Global Voices Online

The CRD/TI Armenia Election Monitor rounds up the latest parliamentary election news.

Ian Chesley reports on a Harvard roundtable on Turkmenistan after the death of Turkmenbashi.

Registan.net covers the latest crackdown on foreign health NGOs in Uzbekistan, which includes action against an organization running an HIV/AIDS prevention program for not just paperwork problems but also because it works with homosexuals. Male homosexuality is a crime in Uzbekistan punishable by three years in prison.

In Armenia yesterday, a man died after setting himself on fire in the capital's Republic Square. It is not known exactly why the man set himself alight, but he reportedly was angry at government officials and over unspecified injustices. The CRD/TI Armenia Election Monitor reports on the incident and rounds up the reactions of Armenian bloggers.

Expat blogger BeneBurundi is learning about local culture (Fr): “Communicating with people from Burundi is all about subtlety and interpretation; for example if you're proposed to and you decline with a ‘no', it is highly possible that what will be heard will be ‘yes, maybe one day if you insist'. Also, in answer to ‘is everything okay?' a ‘yes-yes' would mean there's a problem. “

California-based Congolese blogger Alain Mabanckou has nothing but praise for Senegalese singer Youssou N'Dour's big screen debut in Amazing Grace (Fr):”to see the few clips featuring Youssou N'dour, I think we'll need to to follow him closely. His future is bright if he chooses to concentrate exclusively in this direction and hence to play roles other than those characters deemed natural for men of color. “

Ukraine List posts samples of Chernobyl poster art.

Olechko shares sketches and observations of the Arena bar in downtown Kyiv.

“Who are the prison cells for?” asks Foreign Notes in a post about Volodymyr Shcherban, former governor of the Donetsk and then Sumy regions. Not for those who seem to deserve being there, it appears.

The Glory of Carniola reports on a rather surreal bureaucratic mishap: “This week marks the 15th anniversary of a now infamous moment in Slovenian history: the removal of 18,000 people from Slovenia’s permanent registry of citizens.”

The beatroot writes about Prince Charles' McDonald's comment and the Polish First Lady's views on the planned Rospuda bypass.

Pestcentric writes about Two-Tailed Dog Party - “a guerrilla street artist (read: creative university student with too much spare time) operating out of Szeged” - and showcases some of his work: “Well, fortunately, there’s now an English-language subsite, where a lot of the written work is actually translated so non-Hungarian readers can get the joke too. Granted, sometimes things are lost in translation, but it’s still very much worth a look.”

Pestcentric puts words into Hungarian politicians' mouths.

Shopping for movies at Mozikep DVD/Video shop in Budapest is a crazy experience: read the details at Further Ramblings of a N.Irish Magyar.

According to Further Ramblings of a N.Irish Magyar, the British Council is closing 10 of its 19 offices in Europe, including the one in Hungary. The library will stay, though.