07 Jun 11 | Index Index, Middle East and North Africa, minipost
Three armed men seized a Syrian blogger and forced her into a car yesterday evening (6 June), her cousin recorded the incident on her website. Amina Araf, a Syrian-American dual citizen who writes under the pen name, Amina Abdallah, discusses politics and sexuality on her blog, A Gay Girl in Damascus. She has been an outspoken critic of the Syrian government.
Editor’s note: Amina Abdallah has been discovered to be a hoax, perpetrated by Tom MacMaster, a 40 year old American studying for a masters at Edinburgh University in Scotland.
09 Apr 10 | Index Index, minipost, Uncategorized
Following dramatic scenes in the capital Bishek in the last few days, Roza Otunbayeva, the leader of Kyrgyzstan’s Social Democratic Party said today that a coalition of opposition parties have seized control of the country’s security headquarters, state television and various government buildings. Otunbayeva called on President Kurmanbek Bakiyev — who fled the capital on Wednesday night — to resign and said she would lead an interim government until elections are called. In a press conference on Thursday morning, she claimed that the opposition’s actions were in response to the government’s attacks on freedom: “what we did yesterday was our answer to the repression and tyranny against the people by the Bakiyev regime. You can call this revolution. You can call this a people’s revolt. Either way, it is our way of saying that we want justice and democracy.” Since he took office in 2005, Bakiyev has cracked down on opposition parties and the independent media.
30 Jan 09 | Comment, Middle East and North Africa
The celebrated photographer and Pulitzer prize-winner Kaveh Golestan was one of the great defenders of free speech in Iran. He reflects in this essay, first published in 1994, on the fallout of the revolution
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30 Jan 09 | Comment, Middle East and North Africa
When Ayatollah Khomeini arrived in Tehran on 1 February 1979, a brief period of freedom for Iranians came to an end. Yassamine Mather
looks at the development of the Islamic Republic’s suppression of dissent
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