Global Voices Online

Big Brother is watching Bahraini bloggers. Check what eMoodz has to say about it here.

Respect for the rule of law is what separates Lebanon from India, according to Lebanese blogger Ms Levantine.

Lebanese blogger Mustafa says although a rally in Beirut yesterday was tarnished by useless gimmicks, it showed that the anti-Syrian majority ‘is definitely not “fictional”.'

Blogger Abu Aardvark (Marc Lynch) is off to Doha, Qatar, to participate the US-Islamic World Forum. “I hope to be able to blog from Doha like I did last time, wireless permitting,” he writes.

Wu Wei writes about Slovenia's Culture Day - here and here.

Neretva River writes about the EU's enlargement prospects: “Serbia in the fast lane, Croatia more of the same, and road blocks for Macedonia and Bosnia.”

Our Man in Tirana writes about Albania's energy problems and invites everyone to support “the good people of Albania”: “When I was out walking a few nights ago, I decided to try to record the sound of one of the many generators on my phone. I managed to convert this to a five second MP3 file. So I am pleased to announce this new Tirana ring tone is available for your use here. Just click on download, enter the given code and hit ‘get'. Use it for your ringtone, message tone or any way you want in solidarity with the good people of Albania.”

J. Otto Pohl posts the second “imaginary” syllabus - “Mehmet’s Grandchildren: The Islamic Peoples of Eastern Europe and their Ottoman Roots.”

The Economist's Edward Lucas posts his piece on the Kremlin and its opponents battling in London and replies to critics in the comments section.

LJ user drugoi posts a photo story (RUS) about the kind man Ilya and his 44 dogs, many of them legless or otherwise disabled, living in a house outside Moscow: “For almost 20 years already he's been adopting these street dogs, treating them and leaving them to live with him. Half of those who live in Ilya's big house are ordinary mutts, and the rest are also mutts - but they have managed to learn what human being are like: they are invalids. Beaten, maimed, half-alive, they show up here and get their treatment, housing, food and the human warmth that they missed while living in the big city.”

Silly Bahraini Girl links to a Poynter Online article quoting our very own GV author Haitham Sabbah.

The merits of rehymenisation (yes! you read it right: restoring the hymen in females) are being discussed by Egyptian blogger Sandmonkey here.

Two Yemeni journalists are on trial in their country, reports blogger Said Jane here.

Cribber has a video of a traffic signal that badly needs some intervention from the government. “This particular traffic light is on the crossing of D3 Vasant Kunj crossing. The light pole which you see is specially tilted for people to be able to see the traffic signal. This is the easy way out for MCD or which ever authority is answerable to fix this problem. Apparently it does not bother the government that this reflects poorly on the condition of our countries infrastructure.”

A little sarcasm and great humour by the Great Bong on Valentine's Day and people “protesting” Western Culture. “An assault party from the Sawarana Samaj Party started hurling IEDs (improvised explosive devices) which burst open releasing rose thorns, hot caramel and debris from broken perfume bottles everywhere.”

A Week in Sri Lanka on the future of university education. “In my view, the Sri Lankan universities today rarely encourages free thinking amongst its student population and fails to serve the original purpose of a university. I myself am an undergraduate in the University of Colombo and I have witnessed first hand how the university culture is tuning more towards something similar to the school culture.

Bahas on the interim constitution and the Madheshi turmoil. “This was a big leap forward in Nepal’s history because it completely denies any power to the king, which signals a virtual end of the 239 year old feudal Shah dynastic rule in Nepal. Most importantly the preamble of the constitution states, the sovereign people of Nepal has promulgated this constitution but not by any single person or a power centre.”

Rezwan on the mood in the blogosphere with the political developments in Bangladesh. “People at Drishtipat group blog suspect that strong protests against the MOU in Awami League chief Sheikh Hasina's son Sajeeb Wajed Joy's blog may have been heard at last. “

Israeli blogger Desert Peace tackles new US accusations that Iran is supplying Iraq with weapons here.

Tajikistan plans to give additional autonomy to the Gorno-Badakhshan region, the western part of the country which is mostly inhabited by Pamiris. Vadim says that concerns that this will encourage separatism are exaggerated.

Adam Kesher reports on plans in President Bush's proposed budget to cut funding for Kazakh and Uzbek language radio broadcasts.

Moroccan blogger Mohammed Lachyab says tomorrow (Friday) is the Jerusalem Blogging Day . He urges all bloggers to dedicate their posts on the day to highlight the plight of Palestinians.

KZBlog reports on yet another of the many uses of students in Central Asia. In this case, it is moving Kazakhstan's Ministry of Education into a new building.

Andrea Dall'Olio reports on what one learns about market principles from shopping in Tajikistan's bazaars and the difficulties that Tajik companies trying to make and sell processed foods in the country.

The CRD/TI Armenia Election Monitor 2007 writes about blogs as the new printing press, discussing experiences with blogging and politics in other countries and how those experiences are worth paying attention to in Armenia.

The Armenian Economist writes about the number of articles published in economic journals by authors affiliated with Armenian institutions, saying that the low number is a serious issue because it is an indication of quality of education.

African Architecture has an interesting post about using mud as flooring material, “Mud is a very eco-friendly and affordable material even though some might think it is floor finish associated with being primitive or poor. However I think mud is very beautiful flooring material as long as you can compact it properly, keep it from cracking and water proof its surface.”

Afromusing blogs about solar concentrator (Sun Flower), “This is one product I am looking forward to testing it in Kenya once it becomes available, mainly because it is cost effective, and suitable for those wishing to still be tied to the electricity grid, but supplement their energy needs or even resell it to the Electric company.”

Kubatana blogs

Sub-Saharan Africa