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Category: ASEAN

Junta jet attack kills man in Myanmar’s Kayah state

Editor04 mins

A junta plane attacked two villages in Myanmar’s eastern Kayah state Friday morning, killing a man and injuring two children, locals told RFA. The aircraft first strafed Li Khu Pa Yar village in Hpruso township around midnight Thursday before returning to drop bombs on Li Khu Pa Yar and Do Yaw villages before dawn on Friday. “Li Khu Pa Yar and Do Yaw village are not close so, when Li Khu Pa Yar was fired on from the air at midnight, people in Do Yaw village did not flee as they thought the shooting would not reach their village,” said a local who didn’t want to be named for security reasons. “But both Li Khu Pa Yar and Do Yaw villages were bombed from the air at 4 p.m. Some people were sleeping so they didn’t flee.” The local said the man who died was in his forties but didn’t give the ages of the children. He said five houses in Do Yaw were destroyed by the bombing. Executive Director of the Karenni Human Rights Group, Banyar – who goes by a single name – confirmed the death and injuries and said the details are still being investigated. Li Khu Pa Yar and Do Yaw are small villages with fewer than 50 houses in a state with a low population compared with the rest of Myanmar. Locals said the junta attacked by air because road transport is difficult in Hpruso township. Although the Karenni Defense Forces are active in Kayah state, residents told RFA they had no idea why the junta targeted their villages. Many have now taken refuge in the nearby jungle. RFA called Kaya state’s junta spokesperson Aung Win Oo Friday but nobody answered. According to a June 1 statement by the Progressive Karenni People’s Force there have been 699 battles in three townships in Kayah and neighboring Shan states since the Feb. 1, 2021 coup and the junta has carried out 463 airstrikes. The ethnic armed group said 462 people were killed in Kayah state due to fighting over that period and 15 died in airstrikes. Translated by RFA Burmese. Edited by Mike Firn.

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‘I will never forget the pain of being beaten’

Editor08 mins

She knew she was being sought by authorities for reporting on anti-junta protests.  In the seven months since the military had carried out a coup d’etat in February 2021, Myanmar had descended into chaos, Her husband, a former journalist, had been detained for four days before being released. Fearing for her safety, Thuzar San decided to buy a bus ticket from Yangon for the Thai border town of Mae Sot, due to depart on Sept. 2, 2021. But two days before she was to leave, she was arrested by police while her taxi was stopped at a traffic light by plain clothes police officers. “We were asked to put our hands on our heads on the side of the road while they searched the car and then they handcuffed us, forced us to get into a truck at gunpoint, and blindfolded us,” she told Radio Free Asia.  Thuzar was one of the locally-hired reporters at RFA Burmese Service’s Yangon office from 2013-2014. “There was another woman with us. When we arrived at the [interrogation] center, they said, ‘Let the lady exit first,’ so I asked if it was me they were talking about. All of a sudden, they slapped me in the face.” During that first night, Thuzar’s interrogators subjected her to brutal mental and physical abuse in a bid to learn what she knew about the junta opposition and other journalists who had covered the protests. “Four guys circled me and whipped me with a bundle of three [bamboo] canes bound together,” she said. “They asked me the names of the two young men I met during the protest. I was friends with them on Facebook, but I didn’t know much about them.” Her captors beat her five times with a bamboo sapling that evening and said the wounds on her thighs took “more than a year” to heal. “I will never forget the pain of being beaten with the bamboo sapling,” she said. Ruthlessly whipped Later, she was taken from her cell, blindfolded and led outside, where she was made to kneel on the pavement. Again, her captors beat her, demanding to know how she planned to travel to Thailand, which organizations she had ties to and which reporters planned to flee along with her. “Three guys circled me and whipped me with canes – it was so painful,” she said. “This time, they pierced my flesh with the [sharpened] tip of the bamboo sapling and it was agonizing.” Myanmar freelance journalist Thuzar San was tortured after being arrested. Credit: A Hla Lay Thuzar Facebook When Thuzar told the men that she had nothing to divulge about her fellow reporters, they threatened to videotape her forced confession as “evidence” that she was a junta informant and hold her daughter hostage. “They told me that they could make me talk and said, ‘We’ll bring in your daughter and beat her in front of you,” she said. “After that, I couldn’t stop crying. Finally, they sent me back to my cell.” Over the course of several days, Thuzar was interrogated by several people.  On the ninth day of her detention, her captors took her fingerprints and sent a statement to the local police station, saying that she took part in anti-junta protests while covering the event as a reporter. To Insein Prison She was kept in police custody for nearly a month on charges of reporting fake news and inciting the public against the government. On Nov. 22, 2021, she was sentenced to two years in Yangon’s notorious Insein Prison with hard labor. Thuzar described life at Insein Prison as a constant violation of her human rights. “I stayed in Female Ward No. 9, which was like a hall with closed circuit cameras installed in it,” she said. “We had to change our clothes and use the toilet there [in front of the cameras]. The prison officials regularly scolded us and used harsh words. Our rights were severely violated.” Thuzar was released as part of a general amnesty on Jan. 4, 2023, after spending 15 months in prison.  As she was no longer safe in Myanmar, she fled to Thailand along with her family in March. While she feels unmoored as a refugee in a foreign country, Thuzar said she stays strong thinking about the sacrifices of those who have given their lives in opposition to junta rule. She vowed to return to Myanmar as soon as possible so that she can join together with those fighting for democracy and a better future in her home country. Translated by Htin Aung Kyaw. Edited by Joshua Lipes and Malcolm Foster.

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Myanmar junta arrests 50 social media users for ‘anti-regime’ posts

Editor03 mins

Myanmar’s junta has arrested and prosecuted 50 people in the past seven days for allegedly posting anti-regime content on social media platforms, according to news releases by the military regime. The week-long crackdown began on June 14, according to junta announcements Tuesday and Wednesday, which said people had been prosecuted under anti terrorism laws for comments they made on Facebook, Telegram and TikTok. The arrests culminated in the detention of 30 people on Wednesday. Among those arrested, 12 were from Yangon region, with others from Mandalay, Sagaing, Magway, Bago and Ayeyarwady regions, Shan and Kayin states. One Yangon city resident described the arrests as arbitrary. “The junta’s statements are just propaganda,” said the man who declined to be named for safety reasons. “They impose the sentences they like.” According to junta-controlled newspapers, those arrested will be prosecuted under Section 52 (a) of the Counter-Terrorism Act – which carries a maximum penalty of seven years in prison. They also face prosecution under Section 124 (a) of the Penal Code – which carries a sentence of up to seven years for sedition – Section 505 (a) of the Penal Code – which carries a maximum three-year term for high treason – and Section 33 (a) of the Electronic Transactions Act – which carries a maximum prison sentence of 15 years for using technology for acts detrimental to the security of the state. According to figures exclusively compiled by RFA and based on junta statements, at least 1,050 people who posted or reshared posts deemed to be anti-regime were arrested between February 2022 and April 2023. Translated by RFA Burmese. Edited by Mike Firn.

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High stakes in Vietnam’s Central Highlands

Editor013 mins

On June 11, a group of Montagnards in Vietnam’s Central Highlands attacked the offices of two communes with small arms and molotov cocktails, killing four policemen, two commune officials, and three civilians. The attackers wounded two other policemen and burnt the commune offices. This prompted an immediate and massive government response.  As of the time of writing, 74 people have been arrested, including, allegedly, one of the group’s masterminds. Two people turned themselves in, and the government has promised leniency for others who surrender.  Montagnard villagers throw stones during a protest in Vietnam’s central highland province of Dak Lak in this screenshot from video taken on April 10, 2004. Credit: Dak Lak Provincial People Committee handout via Reuters So far, almost all of the information about the events has come from the government side, so there is clearly a bias in the reporting. The government has selectively leaked a lot of information and ensured that the story has gotten coverage in the state-controlled media.  The Communist Party of Vietnam immediately dispatched deputy prime minister Tran Luu Quang and the deputy minister of public security Luong Tam Quang to signal government control, a sign of the government’s insecurity. Legitimate grievances Dak Lak and the Central Highlands are not new to unrest, though gun violence is very rare in Vietnam. But the region has not been beset by violence for a while, which begs some questions: Why now? What prompted this latest spate of unrest? There are a number of underlying issues for any unrest involving the Montagnards, a broad grouping for some 30 different tribes, in the Central Highlands.  Beginning in the 1990s, the Vietnamese government began to encourage migration of ethnic Kinh Vietnamese to the region to establish coffee plantations and other agribusinesses.  U.S. Special Forces personnel show Montagnard fighters the finer points of rifle handling and safety during a training session in July 1962. Credit: Horst Faas/Associated Press Today, Vietnam is the second largest coffee producer in the world, exporting over 1 million metric tons in 2022, and almost all of it comes from the Central Highlands.  But that put the Kinh population at odds with the Montagnards, who practiced swidden agriculture: burning forests, farming for a few years, and then moving on to new land. All of a sudden, with land titles going to the Vietnamese settlers, the Montagnards were unable to practice their traditional agriculture, its environmental degradation and inefficiency.  Beyond the economic interests in encouraging Kinh settlement, the government had a political interest in settling the region. The Montagnards had close ties to both the French colonial government as well as the Americans. Persecuted minorities often seek protection from the majority population. During the Vietnam War, the United States relied on the Montagnards and the Hmong in neighboring Laos to interdict North Vietnamese troops and supplies along the Ho Chi Minh Trail. Hanoi has never forgiven them for this. But while the Montagnards often portray their struggle as being anti-communist, it’s important to note that the government of the pre-1975 Republic of Vietnam treated them terribly, too, believing that they were abetting North Vietnamese on the Ho Chi Minh Trail. South Vietnamese government officials shared the same mistrust and condescension as their rivals in Hanoi. Beyond politics, there is simply a lot of condescension by Kinh towards the poor tribes that constitute the Montagnards. For the Montagnards, this is simply a form of internal colonialism; indeed, some Montagnards do not even respect Vietnamese sovereignty. Montagnard hill tribesmen emerge from dense forest northeast of Ban Lung, in Cambodia’s northeastern province of Ratanakiri July 22, 2004. Credit: Adrees Latif/Reuters That animus and mistrust is further compounded in Hanoi by the fact that many of the Montagnards are Evangelical Christians. The Vietnam Fatherland Front, an arm of the Communist Party responsible for mass organizations and religions, only recognizes six religions, controlling their clergy and organization.  Evangelical Christianity continues to go unrecognized, and, as such, the house churches are technically illegal. That many of the Montagnard congregations are supported by faith groups in the United States and elsewhere compounds Hanoi’s paranoia.   Land and religious freedom remain at the heart of Montagnard grievances, but there are others.  The Central Highlands remains a poor region of the country, lagging in human development indicators, educational opportunity, and public health. While Vietnam enjoyed over 8 percent economic growth in 2022 and was the darling of foreign investors, receiving over $22.4 billion in investment, that prosperity is nowhere to be seen in the Central Highlands. And while we should not be conspiratorial about this, we do need to consider that the unrest comes at a time when U.S.-Vietnamese relations are set to be upgraded to a “strategic partnership.” CPV General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong has agreed in principle to visit Washington this summer, and President Biden is expected to travel to Vietnam in the fall. Not everyone in Vietnam’s conservative and xenophobic national security establishment and party echelons are happy with the deepened ties. A full-on crackdown is likely to prompt the U.S. Congress to scrutinize Vietnam’s already dismal human rights record, assault on independent journalists and environmental activists, and control over social media.  The quick and effective government response has not been bad for the Vietnam Ministry of Public Security or its minister, To Lam, who immediately promoted the four officers posthumously and moved quickly to compensate their kin and the wounded officers.  What do we know about the attacks? So far we know very little about the motivation for the attacks or the group’s organization or foreign ties, if any. Montagnard organizations in the United States have denied any involvement.  Montagnards who fled Vietnam’s Central Highlands wait in Cambodia’s Senmonorom in Mondulkiri province, which borders Vietnam, May 15, 2001. Credit: Reuters A spokesman for the ministry of public security said the group had acted in “an organized manner, reckless, ruthless and without humanity.” Suspects, allegedly, had been “ordered to kill officers and local police on sight, taking their assets and weapons.”  According…

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Junta announces deaths of 5 people accused of attacking police station

Editor03 mins

Junta authorities have announced the deaths of four men and a woman, arrested in connection with an attack on a police station in Myanmar’s central Bago region, a local People’s Defense Force militia group told RFA this week. They were among 34 locals arrested on suspicion of involvement in the April 27 attack on the police station in Waw township’s Nyaung Khar Shey village. On Monday, an official of the Waw township People Defense Force told RFA that families had been notified of the deaths of 53-year old Tin Myo Khaing; 52-year-old Win Zaw Htay; 45-year-old San Shey; 60-year-old Mya Thein; and 35-year-old Kyaw Myint Thein, all from villages in the township.  They were told to hold funerals but did not receive the bodies. “Family members were called to see the body of Myint Thein from Kyon Par village last month,” said the official, who declined to be named for security reasons.  “He was shot and caught as he tried to flee from the roof of his house … We don’t know when the other people arrested died and did not see their bodies.” The official added that two other men, San Shey and Kyaw Myint Thein, were shot before their arrests. RFA tried to contact the families but they didn’t want to talk because of safety concerns. Calls to the junta spokesperson for Bago region, Tin Oo, seeking information on the deaths went unanswered. People’s Defense Joint Forces attacked the police station in April, leading to a police roundup of locals over several days. They took in 20 people for questioning on April 27 and 28 and another 14 on May 1. Locals said they don’t know if those arrested will be charged or released and RFA has been unable to contact the local police. Translated by RFA Burmese. Edited by Mike Firn.

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China’s president meets top US diplomat in Beijing

Editor014 mins

Chinese President Xi Jinping met with U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken at the Great Hall of the People on Tiananmen Square in Beijing late Monday afternoon in a climax of high-stakes diplomacy. Xi said he hoped the U.S. diplomat’s visit would stabilize ties, adding that state-to-state interactions should be based on mutual respect, Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying, who was present in the meeting, wrote in a tweet. Blinken had earlier met with China’s top foreign policy official Wang Yi and Foreign Minister Qin Gang.  Achieving a meeting with Xi, who is also China’s General Party Secretary, was widely perceived as the key measure of the success of Blinken’s visit as the two nations’ relations plumbed depths not seen since the countries diplomatically recognized each other in 1978.  President Joe Biden said he hoped to see Xi in several months.  Blinken is the first secretary of state to visit China in five years, amid China’s strict COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns and strains over China’s claims on the self-governing island of Taiwan, Russia’s war in Ukraine, Beijing’s human rights record, assertive Chinese military moves in the South China Sea and technology trade. “This visit was basically a means of re-establishing the normal process of contacts between the U.S. and China that was supposed to follow the Bali Xi-Biden meeting but then got derailed by the spy balloon,” Andrew Small, a senior transatlantic fellow with the U.S. German Marshall Fund’s Indo-Pacific Program told RFA. “It is intended to pave the way for other visits to China … and ultimately an expected visit from Xi Jinping for the APEC meeting in San Francisco.”  The Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit will be held in the Californian city on November 12 this year.  Small described China-U.S. relations as essentially “frozen” prior to the trip, adding, “​​The US side anticipated that, assuming meetings with Wang Yi and Qin Gang proceeded according to plan, Blinken would see Xi Jinping, and it was understood to be important that various messages could be delivered directly to him.” ‘Candid, substantive, and constructive’ On Sunday Blinken began the two days of meetings with 7½  hours of direct talks and a dinner meeting with Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang, discussing a host of topics and agreeing to work together on increasing the number of flights between the U.S. and China, a senior state department official said. Blinken invited Qin to continue the discussions in the U.S, and the spokesperson said the pair agreed to schedule a visit at a “mutually suitable time.”  A senior official said, under the condition of anonymity, that the meeting between Blinken and Qin was not about reading talking points to one another, describing the exchange of views as a substantive conversation. The PRC readout on the meeting said, “China is committed to building a stable, predictable and constructive China-U.S. relationship,” which Bonnie Glazer, managing director of the German Marshall Fund’s Indo-Pacific program and nonresident fellow with the Lowy Institute in Sydney, Australia, described in a tweet thread as “important.” U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken walks with Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang at the Diaoyutai State Guesthouse in Beijing, China, Sunday, June 18, 2023. Credit: Leah Millis/Pool Photo via AP Blinken’s talks with Qin were “candid, substantive, and constructive,” said State department spokesperson Matthew Miller. “The Secretary emphasized the importance of diplomacy and maintaining open channels of communication across the full range of issues to reduce the risk of misperception and miscalculation,” Miller said in a written statement late Sunday. Blinken, the spokesperson added, “raised a number of issues of concern, as well as opportunities to explore cooperation on shared transnational issues with the PRC where our interests align.” Chinese state media described the talks as “candid, in-depth and constructive communication on the overall relationship between China and the United States and related important issues.” A report by China’s foreign ministry quoted Qin as saying that “Sino-US relations are at the lowest point since the establishment of diplomatic relations. This does not conform to the fundamental interests of the two peoples, nor does it meet the common expectations of the international community.” ‘Crucial juncture’ On Monday morning, amid much suspense as to whether Xi would agree to meet him, Blinken met with China’s top foreign policy official Wang Yi to discuss re-forging diplomatic channels of communication between the powers. Observers in Beijing described the meeting as “frosty” but free of acrimony, unlike their last meeting, in Munich in March this year, when the two traded barbs in their first meeting since the U.S. shot down a Chinese spy balloon on February 4. U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken (second from left without mask) meets with China’s Director of the Office of the Central Foreign Affairs Commission Wang Yi (second from right without mask) at the Diaoyutai State Guesthouse in Beijing, China, June 19, 2023.  Credit: Reuters/Leah Millis/Pool The Chinese readout described the meeting as coming at a “crucial juncture” in U.S.-China relations and that choices needed to be made between dialog or confrontation, cooperation or conflict, while blaming the downturn in relations on the “U.S. sides erroneous understanding of China.” Wang asked the U.S. to stop “hyping up the China threat,” lift its “illegal sanctions,” stop hindering China’s technological progress and said that on the subject of Taiwan, which he described as “core of China’s core interests,” there was “no room for compromise.” Little progress on key issues The two sides appeared to have made no progress on key issues such as Taiwan, trade, human rights and stemming the flow of chemicals used in the production of the synthetic opioid fentanyl. “Despite very low expectations for any breakthroughs made during Blinken’s visit to China, there is still hope that both sides can maintain their ‘bottom line’ in the relationship,” state tabloid Global Times said in an editorial on Monday. It added, “It is normal for any country to have low expectations after being continuously suppressed by the US.” Derek Grossman, a former daily intelligence briefer to the director of…

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High stakes, low expectations as top US diplomat opens China visit

Editor010 mins

UPDATED AT 02:00 pm EDT on 2023-06-18 U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken opened a high-stakes visit to China on Sunday with lengthy talks with top Chinese officials that both countries described as “candid” and “constructive” and called for more stable ties after years of rising tensions. Blinken is the first secretary of state to visit China in five years, amid China’s strict coronavirus pandemic lockdowns and strains over the self-governing island of Taiwan, Russia’s war in Ukraine, Beijing’s human rights record, assertive Chinese military moves in the South China Sea and technology trade. The top U.S. diplomat began two days of meetings with extended talks with Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang and other officials and a working dinner at Diaoyutai State Guesthouse. Neither Blinken nor Qin made any substantive public comments during their meetings. Blinken’s talks with Qin were “candid, substantive, and constructive,” said State department spokesperson Matthew Miller. “The Secretary emphasized the importance of diplomacy and maintaining open channels of communication across the full range of issues to reduce the risk of misperception and miscalculation,” Miller said in written statement late Sunday. Blinken, the spokesperson added “raised a number of issues of concern, as well as opportunities to explore cooperation on shared transnational issues with the PRC where our interests align.” Chinese state media described the talks as “candid, in-depth and constructive communication on the overall relationship between China and the United States and related important issues.” The report quoted Qin as saying that “Sino-US relations are at the lowest point since the establishment of diplomatic relations. This does not conform to the fundamental interests of the two peoples, nor does it meet the common expectations of the international community.” “China is committed to building a stable, predictable and constructive Sino-US relationship,” the Chinese-language report quoted Qin as saying. “It is hoped that the U.S. side will uphold an objective and rational understanding of China, meet China halfway, maintain the political foundation of Sino-U.S. relations, and handle unexpected incidents calmly, professionally and rationally,” the Chinese foreign minister added. As he had in a blunt pre-meeting phone call with Blinken on Wednesday, however, Qin said China would not budge on its “core interests,” including that the self-governing island of Taiwan will be reunited with the mainland. Qin called Taiwan “the core of China’s core interests, the most important issue in Sino-US relations, and the most prominent risk,” Sunday’s readout said. Blinken is slated to have further talks with Qin, as well as China’s top diplomat Wang Yi, director of the Central Foreign Affairs Office, on Monday. Observers see a possible meeting with President Xi Jinping as a barometer of Beijing’s willingness to re-engage with Washington after years of frosty ties. U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, center, left, walks with Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang, center right, at the Diaoyutai State Guesthouse in Beijing, China, Sunday, June 18, 2023. (Leah Millis/Pool Photo via AP) The visit comes after almost a year of strained relations between the Biden administration and Beijing, which began with then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s trip to Taiwan in August. Other irritants include China’s diplomatic and propaganda support for Russia for its war against Ukraine, and U.S. allegations that Beijing is attempting to boost its worldwide surveillance capabilities. Blinken postponed a planned February trip to China after a suspected Chinese spy balloon flew over U.S. airspace and was shot down. This visit went ahead despite the revelations early this month of a multibillion-dollar Chinese spy base in Cuba. He told reporters before leaving Friday that Washington wants to improve communications “precisely so that we can make sure we are communicating as clearly as possible to avoid possible misunderstandings and miscommunications.” ‘Legitimate differences’ President Joe Biden told White House reporters Saturday he was “hoping that over the next several months, I’ll be meeting with Xi again and talking about legitimate differences we have, but also how … to get along.” U.S. defense officials say Chinese officials have refused phone calls since Blinken canceled a planned trip to Beijing in February due to the Chinese spy balloon. Beijing asserts it was a weather balloon. Chinese Defense Minister Li Shangfu also declined to meet with U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin at the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore earlier at the start of the month, with Li instead using the forum to accuse the United States of “double standards.” U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken (2nd R) and China’s Foreign Minister Qin Gang (2nd L) meet at the Diaoyutai State Guesthouse in Beijing on June 18, 2023. Credit: Leah Millis / POOL / AFP There have been recent high-level contacts, including a trip to China by CIA chief William Burns in May, a visit to the U.S. by China’s commerce minister, and a meeting in Vienna Austria between Wang and Biden’s national security adviser Jake Sullivan. Reuters news agency quoted a senior State Department official as telling reporters during a refueling stop in Tokyo that Washington and Beijing understand they need to communicate more. “There’s a recognition on both sides that we do need to have senior-level channels of communication,” the official said. “That we are at an important point in the relationship where I think reducing the risk of miscalculation, or as our Chinese friends often say, stopping the downward spiral in the relationship, is something that’s important,” the official said. “Hope this meeting can help steer China-U.S. relations back to what the two Presidents agreed upon in Bali,” tweeted Chinese assistant foreign minister Hua Chunying. Biden and Xi met face-to-face on the sidelines of a summit of the Group of 20 big economies in November and agreed to try to restore dialogue despite sharp differences. The two leaders have opportunities to meet later this year, including at the Group of 20 leaders’ gathering in September in New Delhi and at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in November in San Francisco. Updated with statements from the U.S. and China after Sunday’s meetings.

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Cambodia charges two Chinese with the murder of South Korean influencer

Editor04 mins

A Cambodian court has charged two Chinese nationals with the torture and murder of a South Korean social media influencer whose body was found on the outskirts of Phnom Penh earlier this month. Byun Ah-yeong, also known as BJ Ahyeong, was an influencer for popular South Korean streaming service AfreecaTV, and that she had more than 250,000 Instagram followers, Agence France-Presse reported. Media reports say she was 33. Two Chinese, Lai Wenshao, 30, and Cai Huijuan, 39 were charged with murder, court spokesman Plang Sophal told local media. Lai and Cai testified that Byun had gone into seizures and died while receiving treatment at their clinic on June 4, and they had abandoned her body, AFP said, citing a police report. If they are convicted, they could face life in prison. Lai and Cai’s clinic had been operating without a license, Sok Sambath, the governor of Phnom Penh’s Boeung Keng Kang district, told RFA’s Khmer Service. “We shut the clinic down,”  he said, but declined to answer questions inquiring as to how they could have been allowed to open without a license, only saying that they had started before he took office.  Police Chief Sar Thet told RFA that according to the police investigation, “the couple injected [something] into a South Korean lady and she died.” The incident may have happened because of improperly administered anesthesia, Quach Mengly, a Cambodian physician, told RFA. The Ministry of Health hasn’t effectively taken action against unlicensed medical clinics and this has caused several patient deaths as of late, Yong Kim Eng, president of the local PDP-Center NGO, told RFA. He said that the incident could scare off foreigners who want to seek medical treatment in Cambodia.  “[Cambodians] are [also] afraid of using local clinics,” said Yong Kim Eng. “They seek treatment outside of the country, so we are giving money to foreign countries.”  Soeung Sengkaruna, spokesman for the Cambodian Human Rights and Development Association urged the authorities to conduct a thorough investigation to find the real cause of death to restore public trust in Cambodia’s medical services. “The related authorities and the ministry of health need to investigate this case,” he said. “We want to find out whether it was a malpractice or the providers’ lack of skill.” Translated by Samean Yun. Edited by Eugene Whong and Malcolm Foster. 

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Vietnamese police arrest more than 50 in attacks on commune offices

