New Zealand Apologizes for Dawn Raids on Migrants in 1970s

New Zealand has formally apologized to the Pacific community which felt “terrorized” during police raids searching for visa overstayers in the 1970s. The so-called Dawn Raids, carried out between 1974 and 1976, targeted only people from the Pacific Islands even though statistics showed the vast majority of overstayers were from Europe and the United States.

New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said the immigration raids were “dehumanizing.”  Speaking at Auckland Town Hall, she expressed her government’s “sorrow and remorse.”  She acknowledged the “distress and hurt the raids” had caused.

Many Pacific Islanders moved to New Zealand after World War II to boost a work force ravaged by conflict overseas.  By 1976, they made up just over 2% of the population, or about 65,000 people, according to the national census.

As the economy faltered, though, Samoans, Tongans and other Pacific Islanders who had arrived as desperately needed migrant workers were suddenly accused of taking jobs away from New Zealanders.

That prompted a crackdown by the police on those suspected of overstaying their visas.  Churches, schools and workplaces were routinely raided, as were homes — often in the middle of the night.

New Zealand’s Minister for Pacific Peoples Aupito William Sio recalled when his family was targeted.

“To have somebody knocking at the door in the early hours of the morning with a flashlight in your face, disrespecting the owner of the home, with an Alsatian dog frothing at the mouth at your door, and wanting to come in without any respect for the people living in there is quite traumatizing.  I have had sisters say, oh, my goodness, I never, ever want to think about that.  That is just my family – that is replicated across the Pacific community,”  he said.

Thousands of people were arrested and deported, and many have recalled their “humiliation and pain.”  Both major political parties in New Zealand have accepted that the raids were racist.  British and American visitors, who made up about 40% of overstayers at the time, were rarely targeted by the authorities.

New Zealand governments rarely make formal apologies for past injustices.

Ardern also announced that education scholarships would be provided to Pacific communities in New Zealand, including those from Samoa, the Cook Islands, Fiji, and Kiribati.

 

 

Source: Voice of America

Myanmar Junta Forms Caretaker Government; Min Aung Hlaing is Prime Minister

Myanmar’s ruling State Administrative Council said Sunday it has become a caretaker government and its leader, Min Aung Hlaing, is to be prime minister.

The announcement came after Min Aung Hlaing on Sunday repeated his pledge to hold multiparty elections at an unspecified future date.

In a televised address, exactly six months after toppling Myanmar’s elected civilian government, the senior general also said he was ready to cooperate with any special envoy appointed by the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations.

Min Aung Hlaing has said before that any elections would take place at least a year after the Feb. 1 putsch.

The military claims it ousted the ruling National League for Democracy because the party had ignored allegations that general elections in November 2020 were riddled with fraud. The NLD had won the poll in a landslide, drubbing the military’s proxy Union Solidarity and Development Party, in a contest deemed mostly free and fair by local and international election observers.

Since the coup, security forces have shot and killed more than 900 people and arrested thousands in a bid to quash protests and a stubborn civil disobedience movement opposed to the coup, according to the Assistance Associate for Political Prisoners, a rights group tracking the junta’s crackdown from neighboring Thailand.

The military has also arrested dozens of NLD leaders, including de facto leader and Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, and put some on trial for sedition and other alleged crimes. Many more NLD members are in hiding in and outside the country.

The regime has labelled the clandestine government the ousted lawmakers have helped set up in hopes of wresting control from the generals a terrorist group.

Skepticism inside Myanmar

Initial reaction to the announcement in Myanmar was mixed.

Chan Lian, executive director of the Hornbill Organization, an election monitoring group, told VOA it seemed unlikely elections would be held in the next two years.

“Historically, elections have been held for almost three decades after the previous military coup d’état,” he said.

“It is hard for us to believe that it will be held in next two years,” he said, adding, “We can only believe it when the election date is announced.”

He said he thinks “there would be very few political parties running in the upcoming election” if it were held by the military.

Sai Nyunt Lwin, deputy chair of the Shan National League for Democracy, an ethnic opposition party, also was skeptical.

“We do not have much trust what he [Min Aung Hlain] has said,” Sai Nyunt Lwin told VOA.

“The Hluttaw [Myanmar’s parliament] was not convened after the 1990 election. When the 2010 election was held again, the top party leaders including NLD and SNLD were imprisoned. The election was not free and fair and not a credible election.

“Now, the 2020 election result was annulled again. Our party does not accept cancelation of the election result. We still recognize the winning MPs of our party. The SNLD won 42 seats in the 2020 general election,” he said.

Khin Zaw Win, the director of Tampadipa Institute, an advocacy group in Yangon, was also skeptical, saying, “It is unbelievable that the military will hold election in the next two years, adding that he does not believe ASEAN has the capacity to deal with Myanmar even if they appoint a mediator.

Phe Than, a member of the Central Policy Affairs Committee of the Arakan National Party, an ethnic party in Myanmar’s western Rakhine state, struck a similar chord.

“It remains to be seen whether the situation to hold the election will be ready during these years,” he told VOA.

Ethnic parties now find it hard to believe in the election, he said, since the military announced the cancelation of the 2020 election results. He said if Suu Kyi’s NLD does not run, allied parties will not run, adding, “In the absence of participation, the military will pretend to be trying to hold a general election. at that time, I think it is possible there will be a new type of coup by the military to retain power.”

Nandar Hla Myint, however, spokesperson and general secretary of the military-supported Union Solidarity and Development Party, was more positive.

“We are confident that the chairman of the State Administrative Council will hold election as he pledges,” he said.

“As a political party, we will contest the best in the election. The previous election results were annulled because it was not free and fair. It would not have been annulled if it had been handled with responsibility to the complaints of military and political party over election frauds.”

NLD seen as the key

Hervé Lemahieu, a Myanmar analyst with the Lowy Institute, an Australian think tank, said the credibility of any elections the regime stages will rest on whether the hugely popular NLD, which has easily won every general election it has contested, is given a fair chance.

He and other Myanmar watchers believe the junta is prosecuting the NLD’s leaders as a pretext, once they’re convicted, to ban the party outright.

“Given that Min Aung Hlaing has already publicly said that he hopes to learn from the Thai experience, and that the amount of back-and-forth and consultations between [Thai Prime Minister] Prayut Chan-ocha and Min Aung Hlaing, there’s every reason to consider these next elections will be highly stacked in favor of the military and have conditions which will basically prevent the NLD or any … rebranded NLD from running, so it will not be free and fair,” he said.

Prayut also seized power at the helm of a military coup in 2014 and became prime minister after 2019 elections that the opposition claims were rigged in his favor, an allegation Prayut denies.

Lemahieu said any poll without the NLD’s full participation would be little more than “window dressing,” though some smaller parties might be convinced to run to at least give the semblance of a genuine contest.

“The generals will hope that it will give them some added degree of credibility at least in the region, if not in the eyes of the West, that will be passable for ASEAN,” he said.

“I would imagine that most self-respecting, well established pro-democracy opposition figures, if they’re not already in jail, would refrain from running,” he added. “But you would be left with a small list of fringe parties who probably would see that [election] as beneficial potentially to run in.”

Lemahieu said an ASEAN envoy could help nudge the generals toward a fair contest if the bloc selects someone with well-established democratic credentials and lets them operate mostly independent of the group’s chair, which rotates among the 10 members every year. If the envoy changes with each new chair, he said, “it’s not a recipe for success.”

 

 

Source: Voice of America

Thailand Records All-Time High Daily COVID-19 Cases

BANGKOK– Thailand’s daily COVID-19 cases and deaths both set records again yesterday, as the country fights its worst surge in infections, driven by the highly contagious Delta variant.

 

Data from the Ministry of Public Health showed that, Thailand’s COVID-19 caseload rose by 18,912 over the last 24 hours to 697,287, and the death toll increased by 178 to 4,857.

 

Daily case tallies in the Southeast Asian country have continued to rise sharply in July, despite the imposition of tougher restrictions, like curfew and partial lockdown, in its most affected provinces.

 

The number of patients in critical condition and on ventilators also climbed to 4,691 and 1,032 respectively, which is increasing pressure on the medical system in hard-hit areas, like the capital, Bangkok.

 

Local media reported that, the soaring cases have prompted the authorities to consider extending the current restrictive measures for another two weeks.

 

With some 5.5 percent of people fully inoculated, Thailand’s vaccination rate is relatively low. However, the country has accelerated its vaccination progress recently, with a new record of single-day shots on Friday.

 

Source: NAM NEWS NETWORK

Fiji Records 1,121 New COVID-19 Cases, Six More Deaths

SUVA– Fiji reported 1,121 new COVID-19 cases for the last 24 hours, and six more deaths from Thursday to Friday, according to health officials, yesterday.

 

Permanent Secretary for Health, James Fong, said, 241 cases were from the Western side of Viti Levu, and 880 cases from four provinces on the central side of the main island.

 

With 21,707 active cases now, the country has recorded a total of 29,781 cases and 7,705 recoveries. There have been 238 deaths due to COVID-19 in Fiji, and the seven-day rolling average of COVID-19 deaths per day is eight.

 

There are currently 294 COVID-19 patients admitted to hospital, with 56 of them in severe condition and 11 in critical condition.

 

Fong said, a total of 6,289 individuals were screened and 655 swabbed at the stationary screening clinics in the last 24 hours.

 

A total of 270,052 samples have been tested since the outbreak started in Apr, 2021, with 312,913 tested, since testing began in Mar, 2020.

 

The country has imposed a curfew from 6:00 p.m. to 4:00 a.m. local time, to reduce the unnecessary movement of people.

 

Source: NAM NEWS NETWORK

Myanmar To Hold General Elections In Second Half Of 2023

YANGON– Myanmar expects to hold new general elections in the second half of 2023, Commander-in-Chief of Defence Services, Sen-Gen Min Aung Hlaing, chair of the newly formed State Administration Council, said, in his televised message to the public today.

 

“The constitution states, according to subsection (b) of Section 421, if one cannot accomplish the duties within one year of the emergency period, it permits only two extensions of the prescribed duration for a term of six months for each extension. In the meantime, we have to do the things that should be done. Then, we will take six months, by Aug, 2023, to prepare for the election, according to the law,” Min Aung Hlaing said.

 

The state power has been held by the Commander-in-Chief of Defence Services, Sen-Gen Min Aung Hlaing for six months, since a state of emergency was declared in Myanmar on Feb 1, this year.

 

Min Aung Hlaing also pledged to hold multi-party general elections without fail, stressing the need to create conditions to hold free and fair multi-party general elections.

 

The Union Election Commission, cancelled on Jul 27, the results of the previous multi-party general elections held on Nov 8 last year, as the elections were not held in line with the law and were not fair.

 

The National League for Democracy won a majority of seats in both houses of the Union Parliament in the previous general elections.

 

Min Aung Haling said, “We will hold briefings on findings of the previous general elections, to international delegates in the near future.”

 

He also pledged to work with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.

 

Source: NAM NEWS NETWORK

Malaysian Senior Minister To Lead Delegation To Asean Foreign Ministers’ Meeting From Monday

PUTRAJAYA (Malaysia)— Senior Minister of Foreign Affairs (Security Cluster) Hishammuddin Hussein is scheduled to lead the Malaysian delegation to the 54th ASEAN Foreign Ministers’ Meeting (54th AMM) and related meetings, from tomorrow (Aug 2) until Aug 7.

 

The Malaysian Foreign Ministry (Wisma Putra) said in a statement that all the meetings via video conference will be hosted by Brunei Darussalam, in its role as ASEAN Chair for 2021.

 

“At the 54th AMM, ASEAN Foreign Ministers will discuss the progress of ASEAN Community Building; ASEAN 2021 Priorities and Key Deliverables including the collective and COVID-19 socio-economic recovery strategy.

 

“Also will be discussed the implementation of ASEAN Political Security Blueprint 2025, regional and international issues as well as preparations for the 38th and the 39th ASEAN Summits and Related Summits,  scheduled to be held back to back in October 2021,” said the statement.

 

Among the related meetings Hishammuddin is expected to participate during the 54th AMM are 22nd ASEAN Plus Three (+3) Foreign Ministers’ Meeting; Meeting of the Southeast Asia Nuclear Weapon-Free Zone (SEANWFZ) Commission; 23rd ASEAN Political-Security Community (APSC) Council Meeting;  29th ASEAN Coordinating Council (ACC).

 

The others are ASEAN – ROK (Republic of Korea) Ministerial Meeting; ASEAN – China Ministerial Meeting; ASEAN – Japan Ministerial Meeting; ASEAN – US Ministerial Meeting and ASEAN – Australia Ministerial Meeting.

 

The statement said Malaysia, as country coordinator for ASEAN-Australia Dialogue Relations for 2018-2021 will co-chair the ASEAN- Australia Ministerial Meeting, with Hishammuddin and his Australian counterpart Senator Marise Payne leading the discussion on issues of mutual concern.

 

“At the end of the meeting, Malaysia will be handing over the country coordinatorship for ASEAN – Australia dialogue relations to Lao PDR (Laos).

 

“Malaysia will also be taking over the country coordinator ship of ASEAN-Canada dialogue relations from Myanmar following the ASEAN-Canada Ministerial Meeting,” the statement added.

 

The statement said at the conclusion of the 54th AMM and Related Meetings, Foreign Ministers would adopt several outcome documents, including the 54th AMM Joint Communiqué, which will highlight the outcomes of discussion as well as strategic and important decisions made during the meetings.

 

 

Source: NAM NEWS NETWORK