The International Olympic Committee (IOC) on Wednesday said it supported Japanese measures to counter COVID-19 and was confident the Tokyo Olympics would be a “historic” event, despite wide public opposition. With less than three months to go before the games begin on July 23, Japan is battling a surge in coronavirus infections. A majority of its population wants the Olympics canceled or postponed for a second time, according to several polls, with about 70% of the 10,500 athletes — about 7,800 — already qualified for the games. “We are now very much in an implementation phase with 78 days to go and fully concentrated on delivering the games,” IOC spokesman Mark Adams told an online news conference. “When the games happen and the Japanese people are proud hosts of an event that will be an historic moment, I think I am very confident we will see public opinion hugely in favor of the games.” FILE – People protest the Tokyo 2020 Olympics amid the coronavirus outbreak, around Olympic Stadium (National Stadium) as an Olympic test event for athletics is held inside the venue in Tokyo, Japan, May 9, 2021, in this photo taken by Kyodo.His online news conference, however, ended with a protester, who had signed up as a journalist to ask a question, unfurling a banner reading “No to Olympics” and shouting profanities and “No Olympics anywhere” before being cut off. Japan has extended a state of emergency in Tokyo and three other areas until the end of May as the number of cases rises daily, forcing IOC President Thomas Bach to postpone a visit to Japan in May. An opinion survey conducted from May 7-9 by the Yomiuri Shimbun daily showed 59% of respondents wanted the games canceled as opposed to 39% who said they should be held. “Postponement” was not offered as an option. Another poll conducted at the weekend by TBS News found 65% wanted the games canceled or postponed again. More than 300,000 people have signed a petition to cancel the games since it was launched about five days ago. “In terms of Japan and Tokyo we understand the caution,” Adams said. “We are fully in solidarity with them. People are very cautious. We have to fully trust Japanese authorities.” “There will be ups and downs (in public opinion).We have to take account of public opinion on a longer term. As things stand now we are moving full ahead. We continue to plan for full games. That’s the way it has to be for us.” 
 
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An Indigenous New Zealand lawmaker was thrown out of Parliament’s debating chamber Wednesday for performing a Maori haka in protest at what he said were racist arguments.
Rawiri Waititi’s stance came after ongoing debate among lawmakers about the government’s plans to set up a new Maori Health Authority as part of sweeping changes to the health care system.
Some conservative lawmakers have said the plan is separatist. Waititi, the co-leader of the Maori Party, said those arguments amounted to racist rhetoric.
Waititi told lawmakers in the chamber that he was forced to listen to a “constant barrage of insults” directed toward Indigenous people.
If that kind of attitude was acceptable, he said, “then I find this House in disrepute.”
Speaker Trevor Mallard then told Waititi to sit down but instead he performed the haka, a traditional dance or challenge accompanied by a chant.
“Order. The member will now leave the chamber,” Mallard told Waititi, which he did along with his party’s other co-leader, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer.
It’s not the first time Waititi has clashed with Mallard. In February, he won a battle against wearing a tie in Parliament, ending a longstanding dress requirement for men that he described as a “colonial noose.”
Mallard also threw out Waititi from the debating chamber during that dispute after Waititi showed up wearing a traditional pendant around his neck called a hei tiki.
But Mallard backed down the next day, saying neckties would no longer be compulsory, after a committee of lawmakers came out in favor of ending the requirement.
But Waititi’s latest stance isn’t supported by all Maori lawmakers.
After Waititi left, Labour Party Deputy Leader Kelvin Davis pointed out the relatively small support base for the Maori Party.
“Don’t ever think that a party that gets 1.2% of the vote actually represent the views of Maoridom,” Davis told lawmakers.
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The U.N. human rights office is calling for more international pressure against Myanmar’s military junta, which it says has continued a brutal crackdown on opponents despite a recent agreement to halt violence and begin dialogue.Credible sources report at least 782 people have been killed since Myanmar’s military authorities seized control of the country on February 1 and ousted its democratically elected leaders.The U.N. Office for the High Commissioner for Human Rights says the military shows no sign of easing its crackdown on opponents, who remain defiant and continue to protest against the coup leaders.The High Commissioner’s spokesman, Rupert Colville, said besides killing protesters, military authorities continue to commit other gross violations of human rights against Myanmar’s people.“There are daily raids on private homes and offices, and more than 3,740 people are currently in detention.  We are deeply alarmed that the whereabouts and fate of hundreds of these individuals are unknown.  These are situations that may amount to enforced disappearances,” he said.Over the past month, Colville said the military has issued more than 1,500 arrest warrants targeting civil society activists, trade unionists, journalists, and academics, and public personalities. He said military authorities increasingly are taking family members of wanted people into custody to force them to turn themselves in to the police.Tw // violence
More than 30 Schoolteachers, Students and general public were abducted by Terrorists during a violent crackdown on a coalition strike on 118th St., (72×73 St.), Mandalay, today morning. #WhatsHappeningInMyanmar#May12Couppic.twitter.com/O2bZIUC5xA
— Kim Hsu#Save Myanmar (@HsuMyatAung17) May 12, 2021He said the international community must put greater pressure on Myanmar’s generals to abide by a five-point plan they agreed to at a meeting of the regional bloc ASEAN on April 24. The plan includes a call for an immediate cessation of violence and for a constructive dialogue among all parties to look for a peaceful solution.Colville said the military leadership is taking no steps to make this happen. “As a result, we are seeing a continuation of the violence, a continuation of arbitrary detention and arrests, continuation of–people starting to flee the country.  And, as you say the economy and the whole structure of society being really badly damaged.  When you lose your teachers, your university professors, your civil servants, your journalists, you start to have a really crumbling social structures,” he said.The U.N. human rights office is calling on ASEAN to react quickly and to intensify efforts to make the military keep its commitments.  It adds the 10 Southeast Asian countries that form this bloc should hold Myanmar’s leaders accountable for failing to do so.The military has justified its takeover of the country by claiming, without evidence, that the 2020 general election won by the ruling National League for Democracy was riddled with fraud. 
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Vietnam’s maritime militia in the South China Sea shows signs of growing over the past decade, say scholars and a research institution in China where the government disputes parts of the waterway with Hanoi.   According to the National Institute for South China Sea Studies, a research organization based in the Chinese province of Hainan, the 12-year-old militia numbers between 46,000 to 70,000 personnel. It says 13 platoons with a combined 3,000 people operate near the sea’s contested Paracel Islands and another 10,000 people operate armed fishing boats off southern Vietnam. Ten years ago the militia “was just starting up”, said Yun Sun, East Asia Program senior associate at the Stimson Center in Washington.    “They are trying to expand the maritime militia,” said Collin Koh, maritime security research fellow at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. “The idea is that the existing maritime militia needs to expand its manpower.”A Vietnamese floating guard station is seen on Truong Sa islands or Spratly islands, April 12, 2010.China claims about 90% of the 3.5 million-square-kilometer sea that’s prized for fisheries and fossil fuel reserves. Vietnam says much of the sea’s two biggest island chains, the Paracels and Spratlys, fall within its jurisdiction. China is the most militarily advanced of the six governments that dispute sovereignty over the sea, and it controls the Paracels. China and Vietnam occasionally spar at sea, with deadly encounters reported in 1974 and 1988.   Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines and Taiwan call all or parts of the South China Sea their own, as well. Analysts have said China maintains the sea’s most obvious maritime militia, a term that describes fishing boats that are armed and fishermen trained to do paramilitary work with support from a coast guard. China’s maritime militia was formed in the 1950s and answers directly to the People’s Liberation Army, according to the U.S.-based Rand Corp. research organization.   Vietnam’s 2019 National Defense White Paper notes the presence of a domestic “militia” and “changes in its organization and equipment” but does not elaborate. Fishermen form a part-time trained reserve force, Koh said. They act as patrol vessels and can be spotted because they lack visible fishing nets, he said.    Neither officials in Hanoi nor the country’s mass media have discussed the scale, whereabouts or oversight of the fishing militia, said Nguyen Thanh Trung, Center for International Studies director at University of Social Sciences and Humanities in Ho Chi Minh City. The government does not want to rile China or appear to be “copying” it, he said. “They don’t want to show that we are copying a leaf out of China’s playbook – China is using fishing militia and we use the same kind to counter against China,” Nguyen said. The Vietnamese militia is less “professional” than China’s, Koh said.   Vietnam’s militia would faze China but not the other maritime claimants, analysts believe.   Taiwan is more concerned about new Vietnamese air force planes near its major island holdings, said Huang Kwei-bo, vice dean of the international affairs college at National Chengchi University in Taipei.  Philippine and Vietnamese military personnel exchange sporting events on each other’s occupied islands, and in June 2019 a Vietnamese boat rescued a capsized Philippine vessel, said Jay Batongbacal, international maritime affairs professor at the University of the Philippines in Quezon City. “The interactions between Filipinos and Vietnamese fishermen so far have been good,” Batongbacal said. “I think they more less have a cordial understanding.”    Philippine officials say Chinese fishing fleets have occasionally massed near Manila-controlled islets in the Spratly archipelago over the past four years as intimidation. Vietnam will probably deploy its militia prudently and try to avoid conflict, Huang said. “What’s less predictable is, when they’re at sea and in a maritime engagement, whether there would be a misfire situation,” he said. 
