text:
Is Rio de Janeiro at War? Its Residents Debate · Global Voices
Fernanda Canofre

The Brazilian Army in an operation in favelas in Niterói, a city in the state of Rio de Janeiro, during the state crisis. Image by: Estado Maior (CML) via Fotos Públicas, CC-BY-NC 2.0
Everyday, newspapers all around Brazil are flooded with grim headlines about Rio de Janeiro, Brazil's second largest city and home to many of the images found on the country's postcards.
Some examples of these headlines read:
‘14-year-old Girl Shot Dead Inside School’, ‘Every Two Days a Police Officer is Killed in Rio de Janeiro‘, ‘Robbers Used Military Rifles to Mug a Pharmacy’, ‘President Temer sends 8,500 Army, Navy and Air Force men to Rio‘.
In 2017, with an economic crisis and public funds under strain, violence in Rio de Janeiro reached its highest levels in a decade. One NGO has even called on the UN to intervene.
These stories are becoming commonplace and it's unacceptable — or at least that's what the management of one local newspaper says. In an editorial dated August 16th, titled ‘This Is Not Normal’, newspaper Extra — famous for its detailed coverage of violence in Rio — stated that it will be creating a new section named “Rio's War”. All reports of violence from the city will now be published in that section. They explained the motives behind their decision:
O EXTRA continuará a noticiar os crimes que ocorrem em qualquer metrópole do mundo: homicídios, latrocínios, crimes sexuais… Mas tudo aquilo que foge ao padrão da normalidade civilizatória, e que só vemos no Rio, estará nas páginas da editoria de guerra. (…) foi a forma que encontramos de berrar: isso não normal! É a opção que temos para não deixar nosso olhar jornalístico acomodado diante da barbárie.
EXTRA will continue to report the kind of crimes that take place in any big city in the world: homicides, robberies, sexual crimes… However, everything that deviates from the standard of civilised normality, and that we only see in Rio, will be on the war section pages. (…) this is our way of shouting: this is not normal! It is the alternative we have to avoid making our journalistic eye complacent in the face of barbarism.
In a four-minute video shared on Facebook, Extra’s editor-in-chief, Octávio Guedes, says the decision is not something to be proud of, but rather it's a sign of failure:
O Extra deve ser o único jornal do planeta que tem uma editoria de guerra em um país que não reconhece a guerra.
Extra must be the only newspaper on the planet that has a war section in a country that does not recognise the war.
In the same video, one of the paper's reporters says that according to the Public Safety Institute of Rio de Janeiro, there are 843 areas in the city that are under the control of criminal organizations.
The editorial also says:
Temos consciência de que o discurso de guerra, quando desvirtuado, serve para encobrir a truculência da polícia que atira primeiro e pergunta depois. Mas defendemos a guerra baseada na inteligência, no combate à corrupção policial, e que tenha como alvo não a população civil, mas o poder econômico das máfias e de todas as suas articulações.
We are aware that a war discourse, when distorted, can be used to cover up truculent acts by a police force that shoots first, asks later. But we defend the war based on intelligence, on fighting police corruption, and that has as its target not the civil population, but the economic power of mobs and all its associates.
In an article published by The Intercept Brasil, journalist Cecília Oliveira counter-argues that by labelling the violence in Rio a “war”, the media might end up justifying a failed public security policy and even hindering police accountability.
Não é uma guerra. É o resultado de corrupção, mau planejamento – como o próprio Extra mostrou, ao analisar as operações do Exército no Rio, somados a falta de investimentos em pessoal e inteligência e o descaso histórico – e complacente – com áreas do estado. Lembrando que o Estado é maior que a capital.
This is not a war. This is the result of corruption, poor planning — as Extra itself has shown by analyzing Army operations in Rio — added to a lack of investment in human resources and intelligence and the historical and complacent neglect of public services. Just a reminder: the state of Rio de Janeiro is bigger than its capital.
March for peace in Niterói, in the state of Rio de Janeiro, in homage of assassinated cultural promoter Rafael Lage. Image by: Fernando Frazão/Agência Brasil, published with permission.
For Cecília, to say that Rio de Janeiro is “the most violent place in Brazil” is innacurate: “22 out of the 30 most violent cities in Brazil are located in the North and Northeast regions, according to data from 2015 (the latest available). None of these are found in the state of Rio de Janeiro. When we look at homicide rates [by state], Rio ranks 16th”, she writes.
Extra is owned by Globo corporation, Latin America's largest media conglomerate, which, Cecília points out, has for decades been echoing the state's public security policies. Among these security policies was the creation of the UPP (Pacifying Police Unit), launched in Rio in 2003, whose goal is to deploy massive police force to ‘conquer’ a favela and establish a permanent unit there. While initially reducing violent deaths, the UPP came under fire in recent years after numerous reports of harassment and repression were filed by the poor communities these newly established police units were meant to protect.
On his Facebook page, journalist João Paulo Charleaux quoted an article he wrote in 2010 in which he discusses why the violence in Rio does not meet the necessary criteria — as defined by the Geneva Conventions — to be labeled a ‘civil war’. He says:
Além do debate jurídico, há uma consequência humana grave em dizer que há uma guerra no Rio. Ao fazer isso, a sociedade estimula o Estado a agir com meios e métodos próprios de uma guerra, incursionando num território ‘inimigo’, onde os civis são apenas borrões na paisagem, candidatos aos ‘danos colaterais’ e às “balas perdidas'”.
Besides the legal debate, there is a serious human consequence in saying there is a war in Rio. By doing this, society stimulates the State to act with means and methods that are typical of a war, entering in a ‘enemy’s’ territory, where a civil person is only a blur in the landscape, subject to ‘collateral damage’ and ‘lost bullets’.
War or not, residents of Rio's favelas continue to suffer. It’s been a week since the police climbed up the hill of Jacarezinho to avenge the death of an officer. In the midst of all the violence, another incident made the headlines: a fruit seller was killed after being shot by police from a helicopter.

author: Fernanda Canofre


text:
Serbia and Macedonia at War? The Headlines Say So, But Citizens Disagree · Global Voices
Marko Angelov

Front pages of Serbian newspapers on August 22, 2017: Serbian Telegraph (main: “Backstabbers: Zaev declared war on Serbia”, top right: “NATO trembles with fear: Putin's secret weapon stops 21 US ships”), Politika (“Skopje announces support for Kosovo in UNESCO: New blow to Serbia by Macedonian government”), Blic (“Macedonian secret services followed and intimidated Serbian diplomats”), Alo! (“Diplomatic war: Brother Zaev stabs us at the back!”)
On August 21, Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić said that staff from the Serbian embassy had been withdrawn from their posts in Macedonia for consultations in the Serbian capital, Belgrade. This decision was taken after Serbian intelligence agencies allegedly “received sufficient evidence of many offensive intelligence activities against Serbian authorities and institutions.”
In response, pro-government media in Serbia started a new wave of warmongering front page announcements aimed at Macedonia and the Macedonian prime minister Zoran Zaev, including titles such as, “Macedonians Are Stabbing Us in the Back!” and “Zaev Declared a War on Serbia.”
Analysts from the region consider two main factors which may be behind this unprecedented move by the Serbian government. The first might be due to Serbian interest in Macedonia as indicated by a nearly decade-long effort by Russian and Serbian secret services to support anti-western and pro-Russian nationalists in Macedonia. Leaked documents, obtained by the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) and partners NOVA TV and the Crime and Corruption Reporting Network (KRIK), included reports by Macedonian counterintelligence about “strong subversive propaganda and intelligence activity” aimed to disrupt the country's entry into NATO.
This, added to reports that a Serbian intelligence officer was present during the April 27 coup attempt in the Macedonian Parliament, also known as ‘Bloody Thursday’, has created tension in the region. The incident occurred when a mob organized by the former ruling party, VMRO-DPMNE, a right-wing populist party with reported ties to Russia and to Serbian intelligence services, attempted to lynch the soon-to-be Prime Minister Zoran Zaev, other MPs and journalists.
Another reason may involve the ongoing efforts by the Serbian government to prevent Kosovo's bid for membership to UNESCO. Kosovo is a former Serbian province which declared its independence in 2008. Since then, international recognition of Kosovo has been mixed. Vučić's administration had been lobbying other countries to vote against Kosovo's membership within the relevant UN bodies. Some journalists have been speculating that this is a form of pressure intended to intimidate Macedonia into stopping support for Kosovo's bid.
The Macedonian Minister of Foreign Affairs was quick to respond to an inquiry from a citizen about this issue:
Macedonia cannot possibly be in the driving seat on an issue that is both very important and divisive for our neighbors.
— Nikola Dimitrov (@Dimitrov_Nikola) August 21, 2017
Other commenters have noted that this development is a part of the proxy war between Russia and the USA, which also initiated hostile moves at diplomatic level lately. In this respect, Serbia is seen as attempting to destabilize the new Macedonian government which came to power at the end of May with clear a pro-western platform.
Former Serbian Minister of Foreign Affairs Vuk Jeremić, who currently works as an analyst, criticised the events via a much-quoted tweet:
Šta god se desilo u Skopju, povlačenje celokupnog osoblja ambasade je diplomatski dilentatizam i šarlatanstvo, svojstveno banana državama.
— Vuk Jeremić (@jeremic_vuk) August 21, 2017
Regardless of what had actually happened in Skopje, withdrawal of the entire embassy staff is a diplomatic dilettantism and charlatanry, which only occurs in banana republics.
The Macedonian government, in turn, issued statements aimed at de-escalation, stating it will not jump to hasty conclusions and will wait for an explanation from Serbia.
Social network users have been sharing the warmongering headlines from pro-government media in Serbia, as a way to criticize the state for their control of the media.
Kao što sam vam sinoć najavio, plaćeni urednici – bruka za profesiju, afirmišu diplomatsko glupiranje AVučića. 2/2 pic.twitter.com/PzBMM8y81m
— Зоран Живковић (@ZoranDirektno) August 22, 2017
As I noted yesterday, the mercenary editors who shame their profession promote the diplomatic stupidities of Aleksandar Vučić.
Common citizens on both sides of the border refused to take this rhetoric at face value, and initiated a dialogue affirming their abhorrence to political manipulations.
Braćo Makedonci, nema veze sa mnom i normalnom Srbijom, ali evo ja se izvinjavam u ime te sakrivene normalne Srbije zbog ludaka na vlasti.
— QQLELE #ZaDuleta (@ajmeiQQ) August 21, 2017
Brother Macedonians, this has nothing to do with me and the normal Serbia, but I hereby apologize in the name of that hidden normal Serbia because of the madmen who rule her.
Some have been pointing to the absurdity of starting the war between the two nations, especially because of the asymmetry of their size and military power. For instance, one social media user posted a photo of a hotel in the shape of a ship that had been built as part of the Skopje 2014 project, mocking the sensationalist tone of the warmongering media:
[Foto] Uzbuna ljudi!!! MAKEDONCI KRENULI BRODOVIMA NA NAS!!!
cc @unexploded_yet pic.twitter.com/eHZHu8lpDR
— Dobrica Veselinović (@dobrinacelnik) August 22, 2017
Alert people!!! Macedonians had obtained sailing ships and are going to attack us!!!
Macedonian journalist Borjan Jovanovski also mocked the headline's rhetoric by mentioning Vranje, the biggest Serbian city in the vicinity of the border with Macedonia:
До кај стигнавме со офанзивата? дали падна Врање бар?
— Borjan Jovanovski (@BorjanJovanovsk) August 22, 2017
How goes our offensive? Did Vranje fall, at least?
Social media users from the region also reacted to the scandal. For instance, Bosnian film director Dino Mustafić commented:
Medijski naslovi u Srbiji u vezi Makedonije pokazuju kako je Vučić kreirao paranoidnu-šizofrenu realnost u koju ubjeđuje cijelu naciju!
— Dino Mustafic (@MdinoDino) August 21, 2017
Media headlines in Serbia regarding Macedonia show that Vučić created a paranoid-schizophrenic reality and tries to persuade the whole nation to accept it.
Psychologist and political analyst Srđan Puhalo posted an “advertisement” about the vacant embassy, mentioning the Serbian minister of Foreign Affairs Ivica Dačić as a sort of secret agent from the James Bond 007 series:
Izdaje se namjestena ambasada u Skoplju, osvestana!!!
Sifra: Dacic 007
— Srđan Puhalo (@SrkiPuhalo) August 21, 2017
Embassy in Skopje for rent, fully furnished and blessed by an Orthodox priest.
Code: Dačić 007.
In spite of any political turmoil, the relations between the populations of Macedonia and Serbia have remained friendly since the break up of former Yugoslav federation in 1991. In times of need, the regular people of both countries have shown tangible solidarity through grassroots humanitarian aid actions for Serbia in 2014 and Macedonia in 2016, to name a few.

