Southern Cross, a French-hosted regional military exercise, is moving to Wallis and Futuna Islands this year.
The exercise, which includes participating regional armed and law enforcement forces from Australia, Fiji, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea and Tonga every two years, is scheduled to take place April 22-May 3.
Since its inception in 2002, the war games have traditionally been hosted in New Caledonia.
However, New Caledonia was the scene last year of serious riots, causing 14 deaths, hundreds injured, and an estimated cost of 2.2 billion euros (NZ$4.2 billion)
Southern Cross focuses on the notion of “interoperability” between regional forces, with a joint multinational command following a predefined but realistic scenario, usually in a fictitious island state affected by a natural disaster and/or political unrest.
This is the first time the regional French exercise will be hosted on Wallis Island, in the French Pacific territory of Wallis and Futuna, near Fiji and Samoa.
Earlier this month (March 3-5), the Nouméa-based French Armed Forces in New Caledonia (FANC) hosted a “Final Coordination Conference” (FCC) with its regional counterparts after a series of on-site reconnaissance visits to Wallis and Futuna Islands ahead of the Southern Cross 2025 manoeuvres.
Humanitarian, disaster relief
FANC also confirmed this year, again in Wallis-and-Futuna, the exercise scenario would mainly focus on Humanitarian Assistance and Disaster Relief (HADR) and that it would involve, apart from the French forces, the deployment of some 19 other participating countries, with an estimated 2000 personnel, including 600 regional.
A French Carrier Strike Group exercise Clémenceau25 deployment map of operations. Image: ALPACI-Forces armées en Asie-Pacifique et en Polynésie française
Last week, still in preparation mode, a group of FANC officers travelled again to Wallis for three days to finalise preparations ahead of the exercise.
In an interview with public broadcaster Wallis and Futuna la 1ère, FANC inter-army chief-of-staff Colonel Frédéric Puchois said the group of officers met local chiefly and royal authorities, as well as the Speaker of the local territorial assembly.
In 2023, the previous Southern Cross exercise held in New Caledonia involved the participation of about 18 regional countries.
“It’s all about activating and practising quick and efficient scenarios to respond mainly to a large-scale natural disaster,” Colonel Puchois said.
“Southern Cross until now took place in New Caledonia, but it was decided for 2025 to choose Wallis and Futuna to work specifically on long-distance projection.
“So, the Americans will position some of their forces in Pago-Pago in American Samoa to test their capacity to project forces from a rear base located 2000 kms away [from Wallis].
“And for the French part, the rear base will be New Caledonia,” he added.
Port Vila earthquake
He said one of the latest real-life illustrations of this kind of deployment was the recent relief operation from Nouméa following Port Vila’s devastating earthquake in mid-December 2024.
“We brought essential relief supplies, in coordination with NGOs like the Red Cross. And during Southern Cross 2025, we will again work with them and other NGOs”.
However, Colonel Puchois said not all personnel would be deployed at the same time.
“We will project small groups at a time. There will be several phases,” he said.
“First to secure the airport to ensure it is fit for landing of large aircraft. This could involve parachute personnel and supplies.
“Then assistance to the population, involving other components such as civil security, fire brigades, gendarmes. It would conclude with evacuating people in need of further assistance.
“So we won’t project all of the 2000 participants at the same time, but groups of 250 to 300 personnel”.
Cooperation with Vanuatu Mobile Force FANC Commander General Yann Latil was in Vanuatu two weeks ago, where he held meetings with Vanuatu Mobile Forces (VMF) Commander Colonel Ben Nicholson and Vanuatu Internal Affairs minister Andrew Napuat to discuss cooperation, as well as handling and maintenance of the French-supplied FAMAS rifles.
For two weeks, two FANC instructors were in Port Vila to train a group of about 15 VMF on handling and maintenance of the FAMAS used by the island state’s paramilitary force.
The VMF were also handed over more ammunition for the standard issue FAMAS (the French equivalent of the US-issued M-16).
French Armed Forces Commander in New Caledonia (FANC) General Yann Latil visits Vanuatu Mobile Forces (VMF) training in French FAMAS rifles maintenance. Image: FANC Forces Armées en Nouvelle-Calédonie
During his visit, General Latil also held talks with Vanuatu Internal Affairs Minister Andrew Napuat, who is in charge of the VMF and police.
FANC and Vanuatu security forces are “working on a regular basis”, Vanuatu-based French Ambassador Jean-Baptiste Jeangène Vilmer said.
The three-star general (equivalent of a lieutenant-general) flew back to Nouméa about 500 km away on March 8.
French vessel on fishing policing mission At the same time, still in Vanuatu, Nouméa-based overseas support and assistance vessel (BSAOM) the D’Entrecasteaux and its crew were on a courtesy call in Luganville (Espiritu Santo island, North Vanuatu) for three days.
After hosting local officials and school students for visits, the patrol boat embarked on a surveillance policing mission in high seas off the archipelago.
One ni-Vanuatu officer also joined the French crew inspecting foreign fishing vessels and checking if they comply with current regulations under the Forum Fisheries Agency (FFA).
On a regular basis, similar monitoring operations are also carried out by navies from other regional countries such as Australia and New Zealand in order to assist neighbouring Pacific States in protecting their respective Exclusive Economic Zones (EEZ) from what is usually termed Illegal Unregulated and Unreported (IUU) fishing from foreign vessels.
Last month, the D’Entrecasteaux was engaged in a series of naval exercises off Papua New Guinea.
Further north in the Pacific, French aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle and its strike group wrapped up an unprecedented two-month deployment in a series of multinational exercises with Australia, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore and Vietnam), where “one third of the world’s maritime trade transits every day”.
This included its own Exercises Clémenceau25 and La Pérouse (with eight neighbouring forces), but also interoperability-focused manoeuvres with the US and Japan (Pacific Steller).
“The deployment of this military capacity underlines France’s attachment to maritime and aerial freedom of action and movement on all seas and oceans of the world”, the Tahiti-based Pacific Maritime Command (ALPACI) said this week in a release.
US Navy in Western Pacific activity Also in western Pacific waters, the US Navy’s activity has been intense over the past few weeks, and continues.
The Virginia-class fast-attack submarine USS Vermont (SSN 792) returned on 18 March to Joint Base Pearl Harbour-Hickam, following a seven-month deployment, the submarine’s first deployment to the Western Pacific, the US Third Fleet command stated.
On Friday, the USS Nimitz (CVN 68) Carrier Strike Group (NIMCSG) left Naval Base Kitsap in Bremerton, Washington, for a regularly scheduled deployment to the Western Pacific.
The US Third Fleet command said the strike group’s deployment will focus on “demonstrating the US Navy’s unwavering commitment to a free and open Indo-Pacific in which all nations are secure in their sovereignty and free from coercion”.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
Like a relentless ocean, wave after wave of pro-Palestinian pro-human rights protesters disrupted New Zealand deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters’ state of the nation speech at the Christchurch Town Hall yesterday.
A clarion call to Trumpism and Australia’s One Nation Party, the speech was accompanied by the background music of about 250 protesters outside the Town Hall, chanting: “Complicity in genocide is a crime.”
Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa (PSNA) co-chair John Minto described Peters’ attitude to Palestinians as “sickening”.
Inside the James Hay Theatre, protester after protester stood and spoke loudly and clearly against the deputy Prime Minister’s failure to support those still dying in Gaza, and his failure to denounce the ongoing genocide.
Ben Vorderegger was the first of nine protesters who appealed on behalf of people who have lost their voices in the dust of blood and bones, bombs and sniper guns.
Before he and others were hauled out, they spoke for the tens of thousands of Palestinians who have been killed by Israeli forces in Gaza — women, men, doctors, aid workers, journalists, and children.
Gazan health authorities have reported that the official death toll is now more than 50,000 — but that is the confirmed deaths with thousands more buried under the rubble.
Real death toll
The real death toll from the genocide in Gaza has been estimated by a reputed medical journal, The Lancet, at more than 63,000. A third of those are children. Each day more children are killed.
One by one the protesters who challenged Peters were manhandled by security guards to a frenzied crowd screaming “out, out”.
The deputy Prime Minister’s response was to deride and mock the conscientious objectors. He did not stop there. He lambasted the media.
At this point, several members of his audience turned on me as a journalist and demanded my removal.
Pro=Palestine protesters at the Christchurch Town Hall yesterday to picket Foreign Minister Winston Peters at his state of the nation speech.Image: Saige England/APR
This means that not only is the right to free speech at stake, the right or freedom to report is also being eroded. (I was later trespassed by security guards and police from the Town Hall although no reason was supplied for the ban).
Inside the Christchurch Town Hall the call by Peters, who is also Foreign Minister, to “Make New Zealand Great Again” continued in the vein of a speech written by a MAGA leader.
He whitewashed human rights, failed to address climate change, and demonstrated loathing for a media that has rarely challenged him.
Ben Vorderegger in keffiyeh was the first of nine protesters who appealed on behalf of Palestinans before being thrown out of the Christchurch Town Hall meeting. Image: Saige England/APR
Condemned movement
Slamming the PSNA as “Marxist fascists” for calling out genocide, he condemned the movement for failing to talk with those who have a record of kowtowing to violent colonisation.
This tactic is Colonial Invasion 101. It sees the invader rewarding and only dealing with those who sell out. This strategy demands that the colonised people should bow to the oppressor — an oppressor who threatens them with losing everything if they do not accept the scraps.
Peters showed no support for the Treaty of Waitangi but rather, endorsed the government’s challenge to the founding document of the nation – Te Tiriti o Waitangi. In his dismissal of the founding and legally binding partnership, he repeated the “One Nation” catch-cry. Ad nauseum.
Besides slamming Palestinians, the Scots (he managed to squeeze in a racist joke against Scottish people), and the woke, Peters’ speech promoted continued mining, showing some amnesia over the Pike River disaster. He did not reference the environment or climate change.
After the speech, outside the Town Hall police donned black gloves — a sign they were prepared to use pepper-spray.
PSNA co-chair John Minto described Peters’ failure to stand against the ongoing genocide of Palestinians as “bloody disgraceful”.
The police arrested one protester, claiming he put his hand on a car transporting NZ First officials. A witness said this was not the case.
PSNA co-chair John Minto (in hat behind fellow protester) . . . the failure of Foreign Minister Winston Peters to stand against the ongoing genocide of Palestinians is “bloody disgraceful”. Image; Saige England/APR
Protester released The protester was later released without any charges being laid.
A defiant New Zealand First MP Shane Jones marched out of the Town Hall after the event. He raised his arms defensively at protesters crying, “what if it was your grandchildren being slaughtered?”
I was trespassed from the Christchurch Town Hall for re-entering the Town Hall for Winston Peters’ media conference. No reason was supplied by police or the Town Hall security personnel for that trespass order..
“The words Winston is terrified to say . . . ” poster at the Christchurch pro-Palestinian protest. Image: Saige England/APR
It is well known that Peters loathes the media — he said so enough times during his state of the nation speech.
He referenced former US President Bill Clinton during his speech, an interesting reference given that Clinton did not receive the protection from the media that Peters has received.
From the over zealous security personnel who manhandled and dragged out hecklers, to the banning of a journalist, to the arrest of someone for “touching a car” when witnesses report otherwise, the state of the nation speech held some uncomfortable echoes — the actions of a fascist dictatorship.
Populist threats
The atmosphere was reminiscent of a Jorg Haider press conference I attended many years ago in Vienna. That “rechtspopulist” Austrian politician had threatened journalists with defamation suits if they called him out on his support for Nazis.
Yet he was on record for doing so.
I was reminded of this yesterday when the audience called ‘out out’ at hecklers, and demanded the removal of this journalist. These New Zealand First supporters demand adoration for their leader or a media black-out.
Perhaps they cannot be blamed given that the state of the nation speech could well have been written by US President Donald Trump or one of his minions.
The protesters were courageous and conscientious in contrast to Peters, said PSNA’s John Minto.
He likened Peters to Neville Chamberlain — Britain’s Prime Minister from 1937 to 1940. His name is synonymous with the policy of “appeasement” because he conceded territorial concessions to Nazi Germany in the late 1930s, fruitlessly hoping to avoid war.
“He has refused to condemn any of Israel’s war crimes against Palestinians, including the total humanitarian aid blockade of Gaza.”
Refusal ‘unprecedented’
“It’s unprecedented in New Zealand history that a government would refuse to condemn Israel breaking its ceasefire agreement and resuming industrial-scale slaughter of civilians,” Minto said.
“That is what Israel is doing today in Gaza, with full backing from the White House.
“Chamberlain went to meet Hitler in Munich in 1938 to whitewash Nazi Germany’s takeovers of its neighbours’ lands.
“Peters has been in Washington to agree to US approval of the occupation of southern Syria, more attacks on Lebanon, resumption of the land grab genocide in Gaza and get a heads-up on US plans to ‘give’ the Occupied West Bank to Israel later this year.
“If Peters disagrees with any of this, he’s had plenty of chances to say so.
“New Zealanders are calling for sanctions on Israel but Mr Peters and the National-led government are looking the other way.”
New Zealand First MP Shane Jones marched out of the Town Hall after the event, dismissing protesters crying, “what if it was your grandchildren being slaughtered?” Image: Saige England/APR
Only staged questions
The conscientious objectors who rise against the oppression of human rights are people Winston Peters regards as his enemies. He will only answer questions in a press conference staged for him.
He warms to journalists who warm to him.
The state of the nation speech in the Town Hall was familiar.
Seeking to erase conscientiousness will not make New Zealand great, it will render this country very small, almost miniscule, like the people who are being destroyed for daring to demand their right to their own land.
Saige England is a journalist and author, and a member of the Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa (PSNA).
Part of the crowd at the state of the nation speech by Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters at the Christchurch Town Hall yesterday. Image: Saige England/APR
According to a newly filed document in Talbott v. Trump — the court case that will determine whether transgender people can continue to serve in the U.S. military — the military now plans to ask all service members if they exhibit “symptoms” of being transgender. The filing signals a shift from targeting only openly transgender individuals to potentially investigating those who are closeted or…
Green Party co-leader Chlöe Swarbrick called on New Zealand government MPs today to support her Member’s Bill to sanction Israel over its “crazy slaughter” of Palestinians in Gaza.
Speaking at a large pro-Palestinian solidarity rally in the heart of New Zealand’s largest city Auckland, she said Aotearoa New Zealand could no longer “remain a bystander to the slaughter of innocent people in Gaza”.
In the fifth day since Israel broke the two-month-old ceasefire and refused to begin negotiations on phase two of the truce — which was supposed to lead to a complete withdrawal of Israeli troops from the besieged enclave and an exchange of hostages — health officials reported that the death toll had risen above 630, mostly children and women.
Five children were killed in a major overnight air attack on Gaza City and at least eight members of the family remained trapped under the rubble as Israeli attacks continued in the holy fasting month of Ramadan.
Confirmed casualty figures in Gaza since October 7, 2023, now stand at 49,747 with 113,213 wounded, the Gaza Health Ministry said.
For more than two weeks, Israel has sealed off border crossings and barred food, water and electricity and today it blew up the Turkish-Palestinian Friendship Hospital, the only medical institution in Gaza able to provide cancer treatment.
“The research has said it from libraries, libraries and libraries. And what is it doing in Gaza?” said Swarbrick.
‘Ethnic cleansing . . . on livestream’
“It is ethnic cleansing. It is apartheid. It is genocide. And we have that delivered to us by livestream to each one of us every single day on our cellphones,” she said.
“That is crazy. It is crazy to wake up every single day to that.”
Swarbrick said Aotearoa New Zealand must act now to sanction Israel for its crimes — “just like we did with Russia for its illegal action in Ukraine.”
She said that with the Green Party, Te Pāti Māori and Labour’s committed support, they now needed just six of the 68 government MPs to “pass my Unlawful Occupation of Palestine Sanctions Bill into law”.
“There’s no more time for talk. If we stand for human rights and peace and justice, our Parliament must act,” she said.
“Action for Gaza Now” banner heads a march protesting against Israel’s resumed attacks on the besieged Strip in Auckland today. Image: APR
In September, Aotearoa had joined 123 UN member states to support a resolution calling for sanctions against those responsible for Israel’s “unlawful presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including in relation to settler violence”.
“Our government has since done nothing to fulfil that commitment. Our Unlawful Occupation of Palestine Sanctions Bill starts that very basic process.
“No party leader or whip can stop a Member of Parliament exercising their democratic right to vote how they know they need to on this Bill,” she said to resounding cheers.
‘No hiding behind party lines’
“There is no more hiding behind party lines. All 123 Members of Parliament are each individually, personally responsible.”
Several Palestinian women spoke of the terror with the new wave of Israeli bombings and of their families’ personal connections with the suffering in Gaza, saying it was vitally important to “hear our stories”. Some spoke of the New Zealand government’s “cowardice” for not speaking out in opposition like many other countries.
About 1000 people took part in the protest in a part of Britomart’s Te Komititanga Square in a section now popularly known as “Palestine Corner”.
Amid a sea of banners and Palestinian flags there were placards declaring “Stop the genocide”, “Jews for tangata whenua from Aotearoa to Palestine”, “Hands off West Bank End the occupation” , “The people united will never be defeated”, “Decolonise your mind, stand with Palestine,” “Genocide — made in USA”, and “Toitū Te Tiriti Free Palestine”.
“Genocide – Made in USA” poster at today’s Palestinian solidarity rally. Image: APR
The ceasefire-breaking Israeli attacks on Gaza have shocked the world and led to three UN General Assembly debates this week on the Middle East.
France, Germany and Britain are among the latest countries to condemn Israel for breaching the ceasefire — describing it as a “dramatic step backwards”, and France has told the UN that it is opposed to any form of annexation by Israel of any Palestinian territory.
Meanwhile, Sultan Barakat, a professor at Hamad Bin Khalifa University in Qatar, told Al Jazeera in an interview that the more atrocities Israel committed in Gaza, the more young Palestinian men and women would join Hamas.
“So it’s not going to disappear any time soon,” he said.
With Israel killing more than 630 people in five days and cutting off all aid to the Strip for weeks, there was no trust on the part of Hamas to restart the ceasefire, Professor Barakat said.
“Jews for tangata whenua from Aotearoa to Palestine” . . . a decolonisation placard at today’s Palestine solidarity rally in Auckland. Image: APR
This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.
Israel’s most revered jurist, former Supreme Court president Aharon Barak, says that he fears the Netanyahu government’s latest actions, including moves to fire the Shin Bet secret service chief and attorney-general, are steering the country toward civil war.
Speaking to the Ynet news site shortly before Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu convened the cabinet that voted unanimously to fire Bar, Barak said that “the main problem in Israeli society is . . . the severe rift between Israelis”.
“This rift is getting worse and in the end, I fear, it will be like a train that goes off the tracks and plunges into a chasm, causing a civil war,” he said.
In another interview, with Channel 12, when asked why he thought Israel was close to civil conflict, Barak said it was “because the rift in the people is immense, and no effort is being made to heal it.
“Everyone is trying to make it worse.
“Today there are demonstrations, then a car drives through them and runs over someone,” he said, referring to an incident at an anti-Netanyahu protest in Jerusalem on Wednesday when a driver rammed into a protester, injuring him.
“But tomorrow there will be shootings, and the day after that there will be bloodshed,” Barak continued.
Overturned sacking
Barak also told Channel 12 he would have overturned a government decision to fire Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar if he were serving on the bench today.
The former chief justice explained he believed the ousting of Bar from the role in the middle of his term was illegitimate because the position of Shin Bet chief was not a “role of confidence” with the political echelon.
Instead, the person in the job was meant to carry out the role as it was explicitly written in legislation.
“There is authority to dismiss, but no grounds for dismissal,” he elaborated, saying he would also strike down the firing of Attorney-General Gali Baharav-Miara, another top official whom the government is seeking to oust.
When asked about the prime minister’s tweet on Wednesday night alleging the existence of a “leftist deep state” in Israel that was working to thwart Netanyahu’s government, Barak replied: “I don’t know what a deep state is.”
“We’re not the United States, we don’t have a deep state here. We have loyal public servants here, and they do things according to the law,” he added.
Barak also appealed directly to Netanyahu, urging him to halt the process of firing Bar and Baharav-Miara, and other policies the former justice considers destructive, and said he thinks Netanyahu should be offered and should take a plea deal in his criminal trial.
‘Israel feels like it is on the brink of civil war.’ Video: France 24
‘Right for his legacy’
“I think that it is right for Netanyahu. It is right for his legacy. And it is right for the State of Israel. And I think it is possible,” he said.
“Otherwise, the trial will continue. The rift between [those] for Bibi and against Bibi will continue,” he added, using Netanyahu’s nickname.
Asked by the interviewer what he would say to Netanyahu if he could talk to him, Barak answered: “This is your policy, I am completely against it. I ask you, don’t implement it beyond what you have done today. Stop. Stop.”
“Don’t take the rift beyond where it already is,” he concluded.
Responding to Barak, Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar issued a terse statement on X, simply posting: “There will be no civil war.”
Education Minister Yoav Kisch, a member of Netanyahu’s Likud party, said in a post on X that Barak was “threatening a civil war” with his warning, and promised that “these threats will not deter” the government from implementing its policies.
MK Almog Cohen of the far-right Otzma Yehudit party said that Barak is “a reckless and irresponsible man,” who was “sent to issue a Sicilian mafia-style threat of blood in the streets and civil war.”
Retired Israeli Supreme Court president Aharon Barak . . . “We’re not the United States, we don’t have a deep state here.” Image: ICJ
Well-respected internationally
Barak served as a Supreme Court justice from 1978 to 1995. He was then elected as the court’s president. He retired from the bench in 2006.
Despite Barak being a vocal critic of Netanyahu and his policies, the premier chose him to represent Israel as an ad-hoc judge at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) for the genocide case that was brought against Israel by South Africa amid the war in Gaza.
Barak removed himself from the court last June for personal reasons.
Barak, a Holocaust survivor, is well-respected internationally and is seen as Israel’s preeminent jurist.
Within Israel, he long has been seen by Netanyahu and other right-wing leaders as a leftist “activist,” who is to blame for many of the issues with Israel’s judicial system that the government’s controversial judicial overhaul plans aim to rectify.
TAIPEI, Taiwan – Taiwan’s annual military exercises have set 2027 as the potential year of a Chinese invasion – the first time it has specified a particular date for the imagined offensive – as the island’s leader promised to increase its defense spending amid U.S. pressure.
Taiwan holds the Han Kuang Exercise annually to test its military readiness against potential Chinese invasion. The exercise, planned for July 9-18, will involve joint operations among the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marine Corps, featuring live-fire drills, amphibious landings, and simulated missile strikes.
In this year’s drills, the island plans to focus on simulating the defense of the island with scenarios based on a potential offensive in 2027, according to Taiwan’s defense ministry.
“The Han Kuang exercise has always been designed to simulate scenarios that could occur within the next one to two years,” the island’s defense minister Wellington Koo said in a press conference on Wednesday.
“With the acquisition of new weapon systems, our training must continuously undergo validation to ensure combat effectiveness,” Koo said.
China considers Taiwan a breakaway province and has ramped up military pressure through drills and incursions. Taiwan, however, sees itself as a sovereign state and continues to bolster its defenses.
Taiwan’s announcement came after U.S. Strategic Command Commander Anthony J. Cotton warned at a defense conference on Tuesday that as China accelerates its military expansion, the Chinese People’s Liberation Army, or PLA, could “seize Taiwan by 2027.”
In February, Taiwan’s defense ministry proposed to double the duration of the drillS to 10 from five days, while deploying more reserve brigades as part of the efforts to scale up its defensive strength.
Defense budget increase
Separately, Taiwan’s President Lai Ching-te announced on Thursday that the island would increase its defense budget to more than 3% of gross domestic product, or GDP.
Its current defense budget is approximately 2.4%.
In a speech to the American Chamber of Commerce on Thursday, Lai emphasized his administration’s commitment to ensuring the defense budget surpasses 3% of GDP while “continuing national defense reforms.”
Lai’s remarks were the most recent attempt to reassure both U.S. and domestic critics who argue that Taiwan is not investing enough in its own defense.
U.S. President Donald Trump has called on Taiwan to raise defense spending to as much as 10% of GDP – significantly higher than what the U.S. or its key allies allocate – in an effort to deter China.
Since Lai took office in May 2024, China has intensified pressure on Taiwan through heightened military activity, including large-scale joint air and sea exercises and frequent deployments of warplanes and naval vessels near the island.
It has also introduced new military equipment, such as landing barges designed for amphibious operations, and increased cyber and influence operations to sway public opinion in Taiwan.
Beijing announced in early March that it was increasing its 2025 defense budget by 7.2% to US$246 billion, marking the fourth consecutive year of more than 7% growth in defense spending.
“Taiwan plans to advance our cooperation with the U.S. and other democracies in upholding regional stability and prosperity,” Lai said.
Edited by Taejun Kang and Stephen Wright.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by Alan Lu for RFA.
A joint operation between the Fiji Police Force, Republic of Fiji Military Force (RFMF), Territorial Force Brigade, Fiji Navy and National Fire Authority was staged this week to “modernise” responses to emergencies.
Called “Exercise Genesis”, the joint operation is believed to be the first of its kind in Fiji to “test combat readiness” and preparedness for facing civil unrest, counterinsurgency and humanitarian assistance scenarios.
It took place over three days and was modelled on challenges faced by a “fictitious island grappling with rising unemployment, poverty and crime”.
The exercise was described as based on three models, operated on successive days.
The block 1 scenario tackled internal security, addressing civil unrest, law enforcement challenges and crowd control operations.
Block 2 involved humanitarian assistance and disaster relief, and coordinating emergency response efforts with government agencies.
Block 3 on the last day dealt with a “mid-level counterinsurgency”, engaging in stabilising the crisis, and “neutralising” a threat.
Flash flood scenario
On the second day, a “composite” company with the assistance of the Fiji Navy successfully evacuated victims from a scenario-based flash flood at Doroko village (Waila) to Nausori Town.
“The flood victims were given first aid at the village before being evacuated to an evacuation centre in Syria Park,” said the Territorial Brigade’s Facebook page.
“The flood victims were further examined by the medical team at Syria Park.”
Fiji police confront protesters during the Operation Genesis exercise in Fiji this week. Image: RFMF screenshot APR
On the final day, Thursday, Exercise Genesis culminated in a pre-dawn attack by the troops on a “rebel hideout”.
According to the Facebook page, the “hideout” had been discovered following the deployment of a joint tracker team and the K9 unit from the Fiji Corrections Service.
“Through rigorous training and realistic scenarios, the [RFMF Territorial Brigade] continues to refine its combat proficiency, adaptability, and mission effectiveness,” said a brigade statement.
Mock protesters in the Operation Genesis security services exercise in Fiji this week. Image: RFMF screenshot APR
It said that the exercise was “ensuring that [the brigade] remains a versatile and responsive force, capable of safeguarding national security and contributing to regional stability.”
However, a critic said: “Anyone who is serious about reducing crime would offer a real alternative to austerity, poverty and alienation. Invest in young people and communities.”
Earthwise presenters Lois and Martin Griffiths of Plains FM96.9 radio talk to Dr David Robie, editor of Asia Pacific Report, about heightened global fears of nuclear war as tensions have mounted since US President Donald Trump has returned to power.
Dr Robie reminds us that New Zealanders once actively opposed nuclear testing in the Pacific.
That spirit, that active opposition to nuclear testing, and to nuclear war must be revived.
This is very timely as the Rainbow Warrior 3 is currently visiting the Marshall Islands this month to mark 40 years since the original RW took part in the relocation of Rongelap Islanders who suffered from US nuclear tests in the 1950s.
After that humanitarian mission, the Rainbow Warrior was subsequently bombed by French secret agents in Auckland Harbour on 10 July 1985 shortly before it was due to sail to Moruroa Atoll to protest against nuclear testing.
Lois opens up by saying: “I fear that we live in disturbing times. I fear the possibility of nuclear war, I always have.
“I remember the Cuban missiles crisis, a scary time. I remember campaigns for nuclear disarmament. Hopes that the United Nations could lead to a world of peace and justice.
“Yet today one hears from our media, for world leaders . . . ‘No, no no. There will always be tyrants who want to destroy us and our democratic allies . . . more and bigger, deadlier weapons are needed to protect us . . .”
Listen to the programme . . .
Nuclear free Pacific . . . back to the future. Video/audio: Plains FM96.9
Interviewee: Dr David Robie, deputy chair of the Asia Pacific Media Network (APMN) and a semiretired professor of Pacific journalism. He founded the Pacific Media Centre.
Interviewers: Lois and Martin Griffiths, Earthwise programme
The Israeli government vows to continue escalating these military attacks, claiming it is in response to Hamas’ refusal to extend the ceasefire, which has been in place since January 19.
But is this the real reason for pre-dawn attack? Or is there a much more cynical explanation — one tied to the political fate of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu?
This week, New Zealand journalist Mohamed Hassan, host of the Middle East Eye’s weekly Big Picture podcast, speaks to Daniel Levy, the president of the US/Middle East Project and a former Israeli peace negotiator.
Ceasefire broken: Netanyahu is exposed. Video: Middle East Eye
“It seems our foreign policy is up for grabs at the moment,” he said, citing Prime Minister Christopher Luxon’s seeming endorsement of India’s bid to join the Nuclear Suppliers Group despite New Zealand’s previous long-standing objection.
“I think these are bad moves for New Zealand. We should continue to be independent and principled in our foreign policy.”
It included a reference to India’s hopes of joining the Nuclear Suppliers Group.
NZ Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Indian PM Narendra Modi at the Sikh temple Gurdwara Rakab Ganj Sahib . . . “both acknowledged the value of India joining the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG).” Image: RNZ
“Both leaders acknowledged the importance of upholding the global nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation regime and acknowledged the value of India joining the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) in context of predictability for India’s clean energy goals and its non-proliferation credentials,” the statement said, as reported by StratNews Global.
The NSG was set up in 1974 as the US response to India’s “peaceful nuclear test” that year. Comprising 48 countries, the aim was to ensure that nuclear trade for peaceful purposes does not contribute to the proliferation of atomic weapons, the report said.
India is not a signatory of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty which is one of the pre-requisites of joining the NSG.
NZ objected to India
In the past New Zealand has objected to India joining the NSG because of concern access to those nuclear materials could be used for nuclear weapons.
“So it’s a principled stance New Zealand has taken. Christopher Luxon signed that away yesterday,” Hipkins said.
“He basically signed a memo that basically said that we supported India joining the Nuclear Suppliers Group despite the fact that India has consistently refused to sign the Non-Proliferation Treaty.”
It was “a reversal” of previous policy, Hipkins said, and undermined New Zealand’s nuclear-free stance.
But a spokesperson for Foreign Minister Winston Peters denied there had been a change.
“New Zealand’s position on the Nuclear Suppliers Group has not changed, contrary to what Mr Hipkins claims. The joint statements released by the New Zealand and Indian Prime Ministers in 2016 and 2025 make that abundantly clear,” he said.
“If Mr Hipkins or his predecessor Jacinda Ardern had travelled to India during their six years as Prime Minister, the Labour Party might understand this issue and the New Zealand-India relationship a bit better.”
Opposed to ‘selling out’
Peters was also Foreign Minister during the first three years of the Ardern government.
On a possible free trade deal with India, Hipkins said he did not want to see it achieved at the expense of “selling out large parts of New Zealand’s economy and potentially New Zealand’s principled foreign policy stance” which would not be good for this country.
“The endorsement of India joining the Nuclear Suppliers Group is a real departure.”
Comment has been requested from the Prime Minister’s office.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
Israel says President Donald Trump green lit a scorched-earth bombing of Gaza that wiped out entire families and killed dozens of infants and other children.
The US-backed Israeli government resumed its intense genocidal attacks on Gaza early yesterday morning, unleashing a massive wave of indiscriminate military strikes across the Strip and killing more than 410 people, including scores of children and women, according to local health officials.
The massacre resulted in one of the largest single-day death tolls of the past 17 months, and also killed several members of Gaza’s government and a member of Hamas’s political bureau.
The Trump administration said it was briefed ahead of the strikes, which began at approximately 2 am local time, and that the US fully supported Israel’s attacks.
“The sky was filled with drones, quadcopters, helicopters, F-16 and F-35 warplanes. The firing from the tanks and vehicles didn’t stop,” said Abubaker Abed, a contributing journalist for Drop Site News who reports from Deir al-Balah, Gaza.
“I didn’t sleep last night. I had a pang in my heart that something awful would happen. At 2 am, I tried to close my eyes. Once it happened, four explosions shook my home. The sky turned red and became heavily shrouded with plumes of smoke.”
Abubaker said Israel’s attacks began with four strikes in Deir al-Balah.
“Mothers’ wails and children’s screams echoed painfully in my ears. They struck a house near us. I didn’t know who to call. I couldn’t feel my knees. I was shivering with fear, and my family were harshly awakened,” he said.
‘My mother couldn’t breathe’
“My mother couldn’t take a breath. My father searched around for me. We gathered in the middle of our home, knowing our end may be near. That’s the same feeling we have had for the 16 months of intense bombings and attacks.
“The nightmare has chased us again.”
The Israeli attacks pummeled cities across Gaza — from Rafah and Khan Younis in the south to Deir al-Balah in the center, and Gaza City in the north, where Israel carried out some of the heaviest bombing in areas already reduced to an apocalyptic landscape.
Since the “ceasefire” took effect in January, more than half a million Palestinians returned to the north and many of them have been living in makeshift shelters or on the rubble of their former homes.
Hospitals that already suffer from catastrophic damage from 16 months of relentless Israeli attacks and a dire lack of medical supplies struggled to handle the influx of wounded people, and local authorities issued an emergency call for blood donations.
Late Tuesday morning, Dr Abdul-Qader Weshah, a senior emergency doctor at Al-Awda Hospital in Al-Nuseirat camp in central Gaza, described the situation.
“We’ve just received another influx of injuries following a nearby strike. We’ve dealt with them. We are just preparing ourselves for more casualties as more bombings are expected to happen,” he told Drop Site News.
‘Horrified . . . awoke to screams’
“Since the morning, we were horrified and awoke to the screams and pain of people. We’ve been treating many people, children and women in particular.”
Weshah said they have had to transfer some of the wounded to other hospitals because of a lack of medical supplies.
“We don’t have the means. Gaza’s hospitals are devoid of everything. Here at the hospital, we lack everything, including basic necessities like disinfectants and gauze. We don’t have enough beds for the casualties.
We don’t have the capacity to treat the wounded. X-ray devices, magnetic resonance imaging, and simple things like stitches are not available. The hospital is in an unprecedented state of chaos.
“The number of medical crews is not enough. Overwhelmed with injuries, we’re horrified and we don’t know why we are speaking to the world.
“We’re working with less than the bare minimum in our hands. We need doctors, devices and supplies, and circumstances to do our job.”
Al-Shifa hospital director Muhammad Abu Salmiya told Al Jazeera Arabic: “Every minute, a wounded person dies due to a lack of resources.”
The Indonesia Hospital morgue in Beit Lahia, Gaza on March 18, 2025. Image: Abdalhkem Abu Riash/Anadolu
Rising death toll
Dr Zaher Al-Wahidi, the Director of the Information Unit at the Ministry of Health in Gaza, told Drop Site Tuesday afternoon that 174 children and 89 women were killed in the Israeli attacks. [Editors: Latest figures are 404 killed, including many children, and the toll is expected to rise as many are still buried beneath rubble.]
Local health officials and witnesses said that the death toll was expected to rise dramatically because dozens of people are believed to be buried under the rubble of the structures where they were sleeping when the bombing began.
“We can hear the voices of the victims under the rubble, but we can’t save them,” said a medical official at Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City.
Video posted on social media by Palestinians inside Gaza portrayed unspeakable scenes of the lifeless bodies of infants and small children killed in the bombings.
Zinh Dahdooh, a dental student from Gaza City, posted an audio recording she said was of her neighbours screaming as their shelter was bombed, trapping them in the destruction.
“Tonight, they bombed our neighbors,” she wrote on the social media site X. “They kept screaming until they died, and no ambulance came for them. How long are we supposed to live in this fear? How long!”
According to local health officials, many strikes hit buildings or homes housing multiple generations of families.
‘Wiped out six families’
“Israel in its strikes has wiped out at least six families. One in my hometown. The others are from Khan Younis, Rafah, and Gaza City. Some families have lost five or 10 members. Others have lost around 20,” Abubaker reported.
“We talk about families killed from the children to the old. The Gharghoon family was bombed today in Rafah. The strikes have killed the father and his two daughters. Their mom and grandparents along with their uncles and aunts were also murdered, erasing the entire family from the civil registry.
“We are talking about the erasure of entire families. Among Israel’s attacks in Deir al-Balah, Israel bombed the homes of the Mesmeh, Daher, and Sloot families.
“More than 10 people, including seven women, from the Sloot family were killed, wiping them out entirely. The same has happened to the Abu-Teer, Barhoom, and other families.
“This is extermination by design. This is genocide.”
On Tuesday, Palestinian Islamic Jihad confirmed that “Abu Hamza,” the spokesman of its military wing, Al Quds Brigades, had been killed along with his wife and other family members.
A hellish scene Israeli officials said they had been given a “green light” by President Donald Trump to resume heavy bombing of Gaza because of Hamas’s refusal to obey Trump’s directive to release all Israeli captives immediately.
“All those who seek to terrorise not just Israel but also the United States of America, will see a price to pay,” White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said on Fox News.
“All hell will break loose.”
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu released a statement asserting that “Israel will, from now on, act against Hamas with increasing military strength”.
Israeli media reported that the decision to resume heavy strikes against Gaza was made a week ago and was not in response to any imminent threat posed by Hamas.
Israel, which has repeatedly violated the ceasefire that went into effect January 19, has sought to create new terms in a transparent effort to justify blowing up the deal entirely.
“This is unconscionable,” said Muhannad Hadi, the UN Humanitarian Coordinator for the Occupied Palestinian Territories.
“A cease-fire must be reinstated immediately. People in Gaza have endured unimaginable suffering.”
Compounding the crisis in Gaza’s hospitals, Israel recently began blocking the entry of international medical workers to the Strip at unprecedented rates as part of a sweeping new policy that severely limits the number of aid organisations Israel will permit to operate in Gaza.
Plumes of smoke from central Gaza just as Israel began its heavy bombing on Monday night. Image: Abubaker Abed/Drop Site News
Editor’s note: Due to the ongoing Israeli attacks, Abubaker Abed relayed his reporting and eyewitness account to Jeremy Scahill by phone and text messages. This article is republished from Drop Site News under Creative Commons.
A West Papuan liberation advocacy group has condemned the arrest of 12 activists by Indonesian police and demanded their immediate release.
The West Papuan activists from the West Papua People’s Liberation Movement (GR-PWP) were arrested for handing out pamphlets supporting the new “Boycott Indonesia” campaign.
The GR-PWP activists were arrested in Sentani and taken to Jayapura police station yesterday.
In a statement by the United Liberation Movement for West Papua (ULMWP), interim president Benny Wenda, said the activists were still “in the custody of the brutal Indonesian police”.
The arrested activists were named as:
Ones M. Kobak, GR-PWP leader, Sentani District
Elinatan Basini, deputy secretary, GR-PWP Central
Dasalves Suhun, GR-PWP member
Matikel Mirin, GR-PWP member
Apikus Lepitalen, GR-PWP member
Mane Kogoya, GR-PWP member
Obet Dogopia, GR-PWP member
Eloy Weya, GR-PWP member
Herry Mimin, GR-PWP member
Sem. R Kulka, GR-PWP member
Maikel Tabo, GR-PWP member
Koti Moses Uropmabin, GR-PWP member
“I demand that the Head of Police release the Sentani 12 from custody immediately,” Wenda said.
“This was an entirely peaceful action mobilising support for a peaceful campaign.
“The boycott campaign has won support from more than 90 tribes, political organisations, religious and customary groups — people from every part of West Papua are demanding a boycott of products complicit in the genocidal Indonesian occupation.”
Wenda said the arrest demonstrated the importance of the Boycott for West Papua campaign.
We express deep concern over the recent arrests of individuals in Sentani, West Papua for
distributing pamphlets advocating a boycott of Indonesian products from West Papua and
raising awareness of ongoing political issues in the region. The detention of these individuals
likely… pic.twitter.com/4e4hJ7FxUJ
A national Palestinian advocacy group has called on the Aotearoa New Zealand government to immediately condemn Israel for its resumption today of “genocidal attacks” on the almost 2 million Palestinians trapped in the besieged Gaza enclave.
Media reports said that more than 350 people had been killed — many of them children — in a wave of predawn attacks by Israel to break the fragile ceasefire that had been holding since mid-January.
The renewed war on Gaza comes amid a worsening humanitarian crisis that has persisted for 16 days since March 1.
This followed Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu’s decision to block the entry of all aid and goods, cut water and electricity, and shut down the Strip’s border crossings at the end of the first phase of the ceasefire agreement.
“Immediate condemnation of Israel’s resumption of attacks on Gaza must come from the New Zealand government”, said co-national chair John Minto of the Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa (PSNA) in a statement.
“Israel has breached the January ceasefire agreement multiple times and is today relaunching its genocidal attacks against the Palestinian people of Gaza.”
Israeli violations
He said that in the last few weeks Israel had:
refused to negotiate the second stage of the ceasefire agreement with Hamas which would see a permanent ceasefire and complete withdrawal of Israeli troops from Gaza;
Issued a complete ban on food, water, fuel and medical supplies entering Gaza — “a war crime of epic proportions”; and
Cut off the electricity supply desperately needed to, for example, operate desalination plants for water supplies.
“The government is out of touch with New Zealanders but in touch with US/Israel.
“Foreign Minister Winston Peters seems to be explaining his silence as ‘keeping his nerve’.
Minto said that for the past 17 months, minister Peters had condemned every act of Palestinian resistance against 77 years of brutal colonisation and apartheid policies.
“But he has refused to condemn any of the countless war crimes committed by Israel during this time — including the deliberate use of starvation as a weapon of war.
“Speaking out to condemn Israel now is our opportunity to force it to reconsider and begin negotiations on stage two of the ceasefire agreement Israel is trying to walk away from.
“Palestinians and New Zealanders deserve no less.”
A Netanyahu “Wanted” sign at last Saturday’s pro-Palestinian rally in “Palestinian Corner”, Auckland . . . in reference to the International Criminal Court arrest warrants issued last November against the Israeli Prime Minister and former defence minister Yoav Gallant. Image: APR
‘Devastating sounds’
Al Jazeera reporter Maram Humaid said from Gaza: “We woke up to the devastating sounds of multiple explosions as a series of air attacks targeted various areas across the Gaza Strip, from north to south, including Jabalia, Gaza City, Nuseirat, Deir el-Balah and Khan Younis.”
“The strikes hit homes, residential buildings, schools sheltering displaced people and tents, resulting in a significant number of casualties, including women and children, especially since the attacks occurred during sleeping hours.
The Palestinian Ministry of Health in Gaza said at least 232 people had been killed in today’s Israeli raids.
The Palestinian resistance group Hamas called on people of Arab and Islamic nations — and the “free people of the world” — to take to the streets in protest over the devastating attack.
Hamas urged people across the world to “raise their voice in rejection of the resumption of the Zionist war of extermination against our people in the Gaza Strip”.
New Zealand’s National-led coalition government’s policy on Gaza seems caught between a desire for a two-state diplomatic solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and closer alignment with the US, which supports a Netanyahu government strongly opposed to a Palestinian state
In the last 17 months, Gaza has been the scene of what Thomas Merton once called the unspeakable — human wrongdoing on a scale and a depth that seems to go beyond the capacity of words to adequately describe.
The latest Gaza conflict began with a horrific Hamas terrorist attack on Israel on 7 October 2023 that prompted a relentless Israel ground and air offensive in Gaza with full financial, logistical and diplomatic backing from the Biden administration.
During this period, around 50,000 people – 48,903 Palestinians and 1706 Israelis – have been reported killed in the Gaza conflict, according to the official figures of the Gaza Health Ministry, as well as 166 journalists and media workers, 120 academics,and more than 224 humanitarian aid workers.
Moreover, a fragile ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, signed in mid-January, seems to be hanging by a thread.
Israel has resumed its blockade of humanitarian aid to Gaza and cut off electricity after Hamas rejected an Israeli proposal to extend phase 1 of the ceasefire deal (to release more Israeli hostages) without any commitment to implement phase 2 (that envisaged ending the conflict in Gaza and Israel withdrawing its troops from the territory).
Hamas insists on negotiating phase 2 as signed by both parties in the January ceasefire agreement
Over the weekend, Israel reportedly launched air-strikes in Gaza and the Trump administration unleashed a wave of attacks on Houthi rebel positions in Yemen after the Houthis warned Israel not to restart the war in Gaza.
New Zealand and the Gaza conflict Although distant in geographic terms, the Gaza crisis represents a major moral and legal challenge to New Zealand’s self-image and its worldview based on the strengthening of an international rules-based order.
New Zealand’s founding document, the 1840 Treaty of Waitangi, emphasised partnership and cooperation between indigenous Māori and European settlers in nation-building.
While the aspirations of the Treaty have yet to be fully realised, the credibility of its vision of reconciliation at home depends on New Zealand’s willingness to uphold respect for human rights and the rule of law in the international arena, particularly in states like Israel where tensions persist between the settler population and Palestinians in occupied territories like the West Bank.
New Zealand’s declaratory stance towards Gaza
In 2023 and 2024, New Zealand consistently backed calls in the UN General Assembly for humanitarian truces or ceasefires in Gaza. It also joined Australia and Canada in February and July last year to demand an end to hostilities.
The New Zealand Foreign Minister, Winston Peters, told the General Assembly in April 2024 that the Security Council had failed in its responsibility “to maintain international peace and security”.
He was right. The Biden administration used its UN Security Council veto four times to perpetuate this brutal onslaught in Gaza for nearly 15 months.
In addition, Peters has repeatedly said there can be no military resolution of a political problem in Gaza that can only be resolved through affirming the Palestinian right to self-determination within the framework of a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian dispute.
The limitations of New Zealand’s Gaza approach Despite considerable disagreement with Netanyahu’s policy of “mighty vengeance” in Gaza, the National-led coalition government had few qualms about sending a small Defence Force deployment to the Red Sea in January 2024 as part of a US-led coalition effort to counter Houthi rebel attacks on commercial shipping there.
While such attacks are clearly illegal, they are basically part of the fallout from a prolonged international failure to stop the US-enabled carnage in Gaza.
In particular, the NZDF’s Red Sea deployment did not sit comfortably with New Zealand’s acceptance in September 2024 of the ICJ’s ruling that Israel’s continued presence in the occupied Palestinian territory (East Jerusalem, the West Bank and Gaza) was “unlawful”.
At the same time, the National-led coalition government’s silence on US President Donald Trump’s controversial proposal to “own” Gaza, displace two million Palestinian residents and make the territory the “Riviera” of the Middle East was deafening.
Furthermore, while Wellington announced travel bans on violent Israeli settlers in the West Bank in February 2024, it has had little to say publicly about the Netanyahu government’s plans to annex the West Bank in 2025. Such a development would gravely undermine the two-state solution, violate international law, and further fuel regional tensions.
New Zealand’s low-key policy On balance, the National-led coalition government’s policy towards Gaza appears to be ambivalent and lacking moral and legal clarity in a context in which war crimes have been regularly committed since October 7.
Peters was absolutely correct to condemn the UNSC for failing to deliver the ceasefire that New Zealand and the overwhelming majority of states in the UN General Assembly had wanted from the first month of this crisis.
But the New Zealand government has had no words of criticism for the US, which used its power of veto in the UNSC for more than a year to thwart the prospect of a ceasefire and provided blanket support for an Israeli military campaign that killed huge numbers of Palestinian civilians in Gaza.
By cooperating with the Biden administration against Houthi rebels and adopting a quietly-quietly approach to Trump’s provocative comments on Gaza and his apparent willingness to do whatever it takes to help Israel “to get the job done’, New Zealand has revealed a selective approach to upholding international law and human rights in the desperate conditions facing Gaza
Professor Robert G. Patman is an Inaugural Sesquicentennial Distinguished Chair and his research interests concern international relations, global security, US foreign policy, great powers, and the Horn of Africa. This article was first published by The Spinoff and is republished here with the author’s permission.
This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.
Freedom of the press — a bedrock principle of American democracy — is under threat in the United States.
Here at Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism we are witnessing and experiencing an alarming chill. We write to affirm our commitment to supporting and exercising First Amendment rights for students, faculty, and staff on our campus — and, indeed, for all.
After Homeland Security seized and detained Mahmoud Khalil, a recent graduate of Columbia’s School of Public and International Affairs, without charging him with any crime, many of our international students have felt afraid to come to classes and to events on campus.
They are right to be worried. Some of our faculty members and students who have covered the protests over the Gaza war have been the object of smear campaigns and targeted on the same sites that were used to bring Khalil to the attention of Homeland Security.
President Trump has warned that the effort to deport Khalil is just the first of many.
These actions represent threats against political speech and the ability of the American press to do its essential job and are part of a larger design to silence voices that are out of favour with the current administration.
We have also seen reports that Immigration and Customs Enforcement is trying to deport the Palestinian poet and journalist Mosab Abu Toha, who has written extensively in the New Yorker about the condition of the residents of Gaza and warned of the mortal danger to Palestinian journalists.
There are 13 million legal foreign residents (green card holders) in the United States. If the administration can deport Khalil, it means those 13 million people must live in fear if they dare speak up or publish something that runs afoul of government views.
There are more than one million international students in the United States. They, too, may worry that they are no longer free to speak their mind. Punishing even one person for their speech is meant to intimidate others into self-censorship.
One does not have to agree with the political opinions of any particular individual to understand that these threats cut to the core of what it means to live in a pluralistic democracy. The use of deportation to suppress foreign critics runs parallel to an aggressive campaign to use libel laws in novel — even outlandish ways — to silence or intimidate the independent press.
The President has sued CBS for an interview with Kamala Harris which Trump found too favourable. He has sued the Pulitzer Prize committee for awarding prizes to stories critical of him.
He has even sued the Des Moines Register for publishing the results of a pre-election poll that showed Kamala Harris ahead at that point in the state.
Large corporations like Disney and Meta settled lawsuits most lawyers thought they could win because they did not want to risk the wrath of the Trump administration and jeopardize business they have with the federal government.
Amazon and Washington Post owner Jeff Bezos decided that the paper’s editorial pages would limit themselves to pieces celebrating “free markets and individual liberties.”
Meanwhile, the Trump administration insists on hand-picking the journalists who will be permitted to cover the White House and Pentagon, and it has banned the Associated Press from press briefings because the AP is following its own style book and refusing to refer to the Gulf of Mexico as the Gulf of America.
The Columbia Journalism School stands in defence of First Amendment principles of free speech and free press across the political spectrum. The actions we’ve outlined above jeopardise these principles and therefore the viability of our democracy. All who believe in these freedoms should steadfastly oppose the intimidation, harassment, and detention of individuals on the basis of their speech or their journalism.
Australia is caught in a jam, between an assertive American ally and a bold Chinese trading partner. America is accelerating its pivot to the Indo-Pacific, building up its fighting forces and expanding its military bases.
As Australia tries to navigate a pathway between America’s and Australia’s national interests, sometimes Australia’s national interest seems to submerge out of view.
Admiral David Johnston, the Chief of the Australia’s Defence Force, is steering this ship as China flexes its muscle sending a small warship flotilla south to circumnavigate the continent.
He has admitted that the first the Defence Force heard of a live-fire exercise by the three Chinese Navy ships sailing in the South Pacific east of Australia on February 21, was a phone call from the civilian Airservices Australia.
“The absence of any advance notice to Australian authorities was a concern, notably, that the limited notice provided by the PLA could have unnecessarily increased the risk to aircraft and vessels in the area,” Johnston told Senate Estimates .
Johnston was pressed to clarify how Defence first came to know of the live-fire drill: “Is it the case that Defence was only notified, via Virgin and Airservices Australia, 28 minutes [sic] after the firing window commenced?”
To this, Admiral Johnston replied: “Yes.”
If it happened as stated by the Admiral — that a live-fire exercise by the Chinese ships was undertaken and a warning notice was transmitted from the Chinese ships, all without being detected by Australian defence and surveillance assets — this is a defence failure of considerable significance.
Sources with knowledge of Defence spoken to by Declassified Australia say that this is either a failure of surveillance, or a failure of communication, or even more far-reaching, a failure of US alliance cooperation.
And from the very start the official facts became slippery.
Our latest investigation –
AUSTRALIA’S DEFENCE: NAVIGATING US-CHINA TENSIONS
We investigate a significant intelligence failure to detect live-firing by Chinese warships near Australia, has exposed Defence weaknesses, and the fact that when it counts, we are all alone.
— Declassified Australia (@DeclassifiedAus) March 7, 2025
What did they know and when did they know it The first information passed on to Defence by Airservices Australia came from the pilot of a Virgin passenger jet passing overhead the flotilla in the Tasman Sea that had picked up the Chinese Navy VHF radio notification of an impending live-fire exercise.
The radio transmission had advised the window for the live-fire drill commenced at 9.30am and would conclude at 3pm.
We know this from testimony given to Senate Estimates by the head of Airservices Australia. He said Airservices was notified at 9.58am by an aviation control tower informed by the Virgin pilot. Two minutes later Airservices issued a “hazard alert” to commercial airlines in the area.
The Headquarters of the Defence Force’s Joint Operations Command (HJOC), at Bungendore 30km east of Canberra, was then notified about the drill by Airservices at 10.08am, 38 minutes after the drill window had commenced.
When questioned a few days later, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese appeared to try to cover for Defence’s apparent failure to detect the live-fire drill or the advisory transmission.
“At around the same time, there were two areas of notification. One was from the New Zealand vessels that were tailing . .. the [Chinese] vessels in the area by both sea and air,” Albanese stated. “So that occurred and at the same time through the channels that occur when something like this is occurring, Airservices got notified as well.”
But the New Zealand Defence Force had not notified Defence “at the same time”. In fact it was not until 11.01am that an alert was received by Defence from the New Zealand Defence Force — 53 minutes after Defence HQ was told by Airservices and an hour and a half after the drill window had begun.
The Chinese Navy’s stealth guided missile destroyer Zunyi, sailing south in the Coral Sea on February 15, 2025, in a photograph taken from a RAAF P-8A Poseidon surveillance plane. Image: Royal Australian Air Force/Declassified Australia
Defence Minister Richard Marles later in a round-about way admitted on ABC Radio that it wasn’t the New Zealanders who informed Australia first: “Well, to be clear, we weren’t notified by China. I mean, we became aware of this during the course of the day.
“What China did was put out a notification that it was intending to engage in live firing. By that I mean a broadcast that was picked up by airlines or literally planes that were commercial planes that were flying across the Tasman.”
Later the Chinese Ambassador to Australia, Xiao Qian, told ABC that two live-fire training drills were carried out at sea on February 21 and 22, in accordance with international law and “after repeatedly issuing safety notices in advance”.
Eyes and ears on ‘every move’ It was expected the Chinese-navy flotilla would end its three week voyage around Australia on March 7, after a circumnavigation of the continent. That is not before finally passing at some distance the newly acquired US-UK nuclear submarine base at HMAS Stirling near Perth and the powerful US communications and surveillance base at North West Cape.
Just as Australia spies on China to develop intelligence and targeting for a potential US war, China responds in kind, collecting data on US military and intelligence bases and facilities in Australia, as future targets should hostilities commence.
The presence of the Chinese Navy ships that headed into the northern and eastern seas around Australia attracted the attention of the Defence Department ever since they first set off south through the Mindoro Strait in the Philippines and through the Indonesian archipelago from the South China Sea on February 3.
“We are keeping a close watch on them and we will be making sure that we watch every move,” Marles stated in the week before the live-fire incident.
“Just as they have a right to be in international waters . . . we have a right to be prudent and to make sure that we are surveilling them, which is what we are doing.”
Around 3500 km to the north, a week into the Chinese ships’ voyage, a spy flight by an RAAF P-8A Poseidon surveillance plane on February 11, in a disputed area of the South China Sea south of China’s Hainan Island, was warned off by a Chinese J-16 fighter jet.
The Chinese Foreign Ministry responded to Australian protests claiming the Australian aircraft “deliberately intruded” into China’s claimed territorial airspace around the Paracel Islands without China’s permission, thereby “infringing on China’s sovereignty and endangering China’s national security”.
Australia criticised the Chinese manoeuvre, defending the Australian flight saying it was “exercising the right to freedom of navigation and overflight in international waters and airspace”.
Two days after the incident, the three Chinese ships on their way to Australian waters were taking different routes in beginning their own “right to freedom of navigation” in international waters off the Australian coast. The three ships formed up their mini flotilla in the Coral Sea as they turned south paralleling the Australian eastern coastline outside of territorial waters, and sometimes within Australia’s 200-nautical-mile (370 km) Exclusive Economic Zone.
“Defence always monitors foreign military activity in proximity to Australia. This includes the Peoples Liberation Army-Navy (PLA-N) Task Group.” Admiral Johnston told Senate Estimates.
“We have been monitoring the movement of the Task Group through its transit through Southeast Asia and we have observed the Task Group as it has come south through that region.”
The Task Group was made up of a modern stealth guided missile destroyer Zunyi, the frigate Hengyang, and the Weishanhu, a 20,500 tonne supply ship carrying fuel, fresh water, cargo and ammunition. The Hengyang moved eastwards through the Torres Strait, while the Zunyi and Weishanhu passed south near Bougainville and Solomon Islands, meeting in the Coral Sea.
This map indicates the routes taken by the three Chinese Navy ships on their “right to freedom of navigation” voyage in international waters circumnavigating Australia, with dates of way points indicated — from 3 February till 6 March 2025. Distances and locations are approximate. Image: Weibo/Declassified Australia
As the Chinese ships moved near northern Australia and through the Coral Sea heading further south, the Defence Department deployed Navy and Air Force assets to watch over the ships. These included various RAN warships including the frigate HMAS Arunta and a RAAF P-8A Poseidon intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance plane.
With unconfirmed reports a Chinese nuclear submarine may also be accompanying the surface ships, the monitoring may have also included one of the RAN’s Collins-class submarines, with their active range of sonar, radar and radio monitoring – however it is uncertain whether one was able to be made available from the fleet.
“From the point of time the first of the vessels entered into our more immediate region, we have been conducting active surveillance of their activities,” the Defence chief confirmed.
As the Chinese ships moved into the southern Tasman Sea, New Zealand navy ships joined in the monitoring alongside Australia’s Navy and Air Force.
The range of signals intelligence (SIGINT) that theoretically can be intercepted emanating from a naval ship at sea includes encrypted data and voice satellite communications, ship-to-ship communications, aerial drone data and communications, as well as data of radar, gunnery, and weapon launches.
There are a number of surveillance facilities in Australia that would have been able to be directed at the Chinese ships.
Australian Signals Directorate’s (ASD) Shoal Bay Receiving Station outside of Darwin, picks up transmissions and data emanating from radio signals and satellite communications from Australia’s near north region. ASD’s Cocos Islands receiving station in the mid-Indian ocean would have been available too.
The Jindalee Operational Radar Network (JORN) over-the-horizon radar network, spread across northern Australia, is an early warning system that monitors aircraft and ship movements across Australia’s north-western, northern, and north-eastern ocean areas — but its range off the eastern coast is not thought to presently reach further south than the sea off Mackay on the Queensland coast.
Of land-based surveillance facilities, it is the American Pine Gap base that is believed to have the best capability of intercepting the ship’s radio communications in the Tasman Sea.
Enter, Pine Gap and the Americans The US satellite surveillance base at Pine Gap in Central Australia is a US and Australian jointly-run satellite ground station. It is regarded as the most important such American satellite base outside of the USA.
The spy base – Joint Defence Facility Pine Gap (JDFPG) – showing the north-eastern corner of the huge base with some 18 of the base’s now 45 satellite dishes and covered radomes visible. Image: Felicity Ruby/Declassified Australia
The role of ASD in supporting the extensive US surveillance mission against China is increasingly valued by Australia’s large Five Eyes alliance partner.
A Top Secret ‘Information Paper’, titled “NSA Intelligence Relationship with Australia”, leaked from the National Security Agency (NSA) by Edward Snowden and published by ABC’s Background Briefing, spells out the “close collaboration” between the NSA and ASD, in particular on China:
“Increased emphasis on China will not only help ensure the security of Australia, but also synergize with the U.S. in its renewed emphasis on Asia and the Pacific . . . Australia’s overall intelligence effort on China, as a target, is already significant and will increase.”
The Pine Gap base, as further revealed in 2023 by Declassified Australia, is being used to collect signals intelligence and other data from the Israeli battlefield of Gaza, and also Ukraine and other global hotspots within view of the US spy satellites.
It’s recently had a significant expansion (reported by this author in The Saturday Paper) which has seen its total of satellite dishes and radomes rapidly increase in just a few years from 35 to 45 to accommodate new heightened-capability surveillance satellites.
Pine Gap base collects an enormous range and quantity of intelligence and data from thermal imaging satellites, photographic reconnaissance satellites, and signals intelligence (SIGINT) satellites, as expert researchers Des Ball, Bill Robinson and Richard Tanter of the Nautilus Institute have detailed.
These SIGINT satellites intercept electronic communications and signals from ground-based sources, such as radio communications, telemetry, radar signals, satellite communications, microwave emissions, mobile phone signals, and geolocation data.
Alliance priorities The US’s SIGINT satellites have a capability to detect and receive signals from VHF radio transmissions on or near the earth’s surface, but they need to be tasked to do so and appropriately targeted on the source of the transmission.
For the Pine Gap base to intercept VHF radio signals from the Chinese Navy ships, the base would have needed to specifically realign one of those SIGINT satellites to provide coverage of the VHF signals in the Tasman Sea at the time of the Chinese ships’ passage. It is not known publicly if they did this, but they certainly have that capability.
However, it is not only the VHF radio transmission that would have carried information about the live-firing exercise.
Pine Gap would be able to monitor a range of other SIGINT transmissions from the Chinese ships. Details of the planning and preparations for the live-firing exercise would almost certainly have been transmitted over data and voice satellite communications, ship-to-ship communications, and even in the data of radar and gunnery operations.
But it is here that there is another possibility for the failure.
The Pine Gap base was built and exists to serve the national interests of the United States. The tasking of the surveillance satellites in range of Pine Gap base is generally not set by Australia, but is directed by United States’ agencies, the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) together with the US Defense Department, the National Security Agency (NSA), and Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).
Australia has learnt over time that US priorities may not be the same as Australia’s.
Australian defence and intelligence services can request surveillance tasks to be added to the schedule, and would have been expected to have done so in order to target the southern leg of the Chinese Navy ships’ voyage, when the ships were out of the range of the JORN network.
The military demands for satellite time can be excessive in times of heightened global conflict, as is the case now.
Whether the Pine Gap base was devoting sufficient surveillance resources to monitoring the Chinese Navy ships, due to United States’ priorities in Europe, Russia, the Middle East, Africa, North Korea, and to our north in the South China Sea, is a relevant question.
It can only be answered now by a formal government inquiry into what went on — preferably held in public by a parliamentary committee or separately commissioned inquiry. The sovereign defence of Australia failed in this incident and lessons need to be learned.
Who knew and when did they know If the Pine Gap base had been monitoring the VHF radio band and heard the Chinese Navy live-fire alert, or had been monitoring other SIGINT transmissions to discover the live-fire drill, the normal procedure would be for the active surveillance team to inform a number of levels of senior officers, a former Defence official familiar with the process told Declassified Australia.
Inside an operations room at the Australian Signals Directorate (ASD) head office at the Defence complex at Russell Hill in Canberra. Image: ADF/Declassified Australia
Expected to be included in the information chain are the Australian Deputy-Chief of Facility at the US base, NSA liaison staff at the base, the Australian Signals Directorate head office at the Defence complex at Russell Hill in Canberra, the Defence Force’s Headquarters Joint Operations Command, in Bungendore, and the Chief of the Defence Force. From there the Defence Minister’s office would need to have been informed.
As has been reported in media interviews and in testimony to the Senate Estimates hearings, it has been stated that Defence was not informed of the Chinese ships’ live-firing alert until a full 38 minutes after the drill window had commenced.
The former Defence official told Declassified Australia it is vital the reason for the failure to detect the live-firing in a timely fashion is ascertained.
Either the Australian Defence Force and US Pine Gap base were not effectively actively monitoring the Chinese flotilla at this time — and the reasons for that need to be examined — or they were, but the information gathered was somewhere stalled and not passed on to correct channels.
If the evidence so far tendered by the Defence chief and the Minister is true, and it was not informed of the drill by any of its intelligence or surveillance assets before that phone call from Airservices Australia, the implications need to be seriously addressed.
A final word In just a couple of weeks the whole Defence environment for Australia has changed, for the worse.
The US military announces a drawdown in Europe and a new pivot to the Indo-Pacific. China shows Australia it can do tit-for-tat “navigational freedom” voyages close to the Australian coast. US intelligence support is withdrawn from Ukraine during the war. Australia discovers the AUKUS submarines’ arrival looks even more remote. The prime minister confuses the limited cover provided by the ANZUS treaty.
Meanwhile, the US militarisation of Australia’s north continues at pace. At the same time a senior Pentagon official pressures Australia to massively increase defence spending. And now, the country’s defence intelligence system has experienced an unexplained major failure.
Australia, it seems, is adrift in a sea of unpredictable global events and changing alliance priorities.
Peter Cronau is an award-winning, investigative journalist, writer, and film-maker. His documentary, The Base: Pine Gap’s Role in US Warfighting, was broadcast on Australian ABC Radio National and featured on ABC News. He produced and directed the documentary film Drawing the Line, revealing details of Australian spying in East Timor, on ABC TV’s premier investigative programme Four Corners. He won the Gold Walkley Award in 2007 for a report he produced on an outbreak of political violence in East Timor. This article was first published by Declassified Australia and is republished here with the author’s permission.
A former US diplomat, Nabeel Khoury, says President Donald Trump’s decision to launch attacks against the Houthis is misguided, and this will not subdue them.
“For our president who came in wanting to avoid war and wanting to be a man of peace, he’s going about it the wrong way,” he said.
“There are many paths that can be used before you resort to war.” Khoury told Al Jazeera.
The danger to shipping in the Red Sea was “a justifiable reason for concern”, Khoury told Al Jazeera in an interview, but added that it was a problem that could be resolved through diplomacy.
Ansar Allah (Houthi) media sources said that at least four areas had been razed by the US warplanes that targeted, in particular, a residential area north of the capital, Sanaa, killing 31 people.
The Houthis, who had been “bombed severely all over their territory” in the past, were not likely to be subdued through “a few weeks of bombing”, Khoury said.
“If you think that Hamas, living and fighting on a very small piece of land, totally surrounded by land, air and sea, and yet, 17 months of bombardment by the Israelis did not get rid of them.
‘More rugged space’
“The Houthis live in a much more rugged space, mountainous regions — it would be virtually impossible to eradicate them,” Khoury said.
“So there is no military logic to what’s happening, and there is no political logic either.”
Providing background, Patty Culhane reported from Washington that there were several factual errors in the justification President Trump had given for his order.
“It’s important to point out that the Houthi attacks have stopped since the ceasefire in Gaza [on January 19], although the Houthis were threatening to strike again,” she said.
“His other justification is saying that no US-flagged vessel has transited the Suez Canal, the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden safely in more than a year.
“And then he says another reason is because Houthis attacked a US military warship.
“That happened when Trump was not president.”
Down to 10,000 ships
She said the White House was now putting out more of a communique, “saying that before the attacks, there were 25,000 ships that transited the Red Sea annually. Now it’s down to 10,000 so, obviously, sort of shooting down the president’s concept that nobody is actually transiting the region.
“And it did list the number of attacks. The US commercial ships have been attacked 145 times since 2023 in their list.”
Meanwhile, at least nine people, including three journalists, have been killed and several others wounded in an Israeli drone attack on relief aid workers at Beit Lahiya in northern Gaza, according to Palestinian media.
The attack reportedly targeted a relief team that was accompanied by journalists and photographers. At least three local journalists were among the dead.
The Palestinian Journalists’ Protection Centre said in a statement that Israel had killed “three journalists in an airstrike on a media team documenting relief efforts in northern Gaza”, reports
“The journalists were documenting humanitarian relief efforts for those affected by Israel’s genocidal war,” the statement added, according to Anadolu.
In a statement, the Israeli military claimed it struck “two terrorists . . . operating a drone that posed a threat” to Israeli soldiers in the area of Beit Lahiya.
“Later, a number of additional terrorists collected the drone operating equipment and entered a vehicle. The [Israeli military] struck the terrorists,” it added, without providing any evidence about its claims.
‘Liberation’ poetry
In Auckland on Saturday, protesters at the Aotearoa New Zealand’s weekly “free Palestine” rallies gave a tribute to poet Mahmoud Darwish — the “liberation voice of Palestine” — by reciting peace and justice poetry and marked the sixth anniversary of the Christchurch mosque massacre when a lone white terrorist gunned down 51 people at Friday prayers.
Two of the pro-Palestine protesters hold West Papuan and Palestinian flags – symbolising indigenous liberation – at Saturday’s rally in Auckland. Image: APR
This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.
Debate on Guam’s future as a US territory has intensified with its legislature due to vote on a non-binding resolution to become a US state amid mounting Pacific geostrategic tensions and expansionist declarations by the Trump administration.
Located closer to Beijing than Hawai’i, Guam serves as a key US strategic asset, known as the “tip of the spear,” with 10,000 military personnel, an air base for F-35 fighters and B-2 bombers and home port for Virginia-class nuclear submarines.
Local Senator William A. Parkinson introduced the resolution to the legislature last Wednesday and called for Guam to be fully integrated into the American union, possibly as the 51st state.
“We are standing in a moment of history where two great empires are standing face-to-face with each other, about to go to war,” Parkinson said at a press conference on Thursday.
“We have to be real about what’s going on in this part of the world. We are a tiny island but we are too strategically important to be left alone. Stay with America or do we let ourselves be absorbed by China?”
His resolution states the decision “must be built upon the informed consent of the people of Guam through a referendum”.
Trump’s expansionist policies
Parkinson’s resolution comes as US President Donald Trump advocates territorially expansionist policies, particularly towards the strategically located Danish-ruled autonomous territory of Greenland and America’s northern neighbour, Canada.
“This one moment in time, this one moment in history, the stars are aligning so that the geopolitics of the United States favour statehood for Guam,” Parkinson said. “This is an opportunity we cannot pass up.”
Guam Legislature Senator William A. Parkinson holds a press conference after introducing his resolution. BenarNews screenshot APR
As a territory, Guam residents are American citizens but they cannot vote for the US president and their lone delegate to the Congress has no voting power on the floor.
The US acquired Guam, along with Puerto Rico, in 1898 after winning the Spanish-American War, and both remain unincorporated territories to this day.
Independence advocates and representatives from the Guam Commission on Decolonisation regularly testify at the UN’s Decolonisation Committee, where the island has been listed as a Non-Self-Governing Territory since 1946.
Commission on Decolonisation executive director Melvin Won Pat-Borja said he was not opposed to statehood but is concerned if any decision on Guam’s status was left to the US.
“Decolonisation is the right of the colonised,” he said while attending Parkinson’s press conference, the Pacific Daily News reported.
‘Hands of our coloniser’
“It’s counterintuitive to say that, ‘we’re seeking a path forward, a path out of this inequity,’ and then turn around and put it right back in the hands of our coloniser.
“No matter what status any of us prefer, ultimately that is not for any one of us to decide, but it is up to a collective decision that we have to come to, and the only way to do it is via referendum,” he said, reports Kuam News.
With the geostrategic competition between the US and China in the Pacific, Guam has become increasingly significant in supporting American naval and air operations, especially in the event of a conflict over Taiwan or in the South China Sea.
The two US bases have seen Guam’s economy become heavily reliant on military investments and tourism.
The Defence Department holds about 25 percent of Guam’s land and is preparing to spend billions to upgrade the island’s military infrastructure as another 5000 American marines relocate there from Japan’s Okinawa islands.
Governor Lou Leon Guerrero delivers her “State of the Island” address in Guam on Tuesday . . . “Guam cannot be the linchpin of American security in the Asian-Pacific if nearly 14,000 of our residents are without shelter . . .” Image: Office of the Governor of Guam/Benar News
Military presence leveraged
The island has in recent years leveraged the increased military presence to demand federal assistance and the territory’s treasury relies on at least US$0.5 billion in annual funding.
“Let us be clear about this: Guam cannot be the linchpin of American security in the Asian-Pacific if nearly 14,000 of our residents are without shelter, because housing aid to Guam is cut, or if 36,000 of our people lose access to Medicaid and Medicare coverage keeping them healthy, alive and out of poverty,” Guerrero said.
Parkinson’s proposed legislative resolution calls for an end to 125-plus years of US colonial uncertainty.
“The people of Guam, as the rightful stewards of their homeland, must assert their inalienable right to self-determination,” states the resolution, including that there be a “full examination of statehood or enhanced autonomous status for Guam.”
“Granting Guam equal political status would signal unequivocally that Guam is an integral part of the United States, deterring adversaries who might otherwise perceive Guam as a mere expendable outpost.”
If adopted by the Guam legislature, the non-binding resolution would be transmitted to the White House.
A local statute enacted in 2000 for a political status plebiscite on statehood, independence or free association has become bogged down in US courts.
‘Reject colonial status quo’
Neil Weare, a former Guam resident and co-director of Right to Democracy, said the self-determination process must be centred on what the people of Guam want, “not just what’s best for US national security”.
“Right to Democracy does not take a position on political status, other than to reject the undemocratic and colonial status quo,” Weare said on behalf of the nonprofit organisation that advocates for rights and self-determination in US territories.
“People can have different views on what is the best solution to this problem, but we should all be in agreement that the continued undemocratic rule of millions of people in US territories is wrong and needs to end.”
He said the 250th anniversary of the US Declaration of Independence next year can open a new venue for a conversation about key concepts — such as the “consent of the governed” — involving Guam and other US territories.
Paris-based global media freedom watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has recalled that 20 journalists were killed during the six-year Philippines presidency of Rodrigo Duterte, a regime marked by fierce repression of the press.
Former president Duterte was arrested earlier this week as part of an International Criminal Court investigation into crimes against humanity linked to his merciless war on drugs. He is now in The Hague awaiting trial.
The watchdog has called on the administration of current President Ferdinand Marcos Jr to take strong measures to fully restore the country’s press freedom and combat impunity for the crimes against media committed by Duterte’s regime.
“Just because you’re a journalist you are not exempted from assassination, if you’re a son of a bitch,” Rodrigo Duterte said in his inauguration speech on 30 June 2016, which set the tone for the rest of his mandate — unrestrained violence against journalists and total disregard for press freedom, said RSF in a statement.
During the Duterte regime’s rule, RSF recorded 20 cases of journalists killed while working.
Among them was Jesus Yutrago Malabanan, shot dead after covering Rodrigo Duterte’s drug war for Reuters.
Online harassment surged, particularly targeting women journalists.
Maria Ressa troll target
The most prominent victim was Maria Ressa, Nobel Peace Prize laureate and founder of the news site Rappler, who faced an orchestrated hate campaign led by troll armies allied with the government in response to her commitment to exposing the then-president’s bloody war.
“The arrest of Rodrigo Duterte is good news for the Filipino journalism community, who were the direct targets of his campaign of terror,” said RSF’s Asia-Pacific bureau director Cédric Alviani.
RSF’s Asia-Pacific bureau director Cédric Alviani . . . “the Filipino journalism community were the direct targets of [former president Rodrigo Duterte]’s campaign of terror.” Image: RSF“President Marcos and his administration must immediately investigate Duterte’s past crimes and take strong measures to fully restore the country’s press freedom.”
The repression carried out during Duterte’s tenure continues to impact on Filipino journalism: investigative journalist Frenchie Mae Cumpio has been languishing in prison since her arrest in 2020, still awaiting a verdict in her trial for “financing terrorism” and “illegal possession of firearms” — trumped-up charges that could see her sentenced to 40 years in prison.
With 147 journalists murdered since the restoration of democracy in 1986, the Philippines remains one of the deadliest countries for media workers.
Hungry North Korean soldiers are selling some of their military equipment to buy food, prompting officials to conduct inspections that have caught some soldiers without all their issued gear, residents in the country told Radio Free Asia.
Though the country’s military is often said to be under-supplied, military-grade items tend to be of better quality than products civilians can obtain, so are viewed as desirable.
Weapons are used often during training, but personal gear like tents, lunch boxes, canteens and waterproof rice containers are not used as often, so some soldiers figure they won’t be missed.
RFA has reported in the past that soldiers often go hungry, and some of them even steal from residents get food.
The inspections began earlier this month, and will now happen on a regular basis, a resident of the northeastern province of North Hamgyong told RFA Korean on condition of anonymity for safety reasons.
“The authorities recently determined that some young soldiers are selling their military-issued gear or giving it to people they know because they are hungry and need money,” he said. “In fact, quite a few soldiers during this inspection were caught without their gear that they were supposed to have.”
Two items — canteens and waterproof rice bags — are particularly sought after, he said.
Those who were caught without all their issued gear were going to be severely punished, he said.
“They will be questioned about how they disposed of their military gear,” he said. “Measures will likely be taken such as having them bring back their gear or paying for the missing items.”
Not fed enough
A unit in the northwestern province of North Pyongan conducted the surprise inspection by instructing the soldiers to assemble for a combat exercise in an open field, a resident there told RFA on condition of anonymity to speak freely.
“I heard this from a soldier who frequently visits my house,” he said. “The items that were mainly raised during the inspection were military rice containers and personal tents. There was also unit that was missing several shovels.”
He said that the rice container is something that everyone needs, and that the tents can be used to cover holes in the roofs of homes and other buildings.
In North Korea, able-bodied men are required to serve 10 years in the 1.2 million-strong military after high school, from around age 18, while able-bodied women must serve seven years.
“Some newly enlisted soldiers are so hungry that they will secretly sell their military-issued supplies,” he said. “It will be difficult to completely eradicate this phenomenon unless chronic problems such as hunger are resolved.”
Translated by Claire S. Lee. Edited by Eugene Whong and Malcolm Foster.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by Ahn Chang Gyu for RFA Korean.
SPECIAL REPORT: By Giff Johnson, editor of the Marshall Islands Journal and RNZ Pacific correspondent in Majuro
The late Member of Parliament Jeton Anjain and the people of the nuclear test-affected Rongelap Atoll changed the course of the history of the Marshall Islands by using Greenpeace’s Rainbow Warrior ship to evacuate their radioactive home islands 40 years ago.
They did this by taking control of their own destiny after decades of being at the mercy of the United States nuclear testing programme and its aftermath.
In 1954, the US tested the Bravo hydrogen bomb test at Bikini Atoll, spewing high-level radioactive fallout on unsuspecting Rongelap Islanders nearby.
For years after the Bravo test, decisions by US government doctors and scientists caused Rongelap Islanders to be continuously exposed to additional radiation.
Marshall Islands traditional and government leaders joined Greenpeace representatives in showing off tapa banners with the words “Justice for Marshall Islands” during the dockside welcome ceremony earlier this week in Majuro. Image: Giff Johnson/RNZ Pacific
The 40th anniversary of the dramatic evacuation of Rongelap Atoll in 1985 by the Greenpeace vessel Rainbow Warrior — a few weeks before French secret agents bombed the ship in Auckland harbour — was spotlighted this week in Majuro with the arrival of Greenpeace’s flagship Rainbow Warrior III to a warm welcome combining top national government leaders, the Rongelap Atoll Local Government and the Rongelap community.
“We were displaced, our lives were disrupted, and our voices ignored,” said MP Hilton Kendall, who represents Rongelap in the Marshall Islands Parliament, at the welcome ceremony in Majuro earlier in the week.
“In our darkest time, Greenpeace stood with us.”
‘Evacuated people to safety’
He said the Rainbow Warrior “evacuated the people to safety” in 1985.
Greenpeace would “forever be remembered by the people of Rongelap,” he added.
In 1984, Jeton Anjain — like most Rongelap people who were living on the nuclear test-affected atoll — knew that Rongelap was unsafe for continued habitation.
The Able US nuclear test at Bikini Atoll in the Marshall Islands on 1 July 1946. Image: US National Archives
There was not a single scientist or medical doctor among their community although Jeton was a trained dentist, and they mainly depended on US Department of Energy-provided doctors and scientists for health care and environmental advice.
They were always told not to worry and that everything was fine.
But it wasn’t, as the countless thyroid tumors, cancers, miscarriages and surgeries confirmed.
Crew of the Rainbow Warrior and other Greenpeace officials — including two crew members from the original Rainbow Warrior, Bunny McDiarmid and Henk Hazen, from Aotearoa New Zealand – were welcomed to the Marshall Islands during a dockside ceremony in Majuro to mark the 40th anniversary of the evacuation of Rongelap Atoll. Image: Giff Johnson/RNZ Pacific
As the desire of Rongelap people to evacuate their homeland intensified in 1984, unbeknown to them Greenpeace was hatching a plan to dispatch the Rainbow Warrior on a Pacific voyage the following year to turn a spotlight on the nuclear test legacy in the Marshall Islands and the ongoing French nuclear testing at Moruroa in French Polynesia.
A Rainbow Warrior question
As I had friends in the Greenpeace organisation, I was contacted early on in its planning process with the question: How could a visit by the Rainbow Warrior be of use to the Marshall Islands?
Jeton and I were good friends by 1984, and had worked together on advocacy for Rongelap since the late 1970s. I informed him that Greenpeace was planning a visit and without hesitation he asked me if the ship could facilitate the evacuation of Rongelap.
At this time, Jeton had already initiated discussions with Kwajalein traditional leaders to locate an island that they could settle in that atoll.
I conveyed Jeton’s interest in the visit to Greenpeace, and a Greenpeace International board member, the late Steve Sawyer, who coordinated the Pacific voyage of the Rainbow Warrior, arranged a meeting for the three of us in Seattle to discuss ideas.
Jeton and I flew to Seattle and met Steve. After the usual preliminaries, Jeton asked Steve if the Rainbow Warrior could assist Rongelap to evacuate their community to Mejatto Island in Kwajalein Atoll, a distance of about 250 km.
Steve responded in classic Greenpeace campaign thinking, which is what Greenpeace has proved effective in doing over many decades. He said words to the effect that the Rainbow Warrior could aid a “symbolic evacuation” by taking a small group of islanders from Rongelap to Majuro or Ebeye and holding a media conference publicising their plight with ongoing radiation exposure.
“No,” said Jeton firmly. He wasn’t talking about a “symbolic” evacuation. He told Steve: “We want to evacuate Rongelap, the entire community and the housing, too.”
Steve Sawyer taken aback
Steve was taken aback by what Jeton wanted. Steve simply hadn’t considered the idea of evacuating the entire community.
But we could see him mulling over this new idea and within minutes, as his mind clicked through the significant logistics hurdles for evacuation of the community — including that it would take three-to-four trips by the Rainbow Warrior between Rongelap and Mejatto to accomplish it — Steve said it was possible.
And from that meeting, planning for the 1985 Marshall Islands visit began in earnest.
I offer this background because when the evacuation began in early May 1985, various officials from the United States government sharply criticised Rongelap people for evacuating their atoll, saying there was no radiological hazard to justify the move and that they were being manipulated by Greenpeace for its own anti-nuclear agenda.
Women from the nuclear test-affected Rongelap Atoll greeted the Rainbow Warrior and its crew with songs and dances this week as part of celebrating the 40th anniversary of the evacuation of Rongelap Atoll in 1985 by the Rainbow Warrior. Image: Giff Johnson/RNZ Pacific
This condescending American government response suggested Rongelap people did not have the brain power to make important decisions for themselves.
But it also showed the US government’s lack of understanding of the gravity of the situation in which Rongelap Islanders lived day in and day out in a highly radioactive environment.
The Bravo hydrogen bomb test blasted Rongelap and nearby islands with snow-like radioactive fallout on 1 March 1954. The 82 Rongelap people were first evacuated to the US Navy base at Kwajalein for emergency medical treatment and the start of long-term studies by US government doctors.
No radiological cleanup
A few months later, they were resettled on Ejit Island in Majuro, the capital atoll, until 1957 when, with no radiological cleanup conducted, the US government said it was safe to return to Rongelap and moved the people back.
“Even though the radioactive contamination of Rongelap Island is considered perfectly safe for human habitation, the levels of activity are higher than those found in other inhabited locations in the world,” said a Brookhaven National Laboratory report commenting on the return of Rongelap Islanders to their contaminated islands in 1957.
It then stated plainly why the people were moved back: “The habitation of these people on the island will afford most valuable ecological radiation data on human beings.”
And for 28 years, Rongelap people lived in one of the world’s most radioactive environments, consuming radioactivity through the food chain and by living an island life.
Proving the US narrative of safety to be false, the 1985 evacuation forced the US Congress to respond by funding new radiological studies of Rongelap.
Thanks to the determination of the soft-spoken but persistent leadership of Jeton, he ensured that a scientist chosen by Rongelap would be included in the study. And the new study did indeed identify health hazards, particularly for children, of living on Rongelap.
The US Congress responded by appropriating US$45 million to a Rongelap Resettlement Trust Fund.
Subsistence atoll life
All of this was important — it both showed that islanders with a PhD in subsistence atoll life understood more about their situation than the US government’s university educated PhDs and medical doctors who showed up from time-to-time to study them, provide medical treatment, and tell them everything was fine on their atoll, and it produced a $45 million fund from the US government.
However, this is only a fraction of the story about why the Rongelap evacuation in 1985 forever changed the US narrative and control of its nuclear test legacy in this country.
The crew of Greenpeace’s Rainbow Warrior III vessel were serenaded by the Rongelap community to mark the 40th anniversary of the evacuation of Rongelap Islanders from their nuclear test-affected islands this week in Majuro. Image: Giff Johnson/RNZ Pacific
Rongelap is the most affected population from the US hydrogen bomb testing programme in the 1950s.
By living on Rongelap, the community confirmed the US government’s narrative that all was good and the nuclear test legacy was largely a relic of the past.
The 1985 evacuation was a demonstration of the Rongelap community exerting control over their life after 31 years of dictates by US government doctors, scientists and officials.
It was difficult building a new community on Mejatto Island, which was uninhabited and barren in 1985. Make no mistake, Rongelap people living on Mejatto suffered hardship and privation, especially in the first years after the 1985 resettlement.
Nuclear legacy history
Their perseverance, however, defined the larger ramification of the move to Mejatto: It changed the course of nuclear legacy history by people taking control of their future that forced a response from the US government to the benefit of the Rongelap community.
Forty years later, the displacement of Rongelap Islanders on Mejatto and in other locations, unable to return to nuclear test contaminated Rongelap Atoll demonstrates clearly that the US nuclear testing legacy remains unresolved — unfinished business that is in need of a long-term, fair and just response from the US government.
The Rainbow Warrior will be in Majuro until next week when it will depart for Mejatto Island to mark the 40th anniversary of the resettlement, and then voyage to other nuclear test-affected atolls around the Marshall Islands.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
An open letter signed by 100 Christian leaders, calling for the granting of humanitarian visas to Aotearoa New Zealand for families of Palestinians trapped in Gaza has been handed over on the steps of Parliament.
The letter was presented yesterday on Ash Wednesday to opposition Labour Party MP Phil Twyford, who was joined by six other members of Parliament.
Minister for Immigration Erica Stanford and Associate Minister for Immigration Chris Penk were invited to receive the letter, but both declined the invitation.
The open letter was signed by leaders from Anglican, Baptist, Presbyterian, Catholic, Quaker, non-denominational and Methodist movements, and leaders from organisations and groups such as Caritas, Student Christian Movements and Te Mīhana Māori.
Granting immediate emergency humanitarian visas to Palestinians in Gaza who have family in New Zealand;
Providing sustained diplomatic pressure on the Israeli government to allow visa-holders to safely evacuate from Gaza and humanitarian aid to freely enter; and
Providing robust resettlement assistance once these families arrive in New Zealand.
Hoped for troops withdrawal
The letter comes after the end of the first phase of the Gaza Ceasefire agreement — which was due to see Israel withdraw its military forces from the border between Gaza and Egypt.
Christians United for Refuge spokesperson Esmé Hulbert-Putt said: “When we first prepared this letter, we hoped and prayed that we would see the withdrawal of military forces from the border.”
She added that this opening, alongside strong diplomacy and visa pathways, would allow for the family reunification that Palestinians in Aotearoa had been asking for for more than a year.
Following this handover, a separate group, organised by Aotearoa Christians for Peace in Palestine completed a 10km pilgrimage in Auckland, Christchurch and Wellington, symbolising the distance between Bethlehem and Jerusalem and the many military checkpoints along the way.
These pilgrimages each involved praying at the arrivals terminals of the respective international airports — in prayerful hope that one day these doors would open to families of Palestinians in Gaza.
Christian pilgrims have staged airport protests around New Zealand calling for humanitarian visas for Palestinians from Gaza. Image: Christians United for Refuge Aotearoa Campaign
This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.
“Are these really the female soldiers of Taiwan nowadays? Mini skirts, bras, high heels? … Are you sure they can actually fight in a war?” a X post reads in part.
The one-minute and 21-second video shows a group of women in army uniform participating in what appears to be a military drill.
Some social media users claimed the video shows a military drill of Taiwanese female soldiers.(X and Weibo)
The claim began to circulate online amid speculation in the Taiwan media that women may be conscripted into the military to fill gaps in combat units. But Taiwan’s defense minister dismissed the speculation.
Taiwan’s armed forces saw a drop in the number of active-duty personnel to 152,885 in June 2024 from 164,884 in 202, with experts saying this is a problem for the island as it is facing mounting threats from one of the world’s largest militaries: China with more than 2 million active-duty personnel.
Higher wages and the recruitment of foreigners are among proposals being discussed to address the manpower shortage in the military.
But the claim made in the video is false.
A Google reverse image search revealed older versions of the same footage, where a distinctive bulletin board appears in the lower right corner around the 32-second mark, displaying the words “Giant Cannon Company.”
A keyword search for “Giant Cannon Company” found that it refers to a mobile game.
Further keyword searches found a promotional video of the game published on YouTube in April 2014.
Part of the video matches the video circulated among Chinese social media users.
“2014-04-10 Giant Cannon Company Launch Press Conference – Yao Yuan-hao + 50 Girls,” reads the caption of the video.
Yao is a Taiwanese actor, who is seen in the video leading a group of women.
The video circulated among Chinese social media users was in fact taken from a promotional video of a mobile game in 2014.(YouTube and Weibo)
Women volunteers do serve in the Taiwan military and AFCL has previously debunked similar claims that they were “overly sweet” and unfit for combat.
Translated by Shen Ke. Edited by Taejun Kang.
Asia Fact Check Lab (AFCL) was established to counter disinformation in today’s complex media environment. We publish fact-checks, media-watches and in-depth reports that aim to sharpen and deepen our readers’ understanding of current affairs and public issues. If you like our content, you can also follow us on Facebook, Instagram and X.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by Alicia Dong for RFA.
A New Zealand-based Filipino solidarity network has welcomed the arrest of former Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte by Interpol on charges of crimes against humanity on a warrant by the International Criminal Court (ICC).
“We congratulate the human rights activists — both from the Philippines and around the world — who held the line and relentlessly pursued justice for Filipino victims of the former Duterte regime,” said the Aotearoa-Philippines Solidarity (APS) in a statement.
“This arrest is a long time coming, with Duterte having been complicit in the extrajudicial killings of activists, trade unionists, indigenous peoples’ advocates, peasants and human rights lawyers since he was president back in 2016.
“His brutal and merciless so-called ‘war on drugs’ also led to the deaths of thousands of Filipinos — many of which were not involved in the drug trade at all or were merely drug addicts and low-level drug peddlers.
“Their only ‘crime’ was that they were poor, as documented by many human rights watchdogs that Duterte’s fake ‘drug war’ disproportionately targeted poor Filipinos.”
The APS statement said that Duterte had admitted to these crimes when he faced an inquiry before the Philippines’ House of Representatives in October last year.
“In that hearing, the former president admitted the existence of ‘death squads’ composed of ‘gang members’ and Philippine police personnel who would ‘neutralise’ drug suspects – both when he was president and as mayor of Davao City.
Police ordered to ‘goad suspects’
“He also [revealed] that he [had] instructed members of the Philippine National Police (PNP) to goad suspects to fight back or attempt to escape so they would have a reason to kill them.”
The APS noted that all these actions constituted crimes against humanity, the very charge laid against him by the ICC. Since the initial charges were laid against Duterte in 2017 by human rights activists, many had anticipated the day he would finally face justice.
“This arrest is a historic step towards justice and a reminder to all that no one is above the law. The APS extends our best wishes to the bereaved families of those killed during Duterte’s unjust ‘war on drugs’ and also its survivors,” the statement said.
The APS said challenge now was to ensure that justice was meted out by the ICC and Duterte was punished for his crimes.
“Let us not allow this monumental victory slip from our hands and ensure that all evidence against Duterte is brought to light and he faces consequences for the human rights violations he committed against the Filipino people.”
The statement said that Duterte’s arrest also served as a “warning to the US-Marcos regime” that any abuse of their powers and attacks on human rights would not go unpunished.
The continuation of indiscriminate military operations which violated international humanitarian law would also lead to the downfall of President Ferdinand Marcos Jr — who is the son of the 1970s dictator who declared martial law.
Paolo* was just 15 years old when he witnessed the Philippine National Police (PNP) mercilessly kill his father in 2016.
Nearly nine years later, the scales are shifting as Rodrigo Duterte, the man who unleashed death upon his family and thousands of others, now faces the weight of justice before the International Criminal Court (ICC).
“Finally, naaresto din, [pero] dapat isama si [Senator Ronald dela Rosa], dapat silang panagutin sa dami ng pamilyang inulila nila. (Finally, he’s arrested but Dela Rosa should’ve been with him, they should be held accountable for how many families they left in mourning),” he said.
Paolo, then a minor, was also accosted and tortured by Caloocan police — from the same city police who would kill 17-year-old Kian delos Santos less than a year later.
He was threatened not to do anything else or else end up like his father. Paolo carried the threats and the fear over the years, even as he hoped for justice.
This hanging on for hope in the face of devastation was not for nothing.
The ICC has been investigating the killings under Duterte’s flagship campaign, which led to at least 6252 deaths in police operations alone by May 2022. The number reached between 27,000 to 30,000, including those killed vigilante-style.
Duterte was presented by the Philippine government’s Prosecutor-General with the ICC notification of an arrest over crimes against humanity upon his arrival from Hong Kong on this morning.
Slow but sure step to justice Paolo is not the only one rejoicing over Duterte’s arrest. Many families, including those from drug war hot spot Caloocan City, see this as the long-awaited step toward the justice they have been denied for years.
When the news broke, Ana* was overcome with joy and thanked God for giving families the strength and unwavering faith to keep fighting for justice. She knew the weight of loss all too well.
In 2017, police stormed into their home in Caloocan City and brutally killed her husband and father-in-law in a single night.
Ana, who was five months pregnant at that time, was caught in the violence and was hit by a stray bullet. She and other victims have since been supported by the In Defence of Human Rights and Dignity Movement.
“Sa wakas, unti-unti nang nakakamit ang hustisya para sa lahat ng biktima (At last, justice is slowly being achieved for all the victims),” she recalled thinking when she read that Duterte had been arrested.
But Ana is wishing for more than just imprisonment for Duterte, even as she welcomed the long-awaited accountability from the former president and his allies.
“Sana din ay aminin niya lahat ng kamalian at humingi siya ng kapatawaran sa lahat ng tao na biktima para matahimik din ang mga kaluluwa ng mga namatay (I hope he also admits to all his wrongdoings and asks for forgiveness from every victim, so that the souls of those who were killed may finally find peace),” she said.
Brutality they endured
For the families, the ICC’s move and the government’s action are an acknowledgment of the brutality they endured. The latest development is also a validation of their grief and provides a glimmer of hope that accountability is finally within reach. After years of being silenced and dismissed, they see this moment as the start of a reckoning they feared would never come.
Celina, whose husband was shot dead in a drug war operation, feels overwhelming joy but is wary that the arrest is just part of a long process at the ICC.
“Ang sabi nga po, mahaba-habang laban ito kaya hindi po sa pag-aresto natatapos ito, bagkus ito ay simula pa lamang ng aming mga laban [at] naniniwala kami at aasa sa kakayahan at suporta na ibinibigay sa amin ng ICC [na] sa huli, mananagot ang dapat managot, maparusahan ang may mga sala,” she said.
(As they say, this is a long battle, so it does not end with the arrest. Rather, this is only the beginning of our fight. We believe in and will rely on the ICC’s capability and support, knowing that in the end, those who must be held accountable will face justice, and the guilty will be punished.)
‘Duterte should feel our pain’ The wounds left behind by the drug war killings remain deep. The families’ losses are irreversible, yes, but they see this arrest as a long-awaited step toward the justice they have fought for years to achieve.
It is a stark contrast to the reality they have lived following the deaths of their loved ones. They were constantly under threat from the police who pulled the trigger. Many families had to flee to faraway places, leaving behind their own communities and source of livelihood.
“Nakakaiyak ako, hindi ko alam ang dapat kong maramdaman na sa ilang taon naming ipinaglalaban ay nakamit din namin ang hustisyang aming minimithi (I’m in tears — I don’t know what to feel. After years of fighting, we have finally achieved the justice we have long been yearning for),“ said Betty, whose 44-year-old son and 22-year-old grandson were killed under Duterte’s drug war.
For Jane Lee, the arrest only underscores the glaring disparity between the powerful and the powerless.
“Mabuti pa siya, inaresto ng mga kapulisan. Ang aming mga kaanak, pinatay agad,” she said. “Napakalaki ng pagkakaiba sa pagitan ng makapangyarihan at ordinaryong taong tulad namin.”
(At least he was arrested by the police. Our loved ones were killed on the spot. The difference between the powerful and ordinary people like us is enormous.)
Lee’s husband, Michael, was gunned down by unidentified men in May 2017, leaving her to raise their three children alone. Since then, she has volunteered for Rise Up for Life and for Rights, a group composed mostly of widows and mothers who remain steadfast in demanding justice for drug war victims.
Collective rage
Families from Rise Up in Cebu also voiced their collective rage against Duterte who ordered killings from the presidential pulpit for six years. They hope that Duterte will feel the same pain they felt when their loved ones were forcibly taken away from them.
This afternoon, Duterte condemned the alleged violation of due process following his arrest. His allies are also echoing this messaging, calling the arrest unlawful.
His longtime aide, Senator Bong Go, Go, tried to access Duterte in Villamor Air Base, asking the guards to let him deliver pizza since they hadn’t eaten yet.
“Katiting lang iyan sa ginawa mo sa amin na sinira mo ang aming buhay at hanapbuhay dahil sa iyong pekeng war on drugs,” the families of drug war victims in Cebu said. “Wala kang karapatan na kumuha ng buhay ng iba [kasi] Diyos lang may karapatan kaya sa ginawa mo, maniningil ang taumbayan lalo na kaming mga pamilya ng mga naging biktima.”
(That is nothing compared to what you did to us. You destroyed our lives and livelihood because of your fake war on drugs. You have no right to take another person’s life; only God has that right. Because of what you have done, the people will demand justice, especially we, the families of the victims.)
There is still no clear information on what comes next, whether Duterte will be immediately transferred to the International Criminal Court headquarters in The Hague, Netherlands, or if legal battles will delay the process.
But Mila*, whose 17-year-old nephew was killed by police in Quezon City in 2018, hopes for one thing if the former president finds himself in a detention cell soon: “Sana huwag na siya lumaya (I hope he is never set free).”
TAIPEI, Taiwan – The size of Taiwan’s military has been at the center of a public debate in recent months, with reports emerging of plans to recruit women and foreigners while extending military training.
Meanwhile, politicians from the island’s two major parties and members of the public are debating the defense budget, as the U.S. is reportedly pressuring Taiwan to strengthen its military capabilities.
What is happening with Taiwan’s military?
Chieh Chung, a research fellow at Taiwan’s Institute for National Defense and Security Research, said the island is experiencing “a rapid decline” in the number of military personnel, which is affecting front-line combat units.
Taiwan’s armed forces saw a drop in the number of active-duty personnel to 152,885 in June 2024 from 164,884 in 2021, and Chieh believes the trend will continue mainly due to Taiwan’s low birth rate.
This is a problem for Taiwan, according to Michael Hunzeker, associate director of the Center for Security Policy Studies at George Mason University, as the island is facing mounting threats from one of the world’s largest militaries: China with more than 2 million active-duty military personnel.
China sees Taiwan as a breakaway province and has increased military pressure through drills and incursions. Taiwan, meanwhile, views itself as a sovereign state and strengthens its defenses. Beijing has increased military pressure on the island in recent years through air and naval incursions, military drills and diplomatic isolation efforts.
“Besides having more troops and weapons, China’s military leadership has also put more time, energy, and resources into modernizing its military,” said Hunzeker.
“None of these trends bodes well for Taiwan. There is no question that if we compare China and Taiwan in isolation, Beijing holds all of the cards militarily,” he added.
Taiwanese soldiers hold firearms in a military training as Taiwan President Lai Ching-te, not in photo, inspects the Taiwanese military in Taichung, Central Taiwan, Friday, June 28, 2024.(Chiang Ying-ying/AP)
What is being done to address the shortage?
Taiwan has responded with plans to increase military salaries and benefits, but the proposal has been met with skepticism.
Arthur Kuo, a Taiwanese retired major general, is among those who believe that military recruitment is influenced by more than just wages.
“Societal values, the image of military personnel, working conditions, and career development opportunities,” he said as he listed factors that affect Taiwanese people’s willingness to join the military.
“One worthwhile lesson to keep in mind is that most Americans take a great deal of pride in their military,” Hunzeker said. “You don’t see the same thing in Taiwan.”
A 2024 survey found that more than 50% of respondents were not confident in the Taiwanese military’s self-defense capabilities.
“I would therefore imagine that if Taiwanese society held their servicemen and women in higher regard that it would probably do more for recruiting than any financial bonus ever could,” Kuo said.
Some defense officials and analysts have proposed recruiting foreign military personnel.
“The U.S. offers a fast-track naturalization process for green-card holders who join the military, which Taiwan could consider,” Kuo said.
However, some analysts believe that might be “counterproductive.”
Taiwanese soldiers take part in a drill while Taiwan’s President Lai Ching-te inspects its military at a military base in Taitung County, eastern Taiwan, Tuesday, Jan. 21, 2025.(Chiang Ying-ying/AP)
Chieh from the Institute for National Defense and Security Research said Taiwan’s financial systems could collapse in a war, making salary payments for foreigners uncertain.
He warned that foreign troops, often motivated by pay, might lose commitment if payments stopped.
Managing and training mercenaries from diverse backgrounds would also require significant resources, potentially outweighing the benefits, he added.
Meanwhile, Taiwan’s defense ministry dismissed reports last week about a plan for the conscription of female troops.
Does military modernization really require more troops?
Some commentators question whether increasing troop numbers is the right answer. They argue that the Russia-Ukraine war has shown the impact of military modernization, with drones, long-range artillery and missiles giving a force greater advantage than mere troop numbers.
But Kuo believes addressing the manpower shortage issue is still crucial for Taiwan.
“If Taiwan’s military capability declines, it will struggle to counter gray-zone threats from China, maintain strategic deterrence, uphold regional stability, and sustain foreign investment and economic growth – posing a serious national security risk,” he said.
A military honor guard attends National Day celebrations in front of the Presidential Building in Taipei, Taiwan, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024.(Chiang Ying-ying/AP)
Chieh shares similar views, saying that regardless of how advanced Taiwan’s weapons are, it must be prepared to defend the homeland with a sufficient number of ground forces, given China’s naval and air forces continue to grow.
“The key is that while we may maintain a smaller standing force in peacetime, we must be able to rapidly expand our troop numbers through mobilization when necessary,” he said.
China doesn’t just aim to defeat Taiwan’s military, according to Chieh. The authoritarian regime also assumes that U.S. intervention is inevitable.
Under the 1979 Taiwan Relations Act, the U.S. is committed to assisting Taiwan to defend itself, but it has long maintained a policy of “strategic ambiguity” on whether it would intervene militarily to protect Taiwan in the event of a Chinese attack.
“So, its strategy revolves around establishing a dominant position around Taiwan before the U.S. can effectively intervene, and this is why Taiwan should maintain strong troops itself – to send signals to Washington that we’re a reliable ally and it is worthy for them to fight together with us,” Chieh said.
Edited by Taejun Kang.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by Alan Lu for RFA.
Taiwan’s defense ministry is proposing a law that could bring a lengthy prison term for anyone deemed disloyal to its military, it said on Monday, adding the Chinese Communist Party tried to lure officers while its spying was becoming “rampant.”
“Any active military personnel who express loyalty to the enemy through words, actions, texts, pictures, electromagnetic records, scientific and technological methods, etc., which is sufficient to cause military disadvantages, will be sentenced to fixed-term imprisonment of not less than 1 year and not more than 7 years,” the ministry said.
In recent years, the Taiwanese military, in cooperation with national security units, has cracked many espionage cases, it said in a statement.
“The Chinese Communist Party’s intelligence gathering and espionage activities are becoming increasingly rampant,” it said.
The Chinese side “uses money, investment, gambling and other methods to lure and recruit active-duty military personnel to sign written documents, shoot videos and other methods to swear allegiance to the enemy, which has seriously damaged national security,” the ministry said.
A small number of officers and soldiers had “committed treason and crimes” and should be strictly punished, it said.
The ministry was working on a draft amendment to Article 24 of the Criminal Law of the Army, Navy and Air Force that would help “strengthen countermeasures against the Chinese Communist Party’s infiltration and sabotage activities against the national military.”
The amendment will be submitted to the island’s government for review after completing the notice and legal procedures.
The National Security Bureau said in a recent report that the number of Taiwanese citizens charged with attempted espionage for China rose “significantly” to 64 last year from 10 in 2022 and 48 in 2022.
Seven retired military officials were prosecuted last year for activities such as giving China the coordinates and details of military bases and the de facto U.S. embassy in Taipei.
Edited by Mike Firn.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by RFA Staff.
Hamas has accused Israel of “cheap and unacceptable blackmail” over its decision to halt the electricity supply to war-ravaged Palestinian enclave of Gaza to pressure the group into releasing the captives.
“We strongly condemn the occupation’s decision to cut off electricity to Gaza, after depriving it of food, medicine, and water,” Izzat al-Risheq, a member of Hamas’s political bureau, said in a statement.
He said it was “a desperate attempt to pressure our people and their resistance through cheap and unacceptable blackmail tactics”.
“Cutting off electricity, closing the crossings, stopping aid, relief and fuel, and starving our people, constitutes collective punishment and a full-fledged war crime,” al-Risheq said.
He accused Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of attempting “to impose a new roadmap” that prioritised his personal interests.
Israel has been widely condemned for violating the terms of the three-phased ceasefire agreement signed on January 19. It has been trying force “renegotiation” of the terms on Hamas by cutting off food supplies and now electricity.
Albanese slams ‘clean water’ cut off
Francesa Albanese, the UN special rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territory, said Israel’s decision to cut off electricity to Gaza meant “no functioning desalination stations, ergo: no clean water”.
She added that countries that were yet to impose sanctions or an arms embargo on Israel were “AIDING AND ASSISTING Israel in the commission of one of the most preventable genocides of our history”.
According to Human Rights Watch, Israel had already intentionally cut off most ways that Palestinians in Gaza could access water, including by blocking pipelines to Gaza and destroying solar panels used to try to keep some water pumps and desalination and waste management plants running during power outages.
GENOCIDE ALERT!Israel cutting off electricity supplies to Gaza means, among others, no functioning desalination stations, ergo: no clean water.
STILL NO SANCTION/NO ARMS EMBARGO against Israel means, among others, AIDING AND ASSISTING Israel in the commission of one of the… https://t.co/x2cX4MuP0K
— Francesca Albanese, UN Special Rapporteur oPt (@FranceskAlbs) March 9, 2025
In a December report, the organisation noted that Palestinians in many areas of Gaza had access to 2 to 9 litres (0.5 to 2 gallons) of water for drinking and washing per day, per person, far below the 15-litre (3.3 gallons) per person threshold for survival.
“At this point in the war, I do not believe that Israel, Hamas and America are far apart. I want to see our people home. All of them, not just the Americans,” he added.
Boehler praises Qatar’s role
US President Donald Trump’s envoy on captives, Adam Boehler, said face-to-face talks with Hamas representatives — the first such discussions between the US and the organisation in 28 years — had been “very useful”.
In an interview with Israel’s Channel 13, the envoy dismissed a question by the channel’s reporter, who asked if the US had been “tricked” by Qatar into holding talks with Hamas.
“I don’t think it was a trick by the Qataris at all. It was something we asked for,” he said, reports Al Jazeera.
“They facilitated it. I think the Qataris have been great in this, quite frankly, in a number of different regards. They’ve done a very good job.
“Sometimes, it’s very very hard when you’re talking through intermediaries to understand what people actually want.”
Boehler added that his first question to Hamas was what the movement wanted.
“To me, they said they wanted it [the war] to end. They wanted to give all the prisoners back. They wanted prisoners on the other side. Eventually, we will rebuild Gaza,” he said.
Hamas also knew they would not be in charge of Gaza when the war ended, the US envoy said.
“At this point in the war, I do not believe that Israel, Hamas and America are far apart. I want to see our people home. All of them, not just the Americans,” he added.
Seven weeks into the Gaza ceasefire deal, Israel has openly resumed its war crimes in Gaza — blocking humanitarian aid — with the tacit support of the international mainstream media, reports Al Jazeera’s media watchdog programme The Listening Post.
“Seventeen months into the Israeli genocide in Gaza we have reached another critical stage — Israel has resumed its blockade of humanitarian aid and has threatened to cut of the supply of water and power to desperate Palestinians,” says presenter and programme founder Richard Gizbert.
“All because Hamas has refused to change the deal the two sides signed seven weeks ago and free more Israeli captives.
“The headlines now coming out of the international media would have you believe that Hamas and not the Netanyahu government had demanded these changes to the ceasefire agreement.
“Israeli officials somehow insist there is enough food in Gaza and you will not see many Israeli news outlets reporting on the undeniable evidence of malnutrition.”
Presented by Richard Gizbert
Lead contributors: Daniel Levy – President, US/Middle East Project Saree Makdisi – Professor of English and comparative literature, UCLA Samira Mohyeddin – Founder, On the Line Media Mouin Rabbani – Co-editor, Jadaliyya
On our radar:
The LA Times’ new AI “bias meter” — which offers a counterpoint to the paper’s opinion pieces, has stirred controversy. Tariq Nafi explores its role in a changing media landscape that’s cosying up to Donald Trump.
Are the ADL’s anti-Semitism stats credible? The Anti-Defamation League is one of the most influential and well-funded NGOs in the US — and it’s getting more media attention than ever.
The Listening Post’s Meenakshi Ravi reports on the organisation, its high-profile CEO, and its troubling stance: Conflating anti-Zionism with anti-Semitism.
Featuring: Omar Baddar – Political and media analyst Eva Borgwardt – National spokesperson, If Not Now Emmaia Gelman – Director, The Institute for the Critical Study of Zionism
This programme was first broadcast on 8 March 2025 and can be watched on YouTube.
‘Hell plan’ – Israel’s scheme for Gaza. Video: AJ The Listening Post
Why is Phnom Penh now willing to give the United States what it has been demanding for years?
At a meeting on Feb. 24 with Ronald Clark, commanding general of the the U.S. Army Pacific, Cambodia’s military chief Vong Pisen made the most explicit call to date for restarting the bilateral “Angkor Sentinel” military drills that Phnom Penh had suspended in 2017.
Washington has been encouraging the resumption of the exercises since at least 2020, yet Phnom Penh had strung the U.S. along with offers of counterterrorism cooperation, a much lower-level form of engagement.
Cambodia suspended Angkor Sentinel in early 2017 on the premise that its troops were needed to guard that year’s local elections.
Gen. Ronald P. Clark, left, commander of the US Army Pacific, meets with Gen. Vong Pisen, commander-in-chief of the Royal Cambodian Armed Forces, on Feb. 24, 2025.(Royal Cambodian Armed Forces)
A few months later, however, Cambodia’s military started its first joint “Golden Dragon” drills with China. A few months after that, Cambodia’s ruling party dissolved its only political opponent on charges of plotting a U.S.-backed coup.
The same year, Phnom Penh banned several U.S. Congress-funded organizations, sparking a deterioration in U.S.-Cambodia relations.
In 2018, Washington started alleging that Phnom Penh had agreed to a secret deal to allow China exclusive use of its Ream Naval Base. U.S. policymakers came to see Cambodia as a “lost” Chinese client state.
Some observers suggest that Phnom Penh’s offer to restart the Angkor Sentinel drills is a result of Cambodia’s leadership succession in 2023.
That year, long-ruling prime minister Hun Sen, who typically has taken a dim view of the U.S., handed over power to his eldest son Hun Manet, a West Point-educated general considered by some to be reformist and Western-looking.
This is almost certainly not the reason.
China dependency
Hun Manet might be the prime minister, but Hun Sen still calls the shots, especially over foreign policy. Hun Sen’s trusted ally, Prak Sokhonn, was brought back as foreign minister last November to further solidify his control over foreign relations.
Another claim is that Phnom Penh is trying to appease U.S. President Donald Trump to avoid tariffs and wants to win over Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who as senator had long called for U.S. sanctions on Cambodia over its democratic backsliding and human rights violations.
In fact, it was the Biden administration that began a slow, gradual process of reengaging Cambodia, and talks about Angkor Sentinel began at least in October.
The foundations were probably laid long before that, possibly when then-CIA Director Bill Burns visited Phnom Penh last June to meet with Hun Sen. It was the Biden administration that arranged for an U.S. warship to make a port call in Cambodia in December, the first to do so since 2016.
The actual motivation for Phnom Penh to reopen the war games is that it has now accepted that it must reduce its dependency on China.
This explains why Cambodia has spent considerable energy in improving relations with Japan, Canada, Australia and Saudi Arabia in recent months — while also trying to silence exiled dissidents in those countries.
The Chinese military ship Qijiguang prepares to dock at the Sihanoukville port, Cambodia, May 19, 2024.(AFP)
Cambodia’s economy grew by around 5 percent last year, but it’s far from healthy.
Aside from domestic factors like private debt and bad loans, a lack of Chinese investment since the COVID-19 pandemic has weakened the construction and real estate sectors, while tourism is still reeling from the lack of Chinese visitors.
The U.S., by contrast, has steadily accounted for around two-fifths of all Cambodia’s exports for almost a decade.
More importantly, Beijing will no longer throw armfuls of cash at every infrastructure project Phnom Penh thinks it needs.
This became clear last year when Beijing refused to put up substantial funds for the Funan Techo Canal, a vanity megaproject for the Hun family. Last year, China did not approve any new loans to Cambodia.
Scam center crackdown
As well as being more picky, the Chinese government has demanded that Southeast Asian governments tackle their vast cyber scam industries, which are defrauding ordinary Chinese out of tens of billions of dollars each year
The scam centers have put a strain on China’s already weakened economy and the heavy role of Chinese crime groups in the sector is increasingly a source of national embarrassment for the Chinese Communist Party.
Beijing launched a massive public information campaign about its scam-busting efforts in December, before public anger rose in January over news that Chinese actor Wang Xing had been kidnapped in Thailand and forced to work in a scam compound in Myanmar.
He was rescued, but the Chinese public is demanding their government take more action to rescue their relatives.
Talk among Cambodia watchers is that Beijing is irate about Phnom Penh’s lackluster efforts at cracking down on the scam sector.
A casino in Sihanoukville, Cambodia, Feb. 2020.(Reuters)
China has found a willing partner in Thailand—which launched major raids on scam compounds on its border with Myanmar last month. Beijing has also cooperated with Laos’ communist government and some parties in Myanmar’s raging civil war.
Cambodia, though, is allegedly dragging its feet, much to everyone’s frustration, not just China’s.
Some analysts reckon that “pig-butchering” scammers are finding a safe haven in Cambodia as compounds are shut down elsewhere in the region.
Bangkok has just revealed that it is debating whether to build a wall along parts of its border with Cambodia.
Pressing Phnom Penh
If the United States Institute for Peace (USIP) is correct, Cambodia’s scam industry is worth $12.5 billion annually, the equivalent of a third of the formal economy.
According to some experts, Cambodia is also somewhat unique in that a large percentage of the proceeds are laundered through the local economy.
If the authorities were to launch a major crackdown, most Cambodian oligarchs and senior ruling party politicians would allegedly lose access to billions of dollars in tithes and dodgy contracts.
“The level of co-option of state actors in countries like Cambodia exceeds what we saw in narco-states of the 1990s in Latin America,” Jacob Sims, an expert on organized crime in Southeast Asia, recently told The Economist.
Worse, it might destabilize the economy. Who knows how much money from the scammers is propping up construction or property or any other sector?
We now have the ironic situation in which the U.S. and China are aligned over what they want from the Cambodian government: a substantial and meaningful crackdown on the scammers.
Indeed, Washington, like Beijing, is also increasingly concerned that Cambodia-based scammers are defrauding its nationals.
Last September, the U.S. embassy in Phnom Penh estimated that Americans had lost at least $100 million to scams originating in Cambodia.
The same month, Ly Yong Phat, a Cambodian senator and the oligarch arguably closest to the Hun family, was hit by U.S. sanctions because of his association with the illegal industry.
Beijing’s growing frustration with Phnom Penh might soon come to a head.
There is talk that Chinese President Xi Jinping is set to visit Phnom Penh, possibly next month. It’s unlikely that he would arrive — or depart — without a major concession from the Hun family on the scam industry.
Phnom Penh possibly wants to use the resumption of the Angkor Sentinel drills with the U.S. as a way of signaling to Beijing that it is not as beholden as it once was to Chinese pressure.
Whether China would go “soft” so as not to lose influence to the U.S. is another matter.
According to informed sources in Phnom Penh and Washington, most U.S. policymakers don’t view the resumption of Angkor Sentinel as a major sea change after eight years of fraught U.S.-Cambodia relations.
While welcoming an important step towards healthier relations, Washington will be looking for Cambodia to make a more drastic break from Beijing, they say.
David Hutt is a research fellow at the Central European Institute of Asian Studies (CEIAS) and the Southeast Asia Columnist at the Diplomat. The views expressed here are his own and do not reflect the position of RFA.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by commentator David Hutt.
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![The Able U.S. nuclear test at Bikini Atoll in the Marshall Islands, pictured July 1, 1946. [U.S. National Archives]](https://media.rnztools.nz/rnz/image/upload/s--qg602gCG--/ar_16:10,c_fill,f_auto,g_auto,q_auto,w_1050/v1728597147/4KIHF8M_marshalls_un_1_jpeg?_a=BACCd2AD)
GENOCIDE ALERT!
