title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: Military gliders were used during World War II for carrying troops (glider infantry) and heavy equipment to combat zones. The gliders were towed into the air and most of the way to their target by military transport planes, e.g. C-47 Dakota, or by bombers that had been relegated to secondary activities, e.g. Short Stirling. Once released from the tow near the target, they landed as close to the target as possible. The advantage over paratroopers were that heavy equipment could be landed and that the troops were quickly assembled rather than being dispersed over a drop zone. The gliders were treated as disposable, leading to construction from common and inexpensive materials such as wood, though a few were retrieved and re-used. By the time of the Korean War, transport aircraft had also become larger and more efficient so that even light tanks could be dropped by parachute, causing gliders to fall out of favor.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: Even after the development of powered aircraft, gliders continued to be used for aviation research. The NASA Paresev Rogallo flexible wing was originally developed to investigate alternative methods of recovering spacecraft. Although this application was abandoned, publicity inspired hobbyists to adapt the flexible-wing airfoil for modern hang gliders.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: Initial research into many types of fixed-wing craft, including flying wings and lifting bodies was also carried out using unpowered prototypes.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: A hang glider is a glider aircraft in which the pilot is ensconced in a harness suspended from the airframe, and exercises control by shifting body weight in opposition to a control frame. Most modern hang gliders are made of an aluminum alloy or composite-framed fabric wing. Pilots have the ability to soar for hours, gain thousands of meters of altitude in thermal updrafts, perform aerobatics, and glide cross-country for hundreds of kilometers.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: A paraglider is a lightweight, free-flying, foot-launched glider aircraft with no rigid primary structure. The pilot sits in a harness suspended below a hollow fabric wing whose shape is formed by its suspension lines, the pressure of air entering vents in the front of the wing and the aerodynamic forces of the air flowing over the outside. Paragliding is most often a recreational activity.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: Model glider aircraft are models of aircraft using lightweight materials such as polystyrene and balsa wood. Designs range from simple glider aircraft to accurate scale models, some of which can be very large.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: Glide bombs are bombs with aerodynamic surfaces to allow a gliding flightpath rather than a ballistic one. This enables the carrying aircraft to attack a heavily defended target from a distance.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: A kite is an aircraft tethered to a fixed point so that the wind blows over its wings. Lift is generated when air flows over the kite's wing, producing low pressure above the wing and high pressure below it, and deflecting the airflow downwards. This deflection also generates horizontal drag in the direction of the wind. The resultant force vector from the lift and drag force components is opposed by the tension of the one or more rope lines or tethers attached to the wing.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: Kites are mostly flown for recreational purposes, but have many other uses. Early pioneers such as the Wright Brothers and J.W. Dunne sometimes flew an aircraft as a kite in order to develop it and confirm its flight characteristics, before adding an engine and flight controls, and flying it as an airplane.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: Kites have been used for signaling, for delivery of munitions, and for observation, by lifting an observer above the field of battle, and by using kite aerial photography.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: Kites have been used for scientific purposes, such as Benjamin Franklin's famous experiment proving that lightning is electricity. Kites were the precursors to the traditional aircraft, and were instrumental in the development of early flying craft. Alexander Graham Bell experimented with very large man-lifting kites, as did the Wright brothers and Lawrence Hargrave. Kites had a historical role in lifting scientific instruments to measure atmospheric conditions for weather forecasting.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: Kites can be used to carry radio antennas. This method was used for the reception station of the first transatlantic transmission by Marconi. Captive balloons may be more convenient for such experiments, because kite-carried antennas require a lot of wind, which may be not always possible with heavy equipment and a ground conductor.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: Kites can be used to pull people and vehicles downwind. Efficient foil-type kites such as power kites can also be used to sail upwind under the same principles as used by other sailing craft, provided that lateral forces on the ground or in the water are redirected as with the keels, center boards, wheels and ice blades of traditional sailing craft. In the last two decades, several kite sailing sports have become popular, such as kite buggying, kite landboarding, kite boating and kite surfing. Snow kiting has also become popular.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: Conceptual research and development projects are being undertaken by over a hundred participants to investigate the use of kites in harnessing high altitude wind currents for electricity generation.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: Kite festivals are a popular form of entertainment throughout the world. They include local events, traditional festivals and major international festivals.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: The structural parts of a fixed-wing aircraft are called the airframe. The parts present can vary according to the aircraft's type and purpose. Early types were usually made of wood with fabric wing surfaces, When engines became available for a powered flight around a hundred years ago, their mounts were made of metal. Then as speeds increased more and more parts became metal until by the end of World War II all-metal aircraft were common. In modern times, increasing use of composite materials has been made.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: The wings of a fixed-wing aircraft are static planes extending to either side of the aircraft. When the aircraft travels forwards,


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: Kites and some light weight gliders and airplanes have flexible wing surfaces which are stretched across a frame and made rigid by the lift forces exerted by the airflow over them. Larger aircraft have rigid wing surfaces which provide additional strength.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: Whether flexible or rigid, most wings have a strong frame to give them their shape and to transfer lift from the wing surface to the rest of the aircraft. The main structural elements are one or more spars running from root to tip, and many ribs running from the leading (front) to the trailing (rear) edge.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: Early airplane engines had little power and light weight was very important. Also, early aerofoil sections were very thin, and could not have strong frame installed within. So until the 1930s, most wings were too light weight to have enough strength and external bracing struts and wires were added. When the available engine power increased during the 1920s and 1930s, wings could be made heavy and strong enough that bracing was not needed anymore. This type of unbraced wing is called a cantilever wing.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: The number and shape of the wings vary widely on different types. A given wing plane may be full-span or divided by a central fuselage into port (left) and starboard (right) wings. Occasionally, even more, wings have been used, with the three-winged triplane achieving some fame in World War I. The four-winged quadruplane and other multiplane designs have had little success.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: A monoplane, which derives from the prefix, mono means one which means it has a single wing plane, a biplane has two stacked one above the other, a tandem wing has two placed one behind the other. When the available engine power increased during the 1920s and 1930s and bracing was no longer needed, the unbraced or cantilever monoplane became the most common form of powered type.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: The wing planform is the shape when seen from above. To be aerodynamically efficient, a wing should be straight with a long span from side to side but have a short chord (high aspect ratio). But to be structurally efficient, and hence lightweight, a wing must have a short span but still enough area to provide lift (low aspect ratio).


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: At transonic speeds, near the speed of sound, it helps to sweep the wing backward or forwards to reduce drag from supersonic shock waves as they begin to form. The swept wing is just a straight wing swept backward or forwards.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: The delta wing is a triangle shape which may be used for a number of reasons. As a flexible Rogallo wing it allows a stable shape under aerodynamic forces, and so is often used for kites and other ultralight craft. As a supersonic wing, it combines high strength with low drag and so is often used for fast jets.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: A variable geometry wing can be changed in flight to a different shape. The variable-sweep wing transforms between an efficient straight configuration for takeoff and landing, to a low-drag swept configuration for high-speed flight. Other forms of variable planform have been flown, but none have gone beyond the research stage.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: A "fuselage" is a long, thin body, usually with tapered or rounded ends to make its shape aerodynamically smooth. Most fixed-wing aircraft have a single fuselage, often referred to as simply "the body". Others may have two or more fuselages, or the fuselage may be fitted with booms on either side of the tail to allow the extreme rear of the fuselage to be utilized.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: The fuselage may contain a flight crew, passengers, cargo or payload, fuel and engine(s). Pilotless aircraft (drones) do not usually have a pilot or any other flight crew or passengers on board. Gliders usually have no fuel or engines, although some variations such as motor gliders and rocket gliders have them for temporary or optional use.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: Pilots of manned fixed-wing aircraft usually control them from inside a "cockpit", usually located at the front or top of the fuselage, equipped with controls and usually windows and instruments. Aircraft often have two or more pilots, with one in overall command (the "pilot") and one or more "co-pilots". On larger aircraft a navigator is typically also seated in the cockpit as well. Some military or specialized aircraft may have other flight crew members in the cockpit as well.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: In small aircraft, the passengers are typically seated behind the pilot(s) in the same cabin, although occasionally a passenger seat may be beside or even in front of the pilot. Larger passenger aircraft have a separate passenger cabin or occasionally cabins which are physically separated from the cockpit.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: A flying wing is a tailless aircraft which has no definite fuselage, with most of the crew, payload and equipment being housed inside the main wing structure.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: The flying wing configuration was studied extensively in the 1930s and 1940s, notably by Jack Northrop and Cheston L. Eshelman in the United States, and Alexander Lippisch and the Horten brothers in Germany.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: After the war, a number of experimental designs were based on the flying wing concept. Some general interest continued until the early 1950s, but designs did not necessarily offer a great advantage in range and presented a number of technical problems, leading to the adoption of "conventional" solutions like the Convair B-36 and the B-52 Stratofortress. Due to the practical need for a deep wing, the flying wing concept is most practical for designs in the slow-to-medium speed range, and there has been continual interest in using it as a tactical airlifter design.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: Interest in flying wings was renewed in the 1980s due to their potentially low radar reflection cross-sections. Stealth technology relies on shapes which only reflect radar waves in certain directions, thus making the aircraft hard to detect unless the radar receiver is at a specific position relative to the aircraft – a position that changes continuously as the aircraft moves. This approach eventually led to the Northrop B-2 Spirit stealth bomber. In this case the aerodynamic advantages of the flying wing are not the primary needs. However, modern computer-controlled fly-by-wire systems allowed for many of the aerodynamic drawbacks of the flying wing to be minimized, making for an efficient and stable long-range bomber.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: Blended wing body aircraft have a flattened and airfoil shaped body, which produces most of the lift to keep itself aloft, and distinct and separate wing structures, though the wings are smoothly blended in with the body.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: Thus blended wing bodied aircraft incorporate design features from both a futuristic fuselage and flying wing design. The purported advantages of the blended wing body approach are efficient high-lift wings and a wide airfoil-shaped body. This enables the entire craft to contribute to lift generation with the result of potentially increased fuel economy.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: A lifting body is a configuration in which the body itself produces lift. In contrast to a flying wing, which is a wing with minimal or no conventional fuselage, a lifting body can be thought of as a fuselage with little or no conventional wing. Whereas a flying wing seeks to maximize cruise efficiency at subsonic speeds by eliminating non-lifting surfaces, lifting bodies generally minimize the drag and structure of a wing for subsonic, supersonic, and hypersonic flight, or, spacecraft re-entry. All of these flight regimes pose challenges for proper flight stability.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: Lifting bodies were a major area of research in the 1960s and 1970s as a means to build a small and lightweight manned spacecraft. The US built a number of famous lifting body rocket planes to test the concept, as well as several rocket-launched re-entry vehicles that were tested over the Pacific. Interest waned as the US Air Force lost interest in the manned mission, and major development ended during the Space Shuttle design process when it became clear that the highly shaped fuselages made it difficult to fit fuel tankage.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: The classic aerofoil section wing is unstable in flight and difficult to control. Flexible-wing types often rely on an anchor line or the weight of a pilot hanging beneath to maintain the correct attitude. Some free-flying types use an adapted aerofoil that is stable, or other ingenious mechanisms including, most recently, electronic artificial stability.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: But in order to achieve trim, stability and control, most fixed-wing types have an empennage comprising a fin and rudder which act horizontally and a tailplane and elevator which act vertically. This is so common that it is known as the conventional layout. Sometimes there may be two or more fins, spaced out along the tailplane.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: Some types have a horizontal "canard" foreplane ahead of the main wing, instead of behind it. This foreplane may contribute to the trim, stability or control of the aircraft, or to several of these.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: Kites are controlled by wires running down to the ground. Typically each wire acts as a tether to the part of the kite it is attached to.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: A craft may have two pilots' seats with dual controls, allowing two pilots to take turns. This is often used for training or for longer flights.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: The control system may allow full or partial automation of flight, such as an autopilot, a wing leveler, or a flight management system. An unmanned aircraft has no pilot but is controlled remotely or via means such as gyroscopes or other forms of autonomous control.


title: Fixed-wing aircraft

text: On manned fixed-wing aircraft, instruments provide information to the pilots, including flight, engines, navigation, communications, and other aircraft systems that may be installed.


title: Modus ponens

text: In propositional logic, modus ponens (; MP), also known as modus ponendo ponens (Latin for "method of putting by placing") or implication elimination or affirming the antecedent, is a deductive argument form and rule of inference. It can be summarized as ""P implies Q." "P" is true. Therefore "Q" must also be true."


title: Modus ponens

text: "Modus ponens" is closely related to another valid form of argument, "modus tollens". Both have apparently similar but invalid forms such as affirming the consequent, denying the antecedent, and evidence of absence. Constructive dilemma is the disjunctive version of "modus ponens". Hypothetical syllogism is closely related to "modus ponens" and sometimes thought of as "double "modus ponens"."


title: Modus ponens

text: The history of "modus ponens" goes back to antiquity. The first to explicitly describe the argument form "modus ponens" was Theophrastus. It, along with "modus tollens", is one of the standard patterns of inference that can be applied to derive chains of conclusions that lead to the desired goal.


title: Modus ponens

text: The first premise is a conditional ("if–then") claim, namely that "P" implies "Q". The second premise is an assertion that "P", the antecedent of the conditional claim, is the case. From these two premises it can be logically concluded that "Q", the consequent of the conditional claim, must be the case as well.


title: Modus ponens

text: This argument is valid, but this has no bearing on whether any of the statements in the argument are actually true; for "modus ponens" to be a sound argument, the premises must be true for any true instances of the conclusion. An argument can be valid but nonetheless unsound if one or more premises are false; if an argument is valid "and" all the premises are true, then the argument is sound. For example, John might be going to work on Wednesday. In this case, the reasoning for John's going to work (because it is Wednesday) is unsound. The argument is only sound on Tuesdays (when John goes to work), but valid on every day of the week. A propositional argument using "modus ponens" is said to be deductive.


title: Modus ponens

text: In single-conclusion sequent calculi, "modus ponens" is the Cut rule. The cut-elimination theorem for a calculus says that every proof involving Cut can be transformed (generally, by a constructive method) into a proof without Cut, and hence that Cut is admissible.


title: Modus ponens

text: The Curry–Howard correspondence between proofs and programs relates "modus ponens" to function application: if "f" is a function of type "P" → "Q" and "x" is of type "P", then "f x" is of type "Q".


title: Modus ponens

text: where "P", "Q" and "P" → "Q" are statements (or propositions) in a formal language and ⊢ is a metalogical symbol meaning that "Q" is a syntactic consequence of "P" and "P" → "Q" in some logical system.


title: Modus ponens

text: The validity of "modus ponens" in classical two-valued logic can be clearly demonstrated by use of a truth table.


title: Modus ponens

text: In instances of "modus ponens" we assume as premises that "p" → "q" is true and "p" is true. Only one line of the truth table—the first—satisfies these two conditions ("p" and "p" → "q"). On this line, "q" is also true. Therefore, whenever "p" → "q" is true and "p" is true, "q" must also be true.


title: Modus ponens

text: While "modus ponens" is one of the most commonly used argument forms in logic it must not be mistaken for a logical law; rather, it is one of the accepted mechanisms for the construction of deductive proofs that includes the "rule of definition" and the "rule of substitution". "Modus ponens" allows one to eliminate a conditional statement from a logical proof or argument (the antecedents) and thereby not carry these antecedents forward in an ever-lengthening string of symbols; for this reason modus ponens is sometimes called the rule of detachment or the law of detachment. Enderton, for example, observes that "modus ponens can produce shorter formulas from longer ones", and Russell observes that "the process of the inference cannot be reduced to symbols. Its sole record is the occurrence of ⊦q [the consequent] ... an inference is the dropping of a true premise; it is the dissolution of an implication".


title: Modus ponens

text: A justification for the "trust in inference is the belief that if the two former assertions [the antecedents] are not in error, the final assertion [the consequent] is not in error". In other words: if one statement or proposition implies a second one, and the first statement or proposition is true, then the second one is also true. If "P" implies "Q" and "P" is true, then "Q" is true.


title: Modus ponens

text: In mathematical logic, algebraic semantics treats every sentence as a name for an element in an ordered set. Typically, the set can be visualized as a lattice-like structure with a single element (the “always-true”) at the top and another single element (the “always-false”) at the bottom. Logical equivalence becomes identity, so that when formula_2 and formula_3, for instance, are equivalent (as is standard), then formula_4. Logical implication becomes a matter of relative position: formula_5 logically implies formula_6 just in case formula_7, i.e., when either formula_8 or else formula_5 lies below formula_6 and is connected to it by an upward path.


title: Modus ponens

text: In this context, to say that formula_11 and formula_12 together imply formula_6—that is, to affirm "modus ponens" as valid—is to say that formula_14. In the semantics for basic propositional logic, the algebra is Boolean, with formula_15 construed as the material conditional: formula_16. Confirming that formula_14 is then straightforward, because formula_18. With other treatments of formula_15, the semantics becomes more complex, the algebra may be non-Boolean, and the validity of modus ponens cannot be taken for granted.


title: Modus ponens

text: "Modus ponens" represents an instance of the Law of total probability which for a binary variable is expressed as:


title: Modus ponens

text: where e.g. formula_21 denotes the probability of formula_6 and the conditional probability formula_23 generalizes the logical implication formula_24. Assume that formula_25 is equivalent to formula_6 being TRUE, and that formula_27 is equivalent to formula_6 being FALSE. It is then easy to see that formula_25 when formula_30 and formula_31. Hence, the law of total probability represents a generalization of "modus ponens".


title: Modus ponens

text: "Modus ponens" represents an instance of the binomial deduction operator in subjective logic expressed as:


title: Modus ponens

text: where formula_33 denotes the subjective opinion about formula_5 as expressed by source formula_35, and the conditional opinion formula_36 generalizes the logical implication formula_24. The deduced marginal opinion about formula_6 is denoted by formula_39. The case where formula_33 is an absolute TRUE opinion about formula_5 is equivalent to source formula_35 saying that formula_5 is TRUE, and the case where formula_33 is an absolute FALSE opinion about formula_5 is equivalent to source formula_35 saying that formula_5 is FALSE. The deduction operator formula_48 of subjective logic produces an absolute TRUE deduced opinion formula_39 when the conditional opinion formula_36 is absolute TRUE and the antecedent opinion formula_33 is absolute TRUE. Hence, subjective logic deduction represents a generalization of both "modus ponens" and the Law of total probability.


title: Modus ponens

text: Philosophers and linguists have identified a variety of cases where "modus ponens" appears to fail. Vann McGee, for instance, argued that "modus ponens" can fail for conditionals whose consequents are themselves conditionals. The following is an example:


title: Modus ponens

text: Since Shakespeare did write "Hamlet", the first premise is true. The second premise is also true, since starting with a set of possible authors limited to just Shakespeare and Hobbes and eliminating one of them leaves only the other. However, the conclusion may seem false, since ruling out Shakespeare as the author of "Hamlet" would leave numerous possible candidates, many of them more plausible alternatives than Hobbes.


title: Modus ponens

text: The general form of McGee-type counterexamples to "modus ponens" is simply formula_52, therefore formula_53; it is not essential that formula_5 be a disjunction, as in the example given. That these kinds of cases constitute failures of "modus ponens" remains a controversial view among logicians, but opinions vary on how the cases should be disposed of.


