A police officer chased a Native teen to his death. Days later, the police force shut down without explanation.
In 2020, Blossom Old Bull was raising three teenagers on the Crow Indian Reservation in Montana. Her youngest son, Braven Glenn, was 17, a good student, dedicated to his basketball team.
That November, Old Bull got a call saying Glenn was killed in a police car chase that resulted in a head-on collision with a train. Desperate for details about the accident, she went to the police station, only to find it had shut down without any notice.
“The doors were locked. It looked like it wasn’t in operation anymore—like they just upped and left,” Old Bull said. “It’s, like, there was a life taken, and you guys just closed everything down without giving the family any answers?”
This kicks off a yearslong search to find out what happened to Glenn and how a police force could disappear overnight without explanation. This week on Reveal, Mother Jones reporter Samantha Michaels’ investigation into the crash is at once an examination of a mother’s journey to uncover the details of her son’s final moments and a sweeping look at a broken system of tribal policing.
This is an update of an episode that originally aired in April 2024.
TAIPEI, Taiwan – Taiwan said 85% of its national security cases were found to involve retired military and police officers, saying China “systematically and organically cultivated” these forces in the island.
Taiwan’s national security law is a set of legal provisions aimed at safeguarding its sovereignty and democratic system from internal and external threats. It includes measures against espionage, subversion, and activities threatening national security, with a particular focus on countering external interference, including from China.
China regards Taiwan as a renegade province that should be reunited with the mainland, by force if necessary. The democratic island has been self-governing since it effectively separated from mainland China in 1949 after the Chinese civil war.
“85% of current incidents related to national security are involved with retired military and police. We are very concerned about this situation,” said Liang Wen-chieh, spokesperson of Taiwan’s Mainland Affairs Council, which oversees relations across the Taiwan Strait.
“China has been systematically and methodically cultivating these forces on the ground in Taiwan … it has become very difficult to secure evidence in espionage and national security-related cases,” Liang added without elaborating.
The number of individuals in Taiwan prosecuted for Chinese espionage increased from 16 in 2021 to 64 in 2024, Taiwan’s main intelligence agency, the National Security Bureau, or NSB, said in a report this month.
In 2024, 15 military veterans and 28 active service members were prosecuted, accounting for 23% and 43%, respectively, of all Chinese espionage cases.
“Chinese operatives frequently try to use retired military personnel to recruit active service members, establish networks via the internet, or try to lure targets with cash or by exploiting their debts,” said the NSB.
“For example, military personnel with financial difficulties may be offered loans via online platforms or underground banks, in return for passing along secret intelligence, signing loyalty pledges or recruiting others,” the agency added.
The Taiwan government’s announcement on national security cases came days after Taiwanese prosecutors sought a 10-year prison sentence for a retired military officer for leaking classified information to China.
The Taiwan High Prosecutors Office on Monday indicted retired Lt Gen. Kao An-kuo and five others for violating the National Security Act and organizing a pro-China group.
Prosecutors claim that Kao, leader of the pro-unification group “Republic of China Taiwan Military Government,” along with his girlfriend, identified by her surname Liu, and four others, were recruited by China’s People’s Liberation Army, or PLA.
The group allegedly worked to establish an organization that would serve as armed internal support and operational bases for the Chinese Communist Party, or CCP, in the event of a PLA invasion of Taiwan. This effort reportedly included recruiting active-duty military personnel to obtain classified information and monitor strategic deployments.
Additionally, they are accused of using drones to simulate surveillance on mobile military radar vehicles and other combat exercises, subsequently relaying the results to the CCP.
China has not commented on Taiwan’s announcement on national security cases.
Edited by Mike Firn.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by Taejun Kang for RFA.
Hong Kong national security police have taken away three family members of U.K.-based pollster and outspoken political commentator Chung Kim-wah, who has a bounty on his head amid a crackdown on dissent under two security laws.
Chung, 64, is a former deputy head of the Hong Kong Public Opinion Research Institute and co-host of the weekly talk show “Voices Like Bells” for RFA Cantonese.
He left for the United Kingdom in April 2022 after being questioned amid a city-wide crackdown on public dissent and political opposition to the ruling Chinese Communist Party.
Officers took two of Chung’s brothers and a sister from their homes on Wednesday morning.
Chung’s second brother was taken to Tsuen Wan Police Station for questioning, his third sister to Central Police Station, and his fourth brother to Castle Peak Police station.
Chung is accused — alongside Carmen Lau, Tony Chung, Joseph Tay and Chloe Cheung — of “incitement to secession” after he “advocated independence” on social media and repeatedly called on foreign governments to impose sanctions on Beijing over the crackdown, according to a police announcement.
He told Radio Free Asia that the questioning of his family members came as “no surprise,” but said they had nothing to do with his professional activities.
“My brothers and sisters are all adults, so why should they be held responsible for what I do?” Chung told RFA Cantonese in an interview on Jan. 22. “They live in Hong Kong, and I’m in the U.K., so I never tell them anything.”
U.K.-based Hong Kong pollster Chung Kim-wah, who has a bounty on his head, in an undated file photo.(RFA)
Chung said the move was likely an attempt to intimidate people carrying out independent public opinion research, which often involves negative views of the government.
“It seems that they don’t want to face up to public opinion, so they’re doing this to scare us, and ‘deal with’ the Hong Kong Public Opinion Research Institute,” he said. “It’s kind of tedious.”
‘Long-arm’ law enforcement
Exiled Hong Kong democracy activists have called for an international effort to combat the threat of Beijing’s “long-arm” law enforcement beyond its borders, saying recent bounties on the heads of 19 people are deliberately intended to create a “chilling effect” on activists everywhere.
The move came after police questioned Chung’s wife and son and former colleague Robert Chung earlier this month, as part of a “national security police investigation.”
Chung announced he had left the city on April 24, 2022, to “live for a while in the U.K.”
In a Facebook post announcing his departure, Chung said he didn’t want to “desert” his home city, but “had no other option.”
He ran afoul of the authorities early in December 2021, ahead of the first-ever elections for the Legislative Council to exclude pro-democracy candidates in a system that ensures only “patriots” loyal to Beijing can stand.
Chung was hauled in for questioning after pro-Beijing figures criticized him for including a question in a survey about whether voters intended to cast blank ballots in the election, which critics said could amount to “incitement” to subvert the voting system under the national security law.
Nineteen people now have HK$1 million (US$130,000) bounties on their heads following two previous announcements in July and December 2023.
‘Seditious intention’
Meanwhile, national security police said they had also arrested a 36-year-old man in Eastern District on Jan. 21 on suspicion of “knowingly publishing publications that had a seditious intent,” a charge under the Safeguarding National Security Law, known as Article 23.
The content of the publications had “provoked hatred towards the Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, the Hong Kong Police Force and the Judiciary, as well as called for sanctions against government officials and inciting violence,” police said in a statement dated Jan. 22.
“Police remind members of the public that “knowingly publishing publications that had a seditious intention” is a serious crime,” the statement said, warning that offenders could face jail terms of seven years on their first conviction.
“Members of the public are urged not to defy the law,” it said.
More than 10,000 people have been arrested and at least 2,800 prosecuted in a citywide crackdown in the wake of the 2019 protest movement, mostly under public order charges.
Nearly 300 have been arrested under 2020 National Security Law, according to the online magazine ChinaFile.
Translated by Luisetta Mudie. Edited by Roseanne Gerin.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by Lee Heung Yeung and Matthew Leung for RFA Cantonese.
A Just Stop Oil supporter has been arrested on suspicion of planning to organise and/or attend a protest at a UK airport last year. In the latest episode of the ongoing farce that is the UK state – something Alan Ayckbourn would struggle to parody – Joe was nicked in some bizarre pre-crime maneuver by the police.
Just Stop Oil: nicked by the UK pre-crime division
Just Stop Oil shared a clip of Joe’s arrest on X. In it, he said:
It’s been alleged that I’ve been involved in plots of protests at airports about a year ago, and now the police have turned up at my door unannounced, told me they’re going to bash the door down, and are currently going through my room.
BREAKING: MET POLICE RAID JUST STOP OIL SUPPORTER'S HOME
Joe was arrested this morning for allegedly thinking about taking nonviolent action at airports last year.
At this point, it is unclear just what protest, if any, Joe was involved in.
As the Canarydocumented across 2024, Just Stop Oil joined around 21 groups across 12 countries. They staged a range of interventions at 19 international airports across the summer last year, causing serious disruption and having a global impact.
For example, in August six supporters of Just Stop Oil nonviolently blocked the departure gates at Heathrow Airport, causing delays:
Dozens of people were arrested. One of those nicked at Heathrow was Di Bligh who was formerly CEO of Reading Borough Council. She said:
Climate breakdown is endangering all we love. Starvation already threatens those who have done the least to cause this mess. Billions will be on the move as they try to find land they can cultivate, water to drink- any safe place.
Electric cars and windfarms won’t do it: governments must act together before we reach more tipping points into chaos than we can prevent. We need our political leaders to act now, by working with other nations to establish a legally binding treaty to stop the extraction and burning of oil, gas and coal by 2030.
However, Joe did not actively take part in a protest – yet cops have nicked him, anyway. Thanks to the government, though, police are allowed to do this – and already have.
Not the first time
As the Canary previously reported, in August 2024 police arrested four Just Stop Oil supporters near Manchester airport on suspicion of conspiring to cause a public nuisance. That is, they were planning to non-violently disrupt Manchester Airport. Police said it was because Just Stop Oil’s actions “would have brought significant delays”.
As you may well remember, this was at the same time police lost control of parts of the UK to far-right race riots.
Yet cops see fit to arrest Just Stop Oil supporters around the notion of pre-crime. And now, Joe is yet another victim of this authoritarian mindset that’s now infesting the UK. We have of course been here before. My late father, a prominent member of the UK Communist Party in the 1950s and 60s, would always recount stories of their meetings where the chair would, during the introduction, give:
A special welcome to our friends at the back.
The friends were, of course, Special Branch – and as the Spycops saga shows the state has always infiltrated anyone who it deems is or could in the future be a threat to it.
However, this pre-emptive action by cops is hitting another level of repression.
Just Stop Oil: martyrs for us all?
As Joe summed up:
Six police officers turned up for an alleged potential protest over a year ago… You can decide whether that’s a good use of resources.
Any rational, decent person would say ‘no’. But despite the planet burning, non-human animals becoming extinct, and marginalised people being further abused and repressed around the world – apparently it’s some kid with a hi-vis and orange leaflets that’s the problem.
Three Youth Demand supporters defied Met Police restrictions on the Palestinian Solidarity Campaign (PSC) demonstration on Saturday 18 January by standing outside the BBC with signs. Youth Demand are calling for a two-way arms embargo on Israel and for the new UK government to halt all new oil and gas licences granted since 2021.
