Insurgents in Myanmar’s Rakhine state are closing in on an important junta naval base, a spokesman for the group said on Thursday, as military authorities in neighboring regions rounded up people into civil defense teams in preparation for rebel advances.
The Arkan Army ethnic minority force has made stunning gains in Myanmar’s westernmost state, capturing townships, military bases and an airport at Thandwe town, since going on the offensive late last year.
Now AA fighters are attacking the last remaining junta positions protecting its Maung Shwe Lay naval base in Thandwe, AA spokesman Khaing Thu Kha told Radio Free Asia.
He said eight naval vessels were supporting junta ground troops and the fighting was fierce.
Junta spokesmen have not commented on the latest fighting.
Myanmar’s military has been battling insurgencies since soon after independence from Britain in 1948 but the pressure its forces are under this year is unprecedented.
Pro-democracy activists, outraged by the ouster of an elected government in 2021 and a bloody crackdown on protests that followed, have taken up arms, linking up in many parts of the country with ethnic minority rebels fighting long wars for self-determination.
Junta forces have lost ground in Rakhine and Chin states in the west, Kachin state in the north, Shan state in the northeast and eastern areas along the border with Thailand.
In addition, central heartland areas that have been peaceful for decades have been rocked by clashes as anti-junta People’s Defense Forces go on the attack.
Junta officials told administrators on Aug. 16 it would begin setting up militias, or public security committees, to arm people to defend their communities, according to information leaked on social media.
Residents in the Ayeyarwady region, near a conflict zone in southern Rakhine state, said on Thursday that authorities there had begun recruiting people into the militias, drawing names through a lottery system in five townships.
“They’re recruiting us for their militia,” said one resident of a township that borders Rakhine state.
“Local administrators are recruiting people between the ages of 35 and 65 under the pretext of serving public security in the neighborhoods and villages,” said the resident, who declined to be identified.
“They even tried to recruit some disabled people and when they refused, they had to pay a fine.”
RFA tried to telephone Ayeyarwady region’s junta spokesperson, Khin Maung Kyi, for information but he did not answer.
Political parties in the area have also been told to help fill the ranks, said one party member.
“Political parties have been called up for recruitment in some towns,” said the party worker who declined to be identified. “The junta asked us to contribute 50 people.”
Recruits would be asked to carry weapons and do some short military training, he said.
Translated by RFA Burmese Edited by Kiana Duncan and Mike Firn.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA Burmese.
Junta authorities have forcibly recruited nearly six dozen Myanmar nationals repatriated by Thailand after serving time in the country’s Ranong Prison, family members said Friday.
Desperate to shore up its dwindling ranks amid mounting losses to rebel groups and mass surrenders, the junta enacted a conscription law that came into effect in April, three years after the military seized power in a coup d’etat.
Under the law, men aged 18-35 and women aged 18-27 must serve a minimum of two years in the military. Young people have been fleeing the country in droves since its implementation, many of whom have traveled to neighboring Thailand where they landed in prison on immigration charges.
On July 30, Thai authorities deported more than 150 Myanmar nationals from Ranong Prison to Myanmar’s southernmost port of Kawthoung and more than 120 others on Aug. 7.
Myanmar citizens who will be repatriated to Kawthoung, Myanmar, are gathered at the port for deportation in Ranong, Thailand, Aug. 7, 2024. (Ranong Immigration Office via Facebook)
Junta authorities arrested at least 23 people from the first group and 48 from the second group upon their return, according to residents of the border town.
One resident told RFA that the deportees were all men over the age of 20, many of whom were from Myanmar’s wealthier northern cities such as Bago and Yangon and able to pay bribes to escape forced recruitment.
“However, some people were residents of Kawthoung who couldn’t afford to pay,” said the resident who, like others interviewed for this report, spoke to RFA Burmese on condition of anonymity due to security concerns. Those who bribed authorities were “released immediately,” he said.
Myanmar’s military draft has created a cottage industry of corruption as administrators across the country offer eligible citizens a way out of fighting in exchange for a price, sources told RFA in April.
Sources said that bribes to avoid service typically range from 500,000 kyats (US$240) to a staggering 50 million kyats (US$23,830), depending on the area and draft quota requirements. Even the low end of the range represents several times the monthly income of the average worker in Myanmar.
‘Taken like cattle’
One 24-year-old undocumented migrant worker who was deported to Kawthoung after serving a prison term in Thailand was among those arrested by the junta on Aug. 7, but later released after paying more than 6,000 Thai baht (US$170), his mother-in-law told RFA.
