AFRICA
Ethiopia suspends 42 aid groups
By: Oneworld.net, July 27, 2009
The Ethiopian government suspended the activity of 42 humanitarian and human rights organizations last week, in what one citizens’ group calls “Ethiopia’s rapid slide toward increasing levels of authoritarianism.”
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Civic Group urges halt to Zimbabwean constitutional revision process
By: Irwin Chifera, Jonga Kandemiiri & Patience Rusere, VOA News, 27 July 2009
Zimbabwe’s non-governmental National Constitutional Assembly called on the government and parliament Monday to halt the official constitutional revision process, warning it will urge voters to reject any constitution written by politicians and not “people-driven.
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Ethiopian students disappear on trip to Houses of Parliament in UK
By: Telegraph UK, July 24, 2009
The three men were among a group of nine visitors who were staying with families in Hartlepool as part of a three-month visit to Britain.
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Ethiopian official defects to the US
By: Sudan Tribune, July 17, 2009
Ethiopia’s deputy minister for state communication affairs has refused to return back home following his official visit to the United States last month.
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AMERICAS
Brazil: Victory for Awá nomads
By: Survival International, July 29, 2009
A Brazilian federal judge has ruled that ranchers and colonists illegally occupying the Awá Indian reserve must leave the territory within 180 days.
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United States: Rachel Corrie documentary sparks uproar at Jewish film festival
By: Matthai Kuruvila, Truthout, July 25, 2009
The San Francisco Jewish Film Festival has come under siege after deciding to show a documentary about Rachel Corrie, a Washington state 23-year-old killed in 2003 while trying to prevent an Israeli military bulldozer from demolishing a Palestinian’s home.
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Brazil: Fake documents for Iranians
By: The Straight Times, July 25, 2009
An Israeli diplomat for Latin America on Friday accused Venezuela of giving fake documents to Iranians to help facilitate their travel in the region, Argentine Jewish news media said.
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Venezuela’s opposition feels heat from Chavez
By: Chris Kraul, LA Times, July 25, 2009
Politics has become an especially rough contact sport for Venezuelan state and local officials who oppose President Hugo Chavez.
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ASIA/SOUTH ASIA
Closing arguments in Burma trial
By: BBC, July 27, 2009
The prosecution in the military government’s trial of the Burmese pro-democracy leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, is to deliver its closing arguments.
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Xinjiang, Tibet, beyond, China’s ethnic relations
By: Temtsel Hao, Open Democracy, July 27, 2009
The ethnic protests and clashes in China’s westernmost region of Xinjiang on 5-6 July 2009 and the following days have caused around 200 deaths. The deadly violence, mainly between the Uyghur (and Muslim) population and the Han Chinese – but also involving the security forces killing some protesting Uyghurs, in circumstances that are not yet clear – has shocked and polarised public opinion across China.
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Philippines: Arroyo vows not to extend term
By: James Hookway, WSJ, July 27, 2009
Several thousand protesters took to the streets of Manila to mark the annual state of the nation address — many burning effigies of Ms. Arroyo, a common practice in the Philippines — and warn that civil unrest could follow if Ms. Arroyo, 62 years old, doesn’t step down next June after nine years in office.
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Vietnamese Catholics in large street protest against harassment
By: Ekklesia, July 27, 2009
Over 500,000 Catholics took to the streets in Vietnam on Sunday 26 July 2009, to protest over police attempts to stop a parish holding services in the grounds of a church bombed during the Vietnam war and recently confiscated by the government.
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3,000 villagers protest in eastern China
By: AP, July 26, 2009
More than 3,000 villagers in eastern China blocked a highway and clashed with police while protesting alleged official corruption in a land compensation deal, a human rights monitor and a witness said Sunday.
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India: Vedanta blocked by tribal protests as indigenous resistance spreads worldwide
By: Survival International, July 24, 2009
Repeated protests by tribal people in Orissa, India, have blocked the mining plans of one of Britain’s biggest companies, leading to a costly delay.
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CENTRAL ASIA
Kyrgyz runner-up rejects election results, turns to Moscow
By: Farangis Najibullah, RFERL, July 27, 2009
Kyrgyzstan’s Central Election Commission has announced the final results of July 23 elections, officially confirming that Kurmanbek Bakiev has been reelected to a second term in office with more than 76 percent of the vote.