source: news-globalvoices

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

author: Marko Angelov


text:
Men’s Relay Team Gives Trinidad & Tobago an Early Independence Day Gift With Historic IAAF Win · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

Screenshot from a NAAA TT video of the Trinidad and Tobago 4 x 400 relay team about to receive their gold medals at the 2017 IAAF World Championships in London, England, on August 13, 2017.
The 2017 IAAF World Championships, which ended on August 13, 2017 in London, England, left Caribbean netizens brokenhearted that Usain Bolt, widely acknowledged as the Greatest of All Time (GOAT), ended his international track and field career with a bronze medal in his signature event, the 100-metre dash.
Just as gut wrenching was the fact that the Jamaican track team failed to place in the 4 x 100-metre final, as Bolt pulled up during the last leg, unable to carry on due to injury. But the region's spirit was lifted when, seemingly out of nowhere, Trinidad and Tobago clinched the gold in the last event, the 4 x 400 relay.
The win didn't actually come out of nowhere, of course, no matter how surprised the commentators may have been. The team copped silver two years ago at the World Championships, and clearly had first place in their sights this time around. Facebook user and sports enthusiast Peter Samuel noted what a significant achievement the team's win was for the country:
CONGRATS to all of Team TTO's male quartet of [Jarrin] Solomon, [Jereem] Richards, [Machel] Cedenio and [Lalonde] Gordon who has just created HISTORY by winning the men's 4X400m at the World Championships being held in London in a New National Record and World Leading time of 2:58.12. Way to go GENTLEMEN.
The win marked the first ever gold medal for Trinidad and Tobago in the 4 x 400 event — the team dedicated their victory to the country, especially in light of the twin island republic's upcoming 55th anniversary of independence from Great Britain, which will be marked on August 31, 2017:
Facebook user Rose-Marie Ingrid Lemessy-Forde was thrilled with their performance. She posted an image of the leaderboard, noting that the Trinidad and Tobago team won in a world leading time:
Facebook user Rose-Marie Lemessy-Forde's status update, which says, “Well yes! World leading time too! Every single man ran like a beast for this medal!!!” Used with permission.
In a later status update, her heart was full after noticing the display of regional solidarity from the athletes — unity that continued online:
Facebook user Rose-Marie Ingrid Lemessy-Forde's status update which reads, “Oh my God. Watching the Jamaicans celebrate with our gold medal team! Priceless.” Used with permission.
The joy was infectious. As Tillah Willah observed during her afternoon workout up Lady Chancellor Hill:
Everybody on Chancellor like they going for gold this evening #sweetTandT #worldchampions #dohdragdeflag ??
— Tillahwillah (@tillahwillah) August 13, 2017
On CNC3 Television, Trinidad and Tobago's Facebook page, user Majestic Sandy was happy for something other than crime stories to dominate her newsfeed:
Congratulations! You've made us proud. Thanks for shining some light in the darkness that has been plaguing our country. ??
Other social media users praised the team's determination and hoped that the athletes would be aptly rewarded for their efforts — far more than the typical pronouncement of a national holiday.
It is common knowledge that the members of the national athletics team have had no government assistance for about three years. While the National Association of Athletics Administrations of Trinidad and Tobago (NAAATT) does attract some corporate sponsorship, the majority of these funds is put towards operating the association; athletes competing at world-class level often do so largely on their own steam.
In a public Facebook post, Peter Samuel made a point of posting a photo of Tobago-born Renny Quow, perhaps the most accomplished 400-metre runner to hail from the country, receiving his gold medal. Quow ran the heats and was therefore an indispensable part of the team:
To one and all, please let's don't forget Renny Quow, and the part that he played in helping Team TTO getting into the finals of the men's 4X4… Congratulations to all 5 gentlemen on a job well done…… Photo:- Team Manager Dexter Voisin presenting Renny Quow with his gold medal.
Trinidad and Tobago Team Manager Dexter Voisin presenting Renny Quow with his gold medal. Photo shared in a public Facebook post by Peter Samuel.
Some Twitter users were breathless over the excitement of the race…
Well done that was one eventful #bronzemedal from #GBR and OMG that #gold from #Trinidad just wow #WorldAthleticsChampionships #4×400
— Dolly Parnell (@DollyP_Bear) August 13, 2017
While others were glad not to see the usual suspects on the podium:
Shout out to Trinidad and Tobago beating Yanks in 4x400m #WorldAthleticsChampionships #Trinidad
— ? Eóin Ó ? (@redmed94) August 13, 2017
Finally, Twitter user Nadine West summed up the emotions the region was feeling:
Trinidad and Tobago, you absolute legends #Trinidad #WorldAthleticsChampionships
— Nadine West (@andiekarenina) August 13, 2017

