bangkok — After a whirlwind few weeks with Paetongtarn Shinawatra taking the helm as Thailand’s new prime minister, Thailand’s struggling economy needs a clear strategy moving forward to get it back on track, according to some analysts.

The country’s economy has been sluggish and isn’t growing as fast as hoped.

Thailand has the second-largest economy in Southeast Asia, though its annual growth is slower than many of its regional neighbors.

Initial forecasts put Thailand with a GDP growth of 3% for 2024, but its new revised growth is 2.7%, according to Thailand’s Finance Ministry.

Kiatanantha Lounkaew, an economic lecturer at the Thammasat University in Bangkok, said there are two major problems holding Thailand back.

“The household debt per GDP is high, approaching 90%,” he told VOA.

“Secondly, our economy has been operating with the same structure since the year 2000, and that is why our competitiveness has been eroding. We can’t compete in the municipal [foreign direct investments] compared to our regional partners.

“We must have a clear strategy roadmap for Thailand for the next three years. The picture must be credible. Thailand will then be recovered fully, economically, socially and politically,” Kiatanantha said.

Manufacturing, agriculture and services

The three main economic industries driving Thailand’s gross domestic product are manufacturing, agriculture and services.

But manufacturing, for example, has slowed, with nearly 2,000 factories closing last year alone, leading to thousands of lost jobs, local media report. Cheap imports from places such as China, are a factor in Thailand becoming uncompetitive.

Thailand needs to come up with innovative ways to use technology to aid its key sectors, such as agriculture, according to Kiatanantha.

“We have been a technology user for a long time, we can use technology in a smart way to increase our core economy. For example, [shifting] agriculture into smart farming to something more value added, rather than sending out the raw materials.”

And foreign direct investments (FDIs) are also important to Thailand, with countries like Japan, Singapore, the U.S., and China making significant investments in Southeast Asia countries in recent years.

But the labor force is limited, and more training is also needed to attract further FDIs, including in technology.

“The quality of our labor force to cater to a new technology is not that high, and the number of people qualified for such technology is still low,” he said. “We need to produce people with good human capital, so the investor will be confident that when they come to Thailand, they will be able to find suitable people to build a position.”

‘Thailand has lost its footing’

Thailand’s political changes haven’t helped matters either.

Earlier in August, Thailand’s Constitutional Court’s swiftly removed Srettha Thavisin as prime minister over an “ethical violation” for his role in appointing a member of parliament (MP) to his cabinet who had been imprisoned for an alleged attempt to bribe an official.

Thitinan Pongsudhirak, a political analyst, said Thailand’s economy has long had problems because of the political instability in the past two decades.

“Since 2006, Thailand has lost its footing. Two military coups [2006 and 2014]. Elections, multi-major parties dissolved. We’ve had three constitutions along the way. The trajectory shows me we are seeing signs of economic stagnation and political decay,” he said Wednesday at the Foreign Correspondents Club of Thailand in Bangkok.

The removal of the prime minister paved the way for Pheu Thai leader Paetongtarn Shinawatra to be elected as Thailand’s new prime minister.

That marked the return of another Shinawatra as Thailand’s premier. Paetongtarn Shinawatra is the youngest daughter of Thaksin Shinawatra, a former prime minister who recently returned to Thailand following 15 years in self-exile.

In his first public speech since leaving Thailand in self-exile, Thaksin laid out a 14-point strategy to fix the country’s economy, ranging from reforming the public debt, the agriculture sector, empowering tourism, promoting investment into entertainment complexes and the use of locally made products.

But Thitinan, the political analyst, said Thailand must be looking toward digitalization.

“Now I think the dial has moved on, they have to be talking about much more digitalization, digital economy, AI, machine learning, education reform,” he said. “Thailand has missed the semi-conductor innovation, the tech boom and now it is missing the AI burst, and the reason is because of the domestic political situation.”

After government upheavals in recent years with decisions from Thailand’s monarchy, military and judiciary, Thitinan is unsure how long this Shinawatra government will last.

“Now we have a Thaksin 2.0 government, but it’s a shell of itself 20 years ago,” he said. “I’m wondering whether they will be allowed to govern — or continue to be stymied. If it isn’t, Thailand will go nowhere, it will be at a standstill and regress.”

“But,” Thitinan later told VOA, “at least there is a plan.”

Plan aims to give citizens money

One of the controversial policies still up in the air is Thailand’s Digital Wallet scheme, a program aimed at giving 10,000 baht ($275) to 50 million citizens in digital money to spend locally to stimulate the economy. It was a campaign promise from the Pheu Thai party during the 2023 elections.

Thaksin recently said the plan will begin in September. This is despite speculation that government lawmakers want to scrap the idea.

But political analyst Thitinan said its impact will be diluted.

“It will come from the current budget year and the next budget year. So, the effects will be diluted,” he said. “And in order to be effective, you need to have a big fiscal boost in a short time and let that create multiplier effects.”

If it goes ahead, it will cost the Thai government an estimated $13.8 billion. At least 20 million people have registered for the plan.

The only industry seen as thriving economically is Thailand’s crucial tourism industry. At its peak in 2019, tourism accounted for 11.5% of the country’s overall GDP.

By August, there were 21 million visitors to Thailand, with about 36 million forecasted by the end of this year.

Thailand recently relaxed entry rules so tourists from 93 countries will now be permitted 60 days on arrival. A Destination Thailand Visa also was launched that allows digital nomads to live, work and travel in the country.

Kiatanantha, the economic lecturer, said more tourism is a “good sign,” but improvements are needed.

“[Tourism] focuses on a few tourism attractions like Bangkok, Phuket and in Chiang Mai and Chiang Rai. Until [tourism income] is a distributed benefit to other regions, that’s a problem,” said Kiatanantha.

“The health sector has potential. It can combine with the tourism sector to generate a bigger sector where people come for leisure and some health checkups or wellness, and that’s the sector that we are good at,” said Kiatanantha. “Tourism is still a goal, but it has to be a sustainable one. We need to attract tourism with more purchasing power.”
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tokyo — Japan, a nation so hardworking its language has a term for literally working oneself to death, is trying to address a worrisome labor shortage by coaxing more people and companies to adopt four-day workweeks. 

The Japanese government first expressed support for a shorter working week in 2021, after lawmakers endorsed the idea. The concept has been slow to catch on, however; about 8% of companies in Japan allow employees to take three or more days off per week, while 7% give their workers the legally mandated one day off, according to the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare. 

Hoping to produce more takers, especially among small and medium-sized businesses, the government launched a “work style reform” campaign that promotes shorter hours and other flexible arrangements along with overtime limits and paid annual leave. The labor ministry recently started offering free consulting, grants and a growing library of success stories as further motivation. 

“By realizing a society in which workers can choose from a variety of working styles based on their circumstances, we aim to create a virtuous cycle of growth and distribution and enable each and every worker to have a better outlook for the future,” states a ministry website about the “Hataraki-kata kaikaku” campaign, which translates to “innovating how we work.” 

The department overseeing the new support services for businesses says only three companies have come forward so far to request advice on making changes, relevant regulations and available subsidies, illustrating the challenges the initiative faces. 

Perhaps more telling: of the 63,000 Panasonic Holdings Corp. employees who are eligible for four-day schedules at the electronics maker and its group companies in Japan, only 150 employees have opted to take them, according to Yohei Mori, who oversees the initiative at one Panasonic company. 

The government’s official backing of a better work-life balance represents a marked change in Japan, a country whose reputed culture of workaholic stoicism often got credited for the national recovery and stellar economic growth after World War II. 

Conformist pressures to sacrifice for one’s company are intense. Citizens typically take vacations at the same time of year as their colleagues — during the Bon holidays in the summer and around New Year’s — so co-workers can’t accuse them of being neglectful or uncaring. 

Long hours are the norm. Though 85% of employers report giving their workers two days off a week and there are legal restrictions on overtime hours — which are negotiated with labor unions and detailed in contracts — some Japanese do “service overtime,” meaning it’s unreported and performed without compensation. 

