At large international gatherings world leaders sweep into town behind motorcades and barricades and make decisions, declarations and pronouncements (often re-announcing previous announcements). The decisions that they make have big implications for the lives of millions of people around the world. Millions of people who are effectively shut out from events that shape their lives.

It’s left to established media outlets to report back and as we all know, the news agenda can easily be diverted to focusing on the exploits of famous footballers extra-curricular activities. That sells many more papers than complicated issues whose effects are felt on the far side of the world. In order to throw open these Summits and get different perspectives on the events, the decisions and the implications, Oxfam set up VOICE.

For those of you who haven’t heard of it, VOICE gives influential bloggers from around the world the chance to participate, engage, and influence important global events. Our team of bloggers will be in New York when leaders from 192 countries meet next week at the United Nations to discuss progress towards meeting the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

There will be 10 VOICE bloggers at the Summit and they’re a great mix of bloggers with different concerns, different audiences and different networks. Here are a few of them.

From the UK we’ve got 3 fantastic bloggers.
Rowan Davies - representing Mumsnet, an online community that discusses everything from favourite biscuits to election contests. Any aspiring UK politician has to face a Mumsnet web chat! Nick Clegg was there yesterday to talk about the MDGs.

Jonathan Calder blogs on Liberal England, described as “an amusingly eclectic mix of culture and politics” by him and “Well written, funny and wistful” by others.

Anthony Painter – is a veteran of a previous VOICE (G20 in London) blogs about “UK, EU and US politics” www.anthonypainter.co.uk

Spain
Marilin Gonzalo and http://www.marilink.net/
Marilín is the content manager of Hipertextual one of the biggest bloggers networks in Latin America. She is very active in Twitter, where she has one of the most followed in Spain: more than 100, 000 followers

Rwanda, Nkunda, The Cry for Freedom from Rwanda
Nkunda writes frankly about issues facing the Rwandan people. Blogs lately have looked at the election and Paul Kagame but the blogger also examines issues of development in the country.

India: Geetika Kumar Gupta, writes about a Feminist Approach to Technology

Netherlands
Lindi Janssen writes about International conflicts, human rights, politics and media.

We’ll also have bloggers from the USA. I’ll make sure I keep you updated with some of the great content that they produce.

To see their work aggregated visit www.voicehub.org