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If You Doubt Peru’s National Confidence, Just Check Out Its Cherished Military Parade · Global Voices
Juan Arellano

Parade celebrating the 194th anniversary of Peru's Proclamation of Independence. July 29, 2015. Image: Galería del Ministerio de Defensa del Perú / Flickr / CC 2.0.
Unlike many countries, Peru enjoys its national holidays for two consecutive days: July 28 and 29. The festivities kick off on the 28, when the country celebrates Liberator General Don Jose de San Martín declaring Peru's independence from Spain in 1821. On this day, Peruvian officials traditionally attend Mass and singing Te Deum, with the president and other important figures of authority all in attendance. The president also addresses the nation from Congress, and receives the best wishes of diplomats and state authorities in the government palace.
This year's celebrations also included a transfer-of-power, as President Ollanta Humala left Peru's presidency to its new leader, Pedro Pablo Kuczynski, who took the oath of allegiance along with his new cabinet.
Despite the fun and excitement of July 28, it's actually the next day that many Peruvians await most eagerly. On this day, the Great Military Parade of Peru takes place showcasing members of the armed forces and national police. Over the years, the parade has taken place in many different settings, however, it now takes place in centric Brasil Avenue, with some spectators arriving before sunrise to ensure they get seats. On the other hand, some prefer to watch from the comfort of their homes, instead of fighting their way through the crowds—a task made easier thanks to the event being broadcast live on almost all public TV channels.
Preparations for the military parade typically start a week before the event. This year, installation and setup started on July 18 with the cordoning off of roads and the installation of traffic-detour plans.
Despite the parade's huge popularity, however, not everyone agrees with its relevance and some even question its existence entirely.
Te Deum y Desfile Militar. No hay mejores formas de celebrar la independencia en democracia? Pienso que sí!.
— Jeffrey Radzinsky (@jradzinsky) July 25, 2016
Te Deum and Military Parade. Are there no better ways to celebrate independence in democracy? I think yes!
. No entiendo la necesidad y sentido de una #ParadaMilitar: exhibiendo orgullosos armas cuando nuestro país vive tanta #InseguridadCiudadana
— Victor Santillán (@Santinikitan) July 27, 2016
I don't understand the need or reason for a Military Parade: proudly exhibiting guns when our country faces so much insecurity.
But, generally speaking, Peruvians do celebrate the parade. And those who attend in person get there hours early:
#FOTOS Personas siguen ubicandose en la Av. Brasil para ser testigos de la Gran #ParadaMilitar (Foto: H. Vinces) pic.twitter.com/gFyMvxzdob
— Agencia Andina (@Agencia_Andina) July 29, 2016
Photos: People still getting themselves to la Av. Brasil to witness the great Military Parade.
Así está el ambiente en la avenida Brasil a una hora del inicio de la #ParadaMilitarhttps://t.co/T7GxnZYzdIpic.twitter.com/bO7I9XSwks
— Diario Perú21 (@Peru21pe) July 29, 2016
This is the atmosphere now in la avenida Brasil one hour until the start of the Military Parade.
Gran #ParadaMilitar: la ‘previa’ al desfile en #fotoshttps://t.co/mbyaArXzLKpic.twitter.com/MvGEXB4yrB
— Sociedad El Comercio (@sociedad_ECpe) July 29, 2016
Great Military Parade: The ‘preview’ to the parade in photos https://t.co/mbyaArXzLKpic.twitter.com/MvGEXB4yrB
Vendors also make the most of the occasion by offering their products to the large crowds.
Comparte las curiosidades de la #ParadaMilitar con el hashtag #MiDesfilePatrio➡https://t.co/BrBzPpZcWZpic.twitter.com/MeFYAC4pah
— RPP Noticias (@RPPNoticias) July 29, 2016
Share your curiosities of the Military Parade with the hashtag #MiDesfilePatrio [My Patriotic Parade]
The Peruvian president, in his capacity of head of the armed forces, presides over the parade, which begins with canonfire, firecrackers, and a big band.
PPK otorga el permiso y se inicia de manera oficial la #ParadaMilitar https://t.co/T7GxnZYzdI 🇵🇪 pic.twitter.com/A3uIPstEFg
— Diario Perú21 (@Peru21pe) July 29, 2016
PPK [Pedro Pablo Kuczynski] grants permission and officially initiates the Military Parade.
#Perú 21 camaretazos para dar inicio a la #ParadaMilitar por #FiestasPatriaspic.twitter.com/z7Yxu7kIZm
— Jaime Herrera (@JaimeteleSUR) July 29, 2016
#Perú: 21 Canons to signal the start of the Military Parade during the national holidays pic.twitter.com/z7Yxu7kIZm
La la banda de música @naval_peru hace su paso por la #ParadaMilitar@larepublica_pepic.twitter.com/e3siCsaSlX
— Eduardo Salinas (@eduardo_yayo) July 29, 2016
The music band @naval_peru make their way to the Military Parade @larepublica_pepic.twitter.com/e3siCsaSlX
This year, representations from foreign countries were the first to march.
Miembros de las Fuerzas Armadas de Bolivia, Argentina y Colombia participan en la #ParadaMilitar#ElPeruImportapic.twitter.com/Wh2eafuldD
— Anny Gamarra (@annygamarra1) July 29, 2016
Members of the Bolivian, Argentinian and Colombian Armed Forces participate in the Militray Parade #ElPeruImporta [Peru Matters] pic.twitter.com/Wh2eafuldD
Peruvian representatives of United Nations Peacekeeping were also present.
Cascos azules, que ganaron el Premio Nobel de La Paz en 1988, y su paso por la #ParadaMilitar (Foto: @aaronormeno) pic.twitter.com/kOn60vxTZb
— El Comercio (@elcomercio) July 29, 2016
1998 Noble Prize winning Peacekeepers on the march at the Military Parade (Photo@aaronormeno) pic.twitter.com/kOn60vxTZb
Organizations such as the Fire Brigade, made up solely of volunteers, also paraded.
#ParadaMilitar con los bomberos. Su sola presencia ya incita aplausos y más pic.twitter.com/gidzT1MLSl
— Eddú R.Ramírez (@Eduvic3031) July 29, 2016
Military Parade with the Fire Brigade. Their presence alone was enough to incite applause and more.
But the bulk of the parade consisted of the various factions of Peru's Armed Forces.
#ParadaMilitar | Regimiento de Caballería Mariscal Domingo Nieto toca La flor de la canela https://t.co/ulbDoci6lgpic.twitter.com/m2GMwSxvhQ
— Diario La República (@larepublica_pe) July 29, 2016
Military Parade. Mariscal Domingo Nieto's Cavalry Regiment is playing “Cinammon flower.”
Desfila el comando de Fuerzas Especiales del Ejército actualmente realiza operaciones en el Vraem pic.twitter.com/oRpYkRg75x
— Agencia Andina (@Agencia_Andina) July 29, 2016
Parading the current commander of the Special Armed Forces in the VRAEM.
.@PoliciaPeru uno de los mejores del desfile en la #ParadaMilitar Aquí parte de la destreza de los cadetes! pic.twitter.com/HTSeMLEvvE
— Anny Gamarra (@annygamarra1) July 29, 2016
@PoliciaPeru one of the best of the day in the Military Parade. Some of the skills here of the cadets!
“Al cielo iré y volaré🎵……” Por la patria! #LosSinchis del @EjercitoPeru en la #ParadaMilitarpic.twitter.com/cASgrpa9cN
— Anny Gamarra (@annygamarra1) July 30, 2016
“I'll go to the sky and fly🎵……”For the fatherland! #LosSinchis of @EjercitoPeru [Peruvian Army] in the Military Parade.
Tanques del Ejército se desplazan en la #ParadaMilitar por la #FiestadelaPatriapic.twitter.com/TABwoTtjnn — América Noticias (@noticiAmerica) July 29, 2016
Army tanks making moves in Military Parade for the Homeland's Party. pic.twitter.com/TABwoTtjnn
To add a historical touch to the day's proceedings, a tank of Czech origin that participated in the Peru-Ecuador War in 1941 was present. Technicians specially refurbished the tank so it would be in good working condition for the parade.
#VIDEO: Tanques del Ejército desfilan ante el estrado oficial de la #ParadaMilitarpic.twitter.com/5ylXAboYCF
— Agencia Andina (@Agencia_Andina) July 29, 2016
#VIDEO: Army tanks parade before the official Military Parade.
One of the most highly anticipated parts of the event, and not only for children, is the march of the police dogs.
La brigada canina de la @PoliciaPeru hace su desplazamiento en la #ParadaMilitar@elcomerciopic.twitter.com/68usVgLgv4 — Miguel Rocca (@miguelrocca) July 29, 2016
The canine brigade of the @PoliciaPeru [Peruvian Police] make their move in the Military Parade.
La brigada canina para muchos es lo más esperado de la Gran #ParadaMilitarhttps://t.co/T7GxnZYzdI🇵🇪pic.twitter.com/KpQVUiWmix
— Diario Perú21 (@Peru21pe) July 29, 2016
The canine brigade is the main event for many in the great Military Parade.
Hasta el perro peruano con chullo participa de la #ParadaMilitar. pic.twitter.com/OnZX5sAf8e
— Julisa DulantoVargas (@JulissaDulanto) July 29, 2016
Even the Peruvian dog with a wooly hat is participating in the Military Parade.
Congressman General Donayre, a retired soldier, has become a regular presence in television reports on the parade in recent years. Donayre has many critics, however, thanks to his tendency to make politically incorrect remarks on air.
#PeruFesteja No hay #ParadaMilitar sin los comentarios del Gral. Donayre pic.twitter.com/jSXBKnR2fr
— Lima Cero (@Lima_Cero) July 29, 2015
Peruvian Party: There's no Military Parade without comments from General Donayre.
General Donayre se despide de trollear toda la transmisión a Maritere y a Lorena Álvarez. 😂#ParadaMilitarpic.twitter.com/UKstuFKZ5T
— Renato Falcón (@Renatilio) July 29, 2016
General Donayre trolling the whole transmission of Maritere and Lorena Álvarez. 😂
Two members of Peru's Armed Forced helped mark the end of this year's parade with a dance performance.
Así cerraron la #ParadaMilitar
¡Viva el Perú! 🇵🇪pic.twitter.com/5KEFczcAQe
— Floro The King ® (@FloroPeruano) July 29, 2016
And that's how they closed the Military Parade. Long live Peru! 🇵🇪pic.twitter.com/5KEFczcAQe
Thousands of limeños (the inhabitants of Peru's capital city, Lima) then continued the parade after it officially ended, meeting at Brasil Avenue for the unofficial celebrations, while soldiers returned to their barracks.
Delegaciones son recibidas con aplausos al término de la parada en Plaza Bolognesi. #CelebroconTVPerupic.twitter.com/yKtxwu5wSk
— Manuel Igreda (@Elmejormanuel) July 29, 2016
Delegates are received with appaluse at the end of the parade in the Plaza Bolognesi.
Plaza Bolognesi totalmente abarrotada. #CelebroconTVPerupic.twitter.com/jD7twjaTpK
— Manuel Igreda (@Elmejormanuel) July 29, 2016
Plaza Bolognesi completely jam-packed.
This year's celebrations seemed to many to be particularly joyful, and some credit newly appointed President Kuczynski with the good vibes and new sense of national optimism. But Peru's new president faces an adversarial congress that promises to make political compromise, let alone political progress, far more complicated than before.