A recent government white paper on “karoshi,” the Japanese term that in English means “death from overwork, said Japan has at least 54 such fatalities a year, including from heart attacks. 

Japan’s “serious, conscientious and hard-working” people tend to value their relationships with their colleagues and form a bond with their companies, and Japanese TV shows and manga comics often focus on the workplace, said Tim Craig, the author of a book called “Cool Japan: Case Studies from Japan’s Cultural and Creative Industries.” 

“Work is a big deal here. It’s not just a way to make money, although it is that, too,” said Craig, who previously taught at Doshisha Business School and founded editing and translation firm BlueSky Academic Services. 

Some officials consider changing that mindset as crucial to maintaining a viable workforce amid Japan’s nosediving birth rate. At the current rate, which is partly attributed to the country’s job-focused culture, the working age population is expected to decline 40% to 45 million people in 2065, from the current 74 million, according to government data. 

Proponents of the three-days-off model say it encourages people raising children, those caring for older relatives, retirees living on pensions, and others looking for flexibility or additional income to remain in the workforce for longer. 

Akiko Yokohama, who works at Spelldata, a small Tokyo-based technology company that allows employees to work a four-day schedule, takes Wednesdays off along with Saturdays and Sundays. The extra day off allows her to get her hair done, attend other appointments or go shopping. 

“It’s hard when you aren’t feeling well to keep going for five days in a row. The rest allows you to recover or go see the doctor. Emotionally, it’s less stressful,” Yokohama said. 

Her husband, a real estate broker, also gets Wednesdays off but works weekends, which is common in his industry. Yokohama said that allows the couple to go on midweek family outings with their elementary-school age child. 

Fast Retailing Co., the Japanese company that owns Uniqlo, Theory, J Brand and other clothing brands, pharmaceutical company Shionogi & Co., and electronics companies Ricoh Co. and Hitachi also began offering a four-day workweek in recent years. 

The trend even has gained traction in the notoriously consuming finance industry. Brokerage SMBC Nikko Securities Inc. started letting workers put in four days a week in 2020. Banking giant Mizuho Financial Group offers a three-day schedule option. 

Critics of the government’s push say that in practice, people put on four-day schedules often end up working just as hard for less pay. 

But there are signs of change. 

An annual Gallup survey that measures employee engagement ranked Japan as having among the least engaged workers of all nationalities surveyed; in the most recent survey, only 6% of the Japanese respondents described themselves as engaged at work compared to the global average of 23%. 

That means relatively few Japanese workers felt highly involved in their workplace and enthusiastic about their work, while most were putting in their hours without investing passion or energy. 
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DHAKA, bangladesh — Authorities in Bangladesh are bracing for the spread of waterborne diseases and racing to get drinking water to people after devastating floods last week left at least 54 people dead and millions stranded. 

As floodwaters recede slowly, many people remain stranded and in urgent need of food, clean water, medicine and dry clothes, especially in remote areas where blocked roads have hindered rescue and relief efforts. 

The Bangladesh Meteorological Department said that flood conditions could persist if the monsoon rains continued, as water levels were receding very slowly. 

Around 470,000 people have taken refuge in 3,300 shelters across 11 flood-hit districts, where around 600 medical teams are helping provide treatment, with the army, air force, navy, and the border guard assisting in rescue operations, authorities said. 

A disaster management ministry official warned that as floodwaters recede, there is a risk of an epidemic, adding that the outbreak of waterborne diseases is likely if clean water is not provided soon. 

“Our top priority is to ensure the availability of safe drinking water,” the official said. 

In the past 24 hours, around 3,000 people have been hospitalized due to waterborne diseases in flood-hit areas, according to the Directorate General of Health Services. Many areas remained submerged, preventing stranded people from accessing healthcare facilities. 

“Water is everywhere but there is no clean water to drink. People are getting sick,” said Farid Ahmed, a resident of one of the worst-hit districts, Lakshmipur. 

Vast areas of land are submerged, posing a significant threat to crops, agriculture ministry officials said. 

The United Nations children’s agency has warned that 2 million children were at risk as the worst floods in three decades sweep through eastern Bangladesh. The organization is urgently appealing for $35 million to provide life-saving supplies. 

“The devastating floods in eastern Bangladesh are a tragic reminder of the relentless impact of extreme weather events and the climate crisis on children,” said Emma Brigham, deputy representative of UNICEF Bangladesh. 

An analysis in 2015 by the World Bank Institute estimated that 3.5 million people in Bangladesh, one of the world’s most climate-vulnerable countries, were at risk of annual river flooding. Scientists attribute the exacerbation of such catastrophic events to climate change. 

Farah Kabir, director of ActionAid Bangladesh, said that countries like Bangladesh, which contribute minimally to global emissions, urgently need funding to recover from climate-related losses and build resilience for future impacts while pursuing green development pathways. 
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Moscow, Russia — A helicopter with 22 people aboard, most of them tourists, has gone missing in Russia’s Kamchatka peninsula in the far east, regional authorities said Saturday.

“Today at about 1615 (0415 GMT) communication was lost with a Mi-8 helicopter … which had 22 people on board, 19 passengers and three crew members,” Kamchatka Governor Vladimir Solodov said in a video posted on Telegram.

Rescue teams in helicopters have been searching into the night for the missing aircraft, focusing on a river valley that the helicopter was due to fly along, Russian authorities said.

The Mi-8 is a Soviet-designed military helicopter that is widely used for transport in Russia.

The missing helicopter had picked up passengers near the Vachkazhets ancient volcano in a scenic area of the peninsula known for its wild landscapes, pristine rivers, geysers and active volcanoes.

Kamchatka, which is nine hours ahead of Moscow, is a popular tourist destination.

A source in the emergency services told TASS news agency that the helicopter disappeared from radar almost immediately after taking off and the crew did not report any problems.

The local weather service said there was poor visibility in the airport area.

Accidents involving planes and helicopters are frequent in Russia’s far eastern region, which is sparsely populated and where there is often harsh weather.

The emergencies ministry said the search and rescue operation was being hampered by thick fog in the area.

In August 2021, a Mi-8 helicopter with 16 people on board, including 13 tourists, crashed into a lake in Kamchatka due to poor visibility, killing eight.

In July the same year, a plane crashed as it tried to land on the peninsula, with 22 passengers and 6 crew aboard, all of whom were killed.
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Beijing — Beijing accused a Philippine ship of deliberately running into a Chinese coast guard vessel on Saturday near a flashpoint shoal in the South China Sea, the latest in a spate of similar incidents in recent weeks.

China claims almost all of the economically vital waterway despite competing claims from other countries and an international court ruling that its assertion has no legal basis.

A Chinese coast guard spokesperson said Saturday’s incident took place off the disputed Sabina Shoal, which has emerged as a new hotspot in the long-running maritime confrontations between Manila and Beijing.

Shortly after noon, a Philippine ship “deliberately collided with” a Chinese vessel near the shoal, known in Chinese as Xianbin, said spokesperson Liu Dejun, according to state broadcaster CCTV.

“China exercises indisputable sovereignty” in this zone, Liu added.

Liu condemned the Philippine vessel’s “unprofessional and dangerous” conduct.

Sabina Shoal is located 140 kilometers west of the Philippine island of Palawan and about 1,200 kilometers from Hainan island, the nearest major Chinese landmass.

Philippine and Chinese vessels have collided at least twice this month near Sabina, which analysts say Beijing is seeking to further encroach upon, moving deeper into Manila’s exclusive economic zone and normalizing Chinese control of the area.

The discovery this year of piles of crushed coral at the shoal ignited suspicion in Manila that Beijing was planning to build another permanent base there, which would be its closest outpost to the Philippine archipelago.

Recent clashes between Philippine and Chinese vessels have also taken place around the Second Thomas Shoal.

A Filipino sailor lost a thumb in a clash there in June when Chinese coast guard members wielding knives, sticks and an axe foiled a Philippine Navy attempt to resupply a small garrison.

