Stories about LANGUAGES from July, 2007
Palestine: History Lesson
Palestinian Haitham Sabbah links to an Arabic video which posts lessons in Palestinian history 101.
Arabeyes: Muslim Brotherhood Egyptian Blogger Vanishes
Egyptian blogger Ahmed Saad Domah has vanished, according to the Blogger's Observatory, which has been set up to monitor the arrests and harassments bloggers and online writers in the Arab World face.
Japan: A Historic Election Defeat
The overwhelming defeat of the Liberal Democratic Party in Japan's upper house elections on Sunday, historic in its scale, brought about a drastic shift in the Japanese political landscape and sent a clear message to prime minister Abe Shinzo and his government. While media across the world analyze political fallout of the political shift, bloggers are echoing the message and demanding change.
Kyrgyzstan: Issyk-Kul
morrire posts pictures from her visit to the southern shore of Issyk-Kul, one of the biggest high-altitude lakes in the world – and favourite holiday destination for Kyrgyzstani citizens.
Uzbekistan: Digital boom?
Jamiyat translates an article which gives the impression that the use of internet and mobile telecommunication is growing rapidly in Uzbekistan.
Global Voices in Persian Takes off
Global Voices in Persian finally takes off officially. It started its first baby steps in June and a few of its translations have already been republished on a few sites including a very popular one, Gooya.com and the Iranian Digg,Balatarin. On good days we get around 350 hits and 250...
China: Citywide taxi strike
It seems the ten thousand taxi drivers in one Chinese city have all gone on strike, bloggers are making this much clear. Local media appears not to be reporting on the incident, so the reasons for the job action have yet to be made known.
Brazil: About the 2007 Rio Pan-American Games
After two intense weeks full of sports coverage and post-tragedy debates in the media, the XV Pan American Games in Rio de Janeiro has come to an end. Since its inauguration ceremony, where president Lula got booed by the crowd at the stadium, the event has inspired a passionate debate colored by political frictions in the local blogosphere. How the defection of Cuban athletes fits the plot? Read through the end of the post and find out what Brazilian blogs has to say about it.
Argentina: Concern Over Animal Deaths Due to Flooding
Roberto Vico writes in Grito Argentino regarding the recent animal deaths due to the heavy flooding in the Santa Fe province.
Guatemala: Journalist's Column Strikes a Nerve Among Bloggers
Dr. Mario Roberto Morales, a prominent writer from Central America recently wrote a column criticizing bloggers for their alleged lack of credibility. This article sparked a wave of criticisms from Guatemalan bloggers who kindly suggested that if blogs bothered him so much, then he should stop reading. In addition, they write that the freedom to publish content for the entire world to read far outweighs the generalizations that Morales puts forth.
Kuwait: Pictures, Sights and Events
Kuwaiti bloggers are leaping into action, discovering their surroundings, attending events and covering them, keeping tabs on the latest developments on the arrest of the Monster of Hawali and looking for racial slurs on the shelves of supermarkets. Read this post by Abdullatif Al Omar to see what else is happening.
Sympathy for Christian missionaries
After a famous actor who is respected for his morality expressed sympathy for Christian missionaries and the abducted Christian missionaries in Afghanistan on his personal homepage, his webpage was inundated with comments. [k]
Japan: Protester nearly killed at Henoko Bay
An activist protesting environmental surveys currently being conducted in Henoko Bay (Okinawa) in preparation for the construction of a new military base was reportedly nearly killed when government-contracted divers attacked him. While the Defense Facilities Administration Agency (DFAA) denies the incident, the activist himself, pastor Taira Natsume, released a statement...
Bangladesh: The threat of floods and current politics
A flood on its way Like many places in the world it has been raining incessantly in many parts of Bangladesh for a number of days. The rain water had waterlogged many places. Back to Bangladesh posts some pictures of some parts of the waterlogged Dhaka. He wonders whether there...
Bahrain: The Return of the British ‘Butcher of Bahrain’
Politics and human rights are, as ever, the chief topics of discussion on Bahrain’s blogs this week, but we also hear about things that aid and interrupt sleep, creatures that won’t buzz off, and stories of both loneliness and new friendship.
Touring Libyan Blogs: Health Sector, Old Ladies, Confrontating a Racist Bully, Globetrotting and Another Libyan Writer
The case of the Bulgarian nurses (and the Palestinian doctor) is already fading into history - while speculation rages if they have been bought off, whether they were guilty or not, if they were hostage to a political settlement in the New World Order or who is it exactly that defused the situation? One thing is sure on this side of the world is that their innocence or the lack of it has not been proven 100 per cent. However, in the interest of self preservation Libyans are moving on, writes Fozia Mohamed.
Korea: Remember 5.18
History seems unforgettable. Especially tragedies. A movie that just opened in Korea brings up a piece of history, the Kwangju Uprising or Kwangju Democracy Movement (known in Korea as 5.18), and has been touted as a film Koreans should watch. The film touches on issues of patriotism, the plight of...
Madagascar: Community, Identity and the Malagasy diaspora
As it is sometimes the case for sub-Saharan African nations, the Malagasy diaspora carries a substantial weight of the cultural, political and virtual activities related to Madagascar. In the World Wide Web, the bandwidth limitation is a major encumbrance to a larger participation of bloggers from Madagascar in the global...
Bahrain: Housing Crisis
Bahraini emoodz writes about his country's mounting housing crisis here.
Fighting HIV/AIDS in ‘post-Islamist’ Sudan
Despite the challenges of preventing the spread of HIV in what remains a deeply conservative society, a Tunisian blogger working in Sudan's national AIDS prevention program observes a growing openness to once-taboo ideas.
Uzbekistan: Domestic violence, a prison for Uzbek Paris Hiltons and “Iran, go home!”
This week on Uzbekstani blogs: The difficult role of women in society and domestic violence stand in stark contrast to the flamboyant life of the president's daughter. Also, a young Uzbek football player displays a "Iran Go Home" poster before a match, Uzbek civil society is under threat, and a special prison is being built for delinquent civil servants.
