Global Voices Online

“Between Conakry and Bamako there are 1000 km of motorways. First forests, then mountain, savannas after. It is a gift to the eyes and a way to ease the 15 hours' drive. The trip ends in a bath of dust, by the entrance to Mali's capital”. On publishing an incredible picture he took last week, Jorge Rosmaninho [pt] says sorry to those people who live by the motorways he drove past carelessly and left in a cloud of dust.

Ghasbouba, from Morocco, writes about the Touareg struggle for liberation in Niger and Mali.

Sociolingo writes about the Malian female basketball team's victory: “The Malian female basketball team’s win of the 20th basketball championship of the African Nations Cup (CAN), played last September in Dakar, Senegal, is undoubtedly the major event of 2007, according to many people in the Malian capital.”

Sociolingo posts an old map of Timbuktu, Mali: “Here is an old map of the ancient city of Timbuktu from the Perry-Castañeda Library Map Collection, University of Texas.”

Awesome Tapes From Africa posts the music of Mariam Bagayoko: Um, yeah. This is scary. The other-worldly pentatonic balafon and its apocalyptic overtones repeat toward infinity, and I can't help but think of Reich's marimba ostinatos and Partch's microtones here.

Echanges, Reflexion and Cityonenete posts a You Tube video of Alicia Keyes' duet with famed Malian songstress, Oumou Sangare.

Faits Divers d'Afrique relates the fates of abandoned wives and children left behind by men who emigrate.

Rives du Niger posts photographs of sand storms in Timbuktu, where “winds of sands looks like clouds.”