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Overseas activists vow to keep fighting despite new Hong Kong security law

Editor1 year ago09 mins

Overseas activists have vowed to keep up their campaign for Hong Kong’s promised rights and freedoms amid international condemnation of the city’s second national security law, which critics say will likely widen an ongoing crackdown on dissent when it takes effect on Saturday. The Taiwan-based advocacy group Hong Kong Outlanders said the Safeguarding National Security Law, passed unanimously in a Legislative Council with no opposition members on Tuesday, had been rushed through in just 11 days. “We will continue to speak out without fear of this evil law,” the group said, announcing a protest on the streets against the legislation on Saturday, to “defend the rights of Hong Kongers.” U.S. Senator Ben Cardin, who chairs the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said the law will have “a chilling effect on the remaining vestiges of Hong Kong’s autonomy and freedoms.” He said he was “alarmed” about the impact of the law on American citizens, businesses and independent media in the city. “I urge the Beijing and the Hong Kong governments to rescind Article 23, as well as the 2020 National Security Law, and restore to the people of Hong Kong their basic rights and freedoms,” Cardin said, adding that Congress will continue to reevaluate the treatment of Hong Kong as a separate entity from the rest of China under U.S. law. Making life harder British Foreign Secretary David Cameron warned that the law will make it harder to live, work and do business in Hong Kong. “It fails to provide certainty for international organizations, including diplomatic missions, who are operating there,” Cameron said in a statement on the government website. A poster advertises a street activity in Taipei on the Facebook page of the Taiwan-based exile group Hong Kong Outlanders. (hkoutlanders.tw via Facebook) “It will entrench the culture of self-censorship which now dominates Hong Kong’s social and political landscape, and enable the continuing erosion of freedoms of speech, of assembly, and of the media,” he said. In Beijing, foreign ministry spokesperson Lin Jian said such comments were “slander.” “China expresses strong dissatisfaction and firm opposition to certain countries and institutions that denigrate and smear Hong Kong’s Safeguarding National Security Ordinance,” Lin told a regular news briefing in Beijing. “The Chinese government is unswervingly determined to safeguard national sovereignty, security, and development interests, and … to oppose any external interference in Hong Kong affairs,” he said. ‘Puppet government’ U.S.-based Hong Kong rights campaigner Frances Hui said she had “struggled to get out of bed” due to depression after the government bypassed democratic institutions that took decades to build. “I know #JoshuaWong, Wong Ji-yuet, and others will probably spend more days in jail under this law,” Hui said via her X account, in a reference to democracy activists already imprisoned for taking part in protests in the city. “The only remaining bits of freedom in the city will soon be crumbled. Hong Kong will become just another Chinese city with a puppet govt that obeys China,” she wrote. But she added: “I know our determination for freedom & democracy will never change. One day, we will meet again.” Taiwan’s ruling Democratic Progressive Party condemned the passing of the law as the “darkest day” for Hong Kong. Police officers stand guard outside the Legislative Council in Hong Kong, March 19, 2024. (Louise Delmotte/AP) “Hong Kong is now completely shrouded in the shadow of the Chinese Communist Party’s totalitarian rule,” the party said in a statement on Wednesday, adding that the Legislative Council was now just a “rubber stamp” for Beijing. It said the new law’s more expansive interpretations of national security crimes would “completely destroy what Hong Kong has left in the way of human rights or a legal system.” The party vowed to support the international effort to help Hong Kong, safeguard democracy and counter totalitarianism. Investors will leave In Japan, Foreign Ministry Press Secretary Kobayashi Maki said the government has “grave concern” about the law, and called on the authorities to ensure that the rights of Japanese nationals and companies in Hong Kong were respected, citing close economic ties with the city. U.S. State Department spokesperson Vedant Patel said the law has the potential “to accelerate the closing of Hong Kong’s once open society.” “We’re alarmed by the sweeping and what we interpret as vaguely defined provisions laid out in their Article 23 legislation,” he told a regular news briefing in Washington on Tuesday. “We think that this was fast-tracked through the non democratically elected Legislative Council after a truncated public comment period,” he said, adding that U.S. officials are in the process of analyzing potential risks to American interests under the law. Wu Jui-ren, an associate researcher at Taiwan’s Academia Sinica, predicted that the law will spell the end of Hong Kong’s status as a global financial center. Foreign investors will leave one after another, he predicted. Patrick Poon, human rights campaigner and visiting researcher at the University of Tokyo, said the law gives officials too much power, especially when it comes to defining what is meant by “collusion with foreign forces” or “state secrets,” or what constitutes subversion. He said anyone working for foreign organizations in the city could be at risk under the law, even if they post something online that the government doesn’t like. “It’s all entirely up to those who enforce the law to decide, in line with the practice of totalitarian governments,” Poon said. “Hong Kong has gone a step further towards being just like mainland China.” Translated by Luisetta Mudie. Edited by Malcolm Foster.

Health authorities on alert as anthrax infects 14 in southern Laos

Editor1 year ago03 mins

More than a dozen people have been infected by anthrax in two districts in southern Champassak province and authorities have responded by placing restrictions on the movement and slaughtering of some farm animals, several officials told Radio Free Asia. Provincial health officials announced on March 12 that anthrax – a rare, serious infectious disease caused by bacteria – was found in the carcasses of 97 cows, buffaloes and goats. Three people in Champassak tested positive for anthrax last week, but that number jumped to 14 on Tuesday, according to the provincial Health Department. The 14 patients all have large, dark scabs and are receiving treatment, a health official told RFA. Authorities believe they contracted anthrax – or what’s known as “black blood disease” – by eating meat from infected cows or buffaloes.. Anthrax usually affects livestock like cattle, sheep and goats, but humans can be infected if they are exposed to contaminated animal products or animals. According to the World Health Organization, anthrax isn’t generally considered to be contagious between humans, although there have been some cases of person-to-person transmission. The provincial health department has issued a notice asking local medical centers and authorities to report any new cases and urging anyone who develops black bumps on their body to see a doctor as soon as possible. “We’re concerned. We have stopped eating meat,” a Soukhoumma district resident told RFA. “Now, we eat only pork and fish.” Transporting and slaughtering farm animals has been temporarily banned, and people are required to properly bury their dead animals, the department said. A slaughterhouse worker told RFA that they are complying with the order and have stopped buying animals from local farmers. An agricultural official in Pathoumphone district said authorities have stepped up surveillance efforts and have officially warned the public not to eat locally slaughtered meat. Translated by Max Avary. Edited by Matt Reed and Malcolm Foster.

