Global Voices · Citizen media stories from 2011 October 16

16 October 2011

Daily archive · 7 posts

Stories from 16 October 2011

Russia: Soccer Team Qualifies for Euro 2012 - “On To Ukraine and Poland!!!”

Written by Donna Welles · Eastern & Central Europe

The 2012 UEFA European Football Championship is referred to by some as 'Polkraine 2012' since it will be held in both Poland and Ukraine. Russia officially qualified with a 6-0 win over Andorra; citizen media has captured the popular perception of the qualifying round.

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Worldwide: Dialogue and Peace Through Sport

Written by Abdoulaye Bah · Translated by Claire Ulrich · Caribbean, Latin America

Joël Bouzou, a bronze medalist during the 1984 Olympic Games and World Champion of modern penthathlon in 1987, is the founder and president of Peace and Sport, an NGO created in 2007 whose motto is "Building sustainable peace through sport".

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Food Around the World on Blog Action Day 2011

Written by Solana Larsen · Sub-Saharan Africa, Eastern & Central Europe

Every year since 2007, Blog Action Day has united bloggers from around the world in talking about one global issue. Collectively, the thousands of bloggers participating have an audience of millions. And this year on October 16, 2011 they talked about food.

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Poland: Election Results Signal Imminent Generation Shift

Written by Kasia Odrozek · Eastern & Central Europe

Poland's parliamenary election results seemed to be a relief to many and a surprise to everybody. The current PM Donald Tusk has become the first Polish prime minister to be elected to a consecutive term, but the real dark horse of the election is the anticlerical and libertarian Janusz Palikot, whose party has gained 10 percent of votes.

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World Food Day: Living with Hunger Pangs

Written by Juliana Rincón Parra · South Asia, Latin America

According to the World Bank, nearly 1 billion people go to bed hungry around the world, and the rising food prices will make that number grow. Today, for the World Food Day, we put faces on those hungry families and hear their stories.

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Whose Language? The Royal Spanish Academy and Copyright

Written by Juan Arellano · Translated by Marianna Breytman · Western Europe

Can a language used by millions of people be copyrighted and be the property of an institution? This and other questions are circulating online following the news that the Spanish Royal Academy (RAE) and Grupo Planeta told Uruguayan journalist Ricardo Soca to remove web content considered their exclusive property, such as links to the RAE website.

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Bolivia: A Judicial Election Without Campaigning

Written by Eduardo Avila · Latin America

For the first time in its history, Bolivian citizens will elect judges and magistrates to five different courts and tribunals. However, this election also prohibited public campaigning causing many to wonder for whom to vote. Some also feel that the election is set up to benefit the ruling party, and plan to vote null as a way to send a message.

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Updates from 16 October 2011

Saudi Arabia

Photoblogger Monirul Alam posts pictures of a symbolic protest in Bangladesh mocking the execution scene of the beheading of 8 Bangladeshis in Saudi Arabia as punishment.

• Rezwan

India

Parvinder Singh pays a tribute to the Indian Ghazal music legend Jagjit Singh and shares how his music crossed borders and faiths.

• Rezwan

Greece

On Blog Action Day 2011, themed this year around food to coincide with World Food Day, veteran Greek blogger Rodia writes [el] about the dangers of continuous austerity imposed on Greece: ”We are in a state of siege, and food […] will soon be scarce in my country. It's already happening to families poorer than mine.”

• Asteris Masouras

Sri Lanka

Indi.ca reports that “from 2002-2010, the Sri Lankan vehicle population has more than doubled”.

• Rezwan

Hungary

The Wayward Hungarian, a new English-language Tumblr blog, writes about the recent initiative by a Hungarian activist, who has “hacked” the regulation targeting the homeless living in Budapest's District VIII. The regulation imposes a fine of “up to 250 dollars if one is conducting ‘lifestyle-like' behavior in public, but the municipality may now also fine the same amount if one stores items in public areas that may be accessories to the selfsame ‘lifestyle-like' behavior. Items such as blankets for instance. This means that people can be fined for unsettlingly vague things like 'sitting on a rock' and ‘having a blanket'.”

• Marietta Le

Yesterday(Oct. 15), more than 300 “occupiers” gathered at the 1st floor of Taipei 101, the landmark of capitalism in Taiwan[photo] to protest against the financial industry and biased governmental policy. Sun Qiong-li(孫窮理) of Coolloud.org pointed out[zh] that for Taiwan, our first enemy should be imperialism from US, and the event itself needs to be filled with more actions and discourses.

• Portnoy Zheng