Global Voices Online

20 East writes about the sorry state of Polish football: problems include racism and corruption.

Say: Macedonia speaks up against “radicalism” that seems to be more and more prevalent in the Greek-Macedonian relations: “I wish to condemn any violent form of ‘resolving' the issue and to ask everybody to cool down, because the problem will stay, and in the meantime the gap between the two nations will become wider. After all, we do need to live together.”

Andrés Pucci [es] and Renzo Colanzi [es] have started an online campaign against poor service by the supermarket Hipermaxi in Santa Cruz, Bolivia. Colanzi writes that the supermarket has begun the habit of giving out candy instead of coins, of which they claim they are out. He makes the calculation that this has enabled to chain to make more unreported income as a result.

Hungarian Spectrum writes about Hungarian intellectuals in politics.

“The local council elections were today, but their results were a foregone conclusion even before the country’s largest opposition group, the Muslim Brotherhood, withdrew its candidates and called for a boycott,” writesElijah Zarwan, from Egypt, who goes on to discuss the Mahalla protests and general strike.

Balkan Baby writes about the Vukovar massacre and the trial of Bogdan Kuzmic.

Egyptian blogger Sandmonkey provides us with updates about a riot which rocked Al Mahalla, in Egypt, with photographs, in this post.

Bahraini blogger Mahmood Al Yousif announces the country's first farmer's market, being held at a garden centre this weekend.

Balkan Baby writes about the re-election of Filip Vujanovic as Montenegro’s president last weekend.

A Fistful of Euros believes that having former Czech president Vaclav Havel “as the first permanent president of the EU could be ideal as Europe continues to try to get over the divisions of the 20th century.”

A new TGI Friday's has opened in Rabat and Pink Hijab brings us the story.

Bahraini blogger Ammar laughs his way through the opening of a new project in Bahrain.

Lebanese blogger Pink Ployd from Blogging Beirut has launched “I Love Gemmayze,” a campaign protesting the curfew imposed by authorities on the pubs and nightclubs of Gemmayze, a district of Beirut.

Jomhour writes[Fa] that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad says that some ministers should leave government because country needs progress and innovation.The blogger adds may be it is time that Ahmadinejad resigns too.

On publishing a Guardian video about the situation in Tibet, Daniel Arruda [pt] comments: “The sentences are clear: “China does not want the reality of Tibet to be known” or “the Chinese propaganda machine started working.” A video that shows what many of our commentators have tried to deny.”

Kourosh Ziabari admires Sania Mirza,a Muslim tennis player from India.

“We are discussing the superiority of Western Christian civilization over the indigenous peoples because of infanticide. Well, we may disagree, and want to do something about it, but the indigenous tribes do what they do for one reason clear: in their way of life, it is very difficult to keep disable individuals. Whereas we need every now and then a Veja [magazine] cover to remind us about the abuse, murder and torture of children to remind us how advanced we are.” O Hermenauta [pt] has his last word on a controversial subject that has been debated in the Brazilian blogosphere.

Farmers using SMS to get coffee prices in Uganda: “Tonight, a hundred and fifty farmers and their families who I have never met will be going to bed better off. Not only is this significant for the farmers, it's also significant for me. Because without FrontlineSMS, which is being used to provide coffee prices to these smallholder farmers, this would not be happening.”

Kikuyumoja wants to know the number of Africans on Twitter: “How many African twitterdudes & -dudettes are there on Twitter?
Am asking because of my friends on facebook who feel like being spammed with “JKE is twittering:…” messages on their feed pages. I’ve received at least two “what is this twittering business”-questions so far and then try to explain it.”

Meena Kandasamy on caste and male sexuality in Kerala, India.

Rants Raves and Miscellaneous Musings from Sri Lanka asks if people have the right to secede from the country.

All Things Pakistan on politics in the country taking a violent turn.

United We Blog! on the much looked-forward-to elections in Nepal, due to be held tomorrow.

With food prices becoming an issue of debate the world over, Unheard Voices on the fluctuations of the price of rice.

Comrade Fatso on the situation in Zimbabwe: “The parallel realities we live in have become the only reality now. The other one is paralysed. So bread is now hustled on street corners for two US dollars. Like an illegal drug. Milk has also joined the list of ‘goods' that are sold in our parallel economy. Not in the shops but on the streets. And if you're looking for toliet paper then just drive to the nearest ‘Give Way' sign, a Zimbabwean ‘Stop' sign.”

Bassam Bounenni, a Tunisian journalist who blogs at Wherever I Roam, That's My Home, describes covering the elections in Zimbabwe for Al Jazeera [Fr]: “We have been stopped repeatedly and our hotel was surrounded by snipers, who had come to look for Western journalists without accreditation. The country is beautiful and the people are really wonderful, in spite of all the misery.”

Ethan writes about dog fraud in Cameroon: “I mentioned to Stross a new scam I’d become aware of: fraudulent dog sales from Cameroon. Buyers are offered a chance to buy a pedigree’d pooch from an “AKC-certified” breeder in Cameroon - when the sale goes through, the buyer will be asked for additional fees, including travel insurance and vaccination fees. Needless to say, the dog never arrives. Message board posts on this topic make it clear that this is an increasingly common scam, and that lots of people fall for it.”