author: Janine Mendes-Franco


text:
A Look at Some of Syria’s Destroyed Heritage · Global Voices
Alreem Kamal

Aleppo's Citadel in 2008. Courtesy of Jean-Baptiste Rabouan/Hemis.fr. Used with permission.
Syria's story is one that has been weaved through families from one millennium to the next. Subjugated as a Roman province under the command of Pompey the Great in 64 BC, and brought under Ottoman rule 16 centuries later by Sultan Selim I in 1516, the country has experienced its share of the world's great military conquests. The empires that vied to establish dominance over the region left behind varied architectural and cultural legacies that were subsumed into the nation's heritage. For Syrians, the experience of savoring the spices at the Souqs in Aleppo or admiring the gem that is the Roman theatre in Bosra are birthrights.
Syria's historic sites have long attested to its riveting history. But their pulverization over the course of a six-year civil war that has claimed well over 400,000 lives and displaced more than half the country's population means future Syrians, and the world at large, risk being deprived of this long-standing narrative.
The Ancient City of Aleppo, inscribed on UNESCO‘s World Heritage Site list in 1986, has historically served as a vibrant trading centre where commercial roads from East and West met, located strategically between the Mediterranean Sea and Mesopotamia. Its prominence in history is attributed to its location at one end of the Silk Road.
One of the world’s oldest continually inhabited cities, it has experienced some of the most horrid atrocities of the war.
Towards the fall of the then-besieged Eastern part of the city in December at the hands of the Assad regime and its proxies, local activists expressed their struggle to count daily death tolls.
According to the United Nations Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR), a total of 22 heritage locations in the city were destroyed and 48 severely damaged as of 2013.
In the busy bustle of Al-Madina Souq, one would typically find a colourful array of imported goods, ranging from silk to spices, and local goods including soap and wool. Apart from trading, the souq also was home to Khans (caravanserais), which accommodated traders along with their goods.
A shot of the souq from 2011 via Flickr user LucyCaldicott. (CC BY 2.0)
A shot of the Souq from 2012. Credit: AMC, used with permission.
In late 2012, intense fighting took place between the regime and the Free Syrian Army (FSA) in and around the Souq. The regime attacked the historic site using mortars, leaving it ablaze.
While UNITAR’s assessment of the damages found that most of the shops have been completely destroyed, one hopeful Aleppine expressed to The Telegraph newspaper in 2012:
It is very bad and very sad..But we can rebuild it, after the revolution is over.
Aleppo Citadel. Photo by Bernard Gagnon via Wikimedia. CC BY-SA 3.0
The Citadel of Aleppo is a fortified medieval castle located in the heart of the old city and considered to be one of the world’s largest and oldest of its kind. The limestone monument had fallen under the control of Byzantines, Greeks, Ayyubids, Ottomans, and others, and each of its various conquerors left their own mark on it architecturally.
The citadel was shelled continually by the Assad regime from 2012 and a bomb explosion in July 2015 caused part of its walls to collapse.
The Syrian regime and rebel groups exchanged blame for the explosion.
Screenshot from the Association for the Protection of Syrian Archaeology dated to October 3, 2014. The photo was accompanied with the following caption: Several photographs published by a photographer of Syrian TV in Aleppo show sniper positions inside the Aleppo citadel, which has become a military camp of the Assad regime's army. This positioning of snipers puts the monument in danger from rebel fire. The photographs reveal that one of the citadel's towers is damaged and has cracks. Several facades and architectural components of the citadel such as towers have sustained damage. Source: Facebook.
The 15th-century Aleppine historian Ibn al-Shihna wrote: “The Great Mosque of Aleppo rivaled that of Damascus in its decoration, painting, and mosaic.”
The Great Mosque of Aleppo, otherwise known as the Umayyad Mosque, had its spectacular minaret built in 1090 and which lasted nearly 1,000 years — it was destroyed in 2013.
A closer look at the mosque's magnificent courtyard in 2009. Photo by Arian Zwegers via Flickr. CC BY 2.0
The Umayyad mosque shares many characteristics with its sister mosque in Damascus, ranging from the marble courtyard to the location on a Roman/Byzantine site.
The Syrian regime, backed by its Russian and Iranian allies, persistently targeted the mosque in the battle for control of the city that raged following its capture by rebel forces in 2012.
#Syria: Umayyad Mosque of #Aleppo is one of the oldest mosques in the city, dating back to the 8th century, destroyed during clashes. pic.twitter.com/hjdd9J9APd
— Rudaw English (@RudawEnglish) 14 de diciembre de 2016
One witness, a rebel fighter, recalled:
We were standing here today and suddenly shells started hitting the minaret. [The army] then tried to storm the mosque but we pushed them back.
According to UNITAR’s assessment, the mosque has sustained severe damage to its eastern outer wall, the southern part of the eastern gallery, the marble-tiled courtyard, the garden, and the entrance to the souq from the eastern gallery.
Helga Seeden, a professor of archaeology at the American University of Beirut, told The Associated Press:
This is like blowing up the Taj Mahal or destroying the Acropolis in Athens. This mosque is a living sanctuary. This is a disaster. In terms of heritage, this is the worst I've seen in Syria. I'm horrified.
Screenshot of a photo of the Mosque by a citizen photojournalist who went by the name of ‘Lens of a Young Aleppine’ dated to October 22, 2012. Source: Facebook.
Deemed a symbol of the revolution, the Daraa mosque was built in the 7th century by the Islamic Caliph Omar ibn al-Khattab. Its once marvelous minaret, now destroyed, was the first minaret in all of the Levant.
The historic mosque had been the focus of anti-regime demonstrations in Daraa and hosted a great number of protests that were consistently met with brutality from government security forces.
It was primarily for this reason that the regime persistently shelled the mosque, destroying its minaret, in an attempt to crush the spirits of protestors.
In June, Syrian regime helicopters dropped four barrel bombs loaded with incendiary substances on the mosque, burning its northern section.
Screenshot from a page entitled ‘Syrian Archeological Heritage in Danger’ dated to April 24, 2013. Source: Facebook.
In the vicinity of this historically rich southern city lies a grandiose 2nd-century Roman theatre, some of the oldest surviving Islamic mosques and Christian ruins, too. The Ancient City of Bosra, inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1980 and added to UNESCO’s list of World Heritage in Danger in 2013, was once the capital of the Roman province of Arabia and a stop-over for caravans en route to Mecca.
Bosra's Roman theatre taken in 2011. Photo by (Ergo) via Wikimedia. CC BY 2.0
This site of immense cultural importance was bombed by regime helicopters in 2015, causing severe damage to the ancient citadel.
Image from SMART News Agency showing significant damage to pillars inside the castle. Source: Facebook.
The medieval castle overlooking the surrounding scenery. Photo by (Ergo), cropped version by Nev1, via Wikimedia. CC BY 2.0
Crac des Chevaliers, meaning ‘Castle of the Knights’, is a Crusader castle in the Homs Province of Syria. Another UNESCO World Heritage site, it is regarded as one of the most important preserved medieval castles in the world. The fortified castle was built by the Hospitaller Order of Saint John of Jerusalem from 1142 to 1271 and received further construction by the Mamluks in the late 13th century.
The castle has endured significant damage, especially to the Crusader chapel, due to a series of shellings and airstrikes by the Syrian regime.
The 2,000-year-old Arch of Triumph in Palmyra before its destruction by ISIS. Source: Pixabay. Public domain.
The ancient semitic city of Palmyra grew wealthy during the Roman Empire on account of its prominent merchants that operated along the Silk Road. This wealth facilitated the construction of exquisite monuments that include the Temple of Bel, Tower of Elahbel, and the Arch of Triumph. Unfortunately, all three of these monuments have endured severe damage and even destruction.
Since capturing the city in 2015, ISIS has blown up a great number of its temples and other monuments.
ISIS has destroyed many ancient structures like this one in the city of #Palmyra, #Syria. Read more at https://t.co/B5jNUIbsVI pic.twitter.com/RXvb3k30H3
— The Philos Project (@philosproject) 24 March 2017
Once a city that captured the heart of every historian and archeologist, Palmyra now evokes a sense of mourning for a rich heritage cast aside.
The picturesque mosque in 2005. Photo by Abdulhadi Najjar via Wikimedia. CC BY-SA 3.0
The Khalid ibn al-Walid Mosque in Homs is named after the Muslim Arab military commander who led the 7 century Muslim conquest of Syria that ended Byzantine rule in the country. Consecrated in 1908, the mosque is notable for its traditional Ottoman-Turkish architectural style.
In 2013, Assad’s forces shelled the historic mosque, ultimately destroying its mausoleum. The mosque has witnessed regular attacks ever since.
#حمص #سوريا #Syria #Homs
جامع سيدنا خالد بن الولــيــد
Khleed Ibn Wl-Waleed Mosque
11 July 2013 pic.twitter.com/mn3TkWhP7O
— عدسة شاب حمصي (@LensHomsi) 13 juillet 2013
#حمص #سوريا #Syria #Homs
مــســجد خالد بن الولــيــد
Homs City – Ibn Al-Waleed Mosque
18 September 2013 pic.twitter.com/cJhRYZwp3z
— عدسة شاب حمصي (@LensHomsi) 18 septembre 2013

author: Alreem Kamal


text:
A Popular Japanese Cosmetic Surgeon Is Called Out for Admiring Nazism · Global Voices
Nevin Thompson

A commercial for Takasu Clinic, featuring Takasu Katsuya (left) and Japanese viral entertainment sensation Pikotaro (right). So far, the YouTube upload of the TV commercial has been viewed more than 1.2 million times. Screencap from official Takasu Clinic YouTube channel. NOTE: Since this article was published, Takasu Clinic has removed the video from YouTube.
A prominent Japanese cosmetic surgeon has earned the condemnation of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, a US-based Jewish human rights organization, after a blogger translated a series of his pro-Nazi tweets into English.
Dr. Takasu Katsuya has apparently been tweeting his admiration for the Nazis in Japanese since at least 2015. Despite this, he remains a popular, if controversial media presence in Japan, regularly appearing on prime television programs and wildly popular commercials for his business.
Reportedly a billionaire, Takasu, 72, has gained renown in Japan and throughout the world for his innovative approach to cosmetic surgery.  After opening his first cosmetic surgery practice in 1976, he steadily grew a chain of clinics across Japan, while introducing liposuction to the country and patenting new techniques such as pubic hair transplants and armpit gland treatments. Takasu is a member of several prominent Japanese medical associations, as well as the American Academy of Cosmetic Surgery.
Takasu is also known for making outrageous statements, as well as for his public feuds. In late August 2017, Takasu's decision to take Onishi Kensuke, a member of Japan's opposition Democratic Party, to court for defamation made headlines.
However, when Estonia-based blogger Kino Toshiki, a member of Japan-based Counter-Racist Action Collective (C.R.A.C.), decided to translate some of Takasu's tweets about Nazism into English, Japanese media started to examine Takasu more closely, especially after the Simon Wiesenthal Center stated that Takasu's Twitter posts “violate all norms of decency and reveal a person who is a racist antisemite and outright lover of Nazism.”
On his blog, Kino Toshiki gathered and, with help from translator and activist Katsumi Takahiro, translated some of Takasu's tweets from October 2015. In them, Takasu expresses admiration for Nazism. He also denies that the Nanjing Massacre, committed by Japanese troops against Chinese civilians and disarmed combatants, and the murder of Jewish people and others at Auschwitz concentration camp during World War II had occurred:
ユダヤ人が迫害されたのは間違いありませんが全てが連合国の情報によるものであり我々は伝聞によって知っているだけです。我々は南京大虐殺を信じている中国の人たちと同じではないでしょうか？真相が知りたいです。 https://t.co/MbZu5S2cqc
— 高須克弥 (@katsuyatakasu) October 2, 2015
There is no doubt that the Jews were persecuted. But we only know it from hearsay and all of it is based on information from the Allies. Aren't we acting the same as the Chinese people who believe in the Nanjing Massacre? I only want to know the truth.
南京もアウシュビッツも捏造だと思う。 https://t.co/vd8V7Lkld5
— 高須克弥 (@katsuyatakasu) October 19, 2015
I think both the Nanjing and Auschwitz are fabrications.
That particular string of statements was triggered by an initial tweet of his in which he credited a Professor Kuroki with showing him “how great Nazism was” (ナチスの偉大さ):
ドイツのキール大学で僕にナチスの偉大さを教えて下さった黒木名誉教授にお会いした。励まして下さった❗嬉しい?なう pic.twitter.com/ngia6ijUYk
— 高須克弥 (@katsuyatakasu) 2 de octubre de 2015
Reunited with Hon. Prof. Kuroki who taught me how great Nazism was when I was studying at the Kiel University in Germany. I’m so glad for having received his encouragement just now!
Kuroki Yoshikatasu works as a surgeon specializing in hip replacements at Zama General Hospital in Kanagawa Prefecture, west of Tokyo, and sits as a board member on a number of national medical committees in Japan. According to his CV, Kuroki at one time headed the department of orthopaedic surgery at the University of Kiel, in Germany. As one Japanese Internet commenter remarked, Kuroki does not appear to have any specialist knowledge of history.
At the time, many questioned Takasu's statements about Nazism and the war, sparking a Twitter debate that would last for several weeks in October 2015. For example, when asked, “I wonder how Dr. Takasu thinks about the fact that 200,000 people who were regarded as physically or mentally disabled were massacred by so-called ‘German medicine’ under the Nazi regime?”
Takasu responded:
連合国のプロパガンダだと思います。東京大空襲では一夜で健康人の非戦闘員がそれ以上虐殺されています。それについて皆さんはどうお考えなのだろうか。 https://t.co/OjEVWbEqNu
— 高須克弥 (@katsuyatakasu) October 3, 2015
I think it is Allied propaganda. In the massive air raid on Tokyo [during the war], far many more people were massacred in one single night. I wonder how you people think about that.
Takasu also used Twitter to repeatedly express his admiration for Nazi science and medicine, including making the following statement:
我が国の医学は大東亜戦争に負けるまではドイツ医学だった。ナチス政権下のドイツ医学の発展は目覚ましいものだった。それを教えて下さった黒木名誉教授に再会して喜んで何がわるい！ https://t.co/sIlsLr7zX5
— 高須克弥 (@katsuyatakasu) October 3, 2015
Until we [Japan] were defeated in the Greater East Asia War, Japan's medicine followed German-style medicine. There was a remarkable progress in German medicine under the Nazi regime. So what is so wrong about being delighted to reunite with Hon. Prof. Kuroki who taught me this?!
His tweets fail to mention that medical science under the Nazis was known for its heinous experiments on concentration camp prisoners who were killed or left permanently disfigured in the process.
More of Takasu's translated Twitter posts have been translated by Kino Toshiki, and can be read here.
In an email interview with Global Voices, Kino said he chose to highlight the Japanese cosmetic surgeon's online posts because Takasu “repeatedly makes these kinds of statements, such as justifying Japan's invasion of Asia, admiring kamikaze pilots, making hate speech against Korean people, and so on. I just picked up some of his most extreme statements this time.”
Takasu's personal opinions don't seem to have affected his popularity in Japan much. In his blog post, Kino notes:
Despite his numerous “revisionist” statements, the cosmetic surgeon who openly praises Nazi scientists has rarely been criticized by the Japanese media, most probably because he is one of the most influential sponsors of TV broadcasters in Japan.
Japan's Counter Racist Action Collective (C.R.A.C.), of which Kino is a member, also notes that Takasu, as the head of an extremely profitable network of cosmetics clinics in Japan, is an influential television sponsor, highlighting a recent and highly popular television advertisement for the clinics featuring entertainer Pikotaro, whose Pen-Pineapple-Apple-Pen Song became a viral hit in late 2016:
This CM footage shows you how much this Nazi doctor is popular and widely accepted by Japanese people. https://t.co/vrlAyn0VCL
— C.R.A.C. (@cracjp) August 18, 2017
NOTE: Since this article was published, Takasu Clinic has removed the video from YouTube.
After Kino published English translations Takasu's tweets on August 19, he says an anonymous Japanese netizen notified the influential Simon Wiesenthal Center, which works in part to confront antisemitism.
By August 22, Kino published a news release the Simon Wiesenthal Center had sent to news outlets around the world, urging the American Academy of Cosmetic Surgery to take action against Takasu. The letter concludes by saying:
The last thing our world needs today is the embrace of Nazi ideology, under whose banner physicians carried out unspeakable crimes in the name of ‘progress.’ Takasu’s continued membership in the American Academy of Cosmetic Surgery should be canceled immediately.
There has been no official statement yet on the Simon Wiesenthal Center website, and no response from either the American Academy or Takasu, but the Jerusalem Post reported on the Wiesenthal Center‘s censure of Takasu on August 23, as well as in a number of Japanese online media outlets.
This is not the first time prominent Japanese media and business people have expressed fondness for the Nazi regime or been implicated in anti-Semitism. Earlier in 2017, APA Group was forced to apologize after an in-house publication left in guest rooms in Coast Hotels, the Japanese company's Canadian subsidiary, equated “international finance capital” with “Jewish capital.”
In November 2016, a Japanese pop group caused international outrage after its members dressed up in what looked like Nazi uniforms for a Halloween concert. And in 2002, a high-level civil servant was also criticized by the Simon Wiesenthal Center for referring to “money-grubbing ghoulish Jews” while discussing social and economic issues.
As for Takasu, even though he has made no mention of the Simon Wiesenthal Center's news release, he seems to have been caught off guard by Kino's blog post.
He took particular offense to the Twitter hashtag “Nazi clinic” (ナチスクリニック) or “nachisu” clinic, a play on the words “Takasu Clinic,” which sprung up in response. In a tweet on August 24, 2017, Takasu complained:
目をはなした隙にといっぱい捏造される
┐(‘～`;)┌
釘を刺しとかないと捏造シラミが動き出す。
シラミ潰しは面倒だけど
シラミの行うナチスクリニック攻撃は許せない https://t.co/JinDvFJe9q
— 高須克弥 (@katsuyatakasu) August 24, 2017
Take my eyes [off Twitter] for a moment, and a ton of falsehoods are made about me.
┐(‘～`;)┌
If you don't crush them right away, these little bastards will immediately start spreading falsehoods. It's too much of a pain in the ass to track down these good-for-nothing hard-to-find and hard-to-crush little parasites, but I will never forgive whatever crumb-bum launched this “Nazi Clinic” attack on me.
For the time being, Takasu, by all accounts, remains unapologetic about his statements, despite the overwhelming evidence of the Nazis’ atrocities, and despite criticism of his remarks both in Japan, and, increasingly, abroad.
English translations of tweets in this piece, except for the final two tweets, were provided by Kino Toshiki and Katsumi Takahiro. In some cases their English translations have been slightly edited for style.
This article has been updated to reflect that Kino Toshiki did not initially contact Simon Wiesenthal Center; instead, an anonymous Japanese netizen did.

