Stories about Freedom of Speech from November, 2008
Iran: Two cyber activists jailed
Reporters Without Borders (RSF) condemns online journalist Shahnaz Gholami’s arrest at her Tehran home on 9 November. RSF reports that theologian and online journalist Mojtaba Lotfi was arrested on 8 October for a posting a sermon by a well-known opponent of Supreme Guide Ayatollah Ali Khamenei online.
Egypt: Convicted for being a Blogger
Is blogging a serious crime? And is speaking up for others something which warrants punishment? Egyptian Marwa Rakha translates a post from Arabic which discusses bloggers and blogging in Egypt.
Israel: Hoessein Derakhshan Arrested
Iranian-born Meir Javedanfar, who is based in Tel Aviv, blogs about Iranian Hoessein Deraskhshan's arrest in Tehran in this post on Middle East Analyst. Global Voices Advocacy covered the story here.
Sri Lanka: Radio Manager Detained
Free Media Sri Lanka reports that one of the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) affiliates A.R. Vanna Loshan, General Manager of Vettri FM Radio was arrested under Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA) in Colombo. IFJ and the leading media organizations in Sri Lanka condemned the detention of the Tamil journalist...
Egypt on Fire: The Gloves and The Invisible Hand
On Thursday November 6th when Egyptians were celebrating Obama's Victory, Al Ghad Party went up in flames. You can read about the initial blogosphere reactions here and here. Today I am sharing with you Wael Nawara's statements regarding the incident.
Iran: More Than Five millon sites are filtered
Iranian authorities recently announced that more than five million sites and blogs got filtered. Abdolsamad Khoramabadi, a high-ranking judicial official, said[fa] that enemies try to hurt our religious identity by using internet. No-filter, a site that fighting against filtering, says[fa]that Iranian authorities two years ago talked about ten million filtered...
Russia: Russian March Photo by Drugoi
Scraps of Moscow and Moscow Through Brown Eyes both pick LJ user drugoi‘s photo as their favorite one from the Nov. 4 Russian March.
China: Protest and Repression at Earthquake Area, Gansu Longnan
According to mainstream news report, around 30 peasants from Wudu（武都） district Dongjiang（東江） town paid a petition visit to the Longnan（隴南） city committee yesterday (17-18 of Nov), but it ended with police repression. There is little explanation on what had exactly happened as information has been blocked. However, two videos have...
Russia: “Technology's Threat to Human Rights and Free Speech”
Robert Amsterdam writes that Skype is not “safe from the wiretapping efforts of Kremlin authorities.”
Czech Republic: Anniversary of Peaceful Revolution
The Czech Daily Word writes about the time when “Czechs and Slovaks got rid of the Communist regime” 19 years ago – and about those who “still vote for ‘the new communists’.”
Tunisia: Yes, they can. No, we can't!
The week of the US election coincided with the 21st anniversary of 'change' in Tunisia. But while Americans went to the polls to elect their 44th president, in its 50 years of independence, Tunisia has had just two presidents. Tunisian bloggers mark Zine El Abidine Ben Ali's 21st year as president with a call for change.
Egypt Ranks High in Corruption
Egypt ranks 115 in Transparency International's Corruption Perception Index, which tracks 180 countries by their perceived levels of corruption, as determined by expert assessments and opinion surveys. The rankings are in ascending order, with the more corrupt countries scoring higher ranks.
Bahrain: Playground politics?
Bahraini blogger Yagoob is not impressed with the behaviour of a member of parliament who followed another member to Kuwait to make sure he didn't taint Bahrain's reputation at a conference: “What next? Is he going to give out spankings for any MPs who say something he doesn’t like?…Now if...
China: Reflections of a Bridge Blogger
Roland from ESWN posts his presentation, “reflections of a bridge blogger”, for Chinese blogger conference in his blog. (He failed to attend the gathering because of family emergency.)
Russia: “Different Family” Photo Project
"These people may have no home, no jobs. They may be doing drugs, their neighbors may hate them, and they may be banned from entering a theater because of their inappropriate looks. But within such families, love and caring relationship still reign." This is how photographer Irina Popova describes the subjects of her "Different Family" project, currently on exhibit in St. Petersburg. But since the series is centered as much on a toddler named Anfisa, the daughter of Popova's marginal adult subjects, the photographer's interpretation of her own work has caused harsh criticism.
Egypt: Internet Freedom in Egypt
Tunisian blogger, Sami Ben Gharbia, published a video explaining the role of the Egyptian blogsphere in exposing human rights abuses and the role of the social-networking website Facebook and the micro-blogging platform.
Egypt for Sale
Word is out that every Egyptian citizen who is over 21 years old will own a part of Egypt's public sector companies and factories. The announcement has been the core topic of talk shows and has made its way to the blogosphere.
Pakistan: GEO TV News Blocked?
Teeth Maestro is reporting that the transmission of Geo News, a Dubai based Pakistani news channel and other channels of the GEO TV network have been blocked in most parts of Karachi.
Bahamas: Censorship
Simon at Bahama Pundit blogs about “the sensitive issue of censorship.”
Trinidad & Tobago: Accountability
“More than three years have passed already since the Saturday morning in October 2005 when thousands of Trinidadians marched through the streets of Port of Spain to protest the Manning government's failure to deal with spiralling murder and kidnapping rates, widespread public anxiety, and the profound social inequalities behind these”:...
Malaysia: Are the police being too brutal?
A peaceful rally in Malaysia was violently dispersed by the police. Civil society groups have condemned the dispersal, especially the use of force, the repression of assembly and expression, and Malaysian bloggers are up in arms on the whole episode.
