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8 February 2012

Hungary: Goodbye, Malév!

Written by Marietta Le · Eastern & Central Europe

Malév, Hungary's state airline since 1946, ceased operation on February 3, 2012, due to bankruptcy. Marietta Le reports on the reactions in the blogosphere, explaining what Malév meant for the people.

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7 February 2012

Maldives: On the Brink of Chaos

Written by Saffah Faroog · South Asia

The Maldives is in a deep political crisis as the police force and some military personnel mutinied against the government in a follow-up to three weeks of protest by civilians. Details are emerging and there are frequent updates on Twitter.

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Ukraine: Netizens React to Popular File-Sharing Website's Shutdown

Written by Tetyana Bohdanova · Eastern & Central Europe

The news of the shutdown of Ukraine's most popular file-sharing website caused quite a stir online. Tetyana Bohdanova reports on the netizens' varied reactions to the controversy.

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6 February 2012

Russia: Practice of Compulsory Military Service Comes Under Attack

Written by Donna Welles · Eastern & Central Europe

Russia's compulsory military service practices are under attack due to a variety of reasons, including economic inefficiency, governmental corruption, and brutal hazing rituals that incite young conscripts to take their own lives. Donna Welles reports.

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3 February 2012

Côte d'Ivoire: Hackers Threaten Intelligence Agency Upon Arrest of Journalist

Written by Julie Owono · Sub-Saharan Africa

Managing editor of newspaper Le Patriote, Charles Sanga, was arrested by the Ivorian intelligence agency, DTS, following a controversial story about the constitutional court of Côte d'Ivoire. The next day, anonymous hackers threatened to leak confidential documents of the agency if he was not released.

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China: A Death Sentence to Hide Government Corruption?

Written by Oiwan Lam · East Asia

Wu Ying, named China's sixth richest woman in 2006, has lost her appeal against her death sentence at the Zhejiang Higher People's Court. The 30-year old was first arrested in March 2007, charged with illegal fund raising. Oiwan Lam reports.

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Updates about Law

9 February 2012

Cuba

Iván García writes about the late leader of Las Damas de Blanco, Laura Pollan, recounting a violent assault on the group days before her death and saying: “If they have anything left of humanism and dignity, her assaulters owe a public apology to the family of Laura Pollan Toledo.” Pedazos de la Isla, meanwhile, notes here and here that the violence and intimidation continue.

• Janine Mendes-Franco

Russia

At OpenDemocracy.net, Olesya Gerasimenko talks to the parents of three young neo-Nazi men who were convicted of race murders: “One has adopted the views of their only child and says that violence is necessary. One blames the politicians that have incited adolescents to street fighting. One cries, convinced of the innocence of his son. They are all different, but they have all asked themselves one and the same question: ‘am I to blame for what happened?’”

• Veronica Khokhlova

Macedonia

While the authorities in Macedonia remain silent on the country's stance on the ACTA, bloggers, such as Airborne, emphasize the need to gain more knowledge [mk], as the traditional media mostly ignore the issue: “Maybe, one of these days, we'll just simply wake up in the ACTA-ruled world.” The new media attempting to fill this gap in local languages include Metamorphosis and IT.com.mk. Endek blog advocates [mk] standing up for Internet freedom by joining international protest movements.

• Filip Stojanovski

8 February 2012

Barbados

An interesting development in the case of the Cuban prisoner being held past his sentence in Barbados, is here.

• Janine Mendes-Franco

China

Jende Huang from Sino-NK has written an investigative report on the spreading of meth across the China and North Korea border.

• Oiwan Lam

Bulgaria

The civic initiative “People Against Racism” is appealing [en] to the Municipality of Sofia and the Ombudsman of the Republic of Bulgaria with the request to ban an international neo-Nazi racist conference scheduled for Feb. 17 and a neo-Nazi torchlight procession known as the “Lukov March” on Feb. 18. Every year since 2005, Bulgaria's far-right, neo-Nazi, and ultra-nationalist groups have commemorated the death of Gen. Hristo Lukov, who supported Nazi Germany during WWII. Lukov March 2011 drew protests from many civic groups and human rights organizations, including the Bulgarian Helsinki Committee, the Jewish organization B'nai B'rith, and People Against Racism. (More about Lukov March; a 2010 video.)

• Ruslan Trad

Czech Republic

An anti-ACTA rally took place in Bratislava on Feb. 4. On the protest's Facebook page [sk], nearly 7,500 people wrote they would attend, and over 3,800 wrote they'd “maybe” attend. The weather was cold and windy; the recent news from Poland, which has postponed the ratification of ACTA, was good; and it's unlikely that anything will be approved before the Slovak early elections in March. As a result, only 500 people or so showed up for the rally [sk; photos; video]. This week, a number of Slovak and Czech politicians announced they were in favor of postponing the ratification of the controversial treaty.