Middle East Archives - Page 23 of 39 - Investigative Journalism Reportika

Southeast Asia’s water festivals: Hopes and scenes

Editor2 years ago06 mins

As Cambodia, Myanmar and Laos celebrate their annual New Year’s water festivals, RFA asked readers what they hoped for in the year ahead. For many, the wishes are simple – peace and freedom. Cambodia “As a Cambodian, I wish the country and its people would get a leader who pays attention to people’s living standards so they can live in harmony, democracy (and) the rich and poor have equal rights, the same as those who live in the free world. I also wish people would have mutual unity and would restore Cambodia to the prosperity that our ancestors left us.” Sophie Lok “I want RFA to resume its office in this peaceful country. Losing RFA is losing breaking news!” Mala San “I wish Hun Sen would lose the upcoming election.” Boozz Boy “I wish this current regime wouldn’t wage war against its own people.” Rachana Konpa “Hun Sen’s regime changes to a democratic country.” Phairy Kim Myanmar “We miss the past. We hope for peace.” Yangon youth “We would like to get back the stability and development in Myanmar like under Mother Suu’s administration. We would like to see the immediate release of all those arbitrarily detained including Mother Suu and President U Win Myint, and to regain the power by the NLD government, which was elected by the people. I do not want to see people being killed unjustly.” “I wish for the emergence of a federal state which has been desired by all ethnic minorities. I do not want to see the country’s future leaders sacrifice their lives. May the Spring Revolution be successful as soon as possible!” Mandalay woman “As we mark Myanmar’s New Year, may Myanmar be liberated from military dictatorship and end the wars.” Aung Naingtun “I have a sole New Year wish. It is nothing, but down with the military council! I do not want to wish for other things. I know prayer alone is not enough, so I am doing it pragmatically. If I could travel with ‘Time travel,’ I would like to go back to January 31, 2021 and its previous days. I miss those days ruled by Mother (Suu)… I miss my home. I was forced to leave my motherland but I am eager to return to my family.” Salmon “My hope is that people should be involved [in the movement] and they should provide more assistance to the success of the uprising. May Myanmar people possess better lives in the New Year! May the uprising be successful as soon as possible!” Win Ko Ko Oo “I am from Taze township, Sagaing region. In previous years, I used to return to my village during Thingyan holidays. I am so sad that I cannot return to my home this year because I have no home there. Although festivals are held in cities, I cannot enjoy them. I am so sad because I cannot return to my native village and my parents.” Maung Aye Min Htet from a village in Taze township, Sagaing region Laos “I wish I had better health, better living conditions and a higher salary. We can’t go on like this in the current condition in which the cost of living is rising, while the income is staying low.” Grade school teacher in Pakkading district, Borikhamxay province “Yesterday, I went grocery shopping and I bought three cat fish for which I paid 90,000 kip ($5.29), up more than 7% a month ago.” A businesswoman in Vientiane wishes that Laos could get out of the economic and financial troubles sooner than later An owner of a small factory in capital Vientiane wants the war between Ukraine and Russia to be over as soon as possible because the war is the main cause of all the economic and financial woes in the world, including Laos.

Trafficked teens tell of torture at scam ‘casino’ on Myanmar’s chaotic border

Editor2 years ago026 mins

It was a clear day when Kham set out from his home in northwestern Laos for what he thought was a chance to make money in the gilded gambling towns of the Golden Triangle, the border region his country shares with Thailand and Myanmar. On that day – a Friday, as he recalled – the teenager had gotten a Facebook note from a stranger: a young woman asking what he was doing and if he wanted to make some cash. He agreed to meet that afternoon. She picked up Kham, 16, along with a friend, and off they went, their parents none the wiser. “I thought to myself I’d work for a month or two then I’d go home,” Kham later said. (RFA has changed the real names of the victims in this story to protect them from possible reprisals.) But instead of a job, Kham ended up trafficked and held captive in a nondescript building on the Burmese-Thai border, some 200 miles south of the Golden Triangle and 400 miles from his home – isolated from the outside world, tortured and forced into a particular kind of labor: to work as a cyber-scammer. Barbed wire fences are seen outside a shuttered Great Wall Park compound where Cambodian authorities said they had recovered evidence of human trafficking, kidnapping and torture during raids on suspected cybercrime compounds in Sihanoukville, Cambodia, in Sept. 2022. Credit: Reuters In recent years, secret sites like the one where Kham was detained have proliferated throughout the region as the COVID-19 pandemic forced criminal networks to shift their strategies for making money. One popular scheme today involves scammers starting fake romantic online relationships that eventually lead to stealing as-large-as-possible sums of money from targets. The scammers said that if they fail to do so, they are tortured. Teen victims from Luang Namtha province in Laos who were trafficked to a place they called the “Casino Kosai,” in an isolated development near the city of Myawaddy on Myanmar’s eastern border with Thailand, have described their ordeal to RFA. Chillingly, dozens of teenagers and young people from Luang Namtha are still believed to be trapped at the site, along with victims from other parts of Asia. The case is but the tip of the iceberg in the vast networks of human trafficking that claim over 150,000 victims a year in Southeast Asia. Yet it encapsulates how greed and political chaos mix to allow crime to operate unchecked, with teenagers like Kham paying the price. This fake Facebook ad for the Sands International is for a receptionist. It lists job benefits of 31,000 baht salary, free accommodation and two days off per month. Qualifications are passport holder, Thai citizen, 20-35 years old and the ability to work in Cambodia. Credit: RFA screenshot The promise of cash Typically, it starts with the lure of a job. In the case of Lao teenagers RFA spoke to, the bait can be as simple as a message over Facebook or a messaging app. Other scams have involved more elaborate cons, with postings for seemingly legitimate jobs that have ensnared everyone from professionals to laborers to ambitious youths. What they have in common is the promise of high pay in glitzy, if sketchy, casino towns around Southeast Asia – many built with the backing of Chinese criminal syndicates that operate in poorly policed borderlands difficult to reach. Before 2020, “a lot of these places were involved in two things: gambling, where groups of Thais and Chinese were going for a weekend casino holiday, or online betting,” said Phil Robertson, deputy director for Asia at Human Rights Watch. “Then, all of a sudden COVID hits, and these syndicates [that ran the casinos] decided to change their business model. What they came up with was scamming.” A motorbike drives past a closed casino in Sihanoukville, Cambodia, in Feb. 2020. As travel restrictions bit during the pandemic, syndicates that ran the casinos shifted their focus from gambling to scams, says Phil Robertson of Human Rights Watch. Credit: Reuters Today, gambling towns like Sihanoukville, in Cambodia, and the outskirts of Tonpheung, on the Laos side of the Golden Triangle, have become notorious for trapping people looking for work into trafficking. But besides these places, there are also numerous unregulated developments where scamming “casinos” operate with little outside scrutiny, including on the Thai-Burmese border. Keo, 18, had a legitimate job at a casino in Laos when he was contacted via WhatsApp by a man who said he could make much more – 13 million kip ($766) a month, plus bonuses – by working in Thailand. He could leave whenever he wanted, the person claimed. “I thought about the new job offer for two days, then I said yes on the third day because the offer would pay more salary, plus commission and I can go home anytime,” Keo said. He quit his job by lying to his boss, saying he was going to visit his family. A few days later, a black Toyota Vigo pick-up truck fetched him, along with two friends, and they took a boat across the Mekong to Thailand. Scams By that time, Keo realized he was being trafficked – the two men who escorted him and his friends were armed. “While on the boat, one of us … suggested that we return to Laos, but we were afraid to ask,” as the men carried guns and knives. He dared not jump. “Later, one of us suggested we call our parents – but the men said, ‘On the boat, we don’t use the telephone.’ We dared not call our parents because we were afraid of being harmed,” he said. “So, we kept quiet until we reached the Thai side.” Both Keo and Kham told RFA that they were eventually trafficked to Myawaddy Township, an area some 300 miles south of the Golden Triangle. Kham only remembered parts of the journey, when he was made to walk for miles. Keo told RFA Laos he was transported by a…

Sagaing court sentences activists to between 3 and 13 years in prison

Editor2 years ago02 mins

A court in Myanmar’s northern Sagaing region has sentenced nine activists to prison terms ranging from three to 13 years, according to friends of the families. Final year law student and anti-regime strike leader Kyaw Win Sein received a 10-year sentence Friday under the Counter Terrorism Law, and one and a half years for incitement to sedition in the civil service. Kyaw Win Sein is believed to be around 30-years-old. He actively participated in anti-regime protests in Homalin township and boycotted his lessons after the military seized power in a February 2021 coup. Shortly after the coup, the junta issued a warrant for his arrest but he managed to evade capture until August last year. Fellow activists sentenced by the Homalin township court on Friday – seven men and a woman – also received long prison terms. “Nwet Nwet Aung was imprisoned for 10 years; Aung Hein for 10 years; Aung Ko Min for 10 years; Thet Tun Oo for 10 years; Sai Wai Yan for 13 years; Nay Naw for five years; Pyoe Thet Tin for five years; and Aung Myint Oo for three years,” said a family friend who declined to be named for fear of reprisals. “They all are in good health.” According to the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners the junta arrested more than 21,000 people since seizing power in a February 2021 coup. Of those nearly 17,400 are still being held in prisons across the country. Translated by RFA Burmese. Edited by Mike Firn.

INTERVIEW: ‘If I don’t speak up on their behalf, I’ll always be in pain’

Editor2 years ago022 mins

A Nov. 24 fire in an apartment block in Xinjiang’s regional capital, Urumqi, sparked protests across China, with many people expressing condolences for the victims of the fatal lockdown blaze and others hitting back at ruling Chinese Communist Party leader Xi Jinping’s zero-COVID policy. Huang Yicheng was among them, turning up at a spontaneous protest at Shanghai’s Urumqi Road, only to be detained and mistreated by cops, who hung him upside down at one point, as he described in an earlier interview with Radio Free Asia given under the pseudonym Mr.Chen. Now in Germany, Huang spoke to RFA Mandarin about his plans for the future: Huang Yicheng: I’m from Shanghai. I am 26 years old and a graduate of the Chinese department of Peking University. I am currently a postgraduate student at the University of Hamburg, Germany. On Nov. 27, 2022, I was arrested by the police on Urumqi Middle Road, Shanghai, put onto a bus, and then escaped from the bus. Then a white man helped me escape the scene. RFA: You were interviewed by me on Nov. 27, the weekend when the “white paper” movement took place. You were interviewed anonymously then, so why did you choose to disclose your real name and appearance now? Huang Yicheng: This is because I have now left China. I saw that there were so many people around the same age as me who took part in the white paper movement with me, who have been arrested and imprisoned. So I feel that I will always be in pain and have uncontrollable anxiety if I don’t stand up and speak out on their behalf, even though there are great risks involved in doing so. Protesters shout slogans in Shanghai, China, during a protest Nov. 27, 2022. Credit: AFP screenshot from AFPTV I hope that everyone can call for the release of Cao Zhixin and the other peaceful demonstrators who are now behind bars. The government should tell us how many people were arrested in each city after the white paper movement, and issue a complete list of names for each city, so the rest of the world knows exactly what is going on. RFA: You just said that you are aware of the great risk of doing so. How would you deal with this risk? Huang Yicheng: This is very hard to think about, because now I have revealed my true identity, educational background and my true appearance. But I want to use this to encourage others in the same boat. But I also think it’s almost impossible to remain entirely anonymous in the current online environment. So instead of talking about how scared we are, we should face up to the risk and the fear. In that way, I hope that the next generation, or our own generation, within the next 10, 20 years or even sooner than that, will get to live in a society without the need for such fear, where we are free to express our thoughts without fear. RFA: Did you decide to study abroad due to safety concerns, or were you planning to do that anyway? Huang Yicheng: I had originally planned to study abroad, but it was very, very difficult to get a visa during the zero-COVID restrictions. I started this application before the Shanghai lockdown [of spring 2022], and it took more than a year to come through. This delay was one of the reasons that I took part in the white paper protests in the first place, as well as the three-month lockdown in Shanghai. It was an experience that changed my life. RFA: Were you worried that you might be prevented from leaving the country because you had taken part in the protest? Huang Yicheng: Yes, yes I was. I think everyone else had similar worries. They had already taken away two busloads of detained protesters from Urumqi Road in Shanghai between the evening of Nov. 26 and the early morning of Nov. 27. The video clips being shot at the time were very worrying. I never thought going into it that I would get detained. That’s why I want to speak out in support of the people who were detained. Hopefully we can put some pressure on [the authorities] and get them released. RFA: When I interviewed you on Nov. 27, when you had gotten back home, you said that you were very worried that the police would come looking for you, so you asked for anonymity. Did they come looking for you? Huang Yicheng: No, they didn’t. My identity was kept well hidden, and they didn’t find me. Cao Zhixin, an editor at the Peking University Publishing House, was arrested after attending a Nov. 2022 protest in Beijing’s Liangmahe district. Credit: Screenshot from video RFA: How did you manage to protect yourself? Huang Yicheng: I just hid at home and cut off all contact with friends at home and abroad. I don’t know if they used facial recognition or anything like that. I also made a video statement to be posted in case I got arrested and gave it to a friend I trust. He would have posted it if I had been detained. RFA: Given that you were actually caught by the police and put on the bus, it’s pretty lucky that you managed to escape – a fluke, wasn’t it? Huang Yicheng: When I think about it now, I can hardly believe it. It was a bit dream-like. When I was detained and put on the bus, it was parked on the southwest side of the intersection between Urumqi Road and Wuyuan Road. I was probably in the second row, near the door. Protesters are taken away by police in a bus on Urumqi Road in Shanghai on Nov. 26, 2022. Credit: Associated Press The policeman got off the bus and went to detain other demonstrators, but he didn’t handcuff us. We could see from the Twitter account “Mr Li is not your teacher” that there was…

Junta court sentences 4 people to life for ‘funding terrorism’

Editor2 years ago03 mins

A military court in Myanmar’s northern Sagaing region has sentenced four people to life imprisonment under the junta’s anti-terrorism laws, locals told RFA. They were all arrested by troops in their homes in Indaw township on March 5 this year. Residents identified them as Thein Hla, a civil disobedience movement teacher in her 40s; two other women, Khin Pyae Pyae Tun and Aye Aye; and a 24-year-old man, Aye Min Tun. “The 24-year-old man was sentenced on April 1,” an Indaw resident told RFA, speaking on condition of anonymity. “Three other women were also sentenced [on April 3]. All received life time imprisonment under Sections 50 (j) and 52(a)”, a local man told RFA. Section 50 (j) of the Counter-Terrorism Law relates to funding terrorism, while 52 (a) covers the organization of or participation in terrorist acts along with harboring terrorists or hosting meetings. The four were among 22 people arrested and accused of donating money to the Indaw People’s Defense Force. The other 18 were released on bail. “A PDF member was arrested first. Then [more] people were arrested and accused of having their names on the donor list [to the PDF]. But there is no evidence,” said a woman who also declined to be named for fear of reprisals. “The arrest of the teacher Thein Hla also has no evidence. She was accused of providing 100,000 to 200,000 [kyat or U.S.$48-96] in that list and was arrested. She has committed no serious crime. It’s only because she participated in the anti-regime civil disobedience movement. The other three are ordinary people.” Locals say another man from Indaw was sentenced to life imprisonment under the same terrorism financing law on Feb. 27 this year. According to the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (Burma) more than 21,200 civilians have been arrested nationwide during the more than two years since the junta seized power in a coup, of which over 17,300 are still behind bars. Translated by RFA Burmese. Edited by Mike Firn.

Cambodia sells research monkeys to the world. It’s not all legal, US says.

Editor2 years ago022 mins

Visitors are not welcome at the monkey farm co-owned by the sister of Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen. The farm is ringed by moat-like canals, 6-foot-6-inch-high (2 meters) earthworks and a brick wall topped with razor wire. A former employee told RFA that guards with Kalashnikov assault rifles patrol the grounds inside the farm in rural Kampong Speu province, which is two hours’ drive from the capital Phnom Penh. So, what’s there to secure behind the walls? The answer is the captive animals within: long-tailed macaques, a breed of primate favored for medical research. Cages of monkeys are seen on the grounds of a farm co-owned by the sister of Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen in rural Kampong Speu province, March 2023. Credit: RFA Once an unremarkable player in the business of providing the animals for a global research industry, Cambodia has become a hub for exports of long-tails – a lucrative but shadowy business tied to the nation’s political elite. Growing demand from the COVID-19 pandemic meant primate farms like the one owned by the prime minister’s sister exported about a quarter of a billion dollars worth of research macaques in 2022, according to U.N. trade data. But as the business booms, questions are emerging about the origin of the monkeys Cambodia ships around the world. Allegations of illicit trade are at the core of a high-profile legal case brought by U.S. wildlife prosecutors against senior Cambodian government officials. Two officials have been charged with issuing fraudulent export permits certifying poached monkeys as captive-bred animals to circumvent U.S. import restrictions and international treaties governing the trade in endangered species. Cambodia’s wildlife and diversity director, Kry Masphal, was arrested in New York in November while traveling to a conservation conference in Panama. His boss, Forestry Administration Director General Keo Omaliss, was also indicted but remains at large in Cambodia. A permit issued by the Cambodian government for the export of monkeys. Credit: Handout Kry is currently under house arrest near Washington, D.C., and set to face a court proceeding in Miami in June. Yet with so much money to be made in Cambodia, experts fear there is little incentive for reform in the country. “It’s kind of like the realization of our worst fears,” said Ed Newcomer, a recently retired U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service agent who spent 20 years investigating wildlife crimes around the world. “When government officials, and relatives of high-powered officials, are involved in the wildlife trade, how are the Cambodian regulatory and enforcement agencies supposed to effectively enforce the law?” The monkey business Long-tailed macaques, which are native to Southeast Asia, are so-named because their tails are usually longer than the length of their bodies. Other distinguishing characteristics include tufts of hair atop their heads and whiskers around their mouths. An engineer takes samples of monkey kidney cells at a lab in China. Credit: AFP file photo Also known as “crab-eating” monkeys, they are highly prized by biomedical researchers for their similarity to humans. Testing on the animals helped lead to a vaccine for yellow fever. More recently, they’ve been used to test treatments for issues ranging from reproduction to obesity and addiction. Demand for their species soared with the onset of the coronavirus pandemic, as macaques were critical in the development of the mRNA vaccines for COVID. Until recently, China was the world’s top supplier. But in a bid to protect its own vaccine development, Beijing banned exports of research monkeys, leaving Cambodia as the number-one source for a global research industry that was suddenly facing a severe shortfall. In 2019, Cambodia exported the most primates it had ever shipped in a single year, sending 14,931 overseas for $34 million – an average cost of just over $2,271 per monkey, according to the U.N. trade data. The number of macaques being exported and the average cost per monkey continued to rise. Countries reported importing around $250 million worth of monkey shipments from Cambodia in 2022 alone, according to the data. Questions of origin But experts say it would be impossible for all of them to have been legitimately raised and sourced according to rules that govern the use of research primates. Partly to protect dwindling wild populations, but also to reduce potential contamination of experiments, only captive-bred macaques are allowed in medical research. However, they are also slow-breeding, with infants taking three years to reach maturity. So, captive-bred stocks frequently struggle to meet researchers’ needs, and suppliers are often incentivized to pass off wild-caught monkeys as farm-reared. Although a black-market trade in the monkeys has long blighted the industry, the COVID-driven supply shortage has sent illicit poaching into overdrive, conservationists say. “There’s just too much money in this business now for these macaques to stand a chance,” said Lisa Jones-Engel, a primatologist who now advises the animal rights group Peta. A study published last month in One Health, a peer-reviewed veterinary science journal, found that Cambodian breeders would have needed to more than quadruple production rates – from 81,926 over a four-year period to at least 98,000 in a single year – to have legitimately exported the number of macaques shipped during the pandemic. As Cambodia has never reported importing long-tailed macaques, such an increase would have to have been driven entirely by an increase in domestic supply. Yet “Cambodia has historically been incapable of producing second generation offspring macaques, therefore increasing their production capacity legally seems unlikely,” the researchers wrote. The sister The farm owned by the prime minister’s sister Hun Sengny sits at the end of a dusty road on the outskirts of the sleepy town of Damnak Trach. It is registered under a Cambodian firm, Rong De Group, for which she serves as chairwoman. The uniforms of the security guards who wield the assault rifles bear the insignia of her private security firm, Garuda Security Co. Locals who spoke to RFA all described the “boss” of the farm as being Chinese expatriate, Dong Wan De, who Commerce Ministry records identify as the…

Manila, Kuala Lumpur to negotiate with Beijing in South China Sea

Editor2 years ago011 mins

Malaysia and the Philippines have said that they’re willing to discuss oil and gas exploration with China in the South China Sea, a move that analysts say may cause friction within ASEAN as the Southeast Asian bloc wants to accelerate negotiation for a Code of Conduct in order to avoid conflict. On Tuesday the Philippine Department of Foreign Affairs said Manila would resume talks with Beijing on joint oil and gas exploration in the South China Sea, despite the country’s Supreme Court already having ruled against such activities. The court in January decided that a trilateral joint exploration agreement between the Philippines, China and Vietnam – another party in the South China Sea dispute – was unconstitutional because it allowed “foreign corporations to participate in the exploration of the country’s natural resources” without observing required safeguards. The agreement was signed in 2005 but failed to materialize. In 2018, under then-President Rodrigo Duterte, the Philippines and China also signed a document on Cooperation on Oil and Gas Development but Duterte himself terminated the talks last June after both sides failed to resolve the issue of sovereignty over Reed Bank in the Spratlys. For its part, Malaysia has informed China that it is ready to negotiate on the oil exploration in the waters both countries claim. Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim (L) shakes hands with Chinese President Xi Jinping during a meeting at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on Mar 31, 2023. Credit: Prime Minister’s Office of Malaysia via AP Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said Monday that he told China’s President Xi Jinping during his recent visit to Beijing that, as a small country, Malaysia needs to continue with oil exploration but “if the condition is that there must be negotiations to secure [our rights], then we are prepared to negotiate.” On Tuesday the prime minister seemed to adjust his conciliatory tone by adding that he “insisted that the area … falls within Malaysia’s territory” and that “in the meantime our exploration efforts will continue.” Bilateral negotiations China responded that it is “firmly committed to safeguarding our lawful rights and interests in the South China Sea.” Foreign Ministry’s spokesperson Mao Ning said at a Tuesday briefing that, at the same time, “we are ready to work together with the Malaysian side and continue to properly handle maritime disputes through dialogue and consultation.” Some other ASEAN countries that are also embroiled in disagreements with China over natural resources in the South China Sea – Vietnam and Indonesia – have yet to react to the latest developments but analysts warned against what they see as “China’s bilateral approach.” “Xi Jinping has used official state visits by President Marcos Jr. of the Philippines in January and Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim in April to press China’s claims in the South China Sea and to press for bilateral discussions,” said Carlyle Thayer, a veteran regional specialist. “China’s insistence on bilateral discussions has been consistent for the last decade and a half,” the Canberra-based analyst told Radio Free Asia, adding that China can “divide and conquer” using its superior economic weight. Another analyst, Collins Chong Yew Keat at Universiti Malaya, told RFA’s affiliate BenarNews that the scope and level of the negotiations remains to be seen “but it must not be based on a bilateral basis, as Beijing will exercise its burgeoning leverage and cards at its disposal now, to use economic tools and other measures to dictate more favorable terms.” A woman walks past a billboard showing the CNOOC 981 deepwater oil platform, used in the South China Sea, outside of the headquarters of the China National Offshore Oil Corporation in Beijing on July 28, 2016. Credit: AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein ASEAN countries restarted negotiations with China on a Code of Conduct for the South China Sea, with the first round of talks taking place in the second week of March. Several member states have accused China of impeding and harassing their oil and gas activities in areas within their exclusive economic zones that also fall within China’s nine-dash line that Beijing uses to claim “historic rights” to almost 90% of the South China Sea. This imaginary boundary was declared as illegal by a U.N. tribunal in a case brought by the Philippines in 2016. ‘Not an indication of success’ “Indonesia has a long-standing policy of refusing to discuss maritime disputes with China on the grounds that its maritime boundaries are in accord with international law,” said Carl Thayer. Vietnam, which saw several oil development projects with foreign partners stopped under China’s pressure, has always maintained that any joint exploration should abide by international law, especially the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). As a rule, Hanoi does not publicly criticize other ASEAN members’ policies but Vietnamese scholars said that Beijing-led joint projects in the South China Sea could become “dangerous precedents” if pursued. China has been offering other countries to “set aside dispute and pursue joint development,” viewing it “as a measure to assert sovereignty in the negotiated area,” wrote a Vietnamese researcher, Bui Sang Minh, in the South China Sea Studies Journal, which usually reflects the Vietnamese government’s stance. “Most of the areas in which China has brought up such offers are well within other countries’ economic exclusive zones and continental shelves.” As the Philippines and China are to resume talks, Manila should “try not to fall for the ‘setting disputes aside and pursuing joint development’ concept and refrain from prioritizing economic benefits over maintaining its sovereignty in the process,” Minh added. Some other analysts such as Jay Batongbacal, director of the Institute for Maritime Affairs and Law of the Sea at the University of the Philippines, said that a desire to settle disputes amicably “does not mean they will simply give in to China’s demands.” “An announcement that they will discuss and negotiate is not an indication of success in the bilateral approach,” he said. Meanwhile, Carl Thayer told RFA that in his opinion, “China’s bilateral approach is…

Junta raids kill 2, force 5,000 to flee Sagaing region villages

Editor2 years ago02 mins

Two people have been killed and around 5,000 have abandoned their homes as junta troops raided two villages in Tigyaing township, in Myanmar’s northern Sagaing region, residents told RFA. Locals said that a junta column with more than 70 troops fired heavy artillery and entered Nyaung Pin Thar village on March 30. A 20-year-old woman named Zar Chi Win was killed by a shell. “Zar Chi Win was hit by the junta’s heavy artillery shell and died on March 30, while she was trying to escape,” said a resident, speaking on condition of anonymity for safety reasons. “The shell landed in the vicinity of Nyaung Pin Thar village.” Another column with more than 70 troops raided nearby Sit Tan village killing 30-year-old Than Pe Lay as he tried to escape, the local told RFA. “Than Pe Lay was shot dead by a column that entered Sit Tan village on April 2, while he was trying to escape near the village monastery,” he said. On the evening of April 3, the column that entered Nyaung Pin Thar village and the column that entered Sit Tan village combined and left the township.Calls to the military junta spokesman for Sagaing region, Aye Hlaing, went unanswered. According to the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, between Feb. 1, 2021, when the military seized power in a coup, and April 3, 2023, a total of 3,206 people, including pro-democracy activists, were killed by the junta. Translated by RFA Burmese. Edited by Mike Firn.

Activists sue China’s education ministry over rainbow flag reprimand

Editor2 years ago017 mins

Two LGBTQ+ students from Beijing’s Tsinghua University have lodged an administrative lawsuit against China’s Ministry of Education after being harassed and threatened by the authorities over their sexuality. In May 2022, Huang and Li bought 10 rainbow flags on the auction site Taobao, and left them on a small table in a campus supermarket, with a note that read: “Please take one #PRIDE.” The pair, who asked to be identified by pseudonyms for fear of further reprisals, had already given a great deal of thought to what they knew was a highly risky action. They considered posting about the flags on social media, but they knew the authorities would be able to track them down, as they had been forced to use their real names to sign up for an account. Then they remembered an anti-fascist poster that had mysteriously appeared on the wall of the campus supermarket, and that the lack of surveillance cameras in the area had meant the students who put it there were never found. It wasn’t until they had already put the flags in place that they realized that cameras had now been installed in the area, leaving them “terrified” over what would happen next. But Huang told herself that 10 rainbow flags wasn’t going to have a massive impact on the life of the university. Within two hours, they were getting calls from school officials wanting to talk to them about the flags, and warning them that the incident could affect their chances of graduating, and threatening them with possible expulsion. They refused to meet with officials, who then went and found them in their respective dorm rooms, accusing them of “distributing prohibited propaganda material.” By June 30, they had been issued with notification of punishment, and submitted a written defense to the student affairs office in accordance with school procedures. The school responded in July with disciplinary action in the form of a “severe warning,” which would remain on their official file and affect their chances of pursuing scholarships, further study or jobs working for the government. ‘I knew I was doing the right thing’ Huang and Li were furious, and vowed to fight back. “I was in a state of anger every day,” Li said. “But I knew I was doing the right thing, so I didn’t feel scared.” “It felt more as if I was getting some good practice in how to defend my own dignity, and that of my companion, and in not backing down.” Within hours of placing the flags, the students received calls from school officials wanting to talk to them about the flags. By July 2022, the school disciplined the students with a “severe warning” [shown], which would remain on their official file and affect their chances of pursuing scholarships, further study or jobs working for the government. Credit: Courtesy of the respondents They went public with the incident on July 18, posting to WeChat that they were being punished for the rainbow flag incident, in a post that garnered more than 100,000 views and which was later deleted by government censors. By the end of the month, they had filed an official complaint with the university, which upheld the original disciplinary action. So they took it further, lodging a complaint with the Beijing municipal education commission, arguing that they had left the flags for people to pick up, rather than distributing them, and that rainbow flags aren’t illegal in China. But the response from the government was the same as that of the university. Li, the child of a middle-class family, had been greatly affected by her experience of lockdown in the central city of Wuhan in the spring of 2020, in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic. “I knew that a lot of people in my [residential] community had died, and I was affected by knowing that my neighbors were dying,” she said. “Since then, I’ve had no illusions about the current system at all.” The formal warnings issued to Huang and Li expired after six months, but that wasn’t good enough for the two friends, who wanted to dispel the notion that it is wrong to fly a rainbow flag. “It’s a matter of our reputation,” Huang said. “By punishing us, the school made a lot of people feel that we did something disgraceful.” “We also want to do some public advocacy on this matter, and start a public discussion about sexual minorities in universities,” she said. So Huang and Li took their lawsuit all the way to the top, lodging an administrative lawsuit with the Ministry of Education, and calling on its officials to review their case. “We have to take the legal process all the way, so that this winds up in the legal archives, in the media and in online archives,” Li said. “I believe that history will eventually judge us fairly.” “For me, this is a political declaration, and I have to take it all the way, or I wouldn’t be able to live with myself,” she said. But both activists still feared possible retaliation from the authorities. Huang wrote to her family coming out as a lesbian, and detailing all of her actions and the reasoning behind them since May 2022, with a view to sending it if the police came looking for her. They submitted their case to the Beijing No. 1 Intermediate People’s Court on Feb. 20, and have yet to receive a response. Party views on LGBTQ+ activists The ruling Chinese Communist Party currently regards LGBTQ+ rights activists as being influenced by “hostile foreign forces” seeking to undermine its rule, and openly queer public figures are gradually disappearing from mainstream media, film and television under the watchful eye of government censors. Huang and Li, who met at a queer book club and put the flags out to mark the International Day Against Homophobia, Biphobia, Lesbophobia and Transphobia on May 17, came to a realization of their own sexuality in a piecemeal way, despite having…

Junta jets bomb village in western Myanmar, killing 10

Editor2 years ago010 mins

Two Myanmar military jets bombed a village in western Myanmar on Thursday where there was no fighting, killing at least 10 people and injuring 20 others, according to ethnic rebels and residents. The seemingly unprovoked attack on Khuabung village in Thantlang township in Chin state, near the Indian border, is the military’s latest use of air power in its sprawling offensive against anti-junta People’s Defense Force paramilitaries and ethnic armies. It’s a tactic that has become increasingly common as the country’s armed resistance makes greater gains. Such attacks are typically undertaken by the military to support troops fighting anti-junta forces with devastating effect. Chin National Front spokesman Salai Htet Ni told RFA Burmese that the strike by the two jets was unprovoked and clearly targeted a civilian population. However, Thantlang is one of several townships under martial law that the junta has targeted with multiple airstrikes since the start of the year. “They attacked this morning [at around 10:00 a.m.] without any battles happening,” Salai Htet Ni said. “They dropped bombs into a civilian village.” At least 10 residents were killed and 20 injured, he said. The airstrike set many of the village’s houses on fire, residents said. Khuabung, around 5 miles (8 kilometers) from the seat of Thantlang township, is home to more than 230 people living in 53 households. Increasing airstrikes According to the Chin Human Rights Organization, the military launched at least 53 airstrikes, dropping more than 140 bombs, on the townships of Mindat, Hakha, Matupi and Thantlang in the first two months of 2023 alone. The strikes killed five members of the Chin National Front and three members of local anti-junta People’s Defense Force, and also injured six civilians. In addition to the strike on Khuabung village on Thursday, the military also used Mi-35 aircraft to bomb areas it suspected were occupied by local PDF groups, the Chin National Front said. The military has yet to issue any statement regarding the bombing of Khuabung and attempts by RFA to reach Thant Zin, the junta’s spokesperson for Chin state, went unanswered on Thursday. A report issued by the U.N. human rights agency earlier this month said that junta airstrikes in Myanmar had more than doubled from 125 in 2021 to 301 in 2022. The report followed a joint statement on March 1 by Amnesty International, Global Witness, and Burma Campaign (U.K.) urging governments to sanction companies that sell jet fuel to the junta to limit the country’s air force. While international sanctions have limited the air force to some extent, former military officials in Myanmar have said they will never be fully effective while powerful countries, such as Russia and China, are backing the junta. Deaths and displacements in Shan state News of the airstrikes on Thantlang came as RFA learned that at least 33 civilians were killed and more than 5,000 displaced from southern Shan state’s townships of Pinlaung, Pekon and Mobye during the first three months of the year alone. Yin Lianghan, a spokesperson for the Shan Human Rights Foundation, said his organization had compiled the statistics after interviewing Buddhist monks displaced by the violence, as well as aid workers in the region. “These people have been severely displaced because of the junta’s heavy artillery shelling and a massacre in the Nam Neint village,” he said, referring to an incident on March 11, in which junta troops killed 21 civilians, including three monks, in a dawn raid on a monastery in Pinlaung before setting fire to the village. “The main reason why they have become refugees is because of the junta’s extrajudicial killing of innocent civilians,” he said. Residents who fled villages in southern Shan state, Myanmar, are seen in the town of Pinlaung, Sunday, March 26, 2023. Credit: Comet social group Junta Deputy Information Minister Major Gen. Zaw Min Tun has told pro-junta media that the Karenni National Defense Army committed the massacre in Nem Neint village, but the KNDF claims that it was the handiwork of the military. According to Shan Human Rights Foundation, at least two children were among those killed by the military shelling in Pinlaung and Mobye townships since the start of the year.. Tensions rising Khun Bwe Hone, the information officer for the ethnic Pa’O National Defense Force, told RFA that the deaths and displacements occurred amid rising tensions between the military and the ethnic Karrenni Nationalities Defense Force in the three townships, as the junta is preparing a major offensive in the area. “The junta is reinforcing its troops,” he said, noting that most villagers have already left the area in anticipation of the fighting. “Our defense forces have warned them to flee to safety. That’s why they left. This battle is likely to be drawn out because we are determined to fight against the military dictatorship … to the end and the enemy is going to do what it has set out to do, too.” A woman who fled fighting in the area told RFA on condition of anonymity that civilians are pouring into the seat of Pinlaung township from nearby villages to take refuge in camps for the displaced. A monastery and residential homes burn in Nam Neint village, Pinlaung township on March 11, 2023, following a raid by Myanmar junta forces. Credit: Inn Sar Kuu The exact number of refugees is unknown, said aid worker Khun Kyaw Shwe. While the refugees are receiving assistance from social support groups and area residents, they are in “desperate need of medicine,” as well as food and access to clean water, he said. “At the moment, local medical teams are taking care of them with what little medicine they have,” Khun Kyaw Shwe told RFA. “The demand for medicine is quite severe. The refugee camps are dealing with outbreaks of malaria, influenza and respiratory infections.” Only around 20 days of food stores remain for the camps in Pinlaung, he said, urging international donors to help fill the gaps. RFA was unable to reach Khun Thein Maung, the junta’s…

Category: Middle East