Month: August 2021

Myanmar’s military junta has begun a nationwide vaccination campaign as the country struggles under a third COVID-19 wave, but many people are avoiding the jab as they mistrust not only the junta, but also vaccines of Chinese origin, sources in the country told RFA.

The civilian government that was ousted by military coup on Feb. 1 had launched a program to vaccinate everyone over the age of 18, but the army takeover disrupted that plan. In a recent speech, the junta’s leader Sr. Gen. Min Aung Hlaing said about 50 percent of the population of 54 million would be vaccinated by the end of the year.

While the Chinese Sinopharm vaccine has been approved by the World Health Organization (WHO) with an efficacy of 79% against symptomatic COVID-19 infection, the junta’s brutal crackdown on people protesting its rule and its stranglehold on media in the country have made citizens hesitant to get vaccinated.

People in Myanmar are also cautious about the vaccine because products manufactured in their giant northern neighbor China have a poor reputation in the country of 54 million people.

“Mainly I don’t want to have the vaccine because it is Chinese. Second, I don’t trust it since these vaccines are administered by the military council,” Kyaw Myo Lwin, a resident of Myanmar’s largest city Yangon, told RFA’s Myanmar Service.

“If the elected civilian government had administered these vaccines, I would definitely get it, but I won’t under the military council. I reject it. I believe this vaccine will not make any difference for us,” he said.

Kyaw Myo Lwin, who said his family and friends also mistrust the military’s vaccine scheme, will continue to wear facemasks, avoid crowded places, wash his hands frequently and stay indoors to protect himself, he added.

A doctor who requested that RFA not reveal his name or location for security reasons said that mistrust of the military runs deep among most people.

“Judging from their actions, there is nothing trustworthy about them. They have, after all, terrorized the population by arresting, torturing and persecuting them. How can the people trust them?” the doctor said.

“The vaccines they are providing come from China and Russia, countries the junta is aligned with politically. These are all reasons that damage public trust in them,” the physician said.

“People already have their opinions of Chinese products as being of a lower quality,” he said, but advised people to get the Chinese vaccine if there are no other choices available.

Vaccination is the only long-term solution for containing COVID-19, Than Naing Soe, a spokesperson for the junta’s Health and Sports Ministry, told RFA.

“Realistically speaking, it will be hard to maintain measures like wearing face masks, washing hands or keeping distance. The best solution is to vaccinate, so we will get it done,” he said.

The vaccines the junta will provide are not only Chinese, which are among 11 distributed by the World Health Organization’s COVAX program, Than Naing Soe said. Vaccines made in Russia and India will also be administered, he said.

A Yangon doctor who requested anonymity to speak freely told RFA that any of the vaccine options were better than nothing.

“Prevention is better than cure. No matter which vaccine, whether it is 10, 20 or 50 percent effective, it would benefit the host and is a better choice than not having any protection at all,” the Yangon doctor said.

“Many people got hit very hard in this third wave of the pandemic. This is because people were not vaccinated during the second wave. So, vaccination is good for you,” said the Yangon doctor.

The ousted democratically elected government prior to the Feb. 1 coup had announced a program to vaccinate all 38.35 million people older than 18 in Myanmar, using a combination of 30 million purchased and 27 million donated vaccine doses.

Immunization began Jan. 27 with the Indian made AstraZeneca Covishield vaccine and 2.75 million people were fully vaccinated when the program was suspended following the coup.

Junta leader Min Aung Hlaing told Russia’s RIA news agency that the program had been suspended due to supply problems in India, but he said Myanmar was trying to purchase two million doses from Russa and was in negotiations to buy seven million more from China.

According to WHO statistics, Myanmar has confirmed nearly 320,000 COVID-19 cases and close to 11,000 deaths.

Reported by RFA’s Myanmar Service. Translated by Ye Kaung Myint Maung. Written in English by Eugene Whong.

