Global Voices Online

Peter explains how the grounding of a Czech military plane carrying the country's army chief of staff and deputy defense minister by Turkmen authorities is a bad sign for regional stability and military cooperation.

Yon Ayisyen writes (Fr): “As we approach elections, officials cannot afford to admit that they are loosing the fight against insecurity, hence they tell us that the situation has improved and that they are making progress.”

Chilibean writes about Pushplay, a South African version of Netflix, “A new way to hire DVDs has launched in Cape Town. The service is called Pushplay and the way it works is that you sign up, pay between R89 and R139 per month for up to 3 DVDs. The DVDs are delivered to you and you return them when you are done. Yup, that’s right, you return them when you are finished with them, no late fees.”

On Tuesday night, writes Nick Buxton, “the Bolivian Government completely unexpectedly passed an amended land reform bill that aims to redistribute up to a fifth of the country, land that it designates as ‘unproductive' land in the hand of a small minority of rich landholders. It passed the law, the same day as 10,000 indigenous and campesino farmers descended on La Paz in four different marches that have crossed the country.”

Togo-based Expat French blogger Marie visited Ouaga 2000, a neighborhood in Burkina Faso's capital of which she writes (Fr): “Ouaga 2000 is a neighborhood in which you find only mansions … There, you don't feel like you are in [Burkina Faso capital] Ouagadougou. The mansions are built by ministers, people highly placed in government … It is pretty disgusting … The worst is that there is absolutely no one. The mansions are empty. Their purpose is to welcome VIP's during occasional meetings and conferences.”

“La Gringa” surveys the unpaid government worker in Honduras.

Peace Corps blogger Melanie in Honduras describes how she commemorated World AIDS Day.

“Chavez is president and Venezuela is 61% red and 39% blue. Which is to say, morado (”purple/bruised”) writes Sebastian Delmont in a post titled “Venezuela es #9D0062″, after the hexidecimal representation of purple in HTML. Daniel Duquenal is poetic with his late-night reflections: “It is around midnight. A soft rain keeps falling. Rosales has just given his concession speech. I am very sad but at the same time strangely liberated. There are noises on the street, and I go to look at my window and I see a group of young women, with red shirts and flags. The shirts carry different slogans, political slogans that are. And I realize that these women, coming form some celebratory party, were also the umpires at that voting center, now exhibiting freely their partiality.” A.M. Mora y Leon posts pictures and excerpts from the mainstream media as well as Venezuelan citizen journalists and Boz has his standard five points of analysis.

Ana Maria Salazar looks at newly inaugurated President Felipe Calderón's latest cabinet appointees. Colin Brayton criticizes the human rights record of Secretary of Governance Francisco Javier Ramírez Acuña.

Wu Wei writes about the process of adopting EU legislation and other developments in Ukraine: “There is a whole change of culture needed in Ukraine. New laws are regarded as little more than bits of paper if they get in the way of businessmen and the government, so they aren't really important.”

Novala, Europa reports: “Austrian Airlines offer a new feature: Air Mail. Sounds kind of natural, but not quite since they offer the service in the lunch/dinner boxes. The lid of the card board box is a postcard. You can tear it off, write it and hand it over to the cabin crew. It will post it for you. The service is for free. I sent mine to Sarajevo.”

Europhobia posts a comparative roundup of Ukrainian politics.

Neretva River writes about anti-Roma bias on Slovenian TV.

Itching for Eestimaa explains why he disagrees with the new Estonian “law banning the use of Nazi and Soviet symbols in public places.”

Itching for Eestimaa writes about Litvinenko's murder, the image of Russia and the meaning of the recent developments for Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.

Belarusian opposition leader got detained recently, and - surprise, surprise - his detention was justified: he went to Latvia on his son's passport. More on the implications of such absent-mindedness at TOL's Belarus Blog.

“‘Belgazeta', ‘Salidarnasc', BDG ('Belorusskaya Delovaya Gazeta'), naviny.by - all of them publications with critical and objective approach - ran a piece in the past months describing blogs as the new alternative information source, as a major trend in mass media, or speaking about their vulnerability to desinformation.” Read more on what Belarusian mainstream media write about blogs at TOL's Belarus Blog.

Cuckoo's Call on making sanitary napkins for women more affordable. “The key challenge is to design an appropriate product and define the manufacturing technology and business model. I would prefer localised production across the country, with poor women in villages and urban slums securing gainful employment from this.”

“So … the whole Starbucks - Ethiopia affair boils down to a corporate shakedown of Meles Inc. against an honest corporate citizen. Does anyone out there really believe that a single Ethiopian peasant would have seen a cent of money from coffee any more than they see any results from billions in foreign aid?,” writes Ethiopundit.

Journal of a disturbed mind on the Take Back Bangladesh forum and event. “So far the concert was a great start for young generation’s involvement in encouraging clean democracy. The performers performed for free to support this new movement.”

Satellite pictures of the earth at night reveal a lot about energy consumption and economic activity. At The Indian Economy Blog, a post on India's energy needs and its likely growth. “Japan looks like a shining moon in the middle of the pacific. The southern part of the Korean peninsula is bright, the north completely dark. China’s lights shine on the coast and slowly fade inland. India is full of a million dull lights, with a few bright spots.”

A blast in Colombo with the likely target being a Government Minister. More at Indi.ca who says “There’s also a bank and a shopping mall, and a lot of working people pass through there on their way to or from Galle Road. So, that would be a civilian area. Bad form.”.

The Black Star Journal has a link to an article by The Center for Global Development about the exodus of health care workers from Africa and its impact on rural areas.

White African posts a chart showing IP per capita in the world, “African countries represent the bottom of the chart. Actually, 8 of the bottom 10 are African countries (Madacascar, Guinea-Bissau, Central African Republic, Burundi, Malawi, Ethiopia, Niger, Democratic Republic of Congo). That’s not a good thing, but not altogether that surprising either.”

Mayvelous in Fiji is pointing to the developing situation in Fiji and inviting readers to apply for the openings in Fiji.

The Sensintrovert looks at the list of banned books in Malaysia and asks Are We Heading Towards A Third Reich?

Pouya has presented on his blog, paintings of Derlara Darabi, a 20 year old girl, who has been in prison since she was 17. She was sentenced to death for confessing to a murder. Although she later stated her confession was false,this was not accepted by court.

Are Hizbullah babes as photogenic as Hariri's? A debate has broken out about whether the most recent crop of demonstrators are as telegenic as those of the March 14 crowd. Joshua Landis has some photos and links highlighting the Babes of Hizbullah.

“Dubai cannot cope with rain. It is a city built only for desert, with flat roofs, limited drainage and few umbrellas for sale. A small amount of water turns highways into slimy, skidding death traps. A downpour floods roads, pavements and car parks, creating gleaming lakes in the desert that last several days before slowly sinking away,” Secret Dubai said.

Freedom for Egyptians reports that Miss Egypt Meriam George was selected among the top 8 in Miss Earth pageant, held recently in Manila. Meriam was competing with another 84 contestants from all over the world. The Miss Earth contest promotes environmental preservation and contestants are called “beauties for a cause.”

Mustapha says that various eyewitnesses informed him that tens of thousands of protesters have filled the parking lot of the Tripoli International Fair (an area of around 20,000 square meters) in a show of support for the government. The witnesses described a huge forest of Lebanese flags and loud displays of fireworks and festive gun shots.

What is #1 selling point that Nintendo Wii's marketing strategy didn't fully cover? Jackie says that with the Play Stations and other Gaming consoles one sits on his tush and just plays whereas, the Nintendo Wii offers you a way to stay fit and exercise while playing!

Raed Jarrar says that there are unconfirmed rumors that there's been an attempt on the life of Muqtada Al-Sadr n Najaf. There is nothing in the news about this yet, but Raed promised to keep is updated in case he get more details.

“A stabbing, several fist fights and a poorly organised programme” marred the Trinidad leg of MTV Tempo's first anniversary concert series, according to this post by guest writer Michael Mondezie at ttgapers.com.

Geoffrey Philp talks about Jamaican author Pamela Mordecai, who reads excerpts of her work in a podcast from the 2006 Miami Book Fair.

The Guyana Groove republishes an article from the Kaieteur News suggesting that Guyana could be in line for a woman President in the not-too-distant future.

As the Flashpoint Film Festival opens in Negril, Jamaican View remembers Perry Henzell, the late director of “The Harder They Come”, a Caribbean film classic.

The Barbados Free Press, still concerned about Deputy Prime Minister Mia Mottley's proposal that call-in programmes and internet blogs should be placed under government control, sees striking parallels to Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez.

Angry Chinese blogger comments on the press arrangement in China during the Olympics.

Joel Martinsen at DANWEI has translates an article from Southern Weekly about Ng See-Yuen's comments on ratings, regulations, and entertainment in the mainland Chinese film industry.

Positive solutions writes down 10 reasons why living in China is great.

China Media Project compares the party and commercial news coverage of World Aids Day.

Morgan Pitelka in Frog in a Well blogs some invaluable old photos from 1951.

A citizen report by Robert Neff in Ohmynews about the widespread use of security cameras in Korea that causes invasion of privacy.

Robert Koehler comments on the recent report and internet hunt of an English teacher who worked as a pron star for her tution fee when studying in Canada. He points out that this may be another incident of cyber-terrorism against individual.

Hong Kong civil society is having its first social forum this week, a series of pre-conference citizen reports about grassroots workers conditions, migrant domestic workers (zh), gay and lesbian movement (zh), corprate social responsibility issues (zh), etc can be found online at inmediahk.net (zh).

Cathy Bythesea is asking her readers to help her collect a thousand bears for Bicol. Bicol region was badly hit by the typhoon Reming. “Stuffed toys have been known to be effective comfort givers in times of extreme stress and fear. To children, stuffed animals are more than toys, they're imaginary friends who are always ready to give comfort or play. They provide a certain amount of security in a sometimes scary world. Though it may be a small act, my heart's desire is to bring as many stuffed toys - ideally friendly looking teddy bears to the children in the Bicol region. I am hoping to raise at least a thousand bears that I can send to the Albay province in time for Christmas”