Archive for
November 22nd, 2005


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Cambodia: Euthanasia Websites, Water Festival, and More 

a small portrait of this author Tharum Bun · 22:54

Euthanasia Websites
An American citizen who owned websites advocating ‘euthanasia tourism' in Kampot, a French-era beach town, has been sued by Kampot Province's governor for false information and defamation. “You are going to die anyway, so why not in Cambodia?” said one of the sites, which also offered a rationale for suicide and links to purchase books on the subject. The twin sites that help people making arrangements to kill themselves have been requested by business owners in the town to close. They feared the bad publicity would ruin the local tourism industry. The news has attracted attentions of Cambodian bloggers after the news had gone front-page in the Cambodia Daily for several days. ConcernedCatholic is not surprised to realize that euthanasia is being advocated in Southeast Asia by Westerners. rjgiombetti wrote that Suicide “Prevention” Evangelists Score Another Victory Against Free Speech. In a recent report, the Worldwide Press Freedom Index 2005, published by Reporters Without Borders, the country was ranked 90 out of 167 nations. This made PR, a Cambodian-American, surprised to see Cambodia beat out Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, and Indonesia.

Water Festival
Cambodia celebrated her 52nd independence anniversary on November 9. During the celebration, held at Independence Monument, a large gathering called out “Chey yo! Preah Reach Jea Na Jak Kampuchea”, which translates as Long Live the Kingdom of Cambodia! After this occasion, the nation also organized another bigger national event, the Water Festival, which took place from 15 till 17 November. Expecting about two million folks to flock into Phnom Penh capital, an international freestyle kickboxing was offered a day earlier to bring about euphoria to local visitors after the rainy season. Foreign kick boxers from Israel, South Africa, and Japan were greeted by lively crowded fans. During the three day time of the Water Festival, there was a boat race, Bon Om Touk in Khmer, this year also marked the first time regional competition for Greater Mekong Subregion Boat Race trophy. Host Cambodia received teams from Myanmar, Vietnam, Laos, and Thailand. According to local news, the Cambodia Daily, the host beat Vietnam, Myanmar, and Laos, but was defeated by rival Thailand in the final race. Thai Sothea, a Phnom Penh resident, wrote that

“Hundreds of thousands of Cambodian people from all over the country flock the Phnom Penh capital city to observe the three-day Water Festival, one of the country's largest festivities. The Water Festival takes place each year in October or November at the time of the full moon. This year, it falls on November 15 - 17, and during these three days, schools, government institutions, NGO offices and companies are closed. Each day, the festival begins with boat races followed by the floating of illuminated cruises along the river in front of the Royal Palace together with fireworks. This year, a total of 396 boats participated in the races, a slight decline from last year when there were more than 400 boats.”


Throngs of people crowd the riverfront area along Sisowath Quay. Photo by Steve Goodman

This annual event attracted mostly provincial people to visit the city at the time that Phnom Pehners preferred to hang out somewhere else from the crowd. Some people chose to watch live events on television or travel away from home. Patry Pan, had a lot to tell about the first day of the festival, but less on day two and day three. And Lux Mean remarked that businessmen and politicians are main financial supporters of boat race teams from every province. History of the festival can be found on the web site of Ministry of Tourism.

And more
Seserak, a Cambodian college student in Japan, who is trying to learn more about the relation between Cambodia and Japan, found it amazing to realize that there were Japanese settlers in the Angkor city in the 17th century. And he is keen to go further to understand the meaning of Japanese inscriptions left in the Angkor Wat area. He also discussed about national identities preservation by pointing out the differences between traditional wedding and modern wedding in Cambodia. Traditional wedding generally takes up to three days, two days longer than modern culture. Lux Mean, originally comes from Kampong Cham province, wondered about smaller celebration of Hari Raya in Phnom Penh, a festival of Muslim of the Khmer Islam, when compared to the celebration in his home town.

After raining the sun shines. But, after the 1975-1979 genocide regime, handicapped survivors, beggars, widow women, and orphans live in impoverished conditions. You can listen to two songs to feel their story. And there have been lively discussions on poverty reduction in the opinion section of the Cambodia Daily. To own a store on street, under an umbrella, vendors can sell used products, and among people with low income they are as popular as new ones. These products, ranging from used car to electronic devices to socks, being sold on street and under umbrella. It is very common to say that they are shopping at ‘Umbrella Shop' or what is known as second-hand product shop.

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Open letter to all Costa Ricans and Nicaraguans 

This author has no photo Dean CóRnito · 19:50

Dear brethren:

During these ominous days for the relations between our peoples, I would like to issue a call to prudence on both sides of our common border. A stupid border dispute promoted by two of the worst Administrations our peoples have seen in a long time, has grown out of proportion to the point where expressions of mutual resentment have been issued by – undesirable, I suspect – members of our respective societies.

First of all, please accept, my Nicaraguan (nica) brothers, the apologies of a Costa Rican citizen (tico) who feels nauseated by the inhuman lack of action of a handful of Costa Rican policemen the day of the death of José Natividad Canda. I can assure you that beyond the racist expressions of a few individuals who do not represent the Costa Rican society, the majority in this country feels that what happened that day was unacceptable and that those responsible will have to be punished in the manner provided by the law. A human being was subjected to torture for two hours, under the joyful watch of a few crass individuals and a few policemen who do not deserve to wear their uniform, and that is unforgivable. “The lad shouldn’t have been there,” they say. “The man had a criminal record”. Yes, it is true, but it is also irrelevant. The death penalty does not exist in our country, and much less the (legal) possibility to take justice in our own hands. Natividad Canda was a human being who traveled the wrong path, but because of that not less deserving of our compassion. It doesn’t matter whether he was Nicaraguan, black, Chinese, Jewish or gringo; whether he was a thief of an elementary-school teacher.

Please understand that in Costa Rica we have a legal system that works fairly well. It is sometimes slower than we would like, but in the end justice prevails. Those heartless individuals who, having had the opportunity to act to save Mr. Canda’s life didn’t do it, will have to face justice and pay for their actions and/or their omissions. Their faces were caught on video.

I beg our northern neighbors not to take this heinous incident out of context. The death of Natividad Canda was not the product of any persecution of ticos against nicas, after all the man got himself into the situation by trespassing into private property. Sadly, the Costa Rican authorities have been losing the grip on security in our country, and violent crime has become a staple in our daily lives. I invite you to check any of our local newspapers on any random day to verify this. It is not a matter of ticos against nicas, it is a matter of criminals against citizens of good will. Crime does not discriminate: both perpetrators and victims are ticos and nicas, all at once.

(more…)

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Iranian Blogs: WSIS & Human Rights 

This author has no photo Farid Pouya · 15:27

Shirin Ebadi, Noble Laureate, was one of speakers in World Summit for Information & Society in Tunisia.

According to Ravi(Link in Persian), Mrs. Ebadi spoke about censorship, jailed bloggers and filtering. She mentioned that Governmental NGOs are send to conferences to present false reports. She added unfortunately in some countries you can find human rights activists, writers and translators in prison because they express their opinion.

Omid Memarian’s title is Information Society & empty place of Iranian President. Omidian regrets that he couldn’t go to WSIS conference but adds fortunately some communication specialists such as Dr. Shokrkhah were present. (Link in Persian)

Hoder ( Derakhshan), Toronto based blogger , participated in Expression under Repression conference about democracy & censorship in WSIS. He talked about Iranian bloggers’ problems, cen sorship and so on. He says if British & Dutch ambassadors didn’t intervene directly meeting might be cancelled by Tunisian security forces.(Link in Persian)

Human rights has become Iranian new Parliament’s concern but not in a way that you think. Abtahi, former Vice President, writes in Two Parliamentary Points:

I read in the news that the Islamic Consultative Assembly has established a committee for human rights. But this committee is supposed to prepare reports of the violation of human rights in Europe. …..There is something wrong with our minds since Farsi proverbs occur repeatedly like: “You know how to sing the lullaby, why you are still awake?” Or “The light that can be used in the house is forbidden for use in the mosque”.

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Voices from Zimbabwe Plus 

This author has no photo Zimpundit · 12:58

Zimbabwe: Zimbabwe took center stage a couple of times at WSIS in Tunis last week. First up was Robert Mugabe, Zimbabwe's president calling for an end to the use of the internet against the freedom of lesser developed countries by developed nations.

“These last two years have shown us how information and ICTs are often deployed as preludes and accompaniments to aggressing the sovereignties of poor and small nations. I say this because my country Zimbabwe continues to be a victim of such aggression, with both the United Kingdom and United States using their ICT superiority to challenge our sovereignty through hostile and malicious broadcasts calculated to foment instability and destroy the state through divisions.”

Mugabe is accused of single-handedly curbing many freedoms in Zimbabwe, including that of expression. Hope at This is Zimbabwe wonders, ‘“Undermine a country’s values”…? “Cyber-terrorism”…?'

At the on again-off again ‘Expression Under Repression' seminar, Taurai Maduna the information officer at Kubatana.net shared his perspective on the role of the internet in a repressed country noting that Mugabe's government doesn't view the internet as a serious threat,

“Taurai tells us that Kubatana operates openly, with the knowledge of the Zimbabwean government and has avoided harrasment, largely because the government doesn’t see the Internet as a way to reach the Zimbabwean mainstream, just the elites.”