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US outrage over “rigged” elections does not extend to Kyrgyzstan
By: Bill Van Auken, WSWS, July 26, 2009
The brazen rigging of an election, the repression of the opposition and the use of police violence and live ammunition against demonstrators has been met with silence and indifference on the part of the Obama administration and the US media.
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Kyrgyz opposition says won disputed vote, vows protests
By: Olga Dzyubenko, Reuters, July 25, 2009
Kyrgyzstan’s opposition leader on Saturday claimed victory over incumbent Kurmanbek Bakiyev in this week’s presidential election and promised more protests in the Central Asian nation, a focus of U.S.-Russian rivalry
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Big victory by incumbent is questioned in Kyrgyzstan
By: NY Times, July 25, 2006
Kyrgyzstan’s incumbent president appeared Friday to have won a landslide victory, gaining more than 80 percent of the vote in a contest that local and Western monitors said was marred by major violations of election laws.
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EUROPE
Ireland: Seven-day walk for Burma’s Karens
By: Irish Times, July 27, 2009
A seminarian at St Patrick’s College in Maynooth has begun a seven-day walk from Dublin to Limerick to publicise the plight of the Karen people of Burma. Ger Fitzgerald left O’Connell Street in the capital on Saturday and plans to arrive on O’Connell Street, Limerick, on Friday. He is walking with Burmese exiles, and rights activists, and they are fundraising en route for a refugee medical clinic on the Burma-Thailand border.
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Moldovan NGOs cite pre-election problems
By: RFERL, July 27, 2009
Promo Lex, an NGO specializing in human rights, said on July 27 the voter lists are still not entirely accurate, despite the Communist government’s promises to “correct” them after the controversial elections on April 5.
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Will Moldovans, cowed by crackdown, rise up again?
By: J. Kole, AP, July 27, 2009
Moldovans go to the polls Wednesday, three months after protesters stormed the capital accusing the communist-led government of rigging nationwide elections – and used Twitter to rally support after cell phone networks went down.
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Banned dissident literature of Soviet era now on display
By: Russia Past & Present, July 25, 2009
The Andrei Sakharov Museum in Moscow has opened an exhibition of banned literature, which was printed underground in the Soviet Union.
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Russia acts against ‘false’ history
By: James Rodgers, BBC, July 24, 2009
President Dmitry Medvedev recently announced the setting up of a commission to counter the falsification of history. He said this was becoming increasingly “severe, evil, and aggressive”.
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EUprotests over arrest ofbloggers in Azerbaijan
By: Afet Mehtiyeva, Reuters, July 20, 2009
European Union officials visiting Azerbaijan protested on Monday at the arrest of two opposition bloggers, a case seized on by rights groups concerned over shrinking freedoms in the oil-producing state.
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MIDDLE EAST/NORTH AFRICA
Egypt: Bloggers fly into security trap
By: Cam McGrath, IPS, July 28, 2009
Several prominent Egyptian bloggers have “disappeared” from the airport’s arrivals hall, while others report suspiciously long delays that they claim were cover for state security officers to search their laptops and luggage.
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Egypt’s tussle at the top
By: Jack Shenker, Guardian UK, July 28, 2009
Egypt’s aging leader may have defiantly promised to remain in office “until his last breath” but the drumbeat of presidential succession has been growing steadily louder in recent weeks. Hosni Mubarak, now 81, looks increasingly frail and waxen; as the light begins to fade on his pharaonic 27 years in power and his face becomes ever more absent from the day-to-day running of the country, speculation is mounting of imminent change at the top.
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Israel: The self-righteous left’s simplistic world
By: Carlo Strenger, Guardian UK, July 28, 2009
Israel does a lot of reprehensible things. Nevertheless, flawed as it is, Israel is a flourishing democracy in which people can voice our views. We can argue about them – often in bitter anger – but the state does not persecute us for it. There is not a single state in this area where I could express my views freely except Israel.
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Gaza: On the right of resistance
By: Ramzi Kysia, Palestine Telegraph, July 27. 2009
We live in an era defined by its brutality. Our challenge is whether to accept this – or to take the risks necessary to transform our world commons in beloved community.
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Egypt: Political art troupe strikes again: ad calls Gaddafi “lunatic”
By: Middle East News, July 27, 2009
A rogue band of Berlin-based artists on Monday said it had fooled Libyan censors and had placed an advertisement in a local weekly calling Libyan leader Moamer al-Gaddafi a ‘lunatic.’
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West Bank: Three questions for Naim Ateek
By: Jonathan Curiel, San Francisco Chronicle, July 27, 2009
The Rev. Naim Ateek, an Anglican priest often referred to as “the Desmond Tutu of Palestine,” spoke at Grace Cathedral Sunday. Q: Your nonviolence approach contrasts with that of Hamas. How much influence do you have among Palestinians? A: In a large scale, nonviolence has not really been used. It’s going on all the time in a small scale, but we need a movement within the whole of the Palestinian territories that is nonviolent. If every day, tens of thousands of Gazans march toward the Israeli border, this kind of nonviolent message is more effective than any rocket.
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Palestinians take on Israelis in imaginary game of ‘wall soccer’
By: All Headline News, July 26, 2009
In recent weeks, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has been reduced to an imaginary game of soccer. It all began with a seemingly innocent ball in a TV advertisement for Cellcom, Israel’s leading cellphone provider. Simple parodies, most produced by Israelis, began appearing immediately…
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Syrian culture minister extols resistance
By: MEMRI, July 26, 2008
The Arab media have recently publicized statements by Syrian Culture Minister Riyad Na’san Al-Agha in which he extols resistance. In his statements, Al-Agha says that apart from being the only effective strategy against Israel, resistance has certain metaphysical attributes which makes it an essential condition for survival as well as part of human nature, so that anyone who rejects resistance rejects human nature itself. These statements are consistent with Syria’s official policy, whose objective is to make Syria the leader of the rejectionist axis – as is obvious from Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad’s statement to the effect that Damascus is “the cultural capital of resistance” as well as from his other remarks in praise of resistance.
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Bloggers held in Egypt without charge
By: Free Detainees, July 25, 2009
The Committee to Protect Journalists called on the Egyptian authorities today to explain why they have detained three bloggers this week without charge.
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West Bank plan bears fruit, but much more needed
By: AP, July 20, 2009
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says he wants to make ”economic peace” with the Palestinians, and the first fruits are already being seen in eased Israeli restrictions that are stoking a retail and entertainment boom in the West Bank.
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OCEANIA
Australia: Islamic school ban sparks protest
By: Phil Mercer, BBC News, July 27, 2009
Hundreds of people have protested against a government’s decision to scrap plans to build an Islamic school in Australia’s biggest city, Sydney. Parents and prospective students have said the decision was unfair and racist.
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Fiji’s military ruler says the prime minister he ousted would win if elections held tomorrow
By: Rod Mcguirk, Canadian Press, July 26, 2009
In a television interview to be screened by Australian public broadcaster SBS late Sunday, Commodore Frank Bainimarama, Fiji’s self-appointed prime minister, reiterated that he would not bend to international pressure to hold elections before 2014.
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Quiet riot
By: Zeynep Memecan,Newsweek, July 27, 2009
The government of Iran has cracked down on election protests, but the Green Wave refuses to go quietly into that good night. When you can’t flood the streets, how do you register your dissent? Over the years, activists around the globe have evaded surveillance, dodged legal action, and escaped oppression in dozens of mind-bending styles. These techniques might not overthrow governments, but they could embarrass or undermine them in small ways. Here are some of the more creative examples.
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Chine: Sept façons de dénoncer la corruption sur Internet
By: Courrier International, July 27, 2009
La recherche d’individus sur Internet, à des fins amicales ou non, est devenue une pratique courante en Chine. L’hebdomadaire Nandu Zhoukan a répertorié sept manières d’utiliser la Toile pour dénoncer la corruption.
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Bouthan: Déception au pays du bonheur national brut
By: Courrier International, July 27, 2009
Plus d’un an après le passage de la monarchie absolue à un système parlementaire et la tenue de législatives, le gouvernement n’est pas à la hauteur. L’économie, les libertés et l’éducation vont mal.
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Courrier International interdit au Maroc
By: Arret sur images, July 21, 2009
“Alors que la crise économique mondiale a eu des répercussions généralement négatives sur les fortunes du monde entier, Mohammed VI s’en tire plutôt bien : il a vu ses revenus presque doubler, contrairement aux autres”. C’est ainsi que commence l’article que le Courrier International a publié dans son édition du 9 juillet 2009. Un numéro interdit à la vente au Maroc, comme l’a indiqué à l’AFP le gouvernement marocain.
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