- contact@ij-reportika.com
Category: East Asia
Vietnam should ask Cambodia to delay canal project: experts
Participants at a Vietnamese-sponsored consultation have suggested that Hanoi should ask Phnom Penh to delay a proposed canal project for further discussions, amid Vietnamese worries about the project’s environmental and economic impact. Construction of the 180 km (112 mile) Funan Techo canal, connecting the Cambodian capital, Phnom Penh, with the Gulf of Thailand, is planned to begin later this year and to be completed within four years. The proposed canal will include a section of the Mekong River, raising concern in Vietnam about the impact downstream, especially in Vietnam’s rice-growing Mekong Delta. The canal could “reduce the flow of the river by up to 50% by the time it comes to Vietnam,” said Le Anh Tuan, a prominent Vietnamese scientist. Vietnam needs more time for consultation in order to protect the river’s delta, home to 17.4 million people, Tuan told the meeting in the town delta of Can Tho. Another expert, Dang Thanh Lam from the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, said Vietnam must ask for an environment impact report from Cambodia. The U.S. Embassy in Phnom Penh also called for more information, saying that the Cambodian people as well as people in neighboring countries “would benefit from transparency on any major undertaking with potential implications for regional water and agricultural sustainability.” “We urge authorities to coordinate closely with the Mekong River Commission (MRC) to provide additional project details and to participate fully in any appropriate environmental impact studies to help the MRC and member countries fully understand, assess, and prepare for any possible impacts of the project,” an embassy spokesperson said. Ly Van Bon, the owner of the Bay Bon fish pond located on the Mekong river which was affected by sediment, shows redtail catfish inside his fish pond in Mekong’s regional capital Can Tho, Vietnam, May 25, 2022. (Reuters/Athit Perawongmetha) For its part, Cambodia said it had secured endorsement for the project from the MRC chairman – Lao President Thongloun Sisoulith. Sisoulith has just visited Phnom Penh and, during a meeting with Cambodian Senate leader and former prime minister Hun Sen, he was asked to show his support for the canal. “In response, the Laotian president, without hesitation, announced his support,” Cambodia’s Fresh News media outlet, which is supportive of the government, reported. No obligation Laos and Cambodia are both long-term allies of Vietnam but both have in recent years leaned more towards China. Vietnam has repeatedly expressed concerns about the possible environmental and economic impacts of the project. This month, a Vietnamese foreign ministry spokesperson urged Cambodia to provide information and an impact assessment on the water resources and ecological balance of the delta region. In response, a senior Cambodian official said that Phnom Penh was not obliged to do so. Cambodia’s Minister Delegate attached to the Prime Minister in charge of ASEAN affairs, So Naro, told the Khmer Times that Cambodia was not legally required to submit any document to Vietnam regarding the studies and construction of the Funan Techo canal. Cambodia had submitted “all documents of the studies on the canal related to the impacts on the environment and the water resources” to the MRC, So Naro said. The MRC is an intergovernmental organisation in charge of the sustainable management of the Mekong basin. “The Vietnamese authorities can request access to those files,” So Naro said. Cambodia has insisted that the canal would not disrupt the flow of the Mekong. The projected Funan Techo canal (in blue). (Google Maps/ RFA) Officially known as the Tonle Bassac Navigation Road and Logistics System Project, the Funan Techo canal will be developed by a Chinese company at a cost of US$1.7 billion. It will mean that more trade can flow directly to Cambodian ports, bypassing Vietnam. The Cambodian government said it would cut the transport costs and reduce dependence on Vietnamese ports. It also said that the project will bring great social and economic benefits to 1.6 million Cambodians living along the canal. Security questions Besides the environment and economic impacts, analysts say Vietnam is also worried about the security implications of the canal. There have been suggestions that the canal could allow Chinese navy ships to travel upstream from the Gulf of Thailand and the Chinese-developed Ream naval base on the Cambodian coast close to the border with Vietnam. Cambodia has rejected such speculation with Hun Sen insisting that Cambodia and Vietnam “are good neighbors and have good cooperation in all fields.” But Vietnam has been in dispute with China over some island chains in the South China Sea and it eyes China’s involvement in the region with suspicion. Vietnam shares a long land border with Cambodia. Between 1977-1978 there was fighting between Cambodia’s Khmer Rouge and Vietnamese troops during the so-called southwest border war, which led to a Vietnamese invasion and the establishment of a pro-Hanoi government in Cambodia. The situation on Vietnam’s western border should get more attention because of “threats of untraditional security challenges, mostly over the Mekong delta,” said Nguyen The Phuong, a Vietnamese political scientist at the University of New South Wales in Australia. “A loss of the Mekong’s ability to sustain large scale food production will have tremendous impact on Vietnam’s security in the south,” Phuong said. “From my point of view, the western front is becoming more critical day by day but Vietnam is too distracted by maritime issues at the eastern front, or the South China Sea.” Edited by Mike Firn and Taejun Kang.
Tibetans say compensation for Chinese land grab is too low
Tibetan families whose pasture land was sold to Chinese businessmen without their knowledge or consent say that compensation belatedly offered to them – 3,000 yuan, or about US$415 each – is far too low, sources familiar with the situation told Radio Free Asia. Four Tibetans who had been arrested April 10 for protesting the land grab in Markham county in Chamdo, or Changdu in Chinese, in the Tibet Autonomous Region, were released, but said they had been beaten while in detention, a source told RFA Tibetan on condition of anonymity for safety reasons. “The four of them were released on April 16 but they were beaten and tortured during detention, and one of them even has a swollen cheek,” the source said. Since the protest, about 10 policemen have been deployed to patrol the area day and night, where they closely monitor all activities of the people, sources said. Chinese police argue with Tibetans who were protesting Chinese authorities’ illegal seizure of pasture land owned by Tibetans in Markham County in Tibet Autonomous Region, China, April 10, 2024. (Citizen journalist) It’s the latest example of land taken by Chinese authorities in Tibet and in Tibetan-populated areas of nearby Chinese provinces for mining, farming or other use. Local officials routinely use force to subdue those who complain or protest. Earlier this month, about 25 families were shocked when a Chinese businessman came to clear their land. They were told their land had been sold without their knowledge or any compensation. After they protested, Chinese officials agreed to pay each family 3,000 yuan, or about US$415, each. The resident said that the affected families must accept the compensation without protest, and it cannot be negotiated because the amount has been decided by higher authorities. Chinese police argue with Tibetans who were protesting Chinese authorities’ illegal seizure of pasture land owned by Tibetans in Markham County in Tibet Autonomous Region, China, April 10, 2024. (Citizen journalist) Other residents said that those who do not comply with the government’s instructions on the matter could face imprisonment. Authorities conveyed the details of the compensation plan at a meeting on April 16, requiring at least one representative of each of the affected families to attend. “The people were unhappy about the compensation and rejected the low figure,” said the first source, who explained that the pasture land is being dug out to clear all remaining grass. Attendees were not allowed to bring their phones to the meeting, where authorities warned the families that it was forbidden to leak any information outside the country and reprimanded them for committing the “crime” of spreading news about the land grab and protesting it. “They were told that internal problems can only be solved internally,” a second resident said on condition of anonymity to speak freely. “But if this information had not been widely reported, there wouldn’t have been any talk of compensation, let alone the release of the four young men who were arrested and detained.” Additional reporting by Dolma Lhamo and edited by Tenzin Pema for RFA Tibetan
Uyghur butcher served 7 years in jail for urging friends not to drink alcohol or smoke
A Uyghur butcher serving a seven-year prison sentence in southern Xinjiang for advising friends not to drink alcohol or smoke at a gathering has been released alive and returned to his family, sources with knowledge of the situation said. It marks the first time that one of the roughly 100 jailed Uyghur residents from Xaneriq village had been released alive, said an Uyghur from the area who now lives abroad, but who did not give his name for fear of retribution. Authorities freed Mahmudjan Muqeddem, 46, who hails from the Tawaqchi community of Xaneriq village, on April 11, he said. The village lies in Kashgar Yengisheher county in Kashgar prefecture. Police officers salute at the outer entrance of the Urumqi No. 3 Detention Center in Dabancheng in northwestern China’s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, April 23, 2021. A police officer from the Yenitam community in Xaneriq confirmed that Muqeddem, a butcher and farmer, had served seven years in a prison in Urumqi, capital of the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, and was released on April 11. The officer’s colleagues told him that Muqeddem was arrested on suspicion of religious radicalization for advising his friends not to drink or smoke at an event prior to 2016. Initially, he was “educated” in a camp for two years, but in 2019, he was sentenced and transferred to prison, they said. “The reason for arrest is that he stopped others from smoking and drinking,” said the officer. “He is not a religious figure.” Extremist behaviors Abstaining from alcohol is one of 75 different activities and behaviors identified by the Chinese government as a sign of potential religious extremism. It is listed in brochures distributed in some parts of Xinjiang to educate the public on how to identify extreme religious activities. It is also a cause for jailing Uyghurs, who as Muslims abstain from drinking alcohol, as part of a larger effort by Beijing to eradicate Uyghur culture and religion. A person stands in a tower on the perimeter of the Number 3 Detention Center in Dabancheng in northwestern China’s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, April 23, 2021. (Mark Schiefelbein/AP) Xaneriq village consists of 23 smaller communities with a total population of 31,000 people, averaging around 1,400 people in each community. About 800 people live in Tawaqchi community, of which more than 100 were in prison, with some serving indefinite sentences in internment camps, the Uyghur expatriate said. Since 2017, six others imprisoned were released dead, he said, though RFA could not independently confirm this. Muqeddem’s release has offered some hope to others from the village’s Tawaqchi community worried out the fate of their imprisoned relatives, the expat said. But because the butcher was considered to have committed one of the mildest “crimes” among those arrested, his release also caused concern about the fate of those serving sentences for more serious offenses, he added. Translated by RFA Uyghur. Edited by Roseanne Gerin and Malcolm Foster.
Blinken to visit China amid claims about Russia support
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken will travel to China on Wednesday, according to a senior State Department official, in a trip that comes as he and others in Washington accuse Beijing of “fueling” Russia’s war in Ukraine by helping to resupply its military. Blinken will travel to Shanghai and Beijing from Wednesday to Friday, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the plans ahead of time. The official said he could not yet confirm that Blinken would meet Chinese President Xi Jinping during the visit. The trip will attempt to build on recent diplomatic outreach to Beijing, the official explained, but would also necessitate “clearly and directly communicating [American] concerns on bilateral, regional and global issues” where China and the United States differ on policy. Among other issues, Blinken will raise “deep concerns” about alleged Chinese business support for Russia’s defense industrial base, the crisis in the Middle East and also in Myanmar, the issue of Taiwan and China’s recent “provocations” in the South China Sea, he said. But the official played down the likelihood of results, with many of the differences between Washington and Beijing now deep-seated. “I want to make clear that we are realistic and clear-eyed about the prospects of breakthroughs on any of these issues,” he said. He also demurred when asked if Blinken would meet Xi on Friday, as is rumored. But he said more scheduling details will be released later. “It’s safe for you to expect that he’ll spend considerable time with his counterpart … Foreign Minister Wang Yi,” he said. “We are confident our Chinese hosts will arrange a productive and constructive visit.” ‘Fueling’ the Ukraine war American officials have since last week accused Chinese businesses of keeping Russia’s war effort afloat by exporting technology needed to rebuild the country’s defense industrial base that supplies its military. Speaking to reporters on Friday on the Italian island of Capri ahead of the Group of 7 foreign ministers’ meeting, Blinken said U.S. intelligence had “not seen the direct supply of weapons” from China to Russia but instead a “supply of inputs” required by Russia’s defense industry. The support was “allowing Russia to continue the aggression against Ukraine,” he said, by allowing Moscow to rebuild its defense capacity, to which “so much damage has been done to by the Ukrainians.” “When it comes to weapons, what we’ve seen, of course, is North Korea and Iran primarily providing things to Russia,” Blinken said. “When it comes to Russia’s defense industrial base, the primary contributor in this moment to that is China,” he explained. “We see China sharing machine tools, semiconductors, [and] other dual-use items that have helped Russia rebuild the defense industrial base that sanctions and export controls had done so much to degrade.” Beijing was attempting, Blinken said, to secretly aid Russia’s war in Ukraine while openly courting improved relations with Europe. German Chancellor Olaf Scholz met with Xi in Beijing on Tuesday, and Xi is set to meet French President Emmanuel Macron in Paris next month. “If China purports, on the one hand, to want good relations with Europe,” he said, “it can’t, on the other hand, be fueling what is the biggest threat to European security since the end of the Cold War.” The G-7 group, which also includes Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the United Kingdom, also released a statement on Friday calling on China “to press Russia to stop its military aggression.” The seven foreign ministers also expressed their concern “about transfers to Russia from business in China of dual-use materials and components for weapons and equipment for military production.” In an email to Radio Free Asia, Liu Pengyu, a spokesman for the Chinese Embassy in Washington, did not deny Blinken’s claims. But he said China “is not a party to or involved in the Ukraine crisis” and that the country’s position on the war is “fair and objective.” “We actively promote peace talks and have not provided weapons to either side of the conflict,” Liu said. “At the same time, China and Russia have every right to normal economic and trade cooperation, which should not be interfered with or restricted.” Not the only tension Blinken’s trip will come amid a slew of other squabbles between the world’s two major powers bubbling since last year’s Xi-Biden talks. In a speech at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee, on Thursday, FBI Director Christopher Wray repeated claims he made to Congress earlier this year that Chinese hackers were targeting key U.S. infrastructure and waiting to “wreak havoc” in case of a conflict. On April 11, Biden notably warned Beijing that the United States would come to the aid of Philippine vessels in the South China Sea if they were attacked by China, calling the commitment “ironclad.” On the economic front, U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, who herself visited Beijing this month, has slammed Beijing for what she says is over-subsidization of green technology, with cheap Chinese exports crippling development of competing industries worldwide. Xi also expressed concerns to Biden during a phone call on April 2 about a bill that would allow the U.S. president to ban the popular social media app TikTok, which U.S. officials have called a national security threat, if its Chinese parent company does not divest. China, meanwhile, on Friday forced Apple to scrub social media apps WhatsApp and Threads, both owned by Facebook parent company Meta, from its App Store, citing “national security concerns.” Blinken will be joined on his trip by Liz Allen, the under secretary for public diplomacy and public Affairs; Daniel Kritenbrink, the assistant secretary of state for East Asia and the Pacific; Todd Robinson, the undersecretary for narcotics and law enforcement; and Nathaniel Fick, the U.S. ambassador-at-large for cyberspace and digital policy.