“They were being taken like cattle on a truck to a military base,” said the mother-in-law. “We didn’t have enough money for his release, so we asked my sister to borrow money from others.”
The recruits were first taken to the Kawthoung-based Infantry Battalion 262, although it was unclear which units they would be deployed to after their training.
Myanmar citizens who will be repatriated to Kawthoung, Myanmar, are gathered at the port for deportation in Ranong, Thailand, Aug. 7, 2024. (Ranong Immigration Office via Facebook)
The woman said that prior to her son-in-law’s arrest, her son was also arrested in Kawthoung after being deported from Ranong while the junta was recruiting in April. He was later released after paying 200,000 kyats (US$100).
Thar Kyaw, a member of the Myanmar Social Welfare Association based in Ranong, told RFA that his organization frequently receives calls from family members of those who are at risk of deportation after serving time in Ranong Prison.
“In the past, we could guarantee the safe return of released prisoners to their homes before they were handed over to their parents, but at present, we have no authority to do so,” he said. “Thai authorities have no power to protect them from conscription [upon their return], so whether they are arrested or not is decided by the junta troops.”
‘Grave violation of human rights’
Myanmar nationals are deported to Kawthoung every month after being held for immigration violations in Ranong, and at least 355 persons were repatriated in July, according to aid workers assisting in labor affairs.
Nay Bone Latt, the spokesperson for the shadow National Unity Government’s Prime Minister’s Office said that the junta is committing a “grave violation of human rights” by arresting those released from prison in Thailand.
“It is advised that Thai authorities handle such cases very cautiously,” he said. “While [the junta] is losing battles on various frontlines, they are forcibly recruiting for their forces.”
Myanmar citizens who will be repatriated to Kawthoung, Myanmar, are gathered at the port for deportation in Ranong, Thailand, Aug. 7, 2024. (Ranong Immigration Office via Facebook)
An official from the chairman’s office of Myanmar’s Central Body for Summoning People’s Military Servants in the capital Naypyidaw told RFA that he was unaware of any illegal arrests, and had instructed all township-level offices to abide by the rules and regulations for conscription under the country’s military-drafted constitution.
The military carried out two rounds of conscriptions in April and May, training about 9,000 new recruits in total. A third round of conscription began in late May, with draftees sent to their respective training depots by June 22.
Translated by Aung Naing. Edited by Joshua Lipes and Malcolm Foster.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA Burmese.
The first round of soldiers recruited under Myanmar’s controversial military draft law have completed their training and are being deployed to the frontlines of the junta’s war against rebels in the country’s remote border areas, their family members said Tuesday.
The deployment marked the latest chapter in the junta’s bid to shore up its forces amid heavy losses against various ethnic armies and rebel militias since its 2021 coup d’etat, prompting the junta to enact the People’s Military Service Law in February.
Under the law, men between the ages of 18 and 35 and women between 18 and 27 can be drafted to serve in the armed forces for two years.
The announcement triggered a wave of assassinations of administrators enforcing the law and drove thousands of draft-dodgers into rebel-controlled territory and abroad.
The military carried out two rounds of conscriptions in April and May, training about 9,000 new recruits in total. A third round of conscription began in late May, with draftees sent to their respective training depots by June 22.
The first batch of recruits completed their three-month training on June 28, and family members told RFA Burmese on Tuesday that the new soldiers were sent to conflict zones in Myanmar’s Rakhine and Kayin states, and Sagaing region, beginning in early July.
While the junta has never said how many recruits were trained in the first group, a mid-April report by the Burmese Affairs and Conflict Study, a group monitoring junta war crimes, indicated that it was nearly 5,000 young people from across the country.
“My husband told me that orders from [the junta capital] Naypyidaw directed the deployment of new recruits from training batch No. 1 to conflict-affected areas, including Rakhine state,” said Nwe Nyein, the wife of a new recruit from Ayeyarwady region.
“They [the junta] had previously said that new recruits under the People’s Military Service Law would not be deployed to the frontlines,” she said. “However, I am worried because my husband was sent to the remote border areas.”
Nwe Nyein said that the second batch of recruits are expected to complete their military training on Aug. 2 and reports suggest that they will also be sent to the frontlines.
Used as ‘human shields’
A resident of Myanmar’s largest city Yangon, who requested anonymity for security reasons, said that some people close to him had been injured in battles in northern Shan state and have since returned home.
“A young man from our town was shot in the arm, but he never underwent an operation to remove the bullet,” the resident said. “He also said that almost all the new recruits sent to the frontlines had been killed, and their families didn’t even receive their salaries.”
Recruits from the first batch of training under Myanmar junta’s people’s military service law seen on July 16, 2024. (Pyi Thu Sitt via Telegram)
In southern Myanmar’s Tanintharyi region, residents told RFA that the junta is deploying new recruits to battle.
Min Lwin Oo, a leading committee member of the Democracy Movement Strike Committee-Dawei, condemned the deployment of new recruits with only short-term military training, suggesting that they are being used as “human shields.”
Flagging morale
Former Captain Kaung Thu Win, who is now a member of the nationwide Civilian Disobedience Movement of former civil servants that left their jobs in protest of the military’s power grab, told RFA that the junta urgently needs more soldiers, and he expects that nearly all new recruits will be sent to the frontlines.
“About 90% of these new forces will be dispatched to the battlegrounds, regardless of whether they engage in combat [with rebel groups] or target people [civilians],” he said. “Their [the junta’s] main objective is to ensure they have more soldiers equipped with guns.”
Kaung Thu Win also said that the junta faces many challenges in its propaganda efforts to persuade new recruits to fight, but is also increasingly unable to trust its veteran soldiers as losses mount.
Recruits from the first batch of training under Myanmar junta’s people’s military service law seen on July 16, 2024. (Pyi Thu Sitt via Telegram)
Than Soe Naing, a political commentator, slammed the junta over the reported deployment and echoed the former captain’s assessment of the military’s low morale.
“Young people are being sent to die after … [mere] months of military training,” he said. “Even veteran soldiers in their 60s who have been sent to the battlefield have lost their motivation.”
5 years of service?
The junta has yet to release any information about the deployment of new recruits to the frontlines.
Meanwhile, although the People’s Military Service Law states that new recruits must serve for a total of two years, reports have emerged that the junta is telling soldiers that they will have to fight for five.
Junta officials have publicly denied the reports.
Attempts by RFA to contact the office of the chairman of the Central Body for Summoning People’s Military Servants in Naypyidaw for further clarification went unanswered Tuesday.
Translated by Aung Naing. Edited by Joshua Lipes and Malcolm Foster.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA Burmese.
Nearly 1,000 people eligible for conscription into the Myanmar military’s ranks are instead seeking training from the shadow civilian government’s armed forces, the group announced.
The junta, which seized power in 2021 and has since faced increasing desertions and military losses nationwide, announced the implementation of the People’s Military Service Law in February. The military has since recruited about 9,000 people through two rounds of conscription based on a lottery system.
Many young people have fled the country out of fear that they may be drafted. Recruitment by junta soldiers has involved coercing young people, including minors, threatening violence or property destruction and most recently, threats and heavy fines for parents of draft dodgers as a third round of conscription approaches, residents say.
About 960 people have chosen to seek training under the civilian National Unity Government’s People’s Defense Forces, or militias opposing the junta, the group’s southern military office said in a statement on Wednesday. The statement included photos of a recent graduation. The N.U.G. was formed by members of the civilian administration ousted in the February 2021 coup.
A 28-year-old man eligible for military conscription under the junta in central Myanmar’s Mandalay Division told RFA he initially planned on going abroad, like many people already have, but he was now aiming to join anti-junta forces.
“At first I was hesitant to put my family at risk but now I canceled my preparations to go abroad and work and have decided to take up arms. Now I am preparing and am still trying to connect with the training group,” he said, asking to remain anonymous for security reasons.
“I can’t take it anymore, mainly because of the [junta’s] injustice, the way they are killing and torturing people. Most young people would make the same decision. This is the only way left for us to root out the military dictatorship.”
The National Unity Government’s Southern Military Headquarters No. 3 began accepting trainees to undergo basic military courses in April and May, it said in its statement.
RFA phoned the headquarters for more information, but it could not be contacted due to limited telecommunications access.
Translated by RFA Burmese. Edited by Kiana Duncan and Mike Firn.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA Burmese.
Myanmar’s junta has recruited nearly 4,000 men nationwide in its latest round of conscription as it seeks to reinforce the ranks of its army in the face of battlefield setbacks to insurgents battling to end military rule, a nonprofit group said.
