Day: March 9, 2022

The Philippine national police and counter-narcotics agency said Wednesday that they had arrested a suspected Chinese drug kingpin and seized a huge cache of crystal methamphetamine with a street value of more than 1.1 billion pesos (U.S. $20.3 million).

The illegal stash, weighing about 160 kilos, (351 pounds), was recovered during an undercover operation Tuesday in Valenzuela, a suburban city north of Manila, Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency Director General Wilkins Villanueva said.

The suspects “sold the shabu to undercover law enforcement operatives,” Villanueva said in a statement, referring to crystal meth by its local name.

“Apart from the drug evidence, also seized from the two suspects were three mobile phones and identification cards.”

He identified the suspects as 32-year-old Tianzhu Lyu, from Fujian in China, and his companion, Meliza Villanueva, a 37-year-old Filipina.

Gen. Dionardo Carlos, chief of the Philippine National Police, said the operation included intelligence agents from the military and operatives from his department’s drug enforcement unit.

“The PNP vows to sustain with vigor anti-illegal drugs police operations with a greater focus on high-value targets engaged in trafficking and distribution of illegal drugs to help boost the government’s campaign for criminal justice,” Carlos told reporters.

In 2020, anti-drug personnel seized more than 800 kilos of crystal methamphetamine in Bulacan, a province north of Manila.

Tuesday’s haul was the biggest this year and came months after the International Criminal Court (ICC) in September approved a request by its former chief prosecutor to investigate alleged extrajudicial killings tied to the drug war launched by President Rodrigo Duterte’s government.

Duterte, who took office in 2016, campaigned on a pledge to rid the Philippines of illegal drugs and drug addiction.

Since he took power, the police say about 8,000 suspected dealers and addicts have been killed in shootouts, although rights groups say the figure was understated, and that there could be anywhere from 20,000 to 30,000 victims of the drug war.

Duterte has denied sanctioning those killings and said they could have been carried out by rival gangs to discredit the government. He has said that he would not allow ICC prosecutors into the country, and that if he were to go to prison, it should be ordered by a Filipino court.

BenarNews is an RFA-affiliated online news service.

The United States should strengthen defense relationships in the Indo-Pacific region in light of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and a potential similar one involving China and Taiwan, the leader of a congressional committee on military affairs said Wednesday.

House Armed Services Committee Chairman Adam Smith discussed his concerns while presiding over a hearing on national security challenges and military activities in the Indo-Pacific region. Lawmakers heard from Ely Ratner, an assistant secretary of defense for the region; Adm. John C. Aquilino, commander of the U.S. Indo-Pacific Command; and Gen. Paul J. LaCamera, commander of U.S. Forces in Korea.

“The entire world is a challenge with Russia’s unprovoked and devastating invasion of Ukraine,” Smith said in his opening remarks. “We have been reminded that we can’t just focus on one part of the world, but the Indo-Pacific region is clearly one of the most important regions in the world.”

Smith noted that China is the country most capable of competing with the U.S. in terms of economic and military strength.

“We all want a world where China and the U.S. peacefully coexist,” he said while questioning if China had the same wish. “It has become clear that president Xi [Jinping] and China intend something more combative than that.”

Lawmakers asked questions about China’s actions in the Indo-Pacific – specifically toward its democratic neighbor Taiwan in light of the Russian invasion.

Ratner said the U.S. had not changed its position related to the One China Policy – under which Washington recognizes Beijing as the government of China but allows informal relations and defense ties with Taiwan.

Aquilino, for his part, said the military had to take a more robust approach in the region.

“This is a real wakeup,” he replied when asked to compare the Russian invasion with what China could do against Taiwan.

“We have to look at this and say ‘hey, this could happen,’ and I have a sense of urgency to execute the mission the secretary has assigned, which is to prevent this conflict.”

‘Balancing force’ for peace

Aquilino said China has learned from watching Russia’s actions in Ukraine – specifically about the “investment in blood” that would be required to launch such an attack, the international condemnation that followed and the reactions of people to being attacked.

Asked if China wanted war with the U.S., Aquilino said Beijing had not ruled out the use of force.

“My task has been to be ready.”

He said the U.S. participates in 120 exercises a year across the globe and is looking to expand.

He noted that troops had been in Thailand for the annual multi-nation Cobra Gold and would be in the Philippines for the upcoming bilateral Balikatan training exercises. The exercises have been scaled down in recent years as the world has dealt with the COVID-19 pandemic.

Asked about U.S. efforts in the region, Ratner replied that the “trend line is in the right direction.”

Aquilino agreed, noting that military-to-military operations are strong.

Smith, the committee’s chairman who is a Democrat from Washington state, said China had taken an authoritarian approach to the region.

“We need to compete against that to convince the world to go in a different direction,” Smith said about U.S. efforts to spread democracy abroad. “To do that, we need a robust presence in the Indo-Pacific region. … Our military is a huge part of that.

“We have important defense relationships certainly with Japan and South Korea but with a number of other countries as well. We must maintain and strengthen those relationships and we must attempt to be a balancing force to keep the peace in Asia.”

BenarNews is an RFA-affiliated online news service.

A summit between U.S. President Joe Biden and leaders of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) slated for the end of this month has been postponed, Cambodia’s foreign minister said on Wednesday.

Biden had invited leaders of the 10-member Southeast Asian bloc to Washington, D.C., for a summit on March 28-29. The U.S. sees the region as critical to its efforts to push back against China’s rising power in the South China Sea and across the Indo-Pacific region.

The summit “will be delayed because some ASEAN leaders can’t join the meeting as scheduled,” Cambodian Foreign Minister Prak Sokhonn told the pro-government outlet Fresh News on Wednesday.

Cambodia is the current chair of ASEAN.

On Monday Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen said at least three ASEAN leaders wanted to reschedule the meeting

“Some ASEAN leaders wanted the meeting to be held between March 26-27 but the U.S said it couldn’t accommodate 26-27, while three ASEAN leaders couldn’t join the 26-27,” Hun Sen said. He did not identify the countries.

There were no immediate comments on the summit from the White House or from Indonesia, which is the coordinator of the summit, and other members of ASEAN.

Washington, under the Biden administration, has been ratcheting up its engagement with Southeast Asia, where it has traditional treaty allies as well as other partners.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken visited Indonesia and Malaysia in December, a trip that followed visits to the region by Vice President Kamala Harris, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and State Department Counselor Derek Chollett.

Blinken had earlier laid out a “new, comprehensive Indo-Pacific Strategy,” that emphasized the U.S. view of ASEAN and Southeast Asia’s importance to the Indo-Pacific region.

Speaking last week, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said: “It is a top priority for the Biden-Harris Administration to serve as a strong, reliable partner and to strengthen an empowered and unified ASEAN to address the challenges of our time.”

ASEAN has been grappling with a 13-month-old crisis in bloc member Myanmar, where a military junta is bombing and burning swathes of the country to quell resistance to the overthrow of the elected government in February 2021.

The Russian invasion of Ukraine has also posed a challenge to ASEAN unity, with the bloc as whole calling for a ceasefire without naming Russia or using the word “invasion” while members supported much a tougher U.N. General Assembly resolution against Moscow.

Reported by RFA’s Khmer Service. Translated by Samean Yun, Written in English by Paul Eckert.

The U.N. human rights chief must issue an overdue report on serious rights violations by Chinese authorities targeting Uyghurs and other Turkic communities in Xinjiang, some 200 human rights groups said in an appeal on Wednesday, a day after she announced that she would visit China and the turbulent region in May.

Michelle Bachelet, the United Nations high commissioner for human rights (OHCHR), committed in 2021 to issue a report on rights violations in China’s far-western Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, where up to 1.8 million Uyghurs and other Turkic minorities have been held in a vast network of internment camps operated by the Chinese government under the guise of preventing religious extremism and terrorism among the mostly Muslim groups.

Various Western legislative bodies have accused China of committing a genocide against Uyghurs in Xinjiang.

Among the rights organizations that signed the open letter to Bachelet were Human Rights Watch (HRW), Amnesty International, World Uyghur Congress (WUC), Uyghur Human Rights Project (UHRP), and Campaign for Uyghurs (CFU) — groups that have repeatedly raised alarm to Bachelet’s office about extreme measures taken by Chinese authorities since 2017 to eradicate the religion, culture and languages of Xinjiang’s ethnic groups.

“The release of the report without further delay is essential — to send a message to victims and perpetrators alike that no state, no matter how powerful, is above international law or the robust independent scrutiny of your Office,” said their open letter to Bachelet.

The NGOs, some of which have published reports about the arbitrary detention of Uyghurs and the commission of crimes of humanity against them and other Muslims, went on to say that they have been concerned by “the relative silence of [Bachelet’s] Office in the face of these grave violations.”

They noted that Bachelet still had not issued the report, despite saying in September 2021 that her office was finalizing an assessment of available information on allegations of serious human rights violations in Xinjiang “with a view to making it public,” and despite that her spokesman said in December that the report would be issued in the coming weeks.

“We urge you to fulfill your mandate, release the report without further delay, and brief members and observers of the UN Human Rights Council on its contents as a matter of urgency,” the letter said. “Accountability can wait no longer.”

On Monday, Bachelet told the Geneva-based Human Rights Council by videoconference that she had reached an agreement with the Chinese government for a visit “foreseen to take place in May.”

“The Government has also accepted the visit of an advanced OHCHR team to prepare my stay in China, including onsite visits to Xinjiang and other places,” she said.

‘She really is at risk’

Bachelet, a former president of Chile who took office in September 2018, has been working with China to arrange a trip with mutually agreeable parameters for more than three years.

At the beginning of March, U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres repeated a call for China to allow outside officials to visit Xinjiang to observe how the government is treating Uyghur Muslims there.

Sophie Richardson, HRW’s China director, said that if Bachelet wants her May visit to be credible and transformative from a human rights perspective, especially for Uyghurs and in response to crimes against humanity, she first must release her report.

“She has to show that she is serious and aware of and educated about and driven by a motivation to investigate and find redress and accountability, not just show up uninformed and without having made very strong interventions on behalf of victims and survivors,” Richardson told RFA. “And then she really is at risk, not just jeopardizing her own credibility and legitimacy, but the credibility and the legitimacy of the U.N. human rights system.”

Rights groups said China must give Bachelet unfettered access to Xinjiang so she can gather evidence of what’s taking place there and cautioned about Chinese moves to cover up crimes that have occurred there.

“Access to Xinjiang for human rights monitors is an absolutely vital step towards accountability for human rights violations committed by the Chinese government against Uyghurs and other Muslims living in the region,” Joanne Mariner, Amnesty’s crisis response director, said in a statement. “However, it is equally vital that any visit by High Commissioner Bachelet be independent and unhindered.”

WUC president Dolkun Isa pointed out that Bachelet didn’t mention the terms of her agreement with the Chinese government for visiting Xinjiang, where previous visits by journalists and others have been stage-managed by Chinese authorities who have made concerted efforts to disseminate misleading information about the human rights situation there.

“If High Commissioner Bachelet’s visit to East Turkestan is not independent and unconditional with unfettered access, but rather follows China’s agenda with limited access, then her visit will be seen as the U.N. essentially colluding with China to cover up the ongoing Uyghur genocide,” he told RFA. “The international community will not accept the results of such a visit.”

Rushan Abbas, executive director of Campaign for Uyghurs, said Bachelet must be able to interview whomever she wants while in Xinjiang.

“This visit must be in a pure form situation free from government intrusion,” she said in a statement. “It must be a space where individuals may speak freely without repercussions or ramifications for any testimony given.”

“It must be ensured that Bachelet is able to visit the confirmed locations of the geo-located concentration camps confirmed by researchers and satellite experts in order to draw independent conclusions on the truth,” said Abbas.

China will ‘exploit the visit’

German researcher Adrian Zenz, who has documented China’s abuses of the Uyghurs, said that the Chinese government will put up a façade in Xinjiang during the visit, ensuring that no one in the region says anything wrong.

“The problem is her visit is probably not going to be genuine field work, and so the Chinese will use it to whitewash,” he told RFA. “I think it does a great danger that the Chinese propaganda will exploit the visit to show that actually everything is fine in the region.”