title: Modus ponens

text: In deontic logic, some examples of conditional obligation also raise the possibility of "modus ponens" failure. These are cases where the conditional premise describes an obligation predicated on an immoral or imprudent action, e.g., “If Doe murders his mother, he ought to do so gently,” for which the dubious unconditional conclusion would be "Doe ought to gently murder his mother." It would appear to follow that if Doe is in fact gently murdering his mother, then by "modus ponens" he is doing exactly what he should, unconditionally, be doing. Here again, "modus ponens" failure is not a popular diagnosis but is sometimes argued for.


title: Love hotel

text: A love hotel is a type of short-stay hotel found around the world operated primarily for the purpose of allowing guests privacy for sexual activities. The name originates from "Hotel Love" in Osaka, which was built in 1968 and had a rotating sign. Although love hotels exist all over the world, the term "love hotel" is often used to refer specifically to those located within Japan.


title: Love hotel

text: Love hotels can usually be identified using symbols such as hearts and the offer of a room rate for a as well as for an overnight stay. The period of a "rest" varies, typically ranging from one to three hours. Cheaper daytime off-peak rates are common. In general, reservations are not possible, and leaving the hotel will forfeit access to the room; overnight-stay rates become available only after 22:00. These hotels may be used for prostitution, although they are sometimes used by budget-travelers sharing accommodation.


title: Love hotel

text: Entrances are discreet, and interaction with staff is minimized. Rooms are often selected from a panel of buttons, and the bill may be settled by pneumatic tube, automatic cash machine, or paying an unseen staff member behind a pane of frosted glass. Parking lots will often be concealed and windows will be few, so as to maximize privacy.


title: Love hotel

text: Although cheaper hotels are often simply furnished, higher-end hotels may feature fanciful rooms decorated with anime characters, be equipped with rotating beds, ceiling mirrors, karaoke machines, and unusual lighting. They may be styled similarly to dungeons or other fantasy scenes, sometimes including S&M gear.


title: Love hotel

text: These hotels are typically either concentrated in city districts close to stations, near highways on the city outskirts or in industrial districts. Love hotel architecture is sometimes garish, with buildings shaped like castles, boats or UFOs and lit with neon lighting. Some more recent love hotels are ordinary looking buildings, distinguished mainly by having small, covered or no windows.


title: Love hotel

text: The history of can be traced back to the 17th century, in the early Edo period, when establishments appearing to be inns or teahouses with particular procedures for a discreet entry or even with secret tunnels for a discreet exit were built in Edo and in Kyoto. Modern love hotels developed from tea rooms () used mostly by prostitutes and their clients but also by lovers. After World War II, the term was adopted, originally for simple lodgings run by families with a few rooms to spare. These establishments appeared first around Ueno, Tokyo in part due to demand from Occupation forces, and boomed after 1958 when legal prostitution was abolished and the trade moved underground.


title: Love hotel

text: The introduction of the automobile in the 1960s brought with it the "motel" and further spread the concept. Japanese housing trends at the time were characterized by small homes with sleeping areas being used as common areas during the day and, as a result, little opportunity for parents to engage privately in intercourse. Married couples therefore began to frequent love hotels. By 1961, there were around 2,700 inns in central Tokyo alone. Hotels of the time featured unusual attractions such as swings and vibrating beds. The Meguro Emperor, the first castle-style love hotel, opened in 1973 and brought in an average of approximately ¥40 million monthly.


title: Love hotel

text: In 1984, the Businesses Affecting Public Morals Regulation Law placed love hotels under the jurisdiction of the police. For that reason, new hotels were built to avoid being classified as "love hotels"; the garish, over-the-top, bizarre designs and features of the past were significantly downplayed. Beginning in the 1980s, love hotels were also increasingly marketed toward women. A 2013 study showed that couples' selections of rooms at love hotels were made by women roughly 90% of the time. The Businesses Affecting Public Morals Regulation Law was amended in 2010, imposing even stricter limitations and blurring the line between regular hotels and love hotels. Keeping in mind legislation and a desire to seem more fashionable than competitors, an ever-changing palette of terms is used by hotel operators. Alternative names include "romance hotel", "fashion hotel", "leisure hotel", "amusement hotel", "couples hotel", and "boutique hotel".


title: Love hotel

text: Love hotels have enough cultural significance to be added to the first edition of emojis in Unicode 6.0.


title: Love hotel

text: Love hotels (), also known as love motels, first appeared in South Korea in the mid-1980s. They were originally called "Parktel" (). Their boom and growth was originally attributed to the 1988 Olympics which took place in Seoul. The hotels have historically been seen as seedy, with some residents speaking out against them and not wanting them within certain distances of schools and residential areas. Some hotel owners have tried to remove that element from their business by upgrading, offering cleaner modern services, and removing some of the more sexual elements from their decor. They are considered a taboo topic in South Korea and a photo exhibit of love motels taken by a foreigner created a controversy in 2010.


title: Love hotel

text: Thailand has had love motels since 1935 and there are approximately 100 establishments in Bangkok most densely located around Ratchadaphisek Road. The government no longer issues building permits for these types of motels, but some businesses work around the laws. In addition to short-stay, the motels are also used by foreign travellers on a budget.


title: Love hotel

text: A Japanese-influenced love hotel project in Canada opened its doors in Toronto in early 2019, which was the first and only love hotel in the country to offer an authentic Japanese experience. Due to the love hotel only being a temporary project, it has been closed down since late 2019.


title: Love hotel

text: Similar establishments also exist in some other Asian countries including Singapore, Taiwan and Hong Kong. India's first love hotel opened in 2015.


title: Love hotel

text: The same concept also exists in Central and South America. In Guatemala, they are called "autohotels"; in Chile "motel" or "hotel parejero" (couples' hotel); in the Dominican Republic, "cabañas", "moteles" or "estaderos"; in Panama they are called "llcasas de citas", "moteles", "casas de ocasion", "push buttons" or "push" for short; in Argentina and Uruguay, "albergue transitorio" or more informally, "telo", which is "hotel" in reverse. In Mexico, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador and Puerto Rico, they are simply called "motels" (the word is exclusively used for love hotels). In Brazil "motels" (approximately 5,000) are part of the urban landscape. Very popular, they are associated with erotic transgression, but also with romantic love. They usually offer protected parking and, from long before the video era, contactless checkin.


title: Love hotel

text: In Panama, love hotels were first opened in the 1950s. They are often (but not always) fenced with painted opaque walls and are nondescript, are arranged like large outdoor self-storage facilities, rooms have their own garage, and guests can only enter the hotel and its garages while inside a car. They are also used as regular motels. Inside the garage is the door that leads to the room, its price and a "push button" that unlocks the door of the room when pressed or "pushed".


title: Love hotel

text: In Nigeria, love hotels are called "short-time". They are often low-budget accommodations in densely populated areas. Some other hotels offer "short-time" services unofficially.


title: Love hotel

text: In the United States and Canada, certain motels in low-income areas often serve similar functions as a Japanese love hotel. Colloquially known as "no-tell motels" or "hot-sheets joints", these are becoming scarce as local laws increasingly require renters' identification information to be recorded and given to law enforcement agencies. However, the US Supreme Court struck down warrantless searches of hotel records in 2015. In the early 21st century, various adult establishments such as strip clubs, adult arcades, and x-rated book and video stores, sometimes offer rooms with a little privacy for an hourly fee, no ID required. In Miami-Dade County a chain of hourly-rate motels announce openly that their rooms are intended for sex, sometimes with parking in a garage with a door, with the room on top of the garage. Identification is generally required. In the Midwestern United States, a chain of short-to-overnight-stay hotels, Sybaris Pool Suites, offer only rooms with varying luxuries for couples, including swimming pools, whirlpools, saunas, and even waterfalls, along with large beds and lounging areas, and their marketing exclusively focuses on couples, never using the term "hotel", much less "love hotel".


title: Love hotel

text: In Oceania, New Zealand opened its first love hotel in May 2011, and Australia opened its first love hotel in August 2011.


title: Love hotel

text: The annual revenue of the love hotel industry in Japan was estimated in 2009 at more than $40 billion, a figure double that of Japan's anime market.


title: Love hotel

text: It is estimated that more than 500 million visits to Japan's 37,000 love hotels take place each year, which is the equivalent of around 1.4 million couples, or 2% of Japan's population, visiting a love hotel each day. In recent years, the love hotel business has drawn the interest of the structured finance industry.


title: Love hotel

text: Several transactions have been completed where the cash flows from a number of such hotels have been securitised and sold to international investors and buy-out funds.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: Liu Xiaobo (; 28 December 1955 – 13 July 2017) was a Chinese writer, literary critic, human rights activist, philosopher and Nobel Peace Prize laureate who called for political reforms and was involved in campaigns to end communist one-party rule in China. He was arrested numerous times, and was described as China's most prominent dissident and the country's most famous political prisoner. On 26 June 2017, he was granted medical parole after being diagnosed with liver cancer; he died a few weeks later on 13 July 2017.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: Liu rose to fame in 1980s Chinese literary circles with his exemplary literary critiques. He eventually became a visiting scholar at several international universities. He returned to China to support the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and was imprisoned for the first time from 1989 to 1991, again from 1995 to 1996 and yet again from 1996 to 1999 for his involvement on suspicion of inciting subversion of state power. He served as the President of the Independent Chinese PEN Center, from 2003 to 2007. He was also the president of "Minzhu Zhongguo" ("Democratic China") magazine starting in the mid-1990s. On 8 December 2008, Liu was detained due to his participation with the "Charter 08" manifesto. He was formally arrested on 23 June 2009 on suspicion of "inciting subversion of state power". He was tried on the same charges on 23 December 2009 and sentenced to eleven years' imprisonment and two years' deprivation of political rights on 25 December 2009.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: During his fourth prison term, Liu was awarded the 2010 Nobel Peace Prize for "his long and non-violent struggle for fundamental human rights in China."


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: Liu was the first Chinese citizen to be awarded a Nobel Prize of any kind while residing in China. He was the third person to have been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize while in prison or detention, after Germany's Carl von Ossietzky (1935) and Burma's Aung San Suu Kyi (1991). He was the second person to have been denied the right to have a representative collect the Nobel Prize for him as well as the second to die in custody, with the first being Ossietzky, who died in Westend hospital in Berlin-Charlottenburg after being detained in a Nazi concentration camp. Berit Reiss-Andersen, chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, blamed the Chinese communist regime for his death and said that "Liu Xiaobo had contributed to the fraternity of peoples through his non-violent resistance against the oppressive actions of the Communist regime in China."


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: Liu was born on 28 December 1955 in Changchun, Jilin province, to a family of intellectuals. Liu's father, Liu Ling (), was born in 1931 in Huaide County, Jilin. A professor of Chinese at Northeast Normal University, he died of liver disease in September 2011.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: Liu's mother, Zhang Suqin (), worked in the Northeast Normal University Nursery School. Liu Xiaobo was the third-born in a family of five boys.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: In 1969, during the Down to the Countryside Movement, Liu's father took him to Horqin Right Front Banner, Inner Mongolia. His father was a professor who remained loyal to the Communist Party. After finishing middle school in 1974, he was sent to the countryside to work on a farm in Jilin.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: In 1977, Liu was admitted to the Department of Chinese Literature at Jilin University, where he founded a poetry group known as "The Innocent Hearts" (赤子心詩社) with six schoolmates. In 1982, he graduated with a BA in literature before being admitted to the Department of Chinese Literature at Beijing Normal University as a research student, where he received an MA in literature in 1984, and started teaching as a lecturer thereafter. That year, he married Tao Li, with whom he had a son named Liu Tao in 1985.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: In 1986, Liu started his doctoral study program and published his literary critiques in various magazines. He became renowned as a "dark horse" for his radical opinions and scathing comments on the official doctrines and establishments. Opinions such as these shocked both literary and ideological circles, and his influence on Chinese intellectuals was dubbed the "Liu Xiaobo Shock" or the "Liu Xiaobo Phenomenon". In 1987, his first book, "Criticism of the Choice: Dialogs with Li Zehou", was published and became a nonfiction bestseller. It comprehensively criticized the Chinese tradition of Confucianism, and posed a frank challenge to Li Zehou, a rising ideological star who had a strong influence on contemporaneous young intellectuals in China.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: In June 1988, Liu received a PhD in literature. His doctoral thesis, "Esthetic and Human Freedom", passed the examination unanimously and was published as his second book. That same year he became a lecturer at the same department. He soon became a visiting scholar at several universities, including Columbia University, the University of Oslo, and the University of Hawaii. During the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests, Liu was in the United States but he decided to return to China to join the movement. He was later named one of the "four junzis of Tiananmen Square" for persuading students to leave the square and thus saving hundreds of lives. That year also saw the publication of his third book, "The Fog of Metaphysics", a comprehensive review of Western philosophies. Soon, all of his works were banned in China.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: Evolving from his esthetic notion of "individual subjectivity" as opposed to Li Zehou's theory of esthetic subjectivity which combined Marxist materialism and Kantian idealism, he upheld the notion of "esthetic freedom" which was based on the individualistic conception of freedom and esthetics. He also strongly criticized Chinese intellectuals' "traditional attitude of searching for rationalism and harmony as a slave mentality" just as it was criticized by radical left-wing literary critic Lu Hsün during the New Culture Movement. He also echoed the New Cultural Movement's call for wholesale westernization and the rejection of Chinese traditional culture. In a 1988 interview with Hong Kong's "Liberation Monthly" (now known as "Open Magazine"), he said "modernization means wholesale westernization, choosing a human life is choosing a Western way of life. The difference between the Western and the Chinese governing system is humane vs in-humane, there's no middle ground ... Westernization is not a choice of a nation, but a choice for the human race." In the same interview, Liu also criticised the TV documentary "River Elegy", for not sufficiently criticising Chinese culture and not promoting westernisation enthusiastically enough. Liu was quoted to have said, "If I were to make this I would show just how wimpy, spineless and fucked-up [齷齪、軟弱和操蛋] the Chinese really are". Liu regarded it most unfortunate that his monolingualism bound him to the Chinese cultural sphere. When asked what it would take for China to realize a true historical transformation. He replied:


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: In an article in "The New York Review of Books", Simon Leys wrote that Liu Xiaobo's perception of the West and its relationship to a modernizing China evolved during his travels in the United States and Europe in the 1980s.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: During a visit to the Metropolitan Museum in New York City, he experienced a sort of epiphany that crystallized the turmoil of his latest self-questioning: he realized the shallowness of his own learning in the light of the fabulous riches of the diverse civilizations of the past, and simultaneously perceived the inadequacy of contemporary Western answers to mankind’s modern predicament. His own dream that Westernization could be used to reform China suddenly appeared to him as pathetic as the attitude of 'a paraplegic laughing at a quadriplegic', he confessed at the time:


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: My tendency to idealize Western civilization arises from my nationalistic desire to use the West in order to reform China. But this has led me to overlook the flaws of Western culture ... I have been obsequious toward Western civilization, exaggerating its merits, and at the same time exaggerating my own merits. I have viewed the West as if it were not only the salvation of China but also the natural and ultimate destination of all humanity. Moreover I have used this delusional idealism to assign myself the role of savior ... I now realize that Western civilization, while it can be useful in reforming China in its present stage, cannot save humanity in an overall sense. If we stand back from Western civilization for a moment, we can see that it possesses all the flaws of humanity in general ... If I, as a person who has lived under China's autocratic system for more than thirty years, want to reflect on the fate of humanity or how to be an authentic person, I have no choice but to carry out two critiques simultaneously.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: In 2002, he reflected on his initial Maoist-flavored radical esthetic and political views in the 1980s:


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: Liu admitted in 2006 in another interview with "Open Magazine" (formerly known as "Liberation Monthly") that his 1988 response of "300 years of colonialism" was extemporaneous, although he did not intend to retract it, because it represented "an extreme expression of his longheld belief". The quote was nonetheless used against him. He has commented, "Even today [in 2006], radical patriotic 'angry youth' still frequently use these words to paint me with 'treason'."


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: In his letter to his friend Liao Yiwu in 2000, he expressed his thoughts on the prospects of the democracy movement in China:


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: He was also a strong critic of Chinese nationalism, believing that the "abnormal nationalism" which had existed in China over the last century had turned from a defensive style which contained "mixed feelings of inferiority, envy, complaint, and blame" into an aggressive form of "patriotism" that was filled with "blind self-confidence, empty boasts, and pent-up hatred". The "ultra-nationalism" being deployed by the Chinese Communist Party since the Tiananmen protests has also become "a euphemism for worship of violence in service of autocratic goals."


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: In 2009 during his trial for "inciting subversion of state power" due to his participation in drafting the "Charter 08" manifesto which demanded freedom of expression, human rights and democratic elections, he wrote an essay known as "I Have No Enemies", stating that "the mentality of enmity can poison a nation's spirit, instigate brutal life and death struggles, destroy a society's tolerance and humanity, and block a nation's progress towards freedom and democracy", and he declared that he had no enemies, and no hatred.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: In international affairs, he supported U.S. President George W. Bush's 2001 invasion of Afghanistan, his 2003 invasion of Iraq and subsequent reelection.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: In his 2004 article titled "Victory to the Anglo-American Freedom Alliance", he praised the U.S.-led post-Cold War conflicts as "best examples of how war should be conducted in a modern civilization." He wrote "regardless of the savagery of the terrorists, and regardless of the instability of Iraq's situation, and, what's more, regardless of how patriotic youth might despise proponents of the United States such as myself, my support for the invasion of Iraq will not waver. Just as, from the beginning, I believed that the military intervention of Britain and the United States would be victorious, I am still full of belief in the final victory of the Freedom Alliance and the democratic future of Iraq, and even if the armed forces of Britain and the United States should encounter some obstacles such as those that they are currently facing, this belief of mine will not change." He predicted "a free, democratic and peaceful Iraq will emerge."


