BANGKOK — About 1,300 people have fled from eastern Myanmar into Thailand, officials said Saturday, as fresh fighting erupted at a border town that has recently been captured by ethnic guerillas.

Fighters from the Karen ethnic minority last week captured the last of the Myanmar army’s outposts in and around Myawaddy, which is connected to Thailand by two bridges across the Moei River.

The latest clashes were triggered in the morning when the Karen guerillas launched an attack against Myanmar troops who were hiding near the 2nd Thai-Myanmar Friendship Bridge, a major crossing point for trade with Thailand, said police chief Pittayakorn Phetcharat in Thailand’s Mae Sot district. He estimated about 1,300 people fled into Thailand.

Thai officials reported people had started crossing since Friday following clashes in several areas of Myawaddy.

The fall of Myawaddy is a major setback for the military that seized power from the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi in 2021. Myanmar’s once-mighty armed forces have suffered a series of unprecedented defeats since last October, losing swathes of territory including border posts to both ethnic fighters, who have been fighting for greater autonomy for decades, and pro-democracy guerrilla units that took up arms after the military takeover.

The clashes, involving drone attacks from the Karen forces and airstrikes by the Myanmar military, had subsided by noon Saturday compared to the morning, but Mae Sot police chief Pittayakorn Phetcharat said he could still hear sporadic gunshots. He said Thai authorities would move people fleeing into a safer area.

Footage from the Thai border showed Thai soldiers maintaining guard near the bridge with sounds of explosions and gunshots in the background. People with children waded across the river with their belongings and were received by Thai officials on the riverbank. Several are seen taking shelter in buildings along the riverbank on the Myanmar side.

Thailand’s Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin wrote on the social media platform X on Saturday that he was closely monitoring the situation at the border.

“I do not desire to see any such clashes have any impact on the territorial integrity of Thailand and we are ready to protect our borders and the safety of our people. At the same time, we are also ready to provide humanitarian assistance, if necessary,” he wrote.

In March, Thailand delivered its first batch of humanitarian assistance to Myanmar for about 20,000 displaced people.

Nikorndej Balangura, a spokesman of the Foreign Affairs Ministry, told reporters on Friday that Thailand is currently working to expand its aid initiative.
…

Osaka, Japan — Wider access to abortion in Japan has largely remained elusive a year after the historic approval of medical abortion pills.

In April last year, lawmakers approved the use of the two-step abortion pill — MeFeego Pack — for pregnancies up to nine weeks. Before that, women in the East Asian nation could only receive a surgical abortion in private clinics by designated surgeons that often charge as much as $370.

Financial strain aside, women were often required to provide proof of spousal consent to receive an abortion, making it nearly impossible for them to make the decision on their own. Reports showed that even for single women, doctors still asked for permission of a male partner before agreeing to perform such surgeries.

Despite the approval of the abortion pill, only 3% of all clinics with abortion services in Japan provide them a year after the pill’s approval, according to Kumi Tsukahara, independent researcher of reproductive health and rights, “and none of them have a Maternal Body Protection Law (MBPL) designated doctor,” Tsukahara told VOA News.

Under the MBPL, the controversial requirement for spousal consent before a doctor can prescribe oral abortion medication still exists — it’s the same condition for gaining permission for a surgical abortion.

“Unfortunately, there are no signs of change with regard to either,” the expert said.

In contrast to countries with better abortion access, Japan’s approved abortion pills cannot be administered more than once — sometimes, multiple tries are necessary — and the pregnant women will still need to resort to surgical abortion that involves a serious risk to their health.

Since such surgeries are only allowed in private clinics and are considered profitable by designated doctors, they often charge the same price or higher for abortion pills as for a surgical abortion. Neither measure is covered by Japan’s national health system.

“The high prices and low affordability depending on individual doctors, the inaccurate information given by doctors who cannot use drugs to guide people to conventional surgical procedures, the unjust situation and the state’s failure to respond, and the women are disempowered to have a sense of entitlement on their part,” Tsukahara explained.

Abortion rights activist Kazuko Fukuda, who spearheads a grassroots movement to push for women’s rights to end pregnancies in Japan, echoed the sentiment.

“The abortion rights [in Japan] didn’t improve,” Fukuda told VOA News. “Of course, this [approval of oral abortion] was better than nothing, but conservative politicians went against such pills before the approval. … It’s mandated that women have to stay in hospitals that provide beds until the end of the abortion, but designated private clinics don’t usually have beds.”

Women in Japan are banned from taking abortion pills at home. They must be in hospitals and take the pills in front of the doctors as authorities fear that they might resell them. If violated, these women can be subject to imprisonment for up to a year.

Male-dominated political scene

Abortion is still a big taboo in politics, and real rights improvement will go a long way, Fukuda added.

“News of women being arrested for giving birth alone and abandoning them is still very common — we hear that just a few days ago. … The government should repeal the criminalization of abortion. [Things don’t work] as doctors are still afraid of being sued so they require signatures from boyfriends to prescribe abortion pills.”

Last year, Japan started a study, selling morning-after pills over the counter without prescription. However, the study suffers limited availability in many cities. Girls under 15 are not allowed to purchase them, and those ages 16 to 18 must be accompanied by a parent to buy the pills.

Both experts VOA spoke with say that the information and availability of these contraceptive pills doesn’t appear high in online searches — the usual method for the targeted group to look for contraception.

Japan ranked among the lowest of developed countries in a March report this year by the World Bank in terms of women’s rights.

Currently, women account for less than 10% in Japan’s lower house of parliament and 27% in the upper house. In local politics, only 15% of women are on the front line. The gender pay gap in Japan reached 40%, according to a report from the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).

Women’s issues like abortion access or contraceptive measures are often not viewed as priorities for female politicians.

“In the male-dominated politics, a lot of women have to become more conservative and look strong to be accepted so it’s really hard for women to liberal or supportive in this kind of thing [abortion and contraception in the parliament],” Fukuda said.

Women blamed for low fertility rate

Social stigma connected to abortion remains strong as Japan blames women for its low fertility rate. The country hit a record low number of births last year.

“The Japanese government has attributed the ‘decreasing number [fertility rate] to ‘women who don’t give birth,’ women are made to feel socially guilty for trying to choose not to give birth. Of course, such an issue construction is itself highly biased and misogynistic,” said researcher Tsukahara.

Fukuda said that the government’s support of favorable reproductive policies stops with women who don’t want babies.

“Anything against that [wanting babies] is not supported at all. Many people think that ‘contraception’ is a taboo and even taking [morning after] pills can expose to judgment as a promiscuous woman. It’s not easy for women to talk about it.”
…

washington — China is challenging Japan’s latest analysis of the threat posed to the Indo-Pacific region by Beijing as a hyped-up threat and false accusation.

In the Japanese Foreign Ministry’s annual Diplomatic Bluebook that was published Tuesday, China’s military moves are described as posing “the greatest strategic challenge,” according to Japanese media. An official English version has not been published.

The Bluebook reportedly condemns China’s actions in the South China Sea and its attempts to change the status quo in the East and South China Sea.

At the same time, according to Japanese media, it says for the first time since 2019 that Japan seeks to build “a mutually beneficial relationship” with China “based on common strategic interests.”

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lin Jian rejected Japan’s criticisms at a news briefing on Tuesday. “Japan has resorted to the same old false accusations against China and hype of ‘China threat’ in its 2024 Diplomatic Bluebook,” he said.

He continued: “We urge Japan to change its wrong course of actions, stop stoking bloc confrontation, truly commit itself to advancing a strategic relationship of mutual benefit with China and work to build a constructive and stable China-Japan relationship fit for the new era.”

Yuki Tatsumi, director of the Japan Program at the Washington-based Stimson Center, said, “Japan’s concerns about Chinese behavior, both military and paramilitary, have been intensified for the last few years due to the acceleration of Beijing’s aggressive behavior in East and South China Sea.”

She continued, “In addition, Tokyo has been put on alert about Beijing’s increasingly hostile and aggressive rhetoric and behavior toward Taiwan.”

Japanese Defense Minister Minoru Kihara and U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin could meet in early May in Hawaii, according to a Thursday report by The Japan Times citing unnamed Japanese officials.

Kihara and Austin would discuss setting up a proposed allied command and control structure and a body to identify kinds of weapons the two countries will develop and produce together, said the report. These plans were announced April 10 at a bilateral summit in Washington.

The Japanese Maritime Self-Defense Force (JMSDF) announced on Tuesday that it will conduct a naval deployment including six surface ships, submarines, and two air units starting May 3 to support a free and open Indo-Pacific.

The deployment includes visits to more than a dozen countries including the U.S., the Philippines, India, Papua New Guinea, Tonga, Marshall Islands, Fiji and Palau. It is meant “to strengthen cooperation with the allied partner navies through conducting exercises,” said JMSDF.

Daniel Sneider, lecturer in international policy and East Asia Studies at Stanford University, said even as Tokyo is building its defenses and is concerned about Beijing’s assertiveness and especially its relations with Moscow, its mention in the Diplomatic Bluebook of wanting to build relations with Beijing reflects Tokyo’s balanced approach toward China.

“The Bluebook reflects a balance between, on one hand, some degree of warning the Chinese off doing things that disrupt the order” in the region “and, on the other hand, making it clear that Japan really is not interested in some type of full-scale confrontation with China,” including economic warfare, said Sneider.

As to China, it tends to see “any attempts on the part of the Koreans and the Japanese to engage and improve relations as a sign of weakness,” continued Sneider.

China, Japan and South Korea plan to hold trilateral talks in May for the first time since 2019. They will meet in Seoul ahead of a Washington-Seoul-Tokyo trilateral summit expected in July.
…

The Chinese-operated online markets Temu and Shein are shaking up e-commerce with their extremely low prices. But the firms are facing concerns from consumers and Congress. Evie Steele has the story from Washington.
…

ISLAMABAD — Police in Pakistan’s port city of Karachi said Friday two suicide bombers attacked a van carrying five Japanese autoworkers, but they all escaped unhurt.

A senior police officer told reporters that the autoworkers were being driven to an industrial zone in Pakistan’s commercial capital early in the morning when their bulletproof vehicle was targeted.

“One terrorist came close to the van and blew himself while another fired at it,” said Azfar Mahesar, an area deputy inspector general of Karachi police, citing initial investigations into the early morning violence. He added that two security guards escorting the Japanese workers returned fire and killed the bomber’s accomplice.

Mahesar said that police had also recovered the suicide bomber’s remains from the scene of the attack and an investigation was under way to establish the identities of both assailants.

A subsequent police statement said, “All foreign guests are safe. Thank God.” The attack injured one of the guards and reportedly several bystanders.

Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif denounced the attack and prayed for the speedy recovery of those wounded in it, his office said in a statement in Islamabad.

No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack in Karachi, the country’s largest city and the capital of southern Sindh province.

The violence came a day after militants ambushed and killed six customs officers in the turbulent Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.

Officials said Thursday that a team from the Directorate of Intelligence and Investigation Customs was conducting an “intelligence-based” operation in the militancy-hit Dera Ismail Khan district when their vehicle came under attack.

The shooting resulted in the deaths of customs officers who were working to counter militant networks smuggling weapons into the district and surrounding areas of the province, which borders Afghanistan.

Last month, a suicide bomber rammed his explosives-packed car into a convoy of Chinese engineers and workers in the province’s Kohistan district. The attack killed five Chinese nationals and their Pakistani driver.

The foreigners were working on the Chinese-funded multibillion-dollar Dasu Dam on the Indus River, Pakistan’s biggest hydropower project.

Islamabad says that fugitive leaders and fighters of anti-Pakistan militant groups have found refuge in Afghanistan and intensified cross-border attacks since the Islamist Taliban regained control of the neighboring country.

The Taliban deny the allegations, claiming they are not allowing anyone to use Afghan soil to threaten neighboring countries, including Pakistan. 
…

jakarta, indonesia — Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi criticized the United States on Thursday for its votes on previous United Nations resolutions for a Gaza cease-fire, following talks in Jakarta with his Indonesian counterpart, Retno Marsudi.

During the talks, Wang highlighted the importance of maintaining peace and stability in the Middle East, and he called on all parties to exercise restraint in the conflict.

“The conflict in Gaza has lasted for half a year and caused a rare humanitarian tragedy in the 21st century. The United Nations Security Council responded to the call of the international community and continued to review the resolution draft on the cease-fire in Gaza, but it was repeatedly vetoed by the United States,” Wang said at a news briefing at the Indonesian Foreign Ministry.

Wang acknowledged the passage of a Security Council cease-fire resolution in March, saying, “This time, the U.S. did not dare to stand in opposition to international morality and chose to abstain.”

He added that the U.S. claimed the resolution was not binding and said, “In the eyes of the United States, international law seems to be a tool that can be used whenever it finds useful and discarded if it does not want to use it.”

The United States has said it vetoed previous resolutions for not being linked to the release of Hamas hostages.

Both ministers expressed frustration over the humanitarian disaster caused by the Palestinian-Israel conflict. “We agree that the U.N. Security Council resolution on a cease-fire must be fully implemented and without any condition,” said Wang.

China and Indonesia both support full Palestinian membership in the United Nations. Currently, the Palestinian Authority is a nonmember observer state, but it has sought full membership since 2011.

Indonesia does not recognize Israel and has strongly supported the Palestinian cause.

Meeting with Widodo

At a meeting with President Joko Widodo, Wang expressed China’s interest in deepening cooperation and investment in energy transition, infrastructure, and the production and marketing of refined petroleum products.

Widodo highlighted bilateral trade between Indonesia and China and expressed hopes that China will further open its market for Indonesian goods, including by resolving disputes over Indonesian agricultural and fishery products.

Widodo also urged the construction of a strategic petrochemical project in Northern Kalimantan and further collaboration on food security, including replicating Chinese-style cultivation methods in growing rice, horticultural crops and durian fruit.

China is Indonesia’s biggest trade partner, with a yearly trade volume reaching more than $127 billion. China is also one of Indonesia’s biggest foreign investors, with an investment value of more than $7.4 billion in 2023.

Indonesia and China will discuss the details of increasing cooperation on Friday in Labuan Bajo, East Nusa Tenggara province.

Apart from economic cooperation, Marsudi said that efforts to tackle cross-border crimes, including online fraud, will be discussed at the event.

Wang will also visit Papua New Guinea and Cambodia.

Later Thursday, Wang met with Widodo and his soon-to-be successor, President-elect Prabowo Subianto, the current defense minister of Indonesia.

Prabowo won the presidential election in February, and like his predecessor, he supports close ties with Beijing while seeking to balance diplomatic relations between the U.S. and China.

The Indonesian Defense Ministry said Thursday that Wang and Prabowo discussed plans for joint military exercises.

Some information for this report came from Reuters, The Associated Press and Agence France-Presse.
…

Taipei, Taiwan — A new report by a team of Tibet-focused cybersecurity analysts details how hackers with links to the Chinese government are using cyber espionage tactics to target members of the Tibetan government-in-exile and the office of the Tibetan spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama.

“Spyware-as-a-Service,” which was released Thursday, uses information from an enormous data leak in February from Chinese cybersecurity firm I-Soon. According to the report, hackers have been targeting the mobile phones of officials from the Central Tibetan Administration, or CTA, since 2018 and the large amount of information Chinese hackers have collected could pose significant security risks to them and those in their social networks.

That targeting, “represents a significant shift in the tactics used by threat actors, signaling an adaptation to modern communication methods and an understanding of the increasing reliance on mobile devices for both personal and professional activities,” the report said. Tibet-focused research network Turquoise Roof published the report.

The February data dump was a treasure trove of information about China’s cyber espionage and other activities. Leaked documents revealed that private firm I-Soon’s clients include the Chinese police, China’s Ministry of Public Security, and the People’s Liberation Army. The leaked information also detailed tools and tactics used by the organization and connections among hacking groups in China. 

‘Tip of an iceberg’

These new findings provide a glimpse into “the sprawling cyber espionage apparatus” that China has used to target ethnic minorities over the last few decades, says Greg Walton, senior investigator at U.K.-based security consulting firm Secdev Group.  

“While the revelation is only the tip of an iceberg, it’s a very revealing one,” said Walton, who is the report’s author.

“The findings help us learn more about the opaque system [that the Chinese authorities] have been using to target the West,” he told VOA by phone.

One leaked white paper described in the report focused on how I-Soon used compromised e-mail inboxes of exiled Tibetan authorities to demonstrate how their system can satisfy the demand of China’s intelligence agencies to “mine through substantial volumes of intercepted email data.” 

“The platform is engineered to facilitate investigations into an individual’s ‘interpersonal network’ and to intricately map the social networks of targeted individuals,” the report wrote. 

Walton said the white paper offers rare insight into the “capabilities of the Chinese party-state.” 

“[Since] we know that I-Soon has been selling their services to Chinese intelligence agencies, including the public security bureau in Tibet, we make the point in the report that the harvested social network analysis from the exiles’ inboxes could be sold to the authorities in Tibet,” he told VOA. 

In his view, Chinese authorities could incorporate “the web of personal and professional connections” identified from the compromised e-mail inboxes of exiled Tibetan officials into the big data policing platform that they use to crack down on the local community in Tibet. 

“The platform is instrumental in a campaign that criminalizes even moderate cultural, religious expressions, language rights advocacy and surfaces links to exile Tibetan networks,” Walton said. 

In response to the report’s findings, the Chinese Embassy in Washington said Beijing has “always firmly opposed and cracked down on all forms of cyber hacking” according to law. 

The accusation from the report “is a complete reversal of black and white,” Liu Pengyu, the spokesperson of the Chinese Embassy, told VOA in a written response. 

A long history of threats from Chinese cyber espionage

The CTA and the Tibetan diaspora community have been targets of Chinese cyber espionage for more than a decade. In 2008, an extensive cyber operation called “GhostNet,” which is connected to a specialized division of the People’s Liberation Army, caused serious problems across the Tibetan community. 

Between November 2018 and May 2019, some senior members of Tibetan groups received malicious links in tailored WhatsApp text exchanges with operators disguised as NGO workers and other fake personas, according to research conducted by the University of Toronto’s Citizen Lab.

According to Turquoise Roof’s report, the escalation of cyber operations against the CTA by China’s military and intelligence services is “in step with” the exiled Tibetan government’s increased investment in its digital presence and reliance on digital systems for interacting with the diaspora community.

Some Tibetan organizations have been conducting training to enhance their resilience against Chinese cyberattacks. 

“The Tibet Action Institute provides tech assistance to exiled Tibetan organizations and they often teach us about the security measures we can adopt to prevent our accounts or digital devices from being hacked,” Ngawang Lungtok, a researcher at the Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy, told VOA by phone. 

The CTA has also been focusing on upgrading its technical capacity and offering orientations to all Tibetan officials in recent years.

“The Tibetan Computer Resource Center offers training and workshops regularly,” Tenzin Lekshay, the spokesperson of the CTA, told VOA in a written response. 

Walton adds that the CTA even sent people to the United States for specialized training. 

“The CTA has some good people trained in the U.S. and is now in the position to help tackle risks extended from Chinese cyberattacks,” he said. 

The report says the I-Soon leak offers significant insight into the Chinese authorities’ use of AI-driven surveillance systems to “enforce political controls” within and beyond its border. It also showcases Beijing’s efforts to “refine its espionage capabilities” by using novel intelligence tactics against vulnerable populations like the Tibetans before global deployment. 

Considering the impact of cyber espionage on the Tibetans, Walton said he believes investing in the protection of vulnerable populations from digital transnational repression “is an example of” aligning traditional security with human rights advocacy. 
…

washington — A senior U.S. intelligence official is casting doubt on China’s ability to make good on plans to possibly reunify Taiwan by force by its self-imposed deadline.

Various U.S. military and intelligence officials have testified publicly in recent years that Beijing’s own planning documents show President Xi Jinping has ordered the Chinese military to be ready to take Taiwan by force should efforts to reunify the island by other means fail.

They also have said China’s unprecedented military modernization and expansion efforts have been in line with the order to have an invasion plan ready to go by 2027 at the latest.

But Dave Frederick, the U.S. National Security Agency’s assistant deputy director for China, is not sure they can meet that deadline.

“It’s a pretty ambitious goal, so [I] won’t make any predictions on whether they hit it or not,” Frederick said at a security conference in Nashville, Tennessee. He added that China “remains focused on that 2027 capabilities” goal but that obstacles remain.

One of those challenges, he said, is the ability of China’s military to land troops on the island of Taiwan.

An amphibious landing “would be a really, really challenging military problem for them,” Frederick said. “[A] very difficult military problem for them to pull off.”

However, he acknowledged that China is building a fourth amphibious landing craft and that “history’s got many examples of [a] government deciding to pursue a policy that may not even be in their best self-interest, and certainly in cases where military victory isn’t guaranteed.”

Chinese officials dismissed the talk, though, telling VOA by email the situation with Taiwan is “a matter that must be resolved by the Chinese [people].”

“If the U.S. truly hopes for peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait, it should abide by the one-China principle and the three China-U.S. joint communiqués,” said Liu Pengyu, a spokesperson for the Chinese Embassy in Washington.

Washington should “stop meddling in the Taiwan question and stop creating new factors that could lead to tensions in the Taiwan Strait,” Liu added.

Frederick is not the first U.S. official to caution that China’s military expansion, buoyed by new equipment and weapons systems, may be outpacing its actual capabilities.

The U.S. Defense Department’s annual China Military Power Report issued late last year cautioned that Beijing itself believes it still faces some deficits as it tries to field a force capable of fighting and winning wars against other capable adversaries.

“They still have a long way to go in terms of having the level of military capability that we judge that they think that they need to advance their global security and economic interests,” a senior U.S. defense official told reporters at the time.

The official called the lack of combat experience “one of the shortcomings that the PRC highlights in a lot of their own self assessments.”

Top U.S. intelligence officials have said that despite China’s desire to be able to take Taiwan by force, perhaps as early as next year, they believe Xi has not decided whether to use that option.

“Beijing will continue to apply military and economic pressure as well as public messaging and influence activities while promoting long-term cross-Strait economic and social integration to induce Taiwan to move toward unification,” according to last month’s annual threat assessment by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.

A separate assessment by the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency published last week concluded that “Beijing appears willing to defer the use of military force as long as it calculates that its unification with Taiwan ultimately can be negotiated.”

“The costs of armed conflict would outweigh the benefits, and its stated red lines have not been crossed by Taiwan, the United States, or other countries,” the DIA report added.
…

taipei, taiwan — A Vietnamese delegation’s visit to China last week has underscored increasingly close economic ties between the territorial rivals, which analysts say is posing a challenge to the dominance of South Korean investment in Vietnam.

Vietnam’s National Assembly Chairman Vuong Dinh Hue led the high-level delegation from April 7 to 12 and met with Chinese President Xi Jinping.

Hue proposed the two countries create a new push for trade development and “connect Vietnam to China’s large development strategies.”

He also met with the heads of many large Chinese companies that want to participate in Vietnam’s infrastructure construction.

China is Vietnam’s largest trade partner and on the way to becoming its biggest foreign direct investor.

A representative of the Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry, or KCCI, in Vietnam last week told Nikkei Asia that Chinese companies are pushing back South Korean firms as China steps up investment in Vietnam.

“Looking at the cumulative amount of investment in Vietnam since 1988, South Korea ranks first with $85.8 billion, ahead of Singapore and Japan. However, in recent years, Korea has been in a neck-to-neck competition with China,” Kim Hyong-mo told the Japan-based Asia news magazine.

More current figures provided by Vietnam’s Ministry of Planning and Investment put South Korean foreign direct investment since 1988 at $87 billion, accounting for more than 18% of the total, followed by Singapore at $76 billion, Japan, Taiwan and Hong Kong.

But in 2023, South Korea ranked fifth after Singapore, Japan, Hong Kong and China, which led in terms of newly registered projects.

According to Joeffrey Maddatu Calimag, an assistant professor at the Department of Global Business Management at Kyungsung University in Busan, South Korea, competition between South Korean and Chinese companies is increasingly fierce.

“South Korean conglomerates like Samsung Electronics Limited have notably ramped up or increased their investment or R&D spending to counter the investments of China’s in terms of this sector, the mobile technology,” he told VOA.

“And Chinese companies have demonstrated impressive R&D growth, which can heighten the competition for South Korean firms in Vietnam. These combined with China’s technological advancements, presents a formidable challenge to South Korean companies operating in the region,” he said.

South Korea’s Samsung is by far the largest single foreign investor in Vietnam.

Vietnam’s Hanoi Times newspaper reports Samsung invested more than $1 billion in Vietnam in 2023, for a total of more than $22 billion, and is expected to invest a further $1 billion per year.

South Korean lens module manufacturer LG Innotek announced last year that it would invest an additional $1 billion in capital in Haiphong City, bringing the company’s total investment in Vietnam to more than $2 billion.

But China’s investment is heating up.

Vietnam’s Trade Ministry said this month that Chinese automaker Chery signed a joint venture agreement with a Vietnamese company to build a factory in Vietnam at an investment of $800 million, becoming the first Chinese EV manufacturer in Vietnam. China’s BYD, the world’s largest EV maker, also plans to set up a factory in Vietnam.

Reuters reported in November that Chinese solar panel manufacturer Trina Solar, one of five Chinese solar firms the U.S. says used plants in Southeast Asia to avoid duties on panels made in China, plans to nearly double its investment in Vietnam to almost $900 million.

China-based economist and finance commentator He Jiangbing notes that since U.S.-China trade tensions erupted in 2018, many Chinese companies have invested in Southeast Asia to avoid made-in-China tariffs. He says China’s domestic overcapacity has also forced Chinese companies to accelerate their overseas deployment.

“The focus of Southeast Asia is Vietnam because [China and Vietnam] are geographically closer. Vietnam also has a large population, with more than 100 million people. It also hoards a large part of the industrial chain transferred from mainland China,” He said. “Wherever the industrial chain moves, Chinese companies will follow.”

Nguyen Tri Hieu, a Vietnamese American economist, says Vietnam is politically closer to China, a fellow one-party communist state, than democratic South Korea.

“In Vietnam, there is a saying that the relationship between China and Vietnam is just like the teeth and the lips,” he told VOA. “South Korea is politically more remote. I would say [South] Korea is important but is not in the same position as China.”

But unlike Hanoi, Seoul has no territorial dispute with Beijing that could threaten to upend the relationship.

China’s and Vietnam’s competing claims to areas in the South China Sea have not halted trade and investment but they have at times slowed it down amid clashes and tensions.

Beijing claims most of the South China Sea as its own, putting it in conflict with Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan and Vietnam.

  Adrianna Zhang contributed to this report.
…

BANGKOK — Myanmar’s jailed former leader Aung San Suu Kyi has been moved from prison to house arrest as a health measure due to a heat wave, the military government said. On Wednesday it also granted amnesty for over 3,000 prisoners to mark this week’s traditional New Year holiday.

Suu Kyi, 78, and Win Myint, the 72-year-old former president of her ousted government, were among the elderly and infirm prisoners moved from out of prison because of the severe heat, the military’s spokesperson, Maj. Gen. General Zaw Min Tun, told foreign media representatives late Tuesday. The move has not yet been publicly announced in Myanmar.

Suu Kyi’s transfer comes as the army has been suffering a string of major defeats in its fight against pro-democracy resistance fighters and their allies in ethnic minority guerrilla forces. The nationwide conflict began after the army ousted the elected government in February 2021, imprisoned Suu Kyi and began suppressing nonviolent protests that sought a return to democratic rule.

Suu Kyi has been serving a 27-year prison term on a variety of criminal convictions in a specially-built wing of the main prison in the capital Naypyitaw, where Myanmar’s meteorological department said temperatures reached 39 degrees Celsius (102.2 degrees Fahrenheit) on Tuesday afternoon. Win Myint was serving an eight-year prison sentence in Taungoo in Myanmar’s Bago region.

Suu Kyi’s supporters and independent analysts say the charges were fabricated in an attempt to discredit her and legitimize the military’s seizure of power. The military had claimed that her National League for Democracy Party used widespread electoral fraud to win a landslide victory in the 2020 general election, an allegation independent observers found unconvincing.

According to the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, an independent group that monitors casualties and arrests, more than 20,351 people arrested on political charges since the 2021 army takeover are still in detention, most of whom have not received criminal convictions.

Suu Kyi’s health has reportedly deteriorated in prison. In September last year, reports emerged that she was suffering from symptoms of low blood pressure including dizziness and loss of appetite, but had been denied treatment at qualified facilities outside the prison system.

Those reports could not be independently confirmed, but her younger son Kim Aris said in interviews that he had heard that his mother has been extremely ill and has been suffering from gum problems and was unable to eat. Aris, who lives in England, urged that Myanmar’s military government be pressured to free his mother and other political prisoners.

News about Suu Kyi is tightly controlled by the military government, and even her lawyers are banned by a gag order from talking to the media about her cases. Her legal team has faced several hurdles, including being unable to meet with her to receive her instructions since they last saw her in person in December 2022.

Whether the latest move was meant to be temporary was not announced.

Before being sent to prison, Suu Kyi was reportedly held in a military safe house inside an army base.

Other prisoners were released for the Thingyan New Year holiday, state-run MRTV television announced Wednesday, but it wasn’t immediately clear if those released included pro-democracy activists and political prisoners who were detained for protesting army rule.

MRTV said that the head of the ruling military council, Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing, had pardoned 3,303 prisoners, including 28 foreigners who will be deported from Myanmar. He also reduced sentences for others. Mass amnesties on the holiday are not unusual in Myanmar.

Suu Kyi, the daughter of Myanmar’s martyred independence hero Gen. Aung San, spent almost 15 years as a political prisoner under house arrest by previous military governments between 1989 and 2010. Her tough stand against military rule turned her into a symbol of the nonviolent struggle for democracy and won her the 1991 Nobel Peace Prize.
…

WASHINGTON — South Korea is cautiously optimistic about alliance upgrades that the U.S. and Japan have planned to bolster security in East Asia and the Indo-Pacific region.

A South Korean Foreign Ministry spokesperson said the ministry “noted” that the U.S. and Japan, at their summit in Washington last week, spoke of “the defensive nature of the U.S.-Japan alliance” and emphasized “peace and stability” in the region.

The spokesperson continued via email to VOA’s Korean Service on Friday that “South Korea, the U.S. and Japan are making efforts to institutionalize expanded trilateral cooperation through agreements made at Camp David last year” and “to strengthen rules-based international order.”

The three countries held a trilateral summit at Camp David in August after Seoul and Tokyo mended ties frayed by disputes rooted in Japan’s colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula from 1910 to 1945.

At their bilateral summit held in Washington on April 10, Washington and Tokyo announced wide-ranging plans to revamp their military ties. 

The plans include preparations for Japan to develop and produce with the U.S. military hardware, including hypersonic missile interceptors.

U.S. Ambassador to Japan Rahm Emanuel toured a Mitsubishi Heavy Industries F-35 fighter jet factory near Nagoya on Tuesday. He underlined the importance of Japan’s role in manufacturing weapons as U.S. supplies run thin amid crises in Europe and the Middle East.

The plans announced at the summit also call for Japan’s possible involvement in the AUKUS Pillar II security pact, enabling it to develop quantum computing, hypersonic, undersea and other advanced technologies. 

AUKUS is a defense and security group of Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States. AUKUS Pillar 2 refers to a suite of cooperative activities conducted by the three nations to develop and field “advanced capabilities.” 

Japan will hold trilateral exercises with the U.S. and the U.K. starting in 2025 as the Indo-Pacific and Euro-Atlantic regions become “ever-more linked,” according to the joint statement. 

The plans call for Japan to expand its security role and arms buildup in tandem with efforts to implement a national security strategy issued in 2022. That called for an increase in Japan’s defense budget and a shift from a defense-only policy to one that includes counterstrike capabilities amid threats from North Korea and China. 

In December, Japan eased its arms export control regime that had allowed it to sell components but not completed weapons. 

Cho Han-Bum, a senior research fellow at the Korea Institute for National Unification, said “Japan’s arms reinforcement can be viewed as a double-edged sword.”  

In an interview Monday with VOA’s Korean Service, he said the arms buildup significantly helps to deter threats from the Chinese military and North Korean nuclear weapons, but that it concerns South Korea.

Due to unresolved historical disputes from Japan’s colonization of Korea from 1910 to 1945, “trust” between the militaries of the two countries “is not restored fully,” even as they cooperate together now, he said.

South Korea, Japan, and the U.S. conducted a two-day joint naval exercise in the East China Sea from April 11 to 12. The exercise included anti-submarine warfare drills to counter North Korea’s underwater threats and interdiction drills aimed at blocking the North’s weapons shipments. 

South Korea, under President Yoon Suk Yeol, has been pursuing a policy of rapprochement with Tokyo, and has aligned itself closely with Washington in countering Beijing’s economic and military coercion.  

Under the previous administration of Moon Jae-in, Seoul relied for its security on the U.S. while bolstering economic relations with China. Ties with Tokyo remained tense. 

Much of the anti-Japanese sentiment still runs high in South Korea, despite Yoon’s outreach to Tokyo, especially among progressives who increased their majority in an April 10 parliamentary election. 

South Korea’s Foreign Ministry lodged a protest on Tuesday against Japan’s claim over a disputed island that sits midway between the two countries, called Dokdo by South Korea and Takeshima by Japan. 

Won Gon Park, an adjunct professor of North Korean studies at Ewha Womans University in Seoul, said South Korea now has to “make a choice” whether to work more closely with Japan to counter threats from North Korea and China.

He said in an interview with VOA’s Korean Service that this might be necessary, as the U.S. builds a regional security structure to bolster defenses against China. 

At their summit, the U.S. and Japan also announced a planned revision of the command structure of U.S. forces in Japan. This will complement Japan’s plan to establish a joint operations command to improve coordination of its air, ground, maritime forces by 2025. 

Bruce Bennett, a senior defense analyst at the RAND Corporation, said Washington “is increasingly anxious to have global partners” step up their arms manufacturing because the U.S. is not producing enough military hardware to counter all the threats from Russia, China, North Korea and Iran.

Speaking with VOA by telephone on Friday, Bennett said what was announced at the summit was that “Japan would be a global partner,” enabling the U.S. to share highly sensitive “information, technology and other capabilities in exchange for taking responsibility with security and stability in the regions that go outside Northeast Asia.”

He added, “The U.S. recognizes South Korea can’t afford to send multiple divisions to other areas around the world because of the North Korean threats” but is “anxious” to have South Korea play a deeper global role, especially in the Indo-Pacific. 

Kim Hyungjin contributed to the report.
…

Taipei, Taiwan — China’s growing security presence in the Pacific will be scrutinized this week as the Solomon Islands holds its national election on Wednesday. While the Pacific island nation has been plagued by a slew of domestic issues such as youth unemployment and weakening health and education systems, some analysts say the election is a “de-facto referendum” on its relationship with China.

“The results will determine whether the Solomon Islands continues growing its relationship with China or changes course in favor of a different approach,” Parker Novak, a nonresident fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Global China Hub, told VOA in a written response.

Solomon Islands Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare, who seeks an unprecedented second consecutive term, has focused on deepening the country’s ties with China since he returned to power in 2019.

After switching Solomon Islands’ diplomatic recognition from Taiwan to China in 2019, Sogavare signed a series of security-related agreements with China, including a security pact in 2022 and a police cooperation agreement in 2023.

The developments prompted the U.S., Australia and other Pacific island nations to express concerns about the security implications of these deals. So far, the Solomon Islands hasn’t revealed details of the controversial security pact with China.

However, a leaked draft agreement shows that China could potentially deploy security and naval assets to the country.

The lack of transparency around the security deal with China has prompted several opposition candidates in the Solomon Islands to vow to abolish or review the security pact.

While opposition leaders have sounded the alarm about China’s growing security presence in the Solomon Islands, Sogavare has strongly defended his administration’s efforts to deepen bilateral ties with China.

Centering his campaign around his signature “Look North strategy,” which aims to consolidate Solomon Islands’ economic and diplomatic ties with Asian countries, Sogavare has repeatedly emphasized how Chinese support with infrastructure developments and the Pacific Games has helped place the Pacific island nation “in a more favorable footing domestically and internationally.”

In response to opposition politicians’ concerns about China’s growing influence over the Solomon Islands, China’s Foreign Ministry said Monday that Beijing supports the people of Solomon Islands “in choosing a development path that suits their national conditions.”

Some experts say China’s entry into the Solomon Islands’ security sector in recent years has created friction with traditional security partners like Australia. “There has been an increase in friction as a result of China’s entry into the security space in the Solomon Islands and other parts of the Pacific,” said Mihai Sora, a research fellow in the Pacific Islands program at Lowy Institute in Australia.

While the Solomon Islands is trying to retain relationships with partners like Australia amid its efforts to deepen ties with China, Sora said the Sogavare administration’s attempt will be difficult to execute because of continuing “strategic friction” between Beijing and Canberra, especially in the security space. [The Solomon Islands] “will need to resolve the increasing frictions,” he told VOA by phone.

Chinese security presence in the Pacific comes into focus

In addition to the Solomon Islands, China’s growing security presence in other parts of the Pacific region is also coming under scrutiny ahead of other major political events. Earlier this month, Tonga’s Prime Minister Siaosi Sovaleni said he would be open to accepting Chinese security support when the country hosts the Pacific Islands Forum in August.

“There’s no reason to be concerned. China is offering to assist with the hosting of the foreign leaders’ meeting,” he told reporters in the Tongan capital Nukuʻalofa.

The Chinese Embassy in Tonga told AFP in a statement that Beijing “has no interest in geopolitical competition or seeking the so-called ‘sphere of influence.’”

Some analysts say Tonga’s decision to welcome China as a potential security provider reflects Pacific island nations’ efforts to diversify their security partners since 2021.

“China has had success in presenting itself as a security stakeholder in the region and this is certainly of concern to Canberra, Wellington and Washington, who view China’s security interests in the Pacific as disruptive and indicative of China’s broader interests,” Anna Powles, an associate professor in security studies at Massey University in New Zealand, told VOA in a written response.

Meanwhile, Fiji’s Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka told ABC Australia in March that the country has removed Chinese police embedded in its police force despite the earlier decision to uphold Fiji’s policing cooperation agreement with China.

Some experts say Fiji is “walking a fine line” in its relationship with China and Western countries. “By not throwing away the police deal, Fiji is showing that they are not willing to go all in and align with the West,” Michael Walsh, an affiliated researcher at the Georgetown School of Foreign Service, told VOA by phone.

In his view, Fiji’s careful calibration of its security relationship with China demonstrates that “they are going to keep having a relationship with China that extends into the security domain for the foreseeable future.”

While some experts agree that China has made progress in expanding its security presence in the Pacific, Novak from the Atlantic Council said Beijing’s security influence in the region “shouldn’t be overstated.”

“More often than not, Pacific islands countries have elected to maintain or even grow traditional security partnerships with countries like Australia, New Zealand and the United States while carefully maintaining their own sovereignty,” he told VOA.
…