· May, 2007

Stories about Western Europe from May, 2007

Libya: Blair in Tripoli

“British prime minister is touring Africa before leaving his office and we got a glimpse of his visit to Tripoli. His visit brought a very tight security to the city. Our backyard parking area is cleared by the police and there were checkpoints all around our street,” writes Iranian Mr...

How the South is financing the North's internet connection

Reseau International de correspondants writes about pricing inequalities in the international telecom system (Fr) that place a disproportionate burden of payment on developing countries to the extent that “the South is financing the North” and it is in effect “three times more expensive to connect to the internet” in developing...

Human Sacrifice & the Politics of Death

  23 May 2007

At Babilown, French-Beninian author Blaise Aplognan describes the religious and political function of human sacrifice (Fr) in ancient societies: “…its goal was to channel violence toward a (sacrificed) individual, toward the sacred realm, institutionalizing violence by supervising it and practicing it according to very precise rules and rituals.”

Alain Mabanckou on the new French government

  21 May 2007

Congolese poet-novelist Alain Mabanckou writes about several politicians from the left who were given positions in France's new conservative government, as well as the appointment of France's first African Minister of Justice, Rachida Dati, the daughter of Moroccan and Algerian immigrants. On the basis of these appointments, he calls France's...

France's New “Ministry of Nationalism and Expulsion”

Francophone blogger Et Si Nous Parlions has no love for French president Nicolas Sarkozy's new Ministry of Immigration, Integration, National Identity, and Co-Development. He prefers to call it the “Ministry of Nationalism and Expulsion” (Fr). The ministry's title suggests its broad-reaching ambitions. French human rights groups have criticized the ministry's...

The EU: “The ‘Balkans’ They Love to Hate”

TOL's The nEUrosis critiques a Times’ story on the EU's newest members: “But rather than explaining the situation, the article goes on to provide no explanation or example why Bulgaria and Romania are in such a sordid state. In the same vein, anyone could say the same about any country...

Burundi: French Man Mistaken for a Cannibal

  17 May 2007

Bien Au Bout… shares the strange story of children who fled their schools en masse fearing they might be eaten [Fr] by a white man seen wandering in the forests outside their villages. Local rumor had it that Patrice Faye, a French naturalist and collector of endangered snakes with 30...

Europe: Still Some More on Eurovision

Another mini-roundup of entries on last Saturday's Eurovision Song Contest: Anegdote encourages readers to rejoice – because they “accomplished something too by watching” Serbia's winning entry on TV; Belgrade 2.0 thinks Western Europeans should set up a bloc of their own next year, to counter the votes of the existing...