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China’s big-budget foreign influence operation in the United States is heavily tilted toward television broadcasting and other media activities, according to newly disclosed Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) filings.The country’s state-owned China Global Television Network (CGTN) spent more than $50 million on its U.S. operations last year, accounting for nearly 80% of total Chinese spending on influencing U.S. public opinion and policy, according to FARA filings compiled by the Center for Responsive Politics. It was the first year for which CGTN, which began broadcasting in the U.S. in 2012, reported a complete spending figure. In 2019, CGTN had reported partial spending of about $43 million.In total, China spent nearly $64 million on propaganda and lobbying in the United States last year.Counting its television broadcasting operations, China spent more money on influencing U.S. public opinion than any other country. Qatar came in second, reporting nearly $50 million, and Russia ranked No. 3, with $42 million in spending. Both Qatar and Russia run large media operations in the United States.China’s propaganda spending spree comes as Beijing seeks to burnish its global image amid a coronavirus pandemic that originated in the country’s city of Wuhan more than a year ago.The front page of a Chinese newspaper showing the picture of the inauguration of U.S. President Joe Biden at a newsstand in Beijing on Jan. 21, 2021.China Daily, a government-owned newspaper, reported more than $3 million in spending last year, including expenses related to advertising in American newspapers, down from more than $10 million in 2019, the filings show. While much of China Daily’s spending is related to operating costs, the newspaper routinely runs supplements in U.S. newspapers to influence U.S. policy and public opinion, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.China has long denied that it carries out influence operations in the United States.Anna Massoglia, an investigative researcher with the center, said the jump in Chinese influence spending was striking.”It’s attributable primarily to one registrant who was compelled to register by DOJ (U.S. Department of Justice),” Massoglia said.Under FARA, a 1938 law, all foreign governments and other entities that engage in lobbying or influence peddling are required to disclose their activities to the Justice Department. The law makes an exemption for news organizations, but only if they are at least 80% owned by U.S. citizens.The Justice Department has said only outlets that seek to influence U.S. policy need to register under FARA. In 2018, the department directed CGTN and Xinhua News Agency to register. CGTN complied in 2019 and Xinhua just last week.The registrations came as the Justice Department had tightened up enforcement of FARA and forced foreign media outlets to disclose their activities in the United States. Earlier in the Trump administration, the Justice Department forced Kremlin-controlled media outlets RT (Russia Today) and Sputnik to register as foreign agents.Last year, as tensions between Washington and Beijing grew amid the pandemic, the State Department designated CGTN and four other Chinese media outlets as “foreign missions,” subjecting them to the same reporting requirements as foreign embassies and consulates.Maria Repnikova, a professor and global communications expert at Georgia State University, said it is significant that Chinese spending on U.S. public opinion has increased despite escalating tensions between Beijing and Washington.”It means that the Chinese government is still invested in shaping public perceptions in the U.S. and potentially improving the relationship or easing the tensions in its favor,” Repnikova said in an email.A woman wearing a face mask to help curb the spread of the coronavirus browses her smartphone as a masked woman walks by the Huawei retail shop promoting it 5G network in Beijing Oct. 11, 2020.Of the $64 million spent by China on influence operations, nearly $10 million came from nongovernmental entities. Telecom conglomerate Huawei Technologies was the top nongovernmental spender, reporting nearly $3.5 million in lobbying expenditure. Last year, the Justice Department charged the company with conspiracy to steal trade secrets and violate U.S. sanctions on Iran.Massoglia said that spending by Chinese telecom companies is part of a “trend we’ve seen recently as they’ve faced various restrictions and controversies in the United States.”Chinese media outlets were not the only foreign media organizations forced to register under FARA in recent years. Qatar-based Al Jazeera’s U.S. arm as well as Sputnik and RT, which account for most of Russia’s foreign operations spending in 2020, according to Massoglia, have also been compelled.Russia has retaliated with its own requirements, levying hefty fines on U.S.-financed Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) and requiring the outlet to label its content as “fulfilling the function of a foreign agent.”RFE/RL, a sister news agency to Voice of America, is fighting the foreign agent label and fines.
 
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China’s ruling Communist Party has opened a new front in its long, ambitious war to shape global public opinion: Western social media.Liu Xiaoming, who recently stepped down as China’s ambassador to the United Kingdom, is one of the party’s most successful foot soldiers on this evolving online battlefield. He joined Twitter in October 2019, as scores of Chinese diplomats surged onto Twitter and Facebook, which are both banned in China.Since then, Liu has deftly elevated his public profile, gaining a following of more than 119,000 as he transformed himself into an exemplar of China’s new sharp-edged “wolf warrior” diplomacy, a term borrowed from the title of a top-grossing Chinese action movie.”As I see it, there are so-called ‘wolf warriors’ because there are ‘wolfs’ in the world and you need warriors to fight them,” Liu, who is now China’s Special Representative on Korean Peninsula Affairs, tweeted in February.China’s ambassador to Britain Liu Xiaoming takes questions from members of the media at the Chinese Embassy in London on Feb. 6, 2020.His stream of posts — principled and gutsy ripostes to Western anti-Chinese bias to his fans, aggressive bombast to his detractors — were retweeted more than 43,000 times from Jun. through Feb. alone.But much of the popular support Liu and many of his colleagues seem to enjoy on Twitter has, in fact, been manufactured.A seven-month investigation by the Associated Press and the Oxford Internet Institute, a department at Oxford University, found that China’s rise on Twitter has been powered by an army of fake accounts that have retweeted Chinese diplomats and state media tens of thousands of times, covertly amplifying propaganda that can reach hundreds of millions of people — often without disclosing the fact that the content is government-sponsored.More than half the retweets Liu got from June through January came from accounts that Twitter has suspended for violating the platform’s rules, which prohibit manipulation. Overall, more than one in ten of the retweets 189 Chinese diplomats got in that time frame came from accounts that Twitter had suspended by Mar. 1.But Twitter’s suspensions did not stop the pro-China amplification machine. An additional cluster of fake accounts, many of them impersonating U.K. citizens, continued to push Chinese government content, racking up over 16,000 retweets and replies before Twitter permanently suspended them for platform manipulation late last month and early this month, in response to the AP and Oxford Internet Institute’s investigation.This fiction of popularity can boost the status of China’s messengers, creating a mirage of broad support. It can also distort platform algorithms, which are designed to boost the distribution of popular posts, potentially exposing more genuine users to Chinese government propaganda. While individual fake accounts may not seem impactful on their own, over time and at scale, such networks can distort the information environment, deepening the reach and authenticity of China’s messaging.”You have a seismic, slow but large continental shift in narratives,” said Timothy Graham, a senior lecturer at Queensland University of Technology who studies social networks. “Steer it just a little bit over time, it can have massive impact.”Twitter, and others, have identified inauthentic pro-China networks before. But the AP and Oxford Internet Institute investigation shows for the first time that large-scale inauthentic amplification has broadly driven engagement across official government and state media accounts, adding to evidence that Beijing’s appetite for guiding public opinion — covertly, if necessary — extends beyond its borders and beyond core strategic interests, like Taiwan, Hong Kong and Xinjiang.Twitter’s takedowns often came only after weeks or months of activity. All told, AP and the Oxford Internet Institute identified 26,879 accounts that managed to retweet Chinese diplomats or state media nearly 200,000 times before getting suspended. They accounted for a significant share — sometimes more than half — of the total retweets many diplomatic accounts got on Twitter.It was not possible to determine whether the accounts were sponsored by the Chinese government.Twitter told AP that many of the accounts had been sanctioned for manipulation, but declined to offer details on what other platform violations may have been at play. Twitter said it was investigating whether the activity was a state-affiliated information operation.”We will continue to investigate and action accounts that violate our platform manipulation policy, including accounts associated with these networks,” a Twitter spokesperson said in a statement. “If we have clear evidence of state-affiliated information operations, our first priority is to enforce our rules and remove accounts engaging in this behavior. When our investigations are complete, we disclose all accounts and content in our public archive.”China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said that it does not employ trickery on social media. “There is no so-called misleading propaganda, nor exporting a model of online public opinion guidance,” the ministry said in a statement to AP. “We hope that the relevant parties will abandon their discriminatory attitude, take off their tinted glasses, and take a peaceful, objective and rational approach in the spirit of openness and inclusiveness.”
