Global Voices Online

Luís Afonso Assumpção says that a corruption scandal by former economy minister, Palocci is representative of the “status of this ‘ethical' government from Worker´s Party.” Randy Paul compares it to the Scooter Libby scandal in the United States.

Patrice writes that Ex-president Fujimori has married a Japanese woman for what Patrice believes are political reasons. Un Lobo en Perú says that Fujimori is rumored to be extradited from Chile soon to stand trial in Peru and is surprised that the local media is not giving the story more attention. Journalist Juan Carlos Lujan recently encouraged his readers to support an online campaign (ES) by Amnesty International requesting that Fujimori be extradited.

David Read writes in praise of Kyrgyzstan, listing some of the wonderful qualities of the country.

Luke Distelhorst writes on freedom of information in Mongolia.

Andrés Duque has posted pictures of yesterday's protest against presidential candidate Ollanta Humala by Lima's LGBT community just days before the country heads to the polls. Un Lobo en Perú has a collection of quotes by Humala in recent days.

Zarchka updates readers on the performance of the Armenian youth korfball at the recent world tournament at which they took two trophies, but not necessarily the ones they hoped for.

The Golden Road to Samarqand reports on Kyrgyz university students' thoughts on Ryspek Akmatbaev, a man widely believed to be a criminal and unliked everywhere but his hometown who is running for parliament in Kyrgyzstan after protesters demanded he be allowed to stand as a candidate.

Olesya of neweurasia writes about a Russian television program about the legend of Tamerlane's curse.

Ian Mount, in a post titled “Overexposing B.A.–Will it Ever End?” links to an article he wrote for the New York Times about traveling to Buenos Aires. Argentina's largest paper, El Clarín notes (ES) that it was among the most popular online articles at the Times website.

Rob of Rob's Rave describes being stranded first in Tarija and then Sucre, Bolivia because of transport strikes and road blockades.

Tinta Digital (es) attends a forum on “the eternal question” of the licensing of journalists in Puerto Rico, smiles when blogs are briefly mentioned, and concludes that “this discussion might have been interesting in the 20th century. . . .”

Matthew Hunte attends a political meeting of the United Workers' Party in the district of Micoud, St. Lucia.

Abeni pays tribute to St. Vincent-born Sophia Young, this year's WNBA number four draft pick.

Prominent Jamaican citizens are said to be “starring” in sex tapes found at the Kingston home of former ambassdor Peter King, who was murdered back in March. “The clout wielded by these ‘pillars of society' has already set tongues wagging that the police may be party to an extensive cover-up to save the reputations of these individuals,” says Yardflex, who also quotes a child rights activist who expresses the hope that guilty parties will be charged if any of the tapes feature underage boys.

The Rights Action Group T&T blog is aggregating material on the subject of the controversial aluminium smelter to be established by Alcoa in southern Trinidad.

Stacy-Marie Ishmael lists what she and the members of the Soca Warriors Football Forum consider Trinidad & Tobago's top five World Cup moments.

Samudaya.org has a photo-post of dissent in Nepal - things as they stood just before the General Strike.

As the four day general strike in Nepal kicks off, United We Blog! provides an account of the first day.

Lives in Focus on the glimmer of hope offered by a study that suggests there might be a drop in HIV infection in India -”The research, conducted by a joint Indian and Canadian team, found that India's safe sex awareness campaign has had a dramatic impact on reducing HIV infection rates in South India—the epicenter of India's AIDS crisis.”

Yasmine profiles the work of Islamic Relief -”sponsoring a series of six dinners around the United States, in order to raise funds for continuing support for the victims of last October's earthquake in South Asia”

Indian Muslims on the position Muslims find themselves in India - “The two Muslim teachers gave application asking for leave for Haj were asked by the Education Officer, a woman, to given an undertaking that they would not indulge in any anti-national acitivity during the period of their leave.”

Mahmood quotes a Saudi daily news paper which said: “Despite the presence of a large number of Saudi women drivers in Bahrain, not a single case of traffic violation has been registered against them.” Mahmood then wonders, will it take an act of God Himself to get the Saudis to allow their women to drive?

Seems that many Saudi bloggers are not happy with the new Official Community of Saudi Bloggers (OSCAB).

This year, the circumstances surrounding Palestinian Child Day are no different – our children continue to feel the pain of occupation. Israeli forces continue to deprive children of their right to life – since the start of this year alone, 12 children have been killed, bringing to 740 the total number of children fatalities since the start of the intifada. In the same period, around 4,000 minors have been arrested, of whom some 400 are still in prison, Laila said.

