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Latin America: Victims of Faulty Breast Implants Take to the Internet · Global Voices
Laura Vidal

[All links lead to Spanish language pages except when otherwise noted]
The problems arising from the defective PIP breast implants have led to a profound crisis within the realm of public health, calling into question the values surrounding and resources apportioned to breast augmentation in Latin America. The first warning bells sounded in the beginning of 2010 with the discovery of numerous cases of cancer linked by the common denominator of breast implants.
As the months passed, the concern has been growing, so much so that many woman have come together on social media websites to air their opinions and share information as well as to organize legal action.
Examination of a silicone breast implant. Photo by Wideweb Videographer, copyright Demotix.
Cases throughout the continent are many. Nevertheless, we will mention a handful of these cases, women who have been moved to speak out the loudest throughout the Hispanic Web 2.0. There are still many unanswered questions: Who should pay? What will happen after the implants are removed? How high is the risk? What is the opinion of the victims? And also: What does it say about Latin America, this extensive demand for aesthetic surgeries in general, and for breast augmentation in particular?
In Colombia, cases abound, and many woman have organized in groups on Facebook. Two examples of these groups are Those affected by PIP breast implants Colombia and Woman affected by breast implants in Colombia, which also has published a blog, on which some have called into question the accountability of public health institutions:
Las prótesis PIP se vendieron en Colombia durante once años legalmente, a pesar de que la autoridad colombiana nunca tuvo documentos que probaran que sus componentes podrían ser utilizados en seres humanos…
Others have created blogs to tell their stories, such as the blog No to the Biopolymers. These groups and blogs gather testimonies, questions and references about the implants, their care and their removal. Also, those who participate can look for information to determine what legal actions are available as well as discuss the possibilities of replacing the implants.
In Chile, other victims have shared their experiences, including Daniela Campos, who used her YouTube channel to expand upon warnings as well as call for the participation of public institutions in the investigation of the situation and the punishment of those responsible. Daniela asked her subscribers to echo these demands on social networking sites, and she created a Facebook group to demand that those responsible be subject to the Law when it comes to the processes that will be necessary to remove the implants.
http://youtu.be/TZNmgCUPvlM
However, Hernán Corral pointed out the legal problems with this on his blog Derecho y Academia:
¿Podrían invocar las mujeres chilenas afectadas un régimen como éste? Lamentablemente, nuestro ordenamiento jurídico no ha recepcionado aún este tipo de responsabilidad sin culpa. (…) Las afectadas chilenas, invocando el registro del Instituto de Salud Pública como producto médico (y por tanto eventualmente peligroso), podrían demandar al fabricante. Pero si Poly Implants Prothéses no tiene representantes en Chile, les será muy difícil emplazar a la compañía.
From Miami, Sofía Jiménez opened a blog to recount her experience with the PIP breast implants. It details numerous facts about intervention before and after as well as information on how to determine if the implants have ruptured:
El hecho de estar tan cerca de testimonios de mujeres sufriendo de todo tipo de síntomas y complicaciones me hizo abrir un poco más los ojos. Y me pregunte a mi misma, ¿son los implantes tan seguros como nos quieren hacer pensar?
But what is behind the great number of breast augmentation surgeries being performed in Latin America? Two bloggers reflected on this from Venezuela. Naky shared the testimonies of various woman who work next to her office on the blog ProDavinci:
[Una de ellas] Aún debe la mayor parte del crédito bancario con el que financió sus cirugías (…) tiene 24 años (…) gana poco más de salario mínimo y tiene prótesis PIP de 400 cc. Le da gracias a Dios de haber tenido el dinero para pagar todo eso (…) “No todas llegamos al Miss Venezuela, pero hay que hacerle creer al resto que sí.”
[Y otra más opina:] “La estatura que te dan los tacones es nada frente a la manera que te crece el ánimo cuando un tipo se te queda viendo como si quisiera arrancarte la blusa”
De las nueve en conversa, sólo una sabe el tipo de prótesis que tiene, conserva el certificado y pudo hablar con su cirujano, que le garantizó que todo está bien. El resto hizo algunas llamadas, pero se encuentran en el estadio de la negación. Ninguna está dispuesta a operarse de nuevo (…) Les resulta impertinente pensar que deban renunciar a su sinuosidad sin nada que les compense la ausencia. Karla llegó a sugerir que el mismísimo gobierno debiera pagar las nuevas prótesis y reconocer mediante un permiso especial, la ausencia laboral de las afectadas por tal circunstancia (…)
[One woman] She still owes the majority of the bank credit with which she financed her surgeries (…) she is 24 years old (…) she earns only a little more than minimum wage and has 400 cc. PIP implants. She thanks God for having had the money to pay for all of this (…) “Not all of us will make it to Miss Venezuela, but it makes the rest of us believe that yes, we could.”
[The other woman] “The stature that wearing high heels gives you is nothing compared to the way it validates you when a guy stares at you as if he wants to rip off your blouse.”
Of the nine woman interviewed, only one knows the type of implant that she has, saved the certificate and was able to talk with her surgeon, who guaranteed her that everything was all right. The rest have made some calls, but have been rebuffed. None of them are ready to be operated on again (…)  They find it is impertinent to think that they should remove their curves without anything to compensate for their absence. Karla suggested that the very government should pay for new implants and issue special permission to the affected woman to miss work for this (…)
Finally, in Aporrea, Antonio Rangel questioned the social undertone of aesthetic change, and why it is so popular:
Es imposible negar que algunas mujeres, víctimas de la poderosa alienación o enajenación mental que las ha hecho creer que ser más sexy o atractiva las conduce directamente al éxito social y económico, convertidas de la noche para la mañana en señuelos sexuales irresistibles, serán dotadas del poder de seleccionar entre la manada de turulatos seguidores a quien ellas consideren que es el mejor “partido” (…) Les resulta impensable que (…) los reinados de belleza, los desfiles de moda, los cosméticos mágicos, son las mismas que se lucran con las prótesis…
Many more questions and discussions will continue to fill up space on the web. Hundreds of thousands of woman still wonder about the details surrounding the surgeries and their subsequent treatments. The effects of aesthetic surgeries and their compulsive use within the medical world have been at the center of many debates. Though the legal battles have hardly begun, ideas are blowing in the wind that challenge social restraints on women's aesthetic vision and how women answer these types of demands placed on them.

author: Laura Vidal


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Maldives: Ask The People, Go For An Election · Global Voices
Rezwan

Maeed M. Zahir analyzes the current unstable political situation in Maldives after the incumbent resident Mohmaed Nasheed had been forced out of office last month. The blogger comments that Maldives now needs an election to get the people's verdict.

source: news-globalvoices

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

author: Rezwan


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Russia: Anglophone Bloggers Discuss Election Fraud and Post-Election Future · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

This post is part of our special coverage Russia Elections 2011/12.
One way to begin writing about the March 4, 2012, presidential election in Russia is with some irony, as Mark Adomanis did on his Forbes blog, The Russia Hand:
Well, in what is surely one of the more shocking developments of the past several months, Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin just won the election to become Russia’s “next” president. […]
Or, as Craig Pirrong did on his Streetwise Professor blog:
Tsar Vlad the Lachrymose has won his electoral bid to return to Russia’s presidency. This result is hardly surprising (though for a while there was some question as to whether he would win in the first round). […]
Another way to approach the topic is by being serious and straightforward about it, as Katherine Brooks was on TOL's East of Center blog:
The presidential elections in Russia took place on March 4th amid various claims of fraudulent behavior at the polls. Despite the presence of 30,000 trained volunteer election observers and the installation of webcams in more than 90,000 polls in Russia, nearly 1,000 irregularities were reported by midday with Russia’s League of Voters tallying 3,000 reports of fraud by day’s end. In particular, there were numerous complaints of “carousel voting” – wherein a group of voters is bussed from polling station to polling station to register their vote multiple times. […]
Either way, when writing about this past Sunday's election, it seems impossible to avoid mentioning the allegations of voting fraud and its implications for Putin and the Russian citizens.
Adomanis, in his post quoted above, wrote:
[…] The question over the scale of the fraud is not merely an interesting academic exercise, though it is certainly that, but something that offers very meaningful insight into the likely course of Putin’s third term. An election which was free of the most blatant and absurd irregularities (i.e. official results which flatly and blatantly contradicted exit polls and other pre-election opinion polls) would suggest that team Putin was slightly humbled by the recent spate of popular protests and recognized the need for conciliation and change. An election that was just as blatantly rigged as the last one would be rather more ominous and suggest that Putin was not humbled but angered by the recent weakening of his position. […]
After reviewing some of the Western media assessments of the alleged fraud, Adomanis concludes:
So, unfortunately, what the presidential election seems to suggest is a Kremlin that is dead-set on keeping power and that will use any and all of the bewildering arsenal at its disposal. Expect things to get worse before they get better, and expect there to be some increasing nastiness in Russian society as the anti-Putin opposition become ever more radicalized.
Pirrong wrote this in the post linked to above:
[…] The key issue in the near to medium term is whether it is widely perceived in Russia-and among the elite especially-whether Putin really won decisively (as he claims, winning 60+ percent), or whether a far narrower margin of victory was grossly inflated by fraud. The more widespread the perception that Putin felt it necessary to manufacture a huge margin, the more vulnerable he will be. In contrast, if it is widely accepted that his margin was legitimate and largely untainted by fraud, his position will be strong, at least in the near term. […]
A woman votes in the Russian presidential election at a polling station in St. Petersburg. Photo by YURY GOLDENSHTEYN, copyright © Demotix (4/03/12).
Yuri Mamchur of Russia Blog mentioned the costly state-funded webvybory2012.ru [ru] election transparency project:
[…] International observers stated that the elections were fair and transparent, with 89% of all voting locations performing as excellent, 10% – with “minor technical” violations, and 1% with “major violations as reported by the observers.” The nearly half-a-billion-dollar expense on 130,000 web cameras has certainly paid off for Putin – any Russian citizen could watch the elections online at www.webvybory2012.ru to follow the real time voting action at any of 90,000 locations across the country. Most likely there were violation. However, doubtfully they would amount to anything but a margin of error […]. […]
Kyle Keeton and his wife Sveta, of Windows to Russia blog, spent the night of the vote count watching webcams installed at polling stations “all over Russia”:
[…] We found very little variance all over the Russian country and I will post an hour long boring video in the next few days. […] The fact is very little cheating happened and it was very much in the eye of the camera at all times. People worked hard to ensure a proper election and to tell otherwise is to insult that thousands and thousands of people that spent long hours at a tedious job…
Putin won and that is that! […]
Anatoly Karlin of Sublime Oblivion came up with a detailed preliminary analysis of “the degree of fraud,” based on the election data available at the moment:
[…] My assessment is that in these elections it was on the order of 3%-4%, which is lower than my estimated range of the 5%-7% fraud in the Duma elections, but still far too high by developed country standards. The geographical distribution of fraud has changed significantly: Moscow actually appears to be very clean this time wrong (in stark contrast to 2011, and 2009). However, there were little to no changes for the better in the ethnic minority republics, which is where the great bulk of the falsifications are now concentrated. […]
Andy Young of Siberian Light compared this election with the December 2011 parliamentary vote:
[…] After the December’s Duma election debacle, I had held out some hope that the Presidential election would be a bit fairer and increased scrutiny (via webcam, no less) might temper the fraud we’ve seen previously. Alas, I can’t really see any improvement worthy of note and Russian elections still don’t pass the smell test. […]
He also shared some thoughts on the future of the Russian opposition:
The real damage to [Putin's] aura of invincibility won’t come from the election result, it will come from a reinvigorated opposition.
[…] One of the main reasons that Putin has had such an easy ride over the past decade is that there has been no opposition to speak of. And this year’s election was no different – at least, when it came to the candidates.
[…] I expect the protests to die off pretty quickly after the election, but I think in 6 years time they will have proved tremendously valuable in kickstarting a genuinely engaging opposition movement in Russia. I have no idea what that opposition will look like – will it be co-opted by the current opposition or will a new grouping emerge? But I’m fascinated to see how it develops.
Mark Galeotti of In Moscow's Shadows asked more questions on what happens next:
[…] Will the current, largely negative movement begin to cohere around a positive platform of reforms and leaders, and then create the political machine to build a national campaign? Will Putin crack down (I don’t expect more than some moves against ‘disloyal’ elements of the media)? More to the point, given that he has pledged directly and indirectly to spend on social programs, economic diversification and military modernization, pledges he cannot possibly all fulfill, whom will he disappoint, and what will this mean?
Galeotti compared the changes taking place in Russia now to “the shifts of continental plates”:
[…] trying to watch them move is rarely dramatic. I suspect much the same can be said about this election. Big Stuff is happening, but that doesn’t always mean gratifyingly quick or dramatic. […]
Brian Whitmore of RFE/RL's The Power Vertical expounded on Galeotti's metaphor, noting, among other things, the role of the Internet in today's Russia:
[…] thanks to deeper and broader Internet penetration, Russia now has its first horizontally integrated generation.
Previous generations have been vertically integrated, whether through the Orthodox Church, the Komsomol, or, more recently, through youth groups like Nashi.
But with Twitter, Facebook, Vkontakte, LiveJournal, YouTube, etc, like-minded Russians are now able to connect with each other — and organize — from Kaliningrad to Vladivostok. And they can do so independent of — and most often in often in opposition to — the regime.
The process is still in its infancy, but this Power Horizontal will, over the long haul, make it very difficult for Vladimir Putin's Power Vertical to go on with business as usual. […]
This post is part of our special coverage Russia Elections 2011/12.

author: Veronica Khokhlova


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South Korea: Violent Clashes Intensify over Jeju Naval Base Construction · Global Voices
Lee Yoo Eun

Arrest and detention and violent clampdowns are worsening in Gangjeong village, South Korea's Jeju island as dynamites for construction purposes were delivered this week. Media Mongu is live-tweeting photos of clashes between the government and activists, residents and religious groups.

author: Lee Yoo Eun


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Spain: Head of Journalist Association Threatens Activist With a Belt · Global Voices
Leila Nachawati Rego

The Head of the Press Association in Granada, Antonio Mora, was presenting a photo exhibition in Granada, Spain, of the relations between Israel and Spain on Tuesday, March 6, when anti-occupation activists from an organization called Plataforma Andalucía con Palestina (Platform Andalucia with Palestine) entered the room. They held Palestinian flags and started chanting “Boycott Israel” and “No to Zionist impositions” in protest against Spain's support of the Israeli occupation of Palestine through these kind of institutional events.
The activists did not leave when Mora told them to keep quiet, visibly impatient and irritated by their presence. What happened next? The answer is so surreal that you should see it by yourselves. Here is the link to the video.
Screenshot of the video in the moment when Antonio Mora holds his belt as he walks towards the activist.
Shockingly, Mora removes his belt and raises it as if to strike one of the women with it, while a second woman records the scene with her mobile phone. A few seconds later he drops the belt and tries to push the other woman out of the room.
The fact that this reaction comes from the head of a press association has sparked shock and disbelief among Spanish netizens, who have flooded Twitter with comments and even created a hashtag with the Head´s name: #antoniomora.  Spanish journalist Juan Luis Sánchez tweeted:
Journalist Lydia Molina agrees:
Lo más perturbador es la tranquilidad con la que se quita la correa para pegarle a la chavala. No será la primera vez.
The Journalists Union of Andalucía has demanded Mora's resignation [es]. Mora has since resigned [es]. According to the Union's representatives:

author: Leila Nachawati Rego


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Sri Lanka: Uncontrolled Pedestrian Crossings In Colombo · Global Voices
Rezwan

David Blacker writes about the uncontrolled pedestrian crossings in the Sri Lankan capital Colombo, which are slowing down traffic.


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Africa: Tech Entrepreneurship Bubbling in the Developing World  · Global Voices
Lova Rakotomalala

To illustrate the technological transformation that the African continent is undergoing, CNN's African Voices has highlighted 10 leading tech voices from different African countries. While the  article put a much needed emphasis on the innovation trend originating from the African continent and their achievements, many tech experts felt that the feature did not represent the whole scope of tech innovation and entrepreneurship that is brewing in all the regions of the continent. It left out most of the non-English speaking regions and outreach actions that took place in the most isolated areas from a technological standpoint.
Business canvas presentation in Addis Ababa by BillZimmerman on Flickr (CC license BY)
Innovation from Necessity
Bright B Simmons, the Accra-based founder of  mPedigree Network explains “What Africa's Entrepreneurs Can Teach the World”:
It's becoming ever clearer that entrepreneurship is the answer to the vexing economic questions facing Africa today (..) But how has it actually evolved in Africa? Are there peculiar features of African entrepreneurship we may consider relevant to big global debates on development and sustainability? [..] the overall difference in the structure of typical African economies, compared to the West, makes a big difference. The fewer resources available to regulatory and tax authorities and the smaller sizes of businesses jointly mean that when businesses make complex arrangements to rationalize their tax expenditures, their costs go up rather than down. Also, a shallower financial system makes the notion of a corporate treasury function similar to what is common in the West nearly redundant in the African setting.[..] In a sense, African entrepreneurs run profit ecosystems rather than business units. These ecosystems interact with other ecosystems in a culturally elaborate manner that can produce extreme robustness, resilience, and flexibility.
In Senegal, entrepreneurs have clearly identified the need for better networking between actors in the field of agriculture ( and other industries). A Start Up conference is set up on March 30 in Dakar to discuss opportunities in collaboration between tech experts and entrepreneurs [fr] :
Le constat est simple : trop peu de liens sont encore tissés entre les TIC et les secteurs dans lesquelles elles pourraient avoir des retombées sociales et économiques considérables. Les jeunes développeurs ne savent généralement pas comment utiliser leur talent au profit de ces industries et de l’autre côté, les professionnels des secteurs concernés ne sont pas en contact avec le monde des TIC et du fait peinent à exprimer leur problématiques en termes techniques.
In the CNN African Voices feature, Ory Okolloh emphasizes why technology is important but that other critical areas need to evolve as well for the effort to persevere:
In order for this growth to be sustainable and to create more revenue generating opportunities, we need other forms of infrastructure such as electricity to catch up and we need more governments to embrace the idea of open access policies
An indication of the current innovation trends that are bubbling on the continent is the multiplication of technology hubs across the continent (via Crowdmap):
African tech Hubs via Hubs in Africa
A recent example of collaborative tech initiative through the aforementioned hubs is the Apps4Africa event on Climate Change that i-Hub tech community in Madagascar is organizing on March 16.
The Language Divide
Okolloh noticed along with other tech African experts that other regions were missing from the coverage. Jean Patrick Ehouman explains both his satisfaction with seeing African tech being in the news and his disappointment with the lack of coverage of the francophone tech world [fr] :
Il y a 21 pays en Afrique (environ 350 millions de personnes) dont la langue officielle est le Français. En plus de ces 21 pays, il y a 5 autres dont le Français est aussi une langue officielle (la deuxième). Il s’agit de l’Algérie, le Maroc, la Mauritanie et la Tunisie qui sont des pays dont la première langue officielle est l’Arabe. Dans tous ces pays, il y existes des passionnés et des leaders de technologies qui publient régulièrement sur Twitter. Ces personnes passent beaucoup de temps à créer ou a mobiliser les différents acteurs de cette industrie pour en tirer le meilleur. [..] @Fasokan n’a jamais réussi à lever des centaines de millions de dollar pour ces projets, mais il a beaucoup de mérite quand on sait que grâce à lui les villageois des zones reculées du Mali arrivent à se faire connaitre du monde en tenant un blog. Et il publie tant en Bambara (Langue africaine parlée au Sénégal, en Mauritanie, au Mali, au Burkina Faso, en Côte d’Ivoire, en Guinée, …) qu’en français. Combien de blogueurs connaissez qui ont réussi l’exploit de dynamiser l’une des langues les plus parler sur le continent ?
Market in Malian Village by Workshop Segou on Flickr (with authorization)
Lusophone Africa was also left out of the conversation on tech in Africa which did not sit well with GiantPanda. She writes on Menina do Javali:
This has been a pet peeve of mine for a while: the laziness of the international media in relation to the (post-) colonial tower of babel. Articles in English about “Africa” suffer from the “Africa is a Country” lens, but I would go further and say it’s “Africa is a Country That Speaks English” lens [..] Just as Jean Patrick Ehouman suggests in his post in French, let’s start a thread here below assembling the best tweets (in Lusophone Africa)…
The Challenges
Nigerian Ndubuisi Ekekwe, founder of the non-profit African Institution of Technology, highlights the challenge of raising investment funds in developing countries and the importance of making African tech business ventures easier to grasp for investors :
Entrepreneurs need to have plans in place for investors to exit, especially in developing countries. Most investors don't have years to wait around to recoup investments through growth and profits. Most are gone after about four to eight years, and entrepreneurs need to present a clear path for that to happen.
Malagasy tech blogger Tsiory Razafimanantsoa highlights another challenge that plagues the tech world in Africa : the proliferation of online scams [fr] that undermines the trust that investors require for a sustainable business atmosphere [fr]:
(A Madagascar,) Aujourd’hui, l’actualité porte sur la hausse des prix de communications mobile, le mauvais temps, la connexion internet capricieuse… Mais au milieu de tout ce foutoir, il y a une autre “crise” grandissante: l’arnaque pyramidale. [..] Il n’y a pas encore de texte dans la loi malgache qui condamne une telle pratique. En effet, surement déjà pratiquée à petite échelle avant, elle ne gagne du terrain que depuis quelques mois.
In conclusion, despite tangible challenges, tech in Africa is bound for a major leap forward. As Julia Rotich states :
The narrative about Africa is changing every single day, driven with the opportunity in a continent of more than 300 million middle class Africans. [..] The promise here is that the entrepreneurial drive we see in young technologists will translate to more African solutions to African problems, and thereby African prosperity. Challenges abound of course, but indications in innovation hubs like Kenya point to a lot of promise and a very different narrative in the coming years.

author: Lova Rakotomalala


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Brazil: Story of a 93 Year-Old Syrian Migrant · Global Voices
Rami Alhames

‘Sito Badia’, ‘Grandmother Badia’ in Arabic – as her grandsons like to call her – was born in the village of Hwash, in the Western Syrian province of Homs. She immigrated to Brazil with her family 80 years ago, when she was only 13. The following story of her life recalls the early days of Arab immigrants to Brazil and Latin America.
Badia, aged 93 years, and brother Michael, aged 91 years, holding a family photo taken in Christmas 2011. Used with permission.
In 1932, Badia's father, Habib decided to reside in Brazil after his elder brothers moved to São Carlos, in the state of São Paulo:
My Grandfather Farah was in Argentina with my eldest uncles, [aged] only 10 and 12 years old. When he knew that his brother had settled in São Carlos, Brazil, he decided to leave the boys with him and went back to Syria and lived there until his death. My father went to Brazil alone to see his elder brothers; he stayed for a year and went back to Syria. He compared life between Brazil and Syria and decided to settle in Brazil and ask us to join him. I was with my mother and two young siblings, Michael, 11 years old, and Adib, 9, when we left Beirut port in Lebanon heading to Santos port, on a 40 day cruise journey to Brazil. I felt sick in the sea; we stopped in Genoa, Italy where I remember the cemetery, and that they kept us for five days in the ship in Marseille, France
The first generation of the family. Used with permission.
Cousins were waiting for the family in São Carlos, where Sito Bdia's father rented a house. She helped her mother raise her siblings, she didn't go to school (she doesn't know how to write), but she remembers the ancient songs like عتابا ودلعونا (Ataba & Delona) and Dabke of Syria, which she would sing for her mother:
لابدا شعيطة ولابدا بعيطة، الأمر المقدر ياأمي لبسنا البرنيطة. من مدة سبع سنين كنا فلاحين، واليوم مرتاحين بلبس البرنيطة
Most Syrians who immigrated to Brazil have similar stories – staying with relatives and opening their own businesses. According to 1962 statistics, 9% of owners of industries in São Paulo [.pdf], were Syrians and Lebanese.
My father started selling clothes, he opened a shop later in Descalvado, where Michael Shamas, a Lebanese, helped us and my youngest brother Badi. After few years one friend told him about a new town being built called Novo Horizonte. I got married to Mossa our Syrian cousin when I was 28 years.
Sito Badia has four daughters, eight grandsons and will welcome her first grand grandson Gabriel in two months. With her brothers’ families and cousins, altogether there are 90 members. A party takes place every Christmas to introduce the young branches of the family tree while nurturing the relations with its Arabic roots.
Big family, Arabian roots. Used with permission.
Sito Badia still maintains a strong relationship with family in both Brazil and Syria through her daughters: Maria, Najat, Marta and Esmeralda (now deceased); thanks to her the Arabic language has survived in the family:
Only I, my brother Michael, my cousins Elias and Jamelihe are the Syrian Arabic speakers in the family. The family only knows the name of Syrian food [laughing]. I visited Syria three times, but it's very hard now to fly. We talk on the phone every Christmas and Easter. Lately, Marta and Najat visited Syria in 2009, while my first granddaughter married a Syrian.
Badia now lives in Novo Horizonte, São Paulo, where she is planning to celebrate her 100th birthday in seven years.

author: Rami Alhames


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Caribbean: International Women’s Day Message  · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

In honour of International Women's Day, chookooloonks shares the Top 10 things she wants her daughter – and all youngsters – to know, while the Livesay [Haiti] weblog‘s key message for the day is that “No woman should die giving birth.”

author: Janine Mendes-Franco


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China: Ancient Wall Gives Way to Luxurious Mansion · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

A stretch of ancient Changsha city walls was recently unearthed at the construction site of a new luxury development. More from  ChinaSMACK.

author: Oiwan Lam


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China: Copycat Movie Posters · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

Jing Gao from Ministry of Tofu highlights Wenxuecity's collection and comparison of copycat movie posters.


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China: Lesson on Survival Skill · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

C Custer from China Geeks introduced a satirical animation on the future of Chinese young generation whose lives are threaten by the immoral society.


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China: Net Initiative to Help Occupational Lung Disease Sufferers · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

Pneumoconiosis is an occupational lung disease caused by the inhalation of dust. According to the Chinese government's official statistics, in 2010, 676,541 people were found to be suffering from pneumoconiosis and among them 149,110 people died as a result of the disease. The accumulative death rate was up to 22.04%.
The real incidence of the disease it likely to be  much bigger, as rural migrant workers are systematically excluded from occupational disease statistics and are also not covered by the social security insurance system.
A netizen initiated charity project “Love Save Pneumoconiosis” was launched in mid 2011 and recently the group produced an advocacy video to explain the situation of rural Pneumoconiosis patients in China (see below).
Acopy.net has translated the video's subtitles. Below is the video's opening script:
A special group of rural migrant workers: miners, construction workers, tunnel workers and metal workers.
Work and dust. They have contribute to the prosperity of the city with their sweat.
 They pay for our nice homes with their youth.
 They should be rewarded with happiness
, but eventually their most luxurious dream is to be able to breathe.
Their dreams were to feed their families. To pursue after this dream, they left their homeland and stepped into the construction sites and mines…
“大爱清尘”宣传片：数百万尘肺病农民被死亡威胁 from A Copy Workshop on Vimeo.
Prominent investigative reporter Wang Keqin from Beijing is the project leader. He explained [zh] the background of his involvement in his blog in December 2011:
A pneumoconiosis patient in Gansu. Photo taken from Li Keqin's blog.
许多人都在问，王老师，你为什么那么热衷救援中国尘肺病农民工？我的回答很简单：如果没有高考制度，我可能就是一个在煤窑打工的矿工，我也许就会成为一个在死亡线上苦苦挣扎的尘肺农民。
对于我的死活！当用工企业拒不负责、当相关部门置若罔闻、当债台高筑无力救治的时候，作为个体的生命，我想活下去——我渴望有人拉我一把，从死神那里把我抢回来！
作为一个新闻记者，我最早对尘肺病这三个字的了解，源于自己的一次采访。上世纪九十年代中期，作为《甘肃经济日报》的记者我在采访一乡村煤矿的产权纠纷时，认识了这里负责挖煤的副矿长老黄。和他在一起的时候，看到他常常咳嗽的上气不接下气，后来得知他是因长期在煤矿挖煤，接触了大量煤矿粉尘患了职业病，就是现在说的尘肺病。
没几年，他的工友来电，老黄死了，被尘肺病活活憋死了。
一个阶段，老黄的笑容总是出现在我的眼前，挥之不去。
此后比较集中的关注尘肺病源于2009年。这年12月，当时在甘肃工作的当地媒体记者火兴才打来电话，说甘肃省古浪县有一百多个农民集体患上尘肺病，已有数人死亡，其他人的情况也很糟糕。农民求助媒体，地方媒体不让报道，期望我能关注。
Wang sent a reporter to Gansu to report on the situation. However, the report could not help the patients, who were dying. Interviewees passed away one by one in 2010. Wang decided to shift his reporting to social media forum Weibo to call for public attention in December 2010, and a number of netizens took immediate action to help out:
12月25日，“北京厨子”等人到达古浪，通过微博呼吁，更多的网友也紧随前往。一场【拯救121位古浪尘肺病农民兄弟大行动】启幕。
“北京厨子”等志愿者开始通过网络筹款，并组织几位患者到北戴河医院进行洗肺救治。
在媒体在强大压力下，甘肃省社保厅在接受焦点访谈采访时，表态要启动600万紧急救助。
接着，甘肃省武威市开始动员干部群众捐款数百万元。春节后，甘肃政府在强大的舆论压力下，正式决定由政府筹集专项基金1108万元，接盘古浪全体尘肺病农民的救治。
Adopted by the China Social Assistance Foundation in June 2011, the Love Save Pneumoconiosis project is a consolidation of netizens’ spontaneous efforts in helping out pneumoconiosis patients in China. The project [zh] uses Weibo to collect information about pneumoconiosis victims in rural area and report on the project's work and spending.


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Crisis Mapping of US Bombardment in Cambodia · Global Voices
Mong Palatino

A research by Dr. Taylor Owen revealed that the total amount of bombs dropped by the United States in Cambodia between 1965-1973 was five times greater than previously known.

author: Mong Palatino


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Cuba: Doctor goes on Hunger Strike  · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

Havana Times explains why Cuban doctor Jeovany Vega Jimenez is beginning a hunger strike.


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Cuba: Trying to get the Pope’s Attention  · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

El Cafe Cubano reports that Cardinal Jaime Ortega has met with the Ladies in White to inform them that the Pope's schedule is “too busy” and he will likely not be able to meet with them during his visit; Translating Cuba, meanwhile, publishes a letter to the Pope in which Jeovany Jimenez Vega tells him about “the desperate economic situation” in the country.


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Global Voices Seeks Deputy Editor · Global Voices
Georgia Popplewell

Global Voices seeks a Deputy Editor to help manage daily content flow in English. Global Voices in English is a central focal point for more than 500 bloggers and translators around the world who work together to report on blogs and citizen media everywhere, with emphasis on voices that are not ordinarily heard in international mainstream media. We are a global, virtual organization led by a team of part-time editors who work with volunteer authors around the world across multiple time zones, communicating primarily by email and regional mailing lists.
The Deputy Editor must possess professional and personal skills to help the site maintain and expand its role as the leading website for translating, contextualizing, and amplifying international citizen media.
The Deputy Editor will be responsible for the following:
- Working with the Managing Editor to oversee the content on the website on a daily basis
– Working closely with the Regional and Language Editors to provide support for volunteer authors
– Managing the sub-editor volunteer team, and sub-editing articles as needed, reviewing all articles for style, copyright errors and other detail work
– Ensuring that content meets editorial standards prior to publication
– Moderating comments on the site
– Overseeing and updating the style guide and other editorial procedures
– Managing internal mailing lists
– Working closely with the Technical Director to manage and maintain meta data, tagging, linking, and information work flow on the site
– Tracking visitor traffic statistics for the site
– Scheduling and running regular editorial meetings in IRC chat room
The Deputy Editor will report to the Managing Editor.
We are seeking a candidate with the following qualities:
– Experienced editor and writer, with native English capacity and appropriate educational background
– Strong leadership skills
– Experience managing a multilingual, multicultural team
– Strong technical skills and experience with citizen media, including blogging, podcasting, and digital video
– Basic ability to edit and source digital photos
– Ability to lead team in improving headline keyword and linking standards across the site
– Familiarity with open source software and open content communities
– Ability to work independently and to produce results in a timely manner
To work effectively with our community, we would prefer that candidates:
– Have experience living and working internationally, or have traveled extensively in the developing world
– Are active bloggers or creators of online media
– Are multilingual, with fluency in English and at least one other language
– Have experience working in diverse, multicultural environments
– Are strong communicators and facilitators
– Have experience in a professional newsroom setting targeting a global audience
The ideal candidate must have a passionate commitment to the values and goals of Global Voices. He or she will be joining a well established team of editors and authors who are dedicated to amplifying the voices of world. There is no geographic requirement associated with this position; Global Voices has no office or physical headquarters. Substantial travel is likely. Candidates must have access to broadband internet connectivity and be comfortable working in a wholly virtual environment. We strongly welcome candidates from outside North America and Europe, and encourage people currently working on the Global Voices project to apply.
The position is full-time, but should be treated as a freelance contract.
To express your interest, please send a cover letter and CV to “adminjob AT globalvoicesonline DOT org”.
The deadline for applications is March 23, 2012.

author: Georgia Popplewell


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Hong Kong, China: Poems on Ugliness  · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

A poem on “Hong Kong – an Ugly City” from an University student has inspired Hong Kong netizens to write their own poems, such as “China – an ugly country” and “China – a Pathetic Country”.


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Ibero-American Blogging Competition Asks Teens: “What are you reading?” · Global Voices
Silvia Viñas

The Organization of Ibero-American States invites teens ages 12 to 15 to enter a blogging competition about reading. The sign up [es] deadline is May 31, 2012, and judges will consider blog posts written until July 31. The winner from each participating country will receive an iPad. Visit the official website [es] and follow the hashtag #questasleyendo [es] (“what are you reading”) to find out more about the contest.

author: Silvia Viñas


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Inspiring Stories of Women in Cambodia · Global Voices
Mong Palatino

New Waves is a collaboration of the UN with a network of young women in Cambodia with the intention of celebrating the inspiring stories of women and girls in Cambodia.


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Iran: Women Say No to the War Monster · Global Voices
Fred Petrossian

Woman = Man, Source: Khodnevis
The Iranian Islamic regime has ignored International Women's Day for more than three decades. It does not recognize March 8, and has even banned women organizations from celebrating the day. But each year Iranian women both in the real and virtual world stil celebrate.
As international sanctions bite and tension over Iran's nuclear program rises, this year several activists have published videos on the women's rights website Change for Equality saying, “I am against the war.”
These activists say:
War is not just bombs and the destruction of our homes. Even before we embark on a war, it seems that the lives of women have already become more difficult. War has focused its gaze on women and moves closer, step by step. We do not want to become the silent victims of this monster. On March 8, 2012 while being denied the opportunity to celebrate the day or express our demands in the streets, we have taken this opportunity to say that we are opposed to war and each of these short films express our reasons for that opposition.
Reality behind the war photos
No red alert for children
War leaves scars on women
War is a real monster, but unfortunately so is dictatorship and prison. The Iranian blogger Jaarchi reminds [fa] us that 47 women are imprisoned in Iran for their social and political activities.

author: Fred Petrossian


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South Korea: Flight Attendants Demand Right To Wear Trousers  · Global Voices
Lee Yoo Eun

On this year's International Women's Day, March 8, 2012, a rather unconventional protest was held in downtown Seoul, South Korea. Female flight attendants of Asiana Airlines, one of the nation's major airlines, held a press conference in front of the Kumho Asiana building accusing the company of having sexist guidelines regarding female flight attendants’ appearance.
Park Bong (@jayparkbong), member of a feminist organization, tweeted [ko] :
실핀 개수, 눈화장 색, 스타킹 색까지 규정하고 있는 아시아나 외모복장규정. 안경 불가 규정 때문에 건조한 비행기안에서 렌즈를 껴야 하고, 커트 머리도 몇 년 전 파업으로 간신히 따낸것이라 한다. 여성노동력을 어떤 시선으로 보고 통제하고 활용하고자 하는지 너무 티난다.
Screen capture image of Asiana flight attendants, Originally a video clip uploaded on Youtube by YouTube user Rogapol.
Later she tweeted [ko] about the protest:
금호아시아나 빌딩 앞에서 여성승무원에게 바지를 허하라는 기자회견을 하고 사무실 들어가는 길. 104주년 여성의날인데 정말 이런 내용의 시위를 하고 있어야 한다는게 이 나라 여성의 현실. 짜증난다.
According to a news article by Hankyoreh that went viral over past few days, Asiana Airlines has the most complicated rules regarding female flight attendants: the airlines uniform for women uniform exists only in skirt form—there is no version with trousers. Skirts are required to reach knee level. Female flight attendants cannot wear glasses. Hair should be held in place and pinned down to the back of the ears. Women who wear their hair should leave at least one-third of the forehead uncovered. Only two bobby pins in total are allowed in the hair. Restrictions are also imposed on the size of the earrings and necklaces. Eye liner and mascara should be either black or brown.
Asiana responded that the reason they don't have a trouser version of their women's uniform is that the latter is “not compatible to the company's brand image.”
Echoing flight attendants’ complaints, a majority of South Korean net users expressed anger regarding the company's sexist policy. Twitter user @vanilladoll8 tweeted [ko]:
여성 근로자의 “외모” 따위로만 설명할 수 있는 회사 이미지란.. 참.. 하찮다.. 예쁜 승무원이 아닌 안전한 비행, 편안한 서비스.. 이런게 이미지가 되어야 옳지 이 양반들아[…]
@Astralpink warns [ko] that too much focus on female crew members’ appearance is could annoy people into considering a boycott of the airline.
여성 승무원들에 대한 불필요하고 성차별적인 용모, 복장 규정에다가 바지 유니폼을 허용하지 않고 근무 시, 비상 시 불편한 치마 유니폼만 고집하는 아시아나 항공 @Flyasiana.승객 안전보다 승무원 용모를 중시하는 항공사라면 불매하게 될지도.
Lee Jung-hoon(@sm749) tweeted [ko]:
m.hani.co.kr/arti/society/l…아시아나항공 승무원은 바지입으면 안된다네요. 시대착오적이고 인격체로 보지 않고 기업의 이익을 극대화 하기 위한 상품 (으로 보는) 복장 용모규정 70년 박정희 시대인가
South Korea's Network for Glocal Activism [ko] filed a petition [ko] that read:
이와 같은 규정들은 항공사가 […] 여성 승무 노동자들을 ‘관리'의 대상으로 보고 있음을 보여주는 것이다.[…] 기업들의 이러한 행태는 여성 노동자들이 수행하는 업무의 전문성을 보이지 않는 영역으로 밀어내 버리고…
The petition added that the guidelines regarding female flight attendants are five pages long, male crew members are merely expected to maintain a “clean and decent look”.


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Macedonia: ‘Academic Solidarity’ Against Free Speech and Scientific Method · Global Voices
Filip Stojanovski

[All links lead to Macedonian-language content, unless noted otherwise.]
A young woman, gender scholar, human rights activist and blogger, who dared to speak the truth to those in power in Macedonia and stood up against entrenched homophobia, ended up with a ruined academic career.
Irena Cvetkovik gained public prominence in 2007 through her intelligent and courageous writing about gender issues on her blog Femgerila – at the time, she was finishing her master's in the area. She also ran a literary blog featuring short, often erotic, stories, which was closed as part of a deal for publishing a book with the same content.
Photo of Irena Cvetkovik in 2007, used with permission.
Soon afterwards, she was recruited as a columnist for the daily Dnevnik, and gained wider “notoriety” among the conservative establishment – “earning” even a Facebook group with hundreds of members devoted to hating her as symbol of otherness, with some of the comments published in the “Black Book”, a project documenting the rise of hate speech in Macedonia during 2009 (.pdf, pg. 50-53, edited by media expert & blogger Roberto Beličanec, and mentioned in an earlier GV article on hate speech [en]). Here is the intro from the “Black Book”:
Irena has a strange surname. Irena is a feminist. Irena protests against building of a church. Irena can write. Irena can compose a meaningful sentence. Irena is young. Irena is educated. Irena is active. Irena is liberal. Irena is open. Irena is not powerful, at least not in political sense. Irena publicly supports the marginalized groups. Irena is female. Well, how can you not hate her?
Irena Cvetkovik is a person who, due to all of the above, become object of hate and a live example of the capacity for intolerance in Macedonia…
In June 2009, the pressure was raised to a higher level. Aleksandar Lambevski explained on the blog Sextures:
I write this blog due to all the justified fuss raised with Irena Cvetkovik's critique of the [high school] textbook “Pedagogy” by Marija Kostova, Aneta Barakovska and Eli Makazlieva published by Prosvetno Delo in 2005, regarding the way they presented sexuality, especially homosexuality and lesbianism as “reversals” of the “rightful” sexual institct. People with homosexual orientation are presented as “neurotic” and “psychotic” personalities (pg. 203). In her column, Irena Cvetkovik asked the authors to present any evidence from the recent scientific research published in reputable international scientific journals, scientific congresses, or validated by the relevant international or professional organizations, such as World Health Organization, American Psychiatric Association, etc. Simply put, Cvetkovik asked the textbook authors about the basis of their claims about homosexuals, lesbians, and people with different sexual orientations. This is the oldest academic procedure for methodological and epsitemiological validation. For this, Cvetkovik got a “libel” suit. (More info in her text re/published by Okno and Dnevnik, and the scan of the controversial textbook chapter. I apologize for the poor scan quality…)
As Katerina Kolozova previously noted in Dnevnik, the situation of moving a subject of informed public and academic debate to the courthouse is grotesque, tragic and very dangerous. What kind of social scientist, working in an allegedly open, democratic academic environment integrated into the world and Europe, needs to validate “the truth” about their “scientific” argument in court? And what kind of court, especially in Macedonia in 2010, is competent to justly differentiate between the theses of the textbook authors and Irena Cvetkovik's critiques, and decide that her stance, based on her expertise, is “libel”?
As part of the process of European integration, Macedonia was forced to adopt an anti-discrimination law, in which the ruling majority refused to include sexual orientation. The preparation of the initial text included the civil society, but in the end the Parliament adopted a completely changed Law, with very reduced competences. Žarko Trajanovski remarked that the ruling party used the debate about the law for “a homophobic campaign to spread fear and panic that protection from discrimination of the LGBT-persons would lead to legalization of incest, of polygamy, drugs…”:
Even when the law received explicit critique as non-European in the last progress report [2010 .pdf, pg. 19-20, en], the authorities responded in a homophobic manner (“We do not accept homosexuality as normal”). First, MP Jovan Ginev [a medical doctor] declared at a parliamentary session that homosexuality is a disease. Deputy PM Naumovski's  conciliatory statement that “homosexuality is not a disease” sounded empty, after the deputy minister of labor and social policy diagnosed that “it is evident” that homosexuality “cannot be accepted as normal here.”
On the other hand, it is normal here for homophobic textbook authors to sue people fighting homophobia for insult and libel.
In March 2011, after a grueling court process, which incited protests against homophobia in Skopje, the judge finally decided that there were no grounds for libel in the case. In July 2011, the recently formed state Anti-Discrimination Commission issued a binding recommendation that the homophobic pedagogy textbook had to be changed.
Irena Cvetkovik in 2010.
In the meantime, Irena Cvetkovik ended her columnist engagement, pretty much stopped blogging, and focused on her academic career and family. She finished her master's and applied for a job at her alma mater, the University of Sts. Cyril and Methodius, where she already worked part-time. However, as prof. Mirjana Najchevska blogged in Sep. 2011,
I heard that the Philosophy Department had a call for junior assistants. I heard that the Institute of Gender Studies was supposed to employ an assistant. I heard that a commission was formed, and that it proposed a candidate who fit all the criteria, a person who already cooperated with the Institute. I heard that two professors who wrote an openly homophobic textbook and lost a defamation suit against a person who disagreed with them managed to mobilize all dark forces of the faculty and oppose the selection of the proposed candidate. I heard that insults of the lowest kind were spoken. I heard that many professors kept their mouths shut and failed to react. I also heard that the proposed candidate was not elected.
If my colleagues from the Philosophy Department indeed allowed this to happen, I – prof. Mirjana Najchevska, PhD – must admit that I feel terrible shame for them. Shame to work at a university that allows such things to pass. I think the whole University and our higher education has been infected by the VMRO syndrome. Either we'll regain consciousness and oppose it, or the darkness will swallow us one by one.
The rumor proved to be true, even though only one (foreign-based) media outlet – Radio Free Europe – dared to explore the story through two articles. The University Council refused Irena Cvetkovik's candidacy with 10 votes “for” and 41 members abstaining from voting, including the Dean who allegedly declared that he wouldn't vote at the beginning of the procedure. According to RFE,
Dean Goran Ajdinski admits that solidarity with the professors who had a quarrel with Cvetkovik resulted in the refusal of her candidacy.
“Yes, I showed solidarity with my colleague, whom I've known for more than 15 years. She is very respected by us, her colleagues, she is a good professor, the students and the colleagues love her. Maybe this was the tipping point in the decision to elect or not to elect an assistant.”
Still, he denied that he lobbied, pressured or incited “the quiet boycott” against Cvetkovik. He said that “after the professors discussed, I stated my position, but it is unbelievable that anyone can tell another person how to vote. The Dean, in my opinion, as a good Dean, must simply protect the interests of his colleagues.”
The Institute of Gender Studies did not choose another assistant. The competition was annulled. Cvetkovik says she does not plan to apply again, because she believes she has no chance of being elected, and that would also inconvenience the professors who supported her candidacy.
Only one other member of the university staff, prof. Biljana Vankovska, publicly expressed outrage through her weekly column in the Nova Makedonija daily. She explained that the procedure for delegating Council members reflects the level of democracy in the society, and is affected by politics, lobbying and support both within and outside of the institution. This form of management decides on behalf of the staff, who have no influence unless they are members. The Dean's response to her protests in this case was that her e-mails were “tiring and abnormal.” In a subsequent column she wrote that one of the Council members sent her an anonymous message advising that “one has to earn the position on the Council, which is not gained by spitting on the state, the institutions and the colleagues.”
Vankovska was the only employee of the Faculty of Philosophy who filed an official complaint to the Council. There was no reaction by the university or the state authorities in charge of the education system. No commercial media outlets, including the one publishing her columns, explored the case further.
Irena Cvetkovik currently works at the NGO Coalition “Sexual and health rights of marginalized communities.”

author: Filip Stojanovski


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Macedonia: Blogirame.mk, a New Blog Aggregator · Global Voices
Filip Stojanovski

A new Macedonian blog aggregator Blogirame.mk (“We blog”) started working on Feb. 29, 2012. Founded by three popular twitterers/bloggers Pipo, Necovski and Iskric, and hailed by the community (1, 2, 3, 4, 5), it invites manual submitting of sites, which can be used as an indicator of the quantity of active bloggers. Almost 200 blogs have been enrolled so far. [All links are in Macedonian.]


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Malaysian Bill Watcher · Global Voices
Mong Palatino

Malaysian Bill Watcher is a citizen media initiative which was launched to monitor the activities of the Malaysian Parliament and to inform the public about the laws enacted by the institution


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NATO Invites to Citizen Dialogue on New Website · Global Voices
Solana Larsen

A new website, WE-NATO, invites to citizen dialogue on issues related to the agenda of the intergovernmental military alliance, North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). Website contributors include senior members of NATO leadership, including a video blog by the General Secretary and a live webchat with the Assistant Secretary General for NATO’s Public Diplomacy to mark International Women's Day on March 8, 2012.

author: Solana Larsen


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Philippines: Online Rice Knowledge Bank · Global Voices
Mong Palatino

PinoyRice Knowledge Bank is an online source of information to help Filipino rice farmers improve their productivity. The modules in the website are available in 5 local languages.


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Russia: “The Way Forward” · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

OpenDemocracy.net posts an English translation of Yuri Saprykin's Lenta.ru text [ru] on the new, post-election goals of Russia's protest movement. (More insight into the March 4 presidential election and the opposition in Russia – from journalist Tikhon Dzyadko and an independent election observer Julia Chegodaikina.)


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Singapore: Domestic Workers Finally Get A Weekly Day Off · Global Voices
Kirsten Han

Starting next year, Singapore employers will have to give foreign domestic workers one day off per week, or pay them extra to work on that day.
The new regulation was announced by Minister of State for Manpower Tan Chuan-Jin in Parliament on 8 March 2012, and instantly attracted many responses from people on both sides of the argument.
The campaign for a weekly day off for domestic workers – many of whom come from less developed or poorer countries such as Myanmar, the Philippines and Indonesia – was started in 2008 by migrant worker non-governmental organisations (NGOs) such as TWC2, HOME and Unifem Singapore.
From the Facebook page of TWC2
Andrew Loh writes in publichouse.sg that a weekly day off is a basic right for workers in many countries around the world:
To the ordinary person, it was puzzling and indeed embarrassing to see that there was even a need to champion such a cause – a day off for workers is a norm in countries around the world. Singapore, sadly, was among the exceptions.
Joses Kuan also contributed an article to publichouse.sg, and applauds Tan Chuan-Jin for his actions:
In my time volunteering with TWC2 back in Singapore, I had not seen a member of the government, much less a full minister, meaningfully engage migrant worker NGOs and try to effect change. BG Tan has, however, made trips down to TWC2’s Cuff Road Project for displaced, injured and exploited workers, sensitized the everyday Singaporeans to the heinous existence of “repatriation companies” (euphemism for legal thugs), among other substantive actions. This move to codify in law a mandatory off-day is therefore not just a simple exercise in window-dressing and BG Tan should be applauded for his work and direction.
However, he also warns against “premature enthusiasm”:
This new move begs more than a few questions which remain unanswered. How enforceable is this legally-binding piece of legislation? Who’s going to police and scrutinize employers and make sure they comply? What about reprisals for transgression? How qualitatively different is it going to be from the current “standard contracts” which already are instituted (that disproportionately favour employers who can “buy off” discretionary off days)? How about bargaining power or employer-employee dynamics in a new milieu which usually gravitate towards the employer; and are compounded by issues of bad debt, agent loans to service and the impounding of passports.
Complaints and criticism began to pour in from employers opposed to the weekly day off. A number of them wrote in to the Straits Times forum, citing different reasons from extra pressure on Singaporean employers to increased social ills.
Thng Tien Guan also suggested that weekly day off for domestic workers might be detrimental to Singapore's tourism industry:
Many maids gather in big groups along Orchard Road on their days off, and some of these groups can be rowdy. What would be the impact on tourism?
The sudden government decision on having a weekly day off for maids, an important issue affecting families, is disappointing.
The stream of anti-weekly day off sentiment from certain employers were harshly criticised on Twitter:
@Giles_iPresume: The global coverage of Singapore legislating one day off for maids is embarrassing, but don't tell that to the Straits Times letters page
@woonhian: This is appalling. Singaporeans hate being labelled dogs, but they sure as hell like treating others as such.
@kj_nash: @kixes I have no sympathy for employers who will have their routine interrupted by having to treat a maid like a real person.
Some have noted that the option to compensate workers with a day's pay to work on their off day leaves room for abuse, and said that $15 – the suggested amount – was far too little.
@BeccaDBus: @kixes @STcom The value of a day off is all the days you have to work to get it. Therefore, it should be about $100 give or take
@leyandrea: HOW DARE U ASSUME YR $15 IS JUST COMPENSATION RT @STcom: #Maids ‘should get about $15 each time they work on day off’
Eddy Blaxell pointed out that it would still be possible for domestic workers to not receive a growth in income:
One article claimed that maids would be paid 15% more, because most maids are paid monthly and compensation for rest days would have to be paid on top of their monthly salary.
But these changes don't apply to existing contracts. They apply only to workers on work permits issued after 1 January 2013. And wages for those workers haven't been set yet. An employer who wants to continue hiring a maid on exactly the same basis as he is currently doing faces no obstacles. He reduces the maid's monthly salary by 15% and gives it back as compensation. It's as simple as that.

author: Kirsten Han


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South Korea : Crisis Map on Clashes over Naval Base Construction in Jeju Island · Global Voices
Lee Yoo Eun

South Korean net users have created a crisis map on clashes between the government and activists over a naval base construction in the Jeju island. The construction plan has been accused of destroying the environment and the villagers’ way of life.


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South Korea: Journalists Stage Mass Walkout from National Broadcaster · Global Voices
Lee Yoo Eun

Journalists of one of South Korea's biggest commercial television networks, the Munhwa Broadcasting Corporation (MBC) have been on indefinite strike since January 2012 demanding fair journalism. Around 400 unionized employees [ko] launched the strike, and the dispute is intensifying as more journalists, anchors and producers allege that MBC has omitted and minimized coverage on politically sensitive issues. On March 4, 2012, 166 journalists announced they would quit their jobs [ko] in protest.
Among the allegations are that MBC rarely reports on rallies against a free trade deal with the United States, and have underreported a questionable purchase of land by President Lee Myung-bak for his retirement home. Furthermore, MBC's president, Kim Jae-chul stands accused of censoring and wielding his personal influence on MBC News and MBC's signature investigative program, the PD Notebook, rendering the programs journalistically impotent.
South Koreans have shown support for the strike, although it means that some of their favorite programs are now on hiatus.
An uphill battle
MBC television journalist, Jung Woo-young (@mbcjwy) tweeted [ko] his experience of the strike:
파업 36일..아내가 좋아하는 음악학원을 끊자고 아이를 설득합니다. 사장은 세명의 해고자를 만들었고 용역 수십명을 사내에 배치했습니다. 정치권은 공천 밥그릇 챙기기에 바쁘고 눈치보는 언론들은 애써 외면합니다. 그래서 MBC 파업 꼭 이기고 싶습니다.
South Korea's best-selling author and one of the nation's top 5 influential twitterers, Lee Oi-soo (@oisoo) tweeted [ko]:
보아라, 양심 있는 자들이 울면서 직장을 떠나고 있다. 한사코 붙박여 비굴한 눈칫밥으로 연명하는 사람들아. 인생길 가다 보면 오르막도 있고 내리막도 있는 법. 기다려라. 당신들이 울면서 떠나갈 날도 얼마 남지 않았으니[…]
The MBC labor union's twitter account @saveourmbc linked to a YouTube video [ko] of a photo montage of journalists fighting for fair journalism including the names of those who were fired:
They also posted a photo of “company-hired thugs” being briefed in the MBC building:
사측에서는 청경 충원이라는 입장.. RT @saveourmbc: 김재철이 부른 용역 사진 한장 더.. 공개 스튜디오에 모여서 뭔가 교육받고 있나 봅니다.. 잘만하면 백명 될듯.. twitpic.com/8s4x1v
Photo of company-hired gang/extra security force inside MBC building, Twitter photo by @saveourmbc
Han Hak-soo (@mbcpdhan), an MBC producer whose twitter profile reads, “Now on strike […] MBC has collapsed. Resign Kim Jae-chul” posted photos from a rally.
Photo of MBC strike, Twitter Photo of @mbcpdhan
About 40 movie directors released a statement [ko] supporting the strike. The Korean Twittersphere lit up with various responses, mostly tweets that express understanding and encouragement.
Song Yo-hoon (@syh24) tweeted [ko]:
공정방송 회복을 위한 MBC 파업, 앵커들도 가세. 김재철 사장에게 묻습니다. 공영방송 MBC가 당신의 개인기업입니까? 권력의 소유물입니까? 사장에서 물러나라는 구성원 절대다수의 요구가 당신의 개인재산을 내놓으라는 것입니까? 대답할 수 있습니까?
@imdramafan tweeted [ko]:
해품달이 파업 때문에 후반작업에 어려움을 겪고 있다고 한다. 무도는 이번주에도 결방이라고 한다. 마음대로 마이크잡고 펜잡고 카메라 잡기 힘든 세상이 되어버렸다. 굴하지마세요! 화이팅 #무도
When asked in an interview whether he would ever consider stepping down as a way of taking responsibility for the fiasco, Kim Jae-chul responded [ko] that he will not resign until he is, “laid in a coffin.”


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Southeast Asia: Internet Freedom Rating · Global Voices
Mong Palatino

Aim Sinpeng discusses the study made by OpenNet Initiative about the state of internet freedom or unfreedom in several Southeast Asian countries. ‘Partly Free’ countries include Malaysia and Indonesia while ‘Not Free’ countries include Myanmar, Thailand, and Vietnam


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Spain: Ten Years Without the Peseta · Global Voices
Filip Stojanovski

Biljana Veljanoska, a Macedonian woman living in Spain, wrote [mk] about the 10th anniversary of the introduction of the Euro, and the related PR campaign from 2001, which argued that prices will not increase. In general, they have increased (31%), more than the salaries (13%). On the other hand, prices for appliances and cars have Hodropped. Today “older people still count large amounts of money in [pesetas], while the young don't remember them.”


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The Best of the Blogs Awards: Have You Submitted Your Blog? · Global Voices
Claire Ulrich

Have you submitted your blog, social media group, or online initiative to the 2012 Best of the Blogs Awards (The BoBs)?
The BoBs are an annual blog award organized by German international broadcaster Deutsche Welle (@dw_thebobs). Bloggers, writers, artists, citizen video reporters, activists and innovators are encouraged to shun shyness and register their blogs in one of 17 categories in 11 languages.
You can also recommend a blog you love written by someone else. Take a moment to submit the link before March, 13, 2012. Online voting will open on April 2, and the winners will be announced on May 2.
This year, educator blogs are especially welcome since a new Education Award will be awarded. A Reporters Without Borders Freedom of Expression Award makes a comeback this year.
Facebook and Twitter may dominate the current online landscape, but blogs are far from outdated and now blend in with social networks.
The “Best of the Blogs” laureates of 2011 are proof of the transforming power of individuals and groups of netizens striving for change. Many have played a part in uprisings in the Arab world, Russia, Mexico, Iran, Bangladesh (full list of the 2011 BoBs winners here).
A few of the 2011 BoBs winners from Iran, Russia, Egypt, Tunisia, Mexico during the ceremony in Bonn, Germany – Image courtesy of Deutsche Welle
The video below highlights the vision behind this respected and global blog competition, now in its 8th year.
Global voices Online and the Best of Blogs Awards share a common mission: to shine light on rarely heard voices and to create bridges across languages and cultures. Many bloggers who were highlighted on Global Voices have later been distinguished by a BoBs award.
Individuals from Global Voices have also been honored to sit on the jury. This year, along with myself (Claire Ulrich) for the French category, Tarek Amr from Egypt will sit on the jury for blogs in Arabic. Also on the jury is Enda Nasution from Indonesia who was the first Indonesia author on Global Voices from 2005-2006.

author: Claire Ulrich


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Trinidad & Tobago: More Carnival Pics · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

“I suppose it is only the well trained observer who can see how much Carnival has changed over the years”: aka_lol shares his photos from Trinidad and Tobago's 2012 Carnival celebrations.


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Uganda: Can a Viral Video Really #StopKony? · Global Voices
Rebekah Heacock

This post is part of our special coverage Kony 2012.
A film aimed at making Joseph Kony—a Ugandan guerilla leader currently wanted by International Criminal Court for crimes against humanity—”famous” in order to raise support for his arrest has swept the Internet by storm, pushing #StopKony onto Twitter's trending topics list and prompting a wave of backlash from bloggers who worry the film and its associated campaign are overly simplistic.
The 30-minute film has received a combined 20 million views on Vimeo and YouTube in the past two days and has caught the attention of celebrities including Rihanna, Zooey Deschanel, Ryan Seacrest, and Ellen DeGeneres, as well as thousands of others:
@thaRadBrad: I've been on YouTube for a few years now but I've never seen a video go as viral as Kony 2012. Absolutely insane. #stopkony
@WillGorsuch: I'm pretty sure over 5 million people learned who Kony was today #StopKONY
The film, directed and narrated by Invisible Children co-founder Jason Russell, uses popular YouTube videos, clips from Invisible Children's earlier films (partially shot in Uganda), appeals to the power of social media, and footage of Russell's young son to encourage viewers to “make Joseph Kony famous, not to celebrate him, but to raise support for his arrest and set a precedent for international justice.”
Russell directs viewers to “go after” celebrities and policymakers to help spread awareness and encourage the United States government to ensure Kony's arrest in 2012. Viewers are asked to purchase an “action kit” containing bracelets and posters and to “Cover the Night” on April 20 by hanging these posters up in their communities. Russell warns:
In order for Kony to be arrested this year, the Ugandan military has to find him. In order to find him, they need the technology and training to track him in the vast jungle. That's where the American advisors come in. But in order for American advisors to be there, the US government has to deploy them. They've done that, but if the government doesn't believe that the people care about arresting Kony, the mission will be canceled. In order for the people to care, they have to know. And they will only know if Kony's name is everywhere.
The film has met with sharp criticism from netizens in Uganda and further afield, many of whom are skeptical of Invisible Children's understanding of the long-running Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) insurgency and the film's focus on arresting Kony as the way to end the fighting. Ugandan journalist and Global Voices author Rosebell Kagumire tweets:
@RosebellK: this simplification of a story of millions of people of N. #Uganda is not acceptable #KONY2012
Rosebell also posted a video of her own, sharing her thoughts about the film:
Ethiopian diaspora blogger and activist Solome Lemma also questions what she sees as the film's “lack of context and nuance”:
[I]n the video, the founder of Invisible Children tells his young son that Kony is a bad guy and he must go. Daddy will work on making sure he is caught. He states, “if we succeed, we change the course of human history.” Such a humble undertaking! Simply, a long socioeconomic and political conflict that has lasted 25+ years and engaged multiple states and actors has been reduced to a story of the good vs bad guy. And if a three-year-old can understand it, so can you. You don’t have to learn anything about the children, Uganda, or Africa. You just have to make calls, put up flyers, sings songs, and you will liberate a poor, forgotten, and invisible people.
Ugandan poet and musician Musa Okwonga points out that the film fails to mention two key actors in the conflict and its possible resolution—Ugandan president Yoweri Museveni and the Ugandan activists already working to address the problem:
Joseph Kony has been doing this for a very, very, very long time. He emerged about a quarter of a century, which is about the same time that Uganda’s President Yoweri Museveni came to power. As a result the fates of these two leaders must, I think, be viewed together. Yet, though President Museveni must be integral to any solution to this problem, I didn’t hear him mentioned once in the 30-minute video. I thought that this was a crucial omission. Invisible Children asked viewers to seek the engagement of American policymakers and celebrities, but – and this is a major red flag – it didn’t introduce them to the many Northern Ugandans already doing fantastic work both in their local communities and in the diaspora. It didn’t ask its viewers to seek diplomatic pressure on President Museveni’s administration.
Joseph Kony – head of the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA). Photo released by Flickr user Chris Shultz under Creative Commons (CC BY-SA 2.0).
Multiple people familiar with the conflict have pointed out that the film deals almost exclusively with Uganda, despite the fact that the LRA has not been active in the country for several years. Writes Ugandan journalist Angelo Izama:
To call the campaign a misrepresentation is an understatement. While it draws attention to the fact that Kony, indicted for war crimes by the International Criminal Court in 2005, is still on the loose, it’s portrayal of his alleged crimes in Northern Uganda are from a bygone era. At the height of the war between especially 1999 and 2004, large hordes of children took refuge on the streets of Gulu town to escape the horrors of abduction and brutal conscription to the ranks of the LRA. Today most of these children are semi-adults.
Human rights activist and former development worker Siena Antsis points out:
Gulu – and Uganda – has gone through some incredible changes. The economy is booming. The region is re-stabilizing. While Kony’s men continue to kill, rape and slaughter elsewhere, Gulu is not a static, unchanging place. Neither is Uganda, neither is the continent. Portraying a region like Gulu as such, and sending the mass message that the whole continent reflects this, is damaging. It undermines possibilities of investment. It clouds story of entrepreneurship, success and innovation. This goes hand in hand with saying “I work in Africa.” Lumping the continent as one messy area.
Ugandan blogger Julian Mwine tweets:
@Jaymwine: In all fairness #stopkony couldnt have trended when #kony was terrorising #uganda coz there was no twitter then.
Blogger TMS Ruge questions Invisible Children's “fund-raising stunt” and argues that the organization's primary mission is not “selling justice, democracy, or restoration of anyone’s dignity” but rather selfishly ensuring its own survival:
This is a self-aware machine that must continually find a reason to be relevant. They are, in actuality, selling themselves as the issue, as the subject, as the panacea for everything that ails me as the agency-devoid African. All I have to do is show up in my broken English, look pathetic and wanting. You, my dear social media savvy click-activist, will shed a tear, exhaust Facebook’s like button, mobilize your cadre of equally ill-uninformed netizens to throw money at the problem.
TMS Ruge started the #StopIC hashtag on Twitter in response to the film. A growing number of #StopKony skeptics are clustering around the tag:
@tmsruge: Time & time again I have been quiet on this capacity sucking organization that is @Invisible. Stop robbing us of our dignity! #stopIC
@simbamaxxed: If one more person pastes this overdramatic #kony2012 video on my wall…#stopIC
@andykristian: Invisible Children is doing a disservice to #Uganda. Before you support IC, get the facts straight. http://bit.ly/Anf4Sd #StopIC #StopKony
For some Ugandan bloggers, the controversy over the film has also sparked a broader debate about media hype and international awareness of violent conflict. In response to a call I put out on Twitter for Ugandan viewpoints on the film, blogger Ernest Bazanye tweets:
@bazanye: @Opiaiya @rebekahredux @bazanye: …other world events? We could be reading the world just as wrongly as the world is reading us
This post is part of our special coverage Kony 2012.

author: Rebekah Heacock


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Venezuela: “Shooting Cameras Instead of Guns” · Global Voices
Silvia Viñas

Alberto Rojas says he is an “amateur urban photographer,” but the images he posts in his blog Caracas Shots look far from amateurish. He describes his blog as:
[…] a bad copy, or rather an inspiration of the blog Mumbai Paused by MS Gopal (thanks bhai), but without reach its professional level. Anyways I'll try to do the same: Capture the beauty of the simple things using either a shoot camera or my cell phone in a city full of gun shots.
With the motto “shooting cameras instead of guns,” Alberto's objective is to show the friendly side of Caracas, the capital of Venezuela. His post “Flying Bags” shows children in a Caracas slum using bags in place of kites:
Alberto has recently captured images of a Chinese porcelain market:
Banner reads: "Every day, everything on sale"
Here are some shots of Caracas wall art:
An animal shelter:
And much more.
For more stunning photographs of Caracas, subscribe to Caracas Shots’ feed and follow Alberto on Twitter (@chamorojas) and Pinterest.


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A Global Voices Guide to SXSW · Global Voices
Gina Cardenas

SXSW night scene. Credit: Biyani Photography (2011)
This week in Austin, Texas geeks, musicians, film-makers, creative types and ordinary party-goers will be mingling over cutting-edge ideas and free drinks. South by Southwest (SXSW) music festival and conference, now in its 25th year, begins on Friday, March 9, 2012 and runs through March 18. The conference consists of three main events that focus on music, film and interactive technology. SXSW Music is one of the largest music festivals in the United States attended by nearly 20,000 people.
Panels addressing citizen media, independent media and the intersections between technology and social change will be featured at the Interactive Conference from March 9-13. Several Global Voices friends and contributors will be participating at the interactive panels at SXSW.
Our Interactive Panel Recommendations
* Global Voices author and board member, Jillian York from EFF.
Sunday, March 11 12:30pm –  1:30pm
How to Run a Social Site and Not Get Users Killed
This panel focuses on social media and safety, particularly in countries where freedom of expression is limited and where voicing your online comments may be asking for a death sentence.
* Global Voices friend Mary Joyce from Meta-Activism.
Sunday, March 11 11am – 12pm
Internet Power: After Cyber-Optimism and Pessimism.
Panel topic focuses on the contradictory effects of digital technology on power. It can be a double-edged sword that strikes at both the oppressed and the oppressor.
* Global Voices Israel author Gilad Lotan from Socialflow.
Tuesday, March 13 12:30pm – 1:30pm
The Math That Matters in the Real Time Web
Gilad will share his insights regarding the influence of social micro-networks to spread information.
More suggestions
A SXSW self-portrait by Rob de la Cretaz on Flickr on March 8, 2012 (CC-BY-NC-SA)
Popping Your Bubble: Stories of the Digital Divide
Friday March 9, 2012 2:00 pm – 3:00pm
Panel examines how rural netizens cope and compensate with issues of digital divide in their communities.
Social Change, Social Media and Social Filmmaking
Friday March 9 2:00pm – 3:00pm
This panel will share tips, tools & tactics for activists, non-profit pros, volunteers & creative people to promote social change through documentary-style online video.
How 21st Century Tools Are Disrupting Global Power
Friday, March 9 2:00pm – 3:00pm
Panel about the impact that technology and social media are playing in transferring power from governments and large institutions to individuals and small institutions.
Tweeting Osama’s Death: From Citizen to Journalist
Saturday, March 10 3:30pm –  4:30pm
Sohaib Athar, who live-tweeted Osama bin Laden’s raid without knowing it, speaks about his experience in his first trip to the U.S. since bin Laden’s death.
Occupying Media: 24 Hour Protest People
Sunday March 11 5:00pm –  6:00pm
Provides a glimpse into the architecture of the Occupy Wall Street media efforts on the protest encampment grounds and the tools/strategies they used to bypass mainstream media filters.
An Unusual Arsenal: Tech Tools to Topple a Tyrant
Monday, March 12 12:30 – 1:30pm
A panel describing how the social media tools of facebook, Youtube and Twitter fomented the Egyptian uprising that brought down President Hosni Mubarak.
We Are Legion: Digital (R) Evolution
Tuesday, March 13 11:00am – 12:00pm
Writer/director Brian Knappenberger speaks about the challenges of making the film, WE ARE LEGION: The Story of the Hacktivists.
“Unofficial” and Free Events
While the SXSW Conference is geared for paid conference badge holders, several online curators have compiled lists of free events for the non-badge holders to attend. The Unofficial SXSW Guide has a user friendly calendar with free SXSW events. Sanfranfreesco, the San Francisco-based directory of free and fun events in the California Bay Area has taken up the SXSW cause. Their listings can be filtered by a number of search queries such as the availability of free drinks, music and swag. They can also be found on Twitter @FreeSXSW. Twitter user @SXSWPartylist also champions the virtues of SXSW gratis.
The official SXSW conference also has a couple of free events lined-up, including a weekend concert at the Auditorium Shores featuring The Shins, Counting Crows and The Cult. For three days from March 9-11, ScreenBurn Arcade offers gaming geeks the latest in video game releases. Cinephiles can participate in a nostalgic trip to early 90s Austin subculture by attending Slacker 2011 as reimagined by 24 Austin filmmakers 20 years after Richard Linklater’s film Slacker tapped into the city's original quirky mindset.

author: Gina Cardenas


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Brazil: Navy Surrounds Quilombo Community Slated for Eviction · Global Voices
Sara Moreira

Quilombo Rio de Macacos in Bahia, one of the oldest communities of descendents of slaves in Brazil, woke up enclosed by military police threatening their eviction on Sunday morning, March 4, 2012.
The Brazilian Navy hold an order for repossession of the lands on which 50 families live, as Global Voices reported on February 21. However, it was guaranteed in a hearing with the Brazilian federal government on February 27 that the eviction would be suspended for five months [pt] until the conclusion of a Technical Identification and Delimitation Report from the National Institute of Colonisation and Agrarian Reform (Incra).
“Article 68 in the 1998 Constitution and the Decree 4887/2003 guarantee the rights of the community's centuries-long occupation,” explains sociologist and president of the Development Council of the Black Community in Bahia, Villma Reis, one of the first persons to react [pt] publicly on March 4 after the siege by the police:
Marcada para a hoje, 04.03.2012, e suspensa por ação da Presidência da Republica (Secretaria Geral, SEPPIR [Secretaria de Políticas de Promoção da Igualdade Racial] e FCP [Fundação Cultural Palmares]), a tomada do Território do Quilombo Rio dos Macacos está neste momento vivendo uma grande tensão, pois neste momento já tem mais de 03 caminhões de fuzilheiros dentro da Comunidade, cada um com cerca de 80 homens, do lado de fora tem os militares da Bahia (que não podem entrar) e 01 trator posicionado no portão da Vila Naval, área tomada da comunidade há 42 anos atrás.
The Ondina settlement of the Occupy Salvador movement rapidly created an event [pt] on Facebook after receiving requests for help from two local activists. A call for a solidarity “occupation” of the quilombo was soon made. A map showing how to get to the community was shared, and more information was uploaded throughout the day.
Occupy Quilombo Rio dos Macacos. Accessibility map.
“The sense of solidarity with the people of Quilombo do Rio dos Macacos was fundamental in order for the Navy to retreat and withdraw their trucks, marines and the tractor from the area of Quilombo,” announced [pt] the Bahia blog network.
The blog also republished the testimony of one activist who responded to the call and spent the day in the community along with around 300 other individuals, including representatives of various organizations, activists from the black people’s movement, university students and school kids.
Poliana Rebouças, described the following events:
Plenary in Quilombo Rio dos Macacos. Photo shared by Poliana Rebouças on Facebook.
A mobilização começou com uma visita solidária feita por alguns grupos para levar alimentos para a comunidade, que esteve impedida pela marinha de pescar e plantar no local durante o período de ameaça de desocupação anteriormente. Ao chegar lá, este grupo encontrou tratores, policiais militares armados, além de camburões, o que indicava mais uma ameaça de desocupação. Os moradores relataram que foram ameaçados durante a madrugada e houve tiros e intimidações, através de pressão psicológica.
A marinha impediu todo o grupo de entrar no quilombo, o que fez com que a maioria tivesse de entrar pelos fundos e depois tirar uma comissão para entrar no quilombo e levar a alimentação e checar a situação dos moradores. No início da tarde, a situação estava sob controle, contatos foram feitos com representantes do ministério da defesa que garantiram que não haverá desocupação em 5 meses, prazo dado aos moradores para que comprovem que são remanescentes de quilombo originário naquela região.
The same blog shared testimony by an anonymous naval officer who said that “the troop’s presence there was a coincidence and a routine operation.”
Journalist Daniela Novais, from the site Câmara em Pauta, reaffirmed the guarantee promised by the Federal Government “that the community’s rights would be preserved”, adding [pt]:
A corporação [Marinha do Brasil] ainda não se pronunciou e se limitou a informar que enviaria nota através da assessoria de comunicação da corporação militar, quando tiver autorização para tal. Nós do Câmara em Pauta esperamos que o governo da Bahia interfira energicamente a fim de não repetir o episódio de violação de direitos humanos na reintegração de posse de Pinheirinho, em São José dos Campos, São Paulo.
Like Novais, who considered that “Quilombo Rio dos Macacos lived a Pinheirinho day” [pt] several other internet users mentioned [pt] the repossession of Pinheirinho that took place on January 22 under excessive police force, as reported by Global Voices.
In regards to the community’s safety, a note was republished [pt] by Sandra Martuscelli (@PersonalEscrito) on Twitter reflecting the fear shared by many:
ninguém sabe o que pode acontecer depois que esse coletivo for desmobilizado, não há segurança em relação ao que vai acontecer hoje à noite, amanhã, durante a semana…
A petition for the preservation of possession and title of the lands of Quilombo do Rio dos Macacos [pt] has been circulating. It recalls the quilombola community’s rights enshrined in the constitution, while reinforcing the claim for “the “demarcation, titling and ownership of the lands occupied by descendents of the quilombola people, allowing the continuity of these communities, which should be considered as the greatest proof of a symbol of the struggle against slavery, in the past, and racism, in the present”.

author: Sara Moreira


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China: Appeal to Tibetans To Cease Self-Immolation · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

A number of Tibetans activists launched a signature campaign urging Tibetans to cease self-immolation and to cherish their lives in a time of oppression. Via Woser's blog.


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Cuba: To the Women Bloggers  · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

On the heels of International Women's Day yesterday, Reinaldo Escobar at Translating Cuba congratulates all the women bloggers.


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Cuba: Women’s Rights  · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

“The clitoris is not the only thing we can lose, there is a long list of social, economic and political possibilities, which are also snatched from us”: Generation Y posts a list of “the violations that still persist against women” in Cuba.


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Haiti: Criticizing the UN · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

The Haitian Blogger calls the cholera outbreak in Haiti “criminal negligence” by the United Nations and goes on to say that the “UN occupation of Haiti is illegal, criminal and based on lies.”


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Haiti: Nowhere to “Go”?  · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

“The draw-down of hundreds of non-governmental organizations which have been in Haiti since the disastrous 2010 earthquake was inevitable. But with their departure, so, too goes their purse and the millions earmarked for cleaning latrines”: Haiti Grassroots Watch examines “what…that mean[s] for the half a million displaced still living in camps.”


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Iran: Cartoonists Rage Against Khatami for Voting in Election · Global Voices
Fred Petrossian

How you can be the “biggest loser” in an election just for voting? Probably Mohammad Khatami, the former reformist president of Iran can answer this.
Khatami voted  in the parliamentary election on Friday, March 2, 2012 ignoring preconditions he himself had formulated for his participation: “Freedom of [political] prisoners and creation of a free atmosphere for everyone and all groups, the authorities respecting the Constitution and creation of the logistics for conducting a healthy and free election.”
Given the popular calls for boycotting the elections, many reformists were disappointed to see Khatami go back on his word.
He later justified his actions by expressing hope that his vote did not disrupt “reformist solidarity.” He has reportedly stressed the “complexity” of the internal as well as the international affairs and called for, “understanding of these complexities by everyone.”
Several satirical cartoons published on the internet display anger and disappointment with the once popular Khatami.
Nikahang, a leading cartoonist and blogger, considers that Khatami ignored the blood shed during the 2009 protest against regime.
Mana Neyestani, another leading cartoonist, shows one of a character breaking a window on the head of Khatami.
An unnamed guest cartoonist on Khodnevis.org took part in a “cartoons against Khatami” campaign with this entry:


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Myanmar: Life Inside a Refugee Camp · Global Voices
tan

This post is part of our special coverage on Refugees.
Nine months have passed since clashes broke out between the Myanmar Army and Kachin Independence Organization (KIO). Thousands of people have fled to refugee camps in other areas in Kachin State, and in villages near China's border.
At least 66 refugees camps have been set-up in government-controlled areas, while others are in Kachin Independence controlled areas and on the China side of the border.
Based in Yangon, Burmese blogger Nang Nyi and her friends visited one of those refugee camps near the China border in mid-February, and she wrote about her experience there. In part one of her blog entry, she started her story by saying:
As everyone know, I am just a normal girl. I do not get involve in politics, nor do I understand it, and I don't hold onto or participate in any parties or organizations or any ideology. I only believe in freedom, justice, and humanitarianism. So I would like to share back my experience in the way I've seen it and I've felt it.
There were four other friends who went along on the trip with her. They travelled from Yangon to Mandalay and then to Muse, in Shan State. They then crossed over to Chinese's border town of Shwe Li to buy the necessary things for the refugees. The next day, they went to the refugee camp:
Map of the Trip Made by Nang Nyi and her Friends
When war broke in Kachin State, refugees ran away to the nearest border to escape. Loizer Refugee Camp is a well-known camp. But the refugee camps we went to were at the borders near Lwe Je. The camps are in the Chinese area of Lai Yin, next to Lwe Je. The refugee camps near Lai Yin were managed by a Kachin group called Wunpawng Ninghtoi (WPN). “Wunpaung” in Kachin means “All Kachins”, and “Ninghtoi” means “Light”. So you can say that this group is the “Light of Kachins”.
When she entered the refugee camp, she saw many kids, but the kids seemed to be afraid of her:
A Kachin Kid (Photo by Nang Nyi)
I have volunteered at orphanages and monastic education centres, so I was used to being delighted at seeing the kids and greeting them enthusiastically. But here, we can not get near these kids. We were sad to see that kids ran away from us because we were unfamiliar faces and our looks showed that we were Bamar.
She also commented about the conditions of  the refugee camp:
Tents at the Refugee Camp (Photo by Nang Nyi)
One thing we faced when we got there was (not having enough) toilets. In a refugee camp that had over 1000 people, they only had 11 toilets. The water for the toilet has to be retrieved from an almost-dry stream over a mile away. In the whole camp, there was one well. They use that water for drinking. The camp was built on an old dump site between the sugarcane fields at the outskirts of a Chinese village.There were no big trees around the area, so during day time, it was dusty and hot air blew. At night, the cold winter wind passed through the waterproof canvases and gets very chilly.
In part two of her blog entry, she wrote about visiting old mills, or coal factories to find out about their needs. She wrote more about that in her post:
Kids Playing at the Refugee Camp (Photo by Nang Nyi)
Some of the camps that they lived in are very near to the places where the fightings were going on. We also got to a place where they said over a field of corn and a field of sugarcanes, they'll be back to their old village. At such camps, they go back to their old villages to get drinking water. They had to watch out for the situation, and avoid the gunfights. On the morning that we were leaving, a man who went to harvest sugarcanes in a sugarcane field died of a bomb explosion. Also, many people have died in those camps because of diarrhea.
On the second day of her trip, they and the responsible people from the camp held a small meeting to discuss about what the refugees needed, and what they can give back in return:
This Woman Sells Brooms and Sell them at Chinese Markets (Photo by Nang Nyi)
The main things that they need are drinking water, water for cooking, and toilets. After that, medicines, and then foodstuff. Clothes, kitchen items, blankets and pillows are sufficient due to donations from the Chinese villages. But what they gave us were sweaters and pants, so they still need longyis for the women. So we immediately donated the left-over money so that they can dig a well there.
In part three of her entry, Nang Nyi wrote about the terrible ordeals that the Kachin villagers faced:
One evening, the (Burmese) army came to the place where the villagers were hiding, and started shooting at them. The villagers grabbed their children who were playing near the village and stream, and tried to run away, but a woman who had just given birth, her new seven-days-old child, a 4-year-old kid, and her mother were left at the village.
The villagers who were hiding in th forests heard the children crying all night, but they dared not go back into the village. So they didn't run very far away, and waited all night. Only after the soldiers left in early morning, the father of the 7-day-old-child, and the grandfather of the 4-year-old kid went back to look. The two kids couldn't make a sound anymore due to crying all night. The corpse of the mother of 7-day-old child, who had an bayonet wound from left rib to right rib, was found under a rock. The villagers were not able to take her with them, nor bury her, so they just carried the kids, and left. The mother of the 4-year-old kid was abducted by the soldiers, and haven't heard since.
She also wrote about what a Kachin villager had told them during the meeting:
A note written by a Kachin refugee, which says: "We all love you. When you go back to Yangon, will you give us your phone number? When you get back to Yangon, will you send us our photos? We all love you"
“I am so happy that the Bamar kids are visiting us. We do love the Bamar people. After all, we are all human, so we ‘re happy and thankful that you came and helped us in anyway you can. This is not because of  how much you donated us, but because of your kind hearts. We are happy that you will be helping us with the things we need, but what we really need are not those. We want peace. We want to go home. We want to live peaceful in our own farm, in our own land, and in our own home with our families. So please help us for that.” – the villager told us with tears in his eyes.
When Nang Nyi and her friends left the camp, the villagers came along with them to their car. She wrote about their farewell message:
A Group Photo of the Villagers at the Refugee Camp (Photo by Nang Nyi)
We told them, “We will see you again, but not here. In Kachin State.” They cried when they heard that. They replied, “Yes, we also want to see you again, but not here. We will meet you in our own villages”.
The fulfillment of the wishes of the Kachin refugees may not be too far away. Delegates of the KIO Army and representatives of the Burmese government will be meeting in Ruili for the third round of talks for ceasefire negotiation this week. Before departing for Ruili, Sumlut Gam, Head of the Kachin delegates, said:
I'm optimistic. Everything will be better.”
This post is part of our special coverage on Refugees.

author: tan


text:
Pakistan: Who Is Killing Shia Muslims? · Global Voices
Rezwan

Pakistan Blogzine posts a translation of Pakistan’s Shia scholar Allama Jawad Naqvi's lecture in Urdu, in which he identifies the actors responsible for the ongoing, systematic Shia killing in Pakistan.

author: Rezwan


text:
Puerto Rico: Online Campaign to Stop Unnecessary C-Sections · Global Voices
Juliana Rincón Parra

Unnecessary Caesarean is the name of the campaign launched on the first week of March in Puerto Rico, aiming to curb the very high percentage of caesarean births in the country: many of them programmed C-sections that don't respond to medical needs.
The campaign focuses on a video with a hip-hop song urging mothers to get better informed before accepting C-sections as a necessary procedure. According to the campaign's page, about half of the babies born in Puerto Rico are products of caesarean procedures where the baby is delivered through an incision made in the mothers abdomen and womb instead of a vaginal delivery. While Caesarean procedures are truly life-saving in many cases where there are complications that put the mother or child at risk, performing elective C-sections could put the mother and child at higher risk than if she delivered naturally.
In the campaign's hip-hop video, some doctors are portrayed as being driven by convenience rather than health when deciding to deliver babies through caesarean sections as a way to treat more women faster than if they had to wait for nature to take its course. As a proposed solution[es], they ask for more people to be trained as doulas or midwives to assist in natural births, eliminating the unnecessary medical procedures that turn the expectant mother into a patient.
El compromiso principal de inne-CESÁREA es, promover el apoderamiento de las mujeres puertorriqueñas para atender el serio problema de salud pública que representan la alta tasa de cesáreas y las intervenciones innecesarias durante el parto para la madre y el bebé, a través de una campaña de prevención validada, actualizada y atractiva sobre la humanización del parto.
The making of video shows the process that brought together more than 50 people to record the campaign's video, including pregnant women, mothers, children, parents, students, health practitioners and more.

author: Juliana Rincón Parra