Don't Speak

freedom of speech
Originally uploaded by chicawhappa.

This post is not about the hit of No Doubt. I just read from the Dutch higher education portal ScienceGuide that the Chair of the Dutch National Union of Students LSVb was put in jail for a few days and she was not allowed to enter Russia. The reason is that she is part of the Mission to Minsk campaign which criticises strongly the Belarusian government.

After that I read from the Finnish daily Helsingin Sanomat that Putin has said that he is not going to listen to lecturing about democracy in the upcoming G8 Summit in Russia. He has blaimed the critics for colonialism. "If you look at newspapers hundred years back you can see how at that time colonial powers justified their politics in Africa and Asia. They talked about their civilising role, the duty of the white man. If you now change the word civilisation to democracy, you can find the same logic and and you are able to read the same things from newspapers. There are differences between countries and forgetting that is dangerous", Putin said.

Although he was not speaking about this concrete case, I find it being extreme cowardism if the EU - boasting normally with its "European values of human rights, freedom of speech and tolerance" - is not going to say a word. But the most awful thing is that I am not too optimistic.