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China is urging U.N. member states not to attend a Wednesday meeting on the human rights of ethnic Uyghur Muslims that several Western countries and rights groups are hosting, calling it politically motivated and denying there is any problem in Xinjiang.“The current situation in Xinjiang is at its best in history with stability, rapid economic development and harmonious co-existence among people of all ethnic groups,” China’s U.N. mission said in a statement, speaking about the autonomous region in northwestern China where Uyghurs and several other ethnically Turkic Muslim minority groups live. “The U.S. and other co-sponsors are obsessed with fabricating lies and plotting to use Xinjiang-related issues to contain China and create [a] mess in China.”The Chinese mission also called for the virtual event at the United Nations to be canceled, saying it interferes with China’s internal affairs.Demonstrators hold a protest in front of the State Department to urge the U.S. and the international community to take action against China’s treatment of the Uyghur people, May 5, 2021.For years, Beijing has come under strong international criticism from the West and many Muslims for its treatment of Uyghurs, which includes widespread government surveillance and abuses including forced birth control. Human rights groups say China has sent more than a million Uyghurs to detention camps. China says the compounds are “vocational education centers” intended to stop the spread of religious extremism and terrorist attacks.Critics of the policy say the measures are aimed at destroying Uyghur identity.The United States, along with several other Western nations, has described the treatment of the Uyghur population as genocide. Washington imposed sanctions on several Beijing officials in March, and the European Union followed suit. The U.S. also has restricted trade with Xinjiang and sanctioned some Chinese companies accused of using Uyghurs as forced labor.Wednesday’s meeting is co-sponsored by Britain, the U.S. and Germany, as well as several groups including Human Rights Watch (HRW), Amnesty International and the World Uyghur Congress.According to the event invitation, it is intended to bring together participants to “discuss how the U.N. system, member states and civil society can support and advocate for the human rights of members of ethnic Turkic communities in Xinjiang.”British Ambassador to the United Nations Barbara Woodward poses for a photo, Jan. 5, 2021, in New York.“The situation in Xinjiang is one of the gravest human rights crises of our time,” Britain’s U.N. Ambassador Barbara Woodward said. “At the U.N., we are asking for immediate access to Xinjiang for the U.N. high commissioner for Human Rights.”The high commissioner, Michelle Bachelet, has been pressing Beijing to allow her to visit Xinjiang for some time. In late February, the Chinese government said it had invited her, but no visit has materialized.”China may not want more scrutiny of its appalling human rights abuses in Xinjiang but that’s exactly what this event will bring,” HRW’s U.N. Director, Louis Charbonneau, told VOA.  “Beijing has been trying for years to bully governments into silence but that strategy’s failed miserably, as more and states step forward to voice horror and revulsion at China’s crimes against Uyghurs and other Turkic Muslims.”China’s 2010 census put the total population of Uyghurs at just over 10 million, less than 1% of China’s total population. They are the largest ethnic group in the autonomous region of Xinjiang. 
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Three reporters working for a now-banned news broadcaster in Myanmar have been arrested in Thailand on charges of illegally entering the country.
 
The three journalists work for the Democratic Voice of Burma, an online and broadcast news outlet that was recently shut down by the ruling military junta.   
 
DVB Executive Editor Aye Chan Naing said in a statement the trio was arrested Sunday in the northern city of Chiang Mai, along with two activists.  He urged the Thai government not to deport the five people back to Myanmar, saying their lives “will be in serious danger if they were to return.”
 
Aye Chan also appealed to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.
 
DVB is one of several independent news organizations whose operating licenses was revoked since the military ousted the civilian government on February 1 and detained its civilian leadership, including de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi.  Dozens of reporters have also been arrested.  
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China says its population grew to 1.41 billion in the decade ending in 2020, its lowest rate of growth since imposing a strict one child per family policy in the 1980s.   The National Bureau of Statistics announced Tuesday that China added 72 million people between 2010 and 2020, an increase of 5.38%, with annual growth averaging 0.53%, a decline of 0.04% rate from the previous decade.  The world’s most populous nation is facing a worrying trend of declining working-age citizens coupled with a rising number of aging retirees, a trend brought on by the government’s mandatory birth limits as a means of controlling population growth.  Chinese leaders eased those limits in 2015, but the birth rate has continued its steady decline due to the huge cost of living, a lack of decent housing and people more focused on maintaining their careers than starting families.   
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Alec Goldman, an American educator who has made a life in Bangkok, wants to get vaccinated.Right about now would be a good time as COVID-19 cases in Thailand have been spiking since early April, fueled by the highly transmissible variant B.1.1.7, first detected here just before the four-day Thai New Year holiday that began April 12. Goldman worries about the health risks posed by long international flights. He said a trip would strain his finances. Alec Goldman is an American educator and a cofounder of a personalized learning startup based in Bangkok, ThailandTo get a shot in the United States, Goldman, who runs a personalized learning startup in Bangkok, would have to spend at least 20 hours at airports and on airplanes. Depending on vaccine availability, it might take another week to a month to get fully vaccinated.Then the 51-year-old New York native would need permission from Thai authorities to return to Thailand, where, after landing, he would be required to pay to stay at a private hotel for the mandatory 14-day quarantine, even with a vaccination certificate.Although all Americans 16 and older in the U.S. are eligible to receive the vaccine, and about 44% of adults 18 and above in the U.S. are now Paul Risley, chair of Democrats Abroad Thailand, talks to VOA about the group’s appeal to the U.S. government to provide U.S. FDA-approved COVID-19 vaccines for U.S. citizen overseas. (VOA)The call by American expatriates is becoming more urgent as more contagious and virulent variants of the coronavirus emerge. ”Americans who live abroad need to be vaccinated for the same reasons that Americans who live in the United States need to be vaccinated,” Risley told VOA Thai. “Because it’s the only way to stop COVID-19.” Expatriate Republicans echo the Democrats’ concern. ”In this particular case, all of us are on board,” Tony Rodriguez, vice president of Republicans Overseas Asia, told VOA. “Obviously, there’s plenty of vaccines in America. Just get them on a plane and fly them over.”  The two groups, along with the Veterans of Foreign Wars, Post 12074, and American Women’s Club, on May 6 signed a joint letter asking Washington to get vaccines approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) — namely Pfizer, Moderna and Johnson & Johnson vaccines — into the arms of overseas Americans as soon as possible. In the letter, they asked “that our government now continue to fulfill the pledge made by President (Joe) Biden to make coronavirus vaccines available to all Americans.”Le’Ana Freeman from Washington registers before casting vote on the Super Tuesday for U.S. Democrats Abroad multi-location global primary, at Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Thailand in Bangkok, March 3, 2020.Expatriates propose pilotAddressing U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, the groups also proposed that Thailand, with its robust health infrastructure, “could serve an ideal testbed for a pilot project for the U.S. Government to deliver approved and effective vaccines to the tens of thousands of private U.S. citizens living here, and then ultimately replicate that effort for the large number of other Americans living overseas.” ”Would the logistics of such a project be challenging?” the letter asks. “Perhaps, but Americans excel at dealing with precisely these sorts of challenges, especially via the public and private sector partnerships which could undoubtedly be brought to bear.”The Thailand campaign is gaining support from Medical personnel administers the COVID-19 coronavirus vaccine to a man at the Holy Redeemer Catholic church compound in Bangkok on May 9, 2021.Thailand’s vaccine supplyOnly AstraZeneca and China-made Sinovac vaccines are currently available in Thailand. Since February, the country has administered 1.8 million doses to its nearly 70 million people. About 513,000 Thais — or 0.73% — have been fully vaccinated as of May 6, according to Thailand’s Department of Disease Control. Since the onset of the pandemic, the country has reported 85,005 cases and a death toll of 421 as of Monday, according to the Johns Hopkins University Coronavirus Resource Center.  The U.N. estimates the population of Thailand is 69,929,000. After sending mixed messages about the vaccine eligibility of expats, Thailand’s Public Health Ministry said on May 6 that everyone residing in the country is eligible to get a vaccine, including about 3 million foreign residents in the country. While that is a relief for some, Americans interviewed by VOA said they prefer the three vaccines approved by the U.S. FDA. ”My husband is diabetic and I’m immunocompromised. For us, which vaccine we get is extremely important,” Goldman said.  ”We want something that will have a good chance not only of working against the U.K. variant but against the Indian variant that’s emerging right now that seems really serious.” New studies published by the New England Journal of Medicine and The Lancet  showed that the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine has a real-world effectiveness against COVID-19 variants B.1.1.7 and B.1.351, first identified in the U.K. and South Africa. Moderna also said its early trial results show that its booster shot generated increased immunity against variants first found in Brazil and South Africa.  Many Thais have expressed their wariness about the efficacy of the country’s two available vaccines, saying they prefer those approved by the U.S. authorities. Some have traveled to cities in the U.S. for a free jab, and Thai travel agencies are even starting to sell COVID-19 “vaccine tours.” U.S. private citizens on their own The U.S. State Department delivered COVID-19 vaccines to all its eligible workforce stationed overseas in late April and expects its entire workforce to have been fully vaccinated by mid-May, according to Reuters. The program has not been extended to U.S. private citizens abroad.  Nikki Fox, spokesperson of the U.S. Embassy in Bangkok, said in an email to VOA that the State Department does not provide direct medical care to private citizens abroad. The State Department’s current guidelines recommend that Americans overseas check whether they are eligible for a vaccine with local authorities. Some U.S. expats, however, remember when U.S. government personnel inoculated American expats.When Gary Suwannarat first moved to Thailand in the 1980s, she and her family were vaccinated against hepatitis B, a major public health concern in Asia at the time, on the grounds of the U.S. Consulate in the northern Thai city of Chiang Mai. Last month, the 73-year-old vice chair of the Democrats Abroad Thailand wrote to President Joe Biden, urging him to restore the program to make vaccines available for Americans abroad.  ”I think it would be really important for the U.S. government to go back and look at, OK, how did we do it then, let’s do it now,” said Suwannarat.Washington has been under pressure to share excess doses with other parts of the world. The Biden administration committed to sending 60 million doses of AstraZeneca vaccine to hard-hit countries beginning this month. ”I’m not quite sure how it would work for Thailand if there were lines of Americans waiting outside the embassy for vaccination,” Rodriguez said. “Still, I do think it’s an important service that the embassy should be able to provide to Americans.”Cindy S. Spang contributed to this report. 
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European and Chinese leaders are urging swift ratification of the trade deal they agreed to in December, after tensions over accusations of human rights abuses in China delayed approval of the deal by European Union lawmakers.  The EU-China Comprehensive Agreement on Investment (CAI) took seven years of negotiations and was finally agreed to in principle December 30, 2020, following a virtual summit between EU and Chinese leaders. Europe said it was the most ambitious trade deal China had ever undertaken with a third party.  However, EU Commission Executive Vice President Valdis Dombrovskis said last week that efforts to get the deal ratified by lawmakers in the European Parliament had been halted.  FILE – European Commission Vice President Valdis Dombrovskis speaks at the European Parliament in Brussels, Belgium, March 10, 2021.“We have … for the moment suspended some efforts to raise political awareness on the part of the commission, because it is clear that in the current situation, with the EU sanctions against China and the Chinese counter-sanctions, including against members of the European Parliament, the environment is not conducive to the ratification of the agreement,” Dombrovskis told Agence France-Presse on May 4.  The suspension follows tit-for-tat sanctions imposed over China’s treatment of the Uyghur population in Xinjiang province.  The United States, along with several other Western states, has described the treatment of the Uyghur population as genocide. Washington imposed sanctions on several Beijing officials in March. Officials had also voiced reservations over the China-EU trade deal.  The EU followed days later with its own measures, targeting four Chinese officials linked to Beijing’s policies in Xinjiang.  China retaliated by sanctioning five lawmakers in the European Parliament — the very body tasked with approving the trade deal — said Alicia García-Herrero, a senior fellow at the Bruegel think tank, who spoke to VOA from Hong Kong.  “At the end of the day, the ratification happens at the European Parliament. So, in a way, the target of the sanctions was somehow too involved in the decision to ratify,” García-Herrero said.  She added that tensions between China and Europe over Xinjiang and the crackdown on the pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong mean ratification of the trade deal looks unlikely anytime soon. Beijing denies any persecution of the Uyghur population and has urged Western nations to stop interfering in what it calls the “internal affairs” of Hong Kong.  Market expansionAnalysts say the CAI could benefit German carmakers who already have a strong presence in China and are looking to expand the production and sales of electric vehicles.  FILE – German Chancellor Angela Merkel takes her seat during the weekly cabinet meeting at the chancellery in Berlin, Germany, May 5, 2021.Speaking May 5, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said the trade deal should not be abandoned.  “Despite all the difficulties that we will certainly encounter in ratification, it is nevertheless a very important initiative that opens up greater reciprocity in access to our reciprocal markets,” Merkel told reporters.  The agreement was meant to open China’s huge market to European companies and provide greater transparency. From the beginning, many in Europe saw the deal as deeply flawed, García-Herrero said.  “Every single piece of market access that Europe was getting, when you read the details, it’s not actually as big,” she said.  Garcia-Herrero added that the investment deal is a key part of China’s expansion plans.  “Europe is kind of the one and only big developed economic area where China can still buy companies,” she said.  Beijing is pushing Europe to ratify the agreement.  “The China-EU Comprehensive Agreement on Investment aims to be mutually beneficial, to be beneficial to China, to (the) European Union and to the world,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin told reporters last Thursday. “China is willing to communicate and cooperate with (the) EU to promote the realization of the deal as early as possible, to benefit people from both sides and to positively signal to the international community that China supports maintaining an open economy.”   Meanwhile, the EU has unveiled separate plans to block foreign companies that are supported by state subsidies from buying European businesses or bidding for public contracts. Analysts say that would impact Chinese state-backed companies looking to expand in Europe.   
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Police in New Zealand said a man was taken into custody Monday after he allegedly stabbed four people, critically injuring three of them, inside a grocery store in the city of Dunedin.Southern district police commander Paul Basham said police responded to a midafternoon call reporting the stabbings in a supermarket next door to a Dunedin police station. He said when police arrived minutes later, they found four people with serious stab wounds. Basham said officers also found the suspected attacker had been subdued by members of the public. He said supermarket staff who also intervened were among the wounded. He called the actions of all those who stepped in “nothing short of heroic.”Witnesses told local media the suspect entered the store carrying two large knives.  Police said the suspect was taken into custody and treated for injuries he sustained while being subdued. No other information about the suspect was immediately available.New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said investigators told her there is nothing regarding the incident to suggest it was terror related. She said police will release any new information regarding the attacker’s motive when they have it. The most recent mass-casualty attack in New Zealand was the Christchurch mosques shootings in March 2019, when a white supremacist gunman murdered 51 Muslim worshippers and severely injured another 40. The government responded to that incident by passing tough new gun laws.
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Deposed Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi will appear in court on May 24, her lawyer said. She has not been seen in public since February 1, when she was detained and placed under house arrest by the country’s military, which seized power. Since the coup, she has been charged with six alleged crimes, including flouting COVID-19 restrictions during last year’s election. Most seriously, she is charged with violating the country’s Official Secrets Act. A conviction could carry a sentence of up to 14 years, according to Reuters. The current regime also accuses her of corruption but has not brought an official charge. Suu Kyi has reportedly attended some previous hearings via videoconference and complained that the proceedings were moving too slowly. “She will appear in person in court on May 24,” lawyer Khin Maung Zaw told Agence France-Presse. The military junta has defended the arrest of Suu Kyi, saying her party committed electoral fraud during the November elections. The party won in a landslide. Since the coup, Myanmar has been rocked by protests, many of them violent. At least 780 people have been reported killed in the unrest. 