Sabina Shoal is also the rendezvous point for Philippine resupply missions to the garrison on Second Thomas Shoal.

The repeated confrontations prompted Manila to brand Beijing the “biggest disruptor” to peace in Southeast Asia at a defense conference this month.
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Washington — They’ve been waiting for years, sometimes decades, not knowing if their loved ones – victims of enforced disappearances in South Asia – are dead or alive.

The uncertainty over their fate gnaws, yet it also keeps them going.

Farzana Akhtar’s husband, Parvez Hossain, was taken by Bangladeshi security forces 11 years ago. An opposition activist, he was one of more than 600 people forcibly disappeared during former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s rule from 2009 to 2024. While some were released or reported dead, more than 100 are unaccounted for.

Hope for their freedom surged after Hasina’s government collapsed on August 5 in the face of student protests. Three people were released from a notorious detention center in Dhaka, but desperate families that rushed to the site found only empty cells.

Still, Akhtar clings to hope that her husband is alive.

“For this, we hope there are people,” Akhtar said.

Her daughter, Abida Islam Ridi, was just 2 years old when her father vanished. Watching a video of the detention center, she felt a chill of fear.

“How could people stay there?” she said.

Yet, like her mother, she holds onto the hope that her father is alive.

“My mother says I have a father,” Ridi said. “Everyone says they will return my father. But they don’t say where. Everyone just says, you have a father.”

This hope mingled with anguish is echoed by nearly a dozen family members in Afghanistan, Bangladesh, and Pakistan interviewed by VOA.

To human rights activists, the feeling is all too familiar.

“In Sri Lanka, the war ended in 2009 and yet we meet mothers who are still hoping that their sons may be in some secret arrest place and that they will be returned,” said Meenakshi Ganguly, deputy Asia director at Human Rights Watch.

Enforced disappearances are a grave human rights violation. Victims are grabbed off the street or taken from their homes by security forces. Their fate remains unknown: They might be held indefinitely, released, or die in custody. The practice, made notorious by Latin America’s military regimes in the 1960s, has plagued South Asia for decades.

Across the region, the toll is enormous. In Afghanistan, tens of thousands were forcibly disappeared in the late 1970s. In Sri Lanka, between 60,000 and 100,000 have disappeared since the 1980s. In India’s Kashmir region, at least 8,000 cases were recorded between 1989 and 2012. In Pakistan’s Baluchistan, 7,000 cases have been recorded since 2004.

Governments accused of carrying out enforced disappearances deny the allegations. Hasina’s regime often insisted that some of the victims had gone into hiding to evade criminal charges. But Bangladesh’s new interim government has set up a commission to investigate and signed the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearances.

The lack of closure, human rights experts say, is the worst aspect of the practice: Family members would rather receive a body than not know.

“There is nothing more difficult than this,” said Fahima Bibi, whose son, Abdul Khalid, vanished in Pakistan’s Punjab province in 2012. “If a person dies, your heart gets closure, but not knowing if they are dead or alive?”

The long-term psychological effects on families are uncertain. A 2015 study found that post traumatic stress disorder, depression, and complicated grief are more common among these families than in people coping with the death of a loved one. A more recent study, however, found that the evidence is inconclusive.

The vast majority of victims are men, their children bearing the burden of their loss, even those too young to remember them. They come to know them through pictures, mementos, and family stories, forming an imaginary bond. The void becomes painful when they see peers with their fathers.

Fahmida Baloch was 2 when her father, Dr. Muhammad Akbar Marri, was taken from his clinic in Baluchistan by Pakistani paramilitary forces in 2010. Initially telling her that her father had gone on a business trip, Baloch’s mother disclosed the truth when she was about 8 years old.

“I didn’t know before what enforced disappearance meant,” she said.

Little things conjured her father’s absence: fathers picking up their children at school, teachers asking students to bring their fathers to school.

“How could I tell them where my father was?” Baloch said.

She drew strength and hope from her Islamic faith.

“My mother says, ‘Keep up your hope, he’ll definitely come back,'” she says. “I pray. Other than praying, I can’t do anything.”

This hope sustains others well into their middle years.

Farhad Ashkyar’s father was seized in Kabul in 1979. Farhad was 2 at the time. As he grew, he learned about his absent father from family stories: He was a health ministry employee and a good wrestler.

Like Baloch, seeing other children with their fathers sharpened his sense of loss.

“There is nothing harder than it, especially when you see other kids call their fathers or say, ‘My father is getting me new clothes for Eid,” he said.

Through the years of his father’s absence, the family clung to every rumor, every whisper of hope, every late-night knock on the door.

“The thing is we were always waiting,” Ashkyar said.

Waiting but also standing tall. “I realized that whether he comes back or not, I have to stand on my own feet. I have to work hard.”

Then, in 2013, the families of victims found a measure of closure.  A list of nearly 5,000 people forcibly disappeared and executed following the 1978 Communist coup surfaced. For many families, the list brought some solace, if not the bodies, at least an acknowledgement. To honor their memory, they held funeral and prayer services.

But Ashkyar’s father’s name wasn’t on the list.

“That gave us hope,” he said. “If he had been killed, his name would have appeared on the list. To this day, I can’t say ‘May God forgive him,’ because we haven’t seen his body.”

VOA’s Afghan, Bangla, Deewa, and Urdu services contributed to this article.
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Nuku’alofa, Tonga — A joint declaration by Pacific leaders was reissued Saturday morning with mentions of Taiwan removed after China slammed an earlier version as a “mistake” that “must be corrected.”

After five days of talks in Tonga, a “cleared” communique was released Friday that reaffirmed a 30-year-old agreement allowing Taiwan to take part in the Pacific Islands Forum.

But the wording immediately raised the ire of Chinese diplomats, who piled pressure on Pacific leaders to amend the document.

The forum reissued the communique without explanation Saturday morning, conspicuously deleting the paragraph concerning the bloc’s “relations with Taiwan.”

“It must be a mistake. It must be a mistake,” China’s special envoy to the Pacific islands, Qian Bo, told reporters Friday.

“This is a surprising mistake made by someone. I’m not sure, but I think it must be corrected.”

Qian earlier said he had contacted the bloc’s secretariat in the hope of clarifying the situation.

“This should not be the final communique, there must be a correction on the text.”

The original paragraph — titled “Relations with Taiwan/Republic of China” — said leaders had “reaffirmed” the 1992 decision that paved the way for Taiwan’s participation in the forum.

Beijing has aggressively sought to exclude Taiwan — a self-governing island of more than 23 million people — from international bodies and rejects its autonomy.

Solomon Islands, China’s main partner in the South Pacific, has lobbied for Taiwan to be stripped of its “development partner” status with the Pacific Islands Forum.

A Forum spokesperson did not immediately reply to a request for comment. 
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islamabad — A group of 28 asylum-seekers were repatriated to Afghanistan from Germany on Friday after being deported for criminal convictions.

The deportees, on board a chartered flight, arrived in the capital of Kabul, where Taliban authorities promptly detained them for investigation and blocked journalists’ access to the airport, according to witnesses.

The Taliban did not immediately issue a statement regarding the fate of the Afghan returnees or whether the repatriation resulted from mutual understanding between Kabul and Berlin.

Earlier, a German government spokesperson said in a statement on its website that the Afghan nationals had been “convicted for criminal offenses,” carried “no legal residency,” and “were subject to return orders.”

Steffen Hebestreit, a spokesperson for the government, noted that this was the first time Germany had repatriated Afghan nationals since August 2021, when the Taliban regained control of the country.

“The federal government will continue with such returns,” Hebestreit said. “The security interests of Germany clearly outweigh the claim for protection of criminals and individuals endangering national security.”

The Taliban takeover had prompted Germany to halt deportations to Afghanistan and shut down its embassy in the country amid fears of reprisals against returnees.

Hebestreit did not respond to reports from German media that Friday’s deportation flight resulted from two months of secret negotiations between Berlin and Taliban authorities, with Qatar serving as the intermediary.

He said in a statement that Germany had sought the support of “key regional partners to help facilitate the return” and was “very grateful for this support” without elaborating.

Violent offenders and sex offenders were reportedly among the Afghans sent back Friday, including a man who took part in the gang rape of a 14-year-old girl.

Friday’s resumption of Afghan deportations came a week after a deadly knife attack at a street festival in the city of Solingen that shocked Germany. The Islamic State extremist group claimed responsibility for the attack that killed three people. A 26-year-old Syrian man allegedly carried it out.

Last May, a 25-year-old Afghan asylum-seeker was accused of killing a German police officer in a knife attack on a market square in the city of Mannheim. That incident occurred amid a reported increase in criminal activities involving Afghan nationals in Germany. It revived debate about deporting serious criminals even if they come from countries deemed unsafe, like Afghanistan or Syria.

The Taliban have implemented their strict interpretation of Islamic law in Afghanistan, placing restrictions on personal conduct and freedom of the population. They have barred Afghan girls from receiving an education beyond the sixth grade and women from most jobs in public and private sectors.

The curbs, particularly those on women and girls, have outraged the global community and deterred foreign governments from officially recognizing the de facto Kabul government.
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ISLAMABAD — “Ever since I was a child, I’ve only seen war,” says Sammi Deen Baloch, a prominent rights activist from Pakistan’s southwestern province. “I am 26 years old and all I can remember are resistance movements in Balochistan, war and military operations. We have never had a normal life.”

Coordinated attacks by Baloch separatists on August 25 killed at least 52 people — 38 civilians and 14 security personnel. Militants stormed police stations, blew up railway tracks, torched vehicles, and killed 23 laborers after identifying them as residents of Punjab province.

The banned Baloch Liberation Army, or BLA, claimed responsibility for the attacks. The military said it killed 21 militants in retaliatory fire.

Violence has escalated across the province in recent years. Experts say decades of mistrust, bad governance and military interventions have widened the gap between the state and the Baloch people and fueled waves of insurgencies that have left resource-rich Balochistan impoverished and perpetually restive.

Accession to Pakistan

Covering almost 44% of Pakistan’s area, the province became part of the country almost a year after the Muslim-majority nation gained independence from Britain in August 1947 in a bloody partition of the Indian subcontinent.

Many Balochs still see themselves as being forced to join Pakistan as the large princely state of Kalat in the Balochistan region initially declared independence.

After the first wave of tribal resistance against Kalat’s annexation in 1948, three more waves followed between 1958 and 1977 as Balochs sought independence or at least greater autonomy.

To assert its control, Islamabad resorted to military action, dismissal of elected provincial governments and arrests of tribal leaders despite promises of amnesty.

“It is a series of aggressions,” Mir Muhammad Ali Talpur, a veteran of the Baloch tribal resistance in the 1970s, told VOA. “That forced the Baloch to resist,” said Talpur, who has written extensively on the province’s issues since returning in the1990s from Afghanistan, where he took refuge with thousands of Baloch tribal fighters.

Fifth insurgency

Balochistan is currently in the throes of a fifth wave of insurgency that erupted in the early 2000s during military leader Pervez Musharraf’s era.

Angered by the rape of a female doctor from Karachi in 2005, allegedly by an army captain in the Sui district, tribesmen from the Bugti clan assaulted military camps.

The killing of popular tribal leader and former chief minister Nawab Akbar Bugti in a 2006 military operation angered Baloch masses and triggered an insurgency that is still raging.

“The killing of Nawab Bugti, that was like the 9-11 of Balochistan,” said Washington-based Baloch political analyst Malik Siraj Akbar, referring to the 2001 terrorist attack on the United States.

Urban appeal

The current violent resistance led by BLA militants is different from past insurgencies, though, according to Islamabad-based security affairs expert Amir Rana.

“BLA leadership is from the middle class, and during the last decade, we have seen the transformation of the leadership of this insurgent movement,” said Rana, who heads the Pakistan Institute of Peace Studies. “This is not anymore tribal. Though there are a few [tribal] leaders in exile … now it is led by middle class, educated youth.”

The banned outfit is also attracting women. BLA claimed one of its suicide bombers in this week’s attack was a female, reportedly a law student at Turbat University in Balochistan. The militant group first used a female suicide bomber — a mother of three — in an April 2022 attack on Chinese nationals in Karachi.

Rana said increased political awareness has also amplified the sense of deprivation among educated urban youth, pushing them into BLA’s orbit. “Baloch youth got exposure to other parts of the country [through government scholarships], and then they realized how backward their province is.”

Human rights abuses have also fueled the insurgency, analysts say. Decades of violent resistance and military action to quash it have left a trail of brutalized bodies on roadsides and families awaiting information about missing loved ones.

BLA is “able to recruit enough young people to sustain their movement because of [the] perception of the Pakistani government, the military, not being sincere in resolving the issue of disappearances and other problems that the Baloch people face,” analyst Akbar explained.

In a 2023 report, the independent Human Rights Commission of Pakistan noted “with concern the state’s widespread use of enforced disappearances to muzzle dissent.”

Addressing a press conference last May, the Pakistani military’s spokesperson, Lieutenant General Arshad Sharif Chaudhry, said the issue of missing persons was complex and exaggerated for propaganda purposes as some of those presumed missing were killed in encounters with the military or are hiding in Afghanistan.

“You put the same people on the missing persons list and accuse law enforcement agencies of abducting them,” Chaudhry said. “For any genuine cases, all agencies, law enforcement authorities and civil institutions give their input, and nobody rests easy until it’s resolved.”

Development dilemma

After BLA’s brazen attacks this week, the provincial government announced plans to equip 30,000 young Balochs with technical job skills to counter what Balochistan’s chief minister, Sarfraz Bugti, called the alienation of Baloch youth.

Despite promises of prosperity and millions of dollars doled out over decades by provincial and federal governments for infrastructure, education and skill development programs, the sparsely populated province remains poverty-ridden and severely underdeveloped.

“The simple answer is corruption. Nothing else,” said Rana.

The arrival of international mega-projects to tap into the province’s natural resources has further stirred suspicion. Along with funding a deep-sea port and a new airport in Gwadar, Chinese companies run gold, copper and silver mining projects in Saindak and zinc and lead mining in Duddar. Canadian company Barrick Gold mines one of the world’s largest copper and gold deposits in Baluchistan’s Reko Diq region.

Many feel exploited by the lack of robust public debate over contracts, access to mostly low-paying jobs and security restrictions affecting mobility and livelihood.

Rights activists have staged massive protests in the heart of Gwadar, while militants have targeted migrant labor and Chinese interests in and outside Balochistan.

Insurgents, Talpur said, think that “those who are working for the government over here, that is settlers or civilians, are part of an oppressive set-up. Same with the Chinese being attacked as well.”

Political vacuum

“There is a gap [of leadership] that neither the nationalists are filling nor the politicians that keep changing political parties,” said Shahzada Zulfiqar, a veteran journalist and political commentator based in Quetta, the provincial capital.

Political analysts and activists who spoke to VOA say many in Balochistan are disillusioned with the democratic process because of the Pakistani state’s alliance with Baloch tribal elders seen as pliant, distrust of popular nationalist politicians, and alleged manipulation of political allegiances.

The Baloch Unity Committee, or BYC, a nonviolent, civic movement, is now trying to fill that political gap, Zulfiqar said.

Led by a young medical doctor, Mahrang Baloch, the BYC started as a protest movement to draw attention to the issue of enforced disappearances. It has since evolved into a broad civic rights movement with massive support.

“If the state engages constructively with Mahrang and accepts some of the movement’s demands, it will put pressure on BLA and lessen its appeal,” said Rana. “This will benefit the state.”

However, authorities have cracked down on the BYC’s cross-country protests. Officials have accused it of receiving foreign support and maintaining links with separatist insurgents — charges that BYC leaders deny.

“I think there will be a time that no one will talk about peace because of how peaceful voices are suppressed and are being linked with different [militant] groups,” Sammi Deen Baloch, also a prominent BYC leader, told VOA.

Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif visited Quetta Thursday with Army Chief General Asim Munir and announced beefing up bureaucracy and police across the province. Top officials have called the recent attacks a “filthy plan” supported by external rivals to derail development ties with Beijing.

As authorities reject negotiating with Baloch insurgents and ramp up anti-terrorism operations, experts say long-term peace in Balochistan requires long-term, multi-pronged dialogue with leaders whom the Baloch people trust. Similar efforts saw a decade of calm in the 1990s.

“The Pakistani government is trying to look for shortcuts,” Akbar said of the government’s efforts to focus on security without reforms. “There is a need for a more formal but dignified accommodation of the Baloch.”
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DHAKA, Bangladesh — The United Nations Human Rights Office on Friday said it will dispatch a fact-finding mission to Bangladesh, as requested by the interim government, to investigate alleged human rights violations during recent deadly violence in the country.

Last month’s anti-government protests, which began as a student-led movement against public sector job quotas, escalated into the deadliest violence since the country’s independence in 1971.

The unrest left more than 1,000 people dead and prompted Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina to resign and flee to India on August 5. Violence continued for some days after she fled.

An interim government led by Nobel Peace Prize laureate Muhammad Yunus replaced Hasina’s administration, helping quell the violence as security forces also cracked down on protests.

“The office will deploy a fact-finding team to Bangladesh in the coming weeks, with a view to reporting on violations and abuses perpetrated during the protests, analyzing root causes, and making recommendations to advance justice and accountability and for longer-term reforms,” Ravina Shamdasani, spokesperson for the U.N. Human Rights Office, said in a statement.

This decision follows a visit by a UN team from Aug. 22-29, during which they engaged with various stakeholders, including members of the interim government.

U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk welcomed Bangladesh’s recent accession to the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance. He praised the establishment of a national commission to investigate cases of enforced disappearances, a longstanding issue in Bangladesh.

“We stand ready to support the Commission in its work, which should be in close consultation with victims and their families,” Shamdasani said.
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TOKYO — A slow-moving tropical storm had a far-reaching impact in much of Japan on Friday, dumping heavy rain around Tokyo and flooding roads and riverside areas in the south.

Flooding was reported in a number of areas in Kanagawa prefecture, west of Tokyo, where floodwater blocked roads, stalling vehicles and traffic. Warnings for heavy rain and potential landslides included the densely populated capital, Kanagawa and nearby Shizuoka prefecture.

Muddy water flowed down the Meguro River in one of Tokyo’s popular cherry blossom viewing spots, the water significantly swollen from its usual levels, NHK television footage showed.

In Hiratsuka town, dozens of cars in a parking lot sat in water just below their windows. A pedestrian waded through floodwater as high as his thighs. In another Kanagawa town, Ninomiya, floodwater from a river stalled vehicles on a street and broken tree branches were stuck on a bridge over the swollen water.

Tropical Storm Shanshan made landfall Thursday morning on the southern main island of Kyushu as a powerful typhoon. It has steadily weakened but not moved much and remained just off Kyushu’s northeastern coast Friday morning. The slow pace increases the amount and duration of the rainfall and risks of disaster, experts say.

The Japan Meteorological Agency said Shanshan was heading east toward the Shikoku and Honshu main islands with 72 kph winds but a forward speed of just 10 kph.

JMA forecast up to 30 centimeters of rainfall in Shikoku and central Japan, and up to 15 centimeters for Tokyo and nearby prefectures in the next 24 hours through Saturday noon.

The storm has paralyzed traffic, delivery services and businesses across southwestern Japan.

About 80 people have been injured in the Kyushu region, the majority of them in the hardest-hit two southern prefectures of Miyazaki and Kagoshima. Two people were missing. Before the typhoon made landfall, it caused a landslide that killed three people.

Hundreds of domestic flights connecting southwestern cities were canceled, and Shinkansen bullet trains were suspended between Tokyo and Osaka on Friday. Postal and delivery services were mostly suspended in southwestern regions of Kyushu and Shikoku, and supermarkets and other stores were closed in the region. Automakers including Toyota Motor Corp. and Mazda Motor Corp. closed down their factories in the affected regions through Friday.
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NUKU’ALOFA, Tonga — New Zealand’s Māori king, Kiingi Tuheitia Pootatau Te Wherowhero VII, died Friday at age 69, days after the celebration of his 18th year on the throne.

He was the seventh monarch in the Kiingitanga movement, holding a position created in 1858 to unite New Zealand’s Indigenous Māori tribes in the face of British colonization.

Tuheitia died in hospital after heart surgery, said Rahui Papa, a spokesperson for the Kiingitanga, the Māori King Movement, in a post on Instagram.

The movement’s primary goals were to end the sale of land to non-Indigenous people, stop inter-tribal warfare, and provide a springboard for the preservation of Māori culture, the Waikato-Tainui tribe website said. The monarch has a largely ceremonial but still consequential role in New Zealand, where Māori make up close to 20% of the population.

“The death of King Tuheitia is a moment of great sadness for followers of Kiingitanga, Maaoridom and the entire nation,” Papa wrote on social media.

New Zealand Prime Minister Christopher Luxon paid tribute to Tuheitia, saying his “unwavering commitment to his people and his tireless efforts to uphold the values and traditions of the Kiingitanga have left an indelible mark on our nation.”

“I will remember his dedication to Aotearoa New Zealand,” Luxon said, using the country’s Māori and English names, “his commitment to mokopuna (young people), his passion for te ao Māori (the Māori world), and his vision for a future where all people are treated with dignity and respect.”

In recent months, Tuheitia has coordinated national unity talks for Māori in response to policies of Luxon’s center-right government. Critics accuse the government of being anti-Māori in its efforts to reverse policies favoring Indigenous people and language.

King Charles III, New Zealand’s constitutional head of state, and his wife, Queen Camilla, were “profoundly saddened” by Tuheitia’s death.

“I had the greatest pleasure of knowing Kiingi Tuheitia for decades. He was deeply committed to forging a strong future for Māori and Aotearoa New Zealand founded upon culture, traditions and healing, which he carried out with wisdom and compassion,” Charles said in a statement.

The week before Tuheitia’s death, thousands traveled to Turangawaewae Marae, the Māori King Movement headquarters in the town of Ngāruawāhia, for annual celebrations of the king’s ascension to the throne.

The seat of the king is held by the Tainui tribes in the Waikato region, and it was not yet clear who will take the throne.

“It is expected that Kiingi Tuheitia will lie in state at Turangawaewae Marae for five days before he is taken to his final resting place on Taupiri Mountain,” Papa said.
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washington — In an unexplained and puzzling move, North Korea this week placed 13 of its several dozen known submarines on a public list maintained by an international maritime agency, only to have them removed a day later.

North Korea on Tuesday registered 11 Sang-O II-class submarines, as well as two more sophisticated vessels, with the International Maritime Organization’s (IMO) Global Integrated Shipping Information System (GISIS), even though military craft are not normally listed on the registry.

By Wednesday, all 13 submarines had been removed from the list.

When asked about the removal, a spokesperson for the IMO told VOA Korean on Thursday that “member states may request to have their own data updated.”

“GISIS is an online hub for the sharing of shipping-related data, based on information provided by member states,” the spokesperson added.

Rare move

It is unclear what motivated Pyongyang’s initial registration of the submarines, which was first reported Tuesday by VOA Korean.

Besides the 11 Sang-O II-class submarines, Pyongynang registered the Yongung, which is capable of launching ballistic missiles, and the Hero Kim Kun Ok, which is believed to have the capability to carry nuclear-armed ballistic missiles.

The Hero Kim Kun Ok was described by North Korea as its first operational “tactical nuclear attack submarine” at a launch ceremony in September 2023, just days before North Korean leader Kim Jong Un traveled to Russia.

A South Korean Foreign Ministry spokesperson told VOA Korean on Thursday that “the government is monitoring closely the situation related to North Korea’s acquisition of IMO vessel identification numbers” after the registration was reported.

A unique seven-digit identification number is assigned to a ship that registers with the IMO.

The same day the submarines were taken off the list, North Korea boasted that its naval forces “have developed into elite matchless ones” and referred to August 28 as “the Day of the Navy of the Korean People’s Army,” according to the country’s state-run media KCNA.

Choi Won Il, the retired captain of South Korea’s sunken naval ship Cheonan, told VOA Korean on Wednesday he found it “unusual” that North Korea had listed its submarines on a public registry, “because submarines are designed to be stealthy warships.” South Korea accused the North of sinking the Cheonan in 2010.

The IMO is a U.N. agency responsible for regulating maritime traffic, but warships are not required to be placed on its registry. The 13 submarines were registered as nonmerchant vessels operated by the Korean People’s Army Naval Force.

‘Unlawful’ weapons

A spokesperson for the State Department told VOA Korean on Wednesday that the U.S. was “aware of reports that the DPRK registered 13 military submarines” with the IMO and was “consulting closely” with South Korea, Japan and other allies and partners.

DPRK stands for the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, North Korea’s official name.

The spokesperson continued, “We condemn the DPRK’s continued efforts to advance its unlawful WMD [weapons of mass destruction] and ballistic missile programs” and “call on the DPRK to refrain from its further destabilizing actions and return to dialogue.”

North Korea test-fired a 240 mm multiple rocket launcher with a new guidance system under the supervision of Kim, KCNA said Wednesday.

In addition to its ground capabilities, North Korea in recent years has emphasized boosting its underwater capabilities.

In January, North Korea said it test-fired the Pulhwasal-3-31, a newly developed submarine-launched strategic cruise missile, and the Haeil-5-23, an underwater nuclear launchable drone.

In April, construction of a new submarine similar to the Hero Kim Kun Ok at North Korea’s Sinpho South Shipyard was detected on commercial satellite imagery examined by 38 North, a program of the Stimson Center devoted to analyzing North Korea.

Growing threat

North Korea has one of the world’s largest submarine fleets, with an estimated 64 to 85 vessels, according to the Nuclear Threat Initiative, a nonpartisan global security organization.

“Submarines are viewed as an asymmetric capability whose stealth allows them to be a dangerous security threat,” said Terence Roehrig, a professor of national security and a Korea expert at the U.S. Naval War College.

“Though North Korean submarines are noisy” and “limited in how far they can operate from coastal waters,” the nation has “one of the largest submarine forces in the world and remains a serious maritime concern,” he said.

North Korea first acquired Soviet-era Romeo-class submarines from China in the 1970s, according to the Nuclear Threat Initiative.

All submarines that were previously registered with IMO are considered diesel-powered submarines.

The Yongung is a Gorae-class, also known as the Sinpo-class submarine, which was launched in 2014 and has limited capability to stay underwater for more than a few days without surfacing, according to NTI.
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washington — The Bangladeshi interim government has overturned a ban on a controversial religious-based political party, adding an element of uncertainty to the country’s prospects as it moves toward new elections following the ouster of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.

Jamaat-e-Islami and its affiliate Islami Chhatra Shibir had been banned on August 1 amid countrywide protests that led to the ouster of Hasina and her ruling Awami League party four days later. But the interim government announced the lifting of the ban in an official bulletin Wednesday, saying there wasn’t evidence connecting the parties to terrorism or violence.

Jamaat Secretary-General Mia Ghulam Parwar welcomed the decision in an interview with Voice of America’s Bangla Service, saying the original ban was “illegal, as it was initiated by an illegal government.”

“We made a demand to the present interim government to revoke it. … The government did justice by resisting a tyranny. I thank God Almighty for this,” Parwar said.

When asked about participation in new elections now being organized by an interim government, Parwar said, “Jamaat is an election-oriented party. If the election is acceptable to all, we will participate in that election, inshallah.”

Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir, secretary-general of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), which was the largest opposition party during Hasina’s rule, also welcomed the decision to lift the ban.

“Jamaat is a political party. I think it was not right to ban them,” he told VOA. “They have been in politics for a long time. They were represented in the parliament. Therefore, the decision to revoke the banning of Jamaat-Shibir is correct.”

Different takes

Political analyst Badiul Alam Majumdar, founder of the civil society organization Citizens for Good Governance, told VOA he believed the decision was “logical” because the party had been banned by the Awami League government “as a strategy to suppress and counter the movement.”

“The more political parties there are in the country, the better,” Majumdar added. “Political parties can be banned for several reasons. Impeachment should be done for logical reasons, not as political maneuvering. I think reverting the decision to ban Jamaat is a right one.”

Critics of Jamaat-e-Islami, however, worry that re-legalizing the party will undermine efforts to move the country forward.

“Although the rehabilitation of Jamaat is unexpected, this decision of the interim government did not surprise me,” said Imran H. Sarker, spokesperson for the Gonojagoron Moncho human rights movement.

“This is not an isolated incident. The whole process is part of a long process of turning Bangladesh into a communal, failed and dysfunctional state.”

Gonojagoron Moncho led a movement in 2013 demanding justice against those who committed atrocities during the country’s war for independence from Pakistan in 1971. As a result, some leaders of Jamaat who had been active in the party leadership in 1971 were charged with crimes under a 1973 law, the International Crimes (Tribunals) Act.

American political observer Adam Pitman wrote in an opinion piece, “Jamaat had a decade to put itself on the right side of the law. Jamaat had a judgment they could have used as a self-help guide: Disavow communal politics; place women in leadership positions; commit to a secular, democratic system of government. They chose not to.”

Jamaat-e-Islami history

Once an ally of the BNP, Jamaat-e-Islami reached new highs politically in the 1991 general elections, helping then-BNP leader Khaleda Zia to become the first female prime minister of Bangladesh.

But their coalition lost favor because of a series of terrorist attacks, poor governance and corruption, leading to a sharp decline in Jamaat’s representation in the 2008 elections.

To present a more nationalist image, Jamaat has separated itself from its counterparts in Pakistan and India. However, there is still an acceptance struggle going on in Bangladesh because of the party’s cooperation with the Pakistani army during the 1971 Bangladesh Liberation War.

Jamaat was restricted from participating in elections by the Election Commission in 2013 after it was deregistered. That came after the Awami League administration established the International Crimes Tribunal, which tried and convicted several senior Jamaat officials of war crimes during the 1971 conflict. 

Jamaat has remained quiet and focused on religious activities while maintaining its organizational structure, even after much of its leadership was lost to executions and convictions. 

Foreign governments, especially Pakistan and Turkey, have expressed sympathy for Jamaat, creating diplomatic tensions with the now-deposed Hasina government.

Majumdar suggests that lifting the ban on Jamaat-e-Islami alone won’t shape Bangladesh’s political future, but he acknowledges that religion may play a role.

“Time will tell what kind of impact this decision will have on future politics,” he said. “Where will people’s support go? However, it is true that we are gradually becoming religious due to which the public support of such political parties may increase.”

This story originated in VOA’s Bangla Service.  
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Johannesburg  — Chinese lending to Africa rose for the first time in years in 2023, new research by Boston University’s Global Development Policy Center showed Thursday. But the $4.61 billion loaned last year is still far less than China’s commitments to the continent pre-pandemic.

In the heady early days of Chinese President Xi Jinping’s global infrastructure project, the Belt and Road Initiative, or BRI, China’s loans to Africa surpassed $10 billion each year.

That lending dropped sharply at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic and stayed low as China experienced its own economic slowdown. The decrease in loans also came as some African borrowers entered drawn-out debt overhauls.

Lucas Engel, a data analyst who co-authored the Boston University study, explained why he thinks lending was up somewhat in 2023 despite China’s troubles.

“Investment should be viewed in the context of China’s overall economic heft and the importance China attaches to its relationship with Africa,” Engel said, “especially strategically important long-term borrowers that China has developed close relationships with.”

The Boston University paper found a couple of trends when analyzing China’s loans to eight African countries and two regional financial institutions last year. The researchers said one thing that was unique was that more than half the money was loaned to African multilateral banks.

