Global Voices Online

Plan Colombia and Beyond offers an English translation of Representative McGovern's opinion piece in Colombia's daily, El Tiempo last Sunday.

Bloggins by boz gives a complete run down of everything related to Pat Robertson and Hugo Chavez.

Nick Buxton compares grafitti in Bolivia and Britain and finds the former tends to be more thoughtful.

MABB sets forth some plausible complications in December's special elections including voter redistricting to accurately represent the Santa Cruz region's population growth.

Blog from Bolivia comments on Pat Robertson's back peddling away from his comment that Hugo Chavez should be assasinated.

GoodAirs has a hyperlinked post on yesterday's 22 hour strom which flooded Buenos Aires' streets.

Jeff Barry sums up a government project developing an online collection of audio and video materials featuring Argentine writers.

Veronica at Neeka's Backlog has posted a gallery of photos of Moscow street scenes, the Moscow State University and river.

Zimpundit says it took a while to dawn on China that the West's prosperity was built on a network of colonial power, but that Beijing is catching on fast now.

Still Here - Bulawayo, at the Sokwanele Civic Action Group, blogs from amid the comfort of electricity and running water about a growing sense of unreality as “untold suffering” continues.

Blog de Connard has discovered the Ukraine Gothic Portal for all things Gothic, industrial, dark metal, cyber, fetish, romantic, independent, electro, dark folk, synth and medieval.

On a more serious note, Andy (Siberian Light) wonders if reported Russian government plans to stop selling oil at cheap rates to former Soviet states will backfire on the Kremlin.

Andy at Siberian Light took the challenge to see if the size of his soul measured up to that of the Russians. It didn't.

Bruno Stevens, at Human Rights Watch, posts a photo essay from time spent with Ugandan “night commuters”; children who stay constantly on the move and sleep rough to avoid being taken by a rebel group called the Lord's Resistance Army.

Some bloggers from Algeria, Kuwait and Jordan are upset by the remarks (or Fatwa, as Mohsan called it) made by Pat Robertson's, the founder of Christian Coalition. Pat calls for the assassination of democratically elected Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez.

The Kenya Democracy Project reacts with irony and concern for civil society after the government dissolves an NGO umbrella body.

Sleepless in Sudan reports that the World Food Programme's aid delivery flights in and out of the troubled region of Darfur are grounded because there's no fuel to run them, leaving local workers unpaid and key equipment languishing in the capital.

Nazret.com's blogging of a BBC program about rebel leaders who win control of African countries stimulates a passionate debate in the comments section.

Black Looks highlights the work of an organization in Nigeria called “Journalists Against AIDS”, and provides a breakdown of HIV/AIDS statistics in that country.

Iraq The Model post the latest statements of Iraqi law makers that surfaced after the submission of the draft of the constitution to the National Assembly.

Sohrab Kabuli posts a photo of Afghan children apparently scavenging from a rubbish heap.

Farid says that on September 7th, the Iranian Blogsphere will celebrate their forth birthday. On September 7th, 2001 Salman launched the first weblog in Farsi.

The exposure to US based Al Hurra channel and Radio Sawa increased in Egypt from 70% last year to 92% this year. Al Hurra received tremendous negative media coverage and skepticism upon its inauguration. The Big Pharaoh blog gives credit to Al Hurra's correspondent in Egypt, Tarek El Shami for this improvement in the channel exposure.

Want to change the system? Metroblogging Lahore encourages Lahoris to go vote tomorrow for the local elections.

More about Mother Teresa and links to MacIntyre's website that offers a different perspective on Mother Teresa's work and intentions.

Despite being a progressive state, Tamil Nadu has a long way to go, given the plight of Dalits in the state says the nanopolitan.

DeshCalling links to an article that questions if the recent bombings in Bangladesh are a prelude to an Islamic Revolution.

More on the blasts in Bangladesh at Sepia Mutiny. Catching culprits, and the fear that there maybe more to come.

“Don't ever trust things you buy IN China…” that seems ot be the conclusion of three Indonesian bloggers (Waryaman Wardana blogs in both English and Indonesian) and two online resource sites. They each paid 100 yuan, excluding taxes, for a 4GB SONY flash memory card which turned out to be fake.

Google talk was picked up fast by bloggers from Malaysia and Indonesia.

The Brunei-born Australian who blogs Macam-Macam (meaning all kinds) from Indonesia was watching Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah, former World's Richest Man, divorcing his second wife and taking a new bride. “Unsurprisingly, no mention of the Sultan's marriage in the country's compliant national English daily, the Borneo Bulletin. Wouldn't want to let the citizens know what their ruler is up to after all, would we?“

Japan is not a place where fathers are readily allowed to attend the birth of their children. In fact, recounts Cottontimer, it is against many hospitals' policies to allow husbands to be with their wives during labor and delivery. On the other hand, due to work culture in Japan, husbands may also be embarrassed or afraid to ask their boss for time off to attend their child's birth.

Thailand's ‘Sangha’ (loosely translated it means Buddhism Body) declared for the umpteenth time that monks producing Buddhist amulets for financial gain are be stopped. Some of the most sought after amulets e.g. ‘Somdet Wat Rakrang’, may fetch mind-boggling prices up to 30 million baht.

Jeff Ooi points to a story in Oxford Business Group titled: The New Blogocracy which features the Malaysian blogosphere. It is also the topic of academic study with the recent publishing of a paper entitled “Let a Hundred Flowers Bloom: A Malaysian Case Study on Blogging Towards a Democratic Culture” by Tang Hang Wu, assistant professor in the Faculty of Law at the National University of Singapore. Tang says one of the more salient features of the blogging phenomenon is that it allows individuals to bypass the traditional barriers to freedom of speech and freedom of expression.