Stories about Breaking News from July, 2009
Jamaica: Doping Athletes?
Girl With a Purpose reports on five Jamaican track and field athletes “who have been found with traces of a banned substance in their urine.”
Philippines: Reactions to the 9th State of the Nation Address
Philippine President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo gave her 9th State of the Nation Address last Monday, July 27, 2009. This post is a sample of the varied responses to the speech in the Philippine blogosphere.
Mauritania: Election Fraud?
Yesterday, 11 months after a military coup d'état led by General Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz, Mauritania has elected the General to the presidency, resulting in Abdel Aziz's main challengers denouncing the election as a “charade,” according to BBC News. A quick scan of the Sahelian blogosphere shows that the challengers are in good company.
Bombings kill nine in Indonesia
Recently re-elected Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono said that the blasts were initiated by those who wish to see a post presidential election chaos, while Vice President Jusuf Kalla blamed the negligence of police and intelligence agencies
Indonesia: Bomb Explosions at Kuningan, Jakarta
Two explosions hit the Ritz-Carlton and JW Marriott hotels in Mega Kuningan, Jakarta around 7:40 AM local time. Local social media users broke the story to the world, especially those among today's morning commuters.
Azerbaijan: Citizen media in defense of detained activists, bloggers
Although most activity can be found on Facebook where users continue to update each other on the case of video blogger Adnan Hajizade and youth activist Emin Milli, detained last week and sentenced to two months pre-trial detention, less activity might be visible in the mainstream media, but the situation is changing. Nevertheless, citizen media remains the main source of information.
Japan: Tokyo prefectural election results
Adamu at Mutantfrog liveblogged [en] the election results for Adachi Ward (Tokyo).
Philippines: Bomb scare grips the country
Several Philippine cities have been hit by bomb blasts in the past week. In Metro Manila a plot to bomb various government agencies was also discovered by authorities. More than 60 bomb attacks have been reported this year in the country. Bloggers react to the recent bomb explosions.
China: Call for tough response and resent of biased media
With the presence of thousands of armed police, Urumqi, the capital of Xinjiang province, has largely restored order and people are returning to their normal life. The violence that has led to 156 death in past a few days seemed to be gone, but the images of the brutal killings...
Azerbaijan: Youth activists and bloggers beaten and detained
Emin Milli, one of the founders of AN Network, a grassroots youth movement and Adnan Hadji-zadeh, a videoblogger from OL! Youth Movement have been severely beaten by unidentified persons while dining with a group of other civil society and youth activists in a restaurant in downtown Baku.
Arab World: Good Bye Michael Jackson
Bloggers from across the Arab world bid King of Pop Michael Jackson farewell today as millions of fans tune into the silver screen to watch live coverage of his memorial ceremony at the Staples Center in Los Angeles. Here is a snapshot of reactions from Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Bahrain.
Honduras: Videos attempt to explain political situation
After the recent confusing events in Honduras, which some call a constitutional change in power and others a coup d'état, citizens try to make sense of the situation, as shown on this past post. Some are using videos to express their perspectives, and we bring you a few of them.
China: Urumqi mass incident and beyond
According to Xinhua latest report (July 6), the violence in Urumqi, capital of northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, has led to at least 140 people dead and 828 injured. The regional government said that the mass incident was masterminded by the World Uyghur Congress. However, Uyghur independent activist explained...
Iraq – Sovereignty?
"It is like deja-vu all over again. How many times will the media declare Iraqi Sovereignty and us bloggers are expected to stand up and respectfully applaud?" writes Salam Adil in reaction to the news of further US troop withdrawal in Iraq. He brings us more reactions from the Iraqi blogosphere about their "new-found sovereignty".
India: High Court Rule Legalizes Homosexuality
Sanjukta Basu at Desicritics informs that today morning the Delhi High Court legalized homosexuality in India in a ruling in favor of a petition, which challenged the constitutionality of Section 377 of Indian Penal Code. The code criminalizes all acts of oral and anal sex between individuals irrespective of age...