Myanmar’s ambassador to the United Nations, a critic of the country’s six-month-old military regime, has been put under heightened security following a threat made against him by an unknown organization, RFA has learned.

Kyaw Moe Tun, who had previously represented Myanmar’s civilian-led government which was overthrown in a Feb. 1 military coup, now represents the country’s shadow National Unity Government (NUG), formed in opposition to the junta.

Details of the threat made against him are still unclear, Kyaw Moe Tun told RFA on Thursday in an interview.

“At this point I can’t share any information with you in detail, because this is an ongoing security-related matter,” the Myanmar ambassador said.

“U.S. security agents have not given out any comments to journalists yet. I hope you understand,” he added.

Kyaw Moe Tun learned of the threat made against him on Tuesday and immediately reported it to police, the ambassador told the Reuters news service, and a Myanmar national present in the U.S. on a visitor’s visa is now being held for questioning by police and U.S. officials.

Myanmar’s military regime has tried to replace Kyaw Moe Tun as the country’s ambassador to the U.N., but he remains in his post because the U.N. has not recognized Myanmar’s military junta as the country’s legitimate government, according to an Aug. 5 report by The Irrawaddy.

Requests to the U.S. State Department for comment on Thursday received no immediate response. Attempts to reach spokespersons for Myanmar’s military rulers for comment also went unanswered.

Reported by RFA’s Myanmar Service. Translated by Kyaw Min Htun. Written in English by Richard Finney.

Indonesia’s top diplomat on Thursday signaled the start of “a new era” in ties between Southeast Asia’s largest country and the United States, as she wrapped up a visit to Washington.

Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi welcomed Washington’s “increased engagement” in Southeast Asia during a meeting earlier this week with her counterpart, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken.

The two met at the State Department as the American diplomat engaged foreign ministers from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations during various meetings over the course of five days this week.

The United States is looking to the ASEAN member-states for support toward a free and open Indo-Pacific amid China’s increasing expansionism in the contested South China Sea.

“Indonesia and the U.S. are entering a new era of bilateral relations. … Indonesia’s hope is this … engagement will contribute to the creation of peace, stability and prosperity in the [Southeast Asian] region,” Retno said in a videotaped statement issued by her ministry and posted on its YouTube channel.

Blinken and Retno also emphasized the growing importance of the Indonesia-U.S. partnership “and its contribution to a secure and prosperous Indo-Pacific,” State Department spokesman Ned Price said in a statement Tuesday.

“The leaders committed to working together in the fight against the global pandemic, fighting the climate crisis, boosting bilateral trade and economic ties, [and] defending freedom of navigation in the South China Sea,” Price said.

China claims nearly the entire South China Sea, including waters within the exclusive economic zones (EEZ) of Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines, Vietnam and Taiwan.

While Indonesia does not regard itself as party to the South China Sea dispute, Beijing claims historic rights to parts of that sea overlapping Indonesia’s EEZ as well.

Jakarta has intensified sea patrols in recent years after Chinese fishing boats, escorted by China Coast Guard ships, sailed into Jakarta’s EEZ off the Natuna Islands, Indonesia’s name for its waters at the southern end of the South China Sea.

Retno and Blinken met as their countries were holding the largest-ever joint-training between their armies, as more than 4,500 soldiers converged on Indonesian islands for the first live Garuda Shield exercise since 2019.

Garuda Shield focuses on strengthening bilateral relationships and demonstrating “U.S. resolve to support the security interests of friends and allies in the region,” the Pentagon had said late last month.

‘Don’t see anything new’

In addition to helping with military training, Washington is assisting Indonesia – and the wider Southeast Asian region – with pandemic aid.

Earlier, this week, U.S. National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan informed Retno that Washington would provide Jakarta an additional $30 million in COVID-19 assistance, bringing the total U.S. assistance to Indonesia since the start of the pandemic to more than $65 million.

The U.S. has also given Indonesia 8 million doses of coronavirus vaccines so far.

