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Category: East Asia
China’s zero-COVID curbs bring Guangdong’s manufacturing hub to its knees
The ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP)’s zero-COVID measures are forcing large numbers of private manufacturers to close in the Pearl River delta region this month, RFA has learned. Last month, Cooper Electronics, based in Guangdong’s manufacturing hub of Dongguan, announced it would close this month. Hong Kong-owned toymaker Dongguan Kaishan Toys has announced it will follow suit, while Dongguan Jingli Plastics and Electronics will suspend production on Aug. 31 after laying off all of its staff, according to ChinaToysNet. Other private businesses have told RFA they plan to furlough all staff for six months after a massive slump in new orders made it impossible for them to meet their payroll bill. The moves come as foreign-invested manufacturers are increasingly relocating to Vietnam, Cambodia and other Southeast Asian countries, as costs continue to skyrocket in China. Financial commentator Cai Shengkun said the hollowing out of Dongguan as a manufacturing base has been a long time coming. “Dongguan used to be China’s manufacturing base, and in its heyday was the production base for products sold by the world’s largest companies,” Cai said. “During its heyday, Dongguan maintained high GDP growth for over a 20-year period … and accumulated enormous wealth.” “But now with the relocation of some industries and the continuous migration of foreign capital, there are not many high-end factories in Dongguan left,” he said. Cai said CCP leader Xi Jinping’s insistence on a zero-COVID approach, meaning individuals and entire cities can be placed under lockdown at a moment’s notice, with mandatory quarantine and testing for all, have also struck a major blow. “Rising shipping costs and the impact of the pandemic have meant that [these] industries are no longer profitable,” he said. “With shipping costs getting higher and higher, these products will no longer have any export advantage.” This photo taken on July 13, 2022 shows cargo containers stacked at Yantian port in Shenzhen in China’s southern Guangdong province. Credit: AFP Logistical challenges Kaishan Toys, established in 1998, was once one of Hong Kong’s most prestigious toy manufacturers, with more than 2,000 employees. But the company has seen a sharp drop in orders since 2021, with most toy production now outsourced to Southeast Asia. At the time of its closure announcement, just 100 employees remained. Meanwhile, Dongguan Jieying Precision Hardware Products has also announced it will close at the end of the month, citing additional costs and logistical challenges under the zero-COVID policy. Other companies are pausing operations, in the hope of making a comeback if business improves. Huizhou Wanzhisheng New Energy Technology announced a five-day furlough for most departments, citing the impact of disease control and prevention restrictions. The problem isn’t confined to Dongguan or Guangdong province, either. Shandong Guangfu Group, a private iron and steel joint venture established in 1983, suspended production on July 19, with no date for resumption given. And a technology company based in the eastern province of Anhui furloughed all of its staff from July 14 to Jan. 22, 2023. Financial analyst Guan Min said the government has failed to offer any policy incentives or financial support to private enterprises hit by the zero-COVID policy, and that this could be a deliberate choice. “This is a great opportunity for the state sector to expand, and for the private sector to shrink,” Guan said. “Private enterprises have good technology and so much equipment, which can benefit state-owned enterprises if there are mergers.” Retreat from market economics Guan said he has been warning of a total retreat from market economics under Xi for the past decade. “Based on the indicators 10 years ago, I said that only large state-owned enterprises would still be operating in China 20 years down the line,” he said. The government does appear willing to boost the property market, where a slump fueled by a massive backlog in unfinished buildings has started to affect the economy. Since Xi Jinping’s recent comment that “housing isn’t for speculation,” a number of local governments have announced preferential policies for homebuyers, encouraging rural residents to buy in cities. Homebuyers across China are withholding mortgage payments in protest at stalled construction of properties by major developers across the country until developers resume construction of pre-sold homes, local media and social media reported. Japan’s Nomura has estimated that developers have only delivered around 60 percent of homes sold before actual construction between 2013 and 2020. China’s outstanding mortgage loans rose by 26.3 trillion yuan during that period. Social media posts have indicated that, far from moving to ensure that unfinished property is completed, local authorities may be hiring actors to make it look as if work is being done on abandoned construction sites. “Hiring: actors for a construction site, 100 yuan/day,” reads a screenshot of a job advertisement that RFA was unable to verify independently. “Requirements: To bang on the steel pipes, pull trolleys around and pretend to be engaged in construction work if someone comes to check,” the advertisement reads. Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie.
Chinese and Thai air forces to hold 10-day joint exercise this month
China and Thailand are to kick off a major joint air force exercise on Monday after a two-year suspension due to COVID, the Chinese Defense Ministry announced. The ministry said in a statement on Friday that the Falcon Strike 2022 training exercise will be held at Udorn Royal Thai Air Force Base in Udon Thani province, northeastern Thailand. The exercise will begin on Aug. 14 and RFA sources say it will last until Aug. 24. It will include “training courses such as air support, strikes on ground targets, and small and large-scale troop deployment,” according to China’s defense ministry. “The Chinese People’s Liberation Army Air Force (PLAAF) will dispatch fighter jets, fighter-bombers and airborne early warning (AEW) aircraft, and the Royal Thai Air Force will send its fighter jets and AEW aircraft,” the ministry said. The renewed exercise marks a new effort to “enhance mutual trust and friendship between the two air forces,” the ministry said, as well as to further the strategic cooperation between Thailand and China, as the latter seeks to project power and expand its influence in the region. The Chinese military has just finished a week-long air-naval exercise around Taiwan as an angry response to a visit to the island by the Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi. “Thailand cannot deny China’s military role in this region. The combined exercise enables Thailand to better understand and be more familiar with the PLA’s command and control system and its military doctrine,” Dulyapak Preecharush, Deputy Director of the Institute of East Asian Studies at Thammasat University in Bangkok told BenarNews, an RFA-affiliated online news service. Growing military links Reuters quoted an anonymous Thai air force source who said that Thailand will not deploy its F-16s for Falcon Strike 2022. Instead it will use its Swedish-made Saab JAS-39 Gripen fighters as well as German-made Alpha Jet light attack aircraft. It is unclear which types of aircraft China will be deploying for the exercise. Chinese fighters have been seen taking part in recent Sino-Thai Air Force joint training exercises, said Andreas Rupprecht, an expert on China’s military aviation, in a recent interview with RFA. “Thailand has been shifting more towards China in recent years,” Rupprecht said. Fighter jets from China’s PLA Air Force and the Royal Thai Air Force fly in tactical formation during joint training exercise Falcon Strike 2019. CREDIT: Chinese Defense Ministry Since the Thai military increased its power after coups in 2006 and 2014, Bangkok bought tanks, armored personnel carriers and entered into a controversial multi-billion-dollar contract to procure submarines from China. China’s arms exports to Thailand increased five-fold between 2014 and 2018 compared with the preceding five years, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute in Sweden. The Thai-U.S. relationship has encountered some turbulence because of the growing ties between Bangkok and Beijing, despite Thailand being the U.S.’s oldest treaty ally in Asia. The Thai air force expressed a strong interest in buying some F-35 stealth fighter jets to replace its aging fleet of F-16A/B Fighting Falcons but Washington so far seems reluctant to consider the purchase, fearing the fighter’s sensitive technologies could be compromised by China, its biggest military and strategic rival. However the upcoming Falcon Strike exercise should not increase tension between China and the U.S. if it “doesn’t have a scenario such as an attack on U.S. interests or let China become familiar with U.S. military hardware,” argued Thammasat University’s Dulyapak. “Both the U.S. and China can take turns to hold joint drills with Thailand,” the analyst said, adding: “There is no monopoly in Thailand’s defense policy.” Falcon Strike joint training exercises have been held annually since 2015 but were suspended in 2000 because of the global COVID pandemic. This year’s event is the 5th training exercise between the air forces of China and Thailand. Nontarat Phaicharoen in Bangkok contributed to this story.
Vietnam sets up specialized police units to suppress protests across the country
More than a dozen provinces and cities in Vietnam have set up Riot Police Regiments or Battalions to be held in reserve to crack down on people accused of “disturbing public order” and carrying out “illegal demonstrations.” RFA research shows at least 15 provinces and cities had launched forces as of Oct. 10, 2021. They include Ho Chi Minh City, Binh Duong, Binh Phuoc, Dong Nai, Nghe An, Lao Cai, Bac Giang, Thanh Hoa and Gia Lai. The riot squads have been formed to crack down on worker protests at the many industrial parks in southeastern Vietnam, in places such as Ho Chi Minh City, Binh Duong, and Dong Nai. They could also be used to stop demonstrations by ethnic and religious minorities such as the Protestant Ede and Duong Van Minh sect in provinces like Cao Bang and Gia Lai. On Wednesday the Ho Chi Minh City Police held a launching ceremony for its Reserve Riot Combat Police Regiment. State media said the force was established under a ruling by the Ministry of Public Security to set up Reserve Riot Police Battalions in province-level localities. News sites did not publish the full text of the ministry’s Decision No.1984, which called for the regiment’s formation. According to the Công an Nhân dân (People’s Police) online newspaper, the regiments and battalions must be ready to fight in any situation when they receive orders from the Ministry of Public Security or directors of province-level police departments. The Ho Chi Minh City Police Department outlined the riot squad’s duties to the media. They include “preventing and suppressing cases of public disorder and illegal demonstrations,” “conducting rescue operations,” “protecting important political events of the Party and State and [maintaining order during] major holidays,” “ensuring political security, social order and safety of the locality,” and “performing other tasks as required.” Police try to stop protesters demanding clean water in Hanoi on May 1, 2016. CREDIT: Reuters Suppression of protests ‘unconstitutional’ A Ho Chi Minh City-based lawyer, who did not wish to be named for security reasons, said “suppression of unlawful protests” goes against Vietnam’s Constitution. “I think Vietnam doesn’t yet have a Law on Protests, so it can’t be said that demonstrations are illegal,” the lawyer said. “The right to protest is a constitutional right, so repression is unconstitutional.” “The Vietnamese state does not mention a Law on Protests, perhaps because it does not want to because it is afraid people will protest [against it].” A woman, who asked only to be named as Phung, participated in protests against China’s placement of the HD981 oil rig in Vietnam’s Exclusive Economic Zone in 2014. She told RFA the government has been suspending the Bill on Protests for too long. “According to the Vietnamese Constitution, people have the right to protest, but the bill on demonstrations has been frozen for many years,” she said. “Basically, in Vietnam, every protest is suppressed, because they have not passed a bill which would allow people to ask for permission to organize demonstrations like in other countries.” “Article 25 of the 2013 Constitution stipulates that ‘Citizens have the right to freedom of speech, freedom of the press, access to information, assembly, association, and demonstration.’ The exercise of these rights is prescribed by law.” Government drags its heels on protest law In 2013, the government directed the Ministry of Public Security to take primary responsibility and coordinate with relevant agencies to develop a draft Law on Protests. The bill has been repeatedly withdrawn from the National Assembly’s agenda for further study and amendment. In 2017, national legislator Truong Trong Nghia, from Ho Chi Minh City, told the National Assembly that the promulgation of a Law on Protests was necessary in order to implement the 2013 Constitution on ensuring human and citizens’ rights. Since 2018, no National Assembly member or domestic newspaper has mentioned the Bill on Protests. Strengthening the suppression of resistance According to Hanoi-based journalist Nguyen Vu Binh, in Vietnam what is written in the Constitution is one thing, how it is implemented is another. Binh said the establishment of a specialized agency and riot police force is intended to quell all resistance by the people and comes after a series of fierce crackdowns on protests. “Following the trend of increasing repression in the past four-to-five years, the professionalization of these forces to suppress protests and people’s resistance is normal in my opinion,” Binh said. Oil rig protester Phung told RFA the repression and suppression of protests has always taken place in Vietnam. She said Vietnam does not need to sign any more international agreements so the government is not interested in respecting human rights. “At this stage Vietnam does not need to join any treaty or agreement, so they want to deal with [whichever protest] they want. Now they are also bolder,” she said. “I believe that even if a force is formed, they will not use uniformed forces to take action to suppress protesters because that will affect the image of the Vietnamese government. They don’t want to show their true face to the world.” Human Rights Watch’s latest report on Vietnam, published in February, said: “fundamental civil and political rights are systematically suppressed in Vietnam. The government, under the one-party rule of the Communist Party of Vietnam, tightened its grip on the rights to freedom of expression, freedom of association, peaceful assembly, freedom of movement, and freedom of religion.”
North Korean soldiers ordered to harvest grass for compost in spare time
North Korean soldiers in low-level military units have an unusual and not entirely welcome new mission: collecting grass during summer training breaks to produce compost for farms, sources inside the country said. The impoverished and isolated country suffers from chronic shortages of chemical-based fertilizer during the summer growing season, a situation that has grown worse since 2020 because of border closures with China that cut off trade during the coronavirus pandemic. Each year, North Korean citizens are tasked by their government to fill unrealistically high government quotas for fertilizer. But the material they typically collect is human waste, which gets mixed with soil and applied to farm fields. “The dissatisfaction among soldiers is increasing as each unit uses their free time to meet the grass quotas,” a military-related source in North Hamgyong province told RFA on Tuesday. The General Political Bureau of the People’s Army sets grass compost production quotas for all military units each August and September, said the source who declined to be identified so as to speak freely. Each soldier is required to produce 50 kilograms (110 lbs.) of grass daily in order to produce compost, he added. They make natural fertilizer by cutting grass on a nearby mountainside as well as in areas to which they are assigned for their quotas, the military-related source said. “This is all after their daily training,” he said. “As they are required to produce natural fertilizer in their free time after mandatory training, the soldiers are becoming exhausted. The morale of the soldiers participating in the training is declining day by day.” North Koreans cannot understand why authorities are mobilizing soldiers and assigning them to miscellaneous tasks like grass collection for compost, even though they verbally emphasize the importance of their training during the summer months, the military-related source said. They order the soldiers to produce grass-based fertilizer, stressing the importance of providing for the greater society to the benefit of all North Koreans, he said. “The soldiers are confused because they have no idea how to go along with all these different orders,” he said. High-level commands are conducting frequent inspections to encourage the soldiers’ production of grass-based fertilizer, a military-related source in Ryanggang province told RFA on Tuesday. “The staff in each unit is obligated to report the grass-cutting performance of subordinate units,” said the source who declined to be named for the same reason. “Each officer in charge of a unit is struggling to match the daily performance.” Even officers are questioning why authorities are forcing them to produce grass-based fertilizer, he said. “Some military officers are complaining and saying, ‘We should make the military’s main job of training as a side job instead, and change farming to the main job of the military,’” said the source. Earlier this week, RFA reported that North Korean authorities are dispatching veterans and soldiers about to demobilize to collective farms to make up for labor shortages, raising fears among the military ranks that they will be stuck working in rural areas for the rest of their lives. Translated by Claire Shinyoung Oh Lee for RFA Korean. Translated by Roseanne Gerin.
Manila backs Senate bill to officially rename contested waters ‘West Philippine Sea’
The Philippine foreign office said Thursday it was backing legislative efforts to formally rename the country’s portions of the South China Sea as the “West Philippine Sea,” in a move to bolster Manila’s territorial claims in the contested waterway. On Wednesday, Sen. Francis Tolentino announced he had filed Senate Bill 405, a proposed piece of legislation that aims to “institutionalize” the use of “ the West Philippine Sea” as the official name of territories claimed by the Philippines in waters that China and other neighbors also contest. The air space, seabed, and subsoil on the western side of the Philippine archipelago would be renamed “to reinforce the Philippines’ claim to the disputed territories found on the western side of the archipelago,” according to an excerpt from SB405. Maria Teresita Daza, spokeswoman for the Philippine Department of Foreign Affairs, said Tolentino’s bill was consistent with a 2016 international arbitration court’s ruling that sided with Manila. “The West Philippine Sea was already actually defined in 2012 through Administrative Order 29,” Daza told a press briefing on Thursday. “Nevertheless, the department recognizes what the process of legislation can do in terms of clarity and institution building. And we look forward to supporting the process, should we be invited to do so,” she said. Tolentino’s bill covers waters around, within, and adjacent to the Kalayaan Island Group and Scarborough Shoal, as well as the Luzon Sea, or waters also known as the Luzon Strait between the northern Philippine island of Luzon and Taiwan. The Philippine senator said that the proposed legislation came about in response to the “archipelagic doctrine” embodied in the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). Under it, the Philippines is granted a territorial sea of up to 12 nautical miles, a contiguous zone of up to 24 nautical miles, and an exclusive economic zone of up to 200 nautical miles where the West Philippine Sea is located. The bill also directs government offices to use the name in all communications, messages, and public documents, and “to popularize the use of such [a] name with the general public, both domestically and internationally.” Six years ago, the Philippines won an arbitral award against Beijing before the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague. The landmark ruling nullified China’s expansive claims to the sea region, including in waters that reach neighbors’ shores. Manila had filed the case in 2012, when the Chinese occupied areas near Scarborough Shoal, a triangular chain of rocks and reefs that Filipinos consider a traditional fishing ground. Brunei, China, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan and Vietnam all claim parts of the sea. China, for its part, draws a nine-dash line to delineate its claim of “historical rights” to almost 90 percent of the waterway. The line also overlaps with the exclusive economic zone (EEZ) of another nation – Indonesia. And while the name “South China Sea” has gained near universal acceptance in usage, countries that have claims to the disputed waters have their own different names for it. Vietnam calls the maritime region “the East Sea,” and, to Beijing, it is plainly known as “the South Sea.” In 2017, Indonesia renamed a resource-rich northern region around its Natuna Islands, which lie off the southern end of the South China Sea, as the North Natuna Sea. The waters near the Natunas have seen some tense standoffs in recent years between Indonesian ships and ships from China and other nations, including Chinese coast guard vessels. Jakarta’s decision to change the name of the sea region north of the islands was spurred by the arbitration court’s ruling in Manila’s favor the year before that nullified China’s historical claim to the entire South China Sea through the nine-dash line, Arif Havas Oegroseno, then the deputy of maritime sovereignty at the Ministry of Maritime Affairs, told reporters at the time. Since the arbitration court ruled for Manila in 2016, Beijing has refused to budge from the area around Scarborough Shoal. On Thursday, officials at the Chinese Embassy in Manila did not immediately respond to BenarNews efforts seeking comment on the Philippine bill. The proposed formal name change is a far cry from the policy on the disputed waters implemented by former President Rodrigo Duterte, who did not seek to enforce the ruling when he took office in 2016, but instead pursued warmer ties with Beijing. During his six-year term, Duterte, who left office on June 30, also pulled the Philippines away from the United States, the Philippines’ longtime ally and China’s main rival, until later in his term when he declared that the arbitration award was “beyond compromise.” The U.S. government, meanwhile, has insisted on the doctrine of freedom of navigation and has sailed its navy ships into the contested waters. Duterte’s successor, President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., in his first “state of the nation” address to Congress last month, declared he would not preside over any process that would give away “even one square inch of territory” to foreign rivals. Marcos’ newly appointed military chief, Lt. Gen. Bartolome Vicente Bacarro, told his generals and other military officials during his first command conference on Wednesday that the armed forces supported President Marcos’ pronouncement. “We only do what is required of us to do and what is important is we are able to perform our mandate to protect (the state and) our people,” Col. Medel Aguilar, a spokesman for the military, told reporters. BenarNews is an RFA-affiliated online news service.
Hongkongers warn of Chinese Communist Party infiltration of British universities
Youth organizers linked to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) are actively recruiting among Hongkongers in exile at British universities, according to a statement from several Hong Kong advocacy groups. The Hong Kong branch of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), part of the CCP’s United Front Work Department outreach and influence program, is calling on Hong Kong students in the U.K. to sign up for a “mentorship” program at several universities. “Despite being directly connected to a government organization, [the program] promised that ‘there will be no political propaganda’,” a joint statement from five Hong Kong activist groups in the U.K., including Power to Hongkongers and Nottingham Stands with Hong Kong, said. “This claim is contradictory … We strongly oppose this program due to our deep concern over its covert political objective,” the statement, which was also signed by Durham Stands with Hong Kong, Newcastle Stands with Hong Kong and the Liverpool Hongkongers Alliance, said. “We urge the participating student societies to withdraw from this program and disassociate from this organization,” the statement, carried on the Facebook page of Nottingham Stands with Hong Kong, said. A spokesman for Newcastle Stands with Hong Kong who gave only the nickname K said Hong Kong activists are increasingly concerned about CCP infiltration of British universities. “We also experienced a lot of infiltration of the CCP into British universities when we were studying,” K said. “For example, in 2019 ,the Chinese Students and Scholars’ Associations (CSSAs) directed Chinese students to suppress Hong Kong students’ activities on campus in support of Hong Kong.” “The societies participating in this mentorship program are mainly established by Hong Kong people and carry a certain influence in Hong Kong student circles,” K said. “We are worried that the CCP will continue to brainwash the next generation of Hong Kong people overseas by infiltrating these societies.” The official Facebook page of the Hong Kong Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference Youth Federation contains pro-Beijing images and other content. Credit: Hong Kong CPPCC Youth Federation Facebook page Coopting universities K said CCP propaganda, enforced by a draconian national security law imposed on Hong Kong by the CCP from July 1, 2020, has already changed the atmosphere at Hong Kong’s universities, particularly the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) and the Polytechnic University, which resisted attacks by fully armed riot police and even an armored car on their respective campuses with Molotov cocktails and makeshift weaponry in November 2019. “The CCP has never stopped infiltrating, and has set up … organizations overseas to try to extend their influence to students in other countries,” K said. “Overseas governments should pay more attention to this attempt to coopt universities, so as to curb the expansion of CCP influence,” they said. Hong Kong societies at eight British universities including Kings’ College London, Leeds University and Queen Mary University, London had already signed up for the “mentorship” scheme by the time the statement appeared. Kings College London took down the poster soon after the Aug. 8 statement appeared, to be followed by other societies on Aug. 9. But the poster remains on the Instagram accounts of the Unite UK Alliance and the Swansea University’s Hong Kong society. Benefits vs. dangers Chu Seoi, a doctoral student at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology who is currently teaching in a German university, said the “mentorship” program offered some attractive benefits to participants, and urged Hongkongers to remember who was behind it. “This program is pretty tempting,” Chu told RFA. “But the problem is that it is provided by the enemy of us Hongkongers: the United Front Work Department of the CCP.” “It’s being provided by the same CCP that took away our city, our home, and destroyed freedom and democracy in Hong Kong,” Chu said. “It’s as if someone who just killed your family comes running up and offers to introduce you to some people … who could help your career.” An employee surnamed Yue who answered the phone at the the Hong Kong CPPCC youth association on Wednesday said the mentorship program pairs young Hong Kong students with industry leaders in various sectors, and costs nothing to take part in. “Students in the U.K. can participate,” she said. “We will match them up with a mentor based on their wishes, and they can communicate with others in a group.” “We don’t charge students money for this, but it has been postponed until October now,” Yue said. The group was set up in 2014, and consists of CPPCC members under the age of 45, and the offspring of wealthy Hong Kong business owners, to “serve our nation, serve Hong Kong, and serve our members,” according to a motto on its Facebook page. Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie.
China holds Taiwanese incommunicado amid ‘secessionism’ probe into Taiwan activities
Authorities in the eastern Chinese province of Zhejiang have placed a Taiwanese activist in incommunicado detention on suspicion of “separatism” and “endangering national security,” as the democratic island’s president hit out at a China trip by an opposition politician. Taiwan national Yang Chih-yuan was placed in “residential surveillance at a designated location (RSDL)” from Aug. 4 — meaning he will likely be held with no access to a lawyer or to family visits for six months — China’s Global Times newspaper reported. The paper said Yang had been “actively scheming” to work towards formal statehood for Taiwan, which has never been ruled by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), nor formed part of the 73-year-old People’s Republic of China, since high school. It cited his campaigning for a referendum on independence for Taiwan, a sovereign state still using the name of the 1911 Republic of China founded by Sun Yat-sen, and his founding of the Taiwan National Party in 2011 as examples. The paper said state security police in Zhejiang’s Wenzhou city are currently investigating Yang, who is also accused of “colluding with separatist forces to support Hong Kong secessionists” during the 2019 protest movement in the city. Rights groups say RSDL is associated with a higher risk of torture and mistreatment in detention. The news came as the vice chairman of Taiwan’s opposition Kuomintang (KMT), Andrew Hsia, arrived in China on a tour of several southern and eastern cities and provinces. It is unclear whether he negotiated with the Chinese authorities on Yang’s behalf. Hsia’s trip came amid several days of PLA military activity around Taiwan in the wake of an Aug. 2-3 visit to the island, which Beijing claims must be ‘unified’ with China, by military force if necessary. When the nationalist KMT regime of Chiang Kai-shek fled to Taiwan after losing the civil war to Mao Zedong’s Soviet-backed communists, it took over what had been a dependency of Japan since 1895, when Taiwan’s inhabitants proclaimed a short-lived Republic of Formosa after being ceded to Japan by the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911). The island had just been handed back to the Republic of China as part of Japanese reparations in the wake of World War II, and KMT rule wasn’t welcome in many quarters, particularly after the Feb. 28 massacre following a popular uprising in 1947. Nonetheless, Beijing forces countries to choose between diplomatic recognition of Beijing or Taipei, and has repeatedly threatened to annex the island, should it seek formal statehood as Taiwan. Andrew Hsia gestures while speaking to a lawmaker at the Interior Committee of the Taiwan Parliament on April 13, 2016. Credit: AFP Bad timing for trip Taiwan’s Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said the time wasn’t right for Hsia’s trip, given the intensive military activity aimed at Taiwan, while president Tsai Ing-wen told the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) on Wednesday that his visit was disappointing, and could send the wrong message about the level of threat the island faces from China. The KMT has billed the visit as a “fact-finding” mission and a chance to connect with Taiwanese business owners in the Yangtze and Pearl River delta regions. Just this morning, China released a white paper full of wishful thinking … ignoring reality on the other side of the Taiwan Strait and not renouncing the use of force against Taiwan,” Tsai told party members. “It is disappointing to the people of Taiwan that the KMT is insisting on going to China at a time like this,” she said. “[It also] sends the wrong message to the international community. We want to make it clear here that what the people of Taiwan want peace, neither provoking nor escalating conflict, but also to safeguard our sovereignty and national security, and for Taiwan never to back down,” Tsai said. Taiwan People’s Party chairman Ko Wen-je said the trip would only be defensible if Hsia used it to protest the military blockade of air and sea around Taiwan. “If it’s just for fund-raising, then what kind of a time is this?” Ko said. Hsia told journalists just before he left that he “won’t be deterred by the current military exercises.” “We want to listen to our friends, hear what they have to say, and help them, in the hope that some improvements can be made,” he said. “Communication and contact are definitely good things … we won’t be put off by attempts to label us or attack us online or in the media.” Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie.
Naval standoff continues near Taiwan in spite of China claiming war games are over
Chinese and Taiwanese ships continued an apparent standoff in the waters near Taiwan despite the Chinese military saying major drills around the island were over, open source investigators said, citing satellite imagery from Sentinel Hub. As the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) wrapped up its week-long operation, held in response to U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan, “at least two sets of ships in typical ‘shadowing’ positions [were] observed East of Taiwan” on Wednesday, H I Sutton, a well-known independent defense analyst wrote on Twitter. On the same day, Beijing released a White Paper on Taiwan and China’s “reunification” policy, which Taiwan dismissed. “Taiwan rejects the “one country, two systems” model proposed by Beijing,” said Taiwan Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Joanne Ou at a media briefing in Taipei on Thursday. “Only Taiwan’s people can decide its future,” Ou added. Regular patrols Images from satellite data provider Sentinel Hub show two Taiwanese ships “shadowing” two Chinese vessels in waters off Hualian County in eastern Taiwan since early this week, several open source intelligence (OSINT) analysts said. The PLA announced a major military exercise on Aug. 4 after Pelosi made a controversial stopover in Taipei. Beijing repeatedly warned her against the visit, which it condemned as a “gross violation of China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity,” and threatened retaliation. The military exercise was due to end on Aug. 7 but went on for two more days and only wrapped up on Wednesday. Yet the collected OSINT data indicate that China will probably continue to put pressure on the Taiwanese military in coming days. Sr. Col. Shi Yi, spokesman of the PLA Eastern Theater Command, said on Wednesday that the Command’s troops will continue to “organize normalized combat-readiness security patrols in the Taiwan Strait.” The PLA is starting to “normalize” its activities, including drills east of the median line, adding to the pressure it has already exerted on Taiwan, said Collin Koh, a Singapore-based regional military expert, in a recent interview with RFA. A Taiwan Air Force F-16V taking off from Hualien airbase during a recent drill. CREDIT: Taiwan Defense Ministry Less autonomy for Taiwan On Wednesday, the Chinese government office responsible for Taiwan-related affairs released a White Paper titled “The Taiwan Question and China’s Reunification in the New Era,” to clarify Beijing’s policy towards the island that it considers a Chinese province. This is the third White Paper on Taiwan, the previous ones were published in 1993 and 2000. “We are one China, and Taiwan is a part of China,” the paper said. “Taiwan has never been a state; its status as a part of China is unalterable,” it reiterated. “Peaceful reunification and One Country, Two Systems are our basic principles for resolving the Taiwan question and the best approach to realizing national reunification,” the White Paper said, adding that “certain political forces have been misrepresenting and distorting its objectives.” “Lack of details on ‘Two Systems’ compared with the 1993 and 2000 papers suggests an arrangement that might involve less political and legal autonomy for Taiwan,” Amanda Hsiao, China Senior Analyst at the Crisis Group think-tank, wrote on Twitter. The White Paper also provided guidelines for the post-reunification governance over the island. “We maintain that after peaceful reunification, Taiwan may continue its current social system and enjoy a high degree of autonomy in accordance with the law,” it said. However, while both the 1993 and 2000 White Papers pledged that China would not send troops or administrative personnel to be stationed in Taiwan following unification, the 2022 version did not have that line, said Crisis Group’s Hsiao. For the first time Taiwan’s ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) was mentioned in the paper. “The actions of the DPP authorities have resulted in tension in Cross-Straits relations, endangering peace and stability in the Taiwan Straits, and undermining the prospects and restricting the space for peaceful reunification,” it said. “These are obstacles that must be removed in advancing the process of peaceful reunification,” it said, delivering a clear threat to President Tsai Ing-wen’s party.” Recently, China’s ambassador to France provoked an outcry when he said during a TV interview that Taiwanese people will be re-educated after reunification with the mainland. “We will re-educate. I’m sure that the Taiwanese population will again become favorable over the reunification and will become patriots again,” Ambassador Lu Shaye told BFM TV. The Taiwanese authorities have “effectively indoctrinated and intoxicated” the population through de-Sinicization policies, Lu said in another interview. “Re-education” is the indoctrination technique used by several authoritarian regimes against dissent. China has been criticized by foreign countries and human rights groups for its re-education programs for the Uyghurs in its northwestern Xinjiang province.
Junta troops kill 5, torch hundreds of homes in Kachin state village
Junta troops killed five civilians and torched as many as 400 homes over three days of air raids, heavy artillery fire and fierce clashes with a joint force of ethnic rebels and pro-democracy paramilitaries in northern Myanmar’s Kachin state, residents said Wednesday. Four of the victims were killed on Tuesday when military jets flew the first of eight bombing runs over Se Zin village in the jade mining township of Hpakant, killing a child, said a resident, who spoke on condition of anonymity, citing security concerns. “The last plane bombed at about 8:00 pm and then they fired at the village with machine guns and 60-mm heavy weapons,” he told RFA Burmese. “The child died on the spot when his house was hit by the shelling. One woman had to have her leg amputated. And this morning, about 6:00 am, a family was shot at while trying to leave on a motorcycle. The husband and wife and their son [all died].” The fifth victim, a man in his 40s, died on Monday when a shell fell on his house during heavy fighting near the village, the resident said. He told RFA that there may have been additional casualties in the village, but said they hadn’t been confirmed. The raid followed a Monday attack by a combined column of ethnic Kachin Independence Army (KIA) and anti-junta People’s Defense Force (PDF) paramilitaries that led to the capture of a military camp in Se Zin village and a pro-military Shanni National Army (SNA) camp located across the river in Shwepyi Myint village in Sagaing region’s Homalin township. The joint force also attacked the Se Zin Village Police Station on Tuesday. RFA was unable to confirm the number of casualties in the clashes. Another Se Zin resident, who also did not want to be named, said hundreds of homes in the village were destroyed in a fire set by junta troops. “There are about 500 houses in the whole village and 300 or 400 have been turned to ash,” he said. “The fires were set by the military and the Shanni forces. They did it deliberately. They even set fire to houses that were left undestroyed [in the bombing].” Se Zin is a busy village surrounded by private gold mines in Hpakant’s Hawng Par village tract. The fighting forced more than 3,000 residents of Se Zin to flee to the township’s Tar Ma Hkan village, about an hour away by motorcycle, where they are sheltering in schools, churches and monasteries, the resident said. He said the refugees had fled with only the shirts on their backs and are in need of emergency food, clothing and medicine. Other residents of Hpakant told RFA that some of the villagers remain trapped in Se Zin, where the military has set up a camp. File photo of houses in Se Zin village, Hpakant township, Kachin State. Credit: Citizen journalist The ‘usual response’ Speaking to RFA on Wednesday, Social Affairs Minister Win Ye Tun, who serves as the junta’s spokesperson in Kachin state, said the details of the situation in Se Zin village are “not yet known,” but said the military is “ready to help” those who have fled their homes. “We have contingency plans for people who have to leave their homes because of fighting,” he said. “I haven’t received any news yet about the fires or the clashes. I am the minister of social affairs, so reports about the fighting don’t come to me.” Col. Naw Bu, the news and information officer for the ethnic Kachin Independence Organization (KIO), said it has become “routine” for the military to burn the homes of residents whenever there is a clash. “Last night, there was an attack on the police station in Se Zin village and this is the usual response of the [junta],” he said. “When there is a battle with their adversaries, whether it is near a village or their camp, or in the village, they won’t hesitate to kill people or torch houses.” Naw Bu confirmed that there had been three consecutive days of heavy fighting in Se Zin village beginning on Monday and that the military had “launched aerial attacks all day” on Tuesday. The raid on Se Zin comes less than a month after about a week of clashes beginning on July 16 between the military and the armed opposition in and around the village. Hpakant is one of the most heavily militarized townships in Kachin state. The military cut off mobile internet access to the area on Aug. 20 last year. Translated by Khin Maung Nyane. Written in English by Joshua Lipes.
Hong Kong police arrest four over ‘seditious’ Facebook page, radio hosts denounced
Hong Kong police arrested four people for “seditious” social media posts in connection with a Facebook page titled “Civil servant secrets,” after the page was denounced by a newspaper backed by the ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP) for “inciting civil servants” and “smearing government policies and operations.” Two were accused of being the administrators of the group, which stopped posting on the day of the arrests, but later started up at a different address calling itself “Civil servant secrets 2.0.” The last visible post on the original page showed a police officer leaving his firearm unattended as he took a nap on some chairs. Another two were members of the Fire Services Department, and were suspected of having posted to the group, the CCP-backed Wen Wei Po newspaper reported. All four were released on bail on Wednesday, the Hong Kong Free Press cited police as saying. Political denunciations in CCP-backed media are increasingly being used to target civil society groups, journalists and NGOs in Hong Kong. The denunciations usually focus on accusations that a given organization has done something that could be in breach of a draconian national security law imposed on Hong Kong by the CCP from July 1, 2020. The merged Wen Wei Po and Ta Kung Pao website also denounced outspoken political commentator and talk-show host Poon Siu-to, political scientist Simon Shen, veteran journalist Chip Tsao and four colleagues at Commercial Radio for In an Aug. 8 report on a complaint lodged by a pro-CCP group with the city’s Communications Authority about Commercial Radio, the paper reported that the group had complained that the station is “spreading poison” and “betraying Hong Kong.” “Some show hosts have used the platform to publish anti-China speeches betraying Hong Kong and misleading its people,” the report cited the complaint as saying. “They include Poon Siu-to, Simon Shen, Chip Tsao, Jacky Fung, Jan Lamb, Michelle Lo, Ken Yuen and others from Commercial Radio,” the report said. “The group strongly urged the Communications Authority to strictly supervize the media and not allow the station to arbitrarily invite guests who spread anti-government messages and hate speech against the Hong Kong and Chinese governments,” it said. “These hosts have often made false remarks in the program, which they infiltrated with their extreme political stance and distorted values, turning it into a platform for their personal political propaganda … only making negative comments or overly politicized comments and distorted logic … when it comes to governance or China-related topics,” it quoted the complaint as saying. The group called on the authority to take action to silence their “hostile words and deeds,” and prevent them from using the station to spread “poison,” the report said. Tsang Chi-ho, who once hosted the banned satirical news show Headliner for government broadcaster RTHK, said the pro-Beijing press is now casting its net wider than ever. “This encompasses a very broad spectrum,” Tsang told RFA. “Leaving aside the political commentators, Poon Siu-to, Chip Tsao and others, they have even included Jan Lamb who is known as a comedian.” “Nobody thought they would be put in the same category, but now it seems they are,” he said. “It sends the message that anyone who talks about serious political issues will be targeted, even if you just make light-hearted, satirical comments,” Tsang said. Tsang, who was himself denounced many times by the pro-CCP media in Hong Kong before his show was shelved in 2020 for “insulting the police,” said political satire, once a ubiquitous part of Hong Kong’s media offering, appears now to be a thing of the past. He said anyone with a public platform is now vulnerable to similar denunciations, with scant support from a fast-disappearing civil society, an increasingly muzzled media, and a Legislative Council that has been purged of any political opposition. He said the denunciations appear timed to coincide with the forthcoming mid-term review of Commercial Radio’s broadcasting license. “They only approved the renewal of the license for 12 years … with a mid-term review in 2022, so perhaps they are … putting pressure on Commercial Radio to make adjustments to the style and attitude of their programming,” Tsang said. Hong Kong Journalists’ Association (HKJA) chairman Ronson Chan also expressed surprise at the list of names in the article. “If they’re even going to rectify Jacky Lam, then we have a huge problem,” Chan told RFA. “If Jacky Lam, an iconic personality on Commercial Radio, gets rectified, or silenced, or changes his approach in any way, this will naturally mean people lose confidence in the station.” He said people denounced by pro-CCP media are likely to face investigation by police under the national security law imposed on the city by Beijing from July 1, 2020. Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie.