They said this was likely a form of risk mitigation, and Cobus van Staden, managing editor at the China Global South Project, a thinktank based in Pretoria, agreed.

“If you’re lending to African multilateral institutions, that means you are in a mix of lenders and there are de-risking mechanisms in place, partly because the risk is also separated across many actors,” van Staden said. “If you’re lending bilaterally, particularly to a government, then you … the risk impact is higher.”

Despite this growing risk aversion, the researchers noted China was still lending to three major longtime borrowers: Angola, Nigeria and Egypt.

Critics have accused China of ensnaring African countries in “debt traps,” by which large sums owed to Chinese companies make African governments beholden to Beijing economically and politically. However, economists have widely debunked the “debt trap” theory.

Another thing the Boston University research found was that China was once again committed to energy lending after a two-year hiatus. China committed loans to three renewable energy projects in Africa in 2023, in solar and hydropower.

This is in line with China moving away from the large infrastructure projects of the past to so-called “small is beautiful” projects and a “green BRI.”

Lauren Johnston, associate professor of China studies at the University of Sydney, said it was not surprising that despite the 2023 uptick, China’s loans to Africa hadn’t rebounded to anywhere near previous levels. She noted that initially China was financing large projects like the building of dams, roads and railways. Now, that’s done.

“Maybe this is like a period of consolidating those investments rather than just carrying on and building the next big investment,” Johnston said. “It’s a period to consolidate and grasp the economic value and imbed the returns and successes, and learn from any issues with those earlier loans.”

Next week, Xi will address African leaders gathered in Beijing for the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation.

Van Staden said some new loan announcements may be made, but he added a caveat.

“I don’t necessarily expect a single big number,” he said. “I think the announcements will probably be more diffuse.”

Boston University’s Engel said it was difficult to estimate the volume of financing that would be announced at the summit, but he expected pledges in diverse areas of cooperation.

The Chinese embassies in Pretoria and Washington, D.C., did not immediately respond to VOA’s request for comment.
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ISLAMABAD — Militants in northwestern Pakistan released video Thursday of an army colonel and his brother, a senior civilian security officer, showing them in captivity and requesting authorities help secure their freedom.

The officers are part of a group of four people, including their third brother and a nephew, whom gunmen abducted Wednesday evening while attending their father’s funeral in the militancy-hit Dera Ismail Khan district.

The outlawed Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan, or TTP, also known as the Pakistani Taliban, claimed responsibility for kidnapping the four men but did not share their demands publicly.

“We are safe and well and in the custody of the Taliban in a remote area where the Pakistani government has no control,” Lieutenant Colonel Khalid Amir stated in the 35-second video.

Two men dressed in traditional attire, holding assault rifles, are seen in the background with their faces deliberately kept out of the video frame.

“We appeal to the government and our higher authorities to promptly accept the Taliban’s demands for our release,” Amir said without elaborating.

The brother of the army officer, Asif Amir, a police assistant commissioner, made a similar statement and urged his relatives to pressure Pakistani authorities to secure their freedom.

Area security officials confirmed the identities of the hostages and the authenticity of the video to VOA on condition of anonymity because they were not allowed to discuss the matter with the media.

The fate of the other two hostages was not immediately known. The TTP sources claimed that they do not produce videos of civilian captives who are not associated with the Pakistani military and law enforcement agencies.

The Pakistani Taliban routinely carry out hit-and-run attacks against security forces and government targets in Dera Ismail Khan and other districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, which borders Afghanistan.

Pakistan maintains that the TTP, a globally designated terrorist group, orchestrates deadly cross-border attacks from sanctuaries on Afghan territory and receives growing support from the Islamist Taliban leaders of the neighboring country.

The violence has killed hundreds of Pakistanis, primarily security forces, in recent months, straining Islamabad’s ties with Kabul’s de facto Afghan rulers.

Taliban officials reject the Pakistani allegations, saying the TTP is not present in Afghanistan.

However, recent United Nations security reports disputed Taliban claims and described the TTP as “the largest terrorist group in Afghanistan,” being trained and equipped in al-Qaida-run training camps in areas near the border with Pakistan. The U.N. assessments also noted that Afghan Taliban fighters are participating in TTP-led cross-border attacks in Pakistan.
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BANGKOK — A court in Thailand on Thursday found Daniel Sancho Bronchalo, a member of a famous Spanish acting family, guilty of premeditated murder and sentenced him to life in prison, in a lurid case that involved the victim being dismembered.

The Koh Samui Provincial Court issued an initial sentence of death for Sancho but commuted it to life imprisonment due to his cooperation during the trial, said police Colonel Paisan Sangthep, deputy commander of the Surat Thani Provincial Police, who attended the hearing.

Sancho, a 30-year-old chef with a YouTube channel, had been charged with the murder of Edwin Arrieta Arteaga, a 44-year-old plastic surgeon from Colombia, when both were vacationing on the Thai holiday island of Koh Pha-ngan in August last year.

The island is famous for its monthly “Full Moon” beach parties, attracting travelers from around the world for all-night raves.

The convicted man is the son of Rodolfo Sancho Aguirre, a prominent Spanish actor, and Silvia Bronchalo, who has also been in acting. Both parents attended Thursday’s court session.

The court also ordered Sancho to pay more than 4.2 million baht ($125,000) in compensation to the victim’s family. Lawyers representing the family at the trial had asked for 30 million baht ($882,000), Spain’s EFE news agency reported.

EFE also quoted Sancho’s father telling media after the verdict that he intended “to always keep fighting, to keep fighting.”

At his trial on the island of Samui, Daniel Sancho had claimed he got into a fight with Arrieta for allegedly trying to sexually assault him. He said that Arrieta fell as they scuffled and hit his head on a bathtub, losing consciousness and then dying.

He had pleaded not guilty to charges of premeditated murder.

Sancho acknowledged dismembering the victim’s body and disposing of the parts on land and at sea. For the charge of concealing or damaging a body, he received a four-month prison sentence, reduced to two months for acknowledging the act, said Paisan.

He had also pleaded not guilty to the charge of destroying another person’s documents — the victim’s passport — for which he received a two-year prison term.

The elements of the case — violent death on a holiday island, the celebrity connections and the lurid details — attracted huge coverage in Spanish media. HBO produced a Spanish-language documentary on the events.

The case came to light when trash collectors found what the Bangkok Post newspaper described as a sawed-off pelvis and intestines weighing about 5 kilograms (11 pounds) in a fertilizer sack at a garbage dump.

Shortly after that, Sancho reported to police that Arrieta was missing, and police then gathered evidence linking the two men that led them to detain and interrogate him.

Police established a narrative, claiming to the press that Sancho had confessed to the murder and saying he had planned it because Arrieta threatened to disgrace him and his family by revealing their alleged sexual relationship.

Sancho, through his father and his lawyers, said that was a distorted version of what he told police and denied having a sexual relationship with Arrieta.

Police obtained surveillance video showing Sancho allegedly purchasing a knife, rubber gloves, garbage bags and cleaning solutions at a convenience store before Arrieta’s death, which prosecutors claimed bolstered the charge of premeditated murder. 

In his closing statement earlier in his trial, Sancho told the court he regretted his actions, the Spanish newspaper El Pais reported.

“I am sorry that a life has been lost and that parents have lost a son,” Sancho said. “I am sorry that his family was not able to bury him properly. I’m sorry for what I did after the death.”

Under certain conditions, Sancho can apply to be repatriated to serve the remainder of his prison term back home after several years of incarceration in Thailand, according to a treaty between Thailand and Spain.

The handful of Spanish nationals in Thai prisons includes another man convicted of premeditated murder and dismembering his victim.

Artur Segarra Princep was convicted of the 2016 killing of fellow Spaniard David Bernat. Police suspected that Segarra robbed the victim, whom he was said to have known. The body was kept in a freezer in Segarra’s Bangkok apartment until parts were tossed into Thailand’s Chao Phraya River.

His 2017 death sentence was commuted to life imprisonment in 2020 by Thailand’s King Maha Vajiralongkorn.
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Hong Kong — Hong Kong pro-democracy news outlet Stand News and its two former chief editors were found guilty of sedition Thursday, the first conviction of its kind since the city came under Chinese rule in 1997.

The verdict is part of a crackdown on free speech in the former British colony that has seen critics of China jailed or forced into exile, following huge pro-democracy protests in 2019.

Editors Chung Pui-kuen and Patrick Lam are the first journalists to be convicted of sedition since Britain handed Hong Kong over to China in 1997.

They were in charge of Stand News, a Chinese-language website that gained a massive following during the protests in 2019, before it was raided and shut down in December 2021.

On Thursday, district court judge Kwok Wai-kin said Chung and Lam were guilty of “conspiracy to publish and reproduce seditious publications.”

The parent company of Stand News, Best Pencil Limited, was also found guilty.

“The line (Stand News) took was to support and promote Hong Kong local autonomy,” according to a written judgement by Kwok.

“It even became a tool to smear and vilify the Central Authorities (Beijing) and the (Hong Kong) SAR Government.”

Lam was absent from court on Thursday due to illness.

The judge granted the duo bail before their sentencing on September 26.

The sedition offense has its roots in British colonial rule. It was unused for decades until 2020, when authorities started deploying it in cases against government critics.

Under the colonial-era law, Chung and Lam face a maximum penalty of two years in prison. A recent security law enacted in March upped the jail term for sedition to seven years.

Beh Lih Yi from the Committee to Protect Journalists said the use of “archaic legislation like the British colonial-era sedition law… makes a mockery of justice.”

“Journalism is not seditious,” she said.

“Today’s oppressive ruling shows Hong Kong is descending further into authoritarianism, and that not toeing the official line can land anyone in jail.”

‘All-around attack’

Outside the court, more than 100 people, including supporters and media professionals, queued up before the ruling for a spot in the public gallery.

A former veteran journalist called the Stand News trial a “landmark case on the crackdown of press freedom.”

“(Chung) merely did what a normal journalist would do, and in the past that would not lead to criminalization and imprisonment,” the former journalist, who preferred not to be named, said.

Lau Yan-hin, Stand News’ former design chief, said the trial was an “all-around attack” on the media.

“It made you confused with what can be said and what cannot be said, creating further chilling effects and leaving you incapable to tell where are the limits,” Lau told AFP.

Hong Kong has seen its standing in global press freedom rankings plummet in recent years.

Officials from various consulates — including the United States, Britain, France, European Union, and Australia — were also in attendance during the ruling.

The United States has repeatedly condemned the prosecutions of journalists in Hong Kong, saying that the case against the Stand News editors “creates a chilling effect on others in the press and media.”

During the trial last year, prosecutors cited 17 Stand News articles as evidence, including interviews with pro-democracy activists and opinion pieces discussing the decline in freedoms.

Chung, 54, testified that the outlet was a platform for free speech and defended his decisions to publish articles critical of the government.

But prosecutors accused them of bringing “hatred or contempt” to the Chinese and Hong Kong governments.
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Beijing — U.S. President Joe Biden is looking forward to talks with Xi Jinping in the “coming weeks,” top White House aide Jake Sullivan told the Chinese leader Thursday as they met for rare talks in Beijing. 

Sullivan, the first US national security advisor to visit China since 2016, met Xi as he wrapped up three days of talks in Beijing which also saw him sit down with Foreign Minister Wang Yi and other high-ranking officials. 

His visit came as China was embroiled in security rows with US allies Japan and the Philippines. 

At a meeting with Xi in Beijing’s ornate Great Hall of the People Thursday, he said President Biden “looks forward to engaging with you again in the coming weeks.” 

“President Biden is committed to responsibly managing this consequential relationship to ensure that competition does not veer into conflict or confrontation, and to work together where our interests align,” he said. 

Chinese state media said Xi told Sullivan that in spite of “great changes,” China and the U.S. could still enjoy good ties. 

“China’s commitment to the goal of stable, healthy, and sustainable development of China-U.S. relations hasn’t changed,” Xi said. 

“We hope that the U.S. will work with China to meet each other halfway,” he added, according to CCTV. 

On Wednesday, Sullivan and top diplomat Wang discussed plans for their leaders to talk in the coming weeks. 

They also clashed over China’s increasingly assertive approach in disputed maritime regions. 

Taiwan ‘red line’  

On Thursday morning, Sullivan met with senior Chinese army official Zhang Youxia at the Beijing headquarters of the Central Military Commission, where the two discussed Taiwan and other flashpoint issues. 

“It’s rare that we have the opportunity to have this kind of exchange,” Sullivan told Zhang in opening remarks. 

The officials agreed to hold a call between the two sides’ theatre commanders “in the near future,” a readout from the White House said. 

Sullivan also raised the importance of “freedom of navigation” in the South China Sea, where China and the Philippines have clashed in recent months, and “stability” in the Taiwan Strait, Washington said. 

Zhang, in turn, warned that the status of the self-ruled island was “the first red line that cannot be crossed in China-U.S. relations”. 

“China has always been committed to maintaining peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait,” he said, according to a readout by Beijing’s defense ministry. 

“But ‘Taiwan independence’ and peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait are incompatible,” he said. 

“China demands that the U.S. halts military collusion with Taiwan, ceases arming Taiwan, and stops spreading false narratives related to Taiwan,” Zhang added. 

He also asked Washington to “work with China to promote communication and exchanges between the two militaries and jointly shoulder the responsibilities of major powers”. 

‘Avoid miscalculation’  

China has kept up its sabre-rattling since the inauguration this year of President Lai Ching-te, whose party emphasizes Taiwan’s separate identity. 

Thursday’s talks also saw Sullivan express “concerns about (Chinese) support for Russia’s defense industrial base,” the readout added — echoing longstanding US claims that Beijing has rejected. 

He also raised “the need to avoid miscalculation and escalation in cyber space, and ongoing efforts to reach a ceasefire and hostage deal in Gaza,” the White House said. 

Sullivan’s visit comes months ahead of U.S. elections in November.  

The Democratic presidential nominee, Vice President Kamala Harris, would be expected, if she wins, to continue Biden’s approach of seeking dialogue with China while also maintaining pressure. 

Her Republican rival Donald Trump has vowed, at least rhetorically, to take a harder line, with some of his aides seeing a far-reaching global showdown with China.
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Yangon, Myanmar — A military court in Myanmar has jailed a journalist for life and sentenced another to 20 years in prison after convicting them under a counterterrorism law, their editor said on Thursday.

Myo Myint Oo and Aung San Oo, who work for the independent online news service Dawei Watch, were sentenced after being denied the right to legal defense and not being allowed to speak in court, editor Ko Kyaw told AFP.

Since overthrowing Aung San Suu Kyi’s civilian government in February 2021, Myanmar’s military junta has waged a sweeping and bloody campaign against dissent, including targeting independent journalists.

The two journalists were arrested at their homes in the coastal town of Myeik, about 560 kilometers south of Yangon on December 11.

Myo Mynit Oo, 40, was handed a life sentence on May 15, while Aung San Oo, 49, was handed a 20-year jail term on Feb. 16.

They were “violently interrogated” for four days in a detention center before being transferred to the Myeik Prison, a statement from Dawei Watch said.

Ko Kyaw said he learned about the sentences earlier this year but delayed announcing them for the security of the journalists’ families, without providing further details.

The court has not given a detailed explanation of the case, Ko Kyaw said.

Myanmar is now one of the world’s biggest jailers of journalists with 62 detained, second only to China, according to the Paris-based campaign group Reporters Without Borders (RSF).

Myanmar now ranks 171 out of 180 in RSF’s 2024 World Press Freedom Index.

Last September a Myanmar journalist was jailed for 20 years after being indicted on several charges, including breaching a natural disaster law and a telecommunications law while covering the aftermath of a deadly cyclone.

Several foreign journalists have been detained, including U.S. citizen Danny Fenster, who was jailed for 11 years in 2021, before being pardoned and released days later.
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