The Shangri-La Dialogue laid bare China’s undeniable support for Russia in the war in Ukraine, as well as Beijing’s blatant hypocrisy when it says it “supports the policy of territorial integrity and sovereignty”. Last October Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government led a series of study groups asking “Is the War in Ukraine Distracting […]
MANILA — Manila may resort to measures such as filing another international lawsuit like the 2016 case against Beijing to stop China’s continuing intimidating actions in the Philippines’ South China Sea waters, a senior Filipino official warned.
Manila has tried options including protests and official diplomatic complaints, and yet a Chinese coast guard ship – the world’s largest – is again in Philippine waters, said a spokesman of the Task Force for the West Philippine Sea, which is Manila’s name for the waters it claims.
The Philippine task force spokesman Jonathan Malaya explained at a press conference on Tuesday that Manila was running out of options in dealing with Beijing’s continued actions to assert what China claims is its sovereignty over the West Philippine Sea.
Since Ferdinand Marcos Jr. assumed the presidency in June 2022, his administration has filed a total of 199 diplomatic protests against Chinese vessels and activities in the waterway.
Reporters asked whether the Philippines was thinking of filing another lawsuit akin to the one adjudicated in its favor and against Beijing in 2016 by an international arbitral tribunal.
“Will [the presence of the Chinese ship in Manila-claimed waters] lead to another case? All options are on the table,” he answered.
“[T]he closer the ‘monster’ ship is [to] Philippine waters, the more it [raises tensions] and the more the Philippine government contemplates things it was not contemplating before.”
Malaya said that China was “pushing us to the wall” but the Philippines would not back down.
“We do not waver or cower in the face of intimidation. On the contrary, it strengthens our resolve because we know we are in the right.”
“The Monster” refers to the giant 12,000-ton China Coast Guard (CCG) vessel 5901, which patrolled the disputed Scarborough Shoal area in recent days.
The behemoth subsequently moved to the northwestern coast of the Philippines’ Luzon island on Tuesday, where it was last spotted some 77 nautical miles (143 kilometers) from the shoreline.
China responded to Malay’s comments saying it maintained its claim in the waterway. The CCG vessels’ activities there were lawful and “fully justified,” added the superpower’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson.
“China’s sovereignty and rights and interests in the South China Sea were established in the long course of history, and are solidly grounded in history and the law and compliant with the international law and practice,” spokesman Guo Jiakun said Monday at a news conference.
“We call on the Philippines once again to immediately stop all infringement activities, provocations and false accusations, and stop all its actions that jeopardize peace and stability and complicate the situation in the South China Sea.”
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Located about 125 nautical miles (232 km) from Luzon Island, the Scarborough Shoal – known as Bajo de Masinloc in the Philippines – has been under China’s de facto control since 2012.
Beijing’s possession of the shoal forced Manila to file a lawsuit at the world court in The Hague.
The court’s international arbitral tribunal in 2016 ruled in Manila’s favor but Beijing has never acknowledged that decision.
Philippine officials on Monday said the government had filed yet another diplomatic protest over the presence of Chinese ships in waters within its exclusive economic zone.
In recent years, a slew of countries, including the United States, Japan, Australia, France and United Kingdom, have also supported Manila and carried out joint sails with the Philippines in the contested sea.
Reporters asked Malaya whether the Philippine government was considering asking its foreign allies the U.S. and Japan for help in driving away the Chinese vessel.
“Now the ball is in the court of the PRC (People’s Republic of China),” he said.
Recently, the Philippine Senate ratified a so-called Reciprocal Access Agreement (RAA) with Japan, allowing the two allied nations to deploy troops on each other’s soil for military exercises.
The RAA – which will take effect once Philippine President Marcos signs off on it and Japan’s legislature ratifies it – is the first of its kind signed by Tokyo with an Asian country.
Japan, unlike the Philippines, does not have territorial claims that overlap with China’s expansive ones in the South China Sea.
But Tokyo has a separate dispute with Beijing over a group of uninhabited islands in the Senkaku chain (also known as the Diaoyu Islands) in the East China Sea.
On Monday, the leaders of the Philippines, Japan and the United States held a telephone summit to discuss regional security and their countries’ “continuing cooperation” amid China’s activities in the disputed South China Sea.
BenarNews is an RFA-affiliated online news organization.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by Jason Gutierrez for BenarNews.
Indonesia officially joined the BRICS — Brazil, Russia, China and South Africa — consortium last week marking a significant milestone in its foreign relations.
In a statement released a day later on January 7, the Indonesian Ministry of Foreign Affairs said that this membership reflected Indonesia’s dedication to strengthening multilateral cooperation and its growing influence in global politics.
The ministry highlighted that joining BRICS aligned with Indonesia’s independent and proactive foreign policy, which seeks to maintain balanced relations with major powers while prioritising national interests.
This pivotal move showcases Jakarta’s efforts to enhance its international presence as an emerging power within a select group of global influencers.
Traditionally, Indonesia has embraced a non-aligned stance while bolstering its military and economic strength through collaborations with both Western and Eastern nations, including the United States, China, and Russia.
By joining BRICS, Indonesia clearly signals a shift from its non-aligned status, aligning itself with a coalition of emerging powers poised to challenge and redefine the existing global geopolitical landscape dominated by a Western neoliberal order led by the United States.
Indonesia joining boosts BRICS membership to 10 countres — Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa, Egypt, Ethiopia, Indonesia, Iran and the United Arab Emirates — but there are also partnerships.
Supporters of a multipolar world, championed by China, Russia, and their allies, may view Indonesia’s entry into BRICS as a significant victory.
In contrast, advocates of the US-led unipolar world, often referred to as the “rules-based international order” are likely to see Indonesia’s decision as a regrettable shift that could trigger retaliatory actions from the United States.
The future will determine how Indonesia balances its relations with these two superpowers. However, there is considerable concern about the potential fallout for Indonesia from its long-standing US allies.
The future will determine how Indonesia balances its relations with these two superpowers, China and the US. However, there is considerable concern about the potential fallout for Indonesia from its long-standing US allies. Image: NHK TV News screenshot APR
The smaller Pacific Island nations, which Indonesia has been endeavouring to win over in a bid to thwart support for West Papuan independence, may also become entangled in the crosshairs of geostrategic rivalries, and their response to Indonesia’s membership in the BRICS alliance will prove critical for the fate of West Papua.
Critical questions The crucial questions facing the Pacific Islanders are perhaps related to their loyalties: are they aligning themselves with Beijing or Washington, and in what ways could their decisions influence the delicate balance of power in the ongoing competition between great powers, ultimately altering the Melanesian destiny of the Papuan people?
For the Papuans, Indonesia’s membership in BRICS or any other global or regional forums is irrelevant as long as the illegal occupation of their land continues driving them toward “extinction”.
For the Papuans, Indonesia’s membership in BRICS or any other global or regional forums is irrelevant as long as the illegal occupation of their land continues driving them toward “extinction”. Image: NHK News screenshot APR
The pressing question for Papuans is which force will ultimately dismantle Indonesia’s unlawful hold on their sovereignty.
Will Indonesia’s BRICS alliance open new paths for Papuan liberation fighters to re-engage with the West in ways not seen since the Cold War? Or does this membership indicate a deeper entrenchment of Papuans’ fate within China’s influence — making it almost impossible for any dream of Papuans’ independence?
While forecasting future with certainty is difficult on these questions, these critical critical questions need to be considered in this new complex geopolitical landscape, as the ultimate fate of West Papua is what is truly at stake here.
Strengthening Indonesia’s claims over West Papuan sovereignty Indonesia’s membership in BRICS may signify a great victory for those advocating for a multipolar world, challenging the hegemony of Western powers led by the United States.
This membership could augment Indonesia’s capacity to frame the West Papuan issue as an internal matter among BRICS members within the principle of non-interference in domestic affairs.
Such backing could provide Jakarta with a cushion of diplomatic protection against international censure, particularly from Western nations regarding its policies in West Papua.
The growing BRICS world . . . can Papuans and their global solidarity networks reinvent themselves while nurturing the fragile hope of restoring West Papua’s sovereignty? Map: Russia Pivots to Asia
However, it is also crucial to note that for more than six decades, despite the Western world priding itself on being a champion of freedom and human rights, no nation has been permitted to voice concern or hold Indonesia accountable for the atrocities committed against Indigenous Papuans.
The pressing question to consider is what or who silences the 193 member states of the UN from intervening to save the Papuans from potential eradication at the hands of Indonesia.
Is it the United States and its allies, or is it China, Russia, and their allies — or the United Nations itself?
Indonesia’s double standard and hypocrisy Indonesia’s support for Palestine bolsters its image as a defender of international law and human rights in global platforms like the UN and the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC).
This commitment was notably highlighted at the BRICS Summit in October 2024, where Indonesia reaffirmed its dedication to Palestinian self-determination and called for global action to address the ongoing conflict in line with international law and UN resolutions, reflecting its constitutional duty to oppose colonialism.
Nonetheless, Indonesia’s self-image as a “saviour for the Palestinians” presents a rather ignoble facade being promoted in the international diplomatic arena, as the Indonesian government engages in precisely the same behaviours it condemns Israel over in Palestine.
Military engagement and regional diplomacy Moreover, Indonesia’s interaction with Pacific nations serves to perpetuate a façade of double standards — on one hand, it endeavours to portray itself as a burgeoning power and a champion of moral causes concerning security issues, human rights, climate change, and development; while on the other, it distracts the communities and nations of Oceania — particularly Vanuatu and the Solomon Islands, which have long supported the West Papua independence movement — from holding Indonesia accountable for its transgressions against their fellow Pacific Islanders in West Papua.
On October 10, 2024, Brigadier-General Mohamad Nafis of the Indonesian Defence Ministry unveiled a strategic initiative intended to assert sovereignty claims over West Papua. This plan aims to foster stability across the Pacific through enhanced defence cooperation and safeguarding of territorial integrity.
The efforts to expand influence are characterised by joint military exercises, defence partnerships, and assistance programmes, all crafted to address common challenges such as terrorism, piracy, and natural disasters.
However, most critically, Indonesia’s engagement with Pacific Island nations aims to undermine the regional solidarity surrounding West Papua’s right to self-determination.
This involvement encapsulates infrastructure initiatives, defence training, and financial diplomacy, nurturing goodwill while aligning the interests of Pacific nations with Indonesia’s geopolitical aspirations.
Indonesia has formally joined the BRICS group, a bloc of emerging economies featuring Russia, China and others that is viewed as a counterweight to the West https://t.co/WArU5O2PfTpic.twitter.com/IQKmPOJqlS
Military occupation in West Papua As Indonesia strives to galvanise international support for its territorial integrity, the military presence in West Papua has intensified significantly, instilling widespread fear among local Papuan communities due to heightened deployments, surveillance, and restrictions.
Indonesian forces have been mobilised to secure economically strategic regions, including the Grasberg mine, which holds some of the world’s largest gold and copper reserves.
These operations have resulted in the displacement of Indigenous communities and substantial environmental degradation.
As of December 2024, approximately 83,295 individuals had been internally displaced in West Papua due to armed conflicts between Indonesian security forces and the West Papua Liberation Army (TPNPB).
Recent reports detail new instances of displacement in the Tambrauw and Pegunungan Bintang regencies following clashes between the TPNPB and security forces. Villagers have evacuated their homes in fear of further military incursions and confrontations, leaving many in psychological distress.
