public opinion

The majority of youth from Egypt, Tunisia, Libya and Yemen - countries that went through a revolutionary wave of demonstrations and protests that began in December 2010 - feel disenfranchised from the political process in their country, a poll conducted by Al Jazeera Studies Centre has revealed. The study, published on Monday, also found that most of the 8,045 of women and men aged 17 to 31 surveyed from the four so-called "Arab Spring" nations, did not believe that their recently elected parliaments represented them.

With all eyes on Brazil during the Pope’s visit, protests are planned in Rio throughout the week to reiterate demonstrators’ grievances, including insufficient but expensive public transportation, government spending on mega-events like the World Cup, and political corruption. A protest took place in Rio the first day of the Pope’s visit, when around 2,000 people demonstrated outside of the governor’s palace where the Pope had attended an event.

As chaos ensued on streets across Egypt this week, and speculation surrounding the whereabouts of ousted President Mohamed Morsi and his closest Islamist allies intensified, the country's national newspaper splashed an expose across its front page...Wrangling over the sensational headline underscores the biggest casualty of Egypt's two and a half year revolution: truth and accuracy.

After nine months in Havana, Cuba, negotiators are making slow but steady progress toward ending the conflict between Colombia's government and its largest leftist guerrilla group, the 49-year-old Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC). The talks are now at the second of five agenda points, and a growing segment of public opinion believes that this peace process—the fourth in the past 30 years—may end in an accord.

Burns emphasized repeatedly that the United States did not back any individuals or parties in Egypt, only the principle of an open and inclusive transition to a democracy. He said Washington hoped the “ongoing transition” would be “a chance to learn some of the lessons and correct some of the mistakes of the past two years.”

These young people did not live through the repression of the military dictatorship in the 1960s and 1970s. They did not live through the inflation of the 1980s, when the first thing we did when we received our paychecks was to run to the supermarket and buy everything possible before the prices rose again the next day. They remember very little about the 1990s, when stagnation and unemployment depressed our country. They want more.

Corruption and bribery are perceived to be getting worse in many countries, and trust in governments is falling worldwide, according to a survey by the group Transparency International. The Global Corruption Barometer 2013 paints a bleak picture. One in every four people paid a bribe in the last 12 months when accessing public institutions and services, according to Transparency International's report.

Members of New York's Egyptian community descended on the coffee shops, delis and Hookah bars of "Little Egypt" on Wednesday to celebrate the overthrowing of Islamist President Mohamed Mursi after one year in office.

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