The mainstream media in many countries have been preoccupied with events in the United States to commemorate the fifth anniversary of the attacks on the World Trade Centre and Pentagon on 9/11 2001. But the repercussions of these events have spread across the globe and people far beyond New York and Washington. Here the Global Voices team has gathered together a sample of citizens’ voices marking the anniversary. We have samples of opinion from regions across the world (click on the link to go directly to individual sections): Africa, China, South East Asia, South Asia, the Americas and French language blogs as well as the Middle East. We'll start in Africa where kenyanentrepreneur dives in to the most obvious consequence, the US invasion of Iraq, in her post Remembering 9/11: It's amazing watching all the coverage about 9/11. I have yet to see any mention of the 100,000 innocent Iraqi civillians who have been killed in a war that George Bush started using false pretenses. WMD's – none have been found Sadam's links to 9/11 – Bush now says there were no links Now, we are told the goal was to bring democracy to the Middle East. Let's see – you illegally invade a sovereign nation that has not attacked you, in total contravention of international law.. then, you turn around and claim that you are now going to impose the rule of law & democracy on the country that you have illegally invaded!! … The biggest threat to secular regimes in the Middle East are religious zealots like bin laden & Zawhiri, not America (just ask Hosni Mubarak, the Egyptian president, who incidentally has never been elected)…If a free & fair election were held in Egypt today, mubarak would lose and he'd be replaced by religious fundamentalists. The only reason that regime survives is because of the billions of dollars in aid they get from America. Mubarak is an autocrat, but he is their kind of autocrat. He has said that he would like his son to replace him as president when he decides to retire. I will never understand how an idiot like Bush managed to manipulate the American People. In a similar vein nakeel says I too remember 9/11 “Teach Bin Laden to be a terrorist, If you kill one person, you are a murderer, if you kill 2,900 people one morning, you are a terrorist, but if you go to Iraq and kill 330,000 people inthree years you are a democrat like President George Bush.” At Grandiose Parlor Inmakoyi uses the anniversary to consider the effect of anti-terror measures on the foreign remittance-sustained economy of Somalia: This system is driven by an informal money transfer system called Hawala, a system that has been in existence for generations in the Middle East and some Islamic nations worldwide. But this system is about to slam into a brick wall put in place by the United States government. Why? September 11 and susbsequent fight to curb money laundry and terrorism. In order to cut off funding to terrorist organizations, the regulatory agency in charge of foreign money transfer business now mandates and it enforcing stricter regulation of the industry. Unable to secure the required assistance from U.S banks and other financial institutions, the local money transfer system the Somalis have enjoyed for decades is gradually choking and may totally go into extinction, if alternative and workable modes of money remittance are not put in place. Meanwhile in what he calls An ode to reality, Zimpundit exhorts people to remember the strength of shared human experience, not just the negativity: In the billowing dust, the towering smoke, the piercing screams, and the harrowing sites from 9/11 America found this redemptive reality; that when all had been said and done, it was the basic notion of our mutual humanity that meant most to her people in their darkest hour… In that, you stepped into the very souls of the valiant individuals who led the Civil Rights Movement. That very moment brought you into concert with enduring cries for a better world that ring from Auschwitz to Waterloo in antiquity; and through Bhagdad, Beirut, Darfur, Mozambique, Nepal, Rwanda, South Africa, and Zimbabwe in modern times. In all those places; at ground zero, but most importantly in each every human heart resides an inextinguishable flame of an alternative to reality. And at it's core is the ability only human beings posses to see beyond the visual. As you rise like the Phoenix from the flames of your toughest test America, don't forget the reality that saw you through your darkest depression. Hold fast to that reality of the mutuality of our humanity America; for when all else fails you know you can always hang onto that hope that only humans are capable of producing.