ماذا عن تلك المصنوعة في #البرازيل؟ https://t.co/i4ryFCLoOV
— Kristine Beckerle (@K_Beckerle) 23 December 2016
The Saudi-led coalition announced that it will stop using UK-made cluster munitions. What about those made in Brazil?
In fact, those same Brazil-made cluster munitions were launched by the Saudi-led coalition on Dec. 6, near two schools in the Yemeni city of Saada, killing two civilians and wounding at least six.
As Human Rights Watch reported:
The Saudi Arabia-led coalition fired Brazilian-made rockets containing banned cluster munitions that struck near two schools in the northern Yemeni city of Saada on December 6, 2016, Human Rights Watch said today. The attack on al-Dhubat neighborhood in Saada’s Old City at about 8 p.m. killed two civilians and wounded at least six, including a child.
The attack came a day after Yemen, Saudi Arabia, Brazil, and the United States abstained from a vote in the United Nations General Assembly that overwhelmingly endorsed an already widely accepted international ban on cluster munition use. Brazil should join the Convention on Cluster Munitions and cease the production and transfer of cluster munitions, while Saudi Arabia and other coalition members should cease all use of cluster munitions, Human Rights Watch said.”
Human Rights Watch is calling on the Brazilian government to “make an immediate commitment to ending production and export of cluster munitions.”

author: Viridiana Lopez


text:
Syria’s War May be the Most Documented Ever—And Yet We Know So Little. · Global Voices
Ivan Sigal

Syria liveuamap of Aleppo depicting verified events on December 7, 2016, as Aleppo was falling. Liveuamap is an “opendata-driven media platform” that tracks events in conflict by time, location and type. http://syria.liveuamap.com/en/time/07.12.2016
We follow the tweets of 7-year-old Bana Alabed and her mother; the last messages of activists and fighters waiting to surrender or die; and seek to verify chemical attacks or conflicting stories about the bombings of hospitals. And at the same time, we struggle to understand whether this information fits into our existing worldviews, or upends them.
The Syrian civil war may be the most documented war in history. Millions of images, videos, blogs, tweets and audio files have been created about the war, the life that continues on in Syria despite the war, and the affiliated refugee crisis. These media — created by journalists, citizens, activists, combatants and victims — are the product of our burgeoning participatory media culture, of the overlay of digital documentation and reflection that accompanies much of modern life.
Syria, prior to the war, had reasonably robust and growing communications technology, with access to mass media networks, satellite TV, internet and mobile data. Access to those technologies gave Syrians the tools both to communicate among themselves and to connect with the rest of the world. Enough remnants of those networks exist now to allow people in conflict zones to continue sharing information. Despite the war (or perhaps because of it), Syrian citizen media networks, with increasing knowledge and skill, have been a major conduit for the documentation of the war.
But access to huge online archives of information about the war doesn’t guarantee that it is organized or presented in ways that accord with our expectations of war reporting. That’s because information in modern conflict isn’t simply about impartially reporting the facts as they occur. Information instead is part of the battle for perception about the war and its combatants. That, in turn, forms opinions about who is just and moral, who is worth supporting politically or with resources, and who will be a target of attack.
Information and its manipulation have been a vital strategic element in this conflict, and the control of information has become a weapon. The Syrian Electronic Army, a parastatal force supporting the Assad regime, in the early days of the struggle targeted activists with “distributed denial-of-service” (DDoS) attacks, hacks and malware. Meanwhile, both the Assad regime and ISIS targeted journalists for their work.
ISIS managed to change the course of the war through the precise, vicious use of violence, especially in documenting the beheading of Western journalists and promoting those videos through media channels.
The fog of war doesn’t simply happen; combatants contribute to it strategically, with their attempts to mystify and confuse adversaries.
Against the forces of misinformation, finding and building coherent narratives about the war is an immense challenge. We now know the principles and techniques for organizing, prioritizing and verifying information coming out of Syria. We can identify facts and establish evidence through careful analysis, and with media forensics techniques such as reverse image search, geolocation and metadata analysis. We can build and maintain trusted relationships with friends, colleagues and sources who are proximate to the conflict.
We can know a lot about this war, but simply knowing facts isn’t nearly enough to change its course. Demonstrated facts do not necessarily influence the outcome of events. That is the essence of understanding power, and its limits.
This story was originally published by Global Voices’ partner, Public Radio International.

author: Ivan Sigal


text:
Bangladesh’s New Year’s Celebration of Diversity: Into the Deep Podcast · Global Voices
L. Finch

Mangal Shobhajatra is an annual procession of thousands of people that takes over the streets of Bangladesh’s capital city Dhaka. It marks the start of the Bengali New Year in April.
Recently, UNESCO named this parade Intangible Cultural Heritage. But what might look like just a street party is actually a creative stand for unity — and against the forces of intolerance who seek to divide and oppress Bangladeshis.
In this episode of Into the Deep, a Global Voices podcast that digs deep into one topic that isn’t getting the media coverage it deserves, Global Voices contributors Pantha and Rezwan tell us all about Mangal Shobhajatra.
At a time when xenophobia is seemingly on the rise in Europe, the United States and elsewhere in the world, perhaps Bangladesh and its unique New Year’s procession can offer some inspiration on how to take a stand against those trying to sow the seeds of division.
In this episode, we featured Creative Commons licensed music from the Free Music Archive, including Ray Gun – FasterFasterBrighter by Blue Dot Sessions (CC BY-NC 4.0); Dramamine by Podington Bear (CC BY-NC 3.0); Tribal by David Szesztay (CC BY-NC 3.0); Stuck Dream by Podington Bear (CC BY-NC 3.0); and Ally Pally Happy Clappy by krackatoa (CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 US).
We also featured Duur Deshi Shei Rakhaal Chhele (Acapella) – Rabindrasangeet – Anirban Chakraborty (CC BY-NC-SA 3.0) from SoundCloud and audio from YouTube videos published by users Azim Khan Ronnie and nazmulsoft.
The feature photo in this story is from Flickr by Aaapon (CC BY-NC 2.0).
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | RSS

author: L. Finch


text:
Classic Christmas Carols, Satirically Reimagined as Songs About Hong Kong Politics · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

Screenshot from Emilia Wong's video.
A set of Christmas Songs has gone viral on Hong Kong social media during the holiday season.
Shared more than 1,470 times and viewed more than 190,000 times, the songs are no ordinary Christmas carols. The lyrics are rewritten with wit to capture major social and political sagas that have played out recently in Hong Kong.
The singer is Emilia Wong, a local university student whose Facebook page’s banner says, “I am a Hong Konger, and I advocate Hong Kong independence.” That's a bold statement aimed at Chinese authorities, who have vowed to quash an independence movement in Hong Kong, which is a special administrative region of the mainland.
The songs were published as a collection called “Hong Konger, Merry Christmas” and composed of five popular Christmas tunes: Jingle Bells, Silent Night, We Wish You a Merry Christmas, Twelve Days of Christmas and Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. Full of dark humor, these five songs offer a somewhat lighthearted roundup of what happened in Hong Kong in 2016.
The first song is a reimagined version of Jingle Bells. Instead of lyrics that speak of a fun ride in a one-horse open sleigh through the snow, it talks about the politics of land development in Hong Kong surrounding the Wang Chau housing controversy.
The government promised to build 17,000 public housing units at Wang Chau in Hong Kong's New Territories in 2012. The piece of land is currently a huge temporary parking area for containers and vehicles operated by rural elites and members of triad, or organized crime, organizations.
Then, the city's Chief Executive Leung Chung Ying conducted off-the-record “soft lobbying” with the rural communities. Afterward, the government’s development plan was downsized to 4,000 public housing units while the rest of the land was destined to the construction of private apartments and rural small house units. While it is unusual for the chief executive to lead a development lobby, some suspected that the change of plan was made in exchange for the rural communities’ support in the upcoming chief executive election.
In fact, under the new plan, the government will have to build all the infrastructure for the private developers in the name of the 4,000 public housing units. It was later revealed that the government and a private developer shared a consulting firm, which leaked confidential government information to the private party in Wang Chau’s development plan.
In past years, the Hong Kong government has said there is no land left to build more housing, and therefore wants to exploit public areas and country parks for development purposes. But the Wang Chau controversy revealed that the government would rather harm public interest than confront the powerful and privileged.
See how the saga is retold to the tune of Jingle Bells:
香港地 香港地 無樓就要起
拆曬你既訓練地 大球場用黎 起
香港地 香港地 無樓就要起
兩百呎你夠住未 住三口無問題
橫洲喺隔籬 而家開發未
唔搞得笪地 鄉紳嬲到死
重新喺隔籬 隨便搵笪地
寧願郊野公園起 香港有地皮
In Hong Kong, in Hong Kong, more apartments are needed
Tear down your football training ground for the buildings
In Hong Kong, in Hong Kong, more apartments are needed
200 square feet can house a three-person family
Wang Chau is just next door and undeveloped
But the land cannot be used as the rural gentry are angry
Look for another piece of land
Country parks have all the lands needed!
The second song, Silent Night, is reworked to talk about not the birth of Jesus, but two Hong Kong lawmakers’ oath-taking controversy.
The two lawmakers, Leung Hung-Hang and Yau Wai-Ching, altered their inauguration oath’s wording, pledging allegiance to “the Hong Kong nation” and calling China “Shina” — a derogatory term used by Japan during the Second World War. The gesture was viewed as a rejection of the oath, which is outlined in Hong Kong's constitution, called the Basic Law. The steering committee of the People's Congress in Beijing stepped in to offer their interpretation of the law and to pressure local courts into disqualifying the two.
Here is the Hong Kong version of Silent Night:
記得發誓 咪宣錯誓 中央係 老細黎
第日返親工要宣下誓 認做中央管理的契弟
為大家好就記低 香港係一個縣黎
記得發誓 咪宣錯誓 搞港獨 咪過黎
第日中央釋法先至弊 大陸嬲嬲豬會死咁滯
入共產黨就最威 香港就包無問題
Remember to take the oath. Don’t make the mistake. The central government is the boss.
In the future, all positions have to take the oath. Commit yourself as the central government’s servile bastard.
For everyone’s sake, remember Hong Kong is just another province.
Remember to take the oath. Don’t make the mistake. Advocates of Hong Kong's independence, get lost.
The reinterpretation of the law is the worst to come. Agitating the central government is preparing your own coffin.
Joining the party will bring you power. All the problems in Hong Kong will then be solved.
The third song, to the music of We Wish You A Merry Christmas, is about the cross-border smuggling controversy. People from mainland China believe that the quality of groceries, foods and drugs sold in Hong Kong are better. To cater to the huge market demand, many people make their living by carrying items by hand from Hong Kong across the border into China to sell them there.
Here are the new lyrics to We Wish You A Merry Christmas:
逢聖誕應該買藥物
逢聖誕應該買禮物
逢聖誕應該走貨物
人民幣邊度夠
平靚正有售 奶粉乜都有
買金莎可以送豬頭 人民幣邊度夠
Christmas is a season to buy drugs
Christmas is a season to buy gifts
Christmas is a season to smuggle
There isn’t enough yuan [for all we wanted.]
Cheap and quality-guaranteed, infant milk powders and other items are here.
Buying chocolates with a pighead souvenir. [In Cantonese culture, pighead is for offering to the ancestor when visiting courtyard.] There isn’t enough yuan [for all we wanted.]
The fourth song is to the tune of Twelve Days of Christmas. It twists the lyrics, which normally speak of the ever increasing number of gifts the subject receives from their true love, to be about five booksellers from Hong Kong who were abducted by mainland police for selling banned books.
The incident has caused a public panic. While the other booksellers were nabbed either in mainland China or aboard, at least one of the booksellers, Lee Bo, was kidnapped in Hong Kong and taken to mainland China. Later, Lee reappeared in Hong Kong, confessed to his crime and claimed that he had voluntarily traveled o mainland China to assist an investigation.
Here are the new lyrics:
銅鑼灣個老細 話佢買左本禁書
即時入冊 即時畫押 即時道歉 仲要送翻去深圳警署
銅鑼灣個老細 話佢買左本禁書
拉埋～八婆
拉埋～阿婆
拉埋～老婆
拍片認錯
交曬佢份糧
封埋鋪
捉佢上羅湖 仲要送翻去深圳警署
Causeway Bay’s boss bought a banned book
He was then arrested, convicted, forced to apologize and escorted to the Shenzhen police station.
Causeway Bay’s boss bought a banned book
They arrested his mistress
They arrested his grandma
They arrested his wife
He made a TV confession
They paid his staff and closed his shop
Escorted him to the Lo Wu [border and sent him to Shenzhen police station [in China].
The fifth song rewritten to the tune of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, usually about one of Santa Claus's reindeer, is about the upcoming election for the chief executive, the top government position in Hong Kong.
Currently there are four potential candidates:
1. Regina Ip, a lawmaker and a former top government official responsible for preparing the enactment of a national security law in accordance with article 23 in the Basic Law. She resigned from the government after a huge rally against the legislation in 2003;
2. Woo Kwok-hing, a retired judge whose main agenda for running the race is to rebuild social harmony in Hong Kong;
3. Carrie Lam, current chief secretary with relatively high popularity. Many believe she is Beijing's “back up plan” after the current chief executive Leung Chun Ying declared that he would not join the race;
4. John Tsang, who handed in his resignation as the finance secretary before Christmas to prepare for the election race.
The latter two are considered to be the main rivals for the race. John Tsang is nicknamed “Pringles Pizza” by netizens because of his mustache.
Here is how the race is presented in song:
有一個薯片品客 佢鍾意果兩執鬚
最叻計唔啱啲數 派錢派左去邊度
佢想去特首選戰 每一個都讚他好
有一個葉劉想鬥 民望贏硬唔洗鬥
但係中央無綠燈 無得比佢做
「林鄭係個好司長 官職畀佢更擅長」
這一個薯片品客 最終佢都無得撈
佢搵呀胡官傾訴 期待林鄭贏不到
Pringles Pizza is proud of his mustache.
He is not good at math and gives the money to the wrong place.
He wants to join the chief executive race and everyone says he is good.
Regina Ip wants to compete, but Pringles Pizza wins with his popularity.
But Beijing has not given the green light to him yet. So he cannot run.
It said, “Carrie Lam is a good chief secretary and has more experience in the government.”
Pringles Pizza lost his job.
He talked to Judge Woo and hoped that he would beat Carrie Lam in the race.

author: Oiwan Lam


text:
Five Things Tearing Afghanistan Apart and the Local Proverbs That Help Explain Them · Global Voices
Najeebullah Azad

A graffiti on the streets of Kabul, saying: “the country's wounds need healing”
International media coverage of Afghanistan focuses overwhelmingly on war; the damage reaped by NATO/Resolute Support Mission airstrikes, the atrocities committed by militant groups on the ground, the abuses of the civilian population by government troops.
But if the war disappeared tomorrow, Afghan society would still be wracked by social problems. Here are just five whose impact on the country is clearly visible, and explainable with the help of a good old Afghan proverb.
From left to right: Dubai skyscrapers and an Afghan beggar in Kabul
Afghans have a saying “to eat salt and break the salt shaker”. The country is well-known as the world's most corrupt, but not enough attempts are made to investigate the outflow of money — often sourced from international donors — to private companies in Dubai and other countries of the Middle East owned by friends and relatives of Afghanistan's “lions”, as the political class likes to refer to itself.
This trend costs the country billions of dollars a year and reinforces the corrupt status quo by ensuring that old politicians, who have given little to the country in recent times, expand their wealth and influence. Bringing money into Afghanistan, whether through aid or investment, is one thing. Stopping it leaving is an entirely different challenge.
Partridge fighting in the outskirts of Kabul. Photo by Najeeb Azad.
Tribal insults have many roots — from the divide-and-rule of British colonialism through wars fought along ethnic lines over the last few decades. A lot of high-level Afghan purza goya (babblers) use tribal insults to subjugate and control other tribes. These slurs should be regularly documented as examples of the hate speech that is often echoed on social media.
Around forty tribes live in Afghanistan, each of whom represent their own distinct culture, language and traditions. Afghans have a saying “from one hand comes no sound”, which suggests development and progress are joint initiatives. But sectarian public figures undermine groups that are not their own in different ways. Sometimes the insults are subtle, for instance implying that Wardakis (residents of Maidan Wardak province) and Laghmanis (residents of Laghman province) are foxy and untrustworthy, while on other occasions they are openly discriminatory, such as referring to Hazaragis (people from Hazara tribe) as “flat noses”.
The aim is always the same; to prevent the emergence of an Afghan national identity and maintain their power over specific groups.
The remains of Afghan national heroes. Photo by Najeeb Azad.
Afghanistan has many national heroes; every tribe considers their leader to be such a “national hero”, and most of these national heroes emerged during the thirty years of civil war.
In the offices of government organizations, one can often see photos of the head of the office’s tribal leader. Some of these local legends, inevitably, oversaw massacres of groups of Afghan citizens during their lifetimes.
An honest and objective assessment of history and the roles played by these “lions” of the past is essential if Afghanistan is to have a national future. Young Afghans use a proverb to criticise their older compatriots’ rose-tinted view of the old heroes: “Afghans have no good person alive, and no bad person dead.” Another, older proverb has a similar thrust: “A dead goat has golden horns.”
The partition line in Dragon Valley, Bamyan, Afghanistan
The Durand Line that marks the general division between Afghanistan and Pakistan is a rich source of bloodshed for Afghanistan as Pakistan-based insurgent groups move across the porous frontier into their poor South Asian neighbour. Afghan politicians do not tend to recognize the line as the official border between the two countries, and argue the Afghan king who signed the Durand Line agreement with British-India did so under British duress.
While that may be the case, Afghanistan's non-recognition of the line as a border has helped ensure relations with its powerful neighbour remain poor, while the line itself divides Pashtun communities on either side, fuelling resentment. Solving the Durand dilemma might mean Afghanistan giving some of its territory over to Pakistan, but as one saying runs, “stopping your losses is a gain”.
Child malnutrition, Afghanistan. Photo by Najeeb Azad.
“Extend your legs to the length of your carpet”, is an Afghan proverb that equates to “live within your means”. Unfortunately, where social status-boosting weddings and the hajj pilgrimage are concerned, many Afghans are not inclined to do so.
On a daily basis Afghans die of hunger, women and children die during child birth, youngsters take dangerous illegal routes to seek asylum abroad, and youth join militant groups. In this context the huge amounts of money spent on the Hajj seem akin to the money leaving the country in the direction of Dubai; another kind of Hajj could be performed by supporting poor families, health initiatives, and young entrepreneurs.
Many of the country's rural poor, for financial or bureaucratic reasons, never make the journey to Mecca. But they will inevitably borrow money for grand weddings while the dowry system can ruin families that have more daughters than sons. Weddings and other family occasions offer great distractions from the stress of everyday life, until you get the bill. This tendency to overspend on momentary enjoyment brings another famous proverb to mind: “The goat worries about his life, the butcher worries about the fat.”
See also: 9 Things to Love About Afghanistan

author: Najeebullah Azad


text:
Homeless People Outside Tehran Are Taking Refuge in Empty Graves · Global Voices
Mahsa Alimardani

One of the viral images of Iran's homeless population taking refuge in graves outside of Tehran. Image by Saeed Gholamhosseini for ISNA news. Published with rights to redistribute.
Images of homeless people in Iran taking refuge in empty graves outside of Tehran have shocked Persian social-media users, leading to outrage and calls for the government to intervene.
The public uproar intensified after the newspaper Shahrvand, a publication believed to be close to the reformist government of Hassan Rouhani, ran a feature called “Life in the Grave.”
Since the story broke, Iranians have been discussing it heatedly online. One anonymous Twitter user called “Maktoub” quoted an ironic line by the founder of the Islamic Republic,  Ayatollah Khomeini, saying, “I prefer the ‘slum dwellers’ to the ‘palace dwellers.'” The irony of this statement was shown in the juxtoposition of an image of a homeless man living in a grave, with the image of the palace-like shrine, built with government money, that houses his tomb.
” یک موی کوخ نشینان ” را به ” همه کاخ نشینان ” ترجیح میدهم (امام خمینی) pic.twitter.com/CbgNpBuoPY
— maktoub (@Pensylvani) December 27, 2016
I prefer the ‘slum dwellers’ to the ‘palace dwellers’ (Imam Khomeini)
An Instagram post by Iranian artist and cartoonist Bozorgmehr Hosseinpour (seen below) has garnered significant attention on Persian social media, as well. In addition to some controversial remarks about sterilizing the homeless to prevent them from bearing children, Hosseinpour expressed his frustration that no one paid attention to Iran's ongoing homeless problem, until the viral grave images were published.
فرمان ايست! به جاي احساسات خرج كردن هايي كه راه را به ناكجا مي كشاند، به جاي حرف هاي سطحي و بدون دانش… بايد فكري بكر كرد. بايد در اين روزگار تلخ، سنگيني تحمل ناپذير هستي را از كول و دوش بچه هايي كه سرگردان، ضعيف… مريض و با كوله باري از بيمارى و درد وارد اين جهان مي شوند برداشت. بايد با توضيح ماجرا و محبت و آگاه سازي از سرنوشت بچه هايشان، عقيم سازي اين كارتن خواب ها و آشفتگان بي جا و مكان از توليد كارتن خواب هاي آينده جلو گيري كرد. بايد به اين انسان هايي كه اينسان ، بدبخت… بي چاره و سرگردان در حال توليد مثل هستند… فرمان ايست داد. *طبيعتا اين به اين معناي اين نيست كه نبايد به اين افراد بي چاره كمك كرد. اين دردمندان سال هاست كه در زير پل ها، جوب ها و پارك ها سرگردانند. و اين روزها فقط به خاطر تصوير قبر خوابي شان مورد توجه خبري قرار گرفته اند. و اگر همچنان در جوب و زير پل ها خوابيده بودند هنوز كسي ازشان خبري نمي گرفت. خدا را شكر كه اينچنين شد و به اين واسطه ديده شدند تا شايد اتفاقي براي خودشان و نسل بعديشان بيافتد *كساني كه عربده كشان كمك به كارتن خواب ها هستند تا الان كجا بودند؟اين بيچارگان اگر در قبر نخوابيده بودند هنوز ناديده بودند! الان هم فكر كرديد چه مي شود؟ از قبرستان بيرونشان مي كنند. كارشناسان فحاشي به راه شما نخواهم رفت #كارتن_خواب_ها
A photo posted by Bozorgmehr?? (@bozorgmehrhosseinpour) on
Stop! Instead of wasting your time on senseless feelings which gets you nowhere, and instead of shallow and unwise words…let's think of some good solutions. During these bitter days, we have to take off some of the weight from the homeless children who are lost and weak…those who are sick and enter the world with sickness and misfortune. We have to explain the matter with empathy and kindness and educate them on the future of their own children. These inhabitants of boxes (karton khab-ha) should be stopped from having children so we can prevent future populations of these displaced people of boxes. We have to order them to stop reproducing more homeless children who will grow up in the same state of poverty as their parents. Naturally this does not mean that we should not help these people in these unfortunate states. This has been a issue for years that sees these folks living under bridges, in sewers and parks, but these days they are only gaining attention because of the images of them sleeping in graves. If they had similarly been sleeping in the sewer or under the bridge no one would have any news of these people. Thank god that this was the turn of events that people are now aware of this population and might be able to do something to their lives and that of their children. Those that are now screaming for their lives, where have you been until now? If these poor people were not sleeping in graves you wouldn't probably know about them. And now what do you think will happen? They will throw them out of the graveyards… #sleepers_of_boxes
Oscar winning Iranian filmmaker Asghar Farhadi was another notable voice to cry out in outrage at the notion that Iranians had to take refuge in graves to survive the winter. In an open letter penned to President Hassan Rouhani, he exclaimed he was ashamed of his country.
نامه #اصغرفرهادی به #حسن‌روحاني: pic.twitter.com/0Ytq5fjC8y
— امیر کلهر (@AmirrKalhor) December 27, 2016
#AsgharFarhadi's letter to #HassanRouhani
The President was quick to respond, agreeing with Farhadi that these conditions are unacceptable.
روحانی در واکنش به نامه فرهادی: گورخوابی قابل تحمل نیست https://t.co/SVeLjRpK7N #BBCPersian #ایران #گورستان #روحانی pic.twitter.com/tItDxnriEL
— Fardad Farahzad (@BBCFardad) December 28, 2016
Rouhani in response to the letter of Farhadi: Sleeping in graves is not acceptable #Iran #graveyards #Rouhani
Other members of the government, such as the governor of the Province of Tehran (the viral images were taken in the surrounding areas of the city of Tehran), say homelessness is part of a wider problem with drug addiction.
There has been some concern that the public's sudden attention to the grave sites will expose these individuals to government abuse, as officials try to remove them in order to resolve the “graveyard” problem superficially.
As reported by BBC Persian, Hashemi claims that many of the individuals found living in homeless conditions refuse to go to rehabilitation facilities for their addictions. The governor also insisted that no homeless persons are being abused by the government.
بسیاری از این افراد از رفتن به کمپ‌ها خودداری می‌کنند. برهمین اساس ممکن است هنگام جمع‌آوری مقاومتی از سوی آنها صورت بگیرد اما در مورد گورستان نصیرآباد به هیچ عنوان در جمع‌آوری آنها بحث کتک زدن تایید نمی‌شود.
A number of these individuals refuse to go to camps. This is why it is possible that while they were being detained there was some resistance between them and authorities. But in the case of Nasir Abad cemetery there are no confirmed accounts that they were physically hurt while they were being collected.

author: Mahsa Alimardani


text:
Macedonia’s Pollution Is So Bad That Activists Have Installed ‘Mountain Air Breathing Booths’ in Protest · Global Voices
Filip Stojanovski

“Breathing in Skopje harms your health” reads the sign on the “Mountain air booth” in Skopje. Photo by Urban Art Actions, used with permission.
The winter “smog season” has arrived in the Balkans. In Macedonia, faced with high levels of pollution, citizens and activists are turning to parody and protest in order to force the authorities to do their job.
In the grand tradition of guerrilla protest art, the group Urban Art Actions offered a satirical commentary on the ongoing problem by providing residents of the capital city Skopje a breath of “fresh mountain air” with “breathing booths”:
Во знак на поддршка на напорите на граѓаните и еколошките организации за решавање на проблемот со енормното загадување во Скопје екипата наречена Урбани уметнички акции постави 2 кабини за дишење све планински воздух во Скопје односно во Буњаковец и кај пазарчето во Aеродром. Со оваа акција сакаме да помогнеме на граѓаните барем малку да подишат чист воздух. Акцијата ќе продолжи и наредните денови и ќе се носи нов свеж планински воздух. По Скопје акцијата ќе биде спроведена и во Тетово.
As a sign of support for the efforts of citizens and environmental organizations to solve the enormous problem of pollution in Skopje, the team named Urban Art Actions posted two breathing booths with mountain air in Skopje. They are located at Bunjakovec and near the green market in Aerodrom. With this action, we want to help citizens and let them take a breath of fresh air. The action will continue in the following days by bringing new fresh air from nearby mountains. After Skopje, the action will be conducted in Tetovo.
The main causes of air pollution in Macedonia include smoke from burning wood and rubber by increasingly an impoverished population which cannot afford central or electric heating, smoke from factories without filters, dust from construction sites and quarries, and exhaust from motor vehicles.
The Macedonian capital Skopje is especially prone to smog in winter due to inadequate urban planning. The local government had been issuing recommendations for vulnerable people to stay indoors, without providing concrete measures that support children or pregnant women who need to go to school or work. Citizens’ demands for gas masks has noticeably increased.
In the polluted area of Tetovo, a glimmer of hope was provided just before the recent elections in early December. After several years of delaying, the government enforced the law and temporarily closed the metallurgical complex Jugohrom, pending the installation of air filters.
Residents of Skopje can take a breath of “fresh mountain air” through the breathing booths.
A comparison of average pollution levels in the area between November and December 2015 and 2016 showed that the pollution dramatically dropped by 40-50%. However, the general level of pollution there remains alarming, as the other pollution factors had not been tackled.
A recent meeting of the mayors of 17 municipalities comprising Skopje City metropolitan area and the nearby villages, organized by Skopje Mayor Koce Trajanovski, did not result in any overreaching measures, like the transport restrictions instituted few days ago in the Bosnian capital of Sarajevo.
“Итен состанок на 18 градоначалници за загадувањето во Скопје”. Дојделе на состаноко со 18 различни коли.
— Канта Сирење (@SuperExtraBonus) December 26, 2016
“Urgent meeting of 18 mayors about the pollution in Skopje.”
They came to the meeting with 18 different cars.
Conclusions that came out of the meeting include the introduction of steeper fines for people who burn coal or the remains of furniture in their homes, and a pledge by Skopje's mayor to ask the new government, whenever it is formed, to make a new tender for the creation of infrastructure for using natural gas-powered heating.
On social media, citizens have voiced discontent over the perceived disconnect between the low quality of life many Macedonians experience and the government's priorities (as well as its ideological obsession with ancient history).
Најзагадениот воздух во Европа не смее да биде проблем за народ со ДНК на антички воини.
— Ари (@zlatniotari) December 26, 2016
The most polluted air in Europe must not be a problem for a people with the DNA of warriors from antiquity.
pic.twitter.com/vCzMWbbwGM
— Gabriela (@ilievskag) November 25, 2016
Graffiti: “Recommendation: Don't die from cancer!” – Municipality of Bitola.
And citizens of Skopje have announced a public protest on December 28, demanding that the authorities start taking serious measures against the pollution.
#протестирам на чист воздух и здрави деца!
28.12.2016 | 17:00 | фонтана во Градски парк#излезиЗАвоздух pic.twitter.com/snWpBvBPam
— Neb. Gelevski – Bane (@banekoma) December 27, 2016
I protest for clean air and healthy children!
28.12.2016 at 17:00 hrs at the Fountain of the City Park. #ComeOutForAir


text:
Myanmar’s Most Memorable Moments in 2016 · Global Voices
The Irrawaddy

This text is from The Irrawaddy, an independent news website in Myanmar, and is republished by Global Voices as part of a content-sharing agreement.
Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and senior military officials photographed during the official power transition ceremony on March 30 in which Myanmar’s outgoing President U Thein Sein handed over the presidential insignia to new President U Htin Kyaw at the presidential residence in Naypyidaw. (Photo: Hein Htet / The Irrawaddy)
As 2016 comes to an end, The Irrawaddy showcases the best work from our photographers this year, capturing Myanmar’s most iconic moments.
The previous government demolished squatter communities on farmlands in Dagon and Seikkan townships in the capital Yangon in February. (Photo: Hein Htet / The Irrawaddy)
Local farmers protested the reopening of copper mines in Sagaing Division’s Salingyi Township on May 5 and demanded compensation from the Chinese company Wanbao Co. (Photo: Myo Min Soe / The Irrawaddy)
Children play at a camp for internally displaced persons in Kachin State’s Mai Ja Yang on July 16. (Photo: Hein Htet / The Irrawaddy)
Floodwater submerged the central market of Kangyidaunt Township, Irrawaddy Division on Aug. 12. (Photo: Pyay Kyaw / The Irrawaddy)
A powerful 6.8-magnitude earthquake struck central Myanmar on Aug. 24 and damaged 396 pagodas and temples in the famous ancient capital of Bagan. (Photo: Zaw Zaw / The Irrawaddy)
Myanmar’s President U Htin Kyaw talks to Daw Aung San Suu Kyi after the 21st Century Panglong peace conference on Sept. 3 in Naypyidaw. (Photo: Pyay Kyaw / The Irrawaddy)
A government-aligned Border Guard Force (BGF) soldier stands guard on Karen State’s Methawaw Road amid clashes between the Democratic Karen Benevolence Army (DKBA) and a joint force of BGF and Burma Army on Sept. 22. (Photo: Myo Min Soe / The Irrawaddy)
A Burmese policeman on patrol at the Myanmar-Bangladesh border fence after militants attacked border police headquarters and checkpoints in northern Arakan State’s Maungdaw Township on Oct. 9. (Photo: Hein Htet / The Irrawaddy)

author: The Irrawaddy


text:
Vietnamese Mother Goddesses Religion Receives UN Recognition · Global Voices
Loa

This article by Jenny Lý is from Loa, an independent news website and podcast that broadcasts stories about Vietnam. It is republished by Global Voices as part of a content-sharing agreement.
Practitioner Kim Chi performs a lên đồng ritual for her temple delegation on a boat at the Điện Hòn Chén festival. Loa / Jenny Lý
Vietnam’s worship of the Mother Goddesses has received UNESCO recognition as an “intangible cultural heritage of humanity.”
The UN Intergovernmental Committee made the official announcement at the 11th Convention for the Safeguarding of Intangible Cultural Heritage held in Addis-Ababa, Ethiopia, from Nov. 28 to Dec. 2, 2016.
The news is cause for celebration in Vietnam, particularly among the ancestor-worship community and scholars who have spent years advocating for UNESCO recognition. Việt Nam originally submitted the dossier in 2015 for “practices related to the Viet beliefs in the Mother Goddesses of Three Realms,” but the recognition was delayed until this year.
The worship of the Mother Goddesses in Vietnam showcases Vietnamese cultural heritage and the people’s spiritual needs in honoring their ancestors to safeguard a prosperous life. The spiritual practice expresses piety toward the mother figure, which reflects Vietnam’s once matriarchal system.
UNESCO states that the belief “provides a basis for social relations connecting members of participating communities.” The worshipping of the Mother Goddesses also contributes to the “appreciation of women and their roles in society.”
The Mother Goddesses of the Three Realms represent deities from heaven, water, and mountains and forests, and have been affiliated with both real, historical figures, as well as mythical ones.
Temple delegation worship at a temple in Huế during the Điện Hòn Chén festival in August 2016. Loa / Jenny Lý
One key practice in the Mother Goddesses worship is lên đồng, a ritual in which the practitioner goes into a trance and assumes a particular deity in costume and dance to honor the Mother Goddesses. These practices are carried out daily in local ceremonies, as well as at larger festivals and pilgrimages throughout the year.
Vietnam houses 10 other UNESCO-recognized intangible cultural heritages, including Tugging rituals and games (2015), Worship of Hùng kings in Phú Thọ (2012), and Quan Họ Bắc Ninh folk songs (2009).
Learn more about the Mother Goddesses worship by listening to the podcast below:

author: Loa


text:
This Was Also the Year of Citizen Heroes in Latin America · Global Voices
Laura Vidal

