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Category: East
East news. East is the direction toward which the Earth rotates about its axis, and therefore the general direction from which the Sun appears to rise. The practice of praying towards the East is older than Christianity, but has been adopted by this religion as the Orient was thought of as containing mankind’s original home
Reporter’s Notebook: Is China Really Opening to the World?
beijing — Over the last few weeks, China has gone to great lengths to give the impression that it is opening up to the world – whether for foreign businesses, tourists or journalists.
I can’t speak with certainty on these claims. I’m not a China specialist, but a regional reporter who covers what often feels like an impossibly large part of the world, including China.
But my recent experience on a short reporting trip to Beijing reveals the difficulties faced by foreign journalists working in the country. It’s an experience that goes against the official narrative of an “opening up” in China.
Recently, the Chinese government invited me to cover the country’s biggest annual political event, including a meeting of its National People’s Congress, which wrapped up this week in Beijing.
I hadn’t expected to get a visa. Journalists working for U.S. and many other Western news outlets have been mostly shut out of China since the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, when U.S.-China tensions spiked, and the country entered a severe three-year period of lockdowns and strict COVID controls.
No VOA journalist had been given a visa for China since 2020, other than a State Department correspondent who was part of a traveling press pool during a visit by U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken.
By my count, China handed out at least seven short-term journalist visas for U.S. and European media to cover the week-long political gathering, known as the “Two Sessions,” during which China’s political elite delivered a consistently upbeat message about China’s struggling economy.
Mixed messages
It doesn’t take an expert to see that China faces a long list of problems. Even after lifting its COVID-19 lockdown at the beginning of last year, China’s economy has seen some of its slowest growth in decades. Foreign investment has plunged, amid geopolitical tensions and a series of high-profile detentions of Chinese and foreign businesspeople. And fewer tourists are coming to China compared to before the pandemic.
At the Two Sessions, China downplayed those challenges, setting an ambitious economic growth target of about 5% for the year. But while authorities promised to reduce barriers to tourism and foreign trade, they also tightened the Communist Party’s grip over the government and expanded national security laws that many foreign critics already saw as vague.
As a journalist, I also sensed inconsistent messaging. While China restored pre-COVID levels of media access at the Two Sessions, it canceled the usual press conference given by the premier at the end of the gathering. Many reporters felt conflicted about the cancellation; while it was clear the questions at this press conference were usually pre-selected, it was still a rare chance for journalists to engage with a senior Chinese leader.
Journalistic restrictions
Most of my challenges as a reporter began when I left Tiananmen Square, where the political meetings were held, and visited other parts of Beijing. For much of this month, the entire capital area has seen an increased security presence, as is typical during sensitive political moments.
But I figured the omnipresent police patrols would not prevent me from conducting basic journalistic tasks, such as getting video footage of major tourist areas and conducting brief, impromptu interviews with local residents.
My interview questions were innocuous. What do Chinese people think about the upcoming U.S. presidential election? Do they prefer Donald Trump or Joe Biden? Do they have any hope that U.S.-China ties will improve?
The questions generated a range of thoughtful responses, which you can see in the video below.
I didn’t experience any trouble until I returned to my hotel that evening, when I received a phone call saying I should appear immediately at a local office of the Ministry of Public Security, China’s main state policing agency that also monitors domestic political threats.
Upon arrival, I was escorted down a nondescript hall to a small conference room, where I was met by several officers, who proceeded to conduct an interrogation.
Why, the officers demanded to know, was I asking people about Trump and Biden, and not writing about the Two Sessions for which I had media credentials? The focus of my reporting trip, I responded, was on China’s policies, including its foreign relations.
Why, they wanted to know, had I not gotten permission before filming? I told them that not only was I in a public area, but I did also not shoot any interviews without first getting permission from the interviewees.
Their last question took the form of a rebuke: Why was VOA not more fair in telling China’s side of the story? Apparently, the officers had not appreciated the irony that I had been interviewing residents for a piece with the main goal of providing Chinese perspectives.
Pattern of abuse
In the end, I received only a mild scolding before I was allowed to leave. Other China-based reporters often experience far worse abuse, even if only counting very recent incidents.
The week before I arrived in China, a Dutch journalist covering a bank protest in the central city of Chengdu was shoved to the ground and had his equipment confiscated by police, who detained him and his cameraman for several hours while preventing them from making phone calls.
This week, a reporter for The Associated Press said he and a colleague were followed by plainclothes police, who at one point even trailed him into a bathroom. The AP reporters were in Chengdu speaking with elderly retirees who had invested in a trust fund that had gone bankrupt.
“Over a dozen plainclothes followed us, using tactics I’ve only seen in Xinjiang. They followed me into the bathroom and to the airport. They took photos of us,” the reporter, Dake Kang, said on social media website X. “This is Chengdu, one of the most liberal cities in China. Startling to see such tactics deployed here.”
Foreign journalists have often experienced harassment when visiting far-flung areas, such as Tibet or Xinjiang, where China is accused of severe human rights abuses, or while reporting on other politically sensitive topics, such as protests or natural disasters.
But if my experience, and that of many others, is any indication, it is becoming much more difficult for foreign journalists to do even the most non-controversial stories in the biggest of China’s cities.
Even China’s state-controlled journalists have faced increasing restrictions. Just this week, authorities in the city of Sanhe, 50 kilometers outside Beijing, harassed reporters from state outlet CCTV during a live broadcast near the scene of a deadly gas explosion.
The incident prompted a public backlash, even drawing a statement of concern from a Communist Party-affiliated association of journalists.
“The incident was a wake-up call to a problem suffered for decades by more professional news outlets in China that have attempted to do real reporting in the face of formal press restrictions from the Chinese Communist Party leadership above, and frequent intimidation down below,” wrote David Bandurski, in a commentary published in the China Media Project.
“Such acts of obstruction are not an exception but the very nature of media policy in China,” he added.
Open to the world?
So, how does all this relate to China’s official narrative that it is open to the world?
I obviously can’t say how all foreign investors feel about returning to China. But I’ve spoken with colleagues in business and academia who no longer feel comfortable traveling to the country, citing fears of arbitrary detention.
I can’t speak for foreign tourists, either. But I can tell you how difficult it was as a newcomer to accomplish even the simplest tasks – such as booking a taxi, paying for a meal with a foreign bank account and checking Facebook, Instagram or virtually any other Western social media app – given China’s insistence on placing a digital firewall between its people and the rest of the world.
What I can say with certainty is that I felt welcomed by Beijing residents, who seemed eager to interact with VOA, despite a state-backed campaign portraying foreign journalists as potential spies and dangerous troublemakers.
But at one point during last week’s meetings, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi told gathered media that his government is “opening its door wider” to the world. At another point he insisted “more foreign friends are welcome to join us” in telling China’s story.
From my point of view, it sure didn’t feel that way.
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Australia Resumes Aid to UN Palestinian Aid Agency
Sydney — Australian Foreign Affairs Minister Penny Wong said Friday the government will resume funding to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, which is providing humanitarian aid for Palestinians in Gaza. In January, Australia joined several Western nations in suspending funding to UNRWA after Israeli intelligence suggested a dozen of its workers had been linked to the October 7 attack by Hamas militants. Australia is also being criticized for canceling the visas of several Palestinians fleeing the conflict with Israel in Gaza. The Australia Greens party says the move “shows a lack of humanity.”
Speaking to reporters Friday in Canberra Australian Foreign Affairs Minister Penny Wong said she was confident UNRWA was “not a terrorist organization.” She added that the United Nations aid agency for Palestinians was critical to providing help to people in Gaza “who are on the brink of starving.”
Earlier this month, Canada and the European Union announced they would also resume funding to UNRWA. The United States, the agency’s largest donor, continues to freeze payments.
Wong told reporters she is satisfied an investigation into the allegations following the October 7 attack on Israel by Hamas has been thorough.
“The nature of these allegations warranted an immediate and appropriate response. The best available current advice from agencies and the Australian government lawyers is that UNRWA is not a terrorist organization, and that existing additional safeguards sufficiently protect Australian taxpayer funding,” she said.
Australia’s resumption of aid to the agency comes amid criticism for canceling the visas of Palestinians fleeing the conflict.
Data from the Department of Home Affairs states that Australia granted 2,273 temporary visas for Palestinians with connections to Australia between October 7 and February 6.
More than 2,400 visitor visas were also granted to people declaring Israeli citizenship during that period.
The visa category does not allow recipients to work or have access to education or government-funded health care in Australia, although they would not be turned away from emergency rooms.
Campaigners for refugees and migrants say several Palestinians have had their Australian visas abruptly canceled by the Canberra government in recent days. The government, citing “privacy reasons,” refuses to say how many visas are affected.
A cancelation notification obtained by local media asserted a particular applicant had never intended to genuinely “stay temporarily in Australia.”
Australia’s left-leaning Labor government has defended its actions, insisting they were based on ongoing security checks. A spokesperson for the Home Affairs Minister Clare O’Neil said the “Australian government reserves the right to cancel any issued visas if circumstances change.”
But Adam Bandt, the leader of the Australian Greens party, told the Australian Broadcasting Corp. Friday that visa applicants are being treated unfairly.
“What Labor is saying is that peoples’ visas are being canceled because Labor does not know how long the Labor-backed invasion of Gaza will last, and, accordingly, they are refusing them entry into the country. That is callous inhumanity,” said Bandt.
Australia has said Israel has the right to defend itself after the attack by Hamas militants last October.
Canberra advocates a two-state solution in which Israel and a future Palestinian state co‑exist within internationally recognized borders.
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Despite Sanctions, North Korea Runs More Than 50 Restaurants in China
washington — North Korea is operating more than 50 restaurants staffed by its citizens in more than 10 Chinese cities in violation of U.N. sanctions, according to a diplomatic source.
The North Korean regime takes most of the wages its workers earn abroad to fund its nuclear and missile programs.
The source, who asked not to be named because the person was not authorized to speak to the press, provided the names of the restaurants in Korean and Chinese and their addresses in China to VOA’s Korean Service.
The U.N. Panel of Experts that monitors enforcement of sanctions against North Korea is expected to include the list in a report scheduled for publication in the coming weeks, the source said.
The U.S. called for all U.N. member states to enforce sanctions on North Korea when asked about VOA Korean’s findings.
“Under Security Council Resolution 2397, all U.N. member states are obligated to repatriate DPRK nationals earning income in their jurisdiction, subject to certain exceptions,” a U.S. State Department spokesperson said. DPRK stands for the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, the country’s official name.
“Revenue generated by overseas DPRK laborers is used to fund the DPRK’s WMD [weapons of mass destruction] and ballistic missile programs,” continued the spokesperson on Tuesday via email to VOA’s Korean Service.
The U.N. Security Council passed Resolution 2397 in 2017 requiring all member states to send North Korean workers back to their countries by December 2019. It was adopted in response to North Korea’s launch of a Hwasong-15 intercontinental ballistic missile in November 2017.
It will be the first time that a list of North Korean restaurants in China will be included in a U.N. expert panel report since the December 2019 deadline, although the panel published a report listing North Korean restaurants nine months prior to that.
Liu Pengyu, a spokesperson for the Chinese Embassy in Washington, told VOA’s Korean Service on Monday that he was “unaware of the specific situation.”
He continued, via email, “China has been earnestly implementing the relevant Security Council resolutions. The resolutions are not just about sanctions, but also stress the importance of dialogue.”
He added, “We oppose taking a selective, sanctions-only approach without due emphasis on promoting dialogues.”
Joshua Stanton, an attorney based in Washington who helped draft the U.S. Sanctions and Policy Enforcement Act in 2016, said, “The fact that China allows them to work inside its territory five years after a U.N. deadline to repatriate them is further proof, which can be added to an already extensive file of evidence, that it is a flagrant violator of the sanctions it voted for in the Security Council.”
Stanton said via email to VOA on Wednesday that North Korea uses restaurants it sets up overseas as “fronts for laundering cash from forced labor, cybercrimes and other illicit activities.”
The regime also sends young women from North Korea to work long hours at its restaurants abroad and then confiscates most or all of their wages, he said.
The list includes seven North Korean restaurants in Beijing and seven in Shanghai.
Shenyang, a city in Liaoning province that borders North Korea, has 17.
Dandong, a city about 12 kilometers (7.45 miles) from the North Korean city of Shinuiju, has the second-largest concentration of North Korean restaurants on the list. Shinuiju is near the Sino-Korean Friendship Bridge that connects the two countries.
Aaron Arnold, a former member of the U.N. Panel of Experts for North Korea’s sanctions and currently a senior associate fellow at the Royal United Service Institute, a London-based security think tank, told VOA Korean that China and North Korea could be violating other U.N. sanctions. He spoke with VOA Korean on Wednesday via email.
If the restaurants are considered a joint venture, they are in violation of Resolution 2270, which bans establishing new entities with North Korea, according to Arnold. If the restaurants have bank accounts in China, they also violate Resolution 1874, he continued.
UNSC Resolution 2375, passed in 2017, bans all joint ventures including existing ones formed with North Korea.
“Our own government is also to blame if Chinese banks are either willfully or negligently laundering that money and not facing subpoenas, investigations, special measures and secondary sanctions for doing so,” said Stanton.
Secondary sanctions refer to sanctions targeting foreign entities and individuals such as Chinese banks that conduct businesses with already sanctioned entities, individuals and countries such as North Korea.
Arnold said the presence of North Korean restaurants in China represents “another example of China failing to implement its sanctions obligations.”
North Korea has also operated restaurants in Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia and Thailand in the past. Some have closed since the sanctions and the COVID-19 pandemic, while others remain open.
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China Positioning C919 Passenger Jet to Take On Boeing, Airbus
washington — China’s state-owned plane manufacturer is facing industry skepticism over its claims that its newest passenger aircraft, the C919, can break the passenger-jet duopoly of Boeing and Airbus.
COMAC’s promotional tour through the fast-growing aviation markets of Singapore, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia and Indonesia ended in Malaysia on Wednesday, according to China’s official Xinghua news agency. At each stop, the Shanghai-headquartered enterprise presented its C919 to potential buyers as a viable alternative to the Airbus 320 and Boeing 737.
International and regional tourism is expected to reach, then surpass pre-pandemic levels in many Southeast Asian countries this year, according to analysts who cautioned that subsequent growth may hinge on China’s economy making a full recovery.
The Commercial Aircraft Corporation of China (COMAC) expects the demand for passenger aircraft in the Asia-Pacific market to increase over the next two decades from 3,314 to 9,701 planes, according to Chinese state media.
But Skift, a travel industry research site, quoted the executive chairman of Air Lease, one of the largest aircraft lessors in the world, saying the company isn’t planning to buy any C919 jets.
“The CCP [Chinese Communist Party] and COMAC are very interested in selling the C919,” said Steven Udvar-Hazy at the aviation industry’s Wings Club in New York on February 29. “But it’s a one-way dating relationship.”
Brendan Sobie of Sobie Aviation, an aviation industry consultancy in Singapore, told CNBC, “It’s still early days to know if COMAC can shake up the duopoly. … We are not likely to see a C919 overseas order of significance in the near term.”
As the C919 tour progressed, COMAC said its goal was to showcase the aircraft and lay “the groundwork for future market expansion in Southeast Asia.”
The C919 is certified only by the Civil Aviation Administration of China, which approved it in September 2022. The narrow-body jet entered commercial service with China Eastern Airlines last year in May.
COMAC says it has more than 1,000 orders for the C919, but most of those are from Chinese airlines and aircraft lessors. At the Singapore Airshow, COMAC took orders from Tibet Airlines, a Chinese entity, for 40 C919 single-aisle planes. Boeing and Airbus planes are sold out through the end of the decade, according to Bloomberg.
China has said it wants to secure broader international recognition for the C919 and plans on pursuing European Union Aviation Safety Agency certification.
Boeing and Airbus executives say they’re not worried about the aircraft that was shown for the first time outside China at the Singapore Airshow February 20-25.
The C919 is “not going to rock the boat in particular,” Christian Scherer, chief executive officer of Airbus’s aircraft commercial business, said at a media roundtable on the sidelines of the industry event.
Scherer added the C919 was a “legitimate effort” by China but is “not very different” from the Airbus and Boeing aircraft.
Dave Schulte, Boeing’s commercial marketing managing director for Asia-Pacific, said airlines in Southeast Asia may consider ordering C919s, according to Barron’s.
However, he warned that COMAC will face the same supply-chain disruptions as Boeing and Airbus as post-pandemic demand for air travel increases. Assembled in China, the C919 relies heavily on components, including engines, from companies outside China such as GE and Honeywell International.
After Singapore, COMAC took the C919 to Vietnam from February 26-29 for its own airshow followed by a two-week progression of shows in Laos, Cambodia, Malaysia and Indonesia.
Tan Wan Geng, COMAC’s board chair, described Vietnam as an important international aviation center in Southeast Asia and predicted increased exchanges and cooperation between his operation and Vietnam’s aviation industry.
