Social media played in organising the uprising in Tunisia, and now, activists there are focusing their technical skills on helping anti-government protesters in Egypt. Tunisian hackers say they will attack website belonging to the Egyptian government in solidarity with the pro-democracy activists protesting there. Nazanine Moshir reports from Tunis.
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Moustafa Elgindy, a member of the Egyptian Coalition for the Opposition and a former member of Egypt’s parliament, said the pro-democracy protests will continue until president Hosni Mubarak leaves office. He said the solution is a parliamentary republic with a strong army and a prime minister voted on by the people. He spoke to Al Jazeera from Washington, DC.
Continue reading …A restaurant in Hawaii is under review by the state’s Civil Right Commission because of its policy of adding a 15% gratuity to the bills of patrons who don’t speak English. The Waikiki eatery says the policy isn’t xenophobic—it’s just that many customers come from abroad where tipping isn’t…
Continue reading …It is right to be anxious about Egypt but not the weary, confused organisation that represents political Islam there Fear of political Islam is the pivot around which debate on Egypt’s future in the outside world often revolves. It is the spectre which a jittery Israel invokes, and it is still President Hosni Mubarak’s last card in arguing that the system which he and his predecessors created should survive more or less intact, even when he is no longer part of it. Al-Qaida’s Egyptian connections are remembered and the Iranian revolution’s tragic slide into religious fascism recalled. Thus it is that many who cheer on the Egyptian demonstrators feel anxiety when they ask themselves what comes afterward. Yet that anxiety is misplaced. It is misplaced in the very precise sense that it is right to be anxious about Egypt but not right to centre that anxiety on the rather weary, confused and unready organisation which represents political Islam in Egypt today. The Muslim Brotherhood will play a serious part in any new politics. But it is now less a radical organisation than a conservative one, striving to be relevant to modern needs, and divided on how far it can or should trim its policies. Its leadership looks back on several decades of hard decisions, as well as of hard times under a president whose instincts always tended toward persecution or exclusion rather than reconciliation. The most fundamental such decision was to abandon violence, both in practice and in theory, at least on Egyptian soil. Distancing itself from violent means was, quite apart from the question of morality, the right thing to do if the Brotherhood was to have standing among Egyptians, who have consistently shown that they find such means abhorrent. It earned the Brotherhood the hatred of al-Qaida, but that was a political help, not a hindrance. Since then the Brotherhood has
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Fund managers hoping for a repeat of profits that followed uprisings in Thailand and China following unrest in Egypt Speculators are hoping to make a fast buck from the crisis in Egypt by buying shares in companies whose stock market values have been hammered by recent events. One senior financial adviser told Guardian Money that investors who bought after the Tiananmen Square massacre profited hugely from China’s economic rise while, more recently, Thailand has been one of the world’s best-performing stock markets since last April’s Bangkok riots. Mark Mobius, arguably the most renowned investor in politically risky emerging markets, told Citywire.co.uk that he was “looking to buy” in Egypt when the stock market reopens. Shares in Egypt fell by 11% on the last day of trading before the crisis forced the exchange to close. Mobius told Citywire he was looking for stocks to fall a further 10-15% before he started buying. Before the crisis, the Middle East had become the focus of several fund launches aiming to exploit its growing economic strength. These “MENA” – Middle East and North Africa – funds have been called the final frontier in emerging markets investing. The funds were mainly targeted at institutional buyers, but in March 2010 Barings unveiled a MENA fund for small investors, where the minimum investment was £2,500. Its initial portfolio comprised a 29% investment in Egypt, with the manager optimistic about the country’s prospects. Barings said: “It is important to emphasise that changes like this can be positive for investors as well as society.” “We would highlight South Africa post-Apartheid, Indonesia post-President Suharto and much of Latin America … Given renewed tensions in the region, however, and the importance of the Suez Canal to the transportation of oil, we believe it’s important to ensure that we are positioned for potential strength in the oil price across equity portfolios.” But Mark Dampier, of Hargreaves Lansdown, the biggest UK investment funds seller, said: “The number one thing about these sorts of funds is political risk. When things go wrong, you can’t get your money out. These are very immature markets and often quite closed economies.” Other fund managers to hold Egyptian stocks in their funds include BlackRock, Fidelity, Franklin Templeton, Investec and Schroders. Investments Investment funds Investing Financial sector Egypt Middle East Patrick Collinson guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Fox Nation is bashing President Obama for misquoting a Bible verse at yesterday’s National Prayer Breakfast—and the lefty Media Matters is in turn accusing the site of biblical ignorance. “Somewhat ironically, while Fox Nation appears to be positioning themselves as the arbiters of authentic Christianity, they seem unfamiliar with…
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A GPS tragedy in Britain: A 4-year-old girl was killed when her parents followed instructions that contradicted road signs, the BBC reports. Ariana Bardhaj died from multiple injuries after her parents made an illegal right turn into traffic. “They were following a sat-nav and it told them to turn right,…
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Roughly 24 hours after driving away supporters of president Hosni Mubarak in a pitched battle that lasted into early Thursday morning, hundreds of thousands of pro-democracy protesters filled central Cairo and fought running rock-throwing skirmishes east of their encampment, some of which swirled around an opposition party headquarters.
Continue reading …Tahrir Square remained largely peaceful today as throngs of demonstrators—estimates ranged up to the hundreds of thousands—continued their call for Hosni Mubarak to step down and President Obama reiterated his demand for a quick transition of power. The New York Times pegged the mood among demonstrators as “jubilant”…
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