Meanwhile Hope at This is Zimbabwe is seeing flying pigs over reports that Mugabe has announced the discovery in Uranium in Zimbabwe.

Burundi: Agathon Rwasa highlights the strained relationship between Burundi's national media and the local UN office after UN peacekeeper outfits were found in the possesion of the FNL.

He is also reporting the arrest of the FNL's chief of staff,

“The first ever arrest of a senior FNL leader is a major step towards justice.

FNL Bujumbura Chief of Staff Aloys Nzabampema has command responsibility for the troops that carried out the August 13th 2004 Gatumba massacre, which was a “crime against humanity” under international law.

As a senior FNL figure, Nzabampema is also implicated in the group's widespread and systematic campaign of civilian massacres, including the December 28th 2000 “Titanic Express” ambush. The Burundian authorities must look at the evidence for his involvement in this campaign, which also constitutes a “crime against humanity”.

D.R.C: Carl writes about the joys of reliable carbon paper in his mundane operetions,

The length and breadth of this country, at every airport we go to, every form we fill out is duplicated the old fashioned way, with carbon paper. You go to fill out a flight plan and are handed very carefully arranged forms, 3 deep with carbon paper in between each one. One of the airports I go to, the guy does it for me on an old Underwood manual typewriter. He bangs away on that thing and I feel like a character in a World War II movie. The ribbon is wearing out and the letters are half red and half black. The carbon paper works good though.

This is a bit old fashioned but it suits the place because the carbon paper never seems to wear out. That is an important consideration when the last supply shipment from central office was 2 years ago and the next one will be whenever.

007 In Africa decries the exorbitant cost of small amounts of yogurt.

Finally, Adventures of a Retired Armchair Travelernotes that Rwandan mayor Paul Bisengimana, the former mayor of Gikoro has pled guilty to genocide.

Malawi: Mike of Hacktivate endorses the $100 laptop in his comments on WSIS.

Geeta highlights the paradigm shift that has happened in Malawi's fight against HIV/AIDS,

As I’ve mentioned in other posts, there is a paradigm-shift occurring in HIV and AIDS programming. The entire development community has finally come around to thinking that the Malawian response must move to the district level. One trip to a few areas outside of Lilongwe can tell any outsider why this is so terribly important.

If you visit the offices of the District Commissioners (who are like Premiers for a province, but with a lot less power and money at their disposal), they’ll tell you about the total shortage of supplies, training, resources, knowledge, and even autonomy to make necessary choices on a district-specific HIV and AIDS response. If you visit the offices of the District AIDS Coordinators (DACs), you would also see that some don’t have computers on which to type reports they are expected to submit, none have access to the internet, and others don’t even have binders to file their papers.

Rwanda:George shares the inspirational story of a woman surviving with HIV in Africa.

He also takes time to highlight the agreement between Nokia and Grameen Foundation> The agreement seeks to provide cheaper access to communication technology in underdeveloped countries.

Giving his first hand account of the riots that rocked Kampala last week, he gives he take on why they started in the first place,

Turns out that the government thought it wise to arrest and jail one of the leading opposition presidential candidates, and this followed on earlier riots at Makerere University (one student killed by police) and the ongoing tension related to their constitutional amendment allowing President Museveni to remain in power basically forever (it removes term limits, at least as I understand it).

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Global Voices wins a Best of the Blogs 

a small portrait of this author Ethan Zuckerman · 10:46

Global Voices has won a Best of the Blogs award from Deutsche Welle. We're thrilled to be honored as the jury's choice for the Best Journalistic Blog in English. Other Global Voices friends were honored by DW as well, including our friends Manal and Alaa, whose blog from Cairo, “Manal and Alaa's Bit Bucket”, which won the special Reporters Without Borders award.

Lisa Stone of Surfette was on the jury that chose our blog for the DW honor. Her blog post about judging the contest is incredibly flattering regarding our work. Evidently she advocated for Global Voices to win the Best Weblog prize - which Argentine blog “Más respeto, que soy tu madre” won - but because two judges (Hossein Derakshan and Julien Pain) were Global Voices contributors, there was a perception of conflict of interest. In her post, Stone says:

In my opinion, Global Voices is the most important blog in the English speaking world, bar none. This site is more than an up-to-the-minute guide and encyclopedia of the international blogosphere. Global Voices Online is a mega-blog the covers free speech by a global citizenry–and covers it well. It's so important at a time when so many international voices are denied free speech by their governments and, in the United States, a very few, English-speaking, first-world media conglomerates dominate and determine the ownership, distribution and content of news.

Thanks, Lisa, and thanks to everyone at Best of the Blogs for honoring us with this wonderful award. And thanks to everyone on the Global Voices team for making this site worthy of recognition.

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