Under the People’s Military Service Law, enacted by the junta in February, men between the ages of 18 and 45 can be conscripted. The announcement has triggered a wave of killings of administrators enforcing the law and driven thousands of draft dodgers into neighboring Thailand.
A new round of conscriptions was undertaken in mid-April, according to the analysis and data group Burma Affairs and Conflict Study. Training for the nearly 4,000 new recruits began on May 14 in 16 schools across the country, the group said in a release on Wednesday.
One mother was relieved that her two sons were not selected in a raffle system used for the recruitment. She said all families with military aged men had to pay 10,000 kyats (US$ 2) to support the recruits.
“I’m so worried that my sons will be picked in the next round,” she told RFA on Friday. The woman declined to be identified.
About 5,000 people were recruited in the first round of conscription in early April, which brings the total number to about 9,000, according to the research group.
Spokesmen for the junta were not immediately available for comment on Friday but they said in state-backed media during the first round of recruitment that people were not being forced to join and only volunteers were allowed to begin training.
However, civilians reported mass arrests of young people in the Ayeyarwady and Bago regions, as well as village quotas that included adolescents and threats to burn residents’ houses down if recruits did not come forward.
Senior junta official Gen. Maung Maung Aye, who is in charge of the national recruitment drive, said at a meeting in the capital of Naypyidaw on May 20 that the second round of recruitment had begun successfully.
Those who failed to attend would be dealt with according to the law, he said.
Translated by RFA Burmese. Edited by Kiana Duncan and Mike Firn.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA Burmese.
New recruits in the North Korean army are pleading with their parents through the military base fence, almost begging them to buy them food, because they aren’t getting enough during the weeklong registration, residents in the country told Radio Free Asia.
“The spring military draft has reached its final stage. Parents of new recruits are complaining about the poor quality of food in the barracks,” a resident of the northeastern province of North Hamgyong told RFA Korean on condition of anonymity for security reasons.
In North Korea, every man must serve seven years in the military, and every woman five.
Every spring and fall, young soldiers-to-be flock to military facilities all over the country.
Serving is a rite of passage, and families come to the barracks to see their children off. At the end of registration, which can last longer than a week after all the medical and fitness tests, the recruits are issued an official Korean People’s Army uniform.
Tearful farewells
Seeing one’s son or daughter in uniform for the first time is often an emotional experience, sources in the country say.
Parents shed tears of joy that their child has reached adulthood, but they are also tears of sadness because they know that life in the military is grueling, and that they won’t see their children for some time.
Whether sad or glad, the parents stay near the barracks to say good-bye to their kids.
“The area near the provincial military mobilization department is crowded with parents of new recruits from all over the region,” the resident said. “I also stayed there for 10 days until I could see my son in uniform.”
She said that the parents wait outside the fence all day, and if their kids have not received their uniform yet, they turn in for the night and return the next morning.
Most recruits will not be assigned to units in their hometowns. In the case of North Hamgyong province, the recruits are usually sent further south to Kangwon or South Hwanghae provinces.
Paltry rations
But parents say their children come to them asking for more food because they are fed such meager rations on base.
“Most children ask their mothers to buy them food through the fence,” the resident said.
“When I asked what they were served at the barracks’ cafeteria, I was told that they get just a single bowl of rice mixed with corn,” she said. “The portions were too small, and the only side dish was salted radish.”
She said the children telling their parents how hungry they were made many mothers cry.
“The parents worry about the hunger their children will experience during their time in the military,” she said. “How nice would it be if the authorities actually fed the children well, after all, the children are preparing to leave their parents and serve.”
This picture from North Korea’s official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) via KNS on April 26, 2024 shows North Korea’s leader Kim Jong Un (C) paying a visit to Kim Il Sung Military University in Pyongyang to mark the 92nd anniversary of the founding of North Korea’s army. (KCNA VIA KNS/AFP)
In better times the soldiers got a little bit more food.
Prior to the economic crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, soldiers received 800 grams (1.7 pounds) of food per day. Now they get only 600 grams (1.3 pounds).
In comparison, a single meal ready-to-eat, or MRE combat ration, for a U.S. soldier weighs between 510 to 740 grams (1.1 to 1.6 pounds) and likely contains far more calories. And they are fed three times a day.
North Koreans rarely eat meat these days, usually only three to five times per year, during the major holidays.
The resident described the North Korean rations as “pathetic.”
Food vendors
There are those who stand to profit from the poor quality of army food though, a resident of the northern province of Ryanggang told RFA on condition of anonymity to speak freely.
“Every draft season, food vendors gather around the provincial military mobilization department,” he said, adding that the peddlers sell things like rice mixed with artificial meat or tofu, and sweet snacks. The soldiers are so hungry that it’s big business.
For the rich kids though, it’s a different story, the Ryanggang resident said.
On April 10, the country’s leader Kim Jong Un made a visit to Kim Jong Il University of Military Politics – named after his father and predecessor.
“He brought a generous meal for them that included bulgogi (barbecued meat) and apples,” he said.
Parents who gathered outside of the barracks were angry at the news because the kids of the elite receive what enlisted soldiers can only dream about.
“In this one fact, we can see that while Kim Jong Un says he is for the people, in reality, he values the elites,” the resident said.
The future high-ranking officers do not need special treatment, he said.
“I wish Kim Jong Un would care about enlisted soldiers who have to suffer for a long time after they leave their parents at such a young age.”
Translated by Claire S. Lee. Edited by Eugene Whong and Malcolm Foster.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By Ahn Chang Gyu for RFA Korean.
More than 300 Rohingya men from villages near Rakhine state’s capital have been forced by junta troops to attend mandatory training for Myanmar’s military over the last few days, residents told Radio Free Asia on Thursday.
The latest round of compulsory conscription among the stateless Muslim minority comes a month after about 1,000 Rohingya from elsewhere in Rakhine were made to join the military in March.
More broadly, more than 100,000 young men have fled their homes since the military announced in February it would implement a draft to shore up its ranks after a series of battlefield defeats, according to a report released by the Burmese Affairs and Conflict Study.
Myanmar has been wracked by civil war ever since the military overthrew the civilian-led government in a 2021 coup. Amid the battlefield setbacks over the past six months, the military has said it plans to conscript 50,000 young men and women each year – and is forcibly recruiting Rohingya in Rakhine state to meet quotas.
State Administration Council members hand out leaflets explaining the law of militia service on Feb. 29, 2024, in Kyun Hla City, Myanmar. (State Administration Council)
The effort comes in a state where just seven years ago, the military tortured, raped and killed thousands of Rohingya and sent nearly 1 million fleeing into neighboring Bangladesh.
The 300 Rohingya recruits were taken this week from more than 30 villages in Sittwe township and were all between 18- to 30-years-old, a Rohingya village administrator who wished to remain anonymous for fear of reprisals told RFA.
They were taken by police cars to the military’s Regional Command Headquarters in Sittwe to prepare for training, he said.
Soldiers are now pressing those who remain in a patchwork of villages and internally displaced camps into service to prop up their struggling military campaign in the state against the ethnic Arakan Army.
In exchange for their service, the junta has promised would-be Rohingya fighters freedom of movement as well as small amounts of food and money.
‘Worrying around the clock’
Junta officials have communicated through village elders and administrators during the conscription process, according to a Rohingya woman who lives in Sittwe who requested not to be named for security reasons.
“The officials entice the locals with national identity cards and salary,” she said. “They forced village elders to provide young Rohingya to protect the country. But as Rohingya youth are fishermen, they are not suitable for military service.”
State Administration Council members hand out leaflets explaining the law of militia service on Feb. 29, 2024 in Kyun Hla City, Myanmar. (State Administration Council)
None of the recruits are willing to undergo military training, but they face arrest and beatings if they refuse, she said.
“People in Rakhine state are worrying around the clock about the recruitment for military training,” the village administrator said. “Some people have fled from their homes to other places.”
The 1,000 Rohingya who were recruited in March were put through a two-week training. Afterward, some were deployed to the battlefields while others were sent back to their villages or IDP camps as reserves, residents told RFA.
RFA attempted to contact Attorney General Hla Thein, the junta spokesman for Rakhine state, to ask about this week’s recruitment, but he didn’t answer phone calls.
Pressed into service
Since Myanmar’s conscription law was announced by Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing on Feb. 10, troops nationwide have attempted to press-gang large numbers into the dwindling military.
It requires men and women aged 18 to 35 to serve in the junta’s armed forces for two years – prompting more than 100,000 to flee their homes to avoid the draft, the Burmese Affairs and Conflict Study found.
The junta has carried out operations to enforce the military service law in 224 townships across the country, the report said. Approximately 5,000 young men were sent to 15 military training sites by the end of March, it said.
Rohingya Muslims are seen in military uniform during a training session in Rakhine state on March 10, 2024. (Citizen journalist)
In addition, more than 2,000 people from 40 townships across Myanmar have been enlisted as militia – a number that includes the Rohingya who were recruited in March, the report found.
A resident of Mandalay said people are anxiously watching for the recruitment process to begin again, now that the recent Thingyan water festival holiday has concluded.
“It is anticipated that they will start it in May,” he said. “People are curious about what will happen following Thingyan.”
Eventually, the new recruits will be called on for frontline combat operations, according to former military officer Lin Htet Aung, who participated in the non-violent Civil Disobedience Movement after the coup.
“When the regular army no longer possesses the capacity to execute these tasks, it becomes evident that this deliberate strategy aims to rely solely on the youth of the populace as their military force,” he told RFA.
Translated by Aung Naing and Kalyar Lwin. Edited by Matt Reed and Malcolm Foster.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA Burmese.
The junta is increasing quotas this week for villagers to undergo military training in Ayeyarwaddy division, locals told Radio Free Asia. In some villages in Pathein township, six people per village must now enroll.
Since late September, soldiers have been visiting townships across the region, driving up conscriptions however they can. Without local laws guiding recruitment in the country’s southern delta region, teenagers are also being forced to join.
“In Ayeyarwady region, there is no age limit for militia training,” one Pathein resident who requested anonymity for fear of reprisals said on Tuesday. “The [junta] persuaded young people to also learn to be soldiers.”
In Mawlamyinegyun township, teenagers told RFA they were selected after soldiers demanded three participants from their village.
But some locals are concerned about the lack of age limit and speaking out against the recruitment of minors.
“Enlisting minors into [militia training] is creating child soldiers. They shouldn’t do it because it’s against international law,” one person from Mawlamyinegyun township told RFA, asking for anonymity to protect himself.
They added that the people recruited must travel to the Southwestern Regional Military Headquarters in Ayeyarwady division’s capital of Pathein.
Recruiters gave at least 80 people in Ngwe Saung, Pathein and Ngapudaw townships cash bribes to attend.
Local administrators are also enforcing the regime’s orders, leaving many to feel they have no other choice. In some townships, a quota of 30 people must be met and registered for every six villages, said Pathein and Mawlamyinegyun residents.
Instead of attending the two-week training, some villagers went into hiding. To combat this problem, soldiers began providing training within communities.
The military ordered some people who attended the two-week militia training to return as security guards for their villages, said Pathein residents. But others say they haven’t seen their family members since they left for the training, and do not know where they are.
This isn’t the first time the junta has turned to Ayeyarwady division to bolster its numbers. In May and June, widespread conscription in the delta forced several people to flee. Families were forced to pay the army if they didn’t have a family member able to serve, or a fine of over US$50 if that person didn’t want to join the regime troops.
Calls by RFA to junta council spokesman Maj. Gen. Zaw Min Tun seeking comment on this issue went unanswered, as did calls to Ayeyarwady’s junta spokesperson Maung Maung Than.
Translated by RFA Burmese. Edited by Elaine Chan
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA Burmese.
The ruling Chinese Communist Party is stepping up its monitoring of citizens across the board, from door-to-door monitoring of residential neighborhoods to new rules requiring online celebrities to use their real names.
Local governments across the country have been recruiting thousands of people in recent months as “grid workers” supplying information about residents to the local authorities, according to official websites.
The “grid management” system is so named because it carves up neighborhoods into a grid pattern with 15-20 households per square, and gives each grid a dedicated monitor who reports back on residents’ affairs to neighborhood committees, the lowest rung in the government hierarchy.
Neighborhood committees in China have long been tasked with monitoring the activities of ordinary people in a certain area, but the “grid” system will allow officials to do so even more closely, as well as giving indicators of possible dissent at an early stage.
Grid workers are “information collectors, policy propagandists, liaison [officers] for social situations and public opinion, conflict and dispute mediators,” among other things, according to a recruitment ad posted to the website of the Heshan city government in the southern province of Guangdong.
Multiple job recruitment postings for grid workers are seen on a Shandong civil service website in Aug. 2023. Credit: RFA screenshot
In the eastern province of Shandong, authorities in the provincial capital Jinan posted ads for 1,880 grid worker positions in August, with ads also visible on government websites in northeastern Jilin, southeastern Fujian, the southwestern megacity of Chongqing, and Shandong’s Laizhou city.
Such workers “visit regularly to comprehensively collect basic information on people, events, places, objects, emotions, etc, within their grid,” according to the Heshan recruitment material.
Most ads want to recruit people who live in the district they’ll be monitoring, and only those who “support the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party.”
Anyone who has “failed to cooperate” with the government or “implement the party line” in the past isn’t eligible, even if they were merely engaging in passive resistance, according to a recruitment ad posted by authorities in Jilin’s Tonghua city.
Door to door
A photo of a notice posted to social media showed a warning to local residents by the Huanglianqiao Neighborhood Committee in Sichuan’s Deyang city that grid management in the residential district would be starting soon, with grid workers going door to door to “collect personal information from residents.”
“We hope that community residents will actively cooperate,” the Oct. 9 notice said.
Local resident Li Hong said he had received a similar warning from his neighborhood committee, adding that the grid workers are telling people to “be cautious in word and deed.”
“They check the internet and tell adults and children not to go on WhatsApp, not to go on Twitter or Facebook, not to go on Telegram, and not to discuss the war between Hamas and Israel,” Li told Radio Free Asia on Monday. “[Basically] not to speak, and not to comment.”
Calls to the Huanglianqiao Neighborhood Committee rang answered during office hours on Monday.
A member of a neighborhood committee knocks on the door to register locals and ask about their travel history in Jiujiang, Jiangxi province, China, during the COVID-19 pandemic, Feb. 2, 2020. Credit: Thomas Peter/Reuters
A staff member who answered the phone at the nearby Tianyuan Subdistrict Office of the local government said grid workers were also tasked with getting people to download an “anti-fraud” app issued by the government.
“They’re asking everyone to download the anti-fraud app,” the staff member said. “I’m not sure about other tasks.”
Social media footage has emerged in recent weeks of police stopping people at railway stations and streets in Daqing city and in Inner Mongolia and forcing them to download the app, with students at Jiangxi Normal University reporting similar orders.
Online comments have warned that the app continues to work in the background even if it’s deleted by the user, while residents have also told Radio Free Asia that the app contains spyware that tracks all of a phone user’s actions.
‘Hidden risks’
While Radio Free Asia has been unable to verify those technical claims, Professor Yang Haiying of Japan’s Shizuoka University said in an interview on Sept. 27 that the app also prevents overseas contacts from calling people back home in China, citing his own attempts to call relatives in Inner Mongolia since they installed it.
Sichuan’s provincial party politics and law committee described grid work in a March Weibo post as “discovering and reporting hidden risks, reactionary propaganda, cult-related activities, illegal preaching and other political and security risks.”
Grid workers are also tasked with reporting “social issues, damage to public facilities, clues to illegal and criminal activities such as violent debt collection, illegal pyramid schemes, pornography, gambling, drug trafficking, theft, robbery, and the illegal mining of sand and gravel.”
They also play a role in “possible or ongoing cases of individual extremism and mass incidents [protests and demonstrations] … reporting social conditions and public opinion [and] propaganda and mobilization, as well as participating in emergency response activities, policing and stability maintenance,” the article said.
“Grid management is gradually spreading, until it controls the whole of society,” Hunan-based current affairs commentator Yuan Xiaohua told Radio Free Asia. “They are pushing the Fengqiao Experience – grid management is the Fengqiao Experience in a different form.”
Community workers wearing armbands sit by a street as the Third Belt and Road Forum is held in Beijing, Tuesday, Oct. 17, 2023. Credit: Tingshu Wang/Reuters
Chinese Communist Party leader Xi Jinping mentioned the “Fengqiao Experience” during a visit to Zhejiang ahead of the Asian Games in Hangzhou last month, in a reference to the grassroots mobilization of the early 1960s, when then supreme leader Mao Zedong called on the masses to mobilize to wage “class struggle” across the country. Commentators have interpreted this to mean that similar moves are afoot in today’s China.
As well as the granular monitoring of people’s daily lives and thoughts, government censors are also cracking down on online influencers, bloggers and celebrities, insisting that they use their real names on social media, instead of a pen-name.
The social media platform Sina Weibo recently warned users with followings of more than a million followers that they must display their real names on their accounts by the end of October, while users with more than 500,000 followers must comply by the end of the year.
Real-name registration has long been a requirement for social media users in China, but accounts weren’t required to display a person’s real name openly, although they did have to supply it to the service provider.
“Surveillance in China, including censorship of speech, is comprehensive,” current affairs commentator Bi Xin said. “There are no blind spots.”
Translated with additional reporting by Luisetta Mudie.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By Gu Ting for RFA Mandarin.
A Hong Kong police recruitment campaign aimed at persuading ‘brave and loyal’ candidates studying in mainland China to join up has netted just over 100 suitable candidates, with thousands of vacancies remaining empty, as young people say public regard for the force is at a low ebb in the wake of the 2019 protest movement.
Police launched a major recruitment drive among Hong Kong students in mainland Chinese universities in November last year, receiving 447 applications, 128 of which have been successful so far, the city’s security secretary said in a July 26 letter to the Legislative Council. The remainder are still being processed.
The drive came after deputy police commissioner Joe Chow told news site HK01.com in October 2022 that the force had a total of 5,000 unfilled vacancies, citing “political, economic and labor challenges” to recruitment.
“Those who already have work experience must have not just the skills, but also similar values [to the rest of the force],” Chow said in the interview, adding that the force will be looking for “braveness” and “loyalty” in potential recruits.
Despite being allocated huge amounts of fresh funding in the wake of the 2019 protest movement, the force has been struggling to fill its additional vacancies, thousands of which have been filled by allowing officers to work past the usual retirement age of 55.
Hong Kong police fire tear gas at protesters in Sai Wan, Hong Kong , July 28, 2019. Credit: Associated Press
In total, 3,439 serving officers have been approved or approved in principle to extend their service to the age of 60, the security bureau letter told lawmakers.
For many young people in Hong Kong, one major factor prevents them from considering a career as a cop — the 2019 protest movement.
“When I wrote about my future career in primary school, I wrote that I wanted to be a Hong Kong police officer,” 19-year-old Jijai told Radio Free Asia. “When I was a kid, the cops in Hong Kong were very friendly, and I thought that was a way to help people.”
“Now I have completely changed my view, because … I realized that they are just puppets for the communist government of Hong Kong,” he said. “You’re not doing good if you do stuff to hurt your own people.”
“If I had no other option and I really decided on a government job, I’d apply to be a firefighter, because they have a much better image than the police,” he said.
Public anger against the police treatment of protesters began with the intense tear-gassing of unarmed crowds who had no escape route at the start of the anti-extradition protests.
It gained momentum when officers took 39 minutes to respond to hundreds of emergency calls when unidentified mobsters in white T-shirts attacked passengers and passers-by at Yuen Long MTR on July 21, 2019.
And it took on a much darker turn following the bloody attacks on train passengers by riot police at Prince Edward MTR on Aug. 31, 2019, after which the MTR refused to release video footage from trains and platforms despite persistent rumors that at least one person died in the attacks.
‘Like a police state’
By November, police were surrounding major university campuses only to be met with a barrage of makeshift weapons including bricks, bows and arrows and Molotov cocktails as besieged frontline protesters sought to prevent them from coming inside.
They were also criticized for their treatment of journalists throughout the protests, and their handcuffing of medics and first-aid volunteers during the siege of the Polytechnic University.
Wong Tzi-kin, a Hong Konger in graduate school in democratic Taiwan, said he would never consider a career in the police force, citing the Yuen Long attacks.
“I can just imagine the sort of work the government would ask me to do, especially now that Hong Kong has become like a police state,” Wong said.
“The police aren’t maintaining law and order or serving the people any more; they’re a political tool to maintain stability.”
He said wages are relatively high, however.
“The high wages may be very tempting, but nobody with a conscience is going to do that just for the money,” he said.
Eggs thrown by protestors are splattered on a police badge at the police headquarters in Hong Kong, June 22, 2019. Credit: Associated Press
Exiled former pro-democracy lawmaker Ted Hui said the police are no longer an asset to the government.
“Since 2019, the image of the Hong Kong police force has been a negative asset for the Hong Kong government,” Hui said.
“It doesn’t matter how much you try to tout it on [social media platform] Xiaohongshu, or how hard you try to clean up the narrative around Hong Kong, there is no way to make the police force look good,” he said.
“Even Hong Kong students studying in mainland China who are more able to accept the way things are there care more about their own dignity than about the monthly salary of H.K.$20,000-30,000,” Hui said.
“It shows the depths to which the public image of the Hong Kong police has sunk.”
Translated by Luisetta Mudie.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By Chen Zifei for RFA Mandarin.
