Global Voices · Citizen media stories from 2008 May 21

21 May 2008

Daily archive · 5 posts

Stories from 21 May 2008

Saudi Arabia: Dhahran Under Siege

Written by Amira Al Hussaini · Middle East & North Africa

Saudi Arabia hosted the Gulf Cooperation Council's Summit in its Eastern province, bringing the leaders of Bahrain, Qatar, Kuwait, Oman and the UAE under one roof - and holding the residents of Dhahran and Dammam hostage for the duration of their meeting as all the main highways leading to and from the city were shut.

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Xenophobia Plagues South Africa

Written by Muhammad Karim · Sub-Saharan Africa

Extremely violent attacks on foreigners in South Africa in the last days have stirred the entire South African media and of course… blogs. Individual bloggers question whether the government is right to call these attacks "xenophobic", and criticize the media for being too event driven to address the causes behind the violence.

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Lebanon: National dialogue in Doha

Written by Moussa Bashir · Middle East & North Africa

Lebanese parliamentarians, ministers, and opposing political leaders are currently holding talks in Doha, Qatar. This national dialogue came at the end of violent clashes between opposition and pro–government groups two weeks ago. The talks are taking place since Saturday in an attempt to reach an agreement on the national unity government, the election law and to finally elect a consensus president. Following are some bloggers reactions on the dialogue.

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Southeast Asia: Coping with the rice and food crisis

Written by Mong Palatino · East Asia

Food prices continue to rise in the world market. Southeast Asian governments are now re-examining their food and agricultural policies in order to prevent consumer panic and social unrest. Bloggers are discussing the food crisis and its impact in the region.

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Philippines in mourning over death of legendary labor leader

Written by Tonyo Cruz · Philippines

The death of Filipino veteran labor leader, street parliamentarian and legislator Crispin “Ka Bel” Beltran at 11:48 am Tuesday due to massive head injuries saddened and shocked many Filipinos. He was 75.

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Updates from 21 May 2008

Croatia

Sleeping With Pengovsky writes about the Slovenian Diaspora: “You see, people of Slovenia and Croatia lived in peace throughout history. We may say bad things about each other, but in the end Slovenes like Croatian seaside and music and Croats like Slovene mountains and shops. And both hate each other’s roads. It’s only when people who are stuck in 1945 and have a 19th century mindset (i.e. land is power) start stirring the pot, that all hell breaks loose.”

• Veronica Khokhlova

Bosnia Herzegovina

Anegdote comments on Eurovision: “But gay in the original sense of the word: happy, cheerful, was Bosnian song, which gets all my regards for not being a yet another stupid once-upon-a-time-turbo-folk-now-ethno-pop cry for euthanasia.”

• Veronica Khokhlova

Armenia

After yesterday's success enjoyed by the Armenian and Azerbaijani entries in this year's Eurovision Song Contest, Unzipped posts a photograph of Armenia's Sirusho celebrating. In the comments section of the post both myself and the blogger agree that the reason we like the photograph is that “she looks lovely” and that there are “Armenian and Azeri flags next to each other, celebrating success, no fighting, only smiling…” With the conflict between the two countries over the disputed territory of Nagorno Karabakh unresolved, such scenes are rare to say the least, and are perhaps testimony to the underlying purpose of the international song contest.

• Onnik Krikorian

Russia

Window on Eurasia writes about Circassians' “100-year-long resistance to Russia’s southward advance.”

• Veronica Khokhlova

Azerbaijan

The Long Aye-lander in Glasgow comments on the first semi-final of this year's Eurovision Song Contest in Belgrade, Serbia. The blog pays special attention to Azerbaijan's debut entry and says that with “a guy in huge angel wings, gyrating girls in leather dresses and ear-splitting falsetto” there's no point in supporting the British entry in the international song contest. “There's no way they can top this,” the blog concludes.

• Onnik Krikorian