· June, 2006

Stories about Freedom of Speech from June, 2006

Immigration, Exile and Motherland!

Since the 1979 revolution millions of Iranian for various reasons have left Iran and started a new life somewhere else on this planet. Several university educated bloggers share their reasons why they left the country. More helpful in Iran but… Afkar, a US-based blogger, says when she came to USA,...

China: Media bill resisted

  28 June 2006

According to one of China's most-respected and -feared heavyweight magazines, a controversial bill containing a clause with provisions for heavy fines against media reporting on what the government terms ‘emergency situations’ was not in fact approved at the last National People's Conference, as seen in a summary from Non-violent Resistance...

China: When cops tail you

  28 June 2006

MSN Spaces blogger Zeng Jinyan [zh], wife of prominent and oft-harassed AIDS activist Hu Jia, has been writing extensively of female reproductive rights activist Chen Guangcheng who was abducted by police earlier this year, the extensive police surveillance and tailing she's since been subject to and her very clever and...

China: Free media takeover

  28 June 2006

A Communist Party of China's subtler strategy in silencing unsympathetic newspapers? Ex-Massage Milk blogger Wang Xiaofeng, in a rare one-liner post [zh] , says he's heard two major Beijing newspapers will soon be merged. Wang led the bloglash last year when the outspoken The Beijing News was taken over by...

Iran: Free Mossavi blog

FreeMossavi is a new blog to support Mossavi Khoeini, a former deputy who was arrested after 12 June demonstration. In this blog we read last night's gathering to call for his release brought many of Iran's dissidents together. This is how unity comes about, not in endless Paltalk chat rooms...

Belarus: The Language Issue

In a perfect world, languages would be nothing but a way for people to communicate with each other – no language would be considered superior or inferior, children would be encouraged to study as many as possible. In the real world, however, languages are being used as political and ideological...

Nigeria: Adeniyi-Jones

  27 June 2006

Naijablog publishes an article by Nigerian photography, Jide Adeniyi-Jones on his thoughts on Nigeria – he originally sent the article to local newspapers who refused to publish –

Nigeria: Adeniyi-Jones

  27 June 2006

Naijablog publishes an article by Nigerian photography, Jide Adeniyi-Jones on his thoughts on Nigeria – he originally sent the article to local newspapers who refused to publish –

Poland: Hungary In 1956 Vs Iraq Now

The beatroot writes about “the major difference between Hungary back then and Iraq today”: “Hungarians led the uprising, which was later crushed by a Superpower. In Iraq today, a Superpower has ‘liberated’ Iraq and is now experiencing an insurgency by some Iraqis (and a few cross- border terrorist weirdos).” He...

Chinese Netizen Became Ohmynews Journalist

  26 June 2006

Xu Zhiqiang became the 2nd citizen journalist for Ohmynews from China. He writes an introduction of how he gets involved, but he does not think that Ohmynews will be that successful as it is in Korea. As far as the media situation in China is concerned, news content and publishing...

Iran: Death of Intellectualism

Andishe No, talks about that many university professors have been forced to be retired. The blogger writes the most important protest voice comes from universities and Iranian government's priority is to make universities quiet (Persian). The blogger adds it is the death of intellectualism and it started when a cleric...

Syrian Blogsphere in a Week

To start off with a rather hot topic, it's politics, with Ammar Abdulhamid asking THE question… How Secure Is the Assads Regime, Really? To many observers of Syrian affairs, especially in the aftermath of the vaguely-worded report by Brammertz and in view of the growing alliance with Iran, the Assads...

China: Four months later

  24 June 2006

Beijing or Bust blogger and documentary maker Hao Wu has now been in prison for four months for a crime that has Chinese authorities have yet to announce. More than a month ago, Hao's sister Nina was informed that her younger brother would be denied legal representation.

Indonesia Growing Good Blogs, Hatemails and Asia Blog Awards

  23 June 2006

Indonesia blogosphere this last two years has witnessed the growing and heartening development of good blogging and quality bloggers to cheer about. This, for most reason, due to the emergence of some Indonesian intellectuals, writers and journalists who start showing their interests to blog. I have some of good bloggers...

Poland: Offended Blog Reader

The beatroot responds to a commenter's request to take down a post he perceives as offensive: “I mean… can you honestly imagine writing to a web site asking them to remove something that you find offensive? I would be doing nothing else 24/7!”

China: Revolution’s victims’ stories blogged, not forgotten (2/4)

  22 June 2006

Chinese blogger-journalist Ran Yunfei (冉云飞) has spent a large part of his life researching the stories of those painted, purged and persecuted as right wing elements during China's Cultural Revolution; unable to have the stories published in any official media, he's turned to his own well-known blog. Early last month...