In Singapore, Tibet Airlines ordered 10 ARJ21 jets, the C919’s smaller predecessor, and China’s Henan Civil Aviation Development and Investment Group ordered six ARJ21s.
Cambodia’s State Secretariat of Civil Aviation Undersecretary of State and spokesman Sinn Chanserey Vutha said last week that Cambodia supported the entry of C919 and ARJ21 jets into the aircraft market.
“This is a good sign for the aircraft market,” he told China’s official Xinhua while attending the demonstration flight event.
Nguyen Thien Thong, a leading expert in aviation engineering in Vietnam, told VOA Vietnamese in a February 28 telephone interview that it is unlikely that airlines in Vietnam will purchase or lease the COMAC aircraft in the near future.
The founder of the Aviation Engineering program at Van Lang University said that adding one more airline supplier to their current fleets of Airbus and Boeing would complicate maintenance, management and operations while increasing costs.
“I don’t think it is effective,” added the former head of the Aviation Engineering Department at Ho Chi Minh City University of Technology.
Udvar-Hazy, the Air Lease executive chairman, pointed to a lack of support infrastructure needed to make the C919 commercially viable in international markets, according to Skift. He added the Chinese jet also lacks technical support training.
“Without that,” he said, “there’s no export market.”
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Video Shows Rohingya Forcibly Recruited Into Myanmar Military
washington — VOA has recently obtained video footage depicting Rohingya from Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) camps being trained as soldiers in Rakhine state, the scene of heavy fighting between Myanmar’s military junta and ethnic armed groups.
The footage shows the young refugees armed with weapons and undergoing military training, revealing what appears to be forcible recruitment by the junta. Experts and witnesses say they believe the young recruits will be used as human shields by the junta in their struggle to regain territory lost in recent battles with the Arakan Army in Rakhine.
The Rohingya, a predominantly Muslim ethnic minority group, have faced persecution and discrimination in Myanmar for decades.
Denied citizenship under a 1982 Citizenship Law, they have been subjected to systemic discrimination, violence and expulsion from their homes in Rakhine state, bordering Bangladesh to the north. The military government has long portrayed the Rohingya as illegal immigrants from Bangladesh, marginalizing them from society.
The junta, which seized power in a bloody and widely denounced coup just over three years ago, began enforcing a militia conscription law on February 10. Soon after, rumors began circulating of Muslims in Rakhine being arrested and forced to join the military.
Despite the junta’s denials, a video released on March 6 shows about 300 Rohingya youths from IDP camps near Sittwe, Rakhine’s junta-controlled capital, being forced to wear military uniforms and sitting in a large warehouse. The video also features the minister of security and border affairs of Rakhine state, Colonel Kyaw Thura, supervising the operation.
On March 6, 2024, more than 300 Rohingya individuals were estimated to have been sent for military training and compelled to wear military uniforms. The video captures the visit of Colonel Kyaw Thura, the Rakhine State Security and Border Affairs minister, from the Myanmar junta. (UGC courtesy video)
Amid continuing losses in battles with the Arakan Army (AA), a powerful ethnic armed group based in Rakhine state, “the military junta is attempting to use Rohingyas as human shields for political gain,” said Myanmar’s National Unity Government (NUG) deputy human rights minister, Aung Kyaw Moe, in an interview via Zoom. The NUG views itself as a shadow government for Myanmar.
“The military junta, which has been heavily defeated in the battles with the Arakan Army, is using the Rohingya because of the need to reinforce their ranks, and they are taking them from refugee camps where there is no land to run to,” said Aung Kyaw Moe, NUG’s first Rohingya minister.
Arakan Army
The Arakan Army, established in 2009 by Rakhine youth leaders, is a well-trained and well-armed military faction representing a Buddhist ethnic minority. It is part of the Three Brotherhood Alliance, which includes the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army and Ta’Ang National Liberation Army.
The alliance has achieved several major victories against the junta, beginning with the “1027” operation in October of last year in which the junta suffered significant losses of territory and troops.
According to Rakhine observers, there are an estimated 45,000 troops in the AA. The group seeks autonomy from Myanmar’s central government in Rakhine state, aiming to “restore the sovereignty of the Arakan people,” according to its mission statement online. The name Arakan is another name used to refer to the Rakhine people.
Fighting between the junta and the AA, which began in November 2023, is fierce. Dozens of Rohingya civilians were killed in January and February during junta attacks, some with heavy artillery, on AA troops based in Rohingya villages, according to local human rights organizations.
Forced recruitment tactics
Local Rohingya sources have confirmed to VOA that approximately 500 Rohingya youths from IDP camps controlled by the Myanmar military have undergone military training, raising concerns about forced recruitment tactics.
“When the military enforced the conscription law, junta commanders visited IDP camps in Sittwe and Rohingya villages around February 11 to 13, areas they had previously avoided,” a young Rohingya man, who requested anonymity for safety reasons, told VOA. “They first consult with camp leaders, then pressure us to take up arms, citing our duty as Myanmar citizens under the conscription law.
“In addition,” he said, “they threaten us that those who refuse to take up arms will face dire consequences.”
Since 2017, approximately 1 million Rohingya refugees have been forcibly displaced from Myanmar, seeking shelter in neighboring Bangladesh. Additionally, an estimated 630,000 Rohingyas, designated as stateless by the United Nations, face movement restrictions inside Rakhine state.
“Rohingya, who have endured severe oppression by the Myanmar military, reaching the level of genocide charges in Rakhine state, are now being coerced by the army to join their ranks and confront the Arakan Army as human shields. Young Rohingya from villages are unable to flee to neighboring Bangladesh,” said the Rohingya youth.
Several videos have surfaced on social media, revealing recruited Rohingya wearing uniforms and holding rifles riding a military truck and undergoing military training in a field. When VOA checked with local sources, it was confirmed that these events occurred last week near the Rakhine state capital, Sittwe.
Dozens of young Rohingya men were given military training by the junta’s troop in Sittwe, Myanmar, on March 9, 2024. (UGC courtesy video)
A spokesperson for the junta has not yet responded to questions from VOA about the videos, including one that shows the Rakhine border minister visiting Rohingya while wearing a military uniform.
Consequences of coercion
“Initially, the junta claimed that because the Rohingya are not citizens, they have no reason to give them military training,” Aung Kyaw Moe told VOA. “The junta said that it was fake news, but the videos we received prove that they put the Rohingya in uniforms and give them military training.”
Although the young men are being forced into military service, the videos show them laughing and joking, looking unaware of their situation.
“A Rohingya child who has been locked up in a refugee camp since the age of 6 is now 18 years old. This child does not know what is going on in the outside world,” the deputy minister said. “There are hundreds of thousands of people who have been locked up in refugee camps for years and don’t know what’s going on outside. The junta knows this and is using it.
“On the other hand,” he added, “among the Rohingya and other ethnic groups, there are leaders who do business with the junta and organize the Rohingya according to their will.”
Historical coexistence
Aung Kyaw Moe also highlighted consultations between the NUG and the Arakan Army regarding Rohingya in Rakhine State.
“The Arakan Army has condemned forced Rohingya recruitment, citing their historical coexistence,” he told VOA. “Historically, the Muslim Rohingya and the Buddhist Rakhine communities have shared a relationship of peaceful coexistence, characterized by mutual respect and cooperation.
“Despite occasional tensions,” he continued, “both communities have often lived side by side, intermingling culturally and economically. This historical bond has been a testament to the resilience of communal harmony in the region.”
Holding the junta accountable
“The military junta is the common enemy,” the young Rohingya man told VOA. “Not just for the Rohingya, but for the entire country. We must question why [it] now arms us. The army exploits Rohingya suffering for its gain.”
Miemie Winn Byrd, a former U.S. Army lieutenant colonel and Myanmar-U.S. military relations expert, remarked on the irony that the same army responsible for brutally killing thousands of Rohingya is now arming them as soldiers.
“Today the junta are saying the Rohingya are citizens and should be conscripted into the military, whereas for all this time the junta has said that they are not citizens,” she said in a recent interview with VOA. “This highlights the lack of legitimacy of the current government.
“They do as they please because they are not a legitimate government; they are essentially a group trying to terrorize the country. Therefore, it’s not surprising to witness such actions from them, because they are not a professional organization.”
Aung Kyaw Moe emphasized that the junta’s exploitation of vulnerable Rohingya violates international law.
“This is inhumane and a clear violation of the provisional measures issued by the … World Court, which called for the prevention of genocidal acts against the Rohingya minority,” he said.
“The military junta must be held accountable for these egregious violations of human rights and international law.”
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Chinese Cyber Nationalists Target Nobel Laureate, Water Company
Taipei, Taiwan — Online nationalism has been surging in China in recent weeks, with a growing band of cyber nationalists targeting the country’s first Nobel laureate in literature, Mo Yan, and the largest bottled water producer, Nongfu Spring.
The online attacks against Nongfu Spring began after prominent nationalist billionaire Zong Qinghou, the founder of the company’s key competitor, Hangzhou Wahaha Group, passed away on February 25.
Some netizens began comparing Zong with Nongfu Spring’s founder, Zhong Shanshan, the richest person in China, and it quickly grew into an all-out attack against Nongfu Spring. Some online nationalists claimed packaging of Nongfu Springs’ products contains Japanese elements, accusing him of being pro-Japan, while others focused on allegations that Zhong’s son is a U.S. citizen.
“If the successor of Nongfu Spring is an American, this company’s ideology is unacceptable,” wrote one Chinese netizen on China’s popular social media platform Weibo.
“I can’t accept that an American becomes the richest man in China,” another netizen Liu Jia-nan wrote on Weibo. “Even if I can’t change anything, me and my family can definitely stop buying Nongfu Spring’s products.”
The call for boycotting Nongfu Spring’s products has affected the company’s stock, which dropped more than 6% since the attacks began last month. Amid the turmoil, Chinese media outlets reported that Zhong Shanshan stepped down as legal representative of one of Nongfu Spring’s subsidiaries on March 11.
Chinese Nobel laureate Mo Yan, whose real name is Guan Moye, also came under attack from a self-proclaimed nationalistic blogger last month. Wu Wanzheng, who runs the account “Truth Telling Mao Xinghua” on Weibo, announced on February 27 that he planned to sue Mo for violating the Heroes and Martyrs Protection Law in China, which carries a maximum three-year jail sentence if found guilty.
In the indictment shared by Wu on Weibo, he accused Mo of glorifying the Japanese invaders in his novel “Red Sorghum,” which tells the story of a Chinese family during the Second Sino-Japanese War.
He also claimed that Mo tried to “smear heroes and martyrs of the People’s Liberation Army” during the Chinese Civil War in another novel. Wu demanded that Mo apologize, offer an equivalent of $0.14 U.S. dollars to each Chinese citizen as compensation, and have his books removed from shelves across China.
Mo and Nongfu Spring are not the only targets of Chinese nationalists’ online attacks in recent years. Several Chinese and global brands, including Chinese sportswear manufacturer Li Ning and Western brands such as H&M, Nike and Adidas, have come under fire for either having designs that resemble Japanese soldiers’ uniforms during World War II or for boycotting cotton from China’s Xinjiang region.
Some experts say for Chinese people engaging in online activities, “wielding the flag of nationalism” is like “a protective shield.
“Those people choose their targets very carefully and they know they can drive a lot of online traffic to themselves,” Dali Yang, a political scientist at the University of Chicago, told VOA in a phone interview.
He said in some cases, Chinese nationalists may feel a “moral righteousness” when they target certain businesses or individuals. “Unless the situation becomes too excessive, the overall environment would generally be permissive toward people who engage in these activities,” Yang said.
And while there used to be mechanisms to prevent content on Chinese social media from becoming too nationalistic, online content regulators are focused more now on removing critical opinions that may be deemed “unpatriotic” or “sensitive” by Chinese officials.
“There is no resistance to nationalistic content on the Chinese internet, and the reason why Chinese authorities don’t remove nationalistic content online is because it’s in line with the government’s narrative,” Eric Liu, a former Weibo moderator and an editor at U.S.-based bilingual news website China Digital Times, told VOA by phone.
After facing threats from the nationalistic blogger, Mo participated in an event with British writer Abdulrazak Gurnah in Beijing earlier this week, which was covered by several Chinese state media outlets. China’s state broadcaster CCTV also reportedly conducted an interview with the celebrated writer.
Separately, some Chinese netizens have come out to urge nationalists to stop targeting Nongfu Spring, while several state-controlled media outlets across China have published opinion pieces to call on nationalists to “stop the witch hunt against another business owners” in China.
Despite efforts from state media to push back against the online attacks, some observers said it’s unlikely the Chinese government will try to stop this trend. “The government would have punished those online nationalists if they want to stop these targeted online attacks,” Murong Xuecun, a prominent Chinese novelist, told VOA by phone.
“China’s free speech environment is already in a bad shape after a decade under Xi’s rule, and if the trend of targeted online attacks continues, the free speech environment in the country will likely further deteriorate,” the novelist said.
In addition to a deteriorating free speech environment, Liu at China Digital Times said this trend may create a chilling effect for many Chinese internet users. “The online environment in China will deteriorate to a point where many internet users may be concerned about becoming the target of such attacks,” he told VOA.
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Observers: US Investments in Philippines Seen Easing Reliance on China
Taipei, Taiwan — During a trade mission visit to Manila this week, U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo announced plans to invest more than $1 billion in the Philippines’ tech sector and help double the number of semiconductor factories in the country.
Observers say the pledge and visit highlight the Southeast Asian nation’s growing importance to Washington and will also help reduce the Philippine economy’s reliance on China.
“U.S. companies have realized that our chip supply chain is way too concentrated in just a few countries in the world,” Raimondo said in remarks at a business forum on Tuesday.
“Forget about geopolitics. Just at that level of concentration, you know the old adage, ‘Don’t put all your eggs in one basket.’ Why do we allow ourselves to be buying so many of our chips from one or two countries? That’s why we need to diversify,” Raimondo said.
American business executives from 22 businesses, including Alphabet’s Google, Visa and Microsoft, joined Raimondo on the trip.
Possible expansion of chip industry
JC Punongbayan, resident economist and columnist of the online news website Rappler.com, said that while the Philippines is one of the key centers in the global electronics industry chain, it does not yet have the ability to manufacture smartphone or computer chips. The Philippines currently has 13 semiconductor factories that focus on assembly, packaging and testing.
“This commitment by the U.S. government to boost the local semiconductor industry is a welcome development because right now, even if semiconductors have figured prominently in trade statistics, these are not high value-added. So basically, we import a lot of components and then export them after assembly and packaging,” Punongbayan told VOA’s Mandarin Service.
“Hopefully, these investments by the U.S. government and private sector partners will enable the Philippines to export higher value-added goods in the future,” he said.
Punongbayan believes that at a time when the Philippines is working hard to amend its regulations and hoping to attract more foreign direct investment, the promised investment from U.S. companies could provide a strong boost to the capital-starved country.
“We have had some difficulties when it comes to attracting foreign investments. And in fact, from 2020 to 2023, foreign direct investments dropped by more than 6% on an annual basis. So, we really need these investments in order to boost the economy,” Punongbayan said.
“And the billion-dollar investment pledge of the U.S. is several times the actual foreign direct investments that have come in recent years — in fact, almost nine times the foreign direct investment from the U.S. in 2023. These are very crucial to Philippine development,” he said.
During Raimondo’s two-day visit, U.S. companies committed to invest in the digital and energy sectors, areas that are in line with Manila’s overall development plans and will help the Philippines’ industrial upgrading and transformation, Punongbayan said.
Defense and economy
Dindo Manhit, president of the Stratbase ADR Institute for Strategic and International Studies, a policy think tank in the Philippines, said that over the years, the Philippines’ economic growth has been mainly driven by strong consumption.
These investment commitments by U.S. companies will accelerate local economic growth, Manhit said, benefiting both the public and private sectors and positively affecting areas such as the Philippines’ manufacturing supply chain and business process outsourcing.
He said these investments could also allow Manila to fully understand that strengthening its alliance with Washington will not only bring it defense assistance but also economic security.
“Because we all share values, democratic values. We value jobs for people. In the case of the Philippines, imagine if we can create jobs that could provide better income for Filipinos,” Manhit said. “Then we will see the strong partnership with the U.S. not limited to national security only, but also economic security.”
Washington’s pledges of economic support for the Philippines comes at a time of rising tensions between Manila and Beijing over sovereignty disputes in the South China Sea.
Earlier this month, Philippine Secretary of Foreign Affairs Enrique Manalo warned that Manila is facing severe “economic coercion” from China. He also said the Philippines relies heavily on trade relations with China and hopes to expand economic and trade connections with other countries, including establishing formal free trade agreement negotiations with the European Union as soon as possible.
Punongbayan said that despite the disputes in the South China Sea, Manila continues to import a large amount of goods from China, which is the largest source of the country’s trade deficit. That shows how difficult it is for the country to decouple its economy from China, and why it is imperative for Manila to lessen its dependence on Beijing.
Greater interest from the United States to invest in the Philippines is a step in the right direction, he said.
“If we import a lot from China, then indirectly we are boosting China’s economy at the same time. And of course, part of the revenues coming from these payments to China will go to the Chinese government,” Punongbayan said. “So indirectly, in a way, the Philippines is funding China’s incursions in the West Philippine Sea.”
Manhit, however, said compared with other Southeast Asian countries, the Philippine economy is not very dependent on China.
According to recent poll by Stratbase ADR Institute for Strategic and International Studies, the country Filipinos most want to maintain good economic relations with is the U.S., followed by Japan, while China ranks at the bottom.
He said the poll not only shows that China does not have as strong an economic influence on the Philippines as Beijing claims, but also that Filipinos are unanimously willing to expand economic cooperation with countries that share common democratic values, or values of human rights and the rule of law.
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Thai Ex-PM Thaksin Visits Hometown for 1st Time Since Ouster
Bangkok — Thailand’s former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra arrived by private jet on Thursday to visit his northern hometown of Chiang Mai for the first time since fleeing the country after a military coup in 2006.
The influential billionaire has loomed large over Thai politics for two decades, during which his family backed Pheu Thai party has won nearly every general election and is now in power.
In August he made a dramatic return from 15 years of self-imposed exile to dodge jail for alleged abuse of power.
After just six months in a prison hospital, Thaksin received parole in February despite not having spent a single night in jail for a sentence commuted by the king to one year from eight.
Thaksin, wearing a mask and a neck brace, was flanked by his daughter Paetongtarn Shinawatra, agriculture minister Thammanat Prompao and dozens of officials on his arrival for a three-day visit, but he did not speak to media.
“Missed you,” one supporter told the former premier on his first stop at a park, where he met a crowd of dozens with his palms joined together in a traditional gesture of greeting, before she took a selfie picture with him.
“Prime Minister of our hearts,” read the caption under a picture of Thaksin emblazoned on the jacket of another.
At the time of his release from prison, an official had described him as being “truly ill”, needing a wheelchair and wearing his arm in a sling.
Justice Minister Tawee Sodsong said Thaksin had sought permission for the visit to seek alternative medical advice and pay respects to his ancestors.
Critics have complained about Thaksin’s lenient treatment. Thaksin’s return last year coincided to the day with his ally and political newcomer Srettha Thavisin being chosen as prime minister, leading many to suspect a deal between Thaksin and his powerful enemies in the royalist-military establishment.
Thaksin and the government have dismissed the speculation.
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Australian Producers Hope China’s Wine Tariffs Will Soon End
SYDNEY — China’s high tariffs on Australian wine could be lifted within weeks, according to an interim statement from Chinese authorities saying the duties are no longer necessary.
When diplomatic friction between Australia and its biggest trading partner was at its most intense, Beijing imposed 220% taxes on bottled wine from Australia.
Chinese authorities said Australia was guilty of anti-competitive behavior, but analysts believe China’s economic measures were meant as a punishment.
The value of Australian wine exports to China fell from more than $662 million at their peak to just $6.6 million last year.
Last October, Beijing agreed to a review of the tariffs. That decision came after the previous conservative government in Canberra referred the tax issue to the World Trade Organization in late 2021.
The Chinese Ministry of Commerce has now recommended in an “interim draft determination” that the tariffs be removed.
China said Thursday that Foreign Minister Wang Yi, will visit Australia for the first time in seven years. He is scheduled to hold talks with the Australian foreign affairs minister, Penny Wong, in Canberra next Wednesday.
Wang’s visit was welcomed by Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese. He told reporters Thursday there had been “significant progress” in removing trade impediments.
Australia’s Labor government – elected in May 2022 – has sought to defuse tensions with China over human rights, democracy in Hong Kong, Taiwan and the origins of COVID-19.
One by one, Chinese restrictions on Australian barley, beef, coal and cotton have been lifted.
Mitchell Taylor, managing director of Taylors Wines in South Australia, told the Australian Broadcasting Corp. Thursday that he hopes the wine tariffs will soon end.
“We are cautiously optimistic,” he said. “This is terrific news and I must say our trade minister Don Farrell has done a great job in rebuilding trade relations with our largest trading partner. But at the same time, we have lost our market share to the French and the Chilean winemakers.”
China is, by far, Australia’s largest trading partner, accounting for almost one-third of Australia’s total global trade.
Earlier this month, a Canberra government-backed task force was announced to help Australia’s wine industry, which has suffered under Chinese tariffs and an international oversupply of red wine.
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Trump or Biden – Whom Does China Prefer?
As the U.S. election campaign heats up, both President Joe Biden and his likely challenger, Donald Trump, are vowing to take a tough stance on China. So how does China feel about the race? VOA’s Bill Gallo asked Beijing residents to weigh in on the two candidates. Mingmin Xuan contributed.
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Are They Part of China’s ‘Gang of Three’ or Just Xi’s Minions?
TAIPEI, TAIWAN — As China’s biggest political meeting of the year wrapped up Monday, analysts highlighted how power in the world’s second-largest economy continues to consolidate under leader Xi Jinping. Some were also discussing two other prominent politicians — Premier Li Qiang and Xi’s Chief of Staff, Cai Qi — and the role they play in Xi’s China.
Li and Cai are members of the Chinese Communist Party’s top decision-making body, the Politburo Standing Committee. Li is ranked second on the PSC, and Cai is ranked fifth. Both are seen as Xi loyalists who were handpicked by China’s leader to serve in their current roles.
They also have ties with Xi that stretch back decades.
Cai worked with Xi in the 1980s when he was posted in China’s southern coastal province of Fujian. They later worked together in Zhejiang, where Xi rose to the post of provincial party secretary.
Li also worked with Xi in Zhejiang, where he held various posts, including party secretary of Shanghai, before rising to his current position as premier.
Some analysts say that during this year’s Two Sessions, the power of Li, who as premier oversees economic decision-making, was weakened, while the power of Cai, who is responsible for maintaining stability, is on the rise, given China’s growing emphasis on national security.
Hsin-hsien Wang, a distinguished professor at the Graduate Institute of East Asian Studies at National Chengchi University in Taipei, says one major focus of this year’s meetings was a revision of the Organic Law of the State Council, China’s cabinet. The changes to the law — the first since 1982 — gave the party more executive control over the State Council.
“Li Qiang is responsible for the affairs of the State Council, including economy, society, industry and development, while Cai Qi is responsible for security and party affairs,”
Wang said. “This division of labor is becoming more and more clear, so some people overseas say it is the ‘Gang of Three,’ meaning Xi, Li Qiang and Cai Qi.”
China also abandoned a 30-year tradition during this year’s meetings when it canceled the premier’s press conference at the end of the meetings. Both moves, analysts say, downgrade the status of Li and the State Council he presides over.
In contrast, Cai is ranked fifth in China’s leadership chain but is the first in that position to become a top aid to the president since the time of China’s former revolutionary leader Mao Zedong. He has accompanied Xi on numerous foreign trips and in meetings with foreign leaders, including U.S. President Joe Biden last November.
Willy Lam, a senior fellow at The Jamestown Foundation in Hong Kong, says that since winning an unprecedented third five-year term in 2022, X has emphasized that the party leads everything, including the economic and financial fields.
Lam says Xi’s concentration of power even exceeds that of Mao.
“Even in Mao’s era, when [he] wanted to keep all the power in his own hands, Mao still had to [delegate] part of the power, especially because Mao didn’t know much about economics. So, he still [handed it over to] people like Chen Yun and Deng Xiaoping in the party who knew a little bit about economics.”
Cai Shenkun, a U.S.-based independent social media commentator with 288,000 followers on X, formerly known as Twitter, agrees and calls Li and Cai nothing more than “minions who take orders in front of Xi.”
But other analysts, such as Deng Yuwen, say both men still have their own interests and are highly competitive with each other. Deng, a political commentator and former deputy editor at the party journal Study Times, coined the phrase the “Gang of Three” to refer to the Xi-Li-Cai power circle.
The phrase is a reference to the “Gang of Four” that was led by Mao Zedong’s wife, Jiang Qing, during China’s tumultuous Cultural Revolution. Deng sees similarities between the political power dynamics of Xi, Li and Cai today and those of Mao, his wife and Lin Biao, another key leader at that time.
Lin Biao was one of Mao’s greatest supporters and at one time his designated successor, but he died in a mysterious plane crash in 1971 while allegedly fleeing China as a “traitor,” according to China’s Communist Party. Scholars point out the lack of evidence to support the party’s version of events and some believe he was fleeing from a possible purge.
Jiang Qing was a powerful player during China’s Cultural Revolution from the mid-1960s to mid-1970s, a movement that suppressed traditional Chinese culture and led to the persecution and deaths of millions. She was purged after Mao’s death in 1976 and imprisoned as a member of the “Gang of Four,” which was blamed for the extremism of the Maoist movement.
Deng says that Li and Cai take orders from Xi just like Lin and Jiang did from Mao. But unlike Lin Biao, whose influence over the military gave him a power base that was seen as a challenge to Mao, Li and Cai are “completely relying on Xi’s hand. … Therefore, in terms of their relationship with Xi, the two have no capital to dare to disobey Xi.”
Still, Deng says he believes Li is looking to be appointed as Xi’s successor.
Chong Ja Ian, an associate professor of political sciences at the National University of Singapore, says Li and Cai must tread carefully so as not to show too much ambition or else they will not only arouse Xi’s suspicion but also that of their peers. Chong says looking back on the communist party’s history, whoever emerged too early as a possible successor was likely to have trouble.
“I think that in such an environment, it is difficult for them to pursue a certain position more formally,” Chong tells VOA. “If you do it too obviously, you will become a target.”
National Chengchi University’s Wang says Xi’s succession is not yet an issue and may not be for years to come as he could always be reelected by his peers for an unprecedented fourth term in 2027.
China’s National People’s Congress in 2018 eliminated term limits for the president, which could allow the 70-year-old Xi to remain head of state for life.
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Research Highlights Migrants Pay Gap in Australia
SYDNEY — A report released Wednesday shows migrants are paid less than Australian-born workers.
The Committee for Economic Development of Australia, an independent policy advocacy organization, has found migrants often work in jobs beneath their skill levels and can suffer discrimination.
The look into migration highlights missed opportunities for Australia.
The policy group asserts that about $2.64 billion in foregone wages would be unlocked each year if migrants earned comparable salaries to Australian-born workers.
The study found that migrants who have been in Australia for between two to six years earn around 10% less than their locally born counterparts.
The report found the biggest losers were female migrants with a postgraduate degree, who earned on average 31% less than Australian-born women in the workforce with similar qualifications.
The survey’s authors have urged the Canberra government to better recognize the international qualifications of migrants to help address severe skills shortages and to combat discrimination in the workplace.
The committee also said there should be a renewed emphasis on providing better English language tuition to new settlers.
Melinda Cilento, the chief executive of the Committee for Economic Development of Australia, told the Australian Broadcasting Corp. Wednesday that urgent action is needed.
“What we are finding is that people who come from non-English speaking backgrounds are the ones who are really struggling and that is one of the reasons why when we identify the (pay) gap, we are looking at English language ability,” she said. “It is one of the reasons why we think one of things you need to do is to actually improve English language training for people once they are in Australia.”
There has been no response, so far, from the Labor government in Canberra.
But last December, the government released its migration strategy. It plans to reduce immigration numbers by half within two years, because it believes current levels are unsustainable. The number of international students will be cut, and there will be a greater effort to attract skilled workers from overseas.
In 2022, more than a half-million immigrants came to Australia, up from 170,000 the previous year in a post-COVID surge after the removal of pandemic border closures.
Ministers also plan to crack down on international students who have enrolled at bogus colleges in Australia and have been exploiting the system to work and not study.
Most immigrants to Australia come from India and China.
While Australia seeks to curb the immigration of workers and students, it also has strict refugee policies. For more than a decade, the navy has been ordered to turn away boats carrying asylum seekers trying to reach Australia. Those who evade the authorities are automatically detained until their claims are processed.
Australia grants visas to about 20,000 refugees each year.
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Devastating Blast in China Kills 2, Injures 26
Sanhe, China — A suspected gas leak caused a blast at a restaurant in China’s northern province of Hebei that ripped facades from buildings, damaged cars and scattered debris to kill two people and injure 26, state media and authorities said on Wednesday.
The blast happened at about 8 a.m. in the county of Sanhe, state broadcaster CCTV News said, roughly 30 kilometers from the center of Beijing.
Videos on social media platform Weibo showed a large orange fireball over the site, followed by billows of grey smoke, and scenes of the destroyed frontage of buildings, mangled cars, with glass shards in the streets, and some objects still ablaze.
A suspected gas leak triggered the accident in a shop selling fried chicken in the town of Yanjiao, city emergency officials said in a statement, drawing rescuers, firefighters,
health and other officials to the scene.
“I was at home when I heard a loud blast, I initially thought it might be a gunshot,” said Zhao Li, a woman who lives about a kilometer from the blast site.
“The loud explosion was accompanied by a crash of glass and clouds of smoke,” said Zhao, adding that police sealed off the street to the site.
The fire had been brought under control, fire officials said in an earlier statement, adding that 36 vehicles and 154 people had been dispatched to the site and were carrying out rescue work.
China’s latest deadly gas explosion at an eatery comes after the government issued detailed guidelines last year on the use of gas appliances and cookers to avert safety risks.
Social media posters on Weibo said the explosion occurred near a cultural center in the town. Construction of a metro line was taking place nearby, Chinese weekly the Economic Observer posted on its social media account.
City emergency authorities sent an investigation team, according to social media posts. Regional supplier Taida Gas suspended service in several surrounding areas, as a precaution to prevent secondary injuries, it said in a statement.
“Our company … will resume supply after ensuring safety,” it added in the statement, although it said it did not service the area where the shop is located.
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Thailand’s Reformists Brace for Dissolution Decision
BANGKOK — Thailand’s Election Commission is asking the country’s Constitutional Court to dissolve the main opposition Move Forward Party, citing the party’s campaign promises last year to amend a strict law that prohibits criticism of the country’s monarchy.
The Thai monarchy is central to society and is enshrined in the country’s constitution, with the king enthroned in a “position of revered worship.”
Thailand’s Move Forward Party won the most seats in last year’s general elections in part on pledges to amend the country’s lèse-majesté law, a move the Election Commission argues was an attempt to overthrow the country’s monarchy.
“The Election Commission has considered the results of the study and analyzed the decision of the Constitutional Court. It was unanimously decided to submit a petition to the Constitutional Court to order the dissolution of the Kaew Klai Party,” the commission said in a statement.
Article 92 of Thailand’s Political Parties Act states that if a court finds a political party guilty of seeking to overthrow the Thai monarchy, the electoral commission can gather evidence and petitions to present to the Constitutional Court to consider dissolving the party. According to the law, the party’s lawmakers could also be banned from politics for 10 years if the court finds the party guilty.
Parit Wacharasindhu, spokesperson for the Move Forward Party, said they were innocent.
“We have no intention to overthrow the democratic system with the king as the head of state. We will prove our innocence at the Constitutional Court,” he told local media.
Backed by millions of young voters last May, the Move Forward Party won the most seats in the country’s general elections, including 32 out of 33 constituencies in the Thai capital of Bangkok.
But after the elections, the party was blocked from leading the government by Thailand’s military-appointed Senate when pro-royalists refused to endorse the party over its stance to amend the royal defamation law.
Members of the Move Forward Party declined to comment further when later contacted by VOA. The party has argued that its campaign to change Thailand’s strict law was aimed at preventing misuse of the law and strengthening the country’s constitutional monarchy.
Thailand’s lèse-majesté law, or Article 112 of its Criminal Code, prohibits criticism of the monarchy, and those who violate it are punished with lengthy jail sentences.
According to the Thai Lawyers for Human Rights organization, at least 263 people faced charges under Thailand’s royal defamation law from July 18, 2020, through January 2024. In January, a 30-year-old Thai man was given a record sentence of 50 years in prison for breaking the law.
The potential dissolution and charges against the Move Forward Party show they are viewed as a substantial threat to Thailand’s pro-royalist elite, some experts say.
“The party will likely be dissolved, because conservative elites view Move Forward as an existential threat to the constitutional monarchy,” said Zachary Abuza, a professor at the National War College in Washington who focuses on Southeast Asia politics and security.
“The party leadership has been preparing for this; after all it is exactly what happened to Future Forward. They will quickly re-register it,” he told VOA.
The Move Forward Party’s predecessor, the Future Forward Party, was controversially dissolved in 2020 after Thailand’s Constitutional Court ruled the party had been receiving illegal donations.
Its executives were also banned from politics for 10 years, decisions that sparked Thailand’s 2020 and 2021 protests when hundreds of thousands of youth demonstrators took to the streets in Bangkok calling for government and monarchy reform.
“The real problem is that the charismatic and widely known leadership will likely be red-carded and banned from politics for 10 years,” Abuza said of the Move Forward Party.
“This would be the second generation of leaders banned. That leaves the new party in a much weaker position when by-elections are held. There is also a real concern that voters, while supportive and sympathetic, will grow frustrated and elect politicians who can represent their interests on a daily basis,” he added.
Pita Limjaroenrat, a former candidate for prime minister, is hugely popular with his Move Forward supporters. But as well as facing a decade-long ban from politics should his party dissolve, he has also faced several other charges in recent months.
Although he survived a threat of political disqualification in January over allegations of having shares in a media company, he and seven others were sentenced by a Thai court to four months in jail, suspended for two years, over a flash mob rally in 2019.
VOA attempted to reach Pita for comment on the possible dissolution of the Move Forward Party but has yet to receive a reply.
Titipol Phakdeewanich, a political scientist at the Faculty of Political Science at Ubon Ratchathani University, said any dissolution will only spark a “rebirth” for the party.
“[It’s] no surprise. It’s only reflecting the same old political game against the progressive party. If the party is dissolved, it’s not the end for Move Forward Party, as we see with the case of the Future Forward Party. The conservative move against Move Forward will only re-energize the rebirth of the party,” he told VOA.
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Analysis: Does North Korea’s Kim Want Another Summit With Trump?
washington — A re-elected U.S. President Donald Trump could well awaken the following day to a phone call inviting him to Pyongyang for a summit with Kim Jong Un, says a veteran of the two previous Trump-Kim summits in 2018 and 2019.
“If I were Kim Jong Un talking to my advisers in Pyongyang, I’d be thinking of whether I [should] call President-elect Trump the day after the election to congratulate him” and say, “Why don’t you come to Pyongyang? Let’s meet here,” says former Trump adviser John Bolton.
“And Trump might do it,” continued Bolton in an interview with VOA’s Korean Service on Friday.
Bolton served as national security adviser during the period in which Trump and Kim exchanged frequent letters and conducted summits in Singapore in June 2018 and Hanoi in February 2019, as well as an impromptu meeting at the inter-Korean border in June 2019.
The Hanoi summit broke down when Trump walked away from Kim’s offer to dismantle North Korea’s main nuclear plant at Yongbyon in exchange for sanctions relief, and Kim has refused to engage with the United States or South Korea since U.S.-North Korean talks broke down in Stockholm eight months later.
But Bolton said that does not rule out the possibility that Kim might try again, or that Trump might accept.
“The danger with another Trump administration is he prizes making deals more than the substance of the deals, which he often doesn’t understand in the international context,” said Bolton, who has frequently criticized the former president’s approach to foreign affairs since leaving his administration.
Gary Samore, former White House coordinator for arms control and weapons of mass destruction during the Obama administration, told VOA via phone on Friday, “Kim Jong Un may very well believe that if there’s another summit, he can persuade Trump to lift international economic sanctions” and “weaken the U.S.-ROK [South Korea] alliance as Trump did in the Singapore meeting.”
At a news conference following his 2018 summit with Kim in Singapore, Trump announced the U.S. would suspend military drills with South Korea, describing them as “very provocative” and “tremendously expensive.”
Joint exercises resumed, however, under Trump’s successor, President Joe Biden. The U.S. and South Korea are currently holding the annual Freedom Shield exercise. It began on March 4 and will continue through Thursday.
Harry Kazianis, a senior editor at the website 19FortyFive and president of the Rogue States Project, thinks another Trump-Kim summit would be unlikely.
“Right now, North Korea is likely getting billions of dollars a year from Russia to help Putin arm his military in the Ukraine war and likely little sanctions enforcement from China. If those conditions were to hold, Kim has very little to gain from dealing with Trump,” he said.
But, he told VOA via email on Friday, Kim might need to engage with the American leader again if Trump were to bring the war in Ukraine to an end and successfully pressure China to enforce sanctions.
Scott Snyder, director of the program on U.S.-Korea policy at the Council on Foreign Relations, said via email on Friday that Pyongyang has made clear it is not interested in talks.
For diplomacy to resume, he said “both sides would have to find a way of putting the Hanoi experience behind them and establishing a new modus vivendi and mutually beneficial rationales for pursuing a new relationship.”
Sangjin Cho contributed to this report.
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US House Expected to Pass Bill Forcing Chinese Company to Give Up TikTok
WASHINGTON — The U.S. House of Representatives is expected to approve legislation Wednesday that would force the popular TikTok video app to either separate from its Chinese-owned parent company ByteDance or sell the U.S. version of the software.
The bipartisan Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act “gives TikTok six months to eliminate foreign adversary control — which would include ByteDance divesting its current ownership — to remain available in the United States,” said Representative Mike Gallagher, chairman of the House Select Committee on Strategic Competition Between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party, and Representative Raja Krishnamoorthi, the top Democrat on the committee.
“All TikTok would have to do is separate from CCP-controlled ByteDance. However, if TikTok chose not to rid itself of this CCP control, the application would no longer be offered in U.S. app stores. But TikTok would have no one but itself to blame,” the lawmakers said in a prepared statement.
Here’s what we know about the legislation and what happens next in the U.S. Senate.
Why is TikTok under scrutiny?
“The concern is that TikTok could transfer personal information to its parent company ByteDance, who in turn could transfer it to the Chinese government,” Caitlin Chin-Rothmann, a fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, told VOA.
Chin-Rothmann said concerns by some members of Congress about the Chinese Communist Party potentially controlling TikTok’s algorithm for propaganda purposes have not yet been proven.
“That’s not to say that, in the future, there’s not a risk that the Chinese government could exert pressure,” she said.
What does TikTok say about the legislation?
TikTok on Monday called the legislation a “ban” and has repeatedly denied the allegations against it. In a statement last week on X, formerly Twitter, the company said the “legislation has a predetermined outcome: a total ban of TikTok in the United States.”
How do lawmakers view the legislation?
The bill has strong support from House Democrats and Republicans, despite congressional offices receiving floods of phone calls from Americans concerned about losing access to the social media app.
House Speaker Mike Johnson told reporters last week, “It’s an important bipartisan measure to take on China, our largest geopolitical foe, which is actively undermining our economy and security.”
What about the Senate?
The bill could face a much harder road to passage in the Democratic-controlled Senate, where Majority Leader Chuck Schumer has said it will face consideration in the appropriate committees.
“I will listen to their views on the bill and determine the best path,” Schumer said in a statement.
Some Senate Democrats, including Mark Warner, chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, have expressed doubts about the legality of singling out a social media app in legislation. He has introduced alternative legislation more broadly targeting apps that collect personal data.
But Warner told CBS News on Sunday that the TikTok app is a serious national security concern.
“If you don’t think the Chinese Communist Party can twist that algorithm to make it the news that they see reflective of their views, then I don’t think you appreciate the nature of the threat,” Warner said.
How do the leading 2024 presidential candidates feel about the bill?
The White House said it welcomes the legislation, even though the Biden campaign joined TikTok recently as an effort to reach out to younger voters.
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters the bill ensures “ownership isn’t in the hands of those who may do us harm.”
Former President Donald Trump — who initially called for a ban of the app in 2020 — has now changed course, arguing that Facebook will be empowered if TikTok is no longer available.
“There’s a lot of good, and there’s a lot of bad with TikTok. But the thing I don’t like is that without TikTok, you’re going to make Facebook bigger,” the presumptive 2024 Republican presidential nominee told U.S. cable network CNBC in a phone interview this week.
What happens once the bill passes the House?
Apart from constitutional concerns over preventing U.S. citizens from exercising their right to free speech, the bill could also be difficult to legally enforce and face challenges in U.S. courts.
“Chinese export control laws could potentially prevent the sale of TikTok’s algorithm,” Chin-Rothmann said. “A divestiture would be very logistically difficult, in general. TikTok is one of the largest companies in the world. So, any buyer would have to be very large, as well. They would have to have a strategic interest in purchasing TikTok, and then the merger would have to not raise antitrust concerns in the United States.”
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Residents on Taiwan’s Front-Line Kinmen Islands Calm Amid China Tensions
Tensions between Taipei and Beijing have been heating up in the waters around Taiwan-controlled Kinmen Islands, which sit a few kilometers from the Chinese mainland. Residents have endured artillery barrages in the past and persistent military threats. Even so, many say they doubt conflict will reach their shore. VOA’s Elizabeth Lee explains.
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Reports: South Korean Held in Russia for Spying was a Missionary
SEOUL, South Korea — A South Korean citizen arrested in Russia on suspicion of espionage was a missionary who supported North Korean laborers based in Russia’s Far East, South Korean media reports said on Tuesday.
The man, named as Baek Won-soon, was transferred from Vladivostok to Moscow and is accused of handing over classified information to foreign intelligence agencies, Russian state news agency Tass reported.
Baek, 53, was described as a “deeply religious” person who was also registered as the founder of a travel company based in Vladivostok, according to Tass.
It was the first time a South Korean has been detained in Russia for alleged espionage, Tass said.
South Korean television network JTBC said Baek had travelled to Vladivostok from China earlier this year to carry out missionary work for North Korean workers in Russia, citing an unidentified acquaintance.
He was also involved in helping North Koreans to defect, Yonhap news agency quoted an unnamed acquaintance as saying.
South Korea’s foreign ministry said its consulate had been providing assistance since it became aware of the arrest. It declined to give more details as the matter was currently under investigation.
The South Korean government is communicating with Russia for the safe return of its national, a foreign ministry spokesperson told reporters on Tuesday.
U.S. and South Korean officials have raised concerns that Russia has accepted new groups of North Korean workers in defiance of a U.N. resolution amid a blossoming of ties between Moscow and Pyongyang.
A 2017 U.N. Security Council resolution required countries to expel North Korean workers by 2019 on the grounds that their labor was exploited to earn foreign currency for North Korea’s banned nuclear and ballistic missile programs. But thousands reportedly remain in China and Russia.
North Korean construction workers and loggers still remain in Russia, holding student or tourism visas there, a South Korean government report said last year.
Ties between Russia and South Korea have been increasingly strained by Moscow’s growing relations with North Korea amid allegations that Pyongyang has supplied munitions for the war in Ukraine.
South Korea, a U.S. ally, has denounced Russia’s invasion and supplied economic and humanitarian aid to Kyiv, but has so far stopped short of sending weapons.
Since the Ukraine war, South Korea has had a special travel advisory urging its citizens not to travel to Russia.
your ad hereIndonesia to Deport Japanese Man Accused in $90M Fraud
BATAM, Indonesia — A Japanese man accused of helping to run a $90 million investment scam will be sent home after four years on the run, Indonesian authorities said Tuesday.
Yusuke Yamazaki, 43, was arrested off Bulan island in Kepulauan Riau province on Jan. 31, while attempting to cross into Malaysia in a small wooden boat, said Nyoman Gede Surya Mataram, who heads the provincial office of the Ministry of Law and Human Rights. He’s expected to be deported by the end of the day.
The boat also carried four undocumented Indonesian migrant workers and two crew, Mataram said. The others were detained by police for further investigation while Yamazaki was handed over to the Immigration Office in Batam on Feb. 2.
Yamazaki initially gave a false name and was detained on suspicion of visa violations, Mataram said, but police later identified him as an international fugitive.
He was an executive at Nishiyama Farm, an Okayama-based company that ran farm tours across Japan and collapsed amid allegations of fraud in February 2019. Five people connected to Nishiyama Farm were arrested in October 2021 for suspected fraud worth around $90 million and later convicted, but Yamazaki left Japan for Hong Kong in February 2020, according to Japanese media reports.
Aichi Prefectural Police listed Yamazaki as a fugitive on an Interpol Blue Notice in 2022. Mataram said Yamazaki is believed to have arrived in Indonesia by way of Turkey in April the following year.
“Further legal process will be carried out by Japanese government upon his transfer to Japan,” said Batam’s Immigration Office Chief, Samuel Toba, at a news conference.
He added that Japanese Police on had dispatched investigators to Indonesia to assist in the deportation of Yamazaki, who will be flown to Jakarta at noon before he is sent on an overnight Japan Airlines flight to Tokyo.
In a lawsuit filed by 41 investors in Tokyo and four other prefectures seeking compensation from Yamazaki and others, the Nagoya District Court ordered the defendants to pay about $2.2 million in February 2022.
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Palau’s President Relieved by Security Pact Funding Approval
Washington — Critical funds to counter China in the Pacific are finally on their way to three U.S. allies: Palau, Micronesia and the Marshall Islands.
On Friday, the Senate passed a funding package that provides $7 billion over 20 years for the Compacts of Free Association (COFA) as part of a partial government funding bill. It was signed into law by President Joe Biden over the weekend.
“Extending Compact-related assistance is a critical component of the administration’s Pacific Partnership, Indo-Pacific, and National Security Strategies,” said U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken in a statement. “We look forward to working with our partners in the Freely Associated States over the next two decades of COFA-related cooperation.”
The compacts are agreements that give the U.S. strategic access to these regions of the Pacific Ocean. In return, the U.S. provides grants to fund education, health care and infrastructure in these nations, whose citizens are then entitled to study, work and live in the U.S. without a visa.
The United States has had compact agreements in effect with Micronesia and the Marshalls since 1986 and with Palau since 1994.
The compacts were signed last year but funding stalled as U.S. lawmakers struggled to reach agreement on full-year spending. Palau has been forced to borrow to pay for basic government services like education and health care while waiting for $890 million — its share of the funds.
“It’s not Oct. 1, but it’s at least within this fiscal year, and really just in time,” Palau President Surangel Whipps Jr. told VOA in an interview on Monday.
“[This] allows us to stop borrowing to keep government operations going; it allows us to hire those critical police officers, health care workers and education teachers that we need,” he said.
Palau’s economy tanked after Chinese tourism dropped by more than 50% in the wake of the COVID pandemic. The island nation maintains diplomatic relations with Taiwan under repeated pressure from Beijing to switch alliances.
Whipps says he recently met with investors from Singapore and Japan, as well as United Airlines with a request for direct service to Japan. He said now that COFA is funded, he can promise a stable and secure environment to financiers.
“[It’s important that we’re] opening up new markets so that we’re diversified and more resilient, not so dependent on the Chinese tourism, which could be weaponized,” said Whipps.
Coordinated push
The final passage comes after a coordinated pressure campaign, from members of Congress as well as the Pacific region.
“The COFA agreements send a clear message of U.S. commitment to the Pacific region and take a much-needed international strong stand for the ideals of democracy and freedom,” American Samoa Representative Aumua Amata Coleman Radewagen said in a statement after the House passed COFA on Wednesday.
“I’ve appreciated the partnership of my colleagues on both sides of the aisle and thank the many advocates — in Hawaii and in COFA communities across the country — whose hard work made this victory possible,” Hawaii Senator Mazie Hirono said in a statement after the Senate passed COFA, Friday.
The leaders of Micronesia and the Marshall Islands joined Whipps in February in drafting a letter to congressional leaders warning of the consequences of not funding the compacts.
Like Palau, the Marshall Islands maintains diplomatic relations with Taiwan, while Micronesia has diplomatic relations with Beijing.
“There have been ‘carrot and stick’ efforts from the PRC [People’s Republic of China] to shift our alliances, including discontinuing support of Taiwan,” Marshall Islands President Hilda Heine wrote in the February letter.
At a Nuclear Remembrance Day ceremony in the Marshall Islands on March 1, President Heine said the funding delay had created doubt.
“At some point, our nation needs to seriously consider other options available to us if the U.S. is unable or unwilling to keep its commitments to us. Our nation has been a steadfast ally of the United States, but that should not be taken for granted,” she told the audience.
Delay sends signal
Experts say Washington’s funding delay sent a signal to the rest of the Pacific that undermines U.S. credibility.
“They see our agreements with these three Pacific nations as the bellwether for our entire engagement with the region,” Kathryn Hendel Paik, Center for Strategic and International Studies senior fellow, said Monday in an interview with VOA.
“Our waffling on this has really made them question a relationship that they were already starting to be skeptical on because, historically, we have not always been there for the Pacific and we’ve not always showed up the way we should have,” she said.
Charles Paul, Marshall Islands ambassador to the U.S., told VOA via Zoom on Monday, “We’re looking forward to having the compacts approved.”
He added that the agreement includes about $700 million to address the health impacts of radiation introduced in the 67 American atmospheric nuclear tests between 1946 and 1958.
In a 13-minute video posted Saturday on Facebook, Wesley Sinima, president of the Federated States of Micronesia, said the funding delay stirred up “doubt and uncertainty.” He added, however, that the final agreement will “contribute to greater peace and prosperity” for the Micronesian people and “greater security and stability for the Indo-Pacific region and the world.”
As for Palau, President Whipps said he’s been invited to Washington in the coming weeks for an exchange of diplomatic notes to finalize the compacts. He hopes to attend.
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