“I am not a joke” is an artistic campaign in defense of LGBTQ rights. Image used with permission.
Latin America is home to many stories of resistance and heroism. Some are set in minority communities fighting for equal rights, others come from places devastated by natural disasters, in other cases groups expand their horizons through music, dialogue, and more.
Wherever you encounter resistance in Latin America, you find people working to change perceptions and reject the definitions propagated by fear, isolation, and the kind of reductive headlines found too often in the mass media.
Over the past year, Latin American society has discovered many heroes, like the women who resisted Uruguay's 12-year civil-military dictatorship.
Global Voices’ Fernanda Canofre spoke to the film director behind a motion picture honoring these women and the ways their story is still alive today:
About a group of about 30 former political prisoners who accused a large group of military officers of sexually abusing them systematically. The case is still resting in some court’s drawer. This group of women, who were hardly over 20 years-old, besides being tortured through traditional methods [they] were also raped by their executioners. After 30 years of silence, they decided to talk about it. Breaking the powerful taboo that precludes certain subjects and breaking this sickening silence that, somehow, blames them for being victims.
“Migas de Pan” (“Bread Crumbs”) tells the story of Liliana, a Uruguayan woman who was arrested and tortured by the military and has to face her memories 30 years later. In the film, after returning home, Liliana becomes the center of a national debate about memory and justice.” Actress Justina Bustos, who plays the young version of leading character Liliana. Photo: Manane Rodríguez's personal archive and used with permission.
There was also the work of two Argentinian educators searching for alternatives to their   damaged public school system. They traveled, shared various experiences, and brought everything together in a film. As Romina Navarro wrote, you can witness their journey online, too:
The project is based on a journey, in the literal sense of the term. With help from family members, friends, and other collaborators, they prepared their truck and left Buenos Aires on August 11, 2015, heading out on an extensive journey throughout Latin America, in order to get an up-close look at the educational projects of these social movements inside the diverse communities of the region. Their goal is to study them, learn from them, and ultimately reveal them in a documentary that they will edit after returning. The film will be available for free distribution.
2016 will also be remembered regionally as the year Ecuador was hit by a powerful earthquake that devastated most of its coast. The country was in shock and many parts were reduced to rubble. But, as Daniela Gallardo wrote, it also facilitated reconciliation between factions in a deeply divided country, mobilizing powerful organizational capacities to help victims in need:
This event has made people forget about their political and social differences. Personal approval or rejection of the national government's policies were put aside in order to help the most affected provinces: Esmeraldas, Manabí, Santa Elena, Guayas, Los Ríos and Santo Domingo de los Tsáchilas, all belonging to the coastal region. Hundreds of buildings were reduced to rubble in just minutes. Roads were damaged. The touristic center of Ecuador was devastated.
“Social media has served as a great support not only for Ecuadorians abroad, but also for those on the ground […] Likewise, volunteers coordinated using the hashtag #SeNecesitaEC (#NeededEc) for collecting food, clothing and medicine. Photo: A screenshot of video taken in Quito, the capital of Ecuador, where people organize themselves to send water and food to those affected by the earthquake.
Young musicians from Mexico and Paraguay also faced their share of difficulties. Mary Aviles followed the stories of two orchestras, describing how poverty led to music and growth:
The world generates about a billion tons of garbage a year. Those who live with it and from it are the poor – like the people of Cateura, Paraguay. And here they are transforming it into beauty.
News from Colombia was a regular presence both in coverage by Global Voices and the world media, thanks in large part to the country's complex and troubled peace process. Colombia's struggles have also provided stories about how resistance campaigns turn to art, such as the popularization of hip hop, to preserve collective memories.
As seen in this article written by Dylan Tsenak:
“Seeds of the Future” unites approximately 60 youths from Comuna 13 who together practice “AgroArte”. In other words, they link agro (or sowing) with art (hip hop). In this way, they teach young women and men to sow seeds, to work the land, and cultivate gardens. At the same time, the participants write and sing their own musical hip-hop creations, and they use their lyrics to document events and feelings in their own lives. By planting seeds, moreover, they take ownership of physical spaces that have been marked by violence. The spaces then are transformed into “scenes of life” that symbolically capture the theme of resistance against violence.
A song made by the youths belonging to “Seeds of Future” can be viewed below:
Yessika Gonzalez introduced readers to Argentinian traditions practiced to question the ways society understands issues like dance, justice, and love.
Although at its inception only men danced the tango, in the traditional milongas of today, same-sex partners have been victims of discrimination and even expulsion from the dance floor. In fact, the birth of many “queer” milongas came as a response to these attacks […] For many, the tango is a macho dance that relegates women to a passive role. Nevertheless, in recent years with the emergence of this new style of tango, the role of women has become more participatory. In fact, many women enjoy exercising the role of leading the dance. In the Queer Tango, women can lead or be led when dancing with a man or another woman.
Daniel Arzola‘s story also involved LGBTQ discrimination, as well as internationally celebrated visual work:
The focus […] remains the defense of the dignity of people who step outside of the generic norm, who refuse to be objectified, or to be part of dehumanizing stereotypes. It is followed by those who, despite not being a part of the cause, defend it, and those who refuse to be silenced by government or private oppression.
All these stories, as well as countless yet to be told, revolve around popular challenges to violent realities. Told through the eyes of activists and artists, these are stories of heroes, not victims.

author: Laura Vidal