The significant increase in Indonesia’s military presence in West Papua has coincided with demographic shifts that jeopardise the survival of Indigenous Papuans.
Government transmigration policies and large-scale agricultural initiatives, such as the food estate project in Merauke, have marginalised Indigenous communities.
These programmes, aimed at ensuring national food security, result in land expropriation and cultural erosion, threatening traditional Papuan lifestyles and identities.
For more than 63 years, Indonesia has occupied West Papua, subjecting Indigenous communities to systemic marginalisation and brink of extinction. Traditional languages, oral histories, and cultural values face obliteration under Indonesia’s colonial occupation.
A glimmer of hope for West Papua Despite these formidable challenges, solidarity movements within the Pacific and global communities persist in their advocacy for West Papua’s self-determination.
These groups, united by a shared sense of humanity and justice, work tirelessly to maintain hope for West Papua’s liberation. Even so, Indonesia’s diplomatic engagement with Pacific nations, characterised by eloquent rhetoric and military alliances, represents a calculated endeavour to extinguish this fragile hope for Papuan liberation.
Indonesia’s membership in BRICS will either amplify this tiny hope of salvation within the grand vision of a new world re-engineered by Beijing’s BRICS and its allies or will it conceal West Papua’s independence dream on a path that is even harder and more impossible to achieve than the one they have been on for 60 years under the US-led unipolar world system.
Most significantly, it might present a new opportunity for Papuan liberation fighters to reengage with the new re-ordering global superpowers– a chance that has eluded them for more than 60 years.
From the 1920s to the 1960s, the tumult of the First and Second World Wars, coupled with the ensuing cries for decolonisation from nations subjugated by Western powers and Cold War tensions, forged the very existence of the nation known as “Indonesia.”
It seems that this turbulent world of uncertainty is upon us, reshaping a new global landscape replete with new alliances and adversaries, harbouring conflicting visions of a new world. Indonesia’s decision to join BRICS in 2025 is a clear testament to this.
The pressing question remains whether this membership will ultimately precipitate Indonesia’s disintegration as the US-led unipolar world intervenes in its domestic affairs or catalyse its growth and strength.
Regardless of the consequences, the fundamental existential question for the Papuans is whether they, along with their global solidarity networks, can reinvent themselves while nurturing the fragile hope of restoring West Papua’s sovereignty in a world rife with change and uncertainty?
Ali Mirin is a West Papuan academic and writer from the Kimyal tribe of the highlands bordering the Star mountain region of Papua New Guinea. He lives in Australia and contributes articles to Asia Pacific Report.
Chinese authorities in Tibet have forbidden aid workers and Buddhist monks from entering areas of the region struck by deadly earthquakes last week, three residents of the region and a Tibetan in exile told Radio Free Asia.
On Jan. 7, a magnitude 7.1 earthquake struck Dingri county, near the border of Nepal. Chinese state media says it killed 126 people, but Tibetan sources said the toll was likely higher given that at least 100 people were killed in the town of Dramtso alone.
State media also said the disaster injured 337 people and displaced more than 60,000 people.
Starting Monday, authorities blocked off access, preventing monks, relief volunteers and aid providers from entering the affected area under the pretext of “cleanup,” and “security work,” the residents said under condition of anonymity for safety reasons.
The blocking of monks was painful for survivors because in Buddhist tradition, prayers and rituals are conducted at the end of each week for the first seven weeks after a person’s death.
Tibetans in other areas of Tibet, as well as those abroad or in exile in India, Nepal, Bhutan and elsewhere, gathered Monday to offer prayers.
Aftershocks
Since last week’s quake, more than 1,200 aftershocks have been reported by Chinese authorities.
On Monday evening, two strong aftershocks — with magnitudes of 5.1 and 4.6 — struck Dingri County’s Tsogo township (Cuoguoxiang in Chinese) and Tashizong township (Zhaxizongxiang), respectively, according to the United States Geological Survey.
According to a Dingri county official quoted by Chinese state media on Monday, “no casualties have been reported so far” in the latest aftershocks. The official added that “further investigation is underway.”
Information censorship
The Chinese government has also been deleting photos and videos about the impact of the earthquake from social media, residents said.
“Chinese state media has been focusing on propaganda activities such as having Tibetan children wave Chinese flags. They are forcing affected residents to express their gratitude to the Chinese government, and they display (Chinese President) Xi Jinping’s photos in the temporary shelters provided,” another resident said.
On Sunday, Sikyong Penpa Tsering, the democratically elected leader of the Central Tibetan Administration, the government-in-exile based in Dharamshala, India, issued a statement in which he called on Beijing to “…ensure transparency and accountability in relief efforts by granting unrestricted and immediate access to international aid organizations and media delegations.”
Rescue workers conduct search and rescue for survivors in the aftermath of an earthquake in Changsuo Township of Dingri in Xigaze, southwestern China’s Tibet Autonomous Region, Jan. 7, 2025.(Jigme Dorje/Xinhua News Agency/AP)
“Strict information censorship by the PRC government continues to pose significant challenges in verifying the accuracy of casualty reports and assessing the adequacy of relief operations,” Tsering said.
He also called on the Chinese government to “provide adequate assistance in rebuilding efforts that takes into account the traditional Tibetan needs and fundamental rights of the Tibetan people.”
A Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun, in a press briefing on Monday, responded to a query raised on Tsering’s statement, saying, “The disaster response and relief work is generally proceeding smoothly. We are confident in winning this tough battle of quake response and returning work and life to normal in the affected areas as soon as possible.”
Translated by Tenzin Pema. Edited by Eugene Whong and Malcolm Foster.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA Tibetan.
Chinese rights lawyer Xie Yang, who has been behind bars without trial for three years on “subversion” charges, has issued a defiant statement to the authorities after they repeatedly extended his detention, saying he ‘won’t bow’ to them.
Xie marked three years this week in the Changsha No. 1 Detention Center after his pretrial detention period was extended for the 10th time, his U.S.-based wife Chen Guiqiu told RFA Mandarin in a recent interview.
Hunan-based Xie was arrested in December 2021 after he supported a primary teacher forced into psychiatric “treatment” for her outspoken comments on social media and posted a video containing a satirical reference to China’s President Xi Jinping.
The teacher, Li Tiantian, was held for several days in a psychiatric hospital after she spoke out over the expulsion of a Shanghai journalism lecturer who encouraged her students to verify official accounts of the Nanjing massacre.
Since Xie’s arrest, which came after an earlier, two-year detention for subversion, he has been illegally kidnapped, subjected to enforced disappearance and tortured, while the authorities have failed to follow due process throughout his case, according to his defense lawyers.
He remains defiant, however, penning a New Year’s message on Jan. 1, 2025 that read: “I will never bow my head; I would rather it were cut off.”
An official notification of Xie’s 2022 detention, left, and his scrawled note that reads “I’d rather have my head cut off than bow down.”(Courtesy of Chen Guiqiu)
Chen said that Xie’s pretrial detention has been extended this time until Feb. 28, 2025, according to notification she received.
“I think it shows how determined he is to defend a citizen’s right to freedom of speech,” Chen said. “He wants to show the authorities that they can’t force him to plead guilty — that he won’t ‘confess’.”
Police detainees in China have reported being offered more lenient sentences in return for “pleading guilty” and showing a “cooperative attitude,” while the country’s state-run media has been widely criticized and sanctioned for its use of heavily scripted, televised “confessions” on state media.
“I can tell from his note that his willpower is very strong,” Chen said. “I am very relieved that he hasn’t been broken by being in prison for so long, for three years.”
Chen said there is no evidence to back up the charge of “incitement to subvert state power” against her husband.
“There’s no evidence … so they retaliate by repeatedly extending his detention,” she said. “This is arbitrary detention of a citizen; of a human rights lawyer.”
Chen said similar treatment has been meted out by the ruling Chinese Communist Party under Xi Jinping since a crackdown on human rights lawyers and legal staff that saw 300 arrested in 2015. For example, she said, among those arrested in 2015 were rights lawyers Wang Quanzhang and Li Heping, who were subject to harassment and repeated evictions along with their families, who still have children in school.
Xie Yang’s wife Chen Guiqiu in an undated photo.(Courtesy of Chen Guiqiu)
“They see us as the enemy, because we expose their shameless behavior, so they think we stand in opposition to them,” Chen said.
U.S.-based rights lawyer Yu Pinjian said Xie’s work involved defending some of the most disadvantaged people in China.
“He would rather die than bow down to them, which shows his determination to hold to his beliefs in the face of huge political persecution,” Yu said. “He speaks for the rest of us human rights lawyers.”
“His fearless stance inspires us and encourages us to move forward in strength,” he said.
U.S.-based right lawyer Wu Shaoping described the targeting of Xie as “an abuse of power” by the authorities, and his continued detention as illegal.
“They can’t use high-sounding reasoning to explain this away,” Wu said. “Extended detention is illegal, even under the Chinese Communist Party’s own laws.”
After the 2015 crackdown, Xie was held under “residential surveillance at a designated location” in a government guesthouse belonging to the National University of Defense Technology in Hunan’s provincial capital, Changsha.
U.S.-based lawyer Yu Pinjian in an undated photo.(Courtesy of Yu Pinjian)
Subjected to abuse including deprivation of food and water, Xie was tortured again after being moved to the police-run Changsha No. 2 Detention Center following his formal arrest on Jan. 9, 2016, his lawyers reported.
He was subjected to confinement in a “hanging chair” made of plastic chairs stacked high above the ground for hours at a time, so that his legs swelled up and he was in excruciating pain, he told his lawyers.
He was also deprived of sleep and repeatedly beaten, humiliated, and taunted with death threats against his family, according to copious and detailed notes made public from meetings with his lawyers.
He eventually pleaded “guilty” to subversion charges in 2017, but had earlier warned in a public letter that any guilty plea would be the result of “prolonged torture and cruel treatment.”
According to a state media report on March 1, 2017, an official investigation concluded that “no torture had taken place.”
Translated by Luisetta Mudie.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by Chen Zifei for RFA Mandarin.
BANGKOK – A human rights group has urged Thailand not to deport to China 48 Uyghurs who have languished for more than a decade in detention, saying their safety and human rights must be the priority.
The Uyghur men have been held at Thailand’s Immigration Detention Center since 2014, after attempting to escape persecution in China through Thailand.
The rights group Justice for All said recent reports from the detained Uyghurs indicated that Thai authorities were coercing them to fill out forms in preparation for their deportation.
“This decision would endanger these individuals’ lives and contravenes international human rights standards,” the group said.
An Immigration Bureau spokesperson said no decision had been made regarding the Uyghurs, members of the mostly Muslim minority who fled from China’s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in 2014.
“The matter is still under consideration, and no deportations have taken place. Once we reach a conclusion, we will hold a press conference,”
Police Col. Kathatorn Kaomteang, deputy commander of Immigration Division 3, told Radio Free Asia affiliate BenarNews
In 2015, Thailand forcibly returned nearly 100 Uyghurs to China despite rights groups’ fears they would face ill-treatment.
The United States condemned the 2015 deportations and asked Thailand to stop them, while the U.N. refugee agency said it was alarmed and shocked by what it considered a “flagrant violation of international law.”
At the time, the prime minister of Thailand’s military government, which was seeking to bolster ties with China following Western criticism of a 2014 coup, brushed off the criticism saying it was not Thailand’s fault if those sent back suffered problems.
“History must not repeat itself,” said the president of Justice For All, Imam Abdul Malik Mujahid.
He said the 48 asylum seekers detained in Thailand had to be protected under the non-refoulement principle, which prohibits returning individuals to places where they are at risk of serious human rights violations.
“Their safety and rights must be prioritized,” Mujahid said.
Justice for All said while the paperwork, which included the taking of photographs, had initially been presented as voluntary, “pressure was increased on January 9, resulting in detainees engaging in a hunger strike.”
“Verbal threats of deportation back to China by officials in the immigration center have increased, despite their asylum applications being accepted by the United Nations,” the group said, citing detainees.
“This development greatly heightens the urgency and distress of the situation,” it said.
The 48 were among more than 500 Uyghurs who fled to Southeast Asian countries in 2013 and 2014, according to Thai officials and aid groups trying to help them. They hoped to be resettled in Turkey, where some of them eventually traveled.
The Uyghur people, who live in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, are a Muslim minority who have endured persecution and repression by the Chinese government, cases of which have been well documented by human rights groups.
China denies restricting Uyghurs’ religious freedoms and blames Islamist militants for violent attacks in the Xinjiang region.
A spokesman for Thailand’s civilian government said deportations were normally handled by the Immigration Bureau and the police but the government would inquire about the case.
“We need to first consult with the national police chief about the case of these Uyghur civilians who are to be returned – why they are being returned, what kind of negotiations took place, and whether there are any extradition agreements,“ the spokesman for the Prime Minister’s Office, Jirayu Huangsap, told BenarNews.
“We need to inquire about these details first.”
Edited by Mike Firn
BenarNews is an RFA-affiliated news organization.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by Nontarat Phaicharoen for BenarNews and RFA Staff.
Canadian naval vessel HMCS Ottawa successfully completed a joint exercise with U.S. Navy destroyer USS Higgins amid tension in the South China Sea, the Canadian Joint Operations Command said.
During the Jan. 8-11 drills, codenamed Noble Wolverine, both ships “navigated through the South China Sea’s international waters while conducting communications exercises, flight operations and anti-submarine warfare training,” the command announced on its feed on the X social media site on Sunday.
The Halifax-class frigate HMCS Ottawa also sailed near Scarborough Shoal, where the Chinese and Philippine coast guards have been engaged in a cat-and-mouse game for weeks.
USS Higgins and HMCS Ottawa conducted a bilateral exercise in South China Sea, Jan. 8-11, 2025.(Sailor 3rd Class Jacob Saunders/Canadian Armed Forces)
The hotly disputed chain of reefs is inside the Philippines’ exclusive economic zone but under China’s de-facto control. Beijing has deployed its largest coast guard vessel, dubbed “The Monster” for its size, to the area since the beginning of the year, which Manila sees as “an act of intimidation, coercion and aggression.”
The passing Canadian warship was closely followed by a number of Chinese naval vessels, Canada’s CTV News reported.
Free and open Indo-Pacific
Noble Wolverine demonstrated the two countries’ “shared commitment to a free and open Indo-Pacific,” the U.S. 7th Fleet said in a statement, adding that such bilateral operations provide “valuable opportunities to train, exercise and develop tactical interoperability” across allied and partner navies in the region.
Besides the Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS Higgins, a U.S. Navy carrier strike group led by the Nimitz-class aircraft carrier Carl Vinson is also conducting routine exercises in the South China Sea.
The strike group includes the embarked Carrier Air Wing 2, cruiser USS Princeton and destroyers USS Sterett and USS William P Lawrence.
Hong Kong’s iconic pink dolphins have dwindled to just a handful in the waters off northern Lantau Island in recent years, with concerns for the animals’ future since the city’s international airport added a third runway, researchers told RFA Mandarin.
The endangered animals, a local variant of the Indo-Pacific humpback dolphin, a species also known as the Chinese white dolphin, were once chosen as the mascot for Hong Kong’s 1997 handover to Chinese rule, Hong Kong Dolphin Conservation Project researcher Viena Mak said in a recent interview.
But their numbers have plummeted in the past decade, researchers say, despite a brief rebound during the COVID-19 travel restrictions that started in 2020.
Before the construction of the airport at Chek Lap Kok, the waters around Hong Kong’s outlying Lantau Island were teeming with marine life, with 188 pink dolphins counted in 2003, 102 of which were off North Lantau, where the airport now lies.
A security guard stands on the tarmac of the completed third runway at Chek Lap Kok airport, Hong Kong, Sept. 7, 2021.(Peter Parks/AFP)
Now, researchers estimate that just three or four pink dolphins still live in the area.
Even more worryingly, just 10 days after the city’s US$18.5 billion third runway became operational, a pink dolphin was found beached and dead nearby, Mak said.
“It was a mother who had just given birth,” she said. “We had been observing it at sea in October and were able to take pictures of the mother and the baby.”
Mak said she feared the infant wouldn’t survive, as they usually need a mother’s care until they are one or two years old, and can forage independently for food.
Vulnerable species
The Chinese white dolphin is on the Red List of Endangered Species of the International Union for Conservation of Nature, where it is listed as vulnerable.
Their habitat was greatly disturbed by the massive land reclamation that took place in the waters off northern Lantau Island to build Hong Kong’s International Airport at Chek Lap Kok, and sightings of the dolphins have become extremely rare in that part of the city’s coastal waters, according to the Hong Kong Dolphin Conservation Project, which has been monitoring them since before the handover.
In the first year of the airport’s expansion in 2016, just 11 dolphins were recorded north of Lantau. By the time the third runway was completed in 2020, researchers could only find three, although four were spotted last year, Mak said.
One of them has been named “Snowy,” although she’s known in official records simply as NL104.
“That means she’s the 104th pink dolphin to be identified in the waters off Lantau,” Mak said. “She has had three births, one of which was in October 2011. We also saw her with her baby in 2015.”
Government figures back up the Conservation Project’s findings.
People take a commercial tour boat to look for “pink dolphins” in the waters off the coast of Hong Kong, Sept. 20, 2020.(May James/AFP)
Hong Kong was home to just 34 pink dolphins in 2023, down from 47 in 2017, according to a survey by the city’s Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Conservation.
“Large declines in dolphin abundance were detected over the past two decades in both Northeast Lantau and Northwest Lantau survey areas, and noticeable decline was also detected in West Lantau waters but has stabilized in recent years,” the report said.
Increase in casualties
Dolphins are increasingly showing up as casualties following increased activity in the area, Mak said, although the reason isn’t entirely clear.
Five dolphins were beached in 2016, rising to eight in 2018, and 11 in 2020, although there has been a slight fall since then.
“We’re not exactly sure what happened to these dolphins, and why they were found beached in Hong Kong, but it is a cause for concern,” Mak said. “Numbers at sea fell during the same period that the numbers found beached increased.”
A Cathay Pacific Cargo plane takes off at Hong Kong’s Chek Lap Kok International Airport, April 24, 2020.(ANTHONY WALLACE, Anthony Wallace/AFP)
Some of the dolphins have moved elsewhere, she said.
“We found that shortly after the third runway project started, they moved to different places, from the waters of North Lantau to West Lantau and Southwest Lantau,” Mak told RFA Mandarin. “Now that the project is completed, they don’t go back there often.”
“It’s no longer the paradise it used to be … and some of the older dolphins know this very well,” she said.
Move brings risks
The move to unfamiliar waters brings with it greater survival pressures, as the animals come into contact with other human activities like shipping, high-speed ferries and fishing. Once in their new habitat, they then compete with the other dolphins for food.
Part of the problem is that the runway was built around 1 kilometer (.6 miles) from marine coastal protection areas where the dolphins used to raise their young, and in between two conservation areas, effectively cutting off the route for animals that “commuted” between them, Mak said.
A “pink dolphin” swims in the waters off the coast of Hong Kong, Sept. 20, 2020.(May James/AFP)
Mak also cites the building of the massive Hong Kong-Zhuai-Macau Bridge as an example of a land reclamation project that has impinged on the dolphins’ ability to survive.
She said researchers haven’t seen a dolphin in the area of that project in nine years, despite the creation of a marine “reserve” for them, in the form of the North Lantau Coastal Park, once the project was completed.
“You can see from their website how big the reserve is, and what conservation measures have been put in place,” Mak said. “But none of it has worked … because the dolphins just don’t go there.”
Mak suspects that the marine reserve is just cosmetic; a bid by the government to convince people that the dolphins will return after the damage has been done.
“It’s too late now,” she said. “The damage is too severe.”
Translated by Luisetta Mudie.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by Mai Xiaotian for RFA Mandarin.
UK chancellor made comments during visit to China where agreements were made worth £600m to UK economy
Rachel Reeves vowed to stand by her “non-negotiable” fiscal rules as she arrived in China for a trip overshadowed by market turbulence at home.
The chancellor said the trip was a “significant milestone” in UK-China relations, adding that agreements had been reached worth £600m to the UK economy over the next five years.
UK chancellor becomes first holder of her office to make an official visit to China in a decade
Rachel Reeves has said the UK “must engage confidently with China”, as she arrived in Beijing amid market turbulence at home.
The Conservatives and Liberal Democrats had demanded the chancellor call off her China trip after the value of the pound plummeted to its lowest level in a year. But ministers argue that improved relations with the world’s second-largest economy will help boost growth, and that under the Conservatives the UK lagged behind the US and EU when it came to high-level engagement with Beijing.
Remember when the exuberant yelling of Gov. Howard Dean was enough for corporate media to declare him unfit for the presidency (Extra!, 3–4/04)?
Remember January 2004, when Democratic presidential candidate Howard Dean yelled in a pep talk to supporters after the Iowa caucus, and elite media declared that his “growling and defiant” “emotional outburst” was patent evidence of unacceptability? Having already declared Dean too excitable—“Yelling and hollering is not an endearing quality in the leader of the free world,” said the Washington Post (8/2/03)—media found verification in the “Dean scream,” which was played on TV news some 700 times, enough to finish off his candidacy (Extra!, 3–4/04). As Pat Buchanan on the McLaughlin Group (1/23/04) scoffed: “Is this the guy who ought to be in control of our nuclear arsenal?”
Fast forward to the present day, when Donald Trump states, “For purposes of National Security and Freedom throughout the World the United States of America feels that the ownership and control of Greenland is an absolute necessity.”
And today’s journalistic response looks like a CBS News explainer (1/8/25), headed “Why Would Trump Want Greenland and the Panama Canal? Here’s What’s Behind US interest.” It’s simple, you see, and not at all weird. “Greenland has oil, natural gas and highly sought after mineral resources.” And you know what? “Western powers have already voiced concern about Russia and China using it to boost their presence in the North Atlantic.”
In an effort to make Trump’s proposal seem rational, CBS (1/8/25) offered a map that made Greenland look like a chokepoint on the all-important Dalian/Rotterdam sea route. In fact, Greenland is more than 1,500 miles from Eurasia—greater than the distance between Boston and New Orleans.
CBS tells us Trump is “falsely alleging” that the Panama Canal is being “operated by China,” but then adds in their own, awkward, words, “China has also denied trying to claim any control over the canal.” Takeaway: who knows, really? Believe what you want. PS—you’re Americun, right?
The New York Times (1/2/25) assured us that,” Trump’s Falsehoods Aside, China’s Influence Over Global Ports Raises Concerns.” The story made it obvious that Chinese companies in charge of shipping ports is inherently scary—what might they do?—in a way that the US having 750 military bases around the world never is.
The message isn’t that no one country should have that much power; it’s that no country except the US should have that much power. That assumption suffuses corporate news reporting; and China threatens it. So whatever China does or doesn’t do, look for that lens to color any news you get.
U.S. lawmakers are demanding answers after it was revealed that China-backed hackers had accessed Treasury Department workstations and unclassified documents through a compromised third-party software provider. The department said it was working with cybersecurity experts, the FBI, intelligence agencies and independent investigators to and assess the impact of the incident. Beijing called the U.S. accusation of Chinese involvement another example of “unwarranted and groundless allegations” from Washington.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by Paul Eckert.
Chinese TV actor Wang Xing is heading back to China on Friday following his rescue from Myanmar’s notorious KK Park human trafficking and scam operation, where he was lured on the fake promise of a job, according to local media reports.
Wang, who appeared in public with a shaved head following his release, will fly to Shanghai on Friday evening local time, his lawyer told state media, but his family had requested that the flight number not be publicized.
Thai police reported on Jan. 7 that Wang, 31, a relatively unknown TV actor, had been rescued after being lured to Thailand by scammers.
According to Thai police, Wang didn’t realize he’d been deceived until his he was taken across the river into Myanmar and found himself “in a rustic environment.”
However, he did take photos of his vehicle’s license plate and key landmarks on the way, sending them to his girlfriend in China, Chinese state media quoted Thailand’s Senior Inspector General Thatchai Pitaneelaboot as saying.
Wang’s girlfriend Jia Jia then raised the alarm on Chinese social media after losing touch with him, according to the Global Times.
“I’m grateful to the Thai government and the local immigration authorities for bringing me back here safely,” Wang told Thai broadcaster PBS. “I realized I’d been tricked when they took me across the border, but I didn’t dare to resist.”
KK Park
The actor was taken to KK Park in Myawaddy, Myanmar, near the Thai border, where thousands of human trafficking victims from all over Asia — and as far away as Africa — are being held hostage by scammers in the area, victims have told Radio Free Asia in earlier reports.
They said they were lured by false advertisements and forced to scam other people, then tortured if they refused to comply.
The families of victims from Hong Kong recently petitioned the city’s leader John Lee for help, while the relatives of 174 mainland Chinese nationals believed to be in KK Park have made their details public following Wang Xing’s rescue, state media reported.
The campaigners say their relatives are mostly men between the ages of 17 and 35, and have been missing for anything from a few months to a few years, China’s Global Times newspaper reported.
Trips to Thailand
Wang’s kidnapping has prompted a wave of cancellations of planned trips to Thailand by Chinese nationals, local media reported.
“Many Chinese travelers planning to visit Thailand for the upcoming Lunar New Year have expressed concerns on social media this week and posed blunt questions,” Hong Kong’s South China Morning Post reported.
In a separate report, the paper said Cantopop star Eason Chan had canceled a gig in Thailand, citing safety concerns.
Wang’s return came amid growing fears for the safety of Chinese model Yang Zeqi, who is also missing, believed held in KK Park after traveling to the Thai-Myanmar border region, according to HK01.com.
Chinese actor Wang Xing is interviewed by Thai news media in Mae Sot district on the Thai-Myanmar border in Thailand’s Tak province, Jan. 7, 2025.(Cover News)
Yang’s family made an appeal on Weibo on the evening of Jan. 8, saying he had traveled there “after passing an online audition.”
Yang spoke to his mother by video call on Dec. 29, wearing black clothes and looking beat up, telling her he was OK, but nothing has been heard from him since, the report said.
Thai police are investigating his disappearance, according to Thailand’s The Nation.
‘Intensified police crackdowns’
According to China’s Global Times, the majority of Chinese nationals are taken to the park either from the Thai border area, or after crossing the border into Myanmar from the southwestern Chinese province of Yunnan.
Some families still receive occasional messages from their loved ones, but most appear to have had their personal belongings and devices confiscated, the report said.
“Due to intensified police crackdowns by the authorities in China, Myanmar and Thailand, profits from these scam centers have since dwindled,” the paper said, citing family members.
“As a result, these centers have ramped up their deceptive tactics [and] new types of scams are also emerging,” it said, adding that scammers are now targeting actors and language teachers with the promise of jobs.
In November, an ethnic minority militia in northern Myanmar detained more than 1,000 people suspected of online scamming, the majority of them Chinese nationals, and deported them back to China.
Online scamming centers have proliferated across Southeast Asia in recent years, especially in some of the more lawless parts of Myanmar, as well as in neighboring Laos and Cambodia.
The centers are often run by Chinese gangs and are notorious for luring unsuspecting people into jobs that entail going online to contact and defraud people, many in China.
Chinese authorities are keen to get the rackets based over the border in Myanmar shut down, and so action against them has become a key factor for rival factions in Myanmar, from the junta to its insurgent enemies and other militias, as they vie for China’s favor.
Translated by Luisetta Mudie. Edited by Roseanne Gerin.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by RFA Mandarin and RFA Cantonese.
This week on CounterSpin: New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman’s December 17 piece, headlined “How Elon Musk and Taylor Swift Can Resolve US-China Relations,” contained some choice Friedmanisms, like: “More Americans might get a better feel for what is going on there if they simply went and ordered room service at their hotel.” (Later followed quaintly by: “A lot of Chinese have grown out of touch with how China is perceived in the world.”)
But the big idea is that China has taken a “great leap forward in high-tech manufacturing” because of Donald Trump, who a source says “woke them up to the fact that they needed an all-hands-on-deck effort.” And if the US doesn’t respond to China’s “Sputnik” moment the way we did to the Soviet Union, “we will be toast.”
The response has to do with using tariffs on China to “buy time to lift up more Elon Musks” (described as a “homegrown” manufacturer), and for China to “let in more Taylor Swifts”—i.e., chances for its youth to spend money on entertainment made abroad. Secretary of State Tony Blinken evidently “show[ed] China the way forward” last April, when he bought a Swift record on his way to the airport.
In a prayer ceremony for victims of Monday’s earthquake in Tibet, the Dalai Lama told listeners that because it was a natural disaster and “not caused by political tensions,” there was no reason to be angry with Chinese authorities.
The magnitude 7.1 quake left 126 people dead and destroyed 3,600 houses, according to Chinese officials — although Tibetans inside Tibet say the death toll probably exceeds 200.
“Even though it is in our human nature, do not feel dispirited or doomed by such disasters,” the Dalai Lama told more than 12,000 Buddhist clergy members gathered for a ceremony in southern India on Thursday. “It helps to think that events like earthquakes are natural disasters and not caused by political tensions.
The 7.1-magnitude earthquake killed scores of people and damaged thousands of homes.
“There is no reason to show anger or hatred towards China,” he said. “Hence, Tibetans inside and outside Tibet should develop a kinder, more compassionate heart.”
Still, Tibetans are disturbed that Chinese authorities have called off search-and-rescue operations, promoted the government’s official relief work, and banned them from sharing photos or videos about the quake on social media.
The earthquake was centered around Dingri and Shigatse, close to the border with Nepal, in the southern part of the Tibetan Autonomous Region, controlled by China.
‘Meditate upon compassion’
The Dalai Lama, the spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhism, who is visiting the South Indian town of Bylakuppe — which has the largest Tibetan settlement in the world outside Tibet — counseled Tibetans not to lose heart in the face of the natural disaster.
Instead, he urged them to transform this tragedy into a condition for the practice of compassion and spiritual growth and enlightenment.
Butter lamps are seen lit in front of a portrait of the Dalai Lama in remembrance of those who lost their lives in the recent earthquake, at a Tibetan camp in Lalitpur, Nepal, on Jan. 8, 2025.(Niranjan Shrestha, Niranjan Shrestha/AP)
He spoke at the Tashi Lhunpo Monastery, the principal monastery in Shigatse founded by the First Dalai Lama, Gyalwa Gendun Drup, and the former seat of the Panchen Rinpoches that was re-established in South India.
“Even for me, seeing the pictures of ruins of Dingri after the earthquake encourages me to meditate upon compassion and emptiness and pray to Chenrezig, the Buddha of Infinite Compassion,” the Dalai Lama said. “It empowers us to take adversities in our stride and not be crushed by them. That is our advantage as religious people.”
Tibetans in Dharamsala, North India — the residence of the Dalai Lama and the seat of the Tibetan government-in-exile — held a candlelight vigil and prayer service on Thursday for those affected by the quake.
On Wednesday evening, four NGOs — the Tibetan Youth Congress, Tibetan Women’s Association, Students for a Free Tibet and the National Democratic Party of Tibet — jointly organized a candlelight vigil from the Dharamsala suburb of McLeod Ganj to the Tsuglagkhang Temple, followed by a prayer service.
They said they were holding the vigil was to show solidaritywith Tibetans inside Tibet and to demand transparency from Chinese authorities about the disaster.
Search and rescue
Inside the Tibet Autonomous Region, or TAR, Chinese officials announced the end of search-and-rescue operations to focus on the resettlement of those who now are homeless.
The Dalai Lama, right, leads prayers at a monastery in Bylakuppe, India, Jan. 9, 2025, in solidarity with those affected by the earthquake that hit the Tibet Autonomous Region in western China.(Tenzin Choejor/AP)
But Tibetans continued to conduct their own rescue efforts in villages on Thursday, two sources in Tibet’s capital Lhasa told Radio Free Asia.
A third source told RFA that Chinese authorities stopped operations to recover bodies from the ruins, even as the general public continued to retrieve them from the rubble on Thursday.
Most of the casualties were elderly people and children because many young people were away at work when the temblor struck, the source said.
Li Ling, deputy director of the TAR’s Special Disaster Investigation Office, attributed the earthquake to tectonic plate movement and blamed the high casualty numbers on poorly constructed traditional buildings.
The Shigatse government has ordered residents not to post earthquake-related photos and videos on social media, saying it would harm rescue efforts and threatening severe punishment for violators, the two Lhasa sources said.
Chinese authorities are restricting documentation of the actual situation and local rescue efforts while heavily promoting official government relief operations, they added. They are also preventing people from taking photos or sharing information about casualties and damage.
One of the sources reported that after three days, some remote areas still hadn’t received government assistance.
Many villagers are sleeping in damaged building compounds without food, a source from the quake-affected region said.
In Dingri’s Dramtso village alone, over 20 people died, and the Dzongphug Nunnery suffered severe damage, killing two nuns and injuring many others. Residents still had not received aid by the Wednesday afternoon, said one of the Lhasa sources.
The Dewachen Monastery in Dingri’s Chulho township was completely destroyed, he added.
Translated by RFA Tibetan. Edited by Tenzin Pema for RFA Tibetan, and by Roseanne Gerin and Malcolm Foster.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by RFA Tibetan.
Chinese authorities in Xi’an have detained Fei Xiaosheng, a prominent musician and performance artist who had publicly supported the Hong Kong democracy movement, his friends and fellow artists told RFA Mandarin.
Xi’an police caught up with Fei, 55, on Tuesday, and are now holding him the Beilin Detention Center, according to associates who knew him as part of the Songzhuang Artists’ Village scene of dissident and fringe artists in Beijing.
His detention comes as the ruling Communist Party continues to crack down on artists and other creative workers whose work or views are seen as potentially subversive.
Authorities are also holding Gao Zhen, one of the Gao Brothers artistic duo, on suspicion of ‘insulting revolutionary heroes and martyrs,’ after seizing satirical artworks depicting Chairman Mao from his home studio.
“I was shocked to hear that Songzhuang musician and artist Fei Xiaosheng has been detained,” fellow artist Du Yinghong, who now lives in Thailand, said in a social media post on Wednesday.
“Two years ago, we contacted each other a number of times, and he said he envied me [living outside of China],” he wrote. “A few days ago, we had a video call, and I found out he had applied for a passport, gone to Serbia, yet somehow returned to the cage that is our country.”
“He said he planned to leave again soon, and told me to add his European number, but then we heard the bad news that he’d been arrested,” Du wrote.
Devout Christian
Du later told RFA Mandarin that Fei is being held in Xi’an’s Beilin Detention Center, but that the authorities have yet to issue any official notification of his detention.
“This is part of their cultural cleansing operation, and a settling of scores,” he said, adding that Fei had likely been targeted for his public support for the pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong.
“Fei Xiaosheng is a devout Christian who once expressed solidarity and support for Hong Kong, and was detained for more than 40 days for this,” Du said.
Du said the artist had a strong sense of social justice, and followed current affairs closely. He was expelled by state security police from Songzhuang Artists’ Village in 2020.
“He used to organize music festivals and performance art festivals in Songzhuang,” Du said, adding that police had burned Fei’s old passport.
“He had returned to China [from Serbia] for work, and was just about to leave China again,” he said.
‘China is finished’
Writer He Sanpo, who like many Chinese writers now lives in Thailand, said he was saddened to hear of Fei’s detention, but not surprised.
“But people who are really engaged in making art know that China is finished,” He said. “In today’s China, if you have a conscience and dare to speak a few truths, you will have committed some crime.”
“The only thing you can do is to escape from it.”
Fei’s detention came as Gao Zhen’s trial is expected to start.
Gao’s friends told RFA Mandarin in recent interviews that his case will be heard at the Xianghe County People’s Court in the northern province of Hebei next week, possibly Monday.
Gao’s lawyer has been warned not to make public any details of the case, they said.
Translated by Luisetta Mudie. Edited by Malcolm Foster.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by Qian Lang for RFA Mandarin.
They grew up working hard, getting good grades and thinking they’d likely have careers, maybe marry and have kids, all in the city that formed them — Hong Kong.
But now, Anna Kwok, Frances Hui and Joey Siu are all in exile in the United States, with no idea of when they will be able to return. Each has a bounty of HK$1 million (US$128,500) on their heads from the Hong Kong government, which has vowed to pursue them for the rest of their lives.
Hong Kong Chief executive John Lee warned her and others on the list that they would be “pursued for life,” urging them “to give themselves up as soon as possible.”
Hui, the first Hong Kong democracy activist to receive asylum in the United States, and Siu, policy adviser to the London-based rights group Hong Kong Watch, were added to the list in December 2023.
Frances Hui(RFA)
All three women were educated in Hong Kong from elementary school onwards, including classes in Liberal Studies, the former critical-thinking and citizenship program for Hong Kong schoolchildren. The ruling Communist Party has blamed it for waves of youth-led pro-democracy protests since Hong Kong’s 1997 handover from Britain.
Some fled to the United Kingdom on the British National Overseas, or BNO, visa program. Others have made their homes anew in the United States, Canada, Australia and Germany.
The changes have happened fast, and turned around the lives of many young Hong Kongers.
Yet Kwok, Hui and Siu can trace their political development as far back as their school days, and continue to carry the message of the protests to policymakers in the United States and beyond.
Even at a young age, Hui was keenly political, joining the activist movement Scholarism, which organized a mass protest led by then-high schooler Joshua Wong against a Beijing-backed program of ” patriotic education” planned for the city’s schools.
“The movement against patriotic education happened when I was in Form 4 [age 15], and it was a personal issue for me, because if it happened, I would be brainwashed like a lab rat,” Hui said. “I felt that I could speak out because the leader [Joshua Wong] was also still in school uniform.”
“He ushered in an era where schoolchildren took part in political movements,” she said. “Soon after that, the Umbrella movement happened, and I decided to join Scholarism.”
“Then I went to study journalism in the United States … which was also part of my work towards freedom and democracy,” Hui said.
‘Strong sense of justice’
As a girl, Siu saw herself as a potential high-school teacher.
“I was lively and outgoing as a kid, with a strong sense of justice,” Siu told RFA Cantonese in a recent interview, adding that she frequently volunteered for positions of responsibility like prefect, monitor and counselor while in school.
But part of her always felt she didn’t belong.
“I was born in the U.S. and didn’t go back to Hong Kong until I was in elementary school,” she said. “My relationship with my parents wasn’t close because I didn’t live with them as a child … I was looked after by my grandparents.”
Joey Siu relaxes at a sports facility in Hong Kong, before she was forced to leave.(Courtesy Joey Siu)
“My upbringing was pretty strict,” she said. “I was only allowed to watch the 6.30 evening news on TVB while we ate dinner, but I wasn’t allowed to watch any TV the rest of the time.”
“I wasn’t allowed to read anything that wasn’t on the school curriculum, including comics and novels; I was only allowed to read newspapers,” she said.
Kwok, by contrast, was always something of a rebel.
“I’ve always been someone who likes to challenge existing frameworks, ever since I was a child,” she said. “In high school, I often talked back to my teachers, and would also speak out enthusiastically and ask questions about current affairs.”
Anna Kwok before she left Hong Kong, with an ambition to become a filmmaker.(Courtesy Anna Kwok)
“I also loved to try new things, or rather my family gave me a lot of opportunities to try different things, like rhythmic swimming, Chinese music, and playing the piano,” she said.
Complex world
Hui, meanwhile, described herself as “very noisy” in school.
“I don’t like to be boxed in by frameworks,” she said. ” I used to like boy stuff; I was popular and had a lot of different interests.”
Yet her upbringing was strongly Catholic, and her family’s world revolved around the church.
“It wasn’t until I joined Scholarism in 2014 that I actually met people outside of the Catholic community,” she said. “That’s when I realized how complex the real world actually is.”
All three women are now firmly regarded as subversive by their government, and by extension, the ruling Chinese Communist Party.
Their generation is unique in that it received a liberal education from a young age, but also lived through the early stages of Beijing’s patriotic education program in schools and universities.
“Kindergartens and primary schools gradually started to offer classes about China, and study tours to Beijing,” Kwok said. “They were constantly indoctrinating us that we were Chinese and should be proud of our identity as Chinese.”
“But at the same time, I was seeing a lot of negative news about China, including the [banned] Sudan Red food dye, and about the tofu buildings in Sichuan [that led to the deaths of thousands of schoolchildren in the 2008 quake],” she said. “It made me realize that … Hong Kong was different from China.”
Anna Kwok as a child in Hong Kong. Undated.(Courtesy Anna Kwok)
“When I was in junior high school, people starting talking about the identity of Hong Kong people, and I realized that Hong Konger was the identity that I could relate to,” she said.
Yet Kwok doesn’t see herself as particularly influenced by Western ideas.
“Western education has had a definite impact on me, but only in the sense that it made us realize that critical thinking is an essential skill for anyone, and that human rights, freedom and democracy are all necessary to work for the sustainable development of society,” she said.
Around the same time, Siu was getting similar information about China from Hong Kong’s still freewheeling press.
“All my knowledge of politics and current affairs came from the few free newspapers I got in the lobby of my apartment building when I was in school,” she said. “I learned that infant formula in China was laced with melamine, and that they cut corners when it came to building.”
“Later, I saw that the Hong Kong government was ignoring … demands for democracy from its people,” she said. “I’ve known since I was a child that neither the Chinese nor the Hong Kong government is a friend to people of Hong Kong.”
Learning about Tiananmen Massacre
Meanwhile, Hui was glued to a weekend political discussion show that ran live on Radio Television Hong Kong called “City Forum.”
“When I was 10, it was the 20th anniversary of the [1989] Tiananmen massacre, and all the TV stations made anniversary specials, which were a shock to me,” she said. “I never thought there would be such brutal suppression just across the border from Hong Kong, which was still fighting for freedom and democracy, and that some people had lost their lives.”
Frances Hui as a child in Hong Kong.(Courtesy of Frances Hui)
“Those students [in 1989] were just fighting for the right to vote, and for the freedom that should have been their birthright,” she said. “They weren’t brainwashed to do that; it was just something that it was natural for them to pursue.”
Back then, none of them realized how big a role they would come to play in their city’s history.
Kwok dreamed of becoming an artist and filmmaker, while Siu thought she might like to teach Liberal Studies, and Hui was thinking about journalism, or maybe accountancy.
But the 2014 Umbrella Movement — protests in which demonstrators used umbrellas to protect themselves — changed them, without their realizing it at the time.
“Back in 2014 I was studying … in Norway, and the Umbrella Movement started, and I felt very guilty because a friend of mine got caught in a tear gas attack and I wasn’t even there,” Kwok said. “So I organized a seminar in Norway to tell the outside world about what was happening in Hong Kong.”
“The same thing happened again in 2019, when all of [the protests] were happening … I was a overseas, so that time I went to a seminar,” she said. “Basically, there was no way I was going to carry on as if nothing was happening.”
Transnational repression
Life as an activist in exile isn’t easy, however.
All three women bemoaned dwindling attendance at overseas protests, as Hong Kongers start to feel the pinch of their government’s “long-arm” law enforcement, in the form of threats to loved ones and financial assets back home.
Sometimes, they wonder if it’s worth it, and whether they should take a break from lobbying to live their lives more fully.
Frances Hui, Joey Siu and Anna Kwok with former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi at a rally in support of the 45 jailed Hong Kong democracy activists in Washington, Nov. 19, 2024.(RFA)
All of them miss Hong Kong terribly, the city’s hustle and bustle, its Cantonese culture, and their friends and family, with whom they have cut off ties for their own protection.
“It’s been four years and two months since I left Hong Kong,” Siu said. “Before I got on the plane … I was afraid that this would be my final good-bye.”
“When they put out the arrest warrants, I was so sad not to able to celebrate my grandma’s birthday with her, yet I couldn’t call and tell her not to worry about me,” she said.
Yet none of the three women has any regrets about the way things turned out.
“The government is so scared of three young women in their 20s because what we say is right,” Hui said.
Siu added: “Everything we do is done to make Hong Kong a better place.”
Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by Ha Syut for RFA Cantonese.
U.S. lawmakers are demanding answers after it was revealed that China-backed hackers had accessed Treasury Department workstations and unclassified documents through a compromised third-party software provider.
The department said it was working with cybersecurity experts, the FBI, intelligence agencies and independent investigators to and assess the impact of the incident.
Beijing called the U.S. accusation of Chinese involvement another example of “unwarranted and groundless allegations” from Washington.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by Paul Eckert.
Canadian naval vessel HMCS Ottawa sailing in the East China Sea was closely shadowed by a Chinese warship, according to a reporter from Canada’s CTV television network embedded on the ship.
The hours-long incident took place on Tuesday, when the Canadian Halifax-class patrol frigate with 250 crew on board was on its first international deployment of the year to enforce U.N. sanctions against North Korea, called Operation NEON.
Since then it has moved to Operation Horizon, a multi-nation effort to “promote peace, stability, and the rules-based international order,” according to a press release from the Canadian defense department.
The CTV National News reporter on board HMCS Ottawa said that less than 12 hours after leaving the south of Japan, “the Canadian crew on board quickly learned their ship was being closely watched.”
The guided-missile frigate Binzhou (Hull 515) at Gdynia port, Northern Poland on June 22, 2018
Credit: China Military(China Military)
HMCS Ottawa’s commanding officer Adriano Lozer was quoted as saying that the Chinese ship, “because we are in these regional waters, has decided to stick around us and is currently seven miles on our beam and has been in and out between two to seven miles all day.”
Two miles is considered the minimum safe distance between two ships in open waters in order to avoid collision.
The People’s Liberation Army naval ship was identified as Binzhou, a 4,000-ton Type 054A frigate that carries air defense and anti-submarine missiles.
This was not the first time that Canadian military assets taking part in international missions were shadowed and harassed by the PLA.
In October 2023, Canada accused Chinese fighter jets of intercepting a Royal Canadian Air Force aircraft in an “aggressive manner” while the latter was flying over international waters also during an Operation NEON mission.
‘Turning black into white’
The Chinese military has not reacted to the CTV report but a news outlet known for its hawkish stance, the Global Times, accused the Canadian media of “turning black into white by hyping” the PLA shadowing the Canadian warship.
Taking press aboard warships is “designed to allow media to exaggerate China’s legitimate monitoring on its doorstep,” Chinese military expert Song Zhongping was quoted as saying.
“Canada is a country from outside of the region,” Song said, stressing that China’s identification and verification of foreign vessels near its waters “completely conforms to international law.”
Canadian and U.S. warships have often conducted joint transits in the Taiwan Strait, angering China, which sees them as a deliberate effort to challenge its control.
Canada said it is committed to promoting freedom of navigation and a free, open and inclusive Indo-Pacific.
In 2023, the HMCS Ottawa sailed through the waters between Taiwan and China’s mainland twice, and also deployed two sorties of shipborne helicopters near the China-controlled Paracel islands.
During the current Operation Horizon, it is expected to join allied naval vessels to carry out exercises and other operational activities to strengthen regional relationships “through security cooperation, building military-to-military interoperability, and enhancing Canada’s role as a trusted international security partner,” the Canadian defense department said.
Edited by Mike Firn.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by RFA Staff.
Panda bears are adorable—so fluffy and carefree. They can spend their time snacking on bamboo and climbing trees because they have no natural enemies. The panda is such a distinct and lovable animal that it was chosen to represent the World Wildlife Fund, the largest and most well-known wilderness preservation organization in the world. It’s easy to see why these animals are so beloved.
Charismatic megafauna is the quality that makes pandas so distinct. Being large helps a species stand out, but even the colorblind can recognize the black and white fur of a panda. Most importantly, pandas are culturally significant because they’re indigenous; they only come from China.
Pandas are so charismatic that the Communist Party of China uses them in political gestures called Panda Diplomacy. They lease pandas to other trusted countries as a sign of goodwill. It’s a symbolic act. The PCP is saying they don’t want to send bombs and war machines; they want open exchange. They want to share the best and most desirable parts of each other’s cultures.
Humans have a special ability to see meaning in things. That’s what makes us human. Your dog can’t read a map, and your cat can’t understand your songs, but we find meaning in giving a dog a map to its treat, knowing it will be guided by the scent. When we compose and sing 600 verses of a song to our cat, it’s not weird—it’s an expression of care and connection.
We create symbols and assign them meaning. When Lenin and the Bolsheviks were building a new nation, they knew they couldn’t keep the old Tsarist symbols of cruelty and oppression. They needed something new, something the people could rally behind. They looked to the source of their economic power. That’s where the hammer and sickle came in: the hammer to stand for industrial workers, who could manufacture goods for everyone, and the sickle to represent agricultural workers, who sustained the nation with food. The people saw themselves in that symbol. It’s what made it powerful.
The symbols of an oppressive empire need to be discarded. To many, the American flag symbolizes slavery and institutional racism. To others, the Star-Spangled Banner means land theft, invasion, and genocide. The masses can’t rally behind a banner that excludes them. The emblems of a revolution in the United States won’t be stars and bars, nor will they be hammers and sickles. Revolution in the US will have brand new trademarks.
When we create our own banner, we will choose our own symbols. In Mozambique, they overthrew colonial rule and defended their independence with AK-47 assault rifles; their flag still carries an AK-47 to this day. Samora Machel, Mozambique’s revolutionary leader, was brilliant at creating images the masses would rally around. He was also great at putting complicated strategic military maneuvers into simple terms anyone can understand. Machel didn’t try to copy the hammer and sickle; he saw the power in finding the symbol that told their own story.
We don’t have a culturally significant animal like the panda, and we don’t have an agrarian economy with a serf class. But we don’t need those things. Revolutions aren’t built on copy-pasting someone else’s strategy—they’re built on long-term goals and dedication. Hatred and anger might get things started, but they’re not enough to sustain a movement. Che Guevara, one of the most well-renowned guerrilla fighters of all time, knew this. He said, ‘The true revolutionary is guided by a great feeling of love. It is impossible to think of a genuine revolutionary lacking this quality.’
I can’t tell you what the new flag will look like or what symbols it will carry. But I can tell you how it will feel. It will inspire hope, unity, and a sense of belonging. Small countries like Laos and Vietnam have shown us what’s possible when people unite under a shared vision; powerful opponents are brought down. When the working class defeats the capitalist class, it will be under a banner that represents us. Together, there’s nothing we can’t achieve.
China has created two new counties in southwestern Xinjiang in disputed territory also claimed by India, a move analysts say is aimed at strengthening Beijing’s control over the area — and will likely exacerbate tension with India.
The two new counties — Hekang and He’an — are in Aksai Chin, a rugged, high-altitude desert area that China took from India in 1962 during the Sino-Indian War. It is the easternmost part of the larger Kashmir region claimed by India as part of its Nubra district in Ladakh.
“The two new counties show that China is consolidating its control over Aksai Chin,” said Anders Corr, principal of the New York-based political risk firm Corr Analytics.
“The move will further inflame tensions with India, which might seek to retake the Aksai Chin if there is a war with China over Taiwan, for example,” he said.
India objected by lodging an official protest with Beijing, according to Indian media reports.
The decision to create the two new counties was approved by the Chinese Communist Party’s Central Committee and the State Council, according to a Dec. 27 announcement on the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region government’s website.
The He’an county government will be located in Yulghun township, or Hongliu in Chinese, of Hotan county, while the Hekang county government will be located in Shaydulla township of Guma county, the announcement said.
Renaming locations
In other spots along its border with India, China has renamed locations to reflect its desire for territorial expansion and to normalize its occupation of disputed areas.
Speaking to reporters on Jan. 3, Randhir Jaiswal, spokesman for India’s Ministry of External Affairs, said India never accepted China’s “illegal occupation of Indian territory in this area,” The Hindu reported.
“The creation of new counties will neither have a bearing on India’s long-standing and consistent position regarding our sovereignty over the area nor lend legitimacy to China’s illegal and forcible occupation of the same,” he was quoted as saying.
Jaiswal also said India conveyed its concerns to Beijing about the planned construction of a mega hydropower project — which would be the world’s largest such dam — on the Yarlung Tsangpo River, the Tibetan name of Brahmaputra River, which flows through Arunachal Pradesh and Assam.
‘Break apart India’
China had expressed its willingness to cooperate with India on border issues, and on Dec. 18, Indian National Security Advisor Ajit Doval met with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi in Beijing for the 23rd round of boundary negotiations.
Chinese President Xi Jinping (right) meets with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the BRICS summit in Kazan, Russia, Oct. 23, 2024.(Reuters)
But just 10 days later, China announced the creation of the two counties — which U.S. political analyst Gordon G. Chang said could be a negotiating ploy.
“After all, the Chinese are talking to the Indians about territorial matters,” he said. “But we have to step back and understand that China is seeking to break apart India. It has for decades. This establishment of counties is just another tactic in a very long series of tactics of China to break apart India.”
Erkin Ekrem, a professor at Hacettepe University in Ankara, Turkey, said the move is part of Beijing’s pressure tactics against India.
“The aim is to pressure India with a viewpoint or policy that claims this region has historically been Chinese territory in order to resolve the border dispute, and they have been trying to gain control of whatever border they desire,” he said.
Ekrem predicted that China would try to relocate Uyghurs living in the Aksai Chin area and bring in Han Chinese settlers.
He said this is what occurred nine years ago when Chinese authorities established the city of Qurumqash, or Kunyu in Chinese, in Xinjiang, when they brought in many Han Chinese with the Bingtuan, a state-run economic and paramilitary organization that develops land and secures borders.
Leveraging infrastructure
Major infrastructure projects in Xinjiang and neighboring Tibet are positioning China to have the upper hand in territorial disputes and other disagreements that could escalate, Ekrem said.
The creation of a massive reservoir in Tibet, for instance, not only secures China’s water resources but also gives the Chinese leverage over India and other bordering countries, he said.
Recent upgrades to Hotan’s dual-use airport mean that the air field can be used by the military in the event of a conflict with India, and extensive railway networks built by the Chinese in Tibet can facilitate rapid troop deployment, he said.
“Through these infrastructure developments in both East Turkestan and Tibet, China has created a strategic advantage from military and defense perspectives,” Ekrem said, using Uyghurs’ preferred name for Xinjiang.
“These regions can serve as a rear base in any potential conflict with India, allowing China to potentially gain control of the region,” he said. “This strategic positioning explains the significance of these new construction projects and establishment of the counties.”
Translated by RFA Uyghur. Edited by Roseanne Gerin and Malcolm Foster.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by Uyghar for RFA Uyghur.
Responding to the rejection of Chinese human rights lawyer see also:s appeal against his three-year prison sentence for “inciting subversion of state power”, Amnesty International’s Interim Regional Deputy Director for Research Kate Schuetze said on 6 January, 2025: “The charges against Yu Wensheng and his wife, activist Xu Yan – who was convicted of the same offence – are entirely baseless. They reveal the authorities’ inability to provide any legitimate justification for their imprisonment.
“The Chinese government has used Yu’s online comments and his numerous international human rights awards as an excuse to label him a threat to national security. But all this really demonstrates is Beijing’s deep fear of human rights defenders who dare to dissent.
“Yu Wensheng and Xu Yan have been imprisoned solely for exercising their right to freedom of expression and they must be released immediately and unconditionally.”
Health officials in China are calling on people to wear masks and open the windows to help reduce a wave of respiratory infections that has left hospitals across the country swamped with patients ahead of the Lunar New Year travel rush.
“Influenza is peaking in our city, with influenza A (H1N1) as the main virus,” the Beijing Center for Disease Control and Prevention said in a recent statement warning people to take precautions ahead of the Jan. 29 Lunar New Year holiday, known as Spring Festival in mainland China.
The warning came as social media users posted video clips of crowded waiting rooms with masked parents cradling children and people on drips and lying on gurneys in corridors.
“This year’s influenza is pretty severe,” Douyin user @watchthistolearnaboutBeijing said in a video filmed from the Luhe Hospital in Beijing’s Tongzhou district on Jan. 6.
“The emergency rooms can’t see everyone, and are just handing out medicines or telling people to stay home.”
“H1N1 influenza in Shanghai is causing mayhem! The hospitals are overcrowded. Parents, please protect your children. Try to avoid crowded places!” one parent said in a video filmed at one of the city’s hospitals.
“I caught the influenza A virus which caused pneumonia, and my fever was so high that I was delirious, with a temperature of around 40C (104F),” another user said from the central province of Henan.
Worst still to come
Officials said the worst of the wave could still be to come.
“With the coming of the … Spring Festival holidays, there will be more personal travel and visits to relatives and friends,” Beijing CDC said in a notice published by the Beijing News. “You should wear a mask correctly when taking public transportation or going to crowded and relatively closed places.”
“Open the windows for ventilation 2-3 times a day, each time for no less than 30 minutes, to keep the indoor air fresh,” said the notice, which came as the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention reported a sharp increase in respiratory viral infections, including human metapneumovirus, in northern China starting last month.
The European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control said it was monitoring the situation for potential threats to European countries, but said there was no immediate cause for concern.
“The current epidemiological situation in China reflects a seasonal rise in respiratory infections caused by common respiratory pathogens and does not pose any specific concern [for countries in the European Economic Area or the European Union],” it said.
Meanwhile, authorities in Beijing said thats recent Mycoplasma pneumoniae, human metapneumovirus and adenovirus outbreaks had “fallen significantly,” and along with COVID-19 infections were “currently at a low level.”
State broadcaster CCTV called on schools and childcare facilities to keep classrooms ventilated and maintain good hand hygiene, and implement “prevention and control measures” in the event of a clustered outbreak.
Treatment challenges
A resident of Shanghai who gave only the pseudonym Peng for fear of reprisals said his daughter is still sick with flu-like symptoms after several trips to the hospital.
“It seems there are a whole lot of different viruses going around right now, and even the doctors don’t know what it is,” Peng said.
A resident of the eastern province of Shandong who gave only the pseudonym Liu for fear of reprisals said his area had also been hard-hit.
“They said it was influenza A I think, but we thought it could be a variant of COVID-19,” Liu said.
A resident of the central city of Wuhan who gave only the pseudonym Gu said hospitals large and small are packed with respiratory patients in that city too.
“A lot of people are going to the hospital to get IV fluids, but the seats to get IV fluids are all full in the community hospitals,” she said.
People wearing masks wait at an outpatient area of the respiratory department of a hospital in Beijing on Jan. 8, 2025.(JADE GAO/AFP)
She said it’s also getting harder to find medicines to treat oneself at home.
“This morning, I went to the pharmacy next door to buy a few packs of cold medicine, but they were still sold out,” she said, adding that nobody could get hold of the antiviral Mabaloxavir, while the medicines being given by hospitals “did nothing to cure the illness.”
More effective medicines like antivirals were “too expensive, and can’t be prescribed,” she said. ‘You can buy them at your own expense, but they’re not covered by medical insurance.”
Main virus unclear
Lin Xiaoxu, director of the Protovirus Laboratory at the U.S. Army Research Institute, said it was unclear exactly which viruses are driving the current wave of respiratory illness in China.
“It’s possible that there are other, more serious, respiratory viruses in China, but the government hasn’t highlighted them in their testing or their public service announcements,” Lin said.
“Instead, the media have all been focusing on human metapneumovirus [as a recent issue].”
Meanwhile, there are signs that many could struggle to afford any medical care at all.
China’s hospitals are still reeling from the financial impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, and some are trying to claw back revenue by refusing to take insurance cards and insisting that patients pay out of pocket for their treatment, according to recent reports from specialist healthcare bloggers.
“We went to one hospital [for a family member] and they told us … that they couldn’t accept our medical insurance card, so we had to pay out of pocket,” Shanghai resident Peng told RFA Mandarin. “It’s the same for me; a lot of the medicines I take for my current condition are paid for out of pocket, and the price is very high.”
Translated with additional reporting by Luisetta Mudie.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by Kitty Wang for RFA Mandarin.
MANILA – Beijing has denied any infringement of Philippine jurisdiction rights by sending its largest coast guard vessel to near the disputed Scarborough Shoal inside the Philippines’ exclusive economic zone.
Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun told a press briefing that the coast guard “conducts its patrols and law enforcement activities in relevant waters in full accordance with the law.”
“It is fully justified,” he added.
Repeated confrontations in disputed waters over the past year have raised fears of conflict between China and U.S. ally the Philippines.
In the latest development, the 12,000-ton CCG5901, dubbed “The Monster” because of its size, seemed to have left the coastline off Zambales, in the central Luzon region of the Philippines, and was about 90 nautical miles offshore as of Wednesday afternoon, the Philippine coast guard, or PCG, said.
Another Chinese coast guard ship – the CCG3103 – is heading to the area and was likely to serve as a replacement vessel for the monster ship to maintain China’s “illegal presence” within the exclusive economic zone, it said.
Besides the CCG5901 and CCG3103, there are at least six other Chinese coast guard vessels in the waters in which the Philippines holds jurisdiction rights to resources.
“The Monster” had been operating in an area 60-70 nautical miles from Zambales for the previous four days, according to spokesperson Jay Tarriela, who said that coast guard vessel BRP Cabra was deployed to closely monitor the “illegal” Chinese ship.
China “has provocatively deployed a People’s Liberation Army Navy helicopter, tail number 47” to the area, Tarriela said in a statement. The Philippine coast guard has been ordered by its commandant to refrain from action that could escalate tension, he added.
The Philippine military on Tuesday confirmed that it would continue conducting maritime and air patrols in the West Philippine Sea, or part of the South China Sea under Manila’s jurisdiction.
The Global Times, a Chinese newspaper known for its hawkish stance, said the Philippines was “hyping up” the CCG5901’s “normal” activities.
Chinese analyst Ding Duo was quoted as saying that after China announced the baselines around Huangyan Dao, the Chinese name for Scarborough Shoal, both the Chinese navy and coastguard were “set to increase their routine patrols and exercises in the area, and the Philippines needs to adapt to this process.”
That meant the current campaign, seen by Manila as an illegal act of intimidation, was set to continue.
U.S. aircraft carrier
Meanwhile, a carrier strike group led by the Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson (CVN 70), has been operating in the South China Sea since Jan. 3.
Sailors signal aircraft during routine flight operations on the flight deck of the USS Carl Vinson on Jan. 7, 2025.(Petty Officer 3rd Class Nathan J/U.S. Navy)
The strike group includes the embarked Carrier Air Wing (CVW) 2, cruiser USS Princeton (CG-59) and destroyers USS Sterett (DDG-104) and USS William P. Lawrence (DDG-110).
The U.S. Navy has released a number of photos showing the Carl Vinson and its accompanying vessels conducting daily “routine operations” to reaffirm freedom of navigation in the waterway.
It did not specify the carrier’s exact location and only said that it was “in the U.S. 7th Fleet area of operations.”
“U.S. forces operate in the South China Sea on a daily basis,” the 7th Fleet has repeatedly said in its statements. “The United States upholds freedom of navigation for all nations as a principle.”
“No member of the international community should be intimidated or coerced into giving up their rights and freedoms,” it said.
Besides the Carl Vinson strike group, U.S. Navy Arleigh Burke-class destroyer USS Higgins (DDG 76) was also spotted conducting a firearms shooting training for its sailors on Tuesday in the South China Sea.
The Philippines and the U.S. in 1951 signed a Mutual Defense Treaty that commits the allies to help each other in time of attack by a third party.
Edited by RFA Staff.
BenarNews is an RFA-affiliated news organization.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA and BenarNews Staff.
MANILA – Beijing has denied any infringement of Philippine jurisdiction rights by sending its largest coast guard vessel to near the disputed Scarborough Shoal inside the Philippines’ exclusive economic zone.
Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun told a press briefing that the coast guard “conducts its patrols and law enforcement activities in relevant waters in full accordance with the law.”
“It is fully justified,” he added.
Repeated confrontations in disputed waters over the past year have raised fears of conflict between China and U.S. ally the Philippines.
In the latest development, the 12,000-ton CCG5901, dubbed “The Monster” because of its size, seemed to have left the coastline off Zambales, in the central Luzon region of the Philippines, and was about 90 nautical miles offshore as of Wednesday afternoon, the Philippine coast guard, or PCG, said.
Another Chinese coast guard ship – the CCG3103 – is heading to the area and was likely to serve as a replacement vessel for the monster ship to maintain China’s “illegal presence” within the exclusive economic zone, it said.
Besides the CCG5901 and CCG3103, there are at least six other Chinese coast guard vessels in the waters in which the Philippines holds jurisdiction rights to resources.
“The Monster” had been operating in an area 60-70 nautical miles from Zambales for the previous four days, according to spokesperson Jay Tarriela, who said that coast guard vessel BRP Cabra was deployed to closely monitor the “illegal” Chinese ship.
China “has provocatively deployed a People’s Liberation Army Navy helicopter, tail number 47” to the area, Tarriela said in a statement. The Philippine coast guard has been ordered by its commandant to refrain from action that could escalate tension, he added.
The Philippine military on Tuesday confirmed that it would continue conducting maritime and air patrols in the West Philippine Sea, or part of the South China Sea under Manila’s jurisdiction.
The Global Times, a Chinese newspaper known for its hawkish stance, said the Philippines was “hyping up” the CCG5901’s “normal” activities.
Chinese analyst Ding Duo was quoted as saying that after China announced the baselines around Huangyan Dao, the Chinese name for Scarborough Shoal, both the Chinese navy and coastguard were “set to increase their routine patrols and exercises in the area, and the Philippines needs to adapt to this process.”
That meant the current campaign, seen by Manila as an illegal act of intimidation, was set to continue.
U.S. aircraft carrier
Meanwhile, a carrier strike group led by the Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson (CVN 70), has been operating in the South China Sea since Jan. 3.
Sailors signal aircraft during routine flight operations on the flight deck of the USS Carl Vinson on Jan. 7, 2025.(Petty Officer 3rd Class Nathan J/U.S. Navy)
The strike group includes the embarked Carrier Air Wing (CVW) 2, cruiser USS Princeton (CG-59) and destroyers USS Sterett (DDG-104) and USS William P. Lawrence (DDG-110).
The U.S. Navy has released a number of photos showing the Carl Vinson and its accompanying vessels conducting daily “routine operations” to reaffirm freedom of navigation in the waterway.
It did not specify the carrier’s exact location and only said that it was “in the U.S. 7th Fleet area of operations.”
“U.S. forces operate in the South China Sea on a daily basis,” the 7th Fleet has repeatedly said in its statements. “The United States upholds freedom of navigation for all nations as a principle.”
“No member of the international community should be intimidated or coerced into giving up their rights and freedoms,” it said.
Besides the Carl Vinson strike group, U.S. Navy Arleigh Burke-class destroyer USS Higgins (DDG 76) was also spotted conducting a firearms shooting training for its sailors on Tuesday in the South China Sea.
The Philippines and the U.S. in 1951 signed a Mutual Defense Treaty that commits the allies to help each other in time of attack by a third party.
Edited by RFA Staff.
BenarNews is an RFA-affiliated news organization.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA and BenarNews Staff.
Indonesia is the world’s number one producer of nickel, by a large margin. Nickel is an important mineral needed for renewable energy technologies like batteries and solar panels.
In the past decade, the Indonesian government has embarked upon an ambitious industrialization program. Through careful state planning and industrial policy, Jakarta banned the export of raw minerals and, with strategic investments from Chinese state-owned enterprises and favorable loans from Chinese state-owned banks, Indonesia has moved up the value chain, processing nickel at home, instead of simply exporting the ore.
Authorities at a college in the northern Chinese province of Shaanxi have imposed three days of restrictions after the death of a student sparked mass protests on campus, as police insisted there was no foul play involved, according to social media footage and state media reports.
State media have also reported that local officials have investigated the death of a student at a vocational college following a “verbal and physical altercation” with a roommate, after thousands of angry citizens gathered outside the school, sparking clashes with police.
Officials in Shaanxi’s Pucheng county have launched a probe into the Jan. 2 death of a Pucheng Vocational Education Center student identified only by the surname Dang, state broadcaster CCTV reported on Jan. 6, after large crowds gathered a day earlier.
Video clips uploaded to the X accounts “Mr. Li is not your teacher” and “DiplySync” showed large crowds of people chanting outside the school, and rocking an ambulance after the school’s vice principal hid in it, according to an accompanying post.
“[The victim’s] family suspected that the deceased had been bullied on campus and accused the school of concealing the truth,” according to a DiplySync post.
‘Verbal and physical altercation‘
According to the CCTV report, Dang had gotten involved in a “verbal and physical altercation” at about 10 p.m. on Jan. 1 after he complained that two roommates were talking too loudly and stopping him from sleeping.
Dang reported his roommates to the college “political education department,” then returned to his dorm.
“At about 3 a.m. on Jan. 2, Huang, who shared a dormitory with Dang, found a wooden stool under the balcony window of the dormitory when he went to the toilet,” the report said.
“The sliding window was open and the mesh screen on the window had been removed. Dang was down below, outside,” it said.
Police determined that the student had “died from falling from a height,” and that no foul play was suspected, the report said.
Now, the school is reportedly under “stability maintenance” measures, according to a copy of a notice to students leaked to the citizen journalist X account “Mr. Li is not your teacher.”
At least some students have “taken leave for personal reasons” in the wake of the protests, under strict instructions not to make further trouble for the authorities.
“We put forward clear requirements for students who are on leave at home for personal reasons … to study at home and respect the three days of restrictions,” the notice, which RFA was unable to verify independently, said.
“Do not make contact with other students or members of the public to gather in the restricted area,” it said.
In a move that echoed the official response to the hanging death of teenager Hu Xinyu in February 2023, the notice warned students: “Do not speak publicly, do not post, comment on or like any related content on online platforms, and do not start, give credence to or spread rumors.”
The citizen journalist behind “Mr. Li is not your teacher” told RFA Mandarin that they post content that has been directly submitted by people on the ground, as well as content that has also appeared on other social media platforms.
The account noted in an X post on Tuesday that video from the Jan. 5 protests had largely disappeared from the video-sharing platform Douyin, the Chinese version of TikTok.
Translated by Luisetta Mudie.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by Jenny Tang for RFA Mandarin.
Authorities at a college in the northern Chinese province of Shaanxi have imposed three days of restrictions after the death of a student sparked mass protests on campus, as police insisted there was no foul play involved, according to social media footage and state media reports.
State media have also reported that local officials have investigated the death of a student at a vocational college following a “verbal and physical altercation” with a roommate, after thousands of angry citizens gathered outside the school, sparking clashes with police.
Officials in Shaanxi’s Pucheng county have launched a probe into the Jan. 2 death of a Pucheng Vocational Education Center student identified only by the surname Dang, state broadcaster CCTV reported on Jan. 6, after large crowds gathered a day earlier.
Video clips uploaded to the X accounts “Mr. Li is not your teacher” and “DiplySync” showed large crowds of people chanting outside the school, and rocking an ambulance after the school’s vice principal hid in it, according to an accompanying post.
“[The victim’s] family suspected that the deceased had been bullied on campus and accused the school of concealing the truth,” according to a DiplySync post.
‘Verbal and physical altercation‘
According to the CCTV report, Dang had gotten involved in a “verbal and physical altercation” at about 10 p.m. on Jan. 1 after he complained that two roommates were talking too loudly and stopping him from sleeping.
Dang reported his roommates to the college “political education department,” then returned to his dorm.
“At about 3 a.m. on Jan. 2, Huang, who shared a dormitory with Dang, found a wooden stool under the balcony window of the dormitory when he went to the toilet,” the report said.
“The sliding window was open and the mesh screen on the window had been removed. Dang was down below, outside,” it said.
Police determined that the student had “died from falling from a height,” and that no foul play was suspected, the report said.
Now, the school is reportedly under “stability maintenance” measures, according to a copy of a notice to students leaked to the citizen journalist X account “Mr. Li is not your teacher.”
At least some students have “taken leave for personal reasons” in the wake of the protests, under strict instructions not to make further trouble for the authorities.
“We put forward clear requirements for students who are on leave at home for personal reasons … to study at home and respect the three days of restrictions,” the notice, which RFA was unable to verify independently, said.
“Do not make contact with other students or members of the public to gather in the restricted area,” it said.
In a move that echoed the official response to the hanging death of teenager Hu Xinyu in February 2023, the notice warned students: “Do not speak publicly, do not post, comment on or like any related content on online platforms, and do not start, give credence to or spread rumors.”
The citizen journalist behind “Mr. Li is not your teacher” told RFA Mandarin that they post content that has been directly submitted by people on the ground, as well as content that has also appeared on other social media platforms.
The account noted in an X post on Tuesday that video from the Jan. 5 protests had largely disappeared from the video-sharing platform Douyin, the Chinese version of TikTok.
Translated by Luisetta Mudie.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by Jenny Tang for RFA Mandarin.
Comments on the U.S. Embassy’s Weibo social media account are striking an overwhelmingly positive note about Sino-U.S. ties, suggesting the Chinese Communist Party’s “public opinion management” system that governs and manipulates online comments wants to send a kinder message ahead of the Jan. 20 inauguration of President-elect Donald Trump, analysts told Radio Free Asia.
In China’s tightly controlled social media environment, comments are widely deleted if deemed politically taboo, but also written to order by an army of pro-government commentators hired to deliver “public opinion” that suits the Communist Party’s political priorities.
The social media accounts of Western embassies and consulates in China have long been a focus for the country’s “little pink” nationalists, and an opportunity for Chinese to vent their frustrations at foreign governments.
But a New Year’s Day article from the U.S. Embassy looking back at the bilateral relationship since 1979 suddenly garnered several hundred comments mentioning “Sino-U.S. friendship” instead, suggesting that the ruling Chinese Communist Party’s “public opinion management” system has switched priorities ahead of Trump’s inauguration on Jan. 20.
“The China-U.S. relationship is the greatest in human history,” gushed one comment under the Weibo version of the article. Another said, “Sino-U.S. friendship will last forever,” and another said the countries wielded “unprecedented and far-reaching influence” in the world.
Comments underneath a U.S. Embassy Weibo post about the death of former U.S. President Jimmy Carter also took a more positive tone.
“I hope China and the U.S. will put the interests of their two peoples first, respect and understand each other,” said one comment.
‘American devils’
The comments were in stark contrast with previous comments on U.S. Embassy posts, which would once typically say something like: “Enjoy the holiday, American devils, and don’t interfere with China.”
Chinese state media recently launched a campaign to highlight friendly cooperation with the United States in an attempt to improve turbulent ties as Trump prepares to take office, an analyst said.
Before and after Weibo comments under a Dec. 27, 2024 U.S. Embassy post which speaks of “American devils”, right, while comments posted after New Year speak of “friendship.”(U.S. Embassy/Sina Weibo)
The state-run People’s Daily and Global Times, which often carry searing criticism of the United States, called on Dec. 25 for written work, photos and videos from people and organizations around the world with the aim of “bridging cultural differences and fostering friendship and trust” with the United State.
U.S.-based legal scholar Teng Biao said the shift in tone is almost certainly the result of orders from the top.
“Under China’s media [and social media] controls, all directions taken by its nationalism are laid down by the Chinese Communist Party,” Teng told RFA Cantonese in a recent interview, adding that China has been internationally isolated for several years.
“That isolation will make things harder and harder in China, so the Chinese Communist Party has a political need to manipulate an apparently positive nationalistic mood, in order to ease ties with the U.S. or Japan,” Teng said.
“The relationship between China and the United States is a bit of a paradox for the Chinese government,” Teng said. “If it’s managed well, it will be beneficial to the Chinese Communist Party, and enable China’s economy to grow better.”
“But exchanges with the West will also bring in ideas of freedom and openness that Beijing doesn’t want to see,” he said.
‘50-cent-army’
China deploys thousands of internet commentators dubbed the “50-cent army” to generate pro-government posts on social media.
Their exact numbers are unknown, but their job is to try to swing the opinions of Chinese netizens in the direction of the status quo and to deflect criticism and dissent among the country’s 900 million internet users.
U.S.-based current affairs commentator Zang Zhuo said the comments were almost certainly manufactured.
“I have seen various comments on Weibo, which seem to be a 180-degree turnaround in Chinese netizens’ attitude towards the United States,” Zang said. “But these aren’t the real voices of the people … because they are all directed by the government.”
“Chinese online opinion does as it is told.”
Zang said it’s unlikely to be an effective way to ease ties with Washington.
“Does this change in attitude mean that Sino-U.S. relations will ease, or get closer and more cooperative?” Zang said. “I don’t think so.”
“The international environment has completely changed … so unless the Communist Party loses power, I don’t think there’s much hope of that.”
Translated by Luisetta Mudie. Edited by Malcolm Foster.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by Yitong Wu and Pan Jiaqing for RFA Cantonese.
TAIPEI, Taiwan – Chinese firms supporting Russia are presenting themselves as if they are from Taiwan not only to avoid sanctions but also to discredit the self-ruled island, said a Ukrainian activist.
Vadym Labas initially accused the Taiwanese company Taiwan Rung Cherng Suspenparts, or TRC, of modifying and producing servomechanisms for Russia’s deadly glide bombs, citing a transaction document between TRC and a Russian firm.
However, Labas later clarified that further investigation revealed the TRC name in the document was actually a front for a Chinese company seeking to evade international sanctions, not the Taiwanese company.
“We also discovered a double operation, which consisted not only of a new scheme to circumvent sanctions, but also an operation to discredit the Taiwanese manufacturer, which had been repeatedly carried out by the parties concerned,” Labas wrote on his Facebook on Monday.
Labas added that the Chinese company KST Digital Technology Limited supplied servomotors to Russia through a network of intermediaries, including a firm called Kaifeng Zhendaqian Technology. These products were eventually rebranded as those of the Taiwanese firm TRC, whose name was used without authorization.
Servomotors are crucial for glide bombs as they control the bomb’s aerodynamic surfaces, such as fins or wings, enabling precise maneuvering and guidance.
“Taiwan has been unjustly implicated. The actual culprits are Chinese manufacturers exploiting TRC’s name for camouflage,” he added.
Radio Free Asia was not able to contact KST Digital Technology Limited or Kaifeng Zhendaqian Technology for comment.
Chen Shu-Mei, TRC’s deputy general manager, dismissed any suggestion of a business connection with Russia, saying the firm may take legal action to protect its reputation.
“It was a totally unfounded claim,” said Chen, adding that the company primarily produces automotive chassis components and parts for vehicle suspension systems.
While not as advanced as Western precision-guided munitions, Russian glide bombs have become a key part of its air strategy in Ukraine. Military analysts estimate they contribute 20% of Russia’s operational advantage in the conflict.
Ukrainian intelligence reports that Russia has greatly increased its use of such bombs. In May 2023, Russian forces were using about 25 glide bombs daily, but that number has since climbed to at least 60 per day, sometimes exceeding 100.
Edited by Taejun Kang.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by Alan Lu for RFA.
