21 April 2008

Stories from 21 April 2008

Malawian Bloggers Discuss The Zimbabwe Crisis

  21 April 2008

As bloggers from across Africa write about the elections crisis in Zimbabwe, Malawian bloggers join in the condemnation of the delay in releasing the election results, with at least one blogger pointing to the one-sided nature of the discussions on the causes of Zimbabwe’s economic and political problems.

Lebanon: Media reporting on Gaza

“So now the headline is that there is ‘unrest’ in the Gaza strip. Last week, I felt unrestful: I didn't know whether to take chicken taouk or shwarma – but I didn't kill five children in the process…” Burghol commenting on how the media reports about Gaza.

Lebanon: Show-off all the time

“In Lebanon, everybody live in community. Everything you’re doing have to be known, by your friends, your family, your neighbors… it is show-off all the time,” observes élodie while writing about Lebanese fascination with social networking such as Facebook.

Indonesia: 15 years for terrorist leaders

  21 April 2008

jubaonline writes that Indonesian terrorists who were sentenced to only 15 years in jail will be able to “walk out early because they didn't get life sentences.” The blogger adds that “Every Idul Fitri and Independence Day, prisoners in Indonesia get reductions in their sentences for good behavior.

Japan: Comfort Women Video Calls Attention to a Still Unresolved Issue.

  21 April 2008

More than 60 years have passed since the World War II, but women who claim to have been abducted under Japanese Military's orders to serve as sexual slaves on military “Comfort Stations” are still waiting for the government's public apologies and material compensation even as the government still denies the...

Bahamas: Tax Write-Off?

  21 April 2008

Sidney Sweeting at WeblogBahamas.com was shocked that “the ex-Minister of State for Finance said that Government should write off the almost $410 million (that figure is not a misprint) owed to the Government for Real Property Tax.”

New Oil in Brazil Unleashes a Gusher of Media Controversies

  21 April 2008

Twisted information about the discovery of what may possibly be the third largest oil field in the world turned into a hot issue on the Brazilian blogosphere this week. The trigger was a comment from the head of Brazil's National Petroleum Agency [ANP], Haroldo Lima, mentioning that the recently found Carioca [or Sugar Loaf] field in Brazil’s offshore Santos Basin could potentially contain reserves of up to 33 billion barrels of oil and gas.

Jamaica: Calabash 2008

  21 April 2008

Geoffrey Philp blogs about the 2008 Calabash literary festival in Jamaica and says that “Nobel Prize winning poet Derek Walcott is delighted about his upcoming appearance.”

Bermuda: Freedom of the Press

  21 April 2008

As Bermuda's Premier responds to international concern over the country's press freedoms, Vexed Bermoothes thinks that his letter “oozes with false sincerity and contorted logic.”

Jamaica, Martinique, Trinidad & Tobago: Lighting the Way

  21 April 2008

Jamaican litblogger Geoffrey Philp is still processing the news of Aimé Césaire's death: “For if the goal of any life is freedom, then Aimé Césaire was a light”…while Caribbean Free Radio remembers a podcast she did with “Césaire intoning, in his impeccably enunciated French, against a musical background, the first...