Still, Indonesia is unlikely to enter an alliance with the U.S. because of its non-aligned foreign policy doctrine, said Yohanes Sulaiman, an international relations lecturer at Jenderal Achmad Yani University in Cimahi.

“The U.S. wants to court Indonesia especially in the face of China’s growing aggressiveness, but Indonesia balks at this, because of its ‘free and active’ foreign policy and domestic pressure,” he told BenarNews.    

“Indonesia doesn’t want the situation [in the South China Sea] to escalate, but doesn’t want to get too involved either because it has little power. On the other hand, we can’t take a tough stance on China because we need their money.”

While not the largest investor in Indonesia, China’s spending in the Southeast Asian country has consistently grown, nearly doubling to U.S. $4.8 billion in 2020 from $2.4 billion in 2017.

Despite the strategic dialogue, ties between Indonesia and the United States would remain “business as usual,” Yohanes said.

“Other than a reaffirmation of strong Indonesia-U.S. relations, there’s not much in it,” he said. “Unless Indonesia suddenly upgrades military ties with the U.S. to become a ‘semi-ally,’ I won’t consider it a new era. I don’t see anything new.”

Reported by BenarNews, an RFA-affiliated online news service.

Rohingya refugees are increasingly slipping through barbed wire-topped fences that surround their camps in southeastern Bangladesh in search of work, domestically or abroad, officials said Thursday.

Police said 437 Rohingya had been detained since July 7 after leaving their camps in Cox’s Bazar, while some told BenarNews that they needed to find work because humanitarian relief was barely enough to live on. Bangladeshi authorities prohibit the refugees from seeking employment outside their camps and settlements in the district.

“In a bid to enforce strict lockdown, we set up checkpoints at different places of Ramu upazila [sub-district]. Almost every day, Rohingya people are intercepted,” Pranay Chakma, chief of Ramu, an upazila or sub-district in Cox’s Bazar, told BenarNews, an RFA-affiliated online news service, on Thursday.

“They are residents of the camps in Ukhia and Teknaf,” he said.

About 1 million Rohingya are sheltering in Cox’s Bazar, including more than 740,000 who fled from Myanmar’s Rakhine state following a military crackdown there nearly four years ago.

Cox’s Bazar district police records show officers arrested and intercepted nearly 59,000 Rohingya attempting to flee the camps between August 2017, when the mass exodus from Myanmar began, and December 2020.

More recently, district police reported that security personnel intercepted 33 Rohingya on Wednesday and 64 on Thursday.

“They very often flee. Now, we can catch them because of the checkpoints. The interception hints that possibly the Rohingya trend of deserting camps has increased,” Chakma said.

“The Rohingya escapees do not move in a group; rather they cross the checkpoints individually,” he said.

Md. Hasanuzzaman, superintendent of police for Cox’s Bazar district, said officers set up five checkpoints around the area.

“When we catch Rohingya we send them back to the camps after interception,” he told BenarNews.

‘Bored with eating the same food’

A BenarNews correspondent who lives in the southeastern border region spoke to Rohingya who were caught trying to leave their camps.

Mahmudur Rahman, 35, a resident of Kutupalong Camp 2 in Ukhia, said he wanted to help his family.

“The World Food Program provides us rice, lentils, edible oil, salt and other foodstuffs. We are bored with eating the same food,” he told BenarNews.

“The children often ask for fish and meat, but we do not have money. So we go outside the camp for work for cash to buy that.”

Another refugee Nur Mohammad, 30, told BenarNews that he was heading to a nearby sub-district to find work.

“Many Rohingya get out of the camps for menial work at farms and brick kilns there. We also work as day laborers,” he said.

Locals, meanwhile, accused the Rohingya of taking jobs meant for Bangladeshis.

“We have given them shelter on humanitarian grounds. But within years, the refugees have become a threat to the local people. Many local people were killed by the Rohingya,” said Mahmudul Haque Chowdhury, the founder of Rohingya Repatriation and Prevention Committee, a local group demanding immediate repatriation of the Rohingya.

“The government erected barbed wire fencing around the camps to stop their movement but they have been fleeing the camps. This is a big threat for the host community,” he told BenarNews.

An official with another anti-Rohingya group made similar complaints about the refugees.

“Not only they have been exploiting the local job opportunities, they have been venturing to go to Malaysia by sea,” Ayachhur Rahman, general secretary of Save Cox’s Bazar Movement, told BenarNews.

“With the connivance of some local elected representatives and public servants, they have been collecting fake national identity cards and Bangladeshi passports to go to the Middle Eastern countries,” he said.

Md. Alam, president of the Ramu unit of the Citizens for Good Governance, called on authorities to stop Rohingya from leaving their camps.

In response, an additional superintendent in charge of policing at 11 camps, said efforts to control Rohingya movements were difficult.

“[M]any Rohingya cut the barbed wire fence and create new passages to get out of the camps,” Khandakar Ashfaquzzaman told BenarNews. “We immediately seal the passages whenever we trace them.

“Unless the job opportunities in local areas are stopped, the Rohingya will continue to get leave the camps,” he said.

Reported by BenarNews, an RFA-affiliated online news service.

Cambodian journalists and rights groups are voicing concern over the authoritarian government’s creation of a new committee to promote “journalism ethics and professional standards” with the power to discipline reporters.

The Monitoring Committee for Journalism Ethics Practice, launched on Monday, has spawned worries among journalists that it will be used by authorities as a tool to intimidate independent reporters and stifle critical coverage of Prime Minister Hun Sen’s government.

Cambodia, which ranks toward the bottom of global press freedom indexes, launched a crackdown in 2017 on independent media, civil society, and the opposition — closing several newspapers and expelling RFA from the country, and banning the main opposition party and arresting its leader.

The committee will review reports and complaints from the public or other media outlets against journalists and news organizations, as well as resolve disputes over journalistic ethics and professional standards among reporters or media outlets and individuals, government bodies, and other organizations.

The committee also has the power to summon any journalist or media outlet, and its recommendations can influence Cambodian Information Ministry decisions on punishing violations of ethics and professional standards.

Rights groups say the panel underscores the further erosion of freedom of expression under the government of Hun Sen, who has ruled the country of 16 million people since 1985. His Cambodian People’s Party holds all 125 seats in parliament, the result of banning the opposition before 2018 elections.

“The government still doesn’t understand that freedom of expression means that it isn’t the boss of journalists or the media,” said Brad Adams, Asia director at New York-based Human Rights Watch.

“This is just another landmine planted to blow up on people reporting news that the government doesn’t like or on critics on social media,” he said. “The government should focus on the COVID crisis and rooting out corruption instead of harassing journalists.”

Since 2020, the government has prevented independent journalists from reporting on the coronavirus pandemic, blocked news sites, arrested journalists, and declared a state of emergency that gave it unprecedented power to censor traditional and online media, critics say.

Ranking Cambodia 144 among 180 countries in its 2021 World Press Freedom Index, the media freedom watchdog Reporters Without Borders said “Cambodians now only have access to news provided by major media groups directly linked to Hun Sen, such as the online news agency Fresh News, which pumps out pro-government propaganda.”

Narrowing the space for journalists

Local freelance reporter May Tithara told RFA he feared the new panel “will become a burden to or put pressure on some independent journalists, if disciplinary measures are imposed against them or their media outlets without proper consultations among all committee members.”

Hang Samphors, managing director of the NGO Women’s Media Centre of Cambodia, told RFA that professional journalists should be protected, rather than subjected to disciplinary measures.

“Journalists play an important role in reporting real news for the public,” she said. “They serve as a bridge between the public and the state. Without journalists, real news and concerns from the public would never reach the state.”

“The more restrictions on journalists, the narrower the space for journalists to perform their work for the public,” she added.

The 15 members of the committee — led by Buth Bovuth, the Information Ministry’s secretary of state — are senior officials or advisors to the ministry and journalism experts.

The members include Nop Vy, head of the Cambodian Journalists Alliance Association (CamboJA), an independent network formed by former reporters of the Cambodia Daily and Phnom Penh Post, which were forced to shut down during Hun Sen’s crackdown.

Nop Vy told RFA he welcomed efforts to set and enforce professional ethics and standards, but said there must be transparent discussions prior to decisions on disciplinary measures against journalists or media outlets.

“If the committee performs its work without proper principles or a clear basis, it will solve problems or take measures based on its sentiment,” he said, noting that most of the body’s members are government representatives.

Information Ministry spokesman Meas Sophorn said the new committee was created “not to put pressure on journalists or to target journalists for disciplinary measures,” but to direct journalists and media outlets on how to properly comply with journalistic codes of ethics and professional standards.

“For those who have improperly performed their work by failing to uphold the journalistic code of ethics and professionalism, the committee will examine whether to take disciplinary measures against them so as to give them orientation to perform their work properly … as determined by existing laws and legal instruments,” Meas Sophorn said.

“We will give commendations and encouragement to those journalists who properly perform their work,” he added.

Reported by RFA’s Khmer Service. Translated by Sovannarith Keo. Written in English by Roseanne Gerin.

Veteran Chinese journalist Chang Ping fled China a decade ago, and now makes a living as a writer in Germany. A former senior editor at the once cutting-edge Southern Weekend newspaper in the southern city of Guangzhou, Chang spoke to RFA about ever-widening controls on press freedom and public expression under the ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP), and shared his warning to the journalists of Hong Kong, where a citywide crackdown on dissent and political opposition is taking place under a draconian national security law imposed by Beijing:

Editors-in-chief in mainland China have no clue about covering the news. It’s all about self-protection and self-censorship. I also have those skills, but I’m ashamed of them. It’s about carefully playing the game close to the edge of what is allowed, about rewriting your sentences and choosing your words with care, so you are touching the edge but not crossing the line. These skills are rewarded [by the system].

It’s about staying out of the fray while constantly second-guessing others’ actions and following the herd. [Journalists in mainland China read official documents] not for their content, but to understand what is meant by them, and to guess their true purpose.

[Some media] try to use the government’s own rhetoric as both spear and shield, and embarrass the government into genuinely implementing a ‘harmonious society.’ If the government does some small thing towards this, the media will leap into action with editorials in praise of their actions, that they had prepared in advance, hoping to force the government into holding onto the moral high ground. But this never works, because everything they say has to be couched in the language of the regime, so they merely succeed in repeating the government’s slogans. They are still in service to that kind of language.

Curbs on language

The death of independent thinking starts with curbs on language, and ends when language becomes stuck in rigid patterns. The generation before ours lacked vocabulary. If someone was good, then they would say they must be a CCP member. If they were criticizing someone for being a bad person, they would ask if they could still be considered a communist.

Don’t think that if you only exercise permitted freedoms, and stay inside the cage that you will be safe. If you don’t resist, the cage will shrink further. If you don’t even think about using sensitive words, then words that used not to be sensitive will be designated sensitive words. We must lend our support to those at the cutting-edge. A lot of people think they aren’t the smartest, or they think that they’re smart enough to operate close to the edge of what’s permitted. But actually, those people are taking bullets for the rest of us.

It’s hard to use words and phrases that are already disappearing [from Hong Kong], like “overturn the verdict on June 4, 1989.” There is this feeling that one shouldn’t say them. But if we have to express a concept like harmonious society, why can’t we use terms like democracy, liberty and a free press to describe this idea? I would rather use any other words than the political language of the regime.

Otherwise, [people in Hong Kong] will be letting the authorities turn them into the kind of person they always hated.

Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie.