Day: June 25, 2021

The crime-linked Chinese owner of a large casino and resort in northwestern Laos’ Bokeo province has resumed construction on an airport—a project shelved in 2017 due to local opposition—in a bid to bring more tourists into his large resort and special economic zone, sources say.

Zhao Wei, chairman of the Dok Ngiew Kham Group and owner of the Golden Triangle Special Economic Zone (SEZ) in Bokeo’s Tonpheung district, has been tied to human trafficking, money laundering, and the illegal trade in drugs and wildlife products.

In 2018, the U.S. Treasury Department declared the Zhao Wei business network, including the Golden Triangle’s well-known Kings Romans Casino, a “transnational criminal organization” (TCO) and sanctioned Zhao and three other individuals and companies across Laos, Thailand, and Hong Kong.

Speaking to RFA on June 22, a member of the Golden Triangle SEZ management team said the Dok Ngiew Kham Group and Kings Romans are now clearing land for a new airport after making payments in compensation to area landowners who had previously objected to the work. 

“It seems that all landowners are happy with the compensation they’ve received, and are showing no objection to the land-clearing process,” the Dok Ngiew Kham official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

“The company is planning to complete the construction of the airport and to welcome more tourists in 2022,” he said.

A woman living in the Tonpheung district who lost her land to the project confirmed the work was going ahead and said she was happy with the payment she had received, adding, “At first, many of us were opposed to the construction plan, but now all of us have given up our resistance to the project and have accepted compensation.”

Other local residents were less happy with the project, though, with one Bokeo villager saying the new airport is being built only to bring in large numbers of wealthy tourists and won’t benefit the local population.

“This airport isn’t needed, because Bokeo province already has an airport in the town of Houayxay,” the resident said. “The Dok Ngiew Kham Group wants to build this airport just to serve the wealthy people who want to come gamble at the casino,” he said.

“Zhao Wei, the owner of the Kings Romans Casino, wants to build his own airport in order to expand his business and serve his customers,” a villager in the town of Houayxay agreed. “We already have an airport here in Houayxay for the general public.”

But while the new airport will mostly help the casino, “it may also bring some benefit to the local people and economy by bringing more tourists into the area,” another Bokeo resident said.

‘Free and open zone’

Adosorn Semyam—a Thai expert on Laos at the Asia Studies Institute at Thailand’s Chulalongkorn University—voiced concern that with the new airport being built to serve Chinese and not domestic customers, it may soon function as a new route for drug trafficking and other illegal activity in Bokeo.

“This SEZ is a very free and open zone with all kinds of entertainment for tourists, including prostitutes, drugs, and wildlife,” agreed one worker in the Golden Triangle, speaking on condition of anonymity to protect his safety. “These things are available at all the entertainment venues,” he added.

“Wildlife food is served in the restaurants, while tiger or bear wine or meat is available in the VIP rooms,” the worker said.

Asked about the presence of illegal activity in the Golden Triangle SEZ in Bokeo and the Boten SEZ in Luang Namtha, also in the country’s north, an official in the Special Economic Zone Control Department of the Lao Ministry of Planning and Investment replied simply, “I can’t comment on that issue.”

In addition to concerns over crime, many in Laos worry about growing Chinese influence as a result of massive investment in hydropower dams, a high-speed railway, and other infrastructure projects under Beijing’s $1.3 trillion Belt and Road Initiative.

China is Laos’ largest foreign investor and aid provider, and its second-largest trade partner after Thailand.

Reported by RFA’s Lao Service. Translated by Max Avary. Written in English by Richard Finney.

Every year in the run up to the anniversary of the June 25, 1950 North Korean invasion of South Korea that started the three-year conflict, residents of the North are bombarded with propaganda that falsely claims it was the South who set off the conflict.

Fewer and fewer North Koreans are buying the official line these days, sources in the North told RFA.

Seventy-one years ago Friday, North Korea invaded the South and overran the capital Seoul in three days, igniting what both Koreas call the 6.25 War, and quickly conquering the whole peninsula except for a small perimeter around Busan in the southeast, before a U.S.-led United Nations counterattack pushed them back.

North Korea officially maintains that it was the South that provoked the war and that the U.S. had a plan to conquer the whole peninsula as an aggressor. Pyongyang calls the conflict, which ended in an armistice, the “Fatherland Liberation War,” and claims it won a victory over the imperialist U.S.

A resident of the city of Hamhung in the eastern province of South Hamgyong told RFA’s Korean Service that propaganda broadcasts began in the city this week.

Broadcast vehicles from the Korean Workers’ Party Propaganda and Agitation Department lined up near a factory in the city and were “enthusiastically pushing class-consciousness education by saying that the Korean War in the 1950s was an armed invasion by South Korea and other imperialists trying to crush our Republic,” said the source, who requested anonymity for security reasons.

The broadcasts tell how the North Korean invasion of the South was provoked by the enemy attacking first, the Hamhung resident added.

“The soldiers and people fought together with a fighting spirit to defend the country and our leader from the enemy, and through our fierce determination, we finally won,” the source quoted the propaganda as saying.

“Despite this obvious propaganda, most people know the actual history. Any factory worker who has heard a foreign broadcast about the Korean War knows full well that it wasn’t South Korea that attacked first. We actually prepared for the war and started it. They have been repeating the narrative that the war was started by provocations from the United States and South Korea,” said the source.

According to the source, people who are close to each other often talk about the actual history of the Korean War whenever the anniversary draws near.

“They’ll say, ‘If South Korea had started it, the South Korean army could have occupied Pyongyang within three days. How is it possible that the Korean People’s Army were able to take Seoul in three days instead?’” said the source.

“They all know that the propaganda trotted out by the authorities on war history is inconsistent historical distortion,” the source said.

Another source, a resident of South Pyongan province, north of Pyongyang, told RFA that each year as June 25 approaches, authorities repeat the propaganda saying that South Korea, backed by the United States, was trying to devour North Korea.

“They keep saying that we should not forget for a moment that the enemy caused the war, and we should go out to defend our homeland,” the second source said.

“The authorities this year emphasized that young people, who may have friendly feelings toward the culture of South Korea and the United States, should know that the Korean War was a battle of ideology and mental power with the imperialists who were trying to annihilate our country,” said the second source.

The authorities tell young people that they had a responsibility to continue the class struggle even if generations have passed since the war, according to the second source.

“But North Korea’s teens are already watching South Korean and American films stored on USB flash drives or SD cards… so they are well aware of how the Korean War actually began,” the second source said.

“They know full well that when Seoul fell in three days and South Korea was on the brink of disappearing completely from the peninsula, the U.S. and UN forces felt the need to step in, but the authorities are repeating obvious lies,” said the second source.

A college student in his 20s who escaped from Pyongyang in 2018 to settle in South Korea told RFA that a South Korean War movie helped him, and others find out about the true history of the war.

“The movie ‘Taegukgi: The Brotherhood of War,’ which was released in South Korea in 2004, came to Pyongyang on video CD and it was a hot topic among young people,” the student said.

The film is about two brothers who are conscripted into the South Korean army unwillingly and it is highly critical of the South’s anti-communist fervor at the time.

“The movie depicts very well how the Korean War started and how a family suffered tragedies due to the war, so young North Koreans who secretly watched it were greatly shocked to know what it was really like,” the student said.

“Some of my high school friends borrowed it and I remember watching it on a USB stick. That’s when I first learned that it was not South Korea, but North Korea that started the war.”

Reported by Hyemin Son for RFA’s Korean Service. Translated by Jinha Shin. Written in English by Eugene Whong.

Authorities in Beijing have begun moving large numbers of items out of the former residence of late ousted premier Zhao Ziyang ahead of the ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP)’s centenary celebrations on July 1, RFA has learned.

A relative of the late premier, who was forced from office for a too-lenient attitude to the 1989 student-led protests on Tiananmen Square to spend the rest of his life under house arrest, confirmed the move.

