Day: November 19, 2021

A former rapper who became one of the top aides to the head of Myanmar’s deposed National League for Democracy (NLD) government, Aung San Suu Kyi, has been arrested by authorities for allegedly orchestrating several attacks on junta targets in Yangon.

Phyoe Zeyar Thaw, a 40-year-old NLD lawmaker who once represented the capital Naypyidaw’s Zabu Thiri township constituency, was taken into custody during a Thursday afternoon raid by around 70 soldiers and police officers on his apartment in Yangon’s Dagon Seikkan township.

The arrest was featured in pro-military media on Thursday with photos of Phyoe Zeyar Thaw kneeling in handcuffs with bruises on his face along with a gun and some ammunition. The same outlet published photos of 40 young men and seven young women who were arrested between Nov. 12 and Nov. 17 for allegedly carrying out “terror attacks” in various parts of Yangon at Phyoe Zeyar Thaw’s behest.

The NLD official, whose band “Acid” released what is widely considered Myanmar’s first hip-hop album in 2000, was accused of recruiting youths and orchestrating violence in Yangon at the direction of “terrorist groups” like the NLD, the shadow National Unity Government and Parliament’s Pyidaungsu Hluttaw Committee of Representatives.

The junta also alleged that Phyo Zeyar Thaw led a recent attack on police and army units in Yangon’s Htantabin and Kyimyindine townships.

Authorities also arrested Phyo Zeyar Thaw’s sister Khin Pa Pa Thaw in a raid on her home in Yangon on Friday morning, said a source close to the family, who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal.

“A friend of mine who lives near Khin Pa Pa Thaw’s house told me about what happened,” the source said.

“She was arrested in her home at about 8:30 a.m. [The friend] said there were many soldiers around and the entire road was blocked off by military vehicles at the time of the arrest. No one has been seen entering or leaving the house since the arrest.”

Aung Kyi Nyunt, chairman of the Pyidaungsu Hluttaw Committee of Representatives, refused to comment on the allegations against Phyo Zeyar Thaw but said that Myanmar has suffered the loss of many young people due to the military’s “foolish” Feb. 1 coup d’état.

“I don’t even have enough strength to speak about this, but another reason I don’t want to talk about him is that my comments could make him suffer more,” the former leader of NLD lawmakers in parliament from 2015-2020 told RFA’s Myanmar Service.

“It’s not just young people. It doesn’t matter if you are young or old. People are losing lives and property and there’s a big loss for the country because of this stupidity. To put it bluntly, we must end this evil system.”

Holding the junta accountable

Youths make up the one of the largest demographic groups targeted for arrest by the military in Yangon, according to Zeyar Lwin, a leader of the Takatha University Alumni Association. He said that despite feelings of anguish and frustration, fellow youths must take up the roles of those arrested and work “even harder” to remove the junta from power.

“This current revolution is not based on one group or one person, but a mass movement,” he said.

“So, we must keep on doing what we must do, even though we may be saddened by the events. I believe we have to fill in the gaps left by those detained or who have given up their lives for the resistance.”

Bo Bo Oo, chairman of the NLD in Yangon’s Sangyaung township, said junta leader Snr. Gen. Min Aung Hlaing will be held responsible for all crimes committed against the youth in the aftermath of the coup.

“Since the Feb. 1 coup, we have seen that the military does not care about the people at all,” he said.

“They shoot at everything and destroy everything. It’s bad and ugly. Snr. Gen. Min Aung Hlaing must take full responsibility for everything that happened in the country after Feb. 1.”

In a similar case to that of Phyoe Zeyar Thaw, 88 Generation student leader Kyaw Min Yu, better known as Ko Jimmy, was recently arrested by the military, and charged with orchestrating violence and plotting terrorist attacks in Yangon. Some 25 resident youths were taken into custody in the lead up to his arrest.

Reported by RFA’s Myanmar Service. Translated by Khin Maung Nyane. Written in English by Joshua Lipes.

Vietnam held an official ceremony of national mourning on Friday for the more than 23,000 citizens who have died after contracting COVID-19, as some critics said the pandemic may have claimed fewer victims had the government acted differently.

Government officials and relatives of the victims lit candles, burned incense and put lanterns on the water to mourn the dead in a televised event that was organized by the Central Committee of the Vietnamese Fatherland Front, an umbrella group of organizations aligned with the Communist Party, and the cities of Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh. Pagodas and churches in both cities tolled their bells in unison at the conclusion of the ceremony.

Critics said that while it was good the government was acknowledging the victims, Vietnamese government failures likely led to a greater number of deaths than would have otherwise occurred.

“We held a national mourning today, but if we don’t really feel guilty of our failures and mistakes, which caused so many deaths, especially in Saigon, it will mean that we are lying to ourselves,” Tuan Khan, a Ho Chi Minh City musician told RFA’s Vietnamese Service, using the former name of country’s largest city.

Ho Chi Minh successfully weathered three separate waves of the virus but became an epicenter of a fourth outbreak in April 2021. 

After a months-long lockdown, Ho Chi Minh City reopened in early October.

Party Committee Secretary Nguyen Van Nen and Chairman Phan Van Mai at that time admitted mistakes made under their leadership.

Nen said that at the peak of the pandemic, Vietnam had no vaccines, so city officials focused on building field hospitals to isolate the sick. But the field hospitals did not have medicine to treat the disease, so they were little more than holding centers where the infected either recovered or remained, he said.

Tran Bang, a Vietnamese social and political issues expert, told RFA that the officials have not done enough to examine what the government did wrong.

“They didn’t dig into the root cause of their administration’s mistakes. … The fact is those who made the mistakes were chosen by the Communist Party. These people would never have been selected if ordinary people had a real say in elections,” he said.

As of Friday, Vietnam has confirmed 1,035,469 cases of COVID-19 and 23,476 deaths according to data from Johns Hopkins University’s Coronavirus Resource Center.

Translated by Anna Vu. Written in English by Eugene Whong.

A hotel in Prague that refused to host a recent World Uyghur Congress conference on grounds of “political neutrality” has apologized to the group.

The Prague Marriott Hotel declined to host the Nov. 12-14 event, Axios reported Thursday, citing an Oct. 1 email message the hotel sent to a World Uyghur Congress (WUC) representative.

The Germany-based WUC advocates for Uyghur rights and has condemned China for its systematic abuse of members of the minority group in the western region of Xinjiang, where the government has held up to 1.8 million people in a vast network of “re-education” camps and detention centers.

Ultimately, about 200 Uyghur exiles from 25 countries attended the meeting in Prague to discuss the ongoing situation in China and to elect new leaders.

China has denied the abuse and said the camps are vocational training facilities where Uyghurs and other Turkic people learn skills in an effort to prevent religious extremism and terrorism in the region, where about 12 million mostly Muslim Uyghurs live.

Prior to the Prague conference, the Chinese Embassy in the Czech Republic condemned the WUCs an anti-China organization that had spread religious extremism and incited terrorist and separatist activities.

Zumretay Arkin, WUC’s program and advocacy manager, told RFA on Friday that he believed Marriott bowed to pressure from China.

“Its reason given to us is not a valid reason because the hotel does host political events,” Arkin said. “So, we believe there must have been Chinese pressure because the Chinese Embassy issued a statement condemning the hosting [of WUC’s] congress in Prague. So, we think there was definitely Chinese pressure.”

Arkin told Axios that his group had sent a representative to visit the Prague Marriott Hotel to inquire about hotel rates. The hotel’s event manager subsequently sent the representative an email declining to host the conference.

“For reasons of political neutrality, we cannot offer events of this type with a political theme,” the message said.

No other hotel the group reached out to expressed similar concerns, Arkin said.

Ben Gerow, Marriott’s corporate media relations manager, told RFA that “the hotel’s response was not consistent with our policies.”

“We are in the hospitality business, welcoming people from all around the world and from all walks of life representing many beliefs,” he said in an email. “We are working with the hotel team to provide additional training and education on our longstanding practices of inclusion.”

After the Axios story was published, a representative from the hotel chain called WUC’s representative in Prague and apologized, he said.

Sophie Richardson, China director at Human Rights Watch, called the hotel’s refusal to host the conference “reprehensible, cowardly and discriminatory.”

“It’s exactly the reason why companies need to do human rights due diligence not just of their supply chains or their business operations or their investing, but of their decisions about to whom and under what circumstances they’re offering or withholding services,” she told RFA.

This was the second time that Marriott “has visibly capitulated to what it sees as Chinese government pressure and made terrible business decisions as a result,” Richardson added.

In 2018, Marriott International apologized to China and condemned “separatists” there after the Beijing government shut down its website over an online questionnaire for guests that listed Tibet, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Macau as countries, rather than regions of China.

Marriott International, which is based in Bethesda, Maryland, operates 56 hotels across its brand portfolio in China and has another 44 confirmed projects under development there.

Reported by Adile Ablet for RFA’s Uyghur Service. Translated by Alim Seytoff. Written in English by Roseanne Gerin.

Changes to Hong Kong’s political system imposed on the city by the ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP) amid an ongoing crackdown on public dissent have turned the city’s legislature into a “rubber stamp,” and undermined the independence of judges, according to a U.S. government report.

“Changes to Hong Kong’s elections and the composition of its legislature now ensure pro-Beijing lawmakers will always have a majority, turning the once-competitive Legislative Council into a rubber-stamp parliament,” the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission (ESRC) said in its annual report to Congress this week.

Meanwhile, judges in cases brought under a draconian national security law that took effect on July 1, 2020 are now chosen from a list approved by the CCP-backed national security apparatus, “effectively stripping the Hong Kong judiciary of its former independence,” the report said.

“The changes enable the Hong Kong government to ensure all national security cases are assigned to progovernment preferred judges, guaranteeing outcomes favorable to the government and the CCP,” it said.

Taiwan strategic analyst Shih Chien-yu said he was surprised that the report named some national security judges, suggesting the U.S. has carried out highly detailed research for the report.

“This is a review of the erosion of judicial independence in Hong Kong over the past year, and of the principles underlying a fair trial,” Shih told RFA. “It names [judges] to show that the situation has deteriorated very rapidly.”

“The criticism is very direct, showing that [the authors] think the situation is already very serious, and is unlikely to change,” he said.

CCP version of history

The report also cited new powers given to the government to prevent people from entering and leaving the city, amid a net outflow of tens of thousands of permanent residents in the year after the law took effect.

Sweeping changes to the city’s educational curriculum now require teachers to deliver CCP-approved  versions of history, amid a culture of informing on anyone criticizing the government in class, something that is banned under the national security law, the report said.

“Authorities are using these new powers to fire [teachers] for unapproved speech,” it said. “Educators are forced to distort reality and history to portray the [CCP] in a positive light.”

It said the government also has the power and capability to impose internet censorship on Hong Kong at any time, amid an ongoing crackdown on media criticism of the government that has included the forced closure of the pro-democracy Apple Daily newspaper and the arrests of several senior journalists.

Hong Kong Democracy Council founder Samuel Chu said the report is an accurate reflection of Hong Kong’s reality, which is that the city is now much like any other part of China.

“They recommend some very specific actions, such as treating Hong Kong as part of China’s membership of the WTO, and how [China] suppresses or makes use of U.S. companies to advance their plans in Hong Kong,” Chu said.

Political commentator Joseph Cheng said the wording of the report makes very clear that Hong Kong is now under authoritarian rule.

“This report attaches great importance to the freedoms [once] enjoyed by the Hong Kong people, especially with regard to immigration and emigration,” Cheng said.

“They are mainly concerned with … whether Hong Kong people will be subject to unnecessary and unjustified restrictions on leaving Hong Kong,” he said.

“The report is a pretty damning criticism of Hong Kong.”

Jimmy Lai honored

The Hong Kong government rejected the findings.

“The [Hong Kong] government once again urges the United States to respect the international law and basic norms governing international relations,” it said in a statement on Nov. 18.

“Any attempts to interfere in the internal affairs of China through Hong Kong will not succeed and we will continue to discharge our responsibility of safeguarding the national security resolutely.”

In New York, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) presented jailed Apple Daily founder Jimmy Lai with its 2021 Gwyn Ifill Press Freedom Award.

“Lai has become a powerful symbol of the struggle to maintain press freedom in Hong Kong as China’s Communist Party exerts ever greater control over the territory,” the CPJ said in a statement on its website.

“In prison, denied bail, the outspoken critic of the Chinese government and advocate for democracy faces charges that could keep him in jail for the rest of his life,” it said.

Lai faces trial under the national security law for “collusion with a foreign power,” linked to alleged attempts to lobby the U.S. to impose sanctions on Hong Kong and Chinese officials.

Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie.

The U.N. on Friday called on the Chinese authorities to release jailed, ailing citizen journalist Zhang Zhan and allow her to receive life-saving medical treatment.

“We are very concerned about the rapidly deteriorating health of Zhang Zhan, whose life is reported to be at serious risk from a hunger strike she is currently conducting in protest against her conviction in December 2020 for documenting the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic in the Chinese city of Wuhan,” Marta Hurtado, spokeswoman for the office of the high commissioner for human rights, said in a statement.

“We call on the Chinese authorities to consider Zhang’s immediate and unconditional release, at the very least, on humanitarian grounds, and to make urgent life-saving medical care available, respecting both her will and her dignity,” Hurtado said.

Zhang recently won a major press freedom award for her “notable contribution” to press freedom after she reported from the front line of the emerging COVID-19 pandemic in the central Chinese city of Wuhan.

Paris-based Reporters Without Borders (RSF) honored Zhang — whose family say she is close to death in prison after months of refusing food in protest at her sentence — with its 2021 Prize for Courage for those who have “displayed courage in the practice, defense or promotion of journalism,” the group said in an announcement on its website on Thursday.

“Despite constant threats, this lawyer-turned-journalist covered the Covid-19 outbreak in the city of Wuhan in February 2020, live-streaming video reports on social media that showed the city’s streets and hospitals, and the families of the sick,” RSF said.

“Her reporting from the heart of the pandemic’s initial epicentre was one of the main sources of independent information about the health situation in Wuhan at the time.”

Fears that Zhang won’t survive continued incarceration have prompted international calls for her release in recent days.

Petition for release

Dozens of activists and rights groups, including the Coalition for Women in Journalism (CFWIJ) and Human Rights Watch, signed a petition on Friday calling for her immediate release.

“As [her] health worsens in prison, bringing her to the brink of death, the CFWIJ reiterates its demand for her release,” the petition said.

“Zhang … has been on a prolonged hunger strike to protest her detention and is being force-fed through a nasal tube,” it said, quoting Zhang’s family as saying that her life is now in danger.

Zhang, 38, was sentenced to four years’ imprisonment by Shanghai’s Pudong District People’s Court on Dec. 28, 2020, and had been eating very little food in a bid to avoid being force-fed by tube.

Her family say she can’t walk or hold her head up unassisted, and currently weighs less than 40 kilograms, despite being 1.78 meters tall.

“For defying censorship and alerting the world to the reality of the nascent pandemic, the laureate in the ‘courage’ category is now in prison and her state of health is extremely worrying,” RSF secretary-general Christophe Deloire said.

“The RSF Award laureates embody the noblest journalistic qualities and also pay the highest price because of this. They deserve not only our admiration but also our support,” he said.

Late Nobel peace laureate and veteran dissident Liu Xiaobo, who died in prison in 2017, received the press freedom defender award from RSF in 2004.

Zhang’s mother once again submitted an application for her daughter’s release on medical parole to the prison on Nov. 15, while Germany’s Tagesschau newspaper reported on Nov. 16 that the German government is lobbying hard for her immediate release.

Family under pressure

London-based rights activist Wang Jianhong, who heads the Zhang Zhan Concern Group, said Germany had played a role in the release of Beijing-based journalist Gao Yu several years ago.

“We are very excited to hear that the German ministry of foreign affairs has called on the Chinese government to release Zhang Zhan unconditionally,” Wang told RFA. “Germany is a country that attaches great importance to the freedom of the press, and to safeguarding human rights and freedom of speech.”

“We hope that the German government can make [further] requests with the Chinese foreign ministry, the Shanghai municipal government, and the Shanghai Prison Administration,” she said. “Somebody must be allowed to visit Zhang Zhan and give her a comprehensive medical examination for humanitarian reasons.”

When Zhang’s mother applied for medical parole, staff at the Shanghai Women’s Prison took them, and said they would be forwarded to the prison administration within 48 hours, Wang told RFA.

“The chances that Zhang Zhan will be released from prison alive are getting slimmer by the day,” Wang said. “But it became clear that her family was coming under pressure after Zhang’s brother spoke out on Twitter, and they have stopped updating their Twitter account.”

Rights lawyer Wang Yu said Zhang should be released on humanitarian grounds.

“Zhang Zhan should be released so that she can get the best medical treatment,” Wang Yu said. “The most important thing right now is to save her life.”

An employee who answered the phone at the Shanghai Prison Administration declined to comment when contacted by RFA on Wednesday.

“I don’t know much about the issue of medical parole,” the employee said.

Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie.

The United States spoke up Friday in support of the Philippines after Chinese coastguard vessels were accused of harassing Philippine resupply ships with water cannon in the South China Sea.

The incident happened on Tuesday near the Second Thomas Shoal which Manila calls Ayungin Shoal.

On Thursday, Philippine Foreign Secretary Teodoro Locsin Jr. filed a strong protest to the Chinese Foreign Ministry in Beijing, to which China responded by saying that the Philippine boats “trespassed” into China’s waters without permission.

The diplomatic tension has now escalated further with U.S. State Department Spokesman Ned Price issuing a statement condemning China’s actions.

“The United States stands with our ally, the Philippines, in the face of this escalation that directly threatens regional peace and stability, escalates regional tensions, infringes upon freedom of navigation in the South China Sea as guaranteed under international law, and undermines the rules-based international order,” the statement reads.

Price added that the U.S. “reaffirms that an armed attack on Philippine public vessels in the South China Sea would invoke U.S. mutual defense commitments under Article IV of the 1951 U.S. Philippines Mutual Defense Treaty.”

Chinese Foreign Ministry’s spokesman Zhao Lijian told reporters in Beijing late on Thursday that “on the evening of Nov. 16, two Philippine supply boats trespassed into waters near Ren’ai Jiao (Second Thomas Shoal) of China’s Nansha Qundao (Spratly Islands) without China’s consent.”

“Chinese coast guard vessels performed official duties in accordance with law and upheld China’s territorial sovereignty and maritime order,” Zhao said.

The Second Thomas Shoal lies within the Philippines’ exclusive economic zone (EEZ) but is claimed by China, the Philippines, Taiwan and Vietnam.

The Philippine military said Chinese coastguard vessels blocked and fired water cannons on two Philippine supply ships transporting food to military personnel stationed on the shoal.

Since 1999, the Philippines has maintained a Marine detachment there aboard a World War II-era warship, the BRP Sierra Madre, deliberately grounded on the reef to serve as an outpost.

Foreign Secretary Teodoro Locsin Jr. on Thursday issued a statement saying “the acts of the Chinese coast guard vessels are illegal.”

“They must heed and back off,” he said.

According to the Chinese spokesman Zhao Lijian “the sea area of Ren’ai Jiao is generally tranquil” after the incident.

“China and the Philippines are in communication on this,” he added.

Meanwhile the South China Sea Probing Initiative (SCSPI), a Beijing-based Chinese thinktank, questioned the Philippine supply mission.

“As far as we know, normal supplies are tolerable, otherwise the Philippine marines aboard the warship on the beach could not hold on for so many years,” the SCSPI said on Twitter.

“However, any attempt to fortify facilities on this feature is another matter. Waiting for the details,” it said.

‘Vehemently condemn’

The Second Thomas Shoal is a submerged atoll in the Spratly Islands. Manila calls it part of the Kalayaan Island group and “an integral part of the Philippines.”

A 2016 ruling by an international arbitral tribunal invalidated Beijing’s sweeping “nine-dash line” claim to the South China Sea and affirmed Manila’s sovereign rights to a 200-nautical mile EEZ in the sea.

The strongly-worded protest by the Locsin over the event has received support among the Philippine public and officials, local media reported.

Vice President Leni Robredo who is running for president in the 2022 election said in a statement: “The Filipinos cannot be treated like this. Our arbitral victory should be the support for us to continue protecting what is ours.”

Another presidential candidate, former boxing champion Senator Manny Pacquiao, said: “We should be firm to defend our territorial rights.”

Senator Risa Hontiveros, an opposition leader who has been critical of President Rodrigo Duterte’s policy towards China, said she “vehemently” condemns the incident and supports the foreign secretary’s move “to protest this incessant bullying” by the Chinese side.

“This is an outright and unacceptable violation of our sovereign rights and jurisdiction,” the senator said.

“Let us show our military personnel, the very same people who risk their lives for our country, that we will always defend them,” she added.

The Philippine fishermen group Pamalakaya, meanwhile, called the Nov. 16 incident “an awful reminiscence” of when Chinese vessels drove away Filipino fishermen from entering the Scarborough Shoal with the use of water cannon in 2014.

“This is all but indication of a continuing presence and aggression of Chinese forces in our waters that needs to be seriously addressed (by) diplomatic means,” Pamalakaya said, calling on the Duterte government to “immediately lodge a strong protest against this violation of our national sovereignty.”

BenarNews journalist Jason Gutierrez in Manila contributed to this report.