Day: September 10, 2022

Two weeks after tropical storm Ma-On battered Southeast Asia, northern Laos is digging itself out of the devastation, as authorities contend with damaged infrastructure, inundated farmland, and hundreds of displaced people at risk of disease from lack of access to clean water.

The ninth named storm of the 2022 Pacific monsoon season, Ma-On formed over the Pacific Ocean on Aug. 18 and became a severe tropical storm by Aug. 23, before slamming into Mainland Southeast Asia on Aug. 25. The storm brought heavy winds and rain to the region, and triggered flash floods in Vietnam and Laos.

While the storm had mostly dissipated by Aug. 26, its impact on impoverished Laos – with its limited capacity to rebuild in the aftermath of natural disasters – was profound.

Among the worst hit areas in northern Laos was Oudomxay province, where on Thursday, Provincial Governor Bounkhong Lachiemphone described the destruction as “massive” in an interview with the official Lao National Radio.

“The most devastated area is La district, followed by Nomor district and Xay district, where a lot of basic infrastructure such as roads, bridges, the power grid, hospitals, health clinics, schools, farms, and irrigation systems are damaged or destroyed,” he said.

“Our residents’ livelihoods are severely affected, especially in La district where more than 100 homes were swept away, and more than 500 others were damaged. Livestock are dead. Farmland – especially rice and produce fields – are covered with mud and debris.”

Bounkhong said damage from the storm in the three hardest hit districts had surpassed 150 billion Lao kip (U.S. $10 million) and that resources have been stretched thin as authorities continue with recovery efforts.

“Right now, we have employed 300 soldiers to help build shelters and repair damaged homes for the displaced,” he said.

“We’ve had to rely on donations from domestic and international organizations.”

Khamseng Ali, the head of the Public Works and Transportation Department of Oudomxay province, estimated that repairs to 49 roads and 44 bridges damaged in flooding caused by Ma-On would cost at least 60 billion Lao kip (U.S. $3.8 million).

“This is the worst flood in 37 years in our province,” he said.

An official with the Public Works and Transportation Department in Xay district, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told RFA Lao that National Route 13 North, which cuts across northern Oudomxay from the border with Luang Namtha province in the west to the border with Luang Prabang province in the east, had been severed in several places. Highway 2E, which runs from the capital of Oudomxay to the border with Phongsaly province to the northeast, is also damaged in multiple stretches as the result of landslides and flooding, he said.

“Many sections of the highways have become impassable,” he said, adding that recovery crews are “repairing them as we speak.”

Humanitarian efforts hampered

The devastation has severely hampered humanitarian efforts, according to health workers in the province, who told RFA that people displaced by the storm lack access to clean water and are vulnerable to disease.

“More than 1,000 people flocked to our hospital from Aug. 31 to Sept. 8,” said a health worker in Oudomxay’s Namor district.

“These sick people are from the 13 worst-affected villages … in Namor district. Most of them are children who are suffering from high fevers and diarrhea. Our health workers have also traveled to the affected villages and advised residents to only drink boiled water, eat thoroughly cooked food, sleep under mosquito nets, and wear masks.”

The health worker told RFA that many victims of the storm are also suffering from the flu, which has spread quickly within displaced communities.

“Our hospital spent 200 million kip (U.S. $12,700) to buy medicine, but much of it was damaged by flooding,” he said.

“Now, the hospital has run out of money and medicine, so we’ve had to request more funding from the provincial government.”

A resident of Namor’s Tangdoo village told RFA that there is no longer running water in the area and said at least 20 residents are sick from flu and diarrhea.

“Those whose toilets weren’t washed away by flooding must use water from wells or creeks to flush them,” said the resident, who declined to be named.

“When our village was flooded, there was a landslide too. The irrigation system is broken. Now we must fetch water for cooking and sewage.”

Displaced at risk

A health worker in Oudomxay’s La district told RFA that the flu is rampant.

“For treatment of flu, our district hospital and health centers in affected villages have run out of medicine,” the worker said.

“The sick who come to the hospital have to buy their own medicine at the private pharmacy. We haven’t received any additional funding for extra medicine despite the increasing demand.”

An official with the Oudomxay Provincial Health Department said authorities are scrambling to assist those in need, but acknowledged that recovery efforts are slow-going.

“Several areas were buried by landslides during the flooding and all of the water networks – including the irrigation systems – in Namor and La districts are damaged and in need of substantial repairs,” the official said.

Ma-On’s impact on northern Laos came days after authorities released water from nine upstream dams in the provinces of Phongsaly, Luang Prabang, Xayaburi, and Vientiane. Residents told RFA at the time that the release flooded their homes, places of work, and farms, forcing many to escape to higher ground.

Translated by Max Avary. Written in English by Joshua Lipes.

Rural residents in North Korea are complaining that their government is unfairly giving the best quality apples and peaches to citizens of the capital Pyongyang ahead of Saturday’s Chuseok holiday, sources in the provinces told RFA.

Chuseok is the Korean version of the autumn harvest festival celebrated throughout northeast Asia. The holiday draws comparisons to Thanksgiving in the U.S. as people both in North and South Korea travel to be with their extended families and pay tribute to their ancestors by preparing a large ceremonial feast in a “jesa” ceremony.

In a typical jesa, various foods are arranged on a table in a specific way to honor the ancestors, and no jesa table is complete without fruits arranged into a pyramid, with the tops lopped off to signify they are meant for the deceased.

But all of the best fruits in North Korea went to the privileged residents of Pyongyang this year, angering inhabitants of the provinces.

“The best apples have been supplied to all households in Pyongyang and were said to be examples of [North Korean leader] ‘Kim Jong Un’s compassion and love,’” a resident of Tanchon in the eastern province of South Hamgyong told RFA Korean on condition of anonymity for security reasons.

“Many people out here are outraged by the news that Pyongyang residents get the finest apples and peaches. It’s like we in the provinces aren’t really considered citizens,” he said.

The military was even mobilized to deliver the fruits to the produce stores in the capital starting Aug. 26, according to the source.

“The fruits are then given to every household. Due to the large population of Pyongyang, only a few fruits are provided to each resident, but not even a single fruit has been given to the provincial residents,” the source said.

According to the source, the peaches come from Kwail county in South Hwanghae province, and apples come from the Taedonggang Combined Fruit Farm. The government used citizen labor to build fruit farms and processing factories in both locations, promising that an abundance of various kinds of fruits would be supplied nationwide.

“However, the fruits they produce are only supplied to high-ranking officials and Pyongyang citizens. I feel outraged that the Workers’ Party has deceived the provincial residents,” he said.

“It is not the first time that the authorities discriminated against provincial residents,” the source said. Living in Pyongyang is a privilege reserved only for the most loyal citizens. Those lucky enough to live there have better access to food, jobs, and education, and receive other perks and benefits unavailable to their provincial counterparts.

“It is no exaggeration to say that [Pyongyang and the provinces] are two different countries,” he said.

The people of Pochon county in the northern province of Ryanggnang, meanwhile, are angry and frustrated by the government’s show of favoritism this Chuseok, a source there told RFA. 

“I was selected as part of a mobilization effort … in the construction of the Taedonggang Combined Fruit Farm over a six-month period,” he said. “I worked hard by leveling the land and planting fruit trees. There must be a lot of funds and materials that each provincial family was forced to donate for the construction of the fruit farm.”

“Tremendous effort and sweat of countless provincial residents has gone into each fruit that comes out of Taedonggang, but the fruits are only supplied to Pyongyang, so who would not complain?” the second source said.

The second source was critical of Kim and the ruling Korean Workers’ Party for trying to solve the country’s problems by making life better in Pyongyang.

“The authorities’ favoritism for Pyongyang residents is unfair treatment that ignores and discriminates against provincial residents. We are more than eight times the population of Pyongyang,” he said.

Translated by Leejin J. Chung. Written in English by Eugene Whong.

The death toll resulting from a fire at a karaoke parlor in southern Vietnam that claimed 33 lives earlier this week was likely made worse due to the owner’s disregard for safety standards and the failure of clientele to follow orders to flee the building, sources said Friday.

The blaze broke out on Tuesday evening at the An Phu karaoke parlor in Binh Duong province’s Thuan An city while as many as 70 people were inside the four-story building, according to state media reports, which said firefighters were able to bring the fire under control within an hour.

Several people jumped from the building to escape the flames, injuring themselves in the process, while others were able to descend rescue ladders, the reports said. Parts of the building collapsed during the fire, which killed 17 men, 15 women, and an unidentified person who sustained injuries during the incident and later died in the hospital, officials said at a news conference on Thursday.

VnExpress quoted Provincial Police Director Col. Trinh Ngoc Quyen as saying that customers had ignored employees who entered the rooms where they were singing and ordered them to flee. Most of the clientele had been drinking alcohol, he said, and most of the rooms were locked from the inside.

Officials said that the building had passed a safety inspection and that the cause of the fire had yet to be determined.

On Friday, a resident of the area told RFA Vietnamese that while intoxication likely contributed to the high number of deaths, the owners of karaoke parlors and other similar establishments often ignore safety codes.

“It’s frightening, everyone is scared of dying in case of a fire at the karaoke bars,” said the resident, who asked to be identified as “Mr. T.”

“All permits granted to the karaoke bars require that fire safety requirements be met. But in reality, the owners build as many rooms as they can in multi-storied buildings because space isn’t cheap in the city. If a fire starts higher up there’s a chance to get out, but if it starts on the ground floor and rises, there are no exits to escape.”

Mr. T said that the confusing layout at the An Phu karaoke parlor caused customers to panic.

“The lack of exits is why the number of deaths was so high,” he said.

“It is a natural reaction to run into a hiding place when you see fire, and that also led to some deaths. Some of them died because they locked the door to their room, while others ran up to a higher floor and jumped. I learned that some of those who jumped were hospitalized, but died in the hospital.”

Violations likely

Nguyen Van Hau, a Ho Chi Minh City-based attorney with the Vietnam Lawyers’ Association, agreed that safety violations were likely to blame for many of the deaths at An Phu.

“The central government has issued a number of decrees about fire issues,” he said, suggesting that local authorities have failed in implementing them.

He acknowledged that the customers at the karaoke parlor likely ignored warnings to flee, but said the establishment’s owner and city officials bear responsibility for the tragedy.

“The fire authority should regularly carry out inspections after granting permits, especially when any new construction is done,” he said.

“Furthermore, the management was not trained in how to react in case of a fire. The right to run a karaoke bar is contingent on making safety preparations.”

The manager of a store that sells fire equipment in Ho Chi Minh City, who spoke to RFA on condition of anonymity, said that fires at karaoke parlors and other venues that use significant amounts of power are typically caused by an electrical short.

He said that while officials had yet to conclude their investigation of the An Phu blaze, the chain of events suggests safety protocols had been skirted.

“The preliminary report about the fire by the Binh Duong Police said that the An Phu karaoke bar met all fire prevention requirements, but the guests continued to sing after the fire started,” he said.

“This suggests the building did not automatically cut off the electricity and there is a question of whether the fire alarm system even worked or not. There are a number of things to be examined, including whether there were lights at the exits and an emergency sprinkler system in the rooms and hallways.”

In 2016, a fire at an eight-story karaoke parlor in Vietnam’s capital Hanoi killed 13 people after spreading to several nearby buildings.

Translated by An Nguyen. Written in English by Joshua Lipes.

As many as a dozen people have died from starvation or lack of access to medicine in northwestern China’s Xinjiang region during a strict coronavirus lockdown imposed by Chinese authorities since early August, according to residents and local officials.

Starvation had left the members of 10 families in Gurkiratma village, in Ghulja’s (in Chinese, Yining) Araosteng township, in “dire health conditions” amid the lockdown, prompted by outbreaks of COVID-19 in the region, residents told RFA Uyghur.

An official said that as many as 12 people died in Ghulja county within 20 days after the zero-COVID lockdown was implemented, including one man he identified as Mewlan Sidiq, a 62-year-old farmer from Qarayaghach village.

China’s zero-COVID approach is based on extensive lockdowns and testing of residents wherever new COVID-19 cases occur. But it has had negative effects on travel and local economies, and has triggered significant food shortages in some places, including Ghulja.

“[Mewlan Sidiq] died 10 days after the implementation of the lockdown. Village and county officials were not aware of his situation on time and he didn’t have any relatives left around him,” the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

“Mewlan is among 12 people who died during [this lockdown]. They all died [from starvation or lack of medicine] in the first 20 days of the lockdown,” he added, without providing additional details.

RFA was not able to independently confirm the number of dead reported by the official.

A second official told RFA that Sidiq likely died because his prescription medicine did not arrive in time amid the lockdown.

Sidiq had a pre-existing condition which deteriorated after the lockdown began, the official said. He was taken to the hospital but later died, he added.

“We heard that the officials found him sick [from hunger] in his home,” he said. “They took him to the county hospital, and he died there.”

“He also had a pre-existing condition before the lockdown,” said the official. “I don’t know if his death occurred only because of his pre-existing condition or because of his hunger.”

‘We are helping them’

A security officer in Gurkiratma village told RFA that two residents there recently died as the result of a food shortage, while three others were transporting malnourished villagers to a hospital

When asked about the identities of the two who died, the officer said he did not know them because there are 12 villages in the township.

“I’m just a safety guard working here in Gurkiratma, and I’m unfamiliar with all the villages,” he said.

He also said he could not provide information about the specific causes of death without information from relevant authorities.

The chairwoman of women’s affairs in Gurkiratma said that the deceased were both farmers – a man named Tursun Sawut, who died more than a week ago from starvation and a lack of medicine, and a woman named Gulbahram.

A village official in Ghulja told RFA that there are nearly 200 poor families, or about 800 residents, with incomes below the poverty line living there, but he claimed that the government had been assisting those who faced financial hardship during the lockdown period.

“We are helping them, [and] they are happy,” he said.

An elderly Uyghur resident told RFA that his medicine was being delivered on time, but that he and his partner had been given only five loaves of bread to sustain them for three days.

“I underwent two surgeries due to my illnesses, and I have high blood pressure along with other ailments,” he said. “We have to pay government officials to bring us medicine and other food items. We have some bread to survive for some days.”

“We can’t afford meat and vegetables,” he said. “We can’t just live and spend all of our limited savings.”

The World Uyghur Congress (WUC) expressed alarm over the severe COVID-19 measures in Xinjiang and called on the Chinese government to drop the policies.

The Uyghur activist group based in Germany cited videos posted by Uyghurs on Chinese social media, showing that strict policies are denying them medical care and preventing them from getting food, leading to starvation in some cases.

WUC also noted that residents could be seen complaining about the restrictions leading to starvation and a lack of help from local authorities on screenshots of exchanges on the messaging app WeChat.

The current policies appear to indicate that Uyghur residents are under de facto house arrest with the government using the COVID-19 pandemic as justification, WUC said in a statement issued Friday.

“We have been seeing numerous videos posted online, and it is extremely difficult to watch and not be able to offer any humanitarian help,’’ said WUC president Dolkun Isa. “We appeal to the international community to stop the ongoing atrocities.’’

Translated by RFA Uyghur. Written in English by Roseanne Gerin.