New marriage laws introduced in Cambodia
Marriages between old men and young women are "inappropriate", Mr Koy Kuong, a Foreign Ministry spokesman, said, and foreign men who wish to marry nationals must earn a high salary to ensure that "Cambodian women can live a decent life" he continued. Foreigners who earn less than US$2,550 (Bt76,500) per month are also barred from wedding local women. It is interesting that it is a Foreign Ministry spokesman who makes these comments and not some home ministry official, given the policy only applies in Cambodia.
So, in a country where the International Labour Organisation says the per capita income is $321(Bt9,630) and in the countryside, where most workers come from, the average monthly income, for an entire household, is $40 a month and where the average salary for a Cambodian civil servant is $28 (Bt840) a month, for a Cambodian woman married to a foreign man to have a "decent life" the foreign man must have an annual income of $30,600 (Bt918,000) when the average Cambodian wage is about a tenth of this.
The official line is that this law will crack down on "sham marriages and human trafficking". Well excuse me if I say rot. Since this applies only to Cambodian soil, how can a marriage undertaken in Cambodia be a sham and how does trafficking come in to it if the couple want to live in Cambodia?
This is contrary to Cambodia's undertakings in the UN Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW; October 17 1980 signature; October 15 1992 accession) and also international law. This is not a virtuous attempt to protect Cambodian women from exploitation. It is nothing more than a nasty racist policy that has been introduced by Hun Sen's government. Submitted by Fred Morrice Bangkok
Vientiane's recent decision to allow Laotian students to study for bachelor degrees in the Thai language represents a new benchmark of Thai-Lao relations
For decades, this has been an off-area for ties across the Mekong. Until recently, students could study only for masters and post graduate degrees with English language instruction in Thai universities, when scholarships were available.
Beyond the Thai-Lao context, the change of heart manifests the growing pragmatism of the new Lao leadership, which has the vision to transform the land-locked country to become a fully developed land-linked hub in continental Southeast Asia - linking Southern China to the Gulf of Thailand.
With several infrastructure projects in the pipeline under Asean Connectivity, as well as the ongoing Kunming-Vientiane high speed train, Laos is linking its north with southern China and south with Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam, as part of the network of regional connectivity. To prepare for the future, the government has dispatched its best students overseas for education and training. The Lao Communist Party, which recently celebrated its 50th anniversary, is also recruiting bright students to boost its credentials and relevancy.
According to the World Bank, Laos had the second highest economic performance after China last year with an average economic growth of 7.5 per cent. Such impressive growth - unprecedented in its history - was the result of economic reform and overall efforts to integrate with Asean's economy. In the next five years, Laos also hopes to graduate from the list of least developed countries and is also hopeful of joining the World Trade Organisation.
With a new found confidence, the Lao leadership is becoming more outward looking and engaging, especially with neighbouring countries. Since joining Asean in 1997, Laos' overall relations with China, Vietnam and Thailand, have intensified with strong economic ties. Except for Cambodia and Burma, these three neighbours pursue different patterns of political and economic relations, which has enabled Laos to maintain its overall equilibrium.
Lao-China relations improved dramatically in the 1980's and more steadily afterward, as China's presence in the past 6 years has increased by leaps and bounds with huge investment in infrastructure projects. For instance, in Northern Laos, China's economic and demographic presence in Boten is quite impressive. Although China was considered a late comer in comparison with Vietnam, its larger and high-impact investment and assistant schemes including all round cooperation, have all but overwhelmed Vietnam's long-held dominance. Of late, China has also boosted the defence capacity of the Lao armed forces, delivering new military hardware and training. Diplomats frequenting the northern route linking Luang Prabang and border towns in China, have witnessed long lines of military trucks for delivery to Laos.
Truth be told, as a land-locked nation with over six million population, Laos is extremely sensitive to foreign influence. Any tilt towards any country would be addressed quite readily by party leaders. At the National Assembly meeting at the end of last year, the sudden resignation of prime minister Bouasone Bouphavanh was a good case in point. Officially, family problems were cited as the main reason - but diplomatic insiders in Vientiane held different views. They said disagreement over the scope of China's role and economic influence in the country was one of the major factors.
Less controversial this time around were Thai-Lao ties. They have improved tremendously in the past two years due to the repatriation of Hmong refugees inside Thailand, which remained the thorn in the side for the past three decades. This chapter of bad history has finally been overcome. After the controversial repatriation at the end of 2009, Thailand bore the brunt of foreign criticism for pushing back the refugees against international pressure, especially from the US.
Albeit despite repeated reports of irregularities and mistreatment, overall Thailand's actions have been vindicated. Both sides are now working closely and discreetly to wrap up their long acrimonious affairs. UN agencies and third resettlement countries are more collaborative now that the issue is no longer on the political radar.
Following the January death of General Vang Pao, the Hmong resistance leader, Laotian leaders, who long fought against him and his Hmong resistance forces, have gradually opened up to overseas Hmong communities, those living in the US in particular, by inviting them to return to their homeland. The government also targets well-to-do Hmong investors.
From December 19 last year, Thailand and Laos began celebrating the 60th anniversary of their diplomatic relations. Numerous activities are planned, including commemorative stamps and books, joint cultural exhibitions, performance and sports. There is new and ongoing construction of railways, roads, hospitals and public utilities. Her Royal Highness Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn has maintained the most extensive assistance programs inside Laos covering much-needed fields such as education, agriculture, medicine and human resource developments.
Thailand has been very careful in nurturing its new found trust with Laos. Border authorities were given special instructions to prevent trafficking in people, especially along Nakhon Phanom and Nong Khai provinces. Due to the rising cost of living, more and more Laotians have been attracted to work across the border for higher wages. Thai movie stars and singers are being warned to observe and behave within Lao cultural norms and values. Thai tourists flocking to Laos, 1.3 million last year, have a better appreciation of Lao traditions than before. At this juncture, Thailand cannot afford to have any discord with Laos while the Thai-Cambodian ties continue to face uncertainty.
Laos is planning for the upcoming super event as host of the 9th Asia Europe Meeting in November 2012 - the country's biggest diplomatic showcase since its independence. In 2005, Vientiane hosted for the first time the Asean summit. Unbeknown to the public and media, also in 2005, Laos was the first country to offer hosting of the much heralded East Asia Summit, but it was overlooked. However, the possibility of having at least three dozen leaders from Asia and Europe converge on Vientiane
rendered a strong sense of national pride that Laos would be the centre of global attention - no longer merely the land of laid-back people. By Kavi Chongkittavornfor The Nation Bangkok
Vietnam has increased repression of indigenous minority Christians in the country’s Central Highlands, closing small informal churches, compelling public renunciations of faith and arresting worshipers, Human Rights Watch said in a report released Thursday.
The hill tribe minorities, known as Montagnards, are traditionally animist but have been converted to Christianity in large numbers over the past half-century. Culturally and ethnically distinct from the majority lowland Vietnamese, the believers among them worship clandestinely in informal settings known as house churches that are illegal under Vietnamese law.
“Montagnards face harsh persecution in Vietnam, particularly those who worship in independent house churches, because the authorities don’t tolerate religious activity outside their sight or control,” said Phil Robertson, deputy Asia director of the human rights monitoring group, which is based in New York. “The Vietnamese government has been steadily tightening the screws on independent Montagnard religious groups, claiming they are using religion to incite unrest.”
The conflicts involve more than religion as Vietnam’s population and economy expand and lowland Vietnamese settlers encroach on the farmland of indigenous hill tribes, primarily with agricultural plantations.
There is a political aspect as well involving government concerns over links among some of the Montagnards with evangelical groups in the United States. Many Montagnards fought alongside American and South Vietnamese troops during the Vietnam War, and some continued to resist after the Communist victory in 1975.
For the most part Montagnard Christians today are nonpolitical but the government is particularly concerned about a branch known as Dega Christianity, which is associated with a movement for land rights.
The United States designated Vietnam as a “country of particular concern” for religious freedom in 2004 but removed it from the list of such countries two years later, saying it was satisfied with the government’s moves to loosen restrictions.
Most Buddhists, Muslims and mainline Christian denominations worship freely in Vietnam. Buddhist temples are packed during festivals and churches sometimes overflow with worshipers on Sundays and at Easter and Christmas. According to government statistics the population is 9.3 percent Buddhist and 6.7 percent Roman Catholic, the largest Catholic population in Southeast Asia outside the Philippines.
But under Vietnamese law religious groups must register with the government and operate under approved guidelines. When the government gave official sanction to some evangelical Protestant churches a decade ago almost none of the 400 churches in the Central Highlands were included.
