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Theme: After the "Arab Spring"

Editorial

What happened to “the Arab Spring”?

These days, “the Arab Spring” is an expression that has almost an emetic effect on many of those who were most heavily...

Text: Ola Larsmo September 10 2014
Article

The transformations of the Syrian revolution

The Syrian uprising against the al-Assad regime is now entering its fourth year with seemingly no end in sight. In fact, the conflict is now spreading to neighbouring countries such as Iraq. Writer...

Text: Faraj Bayrakdar September 10 2014
Article

Yemen at ground zero

“Since the uprising, Yemen has become a place where you cannot live if you want to be free. This is particularly true for women but also for all who have dreams of another life.” The picture that...

Text: Bushra al-Maqtari September 10 2014
Poetry

Diary of the silent

Syrian poet, Housam Al-Mosilli, was forced to flee Syria in 2012 after he was imprisoned three times and repeatedly tortured. Today, he lives in exile in Turkey. In the poem, “Diary of the silent,” he...

Text: Housam Al-Mosilli September 10 2014
Fiction

What happens to your mother is not your concern!

The cruelties and abuses taking place today in Syria defy all comprehension. Perhaps not even literature, or the language itself, is sufficient to be able to depict what is happening. But how then can...

Text: Omar Kaddour September 10 2014
Article

“The Facebook revolution”

What is known as the “Arab Spring” was allegedly the result of social media and its power to organise and mobilise demonstrations in 2011. But, how accurate is this picture? Poet and blogger Evronia...

Text: Evronia Azer September 10 2014
Article

140 characters make you a terrorist

Saudi Arabia remains one of the countries untouched by the wave of democratic uproar which swept through many other Arab-speaking countries. The reason is the monopoly the ruling royal family holds...

Text: Hana Al-Khamri September 10 2014
Poetry

The spring of blood and ashes

“Blood and ash from the stolen Arabian spring / have penetrated the mornings, evenings and nights,” writes Syrian poet Bandar Abdulhamid in his collection of poems. The brutal reality of Syria is...

Text: Bandar Abdulhamid September 10 2014
Article

I’m not an egg

What does “democratisation” actually mean? How long does it take for the new values in legislation and public debates to sink into the general public's consciousness? An anonymous Tunisian writer...

Text: Anonymous September 10 2014
Fiction

The damned revolution

The thin line between the life of an individual and what is happening at large. Words juxtaposed with one person’s point of view have been the theme of some of the literature world's strongest...

Text: Razan Naim al-Maghrabi September 10 2014
Interview

Can you tell me more about your expectations for your country?

During the so-called “Arab Spring” in 2011, we followed the uprisings, demonstrations and optimism through the anti-government blogs of Afrah Nasser (Yemen) and Lina Ben Mhenni (Tunisia). Three years...

Text: Afrah Nasser, Lina Ben Mhenni September 10 2014
Article

“The Arab Spring”—a timeline

Coined the “Arab Spring,” early 2011 was a challenging time of transition, anti-government movement, and political...

Text: PEN/Opp September 10 2014
Poetry

While we are waiting

Syrian poet Amira Abul Husn is one of those who have chosen to remain in the war-torn country, using her pen to bear witness to all that is going on around her. In her poetry, she depicts fragments of...

Text: Amira Abul Husn September 10 2014

Theme: Digital freedom

Editorial

Welcome to the goldfish bowl

It has been obvious for some time now, perhaps 20 years or so, that the struggle for the freedom of speech is being...

Text: Ola Larsmo May 04 2014
Article

The fifth column, dissidents and a shrinking internet

The Russian president Vladimir Putin recently stated that internet was actually created by the CIA and that Russia needed to build its own internet. It is obvious that the battle for freedom of speech...

Text: Oksana Chelysheva May 06 2014
Fiction

Ammar 404 is dead. Long live Ammar 404!

Tunisia is in 133rd place out of 180 in the Reporters Without Borders Press Freedom Index 2014. The journalist and human rights activist Afef Abrougui writes here about the phenomenon Ammar 404, which...

Text: Afef Abrougui May 06 2014
Article

PEN International's declaration on digital freedom

Everyone has the right to express themselves freely through the digital media without fear of reprisal or persecution. This is the key message in PEN International’s manifesto which was adopted by the...

Text: PEN International May 06 2014
Fiction

Heckling the powerful in Belarus

Freedom of speech is greatly limited in Belarus. Since 2006 the country has been included in the Reporters Without Borders’ list of ”Internet enemies.” The Belarusian author and blogger Jauhen...

Text: Jauhen Lipkovich May 06 2014
Article

“Digitocide”: the new way to silence the masses

Twitter and YouTube were recently closed down in Turkey. Platforms for citizen journalism and websites of non-governmental organisations have fallen victim to the Turkish government’s attempts to shut...

Text: Gürkan Özturan May 06 2014
Interview

The Tor project

After a number of years when dictatorships and espionage agencies seemed to take control of the web, we’re now facing a counter movement. Today, we know much more about the reach and effects of...

Text: Deji Olukotun May 06 2014
Article

Cat and mouse, dog and Ouroboros

“Dictators learn faster than internet users.” This is the sad view of the future of the internet. But is this actually true? For many years, China has been the prototype for countries trying to...

Text: Isaac Mao May 06 2014
Article

NSA’s espionage can aid dictatorships

At one point it looked like a number of totalitarian states and systems would succeed in closing the door that the internet had opened for freedom of speech. This was met by a new wave of “hacktivism”...

Text: Linus Larsson May 06 2014
Article

The art of creating internet without any internet

In Cuba it is forbidden for citizens to have their own internet connection. If you want to read your e-mail or surf the net, you are directed to use public internet connections in internet cafés...

Text: Clive Rudd Fernandez May 06 2014
Article

Ten countries where Facebook has been banned

On 4 February 2014, Facebook celebrated its 10th anniversary. The social networking giant now has over 1.23 billion users, but there are still political leaders around the world who don't want their...

Text: Index on Censorship May 06 2014
Fiction

N’existe Pas

For many years Bruce Sterling has been writing about the battle for freedom on the internet, a subject he first wrote about in the highly acclaimed book The Hacker Crackdown in 1992. In this book...

Text: Bruce Sterling May 06 2014
Fiction

To write and to live in the shadow

The first blog was started in Iran in the beginning of 2001. Since then, the blog culture within the country has grown and there are over 70,000 blogs by Iranians, both inside and outside the country...

Text: Marzieh Rasouli May 06 2014
Article

The Mullahs’ inroads into social media

Internet freedom is highly restricted in Iran. Low speed connections, blocked sites and internet blackouts are just a couple of examples of how the government attempts to strangle internet. An...

Text: Anonymous May 06 2014

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