author: Juan Arellano


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In Mexico, Rio 2016 Will be Broadcast on Digital Media, Shutting Off Open TV · Global Voices
J. Tadeo

Opening of the Olympic Village #Río2016. Photo by Flickr user CONADE. Used under CC 2.0 license.
The XXXI Olympic Games were inaugurated on Friday August 5, 2016 in the Maracanã Stadium of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. About 11,239 competitors from 206 nations are taking part in these games, including members of the Olympic Refugee Team.
Normally, news focuses on the athletes themselves: Who will and will not be participating? How many records will be broken? What country will win the most medals? etc. At Global Voices, in addition to these questions, we ask ourselves: What about the spectators? How will the events be seen by those who don't make the trip to Rio?
Image of Mexican sports fans shared on Flickr by the user James Willamor. Used under CC 2.0 license.
In Mexico, for the first time, spectators will be able to follow the competitions that capture their interest without having to rely on the leading TV companies such as Televisa and TV Azteca, because they now have the choice of watching the events unfold for free on the internet, or via traditional (paid) cable television. This is a result of one of Mexico's business magnate, Carlos Slim, acquiring the transmission rights for the smartphone platform of his company América Móvil, and the live transmission via his internet channel, Claro Sports. The website Sopitas has this to say on the topic:
En 2013 la empresa de Carlos Slim obtuvo la licencia exclusiva del Comité Olímpico Internacional (COI) para la transmisión de las actividades en todas las plataformas de medios en América Latina…
In 2013 Carlos Slim's company obtained exclusive license from the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to transmit the Games’ events on all of the media platforms in Latin America…
On Twitter, users have commented on the impact this will have on the big TV companies:
Hablemos de juegos Olimpicos solo para molestar a los de Televisa y Television Azteca
— Cesar Sahagun (@Unpayaso) 4 de agosto de 2016
Let's talk about the Olympic games just to annoy Televisa and Television Azteca.
Twitter user Disque DJ made the following commentary:
No juegos olímpicos en las 2 grandes televisoras de señal abierta!!!! ese Slim es un loquillo…
— Disque DJ (@eldisque) 3 de agosto de 2016
There are no olympic games on the two big TV stations!!! that Slim is crazy…
Meanwhile, Forbes referred to the multi-million dollar implications of Slim's strategy:
Ninguna de las dos cadenas de televisión abierta más importante del país tendrán el evento deportivo más importante del mundo: los JO. Esto significa dinero. En términos financieros se traduce en que dejarán de ingresar, al menos, unos 45 mdd (847 millones de pesos) en ventas de publicidad, de acuerdo con datos de la consultora MX Sports y valoraciones de Sportcal.
Neither of the most important broadcasters in Mexico will televise the most important sporting event in the world: the Olympic Games. This means a major loss of revenue. In financial terms it translates to a loss of at least $US 45 million (847 million pesos) in advertising, according to information from the consultant MX Sports and assessments by Sportcal.
This innovative form of transmission of the Olympics is geared towards all of the Latin American public, and not only Mexico, because Mr. Slim's company has a presence in 16 countries in Central and South America. In an interview for the online version of the Mexican newspaper La Jornada, a representative stated:
Con esta forma de transmitir un evento de relevancia mundial, por medio de smartphones, tablets y computadoras, estamos llevando la tecnología y las telecomunicaciones a un nivel superior. Nuestra apuesta es que los Juegos Olímpicos Río 2016 sean los más vistos en la historia. Lo que buscamos es expandir la forma en la que la gente pueda disfrutar de esta justa deportiva, dándoles el control a elegir lo que desean ver en la plataforma que quieran en el momento que quieran, desde donde sea que se encuentren…
By using this form of televising an event of worldwide interest, on smartphones, tablets, and computers, we are taking technology and telecommunications to the next level. Our bet is that the Olympic Games of Rio 2016 will be the most watched in history. We are looking to expand the ways in which people can enjoy this sporting event, giving them control to choose what they want to watch on the platform of their choice at a time that works for them, from wherever they are…
In these Olympics, the traditional media players could lose ground if the tycoon Carlos Slim's platform works as expected. In Mexico in particular, a few doubts have been raised after another businessman, Jorge Vergara, also turned his back on the big broadcasters to launch a platform, ChivasTV, exclusively for his football team. A few days after its debut, it experienced numerous technical difficulties, which provoked the displeasure of its viewers. As a matter of fact, netizen Nelson Ned Stark has already used Twitter to denounce the first shortcomings he has encountered with Slim's platform:
Oye @ClaroSports tu transmision me anda haciendo un #ChivasTV y apenas vamos empezando…no podre ver nada en simultaneo de seguir asi.
— Nelson Ned Stark (@VaroTOON) 3 de agosto de 2016
Hey @ClaroSports your transmission is pulling a #ChivasTV on me and we're hardly getting started… I won't be able to see anything live if this keeps up.
We will be keeping track of the Olympic Games, but also of the way in which spectators are following the event now that the main media companies in Mexico will only have limited coverage, and viewing options for other countries in the region have expanded.

source: news-globalvoices

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

author: J. Tadeo


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On the Eve of Independence Celebrations, Jamaicans Delight in the Rio 2016 Olympics Opening Ceremony · Global Voices
Emma Lewis

Rio 2016 Olympic Games Opening Ceremony; photo by Andy Miah, used under a CC BY-NC 2.0 license.
The Jamaican Twittersphere is a lively combination of debates that often return to where they started, and wit that is even more humorous when posted in Patois, a Creole dialect which many feel should be made the official language of the country.
On the eve of the 54th anniversary of Jamaica's independence from Great Britain, as Twitter users sat down to watch the opening ceremony of the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, the conversation was both hilarious and engaging, covering everything from fashion to politics.
Weary of the news cycle about the U.S. presidential election, broadcast journalist Dionne Jackson Miller had some advice for the hopefuls:
Dear Trump & Clinton: #Rio2016 going on. Take a break. Have a seat – in front of a TV.
— Dionne JacksonMiller (@djmillerJA) August 6, 2016
Generally, Jamaicans gave the spectacle of the opening ceremony a firm thumbs up. A young human rights activist tweeted:
The #OpeningCeremony is amazing 😍
— Jherane – YDRIL (@Jherane_) August 5, 2016
Business consultant and children's advocate Deika Morrison declared:
Vibesy Brazil #OpeningCeremony
— Deika Morrison (@deikamorrison) August 5, 2016
She also approved of the green theme of the ceremony, observing:
Like I said…if whole world is gonna watch you, use it to bring awareness for stuff that matters. Well done Brazil. Two thumbs up from me.
— Deika Morrison (@deikamorrison) August 5, 2016
JN Foundation‘s Saffrey Brown also approved:
The Athletes Forest. A truly wonderful legacy @Rio2016 #JAM #TTO @Petchary @TerriKarelle @EmprezzGolding @RossSheil pic.twitter.com/LleG6N3KI7
— Saffrey Brown (@SaffreyB) August 5, 2016
Sports reporter Andre Lowe compared the ceremony to two previous Olympiads, concluding:
Experienced my third Olympic Opening Ceremony. Beijing, London, Rio. Liked them all for different reasons. Beijing definitely my favourite
— Andre Lowe (@AndreLoweJA) August 6, 2016
He added:
This had a very ‘human’ and sensitive touch to it though. Timely and necessary https://t.co/pIYt5OJZ6P
— Andre Lowe (@AndreLoweJA) August 6, 2016
Anticipation grew once the Parade of Nations began, with some complaining about the long wait for the Jamaican team to appear. Blogger Mamachell quipped:
!!!! RT @ViewsFrom876JA: Waiting on the letter J like…. pic.twitter.com/2SeshTgrcM
— Mamachell (@mamachell) August 6, 2016
But it was worth the wait. When the Jamaican team finally appeared, flag-bearer and champion sprinter Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce's hair (which had hitherto been under wraps) was the talk of Twitter.
Fraser-Pryce, who is hugely popular at home, is set to receive an honorary degree from the University of the West Indies in October. Many Jamaicans shared complimentary tweets from Cosmopolitan magazine and other non-Jamaican accounts praising her gold and green tresses, which perfectly matched the colors of the Jamaican flag:
HAIR GOALS 💚💛💚💛💚💛💚💛 #Rio2016 pic.twitter.com/OIL9uQEExb
— Cosmopolitan (@Cosmopolitan) August 6, 2016
Bap bap! #ShellyWithThePatrioticHair #JAM #OpeningCeremony https://t.co/Gql2Dt7Zw3
— Tracey Alayo Wisdom (@writtenbytracey) August 6, 2016
Some were disappointed, speculating as to why sprint superstar Usain Bolt was absent from the Parade of Nations. Although he claimed he was “lazy,” his absence may have been for security reasons. Fellow gold medalist Fraser-Pryce explained on Facebook:
Looks like the organizers are not taking any chances with the #1 person of the event. Sir Bolt will not be attending the Opening Ceremony. Security tight when it comes to UB and his safety. Besides after 3 previous experience[s] do you really need to attend a 4th😄😄 #OpeningCeremonyUpdate #SafetyFirst
Apart from Fraser-Pryce's hair, the hit of the evening — at least among female Jamaicans — was Tonga's flag bearer Pita Nikolas Taufatofua, who appeared shirtless in traditional costume, with a well-oiled torso. This caused quite a flutter:
Tonga to di werl #Rio2016 #OpeningCeremony
— ♀Šonj.N.Štan.Niaah▲ (@CultureDoctor) August 6, 2016
There was, at times, both complimentary and caustic commentary on the other teams’ costumes. Analyst and lecturer Dr. Hume Johnson tweeted:
Won't lie, The American #RalphLauren designed Olympic suits are very sleek, sophisticated. I like…#OpeningCeremony #Rio2016
— HumeReports (@DrHumeJohnson) August 6, 2016
When the Croatian team appeared in their red and white checkers, one Jamaican tweeted:
Croatia come in them tablecloth.
— Eleanor of Aquitaine (@EleanorAnn_) August 6, 2016
On the Swedes’ outfits, writer Gwyneth Harold Davidson tweeted:
It looked like an Abba costume, so it was all good for me. #SuperTrooper https://t.co/2MbZain1pi
— Gwyneth Davidson (@HighWindJa) August 6, 2016
While local TV coverage was interrupted by frequent short breaks for advertisements (and the Lotto draw), Jamaicans were awed by the lighting of the torch. Columnist and businesswoman Jean Lowrie-Chin shared a video clip on Instagram, while entrepreneur Javette Nixon reacted:
Absofreakinglutely spectacular Olympic flame. #OlympicFlame #OpeningCeremony
— Javette Nixon (@Jah_vetted) August 6, 2016
Some tweets hit a sour note, as Jamaicans and other Caribbean nationals traded jibes. Jamaican food writer and photographer Stephen Charoo remonstrated:
Guys, let's not use the Rio Olympics as yet another avenue for regional disunity. We better dan dat
— CHAROO, Stephen (@esteban876) August 6, 2016
Putting differences aside, Caribbean nationals are expected to do well, especially in track and field. With the excitement — and rivalry, at least amongst the fans — continuing to simmer, the Caribbean lifestyle website Largeup.com shared its list of Top Ten Caribbean Athletes to Watch; there were no real surprises.
Finally, this atmospheric photo tweeted by the Views From 876 summed up the mood of Jamaican pride and patriotism:
Jamaicans in RIO #TeamJamaica #JAM pic.twitter.com/WZHnau1QxA
— Views From 876 (@ViewsFrom876JA) August 5, 2016
Happy Independence Day, Jamaica!

author: Emma Lewis


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Porn, Prostitution, or Death: Being Trans in Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa · Global Voices
Sana Saleem

Transwomen celebrate Eid in Pakistan. Photo Courtesy Trans Action Pakistan.
In June, three armed men broke into a home in Mansehra and attempted to rape the person living there, whom they ended up shooting several times. That person is a transgender woman named Kashi, who is only one of many transgender women in Pakistan to have been attacked in recent months. In May, Alehsa, a transgender woman and an activist with the group “Trans Action”, died in the hospital after being shot six times by attackers. Before hear death, Alesha was being propositioned to film pornographic videos, which she refused to do.
Pakistan’s trans community has made some strides in recent years. In 2012, the Pakistani Supreme Court allowed for a “third gender” category to be added to national identity cards, which effectively gave the trans community increased legal standing and the right to vote. At least five transgender women ran for office. Attacks against the community remain widespread, however, and the violence has been increasing in recent years. Since the beginning of 2016, nearly 45 transgender women have been attacked in just the province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
The term generally used by the trans community in South Asia to describe itself is khwaaja sira, and gender identity includes being transsexual, khusra (transgender person), zenanans (cross dressers), and narnbans (eunuch).
The Khwaja Siras live in their own communities led by a Guru (teacher), adopting young boys who are rejected by their families or flee. The community is generally self-sustaining, though many members work as professional dancers or sex workers. Given limited work opportunities, they are at high-risk for being targeted with violence when performing at weddings and parties. They're often targeted when performing sex work, as well.
The organization Trans Action Khyber Pakhthunkhwa routinely shares details about attacks on the transgender community:
Sex work is illegal in Pakistan and members of the transgender community are often at great risk. Even trans individuals who are not sex workers, however, have reported being harassed and intimidated into performing sex acts. Trans women in Peshawar have recently started posting on Facebook about violent treatment by local police officers against the trans community.
In the video above, a transgender woman explains how police arrested their guru in the middle of a party:
We were at a party when the police came they took our guru so we went after them. We are already a laughing stock, people mock and chase us, so of course the police did not let us go inside the police station so we decided to protest and chanting “let us in, let us in”, some boys that were standing nearby threw a rock at the gate, so the police came in from behind us (..) they grabbed and beat us up severely. Look at their condition, they tore off their clothes (..) they tore off my clothes as well and beat me up badly. Six policemen were on top of me kicking me and I passed out. Even when I passed out they kept kicking me and said “get up, get up, stop acting” (..). They grabbed and pulled off their hair and beat up others with sticks. What is our fault? We just went after our guru? What could we have done to the police? They even take money from us (extortion) and even take money from our guru, so what is our fault?
In another video, transwomen from the town of Nowshera reported being detained for ten hours by police officers:
Seven Transgender women were kept in illegal confinement yesterday for 10 hours by Nowshera Cantt Police Station. There shirts were taken off and they were sexualy harrased. Police kept on touching thier diffrent body parts forcefully.
Transwomen from the town of Faislabad, Punjab, are leading a campaign after three transwomen were gang raped by two men last week. In a series of heartbreaking videos, a trans woman named Julie describes the assault and the attempts to shame and silence her and the other victims with subsequent threats of further violence.
In an environment where trans people feel that even the police are not taking serious action against criminals, they have taken to social media to draw attention to the rising discrimination and assaults against their community. Videos shared on Facebook show Julie and her supporters protesting at a local hospital after an on-duty doctor who was supposed to examine her injuries told her simply to “let it go”.
Despite several protests, a police report, and multiple press conferences, many in the trans community feels they are being mocked and silenced, while the violence against them continues with impunity.
Trans people across the country are uniting in their efforts to highlight systemic violence and marginalization. Despite threats, they're continuing efforts to mobilize, demanding that the local authorities take actions to protect them. In a Facebook post, Trans Action Khyber Pakhthunkhwa reminded followers that it will continue to fight for trans rights:
We know our rights and we are standing up to claim them.its just the begining. We are a movemnt, we are pink warriors. There is no going back. We are equal citizens of Pakistan. We refuse to sit back. Despite of all the challanges and obstacles we have managed to stage a protest out side the Bolton Block where Alisha died.
#EndTransPhobia
#TransAction

author: Sana Saleem


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#RallyForTheValley Brings Attention to the Plight of Dam Victims in India · Global Voices
Ajin K Thomas

Protesters at the #RallyForTheValley. Image by Suresh Ediga. Used with permission
Hundreds of people from many places in India joined a protest at Indore Station on July 30 under the banner ‘Rally for the Valley’, in support of 45,000 families whose homes are on the verge of being submerged due to a river dam.
In 2014, the government of Gujarat state, in western India, permitted the height of the Sardar Sarovar Dam on the Narmada River to be increased by 17 metres (from 122 to 139 metres), and now the government has taken steps to fill the dam to its full reservoir level.
Medha Patkar, a social activist, politician and one of the initiators of the Narmada Bachao Andolan, a resistance movement that grew alongside the dam, says that if implemented, this decision will affect the livelihoods of more than 45,000 families.
Welcoming 100s of supporters 4m all over country at Indore railway station #RallyForTheValley #NarmadaSatyagraha pic.twitter.com/rugPnXSmke
— Medha Patkar (@medhanarmada) July 29, 2016
#RallyForTheValley #Stopbigdam #zindabad #copstoguard #youngchampstoroar pic.twitter.com/9rIqnvdUwn
— Amos A F Lazarus (@AmosLazarus) July 31, 2016
Strong women participation in #RallyForTheValley #NarmadaSatyagraha @NarmadaBachao pic.twitter.com/eObRtIHe4s
— Avinash chanchal (@AvinashChanchal) July 30, 2016
On the same day, another rally titled ‘Narmada Jal-Zameen Haq Satyagrah’ (Satyagraha or ‘Insistence for Truth’ for Narmada water and land rights) commenced on the banks of Narmada River in Badwani district of the central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh. The participants included indigenous victims already evicted and are living in different resettlement and rehabilitation sites offered by the government. Suresh Ediga, uploaded the video of the protests in Facebook:
Students from Kerala marching in solidarity from Badwani to Rajghat and singing in unison passionately and fierce fully all along the way.
Almost 350 – 400 people representing various organizations across the country from Gujarat to Kerala to Delhi to Odisha to Jharkhand to Maharashtra to Bangalore joined the Narmada Jal – Jameen Haq Satyagraha.
Image from the rally. Photo by Suresh Ediga. Used with permission
Right from its inception, the Sardar Sarovar Project, one of the largest hydroelectric projects in the world, has been subject to harsh criticism.
Rishit Neogi writes at CounterCurrents:
31 years ago people living along the vicinity of River Narmada rose up against a government decision to convert the pristine river into a series of dams and reservoirs which would submerge their lands. In these 31 years much is gained and a lot lost but nothing is forgotten. Narmada Bachao Andolan till this date remains the largest people’s mobilization around environment that this country has ever seen.
The Pipri village in Badwani district has over 600 houses, who said NO to the survey by the government and NO to their paltry compensation as well. Image by Suresh Ediga. Used with permission
Writers, filmmaker, artists, academics and environmental activists have criticized the official policy regarding the dam as not seriously considering the fate of those affected by it. Kailash Awasya, who has been associated Narmada Bachao Andolan for the past 25 years, writes:
The height increase work has finished in the Sardar Samovar Project which is a blatant violation of law and judgements of the Supreme Court. They should have initiated the rehabilitation of people in the affected areas first, and then only started the work [..]
Since 2014, when the current National Democratic Government took power in Delhi, the Narmada Bachan Andolan has been spearheading protests against officials’ handling of the dam, which they say has marginalised the communities affected by it, among others in the periphery. Some reports point to families being excluded from the list of people deserving compensation and rehabilitation. A whole township, Dharampuri, is no where to be found on the project-affected list.
#JalSatyagraha #RallyForTheValley Image by Suresh Ediga. Used with permission.
The Narmada Bachao Andolan is often heralded as one of the largest non-violent resistance movements in India. It has been constantly engaged in grassroots research and activism and fought court battles in an effort to get justice for those affected by the dam. Writing for the political commentary site Kafila, Ashwin V.S, who had been a volunteer with the organisation for the past three months, accuses the dam project of being an all-around disaster:
The construction of the Sardar Sarovar Dam is complete and the gates remain to be closed. Cases of massive corruption, undeniable environmental damage and loss to property and life accompany this disaster while the projected benefits of the project have also succumbed to forces of private capital and are being diverted for their benefit than to any of the project-affected people.
If government apathy continues, so will the devastation for the people who rely on the river.

author: Ajin K Thomas


text:
The Disappearance of Literary and Social Activist Wahid Baloch · Global Voices
Sana Saleem

Photo of Wahid Baloch by the artist Khuda Buksh Abro.
Wahid Baloch, a Baloch literary and social activist, was kidnapped on July 26 while returning from a friend’s funeral from Umar Khot in Sindh. (Note: his surname and ethnicity are the same word.) Baloch was on a bus when it was intercepted, and he was offloaded against his will into a car. Better known for his social justice and literary work, Baloch works as a telephone operator at Civil Hospital and is an active voice against forced disappearances in Balochistan, one of Pakistan's largest provinces.
Baloch is also in-charge of Sayyad Hashumi reference library in Karachi which  preserves all the published and unpublished materials on Baloch (the people), Balochi (the language) and Balochistan (the province). The Founder of Sayyad Hashumi library professor Sabah Dashtyar was shot and killed in 2011.
Forced disappearances are not a new phenomena in Baluchistan, where Baloch nationalists are engaged in an armed resistance movement against the Pakistani state. However, a considerable number target unarmed civilians—mostly poets, writers, and activists who are an active part of the resistance movement.
According to official data obtained by the news agency The News, nearly a thousand bullet-ridden corpses have been recovered from various parts of Balochistan in the past six years, and more than half the mutilated bodies have been identified as ethnic Baloch. The report further revealed that more than 112 locals are still missing. In 2014, Farzana Majeed marched thousands of kilometers across Pakistan for her missing brother and the missing people of Baluchistan. Majeed's family, like many others, blame Pakistan's security agencies for these disappearances.
Security agencies have routinely denied involvement in these disappearances, but human rights groups say this is a lie, arguing that the government specifically targets individuals involved in Baloch separatist movements and literary figures who write or speak about the Baloch struggle for freedom. In the wake of Baloch's disappearance, Amnesty International released a statement accusing Pakistan's security agencies of involvement, expressing concerns about Baloch's safety and well-being. The Human Rights Commission has formed a team to investigate Baloch's disappearance.
In a text titled “Who Was Comrade Wahid?” published on the website Baluch Samachar (which shares under-reported and often suppressed news stories from Balochistan), Imtiaz Baloch remembers Baloch's activism and his love for the community:
Wahid Baloch has been determined and passionate about his humanitarian work. He organized several press conferences, protests, gatherings and marches against enforced disappearances of Baloch people. Residents of Lyari use to say: “Wahid bleeds for others”. This passion of dedicating his time for others earned him the nickname of “Comrade”. No one knows Wahid in Lyari, if you don’t add Comrade to his name(..) The Gadap police registered an informal report of his kidnapping but declined to file a First Investigation Report (FIR).
The Pakistani government routinely blocks and suppresses news stories from Balochistan, including websites reporting on the Baloch National Movement. Baloch activists often rely on Twitter and Facebook to share reports about abductions and torture. Activists are using the hashtag #SaveWahidBaloch to draw attention to this latest forced disappearance:
#SaveWahidBaloch pic.twitter.com/kevq0DmTDT
— Karima Baloch (@KarimaBaloch) July 31, 2016
#SaveWahidBaloch It is nearly Two Weeks now that Wahid Baloch was #IllegallyDisappeared. There is no news about him and his Family Suffers.
— Mohammad Ali Talpur (@mmatalpur) August 5, 2016
Enforced disappearance of Wahid Baloch is continuation of Pakistani state policy of persecuting educated #Baloch.#SaveWahidBaloch
— Kamal Baloch (@Kamal_Baluch) July 30, 2016
#SaveWahidBaloch pic.twitter.com/qCO9WOfMzY
— Sabúr Balóc (@Saboorbaloch8) July 27, 2016
It has been well over a week since Baloch was abducted. His whereabouts are still unknown, and community members, friends, and his family fear for his life. As Imtiaz Baloch puts it, “A man who fought to eradicate the menace of forced disappearances became a victim of the very crime.”


text:
There’s an Official Funk Song for the Olympics, but Funk Artists in Rio Say They Face Persecution    · Global Voices
PRI/PRX's The World

This article by Catherine Osborn originally appeared on PRI.org on August 4, 2016. It is republished here as part of a content-sharing agreement.
To get Brazilians excited about the Olympics, the city government in Rio de Janeiro commissioned a countdown song in the funk carioca style, which is very popular in the city.
“Funk is the culture of Rio de Janeiro,” says Gabriela Vieira, one of the song’s writers and singers. “It tells the story of the things we live through here.”
But, she adds, it also faces heavy oppression. Funk carioca began in the 1980s, when local artists, known as MCs, started singing over tracks of Miami bass music. They invented irreverent rhymes about daily life, and the scene developed at dance parties called “bailes” in Rio’s poor neighborhoods, favelas.
“Funk got young people from the favelas to circulate around the city, and especially to visit other favelas,” says MC Leonardo. “Residents became proud to say where they were from,” adds Leonardo, who is affiliated with Apafunk, an organization that supports funk in Rio. In the 90s the war on drugs brought violence to many communities, and police began to raid funk parties, claiming they were rooting out drug traffickers. Although traffickers attended and sponsored some bailes, “the specific targeting of bailes reveals a huge double standard in Brazil’s war on drugs,” says Guilherme Pimentel, a lawyer who volunteers with Apafunk.
“Police don’t raid parties in rich neighborhoods where there are plenty of drugs,” Pimentel says. “And in many favelas, police leave traffickers alone for most of the week, and choose to carry out raids when residents are experiencing leisure and self-esteem. If police were serious about reducing violence in Rio, they would take better control of their arms and munitions, which often end up sold to traffickers, instead of raiding funk parties.”
Rio’s pacification police program, launched in 2008, aimed to improve the relationship between police and communities, but officers earned criticism from the start for banning bailes and arresting MCs. In 2013 Rio’s state government abolished the state decree that police frequently used to shut down bailes, and state secretary of public security José Beltrame pronounced, “nothing is more Rio de Janeiro than funk.” But a new, similar decree passed in 2014 requiring heavy documentation, 40 days in advance, for small events in public spaces.
“The law is not applied evenly to all kinds of events,” says multi-genre cultural producer Marcello Santos. He organized a daytime funk event last month that police shut down even though he turned in required documents 45 days in advance. Pimentel has documented over 25 cases of funk shutdowns in the last five years, and a dozen in which police reportedly shot or destroyed thousand-dollar sets of sound equipment. In most cases, event organizers reportedly refused or forgot to pay a bribe. A police spokesman declined to comment on the shutdown of Santos’s event, but their communications office wrote in an email that “the police follow the 2014 decree.”
“There have to be some rules,” says 30-year sound system operator Antonio “Tojão” Aragoso. “But authorities add extra barriers for funk that are expensive and extremely difficult to follow.”
All 30 bailes MC Leonardo named in the now-classic “Endereço dos Bailes” no longer occur regularly, and many have gone extinct. “I don’t think we’re advancing when we have young people staying inside and just reading the news on their smartphones,” Leonardo adds. “They should get out in the city and be the news.”
“I think funk is repressed because it has so much potential to turn people into political actors,” says social worker Rosana Lopes, who was at Santos’s event when the police came. Funk allows self expression on any and every topic. Some funk songs tell stories of living through daily violence, of racism, segregation, and police repression — and also local pride, creativity, and solidarity. Cidinho e Doca's “Não Me Bate Doutor” criticizes police suppression of local culture. And there’s a funk about the Olympics that the government didn’t sponsor. It’s by MC Mano Teko, who sings about evictions and militarization of favelas.
Rapper Marcello Silva, whose production company directed the Olympics countdown video, says artists in Rio have reason to praise, not criticize, the city government. He says Rio invests twice as much as most other Brazilian cities in cultural projects, including in low-income parts of the city. “I think we need to move past the discussion about the favela versus the rest of the city and the persecution of bailes, and focus on creating new things,” says Silva.
Other artists, such as cultural producer Julio Barroso, were less pleased by the Olympic funk song. “I’m shocked,” Barroso says. “The city government is selling a false image, which is that it cares equally about all social classes. In addition to evicting the poor, it cut major bus lines connecting the poor outskirts with the wealthy South Zone, further segregating the city.” He adds, “Black Brazilian culture like funk is used at times when the government wants legitimacy, but if you calculate how much support it gets among government funding for culture, it’s extremely low.”
Teko says it’s so difficult to make a living in funk in Rio that many MCs are regularly traveling to São Paulo to perform. This means income loss in local Rio communities as well, as bailes employ a whole chain of people, including sound operators, food vendors, drivers, barbers, and more.
In São Paulo, a larger music industry can offer funk artists support such as production facilities to make high-quality music videos. “It is possible to develop those services and a more professionalized funk scene here in Rio,” says Teko, “if we work together.” Teko points to a group of funk organizers who used to compete with each other, but now work together to hold special bailes in community centers across the city. On a recent Sunday night in the north side neighborhood of Bras de Pina, hundreds danced at a baile featuring a 12-foot high wall of sound, sparklers shooting down from the ceiling, and the funk anthem of that particular area.
Resistência Funk da Antiga show held last month at the Rio de Janeiro Association for the Deaf in Brás de Pina, Rio's North Zone. Credit: Catherine Osborn
“Funk remains strong,” says MC Carol, who vaulted to fame rhyming about bossing around her boyfriend and rewriting the history of Brazil. “It talks about everything, and whatever a big hit talks about lands in the newspaper. You can’t ignore it.” A popular 2015 funk song about favela bailes has been rewritten as a protest song for high school student occupiers, those opposing poor public services in Rio and those against the impeachment of President Dilma Rousseff.
In addition to the Olympic countdown song, funk will appear in the opening ceremony sung by Rio’s Ludmilla. And during the games, contests of passinho, a dance done to funk music, are scheduled to take place throughout the city.
“I think funk is one of the few things that can unite Brazil in this moment,” says professional passinho dancer Rafael Mike, originally from Rio’s outskirts of Nova Iguaçu. With his group Dream Team do Passinho, Mike has traveled to Miami and New York to perform. But, like Carol, he points out that the bailes where he developed his talents no longer occur, “and it shouldn’t be that way. Bailes should be able to happen in communities.”
The fact that funk has reached the Olympics shows its importance, says Rosana Lopes, “but if funk were given the space it legally deserves, it would boost not only local economies, but also citizenship.”
For Mano Teko, “funk continues to be an act of resistance.”

author: PRI/PRX's The World


text:
Afghanistan’s Hazaras: ‘Do Not Eliminate Us!’ · Global Voices
Samea Shanori

Pairs of eyeglass frames and a sign on the Afghan flag, which reads “Do Not Eliminate Us!”. Shared via Republic of Silence Facebook page.
Nearly 90 people were killed and hundreds injured after two suicide bombers struck a peaceful protest led by the Hazara Shi'ite minority group in Deh Mazang, Kabul on July 23, 2016. The attack, one of the deadliest since 2001, was later claimed by the ISIS.
Afghanistan's minority group, the Hazaras, were marching to protest the Afghan government's plans to re-route a major power project, the 500 kV power transmission line from Turkmenistan to Kabul, which was originally planned to go through Bamiyan, a predominantly Hazara province.
One Global Voices author, Bismella Alizada, was briefly hospitalized following the blasts, and other authors from the GV community had family members directly affected by the savage attack.
The Hazaras had carried out similar protests in May, launching the so-called Enlightenment Movement which had pushed President Ghani to issue a decree to build a smaller electricity line through Bamiyan.
It's systematic discrimination when every single major project bypasses the #Hazara homeland (center) pic.twitter.com/B37Ci6Jbnx #enlightenment
— Hector Of Troy (@HektorOfTroy) July 30, 2016
However, that concession alone was not acceptable to many Hazaras.
President Ghani established a committee to investigate the twin attacks. He declared the next day of the attack a day of national mourning and named Deh Mazang ‘Martyrs Square’.
When addressing the nation, he added:
holding protests is the right of every citizen of Afghanistan and the government puts all efforts to provide security for the protestors, but terrorists entered the protests, and carried out explosions that martyred and wounded a number of citizens including members of security and defense forces.
Haroon Chakhansuri, spokesperson to the President of Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, tweeted:
As we mourn victims of today's terror attack in #Kabul, tomorrow Afghan flag will fly at half-mast at all public buildings-at home & abroad.
— Haroon Chakhansuri (@hchakhansuri) July 23, 2016
Yet following the attack, Afghanistan's Interior Ministry issued a 10-day ban on public gatherings citing a heightened risk of sectarian violence.
Skeptical of the ban, Ahmad Shuja, a researcher at Human Rights Watch, wrote:
3/n The 10-day, countrywide protest ban risks being a blunt instrument at a time when civic action could be essential to public grieving
— Ahmad Shuja احمدشجاع (@AhmadShuja) July 24, 2016
Hazaras have been historically persecuted and discriminated against.
The Deh Mazang attack is the worst recent attack on Hazaras since 2011 when twin blasts in Kabul and Mazar-i Sharif killed around 80 people who had gathered to commemorate Ashura, which marks the death of Shi'ite Islam’s holiest martyr.
Since the collapse of the Taliban regime, abductions, extortions, and violent killings of Hazaras have remained a concern, and sparked protests and demands for better protection of the minority group.
Several Hazara political and intellectual figures blame Ghani's government and are concerned that it is not able to protect Hazaras anymore.
Some Hazaras believed that the attack on July 23 might have been encouraged by people from inside the government.
Aslam Jawadi, editor-in-chief of the Daily Opensociety, tweeted:
We wrote, we shouted, we talked and we demonstrated peacefully, but #NUG instead of listening shot #enlightenment pic.twitter.com/e1dlyNf6tu
— Aslam Jawadi (@majawadi) July 29, 2016
Moreover, some Hazaras were furious at their own political leaders for exploiting the grievances of their own people for their own personal interest. One of the mourners, Ghulam Abbas, said:
They sold us and we will never forget this. They've built skyscrapers for themselves and their families from our blood.
Bilal Sarwary, an Afghan journalist, tweeted that Afghan government knew about the attack.
#AFG One senior Afghan government official tells me, gov had intel 20 days ago, #ISIS wanted 2 carry an attack in Kabul and Jalalabad.
— Bilal Sarwary (@bsarwary) July 23, 2016
Ever since the attack, Hazaras have stormed social media in search of justice, writing about and posting pictures from the protest as well as sometimes graphic images of the aftermath of the attack and its victims.
Noorjahan Akbar, a women's rights activist from Afghanistan, encouraged people to continue voicing their thoughts against the brutal killing of more than 80 people in a peaceful protest through her tweet:
Politics aside, if we are silent in that face of the murder of 86 peaceful protesters, what does our silence say about us? #enlightenment
— (((NoorjahanAkbar))) (@NoorjahanAkbar) July 29, 2016
Maryam Mehtar, an Afghan freelance journalist, added:
We train our children hw to take pencils & pens in their hands, not weapons!#enlightenment #enlightenmentmovement pic.twitter.com/e2EqeSayb4
— MarYam MeHtar (@MaryamMehtar) July 29, 2016
Bismellah Alizada of Global Voices wrote:
Never can a bomb silence the voice for justice & equality. #enlightenmentmovement #notosystematicdiscrimination
— Bismellah Alizada (@BismellaAlizada) July 29, 2016
Hazaras from all over the world showed solidarity through various gatherings and on social media with the victims of the protest and the enlightenment movement.
Saleem Javed, a Hazara human rights activist from Quetta, Pakistan, tweeted:
7 days ago, today, at this time, time stopped for many #Hazara anti-discrimination demonstrators. #enlightenment pic.twitter.com/Uvokq8fh4F
— Saleem Javed (@mSaleemJaved) July 29, 2016
Marziya Mohammadi, an Afghan human rights advocate, wrote from Australia:
You eliminated those who planted the seeds for #enlightenment, but how will you eliminate #enlightenment? pic.twitter.com/AqWmINQEtW
— Marziya Mohammadi (@Marziiiya) July 29, 2016
Afghanistan observed a national day of mourning on July 24.
Families of the victims collected bodies from hospitals and morgues to prepare for funerals.
Many families are still searching for their missing relatives and friends.
Hikmatullah Shafaiee was one of the protestors who was killed in the attack.
Fallen protester: Hikmatullah Shafaiee an engineering graduate is 1 of 23rd July #KabulBlast victims#enlightenment pic.twitter.com/APmzFTOlec
— Aslam Jawadi (@majawadi) July 28, 2016
Basir Ahang quoted the mother of a victim, who encouraged people to continue fighting for their rights.
سیما، مادر احمد شریف دولتشاهی: باید برای حق خود مبارزه کنیم.
We should fight for our rights: Sima, Ahmad Sharif… https://t.co/Vov8BN7YEQ
— Basir Ahang (@basirahang) July 26, 2016
Another victim of the protest carried a sign, which read simply, “Do not eliminate us!”
“Do not exclude us!” Facebook posts have this child listed as one of those killed in the attack. RIP. #enlightenment pic.twitter.com/Lgptqsqbew
— Hector Of Troy (@HektorOfTroy) July 29, 2016
Kabul Relief Effort, a Facebook page that coordinates all the relief efforts for the victims of the attacks, recently posted names of two other victims of the attack, Abdullah Frotan and Qurban, who lost their lives in the NATO Hospital.
Fatima Ghulami, a women's rights activist from Bamiyan, posted a photo of a woman crying for losing a loved one while photos of the victims hang on the walls.
Afghan woman mourns for losing her loved one in recent Kabul attack. No word can describe the tragedy… pic.twitter.com/XvAHtz0tcv
— Fatima Ghulami (@Fatima__GH) July 31, 2016
Photos of those killed are hanging on the walls of the city. Ehsanullah Amiri, a Wall Street Journal reporter, posted:
Kabul streets today. #RIP #enlightenment pic.twitter.com/PcqkIGNVat
— Ehsanullah Amiri (@euamiri) July 29, 2016
Families were painfully searching for the bodies of their loved ones at Kabul hospitals. The bodies of those who were killed were buried in western Kabul or taken to their home provinces.
The graves of those who were killed in the attack at Deh Mazang on July 23, 2016. Shared via Hazara International Network Facebook page.
These are only a few faces of the victims of Deh Mazang attack. The death toll and number of injuries from the blast is still being updated as of August 7.

author: Samea Shanori


text:
How the Zika Narrative About Puerto Rico Explains US Colonialism · Global Voices
Firuzeh Shokooh Valle

The natives are in “chaos.” The “war against Zika” has been “a failure.” A governor’s adviser left his position “in disgust,” and went to vacation in Spain. Disease is rampant. “Some” has been done, “sometimes effectively.” Mosquitoes “breed” in old tires. There are no “cutting-edge plans” to avert the chaos. As “a last resort” the CDC comes to the rescue with the insecticide naled: but, oh, wait, naled is toxic. The natives “rebelled” against the use of naled, and have accused the US of “colonialism” (yes, in quotes!). Ignorant, rebellious, pregnant women do not want to use repellent to protect their babies. What “a horror story.”
Uncle Sam schools the newest recruits to the US imperial fold in the art of “civilization.” Originally published under the title “School Begins” in the January 25, 1899 issue of Puck magazine. By Louis Dalrymple (1866-1905) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.
This narrative dates, not from the period of the 1898 Spanish-American War, during which the United States invaded and colonized Puerto Rico, together with Cuba, the Philippines, and Guam. This narrative, rather, forms part of a story published in the July 30, 2016 edition of the New York Times. It immediately brought to mind those political cartoons that appeared during the Spanish-American War, when the US media played a pivotal role in presenting Uncle Sam as the savior of the half-naked, infantile, natives of the diseased and poverty-stricken tropics.
“In the NYT story, about the Zika epidemic in Puerto Rico, the imperial gaze is clear. The story also contradicts itself.”
In the NYT story, about the Zika epidemic in Puerto Rico, the imperial gaze is clear. The story also contradicts itself: for if no one is doing anything on the island, why is the fact that women are taking measures against the Zika virus, and the possibility of having babies with microcephaly, cited as one of the reasons for the decrease in the birth rate?
Following the publication of this article, a worried US president Barack Obama issued a broadcast warning Puerto Ricans that they must take the Zika virus seriously. The governor of the island, Alejando García Padilla, expressed support for the President’s message, but the secretary of Health, Ana Ríus Armendáriz, said she felt “scolded.” And in fact we all should have felt scolded. Among other critics, the mayor of the city of Bayamón, Ramón Luis Rivera—who is in favor of Puerto Rico changing its political status from territory to federated state—said that Obama should also take the island’s colonial status seriously, as well as release 73-year-old political prisoner Oscar López Rivera, who has been imprisoned in the United States for 35 years.
Many other countries in the world deal with tropical diseases. Most recently and famously, Brazil is hosting the Olympics amid a Zika epidemic. But these countries are rarely treated in this heavy-handed manner, perhaps because they are autonomous states.
“Puerto Rico has fought successfully against tropical diseases for decades. Dengue has been endemic in the country since the 1960s, and more recently we have grappled with chikungunya, and now Zika. These diseases that seem so outrageous and unique to people in the United States have long been part of our daily lives.”
Puerto Rico has fought successfully against tropical diseases for decades. Dengue has been endemic in the country since the 1960s, and more recently we have grappled with chikungunya, and now Zika, among others. These diseases that seem so outrageous and unique to people in the United States have long been part of our daily lives. Both government agencies and citizens are well informed about them. There have been education campaigns, cleaning brigades, and extensive media coverage. And, yes, life goes on. People continue to work, love, live, struggle, and resist, not only the Zika virus, but something much more devastating: over a 100 years of colonialism and its many consequences.
Most recently, Puerto Rico is resisting yet another manifestation of colonialism, in the form of the US-imposed fiscal oversight board that will control many decisions of the government.
Those who live on this Caribbean island are well informed and aware, not helpless infants in need of being rescued, much less scolded. What we need, at the very least, and at this critical moment in our history, is media coverage that is accurate and demonstrates local awareness—stories that treat Puerto Rico and its people with respect, dignity, and humanity.

author: Firuzeh Shokooh Valle


text:
Japan Off to a Strong Start at 2016 Rio Olympics · Global Voices
Nevin Thompson

An unnamed Japanese Olympic athlete in Athletes Village. Photo by Mexican Olympic Committee. Image license: CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.
Japan is off to a strong start at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, and by the third day of the Games had nabbed at least one gold medal and four bronze. The four bronze medals were in judo, weightlifting, and swimming, and Hagino Kosuke claimed Japan's first gold medal of the Games in the men's 400m individual medley.
金メダル第1号は萩野公介選手。期待が集まる中、日本新記録による見事な金メダルでした。幼いころから切磋琢磨してきた瀬戸大也選手も銅メダルを獲得し、日本勢2人が表彰台に上がりました。#がんばれニッポン #競泳 #Rio2016 pic.twitter.com/HmQeobcv6Z
— 日本オリンピック委員会（JOC） (@Japan_Olympic) August 7, 2016
Hagino Kosuke wins Japan's first gold medal [of the Rio Summer Games]. Competing amidst high expectations, Hagino has delivered. Training hard and focused on his Olympic dream since childhood, Seto Daiya also snagged a bronze medal in swimming. Japan's Olympians have ascended the podium. [— Japan Olympic Committee official Twitter account.]
Continuing Japan's early Olympic medal haul, Kondo Ami won a bronze medal in the women's 48 kg judo event.
初めてのオリンピック
結果は悔しさが残るものになりました
一瞬だけ銅メダル取れてホッとした
そんな自分が情けないです
もっともっと努力して強くなります
沢山の応援本当にありがとうございました pic.twitter.com/XQzIspFMsJ
— 近藤亜美 (@amtk_0509) August 7, 2016
This is my first Olympics. While I was sad I could not achieve gold, I felt a wave of relief as soon as received the bronze […] I'm going to keep training in order to become stronger and stronger. Thanks to all of the support I have received so far.
Another female member of Japan's Olympic team helped Japan capture a medal early in the Rio Games. Competing in the women's 48 kg class, Miyake Hiromi won bronze in weightlifting.
銅メダルを獲得した重量挙げ女子48kg級、三宅宏実選手の気迫のこもった試技をご覧ください！#オリンピックhttps://t.co/MgkKBvXhB6
— gorin.jp (@gorinjp) August 7, 2016
Miyake Hiromi wins bronze in the 48 kg class of women's weightling. View her win here at the link.
Takato Naohisa won Japan's fifth medal, claiming a bronze in men's 60-kg judo.
Naohisa Takato (Japan/Bronze Medal) x Orkhan Safarov (Azerbaijan) More countries to visit pic.twitter.com/MwQwfjZ7yc
— вєαυ giℓℓiαм (@BeauGilliam) August 6, 2016
This first weekend of the Rio Games is expected to be just the start of Japan's Olympic medal haul. Japan's men's and women's swimming teams are expected to do well over the next two weeks.
Indeed, the Japan women's swimming relay team broke a Japanese record during a qualifying heat:
内田美希選手、池江璃花子選手、山口美咲選手、松本弥生選手が出場した競泳女子400mリレー予選。
3分36秒74という従来の記録を1秒以上も縮めるタイムを出し、日本記録を更新しました。https://t.co/CHl1hNYxZa#オリンピック
— gorin.jp (@gorinjp) August 7, 2016
Uchida Miki, Ikeh Rikako, Yamaguchi Misaki, and Matsumoto Yayoi appear in the qualifiers for the women's 400-meter relay […] They broke Japan's record by more than a second [this weekend in Rio].
The team was understandably excited. Swimmer Yamaguchi Misaki tweeted:
8年ぶりのオリンピック決勝
リレーで始まり、リレーで終わる。
最高の仲間と泳げて幸せです
失格なく最高の泳ぎができますよーに pic.twitter.com/WQC11pMgho
— 山口美咲 (@miiiyaaa_y3m) August 6, 2016
We've reached the Olympic finals for the first time in 8 years […] I'm so happy to be able to swim with the best team [in the world]. Giving it our all so that we won't lose, and we'll end up on the podium.
Competing in Group A, the Japanese Women's Olympic basketball team has also made a strong start.
【DAY2】アテネオリンピック以来12年ぶりの出場となったバスケットボール女子は、ベラルーシとの接戦を制して白星発進。栗原三佳選手がチーム最多の20得点を挙げました。#がんばれニッポン #バスケ #Rio2016 pic.twitter.com/7PS5igd3Gk
— 日本オリンピック委員会（JOC） (@Japan_Olympic) August 7, 2016
(Day 2) It's been 12 years since Athens, when Japan's women's basketball team last appeared in the Olympics. After notching a victory against Belarus, Japan's women's team advances to the next round […]
Other Japanese Olympic hopefuls experienced setbacks, or had their Olympic dreams dashed. Notably, Japanese fencing star Ota Yuki, competing in what promises to be his last Olympics before retirement, was forced out on the first weekend of the Games:
太田雄貴、初戦敗退で引退意向「これで未練なく」 – フェンシング : 日刊スポーツ https://t.co/Eqjg2TWT9Q#リオ2016 #リオ五輪 #フェンシング #太田雄貴
— 日刊スポーツ (@nikkansports) August 7, 2016
Fencer Ota Yuki defeated and forced to withdraw in the first round of Men's fencing. “I have no regrets,” he said.
Japan's Men's soccer team also lost to Nigeria in its first game of the Olympics, but the team still has a chance to continue, if they can manage to win their next game:
Here are the highlights from Nigeria x Japan's match. No one wanted to play defense. pic.twitter.com/hhmK70SI15
— The New Ultras (@TheNewUltras) August 5, 2016
Perhaps the biggest disappointment for Japanese fans occurred before the Rio Games even started. The Japan national women's soccer team, better known as “Nadeshiko Japan,” after coming in second in the 2015 World Cup, failed to qualify for the Rio Olympics.
The no-show has prompted criticism and soul-searching by Japanese soccer fans:
Sawa speaks and she is not happy: https://t.co/oge5MGb9EC #AFCWOQ pic.twitter.com/Zk2prvWj20
— Ann Odong (@AnnOdong) March 3, 2016

author: Nevin Thompson


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Southeast Asia’s Iconic Mosques, Temples, Pagodas, and Cathedrals · Global Voices
Mong Palatino

Southeast Asia is famous for exotic destinations like Phuket and Bali and modern cities like Singapore and Kuala Lumpur, but its religious landmarks are also recognized for their architectural beauty and global cultural significance. Let’s take a look at some of these majestic structures.
Shwedagon Pagoda. Photo by Michel Meynsbrughen. Flickr. CC License
Shwedagon pagoda is the most sacred site of worship for Buddhists in Myanmar. The structure reached its current height during the 18th century. Today, it stands as the symbol of national pride in the former capital city of Yangon. Myanmar has a Buddhist majority population.
Kuthodaw Temple. Photo by dany13. Flickr. CC License
The name of the 19th-century temple translates as the Royal Merit, which refers to the merit of King Mindon for donating 729 stone slabs inscribed with the Tipitaka (the Buddhist canonical text). Today, it is best known as ‘The World's Largest Book’. The temple is located in Mandalay, the capital built by the last royal dynasty of Myanmar.
Taal Basilica. Photo by Storm Crypt. Flickr. CC License
Minor Basilica of Saint Martin of Tours or more popularly known as Taal Basilica is considered the largest Catholic Church in the Philippines and Asia. It is located in Batangas, a province located south of the capital Manila. Aside from Timor-Leste, the Philippines is the only Catholic-dominated nation in Asia.
Paoay Church. Photo by Ilocos Norte. Flickr. CC License
Paoay Church was declared a National Cultural Treasure by the Philippine government in 1973 and a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1993. This baroque church is located in the northern province of Ilocos Norte.
Jame’ Asr Hassanil Bolkiah Mosque. Photo by MyBukit. Flickr. CC License
Located in the capital Bandar Seri Begawan, it is Brunei’s largest mosque. The mosque has 29 golden domes.
Istiqlal Mosque. Photo by HKmPUA. Flickr. CC License
Opened in 1978, this mosque in Jakarta is Southeast Asia’s largest. The mosque can accommodate more than 100,000 worshippers. Istiqlal means independence in Arabic. Indonesia is the world’s largest nation with a Muslim majority population.
Masjid Negara is the national mosque of Malaysia. It is the only mosque that does not feature a dome. Watch the video above to know more about this Malaysian icon.
Wat Arun. Photo by Trey Ratcliff. Flickr. CC License
Wat Arun or Temple of Dawn is one of the most popular destinations in Bangkok, the capital of Thailand. This Buddhist temple is located along the west bank of the Chao Phraya River. Thailand has a Buddhist majority population.
Angkor Wat. Photo by Juan Antonio F. Segal. Flickr. CC License
Angkor Wat is the most popular temple in the Angkor religious complex. It is also the world’s largest religious monument. Angkor is the capital of the Khmer Empire.

author: Mong Palatino


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In Aleppo, ‘White Helmet’ Volunteers Pull Bodies From Rubble Day After Day · Global Voices
PRI/PRX's The World

A photo posted to the Support Syria Civil Defence Facebook page.
This article by Joyce Hackel originally appeared on PRI.org on August 4, 2016. It is republished here as part of a content-sharing agreement.
Bombs are raining down from the sky every day in Aleppo.
When residents hear the buzz of planes overhead, most dash for cover.
But a group of volunteers, known as the “White Helmets,” continue to rush toward the destruction. And these days it seems their work just doesn't stop.
“The last few days were like hell,” says 29-year-old White Helmet Ishmael Alabdullah. “We don't have any electricity in Aleppo city, the darkness is everywhere … All that we have now is just bombing, bombing, bombing.”
Aleppo has been bombed by Russian and Syrian war planes for months. In recent weeks, government troops have blocked most routes out of the city, trapping some 250,000 civilians in rebel-controlled areas of town. Day after day, volunteers there pull civilian bodies from the rubble left by airstrikes. Alabdullah says yesterday's work was especially sombre.
“We worked for more than 10 hours to pull out the bodies from under the rubble,” he says. “We had 10 people who were killed, including three kids.”
Alabdullah says his team uncovered an injured woman who was rushed to a nearby hospital and survived.
The White Helmets, also known as the Syrian Civil Defense, operate throughout opposition-controlled areas of Syria and are one of the few signs left of a once thriving civil society in Aleppo. Their presence buoys the spirits of many in the city, where Alabdullah says streets are often bare and markets are closed.
The volunteers face great personal risk. Bombings attract crowds that are often a tempting target for more airstrikes.
“When they bomb a place, they wait for us to get there, and they bomb again,” he says.
Two of Alabdullah's colleagues were killed last month after war planes returned to the site of a bombardment where the men were working. One of the White Helmets died instantly in the second bombing. The other lost a hand and a leg, and he perished later in the hospital.
But Alabdullah says he and his colleagues are undeterred.
“When you see human beings suffering, you need to do something to help them,” he says. “I consider everyone who is staying in Aleppo, all of them, are heroes.”


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Food Trucks Have Arrived in Hong Kong, But Not Everyone Is Lining Up · Global Voices
Ryan Kam

Hong Kong Secretary of Commerce Gregory So visiting a food truck in Australia last August. Photo from Gregory So's Facebook via HKFP.
All around the world, people have lauded the food landscape in Hong Kong for its diversity and international offerings. For the first time ever, Michelin last year even included the city's street food in its guide of Hong Kong's local cuisine. The arrival of food trucks should be adding new colour to this smorgasbord, but locals find the imported culture a misfit.
The idea of bringing in food trucks first appeared as a tourism initiative in the Budget Speech 2015-2016. After a year’s deliberations, the Food Truck Pilot Scheme was finally launched on March 30, 2016.
The government made a public call for proposals and issued 16 licenses for the pilot scheme. The competition was vigorous: a total of 192 applicants competed for 16 licenses. The applicants had to submit a written proposal, prepare a HK$600,000 (approximately US$77,400) start-up cost, so as to operate a kitchen that meets extremely strict hygiene standards. Those who were short-listed then entered a culinary contest and presented their set menus to food experts and representatives of the travel industry, representatives of venues for food-truck operations, and government officials.
As expected, more than half of the licenses ended up in the hands of big corporate food subsidiaries, which leveraged their experience in the fast-food industry.
Many, however, believe the food-truck scheme is poorly and unfairly designed. Kenneth Ip, a local architect, for example criticizes the licensing process for killing the grassroots spirit. In an article published on Hong Kong Free Press, he wrote:
those wanting to try their luck at operating a food truck in Hong Kong need to prepare a proposal outlining the type of food they would be offering, the design of their truck and their financial soundness. The entire process reads like a case of over-management and a complete contradiction to the grassroots spirit that gave rise to food truck culture.
Indeed, even though local micro-entrepreneurs received ten bonus points in the licensing consideration process, the start-up cost and kitchen management costs are enormously high because of the strict hygiene standards demanded by the government.
Kenneth Ip also argues that the design of the food truck is at odds with the local urban landscape:
It is no coincidence that the rise of the gourmet food truck came from Los Angeles, a city well known for its automobile culture. Los Angeles is a city built around the car, with ample infrastructure such as parking, allowing for food trucks to thrive. Inversely, Hong Kong is a city more known for its lack of space and traffic congestion. It is hard to not see the government’s initiative for food trucks as a mere superimposition of foreign culture into Hong Kong, taken hugely out of context without considering whether such introductions are suitable for the city.
While the winning cuisine is said to demonstrate Hong Kong's East-meets-West food culture, local residents have complained that it dilutes the truly authentic tastes of local cuisine. Commenting on a news article about the food-truck contest, readers shared some of their anger:
絕大部份入圍者都不是香港本地特色便宜小食…也無燒賣…魚蛋…牛雜…煎釀三寶……之類的街頭小食。單純看食品的名稱和相片去堆測用料和製法不太快捷及簡單…那到時候的定價是關鍵。如還是30蚊以上一份的話…除了那8個指定位置能獨市（賺位置）經營的優勢外…賣點和競爭力何在？
Most of the finalists did not cook affordable local-style snacks like fish-meat dumplings, fish balls, beef intestines, deep-fried fish wrapped in vegetables… Just by looking at the name and photos of the food items, it seems that the cooking method is not fast or simple enough. Then, when the food trucks are operating, the set prices are the key. If each portion is sold for more than HKD$30. What’s the selling point and the competitive edge? (And they enjoy monopolized status in the designated locations.)
>到底明唔明咩叫香港街頭小食?
Does the selection panel even know what Hong Kong street snacks are?
And what of locals’ nostalgia for that comforting mix of food stores and street food carts? The biggest roadblock to such a revival is the government's approach to health and safety. Rather than institute more rigorous inspections and a stricter legal framework for businesses’ operations, state officials have preferred simply to issue fewer permits to vendors.
To rescue the vanishing local street food culture, a number of civic groups have proposed a food-cart program, urging the government to re-issue “hawker licenses” to grassroots street venders. The grassroots scheme only requires around US$1,000 start-up costs and it proposes a modified-bicycle-style cart that accommodates the city's urban landscape.
美食車的營運地點不應止於小量旅遊景點，而應善於社區不同公共的土地及閒置土地，如公園、荒地、天橋底等，使到美食車能服務一般香港市民。
The mobile food service should not be restricted to touristic sites. It should make use of public space and empty space in urban areas, such as parks, landfills, spaces underneath the overpasses, and so on. so that local residents can also enjoy the service.
政府的方案只是遊客的美食車方案，最終只有集團或企業得益，平民美食車方案，能同時做到推廣多元美食文化，便利普羅市民品嘗美食，創造就業機會，善用社區閒置空間，是一個多贏方案。
The government's proposal only caters to the needs of tourists and food corporations. The grassroots project can promote a more diverse food culture, creating job and making use of small unused spaces in the community to provide inexpensive food to local residents. The scheme would benefit all.

author: Ryan Kam


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Activists in Puerto Rico Are Fighting to Keep Beaches Public · Global Voices
Ana Gabriela Calderón

Boat houses in La Parguera, Lajas, Puerto Rico. Photo courtesy Alberto Marty.
Environmental activists and experts in Puerto Rico took a sigh of relief when a law that sought to privatize La Parguera, a public maritime zone in the western coast of Lajas, was rejected. But their battle is far from over. Several public beaches and maritime zones are fighting privatization proposals.
Project #1621, the bill that was recently rejected, intended to legalize floating water houses or casetas. Illegal casetas have existed in La Parguera for decades. The bill would have legalized these homes, allowed the owners to rent the property for up to 40 years and it would have turned the free public space along the casetas into an exclusive tourism zone.
Local mayors and business owners defended the proposed bill, stating that it could help increase tourism in the region. Some residents said that the owners of such homes help boost the local economy, claiming that they contribute around 2 million US dollars to the small town, which represents 20% of Laja's budget.
Despite its supporters, environmental activists staunchly expressed their opposition through protests and social media, with the phrase “Las Playas son del Pueblo” or The Beaches belong to the People, which  has become the official slogan for the anti-privatization movement.
Amigos del MAR (Friends of the SEA), an environmental organization founded in 1995 to protect Puerto Rico's natural resources, were actively lobbying against the bill, writing a letter to Governor Alejandro García Padilla urging him not to sign the controversial law, and recommending various, eco-friendly alternatives, such as allocating funds for studies related to environmental protection.
Legal scholars from various universities in Puerto Rico also joined environmental leaders in trying to orientate politicians about the potential effects of Project #1621, stating that it establishes a disastrous precedent because it conforms to an ongoing tendency of privatization in public areas and it would potentially eliminate access to such spaces.
In 2014, the Interdisciplinary Center for Coastal Studies at the University of Puerto Rico-Mayagüez published a comprehensive study of the environmental history of La Parguera, detailing its origins as a small fishing village to a popular tourist location with hotels, shops, restaurants and recreational activities. Famous for its Phosphorescent Bay, “the marine resources that were once the source of income for subsistence, recreational, and commercial nearshore fishing are mostly gone,” making the old fishing village a now distant memory for locals. The study also states that the casetas are indeed illegally occupying the zone and that they “constitute one of the key elements defining policy and governance.”
The law's original text stated that owners of these casetas have paid the expenses related to the sewage system in La Parguera, but this is also because the houses were responsible for much of the contamination in the area, as stated by the Association of Architects and Landscape Architects.
Puerto Rican anthropologist Rima Brusi has interviewed caseta owners, and, while these constructions are in fact illegal, many individuals are attached to them because they grew up there with their families. However, Brusi adds that there is a sense of ambivalence among locals regarding the law. The majority of the caseteros (floating house owners) belong to the professional class, with some residents claiming that they are typically wealthy, usually own other homes, and limit their boats’ access to the bay, but they also offer some temporary job opportunities cleaning or fixing anything in the casetas.
Project #1621 was only one of several bills that intended to commodify public spaces on the island. In November 2015, an altercation between Marriott hotel's administration and environmental activists made headline news after a ten year struggle erupted into a protest in Isla Verde Beach in Carolina. The organization Coalición Playas Pa'l Pueblo had established a camp site in Isla Verde over 10 years ago to protect free public access in a beach located in the northern city of Carolina. But in 2015, Playas Pa'l Pueblo received an eviction order from the township. Agencia EFE reported last November that the Puerto Rico National Parks Company had transferred the maritime zone to the city of Carolina in 2003; however, CH Properties, a real estate firm affiliated with Courtyard Marriott, has a 99 year lease on the site.
Mural in Isla Verde Beach: “The beaches belong to the people, they are not for sale.” Taken from Amigos del MAR's Facebook page. Used with permission.
Amigos del MAR and Playas Pa'l Pueblo remain two of the most important environmental organizations trying to protect public beaches from privatization, stating that doing so would also affect Isla Verde's ecosystem, including a Leatherback Sea Turtle nest located on the area that could potentially become property of the Marriott. Earlier this year, the Carolina Appellate Court ordered the eviction of Amigos del MAR protesters from Isla Verde, but Carolina mayor José Carlos Aponte Dalmau was against such action, stating that it represents a violation of their constitutional rights.
Sea Turtle Nest in Isla Verde Beach, Carolina, Puerto Rico. Photo from Amigos del MAR Facebook page, used with permission.
Protesters in Isla Verde Beach in Carolina. Sign reads “Marriott, enemy of the environment.” Photo from Amigos del MAR's Facebook page. Used with permission
Another bill proposed this year by the House of Representatives was Project #2853, which intended to legalize the privatization of Puerto Rico's coastal zones. This project would have created a Trust for Ecotourist Conservation in Puerto Rico under the Department of Natural Resources for granting special licenses for the private use of the coastal maritime zone. The bill was rejected by the Senate, and during the night of its hearing, activists gathered outside the Capitol of Puerto Rico to protest, and activist Alberto de Jesús, better known as “Tito Kayak”, climbed a flag pole and replaced the American flag with one that read “Beaches belong to the people.”
Tito Kayak started a hunger strike to protest the proposed bill. The bill was vetoed later by the Governor. Photo courtesy Diana Valle.
While organizations, academics and environmental activists have united forces to protect public spaces and the Puerto Rican ecosystem, the island is routinely plagued by attempts to privatize beaches as an effort to boost tourism. On Friday, August 6, Amigos del MAR organized a protest in front of the Fortaleza in San Juan, the home of the island's Governor. The group used social media to encouraged Puerto Ricans to contact the Fortaleza via phone and urge Alejandro García Padilla not to sign the bill, and activist Tito Kayak announced a hunger strike to protest the project. Campamento Contra la Junta, a camp site established by activists against the federal control board (PROMESA) in front of the Federal Courthouse, also expressed their solidarity for Amigos del MAR.
The bill was vetoed by the Governor on Saturday night, August 7. While this struggle proved to be a triumph for environmentalists, similar projects, like Marriott's expansion, are still ongoing and the future of Puerto Rico's shore will remain uncertain while similar proposals are presented.

author: Ana Gabriela Calderón


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Dear Hong Kong Activists, Please Stop Telling Everyone Telegram is Secure · Global Voices
inmediahk.net

Written by Jason Li and Lokman Tsui. The original version of this post, written in Chinese, was published on inmediahk.net on 4 August 2016. English version is published on Global Voices under a content partnership agreement.
At this year's annual July 1 march in Hong Kong, protest leaders made a big push for mobile chat app Telegram, but for all the wrong reasons. The rally has taken place every year since the UK relinquished power over Hong Kong to China in 1997.
While we marched across Hong Kong Island, voices on a megaphone kept shouting, “download Telegram, it is more secure than WhatsApp!”
A civic group, Citizen Data, urged protesters to download Telegram and activate its geolocation function so that we could “check-in” to the protest.
As we passed the booths of various political and civil society groups on the road, they told us to befriend Telegram bots (automated Telegram accounts that perform simple functions, like image searches or RSS-like updates.) One bot allowed attendees to signal their participation at the march. Another polled voters about their top picks in the upcoming Legislative Council elections.
While we marched across Hong Kong Island, voices on a megaphone kept shouting, “download Telegram, it is more secure than WhatsApp!”
While these new grassroots-organizing tools can seem exciting, they were misleading protesters about one piece of crucial information: Telegram is not more secure than Whatsapp. In many circumstances, it's worse.
Telegram first made waves on the tech scene as a fast, user-friendly “free and secure” messaging app way back in 2013. Data security, specifically its encryption features, were highlighted by tech media as one of its big selling points
Despite its reputation, many conversations on Telegram are not end-to-end encrypted — in other words, not secure. And to make matters worse, the company has developed a reputation for problems with its technology that have led some users to have their information and messages exposed, in some cases to other users.
Over the past year, Global Voices has reported on multiple instances of Telegram users running into serious trouble with the app's security. Telegram users in Russia — some of them journalists and activists — have reported that their accounts were hacked. Another user in Ukraine reported receiving private group messages through her Telegram app for a group that she was not part of. And there has been concern in Iran about the company's compliance with government requests for certain material — bots mainly — to be blocked on the platform.
What's the problem with Telegram?
Telegram's encryption technology is not entirely open source — this means that security experts outside the company can’t see all the details of how it was made. Industry best practices hold that encryption technology should be open source and fully accessible to the public, so that they can be independently tested and verified by other programmers and security researchers. So even though Telegram says their messaging technology is secure, there's no way to know this for sure. You just have to trust them.
In contrast, apps like Signal and ChatSecure have published their code online, so that anyone with technical know-how can review (and critique) it publicly.
Even if you do trust Telegram, its security features are limited.
Researchers also have confirmed that the app collects users’ metadata — information about who they communicate with, and when — making it relatively easy for Telegram users to monitor each other’s communication habits.
Returning to Hong Kong, it's easy to see how these problems could be exacerbated in a protest situation. If an app is easily hackable, all of the information that promoters were urging protesters to share — including their locations — could potentially be exposed to the wrong person, or to government authorities. Location data is very sensitive as it can be traced back to a particular user and jeopardize personal safety.
Anyone doing political activism in Hong Kong knows that the consequences of this kind of breach can be severe.
Ironically, WhatsApp, which was criticized at the march, automatically applies end-to-end encryption to all of its conversations, including its group chats. (This feature was only rolled out earlier this year in April.)
Not only does WhatsApp encrypt all of its messages, it does so using the open source, publicly documented Signal protocol developed by a non-profit groups called Open Whisper Systems. Unfortunately, WhatsApp itself is not open source, so there is no guarantee that the protocol has not been tampered with during implementation. So far though, there is no evidence of foul play, and the team from Open Whisper Systems have written publicly about their partnership and implementation process. But it is certainly no worse than Telegram, which has not made its technical code public.
For maximum, assured security, we recommend using Open Whisper System’s Signal Private Messenger app. Signal is open source from top to bottom — they are entirely transparent about the technology they use for encryption, and everything else. But because it's a not-for-profit, open source project, it lacks the bells and whistles (such as stickers), and the user base of commercial chat apps like Telegram and WhatsApp. For many Hong Kongers, Signal doesn’t appeal for these reasons. Many choose instead to use WhatsApp, which is a safer alternative to Telegram. While it lacks some of the privacy protections of Signal, it is the only widely-used chat app that uses an open and peer-reviewed encryption protocol.
Telegram was not wrong in promoting its security features back in 2013 – end-to-end encryption in mobile chat apps was rare back then. Since then, however, other chat apps have caught up and in many cases surpassed its security features. This isn't to say Telegram doesn't have its merits – neither Whatsapp nor Signal have support for channels (public groups) or bots, and Telegram does have a handy, Snapchat-like, self-destruct feature for conversations. But to recommend Telegram, without reservation, to protesters and activists is simply irresponsible.
Thank you to Citizen Lab and Professor Jedidiah Crandall for helping us out with some background research for this article.


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Decades After Killings and Displacement, Afro-Colombians’ Struggle Isn’t Over · Global Voices
Guest Contributor

Community members pay homage to the victims of Operación Génesis. Image shared by FOR Peace Presence, used with permission.
This post is an adapted version of an original text written by FOR Peace Presence, originally published here.
With peace talks nearly complete, many communities around Colombia must now work to build a lasting truce in the country's more remote regions, facing numerous challenges and a complex network of relationships that have defined the conflict for years.
Today's Afro-Colombian community in Cacarica, in eastern Colombia, knows these challenges all too well. Historically, the region's black community has witnessed high levels of state-sponsored violence. The most infamous example is Operation Génesis, which took place in February 1997 and caused the displacement of more than 4,000 Afro-Colombians during the internal armed conflict that's only coming to an end today.
In 2013, the television program Contravía recorded interviews with several of the victims of this displacement:
Armed forces from both the military and the paramilitary executed the forced dislocation, officially in order to counteract the presence of guerrilla groups. A right-wing death squad called the “United Self Defense Forces of Colombia AUC” worked closely with the military, furnished with weapons by large landowners who had had a vested interest in the operation, because of damage to their businesses caused by guerrilla attacks.
The operation caused the deaths and forced disappearances of more than 80 people. It is just one of several massacres committed by military and paramilitary groups in a joint operation.
Only in November 2013 did the  Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACHR) condemn the Colombian government for the forced displacement of Afro-Colombian communities as a result of Operation Génesis.
For years, the Colombian government refused to implement any of the collective or individual reparations ordered by the IACHR. As a result, surviving community members have organized themselves into the Communities for Self-Determination, Life, and Dignity of Cacarica (CAVIDA), founding one of the first humanitarian zones in Columbia, called Nueva Vida y Esperanza en Dios (New Life and Hope for God). The humanitarian zone is a legal entity based on the Geneva Protocols.
Colombia's humanitarian zones are clearly demarcated areas inhabited by civilian populations where armed forces of any kind are not supposed to enter. The establishment of a humanitarian zone enabled CAVIDA members to return to their land and live protected from the internal armed conflict in a region with presence of all types of legal and illegal armed actors.
During all the years of their displacement, victims of Operation Génesis asked for a collective land title as an Afro-descendent community in order to guarantee their stay on the land, which they received in July 1998. The collective land title of more than 103,024 hectares was finally handed over to the black community of Cacarica in December 1999. This collective title was based on Colombia's Law 70, or the “Law of Black Communities,” passed in 1993 to protect the rights and cultural identity ethnic minorities.
In the documentary film ‘We Are Land,” shared by Peace Brigades Colombia (part of Peace Brigades International), members of the Cacarica community talk about their experiences with displacement and relocation:
Despite facing threats from armed groups, the community resettled its homeland in 2000 and 2001. “We still haven’t really returned,” says one member of CAVIDA in the film. As these people settled land in the newly founded humanitarian zones, only a few were able to return to their original homes and past lives. Most decided to stay on the land concentrated in humanitarian zones, citing fears about continued threats from armed men.
The IACHR had also ordered a reparation measure regarding collective memory. When the government didn't respond, CAVIDA took it upon itself to construct a monument in the humanitarian zone Nueva Vida. The statue's inscription summarizes the community's demands, reading, “Yesterday they displaced us, murdered us, and kidnapped us. Yesterday and today we are together holding hands with the world, resisting death, and resisting impunity.”
The IACHR also established a commemoration to remember Operation Genesis and it atrocities. This year, CAVIDA invited international and national organizations to attend its commemoration of the 19th anniversary of Operation Génesis and organized a hike that lasted several days and led through the thick rain forest to the border between Colombia and Panama, up to a hill called Cerrro Mocho, which is also home to a military base. Cerro Mocho forms a boundary of the black community’s territory in Cacarica with the Panamanian border.
Despite efforts to tackle the traumatic experience of the massacres and displacements caused by Operation Genesis and the unfulfilled demands for reparations, members of the Afro-Colombian population who returned have generally been unable to retake their quiet lives as subsistence farmers, facing continued threats. According to local reports, there have been recent incursions by paramilitary groups that pose the constant risk of forcing new displacements, all over again.
The border region between Panama and Colombia comprises a vast territory of thick rain forest with enormous biodiversity, rich in minerals and precious woods. It also constitutes a strategic corridor for a diverse range of interests: among other projects, plans exist to complete the Inter-American highway and interconnect an electrical power infrastructure between Central America and South America.
But the interested parties looking at this land don't end there. In 2013, a binational military base was constructed at the border. Companies are increasingly interested in exploiting natural resources in the area and are taking advantage of the fertile soil for banana monoculture production. At the same time, the area is also an attractive route for Illegal armed groups that consider the corridor an ideal route for drug trafficking, as well.
Paramilitary groups were officially demobilized in 2005, after the Justice and Peace Law of 2005 was adopted. In reality, however, many members of these groups never demobilized, or they formed new groups that still exercise social and economic control over local populations (especially in this border region). One of the biggest and most hierarchical neo-paramilitary groups is called the Gaitanistas Defence Forces of Colombia (AGC), which also has a strong presence in this region. Even though the peace accord between the Colombian government and FARC has been signed, the communities in Cacarica and elsewhere are mostly worried about the persistence of neo-paramilitary structures, which threaten their rights to a peaceful life, according to human rights defenders.
The binational Colombian-Panamanian base located at the border of the humanitarian zones is another big reason for concern among the communities. In June 2013, five months before the IACHR ruled that the Colombian state is responsible for the displacement of the Afro-Colombian communities, the base Guamal was constructed on Cerro Mocho. According to GPS measurements taken by community members and international delegations, the territory of the military base coincides with the territory of the collective title, a fact that Colombian tribunals have denied. This is quite problematic, as the Colombian military was one of the perpetrators during the the operation that resulted in the mass killings, almost two decades ago.
In an effort to protect the civilian population, communities in the humanitarian zones have laid down rules barring access to armed forces. In addition, the Panamanian news media revealed in 2014 that William Brownfield, Colombia's assistant secretary for international narcotics and law enforcement affairs, along with the former ambassador of the United States in Colombia, visited the base, raising concerns about the US government's role in such a strategic area.
Apart from remembering the victims of Operation Genesis, the commemoration also sought to raise concerns about the new base's location. In a joint statement, CAVIDA and others called for an official mission of verification in order to investigate the possibility that the base is located within the community's collective territory. The statement also calls for an inquiry into any agreements signed between the governments of the US, Panama, and Colombia.
In the meantime, today's self organized Afro-Colombian community is left with a lot of unanswered questions, an unsatisfied demand of justice, and many unpleasant neighbors.
This post is an adapted version of an original text written by FOR Peace Presence, originally published here.

author: Guest Contributor