Editor08 mins

Vietnamese security forces have arrested more than 50 people accused of being involved in last weekend’s deadly attacks on two commune offices in central Dak Lak province, a Ministry of Public Security spokesman told state media on Friday.  The June 11 attack left nine people dead. Those involved in the attacks were young people who harbored delusions and extremist attitudes and had been incited and abetted by the ringleaders via the internet, according to the ministry.   But officials didn’t say who or which organizations had incited or assisted the attackers. The attacks occurred in an area that is home to about 30 tribes of indigenous peoples known collectively as Montagnards.  Vietnamese state media have reported that the attackers were Montagnards, but the ministry did not identify those arrested as such.  Religious and civil organizations advocating for the Montagnard people told Radio Free Asia in an earlier report that they weren’t involved in the armed attacks and condemned the violence. Anger and frustration in the Central Highlands has built up after decades of government surveillance, land disputes and economic hardship, RFA reported earlier. In recent months, there have been a number of land revocation incidents by local authorities, police and military forces. Sought to steal weapons In the ministry’s description of what transpired, about 40 people wearing camouflage vests and equipped with knives and guns split into two groups for a dawn attack on the offices in Ea Tieu and Ea Ktur communes. Members of the two groups also had broken into Special Forces Brigade No. 198’s barracks in Hoa Dong commune in Dak Lak province to steal weapons, but failed, the ministry told state media.    Those arrested said they sought to steal weapons so as to make news headlines, which they hoped would give them the opportunity to immigrate to other countries, according to the ministry. In their preliminary statements, those arrested said they had been incited by others to kill police officers. Four police officers, two commune officials and three civilians were killed. The attackers also kidnapped three civilians, though one of them managed to escape, and the others were rescued later, the ministry said.  The ministry said it would “use all necessary measures” to hunt down and arrest all suspects still in hiding and seize their weapons and explosives.  Vietnamese police officers escort a suspect arrested in Dak Lak province. Credit: Vietnamese State media Vietnam’s one-party government has strictly controlled news about the shootings, heightening people’s curiosity about the incident, but Channel VTV1 of Vietnam Television and many newspapers have published the statements and photos of some of those arrested. Meanwhile, Prime Minister Hun Sen of neighboring Cambodia ordered armed forces in Mondulkiri, Ratanakiri and Kratie provinces to increase security along the border to prevent fugitives involved in the attacks from crossing the border illegally, China’s official Xinhua News Agency reported Friday.  Hun Sen said that anyone arrested would be returned to Vietnam if discovered.  Slapping social media In the past days, police have fined people who share news about Dak Lak shootings via social media.  At least five Facebook users have been slapped with administrative fines for sharing the news and their comments, deemed to be harmful to the state.  Police in Dak Lak as well as authorities in Kontum and Binh Phuoc — two other provinces in the country’s Central Highlands — have fined businesses that sell imitation camouflage military outfits.    Two human rights lawyers told RFA on Thursday that state media should not have publicly disclosed information from the suspects’ statements to police or their photos, though authorities often take advantage of their power and privilege to provide news organizations with unappealing photos of suspects. “Publishing citizens’ photos without their permission or without blurring their faces, even if they are suspects or defendants, is a violation of their rights in terms of their image and could cause many consequences, especially when they are in high positions or are influential people,” said one attorney from Ho Chi Minh City, who asked not to be identified. A human rights lawyer from Hanoi said the Penal Code or the Criminal Procedure Code clearly states that statements from suspects should be kept secret. Attorney Ha Huy Son, a member of the Hanoi Bar Association, said the country’s 2015 Civil Code contains a provision on the rights of an individual with respect to his image, stipulating that he must give his consent for its public use.  But he also pointed to another article stating that a person’s photo can be used without consent from the individual or his legal representative in cases where it serves national or public interest.   The attorneys also said those arrested should be given immediate access to lawyers to ensure fairness and avoid injustice. Neither the Ministry of Public Security nor Dak Lak provincial police have opened cases against the suspects, or provided information about their charges. Translated by Anna Vu for RFA Vietnamese. Edited by Roseanne Gerin and Malcolm Foster.

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Junta pilot and trainee killed in Myanmar military helicopter crash

Editor03 mins

A junta helicopter crashed near an air force base in Myanmar’s capital Naypyidaw, killing the pilot and a trainee, local media reported Friday. The military confirmed Thursday’s crash, thought to have been caused by sudden engine failure, but did not give the names and ranks of the dead. Local news reports, quoting anonymous military sources, named the pilot/instructor as Maj. Min Thu Aung but only said the trainee was a woman without naming her. One local told RFA the army sent an investigation team to the site of the helicopter crash on the Bago mountain range. “It crashed on the Bago Plateau on the edge of Lewe township [in Naypyidaw] and bordering Taungdwingyi township [in Magway region],” said the resident who didn’t want to be named for security reasons.  “Military vehicles came to the area but could not reach the crash site. We saw a lot of helicopter traffic.” The junta said in a statement that they were working to transport the bodies to the nearest military hospital. In March last year, a military helicopter crashed during bad weather in a forest in Chin state’s  Hakha township, injuring some military council air force officers and some education workers. That helicopter was Russian-made and Thein Tun Oo, the executive director of the Thayninga Institute for Strategic Studies, a think tank group made up of former military officers, said at the time it was a durable design but probably crashed due to bad weather. The make of the helicopter that crashed this week is not yet known. Russia is the biggest arms supplier to Myanmar, selling U.S.$406 million worth of military equipment to the junta since the Feb. 1, 2021 coup, according to a report last month by Tom Andrews, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Myanmar on May 17. China, Singapore and India sold at least a combined $600 million-worth of weapons to Myanmar over the same period, he said. Translated by RFA Burmese. Edited by Mike Firn.

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