Day: November 4, 2021

Netflix has removed two episodes of spy drama Pine Gap from its service in the Philippines after local regulators ruled that they were “unfit for public exhibition” for depicting China’s self-proclaimed nine-dash line in a map of the South China Sea.

Vietnam made a similar complaint in July, resulting in Netflix pulling all six Pine Gap episodes from the Vietnam platform.

The problems encountered by the streaming company are a reminder of how the nine-dash line has become an increasingly contentious sovereignty symbol when it crops up in television shows, movies and computer games. It has been embedded in Chinese cultural and entertainment products for years in concerted efforts to reaffirm Beijing’s territorial claims, and raises hackles when it shows up elsewhere.

China uses the line to demarcate its claim over about 90 percent of the South China Sea despite its rejection by neighboring countries and invalidation by an international tribunal.

Among the other claimants, the Philippines and Vietnam have most actively disputed China’s sweeping claims.

‘Government demand’

Netflix announced earlier this week that two episodes of the Australian TV series had been removed from its Philippines streaming platform “by government demand,” without giving more details.

Pine Gap is a political thriller and the removed episodes, the second and third in the series, were set in the context of conflicting maritime claims in the South China Sea region.

In the episodes, a map with the nine-dash line was shown projected on a large screen in the control room of a spy base at Pine Gap which is depicted in the show.

In a statement on Monday, the Philippine Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) said that “following a DFA complaint, the national Movie and Television Review and Classification Board handed down its decision to pull out the episodes of the political drama Pine Gap for showing a map of China’s nine-dash line and violating Philippine sovereignty.”

The DFA said this decision underscored that “every instrumentality of the government, whenever presented with the opportunity, has the responsibility to counter China’s aggressive actions in the West Philippine Sea (South China Sea) to assert the Philippines’ territorial integrity.”

Theodore Te, former Philippine Supreme Court spokesperson, took to Twitter to support the removal, calling the Netflix action “dangerous.”

“The show is a work of fiction and not a documentary; the misleading portion on the 9-dash line could have been addressed by adding a mandatory explanation appearing on screen during those scenes,” he tweeted.

‘Unconventional approach’

Before Pine Gap, two TV series released on Netflix – the Chinese series Put Your Head On My Shoulder and CBS’s Madam Secretary – also featured the controversial map.

While international streaming services and film companies may not pay much attention to the nine-dash line, “asserting Beijing’s territorial claims over Taiwan and the South China Sea islands has been a consistent policy of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) since its inception,” said Alex Vuving, a professor at the Hawaii-based Daniel K. Inouye Asia-Pacific Center for Security Studies, who conducted an in-depth research into China’s so-called “strategic messaging.”

“Maps have been playing an important role in this policy,” he told RFA.

“Chinese cultural products since the 1950s have already featured China’s excessive claims in the South China Sea whenever they printed a map of China. The map would have had a U-shaped dotted line showing Taiwan and most of the South China Sea islands, one of which was occupied by Taiwan, as Chinese territory,” Vuving added.

The Philippine movie regulator was quoted as saying that “using the medium of a motion picture is but China’s unconventional approach to gain an upper hand in the territorial conflict in the South China Sea/West Philippine Sea.”

Norwegian historian Stein Tonnenson, a well-known scholar on the South China Sea, explained that the nine-dash line which encircles all the islands, waters and the continental shelf inside, “is of great symbolic importance in Chinese nationalist education.”

“Anyone Chinese will be seen as unpatriotic if using or making maps without the line,” Tonnenson said.

“We have been watching Chinese films like a hawk,” said an administrator of Hoang Sa (Paracels) Forum, a popular Vietnamese online community focused on the South China Sea, who goes by the initials D.T.

“As maritime disputes with China have become a very hot topic in Vietnam, our community members look extremely closely at each map of the South China Sea shown in the movies. We found that an increasing number of Chinese films, including even romcoms (romantic comedies), make efforts to include the map of the nine-dash line,” D.T. said, adding it “must be a comprehensive and continuous strategy” on China’s part.

In the words of the Philippine movie and TV classification board, “such portrayal is a crafty attempt to perpetuate and memorialize in the consciousness of the present generation of viewers and the generations to come the illegal nine-dash line.”

Little Panda’s Adventure

Vuving said that “aware of the power of propaganda, the PRC has been adept at inculcating the ideas it prefers into the minds of other people.”

“Maps are important weapons of China’s “three warfares,” a major tool of Chinese grand strategy in the South China Sea. The “three warfares” include public opinion warfare, psychological warfare, and legal warfare,” he said.

This sovereignty symbol is seen widely across cultural platforms. An animated movie – Abominable – jointly produced by Shanghai-based Pearl Studio and DreamWorks Animation, was pulled from theaters in Vietnam in 2019 because of a scene involving the nine-dash line.

In 2020, an “educational game” for kids entitled “Little Panda’s World Adventure,” produced by Chinese company Zhi Yong Information Technology, was also purged from Google Play and Apple’s App Store in Vietnam for the same reason.

“One of the growing trends is that China has been carrying out a comprehensive campaign to include its sovereignty claims in scientific works and researches, which are supposed to be objective and non-biased,” said Pham Thanh Van, founding member of the South China Sea Chronicle Initiative, an independent research foundation of the South China Sea.

She recalled occasions when the nine-dash line appeared in reputable publications such as Science Magazine, the journal Nature and the National Geographic.

“This is using science to spread political messages,” Van said, adding that the Vietnamese authorities and the scientific community have yet to work out how to “systematically address this conundrum.”

“You can reject and ban materials with offensive content in Vietnam and demand that foreign companies based inside the country respect your stance, but you cannot do that to what is published overseas,” she said.

Authorities in northwestern China’s Qinghai province are forcing young Tibetan monks to leave their monasteries, sending them back to their family homes in a drive that threatens their connection to Tibet’s traditional religion and culture, sources say.

The move, announced in a Religious Affairs Regulation on Oct. 1, has already seen monks aged 11 to 15 years expelled from Dhitsa monastery in Qinghai, historically a part of northeastern Tibet’s Amdo region, a source in the area told RFA in a written message.

“Also, young monks in Jakhyung monastery and other monasteries in Qinghai have been forced to give up their robes and are being sent back home,” RFA’s source said, speaking on condition of anonymity. “Government officials are now inspecting these monasteries to make sure the regulation is being obeyed.”

Enforcement of the new rule was launched on Oct. 20, “and higher-up officials have been very strict in implementing it,” the source said, adding that the number of young monks expelled so far under the regulation is still unclear.

“But they are being told they can’t return to the monasteries or wear monks’ robes anymore, and whether they will now be sent to government schools or not is also unclear,” he said. “None of them were forced to become monks, and they enrolled in the monasteries with their parents’ consent.”

The new regulation says that monasteries in Qinghai may no longer admit underage boys as monks or allow them to take part in religious activities, but doesn’t specify the age limit required, the source said.

Authorities in Tibetan-populated regions of neighboring Sichuan had already begun three years ago to remove young monks from their monasteries so they could return to government-run schools and learn to “serve society,” Tibetan sources told RFA in earlier reports.

Many had enrolled in the monasteries’ courses in Buddhist philosophy and logic and some were top students in their class, sources said.

Chinese authorities have long sought to restrict the size and influence of Tibetan Buddhist monasteries, traditionally a focus of Tibetan cultural and national identity, sources in the region say.

“Before 2008, according to a government regulation passed in the capital city of Lhasa, no one there was allowed to enroll as a monk under the age of 18,” said Tenzin Phuntsok, a researcher at the Dharamsala, India-based Tibet Policy Institute.

“So now the same kind of regulation is being implemented and forced upon Tibetans [in other places],” Phuntsok said, calling the campaign an attempt to further eradicate Tibetan religion and culture as China moves to Sinicize the region.

Pema Gyal, a researcher at London-based Tibet Watch, added that Chinese authorities say that young Tibetans should complete their education in regular schools before coming of age.

“But in reality, this is just an attempt by the Chinese Communist Party to assimilate Tibetan religious institutions, and to disconnect younger Tibetans from learning their own religion by instilling Chinese communist beliefs in them from a young age,” he said.

Translated by Tenzin Dickyi. Written in English by Richard Finney.

A top executive of Myanmar’s military-owned telecommunications company Mytel was shot dead in an attack outside his home in Yangon on Thursday that also left his wife seriously injured, RFA has learned.

Thein Aung, a retired navy major who served as Mytel’s chief financial officer, died instantly in the early morning attack on Tay Nu Yin Road as he and his wife left their house in Yangon’s Mayangone township, witnesses said.

“He was shot four times as he and his wife left their house in the morning at the 7^th mile bus stop in Ward 7,” one township resident said.

Thein Aung’s wife Theint Aung Thu was injured in the attack and is receiving treatment at an area hospital, a press statement by Myanmar’s ruling State Administration Council, calling the killing of Thein Aung, 56, an attack by “an armed terrorist.”

Junta forces arrived shortly after the shooting and cordoned off the neighborhood.

No group has so far claimed responsibility for the shooting, and the shadow National Unity Government (NUG) set up to oppose rule by the country’s military, which overthrew civilian rule in a Feb. 1 coup, was unavailable for comment.

In addition to being an executive at Mytel, a joint venture between the military and Vietnamese Defense Ministry-owned Viettel, Thein Aung also served as the general manager of the conglomerate Myanmar Economic Corporation (MEC) and its subsidiary Star High Co., Ltd,, the online news outlet Myanmar Now reported.

The MEC was one of two big Myanmar military holding companies that were hit with sanctions by the United States and Britain last March to squeeze the junta that deposed leader Aung San Suu Kyi and her elected government on Feb. 1 and had at the time killed nearly 300 people in fierce attacks on daily protests.

Rights groups and analysts quickly deplored the killing of Thein Aung, who was reportedly close to Gen. Maung Maung Kyaw, commander in chief of the country’s Air Force and Admiral Moe Aung, commander in chief of the Navy.

