In response to the hearing, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), International Press Institute (IPI), and Reporters Without Borders (RSF) – called on Monday for Amaglobeli’s immediate release. Ambassadors and diplomats from the European Union mission and seven countries also attended the hearing, in which Amaglobeli provided detailed testimony for nearly three hours.

A prominent  journalist and founder of the online news outlets Gazeti Batumelebi and Netgazeti, Amaglobeli has been unjustly held in pretrial detention since her arrest on January 12.

“Today’s proceedings show that the trial of Mzia Amaglobeli is shrouded in a shocking smear campaign to destroy her credibility, personally and as a journalist. This, along with her deteriorating health, is deeply troubling and must end. Amaglobeli’s powerful testimony reflects her deep commitment to Georgia and to a free and independent media. Journalism is not a crime.”  

— Gypsy Guillén Kaiser, Chief Global Affairs Officer, Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ).

“The proceedings we witnessed today only confirm our position that this charge against Mzia Amaglobeli is entirely disproportionate and must be dropped. We are also deeply concerned by what appears to be an effort to smear her and to call into question her credibility as a journalist. Mzia is a highly respected, veteran journalist known for her commitment to journalistic ethics and independence. We fully stand by her as an IPI member.”

 — Amy Brouillette, Director of Advocacy, International Press Institute (IPI).

“This hearing once again underlined the lack of foundation in this case. The defense pointed to serious procedural irregularities, including politically charged that should have no place in an ongoing trial. Video footage also called into question the credibility of the alleged victim. Mzia Amaglobeli gave a calm and determined testimony, recalling her arrest and reaffirming her commitment to independent journalism — values for which she is now being prosecuted.”

— Jeanne Cavelier, Head of RSF’s Eastern Europe and Central Asia desk

Amaglobeli has been charged under the criminal code with attacking a police officer – a charge widely viewed as excessive and politically motivated – which carries a sentence of up to seven years in prison. She has been held in pre-trial detention since January 12, during which time her health has declined and she has been struggling with deteriorating vision.

She is being held at the Rustavi Women’s Prison No. 5, south of the capital Tbilisi. CPJ, IPI, and RSF visited the prison site and stood outside in a gesture of solidarity on July 13. The court’s verdict on this case could be announced at a subsequent hearing, set for July 28.

Amaglobeli is the first woman journalist to be jailed since the country gained its independence in 1991. A widely respected figure known for upholding the highest journalistic standards, her arrest and detention are seen by many in the journalism community in Georgia as a deliberate attempt to intimidate and silence the independent press amidst a broader crackdown on civil society and dissent. Last week, 17 European foreign ministers and the European Union’s High Representative, expressed deep concern regarding “increasing repression” in Georgia.

The outlets founded by Amaglobeli nearly 25 years ago, have reported on human rights violations and corruption, serving the public with impartial, trustworthy news. These outlets have endured four political regimes in Georgia’s post-independence era, despite their journalists and editors being attacked, threatened, blackmailed and detained by authorities. 

Amaglobeli’s detention this January comes amid growing harassment of independent media in Georgia and a broader scaling back of democratic freedoms under the Georgian Dream ruling party. Over the past year, journalists in Georgia have been beaten, harassed, detained, jailed, smeared, and fined. Impunity for attacks on journalists, including those perpetrated by police, remains widespread. A wave of repressive legislation – such as the foreign agents law as well as amendments to the Law on Grants and the Law of Broadcasting – deliberately aims to prevent independent media from operating in Georgia. 

As members of the Media Freedom Coalition’s Consultative Network, CPJ, IPI and RSF have urged robust action regarding Amaglobeli’s detention, along with broader concerns about escalating attacks on press freedom that can weaken democracy in Georgia. 

Read more: CPJ’s remarks during a site visit to Rustavi Women’s Prison on July 13, 2025

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by CPJ Staff.

In response to the hearing, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), International Press Institute (IPI), and Reporters Without Borders (RSF) – called on Monday for Amaglobeli’s immediate release. Ambassadors and diplomats from the European Union mission and seven countries also attended the hearing, in which Amaglobeli provided detailed testimony for nearly three hours.

A prominent  journalist and founder of the online news outlets Gazeti Batumelebi and Netgazeti, Amaglobeli has been unjustly held in pretrial detention since her arrest on January 12.

“Today’s proceedings show that the trial of Mzia Amaglobeli is shrouded in a shocking smear campaign to destroy her credibility, personally and as a journalist. This, along with her deteriorating health, is deeply troubling and must end. Amaglobeli’s powerful testimony reflects her deep commitment to Georgia and to a free and independent media. Journalism is not a crime.”  

— Gypsy Guillén Kaiser, Chief Global Affairs Officer, Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ).

“The proceedings we witnessed today only confirm our position that this charge against Mzia Amaglobeli is entirely disproportionate and must be dropped. We are also deeply concerned by what appears to be an effort to smear her and to call into question her credibility as a journalist. Mzia is a highly respected, veteran journalist known for her commitment to journalistic ethics and independence. We fully stand by her as an IPI member.”

 — Amy Brouillette, Director of Advocacy, International Press Institute (IPI).

“This hearing once again underlined the lack of foundation in this case. The defense pointed to serious procedural irregularities, including politically charged that should have no place in an ongoing trial. Video footage also called into question the credibility of the alleged victim. Mzia Amaglobeli gave a calm and determined testimony, recalling her arrest and reaffirming her commitment to independent journalism — values for which she is now being prosecuted.”

— Jeanne Cavelier, Head of RSF’s Eastern Europe and Central Asia desk

Amaglobeli has been charged under the criminal code with attacking a police officer – a charge widely viewed as excessive and politically motivated – which carries a sentence of up to seven years in prison. She has been held in pre-trial detention since January 12, during which time her health has declined and she has been struggling with deteriorating vision.

She is being held at the Rustavi Women’s Prison No. 5, south of the capital Tbilisi. CPJ, IPI, and RSF visited the prison site and stood outside in a gesture of solidarity on July 13. The court’s verdict on this case could be announced at a subsequent hearing, set for July 28.

Amaglobeli is the first woman journalist to be jailed since the country gained its independence in 1991. A widely respected figure known for upholding the highest journalistic standards, her arrest and detention are seen by many in the journalism community in Georgia as a deliberate attempt to intimidate and silence the independent press amidst a broader crackdown on civil society and dissent. Last week, 17 European foreign ministers and the European Union’s High Representative, expressed deep concern regarding “increasing repression” in Georgia.

The outlets founded by Amaglobeli nearly 25 years ago, have reported on human rights violations and corruption, serving the public with impartial, trustworthy news. These outlets have endured four political regimes in Georgia’s post-independence era, despite their journalists and editors being attacked, threatened, blackmailed and detained by authorities. 

Amaglobeli’s detention this January comes amid growing harassment of independent media in Georgia and a broader scaling back of democratic freedoms under the Georgian Dream ruling party. Over the past year, journalists in Georgia have been beaten, harassed, detained, jailed, smeared, and fined. Impunity for attacks on journalists, including those perpetrated by police, remains widespread. A wave of repressive legislation – such as the foreign agents law as well as amendments to the Law on Grants and the Law of Broadcasting – deliberately aims to prevent independent media from operating in Georgia. 

As members of the Media Freedom Coalition’s Consultative Network, CPJ, IPI and RSF have urged robust action regarding Amaglobeli’s detention, along with broader concerns about escalating attacks on press freedom that can weaken democracy in Georgia. 

Read more: CPJ’s remarks during a site visit to Rustavi Women’s Prison on July 13, 2025

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by CPJ Staff.

New Zealand’s Foreign Minister Winston Peters says countries have the right to choose who enters their borders in response to reports that the Trump administration is planning to impose travel restrictions on three dozen nations, including three in the Pacific.

But opposition Labour’s deputy leader Carmel Sepuloni says the foreign minister should push back on the US proposal.

Tonga, Tuvalu and Vanuatu have reportedly been included in an expanded proposal of 36 additional countries for which the Trump administration is considering travel restrictions.

• READ MORE: Trump administration weighs adding 36 countries to travel ban, memo says
• ‘Why us?’ NZ raises alarm as US eyes travel ban on Tonga, Vanuatu and Tuvalu

The plan was first reported by The Washington Post. A State Department spokesperson told the outlet that the agency would not comment on internal deliberations or communications.

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Peters said countries had the right to decide who could cross their borders.

“Before we all get offended, we’ve got the right to decide in New Zealand who comes to our country. So has Australia, so has . . . China, so has the United States,” Peters said.

US security concerns
He said New Zealand would do its best to address the US security concerns.

“We need to do our best to ensure there are no misunderstandings.”

Peters said US concerns could be over selling citizenship or citizenship-by-investment schemes.

Vanuatu runs a “golden passport” scheme where applicants can be granted Vanuatu citizenship for a minimum investment of US$130,000.

Peters said programmes like that could have concerned the Trump administration.

“There are certain decisions that have been made, which look innocent, but when they come to an international capacity do not have that effect.

“Tuvalu has been selling passports. You see where an innocent . . . decision made in Tuvalu can lead to the concerns in the United States when it comes to security.”

Sepuloni wants push back
However, Sepuloni wants Peters to push back on the US considering travel restrictions for Pacific nations.

Sepuloni said she wanted the foreign minister to get a full explanation on the proposed restrictions.

“From there, I would expect him to be pushing back on the US and supporting our Pacific nations to be taken off that list,” she said.

“Their response is, ‘why us? We’re so tiny — what risk do we pose?'”

Wait to see how this unfolds – expert
Massey University associate professor in defence and security studies Anna Powles said Vanuatu has appeared on the US’ bad side in the past.

“Back in March Vanuatu was one of over 40 countries that was reported to be on the immigration watchlist and that related to Vanuatu’s golden passport scheme,” Dr Powles said.

However, a US spokesperson denied the existence of such a list.

“What people are looking at . . . is not a list that exists here that is being acted on,” State Department spokeswoman Tammy Bruce said, according to a transcript of her press briefing.

“There is a review, as we know, through the president’s executive order, for us to look at the nature of what’s going to help keep America safer in dealing with the issue of visas and who’s allowed into the country.”

Dr Powles said it was the first time Tonga had been included.

“That certainly has raised some concern among Tongans because there’s a large Tongan diaspora in the United States.”

She said students studying in the US could be affected; but while there was a degree of bemusement and concern over the issue, there was also a degree of waiting to see how this unfolded.

Trump signed a proclamation on June 4 banning the nationals of 12 countries from entering the United States, saying the move was needed to protect against “foreign terrorists” and other security threats.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

New Zealand’s Foreign Minister Winston Peters says countries have the right to choose who enters their borders in response to reports that the Trump administration is planning to impose travel restrictions on three dozen nations, including three in the Pacific.

But opposition Labour’s deputy leader Carmel Sepuloni says the foreign minister should push back on the US proposal.

Tonga, Tuvalu and Vanuatu have reportedly been included in an expanded proposal of 36 additional countries for which the Trump administration is considering travel restrictions.

• READ MORE: Trump administration weighs adding 36 countries to travel ban, memo says
• ‘Why us?’ NZ raises alarm as US eyes travel ban on Tonga, Vanuatu and Tuvalu

The plan was first reported by The Washington Post. A State Department spokesperson told the outlet that the agency would not comment on internal deliberations or communications.

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Peters said countries had the right to decide who could cross their borders.

“Before we all get offended, we’ve got the right to decide in New Zealand who comes to our country. So has Australia, so has . . . China, so has the United States,” Peters said.

US security concerns
He said New Zealand would do its best to address the US security concerns.

“We need to do our best to ensure there are no misunderstandings.”

Peters said US concerns could be over selling citizenship or citizenship-by-investment schemes.

Vanuatu runs a “golden passport” scheme where applicants can be granted Vanuatu citizenship for a minimum investment of US$130,000.

Peters said programmes like that could have concerned the Trump administration.

“There are certain decisions that have been made, which look innocent, but when they come to an international capacity do not have that effect.

“Tuvalu has been selling passports. You see where an innocent . . . decision made in Tuvalu can lead to the concerns in the United States when it comes to security.”

Sepuloni wants push back
However, Sepuloni wants Peters to push back on the US considering travel restrictions for Pacific nations.

Sepuloni said she wanted the foreign minister to get a full explanation on the proposed restrictions.

“From there, I would expect him to be pushing back on the US and supporting our Pacific nations to be taken off that list,” she said.

“Their response is, ‘why us? We’re so tiny — what risk do we pose?'”

Wait to see how this unfolds – expert
Massey University associate professor in defence and security studies Anna Powles said Vanuatu has appeared on the US’ bad side in the past.

“Back in March Vanuatu was one of over 40 countries that was reported to be on the immigration watchlist and that related to Vanuatu’s golden passport scheme,” Dr Powles said.

However, a US spokesperson denied the existence of such a list.

“What people are looking at . . . is not a list that exists here that is being acted on,” State Department spokeswoman Tammy Bruce said, according to a transcript of her press briefing.

“There is a review, as we know, through the president’s executive order, for us to look at the nature of what’s going to help keep America safer in dealing with the issue of visas and who’s allowed into the country.”

Dr Powles said it was the first time Tonga had been included.

“That certainly has raised some concern among Tongans because there’s a large Tongan diaspora in the United States.”

She said students studying in the US could be affected; but while there was a degree of bemusement and concern over the issue, there was also a degree of waiting to see how this unfolded.

Trump signed a proclamation on June 4 banning the nationals of 12 countries from entering the United States, saying the move was needed to protect against “foreign terrorists” and other security threats.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

Australia’s Foreign Minister Penny Wong has released a statement saying “the Israeli government cannot allow the suffering to continue” after the UN’s aid chief said thousands of babies were at risk of dying if they did not receive food immediately.

“Australia joins international partners in calling on Israel to allow a full and immediate resumption of aid to Gaza,” Wong said in a post on X.

“We condemn the abhorrent and outrageous comments made by members of the Netanyahu government about these people in crisis.”

• READ MORE: NZ ‘running out of patience’ – Peters lashes Israel over Gaza aid blockade
• Israeli attacks target generators at Gaza’s hospitals
• Other Israeli war on Gaza reports

Wong stopped short of outlining any measures Australia might take to encourage Israel to ensure enough aid reaches those in need, as the UK, France and Canada said they would do with “concrete measures” in a recent joint statement.

pic.twitter.com/fDGPRs1G4M

— Senator Penny Wong (@SenatorWong) May 21, 2025

An agreement has been reached in a phone call between UAE Foreign Minister Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan and his Israeli counterpart Gideon Saar, reports Al Jazeera.

According to the Palestinian news agency WAM, the aid would initially cater to the food needs of about 15,000 civilians in Gaza.

It will also include essential supplies for bakeries and critical items for infant care.

‘Permission’ for 100 trucks
Earlier yesterday, a spokesperson for the UN humanitarian office in Geneva said Israel had given permission for about 100 aid trucks to enter Gaza.

However, the UN also said no aid had been distributed in Gaza because of Israeli restrictions, despite a handful of aid trucks entering the territory.

“But what we mean here by allowed is that the trucks have received military clearance to access the Palestinian side,” reports Tareq Abu Azzoum from Deir el-Balah, central Gaza.

“They have not made their journey into the enclave. They are still stuck at the border crossing. Only five trucks have made it in.”

The few aid trucks alowed into Gaza are nowhere near sufficient to meet Gaza’s vast needs, says the medical charity Doctors Without Borders, known by its French initials MSF.

Instead, the handful of trucks serve as a “a smokescreen” for Israel to “pretend the siege is over”.

“The Israeli authorities’ decision to allow a ridiculously inadequate amount of aid into Gaza after months of an air-tight siege signals their intention to avoid the accusation of starving people in Gaza, while in fact keeping them barely surviving,” said Pascale Coissard, MSF’s emergency coordinator in Khan Younis.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

The post Borders, Empire, and Resistance: Confronting Racism, Nationalism, and the Fight for Alternatives appeared first on Project Censored.

This content originally appeared on Project Censored and was authored by Kate Horgan.

AP provides essential reporting that is published by thousands of outlets across the United States and around the world, helping to keep millions informed on matters of national and international importance. U.S. newspapers, radio stations, and television broadcasters rely heavily on the AP’s copy to deliver news to local communities. Barring AP effectively removes these media outlets’ ability to deliver the news to the groups they serve. 

Limiting AP’s access to media pool events because of the news agency’s editorial and style decisions stifles freedom of speech and violates the First Amendment. News organizations should be allowed to make editorial decisions without fear of retaliation from government officials. 

We ask that the administration honor its commitment to freedom of expression, as outlined in President Donald Trump’s executive order, by restoring AP’s access to White House events and ensuring the administration upholds a nonpartisan defense of a free press. 

Signed by– 

Committee to Protect Journalists

Society of Professional Journalists

Freedom of the Press Foundation

Free Press Unlimited

International Press Institute 

Institute for Nonprofit News

National Press Club

National Press Photographers Association

PEN America

Reporters Without Borders (RSF)

Student Press Law Center

Chapters of the Society of Professional Journalists

Arkansas Pro Chapter, Society of Professional Journalists
Boston University Society of Professional Journalists
Chicago Headline Club (SPJ)
Colorado Pro Chapter, SPJ
Connecticut Society of Professional Journalists
Detroit Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists
Georgia Pro Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists
Hawaii Pro Chapter SPJ
Indiana Professional Chapter, Society of Professional Journalists
Las Vegas Pro Chapter, Society of Professional Journalists
Maine Pro Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists
Minnesota SPJ
New Jersey Society of Professional Journalists
SPJ Florida
SPJ Houston Pro Chapter
SPJ Kansas Pro Chapter
SPJ Keystone Pro Chapter
SPJ New England
SPJ Northwest Arkansas Pro Chapter
SPJ San Antonio Pro Chapter
SPJ San Diego Pro Chapter
SPJ University of Arkansas Chapter
SPJ Valley of the Sun (Arizona) Pro Chapter
SPJ Virginia Pro Chapter
St. Louis Society of Professional Journalists, Pro Chapter
The Deadline Club (New York City Chapter of SPJ)
The Press Club of Long Island (SPJ)
Utah Headliners Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists
Washington, D.C., Pro SPJ Chapter

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by Committee to Protect Journalists.

The Paris-based world media watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has called for international journalists to be given open access to the besieged Gaza Strip enclave and has reaffirmed its demand that the International Criminal Court (ICC) prosecutes the perpetrators of Israeli war crimes against journalists.

RSF has already filed four complaints with the ICC and has declared it will continue its efforts to work for justice and support Palestinian journalism.

In 15 months of the Israeli war on Gaza, the military has killed more than 150 Palestinian journalists — the Gazan Media office says more than 210 — including at least 41 who were killed while working.

• READ MORE: Other Gaza media freedom reports

The ceasefire that began on Sunday has ended — for the moment — the war that turned Palestine into the “most dangerous territory” in the world for journalists, according to RSF’s 2024 Round-up.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

The United Nations tasked with providing humanitarian aid to the besieged people of Gaza — and the only one that can do it on a large scale — says it is ready to provide assistance in the wake of the ceasefire tomorrow but is worried about the impact of being “outlawed” by Israel.

A spokesperson, Tamara Alrifai, for the UN Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA) said: “We’re extremely eager to see the humanitarian part of the ceasefire, actioned as of tomorrow morning.”

However, Alrifai also told Al Jazeera that UNRWA was “extremely worried” that if UNRWA was prevented from being able to work “then the glue that brings together the entire complex humanitarian operation might not be able to function”.

• READ MORE: Israel and Hamas reach Gaza ceasefire deal, what are the next steps?
• Israeli cabinet approves Gaza ceasefire deal with Hamas
• Chris Hedges: The Gaza ceasefire charade
• Other Israeli war on Gaza reports

In October, Israel passed a law banning UNRWA from operating on Israeli territory and areas under Israel’s control. The ban is set to take effect next month.

Alrifai said UNRWA was continuing to work in Gaza, with UNRWA staff managing shelters and distributing food.

“Not only is UNRWA the backbone of the humanitarian response with our shelters, our people, our personnel, our trucks and our warehouses . . .  but the minute the ceasefire kicks in, it is of utmost priority to bring over 600,000 children back to some form of learning,” she added.

Another aid agency, Doctors Without Borders (MSF), said that while the ceasefire deal was a “relief”, it was coming too late and political leaders had “failed” the people of Gaza.

“Searching for bodies’
“For more than 15 months, hospital rooms have been filled with patients with severed limbs and other life-altering trauma, caused by strikes, and distressed people searching for the bodies of their family members,” MSF said in a statement.

Lazzarini: Can UNRWA survive Israel’s attacks?     Video: Al Jazeera

The agency, which said eight of its workers had been killed since the start of the war, described humanitarian needs in the besieged and bombarded territory as having reached “catastrophic levels”.

“The Israeli government, Hamas, and world leaders have tragically failed the people of Gaza, by not agreeing and imposing a sustained ceasefire sooner,” it said.

“The relief that this ceasefire brings is far from enough for people to rebuild their lives, reclaim their dignity and to mourn for those killed and all that’s been lost.”

Meanwhile, the Health Ministry in Gaza has released its latest daily casualties update from Israeli attacks, indicating that the number of people killed since the start of the war had risen by 23 to 46,899 in the latest 24-hour reporting period.

Another 83 people were wounded over the same period, bringing the total to 110,725.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

In the special report, “In Washington, Myanmar democracy advocates push for a Breakthrough,” Amarasinghe captures the efforts of Myanmar’s National Unity Government in Washington, D.C., as Deputy Foreign Minister Moe Zaw Oo and press aide Aye Chan Mon navigate the complexities of international diplomacy.

In “Nyah Mway: The boy who will forever be 13,” he delves into the tragedy of a young refugee from Myanmar who was fatally shot by police in Utica, New York. His photographs reveal the effect the incident has had on Nyah’s family and community, offering insight into broader issues of systemic violence and the experiences of displaced people in the United States.

In “Five Years after a Summer of Protest, Hong Kong Exiles are Still Rebuilding Their Lives,” Amarasinghe chronicles the lives of Hong Kong activists who have resettled in the United States following the 2019 pro-democracy protests.

Through his lens, Amarasinghe provides a comprehensive perspective on resilience and transition. Here are some of his photos:

(Gemunu Amarasinghe/RFA)

(Gemunu Amarasinghe/RFA)

(Gemunu Amarasinghe/RFA)

(Gemunu Amarasinghe/RFA)

(Gemunu Amarasinghe/RFA)

(Gemunu Amarasinghe/RFA)

(Gemunu Amarasinghe/RFA)

Edited by Jim Snyder.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by Paul Nelson and H. Léo Kim for RFA.

In the special report, “In Washington, Myanmar democracy advocates push for a Breakthrough,” Amarasinghe captures the efforts of Myanmar’s National Unity Government in Washington, D.C., as Deputy Foreign Minister Moe Zaw Oo and press aide Aye Chan Mon navigate the complexities of international diplomacy.

In “Nyah Mway: The boy who will forever be 13,” he delves into the tragedy of a young refugee from Myanmar who was fatally shot by police in Utica, New York. His photographs reveal the effect the incident has had on Nyah’s family and community, offering insight into broader issues of systemic violence and the experiences of displaced people in the United States.

In “Five Years after a Summer of Protest, Hong Kong Exiles are Still Rebuilding Their Lives,” Amarasinghe chronicles the lives of Hong Kong activists who have resettled in the United States following the 2019 pro-democracy protests.

Through his lens, Amarasinghe provides a comprehensive perspective on resilience and transition. Here are some of his photos:

(Gemunu Amarasinghe/RFA)

(Gemunu Amarasinghe/RFA)

(Gemunu Amarasinghe/RFA)

(Gemunu Amarasinghe/RFA)

(Gemunu Amarasinghe/RFA)

(Gemunu Amarasinghe/RFA)

(Gemunu Amarasinghe/RFA)

Edited by Jim Snyder.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by Paul Nelson and H. Léo Kim for RFA.

RFA speaks with victims of intimidation, policy experts, and lawmakers on what’s at stake.

Episode 1: Across US College Campuses

Episode 1 delves into incidents like a Harvard University protester being forcibly removed by a Chinese Communist Party-linked student, a violent attack at a Columbia University vigil and the harassment of Georgetown students for advocating democratic values.

The documentary uncovers how these students and their families face surveillance, intimidation, and retaliation, both abroad and in China, raising urgent calls for stronger protections and accountability to safeguard freedom on American campuses.

Episode 2: TikTok — National Security Threat?

Episode 2 investigates the potential national security risks posed by TikTok and its parent company, ByteDance, amidst allegations of connections to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).

Explained are the platform’s data collection practices, its potential to manipulate users through algorithms, and the broader implications for American privacy and democracy.

As the deadline for ByteDance’s divestment of TikTok is approaching, the episode raises critical questions about balancing national security with the principles of an open society.

Episode 3: China-linked hackers spark global concern

Episode 3 reveals a recent cyberattack uncovered by Proofpoint, a leading American cybersecurity firm specializing in email security and threat defense.

Proofpoint identified a China-linked hacker group, “UNK_SweetSpecter,” targeting technical personnel connected to a top AI company.

Using phishing emails with malware, the group sought to steal intellectual property, coinciding with U.S. export restrictions on AI models. Despite improved international intellectual property laws, enforcement remains inconsistent.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by RFA Staff.

Since the junta took over Myanmar in a coup in February 2021, cross border trade between junta ally China and northern Shan state has amounted to a total of US$9 billion. But after rebel groups seized control of the area, Beijing shut down its border crossings, disrupting the livelihood of those in Myanmar who buy, sell and ship Chinese goods.

"Many drivers have faced many difficulties,” a truck driver who works in northern Shan state told RFA Burmese. “In the past, we could drive cargo trucks. Now we have no jobs.”

The trucker said that the owners of transportation firms are trying to get work in areas where the borders remain open, out of consideration for their drivers.

Rebels control six border crossings with China on the Myanmar side. Five of these are under the control of the Three Brotherhood Alliance – which is made up of the Ta’ang National Liberation Army, the Arakan Army and the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army – while the sixth is under the control of the Kachin Independence Army.

Daily trade at the Kyin Sang Kyawt gate in Shan state’s Muse township was around US$6.6 million daily when it was open. 

A resident of Pang Hseng township, who sells produce to Chinese buyers, said the closed border is creating hardship.

"We rely on this border gate by selling vegetables to make a living,” the resident said. “Some others buy Chinese products to be sold here. But with the border gate closed now, all of us are facing many challenges, and unemployment has also increased."

Singbyu gate in Muse township is the only open trade route to China in northern Shan state, with limited time for crossing, and the junta has increased custom duties and restrictions.

As a result, prices of imported Chinese goods have sharply increased.

RFA tried to contact the junta’s spokesperson Major General Zaw Min Tun to learn more about the situation at the border, but he did not respond by the time of publishing.

Translated by Aung Naing. Edited by Eugene Whong.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA Burmese.

People in Chin state, western Sagaing region and northern Rakhine state said their supplies of  rice, cooking oil, salt, fuel and medicine are dwindling because of the trade disruption following the border gate closures.

Indian authorities cited the need to check the flow of illegal goods from Myanmar as the reason, according to local sources.

But Reeta Meena, an Indian Embassy diplomat in Yangon, told Radio Free Asia that the Indian government permits movement through designated border crossing points, including ones at Tamu-Moreh, Rikhawdar-Zokhawthar and Zorinpui-Paletwa.

Any restrictions might have been imposed by Myanmar or local authorities, she told Radio Free Asia.

Thousands of civilians from Chin state and Sagaing region have fled across the Indian border and into neighboring Mizoram and Manipur states to escape fighting between junta troops and rebel forces following the Myanmar military’s February 2021 coup d’état.

But those who have stayed behind have struggled to get goods from India amid periodic border closures due to fighting in their areas, while communication blackouts have cut them off from key cities in Myanmar. 

In April, 2023, India locked the gates to key border crossings with Myanmar’s Chin state after three Indian citizens were killed that February during an intensified junta offensive against rebel forces in the western states. 

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Myanmar permits legal international trade with India via the two crossings at Tamu-Moreh in Sagaing region and Rikhawdar-Zokhawthar in Chin state.

The Moreh-Tamu border gate has remained closed on the Indian side since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020.

'Severe difficulties'

But the recent closures of other crossings have led to shortages of basic food items, said a Tamu resident.

“Indian products, such as food and basic consumer goods, are no longer available to local residents living along the border, creating severe difficulties for them,” the resident said. “Job opportunities are scarce, making it increasingly challenging for them to afford basic necessities.”

Indian authorities announced that the Myanmar-India border gate, which connects Rikhawdar in Chin state with India’s Mizoram state, would be closed from July 25 to Aug. 7, though Myanmar residents say it is unlikely to reopen until Aug. 12.  

As a result of this closure, prices of goods in Rikhawdar have surged, with people paying twice as much for goods as they did before, Myanmar locals said.

Since November 2023, Rikhawdar has been under the control of Chin defense forces who oppose Myanmar’s ruling military junta and have jointly established a public administration focused on the India-Myanmar border trade, public security and regional stability.

A spokesman for the Regional Defense Force-Hualngoram, the other organization involved in setting up the town’s administration, expressed hope that the Mizoram state government would take measures to help locals obtain essential supplies from India.

“The closure of the bridge, which we rely on for the flow of goods, has made things more difficult,” he said. “We are currently facing a crisis.”

Because Mizoram residents rely on produce from Myanmar, a prolonged border crossing closure would negatively impact both sides, said Salai Van Sui Sang, deputy director of the Institute of Chin Affairs.

It also could lead to tensions between residents of Mizoram and their state government, he added.

Arakan Army

Some internal trade routes, which run directly between towns in India and western Myanmar, have been cut off because of fighting between junta soldiers and resistance forces in Chin state’s Paletwa and in Rakhine state — areas controlled by the rebel Arakan Army. As a result, Myanmar residents must rely on products from Lawngtlai in Mizoram state.

But since June 24, the Central Young Lai Association, an influential NGO in Lawngtlai, has banned the export of goods. Though it allowed some items, including basic foodstuffs, to be transported again in July, restrictions on fuel and fertilizer remain in place.

On Aug. 7, the organization warned it would take action against the transport of prohibited fuel and fertilizer from Lawngtlai, but did not provide specifics.

Goods transported from Lawngtlai have been banned because the Arakan Army said they were being used to supply junta forces attacking Chin armed groups.

Translated by Kalyar Lwin for RFA Burmese. Edited by Roseanne Gerin and Malcolm Foster.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA Burmese.

The post The No-State Solution & The Case For Open Borders appeared first on Project Censored.

This content originally appeared on Project Censored and was authored by Kate Horgan.

Nicholas Kristof is that guy at the party who reminds you that you haven’t really lived. While you maintain a regular, nine-to-five existence, driving from Point A to Point B, the world has been Kristof’s oyster. With a fully stamped passport, the New York Times columnist can embarrass everyone with his tales from Africa and Asia, marking himself as a true global citizen who yearns for adventure.

Worse, he mobilizes exotic datelines as trump cards to back up his neoliberalism disguised as forward-thinking progressivism: Teachers unions are bad for kids (9/12/12), sweatshops are good for workers (1/14/09) and US imperialism can be a positive force (2/1/02). You, the provincial rube, simply can’t rebut him. “Oh, have you been to Cambodia? No? Well I have.”

Here at FAIR (11/4/21), we were relieved when he announced his resignation from the Times to run for governor of Oregon, taking his vacuous moralism and smug place-dropping to the campaign trail. Upon his disqualification from the election (OPB, 2/18/22), he returned to his coveted perch like he never left at all.

‘BS border move’

Nicholas Kristof (New York Times, 6/8/24) makes the liberal case for immigration restriction: “It’s better that the ladder be raised in an orderly way by reasonable people.”

Recently, he has jumped in (6/8/24) to defend President Joe Biden’s reactionary move to shut down the border and end asylum on a rolling basis.

The Biden order “would bar migrants from being granted asylum when US officials deem that the southern border is overwhelmed” (AP, 6/5/24), a move many immigration advocates have branded as a capitulation to the xenophobic right (Reason, 6/4/24; Al Jazeera, 6/6/24) in his tough reelection campaign against former President Donald Trump (CBS, 6/9/24).

Conservative media weren’t buying it, however. The Wall Street Journal editorial board (6/4/24) said that the move “might help reduce the flow somewhat if they are strictly enforced, and at least he’s admitting the problem,” but worried that migrants “could still seek asylum at ports of entry using the CBP One mobile app, which would be excluded from the daily triggers.” The National Review (6/5/24) called it “too little, too late” for conservatives. The New York Post editorial board (6/9/24) said the president’s “BS border move has already failed.”

Kristof’s column, by contrast, serves as liberal media support for a policy that is cruel, hypocritical and a further indication that Biden’s only election tactic is to outflank Trump from the right. It is important to see how Kristof, and the Times, wield cosmopolitan journalistic instincts to defend closed borders, xenophobia and outright misinformation that serves the right.

 ‘Swing the doors open’

Kristof saying that the US has “lax immigration policies” with a “loophole that allowed people to stay indefinitely” is a cruel misrepresentation of Biden’s border policy (LA Times, 2/24/23).

To start off, Kristof said the current code is flawed because of “a loophole that allowed people to claim asylum and stay indefinitely whether or not they warranted it.” This is a talking point made by anti-immigrant and right-wing groups, and claiming that this is a “loophole” implies that there is a flaw in the system that allows criminals to wiggle out of the law.

In fact, it is legal to come to the country to seek asylum. And the system is far less rosy for refugees than anti-immigrant activists—and now Kristof—portray it. Asylum-seeking families are often separated (LA Times, 2/24/23). And while seeking asylum is a guaranteed right under US and international law, the federal government has “severely restricted access to asylum at the border since 2016” according to the International Rescue Committee (7/1/22). The group explained:

A policy called the Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP) or “Remain in Mexico” forced certain asylum seekers to wait out their US immigration court cases in Mexico with little or no access to legal counsel. Although a federal court blocked the Biden administration’s attempts to end this program, the Supreme Court later ruled in the administration’s favor. For over three years, MPP impacted more than 75,000 asylum seekers, requiring them to wait out their US court hearings in Mexico—mostly in northern border towns. There they faced the often impossible expectations to gather evidence and prepare for a trial conducted in English while struggling to keep their families safe.

Kristof acknowledged that he, as a white man, is an American because his Eastern European father was allowed into the country as a refugee in 1952. But he went on to say that the US today can’t “swing the doors open,” because “we’re not going to welcome all 114 million people around the world who have been forcibly displaced”—as if that’s the question the US faces, rather than the hundreds of thousands of people who actually seek asylum in the US each year. (Of course, Washington could help reduce the global refugee crisis by ending support for the wars, insurgencies and sanctions that to a great extent drive it.)

‘Outcompeted by immigrants’

Wharton School professor Zeke Hernandez (Marketplace, 12/12/23): “When immigrants arrive, there are not just more workers that are competing with native workers, but there are more people who demand housing, entertainment, food, education. And so you need to hire more people to satisfy that bigger demand.”

Admitting that immigration has positive economic impact for the United States, Kristof went for the old line that these newcomers threaten US workers, and that “poor Americans can find themselves hurt by immigrant competition that puts downward pressure on their wages.” Exhibit A is an unnamed neighbor who was forced out of good working-class employment over the decades: “He was hurt by many factors—the decline of unions, globalization and the impact of technology,” Kristof said, but added that “he was also outcompeted by immigrants with a well-earned reputation for hard work.”

First, it is employers, not workers, who have the power to drive down wages. If there is a problem with immigrants being paid less, that’s an issue of exploitation. If Kristof thought about this a little bit longer, he’d realize he’s making an argument for equality among workers, not for dividing them against each other.

But this assumption that immigration depresses wages is itself dubious. The National Bureau of Economic Research (4/24) said:

We calculate that immigration, thanks to native/immigrant complementarity and college skill content of immigrants, had a positive and significant effect between +1.7 to +2.6% on wages of less-educated native workers, over the period 2000–2019, and no significant wage effect on college-educated natives. We also calculate a positive employment rate effect for most native workers.

Zeke Hernandez, professor at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, produced similar findings, noting that immigration causes the economies around these newcomer communities to grow (Marketplace, 12/12/23). And the libertarian Cato Institute (7/26/16) showed that unemployment is lower when immigration is higher.

‘Inflicting even more pain’

Axios (3/13/24): “The immigration increase is a key part of the labor supply surge that helped bring down price pressures last year even amid the economy’s robust growth.”

Kristof also ignored that the current unemployment rate (Bureau of Labor Statistics, 6/7/24) is low at 4% and that, with high demand for labor, inflation-adjusted wages have risen 4.1% over the past year (AP, 6/7/24). Axios (3/13/24) reported that a

surge in immigration last year helps explain the economy’s striking resilience—and if sustained, could allow the job market to keep booming without stoking inflation in the years ahead.

Given that the corporate media have been constantly saying the country is facing a “border crisis,” these facts are hard to square with the notion that immigrants depress native-born workers’ wages.

Kristof went on to say that “native-born Americans may not be willing to toil in the fields or on a construction site for $12 an hour, but perhaps would be for $25 an hour.” Once again, if he really felt this way, then he’d be advocating for general wage hikes—for example, raising the federal minimum wage, which hasn’t gone up since 2009—as labor advocates demand, instead of calling for closed borders. But Kristof isn’t on the Times opinion page to advance labor’s interests.

And that’s when Kristof invokes a sort of liberal MAGAism, saying that while American workers are “self-medicating and dying from drugs, alcohol and suicide, shouldn’t we be careful about inflicting even more pain on them through immigration policy?” Immigrants—living, breathing people—are associated with non-living toxins, evoking the Trumpian smear that immigrants are disease-carrying vermin (Guardian, 12/16/23).

‘Lax immigration policies’

Victoria Sanford (BillMoyers.com, 11/17/17): “Then as now, the US is the engine generating migration through bad foreign policy decisions.”

And it still gets worse. Kristof said:

I’ve also wondered about the incentives we inadvertently create. In Guatemalan villages, I’ve seen families prepared to send children on the perilous journey to the United States, and I fear that lax immigration policies encourage people to risk their lives and their children’s lives on the journey.

I have not been to all the places Kristof has, but I’ve been to a few of them, including Guatemala. People leave these places for the US, not because it is so easy, but in spite of the fact that it is so difficult. They come because they are left with no choice but to leave violence, war and poverty behind.

When a man in Lebanon asked that I take him back with me to the US, he was jokingly invoking the reality that the immigration process is impossible without help. Nor did he think there were so many “incentives” beyond the fact that America’s promise of opportunity was an improvement over his broken country.

And it is curious that Kristof mentions Guatemala specifically. Had he read his own newspaper before writing this piece, he might have seen anthropologist Victoria Sanford (New York Times, 11/9/18; BillMoyers.com, 11/17/17) argue that Central Americans are fleeing the horrific crime that has manifested as a result of Washington’s Cold War interventions and current policies of militarism. Latin American studies professor Elizabeth Oglesby (Vice, 6/28/18) made a similar connection . That’s quite a bit of context to leave out.

‘Feeding into white nationalism’

Arun Gupta (Santita Jackson Show, 6/6/24): ““Biden is feeding into this white nationalism and saying that the solution is this Fortress America.”

I was recently on the Santita Jackson Show (KTNF, 6/6/24) to discuss the recent presidential election in Mexico (FAIR.org, 6/4/24). Joining us was independent journalist Arun Gupta, who has reported from the US/Mexico border for the Nation (4/21/20). He said that the violence of these lawless zones at the border, with migrants waiting to come into the US, will only become more chaotic and dangerous with this new policy.

“Biden is feeding into this white nationalism and saying that the solution is this Fortress America to protect us from these savage brown hordes,” Gupta said. Tens of thousands of migrants have been killed trying to get into the US, he added, and these refugee camps filling up along the border, where narco crime and corrupt police will take more control, will “become death camps.”

Kristof has spent his career telling American readers to care about wars and humanitarian crises abroad (New York Times, 2/6/10, 3/9/11, 6/16/14, 9/4/15, 5/15/24). Yet here he is, utterly indifferent to creating a humanitarian catastrophe right at his own country’s door, seemingly in order to run positive spin for an incumbent president who is eager to rise a few points in the polls.

In fact, Kristof ends with almost a parody of liberalism:

Are we, the people of an immigrant nation, pulling up the ladder after we have boarded? Yes, to some degree. But the reality is that we can’t absorb everyone who wants in, and it’s better that the ladder be raised in an orderly way by reasonable people.

In other words, when a Trumpian policy is practiced by a Democratic administration, it is somehow less horrendous. And Kristof fully admits, “as the son of a refugee,” he is selfishly cutting off people much like his father—except from the Global South, not from Eastern Europe.

And this sums up a very central problem with Kristof. For someone who uses globetrotting as his journalistic trademark, he advances a racist idea that the ability to travel and relocate are reserved for people like him—men of the Global North intellectual class and not the wretched of the earth beneath him.

ACTION ALERT: You can send a message to the New York Times at letters@nytimes.com. Please remember that respectful communication is the most effective. Feel free to leave a copy of your communication in the comments thread.

This content originally appeared on FAIR and was authored by Ari Paul.

The post Reporters Without Borders Finds Significant “Barriers to Press Freedom” in the United States appeared first on Project Censored.

This content originally appeared on Project Censored and was authored by Kate Horgan.

PRISTINA -- Kosovar Prime Minister Albin Kurti says he will not suspend a move by the central bank to ban the circulation of the Serbian dinar in parts of the country with Serbian majorities but will accept the forming of an Association of Serb-Majority Municipalities once Belgrade agrees to sign a basic agreement on bilateral relations.

The basic agreement for the normalization of relations with Serbia was reached in February 2023, and includes the formation of the association, which is expected to more adequately represent predominantly ethnic Serb areas in Kosovo.

Kosovo is not a member of the European Union or its common currency area, the eurozone, but it unilaterally adopted the euro in 2002 to help bring monetary stability and to simplify and reduce transaction costs inside and outside the country.

Serbia, which has never acknowledged its former province's 2008 declaration of independence, still pays many ethnic Serbs at institutions in Serb-dominated parts of Kosovo in dinars. Many also hold their pensions and get child allowances in dinars.

"Regarding the Serbian-dinar-versus-euro issue, it is Kosovo's central bank that decides and they have already decided on December 27 last year," Kurti told RFE/RL's Balkan Service in an interview on March 19, arguing that the ban, which came into force on February 1, was meant to fight financial crime and terrorism.

"We have, thanks to them, a new regulation that is going to enhance the integrity of the financial system to fight illicit activities financing terrorism," Kurti said in Pristina on the same day top Serbian and Kosovar negotiators were holding bilateral meeting in Brussels with EU special envoy Miroslav Lajcak.

The Serbian dinar ban was reported to be high on the agenda, although no joint trilateral meeting has been confirmed so far.

The ban ratcheted up already high tensions between Serbia and Kosovo and threatened to scupper efforts by Washington and Brussels to get the dialogue between Pristina and Belgrade back on track.

"The dinar is not banned in Kosovo, but the euro is the only means of payment," Kurti told RFE/RL, echoing the central bank's line that the ban doesn’t stop anyone from accepting money from any country, it just means the money is converted into euros.

Still, the conversion adds a layer of cost and complication to the daily lives of ethnic Serbs still tied to the dinar.

"We cannot allow bagfuls of dinars in cash to enter our country. (It can happen) only through official financial channels with full transparency, who sends money to whom and for what purpose," Kurti said, adding that any disparities on the ground would have time to be smoothed out over the three-month transition period.

"Serbia can send dinars, we will exchange them into euros and Serbs in Kosovo can benefit from that financial aid," Kurti added.

However, the U.S. envoy to the Western Balkans last week warned that the ban had caused problems for some citizens in the region and challenges for the U.S.-Kosovo relationship.

Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Gabriel Escobar told RFE/RL on March 14 that Kosovo's controversial decision on the dinar was "an issue that we need to address immediately."

Escobar said that the issue had presented challenges in the bilateral relationship, although Washington remains Kosovo's most reliable ally.

The U.S. envoy also said that his proposals for resolving the issue had been rejected by Kurti during their meeting.

"It's not me as prime minister to decide about this thing," Kurti told RFE/RL when asked about why he refused Escobar's solutions.

"We're a democracy where powers and duties are separated. Therefore, I can only help the central bank to affect a smooth transition," Kurti said, declining to elaborate on Escobar's proposals.

"Let those who made the proposals speak," he added, reiterating that he cannot cancel the decision of an independent institution.

"No suspension will come out of talking to me, because the bank is an independent institution," he said, adding that its governor reports only to parliament, not the government.

Asked whether he would at least advise the bank to extend the transition period, Kurti replied: "I cannot also advise the central bank of Kosovo. The governor has his own advisers."

Referring to the basic agreement, Kurti said it was Belgrade that was hampering its implementation.

"I want the normalization of relations and I think that the signing of the basic agreement and its implementation annex can certainly cancel previous violations on one hand and, on the other hand can bring legal certainty for the future.

"The problem is that eight out of 11 articles of the basic agreement have been violated by Belgrade," Kurti said, mentioning a letter sent by Serbian Prime Minister Ana Brnabic to the European Union, in which, according to him, her government said they were withdrawing their pledge to the deal "because they will never recognize independence of Kosovo, never accept Kosovo's membership in the United Nations, and likewise they are not going to respect the territorial integrity of our country."

Referring to the forming of the Association of Serb-Majority Municipalities, which is mentioned in Article 7 of the basic agreement, Kurti reiterated his government's statement from October 27, which blamed Serbia for refusing to sign the document endorsed by the leaders of France, Italy, and Germany.

"What more can I do? We are leaders who are supposed to turn the text that we have agreed upon into signed agreements. Obviously, Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic initially said yes to the agreement without intending to sign it and then regretted saying yes, as Mrs. Brnabic's letter explained," Kurti said.

"I believe that whoever mentions an association of Serbian-majority municipalities outside the basic agreement or before it serving Serbia's quest to turn Kosovo into Bosnia," he said, adding that such an association has to be established withing the framework of the Kosovar Constitution.

"In Brussels I said one cannot serve coffee without a cup. If you ask for coffee without a cup, I will show you an empty cup. The cup is the Republic of Kosovo. What is the legal framework of the association? Is it the constitution of the Republic of Kosova or that of Serbia? If I'm there, it's the constitution of the Republic of Kosovo. No coffee without a cup.

"This is crucial to understand. Belgrade wants to put the cart before the horses. It's not possible. There will be no movement as we have seen since February and March last year," he said, adding that he was ready to go to Brussels again together with Vucic.

Referring to the frustration voiced by the United States and the European Union because of the lack of progress toward the Serbian dinar and the municipalities association, Kurti said that while they are indispensable partners, sometimes differences may arise.

"I consider United States an indispensable ally, friend, and partner. But this does not mean that we have an identical stance toward official Belgrade. As the prime minister of Kosovo, I cannot regard Belgrade through the eyes of the State Department...they do not see Belgrade as I see them. We do not have an identical stance. We have a different experience and history," Kurti said.

This content originally appeared on News - Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty and was authored by News - Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty.

Deadly Connections in the Desert

Image by Ray Acheson.

Last month, organizers and activists from around the United States gathered in Tucson, Arizona for a nationwide summit to Stop Cop City—or, more accurately, Cop Cities. As new research has revealed, there are at least 69 militarized police training facilities in the works across the country. Each was put in motion in or after 2020, clearly a direct response to the Black Lives Matter uprisings that dominated city streets for months to condemn racialised police violence and demand the defunding of police.

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This content originally appeared on CounterPunch.org and was authored by Ray Acheson.

David Slater entered the plea in federal court in Nebraska on March 5 in the latest in a series of embarrassing disclosures and leaks of classified U.S. intelligence, some of it concerning Russia’s ongoing full-scale invasion of Ukraine and U.S. support for Kyiv.

The federal public defender who represented Slater at the hearing didn't comment on the case, but the judge ordered Slater to hire his own attorney after reviewing financial documents indicating he owns several rental homes in Nebraska and a property in Germany.

The judge also confirmed during the hearing that Slater no longer has access to classified information, but it was not clear if that mean he lost his job.

Live Briefing: Russia's Invasion Of Ukraine

RFE/RL's Live Briefing gives you all of the latest developments on Russia's full-scale invasion, Kyiv's counteroffensive, Western military aid, global reaction, and the plight of civilians. For all of RFE/RL's coverage of the war in Ukraine, click here.

U.S. prosecutors said on March 4 that Slater, a retired lieutenant colonel, was working as a civilian employee at U.S. Strategic Command, when he allegedly began an online relationship with a woman on a “foreign dating platform.” U.S. Strategic Command oversees U.S. nuclear arsenals, among other things.

It’s unclear whether Slater, 63, ever physically met the woman, who prosecutors said identified herself as Ukrainian.

In a series of e-mails and chats on the unnamed dating site between February and April 2022, the woman sent messages asking Slater specific questions about U.S. intelligence on Russia’s invasion.

"Dear, what is shown on the screens in the special room?? It is very interesting," the woman texted Slater around March 11, 2022, according to the unsealed indictment.

“By the way, you were the first to tell me that NATO members are traveling by train and only now (already evening) this was announced on our news. You are my secret informant, love! How were your meetings? Successfully?” the woman texted Slater days later.

"Beloved Dave, do NATO and Biden have a secret plan to help us?" the woman wrote on March 18.

“You are my secret agent. With love,” the woman allegedly wrote a week later.

The indictment does not quote any e-mails or messages authored by Slater, who was expected to be released on March 6 on the condition that he surrenders his passport, submits to GPS monitoring, and remains in Nebraska.

If convicted at trial, Slater faces up to 10 years in federal prison on each of the three counts laid out in the indictment.

A series of leaks of classified U.S. data on Ukraine and other issues have embarrassed the U.S. intelligence community and stirred doubts among U.S. allies sharing closely held information.

On March 4, a man who served in the U.S. Air National Guard unit pleaded guilty to leaking highly classified military documents about the Ukraine war and other U.S. national security secrets.

Jack Teixeira, 22, admitted to obtaining the information while he worked as an information technology specialist, and then sharing it with other users on Discord, a social media platform popular with online gamers.

The leaks, which included information about troop movements in Ukraine and the provision of U.S. equipment to Ukrainian troops, were seen as highly embarrassing for the Pentagon; more than a dozen military personnel were reprimanded in the subsequent investigation.

With reporting by AP

This content originally appeared on News - Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty and was authored by News - Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty.

From Feb. 12-20, dozens of Myanmar nationals have been arrested in Thailand on its southern and western borders, said Moe Kyo, who runs the Joint Action Committee on Burmese Affairs based in the Thai border town of Mae Sot. 

“It would even exceed that number. In reality, there are cases of arrests occurring in places that remain inaccessible to us,” he said, citing a nationwide network of organizations sharing information about arrests.

Since junta leader Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing announced the enforcement of the People’s Military Service Law on Feb. 10, people in Myanmar have been scrambling to avoid conscription into the regime’s army through both official and unofficial routes. 

Citizens have flocked to passport offices and embassies nationwide, while mass arrests of young people have caused panic, despite junta spokesperson Maj. Gen. Zaw Min Htun’s pledge that recruitment would not begin until April. 

The law would recruit some 50,000 people a year, with prison time if they refuse to cooperate. Women aged 18 to 27 and men aged 18 to 35 are required to serve two years, while highly-skilled professionals from ages 18 to 45 are required to serve five years. 

Thailand’s Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin issued a statement on Monday saying people entering the country illegally would be prosecuted, adding that security agencies have been alerted to the issue. 

On Sunday, 20 migrants were arrested in two locations near the border, aid worker Moe Kyo said. One group was discovered in Tha Song Yang district of Tak province.

“Thai authorities stopped and inspected a vehicle at a checkpoint. They discovered 13 undocumented Myanmar nationals inside,” he said. “It is also noted that those individuals had paid 15,000 Thai baht (US$418) to the brokers for their journey.”

Others have been arrested in Ranong, Songkhla, and Chumphon provinces in Thailand’s south. 

Desperate to Escape

Thailand’s Ratchamanu Taskforce, based in Tak, arrested two groups totalling more than 54 people from Feb. 14-16 near the border town of Wa Lay. The porous border area is 57 kilometers (35 miles) south of the official Mae Sot-Myawaddy border crossing. 

Task Force Commander Col. Nattakorn Reuntib told RFA on Thursday that 249 Myanmar nationals, including 13 brokers, were arrested in five border districts from Feb. 1-21 in Tak. He declined to comment on the impact of conscription laws, but said the number had increased from 183 people arrested in the entire month of January. 

All 27 people in one group were between the ages of 20 and 29, he said, telling Thai media they fled because of conscription laws. 

“Many of them came via south Wa Lay village. After being arrested, they would be deported through Mae Sot,” an officer at Phop Pra police station said, requesting anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media. 

“There have been many coming this way in recent weeks. We understand them, they need a job and security.”

Organizations focused on migrant rights say the Thai government needs to seriously consider humane solutions for people fleeing conscription as systems become overwhelmed.

The Thai Embassy of Myanmar announced a 400-person per day limit as its office quickly became overwhelmed, and Chiang Mai’s Buddhist University stated it would no longer accept applicants from Myanmar, citing an overwhelming number of applications. 

“I think it's a dangerous situation because we’ve also seen previous incidents where brokers were smuggling migrants and then there was a police chase ending in a car crash with people dying, so I can only hope that doesn't happen in the future,” said Brahm Press, director of the Migrant Assistance Program in Thailand.

“I’m sure that whatever systems are in place that migrants had previously been using are going to be further overwhelmed.”

Translated by RFA Burmese. Edited by Joshua Lipes.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA Staff.

The legal setbacks facing leading Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump are piling up. He now has 30 days to pay $450 million in fines and penalties from a civil fraud case brought by New York Attorney General Letitia James. His two eldest sons face a two-year ban and were each ordered to pay $4 million. Trump says he plans to appeal the ruling, which he described as a “complete and total sham.” But the appeal is unlikely to succeed, says Russ Buettner, a Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist whose reporting for The New York Times led to the state’s case. He lays out how records showed an “overwhelming pattern” of Trump’s businesses “lying to their lenders.” Buettner, who describes Trump as cash-poor, says the penalties will result in “a blow to his personal finances and his business finances that he really can’t handle at this point.”

This content originally appeared on Democracy Now! and was authored by Democracy Now!.

European Union foreign ministers in Brussels provided strong public backing to the exiled widow of Kremlin critic Aleksei Navalny, vowing additional sanctions against Moscow to hold it responsible for the death of her husband in a remote Arctic prison.

"The EU will spare no efforts to hold Russia's political leadership and authorities to account, in close coordination with our partners; and impose further costs for their actions, including through sanctions," the EU’s top diplomats said in a joint statement following their meeting with Yulia Navalnaya on February 19.

Navalnaya, who has become a vocal Kremlin critic in her own right over recent years, vowed to "continue our fight for our country" as she traveled to Brussels to seek backing from the 27-member bloc, whose leaders have expressed outrage over Navalny's death in custody last week and Russian authorities' refusal to allow his mother and lawyers to see his body.

"Three days ago, Vladimir Putin killed my husband, Aleksei Navalny," Yulia Navalnaya said in a two-minute video post on X, formerly Twitter.

Navalnaya, who along with their two children lives abroad, was already in Munich for a major international security conference when reports emerged on February 16 that Navalny had died at a harsh Arctic prison known as Polar Wolf, where he was serving a 19-year sentence for alleged extremism that Navalny and Kremlin critics say was heaped atop other convictions to punish him for his anti-corruption and political activities.

"I will continue the work of Aleksei Navalny," Navalnaya said. "Continue to fight for our country. And I invite you to stand beside me."

She called for supporters to battle the Kremlin with "more fury than ever before" and said she longed to live in "a free Russia."

EU foreign affairs chief Josep Borrell emerged from that meeting expressing "the EU's deepest condolences" and confidence that Russian President "Vladimir Putin & his regime will be held accountable for the death of [Aleksei Navalny]."

"As [Navalnaya] said, Putin is not Russia. Russia is not Putin," Borrell said, adding that the bloc's support is assured "to Russia's civil society & independent media."

An ally of Navalny, Ivan Zhdanov, said in a post on Telegram that an investigator had stated that tests on Navalny's body will take 14 days to complete.

Lithuanian Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis insisted earlier that the EU must "at least" sharpen sanctions against Russia following Navalny's death.

The EU has already passed 12 rounds of Russian sanctions and is working on a 13th with the two-year anniversary of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine approaching later this week, with member Germany pressing for more.

German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock had said Berlin would propose new sanctions on Moscow at the meeting with Navalnaya, but the outcome remained unclear.

The German Foreign Office said it was summoning the Russian ambassador over Navalny's death to "condemn this in the strongest possible terms and expressly call for the release of all those imprisoned in Russia for political reasons."

Chancellor Olaf Scholz's office called separately for clarification on the circumstances and for Russian authorities to release Navalny's body to the family.

The Kremlin -- which for years avoided mention of Navalny by name -- broke its official silence on February 19 by saying an investigation was ongoing and would be carried out according to Russian law. It said the question of when his body would be handed over was not for the Kremlin to decide.

It called Western outcry over the February 16 announcement of Navalny's death "absolutely unacceptable."

The Latvia-based Novaya Gazeta Europe said on February 18 that police were securing a local morgue in the Siberian city of Salekhard as speculation swirled around the location of the 47-year-old Navalny's body and whether it showed signs of abuse.

Navalny is the latest on a significant list of Putin foes who have ended up dead under suspicious circumstances abroad or at home, where the Kremlin has clamped down ruthlessly on dissent and free speech since the Ukraine invasion began.

Political analyst Yekaterina Shulman told Current Time that Navalny "possessed incomparable moral capital" in Russia but also well beyond its borders.

"He possessed fame -- all Russian and worldwide," Shulman said. "He had moral authority [and] he had a long political biography. These are all things that cannot be handed down to anyone and cannot be acquired quickly."

She cited Navalny's crucial credibility and "political capital" built up through years of investigations of corruption, campaigning for elections, and organizing politically.

"Perhaps this apparent political assassination will become a rallying point not for the opposition -- the opposition is people who run for office to acquire mandates [and] we are not in that situation -- but for the anti-war community...inside Russia," Shulman said.

Navalny's family and close associates have confirmed his death in prison and have demanded his body be handed over, but authorities have refused to release it pending an investigation.

Mediazona and Novaya.gazeta Europe said Navalny’s body was being held at the district morgue in Salekhard, although officials reportedly told Navalny's mother otherwise after she traveled to the remote prison on February 17 and was denied access.

A former spokeswoman for Navalny, Kira Yarmysh, claimed Navalny's mother had been turned away again early on February 19.

Yarmysh tweeted that Russia's federal Investigative Committee had told his mother and lawyers that "the investigation into Navalny’s death had been extended. How much longer she will go is unknown. The cause of death is still 'undetermined.'"

"They lie, stall for time, and don't even hide it," she added.

The OVD-Info human rights group website showed more than 57,000 signatories demanding that the Investigative Committee return Navalny's body to his family.

WATCH: Court documents examined by RFE/RL reveal that medical care was repeatedly denied to inmates at the prison where Aleksei Navalny was held. In one case, this resulted in the death of an inmate. The revelation comes amid questions over how Navalny died and as his body has still not been handed over to his family.

The group noted that a procedural review process could allow authorities to keep the body for at least 30 days, or longer if a criminal case was opened.

Since the announcement of his death on February 16, Russian police have cordoned off memorial sites where people were laying flowers and candles to honor Navalny, and dispersed and arrested more than 430 suspected violators in dozens of locations.

Closely watched by police, mourners on February 19 continued to leave flowers at tributes in Moscow to honor Navalny. Initial reports suggested police in the capital did not intervene in the latest actions.

The Western response has been to condemn Putin and his administration, with U.S. President Joe Biden saying there is "no doubt" that Putin is to blame for Navalny's death.

The British and U.S. ambassadors laid tributes over the weekend at the Solovetsky Stone, a monument to repression that has emerged as a site to honor Navalny.

U.S. Ambassador Lynne Tracy said she was honoring "Navalny and other victims of political repression in Russia," adding, "His strength is an inspiring example. We honor his memory."

The French ambassador also visited one of the memorials.

With reporting by Reuters

This content originally appeared on News - Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty and was authored by News - Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty.

This content originally appeared on The Intercept and was authored by Deconstructed.

The question is how far each side might go in carrying out their warnings without drawing Tehran into a broader Middle East conflict in defense of the Huthis, whose sustained attacks on maritime shipping in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden led to its redesignation as a terrorist organization by Washington last week.

"Our aim remains to de-escalate tensions and restore stability in the Red Sea," the United States and the United Kingdom said in a joint statement following their latest round of air strikes on Huthi targets in Yemen on January 21. "But let us reiterate our warning to [the] Huthi leadership: we will not hesitate to defend lives and the free flow of commerce in one of the world’s most critical waterways in the face of continued threats."

The Huthis responded with vows to continue their war against what they called Israel's "genocide" of the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip.

"The American-British aggression will only increase the Yemeni people’s determination to carry out their moral and humanitarian responsibilities toward the oppressed in Gaza," said Muhammad al-Bukhaiti, a senior Huthi political official.

"These attacks will not go unanswered and unpunished," said Huthi military spokesman Yahya Saree.

On cue, the two sides clashed again on January 24 when the Huthis said they fired ballistic missiles at several U.S. warships protecting U.S. commercial vessels transiting the Bab al-Mandab Strait off the coast of Yemen. U.S. Central Command said three anti-ship missiles were fired at a U.S.-flagged container ship and that two were shot down by a U.S. missile destroyer while the third fell into the Gulf of Aden.

With the stage set for more such encounters, Iran's open backing and clandestine arming of the Huthis looms large. While continuing to state its support for the Huthis, Tehran has continued to deny directing their actions or providing them with weapons. At the same time, Iran has showcased its own advanced missile capabilities as a warning of the strength it could bring to a broader Middle East conflict.

The United States, emphasizing that the goal is to de-escalate tensions in the region, appears to be focusing on preventing the Huthis from obtaining more arms and funding. In addition to returning the Huthis to its list of terrorist groups, Washington said on January 16 that it had seized Iranian weapons bound for the Huthis in a raid in the Arabian Sea.

The United States and United Kingdom also appear to be focusing on precision strikes on the Huthis' military infrastructure while avoiding extensive human casualties or a larger operation that could heighten Iran's ire.

On January 24, the Pentagon clarified that, despite the U.S. strikes in Yemen, "we are not at war in the Middle East" and the focus is on deterrence and preventing a broader conflict.

"The United States is only using a very small portion of what it's capable of against the Huthis right now," said Kenneth Katzman, a senior adviser for the New York-based Soufan Group intelligence consultancy, and expert on geopolitics in the Middle East.

Terrorist Designation

The effectiveness of Washington's restoration on January 17 of the Huthis' terrorist organization label and accompanying U.S. sanctions -- which was removed early last year in recognition of the dire humanitarian situation in Yemen and to foster dialogue aimed at ending the Yemeni civil war involving the Huthis and the country's Saudi-backed government forces -- is "marginal," according to Katzman.

"They don't really use the international banking system and are very much cut off," Katzman said. "They get their arms from Iran, which is under extremely heavy sanctions and is certainly not going to be deterred from trying to ship them more weapons by this designation."

But the strikes being carried out by the United States and the United Kingdom, with the support of Australia, Bahrain, Canada, and the Netherlands, are another matter.

The January 21 strikes against eight Huthi targets -- followed shortly afterward by what was the ninth attack overall -- were intended to disrupt and degrade the group's capabilities to threaten global trade. They were a response to more than 30 attacks on international and commercial vessels since mid-November and were the largest strikes since a similar coalition operation on January 11.

Such strikes against the Huthis "have the potential to deter them and to degrade them, but it's going to take many more strikes, and I think the U.S. is preparing for that," Katzman said. "You're not going to degrade their capabilities in one or two volleys or even several volleys, it's going to take months."

The Huthis have significant experience in riding out aerial strikes, having been under relentless bombardment by a Saudi-led military collation during the nine-year Yemeni civil war, in which fighting has ended owing to a UN-brokered cease-fire in early 2022 that the warring parties recommitted to in December.

"They weathered that pretty well," said Jeremy Binnie, a Middle East defense analyst with the global intelligence company Janes.

"On the battlefield, airpower can still be fairly decisive," Binnie said, noting that air strikes were critical in thwarting Huthi offensives during the Yemeni civil war. "But in terms of the Huthis' overall ability to weather the air campaign of the Saudi-led coalition, they did that fine, from their point of view."

Since the cease-fire, Binnie said, the situation may have changed somewhat as the Huthis built up their forces, with more advanced missiles and aging tanks -- a heavier presence that "might make them a bit more vulnerable."

"But I don't think they will, at the same time, have any problem reverting to a lighter force that is more resilient to air strikes as they have been in the past," Binnie said.

Both Binnie and Katzman suggested that the Huthis appear willing to sustain battlefield losses in pursuit of their aims, which makes the group difficult to deter from the air.

The Huthis have clearly displayed their intent on continuing to disrupt maritime shipping in the Red Sea, which they claim has targeted only vessels linked to Israel despite evidence to the contrary, until there is a cease-fire in the Gaza Strip.

This has brought the Huthis' complicated relationship with Iran under intense scrutiny.

'Axis Of Resistance'

The Huthis have established themselves as a potent element of Iran's so-called "axis of resistance" against Israel and the United States, as well as against Tehran's regional archrival, Saudi Arabia.

But analysts who spoke to RFE/RL widely dismissed the idea that the Huthis are a direct Iranian proxy, describing the relationship as more one of mutual benefit in which the Huthis can be belligerent and go beyond what Tehran wants them to.

While accused by Western states and UN experts of secretly shipping arms to the Huthis and other members of the axis of resistance, Iran has portrayed the loose-knit band of proxies and partners and militant groups as independent in their decision-making.

The grouping includes the Iran-backed Hamas -- the U.S. and EU designated terrorist group whose attack on Israel sparked the war in the Gaza Strip -- and Lebanese Hizballah -- a Iranian proxy and U.S. designated terrorist group that, like the Huthis, has launched strikes against Israel in defense of Hamas.

"The success of the axis of resistance ... is that since Tehran has either created or co-opted these groups, there is more often than not fusion rather than tension," between members of the network and Iran, explained Behnam Ben Taleblu, senior fellow at the Washington-based Foundation for Defense of Democracies think tank.

But the relationship is not simply about "Iran telling its proxies to jump and them saying how high," Taleblu said. "It’s about Iran’s ability to find and materially support those who are willing to or can be persuaded to shoot at those Tehran wants to shoot at."

Iran's interest in a certain axis member's success in a given area and its perception of how endangered that partner might be, could play a crucial role in Tehran's willingness to come to their defense, according to Taleblu.

Middle East observers who spoke to RFE/RL suggested that it would take a significant escalation -- an existential threat to Tehran itself or a proxy, like Lebanese Hizballah -- for Iran to become directly involved.

"The Islamic republic would react differently to the near eradication of Hizballah which it created, versus Hamas, which it co-opted," Taleblu said. "Context is key."

"Iran is doing what it feels it can to try to keep the United States at bay," Katzman said, singling out the missile strikes carried out on targets this month in Syria, Iraq, and Pakistan that were widely seen as a warning to Israel and the United States of Tehran's growing military capabilities. Iran is "trying to show support for the Huthis without getting dragged in."

Iran is believed to have members of its Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps on the ground in Yemen. Tehran also continues to be accused of delivering arms to the Huthis, and at the start of the year deployed a ship to the Gulf of Aden in a show of support for the Huthis before withdrawing it after the U.S.-led coalition launched strikes in Yemen on January 11.

"So, they are helping," Katzman said, "but I think they are trying to do it as quietly and as under the radar as possible.

A U.S.-led ground operation against the Huthis, if it came to that, could change Iran's calculations. "Then Iran might deploy forces to help them out," Katzman said.

This content originally appeared on News - Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty and was authored by News - Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty.

• The war in Ukraine will persist until the West realizes that a return to the previous world order is unattainable.
• In Iran, with parliamentary elections scheduled for March, the government is likely to face yet another challenge to its legitimacy.
• In Belarus, setbacks for Russia in Ukraine could prompt the Lukashenka regime to attempt to normalize relations with the West.
• While 2024 will see a rightward shift in the EU, it is unlikely to bring the deluge of populist victories that some are predicting.
• The vicious spiral for women in Afghanistan will only worsen.
• Peace between Armenia and its neighbors could set the stage for a Russian exit from the region.
• Hungary's upcoming leadership of the European Council could prove a stumbling block to the start of EU accession talks with Ukraine.
• Kyrgyzstan is on course to feel the pain of secondary sanctions over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine if the West's patience runs out.

Here, then, are our correspondents' predictions for 2024. To find out more about the authors themselves, click on their bylines.

The Ukraine War: A Prolonged Stalemate

By Vitaliy Portnikov

In September 2022, Ukrainian generals Valeriy Zaluzhniy and Mykhaylo Zabrodskiy presciently warned that Russia's aggression against Ukraine would unfold into a protracted conflict. Fast forward 15 months, and the front line is effectively frozen, with neither Ukrainian nor Russian offensives yielding substantial changes.

As 2023 comes to a close, observers find themselves revisiting themes familiar from the previous year: the potential for a major Ukrainian counteroffensive, the extent of Western aid to Kyiv, the possibility of a "frozen conflict,” security assurances for Ukraine, and the prospects for its Euro-Atlantic integration ahead of a NATO summit.

It is conceivable that, by the close of 2024, we will still be grappling with these same issues. A political resolution seems elusive, given the Kremlin's steadfast refusal to entertain discussions on vacating the parts of Ukraine its forces occupy. Conversely, Ukraine’s definition of victory is the full restoration of its territorial integrity.

Even if, in 2024, one side achieves a military victory -- whether through the liberation of part of Ukraine or Russia seizing control of additional regions -- it won't necessarily bring us closer to a political resolution. Acknowledging this impasse is crucial, as Russian President Vladimir Putin's assault on Ukraine is part of a broader agenda: a push to reestablish, if not the Soviet Empire, at least its sphere of influence.

For Ukraine, resistance to Russian aggression is about not just reclaiming occupied territories but also safeguarding statehood, political identity, and national integrity. Western support is crucial for Ukraine's survival and the restoration of its territorial integrity. However, this backing aims to avoid escalation into a direct conflict between Russia and the West on Russia's sovereign territory.

The war's conclusion seems contingent on the depletion of resources on one of the two sides, with Ukraine relying on continued Western support and Russia on oil and gas revenues. Hence, 2024 might echo the patterns of 2023. Even if external factors shift significantly -- such as in the U.S. presidential election in November -- we might not witness tangible changes until 2025.

Another potential variable is the emergence of major conflicts akin to the war in the Gaza Strip. Nevertheless, this would likely signify the dissipation of Western resources rather than a shift in approaches to war.

In essence, the war in Ukraine will persist until the West realizes that a return to the previous world order is unattainable. Constructing a new world order demands unconventional measures, such as offering genuine security guarantees to nations victimized by aggression or achieving peace, or at least limiting the zone of military operations to the current contact line, without direct agreements with Russia.

So far, such understanding is lacking, and the expectation that Moscow will eventually grasp the futility of its ambitions only emboldens Putin. Consequently, the conflict between Russia and Ukraine will endure, potentially spawning new, equally perilous local wars worldwide.

Iran: Problems Within And Without

By Hannah Kaviani

Iran has been dealing with complex domestic and international challenges for years and the same issues are likely to plague it in 2024. But officials in Tehran appear to be taking a “wait-and-see” approach to its lengthy list of multilayered problems.

Iran enters 2024 as Israel's war in Gaza continues and the prospects for a peaceful Middle East are bleak, with the situation exacerbated by militia groups firmly supported by Tehran.

Iran’s prominent role in supporting paramilitary forces in Iraq, Syria, and Yemen has also drawn the ire of the international community and will continue to be a thorn in the side of relations with the West.

Tehran has refused to cooperate with the UN’s International Atomic Energy Agency over its nuclear program, resulting in an impasse in talks with the international community. And with the United States entering an election year that could see the return of Donald Trump to the presidency, the likelihood of Tehran and Washington resuming negotiations -- which could lead to a reduction in sanctions -- is considered very low.

But Iran's problems are not limited to outside its borders.

The country’s clerical regime is still reeling from the massive protests that began in 2022 over the death of Mahsa Amini in police custody after her arrest for not obeying hijab rules. The aftershocks of the Women, Life, Freedom movement that emanated from her death were reflected in acts of civil disobedience that are likely to continue in 2024.

At the same time, a brutal crackdown continues as civil rights activists, students, religious minorities, and artists are being beaten, detained, and/or given harsh prison sentences.

With parliamentary elections scheduled for March, the government is likely to face yet another challenge to its legitimacy as it struggles with low voter turnout and general disinterest in another round of controlled elections.

Another critical issue Iranian officials must continue to deal with in 2024 is the devastated economy resulting from the slew of international sanctions because of its controversial nuclear program. After a crushing year of 47 percent inflation in 2023 (a 20-year high, according to the IMF), costs are expected to continue to rise for many foods and commodities, as well as real estate.

Iran’s widening budget deficit due to reduced oil profits continues to cripple the economy, with the IMF reporting that the current government debt is equal to three annual budgets.

With neither the international community nor the hard-line Tehran regime budging, most analysts see scant chances for significant changes in Iran in the coming year.

Belarus: Wider War Role, Integration With Russia Not In The Cards

By Valer Karbalevich

Belarus has been pulled closer into Moscow’s orbit than ever by Russia’s war in Ukraine -- but in 2024, it’s unlikely to be subsumed into the much larger nation to its east, and chances are it won’t step up its so-far limited involvement in the conflict in the country to its south.

The most probable scenario in Belarus, where the authoritarian Alyaksandr Lukashenka will mark 30 years since he came to power in 1994, is more of the same: No letup in pressure on all forms of dissent at home, no move to send troops to Ukraine. And while Russia’s insistent embrace will not loosen, the Kremlin will abstain from using Belarusian territory for any new ground attacks or bombardments of Ukraine.

But the war in Ukraine is a wild card, the linchpin influencing the trajectory of Belarus in the near term and beyond. For the foreseeable future, what happens in Belarus -- or to it -- will depend in large part on what happens in Russia’s assault on Ukraine.

Should the current equilibrium on the front persist and Western support for Ukraine persist, the likelihood is a continuation of the status quo for Belarus. The country will maintain its allegiance to Russia, marked by diplomatic and political support. Bolstered by Russian loans, Belarus's defense industry will further expand its output.

The Belarusian state will continue to militarize the border with Ukraine, posing a perpetual threat to Kyiv and diverting Ukrainian troops from the eastern and southern fronts. At the same time, however, Russia is unlikely to use Belarusian territory as a launching point for fresh assaults on Ukraine, as it did at the start of the full-scale invasion in 2022.

If Russia wins or scores substantial victories -- if Ukraine is forced into negotiations on Moscow’s terms, for example, or the current front line comes to be considered the international border -- Lukashenka, consolidating his position within the country, will reap "victory dividends." But relations between Belarus and Russia are unlikely to change dramatically.

Potentially, Moscow could take major steps to absorb Belarus, diminishing its sovereignty and transforming its territory into a staging ground for a fresh assault on Kyiv. This would increase tensions with the West and heighten concerns about the tactical nuclear weapons Moscow and Minsk say Russia has transferred to Belarus. However, this seems unlikely due to the absence of military necessity for Moscow and the problems it could create on the global stage.

The loss of Belarusian sovereignty would pose a major risk for Lukashenka and his regime. An overwhelming majority of Belarusians oppose the direct involvement of Belarus in the war against Ukraine. This fundamental distinction sets Belarus apart from Russia, and bringing Belarus into the war could trigger a political crisis in Belarus -- an outcome Moscow would prefer to avoid.

If Russia loses the war or sustains significant defeats that weaken Putin, Lukashenka's regime may suffer economic and political repercussions. This could prompt him to seek alternative global alliances, potentially leading to an attempt to normalize relations with the West.

Russia, Ukraine, And The West: Sliding Toward World War III

By Sergei Medvedev

2024 will be a critical year for the war in Ukraine and for the entire international system, which is quickly unraveling before our eyes. The most crucial of many challenges is a revanchist, resentful, belligerent Russia, bent on destroying and remaking the world order. In his mind, President Vladimir Putin is fighting World War III, and Ukraine is a prelude to a global showdown.

Despite Western sanctions, Russia has consolidated its position militarily, domestically, and internationally in 2023. After setbacks and shocks in 2022, the military has stabilized the front and addressed shortages of arms, supplies, and manpower. Despite latent discontent, the population is not ready to question the war, preferring to stay in the bubble of learned ignorance and the lies of state propaganda.

Here are four scenarios for 2024:

Strategic stalemate in Ukraine, chaos in the international system: The West, relaxed by a 30-year “peace dividend,” lacks the vision and resolve of the 1980s, when its leaders helped bring about the U.S.S.R.’s collapse, let alone the courage of those who stood up to Nazi Germany in World War II. Putin’s challenge to the free world is no less significant than Hitler’s was, but there is no Roosevelt or Churchill in sight. Probability: 70 percent

Widening war, collapse or division of Ukraine: Russia could defend and consolidate its gains in Ukraine, waging trench warfare while continuing to destroy civilian infrastructure, and may consider a side strike in Georgia or Moldova -- or against Lithuania or Poland, testing NATO. A frontal invasion is less likely than a hybrid operation by “unidentified” units striking from Belarus, acts of sabotage, or unrest among Russian-speakers in the Baltic states. Other Kremlin operations could occur anywhere in the world. The collapse of Ukraine’s government or the division of the country could not be ruled out. Probability: 15 percent.

Russia loses in Ukraine: A military defeat for Russia, possibly entailing a partial or complete withdrawal from Ukraine. Consistent Western support and expanded supplies of arms, like F-16s or Abrams tanks, or a big move such as closing the skies over Ukraine, could provide for this outcome. It would not necessarily entail Russia’s collapse -- it could further consolidate the nation around Putin’s regime. Russia would develop a resentful identity grounded in loss and defeat -- and harbor the idea of coming back with a vengeance. Probability: 10 percent

Russia’s Collapse: A military defeat in Ukraine could spark social unrest, elite factional battles, and an anti-Putin coup, leading to his demotion or violent death. Putin’s natural death, too, could set off a succession struggle, causing chaos in a country he has rid of reliable institutions. While breakup into many regions is unlikely, the empire could crumble at the edges -- Kaliningrad, Chechnya, the Far East – like in 1917 and 1991. Russia’s nuclear weapons would be a big question mark, leading to external involvement and possible de-nuclearization. For all its perils, this scenario might provide a framework for future statehood in Northern Eurasia. Probability: 5 percent

EU: 'Fortress Europe' And The Ukraine War

By Rikard Jozwiak

2024 will see a rightward shift in the European Union, but it is unlikely to bring the deluge of populist victories that some are predicting since Euroskeptics won national elections in the Netherlands, Poland, and Slovakia and polled well in Austria and Germany.

The European Parliament elections in June will be the ultimate test for the bloc in that respect. Polls still suggest the two main political groups, the center-right European People's Party and the center-left Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats, will finish on top, albeit with a smaller share of the vote. But right-wing populist parties are likely to fail once again to agree on the creation of a single political group, thus eroding their influence in Brussels.

This, in turn, is likely to prod more pro-European groups into combining forces again to divvy up EU top jobs like the presidencies of the European Commission, the bloc's top executive body, and the European Council, which defines the EU's political direction and priorities. Center-right European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen is widely tipped to get a second term, even though she might fancy NATO's top job as secretary-general. Charles Michel, on the other hand, will definitely be out as European Council president after serving the maximum five years.

While right-wing populists may not wield major influence in the horse-trading for those top jobs, they will affect policy going forward. They have already contributed to a hardening of attitudes on migration, and you can expect to hear more of the term "fortress Europe" as barriers go up on the EU's outer border.

The biggest question for 2024, however, is about how much support Brussels can provide Ukraine going forward. Could the "cost-of-living crisis" encourage members to side with Budapest to block financial aid or veto the start of de facto accession talks with that war-torn country? The smart money is still on the EU finding a way to green-light both those decisions in 2024, possibly by unfreezing more EU funds for Budapest.

Although it seems like a remote possibility, patience could also finally wear out with Hungary, and the other 26 members could decide to strip it of voting rights in the Council of the European Union, which amends, approves, and vetoes European Commission proposals -- essentially depriving it of influence. In that respect, Austria and Slovakia, Budapest's two biggest allies right now, are the EU countries to watch.

The one surefire guarantee in Europe isn't about the European Union at all but rather about NATO: After somehow failing to join as predicted for each of the past two years, against the backdrop of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Sweden will become the transatlantic military alliance's 32nd member once the Turkish and Hungarian parliaments vote to ratify its accession protocol.

Caucasus: A Peace Agreement Could Be Transformative

By Josh Kucera

Could 2024 be the year that Armenia and Azerbaijan finally formally resolve decades of conflict?

This year, Azerbaijan effectively decided -- by force -- their most contentious issue: the status of the disputed territory of Nagorno-Karabakh. With its lightning offensive in September, Azerbaijan placed Karabakh firmly under its control. Both sides now say they've reached agreement on most of their fundamental remaining issues, and diplomatic talks, after an interruption, appear set to resume.

A resolution of the conflict could transform the region. If Armenia and Azerbaijan made peace, a Turkish-Armenian rapprochement could soon follow. Borders between the three countries would reopen as a result, ending Armenia's long geographical isolation and priming the South Caucasus to take full advantage of new transportation projects seeking to ship cargo between Europe and Asia while bypassing Russia.

Peace between Armenia and its neighbors also could set the stage for a Russian exit from the region. Russian-Armenian security cooperation has been predicated on potential threats from Azerbaijan and Turkey. With those threats reduced, what's keeping the Russian soldiers, peacekeepers, and border guards there?

A Russian exit would be a messy process -- Moscow still holds many economic levers in Armenia -- but Yerevan could seek help from the United States and Europe to smooth any transition. Washington and Brussels have seemingly been waiting in the wings, nudging Armenia in their direction.

But none of this is likely to happen without a peace agreement. And while there don't seem to be any unresolvable issues remaining, there are mounting indications that Azerbaijan may not see it in its interests to make peace. Baku has gotten what it wanted most of all -- full control of Karabakh -- without an agreement. And maintaining a simmering conflict with Armenia could arguably serve Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev well, as it would allow him to continue to lean on a reliable source of public support: rallying against an Armenian enemy.

But perhaps the most conspicuous indication of a broader strategy is Aliyev's increasing invocation of "Western Azerbaijan" -- a hazily defined concept alluding to ethnic Azerbaijanis who used to live on the territory of what is now Armenia and their presumed right to return to their homes. It suggests that Azerbaijan might keep furthering its demands in hopes that Armenia finally throws in the towel, and each can accuse the other of intransigence.

Hungary: The Return Of Big Brother?

By Pablo Gorondi

Critics might be tempted to believe that Big Brother will be watching over Hungarians in 2024 like at no point since the fall of communism.

A new law on the Defense of National Sovereignty will allow the Office for the Defense of Sovereignty, which the law created, to investigate and request information from almost any group in Hungary that receives foreign funding. This will apply to civic groups, political parties, private businesses, media companies -- in fact, anyone deemed to be conducting activities (including "information manipulation and disinformation") in the interests of a foreign "body, organization, or person."

The law has been criticized by experts from the United Nations and the Council of Europe over its seemingly vague language, lack of judicial oversight, and fears that it could be used by the government "to silence and stigmatize independent voices and opponents."

The head of the Office for the Defense of Sovereignty should be nominated for a six-year term by right-wing Prime Minister Viktor Orban and appointed by President Katalin Novak by February 1. This would allow the new authority to carry out investigations and present findings ahead of simultaneous elections to the European Parliament and Hungarian municipal bodies in early June -- possibly influencing their outcomes.

Asked by RFE/RL's Hungarian Service, some experts said fears of the new authority are overblown and that the government is more likely to use it as a threat hanging over opponents than as a direct tool for repression -- at least until it finds it politically necessary or expedient to tighten control.

On the international scene, meanwhile, Hungary will take over the Council of the European Union's six-month rotating presidency in July, a few weeks after voting to determine the composition of a new European Parliament.

MEPs from Orban's Fidesz party exited the center-right European People's Party bloc in 2021 and have not joined another group since then, although some observers expect them to join the more Euroskeptic and nationalist European Conservatives and Reformists.

Orban has for years predicted a breakthrough of more radical right-wing forces in Europe. But while that has happened in Italy, the Netherlands, and Slovakia, experts suggest that's not enough to fuel a significant shift in the European Parliament, where the center-right and center-left should continue to hold a clear majority.

Because of the June elections, the European Parliament's activities will initially be limited -- and its election of a European Commission president could prove complicated. Nevertheless, Orban has said in recent interviews that he wants to "fix the European Union" and that "we need to take over Brussels." So, Hungary's leadership may make progress difficult on issues that Orban opposes, like the start of EU accession talks with Ukraine or a possible reelection bid by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.

Stability And The 'Serbian World'

By Gjeraqina Tuhina and Milos Teodorovic

Serbia, once again, will be a key player in the region -- and its moves could significantly shape events in the Balkans over the next 12 months.

For over a decade, the dialogue to normalize relations between Serbia and its former province Kosovo has stymied both countries. Then, in February in Brussels and March in Ohrid, North Macedonia, European mediators announced a path forward and its implementation. There was only one problem: There was no signature on either side. Nine months later, little has changed.

Many eyes are looking toward one aspect in particular -- a renewed obligation for Pristina to allow for an "appropriate level of self-management" for the Serb minority in Kosovo. This also entails creating possibilities for financial support from Serbia to Kosovar Serbs and guarantees for direct communication of the Serb minority with the Kosovar government.

In October, EU mediators tried again, and with German, French, and Italian backing presented both parties with a new draft for an association of Serb-majority municipalities. Both sides accepted the draft. EU envoy to the region Miroslav Lajcak suggested in December that the Ohrid agreement could be implemented by the end of January. If that happened, it would mark a decisive step for both sides in a dialogue that began in 2011.

"The Serbian world" is a phrase launched a few years ago by pro-Russian Serbian politician Aleksandar Vulin, a longtime cabinet minister who until recently headed the Serbian Intelligence Service. It is not officially part of the agenda of either Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic or the government, but it underscores the influence that Serbia seeks to wield from Kosovo and Montenegro to Republika Srpska in Bosnia-Herzegovina. But how Vucic chooses to exert the implicit ties to Serb leaders and nationalists in those countries could do much to promote stability -- or its antithesis -- in the Balkans in 2024.

Another major challenge for Vucic revolves around EU officials' request that candidate country Serbia harmonize its foreign policy with the bloc. So far, along with Turkey, Serbia is the only EU candidate that has not introduced sanctions on Russia since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. It is unclear how far the Serbian president is willing to push back to foster ongoing good relations with Moscow.

But first, Serbia will have to confront the fallout from snap elections in December dominated by Vucic's Serbian Progressive Party but rejected by the newly united opposition as fraudulent. The results sparked nightly protests in the capital and hunger strikes by a half-dozen lawmakers and other oppositionists. A new parliament is scheduled to hold a session by the end of January 2024, and the margins are seemingly razor-thin for control of the capital, Belgrade.

Central Asia: Don't Write Russia Off Just Yet

By Chris Rickleton

Will the empire strike back? 2023 has been a galling year for Russia in Central Asia as it watched its traditional partners (and former colonies) widen their diplomatic horizons.

With Russia bogged down in a grueling war in Ukraine, Moscow has less to offer the region than ever before. Central Asia’s five countries have made the most of the breathing space, with their leaders holding landmark talks with U.S. and German leaders as French President Emmanuel Macron also waltzed into Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan with multibillion-dollar investments.

And China has reinforced its dominant position in the region, while Turkey has also increased its influence.

But don’t write Russia off just yet.

One of Moscow’s biggest wins in the neighborhood this year was an agreement to supply Uzbekistan with nearly 3 billion cubic meters of gas every year, a figure that could increase.

Power deficits in Uzbekistan and energy-rich Kazakhstan are the most obvious short-term sources of leverage for Moscow over those important countries.

The coming year will likely bring more in terms of specifics over both governments’ plans for nuclear power production, with Russia fully expected to be involved.

And Moscow’s confidence in a region that it views as its near abroad will only increase if it feels it is making headway on the battlefield in Ukraine.

Tajikistan

Tajikistan’s hereditary succession has been expected for so long that people have stopped expecting it. Does that mean it is back on the cards for 2024? Probably not.

In 2016, Tajikistan passed a raft of constitutional changes aimed at cementing the ruling Rahmon family’s hold on power. Among them was one lowering the age to run for president from 35 to 30.

That amendment had an obvious beneficiary -- veteran incumbent Emomali Rahmon’s upwardly mobile son, Rustam Emomali. But Emomali is now 36 and, despite occupying a political post that makes him next in line, doesn’t look any closer to becoming numero uno.

Perhaps there hasn’t been a good time to do it.

From the coronavirus pandemic to a bloody crackdown on unrest in the Gorno-Badakhshan region and now the shadows cast by the Ukraine war, there have been plenty of excuses to delay the inevitable.

Turkmenistan

But perhaps Rahmon is considering events in Turkmenistan, where Central Asia’s first father-son power transition last year has ended up nothing of the sort. Rather than growing into the role, new President Serdar Berdymukhammedov is shrinking back into the shadow of his all-powerful father, Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov.

And this seems to be exactly how the older Berdymukhammedov wanted it, subsequently fashioning himself a post-retirement post that makes his son and the rest of the government answerable to him.

But Turkmenistan’s bizarre new setup begs a question: If you’re not ready to let it go, why not hold on a little longer?

Kyrgyzstan/Kazakhstan

Writing on X (formerly Twitter) in November, a former IMF economist argued that Kyrgyzstan would be the "perfect test case" for secondary sanctions over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Robin Brooks described the country as "small, not remotely systemically important, and very clearly facilitating trade diversion to Russia."

Official statistics show that countries in the Eurasian Economic Union that Moscow leads have become a “backdoor” around the Western-led sanctions targeting Russia. Exports to Kyrgyzstan from several EU countries this year, for example, are up by at least 1,000 percent compared to 2019.

Data for exports to Kazakhstan shows similar patterns -- with larger volumes but gentler spikes -- while investigations by RFE/RL indicate that companies in both Central Asian countries have forwarded “dual-use” products that benefit the Kremlin’s military machine.

Belarus is the only Russian ally to get fully sanctioned for its support of Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine -- but will that change in 2024?

Central Asian governments will argue they have resisted Russian pressure to provide political and military support for the war. They might even whisper that their big friend China is much more helpful to Russia.

But the West’s approach of targeting only Central Asian companies actively flouting the regime is failing.

So, while Western diplomats continue to credit the region’s governments for their anti-evasion efforts, their patience may wear out. And if it does, Kyrgyzstan might be first to find out.

Afghanistan: The Vicious Spiral Will Worsen

By Malali Bashir

With little internal threat to Afghanistan’s Taliban regime and the failure of the international community to affect change in the hard-line Islamist regime’s policies, the Taliban mullahs’ control over the country continues to tighten.

And that regime’s continued restrictions on Afghan women -- their rights, freedom, and role in society -- signals a bleak future for them in 2024 and beyond.

Many observers say the move by the Taliban in December to only allow girls to attend religious madrasahs -- after shutting down formal schooling for them following the sixth grade -- is an effort by the Taliban to radicalize Afghan society.

“Madrasahs are not an alternative to formal schooling because they don’t produce doctors, lawyers, journalists, engineers, etc. The idea of [only] having madrasahs is…about brainwashing [people] to create an extremist society,” says Shukria Barakzai, the former Afghan ambassador to Norway.

The crackdown on women’s rights by the Taliban will also continue the reported uptick in domestic violence in the country, activists say.

Since the Taliban shut down Afghanistan’s Independent Human Rights Commission and Women Affairs Ministry, women find themselves with nowhere to turn to and find it extremely difficult to seek justice in Taliban courts.

With no justice for victims of abuse on the horizon, women’s rights activists say violence against women will continue with no repercussions for the perpetrators.

Barakzai argues that Taliban officials have already normalized domestic violence and do not consider it a crime.

“According to [a Taliban] decree, you can [confront] women if they are not listening to [your requests]. Especially a male member of the family is allowed to use all means to punish women if they refuse to follow his orders. That is basically a call for domestic violence,” she said.

The vicious spiral for women will only worsen.

Being banned from education, work, and public life, Afghan women say the resulting psychological impact leads to panic, depression, and acute mental health crises.

Although there are no official figures, Afghan mental health professionals and foreign organizations have noted a disturbing surge in female suicides in the two years since the Taliban came to power.

"If we look at the women who were previously working or studying, 90 percent suffer from mental health issues now," said Mujeeb Khpalwak, a psychiatrist in Kabul. "They face tremendous economic uncertainty after losing their work and are very anxious about their future."

Heather Bar, associate director of the women's rights division at Human Rights Watch, says, "It's not surprising that we're hearing reports of Afghan girls committing suicide. Because all their rights, including going to school, university, and recreational places have been taken away from them."

Promising young Afghan women who once aspired to contribute to their communities after pursuing higher education now find themselves with no career prospects.

“I do not see any future. When I see boys continuing their education, I lose all hope and wish that I was not born a girl,” a former medical student in Kabul told RFE/RL's Radio Azadi.

Despite immense global pressure, the Taliban seems adamant about maintaining its severe limits on women and reducing their role in society. This will result in a tragic future for the women of Afghanistan with no relief in sight.

This content originally appeared on News - Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty and was authored by News - Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty.

Government officials in China, Cambodia and at least two dozen other countries have targeted journalists in exile, trying to stop them from reporting in a critical manner about their home countries, the report said.

Since 2014, Freedom House has documented 112 incidents by 26 governments – to include kidnappings, physical assaults and assassination attempts – against journalists working in other countries. That figure likely only represents a fraction of the true total, given that many episodes are unreported and conclusively verifying perpetrators is difficult, the report states.

One journalist in exile, Elena Kostyuchenko, who has for years reported on inhumane practices of the Russian government, was hospitalized in Berlin because of suspected poisoning. 

The apparent attack on her, as well as assaults against other journalists, are cited in the report.

Authorities from China, Cambodia and other governments have threatened and stalked journalists in the U.S., the report stated. In some cases, the foreign authorities have doxxed the reporters or engaged in smear campaigns against them in an attempt to stop their coverage of their home countries or at least mute the impact of their journalism.

The goal is often to crush opposing points of view in order to maintain control over citizens living abroad and shape the narratives about their nations. This hardline method is known in the West as transnational repression.

Crushing dissent abroad

The effort of President Xi Jinping and other officials in Beijing to shape the world’s view of China has been underway for years. 

Case studies included in the report illustrate the phenomenon: Chinese government authorities have detained and harassed family members of U.S.-based Uyghur journalists who are reporting on human-rights violations in Xinjiang. The report alleges that Chinese authorities detain the family members in order to put pressure on the exiled journalists so they will stop writing stories deemed critical of Chinese policies.

Officials who work for the Chinese government say accusations that it is trying to silence journalists outside of the country are baseless. 

“China firmly opposes the false narrative of ‘transnational repression,’” wrote Liu Pengyu, the spokesman for the Chinese Embassy in Washington, in an email to RFA. “We urge the related organization to abandon its Cold War mentality and stop the smears and attacks against China.” 

In another example included in the report, journalist Mahammad Mirzali, based in France, had for some time received online threats but continued writing about his home country, Azerbaijan, on a blog. Then, in 2021, he was attacked by a group of men wielding knives. The assailants, wrote the authors of the Freedom House report, may have been sent by the Azerbaijani government.

In addition, a U.S.-based journalist from Cambodia said he worries he is being spied on. In this uneasy atmosphere, the journalist, Taing Sarada, a former RFA employee who currently works for The Cambodia Daily, said he also has concerns about his physical safety.

Officials from the Cambodian Embassy in Washington did not immediately comment on the findings of the Freedom House report. 

Journalists fight back

The report stated that fake social-media accounts have been created, imitating real-life accounts of journalists, in an effort to discredit these individuals and their reporting. The methods of the authoritarian governments can have a chilling effect on those journalists working in the U.S, according to the report, causing some reporters to mute their accounts or to step away from journalism entirely.

Yet others have been emboldened by the authoritarian government campaigns to control their reporting.

“There’s a huge amount of strength among the journalists who continue to fight for the truth, which is what their governments back home most fear,”  Jessica White, one of the report’s co-authors, said. 

One of the journalists featured in the report, Gulchehra Hoja, a Uyghur American journalist who works for RFA, said that her relatives are being held in internment camps in China. This has not stopped her from reporting on the activities of the Chinese government. 

“It encouraged me to work more,” said Hoja, referring to the tactics of the Chinese authorities. Hoja said that the strong-arm efforts of the Chinese officials have only fueled her desire “to find out what the Chinese government is really doing, and to show to the world.”

Edited by Jim Snyder

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By Tara McKelvey for RFA.

We get an update from Avril Benoît, executive director of Doctors Without Borders, on the humanitarian crisis in Gaza and violence hospitals are facing in the occupied West Bank. Israeli troops shot dead two Palestinian children Wednesday during a raid on the Jenin refugee camp, and medical workers say they were blocked from reaching the camp to treat the wounded. “Under humanitarian law, anyone should be able to reach a hospital,” says Benoît, who is demanding a “proper ceasefire” in the region to allow medical aid to reach people devastated by Israel’s war. She says the prospect of Israel resuming its bombardment of Gaza, including in the south where people were ordered to move, would be “a horror show.”

This content originally appeared on Democracy Now! and was authored by Democracy Now!.

Gaza’s two largest hospitals are under a complete siege by Israeli forces and no longer functioning. Palestinian health officials have also accused Israel of using snipers to shoot at people inside Al-Shifa Hospital, where thousands of displaced Palestinians have sought refuge. Israel has claimed Hamas runs a command center below the hospital, though this has been denied by hospital staff and Israel has not publicly released any evidence behind the claim. Dr. Fadel Naim of Al-Ahli al-Arabi Hospital says surgeons are forced to operate in hospital corridors with limited anesthetic supplies. “Unfortunately, we couldn’t help many of these patients. Many of them died because we couldn’t do anything for them.” We also hear from Dr. Tanya Haj-Hassan, a pediatric intensive care physician with Doctors Without Borders who has worked in Gaza and the West Bank. She is a co-founder of the social media account Gaza Medic Voices. “Anyone who tries to leave the hospital is targeted,” says Haj-Hassan. “We have descended into a very dark era for humanity.”

This content originally appeared on Democracy Now! and was authored by Democracy Now!.

Jeff Halper with his book War against the People.

In 2012, at a border security conference I attended in El Paso, Israeli brigadier general Roei Elkabetz gave a PowerPoint presentation to a large group of border industry insiders and border officials, including uniformed Border Patrol agents, about how Israel approaches border enforcement, with an array of walls and “smart” surveillance technologies. “We learned lots from Gaza,” the brigadier general said. “It’s a great laboratory.”

A few years later, I visited Israel to look further into its homeland security industry, which is on the world’s cutting edge. Population control, as anthropologist, author, and political activist Jeff Halper says in the below interview, has become Israel’s niche in a global enforcement regime, which includes border control. I first met Halper in 2016, when I interviewed him at his home in Jerusalem—where he has lived for 50 years and is a dual citizen of both Israel and the United States.

And now—with the ongoing atrocities in Gaza, Israel’s long-standing siege on the territory, the killing of 1,400 Israelis by the Palestinian militant and political organization Hamas, and the bombing and killing of nearly 6,000 Palestinians by the Israeli Defense Forces—I asked Halper for an interview. I wanted to look at this conflict from a different angle, to see how it connects with increasing border enforcement around the world, including on the U.S.-Mexico border.

Halper is the director of the Israeli Committee against House Demolitions and the author of War against the People: Israel, Palestine, and Global Pacification. He is also cofounder of the One Democratic State Campaign. In this interview Halper offers an original and important perspective that both challenges established narratives and broadens the analytic scope of what this conflict means.

I want to view the events in Gaza through the analysis you offer in War against the People. So, first, can you tell us about the central thesis of the book? What do you mean by “war against the people”?

I begin with the question How does Israel get away with it? In terms of colonizing Palestine. Here you have Israel, which conquers, takes over Palestine. It drives out three-fourths of the Palestinian people. In 1967, it imposes an occupation over the rest of Palestine that it hadn’t conquered in 1948. Sets up an apartheid regime. It settles the whole country in violation of international law. And gets away with it. How?

And what I say in the book is that international politics is transactional. There’s no value, no ideology today. Trump was the epitome of this. There are no real alliances. There are no principles. Even though Biden talks about human rights and about how we have to live by the rules of international law, there aren’t such things that hold back powerful governments. It’s all transactional. Short term. What is my immediate advantage? How do I lever my power and get what I want? And “deal” (this is the Trump word) with other powerful parties that have what I want?

In this kind of global system, Israel plays two major roles. One of them is, it becomes an enforcer of the system for the major political players, especially the G7 but not only those countries. Israel also has relations with Russia and with China.

The other one I put in the framework of global capitalism. From the 1970s, the last 50 years, as this neoliberal system has taken over all the world economy—there’s no more socialist countries (China is a state capitalist system)—it’s the only system. It’s saturated all possible markets. It can’t expand. So what it has to do is turn inward. It begins to exploit internally. And then, with no regulation, there is a rise of a super-rich class, the Musks and the Gates and all the billionaires. The capitalist system has always promised you a happier life, especially for the middle class, upward mobility, and a house, and job security, and Ronald McDonald’s shining face. And all of a sudden, it’s becoming repressive. The rest of the world won’t have the standard of living we do. In this system, you need enforcement. Because not only the poor people of the world, but also the middle classes of the Global North, our kids, will not have the standard of living that we do. Now you have the Occupy movement, all kinds of Global South movements. So it has to be more repressive.

The big powers aren’t built for repressing populations. The Pentagon builds F-35s, nuclear submarines, thermodynamic missile systems, not the kinds of weapons you need for population control. The Pentagon is geared toward conventional warfare, not population control. And that’s Israel’s niche, because it has perfected all this on the Palestinians over the last century.

So it has the technologies of repression—we see it now in Gaza. And it has the strategies of population control that most other Western developed countries don’t have. And the experience of boots on the group for a century. So that’s one level, where Israel becomes the enforcer of global capitalism. In a very real way. Not alone, of course, but it becomes the leading force in population control.

This is a homeland security convention I attended in Tel Aviv in 2016. On display is an unmanned ground vehicle, similar to those patrolling along the Gaza border wall. Photo: Todd Miller.

And this leads to the emphasis on border control?

Yes, that’s where you get to the Mexican border, migration, and link that to crime. So Israel has two or three academies training the U.S. police—one is in Atlanta, another one is in Arizona. This niche for population control is what I call security politics. It’s military and security and surveillance prowess put in support of its occupation and what it does. And this is how Israel gets away with it. You see it very clearly with Biden coming to Israel.

In a transactional, international system like that, it’s only the powerful that matter, if you don’t have resources, like the Palestinians don’t, or you don’t have any kind of financial power or political clout, like the Palestinians don’t, or if you are not geopolitically placed in a strategic location, like the Palestinians aren’t, you’re not at the table. You’ve got nothing, nothing to bargain. And so oppressed peoples all over the world like the Palestinians are completely shut out of the political game.

Could you say that Israeli technology is not only being tested and developed on the Palestinians, but that it is also developing and selling a security apparatus?

And a border apparatus.

Yes, that’s what I’m getting at. So how does this apply to not only the U.S.-Mexico border but a world of borders everywhere? Especially with an increasing number of people on the move?

There’s borders throughout the world. Europe has the most concentrated number of borders. Israel has been very involved with that. It’s not only the type of fencing that Israel has developed, certain types of barbed wire and other kinds of sensors. They have what’s called the Rafael system, which is the automatic surveying and firing system. You don’t need soldiers. You can just fire. Or you could have soldiers back home in Texas, in Athens, wherever you are, patrolling the border with these towers, with sensors, surveillance equipment, and machine guns. There are all kinds of border systems. It’s true that what we call the “walls” or “fences” are really systems. Israel is involved in that very much in Europe. But also Israel is involved in India, which is building a wall with Kashmir and with Pakistan.

In other words, wherever there is a border against immigrants or against infiltrators of any kind, Israel is the place to go to. This is one of its specialties. That is certainly a part of population control. Israel has about 600 checkpoints in the West Bank. And it’s developed everything from biometrics and biotechnology that can read eyes and do facial recognition. This is all in War against the People. They have all these surveillance systems that they sell to cities—Safe City systems, they’re called. Israel specializes in magnetic cards and chips on people, so they can monitor them.

In their bodies?

Some do. But what is more common is magnetic cards. They go through and they’re tracked. And that has to do with population movement, and again this idea of fortress Europe, fortress Global North, against the Global South.

This is a slide Jeff Halper shared with me from one of his PowerPoint presentations. It shows the Israeli export of surveillance technology and weapons around the world.

Do you see Israel playing a part, as you were mentioning, as an enforcer of a global system or status quo? Especially in terms of border control and people on the move?

Israel is not the only player. There are other technological companies and systems. But Israel, I think, is the one that has kind of put it together, a coherent system when it comes to population control. Each technology—robotics and biometrics or security systems or surveillance systems. There are other companies that make those products too. But it all kind of comes together in the Israeli system. Israel is able to take these technologies—some that it’s developed, some that has been developed elsewhere, and apply them specifically to population control, population movement. Since that is its focus. Other companies might do biometrics or security, but not with the same political intent. Other companies might do airport security or unlock cell phones, but Israel puts it all together and creates an industry that has to do with population control. And that, I think, is its niche.

Given all that you’ve shared with me today and your thesis in War against the People, how would you interpret what is happening in Gaza?

In a way, it’s sort of like Frankenstein’s monster turns on its creator. The Occupied Territories are a laboratory. They’re a huge laboratory where Israel can perfect all these weapons systems, surveillance systems, and technologies. It helps that you have workers coming into Israel. At the checkpoints, all these companies are creating all kinds of security systems, whether it’s biometrics or facial recognition or chips. They have 120,000 Palestinians going through checkpoints every day. They have a whole laboratory there.

Israel needs a controlled conflict. It doesn’t help in a way if the Occupied Territories of the Palestinians are silent. The guinea pigs got to start running around. Israel doesn’t just tolerate but instigates or exploits uprisings, whether it’s in the Jenin refugee camp or an intifada, or what has been happening in Gaza all these years. And this has been documented, in every major attack on Gaza. It’s used weaponry that has never been used before. It’s being tested in a Gazan laboratory. Like all kinds of new drones that Israel is developing. Israel is world’s leader in exporting drones. Gaza is perfect place for this.

But why now? Why didn’t Israel destroy Hamas the last six times it attacked Gaza? Thinking back to 2008 and even before. Why now? And I think that until now Israel was able—look, Israel developed the Iron Dome system, which it’s exporting all over the place. It couldn’t have done it without Gaza. Gaza was the most conflictual part, there was a conflict there, but it was controlled and used by Israel as its laboratory to develop these weapons. Military people always say the enemy is also smart and doing their own learning, doing their own part, figuring things out. I think in this last attack, first of all the Israeli army was humiliated. Killing 1,400 Israelis is a huge thing. And Hamas has developed urban warfare technologies that Israel is surprised by. I think what happened this time is that there was a constellation of which the controlled, contained conflict went out of control. And then got to the point that Frankenstein’s monster turned on its creator.

This interview first ran on The Border Chronicle.

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This content originally appeared on CounterPunch.org and was authored by Todd Miller.

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An Italian Coast Guard boat on the island of Samos, Greece. The light in the background is from the new “controlled access center,” aka refugee camp on the island. Photo: Lauren Markham.

In the early morning on June 14, 47 nautical miles from the coast of Pylos, Greece, a fishing boat packed with about 700 passengers sank into the water. The boat carried people from Pakistan, Egypt, Syria, Afghanistan, and Palestine, many who were asylum seekers. One hundred and four of them have been rescued, leaving the anticipated death toll near a staggering 600, which would make this one of the deadliest tragedies ever recorded in the Mediterranean.

In the following conversation, Lauren Markham, author of The Far Away Brothers: Two Young Migrants and the Making of an American Life, explains how this shipwreck fits into and needs to be understood within a larger historical context. Since 2014, 27,629 migrants have gone missing in the Mediterranean, according to the International Organization for Migration. And that is an undercount. As Mussie Zerai recently told the CBC, the Mediterranean is a “big, open sea of graves.”

The U.S.-Mexico borderlands have also been referred to as a land of open graves, which is the title of a great book by anthropologist Jason De León about U.S. deterrence policies.

Here, Markham discusses how the EU uses similar strategies and demonstrates how they led to the tragedy. From there, she gives a wider panorama of the event, unlike anything you’ll find elsewhere, drawing from extensive reporting she’s done over the years from Greece and research and thinking she’s done for her forthcoming book A Map of Future Ruins: On Borders and Belonging. In the book (out next spring!), she examines Greek border and immigration policies (as she explains below), but it’s also a meditative and philosophical treatise that examines her own Greek ancestry and migration story, and the importance of the stories we tell about borders and people on the move, and how they become oracles that predict the future.

The recent shipwreck is a gutting tragedy—one of those losses of such epic proportions that it both makes the blood boil and bends the brain and empties out a cavern in your chest. It’s one of the deadliest crashes in recent history. And it absolutely could have, and should have, been prevented.

As in the U.S., the EU uses immigration deterrence strategies that only succeed in pushing people into more deadly territory and more perilous crossings. The ship was headed to Italy but had been blown into Greek waters. The Greeks, however, wanted nothing to do with this boat. The Coast Guard claims that the boat was doing fine, that it was making good headway toward Italy, and so it denied the boat assistance. But these claims have already been brought into serious question. Whether tacitly or intentionally, it’s possible the Greek Coast Guard’s inaction led to this wreck.

So to put this all in context: In the early years of the refugee arrivals, which began en masse in 2015, many Greeks were remarkably welcoming, transforming their fishing boats into search-and-rescue vessels, their tavernas into mess halls, their homes into shelters, their beaches into emergency command centers. But in years since, the Greek government has been adopting a more hard-line, anti-immigration stance. This is, in part, because Europe as a whole has essentially foisted the administration and logistics of its regional refugee “crisis” onto its border countries—places like Italy and Greece, which are already struggling economically. Greece, for instance, is still reeling from the economic crash of 2008 and the austerity policies of the northern European banks. The ongoing economic crisis in Greece has found predictable fall guys: asylum seekers. In part, the refugees outgrew their welcome.

But nationalistic, exclusionary rhetoric had something to do with this too. If people in power tell stories about refugees bringing diseases, and crime, and not belonging—that’s how more and more people begin to see them. We know this very well here in the U.S. And, just like in the U.S., right wingershave used immigration—and the tired but successful play of blaming immigrants for domestic woes—as a rallying point to get more votes. I’m sorry to report that it’s worked.

As I mentioned above, Europe has really externalized its border enforcement to border countries like Greece. In turn, Greece has foisted this enforcement on the Aegean island “hot spots” like Lesbos, Chios, and Samos, among others. As in the U.S., the Greek government, with either the tacit or explicit backing of the EU, is doing what it can to deter people from coming: by making conditions in the camp miserable, by making the asylum process complex and lengthy, by prosecuting refugees for human smuggling and other trumped-up crimes, and above all by ensuring that the passage across land or sea is as risky as possible.

Last year I wrote about the “pushback” phenomenon in Greece for Mother Jones. Pushbacks are extrajudicial mass expulsions of refugees—known as “refoulement” under international law. The Greek Coast Guard or other authorities routinely drag boats of refugees from Greek waters back into Turkish seas, often destroying their engines and leaving them to drift. But it’s also very common for Greek authorities to round people up once they’ve already made it to Greek shores, then load them back onto boats, drive them past the Greek border, and deposit them in dinghies with no food, water, or engine. These are people already on European soil, making clear that they want to apply for asylum, and instead they are being spirited away onto an EU-funded coast guard ship and taken out to sea to drift.

It goes without saying that this is wildly illegal, yet it is happening regularly—we’re talking hundreds if not thousands of boats in the past couple of years—and with impunity. But despite widespread proof, the government denies that these pushbacks are happening. So much of politics, as we know in the U.S., is a matter of defining reality.

To make matters worse, and to keep this practice as hidden from view as possible, the Greek government has criminalized coming to the aid of refugees before they’ve registered with the authorities, and even criminalizing journalists covering these new arrivals. Yet it’s not secret. It’s like a bizarre, upside-down-world, doublespeak open secret. Recently, the New York Timesput out a bombshell report on pushbacks that has video evidence of a pushback in action: families, including babies, being taken from land, marched onto a Coast Guard vessel, and driven to sea. The video was completely unequivocal. And yet the government denied the charges, and the practice continues.

I mention pushbacks here because the shipwreck seems to be part of a continuum of cruel and fatal action—or inaction, as the case may be—on the part of the Greek government when it comes to refugees.

A Map of Future Ruins: On Borders and Belonging (out next spring!) attempts to grapple with the violence of borders, connect the dots between nationalism and exclusion, and look directly at the mythologies built around migrations past and present and who and what they serve.

The book is centered around the story of the fire that destroyed Moria refugee camp and the swift case made against six young Afghans accused of burning it down. (I wrote about this case in The Guardian last year.) Moria was the largest and most infamous refugee camp in all of Europe, often described as a “human rights graveyard.” Though there was scant proof of these young men’s guilt, the Moria 6, as they came to be known, were all tried and convicted.

But A Map of Future Ruins isn’t a traditional journalistic narrative. Alongside the reporting on the Moria case and contemporary migration policies in Greece, I also write about my own family’s migration story from Greece in the Ellis Island era, about the myths of Western civilization and of whiteness, about the global border regime, and about the power and the limitations of storytelling. The book asks what mythologies are built, and how and by whom, in a heavily bordered world, and their consequences.

My book probes the way migration narratives are told—from the story of my great-grandmother’s arrival to Ellis Island, to the stories of Haitians arriving to Del Rio, Texas, last year, to the stories of this shipwreck.

My family has a hero narrative with a happy ending—in part because that’s the way we’ve written the story. In our case, the hero is my great-grandmother, Evanthia. Like the stories of many southern European families of the Ellis Island era, ours is about a poor immigrant who wasn’t considered white back then, a single mother of four who faced a good amount of discrimination but who nevertheless pulled herself up by her bootstraps, didn’t complain, made things work, and paved the way for the rest of us (now very much white people) to live and to thrive. But of course, there’s much more to this story than that. It’s just not so simple, so clean, or with such an ordered arc. But we tell the story this way because it makes meaning of our present. That is to say, we tell the story to reify what we feel and want to be true: that we belong here and that we earned our station via her struggle.

How we tell stories matters—that’s a truism verging on platitude, I know, but I believe it deeply. It makes a difference whether this shipwreck story is rendered as a horrible accident at sea or an inevitable function of militarized borders. The way we tell, read, and understand such stories cements a certain viewpoint, and from that viewpoint emerges policy. That’s what I mean when I say stories are oracles and that they predict the future. While it can feel really pat to be all “stories can change the world!,” it is very true that the way something is spun or cast dictates real decisions and stances that in turn determine whether people live or die.

Sadly, I do not think history will show this most recent shipwreck to be an anomaly. I think we are seeing more of the future here: exclusionist border policies and practices that lead directly to death. I think they call that murder? I certainly do.

This interview first appeared on The Border Chronicle.

This content originally appeared on CounterPunch.org and was authored by Todd Miller.

On April 8, three young Venezuelan men were detained in El Paso, Texas, where they had just crossed the border from Ciudad Júarez, Mexico. They were among the 183,000 undocumented people reportedly apprehended by the United States Border Patrol that month, which, according to the Reuters news agency, constituted a 13% increase from March.

I had met these three men in February in Panama when they had emerged with their three Colombian travel companions from the traumatic stretch of corpse-ridden jungle known as the Darién Gap. Over the next month and a half, we seven had remained in continuous contact on WhatsApp, and I had undertaken an informal fundraising campaign that consisted of harassing wealthy acquaintances to send me money that I could transfer to my friends to help offset the costs of undocumented movement.

Chief among these costs is the official extortion that currently reigns in Central America and Mexico. Police, immigration personnel, and other state agents have wholeheartedly embraced the same sinister logic as criminal outfits that prey on asylum seekers—a logic that is based on extracting cash from people who have none to spare and who are often migrating for that very reason.

The willful arbitrariness, ambiguity, and chaos that emanates from the U.S. asylum and migratory apparatus—all of which unfolds against a backdrop of omnipresent danger—does wonders in terms of eroding the morale of the “enemy”, i.e. the impoverished refuge seeker.

Of course, the blame for the whole twisted arrangement lies fundamentally with my own country, the United States, the unilateral sanctity of whose border has spawned a flourishing international anti-migrant industry and rendered the business of seeking refuge a very deadly one.

My Venezuelan friends were held for six days in a Texas detention center, during which time they were permitted a single shower. They were then flown, cuffed at the hands and legs, to Arizona and dumped across the border into the city of Nogales in the Mexican state of Sonora.

One of the three, a 21-year-old from Caracas named Johan, would subsequently describe the disorienting experience as psychologically manipulative “torture”—an eye-opening introduction, he said, into the “real nature” of the country he had risked his life to reach.

In Nogales Johan notified me via WhatsApp that he could no longer furnish me with his usual daily assurance that he would be OK because it had become unavoidably clear that personal safety was no longer even a remote possibility. I then convinced him to abandon the “American dream” and travel instead to Europe, which, for all of its own egregious xenophobic defects, is at least straightforwardly reachable by Venezuelans with passports.

The matter of Johan’s own lack of a passport was resolved when I spontaneously became best friends with the Venezuelan embassy in Mexico City. An official told me that, although the embassy was regrettably lacking in passport-making materials, they could provide Johan with a permit to travel without a passport back to Caracas, so his travel document could be processed there—and they wouldn’t even judge him for the life choices he had made. And off he went.

Meanwhile, Johan’s two Venezuelan companions returned to Ciudad Juárez to once again attempt the crossing into El Paso. They have not been heard from since May 1.

As for the three Colombians who also undertook that same initial U.S. border crossing on April 8, two were briefly detained in Texas and then released with an unintelligible paper from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security informing them that they had “been arrested and placed in removal proceedings.” They were ordered to appear at a later date at a hearing in New York City, 3,500 kilometers (2,175 miles) to the northeast.

The third Colombian, a 17-year-old named Julián, remains in indefinite detention in Tampa, Florida, where he was transferred from El Paso, a mere 2,800 kilometers (1,740 miles) away. Back in Panama, Julián had told me that he wasn’t even sure he was doing the right thing by going north but he felt obligated to try to help his mother financially.

Furthermore, he told me, he was always there to listen if I ever needed to talk.

And while Julián may not be available to listen at the moment, we do need to be talking about the psychological warfare that is presently raging on the U.S. border. The willful arbitrariness, ambiguity, and chaos that emanates from the U.S. asylum and migratory apparatus—all of which unfolds against a backdrop of omnipresent danger—does wonders in terms of eroding the morale of the “enemy”, i.e. the impoverished refuge seeker who is often fleeing U.S.-inflicted catastrophe in the first place and whose undocumented labor is in fact vital to the U.S. economy.

The U.S. operates according to the assumption that psychological torment and bodily anguish deter asylum applications and migration, but this could not be further from the truth. After all, you cannot deter desperate folks with nothing to lose—although you can certainly make their trajectories a lot more lethal.

To be sure, the effects of psychological warfare are amplified by the unique reality of the U.S. “border,” which is not confined to a single geographical line but is rather fairly omnipresent—extending from the Darién Gap to Tapachula, Chiapas, Ciudad Juárez, and everywhere in between and beyond where refuge seekers are reminded that their lives are, for all intents and purposes, meaningless.

Now, with the expiration on May 11 of the Donald Trump-era Title 42 policy, which enables the U.S. to summarily expel asylum seekers, using the coronavirus pandemic as a pretext, President Joe Biden’s administration has come up with a noble substitute, which kind of amounts to banning the whole concept of asylum altogether.

In support of his new plan, Biden has pledged to deploy 1,500 additional U.S. soldiers to the U.S. border with Mexico, boosting the number of active duty soldiers there to 4,000—as if there was any doubt that the psychological border war entails a very physical side, too.

And yet sometimes humanity prevails in the face of an utterly dehumanising system. The other day in Caracas, Johan was able to hug his mother for the first time in five years because, before embarking on the hazardous 1.5-month trek to the U.S., he had worked as a labourer in Colombia and had been unable to scrape together the money for a visit home.

Here’s hoping Julián can one day hug his mother again. But for the time being, he’s just another casualty of the U.S. war on asylum.

This content originally appeared on Common Dreams and was authored by Belén Fernández.

On April 8, three young Venezuelan men were detained in El Paso, Texas, where they had just crossed the border from Ciudad Júarez, Mexico. They were among the 183,000 undocumented people reportedly apprehended by the United States Border Patrol that month, which, according to the Reuters news agency, constituted a 13% increase from March.

I had met these three men in February in Panama when they had emerged with their three Colombian travel companions from the traumatic stretch of corpse-ridden jungle known as the Darién Gap. Over the next month and a half, we seven had remained in continuous contact on WhatsApp, and I had undertaken an informal fundraising campaign that consisted of harassing wealthy acquaintances to send me money that I could transfer to my friends to help offset the costs of undocumented movement.

Chief among these costs is the official extortion that currently reigns in Central America and Mexico. Police, immigration personnel, and other state agents have wholeheartedly embraced the same sinister logic as criminal outfits that prey on asylum seekers—a logic that is based on extracting cash from people who have none to spare and who are often migrating for that very reason.

The willful arbitrariness, ambiguity, and chaos that emanates from the U.S. asylum and migratory apparatus—all of which unfolds against a backdrop of omnipresent danger—does wonders in terms of eroding the morale of the “enemy”, i.e. the impoverished refuge seeker.

Of course, the blame for the whole twisted arrangement lies fundamentally with my own country, the United States, the unilateral sanctity of whose border has spawned a flourishing international anti-migrant industry and rendered the business of seeking refuge a very deadly one.

My Venezuelan friends were held for six days in a Texas detention center, during which time they were permitted a single shower. They were then flown, cuffed at the hands and legs, to Arizona and dumped across the border into the city of Nogales in the Mexican state of Sonora.

One of the three, a 21-year-old from Caracas named Johan, would subsequently describe the disorienting experience as psychologically manipulative “torture”—an eye-opening introduction, he said, into the “real nature” of the country he had risked his life to reach.

In Nogales Johan notified me via WhatsApp that he could no longer furnish me with his usual daily assurance that he would be OK because it had become unavoidably clear that personal safety was no longer even a remote possibility. I then convinced him to abandon the “American dream” and travel instead to Europe, which, for all of its own egregious xenophobic defects, is at least straightforwardly reachable by Venezuelans with passports.

The matter of Johan’s own lack of a passport was resolved when I spontaneously became best friends with the Venezuelan embassy in Mexico City. An official told me that, although the embassy was regrettably lacking in passport-making materials, they could provide Johan with a permit to travel without a passport back to Caracas, so his travel document could be processed there—and they wouldn’t even judge him for the life choices he had made. And off he went.

Meanwhile, Johan’s two Venezuelan companions returned to Ciudad Juárez to once again attempt the crossing into El Paso. They have not been heard from since May 1.

As for the three Colombians who also undertook that same initial U.S. border crossing on April 8, two were briefly detained in Texas and then released with an unintelligible paper from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security informing them that they had “been arrested and placed in removal proceedings.” They were ordered to appear at a later date at a hearing in New York City, 3,500 kilometers (2,175 miles) to the northeast.

The third Colombian, a 17-year-old named Julián, remains in indefinite detention in Tampa, Florida, where he was transferred from El Paso, a mere 2,800 kilometers (1,740 miles) away. Back in Panama, Julián had told me that he wasn’t even sure he was doing the right thing by going north but he felt obligated to try to help his mother financially.

Furthermore, he told me, he was always there to listen if I ever needed to talk.

And while Julián may not be available to listen at the moment, we do need to be talking about the psychological warfare that is presently raging on the U.S. border. The willful arbitrariness, ambiguity, and chaos that emanates from the U.S. asylum and migratory apparatus—all of which unfolds against a backdrop of omnipresent danger—does wonders in terms of eroding the morale of the “enemy”, i.e. the impoverished refuge seeker who is often fleeing U.S.-inflicted catastrophe in the first place and whose undocumented labor is in fact vital to the U.S. economy.

The U.S. operates according to the assumption that psychological torment and bodily anguish deter asylum applications and migration, but this could not be further from the truth. After all, you cannot deter desperate folks with nothing to lose—although you can certainly make their trajectories a lot more lethal.

To be sure, the effects of psychological warfare are amplified by the unique reality of the U.S. “border,” which is not confined to a single geographical line but is rather fairly omnipresent—extending from the Darién Gap to Tapachula, Chiapas, Ciudad Juárez, and everywhere in between and beyond where refuge seekers are reminded that their lives are, for all intents and purposes, meaningless.

Now, with the expiration on May 11 of the Donald Trump-era Title 42 policy, which enables the U.S. to summarily expel asylum seekers, using the coronavirus pandemic as a pretext, President Joe Biden’s administration has come up with a noble substitute, which kind of amounts to banning the whole concept of asylum altogether.

In support of his new plan, Biden has pledged to deploy 1,500 additional U.S. soldiers to the U.S. border with Mexico, boosting the number of active duty soldiers there to 4,000—as if there was any doubt that the psychological border war entails a very physical side, too.

And yet sometimes humanity prevails in the face of an utterly dehumanising system. The other day in Caracas, Johan was able to hug his mother for the first time in five years because, before embarking on the hazardous 1.5-month trek to the U.S., he had worked as a labourer in Colombia and had been unable to scrape together the money for a visit home.

Here’s hoping Julián can one day hug his mother again. But for the time being, he’s just another casualty of the U.S. war on asylum.

This content originally appeared on Common Dreams and was authored by Belén Fernández.

The closure comes amid an intensified military offensive against rebel forces in Chin state, where on April 10, a junta jet dropped bombs near a high school in Falam township, killing nine civilians and injuring four others. 

Thousands of Myanmar nationals have fled fighting and taken refuge across the border in India’s Mizoram state.

Sources told RFA Burmese that on March 22, the charred remains of three Myanmar-born ethnic Chin women holding Indian citizenship were discovered in Matupi. An investigation identified the victims as C. Biaksuii, 48, Bablu Talukdar, 37, and B. Lathafamkima, 44, but has yet to determine who is responsible for their deaths.

In the aftermath of the discovery, civil society organizations in Mizoram issued a statement warning Indian nationals against traveling into Myanmar and on April 6, Indian authorities shuttered the two main border gates at Matupi’s Hlungmang and Gawnglaung villages, residents told RFA. Additionally, crossings accessed from the Chin towns of Rihkhawdar and Thantalan were also closed by the Indian side, they said.

A resident of Matupi, who declined to be named for security reasons, told RFA that the closure of the border gates had cut off access to food, medical treatment, and refuge for inhabitants of the township.

“The closure of the border is mostly related to the murder of Indian nationals,” the resident said. “It’s caused a lot of trouble for Myanmar refugees in Matupi. They can’t enter the Indian side for now.”

Attempts by RFA to contact Thant Zin, the junta’s social affairs minister and spokesman for Chin state, for comment on the measures taken to restrict border crossings went unanswered Tuesday.

“What I mean by ‘illegal’ includes doing business illegally, committing crimes and that sort of activity,” Dokhar told RFA. “I urge all Myanmar refugees not to become involved in such activities because one person’s crime can impact tens of thousands of refugees sheltering in India.”

Arrests in Manipur

Following the deaths of the three Indian nationals, residents of India’s Manipur state, which also borders Chin state to the north, said that they have seen authorities conduct a series of arrests of Myanmar nationals on the grounds of illegal immigration.

In one incident on April 6, authorities in Manipur arrested a group of six men, 11 women, and six children from Myanmar who had fled across the border to Langkaur township and were working in the local weaving industry, Myanmar refugees told RFA.

“The reason for their arrest is that they did not have permission to stay in the town,” a Myanmar national in Langkaur told RFA. “They were supposed to stay in temporary refugee shelters being built by the Manipur government. They are being kept in a temporary detention center for now and will be moved to the refugee shelters once they are complete.”

Police in Manipur began hunting Myanmar nationals living in the state at the start of the year and, as of the beginning of March, had arrested around 170 people, according to aid workers assisting refugees.

“They came and took pictures of the refugees and issued refugee identity cards to them … saying that it will be more secure to live there,” said a refugee in Moreh, who spoke to RFA on condition of anonymity. “They have made a list of the refugees, too. We are currently staying near the villages along the border.”

RFA emailed the Indian Embassy in Yangon inquiring after the border closure and the arrests of refugees in Manipur, but had yet to receive a response as of Tuesday evening.

According to Chin civil society organizations, around 60,000 people have been displaced by fighting in Chin state, while some 50,000 others have fled across the border to Mizoram and Manipur states in India.

Translated by Myo Min Aung. Edited by Joshua Lipes and Malcolm Foster.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA Burmese.

The United Nations migration agency said Wednesday that the first three months of 2023 were the deadliest quarter in six years for people attempting to cross the Mediterranean Sea to reach the European Union, with at least 411 migrants dying on the central route through the sea.

Antonio Vitorino, director general of the International Organization for Migration (IOM), said the "persisting humanitarian crisis in the central Mediterranean" has become "intolerable" as state-led search-and-rescue (SAR) efforts have been significantly delayed—in some cases by right-wing anti-migration policies.

"With more than 20,000 deaths recorded on this route since 2014, I fear that these deaths have been normalized," said Vitorino. "States must respond. Delays and gaps in state-led SAR are costing human lives."

The agency said delays in government-led rescues in the Mediterranean were a factor in at least six incidents that led to the deaths of at least 127 people. At least 73 migrants died in another incident in which no attempt at SAR was made by an E.U. government.

"Guided by the spirit of responsibility-sharing and solidarity, we call on states to work together and work to reduce loss of life along migration routes."

In addition to governments' unwillingness to ensure the safe arrival of the tens of thousands of people who attempt the journey from northern Africa to the E.U. each month—including a record number of migrants in the first three months of 2023—right-wing anti-immigration policies have delayed humanitarian organizations from rescuing migrants.

As Common Dreamsreported in February, the government of Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni introduced a new law requiring humanitarian rescue shops to request access to Italy's ports, proceed to the country "without delay" after conducting a rescue, and dock in ports in the northern part of the country, far from where rescues take place.

The international charity Medicins Sans Frontiers said earlier this year that following the statute would force the group to leave many refugees stranded in the Mediterranean.

"Saving lives at sea is a legal obligation for states," said Vitorino. "We need to see proactive state-led coordination in search-and-rescue efforts. Guided by the spirit of responsibility-sharing and solidarity, we call on states to work together and work to reduce loss of life along migration routes."

The IOM demanded that E.U. members take more action to rescue migrants in the Mediterranean a day after Meloni's government declared a state of emergency in Italy stemming from so-called "migration congestion."

The government plans to spend $5.42 million to build "new structures, suitable both for sheltering as well as the processing and repatriation of migrants who don't have the requisites to stay."

Alissa Pavia, North Africa associate director for the Atlantic Council, warned the state of emergency, which is scheduled to last for six months, will make it "easier for Meloni to reject and send back migrants because of [the] alleged emergency."

"For YEARS Italian NGOs in the south have been pleading the government to help deal with the inhuman conditions in the centers," said Pavia. "Yet nothing was done."

Instead of declaring a "highly unethical" state of emergency and striving to keep migrants out of Italy, she added, the government should "strengthen asylum and refugee systems" and address integration challenges to normalize the presence of refugees and migrants in the country.

This content originally appeared on Common Dreams and was authored by Julia Conley.

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has spent the last four years locked up at the Belmarsh high-security prison in London, where he has been fighting extradition to the United States on espionage charges. He faces up to 175 years in prison if convicted. This week, amid growing concerns about Assange’s health, Reporters Without Borders attempted to become the first NGO to visit with Assange since his arrest four years ago. Despite being given approval, RSF representatives, including our guest, RSF secretary-general and executive director Christophe Deloire, were denied entry.

This content originally appeared on Democracy Now! and was authored by Democracy Now!.

This content originally appeared on openDemocracy RSS and was authored by openDemocracy RSS.

This content originally appeared on openDemocracy RSS and was authored by openDemocracy RSS.

On Tuesday, March 14, border guards at the airport in Tbilisi, the capital, held Aleksandra Shvedchenko, a reporter with independent broadcaster Dozhd TV, for about 30 minutes before denying her entry to the country, according to her outlet and media reports.

In recent months, authorities have similarly denied entry to at least three other journalists, according to media reports and journalists who spoke to CPJ. Since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, scores of Russian journalists have fled the country, with many seeking refuge in Georgia.

“Georgia has an opportunity to host hard-hitting independent Russian journalists no longer able to work in their home country. Authorities should embrace this responsibility instead of shirking it,” said Carlos Martinez de la Serna, CPJ’s program director, in New York. “Dozhd TV journalist Aleksandra Shvedchenko and all other Russian journalists seeking a safe place to do their reporting should be allowed to work freely in Georgia.”

Authorities gave Shvedchenko a document stating that she was not allowed to enter the country under “other cases envisaged by Georgian legislation,” and put her back on a plane to Riga, Latvia, according to her outlet and Dozhd TV chief editor Tikhon Dzyadko, who spoke to CPJ via messaging app. She had been living in Tbilisi for a year, her outlet said.

In November 2022, authorities denied entry to Yekaterina Arenina, a journalist with investigative outlet Proekt, according to media reports and Arenina, who spoke to CPJ via messaging app. A border guard who gave her the same written refusal as Shvedchenko told her that he could not explain anything verbally, and that their conversation was recorded.

In December 2022, authorities at the Tbilisi airport gave a similar document to Aleksei Ponomarev, a podcast editor with independent news website Holod, and made him return to Riga, where he was flying from, according to his outlet and media reports.

Ponomarev told CPJ that he had lived in Georgia for almost two years at the time of the incident, and that he was able to return to the country two weeks later but was unsure if he could leave and reenter in the future.

On February 19, 2023, Tbilisi airport authorities told Filipp Dzyadko, a Russian writer and journalist, that he could not enter the country because their computer was frozen, and told him they “could not comment on anything,” according to news reports and the journalist, who spoke to CPJ in a phone interview. He said he stayed in the airport until the following day, when he took a flight to Armenia.

Dzyadko had lived in Georgia since March 2022, he said. He told CPJ that he believed the refusal was linked to his former journalistic activities as a Dozhd TV journalist, the chief editor of the now-shuttered newspaper Bolchoy Gorod, and an “anti-war” novel he published in April 2022. He said it was also possibly related to his brother Tikhon’s work as chief editor of Dozhd TV.

CPJ is also investigating Georgian immigration authorities’ November 2022 denial of Gala Latygovskaya, who works in an administrative capacity for the independent news website Mediazona. Latygovskaya told CPJ by phone that she was traveling to the country for her work when authorities denied her entry without giving her any explanation or documentation.

In September 2022, Grigol Liluashvili, the head of the Georgian State Security Service, stated that an “uncontrolled influx” of Russian opposition figures would be “just as dangerous” as Russian government supporters entering the country as tourists.

Previously, in March 2022, Georgian authorities denied entry to Dozhd TV journalist Mikhail Fishman and to Mediazona journalist David Frenkel. In June 2022, Russian blogger Insa Lander was stranded for more than two weeks at the Georgian border before being eventually allowed in.

CPJ emailed the Georgian Interior Ministry police and the State Security Service for comment, but did not receive any reply.

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by Erik Crouch.

This content originally appeared on openDemocracy RSS and was authored by openDemocracy RSS.

The bodies of drowned migrants are still washing up on the beaches of Crotone, Italy on the Mediterranean Sea. Their wooden boat crashed on the rocks just offshore from this Calabrian resort town, turning the beach, said one local, “into a graveyard.” The death toll reached 67 on Wednesday, with 80 survivors. It is assumed that many more died, as at least 200 people were aboard the boat when it departed Izmir, Turkey, a few days earlier.

“I have been treating migrants for 30 years and have never seen anything like this,” Orlando Amodeo, a local doctor, told The Guardian. “These people traveled 1,078 kilometers by sea only to die three meters from the shore.”

The Mediterranean Sea itself has become a massive graveyard in recent years. The UN’s International Organization for Migration (IOM) estimates that at least 26,000 migrants have perished while crossing to Europe, mostly from Turkey and Libya, fleeing Afghanistan, Syria, and drought-stricken and war-torn African nations. Many more migrants have died uncounted, as clandestine voyages on makeshift boats, overcrowded by human traffickers out to maximize profit, too often disappear at sea without a trace.

“There is a lot more media attention in this case because the tragedy happened so close to Italy,” Caroline Willemen, deputy head of search and rescue with Médecins Sans Frontières, or Doctors Without Borders, said of the Crotone shipwreck on the Democracy Now! news hour. “But this is something that happens on a quite, unfortunately, regular basis, also very often closer, for example, to the Libyan coast, to people leaving Libyan shores. Very often that news will not even reach Western media.”

Over seven million Ukrainians fleeing the Russian invasion have rightly been welcomed in Europe. Teymoori Mohammad lost a relative in the Crotone disaster. Speaking to the press there, he lamented the lack of equal treatment for non-white refugees:

“Because they have their black hair or they don’t have green or blue eyes, they didn’t rescue these people…their human right. Because they have the black eye or the black hair, they weren’t human.”

MSF has been operating search and rescue vessels in the Mediterranean since 2015, plying dangerous waters to rescue thousands of migrants who might otherwise have died, while also dodging an increasing array of regulations and restrictions imposed by European countries intent on blocking migration. MSF’s latest ship, the Geo Barents, was refitted and launched in June, 2021. It is currently impounded in a Sicilian port, victim of Italy’s new crackdown on humanitarian search and rescue operations, launched by the far-right government of Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni.

“This new legislation that has come out targets only NGOs doing search-and-rescue work,” Willemen explained. “Keep in mind that the vast majority of people who arrive in Italy, either they manage to arrive autonomously or they are rescued by the Italian Coast Guard, but the legislation targets only NGOs, which says quite a lot.”

Médecins Sans Frontières is not the only humanitarian organization involved in migrant rescue that is being hounded by various European governments. Sea-Watch, RESQSHIP and other German-based groups are condemning Germany’s new ship safety ordinance that seems designed specifically to hamper civilian migrant rescue operations.

In 2015, a youth-driven project led to the acquisition and conversion of a small fishing vessel christened Iuventa. The ship operated in the central Mediterranean, considered the most dangerous route to Europe, helping save 14,000 migrants from 2015 until it was seized by Italian authorities in 2017. Now, more than five years later, several crew members are being tried in Italy, along with activists from MSF and Save the Children, accused of “aiding and abetting unauthorized immigration.”

Sascha Girke, one of the Iuventa crew members made a statement in court on Wednesday:

“I would like to begin this statement today, in this courtroom by commemorating those who lost their lives off the coast of Crotone…while we were sitting in this courtroom on Saturday, they started to fight for their lives. In a terrible and unambiguous way, the deaths of these people remind us of what is actually being on trial here: the Crotone shipwreck is inseparable from this trial…It wasn’t the bad sea weather – it was the denial of help where it was possible. The answer to the Crotone disaster is the expansion of rescue capacities at sea and not their confiscation. The answer is safe and legal entry routes and not Fortress Europe.”

Six years ago, Dr. Orlando Amodeo posted a video showing body bags of drowned migrants being lowered to a dock, off of one of MSF’s rescue ships. He called the video “From Mare Nostrum to Mare Mortuum,” invoking the ancient Roman name for the Mediterranean, Mare Nostrum, “Our Sea,” and naming what it has become, Mare Mortuum, the Sea of Death.

This content originally appeared on Common Dreams and was authored by Denis Moynihan.

The post Land for Peace: Borders Aren’t Sacred, Human Lives Are appeared first on CounterPunch.org.

This content originally appeared on CounterPunch.org and was authored by Dimitri Lascaris.

The international charity Medicins Sans Frontiers said late Thursday it is "assessing what legal actions" the group can take to contest a new anti-refugee law passed in Italy, under which the group was informed its rescue ship is being detained and prevented from rescuing migrants for 20 days.

The group, also known as MSF or its English name, Doctors Without Borders, said Italian authorities entered its rescue ship, Geo Barents, on Thursday evening to inform the crew of a new law passed by the country's parliament.

The law requires ships to request access to a port and proceed to Italy "without delay" after rescuing migrants trying to cross the Mediterranean Sea, like the more than 630,000 people whose lives have been saved by Geo Barents and other ships since 2015.

Charities say the new "code of conduct" also requires crews to dock in ports in northern Italy, far from where rescues take place.

Previously, the Geo Barents has conducted multiple rescues and brought dozens of people on board before proceeding to a port where they can disembark in Italy and apply for asylum.

The ship is now in administrative detention for 20 days and MSF has been ordered to pay a $10,500 fine.

"This is not acceptable!" tweeted MSF.

Organizations that disobey the new code could be fined more than $53,000 and have their rescue vessels impounded, Al Jazeera reported.

"Today our team was supposed to be back at sea to prevent more deaths in the Central Mediterranean," said MSF Friday. "Who will pay the real price of the detention imposed on Geo Barents?"

The International Organization for Migration says that less than two months into 2023, at least 157 people have been reported as missing and presumed dead after attempting to cross the Mediterranean from northern Africa.

Far-right Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni has been denounced by human rights experts for her hardline anti-immigration stance. Her government has previously refused to allow rescue ships to enter ports and has barred refugees from leaving ships after they arrive in Italy.

Meloni's government has claimed the Mediterranean rescues by MSF and other humanitarian groups encourage people to make the dangerous journey across the sea, but MSF has said its work is vital, as refugees will attempt to reach Europe regardless of whether they believe they'll encounter a rescue ship.

"We all watch with horror the plight of those crossing the Mediterranean, and the desire to end that suffering is profound," said U.N. human rights high commissioner Volker Türk this week, after the new code of conduct was proposed. "But this is simply the wrong way to address this humanitarian crisis. The law would effectively punish both migrants and those who seek to help them. This penalization of humanitarian actions would likely deter human rights and humanitarian organizations from doing their crucial work."

Other rights groups expressed solidarity with MSF after it temporarily lost its ability to operate Geo Barents.

"Once again, the central Mediterranean is emptied of a vital rescue asset," said SOS Mediterranee, which operates a ship called Ocean Viking. "Civil rescue ships are only filling the deadly gap left by E.U. States in the central Mediterranean. Criminalization of search and rescue at sea must end."

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• China reopens its borders
• COVID-19 frontline rural doctors
• Jack Ma gives up Ant Group
• China moves to climate-adaption

This content originally appeared on Dissident Voice and was authored by Dongsheng News.

Kosovo shut down its largest border crossing with Serbia on Wednesday, underscoring the extent to which tensions between the two Balkan countries are rising.

Albanian-majority Kosovo declared independence from Serbia in 2008 with Western support, roughly a decade after North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) forces intervened and carried out a bombing campaign on behalf of ethnic Albanians during a 1998-1999 civil war.

Serbia has refused to recognize the statehood of its former province, however. Instead, according toAgence France-Presse, Belgrade has encouraged 120,000 ethnic Serbs living in Kosovo to defy Pristina's authority—especially in northern Kosovo where Serbs constitute the majority.

According toAl Jazeera: "About 50,000 Serbs living in ethnically divided northern Kosovo refuse to recognize the government in Pristina or the status of Kosovo as a country separate from Serbia. They have the support of many Serbs in Serbia and its government."

As AFP reported:

The latest trouble erupted on December 10, when ethnic Serbs put up barricades to protest the arrest of an ex-policeman suspected of being involved in attacks against ethnic Albanian police officers—effectively sealing off traffic on two border crossings.
After the roadblocks were erected, Kosovar police and international peacekeepers were attacked in several shooting incidents, while the Serbian armed forces were put on heightened alert this week.
Late Tuesday, dozens of demonstrators on the Serbian side of the border used trucks and tractors to halt traffic leading to Merdare, the biggest crossing between the neighbors—a move which forced Kosovo police to close the entry point on Wednesday.

Due to recent border blockades and closures, just three entry points between the two countries remain open. The obstructions are "preventing thousands of Kosovars who work elsewhere in Europe from returning home for holidays," Al Jazeera noted.

"Kosovo's government has asked NATO's peacekeeping force for the country, the approximately 4,000-strong KFOR, to clear the barricades" erected on its side of the border, the news outlet reported. "KFOR has no authority to act on Serbian soil."

KFOR commander Major General Angelo Michele Ristuccia said Wednesday in a statement that "it is paramount that all involved avoid any rhetoric or actions that can cause tensions and escalate the situation."

"Solutions should be sought through dialogue," he added.

On Tuesday, Kosovo Interior Minister Xhelal Sveçla accused Serbia, under the influence of Russia, of trying to destabilize its former province by supporting ethnic Serbs who have been demonstrating for weeks in northern Kosovo.

According to Al Jazeera:

Serbia denies it is trying to destabilize its neighbor and says it only wants to protect the Serbian minority living in what is now Kosovan territory... not recognized by Belgrade.
Moscow said on Wednesday that it supported Serbia's attempts to protect ethnic Serbs in northern Kosovo but denied Pristina's accusation that Russia was somehow stoking tensions in an attempt to sow chaos across the Balkans.

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov called it "wrong" to blame Moscow for escalating tensions between Kosovo and Serbia.

"Serbia is a sovereign country, and naturally, it protects the rights of Serbs who live nearby in such difficult conditions, and naturally reacts harshly when these rights are violated," said Peskov.

"Having very close allied relations, historical and spiritual relations with Serbia, Russia is very closely monitoring what is happening, how the rights of Serbs are respected and ensured," he added. "And, of course, we support Belgrade in the actions that are being taken."

In a joint statement released Wednesday, the European Union and the United States called on all parties "to exercise maximum restraint, to take immediate action to unconditionally de-escalate the situation, and to refrain from provocations, threats, or intimidation."

Serbian Defense Minister Miloš Vučević on Wednesday described the barricades as a "democratic and peaceful" means of protest and said that Belgrade has "an open line of communication" with Western diplomats on resolving the issue.

"We are all worried about the situation and where all this is going," said Vučević. "Serbia is ready for a deal."

As AFP reported, "Northern Kosovo has been on edge since November when hundreds of ethnic Serb workers in the Kosovo police as well as the judicial branch, including judges and prosecutors, walked off the job."

"They were protesting a controversial decision to ban Serbs living in Kosovo from using Belgrade-issued vehicle license plates—a policy that was eventually scrapped by Pristina," the news agency noted. "The mass walkouts created a security vacuum in Kosovo, which Pristina tried to fill by deploying ethnic Albanian police officers in the region."

This content originally appeared on Common Dreams and was authored by Kenny Stancil.

This content originally appeared on openDemocracy RSS and was authored by openDemocracy RSS.

A year after re-opening its borders, Fiji has recorded an injection of F$805 million into its economy from international visitor arrivals between April and August.

After shutting its borders for almost two years at the height of the covid-19 pandemic, Fiji has welcomed 520,000 tourists to its shores in the past 12 months.

Tourism Fiji chief executive Brent Hill said the steady increase in international visitors is promising for an economy where tourism is its largest asset, previously accounting for 40 percent of the country’s GDP.

• READ MORE: Other Fiji tourism reports

“It’s been wonderful to welcome back international visitors for the last 12 months and to see a steady increase in numbers as the world gets used to travelling again.

“The recovery trajectory for visitor arrivals has exceeded our expectations, and the impact can be seen in our economy with tourists buzzing in resorts, towns, and villages as people experience the true Fiji,” Hill said.

Success in structure
Last year, Fiji was one of few Pacific nations to open its doors to tourists with minimal restrictions. What may have seemed like a bold decision at the height of the pandemic has today paid off for a nation that heavily relies on tourism as its highest income earner.

The successful rebound is attributed to the covid-safe measures implemented by the industry prioritising vaccination and the Care Fiji Commitment programme, Tourism Fiji’s New Zealand regional director Sonya Lawson said.

Lawson said while tourists were eager to travel again, security and well-being remained a priority for travellers.

“The programme implemented by Tourism Fiji was a standard of best practice protocols and standards, and certified tourism operators as having rigorous measures in place to manage covid-19 was reassuring,” she said.

“This really provided confidence to travellers, tourism provider providers and locals alike, and that was a key factor in the initial stages, and from there, the confidence has just continued.”

New Zealanders flocking to Fiji
Tourism Fiji said bookings from New Zealand in October this year exceeded pre-pandemic levels at 103 percent of the same period in 2019.

July welcomed over 25,000 New Zealanders which is 91 percent of 2019 levels; in August, that hit 87 percent, and September achieved 95 percent before exceeding Kiwi visitor numbers by October.

Hill said similar to New Zealanders, the resilience of the Fijian people, hospitality, and a commitment to welcoming back visitors is why Fiji has been successful in standing out as a destination.

“We look forward to a bigger and better 2023 focusing on sustainable, authentic tourism.”

New Zealand is Fiji’s second largest international visitor market, now accounting for 26 percent of total visitors – an increase of 3 percent from the 2019 figures.

Lawson added that New Zealand’s visitor arrivals into Fiji had also increased as it previously used to sit at around 23 percent.

There was a 4 percent increase in visitors from Auckland, and 2 percent rises from both Wellington and Christchurch in July this year compared to 2019. This coincided with the phased re-opening of New Zealand borders when Kiwis could travel freely without MIQ.

“Many hotels and resorts have recorded growth in their number of Kiwi visitors — New Zealand is now the second largest market for Six Senses Fiji (resort), having been fourth in previous years,” she added.

New trends for tourists
Leisure and spending also took a turn from pre-pandemic activities. Tourism Fiji recorded tourists travelling around the country with more extended stays.

“For New Zealanders, Denarau, Coral Coast, and Nadi are generally a fan favourite, but we’ve noticed high demands for other regions like the Yasawa Islands and the northern parts of Fiji where there are unique experiences. New Zealanders who have been to Fiji more than once are now discovering other regions to discover,” Lawson said.

“We also previously noticed an average stay of around five nights, but in the last eight months this has increased to around nine nights. We’ve also seen that the spending has increased by an average of 12 percent per day per visitor.

“So we’re putting a lot of this down to the fact that people are embracing travel, have missed the ability to travel, and are taking longer to enjoy a holiday in Fiji.”

Lawson explained that Fiji noticed an increase in ‘multi-generational travel’ where extended families travel together and reconnect in Fiji.

Tourism Fiji has set an ambitious goal of 3 million extra visitor arrivals by 2024, and they believe they are trekking to achieve this target.

“At this stage, Fiji has exceeded all of our expectations for this year, and we’re delighted with how Fiji has resumed and bounced back this year,” said Lawson.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ. 

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

The Niue government has confirmed the country is experiencing covid-19 community transmission for the first time since the virus was recorded at the border in March.

“We don’t have additional resources to be finding sources of infection, previously we haven’t done that before.

“This is the first time we have had community transmission in Niue,” Acting Secretary of Government Gaylene Tasmania said.

• READ MORE: Other Niue covid reports
• NZ covid-19 update: 27,076 new cases, 58 deaths and 328 in hospital

Out of the seven cases recorded in the reporting period to November 28 local time, four were listed as covid-19 community transmission.

On November 29, 12 new cases were recorded taking the total number of active cases to 33 and the total number of cases since covid-19 arrived at the border in March 2022 to 136.

Community transmission means a case has not been linked to any other infections, Tasmania said.

“We are unable to link it back and we stopped linking it back because we need to look at containing the spread,” she said.

New Zealand-based public health specialist Sir Collin Tukuitonga said this marked a new chapter in Niue’s covid-19 response,

“You can have a community case that is not from a community transmission, this is a case that is in the community connected to the border but this person is now in the community, that is not community transmission,” Sir Collin said.

What is ‘community transmission’?
There has been confusion around what community transmission means with the term being used by the public.

“You have got to be careful, for public health people like myself, we have a very strict definition of what constitutes a community transmission,” Sir Collin said.

Any case that starts in the community and can’t be linked to the border is called a case of community transmission, according to Auckland University.

“A case comes through the border, negative tests and therefore goes into the community but nobody knows they have covid-19 because they are asymptomatic and they test negative but they are carrying the virus with them.

“So that individual could go home and be with family and be the source of infection,” Sir Collin gives an example of how community transmission can occur.

Tasmania said at the moment Niue residents could assume that there were people in the community that were positive that had not yet been identified.

“People are just picking it up just by being around the community,” Tasmania said.

The cases deemed community transmission were not been able to be linked back to any of the positive cases or any of the close contacts, she said.

New phase for Niue covid-19 health response
As of Tuesday, 29 November, the government covid-19 website is set to change and will not report “community cases” just “active cases”, Tasmania said.

“It is not an unusual response,” Sir Collin said.

He said New Zealand “gave up”, or placed less emphasis on contact tracing when the covid-19 numbers became high and the system was stretched.

“They have accepted the fact that there will be cases. Why would you persevere with all of that if you have changed your focus,” he said.

“Like us they’ll probably see a blip like increasing cases you are seeing here [in New Zealand] but given the high vax status I expect the peak to be lower and not as many sick people.”

No request has been made to New Zealand for support but Tasmania said there were options if needed.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ. 

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

This content originally appeared on openDemocracy RSS and was authored by openDemocracy RSS.

This content originally appeared on openDemocracy RSS and was authored by openDemocracy RSS.

This content originally appeared on openDemocracy RSS and was authored by openDemocracy RSS.

This content originally appeared on openDemocracy RSS and was authored by openDemocracy RSS.

Residents said about 170 soldiers in a military column raided Pale township’s Mwe Ton village in Sagaing region and then entered Yesagyo’s Wet Khoke village. 

They identified the two victims as Pho Sal, 42, and Soe Lin, 24, both male.

They were weeding fields outside the village on Monday when soldiers appeared.

"People did not run as there was no fighting before and they did not know troops were coming to the village. But when [the two victims] saw them they got scared and ran away,” said a Wet Khoke resident, who didn’t want to be named for safety reasons. 

“They were killed while farming near the village… The column left the village and spent the night in Ngwe Thar village and burned down that village too.”

He added that it is not known exactly which city and which battalion this column is from, but that it is continuously conducting offensives in the villages between Magway and Sagaing regions.

On Monday the military column entered Salingyi Township’s Ngwe Thar village in Sagaing region and burned down more than 40 houses, according to residents.

The following day, a battle erupted between the troops leaving the village and the local People’s Defense Force, but there were no casualties, a PDF official told RFA.

The military column reached nearby Salingyi Township’s Sar Khar village today on Wednesday. About 1,000 locals from Sar Khar, Paung Wa andTaung Kyar villages fled to safety, according to Sar Khar residents. 

Calls to the State Administration Council spokesman for Sagaing region by RFA went unanswered on Wednesday.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA Burmese.

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The Federated States of Micronesia will reopen its international borders on Monday.

President David Panuelo said anyone wishing to travel will need to be fully vaccinated, including boosters, against covid-19 and have had a PCR test 72 hours prior to departure.

The moves comes despite the country discovering its first case of covid on July 19.

• READ MORE: Other covid-19 reports in the Pacific

Panuelo said community spread is increasing, and thousands of people are already infected.

In an address to the nation, he said he would soon issue a decree requiring everyone to wear masks in public places.

“I will require all persons who feel sick to get tested and to stay home,” he said.

“I will request that all citizens stay home unless it is essential for them to go to work, to go shopping, or to otherwise conduct necessary errands.”

Hard lockdown ruled out
But he has ruled out a hard lockdown to tackle the outbreak.

“The advice I have received from our Department of Health and Social Affairs is that the initial transition period from being covid-19 free to covid-19 infected will take about one to two months for each State.

“We will see cases rise, plateau, and then lowered in our country. Afterwards, we should be fully emerged into our new status of covid-19 protected.”

Starting on Friday, July 29, vaccines for infants aged between six months and four years old will be available across the country.

Panuelo said the FSM had “significant supplies” of the antiviral drug Paxlovid, and monoclonal antibodies to treat people.

“What is needed now is for all of us to work together in practising peace, friendship, cooperation, and love in our common humanity with each other,” Panuelo said.

“We need to get vaccinated. We need to get tested. And we need to stay home if we are sick or if our family is sick. These are dark days, but we will endure beyond them. The sun will rise tomorrow, and, God willing, we will adapt to and overcome covid-19.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

Among them was the South Australia Xinjiang Association, a nonprofit organization set up in 2009 that provides a platform for Chinese migrants from the region in northwestern China to meet one another and network.

The group also has a more nefarious purpose, two researchers say in a new report on China’s efforts to tamp down global criticism of its policies in Xinjiang, where well-documented reports have uncovered widespread abuses toward Uyghurs and other Muslim minority groups.

The Han Chinese-dominated South Australia Xinjiang Association, which has the backing of China’s diplomatic mission to Australia, “claims the right to speak on behalf of the Xinjiang diaspora while neutralizing the legitimate concerns of the Uyghur community about Beijing’s human rights abuses in the Uyghur homeland,” write Lin Li, and independent researcher, and James Leibold, a senior fellow at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute’s International Cyber Policy Centre,

Dozens of SA Xinjiang Association members displayed a huge banner bearing the group’s name as they marched wearing the traditional attire of Uyghurs and other ethnic minorities, despite objections from some of the city’s 1,500 Uyghur residents that the Han Chinese were appropriating their culture, which Chinese authorities back home were working to extinguish through a harsh campaign of forced assimilation.

Adding insult to injury, the association won the best costume award, its members triumphantly posing for photos with Jay Weatherill, who was then the premier of South Australia, boosting the group’s public profile.

Some Uyghurs later complained to the Adelaide City Council that the parade march by the Han Chinese was an intentional by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) effort at “a soft propaganda publicity act” to distract from the communist Chinese government’s persecution of Uyghurs, including members of their own families.

The CCP uses deceptive and coercive influence operations around the globe to undermine Uyghurs living outside China, often through the United Front Work Department (UFWD), say Li and Leibold in their 65-page policy paper, titled “Cultivating Friendly Forces: The Chinese Communist Party’s Influence Operations in the Xinjiang Diaspora.”

The UFWD gathers information about and attempts to influence individuals and organizations inside and outside China to ensure they are supportive of or useful to the party’s interests.

The information collected is also used to harass Uyghurs and other minorities living overseas, the report says. Community organizations with innocuous-sounding names serve as conduits for propaganda about Xinjiang in an effort to dispute the well-documented human rights abuses in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR), the researchers say.

“What we were trying to do in this report is to open up another window onto the strategy of the Chinese Communist Party in its very complex and decentralized united front system,” Leibold told RFA in an interview. “And that is the efforts to co-opt Chinese overseas community organizations who would have members which had some links to Xinjiang.”

Since 2017, Chinese authorities have ramped up a clampdown on Uyghurs and other Turkic minorities in the XUAR through arbitrary arrests and lengthy detentions. An estimated 1.8 million members of these groups have been held in internment camps, where some experienced severe human rights abuses, torture, rape and forced labor.

“The SA Xinjiang Association, which is part of a large network of Xinjiang-linked overseas groups, might not be immediately recognizable as closely aligned with the CCP and its united front system, but our research demonstrates how the CCP actively cultivates community organizations, such as the SA Xinjiang Association, as conduits for advancing the party’s agenda abroad and obscuring — or even silencing — the voices of Uyghurs and other critics of its policies in Xinjiang,” the report says.

‘Tool to exert influence’

The report cites three other case studies of organizations like the SA Xinjiang Association that work to neutralize or silence criticism of CCP policies in Xinjiang.

“It’s a tool of the Chinese Communist Party to exert its influence amongst the entire diasporic community and really undermine democratic values and institutions in places like the United States, Canada and Australia,” said Leibold, who has been blacklisted by the CCP. “The starting point really is to expose the way the system operates, its aims, its ambitions and its strategies.”

“By offering up four case studies, we tried to expose the kind of inner workings of these community organizations and their direct links back to the united front system and the Chinese Communist Party,” he said.

The CCP gathers intelligence on its critics, maintains databases of former and current Xinjiang residents with overseas connections, and establishes research institutes that suggest policies to lawmakers in their respective countries, the report states.

The tactics also include cultivating overseas community leaders and sending officials tasked with qiaowu — overseas Chinese affairs —to conduct united front work, while inviting targets residing abroad to China.

The CCP taps into business networks, offers political honors for its backers, and stages cultural performances to “nurture friendly forces for China” through language schools and summer camps in a widespread public relations campaign.

“It’s easy to get duped into thinking these are just normal cultural activities,” Leibold said.

The researchers used Chinese-language media reports, government documents and social media posts to track groups and individuals promoting the CCP’s Xinjiang narrative and policies overseas.

They urge other researchers to document human rights abuses in the XUAR and call on governments to hold China accountable for its repressive policies there.

They also recommend that media, NGOs and research institutes increase public awareness of the links between community organizations in the Xinjiang diaspora and the CCP and ask on law enforcement and civil society groups to disrupt the CCP’s ability to interfere.

Written in English by Roseanne Gerin.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By Kurban Niyaz for RFA Uyghur.

This content originally appeared on openDemocracy RSS and was authored by Emily Kenway.

Samoa and China do not have any plans for military ties, Samoa Prime Minister Fiamē Naomi Mataʻafa says.

Fiamē — who is on a three-day trip to Aotearoa — is making her first official bilateral trip abroad since becoming leader last year.

Her visit marks 60 years of diplomatic relations between New Zealand and Samoa and the 60th anniversary of Samoa’s independence.

At a media briefing after talks with New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern yesterday, Fiamē said: “There are no discussions between Samoa and China on militarisation at all.”

She said the Pacific nations would discuss China’s security proposals at the Pacific Islands Forum due to take place from July 12.

“The issue needs to be considered in the broader context,” she said.

Ardern said there was capability in the region to deal with security issues and they could be addressed together, while stressing that Pacific nations still had the sovereign right to decide their own future.

“We have convergence on our regional priorities,” Fiamē said, adding that Samoa believed in the region taking a collective approach to issues.

She said the anniversary of the Treaty of Friendship signed by the two countries would coincide with Samoa opening its borders fully on August 1.

Watch the media briefing

The talks with Ardern had covered a lot of ground, she said, and the two countries would work together on tourism, education and in other economic areas.

“Targeted assistance from New Zealand has enabled us to open our borders.”

From August 1 flights to Samoa would increase from the current weekly flight for passengers to daily flights by the end of the year.

Her message to Samoans living in New Zealand was that the anniversary celebrations will take place over 12 months so they had plenty of time to come home.

Asked what Samoa required of New Zealand, Fiamē said “she was not in a rush to come up with a shopping list”.

Instead it might be time just to reflect on reprioritising issues while saying climate change and education remained important as well as “building back stronger” after covid-19.

Time for a rethink on RSE scheme
On the subject of seasonal workers, which Samoa has “slowed down”, she said the New Zealand scheme was well run. But there were some concerns and Samoa was noticing the impact of the loss of workers in its own development sectors.

Originally it was intended to send unemployed workers to Australia and Aotearoa for the RSE programme, but now the civil service and the manufacturing sector in Samoa were being hit by experienced employees leaving.

“We need to have a bit more balance,” Fiamē said, adding that the new government wanted to hold new talks with both the Australia and New Zealand governments on the issue.

Referring to the Dawn Raids, Fiamē welcomed Ardern’s formal ceremonial apology last year.

“When we all live together it’s important to settle grievances and differences,” she said.

Ardern said the visit has come at a special time for the two countries, referring to the Treaty of Friendship and Samoa’s 60th anniversary.

She announced the launch of a special fellowship in Fiamē’s name and the New Zealand prime minister’s award plus the start of new sports leaders’ awards with an emphasis on women and girls.

Discussions had covered their shared experiences on Covid-19 with Ardern praising the high vaccination rates among young Samoans.

Climate change had also been discussed and New Zealand will increase funding for Samoa’s plans to tackle it.

Invitation to Ardern
On her arrival at Parliament yesterday morning, Fiamē invited Ardern to Samoa to take part in the independence celebrations next month and she repeated the invitation at the media briefing.

Fiamē’s visit comes ahead of the Pacific Island Forum meeting.

After welcoming Fiamē, Ardern acknowledged the importance of that meeting which will discuss issues like climate change and the current “strategic” situation across the Pacific.

China’s growing presence in the Pacific is among topics sure to be covered by the two leaders during their talks.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

Photograph Source: Baldeadly – Public Domain

I was walking one day at the height of the Troubles in the 1970s with a friend in South Armagh close to the border between Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic. My friend, who was from the area, commented that it had great potential for tourism and was not as dangerous as people imagined “though you have to keep a look out for trip wires.”

He was referring to real physical trip wires attached to giant roadside bombs which made South Armagh the most dangerous place for British soldiers in the whole of Northern Ireland. This era has long gone and the 300-mile-long land border that snakes between the North and the Republic has ceased over the past 20 years to be a place of bombs and fortifications.

But issues relating to the Irish border, the partition of Ireland, the Irish Sea trade border so disliked by unionists, are still political trip wires capable of detonating a small or large crises. Yet Conservative Party politicians have been extraordinarily cavalier about the way they deal with the Irish border, careless when Brexit in 2016 reopened the question of Irish Partition and uncaring again when Boris Johnson persuaded a credulous Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) that he would never allow a new sea border in the Irish Sea.

Now the Foreign Secretary Liz Truss is threatening to unilaterally scrap key parts of the Northern Ireland Protocol. The move will be regarded sceptically in Northern Ireland as a bit of Union Jack waving aimed at bolstering Truss’s patriotic credentials – and hostility to the EU – in the event of a Conservative leadership contest. In practice, the government in Westminster will be encouraging the DUP to be intransigent about entering the Northern Ireland Executive until the protocol is dropped.

This is somehow supposed to save the Good Friday Agreement because public opinion in Northern Ireland is against it, despite the fact that 54 of the 90 newly elected members of the Northern Assembly accept the Protocol as it is. The DUP put opposition to the Protocol at the heart of its election campaign. But this did not do it any good at the polls where there was a sharp fall in its vote share.

Sinn Féin won 27 Assembly seats and polled 250,388 first-preference votes compared with the DUP’s 25 seats and 184,000 votes. Sinn Féin can now claim the post of First Minister in any new Executive in the unlikely event of the DUP failing to veto its formation.

One struggle was over who holds power within Northern Ireland where, in the first half century of its existence, Catholics were second-class citizens in an Orange state. That sectarian state has been long dead, even though many unionists never accepted this.

The second struggle is over the constitutional position of Northern Ireland and the legitimacy of the state as a whole. Brexit made partition an international issue for the first time. It is this smouldering dispute that Truss and the British government are threatening to prod into life – though with what degree of seriousness it is impossible to say. The British Government may be happy to have permanent friction in its relations with the Republic of Ireland and the EU, but not with the US with Joe Biden as president.

This content originally appeared on CounterPunch.org and was authored by Patrick Cockburn.

Many of the workers who left for Thailand have previously worked in the country. When the pandemic hit and they lost their jobs, they returned home to Laos before the two countries sealed their borders.

The large workforce later took jobs in SEZs in the capital Vientiane region, where Chinese companies are given concessions in exchange for development and jobs. With no other choice, the workers were forced to accept wages that were a mere fraction of what they could get in wealthier Thailand.

But the reopening of the borders last week brought a mass exodus of workers, Thanongxay Khounphaithoun, director of the Special Economic Zone Management Department of Vientiane, told local media.

In the five SEZs in Vientiane, only 3,375 workers are on the job and, of those, 2,737 are Laotian, he said. To operate at full capacity, the zones need a total of 6,000 Lao workers this year and 10,000 next year.

The money is simply better in Thailand.

“We can’t attract workers,” an employee at one of the SEZs told RFA’s Lao Service on condition of anonymity for safety reasons.

“The problem is that most Laotians came to work with us only temporarily then quit. And now they went back to Thailand,” he said.

Another factor that may cause workers to favor Thailand to the SEZs is the language barrier. The Thai and Lao languages are mutually intelligible. But working in the SEZs may require learning Chinese, ultimately for less money.

“Chinese companies need Lao workers who speak Chinese,” an employee of a Chinese company in one of the capital’s SEZs told RFA on condition of anonymity for security reasons.

“If you speak Chinese, you can send your application and resume to their email then wait for a call,” the employee said.

But the companies in the SEZ badly need workers and are taking anyone they can get, another employee of a Chinese company in a different SEZ told RFA.

“We need a lot workers in the production department. Those who have graduated from high school and are 18 years old or older can apply,” the second employee said.

An unemployed Lao resident who used to work in Thailand told RFA that although he could find a job in the SEZs relatively easily, he did not plan to apply.

“I don’t want to work in the special economic zones because the wages are too low. I’ve seen an announcement from the Labor Ministry that says the SEZs need a lot of workers, but I don’t want to apply because it’s not worth it,” he said.

The difference in wages between the two countries is stark. A Lao worker who is employed in a suburb of Thailand’s capital Bangkok told RFA that she now makes more than three times what she did in Laos for the same job.

“In Laos, I worked at a factory in Savannakhet province and I received a basic salary of 1.1 million kip [U.S. $85] per month,” she said.  “Here in Thailand I get 10,000 baht [$288] a month and the cost of living in Thailand is cheaper too.”

The Lao Federation of Trade Unions in late March called on businesses to raise the minimum wage from 1.1 million kip ($85) to 1.5 million ($115), the Vientiane Times reported.

RFA reported last week that the Lao kip is also in serious decline, losing value against the Thai baht and U.S. dollar to the tune of a 6% drop between January and April.

This has coincided with a 15-50% increase imported household goods, meaning that wages paid in kip have gone down in terms of what they can purchase, and wages paid in baht have remained stable by the same measure, and have gone up when compared to the value of the kip.

Translated by Max Avary. Written in English by Eugene Whong.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA’s Lao Service.

For the first time in more than two years, New Zealand’s border will reopen to international visitors at midnight tonight.

On 19 March 2020, New Zealand snapped its border shut to anyone without citizenship or residency, before any covid-19-related deaths were recorded.

It was the first time in our history such a move was made, with the ban also including those from the Pacific.

• READ MORE: Covid-19 update: Fourteen more deaths, 8242 new community cases
• ‘Shooting ourselves in the foot’ – NZ doctor calls for tighter mask rules

Today, the countdown is on to welcome back vaccinated visitors from visa waiver countries.

New Zealand’s already reopened the border to vaccinated Australians and some international students.

Air New Zealand chief executive Greg Foran said almost 1000 people will arrive on the first three flights, which will come from Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Fiji.

The airline has been struggling to prepare for the influx in international visitors due to staff recruitment issues.

The Ministry of Health reported 14 more more deaths with covid-19 and a further 8242 new community cases on Friday.

The seven-day rolling average of case numbers was 7540, down from last week’s 8166.

The total number of reported deaths with covid-19 rose to 737

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

This content originally appeared on openDemocracy RSS and was authored by Sally Hayden.

In Myanmar’s eastern border town of Muse, exports to China of seven types of goods — including rice, chilies and eels — have been suspended since March 15, resulting in a backup of more than 70 trucks, border traders there told RFA’s Myanmar Service.

"From the very beginning, it has been very difficult to trade with the Chinese side because of the high cost and the frequent changes in the system,” Than Bo Oo, general secretary of the Muse Rice Commodity Exchange, told RFA. “Lately, most of the goods being moved are those left over from recent months. No new shipments have come from the mainland.”

“We are still adjusting to the system changes. The cost of shipping from the border now seems higher than the cost of shipping on the seas," he said.

Some of the trucks have opted to unload their cargo into warehouses along the Muse border rather than wait around for China to ease the restrictions, he said.

Prior to the coronavirus pandemic, border traders were able to export 40,000 to 60,000 bags of rice a day. Prior to last week’s restrictions, only two or three 12-wheelers with 50 tons of rice could get into China each day, the traders told RFA. Now none are crossing.

Fisheries products are now being sent to China through the air because the land route is inaccessible, Tai Kyaw said.

Khun Min Thant blamed China’s policy of delegating responsibility for local COVID-19 policies for the back-up at the border. He said that local Chinese officials in areas near the Myanmar are quick to stop imports to show they are trying to respond to outbreaks. They worry that doing nothing would put their jobs in jeopardy.

“Two mayors already lost their positions in Ruili in connection with COVID surges. So if only one or two people are found infected, they order a complete lockdown,” Khun Min Thant said “Under these circumstances, our losses will continue.

More than 200 trucks have been stopped at the border by Chinese authorities in Kachin State, just north of Muse.

The recurring opening and closing of the border since trade officially resumed in November last year has been a headache for Myanmar traders. RFA reported in January that after an abrupt closing, trucks carrying watermelons decided to dump their cargo near the border rather than wait around for the fruit to spoil.

China is fighting its worst COVID-19 outbreak since the Wuhan mass infections at the start of the pandemic, with authorities struggling to contain the highly contagious omicron variant under the Chinese Communist Party's controversial "dynamic zero-COVID" policy.

An estimated 50 million people had been placed under lockdown in various cities and districts across the country as of last week.

Figures for lockdowns in Yunnan, the Chinese province bordering Laos and Myanmar, were not immediately available. But local media said Chinese authorities closed a fruit market in the border town of Ruili after a cluster of transmissions was reported on March 8.

Thaung Naing, an assistant secretary at the Ministry of Commerce, told RFA that officials with the ruling military junta are working to get China to lift the various restrictions on Myanmar goods.

RFA attempted to contact the Chinese embassy in Yangon but received no response.

According to figures from the Myanmar Ministry of Commerce, cross-border trade between Myanmar and China totaled $5.47 billion for 2020. But it slumped to only $3.13 billion last year.

Laos’ logjam

The backup of trucks at the Chinese border in Laos remains agonizingly long for drivers trying to get their goods into China, with disputes over access spilling into fistfights between Lao and Chinese truckers. Even as trade between the countries resumed, China imposed a number of precautions to prevent the spread of coronavirus, including reducing the number of trucks that can cross over the border gate at Boten.

“It’s been a parking lot from Nampheng Village all the way to the Boten border gate for almost six months now,” a Lao truck driver told RFA’s Lao Service, describing a backup of about 25 miles.

“It takes us more than 14 days to get to our destination in China,” he said.

Another trucker told RFA that the authorities must solve the congestion at the border soon, because most of the trucks are carrying produce.

“Some products have an expiration date, and they won’t be accepted by the Chinese. For example, vegetables, watermelons, bananas and chilies are quickly perishable. The dry produce like corn and cassava is OK though,” he said.

But a Lao customs official at the Boten gate told RFA that traffic at the border has improved, due to the reopening of another gate in a different province.

The recently opened $6 billion Lao-China Railway should help alleviate the border backup by reducing demand for truck freight. But most Lao goods cannot be shipped to China along the high-speed rail connecting the Lao capital Vientiane to China’s rail network, a Lao import-export expert who requested anonymity for safety reasons, told RFA.

“Only the Chinese goods are coming to Laos [via train]. We have to wait until the Lao goods are allowed,” he said.

Lao minerals, cassava and cassava powder are allowed in the cargo bays on the train, he said.

For those whose goods are in the clear, the railway has been great for business, a mineral exports worker told RFA.

“We ship our on the train to China every day,” he said. “We ship the freight in containers it takes no more than 30 hours to reach the destination. We’ve all switched to the railway to ship our products because it’s faster and cheaper.”

An official of the Lao Ministry of Industry and Trade explained that Laos was negotiating with China to open train freight to more types of Lao products.

“Of course, we want to ship more goods, especially agricultural products such as vegetables, bananas, watermelons and rubber by train to China. We don’t know how long the negotiation will last or when it will end,” the official said.

The Vientiane Times reported this week that the Lao government has promised to get more investment from China in an effort to boost exports.

Key to their strategy will be making the train available to Lao goods headed for China. The report said in the railway’s first 100 days, more than 360 cross-border trains transported 280,000 tons of freight to Laos, Cambodia, Myanmar, Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore and Bangladesh.

Translated by Khin Maung Nyane and Max Avary. Written in English by Eugene Whong. 

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA’s Myanmar and Lao Services.

The post How Russia’s Frozen Conflicts Could Warm Up Along Its Sizable Borders appeared first on CounterPunch.org.

This content originally appeared on CounterPunch.org and was authored by John P. Ruehl.

On Saturday, March 5, authorities at Georgia’s Tbilisi International airport denied entry to Mikhail Fishman, a journalist for the now-shuttered independent Russian outlet Dozhd TV (also known as TV Rain), after he flew to the country to be with his family, according to news reports and Fishman, who communicated with CPJ via messaging app.

Georgian authorities did not offer any reason for the denial, and rerouted Fishman to another country, which he asked not to be named for security reasons, the journalist told CPJ. Two family members with whom he was traveling were allowed to enter Georgia, according to those sources.

“With independent journalists in Russia fleeing from an unprecedented number of threats, it is time for the international community to step up and offer them refuge,” said CPJ Europe and Central Asia Program Coordinator Gulnoza Said, in New York. “Journalists like Mikhail Fishman have already been targeted by the Kremlin’s crackdown on the free press and should be able to find safety. We hope Georgian authorities will be welcoming those fleeing from persecution in Russia.”

Russian citizens do not need visas to travel to Georgia. Georgia’s Ministry of Internal Affairs did not return CPJ’s emailed request for comment.

Fishman told CPJ that he had “one explanation” for why he was denied entry: “Because I am a well-known journalist in Russia. I have no doubt that this occurred because of my work.”

On March 3, Dozhd TV announced that it would suspend operations in Russia after authorities blocked its website for spreading “deliberately false information about the actions of Russian military personnel.”

The following day, Russian President Vladimir Putin enacted amendments to the country’s criminal code that would allow penalties ranging from fines to up to 15 years in prison for spreading information about military operations that state authorities deem false, or information that was discrediting to Russia’s armed forces, as CPJ documented. 

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by Erik Crouch.

Epidemiologist Sir David Skegg, who along with his team has been providing advice to the New Zealand government on the covid-19 response, says more border restrictions may ease soon, as the opposition National Party calls for all visitors to be allowed into the country.

Yesterday, the government announced that from 11.59pm on Wednesday, vaccinated New Zealanders returning to the country and who test negative on pre-departure will no longer have to self-isolate on arrival.

The move brings forward step two of the phased reopening of the border, but the National Party says that does not go far enough and is calling for the border to be open to all visitors, to jump-start the tourism industry.

• LISTEN TO RNZ MORNING REPORT: ‘The next few weeks are going to be very challenging’ – Sir David Skegg

The government relied on urgent advice from the Strategic Covid-19 Public Health Advisory Group — chaired by Sir David — before making the changes.

Sir David told Morning Report the next few weeks were expected to be very challenging on the health system as the peak of the omicron outbreak evolves, so it was best to wait until then before making decisions about opening to tourists.

“We still don’t know where it’s going to end. The number of people going into hospital every day is increasing, so I’m not surprised that they’re [the government] just going to take a bit of time to decide about that, but I expect that tourists will be welcome to New Zealand earlier than we expected,” he said.

“And it’s funny everyone calls for certainty, but actually this is a case where the uncertainty has been beneficial to those interests because the dates are coming forward.”

Tourism industry planning
However, National Party Covid-19 response spokesperson Chris Bishop told Morning Report that the tourism industry needed that certainty from now to plan ahead.

“If you talk to people involved in the tourism industry, they are literally borrowing money on their credit cards, mortgaging their houses to try and get through. And so what we can do for them is reconnect New Zealand to the world, open those borders, and allow tourists to come here,” he said.

“You’re probably not going to see a massive influx of tourists straight away in the next two to three, four weeks, you know, airlines have got to put flights on.

“But it is really important that we send signal to the airlines and to the airport that tourists are going to come and they’re going to come soon because airlines are making those bookings for the next few months and the next year right now so they do need some certainty, they do need that time frame.”

Bishop said while there would be some risk in such a decision, it was about considering the “relative risk”.

“The relative risk of allowing people who are vaccinated, who have passed the pre-departure test, to arrive into New Zealand, going into a country with one of the highest reproduction rates in the world right now and with 15,000 covid cases per day, the relative risk is much lower.

“But you’ve also got to weigh that up against the incredibly tough circumstances that our tourist parts of the economy have been in over the last two years.”

‘Minimal effect’ on NZ
On the other hand, Bishop said yesterday’s announcement was undoubtedly good news for the grounded New Zealanders who would be excited to once again be able to see their friends and whānau here.

Sir David said the changes announced yesterday would only have a “minimal effect” on New Zealand’s situation.

“The impact of this on the progress of our epidemic in New Zealand will be very small, really quite slight. The fact is that we’ve got thousands of new cases occurring every day … the number of people turning up at the airport who are infected at the moment it’s an average of about 10 a day.

“That number will go up, of course, with more people coming into New Zealand, but it will have a minimal effect on our epidemic.”

The government has asked the advisory group to now review the role of vaccine passes and mandates for the future.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

The post Labor Solidarity, and Worker Victories, Across Borders appeared first on CounterPunch.org.

This content originally appeared on CounterPunch.org and was authored by Dan Beeton.

Opposition whip Lynda Tabuya says Fiji should have taken its cue from Australia and delayed the opening of its borders due to uncertainty surrounding the new covid-19 variant omicron.

In her response to last week’s Parliament opening address by President Ratu Wiliame Katonivere, she said “lives are more important than livelihoods”.

The World Health Organisation declared omicron “a variant of concern” on November 26, but said it was “not yet clear” whether it was more transmissible when compared with other variants, and the severity of the disease was uncertain at the present time.

• READ MORE: Aussies take advantage of Fiji holiday offer amid omicron threat

Australia has reported seven cases of the new variant so far, with six in New South Wales alone.

Fiji opened its borders yesterday with more than 200 arrivals, and about 600 are expected to arrive from Australia today.

Speaking in Parliament, she said that the last time there was a call for stricter border controls, the government brought in corona’s deadliest strain, the delta variant via a flight from India.

“I, more than anyone, want our hotel workers and the rest of the tourism sector to thrive again — but not at the cost of locking down our beloved country,” she said.

Australia delayed opening borders
“We have just begun to regain some sense of normalcy.

“Australia has just done it. They have been delayed from today (Wednesday) to December 15, Japan has completely shut its borders until further notice.

“Initial reports were that the omicron variant may be less deadlier than the delta variant, but the Australian government isn’t going to put the lives of its citizens at risk and is postponing opening their borders until there is more certainty.”

The outspoken opposition MP said the lives of Fijians were far more important than their livelihoods.

“Why isn’t Fiji doing the same? Our lives are more important than our livelihoods,” she said.

“While Australia has reassured its citizens to remain calm as they look for answers, our government waited on the Nadi airport tarmac today with Rebel Wilson to welcome the world.

“Time and again, this government has shown it cannot keep Fiji safe.”

Luke Nacei is a Fiji Times reporter. Republished with permission.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

Yesterday afternoon, Uzbek officials at the Zhibek Zholy-Gisht Kuprik (Chernyaevka) border crossing with Kazakhstan denied entry to Pikulicka, a Polish citizen and freelance correspondent for Al-Jazeera and The Guardian, saying she had been banned from the country, according to news reports, tweets by the journalist, and Pikulicka, who spoke to CPJ in a phone interview.

Pikulicka said she arrived at the border crossing at about 2:30 p.m., hoping to briefly cross into Kazakhstan and then return to Uzbekistan to renew her 30-day visa, a process she had had to do since Uzbek authorities refused to extend her accreditation earlier this year, but which she had done in the past without issue. However, Kazakh authorities denied her entry to the country citing COVID-19 regulations, and when she tried to return to the Uzbek side, border guards told her she was banned, she said.

Pikulicka spent the night at the Uzbek border station, and authorities told her she needed to stay at the station until tomorrow morning, when she is scheduled to take a flight from Tashkent, the capital, out of the country, she told CPJ.

“Uzbek authorities have trapped journalist Agnieszka Pikulicka in bureaucratic limbo by refusing to allow her into the country,” said Carlos Martínez de la Serna, CPJ’s program director. “If newly reelected Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev’s promises of expanding press freedom are to retain any credibility, authorities must either offer a legitimate reason for refusing Pikulicka entry or allow her to return to Uzbekistan and continue her work.”

In April, the Uzbek interior ministry issued a statement accusing Pikulicka of spreading “negative and unobjective information” about Uzbekistan and violating the country’s media laws with her reporting on LGBT rights advocate Miraziz Bazarov, as CPJ documented at the time. In June, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs refused to extend her accreditation on account of her work “degrading the honor and dignity” of Uzbek citizens and “interfering in [Uzbekistan’s] internal affairs,” which Pikulicka told CPJ at the time she believed was retaliation for the same reporting.

Pikulicka was able to continue reporting from Uzbekistan despite her lack of accreditation, but was not able to obtain interviews with government officials, she told CPJ.

After denying her entry, the Uzbek border officials first would not allow Pikulicka to wait inside the checkpoint building, and forced her to wait outside in the cold for about seven hours, she told CPJ, adding that a friend brought her warm clothes and a sleeping bag, and she was eventually allowed to sleep inside the building at about 2 or 3 a.m.

Since then, the border staff have been kind and provided her with warm drinks and a room where she can sit, she told CPJ.

Polish Embassy staff confirmed the existence of the ban and were trying to establish the reasons for it and how long it will be in effect, Pikulicka told CPJ, adding that the Polish Embassy was responsible for negotiating her flight out the country. CPJ called and emailed the Polish Embassy in Uzbekistan for comment, but did not immediately receive any replies.

Pikulicka called Uzbek authorities’ decision “heartbreaking” and “devastating,” saying that her friends, apartment, and much of her work had been in Uzbekistan for more than three years. Authorities told her that she would not be able to go to her apartment before leaving on tomorrow’s flight, Pikulicka said.

She said she had no idea why authorities chose this moment to act against her, saying she has not reported on Uzbekistan frequently in recent weeks and had not received any warning from authorities.

CPJ called and emailed the Uzbek Ministry of Foreign Affairs for comment, but did not receive any replies.

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by Committee to Protect Journalists.

RNZ News

In just a few weeks the situation in Afghanistan has deteriorated sharply as millions cope without desperately needed international aid, New Zealand journalist Charlotte Bellis says.

Bellis is Al Jazeera’s senior producer in Afghanistan and reported on the turmoil in August as the Taliban took over the government and thousands of people tried to flee.

She has dealt with Taliban leaders for a long time, and has sensed a change in their attitudes since they first ruled the country before being toppled 20 years ago.

• LISTEN: ‘I just can’t believe how quickly everything has deteriorated’ – NZ journalist Charlotte Bellis in Afghanistan (Duration 10′:12″)
• READ MORE: Taliban takeover: Charlotte Bellis faces perils outside ‘enemy territory’ — Pacific Journalism Review

She had to leave the country in mid-September because the network feared for her safety and Bellis noted on Twitter that the Taliban were detaining and beating journalists trying to cover protests.

Now she has returned and told RNZ Sunday Morning that she was not worried about her safety.

“The situation here is pretty dire and there are a lot of stories still to be told and I feel invested in what’s happening here and I also just love the country. It’s a beautiful place to be with amazing people and I genuinely like being here.”

However, the country is facing an uncertain future with its population suffering more than ever now that international aid has been cut off.

UN warns of humanitarian crisis
This week the United Nations warned that Afghanistan is becoming the world’s largest humanitarian crisis and Bellis agrees.

“The Taliban took over about two months ago and I just can’t believe how quickly everything has deteriorated.

“People cannot find food, there’s no money, they can’t pay for things, employers can’t pay their workers because there’s no cash, they can’t get money out even from the ATMs.”

Millions of jobs have disappeared, half of the population does not know where their next meal is coming from and already children are dying from malnutrition, Bellis said.

All the aid agencies are appealing to the world to listen.

23 million need urgent help
She is about to go out with the UN Refugee Agency whose teams are organising some aid distribution as the temperatures drop to 2 degC overnight as winter approaches. They are handing out blankets, food and some cash to thousands of the needy in camps in Kabul.

“But it’s such a Band-Aid. There is no way they can reach the number of people they need to reach — it’s  like 23 million people who need that kind of assistance,” she said.

Neighbouring countries such as Pakistan and Iran were very concerned, in part because they fear a huge influx of refugees. They have closed the borders to try and keep them away.

The process of getting money and food into people’s hands had broken down, she said, with a lot of it due to United States sanctions.

Three quarters of the country ran on foreign donations before the Taliban took over and that has dried up because no countries are recognising the Taliban’s legitimacy to govern.

Bellis has spoken to one senior Taliban official who said that at recent meetings between the Taliban and the US in Doha the Americans would not tell the Taliban what policies they needed to enact to unfreeze billions of dollars in funding.

“They [the Americans] are playing with millions of people’s lives.”

School problem for girls
She believes some Taliban leaders are pragmatic and would be willing to agree to high school girls being educated but are worried they will alienate their conservative base.

In the main, primary school age girls are able to attend their lessons but the problem is at secondary school level.

“If you’re a high school girl in Kabul it’s awful – sitting around thinking how did this happen. It’s really frustrating and really frustrating for everyone to watch and say this doesn’t make sense.”

Bellis said while she feels safe at the moment, the main problem is the terrorist group, ISIS-K, who have made threats against the hotel where she is staying.

The Taliban have said they will protect guests and have placed dozens of extra guards outside.

ISIS-K is believed to only number between 1200 and 1500 yet they are a potent force with their random attacks, such as beheading members of the Taliban, whom they hate.

She believes the Taliban’s biggest worry is that ISIS will appeal to its most fundamentalist members.

ISIS attracting recruits
ISIS is also believed to be trying to attract recruits who would be trained as fighters and be paid $400 a month which is a substantial amount of money in Afghanistan.

Bellis said she feels guilty staying at a hotel with the scale of poverty and deprivation she is witnessing.

“Right outside the door people are desperate,” she said.

She visited a major maternity hospital in Kabul yesterday and the only medication available for women giving birth was paracetamol.

“Imagine going into labour and thinking, OK if anything goes wrong I’ve got paracetamol. It’s just life and death on so many levels.”

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

For those of you wondering what you can do to help Afghans.. this @WFP project is the gold standard.
You donate meals direct to Afghans – choosing a set number of meals or month at a time. https://t.co/qgmuaTdpfo

— Charlotte Bellis (@CharlotteBellis) October 26, 2021

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by Pacific Media Watch.

Many allegations have been leveled against Papua New Guinea’s disciplinary forces over the years, alleging that police and soldiers sell firearms.

However, Papua New Guinea Defence Force (PNGDF) Commander Major-General Gilbert Toropo denies these claims, saying all firearms are inspected and are accounted for on a fortnightly basis.

He said that the military had a system in place to ensure accountability for weapons in the force.

• READ MORE: Other PNG military and security reports

With recent reports of the use of firearms in tribal fights across parts of the country, many have started to ask where they are getting the guns from.

General Toropo said such statements must be backed up with evidence.

“Today, people can get such military specification weapons anywhere through the borders,” he said.

“So these allegations have to be supported with evidence. It is unfair to make generalised statements which only undermine our efforts to make PNGDF a force that our people and governments can trust.

“It’s easy for people to make statements that only discredit the force [and] that are very hard to retract,” he said.

Attempts made to get comments from the Royal Papua New Guinea Constabulary (RPNGC) were unsuccessful.

Unwritten rule
Back at Independence in 1975, there were already a few guns in the community, but as the former Provincial Secretary of Chimbu, Barungke Kaman, said some 40 years ago, there was an unwritten rule that they would not be used in tribal fights, where participants would stick with traditional weapons.

When asked about the consequences of those unwritten rules being dropped, Kaman responded at that time that “there would then be mayhem”.

Well those rules have long since been dropped, said Institute of National Affairs (INA) executive director Paul Barker.

Barker said tribal leaders today were hiring gunmen — or hitmen — often from outside their own clans, to target opponents, and the other side responded in the same way.

“We had the gun summit and task force, led by former commander Jerry Singirok and respected senior police officers, like John Toguata, but little action has ever been taken by government to follow up,” he said.

“This is partly because those that are involved in the gun trafficking and arming of groups, sometimes called warlords, are often closely linked to politics and politicians, helping deliver support and countering opponents, or law enforcement officials.”

According to the United Nations Trust Facility Supporting Cooperation on Arms Regulation (UNSCAR) that backs action on guns regulation, Papua New Guinea has about 51,957 illegal and unlicensed firearms.

Tougher PNG gun laws
In 2018, to address the widespread use of firearms in crimes and in tribal fights, Parliament passed tougher gun laws that included penalties of up to K10,000 (NZ$4000) or five years’ jail for the use of unlicensed firearms or the misuse of licensed weapons, with the manufacturing of guns now attracting up to 10 years’ jail time.

But Barker said users and manufacturers of guns seemed to consider themselves astonishingly immune from arrest and prosecution by law enforcement.

Some operating within PNG’s cities have even been ready to be interviewed by international film crews and barely conceal their identities or whereabouts or activities, as though they consider themselves protected from police action.

Rebecca Kuku is a senior PNG Post-Courier journalist. She also reports for The Guardian’s Pacific Project.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

Yesterday, officers with the Federal Security Service (FSB) raided Dobrokhotov’s apartment, where his wife lives, and his parents’ apartment in Moscow, according to news reports. Authorities detained the journalist’s father and wife and interrogated them at a local police station, those reports said. The reports did not specify the nature of the questioning.

Russia’s Justice Ministry added the investigative website The Insider, which Dobrokhotov founded and edits, to its registry of so-called “foreign agents” on July 23, and on July 28 raided Dobrokhotov’s home and confiscated his equipment and passport, as CPJ documented at the time.

Dobrokhotov fled the country after the raid, and he is now living in an undisclosed location, according to news reports. 

He tweeted that authorities were targeting his family over his alleged illegal crossing of the Russian border, and said that his family’s phones and computers had been confiscated.

“Russian authorities must stop persecuting journalist Roman Dobrokhotov and harassing his family members,” said Gulnoza Said, CPJ’s Europe and Central Asia program coordinator, in New York. “Dobrokhotov has already faced significant official retaliation over his work, and authorities should not expand their targets to include his family.”

Authorities accuse Dobrokhotov of illegally crossing from Russia into Ukraine by “bypassing the established checkpoints,” when leaving the country in August, according to news reports and his lawyer, Yulia Kuznetsova, who spoke to The Insider.

If charged and convicted, he could face up to two years in prison, according to the Russian criminal code.

The Insider has collaborated with the Netherlands-based investigative outlet Bellingcat on several high-profile investigations, including the August 2020 poisoning of Russian opposition figure Alexei Navalny.

When CPJ called the Ministry of Justice, an official on duty said the ministry had no comment on the case.

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by Committee to Protect Journalists.

A new poll shows nearly two out of three New Zealanders want the border to remain closed until at least 90 percent of the country is vaccinated.

The poll, in partnership with the country’s leading daily newspaper The New Zealand Herald, which is also running a 90% Project in support of high vaccination, showed growing support for vaccination, according to the paper in a front age report.

The Herald said the Talbot Mills Research poll indicated that 89 percent of those polled planned to get vaccinated or had already done so.

• READ MORE: Covid-19 update: 12 new community cases in Auckland – Health Ministry
  
• Key’s ‘smug hermit kingdom’ covid comment dismissed as an ‘insult’ by Hipkins
• ‘Fear doesn’t work with unvaccinated’ – Sir John Key
• Other NZ covid lockdown reports

“The results contrast with a public appeal yesterday from former prime minister Sir John Key for New Zealand to break out of its ‘smug hermit kingdom’ by opening the border as soon as possible,” the Herald said.

The newspaper said that support for 90 percent was much higher than for the “option of opening the borders after everybody had been given a reasonable chance to get vaccinated, regardless of the overall rate – an option favoured by 26 percent of people.”

Political editor Claire Trevett wrote that support for the 90 percent plus threshold was “particularly high among Labour and Green supporters (70–72 percent support) – but about 60 percent of National and Act supporters also favoured it”.

The government had so far refused to set a specific threshold or date at which it would ease border restrictions, Trevett wrote. However, it had committed to trialling measures such as home isolation this year, as part of its road map.

“The poll of 1050 people aged 18 and over was taken from August 31 to September 6 – the third week of the lockdowns sparked by the delta outbreak. It has a margin of error of +/- 3.1 per cent,” wrote Trevett.

“The NZ Herald has joined with Talbot Mills Research for polling on vaccinations as part of the 90% Project, to help track public sentiment over the coming months.”

Covid 19 Delta outbreak: Sir John Key – 5 ideas to transform our approach, via @nzherald https://t.co/HByf2xoANA Problem is Maori and Pasifika will suffer most while Key’s mates enjoy their overseas holidays. Lift vaccination first

— Colin Tukuitonga (@ColinTukuitonga) September 25, 2021

12 new covid community cases
The Health Ministry reported 12 new community cases of covid-19 in New Zealand today, with all but two epidemiologically linked to previous cases.

In a statement, the Health Ministry said there were now a total of 1177 community cases associated with the latest outbreak of the delta variant of the virus, RNZ News reports.

All of the latest cases were identified in Auckland.

The ministry said one of today’s community cases had previously been under investigation and was now confirmed and linked to the current outbreak.

“The case has now recovered. The case spent 14 days in a quarantine facility along with household members who also tested positive for covid-19,” the statement said.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by Pacific Media Watch.

Papua New Guinea and neighbouring Indonesia have been discussing a potential reopening of their shared border.

The border was officially closed early last year due to the covid-19 pandemic, but the illegal movement of people back and forth has continued across the porous international boundary.

PNG Prime Minister James Marape met with Indonesia’s Ambassador in Port Moresby, Andriana Supandy, and agreed that the border must be properly policed to prevent the spread of covid-19.

• READ MORE: Other reports on the PNG-Indonesian border

Indonesia’s heath system is being stretched with high covid infection rates, and PNG has also struggled to contain the spread of the virus.

No date has been given for when the border may reopen officially.

In others areas discussed, Supandy proposed for the two countries to enter into a Free Trade Agreement to boost trade and commerce, citing the potential as demonstrated in the success of vanilla trade between PNG and Indonesia.

The ambassador also informed Prime Minister Marape that Indonesia has already ratified the Border and Defence Cooperation Agreement and Land Border Transport Agreement and was awaiting PNG to do the same.

He said these agreements would pave the way for a more robust bilateral tie between the two countries.

On West Papua, the diplomat said that Indonesia appreciated the consistent position that PNG government has taken in acknowledging that the western half of New Guinea was an integral part of Indonesia.

He said the West Papuan self-determination demands remained an internal issue for Indonesia to resolve.

A release from Marape’s office also said both countries had discussed the need for joint cooperation in power connectivity to areas in PNG’s Western and West Sepik provinces.

Military donation
The Indonesian military has donated an aircraft engine to the PNG Defence Force Air Transport Squadron for one of its aircraft to be used for operations in the 2022 general election.

Marape also confirmed yesterday that US$14 million would be ballocated in 2021 and 2022 to ensure all aircraft were ready to be used next year.

The The National newspaper reports Marape saying the aircraft would also be used in enforce transborder security.

The head of the Indonesian National Armed Forces Strategic Intelligence Agency, Lieutenant-General Joni Supriyanto, arrived on a Lockheed C-130H Hercules in Port Moresby yesterday with the engine.

He said transporting the overhauled Casa aircraft engine to PNG “would enhance relationship and cooperation between the armed forces contributing to security and stability in the region”.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

Indonesia is pressuring Papua New Guinea over an illegal group East Sepik claiming to form an army unit to help West Papuan pro-independence rebels fighting against Indonesian forces across the border.

Calling such armed groups as “terrorists”, Indonesia’s Ambassador to PNG, Andriana Supandy, said his country respected the sovereignty of its neighbour, PNG, and called on the PNG authorities to act over the threat.

A video of a group dressed in military fatigues and brandishing automatic rifles has gone viral on social media, prompting the Indonesian response.

• READ MORE: Other Asia Pacific Report coverage on the West Papua conflict

The men in the video, speaking in PNG “tok pisin”, claim to be from East Sepik. They say they stand with the West Papuan rebels and are ready to cross the border to support the West Papuan cause for independence.

Supandy said the Indonesian Embassy had been informed that PNG government officials were in Wewak to investigate the viral video on the social media post.

“The Indonesian government honour[s] the PNG government as a sovereign nation and leave the response to the alleged militants to the relevant authorities in PNG,” Supandy said.

“Both governments have the same understanding about the challenge and opportunity in managing the formal relations through the spirit of friendship and mutual respect.”

Gratitude over safety
Supandy said that despite the video causing uneasiness, the Indonesian Embassy would like to convey its gratitude to the government and the people of PNG for “ensuring the safety and wellbeing of Indonesians” working and living in PNG.

The embassy said the Indonesian government and people were reciprocating the gesture for PNG citizens living in Indonesia.

Supandy said the video of a vigilante group would not affect the strong relations between Indonesia and PNG.

“These armed groups in Papua and West Papua have resorted to acts, methods and practices of terrorism aiming at destruction of human rights, fundamental freedoms and democracy while also threatening the territorial integrity and security of the Republic of Indonesia,” he claimed.

Right to ‘reliable information’
Supandy said Papua New Guineans had the right to “reliable information” relating to this issue.

He said Indonesia was committed to taking measures aimed at “addressing the root causes” of the situation in Papua and West Papua provinces.

He said in this context, Indonesia advocated humane, prosperous and inclusive development approach, including:

• Respecting the basic rights of the people in Papua and West Papua provinces;
• Establishment of good governance in Papua; and
• Opportunities for Papuans to shape and direct local development strategies and regional policies.

SBS News reporting on the West Papua conflict.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

Police in Solomon Islands say they cannot successfully secure the western border with Papua New Guinea and stop the spread of covid-19 without the help of communities in the Western, Choiseul and Malaita provinces.

Neighbouring Papua New Guinea has had a huge surge of covid-19 cases with numbers now over 5000, including dozens of cases in Bougainville.

Deputy Commissioner Juanita Matanga said the vast area covered by the western border with PNG was too big for the resources and manpower of the Solomon Islands police.

She said the only way authorities could protect people from covid-19 was for people living in the region to stop moving across the border.

Matanga met with communities in the Shortland Islands and surrounding areas last week.

She said police were concerned and while they understood the reasons why people were travelling to Bougainville, people were reminded these were not normal times.

Last week PNG placed a ban on traditional border crossings.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

“There cannot be any complacency or missteps once our border controls are eased. The risks need be managed as well as possible,” said the country’s largest and most influential newspaper in an editorial today.

“There is time to ensure entry processes are running smoothly before the next big step.”

READ MORE: Al Jazeera coronavirus live updates – US coronavirus deaths near 120,000

The Herald gave its verdict in the wake of a series of shock border lapses in a week that catapulted the country from virtually a 28-day covid-free status to nine active cases – four in the last two days. All are directly travel-related cases.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern announced at her news briefing today that the government was extending a ban on cruise ships and updating its health order to make clear that travellers may be required to take multiple tests.

This followed weekend reports that Auckland’s covid-19 isolation facilities had reached capacity, with 4272 New Zealanders in managed isolation and almost 900 more expected to arrive in the country in the next two days.

Director-General of Health Dr Ashley Bloomfield said the first case today was a teenage girl who arrived in New Zealand on June 13 and was travelling with her family, who have tested negative so far, reports RNZ News.

Runny nose, or no symptoms
They were staying at the Novotel Auckland Airport hotel.

Dr Bloomfield said the teenager’s only symptom was a runny nose. The second case was a man in his 30s who had arrived from India on June 15.

He was staying at the Grand Millennium in Auckland and had no symptoms.

“Fortunately,” said The Herald today, “in terms of new coronavirus infections, we have so far avoided much damage after the case of two sisters from Britain [last week] revealed that the isolation and testing systems had not been working properly…

“It is not as though other countries which have largely subdued covid-19 have avoided hiccups either.

“China has battled a spike in Beijing. South Korea had to hose down a virus flare-up centred around nightclubs.

“Germany has hundreds of new cases linked to abattoirs.

“Australia’s outbreak is at a low level, but it is still experiencing new infections and has more than 400 active cases.

Trump’s political rally
“As we held crowded Super Rugby Aotearoa matches for a second weekend, the United States debated the wisdom of President Donald Trump holding an indoor political rally in Oklahoma yesterday, which is experiencing a rise in coronavirus cases.

“On Saturday, the US gained 32,000 new cases – the most in a day since May 1. The states of most concern are Texas, Florida, and Arizona.

What the saga of the two travellers from Britain and other such stories had told New Zealand, The Herald said, was that the public’s trust was easily shaken.

“Quick action to arrest a slide is then essential. The Prime Minister appears to understand that,” the newspaper added.

“Basic and obvious competence is the secret sauce any government and ministry need to maintain trust.”

Covid update 22 June. Graphic: RNZ

Public confidence in New Zealand’s border controls has been shattered.

The obvious anger of the prime minister when talking about the latest border bungle shows that goes right to the top.

The fate of Health Minister David Clark and potentially Director-General of Health Dr Ashley Bloomfield hang in the balance, having ultimate responsibility for putting the rules in place, and making sure they’re followed.

READ MORE: ‘Raise our game’ warning on NZ border

The case of the two women returning home to see a dying relative that were allowed to leave managed isolation without being tested has laid bare fundamental failings in the way the most high-risk people in the country have been managed.

New Zealanders were assured border controls would be beefed up even more after moving into level 1 – those in managed isolation and quarantine would be tested on day 3 and day 12, and no-one would be given exemption to attend a funeral.

– Partner –

We know now that at least on one occasion that testing did not happen – and it was only because two positive tests were returned this even became known.

It’s a confronting wake-up call that New Zealand is still vulnerable and the dreaded “second wave” could still happen. The government has defended the times it has acted with caution to avoid going back into lockdown, the worst case scenario for an economy already plunging into recession.

‘Kiss and cuddle’
The handling by ministers and officials has not helped; strong initial assurances the women had no close contacts during the drive down the North Island only to be proven wrong by National’s Michael Woodhouse – what would in normal times be an uncontroversial social interaction a “kiss and a cuddle” – now a matter of great political debate.

That contact – still described as “fleeting” – has created even more risk of the virus spreading with more people coming forward by the hour.

The two women though should not be demonised, they followed the rules and by all accounts tried to do all that was expected of them after being granted the exemption to travel to Wellington.

But their case has unleashed even more stories about people in quarantine asking for tests and not getting them, large groups allowed to attend a funeral in contravention of the rules and people given leave to go a funeral taking off and having to be tracked down by authorities.

These are all an indictment of the system New Zealanders have been assured will protect them at the most vulnerable point – the border.

Attendance at funerals in particular has been a pressure point all the way through. Officials were roundly criticised for taking a hard line but had to take another look after a High Court decision questioned the approach being taken and there did seem to have been more of a willingness to allow people to attend – up until the rules were changed again on June 8.

Testing for all arrivals was only made compulsory that same day.

Problems are broader
However the problems are broader than whether people have been tested according to the protocols; there are also serious questions around the laxity of enforcement around quarantining and managed isolation with reports of people mingling with the public on supervised walks and even staff of the Chief Ombudsman needing tests after unexpectedly finding themselves “mingling” with people in a hotel lobby who were supposed be in isolation.

The border was first closed on March 19 and there were problems from the start.

Cabinet Minister Jenny Salesa was dispatched to Auckland International Airport after reports the advice and direction from officials about self-isolating was a shambles, followed later by an admission from police they were not carrying out the checks on people trusted to self-isolate after arriving from other countries.

At that time the government was overwhelmed by the sheer numbers of New Zealanders arriving home, but no such excuse now.

The prime minister’s answer is to bring in the military and bring some organisational discipline and resource to the regime, led by Air Commodore Digby Webb.

However, RNZ understands defence personnel have already been involved in quarantining as part of the operations command centre under former Police Commissioner Mike Bush, including someone from Defence managing one of the hotels being used.

Bringing in the military to manage or exert any kind of control over a civilian population could cause alarm but they’ve been brought for their logistical skills, and the ability to bring in plenty more manpower if needed, not to impose law and order. Appointing Air Commodore Webb to not only run the show but to rake back over what had already happened is a clear vote of no confidence in the health officials.

The next few days will be crucial. Testing and contact tracing that will be frantically happening should give us a better idea of whether this is limited to just the two women, or if the failures at the border are going to have more wide-reaching consequences.

Police in Papua New Guinea have arrested nine alleged illegal border crossers and quarantined them in Vanimo, reports RNZ Pacific.

The arrests came as East Sepik Governor Allan Bird called for “shoot to kill’ orders for illegal border crossers and a military control of areas along the border between Papua New Guinea and Indonesia, reports the PNG Post-Courier.

The newspaper The National reports three Indonesians from Papua and six vanilla sellers from PNG’s East Sepik province had crossed the border from Indonesia

READ MORE: Al Jazeera coronavirus live updates – Global cases surpass 900,000

They were arrested and then placed in 14 days of quarantine by the West Sepik provincial health authority.

The land border between PNG and Indonesia has been closed since late January due in an attempt to prevent the spread of Covid-19.

– Partner –

The West Sepik police commander, Chief Inspector Moses Ibsagi, said the illegal border crossers were not taking heed of the national government’s warning on the dangers of Covid-19.

Mr Ibsagi said the vanilla traders in particular, who had just returned from selling their beans in Jayapura, were more concerned about money than the lives of eight million people of PNG.

Confirmed cases in Jayapura
With several confirmed cases of Covid-19 in Jayapura, and likely more unreported cases, the provincial police commander is concerned about the virus spreading via the PNG kina bank notes which the traders obtained in Jayapura.

He warned that when the money was brought back to PNG, it could circulate through buying and selling of goods or services, helping the virus to easily spread among local people.

Meanwhile, in a statement yesterday, East Sepik Governor Allan Bird called for a “shoot to kill” policy.

“I have a disturbing report that people are still crossing the border from Indonesia into my province. Even as of l[Sunday night] five people came in a speed boat and three people the previous night,” Bird said.

“I am asking if a special order can be made and our border districts be placed under military control.

“I want the military to be given shoot to kill orders. East Sepik has no hospital facilities. We are only operating out of makeshift shelters. We can’t cope.”

Bird said the East Sepik province had so far 37 people of interest and all of them had come across from Indonesia.

‘Massive infections’
“I understand Indonesians who are frightened by the massive infections on that side could be crossing the borders to run away from the disease. If that happens, we are finished.

“I have been raising concerns about this border for more than two months. Nobody listened to my concerns.

“I am raising a new threat from the border which I see coming. They could already be moving across as I speak.

“Leaders we must take this decision to save our people.”

Bird is expected to raise the same issue when Parliament meets today to introduce the Emergency Bill to give legal effect to the state-of-emergency and also to introduce a supplementary budget containing a stimulus package containing relief during the emergency period.

Prime Minister James Marape has also given assurance that the police and military presence would be beefed up along the border provinces of West Sepik and Western.

Indonesia has issued a stern warning over illegal border crossers from Papua New Guinea.

This follows Indonesia stepping up its security measures at the border in response to the global Covid-19 coronavirus pandemic.

The First Secretary to the governor for West Sepik, Adam Wangu, has already informed people via a social media forum.

READ MORE: Al Jazeera coronavirus live updates: Italy deaths rise by 756 in one day

He was informed by the Papua New Guinean Embassy in Jakarta that police and military personnel are guarding all the entry points that are used by PNG citizens.

“There maybe no mercy if you are caught,” Wangu said.

– Partner –

“Don’t take this message as a joke.”

Four men picked up
This follows an instance where four men from Maprik in East Sepik who were picked up on Thursday in Vanimo as persons of interest after they illegally crossed through the jungle past Wutung into Jayapura to sell their vanilla beans.

Provincial police commander Moses Ibsagi said yesterday West Sepik was on lockdown and a few hinterland areas like Lumi were being monitored by police reservists that had been engaged.

He said frontline service providers such as PNG Power, police, military personnel, health officials, quarantine and customs were still active.

A Consort shipping vessel is expected to arrive in Vanimo with store goods and Ibsagi said the police had issued notice to people to stock food rations.

Police Minister Bryan Kramer, in a press conference on Thursday, said the national operations Covid-19 was considering West Sepik and Western as high risk locations and there would be increased surveillance there to protect the country from any openings for the virus.

The government should make an announcement this week on the deployment.

Indonesia has reported coronavirus infections on the rise to at least 1155 with 102 deaths, according to World Health Organisation (WHO) figures yesterday.

In Papua New Guinea, there has been only one reported case of an international traveller who has since been airlifted out of the country.

Elias Nanau is a PNG Post-Courier reporter.

With some of the toughest border restrictions and a newly-announced NZ$500 million boost to health services, New Zealand is among a small number of countries with a strategy to contain the Covid-19 coronavirus pandemic.

New Zealand is also fortunate in having a brief window of opportunity to refine and roll out an effective response to Covid-19. As at today, there were 52 confirmed cases in New Zealand, all except two related to overseas travel. There is not yet any evidence of community transmission.

This situation could change rapidly as mild cases may not seek medical attention, effectively resulting in “silent transmission”. This process has seen other countries slip into widespread community transmission.

READ MORE: New Zealand outstrips Australia, UK and US with $12 billion coronavirus package for business and people in isolation

New Zealand is vulnerable until our testing rates and contact tracing capacity increases, potentially to the levels used successfully in South Korea.

To guard against this risk New Zealand should consider a short “pulse” (a few weeks) of intense social distancing, including bringing forward the school holidays and temporary closures of most businesses, social meeting places and public transport.

– Partner –

Doing this now has the potential to slow undetected chains of transmission while containment measures are being ramped up. If containment is sustained, there may be the chance of avoiding the prolonged lock-downs seen in many countries.

New Zealand’s effort to contain Covid-19 will also help protect Pacific Island nations. Samoa in particular has a terrible history of devastating pandemics, notably influenza in 1918 and more recently measles.

Intensive containment can work
Like other countries, New Zealand has relied on advice from the World Health Organisation, whose pandemic plan, originally developed for influenza, focuses on managing spread through successive phases.

But Covid-19 is not influenza. Its longer incubation period (median of five to six days, compared to influenza with one to three days) means we have a better chance of identifying and quarantining contacts, but only if done swiftly and effectively.

By introducing border restrictions and maintaining a focus on stamping out chains of transmission, New Zealand has joined countries like Singapore, Hong Kong and Taiwan that rigorously pursue containment of Covid-19.

The strongest evidence that containment works comes from the remarkable success of China in reversing a large outbreak. Also relevant are examples of smaller Asian jurisdictions.

Planning for the next phase if containment fails
New Zealand needs to continue planning for the scenario where containment fails and we move into widespread community transmission. With Covid-19, it seems impossible to spread demand for treatment sufficiently to manage it through existing health sector capacity.

At this point, we would need additional social distancing measures to suppress the epidemic to ensure New Zealand’s hospital and intensive care capacity are not overwhelmed.

We also need to strengthen other critical components of the national response, notably hospital capacity to treat large numbers of critically ill patients with pneumonia while also ensuring high standards of infection control.

And it is vital to support vulnerable populations to reduce their risk of infection. As with influenza, the risk of Covid-19 infection is particularly concentrated in older people and those with chronic medical conditions. This makes Māori and Pacific peoples particularly vulnerable – as seen in past pandemics.

Support with social distancing, hygiene and home isolation in a way that is consistent with tikanga (Māori customary practices) is particularly important for protecting these groups. Services for community diagnosis and treatment need to be responsive to these populations, as well as those with disabilities and the elderly.

Strategic challenges ahead
Countries have consistently underestimated the Covid-19 pandemic in terms of its global spread and intensity. They now seem to be diverging markedly in their strategic responses.

New Zealand is among those countries and territories committed to containment, but elsewhere, the aim in most high-income countries seems to be to mitigate the effects. Across much of the rest of the world, including the United States, it is unclear whether there is an agreed goal to guide the national response.

The possibility of uncontrolled outbreaks in some regions means countries that pursue containment will face long-term challenges, until a vaccine or treatment is available.

All of these approaches have uncertainty and risks and we will only understand the net societal benefits and costs in hindsight. Certainly in New Zealand, the containment approach appears to have widespread public support, particularly across the health sector.

Many of us are working to monitor and evaluate it so that we can learn how to better manage such threats in the future, some of which may be far worse as biotechnology advances open up new hazards.

Dr Michael Baker is professor of public health at the University of Otago and Dr Nick Wilson is professor of public health at the University of Otago. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

• If you have symptoms of the coronavirus, call the NZ Covid-19 Healthline on 0800 358 5453 (+64 9 358 5453 for international SIMs)

Stahl: “We have heard that half a million children have died. I mean, that is more children than died in Hiroshima. And, you know, is the price worth it?

Albright: We think the price is worth it.

The “price” was US sanctions imposed on Iraq under colour of a UN Security Council Resolution, the effect of which was to deny Iraq access to basic medical supplies. Of course, the death toll in Iraq was not confined to the denial of medical supplies. Atomic waste contamination from the first Gulf War and continued military operations later would add to the death toll from cancer and preventable disease, due to the destruction of vital civil infrastructure, like water and sewage systems.

The world should probably be thankful that the corona virus (CORVD-2019) problem was not first submitted to the US-dominated UN Security Council for deliberation.

As of this writing the intra-European borders are being closed and/or subject to control, suspending the provisions of the Schengen Agreement. The current President of the French was 19 years old when Ms Albright gave that interview. Today he declared war, adding that it is a “guerre sanitaire”.¹ That is a striking and also fitting contrast to Mr Xi’s declaration that the fight against the corona virus outbreak in China was “a people’s war”. This shows something elemental about the difference between the campaign to control the contagion in China and the campaign in the West.

Mr Xi’s term refers to the war the Chinese, led by the Chinese Communist Party, fought first against Japanese invasion and occupation and then against the Western colonial forces under Chiang—who had purged the KMT of the Communists at the West’s behest. For Mr Xi, the fight against the virus outbreak in Wuhan was a fight by the Chinese masses against a threat to their economic and social development. His term was a summons to defend China against forces he was diplomatic enough not to name.

In contrast, the Western (US-owned or controlled) mass media did not hesitate to give the novel corona virus the historic colour of the “yellow peril”.

1. Macron’s choice of words shows that he represents the war of the (mainly financial) elite against the People, a state that Mme Le Pen’s supporters had long recognised, even if they found no vehicle adequate to defend themselves. After the outgoing PSF president had successfully neutralised what little socialism or French was left after Mitterrand’s reign, neutering the Partie Socialiste Francaise, M. Macron was exhumed from the cesspool of some chateau of ill repute to fend off the anti-EU front emerging, not only from the Right.
2. Macron’s “guerre sanitaire” is a poor substitute for the more ideologically charged cordon sanitaire. It has nothing to do with health but with waste disposal and control, with hygiene. Naturally there are those who will insist that this is a reference to washing hands. But whose hands? M. Macron’s declaration of a “guerre sanitaire” conjures visions its opposite, the “guerre sale”, the dirty war, or what Sartre described, les mains sales. Both the French author Albert Camus (The Plague) and the Portuguese author Jose Saramago (Blindness) depicted the insidious and deceptive character of this kind of war by a ruling elite against its citizens. Saramago wrote a sequel, Seeing, however, which together with Blindness ought to instruct us in greater circumspection.

Today my grocer asked me if I could remember the 40s and 50s of the past century. He knows that I am not quite that old but also that as a history teacher I am familiar with records and remembrance of things past. Then he said, point blank, “we are in a state of war.” He was not talking about the efforts to prevent infection, the risk of sickness. He was talking about the unspoken state of hostility against person or persons unknown (or unnamed) that characterises the entire environment in which the West has ostensibly found itself within the past three weeks. Ostensibly the virus is the enemy. But sane people are not so easily deceived.

There are many details one could mention. I have been writing about this now since St Greta started to terrorise us with her apocalyptic spasms.

However, it might bear consideration. M. Macron no longer has yellow vests. Madrid can dispense with its Catalonian annoyance. Italy is prevented from active participation in the Belt and Road project. Germany, well, the Sphinx of Berlin will never admit what her government’s real objectives are. (We should recall that every high official who dared to openly mention German military activity in Central Asia was forced to resign.) The war against China has not ended — maybe it is only just starting. And then there is the war against us. I am sure that if asked today not only Ms Albright would reply, “We think the price is worth it.”

1. Le Monde, “Nous sommes en guerre“: Ie verbatim du discours d’Emmanuel Macron [↩]

This article was posted on Tuesday, March 17th, 2020 at 8:14pm and is filed under Borders, China, COVID-19 (coronavirus), Europe, France, President Emmanuel Macron, War.