Removal company staff entered the traditional Beijing courtyard home at No. 6 Fuqiang Alley in Beijing’s Dongcheng district on Thursday morning, packing a large number of items into a vehicle.

The Zhao family member confirmed by phone that the family — which has been given notice to leave the state-owned property — is in the process of removing his belongings.

But they declined to elaborate on which items were being moved, or their personal or political significance.

“We had been planning to move out anyway, and this is happening gradually,” the family member said. “We don’t know exactly when we will complete the move.”

“As to the value of the items, it depends on your point of view,” they said. “This is an entirely personal matter.”

Since Zhao’s death at the age of 85 in January 2005, the house has been occupied by his daughter Wang Yannan and her family.

They were served notice to leave by the CCP General Office, which manages practical arrangements for Chinese leaders, last year.

The move is unlikely to have been completed by the July 1 centenary, however, according to former 1989 student protester Ji Feng, who is acquainted with the family.

“The original plan was to get them to move out by July 1, but the authorities didn’t force them,” Ji said. “They just let them do it in their own time.”

Memorials, dissent

The house had become a focus for memorials to Zhao and events by dissidents and petitioners marking his death, with hundreds paying their respects on the anniversary and on the traditional grave-tending festival of Qing Ming in April.

The insistence that the family move was likely a bid to ensure that it wouldn’t provide any kind of focal point for dissent during the centenary celebrations, Ji said.

“While only Wang Yannan and her husband actually lived there, a lot of people would go there to pay their respects, often in connection with the Tiananmen massacre,” he said.

“They are worried that if more people start going, it could lead to unrest,” Ji said.

“The place has become a pilgrimage site, just like the grave of Lin Zhao,” he said, in a reference to the Mao-era dissident executed by the CCP. “So they have to get rid of it.”

Ji said the items currently being moved mostly came from Zhao’s study and bedroom, and included desks, tables and chairs, upholstered furniture, and other items, which have now been taken for storage in a warehouse on the outskirts of Beijing.

Among Zhao’s belongings were large numbers of books and other gifts he received from world leaders during his overseas trips while in office, as well as commemorative photo albums, he said.

Sources said the family may donate some items to a museum in Zhao’s hometown in the central province of Henan.

“The family will likely donate some things to make a dedicated memorial hall … all of the things he used while carrying out his work,” Ji said.

According to a tweet from Beijing-based political journalist Gao Yu, Wang Yannan’s plan is to create a replica of her father’s study in her new home.

Politically sensitive items

Feng Chongyi, associate professor of Chinese Studies at the University of Technology Sydney, said he was concerned that some items could be taken away by the authorities if they are considered politically sensitive.

“This is kind of a gray area, items belonging to former Chinese leaders,” Feng said. “If [the CCP] sees you as one of them, they will take steps to protect them, and they will take the views of the family into account when making arrangements.”

“But they view Zhao Ziyang as their enemy, even though he has never been publicly denounced as a traitor, so they won’t be protecting his belongings, nor allowing his family to take away or dispose of them,” he said.

Prior to his ouster for showing sympathy with the student protesters, Zhao was a liberal-minded and well-loved leader who rose to the top of the ruling party at the 13th Party Congress in 1987.

His name rarely appears in the official record, although he has a loyal following of former officials seeking to rehabilitate him as a figurehead of the reform era that began in 1979.

In a conclusive break with the reformist thinking of the 1980s, China’s current supreme leader Xi Jinping is now serving an indefinite term as president following constitutional changes nodded through in March 2018 by China’s rubber-stamp parliament, the National People’s Congress (NPC).

Reported by Gao Feng for RFA’s Mandarin Service. Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie.

China is caught between power shortages and the political cost of lifting its ban on coal from Australia as Beijing struggles to contain rising prices after cutting off imports from its leading commodity supplier.

Reports differ widely on the origins of China’s unofficial ban against imports of both Australian thermal coal for power generation and metallurgical or coking coal for steelmaking.

In March, Argus Media traced the start of the policy as far back as the previous April, while more recent reports have cited last October as the effective date of the undeclared embargo.

News of the restriction spread quickly during an early winter power crisis when the Communist Party-affiliated Global Times reported on Dec. 13 that China’s top planning agency had met with 10 power companies, giving them “approval … to import coal without clearance restrictions, except for Australia.”

Reports on the cause of the rift have also varied widely, with some citing Canberra’s decision in 2018 to exclude Chinese telecom companies ZTE Corp. and Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd. from developing Australia’s 5G network due to security concerns.

Many other sources of bilateral tension have emerged, including differences over China’s territorial claims to the South China Sea, Australia’s offer of visas to Hong Kong democracy advocates and its support for policies of the United States.

“We urge Australia to stop interfering in Hong Kong affairs and China’s internal affairs in any form, to avoid further damage to China-Australia ties,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin warned in March.

An annual study by the Australian National University found a 61-percent drop in China’s investment in the country last year, the South China Morning Post reported.

Since then, several reports have cited Australia’s call for a thorough investigation of the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic as the leading cause of the coal ban.

Beijing has also taken out its anger by raising tariffs and effectively barring imports of other Australian products including wine, barley and cotton, while imports of essential commodities like iron ore have continued at a higher cost.

This week, the feud intensified at the tit-for-tat level as Australia brought a complaint against China’s wine and barley tariffs before the World Trade Organization. China responded quickly by filing a dispute against Australia’s anti-dumping measures on Chinese products including railway wheels, wind towers and stainless steel sinks.

Whatever the motives may have been for singling out Australia for sanctions, China’s decision on coal has gradually grown from an affordable penalty into a critical cost as recovery-driven demand and summer power use rise.

In the first five months of the year, electricity consumption had already climbed 17.7 percent, the National Energy Administration reported, setting the stage for summer power shortages and high coal demand.

Domestic coal production of 1.62 billion metric tons rose 8.8 percent in January through May, while imports of 111.17 million tons fell 25.2 percent, the National Bureau of Statistics said, reflecting the Australia ban.

“China, which used to count Australia as its second- biggest supplier of coal, appears to be paying a heavy price for its ban on imports from the world’s second-biggest shipper of thermal coal and the no. 1 supplier of coking coal used to make steel,” wrote analyst Clyde Russell in a Reuters commentary this month.

Paying twofold

China is now paying about twice as much as Australia’s Newcastle coal price for lower-quality fuel from other suppliers, according to figures cited by Russell.

“Overall, the various coal price benchmarks across Asia reflect not only the strength of underlying demand, they also bear witness to the disruption of China’s ban on imports from Australia,” he said.

Conditions in China have contributed to price pressures in the country that accounts for about half of the coal production and consumption in the world.

This year’s surge in production has also had a high human cost. In April, the government launched a series of safety inspections at China’s mines following a rash of deadly accidents caused by pressure to boost output in response to demand.

Price increases have magnified the impact of the Australian coal curb, but China’s government has shown no sign of reversing course.

“My instinct is that the leadership will not back down on the Australian embargo,” said Mikkal Herberg, energy security research director for the Seattle-based National Bureau of Asian Research.

“The embargo and the Australia grudge match are much too prominent internationally to back down and lose face,” Herberg told RFA.

“I suspect they are hoping it will be a fairly temporary squeeze on coal and power, and will resort to well-worn strategies of short-term price controls and administrative pressures,” said Herberg. “They will tough it out rather than back down on the Australia fight,” he said.

On June 9, Bloomberg News reported that the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) planning agency was considering a cap on coal prices to deal with the price spike. News of the non-market measure seemed likely to exert a drag on volumes as the loss of incentives raises the risk that suppliers will hold back.

On June 10, Reuters reported that the government had also sent inspectors to coastal coal ports to crack down on hoarding.

“Power plants need to build up inventory before the peak summer demand period arrives. But at the moment, a lot of coal is piled at ports in the hands of traders who are holding it for higher prices,” a trader at Caofeidian port in northern Hebei province told Reuters.

The pressures added to an inflationary surge in commodities last month as China’s producer price index (PPI) soared 9 percent from a year earlier, the biggest increase since 2008.

Nearly forgotten in all the stress over power shortages and inflationary pressures is President Xi Jinping’s pledge last September to reach a peak in carbon emissions before 2030 and achieve carbon neutrality before 2060, goals that will require a phase-out of coal.

The Wall Street Journal reported on June 9 that the NDRC has “put the brakes on attempts by environmental officials to reduce carbon emissions,” giving priority to economic growth over the pledge to meet climate goals “for now.”

The report, which cited “people familiar with the matter,” may mark a turnaround from the situation in January, when advocates from the government’s Central Environmental Inspection Team blasted the NEA in a public report for failing to advance Xi’s climate agenda and instead favoring economic growth.

According to the Journal, the NDRC has watered down the national carbon trading scheme which was scheduled to go into full operation this month, limiting its scope.

Unclear intentions

China has also sent ambiguous signals on plans for building new coal-fired power plants.

At a meeting of the International Financial Forum in Beijing on May 29, the chief economist of the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, Zhou Yueqiu, announced that the giant lender would take the first steps toward ending financing of coal-fired plants, but without saying when.

Zhou said the bank would “establish a road map and timeline for the gradual withdrawal of coal financing,” the Morning Post reported, adding that observers viewed the move as “significant.”

But the highly qualified statement fell far short of the demands of climate activists for an immediate halt to new coal projects in China. Groups including Greenpeace have been calling for a moratorium on new plants since 2014.

China’s coal and power shortages this year suggest that such a step is still a long way off.

The risk to the economy and social stability may be seen as simply too great to suffer a setback in growth, particularly in the Communist Party’s centennial year.

But higher coal costs may be an inevitable consequence of avoiding power shortages, especially if the ban on Australian coal is maintained.

On June 17, an NDRC spokesperson said that the electricity problems in the southern region had started to ease, but Bloomberg reported that 80 percent of power providers in Guangdong province had suffered losses when they were forced to sell power for less than their costs.

“One thing appears certain. Chinese consumers will be paying significantly more for coal than consumers elsewhere able to take Australian material,” said Rory Simington, principal analyst at the Wood Mackenzie consulting firm, in a note quoted by the Morning Post.

Easing the ban would also have consequences, sending a signal that China is not strong enough to impose sanctions on commodity suppliers who differ with its political views.

China’s predicament may be another side of its vulnerability to energy security risks, with its growing dependence on imports of oil, natural gas and now coal.

Hong Kong’s leader Carrie Lam announced a reshuffle of her cabinet on Friday, placing two ex-cops in key cabinet positions, including the police commissioner who presided over the widespread use of violence against mostly peaceful demonstrators during the 2019 protest movement.

The ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP) approved the appointment of former secretary for security, John Lee, to replace Matthew Cheung as Lam’s second-in-command, while former police commissioner Chris Tang was made secretary for security, the government said in a statement on its official website.

Lee joined the Hong Kong Police Force in 1977, rising to the rank of deputy commissioner in September 2010, before serving as under-secretary for security.

Tang was commissioner of police throughout the 2019 protest movement, which saw widespread international criticism of police violence against protesters. He will be replaced by former deputy police commissioner Raymond Siu.

The changes come almost exactly one year after the CCP imposed a draconian national security law on Hong Kong that forbids public criticism of the Hong Kong and Chinese governments, as well as criminalizing overseas lobbying and fundraising efforts, and journalism that calls for overseas sanctions on foreign officials.

Lam, Lee, and Tang were all sanctioned by the Trump administration in August 2020 for “undermining Hong Kong’s autonomy and restricting the freedom of expression or assembly of the citizens of Hong Kong.”

“The recent imposition of draconian national security legislation on Hong Kong has not only undermined Hong Kong’s autonomy, it has also infringed on the rights of people in Hong Kong, allowing mainland China’s security services to operate with impunity in the region, mandating “national security education” in Hong Kong schools, undermining the rule of law, and setting the groundwork for censorship of any individuals or outlets that are deemed unfriendly to China,” the U.S. Treasury said in a statement at the time.

Asked if Hong Kong had become a police state, as evidenced by the new appointments, pro-Beijing lawmaker Alice Mak dismissed journalists’ concerns.

“If it’s a police state, why not? I don’t think there’s any problem with a police state,” Mak said. “When we say a police state, I will view the other side, that is the emphasis on security.”

“If someone from the police discipline can help to govern Hong Kong, can help to maintain law and order in Hong Kong, why not?” she said.

Lee told journalists that he would ensure that Hong Kong was governed by “patriots,” while Tang vowed to protect “national security” in the city, and eradicate domestic “terrorism,” as well as threats from “external forces.”

‘Rioting, illegal assembly’

More than 1,000 people have been prosecuted and thousands more arrested, mostly for charges linked to “rioting” and “illegal assembly” under the Public Order Ordinance.

But the imposition of the national security law from July 1, 2020 launched an ever-widening crackdown on public dissent and political opposition that has seen dozens of former opposition lawmakers and democracy activists detained for “subversion” for taking part in a democratic primary in 2020.

The mass public protests — which Beijing claims were incited by hostile foreign powers fomenting a “color revolution” in Hong Kong — and the increasingly violent responses by protesters to widespread and excessive police violence, were cited as the main reason for the new regime.

Siu said he will continue to “lead the police force in a spirit of loyalty and connecting with the community to protect Hong Kong’s national security”.

The announcements came a day after the forced closure of the pro-democracy Apple Daily newspaper in the wake of a national security police raid that saw several of its journalists and executives arrested for “collusion with foreign powers” and its assets frozen.

On the day of the raid, Lee referred to Apple Daily journalists as “criminals,” while U.S. President Joe Biden called the paper’s closure a “sad day for media freedom” that showed “intensifying repression” by China.

The paper’s founder Jimmy Lai is currently serving time for “illegal assembly” in connection with a peaceful protest, and is awaiting trial for “collusion with foreign powers” under the national security law.

The paper was reportedly raided in connection with articles it had printed calling on foreign governments to sanction Hong Kong and Chinese officials, some of which dated back to 2019, well before the national security law took effect.

Travel ban to take effect

Under an immigration bill due to take effect in August, Hong Kong’s secretary for security will have new powers to order border guards to prevent anyone of any nationality from boarding any form of transportation leaving the city.

The bill has sparked concerns that the authorities may use travel bans to stem the current exodus of families and individuals from Hong Kong, as controls over freedom of speech and publication intensify, and as the government’s “national security education” program is implemented in schools.

Lee’s wife and two children hold U.K. citizenship, giving Lee the ability to claim U.K. citizenship as well, according to a report in the Hong Kong Free Press.

Chung Kim-wah of the Hong Kong Public Opinion Research Institute (PORI), said the appointments of Tang and Lee are a break with the convention that much of Hong Kong’s government is run on a day-to-day basis by powerful civil servants.

“They are disregarding public opinion in appointing John Lee chief secretary for the administration,” Chung told RFA. “They want to break with the tradition of administrative officers running things, meaning that there will be far less of a political role for civil servants than there was in the past.”

Current affairs commentator Johnny Lau said the fact that Lee, Tang, and Siu all have a background in law enforcement is significant.

“It is a sign that the current hardline style will be transferred from the top-down dictatorship of law enforcement to the machinery of policy-making,” Lau said. “It’s a lot like the political and legal affairs committee system in mainland China.”

“Hong Kong is increasingly convergent with the mainland in implementing such a system,” he said.

Reported by Lau Siu Fung, Cheng Yut Yiu, Carmen Wu, Gigi Lee and Emily Chan for RFA’s Cantonese and Mandarin Services. Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie.