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Category: East Asia
China, Uyghurs battle for support at UN over Xinjiang rights report
China has vowed to “fight” any United Nations action on human rights abuses against Uyghurs in Xinjiang cited in a damning report by the U.N. human rights chief, while Uyghurs are pressing the world body to move forward with investigations and other concrete follow-up measures. The report issued on Aug. 30 by U.N. High Commissioner of Human Rights Michelle Bachelet concluded that China’s arbitrary detention and repression of Uyghurs and other Turkic minorities in Xinjiang “may constitute international crimes, in particular crimes against humanity.” Uyghurs and their supporters want the U.S. and other Western countries to follow up with a U.N. Human Rights Council resolution condemning the alleged violations, an investigation, and a special envoy on Xinjiang. China, which rejected the Bachelet report as “based on the disinformation and lies fabricated by anti-China forces,” sent a large delegation to the rights council in Geneva this week to condemn the report and present its rebuttal. “The assessment is based on a presumption of guilt, includes mostly disinformation and lies,” Xu Guixiang, head of the Xinjiang government’s information office, told reporters in Geneva Thursday. “If some forces in the international community – or even anti-China forces – make so-called ‘Xinjiang-related motions’ or so-called ‘resolutions’, we won’t be afraid,” Xu said. “We will take countermeasures resolutely and fight.” Bachelet’s report puts a U.N. imprimatur on many findings in investigative reports issued by rights groups, researchers, foreign media and think tanks in the five years since Chinese authorities began detaining up to 1.8 million Uyghurs and other Turkic minorities in internment camps in Xinjiang, The predominantly Muslim groups have also been subjected to torture, forced sterilizations and forced labor, as well as the eradication of their linguistic, cultural and religious traditions, in what the United States and several Western parliaments have called genocide and crimes against humanity. Beijing has angrily rejected all charges, insisting it is running vocational training facilities in the region to counter extremism. The Chinese delegation in Geneva this week included large numbers of officials who challenged the reports and a group of Uyghurs who claimed to support Chinese policies. “The Chinese mission held a side event at the U.N. yesterday featuring five Uyghurs to promote its propaganda that Uyghurs are free and happy in China,” said Zumretay Arkin, program and advocacy manager at the World Uyghur Congress “Some diplomats from Cuba, Venezuela and Zimbabwe came to support China while some Western diplomats came to hear what China had to say,” said Arkin, who is campaigning for the U.S.-led democracies to introduce a resolution condemning China’s genocide against Uyghurs. Addlet Sabit comforts her daughter as she displays pictures of her father, Ablimit Ablaze whom she has never met, during a hunger strike in front of the White House in Washington, D.C., Sept. 21, 2022. Credit: Gemunu Amarasinghe/RFA ‘Put our words into action’ Group of 7 Foreign Ministers met on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly and welcomed the report, pledging to “address these issues with partners, civil society and the international community.” The G7 ministers “remained deeply concerned by the serious human rights violations in Xinjiang and took note of the overall assessment of the report that some of these violations may constitute ‘international crimes’ in particular crimes against humanity,’” said a statement by German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock, chair of the meeting. The G7 statement Thursday came after U.S. President Joe Biden and German Chancellor Olaf Sholtz raised rights violations in Xinjiang in their speeches to the U.N. General Assembly. In Washington this week, the Uyghur American Association has been staging a hunger strike in front of the White House by leaders of the advocacy group and by three internment camp survivors to demand U.S.-led steps to translate the U.N. report into concrete action. Chris Smith, co-chair of the Bipartisan Congressional Uyghur Caucus, who visited the hunger strikers outside the White House on Wednesday, introduced a bill calling on the Biden Administration to direct the U.S. mission team in Geneva to sponsor a resolution that would establish a UN commission to investigate the issues raised in the Bachelet report. “The UN’s recent report demonstrates that Communist China is guilty of serious human rights violations that at a minimum constitute crimes against humanity in the eyes of the world community,” said Smith, “We must speak out forcefully on these atrocities and put our words into action at the United Nations,” she added. Kellie Currie, former U.S. Ambassador-at-Large for Global Women’s Issues, called on Biden to “not only introduce a resolution in the Human Rights Council, but you personally need to make sure that it passes by doing everything you can, reaching out to other countries, using political capital and influence that you have with other countries that are on the Human Rights Council to make sure that it passes.” Reporting and translation by Alim Seytoff. Written by Paul Eckert.