Youth Demand: not letting the BBC get away with it
At around 4:00pm, the three were arrested under Section 14 of the Public Order Act after marching to the BBC and standing on the pavement with signs, defying the conditions imposed on the protest by the Met. One Youth Demand supporter was holding a sign saying “Can I protest here?”, another held a completely blank sign.
A Vietnamese government restructuring proposal includes the shifting of authority over state-owned MobiFone –- the country’s third-largest telecommunications provider –- to the Ministry of Public Security.
Such a move could allow the ministry to easily obtain personal information for police investigations, several commentators on Radio Free Asia’s Facebook page said this week.
Those fears are partly based on the government’s recent efforts to tighten control on what can be posted on global internet sites such as YouTube.
Vietnamese authorities can demand access to that information. The decree raised concerns about the government’s growing use of the law to crack down on freedom of expression.
Why is Vietnam streamlining its government?
General Secretary To Lam announced the ambitious state restructuring in December. The plan includes the elimination of parliamentary committees, the shuttering of government offices and party committees and the closure or consolidation of five of 21 ministries, according to state media. The number of civil servants is expected to be reduced by a fifth.
To Lam’s goal is to complete the plan before the next Communist Party of Vietnam National Congress, planned for early 2026, according to Carl Thayer, a veteran Vietnam watcher and emeritus professor at the University of New South Wales in Canberra, Australia. The Congress is expected to decide whether to elect him to a full term at that time.
Vietnam’s General Secretary of the Communist Party To Lam at the National Assembly in Hanoi, Vietnam, Oct. 21, 2024.(Minh Hoang/AP)
To Lam was named to the most powerful position in the country in August following the death of his predecessor. He told state media at the time that large national institutions like the government must change before Vietnam can become a wealthy, democratic, just and civilized country.
The restructuring aligns with the party’s goal of transforming Vietnam into a high middle-income country with modernized industries by 2030 and a developed, high-income nation by 2045, Thayer said.
To Lam also pledged in August to build a strong Communist Party of Vietnam, according to state media.
Why would the Ministry of Public Security be given authority over MobiFone ?
In 2016, MobiFone acquired 95 percent of Audio Visual Global JSC, or AVG, a privately run company that provided a paid television service. MobiFone intended to rebrand the television service to “MobiTV.”
A follow-up police investigation found that more than US$3 million in bribes were paid to the then-minister of information and a top deputy to approve the sale without seeking proper permission from the Ministry of Public Security.
The Vietnam Government Inspectorate later found that AVG was in poor financial condition. The sale was nullified, resulting in the loss of more than US$300 million to the state budget.
To Lam, who was a top deputy at the Ministry of Public Security at the time, is believed to have been involved in the signing of official documents in late 2015 that paved the way for the deal.
One document affirmed that the agreement complied with existing laws and regulations and stated that the sale price was reasonable. The document was classified as secret. Another document signed by To Lam in March 2015 was also classified as secret and directed the Ministry of Information to prohibit media organizations from reporting on the sale.
To Lam was never charged or implicated in the investigation, which resulted in long prison terms for the two Ministry of Information officials. His recent rise to the top of Vietnam’s leadership came amid an anti-corruption campaign that saw eight members of the Politburo resign between December 2022 and May 2024.
MobiFone remains profitable, which could benefit the Ministry of Public Security and help strengthen To Lam’s continued influence within the police force.
Will MobiFone users stay with its cellphone service?
A Hanoi lawyer who has used MobiFone’s cellphone plans for five years said he was concerned that the Ministry of Public Security “could directly access user databases” -– something that could “undermine the privacy and security of customers’ personal data,” he said.
“They could monitor users without their knowledge,” he told RFA, requesting anonymity for personal reasons.
Le Hong Phong, a security guard in Hanoi, said he has been using MobiFone for over 20 years but would switch providers immediately if it is officially transferred to the Ministry of Public Security because he doesn’t police to use “users’ information against themselves.”
But one commentator on RFA’s Facebook page said this week that if people don’t break the law, they shouldn’t be worried about government monitoring.
“If I don’t break the law and live by it, why should I be afraid of using MobiFone’s service?” said the commentator whose user name was listed as T.V.
Another Facebook commentator, X.L., noted that other mobile networks in Vietnam are also assumed to include some kind of government surveillance of private data.
“Every provider requires users to register with their names and take photos of their faces and IDs,” he said. “Things are fully monitored.”
Translated by Anna Vu. Edited by Matt Reed.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by RFA Vietnamese.
Various news outlets reported on January 7 that a 36-year-old woman from Hardoi in Uttar Pradesh had allegedly left her husband and six children, and eloped with a beggar.
ABP News published a report on this event, noting that the husband, identified as Raju, had filed a police complaint, under Section 87 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, which pertains to the crime of abducting a woman. The husband had suspected his wife, Rajeshwari, of an extramarital affair with a man named Nanhe Pandit, who sometimes used to beg in the neighbourhood. (Archive)
Deccan Herald reported that the 36-year-old woman had often been seen talking with the Pandit for long hours, but little did the family apprehend that the two could fall in love with each other. (Archive)
Besides, various other popular news outlets in India, like Times Now, Jansatta, News 18, reported on this incident from Uttar Pradesh, alleging that the woman had eloped with a beggar, deserting her husband and six children. (Archived links: 1, 2, 3)
A keyword search in Hindi led us to a clarification, issued by the verified X account of Hardoi Police (@hardoipolice). It states that on January 5, a man named Raju, from Lamkan village in the district of Hardoi, had filed a report at the Harpalpur police station, claiming that his wife Rajeshwari had absconded with a man named Nanhe Pandit, along with all the money in their house.
Rajeshwari, on being notified that a case had been registered by her husband, turned herself in voluntarily at the Harpalpur police station, and clarified that she had left her husband because of his abusive tendencies. Angered by the fact that he would frequently mistreat her and beat her up, Rajeshwari had left her home and gone to stay at her relative’s house, in Farrukhabad. The police statement clearly states that allegations levelled against the woman of eloping with someone were false and baseless.
कतिपय सोशल मीडिया प्लेटफॉर्म पर थाना हरपालपुर क्षेत्रांतर्गत वायरल खबर के संबंध में- pic.twitter.com/NdqGApUmMI
In short, the viral claim that a 36-year-old woman had left with a beggar deserting her husband and six children is false. The woman, identified as Rajeshwari, had gone to a relative’s house, to escape her husband’s abuse and physical violence.
Clarification Issued by India Today and The Times of India
The official X handle of India Today (@IndiaToday) had shared the viral claim on January 7. However, after the clarification issued by Hardoi Police, the news outlet tweeted an update.
UPDATE: A Hardoi man’s allegations of his wife eloping with a beggar were dismissed by @hardoipolice as ‘baseless’ after the woman appeared before the cops and accused him of abuse and provided her side of the story. https://t.co/J9ptectrWLpic.twitter.com/pRtUEKciZo
Times of India (@timesofindia) was another news outlet that misreported the incident. Upon the disclosure of Rajeshwari’s account, they also updated their story. The original tweet, however, is still live and provides no clarification on the event.
#UttarPradesh | A 36-year-old woman from #Hardoi district, reportedly absconded with a beggar after leaving her husband and six children behind.
Her husband filed an FIR, suspecting the beggar, who often visited their neighborhood.
British director of Human Rights Watch attacks ‘dangerous hypocrisy’ of government
Britain’s crackdown on climate protest is setting “a dangerous precedent” around the world and undermining democratic rights, the UK director of Human Rights Watch has said.
Yasmine Ahmed accused the Labour government of hypocrisy over its claims to be committed to human rights and international law.
The voter turnout at the last election was less than 50 percent but Malessas is optimistic participation today will be high.
He urged voters to go and exercise their democratic right.
“This country — we own it, it’s ours. If we just sit and complain that, this, that and the other thing aren’t good but then don’t contribute to making decisions then we will never change,” Malessas said.
Not everybody convinced
But not everybody is convinced that proceeding with the election was the right decision.
The president of the Port Vila Council of Women, Jane Iatika, said many families were still grieving, traumatised and struggling to put food on the table.
“If they were thinking about the people they would have [postponed] the election and dealt with the disaster first,” she said.
“Like right now if a mother goes and lines up to vote in the election — when they come back home what are they going to eat?”
This is the second consecutive time Vanuatu’s Parliament has been dissolved in the face of political instability.
And the country has had four prime ministerial changes in as many years.
The chairman of the Seaside Tongoa community, Paul Fred Tariliu,. said people were starting to lose faith in leadership, not just in Parliament but at the community level as well.
Urging candidates to ‘be humble’
He said they had been urging their candidates to be humble and concede defeat if they found themselves short of the numbers needed to rule.
“Instead of just going [into Parliament] for a short time [then] finding out they don’t have the numbers and dissolving Parliament,” Tariliu said.
“We are wasting money.
“When we continue with this kind of attitude people lose their trust in us [community] leaders and our national leaders.”
The official results of the last election in 2022 show a low voter turnout of just over 44 percent with the lowest participation in the country, just 34 percent, registered here in the capital Port Vila.
The Owen Hall polling station in Port Vila, Vanuatu. Image: Koroi Hawkins/RNZ Pacific
Conducting the election itself is a complicated logistical exercise with 352 polling stations spread out over the 12,000-sq km archipelago manned by 1700 polling officials and an additional one in Nouméa for citizens residing in New Caledonia.
Proxy voting is also being facilitated for workers overseas.
360 police for security
Deputy Police Commissioner Operations Kalo Willie Ben said more than 360 police officers had been deployed to provide security for the election process.
He said there were no active security threats for the election, but he said they were prepared to deploy more resources to any part of the country should the need arise.
“My advice [to the public] is that we conduct ourselves peacefully and raise any issues through the election dispute process,” Kalo Willie Ben said.
The head of the government Recovery Unit, Peter Korisa, said according to their initial estimates it would cost just over US$230 million to fully rebuild the capital after the earthquake.
Korisa said they were getting backlash for the indefinite closure of the CBD but continued to work diligently to ensure that, whatever government comes to power this month, it would be presented with a clear recovery plan.
“We still have a bit of funding but there is a greater challenge because we need to have a government in place so that we can trigger the bigger funding,” Korisa said.
Polling stations close at 4:30pm local time.
Unofficial check count
Principal electoral officer Malessas said an unofficial count would be conducted at all polling station venues before ballot boxes were transported back to the capital Port Vila for the official tally.
According to parliamentary standing orders, the first sitting of the new Parliament must be called within 21 days of the official election results being declared.
A spokesperson for the caretaker government has confirmed to RNZ Pacific that constitutional amendments aimed at curbing political instability would apply after the snap election.
The most immediate impact of these amendments will be that all independent MPs, and MPs who are the only member of their party or custom movement, must affiliate themselves with a larger political party for the full term of Parliament.
They also lock MPs into political parties with any defection or removal from a party resulting in the MP concerned losing their seat in Parliament.
However, the amendments do not prohibit entire parties from crossing the floor to either side so long as they do it as a united group.
It remains to be seen how effective the amendments will be in curbing instability.