Riverbend was shocked to find out the book “Baghdad Burning” had made the short list for the Samuel Johnson Prize- a prestigious, British award for non-fiction.

Omar Barsawad says that Hadhramout's ecosystem too, is in danger of being overwhelmed. For the last twelve years, Omar have never seen a hyena around; and yet before he could see one every now and then; and now too, he's seeing fewer and fewer foxes and wild rabbits. Each year thousands of turtles come to the shores of Hadhramout to lay their eggs; and though there is government protection, the number of turtles now is much fewer too.

Chen Yongmiao posts on his Constitution Blog a letter he sent recently to lawyer John Wei Chien-feng, former president of the Taiwan Association for Human Rights, on behalf of some of China's leading democracy activists and legal experts in which he states the need for democratic reforms, suggests some practical first steps and welcomes any advice or introductions. [zh]

A message on the front page of alternative news website Zheteng says the site was forced to close on March 31 due to “illegal” content, but was allowed to reopen the next day once the content concerned had been erased. Zheteng was the only mainland media outlet in attendance at a news conference held last month by Zeng Jinyan, wife of the recently-released AIDS activist Hu Jia. [zh]

Zhou Enlai's death thirty years ago this year gave rise to the April 5th movement. Or was it May 4th? The Useless Tree gives us a refresher, and more.

“There are no official commemorations of the 1976 demonstrations in the PRC today. The official party line is that the April 5th Movement was a patriotic, even revolutionary (i.e. not counter-revolutionary as was first held) event that confirmed the rightness of Deng Xiaoping and, thus, the current party leadership. But the government would just as soon ignore the date. The ruling party does not want to remind people that protesting on Tiananmen Square might be a good thing.”

The Opposite End of China gathers coverage of last week's discovery of 121 skulls in a forest in northwestern China's Gansu province which tests show belonged to women and children.

“So, what's the deal?” asks the blogger. “Is there a psychotic serial killer on the loose in northwest China? Is this another case of shady post-mortem organ harvesting? Nobody seems to know at the moment, but I'll keep you posted.”

The Asiapundit observes that according to a think-tank run by the Chinese Communisty Party, Japan's human rights record is by far the worse of the two countries.

“Actually,” the blogger continues, “the official website of the government-sanctioned Chinese Society for Human Rights Studies doesn't really keep official statistics on human rights abuses in China. It does have some glowing reports on how quality of life is improving in China, and several reports noting human rights abuses in the United States.”

uleewang at Non-violent Resistance blogs on Chinese blog service provider BlogBus' new blog moving service:

“It's pretty obvious what this could mean to the domestic blogsphere. If you are not happy with your current BSP, you can move house with the least hassle — in a matter of 20 minutes and some clicks of the mouse, you can dump the sorry old home and start anew without losing your online identity. Right on, Blogbus!”

uleewang follows up with a comment, “[a]pparently I was over-optimistic about BlogBus's service, as people tend to be about a lot of things in China these days. Experimented with my own MSN Space a couple of times in the past week. Never worked. The exporting process seems to work fine in the beginning, with a window telling me ‘XX blog entries already exported.' But somehow it always gets stuck at 59 blog entries.”

In ‘Hell Money,' Outside In blogger Jo gives a rundown of Qing Ming (grave sweeping festival) past, present and future.

Konstantin Dlutskiy of Russian Marketing Blog reports on the long-awaited alternative to pirated DVDs: “Cheap’n’early DVDs from Universal Pictures cost 150-200 rubles per disc (~$5,5 – $7,2). They are of lower quality and are released only four weeks after the first night.”

W. Shedd of The Accidental Russophile writes on how today's Russians perceive Stalin: “The attitude I have witnessed seems to be: ‘Yep, Stalin was bad, but that was a long time ago and what can you do about it? Things are different now … and you, as an American should shut up anyway because you have that Hitler-wannabe George Bush attacking everyone in the world and stealing oil, etc. etc.'”

Warsaw Crow writes about the death of Stanislaw Lem, the great Polish science fiction writer, and muses on Poland's other “unique but aging voices.”

Pestiside.hu reports that a drink capable of saving one from hangover has been created by Hungarians: Soberguard, […], combats the symptoms of a hangover (macskajaj) by ‘cataliyzing the enzymatic alcohol metabolism pathways'.”

As the Danube water continues to rise, Paul of Further Ramblings of a N.Irish Magyar thinks various Hungarian parties' activists have a chance to get involved in “real community politics” on the eve of the election.

Annabengan at annasblog tells an Albanian joke about what's considered a “modern” bride. The joke does reflect the reality and the reality isn't likable: “Albanian modern brides - husbands' sex objects instead of house slaves of their families? Come on - there MUST be some other roles to pick from!?”

Viktor of Belgrade Blog writes about what it takes for an average Serb to get a visa to travel to the EU. He also has an advice to those who are visiting Serbia: “Fact: more than 70 percent of Serbian students never traveled outside the country borders. […] So, when chatting with the locals, feel free to share some of your culture with them, besides learning about theirs.”

A pedicab is a bicycle with a sidecar. It is a popular public transport in many Southeast Asian countries, including the Philippines and Indonesia. Sarapan Ekonomi has a photo.

Per the latest revisions in the law, for purposes of establishing a house of worship, religious congregations are now required to have a minimum of 90 members. They must also secure the prior approval of the government and the residents of the area where the house of worship is to be erected. Indonesia Matters republished an interview of a Philosophy professor who says the new rules violate the Constitutional right to freedom of religious worship.

Piercing Pens links to a New York Times editorial that talks of President Gloria Arroyo's “increasingly authoritarian tendencies”. PCIJ reproduces the statement delivered by Press Secretary Ignacio Bunye who says the editorial shows that “the opposition’s irresponsible political efforts are impacting international perceptions”.

Over at The Man-Blog, Emerson Bañez has the rundown on different kinds of beer–their colors, flavors, aroma and alcohol content.

Soci of Singabloodypore confirms Chemical Generation Singapore's speculations that one of Singabloodypore's bloggers is, in fact, the President of the Young Democrats in the Singapore Democratic Party. However, Soci challenges Chemical Generation's allegation that Singabloodypore is just another SDP tool for political propaganda by presenting the public profiles of all its bloggers.

Le Blog du Congolais posts (FR) a lengthy declaration by the President of UDPS' National Committee questioning the motives of the international community in its various involvements with DRC's elections, the constitutionality of elections postponed beyond June 30, 2006 and the violent image of UDPS that is portrayed in western media. The declaration proclaims various demands related to the fairness of the electoral process, transparency in government, freedom of expression, access to the media, human rights and disarmament.

Idland is concerned about some evangelical posters on display in South Africa that claim they can cure HIV/AIDS...”In a country where fighting misinformation is a major part of the battle against HIV/AIDS, I am not sure these crusaders have picked the right side.”

Ethnic Loft writes there is more to blogging than politics and technology and suggests that “upcoming pundits would delve into, and shed more light on, some of these undercovered topics and others” such as food, music, health and sport.

Afrikan Eye writes on the affect of colonialism on African Women....”Firstly, women were affected by the alienation of land experienced by most Africans. However, women appear to have been more personally affected by this land alienation.”

EMDHR writing on Eritrea comments on the government's treatment of the youth in the country. As they represent the future the government should apply a more inclusive policy towards the youth….”the youth are sizeable proportion of the Eritrean labour force. Youth are an engine of growth and development. The sooner responsibility is given to young people, the sooner will they become responsible and be able to handle their own affairs. Increased participation soon creates greater self-reliance. At the same time, youth participation should be looked at as a process, not a method; and it involves learning from mistakes. With out the provision of an equal chance to the young people to express them, equitable development is near to impossible.”

Naijablog comments on the “sterility of political discourse in Nigeria” instead of the same old discussion around 3rd term and fiscal policy he suggests a move towards a transformative discourse with a progressive vision of a future Nigeria.

This is Zimbabwe publishes the response by Eddie Cross to a series of questions posed on their blog regarding the governance and politics of Zimbabwe and in particular to the MFD congress that recently took place.

Yebo Gogo provides a detailed account of the charges faced ex Liberian President, Charles Taylor who is on trial in Sierra Leone.

Sotho on Mzansi Afrika tackles racism in post apartheid South Africa and racists assumptions about Black people's contribution to history and society....”You didn't steal our brick-making techniques, you nicked the damned bricks themselves. Your arguments don't seem in the least like colonialist arguments, they are the very definition of colonialist arguments. History says the African was enslaved abroad and on his native content by those wielding more brutal weapons. Of course you built the universities, if by “you” you mean the one who was in power then. Who else could have built them? Oliver Tambo in Tanzania?”

African Shirts writes on Jacob Zuma's testimony during the rape trial in South Africa in which he claims he took a shower after having unprotected sex with an HIV postive woman. African Shirts comments “it is this kind of ignorance which perpetuates the spread of HIV. People raping infants in SA, because of local lore that sex with a virgin cures HIV. Or even some belief among men that they're immune from the virus. The Catholic Church preventing the use of contraception doesn't help either. The spread of HIV should not be as fast as it is today.”