author: Nevin Thompson


text:
Blaming Social Media Comments, a Russian Tycoon Announces He’s Done With Macedonian Sports · Global Voices
Marko Angelov

Several publications including (center) Fokus weekly from Macedonia with the headline “Sergei Samsonenko, a joint project by Putin and the Family: Failed Geopolitical Investment.”
Sergei Samsonenko, a Russian businessman and honorary consul to Macedonia, announced that he will give up his ownership of three Macedonian sports clubs because of the insulting comments some fans had posted on social media about him.
Many in the country, however, are theorizing that it's an excuse for Samsonenko to escape possible scrutiny from corruption investigators over his business dealings.
Since his arrival to Macedonia in 2006, shortly after the government lead by nationalist VMRO-DPMNE came into power, Samsonenko made a name for himself as an investor who often received government support for his projects, which are run through off-shore companies registered in Cyprus and Belize.
Back in Russia, he owned a betting company BETCITY and had some issues with the authorities. In Macedonia, Samsonenko has come to own betting parlors and over 30 various companies. Over time he also acquired three sports clubs: the biggest football club in the country, FK Vardar, as well as the male and the female versions of Vardar Handball Club. All three had been among the most successful of Macedonian sports teams in recent years, which helped boost the businessman's public image.
But on August 11, Samsonenko published an emotional open letter stating that he will renounce his ownership of all three clubs because he was “deeply upset” by the offensive comments football fans had been writing about him over high ticket prices for a Europe League match between Vardar FC and the Turkish club Fenerbahçe:
Ова е последна сезона во која јас, Сергеј Самсоненко, како инвеститор вложувам во сите три спортски клуба во Македонија. По оваа сезона, ќе ги вратам трите клуба на поранешните сопственици во одлична состојба, со шампионски титули, добар ранкинг и без долгови.
This is the last season in which I, Sergei Samsonenko, invest as an investor in all three sports clubs in Macedonia. After this season, I will return the three clubs to the former owners in excellent condition, with championship titles, good ranking and no debts.
In the letter, Samsonenko also said that he wasn't in it for the ticket money and announced that he'd lower the price to 300 denars (around six euros or seven US dollars), from the original 2,000-3,000 denars
Reactions from media close to the former VMRO-DPMNE government (which was favored by Russia) praised Samsonenko's generosity and lamented his departure, without digging any deeper into his decision. The rest of the Macedonian public, however, didn't so easily accept that the move was only because of social media vitriol.
Under the ironic hashtag #ThanksSamsonenko (#ФалаСамсоненко in Macedonian), one Twitter user wrote:
Сегде низ светот од навивачи има навреди и лоши зборови за претседателот на клубот па никој не го остави заради тоа клубот.#фалаСамсоненко
— Жикат'а (@zhikatha) August 12, 2017
All over the world fans insult and badmouth club presidents, yet no president has left a club because of that. #ThanksSamsonenko
Others pointed to his links to the former “ruling family” of Macedonia (headed by ex-Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski and his cousin, ex-secret police chief Sasho Mijalkov) and other businessmen who are accused of being in their pocket, such as Orce Kamchev, one of the richest people of Macedonia who owns factories, retail stores, hospitals, and media companies.
Дали Камчев сега ќе мора да купи 14.000 квадрати земја и куп кладилници во Скопје е тешко прашање на жешково. #фалаСамсоненко
— В!Дана (@VidanaDeSign) August 11, 2017
“Will Kamchev now have to buy out 14,000 square meters of real-estate and a bunch of betting parlors in Skopje?” is a hard question to ponder during this summer heat. #ThanksSamsonenko
A December 2016 documentary from investigative journalism outfit SCOOP highlighted Samsonenko's close relationship with these figures:
One of the issues noted by the SCOOP documentary is that according to FIFA's Code of Ethics, people involved in the betting industry should not be involved in professional football:
25: Integrity of matches and competitions
Persons bound by this Code shall be forbidden from taking part in, either directly or indirectly, or otherwise being associated with, betting, gambling, lotteries and similar events or transactions connected with football matches. They are forbidden from having stakes, either actively or passively, in companies, concerns, organisations, etc. that promote, broker, arrange or conduct such events or transactions.
Regardless, during the same month, Samsonenko received the award for “The Best Sports Worker for 2015/2016″ by the Macedonian Football Federation.
Samsonenko was also the recipient of official honors: In 2016 he was declared a honorary consul of the Russian Federation to Macedonia.
An analysis by the Croatian sports portal Telesport suggested that the real reasons for the departure are potential investigations related to financial malpractice and tax evasions, similar to those in Russia. A new government came to power on May 31 in Macedonia with promises to investigate all allegations of corruption.
Such efforts, however, have been stalled so far by officials who were appointed by the leadership of the former ruling party. But if and when they get underway, the authorities who allegedly used Samsonenko as proxy for shady business deals, including government tenders, would no longer be in a position to protect him, Telesport author Mihovil Topić argued.
Meanwhile, Samsonenko is refuting the claims that he's fleeing and taking his capital with him. While meeting with the players of the Macedonian Handball Club Vardar after his original announcement, he assured them that he'll remain owner for another season.


text:
Diplomatic Row Between Serbia and Macedonia Thwarted, No War in Sight · Global Voices
Marko Angelov

