Day: June 3, 2022

Cambodians will go to the polls Sunday to elect local commune councils in what observers believe will be a test case of support for a rising opposition party after five years of a coordinated campaign by Prime Minister Hun Sen and his supporters to squash dissent.

Hun Sen has ruled Cambodia for more than three decades. His Cambodian People’s Party (CPP) is expected to win in a landslide, as it is the only political party large enough to field candidates nationwide.

Heading into Sunday’s vote, the United Nations Human Rights Office criticized what it called a “systemic shrinking” of political space in the country, leaving room only for the CPP.

“We are disturbed by the pattern of threats, intimidation and obstruction targeting opposition candidates ahead of communal elections in Cambodia on 5 June,” office spokesperson Liz Throssell said in a statement.

“Candidates have faced numerous restrictions and reprisals that have hindered their activities, with imprisonment of a number of candidates that appears designed to curb political campaigning.  Four days before the election, at least six opposition candidates and activists are in detention awaiting trial while others summonsed on politically motivated charges have gone into hiding.”

Throssell noted the government’s response to the last commune elections, five years ago. The Supreme Court dissolved the main opposition Cambodia National Rescue Party (CNRP) after it performed well in the local races in 2017, a decision that paved the way for the CPP to take all 125 seats in the National Assembly in the 2018 general election.

Though the country is essentially now a one-party state, a new opposition party, the Candlelight Party, has entered the fray and will face its first major test on Sunday.

The Future Forum, an independent think tank based in Phnom Penh, called the election a “litmus test” for the country.

“The outstanding and primary concern of any election cycle set today is the absence of a viable political opposition,” it said in a report. “This in itself renders the anticipated outcome of such processes reasonably predictable. It is however crucial to note that, versus the 2018 cycle, there are a larger number of electoral observers, and the presence of an alternative vote for nearly all communes in the kingdom.”

The elections will not have much effect on the balance of national power, as commune councils are concerned mostly with local matters. But councilors elected Sunday will vote on behalf of their constituents in 2024 elections for the Cambodian Senate.

Election watchers are looking at the contest between the CPP and 16 other parties for 11,622 seats in 1,652 rural and urban precincts to find out how much support the opposition Candlelight Party can win in the atmosphere and after months of harassment from the ruling party.

Members of parliaments in other Southeast Asian countries condemned “harassment and intimidation” suffered by the opposition during the campaign.

In a statement released Friday, the ASEAN Parliamentarians for Human Rights (APHR) took issue with incidents of political bullying by local officials.

“It is impossible to hold free and fair elections in an ongoing climate of persecution against the opposition … these polls cannot be regarded as an exercise in pluralism and democracy when the CPP led by Prime Minister Hun Sen is not allowing anyone who can challenge their power to campaign freely and safely,” said Maria Chin Abdullah, a member of the Malaysian Parliament and an APHR member.

“The intimidation of the opposition we are witnessing now is nothing new. It is part of a long pattern in which Hun Sen and his party have maintained and increased their control over Cambodia, closing the space for opposition and rights defenders to dissent without fear of reprisal. This does not bode well for the future of democracy in Cambodia. The outcome of this local election will pave the way for next year’s national elections and will determine who will control the country’s overall political power,” Abdullah said.

She urged neighboring countries to “maintain a critical eye” on Cambodia and not accept that Sunday’s elections would be a true democratic exercise, criticizing the elections as “another attempt by the CPP to legitimize its increasingly dictatorial rule.”

Campaign draws to a close

On the last day of the official two-week campaign Friday, the CPP and Candlelight Party held political rallies all over the country, with thousands in the capital Phnom Penh attending the rallies for both sides.

Hun Sen’s son Hun Many attended campaign events in the capital, as CPP supporters including famous celebrities drove luxury cars in a convoy, hoping to sway voters with star appeal.

Candlelight supporters drove their own convoy through the city, using megaphones to remind people to vote.

Both sides reflected on the campaign period optimistically.