Blinken stresses ‘ironclad’ support for Philippines in South China Sea standoffs

Editor1 year ago07 mins

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken met with his Philippine counterpart in Manila on Tuesday to lay the groundwork for a summit between the leaders of the United States, the Philippines and Japan next month. U.S. President Joe Biden, Philippine leader Ferdinand Marcos Jr. and Prime Minister Fumio Kishida will meet in Washington on April 11 for trilateral talks that will focus on protecting a “free and open” Indo-Pacific region, according to the White House. Speaking at a press conference alongside Blinken, Filipino Foreign Secretary Enrique Manalo said the three-way summit aimed to capitalize on “complementarities” between the countries, notably in infrastructure, critical minerals, energy and maritime security. Blinken said that collaboration on defense and economic issues would only result in all three countries becoming stronger. “So that’s what the summit is about, as well as our work together to uphold international law,” he said. He and Manalo had discussed ways of streamlining the budding trilateral alliance “to make sure that even as we have this leaders’ summit, we have mechanisms in place to make sure there are things working together day in day out.” Blinken’s visit comes at a crucial moment in bilateral relations between the two allies, who have ramped up defense cooperation amid increasing Chinese assertiveness in the South China Sea, including in waters that fall within the Philippine’s exclusive economic zone. China claims nearly all of the South China Sea while dismissing the territorial claims of several Southeast Asian nations and Taiwan. “The alliance has never been stronger, but we not only have to sustain that, we have to continue to accelerate the momentum,” said Blinken, who was making his second trip to Manila as America’s top diplomat. He first visited the Philippines in August 2022, weeks after Marcos took office as president. Filipino activists protest at the Mendiola Peace Arch outside the presidential Malacañang Palace in Manila ahead of a meeting between President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. and U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken on March 19, 2024. (Jojo Riñoza/BenarNews) Manalo said he had thanked Blinken for Washington’s “consistent support,” particularly in regards to Chinese harassment of Filipino supply boats. In the most recent incident, four Filipino sailors sustained minor injuries earlier this month when China Coast Guard boats intercepted a supply vessel and fired at them with water cannons. “We discussed regional issues, especially the situation in the South China Sea, and I stated that the Philippines is committed to managing disputes in accordance with our national interests, the rules-based international order and international law, especially UNCLOS,” Manalo said, referring to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. “We reaffirmed our shared view that a strong and capable Philippines would make a formidable ally for the United States.” Blinken reiterated Washington’s “ironclad commitments” to defend the Philippines from outside aggression. He also said the two allies had shared concerns about Chinese “actions that threaten our common vision for a free and open Indo-Pacific,” including within the Philippine exclusive economic zone. “Repeated violations of international law and the rights of the Philippines – water cannons, blocking maneuvers, close shadowing, other dangerous operations – these waterways are critical to the Philippines, to its security, to its economy, but they’re also critical to the interests of the region, the United States, and the world,” Blinken said. On Tuesday, China’s foreign ministry spokesman Lin Jian said the U.S. had no right to interfere in disputes between Manila and Beijing and China would take the necessary actions to defend its territory. “Military cooperation between the United States and the Philippines should not harm China’s sovereignty and maritime rights and interests in the South China Sea, let alone be used to prop up the Philippines’ illegal position,” Lin told a regular briefing, according to a report from Reuters. Blinken is expected to meet with Marcos later on Tuesday. The Philippine leader recently returned from a trip to Germany and the Czech Republic in which he criticized Beijing’s expansive territorial claims and sought support for a free and open South China Sea. Camille Elemia contributed reporting from Manila. BenarNews is an RFA-affiliated online news organization.

‘Piles of corpses’ left after Myanmar junta attacks village

Editor1 year ago04 mins

A junta aerial bombardment killed and injured dozens in western Myanmar, locals told Radio Free Asia. Most residents in Thar Dar, a predominantly Rohingya village in Myanmar’s Rakhine state, were sleeping when a fighter jet dropped a bomb around 1 a.m. Friday, a local said. “Twenty-three people died on the spot and more than 30 were injured. There are piles of corpses in the village,” said the man who didn’t want to be named for safety reasons. “Children and elderly are among the dead, covered with tarpaulin and everything. Most of those who died and were injured lost their limbs.” Thar Dar village, nearly five kilometers (three miles) north of Minbya city, was captured by the Arakan Army on Feb. 26. The rebel group has also seized six other townships in Rakhine state, including most recently Kyaukphyu, where a large Chinese mega-project is located. The army also controls Pauktaw township in neighboring Chin state to the north. While the Arakan Army has announced its intentions to control the state’s capital of Sittwe, junta troops have focused their resources on both small and large-scale attacks against civilians, which villagers have labeled a pattern of indiscriminate killings. Thar Dar village has little more than 300 houses and a population of under 2,000, residents said. While there was no battle in the area to warrant an attack, residents told RFA the village had become a brief refuge for Rohingya fleeing nearby Sin Gyi Pyin village after it was also targeted. Rakhine state has also seen other attacks on the ethnically persecuted group, including an attack that killed an entire Rohingya family in Sittwe. RFA contacted Rakhine state’s junta spokesperson U Hla Thein for more information on Thar Dar’s aerial bombardment, but he did not pick up the phone. Junta columns regularly shell and drop bombs on villages in Minbya, Mrauk-U, Pauktaw and Ponnagyun townships where they have already lost control, residents said. As of March 3, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs reported more than 170 civilians had been killed and over 400 injured since the fighting in Rakhine state began again on Nov. 11, 2023. Translated by RFA Burmese. Edited by Kiana Duncan and Mike Firn.

Vietnam’s next leader faces crunch time with economy, demographics

Editor1 year ago014 mins

January brought a fresh gust of rumors about the whereabouts of Nguyen Phu Trong, the Communist Party of Vietnam general secretary. He hadn’t been seen in public for a few weeks and failed to meet with the visiting president of Indonesia, leading some commentators to speculate that his health was deteriorating once again. We had been here in 2019 when it was rumored – accurately, it turned out – that Trong had suffered a stroke while on a visit down south. This time around, Trong showed up again rather quickly, delivering a speech to the National Assembly on January 15. But rumors of the 79 year-old’s failing health are a reminder of his and the country’s frailty. Given that party chiefs tend to rule for two five-year terms, we can assume that the next general-secretary, if voted in at the next Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV) National Congress in 2026 and if Trong does actually retire then, will rule until 2036. It is not overly dramatic to say that the next party chief will govern during the most consequential decade of Vietnam’s development. Women work at the Hung Viet garment export factory in Hung Yen province, Vietnam, Dec. 30, 2020. (Kham/Reuters) Not least, that person is likely to enter office facing even more uncertain world politics. One uncertainty is China, whose economy is in a terrible state and which is set to experience perhaps the worst demographic crisis of any country in known history. The other is a retreating America. The great debate in the United States right now is whether to maintain its post-1945 interest in world affairs or to descend into nationalism and protectionism. If Washington chooses the latter – and Donald Trump’s possible re-election later this year would be an indication of that – the globalization we’ve known since 1945 that has depended on U.S. security guarantees, not least to keep the seas safe for world trade, could collapse. Vietnam has arguably been one of the biggest beneficiaries of globalization – perhaps second only to China in recent decades. More to the point, China and the United States combined account for 46 percent of Vietnam’s exports and 40 percent of its imports. Demographic time bomb Hanoi can do little to rectify China’s troubled economy or dispel America’s isolationist tendencies. But it can clean its own house. The most existential concern, as framed by a headline in the state-run press last year, is its “demographic time bomb.” Thailand is set to lose 10 million people of working age by 2050, about a quarter of its current workforce. China, based on conservative estimates, will lose 217 million workers, down from 984 million today. Vietnam, thanks to its citizens having so many children in the 1990s, will only see its working-age population dip by around 253,000 people by 2050, from 67.6 million now – a 0.3 percent fall. The workforce will have passed its peak by the mid-2030s. Instead, Vietnam appears set to suffer the problem of too many retirees. Vietnam became an “aging” society in 2011, when 7 percent of its population was aged over 65. It will become an “aged” society, when that demographic is more than 14 percent of the population, in 2034. Elderly people exercise at a public park in Hanoi, Oct. 9, 2018. (Kham/Reuters) Vietnam will be the fourth “aged” society in Southeast Asia, after Singapore, Thailand and Brunei. The percentage of people over 65, those who don’t work and are net extractors of state money, will double between now and 2050, from 10 percent to 20 percent. In fact, people over 60 will go from 14.7 to 26.5 percent of the population over this timeframe. That’s the figure to bear in mind since Vietnam’s retirement age for men will be 62 in 2028 and 60 for women in 2035. Moreover, the proportion of retirees will probably be higher than 26 percent of the population since women, who retire earlier, outnumber men by the time they’re 60 years old. So it’s possible that Vietnam is looking at around a fifth of its population in retirement by 2030 and nearly a third by 2050. Unlike Thailand and China, whose demographic future is dire, more so than some analysts think, Vietnam won’t see a declining workforce at the same time as an increase in retirees, so it won’t be left trying to scrape less money from fewer workers for greater welfare payments to more retirees. However, Vietnam is starting from a lower wealth base. If its GDP per capita doubles between now and 2034, it would still be on par with Thailand’s GDP per capita today. If it triples, it will be on par with today’s Malaysia, which won’t become “aged” until 2042. Tough decisions won’t wait Vietnam risks becoming old before it becomes rich, unless, that is, it can turbocharge its economy over the coming decade and half. According to the World Bank, Vietnam has until 2042 before its “demographic window of opportunity will close.” The state will have to find vastly more money for its retirees, sapping funds that could be invested in infrastructure and education. Spending on education has already fallen from around 18 percent of government expenditure in the early 2010s to around 15 percent. Infrastructure spending has been criminally misused. Just look at the badly managed Ho Chi Minh City metro project. Currently, average social insurance payments are just $240 per month, a little over two-thirds of workers’ average income. A lengthy World Bank report noted that “Countries with old-age dependency ratios equal to Vietnam’s projected level in 2035 typically spend 8-9 percent of GDP on public pensions, well above the 2-3 percent that Vietnam has spent over the past decade”. Commuters fill the street during morning rush hour in Ho Chi Minh City, Jan. 12, 2024. (Jae C. Hong/AP) By today’s GDP, that means the Vietnamese state will need to find something in the range of $18-21 billion annually just for pensions within a decade. That’s not counting the additional…

Smuggling of the deadly Synthetic opioid FENTANYL

Editor1 year ago10 months ago216 mins

An investigative report on Fentanyl production, smuggling, its impacts on health and on geopolitics of the world.

Three years on, whereabouts of Tibetan poet is a mystery

Editor1 year ago05 mins

More than three years after the arrest of a popular Tibetan writer and poet in northwestern China, police have not provided any details about his whereabouts, his sentence or his well-being, despite repeated appeals by his family for information, two sources told Radio Free Asia. Gendun Lhundrub, a former monk at Rongwo Monastery in Rebgong county of Malho Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture in China’s Qinghai province, was detained on Dec. 2, 2020. Authorities did not cite any reasons for his arrest, which followed a long period when police monitored his activities for signs of dissent and opposition to Chinese policies, RFA learned at the time. Chinese authorities frequently detain Tibetan writers, artists and singers who promote Tibetan national identity and culture or who have criticized China’s rule of the western region. They scrutinize their writings for content considered as “endangering national security” or constituting an “act of separatism,” thereby deeming them threats to the ruling Chinese Communist Party. Lhundrub’s relatives have made repeated requests to authorities in Rebgong county to find out where he is and whether he has been sentenced, said one source from inside Tibet. “However, they have not received any response to their queries,” said the source, who declined to be identified for safety reasons. Whenever the family wants to send items to Lundrub, officials at the Chinese government’s Rebgong county office tell them to leave the items with them, and they will forward them to Lundrub, he said. “His well-being is also unclear as no one has been allowed to meet him,” the source added. Additionally, officials have shared no details or documentation as proof of Lhundrub’s sentence, both sources said. Long list Lhundrub is among those on a long list of well-known Tibetan writers and poets arrested by authorities. In 2016, Tibetan language advocate Tashi Wangchuk was arrested and tortured. He was released in 2021 after being held for two years in pre-trial detention and serving part of a five-year prison sentence. Gendun Lhundru was born in 1974 in Rebgong in the traditional Amdo region of Tibet in the northeastern part of the Tibetan Plateau. He became a monk at a young age and enrolled in the Rebgong Dargye Monastery. He later studied at the Rebgong Rongpo Monastery, Labrang Tashi Kyil and Serta Labrang. Starting in 1994, he wrote poetry. In October 2022, he released an anthology of poems called “Khorwa,” and wrote on the website Waseng-drak that writers and artists require freedom to express their thoughts and emotions without restriction, RFA learned from sources that year. Lhundrub’s collection of poems, which include “Black Rosary,” “Melody of Life” and “White Book,” and his literary skills are highly regarded by Tibetans around the world. Written by Tenzin Pema for RFA Tibetan. Edited by Roseanne Gerin and Malcolm Foster.

’10 Don’ts’ for Chinese young people

Editor1 year ago08 mins

Over the past year or so, young Chinese “refuseniks” have been swearing off marriage, children and mortgages – rejecting traditional milestones on the path to adulthood – amid apparent despair over their futures, the economic outlook and politics. But recent social media posts show that they’ve added several more “don’ts” to the list. They include not donating blood, not giving to charity, not playing the lottery, not investing money, including in property, and even not helping an elderly person — largely because they’re afraid they might get exploited or trapped. The list, dubbed the “10 Don’ts” of young people, has been circulating on social media. “This generation of young people have no hope, so they don’t bother working hard any more,” said a university graduate who gave only the surname Wang for fear of reprisals. “They might as well just lie down in the hope of a stress-free life.” The attitude is particularly problematic for the ruling Communist Party as it tries to encourage people to use the internet to share “positive” content, particularly about the economy, rather than complaining about how hard their lives are. Young workers rest outside a shopping mall in Beijing, Jan. 17, 2024. (Ng Han Guan/AP) Author and political essayist Yu Jie said the refusal to marry and have kids is linked to young people’s disillusionment with the Chinese government and the way it manipulates them to believe they are the future of the nation, when actually they are merely its tools. “No young person today believes in the lies of Mao Zedong or his successor Xi Jinping,” Yu wrote in a commentary for RFA Mandarin. Motivated by fear Many Chinese don’t want to donate blood because they fear the data could be used to force them into donating organs for the elite, said a resident of the eastern province of Shandong who gave only the surname Lu for fear of reprisals. People worry that if they get into an accident, their organs will be taken without their consent if information about their blood type is available to the authorities, she said. “The reason they won’t donate to charity is that they can barely support themselves, and that they need donations themselves,” Lu said, summarizing some of the many comments on the topic that were no longer visible on Weibo on Tuesday. The resistance to investing in property is linked to overpricing and the fear of becoming a “mortgage slave,” current affairs commentator Tianluke told RFA Mandarin, using his pen-name “Pilgrim” for fear of reprisals. “The economic situation in China is very bad right now,” Tianluke said. “A lot of people have been laid off, and there are a lot of graduates who are unemployed.” And some people are afraid of helping an elderly person in trouble in case they get accused of causing the problem they’re trying to address. It’s a “manifestation of the collapse of trust … in Chinese society,” he said. A young couple walk by a construction site near office buildings in the Central Business District in Beijing on March 2, 2024. (Andy Wong/AP) Yu, the essayist who wrote a Dec. 29 column for RFA Mandarin, said the various “don’ts” are all about avoiding the various “traps” set by the Communist Party – meaning people getting caught up in a system that exploits them for the benefit of the privileged political and financial elite. “Things such as donating money to charity, donating blood, and helping the elderly are all good deeds that are taken for granted in civilized countries,” he wrote. “But in China, they are all taken advantage of.” “The rich are getting richer, and the poor are getting poorer,” Yu wrote. “That’s why young Chinese people warn each other to avoid these traps to avoid disaster.” ‘Kids have no future’ Meanwhile, censors have deleted an article that questions the value of hothousing children through the highly competitive education system — a defining behavior of the country’s middle class. The article, titled “Middle-class kids have no future,” was unavailable “due to violations of regulations” on Tuesday, though copies were still visible outside China’s Great Firewall of internet censorship. People tour by a deserted shopping mall in Beijing on Feb. 19, 2024. (Andy Wong/AP) The blog post tells the tale of a successful Shanghai parent whose son didn’t want to study any more, because he wasn’t naturally good at passing exams, and didn’t see the point. He started delivering food in the evenings instead, to earn some money. In a follow-up post in which he reports that the article has been taken down, the blogger argues that only gifted kids should compete for spots at top schools, because the rest are effectively only there as “cannon fodder” for the competitive system. “It’s the middle-class trap, isn’t it?” commented X user @passi0nateGirl under RFA’s X post about the article. “Nowadays, the middle class can wind up back in poverty due to sickness, unemployment, a property crash, badly performing stocks, or a company partner running away.” Translated with additional reporting by Luisetta Mudie. Edited by Malcolm Foster.

China’s ‘little pinks’ go after drinks maker over ‘Japanese’ styling

Editor1 year ago010 mins

Shares of Chinese soft drink maker Nongfu Spring have dropped after some consumers said they were boycotting their products due to a perceived lack of patriotism, and posted videos of themselves on social media dumping out their contents. Hong Kong-listed shares in Hangzhou-based Nongfu Spring slid 7.7% from HK$44.60 on Feb. 29 to HK$41.20 on March 5, as online nationalists launched a boycott at the start of the annual National People’s Congress, which ended Monday. Users shared photos of labels on some of the company’s spring water bottles, complaining that it depicted a Japanese temple. Others likened a Greek letter on the company’s bottled jasmine tea to the shape of Tokyo’s Yasukuni Shrine, where the Japanese war dead are remembered. Others targeted the company’s founder and China’s richest man Zhong Shanshan, calling him a profiteer, and pointing out that his son Zhong Shuzi is an American citizen, citing the company’s 2020 prospectus. Still others said the red bottle cap used on Nongfu Spring water bottles recalled the red sun emblem in the Japanese national flag. Zhong Shanshan, chairman of Nongfu Spring, gestures during a speech at a press conference in Beijing, May 6, 2013. (CNS via/ AFP) Nongfu Spring responded on March 8, saying that the labels on its Oriental Leaf Green Tea bottles are based on a Chinese temple, and pointing to text on the label which mentions that the Japanese art of tea-drinking originated in China. “The content is not only authentic but also meticulously sourced, with the intention of highlighting the profound impact of Chinese tea and tea culture on a global scale, thereby showcasing a strong sense of national pride and confidence,” the company said in comments reported in the nationalistic Global Times newspaper. Targets of wrath The statement appears to have done little to mollify the “little pinks,” a nickname for zealously patriotic supporters of the ruling Chinese Communist Party. On Sunday, two branches of 7-Eleven in the eastern province of Jiangsu said they had pulled all Nongfu Spring products from the shelves, saying that they won’t sell products that “adulate Japan,” the paper reported. Nongfu Spring hasn’t been the only target of nationalists’ ire in recent days, either. They have also gone after Nobel literature laureate Mo Yan for hurting their feelings by “insulting the People’s Liberation Army, late Chairman Mao Zedong, and the Chinese people.” Mo’s work “Red Sorghum,” which was made into a 1987 film starring Gong Li, “vilified the Eighth Route Army” and “insulted revolutionary martyrs,” according to some comments, while others demanded compensation for hurt feelings and “reputational damage.” Chinese Literature Nobel Prize winner Mo Yan, center, leaves following a panel discussion at the Beijing International Book Fair in Beijing, Aug. 23, 2017. (Mark Schiefelbein/AP) Netizens also took aim at Beijing’s Tsinghua University for being the only top university that hasn’t been targeted for U.S. sanctions. China has laws banning insults to revolutionary heroes and martyrs, as well as to the national anthem, its soldiers and police force. You’re hurting my feelings Its lawmakers are also considering a law criminalizing “hurting the feelings of the Chinese people,” a stock phrase frequently used by Chinese officials and state media to criticize speech or actions by outsiders that Beijing disapproves of. Under a proposed amendment to the Public Security Administration Law, wearing the wrong T-shirt or complaining about China online could lead to a fine of up to 5,000 yuan (US$680) or 15 days in jail. The law doesn’t specify what kind of acts might do such a thing, but does warn that “denying the deeds” of revolutionary heroes and martyrs or defacing their public memorials would count. “Sometimes it’s directly organized by the government, and sometimes it’s not — it’s just people jumping on the bandwagon,” political commentator Ji Feng said. He said the hate campaign against Mo Yan recalled the public denunciations of the 1966-76 Cultural Revolution, and the Anti-Rightist Movement of the 1950s. If such denunciations continue, Ji warned that they will eventually target people who say nothing at all, and eventually move on to include those who don’t sing the praises of the Communist Party or its leaders loudly enough, “layer by layer.” Hard-wired U.S.-based political commentator Hu Ping said both Mo Yan and Nongfu Spring were once considered to be firmly inside the Chinese political establishment, and they are now next in line because public figures who supported democracy have long since been dealt with. “[Their targets] are getting more and more left-wing, because there’s nobody left on the other side of the political spectrum,” Hu said. “So they just find the most liberal-minded person and attack them, which we all think is pretty ridiculous.” Members of security look on after the opening session of the National People’s Congress at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on March 5, 2024. (Pedro Pardo/AFP) Independent political scholar Chen Daoyin said patriotism has become hard-wired into China’s legislation, administrative regulations and throughout law enforcement under the leadership of Xi Jinping. “Anyone deploying this kind of patriotic [attack] is protected by these structures, so internet censors wouldn’t dare to stop them, or they might get burned themselves,” Chen said. He said nationalistic witch hunts drive huge amounts of traffic on Chinese social media platforms, suggesting that the latest wave of “little pink” activity wasn’t driven by any government order. “It was a spontaneous thing, and purely driven by economic motives.” Mo, who won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2012, has yet to respond publicly to the criticisms of his work. British-Chinese writer Ma Jian said totalitarian regimes lend themselves to such dramas in the absence of freely available information. “When a totalitarian country has eliminated true patriots, and anyone with a sense of morality or justice … then when the mob starts to bite there is nowhere they won’t go once they take the opportunity,” Ma said. “We will continue to see stories like this, and the most extreme kind of absurdities — it won’t just be…

Week-long battle in northern Myanmar displaces over 110,000

Editor1 year ago06 mins

Week-long fighting between the junta and a northern ethnic army is responsible for mass displacement in Myanmar, locals told Radio Free Asia on Tuesday. Junta troops entered Hsihseng city in western Shan state on March 3, where gunshots could still be heard as of Monday at noon, said one Hsisheng resident, asking for anonymity. “The battle is still going on. The junta based in Hsaik Hkawng village and Bang Yin city are shelling towards Hsihseng city,” he said. “On March 3, the junta troops returned to enter Hsihseng city, and the fighting has been going on ever since and hasn’t stopped yet.” The Pa’O National Liberation Army captured Hsihseng on Jan. 22, causing junta troops and the allied Pa-O National Army to retaliate with heavy weapons and airstrikes. The Pa-O National Liberation Army is an insurgent group composed of the Pa-O, an ethnic group native to northeast Myanmar’s Shan state. More than 100,000 people from six urban Hsihseng neighborhoods and 60 villages in Hsihseng township have fled to safety, as have the residents of 31 villages in neighboring Hopong township. Fighting also resumed in southern Shan state’s Pinlaung township on Saturday, forcing nearly 10,000 civilians from 17 villages to temporarily relocate. A Pinlaung resident who wished to remain anonymous for security reasons told RFA on Monday that fighting between the junta and Karenni Nationalities Defense Forces and allied Pa-O National Liberation Army resumed in the township after junta troops carried out an offensive. “The junta army carried out the offensive and confronted them there. It’s been three days since March 9,” he said. On Sunday and Monday, fighting grew more intense as the junta began using airstrikes and heavy weapons, he added. Heavy damage in southern Shan state The renewed conflict has killed nearly 50 civilians and injured 60 more from Jan. 22 to March 11, despite a Nationwide Ceasefire Agreement signed by both the Pa-O National Liberation Army and junta officials in Hsihseng, Hopong and Loilen townships, according to the Pa-O Youth Organization. Roughly half of the dead were killed by airstrikes or heavy weapons, among them five children, according to the youth organization’s Monday statement. “The military council has increased the airstrikes and drone bombings in the Hsihseng city battles. In Hopong’s Mae Nel mountain ridge, the junta carried out an airstrike when the locals returned after fighting calmed on March 8,” said Nan, a spokeswoman of the Pa-O Youth Organization. “It killed a man on the spot in Kyauk Ka Char village, Hopong township. About 10 houses were damaged, although there was no fighting in that village.” In some areas, civilians are continuing to die from airstrikes, she added. Thirteen of the near 50 deaths occurred when people died after being arrested and interrogated by the junta. Eight people, including those internally displaced, died due to other causes. Four children were among the 60 injured. Airstrikes injured 36 people, artillery shells injured 18 and six were injured by landmines and other causes, according to the statement. The junta army fired over 1,500 explosives, and conducted over 400 attacks by air and drones, destroying nearly two hundred homes, as well as 15 religious buildings. RFA reached out to Shan state’s junta spokesperson Khun Thein Maung to confirm the organization’s statistics, but he did not answer calls. In early 2023, conflict killed more than 30 civilians and displaced more than 10,000 during fierce battles between the Karenni National Defense Forces, affiliated resistance groups, or People’s Defense Forces, and junta troops in Pinlaung township. Translated by RFA Burmese. Edited by Kiana Duncan and Mike Firn.

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