Independent unregistered groups often come under harsh government pressure. They include unapproved or independent congregations of Mennonites, Cao Dai, Hoa Hao Buddhists, ethnic Khmer Theravada Buddhists and the Unified Buddhist Church of Vietnam, as well as the Montagnard Christians.
The police and local officials disperse their religious gatherings, confiscate religious literature and summon religious leaders to police stations for interrogation. In some instances police officers destroy the churches of unauthorized groups and detain or imprison their members on charges of violating national security.
“The United States government should recognize this and should clearly designate Vietnam as a country of particular concern for violations of religious freedom,” Mr. Robertson said. “I think the facts demand it. The situation with the Montagnards is one of the most egregious violations of religious freedom in Vietnam.”
The Central Highlands are mostly off limits to journalists and independent rights groups. The report said much of its information came from the official news media as well as from asylum seekers who have fled through the mountains to neighboring Cambodia, and from overseas Montagnard advocacy groups.
The Vietnamese news media are remarkably forthright about the pressure on the Montagnards, Mr. Robertson said.
The Human Rights Watch report quoted one Vietnamese press report, in Bao Gia Lai, a state newspaper in Gia Lai Province, as saying: “After attempting to organize violent protests at various locations in the highlands and facing continued failure, some helpless leaders fled into the forest. But the sacred wood and untamed water could not protect them.”
It quoted Radio Voice of Vietnam as saying: “When a so-called religion becomes a tool in the hands of evil people, it should be considered evil and unlawful and should be eliminated.” By SETH MYDANS International Herald Tribune
A spirit of voluntary self-restraint or jishuku is sweeping the country following the earthquake, tsunami and nuclear reactor crises. But experts are concerned about the impact of this on the economy
EVEN in a country whose people are known for walking in lockstep, a national consensus on the proper code of behaviour has emerged with startling speed.
Consider post-tsunami Japan as the age of voluntary self-restraint, or jishuku, the antipode of the Japan of the "bubble" era that celebrated excess.
With hundreds of thousands of people displaced up north from the earthquake, tsunami and nuclear crisis, anything with the barest hint of luxury invites condemnation. There were only general calls for conservation, but within days of the March 11 quake, Japanese of all stripes began turning off lights, elevators, heaters and even toilet seat warmers. But self-restraint goes beyond the need to compensate for shortages of electricity brought on by the closing of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant.
At a time of collective mourning, jishuku also demands that self-restraint be practised elsewhere. Candidates in next month's local elections are hewing to the ethos by campaigning quietly for votes, instead of circling neighbourhoods in their usual campaign trucks with blaring loudspeakers.
With aggressive sales tactics suddenly rendered unseemly, the giant Bic Camera electric appliance outlet in central Tokyo has dropped the decibels on its incessant in-store jingle, usually audible half a block away.
At the high school baseball tournament in Osaka, bands put away their instruments; instead, cheering sections have been clapping by hitting plastic horns together. There are also doubts about whether it is proper to partake in the seasonal pleasures that regulate much of Japanese life.
"At this time of the year, we'd usually be talking about going to see cherry blossoms," Hiroshi Sekiguchi, one of the country's best-known television personalities, said on his Sunday morning talk show.
In fact, cherry blossom viewing parties and fireworks festivals have been cancelled.
Graduations and commencements have been put off. Stores and restaurants have reduced their hours or have closed. Cosmetics and karaoke are out; bottled water and Geiger counters are in.
It is as if much of a nation's people have simultaneously hunkered down, all with barely a rule being passed or a penalty being assessed.
"We are not forced or anything," said Koichi Nakamura, 45, who runs a karaoke shop in Kabukicho, Tokyo's famed entertainment district, where customers looking to sing their lungs out have all but vanished. "I hope it will somehow contribute to the affected areas."
The almost overnight transformation is likely to continue for months, if not years. The hot summer ahead is expected to further strain the nation's electrical network, leading to more disruptive blackouts that make it hard for business to be conducted the Japanese way, face to face and often into the night. The vast entertainment industry that greases corporate Japan, including sushi bars and cabarets, is likely to be deeply hurt.
As effective as the self-restraint has been -- conservation measures have allowed Tokyo Electric Power to cancel some planned blackouts -- the continued scaling back is likely to have a corrosive effect on Japan's sagging economy.
While the government will spend heavily to rebuild the shattered prefectures to the northeast, consumer spending, which makes up about 60 per cent of the economy, will probably sink; bankruptcies are expected to soar.
Had the disasters hit a more distant corner of the country, things might have been different. But because Tokyo has been directly affected by the blackouts and the nuclear crisis, the impact has been greater.
The capital and surrounding prefectures, where so many companies, government agencies and news media outlets are located, account for about one-third of the country's gross domestic product.
Japan has gone through spasms of self-control before, including after the death of Emperor Hirohito in 1989.
This time, though, self-restraint may be a way of coping with the traumatising scale of the loss of life as well as the spreading fears of radioactive fallout, according to Kensuke Suzuki, an associate professor of sociology at Kwansei Gakuin University in western Japan.
"With the extensive coverage of the disaster zone, jishuku has become a way for people in Tokyo to express solidarity at a time of crisis," Suzuki said in an email. "Jishuku is the easiest way to feel like you're doing something, though perhaps there isn't much thought put into how much these actions make an overall difference."
It is not surprising then that the national obsession with self-restraint has bled into political circles.
In several prefectures, like Gifu, Aomori and Akita, candidates have agreed not to campaign too aggressively, by limiting their appearances and not calling voters at home.
But others, like Japan's Communist Party, have explicitly rejected a calmer tenor to their campaigning, saying that it would rob voters of valuable information about candidates.
There were other opponents of self-restraint. While the ethos has been strongest in northern Japan and in the Tokyo area, western Japan appeared split. Kobe, the site of a 1995 earthquake, was firmly in favour.
But Toru Hashimoto, the governor of Osaka, Japan's second-biggest city, said too much holding back would hurt the economy. He urged people to spend even more, so as to support the economy; some businesses are helping by donating part of their proceeds to affected areas.By KEN BELSON and NORIMITSU ONISHI NYT
IF there is a rainbow behind the dark clouds currently blanketing Japan -- the country is facing its gravest crisis since World War 2 -- it could be this: relations with China, which were at their worst in decades last year, are taking a turn for the better.
The Chinese government was quick to offer its sympathy and support, and the vast majority of the Chinese public endorsed this, despite predominantly negative sentiments about Japan reflected in previous public opinion surveys.
A poll taken last year showed 79 per cent of Chinese felt that Japan could not be trusted.
However, an online survey conducted after the earthquake showed that 1.2 million of 1.5 million respondents backed their government's efforts to aid Japan.
The triple disaster -- earthquake, tsunami and nuclear reactor crisis -- offers an opportunity for repairing Sino-Japanese relations just as the Sept 11 attack on the United States in 2001 provided an opportunity for China to improve ties with the US.
In 2001, then president Jiang Zemin telephoned his American counterpart, George W. Bush, the same day to offer China's sympathy and its cooperation in the campaign against terrorists.
That helped to reverse a decline in Sino-American relations that was symbolised by the collision earlier that year between a Chinese fighter jet and an American reconnaissance aircraft gathering intelligence along the Chinese coast.
The Bush administration had entered office viewing China as America's next adversary after the demise of the Soviet Union.
Similarly, the current disaster gives China an opportunity to mend a key relationship that went terribly wrong last year after the arrest by Japan of a Chinese fishing boat captain in the vicinity of disputed islands after his trawler allegedly rammed two Japanese coast guard vessels.
Last year was not a high point in Chinese foreign policy, marked as it was by a steep deterioration in relations with the US and Europe, in particular after the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to Liu Xiaobo, a dissident serving an 11-year prison term.
Since then, however, China appears to have adopted a more moderate stance.
President Hu Jintao made use of his state visit to Washington in January to increase mutual trust. Most notably, he joined President Barack Obama in criticising North Korea over its uranium enrichment facility.
The Japanese disaster is providing China with a providential opportunity to mend relations on that front as well.
For one thing, it is offering the Chinese public a view of Japan that they do not always have: a country whose people are disciplined, stoical and orderly even when under the most extreme stress.
While people in China panicked and stocked up on salt thinking it would protect them from radiation, the Japanese, by and large, remained calm and uncomplaining, doing what they could to help victims of the disaster.
Accounts of actions by individual Japanese have also touched the hearts of people in China.
One story, that of a 59-year-old company manager named Mitsuru Sato, who escorted 20 Chinese female interns to safety and then returned to look for his own family only to be swept away during the tsunami, has been told and retold in China.
In a way, the great Sichuan earthquake of 2008 had set a precedent, with Japan providing material aid and sending a search-and-rescue team.
Pictures of Japanese rescue team members paying respect to Chinese bodies, in particular, helped to enhance the image in China of Japan as a highly cultured society.
This time, there is a chance for China not just to improve its image in Japan, but to actually improve bilateral relations.
There is much that can be done, beginning with resolving the dispute over natural resources in the East China Sea.
The two countries agreed in principle on joint development in 2008 but, in the intervening years, there has been no accord on when and where to begin such development.
Japan has been eager to make a start but China has been dragging its feet.
This and other disputes have poisoned the atmosphere. While they have always existed, they had, in the past, been properly managed.
There are those who think that the current crisis has permanently diminished Japan and that it will no longer be able to compete with China.
Be that as it may, Beijing's policy should be to improve relations with Tokyo rather than to take advantage of a weakened Japan. By Frank Ching for The New Straits Times Kuala Lumpur
As U.S. forces were firing hundreds of missiles to establish a Libyan no flight zone, Pakistani newspaper headlines were consumed by a different missile strike: “Pakistan furious as U.S. drone strike kills civilians,” blared The Express Tribune; “38 killed in drone strike on NWA tribal jirga,” declared the Daily Times.
This week marks the second anniversary of the Obama administration’s “Af-Pak strategy” to confront the “security threats posed by extremists in Afghanistan and Pakistan.” But while the United States scrambles to develop a response to protests in North Africa and the Middle East, its policy toward Pakistan is crumbling — with no clear fix in sight.
Last December, the administration’s “2010 Afghanistan and Pakistan Annual Review” reported positive developments throughout the region. According to the unclassified version, the U.S.-Pakistani “renewed bilateral partnership is helping promote stability in Pakistan” and defeat Islamic radicalism. But today, the facts are otherwise.
Pakistan is deeply divided and radicalism is spreading even among the nation’s most privileged classes. After the governor of Punjab was murdered in January for supporting the repeal of Pakistan’s blasphemy law, thousands took to the streets. But instead of protesting the murder, they marched in support of the law and the assassin. Pakistani lawyers — a group that was instrumental in toppling the Musharraf regime — threw rose petals at the accused killer and hailed him as a hero.
A few weeks later, another opponent of the blasphemy law and Pakistan’s only Christian cabinet member was gunned down. Although the culprits escaped, Rafi Usmani, the grand mufti of Pakistan, told the Associated Press, “I am afraid that this could be an American conspiracy to defame the government of Pakistan, Muslims and Islam.”
Far from a U.S.-Pakistani “partnership,” anti-Americanism is rampant. Last fall, 29.5 percent of students in postgraduate colleges and universities identified the United States as the greatest threat to Pakistan, according to a survey by the Pak Institute for Peace Studies. That number was more than twice as many as the next greatest threat, India, with whom Pakistan has fought four wars. Only 6.8 percent of Pakistan’s young elites identified the Taliban as the greatest threat; 6.5 percent said it was Al Qaeda. In perhaps the most troubling response for America’s strategic engagement, 68.3 percent thought Pakistan should not support the “U.S.-led War on Terror,” while only 21 percent thought it should.
Since then, ongoing drone strikes, the killing of two alleged attackers by the C.I.A. contractor Raymond Davis, and the claims of his diplomatic immunity by the United States, have further inflamed public opinion. While payments to the dead men’s families recently gained Davis’s release, even moderate opposition politicians and journalists have criticized the settlement, even though the payment of “blood money” is sanctioned by Shariah law.
As for the United States promoting stability within Pakistan, the Obama administration’s expanded use of drones appears to be having the opposite effect. As early as 2009, according to a leaked cable, a former U.S. ambassador to Pakistan, Anne Patterson, warned that America’s unilateral targeting of militants risks “destabilizing the Pakistani state, alienating both the civilian government and military leadership, and provoking a broader governance crisis in Pakistan without finally achieving the goal.”
One of the authors of this article, Shamshek Asad, was raised in Pakistan. During a trip to Karachi a week ago, he experienced greater anti-Americanism than ever before at all levels of society. More than 60 years after independence and 40 years after the loss of Bangladesh, Pakistan remains extraordinarily leery of foreign influence. Coupled with a remarkable belief in foreign conspiracies and a decade of anti-U.S. propaganda by Islamists, this generates not only resentment, but near paranoia about U.S. intentions in Pakistan.
Optimists argue that U.S.-Pakistani relations may have hit a rough patch, but they remain sound. Skeptics contend that the United States has failed to bolster President Asif Ali Zardari’s government, despite billions of dollars in military and civilian aid, and that America’s efforts have yielded more antipathy than gratitude.
Two years ago, the Af-Pak Strategy answered Pakistani criticism that America had historically abandoned both countries by committing “all elements of international power — diplomatic, informational, military and economic” to the region. It is time to assess whether this ambitious strategy is working.
The Obama administration should conduct an independent review of U.S. policy toward Pakistan. The questions it should address include: Is the core goal of the United States — to disrupt, dismantle, and defeat Al Qaeda and its safe havens in Pakistan — distorting American policy toward Pakistan? Would a lower U.S. profile and more modest agenda be more effective and sustainable? Do the tactical benefits of drone strikes further long-term, strategic goals? And should the U.S. abandon the “Af-Pak” regional approach in favor of more tailored policies for each country?
There are no easy answers. But after two years of limited progress in an increasingly radicalized, nuclear Pakistan, tough questions are the least of our worries.
The New York Times By PETER CHARLES CHOHARIS and SHAMSHEK ASAD. Peter Charles Choharis, a visiting fellow at the American Security Project, practices international law in Washington.Shamshek Asad is an international energy consultant.
Members of the People's Liberation Army Navy in parade formation in September 2009.
The Chinese government has announced that the military budget for 2011 is about $92 billion, up 12.7 percent from 2010.
BEIJING — The Chinese military said Thursday that while the security situation in Asia and the Pacific was generally stable, it was becoming “more intricate and volatile,” with no clear solutions for tension points like the divided Korean Peninsula and with the United States increasing its involvement in regional security issues.
The military’s vision was laid out in a national defense white paper, a document published every two years since 1998. The paper tries to walk a line between trumpeting the modernization efforts of the Chinese military and assuaging fears by foreign governments and analysts that the fast-growing People’s Liberation Army will be used for expansionist purposes or regional dominance.
The paper stressed that China’s military buildup is purely defensive in nature, a line that Chinese leaders have long espoused. The paper had more detail than previous editions on China’s attempts to establish confidence-building measures with foreign militaries. In the past year, perceptions by foreign countries of China’s military growth and of a more assertive Chinese foreign policy have resulted in diplomatic discord and discomfort, particularly between China and the United States.
“China attaches importance to its military relationship with the United States and has made ongoing efforts towards building a sound military relationship,” Sr. Col. Geng Yansheng said at a news conference on Thursday, reading from a text. “The Chinese military is now taking steps to advance exchanges with the U.S. military this year.”
But “there’s no denying that in developing military relations, we still face difficulties and challenges,” he added.
The white paper observed that in the Asia-Pacific region, “relevant major powers are increasing their strategic investment.”
“The United States is reinforcing its regional military alliances, and increasing its involvement in regional security affairs,” it added.
Colonel Geng said that the army’s Chief of General Staff, Gen. Chen Bingde, would visit the United States in May. Robert M. Gates, the United States defense secretary, flew to Beijing in January to smooth over military-to-military relations that had been frozen after the Obama administration announced arms sales to Taiwan in January 2010. In June, Mr. Gates got into a prickly dispute with Gen. Ma Xiaotian at a security summit meeting in Singapore, an episode that revealed the deep fissures in the military relationship.
Mr. Gates had to navigate yet another tricky diplomatic situation here when the Chinese military tested a J-20 stealth fighter jet in Sichuan Province while he met in the Chinese capital with President Hu Jintao.
In December, Adm. Robert F. Willard, the commander of United States Pacific Command, told a Japanese newspaper that China had a working design for an antiship ballistic missile that could strike at aircraft carriers and could soon be ready for deployment. The missile, known as a “carrier killer,” has become a symbol in Western military circles of the Chinese army’s technological advances.
The weapon “is not science fiction,” Andrew S. Erickson, a professor at the United States Naval War College, said in an e-mail interview earlier this year. “It is not a ‘smoke and mirrors’ bluff," he wrote. "It is not an aspirational capability that the U.S. can ignore until some point in the future.”
Of equal or greater import is China’s plan to soon deploy an aircraft carrier known to be under construction. But the white paper, while ostensibly aimed at making China’s military development more transparent, did not discuss the carrier project. Colonel Geng dodged a question about it at the news conference.
The paper noted that China still faced challenges from “separatists” striving for the independence of the restive western regions of Tibet and Xinjiang and the self-governing island of Taiwan.
“Pressure builds up in preserving China’s territorial integrity and maritime rights and interests,” it said. “Nontraditional security concerns, such as existing terrorism threats, energy, resources, finance, information and natural disasters, are on the rise. Suspicion about China, interference and countering moves against China from the outside are on the increase.”
The Chinese government has announced that the military budget for 2011 is about $92 billion, up 12.7 percent from 2010. The previous announced annual increase was 7.5 percent, the first time in years that the reported growth had dipped below double digits.
“China pursues a national defense policy which is defensive in nature,” the white paper said. “China will never seek hegemony, nor will it adopt the approach of military expansion now or in the future, no matter how its economy develops.” International Herald Tribune By EDWARD WONG and JONATHAN ANSFIELD
Answering for history
Bangladesh responds to criticism of its plans to try war criminals
BANGLADESH’S government had been hoping for swift justice when it set up a war-crimes tribunal in March. Its plan was to put dozens of people on trial for atrocities committed during the country’s secession from Pakistan nearly 40 years ago. Now, with nobody even formally charged, it is bowing to criticism that its vision of justice was flawed.
Some opposition politicians have accused the government of waging a vendetta. The government made clear early on that it would not try to prosecute Pakistanis who fought for West Pakistan against the separatists of East Pakistan (as Bangladesh was then known) in 1971. Hundreds of thousands of civilians—officials say as many as 3m—were killed in the nine-month conflict. Instead, it is targeting only Bangladeshi citizens accused of collaborating with the West Pakistanis. Some of the most prominent alleged collaborators happen to be members of Jamaat-e-Islami, Bangladesh’s biggest Islamic party and a partner in the main opposition alliance.
In August the tribunal detained five Jamaat-e-Islami leaders to prevent them from “hindering investigations” into war-crimes allegations against them. Their party supported West Pakistan’s army in 1971. On December 16th, police arrested a politician of the opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party on unrelated murder charges. He has also been accused of war crimes. Opposition supporters say the government is flouting justice.
On this point they have growing support. Human Rights Watch, a New York-based lobby group, says that “significant improvements” are needed in Bangladesh’s International Crimes Tribunal Act of 1973, under the terms of which trials are to be held. Critics’ concerns include lax rules for the admissibility of evidence and inadequate appeal procedures.
There is little support for these arguments among ordinary Bangladeshis. In a country where trial standards are generally low, most people cannot see why alleged war criminals should be treated any better. Some say the rights of victims are being ignored. “The perpetrators are Bangladeshi, the victims are Bangladeshi, the crimes took place in Bangladesh, the trial will be in Bangladeshi courts under Bangladeshi law. We should set our own standards”, says Sharier Kabir, a leading campaigner for the trials. His cousin was one of many intellectuals who were abducted and killed in the war.
But the government appears to recognise that domestic support is not enough and that the trials will need more time. The law minister, Shafique Ahmed, has admitted that they might not be finished until 2014, when the government’s term ends. Having long fiercely rejected criticism of the tribunal act, officials are showing signs of softening. They have invited Stephen Rapp, an American diplomat looking into war-crimes issues, to visit Dhaka next month to assess the proceedings himself.
Sources say they have also asked the UN for assistance. This is risky for the government, which will be accused of vacillating or even caving in to foreign pressure. But justice needs to be seen to be fair. The Economist
With the demise of left-wing movements around the world — except in the more adventurous parts of Latin America and pockets of European academia and trade unionism — calls for greater attention to economic and social inequality have increasingly become the domain of fringe civil society outposts or individual “activists” with an ethnic, gender, cultural or some other agenda. In the days of the global village and the free market, social concerns of economic equality are increasingly being pushed into the background.
This is not surprising. Ideologies wax and wane with the times. The language of self-sacrifice by the few for the good of the many can lose its appeal in a cornucopia of world trade and economic expansion.
Socialism’s decline in the USSR and Eastern Europe and the growth of a China with increasingly capitalist characteristics have robbed political movements everywhere of a working model of how economic growth might be balanced by socialist redistribution.
Why worry about equality when even the most cherished alternative models have bitten the dust? Inequality, as the landed nobility have always believed, is simply a part of human nature. It seems to be part of our very genes.
What’s more, governments who do believe in the promotion of economic equality and social inclusion, in economic justice if you will, and win elections on such promises, frequently find them hard to deliver.
High public expectations on the one hand — fueled by the ubiquity of international travel and interactive media — and shrinking policy instruments on the other, keep governments’ enthusiasm in check once they move from the opposition into the complexities of governing.
Gone are the days when concentrated landholding, a time-honored source of wealth and military power, could be removed by radical land reforms or simply giving away land to the tiller.
Sanctity of property is the mantra of free markets and an attractive investment climate. Governments of the 21st century cannot repeat the policy radicalism of the mid-20th century with impunity. The land reforms of Korea, Taiwan, China and India cannot be replicated in today’s global economy.
A less painful solution to inequality, compared to the physical distribution of assets, was progressive taxation. Those good old days of Fabian socialism are also long gone.
Progressive taxation today runs the risk of capital flight and international ridicule. A low taxation threshold, much of it indirect and regressive, assiduously collected, seems to be the order of the day.
That leaves the solution of ensuring a more equitable provision of essential social services, such as education, health, law and order, disaster relief and poverty reduction-targeted cash transfers.
In essence, this is not much more than the welfare state in modern clothing.
The search is on for smarter policies, to discover how to do more with less, how to keep subsidies targeted and temporary to help the poor climb out of poverty, rather than spending a lifetime on state-run benefit schemes which received so much bad press in the developed West in the 1980s and 1990s.
The problem is not so much with the awareness of the challenges that poverty — and its closely linked condition, inequality — presents for the world economy and individual countries.
Terrorism, transnational crimes, human smuggling and the ragged army of the dispossessed diaspora which swells in numbers with every social conflict from the Congo to Pakistan, Iraq, Egypt, Sri Lanka and Somalia, are all daily reminders that the world is not a fair place, that the poor have few if any options, that the womb of global plenty contains within it the seeds of unfathomable despair.
The lack of political urgency with which the challenges of poverty and inequality are viewed is the main issue. Nowhere is this more true than in developing Asia which, having learned how to sustain rapid economic growth, remains largely in denial about the lurking dangers of economic inequality and injustice.
Sustaining rapid growth means courting global investors who are more concerned with financial returns than the imperatives of a fairer income distribution.
The relentless march of globalized markets has been accompanied by a widening distribution of income between developed and developing countries, between skilled and unskilled workers and between one region and another within the same country.
Despite these questions of perception and political urgency, dealing with inequality remains a challenge that a newly democratic Indonesia ignores at its peril. Political systems are difficult to change, but when they do, political credibility and legitimacy matter more than anything else. Volumes have been written on the challenges which early democracies face.
The debate on the possibilities of democratic, but relatively poor, societies is not an account of history but a manifestation of the dilemmas of policy making in fast-growing economies which are forever torn between growing faster and growing better.
The nostalgia for the benevolent despot, for trains running on time, cheap grain and everyone knowing their own place in the national family tree is alive and well today.
To bury the old political system, the new must bring something more than street demonstrations, party conferences and ministerial scandals. The new democracy needs to win the hearts and the minds of the majority. Injecting economic fairness as well as a political voice is a recipe for doing just that.
2014 is just around the corner. No political party, including the Democratic Party, has fully worked out a program for democratic consolidation. Coalitions are built on what are called “transactional” understandings. Indonesia has come a long way in its efforts to complete a transition to electoral democracy.
As Indonesia’s first democratic wave so painfully illustrated in the 1950s, nothing should be taken for granted. Just as the French Revolution, bloody and driven by raw emotion as it was, led to Bonapartist dictatorship, Sukarno’s post-independence idealism gave way to an open massacre of left-wing sympathizers in the mid 1960s.
Democratic episodes in many other developing countries have been reversed within a few years of their inception.
To sustain a new democracy one needs to understand the economic arithmetic of democracy, a task attempted in Indonesia’s Second National Human Development Report in 2004.
Equality of political status (one-person, one-vote), is by itself not enough to sustain a new democracy. It needs to be buttressed by the idea of equal economic opportunities, and guaranteed rights to education, health, food and physical security for each citizen. A majoritarian political system needs to reflect the economic interests of the majority and not just at election time.
This is easier said than done. Globalization has raised the odds.
Income distributions can worsen quickly and unexpectedly. A look at Eastern Europe, China, India and dozens of others shows how the ground is shifting under our feet even as we gear up to tackle the complexities of income inequality and social exclusion. Today’s economic growth is accompanied with rising inequality, lower employment absorption and a falling elasticity of poverty reduction to economic growth.
It is time to wake up. Economic equality, equally distributed citizen’s rights and the ability of the citizenry to monitor and question the regularity, cost and quality of public services are the essential building blocks of Indonesia’s decade-old democracy.
To ensure that Indonesia does not face its own 18 Brumaire, it is time to get back to basics.
By Satish Mishra managing director at Strategic Asia Indonesia, a Jakarta-based consultancy promoting cooperation among Asian nations.
ONCE more, our country has been judged to be among the least attractive investment destinations. What makes this one more painful is that the assessment was done by businessmen in Asean (the Association of Southeast Asian Nations), people eager to see our regional grouping become a common market so that they and the peoples of Asean prosper and enjoy a better quality of life.
The judgment came out in the result of a survey conducted in the second half of 2010 by the Asean Business Advisory Council (ABAC). Asean, of which our country is an original founder, groups the Philippines, Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.
The survey was done to measure Asean competitiveness.
The respondents are from 335 companies across the Asean countries. Almost half of the enterprises surveyed are small companies employing less than 50 people.
Eighty-five percent of the respondents belong to companies with headquarters in an Asean country. Sixty percent of those surveyed are native or homegrown enterprises.
Eighty-five (85) percent of the survey respondents said they plan to invest or expand in at least one of the 10 Asean member-countries over the three-year period 2010 to 2012. Forty-one (41) percent of respondents prefer Vietnam, 36 percent prefer Singapore and about 33 percent Thailand or Indonesia or Malaysia.
Only 12 percent of respondents are interested in the Philippines—a smaller number than those interested in Cambodia (13 percent), Myanmar (14 percent) and Laos (19 percent).
Brunei was ranked lowest, with only five (5) percent of respondents eyeing it. We are second lowest with our 12 percent.
To the question which country offers the best prospects for offshore direct investments, 48 percent named Vietnam, Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia, Laos, Myanmar and Thailand. Not a single respondent chose the Philippines.
Asean as a whole, the 10 countries combined, got more “votes” from the respondents than China as the “country that offers the best prospects . . . for offshore direct investments.”
Impatient for Asean common market
Businesses polled expressed anxiety over the delay in the implementation of the Asean Economic Community (AEC) Blueprint. The respondents apparently want to see the region become a single market and production base by 2015, which is the objective of the AEC Blueprint.
Ninety-one (91) percent of respondents said the implementation of the AEC Blueprint is an important consideration in their plans to invest or expand within Asean. Eighty-nine (89) percent said failure to form the AEC in 2015 would impact on their business costs. This means a lot of Asean businessmen have actually planned and spent for the future time when our region has become a common market.
What is the ABAC?
The government should take the results of this survey seriously.
The body behind it, the Asean Business Advisory Council (Asean-BAC) was established by the Asean Heads of State and Government (HOSGs) at the Seventh Asean Summit in November 2001 in Bandar Seri Begawan, Brunei Darussalam. Inaugurated at the Asean Secretariat in Jakarta, Indonesia, in April 2003, ABAC’s primary mission is to promote public-private sector partnership to achieve the integration needed for the Asean Economic Community (AEC).
Asean-BAC provides private sector feedback on the implementation of Asean economic cooperation activities. It identifies priority areas for the consideration of the Asean leaders (the economic ministers mainly and the heads of state and government).
We must improve in global competitiveness
In a survey of 473 Japanese companies conducted by the Japan External Trade Organization (JETRO) also last year (November to December), our country also figured as the least preferred investment venue in Southeast Asia.
We trailed behind Singapore, Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia and Vietnam.
But we beat Vietnam and Malaysia as the preferred site for expansion of regional headquarters. The Japanese Chamber of Commerce of the Philippines attributed this to our “good command of English.”
We must have other qualities than just our English—which other countries in Asean are fast learning to cultivate.
Early in the year, we had some good news from the World Economic Forum’s World Competitiveness Index. We improved by two rungs. We were only in 87th place last year. Now we are in 85th place. The only problem is that 85th place still places us in the bottom third of the 139 countries rated by the Davos, Switzerland-based WEF.
Other Asean countries rate much better than us. Singapore is of course among the very top—3rd place. Malaysia is in 26th place, Thailand in 38th, Indonesia in 44th, and Vietnam in 59th. We are in the league of African countries like Uganda and Zimbabwe.
In coming up with its ratings, the WEF’s World Competitiveness Index assesses 12 pillars of competitiveness. These are (1) Institutions, (2) Infrastructure, (3) Macroeconomic environment, (4) Health and primary education, (5) Higher education and training, (6) Goods market efficiency, (7) Labor market efficiency, (8) Financial market development, (9) Technological readiness, (10) Market size, (11) Business sophistication, and (12) Innovation.
We are worst in Institutions. Of the 139 countries, we are at 125th place. We are miserably placed in “Diversion of Public Funds” (135th), “Public Trust of Politicians” (134th), “Ethical Behavior of Firms” (129th), and “Irregular Payments and Bribes” (128th). All of these suggest corruption in both government and the private sector.
We are also in the lowest one-fourth places in Innovation, Labor Market Efficiency, and Infrastructure.
Being poor in innovation shows up our weakness in science and technology and research and development. Poor labor market efficiency indicates our labor mismatches and business and government’s failure to help our labor sector adjust to changing market demands.
Low rating in Infrastructure simple means the other countries have better roads, logistics, etcetera. We must cease having diluted cement and asphalt—for heaven’s sake! Manila Times Editorial
The execution of three convicted Filipino drug couriers in China Wednesday as Philippine President Benigno S. Aquino III stood powerless to stop the event underlines a deep divide between the region's reigning power and one of its chronic underachievers.
Aquino sought to accommodate the Chinese government on a variety of issues in an effort to save the three but his inability to do so is an insult and highlights his naiveté. It was almost certain from the very start that the Chinese were going to carry out the executions.
In effect the message to the Philippines and the rest of the region is simple: China will do what it wants.
With seemingly the entire country praying vainly for the deliverance of the three convicted overseas workers, Sally Ordinario-Villanueva, Ramon Credo and Ellizabeth Batain were all executed by lethal injection — Batain, 38, in Shenzhen, Ordinario-Villanueva, 32, and Ramon Credo, 42, in Xiamen. They joined the long trail of some 1,500 to 2,000 people who are executed in China every year. In 2009, the last year for which Amnesty International provided figures, China executed more people than the rest of the world combined.
"Our government has taken every available opportunity to appeal to the authorities of China for clemency," Presidential Spokesman Edwin Lacierda said in a prepared statement. "In the end, however, the sentence was imposed."
The executions end a months-long saga in which Vice President Jejomar Binay rushed to China to plead for the sentences to be commuted and at least succeeded in getting them delayed. In addition, the Philippines boycotted the Nobel Prize ceremony in Norway in which Chinese activist Liu Xiaobo was awarded the Peace Prize. In what was widely regarded as related to the death sentence cases, Manila also enraged Taiwan by sending alleged Taiwanese scamsters preying on Chinese investors in the Philippines back to China instead of Taiwan.
That isn't to say that the Philippines was wrong in attempting to save the lives of the three. Easy-going Filipinos, who want to believe the best of everyone, especially those who pray for forgiveness, have bumped up against an opaque totalitarian Chinese state that can be and often is brutal when it comes to life, not only of foreign criminals but its own people.
Punishment is about repentance and asking for forgiveness in the Philippines. In China, it is about punishment. Whatever its many faults, the Philippines is a country that* honors life enough to respect forgiveness and to accept that people make mistakes rather than one that is prepared to grind up three small people as some kind of example to others because that is what the rule book says.
Noynoy should have got tough with China, even if it would not have saved any lives. He ended up looking small and making his country look small in the process. On a national level, the Philippines reinforced its weak image.
On a human level, however, it is certainly hard not to be moved by the words of Villanueva asking that someone look after her children and saying she would become an "angel" for her family. That these three and countless others who ferry drugs across borders for a fee as people who either wittingly or unwittingly did something stupid, is beyond question. It is also beyond question that more will follow. More than 500 Filipino men and women are already in foreign jails on drug-related cases, Foreign Ministry spokesman Edward Malaya told Agence-France Press. Some 227 of them are in Chinese jails alone.
With nearly 10 percent of the Philippines population of 99 million working overseas, it is inevitable that many get into desperate trouble. In particular, as menial jobs vanish in the global recession and opportunities fail to materialize at home, more and more Filipino women are resorting to smuggling drugs as mules.
When they are caught, Filipinos seem to always react in astonishment. The first assumption is that the offender is innocent – and if not innocent, worthy of forgiveness. After all, this is a country where Ferdinand Marcos and his family could loot the treasury of billions of dollars and his wife and children are in Congress. In 1995, when Singapore executed a maid named Flor Concepcion for murdering a fellow Filipino maid and a four-year-old Singaporean boy, her coffin was paraded through the streets of Manila in front of thousands of onlookers and then-President Fidel V. Ramos declared her a heroine.
That is in stark contrast to China, which refuses to be moved by countless international appeals to eliminate the death penalty and the criticism of Amnesty International and a huge number of other nongovernmental organizations.
Live local television coverage for the past several days in the Philippines portrayed a nation gripped by remorse for these three unfortunate people, a kind of passion play of suffering and hopelessness. We are poor. We suffer for our families. We are victims.
The sentiment has not made the Philippines a power in the world nor allowed it to realize its potential. In many ways such sentimentality, easily exploited by the media and politicians, has been a drag on the country's ability to rise above the morass of poverty and feudal rule.
But one has to admit that such feelings are deeply humanizing. It is difficult to escape the deep impression that their country actually cared for these three workers, even if, ultimately, the government proved too powerless or naive to do anything to stop their deaths.
It would be hard to imagine China showing the same concern for three of its citizens in a similar fix. Asia Sentinel
A senior Indonesian al-Qaida terror suspect wanted in the 2002 Bali bombings has been arrested in Pakistan in a major scalp for the international campaign against Islamist extremists. Few details were released about the arrest of Umar Patek, but it appeared to be the result of cross-border co-operation in the fight against terrorism. After the 9/11 attacks, several top al-Qaida operatives were arrested in Pakistan, but in recent years there have been few known high-profile arrests.
Umar Patek, a suspected member of the al-Qaida linked militant group Jemaah Islamiyah, is believed to have served as the group's deputy field commander in the nightclub bombings that left 202 people dead, many of them foreigners.
The U.S., which lost seven citizens in the attack, was offering a $1 million reward for his arrest. Patek's whereabouts were not immediately known Tuesday. The question of what to do with him could become a key indicator of how U.S. President Barack Obama will handle major terrorist suspects captured abroad. However, American officials declined to comment on the case. Under former President George W. Bush, he likely would have been moved into the CIA's network of secret prisons. For instance, one of Patek's accused co-conspirators in the nightclub bombing, Hambali, spent years in the prison system and is now being held in Guantanamo Bay. But the CIA's secret prisons are closed and Obama is trying to empty Guantanamo, not add new inmates.
Patek is believed to have been among a group of Indonesians, Malaysians and Filipinos who travelled to Afghanistan and Pakistan during the 1980s and 90s for training and fighting. On their return to Southeast Asia, they formed Jemaah Islamiyah, blamed for a string of suicide bombings targeting night clubs, restaurants, hotels, and a Western embassy in Indonesia. Together more than 260 people have died. Patek fled to the southern Philippines after the Bali bombings, seeking refuge and training with both the MILF and later, Abu Sayyaf. But he is believed to have remained heavily engaged in Jemaah Islamiyah operations at home. His arrest in Pakistan is likely to raise questions over how such a high-profile terrorist can travel across international borders.
By Niniek Karmini and Associated Press writers Jim Gomez in Manila, Philippines; Chris Brummitt in Islamabad, Pakisan; and Adam Goldman and Matt Apuzzo
in Washington D.C. contributed to this report.
China uses military, logistical, infrastructure aid to strengthen anti-Tibetan alliance
Under pressure from the Beijing, the Nepalese government has arrested hundreds of refugee Tibetans who cross the border from Tibet to escape persecution by the Chinese regime, refugees say, sending many back to China and earning objections from human rights groups.
Kathmandu has also blocked human rights demonstrations led by Tibet support groups and has put a stop to all pro-Tibet activities, refugees who have made it to Dharamsala say, in particular on March 10 when Tibetans sought to commemorate the anniversary of the failed 2008 uprising in Tibet. The 20,000-odd Tibetans who live in Nepal are barred from holding any protests on its soil. Celebrations of the Dalai Lama's birthday are taken as anti-government activities by authorities.
The tiny Himalayan nation is caught between Asia's two giants, India and China. Most Tibetans fleeing their homeland cross Nepal to India for shelter in the hill town of Dharamsala where their supreme leader and Tibetan Buddhism's highest religious figure, the Dalai Lama, took refuge in 1959 along with thousands of his followers with the consent of the Indian government.
The pressure increased after China's army chief of staff, Gen. Chen Bingde, visited Kathmandu to pledge US$20 million in military and logistical support to the impoverished government of the tiny neighboring country. It was not the first donation and is unlikely to be the last.
Chen led a 15-member army delegation to Nepal seeking to prevent any additional turmoil by the Tibetans in the country. It was the highest-level military visit from China to Nepal in more than a decade. The People's Liberation Army chief held high-level talks with Nepalese President Ram Baran Yadav, Prime Minister Jhalanath Khanal, Defence Minister Bishnu Paudel and his Nepalese counterpart General Chhatraman Singh Gurung, requesting that the Nepal government block movement of Tibetans across the border.
"The purpose of my visit is to strengthen friendship and cooperation between Nepal and China," Chen told reporters. "This cooperation is not only conducive for our people but also for world peace and the Asia Pacific region."
The Nepalese government reassured China of its support and commitment to the 'One China Policy,' and indicated it would bar anti-Chinese activity on its soil. It also agreed to "deepen military ties and ensure peace at the Tibet frontier."
"General Chen expressed gladness at the steadily developing relation between two countries and said that economically developing and politically stable Nepal is important not only for the stability of Asia Pacific region but also for the whole world," according to a statement released by the Nepal's Prime Minister's Office in Kathmandu.
Over the years Beijing has vilified any efforts by exiles to change the situation inside Tibet, which the Chinese occupied in 1950, terming the invasion a peaceful liberation of longstanding Chinese territory. Tibetans refugees started flocking to Nepal after the failed 1959 uprising against Chinese rule and the Dalai Lama fled over the Himalayas into exile in India.
Interestingly Nepal has traditionally been more aligned with India. However, recent moves by Beijing, especially in infrastructure development, have made China a much more influential player in Nepal than India.
"We are treated as criminals in Nepal," said an exiled Tibetan who gave his name only as Tsering. "The Nepalese government does everything the way China wants it do, and we have even lost the right to do a peaceful march." He had lived in Nepal but fled to Dharamsala, he said.
Nepal has launched many crackdowns since refugees staged protests against China in the run-up to the Beijing Olympic Games and the deadly 2008 Tibetan riots. Rights groups have declared Tibetan refugees in Nepal to be increasingly vulnerable and at risk of arrest and repatriation to China. Under pressure from China, Nepal has refused to recognize Tibetan refugees who arrived after 1989. They are not allowed to register marriages.
On any major anniversary of that Tibetan exiles attempt to celebrate, dozens are arrested, with reports that even monks are beaten, tear-gassed and kicked. The United Nations' human-rights office says some people are now being arrested purely "on the basis of their appearance" without being demonstrators.
Recent Tibetan government-in-exile elections were treated as an unlawful activity by the Nepalese government, depriving a large number of people the right to exercise their vote.
"We cannot allow such an illegal activity within our territory," Superintendent of Police Pushkar Karki, who also serves as chief of Kathmandu Metropolitan Police Circle, told local media. "We need to follow the government's policy."
Last year the Wikileaks website disclosed US State Department cables from the embassy in New Delhi, alleging that China pays Nepalese police substantial money to arrest fleeing Tibetans.
"Chinese government rewards (Nepali forces) by providing financial incentives to officers who hand over Tibetans attempting to exit Tibet," said the cable, titled 'Update on Tibetan refugee flow.'
Despite the restrictions, more than 2,500 Tibetans cross the border annually, embarrassing the Chinese government, which has sought to portray its administration in Lhasa as benevolent and dedicated to the welfare of the Tibetan people. The Nepalese government since the Wikileaks disclosures has come under fire for bending to pressure from the Chinese government in deporting exiles to China after previously having allowed them unhindered passage.
The Nepalese government previously honored a United Nations-brokered "gentlemen's agreement" between Nepal and the UN High Commissioner for Refugees to provide safe transit to Tibetan refugees who wish to travel through Nepal to Dharamsala, where thousands of Tibetan exiles have their base. That agreement has been abrogated under Chinese pressure.
Watch groups such as Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and the International Commission of Jurists have recently warned Kathmandu against breaching its international obligations, instead substituting "preventive arrests and policing restrictions on demonstrations and freedom of movement that deny the right to legitimate peaceful expression and assembly during anniversaries and festivals marked by the Tibetan community."
"The link between China's aggression against Tibetans and Nepalese police actions has contributed to an environment of fear and insecurity in Nepal's Tibetan communities," the International Campaign for Tibet, the US based Tibet lobby said.
Western countries, particularly the United States, have pressed the Nepalese government to soften its stance. The Undersecretary of State for Democracy and Global Affairs Maria Otero, the White House's special coordinator for Tibetan issues, visited refugee centers in Nepal in February where she met government officials to raise the issues of free passage and problems faced by Tibetans in Nepal itself. She pledged the continued support of the US government for the safety and welfare of refugees.
"We have a longstanding policy, as you know, of supporting the needs of vulnerable refugee populations, and consider the Tibetan populations in Nepal to be particularly vulnerable. The U.S. continues to monitor the situation of both newly arriving refugees and the long-staying populations," a State Department official said in a statement on Feb. 18.
The Tibetan government-in-exile has appealed to Western nations to persuade the Nepalese government to allow the Tibetan activities and respect the human rights situation.
Analysts believe China's long term plan is to neutralize Tibetans outside Tibet, leaving no voices to speak against them when the Dalai Lama retires completely. Rameshwor Acharya, the former Nepal ambassador to China, told reporters on March 24 that "China's concerns over Nepal are growing" and that "the visit shows that China wants the support of our army to control anti-Chinese activities following the resignation of the Dalai Lama."
Thus many of the thousands of refugees wishing to leave their Himalayan homeland are finding that safe passage through Nepal is becoming increasingly unlikely and the future of Nepal's ownTibetan community appears uncertain as well. By Saransh Sehgal writer based in Dharamsala, India.
China uses military, logistical, infrastructure aid to strengthen anti-Tibetan alliance
Under pressure from the Beijing, the Nepalese government has arrested hundreds of refugee Tibetans who cross the border from Tibet to escape persecution by the Chinese regime, refugees say, sending many back to China and earning objections from human rights groups.
Kathmandu has also blocked human rights demonstrations led by Tibet support groups and has put a stop to all pro-Tibet activities, refugees who have made it to Dharamsala say, in particular on March 10 when Tibetans sought to commemorate the anniversary of the failed 2008 uprising in Tibet. The 20,000-odd Tibetans who live in Nepal are barred from holding any protests on its soil. Celebrations of the Dalai Lama's birthday are taken as anti-government activities by authorities.
The tiny Himalayan nation is caught between Asia's two giants, India and China. Most Tibetans fleeing their homeland cross Nepal to India for shelter in the hill town of Dharamsala where their supreme leader and Tibetan Buddhism's highest religious figure, the Dalai Lama, took refuge in 1959 along with thousands of his followers with the consent of the Indian government.
The pressure increased after China's army chief of staff, Gen. Chen Bingde, visited Kathmandu to pledge US$20 million in military and logistical support to the impoverished government of the tiny neighboring country. It was not the first donation and is unlikely to be the last.
Chen led a 15-member army delegation to Nepal seeking to prevent any additional turmoil by the Tibetans in the country. It was the highest-level military visit from China to Nepal in more than a decade. The People's Liberation Army chief held high-level talks with Nepalese President Ram Baran Yadav, Prime Minister Jhalanath Khanal, Defence Minister Bishnu Paudel and his Nepalese counterpart General Chhatraman Singh Gurung, requesting that the Nepal government block movement of Tibetans across the border.
"The purpose of my visit is to strengthen friendship and cooperation between Nepal and China," Chen told reporters. "This cooperation is not only conducive for our people but also for world peace and the Asia Pacific region."
The Nepalese government reassured China of its support and commitment to the 'One China Policy,' and indicated it would bar anti-Chinese activity on its soil. It also agreed to "deepen military ties and ensure peace at the Tibet frontier."
"General Chen expressed gladness at the steadily developing relation between two countries and said that economically developing and politically stable Nepal is important not only for the stability of Asia Pacific region but also for the whole world," according to a statement released by the Nepal's Prime Minister's Office in Kathmandu.
Over the years Beijing has vilified any efforts by exiles to change the situation inside Tibet, which the Chinese occupied in 1950, terming the invasion a peaceful liberation of longstanding Chinese territory. Tibetans refugees started flocking to Nepal after the failed 1959 uprising against Chinese rule and the Dalai Lama fled over the Himalayas into exile in India.
Interestingly Nepal has traditionally been more aligned with India. However, recent moves by Beijing, especially in infrastructure development, have made China a much more influential player in Nepal than India.
"We are treated as criminals in Nepal," said an exiled Tibetan who gave his name only as Tsering. "The Nepalese government does everything the way China wants it do, and we have even lost the right to do a peaceful march." He had lived in Nepal but fled to Dharamsala, he said.
Nepal has launched many crackdowns since refugees staged protests against China in the run-up to the Beijing Olympic Games and the deadly 2008 Tibetan riots. Rights groups have declared Tibetan refugees in Nepal to be increasingly vulnerable and at risk of arrest and repatriation to China. Under pressure from China, Nepal has refused to recognize Tibetan refugees who arrived after 1989. They are not allowed to register marriages.
On any major anniversary of that Tibetan exiles attempt to celebrate, dozens are arrested, with reports that even monks are beaten, tear-gassed and kicked. The United Nations' human-rights office says some people are now being arrested purely "on the basis of their appearance" without being demonstrators.
Recent Tibetan government-in-exile elections were treated as an unlawful activity by the Nepalese government, depriving a large number of people the right to exercise their vote.
"We cannot allow such an illegal activity within our territory," Superintendent of Police Pushkar Karki, who also serves as chief of Kathmandu Metropolitan Police Circle, told local media. "We need to follow the government's policy."
Last year the Wikileaks website disclosed US State Department cables from the embassy in New Delhi, alleging that China pays Nepalese police substantial money to arrest fleeing Tibetans.
"Chinese government rewards (Nepali forces) by providing financial incentives to officers who hand over Tibetans attempting to exit Tibet," said the cable, titled 'Update on Tibetan refugee flow.'
Despite the restrictions, more than 2,500 Tibetans cross the border annually, embarrassing the Chinese government, which has sought to portray its administration in Lhasa as benevolent and dedicated to the welfare of the Tibetan people. The Nepalese government since the Wikileaks disclosures has come under fire for bending to pressure from the Chinese government in deporting exiles to China after previously having allowed them unhindered passage.
The Nepalese government previously honored a United Nations-brokered "gentlemen's agreement" between Nepal and the UN High Commissioner for Refugees to provide safe transit to Tibetan refugees who wish to travel through Nepal to Dharamsala, where thousands of Tibetan exiles have their base. That agreement has been abrogated under Chinese pressure.
Watch groups such as Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and the International Commission of Jurists have recently warned Kathmandu against breaching its international obligations, instead substituting "preventive arrests and policing restrictions on demonstrations and freedom of movement that deny the right to legitimate peaceful expression and assembly during anniversaries and festivals marked by the Tibetan community."
"The link between China's aggression against Tibetans and Nepalese police actions has contributed to an environment of fear and insecurity in Nepal's Tibetan communities," the International Campaign for Tibet, the US based Tibet lobby said.
Western countries, particularly the United States, have pressed the Nepalese government to soften its stance. The Undersecretary of State for Democracy and Global Affairs Maria Otero, the White House's special coordinator for Tibetan issues, visited refugee centers in Nepal in February where she met government officials to raise the issues of free passage and problems faced by Tibetans in Nepal itself. She pledged the continued support of the US government for the safety and welfare of refugees.
"We have a longstanding policy, as you know, of supporting the needs of vulnerable refugee populations, and consider the Tibetan populations in Nepal to be particularly vulnerable. The U.S. continues to monitor the situation of both newly arriving refugees and the long-staying populations," a State Department official said in a statement on Feb. 18.
The Tibetan government-in-exile has appealed to Western nations to persuade the Nepalese government to allow the Tibetan activities and respect the human rights situation.
Analysts believe China's long term plan is to neutralize Tibetans outside Tibet, leaving no voices to speak against them when the Dalai Lama retires completely. Rameshwor Acharya, the former Nepal ambassador to China, told reporters on March 24 that "China's concerns over Nepal are growing" and that "the visit shows that China wants the support of our army to control anti-Chinese activities following the resignation of the Dalai Lama."
Thus many of the thousands of refugees wishing to leave their Himalayan homeland are finding that safe passage through Nepal is becoming increasingly unlikely and the future of Nepal's ownTibetan community appears uncertain as well. By Saransh Sehgal writer based in Dharamsala, India.
AUSTRALIA'S controversial plan for a refugee processing centre in East Timor was effectively taken off the agenda before last night's opening of the Bali ministerial summit, with senior officials making it clear the proposal would not form part of the final discussions.
While Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd and Immigration Minister Chris Bowen met with counterparts last night to begin negotiations on a regional asylum-seeker framework, The Australian understands East Timor's government has decided to reject the approach for a centre to house 4000 refugees.
Speaking on condition of anonymity, several senior officials intimately involved in the talks said the Timor proposal had not formed part of any of the official-level discussions that began yesterday, nor was there an expectation it would feature in future negotiations.
Asked if any reference to the Timor centre would be included in today's official communique, one senior official told The Australian: "No."
The omission is a snub to Canberra, which had framed Bali as the venue for discussing the idea, launched in July by Julia Gillard in an attempt to suppress as an election issue the surge of boatpeople arrivals.
Pressed on Timor's likely refusal of the centre, Mr Bowen dodged the issue, claiming that its proposed location in East Timor was never to be considered in Bali.
"We've been very consistent that this is about a framework, this is about an assessment centre," he said. "But the location of an assessment centre is for bilateral discussion, not for discussion through the Bali meeting."
Mr Rudd also moved to manage expectations about the summit: "There are no easy fixes in this business. We're working our way through each of the issues."
In October, Mr Bowen said he would have a "concrete proposal" for a regional processing centre before the Bali meeting. His statement echoed Mr Rudd, who in September told parliament the processing centre plan would "form the subject of discussions when the Bali Process meeting is held in the months ahead".
East Timorese President Jose Ramos-Horta continues to discuss aspects of the proposal with Australian officials, but the nation's powerful Prime Minister, Xanana Gusmao, has privately dismissed it. It is understood Australian officials have started sounding-out other governments in the region about their willingness to host a centre.
Senior Indonesian Ministry of Foreign Affairs official Hamzah Thayeb yesterday dismissed the centre proposal as "a small part of the whole framework".
"I think what is important is for us to come up with this framework first and not to work from the small part to the bigger part," he said.
Indonesia, East Timor and other countries had earlier said the Bali summit was the proper place to deal with the East Timor plan. However, in an apparent snub, East Timor Foreign Minister Zacarias da Costa has travelled to Fiji, where he will be an observer at meetings of the breakaway Melanesian Spearhead Group, chaired by strongman Frank Bainimarama, rather than attend the closer Bali meetings.
A small, relatively junior East Timor delegation arrived yesterday for the Bali talks, led by Vice-Foreign Minister Alberto Carlos.
A spokesman for Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, who met Mr Rudd yesterday in Jakarta, said they spoke only briefly about the Bali Process meeting.
Teuku Faizasyah said the Indonesian leader told Mr Rudd now was the best time for the Bali Process to discus a regional refugee protection framework because the political and social upheavals throughout the Middle East and North Africa threatened to generate new tides of asylum-seekers and refugees.
There was better news for the Mr Rudd and Mr Bowen yesterday, with fresh hope that Indonesia's parliament would soon pass legislation criminalising people-smuggling. The long-awaited and long-delayed amendments to the nation's immigration law could be passed by parliament and ratified by Dr Yudhoyono as early as next week. The Australian
The royalty's role in the tumultuous events of 2008
With Thailand's government in the hands of an ally of deposed Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra in 2008, ailing King Bhumibol Adulyadej explicitly told the country's army commander not to launch another coup, an advisor to Queen Sirikit told US Ambassador Eric John, according to a Nov. 4, 2008 State Department cable made available on the WikiLeaks Web site.
A coup in September 2006 ousted Thaksin, who was later convicted of corruption and fled the country. The palace has been implicated in supporting that coup by numerous sources.
In 2008, Army Commander Anupong Paochinda said publicly that there would be no further coups. However, it is believed that the military came close to moving against the government and subsequent events showed that even the King's nominal allies paid scant attention to his wishes for calm.
"What can I say?" said a well-placed source in response to the leaked cable. "The monarchy was directly involved in Thai politics and continues to do so. As much as the king has intervened in politics himself, some of his close aides often claim to act on his behalf even when the King knows nothing about it.
"But you must look at the monarchy as a network that also comprises the Privy Council, the military, and not just an individual."
While the political situation is undoubtedly calmer now, uncertainty remains. Thaksin is still outside the country exhorting his followers to demonstrate against the Democrat-led government of Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva. Abhisit, who survived paralyzing pro-Thaksin demonstrations in Bangkok last year. Abhisit has promised to dissolve Parliament in May to prepare for general elections, probably in June or July.
Back in 2008, a long siege of violent protests by Yellow Shirt" royalists first resulted in the ouster by a Constitutional Court of then Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej, a Thaksin ally, on the pretext of his having received money besides his government salary by appearing as the host of a television cooking show.
Somchai Wongsawat, Thaksin's brother-in-law, followed Samak, who has since died. According to the cable, the palace thought highly of Somchai, who "had many qualities that made him suitable to be Prime Minister, including a sense of fairness and a moderate temperament."
The palace's favorable disposition towards Somchai, however, wasn't enough to save his government. The palace source told the ambassador that on Oct. 6, 2008 he had dined with a top figure in the anti-Thaksin People's Alliance for Democracy (PAD) who said the yellow shirts were aiming to spark a violent clash that would lead to a second coup.
The PAD source, according to the cable, "explained that PAD would provoke violence during its Oct. 7 protest at the parliament. The unnamed PAD figure predicted [wrongly] that the Army would intervene against the government by the evening of Oct. 7. [The source] asserted to us that PAD remained intent on a conflict that would generate at least two dozen deaths and make military intervention appear necessary and justified."
The Yellow Shirt protesters had occupied Government House for months, paralyzed the middle of Bangkok and forced the closure of the city's international airports. Finally, in December 2008 the courts ruled that Somchai must dissolve parliament yet again. It is widely believed that the army influenced the decision and many have called the court ruling a coup in everything but name.
It is unknown what would have happened if Somchai had refused to go. But it demonstrates just how tenuous the aging monarch's hold was on the political situation at the time. It stood in marked contrast to his role in 1992 when the leader of a military coup, Suchinda Kraprayoon, and ousted Prime Minister Chatichai Choonhavan were filmed on their hands and knees before a sternly lecturing king who told them to put an end to violence.
The cable also indicates that the US Ambassador's contacts at the palace said the monarch was frail and suffering from back pain. The palace source is not named.
The source's claim that the king instructed Anupong not to conduct a coup "is the strongest account we have heard to date about the King's opposition to a coup and his communicating this to Anupong," according to the cable. "It would explain why Privy Counselors Prem [Tinsulanonda] and Siddhi [Savetsila], both seen as opponents of the current government, gave recent assurances to the Ambassador that there would not be a coup."
In another indication of his waning power, the king also was said to be "highly irritated" by PAD's occupation of Government House and other disruptions during the tumultuous demonstrations that began in May of that year. But he was said to be unsure of how to quell them. According to the cable, the source told John that the King sent emissaries to convey his wishes for the PAD to leave Government House. One of them Disathorn Natcharothai, a longtime associate of the king, on Oct. 29 said publicly that "Thais who love the King should ‘go home.'"
However, the cable indicates, Sondhi Limtongkul, the media tycoon who had become a leader of the Yellow Shirts, "had become obsessed with his own sense of mission." Sondhi was initially charged with lese majeste, but has never been prosecuted, unlike dozens of followers of Red Shirt protesters.
Subsequently, Yellow-shirt supporters also seized airports in three resort cities and blocked roads and highways. They occupied a government television station and several ministries, fomenting violence that left dozens injured and one protester dead. Their activities culminated in the seizure of Bangkok's major international airports. The situation had become untenable.
After the Constitutional Court dissolved the Thaksin-aligned People's Power Party and banned its leaders from politics, Anupong is believed to have put serious pressure on the banned party's members to defect to the Democrat Party. Abhisit was named premier and Kasit Piromya, a PAD co-leader, was made foreign minister. There has not been a general election since and it is believed the pro-Thaksin forces still have considerable electoral support in rural areas.
The cable also indicates that the palace regarded Queen Sirikit's appearance at an Oct. 13, 2008 funeral for a young PAD supporter as a "significant blunder, jeopardizing the public's perception of the palace's neutrality."
The source "claimed the Queen had been emotionally affected when she learned that one victim of the Oct. 7 violence was a young lady about to be married, and that she had told her father she was going to the protest to defend the monarchy."
The source said there had been no intention for the Queen to involve either herself or the monarchy in political matters, but, unfortunately, some members of the public could interpret the funeral appearance differently. In an effort to neutralize the effect of her appearance at the funeral, "the Queen later reached out to seriously injured police officers in an attempt to show her neutrality, but this signal went largely unnoticed." Asia Sentinel
New marriage laws introduced in Cambodia
