26 January 2014

Stories from 26 January 2014

Outdoor Air pollution in Bhopal

  26 January 2014

Proloy Bagchi reports that outdoor air pollution in Bhopal, the capital of the Indian state of Madhya Pradesh, has risen to an alarming proportion mainly from the emission of the transports. The blogger slams at the inaction of the state government and stresses the importance of reducing this pollution. According...

The Other Side of Social Media

  26 January 2014

That’s Twitter – it makes a joke out of serious issues and takes jokes seriously. - comments blogger Purba Ray while discussing Sunanda Pushkar’s sudden death who underwent a Twitter spat with a Pakistani journalist. The unusual death of the wife of Indian minister Shashi Tharoor has created a lot...

‘AFTER 25 Conference': Tokyo and Berlin Discuss Creative Culture

  26 January 2014

As Berlin and Tokyo mark 20 years of friendship as sister cities, representatives of two creative industries, including Chairman of the Club Commission of Berlin Marc Wohlrabe and Takahiro Saito, a lawyer and member of Let's Dance, a consortium that fights against Japan's dance regulations, will come together for the AFTER 25 conference on...

Four Biggest Misconceptions About #Euromaidan Protests in Ukraine

  26 January 2014

Ucrainica Marginalis published an overview of the four largest misconceptions about #Euromaidan, written by scholars Sofiya Grachova & Stephen A. Walsh. What this overview points out is the vast gap between how international media and outside spectators view what is happening and the message that Ukrainians involved in Euromaidan protests...

Independent Ukrainian Filmmakers Create #Euromaidan Documentaries

  26 January 2014

In Ukraine, several filmmakers united to produce a video chronology of the events that came to be known as the Euromaidan protests. “BABYLON'13”, named after a bar in which the filmmakers came up with the idea for the project, is a collection of short documentaries reflecting the development of the...

Pig Photos Censored in Malaysia

  26 January 2014

Photos of pigs were blackened out by a printing company in the Malaysian edition of the New York Times. The 'pig censorship' shocked many people in the Muslim-majority nation

Indonesia Apology Urged Over Massacre of a Million Citizens in 1965

  26 January 2014

Human rights groups Tapol and East Timor and Indonesia Action Network have launched a campaign called ‘Say Sorry for '65’ addressed to the Indonesian government in relation to the reported killing of a million citizens during the anti-communist campaign of the government in the 1960s: In 1965/66, up to a...

East Timor's Rising Budget for ‘Public Transfers’

  26 January 2014

The La’o Hamutuk NGO is concerned that the East Timor government is alloting more funds for so-called ‘public transfers’ which lacks transparent mechanisms: In recent years, Timor-Leste has spent about 20% of its state budget on “Public Transfers” – payments of money to individuals or institutions which are not controlled...