19 June 2007

Stories from 19 June 2007

Iran:Appeal for Iranian Students

In CityBoy we read “this is an appeal by bloggers against the detention of 9 Iranian students from the Amir Kabir Polytechnic University in Tehran who are been kept and repeatedly tortured at the notorious Evin prison.”The blogger has published the photos of these 9 jailed students too.

Barbados: Accountability in Construction Sector

  19 June 2007

“Recently Barbadians witnessed the sanitizing of a ‘list’ of 300 companies which were previously approved by government to benefit from building contracts.” Barbados Underground wonders whether the inefficiencies of the construction sector make it an easy vehicle through which taxpayers’ money can be misappropriated.

Japan: Freak Accidents

  19 June 2007

TokyoMango reports on freak accidents in Tokyo in the news today: a 28-year old woman was strolling in Shinjuku when a sign from a pizza place fell on her head, leaving her in the hospital with a brain contusion, and a fancy day spa in an upscale neighborhood in Shibuya...

China: Chen Guangcheng beaten, on hunger strike

  19 June 2007

It's Dragon Boat time, nearly a year to the day since blind reproductive rights advocate Chen Guangcheng was taken in by police, and civil rights blogger Hu Jia makes his blogging return with news that Chen has been beaten while in prison.

China: Environmental politics

  19 June 2007

Chong from interlocals.net translated an article by Zhu Jiangang on “three parties in environomental politics”: the three parties are central government, civic groups and citizens, special interest consortium in the local levels.

China: Security guard culture

  19 June 2007

Security guards (Bao-an) in China is omnipresent. Granite Studio noticed the presence of Bao-an is very distinctive feature in China, but they have different set of rules for locals and for foreigners.

China: Harmonizing 18 child rape cases

  19 June 2007

Chris O'Brien from Beijing Newspeak criticised Chinese media for downplaying the crime of 18 child rape cases in Gansu by a primary school teacher: Xinhua did not release this story in Chinese. The report about the death sentence was buried, as usual, on page four or five of the local...

Hong Kong: Defending plagiarism

  19 June 2007

A blogger's commentary on a comic had been plagiarized by a popular local magazine. An apology would have ended the issue. However, the editor's attempt to defend plagiarism has resulted in more outraging responses from the blogsphere. ESWN has translated the conversation between the blogger and the editor. The original...

Japan: Video Art, Media and Zen

  19 June 2007

An interview with Montreal-born Japan-based video producer Michael Goldberg has been posted at gyaku. In the interview, Goldberg discusses his experience with media art movements in the 60s and 70s, as well as his recent documentary entitled “A ZEN LIFE” about Japanese author/translator D.T. Suzuki, widely credited as having introduced...

China: More on Slave workers

  19 June 2007

ESWN translated various local reports on Shanxi slave workers issue. They give more background on the morality of contemporary Chinese society.

Afghan Whispers:Education, music, wonderful nature and freedom

Sun Leaf talks about the painful situation of Afghanistan's education system. The blogger says Compared to other countries in Asia, the Afghan education situation is startling. The statistics below show that tremendous challenges remain. One of the poorest measures includes funding or implementing short-term education projects, which are abrubtly brought...

Costa Rica: Breaking Relations with Taiwan and Starting with China

  19 June 2007

After 60 years of diplomatic ties with Taiwan, the Costa Rican government broke this relationship to begin a new one with China. Some bloggers see this as a positive commercial step for the country, while others think that Costa Rica prides itself on being a defender of human rights and freedom of speech and that this should not be compromised in exchange for access to markets.