9 January 2008

Stories from 9 January 2008

Israel: President Bush Visits Israel

American President George W. Bush is arriving in Israel today and for once, English speaking Israelis have little to say. Views fall primarily into two camps: Complaints about the short-term discomfort that high security will cause Jerusalemites in their daily routines, and concern about new rockets launched from Lebanon and ongoing attacks from Gaza hailing Bush's visit.

9 January 2008

Lusosphere: Happy birthday Pimenta Negra

Blog Pimenta Negra [pt] celebrates its 4th anniversary. “It came up due to several circumstances related to the need to find an independent communication channel and an alternative to spread...

9 January 2008

Portugal: We have been betrayed

Susana Charrua [pt] is alarmed that Portuguese Prime Minister Jose Socrates has decided to seek ratification of the EU's new reform treaty by parliament rather than in a referendum as...

9 January 2008

Kenya: Action Alert Blog

Black Looks writes about Kenya Action Alert blog: “Pambazuka News has created an Action Alert blog for up to date news and alerts on Kenya.”

9 January 2008

Environment: ‘Green Deserts’ in China

Gaoming Jiang of China Dialogue writes of ‘green deserts’ characterized by poplar trees and nothing else. “The Chinese government should consider the needs of local species and biodiversity. We need...

9 January 2008

Bahamas: Tourism & Crime

“The government, and Bahamians at large, must recognise that tourism is a multi-dimensional phenomenon that calls for much more than a handful of sand, a tan and a dip in...

9 January 2008

Georgia: Final Results

Writing for his blog, This is Tbilisi Calling, the BBC's Matthew Collin says that the official results for Saturday's presidential election have finally been declared. As had been reported in...

9 January 2008

China: Land Ownership

There is an appeal for returning land ownership back to rural peasants (zh)in the civic rights volunteers’ blog.

9 January 2008

China: City Management Team

Recently a passerby was beaten to death by a city management team in Hubei because he had taken photos of their violent acts. Boyer2000 pointed out that such kind of...

9 January 2008

Kazkahstan: UFO down reported

Zhanna Zhukova writes about a weird news item about alleged crash of an UFO in the northern Kazakhstan that has been reported to the competent bodies by a local head...

9 January 2008

Afghanistan: Drug Use

Nasim Fekratْ focuses this time on the issue of drug abuse in Aghanistan and says that the number of opium addicts in Kabul alone was more than 30,000 in estimation...

9 January 2008