Front page headlines of the Macedonian daily Sloboden Pečat during the diplomatic crisis between Serbia and Macedonia. August 22 (left): “So, we get to spy on them for once!” August 23 (center): “Skopje calmly responds to Belgrade provocations: Brothers Serbs, we love you!”; August 24 (right): “Vučić and Zaev pledge over the phone: We'll build friendly relations and lead dialogue about the differences.”
Two days after it began, the diplomatic row between Serbia and Macedonia has seemingly halted.
Tensions defused after a telephone call between the Macedonian Prime Minister Zoran Zaev and the Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić who issued a joint announcement pledging to solve all misunderstandings through dialogue. Serbia announced the gradual return of their staff to the embassy in Skopje.
The front pages of Serbian pro-government media, which had screamed “War!” and blamed Macedonians for “backstabbing,” have taken a less inflammatory tone, and then dropped the subject altogether. On social media, the response to the media frenzy was almost unanimous across the region, with citizens expressing their indignation with warmongering.
Најбитно е што народите на Србија и Македонија ОДБИЈА да се скараат!
ОД-БИ-ЈА!!!
— Mindplumber (@mindplumber) August 23, 2017
The most important thing is that the people of Serbia and Macedonia REFUSED to be drawn into the quarrel!
RE-FU-SED!!!
Се утепавме од ретвитање и заследување едни други со србите овие два дена. Сакам да кажам као заеднички будали што може да те спојат – никој
— Ljubiša (@Sulimanovic) August 22, 2017
Both us and Serbians worked our fingers to the bone retweeting and following up with each other these two days. What I want to say is that nobody can unite you like common idiots!
Citizens across the region have praised the leading Macedonian daily “Slobodon Pecat” for its proper response to the warmongering rhetoric of Serbian tabloids. The August 23 front page displayed anti-Macedonian front pages along with a large headline in Serbian declaring “Brothers Serbs, we love you!” written in Macedonian Cyrillic.
This should be the reply to every tabloid lynching attempt ever. You hate us? Aww. We love you, dear Serb brothers. #embassygate #macedonia pic.twitter.com/rgado1SVZ4
— Una Hajdari (@UnaHajdari) August 23, 2017
Many Twitter users also continued mocking the warmongering, as well as pointing out the similarities between the populist regimes of Vučić and former Macedonian Prime Minister Gruevski (2006-2017).
Makedonac je izbio na treće mesto na listi najvećih srpskih neprijatelja.
Iza Promaje i Rominga
ispred Hrvata i Sapuna.
— Serge Truffaut (@WhistlerDick) August 22, 2017
Macedonians have reached the third place in the list of the biggest Serbian enemies.
Behind the promaja and roaming charges,
ahead of the Croats and soap.
Ја би идел у рат со Србите со жолта и овчо. Нивно е да донесат кајмак и чварки. Бар едно три дена би ратувал.
— Martin Nikolic (@Martin_Nikolic) August 22, 2017
My weapons in the war against the Serbs would be yellow rakija and lamb meat. For their part they can bring kaymak and pork rind. I would fight such a war for three days.
One Serbian Twiter user referred to the ‘Colorful Revolution’ movement that helped bring down the authoritarian regime in Macedonia:
Nego Makedonci, jel vam ostalo nešto od onih farbi i boja, i mi treba da krečimo do Nove godine.
— Tatjana Vojtehovski (@TVojtehovski) August 22, 2017
BTW Macedonians, do you have some of that paint left? We have some painting to do by the New Year.
‘Case closed’ — not likely!
The diplomatic crisis has unleashed additional information regarding the circumstances surrounding the presence of Serbian intelligence operative Goran Živaljević in the Macedonian Parliament during the ‘Bloody Thursday’ attack of April 27 when he made a selfie.
In an August 22 TV interview on Radio Television of Serbia (RTS), Serbian President Vučić explained that their agent was there with the permission of the highest executive authorities in Macedonia. However, VMRO-DPMNE, former ruling party of Macedonia at the time, issued a denial claiming Vučić was not telling the truth.
Сите биле недостапни за време на нападот со умисла во Собрание. Живаљевиќ ПРАШАЛ и добил дозвола од извршната власт да уџиџе. Кога и кого?
— В!Дана (@VidanaDeSign) August 23, 2017
All [top government officials] were inaccessible [for telephone contact] during the premeditated attack on the Parliament. Živaljević ASKED and received permission from the executive authorities to enter. When exactly and by whom?
The next day, RTS aired a statement by Živaljević himself claiming he was allowed to attend by a security adviser to the Macedonian president Gjorge Ivanov. Ivanov gained his position thanks to VMRO-DPMNE and holds direct command over the Intelligence Agency.
Ivanov's cabinet then issued a denial of their own, claiming the Serbian agent did not ask for permission but called them later to secure an alibi. They insist “the case regarding Mr. Živaljević’s unauthorized stay in Parliament is closed after an agreement was reached between the services,” yet it seems the case is anything but closed.
If true, this implies that former PM #Dimitriev, MFA #Poposki, as well as President #Ivanov & his adviser R involved in #Coup & #Treason
— Andreja Stojkovski (@andrejas_mkd) August 24, 2017
Calls for a thorough inquiry into all aspects of ‘Bloody Thursday’ have intensified in recent days. Citizens ask for an investigation that may lead to charges of high treason and/or impeachment of officials colluding with foreign secret services during that critical night in April when Macedonia itself almost slid into civil war.


text:
Scholars at Home and Abroad Call for Withdrawal of Protest Charges Against Five Thai Academics · Global Voices
Mong Palatino

Conference participants holding up placards reading ‘An academic forum – is not – a military camp.’ Photo from Thai Academic Network for Civil Rights.
Hundreds of scholars and researchers around the world have signed an open letter addressed to the government of Thailand appealing for the withdrawal of charges against five local academics accused of violating the ban on political assemblies.
The case was filed by an army officer after the 13th International Conference on Thai Studies took place successfully in Chiang Mai, northern Thailand, on July 15-18, 2017. The conference, held every three years, attracted 1,224 participants this year and was hosted by universities in Thailand, Australia, China, India, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom and the United States.
The Thai government has accused conference organizer Dr. Chayan Vaddhanaphuti of holding a political assembly after some participants staged a protest by raising a placard reading, “An academic forum is not a military camp.” Col Suebsakul Buarawong, deputy commander of the 33rd Military Circle in Chiang Mai, subsequently identified and charged academics Pakawadee Veerapatpong, Chaipong Samnieng, Nontawat Machai, and Thiramon Bua-ngam for violating the law.
Thailand's army grabbed power in 2014 and continues to rule through its constitution drafted in 2016. It vowed to restore civilian rule once political and electoral reforms have been implemented. Since 2014, the military junta has strictly regulated the media and forced some reporters to undergo “attitude-adjustment” sessions. It has also outlawed protests and prohibited the political gathering of five or more people through Order No.3/2015 which remains in effect.
As of this writing, 418 scholars have signed the statement describing Dr. Chayan Vaddhanaphuti as a “deeply respected academic within academia, civil society and within Thai government ministries.”
The statement has three demands: “immediately withdraw the summons” against the five conference participants; “support academics and students in their conduct of scholarly teaching, research, public discussion and debate, on- and off-campus;” and “ease the restriction on free and open discussion on pressing issues of concern to the wider Thai public.”
13th International Conference on Thai Studies poster, Chiang Mai, 2017
Meanwhile, 291 conference attendees have already signed a similar statement urging the government to drop the charges. The statement also mentioned that the conference proper “was marred by the intimidating presence of uniformed and non-uniformed security personnel.”
According to a joint statement released by several human rights groups in the Asia-Pacific, it was the military surveillance during the event which prompted some conference participants to raise a protest placard:
The conference participants who are being charged for holding posters did so to send a message to plainclothes soldiers and police who entered the conference venue unidentified, disregarding a conference rule requiring name badges, intruding on discussions, and photographing people without their consent.
Dr. Chayan Vaddhanaphuti told police that the protest was not part of the conference program. He insisted that because the event is not a political assembly, conference organizers are not obliged to secure military approval.
Ploenpote Atthakor, the editorial pages editor of Bangkok Post newspaper, criticized the decision to prosecute the conference organizer and four of the participants:
This is not the first time we've heard of state intimidation against those advocating academic freedom and freedom of expression. The form may be different, but the goal is just the same: to silence those with different opinions.
Whatever the reason, this has raised quite a few questions: How can we achieve reform when the state still treats those who voice concern about public issues as its enemies?
How far can we go on this reform path when the authorities use all the mechanisms they can to muzzle the people?
The Scholars at Risk international network also released a statement expressing support to the five Thai academics.

author: Mong Palatino


text:
‘Privacy is a Fundamental Right’: Advocates Hail India’s Supreme Court Ruling · Global Voices
Subhashish Panigrahi

Biometric data collection center in India. Photo by Bishwarup Ganguly via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 3.0)
The right to privacy — on the internet and everywhere else — has become “intrinsic to [the] right to life,” in the words of India's supreme court.
After years of debate, a panel of nine judges gave this historic verdict on the morning of August 24. The court unanimously ruled that privacy is a fundamental right and will thus become part of the Article 21 and Part 3 of India's constitution, which details the Right to Life and Personal Liberty.
The verdict was handed down after the court considered multiple citizen petitions that challenged the government's move to make Aadhaar — India's national digital ID system — mandatory for various social welfare benefits.
Legal experts and digital rights advocates have been sharing excerpts from the 547-page ruling and hailing the decision on Twitter:
More love! #RightToPrivacy pic.twitter.com/mLcG5YdUo4
— Mayank Jain (@Mayank1029) August 24, 2017
The nine judge bench of the Supreme Court has unanimusly held that privacy is a fundamental right under the Indian Constitution.
— Gautam Bhatia (@gautambhatia88) August 24, 2017
This is a 9-0 unanimous ruling #RightToPrivacy India.
— Mishi Choudhary (@MishiChoudhary) August 24, 2017
Administrated by the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI), a statutory authority, the Aadhaar system requires citizens to disclose significant amounts of personal and biometric data to the government.
Prior to the ruling, UIDAI declared that privacy is not a fundamental right and assured the public that data in the Aadhaar system was being sufficiently safeguarded.
Yet technical problems in the system have brought serious consequences for the public. System malfunctions have led to massive leaks of citizens’ data (affecting an estimated 130 million people), and have left low-income people unable to receive state food subsidies.
Activists, lawyers, petitioners and many individuals are celebrating the supreme court's verdict on social media with the hashtag #RightToPrivacy, and many also foresee that Aadhaar will soon be in jeopardy. The ruling even compared the Aadhaar system to government wiretapping of private citizens’ telephones.
The verdict has raised the hopes of those who are against Aadhaar. Some have mistaken the verdict as a ruling against Aadhaar, which it is not.
Not yet sir … Can't say Aadhar gone yet !!
— अखण्ड विराट भारतीय (@RAJ_KUMAR_VERMA) August 24, 2017
But the battle may be won, but this is *not* a judgement on #Aadhaar. But earlier judgments state that the CB judgment will have a bearing
— Saikat Datta (@saikatd) August 24, 2017
Apar Gupta, a lawyer and human rights advocate based in New Delhi, cautioned that the future of Aadhaar was still subject to authorities’ interpretation of the ruling and subsequent court decisions:
Privacy case irrespective of result will need to be applied to Aadhaar. Will be by subsequent benches. We will succeed by persistence. 2/2
— Apar (@aparatbar) August 24, 2017
A definite cause for celebration, but we cannot proclaim victory. The true test will be an application which will draw out legal nuance.
— Apar (@aparatbar) August 24, 2017
The current government, run by right-wing Bharatiya Janata Party, was not pleased with the verdict as it will directly impact the way private data is collected and shared in India. The ruling party has promoted Aadhaar as a core project of the Digital India campaign.
Also note to gushy cheerleaders Modi govt had actually told the court that citizens did not have right to privacy. #RightToPrivacy
— Swati Chaturvedi (@bainjal) August 24, 2017
There have arguably been multiple attempts to silence those who went public pointing out the issues with Aadhaar. Some of the most well-researched critiques of the system have come from the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS), an inter-disciplinary research organisation in Bangalore that has become a target of the pro-Aadhaar lobby. Shortly after CIS released a report that pointed to security flaws in the Aadhaar ecosystem, the UIDAI accused the organization of hacking into the Aadhaar system themselves.
The UIDAI has gone after other critics as well, including the creator of a video blog post that showed about the vulnerability of Aadhaar data. In response, the UIDAI accused the creator of violating Section 37 of the Aadhaar Act.
The Article 12 of 1948 United Nations Declaration of Human Rights recognizes privacy as a fundamental human right. As of today, India joins 151 countries across the world (with notable exceptions of the United States and Ireland) that recognize the right to privacy in their respective constitutions.