“The targeted killing of an executive of a company is something that cannot be condoned from a human rights perspective,” Phil Robertson—Asia division director for New York-based Human Rights Watch—told RFA Thursday.

“Obviously, this person was close to the military. But such tactics—assassinating a man while he is out on a walk with his wife—just show how bad the situation has become in Myanmar,” Robertson said.

Robertson noted that “ongoing abuses that are being perpetrated by the military and the police have radicalized people in a very significant way,” and that reaction to the violence was not surprising.

“But doing so in this way is just going to create more tit-for-tat violence that will make all the people of Burma suffer,” he said.

“[People] should not be able to decide who should live and who should die. This is only tribalism,” added Sai Kyi Zin Soe, a political and human rights analyst based in Yangon.

“But is has been nine months now since the military coup, and there has been no change. People feel suffocated, and more and more have been experiencing poverty and hardship. It is becoming harder to survive, and the state of security for everyone is in decline.”

The killing in Myanmar’s commercial hub and former capital comes a month after anti-junta forces claimed they had damaged or destroyed 120 telecom towers owned by Mytel in attacks across Myanmar between Sept. 4 and Oct 7.

Engineers have estimated the loss at 20 billion kyats (U.S. $10.3 million) in attacks a Mandalay anti-junta militia member told RFA were in retaliation for the military’s extrajudicial killings and indiscriminate arrests and torture of pro-democracy civilians.

“Mytel makes money that benefits the military, and the latter buys weapons with that money, so if we attack Mytel, we would block the flow of money,” the fighter told RFA last month.

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

A former student activist on Thursday pleaded guilty to charges of “secession” under Hong Kong’s draconian national security law, while the city’s highest court ruled that people can’t be charged with “rioting” or “illegal assembly” if they weren’t actually present at the scene of a protest.

Tony Chung, 20, pleaded guilty to publishing “seditious messages” on social media, and to holding protests and activities in 2020 with “secessionist intent,” prosecutors told the District Court.

Chung, who once headed the now-disbanded pro-independence group Studentlocalism, told the court: “I have nothing to be ashamed of.”

A further charge of “money-laundering” relates to his use of a Paypal account to collect donations from supporters to fund “illegal actions.”

According to prosecutors, Chung continued to publish posts to his group’s Facebook page even after the ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP) imposed the national security law on Hong Kong from July 1, 2020, providing links for donations, despite Chung’s claim that his group had stopped all Hong Kong-based activities.

Police had seized pro-independence flags, leaflets, and books about Hong Kong independence at Chung’s home, they told the court.

“Secession” charges carry a maximum sentence of life imprisonment, but the District Court can only hand down jail terms of up to seven years.

Chung has been denied bail since his initial arrest at a coffee shop near the U.S. Consulate in Hong Kong on Oct. 27, 2020.

He is standing trial under Article 21 of the national security law, which prohibits anyone from “actively organizing, planning, implementing or participating in acts aimed at dividing the country and undermining national unity in Hong Kong.”

Chung’s plea came as Hong Kong’s Court of Final Appeal knocked back a decision allowing the legal principle of “joint enterprise” to be applied to people who supported protesters, but who weren’t present at the scene.

Five judges made the ruling following a request from the department of justice to clarify the law.

A lower court had ruled that people who encourage others to join illegal protests through social media, provide resources, or provide transportation to help protesters leave the scene of a protest were liable to charges of “illegal assembly” or “rioting,” despite not being physically present.

“A defendant who is not present at the scene of an unlawful assembly or riot cannot be found guilty as a principal offender because ‘taking part’ in the criminal assembly is a centrally important element of these statutory offences. That requirement cannot be overridden by the common law doctrine of joint enterprise,” the panel of five judges said.

Other charges possible

They said such people could potentially still be guilty of other offenses, such as conspiracy or incitement to take part in “illegal assembly” or “rioting.”

They said anyone who assists an offender remains liable under section 90 of the Criminal Procedure Ordinance.

One of the appellants in the case was Tong Wai-hung, who was earlier acquitted of rioting in July 2019 – one of more than 10,000 people arrested during months of sometimes-violent anti-government protests that rocked Hong Kong that year.

While Tong’s acquittal wasn’t under threat, the department of justice wanted a ruling showing that a person could be convicted of “rioting” or “illegal assembly” even if they weren’t present.

Social worker and rights activist Jackie Chen told RFA that she is currently awaiting a ruling after the Attorney General appealed her acquittal in relation to a protest on Aug. 31, 2019.

“The earlier judgment from the [lower court] had been very worrying … and we have seen a number of cases prosecuted [under joint enterprise],” Chen said. “The latest ruling is more reasonable, from the point of view of those awaiting sentencing.”

“A number of people have been prosecuted just for existing, not because they went somewhere,” she said. “At least now, there is the hope of appeal.”

Barrister Johnny So said the ruling could affect some cases in the pipeline.

“Some people are saying it means people should be released … but even if they can’t say you took part in a riot, they can accuse you of inciting or assisting others to do so,” So said.

“This just clarifies what they will regard as breaking the law.”

Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie.