Blogs of War

Students for a Free Tibet has an update:

Beijing – Brian Conley, creator of the well-known videoblog, Alive in Baghdad, was detained with his friend, Jeffrey Rae, early Tuesday, August 19th in Beijing. Their detention appears to have taken place at the same time as that of international artist James Powderly, whose detention was reported Tuesday. Three other bloggers and activists, Jeff Goldin, Michael Liss, and Tom Grant, have also been missing since Tuesday morning. Conley, 28, Rae, 28, Goldin, 40, Liss, 35, Grant, 39 are all American citizens.

The five “citizen journalists” and activists were in Beijing to support and promote human rights, freedom of expression, and freedom for the Tibetan people. They and numerous others have acted as an independent media centre for the dozens of pro-Tibet activists in Beijing who have sought to draw attention to the Chinese government’s occupation of Tibet during the Olympics. Rae and Conley shot and released online high-resolution photographs and footage of the recent protest by Students for a Free Tibet supporters at the Chinese Ethnic Culture Park.

A little additional information has leaked out – but not much:

At about noon Tuesday, Conley’s wife in Philadelphia received a text message from him reading “In Jail. All fine.”

Events like this just focus additional attention on a question many more people should be asking. Just why does the IOC allow brutal totalitarian governments like China to host the Olympics?

Update:
Follow the discussion on Twitter.

Related:
Alive in Baghdad (Brian Conley)
BaghdadBrian (Brian Conley on Twitter)

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