“She should not go because she’s a high-profile person,” said Zenz. “The Chinese will just exploit that. Instead, she should send a team of researchers to spend half a year in the region and to find out all kinds of things, with no restriction.”

Bachelet must not allow her visit to become a public relations victory for the Chinese government, said UHRP executive director Omer Kanat in a statement.

“While a visit may help U.N. investigators further assess the situation on the ground, they must remember that the Chinese government has done everything in its power to promote a story about their treatment of Uyghurs that does not align with basic facts,” he said.

UHRP board chairman Nury Turkel, who is also vice chair of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, called the announcement of the visit a positive development but warned that China would have plenty of time to conceal evidence of genocide and crimes against humanity in Xinjiang.

“Why does China agree in March to have the U.N. be granted access for a visit in May?,” he asked. “That obviously likely means that China is preparing perfect Potemkin villages for the next two months to hide and whitewash industrial-scale concentration camps and forced labor facilities.”

Translated by RFA’s Uyghur Service. Written in English by Roseanne Gerin.

Two trains traveling on the new China-Laos high-speed railway experienced lengthy and unexpected weather-related delays this week in Laos, with one train taking eight hours to travel between the historic town of Luang Prabang and the capital Vientiane, about five times longer than usual, passengers said.

A centerpiece of China’s Belt and Road Initiative of state-led lending for infrastructure projects to tie countries across Asia to China, the railway began transporting passengers in December, running between Kunming in Yunnan province and Vientiane.

The Lao section of the railway handles an average of two trains each way daily, covering 254 miles and 10 passenger rail stations from Boten on the Chinese border to the Lao capital.

The two trains on Monday were slow and experienced several delays, stopping for one to two hours at different spots during a journey that normally takes one hour and 40 minutes, passengers said.

The one train departed Luang Prabang, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, at 1:30 p.m. and arrived at its destination at 9:30 p.m. with angry passengers complaining about a lack of food and water onboard.

A train attendant said the delay was due to heavy rain amid a storm, an unusual occurrence in March during the country’s dry season.

“The cause was the storm and the heavy rain that technically overwhelmed the capacity of the train,” he said. “We have to stop to see if there is any danger or risk when it’s raining hard.”

One passenger, who did not provide a name, said that a train attendant had informed travelers that a powerful storm was coming, and that the train could not proceed.

Another passenger said the train stopped and restarted at lengthy intervals lasting more than an hour.

“We arrived at the capital at 9:30 p.m.,” he said. “There was no food, and passengers were not allowed to get off. Nothing was available, no food, no water. The train got stuck for too long, and we were hungry.”

The traveler said he did not want compensation from the railway operator for the delay, but rather an explanation and an improvement in service.

“The train should have water or snacks for sale,” he said.

A woman who was concerned about her son who was the train told RFA that she also wanted information about the lengthy delay.

“I want to see a press release or a statement issued by the company,” she said. “This is a serious matter because it’s about the confidence of the public.”

“For the elderly or for those who have some medical condition, the lack of food and water might cause loss of life or worsen their illness,” she said, but added that it appeared as though the railway company was not responsible for the incident.

“I don’t blame the company because when the train took off in Luang Prabang city, light rain had already begun,” said another Lao passenger.

A Laotian who traveled the same day in the opposite direction told RFA that his train also experienced delays due to the storm, departing Vientiane at 4 p.m. and arrived in Luang Prabang at 9 p.m.

On Facebook, a previous train passenger said that travel delays within Laos were nothing new.

“This is not the first time that the train has been stuck; it’s happened several times before without any reason [given],” he wrote.

RFA could not verify whether earlier passenger trains had experienced unaccounted-for delays.

The China-Laos Railway Company Ltd. did not provide online information about the delays.

On Tuesday, the company posted on Facebook a notice to passengers that train C84 from Vientiane to Luang Prabang would be temporarily suspended between March 9 and 10 due to the necessity to exchange railway staff.

Reported by RFA’s Lao Service. Translated by Max Avary. Written in English by Roseanne Gerin.

As CIA director William Burns warned lawmakers in Washington not to underestimate Chinese Communist Party (CCP) leader Xi Jinping, analysts said Beijing is highly unlikely to start any military action against its democratic neighbor ahead of the CCP congress later this year.

Burns told the House of Representatives intelligence committee on Tuesday that China appeared to have been “unsettled” by the difficulties Russia has faced since it invaded Ukraine.

“I would just say analytically, I would not underestimate President Xi and the Chinese leadership’s determination with regard to Taiwan,” Burns told the committee.

“I do think … that they have been surprised and unsettled to some extent by what they’ve seen in Ukraine over the last 12 days, everything from the strength of the Western reaction to the way in which Ukrainians have fiercely resisted,” he added.

He said Beijing hadn’t likely anticipated the reputational damage done to the CCP by its close relationship with Russian president Vladimir Putin.

He said the international response to Ukraine would likely have an impact on Beijing’s projections regarding any invasion of Taiwan, which has never been ruled by the CCP, nor formed part of the People’s Republic of China.

The war in Ukraine has prompted widespread concern in Taiwan that Xi could invade the island while the rest of the world is distracted by the war in Ukraine.

Unprecedented third term

Chieh Chung, a research fellow at Taiwan’s National Policy Foundation, said Xi is currently in a fairly unassailable position of power at the helm of the CCP, and is unlikely to want to jeopardize that as he seeks an unprecedented third term in office.

“Xi Jinping is in a position of certainty right now, and if he were to take military action in the Taiwan Strait, the outcome of which isn’t so certain, he would just be making trouble for himself,” Chieh told RFA.

He said the U.S. military presence in the Indo-Pacific region, particularly its navy and air force, hadn’t been affected by the war in Ukraine.

Titus Chen, associate professor of political science, at Taiwan’s National Sun Yat-sen University in Kaohsiung, said Xi will likely view any action against Taiwan as too risky ahead of the CCP’s 20th party congress later this year.

“There would be a huge degree of uncertainty, and such a war would be so costly,” Chen said. “Taiwan would be destroyed, along with China’s southeastern coast.”

“Then, international isolation and lot of sanctions, which would really hurt the Chinese people, and that wouldn’t be a good thing for him,” he said. “So he’ll be wanting to at least put on a peaceful face until after the 20th party congress.”

Taiwan’s world-leading semiconductor manufacturer, TSMC, declined to comment on Wednesday when asked if it had stopped chip exports to Russia, in keeping with Taipei’s pledge to join international sanctions against Putin and his government.

“TSMC has always followed relevant laws and regulations wherever they apply in the world,” the company said in a written response to RFA’s question. “There is no other relevant information to make public at present.”

Chip dependency

Tsui Lin, associate professor at Taiwan’s Tamkang University, said Russia is heavily dependent on chip imports, with TSMC currently producing two Russian processor brands: Elbrus and Baikal.

“Russia is dependent on Taiwan-made semiconductor chips, for everything from laptops to military equipment, so cutting of this supply will have a huge impact on them,” Tsui told RFA. “For now, Russia can make up the gap in supply by cooperating with China’s SMIC, but TSMC remains the best choice of foundry, globally speaking.”

Liu Pei-chen, a researcher and industrial consultant at the Taiwan Economic Research Institute, agreed, saying China’s most advanced semiconductor chip produced so far is only 28 nanometers.

“So far it hasn’t announced the production of a 14 nanometer chip … which is still in the pipeline, so [China] won’t be able to fill Russian demand for the more advanced chips,” Liu said.

“Russia’s military, emerging technologies, artificial intelligence, quantum computing, virtual reality, augmented reality, high-performance computing, and advanced weapon systems … all rely on TSMC’s high-tech chips,” he said.

If Taiwan is stopping the supply from TSMC, it will stop any Russian military technological advancement in its tracks, according to Su Tze-yun, analyst at Taiwan’s national defense ministry.

“Russia has been sending integrated circuit designs to TSMC for production,” Su said. “[Sanctions] will affect their ability to develop new, high-tech equipment in the longer term.”

He added: “Also, it seems that Russia doesn’t trust Chinese IT products. TSMC is an important source of IT equipment for national security agencies, whether intelligence or military.”

The Russian government on Monday included Taiwan in a list of countries “unfriendly” to Russia, along with the U.S., the E.U., the U.K, Australia, New Zealand and Japan, Russian media reported.

Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie.