Stories about Freedom of Speech from October, 2006
Poland: News and Opinion
The beatroot writes about media freedom in the EU, the fear of the Polish plumber (again; 70 comments so far), a Sudanese woman giving birth on a bus in Warsaw, and a few other matters.
Hugo Chavez in the Iranian left-wing blogs
Hugo Chavez, the leftist Venezuelan President, has developed a very friendly relationship with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the Iranian Islamist President. Iran even awarded the Venezuelan President its highest state medal for supporting Tehran in its nuclear standoff against the international community. This alliance was discussed a couple of months ago among...
Mexico: The last moments of Bradley Roland Will
Journalism seems like a precarious profession to practise in Mexico. It's ranked by the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) as one of the most dangerous places to be a journalist. The latest tragic example of this came on Friday 27th October, in the southern state of Oaxaca, with the shooting...
Kazakhstan: Unfree Speech
At neweurasia, Leila translates a Russian language post on press freedom in Kazakhstan.
Belarus: News Roundup
TOL's Belarus Blog writes about yet another arrest; prize for Milinkevich, and the Belarusian language museum.
Bulgaria: The Tripoli Six Update
Declan Butler posts an update on “the buildup of international pressure” in the Tripoli Six case.
IGF in Athens: searching globally for the Internet's common ground
The first meeting of the Internet Governance Forum – IGF, which aims to be a a place for a “multi-stakeholder policy dialogue”, starts tomorrow, going from 30 October to 2 November in Athens, Greece. The idea of the forum emerged during last year's meetings of the World Summit on the...
Prominent Bahraini Blog, Blocked!
It's official, Mahmood's Blog (http://mahmood.tv) will be blocked effective immediately, by the orders of the Bahraini Ministry of Information. Together with 6 other web sites (listed below), the official memo was delivered to all the ISP's in Bahrain this afternoon. Mahmood Al-Yousif, is a prominent Bahraini/Arab blogger. His blog is...
Bangladesh in Turmoil
Bangladesh is going through turbulent times as the row over an interim caretaker government chief persists who will lead the country towards the upcoming parliament election in January 2007. This unique caretaker government (CTG) system adopted in Bangladesh constitution worked in past three elections. However this time the opposition parties...
Russia: LJ and Politics
On October 25, International Herald Tribune published Evgeny Morozov's opinion piece on the recent developments in the Russian blogosphere. On his blog – Sharp & Sound: Perspectives On Modern Politics – Morozov wrote: […] I’ve been surprised how little coverage the story has received in the Western media…Hm, virtually none…...
The Week That Was in Bahrain
Bahrain's bloggers celebrated Eid this week, with many posting greetings on their sites or simply musing about the tradition. While Mahmood Al Yousif thinks that “Eid this time seems to be spread through the whole week, rather than a single day where the whole nation celebrates!”, Silly Bahraini Girl took...
Greece: Blog censorship in Greece ahead of the IGF forum in Athens
Currybetdotnet reports about the administrator of a Greek RSS aggregating service (blogme.gr) who was sued, arrested and jailed for hosting a link to a blog with allegedly offending content. This censorship case occurs days ahead of UN's IGF forum in Athens, which among other issues will be focusing on ‘Freedom...
Madagascar: Among the Top Third for Freedom of the Press
Blogin'i Harinjaka writes (Fr): ” Madagascar is 66th in the global ranking of freedom of the press established by international non-governmental organization Reporters without Borders. … 66th is not among the very first but it is not bad considering the country iis ranked in the first third.”
Russia: Rice on Politkovskaya
Sean's Russia Blog writes about Anna Politkovskaya, the Russian and US media, the war in Iraq and Condoleezza Rice's visit to Moscow.
Romania: 1956 in Csikszereda
Csikszereda Musings writes about the events of 1956 in a Romanian town with a sizable Hungarian community.
Pakistan: Press Freedom
The Glasshouse on Pakistan's rank in the RSF Press Freedom Index. “At times the regime moves swiftly to prevent ‘harmful’ news from spreading, as was the case in late 2005 when it closed a local FM Radio relaying a BBC World Service Programme, which began providing independent news on the...
Torture in Gambia, “Militocracy” in Africa, Press Freedom and Dirty Water and Gold
We begin this week's West African blogs round-up with a post in a Gambian blog, Home of the mandinmories, about a Gambian soldier being “Coerced, and tortured” over an alleged coup plot: Browsing through the Point today, a story on the court martial of Captain Yahya Darbo caught my eye....
Voices from South Asia
Bangladesh: - What does Bangladesh need now for a better future? Angelmorn has a ten point prescription. - Rifat of Close your eyes and try to see is critic about the noise pollution in Bangladesh, especially using the loudspeakers. - Shafiur of imperfect world | 2006 informs that many of...
China: real name registration
DANWEI has translated Wang Xiao Feng's post on “The paradox of registering bloggers’ real names”(zh).
China: error in arrest
The China Media project reports that Chongqing police admit error in arresting author of satirical poem.
Russia: Thoughts on LiveJournal/ZheZhe
The Second Blog War continues in Russia. Brad Fitzpatrick, the LiveJournal's creator, has now joined the discussion over at sup_ru LJ community: in English, he offers some explanations and apologies here (and receives 248 comments so far) and lists the bloggers’ most common questions and concerns here (123 comments so...
