Day: October 21, 2021

Authorities in North Korea have sentenced five farmers to disciplinary labor for hiding corn meant for redistribution to state supplies, sources in the country told RFA.

With an expected meager autumn harvest looming, farmers are nervous about the annual grain redistribution this year. The government takes 60 percent of the harvest from every farmer, leaving them with the remaining 40 percent.

In most years, their share is not enough to live on, but with yields about 20 percent smaller than expected in some areas, this year could be worse. For this reason, many farmers are looking to cheat the system, a resident of the northern province of Ryanggang told RFA’s Korean Service.

“A few days ago, five farmers were caught hiding corn during an unexpected inspection. Each of them was sentenced to five months in a disciplinary labor center,” said the source, who requested anonymity to speak freely.

“Since each farm receives distribution based on yield, the amount of distribution for farmers will inevitably be reduced,” said the source.

The U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization predicted in June that North Korea would be short about 860,000 tons of food this year, or about two months’ supply.

The smaller yield this year could mean that farmers will only get five- or six-months’ of food for next year, a source in the agricultural industry in the country’s northeastern province of North Hamgyong told RFA.

“Since the beginning of October, farms nationwide have been estimating how much of the harvest the farmers are going to get. They expect their distribution will be smaller than usual, and they are worried about how they will live next year with very little food,” said the second source, who requested anonymity for security reasons.

“The farmers’ livelihood is intimately tied to the redistribution, because they are working on the farm all year,” said the second source.

In North Korea’s nascent market economy, most people have secondary jobs because a government salary is not enough to live on. Farmers, however, do not have the time to work anywhere else, so they live or die by the harvest.

Plans by the government to take more of the crop this year could potentially leave the farmers with only two months’ worth of food, while soldiers and other grain recipients will get their full distribution.

“Grain silos and outdoor warehouses are already empty… so the situation is frustrating, it’s eating them inside,” said the second source.

The coronavirus pandemic has had profound negative effects on the agriculture industry and the food situation in North Korea, according to the second source.

When Beijing and Pyongyang closed off the Sino-Korean border and suspended all trade at the beginning of the pandemic in January 2020, North Korea was left to its own devices to produce enough food, without Chinese imports to cover shortfalls and with no access to imported fertilizer or farming equipment.

The shortage of farming materials increased prices and farmers went into debt, agreeing to pay back their creditors with food from the fall harvest, the second source said.

“This is going to reduce the redistribution to the farmers even more. They worked hard all year to produce as much grain as possible, but what they are going to get back this fall is going to be a trivial amount, so they are beyond frustrated.”

The food situation in North Korea is dire.

UN Special Rapporteur on North Korean Human Rights Tomás Ojea Quintana warned in a report in March that the closure of the border and restrictions on the movement of people could bring on a “serious food crisis.”

“Deaths by starvation have been reported, as has an increase in the number of children and elderly people who have resorted to begging as families are unable to support them,” said the report.

RFA reported in April that authorities were warning residents to prepare for economic difficulties as bad as the 1994-1998 famine which killed millions, as much as 10 percent of the population by some estimates.

Reported by Myung Chul Lee for RFA’s Korean Service. Translated by Claire Lee and Leejin Jun. Written in English by Eugene Whong.

The newly appointed Chinese Communist Party (CCP) boss in Tibet, a hardline apparatchik under multiple international sanctions for severe human rights abuses in neighboring Xinjiang, is expected to apply to Tibet’s Buddhists the same harsh policies carried out against the Muslims in Xinjiang, Tibetans and experts said.

Wang Junzheng, deputy CCP boss and security chief in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR), has overseen atrocities against the Uyghurs and other Turkic minorities in the XUAR that have been labeled genocide in Western capitals.

Tibet advocates greeted the announcement Monday of the promotion of the 58-year-old Wang with concern that he will take the repression Tibetans have known for decades to a higher-level, and they called for the continuation of coordinated sanctions on him by Britain, Canada, the European Union and the U.S.

“Wang Junzheng’s appointment as head of the Tibet Autonomous Region Party Committee indicates that the Chinese authorities intend to continue using an iron fist to control the Tibetan people,” said the International Campaign for Tibet, an advocacy group with offices in Washington, D.C. and Europe.