“For the past 14 days, we have showed that we are better and more firmly situated than other parties,” Sar Kheng, who is the CPP’s vice president and the country’s minister of interior, said to supporters while leading campaign activities in the southern province of Prey Veng.

“We have shown that the CPP is the only party can guarantee peace and read development,” he said.

Candlelight’s vice president, Thach Setha, who led campaign activities in Phnom Penh Friday, told RFA’s Khmer Service that his party has received overwhelming support because the voters recognize their true need for democracy. He acknowledged that the campaign is supported mainly by donations from supporters.

During Friday’s convoy, people cheering the party on provided campaigners with water from the roadsides, he said.

“[The people] want change, and they want to tell the CPP that they want change, they don’t want to keep doing the same thing,” Thach Setha said.

The campaign period was mostly peaceful, Hang Puthea, spokesperson for the country’s National Election Commission (NEC), told RFA.

“Over the past 14 days, there was no violence or threats,” he said. The NEC received only 52 complaints during the campaign period. “The campaigns were helped with good security and order,” he said.

But Kang Savang, a coordinator at the Committee for Free and Fair Elections in Cambodia (Comfrel), noted that the property of opposing political parties have been destroyed and civil servants have abused their positions by using government resources for campaign activities.

Comfrel is urging the government to review the status of civil servants, members of the military and court officials, who participated in campaign activities, he told RFA, because these people cannot serve the public while out campaigning.

“We’re giving these recommendations so the law can be strengthened by using this years’ experience to improve the situation ahead of the 2023 general election,” he said.

Translated by Samean Yun. Written in English by Eugene Whong.

Runaway inflation in Laos has caused prices of food, gas and other essentials to nearly double over the past year, some even within the last month, sources in the country told RFA.

Inflation in the country is closely related to the value of the kip relative to other currencies, due to the country’s heavy reliance on imports for most of its consumer needs. On Friday, U.S. $1 equaled about 13,950 kip, compared with 9,420 kip a year ago, for a depreciation of about 48%.

The sudden rise in food prices is making life difficult, sources told RFA.

“On Saturday, May 28, 2022, I gave 2,000 kip [$0.50] to my 12-year-old son to go to buy some eggs from a nearby store for his lunch,” a mother in the capital Vientiane, who like all other unnamed sources in this report, requested anonymity for security reasons, told RFA on Tuesday.

“At first, I thought that with the 2,000 kip, my son would be able to buy two eggs. But, when he arrived home with only one egg, I was surprised that the price of an egg has now doubled since late last year,” she said.

Six months ago a pack of instant noodles in Vientiane’s Hatxayfong district cost 20,000 kip, now it costs 40,000, a resident there told RFA.

“The price of everything is doubling,” she said.

Pork in Pakse, a city in the southern province of Champassak, now costs 55,000 kip a kilogram (2.2 pounds), up from 30,000 kip, a resident said.

“Food prices are going up every day. The government must solve the problem,” the person said.

According to data from the Lao Statistics Bureau and RFA Lao, in just the past month, the cost to buy rice, beef, pork or eggs has significantly increased. Eggs have doubled in price.

Inflation is not limited to food. The price of gas rose for the 13^th time this year on June 1, according to the Lao Ministry of Industry and Commerce.

Regular unleaded gas increased from 23,770 kip per liter ($6.46 per gallon) to 28,070 per liter ($7.64/gallon)

Gas prices are so high that “a lot of people go across the Mekong River to visit [Thailand] and buy cheaper gas and other consumer goods,” a motorist in Vientiane told RFA.

“We have to adjust ourselves to the new normal, in other words to change our lifestyle,” Another motorist told RFA

“For example, I drive my car only when it’s very necessary and I sometimes drive to Thailand to buy cheaper gasoline, vegetable oil, fish sauce and other food items.”  

A gas station owner in Thailand verified the trend. He told RFA that two weeks ago he noticed a sharp increase in customers from Laos.

“Most of them buy consumer goods and fill their vehicle tanks with gasoline on their way back home,” he said.

Public transportation costs are also rising.

“Starting June 1, 2022, a Laos-China train ticket to the capital Vientiane will be 242,000 kip at the sale office counter and 262,000 kip at stores, up from 198,000 kip,” a ticket seller in Luang Prabang City, Luang Prabang Province, said.

Train fares are out of reach for most people, a villager in the northern province of Luang Prabang told RFA.

“Most people are suffering from severe gas shortage and inflation, and now there are high train fares too,” he said. “I want to see lower prices because everything is going up.

Farmers in Laos have had to deal with a double-whammy of inflation and shortages of some products required to do their work. The combination has delayed plowing in the southern province of Attapeu, a provincial official told RFA.

“These farmers are poor and unable to afford gas. They just sit and wait for gas prices to come down,” he said.

Small businesses are also suffering in the harsh economic climate, a Vientiane businessman told RFA.

“One half of all SMEs [small-to-medium enterprises] are dead. They can’t survive the high gas prices and lack of business. The other half is struggling.”

The World Bank reported that inflation in Laos jumped to 9.9% in April this year from only 2% in January 2021. The bank recommended that the country stabilize the kip, push for more agricultural production, work to attract more investment and create more jobs.

A Lao financial expert told RFA that the country must change how its economy has operated to survive.

“One of the solutions would be that we should import fewer goods. We can’t afford to buy as much as before because we have less foreign money,” he said. “The other solution would be that we produce more domestically.”

Sonexay Sitphaxay, governor of the National Bank of Lao P.D.R., told reporters on May 27 that the government was trying several approaches to solve its problems.

“[We] are attempting to divert foreign currencies into the banking system from black market, punish money exchangers and manipulators, reduce the impact of inflation on society, negotiate with trade partners and convince them to accept the kip, and reduce the need of foreign currencies,” he said.

An economist told RFA, “First for most, the government should stabilize the kip, increase foreign currency reserve and expand economy in a sustainable way.”

But the recovery for Laos will take time, an Asian Development Bank employee said.

“[It] is going to be slow this year and in the next several years because of COVID-19, the stronger U.S. dollar and the crisis in Ukraine,” he told RFA. “While the buying power of Laotians is lower, the Lao economy may start up again in 2-3 years.”

Translated by RFA’s Lao Service. Written in English by Eugene Whong.

China has put pro-democracy activists under house arrest ahead of the 33rd anniversary of the 1989 Tiananmen massacre, while the strict suppression of June 4 commemorations of victims has spread to once-free Hong Kong, now under mainland-style authoritarian rule. But with the student protesters now well into their 50s, and children born since the killings being raised with scant knowledge of the event, the passage of time is helping the Communist Party erase memories.

In the first part of this two-part essay, Bao Tong, a former political secretary to late, ousted Chinese leader Zhao Ziyang, comments on then Premier Li Peng’s accounts of the events leading up to the June 4, 1989 bloodshed by the People’s Liberation Army that put an end to weeks of student-led protests on Tiananmen Square. An English-language version of the diary was published in 2010 as “The Critical Moment – Li Peng Diaries.”  Zhao was later removed from office and spent the rest of his life under house arrest at his Beijing home, dying in early 2005. Bao, who before the events of 1989 worked as director of the Office of Political Reform of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party, served a seven-year jail term for “revealing state secrets and counter-revolutionary propagandizing.” The 89-year-old Bao, a long-time contributor of commentary on a wide range of Chinese and international issues for RFA Mandarin, including a column titled “Under House Arrest,” remains under close police surveillance in Beijing.

This article is addressed to those working in the free press and to researchers.

Let’s start with a few key events from the spring and summer of 1989:

April 15, 1989: Hu Yaobang dies. He had been one of the best-loved Chinese Communist Party (CCP) leaders because of his commitment to reversing millions of miscarriages of justice from the days of the Cultural Revolution, and for his advocacy of free thinking, and because his ouster at the hands of Deng Xiaoping in early 1987 elicited widespread public sympathy.

April 16, 1989: Li Jing asks then general secretary Zhao Ziyang what the official line should be on the students’ mass mourning for Hu on Tiananmen Square. Zhao answers, in front of the entire Politburo standing committee and Deng Xiaoping’s secretary: “It’s fine. Yaobang was our leader. If we mourn him ourselves, then how can we forbid the students from doing the same?

April 19, 1989: Deng Xiaoping tells Zhao Ziyang he should still go on his scheduled trip to North Korea.

April 22, 1989: As the official memorial service for Hu Yaobang concludes, Zhao announces that he will leave for North Korea on the following day.

“I have three things to say about the students,” he says.

“1. The mourning period is over, and the students should be told to go back to class. 2. There is to be no deployment of the police or military unless there is smashing and looting. 3. We should seriously study the students’ demands and resolve this through consultation and dialogue with all sectors.”

All of this was endorsed by the entire Politburo standing committee, and by Deng himself. These three points were effectively a resolution by the standing committee. Zhao also told me at the time that, with regard to political reform, we should focus all of our efforts on achieving dialogue and consultation, because that in itself was a kind of reform.  

I was present for all of the above, and I take responsibility for authenticating it. As the events described below, I have no knowledge of them other than via the account provided in “Li Peng: June 4th Diary.”

Two Li Pengs

 Regarding the events of April 23, we see two Li Pengs described by Li in his diary.

Let’s look at the afternoon Li Peng first. That Li Peng accompanies Zhao to the railway station, where he will take a train to North Korea, and asks him if there are any other instructions. Zhao replies: “No. Just get it done.”

Li returns to CCP headquarters in Zhongnanhai, immediately seeks out then National People’s Congress (NPC) chairman Qiao Shi, and they send out the communique together. That was the Li Peng we see in the afternoon.  

Now let’s look at the evening Li Peng. Li writes that Yang Shangkun, president of the People’s Republic of China, told him to go and see Deng, that Li asked if Yang would come too, and that Yang agreed. So, did Yang and Li actually go visit Deng that evening? If so, what did they talk about? What actually happened? What made Li, Yang and Deng feel the need to meet up the moment Zhao’s back was turned? The diary doesn’t say they actually went, but neither does it say they only talked about going, but wound up not going. There’s nothing in Deng’s official annual report about any meeting, planned or actual, with Li and Yang that night. It claims that Deng didn’t meet with Li and Yang to hear their reports until the following morning, on April 25. This is entirely understandable, as Deng’s annual reports are CCP records that are kept confidential within the party.  

To find out the truth of the matter, we need to go back to Li Peng’s diary and take a closer look at what Li Peng was doing and thinking on the evening of April 23. I believe with 100 percent certainty that Li Peng had figured out what Deng Xiaoping was prepared to do to quash the student protests by the evening of April 23. Because there must be a reason for Li Peng’s apparent transformation starting from that evening. Because Li wasn’t the same premier after that point, the premier who had been in such a hurry to send out documents conveying general secretary Zhao Ziyang’s three-point opinion earlier the same day. Instead, he singlehandedly rejects this important communique from general secretary Zhao Ziyang that had already been endorsed by the entire Politburo standing committee.

According to his diary, Li was worried that the students would bring back the chaos of the Cultural Revolution to China. So he decided to instruct the Beijing municipal party committee to make a report on the student unrest to the standing committee immediately. He also took unusual care to prime Wen Jiabao, then head of the General Affairs Office that coordinates the workings of the party and its leaders, not to say anything about the extraordinary meeting at which the Beijing party committee made this report to me, despite the fact that it was my bounden duty as sole political secretary to attend all meetings of the Politburo standing committee, whether scheduled or extraordinary.

Wen Jiabao told me four days later, just before the standing committee met again on April 28, that it was Li Peng who had taken the decision not to have me at the meeting on the evening of April 24. I’m grateful to Wen Jiabao for his kindness, but such an authoritative and secret plan is far more likely to have come from Deng Xiaoping and Yang Shangkun than Li Peng.  

According to Li’s diary, it was Deng’s secretary who called up Li and Yang late in the evening of April 24, telling them to present themselves to Deng on the morning of April 25, to relay to him what happened at the standing committee meeting. DEng took a hard line at this meeting, claiming that “the students of Beijing are in uproar!”

This was followed with the famous editorial that appeared in the April 26 edition of the People’s Daily on behalf of the CCP Central Committee, which talked about the students as “creating turmoil,” and spreading revolutionary momentum all around the country. The biggest protest march in Chinese history followed on April 27, with not just students but regular citizens taking part.

Key omissions by Li and Deng

All of this shows us that on the evening that Zhao Ziyang left Beijing, Deng, Li and Yang must have had some kind of contact they couldn’t tell anyone about, be it direct or indirect. Why else would both Li Peng’s diary and Deng Xiaoping’s annual report both omit what actually took place on that historically important evening of April 23?

Deng was lauded throughout the CCP media as the savior of both party and nation. But were the students really the issue that was bothering Deng? Li’s diary states that, on May 21, Li Peng was anxious for a meeting with Deng as soon as possible to “resolve the matter of Zhao Ziyang.”

Deng’s secretary, primed by Deng’s Machiavellian instincts, told Li that such a meeting couldn’t take place until the People’s Liberation Army had entered Beijing, “so as to be more sure of things.”

And there you have it. They couldn’t be sure of the outcome of the meeting without a few bayonets as back-up. So, we see that the crux of the matter for both Deng and Li wasn’t so much what to do about the students but what to do about Zhao Ziyang.  

We must now explore a whole new question. Did Deng Xiaoping describe the student protests as “turmoil” in a bid to stop them, or was it deliberately intended to irritate students who had already shown they weren’t afraid to take to the streets?

Imagine for the sake of argument that the students just gave up, and life went back to normal. What would have transpired after that? Would Deng and Li still have had enough justification to hold an extraordinary meeting to deal with Zhao Ziyang? Why would the party or nation even need a savior?

I should point out that while Zhao might have been seen as an adversary by Li Peng at the time, he had never been a natural enemy of Deng Xiaoping. According to the May 28 entry in Li Peng’s diary, Deng’s card-playing buddy Ding Guangan, who knew much of Deng’s internal processes, told Li Peng that Deng had been warned as early as 1988 by then president Li Xiannian that he would have to get rid of Zhao Ziyang. Deng had replied then that the time wasn’t yet ripe. Deng pondered this heavily, but didn’t get up the resolve to actually do it until May 1989. Deng wasn’t receptive to Li Xiannian’s roundabout warning because Zhao was the Great Wall upon which Deng was relying at that time, so Li Xiannian could dream on! But Deng’s answer meant that the moment Zhao innocently expressed his support for the student memorials for Hu Yaobang, he could hardly fail to secretly criticize Deng after his death, hardly fail to bring up all of the miscarriages of justice righted by Hu Yaobang, and hardly fail to become China’s Khruschev.

But was Deng Xiaoping really that petty? Hu Yaobang knew it better than anyone. He found that Deng would readily approve any injustices that had been the work of Mao Zedong, but it was well-nigh impossible to overturn any cases in which Deng himself had a hand. The cases of Gao Xiao and Liu Bocheng were a case in point. Even though 99.999 cases brought during the Anti-Rightist movement of the 1950s have been overturned, that movement was still regarded as “necessary” by Deng Xiaoping. The reason is that Deng Xiaoping headed the Anti-Rightist leadership group, back in the day.  

Zhao brushed off by Deng

But this article will stay away from matters of personal integrity. The entry for the afternoon of May 13 in Li Peng’s diary is rather cryptic. It reads: “Xiaoping told president Yang Shangkun to hurry over and tell me (Li Peng) that Deng is a little deaf today, and that he didn’t hear anything of what Zhao Ziyang had told him this afternoon. “Who can decipher the meaning of this mysterious message? I happen to know what Zhao Ziyang told Deng Xiaoping on the afternoon of May 13, and I also happen to know what Deng was referring to when he replied: “All agreed. “Deng told Zhao Ziyang that afternoon, in the presence of Yang Shangkun, that he agreed with all of Zhao’s proposals for dealing with the student protests. No sooner had Zhao left than Deng turned to Zhao had told him to tell Li Peng that Deng was deaf, and had heard nothing of Zhao’s plan, thereby invalidating his apparent agreement to it.

How do I know this? Because Zhao had been seeking a meeting with Deng Xiaoping to discuss the student movement ever since he had gotten back to Beijing on April 30, and been brushed off on a daily basis by Deng. Eventually, he got a phone call on the morning of May 13 informing him that Deng would see him that afternoon. Zhao Ziyang was very pleased that day. Zhao had been working flat out during the previous 13 days, in consultation with all kinds of people about how best to engage in dialogue and consultation within the framework of democracy and the rule of law. He had also begun implementing some preliminary reforms of administration and governance among high-ranking officials, and had basically achieved a consensus at meetings of the Politburo standing committee on May 8 and at the plenary Politburo meeting on May 10. So he was anxious to hear Deng’s thoughts. I was also really excited, and spent the entire afternoon in Zhao’s personal office, which was empty.

Ziyang got back just before dinnertime.

“So what did Comrade Xiaoping have to say?” I asked him.

“Yeah, he agreed with all of it,” Zhao replied slowly, as was his way.

So I went straight over to the think-tank and told the researchers that Deng had agreed with all of it.  

Backpedaling on reforms

Deng Xiaoping was a little deaf, but not very. Besides, he had all kinds of people reporting back to him on a daily basis, through a variety of channels, what Zhao was up to. He backpedaled on Zhao’s plan precisely because he knew all too well what it entailed. He was afraid Zhao would call a meeting to tell everyone about it. Why did Deng feel the need to conspire in this way? Far be it from me to stray from the official line, but it had nothing to do with clearing up a misunderstanding. If there had been one, he would have sent Yang to talk to Zhao. Why send his soldier-messenger off in such a tearing hurry to convey a secret order to Li Peng, who wasn’t even involved?

The first item in Zhao Ziyang’s package of measures was the formal withdrawal of the April 26 People’s Daily editorial, that had been issued in the name of the Politburo standing committee. I think that this was probably the focus of his briefing to Deng on the afternoon of May 13, because during the 13 days that elapsed when Deng was refusing him a meeting, Zhao had talked several times to Yang about the plan, and asked Yan Ming and Xu Jiatun to recommend it to him as well. It was Zhao’s belief that the editorial had struck the wrong tone, and was hurtful to the students, who were patriotic. But this wrong could only be righted by the person who had caused it in the first place. This was unavoidable. They would have to admit that the April 26 editorial was wrong, if they wanted to start a dialogue with the students. Without that sign of good faith, any dialogue would be pointless. And only such a show of sincerity would have the power to unite students and citizens and turn them into partners in the process of negotiation and reform.

But Yang had all along kept his views about Zhao’s plan to himself, just telling him not to rush things, to take it more slowly. That’s why I believe that this was the most important topic of discussion when Zhao finally got his meeting with Deng on May 13.

It’s highly unlikely that it wasn’t included in the “all” that Deng was referring to when he responded: “All agreed.”

I think my suppositions are well-founded, but I can’t be totally certain of them. I can only hope that a recording of this May 13, 1989 meeting between Deng and Zhao still exists, and hasn’t been destroyed.

Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie.

Bangladesh should reject a “cold war mentality and bloc politics,” China told Dhaka’s ambassador this week as it criticized Washington’s policy to contain Beijing that U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken outlined in a speech last week.

This was China’s second apparent warning to Bangladesh in a little over a year. In May 2021, China’s envoy to Dhaka said that bilateral ties could be “substantially damaged” if the South Asian country joined the four-nation U.S.-led Quad grouping, although there had been no sign of Dhaka wanting to join it or be invited. China’s warning at that time provoked an unusually strong rebuke from Bangladeshi Foreign Minister A.K. Abdul Momen.

This time, the Chinese admonition was saltier, and it came via a foreign ministry statement issued about a Wednesday meeting between senior Chinese foreign ministry official Liu Jinsong and Bangladesh’s envoy in Beijing, Mahbub uz Zaman.

“The logic behind the U.S. Indo-Pacific strategy, AUKUS, the Quad grouping and the latest Indo-Pacific Economic Framework is U.S. ‘centrism’ and ‘exceptionalism,’ the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement issued Thursday.

“As a Bangladeshi proverb puts it, ‘a cock is bold on his own dunghill.’ As a result, it will only bring disgrace to itself, and at the same time undermine the regional cooperation framework and create bloc confrontation.”

Liu Jinsong (pictured below) serves as director-general of the Asian Affairs department at the ministry.

“China believes that countries in the region, including Bangladesh, will bear in mind the fundamental interests of their own countries and the region, uphold independence, reject the Cold War mentality and bloc politics, safeguard true multilateralism and defend the hard-won environment for peace and development in the region,” the statement went on to say.

The proverb cited in the press statement is, in fact, an old English one: “Every cock will crow upon his own dunghill.” According to The Oxford Dictionary of Proverbs, it means everyone is confident when on home ground.

The Quad, or the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue on the Indo-Pacific region, comprises the U.S., Japan, Australia and China’s arch-rival, India. AUKUS is a security pact under which Washington and London will help Canberra build nuclear-powered submarines using advanced technology.

And the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework is the bulwark of Washington’s economic strategy in the region that was unveiled last month with an initial membership of a dozen countries, including seven ASEAN members and other Indo-Pacific powers.

Blinken cited these and Washington’s involvement in other groups as “aimed at defending and, as necessary, reforming the rules-based order that should benefit all nations.”

Throughout his speech Blinken stressed Washington’s respect for nations’ sovereignty and respect for international rules, both of which China has continually breached, in the disputed South China Sea and at its borders with nations such as India.

“[W]e we want to strengthen a system in which as many countries as possible can come together to cooperate effectively, resolve differences peacefully, write their own futures as sovereign equals,” Blinken said in his speech at George Washington University in Washington on May 26, in which he laid out the Biden administration’s strategy for countering China’s global influence.

“The United States shares the vision that countries and people across the region hold:  one of a free and open Indo-Pacific where rules are developed transparently and applied fairly; where countries are free to make their own sovereign decisions; where goods, ideas, and people flow freely across land, sky, cyberspace, the open seas, and governance is responsive to the people.”

All of these U.S. initiatives have drawn Beijing’s ire.

‘Not concerned with what China says’

Meanwhile, Bangladesh’s diplomatic circles aren’t happy either with China’s warnings.

Faruk Khan, chairman of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said Bangladesh would decide its courses of action independently.

“We are not concerned with what China says or America says about our position; we will take decisions independently in line with our foreign policy of prioritizing national interests and peace,” he told BenarNews on Friday.

“Our basic foreign policy principle is friendship to all malice to none. Bangladesh keeps herself aloof from all sorts of military alliances.”

Former foreign secretary Shamsher Mobin Chowdhury described China’s statement as inappropriate.

“This is completely a Chinese statement, not a joint statement. In this statement, China has made her position on Quad, Indo-Pacific alliance, AUKUS and the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework clear. And I think the statement does not reflect Bangladesh’s position,” he told BenarNews.

“In diplomacy, discussions on a third country come up at bilateral meetings. But the issues are never revealed in public, and these should not come in the public domain,” he said.

Munshi Fayaz Ahmad, a former Bangladesh ambassador to China, said China’s statement was intended as a message to all of the region’s countries.

“China thinks the U.S. and the western countries have been trying to engage many countries against China. They think so after the latest [U.S.] announcement of the China strategy,” he said.

“Actually, we need both the U.S. and China for our own interests. I think Bangladesh can join the Belt and Road Initiative and the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework for her own interests.”

BenarNews is an RFA-affiliated online news service.

Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese will travel to neighboring Indonesia this weekend as the new government in Canberra tries to gather regional allies in efforts to counter China’s increasing assertiveness in the Indo-Pacific.

During talks in Jakarta, Albanese and President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo will discuss trade and investment, as well as bilateral cooperation on climate and energy, the Australian government said.

“We partner together closely on issues of trade, development, education, and regional security,” a news release issued by the PM’s office Friday quoted Albanese as saying.

Penny Wong, Australia’s foreign minister, said the new government was “serious” about its engagement with Southeast Asia.

“We share a fundamental interest in promoting a more prosperous, stable and secure region, where sovereignty is respected,” she said in the same statement.

“Australia’s partnership with Indonesia has never been more consequential to this objective.”

Wong, who will accompany Albanese to Jakarta as part of a five-person delegation, will arrive there fresh off a 10-day official trip to South Pacific island states as well as Indonesia’s tiny neighbor, East Timor, the Associated Press reported.

Santo Darmosumarto, director of East Asia and the Pacific at Indonesia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said Albanese visiting Jakarta so soon after he became prime minister is a testament to the importance that Australia attaches to ties with Indonesia, its giant neighbor next-door.

“This shows how important the Indonesia-Australia comprehensive strategic partnership is,” Santo told BenarNews.

Nuclear concerns

Santo said Albanese and Indonesian Jokowi would also discuss regional issues such as a security pact between Australia, Britain and the United States, known as AUKUS.

The pact, which was formed last year, allows Canberra to acquire a fleet of nuclear-powered submarines from the United States with unlimited and hard-to-detect underwater cruising capabilities.

Indonesia has on several occasions expressed concern that Australia’s move could start a regional arms race.

Last week, Albanese said that at a meeting in Tokyo with the leaders of the U.S., Japan and India, he had talked about engaging more in the Indo-Pacific and to “push our shared values in the region at a time when China was clearly seeking to exert more influence,” news reports said. The four countries make up the so-called Quad group.

“We will stand firm on our values and our beliefs, on what we know will enhance the prosperity and stability of our region and what is firmly in the interests of all those who call the Indo-Pacific home,” he reportedly said.

Albanese would likely try to assure the Indonesian government that his country’s decision to acquire nuclear submarines would not be a threat, according to Dewi Fortuna Anwar, a political analyst at the National Research and Innovation Agency (BRIN).

Australia has insisted that it has no intention of acquiring nuclear weapons and will remain a non-nuclear weapons state.

“For Indonesia, the concern is not the alliance per se, but the nuclear acquisition,” Dewi told BenarNews.

“I think the new government will do the same as the previous government did [to reassure Indonesia that the AUKUS is not a threat].”

Hikmahanto Juwana, an international law professor at the University of Indonesia, concurred.

“It is hoped that the PM will explain how AUKUS does not need to be a concern for Indonesia and the region,” Hikmahanto told BenarNews.

Jakarta’s refusal so far to disinvite Russia from the G-20 summit in November in Bali is another issue expected to be raised during the meeting between officials of Australia and Indonesia, David Engel, the head of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, wrote in its publication, The Strategist.

“Jokowi will insist on Albanese’s attendance regardless of Putin’s presence and his offenses against international law that Indonesia claims to hold dear,” Engel wrote.

“Much could happen in the interim to engineer an acceptable compromise that would see the summit proceed, however effectively, with its full membership. Albanese’s default position should be to commit Australia’s support for finding and supporting that compromise, in conjunction with like-minded partners such as Japan.”

Trade

Albanese also said he hoped to revitalize the trade relationship between Indonesia and Australia.

He will be accompanied by Trade Minister Don Farrell and Industry Minister Ed Husic during the Indonesia visit, the Australian statement said.

“Especially important will be both sides’ ambition to unlock the potential of the Indonesia‑Australia Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement, including to take forward the Government’s proposed AU$200 million climate and infrastructure fund with Indonesia,” the prime minister’s office said.

Under the free trade agreement, which came into effect in July 2020, over 99 percent of Australian goods’ exports by value to Indonesia can enter duty free or under significantly improved preferential arrangements.

It also requires Indonesia to issue import permits automatically and without seasonality for key Australian products such as live cattle, meat and agricultural produce.

The deal allows Australian universities to operate in Indonesia and Australian companies to have greater stakes in sectors such tourism, health and mining.

BenarNews is an RFA-affiliated online news service.