author: Subhashish Panigrahi


text:
Chinese Police Arrested a Man for Complaining About Hospital Food. Netizens Say It’s Police Abuse. · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

A netizen complained about hospital food and used food scraps to write the words “tastes bad” in his comment. He was arrested on charges of fabricating facts and disturbing public order. Photos from China Daily's Weibo.
A man in Hubei province was arrested and detained for “disturbing public order” after he posted a negative comment about hospital food in She Xian of Handan City.
According to local media reports, the She Xian police received a complaint saying that someone was making negative remarks online about the price, amount and quality of food in a hospital cafeteria, bringing the hospital bad publicity. Upon investigation, the police concluded that the man, named Zhang, was fabricating information and disturbing public order.
The police arrested Zhang on August 16 and held him in administrative detention at the police station.
The news soon went viral and triggered outrage online. Even state-affiliated media outlets are criticizing police actions. Under public pressure, She Xian police released Zhang and admitted that they misinterpreted the law. The head of the police station had been transferred to another position.
The incident has since been coined “Food Pickygate” (挑食門) by Chinese netizens, to highlight the absurd nature of the arrest and abuse of power by police.
Zhang wrote his post on She Xian’s forum:
新医院搬迁后，老百姓看病极为不便，路途遥远，但条件好了远就远吧，新址周围没有小吃摊点，吃饭只能去餐厅，进去一看，富丽堂皇，再问价格，胆战心惊，一碗面要14元！
我晕，我是涉县本土农民，不是来旅游的好吧，忍痛掏钱买吧，10元一份米饭套餐，交钱买卡拿饭，打开再看，更晕，几片北瓜，蒜薹葱头，土豆块倒是不小，但是说好的肉呢？
去哪了？不是两荤一素吗？米饭也少的可怜，口大点三口能干光，去找卖饭的，人家说：大锅炒的菜不均匀，这样很正常，鱼香肉丝里不是有肉吗？米饭不够一块钱再加一份。你们这样忽悠我这个见过市面的农民好吗，那也叫有肉，还没星爷捡的那块大。
医院搬迁搬出新高度，医疗水平不知道提高了多少，倒是把涉县老百姓的消费水平提高不少，原来住院一天7、8块吃不了，现在20块吃不饱，5毛的小米汤呢？1块的大包子呢？4块的卤面呢？5块钱一个人吃不了的饸洛面呢？6块钱四个菜的米饭套餐呢？都搬没了？那良心呢？？？？？？
The new hospital has moved. The location is far and it is very inconvenient for people. But the facility has improved, so the distance can be excused. There aren’t any street vendors by the new site, so the hospital cafeteria is the only choice. It looks classy but the prices are shockingly high. A bowl of noodles costs RMB 14 yuan!
My god, I am a local peasant, not a tourist. Unwillingly I paid RMB 10 yuan for a set lunch. When I opened the box, just a few piece of melon and leeks. They did give a good amount of potatoes, but where’s the meat?
Where’s the meat? The set said one kind of vegetable and two kinds of meat. There were just three mouthfuls of rice. I asked at the food counter, they said: this is normal as the vegetable and meat are cooked in a big pot. Can’t you see the meat strips? If you want more rice, you can pay more. Though I am a peasant, I have city experience — can you call that tiny bit meat?
The relocation of the hospital has pushed everything to a new level. The quality of care may have improved but the consumption level of She Xian has also risen. In the past, a full meal cost RMB 7-8, now RMB 20 cannot fill up your stomach. Where have the RMB 0.5 yuan congee and RMB 1 yuan bun gone? How about the RMB 4 yuan noodle and the RMB 5 yuan big noodle and the RMB 6 yuan set meal with four side dishes? All disappeared? How about conscience???
The public would not have been aware of the local story if police had not made Zhang's detention a showcase of their campaign to crack down on rumors, via She Xian’s television’s official Weibo account:
大干100天，让涉县更加和谐平安。涉县公安局将县十三届二次全委（扩大）会议精神落实到具体工作中，统一思想，精心组织，迅速行动，于近日成功破获两起虚构事实、网络传播、扰乱公共秩序案。…
100 days of campaign will make She Xian become more harmonious. She Xian’s police have implemented the spirit of the county’s 13th party committee second meeting in its daily operation. With a unified thought, well-planned and swift action, it has successfully cracked down on two cases on fabrication of facts online and disturbing public order.
The 100-day campaign was written in the county’s party committee meeting report released on 16 of August, the date police took action on the two online rumor cases. The first case concerned the spread of misinformation online about the death of a taxi driver. The second case was that of Zhang.
According to an independent netizen’s investigation, Zhang wrote and posted his comments in June. The hospital had given response and local media had followed up on the news. The story should have ended there. But following the spirit of the party meeting, the She Xian police turned the case into a criminal act of spreading rumors.
This did not stop netizens from expression alarm on social media. Here is a selection of comments on one of the news threads on Weibo:
问：哥们，你犯什么事进来的。 答：挑食
反问：哥们你呢，你为啥进来的啊？答：电梯强奸未遂。问：哇那你这个厉害了，要判好久吧！答：哦，跟你一样，15天。
[Conversation in a detention cell] Ask: Brother, what brings you here? Answer: Criticising the food in the hospital cafe. Ask back: Brother, what brings you here? Answer: Attempted rape on elevator. Ask: Wow, the sentence is pretty long, right? Answer: Same as you, 15 days in detention.
这个社会到底是怎么了？以后淘宝差评直接抓起来，影响我的销量
What has happened on our society? Just arrest all the negative comments in Taobao shop, they affect my business.
吓得我赶紧把美团、大众点评、糯米的评论全删了
So scary, I have deleted all my food comments on social media.
这个事件的发生主题一个是医院，一个是当事人，关派出所什么事？如果医院认为是造谣，不是事实给医院带来了损失，那么医院应该去民事诉讼，告当事人造谣诽谤，赔偿损失！派出所把当事人抓起来是什么法律？执法者不知法，还违法！这明明就是一个民事诉讼案子，怎么就成了一个治安和刑事案件？
The incident involves a hospital and a man. The police have no role in it. If the hospital believes that the man is spreading rumors and has harmed the hospital, it should take legal action and sue him for libel. Which law empowers the police to arrest the man? The law enforcers have no legal knowledge and have violated the law. This is definitely a civil case — how can it be a public security and criminal case?
In fact, “food pickygate” is not a single incident. The rumor regulation, which was implemented in 2013, has given Chinese police excessive power to arrest netizens who are critical of state-run institutions, the government and party authorities.
Recently, there have been a number of incidents reflecting police abuse of power, as pointed out by Twitter user Zhao Shilong:
涉县说医院食堂不好吃者、和顺矿难爆料者、陕西教师质疑强制捐款被抓，都指向同一问题：警权过大，滥用越权，甚至已沦为官僚的打手。如果不是舆情发酵，前两单不可能翻转，更严劣的陕西教师案还没有翻过来……任意曲解法律，对公民人身自由和言论表达权利的侵犯，以及缺乏追惩，才是最令人担忧的！
— 赵世龙 (@QfWT4KGpxqImovM) August 20, 2017
The arrest of the food critic of She Xian hospital canteen, the netizen who revealed the casualties in a fatal landslide in Heshun county [of Shanxi], the teacher in Shaanxi who questioned forced donation — all these cases point to the same problem: the excessive and abusive use of police power which is used to protect the interest of government officials. If the public were unaware of the first two incidents, the results would not be reversed. The Shaanxi teacher’s case hasn’t been vindicated… The distortion of law, the infringement of citizen’s right to speech and expression, the lack of mechanism to punish the power abuser are the issues at stake.

author: Oiwan Lam


text:
How to Save Languages from Dying, and What I Learned While Documenting My Own · Global Voices
Subhashish Panigrahi