“ICT expects Wang to bring his experience to Tibet as part of the party’s Tibet-Xinjiang feedback loop. Chen Quanguo, his boss in Xinjiang, took his Tibet experience as the party secretary from 2011 to 2016 to Xinjiang, where he has led the Chinese government’s ongoing, horrifying genocide of the Uyghurs,” the group said in a statement.

Chen moved to the XUAR capital Urumqi in August 2016 after five years as party boss in Tibet, where he built up security measures and surveillance, suppressed support for the Dalai Lama, Tibet’s spiritual leader whom Beijing accuses of being a separatist, and criminalized many ordinary religious and cultural activities.

Wang’s promotion, part of a slate of new CCP leaders appointed in seven provincial-level governments across China ahead of a party congress next year,  comes five years after Chen took over as XUAR party boss and locked up some 1.8 million Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in a network of internment camps in the name of fighting terrorism and extremism.

“Wang Junzheng’s reign promises to be for Tibetans as bad as Chen Quanguo’s, or worse,” the online religious freedom website Bitter Winter said in an analysis.

“Indeed, his appointment in Tibet is a slap in the face of the United States and democratic countries in general. The ‘butcher of Xinjiang’ not only is not reined in by Beijing, he is promoted to higher office,” the Italy-based website said.

‘Sinicization of the Tibetan Buddhism’

In a speech in the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) capital Lhasa on Tuesday, Wang did little to dispel the fears of Tibetans.

“I will consider myself a Tibetan from now onwards. My main role and responsibility is to create a harmonious society that is inevitable and will resolutely strike against separatist activities,” he said, according to state media.

“It is necessary to actively guide the Tibetan Buddhism to adapt to the socialist society and promote the Sinicization of the Tibetan Buddhism.”

Wang was among XUAR officials hit with travel bans and asset freezes in March by Britain, Canada, the EU and the U.S., The quasi-military Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps’ Public Security Bureau, where Wang served as political commissar, was also penalized.

“I need to stress that I have no interest at all in travelling to the European Union, the United States, Britain or Canada,” Wang told state media at the time.

“I don’t have a cent of savings in these places.”

XUAR party boss Chen, architect of the detention camp system, was sanctioned under the Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act, a move that followed the enactment last year the Uyghur Human Rights Policy Act of 2020, which provides for sanctions on the Chinese officials who implement arbitrary incarceration, forced labor, and other abuses.

“The United States stands with the many Tibetans oppressed and imprisoned by the PRC for the exercise of their human rights,” a State Department spokesperson said in response to an RFA question about Wang’s transfer.

“Tibet remains a priority for this Administration.  We will consider the use of all appropriate tools to promote accountability for PRC officials responsible for human rights abuses in Tibet,” the spokesperson told RFA’s Tibetan Service.

‘Genocide under his watch’

While the spokesperson did not address Wang’s appointment, Rep. Jim McGovern, chairman of the Congressional Executive Commission on China, an advisory body in Washington, told RFA he is “deeply worried about the promotion of Wang.”

“Wang Junzheng was security chief in Xinjiang when the U.S. government determined the Chinese government was committing genocide under his watch,” he said.

“Whether his promotion shows defiance of the U.S. sanctions placed upon him is less important than the worries we have about what he may impose upon Tibetans as party boss in the TAR,” McGovern told RFA.

In Washington on Wednesday, President Joe Biden’s nominee to be U.S. ambassador to China, Nicholas Burns, did not mince words on China at his Senate confirmation hearing.

“The PRC’s genocide in Xinjiang, its abuses in Tibet, its smothering of Hong Kong’s autonomy and freedoms, and its bullying of Taiwan are unjust and must stop,” Burns said, listing points of conflict between Washington and Beijing.

Formerly an independent nation, Tibet was invaded and incorporated into China by force nearly 70 years ago, and the Dalai Lama and thousands of his followers fled into exile in India and other countries around the world following the failed 1959 uprising against Chinese rule.

Chinese authorities maintain a tight grip on the region, restricting Tibetans’ political activities and peaceful expression of cultural and religious identity, and subjecting Tibetans to persecution, torture, imprisonment, and extrajudicial killings.

Reported by RFA’s Tibetan and Uyghur Services. Translated by Tenzin Dickyi.

Washington is talking with ASEAN member Singapore about limiting the Burmese military regime’s access to money, as part of efforts to pile pressure on the junta chief who has been barred from an upcoming regional summit, a senior U.S. State Department official said Thursday.

The decision by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations last week to disinvite junta chief Min Aung Hlaing from the ASEAN summit in late October, and his subsequent release of thousands of prisoners, shows how effective international pressure can be, State Department Counselor Derek Chollet said during a news conference by phone from Jakarta.

The foreign minister of Malaysia, an outspoken ASEAN state, similarly said on Thursday that the regional bloc needed to use its standing to put pressure on those who violate human rights – and should therefore rethink its cherished principle of non-interference in members’ affairs.

“Deepening our partnership with ASEAN is the main objective of our inter-agency trip, for example … Singapore has significant financial leverage over the regime and we discussed how we can partner effectively to wield that,” Chollet said about his trip to the city-state a day earlier.

Chollet was speaking to reporters on the final leg of a three-country visit to Southeast Asia by an inter-agency American delegation, which he is leading.

“At each stop, we reiterated our support for the people of Burma and their aspirations for democracy,” he told reporters. “We have underscored that the international community has the responsibility to pressure the military regime to stop violence and respect people’s will. It is a critical juncture in the crisis.”

While visiting the Lion City, Chollet tweeted, he had a “productive meeting” with Ho Hern Shin, deputy managing director of the Monetary Authority of Singapore.

“We discussed ways to limit the Burmese military regime’s access to overseas financial assets,” he said.

Singapore overtook China to become the largest investor in Myanmar in 2019, The Myanmar Times reported back then. From October 2018 to February 2019, Singapore invested U.S. $20.6 billion there, according to a government agency called Enterprise Singapore.

Chollet also cited the example of jointly taking advantage of Thailand’s long border with Myanmar.

“Thailand is a critical humanitarian assistance partner because of its long border with Burma and the leverage that gives is one of the things we discussed in Thailand,” he said.

In addition, Washington, for several months now, has held talks with members of the shadow civilian National Unity Government in Myanmar, Chollet said.

“We are deeply committed to engaging with them … encouraging them to unify [the pro-democracy] movement. And we will continue to engage with them,” he said.

ASEAN should do ‘soul searching’

Meanwhile, on the far side of the globe, a senior U.S. National Security Council (NSC) member said that apart from ASEAN’s decision to bar the Burmese junta chief from the summit on Oct. 26-28, more action needed to be taken to respond to post-coup challenges in Myanmar effectively.

“Of course, we applaud ASEAN for the leadership it has shown, but obviously this is not enough,” Edgard Cagan, senior director of East Asia and Oceania at the NSC, said at an event at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington late Wednesday.

“Addressing the challenges of the coup and the difficulties people are facing because of the coup, those things require a broader and more effective effort.”

Cagan did not specify what those efforts could be. But many analysts have said that ASEAN should suspend Myanmar’s membership, stop trade with it – and not take steps such as lobby to water down a United Nations resolution calling for an arms embargo on the country.

Indeed, there has been criticism of ASEAN, even from within its members, about the slow pace of its decision making and because it took the bloc more than 100 days to appoint a special envoy to Myanmar.

In recent weeks, Malaysian Foreign Minister Saifuddin Abdullah has been forthright about what ASEAN needs to do and about its shortcomings.

On Thursday, he said that ASEAN’s “almost sacrosanct principle” of not interfering in member-states’ internal business has “in many ways, been useful and practical in many situations.”

“But when we are faced with a situation like the one that is currently occurring in Myanmar, then perhaps ASEAN should actually do some soul searching,” he said. Saifuddin was referring to the violence unleashed after the coup by security forces who have killed almost 1,180 people, most of them pro-democracy protestors.

“Maybe now is the time for ASEAN to do serious soul searching on the application of the principle of non-interference and look at other experiences of other regions,” he said.

Saifuddin cited the African Union, which suspended its member Mali after a military coup there in late May.

Saifuddin said that at last week’s meeting with his ASEAN counterparts, some member-states had shown reluctance on the issue of shutting out Min Aung Hlaing.

“I stated the fact that we cannot use the principle of non-interference as a shield to avoid issues being addressed,” the minister recalled.

“The principle of non-interference cannot be applied separately from, or above, other ASEAN principles of strengthening democracy, promoting and protecting human rights, good governance and the rule of law.”

In previous years, ASEAN members have talked about “constructive engagement” rather than non-interference, regional analysts said.

“I think ASEAN is starting to move away from strict non-interference, but … the newer members may feel intimidated if ASEAN chooses to snub Myanmar or punish it,” Tunku Mohar Mokhtar, an academic at the International Islamic University Malaysia, told BenarNews, an RFA-affiliated online news service.

“However, ASEAN should also make it clear to Myanmar that the association does not tolerate blatant abuse of human rights by any of its members.”

Still, the biggest sticking point in ASEAN’s decision-making process remains the principle of “consensus” – all decisions taken by the bloc have to be approved by all members.

“The problem is the mechanism itself, because as we know, to reform ASEAN you need consensus among all the countries, including countries that do not want to change. Therefore there can be no consensus.”

“It’s an irony – to change the system you need people in the system who to want to change, so that is the difficulty.”

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

China’s internet regulator has updated a whitelist of pre-approved media organizations whose copy may be freely used by websites behind the Great Firewall, omitting the cutting-edge, privately owned Caixin Media.

In a move aimed at tightening control of the “master switch” of online news and information, the Cyberspace Administration of China said it had made the changes to “adapt to a new situation, recent changes and new demands” in the online information sector.

The list covers news websites and organizations under central government control, specialist industry media, local news websites and organizations, and government media release platforms, the agency said in a statement on its official website.

“In order to preserve the probity and credibility of this list, news copy sources that no longer meet requirements … have been removed,” it said in a statement dated Oct. 20.

“Compared with the 2016 version of the news copy source-list, the new version … has been greatly expanded, with nearly four times the previous number of sources,” the statement said.

Among the newly expanded sources are government platforms issuing public statements and press releases, “to provide a strong endorsement of … authoritative voices from various government departments around the country.”

A previous whitelist, issued in 2016, which included content from Caixin, no longer applies, the agency said.

The update comes after the administration, the press regulator and the State Development and Reform Commission (SDRC) said on Oct. 9 that they are planning to ban private sector investment in media organizations.

The Oct. 8 list, which is intended to apply across China without local variation, requires that “organizations with no public sector investment shall not engage in business involving newsgathering, editing or broadcasting.”

Banned organizations would include news agencies, newspaper publishing groups, radio or television broadcasters and providers of online news, editing services or publishers, it said.

The Oct. 8 recommendation was signed by the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television and the General Administration of Press and Publications, as well as the Cyberspace Administration.

Private investors are also banned from investing in political, economic, military, or diplomatic organizations, and from “major social, cultural, technological, health, education, sports and other services.”

In particular, there must be no private sector involvement in “political and public opinion guidance or value orientation,” the proposed list of banned investments said.

The Cyberspace Administration cited ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP) leader Xi Jinping’s call for “positive energy” in the country’s tightly controlled media industry, where the majority of organizations are already state-run, and expected to toe the party’s propaganda line.

Caixin has reported on cutting-edge business and financial news, including official corruption, pollution, and public anger against the government.

Its exclusion from the whitelist means its articles can no longer be reposted on news portals like Sina.com, removing them from a huge portion of its former readership.

Neither Caixin nor the company’s founder Hu Shuli had responded to requests for comment at the time of writing.

Hu told the New York Times in 2005 that she was on a mission to develop Chinese journalism, while at the same time not crossing any red lines laid down by government censors.

Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie.

A pop duet taking aim at China’s army of nationalistic “Little Pink” commentators and trolls has garnered nearly 10 million views on YouTube after the singers’ accounts were blocked on Chinese social media and their songs removed from online platforms.

In the official video for “Fragile,” Malaysian singer Namewee and Australia’s Kimberly Chen sing repeated apologies to a dancing panda, who lives in a hobbit-style house and waves a flag bearing the online insult “NMSL,” frequently used by Little Pinks to wish death on the mothers of those they believe have insulted China or hurt the feelings of its people.

China frequently demands apologies from companies and celebrities if they use sensitive words not in line with Chinese Communist Party (CCP) propaganda, including the idea that Taiwan is a sovereign country that has no interest in being invaded or ruled by its larger neighbor.

The song video starts with a message: “Warning: be cautious if you are a fragile pink,” as the camera focuses on baskets of cotton, in a reference to Uyghur forced labor in the northwestern region of Xinjiang, and teddy bears resembling Winnie the Pooh, a satirical reference to CCP general secretary Xi Jinping that has now been banned from China’s tightly controlled internet.

“You never want to listen to people, but just launch constant counterattacks,” Namewee sings. “I’m not quite sure how I’ve offended you.”

“You always think the world is your enemy.”

Namewee and Chen, who are based in democratic Taiwan, which China has threatened to invade if it doesn’t accept CCP rule, then sing together: “You say I belong to you, and that I should come home,” adding “you are unreasonable … you want me to affirm that we are inseparable.”

“Sorry that I hurt your feelings,” the pair sing, amid the sound of breaking glass. “I hear the sound of fragile self-esteem breaking into 1,000 pieces.”

Winnie the Pooh

The song also references Xi Jinping’s “common prosperity” slogan and “poverty alleviation,” taunting the panda for having to gather “honey” for Winnie the Pooh, and showing it hurt and shocked when a stuffed toy bat is served to it on a dish, in a reference to the racist bat soup meme suggesting a Chinese origin for the coronavirus pandemic.

Taiwan rapper Dwagie and singer Chen Chia-hsing both welcomed the song for speaking out against CCP-backed online trolls, known collectively as Little Pinks, or the 50-cent Party.

Chen Chia-hsing told Taiwan’s Central News Agency (CNA) that the slang phrase “Chinsult” is used to refer to anything China finds insulting, saying that living in Taiwan is enough to make CCP supporters feel you have insulted their homeland.

“Being alive is a Chinsult too … If you want to be a free person, you will inevitably Chinsult, and as time passes, you get used it, therefore the earlier you Chinsult, the earlier you begin to enjoy the freedom,” he told CNA.

Dwagie told the agency that “Fragile” taps into a seam of public anger and irritation in the region over the public face that the CCP and its supporters present to the world.

Both Kimberly Chen and Namewee’s accounts on the Chinese social media platform Weibo were blocked after the song was released, while their music has been taken down from online platforms like QQ Music and Tencent Video.

Namewee said on his Facebook page that he had made no mention of China in the entire song, “yet you think every word and phrase is an insult directed at you.”

Ban underscores fragility

Pop culture expert Chuang Chia-ying, associate professor of Taiwanese Language and Literature of at National Taiwan Normal University, said the incident showed that music is politics.

“Little Pink-style, nationalistic consumer identity has always been ubiquitous in global pop culture circles, resulting in the collective bullying of others,” Chuang told RFA.

“It looks as if their [output] is now being taken off the shelves, and Weibo’s reaction is par for the course.”

He said Namewee’s work has always been highly political, touching on racial and religious tensions in Malaysia, and criticizing the school system.

Kong Ling-hsin, who heads the journalism department at Taiwan’s Ming Chuan University, said the song would become a self-fulfilling prophecy where China is concerned.

“If China bans [the song], then it will have shown its fragility for all to see,” Kong told RFA. “But they way it was shot, it will have to ban it, because it presses all of their buttons.”

Taiwan-based labor union official Sun You-lien, who hails from Malaysia, said Namewee and Chen have clearly made peace with the loss of access to the Chinese market.

“A lot of people are willing to give up [creative freedom] to keep the Chinese market, and avoiding offending people in a system they know is unjust,” Sun said.

“This song is saying very clearly that [China’s] world isn’t my world … and it’s getting that message through to even more people that pop artists can play their part [in resisting China],” he said.

Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie.