Stories about Western Europe from July, 2008
The Baltics: Baltic Sea Environmental Campaign
Copydude writes about Moving Baltic Sea – a campaign to promote creative strategies for cultural and environmental co-operation among Baltic Sea states.
Tube Adventure: A Bilingual Quest Game on YouTube
The popular Spanish YouTube channel Pinofas has created a novel project: it's an hero adventure quest live-action game that takes advantage of the new tagging, linking and commenting capabilities that YouTube has implemented, called Tube Adventure.
Italy: A National Registry for Roma People?
Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi's new right wing Cabinet recently launched plans to carry out a national registration of all Roma people in Italy, including fingerprints of all children. Italy is home to an estimated 150,000 Roma and Sinti people (often referred to as Gypsies). The ensuing, heated public debate over whether this measure amounts to racial discrimination is overflowing in the online space of Italy and beyond.
Philippines: Monthly salary of politicians
A Filipino politician reveals his monthly salary to belie popular perception that politicians are earning big.
Costa Rica: Concerts, riots and concerns.
Journalist Cristian Cambronero from popular Costa Rican blog Fusil de Chispas posts a recount of Sunday's Concert where youth rioted and destroyed the campus of the Universidad Latina in the capital city of San José. It seems that when around 3000 of them were not allowed entrance to the free concert venue where already 5000 spectators were waiting for the concert some of the irate teens destroyed the university buildings, storefronts,dismantled cars, damaged the church in the vicinity, looted, threw chairs, rocks and bricks everywhere.
Morocco: Another perspective on Faiza Silmi
Last week, Global Voices covered the story of Faiza Silmi, the Moroccan woman denied French citizenship for her beliefs and actions (which included, among other things, wearing the niqaab or full facial veil). Today, Moroccan blogger ...xoussef [FR] chimes in with another perspective on the issue.
Serbia: Anglophone Bloggers Continue Discussion of Karadžić's Arrest
From one of the world’s most wanted fugitives, Radovan Karadžić - aka Dr. Dragan David Dabić - has turned into one of the world's most talked about detainees. Below are snippets of some of the discussions that have taken place in Anglophone blogs in the past few days.
French Ambassador expelled from Madagascar because he was bad luck?
Malagasy and French netizens debate the French Ambassador's expulsion from Madgascar. Was it a matter of superstition?
Serbia: Radovan Karadzic was Disguised as a Doctor
Radovan Karadzic lived in Belgrade under false name of Dragan David Dabic. He was disguised as an alternative medicine doctor and even worked in one private clinic in Belgrade. He also was a contributor to the Healthy Life magazine and took part in forums and lectures, gathering up to several hundred people. At the time of the arrest, Radovan Karadzic (aka Dragan Dabic) had long hair and a white beard. Sinisa Boljanovic translates Serbian bloggers' reactions to this astonishing piece of news.
Russia: Ethnic German Diaspora
Otto's Random Thoughts discusses the question of belonging for the ethnic German diaspora in Russia against the background of regular displacement and forced movement.
Japan: LGBT Youth Exchange Project
LGBT Youth Exchange [jp] is a joint project by the Center for Gender Studies at International Christian University in Tokyo and Youth and Play Services of the city council of Bristol to bring LGBT youth from England and Japan together. This year, young people from Bristol are invited to come...
Russia, UK: TNK-BP Battle
The Oil and the Glory reflects upon the currently strained relations between Russia and Britain, with the battle over TNK-BP and Russian nationalisation of energy resources as a background. Tim Newman of White Sun of the Desert reflects further on the issue of what will happen if BP is actually...
Serbia: Local Bloggers Discuss the Arrest of Radovan Karadžić
Just a few days after the 13th anniversary of the massacre in Srebrenica, in which over 7,000 people, most of them Muslim civilians, were killed, Radovan Karadzic, former president of Republika Srpska, is arrested. Many bloggers from the Serbian blogosphere were surprised by the news. Below are the first reactions from some of them.
Brazil: Portugal ratifies Portuguese language agreement
Portugal's President Anibal Cavaco Silva has ratified the agreement to standardise the Portuguese language and its spelling in a move to make the language, spoken in 8 countries, more uniform globally. O Hermenauta [pt] has written a round up of reactions from both sides of the ocean and concludes the...
Colombia: Freedom March Around the World
After the rescue of 15 high profile hostages held in the FARC's power on July 2nd 2008, the same group that organized the last global march on February 4th against the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) decided that there should be a another one on July 20th, the day when Colombia's Independence from Spain is celebrated. The following videos and photographs show the way this Independence celebration and liberation march was celebrated around the world, and also some of the contrasting thoughts regarding the meaning of nation and freedom.
Arabeyes: Moroccan woman refused French citizenship for burqa
Last week a French resident was refused citizenship on the grounds that she was “insufficiently assimilated.” The woman, referred to in the Press as “Faiza M.,” is a Moroccan citizen but has lived in France since 2000 with her husband, a French citizen, and three children, all born in France. The incident has set a precedent and has stirred up the feelings of bloggers around the world, reports Jillian York.
Bahrain: Arrogant French Embassy
Bahraini blogger Mahmood Al Yousif complains about the ‘arrogance’ of the French Embassy in Bahrain in this post – where he claims he wasn't treated well when he went to apply for a Schengen Visa.
Serbia, U.S.: Peter Egner
East Ethnia writes about the arrest of a man thought to be Peter Egner, 86, “a member of the Nazi security police in Belgrade between 1941 and 1943 where he acted as an interpreter during interrogations of prisoners and guarded transports of prisoners (at least) between two prison camps in...
DRC: Kabila meets with Sarkozy
At his meeting with Congolese President Joseph Kabila yesterday, French President Nicolas Sarkozy extinguished any hopes of more debt relief. Blogger Alex Engwete has this to say [Fr]: “the lesson to take from the diplomatic debacle is that the development of the DRC will not happen by way of the...
Europe tightens border control, Brazil returns in kind
Father LaCour, a missionary in Burkina Faso, writes about French tourists who were arbitrarily denied entry by Brazilian immigration authorities [Fr], apparently in retaliation for Europe's increasingly strict immigration policies.