Chinese navy is operating out of Cambodia’s Ream base: US think tank
Cambodia appears to have given the Chinese navy extended and exclusive access to its naval base in Ream despite official claims that they only arrived for training purposes, a U.S. think tank said. Radio Free Asia first reported on the arrival of two Chinese corvettes last December, the first foreign warships allowed to dock at the new Chinese-built pier at Ream, Sihanoukville province. The ships left the pier on January 15, 2024, only to return several days later, said the Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative (AMTI) at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in Washington D.C. in a new report. AMTI analyzed commercial satellite imagery that shows the Chinese vessels “have now maintained a consistent presence for over four months.” “It appears that they’ve been based there, just as the leaked 2019 MOU [memorandum of understanding] suggested they would be,” said Greg Poling, AMTI’s director, referring to the reported controversial agreement between Cambodia and China in 2019 giving Beijing exclusive rights to part of the Ream naval base. “This isn’t just a visit or an exercise,” Poling told RFA. “Despite the Hun Sen and Hun Manet governments’ denials, the PLAN [People’s Liberation Army Navy] is operating out of Ream.” Training Cambodian navy The AMTI report said that no other ships, including Cambodian vessels, have been seen docking at the new pier, “which was completed last year to enable larger warships to dock in Ream’s shallow waters.” This indicates “a visible sign of privileged access for China’s military,” it said, adding that the degree of China’s access to Ream in the future will confirm whether Ream has become a Chinese naval base. Former Cambodian defense minister Tea Banh visits a Chinese warship at Ream naval base, Dec. 3, 2023. (Facebook: Tea Seiha) Cambodia is preparing for the upcoming annual joint exercise Golden Dragon with the Chinese military, part of which will be conducted at sea, RFA has learned. Naval commanders held a meeting in Phnom Penh on April 18 to discuss the exercise. It is unclear whether the Chinese vessels currently at Ream would take part in Golden Dragon 2024. In last year’s iteration, the two navies conducted their first-ever joint naval drills in the waters off Sihanoukville, but with a landing ship dispatched from China. RFA has contacted Rear Adm. Mey Dina, Ream naval base’s commander, for more clarification but has not received any reply. When the two Chinese ships arrived in Ream in December 2023, Cambodia’s minister of defense Tea Seiha said on Facebook that it was “for training our Cambodian Navy crew.” In the following days there was indeed a training course for Cambodian navy staff at Ream, attended by Chinese officers. However, there were no further reports on any activity of the Chinese ships in either Cambodian or Chinese media. “We don’t know what the Chinese have been up to [at Ream] because China builds and operates it itself,” said a Cambodian analyst who wished to stay anonymous due to the sensitivity of the topic. “What appears to be evident is that Beijing has begun to station semi-permanent warships there as a means of solidifying its military footprint across Southeast Asia,” said Paul Chambers, a political scientist at the Center of ASEAN Community Studies at Naresuan University in Thailand. “A Chinese foothold in Cambodia offers support to other nearby Chinese military platforms in the South China Sea, Myanmar, Laos, and southern Asia,” Chambers told RFA. ‘Serious concerns’ There has been no immediate comment from the U.S. Embassy in Phnom Penh. The U.S. State Department last December said it had “serious concerns” about China’s plans for exclusive control over portions of Ream Naval Base, a claim that Cambodia has repeatedly denied. Top officials in Phnom Penh have maintained that allowing a foreign military to be based in Cambodia would be in contradiction to the country’s constitution. Sailors stand guard at the Cambodian Ream Naval Base in Sihanoukville, Cambodia, July 26, 2019. (Reuters/Samrang Pring) Cambodian analyst, Chhan Paul, wrote in the pro-government newspaper Khmer Times that any allegation of a Chinese military base is a “deliberate attempt to malign Cambodia.” “Cambodia never claims that it won’t allow warships from China to dock at the Ream naval base. Cambodia openly welcomes warships from other friendly countries to dock at the base,” the independent analyst wrote, “Therefore, the mere sighting of a Chinese warship cannot be interpreted to mean anything out of the ordinary.” Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi is to visit Cambodia from April 21 to 23 to further consolidate bilateral relations in “wide-ranging areas,” according to a press release from the Cambodian foreign ministry. Wang Yi is scheduled to call on King Norodom Sihamoni and meet with Prime Minister Hun Manet and his father Hun Sen, who is now the president of the country’s Senate. Edited by Mike Firn.
Interfaith conference seeks to raise awareness about Uyghur genocide
The hundreds of thousands of Uyghurs subjected by China to detention, forced labor and cultural erasure underscores the urgency for global action, panelists said at a two-day interfaith conference on disrupting Uyghur genocide organized by The Elie Wiesel Foundation for Humanity that wrapped up Thursday. Survivors, experts, religious leaders and activists participated in panels to discuss the situation of the Uyghurs and called on governments to promote pro-Uyghur policies and to pressure businesses that profit from Uyghur forced labor, said a notice about the conference on the foundation’s website. An estimated 1.8 million mostly Muslim Uyghurs and other Turkic ethnic groups have passed through “re-education” camps in Xinjiang, in China’s far northwest, as part of a larger effort by Beijing to wipe out the Uyghurs along with their culture, language and religion. Some of the detainees have been subjected to torture, rape and psychological abuse. These actions and policies, the United States and other Western governments say, amount to genocide and crimes and against humanity against the 11 million Uyghur people. China denies the human rights abuses and says the camps were vocational training centers and have since been closed. Restrictions placed on Uyghurs are to counter religious extremism and terrorism, according to Beijing. Western diplomats have raised the Uyghur genocide issue “directly and forcefully” with Chinese officials, Ellen Germain, special envoy for Holocaust issues at the U.S. State Department and a panel speaker, told Radio Free Asia. Additionally, the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act of 2021 and the Elie Wiesel Genocide and Atrocities Prevention Act of 2018, require the U.S. government, State Department and Department of Homeland Security, among others, to take action that will impose consequences on those who commit genocide or other atrocities, she said. “We recognize that it’s never enough for those who are suffering,” Germain said. ‘We are not afraid’ The Elie Wiesel Foundation for Humanity, named for the Holocaust survivor, Nobel Peace Prize laureate, writer and human rights activist who died in 2016, has thrown its support behind raising awareness of the Uyghur genocide through protests, op-eds, funding and events such as conferences. Elie Wiesel poses with his wife Marion and son Elisha in New York, Oct. 14, 1986. (Richard Drew/AP) In 2023, the foundation awarded grants amounting to hundreds of thousands of dollars to three Uyghur groups dedicated to Uyghur rights advocacy and education amid ongoing repression against the ethnic group by Chinese authorities. “We’re not afraid of the Chinese Communist Party because they are in the wrong, and what they are doing is intolerable,” said his son, Elisha Wiesel, the foundation’s chairman. “And if we can help to get the world to see that, to get the American public in particular to see that, that’s part of our role, and we need to do it in serving my father’s memory,” he said. Forced sterilizations of detained Uyghur women, the destruction of thousands of mosques throughout Xinjiang, and the assignment of Han Chinese civil servants to stay in the homes of Uyghur families are other ways the Chinese government has sought to wipe out the Uyghurs and their culture. “That is a genocidal activity to suppress the birth rate of a people, to change their buildings and remove their character, to forcibly remove their traditions by inserting people into the family life to prevent certain traditions from being followed,” Wiesel said. Two major challenges The foundation faces two major challenges in trying to raise awareness about the Uyghur genocide, Wiesel said. The first is the Chinese government’s “information blackout policy,” making it nearly impossible for Uyghur families living in Xinjiang to communicate with relatives overseas or for the press to get first-hand information on what’s happening there. “If the Western free press doesn’t have access to the atrocity, it can’t report it,” Wiesel said. “And then, it’s almost as though it doesn’t happen.” The second is that it is difficult to get celebrities to draw attention to the genocide because China is a major market for U.S. and Western movies and goods, such as sneakers. “So, all of a sudden [China] has dollars and cents to impact celebrities, which makes it much harder now that their bottom line is at stake,” Wiesel said. “It’s much harder to activate them.” Edited by Roseanne Gerin and Malcolm Foster.
Report: China is exporting digital control methods
China’s government has turned the country’s tech companies like Huawei and ZTE into its “proxies” and uses their dominant market share in developing countries around the Indo-Pacific region to export its authoritarian model of the internet, according to a new report. In countries such as Cambodia, Malaysia, Nepal and Thailand, the dominance of the Chinese companies in building digital infrastructure has meant Beijing’s controlled version of the internet is expanding, leading to a fragmentation with the West’s open web, it says. The report is titled The Digital Silk Road: China and the Rise of Digital Repression in the Indo-Pacific and was released Wednesday by Article 19, a London-based internet-freedom advocacy organization. The group says the cut-price internet infrastructure being offered by companies beholden to the Chinese Communist Party “has benefited” countries that otherwise would be stuck with outdated infrastructure. But that assistance comes with a catch, it says. “China has packaged its model as the prevailing best practice, often masked as support for innovation centers, exchanges or broader digital diplomacy initiatives, especially on issues relating to cybersecurity,” the report says, adding that the result is further “digital repression.” “This is intended to tip the scales in global adoption to influence more states to employ Chinese norms, accelerating internet fragmentation.” Cambodia’s ‘Great Firewall’ The report points to Cambodia, where it says “China is present at virtually every layer of the digital ecosystem,” which it says has been marked by a “shift towards China-style digital authoritarianism.” Firms like Huawei and ZTE have played “a leading role” in laying out infrastructure, it says, to the point where Cambodian telecoms companies only offer the two companies’ internet routers. Hip-hop artist Kea Sokun listens to one of his songs online at a cafe in Phnom Penh, Cambodia January 29, 2022. (Tang Chhin Sothy/AFP) Huawei is also Cambodia’s only authorized cloud service provider and is responsible for much of the country’s 5G network, it notes, as well as its terrestrial and submarine internet lines and data centers. But it says China’s influence extends beyond infrastructure. “Alongside infrastructure-level cooperation, the shadow influence of China’s internet governance model has loomed large over Cambodia’s embrace of digital authoritarianism,” the report says, terming China’s influence on internet norms a form of “digital diplomacy.” In some areas, that has improved network engineering, the report says, but it also includes provision of “the technical knowhow for Cambodia to better emulate China’s digital authoritarian model.” The report blames such digital diplomacy for Cambodia’s National Internet Gateway, a system akin to China’s “Great Firewall” that allows the government to monitor and control all internet traffic. Phnom Penh has not said who is building the system, “but experts in Cambodian civil society believe it is Huawei or ZTE,” the report says. China alternatives The report recommends Western governments seek to work further with Taiwan and its technology sector to develop the self-ruling island further as a “counterweight” to China’s digital influence. A technician stands at the entrance to a Huawei 5G data server center at the Guangdong Second Provincial General Hospital in Guangzhou, in southern China’s Guangdong province on Sept. 26, 2021. (Ng Han Guan/AP) Taiwanese companies could help export infrastructure more friendly to the open web, it says, and countries like the United States could provide “greater financial resources” to civil society groups in the affected countries to push back against digital authoritarianism. But it warns against casting too wide of a net in searching for alternatives to Chinese-built infrastructure and internet norms. Specifically, “while greater regional cooperation is necessary,” it says, “uncritically embracing countries with their own records of digital dictatorship, such as Vietnam, will ultimately be counterproductive.” Edited by Malcolm Foster.
China axes hundreds of TV dramas depicting family tensions
China’s internet censors have deleted hundreds of online TV dramas for portraying the negative aspects of family life amid an attempt by the ruling Communist Party to get more people to start families and rescue plummeting birth rates. Censors at video platforms Douyin and Kuaishou deleted more than 700 videos of TV micro-dramas portraying in-fighting between in-laws because of the “extreme emotions” they evoked, the government’s “Rumor-refuting platform” on Weibo reported. “Many micro-dramas on this theme deliberately amplify and exaggerate conflicts between husband and wife, conflicts between mother-in-law and daughter-in-law, and intergenerational conflicts through eye-catching stereotypes and abnormal and bizarre relationships,” the post said. The move comes as President Xi Jinping tries to promote marriage and family life as a way of boosting flagging birth rates. The number of Chinese couples tying the knot for the first time has plummeted by nearly 56% over the past nine years, with such marriages numbering less than 11 million in 2022. A November 2023 poll on the social media platform Weibo found that while most of the 44,000 respondents said 25 to 28 are the best ages to marry, nearly 60% said they were delaying marriage due to work pressures, education or the need to buy property. The logo of Chinese video sharing company Kuaishou is seen at its company in Hangzhou, in eastern China’s Zhejiang province on February 5, 2021. (AFP) Birth rates have fallen from 17.86 million in 2016 to just 9.02 million in 2023, despite a change in policy allowing couples to have up to three children in 2021. In October, Xi called on women to focus on raising families, and the National People’s Congress this month started looking at ways to boost birth rates and kick-start the shrinking population, including flexible working policies, coverage for fertility treatment and extended maternity leave. Changing priorities But young women in today’s China are increasingly choosing not to marry or have kids, citing huge inequalities and patriarchal attitudes that still run through family life, not to mention the sheer economic cost of raising a family. A recent study of Mandarin pop songs aimed at a female audience focused far less on romantic love and more on personal freedom and economic independence. It appears the authorities want to avoid having women put off taking the plunge into family life by clamping down on mother-in-law gags and other depictions of family tensions. A screen shows a military parade at a booth of Chinese video-streaming startup Kuaishou, at the 2020 China International Fair for Trade in Services (CIFTIS) in Beijing, September 4, 2020. (Tingshu Wang/Reuters) “Douyin and Kuaishou have recently removed from the shelves a number of illegal micro-short dramas that deliberately choreographed “mother-in-law and daughter-in-law battles” to exaggerate extreme emotions.” The deleted shows “promoted unhealthy and non-mainstream views on family, marriage and love, and deliberately amplified and exaggerated conflicts between husband and wife, mother-in-law and daughter-in-law, etc,” the Weibo “rumor-refuting” post said. The censored titles included shows called “My Husband is a Mommy’s Boy,” “In the Doghouse with Mother-in-law,” and “Rich Lady Strikes Back,” and were removed to promote the “healthy development” of the online video market, it said, adding that Kuaishou had deleted more than 700 such shows. China’s State Administration of Radio, Film and Television has also issued new rules requiring platforms to apply for a license to distribute online TV shows, starting June 1. ‘Positive energy’ Current affairs commentator Chang Guantao said many online TV producers like to use social injustice as a talking point to get more viewers, which he said was “embarrassing” to the government, which wants anything posted on China’s tightly controlled internet to exude “positive energy” for the future of the country. “More and more micro-dramas are vying with each other to directly address society’s sore points, and those marginalized by government policy,” Chang said. “This is likely something that news regulators and public opinion control agencies don’t want to see, so they have to regulate and control them, and limit their development in various ways,” he said. The logo of Chinese video-streaming startup Kuaishou is seen in Beijing, China May 10, 2017. (Stringer/Reuters) Current affairs commentator Bi Xin said micro-dramas have been much more lightly regulated than regular TV shows — until now. “It doesn’t cost too much to make a micro-drama, around 300,000 yuan (US$41,000), but they have a wider reach,” Bi said. “The authorities need to suppress and manage them by forcing them to get licensed, because their content isn’t always in line with the main theme [of government propaganda].” The news website Caixin quoted micro-drama producers as saying that there will now be a classification and hierarchical review system for the shows, which will be divided according to their production budget. Higher budget shows will be directly regulated by the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television, while lower budget productions will be managed by the same authorities at the provincial level. The lowest-budget shows will be left to video-sharing platforms to censor, the report said. Translated by Luisetta Mudie. Edited by Malcolm Foster.
Chinese authorities arrest 4 Tibetans for protest over land grab
Police have arrested and detained four Tibetans who protested Chinese authorities’ seizure of pasture land owned by Tibetans in the Tibet Autonomous Region, three sources inside Tibet told Radio Free Asia. On April 10, residents of Taktsa village in Luonixiang rural township in Markham county in Chamdo, or Changdu in Chinese, clashed with authorities after they appealed against the land grab and demanded compensation, said the sources, who requested anonymity for fear of reprisal. In 2023, a Chinese county official illegally sold the pasture land to businessmen without the knowledge of locals and without providing them any compensation, the sources said. The Tibetans had no knowledge that their land had been seized illegally until this April when the businessmen sent people to clear it. The Tibetans then confronted authorities, demanding payment. Police arrested and detained four of the Tibetans, and slapped and beat many others at the scene, said one of the sources. There were no immediate details about the status of the four or the charges against them, and it is not clear for what purpose the seized land will be used. Despite repeated attempts, RFA did not receive any immediate response to calls to Markham county authorities and the local police station. Chinese police argue with Tibetans protesting the seizure of pasture land in Markham county in western China’s Tibet Autonomous Region, April 10, 2024. (Citizen journalist/video screenshot) Chinese authorities in the Tibet Autonomous Region and in Tibetan-populated areas of nearby Chinese provinces often ignore residents’ concerns about mining and land grabs by local officials, who routinely rely on force to subdue those who complain or protest, according to human rights groups. Over the past few years, there have been several reports of similar land grabs that have taken place in Chamdo, a resource-rich area in eastern Tibet. Most of the land grabs have been related to mining, including copper, gold and lithium, and development projects that China has undertaken in the areas. In some cases, Tibetans have been forced from their homes. Thumbs up Videos obtained by RFA show over a dozen Tibetans pleading before Chinese police as they raised both their thumbs up — a Tibetan gesture of a request to show mercy. The gesture was also seen being made by Buddhist monks and Tibetans residents during February protests in Dege county, southwestern China’s Sichuan province, in an appeal to Chinese officials to stop a planned dam project on the Drichu River. Chinese police argue with Tibetans protesting the seizure of pasture land in Markham county in western China’s Tibet Autonomous Region, April 10, 2024. (Citizen journalist/video screenshot) In the videos from Markham county, young and elderly Tibetans kneel before police clad in black, and wail, while others pull and tug at the authorities to heed their pleas. The land in question is used by about 25 Tibetan families to graze their animals and for recreation purposes, the sources said. Chinese authorities have arrested the official who had colluded with the businessmen to illegally seize the land without compensating the Tibetans, charging him with corruption, said one of the sources. Now, the residents are demanding compensation for the land that had been occupied, he added. Chinese police have forbidden the Tibetans from sharing information about the incident with people outside China, the sources said. Translated by Dolma Lhamo and edited by Tenzin Pema for RFA Tibetan. Edited by Roseanne Gerin and Malcolm Foster.
Viral video highlights targeting of Hmong women to marry Chinese men
The man behind the phone chuckles as he calls out in the Hmong language to villagers sitting around a raised wooden home in rural Laos. A young man in a yellow hooded sweatshirt offers a slightly embarrassed smile, while other men gathered around a motorbike appear to pay him no mind. The camera zooms in on two young women who look shocked or turn away, as others laugh, before it settles on a girl barely in her teens, sitting atop a bike between two other children. This 30-second video, shot in an undisclosed location in Laos, went viral late last month after it was posted to Facebook, along with dialogue warning of ethnic Hmong middlemen working as interpreters for Chinese nationals seeking Hmong women and girls as wives. While the offer of marriage can be a financial leg up for largely poor Hmong villagers in rural Laos, many women who accept end up victims of human trafficking, according to a Lao official, who is calling on authorities to take action against the middlemen. Some of the women end up as forced laborers and sometimes face physical punishment, the official said. “In the video, the middleman goes to a village and says that there are some Chinese men looking for Lao Hmong girls and women to be their wives,” a speaker of the Hmong language told Radio Free Asia. “The video doesn’t mention the province, district, or village,” he said. “It’s only clear that Chinese men are looking for Lao Hmong wives.” A Lao Hmong middleman assists Chinese middlemen looking for Lao Hmong girls and women to marry Chinese men, March 24, 2024 in Laos. (Citizen journalist) The women and girls typically live in remote hill areas and are usually uneducated, according to an official from the Lao People’s Revolutionary Youth Union, the ruling party’s youth wing. “As I observe, some of the men cannot marry Chinese women because they are poor,” the youth official said. “But when they come to Laos, they’re in a better position in terms of wealth.” Loopholes in Laos’ laws The Chinese men offer the parents large amounts of money or promise to build a modern cement house, he said. And they mostly target the Lao women in their early 20s, with fair skin and a small body, a source in Vientiane province’s Thoulakhom district told RFA. The influx of Chinese people into Laos in the last few years has presented new challenges to the Lao government’s anti-human trafficking efforts, according to several government officials. Many of the Chinese men obtain all of the required Lao government documents before marrying Hmong women, one Vientiane-based official told RFA. That can make it more difficult for provincial authorities to gauge whether the women will face an abusive situation once they move to China, the official said. “There are some loopholes in Lao regulations and laws for the Chinese men to take advantage to bring Lao girls and women to China,” the official said. “We only know their whereabouts once they face problems and are in a situation where they need help. But we can’t stop them from going to China with their new husbands.” It was unclear how many Hmong women have moved to China to marry Chinese men in recent years. But Lao government officials and one person who works for an NGO said the practice has become commonplace in the country’s north, particularly in Luang Prabang and Oudomxay provinces. “I just saw this happen earlier this year,” a resident of Xayabury province’s Hongsa district told RFA. “A middleman who works for Chinese men came here to negotiate with parents of Hmong women. When the parents said yes, he did all the paperwork according to regulations and laws on marriage.” In every instance, the Hmong women and the Chinese men didn’t meet each other until after the paperwork was completed, he said. Because of that, the village doesn’t hold an engagement ceremony, like with other marriages. Translated by Phouvong. Edited by Matt Reed.
