December reading

I have a wealth of waiting links from almost the whole autumn to post - so I'll be unorthodox and start with the latest ones. ;-)

Goran Bregovic played in Stockholm - here reviewed in Svenska Dagbladet.

Bitte Hammargren writes here in Svenska Dagbladet of meeting the inhabitants of Nahr el-Barid camp in northern Lebanon, months after the siege.

The National interviews new UAE ambassador to Sweden.

Ing-Marie Froman reflects on neo-feminism and social conservatism with swedish televisison iniativ Halal-tv as a backdrop. This show has also been much debated a few weeks ago on Newsmill, actually mainly before broadcasting began.

A lot of Svenska Dagbladet today - here they published an essay exploring the importance of cassettes for spreading news and information in Arabic, here in Yemen.

A much-discussed arrest of blogger Hoder in Iran has not met with much attention in sweden, but Brian Whitaker of the Guardian discusses it here. a mass of different theories and points-of-view have popped up, will post more if I find something sensible and comprehensive.

I believe I have previously (even if it was quite some time since) pointed to the specific situation in the Sinai. Human Rights Watch issued a new report in the subject in November.

Sexuality is a powerful taboo not least in the Middle East (in Sweden we are less afflicted by it ;-) ) - Dagens Nyheter here meets sex-advisor in Lebanon and discusses implications.

A Dagens Nyheter-editorial on EU-Russia relations, against the background of an installation speech by Swedish EU-minister Cecilia Malmström at the Royal Swedish Academy of War Sciences.

The Institute for Gulf Affairs offered a report on religious freedom in Saudi-Arabia - I haven't read it but the topic is always interesting!

Robert Fisk is angry and to the point as usual - here lamenting the fact that Arab archives are closed and making the writing of history dependent on British and Israeli archives! I am by the way reading a book on the colonial officers who shaped the Middle East and it's 20th century - coming back to that in a later post.