Stories about Freedom of Speech from February, 2008
Serbia, Kosovo, U.S.: Diaspora Serbs
Reluctant Dragon and Gray Falcon offer two different perspectives on what it feels like being a Serb in the United States following Kosovo's declaration of independence.
Russia: Election Roundup
A roundup on Russia's upcoming presidential election: Mark MacKinnon writes on the 72 percent “target” for Medvedev; Megan Case writes about the reasons NOT to vote; Robert Amsterdam writes about betting on the Russian election, writer Victor Erofeyev's pro-Putin and pro-Medvedev op-ed in the New York Times, and more election...
Serbia, Kosovo: Lack of Trust
Balkan Anarchist writes at length about “the utter lack of inter-ethnic dialogue between Serbs and Albanians” in Kosovo.
Serbia: Window For Slovenian Embassy
East Ethnia reposts a photo of a new window presented to the Slovenian embassy by “the students of Belgrade.”
China: Chongqing's Pride
Zhang Xiaozhou's soccer game report has hurt Chongqing citizens’ pride. Students, representatives of people congress, and newspapers editors protested against the report and demanded the authority to punish the reporter. Blogger Wen yunchao commented that Chongqing people were over sensitive (zh). Zhao Mu criticized that the Chongqing local newspapers were...
Serbia: “Ray of Light in Tough Times”
Belgrade 2.0 posts a selection of photoshopped Kosovo-related parodies and writes: “If there’s one thing I always appreciated about Serbia and it’s turbulent times, it’s the people’s strenght to find something humorous in all that, no matter how bad the times are. It was like that during the sanctions, during...
Iranian web editor arrested for criticizing Khomeini’s grandson
Hossein Nobakhtian, the managing editor of the banned conservative Iranian website Nosazi (Renovation) has been detained for criticizing Khomeini’s grandson.
Africa: Is Chinese influence eroding press freedom?
The BBC posted an interview with head of Reporters Without Borders Leonard Vincent commenting on the decline of press freedom in Africa over the past year. Ugandan blogger, Ugandan Insomniac, was the first to discuss the interview.
China: Thoughts and debates on the name-calling professor
The start was in fact very simple. In 2007, Professor Zhong Hua at Sichuan Normal University issued an article entitled Cultural Studies and the Lost of Literary Theory in the 11th issue of “Literature and Art Studies”, one of the core academic journals in China, criticizing an academic work entitled...
Poland: Giertych's Fear of Feminism
The beatroot reports on Maciej Giertych's fear of feminism.
Serbia: Where is Facebook's Belgrade?
According to Belgrade 2.0, Serbia's capital has mysteriously disappeared from Facebook: “Anyway, there are couple of groups now fighting to get Serbian cities back on the list of hometowns, since about 70 thousand Serbs that are already on Facebook just lost that option. Unfortunately, the protesters are not being very...
Egypt: Praying against Mubarak in the Metro
From an offer to give up a seat at the metro, to an impromptu protest against Egyptian President Mohamed Hosni Mubarak. Eman Abdurahman brings us the story from Egypt.
Morocco: Blogger Quits
A popular and well respected university professor and blogger, Pr. Mohamed Drissi Bakhakhat, decided to stop blogging out of fear for his safety after what happened to Fuad Mourtada, writes A Moro in America.
Kosovo, Serbia: A Roundup
Update on Kosovo/Serbia: Belgrade 2.0 sums things up; East Ethnia discusses the possibility of partition; Csíkszereda Musings writes on the meaning of Kosovo for Romania's Székelyföld autonomy; Greater Surbiton re-posts his article on what's “at stake in the struggle for Serbia”; Steady State writes on the implications of Kosovo for...
Poland, U.K.: Football and Anti-Semitism
The beatroot examines whether the UK and Polish football fans are the “most anti-Semitic in Europe.”
Estonia: National Identity
Itching for Eestimaa marks Estonia's independence day (Feb. 24) by writing about Estonian national identity.
Czech Republic, Slovakia: 60 Years Since Communist Takeover
The Reference Frame writes about the 60th anniversary of the Communist takeover of Czechoslovakia.
Russia, Ukraine: February 23
Scraps of Moscow, Ukrainiana, and Windows to Russia! write about the Defender of the Fatherland Day (formerly known as the Soviet Army Day). Feb. 23 also happens to be president Victor Yushchenko's birthday, and, as Window on Eurasia points out, it is also the day on which Stalin’s deportation of...
Russia: Lev Ponomarev; Solovetskiy Stone
Robert Amsterdam reports on an investigation launched against human rights activist Lev Ponomarev, who has been “accused of committing slander against the Russian Federation, and is currently being prevented from leaving the country.” Also, Amsterdam writes about the Solovetskiy Stone memorial and the authorities’ plans to remove it from Lubyanka...
Russia, U.S.: The New York Times’ Russian LJ
Lyndon of Scraps of Moscow provides a comprehensive review of the New York Times‘ Russian-language LJ community, a platform for a “translator-assisted online dialog” between Russian bloggers and the newspaper's regular readers and its Moscow bureau staff: “a very interesting and creative step, with the potential to realize the full...
Turkmenistan: TV Appearance with Consequences
CXW reports that a cockroach’s five minutes of fame led to the sacking of 30 people from Turkmen State Television and raises questions about the future of TV in the country.
