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India’s elections are right around the corner — and the fake news problem is not going away · Global Voices
GV South Asia

Practices in India: Sending daily religious quotes in Hindi language through WhatsApp. Image from Flickr by Lau Ray. (CC BY-NC 2.0)
With general elections drawing near and digital disinformation running rampant across multiple online platforms in the country, India's democracy may soon reach an inflection point.
In 2018, mob lynchings triggered by disinformation spread on WhatsApp claimed more than 30 lives. In the early months of 2019, falsified statistics from the India-Pakistan conflict spread on multiple platforms, leading to mass attacks on Kashmiri students across the country.
In a highly-publicized effort to counter these trends, the Indian government led by Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has pressured leading technology companies — mainly Facebook and Twitter — to tackle fake news and prevent the spread of information that could lead to electoral interference.
But experts have found that many of India's most insidious disinformation campaigns arise from political parties themselves, with their social media cells attacking journalists and activists. On top of this, fact-checking efforts organized by Facebook have had mixed and in some cases harmful results.
With 900 million voters registered across 29 states for the election cycle that will begin in April 2019 and rising levels of political and social tension under the leadership of sitting Prime Minister Narendra Modi, there is a lot riding on this election for Asia's third-largest economy. Indian citizens will need to be able to find trustworthy news sources online that they can depend on as they make their choices at the ballot box. But this may be easier said than done.
Following a series of allegations and accusations concerning the spread of disinformation on Facebook and WhatsApp (which is owned by Facebook), the parent company has partnered with several local news platforms in India to counter fake news ahead of the biggest democratic elections on earth.
The company identified media platforms, certified by third-party fact-checking programmes, to identify and take action against various types of misinformation. These platforms include India Today, Vishvas News, Newsmobile and Fact Crescendo. Previous members include Boom and international news wire Agence France-Presse (AFP). The coalition platform said it would vet and rate stories for misinformation in various local languages including Hindi, Bengali, Telugu, Malayalam, and Marathi.
In a February 11 statement to Reuters, Facebook's former India News Partnership Head Manish Khanduri said:
We are committed to fighting the spread of false news on Facebook, especially ahead of the 2019 General Election campaign season. And one way to do that is by growing our partnership with third-party fact-checkers. We now have seven partners across the country covering six languages, who will review and rate the accuracy of stories on Facebook.
The partners have been working to vet information and rate stories and posts, in an effort to reduce their proliferation across the social media platforms and groups.
But following the February 14 terrorist attack in Kashmir that killed 40 people, some of Facebook's fact-checking partners were found to be sharing unverified information on their platforms.
Dainik Jagran, Newsmobile and India Today were all found to have misreported events and spread distorted information as India and Pakistan reached military confrontation in Pakistan's Balakot area.
Independent fact-check platform AltNews (which does not participate in Facebook's partnership program) reported that India Today published four unverified articles relating to Pulwama attack and Balakot strikes. The same group also reported that Dainik Jagran and Newsmobile carried unverified information.
It is not clear what led Facebook's fact-checking partners to share these unverified reports. Like many people, they may have been caught up in the chaotic online aftermath of the attacks, in which disinformation seemed to be at an all-time high.
AltNews explained that while the partnership initiative may have seemed well-intended, the results of their work appeared to be contributing to the problem at hand:
With a booming industry of misinformation on Facebook, the platform partnering with fact-checking websites is appreciated. However, when such partners are found to be contributors to misinformation, the question arises – is Facebook sincere in its efforts to curb fake news?
The question raised by AltNews is not a new one in the fact-checking world. In an interview with The Guardian, Brooke Binkowski, the former managing editor of the US-based fact-checking website Snopes explained that the group's partnership with Facebook fell apart when they began doubting Facebook's intentions.
“They’ve (Facebook) essentially used us for crisis PR,” she said. “They’re not taking anything seriously. They are more interested in making themselves look good and passing the buck…They clearly don’t care.”
Facebook has also made efforts to counter disinformation spread on WhatsApp, where Indian users make up the largest proportion of its market — there are 200 million WhatsApp users in India, out of a total of 1.5 billion worldwide. Angry mobs killed more than 20 people accused of child kidnapping and bovine smuggling in viral, widely-circulated WhatsApp messages across different states including Rajasthan and Maharashtra.
Mapping reports of Whatsapp instigated lynchings in India till July 2018. Image by Adondai, Wikipedia. CC BY-SA 4.0
Curbing the spread of such rumors is a more complex challenge on WhatsApp than on Facebook's signature platform, given that the content of all messages sent on WhatsApp is encrypted and not readable for the company.
In response to pressure from the Indian government, the company deployed a technical change to the app, reducing the number of users to whom a message can be forwarded to just five. Previously, users could forward any given message up to 20 times on the app. This change was first rolled out in India alone, and then later replicated for the rest of the world.
While technical changes may help to reduce some of the flow of disinformation, a well-resourced and professionally executed disinformation campaign is likely to find a way to circumvent this problem. In the case of India, where many say that party politics and political manipulation are driving the weaponization of WhatsApp, simple technical adjustments may not be enough to solve the problem.
According to a survey from the non-profit Internet and Mobile Association of India and data journalism portal Factly, only 2.7 percent of Indians believe what they read on social media and mostly rely on news media including newspapers.
While the problem of fake news is enormous for South Asia and India, many news platforms are adding to the information chaos by repeating unverified reports, which gain traction on social media. With India's press freedom ranking in decline, journalists and civil society groups are facing attacks on social media, and restrictions offline, in the form of policies limiting their ability to report the news and work in the public interest.
As they watch the face-off play out between current Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Indian National Congress’ chief Rahul Gandhi, Indians will have to grapple with this increasingly complex information environment where trustworthy news is hard to find and identify.
At the global level, these developments are also contributing to India's declining protections for media and civil society. According to international civil society group CIVICUS Monitor, India now sits in the “obstructed” category, alongside Brazil, Kenya, Morocco and other countries with mixed records in this area. Venezuela, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and Iran are in the next level down, which is known as “blocked”.
Screenshot from the Civicus Monitor Website depicting the state of civil society freedoms in all countries of the world.
The report highlights how disinformation campaigns and authoritarian regimes are targeting civil society protests and activism globally, and fake news is an integral part of the problem. India's approaching election cycle may become a case study in this rapidly developing area.

author: GV South Asia


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Is the Haitian parliament’s revocation of Prime Minister Céant another feat of zero-sum game politics? · Global Voices
Joseph W. Alliance

Luis Almagro, OAS Secretary General, meeting with Jean-Henry Céant on October 30, 2015 in Washington D.C. At the time, Céant was a presidential candidate of Haiti. Photo by Juan Manuel Herrera/OAS, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0
It is a tradition of modern Haitian politics that the prime minister serves as a buffer to the president and is usually the one to be sacrificed when the government is under pressure. Jean Henry Céant is that buffer. As president Jovenel Moise's pick for prime minister (who hoped he was the right man to reverse the country's socio-economic crisis), Céant took office in September 2018. Now, six months later, the Haitian parliament sealed his fate, just as it did with his predecessor Jacques Guy Lafontant.
On March 17, the Lower Chamber handed down a vote of no-confidence in Céant, with 96 deputies voting to remove him. A minority of six lawmakers voted in his favour, while three others abstained:
#Haiti‘s Lower Chamber of Deputies just voted 93 to 6 with 3 abstentions to fire PM @jeanhenryceant and his government. Céant was not present in the chamber and there was no debate, which is unusual for a chamber that likes to talk.
— Jacqueline Charles (@Jacquiecharles) March 18, 2019
The crisis has undoubtedly worsened since Céant took charge, but even though his measures were struggling to take effect, the prime minister showed interest in tackling its underlying cause.
At times, he even displayed leadership, like in his address to the nation after the street protests, in which he adopted a more conciliatory tone than President Moise, whom many felt missed the opportunity to show that he had a good grasp of the nation's troubles. As far as the public was concerned, it was the prime minister's speech that brought some appeasement after the 10-day riots, not the president's.
Céant is not the first to face such an undignified dismissal. In April 2008, the Haitian Senate, bolstered by mob pressure, conducted a special session to end Prime Minister Jacques Edouard Alexis's tenure during President Rene Preval's second term in office, after he failed to respond to intense food riots that were consuming the nation.
Alexis’ successor, Prime Minister Michelle Duvivier Pierre-Louis, lasted just one year in charge. The Senate removed her in October 2009 over allegations that she had not addressed the crisis as promptly as expected, as well as for mismanaging 197 million US dollars that had been allocated for emergency relief following the devastation caused by four hurricanes that struck the country in 2008.
Haiti's Lower Chamber also showed prime minister Lafontant the door because he could not manage the social unrest provoked by the government's attempt to raise fuel prices last summer.
The situation is slightly different this time, though. The violent protests that shook the country in February were calling for a clean slate and the resignation of President Moise. Nobody was demanding the head of the prime minister, which has led many to assume that the cause of Céant's dismissal may not have been rooted in public dissatisfaction, or related to how the population thinks he managed the crisis:
They came to censure the PM, not to interrogate him about anything else. This was not really an interpellation. There is nothing the PM could have done to gain a vote of confidence from the lower Chamber. Too late now. We are back to installing a new PM for 6 months. pic.twitter.com/61BuNg5jmD
— Jacques Jonassaint (@mjjonassaint) March 19, 2019
At first, Céant tried to fight back, saying that the revocation of his post was illegal and unconstitutional, and that he was still the prime minister. As it turns out, his uneasy cohabitation with the president may have cost him the job:
@jeanhenryceant a déclaré : « Le président @moisejovenel doit travailler avec moi pour trouver #KotKòbPetroKaribeA ». pic.twitter.com/hPyr28QTa4
— Michel Joseph (@Lemichel011) February 23, 2019
@jeanhenryceant said: “The president @moisejovenel must work with me to find #KotKòbPetroKaribeA [Where is the PetroCaribe money]”.
According to Gary Bodeau, the president of the Lower Chamber, the focus is already on finding a new prime minister who will not be a challenge to the president or his priorities:
The way @garybodeau is speaking on @Magik9haiti on the profile of next #Haiti Prime Minister sounds like he already has a name not just a description of this “technician who can combat corruption, contraband” “and not be in conflict with the president.” https://t.co/zX3J3w5gbm
— Jacqueline Charles (@Jacquiecharles) March 20, 2019
Ceant's situation is mostly similar to Garry Conille who served for four months as prime minister during Michel Martelly's presidency. Conille resigned in February 2012 due to political infighting with president Martelly and his insistence on the audit of millions of dollars of post-earthquake contracts held by the previous administration. The Martelly circle opposed this move as that could affect people associated with the president, which obliged Conille to resign.
On March 21, as President Moise nominated his minister of communication, Jean Michel Lapin, as the new interim prime minister, Céant finally submitted his resignation letter, leaving Haiti's political establishment up for a new power struggle while the country's real economic crisis bubbles on the back burner.
This new reshuffle is impacting the government's capacity to provide timely and effective response to the crisis. On March 7, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) agreed to provide 229 million US dollars to the country at zero per cent interest rate over three years, but the IMF has announced this money will not be disbursed until a new government is in place:
No I warned that this was going 2 happen in my story on the firing of @jeanhenryceant and impact of #Haiti’s poor timing. It’s costing the government $100 M that it currently doesn’t have given that fuel boat now on day 24 at cost of $20K-$25K per day https://t.co/zX3J3w5gbm https://t.co/aZLI7QRCFb
— Jacqueline Charles (@Jacquiecharles) March 22, 2019
United States Senator Marco Rubio recently travelled to Haiti to reinforce his country's position as a firm supporter of the Haitian president's call for dialogue. Moise was among the Caribbean leaders invited by US president Donald Trump to Mar-a-Lago, Florida, on March 22 to discuss opportunities for investment and stronger cooperation:
Met with President of #Haiti @moisejovenel to discuss the importance of dialogue towards elections in October. Thanked President Moïse for his support on #Venezuela and spoke about exploring opportunities to partner on economic development & stopping drug trafficking. pic.twitter.com/3V4N84FPGu
— Marco Rubio (@marcorubio) March 20, 2019
This continuing support has surely strengthened President Moise's hand in the shaky chessboard of Haitian politics, but the new change in government may very well indicate a desire to gain firmer control of the state apparatus to protect narrow political interests at the expense of finding lasting solutions to the country's ongoing crisis. The moment that former prime minister Céant expressed a willingness to address issues sensitive to president Moise, like the PetroCaribe controversy and the recent arrest of armed US citizens in Haiti, he may have engineered his own downfall.