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The global shortage of semiconductors, or microchips — the “brains” in all electronic devices, has heightened the geopolitical significance of Taiwan and its chip-making sector. The island is home to the world’s largest contract chipmaker: Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC).Many describe Taiwan’s strength in microchips as its “silicon shield,” which can protect it against Chinese aggression.But others suspect the sector, coveted by China, may also trigger China to accelerate its efforts to take advantage of Taiwan’s tech prowess.‘Not let war happen’When asked to explain the shield, TSMC chairman Mark Liu told CBS News’ “60 Minutes” program last week that it means “the world all needs Taiwan’s high-tech industry support. So, they will not let the war happen in this region because it goes against interest of every country in the world.”While refusing to comment on whether the industry will keep Taiwan safe, Liu added that he hoped no war would occur in Taiwan. It is widely believed that any war fought in Taiwan could disrupt the global supply chains of microchips.More than 1 trillion chips are currently being produced annually. Industry watchers, including the National Bank of Canada estimated earlier that TSMC alone accounts for one-fifth of the world’s chip production and up to 90% of the supply of the most advanced chips.In an “extremely hypothetical scenario,” such a disruption in Taiwan’s chip production could cause $490 billion in annual losses for electronic device makers worldwide, according to estimates by the U.S.-based Semiconductor Industry Association last month.All shut downAmerican tech giants including Apple, major European auto makers and even Chinese companies would have to halt production in the event of a TSMC collapse, said Frank Huang, chairman of Taiwan’s third-largest chipmaker Powerchip Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp.That, he said, will make China think twice about using force against Taiwan, the self-ruled island Beijing views as a renegade province.“China likes [to]… threat [threaten] Taiwan. But realistically without Taiwan, they cannot move either. Their semiconductors also shut down. So, the problem is: can you take over Taiwan without [triggering] impact [on] semiconductors? That is not [going to] happen,” Huang told VOA.The term “silicon shield” was first coined by Craig Addison in late 2000, who argued in his book “Silicon Shield: Taiwan’s Protection Against Chinese Attack” that the island’s rise as the key supplier for the world’s digital economy would serve as “a deterrent against possible Chinese aggression.”FILE – A leaflet that asks employees to protect the company’s confidentiality is seen at a reception in Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC), in Hsinchu, Taiwan, Aug. 31, 2018.The debate over such a deterrent has heated up now that the pandemic has seriously disrupted most supply chains. The U.S. has also placed restrictions on exports of chips and chip-making equipment using U.S. design and technology to China — a development that some observers also fear may end up provoking China to increase aggression toward Taiwan.But Darson Chiu, a research fellow at the Taiwan Institute of Economic Research (TIER) in Taipei, disagreed, saying that he believes the world will stand behind Taiwan.“The world’s superpowers will view TSMC as a key driver behind the future global economic revival, which belongs to no one but the world. Hence the world will not tolerate China’s use of force to control TSMC,” Chiu told VOA over the phone.Double layer of protectionThe island’s dominance in chip-making has fueled the debate over its silicon shield, but the U.S. is more concerned that the shield may “have holes in it” and the technology is being used by China’s military, according to Alexander Neill, a former Shangri-La Dialogue senior fellow for Asia Pacific security at the International Institute for Strategic Studies.An earlier Washington Post report alleged that a Chinese firm had used TSMC chips in the Chinese military’s development of hypersonic missiles. But the company denied the charges.The U.S. is also concerned about vulnerabilities caused by TSMC production being concentrated in Taiwan. The island’s water and electric supply shortages could disrupt production.“What the United States wants to do is to help TSMC diversify its production base so that there’s a double layer of protection. So, if the first shield is being penetrated, the second [reinforcement] shield is to nurture the chip production base in friends and ally countries including the United States,” Neill told VOA over the phone.Surging demandTSMC has planned to invest $100 billion in the next three years on new production facilities including a state-of-the-art wafer fabrication plant in the U.S. state of Arizona and expansions of its Nanjing, China-based fab to produce 28 nanometer chips for auto makers.The move aims to increase TSMC’s capacity, which is currently working at full capacity, to meet surging demand and support future growth in the global economy, TIER’s Chiu said.In a stock exchange filing last month, TSMC said it “is entering a period of higher growth as the multiyear megatrends of 5G and HPC (high performance computer) are expected to fuel strong demand for our semiconductor technologies in the next several years. In addition, the Covid-19 pandemic also accelerates digitalization in every aspect.”But Powerchip’s Huang questions if overseas wafer fabs will be as cost effective as those based in Taiwan. He said that many fabs in the U.S. and Germany have proved to be too expensive to sustain.Expansion in ChinaFor years, China’s attempts to manufacture chips have failed since China lacks access to the intellectual property required for the process.Hence, TSMC’s expansion plan in its Nanjing plant is welcomed by many in China despite worries that the survival of homegrown chipmakers may be threatened by the Taiwanese chipmaker, according to Song Hong, assistant general director at the Institute of World Economics and Politics under the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.“28nm chips aren’t high-end. But mid- to low-end chips are in higher demand. So, I think this shows TSMC’s optimism in China’s future demand. It is in our hope to bolster homegrown chipmakers, but we also welcome competition,” Song told VOA.Song, however, shrugged off the geopolitical implications of Taiwan’s silicon shield, saying that China views Taiwanese issues as domestic affairs and will not be deterred from its goals by U.S. action. (This article originated in VOA’s Mandarin service.)
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Indonesian authorities have arrested Papuan independence leader Victor Yeimo over accusations that he orchestrated some of the most serious civil unrest in decades that broke out in 2019, police said on Monday. Tension has reignited in recent weeks in Indonesia’s easternmost provinces, with President Joko Widodo calling for a crackdown after a senior intelligence figure was shot dead late last month, and with an additional 400 troops deployed there. Yeimo, 38, who is the international spokesman of the West Papua National Committee, was arrested in the provincial capital of Jayapura on Sunday and is being questioned, said national police spokesman Iqbal Alqudusy. Police accuse Yeimo of being the “mastermind” behind the civil unrest and of committing treason, as well as inciting violence and social unrest, insulting the national flag and anthem, and carrying weapons without a permit. Emanuel Gobay, one of a group of Papuan lawyers representing Yeimo, said his client had not yet been officially charged. Treason can carry a sentence of life in jail. Protests convulsed Indonesia’s provinces of Papua and West Papua, on the island of New Guinea – collectively known as Papua – for several weeks in August 2019. The sometimes violent unrest erupted after a mob taunted Papuan students in Surabaya, Indonesia’s second city on the island of Java, with racial epithets, calling them “monkeys”, over accusations they had desecrated a national flag. The 2019 protests also spurred calls for independence from Indonesia. Papuan separatists have pushed for independence for decades, saying a 1969 vote overseen by the United Nations that brought the region under Indonesian control was illegitimate.  Indonesia rejects the claims. In a development that has alarmed rights activists, Indonesia’s chief security minister has announced that armed Papuan separatists can be legally designated “terrorists,” and prosecuted under the counterrorism law. Yeimo’s arrest could inflame the situation further, said Indonesian human rights lawyer Veronica Koman. “Since the news broke that he (Yeimo) was arrested, many West Papuans have already announced that they will take to the streets to demand his release,” she said.
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South Korean President Moon Jae-in is vowing to spend his final year in office trying to finally bring a lasting peace on the Korean peninsula. In a nationally televised speech Monday from Seoul, President Moon said this last year of his single five-year term may be “the last opportunity to move from an incomplete peace toward one that is irreversible.”   Moon threw his support behind U.S. President Joe Biden’s “flexible, gradual and practical” diplomatic approach in achieving denuclearization. Biden’s foreign policy team has concluded a review of the North Korean stalemate, which officials have signaled will rely on incremental steps towards persuading the regime to give up its nuclear and ballistic missile program.Biden Hints at More Flexible North Korea ApproachWhite House officials unveiled broad outlines of president’s North strategy, following a months-long internal review The South Korean leader said his goals for his upcoming summit with Biden on May 21 in Washington will be to “restore dialogue between the two Koreas and the United States and North Korea.” President Moon has championed greater engagement between Seoul and Pyongyang since taking office in 2017. His outreach led to three historic summits between himself and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, as well as two historic summits between Kim and then-U.S. President Donald Trump. But the overtures ended after Trump and Kim’s second summit in Vietnam in 2019 failed to resolve the matter of U.S.-led sanctions imposed on the North.  
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A Myanmar poet whose work promoted resistance against the military junta has died, his family said Sunday. Khet Thi and his wife, Chaw Su, were both taken in for questioning on Saturday in the town of Shwebo in the Sagaing region, family members said. Chaw Su was released but Khet Thi was not.   “They called me in the morning and told me to meet him at the hospital in Monywa,” Chaw Su told BBC Burmese language news. “I thought it was just for a broken arm or something. … But when I arrived here, he was at the morgue and his internal organs were taken out.” Family members told reporters that his body was missing some organs and showed signs of torture when they went to identify him at the morgue. The army released the body to the family, Reuters reported.  Khet Thi, who penned the line, “They shoot in the head, but they don’t know the revolution is in the heart,” was in his 40s, according to his Facebook page. The military junta, which seized power in a coup in February, has not publicly commented on the poet’s detention or death. Calls to a spokesman for the junta seeking comment were not answered, Reuters reported.  Khet Thi is at least the third poet to die since the coup, according to Reuters. Khet Thi had been friends with K Za Win, 39, a poet who was shot during a protest in March.A woman lights a candle while others flash the three-fingered sign of resistance during a candlelight vigil to remember those who died in the military junta’s violent response to anti-coup demonstrations in Yangon, Myanmar, April 16, 2021.With the coup approaching its 100th day, protests have continued, aided by strikes by students and civil servants throughout the country. The military, known as the Tatmadaw, has killed 780 demonstrators since February, according to the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, a non-profit human rights group based in Thailand. The Tatmadaw has justified the coup by claiming, without evidence, that the 2020 general elections that delivered the ruling National League for Democracy a second term were riddled with fraud. It has promised to hold new elections sometime after a one-year state of emergency, though many expect it to delay and to disqualify the widely popular NLD from running candidates.   Many top NLD leaders, including Nobel laureate Aung Sang Suu Kyi, have remained in custody since their arrests on the morning of the coup, while others are in hiding.  Fighting between the Tatmadaw and some ethnic armed groups has also increased. Cultural figures, such as Khet Thi, and celebrities have been vocal supporters of the protests.  An engineer until 2012, Khet Thi quit his job to focus on poetry and sell cakes and ice cream, Reuters reported. He expressed his frustration recently, saying he didn’t want to be a “hero,” a “martyr,” “a weakling” or a “fool.”  
 
“My people are being shot and I can only throw back poems,” he wrote. “But when you are sure your voice is not enough, then you need to choose a gun carefully. I will shoot.” Esha Sarai contributed to this report.
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China will set up “a line of separation” at the summit of Mount Everest to prevent the mingling of climbers from COVID-hit Nepal and those ascending from the Tibetan side as a precautionary measure, Chinese state media reported on Sunday.Everest base camp on the Nepalese side has been hit by coronavirus cases since late April. The Nepalese government, starved of tourism revenue, has yet to cancel the spring climbing season, usually from April to early June before the monsoon rains.It was not immediately clear how the line would be enforced on the summit, a tiny, perilous and inhospitable area the size of a dining table.A small team of Tibetan climbing guides will ascend Everest and set up the “line of separation” at the summit to stop any contact between mountaineers from both sides of the peak, Xinhua news agency reported, citing the head of Tibet’s sports bureau.A group of 21 Chinese nationals are en route to the summit on the Tibetan side, Xinhua reported.The Tibetan guides will set up the separation line ahead of their arrival, the state-run news agency said, without describing what the line would look like.It was also unclear whether the Tibetan guides would be the ones enforcing the “separation”, or whether they would remain in the so-called death zone, where many lives have been lost due to a dearth of oxygen, to hold the line. The top of the 8,848-metre peak is a small mound of snow with barely enough space for half a dozen climbers and guides at any one time.China has not allowed any foreign climbers to ascend from the Tibetan side since the outbreak of the new coronavirus last year due to infection concerns.Tourists in the Everest scenic area in Tibet are also banned from visiting the base camp on the Tibetan side.Mainland China on Sunday reported 12 new COVID-19 cases on May 8 – all of which involved travelers arriving from overseas – up from seven a day earlier. Nepal reported 9,023 new cases on Friday, the country’s biggest one-day increase. 
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The Myanmar junta’s equivocal reaction to a plan it agreed to with its regional neighbors for pulling the country back from the brink of collapse is raising doubts about the junta’s commitment to follow through anytime soon. Since Myanmar’s military toppled the country’s elected civilian government February 1, the junta has shot and killed hundreds of mostly peaceful and unarmed protesters and sent thousands fleeing to neighboring India and Thailand seeking refuge. United Nations officials and envoys are warning of a pending humanitarian crisis and all-out civil war. In a bid to keep the crisis from spiraling out of control, leaders of the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations, which includes Myanmar, met in Jakarta, Indonesia, on April 24 with coup leader Min Aung Hlaing. A statement from the current chair of the bloc, Brunei, said the leaders reached a “five-point consensus” including a call for an immediate end to the violence and talks “among all parties concerned.”  Trainees take part in military exercises with the Karen National Union (KNU) Brigade 6, an armed rebel group in eastern Karen state on May 9, 2021, amid a heightened conflict with Myanmar’s military following the February coup.In addition to ending the violence and holding talks, Brunei said the leaders agreed that the bloc would provide humanitarian assistance and that Brunei would appoint a special envoy to facilitate the talks and to visit Myanmar to meet with “all parties concerned.” The chair’s statement offers no timeframe or details on when or how to put the plan into action. Analysts say that gives Myanmar’s military, or Tatmadaw, plenty of room to decide how that happens. “It’s exploiting the vagueness of the deal and the lack of agreed timeframe to its own advantage, as opposed to rejecting the deal outright. And it will try to sort of delay this as much as it can and ensure that in the meantime the Tatmadaw’s own kind of blueprint for how the country should run prevails,” said Hervé Lemahieu, Myanmar and Southeast Asia analyst at Australia’s Lowy Institute.  The Tatmadaw has justified the coup by claiming, without evidence, that the 2020 general elections that delivered the ruling National League for Democracy a second term were riddled with fraud. It has promised to hold new elections sometime after a one-year state of emergency, though many expect it to delay and to disqualify the widely popular NLD from running candidates.  One of the key questions the five-point plan leaves unanswered is the precise meaning of “all parties concerned.” Brunei’s statement sets no boundaries, leaving many to wonder whether it includes the NLD, any of the many ethnic minority-based parties and associated armed groups in the country, or the National Unity Government, which they have forged since the coup to challenge the junta. Myanmar Classifies Resistance Government as ‘Terrorist Organization’ ‘We ask the people not to … support terrorist actions, nor to provide aid to the terrorist activities of the GUN and the CRPH,’ state TV says“We don’t know, and that will also be up to the Tatmadaw largely to determine,” Lemahieu said. “The Tatmadaw really has control over the timing and then control over how you operationalize this plan.” Many top NLD leaders, including Nobel laureate Aung Sang Suu Kyi, have remained in custody since their arrests on the morning of the coup, while others are in hiding to keep from joining them. Fighting between the Tatmadaw and some ethnic armed groups has also spiked. “It’s not very clear who [are the] stakeholders in the statement. Without a clear definition and commitment from the regime, it will still be difficult to implement,” said Min Zaw Oo, who heads the Myanmar Institute for Peace and Security, a local think tank. He said that at some point an ASEAN envoy may visit and humanitarian aid might arrive. Given what the junta has said and done since the meeting in Jakarta, though, he said he does not expect the Tatmadaw to let the five-point plan blow it far off the course it has already set for the country. “I don’t think there will be any radical change different from the course the regime is steering in Myanmar, which is the new election and probably changes [for a] new electoral system,” he said. “The regime is forcing it through within one or two years, very likely two years, so I don’t think the ASEAN decision … will have a major impact on the regime’s major roadmap to where it is leading to.”
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The remnants from an out-of-control Chinese rocket have safely reentered Earth’s atmosphere over the Indian Ocean, according to Chinese state media. The bulk of the rocket was destroyed once it reentered Earth’s atmosphere. Space experts were unsure about where or when the debris would land and what would happen upon landing. There was speculation that the debris could land on the ground, potentially harming humans and the environment. Aerospace Corp. and Space-Track.org followed the rocket’s descent. Debris from the rocket landed in the Indian Ocean near the Maldives after reentering the atmosphere at approximately 2:30 a.m., Universal Time, Chinese state media reported.  Space-Track.org had estimated Saturday evening that the rocket would reenter the atmosphere over the North Atlantic at 2:04 a.m. Universal Time, give or take one hour. Aerospace Corp, put it at 3:02, give or take two hours. The Aerospace Corp. is a nonprofit corporation that operates a federally funded research and development center committed to space enterprise, according to its website. Space-Track.org says it provides critical space situational awareness data for a worldwide space community.  Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin said Friday that the rocket is unlikely to cause damage. Wang told reporters in Beijing that the rocket will mostly burn up on reentry and “the probability of this process causing harm on the ground is extremely low.” He said China was closely following the rocket’s path toward Earth and will release any information about it in a “timely manner.” The Long March 5B rocket was launched April 29 from Hainan Island. It was carrying a module for a planned Chinese space station. After the unmanned Tianhe module separated from the rocket, the nearly 21,000-kilogram rocket should have followed a planned reentry trajectory into the ocean. Because that did not happen as planned, the rocket had an uncontrolled reentry, and no one knew precisely where the debris would land. “U.S. Space Command is aware of and tracking the location of the Chinese Long March 5B in space, but its exact entry point into the Earth’s atmosphere cannot be pinpointed until within hours of its reentry,” Lieutenant Colonel Angela Webb, of U.S. Space Command Public Affairs, told CBS News.  Pentagon Press Secretary John Kirby said that “this rocket debris” is “almost the body of the rocket, as I understand it, almost intact, coming down, and we think Space Command believes, somewhere around the 8th of May.”In May 2020, debris from another Long March 5B rocket fell on parts of Ivory Coast, causing damage to some buildings. Harvard-based astrophysicist Jonathan McDowell told Reuters that the debris could fall as far north as New York or as far south as Wellington, New Zealand. Speaking with reporters Thursday, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin said the United States had no plans to try to shoot down the rocket.  “We have the capability to do a lot of things, but we don’t have a plan to shoot it down as we speak,” Austin said. “We’re hopeful that it will land in a place where it won’t harm anyone. Hopefully in the ocean, or someplace like that,” he added. The launch of the Tianhe module is the first of 11 planned missions to build the Chinese space station. 
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Family members of former Uyghur textbook editors accused of incorporating ethnically charged and separatist views into classroom literature say a recent documentary on the topic produced and broadcast by a pro-Beijing media company grossly misrepresents them.Last month, the state-run China Global Television Network aired a 10-minute documentary, Challenges of Fighting Terrorism in Xinjiang: The Textbooks, accusing former Uyghur publishing officials and senior editors such as Yalqun Rozi, editor of the Xinjiang Education Press, of incorporating extremist “separatist thoughts” into children’s educational materials as early as 2003.“I learned those textbooks as a kid,” said Kamalturk Yalqun, the son of the now-imprisoned Yalqun, who described last month’s broadcast as more evidence of Beijing’s efforts to mask its brutal campaign against the mostly Muslim Uyghurs as a response to a burgeoning domestic terror threat.“Reading them was purely a happy literary adventure for me and there was nothing to incite hatred or radicalism,” said Yalqun, who came to the U.S. to pursue graduate studies in 2014.He has not heard from his father since his October 2016 arrest by Xinjiang authorities. “I almost failed to recognize when I first saw his photo displayed in the film,” Yalqun told VOA. “Clearly, there had been physical torture.”This graphic from China Global Television Network’s ‘Challenges of Fighting Terrorism in Xinjiang: The Textbooks’ shows editors the documentary accuses of spreading extremist ideas. ‘Toxic’ textbooksIn the 10-minute film, which aired April 2, CGTN claims that Sattar Sawut, the former director general of Xinjiang Education Department, had formed a “criminal gang” of six Uyghurs — his deputy, Alimjan Memtimin, two former Uyghur heads of Xinjiang Education Press, Abdurazaq Sayim and Tahir Nasir, and two senior editors, Yalqun Rozi and Wahitjan Osman — to spread extremist ideas to 2.3 million Uyghur students who studied “the problematic” textbooks. According to Chinese media, the six Uyghur officials in 2017 were charged with attempting “to split the country”; Sawut was reportedly given a death sentence with a two-year reprieve, while three other officials received life sentences, and the two editors received 15 years each.Abduweli Ayup, a Norway-based Uyghur linguist and rights activist, said the textbooks were originally developed under Beijing’s campaign of “suzhi jiaoyu” or “education of personal quality.”“Some senior Chinese officials who worked on reviewing the textbooks were never mentioned in the documentary while their six Uyghur counterparts were singled out as separatist criminals is evidence that this is a sham trial,” Ayup told VOA.Seven copies of 22 purportedly “toxic” Uyghur textbooks obtained by VOA list names of both Uyghur and Chinese officials responsible for vetting the contents.The textbooks introduce China as “the motherland” of all “56 ethnic groups,” including both Uyghurs and Chinese. They also highlight essays of leading modern Chinese writers such as Lu Xun and include hagiographies of prominent Chinese figures.A sixth-grade literature textbook featured Uyghur translations of two Chinese stories, “Remembering my father, Li Dazhao,” and “Overnight Work,” about early Chinese communist leaders Li Dazhao and Zhou Enlai.Zhao Lijian, Chinese Foreign Affairs Ministry spokesperson, said last month CGTN documentaries showed that Beijing’s campaign in Xinjiang is “counter-terrorism and de-radicalization.”To the families of the former Uyghur officials, though, China’s accusations are inconsistent, given that those same officials were awarded for the same work.Aykanat Wahitjan, the daughter of Wahitjan Osman, a former senior editor accused in the film, said state media in the past broadcast her father’s award ceremony for his “extraordinary literary work.”“In 2012, China awarded my father with its 10th Junma Award, a national literary award for his outstanding literary work,” Aykanat, an economics student in Istanbul, told VOA. Now, she said, “years later, the same [government] broadcasts that my father committed a crime because his literary work ‘provoked ethnic hatred.’”Purporting to offer evidence that the textbooks promote “ethnic hatred against Chinese soldiers and separatism,” Beijing’s documentary highlights the legendary story of seven Uyghur girls who resisted Manchu soldiers during the Qing empire conquest of the region in the 18th century. The documentary also features a picture of a 20th century Uyghur leader, Ehmetjan Qasimi, who had the star-and-crescent emblem of East Turkestan Republic on his left jacket chest and reports it as a symbol of separatism.  “The actual text [taken from the textbook] in the video itself clearly says ‘Manchus.’ This shows that this is a story from the Qing empire, before Han [Chinese] soldiers were present in Xinjiang,” said James Millward, a professor of Chinese history at Georgetown University, adding that the voice-over about the seven Uyghur girls is thus a clear lie, as shown by the documentary footage itself.According to Millward, outlawing the textbooks is a part of China’s recent effort to alter the historical narrative of key events and actions by Uyghur leaders.“Most English-speaking viewers will not see why the picture of Ehmetjan Qasimi and his medal is offensive or dangerous — because it isn’t, it is simply an historical image,” said Millward.Qasimi led the East Turkestan Republic and controlled what is now northern Xinjiang in the 1940s. He entered a treaty with China’s then-ruling Kuomintang to co-govern Xinjiang after the 1945 Sino-Russian Friendship Treaty. When Qasimi mysteriously died in a plane crash in 1949, the founder of People’s Republic of China, Mao Zedong, praised him as “worthy of the eternal memory of all Chinese people.”Milward charged that Qasimi had been mentioned in official Chinese history books for nearly 70 years, which became forbidden only under President Xi Jinping.China’s crackdown against Uyghurs has been raised to higher level since August 2016 when Xi appointed Chen Quanguo, a former Tibet party chief, to be Chinese Communist Party secretary of the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region. Chen’s administration has since been accused of holding over a million Uyghurs in internment camps.Omar Kanat, the executive director of Uyghur Human Rights Project, called the film “the latest proof” of a systematic campaign to eliminate Uyghur culture and history.“The idea that these children’s’ textbooks that were overseen and approved by the Ministry of Education for over a decade are somehow ‘violent’ is self-evidently absurd,” Kanat told VOA, adding that it “resembles some of the darkest chapters of the CCP’s history of wild accusations targeting intellectual freedom,” referring to the Chinese Communist Party by its initials.