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: He commented on Islamism that, "a culture and (religious) system that has produced this kind of threat (Islamic fundamentalism) must be inherently intolerant and bloodthirsty." He also criticized the Iraq prison abuse scandals. During the 2004 US presidential election, Liu again praised Bush for his war effort against Iraq and condemned Democratic Party candidate John Kerry for not sufficiently supporting the wars in which the U.S. was then involved.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: On Israel, he said "without America's protection, the long persecuted Jews who faced extermination during World War II, would probably be drowned once more by the Islamic world's hatred." He had defended U.S. policies in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, which he thought was the fault of the "provocateur" Palestinians.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: On 27 April 1989, Liu returned to Beijing and immediately became an active supporter of the movement. When the army seemed ready to violently eject the students who persistently occupied Tiananmen Square in order to challenge the government and the army that was enforcing its declaration of martial law, he initiated a four-man three-day hunger strike on 2 June. Later referred to as the "Tiananmen Four Gentlemen Hunger Strike", the action earned the trust of the students. He requested that both the government and the students abandon the ideology of class struggle and adopt a new political culture of dialogue and compromise. Although it was too late to prevent the massacre which started on the night of 3 June from occurring beyond the square, he and his colleagues successfully negotiated with the student leaders and the army commander so the several thousand students who remained in the square would all be allowed to peacefully withdraw from it, thus preventing a possibly much larger scale of bloodshed.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: On 5 June, Liu was arrested and detained in Qincheng Prison for his alleged role in the movement, and three months later he was expelled from Beijing Normal University. The government's media issued numerous publications which labeled him a "mad dog" and a "black hand" because he had allegedly incited and manipulated the student movement to overthrow the government and socialism. His publications were banned, including his fourth book, "Going Naked Toward God", which was then in press. In Taiwan however, his first and third books, "Criticism of the Choice: Dialogues with Leading Thinker Li Zehou" (1989), and the two-volume "Mysteries of Thought and Dreams of Mankind" (1990) were republished with some additions.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: In January 1991, 19 months after his arrest, Liu Xiaobo was convicted of "counterrevolutionary propaganda and incitement" but he was exempted from criminal punishment due to his "major meritorious action" for preventing what could have been a bloody confrontation in Tiananmen Square. After his release, he was divorced; both his ex-wife and son subsequently emigrated to the US. He resumed his writing, mostly on human rights and political issues, but was not allowed to publish them in Mainland China.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: In 1992, while in Taiwan, he published his first book after his imprisonment, "The Monologues of a Doomsday's Survivor", a controversial memoir which contains his confessions and his political criticism of the popular movement in 1989.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: In January 1993, Liu was invited to visit Australia and the United States for the interviews in the documentary film "The Gate of Heavenly Peace". Although many of his friends suggested that he take refuge abroad, Liu returned to China in May 1993 and continued his freelance writing.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: On 18 May 1995, the Chinese police took Liu into custody for launching a petition campaign on the eve of the sixth anniversary of the Tiananmen protests calling on the government to reassess the event and initiate political reform. He was held under residential surveillance in the suburbs of Beijing for nine months. He was released in February 1996 but was arrested again on 8 October for writing an October Tenth Declaration, coauthored by him and another prominent dissident, Wang Xizhe, mainly on the Taiwan issue, that advocated a peaceful reunification in order to oppose the Chinese Communist Party's forceful threats against the island. He was ordered to serve three years of reeducation through labor "for disturbing public order" for that statement.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: In 1996, while he was still imprisoned in the labor camp, Liu married Liu Xia, who herself was not a prisoner. Because she was the only person from the outside allowed to visit him in prison, she was deemed his "most important link to the outside world."


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: After his release on 7 October 1999, Liu Xiaobo resumed his freelance writing. However, it was reported that the government built a sentry station next to his home and his phone calls and internet connections were tapped.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: In 2000, while in Taiwan, Liu published the book "A Nation That Lies to Conscience", a 400-page political criticism. Also published, in Hong Kong, was a "Selection of Poems", a 450-page collection of the poems as correspondences between him and his wife during his imprisonment; it was coauthored by Liu and his wife. The last of three books which he published during the year was published in Mainland China, later titled "Selected Poems of Liu Xiaobo and Liu Xia" (劉曉波劉霞詩選), a 250-page collection of literary critiques coauthored by a popular young writer and himself under his unknown pen name of "Lao Xiao". The same year, Liu participated in founding the "Independent Chinese PEN Center," and was elected to both its board of directors and as its president in November 2003; he was reelected to both positions two years later. In 2007, he did not seek reelection as president but held his position as a board member until he was detained by the police in December 2008.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: In 2003, when Liu started writing a human rights report on China at his home, his computer, letters and documents were all confiscated by the government. He once said, "at Liu Xia's [Liu's wife] birthday, her best friend brought two bottles of wine to [my home] but was blocked by the police from coming in. I ordered a [birthday] cake and the police also rejected the man who delivered the cake to us. I quarreled with them and the police said, 'it is for the sake of your security. It has happened many bomb attacks in these days.'" Those measures were loosened until 2007, prior to the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: In January 2005, following the death of former Chinese Premier Zhao Ziyang, who had shown sympathy towards the student demonstrations in 1989, Liu was immediately put under house arrest for two weeks before he learned about the death of Zhao. The same year, he published two more books in the US, "The Future of Free China Exists in Civil Society", and "Single-Blade Poisonous Sword: Criticism of Chinese Nationalism".


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: Liu's writing is considered subversive by the Chinese Communist Party, and his name is censored. He called for multi-party elections and free markets, advocated the values of freedom, supported separation of powers and urged the governments to be accountable for its wrongdoings. When not in prison, he was the subject of government monitoring and he was also put under house arrest during times that the government considered politically sensitive.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: Liu's human rights work received international recognition. In 2004, Reporters Without Borders awarded him the Fondation de France Prize as a defender of press freedom.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: Liu Xiaobo actively participated in the writing of "Charter 08" and signed it along with more than three hundred Chinese citizens. The Charter is a manifesto that was released on 10 December 2008 in order to coincide with the 60th anniversary of the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. It was written in the style of the Czechoslovak "Charter 77", and calls for more freedom of expression, human rights, more democratic elections, the privatization of state enterprises and land, and economic liberalism. As of September 2010, the Charter had collected over 10,000 signatures.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: Two days before the official release of Charter 08, late on the evening of 8 December 2008, Liu was taken into custody by the police, as was Zhang Zuhua, another scholar and "Charter 08" signatory. According to Zhang, the two were detained on suspicion of collecting signatures for the Charter. While Liu was detained in solitary confinement, he was forbidden to meet with either his lawyer or his family, but he was allowed to eat lunch with his wife, Liu Xia, and two policemen on New Year's Day 2009. On 23 June 2009, the Beijing procuratorate approved Liu's arrest on charges of "suspicion of inciting subversion of state power," a crime under Article 105 of China's Criminal Law. In a Xinhua news release announcing Liu's arrest, the Beijing Public Security Bureau alleged that Liu had incited the subversion of state power and the overthrow of the socialist system through methods such as spreading rumors and slander, citing almost verbatim Article 105; the Beijing PSB also noted that Liu had "fully confessed".


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: On 1 December 2009, Beijing police transferred Liu's case to the procuratorate for investigation and processing; on 10 December, the procuratorate formally indicted Liu on charges of "inciting subversion of state power" and sent his lawyers, Shang Baojun and Ding Xikui, the indictment document. He was tried at Beijing No. 1 Intermediate Court on 23 December 2009. His wife was not permitted to observe the hearing, although his brother-in-law was present. Diplomats from more than a dozen countries – including the U.S., Britain, Canada, Sweden, Australia and New Zealand – were denied access to the court in order to watch the trial and they all stood outside the court for its duration. Among them were Gregory May, political officer at the U.S. Embassy, and Nicholas Weeks, first secretary of the Swedish Embassy.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: Liu wrote a statement, entitled "I have no enemies", intending for it to be read at his trial. He was never given the right to speak. The essay was later read in the 2010 Nobel Peace Prize ceremony, which Liu was unable to attend due to his imprisonment. On 25 December 2009, Liu was sentenced to eleven years' imprisonment and two years' deprivation of political rights by the Beijing No. 2 Intermediate Court on charges of "inciting subversion of state power". According to Liu's family and counsel, he planned to appeal the judgment. In the verdict, "Charter 08" was named as part of the evidence supporting his conviction. John Pomfret of "The Washington Post" said Christmas Day was chosen to dump the news because the Chinese government believed Westerners were less likely to take notice on a holiday.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: Liu argued that his verdict violated both the Chinese constitution and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of the United Nations. He argued that charges against him of 'spreading rumors, slandering and in other ways inciting the subversion of the government and overturning the socialist system' were contrived, as he did not fabricate or create false information, nor did he besmirch the good name and character of others by merely expressing a point of view, a value judgment.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: Criminal law professor Gao Mingxuan characterized Liu's activities as publishing provocative speech on the Internet and gathering signatures to advocate the overthrow of government, activities he argued were prohibited by Chinese criminal law. However, Liu was advocating for the incremental and peaceful adoption of a democratic system with individual rights. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the People's Republic of China asserted that there are similar laws in many countries to prevent activities to advocate the overthrow of government, such as the Treason Act 1351 of England.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: Liu's detention was condemned worldwide by both human rights organizations and foreign countries. On 11 December 2008, the U.S. Department of State called for Liu's release, which was followed on 22 December 2008 by a similar request from a consortium of scholars, writers, lawyers and human rights advocates. Additionally, on 21 January 2009, 300 international writers, including Salman Rushdie, Margaret Atwood, Ha Jin and Jung Chang, called for Liu's release in a statement put out through PEN. In March 2009, the One World Film Festival awarded Liu Xiaobo the Homo Homini Award, organized by the People in Need foundation, for promoting freedom of speech, democratic principles and human rights.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: In December 2009, the European Union and United States issued formal appeals calling for the unconditional release of Liu Xiaobo. China's government, responding to the international calls prior to the verdict, stated that other nations should "respect China's judicial sovereignty and not do things that will interfere in China's internal affairs".


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: Responding to the verdict, United Nations Human Rights Commissioner Navanethem Pillay expressed concern about the deterioration of political rights in China. German Chancellor Angela Merkel strongly criticized the verdict, stating "despite the great progress in other areas in the expression of views, I regret that the Chinese government still massively restricts press freedom." Canada and Switzerland also condemned the verdict. The Republic of China President Ma Ying-jeou called on Beijing to "tolerate dissent". On 6 January 2010, former Czech president Václav Havel joined with other communist-era dissidents at the Chinese Embassy in Prague to present a petition calling for Liu's release. On 22 January 2010, European Association for Chinese Studies sent an open letter to Hu Jintao on behalf of over 800 scholars from 36 countries calling for Liu's release.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: On 18 January 2010, Liu was nominated for the 2010 Nobel Peace Prize by Václav Havel, the 14th Dalai Lama, André Glucksmann, Vartan Gregorian, Mike Moore, Karel Schwarzenberg, Desmond Tutu and Grigory Yavlinsky. China's Foreign Ministry spokesperson Ma Zhaoxu stated that awarding the Nobel Peace Prize to Liu would be "totally wrong". Geir Lundestad, a secretary of the Nobel Committee, stated the award would not be influenced by Beijing's opposition. On 25 September 2010, "The New York Times" reported that a petition in support of the Nobel nomination was being circulated in China.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: On 14 September 2010, the Mayor of Reykjavík, Jón Gnarr, met on an unrelated matter with CPC Politburo member Liu Qi and demanded China set the dissident Liu Xiaobo free. Also that September Václav Havel, Dana Němcová and Václav Malý, leaders of Czechoslovakia's Velvet Revolution, published an open letter in the "International Herald Tribune" calling for the award to be given to Liu, while a petition began to circulate soon afterwards.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: On 6 October 2010, the non-governmental organization Freedom Now, which serves as an international counsel to Liu Xiaobo as retained by his family, publicly released a letter from 30 members of the U.S. Congress to President Barack Obama, urging him to directly raise both Liu's case and that of fellow imprisoned dissident Gao Zhisheng to Chinese President Hu Jintao at the G-20 Summit in November 2010. The Republic of China's President Ma Ying-jiu congratulated Liu on winning the Nobel Prize and requested that the Chinese authorities improve their impression in the eyes of the world by respecting human rights, but did not call for his release from prison.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: On 15 October 2010, the "China News Service" indicated that in 2008 Liu had received a financial endowment from the National Endowment for Democracy, which is ""a Washington-based nonprofit funded largely by the US Congress"".


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: In 2011, a WorldWideReading was dedicated to Liu Xiaobo; on 20 March, readings in more than 60 towns and cities on all continents and broadcast via radio stations were held in his honor. The "Freedom for Liu Xiaobo" appeal was supported by more than 700 writers from around the world, among them Nobel Prize laureates John M. Coetzee, Nadine Gordimer, Herta Müller and Elfriede Jelinek, as well as Breyten Breytenbach, Eliot Weinberger, Salman Rushdie, Vikram Seth, Mario Vargas Llosa, Wolf Biermann and Dave Eggers.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: On 20 March 2011, the international literature festival called for a worldwide reading for Liu Xiaobo. More than 700 authors from all continents signed the appeal and over 150 institutions took part in the event.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: On 19 November 2013, his wife, Liu Xia, who was placed under house arrest shortly after Liu Xiaobo was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, filed an appeal for Liu Xiaobo's retrial. This move has been called "extraordinary" because the action could refocus the world's attention on China's human rights record.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: According to her attorney, Mo Shaoping, Liu Xia visited her husband in Jinzhou Prison in Liaoning and gained his approval before filing this motion.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: On 8 October 2010, the Nobel Committee awarded Liu the Nobel Peace Prize "for his long and non-violent struggle for fundamental human rights in China", saying that Liu had long been front-runner as the recipient of the prize. Liu's wife, Liu Xia, expressed gratitude on behalf of her husband to the Nobel Committee, Liu's proposers, and those who have been supporting him since 1989, including the Tiananmen Mothers—family members or representatives of those who were killed, or had disappeared, in the military crackdown of the protests of 4 June 1989. She said, "The prize should belong to all who signed "Charter 08" and were jailed due to their support".


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: Liu Xia informed her husband of his award during a visit to Jinzhou Prison on 9 October 2010, one day after the official announcement. She reported that Liu wept and dedicated the award to those who suffered as a result of the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989, saying: "The award is first and foremost for the Tiananmen martyrs" After Mrs. Liu returned home, she was put under house arrest and was watched by armed guards. She expressed the desire to attend the awards ceremony in Norway in December, but was skeptical of her chances of being allowed to do so. Liu Xia wrote an open letter to 143 prominent figures, encouraging them to attend the award ceremony in Oslo.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: China reacted negatively to the award, immediately censoring news about the announcement of the award in China, though later that day limited news of the award became available. Foreign news broadcasters including CNN and the BBC were immediately blocked, while heavy censorship was applied to personal communications. The Chinese Foreign Ministry denounced the award to Liu Xiaobo, saying that it "runs completely counter to the principle of the award and it is also a desecration of the Peace Prize". The Norwegian ambassador to the People's Republic of China was summoned by the Foreign Ministry on 8 October 2010 and presented with an official complaint about the granting of the Nobel Peace Prize to Liu. The Chinese government has called Liu Xiaobo a criminal and stated that he does not deserve the prize. Chinese dissident Wei Jingsheng, in his response to news of the award, criticized Liu by calling him "the accomplice of the Communist regime." As a result, nearly all large-scale commercial trading between Norway and China was limited, and relations soured until after Liu Xiaobo's death in 2017, when talks resumed. In October 2018, the Norwegian King Harald V visited Beijing and met with Chinese president Xi Jinping, symbolizing the recovery of China-Norway relations.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: "Global Times", part of the Chinese government-owned "People's Daily", published a statement saying that Liu Xiaobo and his case had properly undergone "strict legal procedure", blaming Western regimes for sensationalizing the Liu Xiaobo story "in defiance of China's judicial sovereignty". The Chinese paper also rejected the view that Liu Xiaobo should be described as "China's Mandela", by stating: "Mandela was a Nobel Peace Prize laureate for leading African people to anti-apartheid victory through struggles ... however, awarding a Chinese prisoner who confronted authorities and was rejected by mainstream Chinese society derides China's judicial system ... [which] makes sure a society of 1.3 billion people runs smoothly."


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: Following the announcement of the Nobel Peace Prize, celebrations in China were either stopped or curtailed, and prominent intellectuals and other dissidents were detained, harassed or put under surveillance; Liu's wife, Liu Xia, was placed under house arrest and she was forbidden to talk to reporters even though no official charges were filed against her. Sixty-five countries with missions in Norway were all invited to the Nobel Prize ceremony, but fifteen of them declined the invitation, in some cases due to heavy lobbying by China. Besides China, these countries included Russia, Kazakhstan, Tunisia, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Iraq, Iran, Vietnam, Venezuela, Egypt, Sudan, Cuba, and Morocco.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: China also imposed travel restrictions on known dissidents ahead of the ceremony. A Chinese group announced that its answer to the Nobel Peace Prize, the Confucius Peace Prize, would be awarded to former Taiwanese Vice-President Lien Chan for the bridge of peace which he has been building between Taiwan and Mainland China. Lien Chan himself denied any knowledge of the $15,000 prize.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: On 26 June 2017, it was reported that Liu had been granted medical parole after being diagnosed with terminal liver cancer in late May 2017. The Shenyang Justice Ministry released a statement on 5 July saying that the First Hospital of China Medical University, where Liu was being treated, has invited cancer experts from the United States, Germany and other nations to join its team of doctors. However, the statement did not mention which foreign doctors had been invited or whether or not any of them had responded. A statement one day later from the hospital said that Liu was admitted on 7 June. On 8 July, the hospital said that Joseph M. Herman of University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center and Markus Büchler of Heidelberg University had joined domestic experts for group consultation. The foreign doctors said that Liu had indicated that he wanted to be sent abroad for treatment. Acknowledging the risk that is involved when a patient is moved, they deemed that Liu was fit to travel abroad in order to receive the care which they were willing to provide him. However, the hospital said that the foreign doctors had confirmed that even they had no better treatment methods and also that the domestic doctors had done a very good job. On 10 July, the hospital said that Liu was in critical condition, and that he was suffering from an increasingly bloated stomach, an inflamed abdominal wall, falling blood pressure, faltering kidneys, growing cancer lesions, and that they were actively rescuing him, and were starting to use continuous renal replacement therapy (CRRT). On 12 July, the hospital said that Liu was suffering from liver failure (Child–Pugh class C), kidney failure, respiratory failure, septic shock, blood clot, etc. and that they had communicated the necessity for tracheal intubation, but his family had rejected the procedure. The "New York Times" reported that Liu's family could not be independently reached for confirmation of his condition.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: Liu Xiaobo died on 13 July 2017 in Shenyang's First Hospital of China Medical University from liver cancer.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: Since his death, the fate of Liu Xiaobo has been compared by the media of the world to that of Carl von Ossietzky, Nobel Laureate in 1935 who also died as a prisoner of an authoritarian regime. Whilst Liu's death was widely reported in the Western media, it was mentioned only in the most perfunctory manner in the press inside mainland China. Censors deleted images or emojis of candles, or a simple "RIP"; searches on Sina Weibo regarding Liu's health returned the message: "According to relevant laws and policies, results for 'Liu Xiaobo' cannot be displayed". The Citizen Lab documented censorship of the death of Liu Xiaobo on WeChat and Weibo." They noted on 16 July censorship on WeChat of images related to Liu after his death, and found that even images were being blocked in one-to-one chat the first time as well as in group chat and WeChat Moments. Based on analyses of search term blocking on Weibo, the lab confirmed that a blanket ban on searches for Liu Xiaobo's name was still being applied. They said: "In fact, just his given name of Xiaobo is enough to trigger censorship in English and both Simplified and Traditional Chinese..."


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: On the early morning of 15 July 2017, a brief funeral service was held for Liu which Liu's body was cremated following a short mourning service. Liu's mourning ceremony and funeral were heavily stage-managed as friends and supporters had been warned that public funeral or memorial would not be tolerated.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: All the questions international journalists have been asking about Liu failed to appear in official transcripts of news briefings by the Chinese foreign ministry.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: The funeral was organized in a heavy-handed fashion in which Chinese government attempted to defend their treatment of Liu and his wife, even though it was clear they and their family members were under perpetual surveillance. Although the funeral was attended by a brother of Ms. Liu and two of Mr. Liu's brothers and their wives, none of Liu's friends could be identified from official photographs of the mourners.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: A government spokesman said: "Liu Xia is free now, [but was] grief-stricken and doesn't need to be disturbed" However, she has been out of sight since the video of Liu's sea burial.


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: The government claimed that Liu had been cremated, and his ashes scattered into the sea at the family's own request. His eldest brother, Liu Xiaoguang appeared at the same press briefing, thanked the Chinese Communist party and also the government "because everything they have done for our family shows a high level of humanity and personal care to us". According to Liu Xiaobo's biographer Yu Jie, Liu had excommunicated his eldest brother, Xiaoguang, after the 4 June incident, calling him a "petty bureaucrat of the Communist Party". Yu further criticized Xiaoguang for usurping Liu Xia's position of next of kin and his "shamelessness" in attempting to grab a share of Liu's Nobel Prize money. The government of China has been accused by Liu's supporters of trying to erase any shrine or traces to Liu Xiaobo with a sea burial of his remains. Chinese human rights activists Hu Jia stated to the "South China Morning Post" that the hasty actions were "humiliating to a Nobel winner".


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: In Hong Kong, which still enjoys a rapidly diminishing range of civil rights that are nonexistent in mainland China, activists organized the only large-scale commemoration for Liu on Chinese soil. A vigil outside the Beijing Liaison Office started on 10 July and continued until his death. Some newspapers in the city splashed Liu's portrait on their front pages to announce his death, while other pro-Communist journals relegated coverage to the inner pages. In the Legislative Council legislators of the Pro-democracy camp made seven attempts to table a debate on Liu, but president of the council, Andrew Leung, who is from the governing faction, rejected the attempts on the grounds that the matter did not have "urgent public importance according to 16.2 of the Rules of Procedure, [and that] the wording of their petitions lacked neutrality".


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: Tibetan Government in Exile: The 14th Dalai Lama, who himself is the 1989 Nobel Peace Prize winner, the Speaker of the Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile, Khenpo Sonam Tenphel, and Prime Minister of the Tibetan Government-in-Exile, Lobsang Sangay mourned the death of Liu. The Dalai Lama issued the following short statement on 14 July 2017, "I am deeply saddened to learn that fellow Nobel Laureate Liu Xiaobo has passed away while undergoing a lengthy prison sentence. I offer my prayers and condolences to his wife, Liu Xia and to other members of his family. Although he is no longer living, the rest of us can best pay honor to Liu Xiaobo by carrying forward the principles he has long embodied, which would lead to a more harmonious, stable and prosperous China. It is my belief that Nobel Laureate Liu Xiaobo's unceasing efforts in the cause of freedom will bear fruit before long."


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: The Congressional-Executive Commission on China, whose commissioners come from both the House of Representatives and Senate, issued a bipartisan statement. The United States House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health, Global Human Rights and International Organizations held a hearing on Liu and his death (entitled "The Tragic Case of Liu Xiaobo"). Nancy Pelosi, the House Minority Leader, was saddened by the news of Liu's passing. Back on 18 May, both Republican Senator Ted Cruz and Representative Mark Meadows had re-introduced bills to resume their push to rename the address of Embassy of China in Washington, D.C. as "1 Liu Xiaobo Plaza." Bob Fu, a Chinese American human rights activist and pastor, told The Texas Tribune that he is "definitely more optimistic" about Cruz's bill getting enacted with President Trump in office. Later Senator Marco Rubio wrote a letter, which was sent to Liu Xia, Liu Xiaobo's widow. Senator John McCain said that "this is only the latest example of Communist China's assault on human rights, democracy, and freedom."


title: Liu Xiaobo

text: A statue of Liu Xiaobo in Hong Kong was removed in November 2021 after the police objected to its presence.


title: Ambazonia

text: Ambazonia, officially the Federal Republic of Ambazonia, also referred to as Amba Land, is an unrecognised breakaway state in West Africa which claims the Northwest Region and Southwest Region of Cameroon, though it currently controls almost none of the claimed territory. No country has formally recognized Ambazonia's independence, and it is currently the site of an armed conflict between Ambazonian separatist guerrillas and the Cameroonian military known as the Anglophone Crisis. Ambazonia is located in the west of Cameroon and southeast of Nigeria on the Gulf of Guinea.


title: Ambazonia

text: Until 1961, the region was a British colony, Southern Cameroons, while the rest of Cameroon was a French colony, French Cameroon. At independence, a plebiscite was held, and voters in Southern Cameroons opted to join Cameroon as a constituent state of a federal republic. Over time, the power of the central government, dominated by Francophones, expanded at the expense of the region's autonomy. Many inhabitants identify as Anglophones and resent what they perceive as discrimination and efforts to eliminate Anglophone legal, administrative, educational, and cultural institutions by the Cameroonian government.


title: Ambazonia

text: In 2016 and 2017, a widespread protest movement was met with a violent government crackdown, which led to rioting and violence against security forces and, in 2017, a unilateral declaration of independence by Ambazonian leaders. The violence developed into a guerrilla war, and , clashes continue, with population centers and strategic locations largely controlled by the government engaged in counterinsurgency actions, with swathes of more remote, rural areas controlled by separatist militias and used to launch guerrilla attacks. Ambazonian forces have struggled to form a united front, and internecine conflicts have hampered efforts to negotiate with Cameroon or establish control over the various militia groups engaged in the fighting. Ongoing violence has led to widely reported human rights abuses by both sides, including indiscriminate killing of civilians, torture, rape and gender-based crimes, and unjustified detentions and kidnappings.


title: Ambazonia

text: The term "Ambazonia" is derived from the word "Ambozes", the local name for the bay at the mouth of the Wouri river, known in English as Ambas Bay. The name was coined by Fon Gorji Dinka in 1984 as part of a campaign for the restoration of autonomy and preservation of Anglophone institutions in the region.


title: Ambazonia

text: The term "Ambazonia" is more usually associated with the separatist or independence-seeking faction, while the Cameroonian government and other official sources, such as the UN, continue to refer to the "Northwest Region" and "Southwest Region" (or sometimes the "NoSo" regions), the official names of the two administrative provinces since 1972. Other sources may also refer to "Southern Cameroons", "Anglophone Cameroon" or "Cameroon's Anglophone regions".


title: Ambazonia

text: European traders from several nations visited Ambas Bay beginning with the Portuguese in the 1470s. The first permanent European settlement on the mainland in the region was founded in 1858 by British Baptist Missionary Alfred Saker as a haven for freed slaves. This settlement which was later named Victoria (now Limbe, Cameroon) after the then Queen Victoria. Until the 1880s, European activity was dominated by trading companies and missionaries. However, in the 1880s, the Scramble for Africa reached full swing with European powers rushing to gain diplomatic or military control over Africa to secure colonial claims. The Germans, who had established substantial trading centers to the southeast on the Wouri River delta (modern Douala), and the British, who had extensive interests to the west in Nigeria, both raced to sign agreements with local rulers. German explorer Gustav Nachtigal signed key treaties with several prominent kings. Dissatisfaction with these agreements led to the brief Douala War in 1884, in which Germany assisted its local allies in winning, essentially cementing its colonial position in Cameroon and by 1887 Britain had abandoned its claims in the region.


title: Ambazonia

text: Germany continued to consolidate its control over the coast through agreements with local leaders backed up by military expeditions. Germany conquered Buea in 1891 after several years of fighting, transferring the colonial capital there in 1892 from Douala. By 1914, the Germans had established control either directly or through local leaders well into the hinterlands of the territory now claimed by Ambazonia, conquering communities such as Nkambe and establishing a garrison fort at Bamenda in 1912. However, many towns and villages in the hinterlands had no German administration and may have only seen German soldiers a handful of times. German administration was focused on establishing plantations for cash crops, and improving transportation and communication infrastructure to bring products and natural resources swiftly to ports and thence to Europe. The rough terrain of the Cameroon line and the lack of navigable rivers in much of the interior of the region claimed by Ambazonia limited colonial activity outside the coastal regions.


title: Ambazonia

text: In 1914, as World War I began, British forces from British Nigeria and French forces from French Equatorial Africa and Gabon attacked German Kamerun. Allied naval superiority allowed the swift capture of the Cameroonian coast, cutting the Germans off from reinforcement or resupply. In early 1916, the last Germans surrendered or withdrew from Cameroon into neutral Spanish Guinea. In 1919, Germany signed the Treaty of Versailles, formally surrendered its colonies to the Allies. A few weeks later, Britain and France issued a statement known as the Simon-Milner Declaration, delineating the frontiers between the British Cameroons and French Cameroon. This boundary was recognized internationally in 1922 and Britain and France were given control of their respective regions as League of Nations Mandates.


title: Ambazonia

text: The British Cameroons Administration Ordinance, 1924 divided British Cameroons into the Northern Cameroons (administered as part of Northern Nigeria) and the Southern Cameroons (administered as part of Eastern Nigeria). When the League of Nations mandate system was transmuted into the UN trusteeship system in 1946, this arrangement was again provided for in the Order-in-Council of 2 August 1946 providing for the administration of the Nigeria Protectorate and Cameroons under British mandate. In 1953, the Southern Cameroons representatives in the Eastern Nigerian Legislature demanded a separate regional government for the Southern Cameroons with seat in Buea. Under the Lyttleton Constitution of Nigeria in 1954, Southern Cameroons gained limited autonomy as a Quasi-Region within the Nigerian Federation. E.M.L. Endeley emerged as leader of the Quasi-Region of Southern Cameroons, with his official title being Leader of Government Business.


title: Ambazonia

text: In 1957, United Nations Resolutions 1064 (XI) of 26 Feb 1957 and 1207 (XII) of Dec 13, 1957 called on the Administering Authorities to hasten arrangements for Trust territories to attain self-governance or independence. In 1958, the Southern Cameroons attained the status of a full autonomous region of the Nigerian Federation and Endeley's official title accordingly changed to Premier. Despite calls by Southern Cameroons leaders for full independence as a separation nation, United Nations' resolutions 1350 (XIII) of March 13, 1959 and 1352 (XIV) of October 16, 1959 called for plebiscites in Southern Cameroons and Northern Cameroons with two alternatives for ending the trusteeship: joining Nigeria or joining Cameroon.


title: Ambazonia

text: Despite calls by Southern Cameroons leaders for full independence, United Nations' resolutions 1350 (XIII) of March 13, 1959 and 1352 (XIV) of October 16, 1959 called on Britain, the Administering Authority to organize separate plebiscites in Southern Cameroons and Northern Cameroons under UN supervision based on the following two 'alternatives': independence by joining Nigeria or joining Cameroon. Two reports by English economists, the Phillipson Report in 1959 and the Berrill Report in 1960 both concluded that Southern Cameroons would not be able to continue to finance development and growth as an independent state. The United Nations initiated discussions with French Cameroun on the terms of association of Southern Cameroons if the outcome of the plebiscite was in favour of a federation of the two countries. While many Southern Cameroonians resented the lack of an independence option, the disappointment with Nigerian administration which had fed the push for further autonomy and hope that a more equal federation could be had with Cameroon led to a majority in favor of "reunification" with Cameroon.


title: Ambazonia

text: On 21 April 1961, UN resolution 1608 (XV) set 1 October 1961 as the date of independence for the Southern Cameroons. In July 1961, the Southern Cameroons and the French Cameroon Republic delegations met in Foumban, a town in French Cameroon near the border with Southern Cameroons. The South Cameroons delegation lacked much leverage as the interests of the UN and colonial powers were to expedite the unification rather than guarantee the autonomy of Southern Cameroons. The result was a constitution that provided for a federal structure with two constituent states, East Cameroon (former French Cameroon) and West Cameroon (former Southern Cameroons), but which gave power over most critical issues to the national government (dominated by Francophones). One critical concession was to require that laws applying to both states could only be adopted by the federal assembly if a majority of deputies in both federated states vote for them.


title: Ambazonia

text: In 1961, the government of Cameroon, with continuing assistance from France, was fighting a civil war against remnants of pro-independence fighters still dissatisfied with continued French influence in Cameroon or hoping to overthrow the pro-Western government and implement a Marxist program. President Ahmadou Ahidjo used the continuing war and the vagueness of many provisions of the Constitution, to consolidate power. In 1962, he arrested and imprisoned a number of prominent (Francophone) political opponents on charges of subversion and criticizing the state. In 1966, he succeeded in banning opposition political parties, establishing a one-party state. During this time, West Cameroonian leaders were critical of efforts to decrease their autonomy through expanded assertions of federal authority by Francophone administrators in West Cameroon. Anglophones also resented the introduction of bilingual schools in West Cameroon as an attempt to assimilate Anglophones.


title: Ambazonia

text: After achieving near total control over East Cameroon, in spring 1972 president Ahidjo targeted the autonomous powers of West Cameroon. Placing the blame for Cameroon's underdevelopment and poorly implemented public policies on the federal structure and arguing that managing separate governments in a poor country was too expensive, he announced a referendum on a new constitution, which did away with the federal structure in favor of a unitary state and granted more power to the President. The referendum was held on 20 May 1972 and in the one-party state, the outcome was never in doubt. Official results claimed 98.2% turnout and 99.99% of votes in favor of the new constitution. Ambazonian nationalists have claimed that the referendum was not free and fair. They have additionally argued that the new constitution was legally invalid since changes to the 1961 Constitution required approval from a majority of members of the Federal Assembly (legislature) and from each of the two constituent states, and that the new constitution was never approved by a majority of West Cameroonian legislators. Along with the new constitution, the country's name was changed from 'Federal Republic of Cameroon' to the 'United Republic of Cameroon'. West Cameroon was divided into two administrative regions, which survive today: the "North West" and "South West" regions.


title: Ambazonia

text: In 1975, the government removed one of the two stars from the flag, another symbol of the federation between two states, creating a new flag with a single star. On 6 November 1982, Ahidjo resigned and handed over power to Paul Biya who continued Ahidjo's policies and, after a falling out with Ahidjo and attempted coup by Ahidjo supporters, consolidated power in himself. In February 1984, Biya changed the official name of the country from the United Republic of Cameroon – the name adopted after unification with the Southern Cameroons - back to the Republic of Cameroon. Biya stated that he had taken the step to affirm Cameroon's political maturity and to demonstrate that the people had overcome their language and cultural barriers but many in Southern Cameroons saw it as yet another step to erase their separate culture and history.


title: Ambazonia

text: From the mid-1980s, the break between the Southern Cameroon elites and the Francophone-dominated central government became increasingly apparent. Political exclusion, economic exploitation and cultural assimilation were criticized more and more openly. In early 1985, Anglophone lawyer and President of the Cameroon Bar Association Fon Gorji Dinka circulated a number of essays and pamphlets arguing that the Biya government was unconstitutional and calling for an independent Republic of Ambazonia. Gorji Dinka became the first head of the Ambazonia Restoration Council. In May 1985, he was arrested, imprisoned, and then put under house arrest for three years before escaping first to Nigeria and then to the United Kingdom.


title: Ambazonia

text: In 1990, opposition political parties were legalized and John Ngu Foncha, the leading Anglophone in Cameroon's government, resigned from the governing party and encapsulated much of the dissatisfaction with the central government's attitude toward the Anglophone regions in his public resignation letter:


title: Ambazonia

text: In 1993, the All Anglophone Conference took place in Buea bringing together all Southern Cameroons citizens who called for the restoration of the federal system. At a second All Anglophone Conference held in Bamenda the call for the Cameroon government to accept a return to the two state federation was reiterated with some voices explicitly calling for secession. In 1995, over the objection of some Anglophone Cameroonians, Cameroon was admitted to the Commonwealth of Nations recognizing former Southern Cameroon's history as a British colony. During this period various independence and federalist factions joined to form the Southern Cameroons National Council, a pressure group which undertook initiatives at the UN, the African Court on Human and Peoples' Rights, the Commonwealth, and with national embassies to bring attention to the region and Anglophone issues in Cameroon. In 2005, the Southern Cameroons/Republic of Ambazonia became a member of the Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organisation (UNPO) it was renewed in 2018. Due to harassment and arrests by the government, many leaders of he SCNC and other organizations fled the country. Both 1999 and 2009 saw symbolic declarations of independence by Ambazonian nationalists, which led to arrests but little concrete action.


title: Ambazonia

text: Increasing pressure for autonomy or independence reduced trust and engagement between the government and the Anglophone minority, with the result that by 2017 there was only one Anglophone among 36 ministers with portfolio in the Cameroonian government.


title: Ambazonia

text: In November 2016, a number of large protests and strikes were organized, initially by Anglophone lawyers, students, and teachers focused on the growing marginalization of English and Anglophone institutions in the law and education. Several demonstrations were violently dispersed by security forces, leading to clashes between demonstrators and police in which several people were killed. Violence by both sides undermined negotiations in early 2017, which fell apart without an agreement. The violence led to additional demonstrations, general strikes (called "lockdowns"), and further crackdowns by the government into early 2017, including the banning of civil society organizations, cutting off phone and internet connections from January to April, and arrests of demonstrators. Although the government established a Commission to focus on Anglophone grievances and took steps to address issues of language equity in courts and schools, continued distrust and harsh responses to protests prevented significant deescalation.


title: Ambazonia

text: By late 2017, with dialogue efforts moribund and violence continuing on both sides, the leading Ambazonian nationalist movements organized the umbrella organization Southern Cameroons Ambazonia Consortium United Front (SCACUF). SCACUF unilaterally declared the region's independence as Ambazonia on October 1, the anniversary of Southern Cameroons' independence from the United Kingdom. SCACUF sought to transition itself into an interim government with its leader, Sisiku Ayuk Tabe Julius, as interim president. At least 17 people were killed in protests following the declaration of independence, while fourteen Cameroonian troops were killed in attacks claimed by the Ambazonia Defence Forces. The Cameroonian government stated that the declaration had no legal weight and on November 30, 2017, the President of Cameroon signaled a harder line on separatist attacks on police and soldiers. A massive military deployment accompanied by curfews and forced evacuations of entire villages. This temporarily ended hopes for continued dialogue and kicked of full-fledged guerilla war in Southern Cameroons. Several different armed factions have emerged such as the Red Dragons, Tigers, ARA, Seven Kata, ABL, with varying levels of coordination with and loyalty to Ambazonian political leaders. In practice, pro-independence militias operate largely autonomously from political leaders, who are mostly in exile.


title: Ambazonia

text: On 5 January 2018, members of the Ambazonia Interim Government in exile in Abuja, Nigeria, including President Sisiku Julius Ayuk Tabe, were arrested and deported to Cameroon into the custody of government forces to face criminal charges. On 4 February 2018, it was announced that US-based preacher Dr. Samuel Ikome Sako would become the Interim President of the Federal Republic of Ambazonia, temporarily succeeding Ayuk Tabe. However, despite receiving a life sentence on terrorism charges from a Cameroon court, on 2 May 2019, Ayuk Tabe declared from prison the dissolution of Sako's caretaker cabinet and the restoration of his own cabinet. Sako resisted, leading to the 2019 Ambazonian leadership crisis.


title: Ambazonia

text: As the violence intensified, international efforts to resolve the crisis picked up. On 13 May 2019, the United Nations Security Council had an informal meeting to discuss the Anglophone Crisis. Peace talks mediated by the Swiss government have fallen apart multiple times, primarily due to factional divisions and lack of actual control over militias by separatist leaders making even preliminary steps difficult.