South Asia Archives - Page 40 of 94 - Investigative Journalism Reportika

Make revolution, not love

Editor1 year ago01 mins

North Korean authorities have threatened to punish young couples partaking in “degenerate” romantic behavior at solemn historical sites honoring the ruling Kim family. The warning came after an angry official carped that lovebirds were “casually holding hands and openly dating” at the birthplace of Kim Jong Suk, grandmother of leader Kim Jong Un. Monuments to the three-generation Kim dynasty that dominate the urban landscape of North Korea are popular dating venues because they are well-lit in a country where electricity is a luxury.

India plans to extend fence along Myanmar border

Editor1 year ago010 mins

India plans to begin installing an additional 70 kilometers (44 miles) of border fencing over concerns about illegal immigrants entering Manipur state from neighboring Myanmar and an increase in arms and drugs smuggling. India and Myanmar share a 1,600-kilometer-long (1,000-mile-long) border. Manipur state, where the additional fencing will occur, accounts for 400 kilometers (250 miles) of that border, of which less than 10% is fenced, leaving the region open for arms and drug smuggling, according to Indian media. Earlier this year, Indian authorities began installing barbed-wire fencing along Manipur’s border with Myanmar to curb smuggling, infiltration and other border crimes, according to Indian media. “In view of the rise in illegal immigration and drugs smuggling from the neighboring country, safeguarding our porous borders has become an urgent necessity,” N. Biren Singh, chief minister of Manipur state, said at a meeting with officials from India’s Border Roads Organisation, Indian media reported on Sept. 24. The organization develops and maintains road networks in India’s border areas and in friendly neighboring countries. The move comes as nearly 60,000 Burmese civilians from Chin state and the northern Sagaing region have fled across the border into India’s Manipur and Mizoram states since the military ousted Myanmar’s democratically elected government in a February 2021 coup, according to ethnic Chin civil society organizations. Junta forces have bombed and conducted armed attacks on civilian areas while trying to root out resistance fighters. Over 5,000 of them have taken refuge in Manipur state, of which more than 70 have been arrested for immigration violations or other charges, according to India For Myanmar, a group that helps Burmese refugees in India. Trapping civilians Human rights groups and Burmese refugees have decried the move to extend the fence in Manipur because it would keep people from fleeing into a safe area. “The closure of the border is only intended to fence off Myanmar refugees, but I don’t think it will prevent many other crimes and other illegal trade,” said Salai Dokhar, founder of India For Myanmar. “If India wants to end these illegal businesses, it should cooperate with the western countries and those with strong democratic values to be able to take more effective actions along the border,” he said. In 2018, under Myanmar’s previous civilian-led government, travel was allowed through the Myanmar-India land border to promote trade between the two countries. But now the Manipur government has accused Myanmar of allowing more arms and drug trafficking on the border, thereby worsening ethnic conflict in the state due to an influx of Burmese civilians fleeing violence at home. Ethnic conflict Manipur itself is experiencing an ethnic conflict between the mostly Hindu Meiteis and the mainly Christian Kukis, and state officials often accuse the Burmese refugees who seek a safe haven there of making the problem worse. In the meantime, Indian authorities in Manipur state arrested an alleged terrorist suspected of being associated with Myanmar-based rebel groups, and handed him over to the National Investigation Agency, India’s central counter-terrorism law enforcement agency, the Indian English-language daily newspaper Deccan Herald reported on Sept. 23. Refugees who fled Myanmar rest in a shelter at Farkawn quarantine camp in India’s eastern state of Mizoram near the Myanmar border, Sept. 23, 2021. Credit: AFP Although Myanmar’s armed resistance groups have traveled across the border to India, they have done nothing to cause harm or damage, and have even helped arrest border drug smugglers, said Chin National Defense Force spokesperson Salai Kyung Gain. The Chin ethnic armed group in western Myanmar’s Chin state, which lies south of Manipur state and east of India’s Mizoram state, is the armed wing of the Chin National Organization. “If we close these entrances and exits on the border, there will be some difficulties,” Salai Kyung Gain said. “Drug and arms trade always occurs along the border, but they have become more frequent lately during tough situations like there is now.” “But since our defense forces and revolutionary forces have to commute to the Indian side of the border, such as to Mizoram, we help arrest some [weapons and drug smugglers] as much as we can to protect the people,” he said. ‘Will hurt Myanmar refugees’ If the Manipur state government extends the fence, it will hurt Myanmar refugees forced to flee their homes by Myanmar junta forces fighting anti-regime forces in Chin state and Sagaing region, said Salai Kyung Gain. Indian authorities have driven back Burmese civilians from Sagaing and Chin who fled across the border to Manipur, forcing them to shelter along the border in difficult conditions, some of the refugees said. Pu Khaing, a displaced Burmese, told RFA that those who fled were civilians and not arms or drug smugglers. “There is no problem for us with their fence because we are no longer building our refugee camps on the Indian side, but only on the Myanmar side of the border,” he said. “They [Indian authorities] drove us out, but the smugglers have their own way of crossing the border. Ordinary refugees don’t get involved with them.” A Burmese refugee in Mizoram, who declined to be named for safety reasons, said the local office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees in New Delhi should not ignore the situation. “If they shut down the [Burmese refugees’] right to freedom of travel, we will have to see what kind of measures UNHCR will take,” he said. “Another thing is that we have to wait and see what kind of action the Mizoram state government will take against us.” The Indian Embassy in Yangon and the UNHRC in New Delhi did not respond to emailed requests for comments. RFA could not reach junta spokesman Maj. Gen. Zaw Min Tun for comment. Translated by Myo Min Aung for RFA Burmese. Edited by Roseanne Gerin and Malcolm Foster.

What to do about ‘freedom from speech?’

Editor1 year ago015 mins

A recent survey from the Pew Research Centre, ostensibly about the opinions of Buddhists and Muslims in South and Southeast Asia, offered a disheartening read to those of us who cherish free speech. But the study also highlighted that it is wrong to think the only enemies of free speech are the region’s authoritarian governments. The pollsters asked respondents from four Southeast Asian states to choose between two statements: “People should be allowed to speak their opinions publicly even if they upset other people” or “harmony with others is more important than the right to speak one’s opinion”. Around two-thirds of respondents—69 percent in Cambodia, 67 percent in Indonesia, and 64 percent in Singapore—chose harmony over free speech. Interestingly, 59 percent of Thais chose the opposite. It’s more straightforward, though not easy, to pick a fight with governments for their repression of free speech, as it is to argue against the common claims that free speech is an illusion or that democracies are just as censorious as authoritarian states. What’s harder to comprend, and more dangerous not to rebut, is the proposition that freedom of speech is undesirable and honesty is a species of antisocial behavior. Indeed, the argument you should keep silent even if you know you would speak the truth. But that is what one confronts in Southeast Asia, vide the Pew survey. A Thai man prays in the rain during an all-religion prayer meeting for peace and harmony at the Lumpini park, in Bangkok in 2010. Thousands of residents gathered at dawn to pray for peace at sites across Bangkok where people were killed and high rise buildings torched in two months of political violence. Credit: Manish Swarup/AP I say it’s harder because one must realize that it is not just your governments who want to silence you; it’s also your neighbors. None of this is palatable. It’s far easier to think that all tyranny stems from way up high, in part because one has to get on in society with people who think differently and, also, because it provides a convenient excuse for inactivity. However, this isn’t a new realization. In 2015, Pew conducted a global survey on people’s attitudes towards free speech. Only 29 percent of Indonesians, for example, thought that people should say what they want without censorship and just 21 percent reckoned that internet use without censorship is important. What point is there in free speech if one is only allowed to say something uncontroversial or what everyone else already (appears) to think? That’s not free speech; that’s repetition. And repetition doesn’t change people’s opinions nor educate. Why not stick to what you thought at sixteen years old and never change your mind? But in order to be allowed to question your established ideas, to educate yourself, you have to be presented with uncomfortable information in an uncomforting way—few people relish being told they’re wrong and that they have been wrong for years. I say “allowed” because that is at the core of free speech. It is often assumed that the true victim of censorship is the person engaged in speaking. They are victims, but so, too, is everyone else. If your thoughts are censored, then I am now able to hear them. If my thoughts are censored, you are not allowed to hear my opinions and judge them against your own. As such, censorship makes each person a prisoner of their own thoughts and makes society barren silos. Enforcing the will of the majority I am not singling Southeast Asia out unfairly, The desire for “freedom from speech” is universal. Indeed, the want for a “quiet life”, to be protected from discomforting truths, is much in the Western consciousness, and increasingly so. It is the defining ethos of totalitarianism—a Western concept—and of almost all religions. Isn’t the founding tenet of Christianity, Judaism and Islam that Adam was wicked for giving up the “harmony” of Eden for a free life, and that all us apparent descents are still being punished for that “crime”? It is often said that censorship is grounded in the need to protect minorities. That, at least, is how social “harmony” is often defined in Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia; multiethnic countries with political systems that fracture on racial or religious lines. However, time and time again what one finds in practice is that censorship is used to enforce the will of the majority over the minority. Worse, what this becomes is the assertion that harmony can only be protected by prosecuting the minority so that the majority does not engage in violence. Malaysia’s Police Chief Khalid Abu Bakar warned journalists “Don’t do anything or publish drawings or writing that can cause exasperation in the community.” Credit: Alexandra Radu/AP file photo There are numerous examples of this. But to take a lesser-known one: in early 2017, a small Chinese-language daily newspaper in Malaysia ran a caricature of the president of the Malaysian Islamic Party (PAS) that was deemed by some to be anti-Islamic. Shortly after the cartoon went public, admittedly to the newspaper’s small readership of mainly ethnic-Chinese, a PAS state commissioner warned the newspaper not to forget what happened to the journalists of Charlie Hebdo, when 12 journalists were murdered at the French newspaper’s Paris offices two years earlier. “If you remember last time, there was a French newspaper that published a caricature that angered the whole Muslim world,” said Muhammad Fauzi Yusof, adding that the newspaper would be responsible for the “devastating” consequences. Then-Police chief Khalid Abu Bakar waded into the debate. “Don’t do anything or publish drawings or writing that can cause exasperation in the community. We have to be careful with these things,” he instructed newspapers and journalists. What do we make of this? Obviously, it was not the Chinese-language newspaper, representing a minority, that threatened violence but the politician, from the majority, who told journalists that they could be assassinated en masse. And what about the police chief? He didn’t arrest the politician for a…

Myanmar junta sacks general for alleged bribery and corruption

Editor1 year ago09 mins

Myanmar’s junta said it has sacked a high-ranking general for alleged bribery and corruption. Lt. Gen. Moe Myint Tun, 55, was the seventh-highest leader in the State Administration Council, the governing junta. He had been sanctioned by the United States and other nations. He was abruptly removed from his positions as chairman of the Myanmar Investment Commission, Foreign Exchange Supervisory Committee, and Central Committee on Ensuring the Smooth Flow of Trade and Goods, the regime said in a statement issued Monday. Earlier this month, authorities arrested Moe Myint Tun, said to have accepted millions of dollars in bribes from businesspeople during the past two years, but it wasn’t clear if he would be tried. He is under house arrest and being interrogatad in the capital Naypyitaw, according to businesspeople who declined to be named for safety reasons. His removal is part of a crackdown on trade and finance officials, businesspeople and exporters amid economic turmoil and sanctions as the junta struggles to accumulate foreign revenue and soaring commodity prices, sources say. Lawyer Kyee Myint said that even if the top military generals were found to be corrupt, the junta’s top leader Snr. Gen. Min Aung Hlaing would not put them on trial, but only remove them from their positions. “They will never admit that their members are corrupt,” he said. “That’s why their case will never get to the court. I don’t think they will be charged under any article of the law but just removed from their positions. They will remove these officials to make it appear that only a few of them were corrupt.” Easy to exploit power His chairman positions were given to Gen. Mya Tun Oo, another member of the State Administration Council. Moe Myint Tun had been appointed to those posts on Feb. 2, 2021, a day after the military seized control of the elected government in a coup d’état. Legal experts and political analysts said the scandal shows that high-ranking military officers can easily exploit their posts, and that effective action should be taken against Moe Myint Tun if he is found guilty of bribery and corruption. Gen. Yan Naung Soe is seen in Myanmar in an undated photo. Credit: MDN A retired brigadier general, who also spoke on condition of anonymity for safety reasons, said authorities should prosecute Moe Myint Tun according to military regulations if the allegations are true. “Corruption should not occur at any level,” he said. “Since it is customary in our country for people to give gifts to show respect, it encourages corruption. They don’t happen to notice that they are committing corruption while showing respect like that.” Several governments, including the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom and the European Union have imposed sanctions on Moe Myint Tun for his role in the military coup, the subsequent military and police repression of peaceful demonstrators, the killing of civilians, and the gravity of Myanmar’s human rights’ abuses. The sanctions include the freezing of any assets in these countries, a ban on transactions with their citizens, and travel bans. Another recent case Earlier this month, the junta arrested another high-ranking military official — Gen. Yan Naung Soe, joint secretary of the Central Committee on Ensuring the Smooth Flow of Trade and Goods — amid the crackdown and an investigation of Commerce Ministry officials, the online news outlet Myanmar Now reported. The committee is responsible for procuring U.S. dollars for trade licensing purposes and other commercial transactions. Authorities arrested and interrogated him before Moe Myint Tun was fired. Afterwards, the junta summoned businesspeople from various sectors for questioning in Naypyitaw, said an import and export entrepreneur, who requested anonymity for security reasons. The lieutenant general was sacked based on their testimony, he said. Authorities also summoned former Interior Minister Lt. Gen. Soe Htut and Deputy Commerce Minister Nyunt Aung, according to Yangon-based businesspeople. RFA has yet to confirm this information. Moe Myint Tun, Yan Naung Soe and Nyunt Aung have allegedly made millions of dollars from their dealings with traders and by benefiting from the disparity between Myanmar’s official exchange rate of 2,100 kyats to the U.S. dollar and the market rate amid a steep decline in the kyat’s value, Myanmar now reported on Thursday. Worsening corruption Nay Phone Latt, spokesman for the Prime Minister’s Office of shadow National Unity Government – made up of former civilian leaders and anti-junta activists – said corruption among top military officials has been common for decades and has grown worse under the ruling junta. “Military rulers in our country have always worked for their own self-interest and the interest of their families, causing public poverty,” he said. “Lately, we’ve seen such corruption becoming worse.” Junta spokesman Maj. Gen. Zaw Min Tun did not respond to calls for comment. Thein Tun Oo, executive director of the pro-military Thayninga Institute for Strategic Studies, said he did not know the reason for Moe Myint Tun’s removal, and that there was a lot of speculation concerning frequent position changes of top military leaders. There were only two or three changes in the positions of top military leaders under the State Law and Order Restoration Council (1988-97) or the State Peace and Development Council (1997-2011), two previous military juntas that ruled Myanmar, he said. Translated by Myo Min Aung for RFA Burmese. Edited by Roseanne Gerin and Malcolm Foster.

Uyghur event in NY goes ahead despite Beijing’s warning

Editor1 year ago011 mins

The Chinese government is increasingly moving Uyghurs from internment camps to the regular penal system while claiming it is closing the camps, experts and foreign diplomats told a forum on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly in New York on Tuesday. Chinese diplomats over the weekend tried to hamstring the event by sending out a letter to foreign missions to the United Nations warning them against attending. The panel of diplomats and human rights experts slammed Beijing’s attempted interference. “Thank you also for being here, notwithstanding the PRC’s continued attempts to intimidate and to silence those speaking out on human rights,” said Beth Van Schaack, the U.S. ambassador-at-large for global criminal justice, using an acronym for China’s government. She described the Chinese U.N. mission’s letter as “yet another example of a global campaign of transnational repression” against the Muslim minority, most of whom live in China’s far-west Xinjiang region. “I’m also pleased to see that their efforts have only increased international scrutiny on the situation within Xinjiang, and particularly the atrocities against the Uyghur people,” Van Schaack said. A detention facility in Jiashi County in Kashgar Prefecture in China’s northwestern Xinjiang region in July 2023. The Chinese government is increasingly moving Uyghurs from internment camps to the regular penal system while claiming it is closing the camps, experts and foreign diplomats told a forum on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly in New York on Tuesday. (Pedro Pardo/AFP) Sophie Richardson, the China director for Human Rights Watch, brandished a copy of the letter, which was first obtained by National Review, and said the “strong recommendation” from China that nobody attend the event made it more important that the room was full. “Any government that’s going to go out of its way to bother doing this, first of all, has no business sitting on the U.N. Human Rights Council, but also it’s essentially confirming that it’s got a lot to hide and it knows it,” Richardson said, defending the event as a moral imperative. The panel’s job was “to talk about the facts,” she said, “because we can, and because they don’t want us to, and because Uyghurs can’t.” Radio Free Asia contacted the Chinese Embassy in Washington, which said questions should be directed to China’s permanent mission to the United Nations. But Chinese diplomats at the U.N. mission could not be reached by phone and did not respond to an emailed request for comments. Diplomatic pushback Two European diplomats also spoke during the event. Peter Loeffelhardt, the German Foreign Office’s director for Asia and the Pacific, referred to China’s warning letter, which accused the panel of “plotting to use human rights issues as a political tool to undermine Xinjiang’s stability and disrupt China’s peaceful development.” “It is a false and dangerous narrative to say that human rights are an obstacle to development,” he said. “Human rights always need to be part of the discussion. When we address human rights violations, bilaterally and multilaterally, it is not an interference in internal affairs.” Belén Martinez Carbonell, managing director for multilateral affairs at the European Union’s foreign relations arm, said Europe believed the repression of the Uyghurs was “a very important topic that we would not like to be missed” among all the issues at the General Assembly. “In the European Union, we are concerned for many issues, such as political reeducation camps, mass arbitrary detentions, widespread surveillance, trafficking and control measures, systemic and severe restriction of the exercise of fundamental freedoms,” she said. Those included “the use of forced labor, torture, forced abortion and sterilization, birth control, and family separation policies and sexual and gender based violence.” “What a long list,” she said. Martinez Carbonell also said the European Parliament was working on Europe’s own version of the U.S. Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act, which bans the import of any product that was made even partially using forced labor of Uyghurs interned in Chinese camps. Shifting repression Gady Epstein, a senior editor at The Economist magazine and the forum’s moderator, noted that “stories about Xinjiang have faded a little from the headlines or from the front pages” in recent times, being replaced by some about the closure of certain internment camps. Uyghurs living in Turkey protest in Istanbul in March 2021 against China’s treatment of Uyghurs in Turkey. (Emrah Gurel/AP) Amnesty International Secretary-General Agnès Callamard said the decrease in attention was not due to any changes on the ground. “The situation has not changed in its essence,” Callamard said. “It may have shifted a little bit in the forms that certain violations have taken, but it has certainly not shifted in the essence of the violations.” Callamard said Uyghurs still enjoyed no freedom of movement, or religion or culture, or to “equality and non-discrimination.” She added that even the claims of camp closures were disingenuous. “It is a fact that we are witnessing more and more arbitrary detention [and] the shifting of individuals into formal prisons,” Callamard said. It was a concern mirrored by Van Schaak, the U.S. official. “We are now particularly concerned about the dramatic increase in prosecutions with long-term sentences in Xinjiang, including the reported transfer of some detainees from so-called re-education or vocational training centers into more formal penal prisons,” she said. “Of the more than 15,000 Xinjiang residents whose sentences are known, more than 95% of those convicted – often under very vague charges, like separatism or endangering state security – have received sentences of 5 to 20 years, and in some cases of life.” Bittersweetness Rayhan Asat, a Uyghur human rights lawyer and a nonresident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, which organized the panel, told the panel that another enduring part of Beijing’s repression campaign was the cruel methods it often used to silence Uyghurs living outside China. “Uyghur-Americans living in America are still subject to China’s long-arm reach,” Asat said. “What they are using is our families, our loved ones, their lives. They are literally keeping them hostage.” She explained that…

South Korea Presidents clash over North Korea policy

Editor1 year ago09 mins

Five years ago, when leaders of the two Koreas exchanged a historic handshake in Pyongyang, the Korean people looked on with hope, wishing that this masterpiece of diplomacy may finally put an official end to the seven-decade-long war on the peninsula. But as time surges forward, the once-celebrated inter-Korean agreement stands vulnerable, overshadowed by North Korea’s escalating nuclear threats, and its leader, Kim Jong Un reinforcing ties with his fellow authoritarian leader Vladimir Putin of Russia. Now, South Korea grapples with a growing divide on whether to uphold that deal. The debate is set to intensify on the back of former South Korean President Moon Jae-in’s attendance of the commemorative event of the fifth anniversary of the September 19 Pyongyang Joint Declaration in Seoul on Tuesday. “The [current] government and the ruling party have expressed their intentions to reconsider or possibly scrap the military agreement,” Moon said at the event. “However, it’s crucial to note that the inter-Korean military agreement has been instrumental in preventing military confrontations between the two Koreas.” Moon’s comments are largely seen as a warning against the administration of President Yoon Suk Yeol for its hardline policy on North Korea. “It would be irresponsible to remove the last safety pin in place,” Moon added. “As relations between the two Koreas deteriorate and military tensions escalate, it’s imperative for both sides to uphold the agreement.” His remarks may potentially improve public opinion of South Korea’s progressives before the general election in April. Should that happen, it would conversely work against Yoon’s hardline policy on Pyongyang. Under the 2018 inter-Korean military deal, the two Koreas agreed to “end hostility” and to “take substantial steps to make the Korean Peninsula a permanent peace zone.” “Military accords should be honored and respected to the fullest extent to ensure dialogue continues and to prevent dire consequences,” Moon said. The former president was supported by key officials from his administration – his foreign minister Kang Kyung-wha and unification minister Kim Yeon-chul at the event. North Korean leader Kim Jong Un with South Korean President Moon Jae-in inside the Peace House at the border village of Panmunjom in Demilitarized Zone, South Korea on April 27, 2018. (Credit: AP) South Korea’s progressives see consistent engagement with North Korea as a potential catalyst for altering Pyongyang’s hostile behavior and its actions of violating human rights. They believe that integrating North Korea into the international stage would foster transparency, open avenues for dialogue, and gradually shift the North’s stance towards global norms and values. Conservatives, on the other hand, have long protested against what it defined as far-fetched engagement, saying that excessive aid to North Korea despite its continued provocations would only foster its nuclear ambitions. The conversative Yoon administration is thus adopting a hawkish policy on North Korea, aimed at pressing Pyongyang to forfeit its nuclear weapons. The ongoing debate is set to gain its momentum, as Yoon’s Defense Minister nominee Shin Won-sik has opined about his inclination to scrap the inter-Korean military deal last week. Some analysts consider the deal invalid, with North Korea returning to its brinkmanship diplomacy after its high-stakes summit with the United States collapsed in Hanoi February 2019. For instance, in November 2019, North Korea fired coastal artillery near the maritime buffer around the border island of Changlin-do. In May 2020, North Korea fired gunshots towards a South Korean guard post at the inter-Korean border, and in September 2020, a South Korean civilian was shot dead at the maritime border by the North and subsequently incinerated. Further complicating matters is North Korea’s amplified nuclear and missile threats. The threats are expected to further intensify with Putin vowing to aid North Korea in developing its satellite technology. Rocket technology can be used for both launching satellites and missiles. For that reason, the UN bans North Korea from launching a ballistic rocket, even if it claims to be a satellite launch. South Korea’s internal disagreement surrounding its North North Korea policy could potentially undermine that of the allies. The lack of a unified stance – be it hardline or dovish policy – risks disabling Seoul and Washington to form a coherent strategy that could be implemented in the long-term. Experts, however, noted that the main reason for this policy inconsistency is due to Kim Jong Un’s altered stance on his diplomacy after the fallout in Hanoi in 2019. “North Korean inconsistency is what leads to South Korea having to change its policy. If Pyongyang had continued to engage post-Hanoi summit, I think that both, Moon first, and Yoon now would have probably sought to try to accommodate this. Alas, this hasn’t been the case,” said Ramon Pacheco Pardo, Professor of International Relations at King’s College London and the KF-VUB Korea Chair at the Brussels School of Governance of Vrije Universiteit Brussel. “Likewise, I think that it was domestic instability in North Korea in the late 2000s, due to Kim Jong Il’s health condition, and then the transition process to Kim Jong Un, [being] the main reason behind the end of the inter-Korean engagement. So liberals and conservatives may not fully agree on how to approach North Korea, but I actually think that Pyongyang is the main reason why Seoul changes its policy.” Edited by Elaine Chan and Taejun Kang.

Cambodian farmer says raising rats for food has boosted his family’s income

Editor1 year ago04 mins

The rats squeak as Muy Chameroun nears their cages to feed them foods like corn, rice, potatoes, grass and anything else that is healthy for them.. But these rats number more than 100 and they are not his pets. Muy Chameroun is a farmer, and he is raising the rats as food. Rats are not only consumed in Cambodia, but also in other countries in the region, including Thailand, China, and India. From his small farm in Kdol Tahen commune, Bavel district, in the western province of Battambang, Muy Chamroeun breeds and raises a type of rat that he imported from Thailand. He used to work in the construction industry in neighboring Thailand, but found that he could make more money raising the rodents that he has fond memories of eating in his childhood. In the four years he has been raising rats, Muy Chamroeun has been able to lift his family’s standard of living. The business has allowed him to save 2 to 2.4 million riel (US$486-583) per month. Growing an Industry Other farmers in the area are foregoing swine and cattle to try to get in on the rat racket, and Muy Chamroen sells them adults from his mischief to help them get started. He has also set up a Facebook page called Sovanrachna Rat Farm to share tips on raising, feeding and upkeep. Sum Pina, one of his customers, says the rats do not cost a lot to raise. The largest expense is building a shed to house them in, and their food is negligible, he says. Additionally, these Thai rats are better than the local domesticated and wild breeds because they do not emit such a foul odor, he said. Rat farmer Muy Chamroeun holds a rat at his farm in western Cambodia’s Battambang province, Sept. 14, 2023. Credit: RFA Once the rats have matured and fattened up to around 1 kilogram (2.2 pounds) or more, they can be taken to market and sold for 20,000 to 25,000 riel (about $5-6) per head. Theng Savoeun, President of the Association of Cambodian Farmers’ Communities, said that raising rats for meat can help reduce Cambodia’s meat imports of meat and improve the livelihood of farmers. There are no domestic regulations on breeding or raising rats or selling their meat, so it is an easy business to get into. Muy Chameroun wants to sell his rat meat overseas, and to do that he would need a license from the Ministry of Agriculture, but currently there are no regulations or procedures for doing that – yet. Translated by Samean Yun. Edited by Eugene Whong.

Hanoi fire that killed 56 draws attention to lax safety standards in Vietnam

Editor1 year ago010 mins

The fire that tore through the nine-story Hanoi apartment building this week and killed 56 people has shed light on Vietnam’s lax fire safety standards. Deputy Prime Minister Tran Luu Quang has ordered an investigation, along with tougher regulations for smaller apartment buildings, according to a government statement. One tenant whose family has been living in a tiny 30-square meter (323-square feet) unit in a five-story building for many years said that after Wednesday’s fire in the Thanh Xuan section of Hanoi, he checked the fire prevention system in his building and realized there was none. “Prior to the tragedy, I had already studied our building layout and the surrounding area to see how to escape or how to jump to a neighboring house if a fire occurs,” said the man, who requested anonymity for security reasons on Friday. “Our building doesn’t properly equip tenants with any fire prevention equipment.” Burned motorbikes and damaged ground floor of a 10-storey building after a major fire at an apartment block in Hanoi on Sept. 13, 2023. Credit: Nhac Nguyen/AFP His building is located in a small alley in Hanoi’s Ba Dinh district. The road is so narrow that it would be impossible for fire trucks to get to the building if a fire were to break out. Also, there are no hydrants near the building, nor is it equipped with hoses. He said he has grave concerns for his family’s safety, but the landlord does not seem to care. “After the incident, I’ve been waiting to see whether the landlord or the company managing the building would issue any alerts or provide any firefighting equipment but haven’t received any notification, warning, or any equipment at all,” he said. Living in such an unsafe space is not a choice, he said. It is the only place they can afford. “For people migrating from a rural area to the city like us, we don’t have many options,” said the man. I have always had a desire to live in a place safe from fire and floods, but our current incomes only allow us to rent out here in the slums.” Mini-apartments Hanoi is home to around 2,000 similar mini-apartments, while Ho Chi Minh City in the south has around 4,200 of them, according to media reports. Many in his neighborhood are in worse shape than his, the man said. He once inspected a seven-story building in the district where his friend lives. “The landlord told me that they had built the seven-story building illegally but the local government did not know,” he said. “From the outside, the building looks like a beautiful house, but when you enter, you will notice that it is divided into many small rooms for students and low-income people to rent.” “Mini-apartment” is not an approved category of domicile under Vietnamese law, Hoang Anh Tuan, the Director General of the Ministry of Construction’s Administration of Construction Management told the local Pioneer (Tien Phong) newspaper. Relatives weep as they wait outside a funeral house to identify victims of a major fire at an apartment building in Hanoi on Sept. 13, 2023. Credit: AFP The director general of the ministry’s Department of Science, Technology & Environment, Vu Ngoc Anh, said that the mini-apartments had operated similarly to residential apartment buildings, but without fire and safety systems required by law. Units in similar buildings are available to rent all over the city. A Facebook group called “Renting Houses, Houses for Rent, Mini-Apartments, and Cheap Rental Rooms in Hanoi” advertises a newly opened 27 room mini-apartment building in the city’s Nam Tu Liem district. But the person who posted the ad would not respond to RFA’s questions regarding fire prevention and evacuation measures. What to do The man who lived in a mini-apartment said he and his wife have discussed fire prevention measures and agreed on a plan in the event of a fire. “I have instructed my family on how to use electricity and gas or what we should do when a fire occurs,” said the man. “For example, we must unplug electric appliances after use or always check whether there is a gas leak.” The family has also mapped out the local area and developed plans for what to do with the kids and their valuables. “If a fire breaks out, we must stay calm and figure out the best solution for our family,” he said. He said the building’s electrical system is overtapped, and with so many people living in a cramped space, the floors are cluttered. “I think if a fire breaks out, it would be challenging for the people there to escape, and they would be in a situation similar to the Thanh Xuan fire.” Fire safety After the Thanh Xuan disaster, the demand for fire prevention equipment has sharply increased. The price for some items has even doubled, sources told RFA Vietnamese. Nguyen Dinh Ha, a resident living in the upscale Vinhome Times City building in Vinh Tuy district, said that his and other newly built residential buildings in the capital had to fulfill the city’s fire prevention requirements before they were handed over to end-users. Therefore, these residential buildings are not subject to the city’s upcoming examination of fire prevention work at multi-family buildings. A security guard sits as residents watch from far after a major fire at an apartment building in Hanoi on Sept. 13, 2023. Credit: Nhac Nguyen/AFP He suggested that the city pay attention to the fire prevention of houses in small alleys and mini apartments as their construction did not follow the city’s standards like projects on residential building development. He also recommended installing fire prevention equipment in older residential buildings to enable them to meet the current standards. Minh Tuan, a Hanoian who moved out from a residential building in Me Tri ward, Nam Tu Liem district, told RFA that after the deadly incident in Thanh Xuan, his building had introduced stiffer fire prevention measures, requiring residents not to recharge their…

Hypocritical? Christening of new North Korean submarine raises eyebrows

Editor1 year ago07 mins

With supreme leader Kim Jong Un looking on, the foreign minister smashed a bottle of champagne against the hull of North Korea’s latest nuclear submarine, prompting the crowd of sailors and factory workers to erupt in thunderous cheers and applause. But the reaction to the smashed bottle among the general public was less than smashing. Many North Koreans saw the ceremony, involving Foreign Minister Choe Son Hui, as puzzling and even hypocritical in a country that suppresses superstitious activities – which is how the submarine christening appeared to many. “Everyone was surprised to see the female foreign minister come forward and break a liquor bottle by hitting it against the hull,” a resident from the northeastern city of Rason told RFA Korean on condition of anonymity for security reasons. “The authorities have been cracking down on the simple rituals of fishermen performing ancestral rites and pouring alcohol to ensure the safe navigation of boats, defining them as superstitious practices,” he said. In this North Korea’s Korean Central News Agency released photo on Sept. 8, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un claps after Foreign Minister Choe Son Hui smashed a bottle of champagne against the hull of a new submarine during a launching ceremony in North Korea. Credit: KCNA via Reuters North Korean fishermen have traditional ceremonies whenever they take a new boat out to sea or when they repair an old boat, and sometimes they involve elements of superstition that have been passed down over generations. Those rituals, which can involve a pig’s head and copious amounts of alcohol, are, like the submarine christening, meant only to wish for the safety of ships at sea, the resident said. Punishing ‘capitalist’ behavior Though anti-superstition laws have long been on the books they were not strictly enforced all the time, but the recent passing of a new “anti-capitalist” law caused authorities to be less tolerant of superstitious activities. The 2020 Anti-Reactionary Thought and Culture Act, is aimed at preserving the purity of North Korean socialist ideals by harshly punishing people for watching foreign media, speaking like a “South Korean,” wearing “capitalist” fashion, or even dancing like a “capitalist.” The law does not specifically mention superstitions and the fishermen are emulating their own ancestors rather than “capitalist” fishermen in the South, but authorities have interpreted their activity as “reactionary ideology” brought in from the outside. Fishermen have therefore been secretly holding these ceremonies under cover of night to avoid being punished. In this North Korea’s Korean Central News Agency released photo on Sept. 8, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un attends a launching ceremony for a new tactical nuclear attack submarine in North Korea. Credit: KCNA via Reuters “I couldn’t help but be surprised that a ceremony that the authorities say is a punishable superstitious act was held in front of Kim Jong Un,” the resident said, adding that the small ceremonies fall under Article 256, a different law that forbids fortune telling, divination, and exorcism as superstitious acts. According to that law, punishments can range from “up to a year” in a disciplinary labor facility to “a minimum of three to seven years” depending on how serious the act is. “After seeing the reports of the submarine launch ceremony, fishermen and other residents are saying that the authorities are two-faced, and they should no longer have to do their own ceremonies in secret,” the resident said. It was the first time that a ship christening was reported in state media, a resident of Rason’s surrounding North Hamgyong province told RFA on condition of anonymity to speak freely. “It is deeply contradictory for the authorities to tell residents not to believe in superstitions and not engage in superstitious behavior, but then to do something similar [themselves.]” he said. “People are mocking the authorities by asking, ‘Do [the authorities] believe in superstitions, too? Is it okay to do superstitious acts in front of Kim Jong Un?’” Translated by Claire Shinyoung Oh Lee. Edited by Eugene Whong and Malcolm Foster.

Organizers of rally to form Cambodian political party detained

Editor1 year ago05 mins

Six members of Cambodia’s opposition Candlelight Party, or CLP, remained in police custody after they were detained on Friday and Saturday for holding a rally in support of a new political party. Rights groups slammed the detention as the latest bid by the ruling Cambodian People’s Party, or CPP, to eliminate its political rivals. They say the CPP has used other tactics – including onerous bureaucracy, legal technicalities, and intimidation – to keep would-be competitors off of the country’s ballots and maintain its grip on power. Police arrested Banteay Meanchey province CLP leaders Sin Vatha, Tep Sambath Vathano, Long Lavi, Tuot Veasna, Chhum Sinath Van Siw and 17 others on Sept. 8 and 9 in connection with a rally they held to collect enough people’s fingerprints to register a new opposition party, former Banteay Meanchey Provincial CLP Secretary Suon Khemrin told RFA Khmer. Authorities detained the rally’s organizers despite having obtained authorization from the Ministry of Interior to form the new Panha Tumnerp – or Intellectual Modern – Party, said Suon Khemrin. The former CLP secretary, who was among those arrested, was released along with 16 others on the afternoon of Sept. 10, after more than 30 hours in custody, he said. Suon Khemrin said that while in detention, police asked him who was behind the new party, but he told them he had only had seen an Aug. 18 letter from the Ministry of Interior granting Im Sognet the right to form the Tumnerp Party and requiring him to collect enough fingerprints to register the party within 180 days, according to the country’s political party law. He told RFA that the six men who remain in detention were being held at the Banteay Meanchey Provincial Police Station “for further questioning.” “Before I was released, the police told me to sign a document that was noticeably vague in its wording,” he said. Attempts by RFA to contact Banteay Meanchey Provincial Police Chief Sithi Loh for comment on the arrests went unanswered. ‘Violation of political rights’ Seung Senkaruna, the spokesperson for local NGO the Cambodian Human Rights and Development Association, or ADHOC, told RFA that the arrests are a violation of citizens’ political rights. He said that the formation of a new party is a “legitimate political action,” and that authorities should facilitate such actions. “[The authorities] have been doing this to the opposition party and its members for some time now, but it only draws more criticism and can be seen as politically motivated,” he said. “It only proves that the oppositions’ accusation of persecution is real.” According to the Law on Political Parties, any Cambodian citizen who is aged 18 or older and is a permanent resident of the country has the right to form a political party simply by notifying the Ministry of Interior. The Ministry of Interior must reply in writing that it has received the notification within 15 days. The law states that in order to be valid, political parties must apply for registration with at least 4,000 members, depending on the province where the party is based. Translated by Sok Ry Sum. Edited by Joshua Lipes and Malcolm Foster.

Category: South Asia