TAIPEI, TAIWAN — A new survey by Chinese media shows that housing rents in Beijing, Shanghai and Shenzhen have fallen to 2015–2017 levels, while rents in Guangzhou, Chengdu and Tianjin have dropped to the early 2010s levels.
Analysts attribute the decline in rents to falling household incomes, which have weakened demand.
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WASHINGTON — Chinese President Xi Jinping’s recent meeting with tech executives, including Jack Ma, signals a shift from regulatory crackdowns to a more supportive stance toward China’s private sector.
This follows China’s cyclical pattern of tech regulation: initial leniency, strict crackdowns, and eventual relaxation to restore market confidence.
The policy shift stems from economic concerns as China faces slowing growth and needs for the private sector to drive innovation and employment. While the tech sector enters a period of regulatory easing, the duration remains uncertain as China’s regulatory pendulum could swing back if new economic or political concerns emerge.
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Manila — A young kidnap victim clad in pajamas and missing a finger was rescued from the side of a busy Manila thoroughfare this week after his abductors ditched him during a police pursuit, Philippine authorities said Wednesday.
The kidnappers, like their teenaged target, were Chinese nationals, said the interior department’s Juanito Victor Remulla, and part of a “sophisticated” syndicate with ties to the now-banned offshore gambling sites known locally as POGOs.
Notorious as fronts for human trafficking, money laundering and fraud, POGOs were banned by President Ferdinand Marcos last year, sending those who worked for them in search of new income streams.
“We are definite that the syndicate behind the kidnapping were former POGO operators,” Remulla told reporters, adding those involved had lost a lucrative living when the sites were shuttered.
The kidnappers tried and failed to obtain a ransom — at one point sending the parents a video of the victim’s finger being severed — before they were tracked down on Tuesday and pursued by police who homed in on their cellphone signal.
“The choice was pursuing the vehicle or securing the child. Obviously, the [police] prioritized the child,” Remulla said. A manhunt remains underway.
The boy’s driver, who had picked him up outside an exclusive private school days earlier, was found murdered inside another vehicle in Bulacan province north of Manila.
“These [cases] arose in January after all POGOs were closed; they got into kidnapping,” Remulla said, without providing statistics.
AFP is aware of at least two other kidnapping cases involving Chinese nationals living in the Philippines this year.
While describing the incident as “Chinese against Chinese” crime, Remulla said disaffected former Filipino police or soldiers were likely used as foot soldiers in some cases.
Gilberto Cruz, chief of the Philippines’ anti-organized crime commission, told AFP that government figures showed there were still about 11,000 Chinese nationals in the country after the gambling sites they worked for were shuttered.
“Some have turned to other crimes, but we can’t provide numbers as of now,” he said, before adding that some had likely ventured into “kidnapping operations.”
At a press conference on Wednesday, the immigration department said about 300 foreign nationals linked to POGOs were being held at a detention facility built for 100 while awaiting deportation.
In a separate statement, the department said 98 Chinese nationals had been repatriated to China aboard a chartered Philippine Airlines flight on Tuesday night.
The Chinese embassy said the joint repatriation marked “another step in the law enforcing cooperation of the two countries after the ban on POGOs.”
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BANGKOK — At least 18 people were killed and 23 injured in eastern Thailand on Wednesday after the brakes failed on a tour bus and it rolled upside down into a ditch, police said.
“It was a downhill road and the brakes failed, and the driver lost control of the vehicle before it overturned,” said Colonel Sophon Phramaneehe, adding that those who died were adults on a study trip.
There were 49 people on the bus, all Thai, including the driver, the police official told Reuters.
Social media posts showed rescue and medical workers at the scene in Prachinburi province, 155 km east of the capital Bangkok, helping victims near the bus with its undercarriage exposed.
Thai Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra expressed her condolences to the victims’ families and said an investigation was taking place.
“If it is found that there is a violation of the use of vehicles that do not meet the standards or are involved in reckless use of vehicles, legal action will be taken,” she said in a post on X.
“Inspection of vehicles must be safe and pass the specified standards before they are put into use to prevent accidents and reduce losses like this again,” she said.
Road accidents and fatalities are common in Thailand due to weak enforcement of vehicle safety standards and poorly maintained roads. The Southeast Asian nation ranked ninth out of 175 World Health Organization member countries for road traffic deaths, according to its 2023 report.
Last year, a school bus caught fire due to a gas cylinder leak, killing 23 people, including 16 students.
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PENTAGON — President Donald Trump’s nominee for deputy secretary of defense is warning that China’s military is resolute on surpassing the United States and is calling for a fix to “significant” military shortages at a time when administration leaders are trying to make big budget cuts.
“China is incredibly determined, they feel a great sense of urgency, and they’ll be fully dedicated to becoming the strongest nation in the world and having dominance over the United States,” Steve Feinberg told members of the Senate Armed Service Committee on Tuesday.
Feinberg, a businessman and investor, said the U.S. military shortages include “shipbuilding, nuclear modernization, aircraft development, cyber defense, hypersonics, counter space, defending our satellites [and] counter drones.”
“We really need to plug these shortages, focus on our priorities, get rid of legacy programs, be very disciplined, while at the same time focusing on the economics. If we do that, given America’s great innovative capability, entrepreneurship, we will defeat China. If we don’t, our very national security is at risk,” Feinberg said.
The hearing comes as Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth has called on the department to cut 8% — roughly $50 billion — to reinvest in priorities aligned with a “more lethal fighting force.”
Senator Jack Reed, the top Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee, on Tuesday pushed back against the move saying, “Slashing the defense budget will not create efficiency in our military. It will cripple it.”
The concern about cuts to the military has echoed on both sides of the aisle.
Republican committee Chairman Roger Wicker told the Breaking Defense news organization last month that he hoped to increase defense spending by as much as $200 billion in coming years.
And Republican Senator Dan Sullivan on Tuesday called for prioritizing solutions to shipbuilding to counter threats from China and others.
“We’re in the worst crisis in shipbuilding in over 40 years. The Chinese are building a giant navy. It’s already bigger than ours,” he said.
China’s military has about 370 warships, according to the Pentagon’s latest China Military Power Report, while the U.S. military has about 300.
Feinberg acknowledged that the shipbuilding shortage is “a tough problem” for the military.
“Our supply chain is definitely weak. Our workforce needs to be improved. But a big piece of improving our supply chain is working more closely with our private sector. We have companies that can get at where our needs are, where our shortages are, and we need to work more closely with them. We need people inside of government that understand their issues,” Feinberg said.
Several Democrats on the committee were critical of interference at the Pentagon by the Department of Government Efficiency, saying it could create a major vulnerability should its members not handle data more carefully.
“They [DOGE] just sent an unclassified email with CIA recent hire names in an unclassified space. As a former CIA officer, you just blew the cover of someone who was going to risk their life abroad to protect our country,” said Democratic Senator Elissa Slotkin.
“Do you know how appetizing it is for our adversaries to have this data? … It is quite literally an issue of safety and security,” she added.
Democrats also raised concern about plans to let go more than 5,000 Pentagon civilian employees this week, while Republican Senator Markwayne Mullin countered that cutting 5,000 jobs amounted to less than 0.5% of the workforce.
“Our national debt is now costing us more to just pay interest than we spend on our military. That’s a huge national security risk,” he said. “And so, at what point do we start making cuts?”
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BANGKOK — Thailand is emerging as one of Russia’s main pipelines for machine and computer parts with the potential for military use, with a growing number of local companies accused of helping Moscow evade Western export controls meant to cripple its war on Ukraine.
Since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the United States has imposed sanctions on seven companies in Thailand for exporting these “high priority items” to Russia, the last of them in December.
Trade data published last year by S&P Global, a financial analytics and services firm based in New York, also show a huge spike in these exports out of Thailand since 2022.
Thailand eluded mention when the U.S. Treasury and Commerce departments started warning in mid-2023 of third countries being used to funnel high-priority items to Russia as a way of skirting the West’s export controls.
“So, it was a surprise to see them … as a new country or a new location which had been involved in this type of goods transaction,” Byron McKinney, a sanctions risk and supply chain expert at S&P Global Market Intelligence, told VOA of his team’s research.
Supply chains hit by sanctions, McKinney said, are “a little like water in a stream — if you try damming in one place, it will try and move around. So, Thailand kind of appeared in this way, as a country which wasn’t there originally for the transshipment or transit of these goods but has appeared later on.”
Within days of the 2022 invasion, the U.S. Commerce Department placed export controls on dozens of high-priority items it said Russia needed most “to sustain its brutal attack on Ukraine,” from ball bearings to microchips. These are commonly known as dual-use goods for their potential to be put to both civilian and military use.
A 2024 report by McKinney and his team shows China exporting or reexporting the vast majority of these goods to Russia since the invasion — over $6 billion worth in 2023 alone. It also shows countries funneling more such goods to Russia than Thailand.
But of the 14 countries whose exports and reexports to Russia that the report breaks down, Thailand saw the sharpest spike of any, from $8.3 million in 2022 to $98.7 million in 2023, a jump of over 1,000%.
Thailand’s 2023 shipments also included an especially large proportion of the most sensitive, high-priority goods such as microchips, designated by U.S. Customs as Tier 1.
More recent data shared with VOA by S&P Global show Thailand’s exports and reexports of high-priority goods to Russia again topping $90 million in 2024.
McKinney said the trade routes on which the goods are shipped are in constant flux.
But for the time being, he added, “Thailand just happens to be in an area where there’s the possibility to transit these goods easier or quicker because maybe the regulation is a bit more light touch, for example, than it would be in other locations. So, it kind of gets picked on from that particular perspective and … turns up as a particular transit or transshipment hub.”
The U.S. has put sanctions on seven Thailand-registered companies in the past 13 months.
The first was NAL Solutions in January 2024. In announcing the sanctions, the U.S. Treasury Department said NAL was part of a network of companies controlled by Russian national Nikolai Aleksandrovich Levin channeling electronics and other goods from the United States and other countries to Russia.
Washington sanctioned another five firms in Thailand in October, including Intracorp, which Treasury accused of setting up other companies that send high-priority goods to Russia.
Treasury also tied Thailand’s Siam Expert Trading — added to the sanctions list in December — to the TGR Group, which it described as “a sprawling international network of businesses and employees that have facilitated significant sanctions circumvention on behalf of Russian elites.”
Five of the seven firms did not reply to VOA’s repeated requests for comment about the sanctions. The other two could not be reached.
Spokespersons for the Thai government and Ministry of Commerce, which oversees the country’s exports and company licensing, did not reply to VOA’s requests for comment either.
Since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Thailand has been keen to keep up warm diplomatic and economic ties with Russia.
At an international summit on China’s Belt and Road Initiative in Beijing two years ago, Thailand’s prime minister at the time, Srettha Thavisin, hailed his country’s “close relations” with Russia, shook hands with Russian President Vladimir Putin and invited him to Thailand.
“When Srettha became prime minister in 2023, he was focused like a laser on economic growth and viewed Russia as a useful economic partner,” Ian Storey, a senior fellow at the ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute in Singapore, told VOA. “Visa-free entry was extended for Russian tourists, and the authorities turned a blind eye to incidents of antisocial behavior and illegal activities.”
He said Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra, who replaced Srettha last year, has carried on both his fixation on economic growth and neutral stance on the Russia-Ukraine war.
Just last month at Putin’s invitation, Thailand joined BRICS, a group of developing countries with Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa at its core, focused on forging closer economic ties.
And while bilateral trade between Russia and Thailand has been falling in recent years, Storey says Russians have become major players in Thailand’s property market. They have also helped boost Thailand’s tourism sector, a pillar of the economy.
In an interview with Russia’s state-owned TASS news agency in 2023, Vitaly Kiselev, president of the Thai-Russian Chamber of Commerce, said Western sanctions on Moscow were also opening up more trade opportunities between Russia and Thailand. He said chamber membership was on the rise.
Given Thailand’s priorities, and U.S. President Donald Trump’s approach to negotiating an end to the Russia-Ukraine war, Storey doubts that Thai authorities will step in to stop the country’s trade in dual-use goods.
“If Bangkok hasn’t taken action to crack down on this trade three years after the war started, there’s little chance that it will do so now, especially as the Trump administration is making nice with Russia,” he said.
Across Asia, only Japan, Singapore, South Korea and Taiwan have imposed trade restrictions or other sanctions on Russia since the 2022 invasion.
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TAIPEI, Taiwan — Taiwanese authorities are investigating a Chinese-crewed ship suspected of severing an undersea communications cable in the latest such incident adding to tensions between Taipei and Beijing.
Taiwan’s coast guard intercepted the Togolese-flagged cargo ship Hongtai in waters between its main island’s west coast and the outlying Penghu Islands early Tuesday, according to a statement by the coast guard.
The coast guard had earlier been notified by telecommunications provider Chunghwa Telecom that one of its undersea cables had been severed 6 nautical miles (11 kilometers) northwest of Jiangjun Fishing Harbor.
The Hongtai had been anchored in that same area since Saturday evening, the coast guard said. From Saturday until early Tuesday, authorities in the nearby Anping Port in Tainan had sent signals to the vessel seven times but had received no response. After the Chunghwa Telecom cable damage report, the coast guard approached the ship, which had begun to sail northwestward, and escorted it to Anping Port.
Taiwanese authorities said the ship’s entire eight-person crew were Chinese nationals and the case was being handled “in accordance with national security-level principles.”
“The cause of the underwater cable break, whether it was due to intentional sabotage or simply an accident, is still pending further investigation for clarification,” the coast guard said.
“The possibility of this being part of a gray-zone incursion by China cannot be ruled out,” it added.
Communications on the Penghu Islands were not disrupted because Chunghwa Telecom had successfully activated a backup cable, the coast guard said.
This is the latest in a series of incidents in recent years in which undersea Taiwanese cables have been damaged — with Taipei in some instances blaming China. Earlier this year, a Chinese cargo ship was suspected of severing a link northeast of the island.
In February 2023, two undersea cables serving Taiwan’s Matsu Islands were severed, disrupting communications for weeks.
Taipei fears China might damage its underwater communications cables as part of attempts to blockade or seize the island, which Beijing claims as its own.
A Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson said during a regular press briefing on Tuesday that he was not aware of the issue and it did not pertain to diplomacy.
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HONG KONG — A Chinese national political adviser has recommended lowering the legal age for marriage to 18 to boost fertility chances in the face of a declining population and “unleash reproductive potential,” a state-backed newspaper said on Tuesday.
Chen Songxi, a member of the National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), told the Global Times that he plans to submit a proposal on completely relaxing restrictions on childbirth in China and establish an “incentive system” for marriage and childbirth.
Chen’s comments come ahead of China’s annual parliamentary meeting next week where officials are expected to announce measures to offset the country’s declining population.
The legal age for marriage in China is 22 for men and 20 for women, amongst the highest in the world, compared with most developed countries where the legal marriage age is 18.
Chen said China’s legal marriage age should be lowered to 18 “to increase the fertility population base and unleash reproductive potential.”
It is to be consistent with international norms, Chen said.
China’s population fell for a third consecutive year in 2024, as marriages plummeted by a fifth, the biggest drop on record, despite efforts by authorities to encourage young couples to wed and have children.
Much of China’s demographic downturn is the result of its one-child policy imposed between 1980 and 2015. Couples have been allowed to have up to three children since 2021.
Chen said China should remove restrictions on the number of children a family can have to meet the “urgent needs of population development in the new era.”
However, a rising number of people are opting to not have children, put off by the high cost of childcare or an unwillingness to marry or put their careers on hold.
Authorities have tried to roll out incentives and measures to boost baby making including expanding maternity leave, financial and tax benefits for having children, as well as housing subsidies.
But China is one of the world’s most expensive places to bring up a child, relative to its GDP per capita, a prominent Chinese think tank said last year, detailing the time and opportunity cost for women who give birth.
CPPCC, a largely ceremonial advisory body, meets in parallel with parliament. It is made up of business magnates, artists, monks, non-communists and other representatives of broader society, but has no legislative power.
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The top U.S. Army officer for the Asia-Pacific region began a two-day visit to Cambodia Monday in a trip designed to expand and improve frayed ties between the two nations.
General Ronald P. Clark, the commanding general of the United States Army Pacific met with Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Manet and senior Cambodian military officials in Phnom Penh.
Ties between the U.S. and Cambodia have been strained with Washington’s criticism of Cambodia’s political repression and human rights violations.
However, the U.S. and other countries are also greatly concerned with Cambodia’s close ties with China. Of special interest is China’s access to the Ream Naval Base near the disputed South China Sea, a waterway China claims almost in full.
In 2016, an international tribunal in The Hague rejected China’s sweeping claims. The naval base is strategically located in the Gulf of Thailand, which borders the western section of the South China Sea. The base’s renovation was funded by China.
China has contributed massive amounts of money to Cambodia’s updating of its infrastructure with the help beginning when the prime minister’s father, Hun Sen, was leading the country.
That funding continues and later Monday, Manet met with Yin LI, a member of the Politburo of the Chinese Communist Party, according to a post on the prime minister’s Telegram account.
The post said the Li praised the progress on “all cooperation in all fields” between Cambodia and China.
During the meeting, Clark also expressed his admiration for Cambodia for sending U.N. peacekeepers to several international locations, according to the prime minister’s office.
The prime minister also thanked the U.S. for its assistance in helping to clear explosives from Cambodia after years of war that left Cambodia in the late 1990s with 4 million to 6 million land mines and other unexploded ordnance, including unexploded U.S. bombs.
Clark also met Monday with General Mao Sophan, Cambodia’s military chief.
The two military generals had “constructive discussions,” the army said in a statement. Topics of their talks included defense, trade, tourism, counterterrorism, peacekeeping and demining, the Cambodian army said.
Their discussion also included the possible revival of the Angkor Sentinel exercise, the joint military exercises previously held by the U.S. and Cambodia that were abandoned nearly 10 years ago, the army said.
Some information provided by The Associated Press and Agence France-Presse.
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President Donald Trump pledged last week to impose an additional 25% tariff on U.S.-bound imports of cars, semiconductors and medical products, possibly after April – a move that experts believe could significantly affect Taiwan.
TSMC, which is based in Taiwan and the world’s largest contract chipmaker, may suffer the most as 60% of its revenues are believed to be generated in the U.S.
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Beijing — China’s rising demand for food calls for increased efforts to boost grain production even after record-high output in recent years, China’s Central Rural Work Leading Group said on Monday.
“More than 1.4 billion of us want to eat, and we want to eat better and better,” Han Wenxiu, a director from China’s Central Rural Work Leading Group told a news conference.
More people eat meat, eggs and milk in greater volumes, which requires a large-scale increase in grain for feed, Han said.
China is the world’s largest agriculture producer and importer, bringing in more than 157 million metric tons of grain and soybeans last year, when it also reported record grain production of 706.5 million tons.
In its annual rural work policy blueprint released on Sunday, known as the No. 1 document, the State Council sharpened China’s focus on self-sufficiency and supply stability to counter potential disruptions to agricultural trade with the United States, the European Union and Canada.
Last year’s bumper harvest helped to stabilize prices and relieved consumers’ concerns, Han said.
But he cited “the current complex and severe domestic and international environment,” and said the need to buffer shocks from extreme weather conditions called for increased output.
“The central government’s policy is clear: grain production can only be strengthened, not relaxed. We must not say that grains have passed the test just because of a momentary downturn in prices,” he said.
China has further potential to develop and integrate biotechnology, strengthen equipment support and build a diversified food supply system to ensure food security, he said.
The agriculture ministry aims to increase grain production by 50 million tons by 2030, which would be a 7% increase over 2024’s grain harvest.
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Manila, Philippines — Japan and the Philippines agreed on Monday to further deepen defense ties in the face of an “increasingly severe” security environment in the Indo-Pacific region, Japanese defense minister Gen Nakatani said on Monday.
Nakatani met his Philippine counterpart Gilberto Teodoro in Manila for a meeting in which the two ministers tackled regional security issues, including the maritime situation in the East and South China Seas.
“The security environment surrounding us is becoming increasingly severe and that it is necessary for the two countries as strategic partners to further enhance defense cooperation and collaboration to maintain peace and stability in Indo-Pacific,” Nakatani said through a translator.
Nakatani said the Philippines and Japan have agreed to deepen cooperation on military exchanges, establish a high-level strategic dialogue among its military and deepen information sharing.
Security ties between the two U.S. allies have strengthened over the past two years as Japan and the Philippines share common concerns over China’s increasingly assertive actions in the region.
Last year, Manila and Tokyo signed a landmark military pact allowing the deployment of their forces on each other’s soil.
Japan and China have repeatedly faced off around uninhabited Japanese-administered islands that Tokyo calls the Senkaku and Beijing calls the Diaoyu.
The Philippines and China have also clashed frequently in the South China Sea around disputed shoals and atolls that fall inside Manila’s exclusive economic zone.
Nakatani visited military bases in the northern Philippines on Sunday, including a naval station that houses a coastal radar that Japan donated as part of its $4 million security assistance in 2023.
Manila was one of the first recipients of Tokyo’s official security assistance, a program aimed at helping boost deterrence capabilities of partner countries.
In December, the two countries signed a second security deal in which Japan agreed to provide the Philippine navy rigid-hull inflatable boats (RHIB) and additional coastal radar systems.
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Bangkok — In a record year for internet shutdowns, countries in the Asia-Pacific region imposed the most restrictions, according to a new report.
Myanmar is the worst-affected country worldwide, with 85 shutdowns last year, research by the digital rights group Access Now found.
Its report, released Monday, Feb. 24, shows authorities worldwide imposed at least 296 shutdowns in 54 countries. Conflict — followed by protests, school or university exams and elections — was the biggest trigger, Access Now found.
For the Asia-Pacific region, the report finds 202 shutdowns in 11 countries or territories. It is the highest number ever recorded by Access Now in a single year for the region.
The three countries with the worst record are all in Asia: 190 cases in Myanmar, India and Pakistan accounted for around 64% of all recorded shutdowns in 2024. India, often referred to as the biggest democracy in the world, had 84 recorded cases.
VOA contacted Myanmar’s military administration, and the Washington embassies for India and Pakistan for comment. As of publication, VOA had not received a reply.
Raman Jit Singh Chima, the Asia Pacific policy director at Access Now, warned of a rise of digital authoritarianism in Asia.
“Shutdowns destabilize societies, undermine digital progress, put entire communities at risk, and provide a cloak of impunity for human rights abuses,” he said in a statement. “Authorities from Myanmar to Pakistan are isolating people from the rest of the world with impunity, reflecting the rising digital authoritarianism in Asia.”
Access Now collects data on shutdowns, which include cables being cut, equipment confiscated, platforms being blocked, and orders to telecommunication companies.
‘Rebirth’ of radio
Since seizing power in a coup in February 2021, the junta in Myanmar has regularly blocked access to the internet. The junta says the blocks are to maintain “stability” and prevent what it calls the spread of disinformation and fake news.
At the same time, the junta has jailed dozens of journalists and revoked media licenses.
Out of the 85 shutdowns imposed in Myanmar last year, 31 coincided with documented human rights abuses and at least 17 correlated with airstrikes on civilians, the Access Now report found.
The record puts the country among the worst for digital rights for the fourth consecutive year, the report found.
Toe Zaw Latt, a veteran journalist from Myanmar, told VOA it was “no surprise” that the country tops the list.
“Myanmar has one of the worst censorship [records] on digital platforms,” he said. “[The military does this] so most of the people can’t access independent information or internet mainly, especially young people. They just want one version of truth, the army’s version of truth.”
Zaw Latt said the junta is trying to prevent “independent access of information on the internet.”
A journalist for decades, Zaw Latt is also secretary of the Independent Press Council Myanmar. He said the internet blocks have seen a “rebirth” in radio.
“Globally, radio is dying but it’s having a rebirth in Burma because it’s cheap and accessible,” he said, using the country’s former name. “Even some people go back, very primitive, back to print because of these internet shutdowns.”
Still, Zaw Latt said, it is not possible to completely cut off the internet, “because people will find a way.”
Alongside shutdowns the junta has passed laws to further control the information narrative.
On Jan. 1, a cybersecurity law was enacted in Myanmar, banning the use of Virtual Private Networks, or VPNs, that people use to access blocked or censored content. The law penalizes those who share information from banned websites. Experts say it’s another attempt from the junta to suppress public information.
Two other Asian countries — Malaysia and Thailand — also made the list for the Southeast Asia region for the first time.
Thailand was included after it shut electricity and internet connections on its border with Myanmar following an attempt to crack down on scam centers that have lured thousands into forced labor and scammed billions from internet users worldwide.
Overall, press freedom in East Asia continues to see a decline, according to Reporters without Borders. The global watchdog reports that 26 out of 31 countries in the Asia-Pacific region have seen a decline in press freedoms between 2023 and 2024.
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SUSONO — Woven City near Mount Fuji is where Japanese automaker Toyota plans to test everyday living with robotics, artificial intelligence and autonomous zero-emissions transportation.
Daisuke Toyoda, an executive in charge of the project from the automaker’s founding family, stressed it’s not “a smart city.”
“We’re making a test course for mobility so that’s a little bit different. We’re not a real estate developer,” he said Saturday during a tour of the facility, where the first phase of construction was completed.
The Associated Press was the first foreign media to get a preview of the $10 billion Woven City.
The first phase spans 47,000 square meters (506,000 square feet), roughly the size of about five baseball fields. When completed, it will be 294,000 square meters (3.1 million square feet).
Built on the grounds of a shuttered Toyota Motor Corp. auto plant, it’s meant to be a place where researchers and startups come together to share ideas, according to Toyoda.
Ambitious plans for futuristic cities have sputtered or are unfinished, including one proposed by Google’s parent company Alphabet in Toronto; “Neom” in Saudi Arabia; a project near San Francisco, spearheaded by a former Goldman Sachs trader, and Masdar City next to Abu Dhabi’s airport.
Woven City’s construction began in 2021. All the buildings are connected by underground passageways, where autonomous vehicles will scuttle around collecting garbage and making deliveries.
No one is living there yet. The first residents will total just 100 people.
Called “weavers,” they’re workers at Toyota and partner companies, including instant noodle maker Nissin and Daikin, which manufactures air-conditioners. Coffee maker UCC was serving hot drinks from an autonomous-drive bus, parked in a square surrounded by still-empty apartment complexes.
The city’s name honors Toyota’s beginnings as a maker of automatic textile looms. Sakichi Toyoda, Daisuke Toyoda’s great-great-grandfather, just wanted to make life easier for his mother, who toiled on a manual loom.
There was little talk of using electric vehicles, an area where Toyota has lagged. While Tesla and Byd emerged as big EV players, Toyota has been pushing hydrogen, the energy of choice in Woven City.
Toyota officials acknowledged it doesn’t expect to make money from Woven City, at least not for years.
Keisuke Konishi, auto analyst at Quick Corporate Valuation Research Center, believes Toyota wants to work on robotic rides to rival Google’s Waymo — even if it means building an entire complex.
“Toyota has the money to do all that,” he said.
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Moscow — Myanmar and its close ally Russia signed a memorandum on investment cooperation in a special economic zone in Dawei, including construction of a port and an oil refinery, Russia’s Ministry of Economic Development said on Sunday.
The document was signed by the head of the Russian ministry, Maxim Reshetnikov, and Myanmar’s minister for investment and foreign economic relations, Kan Zaw, during a visit of a Russian delegation to the Southeast Asian country.
“The text of the memorandum contains the basic parameters of several large infrastructure and energy projects that are being implemented jointly with Russian companies in Myanmar,” the Russian ministry cited Reshetnikov as saying in a statement.
“We are talking about projects to build a port, a coal-fired thermal power plant and an oil refinery.”
He added that “oil refining is still the most complex element,” and there was no final decision on construction of a refinery.
“As for the refinery — there is a desire of the Myanmar side to have a refinery. Our companies are still studying the economics of such a project, it is very complicated from the point of view of economic feasibility,” Interfax news agency cited Reshetnikov.
According to the Russian ministry, the Dawei special economic zone is a 196 square-kilometer project in the Andaman Sea which is planned to house high-tech industrial zones and transport hubs, information technology zones and export processing zones.
Russia has become Myanmar’s closest ally since the military coup that overthrew Aung San Suu Kyi’s elected civilian government in February 2021.
Moscow and Naypyidaw have been discussing a deeper energy cooperation, including Russia’s participation in the construction of a gas pipeline to the Myanmar’s main city Yangon. Russia has also had plans for a nuclear research reactor in the country.
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MANILA, PHILIPPINES — A village in the densely populated Philippine capital region launched a battle against dengue Wednesday by offering a token bounty to residents for captured mosquitos — dead or alive.
The unusual strategy adopted by the Addition Hills village in Mandaluyong City reflects growing concern after the nearby city of Quezon declared an outbreak of the mosquito-borne illness over the weekend. Eight more areas reported an upsurge in cases of the potentially deadly viral infection.
At least 28,234 dengue cases have been recorded in the Philippines this year up to Feb. 1, a 40% increase compared to the same period last year, according to health department statistics. Quezon City declared a dengue outbreak Saturday after deaths this year reached 10 people, mostly children, out of 1,769 residents infected.
A urban village of more than 100,000 residents living in crowded neighborhoods and residential condominium towers, Addition Hills has done clean-ups, canal declogging and a hygiene campaign to combat dengue. But when cases spiked to 42 this year and two young students died, village leader Carlito Cernal decided to intensify the battle.
“There was an alarm,” Cernal told The Associated Press. “I found a way.”
Residents will get a reward of one Philippines peso (just over 1 cent) for every five mosquitos or mosquito larva they turn in, Cernal said.
Critics warned the strategy could backfire if desperate people start breeding mosquitoes for the reward. Cernal said that was unlikely because the campaign would be terminated as soon as the uptick in cases eases.
As the campaign began, about a dozen mosquito hunters showed up at the village office. Miguel Labag, a 64-year-old scavenger, handed a jug with 45 dark mosquito larvas squirming in some water and received a reward of nine pesos (15 cents).
“This is a big help,” Labag said, smiling. “I can buy coffee.”
Dengue is a mosquito-borne viral infection found in tropical countries worldwide. It can cause joint pain, nausea, vomiting and rashes, and in severe cases can cause breathing problems, hemorrhaging and organ failure. While there is no specific treatment for the illness, medical care to maintain a person’s fluid levels is seen as critical.
Officials in another village in Quezon City were considering releasing swarms of frogs to eat mosquitoes.
Health Secretary Teodoro Herbosa said it’s crucial to clean up mosquito breeding sites, and for anyone who might be infected to seek immediate medical attention. Despite an increase in dengue infections, the Philippines has managed to maintain low mortality rates, he said.
Dengue cases surged unexpectedly ahead of the rainy season, which starts in June, likely because of intermittent downpours that have left stagnant pools of water where dengue-causing mosquitos can breed, Health Undersecretary Alberto Domingo said, adding that climate change was likely contributing to off-season downpours.
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HO CHI MINH CITY, VIETNAM — Analysts are pointing to management and funding issues for Vietnam’s planned north-south, high-speed rail initiative and express concerns over potential “debt traps” and growing Chinese influence as Beijing funds a railway connecting the two countries.
The comments come as Vietnam is expanding its infrastructure by building railways using Chinese and Vietnamese funding, projects that could help the country’s outlook in the long term. As part of the effort, Vietnam’s National Assembly on Feb. 19 gave near-unanimous approval to legislation allowing the country to use Chinese loans for a new $8.3 billion rail link from the port city of Haiphong to China.
Nguyen Hong Minh, then the transport minister, announced Vietnam’s plans to use the Chinese loans for the 391-kilometer passenger and freight line from Lao Cai on the Chinese border and passing through Hanoi.
“Vietnam’s current railway system is outdated, and the country needs a new system to support its economic development,” Minh, now the construction minister, said, adding that construction is expected to begin this year and be completed by 2030.
The National Assembly vote followed its November approval of construction of a high-speed railway connecting Hanoi to the country’s southern economic hub, Ho Chi Minh City. That project is Vietnam’s most ambitious infrastructure initiative to date and is projected to cost Vietnam $67 billion. Authorities said construction should begin in 2027 and be completed by 2035.
Ha Hoang Hop, chair of the Hanoi-based Think Tank Viet Know, told VOA on Feb. 17 that while both projects could modernize the country’s transport network and improve its economy, “public sentiment is cautious.”
“There have been several publicly funded railway and infrastructure projects in Vietnam that have led to public frustration due to delays, cost overruns and poor-quality outcomes,” Hop said.
“Public skepticism is also fueled by fears of debt traps associated with Chinese loans,” he said.
Hop cited fear the construction of the high-speed rail project could be dogged by the country’s “historical issues with project management and corruption.”
“There is indeed concern that the north-south, high-speed rail could face similar challenges given the scale and complexity of the project,” Hop said.
Mismanagement and corruption
Albert Tan, associate professor at the Asian Institute of Management in Manila, told VOA on Feb. 18 that while Vietnam’s railway modernization will improve the country’s supply chain efficiency, the major problem is corruption.
“The corruption level in Vietnam is so high that when you have that amount of money that the Chinese are pumping in, I’m sure there will always be leakages,” he said.
Tan said railway funds ending up in “someone’s pocket” have caused delays and cost overruns for Vietnam’s two city Metro lines. In 2021, the Chinese-funded Cat Linh-Ha Dong Metro line began running in Hanoi, five years behind its originally planned opening. The first line of the Ho Chi Minh City Metro, primarily funded by Japan, opened in December 2024, six years behind schedule. Costs ballooned for both Metro lines while under construction and delayed payments to contractors slowed the process.
“Somehow the money doesn’t go back to the contractor. Money goes somewhere to other stakeholders,” Tan said.
For the north-south, high-speed rail, Hop said the country is planning to rely on domestic funding with capital likely to come in the form of “government bonds, public investment and possibly some low-interest loans.”
“A $67 billion project will still be a significant challenge requiring careful financial management,” Hop said.
Chinese influence
Hanoi’s decision to pursue domestic funding for its high-speed rail shows the country’s drive to “maintain strategic autonomy,” Hop said. As it looks to Chinese loans for another rail project, though, “there remains a significant portion of the populace wary of increasing economic dependency on China,” he added.
Tran Anh Quan, a Vietnamese social activist currently living in exile, told VOA on Feb. 18 he fears the Chinese-funded railway will leave Hanoi indebted to Beijing and could be a weak point if conflict were to break out between the countries.
“This is definitely a debt trap,” he said. “Expanding the railway to China would be very dangerous if China attacked Vietnam.”
Tan also shared concerns over the “one-way” flow of money. He said the Chinese loans are likely to be paid to Chinese firms that will “retain control over construction and maintenance, with little technology transfer to local engineers.”
Joshua Kurlantzick, senior fellow for Southeast Asia and South Asia at the Council on Foreign Relations, told VOA that Chinese influence in the region is already “massive.” He said Chinese funding for the Vietnamese railway is in line with Beijing’s goal to expand its influence in Southeast Asia.
The railway “fits right into China’s efforts to link the Mekong region, and to connect them to China,” he wrote in an email.
Kurlantzick said that in Vietnam’s delicate balancing act between Washington and Beijing, China is taking the upper hand as he sees U.S. influence waning with the withdrawal of funding to Vietnam through USAID and weakening public diplomacy more broadly.
“China is by far the dominant economic power in Southeast Asia already, increasingly the dominant security power, and now, with the U.S. giving up its soft power in the region, China will increasingly bolster its soft power in the region, too, making it even more dominant,” Kurlantzick said.
Minh Son To, a research assistant focused on Vietnamese and Chinese politics at Singapore’s Nanyang Technological University, told VOA February 20 Hanoi has looked to Laos with concern after a China-funded high-speed rail threw the country into an “existential debt crisis.” Still, he said many are eager to see Vietnam develop.
“Any ‘China’ label is bound to evoke some concern, though I wouldn’t overstate that,” he told VOA. “Vietnamese know that they need development and infrastructure, regardless of where it comes from.”
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Congressman Riley Moore recently wrote an op-ed urging the administration to ban all student visas for Chinese nationals to prevent the CCP from using U.S. academic institutions as platforms for espionage. Experts told VOA Mandarin that due to the number of espionage cases Chinese students in the U.S. involved in, it might be more helpful to close the CCP-sponsored Chinese students and scholars’ associations on U.S. campuses.
Click here for the full story in Mandarin.
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WASHINGTON — U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent traded policy complaints with Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng on Friday, with Bessent telling Beijing to do more to curb fentanyl trafficking and rebalance its economy, and He voicing concerns about President Donald Trump’s new tariffs, the two governments said.
The top economic officials from the world’s two largest economies agreed to keep up communications, the Treasury said in a readout of the introductory video call.
“Secretary Bessent expressed serious concerns about the PRC’s counternarcotics efforts, economic imbalances, and unfair policies, and stressed the Administration’s commitment to pursue trade and economic policies that protect the American economy, the American worker, and our national security,” the Treasury said, using the acronym for China’s official name, the People’s Republic of China.
Earlier, Chinese state media reported that He expressed concerns to Bessent over U.S. tariffs and trade restrictions on China during the call.
The two sides had an “in-depth” exchange of views on important issues in China-U.S. economic relations, and both agreed to keep communicating on matters of mutual concern, according to a readout released by Chinese state media.
He, the lead China-U.S. trade negotiator on the Chinese side, and Bessent recognized the importance of bilateral economic and trade relations, the readout said.
More tariffs
China and the United States are seeking to manage their relationship as they stand on the precipice of a renewed trade war.
Trump imposed 10% tariffs on all Chinese goods in early February, citing China’s failure to stanch fentanyl trafficking.
Beijing retaliated by imposing targeted tariffs of up to 15% on some U.S. imports, including energy and farm equipment, and put several companies, including Google, on notice for possible sanctions.
Trump has also planned further reciprocal tariffs for all countries that tax U.S. imports, a move that is likely to further escalate global trade tensions. During his election campaign, Trump threatened 60% tariffs on all Chinese imports.
Trump said earlier this week he expected Chinese President Xi Jinping to visit the U.S., without giving a timeline for such a trip.
Bessent said on Thursday he would tell his Chinese counterpart that China needed to rebalance its economy and rely more on domestic consumption for growth and less on investment and exports.
“They are suppressing the consumer in favor of the business community,” Bessent told Bloomberg Television.
Similar arguments
The U.S. had a $295.4 billion goods trade deficit with China in 2024, down from a peak of $418.2 billion in 2018, the year Trump began imposing new tariffs on some $370 billion of Chinese imports.
But last year’s deficit rose $16.3 billion from 2023 as Chinese exporters rushed to beat a new round of Trump tariffs.
Bessent’s predecessor, former Treasury secretary Janet Yellen, met several times with He in recent years and lodged similar complaints about China’s state-led economic policies.
She argued during a trip to China last year that those policies were leading to excess production capacity that was threatening the viability of firms in the U.S. and other market economies, a warning that laid the groundwork for former President Joe Biden’s steep tariff hikes on electric vehicles, semiconductors and solar products.
He and other Chinese officials never accepted U.S. excess capacity assertions, arguing that China’s EV and other key industries are simply more competitive.
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SYDNEY — Airlines modified flight paths between Australia and New Zealand on Friday after China notified Australia that the People’s Liberation Army Navy would hold live-fire exercises off the New South Wales coast in international waters, a rare event.
Australia’s Prime Minister Anthony Albanese told reporters on Friday afternoon that the time period for the Chinese navy exercises had expired, and it was unclear if live fire had been used by the Chinese navy.
“China issued, in accordance with practice, an alert that it would be conducting these activities, including the potential use of live fire. It’s outside of Australia’s exclusive economic zone,” he said, indicating it was at least 370 kilometers offshore.
“According to defense, there has been no imminent risk of danger to any Australian assets or New Zealand assets, and that’s why this notification occurs,” he added.
A People’s Liberation Army Navy frigate, cruiser and replenishment vessel last week entered Australia’s maritime approaches, and traveled down Australia’s east coast this week, monitored by the navies and air forces of Australia and New Zealand.
Airlines were contacted by Australia’s air traffic control agency on Friday warning them of reports of live fire where the Chinese navy task group was operating, the agency and Australian officials said.
“The Civil Aviation Authority and Airservices Australia are aware of reports of live firing in international waters,” air traffic control agency Airservices Australia said in a statement.
“As a precaution, we have advised airlines with flights planned in the area,” it added.
Qantas and its low-cost arm Jetstar were monitoring the airspace and temporarily adjusted some flights across the Tasman Sea between Australia and New Zealand. Air New Zealand said it had modified flight paths as needed to avoid the area, with no impact to its operations, while Virgin Australia was following instructions from Airservices Australia.
Albanese said he had contacted New Zealand’s Prime Minister Christopher Luxon about the matter.
“The chief of the defense force has advised that it’s not clear whether there was any actual live fire used in this area, but it is consistent with international law,” Albanese said. Foreign Minister Penny Wong would raise the matter with her Chinese counterpart in South Africa, where they are attending the G20 foreign ministers meeting, he added.
Wong said the live fire was “an evolving situation.”
“We do have concerns about the transparency associated with this and the notice, and I certainly will be having a discussion with (China’s) Foreign Minister Wang about that,” she said in an ABC television interview Friday.
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SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA — South Korea’s ousted premier said on Thursday that he had opposed suspended President Yoon Suk Yeol’s declaration of martial law, testifying for the first time at his former boss’s impeachment trial about the events of a night that threw the country into turmoil.
Han Duck-soo was impeached by parliament as acting president and prime minister in December over alleged obstruction of the trial that could formally remove Yoon from office for his martial law decree.
He appeared before that trial for the first time on Thursday, telling Seoul’s Constitutional Court he had “expressed my opposition” to Yoon’s decision to suspend civilian rule on the night of Dec. 3.
Han said he and most of his fellow cabinet members “believed such a declaration would put South Korea in serious difficulty” and that he recalled them “being concerned and trying to dissuade it.”
The court said later on Thursday the final hearing will be held on the 25th.
The judges will then deliberate behind closed doors, with elections required within 60 days if Yoon is removed.
Yoon walked out of the court just five minutes after proceedings began on Thursday, according to a pool report.
His lawyer Yoon Kap-keun told reporters the ousted president felt it was “inappropriate” for him to sit in the same court room with Han “or for the president to watch the prime minister testify.”
“It is not good for the nation’s prestige,” his lawyer quoted Yoon as saying.
Yoon returned later to hear the testimony of former senior intelligence official Hong Jang-won, seen as a key figure in the decision to declare martial law.
Hong has claimed to be in possession of a memo containing a list of names of individuals Yoon ordered arrested during the night of the martial law declaration, including the leaders of the opposition and Yoon’s own ruling party.
“I will do my best to recount everything as I remember it,” Hong told reporters before the hearing.
Court footage showed Yoon shouting at Hong, accusing him of plotting his impeachment.
Given the opportunity to speak by one of the court’s eight judges, Yoon acknowledged that it was “unnecessary and wrong” to try to track the locations of politicians on the night of the decree but also said he was doing it simply to “monitor movements” and not to “arrest” them.
The head of South Korea’s National Police Agency, who is also on trial on insurrection charges related to the martial law decree, is another witness.
Courting controversy
The impeachment hearing was Yoon’s second of the day. He also appeared in court in the morning to answer charges of insurrection, becoming South Korea’s first sitting president to stand trial in a criminal case.
The 64-year-old former prosecutor has been behind bars since he was arrested last month on those charges, for which he could be sentenced to life in prison — or face the death penalty — if convicted.
Yoon attended that hearing but did not speak, an AFP journalist in the packed courtroom said.
Prosecutors have accused the suspended president of being the “ringleader of an insurrection.”
They argued on Thursday against releasing him, saying he could try to “influence or persuade those involved in the case.”
Yoon’s lawyer Kim Hong-il condemned the “illegal probe,” telling the court the “investigating body has no jurisdiction.”
“The declaration of martial law was not intended to paralyze the state,” Kim said.
Instead, he said, it was meant to “alert the public to the national crisis caused by the legislative dictatorship of the dominant opposition party, which had crippled the administration.”
Much of Yoon’s impeachment trial has centered on the question of whether he violated the constitution by declaring martial law, which is reserved for national emergencies or times of war.
The crisis has plunged South Korea into months of political turmoil with protests, two impeachments and a surge of online disinformation.
Yoon also sent a message rallying his supporters on Thursday, urging “the older and established generations to work together with the younger generation.”
“If that happens, I will be able to swiftly return to my duties and lead South Korea with the power of generational integration,” Yoon said, according to his lawyers.
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U.S. President Donald Trump has said, “The Gaza Strip would be turned over to the United States by Israel at the conclusion of fighting.” Beijing rebuffed those plans, saying it opposes forced displacement of Palestinians to neighboring countries. How will a Gaza takeover plan impact the U.S.-China competition in the Middle East?
Click here for the full story in Mandarin.
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Impeached South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol appeared in two Seoul courtrooms Thursday, first to hear criminal insurrection charges and then to face a Constitutional Court impeachment trial, both in connection with his short-lived, Dec. 3 imposition of martial law.
Yoon was taken by motorcade from the Seoul Detention Center, where he is being held, to the Central District Court for the preliminary hearing on the insurrection charges prosecutors filed last month.
In that hearing, Yoon’s lawyers argued that his declaration of martial law was not intended to paralyze the state, but to “alert the public to the national crisis caused by the legislative dictatorship of the dominant opposition party, which had crippled the administration.”
The lawyers also asked for Yoon’s release from detention, although it was unclear when the court would rule on that request.
Yoon next traveled to the Constitutional Court for the tenth and final scheduled hearing in the trial over validity of his impeachment for declaring martial law.
In Yoon’s first appearance at that trial, the court heard testimony from Prime Minister Han Duck-soo, who was also impeached by National Assembly lawmakers for his role in the early December declaration. Yoon briefly left the courtroom during Han’s testimony, with Yoon’s lawyers explaining they felt it was inappropriate for the two to be seen together.
Han told the court that while he shared Yoon’s views on the liberal opposition, he and the rest of the cabinet disagreed with the president’s declaration of martial law and even tried to dissuade him. To his knowledge, the prime minister added, none of the cabinet members supported the action.
The Constitutional Court is reviewing parliament’s Dec. 14 vote to impeach Yoon and will decide whether to permanently remove him from office or reinstate him.
The court is considering if Yoon violated the constitution while Yoon and his lawyers have argued that he never intended to fully impose martial law but had only meant the measures as a warning to break a political deadlock.
If Yoon is removed, a new presidential election must be held within 60 days. The court is expected to deliver its ruling in early or mid-March.
Some information for this report came from The Associated Press, Reuters and Agence France-Presse.
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SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA — The vast majority of human rights groups focused on North Korea face an existential crisis after receiving notices from the U.S. government that their grant funds have been frozen, according to several sources among the predominantly Seoul-based NGOs.
The National Endowment for Democracy, or NED, established by Congress to strengthen democratic institutions globally, and the State Department’s Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor Bureau, which provide most of the groups’ funding, sent the notices over the last several weeks, according to documents reviewed by VOA.
The freeze threatens to devastate an already fragile collection of North Korea human rights groups, potentially wiping out vital sources of advocacy and research on one of the world’s most closed and repressive states, which has a population of 25 million.
Hanna Song, executive director of the Database Center for North Korean Human Rights, told VOA her organization, like many others in Seoul, is now in “survival mode” because of the funding freeze.
“I just really don’t know how many will be able to survive,” said Song, whose organization works directly with North Koreans who have fled the North and has long been a key repository of data on Pyongyang’s abuses.
Trump policy shift
The funding freeze is part of U.S. President Donald Trump’s broader push to reshape the federal bureaucracy and realign taxpayer spending with his “America First” agenda, in coordination with billionaire businessman Elon Musk.
The NED has been repeatedly attacked by Musk, who has called it a “scam” and an “evil organization [that] needs to be dissolved.”
In a message sent last week to several North Korea-focused human rights organizations, the NED said it has “unfortunately been unable to access our previously approved funds” and “may not be able to provide additional payments to your organization.”
“Once you run out of money, consider your NED grant agreement suspended,” the message added.
Meanwhile, a January 24 notice from the State Department bureau ordered organizations receiving grants to immediately stop all work, even if already funded.
The bureau has reportedly fired dozens of contractors and is also subject to a Trump executive order suspending foreign aid for 90 days. Although aid could theoretically resume, the pause has already had devastating consequences for many North Korea advocacy groups.
Survival mode
Song’s Seoul-based center, whose mission includes providing psychosocial support to North Korean defectors, has had to postpone counseling sessions while they look for new funding, Song said.
“It’s just absolutely destroying groups working on North Korea,” said Sokeel Park, South Korea country director at Liberty in North Korea, which helps North Korean defectors escape and resettle. “It’s by far the biggest crisis facing NGOs working on this issue since the start of the movement in the 1990s,” he said in an interview.
Although the group does not receive direct U.S. government funding, Park said other organizations have been forced to reduce salaries, furlough staff, or halt projects midstream.
The freeze threatens a broad range of activities, including support for North Koreans who have fled, efforts to transmit information into and out of the country, and raising global awareness of its abuses.
The crisis comes at a time when gaining insight into North Korea is more challenging than ever. Since the COVID-19 pandemic, strict border controls have made escapes rare and slowed the flow of information, leaving the outside world with extremely little insight into the reclusive country.
This isolation has coincided with a decline in global attention to North Korea more generally, which has made it harder for organizations to diversify their funding sources, activists say.
Seoul’s inconsistency
While South Korea, a wealthy democracy bordering the North, might seem like a natural alternative source of funds, it has failed to consistently support North Korea-focused NGOs, mainly because the issue is politically sensitive in Seoul.
Conservative governments, which take a harder line on the North, often condemn its human rights abuses and provide more backing for civil society groups. In contrast, left-leaning governments tend to focus on improving ties with Pyongyang, favoring humanitarian aid directly to the North Korean government in the hope that better relations will eventually lead to improved human rights.
South Korea’s inconsistency on the issue is unfortunate, Lee Jung-hoon, former South Korean ambassador for North Korean human rights under conservative President Park Geun-hye told VOA.
“In fact, we should be the ones providing funding to American NGOs working on North Korea… we should be at the forefront of this,” Lee, now a dean and professor of international relations at Seoul’s Yonsei University, said.
After taking office in 2022, South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol pledged to improve North Korea’s “horrendous” human rights situation. However, in December, Yoon unexpectedly declared martial law to combat what he called “anti-state forces,” leading to his impeachment and possible removal from office.
With Yoon’s future uncertain, the left-leaning Democratic Party is seen as the favorite to reclaim the presidency. Such political volatility has made many NGOs hesitant to accept South Korean government funding, fearing it could be easily withdrawn.
As a result, many organizations have felt compelled to rely on U.S. government funding – primarily from NED and the State Department. With that money now frozen, many groups are scrambling to fill the gaps by seeking support from European governments and major private donors, Park said.
North Korea-focused groups, though, are competing with countless global causes for limited funds.
Song said no one wants to be in a position where they’re saying North Korea is a more important issue events in Myanmar or Syria, “But it’s gotten to the point where it’s just survival mode.”
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