South Asia Archives - Page 53 of 94 - Investigative Journalism Reportika

U.S. sanctions two people, six entities for supplying Myanmar with jet fuel

Editor2 years ago010 mins

The United States Treasury Department has announced additional sanctions on Myanmar to prevent supplies of jet fuel from reaching the military in response to airstrikes on populated areas and other atrocities. The sanctions came just days before Myanmar celebrated its 78th Armed Forces Day on Monday. The announcement on Friday targeted two individuals, Tun Min Latt and his wife Win Min Soe, and six companies including, Asia Sun Trading Co. Ltd., which purchased jet fuel for the junta’s air force; Cargo Link Petroleum Logistics Co. Ltd., which transports jet fuel to military bases; and Asia Sun Group, the “key operator in the jet fuel supply chain.” The statement said that since the Feb. 1, 2021 coup that overthrew the country’s democratically elected government, the junta continually targeted the people of Myanmar with atrocities and violence, including airstrikes in late 2022 in Let Yet Kone village in central Myanmar that hit a school with children and teachers inside, and another in Kachin state that targeted a music concert and killed 80 people. According to a March 3 report by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, junta-led airstrikes more than doubled from 125 in 2021 to 301 in 2022. Those airstrikes would have been impossible without access to fuel supplies, according to reports from civil society organizations, Friday’s announcement said. “Burma’s military regime continues to inflict pain and suffering on its own people,” said Under Secretary of the Treasury for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence Brian E. Nelson. “The United States remains steadfast in its commitment to the people of Burma, and will continue to deny the military the materiel it uses to commit these atrocities.” Helicopters and other aircraft are displayed at the Diamond Jubilee celebration of Myanmar’s air force, Dec. 15, 2022. on diamond Jubilee celebration of the Military Air Force. Credit: Myanmar military The announcement named Tun Min Latt as the key individual in procuring fuel supplies for the military, saying he was a close associate of the junta’s leader Sr. Gen Min Aung Hlaing. Through his companies, he engaged in business to import military arms and equipment with U.S. sanctioned Chinese arms firm NORINCO, the announcement said. “The United States continues to promote accountability for the Burmese military regime’s assault on the democratic aspirations of the people of Burma,” said U.S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken in a separate statement. “The regime continues to inflict pain and suffering on the people of Burma.” The additional sanctions by the U.S. aligned with actions taken by Canada, the United Kingdom and the European Union, Blinken said. Cutting bloodlines “I am very thankful to the United States for these sanctions,” Nay Phone Lat, the spokesperson for Myanmar’s shadow National Unity Government, told Radio Free Asia’s Burmese Service. “I know that sanctions are usually done one step after another. It’s like cutting the bloodlines of the military junta one after another.” He said that the shadow government was trying to cut each route of support for the junta, including jet fuel, one after another. “[The junta’s] capability of suppressing and killing innocent civilians will be lessened,” he said. Banyar, the director of the Karenni Human Rights Group, which was among 516 civil organizations that made a request in December to the United Kingdom to take immediate action to prevent British companies from transporting or selling jet fuel to the Myanmar military junta, told RFA that the U.S. sanctions would have many impacts. “If you look at the patterns, the number one thing is that taking action against these companies that provide services to the junta directly discredits the military junta,” he said. “And the sanctioned companies are also punished in some ways. We can say that this is also a way to pressure other companies to not support the military junta.” But Myanmar has been sanctioned before to little effect, said Thein Tun Oo, executive director of Thayninga Institute for Strategic Studies, which is made up of former military officers. “No matter what sanctions are imposed, there will not be any major impact on Myanmar as it has learned how to survive through sanctions. There may be a little percentage of economic slowdown but that’s about it,” he said. The military has many options when it comes to buying jet fuel, said Thein Tun Oo. “We are not buying from just one source that they have just sanctioned, we can buy from all other sources. Jet fuel is produced from not just one place,” he said. “If we want it from countries in affiliation with the United States, we may have problems but the United States is not the only country that produces jet fuel, so there is no problem for the Myanmar military.” The military could look to China, Thailand, India or Russia for jet fuel if necessary, political analyst Than Soe Naing told RFA. “The sanctions imposed against the Myanmar military are little more than an expression of opinion, in my point of view, as they cannot actually restrict the junta effectively from getting what it needs,” said Than Soe Naing. “The reason is that the three neighboring countries and Russia can still supply the junta with the jet fuel from many other routes.” Ze Thu Aung, a former Air Force captain who left the military to join an armed resistance movement after the coup, told RFA that U.S. sanctions are not enough to stop the junta. “Whatever sanctions [Washington] imposes, the military junta can still survive as it is still in control of its major businesses such as the jade, oil and natural gas industries,” he said. “They have enormous funds left. They have Russia backing them as well. China is supporting them to some extent, too.” Translated by Myo Min Aung. Edited by Eugene Whong and Matt Reed.

For founder’s birthday, North Korean cities ordered to decorate streets with flowers

Editor2 years ago08 mins

To celebrate the April 15 birthday of North Korea’s founder Kim Il Sung, authorities have ordered cities and towns to decorate the streets with flowers for the first time in three years, two sources in the country told Radio Free Asia. The holiday is a big deal in North Korea, where it is known as the “Day of the Sun.” Together with the “Day of the Shining Star,” the Feb. 16 birthday of his son, Kim Jong Il, the holiday perpetuates the personality cult surrounding the Kim family, which has ruled the country for three generations. Normally, the capital of Pyongyang and other major cities are decorated with flowers and new propaganda paintings and slogans are splashed across the cities ahead of the Day of the Sun, but that stopped about three years ago in most places due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Authorities want to bring the flowers back this year, even in rural towns and villages, a company official from Pochon county in the northern province of Ryanggang told RFA’s Korean Service Wednesday on condition of anonymity to speak freely. “It seems like an attempt to change the mood in the province, which has gone sour due to ongoing food shortages and a lack of daily necessities,” the source said. North Korea’s food situation was already dire prior to the pandemic but it got worse when authorities shut down the Sino-Korean border and suspended all trade for more than two years. Although rail freight between the northeast Asian neighbors has resumed, North Korea has not yet fully recovered. Flowers play an important role in the Days of the Sun and Shining Star because both of the late leaders have flower species named after them, a strain of orchid named Kimilsungia, and a strain of begonia named Kimjongilia, although it wasn’t clear if this year’s decoration orders called for either species. People walk in the street decorated with colorful flowers on the occasion of the 110th birth anniversary of late North Korean leader Kim Il Sung, in Pyongyang, April 15, 2022. Credit: Associated Press Paper flowers to make up for shortfall To adorn the streets of Pochon county with flowers, the landscaping management office has had to get creative, making paper flowers to make up for a shortfall of real ones, the source said. “They are growing as many fresh flowers as possible to decorate the center of the town and supplement them with paper flowers if they don’t have enough,” said the source. “The landscaping management office operates a small vinyl greenhouse but it is difficult to keep the temperature constant, so they have not been able to grow many flowers.” The greenhouse’s temperature is maintained by firewood brought in by employees from the mountainside, it hasn’t been working well. “The office therefore distributed five flower pots to each employee who lives in decent conditions to grow the flowers in their homes,” the source said. Chongjin scramble In Chongjin, one of the country’s largest cities, authorities are scrambling to grow flowers fast enough. They haven’t had to prepare flowers for the Day of the Sun in three years, and the order took them by surprise, a resident there told RFA on condition of anonymity to speak freely. “This year the Central Committee issued instructions to decorate the roads with flowers to create a festive atmosphere, so the landscaping management office of each district of the city, as well as the city’s flower office are struggling to prepare fresh flowers,” the second source said. “Keeping the right temperature inside the greenhouse is key to growing flowers quickly so that they can be ready for April 15th,” the second source said. “Currently, landscaping management offices and flower offices are spending money that they barely have to buy firewood from the market to maintain the temperature.” This could turn out to be problematic down the road, as the central government has not told the local office that they would finance their firewood purchases, the second source said. Most residents could care less about the festivities or the flowers, the second source said. “[They] are busy making a living every day have no time to appreciate or think about flowers,” he said. “The authorities’ order to set the holiday atmosphere with flower decorations for the ‘Day of the Sun’ is just a makeshift measure to try to end the dark atmosphere caused by hardships in life.” Translated by Claire Shinyoung Oh Lee. Edited by Eugene Whong and Malcolm Foster.

Chinese coast guard ship chased out of Vietnam waters

Editor2 years ago08 mins

A Chinese coast guard ship and a Vietnamese fisheries patrol boat apparently had a tense encounter during the weekend in the South China Sea, coming as close as 10 meters to each other, according to data from Marine Traffic, a ship-tracking website. The data, based on the ships’ automatic identification system (AIS) signals, shows that the China Coast Guard ship, CCG5205, and Vietnam’s Kiem Ngu 278 came “crazy close” to one another at around 7 a.m. on Sunday local time (midnight UTC), said a researcher based in California. As of Monday afternoon (local time), the CCG5205 was operating in Malaysia’s exclusive economic zone after it left Vietnam waters where the Kiem Ngu 278 had been pursuing the considerably larger Chinese ship since March 24, tracking data showed. At one point the two ships were less than 10 meters (32.8 feet) apart, according to Ray Powell, the Project Myoushu (South China Sea) lead at Stanford University, who first spotted the incident at sea. “The Vietnamese ship was pretty bold given the difference in size – the Chinese ship is twice the size of the Vietnamese ship,” Powell said. “It must have been a very tense engagement.” The incident occurred some 50 nautical miles (92.6 kilometers) south of Vanguard Bank, a known South China Sea flashpoint between Vietnam and China. About 90 minutes later, the Chinese ship left Vietnam’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ) where it had been since Friday evening. An EEZ gives a state exclusive access to the natural resources in the waters and in the seabed. Ship-tracking data shows Vietnam’s Kiem Ngu 278 was closely following the Chinese coast guard vessel CCG5205. [Marine Traffic] Last month, the same China Coast Guard ship was accused of approaching about 150 yards (137 meters) from a Philippine Coast Guard ship and pointing a laser at the crew, causing temporary blindness to them. On Feb. 6, the Philippine Coast Guard said that the Chinese ship had “directed a military-grade laser light” twice at the BRP Malapascua, which was on its way to deliver food and supplies to the troops stationed at the Second Thomas Shoal in the South China Sea. Manila lodged a diplomatic protest and the U.S. State Department issued a statement supporting “our Philippine allies.” Beijing rejected the allegation, saying the Philippine ship had “intruded into the waters” off the Spratly Islands “without Chinese permission” and the Chinese coast guard ship had “acted in a professional and restrained way.” ‘Too close for comfort’ In the Sunday encounter, Marine Traffic’s past track showed the Chinese CCG5205 and the Vietnamese Kiem Ngu 278 were so close that they could have collided. “Ten meters between ships is really too close for comfort,” said Collin Koh, a Singapore-based regional maritime analyst. “Depending on the sea state, the risk of collision is fairly high,” Koh told Radio Free Asia (RFA). A retired Vietnamese Navy senior officer, who spoke to RFA on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the topic, said the two ships must have narrowly escaped a collision because they were sailing in opposite directions and at a very slow speed. “If they were heading to the same direction a collision would have not been avoidable as the distance is too close and too dangerous,” he said. Chinese ships had deliberately rammed Vietnamese patrol ships in the past, he added, but not in recent years. The CCG5205 left Sanya, in Hainan island, for the current mission on March 11 and entered Vietnam’s EEZ the first time on March 12. It then moved to the overlapping area between claimant states in the South China Sea and Malaysia’s EEZ before entering Vietnam’s EEZ again on March 21 for a couple hours and for the third time on March 24 when the Kiem Ngu 278 chased it. At around midnight UTC on March 26, Vietnam’s Kiem Ngu 278 and China’s CCG5205 were dangerously close. [Marine Traffic] The Kiem Ngu 278, officially named Vietnamese Fisheries Resources Surveillance ship KN-278, is homeported in Vung Tau, south of Ho Chi Minh City. It left base on March 13 and had been following the Chinese vessel closely since. In July 2021, the Kiem Ngu 278 was following another Chinese coast guard ship, the CCG5202, which Vietnam accused of harassing its gas-exploration activities. Six parties hold claims to parts of the South China Sea and its natural resources but China’s claim is the biggest and Beijing has been trying to hinder other countries’ oil and gas activities in the waters inside its self-claimed nine-dash line. A 2,600-ton Chinese survey vessel, the Haiyang Dizhi Si Hao, had lingered inside Vietnam’s EEZ from March 9 until March 25, when it switched off its AIS, according to data from Marine Traffic. Its whereabouts are currently unknown.

The detrimental impact of Chinese DWF on the environment

Editor2 years ago2 years ago011 mins

With the local and domestic marine life depleted, many of the industrialized nations such as China are looking towards foreign waters to meet the need for seafood. This had led to the exploitation of less industrialized and under-developed nations, especially in Africa and Latin America. Not only are these distant water fishing fleets competing with the local fishermen but also are responsible for overfishing and extraction of unsustainable amounts of seafood through illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing activities. According to our comprehensive report, China has deployed its distant-water fishing (DWF) vessels across every ocean around the globe. It has also been found guilty of trespassing in the Exclusive Economic Zones of more than 80 countries and fishing outside its EEZ on the high seas. With more than 18,000 boats in the world’s oceans, China has consistently ranked top in seafood production and fish capture. Producing almost 12 million tons of live weight, almost double of Indonesia, the second largest producer, it is quite evident that Chinese DWF is heavily engaged in IUU fishing activities and catching way above the surplus amount. Distant-water fishing fleets are vessels that operate within the EEZs of other countries that have signed access agreements to allow these fleets to fish inside their territories as well as on the high seas. However, the DWFs are only allowed to take the ‘surplus’ fish not caught by the host country against a fee negotiated under the access agreement. According to our findings in the comprehensive report, Chinese authorities have not published any statistics regarding catch or stocks, and these fleets have been catching well above the surplus. In addition, there have been accusations about them falsifying licenses & documentation, espionage & reconnaissance activities, seizing territories, generating a lot of sea waste, and targeting endangered shark species. Pollution caused by the DWF The distant-water fishing vessels travel from one side of the globe to the other side. This means a lot of fuel is consumed during multi-day trips. A trip from China to western Latin America (the East Pacific Ocean) would take around 43 days and a trip to the eastern part of Latin America ( the Mid-Atlantic Ocean) would be completed in approximately 49 days on a ship going at the speed of 10kt. Assuming that one of these trawlers is powered by a 5000 HP engine, fuel consumption for one of these trips to Ecuador would be 416,783.27 gallons for a petrol engine and 283,063.88 gallons for a diesel one. Similarly, from China to Brazil, the same trawler would consume 475,258 gallons of petrol or 322,768.74 gallons of diesel. While the fuel consumption decreases at cruising speed, these numbers would still be high enough to raise eyebrows in shock. Consumption of even 1 gallon of petrol/diesel produces Carbon Monoxide (CO), Carbon Dioxide (CO2), Sulfur (SO2), Nitrogen Dioxide (NOx), Nitric Oxide (N2O), Volatile organic compounds (VOCs), and Hydrocarbons (HCs). One can estimate the damage that the Chinese Shipping vessels are doing to the environment. The Chinese Bottom Trawlers The majority of vessels that are engaged in distant-water fishing are trawlers and longliners. Trawlers are large boats that have large weighted nets that are pulled along the bottom of the sea or in midwater at a specified depth. Trawling is considered an ecologically taxing fishing activity that causes a lot of damage to marine life, marine habitats, coral reefs, and sea beds. The destruction of coral reefs where marine animals live and the breed has led to reduced population and marine diversity. This is leading to ocean acidification, warmer seas, and reduced oxygen levels in the water. While China has banned bottom trawling within its territory, it has encouraged its DWF vessels to conduct trawling activities close to other countries’ EEZs in Africa, South America, Russia, and littoral states of the Indian Ocean, South, and mid-Atlantic ocean and the pacific ocean. The Chinese Longliners Another type of vessel commonly used by the Chinese for DWF is the long-liners. Long lining is a type of fishing method that uses a large number of short lines with hooks which are then attached to a longer main line at regular distances. The main line can extend up to 10 km with thousands of shorter lines with baited hooks floating along the surface of the ocean to catch pelagic fish species such as tuna or marlin. However, the baited hooks can attract other species of fish too, resulting in a substantial amount of unwanted bycatch. Moreover, these long lines also kill larger animals such as turtles, sharks, whales, and even sea birds that come in the way of sharp hooks. Long liners are also notorious for ghost fishing. Ghost fishing is a term used to describe fishing done by any derelict gear, which is lost, abandoned, or discarded. Such fishing gear, uncollected by the fishermen, floats around in the ocean freely and catches and even kills animals trapped in them. The long lines, which float on the ocean surface, can detach or break if any ship passes over them. Once separated from the marker buoys, the detached lines are difficult to find, becoming ghost gear. Garbage dumps in the ocean Ghost gears contribute a lot to the waste generated by the longliners in addition to containers of marine oil, bottles, Chinese-labeled jute bags, etc. In the Galapagos Islands, Chinese boats have been dumping gigantic amounts of plastic waste in the water. They are responsible for killing wildlife and polluting the water of a place that is home to more than 7,000 endemic species. According to experts, about 30% of the garbage on the islands’ shores comes from Chinese fleet fishing at Ecuador’s coasts and marine protected areas. At a time when all countries around the world are changing their policies in favor of environmental conservation, the Chinese are still aggressively engaged in activities that are extremely detrimental to the environment. Overfishing, dumping waste into marine protected areas, polluting air, water, and land alike, disturbing and destroying the coral reefs, killing…

Impacts of Chinese DWF on the Asian countries

Editor2 years ago2 years ago010 mins

China’s Distant-water fishing fleet, which operates on the high seas and also in the Exclusive Economic Zones of other countries, is the biggest fleet in the world with an estimated 2,700 ships. The distant-water fishing sector is infamous for being secretive and unregulated as many countries fail to publish their fishing data. This is not surprising given the fact that it is often found guilty of illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing practices, targeting prohibited species and causing irreversible environmental damage as well as intelligence gathering, espionage, and space tracking. The presence of illegal Chinese DWF vessels is felt all over the world, but it is particularly worse in Africa, Latin America, and Asia. Countries in the Indian Ocean Region (IOR), South China Sea region, as well as East Asian countries, and Russia, are all victims of IUU fishing and violation of EEZ by Chinese vessels. Despite the fact that the IOR has the presence of many countries in the region, the Chinese DWF fleets have increasingly become a hazard, especially in the Northern Indian Ocean region (NIOR). The NIOR is an important region as most of the world’s maritime traffic passes through it, hence the presence of dubious Chinese DWFs raises concern. The NIOR, which comprises countries like India, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Iran, and Oman, is seeing a surge in unregistered Chinese fishing vessels. According to the Indian Navy, they monitored more than 392 Chinese IUU fishing incidences in the Indian Ocean in 2021 compared to 379 in 2020. It is also reported that spy ships disguised as fishing boats are being used by the Chinese to gather intelligence data and spy on assets of other countries, including India’s Andaman and Nicobar islands. While the other countries have seen a significant increase in Chinese activities in their EEZ, in Pakistan on the other hand, the presence of China’s DWF is minimal and on a downward slope. Could it be a benefit of being a trading partner and ally to China? The island nations in the NIOR like Sri Lanka and Maldives have reported the presence of Chinese DWF vessels such as squid jiggers, trawlers, and long liners that fish in the area before moving to other target areas like Oman in the Arabian Sea. The Chinese vessels in Oman, according to our report, often misuse the Iranian flag as a disguise and are engaged in fishing at an industrial scale. This activity has increased exponentially since 2016. A similar issue persists in Iran where the trawlers are taking close to 46,000 tons of commercial fish, as stated in a report from the Iranian parliament. This is leading to depletion in numbers of protected species and dolphins which are killed by commercial dragnets. Reflagging themselves under Iran’s flags, these trawlers fish for seahorses, who are then dried and powdered to be used in Traditional Chinese Medicines (TCM). Eastern Indian Ocean Region In the eastern IOR, nations like Indonesia and Malaysia are sea-based economies that are highly dependent on fishing. As Chinese DWFs with huge capacities stay longer in the area, the local fishermen are finding it tough to earn their daily bread and butter. Indonesian laborers, who work on some of these fishing vessels, suffer racial abuse and exploitation at the hands of their Chinese managers. It has been reported that between 2019 and 2020, 30 Indonesian fishermen died onboard Chinese long-haul fishing boats because of substandard food, dangerous drinking water, and excessive working hours. Due to its close proximity to China, East Asian nations like Japan and South Korea are the most vulnerable and the most impacted by Chinese vessels. South Korea has also reported Chinese-flagged ships fishing in their EEZ. The western region neighboring China is the worst affected with over 300K hours of illegal fishing done by Chinese vessels. The governments of South Korea and China have held several talks to smooth out this issue since the beginning of the last decade, which have failed to bear any fruit. Chinese coast guard ships and fishing vessels have been making attempts to change the status quo by coercion in the Senkaku islands. Chinese ships mounted with artillery approached Japanese ships in the Japanese territory. The Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs has released a statement saying, “The Senkaku Islands are indisputably an inherent part of the territory of Japan in light of historical facts and based upon international law, and are, in fact, effectively under the Japanese control… It is a violation of international law for the China Coast Guard ships to act making their assertions in Japanese territorial waters around the Senkaku Islands, and such acts will not be tolerated.“ Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs Quite surprisingly, Chinese trawlers were also spotted in the EEZ of Russia. The vessels have done over a million hours of dark surfing in the Russian far-east. While many countries have strongly opposed the fishing activities by Chinese vessels, some have taken strict measures. Indonesia, for example, has sunk many Chinese ships in the last four years which were dangerously close to their land boundary. The Quad, comprising India, Australia, Japan, and the US have announced a major regional effort under the ambit of Indo-Pacific Maritime Domain Awareness (IPDMA) aimed to provide more accurate maritime pictures of activities in the region. As the Chinese distant-water fishing activities are growing rapidly and unsustainably all around the world, it is depleting global fish stocks and disrupting the marine ecosystem. Moreover, it is increasingly becoming a source of diplomatic and environmental tensions with other nations. Hence, it has become imperative to introduce laws, policies, and strict measures to keep it in check.

BRIDES FOR SALE: Nepal

Editor2 years ago2 years ago05 mins

Women in Nepal are trafficked every year to China by strangers, neighbors, and families for sexual exploitation. They are also made to work in circuses, as domestic workers, in forced labor, or even are made to give up their organs. Many are often lured with promises of well-paying jobs in foreign employment or with fake marriages. Nepal stands to be one of the primary targets of China when it comes to sex trafficking on account of its massive unemployment and dubious financial status. Mostly the traffickers themselves lure these women and get married to them. This way they easily transport these women to China and sell them off to interested buyers. Because these Chinese traffickers are legally married to Nepali women, it is difficult to establish a case for trafficking. When caught, they usually have all the required documents. Statistics Chinese men pay around Rs 10-15 lakhs (USD 12500-18900$) to marry Nepali women to brokers. They also provide lavish gifts worth up to Rs 60,000 (USD 750$) to potential brides and their families. This helps to convince the girls and their families that they will have a better life in China. According to a report released by the National Human Rights Commission, the Nepali national human rights body, in the year 2019 alone as many as 15,000 women and girls including 500 children were trafficked, and these are just the known cases. It is estimated that more than 17,000 women (two fiscal years ending mid-July 2015) and girls are trafficked every year. The government of Nepal disputes these figures. According to them, only 181 Nepalese were trafficked in 2013, compared with 185 in 2014. In 2013, 56 women were rescued from their traffickers by an NGO. It has also been reported that the trafficking of Nepalese women to China for marriage has resulted in as many as 1,000 women being exploited by marriage bureaus with promises of citizenship, job opportunities, and good family life. According to the data gathered in 2019 by the National Human Rights Commission, on caste and ethnicity, 49%, the majority of trafficked women survivors are Indigenous nationalities, followed by Dalit at 15%. Madhesis account for 6% and other ethnicities constitute the remaining 29%. Indigenous Peoples, Dalits, and Madhesis are the most socially, politically, and economically marginalized and excluded communities in Nepal. Tamang women are at particular risk. Routes Read about the ordeal of the Nepali women in the complete report.

BRIDES FOR SALE: Pakistan

Editor2 years ago2 years ago05 mins

Bride trafficking has been taking place from Pakistan around the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), the $62 billion flagship project of China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) in Pakistan. The practice involved cases of fraudulent marriage between Pakistani women and girls — many of them from marginalized backgrounds and Christian families — and Chinese men who had traveled to Pakistan. The victims were lured with payments to the family and promises of a good life in China but reported abuse, difficult living conditions, forced pregnancy, or forced prostitution once they reached China. According to various media reports, many Pakistani Christian women and girls with a lack of Chinese buyers are killed and their organs are sold! An investigation by News Agency AP in 2019 revealed how Pakistan’s Christian minority has become a new target of brokers who pay impoverished parents to marry off their daughters, some of them teenagers, to Chinese husbands who return with them to their homeland. Many of the brides are then isolated and abused or forced into prostitution in China, often contacting home and pleading to be brought back. Christians are targeted because they are one of the poorest communities in Muslim-majority Pakistan. The trafficking rings are made up of Chinese and Pakistani middlemen and include Christian ministers, mostly from small evangelical churches, who get bribes to urge their flock to sell their daughters. Investigators have also turned up at least one Muslim cleric running a marriage bureau from his madrasa, or religious school. Omar Warriach, Amnesty International’s campaigns director for South Asia, said Pakistan “must not let its close relationship with China become a reason to turn a blind eye to human rights abuses against its own citizens” either in abuses of women sold as brides or separation of Pakistani women from husbands from China’s Muslim Uighur population sent to “re-education camps” to turn them away from Islam. Statistics Recently, there were several media reports suggesting that Pakistani girls were being lured into marriage contracts and then used for prostitution in China. One such report in 2019 put the number of such Pakistani girls at 600. The report also claimed that the average per ‘bride’ earnings was from USD 25,000 to 65,000, but a paltry amount of PKR 200,000 (~USD 800$) was given to the family. The exact number of women trafficked is not released by the Government of Pakistan. Routes Some women are trafficked to China along the route of China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) and other are trafficked via sea route. Due to the close relationship between the two countries and the nature of regimes, the actual number of victims and the routes of trafficking are underreported or unreported. Attempts to whitewash by China China has issued a lot of clarifications and tried to whitewash the grave crime it has committed with respect to sex trafficking.

BRIDES FOR SALE: India

Editor2 years ago2 years ago02 mins

In India the modus operandi used by the Chinese for Brides Trafficking is different. Online dating applications like 2redbeans are flooded with profiles of Chinese Men. These profiles are then advertised to local service providers and matrimonial sites to target Indian women. Propaganda Youtube channels are created showing Indian women happily married to Chinese men. Other than this, Indian women from the North-East states bordering Myanmar are lured to enter Myanmar from where they are trafficked to China and other South East Asian countries. Propaganda is also done through Youtube channels. Chinese grooms can be seen in these videos with Indian women happily living after marriage in China. They are made to dance to Bollywood songs to get acceptance in Indian society. Routes Women trafficking from major cities in India is still at a nascent stage but from the North-Eastern states of India took place through Myanmar as the transit country at a much larger scale. India and Myanmar have a porous border with poor boundary demarcation. Women in the bordering areas in search of work or fire woods crossover to the bordering districts of Myanmar from where they are trafficked.

BRIDES FOR SALE: Myanmar

Editor2 years ago2 years ago010 mins

The director of the Gender Equality Network (GEN), Daw May Sabe Phyu, said that every year hundreds of Myanmar women, especially from Shan and Kachin states, are trafficked to China as “brides”. Many are tricked into traveling to China to seek job opportunities, while some are kidnapped and held against their will to be sold to Chinese men seeking wives. Human Rights Watch published a report in 2019 called “Trafficking of Kachin “Brides” from Myanmar to China” based on interviews conducted with the survivors of brides trafficking from Myanmar. According to the report, the traffickers used deceit to deliver women into sexual slavery. Most of the women and girls interviewed were recruited by someone they knew and trusted. Of the 37 survivors interviewed: Some girls said they were drugged on the way and woke up in a locked room. Others were told, after crossing the border, that the job they were promised was no longer available, but another job was, several days’ journey away. Unable to communicate due to language barriers, and with no money to make their way home, many women and girls felt no option but to stay with the person escorting them, even in the face of growing unease. In Myanmar, conditions resulting from conflict, land confiscation, forced relocation, and human rights abuses have spurred widespread landlessness and joblessness, resulting in increased migration to China. Lacking proper documentation, language, and education, Myanmar women are increasingly at risk of trafficking, including forced marriage. Propaganda Videos by the state media To counter the growing uproar against the brides trafficking from Myanmar to China, Chinese state media from time to time release propaganda videos showing happily married Myanmar women living in China, but such videos are also reacted to by the locals sharply. Advertisements for marriages and surrogacy In 2019, residents of Muse, a Myanmar border town in northern Shan state that serves as a major trade hub between the two countries (Myanmar and China), reported seeing advertisements posted on lampposts and building walls. One ad with a headline reading “Invitation for Marriage” in Chinese and Burmese, gives the height, income, and address of an unnamed Chinese man who is looking for a Myanmar bride between the ages of 26 and 32. The ad also provides a contact number and says more details can be discussed over the phone. Other advertisements with the headline “Surrogate Mothers Wanted” say a company is looking for women under the age of 25 to carry the babies of Chinese men in exchange for payments of 13,000 yuan (USD 1,900$) a month plus meals and accommodations. The ads also provide a contact number. Statistics Over 7,400 women and girls were estimated to be victims of forced marriage in four districts (Kachin State and Northern Shan State) in Myanmar, with over 5,000 females forced to bear children with their Chinese husbands. According to burmese.dvb.no (archives), Bride prices offered range from 1,500,000 Myanmar Kyats (~USD 700$) to 6,00,000 Myanmar Kyats (~USD 3000$) and they are sold in China at the price of over 2,00,000 yuan(~ USD 30000$). According to the data collected from the Myanmar National Human Rights Commission (MNHRC) and Myanmar Department of Social Welfare following is the number of reported women trafficked from Myanmar to China. (Most of the trafficking of women doesn’t get reported) Routes The majority of the routes are from the Kachin and Shan states of Myanmar directly to China’s Yunnan province. After the Rohingya crisis in Rakhine state, many women are trafficked from Rakhine to Shan state and then to China. Other prominent routes include the trafficking of women from Myanmar to Laos and Thailand as transit. The ordeal of Myanmarese women Seng Moon’s family fled fighting in Myanmar’s Kachin State in 2011 and wound up struggling to survive in a camp for internally displaced people. In 2014, when Seng Moon was 16 and attending fifth grade, her sister-in-law said she knew of a job as a cook in China’s neighboring Yunnan province. Seng Moon did not want to go, but the promised wage was far more than she could make living in the IDP camp, so her family decided she shouldn’t pass it up. In the car, Seng Moon’s sister-in-law gave her something she said prevented car sickness. Seng Moon fell asleep immediately. “When I woke up my hands were tied behind my back,” she said. “I cried and shouted and asked for help.” By then, Seng Moon was in China, where her sister-in-law left her with a Chinese family. After several months her sister-in-law returned and told her, “Now you have to get married to a Chinese man,” and took her to another house. Said Seng Moon: My sister-in-law left me at the home. …The family took me to a room. In that room I was tied up again. …They locked the door—for one or two months.… Each time when the Chinese man brought me meals, he raped me…After two months, they dragged me out of the room. The father of the Chinese man said, “Here is your husband. Now you are a married couple. Be nice to each other and build a happy family.” Other stories of the Myanmarese women

Asia Fact Check Lab: Did NATO donate HIV-infected blood to Ukraine?

Editor2 years ago012 mins

During the past two weeks, a conspiracy theory alleging that NATO members had donated HIV and hepatitis-infected blood to Ukraine was originally posted and spread on Weibo by “Guyan Muchan,” an influential account with more than 6 million followers. Asia Fact Check Lab (AFCL) tracked down and confirmed the pro-Putin Telegram channel Breaking Mash as the disinformation’s source. Further inquiries by the Ukraine-based fact-checking organization StopFake caused the Ukrainian government to release a formal statement debunking the disinformation. On Nov. 3, Guyan Muchan, a widely followed Weibo user, published a post claiming to reveal a tainted blood scandal involving NATO and Ukraine. The statement reads: “Ukraine asked NATO to provide more than 60,000 liters of blood for wounded soldiers in the Odessa, Nikolaev, Dnepropetrovsk, Kharkov and Zaporozhye regions. NATO member countries provided Ukraine with canned blood. However, Ukrainian medical staff found HIV and hepatitis B and C viruses in the blood after random examinations. Kiev has written to NATO requesting an independent assessment of the donor blood and asking that blood “not be collected on the African continent.” In the first group, 6.3% of the samples had HIV, 7.4% had hepatitis B and 3.2% had hepatitis C. In the second group: 5.9%, 6.8% and 3.1%, respectively. The information is obtained by leaked files after the Ukrainian government office computers were hacked.” The post contained three images. The first was a picture of a statement that hackers allegedly had obtained confidential documents from Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal’s email. The second was an alleged letter from Ukraine’s Minister of Health to Shmyhal. The third was the English translation of the letter. Each image’s background contained the word “mash” as a watermark, which AFCL used to trace the post back to its original source. Guyan Muchan is one of China’s “patriotic” influencers who in recent years rose to fame by pandering to domestic nationalist sentiment. Her post claiming the use of tainted blood was liked by hundreds of people, with other influential social media figures reposting it to millions more. This “news” swiftly spread on a number of Chinese language websites, including the popular internet news portal 163.com. What is the claim’s source? AFCL was unable to find any reports about the claim from credible English media outlets. A few English websites with poor news credibility did repost it, including the pro-Russia website info.news and the gun-lover community forum snipershide.com. A slew of unreliable Twitter accounts have also posted the claim in English. Chief among them is ZOKA, a user with more than 105,000 followers. Marcus Kolga, director at DisinfoWatch, a fact-checking project under the Macdonald-Laurier Institute in Canada, told AFCL that ZOKA is a “well-known pro-Kremlin account.” AFCL also found the Russian version of the claim being spread on many websites, forums and social media platforms. After comparing both the publishing time and watermark, AFCL traced the claim back to a post on the Telegram channel “Breaking Mash,” first published at 1 a.m. on Nov. 3. The original post has since gained over 1a million views. Breaking Mash is the official Telegram channel of the Russian-language website Mash.ru. The website’s content is full of lies and is highly aligned with Moscow’s propaganda, according to Christine Eliashevsky-Chraibi, a media veteran and translator at Euromaidan Press. Mash senior staff are suspected of being close to the Russian government, with company executive Stepan Kovalchuk’s uncles, Kirill and Yuri Kovalchuk, marked as “elites close to Putin” by the United States.S. In sum, both the claim’s original Russian source along with the English websites and social media accounts that spread the claim all suffer from low credibility. Is the claim true? AFCL deems the Guyan Muchan post to be false. It came from a pro-Russia Telegram channel with low credibility. The Ukraine Ministry of Health refuted the claim in a statement offering more details about blood donation in Ukraine. The claim alleges that the “scoop” was leaked from the hacked email of Ukraine’s prime minister, Denys Shmyhal. But no credible media outlets reported on the leaked emails.The statements the claim relies on use questionable language that normally would not be appropriate for official documents. For example, the claim alleges that the mMinister of hHealth demanded that NATO’s donor blood “not be collected on the African continent.” The possibility of such racist language appearing in a formal government document is unlikely. Eliashevsky-Chraibi said the alleged government letter is “very suspicious” as there’s “no date, no signature, no stamp” and it was “not formal procedure.” Through the Ukraine based fact-checking organization StopFake, AFCL checked with the Ukrainian government regarding the veracity of this claim. On Nov. 7, the Ukrainian Ministry of Health published a statement on its official website refuting the claim. Ukraine has never requested blood donations from any organization outside of the country, and all donor blood needed for the battlefield comes from within Ukraine and meets European standards, according to the ministry’s statement. Whenever there is an urgent need at a blood center, people respond quickly to requests for donations, negating the need for any supplies from outside of the country. The statement adds that Ukraine does not have a “random sampling” system of donor blood. Instead, it tests all donations to ensure they are safe and reliable. The alleged letter from Ukraine’s Minister of Health is a forgery, the statement says. The allegation about blood donated to Ukraine originated on the Russian telegram channel Breaking Mash [left] and then was picked up by a pro-Kremlin account on Twitter [center] and a few hours later by an account on Weibo [right] with 6.44 million fans. Credit: Asia Fact Check Lab screenshots Background Information In late October, the Kyiv Post, a leading English newspaper in Ukraine, published a report that Russia’s Wagner private military company had recruited Russian prisoners suffering from severe infectious diseases, in particular HIV and hepatitis C. This news bears some similarities with the claim made on the Breaking Mash Telegram channel, including the mention of HIV, hepatitis and the war, but…

Category: South Asia