The only real certainty provided by the constitution after this snap election is that the option to dissolve Parliament will not be available for the next 12 months.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
To make good on the promise implicit in the “Secure DC Omnibus Crime Bill ,” to intensify its war on the Black working class, the DC government is now targeting anyone who can’t afford to pay for public transportation.
In December 2024, a new enforcement campaign was launched called “Operation Fare Pays for Your Service” professing an intention to decrease fare evasion on DC’s Metrobus system. The Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA) argues that increased fare enforcement is necessary after reporting that more than 70% of metrobus riders do not pay their fare, and claiming a $50 million dollar loss in annual revenue.
Palestine Action targeted the new London premises of an Elbit Director’s consultancy firm, Eagle Strategic Consulting Limited, on Tuesday 14 January. However, at the same time in Bristol cops were ‘visiting’ the venue where a group meeting is being held in Bristol. Coincidence?
Palestine Action: smashing the genocide enablers
Palestine Action activists shattered the windows and sprayed the company’s new London address in red paint to symbolise the company’s continued complicity in Palestinian bloodshed:
BREAKING: Palestine Action target the new London address of an Elbit director's weapons consultancy firm.
Eagle Strategic is owned by Richard Applegate, the former chairman and current 'Head of Strategy & New Business' for the British division of Israel's biggest arms firm. pic.twitter.com/0zpdx4Jdu0
Eagle Strategic acts as a consultancy firm for weapons manufacturers and is wholly owned by Richard Applegate, the former Chairman and current ‘head of strategy and new business’ for Israeli weapons firm Elbit Systems UK. This is the second time his lobbying company have been targeted by the direct action network, with Palestine Action shattering windows and spray painting the building of the Dorset premises in March 2024.
Applegate has a long history of lobbying for the Israeli arms company, previously boasting about pulling off a covert political lobbying campaign which secured a £500m from the MOD, by ensuring his “fingerprints weren’t over any of it”. He was caught by journalists admitting that he had applied pressure by “infecting” the system at “every level”.
According to Israeli media, Elbit provides up to 80% of the Israeli military’s land based military equipment and 85% of its military drones. It supplies vast numbers of munitions and missiles – including the ‘Iron Sting’ recently developed and deployed for the first time in the 2023-2024 Genocide in Gaza, along with wide categories of surveillance technologies, targeting systems, and innumerate other armaments.
Cops trying to disrupt legitimate assembly
Meanwhile, as Palestine Action posted, cops visited Head First Bristol; a venue that is hosting a meeting of the group:
BREAKING: The police visited the venue of a scheduled Palestine Action talk and attempted to question the venue on their affiliation to our direct action group.
As ever, we refuse to be intimidated and look forward to the event tonight organised by Bristol Transformed.
Called “Smashing the genocide-industrial complex“, the meeting will look at what activists can learn “about effective direct action from the courageous efforts of Palestine Action?”. No wonder the cops weren’t happy.
The venue and the group refused to be intimidated, however, and the meeting is due to go ahead as planned.
A Palestine Action spokesperson said:
We remain committed to targeting all firms and associations which enable Israel’s weapons trade to continue fuelling genocide. There is no space for war criminals on our streets and those responsible for mass murder must be held accountable. Applegate can’t hide behind his consulting firm and changing its premise doesn’t change a thing. We’ve hit Eagle Strategic before, we’ll hit them again and we’ll keep taking action until we’ve shut down Elbit Systems for good.
While mediator Qatar says a Gaza ceasefire deal is at the closest point it has been in the past few months — adding that many of the obstacles in the negotiations have been ironed out — a special report for Drop Site News reveals the escalation in attacks on Palestinians in Jenin in the occupied West Bank.
SPECIAL REPORT:By Mariam Barghouti in Jenin for Drop Site News
On December 28, 21-year-old Palestinian journalist Shatha Sabbagh was standing on the stairs of her home on the outskirts of the Jenin refugee camp when she was shot and killed.
The bullets weren’t fired by Israeli troops but, according to eyewitnesses and forensic evidence, by Palestinian Authority security forces.
The Palestinian Authority has been conducting a large-scale military operation in Jenin since early December, dubbing it “Operation Homeland Protection”.
A stronghold of Palestinian armed resistance in the occupied West Bank, the city of Jenin and the refugee camp within it have been repeatedly raided, bombed, and besieged by the Israeli military in an attempt to crush the Jenin Brigade — a politically diverse militant group of mostly third-generation refugees who believe armed resistance is key to liberating Palestinian lands from Israeli occupation and annexation.
Over the past 15 months, the Israeli military has killed at least 225 Palestinians in Jenin, making it the deadliest area in the West Bank.
The real aim, residents say, is to crush Palestinian armed resistance at the behest of Israel. Dubbed the “Wasps’ Nest” by Israeli officials, Jenin refugee camp has posed a constant threat to Israel’s settler colonial project.
But the current operation, which is being billed as a campaign to “restore law and order,” is the longest and most lethal assault by Palestinian security forces in recent memory. While the PA claims to be rooting out armed factions and individuals accused of being “Iranian-backed outlaws,” according to multiple residents and eyewitnesses, the operation is a suffocating siege, with indiscriminate violence, mass arrests, and collective punishment.
Sixteen Palestinians have been killed so far, with security forces setting up checkpoints around the city and refugee camp, cutting electricity to the area, and engaging in fierce gun battles. Among those killed are six members of the security forces and one resistance fighter, Yazeed Ja’aysa.
Yet the overwhelming majority of those killed have been civilians, including Sabbagh, and at least three children — Majd Zeidan, 16, Qasm Hajj, 14, and Mohammad Al-Amer, 13.
“It’s reached levels I have never seen before. Even journalists aren’t allowed to cover it,” M., 24, a local journalist and resident of Jenin, told Drop Site News on condition of anonymity for fear of being arrested or targeted by PA security forces.
Dozens of residents, including journalists, have been arrested from Jenin and across the West Bank by the PA in the past six weeks under the pretext of supporting the so-called Iranian-backed “outlaws.”
PA security forces spokesperson Brigadier-General Anwar Rajab has justified the assault as “in response to the supreme national interest of the Palestinian people, and within the framework of ongoing continued efforts to maintain security and civil peace, establish the rule of law, and eradicate sedition and chaos”.
‘Wasps’ Nest’ threat to Israel’s settler colonial project
But the real aim, residents say, is to crush Palestinian armed resistance at the behest of Israel. Dubbed the “Wasps’ Nest” by Israeli officials, Jenin refugee camp has posed a constant threat to Israel’s settler colonial project.
Just one week into the operation, on December 12, PA security forces shot and killed the first civilian, 19-year-old Ribhi Shalabi, and injured his 15-year-old brother in the head. Although the PA initially denied killing Shalabi and claimed he was targeting its security forces with IEDs, video captured by CCTV shows Ribhi being shot execution-style while riding his Vespa.
The PA later admitted to killing Shalabi, saying “the Palestinian National Authority bears full responsibility for his martyrdom, and announces that it is committed to dealing with the repercussions of the incident in a manner consistent with and in accordance with the law, ensuring justice and respect for rights”.
Just two days later, the PA began escalating their attack on Jenin. At approximately 5:00 am on December 14, the Palestinian Authority officially declared the large-scale operation, dubbing it “Himayat Watan” or “Homeland Protection.”
By 8:00 am, Jenin refugee camp was under siege and two more Palestinians had been killed, including prominent Palestinian resistance fighter Yazeed Ja’aisa, and 13-year-old Mohammad Al-Amer. At least two other children were injured with live ammunition.
The roads leading to Jenin are now riddled with Israeli checkpoints while the entrance to the city is surrounded by PA armoured vehicles and security forces brandishing assault rifles, their faces hidden behind black balaclavas.
Eerily reminiscent of past Israeli incursions, snipers fire continuously from within the PA security headquarters toward the refugee camp just to the west, sending the sound of live ammunition echoing through the city. The PA also imposed a curfew on the city of Jenin, warning residents that anyone moving in the streets would be shot.
PA counterterrorism units have also been stationed at the entrance to Jenin’s public hospital, while the National Guard blocked roads with armoured vehicles and personnel carriers, denying entry to journalists.
When I attempted to reach the hospital on December 14 with another journalist to gather information for Drop Site on the injuries sustained during the earlier firefight and follow up on the killing of Al-Amer, the 13-year-old, armed and masked PA security forces claimed the area was a closed security zone. When we attempted to carry out field interviews outside the camp instead, two armed men in civilian clothing who identified themselves as members of the mukhabarat — Palestinian General Intelligence — requested that we leave the area.
“If you stay here, you might get shot by the outlaws,” he warned. Yet, from where we stood between the hospital, the PA security headquarters, and Jenin refugee camp, the only bullets being fired were coming from the direction of the PA headquarters towards the camp.
PA security forces also appear to have been using one of the hospital wards as a makeshift detention center where detainees are being mistreated. While Brigadier-General Rajab, the PA’s spokesperson, denied this; several young men detained by the PA told Drop Site they were taken to the third floor of Jenin public hospital where they were interrogated and beaten.
“They kept asking me about the fighters,” said A., a 31-year-old medical service provider from Jenin refugee camp, who says he was held for hours, blindfolded, and denied legal representation.
“They kept beating me, cursing at me, asking me questions that I don’t have answers for.”
Fear of being arrested, abused again
Since his arbitrary detention, A. has not returned to work out of fear of being arrested and abused again.
According to residents, the PA also stationed snipers in the hospital, firing at the camp from inside the facility. During the past six weeks, according to interviews with several medics in Jenin, PA security forces shot at medics, burned two medical vehicles, beat paramedics, and detained medical workers throughout the siege.
“What exactly are they protecting?” Abu Yasir, 50, asks as he stands outside the hospital, waiting for any news of the security operation to end.
A father of three, Abu Yasir grew up in the Jenin refugee camp. “There are people being killed in the camp just for being there. They didn’t do anything,” he told Drop Site as he burst into tears.
By December 14, with Operation Homeland Protection entering its 10th day, families in the refugee camp had run out of food, the chronically ill needed life-saving medication, and with electricity and water punitively cut from the camp, families found themselves under siege and increasingly desperate.
Women and their children tried to protest in an attempt to break the PA-imposed blockade. They also wanted to challenge the PA’s claim of targeting outlaws. As the women gathered in the dark towards the edge of the camp, several men worked to fix an electricity box to restore power to the camp.
When the lights came on, cheers echoed in the camp — but barely 15 minutes later, PA forces shot at the box, plunging the area into darkness again.
Denying electricity for families
According to residents of the camp, over the course of 10 days, the PA shot at the electric power boxes more than a dozen times, denying families electricity just as temperatures began to plummet.
Elderly women confronted soldiers of the Special Administrative Tasks squad (SAT), a specialised branch of the PA security forces, SAT is trained by the Office of the United States Security Coordinator (USSC) and is responsible for coordinating operations with the United States and Israel, including joint-operations and intelligence sharing.
“I yelled at them,” said Umm Salamah, 62. “They burst through the door, and at first, I thought they were Israelis’” she told Drop Site, pointing to the destroyed door. “I told them I have children in the house. But they forced their way in.
“I told them we already have the Israeli army constantly raiding us, and now you?”
Not only were homes raided, according to Umm Salameh, but PA security forces also fired at water tanks, effectively cutting water supplies to the camp. Jenin refugee camp had already been severely damaged in the last Israeli invasion, during which Israeli military and border-police bulldozed the city’s civilian infrastructure, turning streets into hills of rubble.
Operation Homeland Protection comes just three months following “Operation Summer Camps,” Israel’s large-scale military operation between August and October.
Under the pretext of targeting “Iran-backed terrorists,” Israeli forces destroyed large swathes of civilian infrastructure in the northern districts of the West Bank, namely Jenin, Tulkarem, Nablus and Tubas, and killed more than 150 Palestinians over three months, a fifth of whom were children.
Protest over ‘outlaws’ framing
Outside in the mud-filled streets, the group of women began to chant “Kateebeh!” (Brigade) in support of the Jenin Brigade, and in protest of the PA’s attempt to frame them as “outlaws” and a “threat to national security.”
Within minutes, the SAT unit responded with teargas and stun grenades fired directly at the crowd, which included journalists clearly marked with fluorescent PRESS insignia. While elderly women tripped and fell to the ground, children ran back towards the camp as PA security forces kept lobbing stun grenades at the fleeing crowd.
In an interview with Drop Site that evening, Brigadier-General Rajab affirmed that “this operation comes to achieve its goals which are the reclaiming of safety and security of Palestinians and reclaiming Jenin refugee camp from the outlaws that kidnapped it and spread corruption in it while threatening the lives of civilians.”
Days later, the PA had expanded its operations to Tulkarem, where clashes between resistance fighters and PA security forces erupted on December 19. This came just one day following an Israeli airstrike which killed three Palestinian fighters in Tulkarem refugee camp: Dusam Al-Oufi, Mohammad Al-Oufi, and Mohammad Rahayma.
On December 22, Saher Irheil, a Palestinian officer in the PA’s presidential guard was killed in Jenin, and two others injured.
According to official state media and statements by the PA, Lieutenant Irheil was killed by the “outlaws” of Jenin refugee camp. Brigadier-General Rajab claimed “this heinous crime will only increase [the PA’s] determination to pursue those outside the law and impose the rule of law, in order to preserve the security and safety of our people.”
By military order, speakers from mosques across the West Bank echoed in a public tribute to the fallen officer. The same was not done for those killed by the PA, including Shalabi, the 19-year-old whom the PA dubbed “a martyr of the nation” after being forced to admit they killed him.
That week, PA security forces escalated their attack on the Jenin refugee camp, using rocket-propelled grenades and firing indiscriminately at families sheltering in their own homes. PA security officers even posted photos and videos of themselves online, similar to those taken by Israeli soldiers while invading the camp in August and September.
On December 23, security forces shot and killed 16-year-old Majd Zeidan while he was returning to his home from a nearby corner store. The PA claimed Zeidan was an Iranian-backed saboteur.
Killed teenager had bag of chips
“They killed him, then said he was a 26-year-old Iranian-backed outlaw,” Zeidan’s mother, Yusra, told Drop Site. “Look,” she said while pulling her son’s ID card from her pocket. “My son was 16 years old, killed while returning from the store with a bag of chips.”
According to Yusra, not only was her son killed, but her brother who lives in Nablus, was arrested by the PA a few days later for holding a wake for his slain nephew.
“The Preventative Security are detaining my brother because he was mourning a mukhareb,” she said. The term “mukhareb” which roughly translates to “saboteur” is a term derived from the Israeli term “mekhablim” which is commonly used when arresting Palestinians.
The funeral of journalist Shatha Sabbagh who was shot and killed on December 28 in Jenin. The journalist carrying her body the next day on the left (Jarrah Khallaf) was later arrested by the PA. Image: The photographer chose to remain anonymous for fear of reprisal by the PA/Drop Site News
A few days later, on December 28, Shatha Sabbagh, a young journalist, was shot and killed as she stood on the stairs of her home at the edges of the camp. Official PA statements claim that Sabbagh was killed by resistance fighters, not its security forces.
However, accounts by eyewitnesses and the victim’s family belie those claims.
According to testimonies from her family and residents, Sabbagh was killed while holding her 18-month-old nephew; her sister lives nearby, on Mahyoub Street in the refugee camp — the same area PA snipers were targeting. Initial autopsy findings shared with Drop Site show that the bullet that struck her came from the area in which PA snipers were positioned in the camp.
Known for her reliable reporting during both Israeli and PA raids on Jenin, local residents claim that PA loyalists had been inciting against Sabbagh for some time. Further inflaming tensions, Sabbagh’s killing underscored the risks faced by Palestinian journalists in documenting what the PA would rather conceal.
Soon afterward, Brigadier-General Rajab spoke about the killing of Sabbagh in a live interview with Al Jazeera. He turned off his camera and left the interview, however, as soon as Sabbagh’s mother was brought on air. Sabbagh’s mother, Umm Al-Mutasem, was next to her daughter when she was killed.
On January 5, the Magistrate Court of Ramallah announced a suspension of Al Jazeera’s broadcasting operations in the West Bank, citing a “failure to meet regulations.” This move followed Israel’s closure of Al Jazeera offices during Operation Summer Camps in September of last year.
100 Palestinians arrested in operation
The Preventative Security, an internal intelligence organisation led by the Minister of Interior, and part of the Palestinian Security Services, arrested more than a hundred Palestinians as part of Operation Homeland Protection, including five journalists in Nablus and Jenin. Palestinians were summoned and interrogated, at times tortured, and detained without legal representation.
The PA not only targeted residents of the camp, but also expanded its repressive campaign to target anyone that would sympathise with the camp or is suspected of having any solidarity with the armed resistance.
Amro Shami, 22, who was arrested by the PA from his home in Jenin on December 25 had markings of torture on his body during his court hearing in the Nablus Court the following day. Shami was reported to have bruising on his body and was unable to lift his arms in court.
Despite appeals by his lawyer, the court denied Amro release on bail. Amro’s lawyer was only able to visit 15 days later when he reported additional torture against Amro, including breaking his leg.
An armed resistance fighter of the Jenin Brigade in Jenin refugee camp last month. Image: The photographer chose to remain anonymous for fear of reprisal by the PA/Drop Site News
At the very end of December, as the operation stretched into its fifth week, journalists were able to enter the camp at their own risk. With water and electricity cut off, families huddled outside, burning wood and paper in old metal barrels to try and keep warm.
The camp reeked with uncollected trash piled in the alleyways due to the PA cutting all social services from the camp.
Inside the camp, armed resistance fighters patrolled the streets. After confirming our IDs as journalists they helped us move safely in the dark.
“In the beginning there were clashes between the Brigade and the PA, but we told them we are willing to collaborate with anything that does not harm the community,” H., a 26-year-old fighter with the brigade, told Drop Site. The young fighter was referring to the PA’s claims that they are targeting “outlaws”, in which the Jenin Brigade agreed to hand over anyone that is indeed breaking the law.
However, the PA seemed more interested in the resistance fighters.
Spokesmen of the Jenin Brigade have made several public statements informing the PA that as long as the operation was not targeting resistance efforts, they would fully comply and coordinate to ensure law and order.
‘We are with the law . . . but which law?’
“We are with the law, we are not outside the law. We are with the enforcement of law, but which law? When an Israeli jeep comes into Jenin to kill me, where are you as law enforcement?”
Abu Issam, a spokesman for the Jenin Brigade told Drop Site: “As I speak right now, the PA armoured vehicles and jeeps are parked over our planted IEDs, and we are not detonating them,” he said.
A former member of the PA presidential guard, Abu Issam is no stranger to the PA’s repressive tactics to quell resistance.
“Our compass is clear, it’s against the occupation,” he said. “Come protect us from the Israeli settlers, and by all means here is my gun as a gift. Get them out of our lands, and execute me.
“We were surprised with the demands of the PA. They offered us three choices: to turn ourselves in along with our weapons, offering us jobs for amnesty; to leave the camp and allow the PA to take over; or to confront them.
“We have no choice but to confront,” he says, holding his M16 to his chest. “We want a dignified life, a free life, not a life of security coordination with our oppressors,” H. said.
By the second week of January, not only did the PA expand its security operations to Tulkarem and Tubas, but intensified its violence against Palestinians in Jenin refugee camp as well.
On January 3, PA snipers shot and killed 43-year-old Mahmoud Al-Jaqlamousi and his 14-year-son, Qasm, as they were gathering water. Two days later, PA security forces began burning homes of residents near the Ghubz quarter of the camp.
“Why burn it? I didn’t build this home in an hour, it was years of work, why burn it?” Issam Abu Ameira asks while standing in front of the charred walls of his home.
The operation, ostensibly intended to restore security and order, has instead brought devastation, raising troubling questions about governance and resistance in the West Bank.
“This is not solely the PA. This is also the United States and Israel’s attempt to crush resistance in the West Bank,” H. said. Like him, other fighters find the timing of the operation to be questionable.
“This is an organisation that negotiated with the occupation for more than 30 years, but can’t sit and talk with the Jenin refugee camp for 30 hours?” Abu Al-Nathmi, a spokesperson for the Jenin Brigade, said as he huddled inside the camp while fighters patrolled around us and live ammunition fired continuously in the area.
‘PA acting like group of gangs’
“The PA is acting like a group of gangs, each trying to prove their power and dominance at the expense of Jenin refugee camp,” Abu Al-Nathmi tells Drop Site. “Right now the PA is trying to prove itself to the United States to take over Gaza, but there was no position taken to defend Gaza.”
While the PA continued its attack on Jenin refugee camp, the Israeli military waged military operations on the neighboring villages of Jenin, as well as Tubas and Tulkarem where 11 Palestinians were killed in the first week of January, three of whom were children.
In the 39 days since the PA launched Operation Homeland Protection, more than 40 Palestinians have been killed by the Israeli military in the West Bank, including six children. Over that same time period, Israeli courts have issued confiscation orders for thousands of hectares of land belonging to Palestinians in the West Bank.
The PA is failing to provide protection to the Palestinian people against continuous settler expansion and amid an ongoing genocide in Gaza, residents of the Jenin refugee camp say.
“The PA is claiming they don’t want what happened to Gaza to happen here, but here we are dying a hundred times,” Abu Amjad, 50, told Drop Site. Huddled near a fire outside the rubble of his home, he cries “we are being humiliated, attacked, beaten, and told there’s nothing we can do about it. In this way, it’s better to die.”
Mariam Barghouti is a writer and a journalist based in the West Bank. She is a member of the Marie Colvin Journalist Network. This article was first published by Drop News.
For 30 years, Filipino journalist Manny “Bok” Mogato covered the police and defence rounds, and everything from politics to foreign relations, sports, and entertainment, eventually bagging one of journalism’s top prizes — the Pulitzer in 2018, for his reporting on Duterte’s drug war along with two other Reuters correspondents, Andrew Marshall and Clare Baldwin.
For Mogato it was time for him to “write it all down,” and so he did, launching the autobiography It’s Me, Bok! Journeys in Journalism in October 2024.
Mogato told Rappler, he wanted to “write it all down before I forget and impart my knowledge to the youth, young journalists, so they won’t make the same mistakes that I did”.
His career has spanned many organisations, including the Journal group, The Manila Chronicle, The Manila Times, Japan’s Asahi Shimbun, and Rappler. Outside of journalism, he also serves as a consultant for Cignal TV.
Recently, we sat down with Mogato to talk about his career — a preview of what you might be able to read in his book — and pick out a few lessons for today’s journalists, as well as his views on the country today.
You’ve covered so many beats. Which beat did you enjoy covering most?
Manny Mogato: The military. Technically, I was assigned to the military defence beat for only a few years, from 1987 to 1992. In early 1990, FVR (Fidel V. Ramos) was running for president, and I was made to cover his campaign.
When he won, I was assigned to cover the military, and I went back to the defence beat because I had so many friends there.
‘We faced several coups’
I really enjoyed it and still enjoy it because you go to places, to military camps. And then I also covered the defence beat at the most crucial and turbulent period in our history — when we faced several coups.
Rappler: You have mellowed through the years as a reporter. You chronicled in your book that when you were younger, you were learning the first two years about the police beat and then transferred to another publication.
How did your reporting style mellow, or did it grow? Did you become more curious or did you become less curious? Over the years as a reporter, did you become more or less interested in what was happening around you?
MM: Curiosity is the word I would use. So, from the start until now, I am still curious about things happening around me. Exciting things, interesting things.
But if you read the book, you’ll see I’ve mellowed a lot because I was very reckless during my younger days.
I would go on assignments without asking permission from my office. For instance, there was this hostage-taking incident in Zamboanga, where a policeman held hostages of several officers, including a general and a colonel.
So when I learned that, I volunteered to go without asking permission from my office. I only had 100 pesos (NZ$3) in my pocket. And so what I did, I saw the soldiers loading bullets into the boxes and I picked up one box and carried it.
Hostage crisis with one tee
So when the aircraft was already airborne, they found out I was there, and so I just sat somewhere, and I covered the hostage crisis for three to four days with only one T-shirt.
Reporters in Zamboanga were kind enough to lend me T-shirts. They also bought me underpants. I slept in the headquarters crisis. And then later, restaurants. Alavar is a very popular seafood restaurant in Zamboanga. I slept there. So when the crisis was over, I came back. At that time, the Chronicle and ABS-CBN were sister companies.
When I returned to Manila, my editor gave me a commendation — but looking back . . . I just had to get a story.
Rappler: So that is what drives you?
MM: Yes, I have to get the story. I will do this on my own. I have to be ahead of the others. In 1987, when a PAL flight to Baguio City crashed, killing all 50 people on board, including the crew and the passengers, I was sent by my office to Baguio to cover the incident.
But the crash site was in Benguet, in the mountains. So I went there to the mountains. And then the Igorots were in that area, living in that area.
I was with other reporters and mountaineering clubs. We decided to go back because we were surrounded by the Igorots [who made it difficult for us to do our jobs]. Luckily, the Lopezes had a helicopter and [we] were the first to take photos.
‘I saw the bad side of police’
Rappler: Why are military and defense your favourite beats to cover?
MM: I started my career in 1983/1984, as a police reporter. So I know my way around the police. And I have many good friends in the police. I saw the bad side of the police, the dark side, corruption, and everything.
I also saw the military in the most turbulent period of our history when I was assigned to the military. So I saw good guys, I saw terrible guys. I saw everything in the military, and I made friends with them. It’s exciting to cover the military, the insurgency, the NPAs (New People’s Army rebels), and the secessionist movement.
You have to gain the trust of the soldiers of your sources. And if you don’t have trust, writing a story is impossible; it becomes a motherhood statement. But if you go deeper, dig deeper, you make friends, they trust you, you get more stories, you get the inside story, you get the background story, you get the top secret stories.
Because I made good friends with senior officers during my time, they can show me confidential memorandums and confidential reports, and I write about them.
I have made friends with so many of these police and military men. It started when they were lieutenants, then majors, and then generals. We’d go out together, have dinner or some drinks somewhere, and discuss everything, and they will tell you some secrets.
Before, you’d get paid 50 pesos (NZ$1.50) as a journalist every week by the police. Eventually, I had to say no and avoid groups of people engaging in this corruption. Reuters wouldn’t have hired me if I’d continued.
Rappler: With everything that you have seen in your career, what do you think is the actual state of humanity? Because you’ve seen hideous things, I’m sure. And very corrupt things. What do you think of people?
‘The Filipinos are selfish’
MM: Well, I can speak of the Filipino people. The Filipinos are selfish. They are only after their own welfare. There is no humanity in the Filipino mentality. They’re pulling each other down all the time.
I went on a trip with my family to Japan in 2018. My son left his sling bag on the Shinkansen. So we returned to the train station and said my son had left his bag there. The people at the train station told us that we could get the bag in Tokyo.
So we went to Tokyo and recovered the bag. Everything was intact, including my money, the password, everything.
So, there are crises, disasters, and ayuda (aid) in other places. And the people only get what they need, no? In the Philippines, that isn’t the case. So that’s humanity [here]. It isn’t very pleasant for us Filipinos.
Rappler: Is there anything good?
MM: Everyone was sharing during the EDSA Revolution, sharing stories, and sharing everything. They forgot themselves. And they acted as a community known against Marcos in 1986. That is very telling and redeeming. But after that… [I can’t think of anything else that is good.]
Rappler: What is the one story you are particularly fond of that you did or something you like or are proud of?
War on drugs, and typhoon Yolanda
MM: On drugs, my contribution to the Reuters series, and my police stories. Also, typhoon Yolanda in 2013. We left Manila on November 9, a day after the typhoon. We brought much equipment — generator sets, big cameras, food supply, everything.
But the thing is, you have to travel light. There are relief goods for the victims and other needs. When we arrived at the airport, we were shocked. Everything was destroyed. So we had to stay in the airport for the night and sleep.
We slept under the rain the entire time for the next three days. Upon arrival at the airport, we interviewed the police regional commander. Our report, I think, moved the international community to respond to the extended damage and casualties. My report that 10,000 people had died was nominated for the Society Publishers in Asia in Hong Kong.
Every day, we had to walk from the airport eight to 10 kilometers away, and along the way, we saw the people who were living outside their homes. And there was looting all over.
Rappler: There is a part in your book where you mentioned the corruption of journalists, right? And reporters. What do you mean by corruption?
MM: Simple tokens are okay to accept. When I was with Reuters, its gift policy was that you could only accept gifts as much as $50. Anything more than $50 is already a bribe. There are things that you can buy on your own, things you can afford. Other publications, like The New York Times, The Washington Post, and Associated Press [nes agency], have a $0 gift policy. We have this gift-giving culture in our culture. It’s Oriental.
If you can pay your own way, you should do it.
Rappler: Tell us more about winning the Pulitzer Prize.
Most winners are American, American issues
MM: I did not expect to win this American-centric award. Most of the winners are Americans and American stories, American issues. But it so happened this was international reporting. There were so many other stories that were worth the win.
The story is about the Philippines and the drug war. And we didn’t expect a lot of interest in that kind of story. So perhaps we were just lucky that we were awarded the Pulitzer Prize. In the Society of Publishers in Asia, in Hong Kong, the same stories were also nominated for investigative journalism. So we were not expecting that Pulitzer would pay attention.
The idea of the drug war was not the work of only three people: Andrew Marshal, Clare Baldwin and me. No, it was a team effort.
Rappler: What was your specific contribution?
MM: Andrew and Clare were immersed in different communities in Manila, Tondo, and Navotas City, interviewing victims and families and everybody, everyone else. On the other hand, my role was on the police.
I got the police comments and official police comments and also talked to police sources who would give us the inside story — the inside story of the drug war. So I have a good friend, a retired police general who was from the intelligence service, and he knew all about this drug war — mechanics, plan, reward system, and everything that they were doing. So, he reported about the drug war.
The actual drug war was what the late General Rodolfo Mendoza said was a ruse because Duterte was protecting his own drug cartel.
Bishops wanted to find out
He had a report made for Catholic bishops. There was a plenary in January 2017, and the bishops wanted to find out. So he made the report. His report was based on 17 active police officers who are still in active service. So when he gave me this report, I showed it to my editors.
My editor said: “Oh, this is good. This is a good guide for our story.” He got this information from the police sources — subordinates, those who were formerly working for him, gave him the information.
So it was hearsay, you know. So my editor said: “Why can’t you convince him to introduce us to the real people involved in the drug war?”
So, the general and I had several interviews. Usually, our interviews lasted until early morning. Father [Romeo] Intengan facilitated the interview. He was there to help us. At the same time, he was the one serving us coffee and biscuits all throughout the night.
So finally, after, I think, two or three meetings, he agreed that he would introduce us to police officers. So we interviewed the police captain who was really involved in the killings, and in the operation, and in the drug war.
So we got a lot of information from him. The info went not only to one story but several other stories.
He was saying it was also the police who were doing it.
Rappler: Wrapping up — what do you think of the Philippines?
‘Duterte was the worst’
MM: The Philippines under former President Duterte was the worst I’ve seen. Worse than under former President Ferdinand Marcos. People were saying Marcos was the worst president because of martial law. He closed down the media, abolished Congress, and ruled by decree.
I think more than 3000 people died, and 10,000 were tortured and jailed.
But in three to six years under Duterte, more than 30,000 people died. No, he didn’t impose martial law, but there was a de facto martial law. The anti-terrorism law was very harsh, and he closed down ABS-CBN television.
It had a chilling effect on all media organisations. So, the effect was the same as what Marcos did in 1972.
We thought that Marcos Jr would become another Duterte because they were allies. And we felt that he would follow the policies of President Duterte, but it turned out he’s much better.
Well, everything after Duterte is good. Because he set the bar so low.
Everything is rosy — even if Marcos is not doing enough because the economy is terrible. Inflation is high, unemployment is high, foreign direct investments are down, and the peso is almost 60 to a dollar.
Praised over West Philippine Sea
However, the people still praise Marcos for his actions in the West Philippine Sea. I think the people love him for that. And the number of killings in the drug war has gone down.
There are still killings, but the number has really gone so low, I would say about 300 in the first two years.
Rappler: Why did you write your book, It’s Me, Bok! Journeys in Journalism?
MM: I have been writing snippets of my experiences on Facebook. Many friends were saying, ‘Why don’t you write a book?’ including Secretary [of National Defense] Gilberto Teodoro, who was fond of reading my snippets.
In my early days, I was reckless as a reporter. I don’t want the younger reporters to do that. And no story is worth writing if you are risking your life.
I want to leave behind a legacy, and I know that my memory will fail me sooner rather than later. It took me only three months to write the book.
It’s very raw. There will be a second printing. I want to polish the book and expand some of the events.
A new year has begun, yet Israel’s atrocities in Palestine persist. In Gaza, the situation is more dire than ever. Health workers are stretched to breaking point, particularly in northern Gaza, where not a single hospital remains functional. Their resilience in the face of unimaginable suffering is nothing short of heroic, but they cannot do it alone.
On Monday 7 January, health workers and supporters gathered outside parliament to demand urgent action. Jeremy Corbyn addressed the crowd calling for IDF troops to withdraw from Gaza and the West Bank, as well as from southern Lebanon and Syria; and for the British government to stop supplying arms to Israel.
Chinese authorities in Xi’an have detained Fei Xiaosheng, a prominent musician and performance artist who had publicly supported the Hong Kong democracy movement, his friends and fellow artists told RFA Mandarin.
Xi’an police caught up with Fei, 55, on Tuesday, and are now holding him the Beilin Detention Center, according to associates who knew him as part of the Songzhuang Artists’ Village scene of dissident and fringe artists in Beijing.
His detention comes as the ruling Communist Party continues to crack down on artists and other creative workers whose work or views are seen as potentially subversive.
Authorities are also holding Gao Zhen, one of the Gao Brothers artistic duo, on suspicion of ‘insulting revolutionary heroes and martyrs,’ after seizing satirical artworks depicting Chairman Mao from his home studio.
“I was shocked to hear that Songzhuang musician and artist Fei Xiaosheng has been detained,” fellow artist Du Yinghong, who now lives in Thailand, said in a social media post on Wednesday.
“Two years ago, we contacted each other a number of times, and he said he envied me [living outside of China],” he wrote. “A few days ago, we had a video call, and I found out he had applied for a passport, gone to Serbia, yet somehow returned to the cage that is our country.”
“He said he planned to leave again soon, and told me to add his European number, but then we heard the bad news that he’d been arrested,” Du wrote.
Devout Christian
Du later told RFA Mandarin that Fei is being held in Xi’an’s Beilin Detention Center, but that the authorities have yet to issue any official notification of his detention.
“This is part of their cultural cleansing operation, and a settling of scores,” he said, adding that Fei had likely been targeted for his public support for the pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong.
“Fei Xiaosheng is a devout Christian who once expressed solidarity and support for Hong Kong, and was detained for more than 40 days for this,” Du said.
Du said the artist had a strong sense of social justice, and followed current affairs closely. He was expelled by state security police from Songzhuang Artists’ Village in 2020.
“He used to organize music festivals and performance art festivals in Songzhuang,” Du said, adding that police had burned Fei’s old passport.
“He had returned to China [from Serbia] for work, and was just about to leave China again,” he said.
‘China is finished’
Writer He Sanpo, who like many Chinese writers now lives in Thailand, said he was saddened to hear of Fei’s detention, but not surprised.
“But people who are really engaged in making art know that China is finished,” He said. “In today’s China, if you have a conscience and dare to speak a few truths, you will have committed some crime.”
“The only thing you can do is to escape from it.”
Fei’s detention came as Gao Zhen’s trial is expected to start.
Gao’s friends told RFA Mandarin in recent interviews that his case will be heard at the Xianghe County People’s Court in the northern province of Hebei next week, possibly Monday.
Gao’s lawyer has been warned not to make public any details of the case, they said.
Translated by Luisetta Mudie. Edited by Malcolm Foster.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by Qian Lang for RFA Mandarin.
The Bihar Public Service Commission (BPSC) conducted the common (preliminary) competitive examination (CCE) across the state on December 13, 2024. However, the exam process soon got mired into controversy when multiple videos emerged from an examination centre in Patna. These videos showed a group of people entering the venue, forcefully snatching and tearing the answer sheets of candidates alleging a paper leak. Additionally, students complained about delays in the distribution of question papers. In response, the BPSC announced a re-examination at the affected centre. Despite this, several candidates continued to raise concerns, pointing to errors in the question papers and irregularities during the exam. They demanded that the test be conducted again for all candidates, not just at the affected centre. The matter escalated when the agitated candidates staged a sit-in demonstration, which was met with police intervention, including lathicharge.
Against this backdrop, Prashant Kishor, chief of Jan Suraj, started an indefinite hunger strike at Gandhi Maidan in Patna on January 2 in support of the candidates demanding the cancellation of Bihar Public Service Commission (BPSC) examination due to the alleged paper leak and irregularities. On the morning of January 6, police reached Gandhi Maidan to arrest him for demonstrating in a restricted area. During this, police clashed with his supporters. Videos of police misbehaving with journalists and activists also surfaced, in which Akashvani Patna tweeted a video and accused the police of trying to beat up a journalist. Meanwhile, a video began circulating widely on social media depicting the policeman coming to arrest Prashant Kishor, his workers and the students gathered there. Alongside this video, it was claimed that a policeman slapped Kishor.
ABP News anchor Chitra Tripathi shared the video, claiming that the police had slapped Prashant Kishor.
BPSC छात्रों के समर्थन में एक व्यक्ति चार दिन से अनशन पर है. पुलिस वाले PK को गिरफ्तार करने पहुंचते हैं. एक वीडियो आता है जहां पर बिना किसी वजह के एक पुलिसकर्मी प्रशांत किशोर को थप्पड़ मारता हुआ दिखाई दे रहा है.
ख़ाकी वर्दी को ऐसे ही पुलिसवाले बदनाम करते हैं. #बेहद_शर्मनाक… pic.twitter.com/4qA0dC0owe
A journalist from the outlet named Gyaneshwar also shared the viral clip on social media, suggesting that the video footage released by Jan Suraj hinted at Kishor being slapped by a policeman. Quoting this claim, NDTV editor Pankaj Jha stated that it was “clearly visible” in the video that the police had slapped Prashant Kishor.
इस वीडियो में तो साफ़ दिख रहा है कि बिहार पुलिस के एक जवान ने प्रशांत किशोर को थप्पड़ मारा है https://t.co/QNra44DiMD
A keyword search using terms related to Prashant Kishor’s arrest led us to a report by news agency ANI. It contained a longer version of the viral video, and had been recorded from a different angle. At the 0:59 mark of this footage, it can be clearly seen that a young man who was physically holding on to Prashant Kishor and preventing the police from taking him away was slapped on the head by a policeman. Following this, other workers and supporters at the scene began shouting.
#WATCH | BPSC protest | Bihar: Patna Police detains Jan Suraaj chief Prashant Kishor who was sitting on an indefinite hunger strike at Gandhi Maidan pic.twitter.com/cOnoM7EGW1
When we reviewed the video in slow motion, it became clear that the slap was directed at the boy holding Kishor, not at Prashant Kishor himself.
In a statement to the media, Prashant Kishor denied the claims circulating in the press about him being slapped by the police.
To sum up, police did not slap Prashant Kishor, who was on a hunger strike at Gandhi Maidan in Patna, but a young man who was holding him to prevent the police from picking up the Jan Suraj chief.
A former opposition party lawmaker was fatally shot just after arriving in Bangkok from Cambodia’s Siem Reap province, apparently by an assassin who fired at him as street vendors and others stood nearby, then casually rode off on a motorbike.
Surveillance video footage posted to Facebook showed a tall man remove his helmet just before strolling across a busy street near Wat Bowonniwet Vihara temple in Bangkok’s Phra Nakhon district.
Three shots could be heard on the video, although the actual shooting was not visible. Then the man, wearing long jeans and a grey short-sleeved shirt with a bag across the front, jogs back to his parked motorbike and rides away, steering with one hand while adjusting his helmet.
The Bangkok Post reported that Lim Kimya, 74, was shot twice at around 4 p.m. and died at the scene. He had traveled by bus with his French wife and Cambodian uncle, police told the newspaper.
Police said they’ve launched a manhunt for the shooter. Thailand’s Khaosod newspaper posted two surveillance images of the suspect riding a motorbike at around the time of the shooting.
The shooting will have a “direct impact” in further intimidating hundreds of Cambodian political opposition figures, activists and human rights defenders who have fled to Thailand to escape political repression in Cambodia, said Phil Robertson, the director of Asia Human Rights and Labour Advocates.
“This brazen shooting … on the streets of Bangkok has all the hallmarks of a political assassination, and looks to be a significant escalation in the use of transnational repression in Bangkok,” he said in a statement.
Lim Kimya told Agence France-Presse in 2017 that he would “never give up politics” and planned to stay in Cambodia despite an order from the Supreme Court banning the opposition Cambodia National Rescue Party, or CNRP.
Lim Kimya, a member of the National Assembly from Cambodia National Rescue Party, walks out of the National Assembly Building in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, Nov. 8, 2017.(Tang Chhin Sothy/AFP)
The CNRP was founded by veteran opposition leader Sam Rainsy in 2012. It was banned by the court following accusations that it had plotted to topple the government. Many of its top leaders – including Sam Rainsy – left the country after the ruling.
“With dual French-Cambodian citizenship, Lim Kimya could have easily joined the three dozen MPs who have fled abroad,” AFP wrote in 2017. “Yet Lim Kimya refuses to quit.”
Proposal for ‘terrorist’ designation
Tuesday’s shooting came as former Prime Minister Hun Sen urged the government to pass a law allowing prosecutors to charge dissidents with terrorism.
“It is time to make a law that will define any person or group that has plans or actions to create an anti-extremist movement, cause chaos and insecurity in society, cause conflict with others, and attempt to overthrow the government as terrorists who must be brought to justice to protect peace,” he said at a public ceremony.
With no real opposition, the ruling Cambodian People’s Party, or CPP, coasted to national election victories in 2018 and 2023.
After 38 years in power, Hun Sen resigned as prime minister just after the 2023 election to make way for the appointment of his son, Hun Manet, who has since shown little interest in diverting from his father’s heavy-handed approach to ruling Cambodia.
Hun Sen continues to serve as president of the CPP and as Senate president.
Lim Kimya, a member of the National Assembly from Cambodia National Rescue Party, works in his office in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, Oct. 17, 2017.(Tang Chhin Sothy/AFP)
Tuesday’s ceremony marked the 46th anniversary of the day that the Khmer Rouge regime was driven from power by a Vietnamese-led force. The event is celebrated annually by the CPP, which has historic ties to Vietnam and came to power after the Khmer Rouge was forced out of Phnom Penh.
Last February, Prime Minister Hun Manet met with then-Thai Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin in Bangkok to discuss a crackdown on what they called “interference” in Cambodian politics by Thai-based Cambodian political activists.
In June, Hun Sen encouraged CPP supporters to “smash” and “destroy” opposition political activists in audio comments that were purportedly recorded at a party meeting and circulated on Cambodian social media.
In November, six activists associated with the CNRP and one minor were deported from Thailand to Cambodia at the request of the Cambodian government. The six adults, who escaped Cambodia in 2022, were subsequently charged with “treason.”
Cambodian activists remaining in Thailand told RFA in November that the arrests have increased their safety concerns, with one dissident saying that nearly 100 Cambodian refugees had fled their rented rooms for new housing and agreed to stop meeting up in-person.
Robertson urged Thai authorities to conduct a thorough and transparent investigation, adding that the French government should also “aggressively pursue justice” for Lim Kimya – “no matter where the path leads.”
“Thailand’s international reputation is on the line in this case, and the Thai police and politicians should recognize they can’t just sweep this brutal murder under the rug,” he said.
International human rights groups have condemned Thailand for assisting neighbors, including Vietnam and Cambodia, to undertake what the groups say is unlawful action against human rights defenders and dissidents, making Thailand increasingly unsafe for those fleeing persecution.
Human Rights Watch has criticized what it called a “swap mart” of transnational repression in which foreign dissidents in Thailand are effectively traded for critics of the Thai government living abroad.
Translated by Yun Samean. Edited by Matt Reed and Malcolm Foster.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by RFA Khmer.
Honolulu police have announced the death of a fourth person due to the New Year’s Eve fireworks explosion in Aliamanu, Hawai’i — a 3-year-old boy who has died in hospital.
Six people with severe burn injuries from the explosion were flown to Arizona on the US mainland for further treatment.
“We’re angry, frustrated and deeply saddened at this uneccessary loss of life and suffering,” Honolulu Mayor Rick Blangiardi told a news conference.
Three people died on New Year’s Eve after a Honolulu fireworks explosion. Image: Hawaii Governor/Josh Green FB
“No one should have to endure such pain due to reckless and illegal activity.”
He said this incident was a painful reminder of the danger posed by illegal fireworks.
“They put lives at risk, they drain our first responders, and they disrupt our neighbourhoods.
“Every aerial firework is illegal and this means we need to shut down the root cause — shutting down the pipeline of illegal fireworks entering our islands.”
The Illegal Fireworks Task Force seized 103,000 kilos of fireworks in the last year and a half, yet those cases have resulted in zero criminal charges.
Hawaii News Now obtained the state’s illegal fireworks task force’s 2025 report to lawmakers, revealing the big financial windfall for those who deal in illegal aerials.
The report said “the return on investment for those who smuggle illegal fireworks into Hawai’i is a rate of five to one”.
It also said law enforcement doesn’t have enough money or staff to interdict smuggling at points of entry.
It added that: “the task force is part-time and members have a primary job they must do in addition to task force work.”
The investigation into the explosion continues.
A fifth person died after a separate fireworks blast in Kalihi on New Year’s Eve.
He sustained multiple traumatic injuries, including a severe arm injury, according to Emergency Medical Services.
Meanwhile, five people died across Germany and a police officer was seriously injured from accidents linked to the powerful fireworks Germans traditionally set off to celebrate the new year, police said.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
It is an unprecedented case. And it risks triggering an unprecedented threat to journalism. The UK police have repeatedly tried to obtain the passwords to the phones of the British independent journalist, Richard Medhurst, the first reporter arrested in London under Section 12: his analyses and comments on Israel’s bloodbath in Gaza – which Amnesty International has characterised as genocide – have been interpreted by the police as support for organisations banned from the UK, such as Hamas and Hezbollah.
The son of two UN peacekeepers, Medhurst was arrested last August at London’s Heathrow Airport
Virgin Australia has confirmed a “serious security incident” with its flight crew members who were in Fiji on New Year’s Day.
Virgin Australia’s chief operating officer Stuart Aggs said the incident took place on Tuesday night – New Year’s Eve
The crew members were in Fiji on night layover.
Fiji police said two crew members had alleged they were raped while out clubbing and one alleged her phone had been stolen.
They had gone out to a nightclub in Martintar.
“I’m sorry to advise of a serious security incident which affected a number of crew in Nadi, Fiji, on Tuesday evening,” said Aggs on New Year’s Day.
“Our immediate priority is to look after the wellbeing of our crew involved and make sure they are supported. The safety and welfare of our people is our number one priority.”
Virgin Australia has kept the crew members in Nadi as police investigations continue.
New Orleans, LA – On Tuesday, December 17, community organizations and New Orleanians impacted by police misconduct or police violence united at the Consent Decree Fairness Hearing to demand that Judge Susie Morgan rule against the New Orleans Police Department sustainment plan.
The consent decree is the federal oversight instituted in 2013. That year, the Department of Justice found the NOPD to be practicing unlawful misconduct and unconstitutional policing. Different community groups rallied outside against the motion.
The people came together around five points of unity.
A prominent Vietnamese writer and karate artist who is hiding and wanted by police said Monday that authorities are harassing his family to try to find out his whereabouts.
Doan Bao Chau, 59, faces prosecution for Facebook posts and interviews with foreign media critical of the authoritarian state ruled by the Communist Party.
He fled earlier this year after police in Vietnam’s capital Hanoi showed him a request for his prosecution but assured him it was “not a problem.”
However, they have repeatedly harassed his family since he left, Chau said.
Chau, who gained fame after losing a friendly four-minute karate match with Canadian martial artist Pierre Francois Flores in 2017, said Hanoi police’s Security Investigation Agency had summoned him on June 21 about a crime report from the Cybersecurity and High-tech Crime Prevention Division.
During the meeting, a security officer showed Chau a document that prohibited him from leaving the country and a file with a request for his prosecution.
The officer said Chau allegedly created and disseminated information opposing authorities, insulting leaders, distorting facts, and causing public confusion through six videos. Most of the videos were of his interviews with activists about human rights or other pressing social issues. An interview he gave to BBC Vietnamese in 2016 was among the videos.
At the end of the meeting, a representative from the Security Investigation Agency told Chau the case against him was not serious and let him go home. But feeling that he might be in danger, Chau fled elsewhere to safety.
Second summons
Two months later, the police issued him a similar summons, but since he didn’t appear on the appointed date, they began searching for him.
“On the one hand, they said they would not pursue my case because it’s not serious,” Chau told Radio Free Asia. “On the other hand, they are hunting for me and harassing my family.”
Chau said police officers have frequently visited his home and called or summoned his wife to their headquarters to ask about his whereabouts.
In addition, investigators raided his brother’s and sister’s homes, suspecting he was hiding there. The police also contacted his son’s teachers and friends for information.
Nguyen Duc Hai, the investigation officer handling Chau’s case as noted in the summons, did not respond to RFA’s questions when asked to verify the information.
As police intensified their search for Chau in December, he re-shared the six video clips, which authorities consider “problematic,” on his Facebook account to assert his innocence.
Chau, who has 175,000 Facebook followers, was previously a photojournalist and contributor to various international newspapers. As an author, he has published six novels in Vietnam.
Translated by Anna Vu for RFA Vietnamese. Edited by Roseanne Gerin and Malcolm Foster.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by RFA Vietnamese.
Police in Manchester were called to the Chinese consulate over the weekend after staff started an altercation with a Radio Free Asia journalist who filmed them cleaning up Hong Kong protest graffiti on the street outside.
Four members of staff surrounded RFA Cantonese Service reporter Matthew Leung on Saturday afternoon after he started taking photos of them scrubbing away slogans in white paint daubed on the sidewalk outside the Chinese consulate on Manchester’s Denison Road.
The slogans read “F— PRC!” [People’s Republic of China] “Independence for Hong Kong!” and “Long Live the Republic of China!” the official name for democratic Taiwan, according to photos shared on the messaging app Telegram on the afternoon of Dec. 28. There was also an epithet referring to China by a highly offensive historical slur, which has been used by Hong Kongers in protest slogans before.
A staff member from the Chinese consulate in Manchester, center, tells an RFA reporter they can’t take photos on the street outside the building, Dec. 28, 2024.(Matthew Leung/RFA)
A Telegram user said they had painted the slogans, “because they are communists.”
Staff moved quickly to scrub the graffiti away, but threatened RFA reporters who arrived and started taking photos at the scene.
“We know your name, we know your address,” one warned RFA’s reporter. “I know our rights — if you take photos of us, we have image rights.”
“We don’t want any photos or videos to appear on the Internet. If you publish them, we will notify the police,” one staff member said.
The Chinese Consulate in the northern British city made headlines in 2022 after Consul General Zheng Xiyuan assaulted a Hong Kong protester inside the Chinese consulate in Manchester.
Anti-Communist Party slogans outside the Chinese Consulate in Manchester, Dec. 28, 2024.(Social Media)
There are also growing concerns over Chinese Communist Party infiltration of all aspects of British life, and warnings from Hong Kongers in exile over growing acts of violence by Beijing’s supporters and officials alike.
Another staff member, who spoke accented Cantonese, said: “Stop shooting; we’re calling the police now,” while another staff member repeated the demand in English.
One staff member tried to gain access to the digital touchscreen of the camera, despite a verbal complaint from the RFA journalist, but was eventually pulled away by colleagues.
Staff also demanded that the RFA journalist identify themselves, which the reporter did, showing an official National Union of Journalists press accreditation.
Workers clean the boundary walls of the Chinese consulate in Manchester after they were daubed with Hong Kong protest graffiti, Dec. 28, 2024.(Matthew Leung/RFA)
“This is the Consulate General,” said one of the men, to which the reporter replied that he was standing on a public footpath.
“If you want to shoot, you have to get our permission,” the man retorted, citing “diplomatic privileges under the Vienna Convention.”
When the police arrived after being called both by the RFA reporter and consulate staff, they took away a bag of evidence, and reminded consular staff that journalists have a right to film in public places.
They questioned everyone at the scene, including asking the RFA reporter if they saw who painted the slogans, then left.
They initially told RFA Cantonese they would investigate the graffiti as a “hate crime,” but later said that they wouldn’t be pursuing an investigation because consular staff at “refused to cooperate.”
Greater Manchester Police officers at the Chinese consulate, Dec. 28, 2024.(Matthew Leung/RFA)
Simon Cheng, founder and chairperson of the advocacy group Hongkongers in Britain, said the move appeared to be a bid to control media activities on British soil.
“At the very least, it can be said that the consular staff have no sense of their own legal rights or boundaries,” Cheng said. “More importantly, if they start applying China’s method of restricting media freedom and blocking filming in the UK, that’s definitely a form of transnational repression.”
Hong Kong exile groups in the United Kingdom have hit out at alleged transnational repression by the Chinese Communist Party on British soil after a church in the southern British town of Guildford canceled a children’s workshop on justice, civil liberties and human rights in 2023.
Cheng said the staff appeared to have toned down their approach following an incident in 2022, which saw six Chinese diplomats including the Consul General withdrawn after an attack on Hong Kong protester Bob Chan.
“There are slight differences in the way they handled it … they appeared to be de-escalating and threatening to call the police, but that doesn’t mean they had any legal grounds or justification for doing so,” Cheng said.
He said the graffiti expressed simmering anger among Hongkongers in the U.K. at China’s ongoing crackdown on public dissent and political opposition in Hong Kong, but called on protesters to “express their demands in a legal manner.”
Translated by Luisetta Mudie.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by Matthew Leung and Jasmine Man for RFA Cantonese.
Trigger Warning: Disturbing Visuals/ Sexual Harassment
A video compilation is going viral on social media. The clip begins with what appears to be CCTV footage showing a group of girls in uniform walking down a street. As they pass by, a man on a bike drives past and inappropriately touches one of the girls. Later, the video shows a man being beaten up and paraded by the police on the road. The viral claim along with the video(s) is that the perpetrator, a Muslim, was duly punished by Uttar Pradesh police in public. Most of the social media posts carry an implicit tone of endorsement of how UP police treated the accused.
X user Baba Banaras (@RealBababanaras), tweeted the video compilation on December 20, 2024, with a caption, “Abdul was molesting school girls every day. His activity captured in CCTV camera. Rest job done by UP police. Do you support this action of police ?”
Abdul was molesting school girls every day. His activity captured in CCTV camera. Rest job done by UP police.
The tweet has garnered over 1 Million views and has been retweeted around 7,000 times. Readers should note that this user shares communal propaganda and disinformation on social media on a regular basis.
Another X account, Frontal Force (@FrontalForce), tweeted the same video compilation with the same caption, “Abdul was molesting school girls every day. His activity captured in CCTV camera. Rest job done by UP police.”
Abdul was molesting school girls every day. His activity captured in CCTV camera. Rest job done by UP police.
After breaking the video into several key frames, we ran a reverse search image on a few of them from the first half of the video which shows the bike-borne man harassing the girl. This led us to an article by News75.com with the headline, “Bike rider’s brutality: molested a school girl, hit her breast”. According to the article, the incident occurred on December 6, 2024, in Prabhani, Maharashtra.
Taking cues from this we performed a keyword search that led us to a news report by a local media outlet Deshonnati. According to the report, on December 6, 2024, a group of college girls were on their way to the district general hospital via the back road of Mahatma Phule College in Parbhani, Maharashtra. During this time a young man on a bike harassed one of the girls. A case of molestation was registered against the accused at Nanalpet police station. The entire incident was recorded on CCTV, which allowed the police to track down the accused. On December 8, 2024, a persona named Md. Aslam was detained from Dharampuri in Parli taluka and brought to Nanalpet police station for further action.
Second Part of the Viral Video
We performed a reverse image search on a few key frames from the second half of the video compilation. This led us to a news bulletin by News21 on YouTube from December 8, 2024, with the title “Gadarwara: Madhur Chawrasia was murdered over a transaction worth Rs 40,000| MP News | News Update | MP Police”
The bulletin comprises the same video as the one which has gone viral, where police are seen beating up a man while parading him on the street.
According to the report, police arrested Vikas Kuchbandia on charges of killing Madhur Chaurasia for not returning Rs 40,000 that he had borrowed, in Gadwara, Madhya Pradesh.
Taking a cue from this, we performed a keyword search on YouTube that led us to another news bulletin by Bharat Samvad Tv. The video featured footage similar to the viral video.
According to this report, a young man, Madhur Chaurasia was murdered in Gadarwara town in Narsinghpur district of Madhya Pradesh on December 5, 2024. The incident took place in front of Nalanda School. The prime suspect in the murder, Vikas Kuchbandiya, was arrested following an investigation. The murder was allegedly committed as Madhur did not return Rs 40,000 he owed Vikas.
In our investigation, we found several news reports that corroborated the incident. NavBharat, for example, reported that Krishna Sahu, a resident of Shivalaya Chowk Gadarwara, had filed a report that Vikas Kuchbandiya had killed Madhur Chaurasia by slitting his throat and bashing his head with a stone in Chowpatty Gadarwara. Dainik Bhaskar and Aditi News, too, reported on the same incident.
To sum up, firstly, the two videos compiled together are not related to each other. Secondly, the two incidents are from two different states, Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh, respectively. The video compilation is falsely shared as an incident from Uttar Pradesh.
In the first incident, the accused was identified as Md Aslam. In the second incident, the person arrested for alleged murder is Vikas Kuchbandiya. The two incidents are completely unrelated and neither of them is from Uttar Pradesh. However, the two videos were shared together to create the narrative that this was how UP police treated a Muslim accused (by publicly flogging and parading him). This is misleading. And this is not the first time the Right Wing has tried to ‘credit’ UP police, and by extension, Yogi Adityanath’s government, of meting out a right ‘treatment’ to a Muslim accused in a crime by sharing unrelated videos or false and misleading information. The subtext behind such claims is that police forces from other states should learn from UP police how to treat an accused if he is Muslim by faith.
Activist Pham Thanh Nghien, who took refuge in the United States last year, says Vietnamese police harassed her family shortly after she accepted a human rights award at a ceremony in Texas.
Nghien, 47, a former political prisoner, received the 2024 Vietnam Human Rights Award on behalf of prisoner of conscience Do Nam Trung at the ceremony in Houston on Dec. 15.
On Monday, just over a week later, Hai Phong City Police visited her sister’s house saying they wanted to check who was living there. An officer asked questions about Nghien, including her job and address in the U.S. They also quizzed relatives about the book “Life Behind Bars,” she wrote in 2017. Officers took a statement from her sister and asked her to sign it but didn’t give her a copy, Nghien said.
“I am very worried about my family,” Nghien told Radio Free Asia. “I don’t know what they will do in the future because in Vietnam they face many risks such as harassment, arrest and even imprisonment.”
Nghien said the behavior of the police was a form of transnational repression. By intimidating her relatives, the authorities were trying to threaten her into silence because of her outspoken criticism of Vietnam’s human rights violations and articles critical of the top leader, Communist Party General Secretary To Lam.
Nghien said in spite of this she would continue to speak out, adding that years of harassment at the hands of Vietnamese authorities had failed to silence her.
RFA called police in Hai Phong city and An Hai district but were told to contact police in Dong Hai ward. The reporter repeatedly called the ward police number but no one answered.
Nghien was sentenced to four years in prison and three years’ house arrest in 2010 for “propaganda against the state,” two years after police raided her home and arrested her during a crackdown against dissidents.
In April 2023, she went to the U.S. to avoid harassment following her release. Later that month, the police visited the house her family had rented while her two sisters were cleaning it before returning it to the landlord. She said the police took statements from both sisters because they thought the two had helped her flee the country.
At the end of May this year, Nghien received a text message from a man calling himself Trong, an officer of Vietnam’s Ministry of Public Security. He said he was in Texas on vacation and invited her to dinner. Nghien declined to go and reported the incident to the FBI and the U.S. State Department.
Translated by RFA Vietnamese. Edited by Mike Firn.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by RFA Vietnamese.
Millions of people in the United States are de facto deputies who can be asked at a moment’s notice to carry out what is considered the most important job in the nation, keeping Black people under physical control. The most recent case brought to public attention was that of Daniel Penny, a white man who put an emotionally disturbed Black man, Jordan Neely, in a chokehold on a New York City subway. Neely died after the assault and Penny was recently acquitted of manslaughter and criminally negligent homicide.
What followed was a predictable and righteous reaction of outrage at the obvious racist injustice.
After years of intense opposition that left one protester riddled by police bullets, Atlanta’s so-called Cop City is set to begin operations in the next few weeks. The city’s police chief hosted a tour of the campus last week and training programs are expected to start during the first quarter of 2025.
The Atlanta Public Safety Training Center, as it is officially known, is an 85-acre campus with a price tag of at least $110 million and another $1.7 million recently approved by Atlanta’s City Council for its security.
Most infamously, it includes a mock city, for which the site gained its Cop City nickname, for “real-world” training that includes a convenience store, two-story house, apartment and commercial-style building.
People living near low lying areas or rivers have also been told to move, should water levels rise.
The heavy rain may also cause flash flooding.
USAR team leader Ken Cooper said last Tuesday’s 7.3 earthquake caused significant landslides.
“With the weather system that’s coming in, there is a high likelihood that the landslides continue and we need to ensure that there’s no life risks if those landslides should move further,” Cooper said.
Death toll now 12
Aftershocks have continued, and early this morning, the US Geological Survey recorded a magnitude 6.1 quake, at a depth of 40km west of Port Vila.
New Zealand and Vanuatu engineers were assessing prioritised areas in the capital, and a decision would then be made as to whether a community needed to be evacuated, Cooper said.
Since the team had been in Vanuatu, it had taken damage assessments of buildings and infrastructure, with the Vanuatu government, allowing them to prioritise the biggest risks and to assist the community in recovering more quickly, he said.
The official death toll from Vanuatu’s 7.3 magnitude quake is now 12 according to the Vanuatu Disaster Management office.
This has been confirmed by the Vila Central Hospital.
The deployment lead for New Zealand in Vanuatu praised the resilience of the ni-Vanuatu people following the 7.3 earthquake. Image: MFAT/RNZ Pacific
The team had completed almost 1000 assessments, alongside the Australia USAR team, which was a significant task, Cooper said.
Both teams shared common tools and practices, which had allowed them to work simultaneously and helped the teams to quickly carry out the assessments, he said.
“When we undertake the assessments that really gives us a clear picture of what should be prioritised and we work with the [Vanuatu] government and their infrastructure cluster, and some of the priorities we have looked at are bridges, [the] airport, the port, and also landslides,” he said.
Resilience shown by locals The deployment lead for New Zealand in Vanuatu praised the resilience of the Ni-Vanuatu people following the 7.3 earthquake.
Thousands of people had been affected by the disaster but the response effort was being hampered by damage to core infrastructure including the country’s telecommunications network.
Emma Dunlop-Bennett said the New Zealand teams on the ground were working in partnership with the Vanuatu government.
She said she was in awe of the strength of locals after the disaster.
“As we go out into communities, working . . . with the government, people are out there, getting up and doing what they can to get themselves into business as usual, life as usual. I am really in awe and humbled.
The purpose of the New Zealand team being in Vanuatu was three-fold: To provide urgent and critical humanitarian assistance, a response for consular need to New Zealanders, and to support a smooth transition from relief, response to recovery, Dunlop-Bennett said.
Then to business as usual, working along side the priority need identified by the Vanuatu government, she added.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
Nearly two years after police killed Terán, and a year after the state refused to bring charges against any of the state troopers responsible, Tortuguita’s parents are still seeking answers and accountability for the death of their 26-year-old child.
Belkis Terán and Joel Paez, Tortuguita’s mother and father, are suing Georgia Bureau of Investigation Special Agent Ryan Long as well as Georgia State Patrol troopers Mark Lamb and Bryland Myers in federal court claiming that the raid that led to their child’s killing violated Tortuguita’s civil rights.
BREAKING: MET POLICE RAID JUST STOP OIL SUPPORTER'S HOME
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