Where We Are on TV Report - 2015. The Where We Are on TV report analyzes the overall diversity of primetime scripted series regulars on broadcast networks and looks at the number of LGBT characters on cable networks for the 2015-2016 TV season. Download the full report Below are some of the most remarkable points GLAAD found in its research this year, download the full report now to read more. Of the 881 regular characters expected to appear on broadcast primetime programming in the coming year, 35 (4%) were identified as gay, lesbian, or bisexual.
There were an additional 35 recurring LGB characters.The number of regular LGBT characters counted on cable increased from 64 to 84, while recurring characters increased from 41 to 58.For the first time, GLAAD counted LGBT characters on original series that premiered on Amazon, Hulu, and Netflix. Where We Are on TV Archive: GLAAD’s annual TV report not only propels national conversations about LGBT representation, but informs GLAAD’s own advocacy within the television industry. Lessons in Lesbos: Can tourism survive migrant crisis? Under blue Mediterranean skies, cruise ships would be offloading scores more visitors, sinking cash into the local economy. Not this year. Twelve months ago, Lesbos found itself at the center of the migrant crisis that has gripped much of Europe as families flee conflict in the Middle East and elsewhere. News reports showed migrants packed into camps on the island, awaiting their fate.
There were also scenes of violence amid clashes with authorities. And subsequently, the visitors stopped coming. But what is life like on the island now? "We feel very safe here but it's sad to see tavernas we love completely empty," says Gill Greenhall from the UK. Greenhall is a regular visitor each spring to Lesbos, which is home to 330 bird species and is the number one birdwatching site in Europe. But this year, she's an exception.
Empty flights "The flight was half-empty on the way here -- first time we saw that," says Greenhall. It's not just the birdwatchers. "It was shocking, a situation above us all. Greece’s Debt Crisis Explained. Migrant crisis: Greek judges tell Syrian refugee Turkey is unsafe. Image copyright EPA Greek judges have ruled that a Syrian asylum seeker should not be sent back to Turkey because it is not safe. Amnesty International campaigners say the decision throws the EU-Turkey migrant deal into doubt. They say migrants in Turkey do not have basic human rights and many are at risk of being taken to Syria. A source at the Greek migration ministry said the judges were only deciding whether the individual's case could be heard in Greece or not. On the same day the judges' ruling emerged, Greek and EU authorities sent back 51 migrants to Turkey on boats from the islands of Lesbos and Kos. Under a deal struck between Turkey and the EU, migrants arriving in Greece are sent back to Turkey if they do not apply for asylum or if their claim is rejected.
The deal came into force in March, and more than 400 people have been sent back. Now a Greek committee of judges has decided against sending a Syrian asylum seeker back to Turkey. 'The right approach' Key points from the agreement. Greek Education Ministry-UNICEF Plan to Educate Refugee Children. 19 6Google +0 0 0 25 The Greek Ministry of Education and UNICEF are working together to help refugee children stranded in Greece complete their education. UNICEF Central and Eastern Europe Regional Director Marie-Pierre Poirier ended her four-day visit to Greece on Saturday. She came to study the ongoing refugee and migrant crisis in Europe and ways of alleviating its impact on children. Meeting with Greek education officials she presented two pylons in which to address the education needs of asylum-seekers children. The first stage of the education program concerns the immediate intervention at reception centers, such as the one at Skaramanga.
At a second level, adolescence needs to be addressed with new education programs and programs of career orientation. Younger-aged children will take part in a program to learn their mother tongue and English so that they are ready to adapt to their new life once they settle in a host country. Greece Raises Taxes in Exchange for Debt Relief, Loans. Greek lawmakers approved tax increases and a new privatization fund on Sunday and freed up the sale of non-performing loans in exchange for much-needed bailout loans and debt relief. Athens hopes the measures, two days before a key euro zone finance ministers meeting, will help it unlock the funds it needs to pay IMF loans, ECB bonds maturing in July and increasing state arrears.