source: news-globalvoices

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

author: Joseph W. Alliance


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Russian regulators ask VPNs to block blacklisted websites, but most have refused · Global Voices
RuNet Echo

Skitterphoto under CC0
On March 28, Russia’s media regulator said in a press release that it was sending letters to 10 VPN providers asking them to block users’ access to “blacklisted” websites in Russia.
The letters demand that VPN providers plug into the “Federal-State Information System” (FGIS), a technical system that will signal to their services which websites need to be blocked. The move comes as part of the regulator's implementation of a censorship circumvention law that came into effect on November 1, 2017.
Contrary to some headlines, the law does not ban VPN services altogether. Instead, it requires them to abide by the government’s extensive “blacklist” of banned websites and prevent Russian users from accessing them.
Of course, this defeats the purpose of a VPN, a technology used primarily to help people access websites that are blocked in the jurisdiction where they are located. The law is one of the various measures taken by media regulator Roskomnadzor (short for Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology and Mass Media) in recent years, in an effort to better control what Russians can and cannot see online.
If these VPN services refuse to comply with the law at Roskomnadzor’s written request, the press release says, the agency will consider “limiting access to the VPN service.”
Nevertheless, for VPN service providers, there may be no real upside to agreeing with Roskomnadzor’s request. Internet freedom activist Vladislav Zdolnikov explained in a comment to Novaya Gazeta:
Ни один зарубежный VPN-сервис не согласится выполнять этот закон по двум причинам.
Во-первых, это противоречит самой сути VPN-сервисов, которые, в том числе, работают на обход блокировок и защиту трафика.
Во-вторых, это огромный ущерб для каждого VPN-сервиса. Новость о том, что какой-то из сервисов начал фильтровать сайты, моментально отобьет желание пользователей их использовать.
No foreign VPN service will ever agree to follow this law for two reasons.
Firstly, this goes against the very principle of every VPN service whose purpose, among others, is precisely to circumvent blockages and protecting traffic.
Secondly, this can be a major blow to any VPN service which dares to comply. News of one of the services beginning to filter access to websites will immediately put off any customer.
The list of VPN services currently on notice includes NordVPN, Hide My Ass!, Hola VPN, OpenVPN, VyprVPN, ExpressVPN, TorGuard, IPVanish, Kaspersky Secure Connection, and VPN Unlimited. OpenVPN is not itself a service, but an open-source technology that enables it.
Almost all have already publicly stated their intent to refuse to comply with Roskomnadzor’s demands:
Hello. Having in mind the complexity of the request, we have no other option but not to comply.
— NordVPN (@NordVPN) 29 марта 2019 г.
Some, such as TorGuard, have also declared that they will be removing their servers from Russian soil:
At the time of this writing TorGuard has taken steps to remove all physical server presence in Russia. We have wiped clean all servers in our Saint Petersburg and Moscow locations and will no longer be doing business with data centers in the region.
The only exception on the list is Kaspersky Secure Connection, a service provided by the cybersecurity research firm Kaspersky Labs. The group is headquartered in Moscow, and thus uniquely vulnerable to local laws. Nevertheless, some people balked at their decision to comply with the news rules:
VPN-сервис (!!!) Kaspersky Secure Connection…
Даже не знаю с чем и сравнить сей абсурд.
Kaspersky Secure Connection согласен на полное сотрудничество с Роскомнадзором.
КМБУ!https://t.co/QYEnp6EKPG
— Александр Лисовцев (@A_Lisovtsev) 29 марта 2019 г.
VPN-service (!!!) Kaspersky Secure Connection…
I’m not sure what to compare this absurdity to.
Kaspersky Secure Connection fully agrees to cooperate with Roskomnadzor. Why would anyone be surprised at that!

author: RuNet Echo


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#WelcomeHomeAlaa: Egyptian revolution activist Alaa Abd El Fattah released after five years in prison · Global Voices
Afef Abrougui

Alaa Abd El Fattah and Manal Hassan. Photo by Lilian Wagdy via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 2.0)
Egyptian blogger and activist Alaa Abd El Fattah was released by authorities late on the night of March 28 after serving five years in prison for defying a protest ban.
The news broke on Twitter when his sister, activist Mona Seif, tweeted simply: “Alaa is out.” She later delighted her brother's friends and allies by posting a photo of the renowned Egyptian revolution activist playing with his family's dog, Toka, who he met for the first time:
اللقاء الأول
علاء وتوكة
? pic.twitter.com/mjkugrqrR3
— Mona Seif (@Monasosh) March 29, 2019
First meeting of Alaa and Toka ?
Supporters around the world have begun posting photos on Twitter with signs reading “Welcome Home Alaa!”:
In my name and in the name of all your friends at @apc_news: Welcome home, dear Alaa! <3#WelcomeHomeAlaa pic.twitter.com/MAPcO8fN8b
— Leila Nachawati Rego (@leila_na) March 29, 2019
@tunawezacongo #SJS à #Kinshasa fête le retour de
#Alaa
à la maison. #freealaa #welcomehomealaa #rdc pic.twitter.com/1D0k9WWdT9
— Si Jeunesse Savait (@tunawezacongo) March 29, 2019
The feminist organization “si jeunesse savait” [“if youth knew”] celebrates Alaa’s return home
After five years in jail, activist and digital rights champion from #Egypt @alaa is free. #WelcomeHomeAlaa from your @globalvoices @advox fam pic.twitter.com/ql9xrkncv7
— Arzu Geybulla (@arzugeybulla) March 29, 2019
Alaa was a leading voice among Egyptian bloggers and technology activists in Cairo approaching and during the Egyptian Revolution. Together with his wife, Manal Hassan, he helped develop on a range of technology and political activism projects working with activists and bloggers in the region and beyond, including with many members of the Global Voices community.
The 37-year-old activist was arrested and taken from his family’s home in November 2013. More than one year later, in February 2015, he was finally tried and sentenced to five years in prison for “organising” a protest under a 2013 protest law that prohibits unauthorised demonstrations. While he did take part in a protest against military trials for civilians on 26 November 2013, Alaa had no role in organising it. His sentence was confirmed by Egypt’s Court of Cassation in November 2017.
Clockwise: Sanaa (left) and Mona; Alaa Abd El Fattah with his son Kahled and wife Manal Hassan, Alaa and Sanaa, and Sanaa and Mona. Photo from Mona Seif's Facebook page.
Alaa comes from a family of prominent human rights advocates, including human rights lawyer Ahmed Seif El Islam, Alaa's father, who was jailed multiple times under the regime of Hosni Mubarak. Abd El Fattah’s sisters, Mona and Sanaa Seif, are also human rights defenders who have long campaigned against the military trials of civilians in the country.
Alaa has been jailed or investigated under every Egyptian head of state who has served during his lifetime. In 2006, he was arrested for taking part in a peaceful protest. In 2011, he spent two months in prison, missing the birth of his first child, Khaled. In 2013, he was arrested and detained for 115 days without trial.
Following his release, Alaa will be made to spend every night in his local police station for an additional five years.
For now, however, his family, friends and supporters are relieved to hear that he is out of jail. And so is the Global Voices community.
Long-time @globalvoices and @advox friend @alaa is out of jail in #Egypt after five long years behind bars. #freealaa #welcomehomealaa pic.twitter.com/kAF1ifjGMB
— Global Voices (@globalvoices) March 29, 2019

author: Afef Abrougui


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What changed for the Macedonian people after the country changed its name to Republic of North Macedonia · Global Voices
Filip Stojanovski

