19 June 2009

Stories from 19 June 2009

Jordan: Hands off private schools

At Creative Jordan, Yusuf Mansur argues in favour of private schools. “Jordanian policy makers, lacking the resources to promote world-class educational systems, have focused their attention on overregulating the private...

19 June 2009

Egypt: Weekend Digressing

Egyptian blogger Nermeena has been away from the Internet for a while and shares tidbits from her life in this post, including the latest book she is reading.

19 June 2009

Bahrain/Tunisia: Censors of the Net

Sesawe‘s blog publishes an English translation of an article which appeared in France's Le Monde 2, entitled Censors of the Net, written by Claire Ulrich, which focuses on censorship, including...

19 June 2009

Egypt: Sign Avaaz Settlements Petition

Egyptian Dalia Ziada announces that she has just signed an Avvaz petition, which supports US president Barack Obama's call to stop the building of Israeli settlements on Palestinian territories. So...

19 June 2009

Egypt: A New Presidential Candidate in the Making

In September 2005 Ayman Nour of Al Ghad Party and No'man Goma'a of New Wafd Party nominated themselves against President Hosni Mubarak. Nour was charged with fraud and Goma'a was accused of insanity! Since 2000, Gamal Hosni Mubarak has the been groomed to be his father's successor as the next president with no apparent opponent. Today, rumor has it that Omar Soliman, Chief of The Egyptian General Intelligence Services, is an eligible presidential candidate.

19 June 2009

Iran: Reformist and activist bloggers arrested

As demonstrations continue in Iran against the results of the June 12 presidential elections, authorities continue their clampdown on activists, journalists and bloggers. Hamid Tehrani reviews the Iranian blogosphere, where several reports of blogger arrests are being circulated.

19 June 2009

Egypt: Between the Swine Flu and Approaching Plague

Terror and panic have gripped many Egyptians after the first case of H1N1 influenza, or Swine Flu, was detected in the country. The panic had actually started before the virus hit, prompting the Egyptian government to cull pigs. Bloggers are also voicing their concerns about the spread of the deadly plague in a neighbouring Libyan town.

19 June 2009

Nepal: The Musicians

Kathmandu Blogger writes about the unsung heroes of Nepali Weddings, the musicians.

19 June 2009

Pakistan: Karachi Without Power

On the 17th of June Karachi witnessed the worst power breakdown which lasted about one day. Raja Islam at Karachi Metblogs liveblogged the power outage. Doodh Patti posts pictures showing...

19 June 2009

Bangladesh: Back From No Wo/man's Land

Renowned photojournalist and blogger Shahidul Alam, who was arrested by Indian border guards first and later by Bangladesh police, has been released on bail and has written in his blog...

19 June 2009

India: Doing Something For The Country

Parth Dave at The Indian World introduces an website titled One Letter A Week (ONLW) which aims at addressing socio-economic or cultural issues of India by encouraging readers to write...

19 June 2009

Confederation Cup: Egypt beats World Champions Italy in Football Victory

Egypt moved closer to reaching the semi-finals of the Confederation Cup after a famous 1-0 win over Italy, the world champions. After the match, many Egyptians took to the streets loudly beeping their car horns at midnight. Streets became crowded after traffic was light during the match. Young men were seen hanging from the windows of moving cars, cheering and waving Egyptian flags. Tarek Amr reviews messages on Twitter during and after the match.

19 June 2009

Pakistan: Enriching Google Map Data

Pro Pakistani informs that “Pakistani netizens are posting more localized information and data to the Google’s ‘map maker’ than the web users of any of the 160 countries”.

19 June 2009

Iran: Khamenei on the election

Change for Iran tweeted that Iranian Leader, Ali Khamanei today said “people should not go to streets killing Innocent basij & police troops, it will have a bad outcome if...

19 June 2009