Documentary about China's Wild West: an area on the west frontier of China's Gobi Desert named Xinjiang (New Land) by the Chinese, but populated by a Muslim minority known as Uighurs who believe they should be an independent Uighur nation.
posted by Surfin' Bird on Aug 27, 2008 - 7 comments

Idaho Standoff Continues and while it may seem easy to view this as another Ruby Ridge, the differences in opinions that are coming up in the news reports are fairly interesting. The cops claim they are being attacked with guns and dogs while the lawyer for the children [who is consistently referred to as a man who has defended the Aryan nation] denies most of the allegations. Are they starving and cold, or do they have food and heat? Did their mother abuse them, or just try to homeschool them? And, most importantly, are you allowed to be poor, weird and paranoid nowadays without being labelled a criminal?
posted by jessamyn on Jun 1, 2001 - 14 comments

Basques separatists: a long-standing problem The Basque separatist movement is symptomatic of ethnic , religious, and cultural desire to be distinct and to have their own "place." And yet, at the same time, the world moves toward globalization, with economics becoming trans-national. A push and a pull at the same time. Can this contradiction be resolved without violence?
posted by Postroad on Jan 24, 2001 - 4 comments