Global Voices Online

Leila of neweurasia translates a Russian language post about Kazakhstan's entry into the space industry. The country has launched two of its own satellites from its launching facilities at Baikonur and now it has plans to woo foreign aerospace professionals to work in Kazakhstan.

Nessuna notes that the analysis of the black box from the Armenian jet that crashed near Sochi recently is finished, but says that it does not answer all the questions about the crash. She also says that the results of the investigation should be public.

Peter of neweurasia discusses the upcoming local elections in Turkmenistan and their potential significance as a sign of limited democratization.

Onnik Krikorian interviews Christine Allison, a researcher curently in Armenia studying the oral history traditions of Kurds.

Guyana Providence Stadium assesses the performance of a few Guyanese blogs. Among the category headings is “started out hot & sweaty and then simply fizzed out”.

“How dare a man be six foot seven and called Crouch?” writes Jeremy Taylor at the Caribbean Beat Blog, in his entertaining account of Trinidad & Tobago's clash with England today at the World Cup.

Barbados Free Press points out the fallaciousness of Prime Minister Owen Arthur's assertion that “Happily, we in the Caribbean have thus far been spared Enron-type experiences,” by reminding us that Enron used Barbadian and other Caribbean “offshore companies and banks to set up some 900 front companies to facilitate the movement of money to the detriment of Enron shareholders.”

The Bahamian tourism industry is almost 200 years old, writes Nicolette Bethel, but that longevity may in fact work against its becoming a sustainable enterprise. “It’s not sustainable because it doesn’t place the uniqueness of The Bahamas — our landscapes, our culture, our selves — at the centre of the deal,” she says. “Oh, it sells that uniqueness, rather the way that Madison Avenue sells the features of cars; but we don’t make that uniqueness central to the endeavour, so much so that it will be preserved.”

A hilarious post on Domain Maximus as a response to the govenrment in one state deciding that traditional nursery rhymes were to be done away with. He comes up with a bunch of side splitting new ones that are more culture specific.