Blogging the democratic revolution
No, not in the Middle East. In Venezuela. A first. A crusading journalist who asked too many questions about aluminum mining, the same damn industry the Russian mafia hits journalists for. By terrorists. With never-before-seen-in-Venezuela methods. To terrify. Alek Boyd now has an update here. It turns out they didn’t completely chop his head off, but they came close and the guy died.
Nicaragua’s slimey unelected Sandinista bureaucrats may have finally cornered President Enrique Bolanos who busted them and their nasty rightwing allies for bonafide corruption. Now, they are demanding that he step down for ‘violating the constitution.’ Don’t tell me this isn’t political. And ominous. Read it here.
I haven’t given this idea thought before. Very interesting. (Hat tip: New Mongols) ULAAN BAATAR, Mongolia — While the world powers grapple with how to check North Korea’s nuclear ambitions, Mongolia has quietly engaged the country and is pressing it to undertake reforms in a more direct manner. The primary tool to woo Pyongyang is Mongolia’s own successful transition from a Stalinist state to a free-market democracy. Once allies within the Soviet bloc, North Korea and Mongolia chose very different tacks after the Soviet Union collapsed in 1990. While North Korea’s continuing Stalinism has brought it to the brink of…
Boli-Nica has a couple of amazing posts on the growing evidence against Hugo Chavez in the bankrolling of the blockades against Bolivia’s cities this month, the purpose of which was to starve the citizens into submission until they agreed to nationalize Bolivia’s energy resources. Seriously good blogging. Read it here and here.
City government machines are usually filthy even in the most ideal of first-world political conditions, which makes them an ideal operating environment for Venezuela’s dictator, Hugo Chavez. That may be why he’s growing active there. Alek Boyd recently questioned the brazen use of London municipal resources for Chavez’s government propaganda effort and got an amazing response from London officials, disingenuously wondering what the problem was. Read Alek’s account of Chavez’s London onslaught here.
Mass resignations are following Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez’s decision to honor Cuban dictator Fidel Castro at Venezuela’s Independence – that’s right, Independence – Day, parade. Venezuelan troops seem to think Castro’s hand makes a mockery of independence. After all, he is a tyrant. It’s too much for the troops. Read it here.
Chris Borgen over at Opinio Juris has a couple of engaging posts on international institutions and the building of a global liberal order. He argues that Clinton was more successful at promoting a desirable world order because of his support for international institutions, and his greater preference than the White House’s current occupant for treaty-making. I think Clinton does deserve a fair amount of credit for promoting global freedom, but I disagree with Borgen over his use of the term “liberal order” to the extent that he identifies it with international institutions which do little to nothing to promote democratization…
The Moldovan parliement recently signed a Ukraine-drafted accord on how to move forward with the Transdniestria separatist conflict. HISINAU, June 10 (Itar-Tass) – Moldovan parliament has approved a plan of settlement of the conflict with the breakaway Dniester region proposed by Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko. Parliament also has adopted an address to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) on principles and conditions of demilitarisation and democratisation of the Dniester region. Moldovan President Vladimir Voronin and the government attended the parliamentary sitting. The declaration approving the Ukraine-proposed settlement plan said it ???????lacked some moments, including the withdrawal of…
Once again, the brilliant Carlos Alberto Montaner writes what I wish I’d written. He is awesome, awesome. He tells why President Carlos Mesa was not fit to govern, the sad subtext to all the turmoil in Bolivia. Read it here.
King Gyanendra ended the three month state of emergency this past April 30, meaning he was supposed to ease up tight controls on civil liberties imposed since February. Of course, that didn’t happen. In the most recent example of his power grab, over 100 journalists were arrested for protesting against the restrictions. Police arrested nearly 100 journalists Monday after scuffling with them during a protest to demand King Gyanendra immediately lift media restrictions in Nepal imposed four months ago. … Protesters from the Federation of Nepalese Journalists were arrested as they marched into a restricted area near the royal palace,…
Having been out of the blogosphere for a week due to conflicting obligations, I’m back and I’ve put up a Middle East Week in Review looking at the major events. The main events centered around Lebanon’s elections, but Iraq made progress in facing down terrorists and Iran moved close to its “elections,” such as they are.
Yesterday I posted on the third round of the elections in Lebanon taking place in Bekaa and Mt. Lebanon. It was termed “the mother of all election battles” because it pitted in tightly contested races the electoral lists of the now split opposition led separately by Hariri-Jumblatt and Aoun. A lot of the success of the Hariri-Jumblatt anti-Syria coalition depended on their victory during this round, given that 58 out of 128 seats were at stake. If Aoun scored a steady political ground, it would make the aforementioned much more shaky. Well, he did, so let’s see how well I…
Military troops threatening to seize western oil fields. Read it here. UPDATE: Miguel has a superb explanation of what’s really going on in this case. He also notes some of the implications. Read it here. UPDATE: Daniel has a first-rate analysis of further trouble in another quarter of the military, the rebellion against Chavez’s honoring Fidel Castro, whose troops are calling the shots in parts of Venezuela’s military. Read it here.
Jim Hoft of Gateway Pundit is hosting this week’s carnival of revolutions, catching you up on everything that has gone down this week in the democratic movement. “So let????????s cut to the chase, down to this past week????????s developments in democracy, elections, tyrannous acts, human rights, and pie. Apple pie.”I knew that quote would come back to get me! On a similar note, Arthur Chrenkoff has a new installment of good news in Iraq. Also critical reading.
This is big. Keep reading, you’ll see why. Hundreds of women staged an unauthorized demonstration in Tehran today, protesting sex discrimination under Iran’s Islamic leadership just days before the June 17 presidential elections. The protest was the first public display of dissent by women since the 1979 revolution, when the new regime enforced obligatory veiling. “We are women, we are the children of this land, but we have no rights,” they chanted. More than 250 marched outside Tehran University, and about 200 others demonstrated two blocks away after hundreds of riot police swarmed in and barred them from joining the…
It looks like the Kuwaiti government has made good on its promises. When women got the vote, they promised that they would appoint women to the government. Bingo. KUWAIT (Reuters) – Kuwait named its first woman cabinet minister on Sunday, less than a month after giving women the vote, a key plank in its democratic reforms. Prime Minister Sheikh Sabah al-Ahmad al-Sabah announced rights activist Massouma al-Mubarak’s appointment as planning minister and minister of state for administrative development affairs, the state news agency KUNA reported. “Naming a Kuwaiti woman as a minister … is a special step we had longed…
Miguel Centellas gives it till the end of the year. Read it here.
Lebanon went to the polls for the third time today (I think they like it!) in the districts of Mt. Lebanon and Bekaa. Usually I would do a really long post and analysis, given that most news stories fail at covering the event well, but An Nahar did such a good job that it will require little further elaborating. Lebanon’s mother-of-all election battles is on, pitting Gen. Aoun and allied Syrian loyalists against a ‘strategic pact’ of major opposition groupings comprising Walid Jumblat, Saad Hariri, Qornet Shahwan and Samir Geagea’s Lebanese Forces. The polls opened at 7 a.m. Beirut time…
Everything you wanted to know related to Iran, published in a single sweet post. Also, make sure to check out the schedule of pro-democracy events over the coming week.
The Philippines is seeing massive protests over the discovery of a tape which purports to show that that President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, the daughter of a founding president of the nation, rigged her re-election last year, a contest she just barely won. She got her initial power in a People Power coup in 2001, an event I witnessed in Manila, and now apparently it’s her turn to exit the same way. Sad, because none of this is democratic. Initial news accounts are here, here, and here. Much of the blogging sentiment around Manila is that bad as she is, the…
Miguel at MABB on Bolivia has a very significant item utterly ignored in the U.S. media about how Bolivia’s protestors are being coerced. They are being shaken down by Marxist social movements like Evo Morales’ ally FEJUVE, which sends block committees into neighborhoods of El Alto, checking to see that at least one member of the household is out there protesting for Morales’ suicidal nationalization causes. I knew those Indians weren’t doing this on their own! There were too many of them at the pro-Mesa protests in March. They are being forced to protest! Or else. The Morales crew puts…
I just finished reading through a bombshell scientific survey conducted by the Iran Institute for Democracy to gauge public opinion in the country. It’s the only one of its kind out there that is so thorough and well-done that it is truly a must-read. For the complete executive summary, click here (corrected: this summary is from 2002, the summary for the latest hasn’t been released yet). Here’s the press release with much of the relevant information. A recent public opinion survey of Iranians, conducted by The Tarrance Group, surprisingly found that a vast majority (74%) of Iranians feel America’s presence…
Music to my ears. When Syria withdraw its troops from Lebanon back in April, it was pretty obvious to the world that it left behind a thick residue of intelligence agents. The several bombs that have gone off, and the targetted assassination of an anti-Syria journalist, are part of a general pattern of political intimidation. Earlier in the week, the U.S. government reported that it had received a intelligence of a Syrian hit list made up of Lebanese opposition politicians. The assassination of anti-Syria journalist Samir Kassir has relaunched the campaign to drive Syria away. Because of the great public…
Randy at Beautiful Horizons has an important item on the potential for Ecuador- and Bolivia-style unrest in Peru. It’s growing. Like the other two nations, Peru has weak institutions and grinding poverty and growing discontent. The Shining Path has made some frightening recrudescences in Andean villages, scaring the locals who want that era over forever, a sure sign of trouble brewing. I talked to some investment bankers yesterday on Bolivia as well, and learned they had concerns about Peru, which has posted 38 straight months of economic growth yet somehow hasn’t ended poverty. What a terrible thing! Alvaro Vargas Llosa,…