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Category: ASEAN

Airstrikes kill 6, including children, in Myanmar’s Kachin state

Editor06 mins

An onslaught of airstrikes in northern Myanmar killed six civilians and injured 13 more, rescue workers told Radio Free Asia on Monday.  Junta troops retaliated after joint resistance forces attacked a regime base in Kachin state on Friday.  After the Kachin Independence Army and Arakan Army, two allied ethnic armed organizations, fired on Mansi township’s “strategic hill,” the junta base turned its guns on nearby Si Hkam Gyi village. Mansi township, which borders China, has been a site of previous conflict in late January. The Kachin Independence Army claimed the capture of 30 junta troops on Jan. 22 and 57 more soldiers escaped attacks by crossing the Chinese border.  Regime soldiers bombarded the village by air in a two-day attack on Saturday and Sunday, when roughly 1,000 residents fled the area, locals said.  On Saturday alone, troops dropped 20 bombs on four villages, they added. A rescue worker with Myitta Shin Charity Group, who wished to remain anonymous for security reasons, said civilians and victims are being moved to safety. “Hundreds of local people are trapped in the villages, including Si Hkam Gyi village. We plan to evacuate these people first and we are waiting to pick up the evacuees coming out of the villages today,” he told RFA on Monday.  “The bodies haven’t been picked up yet because they died in the bomb shelters. We haven’t been able to get inside.” The blasts killed two girls aged two and six. The airstrikes also killed four men in their 40s. The injured, mostly women, were sent to nearby Bhamo Hospital.  Many of the displaced were sent to Man Thar village monastery and are being provided with medicine and food, he added. A resident of nearby Si Kaw village who wished to remain anonymous for security reasons told RFA he was forced to flee in the middle of Saturday night, during the blasts. “We left the village at 2 a.m. There was no difficulty on the way and I came with my own motorbike. I am staying in the hall next to Man Thar Monastery,” he said. “The communities in Man Thar village provided food as soon as we arrived and the Myitta Shin Charity Group’s rescue team is picking up all the people who want to take refuge and helping them.” Kachin Independence Army spokesperson Col. Naw Bu said on Sunday that people needed to live in a safe place and protect themselves from the junta airstrikes. “There is fighting on the side of Si Hkam Gyi village. The military junta fires airstrikes all day long. The fighting continues there, like it did before,” he said. “They mainly do not attack on the ground and depend on heavy artillery and airstrikes, so people must flee for their safety as much as possible.” The junta’s Northern Region Military Command Infantry Battalions 121, 276, 123 and 15 are stationed just 48 kilometers (30 miles) away from Strategic Hill. Mansi township is one of the main supply routes to junta troops in nearby Bhamo city, which is why their attacks have been so fierce, said Col. Naw Bu. RFA contacted Kachin state’s junta spokesperson Moe Min Thein on Sunday for comment on the accusations of indiscriminate firing and civilian deaths, but he did not answer at the time of publication.  According to data compiled by RFA, junta airstrikes have killed 1,429 civilians and injured 2,641 more from the day of the coup on Feb. 1, 2021 to Jan. 31, 2024. Over 2.6 million people had been displaced due to war by the end of 2023, according to a report from the United Nations Office of Humanitarian Affairs. Translated by RFA Burmese. Edited by Mike Firn.

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‘I am devastated.’ Burmese parents’ horror at burning death of sons

Editor016 mins

Earlier this month, a video of the burning deaths of two anti-junta fighters was widely viewed by Burmese people on social media. Phoe Tay, 23, and Thar Htaung, 22, were captured Nov. 7, 2023, in fighting between pro-junta forces and resistance fighters at Myauk Khin Yan village in Magway region’s Gangaw township.   The video showed them in shackles as they were interrogated by armed men. They were then dragged to a nearby tree where they were suspended as a fire was set underneath them. The two young men screamed as flames rose up and engulfed them. The video was taken by a villager who fled the area in December, according to a local official from the administration of the shadow National Unity Government. It’s unclear who first posted the video that began circulating in early February. Phoe Tay’s father, Myint Zaw, told Radio Free Asia last week that he was aware of his son’s death but had not seen the video. Edited transcripts of RFA’s interviews with Myint Zaw and the parents of Thar Htaung – Ye San and Soe Linn – are below. Interview with Myint Zaw RFA: We watched the video of the burning alive of two youth People’s Defense Force fighters – Phoe Tay and Thar Htaung. Myint Zaw, what would you like to say first? Myint Zaw: When Phoe Tay died in action, it was immediately posted online. Yes, it is Phoe Tay, my son. He is gone. His life as a human is over.  I learned that he was beaten on the head, beaten on the knees. In one photo, he was on his knees. That image is still springing to my mind. The image is still in my phone.  After that, I didn’t know how he was killed. We could not retrieve the body. Nobody could go there because Myauk Khin Yan is a stronghold village of the pro-junta Pyu Saw Htee militias.  Phoe Tay’s father says his son joined the resistance after the 2021 coup. (Provided by family) RFA: You saw photos from just before the burning. Did you watch the video of them being burned alive? What did you hear about this video? Myint Zaw: I haven’t watched it. But there are reports about it, and many people are talking about it. My phone is not available for such things because of poor internet connections.  His friends in the village are horrified by it. “Is it true? They really did that?” People are deeply hurt. They cannot accept such an act. Many people are talking about it.  I heard that they dragged him by tying a rope around his neck and that they burned him alive. So, I’ll never forgive the perpetrators. RFA: Please tell us about Phoe Tay. What was his education?     Myint Zaw: My son, Phoe Tay, is also known as Myo Htet Aung – that was his school registration name. Before the coup, under the National League for Democracy government, he sat for the matriculation exam. Two months after the 2021 coup, when the exam results were announced, he passed with two distinctions. RFA: We learned that he joined the Yaw Defense Force. Why did he join the YDF?     Myint Zaw: When the 2021 coup d’état took place, he was in a jade mine in Hkamti, where he was learning to drive a backhoe. My nephew, his cousin, was driving a backhoe there. He brought my son there.  Then some friends called him and asked him what he was doing. With politics in his mind, he immediately returned home. Then he joined the YDF. RFA: Did he seek permission from you to join the YDF? Myint Zaw: I told my son that if I was your age, I would have already joined the resistance. My son and I had the same opinion. But he did ask for my permission. RFA: Did you talk to him at all after he joined the armed group? Myint Zaw: I still have to take care of his younger brother. After the Thadingyut festival (to celebrate the harvest moon) in October, (Phoe Tay) said we had to initiate the brother as a Buddhist novice.  He said, “Father, I can look after you only when the revolution is over. Please try hard now. We have to initiate my brother as a Buddhist novice monk. I can help you only after the revolution.” I told him not to worry about us. “I’m proud that my son sacrificed for the people and the country. But I feel sad … I am devastated,” says Phoe Tay’s father. (Provided by family) RFA: What do you do to make a living? Myint Zaw: I’m a farmer. There is a land plot given by my mother in Maw Lel village of Gangaw township. I make a living with a rice milling machine. I have a tricycle to transport sand and stones to nearby villages. RFA: On Nov. 7, when Phoe Tay was killed, did the Yaw PDF inform you? How did they inform you? Myint Zaw: They arrived one-and-a-half days later, because they had to come on foot. His comrades looked glum. They came and told us that he was killed and asked us what they should do. RFA: Did the YDF provide your family with cash? Myint Zaw: Yes, they gave us cash. They provided 2 million kyats (about US$950) for Thar Htaung and the same amount for Phoe Tay. RFA: How do you and your family feel about your son being burned alive, killed brutally and inhumanely? Myint Zaw: I’m proud that my son sacrificed for the people and the country. But I feel sad. I don’t want to talk about it. And I don’t know what to say. I am devastated. RFA: Phoe Tay might have been the smartest in the village. He passed his exam with two distinctions. What were his goals? Did he tell you about what he wanted to be? Myint Zaw: He didn’t say exactly. What he used to say was that he…

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300 Myanmar junta troops who fled attack return from Bangladesh

Editor06 mins

Some 300 members of a junta military unit and a border police force who fled to Bangladesh during an attack by the rebel Arakan Army have been repatriated to Myanmar, according to several Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh. They were returned by sea on Thursday following a handover ceremony in Cox’s Bazar that was attended by five Myanmar junta officials and Myanmar’s ambassador to Bangladesh, a Rohingya refugee told Radio Free Asia. “We learned that five representatives, including a police colonel of the Border Guard Police, came,” the Rohingya refugee said. “Also, we learned that Amb. Aung Kyaw Moe met with the chief of Border Guard Bangladesh and handed them over.” Video showed uniformed Bangladesh guards escorting the junta troops and officers – some of them wounded – onto a ship.  Cox’s Bazar is located on southeast Bangladesh’s coast near Myanmar’s western Rakhine state. Over the last decade, almost 1 million Rohingya refugees have fled from Myanmar to the Cox’s Bazar area, which has become the world’s largest refugee camp.  The junta border guards who crossed over to Bangladesh were retreating from an attack by the ethnic Arakan Army on the Taung Pyo Let Yar outpost and a nearby strategic hill in Rakhine’s Maungdaw township on Feb. 4. AA takes control of Myebon The attack marked the latest blow to Myanmar’s military junta in Rakhine state, where the Arakan Army, or AA, ended a ceasefire in November that had been in place since the junta assumed power in a Feb. 1, 2021, coup d’etat. A total of 330 people crossed over to Bangladesh in early February, including Lt. Col. Kyaw Naing Soe, the commander of the junta’s No. 2 Border Guard Police battalion, 302 soldiers, four family members, two other military personnel, 18 immigration officers and four civilians, according to RFA sources on the Bangladesh border. Elsewhere in Rakhine, the AA said it has captured all military council camps and police stations in Myebon township. The Arakan Army said in a statement on Thursday that it now controls seven towns in the state. Myanmar nationals and Border Guard Police who crossed the Bangladesh-Myanmar border to seek shelter in Bangladesh amid recent conflicts between military forces and rebel groups, are escorted back into Myanmar at Cox’s Bazar on Feb. 15, 2024. (AFP) The AA has recently launched offensives in townships near the state capital of Sittwe, including Rathedaung and Buthidaung. There are reports that the AA has warned the junta’s regional operations command in Sittwe, the Rakhine state capital, to surrender. The junta has not released a statement about recent developments in Rakhine, and RFA’s calls to Hla Thein, junta’s spokesperson and attorney general of the Rakhine state, went unanswered on Friday. Rebel victory in Kayah state The junta has also suffered a loss to rebels in northeast Kayah state, where the Karenni Nationalities Defense Force, or KNDF, announced Friday that it had gained complete control of Shadaw city after a month-long battle. The KNDF began attacking junta outposts surrounding a strategic hill in Shadaw on Jan. 15, the group said in a statement.  On Jan. 21, they began a siege to a junta base after troops refused to surrender and the junta dropped in another 70 troops by helicopter, the KNDF said. A final attack on the base began on Monday.  More than 160 junta soldiers, including a colonel and a lieutenant colonel, were either killed or captured, the KNDF said. The junta hasn’t released a statement on the battle. RFA’s calls to junta spokesman Maj. Gen. Zaw Min Tun to seek comments on the KNDF’s claims went unanswered. Translated by Htin Aung Kyaw. Edited by Matt Reed and Malcolm Foster.

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Two political prisoners killed during junta escort, Myanmar resistance group claims

Editor05 mins

Myanmar junta troops shot dead two political prisoners, including one high-profile activist, a resistance group told Radio Free Asia on Friday.  Nobel Aye and Aung Ko Hein were killed while returning from a court appearance in Bago region, north of Yangon, on Feb. 8, according to Waw township People’s Defense Force citing sources close to the court and hospital. The pair were taken to Waw township’s courthouse by junta troops when they allegedly tried to escape, the resistance group said.  Nobel Aye is known for her role in protesting against police brutality in Myanmar in 1996, and again in 2007 during the Saffron Revolution’s economic and political protests. She had been arrested twice before,  following both demonstrations. The prisoners were being interrogated at the No. 901 Artillery Station Command Headquarters, an official of the Waw People’s Defense Force said.  “They appeared in Waw Court and were shot dead near the exit of Kyaik Hla village between Waw and Paya Gyi on the way back to the military interrogation,” he said, declining to be named for security reasons. “The bodies were well-packed and sent to the morgue. No one was allowed to look at the bodies and they were cremated secretly before nightfall.” Nobel Aye’s brother, Htet Myat, said his family has not heard any official confirmation from police about his sister. “We have not yet been informed of what happened and how. I am very worried. As a family, I didn’t know what to do when people who knew about this incident confirmed it,” Htet Myat said on Friday. “I felt uncontrollable. We want reliable and accurate information to be released by those responsible.” However, the junta has denied that the prisoners died in custody. Bago’s junta spokesperson Tin Oo told RFA the information was just a rumor. “That’s wrong and fake news, dissemination of false information. We are working in accordance with the law,” he said. Nobel Aye was allegedly shot dead while returning from a court appearance in Bago region on Feb. 8, 2024. (Myanmar Political Prisoners Network) Nobel Aye and Aung Ko Hein were arrested by junta soldiers after being caught with weapons on Jan. 29, sources close to her family said. Nobel Aye was also active in distributing aid during the COVID-19 pandemic and protested frequently after the country’s 2021 military coup, they said. Aung Ko Hein is a resident of Insein township, Yangon region. RFA could not confirm his personal details.  In June 2023, troops shot and killed at least 13 political prisoners in central Bago after a prison truck crashed. According to notices junta officials sent to prisoners’ families, 37 detainees attempted to escape when a prison vehicle overturned during a transfer. RFA could not confirm the whereabouts of the remaining prisoners.  According to the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners’ Feb. 15 statement, more than 4,500 pro-democracy activists and civilians have been killed during the coup, while over 26,000 have been arrested. Translated by RFA Burmese. Edited by Mike Firn.

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Myanmar youths go into hiding to avoid getting forced into battle

Editor012 mins

With Myanmar’s junta plowing ahead toward a full-scale draft, young men say they are staying indoors to avoid getting dragooned into the army to fight in a war in which the military is losing ground and men. Most youths have no desire to fight – for the junta or the armed resistance, said a 22-year-old Mandalay resident who asked not to be identified.  “We have no choice as the junta is cornering us to join the army,” he said. “Now we don’t dare to go out – day or night. There are a lot of abductions [for forced recruitment], so I’m worried. My friends say they will join the [resistance] but I don’t know what to do, since I can’t fight.” With recent rapid advances by ethnic armies People’s Defense Force, or PDF, militias of civilians who have taken up arms against the junta, the military appears to be on the defensive as hundreds of soldiers have surrendered. Junta leader Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing announced on Feb. 10 that the People’s Military Service Law, enacted in 2010 by a previous military regime, would go into effect immediately. On Tuesday night, the junta announced the formation of a committee to oversee the conscription process. But reports suggest that the military and pro-junta militias are already rounding up as many able bodies as they can with the goal of forcing recruits to undergo simple training, putting weapons in their hands, and dumping them onto the battlefield. Eligible citizens have told RFA Burmese that they would rather join the armed resistance or flee Myanmar than fight for the junta, which seized control of the country in a Feb. 1, 2021, coup d’etat. One young resident of Yangon told RFA he would likely be killed if he is forced to join the military. “I don’t want to join and my friends feel the same, but … we can’t resist because they have weapons,” he said. “So, we have to take the training they’ll give us and if I get a chance, I will go to the liberated areas [controlled by anti-junta forces].” The ‘right’ to defend the country Junta spokesman Maj. Gen. Zaw Min Tun told military-controlled media on Tuesday that the national conscription law provides every citizen “the right” to receive military training to defend the country, and urged people not to be concerned because they wouldn’t immediately be sent to fight. “Just like us professional soldiers, you have to carry out national defense duties only after undertaking proper military training,” he said. A parade of the 78th anniversary of the Armed Forces Day which on March 27, 2023. (AFP) According to Myanmar’s compulsory military service law, men aged 18-35 and women aged 18-27 face up to five years in prison if they refuse to serve for two years. Professionals – such as doctors, engineers and technicians – aged 18-45 for men and 18-35 for women must also serve, but up to five years, given the country’s current state of emergency, extended by the junta on Feb. 1 for another six months. According to the 2019 census, there are 6.3 million men and 7.7 million women – totaling nearly 14 million people – who are eligible for military service in Myanmar, Zaw Min Tun said Tuesday. The number is equivalent to just over one-quarter of Myanmar’s population of 54 million. He added that parents “don’t need to worry” because there are more than 3,000 wards and 60,000 villages across the country, “so only one or two persons per ward need to join the military.” Zaw Min Tun’s comments did little to sooth the concerns of Yangon resident Wai Lwin Oo, whose 23-year-old son is eligible for the draft. “Parents are extremely concerned,” he said. “There are only two options and as a parent, the last thing I want to do is tell my children which path to choose … There are no parents who are amenable [to the conscription law].” Round-ups underway Residents of Yangon and Mandalay told RFA that since the military service law was announced on Feb. 10, young people are nowhere to be seen in the city after 8 p.m. Additionally, RFA received reports on Wednesday that at least 25 young people from Ngwe Than Win Ward in Yangon region’s Thanlyin township had been rounded up for conscription by joint forces of the junta and pro-junta militias conducting house-to-house inspections since Monday. The following day, at least 10 others were taken into custody from Thanlyin’s Darga ward, according to Private Sanda, an official with the local People’s Defense Force. Southwestern commander Brig. Gen. Wai Lin meets with members of militia from some townships of the Ayeyarwady region on Sept. 22, 2023. (Myanmar Military) RFA also received reports on Wednesday that the junta has been recruiting residents of five townships in Myanmar’s southwestern Ayeyarwady region for military training using a raffle drawing since January. Residents said that whoever is selected in the raffle in Kyonpyaw, Myanaung, Kyangin, Kyaiklat and Mawlamyinegyun townships and refuses to join the military is being made to pay up to 1 million kyats (US$475). A lawmaker, who declined to be named, said that the junta is targeting Ayeyarwady because the region is firmly under its control, adding that the military has a “very high demand for soldiers” because its troops are “surrendering, fleeing into other countries, and dying” on the frontlines. Attempts by RFA to reach junta officials for comment on the reported round-ups went unanswered Wednesday. ‘Human shields’ on the battlefield Zaw Min Tun, the junta spokesman, has been cited in media reports as saying that the conscription law will be put into practice after the traditional Thingyan New Year holidays in April, and 5,000 conscripts will be called up in each round. No further details have been provided. Myanmar’s shadow National Unity Government, or NUG, responded to the junta’s announcement of the formation of the Central Committee for Militia Recruitment on Tuesday with a statement urging people not to comply with the conscription…

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Mass arrests in Myanmar spark fear over conscription laws

Editor05 mins

Junta soldiers on a two-day spree have arrested young and internally displaced people, locals in Bago region told Radio Free Asia. Since enforcing the People’s Military Service Law on Saturday, junta leader Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing announced conscription would begin immediately. Refusing to serve could result in a five-year prison sentence for young men and women across the country.   This isn’t the first time the area has faced conscription efforts. Soldiers in January made rounds across several townships, trying to gain numbers through threats, fines, and incentives.  On Monday, soldiers entered Htantabin township’s Za Yat Gyi city in eastern Bago, where locals fled conflict days before the arrests. It was the site of a battle a week ago when the Karen National Liberation Army and People’s Defense Forces fought with junta troops. Around 50 people were killed by junta artillery fire and more than 10,000 were forced to leave their homes amid heavy shelling. The city was left mostly empty, but residents who chose not to flee were abducted from their homes, locals said. Junta troops stationed at Za Yat Gyi Hospital also detained young people in Htantabin township’s surrounding villages. A local in Za Yat Gyi city who wished to remain anonymous for security reasons told RFA on Tuesday that he fled because people who have reached the age of 18 are being rounded up for military service. “At the moment, the whole village is fleeing because the junta’s army entered the village and dragged people out. We are also hiding and fleeing,” he said. “They arrest women who are around 18 and 19 years old. Men at that age are also being taken to the trucks and forced to serve in the military.” Since troops began raids, villages are nearly empty, he added. Internally displaced people from nearby villages were also targeted, although locals said they could not confirm the details of the arrests.  Regime denies mass arrests Junta forces set up blockades on roads leading from Za Yat Gyi to Htantabin city and conducted spot checks and arrests at Htantabin Bridge, according to locals.  Bago residents near the Sittaung river and Kayin state border haven’t been able to get to Taungoo city, roughly 290 kilometers (180 miles) north of Htantabin since the weekend because of blockades, they said. Bago region’s junta spokesperson Tin Oo denied people were being press-ganged into military service.  “As far as arrests are concerned, we are arresting organizations related to the People’s Defense Forces and organizations that support terrorists according to the law,” he told RFA. “We do not arrest innocent people without reason.” No mass arrests occurred, and only three or four people were taken in for interrogation, he said.   On Tuesday night, the regime-backed media announced the formation of a Central Militia Recruitment Team led by the Ministry of Defense.  Translated by RFA Burmese. Edited by Mike Firn.    

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Myanmar junta kills 4 civilians in tea shop shelling

Editor05 mins

Junta shelling killed four civilians and injured seven others in Myanmar’s Sagaing region, locals told Radio Free Asia on Tuesday.  The army turned its big guns on Monywa township, where junta troops were accused of burning homes and bodies, as well as arresting children and elders last December. All the dead and injured in Hta Naung Taw village are men, said one local, declining to be named for security reasons. The injured are stable and their wounds are not life-threatening, he added. A shell exploded directly on a crowded tea shop in the village center, he said, adding that it was fired by a junta battalion based in Ma Au village on the Monywa-Mandalay road. “It dropped straight on the tea shop. The dead include a cattle broker from Kya Paing village and two brothers from Hta Naung Taw tea shop. Another one is a passenger who was having some tea,” he told RFA Burmese. RFA contacted Sagaing region’s junta spokesperson Sai Naing Naing Kyaw for more details about the shelling, but he had not returned the calls at time of publication.  The army opened fire on the village in retaliation after a battle in Hta Naung Taw 10 days ago between local defense forces and junta troops, residents said. Press-gangs in Monywa Elsewhere in Monywa, locals claim the junta’s conscription efforts have increased after regime leader Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing announced on Saturday he would immediately enforce the country’s People’s Military Service Law. The law forces men aged 18-35 and women aged 18-27 to serve for two years in the regime’s military. Professionals from a larger age bracket must serve for three to five years.  Junta police forces at a checkpoint in Monywa city on Nov. 21, 2021. (Citizen journalist) Following the announcement, junta troops seized nearly 50 men on Sunday, locals said.  Soldiers arrested roughly 20 people in Monywa’s Myawaddy neighborhood, including some sitting in a teashop on Sunday morning, witnesses said. They rounded up 28 more from public areas around the city. A Monywa resident who requested anonymity for security reasons said soldiers have been roaming the city in plain clothes, preying on locals, and conducting checks and arrests. Given that those arrested are between the ages of 18 and 35, some locals in the same age range have gone into hiding for fear of being conscripted, he said. “They often wander around the city and catch people. There are four to 10 soldiers in one place spreading out all over the city and conducting checks and arrests,” said the man. “They could be held at Monywa City Hall. I heard that some of them were being released after paying money. I don’t know how much.” Another Monywa resident said the city remained quiet until Monday morning, when people came out to do their shopping. Military-backed channel Myanmar Radio and Television called the reports fake news.  Also Sunday morning, nearly 40 passengers traveling on the Mandalay-Monywa road near Lel Gyi village, Sagaing township, were held by troops for interrogation, residents said. RFA has been unable to find out whether they have been released. According to the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, more than 26,000 people have been arrested in the three years since the coup, as of Tuesday. Translated by RFA Burmese. Edited by Mike Firn.

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Torture, forced labor alleged at Prince Group-linked compound

Editor021 mins

This is the third article in a three-part series on the Prince Group. For Part I of RFA’s investigation, click here. For Part II, click here.  Panha has an idea of the horrors that take place within the Golden Fortune Science and Technology Park in Cambodia’s southeastern border town Chrey Thom. He has witnessed what happens to those who try to leave. “When they recapture escaped workers they beat them until they’re barely alive. I’ve seen it with my own eyes,” Panha told RFA, declining to give his family name. His brother, he said, is head of security at the 15-acre (four-hectare) facility, and Panha has watched him hunt down escapees. “If you don’t beat them they will stop being afraid and more will try to escape.” While the compound is ostensibly open to the public, and billed as an industrial park, it is surrounded by a 10-foot-high (three-meter) concrete wall topped with barbed wire. Its heavy, metal front gate is manned by uniformed security guards, who bar entry to ordinary visitors.  Built by the powerful and well-connected Prince Group, the facility now counts cyberscam operations among its businesses, according to witnesses, staff and former employees. While the group denies any involvement in the park, it is run by a company headed by Prince executives and bears several other indicators of connections to the group. Golden Fortune Science and Technology Park in Chrey Thom, Cambodia, is surrounded by a 10-foot-high concrete wall topped with barbed wire. It is seen here in a recent photo. (RFA) Inside, locals allege, trafficked Vietnamese, Malaysian and Chinese nationals are forced to carry out cyberscams. They are part of an enslaved workforce that the U.N. estimates numbers approximately 100,000 people across Cambodia – a claim the government denies. Fourteen local residents – among them current and former employees working at the Golden Fortune compound – separately told RFA they had witnessed security guards violently subduing escaped workers before returning them to the compound. For security reasons, witnesses requested their names not be used. At least two other Prince Group-linked properties have previously been connected with human trafficking and cyberscam operations, according to local and international media reports.  Prince Group spokesperson Gabriel Tan told RFA that while the conglomerate built the Golden Fortune compound, it did so at the request of a client, whom he declined to identify. Asked about allegations of trafficking and cyberscam operations within the compound he added, “we are unaware of the incident you mentioned.”  Cambodian corporate records suggest that the park’s parent company, Golden Fortune, is run by Ing Dara, a businessman with extensive ties to the Prince Group. He holds directorships in a number of Prince companies, including one cited by the Prince Group’s founder as the ultimate source of his wealth in disclosures to an offshore bank. Ing Dara and Golden Fortune could not be reached for comment.  RFA has previously revealed that Chinese police have established a special task force to investigate the Prince Group’s alleged money laundering and illegal online gambling operations run from Cambodia. In part two of our series, RFA explored how illicit funds appear to be washed and funneled into legal Prince Group-affiliated businesses.  This final installment in the three-part investigation into the company explores allegations that one of its facilities holds victims of Asia’s blossoming cyber-slavery industry.  Dirty jobs Chrey Thom is a one-road town abutting the Bassac river just a few hundred yards upstream from Vietnam. Like many border communities in Cambodia, the town is thick with casinos built to service foreigners who face restrictions on gambling in their own countries.  A Cambodian government crackdown against online casinos in 2019 forced many to close. In some cases, the empty real estate has been taken over by criminal gangs that force trafficked workers to perform cyber fraud. Such frauds have exploded in recent years, in particular “pig butchering” in which victims are lured into putting large sums of money into phony investment schemes. However, those performing the scams are often also victims held against their will and forced to find people to dupe using various online platforms.  As cyberscam operations have proliferated, they’ve also been found operating in office blocks, apartment complexes and what appear to be purpose-built compounds.  A “hotel” just outside the Golden Fortune compound in Chrey Thom, Cambodia, has bars on its balconies to keep people from getting out, sources tell RFA. (RFA) Set on 15 acres of land and surrounded by concrete walls topped with barbed wire, the Golden Fortune facility hosts a soccer field, a basketball court and 18 large dormitory style buildings, all of which were constructed since mid-2019, according to satellite imagery reviewed by RFA.  Metal bars cover the dormitory windows on each of the five floors, suggesting they are designed to keep people in. Those allegedly imprisoned inside are mostly Vietnamese and Chinese, locals said. Cambodians work inside the compound, too, in security roles. Online Khmer-language advertisements for jobs within the compound seen by RFA called for Cambodians who speak Vietnamese, offering a salary of $600-800 a month on top of three meals a day and accommodation.  Though relatively well-paid, such work is wholly unappealing to 60-year-old Moeun, who asked that her full name not be used. She spoke with RFA reporters while standing in the thigh-high oily water of a drainage canal, catching fish with her bare hands. “If we don’t do good work and torture they will cut our salaries, so we prefer to come here and catch some fish to get some money,” said Moeun, whose children had worked inside the compound. “Besides working for them, what else can we do?”  A former Golden Fortune security guard says workers who escaped from the compound, the triangle-shaped area seen in this Dec. 19, 2023 satellite image, would be hunted down and bounties offered for their return. (CNES/Airbus) Her account was confirmed by a current Golden Fortune employee, who told RFA that disobedient or unproductive workers are detained on the first floor of a building…

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The case for seating overseas legislators in Southeast Asian parliaments

Editor012 mins

Around 1.7 million Indonesians living overseas are registered to vote in this month’s presidential and legislative elections, a mammoth task for the General Elections Commission, which has had to prepare 828 voting booths at Indonesian representative offices worldwide, as well as 1,579 mobile voting boxes and 652 drop boxes for absentee voting.  How many overseas Indonesians will actually turn out to vote is another matter, and will there be any further controversy after reports that ballots were given to overseas nationals too early? According to a review by the Philippines’ Commission on Elections published this month, of the estimated 10 million overseas Filipinos, only 1.6 million are registered to vote and only 600,000 (around 40 per cent) did so at the 2022 elections.  Expat Filipinos react as presidential candidate and former president Joseph Estrada speaks during a campaign event in Hong Kong, April 4, 2010. (Tyrone Siu/Reuters) Most Southeast Asian governments, at least the more democratic ones, are looking at ways of reforming how overseas nationals vote. The Philippines’ electoral commission says it intends to have an online voting system in place by 2025 for overseas nationals, although there is still talk that this might be cost-prohibitive and could require digital voting to be rolled out at home too, which is simply too difficult for the election commissions of most Southeast Asian countries for now.  In Malaysia, where overseas balloting has been in something of a mess for the past decade, parliamentarians last month hit on fixed-term parliaments as one way to fix the problem.  However, it might be worth pondering why overseas voters are still asked to vote for representatives in parliament who live hundreds of miles away from them, whose priority is to represent constituents back at home, and who may know nothing about the concerns of overseas nationals.  Constituencies mismatched In Indonesia, for instance, votes from overseas Indonesians go to deciding the seven seats in the House of Representatives sent by Jakarta II district. (Jakarta II, which is Central and South Jakarta, was chosen because that’s where the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is located.)  This may actually be superior to how other Southeast Asian states count overseas ballots – indeed, at least the seven congresspeople from Jakarta II district know they’re supposed to represent overseas constituents. Compare that to Thailand, where overseas voters select the candidates in the constituency where they are from or were registered, so a Thai living in London but who hails from, say, Chiang Mai province votes for the MPs from Chiang Mai province. But how can the MP from Chiang Mai province be expected to adequately represent overseas electors when perhaps only 0.1% of the ballots cast for them came from overseas? An Indonesian voter receives a ballot-slip at the Indonesian Embassy in Singapore to vote in presidential election, July 8, 2009 (Wong Maye-E/AP) Why not, instead, make overseas voters a separate district and allocate six or seven seats solely for them? They could have one seat for an MP representing Indonesians in North America, another for Indonesians in Europe, another for those in Northeast Asia, another for Southeast Asia, and so forth.  And these seats would be occupied by candidates who live overseas. Imagine the Indonesian congressperson who resides in Berlin, New York, Seoul, or Melbourne. They obviously would be able to understand better the concerns and problems facing other Indonesians living abroad.  Aloof from local politics There’s a democratic element to this, too. An overseas MP wouldn’t have to mix daily with their peers in Manila, Kuala Lumpur or Jakarta. They would, on the one hand, remain aloof from the politicking and palm-greasing back home and, on the other hand, be able to bring new ideas learned from abroad back to their capitals.  They could attend parliamentary sessions every month or two, funded by the state, and spend most of their time abroad, where they could also work more closely with their country’s embassies in the regions they represent.  Officials check documentation of Indonesians living in Malaysia as they stand to cast overseas ballots ahead of the Indonesia’s general election, in Kuala Lumpur, April 14, 2019. (Mohd Rasfan/AFP) Currently, almost 10 million overseas Filipinos are represented by several government bodies, such as the Commission on Filipinos Overseas, an agency under the Office of the President. However, having overseas MPs in parliament would provide another layer of representation for nationals living abroad, allowing their voices to be heard by the government bodies and by overseas-based elected representatives.  Indeed, protecting the large population of overseas Filipinos is one of the three pillars of Manila’s foreign policy initially laid out in the 1990s, yet those emigrants have little legislative representation.  It isn’t a revolutionary idea to have overseas-based MPs represent overseas voters. France’s National Assembly has eleven lawmakers representing overseas constituencies. Italy’s parliament has had eight.  Global examples Nor is it specifically a European idea. The Algerian parliament has eight MPs who represent overseas nationals. Angola, Cape Verde, Mozambique, Peru and Tunisia, to name but a few, also have some parliamentary seats set aside for overseas constituencies.  To quickly rebut one argument against it, it would not require a massive change to the composition of parliaments, nor would it require too many administrative changes. At the most, we’re talking about less than ten seats, so a fraction of parliament in a country like Thailand, whose National Assembly has 500 seats! Philippine Senate president Juan Ponce Enrile looks at a tally board during the counting of overseas votes for presidential and vice-presidential candidates at the House of Representatives in Manila, May 28, 2010. (Romeo Ranoco/Reuters) But if electoral commissions are now pondering ideas to better include their overseas nationals in the democratic process, it might be worth considering the more affordable and, perhaps, more democratic option of giving a handful of seats in parliament to overseas representatives.  Nor, indeed, would it be a terrible idea if campaigners in Southeast Asia’s autocracies suggested this as a rational way of protecting their overseas compatriots –…

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Eight songs that didn’t make it into China’s Lunar New Year gala

Editor025 mins

As people across China welcome the Year of the Dragon, the ruling Communist Party’s propaganda machine has stepped up a campaign of “positive energy” and “good news” about the economy despite widespread reports of slashed bonuses, unpaid wages and youth unemployment and disenchantment. Yet the songs that have truly resonated with people during the past year weren’t featured on the annual star-studded Spring Festival Gala show aired by state broadcaster CCTV on Friday.  Most of these songs first emerged on social media and became quite popular – until censors blocked many of them. But people are still able to see and hear them using virtual private networks, or VPNs, or finding other ways to circumvent China’s “Great Firewall.” Some are still viewable on Bilibili, the Chinese version of YouTube, or other social media platforms.   1. “You’re Not Really Happy” by Mayflower “Are you happy?” an interviewer asks an oil-smeared mechanic at the start of a reboot of the 2008 Mayflower hit “You’re not really happy.” “Sure,” says the man, adding that happiness is fixing cars and not giving his parents any cause to worry. “But what about your happiness?” asks the interviewee. “I don’t know,” says the man uncertainly, in a remixed video posted to X by citizen journalist Mr Li is not your teacher. Undercutting propaganda images of a prosperous country that is merely undergoing some “problems and challenges,” the song’s lyrics highlight the need to pretend everything is fine, just to survive. “You’re not really happy — that smile’s just a disguise,” say the lyrics. “The world laughs, and you join in, hiding your tears. Survival’s the game, no choice, just comply.” “Why take this punishment when you’ve already lost … let sorrow end now, start fresh, breathe new air,” it concludes, striking a chord with X users when it was posted on Feb. 2, ahead of the Lunar New Year festivities. “Chinese people’s happiness is like North Korean happiness, like Stockholm syndrome happiness,” commented @pifuzhinu113541 on the video. “Because ‘unhappiness’ is a crime!” “This is most people,” added @Louis00135, while @DodgyLee1 quipped: “Propaganda department: Don’t spread rumors if you don’t believe them. Also the propaganda department: The whole country is brimming with optimism!”  U.S.-based current affairs commentator Tang Jingyuan said the song “lays bare the scars that lie below the glamorous image projected by the Chinese Communist Party.” “The video raises the question why, in the world’s second-largest economy, so many people from different social classes, men, women and children, are having such a hard time, and can’t achieve happiness,” Tang said.   2. “Descendants of the Dragon” by Namewee Malaysian rapper Namewee’s love letter to the “little pinks” drips with cultural references and political irony, and has notched up more than 7 million views since it dropped — just in time to welcome the Year of the Dragon. Complete with emperor figure in a Winnie-the-Pooh mask as a stand-in for Communist Party leader Xi Jinping, the song isn’t the first time Namewee has taken aim at the “little pinks,” some of whom recently also went viral in a stand-off with British boogie-woogie pianist Brendan Kavanagh around the public piano at London’s St. Pancras Station.     Images and references to Winnie-the-Pooh are banned by Chinese internet censors due to a supposed resemblance to Xi, who is suspected of ordering the removal of Lunar New Year’s Eve from the list of official public holidays this year, because its name (除夕 chúxì）is a homophone for “get rid of Xi” (除习 chúxí). According to Namewee’s Facebook page, the song is satirically “dedicated to every Chinese at home and abroad from all over the world (including Singapore, Malaysia, Hong Kong, and Taiwan), to defend the dignity of the Chinese people!” “As a ‘descendant of the dragon,’ we must always remember: Love the party, love the country, love the chairman!”  The track fires out multiple puns on the Chinese word for dragon, “龙 lóng,” taking aim at those who further the aims of the authoritarian government, despite not wanting to live under its rule. “There’s a group of people from the East,” Namewee raps, “who love their motherland but live in London, Cambodia, Northern Myanmar and Thailand … everywhere, from NYC to LA, chain-smoking, talking on the phone all day, to their cousins and their nephews, calling all their fellow villagers to come and join them.” “Hating on Japan and dissing the U.S. is our duty … flooding YouTube, criticizing and spreading fake news — FALSE!” it says. “His Majesty dons the Dragon Robe,” Namewee raps, while dancing alongside “Emperor Poo.” “Together, we learn to roar like a dragon.” A Chinese person who recently emigrated to Australia and gave only the nickname Liga for fears of reprisals said anti-communist culture is now hip, with the potential to reach large global audiences. “This is a new trend, the attractiveness of anti-communist creative content, which can be monetized,” Liga said. “It shows that people who are dissatisfied with the Chinese Communist Party are now a political force that cannot be ignored, despite not having the right to vote.” “Their influence is pretty formidable, with the help of the internet,” they said.   3. “Qincheng Prison Welcomes You” by RutersXiaoFanQi Chinese censors have gone to considerable lengths to have the channel silenced, filing takedown requests that YouTube has complied with despite growing concerns over Beijing’s “long-arm” overseas law enforcement. The channel’s song “Qincheng Prison Welcomes You” opens with the face of Winnie-the-Pooh shining down as the sun, and warns that anyone found insulting Xi will find themselves welcome at Beijing’s notorious Qincheng Prison. YouTuber @RutersXiaoFanQi puts out a steady stream of spoof videos and satirical content targeting Xi Jinping, in what has become a sub-genre using the hashtag #InsultTheBun. “Insult Winnie, commit thought crimes, the trail to jail is your fate,” sing the robotic synthesized voices. “Make yourselves at home, fellow inmates, old and new alike.” “You may laugh, but you’re on the list — can’t you see?” “The monarchy’s no longer a…

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Investigative Journalism Reportika © March 2022 by Ij-Reportika is licensed under CC BY 4.0