A screenshot from the author's YouTube video of his grandmother.
This story is based on a talk given by the author on July 15, 2017 at the TEDx Youth@AmaatraAcademy in Bangalore, India.
It was during the winter of 2014. I was at home, researching the storytelling patterns of my community. I spent days trying to persuade my grandma to tell me some of the stories from her time. But she’s always been moody, and she wouldn’t comply.
Then one morning, out of the blue, she started telling me stories. After the first one, I had this gut feeling that I had to record it, even though I didn’t know how I would use it. So I covertly took out my camera and started shooting.
My grandma didn’t just narrate the stories—she made herself part of them. Relating a sad episode that the characters were going through would make her shed tears. And she would burst into laughter at a happy ending.
She also sang me a few songs, songs that brides used to sing after their weddings as they left their parents’ homes to go and live with their in-laws. These were songs about separation, originally filled with sorrow. But slowly it became a social phenomenon. People started creating literature around it, adding humour and sarcasm. And because not everyone is good at crying, the whole thing would be rehearsed beforehand, and women like my grandma played a great role as master trainers.
I had a great time recording these unique songs and stories of my community. I uploaded them and made them available publicly online.
But I didn't understand how valuable those recordings were until I met Daniel Bogre Udell, who told me about a project he and his friend Freddie Andrade were building called Wikitongues. They were collaborating with volunteers around the world to record videos of people narrating a story or incident in their native languages. I loved the idea. Videos on Wikitongues helped me learn about many beautiful stories from all over the world that would have been totally hidden otherwise. They also inspired me to add subtitles and more information to my recordings.
Unfortunately, many languages are dying, and quite rapidly. UNESCO estimated that almost half of the 6,909 living languages in the world might have vanished entirely within the next century. We lose at least one language every two weeks. 220 Indian languages have died in the last 50 years. 197 Indian languages identified by UNESCO as endangered are at risk of dying soon. We’re becoming increasingly monolingual. And as linguist Steven Bird has pointed out, research has shown that the brains of monolingual people deteriorate faster.
How languages die
Languages are influenced by contact with other languages. Sometimes the change is irreversible. The fate of our languages is also decided by socio-politics. For instance, public policies determine that certain languages become the standard in education, scientific research, and governance, while others are left to die a slow death. Because it's not obviously profitable to create media in “minority” languages, the growth and enrichment of those languages suffer, and many remain entirely undocumented.
Just a few hundred years ago, the Latin alphabet was largely unknown on the continents of Africa, the Americas and Asia. But thanks to the colonialism, the Latin alphabet is now the norm in many countries. Much less is known about the original scripts of the languages of these parts of the world. Fortunately, scholars have studied and documented some of these languages and writing systems, and their work allows us today to discover many fascinating stories from those cultures.
While it is interesting and advantageous to know more than one language, our native language is particularly important, as it is the tool in which we most easily encode and decode our emotions, our stories, and our secrets.
If we don’t start documenting languages digitally—especially the endangered ones—we may lose the colourful diversity of human civilisation. Languages are a gateway to new worlds. And not everything is translatable. Languages can also be important repositories for indigenous knowledge—knowledge that is relevant to modern society. It’s up to us, as speakers of minority languages, to decide how long we want to keep our languages alive.
Languages can unite people!
Some time ago, I was interviewing a Karbi language speaker. Karbi is an endangered language spoken by about 41,900 people in the Indian state of Assam in northeastern India. My interviewee told me about a festival called Cho Mang Kan that memorialised dead ancestors. The festival involves lots of dancing, feasting, and drinking of locally-brewed spirits, and it's also a place for young people to find their future spouses.
The thing that fascinated me most about Cho Mang Kan, however, is that my community has a comparable festival, and similar festivals exist across South and East Asia. Even though I read about these festivals before, experiencing it in person in a different community felt like a rediscovering a part of myself. We might not look the same, and speak different languages, but deep down inside we are closely connected. Had it not been for the recording I was doing, I would never have experienced this connection so strongly.
Maybe documenting a language is not your thing, and that's fine. Not everything is for everyone. But in thinking about how to encourage more people to document the dying languages, I noticed something interesting. My wife creates funny video messages using Snapchat’s voice changer and those cool video filters, and send them to her siblings. They would then reply with their own funny video messages. The striking aspect of this is that the language they use in their Snapchat conversations is the one that was spoken in their grandparents’ generation. Not many people today speak that language anymore. So here you have young people using augmented reality, deep learning, and artificial intelligence to—albeit inadvertently—help a marginalized language stay alive.
The lesson here is that people don’t need to make language documentation their religion—there are fun, creative ways you can use language that so the same thing. It would be great, however, if these activities were taking place outside of private spaces like Snapchat, as we desperately need more of this kind of content on public digital platforms.
How you can help
So, I want to leave you with four ways to consider for creatively documenting languages you hear around you:
1. When you meet someone new, show a little curiosity and ask them what language they speak with their grandparents. Ask them to tell you a story, sing a song or just say a few words, and record it.
2. Use the tools you already love and use—Snapchat, Facebook, Twitter?—and host a live session on social media where you invite a guest to narrate a story or teach you a traditional game of their community, and record the session.
3. Share your recordings publicly under an open license that allows others to make use of your work in a way that allows them to credit you without having to request permission each time. I would personally recommend the Creative Commons licenses, as most multimedia platforms like Vimeo and YouTube allow them. There are also open source platforms like the Wikimedia Commons, Internet Archive, and ma where you can upload your recordings along with tags and metadata that make the content searchable. Three researchers from the University of Washington recently conducted an experiment using public domain video and audio files of President Obama’s speeches. They used artificial intelligence to manipulate the videos so Obama appeared to be lip-syncing to the pre-recorded audio. The result was fascinating and surprisingly realistic, but they could do this only because those videos and audio files bore a public domain license.
4. Share a text summary of the recorded content in as many languages as possible along with the content. This helps others discover your work.
If many of us take the actions above, we will soon have a large library of multimedia content in scores of native languages. That could lead to important developments, some of which we probably cannot even imagine. Tools like text-to-speech could be built from audio libraries to help people who are illiterate, autistic or visually impaired access knowledge and contribute to the knowledge commons.
You could make history by recording and publishing the languages in your environment and publishing them publicly with open licenses, and in the process, save them from joining the legions that die each year.


text:
Macedonian Citizen Fined 400 Euro For Insulting Turkish President Erdoğan on Facebook · Global Voices
Goran Rizaov

Photo by Flickr user zeevveez. CC BY 2.0
For the first time since the country gained independence in 1992, a Macedonian court has applied the lèse-majesté (royal insult) portion of the Criminal Code in order to protect a president — though not the president of Macedonia.
In their ruling, which concerned a Facebook post referring to Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, the court found the citizen guilty of posting “ironical statements and insult[ing] a leader of a foreign country.”
According to reports by Anadolu Agency and local media, the person, known only by the initials EA, bears Macedonian and Turkish citizenship. EA will have to either pay around 400 euros or serve a prison sentence.
The proceedings before of the Macedonian Criminal Court opened after the Turkish ambassador to Macedonia, Tulin Erkal Kara, filed charges against EA in late 2016, when Macedonia's previous government was still in power. The court issued its ruling in mid-July and the ruling became public on August 24.
Article 181 of the Macedonian Criminal Code protects the “reputation of a foreign country” and stipulates that “a person who has the intention to publicly ridicule a foreign country, a flag, a coat of arms, an anthem or a head of state or a diplomatic representative will have to pay a monetary fine.”
But not a single judge in the history of the country's independence has used this article to sentence someone for insulting a foreign country, flag, coat of arms, anthem or a head of state. On social networks, Macedonian citizens reacted to the news about this case with outrage and dismay.
Македонски Суд осудил лице за навреда на Ердоган? Поради пост на Фејсбук? This is a joke??
— Пргавиот (@prgaviot) August 25, 2017
A Macedonian Court has sentenced someone for insulting Erdoğan? Because of a Facebook post? This is a joke??
Filip Medarski, a prominent lawyer from Skopje, tweeted that Macedonian Criminal Code Article 181 and the verdict from the judge are inconsistent with the practices of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR):
Самиот член,а посебно пресудата се спротивни на праксата на Стразбург.Најпозната пресуда во тој контекст е: https://t.co/pxMMGrWm0B
— Filip Medarski (@FilipMedarski) August 25, 2017
The article itself, and especially the verdict are contrary to the Strasbourg law practice. [ECHR is based in Stratsbourg]
The most famous case in this context is: [Eon Vs. France]
Since Macedonia is a member of Council of Europe, the decisions of this court are binding for its judiciary.
In a statement for the Meta News Agency in Skopje, Medarski said that such a crime may exist in the Macedonian Criminal Code, but in another form because in principle, it should defend the symbolic aspect of flags, coats of arms and other representations of a state, in deference to the institution of the state — not to the individual who holds office.
“But here it is not about insulting the president as an institution, but an insult to the actual person currently in office, in this case – Erdoğan”, Medarski said, adding that this was also noted by the ECHR and in the verdict that he cited in his tweet.
In 2013, the European Court of Human Rights heard Eon Vs. France, a case that concerned the 2008 visit of now former French president Nicolas Sarkozy to the French city of Laval, where a citizen named Hervé Eon waved a small banner reading “Get lost, you prick” (Casse toi pov’con). Sarkozy himself had used the same phrase earlier that year at an agricultural rally, for someone that wasn't so keen on greeting him. It later became a frequently used banner at different demonstrations and on the internet.
Eon was arrested and prosecuted for offending the President. He was found guilty and made to pay a fine of 30 euros. Later that decision was confirmed by the Court of Appeal in France and even by the highest court in the French judiciary, the Cour de Cassation. The applicant was immediately arrested and prosecuted for offending the President, an offense under the 1881 Freedom of the Press Act.
Consequently, Eon asked the European Court of Human rights to recognize that his sentence infringed his right to freedom of expression guaranteed by Article 10 of the European Convention of Human Rights. Eventually the ECHR confirmed that his freedom of expression had been violated. The Court concluded that by echoing the phrase used by the president, Hervé Eon had used “satirical impertinence” to express his criticism.
Unlike France, Macedonia has a record of high levels of corruption in all segments of society, low levels of respect towards the rule of law and undeniable attempts to restrict media freedoms and interfere with the judiciary. This was highlighted in the last report from the US State Department's Bureau for Democracy, Human Rights and Labor. “Political interference, inefficiency, favoritism toward well-placed persons, prolonged processes, violations of the right to public trial, and corruption characterized the judicial system,” the report read.
In May 2017, Macedonia ushered in a new government that introduced a bold and optimistic reform plan in order to expedite the country's processes of integration into NATO and the EU, that were stalled by the previous rule of right-winged VMRO-DPMNE party and their inclination towards Russia. A major aspect of these plans is comprehensive reform of the judiciary.

author: Goran Rizaov


text:
Residents of Ethiopia’s Oromia Region Strike to Demand Release of Political Prisoners · Global Voices
Endalkachew Chala

Closed shops and deserted streets in Bale Robe, a town in Eastern Ethiopia. Photo sourced from Jawar Mohammed's Facebook page and widely shared on social media.
The Oromos, Ethiopia’s single largest ethnic group, collectively rallied against Ethiopia's ruling regime on Wednesday, August 23, this time by staying at home, skipping work and refusing to open their businesses.
The towns and cities of Oromia, Ethiopia’s largest administrative region where the Oromo people are concentrated, are normally bustling. But photos shared on Facebook showed shopping centers and open markets were largely quiet on Wednesday and Thursday. Roads were nearly empty, and public transportation services providers such as buses stopped, forcing government workers who had no other way of reaching their post to take part in the protest.
#Breaking: Harar and its surroundings under strike; no trade and transport activities observed. Some damaged vehicles were also spotted. pic.twitter.com/YmyOSIt2Tk
— The Reporter (@TheReporterET) August 24, 2017
The strike, which is set to last for five days, was called by a mysterious Oromo youth movement calling themselves “Qeerroo,” referring to their youthfulness in the Oromo language.
The secretive activist group’s main demand is the release of political prisoners and jailed activists, in particular prominent opposition figures such as Merera Gudina and Bekele Gerba who were arrested over the last two years of protests and charged with crimes such as terrorism and promoting “regime change using illegal forceful means and threats”.
Two years ago, thousands across Ethiopia mainly in the Oromia and Amhara regions rose up, demanding more political freedoms and social equality and a stop to government land grabs. In terms of representation, Oromos make up 35 percent of the country’s 100 million people and Amharas account for about 30 percent of the population. The Tigrayans, on the other hand, represent only 6 percent of the population, yet Tigrayan elites are among the most high-ranking military officers who control the nation's security.
The government's response to that uprising was brutal; hundreds were killed and thousands arrested. In October 2016, authorities declared a nationwide, nine-month state of emergency that was lifted on August 4, 2017.
With this recent strike, the Qeerroo also want an end to what diaspora-based activists say an unjust tax hike. In July 2017, the government introduced a new tax scheme for small business operators across the country that prompted a similar protest both in the Oromia and Amhara regions. That protest in July quelled without any demonstrable political results, but the demand has resurfaced here.
Also, in the middle of all of this, the Oromos have a border dispute with the neighboring Ethiopian Somali. In April 2017, during the state of emergency, the Ethiopian government told the two regions to come to an agreement redistricting their boundaries per the outcome of a referendum that was conducted 10 years ago, in which Oromia lost some land. The government recruited “Liyou Police” or special police of the Somali region as an armed force to enforce the outcome.
The Oromos saw this as a plot of the Tigryan elite to weaken them, and they accuse Liyou Police of human rights violations. Ending the alleged human rights violations is contained within demands of the ongoing peaceful protest.
#Ethiopia – call for an end to “Liyu police anarchy” in #Oromia as stay-at-home strike spreads through the region https://t.co/GbY1YcRhz0 pic.twitter.com/BNnsZ0gnQA
— Addis Standard (@addisstandard) August 24, 2017
The Qeerroo reach to their audience entirely through Facebook, a website, and diaspora-based satellite television networks. Jawar Mohammed, executive director of Oromo Media Network, appears to be a major source of information. His Facebook page has more than one million  followers, most of them gathered over the last three years.
The only apparent major information hub focusing on the current protest is the Facebook page of America based Oromo activist Jawar Mohammed.
— Zecharias Zelalem (@ZekuZelalem) August 23, 2017
The ongoing protest underscores the rise of a potentially treacherous challenge to the ruling Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) monopoly of power: widespread public outrage and a growing willingness of the public to participate in a strike when they are called.
But there are concerns about the absence of a single compelling protest message, coming even from supporters of the cause.
The protest message is fairly written in Oromo language, primarily focused on mobilizing people who dwell in the region. Urging his compatriots to expand the protest into other parts of the country, Abebe Gellaw wrote on Facebook:
We cannot wage effective and sustained civil resistance at a regional level as the cost would be too high on the people without the desired outcome. The cost should rather be unbearable to the regime, not the people. It should be waged at a national scale in a manner that can overwhelm and stress out the controlling power of the regime.
Furthermore, on August 22, as the protest was set to begin, activists put out communications directed at a range of demographic groups in Oromia who are not willing to participate that came off as a threat of violence, particularly against the Guraghe ethnic minority who live intermingled in towns and cities across Oromia.
Though activists insist that their message is nonviolent and that they harbor no hatred for other peoples, this may prove a test for the Qeerroo to figure out how to address their anger against the ruling EPRDF without inciting violence.
Diaspora-based activists have declared the action so far a success and urged participants to continue. It remains to be seen what political impact the protest has.

