matteo mohorovicich

focus: human rights - internationality - freedom of expression - planet earth - aob

visit me

come and visit me here. i definitely (?) moved here

Post: matteomohorovicich a 22:11 | link | commenti |

See you on September (or maybe before)

Due to my work, I think it will be difficult to keep my blog upated, at least until September. I'm trying to be a journalist for three months in a local paper in Tuscany. Very exiting experience, I'm learning a lot and having good time. But, the truth is that I don't have any Internet at my house and can't surf when I want. So, I'm forced to silence. 

See you on September, then, I suppose. Maybe before, if I am able to post something...

Matteo

Post: matteomohorovicich a 12:28 | link | commenti (1) |

Let's try sometimes to talk about Africa...

It would be better if information tried sometimes to get different targets... An example? Africa, the same old example, the same old lack of news.
See what's happening in Congo. Did you knew that about 7.400 people of South Kivu Province who avoided violence in May (the avoided violence? Which violence? someone could say) are in urgent need of relief aid, as International Rescue Committee (IRC) said? Ruandan Hutu rebels attacked their homes on May 23 and forced them to move to the town of Walungu. During the attack, 19 people were killed and other mutilated (Hutu rebels cut their hands and feet) and over 50 were caught prisoners. For more informations, read allafrica.
Why nobody speaks of it? Isn't it interesting enough? Isn't it "chinese" enough for a world that discovered in China the main of its actual foreign news (and often the only one)?

Post: matteomohorovicich a 14:51 | link | commenti (1) |

When Pope becomes an example of Internet censorship

I can't check it, but trust me that it's most likely to be happened...

The only country (or one of the few) that didn't celebrate with media obsession Pope's death is China. So far, nothing strange. The fact is that they did it with their typical style. That is to say: censorship on the net.
George Lessard, one of the members of Yahoo! group "Chinese Internet Search", wrote that Chinese web portals (such as sina.com and souhu.com) systematically blocked their forums from being posted with prayers, blessings and other comments on the death of John Paul II. On Sunday April 2, the forums were full. On Monday April 3, empty.
Lessard explains: "An official with Sohu.com confirmed the company had censored the comments, using sophisticated technology to allow only the writer to see his or her own comments ... Asked whether the portal had received an order from the government, the official insisted it was the company's own decision".
Even though we admit this last remark to be true, why allowing peple to see only what they posted, so that they can't share anything? Better to ban everyone from talking about religion than giving a semblance of democracy to the whole thing...

Post: matteomohorovicich a 22:29 | link | commenti (5) |
china

congratulations, usa!

UN Security Council approved Thursday, 1 April a resolution that authorises International Crimanal Court (ICC) to try suspected perpetrators of human rights abuses and war crimes in Sudan's Southern region of Darfur.
Usa, that doesn't recognize the ICC authority, had threatened to veto the resolution for fears that this would have involved Americans citizens and made of them targets of political lawsuits. So what? They obtained "assurances that bar the ICC, and other courts, from prosecuting citizens within Sudan from countries that are not a party of the ICC", as AllAfrica says. Americans talked about "genocide" for crimes committed in Darfur, but actually consider their fears more important than resolving this tragic situation. Exporting democracy is worth only for Iraq...

Post: matteomohorovicich a 11:15 | link | commenti |

Telecom Italia charged with being too expensive

Finally someone did it. Anti Digital Divide Association, as president Maurizio Gotta cinfirms, has charged Telecom Italia to EU Antitrust Telecom Italia. What with? Having too expensive prices for Adsl connection and not providing a good service, expecially in the South of Italy. Now, Bruxells has 60 days to decide: to hold an inquiry into Telecom or to ask for more informations?
I remind you that in Italy Adsl connection costs much more than in other EU countries. In the meanwhile, Alice Adsl, Telecom Adsl offer, will reach since March 31 4 megabits per second speed. As we pay a lot for a more or less four times less speed-transmission broadband, maybe it's a kind concession imposed by a sense of guilt...

Post: matteomohorovicich a 23:03 | link | commenti |

Zheng Yichun, another cyberdissident in jail

Just another one to add to the list of Reporters sans frontières: journalist or, as China seems often not to make any difference, cyberdissident Zheng Yichun, aged 48. He was charged with "subverting State power" by publishing articles. Where? Obviously on the same banned newspapers (Epoch Times; here you can find the English online version) and sites (just to tell one, boxun.com), all based abroad.
 The strangest thing (or not so strange, when we speak about censorship, free information repression and imprisonment in China) is that Zheng has been imprisoned on December 3. And only on March 25 (more than three months later!) Rsf wrote about it. Of course, it's not because of their negligence. Zheng's relatives, notified of his charge only on December 31, were warned not to talk about his imprisonment with press or human rights organizations, unless they wanted reprisals. They decided to stop keeping silence after a Yingkou daily newspaper reported the arrest on February 24.

To know more about Zheng's vicissitude, read Rsf.

Post: matteomohorovicich a 22:17 | link | commenti |
china

Does Northel Networks Corporation respect human rights?

As a part of its tenth Five-Year Plan for economic development, China is building a railway to link the northern city of Gormo to the capital of Tibet, Lhasa. The project will connect for the very first time Tibet with the Chinese nationwide railway grid. According to Students For A Free Tibet, this Gormo-Lhasa (the world's highest rail service) is part of China's plan known as "Western Development Campaign" and, as the previous railways built in Mongolia and East Turkestan, is meant to speed colonization of the area. Apart from being very expensive, the project -continues Students For A Free Tibet- will cause serious environmental destruction and has no particular benefits for Tibetans. Just a few words are enough: among the 38.000 who are working to build the Gormo-Lhasa line, only 6.000 are Tibetans and most of them earn up to eleven times less than the other employees, who are mostly from China. I suggest yor reading of the whole report by the International Campaign fot Tibet. It removes any doubt.
As Jam Yang wrote on Yahoo! Group "Chinese Internet Research", Canadian firm Nortel Networks Corp. said a few weeks ago that Chinese Railways Ministry has chosen it to provide a digital wireless communications network on the Gormo-Lhasa railway. The decision followed a year-long trial of Nortel's GSM-R (Global System for Mobile Communication) for Railways technology in China at altitudes of up to 15,700 feet above sea level, as Nortel specified in a statement some days ago.
The fact is: many human rights activists are now worried Nortel could be helping China to swamp Tibetan culture, giving Chinese the possibility to realize their railway and their (hidden) goal to assimilate Tibet. Obviously, Marion MacKenzie, vice-president of corporate communications at Nortel, categorically rejected that the Canadian firm could be involved in repressing and stifling human rights and freedom of any individual.

But there's more to say. Jam Yang, in another message to "Chinese Internet Research", wrote that Nortel-China Customs deployment will support the state-owned Golden Customs initiative, a nationwide project developed to connect the information networks of the customs and foreign trade sectors.
Nortel has also supplied Golden Taxation, a national information network linking state taxation headquarters with local taxation offices at all levels. Authorities told that Nortel Solutions will protect China Customs Business Critical Information: according to them, Nortel's Optical Metro DWDM (dense wavelength division multiplexing) technology will enable "secure, reliable, real-time data storage". 
But this tecnology seems not to respect data protection: in particular, UK human rights organization (The Omega Foundation) recommended respect in using personal data and the establishment of a specific legislation to protect citizens. But I think China is not worried about.
And Nortel Networks makes its business...

Post: matteomohorovicich a 19:00 | link | commenti |
china

better Darfur or Congo?

Darfur is one of the terrible examples of how human rights can be violated without any international reaction. Don't forget anyway that Africa is very big. And things such those happened in Darfur may happen in many other places, if there's no complaint. See the case of Congo. A UN report recently described unbelievable atrocities: rape, mutilation, cannibalism and so on. Jan Egeland said that Congo's district of Ituri has replaced Sudan's Darfur region as the worst in the world. Human right violations have mushroomed all over Africa. And nobody talks about it.

To know more about Congo, read The Guardian

Post: matteomohorovicich a 12:03 | link | commenti (1) |

a risky profession, according to CPJ

In 2004, as Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) says, 56 media workers have been killed. Today is March 17 and those killed in 2005 are already 6.
Since 1982, 22 journalist disappeared. They're still missing.

Post: matteomohorovicich a 11:30 | link | commenti |