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The ruling junta in Myanmar announced Saturday that the resistance government, made up of deposed deputies who went underground, was now on the list of “terrorist organizations.”Some of these deputies, including many members of the National League for Democracy (LND) of Aung San Suu Kyi, ousted from power by the coup of February 1, formed a “government of national unity” (GUN) to resist the junta.On Wednesday, this underground resistance government announced the establishment of its own defense force intended to fight against the regime of the generals and to protect civilians against the repression orchestrated by the military.On Saturday evening, state television announced that this “people’s defense force” as well as a group called the Pyidaungsu Hluttaw Representative Committee (CRPH), the Burmese term for parliament, were now on the list of “terrorist organizations.””We ask the people not to … support terrorist actions, nor to provide aid to the terrorist activities of the GUN and the CRPH, which threaten the security of the people,” state television said.Previously, the junta had declared GUN and the CRPH “illegal associations” and said that entering into contact with these organizations amounted to high treason.But this new classification as a “terrorist organization” means that anyone who communicates with its members, including journalists, could be prosecuted under anti-terrorism laws.The Arakan Army, an insurgent group that clashed with the Myanmar military in Rakhine state, was classified as a terrorist organization in 2020. A journalist who interviewed an official of this organization was arrested.Although he was released soon afterward, the use of anti-terrorism legislation to prosecute journalists raised fears of yet another turn of the screw on the press.Dozens of journalists were arrested after the coup, media were shut down and television channels were stripped of their licenses, resulting in a veritable news blackout for Burma, which is another term for Myanmar.The GUN hopes to eventually form a “federal unity army” that would bring together dissidents and ethnic rebel factions opposed to the junta.From cities to the most remote rural areas, Myanmar has been in turmoil since the putsch.In the face of protests, the repression has been bloody. Nearly 800 civilians have been killed by security forces since the February 1 coup, according to the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (Burma).  
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In 2018, Elon Musk signed an agreement with the Shanghai Municipal Government to open a plant to make Tesla vehicles, making it the first non-Chinese auto company with a solely owned subsidiary in China since the 1990s. Now the company is facing a backlash over its electric car business there. And, experts say, by making use of anti-American public sentiment, the ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is making a move against Tesla that is well-known to foreign companies with technologies it covets: To stay in China’s lucrative market, a company must share its tech with Beijing. “There is little doubt in my mind that the CCP is squeezing the American company through a controlled burst of anti-American xenophobia because of Tesla’s phenomenal success in China, its advanced technology, and its close involvement in U.S. space programs,” said Miles Yu, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute who specializes in U.S. and Chinese military and diplomatic history, and U.S. policy toward China. On May 2, Musk’s SpaceX ended its first commercial crew, long-duration endeavor with NASA, FILE – A customer looks at automobiles in a Tesla car showroom in Beijing, June 11, 2020.Tesla sold more than 137,000 Model 3s in 2020, making it the best-selling electric car in China, according to the China Passenger Vehicle Association. According to the SEC filing, Tesla’s 2020 revenue from China increased 124% year-over-year on sales of $6.6 billion. Then China pulled a U-turn.Earlier this year, China’s military banned Teslas from military barracks and family quarters, citing security concerns over the onboard cameras, according to the Wall Street Journal, which first reported the ban on March 19. There are eight cameras in a Model 3 — three in front, two on each side and one at the rear — which are used for the autopilot, the security system and the dashcam, according to Car and Driver. The cameras can obtain data, including when, how and where the vehicles are being used as well as the contact lists of mobile phones synced to them. Beijing was concerned that some data could be sent back to the U.S., according to the Journal. On March 20, Musk assured members of the government-backed China Development Forum in Beijing that the cars were not spying and that the data collected from cars in China was kept in China.VOA contacted Tesla in the U.S. and in China, where VOA contacted Tesla media offices and the sales center in Shanghai to request an interview on possible pressure from Chinese authorities and concerns about technology transfers. The company did not respond.Viral video Then, on April 19, at the Auto Shanghai 2021 trade show, a Tesla owner climbed onto the roof of a Model 3 and shouted “Tesla brakes fail,”  giving voice to a problem that customers claimed they had found in some of its China-made cars. A female Tesla owner climbed on top of a car’s roof at the Tesla booth to protest her car’s brake malfunction at the Shanghai auto show Monday. The booth beefed up its security after the incident. pic.twitter.com/ct7RmF1agM— Global Times (@globaltimesnews) April 19, 2021Video of the woman, identified only as Zhang, went viral. Tesla responded within hours on Weibo, a Twitter-like Chinese platform, saying, “We won’t respond to unreasonable requests from customers.”  The remark drew enough online criticism that China’s state media, controlled by the CCP, jumped in and accused Tesla of being “arrogant.” Later on April 19, Tesla posted, ”We apologize and self-reflect (on our behavior).”   But netizens were shifting their criticism of Tesla into overdrive as Zhang’s remarks had hit home with many Chinese Tesla owners, and within days her post had more than 220 million views on Weibo. By comparison, Tesla sold just under 635,000 vehicles in China in 2019 and 2020, according to Nikkei Asia, which used China Passenger Car Association figures. On April 20, the company posted on its Weibo feed, saying, “Tesla complies with and obeys the decisions of relevant government departments, respects consumers, abides by laws and regulations, and actively cooperates with all investigations by relevant government departments. … We will do our best to meet the demands of car owners and strive to satisfy them.” On April 22, Hu Xijin, editor-in-chief of the Global Times, an official Chinese state outlet, posted on his Weibo account, “I believe that Tesla feels the hardness of China’s market rules, as well as its strength and dignity, and they will understand that only practical adjustments can restore public trust.” On April 23, Xinhua, a Chinese state-run media outlet, published an article criticizing Tesla’s apology as “insincere” and calling for Tesla to respect Chinese consumers.Private companies in China Tu Le, an analyst at Sino Auto Insights, a research organization, told Reuters, “Social media has always been dissatisfied with the quality and service issues of Tesla in China. Until Tuesday, these issues were basically ignored by the local Tesla team.”Zack Cooper, senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, believes the change of Tesla’s attitude is common for private companies operating in China. If a company wants to succeed in China, they must make statements in line with the CCP that can be “problematic,” he said.Facing the online outcry from the Chinese public and the ensuing coverage from official state media put Tesla bumper-to-bumper with the CCP. According to Cooper, who spoke with VOA by phone, it’s a concern “from the American side — does Elon Musk have to say certain things about China or about the Communist Party so that he can continue to operate (a) business in China?” Cooper continued, “If you are operating in China, then the Communist Party has some ability to regulate your business operations. Obviously, some of that is legal and not problematic. Other parts that involved political influence that I think are problematic. … So I think there are broader … questions about the kinds of activities businesses are required to engage in, and the kinds of political statements they have to make or support, if they are going to operate in the Chinese market in a significant way.” Yu, of the Hudson Institute, told VOA Mandarin that what has happened to Tesla is a common “bait and switch” strategy China uses on foreign investments with critical technologies and proprietary innovations. Yu said China lures a foreign enterprise “into China with initial preferential tax and regulatory treatments. Once you are hooked in China, and have gained initial success, the CCP would not hesitate to use your investments in China as a leverage to force you to comply with a whole list of demands, outright or subtle, including sharing proprietary technologies and knowledge, prohibiting transfer of funds out of China, curtailing your market share inside China and possibly divulging critical national security secrets in your company’s other operations with the U.S. government such as the SpaceX project.” 
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Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga announced Friday the government will extend COVID-19 state of emergency measures for Tokyo and surrounding prefectures by three weeks, to May 31, because infection rates remain high.
Suga told reporters Japan’s emergency measures, less strict than blanket lockdowns in other countries, have been effective in keeping people from going out. But numbers of new infections in the nation’s major cities remain high and he said, “hospitals continue to be overwhelmed in Osaka and Hyogo prefectures.”
The state of emergency restricts commercial activity, with bars and restaurants told to close or stop serving alcohol, and movie theaters and karaoke parlors closed. 
 
Suga sought to reassure those who are concerned about the wisdom of hosting the Olympics — scheduled to begin July 23 — during the pandemic, saying that played a role in the decision. “By carrying out these thorough measures we will protect citizens’ lives and health. We believe it is possible to realize a safe and secure Olympics and want to make firm preparations.”
The prime minister praised Pfizer’s offer of vaccinations to all Olympic and Paralympic athletes, noting that Japanese athletes are highly likely to get vaccinated before the games as well.  
While Japan’s pandemic has been less severe than other major countries, its vaccination program has been much slower, with about 1% of the population totally vaccinated. He pledged Friday to speed that up, with the goal of vaccinating a million people a day, and having the nation’s elderly fully vaccinated by the end of July.
Tokyo reported 907 new COVID-19 cases Friday, compared to 635 when the state of emergency was reimposed last month. Overall, Japan says it has seen 622,273 cases and 10,566 deaths since the pandemic began.
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