Radio Free Asia

Urgent Steps Announced to Restore Power

Josh Lipes — 2012-05-23T22:25:07Z

Hundreds of demonstrators took to the streets of Burma’s largest city Tuesday for a second day of protests over chronic power cuts, effectively forcing the government to announce emergency measures aimed at restoring electricity to full capacity within weeks.

As many as 400 protesters defied police orders to disperse, and held a candlelight vigil Tuesday in downtown Rangoon near the Sule Paya Pagoda, which had been the focal point of pro-democracy protests in 1988 and 2007, both of which were brutally crushed by Burma’s former military regime.

The more recent of the two, led by monks and now known as the Saffron Revolution, had been sparked by protests over rising gas prices.

Htin Kyaw, one of the demonstrators, said that the people of Rangoon had been living in “dark nights” and were simply expressing grievances according to their rights under Burma’s constitution.

"We're not protesting, but peacefully expressing our rights," he said.

Police later directed the candlelight vigil to move from the streets to the pagoda compound, where they allowed it to continue. Protesters vowed to return for a third consecutive day if their demands remained unmet.

The vigil prompted Aung Khin, chairman of Rangoon’s electricity department, to pledge the restoration of 24-hour electricity to the city’s inhabitants within two weeks.

The government announced emergency measures Wednesday, including the purchase of six generators from U.S.-based Caterpillar Inc., which will be air-freighted within a week, and two 25-megawatt gas-turbines to be bought from General Electric Co.

The orders follow the lifting of U.S. sanctions against Burma last week, and both companies have expressed desire to expand their presence in the country.

The Burmese government contends that the power cuts were a result of damage to infrastructure essential to the national grid during skirmishes with Kachin ethnic rebels in the country’s border area with China.

Urgent repairs will be carried out on the power stations damaged in the fighting, state television said, adding that Rangoon, Mandalay, and Monywa will receive a total of 37 high-powered generators to boost supplies.

State media also sought to explain the power cuts to the public, saying Burma has only 18 hydropower stations, one coal-fired power plant, and 10 gas-fired power stations supplying 60 million people nationwide. The combined capacity of about 1,340 megawatts during a recent drought has fallen far short of consumption levels reaching as much as 1,850 megawatts.

Testing freedoms

Protesters gathered for the second time in two days on Wednesday in Rangoon, following demonstrations which began on Sunday in Mandalay and spread to Monywa, 130 kilometers (80 miles) to the northwest, on Monday, before reaching the former capital Tuesday. Activists spread word of the protests through Facebook.

Around 1,000 people also held a third day of protests in Mandalay, the country’s second-largest city. Authorities in Mandalay brought residents in for questioning on Tuesday, but later freed them.

Six-hour blackouts are commonplace in Rangoon, while Mandalay often sees cuts that last three times as long.

Similar public gatherings took place Wednesday in South Dagon, where about 100 people held lit candles and signs demanding the full restoration of electricity. And some 500 people held a candlelight vigil in Pegu, as about 1,000 police looked on.

The extremely rare protests represent a test for the nominally civilian government of reformist President Thein Sein which took power in March last year after five decades of military rule.

Thein Sein approved a bill last year which allows for peaceful protests.

And while organizers of the power-cut protests did not seek to get approval from the authorities five days in advance of the gatherings as required under the new law, police have allowed them to continue. Punishment can carry a one-year sentence to jail.

Protesters have accused Burma’s former military government officials of selling off natural gas reserves to China and pocketing the profits, while some 75 percent of Burmese have no access to the country’s power grid. Power consumption in Burma averages 104 kilowatts an hour per person—one of the lowest per capita rates worldwide.

Opposition leader and Member of Parliament Aung San Suu Kyi had said Tuesday during the opening of an office for her National League for Democracy (NLD) party in East Dagon township that power shortages were a direct cause of government mismanagement.

She called on the authorities to address the power outage issue as well as that of joblessness in Burma.

Reported by RFA’s Burmese service. Translated by Win Naing. Written in English by Joshua Lipes.

Catholics Face Trial for Social Activism

Rachel Vandenbrink — 2012-05-23T21:10:00Z

An international rights watchdog has called on Vietnam to release four Catholic activists accused of conducting propaganda against the state and to drop all charges against them, in a statement on the eve of their long awaited trial beginning Thursday.

The four men—Dau Van Duong, 24, Tran Huu Duc, 24, and Chu Manh Son, 23, and Hoang Phong, 25—will be tried in a court in northern Vietnam’s Nghe An province for allegedly distributing pro-democracy leaflets.

The activists, all students or recent graduates in the city of Vinh, had participated in volunteer activities including donating blood, helping orphans and natural disaster victims, and encouraging women not to have abortions, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said.

“They’re local volunteers, people supporting the Catholic Church, working on basic association expression issues … people who are operating on a day-to-day basis in support of what they believe,” Phil Robertson, HRW’s deputy director for Asia, told RFA’s Vietnamese service.

“For them to be charged with propaganda against the state for allegedly distributing leaflets is really beyond the pale. It shows very clearly that the government of Vietnam does not respect freedom of religion or expression,” he said.

They are to be charged under Article 88 of the penal code, which rights groups say is often used by the Vietnamese authorities to arbitrarily imprison bloggers, legal advocates, and other critics of the state .

“Article 88 is the equivalent of a legal buzz-saw, designed to cut down those who freely criticize or question the government,” Robertson said in a statement.

Three of the activists have been held since August of last year and the fourth since December.

If convicted, they face sentences of between three and 20 years under Article 88 of Vietnam’s criminal code.

A day before the hearing, the activist’s families have yet to receive formal notice to attend, according to Viet Tan, an opposition group banned in Vietnam that monitors human rights in the country.

The activists have only recently had access to their lawyers, the group said.

Article 88

Vietnam's constitution guarantees freedom of belief and religion, but religious activity is closely monitored and remains under state control.

With six million members, Catholicism is the country’s second-largest religion after Buddhism, but tensions between the community and the Hanoi government have led to unrest over church property and other issues.

But the four activists, who allegedly distributed leaflets calling for political pluralism and criticizing the government, are facing charges not under rules governing religious activity, but freedom of expression.

Article 88 calls for punishment for such acts as “propaganda,” “circulating documents or cultural products,” or “psychological warfare” against the government.

“Vietnam’s leaders should repeal this draconian law and listen to their people,” Robertson said.

In March, two other Catholic activists, Vo Thi Thu Thuy and Nguyen Van Thanh, were sentenced to five and three years in jail, respectively, under Article 88 for distributing anti-government leaflets, HRW said.

The two were associated with Nguyen Van Ly, 65, a Catholic priest and long-time pro-democracy activist who has spent half of the past three decades in jail, HRW said.

In 2011, at least ten bloggers and activists were jailed under the provision, and at least three more bloggers—the well-known Nguyen Van Hai (also known as Dieu Cay) and other founders of the Free Journalists Club website—are awaiting charges under Article 88.

Reported by Mac Lam for RFA’s Vietnamese service. Written in English by Rachel Vandenbrink.

Media Scores Rare Court Victory

Parameswaran Ponnudurai — 2012-05-23T20:05:00Z

In a rare court victory for the media in reform-embracing Burma, a judge ruled Wednesday that a news magazine need not disclose to the government the name of a reporter who filed a controversial story about corruption.

The Ministry of Mines had filed a defamation suit against the Voice weekly journal, demanding that it reveal the author of the article published in March about misappropriation and irregularities in the accounts of several government ministries.

But the court dismissed the ministry's application on hearing arguments from both sides at a hearing Wednesday, the Voice's editor-in-chief Kyaw Min Swe told RFA.

"Both sides put up our arguments on the issue and finally the judge gave a verdict that they have no grounds for asking for the reporter's name," he said.

Hearing on the defamation suit will continue on June 6.

In the March report, the Voice, citing a report from the auditor general's office to the parliament's public accounts committee, charged that accounts of ministries such as those in charge of information, agriculture, industry and mines had been misappropriated from 2009-2011.

It particularly said that the Ministry of Mines sold 50 percent of shares in the Monywa copper mine, owned by the ministry, to local industrial conglomerate the Union of Myanmar Economic Holdings Limited (UMEHL), but that a foreign company paid the money on behalf of UMEHL.

“All of the facts are reliable,” Kyaw Min Swe said. “We’ve got a 36-page report. [In] fact, our news does not contain all the details of the report. The details of it are more serious,” he was quoted by exile Mizzima News Agency as saying.

The court ruling on Wednesday means the Voice will be allowed to protect its reporter's name, lawyer Win Shwe told The Associated Press.

Censorship controls

Since a nominally civilian government replaced decades of harsh military rule in March last year, Burma has released imprisoned bloggers, softened official censorship, and had fewer reports of harassment and attacks against journalists, according to independent watchdog Freedom House's recent report that reviewed developments in 2011.

The Southeast Asian nation also saw an increase in the number of private media outlets, which led to somewhat more diversity of content and less self-censorship, the report said. In addition, a number of exiled journalists were able to return to the country.

Despite the improvements, the media environment remains restricted with censorship controls.

In an indication of the fragile political situation, the Press Scrutiny and Registration Division, which requires media outlets to submit articles for approval before publication, has not allowed local media to report on the resignation in early May of hardline vice-president Tin Aung Myint Oo. It warned journals that they will face disciplinary action if they do so.

Burmese censorship rules generally apply to two categories of newspapers and magazines.

One group of 178 publications focusing on education, economics, international news, art, general knowledge, health, sports, children’s literature, and technology are not required to submit their reports to censors prior to publication.

The other group of more than 180 publications focusing on local news, religion, and crime have to submit all articles and photographs to censors prior to publication.

“Censorship should not be imposed at every step of a publication from registration of news media to distribution,” said a statement issued by the Myanmar (Burma) Journalists Association Organizing Committee (MJAOC) on World Press Freedom Day this month.

Reported by RFA's Burmese service. Translated by Nyein Shwe. Written in English by Parameswaran Ponnudurai.

China's Para-Police 'Abuse Authority'

Rachel Vandenbrink — 2012-05-23T15:25:00Z

China's city management officials, known as "chengguan," routinely abuse their authority in their attempts to keep city streets in order and are often themselves a threat to public safety, a U.S.-based rights group said on Wednesday.

The para-police agency, which is tasked with enforcing non-criminal urban administrative regulations, lacks effective official supervision, training, and discipline, Human Rights in China (HRIC) said in a new report, titled "Beat Him, Take Everything Away."

"The chengguan’s abusive conduct turns the idea of rule of law on its head," said Sophie Richardson, China director at Human Rights Watch. "Instead of carrying out clearly defined and limited activities to enforce the law, some chengguan are abusing their authority."

The chengguan were set up in 1997 to enforce non-criminal administrative regulations, including rules governing environmental, sanitation, traffic, and civic pride.

But rights activists and netizens say the chengguan, who are often demobilized soldiers, are a law unto themselves, often using unnecessary brute force against ordinary citizens. Often paid no basic wage, they rely on income from fines and fees levied from citizens to make a living.

Hawker beating

The HRIC report comes just days after the alleged beating of a local hawker by chengguan sparked a standoff in the eastern province of Jiangsu, in which angry local people overturned a chengguan vehicle.

Local workers said the chengguan officer involved in the incident on May 10 was in the pay of a local canteen and was deliberately preventing local food hawkers from carrying affordable lunch boxes to the construction site where they worked.

"This is the result of the chengguan beating people," said a worker who witnessed the unrest. "We couldn't get hold of our food, so we expressed our anger by overturning their vehicle."

"The hawker who was bringing our food was injured and taken to hospital," the worker said.

The wife of the injured hawker said in a video posted online that the chengguan had prevented him from taking lunchboxes to the workers because of their own vested interests.

"How can this be called administrative law enforcement?" she said. "They should implement the law with more justice and treat everyone the same."

Calls to the Yixing municipal urban management bureau went unanswered during office hours on the day of the incident.

'Open scandal'

According to Jiangsu-based rights activist Zhang Jianping, the chengguan are often the relatives of local officials.

"There have been examples of chengguan brutality all across China," Zhang said. "It's also a common spark that ignites mass incidents."

In October 2008, the beating of a university student by chengguan in the central city of Zhengzhou sparked mass protests involving tens of thousands of people. The incident had followed similar protests in Sichuan’s Yibing city in November 2007, and in Hunan’s Shaoyang city in May 2008.

"Chengguan forces have earned a reputation for brutality and impunity," said Richardson. "They are now synonymous for many Chinese citizens with physical violence, illegal detention, and theft."

"Chengguan abuses are an open scandal in China,” she said, calling on the government to investigate those responsible.

Chengguan beatings are a common theme among China's 250 microbloggers, for whom they are synonymous with government-sponsored brutality and corruption.

When U.S. President Barack Obama announced the death of Osama bin Laden in May 2011, one user on the Netease microblog site commented wryly: "The ... chengguan have claimed responsibility for this incident."

Reported by Qiao Long for RFA's Mandarin service. Translated and written in English by Luisetta Mudie.

Cyber Activist on Trial in Yunnan

Josh Lipes — 2012-05-23T15:07:30Z

Authorities in the southwestern Chinese province of Yunnan are trying a pro-democracy activist and former manager of a local cybercafe for "subversion," his lawyer said.

"The trial lasted for two hours ... but they aren't saying it's incitement to subversion now; it's just straight subversion," said rights lawyer Ma Xiaopeng, who is representing Cao Haibo.

"During the hearing, we tried to point out some unreasonable elements in the prosecution's case—the fact that these charges are trumped up," Ma said.

"We pointed this out very clearly, but we don't know if it has had any effect," he said. "This trial isn't being held openly."

Cao, 27, formerly managed an Internet cafe in Kunming. His trial was held behind closed doors at the Kunming Municipal Intermediate People's Court on Tuesday.

Wife's visit

His wife, Zhang Nian, had applied for a permit to attend the trial, but was turned down because the case "involved secrets."

She was later allowed a meeting lasting just five minutes with Cao.

"I wasn't allowed in [to the courtroom], so after the hearing was over, I took our baby to visit him briefly," Zhang told RFA's Cantonese service after the visit. "He said a couple of words to the baby. The meeting lasted only a few minutes."

"It has been so long since we saw each other, we didn't know what to say, so we didn't say very much," she said. "He said he was doing fine [in the detention center] and told me to take good care of our child."

The visit was the first Cao has been permitted since his initial detention last October, according to the China Human Rights Defenders (CHRD).

"During Cao’s detention, his wife has gone long periods without receiving correspondence from him, and has been largely unaware of her husband’s situation," the group said in an emailed statement on Wednesday.

Cao was detained by state security police on Oct. 21, and he was formally arrested on Nov. 25.

Police also searched his home and confiscated cell phones, desktop computers, a laptop, and USB drives, among other items, CHRD said.

Originally from the eastern province of Jiangsu, Cao is currently being detained at the Xishan detention center in Kunming.

Decades in jail

In a separate development, CHRD expressed concern over released Tiananmen Square protester Li Yujun, who served nearly 23 years in jail after he set fire to an oil truck in an attempt to prevent People's Liberation Army (PLA) troops from marching on student-led protests during the 1989 democracy movement.

"Li, now 45 years old, will reportedly need to report to a police station once a month, and he will not be allowed to leave Beijing, give media interviews, or express political views online," CHRD said.

Li initially received a death sentence in 1991 at the Beijing Higher People’s Court for "arson," which was commuted to life imprisonment and later reduced to 20 years in 1996.

Released earlier this month from Beijing No. 2 Prison, Li was one of the last of the 1989 "hooligans"—ordinary people who took the side of the students—still serving sentences for convictions linked to the 1989 crackdown.

Reported by Wen Yuqing for RFA's Cantonese service. Translated and written in English by Luisetta Mudie.

Authorities Quiz Power-Cut Protesters

Rachel Vandenbrink — 2012-05-22T23:45:00Z

The Burmese government has detained residents and opposition party members who participated in large protests against electricity blackouts amid rising public anger over chronic power shortages in the country.

The government also issued a rare plea to the public to understand the need for the “electricity rationing” which it said is critical to cater to increasing demand.

The protests, the country’s biggest in five years, entered their third day Tuesday as they spread to Rangoon, Burma’s largest city, where about 100 people held a candlelit vigil near the Sule Paya pagoda.

The Rangoon gathering followed earlier demonstrations the northern cities of Mandalay and Monywa on Sunday and Monday night against blackouts that have worsened in the past three months, leaving residents with as little as five hours of power per day.

Authorities in Mandalay brought residents in for questioning on Tuesday morning, after some 1,000 people protested the night before, demanding 24-hour electricity supply, according to some of those who were detained.

Interrogated

Well-known writer Nyi Pu Lay, who participated in the demonstration Monday night, said police interrogated him about who had organized the protest.

“They asked me, ‘Who are the leaders of the demonstrations held over the past two days here in Mandalay demanding 24-hour electricity? Which organizations are behind this movement?,’” he told RFA’s Burmese service.

While police from the Bureau of Special Investigation questioned him for several hours at their office near Mandalay Hill, he saw that seven other city residents had also been brought in and asked the same questions, the writer said.

According to Agence France-Presse, several members of opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy were also taken in for questioning.

Police told Nyi Pu Lay the government “is still working on a Freedom of Expression Act that is not finished yet,” suggesting the demonstrations were not lawful, he said.

Protests are extremely rare in Burma, which, until last year, was ruled by a military junta. Since then, Burma’s nominally civilian government that took power last year has implemented a series of reforms, including introducing a law allowing peaceful protest.

Rare statement

In response to the protests over the power shortages—the country’s largest since the 2007 Saffron Revolution, when demonstrations sparked by soaring gas prices triggered a brutal crackdown—the authorities issued a rare statement of appeal to the public on Tuesday.

Burma’s Electric Power Ministry issued a statement in all three state-run newspapers Tuesday under the headline, "Plea to the Public," asking the people “to cooperate by sparingly using electricity.”

It blamed the shortages on increased demand at the start of summer and on fighting with ethnic Kachin rebels in the north. "Please understand that electricity rationing had to be introduced," the statement said.

But protesters said the shortages are due to the government selling electricity to neighboring countries, demanding that the government stop the practice.

Burma had previously announced plans to construct hydropower dams that would have supplied electricity to China—including the Myitsone Dam on the headwaters of the Irrawaddy River which was suspended in September following opposition to the project.

Reported by RFA’s Burmese service. Translated by Khin Maung Soe. Written in English by Rachel Vandenbrink.

House Church Asked to Halt Activities

Parameswaran Ponnudurai — 2012-05-22T22:35:00Z

Authorities in China’s southwestern province of Sichuan have requested a large family-based Christian church to halt its activities, the church’s pastor told RFA on Tuesday.

The move came as Chinese authorities intensified their harassment of Christians and cracked down on unofficial churches, called “house churches,” across several Chinese provinces.

“The authorities have asked us to end our family church congregations, calling our gatherings ‘illegal,” said Pastor Li, leader of the 1,500-member house church based in the Qili township of Sichuan’s Langzhong city.

“They…still haven’t taken direct action against us, but this has worried churchgoers,” Li added.

Li said the government warning arrived on May 18 in a notice delivered to the home of a church member, and was not sent to their meeting place.

“Our prayer meeting of that day had about 20 believers,” Li said, adding that because of the large size of his congregation, church meetings are held in small groups in area villages.

Restrictions increase

Chinese authorities have recently moved to increase restrictions on the activities of China’s house churches, whose members are estimated to number about 40 million according to government figures.

On May 5, a family church gathering in Shijiazhuang in China’s northeastern Hebei province was broken up by police who declared the gathering illegal. Officers took worshippers’ names and told them to pray instead at government-approved churches.

And on Tuesday, a family church staff member in Nanyang in the central province of Henan said that authorities had ordered local house church members to join official churches.

“But we categorically refused to do so,” the man, surnamed Xi, said. “They want to control us.”

“The severity of the crackdown on family churches varies in different places,” said Zhang Mingxuan, president of the Chinese Association of Christian Family Churches and active in preaching in central China’s Anhui province.

“In places where there are many family churches, the local government may have a better understanding of them, and officials will be more prudent,” he said.

“But in places where you have only a few believers, local authorities will treat them as an ‘evil cult.’”

Reported by Qiao Long for RFA’s Mandarin service. Translated and written in English by Ping Chen.

Authorities Target Southern Broadcasts

Josh Lipes — 2012-05-22T22:05:00Z

Updated at 2:30 p.m. EST on 2012-05-23

Authorities in North Korea have stepped up efforts to jam South Korean television and radio broadcasts in a bid to prevent the public from accessing news from the outside world, according to North Korean sources inside the country and along the border with China.

A North Korean resident surnamed Yoon, who lives in Kangwon province’s Wonsan city near the Chinese border, said that television programs from the South had been harder to receive than usual in recent weeks, and that authorities may be interfering with the broadcasts which they fear might undermine authoritarian rule.

“Nowadays, it is really difficult to watch South Korean programs on TV,” Yoon told RFA during a trip to China where he was visiting his relatives.

“I’ve been seeing [static] for some time now,” Yoon said. “I first thought it was because the weather was bad, but things like this have happened rain or shine, so I suspect it is because the authorities are jamming the signals.”

He said that on other days, he encountered no interference when viewing the same channels.

“I don’t think they jam the broadcasts every day,” Yoon said. “But I still can’t tell why they jam the broadcasts on some days and not on others.”

A Nampo resident surnamed Lee, from South Pyongan province, also on the Chinese border, said that news programs from South Korea’s largest television network, Korean Broadcasting System (KBS), had also been difficult to receive.

“Until recently, the KBS satellite broadcasting programs were easier to watch than the [official] North Korean central broadcasting programs,” he told RFA during a trip to China.

“But due to poor picture and sound quality these days, it is now very difficult to watch the South Korean programs.”

A Chinese source closely monitoring North Korea and who listens to RFA broadcasts near the border area said that authorities are also targeting radio signals from the South with jamming frequencies.

“It has become increasingly difficult to listen to radio broadcasts in recent days due to the jamming signals coming from North Korea,” the source told RFA on condition of anonymity.

But the source added that reception can, at times, be very clear, leading him to believe that North Korean authorities are not jamming the broadcasts continuously.

“Due to serious electricity shortages, it would be difficult for them to jam the broadcasts on a regular basis,” he said.

Widespread accessibility

While it is largely the coastal regions in North Korea that can access South Korean broadcasts, the extent of the areas that receive the programs is reportedly quite wide.

According to an RFA survey of North Koreans who have traveled to China, residents of the Kaesong area, which is close to the South Korean border, as well as those in western coastal areas such as Haeju and Nampo, receive broadcasts.

Those residents have reported the ability to watch programs from all three of South Korea’s free-to-air networks, including KBS, MBC, and SBS, just as clearly as they can watch programs from North Korea’s Korean Central Television (KCTV).

And residents of North Korea’s eastern coastal regions, including the cities of Wonsan, Hamhung, and even Chungjin, have reported simply needing to adjust their indoor antennas to access South Korean television broadcasts.

Experts have suggested that, based on these reports, North Korean authorities understand the limits they face in monitoring the people against accessing South Korean broadcasts and instead are focusing their efforts on jamming the signals.

Earlier this month, sources told RFA that illicit South Korean movies and other entertainment programs are becoming more available on North Korea’s black market due to the proliferation of DVD writers smuggled in from China and new distribution networks in the south of the country.

They said that DVD writers are stoking the production of videos of South Korean soap operas, movies, and music which North Korean leaders have long tried to forbid in an attempt to keep unwanted foreign influences from seeping into the isolated nation.

Reported by Joon-ho Kim for RFA’s Korean service. Written in English by Joshua Lipes.

Cambodia to Extradite Taiwanese to China

Rachel Vandenbrink — 2012-05-22T21:50:00Z

Cambodia disclosed Tuesday that it will deport to China 49 Taiwanese suspected of involvement in an Internet extortion ring, saying Phnom Penh was compelled to take the action because it has no diplomatic relations with Taipei.

In a move sure to enrage Taiwan, Ministry of the Interior Spokesman Kheu Sopheak said Cambodia is making arrangements for the group, arrested Friday in a raid on their operations in Phnom Penh, to fly to China in line with the country’s policy of maintaining relations only with China.

“The Ministry of the Interior is working on an urgent measure to expel the 49 Taiwanese on a special flight to China, not to Taiwan, because of the government’s One-China policy,” he said, referring to the policy that supports China’s sovereignty over Taiwan.

“The government recognizes only one China,” he said.

In the Friday raid on three districts in the city, police confiscated computers, headphones, and other equipment that they said the group had used to call and extort money from victims in Taiwan from their base in Phnom Penh.

The suspects, whom authorities said had entered the country illegally, are currently being held at the immigration department awaiting deportation.

The arrests are the third round of a crackdown on the same online scam operation, after authorities deported a group of 55 Chinese and Taiwanese nationals in September to face charges in China.

A few months earlier, authorities had rounded up 187 Taiwanese related to online scams in Sihanoukville, Svay Rieng, and Phnom Penh.

Cambodia’s Ministry of the Interior Spokesman Khieu Sopheak said the recent crackdown on what he called an international crime syndicate was a success for the country.

“Cambodia is not a haven for mafia to commit crimes. Cambodian authorities are just as capable as other authorities. We have worked to destroy this mafia network,” he said, adding that authorities are looking to make more arrests.

Cambodia, China, and Taiwan

China, which has cultivated close economic ties with Cambodia and is its top investor, claims sovereignty over the island of Taiwan and encourages other nations not to recognize it as a country.

China and Taiwan have been ruled separately since defeated Nationalist forces fled to the island at the end of the civil war with the Communists in 1949.

Beijing maintains that Taiwan is simply a renegade Chinese province which has no right to seek independence, and it has never renounced the use of force to bring Taiwan under its control.

Cambodia severed formal relations with Taiwan in 1997, when Prime Minister Hun Sen ordered the closure of the Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Office, the de facto Taiwanese embassy in Phnom Penh, shortly after he took power.

Despite supporting the One-China policy, Cambodia has maintained trade relations with Taiwan.

In February 2011, the Philippines outraged Taipei when it deported to China 14 Taiwanese nationals, along with ten Chinese nationals, over their suspected involvement in a fraud ring. Taiwan retaliated with tightened immigration policies on Filipinos working in their country.

Reported by Sok Serey for RFA’s Khmer service. Translated by Samean Yun. Written in English by Rachel Vandenbrink.

Defrocked Monk Decries ‘Biased’ Decision

Josh Lipes — 2012-05-22T20:30:00Z

A monk in western Cambodia who was defrocked on Monday after observing a political debate ahead of local commune elections has accused his superiors of being politically biased.

Ung Kaing, 25, said he was defrocked after attending a debate along with an activist from the opposition Sam Rainsy Party (SRP), of which he was previously a member. He had left the SRP after taking his vows of monkhood.

According to Cambodia’s commune election law, monks are allowed to vote, but may not participate in political activities or run as candidates. Commune elections will take place on June 3.

The young monk told RFA’s Khmer service on Tuesday that 68-year-old Pot Pun, the chief monk of the Suriya Rongkor Pagoda in Siem Reap province’s Sort Nikum district, had dismissed him from the fold because he did not agree with the policies of the SRP.

“I didn’t agree with his decision to defrock me. I opposed it,” Ung Kaing said.

“He was putting pressure on me because he was biased toward political parties.”

Ung Kaing said that before being defrocked, Pot Pun had also questioned him about his involvement with the SRP in an earlier political debate.

Pot Pun told RFA that he made the decision to defrock Ung Kaing because he had lied to him about going to retrieve medicine from outside of the pagoda when he had really attended the debate.

But he admitted that he had been pressured by higher level monks to kick the monk out of the pagoda.

“The top monks told me that he had breached the law and must be defrocked,” he said.

“Top officials had asked me [about the monk], so in order not to make trouble for myself, I did it.”

SRP District Director Porm Pung confirmed that Ung Kaing had been a party activist, having initially joined the party in 2010.

He said that local party leaders had volunteered the monk as a candidate in Sort Nikum district for the position of commune councilor in Khjash commune, though Ung Kaing maintains that he had never asked to run, which he is prohibited from doing by law.

Monks and politics

According to Cambodia’s commune elections law, anyone, including monks, can vote for commune councilors as long as they are a Cambodian citizen, 18 years of age by the day of the election, and reside in the commune. Only convicts are unable to register to vote.

But the Sangha, or monastic, community has been increasingly divided over politics since monks were given the right to vote in 1993 during the country’s first elections since the fall of the Khmer Rouge regime.

Currently, a small group of politically active monks known as the “young monks”—most of whom are members of the SRP—voice public opposition to the current government, while some senior monks have opposed this activism and called for their arrest or defrocking.

In August last year, Cambodian environmental activist monk Luon Savath was barred by the official Buddhist Sangha Council from entering pagodas in his home province of Siem Reap after participating in protests against rainforest destruction.

Pagodas customarily host traveling monks who are in need of a place to stay.

He was told that the ban would be lifted only if he agreed to end public support for the protesters and “confess his wrongdoings” to the council.

The order followed an earlier one in April, when Luon Savath was banned from entering pagodas in Cambodia's capital Phnom Penh for participating in land protests.

The Cambodian Center for Human Rights said at the time that the ban represented a political abuse of Buddhism, which does not prohibit social activism.

In June 2011, the New York-based Human Rights Watch awarded Loun Sovath with the Hellman/Hammett grant for his work supporting communities facing forced evictions and land-grabbing in Cambodia.

Luon Savath told RFA that no pagoda has been willing to host him since the ban.

Reported by Hang Savyouth for RFA’s Khmer service. Translated by Samean Yun. Written in English by Joshua Lipes.

Death Row Billionaire Gets Reprieve

Richard Finney — 2012-05-22T18:55:00Z

An appeals court in the eastern Chinese province of Zhejiang has suspended a death sentence handed down to a former billionaire businesswoman for fraud, following an online campaign on her behalf, official media reported.

Wu Ying, 31, was sentenced to death in 2009 by the Jinhua Intermediate People's Court in the eastern province of Zhejiang.

Now, that sentence will be suspended for two years pending a judicial review, and all of Wu's property confiscated, the official Xinhua news agency reported.

Wu's appeal was rejected by the Zhejiang High Court in January, and China's highest-level appeals court, the Supreme People's Court in Beijing, announced in February that it would review her case.

According to Chinese government statistics, 99.9 percent of death sentences with a two-year reprieve do not result in executions, legal experts say.

Wu was found guilty of raising 770 million yuan (U.S. $122 million) in funds through one of China's off-the-books, illegal lending networks and of promising her investors huge returns on their investments through the then-booming property market.

The former president of Bense Holding Group was accused of "squandering" around half the amount she raised between 2005 and 2007 on luxury cars, jewellery, and real estate.

Online campaign

Chinese netizens have launched a vociferous online campaign to save Wu from execution, seeing the former hair-salon boss as the scapegoat for a system in which the corrupt political elite routinely get away with far-worse excesses at taxpayers' expense.

Her case has sparked widespread calls for the legalization and regulation of the shadowy money markets which proved her downfall.

Lawyer Zhang Xingshui said private money markets have sprung up as a way around the state monopoly on bank loans.

"They should legalise private investment and lending, but there are a lot of risks attached to doing so," Zhang said.

And Beijing-based legal scholar Teng Biao, who has been closely following Wu's case, said Teng's death sentence had been the result of a concerted campaign by officials in her home province of Zhejiang.

"Her assets were confiscated long before the sentence took effect," Teng said. "They were swallowed up and divided."

"The State Council has already said that it wants to use Wenzhou as an experiment in China's financial reforms," he said. "The financial monopoly must eventually be broken."

Wu's sentence came as China's leaders vowed to crack down on unauthorized lending networks and on rampant real estate speculation, which has put the price of residential property out of reach for many Chinese.

But the campaign to revoke Wu's death sentence spread rapidly via China's hugely popular microblogging service and included some high-profile figures, including Zhang Sizhi, the 85-year-old lawyer who defended Mao Zedong's wife Jiang Qing during the trial of the Gang of Four in 1976.

Zhang, who argued that Jiang was following Mao's orders at all times, said that Wu invested in hotels, advertising, wedding planning, and transport companies with money from friends and family, not the general public.

Reported by Tang Qiwei for RFA's Mandarin service. Translated and written in English by Luisetta Mudie.

Call for HIV Funding in Burma

Richard Finney — 2012-05-22T18:40:00Z

The U.N. warned Tuesday that progress in the treatment and reduction of HIV/AIDS cases in Burma could be reversed if increased funding and other resources for programs to fight the deadly disease in the country are not found.

U.N. officials on a visit to Burma this week noted that HIV infection rates in Burma have begun to drop and that growing numbers of infected Burmese are receiving treatment, but warned that two-thirds of people living with HIV in the country remain untreated, and that financial support for treatment and prevention programs is expected to decline.

“If additional resources are not made available for, and within, Myanmar, even the gains of the past years will be lost, and the badly needed scale-up of services will not happen,” UNAIDS Director and delegation member Steven Kraus said, according to a statement by the Office of the U.N. Resident/Humanitarian Coordinator in the country.

As of last year, an estimated 216,000 people were believed to be living with HIV in the formerly military-ruled country, also called Myanmar, according to data provided by the U.N.

Burmese opposition leader and member of parliament Aung San Suu Kyi shared her concern at the prospect of reduced funding and noted the importance of community-based efforts to prevent HIV and to care for those infected.

To be effective, she added, programs must be sustained and well-managed.

“All the work needs to be closely monitored to assure accountability,” she said.

Tightening budgets

Last November, the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, an international public-private scheme to combat the three diseases, said that it would not hand out any more funds for scaling up AIDS treatments until 2014 because of tightening budgets in donor countries.

U.N. Special Envoy on HIV/AIDS in Asia and the Pacific Dr. Nafis Sadik said investment on AIDS in Burma needs to “increase dramatically” from international sources to assist those who are living with HIV and to prevent more people from becoming infected.

“Increased government budget allocation to AIDS work is also needed,” she noted at the conclusion of a week-long official visit at the head of a high-level U.N. delegation.

“Furthermore, laws, policies, and programmes that block access to services for people living with and most affected by HIV need to be revised and removed,” she said.

“Only this will enable the provision of effective and sustainable prevention and treatment services,” she added.

Burma’s vice president Dr. Sai Mauk Kham pledged continued official commitment to addressing HIV, tuberculosis, and malaria, as “prominent public health problems” in the country, according to the statement.

“[Burma’s] government is working in close collaboration with the UN, non-governmental organizations, local freelance philanthropic organizations and civil society in its response to HIV.”

Last Thursday, in a gesture acknowledging the beginning of political reforms in Burma, the United States announced an easing of investment and financial restrictions, but said it will maintain wider sanctions amid ongoing concerns over human rights abuses and ethnic conflict.

The two countries also announced they will exchange ambassadors to reflect the improvement in bilateral relations.

Reported by Richard Finney.

Lawyers Challenge Visit Ban

Josh Lipes — 2012-05-22T16:45:00Z

A group of lawyers in China has challenged a ruling banning them from meeting with blind Chinese dissident Chen Guangcheng's nephew, who is facing trial for "intentional homicide" in the wake of his uncle's daring escape from house arrest.

In a letter addressed to the police chief of the Yinan county public security bureau in the eastern province of Shandong, the lawyers hit out at police interference in their efforts to defend Chen Kegui.

"We believe your bureau’s conduct violates the Criminal Procedural Law of the People’s Republic of China and other administrative and legal regulations," said the official letter, which was signed by Beijing public interest lawyer Ding Xikui and Shanghai-based lawyer Si Weijiang.

"[It] seriously violates the legal rights of Chen Kegui and lawyers’ lawful rights to carry out their profession," said the letter, which followed unsuccessful attempts last week by the legal team appointed by Chen's wife, Liu Fang, to meet with their client.

Ding confirmed to RFA's Cantonese service on Tuesday that he and Si had been denied permission to visit Chen Kegui at the Yinan county detention center, where he is currently being held.

"They said they have already found him legal assistance, and they wouldn't let us see him," Ding said. "But their reasoning doesn't stand up, because we have the right to visit him."

"According to the spirit of the law, the defendant should be able to hire his own lawyers ... legal aid attorneys are paid by the taxpayer, and here, a citizen is willing to hire his own."

"There is no need for the state to pay his legal expenses," Ding added.

'Denying counsel'

The China Human Rights Defenders (CHRD) group said in a statement that police obstruction was "tantamount to denying Chen Kegui access to counsel."

"To date, Chen Kegui has not been permitted to meet with any lawyer of his own choosing," the group said in an emailed statement on Tuesday.

Ding's request to meet Chen in person to verify police claims that he had already been allocated legal aid lawyers was rejected because it "did not accord with legal regulations," CHRD said.

Citing Article 23 of China’s Legal Aid Regulations, Ding wrote in the letter that he and Si are Chen Kegui’s lawful attorneys, having been authorized by Chen’s wife to represent her husband, and that the government-appointed legal aid lawyers should stop providing legal assistance to Chen Kegui.

Nanjing-based activist He Peirong, who spearheaded the online campaign to raise awareness of Chen's plight during his 20 months of house arrest and who helped him flee to Beijing, said she was concerned that the activist's departure for the U.S., where he settled in as a visiting scholar at New York University this week, wouldn't spell the end of trouble for his supporters.

"I think they will start to go after people in future," said He, who is currently living without obvious surveillance at her home. "We are all waiting because we don't know what's going to happen."

But He said she had no regrets about helping the activist, who acted as legal advocate for families threatened with forced abortion and sterilization at the hands of local family planning officials.

"I have never felt regret over this," she said, adding that Chen had been very circumspect over the details of his daring escape in the hope of protecting his allies from retribution at the hands of the authorities.

Reported by Grace Kei Lai-see for RFA's Cantonese service. Translated and written in English by Luisetta Mudie.

Thousands Protest Garment Factory Conditions

Rachel Vandenbrink — 2012-05-21T22:30:00Z

Some 3,000 employees of a textile factory in Cambodia’s capital of Phnom Penh gathered to demand better working conditions on Monday, in one of the largest recent strikes to hit a garment industry plagued by complaints of low wages and few protections for labor rights.

On the third day of their strike, workers from the Chinese-owned SL Garment Processing Cambodia company’s two factories in the outskirts of Phnom Penh took their protest downtown, gathering in front of the Social and Labor Ministry building in the capital.

The protesters said they were determined to continue the mass strike until they receive better working conditions, benefits, and protection of their rights.

“If we don't have a solution, what will we do next? We will struggle until we can see a solution,” one worker shouted at the protest.

The demands are not an unusual refrain in the country’s garment factories, which are the country’s largest employers and hire more than 300,000 people, mostly women.

Art Thun, president of the Coalition of Cambodian Apparel Workers' Democratic Union, said the company should address the workers’ concerns.

“They will go to negotiate right at the factory, since whether or not the factory owner agrees [to their conditions] they still need to seek a proper solution for the workers. The owner can't avoid responsibility for this matter,” he said.

The factory’s management has condemned the strike as illegal and warned protesters not to try to take over the factory buildings.

“Don’t take any action to incite or lead workers to block the entrance gates to the SL factory companies,” a member of the management company shouted to the strikers through a loudspeaker.

Strikes and protests are not uncommon at textile factories, where laborers often work long shifts for little pay.

In February, protests by two thousand workers at the Chinese-owned Manhattan Textile and Garment Corp’s factory in southeastern Cambodia’s Kampong Cham province turned violent when workers blocked a national highway and vandalized the factory.

The industry has also been rocked by nearly a dozen incidents of mass fainting in the past year. The faintings are mostly blamed on workers' poor health, bad ventilation in the workplace, or exposure to dangerous chemicals, although some factory managements have disputed this.

Reported by Uon Chhin for RFA’s Khmer service. Translated by Taing Sarada. Written in English by Rachel Vandenbrink.

Electricity Cuts Spark Rare Protest

Josh Lipes — 2012-05-21T21:55:00Z

In Burma’s largest protest in years, as many as 1,000 people staged a candlelit demonstration in the northern city of Mandalay on Monday, protesting severe electricity shortages which the government has blamed on fighting in the Kachin border region.

Mandalay residents carrying candles gathered near the city’s power station from 7:00 p.m. on Monday for the second night of protests, demanding officials restore round-the-clock electricity after gradual power cuts over the past three months reduced the supply to as little as five hours a day.

Officials dispatched riot trucks to control the demonstration, but allowed it to continue until after 11:00 p.m.

Mandalay officials held an emergency press conference around 10:00 p.m. to say that high demand for electricity at the start of the summer and a lack of rainfall needed to generate hydropower from the country’s dams were at fault for the recent blackouts.

But residents demanded to know how much of the region’s electricity was being sold to neighboring China.

Three other cities have seen similar demonstrations over electricity in the past two days, including nearby Monywa as well as Pyay, in the southern part of the country, and Thone Kwa, near Rangoon.

But the protests in Mandalay are the country’s largest since the 2007 Saffron Revolution, when soaring gas prices prompted thousands to take to the streets in the capital, triggering a brutal crackdown.

Since then, Burma’s nominally civilian government that took over last year has implemented a series of reforms, including a law allowing peaceful protest.

After landmark elections held in November 2010, Mandalay's electricity supply was relatively stable, because candidates had promised to provide better service, residents said.

But in recent months, blackouts have become routine, they said.

Kachin conflict

On Sunday, state media blamed national power shortages on attacks by ethnic Kachin rebels on four towers that form part of the national power grid in northern Burma’s Shan state.

Bomb blasts by the Kachin Independence Army (KIA) had destroyed the four towers, the official New Light of Myanmar newspaper said, amid fighting that has intensified since a 17-year peace agreement was shattered in June.

The bombing occurred just before a government delegation met with Kachin leaders on Monday in Thailand’s Chiang Rai for unofficial talks aimed at forging a ceasefire agreement.

"It was just a preliminary discussion in order to make future meetings possible,” Gen. Gwan Maw, the KIA’s deputy commander-in-chief, said of the meeting.

Neither side has commented on the details of the discussion, which is believed to be their fourth unofficial meeting.

At least 60,000 have been forced to flee their homes amid the fighting, with some living in internally displaced person (IDP) camps in Burma and others across the border in China.

Reported Zaw Moe Kyaw and Tin Aung Khine for RFA's Burmese service. Translated by Win Naing. Written in English by Rachel Vandenbrink.