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Category: South Asia

Manila dismisses China’s ‘gunboat’ claim

Editor09 mins

Updated Oct. 10, 2023, 06:20 a.m. ET. The Philippines’ military chief on Tuesday rejected a claim that its navy vessel was driven away from a disputed reef in the South China Sea by the Chinese coast guard, calling it “Beijing’s propaganda.” Early on Tuesday, the China Coast Guard said a Philippine Navy gunboat came into China’s “jurisdictional waters” near the Scarborough Shoal in the Spratly Islands. “On Oct. 10, a Philippine Navy gunboat intruded into the waters adjacent to China’s Huangyan Island, ignoring China’s repeated warnings,” Chinese Coast Guard spokesperson Gan Yu said in a statement, using the Chinese name for a shoal the Philippines calls Bajo de Masinloc. Gan said that China Coast Guard ships “took necessary measures, such as tracking and controlling the ship’s route, to drive away the Philippine vessel according to the law.” Beijing’s claim – which comes against a backdrop of deteriorating relations between the neighbors – was rejected by the Philippines’ top military commander, who denied such an incident had taken place. “That is just propaganda from Beijing … to show that they are doing something,” Gen. Romeo Brawner Jr. told RFA-affiliated news organization BenarNews on Tuesday. A Philippine navy boat was in the vicinity of Bajo de Masinloc, but it was carrying out a maritime patrol. “It was sailing and it just so happened that the China Coast Guard was there and we issued a challenge,” Brawner said. “Our ship continued with its mission. He added the boats were “far” away from each other. A China Coast Guard ship is seen from a Philippine fishing boat at the disputed Scarborough Shoal April 6, 2017. Credit: Reuters Both Beijing and Manila claim sovereignty over Scarborough Shoal, which China seized after a standoff with the Philippines in 2012 and has maintained control over since. The Chinese spokesperson accused the Philippines of violating China’s sovereignty over the shoal, adding: “We call on the Philippines to immediately stop its infringement.”  On Monday, the Chinese Foreign Ministry also warned Manila against “making provocations and creating troubles at sea,” saying “China has made serious démarches [diplomatic protests] to the Philippines on multiple occasions.”   The ministry was responding to a statement by the Philippines on Saturday that China’s “unfounded” claims in the South China Sea and Beijing’s actions there are “irresponsible.” ‘Stirring up trouble’ The latest incident marks a further deterioration in the relationship between the two neighbors. A Beijing-based think tank, the South China Sea Probing Initiative (SCSPI), accused the Philippines of “stirring up” the situation in the sea. This week, U.S. and Philippine warships are conducting a bilateral training exercise called Samasama (Together) 2023 in the waters off the Philippines. The exercise, joined by several other U.S. allies, is being seen as a testament of the strong bond between the two militaries. “Currently, the Philippines is at the vanguard of challenging China at sea, much more aggressive than any other party including the United States,” SCSPI said in a post on the social media platform X, formerly Twitter. “Wait and see,” it added in a thinly veiled threat, “The Scarborough Shoal Incident in 2012 is a wake-up call for both China and the Philippines.”  The 2012 standoff began on April 8, 2012, after the Philippine Navy attempted to arrest Chinese fishermen who it accused of illegal fishing in the waters near Scarborough Shoal but the attempt was blocked by Chinese maritime surveillance ships. Naval vessels from both sides were deployed in the standoff that lasted more than two months. The Philippines pulled its two vessels out on June 15, 2012, but China kept its ships at the shoal. Scarborough Shoal has since become a hot spot and a trigger point between China and the Philippines in the contested South China Sea. Most recently, in late September, the Philippines said China had installed a 300-meter (984-foot) floating barrier to block Philippine fishermen from accessing the waters around the shoal.  The Philippine coast guard carried out a “special operation” to cut the barrier and remove its anchor. An aerial view shows the BRP Sierra Madre on the contested Second Thomas Shoal, locally known as Ayungin, in the South China Sea, March 9, 2023. Credit: Reuters The risk of confrontation has also risen in recent days over another disputed atoll in the South China Sea, internationally known as the Second Thomas Shoal. The Philippines calls it Ayungin Shoal, where it maintains an outpost with less than a dozen marines, stationed on a rusty WWII landing craft, the BRP Sierra Madre.  Manila accuses China of regularly blocking its resupply missions to the troops on the Sierra Madre. It said on Aug. 6, 2023, Chinese Coast Guard ships fired a water cannon at one of the Philippine ships resupplying the outpost. China calls it Ren’ai Jiao and maintains that the atoll lies within its jurisdiction. Six parties – China, the Philippines, Brunei, Malaysia, Vietnam, and Taiwan – claim parts of the resource-rich South China Sea together with the islands inside but Beijing’s claim is by far the most extensive, occupying nearly 90% of the sea. An international tribunal in 2016 ruled that China’s claims in the South China Sea were illegal and invalid, but Beijing refused to accept the ruling. Edited by Mike Firn and Elaine Chan. BenarNews is an RFA-affiliated online news organization. Updated to include comment from Philippine military commander Gen. Romeo Brawner Jr.

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‘Eliticide’ as China jails Uyghur intellectuals to erase culture

Editor011 mins

Over a fortnight, a Uyghur folklorist missing since 2017 was revealed to be serving a life prison for “separatism,” while another Uyghur scholar who had vanished into Chinese custody years earlier appeared on shortlists and oddsmakers picks for the 2023 Nobel Peace Prize. The cases of ethnographer Rahile Dawut, whose life conviction in December 2018 was uncovered by a U.S. NGO only last month, and economist Ilham Tohti, put away for life on similar charges in 2014, share key similarities that highlight the personal and family tragedies behind China’s relentless assimilation policies in the northwestern Xinjiang region. Both Dawut, who was born in 1966, and the 53-year-old Tohti built their academic careers inside the Chinese system, teaching at prestigious universities and releasing their work through major state publishing houses. The two scholars collaborated with and were respected as authorities by their Chinese and international peers. Uyghur professor Rahile Dawut talks with a man in northwestern China’s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in an undated photo. Photo courtesy of Akide Polat/Freemymom.org Dawut created and directed the Xinjiang University ‘s Minorities Folklore Research Center and wrote dozens of articles in international journals and a number of books on the region and its culture. An economist at the Central University for Nationalities in Beijing, Tohti ran the Uyghur Online website, set up in 2006, which drew attention to the discrimination facing Uyghurs under Beijing’s rule over Xinjiang and its increasingly restrictive religious and language policies. The families of Dawut and Tohti share the common fate of not having heard anything from their jailed loved once since 2017, the year that China’s harsh crackdown in Xinjiang went into overdrive, with the establishment of a network of internment camps for Uyghurs, Kazakhs and other Turkic minorities. “My first reaction was that I couldn’t believe it, I couldn’t believe it at all,” Dawut’s U.S.-based daughter, Akide Polat, told Radio Free Asia last month. “None of my mother’s work, nor the way she went about it, nor anything in her personal life had anything to do with ‘endangering state security,’” she said of the charges on which her mother was convicted. ‘No intellectual resistance’ The Dui Hua Foundation, which revealed Dawut’s life sentence, noted estimates of as many as several hundred Uyghur intellectuals who have been detained, arrested, and imprisoned since 2016. RFA Uyghur has documented scores of disappearances and detentions of Uyghur writers, academics, artists and musicians in recent years. “What we’ve seen inside the Uyghur region of China is what is often termed ‘eliticide,’” said Sean Roberts, a Central Asia expert at The George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs in Washington, D.C. “There’s a particular focus on the intellectual elites, many of whom were working at state institutions, have been loyal to the state, did not did not present any sort of real resistance. Their only crime was basically maintaining the idea of a Uyghur nation and identity,” he told RFA Uyghur. Akida Polat holds a photo of her mother, imprisoned Uyghur folklore expert Rahile Duwat. Credit: X/@Kuzzat_Altay Roberts said eliticide “is often identified as occurring at the beginning of a genocide, where there’s an attempt to get rid of the entire political, economic and intellectual elite to ensure that there is no intellectual resistance to the erasure of a people and their identity.” In early 2021, after years of cumulative reports on the internment camp system in Xinjiang, the United Nations, the United States, and the legislatures of several European countries, officially branded the treatment of Uyghurs as genocide or crimes against humanity.  China has angrily rejected the genocide charges, arguing that the “reeducation camps” were a necessary tool to fight religious extremism and terrorism, in reaction to sporadic terrorist attacks that Uyghurs say are fueled by years of government oppression. Beijing has also waged an information counterattack, with a global media influence campaign that spreads Chinese state media content to countries in Asia and beyond, invites diplomats and journalists from China-friendly countries on staged tours of Xinjiang and promotes pro-China social media influencers.   Awareness-raising on genocide Last month, the pushback saw Chinese diplomats pressuring fellow United Nations member states not to attend a panel on human rights abuses in Xinjiang sponsored by a think tank and two rights groups on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly in New York. Tohti, who has been nominated for the Norwegian Nobel Committee’s Peace Prize since 2020, was listed by the U.S. news outlet Time as one of top three favorites to win the medal this year, following Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and jailed Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny. Tohti was given higher odds on many of London’s famed betting sites of winning the prize than the recipient, jailed Iranian activist Narges Mohammadi. “There are many human rights issues around the world that are equally as important as the suffering that the Uyghurs are going through, but the international status and power of the perpetrators of these human rights abuses aren’t considered equal,” said Jewher Ilham, Tohti’s daughter. “The Chinese government is known to have a much more powerful political and economic influence than the Iranian government in the western world,” she told RFA Uyghur. Jewher Ilham holds a photo of her father, Ilham Tohti, during the Sakharov Prize ceremony at the European Parliament, in Strasbourg, France, Dec. 18, 2019. Credit: AP Photo It is not clear that that China would be moved by a Nobel Prize to release Tohti or moderate policies in Xinjiang, where Communist Party chief Xi Jinping appears to be doubling down on draconian security measures and policies to suppress Uyghur culture. Beijing lashed out at the Nobel Committee and imposed trade sanctions on Norway after the Nobel 2010 went to Chinese dissident writer Liu Xiaobo. With Liu in jail, the Chinese capital Beijing won the right in 2015 to host the Winter Olympics, and Beijing largely shrugged off the global outcry when in 2017, Liu became the first Nobel laureate to die in jail since German journalist and Nazi opponent…

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Anti-junta teachers still 130,000-strong

Editor08 mins

More than 130,000 teachers remain a part of Myanmar’s Civil Disobedience Movement, or CDM, made up of government employees who have walked off the job to protest the military’s February 2021 coup d’etat, the country’s shadow government said Thursday. Speaking at an event to mark World Teachers’ Day, National Unity Government Minister of Health and Education Zaw Wei Soe said that CDM teachers have continued to make significant contributions to the resistance, despite a growing number of hardships since the movement boasted more than 200,000 teachers in the days immediately following the takeover. “For almost three years, these teachers have been participating in the CDM as part of the Spring Revolution without taking a single penny of salary,” he said. “There are still more than 130,000 CDM teachers who have helped to limit the effectiveness of the terrorist military regime.” While some teachers left the CDM due to social and economic pressures, others cited safety concerns as they saw the junta increasingly arrest, jail and kill their colleagues. In some cases, teachers said they did not receive as much support from the NUG and anti-junta groups as they expected. By some estimates, thousands of teachers left the CDM when schools reopened for the year in June 2022 and 2023. In the years since the coup, the National Unity Government, or NUG – made up of former civilian leaders and anti-junta activists – has launched more than 70 classes online and over 5,000 basic education schools, NUG Acting President Duwa Lashi La said at the event, despite the military’s “deliberate targeting of the education sector.” “[The junta] has been committing inhuman crimes such as launching indiscriminate airstrikes and arson attacks on schools or and arresting, torturing and killing their teachers,” he said. The junta has said that teachers, parents, and students who attend NUG schools, as well as those who provide financial support, face “serious action.” Hundreds of thousands of families have pulled their children out of state-run schools since the military seized power in favor of “self-help” schools set up by the CDM, the NUG and anti-junta People’s Defense Force, or PDF, paramilitary groups. Attacks on self-help schools Amid an ongoing junta offensive against the PDF and ethnic rebel groups in Myanmar’s remote border regions, attacks on villages have led to injuries and even deaths at self-help schools. Even when the schools don’t face the threat of conflict, teachers and students are often forced to attend classes in makeshift conditions and lack access to critical education resources. The NUG’s message on World Teachers’ Day stood in stark contrast to that of junta chief Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing, who urged Myanmar’s youth to obtain an education “in order to establish a peaceful future society” and called for more “good teachers to produce such youths.”  There is a long tradition of teachers and students assuming an outsized role in the struggle against dictatorship in Myanmar. In 1988, under the rule of strongman General Ne Win, a student-led anti-dictatorship movement boiled into a nationwide uprising following the regime’s announcement banning 25-, 35- and 75-kyat bills from circulation and later the killing of a university student by police. The nationwide uprising, which peaked on Aug. 8 of that year, became a historic milestone that united Myanmar’s various ethnic groups, socioeconomic classes, and other communities against the then-ruling junta. CDM couple detained In the latest example of persecution that CDM participants face, RFA learned that junta authorities in the northern Sagaing region arrested a married couple of public servants. Myanmar authorities have arrested Aung San Win and his wife, Myo Su Thet, government employees who joined the Civil Disobedience Movement. Credit: Facebook/Myo Su Thet On Sept. 30, junta troops in Sagaing city’s Sein Kone ward arrested Aung San Win, 37, and his wife Myo Su Thet, 35, who are junior engineers for Sagaing’s Road Department, residents told RFA. Four days later, authorities had their home sealed off. “Maybe they were arrested because the junta wanted their family member, or they joined the CDM,” said one resident who spoke on condition of anonymity, citing fear of reprisal. “This morning, the house was sealed off.” While the reason for their arrest was not immediately clear, pro-junta channels on social media platform Telegram claimed that they had “contacted the PDF,” which the regime has labeled a terrorist group. The couple are currently being held at the Sagaing police station, residents said. Calls by RFA to Sai Naing Naing Kyaw, the junta’s spokesperson for Sagaing region, seeking more information on the arrest went unanswered Thursday. According to Thailand’s Association for the Assistance of Political Prisoners (Burma), nearly 20,000 people arrested since the coup remain behind bars for their political activities. Translated by Htin Aung Kyaw. Edited by Joshua Lipes and Malcolm Foster.

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Myanmar guerrilla group says it shot junta conspirator in Yangon

Editor04 mins

A man accused of working with Myanmar’s ruling junta has been shot in the head in central Yangon, a local guerilla group said. The Urban Owls released a statement shortly after Monday’s shooting claiming responsibility for the attack, saying that businessman Nyan Lwin Aung was targeted for his close relationships with military leaders.  They said the man accompanied junta leader Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing on his trip to Russia last year and met with Russian Defense Ministry officials. Nyan Lwin Aung also bought weapons for the junta, the group claimed. He was shot in the head at an intersection in Latha township, residents told Radio Free Asia on Tuesday. “It happened at around 10 p.m. last night,” said one local, asking to be kept anonymous for fear of reprisals.  “He was sent to the Yangon General Hospital. A large number of junta troops arrived with military vans and investigated 17th to 19th Street after the shooting incident.” Police and soldiers began searching civilians along the busy Shwedagon Pagoda Road after the shooting, the local said. Another Latha resident said Nyan Lwin Aung was shot at close range in his left temple and was sent to Yangon General Hospital. The hospital’s emergency department confirmed to RFA Burmese that Nyan Lwin Aung arrived at the hospital Monday night with a serious wound. One surgeon said he was in a critical condition and being treated in the intensive care unit.  Yangon division’s junta spokesperson and regional attorney general Htay Aung had not responded to RFA at the time of publication.  Monday’s statement by the Urban Owls added that Nyan Lwin Aung had also worked for the Ministry of the Interior, installing CCTV facial recognition cameras.  It said he had a company in Myanmar with business subsidiaries in Thailand, Russia, China, and the United Arab Emirates under the name North Gate Engineering and Technology. RFA has yet to confirm the group’s claims. When a reporter called North Gate’s Yangon office an employee said he was not authorized to comment. The guerilla group has carried out a number of killings, claiming responsibility for the death of Ye Khine, security chief of the Yangon International Airport, as well as Minn Tayzar Nyunt Tin, a junta-affiliated lawyer accused of money laundering. Translated by RFA Burmese. Edited by Mike Firn.

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Chinese police harass family of Washington DC student activist

Editor016 mins

An international student in the U.S. capital has been harassed by China’s state security police for pro-democracy activism on American soil, with his loved ones back in China hauled in by police for questioning and told to get him in line, Radio Free Asia has learned. Zhang Jinrui, a law student at Washington’s Georgetown University, said his family in China received an unexpected visit in June from state security police, who interrogated his father about Zhang’s level of patriotism and questioned him about his activities in the United States. “The state security police knocked on our door and took my father away for lengthy questioning,” Zhang told Radio Free Asia in a recent interview. “[They asked him] ‘Does this child of yours take part in pro-democracy activities? Do they usually love their country and the [ruling Chinese Communist] Party?’” “If not, you have to teach him to love his country and the party better,” the police said. “It’s not OK that he’s doing this, and it won’t do any good.” Zhang’s experience comes amid growing concern over Beijing’s “long-arm” law enforcement targeting overseas activists and students, who had expected to enjoy greater freedom of speech and association while living or studying in a democratic country. Zhang said the questioning of his father came after he took part in protests in support of the “white paper” protest movement in November 2022, and against Beijing’s hosting of the Winter Olympics in February. There are growing concerns over Beijing’s “long-arm” law enforcement targeting overseas activists and students. Here, “Viola,” a New York University graduate student, delivers a speech during a gathering to mark the third anniversary of the death of Chinese whistleblower Li Wenliang in New York on Feb. 5, 2023. Credit: Gemunu Amarasinghe/RFA Yet he wasn’t contacted at the time by police, who sometimes contact overseas Chinese nationals via social media platforms to get their message across.  “On the evening of June 29, I suddenly received a WeChat message from my sister saying ‘Contact me urgently, something happened,’” Zhang said. “The people from the police station had called my sister and asked about her [relative] in Washington, wanting to know if they took part in the Torch on the Potomac group, saying I was a key member.” Fear and self-censorship Torch on the Potomac was set up by students at the George Washington University in April, to provide a safe space for dissident activities by Chinese students. But Zhang was nonplussed by the accusation, saying that the group has yet to organize any activities, and that police have also been harassing the families of Chinese students who haven’t taken part in any activism at all. Calls to the Wusan police station, which is close to Zhang’s family home in the northeastern Chinese city of Shenyang, rang unanswered during office hours on Sept. 19. Several other Chinese students declined to be interviewed when contacted by Radio Free Asia. Sarah McLaughlin, senior scholar at The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, said speaking to the foreign media could bring down further trouble on the heads of students who may already have seen their families hauled in for questioning. “I know that that’s something that international students have run into before,” she said. “They’ve gotten in trouble when they returned home for things they’ve said online while in the United States.” McLaughlin said the harassment of their families in China will have a chilling effect on students’ speech, even overseas. “There are definitely some real fears among these students, and there’s definitely self censorship,” she said. Classroom informants And the police aren’t the only source of such anxiety – there is also the risk of being reported by fellow students from China, who are encouraged via the Chinese Students and Scholars Associations to keep an eye on each other. A Georgetown University faculty member who asked to remain anonymous said the problem is becoming more and more serious, with Chinese students feeling unable to speak freely in class, for fear of being informed on by their Chinese classmates. Georgetown University student Zhang Jinrui says he was harassed by members of the Georgetown branch of the Chinese Students and Scholars Association as he was distributing flyers. Credit: Gemunu Amarasinghe/RFA Last year, when students at George Washington University put up posters on campus opposing China’s hosting of the 2023 Winter Olympics, the Chinese Embassy sent members of the campus branch of the Chinese Students and Scholars Association to tear them down again and put up posters denouncing their actions. “They even got in touch with the school, saying that the Chinese students who support democracy and oppose zero-COVID are racist,” Zhang said. “That’s why they set up the Torch on the Potomac, because a lot of their activities weren’t getting the support of the school.” George Washington University President Mark Wrighton admitted in a Feb. 8 statement that the removal of the posters was a mistake, and the university administration should have waited until they better understood the situation before acting. “We began to receive a number of concerns through official university reporting channels that cited bias and racism against the Chinese community,” Wrighton said. “I also received an email directly from a student who expressed concerns.” “I have since learned from our university’s scholars that the posters were designed by a Chinese-Australian artist, Badiucao, and they are a critique of China’s policies,” he said. “Upon full understanding, I do not view these posters as racist; they are political statements.” Neither Georgetown University nor George Washington University had responded to requests for comment on the renewed harassment of Chinese students in the United States by Sept. 19. A wall with posters at Georgetown University in Washington. Torch on the Potomac was set up by students at the George Washington University in April, to provide a safe space for dissident activities by Chinese students. Credit: Gemunu Amarasinghe/RFA Close contact with embassies Zhang said he has also been personally harassed by members of the Georgetown branch of the…

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Zoned out: China-Myanmar Economic Corridor still going nowhere

Editor014 mins

As Myanmar’s economy continues to skid, with soaring inflation, a depreciating kyat, and flat revenue, junta leader Min Aung Hlaing seems to be looking for a few Chinese-backed marquee projects to kickstart growth, and ensure Beijing’s long-term commitment to the State Administrative Council, as the regime is formally known.   In August Min Aung Hlaing called for the completion of the Kyaukphyu special economic zone (SEZ) and container port, while engineering work is starting on the 810-km railway connecting Kyaukphyu with Muse, a city on the Myanmar-China border.  The project in western Myanmar has evolved and absorbed different components since a 2011 memorandum of understanding for the Kunming-Kyaukphyu railway led eventually to a set of projects under China’s ambitious $1 trillion Belt and Road Initiative. But as the BRI prepares to celebrate its tenth anniversary at a summit in Beijing in October, China, unhappy with the slow pace of CMEC implementation, looks unlikely to extend an invitation to Min Aung Hlaing, denying him the recognition that he covets. Oil tanks seen on Maday island outside Kyaukphyu, Myanmar, are seen May 17, 2017. Credit: Soe Zeya Tun/Reuters Chinese projects in Myanmar were facing trouble before Min Aung Hlaing overthrew the country’s elected government on Feb. 1, 2021. Now they are beset by unrest, power shortages and transport woes.  Kyaukphyu began as a small port for offshore and imported oil, as well as being the land terminus for the Shwe gas field. The 51-49 joint venture between China National Petroleum Company and the Ministry of Oil and Gas Enterprises constructed a pier and 12 tanks, which commenced operations in 2013.  The US$2.5 billion 750 km oil pipeline and 770 km gas pipeline to Kunming became fully operational in 2017. That year, PetroChina opened up a refinery in Kunming that was able to handle 7% of China’s total refining needs.  These pipelines were China’s strategic priority, but Beijing had other goals for linking landlocked southwestern China to the Indian Ocean. China saw the project as a way to address what then Chinese President Hu Jintao described in 2003 as the “Malacca dilemma” of vulnerability to a naval blockade of the Southeast Asian waterway which carries two-thirds of China’s energy imports and trade flows. In 2018, the two sides established the China-Myanmar Economic Corridor (CMEC) to jumpstart the projects as part of the BRI, the signature project of Hu’s successor Xi Jinping. Beijing also saw as supporting Myanmar’s National Ceasefire Agreement signed by some ethnic armies in 2015 to end years of hostilities with the government. All existing Myanmar projects were folded into the CMEC, and still there was little movement. Two of the first MOUs were a feasibility study for the first phase of the railway project and an environmental and sustainability impact study of Kyaukphyu. Ambitious projections A December 2015 tender between the government of reformist military leader Thein Sein and a consortium of Chinese corporations led by the state controlled investment company, CITIC, established the Kyaukphyu SEZ and deepwater port. The $7.3 billion project was 85% owned by the Chinese consortium. The phased project included the 1,736 hectare Kyaukphyu SEZ followed by two deep water container ports on Maday and Ramree islands. At capacity, 270 and 237 hectares ports would be able to berth 10 ships at once and handle 4.9 million containers annually.  There were wild promises by CITIC, including projections of adding $10 billion to GDP annually and the creation of 100,000 new jobs. But little happened.  And there was already pushback from the elected National League of Democracy government led by Aung San Suu Kyi . Fearful of a scenario that played out when Sri Lanka became heavily indebted to China, in 2018, the Suu kyi administration renegotiated the agreement, lowering China’s stake to 70% as well as decreasing the overall debt for the project. But the ethnic cleansing and violence in Rakhine state, the location of the port facility, kept everything at a standstill.   Xi Jinping’s January 2020 visit to Myanmar took advantage of Aung San Suu Kyi’s diplomatic isolation following the forced expulsion of Rohingya Muslims in 2017 that led to UN genocide charges. More than 30 agreements were signed, many of which related to Kyaukphyu and its rail links.  Days before the February 2021 coup, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi met with Suu Kyi to push for the quick implementation of CMEC projects, including Kyaukphyu. Myanmar’s State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi meets with China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi in Naypyidaw, Jan. 11, 2021. Credit: Thar Byaw/Myanmar State Counsellor Office/AFP Seven months after the military seized power, site work began on the 1,740 hectare site. But there were immediate protests from the 20,000 people who were being displaced and harbored mistrust over promised compensation. Unrest was also fueled by civil disobedience against the coup, and junta crackdowns and arrests of local officials and activists.   Another impediment for the project is the regional shortage of electricity. In 2019, a Hong Kong based firm, VPower, which is partially owned by CITIC, won an emergency tender to provide electricity in Myanmar. By 2021, it had nine different power projects around the country, including three in Kyaukphyu.  Yet, the firm shut down the 200mw Kyaukphyu II project in mid-2021, despite it being a 60-month contract. By 2022, VPower had shut down the Kyaukphyu I  plant. Both were dismantled. The firm cited a number of factors in the closing of the plants, including irregular supply of LNG, currency controls and other issues related to the post-coup investment climate. Left unsaid was the government’s inability to pay for the amount of electricity that it contracted for and to pay the sum in U.S. dollars.  That left only one power plant in Kyaukphyu, a 135mw gas-fired plant, a 2020 joint venture between VPower, CNTIC, and Myanmar’s Supreme Group. It was still in operation in early 2023, though there are reports that it has recently closed. Underwriting the junta Without power, little is progressing. In March 2023, a Chinese company signed a MOU…

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Cambodian-American lawyer transferred to prison in capital

Editor06 mins

Cambodian authorities have transferred an outspoken Cambodian-American lawyer and human rights defender from a remote jail to the country’s largest prison on the outskirts of the capital Phnom Penh, a Prison Department official said Friday.  Theary Seng, a 52-year-old American citizen, has been serving a six-year sentence in Preah Vihear Prison, in the north, since June 2022, when she was convicted treason, stemming from her failed efforts in 2019 to bring about the return to Cambodia of political opposition leader Sam Rainsy. The Ministry of Interior transferred her to Prey Sar II Prison, which houses detained women, in the capital on Sept. 23, said Prison Department spokesman Nuth Savna. “There is no reason for the transfer,” he told Radio Free Asia. “It was the decision of the ministry’s leadership.”  Theary Seng’s lawyer and supporting NGOs requested her transfer because her appeal case is being tried in the capital. Sam Chamroeun, her attorney, said the transfer will enable Theary Seng to work with her  defense team and to meet with her family in Phnom Penh.  Theary Seng was one of many casualties of former Prime Minister Hun Sen’s government ahead of a July 23 general election that the ruling Cambodian People’s Party won in a landslide. But Western governments and opposition activists deemed it a sham because officials prevented the main opposition Candlelight Party from participating on a technicality. In the months leading up to the election, Hun Sen used a combination of legal action, threats, harassment and arrests to target the political opposition, activists, independent media and civil society groups.   People wait at an entrance to Prey Sar Prison on the outskirts of Phnom Penh, Cambodia, in an undated file photo. Credit: RFA/Uon Chhin Though Sam Chamroeun filed an appeal against the guilty verdict handed down by a court in the Phnom Penh verdict, the Appeals Court has not yet scheduled a hearing. He said that he will meet his client soon to discuss further steps. “I received two statements from the Prison Department to meet with Theary Seng, so there will be no obstacle for a meeting between client and lawyer because she is nearby,” he said. Hunger strike After her arrest, authorities sent the activist from Phnom Penh Prison to Preah Vihear on June 15 to ensure public security and order, according to the Prison Department.  While in Preah Vihear Prison, Theary Seng went on a 10-day hunger strike five days after the U.N. Working Group on Arbitrary Detention issued a judgment calling her detention “arbitrary, politically motivated, and in violation of international law.” Jared Genser, Theary Seng’s pro bono international human rights lawyer, told RFA on Wednesday that he will use the working group’s report to build momentum for her case.  He will also push for the United States to designate her case as “wrongfully detained” under the Levinson Act, a 2020 law that would allow sanctions to be imposed on individuals responsible for holding U.S. nationals hostage. Humanitarian groups said that the transfer was meant to politically persecute her since her case is being handled by the Phnom Penh court.  Soeung Sengkaruna, a spokesman for the rights group Adhoc, urged Cambodia’s judiciary to speed up Theary Seng’s appeal process so she can receive justice because she did not commit a crime.   “We haven’t seen the new government improve freedom spaces yet,” he said, referring to the government of Prime Minister Hun Manet, Hun Sen’s son who came to power following the July election, won by the ruling Cambodian People’s Party in a landslide.  “We will continue to monitor the situation and hope that Theary Seng’s case is a start for resuming freedom and political space,” Soeung Sengkaruna said, referring to the government’s illiberal rule and rights violations.  Translated by Yun Samean for RFA Khmer. Edited by Roseanne Gerin and Malcolm Foster.

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Short changed: Can China pay the bills?

Editor09 mins

Amid reports and rumors of starving zoo animals and retirees not being paid their pensions, the chair of financially distressed China Evergrande Group, the world’s most indebted property developer, is now under “residential surveillance.” Call it house arrest – and as the Chinese property sector loses its mojo some 42,000 local governments are looking for money to pay off creditors. Evergrande chairman Hui Ka Yan, or Xu Jiayin, is under 24-hour police supervision and can neither leave his home nor receive guests without permission. He was once the richest man in China. In 2017, Hui Ka Yan had a net worth of US$42.5 billion, surpassing Alibaba founder Jack Ma and Tencent founder Pony Ma. Much of China’s prosperity – like Hui’s – probably now begs a question mark, and it’s not just the private property giants like Evergrande; it’s the tens of thousands of local governments that have built out and “modernized” China on what may be the speculative property bubble of all time. The court is out on the extent to which real estate accounts for China’s GDP – 25% to 30% by most reckonings – but the issue, in a new era of massive oversupply and low demand, is where the new equilibrium will settle.   Says Andrew Collier, managing director of Orient Capital Research, “China has to reduce the size of the property industry by about one-third, which is going to cause a lot of pain for homeowners, local governments and some banks.” Some analysts might describe that as an optimistic assessment. ‘Too big to resolve’ George Magnus, Research Associate at the China Center, Oxford University says that debt is everywhere in the Chinese system, and the extent of it is difficult, if not impossible to evaluate. “Debts are lurking in public-private partnership projects – [there are] loans that are off balance sheet or off the books completely, and other local government fund raising schemes.” Anne Stevenson-Yang, founder and research director of J Capital Research describes it as “a very inexact science,” referring to the problem of ascertaining the depth of China’s countrywide debt. “A government may write a contract with a company to get a loan of, say, 100 million yuan,” Stevenson-Yang says, adding that it might be presented “as a land sale.” “There’s an understanding that the land will be turned back once the money is repaid, but that understanding may not be written down.” Adds Stevenson-Yang, “I think the problem is just too big to resolve.” An accurate measure of off-the-books debt would be a tall order, says Dexter Roberts, director of China affairs at the Mansfield Center at the University of Montana and a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council. “What we do know is that it is very large and growing,” Roberts says.   “Beijing does seem determined to avoid the moral hazard of bailing out local governments. The trouble with that is the indebtedness of local governments has become so severe that it is spilling over and affecting many regular Chinese as well, as is true with elderly who are seeing their pension payments delayed or civil servants who aren’t getting paid on time.” Elderly women sit at a park in downtown Shanghai March 16, 2012. Credit: Reuters   In short, the debt that’s weighing down the former Chinese growth juggernaut has to settle somewhere and it will be likely to fall on the heads of those least likely to be able to afford it. “The people of China,” says Stevenson-Yang. She adds, speaking on the question of how Beijing might approach the problem: “I have no idea what their plan is other than to hide head in sand. I actually think they are bureaucratically stuck.” Economist Michael Pettis commented in a tweet thread, on the social media platform now known as X, that it would probably be best if Beijing provides only temporary relief while forcing local governments to resolve the debt themselves.” The “extremely difficult bind” local governments found themselves in, with dwindling revenue that crimps ability to repay debts, was due to a confluence of factors, says Roberts.  “The pandemic lockdowns plus crackdown on the overleveraged property sector which was probably necessary but has been so damaging to the overall economy, plus the drop in incomes and the ability to spend brought on by the overall economic hard times.” Oxford’s Magnus says, “The central government has seemingly started sending inspectors in to get a proper picture of local government debt, and there is talk from finance pros and some policy people about debt swaps, under which expensive local government debt would be swapped for cheaper central government bonds. “This would, at best, buy a bit of time, but it’s just replacing debt with debt and doesn’t really solve the problem.” The Country Garden One World City project under construction is seen on the outskirts of Beijing, Thursday, Aug. 17, 2023. Credit: AP In the meantime, China’s private property giants – Evergrande, Country Garden and Vanke, among others, continue to reel in a market with no takers. Local governments that have indebted themselves on the basis of property assets that are now overvalued and will not be bailed out from on high are in a bind. “Emigrate,” said J Capital Research’s Stevenson-Yang when asked what she might do if she was running an indebted local government in China. Edited by Mike Firn and Elaine Chan.

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Soaring palm oil prices prompt long lines in Myanmar

Editor07 mins

The price of edible palm oil in Myanmar has soared in recent months to more than five times what it was prior to the February 2021 military coup, leading to long lines around the country. A staple commodity in Myanmar, where it is used to cook, the cost of palm oil is a barometer for inflation and the health of the wider economy, which has become progressively worse since the takeover amid fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic, international sanctions and junta mismanagement. In 2020, before the coup, the price of a viss (3.6 pounds) of palm oil was just over 1,800 kyats (US$0.85), but in recent months has hovered north of 10,000 kyats (US$4.75), forcing consumers to curb their purchasing.  Responding to the increase, the junta recently ordered major palm oil wholesalers to sell their product at around 4,200 kyats (US$2) per viss per household. The central bank’s official exchange rate for the kyat is 2,100 kyats per U.S. dollar, which has been in force since April last year, but on the external market, one U.S. dollar trades for between 3,300 and 3,500 kyats, sources tell RFA Burmese. May Thu, from Yangon’s Insein township, told RFA she can no longer buy the amount of palm oil she needs from retail stores and now must join thousands of others standing in long lines around the country to buy it at wholesale rates. “Housewives have to go and stand in line whether they are busy or not because they have no oil to cook with,” she said. “That’s why they have no choice but to wait in line to buy it.” May Thu said wholesalers only sell the oil on certain days and that she has to “rush to get a token and wait in line whenever they announce the sale.” ‘Shoving one another under the burning sun’ A resident of Mandalay who, like others RFA interviewed for this report, declined to be named citing security concerns, said that there are days when she has to return home empty-handed after standing in line for hours to buy oil. “We have to wait in line, shoving one another under the burning sun … about every other day,” she said. “It’s like that all over Mandalay. Some people don’t get to buy the oil. About 300 people line up for only 150 bottles worth.” A housewife in Yangon told RFA that there are always people who suffer from overheating and faint while standing in line in the extremely hot weather. “We want to be able to buy it at 4800 kyats per viss – the same price the junta sells at – from retail shops in our neighborhood,” she said.  “As only the lower class uses palm oil, that’s who lines up for it,” she said. “There are often arguments with people swearing at one another. It’s just another way our lives have been uprooted these past two and a half years [since the coup].” ‘Get arrested or don’t sell’ Wholesalers said the cost increase and the junta’s order to sell at reduced prices has put them in a bind. “The situation is such that we either sell at a higher price and get arrested or we don’t sell at all,” said one businessman. “That’s why many oil merchants have stopped selling, leading to a shortage of palm oil. The market economy mechanism is broken.” Another businessman suggested that the junta had ordered wholesalers to sell for reduced prices to generate lines as part of a “show” for the global community. “Are they trying to make a scene that appears as if they are providing enough to the people when international visitors come?” he wondered. “No other country has this type of situation – only in Myanmar do people have to wait in line to buy palm oil.” In 2022, Myanmar imported a monthly average of around 40,000 tons of palm oil, with the maximum in July at 58,600 tons and the minimum in May at 25,000 tons. Domestic oil production in Myanmar is insufficient, and two-thirds of palm oil consumed in the country is imported from abroad. Amid the drop in value of the kyat since the military takeover, Myanmar has had to purchase foreign imports at higher prices and is experiencing various shortages. Translated by Myo Min Aung. Edited by Joshua Lipes and Malcolm Foster.

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Authorities arrest Tibetan man twice for possessing Dalai Lama photo

Editor04 mins

Chinese authorities have arrested a Tibetan man for a second time for being in possession of a photo of the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, sources with knowledge of the situation said.  Possessing photos of the Dalai Lama, who has resided in northern India since 1959, is considered an act of separatism and has been a punishable offense in Tibetan-populated areas of China for decades. Tibetan sources recently told RFA that authorities arrested Tsultrim, a Tibetan from Tsaruma township in Ngaba’s Kyungchu county, in February 2023 after they discovered pictures of the 14th Dalai Lama on his mobile phone.  He was detained until April, they said, when he was sentenced to two years in prison by the People’s Court of Ngaba, a Tibetan region in southwestern China’s Sichuan province, also known as Aba in Chinese. Chinese authorities maintain a tight grip on Tibet, restricting Tibetans’ political activities and peaceful expression of cultural and religious identity. Tibetans frequently complain of discrimination and human rights abuses by authorities and policies they say are aimed at eradicating their national and cultural identity. Authorities in China maintain a tight lockdown on the flow of information in and out of the country’s Tibetan regions, and it can often take weeks to learn of arrests and other incidents through the exile community. Tsultrim, whose age is unknown, is serving his sentence in Yaknga Prison, and none of his family and friends are allowed to see him, said a Tibetan who lives in exile.  After graduating from Northwestern Minzu University in 2016, Tsultrim worked as a self-employed businessman, said the source who declined to be named so he could speak freely.  “He has always been an intelligent young Tibetan and has advocated for preservation of the Tibetan language,” the source said. Prior to this incident, Chinese authorities summoned and interrogated Tsultrim in July 2022 for sharing a picture of the 14th Dalai Lama on social media and saving the photo on his mobile phone, said a Tibetan from inside the western region.  Authorities examined his phone and detained him for two months until September when he was released, said the source who also declined to be named. “However, during his detention, he was beaten and had gone through such a tough time that he wished death upon himself,” the source told RFA.   In May, authorities also sentenced two Tibetan monks in Sershul county, or Shiqu in Chinese, on separatism charges for possessing photos of the Dalai Lama on their phones, giving one three years and six months in jail, and the other three years, RFA reported earlier. Translated by Tenzin Dickyi for RFA Tibetan. Edited by Roseanne Gerin and Joshua Lipes.

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Investigative Journalism Reportika © March 2022 by Ij-Reportika is licensed under CC BY 4.0