The ceremony of raising the NATO flag in front of the Government of the Republic of North Macedonia on February 12, 2019. In the background: The old name of the institution was removed from the facade a day before. Photo by the Government of the Republic of North Macedonia, public domain.
On January 11, 2019, the parliament of North Macedonia approved the constitutional amendments that changed the country's name to Republic of North Macedonia, at last ending a 27-year-old dispute with Greece, which has its own region called Macedonia.
The amendment enshrined in national law the UN-brokered Prespa Agreement, signed in June 2018 between Greece's Prime Minister Alexis Tsipiras and his Macedonian counterpart Zoran Zaev. They were both nominated to this year's Nobel Peace Prize for ending one of the oldest active ‘cold’ conflicts in Europe.
The change was a crucial step on the Republic of North Macedonia's path towards joining the European Union and NATO, as that had been vetoed beforehand by Greece because of the name issue.
However, that didn't just transform the Balkan country's international relations: it also introduced many changes that affect the everyday lives of its people.
The names of government bodies, websites, road signs, and inscriptions on public buildings have either been replaced, or are slated to be replaced, since the new name became official on February 12.
Symbolically, the road sign on the Greek border was the first to be amended with the new name. Some others will incur in significant costs and are still pending. That includes the plaque on the government's main building. The original sign, with the words “Government of Republic of Macedonia,” was removed on February 11 and a new one hasn't yet arrived.
For citizens on both sides of the border, one benefit of improved neighborly relations is the reinstatement of a flight connection between Skopje and Athens after more than ten years. The flight began on November 1, 2018.
Before: On February 10, the government seat's building displayed the words “Government of Republic of Macedonia,” in Macedonian Cyrillic. They were removed the next day to be replaced with the new constitutional name of the country. Photo by Global Voices, CC-BY
The Prespa Agreement stipulates that the personal documents of the citizens of the Republic of North Macedonia will be changed over the next five years.
Documents such as passports, ID cards, or car license plates, will be valid over this period, and replacement will be gradual. Citizens whose documents bearing the old name expire before that deadline will get new ones, with the new name, whenever they renew them.
Meanwhile, the police officers on all border crossings started adding a stamp onto Macedonian passports that says: “This passport is the property of Republic of North Macedonia.” This is a temporary measure while passports with the old name are still valid.
North Macedonia's codes for license plates will also change from MK to NM or NMK, and border authorities have started putting “NMK” stickers on plates over the old MK field.
One concession made by the Prespa agreement is the country's code for purposes other than license plates, like the top level internet domain, which will remain MK and MKD, as officially assigned by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO).
The inside front cover of a Macedonian passport with a stamp designating the new name of the country in three languages (Macedonian, English, and French). Underneath it, a now-obsolete sheet that Greek authorities used to stamp entry and exit of Macedonian visitors in place of their passports. Photo by Global Voices, CC-BY
Greece has also introduced a few changes since the agreement's signature, including recognizing North Macedonia's passports.
Until February 2019, Macedonian visitors in Greece had to fill in a separate piece of paper in Greek and English which served as a kind of surrogate passport — a document that border police would stamp so that they didn't have to deal with passports bearing the name “Republic of Macedonia.” While on Greek soil, travelers had to keep that piece of paper with them at all times.
Since the Prespa agreement, Greek authorities have also stopped putting stickers on the cars of Macedonian citizens entering Greece that read, in Greek and English, that the country was “recognized by Greece as FYROM.” The acronym stands for “former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia,” which was how the UN referred to North Macedonia since the 1990s while a solution to the dispute was pending.
In 2012, this was considered a humiliating provocation by Macedonian authorities, as well as by Macedonian tourists visiting Greece who saw it as unnecessary political harassment while they put money into the Greek economy.
Nothing changed for the Greek citizens traveling to North Macedonia. Their passports were always recognized by Macedonian authorities, who also didn't put any stickers on their cars when visiting their central northern neighbor.
Solving a generational conflict by compromise has been considered revolutionary for the Balkans, a region where nationalist tenets still dominate much of domestic and regional politics.
Soon after the signing, the Macedonian government published the whole agreement to alleviate the fears that it endangers the Macedonian ethnic identity. The Greek government did the same thing at that time.
The agreement states that the term “Macedonian” has different meanings to different people, and neither signatory party has an exclusive right to its use nor can forbid the other to use it in their particular context.
Therefore, the Greeks can continue using it in the context of the history of ancient Greece and in the contemporary sense of their northern region, while the Macedonians use it to designate their modern ethnic identity and language, which is part of the Slavic branch of the Indo-European family. Around 64 percent of North Macedonia's population are ethnic Macedonians.
This is the set of media guidelines published by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs on the official use of the terms based on the stipulations of the Prespa Agreement:
The official name of the country: “Republic of North Macedonia”; Short name: “North Macedonia”.
Correct examples: Macedonian ethnic identity; Macedonian language; Macedonian culture; Macedonian territory; Macedonian people; Macedonian history, Macedonian mountains; Macedonian literature; the Macedonian Cyrillic alphabet; Macedonian food; Macedonian churches etc.
Incorrect: Other adjectival references, including “North Macedonian”, “Northern Macedonian”, “N.  Macedonian” and “NorthMacedonian”, should not be used.
In the meantime, the relations between the two countries have been warming to an unprecedented level of friendship.
The recent statement by Greek PM Tsipras urging the EU to start the negotiations for membership with North Macedonia in June would have been unthinkable just a year ago.
The EU negotiations process will force North Macedonia to raise its standards not only in a formal sense — by adjusting its legal system, for example –, but also in practice by solving endemic problems affecting people's quality of life, such as rampant pollution and impunity to corruption.

author: Filip Stojanovski


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A magical image of a Carnival stilt-walker asserts the legitimacy of public breastfeeding in Trinidad & Tobago · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

On the southern edge of Port of Spain, while waiting for her band to cross the South Quay judging point on Carnival Tuesday, 2019 Trinidad and Tobago Queen of Carnival Shynel Brizan breastfeeds her son Prince. Photo by Shaun Rambaran, used with permission.
It was a beautiful bonding moment seen around the world: Carnival Tuesday in Trinidad and Tobago; newly crowned Queen of Carnival, Shynel Brizan, calmly sits on the perimeter wall of Lapeyrouse Cemetery in Port of Spain, breastfeeding her one-year-old son, Prince.
2019 Queen of Carnival Shynel Brizan sits atop the wall of Lapeyrouse Cemetery on Carnival Tuesday, breastfeeding her son, Prince. Photo by Jillian Fournillier, used with permission.
Her friend Jillian Fournillier, who took the photo, had been following the group and looking after Prince, as Brizan, her partner and the other stilt-walkers (known in Trinidad and Tobago as “moko jumbies”) that comprised the carnival band “Palace of the Peacock” strode through the streets. She realised the child was hungry and needed his mother. “I'll rest just now,” Brizan promised, and as soon as she saw an opportunity, she did. There weren't a lot of people on the stretch of road bordering the cemetery. Brizan perched on the wall and Fournillier handed Prince up to her. She nursed her son for about ten minutes.
Fournillier remembers that moment to have been quite tranquil — unusual for a Carnival Tuesday, when the music is loud and the energy electric. Speaking by telephone with Global Voices, she said, “For most of the day, Prince wore rather bulky ear protection, but we were able to take if off of him and just let him bond with his Mummy. He was quite contented and didn't need to nurse again for a long time afterwards.”
That sense of peace is reflected in the serenity of the picture, which has since been shared a number of times on social media, including by The Breastfeeding Association of Trinidad and Tobago and by La Leche League USA.
Most of the other photographers around were male, Fournillier recalls, and they shied away from the scene — all but Shaun Rambaran, who snapped several shots of the Brizan that day, some of them while she was breastfeeding. Via email, Rambaran explained to Global Voices that he wasn't intimidated by capturing the moment, perhaps because his mother had been an obstetrician's assistant: “I think being exposed in such an open way to knowledge of the body has left me today with slightly uncommon attitudes toward being human, nudity, sex, maintaining one's health, and life itself, really.”
While waiting to enter Park Street for the Victoria Square judging point, Prince happily sits at the head of the Moko Somõkõw band on March 5, 2019. Photo by Shaun Rambaran, used with permission.
In a piece titled “Moko – Mother – Marvel”, Brizan told blogger Sheetal Daswani, “The stilts and I become one when I’m a Moko, and when I’m feeding my son, he and I also become one. The experiences are similarly spiritual.” Daswani noted that the photographs of Brizan breastfeeding served to “break the worn-out binary dialogue — the divide between the acceptable and unacceptable, the private and the public, the isolated and the social.”
Marilyn Stollmeyer, a lactation consultant at the Mamatoto Resource and Birth Centre, agrees. She was heartened at how much play the photograph of Brizan got, interpreting it as a sign that Trinbagonian mothers are becoming more educated about the benefits of breastfeeding their children. She spoke with Global Voices by phone about societal attitudes towards public breastfeeding, saying, “I don't think it's religious-based; more cultural. Particularly at Carnival, we're a society that says it's okay to put on skimpy costumes and bare your breasts, but if women are breastfeeding, many times they are asked to cover up or go somewhere else.”
While wearing her sticks and sitting atop a wall, Shynel Brizan takes a moment to feed her son, Prince. Photo by Shaun Rambaran, used with permission.
Or, to use Daswani's words, “Shynel’s images assert the legitimacy of public breastfeeding, and her audience acknowledges the exposure of her body and has normalized it, the same way they normalize all women playing mas despite their level of self-exposure. These photos have presented an unintended aesthetic strategy to put forth a profound proclamation for all women — We own our bodies. Eating in public spaces is normal and natural regardless of whether you’re eating off of a plate, a banana leaf or your mother’s breasts.”
Even so, Stollmeyer says, there is still work to do to overcome what she calls the “baby and bottle culture”. Employers, at the very least, should be made to provide proper facilities in which working mothers can express and safely store their milk. “The demands on mothers have not got easier,” Stollmeyer explains. “We have to do everything we can to prepare women to breastfeed antenatally, and to offer them, their partners, and the ‘village’ that it takes to raise a child proper support in making the healthiest choices.”
From a photographer's perspective, Rambaran is hopeful that the change is already happening. “The optimistic side of me wants to believe that while in the United States, for instance, there have been silly fiascos over breastfeeding in public, we've hung onto our ‘Caribbeanness’ enough to reject those particular ideas in which we're ahead. It makes me more than happy to share these photographs with you, so to help preserve ourselves and our ideas.”

author: Janine Mendes-Franco


text:
Back-to-back fires in Dhaka trigger concerns over regulation and safety in Bangladesh · Global Voices
Palash Ranjan Sanyal

A fire truck of the Bangladesh Fire Service and Civil Defence. Image via Flickr by Shadman Samee. CC By-SA 2.0
Early on the morning of Saturday, March 30, a fire broke out in DNCC Market in Bangladesh's capital city, Dhaka. The market was completely destroyed by fire in 2017, and this latest incident takes place just two days after another fire the Banani residential and commercial area killed at least 25 people and injured many more. The 23-floor Faruk Rupayan (FR) Tower was ravaged in the blaze.
These incidents have raised questions about fire safety, building codes and regulations, and the role of the city authorities.
A #fire broke out at #DNCC #market in the morning in #Gulshan, #Dhaka, #Bangladesh on Saturday, 30 March 2019.
In March 28, 2019 just two days before from today at least twenty-five #people #died in a fire #incident occured in #Banani, Dhaka.
©https://t.co/35OAmhYkeB pic.twitter.com/ESSAPk2DmH
— Syed Mahamudur Rahman (@RLiemu) March 30, 2019
The DNCC market fire started around 6 am. It took 20 firefighting units more than 4 hours to bring it completely under control. No casualties have been announced, but more than 200 shops were destroyed at the market in the flame.
The Banani FR Tower fire on March 28 was one of the deadliest fires ever to take place in a high-rise building in Bangladesh. The incident has raised many questions regarding fire safety procedures in Dhaka's high-rise buildings. When the fire broke out, the building's emergency exits were locked, and there were only two fire exits and no sprinklers.
A total of 25 deaths have been confirmed in a deadly fire that broke out at a building in #BananiFire . There have been reports that several people have been critically injured after jumping from the building. Victims were immediately taken to hospitals for treatment #Bangladesh pic.twitter.com/sOWYNFC0Ma
— Ali Ahmad Mabrur (@Mabrur00) March 29, 2019
The whole country watched the horrific event unfold as people tried to escape the deadly fire, as shown in the video below (viewer discretion advised).
#Bangladesh#dhaka fire#DhakaFire#DhakaBananiFire#Dhaka #BananiFire pic.twitter.com/68oJ2a0otm
— Kazi Anam Al Madani (@madani_kazi) March 28, 2019
“I tried to go to the roof, but the thick smoke blurred my vision and was having difficulty to breath. My skin was seething and all I wanted get out of the inferno,” a survivor says #Dhaka #BananiFire #Banani #dhakafire #Bangladesh pic.twitter.com/lOc7IvfKNJ
— Selibis Sarkar (@SarkarSelibis) March 29, 2019
Hundreds of people crowded the scene, which has also raised the question of civil ethics, codes of conduct and crowd control during emergencies. Often, people gather around such incidents, becoming obstacles to emergency crews.
even if we do not change our-self now then there is worse times to come.
Be prepared #bangladesh.
We should chamge ourself first. #Banani pic.twitter.com/14Vmi7QGYI
— Arman Hossain Nihal (@ArmanHossainNi6) March 28, 2019
Netizen Ireen Sultana wrote in a Facebook post
নিউ জিল্যান্ডের ক্রাইস্টচার্চের ঘটনার পর পর সেখানে কি উৎসুক জনতাকে ভিড় করে মোবাইলে ভিডিও-ছবি তুলতে দেখেছেন?
না।
চুড়িহাট্টার ঘটনার সময় ও পরের কয়েকদিন ওই সরু গলিতে শত শত লোকের ঢল দেখেছিলেন ওই জ্বলতে থাকা, পুড়ে যাওয়া ভবনগুলোর সামনে, ছবি তোলার জন্য?
হ্যা।
আমাদের এখানে প্রতিটি দুর্ঘটনার মুহূর্তে একেবারে ঘটনাস্থলে হুমড়ি খেয়ে পড়ে মানুষ এবং দানবের মত জ্বলে ওঠে তাদের হাতের মোবাইল ফোন।
Did you notice people in Christchurch gathered around the mosque after the mass killing and use mobile devices to take pictures or video?
No.
Did you notice during and after the incident in Churihatta, hundreds of people came in that narrow lane to take pictures of burnt buildings?
Yes.
Here, after an accident, crowd flows and their mobile phones flash like monsters.
Amidst the criticism of crowd behaviour, a photo of a young boy trying to stop a leak in one of the firefighters’ water hoses has been singled out for praise by netizens:
Real Hero of the day. When many were busy to take pictures… [Love You Brother] ? ?#Bangladesh #Fire pic.twitter.com/AOeX97ebxL
— Freelancer Mustakin (@jkmustakin) March 28, 2019
The DNCC market fire is the third incident of such magnitude in recent times in Dhaka, highlighting the unplanned nature of the city and the need for decentralization. This has prompted Government officials to talk about inspection measures and modernizing infrastructure. In late February 2019, several buildings caught fire in the old part of Dhaka, killing at least 70 people and causing multiple injuries. That fire triggered memories of the 2010 Nimtoli incident, one of the deadliest in the city's history.
The February fires renewed concern about the storage facilities in some of the places where garments factories are located. City authorities launched a campaign to remove industrial chemicals from the residential sections of the district, though faced resistance, in the process, from the people working and living in those areas.
Fire Reveals Chemical Dangers in Garment Supply Chain
Deadly blaze in Bangladesh renews scrutiny of safety factors in a global industry #NorthStarBizIn #Bangladesh #GarmentsIndustry #SupplyChain #Chemical #Fire #GarmentSupplyChain https://t.co/jTsWoDPheT
— North Star Business Consulting (@NorthStarBusin2) March 9, 2019
There are several reasons fire remains a persistent safety concern for Bangladesh. With 44,500 people per sq km, Dhaka is the most densely populated city on earth, according to UN Habitat data. There is no fire hydrant system in place, and those on the street are often not in working condition. Old Dhaka is so prone to fire disasters that last year it witnessed on average one fire per day.
The fire service found 537 chemical warehouses in the old town. The fire services, in many instances, advised residents and business owners of the danger and even began eviction drives with the help of mobile courts. These measures, however, were met with pushback from the locals.
Bangladesh Fire Services and Civil Defence has conducted multiple surveys which found thousands of buildings, shopping malls and hospitals to be at risk of fire hazard. Inadequate access, the close proximity of the structures, and the almost invisible presence of fire safety measures add to the risk.
The department came up with a set of recommendations, including the immediate installation and maintenance of sprinklers, placing fire extinguishers, and relocation of the chemical stores and shops from residential areas. But many establishments are not following them.
Corruption and illegal housing permits have also been highlighted in social media, after it was revealed that the 23-story FR Tower only had approval for 18 stories. RAJUK, the city development authority, has been named in multiple instances of corruption at different levels of construction and the connection of utility services. As Shakoor Majid, an expat Bangladeshi writer, noted on Facebook:
আমাদের একটা ১০ তলার উপরের বিন্ডিং এর প্ল্যান পাস করাতে পরিবেশ, ফায়ার ফাইটিং সহ ১৩ টা দপ্তরের অনুমোদন লাগে। প্ল্যান পাস করাতে এই বিভাগের সবাই টাকা খায়। টাকা না দিলে প্ল্যান পাস করে না। পরে বিল্ডিং হবার পর এই বিভাগের দায়িত্ব থাকে, প্ল্যান অনুযায়ী বিল্ডিং হলো কী না তা দেখে সার্টিফিকেট দেয়া। এই সার্টিফিকেট পেলে ইউটিলিটি কানেকশন হবে, না হলে হবে না। কিন্তু রাজউক, পরিবেশ, সিভিল এভিয়েশন, ফায়ার ফাইটিং, এই বিভাগের লোকেরা টাকা খেয়ে ইউটিলিটি কানকশন দিয়ে দে।
We will need to go through 13 departments to approve our 10 storied building plan which includes fire services, environment etc. All these departments take a bribe to approve the plan. The plan would not be approved without money. These departments are responsible for ensuring that the construction of the buildings is done according to the plan and provide certificates. These certificates are mandatory to obtain utility services and their connections. But RAJUK, Environment, Civil Aviation, Fire Service, they provide the approval over bribes.
With the increasing number of fire cases over the last ten years, Bangladesh has also been developing its volunteer emergency force.

author: Palash Ranjan Sanyal


text:
In the Caucasus, queer people are forced to flee their homes · Global Voices
OC Media

Photo by Anna Nikoghosyan for OC Media. Used with permission
The following is a version of a partner post written by Armine Avetisyan, Nika Musavi, and Dato Parulava that first appeared on the website OC Media.
Faced with bullying, discrimination, and violence, queer people in the South Caucasus are frequently forced to flee their homes.
“I was still in kindergarten when I realised I was born in someone else’s body.’
‘At school, I was forced to write on my workbooks ‘schoolgirl’. I would erase the ‘girl,’ and teachers would add it again, and so on. My development was very straightforward, there was no moment I would consider the beginning of my identity discovery, as I have always considered myself a boy,” 30-year-old Mel Daluzyan from Gyumri tells OC Media.
Mel Daluzyan, 30, from Gyumri, northwest Armenia (/Private archive)
Despite Mel’s best efforts, to society, he was a girl named Meline. Mel has been weightlifting since 2002 and was a part of the Armenian Weightlifting Federation’s women’s national team.
“My trainer would try to inspire me, telling me God created me “like this” in order to be good at heavy lifting, and at some point, when I was still young, I also tried to look at it from this perspective. But I realised that despite everything, I also have the right to a personal life, the right to be happy, especially considering I’m not hurting anyone with my life and lifestyle,” says Mel.
According to Mel, when he participated in Pink Armenia’s first LGBT forum in Armenia in 2015, and a group photo of the participants was published online, the media began to discuss his personal life, threatening his career. The record-holding two-time European champion and double bronze world medalist left Gyumri two years ago, settling abroad.
Pink Armenia’s first LGBT forum in Armenia in 2015 (Pink Armenia)
“I left Armenia in 2016, after a year of unsuccessful attempts to find a job in my field. So many negative attitudes were spread towards me that I couldn’t even find a job as a trainer in a gym. Now I live in the Netherlands, I haven’t faced any discrimination here, only unconditional support in all matters. At this point, I am not even considering returning to Armenia.”
Mel says that life is difficult in Gyumri for those who are ‘different’, especially if you are famous.
“Gyumri is the most conservative city in Armenia. The main problem was gossip: everybody considered it their sacred duty to invent a myth about me to explain what they didn’t understand, and the media helped to spread these rumours. Of course, all of this created some difficulties for me when I appeared in my new environment, when I had to build my life again from nothing, but eventually, I succeeded in introducing myself to people as I am. I was able to achieve the fact that my friends won’t let anybody call me “Meline.”
According to Mel, there would be no problems with his parents if society had not interfered.
“LGBT people in Armenia are deprived of almost all rights. Of course, if someone has a secret life, drowning out their identity, having a formal marriage, it’s possible to live “quietly” in Armenia. But judge for yourselves — how can it be considered a “quiet life”? I don’t have any friends who are not hiding and are able to live quietly.”
Homosexuality has been legal in Armenia since 2003, but the rights of queer people are not protected under the law. A 2017 report on the human rights situation of queer people in Armenia by queer rights group Pink Armenia, said that despite the positive trend of a number of media outlets cooperating with rights groups and queer people to present their stories, the population of Armenia still had an overwhelmingly negative attitude towards queer people.
Research conducted in 2016 by Pink Armenia and think-tank the Caucasus Research Resource Center showed that 89% of Armenia's population think homosexuals should not be allowed to work with children.
The research found that people who had less contact with queer people had more negative attitudes towards them than those with queer acquaintances.
People from queer rights groups insist that while the numbers are uncertain, many queer people leave Armenia every year due to homophobia.
Twenty-two-year-old Tazo Sozashvili can’t visit his family in Kakheti, the region in eastern Georgia where he was born. He is afraid he will be harassed because of his sexuality. He is afraid of what his family might have to go through if such a thing happened.
Tazo Sozashvili, 22, from Kakheti, eastern Georgia (Dato Parulava/OC Media)
Tazo, who works for Equality Movement, a queer rights group, made headlines with his emotional speech at the Georgian Parliament in 2018.
“I cannot go to my village to see my parents, my grandmother, and grandfather. I was bullied at school for 12 years. I still hate to visit the place, because every day it was terrifying, each day meant facing death. Today I cannot visit my parents in Kakheti, because it is dangerous. This is the difference between me and you. You will never understand what it costs me to stand here and say this because it will cause problems for me. You will never understand this because you are white heterosexual privileged people. I hate you,” Tazo said on 1 May, in front of parliament’s Human Rights Committee after they went back on their promise to mark International Day Against Homophobia.
In 2017, the prosecutor’s office examined 86 alleged hate crimes, 12 out of which were based on sexual orientation and 37 on gender identity.
The Public Defender’s report says violence against queer people, whether in the family or in public spaces, is a serious problem, and that the government has been unable to respond to this challenge.
Tazo’s speech was unplanned. Realising what his family might have felt after suddenly seeing him on TV, he decided to prepare them and called them. That’s when he came out to his mother.
“She cried. Why would you do something like that? What will people say? — She asked with rebuke, but it was not anger she was speaking out of, it was regret,” Tazo says.
His phone was loaded with messages and calls. A lot of them were encouraging, but there were others who didn’t get it.
Tazo has not talked to his father since his speech.
“All our relatives and friends have been calling him. He wanted to throw his phone away. They showed sympathy, which is rare because some families in the same situation have been pushed to leave villages,” Tazo says.
Queer rights activists protesting outside Georgia's parliament on 1 May (Dato Parulava/OC Media)
After his public coming out, several old acquaintances from the village tried to reconnect.
“Around 10 people who I knew from the village sent me friend requests — they were asking why I’d think they were homophobes, that they’re here to help me and that only my well-being matters,” says Tazo.
But others were not so welcoming. They have been threatening him for several years now.
“Now I’m pretty sure I can’t go back for a very, very long time. They have been threatening me for several years now. When these guys are together, they are very aggressive, but individually they have told me they understand me,” says Tazo.
For the first several days after his public coming out, Tazo was unable to use public transport. He was afraid of being recognised. But now it’s getting better.
“Some of my acquaintances have told me they have seen a whole different me. They ask if there is anything they can do because they don’t want to raise their children in this kind of environment,” he says.
But it’s not the same for policymakers Tazo says. He says there are very few politicians who can see the severity of the issue and a few who can see it, but just don’t care.
Tazo says he is proud to have given voice to the “invisible people.”
“This is not only my story. This is the voice and pain of thousands of people who fall victim to domestic violence, who are kicked out of their own homes, rejected by their parents, bullied at school, discriminated against at work because of their sexual orientation.”
“There is a point after which you just can’t take it anymore. There will come a time when many people will speak up, just like me, and we will all come together and demand that officials stand where they belong, and do live up to their responsibilities,” says Tazo.
Elvira and Amina are a couple who originally lived in Baku. Their lives have changed a lot since OC Media first spoke with them in September 2017.
The women’s relationship moved fast; they moved in together six months after meeting. Shortly after this, they got married in a European country where same-sex marriage is allowed.
The couple says they felt that they had a truly nuclear family and that friends and relatives perceived them the same way. Elvira and Amina’s parents, albeit reluctantly, soon came around to the idea that they do not have sons-in-law, but daughters-in-law. However, the couple still felt uncomfortable in Azerbaijan and were thinking about emigrating.
The office of Azerbaijani queer rights group Gender and Development (Vafa Zeynalova/OC Media)
“First of all, we were tired of being secretive,” Amina says. “Secondly, the certificate of marriage issued in Europe was not valid at home, and according to the law, we remained strangers to each other. Elvira’s young son lives with us and it’s hard to explain to him that he should not speak openly with other people. What if people, for example in the kindergarten, learned what our family looks like?”
Their son unfortunately became an indirect participant of almost criminal drama, which forced the family to leave Azerbaijan.
“I lost some expensive gold jewellery from my jewellery box. They could only have been stolen by my son’s nanny. No one except her stayed in our apartment alone,” said Elvira.
When it came to the police, the nanny neither recognised nor denied her guilt. Instead, she gave the investigator some compromising evidence on her employers — intimate photos and videos.
“We turned from victims into suspects. In any case, the investigator treated us as if we were suspects,” adds Elvira.
After the police officer received the compromising material, he told Elvira she should drop the charges — and not only because the nanny could publish their personal photos and video online. According to him, during the investigation, police would begin checking the couple’s ‘moral appearance’ (although, according to the law, it has no relevance to a case of theft) and they would interview their parents and colleagues; they could even take custody of their son away from them. The investigator also advised Elvira to look closer at Amina as the possible thief.
“It was disgusting! I realised that this woman had been spying on us. I felt a sense of insecurity, the investigator’s gaze, and after being advised to lay low, we decided to leave this country as soon as possible.”
In mid-March 2018, the family bought a one-way ticket to the US.
(Vafa Zeynalova/OC Media)
Until 2000, same-sex relationships were criminally punishable in Azerbaijan, with sentences of several years in prison. In 2000, same-sex relationships between people over the age of 16 became legal. But the ban and its subsequent repeal concerned only men. There was not a single word about queer women in the law.
Azerbaijan does not prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation. For cases of blackmail, dismissal from work, and other cases of harassment, victims can file only a general complaint, for example, about a human rights violation.
In 2014, the Nefes LGBT Azerbaijan Alliance conducted a survey on attitudes towards queer people. The results showed that 56% of respondents consider queerness to be an innate disease, 60% of them treat queer people badly, and 64% would not want to work with them. Most of the respondents were young men with a higher education.
A number of queer people in Azerbaijan told OC Media that queer men are treated even worse than queer women. Human rights activist Eldar Zeynalov explains that Azerbaijan’s patriarchal society, where society sets high standards for a man’s ‘masculinity’ is primarily responsible for this.
“For a man in a homosexual relationship, it’s as if he “reduces himself to the level of a woman” and humiliates himself, but also encroaches on the tradition and on the foundations of society,” Zeynalov explains.
According to him, there is only one way for Azerbaijani society to accept queer people — money, power, or both.
“Money and power for the majority in Azerbaijan are a stronger argument in favour of masculinity than sexual preferences. A rich and powerful man can be forgiven for much, including sexual relations with someone of the same sex,” Zeynalov added.
Amina and Elvira are now living in the US with their son. They are trying to get settled: looking for a job, settling into a new apartment, and getting used to not being afraid that someone will find out the truth about them.

author: OC Media


text:
Uyghur man bids to save ‘most extraordinary mom in the world’ from Chinese camp · Global Voices
Chris Rickleton

Mirshad Ghalip speaks about his mother's detention in XInjiang China. Screenshot from YouTube video published on March 25, 2019.
Mirshad Ghalip, an Uyghur man born in China has made an impassioned video to save his mother, 58-year-old Zumret Awut, from what he calls a Chinese “concentration camp.”
Ghalip believes that Zumret Awut is one of more than a million prisoners stuck in China's dystopian system of “re-education” in Xinjiang. He admits, however, that he cannot be sure she is still alive.
His mother was interned into the system in 2017, the same year that stringent population controls went into effect across Xinjiang under the leadership of regional communist party boss Chen Quanguo.
China has described Xinjiang's “vocational and education centres” as being voluntarily attended and aimed at combating separatism and religious radicalism.
Mirshad Ghalip's powerful testimony shows that anybody can end up in these centres, even if they had never come under suspicion of the state before.
To be viewed as in need of “re-education”, it is sufficient to have links with foreign countries — both Mirshad Ghalip and his sister study abroad.
As the largest non-Han ethnic group in the region, Uyghurs are believed to make up the majority of residents in China's internment centres.
Until recently, however, many Uyghurs outside China have been reluctant to speak up about the suffering of their relatives in Xinjiang.
Kazakhs — the region's second-largest non-Han Chinese group — have benefited from more vocal and better-organised representation, mostly due to the work of activists in China's Central Asian neighbour Kazakhstan.
The #MetooUyghur campaign did much to change the broad Uyghur silence that Ghalip says “is exactly what the Chinese Communist Party wants.”
But Uyghurs and people of the other majority-Muslim groups hailing from the region continue to express disappointment over weak diplomatic efforts on Xinjiang.
In a move highlighting the extent of China's economic leverage in many parts of the world, the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation — a body consisting of 57 Muslim states — affirmed that it “commends the efforts of the People’s Republic of China in providing care to its Muslim citizens” as part of a resolution adopted during a gathering of foreign ministers this month.
Diplomatic dynamics of this nature leave Mirshad Ghalip and others like him no choice but to speak out louder and campaign harder for the freedom of their loved ones.

author: Chris Rickleton


text:
Russians rejoice as their favorite Ukrainian presidential hopeful, a comedian with no political experience, wins first round · Global Voices
RuNet Echo

Volodymyr Zelensky (fourth from right), the unexpected frontrunner in Ukrainian presidential elections, tours with District 95, a TV comedy troupe he co-founded in 2003. Photo by Vadim Chuprina, CC 4.0
On March 31, Ukrainians voted on the first round on its presidential elections. This is the seventh time the country will choose its president since it gained independence from the Soviet Union in 1991—and the second since the so-called Revolution of Dignity unseated then-president Viktor Yanukovich and elected Petro Poroshenko by a landslide amid a looming war with Russia over the breakaway regions of Eastern Ukraine.
Since then, the popularity of Poroshenko, who is seeking reelection this year, has dropped sharply, but no other candidate has mustered enough support to take his place — except one.
Forty-one-year-old comedian Volodymyr Zelensky, whose main experience in politics consists of playing the lead role in a TV series about a history teacher who accidentally becomes president, won the first round with 30 percent of the total vote and a 13-point lead over runner-up Poroshenko. Such is the disillusionment of Ukrainian voters in conventional candidates — there were 39 in total on the ballot.
Volodymyr Zelensky's rise is a resounding slap in the face to an entire Ukrainian political class https://t.co/sVlPaKyqhy
— The Economist (@TheEconomist) 1 апреля 2019 г.
The elections attracted intense attention from neighboring Russia, with state television channels—usually extremely hostile to post-Maidan Ukraine—attempting to paint a picture of chaos and disarray:
Russian state TV coverage of elections in Ukraine: life there so bad Ukrainians run to work in Poland, where they vote en masse. Look, Russians, what popular uprisings lead to! pic.twitter.com/dXSwlLgeeD
— Ivan Nechepurenko (@INechepurenko) 31 марта 2019 г.
However, both pro-Kremlin channels and opposition-minded Russians have been sympathetic to Zelensky, for different reasons. Many pointed out that the very fact that an outlier like Zelensky can pose a serious threat to establishment politicians is worthy of praise and envy in a country like Russia, where presidential elections don’t give voters much of a choice.
Сам по себе факт, что действующий президент может проиграть выборы, является высокой оценкой состояния демократии в стране, где это происходит. Даже кое-где в Африке этому уже научились, но для нас это всё ещё экзотика.
— Vladimir Varfolomeev (@Varfolomeev) 31 марта 2019 г.
The fact that an incumbent president can lose an election is a testament to a healthy democracy. That sometimes happens even in Africa, but for us it’s still an exotic notion.
Моя тви-лента разделилась: из Украины пишут, что страна сошла с ума, обречена – выбрала комика, актёришку, чью-то марионетку вместо старого опытного, а из России, что на Украине здорово – можно выбрать комика, актёришку или даже чью-то марионетку вместо старого номенклатурщика.
— Михаил Мандражицкий (@Mandrazhitskiy) 1 апреля 2019 г.
My Twitter feed is divided: Ukrainians are saying that the country has gone mad and is doomed for electing a comic, wannabe actor instead of someone older and experienced, while Russians think that it’s great that Ukraine can elect a comic, a wannabe actor or even someone’s puppet instead of an ageing member of bureaucratic elite.
Я не понимаю почему Порошенко и остальные так пренебрежительно относятся к юмористической карьере Зеленского.
У меня много знакомых играли в КВН. Большинство из них – умнейшие люди. Намного умнее российских политиков.https://t.co/Fm31grIU1o
— Maxim Mironov (@mironov_fm) 31 марта 2019 г.
I don’t understand why Poroshenko and others are so dismissive of Zelensky’s career in standup comedy. I have many friends who were on KVN [a Russian humor show dating back to 1961]. Most of them are extremely bright people. Much smarter than most Russian politicians at least.
Others focused on Zelensky’s ethnicity, saying that a Jewish president might be too progressive even for the United States:
Зеленский мне совершенно не близок, но голосование за еврея в постсоветской стране с высоким уровнем антисемитизма — это очень-очень круто само по себе
в Америке не было президента-атеиста даже, например
— Feldman (@EvgenyFeldman) 31 марта 2019 г.
I’m not at all sympathetic towards Zelensky, but electing a Jew in a post-Soviet country with a high level of anti-Semitism is cool as it is
It’s worth noting that even America has never had an atheist president
However, given Ukraine’s tense relations with Russia — after all, the two countries are at war, albeit an undeclared one — it’s inconceivable for a Ukrainian politician who values their office to express any sympathy towards Russia. That fact didn’t escape Zelensky’s Russian fans:
Последний день, когда можно сказать что-то хорошее про Зеленского. Начиная с понедельника ему придётся ссориться с Россией.
Короче, мне нравился этот актёр! И сегодня болею за него, да простит меня мой дорогой и единственный украинский фолловер. Она за Порошенко.
— настоящий Низовцев (@zimbru_khv) 31 марта 2019 г.
Today is the last day when it’s fine to say something nice about Zelensky. Starting from Monday, he’ll have to get tough on Russia. So, I’ve been a huge fan of this actor! And I’ll still be rooting for him today, with apologies to my only Ukrainian follower who will be voting for Poroshenko.
Meanwhile, Russian state TV’s power couple, Olga Skabeyeva and Evgeny Popov, the hosts of popular talk show “60 Minutes”, ran a live-streamed election night marathon, endorsing Zelensky’s candidacy on air and cheering on his lead in the polls.
#Skabeyeva and her husband -flagship pair of #Russian #agitprop – already feel celebratory, write on cups of coffee Зе!, gives preliminary results w/ #tymoshenko not getting into top3, allegedly Boyko getting 3rd #UkraineElections pic.twitter.com/ycb1fMIqbv
— Yevhen Fedchenko (@yevhenfedchenko) 31 марта 2019 г.
That gave Ukrainian observers and candidates, including Zelensky’s competitor in the second round, grounds to think that Zelensky is the preferred candidate for Russia because he’s weak:
Poroshenko is clearly attempting to paint Zelenskiy as Russia's choice.
“Ukrainians put the Russian scenario to bed in the first round; I know they'll do it in the second, too.”#UkraineElections #UkraineElections2019 pic.twitter.com/U4LgPNHHA8
— Nina Jankowicz (@wiczipedia) 1 апреля 2019 г.
Zelensky, however, didn’t mince words when pressed for answers on his Russia policies:
Q: what will you say to Putin when you meet him?
Ze: do we already have a meeting? When I meet him, I’ll say thanks for returning our territories. #ukraineelections #ukraineelection2019 pic.twitter.com/RHu666HHRQ
— Nina Jankowicz (@wiczipedia) 31 марта 2019 г.
However, Zelensky does not actually have many coherent policy proposals beyond that, and now he will be facing off seasoned politician Petro Poroshenko, not a motley crew of filler candidates. It's as of yet unclear who his Russian fans will be rooting for in the second round, scheduled for April 21.


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Hong Kong rallies against amendment allowing extradition of ‘fugitives’ to China · Global Voices
Hong Kong Free Press

Rally against amendment of extradition law. Photo: Holmes Chan/HKFP.
The following post is originally written by Holmes Chan and published on Hong Kong Free Press on 31 March 2019. The edited version is republished on Global Voices under a content partnership agreement.
Thousands of protesters rallied on 31 of March, 2019 against an upcoming amendment to Hong Kong’s extradition laws that allow China to extradite “fugitives” from Hong Kong. Protesters were worried that the law would be abused to extradite political dissidents to mainland China.
Organizers from pro-democracy groups and the Civil Human Rights Front said 12,000 people took part in the march from Southorn Playground in Wanchai to the government’s Admiralty headquarters. Police put the peak figure at 5,200. The demonstration marked one of the biggest demonstrations of 2019.
The protest organizers called on the government to withdraw an upcoming amendment and vowed that they would be further protests next week if the government tries to pass the law by force.
Hong Kong has in the past signed bilateral extradition agreements with specific jurisdictions, but last month, the government proposed a case-by-case system that would allow the city to handle extradition requests from jurisdictions where there were no pre-existing deals – most notably China and Taiwan.
“With extradition to the mainland, Hong Kong becomes a dark prison,” protesters chanted amidst the drizzle. “Stop the evil law.”
Lawmaker Claudia Mo, who convenes the pro-democracy camp, said that the amendment would have dire implications for not just Hong Kong residents, but also foreign nationals who work and travel in the city.
Protesters were worried that extradition agreement once passed would be abused to arrest political dissidents in Hong Kong. Photo: Tom Grundy/HKFP.
Don’t think that this is a minor law amendment… it is going to affect everyone. It will cast a dragnet over all of Hong Kong.
Bookseller Lam Wing-kee, who was allegedly kidnapped when he was detained by mainland authorities in 2015, stood at the forefront of Sunday’s rally.
Lam was the founder of Causeway Bay Books, which specialised in political gossip titles banned in the mainland. He went missing from Shenzhen in October 2015, only to re-emerge on a Chinese television channel months later “confessing” to the crime of running a business – alongside four other missing booksellers – which “illegally” sent books to the mainland. Lam addressed the protesters,
“ used to think I would stay in Hong Kong for another eight or 10 years, but now I know I can’t. If this amendment passes, it’s not just me who has to get away. I think a lot of people [in Hong Kong] have no idea it will affect them too.
Lam had previously told local media that Sunday’s march would be the final time he took to the streets, as he would leave before the amendment becomes law.
Secretary for Security John Lee claimed thay there were human rights safeguards in place so that no one will be extradited due to political crimes.
Last week, Lee announced a partial concession in the amendment by excluding nine types of commercial crimes, amid pressure from the business community. The bill will be sent to the Legislative Council on Wednesday April 2, with the government expecting it to pass before July.
Mo said that the pro-democracy camp was considering calling on the public to surround the legislature in protest.
Jimmy Sham, convenor of the Civil Human Rights Front, said that the amendment was worse than the controversial Article 23 of the Basic Law – which states that Hong Kong must enact national security legislation.
Article 23 at least requires the law to be passed in Hong Kong, and people will face trial and be sentenced here. But under the [extradition law] it only takes the chief executive’s signature for a person to be extradited to the mainland, or even North Korea. Removing the commercial crimes was just a move to put the business sector on the spot.
The march saw many high-profile figures from the pro-democracy camp, including Cardinal Joseph Zen, barristers Martin Lee and Margaret Ng, as well as Apple Daily owner Jimmy Lai.
Younger protesters included the political group Demosisto, as well as representatives from the student unions of four local universities. A small group of people also held pro-independence flags.
Mr. Cheung, a 40-year-old parent who brought along his daughter, told HKFP that he had a strong distrust for the mainland’s judicial system.
There is no reason to trust that they will give us a fair trial,” he said. “Why are we lowering our standards so easily?
Another protester, who declined to be named, told HKFP that she felt the government was unfairly biased towards the business community.
Why does the government only react when [businesses] are scared? It is not right for them to have the power to demand specific crimes to be excluded.
Last month, Chief Executive Carrie Lam said that the new extradition proposal was intended to plug a loophole in existing law, and the public should not be too concerned.

author: Hong Kong Free Press


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Government official says the ban on messaging apps is slowing flood relief in Iran · Global Voices
Center for Human Rights in Iran

Social media blocks prove detrimental to flood relief. Graphic by the Center for Human Rights in Iran.
State censorship of social media apps has reduced the efficiency of relief operations in regions of Iran hit with heavy flooding, according to an official at a state agency that promotes public service information.
“If filtering was not an obstacle, the rescue operations would have been more effective,” tweeted Alireza Moezi, the secretary of the government’s Information Council, on March 24. “Let’s learn from experiences.”
Moezi also stated that some people have been using the apps over virtual private networks (VPNs), and that these connections have helped to expedite relief efforts. VPNs allow users to bypass censorship infrastructure.
“Conventional media have fallen behind because they are not able to share information easier and quicker than social media,” he said.
“Messaging apps and social media have played an outstanding role as rescue information carriers, especially Telegram and Twitter,” he added. Both Twitter and Telegram are blocked in Iran.
On April 2, Morteza Khaledi, the spokesman for Iran’s Emergency Medical Services Organization, reported that 57 people had died as a result of flash flooding which began on March 19 and had affected 23 of the country’s 31 provinces. The actual number of casualties could be much higher.
The hardest-hit areas have been in southern and central Iran, including Fars, Isfahan and Yazd provinces. The governor-general of Khuzestan Province declared a state of emergency after flooding swallowed buildings and bridges in his region on March 31.
Popular social media networks like Facebook and Twitter offer free, built-in tools that allow users to inform the public about natural disasters, request help, or mark themselves as “safe.” But both are blocked in Iran.
Unable to effectively censor specific posts or accounts on the apps, the Iranian government has blocked access to many social media services in the country. The widely used Telegram messaging app was the last to be censored. According to the company, it had 40 million monthly users in Iran before it was filtered in May 2018.
As news and images of the flooding began making waves on these social media apps, which are filtered in Iran, some people in Iran began asking why they are still not allowed to access them.
Iranian user Nazanin Matinnia tweeted at the Minister of Information and Communications Technology on April 1:
چرا الان که می‌دونین مردم به اطلاع‌رسانی احتیاج دارن، اکثرا از تلگرام استفاده می‌کنن و رسانه ملی هم هیچوقت تو کمک با شما همراه نبوده و کاری از دستش برنمیاد، فیلتر تلگرام رو برنمی‌دارین؟! یعنی الان و تو این شرایط هم مردم باید هزینه اضافه بدن؟! #سیل @azarijahromi
— nazaninmatinnia (@nazaninmatinnia) April 1, 2019
You know people need to share information so why aren’t you lifting the filter on Telegram?! You know most people use Telegram and the national media organization Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting has never been cooperative when you needed help and it’s incapable of doing anything. Are you saying that the people should suffer even under these circumstances? #floods @azarijahromi
Some officials meanwhile called for the bans to be lifted. Member of Parliament Mahmoud Sadeghi tweeted:
خدا قوت!
کاش دادستانی محترم نیز فعلا ولو موقت فیلتر تلگرام را بردارند تا مردم بتوانند از این امکان برای برقراری ارتباط استفاده کنند. https://t.co/hi4vK31wCf
— محمود صادقی (@mah_sadeghi) April 1, 2019
I wish that the honorable Prosecutor [General Mohammad Jafar Montazeri] would at least temporarily lift the filter on Telegram so that the people could use it as a means of communication
Journalists also struggled to get information to the public, in some cases asking colleagues to post information for them because various VPN tools, which are used to bypass state filters, had suddenly become unusable during the flooding.
On Twitter, one user said they had been sent photos by a reporter in one of the affected areas:
وحید باسره (@vahidbasereh) از روزنامه‌نگاران محلی #ایلام این تصاویر رو برام واتساپ کرده و نوشته «فیلترشکنم کار نمی‌کنه، لطفا اطلاع بدید: رانش زمین و ریزش کوه در بخشی از ورودی شهر به علت بارش‌های بی وقفه».
پ.ن: ایلام علاوه بر #سیل و بارندگی، امروز یه #زلزله نسبتا شدید هم داشته pic.twitter.com/2yAJSMILKg
— آرمین سلیمانی/ (@ArminSoleimany) April 1, 2019
Vahid Basereh, one of the local reporters in [the city of] Ilam, sent me these photos via WhatsApp and wrote: ‘My VPN does not work. Please share this information: Because of relentless rains there are landslides and falling rocks from the mountains at the entrance to the city.
Commenting on that tweet, BBC Persian reporter Kayvan Hossein wrote:
توییتی با دو بخش مهم که هر دو دلهره‌آورند:
یکی اینکه رانش زمین و ریزش کوه وضعیتی خطرناک درست کرده.
و دیگر اینکه «فیلترشکنم کار نمی‌کنه». سانسور در چنین مواقعی که اطلاع‌رسانی حیاتی است، به راحتی می‌تواند به یک پدیده مرگبار تبدیل شود. https://t.co/QKcSCmYqRt
— Kayvan Hosseini (@Kayvan_Hosseini) April 1, 2019
This tweet has two important aspects both of which are terrifying: One about the dangerous situation caused by landslides and falling mountain rocks and the other about his VPN not working. In situations where sharing information is vital, censorship can turn into a deadly phenomenon.
As Iranians struggled to access information about the floods, Iranian officials including Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and President Hassan Rouhani posted freely on Twitter and Telegram, which are blocked off to the Iranian public.
Many Iranian users directed their tweets at Minister of Information and Communications Technology Mohammad Javad Azari Jahromi.
Parvin Mohammadi, who describes herself as a child psychologist, tweeted:
روستاهای #لرستان با سیل دست و پنجه نرم می کنند. ان وقت تنها راه کمک خواهی انها از بین رفته. هیچ خبری از روستاها نیست. آنتن دهی قطع شده. پیام رسان ها با فیلتر کار میکنن که با این وضع آنتن دهی رسما خبردهی رو غیر ممکن کرده.
وزیر جوان دقیقا وسط سیل داری چه کار میکنی؟@azarijahromi
— پروین محمدی (@Parvinmhdi) April 1, 2019
The villages in Lorestan Province are grappling with floods and yet they have lost the only means they have to seek help. There’s no news from these villages. There’s no internet connection. Messaging apps work with VPNs but the connections are so weak that it’s almost impossible to share information. In the midst of this flood, what are you doing young minister@azarijahromi?
Jalal Rouhani, who identifies herself as an information technology expert, tweeted:
سازمان #نقشه برداری کشور #سیل_لرستان #سیل_خوزستان رو در قالب نقشه‌های با دقت بالا منتشر کرده. شاید برای دفعات بعدی این خروجی‌ها رو تو #بلد و @NeshanMaps و #KML بشه منتشر کنند برای بهره‌برداری بهتر.
و ایکاش #توییتر هم فیلتر نبود.
خاک تو سر سه کَس. فیلترچی و تحریم‌چی و تندروچی. pic.twitter.com/37S4hF97QJ
— Jalal Rohani (@jranil) April 1, 2019
I wish Twitter was not filtered. Damn all three of them: those who imposed the filters, those who imposed the sanctions and extremists.
Journalist Parastoo Beiranvand tweeted:
در شرایط بحرانی سیل که ارتباط جاده ای قطع میشود و نمیتوان خبری از مردم گرفت نیاز به ارتباط مخابراتی و نبود فیلتر برای اعلام گزارش ضروریه.
وزیر جوان @azarijahromi آیا نباید به این قضیه فکر کرد و حداقل به صورت موقت فیلترینگ را برداشت؟
— Parastoo Beiranvand (@Parastooo_B) April 1, 2019
In the current crisis conditions, when roads are being cut off and we can’t get information from the people, it’s necessary to allow communications without filters. Shouldn’t you think about this young minister @azarijahromi and at least temporarily remove the filters?
Entrepreneur Jalal Ofteadeh tweeted:
کاش حداقل #توییتر و #تلگرام رو برای اطلاع‌رسانی بحران باز می‌کردن بعد از اینکه آب‌ها از آسیاب افتاد دوباره محبت می‌کردن فیلتر کنند.
البته شاید از نظرشون هر نوع اطلاع‌رسانی خوب نیست :) #سیل
— Javad Oftadeh (@javadOftadeh) March 26, 2019
I wish at least they would open access to Twitter and Telegram to be able to share information about the crisis and when the water recedes they can filter it again. Of course, maybe they think sharing information is not good under any circumstances.
Reporter Hossein Dehbashi tweeted:
اکانت رهبری درتوئیتر به ریاست ستادکل نیروهای مسلح و اکانت رئیس ق.ق درتوئیتر به ریاست سازمان بازرسی کل کشور برای پیگیری سیل گلستان دستورات عاجل و قاطع می‌دهند. درحالیکه توئیتر فیلتر است و بی‌فیلترشکن دور از دسترس. خب! امثال این موارد را بعدها و برای تاریخ به سختی می‌شود توضیح داد!
— حسین دهباشى ?? (@majazestan) March 23, 2019
The Twitter accounts belonging to the supreme leader, the head of the General Staff of the Armed Forces, the judiciary chief and the head of the National Auditing Organization are issuing urgent and decisive orders concerning the handling of floods in Golestan Province. This is at a time when Twitter is filtered and you cannot access it without a VPN. This will be hard to explain for history's sake.
Activist Sina Qelich wrote:
ستاد مدیریت بحران می‌تواند درخواست کند که در این شرایط #تلگرام رفع فیلتر شود.
کانال اصلی اطلاع‌رسانی همین تلگرام فیلترشده است.
روا نیست که مردم برای نجات جانشان با سد فیلتر مواجه شوند.#سيل
— سینا قلیچ (@SinaQelich) March 26, 2019
Under these circumstances, the Crisis Management Organization can make a request to lift the filter on Telegram. Despite the filter, Telegram has been the main source of information. It’s not right to block people who are trying to save their lives.
Last week, Iranian authorities warned citizens that they could be prosecuted for posting images or videos online about the flooding under the charge of “disturbing public opinion.”

author: Center for Human Rights in Iran


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Hashtag battle in India as candidates go head to head in 2019 summer elections · Global Voices
Devika Sakhadeo

Screenshot of the Nation With NaMo website, which claims to be India’s biggest community of volunteers who have come together to support PM Narendra Modi.
With India's much awaited 2019 Lok Sabha general election just around the corner, political parties are gearing up their slogans in order to sway the people ahead of April 11-19 May voting dates. This year, the campaign ads have leaned hard on social media, leading to a battle of the hashtags between the incumbent prime minister and those that want to unseat him.
In 2014, Narendra Modi, the face of Bharatiya Janata Party pushed the slogan “Abki Baar Modi Sarkaar” (This time it will be Modi government). During the last election cycle, Rahul Gandhi, the current president of opposition party Indian National Congress, called Narendra Modi a ‘chowkidaar’ which means watchman or guard in Hindi. He then went on to call him “Chowkidaar chor hain” which means that the guard is, in fact, the thief. Putting a spin on this reference, the Bharatiya Janata Party came up with their 2019 campaign slogan — “Main Bhi Chowkidaar” (Even I am a guard).
This slogan has created a wave of response across Twitter and discussion forums. Staunch supporters of BJP, also known as Bhakts, have given the hashtag their full support — even going so far as producing a line of merchandise.
Phir Ek Baar, NaMo Chowkidar!
India is showing its support for NaMo Again with Main Bhi Chowkidar T-shirts!
Get your own at https://t.co/6Czw3BXYBr or on the NaMo App at https://t.co/TQbP2KsOFF pic.twitter.com/ZKbfIFIehV
— NaMo Merchandise (@namomerchandise) March 23, 2019
Once again, Narendra Modi (NaMo) as the guard
Screenshot of the Twitter Home Page of the Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
BJP politicians, both politicians working in public office and non-elected officials, have changed their Twitter handles and added the title of “Chowkidaar”  before their names. Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s personal Twitter account handle has also been changed to Chowkidaar Narendra Modi. A video of the campaign showing a mix of people with “Main Bhi Chowkidaar Hun”  (I too am a guard) playing in the background has been released by the BJP. The video has also attracted a lot of attention and criticism.
The Prime Minister shared the link of sale outlets for the merchandise of this particular campaign. Interestingly, the merchandise sticks to the saffron color and the slogan printed on it, adding to their image as the Saffron Party.
Narendra Modi’s 2019 campaigns and rallies have been flooded by his Bhakts (supporters). A rally, which looked like the sort of presidential campaign you could find in the USA (with big screens, banners of slogans, audience sporting merchandise) seemed to be the highlight of Modi’s campaign.
India came together and said in one voice- #MainBhiChowkidar.
A big thank you to all those who took part in the programmes across India!
Your blessings and affection are a source of immense strength. pic.twitter.com/Z2qcB5MbRr
— Chowkidar Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) March 31, 2019
In Mumbai, a car rally was also organized as part of the political campaign by BJP. The rally participants were seen donning saffron-coloured T-shirts with the slogan printed on it. PM Narendra Modi organised video conferences for the programs of his speeches.
There are lakhs of Chowkidars in every part of India.
Here is where you can join a #MainBhiChowkidar programme nearest to your place of stay.
See you this evening! https://t.co/87zAQ9eJN9
— Chowkidar Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) March 31, 2019
Criticism of the BJP hashtag campaign has also been strong and the Indian National Congress Party has kickstarted with their campaign slogan –“Main Bhi Berozgar” (I too am jobless) as a mockery to the slogan of the BJP. In support, the Youth Wing of the Congress introduced the hashtag of “#MainBhiBerozgar”. Some of the INC party officials followed suit and changed their Twitter handles.
As a spin on the entire BJP campaign, the INC Party has changed the slogans but maintained one– “Chowkidar Chor Hain” (the guard is the thief). At a recent Indian Premier League match (Cricket) in Rajasthan, a part of the crowd started chanting this slogan as per a video that went viral. During the match between Rajasthan and Punjab states, spectators were heard belting out “Chowkidaar Chor Hain”. This might not come as a surprise for many, as the current Chief Minister of the Rajasthan state is of the Congress Party.
चौक़ीदार की खुल गई पोल,
बीच मैच, मच गया शोर….
“चौक़ीदार चोर है…!” pic.twitter.com/7zehsrIZGY
— Amarinder Singh Raja (@RajaBrar_INC) March 26, 2019
The cat's out of the bag.
Noise in middle of a match
…
…
The guard is the thief…!
On April Fool's Day, INC came up with two new hashtags- #MadiMatBanao and #ModiDiwas- translating to ‘Don't make us Modi’ and ‘Modi Day’.
देखिये कैसे आपके चौकीदार,
ले कर आये जुमलों का भंडार।
कहा गई 2 करोड़ नोकरियाँ?
दुगनी आय? हर खाते में 15 लाख?
बस बता रहे है – क्या बोलो, क्या खाओ
हम तो कहते अब बस #ModiMatBanao
— #MainBhiBerozgar (@shyammaliINC) April 1, 2019
Take a good at look at your guards
The ones who come to their own collection of oppression
Where are the 20 million jobs?
Double income? And where are the 1.5 million (Indian Rupees) in every account?
They simply tell – what to say, what to eat
We say that's enough #Dontmake (us) Modi
It's a take on making one a fool
Another strategy utilized by both the parties is of giving candidature to celebrities from the film and television industry. This is one of the oldest strategies in Indian politics and this time too — they have banked on it.
Political parties candidates have started to fill nominations across the country from the respective Lok Sabha constituencies.
Meanwhile, others have been critical about this tactic with comedians directly dissecting the BJP slogan and articles asking whether the entire political party is worthy enough to be called as the guards of the country. Comedians have been blatant critical of the current governing party, and have continued with the same enthusiasm since the campaigns of 2019 have gotten into full swing.
Hasan wanted to take a moment to respond to questions about whether or not Patriot Act uses a laugh track. https://t.co/rQmxwkIj7l pic.twitter.com/acsKhVLohU
— Patriot Act with Hasan Minhaj (@patriotact) March 31, 2019
Only a matter time of time Modiji starts selling tickets for his election rally on bookmyshow… https://t.co/a1w5xWuQ8K
— Kunal Kamra (@kunalkamra88) March 24, 2019
All of this drama would be put to test as the world's largest democracy goes into election from the 11th April to 19th April 2019.

author: Devika Sakhadeo


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Animated film explains how Myanmar’s Telecommunications Law undermines free speech · Global Voices
Mong Palatino

Film screening at the Myanmar Digital Rights Forum. Photo from EngageMedia.
A short animated film is helping to educate the public about Myanmar’s Telecommunications Law and the ways that it can suppress free speech.
Are You Ready is a collaboration between EngageMedia and several digital rights activists in Myanmar. It was first screened in December 2018 in Yangon at the Myanmar Digital Rights Forum. Myanmar ICT for Development Organization and Phandeeyar Innovation Lab were among those who helped organize the film screening.
EngageMedia said the film “describes the impact on freedom of expression in Myanmar, and how people's digital rights are being violated.” It added:
The film showcases how authorities abuse the law to avoid and repress dissent.
The law is frequently used by the powerful to silence dissent, and with more than 100 cases filed, its chilling effect on free expression is widespread.
The film focuses on Article 66(d) of the law, which criminalizes everything from “extorting” to “disturbing” to “causing undue influence” toward another person. It has been controversial since 2013 because it has mainly been used by authorities to intimidate critics and journalists. Its vague wording and harsh penalties have been abused to silence ordinary citizens. Here’s the exact text of Article 66(d):
66. Whoever commits any of the following acts shall, on conviction, be liable to imprisonment for a term not exceeding three years or to a fine or to both. (d) Extorting, coercing, restraining wrongfully, defaming, disturbing, causing undue influence or threatening to any person by using any Telecommunications Network.
It was slightly amended in 2017, but human rights groups say it failed to address many concerns about the draconian features of the law. Maung Saung Kha, from youth group Athan, acknowledged the value of the animated film in their campaign to abolish Article 66(d):
There have been no effective changes even though Telecommunications Law was amended in 2017. But there were more than 70 cases under the law. Are You Ready reflects the impact of Article 66(d) and it is very helpful to the Telecommunications Law amendment campaigns.
Watch the animated film:

author: Mong Palatino