Myanmar worst for state violence against civilians in first half of 2022
More incidents of violence against civilians by government forces were reported in Myanmar than anywhere else in the world during the first six months of 2022, according to a U.S.-based group that compiles data on conflict in developing nations. The Armed Conflicts Location and Event Data Project (ACLED), a partner organization of the United Nations, said in a report over the weekend that it had recorded 668 incidents of violence against civilians by state authorities in Myanmar from January to June this year. It ranked Myanmar atop a list of nations that included Afghanistan, Yemen, Kazakhstan, the Democratic Republic of Congo, China, Ethiopia and Iran. The majority of the violence “involved direct attacks with small weapons on individuals who are unarmed and not participating in demonstrations” against the military’s Feb. 1, 2021, coup, the group said. ACLED documented more than 11,000 reported fatalities in Myanmar over the same period, mostly as the result of battles between the military and anti-junta armed groups. Explosions and remote violence, as well as violence against civilians, were also leading causes of fatalities, it said. The group also counted more than 6,000 political protests in Myanmar during the first six months of the year. “With much of the country in active revolt against the takeover, the military has failed to consolidate control, resorting instead to extreme violence,” ACLED said. “Armed struggle against the junta has continued while anti-coup demonstrations persist.” ACLED said that violence against civilians by state forces took place in all 14 states and regions in Myanmar in the first half of 2022. “Civilians are shot at checkpoints, tortured in prisons, and killed following battles in villages,” it said. “Children have also been targeted, as have family members of anti-coup activists. In several cases, the military has desecrated the bodies of those killed, cutting off body parts and setting corpses on fire.” ACLED warned that political violence and protest trends seen at the start of 2022 “are likely to carry on into the second half of the year.” “As the military incurs further losses and fails to gain control of significant parts of the country, it will continue to target civilians with extreme acts of violence. Resistance to the coup — both armed and unarmed — shows no signs of stopping,” it said. Undated photo of Myanmar junta troops stationed in Mindat, Chin state. Credit: Citizen Journalist Soaring casualties Responding to ACLED’s report, Thein Tun Oo, the executive director of the Thayningha Strategy Studies Group, a group of former military officers, blamed civilian deaths on the armed resistance. “There will be deaths as long as they hide among civilians,” he said, referring to members of the anti-junta People’s Defense Force (PDF) paramilitary group, which the regime has labeled a terrorist organization. “No matter how many instructions are issued by the higher authorities, soldiers return fire at the place where bullets come from. As a result, those people caught in-between get hurt. This is unavoidable.” But political observer Than Soe Naing chalked the high civilian death toll up to the junta’s use of asymmetric warfare in the conflict. “The PDF forces came from the civilians. A lot of people are dying and getting injured because the military offensives make use of air strikes and naval attacks [in addition to ground forces],” he said. “The only way to reduce these casualties is for the PDF to surrender or totally annihilate the junta forces.” Seeking accountability Kyaw Zaw, spokesman for the office of shadow National Unity Government (NUG) President Duwa Lashi La, told RFA the junta is committing some of the worst war crimes on earth and “will surely pay the price.” “Those who gave the orders are also responsible,” he said. “You can’t run away from your crimes.” Kyaw Zaw pointed to a Sept. 16 helicopter attack on Let Yet Kone village, in Sagaing region’s Depayin township, that killed 19 people, including six children, as an example of how “there is no army as brutal as Myanmar’s.” In the meantime, he said the NUG is working to provide the people of Myanmar with as much protection as possible. But Kyaw Win, director of the Burma Human Rights Network, called on the NUG to do more to make the international community aware of the violence facing Myanmar’s civilian population. “NUG needs to work more closely with the international community. It needs to be more effective. It needs to bring additional resources into the country,” he said. “Right now, [the junta] is already bullying and killing as many people as it wants.” According to the Burma Human Rights Network, the military is killing more than 100 civilians a month in Myanmar, and Kyaw Win said that “thousands” have died in the 19 months since the coup. Thailand’s Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (Burma), said authorities in Myanmar have killed at least 2,311 civilians and arrested nearly 15,600 others since the coup — mostly during peaceful anti-junta protests. NUG President Duwa Lashi La put the death toll at more than 3,000 in a speech marking the anniversary of the armed resistance earlier this month. Translated by Khin Maung Nyane. Written in English by Joshua Lipes.
Targeted sanctions on arms sales key to ending violence in Myanmar: observers
Myanmar’s junta is using weapons purchased from abroad to commit “war crimes” against its people and must be targeted with new sanctions to end violence in the country, former military officers and political observers said Monday. On Friday, the United Nations human rights office in Geneva said in a report that countries should do more to prevent money and arms from reaching the junta, which rules through terror and repression. The office called for further isolation of the military regime, which it said had failed to govern effectively, suggesting U.N. members impose bans on arms sales and more narrowly defined sanctions to prevent its business network from gaining access to foreign currency. While the U.S., Britain, Canada and the EU have imposed sanctions on Myanmar since the military seized power in a February 2021 coup, several countries have continued to supply the junta with arms — most notably Russia, China and Serbia. Speaking to RFA Burmese on Monday, former army Capt. Lin Htet Aung, who is now a member of the anti-junta Civil Disobedience Movement (CDM), said sanctions are key to cutting the junta off from the modern weapons and raw materials it needs to maintain its hold on power. “The military’s domestic production capacity cannot provide all the weapons it needs for the army,” he said. “Missiles and heavy weapons and their accessories, as well as ammunition used by its armed forces, are all imported from abroad. All these things, as well as raw materials, have to be purchased from foreign nations.” The CDM captain said the military will continue to commit human rights violations, including bombing attacks on towns and villages, if the international community fails to level effective sanctions. On June 18 last year, the U.N. General Assembly approved a proposal to ban arms exports to the Myanmar military. One hundred and nineteen countries voted in favor of the resolution, while 36 countries — including China, India and Russia — abstained. Russian ally Belarus voted against it. Myanmar junta chief Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing and his team inspect weapons and equipment at the Higher Military Command School in Novosibirsk, Russia, July 16, 2022. Credit: Myanmar military Ineffective sanctions Observers told RFA that the junta continues to obtain military equipment and technology via large domestic and international arms brokering companies. Hla Kyaw Zo, a Myanmar political analyst based in China, said sanctioning these companies would have a significant effect on ending the junta’s domination. “Western countries consider their own interests and big arms companies are more or less connected with the Western world, so this issue is difficult to discuss,” he said. “If the West blocks [these sales] effectively, it’ll be good, but I don’t think they will press on the issue.” According to a list compiled by NGO Justice For Myanmar, there are more than 150 companies selling arms to Myanmar’s military, 135 of which are based in Myanmar, Russia and Singapore. Yadana Maung, the group’s spokeswoman, told RFA that many companies have been able to evade Western sanctions, meaning financial and military support continues to flow to the junta. Thein Tun Oo, executive director of the Thayningha Strategic Studies Institute, which is made up of former military officers, said using human rights to justify sanctions against Myanmar is “weakening the defense of the country.” “All we have heard so far is the noise they’re making about human rights,” he said. “In reality, what we understand is that they are using that premise to allow those who are pulling the strings to obtain more power.” He said the junta will continue to purchase arms from its allies despite attempts to block them. Propping up a brutal regime In February, former U.S. Rep. Tom Andrews, who serves as U.N. special rapporteur on human rights in Myanmar, said in a report to the U.N. Security Council that countries should stop selling arms to the junta, citing a brutal crackdown on civilians since the coup. The report called out permanent Security Council members China and Russia, as well as India, Belarus, Ukraine, Israel, Serbia, Pakistan and South Korea, for selling the weapons, which Andrews said are almost certainly being used by the military to kill innocent people. However, analysts say it is unlikely that the sale of arms to the junta can be cut off completely as Russia and China, which are its main suppliers, wield veto power at the Security Council. In the meantime, junta chief Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing has visited Russia three times in the 19 months since the coup. During his last trip, earlier this month, he signed an agreement with Russian government officials to build a nuclear reactor factory in Myanmar. Translated by Khin Maung Nyane. Written in English by Joshua Lipes.
FBI report of a Chinese agent working at Twitter sparks calls for government action
Chinese rights activists overseas have told RFA that they are concerned but unsurprised at recent allegations that an agent of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) was working at Twitter, saying such infiltration is part of Beijing’s global influence operation. The FBI informed Twitter of at least one Chinese agent among its employees, according to U.S. Senator Chuck Grassley, while hacker and whistleblower Peiter Zatko said the company’s lax security sparked fears that personal data on Chinese users was being collected by authorities in China. Zatko, Twitter’s former head of security, made the allegations during testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee, detailing internal clashes between some who sought advertising revenue from China, and others who were concerned about doing business inside China amid rising geopolitical tensions. “This was a big internal conundrum,” Zatko told the hearing, adding that Twitter appeared reluctant to turn away from China. “In a nutshell, if we were already in bed, it would be problematic if we lost that revenue stream,” he said. Zatko said the FBI had told the company that China’s secret service, the Ministry of State Security, had an agent on the payroll. A Twitter spokesperson said Twitter’s hiring process was independent of foreign influence, and that access to personal data was subject to stringent controls, adding that Zatko’s allegations were “riddled with inconsistencies and inaccuracies.” France-based commentator Wang Longmeng said the CCP has long targeted Western social media platforms to wage its overseas influence campaigns, and that some of the company’s regional executives have close ties to the CCP, including Kathy Chen. A Twitter logo is displayed on a mobile phone in an August 2020 file photo. Credit: AFP Whistleblowers Chen’s 2016 appointment as Twitter’s managing director for Greater China raised concerns in particular, as it emerged she had served as a software engineer in the People’s Liberation Army’s strategic missile force. “Kathy Chen, who had a military background, joined [the company], then Fei-fei Li became an independent director,” Wang said. “The CCP’s infiltration of Western media is one of its key strategies.” “It’s not surprising that the whistleblower revealed there are Chinese agents at Twitter, because there have been suspensions and deleted accounts, and yet Twitter still allows CCP diplomats to spread rumors and lies,” he said. China bans Twitter, Facebook and other U.S. social media firms, but government agencies and diplomats use the platforms to reach an international audience Rights activist Zhou Fengsuo, a former student leader during the 1989 Tiananmen protests and the chairman of Humanitarian China, said the U.S. government hasn’t responded adequately to the problem. “Zoom closed our Zoom account for commemorating the June 4 [Tiananmen massacre], and the Zoom employee who was later indicted was part of China’s state security police,” Zhou told RFA. “This has also been played out several times at Twitter, with Kathy Chen, who everyone knows has a military background, hired as managing director for the Greater China region, and then Fei-fei Li’s appointment to the board,” he said. “She has previously expressed her loyalty to the CCP.” “The United States has done nothing to remedy the situation,” Zhou said. “It selectively ignores this massive problem of high-tech companies colluding with the CCP because they want to do business in China.” “I have been calling on the U.S. government to investigate all high-tech companies,” he said. Blocking of sites A blogger known as “the Voice of Surfing” said there are other examples of pro-CCP bias on the platform, including the blocking and banning of the Great Translation Movement, which provides uncensored examples of social media comment from China’s tightly controlled internet. “The Great Translation Movement, which uses Twitter as its main platform, has been repeatedly banned by Twitter officials for violations of the rules,” the blogger said. “With Twitter management infiltrated by CCP forces, employees often take a pro-China stance when it comes to Chinese censorship on the platform,” they said. “They help the CCP’s United Front Work Department to tell good stories about China, and use their positions to suppress dissent against the Chinese government.” “This shameless practice is also happening on other platforms that have been infiltrated by the CCP.” The blogger said many Chinese rights activists who use Twitter have been subsequently summoned by state security police for posting politically sensitive material, yet the company has remained silent on how much user data is being leaked to the Chinese government. “We often hear about Chinese users being ‘invited to tea’ by the local police because of politically sensitive remarks on Twitter, but Twitter officials have never responded to questions about the disclosure of users’ personal information [to the Chinese authorities],” they said. “Under the influence of CCP capital, Twitter has moved closer to Weibo.” Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie.
