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Thailand: Red Shirt dog · Global Voices
Mong Palatino

Red Shirt anti-government protesters in Thailand also brought along a red shirt dog to the rally site last weekend.


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Trinidad & Tobago: Anti-Everything  · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

KnowTnT.com‘s Edmund Gall asks himself, “Are we Trinis more likely to be *against* something than *for* the opposite?”

source: news-globalvoices

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

author: Janine Mendes-Franco


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Trinidad & Tobago, Barbados: The Order of Things  · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

Barbados-based B.C. Pires posts some observations about the Trinidad and Tobago Prime Minister's statements “that a war is on between the PNM government and some elements of the construction sector”: “No matter which way you look at it, everyone in these small islands is firetrucked.”


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Trinidad & Tobago: Untouchable?  · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

Trinidadian bloggers discuss the Prime Minister's behaviour during a recent “walkabout”.


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Uganda: Students riot, Kampala burns · Global Voices
Rebekah Heacock

Two separate tragedies struck Kampala, the capital of Uganda, on Tuesday: students at Makerere University rioted after the shooting death of two of their peers. And the Kasubi Tombs, a UNESCO World Heritage Site and the burial location of the king of one of Uganda's largest ethnic groups, burned to the ground.
Riots at Makerere University
According to Ugandan newspapers, the riots at Makerere University, Uganda's largest university, began after two students were shot dead and another critically injured by a security guard Monday night during a meeting about the current Student Guild elections.  The Daily Monitor reports two versions of the events:
Police say many students had gathered at the Hostel for the final leg of the Guild election campaigns when the watchman, suspecting one of the students could have intended to damage a vehicle in the parking lot, opened fire.
Earlier reports suggested supporters of Simon Kamau, one of the contestants in the guild presidential race, clashed with those of NRM's John Taylor, prompting the shooting of the Kenyan students.
The New Vision suggests the shootings were a result of a disagreement between one candidate and the supporter of another:
As the group prepared to leave, they were confronted in the compound by Nyongesa, who is believed to belong to the camp of John Kamau, one of the two Kenyans in the guild race.
He reportedly tried to hit [candidate John] Teira with a bench when the group rejected his calls to leave the hostel.
A brief commotion ensued, which, according to eyewitnesses, compelled the guard to fire the bullet that hit the three students.
Students responded on Tuesday by marching through Makerere University grounds, carrying signs and a coffin to protest the killings.  Both newspapers report that the protests turned violent and that police used tear gas to disperse the crowds.
Ole Tangen Jr, a journalist living in Kampala, was one of the first to blog about the Makerere riots.  He wondered why more students weren't using social media networks to spread the news:
Last night two Makerere students were shot by an armed security guard leading to widespread riots near the university today.
However no one thought to utilize Twitter to get the story out. Searches for #Makerere all day on Twitter Search resulted in nothing more than news reports. How is it that students — particularly politically-active students — are not making use of the social media tools available to them. Is it ignorance of Twitter? Is it the high cost of an internet connection? What has led to this?
A Twitter search for “makerere” largely supported his claim, with most tweets consisting of links to newspaper articles.  Still, some Twitter users in Kampala were able to add some context:
@arthurnakkaka (18 hours ago): Gunshots being fired. Or its tear gas? #Makerere
@arthurnakkaka (18 hours ago): Students screaming and running. Situation getting bad #Makerere
@aspindler2 (18 hours ago): Demonstrations at Makerere Univ. Kampala uganda after shooting of 2 stdnts last night by security guard. Police firing teargas disperse crwd
@mirembe_maria (14 hours ago): The makerere University Strike has left two dead and one in critical condition, what is the way forward for the Government about all this??
Kasubi Tombs Burn
On Tuesday night, in an apparently unrelated incident, the Kasubi Tombs, the burial site of the kings of Uganda's Baganda ethnic group, burned to the ground.  The current king of the Baganda people has been in the news recently for his clashes with Ugandan president Yoweri Museveni.  In September 2009, the tension between the two led to deadly riots in Kampala, and citizens fear that the fire could lead to future unrest.
Ugandan blogger 27th Comrade writes:
Usually it is arson when a place like that burns down. They are made of grass thatch, the tombs, so the fire will be absolutely devastating.
Already, some f***wits around me are saying “Government!” I'd be more-likely to say “Opposition!” But I guess it is more-likely some staffer who was careless with fire. Let us wait for news.
Blogger and journalist Rosebell writes:
This relationship between President Museveni’s government and Buganda Kingdom is far from rosy and this  has already given fertile ground for many to think there was some foulplay. Many people seem to expect riots to breakout at dawn. We only hope there will be a thorough investigation  into the burning of the tombs and that no people will lose their lives and property. This is crucial time for Buganda leadership too. The Kasubi tombs are equally a heritage for the country so i hope both sides deal with this issue with maximum restraint.
Ugandans on Twitter are equally worried:
@daphnzempire (6 hours ago): kasubi tombs is on fire..oh my God where are we headed
@Kakazi (6 hours ago): Kasubi tombs burnt down about 2hours ago.. I honestly pray it wasn't arson!! A great loss to our heritage..:-(
@mugumya (6 hours ago): I fear there might be some kind of disturbance 2moro after Kasubi tombs are gutted in Kampala
Lauren, an American who formerly lived in Kampala, remembers taking friends to visit the tombs:
The Kasubi Tombs are more than important cultural and historic structures to me.  When we lived in Uganda, they were my neighbors.  Our apartment was at the bottom of  Kasubi Hill, and we passed the Tombs every day to and from downtown Kampala.  We took numerous visitors to see the tombs to learn more about the Buganda tribe, its history and culture.  I always loved passing the guards of the Tombs; dressed in the traditional saffron-colored robe and leaning against the big tree out front, they waited patiently to greet the next set of visitors.
The Kasubi Tombs in October 2008.  Photo courtesy of Lauren.

author: Rebekah Heacock


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Ukraine: Book-Burning and Book-Recycling Rallies · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

Steve Bandera of Kyiv Scoop writes about a book-burning rally in Crimea – and a book-recycling rally in Lviv. The latter was in protest to the appointment of Ukraine's new minister of education and science, and LEvko of Foreign Notes has more on it.

author: Veronica Khokhlova


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Bangladesh: Climate Change  · Global Voices
Rezwan

Anirvan Chatterjee  at Year Of No Flying lists six things you need to know about Bangladesh regarding climate change.

author: Rezwan


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Bangladesh: The China Card · Global Voices
Rezwan

J Rahman at Mukti shares his cautious optimism about Bangladesh Prime Minister's ongoing China trip.


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Barbados, Trinidad & Tobago: The Law is an Ass  · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

From Barbados, B.C. Pires comments on the political goings-on in Trinidad and Tobago, saying, “There is only a small difference between prosecution and persecution.”


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Bermuda: Lack of Confidence  · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

“I don’t think anyone has any real confidence that Government will act to restrain its spending, or plan to work down the debt without strangling the community with taxes”: Bermuda's budget debate has eroded Vexed Bermoothes‘ confidence.


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Bloggers’ opinions about technology and football · Global Voices
Richard Wanjohi

Despite the dramatic advances in technology, The International Football Association Board (FIFA) has rejected the introduction of goal-line technology during World Cup 2010 in South Africa.
What has been the reaction from sports bloggers?
WorldCupBlog argues that errors in football, which can be prevented by technology, do cost clubs a lot of money:
European Football has grown into a 12bn Euro business, so these errors aren’t just about football narratives and mythology, but about costing clubs millions of Euros.
Another blogger believes that technology can make football “really fair”:
Why is it fine to contest decisions with technological aid in other sports while football/soccer referee decisions are only based on the limited capabilities of man? Sure we want to keep enjoying the game as it is but let’s make it really fair for both teams that enter the field for 90+ minutes. What do you say Irish fans? Do you have anything in particular to say to FIFA?
FIFA World Cup South Africa captures the anxieties over the FIFA decision:
If we start with goal-line technology then any part of the game and pitch will be a potential space where you could put in place technology to see if the ball was in or out, whether it was a penalty and then you end up with video replays. The door is closed

author: Richard Wanjohi


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Blogging about the Caribbean’s Repeating Islands · Global Voices
Nicholas Laughlin

Lisa Paravisini-Gebert
Ivette Romero-Cesareo
In his already classic 1992 book The Repeating Island, the Cuban writer Antonio Benítez-Rojo set out to chart the cultural and historical complexities of the Caribbean. He argued that within the Caribbean’s “sociocultural fluidity” and “ethnological and linguistic clamour” “one can sense the features of an island that ‘repeats’ itself, unfolding and bifurcating until it reaches all the seas and lands of the earth.”
When the literary scholars Lisa Paravisini-Gebert and Ivette Romero-Cesareo decided, in early 2009, to start a new blog covering Caribbean literature, arts, and culture, they were inspired not only by the title of Benítez-Rojo’s book, but also by his sense of the Caribbean as an expansive and expanding cultural and mental space not limited by geography. Repeating Islands, launched in March 2009, quickly attracted an audience of Caribbeanist scholars, writers, and artists, and ordinary readers across the Caribbean and further afield.
Posting several links each day (with occasional commentary), and covering everything from new books and exhibitions to political intrigues and environmental concerns, Repeating Islands is an essential resource for keeping up with cultural developments in the Caribbean and its wide international diaspora. Thanks to the backgrounds, research interests, and multilingual fluency of its authors, the blog transcends the linguistic barriers that can make it difficult to engage with the whole region.
Romero-Cesareo was born in Manhattan and raised in Puerto Rico, and “has always considered herself to be an islander.” She is professor of Spanish and Director of Latin American Studies at Marist College. Paravisini-Gebert was born and grew up in Puerto Rico, and is now the Randolph Distinguished Professor in the Hispanic Studies department at Vassar College. The two scholars have collaborated in the past, co-editing two books on Caribbean literary and cultural studies.
Around the time of the blog’s first anniversary, I interviewed them via email, asking them about their motivations for starting Repeating Islands, how the blog intersects with their research interests, and future plans.
•••
Nicholas Laughlin: First things first: what promoted you to launch Repeating Islands early last year? Were you inspired by specific existing blogs, or some turn of events?
Ivette Romero-Cesareo: The mastermind and engine behind Repeating Islands was Lisa, who has had significant experience with blogs from the research standpoint (angle). She had researched and lectured extensively on blogs and their place in the academic sphere. I was unnecessarily suspicious and doubtful about blogs because, for the most part, I saw them as too narrowly focused on individual concerns and, apart from the Huffington Posts of the world, considered them a space for (sometimes) egocentric expression.
When Lisa proposed that we co-blog on Caribbean arts, literature, and cultural manifestations of various types, I very subtly and eloquently answered, “A blog?! Eeeeeww! Bluuugh!” I was walking home and she had called me on my cell phone; literally, two minutes later, I snapped out of my “Bah, humbug” mood, called her up, and said, “I’ve got a name for the blog!” But, alas, it was not Repeating Islands.
Lisa Paravisini-Gebert: I was working on a paper called “Blogueros: The Puerto Rican Nation in Cyberspace”, thinking about how blogs can construct communities of readers around shared interests and concerns, when I thought of the possibility of a blog for our community of people interested in pan-Caribbean literature, culture, and the arts. Ivette’s response when I proposed it was hilarious — she seemed horror-stricken, so I suggested she think about it. She called back right away. The inspiration was not so much other blogs — although I am an inveterate reader of blogs — but the absence of a blog that addressed our own specific interests and needs. I was thinking of a blog that someone could read every day like the morning paper and feel sort of up-to-date with what was happening culturally across the region.
NL: Where does the blog fit into your respective research and teaching careers? Do you have the sense that your students and colleagues are regular readers?
IRC: We began posting news in March 2009. I was working as a visiting professor at Vassar College and I jokingly said to one of my classes that I was bleary-eyed because I was up for many hours working on the new blog, which has become an obsession of sorts. I immediately noticed that students were very curious and interested in the blog, especially students who love literature and have a curiosity about global cultures. I dare say that, while some of my colleagues were enthusiastic, I was amazed at how resistant to the new blog other scholars were; perhaps they shared my initial distrust of blogs.
However, I was pleasantly surprised to see that we immediately began receiving high praise and enthusiastic feedback from top scholars and writers; people whose work I have always admired and respected had become regular readers. This praise was the best form of encouragement.
As for my research and teaching, I can wholeheartedly say that Repeating Islands has been energising in every way. I am a slow writer and a “meandering” researcher, easily getting distracted by tangential information. For one, with the blog, I can use my skills in detouring; in this case, those detours have been fruitful because I run across much more information than I set out to find. On the other hand, the blog ensures that I do some type of writing every day; it has also forced me to develop a faster and more efficient writing style. Of course, my perception of “speed” and “efficiency” is very different from my co-blogger’s view.
What I enjoy most about blogging for Repeating Islands is that now I am much more informed about the wider Caribbean. Since Lisa and I are both comparative Caribbeanists, this is a very organic to what we research and teach.
LPG: The blog responds to my academic interests and concerns — but also to a preoccupation about how these concerns connect with politics and ideology across the region. Ironically, this is not a “personal” blog — insofar as we are not emphasising our feelings or offering a lot of personal commentary — but it could not be more “personal” in the sense of how our choices about what to include reflect our specific interests and preoccupations. Who we are shapes the blog — from my own environmental concerns and obsession with Haiti to Ivette’s focus on new artists and the condition of women across the region.
One of the things that surprised me about the blog, however, is how little one can control who our readers are. I had an implied reader in mind — people interested in keeping abreast of what was happening in pan-Caribbean culture — and that ideal reader remains our target audience. It is surprising, however, that our “regulars” — those people who go directly to our home page — are only about ten per cent of our daily readers. The rest of our readers (a whopping ninety per cent) come to the blog through searches that bring them to new and old posts. Every post out there (and by now we have posted more than three thousand items) can potentially pull in readers at any time. It is wonderfully out of our control. Many of those readers remain with us, becoming part of the group of “home-page regulars” for whom we post daily.
NL: Repeating Islands has become a sort of clearing-house for news about Caribbean literature, art, music, culture generally, the environment — I personally hear about many events through your blog that I might not otherwise come across. How do you manage to keep up, and keep informed? How much time does it take you every day to keep the blog going?
IRC: In order to really keep up with as many events as possible and maintain the blog with enough variety, I need to work about four hours a day, something that is very difficult to do in view of our full-time teaching and other academic responsibilities, as well as our personal research and writing. At times, we choose to research information for the blog that is also related to our academic projects, but that is not always possible.
LPG: I have been fortunate to have a research assistant provided by my institution (Vassar College) to help with the research for the blog. She sends me a list of possible items for the blog every evening, with the links to stories. I choose among them for the daily posts and spend some time searching for appropriate images, which is, I confess, one of my favourite things about the blog. I tend to take less pains about the writing than Ivette does, so on most days I spend about an hour updating the blog posts. I think we balance each other out well in terms of our approach to the blog.
NL: Have you considered doing a version of the blog in, say, Spanish, since you both have roots in the Hispanophone Caribbean?
IRC: It would be great to do that if we had more time. However, I believe that our skills are best utilised in making available in English the wealth of information in French and Spanish that does not always get to circulate widely unless it is translated. In my observations, scholars in the Francophone and Hispanophone Caribbean are often bilingual or trilingual for various reasons. Perhaps because of an absence of need or a linguistic imperialism of sorts, this is not always the case with English-speaking scholars.
I have been at many conferences in Spanish, French, or Portuguese-speaking countries and have always heard English-speaking participants grumble when discussions take place in languages other than English. This has always surprised me. I have never observed the contrary; when Spanish, French, or Portuguese-speaking scholars attend conferences in Anglophone countries, they expect to listen to discussions in English. I can read Papiamento, and Lisa has a strong working knowledge of Creole, so we are able to bring a richer array of posts to our readers. The blogging process has also convinced me that I need to learn Dutch, and I am looking into taking an intensive course; this way, I can truly say that I am contributing to the blog from a pan-Caribbean perspective.
LPG: I agree with Ivette, in that I think that we can best serve our target audience in English, which has become a bit of a lingua franca throughout the Caribbean. And, to tell you the truth, I don’t know where we would ever find the time. The blog — or more to the point, our loyalty to the readers who come to the blog every day — imposes a daily obligation (for example, we have never missed a day of fresh posts in over a year now), but it is at times a hard commitment to maintain. It would be very difficult to add to those efforts another venture in Spanish.
NL: Most of your posts are based around a link to a specific article or event. Do you think in the future the blog could evolve into offering more commentary or personal reflections as well, or have you deliberately decided to downplay that kind of content?
IRC: Yes, the original concept was to gather and make available news that was already circulating. We have had the need more and more often to contribute our own commentary, especially when reviews are not available for new books, exhibitions, carnivals, etc. I think Lisa tends to offer her own observations more often. Recently, she had another wonderful idea that would entail more direct writing from us, but I will let her describe the project.
LPG: I think that from the beginning we wanted to use the blog to consolidate information and build a community of readers who could catch up on news and information about the region by coming to the blog. That is an easier task than to bring readers together to read your thoughts and commentary. Sometimes, when the news strikes me as absurd, I will provide commentary, a departure I enjoy. I think, however, that the blog will continue to be primarily that, since that seems to be what our readers come to us for.
Recently, however, we have begun to work on ideas for providing our own content — our own reviews of books, plays, and art, for example, and our own interviews with writers and artists. This is our new project, and we have begun to contact writers and artists to develop these interviews. Readers should begin to see them in a month or so.
NL: What’s been the most surprising thing about working on the blog?
IRC: As is always the case with research, I am constantly amazed at how much information is out there and how little time we have to report on all of that. It always feels to me that we are barely scratching the surface. The other surprise has been the exponential growth of our readership. The numbers have really shot up since March 2009, when we began our work on Repeating Islands.
LPG: I would have to agree with Ivette that it has been the rapid growth in the number of readers. The first time we hit one hundred readers in a day, I wanted to open the Champagne. A year later, that number has multiplied exponentially, and it brings a sense of connection with readers that is very humbling. At first I thought that, since the blog was aimed at readers with academic interests like us, there were maybe at most five hundred people out there who might be interested in the content we offered. I wasn’t quite prepared for thousands of daily readers, with the number continuing to grow from week to week. We are always very touched by the emails we receive from people who have just discovered the blog and write to tell us how much they enjoy it.
NL: Do you know of other Caribbean or Caribbeanist scholars who blog or otherwise share information and knowledge online? Why do you think more Caribbean academics are not doing this?
IRC: Yes, there are institutions or individual Caribbean artists, writers, and scholars who have very interesting sites or blogs; and for the most part, we have provided the links on our blog or in our posts. For example, we really miss the Caribbean Review of Books! Usually, the blogs with a Caribbean focus centre on specific genres, geographic or linguistic areas, subject matters, and fields. It is difficult to maintain a very broad perspective and not favor a geographic area — Puerto Rico, for instance!
LPG: Our blogroll lists the blogs we enjoy checking and reading, as Ivette has commented. There is, to me, an obvious reason why there aren’t more blogs of this kind — they take an enormous amount of time and need to be kept up daily. As an avid reader of blogs, I know how disappointing it is to check your favourite blogs day after day and find no new posts. From the beginning, this was my foremost concern, to make sure that, no matter what, any reader coming to the home page would find at least a couple of new posts every day. (We average seven to eight new posts every day.) This is very hard to do, as we have to anticipate what happens when we travel, when we have other deadlines, when life brings surprises, or when we have a cold.
It works because there are two of us and we check with each other in advance to make sure that the other can cover when life intervenes. We also may prepare posts in advance when we are travelling. We think of it as facing a daily deadline and knowing that hundreds of people will check the home page first thing in the morning, and there better be something new there. It is quite a challenge.
NL: What are your favourite blogs and other online resources for Caribbean culture and scholarship?
IRC: My particular favorites are the blogs, online journals, or sites on the visual arts, such as Art Nexus, Harte, msa Xperimental Art, El Status, and blogs that raise consciousness about specific causes such as the AIDS/HIV pandemic or poverty, such as the Pulitzer Centre for Crisis Reporting. I also enjoy reading sites and blogs of institutions for which I have a great deal of respect for their in-depth articles and dissemination of Caribbean culture, for example Casa de las Americas’ La Ventana.
LPG: I begin my day checking my favorite blogs, all lined up under “favourites” in my browser. I may start with something like This Is Indexed, Geoffrey Philps’s blog, or Karin Wilson Edmonds’s Yard Edge. I also like to look at the Small Axe blog to see what’s new.
NL: You mentioned plans to start posting your own reviews. Are there any other future plans for Repeating Islands that you'd like to share?
LPG: We are very shortly beginning a series of brief interviews with artists (“Five Questions with Repeating Islands”), in which we focus on one particular work by a Caribbean-based or Caribbean-born artist. We are very excited about this, as we think it will help us shed some light on the creative process and bring to readers’ attention the abundance of talent across the region.
We are also interested in showcasing new writers by posting short pieces or poems accompanied by introductory notes or interviews. We want to make sure, however, that readers coming to us to keep up with cultural and artistic news on the Caribbean continue to find that in the blog, so these new “series” would be scheduled for particular days of the week, so readers can know when these feature will appear and check on those days.

author: Nicholas Laughlin


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Chile: Tu Sunami jabs at President, quakes and aftershocks · Global Voices
Juliana Rincón Parra

From Chile, a video mashup by tintoweno mixes McHammer, Storm Troopers and the Chilean president Sebastián Piñera as comic relief: adding  humor to the tense situation lived in Chile as they still experience very  strong aftershocks after the February 27th 8.8 earthquake. The video's name, Tu Sunami refers the President's  slip up when he mispronounced Tsunami.

author: Juliana Rincón Parra


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China: Confession of a ‘Second Generation Migrant Worker’ · Global Voices
Andy Yee

China’s hukou system, adopted in 1958 to control population movement, has long been criticized for tying the population to their place of origin. With the mass migration of rural workers to China’s cities and coastal regions, the system is under the spotlight as it means that these migrants suffer discrimination vis-a-vis urban residents in public services such as education, housing, healthcare and other social protection. The debate reaches a new height following a joint appeal to abandon the system by thirteen Chinese newspapers to the National People’s Congress earlier this month.
Could reforming the hukou system bring better lives to migrant workers? Wang Xiaodao, who calls himself a ‘second generation migrant worker’, airs in his blog the grievances and doubts which are representative of this special group in China. Compared with the first generation, this second generation migrant workers face fewer opportunities. Competition is fierce in many occupations. After working for more than seven years in the cities, he has many doubts. Perhaps some doubts could be answered by a hukou reform:
我不明白，在上海，与上海人在同一家事业单位干同样的工种，为什么他每月就比我多五六百块？经理说他是上海人，有福利保障和各种补贴，我不明白为什么他有，我就没有？我们不都是中国人吗？难道中国城市是分等级的，中国人也是分等级的?
I don’t understand why, in Shanghai, I receive 500 to 600 yuan a month less compared with other workers, who are doing the same kind of job in the same unit. The manager said because he is Shanghaiist, he can enjoy various social benefits and subsidies. I don’t understand why he can have it, but I cannot. Aren’t we both Chinese? Is it true that Chinese cities are hierarchical, and Chinese people are hierarchical too?
我不明白，我堂哥在城市打工十几年了，侄子现在在城市读书，为什么我侄子要缴比城里孩子还高的学费？为什么城里人却不让他们的孩子与我侄子同桌？为什么我侄子在学校会受到孤立和排挤？
I don’t understand why, with my cousin having worked in the cities for over ten years, his son still needs to pay higher school fees than urban children. Why do urban residents not allow their children to share the same table with my nephew? Why is my nephew being isolated and discriminated?
But the above are only parts of the problem. Many more difficulties, such as lack of reasonable safeguards of rights and interests of workers, and unaffordable housing, cannot be solved merely by reforming the hukou system:
我不明白，我们民工用血汗，甚至用生命在城市建设了那么多高楼大厦，可建一辈子房子，却买不到哪怕一间厕所？这跟种一辈子地却没粮食吃异曲同工
I don’t understand why, having spent their lifetime constructing many skyscrapers, migrant workers couldn’t even buy a toilet. This is the same as farmers who spend their lifetime growing crops but could not even feed themselves.
我不明白，为什么南方那么多工厂，就是找不到一家八小时工作制的呢？最低工资标准，意思应该是工资不低于那个标准吧？为什么我们的底薪就等于最低工资标准？为什么辛辛苦苦一天工作十四五个小时，一年下来只够买几包化肥？是工资低了，物价高了，还是我们生活太奢侈了？
I don’t understand why, with so many factories in southern China, I could not even find a single one with an eight-hour work day. Minimum wage means that the salary would be above a certain standard, right? But why are our salaries merely equal to that standard? Having toiled for over 14 hours a day, a few packs of fertilizers are all that we can afford at the end of the year. Is the wage too low and the price too high, or are we too luxurious?
我不明白，为什么我们干了活，可以不给我们工钱，不是说“一份耕耘，一份收获”么？为什么找相关部门解决总那么难，总把我们当球踢，当猴耍？为什么会出现跳楼讨薪，开胸验肺？
I don’t understand why, having worked so hard, the managers dare to withhold our salaries. ‘You get what you give’, isn’t this what they say? Why are the relevant departments finding it so difficult to solve it, kicking us around like footballs? To fight for missing salaries and compensation, some go so far as to threaten to jump off from the building, and voluntarily ‘opening their breast’ through a surgical operation to prove that they’ve developed pneumoconiosis from their workplace.
How about going back to the countryside and be a farmer? He has though about it:
城市，已没有我们安家之所，而农村呢，我们怎么回去？像一个逃兵一样？又有何面目见江东父老？回去之后，会种地吗？愿意种地吗？其实我本人是赞成回农村种地的，毕竟我们国家还得需要人来种地，但怕父母从此在农村抬不起头来，被其他村民嘲笑，尽管其他村民的孩子们也在城市流离失所。在他们看来，战死在城市，也比做一名逃兵好。
The cities have no place for us, how about the countryside? But how can we go back? Like a deserting soldier? Do we have the ‘face’ to see the villagers again? After returning, do we know how to farm? And are we willing to farm? Personally, I’m actually in support of returning and becoming a farmer. After all, the country needs someone to be farmers. But I’m afraid that my parents will be laughed at by other villagers, though their children are also suffering in cities. In their eyes, dying in cities is better than being a deserting soldier.
This new generation of migrant workers is a generation with dreams bigger than money. As Prof. Xie Jianshe, a specialist on migrant worker studies, commented:
They are more attached to cities, rather than rural villages. They are eager to blend into cities, but they are unable to break through the barrier of system and culture. When they go back to the the countryside, they find themselves unable to do farming.
When wealth, houses, cars and a good life are distant dreams, he sees no future, only doubts, illusions and frustrations:
人呐，其实就像种子，最重要的是看你被撒在什么地方，撒在城市，再劣质的种子也能茁壮成长，撒在农村，你再优良也得拼命挣扎才有出头之日。
Human beings are like seeds. What matters is where you are dropped. Dropped in the cities, the worst quality can still grow and be strong; dropped in the countryside, you really need to struggle before you can be strong, even if you are of the best quality.
我们的明天，该何去何从？我不知道。只能像一个无根的浮萍，随波逐流。我曾经说只有猪才是最幸福的动物 […]真的，我真喜欢做一头猪，没心没肺，有吃有喝，也不会去想劈什么柴喂什么马，呆在猪圈里，不知道天高也不知道地厚，就这样迷糊至死。
As for my future, where should I go? I don’t know. I can only be a piece of duckweed, floating along with the waves. I once said that pigs are the luckiest animals […] I would really like to become a pig, without any worries and feelings, only eating and drinking. They just stay in the pigsty, not knowing the world around them, until they die.
现在基本上也不怎么存钱了，因为存了也没用，有钱就花掉，今朝有酒今朝醉，做一天和尚撞一天钟，说我们消极也好，说我们破罐子破摔也好，都无所谓。因为积极奋斗也只会更加头破血流，因为就算是一只好罐子，也卖不出好价钱。消极，更让我释然，日子也过得更轻松。
Now I basically don’t think about saving, because saving is useless. I spend all I earn. You can say I am too negative. But striving for a better live will only lead to blood, sweat and toil, and no more. A good vase cannot be sold for a good price. This loss of hope makes me feel better and easier to pass the days ahead.

author: Andy Yee


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China: The first case of naked government · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

China Hush translated a local news story about a village government in Sichuan publicizing all of its expenses in detailed records in January of this year. Chinese netizens called it “the first case of naked government”.

author: Oiwan Lam


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Egypt: And the IslamOnline strike continues · Global Voices
Mohamed ElGohary

The IslamOnline employees sit-in continues after some achievements. After  the situation escalated threatening the striking employees to leave without  getting their financial rights from the new administration, things turned to  another direction in what seems like the beginning of a victory for the employees.
Nadia ElAway, an ex-journalist  in IOL, tweets from the strike location at the Cairo Bureau:
@NadiaE: Sheikh  Qaradawy freezes 2 #islamonline Qatari board  members and their recent decisions (im at #iol & heard  announcement)
Mohammed who is also  a former IOL employee and who is following the strike closely, tweets:
@MohammedY: Not  sure yet what the latest updated on #IslamOnline crisis means  exactly, but it seems to be a victory for the protesting employees! #IOL
Mohammed Ghafari, who is one of  those responsible for live-tweeting and live-streaming the strike, explains the  goal of continuing the strike:
@Ghafari:  اعتصام موظفي اسلام اون لاين مستمر حتى تمكينهم من اداء عملهم الصحفي واعادة التحكم  في المواقع الى مكتب القاهرة مجددا #IOL #IslamOnline
Ahmed AbdelFattah mentions the names of the sacked board members, previously mentioned by Nadia:
@Ahmedikhwan: عاجل : الشيخ يوسف القرضاوي يقيل العمادي والانصاري بعد ضغوط من اعضاء مجلس  الادارة الذين اتهموهم بهدم موقع اسلام أون لاين
And he mentions that no decisions have been taken yet regarding the employees on strike directly:
@Ahmedikhwan: ولايزال الاعتصام مستمر لانه لا توجد حتي الان قرارات تتعلق بالعاملين #islamonline #iol
Ahmed also uploaded many photos of the strike on his Flickr account:
IslamOnline employees sit-in (Used under permission)
The strikers created a Youtube channel and a blog with the name IslamOnline Voice to  centralize their updates.
Here is the video of the third  day of the strike:
The strikers made the following video expressed as a spoken protest to the potential restructuring of IslamOnline that would result in an ultra conservative model alienating the vast  majority of 120,000 daily visitors.
Also on Global Voices Online:
Egypt: IslamOnline Employees Strike

author: Mohamed ElGohary


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Global: Furs And Fashion · Global Voices
Sonam Ongmo

If you thought that wearing fur was outdated – what with all those green movements and animal rights activists who put this cruel sense of fashion in its right place with the likes of Cruella de Vil – fashionista's say, think again.
Last month the fashion world went literally “wild” in New York, Paris and Milan during the unveiling of their fall collection. They had models strutting the catwalk in so much fur, it was scary enough to make animal rights activists and environmentalists jump out of their skins.
In this era of global warming and dwindling animal species, one would think that we humans would come to our senses and rethink our actions. Not so, it seems, as there is a whole other world out there – the fashion industry of the west – whose endorsement and use of fur and exotic animal products simply encourages the mass slaughter of many endangered species.
A dealer's bounty at the Quartzite annual show for art and crafts. Image by Flickr user cobalt123. Used under a Creative Commons License
To name a few, the Chiru or Tibetan antelope, whose underbelly fur is used to make “Shatoosh” the world's most expensive shawls, also known as “shawls of death”. It takes 3 dead antelopes, to make one shawl, so fine it can fit through a finger ring, and each one can cost between $5000 to $20,000 in the international market. Even babies, and mother's who have just delivered, are not spared.
According to WWF, the population of this species has declined by over 50 percent in the last 20 years and the Tibetan Plateau Project says that it was the fashion-driven demand for Shatoosh in the U.S that resulted in as many as 20,000 antelopes being slaughtered. It is alarming to know that the animal could become extinct in the next three years at this rate.
In a blog run by Uma and Hurree called Animal Rights India, they argue how farming of Chiru's – like Eider ducks in Iceland for eider, will not make a difference to the dwindling numbers.
But hello: Eider ducks are now a protected species, and farmers in iceland use a technique of collecting the down without harming the bird. And no, it is not possible to obtain the shahtoosh wool without killing the chiru.
They go on to say:
It's impossible to justify killing three beautiful wild animals every time you want to push a length of shawl through a ring, blah blah. And to farm them just to kill them for shawls?
Raja Basu, another blogger said:
The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) – which controls the trade in endangered species products – has completely banned international trade in Tibetan antelope products (including Shahtoosh). It is illegal to import Shahtoosh into many countries, including the USA (ironically, Shahtoosh products are so popular in the US fashion industry).  Unfortunately, despite such laws being in place, the Shahtoosh trade is going on in full swing. This is because it is not enough to have laws. There must also be a strong public protest across the board against every person who is by any means related to the Shahtoosh trade. There should be a widespread public sensitization campaign to educate the common people.
Bloggers in the west, however, were giving this some thought and debated:
Rachel Menashy wrote on her blog:
1. People eat rabbits at restaurants. These rabbits have been killed to provide ‘dinner’ for people like us (I would like to point out that I have never eaten rabbit and by ‘us’ I mean people who eat in restaurants). Why is it right that rabbits can feature on a menu in a restaurant but wrong to wear a fur coat? These rabbits inevitably are skinned in preparation to be cooked – what else should we do with the fur?
2. Is it more acceptable if the coat is Vintage? Why?
3. Is rabbit fur better/worse than Mink? Some argue that rabbit fur is not as bad because rabbits are not in danger of becoming extinct, unlike mink which is. Then again, people keep rabbits as pets so is it more cruel to wear rabbit than mink?
4. If a fur coat is hanging on a rail at a store and one customer refuses to buy it, somebody else will…
5. Should role models such as Kate Moss be seen wearing fur? Kate's style is copied by millions of girls (and women) – is she giving a bad impression?
To which Denise replied:
1. I would personally be more likely to wear rather than eat rabbit. The eating of it seems less acceptable somehow.
2.Vintage coats have been around for a while and should be recycled – which I'm definitely into.
3. Mink are feral creatures and even though their fur is more desirable, mink are not aiming for extinction, so why not wear it?
4. Agreed.
5. I don't mind fur being worn by anyone, and Kate Moss is just showing that this is acceptable. Too many people are on the “fur is bad” bandwagon. I bet most of these people eat meat and wear leather, so what's the difference?
But there is a difference as Barry Williams responded to a thread: Wearing Fur is not immoral on www.helium.com
If we go around killing cattle for leather, alligators for shoes, deer for chamois and see nothing morally wrong in that , why it is immoral to wear fur. What I see as immoral is the killing of animals simply for the fur alone. It really is such a waste, isn't it? Apart from the leather we obtain from cattle not much of the animal is wasted. Beef cattle supply our meat.
There are a multitude of arguments out there, but in the meantime the Humane Society for the United States, says that Canada will slaughter 388, 200 harp, grey and hooded seals this year, an increase of 50,000 from 2009. This, because of the overall demand for fur.  The site of the Fur Council of Canada shows styles and celebrities modelling various furs in what it describes as a fashion trend of 2010.
And unfortunately in the U.S, and much of the west where Global Fashion trends are set, laws don't seem to be enough to curb their greed.  According to the International Fur Trade Federation Blog:
..the shift in the attitude towards fur can be attributed to “changes within the fur trade, such as the introduction of the new Origin Assured initiative, which guarantees that fur bearing the label comes from a country with animal welfare regulations”. This shows that the fur trade efforts and initiatives to challenge the outdated ideas of our industry have been noticed. We are a transparent and well-regulated industry that supports high animal welfare standards and we welcome the confidence and support shown by the fashion designers as well as the European Commission, who recently recognised the importance of the Origin Assured label.
Fashion designers who have been courted by Furriers say they are “confident using fur after examining the chain of production and finding it humane.”  But could this confidence be based on a lack of investigation or knowledge? According to an endangered species handbook :
The New York luxury department store, Bergdorf Goodman, advertised shahtoosh in 1995 as a “royal and rare” fabric, making incorrect statements about the wool having been obtained from the Mountain Ibex goat of Tibet which “sheds its down undercoat by scratching itself against low trees and bushes” from where it is gathered by local shepherds (Schaller 1998)
And if the clubbing of baby seals and mass slaughtering of Chiras, mothers and babies, is “humane” then its sad to think of what “humane” means anymore, and what we are willing to condone in the name of “Fashion”.

author: Sonam Ongmo


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India: Masters, Not Representatives · Global Voices
Rezwan

Amit Verma at India Uncut comments on the news that garlands of thousand-rupee notes were presented to a political leader in India: “this kind of behaviour demonstrates, yet again, how our politicians believe that they are our rulers, and not our servants.”


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Iran: Jailed blogger’s mother called to release his son · Global Voices
Fred Petrossian

Several news sites reported that Hossein Derakhshan's mother has called on the head of Iran's judiciary to release her son for the Iranian New Year, or Norouz, marked on March 21. Hossein, has been in your prison for more than 500 days. And we have been waiting for him outside the prison every day,” she writes. Derakhshan is one of Iranian jailed bloggers.

author: Fred Petrossian


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Iran: Opposition leader used You Tube for New Year Message · Global Voices
Fred Petrossian

Mir-Hussein Mousavi, one of Iranian opposition leader, and his wife, Zahra Rahnavard, used You Tube to deliver his new year,Noruz, message. He called Iranian people will face very difficult economic situation next year and country has been very isolated in international community. He praised “Green Movement” [Iranian opposition movement] and says the struggle goes on.


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Nigeria: “Enough is Enough!” youth march on the capital · Global Voices
Eremipagamo Amabebe

On Tuesday, March 16, thousands of Nigerians marched on the capital, Abuja, to show their frustration with the woes that continue to besiege the country. This sort of protest has not been a common feature of the Nigerian political scene – at least not in this decade– though this demonstration is one of several that have taken place this year.
The protest was organized by Enough is Enough, a diverse coalition of youth, media, and business leaders. The group marched to the National Assembly building bearing a letter which outlined their demands, four of which they said stand out as requiring “urgent intervention”. Excerpts of the demands are as follow:
1.   The Jos situation makes it clear that the Nigerian state is incapable of securing the lives and limbs of its citizens…. We demand an urgent overhaul of the security and intelligence apparatus in our country…
2.  The promise of 6000 megawatts was flagrantly broken…. [We] demand that within the month, the government gives a realistic, practical plan to solving this perennial power problem.
3.  We also demand that President Yar’Adua should resume, resign or be removed so that Nigerians know who their leaders are…
4. The Uwais report has been lying between the executive and the legislature for months now, and now election timetables have been released… We demand that all its recommendations be passed and implemented before the next elections.
[The Uwais Report is a document containing recommendations for making Nigerian elections fairer and more transparent.]
The coalition's letter emphasized the fact that those under 35 make up 75% of Nigeria's population; it carried a warning for the upcoming election:
We will come out to vote massively this time around, we will be watching closely and we will not leave election centres until all votes are counted. Anyone who rigs elections this time around will have themselves to blame. Young people across the country – from the North to the South – will be coming out in their millions…
The letter concluded:
We grew up hearing ourselves addressed as the “leaders of tomorrow,” and now we have realised that it is time… to take our destinies into our hands if we want to stand any chance of witnessing that much-touted “tomorrow.”
The protest ended relatively peacefully, and was largely declared a success. Olamild gave a play-by-play of the events of the day:
After hours of waiting and chanting, the crowd switched to Plan B Mode – they sat on the bare floor insisting that bankole and mark come out.
[Dimeji Bankole is Speaker of the House of Representatives; David Mark is President of the Senate]
The crowd insisted on seeing who they came for and gave an ultimatum – ” It is either we march into the house by force or you bring Mark or Bankole to come out and speak to us.”
The doors were eventually opened and the youths marched into the house where they encountered 4 layers of hand-locked policemen. Serious pushing was involved but they got in. On getting in, they were told that the House of Assembly officials had escaped through the back door. Protesters were then urged by their leaders to head out and end the rally. Angry Stella Damasus yelled “we can't just go like this. “
[Stella Damasus is a popular Nigerian actress]
The youths were shocked at the act of cowardice displayed by the House of Assembly. “They ran away?? Only one who has done evil will run away at a time like this. We will come back again and the next time we come, we will shut this place down.”
Twitter users Gbengasesan and Bubusn posted pictures of the march, and live footage of the event was available at ustream. The demonstration had an online presence unprecedented in the history of Nigerian protest: Facebook, Twitter, and Nigeria's extensive blogging networks were all mobilized in support of the event (of particular note were the Facebook group Save Nigeria and the demonstration organizers’ website Where is Yar'Adua?). Nigerian Curiosity even reported that the hashtag #enoughisenough was the number three trending topic on Twitter (though she pointed out that not all the tweets referred specifically to the demonstration in Abuja).
Many in the online community expressed their support for the marchers. Jcsgrl, a commenter on Bella Naija's post about the protest, articulated many people's thoughts when she wrote:
This is quite new to us Nigerians. We’re not known to protest. We sit back and let things happen to us. Perhaps, the fear of military leadership still rules our life. Give it time…be patient. Keep building momentum and developing a grassroots mentality. We’ll get it together one day. In the mean time, don’t ever give up hope and don’t ever stop fighting for what you believe in. I support this group 100%. Just hope the fight doesn’t end there.
Demiji, commenting on Imnakoya's post, had a similar view:
I’m proud my people have found a new zeal to pursue their demands, how I wish I could be part of this historic moment!
Tolu Ogunlesi wrote of his reasons for protesting:
This sorry state of our country has left an interesting side effect. It has turned us all into comedians, people for whom no lemon is too unripe to be turned into lemonade, for whom absurdity is an instant ‘open-sesame’ for verbal ingenuity. We have made jokes about everything; composed ballads for President Yardie, turned “Turai” and “Mutallab” into verbs; and wondered why, after having a president who suffered kidney failure, we now have an acting president afflicted by “liver failure.”
Increasingly, however, we are realising that it is time to move on, to go beyond Concern, and Comedy, and make our way into the uncharted territories of Commitment. It is dawning on us that it is not enough to be Angry Young Men and Women, trapped in the online factories of Twitter and Facebook assembling jokes and status updates from our ever-increasing frustrations.
We need all the support we can get. So, if you are young, or young at heart, and think it is time to say ENOUGHISENOUGH, to electoral malpractice, to power failure, to fuel scarcity, to the cabals in high places, and to whatever else you may think of, let’s start in Abuja on Tuesday March 16, 2010.
Not all observers were unequivocally optimistic. Imnakoya wrote that he admired the protesters energy and commitment:
They are the ones in the trenches and up against the brutality of the security forces. Putting their bodies at risk and investing their time to make a case for the general well being of Nigerians is a noble task, and I doff my hat!
But he was skeptical of their demands. He outlined his reasoning as follows:
The removal/resumption/retirement of Mr. Yar’Adua is no longer critical at this stage of event in Nigeria. What is important is having in place constitutional measures that will prevent similar occurrences in the future. Let’s deal with the issue of transparency, the root cause of the problem.
We could have asked for the establishment of regional/local/ industrial parks nationwide with 20-24 hrs of electrical power (and other necessary amnesties) where businesses can set up shop and engage in symbiotic existence. Nigeria does not need power 24-7 nationwide at this point, just guarantee power to the industrial and production centers! Ending the five-month scarcity is easy, just get more ships to bring in more fuel! But this is not the solution to the problem…
Oil refinement must be done locally, and open to the private sector involvement. Three refineries are too few to handle the demands of Nigerians and her nearby neighbors! Rid the sector of politics and see how quick a turn-around will happen. Have each geo-political zone own and operate a refinery.
Solomonsydelle was similarly skeptical:
Will any of these demands be fulfilled by the end of March? A reasonable thinking person familiar with Nigeria would be foolish to say yes. There were promises made to my grandparents generation that are yet to be fulfilled by the Nigerian federal government. And for that reason, I personally would be seeking more than a plan when it comes to the second demand concerning electricity. Despite this, I feel that this protest is a step in the right direction for Nigerian democracy, as it is crucial for citizens to express themselves even when the consequences could be dire.

author: Eremipagamo Amabebe


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Nigeria: The State of the Union · Global Voices
Ndesanjo Macha

Vera and other Nigerian bloggers will discuss the State of the Nigerian Union on the Verastically Speakin’ Talk Radio.

author: Ndesanjo Macha


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Peru: The Pardon of José Enrique Crousillat · Global Voices
Juan Arellano

In the midst of some confusing turn of events, the Peruvian government reversed its decision to grant a pardon to former television businessman José Enrique Crousillat. This led to Crousillat to go into hiding, and some speculate that he may have fled the country. Crousillat, along with his son, were shareholders and on the board of directors of América TV television station in the 1990s.
However, during the scandal involving the videos that showed former head of Peru's intelligence service Vladmiro Montesinos giving bribes for favorable media coverage, Crousillat and his station were implicated for receiving payment for favorable coverage for the campaign of former President Alberto Fujimori. He fled the country, but was later captured and extradited back to Peru, where he was tried and sentenced to prison.
Peruvian government palace by martintoy and used under a Creative Commons license.
He was scheduled to have completed his sentence in 2014, but in November 2009, there were discussions that he would be pardoned for humanitarian reasons because he had complained of heart problems. On December 11, Crousillat was pardoned by President Alan García and was released the same day. This led to a wave of reactions, some in favor and others against the decision.
Following his release, Crousillat stated his intention to retake control of his former television station. However, what turned public opinion against him were the photographs that showed him first at an exclusive resort, and later at a café in the upscale neighborhood of Miraflores. This showed that Crousillat was not on the verge of death as had been alleged.
Due to the media pressure and citizen outrage, President García called for a review of the pardon. However, it was the role of Justice Minister Aurelio Pastor, who was fired by García, for allegedly providing unreliable evidence that led to Crousillat's pardon, which has now been revoked and which led to his going into hiding. He was the first political victim in this case was the Justice Minister Pastor, who before being fired or “resigned” as the government states, said that an economic group wanted to “crucify” him [es]. After his resignation, he left a message for his Facebook contacts.
These events bring back memories for some citizens, such as the blogger from Plan H [es], who comments sarcastically:
Esta historia me parece haberla escuchado antes. Un presidente que sale ante cámaras, proclama ante el país que el otro hombre es un peligro nacional y que ha dañado la imagen del país, además de ser un corrupto. El presidente lo declara enemigo numero 1 y posteriormente se lanza en su captura,.. esto se repite en las mismas circunstancias que hace 9 años, cuando Fujimori, aterrado por los reveladores vladivideos, salió a la “caza” de Montesinos en una patético demostración de la poca dignidad que le quedaba a ese gobierno. Ahora, reemplaza la palabra Fujimori por Alan y Montesinos por Crousillat y tenemos lo mismo.
However, not all the bloggers take the news with the same humor, and in the month of December 2009, Silvio Rendón of the blog Gran Combo Club [es] provides his opinion on the suspected and dangerous precedent that the pardon would mean:
El monto de reparacion civil que debe al estado quedo “sin efecto”. Después el estado se queja de que no hay dinero para pagar las reparaciones de derechos humanos. … A este paso sólo falta indultar a Fujimori. La puntada es con hilo: García prepara indulto a ex dictador Fujimori.
The amount of civil reparation that he owes the state now remains “void.” After the state complained that there is no money to pay human rights reparations … At this rate, all that is left is to pardon Fujimori. The stitching is with thread: García prepares to pardon former dictator Fujimori.
Victor Liza Jaramillo of the blog Metiendo la Pata [es] expresses similar opinions:
Todo esto transcurrió en una semana que acaso, en opinión del que suscribe, es la más vergonzosa que ha vivido este régimen. Incluso más que cuando ocurrieron hechos como los “petroaudios” y el “baguazo”. Porque estas idas y venidas reflejan algo más que sentirse “burlado”, además de una tremenda descoordinación. Reflejan, sin duda alguna, que el gobierno buscaba algo más, y que esta rectificación tardía es una vergüenza para el país. Es un pésimo precedente, tanto en materia jurídica como la política.
All this happened in a week where  in a week perhaps, in my opinion, is the most embarrassing that this government has experienced. It is even more embarrassing than the “petroaudio” and “baguazo” scandals. All of these comings and goings reflect something more than feeling “tricked,” as well as a tremendous dis-coordination. It reflects, without a doubt, that the government loked for something more, and that this late correction is an embarrassment for the country. It is a terrible precedent, both legal and political.
Juan Sheput, politician and blogger at Mate Pastor [es] points the blame directly at President Garciá for this debacle:
El doctor Alan García ¿habría procedido a revocar el indulto sin la presión e indignación ciudadana? No, por supuesto que no. A pesar de que sus compañeros de partido afirmen que ha sido “sorprendido” yo pienso que no es así. Si se indultó a José Enrique Crousillat fue porque había una decisión política en ese sentido, y el hasta ahora ministro Aurelio Pastor fue un eficiente operador…. los esfuerzos de dos gobiernos anteriores, el de Valentín Paniagua y de Alejandro Toledo, en materia de lucha contra la corrupción, han involucionado. Hoy se hace lo posible por deteriorar la institucionalidad y ser permisivo con la corrupción.
Would President Alan García have revoked the pardon without all of the pressure and public outrage? No, of course not. Even though his fellow party members claim that they were “surprised” I don't think that was the case. If José Enrique Crousillat was pardoned it was because it was a political decision in this regard, and until now Minister Aurelio Pastor was an efficient operator …the efforts of the two previous governments, that of (former Presidents) Valentín Paniagua and Alejandro Toledo, in the fight against corruption, have digressed. Today it is possible to damage the institutions and be tolerant of corruption.
The well-known and controversial ex-head of the National Directorate Against Terrorism (DINCOTE for its initials in Spanish), Colonel Benedicto Jimenez writes in his blog El Pacificador [es] about his perspective of the events, and its relationship with large media companies:
Cuando el Grupo Plural (El Comercio y La República) sintió que sus intereses eran amenazados, soltaron los “perros de presa” o “seudos” investigadores periodísticos para husmear, perseguir, ubicar, fotografiar, filmar o seguirle los pasos a José Enrique Crousillat , personaje que cometió el error de sentirse invencible, intocable, soberbio, tal vez, confiaba en que nunca iba a ser tocado porque el indulto es irrevocable o se sentía seguro y confiado porque cuenta con grabaciones sobre la negociación del indulto … porque existe la sospecha que el indulto no cayó por gracia del Espíritu Santo que se apiadó de un septuagenario próximo a morir y que debía pasar sus últimos días en compañía de sus seres queridos. Desde ese momento, dos grupos económicos se han declarado la guerra y los ciudadanos miran impávidos como se destrozan o atacan los dueños del país para hacerse dueño de América TV. Por un lado está el Grupo Plural, por otro lado, el grupo económico que representa José Enrique Crousillat
When the Plural Group (El Comercio and La Republica) felt that their interests were threatened, they released the “attack dogs” or “pseudo” journalistic investigators to snoop, pursue, locate, photograph, video, or follow the steps of Jose Enrique Crousillat, a person who made the mistake of feeling invincible, untouchable, arrogant, and perhaps, was confident that he would never be touched because the pardon is irrevocable or felt secure and confident because it had recordings of the negotiation of the pardon … because it is suspected that the pardon did not fall by the grace of the Holy Spirit which took pity on a septuagenarian near death and that he should spend his last days with loved ones. Since then, two economic groups have declared war and the citizens are watching impassively as they destroy or attack the owners of the country to become master of América TV. On one side is the Plural Group, on the other side, the economic group that represents José Enrique Crousillat
The case is still under development with the results being awaited of the lawsuit filed by Crousillat, even thought it was declared inadmissible [es] in an injunction filed in the northern city of Motupe, which was based on a irregular housing certificate. Crousillat's lawyer has been denounced for concealment of his client [es]. That while there is a warning that Crousillat could request via a habeas corpus to request the restitution of his pardon. There is also a Facebook group called “Wanted: Crousillat [es]” which already has more than 1,300 members.

author: Juan Arellano


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Russia: Authorities Shut Down File Sharing Service · Global Voices
Alexey Sidorenko

ifolder.ru, Russian file sharing service, has been shut down by police, roem.ru reported. This is the second case of the file sharing site being shut down. The first one was the scandalous case of torrents.ru.

author: Alexey Sidorenko


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Saudi Arabia: Call to Demolish the Grand Mosque  · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

“Shiekh (?) Yousuf al-Ahmad from Imam Muhammad bin Saud Islamic University in Riyadh has shamelessly called for demolishing of the Grand Mosque in Makkah and rebuilding it in a way that prevents women from mingling with men during tawaf and prayers,” reports Saudi Jeans, who links to the video in which he speaks.

author: Amira Al Hussaini


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Saudi Arabia to mark Earth Hour  · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

“On March 27, Saudi Arabia will take part in Earth Hour by switching off power for an hour,” announced the SaudiEmbassyUSA on Twitter.


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Senegal: RIP Mahaman Traor · Global Voices
Ndesanjo Macha

The Senegalese film director and one of the founders of the Pan-African Film festival [FESPACO], Mahaman Johnson Traor is no more.


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Slovenia: Minister arrested by police · Global Voices
Vilhelm Konnander

Sleeping with Pengovsky comments on the recent arrest of Slovenia's minister of agriculture by the country's National Bureau of Investigation.

author: Vilhelm Konnander


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South Africa: What are your rights when stopped at a roadblock? · Global Voices
Ndesanjo Macha

Emma discusses the rights of drivers when stopped by traffic police in South Africa.


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South Korea: Ohmynews feeling · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

Guilherme Lopes Neves tells the readers what's the difference between writing in Ohmynews! and professional media platform.


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St. Lucia: Literary Festival  · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

Caribbean Book Blog is excited about St. Lucia's upcoming WORD ALIVE International Literary Festival, “the first full-scale international literary event of magnitude to be held in the island.”

author: Janine Mendes-Franco


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Trinidad & Tobago, Guyana: Miss Tourist · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

Lifespan of a Chennette goes “touristing” in Guyana's capital city.


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Uganda: LGBT activist to speak in NY · Global Voices
Rebekah Heacock

Frank Mugisha, head of Ugandan activist group Sexual Minorities Uganda, is speaking in New York City on March 22.

author: Rebekah Heacock


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Ukraine: Differing views of the Orange revolution · Global Voices
Vilhelm Konnander

The Ivanov Report presents a very critical comment on an essay about the Orange revolution by Keith Gessen in The New Yorker.


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Africa: CAF 2010 Awards was an embarrassment · Global Voices
Ndesanjo Macha

Thomas Kwenaite reviews the 2010 Confederation of African Football Awards: “Last week, I watched in utter embarrassment as none of the finalists in the Caf awards turned up for the event.”


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Africa: How not to give money to charities in Africa · Global Voices
Ndesanjo Macha

How not to give money to charities in Africa: “Do not watch TV images of Africa and feel only pity: starvation, war, HIV-AIDS etc…, Do not give money to Africa in an attempt to make yourself feel good, Do not give money to Africa because you feel guilty about colonialism…”


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Armenia: Women · Global Voices
Onnik Krikorian

Emily Haas’ Armenian Experience, a blog by a Peace Corps Volunteer (PCV) in the former Soviet republic, post photographs and an insight into the lives of women in Armenia. The blog says that the project is to “show how hard the women in Armenia work and the important and overlooked role they hold in society.” Meanwhile, Ianyan has started to publish a series of posts on what it means to be a woman in general.

author: Onnik Krikorian


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Bangladesh: Extra-judicial Killing · Global Voices
Rezwan

Jerome at Bangladesh, Canada And Beyond writes about the extrajudicial killings which are a blot on Bangladesh.

author: Rezwan


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Barbados, Jamaica: Feeling the “Vybz” · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

Boyce Voice and B.C. Pires blog about the public outcry surrounding the appearance of Jamaican dancehall performers, Vybz Kartel and Mavado, in Barbados.


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Belarus: Blogger Attempts to Run Internet Election Campaign  · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

Information Policy writes about a Belarusian blogger's failed attempt to run for Minsk city council, the use of internet in his campaign – and the new internet regulations that might soon be introduced in Belarus: “Lipkovich noted that his video interview in which he had announces his intention to step forth as a deputy candidate ‘gathered 17 thousand downloads in one day’. […] However, only 3 of 153 undoubtedly legitimate signatures were gathered via the Internet. […] ‘Internet and social networks don't hold any influence whatsoever in our country. Those who prepared decree N60 are really just paranoid people who are afraid of their own shadow.'”

author: Veronica Khokhlova


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Bosnia: Gay Dutch Soldiers · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

Kirk Johnson of Americans For Bosnia reacts to retired NATO commander John Sheehan's homophobic comment on the Dutch troops’ performance in Bosnia in 1995: “Regarding the Srebrenica Genocide; there are many things for which we can hold the Dutch military at fault, but allowing gay Dutch citizens to serve their country in the military is not one of them.”


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China and U.S: Rhetorics on Google’s Exit · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

Kai Pan from china / divide criticizes western rhetorics in discussing Google's exit from China. The blogger in particular comments on Nicole Kempton piece on the Huffington Post that neglects democratic countries’ role in advocating Internet censorship.


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China: Urban Villages · Global Voices
Oiwan Lam

Maryannodonnell explains how “urban villages” appears in city, like Shenzhen, as a result of development and the negotiation of space between “farmers” and “city people”.


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China: Verdict postponed in Fujian netizen trial · Global Voices
John Kennedy

A long overdue verdict was expected today in the “false accusations” trial of activists Fan Yanqiong (范燕琼), You Jingyou (游精佑) and Wu Huaying (吴华英) who have remained in police custody in Fuzhou since their arrests last summer.
The charges against them stem from a filmed interview with Lin Xiuying in which she details her suspicions that her daughter, Yan Xiaoling, was murdered after being gang-raped at the hands of police. The footage was put online and passed around, leading to a number of arrests of netizens beginning in June 2009; while several were soon released, as for the two women and one man still in custody, noted in the EastSouthWestNorth blog post linked to above, “Lin Xiuying has said many times that the defendants were arrested for helping her.”
A number of netizens gathered at the courthouse in Fuzhou‘s Mawei district prior to the trial this morning to report the outcome via microblog. Among those was well-known citizen journalist and poverty activist Tiger Temple (Laohu Miao) who shortly after nine a.m. tweeted [zh] that the court session had lasted only a minute, with the judge choosing to postpone the verdict pending further investigation.
Lawyer for the three netizens, Liu Xiaoyuan, who has written nearly 200 blog posts on developments in the case, stated in an interview with the Chinese Human Rights Defenders website shortly after the trial that, having just been barred from entering the local petition office, his next step would be to file a complaint with the procuratorate, citing lack of evidence. Liu also pointed out in the interview that results of the judge's earlier call for further investigation had not been made known to him.
Outside the courthouse following the trial, those present estimated a crowd of nearly a thousand; scuffles with police and security personnel reportedly took place with cameras being confiscated and photos deleted. Several which were earlier accessible on Chinese microblogging platform Zuosa can no longer be viewed, while others from Tiger Temple remain:
现场来了一个母亲控诉福州司法黑暗。
WHY女儿杜梅控诉流氓打人和抢走相机和手机，现在还没归还。
[update: more photos from outside the courtroom can be seen here]
Currently on Tiger Temple's blog is a video clip in which Lin Xiuying presents the many developments and documents related to the case, including photos of her daughter's corpse.

author: John Kennedy


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Cuba: Peace Prize Nominee  · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

Uncommon Sense confirms that Cuban dissident leader Oswaldo Payá has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize, saying, “There should be little doubt that if he were to be named this year's recipient, it would elevate his status and that of the entire dissident movement on the island.  And it would be a big win for the cause of Cuban freedom.”


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Dominican Republic: Construction of University in Haiti · Global Voices
Eduardo Avila

The government of the Dominican Republic announced that it will construct a university in neighboring Haiti for 10,000 students, writes Duarte 101 [es].

author: Eduardo Avila


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Guatemala: Adoption Bureaucracy · Global Voices
Eduardo Avila

Luis Figueroa of the blog Carpe Diem [es] writes about the amount of bureaucracy involved to approve adoptions in Guatemala.


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Guyana: I & I · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

Guyana-Gyal has a theory about “how tongues all over the world latch on to the I-Talk.”


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Malawi: Does Malawi need 4 mobile operators?  · Global Voices
Ndesanjo Macha

Clement wonders whether Malawi needs four mobile phone operators as the government launches an international tender for a fourth mobile phone operator.


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Maldives: Extremist Blogger · Global Voices
Rezwan

Yaamyn talks about an extremist blogger who has issued death threats to a number of people including another blogger and the first lady of the Maldives.


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Mali: Fabric weaves an economical and cultural support · Global Voices
Juliana Rincón Parra

Through videos, we see and learn about the cultural importance and economical boost that working with fabric is giving some people and organizations in Mali. From a women's group which claim to have placed Mali as a power in the cloth dying industry, to artists who have decided to make Bogolanfini or mud dyed cloths their medium, to the touristic industry that has grown around this art.
First, via Craft: we learned of a recent fundraising activity Maureen Gosling organized to assist her in finishing her documentary about the women cloth dyers of Bamako (Mali's capital city).  In this video preview, the women dyers speak about the importance their dyed cloth has in Mali and how working with it has impacted their lives:
Another traditional textile  is the mudcloth. This next video from TravelWestAfrica shot in Ségou, we see how they make the dyes which include the mud that gives the cloth its name:
Another name for the mudcloth is Bogolanfini; in this following video by hubuf made in 2006, a trainer explains to a group of students what bogolan is, what it's made of and what it means for Malian culture:
In this next video by claudiodumali we can see a group of visitors learning by doing; with small scraps of cloth they experiment with the different dyes and muds used in Bogolan making in Ségou:
If you wish to know more about Bogolan, polbenmali has uploaded a 2 part documentary (part 1, part 2 [fr]) on Issiaka Dembele, an artist who turned to Bogolan as his medium. In the videos, Dembele speaks in French about his trade, but the images show clearly the intricate and time consuming process of dying the fabric yellow, covering it in pond mud left to rot for months which will turn the fabric black, and then going over the yellow areas to remove the dye in certain parts, painting over other colors in others:

author: Juliana Rincón Parra


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Netherlands: Reaction to US general’s gay theory of Srebrenica · Global Voices
Percy Balemans

Dutch foreign minister, Maxime Verhagen tweeted [nl] in reaction to a claim by a retired US general that “gay soldiers contributed to the Bosnian massacre” in Srebrenica in 1995: “Extremely weird statement about Srebrenica. I fear this has more to do with the discussion in the US about homosexuality in the army.”

author: Percy Balemans


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Plural+ Video Festival for Youth under 25 · Global Voices
Juliana Rincón Parra

Plural+ is once again calling for entries for their Youth Video Festival on Migrant issues, asking youth worldwide to send in their videos discussing identity, diversity, integration, human rights and inclusiveness among other topics. Entry deadline is June 30th and video submission is by sending in a DVD to the USA.  Rules and Regulations here.


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Russia: Andrei Loshak’s Text on Corruption · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

Andrei Loshak's much-discussed text about corruption and “the normal functioning of an irrational system” in Russia has been translated into English by OpenDemocracy.net (the Russian-language original is at OpenSpace.ru).


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Russia: “Battle for Khimki Forest” · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

A detailed account of the ongoing “battle for Khimki Forest” – by Yevgeniya Chirikova at OpenDemocracy.net: “The plan to construct a section of the new Moscow-St.Petersburg motorway through the legally-protected Khimki Forest Park will destroy a rare eco-system. Dogged local resistance has turned this into a national, even international issue. But it has not derailed the plan.”


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Russia: Bread · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

Photos of “how Russian bread is being baked” – at English Russia.


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South Africa: We Want What’s Ours · Global Voices
Ndesanjo Macha

“We Want What’s Ours” is a documentary film in progress on the complications of land reform in South Africa.


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Sri Lanka: Fonseka And UNP · Global Voices
Rezwan

Indrajit Samarajiva at Indi.ca reacts to  the recent news that the Sri Lankan opposition alliance is abandoning their candidate Mr. Sarath Fonseka, because he is in jail now.


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Sudan: Conflicting views on Sudan from US officials · Global Voices
Ndesanjo Macha

Gregory Simpkins discusses conflicting views on Sudan policy from the Obama Administration.


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UK: Foreign Office on Ukraine and Belarus · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

Leigh Turner, UK Ambassador to Ukraine, writes about London's “intense interest in what's going on in Ukraine.” Belarus Digest reports that UK Foreign Secretary David Miliband (whose blog is here) “singled out Belarus in his introduction to the Foreign Office’s Annual Report on Human Rights 2009.”


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Ukraine: Crimean Tatar Leader Addresses European Parliament · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

Links related to the March 17 European Parliament hearing with Mustafa Dzhemilev, former Soviet dissident and Chairman of the Mejlis of the Crimean Tatar People: Dzhemilev's speech (.pdf file); an overview at Window on Eurasia; an overview at Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization (UNPO); a written address by MEP Heidi Hautala at her Human Rights Diary; an RFE/RL article by Ahto Lobjakas – “Going Nowhere Fast — Crimean Tatars In The EU.”


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Ukraine: Fundraising Effort to Help Street Children · Global Voices
Veronica Khokhlova

Scenes from the Sidewalk announces – here and here – a fundraising effort for CrossRoads Foundation: “If you want to be a part of a group of people who are doing amazing work with street and at risk children in Ukraine, please consider helping us raise money.”


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China: Revaluing the One-Child Policy · Global Voices
Don Weinland

Amidst talk of an aging society and a depleting demographic dividend, appeals for a reconsideration of China’s One-Child Policy were voiced during the annual meetings of the National People’s Congress and the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference held Mar. 3 to 14.
Zhang Yin, China’s wealthiest woman and member of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, called for a “gradual release” from the 30 year-old policy, with a three to five year trial period allowing some the right to have a second child before the nation as a whole.
In an interview with Southern Weekend Zhang said she was one among many who voiced concern over China’s low birth rate and the consequences of an aging society.
(photo/Don Weinland)
In an open letter issued by the Communist Party’s central committee in September of 1980, the One-Child Policy was suggested in order to relieve the demographic tensions of runaway birth rates.  The letter states that after 30 years of state controlled family planning, “different demographic policies can be adopted.”
As the policy completes its 30 year course, the future of family planning has become a topic for debate.  Despite a long tradition of large families in China, online opinion concerning a possible “Two-Child Policy” is mixed.
Blogger You Xin sees the One-Child Policy as inseparable from China’s long-term growth and conservation of resources.
计划生育是我国的基本国策，人口数量控制在今后很长一段时间内还是要有力执行的。只有将人口总量控制在一个适度范围，面临日益匮乏的资源短缺，我国人均资源量才不会及其匮乏，人民生活水平才会有质的提高。
Family planning is a fundamental policy in my country.  Population control for a long period of time in the future must be carried out with force.  In the face of daily increasing shortages of resources, only population control on a suitable scale will prevent extreme per capita resource shortages.  Only then can the people’s quality of living be raised.
You Xin says China’s demographic dividend, the world’s largest group of labor-aged workers largely responsible for powering the country’s manufacturing engine, has not helped develop a white-collared job market suitable for university graduates.
为什么大学生就业难？并不要找不到工作，而是找不到合适的工作。大学生作为知识分子，当然不愿融入制造业当中了。对于”人口红利“时代的拐点，劳动力下降，我们可以采取其他措施，而不是放开二胎政策 … 随着以后经济发展，我国也可仿效发达国家，将制造业大批转入其他更贫穷的国家。
Why can’t university students find a job?  It’s certainly not because we can’t find work, but because we can’t find suitable work.  Students, as intellectuals, of course aren’t willing to go into manufacturing … As the economy develops further, [China] can follow the example of developed countries and transfer manufacturing on a large scale to other poorer countries.
Blogger ‘Grassroots Public Servant’ disagrees, saying growth in the manufacturing work force is essential to China’s future and may influence the passing of a “Two-Child Policy” sooner than later.
如果中国经济能够较快复苏，则民工荒会加剧，且远比前几年厉害，有可能促使全面放开二胎政策的提前出台。未来中国经济发展的一大制约因素，必然是劳动力，特别是低端劳动力的供给不足。
If China’s economy recovers relatively quickly, dramatically increasing the  laborer shortage even more than the last few years, this may expedite the passing of the Two-Child Policy nationally.  A major limitation to China’s future growth will certainly be labor power, especially shortages in the supply of low-level labor.
Blogger Wan Yu, who calls herself a basic level family planning officer, says the One-Child Policy was adopted to meet the economic challenges caused by the Cultural Revolution, which ended in 1976 and resulted in widespread unemployment.  She says the policy was directed toward one generation of citizens and should be reviewed.
A deterioration of tradition family relationships is one of many problems Wan Yu cites with the continuation of the One-Child Policy.
…曾听见音像店播放一种儿歌，内容是“爸爸的哥哥是伯伯，妈妈的妹妹是姨妈……”，初听颇觉匪夷所思，细想不胜感慨，几代独生子女状态如果延缓下去，这些家庭伦常关系将成为历史遗迹，孩子们只有在儿歌里才能听明白，他们的社会关系会与现在出现极大差别。
I once heard a music store playing a children’s song that went like this: “My dad’s brother is my uncle.  My mom’s sister is my aunt…” When I first heard it I thought it was unbelievable and couldn’t help but sigh.  If generations of single children continue, the traditional family relationships of these families will become a historical artifact.  Children will know [these names] from children’s songs only.  Their social relationships will be extremely different from ours.
Blogger Shui Lian disagrees with the idea that a “Two-Child Policy” will permanently solve China’s demographic problems and argues that higher birth rates will continue the cycle of China’s once-endemic overpopulation problems.
…如果放开二胎政策的构想成为现实的话，为了养老就可以多生子女，那么，当这些子女老去的时候，他们又要依靠谁来养老呢？这不仅会人为增加社会养老的成本，而且势必加大每一个家庭的养老负担，是一种不折不扣的逻辑悖论。
If two-child policy thinking becomes a reality, and we can have more children in order to take care of the elderly, then who will they rely on to take care of them when they grow old?  This will not only artificially increase the costs of care for the elderly but will increase every household’s burden for caring for them.  It is purely a contradiction in logic.
Results from China’s sixth national census point to the possibility of an easing in family planning policy.  Southern Weekend reports that conditions that were once described as “population pressures” are now being called “advantages in human resources”.  What was once called “population control” has now been dubbed “population development”, the article says.

author: Don Weinland


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“Damas de Blanco:” A Week of Protest in Cuba · Global Voices
Susannah Vila

To the extent that the Castro brothers are, as Blog for Cuba writes, “afraid of women wearing white,” it's due to more than just the uniform color  of their outfits or their weekly marches through Old Havana.
The Damas de Blanco (Ladies wearing White) protests come on the heels of a flutter of international condemnation incited by the hunger striker Orlando  Zapata Tamayo's death last  month. An official  resolution was passed in the European Parliament, and a petition calling for the  immediate release  of all political prisoners that was posted  to a blog less than a  week ago has already been signed by Spanish director Pedro Almodovar and Peruvian   writer Mario Vargas Llosa. Meanwhile,  yet another hunger striker is  hospitalized in Havana after refusing asylum.
Wednesday's crackdown by Cuban police was the first in two years on the political group, which is made up of the daughters, wives and mothers of imprisoned political dissidents. They're commemorating the seventh anniversary of 2003's “Black Spring,” in which 75 dissidents were arrested, by marching every day in the Cuban capital.  In the most violent of the reactions to these protests, the women were reportedly attacked by a mob of pro-government Cubans and forced onto a bus by authorities.
We are protesting peacefully and we are not going to get on the bus of a government that has kept our family members in prison for seven years…
said the group leader, Laura Pollán, just before she was forced off the street and onto the bus. Repeating Islands quotes an AFP report, saying:
As police were taking the women away, Margarita Rodríguez, a housewife in a crowd of some 300 pro-government demonstrators, shouted: ‘Board them by force, it’s what they deserve. This is a provocation.’
This was the least of the slurs directed at the Ladies in White by the Castro supporters who flanked the marchers and pushed them towards the bus. In reaction to the violent antagonism among Cubans of different political viewpoints, Yoani Sanchez writes:
I shudder to imagine a Cuba where physical – and legal – attacks against people, for their political affiliation or ideological leanings, continue. What a sad country we will have if the authorities continue to consider it normal to ‘teach a good lesson’ to anyone who contradicts the official viewpoint. To me, a society that passively stands by as peaceful women with gladioli in their hands are bullied, as happened yesterday, is quite sick.
At Havana Times, Yusimi Rodriguez recounts turning a corner in Old Havana and realizing that this was not your everyday “Damas” march:
Coming down the street was a group of approximately twenty women dressed in civilian clothing and chanting slogans.  Around them flocked several reporters filming and taking pictures.  I suppose these were mainly or entirely foreign reporters.
At first I didn’t know what was happening until somebody told me it was about the Ladies in White. But none of the women I saw were wearing white, nor could I understand the first slogans they chanted.  But suddenly, at the closest spot I could reach, they began to shout, ‘Whoever doesn’t jump is a Yankee'…The women in the demonstration itself did indeed jump.  One even ran forward jumping with her two feet at the same time.  Finally that group went by and I was able to see —for the first time since I’d heard of them— the Ladies in White: a group of between fifteen and twenty women dressed in white. They all proceeded in silence and carried gladiola flowers. Around them were several uniformed police.
Rodriguez also notes the marked organization of the anti-government protesters:
I find it striking that these community women, who are not police or agents, have been able to become organized so well and interrupt the Ladies in White so quickly.  Could it be that they all come from the same neighborhood?  How did they find out about the march?   Was it publicized?  I was also surprised they were only women. Undoubtedly it would have looked very bad if men had faced up to the Ladies, especially if it was true that there was some pushing and shoving in the heat of moment, as someone said.  Between women it’s something else, there are more equal conditions.  Both sides were made up only of women: those from the community and the Ladies in White (who, by the way, are also Cuban women and therefore part of the broader Cuban community).
“One thing is clear these manifestations against the ladies in white at clearly organized by the regime,” writes Julio de la Yncera in a comment at Havana Times.
On Wednesday night, Cuban television aired a round table discussion about implicating international meddlers in the domestic unrest.  In this case, the government may be more on target than it would like: as bloggers and other online activists are showing, anger over human rights abuses within (and without) the island is swelling, and more people are watching to see what will happen next.

author: Susannah Vila


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French Guiana, Guadeloupe, Martinique: March 19th 1946 · Global Voices
Fabienne Flessel

Guadeloupean blogger Anba pyé mango-la  wonders [Fr] about the situation of French Guiana, Guadeloupe, Martinique and Reunion, former colonies which became the four overseas departments of the French Republic, sixty-four years ago.

author: Fabienne Flessel


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Iran: Obama’s Norouz message · Global Voices
Fred Petrossian

President Obama sends a message to those celebrating the Persian holiday of Nowruz (Norouz), and in particular to the people and government of Iran. Here is the message in You Tube with Persian subtitles.

author: Fred Petrossian


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Iran: Raising money for Iranian journalist refugees · Global Voices
Fred Petrossian

Balatarin web community is raising money for Iranian journalist refugees. The goal is to raise 15000 dollars.


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Iraq: Seven Years On · Global Voices
Salam Adil

But first… if you read no other blog this week read this one
Lubna writes:
Now, I want to share with all of you guys some of my own personal experience as a young woman living in Baghdad, may be that’ll give you an inside access to the sometimes very secret and seemingly mysterious world of ‘Middle Eastern women'…
So here I am saying it loud and clear : I am an Islamic feminist, my mom ran out of the house when I was 12 and we’ve never heard anything from her ever since, that’s right, she’s not dead, but I refuse to be judged by others according to what my mom did, Allah judges me according to my own actions only-not according to the actions of anyone else even if that anyone else was my mom, so all of you must do the same, all of you must accept me as I am
Seven Years On
With the recent elections still fresh in the news it is all too easy to forget that the anniversary of the start of the war is this week. But this will not pass some bloggers.
In a series of four posts, Layla Anwar marks the seventh anniversary of the invasion of Iraq with her memories of wars past. The power of her writing brings back vividly the pain of a people who have endured war after wars for more than fourty years. She writes:
One scene leads to another, like in a labyrinth…no wonder this is a door I never wanted to open…
War after War after War…back in the tunnel, swirling back…subtracting years, 1991, the fireworks of another liberation. 1980, 1973, 1967…I remember them all…one by one…
The same scene repeats itself…windows shattering, plastic and tapes, glued to the radio for the latest news, hoping batteries won't run out, and more sirens…all the sirens sound the same…Baghdad and beyond — same sirens, same wars…
Israeli air raids in 1967 and 1973, I was there too…I laugh when I think about it, laugh sarcastically, as if Destiny wanted me to be a witness…
I remember another shelter…this one was very damp…it was in the basement of a building…not really a shelter but more like an underground storage room…it smelled bad…humidity and piss…I remember Dad grabbing the radio, and Mom pulling me by the arm – Yalla Layla, let's go…and I'd hear the thunder outside shaking the earth beneath my feet…and after so many rounds of “punishment” from the Sky, I'd say to my mother – do we really have to go to this dark room, can't we just die here in our home ?
I remember her just pulling me by the arm down the stairs — no time for a reply, every minute counted…hurrying down the stairs whilst everything shook…and ending up in that dark humid, smelly room, smelling of rot and piss…there would be several families there…again each family would take a corner, gather and huddle together…waiting for the final verdict, waiting for the final sentence, waiting…to see if God, the Universe, MIG fighter jets…decide who will live and who will die that day…
And so it is in this part of the world, from 2010 to all the way back…their raids and bullets fly over your head taking you from up and their articles take you from down….and they still shove them under your nose telling you how oppressive – oppressed you are…
and Iraq Pundit makes a defiant statement: Iraq will never fall apart. He writes:
The outsider view of Iraq is that it is crumbling. There is a deep sectarian divide that is difficult to heal, according to outsiders. Experts for hire declare: “It could get really nasty,” says Joost Hilterman of ICG. “I'm utterly unconvinced that the Iraqi institutions are strong enough to withstand that kind of conflict.” Of course he would say something negative, he has been arguing against Iraq all along. He can't believe Iraqis can get along because he would not longer have an act. He and others have built entire careers on the idea that Iraq is a failure.
To outsiders, it's a divide between Sunnis and Shiites. This is based on what Iraqis consider a war of attrition between al-Qaeda and the Iranian militias. Naturally they coopted locals into the battle, but Iraqis by nature don't focus on Sunni-Shiite differences.
Post Election Talk
With Inside Iraq's summary of the latest results showing that the election on 7th March is still too close to call there is only speculation in the blogs.
Laith wonders about the whole point of the election:
In all the election all over the world, the majority is the one who form the government but in Iraq, it looks that our political parties have a different ideology for election… It looks that our politicians want to design a kind of democracy that fits their demands and wishes regardless the wish of millions of people who voted only to have a real national government that can provides their basic needs which they have been waiting to gain for decades.
If we are going to see the same sectarian and ethnic sharing in the coming government and since our election aims only to share the positions among the political parties, then why did we participate in election. In fact the right question should be (why do we even have election?)
Ladybird  gives her analysis of the post election conflicts and predicts the worst scenario for the Americans in the elections. She writes:
Washington’s worst scenario right now, is that any understanding occurs between Syrian — Saudi Arabia during the conflict tactics will lead to the rise of a unity government and a new Iraqi nationalism, leads to the emergence of unexpected election results similar to the results created by the new Lebanese cabinet recently, which are formed as a background of an understanding between Syria — Saudi Arabia, and led to a major coup in the agenda of regional Middle East policy.
To look at his blog you would think of him as an average American. Yet, Ramsin voted in the Iraqi election even though he grew up a world away from Iraq and his parents left some twenty years before he was born. He gives his reasons why he took part in the out of country vote (OCV):
Until Iraq’s democracy moves past its post-conflict illiberal stage, OCV-eligible voters have a duty to express their franchise in solidarity not with some interest group but rather with the principle of democracy itself. That is the story behind my purple finger.
And Dr. Human wrote:
Actually I hate politics , and I dont want my head to ache me because of it , I thought not to go to the election , but then I thoght they may play with my paper and fill it with a person that we never want him .. !! so I went and [gave] my vote to a person after I read his C.V. on the net ,and I saw that he is an active person and has nice projects ..

author: Salam Adil


text:
Macedonia: If There Was No Internet · Global Voices
Filip Stojanovski

Macedonian bloggers and other new media users offered their own responses to the question “How internet changed your life?”, posed in an article [MKD] on BBC's Macedonian language site.
Darko Buldioski of Komunikacii.net applied a style figure reminiscent of Slavic antithesis to rephrase the question into “If I had no internet…” and posted the following answers:
I would not have…
Linking to the relevant South Park episode – “Over Logging” – Buldioski also invited others to share their thoughts.
Dozens of Twitter users offered their opinions via the hashtag #danemaseinternet [MKD] or “If there was no Internet”…
…and a number of them blamed the internet for not being in shape, lack of muscle mass or excess fatty tissue.
Marjan Zabrcanec considers his blog Golemata slika  (The Big Picture) and his Twitter and Facebook profiles his “loudspeakers” for exercising his right to the freedom of speech. He explained [MKD] that he opened his first e-mail account 15 years ago, and that without internet he would not have known “which topics and arguments are used by debaters from all over the world. Research would have been tremendously hard. Now, there's Debatopedia,” and would not have been able to effectively manage his NGO, or offer cheap but powerful internet marketing campaigns for the clients of his current employer.
Vasilka Dimitrovska reckoned [MKD] that without Internet she would have never learned how to blog and use new media to “detect, present and protect cultural heritage,” and influence the public opinion, including appearing on TV.
…I would have remained just one more archeologist in the sea of unknown and anemic archeologists in Macedonia without any attention from the society, and with even less respect.
Ribaro  (The Fisherman) responded via a vlog post, with audio in Macedonian and English subtitles.
Viktor Arsovski wrote [MKD] that without Internet he probably would have continued to teach English, and not take part in the founding of IT.com.mk, and…
Bloggers who posted on this subject also included Kihu Potru [MKD], who emphasized the Internet's importance in sharing art and establishing connections between artists – from visuals to haiku; Kuzmanov [MKD]; Martin [MKD]; and Dzaman [MKD].
Finaly, some people responded through comments on blogs of others, like Oksimoron, who said [MKD]:
If there was no internet… I would have walked around more, I would have been a better housewife, and would not look silly laughing alone in front of the monitor :-)
Nadezhna said [MKD]:
- I now read more books, and they are much cheaper :)
– Someone listens to my voice (reads my blog).
– The Internet helped me to get a job.
PRoom noted [MKD] that without Internet:
…would not have enrolled into post-graduate studies (found over the Internet)
– I would not have stayed awake till 5 in the morning
– I would not have known many of my current friends
– I would not have been able to book a hotel in Nice
– I would not have been able to surprise my loved ones who are far away with gifts
And for certain I would not have known that one day the Internet will die [MKD] ;)

author: Filip Stojanovski