Stories from 17 November 2006
Costa Rica: 55,000 Foreigners to Get Free Residency Renewal
Bob Glass writes: “Due to critical renewal lag times at Immigration, the government will renew 55,000 residencies automatically. The lucky foreingners are those whose residency cards expire from December 1st and July 1st of 2007.”
Costa Rica: “Doing the government's job”
Complaining about Costa Rica's government infrastructure and services, Uri Ridelman reveals a clever bit of citizen safety engineering.
Bolivia: Constituent Assembly Consensus
Bolivia Rising translates a piece from La Razon about the political forces seeking consensus to resolve regulations for the Constituent Assembly which will rewrite the nation's constitution.
Mexico: Protesting Wal-Mart
Erwin Cifuentes describes Tuesday's demonstration at a Wal-Mart store on the outskirts of Mexico City. Colin Brayton adds that “Wal-Mart is accused of having violated Mexican election laws with impunity in 2006 and so has been the target of disruptions by the “vote by vote” social movement lead by López...
Latin America: Technorati en Español
Martin Varsavsky confirms [ES] that Technorati will soon be available in Spanish. Argentine blogger Mariano Amartino notes [ES], “what's interesting is that, despite the fact that we're just 2% of the worldwide blogosphere, we're recognized as “the most global language” of all [the blogs] that are tracked on the site....
Latin America, Venezuela: Polling Wars
On top of Boz's weekly poll numbers he also ventures into the controversial territory of the Venezuela polling wars and predicts that neither Chavez nor Rosales will win over 54% of the vote. Daniel Duquenal concentrates on Venezuela's state elections and Oil Wars is skeptical of a recent poll that...
Jamaica: “I am HIV”
It's widely acknowledged, in the Caribbean and elsewhere, that the fear of stigma and discrimination is a major factor preventing people with HIV/AIDS from seeking treatment or from admitting their HIV status publicly. For this woman, however, photographed in the streets of Kingston, Jamaica by blogger and Flickr user Ria...
Tanzania: freedom of information
In order to fight corruption effectively, Tanzanians need to have free access to public information, argues Jaduong Metty
Iran:Violence against an Iranian student in UCLA
According to Iraniantruth, Mostafa Tabatabainejad, a UCLA student, was repeatedly stunned with a Taser and then taken into custody when he did not exit the CLICC Lab in Powell Library in a timely manner. Community Service Officers had asked Tabatabainejad to leave after he failed to produce his BruinCard during...
Cambodia: After the Vietnamese Left
Chhay Vet continues his series of memoirs on the recent history of Cambodia. In this episode he recalls the years immidiately after the Vietnamese left Cambodia. The Vietnamse initially attacked Cambodia in 1978 and got rid of the infamous Khmer Rouge regime but stayed on till the early 90s.
Philippines: Falling TV Profits
Mike Abundo writes about the falling profits of mainstream television stations in Philippines.”t’s about time Filipinos connected with each other and the rest of the world, instead of the cheap outdated shit local networks try to shovel down the throats of the masses. Philippine TV networks should either get on...
Singapore: Retrenchment Compensation
Blueheeler in Singapore applauds the newly lauched compensation scheme for retrenched workers in Malaysia and says that Singapore should implement similar policies.
Thailand: Reason For the Coup
Bangkok Pundit discusses a newspaper story on the reasons that might have prompted the Thai military to stage the coup.
Kenya: Kenyan blogger at 2006 Social Forum
The Indian Social Forum in words and pictures from a Kenyan blogger.
Africa: China/Africa relationship
Africabeat's fascination with China-Africa relationship: a partial explanation.