author: Endalkachew Chala


text:
Two Brothers, a Dream and a Tragic Trailer Death in Texas, U.S. · Global Voices
Connectas

Los Pericos Team, to which Mariano belonged. Photo used with permission from Connectas.
This text was written by Flavia Morales for AVC Noticias, republished by CONNECTAS and Global Voices thanks to a content sharing agreement.
On July 23, 2017, ten immigrants died and 29 were rescued from a trailer that had transported them across the United States (U.S.)-Mexico border in inhumane conditions. The trailer was found parked at a Walmart in San Antonio, Texas. This is the story of two brothers who traveled in that vehicle.
Mariano and Humberto López Cano made 120 pesos per six-hour workday (about $6.80 USD) planting in the fields of their community, José María Morelos, about 40 minutes from Papantla, north of Veracruz. Even though the state-owned Petróleos Mexicanos constructed schools and roads and the area is overrun by oil wells, planting maize and beans on owned or rented land is the only work available.
When the opportunity arose to go to the U.S., Humberto did not hesitate. For the first time, he could leave his community to find a better life. A few days before his departure to the U.S., a vacancy opened up and Humberto invited his older brother, Mariano López, to join him.
The brothers left on Sunday, July 16 and just seven days later, tragedy triggered their community into mourning. The news exploded: ten migrants had died from asphyxiation after being abandoned inside a trailer in San Antonio, Texas; another 29 survived. The López Cano family was in disbelief when they learned the two brothers had been found in the trailer.
Mariano, a 27-year-old father of three children, suffocated inside the trailer traveling from McAllen to Houston, Texas. Temperatures inside the trailer had reached up to 65 degrees Celsius (150 degrees Fahrenheit). Humberto, a 24-year-old father of two, was hospitalized and is still in the U.S. as a witness to the incident.
The grave where Mariano was buried. Photo used with permission of Connectas.
Mariano López, the father of the two brothers, said their intention to go to another country was to have a better life: “They wanted to succeed, start a business.”
Ellos quisieron irse, de la noche a la mañana, no tardaron ni dos días, hicieron planes, iban con la ilusión de hacer algo, no eran chicos maleados, y pues uno no sabe cuándo sale que destino llevamos, nunca pensé que iba a pasar esto.
They wanted to leave overnight, they didn’t even wait two days, they made plans, they went with the illusion they could do something, they were not delinquents, and, well, you never know where destiny will take us. I never thought this would happen.
The brothers used to share fantasies about how much they would make in one month or in one year. Mariano dreamed of buying a car. His father noted:
A mí me pidieron prestado, me dijeron que consiguiera dinero, estaban seguros que les iba a ir bien e iban a pagar rápido, los planes era ganar en dólares, en dos o tres años conseguir una mejor vida, un mejor futuro para los niños.
They asked me for a loan, they told me to get them money, they were sure it was going to be fine and they would get paid quickly, the plan was to earn U.S. dollars, in two or three years have a better life, a better future for their children.
The day after Mariano López Cano left for the U.S., his wife Beatriz gave birth to their third child who Mariano will never meet.
Mariano decided to accompany his brother and said goodbye to his wife, children and the rest of their family just two days before departure.
“Nothing is going to happen to me, everything will be fine,” were the last words he told his wife, who was also surprised by his decision.
Beatriz López Paredes met Mariano at their local elementary school, they started dating in high school, got married in May of 2012 and had three children. The third was a surprise for the young married couple.
Perhaps this unplanned pregnancy sparked Mariano's decision to leave:
Le pedí que no se fuera, pero dijo que era algo decidido, dijo que se iba por sus hijos para que no les faltara nada.
I asked him not to leave, but he said it was already decided, he said that he was doing it for his children so they would never lack anything.
In an interview with 24-year-old Beatriz, she stands in her kitchen with her children ages one and three and straightens a yellow shirt onto one of them:
El sábado en la noche me dijo, me voy mañana, se despidió de nosotros el domingo, no pude hacer nada más.
Saturday night he said ‘I'm leaving tomorrow.’ He said goodbye to us on Sunday. there was nothing else I could do.
Some young people from the village emigrate to the U.S. but most leave in search of work in Guadalajara or Mexico City. The Cano brothers, however, had never left their community, says Beatriz.
After several days of waiting, Mariano's body arrived home on August 4 to his community from San Antonio, Texas.
His friends wore his “Los Pericos” team uniform and took him to the stadium so he could say goodbye to his passion: football.
Both brothers played football since childhood. Mariano was defensive midfield, number 10 and according to his teammates, he was one of the best players on the team. Humberto was number 9, center forward, and seeing the Cano brothers after football matches on the football field was a common sight.
The tragic death of Mariano López Cano follows other devastating losses faced by the community. Two years ago a young man from the community died crossing the Rio Bravo in search of the “American dream.”
Another man in the community reports that he migrated to the U.S. 17 years ago and incurred a debt for approximately $1,400 USD to cross the border. He traveled through the desert across the Rio Bravo and walked for three days to get to Houston, where he stayed for four years until he was deported.
He said protection levels depend on how much the coyote gets paid. Usually, relatives or acquaintances source the person responsible for transferring undocumented immigrants across the border and negotiate a fee.
It was Humberto who wanted to leave and encouraged his brother to go with him when the vacancy opened. Others say Mariano had made the decision a long time ago.
To concerned family and friends, the contacts and resources the brothers used to travel remain a mystery.

author: Connectas


text:
Venezuelan Government Wants to Regulate Hatred on Social Media · Global Voices
Marianne Diaz Hernandez

Image by Esther Vargas via Flickr (CC BY-SA 2.0)
Venezuela's National Constituent Assembly (ANC) — which came into power just days ago on inaugurated on 21 August — is seeking to regulate the use of social media in order to clamp down on what it describes as “hate crimes.”
This week, the ANC began debating a draft law entitled “Ley de Convivencia Pacífica, contra la Intolerancia y la Violencia” [Peaceful Coexistence Law, to Counter Intolerance and Violence]. The ANC sees the draft law as part of its mandate to produce a new national constitution within a time frame of two years, for the duration of which all other public authorities have been brought under its supremacy.
In July 2017, the National Constituent Assembly assumed all legislative powers that had previously come under the purview of the National Legislative Assembly, where the opposition held the majority, effectively dissolving parliament and strengthening the Venezuelan government's repudiation of the elected body. The government had previously declared the Legislative Assembly to be in contempt , thus invalidating any actions it may take.
The ANC was formed amid a wave of protests that have racked the country for months, and against a backdrop of serious questions over the legitimacy of its proceedings, in addition to claims of electoral fraud — made even by the same company that provided the technology for the elections — and international refusal to accept its legitimacy.
The chavista administration’s vilification of social media is, however, nothing new: in 2010 the government was already accusing online networks of inciting hatred and violence, and those who use them increasingly risked being arrested. In 2014, a draft law proposed by the governing party sought to classify online protest as “cyberterrorism.”
Delcy Rodríguez, who acts as president of the ANC, stated that:
Las redes sociales se han convertido en la plataforma más grotesca y brutal para atentar contra el pueblo. Esas expresiones, amenazas de muerte, esas expresiones de odio deben acabarse en Venezuela y por eso esta ley va a contener sanciones para el delito de odio, va a contener sanciones y regulaciones en los medios de comunicación.
Social media has become the most grotesque and brutal platform for those who wish to attack the people. These utterances, death threats, these words of hatred must stop in Venezuela and that is why this law will provide for punishment for the crime of hatred and regulation of the media.
Among other criticisms, citizens have pointed out a lack of transparency around the proposed law, the text of which is not available online. Although proponents claim that the law will be discussed “with the people,” it is official practice for these kinds of discussions to be treated as mere formalities, conducted with organised groups supportive of the government.
El proyecto de ley contra el odio no está disponible para que los ciudadanos lo leamos: https://t.co/88txrxFF60
— Naky Soto (@Naky) 24 de agosto de 2017
The draft law against hatred has not been made available for us citizens to read: https://t.co/88txrxFF60
Certain commentators also recalled a series of earlier attacks on freedom of expression, to which the move to regulate social media use can now be added.
Maduro sigue reprimiendo libertades al sacar canales extranjeros y querer controlar las redes sociales.
Venezuela sufre una gran dictadura.
— Ramiro Tafernaberry (@RTafernaberry) August 24, 2017
Maduro continues to suppress civil liberties by blocking foreign channels and aspiring to control social media. Venezuela is suffering under a full-scale dictatorship.
The draft law, presented to the ANC by president Nicolás Maduro on the very same day that he swore allegiance to the “supra-constitutional and plenipotentiary”, seeks to punish “hatred” on social media with a prison sentence of up to 25 years. Today, with an all-powerful ANC composed solely of representatives from the governing party, it seems unlikely that anything will be able to stop the law from being passed.

author: Marianne Diaz Hernandez