"Greeks have already paid a lot, but this is probably the first time that the possibility of these sacrifices being the last is so evident," Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras told lawmakers before a vote in parliament. Try Newsweek for only $1.25 per week His left-led coalition, re-elected in September on pledges to implement the terms of a 86-billion euro bailout it signed up for in July, has a narrow majority of 153 lawmakers in the 300-seat parliament. Hundreds of demonstrators rallied outside parliament in the evening to protest against the reforms. "It's a disaster! Debt relief. Greece and Creditors Spar Over Legislation Changes. Greek workers strike against Syriza’s austerity policies. 9 May 2016 Over the weekend, masses of workers across Greece joined in a general strike and tens of thousands demonstrated against the package of brutal austerity measures adopted by the Syriza (Coalition of the Radical Left) government and passed by the Greek parliament Sunday night.
In Athens, many thousands took to the streets, shouting slogans such as “Rise up to throw out the government, the EU and the IMF!” And “No to the dismantling of social security!” The three-day strike shut down large parts of the Greek economy. Subway, bus and train drivers, teachers, public servants, journalists, ferry staff, rubbish collectors and workers in the private sector participated.
Even owners of kiosks and small shops stopped work. This did not prevent Syriza from voting in parliament for €5.4 billion in regressive tax hikes and €1.8 billion in pension cuts. Syriza has many accomplices in this political crime. Christoph Vandreier. Greece's Syriza government imposes harsh austerity measures. By Christoph Vandreier 27 May 2016 On Tuesday evening, the finance ministers of the Eurogroup agreed to provide the Greek government with €10.3 billion from the European Stability Mechanism (ESM).
The first €7.5 billion will be paid out at the end of July. This tranche is part of a credit agreement that the Syriza government negotiated with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) last summer. In the foreseeable future, there will be no comprehensive debt relief, although even the IMF has called for such a measure in order to make Greece’s state debts manageable. In this way, the Euro countries have made it clear that they will accept no other way of dealing with the debt crisis other than continuing radical attacks on the living conditions of the workers.
The rapid decision of the Eurogroup has a symbolic character. The events in France have provided a major shock to the European powers. This was not the case with Syriza, however. This quickly proved to be an illusion. Photo Essay: Refuge, but No Respite in Greece | Refugees Deeply. As Greek police relocate migrants and refugees from the informal Idomeni camp, photographer Kelly Lynn Lunde documents a 1,300-strong settlement at a gas station next door, one of several nearby refuges that have sprung up over the past several months.
Once a forgettable rest stop outside the city of Polykastro in the north of Greece, the local EKO gas station has served for the past several months as a refuge for roughly 1,300 refugees waiting to cross into Macedonia. Most are Syrian, Iraqi and Kurdish families who chose it over the crowded and intense Idomeni camp, 12 miles (20km) to the north, where 11,000 other refugees have been camping. It turned out to be a prudent decision. While the owners of the gas station have allowed the refugees to stay, this week Greek police started evacuating thousands of migrants from Idomeni. In April, many of the refugees, whose movements have been stifled by the shuttering of various borders, staged a demonstration on the highway.
‘Piles of waste, overcrowded': Activists slam squalid conditions at Greek refugee camps. Civil rights activists are up in arms over new refugee camps in former factories and warehouses near Greece's second-largest city, Thessaloniki. The abysmal conditions in overcrowded camps “put at risk the health of people,” refugee campaigners say. Several thousand refugees were transported to the new sites after Europe's biggest refugee camp at Idomeni, close to the Macedonian border, was cleared by police last week. Human rights groups have repeatedly voiced concerns over the deplorable living conditions at Idomeni, home to at least 8,000 migrants and refugees, most of them Syrians and Iraqis. One of the camp's critics, Greek Interior Minister Panagiotis Kouroumplis, even dubbed it the “modern Dachau,” comparing the facility to the famous Nazi concentration camp. Read more Civil rights activists say that the conditions at the new migrant facilities in Greece also leave much to be desired, however.
“The places where the camps have been set up are all in industrial areas. Greece: Daily life inside Malakasa refugee camp. Since the closure of the Balkan route to Germany, there are now some 46,000 refugees stranded in Greece, waiting for their asylum claims to be processed. Malakasa refugee camp is one of the many camps recently set up in the country to house the hundreds of thousands of displaced people fleeing war-torn countries. Guarded by soldiers, the camp is located roughly 25 miles north of Athens.
It has the capacity to house a mere 1,000 people, most of whom are of Afghan citizenship. Yet according to UNHCR data released on 3 April, 2016, the camp's current capacity has been exceeded. This has resulted in worsening living conditions, tents being over-occupied with over 10 people - many without blankets or sleeping bags. Healthcare is limited and there has been an urgent plea for doctors, including women's health specialists and midwives. Getty Images photographer Milos Bicanski visited the Malakasa camp, documenting the daily lives of some of the women, men and children who are currently stranded.
Will Greek debt deal really change anything? Image copyright Getty Images Greece has got some debt relief from the eurozone. Or has it? It was one of the key items discussed by eurozone finance ministers at a meeting in Brussels They agreed what they called "a package of debt measures". It's worth spelling out straight away one thing that was not included and was never on offer. So the measures they have in mind involve cutting or capping interest rates on the loans and allowing Greece more time to make the repayments. Some measures are to come into effect this year and next, including a waiver of an interest rate increase that was due in 2017. For 2018 and after, the eurozone "expects to implement a possible second set of measures following the successful implementation of the programme".
That means that Greece will have to meet the reform commitments set out in the bailout agreement, such as reducing government borrowing needs, labour market reforms and privatisation. 'Highly concessional' terms So is this really debt relief at all? REFUGE: Documentary Shot in Greece Chronicles Human Stories from the European Refugee Crisis [video]
81 6Google +0 0 0 87 “Refuge” is a multimedia project by creative firm Magna Carta, and chronicles human stories from the European Refugee Crisis. Shot on location in Greece during January 2016, the project focuses on humanity and hope. Magna Carta’s team spent more than two weeks conducting a total of 30 on-camera interviews in Athens and the islands of Lesvos and Leros. “The idea for the project was rooted in the desire to use “art to tell a painful story,” Refuge’s director, Matthew K. Firpo, told The WorldPost. As the video’s description on Vimeo states “this was made to be watched full screen and loud.” The EU Has Turned Greece Into a Prison for Refugees. In the port-side café before the sun comes up, a group of men are talking. “In the beginning, when there were maybe 40 of them in the boats, all wet, we helped them.
Now they’re too many. They steal chickens. They shit in the fields. They threw stones at a woman.” “Do you think it’s chance that they’re all coming here? The NGOs, the whatever they’re called, are making money off it. “Eventually they’ll set off a bomb and sink the island.” “Sink or float, what difference does it make? Chios, my grandfather’s island in the northeast Aegean Sea, has become an open-air prison for more than 2,000 refugees.
These late arrivals can’t leave the islands until their cases have been decided by the Greek asylum system, which is overloaded to the point of paralysis. Of the 8,500 women, children, and men who have landed on the islands since the agreement was signed, 400 have been returned so far, some to be detained for weeks without legal representation. Even unlocked, Vial feels like a prison. Germany Won’t Cut Greece Any Slack On the $358 Billion It Owes But Can’t Repay. European finance ministers are poised to free up $12 billion in loans to Greece early Wednesday, meeting their self-imposed deadline to fill the coffers of a close-to-broke EU member. Deal or no deal, though, the grim reality remains the same: Athens owes a jaw-dropping $358 billion, and there’s no way it will ever be able to pay it all back.
The International Monetary Fund is well aware of Greece’s unrelenting economic nightmare — on Monday, the fund predicted double-digit unemployment in Greece until at least 2040, and the country’s economy has been battered by years of recession. IMF chief Christine Lagarde insists Europe forgive some of Greece’s debt if the fund is to participate in the bailout program. Enter the Germans, who have steadfastly refused to even consider a Greek haircut until at least 2018, after Germany holds parliamentary elections in 2017. They also won’t continue to provide bailout funds unless the IMF puts up some money as well. Photo credit: JOHN THYS/Getty Images. Greece Begins Moving Refugees Out of Idomeni Camp. ATHENS — The Greek authorities began moving hundreds of refugees on Tuesday out of a sprawling makeshift camp near the village of Idomeni, on the border with Macedonia, a crucial point on the so-called Balkan trail for migrants that has been closed off for months.
A police operation started around 6 a.m., and by early evening more than 2,000 refugees had been taken by bus to state-run encampments near Thessaloniki, the second-largest city in Greece.