A Twitter channel for the President of Kenya, Mwai Kibaki!: “Time to take a nap. This reminds me, I should have a bedroom built at Harambee house.”

“In another blow to the controversial dancehall music industry, iTunes Canada has pulled several songs from major Jamaican dancehall singers…which contain lyrics glorifying violence against gays”: Caribbean Beat Blog says that the Jamaican government appears unfazed.

YardFlex.com acknowledges the passing of Jamaican reggae icon Bob Marley's mother.

Blogging from St. Vincent & the Grenadines, Abeni is concerned about the rise in the price of flour.

Trinidadian blogger Jeremy Taylor lets loose on everything from the tour of the Olympic torch to the elections in Zimbabwe.

“As you may be aware, the Olympic torch relay through major European cities has been successfully disrupted over the past week by demonstrators calling on Communist China to respect human rights and to get out of Tibet”: Child of the Revolution focuses on Cuba's reaction.

“Has anyone else noticed how all the major bankers are lining up to tell us how the take over of RBTT by Royal Bank of Canada won’t affect competition in the Barbados banking market place?”: Notes From The Margin remains unconvinced.

Vexed Bermoothes thinks that Bermuda's tribal way of voting is “politically immature and very depressing.”

“In spite of the negativity surrounding Jamaica…there is one more reason to be proud”: YardFlex.com reports that a Jamaican has been chosen by the American Biographical Institute as their Woman of the Year in Education.

Geoffrey Philp features the work of Jamaican writer Opal Palmer Adisa.

Kenny writes about the use of FrontlineSMS in Zimbabwe: “A local NGO seeking to promote human rights and good governance, Kubatana were the very first users of FrontlineSMS when it launched back in 2005, starting a trend which has seen the software used for similar activities in a number of other countries around the world. In their own words, FrontlineSMS finally opened up the possibilities for text messaging in their work, and I knew they had plans to use it during the 2008 elections. This is what they've been doing.”

Peixoto Alves [pt] has an extensive post about the future of Angola. “The challenge is thinking with an innovation-intelligent approach as a tool for the country in a long term perspective, sustaining short-term action at the political, economic, social and cultural levels.”

Woser reposted an article by a Tibetan monk on the March 14 incident. He criticized the violent protest as well as the blame that Chinese government put on Dalai Lama [zh] which distorted the truth.

In three weeks time, a book about lies and truth of Tibet has been published in China. Joel Martinsen from DANWEI translated an interview with the publisher, Zhang Weimin.

Diumanpark described the seizing of Olympic torch by protesters as Pre-Olympic sport[zh].

Fongyun commented on the Chinese security staffs in guarding the Olympic torch away from protesters. The blogger pointed out that Australian media were correct after all [zh], China did send out military police for guarding Olympic torch.

Kursk continued to explain why he urged for boycotting Olympics [zh].

The Azamat Report informs readers that Kyrgyzstan's Parliament Speaker Adaham Madumarov, also leader of pro-presidential Ak Jol Party, said that the Central Election Commission does not have to report to anyone, when he was asked why the December 16 elections results have still not been published.

Lena reports that the Kazakhstan Ministry of Internal Affairs is seeking cooperation with Muslim and Orthodox Christian officials in crime prevention.

Barnett Rubin analyzes why many of internationally accepted standards and practices of community's capacity builing do not work very well in Afghanistan, and says that they presuppose a set of interoperable systems that do not exist.

La Voz de Guamote [es] writes about a taxi strike in Riobamba in which 2,500 taxi blocked the road in protest of the proposed creation of more taxi cooperatives.

Adam reports that Kazakhstan will impose a crude export duty of $109.91 per tonne from May in a move to solve fiscal challenges, stabilize domestic oil products prices and manage inflationary pressures.

Steve LeVine opines that the alleged birth of an extramarital son to the Kazakhstan's oil tycoon and presiential son-in-law Timur Kulibayev, as well as a London-based socialite raises questions on whether he is still Kazakhstan's most important oilman.

Omar Barsawad, from Yemen, introduces us to the highlands of Hadhramout in a series of breath-taking pictures.

From Dubai, Seabee reports on court cases in the Emirate in this post. Among them is the high profile case of a French boy, who was raped in Dubai.

Seabee, from Dubai, reports yet another accident, and posts a picture too.

Turkish blogger Metin links to a chilling interview with “Murat Kurnaz, a German of Turkish origin, who was detained (and tortured) at Guantanamo Bay, even though he was completely innocent, and with no connection to terrorism.”

From Algeria, Nouri the Moor sheds more light on the Arab Summit, held recently in Syria, and the coverage it got.

“Qaym (Ar) is a website for user-generated restaurant reviews based on social rating. The idea behind it may sound simple, but the execution is excellent and the result is great,” writes Saudi blogger Saudi Jeans.

Saudi Arabia is moving towards introducing more regulations with regards to women's employment, reports Saudi Jeans, who comments on a new ‘vague' law just introduced in the Kingdom.