Newly arrived Rohingya refugees say hundreds want to leave Myanmar
Hundreds of people were waiting to cross into Bangladesh from Myanmar, a small group of newly arrived Rohingya told BenarNews, amid fierce fighting close to the border that has sparked diplomatic protests over reports of artillery and mortar shells landing in Bangladeshi territory. One of the new arrivals said he saw “several hundred” people clustered along a river that separates Cox’s Bazar district in southeastern Bangladesh from Myanmar’s Rakhine state, and who were trying to cross the frontier several days ago. It was not immediately clear what happened to those other people apparently displaced by intense clashes in recent weeks between Burmese junta forces and Arakan Army (AA) rebels. In Bangladesh, where the government has tightened security along the border amid the violence in Rakhine, authorities have not confirmed reports of any new refugee arrivals or influx into Cox’s Bazar. Meanwhile, a Rohingya leader said that at least five Rohingya fleeing Myanmar had arrived at a Cox’s Bazar camp in recent days. “Two Rohingya families of five people, including two infants, have taken shelter at the Lambasia camp in Ukhia,” Muhammed Jubair, secretary general of the Arakan Rohingya Society for Peace and Human Rights (ARSPH), told BenarNews. The adults were identified as Abul Wafa, his wife, Minara, and another woman, Dildar Begum. Wafa said they fled from Buthidaung in Myanmar on Sept. 6 as junta and AA forces clashed. “The junta started torturing the Rohingya in Buthidaung,” he told BenarNews. “That’s why we came to Bangladesh to save our lives, but we are also hiding here.” “When we were entering Bangladesh, we saw several hundred Rohingya people, mostly women and children waiting to leave near the Naf River,” Wafa said. Two days earlier, on Sept. 4, the Foreign Ministry issued a news release expressing “deep concern” over mortars that reportedly landed on the Bangladeshi side of the frontier the day before. The release noted that Myanmar Ambassador U Aung Kyaw Moe was summoned regarding the incident, just as he had been summoned on Aug. 21 and 28. “During the meeting, the ambassador was also told that such activities are of grave threat to the safety and security of the peace-loving people, violation of the border agreement between Bangladesh and Myanmar and contrary to the good neighborly relationship,” the ministry said. On Tuesday, Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal said he expected firing inside Myanmar along the border to end soon. “We heard that a group called Arakan Army was fighting with the government forces inside Myanmar. When the government forces attack the Arakan Army, some shells land inside our territory,” he told reporters. “Our Border Guard Bangladesh (BGB), as well as Foreign Ministry, have strongly protested the incidents by calling the ambassador of Myanmar.” Refugees’ accounts Jubair said Wafa and the others sheltered with a relative after arriving in Bangladesh before moving into another camp. Wafa said his group gave a boatman a piece of gold jewelry to carry them across the Naf River because they had no money to pay him. Dildar Begum, 22, said her husband, Syed Ullah, was killed by the “Mogh army” a month ago. She was referring to the Arakan Army although “Mogh” is a term that Rohingya also often use to refer to the Burmese military. “I fled with Wafa’s family to Bangladesh as there was no other option for me,” she told BenarNews. In Rakhine state, an official with the AA rebels denied that the group was targeting members of the stateless Rohingya Muslim minority. “The allegations on AA targeting Muslims are not just wrong but baseless accusations, because the fighting [in the state between Arakan Army and junta troops] has been more than a month,” Khine Thu Kha, a spokesman for the rebel group, told RFA Burmese. “We want to question back, did you guys see or hear any report of a Muslim killed or injured by the fighting? Did you hear any report or see anyone saying there was a shell or a bullet from AA falling in a Muslim village so far? Otherwise, it is just an accusation with other intentions to defame our organization.” Despite the claims made by the Rohingya, Md. Shamsud Douza, Bangladesh’s commissioner for Refugee Relief and Repatriation, said there was no official information about any new arrivals from Rakhine state infiltrating Bangladesh territory. “Clashes are occurring between two groups in Myanmar. It is very normal that it will create some tension on our border as a neighboring country,” he told BenarNews. “Our decision is very clear – we cannot allow even a single Rohingya to enter Bangladesh.” Robiul Islam, additional superintendent of police, said his unit was “not sure about a fresh entry of Rohingya but we are looking into the matter.” Sheikh Khalid Mohammad Iftekhar, a senior official of Border Guard Bangladesh, said the border police force had tightened security at the frontier to prevent any attempts by refugees to enter the country. From January to June, 478 Rohingya were denied entry and four were arrested, according to the BGB. Repatriation hopes A Rohingya who lives in Maungdaw, Myanmar, and asked to not be named for security concerns, said that the increasing conflict in the state had dampened Rohingya hopes for repatriation. “It will be difficult for them to return in this situation. The current situation will not allow them to come here,” the resident told RFA. “The situation here is not very good. There is no security. People here are fleeing to other areas because fighting is going on. In this situation, they will not be able to come back.” Fighting between the military and the AA resumed in July. Oo Maung Ohn, a resident of Maungdaw Township, blamed the resurgence in Rakhine State after a nearly two-year ceasefire on the junta. “Do you know why all this fighting resumed? They (the junta) closed the roads and started the fighting and they arrested many innocent people,” he told RFA. “They arrested village administrators, questioned them and hit them.” Rakhine State Attorney General Hla…
Myanmar’s people, shadow govt mourn UK monarch amid junta silence
Citizens of Myanmar reacted to the passing of Queen Elizabeth II, who died last week at age 96 after 70 years on the British throne, with sadness on Monday, remembering the monarch as a champion of democracy and a source of comfort in the face of national adversity. Elizabeth’s reign began in 1952, just four years after the end of more than a century of British rule in Myanmar, at a time of strong anti-British sentiment in the fledgling Southeast Asian nation. Myanmar did not join the Commonwealth after independence, like most other former colonies. However, many Burmese remember her as overseeing improved bilateral relations that culminated in substantial support from London for democratic reforms in Myanmar under the National League for Democracy (NLD) government of Aung San Suu Kyi, prior to its ousting by the military last year. “The queen was part of the ruling class of the country that has continuously supported the cause of Myanmar’s democracy,” Thet Oo, a resident of Salingyi township in northern Myanmar’s Sagaing region, told RFA Burmese. “I wish for her to rise into heaven.” Khin Maung Nyo, a Yangon-based writer who previously studied in the U.K., told RFA that while the queen’s role was largely ceremonial, she was seen as a steadying and unifying presence. “People saw her as their guardian angel watching from above as a loving mother would or as a good ruler should. That’s why her subjects from all the 15 Commonwealth realms loved and respected her,” he said. “During the time I was in England, the country was having economic problems but the people struggled hard in unity. Though there are a lot of problems at the Palace, I’m sure Prince Charles will be able to steer the country, as King Charles III, out of danger.” The Burmese people can empathize with the grief currently felt by Britons, a Mandalay resident who requested anonymity for security reasons, told RFA. “I can see the entire British population is in grief because she had done many good deeds during her 70 years of rule. It’s sad to see them like this. Stories about their grief made me remember the time when our people were similarly in grief when General Aung San was assassinated [in 1947],” the Mandalay resident said, referring to Aung San Suu Kyi’s father, who was a revolutionary hero that many consider to be the founder of modern Myanmar. “Nobody would be grieving for those leaders who didn’t do any good for the country. Just look at [previous military rulers] Gen. Ne Win and Senior Gen. Saw Maung. Nobody was moved or sorry for them. People only grieve for good rulers,” he said. Junta silence Though the junta has remained silent on the passing of Queen Elizabeth II, the shadow National Unity Government (NUG) made a point of publicly showing condolences both at home and abroad, a NUG spokesman told RFA. The NUG’s Acting President Duwa Lashi La sent his official message shortly after learning of the queen’s death on behalf of the shadow government, formed by former lawmakers who were ousted by the junta in the Feb. 1, 2021 coup. “The prime minister has also sent a similar message on behalf of the NUG government, and our representative in Britain has, in person, signed the Book of Condolences,” said NUG spokesman Kyaw Zaw. The British government and the royal family have continuously supported the democracy movement in Myanmar and the queen had been, according to Kyaw Zaw, a “good friend” of Aung San Suu Kyi, the most well-known figure in the movement who served as State Counselor prior to the coup. The junta’s official newspaper reported on the queen’s death in its Sept. 9 issue. RFA attempted to reach junta Deputy Minister of Information Maj. Gen. Zaw Min Tun and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs for comment on why the junta, which claims to be Myanmar’s legitimate government, had not sent a message of condolence to London, but received no reply. Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing sent such a message to the government of Japan after the assassination of its former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in July. Post-coup relations Thein Tun Oo, executive director of the Thayningha Strategic Studies Institute, made up of former military officers, told RFA that the junta likely chose to stay silent because Britain and the international community have been putting pressure on Myanmar since the coup. “Diplomatic relations with countries like Britain … have not been very good since February 1 [2021],” said Thein Tun Oo. “As you know, former British ambassador Vicky Bowman was also recently arrested [by the junta] and punished for meddling in Myanmar politics. So, politically, especially diplomatically, relations are not very good.” Last week, former U.K. Ambassador to Myanmar Vicky Bowman and her Burmese husband, Htein Lin, were sentenced to one year in prison each on immigration violation charges, which activists said were concocted by the junta. Authorities arrested Bowman, who served as ambassador from 2002-2006, and her husband, an artist and former political prisoner, on Aug. 25 for allegedly violating immigration laws and jailed them in Yangon’s notorious Insein Prison. The arrests came after the U.K. announced a new round of sanctions against the junta. Than Soe Naing, a political observer, said the snub was a result of political and economic sanctions on the junta. “The British royal family stands with the democratic forces of the world who are fighting against the military dictatorship today and so, they have no reason to send a message of condolences to the death of a state leader of England which is putting all kinds of political and economic sanctions on the junta,” Tan Soe Naing said. “That’s why their papers only announce the news of the death. They have not acknowledged and expressed sorrow in any way,” he said. The British government has consistently supported Myanmar’s democracy since the 1988 military coup. When Aung San Suu Kyi, whose late husband was a British national, was released from house…
Cambodian psychiatrist calls award reason ‘to work even harder’
Cambodian psychiatrist Chhim Sotheara, one of four winners of this year’s prestigious Ramon Magsaysay Award, was surprised to learn he had won the award and didn’t know he had been nominated to receive it, he told RFA in an interview this week. “At first, I didn’t believe it, because I hadn’t applied for it,” Sotheara said. “I thought at first it was an online scam,” he said. “This is a valuable award. Only a few people in Asia have received it, and it is an honor for our country, as Cambodia will be recognized through the award,” Sotheara said. The award also acknowledges the efforts he and his NGO have made over the last two decades to help the people of Cambodia, he said. “All our employees are so happy, and this will encourage us now to work even harder to deserve having received the award,” he added. Established in 1958 and named after the Philippines’ seventh president who died in a plane crash a year earlier, the Ramon Magsaysay Award is considered Asia’s most prestigious prize. It honors people across the region who have done groundbreaking work in their fields. Also receiving the award this year are Filipina pediatrician Bernadette J. Madrid, French anti-pollution activist Gary Bencheghib, and Japanese ophthalmologist Tadashi Hattori. All four are expected to attend an awards ceremony in Manila Nov. 30. Sotheara, 54, was among the first generation of psychiatrists to graduate in Cambodia after the 1975-79 period of Khmer Rouge rule that killed an estimated 1.7 million people and left many thousands of survivors deeply traumatized, many of them living in remote rural areas of the country. Now executive director of Cambodia’s Transcultural Psychosocial Organization (TPO), Sotheara developed the concept of baksbat, or “broken courage” — a post-traumatic state of fear, passivity and avoidance considered more relevant and particular to the Cambodian experience. Sotheara Chhim meets with a patient in a rural area of Cambodia, in an undated photo. Credit: Sotheara Chhim Underserved rural areas Switching to clinical psychiatry after working for a time as a surgeon, Sotheara later quit his job at a state hospital after he was approached for help by a patient coming from a remote community and became aware of the needs going unmet in Cambodia’s countryside. Sotheara’s NGO now delivers treatment directly to people’s homes and communities, he said. “When I help one patient, I also help his family and community, because when one person experiences mental issues, we need to treat the whole family.” Many Cambodians experience mental health problems, and Sotheara’s TPO has not been able to respond to all their requests for help, he said. “But since we started, we’ve improved a lot.” There were only 10 psychiatrists at Sotheara’s own graduation, he said. “Now we have around 100 psychiatrists, but we can’t answer all the demands made of us because many of those experts like working in the city, and not many work out in the communities.” Around 80% of Cambodia’s population live in rural areas, and service must be provided to those people, he added. Also speaking to RFA, TPO employee Taing Sopheap said she has worked with Chhim Sotheara for the past 15 years and has seen him sacrifice himself both physically and financially to carry out his NGO’s work. “If a case is urgent and important, he will work on it regardless of the cost in time to his team or to other cases,” she said. Translated by Samean Yun for RFA Khmer. Written in English by Richard Finney.
WeChat warns users their likes, comments and histories are being sent to China
The Chinese social media platform WeChat is warning users outside China that their data will be stored on servers inside the country, RFA has learned. A number of overseas WeChat users received a notification on Sept. 6, warning that “personal data [including] likes, comments, browsing and search history, content uploads, etc.” will be transmitted to China. The notification also reminds users that their behavior while using the app is subject to WeChat’s licensing agreement and privacy policy. A YouTuber living in France who gave only the pseudonym Miss Crook said she was shocked to receive a French translation of the same message. “I clicked through and … this message popped up, so I automatically clicked cancel,” she said. “It’s becoming clear what the difference is between a democracy and a dictatorship.” She said the move would likely affect large numbers of Chinese nationals and emigres living overseas. “Overseas Chinese have become very dependent on WeChat, but is it really that important?” she said. “We can actually stop using it completely, so we shouldn’t let them confuse us. It’s really not that important.” Faced with mounting international concern over privacy protection, WeChat said in September 2021 that it had “separated” its data storage facilities for domestic and international users, asking overseas users to re-sign the terms and conditions to keep using the app, which many people rely on to send money to people in China, make purchases in Chinese yuan, and stay in touch with friends and family. Former Sina Weibo censor Liu Lipeng said the move was largely a cosmetic one, however. “Last year … WeChat re-signed its agreements with all overseas users, but everything on there except for one-to-one chats have to use WeChat protocols,” Liu said. “So the moment you click OK, you are back in [the Chinese version] again.” “Everything you write is still available [to the Chinese authorities], so it’s basically sleight of hand. Nothing has changed,” he said. “You are a still a WeChat user.” U.S.-based legal scholar Teng Biao said WeChat’s parent company Tencent is already required under China’s Cybersecurity Law to assist the ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP) with any data it says it needs, as are all of the other internet service providers and social media platforms in China. “The Chinese government has always used WeChat inside China as a tool to control society and censor speech, which is part and parcel its program of high-tech totalitarian control,” Teng told RFA. “It has also always used WeChat as a way to export its censorship beyond its borders, to the United States and other countries,” he said. “Western countries should consider re-evaluating WeChat as a threat to national security, data security, personal privacy and so on,” Teng said. “[They] cannot allow China’s censorship system to extend into the West and all around the world.” Growing concerns Concerns have been growing for some time over overseas censorship and surveillance via WeChat, with the U.S. banning any U.S.-based individuals or entities from doing business with Tencent, and rights activists describing it as a “prison” that keeps overseas users within reach of CCP law enforcement operations. Launched by Tencent in 2011, WeChat now has more than 1.1 billion users, second only to WhatsApp and Facebook, but the company keeps users behind China’s complex system of blocks, filters and human censorship known as the Great Firewall, even when they are physically in another country. The app is also used by China’s state security police to carry out surveillance and harassment of dissidents and activists in exile who speak out about human rights abuses in the country, or campaign for democratic reform. And it’s not just Chinese nationals who are being targeted. In May 2020, researchers at CitizenLab at the Munk School of Global Affairs, University of Toronto warned that anyone using WeChat, even if they have lived their whole lives outside China, is “subject to pervasive content surveillance that was previously thought to be exclusively reserved for China-registered accounts.” Documents and images transmitted entirely among non-China-registered accounts undergo content surveillance wherein these files are analyzed for content that is politically sensitive in China, the report, titled “We Chat, They Watch,” said. The report warned of “very serious” security and privacy issues associated with WeChat and other Chinese apps, and called on app stores to highlight risks to users before they download such apps. And a recent report detailing massive amounts of user data collected by TikTok also sparked privacy concerns around the hugely popular video app, which is owned by Chinese internet company ByteDance. In a technical analysis of TikTok’s source code, security research firm Internet 2-0 found the app, which is the sixth most-used globally with forecast advertising revenues of U.S. $12 billion in 2022, was “overly intrusive” and data collection was “excessive.” While TikTok claims user data is stored in the U.S. and Singapore, the report found evidence of “many subdomains in the iOS app scattered around the world,” including Baishan, China. As of September 2021 TikTok had more than one billion active users globally, 142.2 million of whom are in North America. The report found that TikTok makes use of a number of permissions considered “dangerous” by industry experts. Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie.
UN experts urge action on findings of Uyghur abuse in China
A collection of human rights officials on Wednesday said the international community must not ignore the systematic abuses allegedly perpetrated against Uyghurs and other Turkic minorities in northwestern China’s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, and repeated a call for the U.N. Human Rights Council to review the charges. The more than 40 experts, comprising U.N. special rapporteurs, independent experts and members of working groups under the U.N. Human Rights Council, issued their call in response to a damning report issued on Aug. 31 by former U.N. human rights chief Michelle Bachelet, finding that China’s repression of the predominantly Muslim minorities in Xinjiang “may constitute international crimes, in particular crimes against humanity.” Bachelet, who traveled to Xinjiang in May, issued the overdue report on rights abuses in the region on the day she concluded her four-year mandate as U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights. The report states that “serious human rights violations” have been committed in Xinjiang in the context of the Chinese government’s application of counter-terrorism and counter-“extremism” policies and practices. China’s Permanent Mission to the U.N. Office at Geneva dismissed the report, saying it ignored the human rights achievements by people from all ethnic groups in Xinjiang and the damage caused by terrorism and extremism to the human rights of all ethnic groups there. But the U.N. experts supported the report’s conclusions on abuses in Xinjiang, highlighting the finding that “the extent of arbitrary and discriminatory detention of members of Uyghur and other predominantly Muslim minorities … may constitute international crimes, in particular crimes against humanity,” according to a news release issued by U.N. Human Rights Special Procedures in Geneva. The experts also drew attention to the report’s finding of “credible allegations of patterns of torture or ill-treatment, including forced medical treatment and adverse conditions of detention, as well as incidents of sexual and gender-based violence including invasive gynecological exams, and indications of coercive enforcement of family planning and birth control policies,” the news release said. The experts, who have mandates to report and advise on human rights issues, also repeated a call from June 2020 for the Human Rights Council to convene a special session on China to address allegations of arbitrary detentions, enforced disappearances, and restrictions on movement, freedom of religion and freedom of expression on the premise of national security. The Human Rights Council should consider establishing a panel of experts to closely monitor, analyze and report annually on the human rights situation in China, the group of U.N. experts said. They also recommended that the U.N. General Assembly or secretary-general consider the creation of a special envoy. U.N. member states, U.N. agencies and businesses should demand that China fulfills its human rights obligations, the experts said. Since 2017, Chinese authorities have ramped up their repression of Uyghurs and other Turkic minorities, arbitrarily detaining up to 1.8 million people in internment camps and committing severe human rights abuses. Credible reports by rights groups and the media documenting the widespread abuse and repression have prompted the United States and some parliaments of Western countries to declare that the Chinese government’s action amount to a genocide and crimes against humanity. ‘We have to name it’ When asked for comment on the experts’ remarks, Stephane Dujarric, spokesman for U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres, told RFA that he had nothing to add to what he said about Bachelet’s report during a regular press briefing on Sept. 1. At the news conference, Dujarric said Guterres had read the report and that it confirmed what the secretary-general’s position that the Uyghur community in Xinjiang must be respected without discrimination. “The secretary-general very much hopes that the government of China will take on board the recommendations put forward in the assessment by the high commissioner for human rights,” he said at the time. Nury Turkel, chair of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, a bipartisan and independent federal government body, said he was “thankful” that the U.N. experts are acknowledging an obligation to address the Uyghur issue. “This comes years too late, but is a good step forward,” he told RFA. “No member state can say that they didn’t know or can escape the brutal reality of active genocide in China.” Dolkun Isa, president of the World Uyghur Congress, called the U.N. experts’ calls “highly timely as the U.N. has no excuse not to act in light of the release of the Uyghur report by the U.N Human Rights High Commissioner.” Alexis Brunnelle-Duceppe, a member of Canada’s Parliament, said he wanted the government of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to take a stand for human rights and condemn China for its maltreatment of Uyghurs. “What I’m asking from this government, the Canadian government, is to … ask the U.N. to send a special envoy to Xinjiang and to stop being weak in front of China when it comes to crimes against humanity, when it comes to genocide,” he told RFA. Though Canada’s House of Commons voted overwhelmingly in February 2021 to declare China’s repression of the Uyghurs a genocide, the country’s government has not issued that determination. “This is a problem. If you want to solve a problem, you have to name it, and we’re in front of a genocide right now. We have to name it,” he said. Translated by Alim Seytoff for RFA Uyghur. Written in English by Roseanne Gerin.
UK will ‘bear consequences’ of new leader’s hard line on China: Chinese state media
Chinese state media hit out at newly elected Conservative Party leader Liz Truss over her statement that China represents a major threat to national security, as polling showed Truss will soon take over from outgoing Prime Minister Boris Johnson. Truss was announced as the party’s new leader amid a cost-of-living crisis after she beat former chancellor Rishi Sunak in a weeks-long internal contest for the ruling party’s top job, and the post of prime minister that comes with it. “Another statement of Truss during the campaign [was that] she might declare China a ‘national security threat’ to the UK,” the English-language China Daily said in an editorial on Monday. “Trying to divert domestic attention by exaggerating the ‘China threat’ and slamming other countries is like an old meme played by lame political talk show actors, which serves no purpose other than to expose the incapacity of such politicians in terms of their governance,” the paper said. “The easiest way is to pander to populism, but this will only bring about a more difficult fate for their countries,” the paper said. The two-month leadership contest left a power vacuum at the heart of the British government as incumbent Boris Johnson jetted off on at least two overseas vacations, having resigned in the wake of a cascade of ministerial resignations calling on him to go. Inflation is above 10 percent, with tens of thousands of workers currently striking for pay and conditions to keep up. Foreign secretary Truss, who has spoken of her admiration for late former prime minister Margaret Thatcher, summoned China’s ambassador to the U.K. for crisis talks over Beijing’s military aggression targeting Taiwan during the Aug. 2-3 visit by U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. “We have seen increasingly aggressive behavior and rhetoric from Beijing in recent months, which threaten peace and stability in the region,” Truss said in a statement at the time. She reportedly vowed to declare China “a threat to national security” if she won the leadership race. Improved ties unlikely The nationalistic Global Times newspaper, which has close ties to CCP mouthpiece the People’s Daily, said there was little reason to believe relations between London and Beijing would improve under Truss’ premiership. “With the country effectively drifting aimlessly without a government since former Prime Minister Boris Johnson was forced to resign after caroming from one scandal after another and subsequently going AWOL, the country needs pragmatism and practical policies, not outdated ideology,” the paper said. “Having designated China as a threat to the U.K.’s national security … holding to that stance when in office will not be in the U.K.’s best interests,” the editorial warned. It said plenty has changed since the Conservative government heralded a “golden age” in Sino-British relations in 2015. “In the hope of securing a trade deal with the U.S. to help extricate the U.K. from the jaws of the monstrous Brexit mess the country brought upon itself, being tough on China was seen as a way to curry favor with Washington,” the article said. Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie.
